“Are you sure?” Avery asked, raising a dubious eyebrow at Brent. “I’ve been told having his Skill used on you feels like a dozen worms burrowing through your brain. Each of which goes into a frenzy if you lie.”
“It is the quickest way to resolve this … misunderstanding,” said Brent, giving a forced shrug. Right. They think we are henchmen of some evil dude? What did Viktor call him? ‘Were-cunt’, was it? So a werewolf maybe?
“If you say so,” said Avery, looking like she was rolling a piece of rotten lemon around in her mouth. “But I’ll have to ask you to take off your sword beforehand. Everyone until now tried to attack the kid, even if he tries to be as gentle with his Skill as possible. We could hold back regular people, but I don’t want to test whether we are faster than your sword arm.”
“Understandable,” said Brent tersely, then with slow movements unfastened his belt and threw the sword at Mark. “Hold onto that for me. Mia, could you and the runt come with me?”
“Uh, sure?” Mia blinked, glancing at the rather displeased ‘runt’ next to her. “Give me a moment, let me summon another Familiar.”
“That won’t be a problem, will it?” Brent glared challengingly at the crowd.
“What’s a Familiar?” Asked Viktor with his arms crossed. The wheels were sluggishly turning in his head, and Mia could tell the exact moment when the idea to shut down Brent's request solidified in his head from the gleeful twinkle in his eyes. He had no idea what a Familiar was, but if refusing Brent meant he got them out of here, he would be happy. At least that was the conclusion Mia came to from watching him.
“It’s like a pet, a magical pet that protects me,” Mia said. “It’s pretty harmless, looks like a cute pink cat.”
“Should be fine,” said Avery with a grin. “How long do you need?”
“A minute will do,” Mia said after checking on her reserves. She’d be running on fumes after casting it, but she’d been diligently pushing both of her Assimilation Skills to the limit to replenish them. She had just enough to cast the spell, then some more for another four or five Blasts should the need arise.
“Go ahead,” said Avery, turning to stare at Viktor with a challenging smirk.
“Face the other direction at least,” the old man grumbled. “I don’t want you pulling a fast one on us and blowing my head off.”
Mia shrugged and turned around, making eye contact with Carmilla for a moment. Whatever fear of getting attacked when she had her back turned evaporated as she saw the predatory glint in the girl’s crimson eyes. It reminded her of the look cats had before pouncing on their prey. No one was going to get through that girl to attack her, Mia was sure of it.
Clearing her mind with a quick breathing exercise, Mia sent herself into a focus. Reviewing the spell circle again, now knowing what to look out for and being pleasantly surprised that the Tome almost naturally corrected half of the mistakes she’d made previously. In just ten seconds, she had a circle assembled in her runic-model that she was satisfied enough with to cast it.
A sudden shout coming just the moment when she was about to launch all her focus into casting the spell almost threw her right out of the loop and let loose the giant clump of mana filling up her entire right hand. I’m going to kick someone in the nuts for that.
Mia took in a swift breath which came out as a hiss, the mana taking her split-second lapse in focus to tear at her channels like a thousand magma-coated needles. It fucking hurt, but letting go even more could cost her much more than sore energy channels so she fought through it and once again launched her mental muscles into overdrive and pushed at the damned mana.
The mystical energy halted, then flooded out of her arm in a fraction of a second. The spell circle flashed above her palm and then she sent the same mental image of a cat at it as she did before.
It’s done. Mia staggered for a moment, feeling like her entire right hand was on fire. Okay, the more mana I have clumped together, the more it fights back against my control. It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out so I could have done without the practical lesson. Noted. Fuck, that hurts like a bitch.
The bond with her new familiar snapping in place and its soft paws landing on her shoulder caught her attention. The cat was hissing, protectiveness and wariness flooding through the bond as it swivelled its little head around with the hairs standing along its spine.
“Calm down,” Mia whispered. “I shouldn’t be in danger.”
She turned around, eyes narrowed in barely contained fury as her arm continued to throb and send spikes of pain throughout the rest of her body. “Who the fuck shouted at me while I was casting?”
It took her just a moment to find Carmilla not next to her but with her fingers transformed into solid crimson talons which wrapped around Viktor’s throat and holding him half a meter off the ground. Mark and Lina were also standing with spells and weapons readied while Brent was doing damage control, speaking placatingly to Carmilla.
“It was him?” Mia asked, narrowing her eyes at the man.
