Mark sat in his room, staring at the box of black marbles.
Perhaps, if the dragon hadn’t shown up, then he would be out partying with Eliot and Isoko.
For some reason, that specific loss of joy caused Mark to turn incredibly, incandescently angry.
It was now 3 am, and Mark had spent an hour in an interrogation room with David and Orissa about what had happened out there with the dragon. They had asked him a bunch of angering questions that Mark knew they had needed to ask him, but which he did not appreciate. Everything from ‘are you a hidden dragon?’ to ‘are you in league with the dragon?’ and ‘are you planning on using the dragon to enact some sort of power over this or that part of humanity?’. All of that sort of thing. The Mind Reader, Doctor Cheryl Appell, had been there.
They didn’t need him to actually answer, but answering felt important, so Mark had given answers that were as correct as he could make them. They were the same sorts of questions that he had been asked when he first came to Citadel, apparently, though Mark did not know that, considering he had been incredibly out of it for a whole week after the Tutorial.
After this most recent interrogation, Cheryl, who had told Mark to call her Cheryl, had said that Mark had done very well with the dragon. Mark had achieved the ‘best sort of outcome possible, when dealing with alien intelligences born from dead archmages and demons’.
None of those questions had bothered Mark. They needed to protect humanity, and Mark was fine with being questioned in that way.
But here, alone in his room, Mark had missed out on celebrating the win over the goblins.
And that pissed him off way too much.
Mark got to his feet. “Fuck that fucking dragon. I’m partying.”
He called up Eliot.
Eliot answered instantly, excitedly, “Mark! They let you out of interrogation yet?!”
Mark was glad to hear the guy’s voice. “They did. I need to hang out and watch stupid television shows, or something. Want to do that? I need to call up Isoko, too.”
“Yes! Isoko is here with me at the house. None of us can sleep. Her grandmother is on the phone with my mother right now. The dragon showed up at Crystal Tower and signed up for the Hero/Villain Program! He called himself ‘Addavein’! He filled out your paperwork—”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Mark said, cutting off Eliot’s probable rush of information, and feeling some weird kinda way about everything. “Not over the phone. In person: yes. Not on the phone. I’ll hop on the tram and come over there.”
“Yes! Come over here!”
Mark hung up.
And then he stuffed the adamantium pellets under some books and papers in his desk.
He was on the tram in minutes.
- - - -
Mark sat by the pool, watching the sun come up, as he had a really nice omelet. Eliot and Isoko had their own food, similar to Mark’s, and they all had mimosas.
After Mark showed up they had spent the first hour drinking and talking wild shit about dragons and kaiju and what they meant as real threats, and how it was so much different to see one in person. The second hour they had watched documentaries for aspiring kaiju hunters, and how the pure terror of a kaiju, and a dragon, were the hardest parts of fighting them. People were truly so small, no matter the powers they might have, when compared to beasts the size of several city blocks. Literally the only way to survive a kaiju was to be faster than they were, which was a problem because all kaiju showed up with entire ecosystems growing on them that made up for all of their deficiencies.
And now Mark, Eliot, and Isoko were out here, watching the sun come up.
Isoko sipped her champagne and orange juice, the bright yellow drink sparkling in the sunrise, as she said, “So those goblins were pretty terrifying, yeah?”
Eliot burst out laughing.
Mark grinned, and then he started laughing, too.
Isoko smiled as she laughed, too. “They kinda got overshadowed!”
“A little bit!” Eliot said. “Holy fuck Addavein is big!”
'Addavein'! Bah!
Mark got suddenly disgusted, then weirded out, and inundated with all sorts of tangled emotions. Those emotions seemed to come pulsing out of him in the black veins that rushed down his arms and into the air around him. The flow pulsed larger, taking in resilience and pushing out weakness, as Mark gave an exasperated, “And he’s just picking that name, huh!”
Isoko smirked. “What? You wanted it?”
Mark found himself disarmed, his veins retreating. “Not really! … I guess!”
Isoko grinned some more. “So I got Chosen about 20 minutes ago.”
Mark’s eyes went wide at the change in conversation.
Eliot smiled. “Congrats!”
Mark asked, “What’s your mission?”
“I have options,” Isoko said, “I can continue on to the Grand Guard in Crytalis, like I originally planned, or I can join any of the empires of Daihoon as one of their roamers. The Aluatha Empire, the Dominion of Okuana, and the Settlement of Xerkona all need warriors, anywhere. She even told me I could work with the Slayers, if I wanted. She just wants me somewhere killing monsters and protecting a team. Any of those work for Freyala. She’ll grant me Union of Breath and soon Blood, after a trial period. But! I don’t actually have a team yet.” She asked, “So I was wondering what your plans were?”
Mark went wide-eyed. His heart beat hard and his black veins faded by half. “You want to party with me?”
