Mark stepped off of the tram and breathed in the clean air, feeling great. It was nice to decide to cut through the bullshit, and just do what he wanted to do.
Isoko stepped off of the tram next to him, looking good. Her breastplate gleamed in the light, her chainmail caught the auroras overhead, and her white warrior’s clothes were immaculate and a little bit platinum.
Strangely enough, it was only the two of them on the platform in front of Mage Society, which was the true name of the Mage Guild. Not even Daihoonians called it by its proper name all of the time, though, because Mage Society wasn’t properly formed most of the time. ‘Mage Guilds’ were loose affiliations between many different enclaves in Mage Society. Such a place would look more like a city than a fortress. True Mage Societies were more like arcanaeums, or rather, post-graduate arcanaeums. Places for secondary education.
There were no young students here at this Mage Society, though there were young people learning magic. The people here either wore the full robes of an accredited mage, or they wore normal clothes, and they were not allowed into the special mage-only places.
Mark, with his black webweave and charcoal-colored ablative plates, and Isoko with her standard Freyalan Healer outfit, did not stand out too much, but they were certainly not going to be allowed into the big building in back that was guarded by bored mages in thick robes who were passing the time talking to each other. Even in a settlement like this there was strict anti-outsider sentiment among the true mages.
In a way, Mark was glad he was not going to be coming here for magic lessons. He hated the secrecy of it all. If Mark and Isoko were to break into Mage Society and steal books, or whatever, they’d be vulnerable to the Mage Secrecy laws, and that would be a very, very big deal.
Breaking Tartu’s back in public was a much lesser offense.
Mark hoped Tartu was in one of the normal buildings outside of the main structure in the back.
The place was set up like a college campus, with the tram station at one end of a wide grassy lawn between buildings and other structures, with the main hall at the other end of the grass. People were sitting on the grass and reading with friends, or talking about this or that, or they were on benches at a food place over there, or they were sipping coffee as they walked between the public buildings here and there. Mark guessed there were about 50 people out and about right now. There were probably a hundred in the big building in the back.
Some of the people here were looking their way. Mark mostly noticed those people noticing him through their vectors. Some were surprised. Some looked over and didn’t care, or they didn’t recognize Mark and Isoko. Some guys who were headed up the platform all took notice of Isoko and her breastplate first, and then they noticed Mark, the four of them going wide-eyed, and then two of them chuckling and whispering something to their friends. One of the friends complained about not wanting to be late, and the rest of their conversation was too quiet to hear.
But Mark overheard something about sticking around for the beatdown to come.
Isoko’s eyes glinted platinum as she gazed out at the same problems Mark was seeing, then she turned to him and asked, “What’s the plan?”
Mark hovered Quark out of his bag, asking his AI, “Locate Tartu Solari, please.”
One of the guys in the quartet exclaimed, “Oh shit!” Then he told his friends, “We’re staying.”
This comment began another argument among those guys, and Mark suspected that the group of four would split in half with two staying and two going.
Mark mostly looked at Quark, though. Quark flickered silver on Mark’s screen, and then text rolled by as it rapidly executed Mark’s orders.
Querying settlement population database… granted.
Querying location of Tartu Solari… denied.
Querying location of Shawn Yelik, Lenny Lennon, Kandi Shale… approved.
The image rapidly flickered and changed, the camera activating, allowing Quark to draw an overlay on the view of Mage Society. Shawn and Kandi were an arrow pointed to the right, far off screen, but Lenny, the mud mage, was right there, in that building on the right, somewhere on the second or third floor—
The image flickered and died.
Quark’s silver glow reappeared along with some words in bold print.
THIS ACTION WILL HAVE CONSEQUENCES.
YOU ARE WARNED AGAINST THIS ACTION.
Quark erased the words and spoke, “We have been barred from further population query.”
Mark grinned. “That’s okay. Thank you, Quark.”