“Please tell your friend to calm her tits,” Avery asked in a mild panic. “Viktor is a cunt, but-”
“I almost lost my arm just now, he should be happy I kept the Familiar from tearing his throat out the moment it materialised.” Mia glared at the girl, her mana flaring up unconsciously as it seeped into her channels. It wasn’t under her control, but for a change its raging currents and vicious arcs were in tune with Mia and flowed through her harmlessly.
Her fingers twitched, alight with pinkish energy that was wrapping around her entire body like a cloak. She knew, instinctively that should she wish for it, beams of energy would borrow right through Viktor’s head in a moment. Then she felt it, the impending and unmistakable sensation of mana deprivation.
Shit. Shit. Shit. Mia pulled her mana back into her pool in a hurry, doing her best to maintain her furious glare at Avery even as she was panicking on the inside.
“Oh fucking hell!” Avery ran a hand over her face. “You get the girl off of him and I have him taken away from here, deal? You won’t have to see his face ever again if you leave afterwards.”
Mia maintained eye contact for a few seconds, then let out a huff. “Fine. Carmilla, please let go of the cunt. I’m mostly fine.”
“You sure?” the girl asked nonchalantly, entirely unbothered by the group of older people glaring at her. Though the chair-legs and pipes they were holding like weapons probably didn’t help their image. “I’m pretty sure he wanted you to get crippled. He stinks of malice.”
“If he does it again I’ll kill him myself,” Mia said, momentarily surprising herself. She stiffened, realising she had entirely meant every word of that sentence and felt a shiver run down her spine. Even now, she felt angry enough to Blast the man into oblivion.
B-but- that’s murder. A part of her resisted, screaming and thrashing inside, only getting louder and louder as the adrenaline in her veins dimmed and her anger started to fade. She gulped, feeling disconnected from the world around her even as she watched Carmilla nonchalantly drop the older man and strut back over to her side with a harumph.
Mia gave a glance to Avery, and thankfully the girl caught her meaning in a blink. “Take him away, you saw how easily the girl manhandled him. You old fucks are alone against a group of people as strong as her if you want to fight them. Fuck off, chop chop.”
“Protect me. Try not to kill anyone if you don’t have to. Focus on intercepting attacks and projectiles should anyone try to ambush me,” Mia whispered under her breath and felt the Familiar’s acknowledgement through their bond. It settled in, not draping itself over her shoulder like the previous one but settling down with its paws hidden underneath its body as it lay in wait. It looked a moment away from darting off and ripping a throat out, which was even more accentuated by the way its narrowed eyes roamed the surroundings.
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Different elementals, different habits I guess. Mia mused as she watched a group of the older people hold Viktor up by throwing his arms around their shoulders and help him away. Most of the older people that supported him followed behind them, none seeming all too pleased about what happened and many throwing glares at Mia’s group.
“Well, that went swimmingly, didn’t it?” Avery said, scrunching up her nose with her fists on her hips. “Fuck me. I’d spent the last five days trying to make that senile old cunt see reason, but this is just going to make him even more paranoid. Fuck my life.”
“Why do you even need to bother?” Mark asked, sounding just as bored and annoying as ever. He had that tone, the one that made anyone he talked to feel like he was taking them for a witless moron. Which, in fact, was exactly what he was doing most of the time. “Your group is obviously much stronger than his. He couldn’t do anything even just now when you sent him to his room.”
“The older people listen to him,” Avery said testily. “Most of them don’t even come out of their damned apartments, staying inside those boxes with their heads stuck so far up their asses they couldn’t see reason even if I whacked them over the head with it. Still, they are the ones who have almost all of the classes useful for crafting, making food and the rest. We need them, if we want to stay alive for any sizable length of time.”
“Well, that sucks balls, doesn’t it?” Mark asked, sounding entirely insincere.
“Mark, shut up please,” Mia said. I still want to ask them whether they have any idea where my mom could be. “Sorry about him.”
“It’s whatever,” Avery said, a deep scowl still on her face. “Put your weapons and spells away maybe?”
“After you,” Mia said, narrowing her eyes at the girl. She had no spells readied, nor any mana wrapping around her like before, but Mia clearly felt a torrent of mana churning just deep enough in her channels to not be visible through rudimentary mana sight. “And the Familiar is staying.”
“No need to antagonise them further,” said Brent, pushing the mace Mark was swinging in circles like a fidget toy down to the ground. “I believe we are mostly done here, Mia you had a question to ask them. Do that, then let’s be on our way.”
“Right,” Mia said sourly as a dozen gazes landed on her. She took a deep breath and shoved her hands into her pockets. “Do you know anything about the suburbs? How are the monsters out there? Was there anyone seeking refuge around here from out there?”