“I can’t,” Isoko said, throwing water on Mark’s fire. “Not really. I cannot keep up with you. That’s a simple fact. You’re an exponent above me, Mark. I already know how it’ll happen, too. You’ll eventually gain the ability to fly with your adamantium stuff, and I’ll be on the ground, and a liability. Maybe I’ll be able to fix that eventually with flying magics, or something like that. I don’t know. But that won’t happen for years. Maybe not ever.
“But I’ll be at some sort of home base, if you want to work out of Crytalis, or somewhere else. I do want to work with you, even if I can’t keep up with you. Maybe we can party for small monster kills, though, until you find some people who are at your level. That is something I would absolutely want to do.”
Mark felt all warm inside. “Yes! I absolutely want to party with you— But why do you want to party with me? That damned dragon is going to… I don’t know what he’s going to do, actually. I have a feeling that I need to vanish.”
Isoko grinned. She said, “I want to party with you because you’re a guy who I can trust to have my back out there in the wilds.” She stopped smiling. “And… Well. Addavein is something I need to not be scared of. I might not be able to fight dragons or kaiju myself, but I can at least not be scared of them. If I’m not running, screaming, then I can support others with Union.” She shrugged. “We might not stick together forever, but you’d be a good person to step onto Daihoon with.”
While Mark was having a bunch of really nice, funny and light feelings in his chest—
Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.
Eliot said, “People are always asking grandma to go out and build cities in the wilds and I have her same Power, and she asked me if I wanted to take over some of her workload. There’s this city building program that all of the empires have. If you two are interested, I’d like you two to come with me to those places. I’d like to build cities in the wilds with a competent team backing me up. I’m shit against monsters, as you saw, but city building is… It’s something that I am realizing that I could be very, very good at. But monsters are fucking terrifying and I need to be, uh, not exposed to monsters, ever again. Not without some heavy meat shields in front of me, and preferably self-healing meat shields.”
Mark felt all kinds of good.
Isoko grinned as she teased Eliot, “Mind goblin got your courage?”
“Yes,” Eliot said, emphatically. “I think those shits might be more terrifying than the dragon! At least that dragon was willing to talk. The goblins just want to eat you.”
Isoko smiled. “I think the dragons want to eat you, too.”
“At least they come at you directly! They don’t hide… oh shit. Addavein was completely invisible before I shined the lights on him, and you called him out, Mark.” Eliot’s brown features turned almost pale. “Oh fuck. Invisible kaiju.”
Isoko laughed.
Eliot whispered, “I need to get a whole lot stronger.”
Isoko laughed loudly, like happy bells chiming.
Eliot eventually grinned, though it took a minute.
Mark felt a bunch of butterflies as he practically giggled. He smiled. He wiped away some tears. “I’d love to head in both of your general directions, too.”
“Good!” Isoko said, and then she raised her glass. “To heading in the same general direction!”
Eliot and Mark both laughed, and said the same sorts of words.
Breakfast was good.
At the end of it, Mark asked Eliot, “Are you doing the Chosen program, too? I forgot if you said so or not.”
Eliot hummed as he winced, then he looked around at the house, to see if anyone was watching, or something. They were pretty much alone out here, for his mother was elsewhere, his father and the butler had left them alone, and his siblings were out for the day, too. Right now it was just Eliot, Mark, and Isoko at the house, and also the butler. Eliot had been the one who actually cooked the food, and prepared the meal.
Eliot still looked unsure about what he said next, “I’m still Freyalan… but Hearthswell is all about emplacements and stuff.”
Isoko’s eyebrows went high up, and then she drank down her fourth mimosa. “Shit.”
“Oh fuck! That’s right!” Mark asked, “How did you guys end up as Freyalan when Hearthswell is the Castellan, the Empire Builder?”
“I’m still learning the story,” Eliot said, “But grandma is the one who had Man-made Manipulation to begin with, and she was all about adventuring, back before that word gained a bad connotation in the 90s. Grandma is still out there putting up outposts in the wilds, too. She loves it, and she has a whole team that helps her. But… But I’ve gotten some really, really good offers in the last few hours since I handed the goblin extermination video over to COFR for final approval. And I want to explore those offers.”
Isoko refilled her mimosa, as she asked, “What kind of offers?”
“Possible Castlekeeper of Hearthswell.”
Isoko’s eyes went wide.
Mark asked, “What’s that?”
“It’s a step below Freyala’s ‘high priest’,” Eliot answered. “I wouldn't start there, of course, but instead I’d be a Housekeeper. Which would be… simply amazing, really. At a base function it would make all my buildings grow in Power Level depending on… A lot of factors, really. I’m probably going to have a fight with my whole family about it, but…” Eliot paused. “My family never wanted me to be a ‘bard’, anyway. They told me that I’d be wasting my Power and dying in some hole.” He frowned a little. “And I think they were right. The goblins really woke me up. Mind shit is awful.”
Eliot looked distraught.
Isoko was unsure.
But Mark smiled, and said, “That sounds awesome, Eliot! Diversity in Power is good, and I’m not quite sure how Union would be the best fit for you, anyway. I have absolutely no idea about Castellan, but even at the surface level it’s a much better fit, right?”