“Surprised that was the plan,” Isoko said, grinning.
“It worked!” Mark said. Quark flickered once and Mark floated him back into his backpack, safely nestled inside a thin layer of adamantium. With one foot in front of the other, and a queasiness in his stomach that he banished as best he could, Mark strode onto the grasses in the middle of Mage Society, toward the building that Lenny was in, muttering, “Let’s see how this goes.”
“You’re too worried, Mark,” Isoko said, head held high, gleaming like a mirror. Even her armor was reflective. With a stage voice, she said, “The rebound will be large since we’re doing this outside of HVP, but he has it coming, and what kind of villains wouldn’t seek vengeance?”
Some people commented to the side, and Mark felt vectors focus on them.
Mark grinned a little. And then he set his face and walked tall. Fists tight, armor set, caltrops ready to deploy. No weapons here. Technically, Mark always carried weapons with him, but this was a beat down. He would not be seeking to injure anyone at all. Not permanently, anyway.
They rapidly reached the middle of the grass square, right in front of the three-story building that held Lenny, and probably Tartu as well. The words ‘POTION HALL’ were emblazoned on the archway leading into the main structure, and though the front area had some sort of sales area, it seemed more like a library and study place, for Mark saw rows of books in the depths beyond the entrance. People were studying in the front, reading or watching quiet videos on their phones with their friends and coworkers.
They had already noticed Mark and Isoko, but they hadn’t really noticed them until now; Until Mark and Isoko stood before Potion Hall.
Isoko smirked, the grass and the sky and the worried and delighted faces of Mage Society all reflected on the mirror sheen of her body and clothes. Her vector pointed everywhere, but mostly at Mark and at a low wall, and at the Potion Hall beyond that low wall. Mark wondered what she was going to do to that low wall—
Isoko raised her voice to the sky, and shouted, “It would be poor form to let such thievery go without consequence! So let’s be rich in our reprisal!” As the group of people ahead rapidly decided to either get to the side or stay frozen at the spot, Isoko placed a platinum hand on the low wall. Platinum soaked into the wall, just a little, and then she kicked, rapid, almost too fast to see, and the wall splashed down and away, rock breaking at her touch. A torso-sized hunk of the wall remained in her grip. She held it high, shouting at the building beyond, “Honor goes out the window for the likes of you, Tartu Solari!”
Mark was a little bit in love at that moment.
That feeling multiplied when a pair of vectors inside and up ahead both went to a window, and one of those vectors turned absolutely enraged. Mark hadn’t been able to tell exactly where Tartu had been before that moment, but he could tell that vector, slightly hidden beyond that window up there, was Tartu, and also Lenny. It was absolutely them.
Isoko threw the rock right at the window with enough force that it did not arc at all.
The boulder sailed, straight as a bullet, and impacted glass. It did not go through. The boulder struck something harder than glass, and the glass broke downward, falling out of the building and onto the study square in front of Potion Hall. Every single bystander was mostly out of the way by then, but a few lingering souls hurried the fuck up. Glass crashed onto the ground and the boulder followed with a cracking thump.
Mark was sure someone had muttered ‘crazy fuckers!’ but he was too furious to care about them right now.
Ahhh!
This was good.
“Thank the gods!” Tartu said, jumping out of the window, voice full of anger. He was wearing white and blue, just like his hair. He landed softly, his vector focused on Mark and Isoko. “You deserve everything that’s about to happen!”
And then his vector vanished, and so did the vectors of everything around Mark and Isoko. The world was still there, but everything felt dull. It was an anti-Union Domain.
Mark and Isoko both backed up, Isoko rapidly stepping away while Mark floated away on his caltrops.
Tartu almost said something—
But Mark scooped a chunk of dirt out from the grass, along with a bunch of grass, and tossed it at Tartu. Dirt rained down on the guy and he complained, while also trying to fish out something from beneath his robes, but Mark just grinned as he grabbed another load of dirt and tossed it—
And then he was outside of the anti-Union Domain, in the middle of the grasses, and he connected to the world.
Tartu remained inside his Domain, shielding his face with an arm. He sputtered out dirt and Lenny landed behind him with the same sort of softness as Tartu had displayed.
Tartu pulled out a black wand and pointed it at Mark, saying, “Fuck your Powers in particular!”
A jolt of dark light flickered out of the tip of the black wand, like a thin lightning bolt. It crashed across the distance between Tartu and Mark and soaked into Mark like water into a sponge. Mark gasped as the world felt dull again, in a completely different way. His adamantium faltered, and then so did he.
Mark slammed a knee to the ground, gasping for breath, righting himself as much as he could—
“Ha!” Tartu said, triumphant, even with all the dirt on his face. “And here I was thinking I’d have to wait two months to try that out!”
Lenny, also covered in dirt, waved a hand and the dirt flowed off of both he and his partner, into a ball in his outstretched hand. He pointed, even before Tartu was done gloating, and the ball rocketed to Mark’s face, filling his vision—
A platinum hand was there, and the dirt billowed just a little bit, trying to splash outward, before Isoko held the ball in her hand, the improvised weapon turning platinum. And then she let it go, dropping mud to the ground, saying nothing. She didn’t need to speak. She was in a Union with Mark right now, and they were in tune with each other.
Both of them had perhaps expected more taunting. More words.
But no.
It was go-time, fully and completely.
The Union-void around Tartu and Lenny expanded, rapidly enveloping Mark and Isoko, and their Union broke once again, like the snapping of a bridge.
Lenny threw another mudball straight up and over, lobbing the payload like Mark or Isoko couldn’t dodge such a slow moving ball, like he didn’t even care to hit either of them.
Mark had barely gotten back to his feet before he stepped to the side, but the mudball tracked him. It curved right for him. Lenny threw another mudball straight at Isoko, and this one was not slow at all. It moved too fast for her to intercept both of them. Isoko was too far away and both of them knew it.
Mark lifted an arm and took the ball on the forearm. It was like getting hit with a stone that then deformed and wrapped around his arm, droplets slapping onto his face, his chest. It locked there. Mark tried to shake it off, to prepare for the next ball of mud coming his way, but the mud clung and Mark knew there was magic involved in the cling. Had his arm broken? No. But it was painful.
Might be broken.
Who the fuck knew.
It was not that heavy. Maybe 5 kilos. But then Mark looked up and there were five mudballs in the air already. Getting hit with any more of them would be painful and definitely humiliating.
Mark slipped to the side, falling into a flow that he hadn’t felt in a while. Union was cut off, but Mark had been dancing in battle long before Tutorial. He splashed one mudball with a hand, rushed forward and avoided the sudden curve of another. The others went wide enough that Mark didn’t care about them anymore.
Lenny’s face spoke of disbelief. “How the fuck!”
The fight was still going.
Isoko rushed forward, directly into the line of fire of one of Tartu’s wands. Light splashed against a mirror and fell away, freezing the ground with icicles that did not seem real at all. The icicles misted away in the open air, and against the ground.
Tartu tsk’d, eyes wide, as he leapt into the air.
Lenny dashed to the right, digging his fingers into the stone wall of the building and, like an escalator, Lenny flowed up the stone. Mark wasn’t attacking, because he was too busy dodging, so Lenny had to reposition against Isoko, who was now close to both of them.
Two more mudballs were already flying at Mark, and he focused on those, dodging one and then almost dodging the second one. The second slipped sideways and cracked into Mark’s left leg, against one of his larger ceramic plates. The plate ablated, as it should, but the mud wrapped around his left leg and almost connected to his right leg, but Mark widened his legs when he saw what was going to happen; he was going to have his legs stuck together if he didn’t move well enough. Thankfully that did not happen. The mud wrapped his left leg and held there.