Eliot looked a bit more secure. “Yeah. It is.” He smiled, adding, “I even got a good offer from Pluta, the Goddess of Wealth and Prosperity, but I’m a lot less certain about that one than Hearthswell. I think Pluta was just putting it out there to see if it worked at all, so she won’t mind if I forgo it.”
“Hearthswell, huh?” Isoko asked, “That’s gonna be a big deal, isn’t it?”
“Oh yeah,” Eliot said, looking more worried by the moment. “All the Cybersongs are going to freak.” He gestured at the world with a wide, open gesture, saying, “But we’ve already got Hearthswell people here, in Citadel, keeping the place secured. Every city has some of her people in it. A city isn’t a city without Hearthswellians there to hold it down. And the cities I make… I’ll be able to make a place and then actually secure it all on my own… Theoretically.”
Mark smiled wide, saying, “Sounds great to me!”
Isoko tried to sound confident as she said, “Sounds excellent, Eliot.”
Eliot grinned a little, looking better.
Isoko moved on, “So you finished the goblin extermination video?”
“I think so,” Eliot said, falling back into a more comfortable topic. “Soon as COFR gives final approval then it’s published. I expect to get more offers after that. I really showed off what I can do. You both are probably gonna get big offers, too, as soon as the personal AIs of the powers-that-be poke at it and send it upstream to whoever might be interested in what we can do. Do you want me to organize those communications for any of you?” He rapidly added, “To be clear, I’ll send them your way, or tell them ‘no thanks’. I don’t want to be anyone’s agent.”
Isoko downed the last of her mimosa, saying, “I need sleep, and I also need those offers, yes. Send them to my email, through COFR. All of them. Just put my email onto the video— Actually. I’ll make an account, too, and then set that up with a first video and you can link to that. Can you hold off on posting the video until tomorrow?” She stood up. “I need sleep first.”
Eliot grinned and stood up, saying, “Sure. I can hold off. How about you, Mark?”
“No offers for me. I already have a good idea of how that will go, and I don’t want to stick out there too much and deal with people trying to… woo me, or whatever.” Mark stood up, saying, “I’m gonna have a few more meetings with Inquisitors, or whoever. After that I’m just signing up with the Slayers… Unless a really good offer comes through? COFR can sort through that stuff, right?”
Eliot shrugged. “You might want to consider investing in a personal AI unless you’re going to stick with Freyala for a long time.”
Mark said, “I’m pretty sure I’m gonna stick with Citadel Freyala forever, really. Lola wants me to declare for Freyala and become a Paladin because I need the legitimacy. Before last night my need for legitimacy was rather high, but not a burden. Now that I’m ‘a dragon’s brother’ I need that good legitimacy.”
Isoko said, “You need to sign up for the Hero/Villain Program too. You could have Crystal Tower sort your inquiries… And now that I say that, I need to sign up for that stuff, too. I’m going the villain route, too. ‘Platinum Princess’.”
Mark had some mixed emotions on that, until Isoko mentioned her ‘villain name’. He grinned. “Pretty pretty princess.”
“The prettiest!” Isoko said, grinning, as she flashed platinum for a moment, to shimmer in the morning light like a golden goddess, all reflective and glittering.
… Mark suddenly felt burdened for a whole host of reasons.
He said, “Still have no fucking clue what being talzarki with Addavein means… And I’m sorry for dragging you two into that.”
Mark almost asked them if they were ‘going in his general direction’ instead of ‘partying with him’ because of that dragon, but Mark didn’t actually want to know that answer. Not really. It was better not to know that the dragon was fucking up his life that much.
Eliot smiled softly. “Not your fault.”
Isoko teased, “I already had very good reasons for not partying with you directly, Mark. Eliot is the one that got scared off.”
Mark’s face felt a little hot. Was he that easy to read?
Eliot’s face got a little red, too. “We’re still going in the same direction!”
Isoko grinned, and then she led the way out, saying, “Great food! Better than fish soup.”
Eliot walked with her, and Mark hurried to follow, as Eliot said to Mark, “Sorry. Facts are facts and she’s… not exactly wrong.”
Somehow Mark’s heart felt lighter, even though the facts of reality felt heavy.
Mark said, “I’m glad we got to hang out, though.”
Isoko scoffed. “Don’t say that like it’s the end! This is just a start.” She yawned as they walked through the main foyer of the house, then said, “Let’s try to end up in the same settlement expansion area. We’ll figure it out.”
Mark grinned. “Sounds good to me. And yeah. We’ll figure it out.”
Eliot asked, “It might take a month before we leave, but that gives us time to do paperwork and stuff?”
“Sure,” Isoko said.
“A month or something,” Mark said.
They parted ways at the front door, with smaller words of ‘next time’, and thanks for the food.
Mark ended up on the tram with Isoko, headed back to the dorms, where they soon parted ways, with Isoko yawning again.
Mark got back into his room, and found his adamantium pellets still there, in the little box in his room.
He crashed out on the bed.