Mark rushed away, getting out of the anti-Union Domain. Twenty meters from the fight and Mark connected to the world once again. There was something inside the mud on his body. Mark didn’t know how he knew it, but there was a tickle of magic inside the mud on his arm and his leg. What do? His Adamantiumkinesis was locked down for whatever reason, and everything felt sluggish, so he couldn’t cut off the mud.
Clean it up?
It was mud after all.
Mark beat his heart with purity and shoved away impurity. It did nothing against the mud, but something else was happening inside. Sickness flowed away with every beat of his heart, a darkness evaporating from his skin, and Mark gradually felt the adamantium cage around Quark, in his backpack, once again. On a twitch of an idea, he tried to connect to the Skill (or just skill) holding together the mud on his body, but how? The mud wasn’t breathing. It wasn’t anything. It was certainly some sort of separate thing, though, or else Mark’s purity magic would have erased the mud already.
So Mark knew he had to connect to the mud itself.
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How?
It was moving with Mark, and it was already connected to him? Was that enough?
That was enough for a Union. Mark moved and the mud moved with him, and three beats later the mud crumbled away and Mark raced into Tartu’s anti-Union Domain again, where Isoko was engaging both Tartu and Lenny.
She was agile and quick, but she could only throw rocks at the men in the air, and both of the men were able to defend against that. Tartu had some sort of flying shield that was intercepting stuff from Isoko’s direction while Lenny stood sideways on the exterior of Potion Hall, feet embedded in the mud, while he used a wand to conjure more mud from the air, or from the wand itself. Mark couldn’t tell. He had no idea how that particular wand functioned. Lenny turned those balls of mud into cannonballs, slamming them at Isoko, who tried to catch them and throw them back.
It was like catching cannonballs, though, so Lenny was having a tough go of it.
And then Isoko batted one mudball aside. She sent the balls to the ground as she leapt onto the exterior of Potion Hall, the stone turning platinum where she stood. She held there, on the wall. Grinning. She could wallwalk? She could wallwalk!
“That’s fucking cheating, too!” Lenny said.
“Sucks to suck,” Isoko said, rushing at Lenny.
Tartu pointed a wand at Isoko and shouted, “Hey!”
Frozen light shot from the wand again but Isoko ignored it this time and the attack splashed wide, peppering the facade of Potion Hall with misty icicle spikes.
Tartu muttered something unkind, but he was in the air and fully away from the wall. Isoko wasn’t headed in his direction.
She gave chase against Lenny, and Lenny raced away, though both of them were going at walking speeds because if they ran then they would disconnect from the wall and they would fall. Isoko was faster than Lenny, by far. Twice as fast as a normal person, in fact.
“Don’t ignore me!” Tartu shouted, as he held a new wand in his hands, but he paused, reluctant to use that one.
Isoko just laughed as she closed in on Lenny.
Tartu glanced down at Mark rushing back into his Domain, but he was 5 meters up and he didn’t think Mark’s Adamantiumkinesis had returned. He pointed the black-tipped wand at Isoko—
“Isoko! Tartu’s wand!” Mark warned, as he reconnected to the adamantium on the ground, just fast enough to grab a broken stone from the side.
Tartu sneered at him, but he was still focused fully on Isoko as he fired the wand. Solid illumination flowed directly at Isoko.
Isoko turned and saw the solidness coming her way, but she just raised a hand against it while she kept after Lenny, who fired a ball of mud at her at the same time. She caught both. The mudball was just a ball. The light splashed from Isoko and wrapped around her like a fog.
Lenny dropped to the ground and a foggy figure, Isoko, rushed to where Lenny had been. A mudball launched out of the fog and impacted 4 meters to Lenny’s left. The fog tracked Isoko somehow, clinging to her. Even the stuff she had left behind raced after her. It was another shut-down wand. A fog wand.
And while Tartu’s floating shield was pointed at Isoko, Mark threw an adamantium-assisted boulder of stone right at Tartu’s legs.
The stone clipped him like a car clips a person; with deadly effect.
Tartu cried out and went tumbling in the air, landing on the edge of whatever platform he had created, an arm hanging off the side and several things falling from his person. Mark took absolute advantage of the strike and hovered up at him, grabbing him by the neck even as he cried out in pain. His leg was bent the wrong way and Mark barely cared about that.
Lenny shouted, “No!” And threw mudballs at Mark.
They struck his back and clung there, grabbing at his face and obscuring an eye—
But a cloudy Isoko landed on the ground next to Lenny and a platinum arm burst from the cloud, grabbing Lenny’s anything. She managed to grab his robes, and then it was over for Lenny. Isoko Tactile Telekinesis’d his robes, turning them platinum, locking Lenny into his own fabrics. She picked him up and walked away with him, saying, “You and I can have a talk over here while they have their own talk over there.”
Lenny shouted something, but Isoko told him something louder.
Mark was too focused on Tartu to care about what Isoko did to Lenny.
A red rage flowed, and Mark felt good.
Tartu had seen better days.
Mark locked down his arms with adamantium, making sure he couldn’t move, and then Mark sat on top of the guy, holding him down. Mark had an easy 40 kilos on the thinner mage and his hand was around Tartu’s neck, but the adamantium locked around those wrists is what kept Tartu fully contained.
Tartu glared, hateful and furious in his forced T-pose on the ground.
Mark glared, too.
They were still inside the anti-Union Domain.
“Drop the anti-Union Domain and I’ll heal you,” Mark said, holding Tartu down in every way possible, one fist at Tartu’s throat.
Tartu remained silent, furious. The Domain remained active.
Mark glanced backward at Tartu’s broken leg, at how it was bent in at least two places. “I broke the femur, but your fall broke the ankle.” He stared down at Tartu, taunting, “Should drink more milk.”
“Fuck you, hidden demon.”
Tartu focused and the Domain shifted.
A weight slammed into Mark’s soul, grabbing onto his astral body and locking him down, much like he had experienced when he was training to lift adamantium. It was a last-ditch effort. It was manageable. Mark’s adamantium grip on Tartu’s outstretched arms was just as good as his physical grip on his neck. Tartu thrashed under Mark, but the guy was in a lot of pain, and Mark’s simple weight was enough to hold him there.
And Tartu’s Domain effort didn’t work well enough.
More than that, it appeared he could only do one Domain at a time over an area, because Mark’s unionsense returned. Slowly, sluggishly, Union was there once again.
Mark breathed deep, then said, “I suppose that’s following the letter of the order, if not the intent.” Mark squeezed his hand a little. Tartu clenched his teeth so hard one of them could have broken. Mark said, “I’m going to straighten your leg now. It’s gonna hurt.”
Mark did exactly that, grabbing the guy’s leg with an adamantium grip and pulling it straight. Tartu screamed. Suddenly, it was all too much for Mark. Mark felt ill to hurt another person like this... but he did it anyway. For another 3 seconds. And then he connected to Tartu with Union and breathed out pain, while breathing in comfort. Tartu’s scream ended as fast as it came. He glared at Mark, but less with hate, and more with a strange sort of worry.
Mark kept up the pain/comfort breathing while healing Tartu with a Union of Blood.
Tartu was confused. He asked, “What—”
Mark punched Tartu in the face with his free hand, saying, “Shut up.”
There was a snap and Tartu’s nose was way broken, but he barely felt it; Mark could tell. Tartu looked more surprised than in pain, even with that new flatness to his face. Mark was still running pain/comfort, though, so of course Tartu didn’t feel it. Tartu had spared Mark the pain of his beating, so it was only fair to return the favor. At least a little.
Tartu did snort and choke on the blood, but Mark used his free hand to wiggle Tartu’s nose back into position. A few heartbeats later and the wound was gone. The blood remained.
Mark spoke, “I was thinking of how to shut you down for two days, just like you did for me. I don’t have a really good solution because there is none. It’s dangerous to do something like that, Tartu. I’m not a kaiju killer, but I’m still on the team as support. If something had happened then I would have tried to Union with whoever was going to fight, and maybe my help would have been necessary, or maybe not.
“With that shavallian, you made a bet that I wasn’t needed for those two days.
“You got lucky.
“It could have been a disaster.
“You deserve to be down for two days, too.
“But I’m not sure how to—”
Tartu tried to speak again.
Mark punched him again. Twice this time. Tartu tried to speak, to call it off, or whatever. But Mark punched him a few more times and Tartu got the message. He went limp under Mark, and Mark healed the guy back up. No permanent damage here!
He had to move one of Tartu’s teeth back into position, but the guy was fine afterward.
Mark stared at Tartu, daring him to try to speak again.
Tartu said nothing.
Mark nodded, and continued, “I don’t want to put you down for any real length of time. That’s just wrong. So, here’s my solution: Stay in your room, your house, of your own volition, for the next two days, Tartu. Unless there’s an attack and you need to be on the wall, or wherever, of course. This is my solution. Do you understand? You can speak now.”
“… Yes,” Tartu said, reluctantly, as though he wondered if he was going to get punched again. He was still full of rage, though. He wanted to do more than just agree. He wanted to fight.
“It’s good you understand.” Mark glared. “But do you agree to these terms?”
“… Yes.”
Mark stood up and pulled his adamantium away.
He stepped four meters away and waited for Tartu to stand. Mark glanced around, looking for Aurora or anyone else in power, but she wasn’t anywhere close and obvious. There was no one close and obvious, besides all of the spectators. The vectors far to the side and in the air might have been Aurora or someone else. Maybe a few of the guards for the army? The military police were surely around here somewhere. Mark would find out about that later.
Mark was focused on Tartu.
Tartu stood and brushed himself off, straightening his robes, though the brushing was more for show than anything else. He was still covered in blood and dirt.
Mark said, “It should go without saying that reprisal for this will be met rather harshly. This was me getting even, Tartu. Blackvein wasn’t involved at all.”
Tartu asked, “Where did you get more adamantium?”
“I have sources.”
“Is he here? Has he been here? What has he done.”
“Nothing, to my knowledge.”
“Kaijushit. Addashield was capable of infiltrating anywhere and doing anything he wanted ever since he turned archmage 350 years ago. His dragon progeny can do the same. What has he done while he was here, delivering adamantium to you?”
Mark glared. He repeated, “Nothing, to my knowledge.”
Tartu glared.
The audience recorded on phones and they also just watched. Some were mad. Some were worried. None interfered.
Mark said, “Go home, Tartu. Lock yourself in your house for two days.”
And then Mark walked away.
Isoko was waiting for him at the far end of the lawn, near the tram, with her grip on Lenny’s clothes. Lenny was still locked down in his own garments. She let go when Mark got close enough, though.
Lenny stumbled away, saying, “Fuck you that was unfair.”
“It was a spar, you lost,” Isoko said, almost uncaring. “Cry more, and maybe the scales will be slightly more even.” She stared death, adding, “But the scales are not even, Lenny. Not at all.”
Lenny frowned, and then he walked away, toward Tartu and the crowd of people in the distance.
Mark heard raised voices in that crowd and he saw people flinch away, but he stopped looking, caring, and then he continued into the tram station with Isoko. Isoko was still Full Platinum, her footsteps causing the ground to flicker platinum alongside her stride.
They were not alone in the tram station this time, but the only people there were a trio of girls standing to the side. One of them had their phone out, recording, but she put it away when Mark looked at her—
A pair of vectors came down from the sky. One vector was pissed, the other was less pissed. Mark somehow recognized one of them before he even saw her.