“Why do you ask?” Avery asked, crossing her arms under her chest.
“My mother lives out there,” Mia said.
“Oh,” the girl faltered in her standoffish demeanour. “No, we haven’t heard much. But I don’t think we heard or saw any monsters ever coming this way from that direction. DID WE?”
“No,” people answered the girl’s question, shaking their heads collectively.
“There’s that.” Avery shrugged. “There is that hilly, foresty region around that way though. Stay clear of it, a cunt calling himself the ‘werewolf king’ set up camp around there in the woods and he has at least a hundred or two lunatics following his orders. Raiders and looters the lot of them.”
“Thank you,” said Brent. “While we are at it, I do have a question of my own. You spoke about some broadcast from the military … ?”
“Oh, that.” Avery scowled even harder, if that was possible. “It’s all over the radios, you know tech stuff works again, right? So a bunch of people started up their antique radios and the military is blasting this bullshit on loop on almost every frequency.”
“What are they saying?” Brent asked, sounding hopeful.
“‘Stay inside, keep calm, don’t panic, we are coming to save you.’” Avery rolled her eyes so hard they threatened to pop out of their sockets. “For the record, the broadcast is still saying they’ll reach Graz on Tuesday the ninth.”
“Oh,” Brent let out a dumb sound.
“Yeah, ‘Oh’.” Avery chuckled. “Isn’t it great? They must have figured out some crazy sci-fi cloaking tech because I sure as shit can’t see any of the promised tanks and troops around here and Tuesday has been five blasted days ago.”
“Uhh, Mia?” Carmilla whispered, poking Mia in the side as she leaned over. “I, uhhh, forgot to ask but what month is it?”
“July,” Mia replied, looking at the girl weirdly. “It should be the … 14th of July.”
A cold pit formed in Mia’s stomach. The fourteenth of July, time flew by so fast and so absorbed she was in the world going to shit that she totally forgot about the first anniversary of Gabe’s death. It’s been one year already without him.
“What year?” Carmilla asked, sounding a bit panicked.
“What?” Mia asked, blinking away tears.
“What year is it? 2023? 24?”
“It’s 2025,” Mia said, looking at the redhead strangely. Not that it revealed anything, as Carmilla stiffened, freezing up like a movie on pause. Her eyes dimmed and looked … lost.
“Two years,” Carmilla whispered so silently Mia couldn’t even hear it, nor was she meant to.
Not that she was in the right headspace to care at the moment, her thoughts swinging right back to her little brother. July the 5th was the day he died, at around 5 pm. … July the 5th, five in the afternoon. That was nine days ago … and this was the ninth day of the ‘apocalypse’.
Weird. Mia shook it off, deciding to ignore the System deciding to come barging in just at the right moment to make her forget about the anniversary of her brother’s death.
*****
The sound of glass shattering echoed through the office, making the man kneeling with his forehead kissing the ground flinch and the languishing bodyguard draped over a sofa jump up in surprise.
“What do you mean he’s gone?” Prince Arwen asked, his fingers bleeding still from the glass he broke just a moment ago in his fist. “How? Where has he gone?”
“Through the barrier, Lord Regent.” The man would have kneeled even deeper, but the floor stopped his face from sinking any further. “Sir Gabriel seemed to be inspecting it one moment, then he stepped through without it stopping him. No one could stop him.”
“How?” Arwen asked, fist clenching as he barely restrained himself from lashing out and sending his desk crashing into the wall. “He wasn’t kidnapped? Threatened? Lured away? Did your eyes fail you? He is Rank 3 and you yourself confirmed numerous times that the barrier only lets through Rank 0 Users.”
“We … have launched investigations already My Lord Regent,” the kneeling man said. “We have a theory, if you would wish to hear it?”
“Meaning you withheld this information from me until you could find an explanation for it?” Arwen asked, his glare heating up even further. He might have been only at the very top of Rank 3 and the man kneeling before him might have been a peak Rank 5 Shadow, but he now had all the Authority of the King of Starhaven backing him up.
With Shadows all having sworn blood oaths and tying themselves deeply to the Faction, he could kill every single one of them with but a thought. They had every right to tremble in fear of his wrath, especially when one of them let his friend disappear on him despite his explicit orders not to let such a thing happen.
Not that he would ever give in to that anger, especially with this one. Rank 5 operatives, especially ones with their loyalty ensured by a blood oath, were an outrageously valuable asset to a Kingdom like Starhaven whose highest Ranked Rifts and Dungeons had been mere Rank 3s just weeks ago. Rank 5 fighters were rare, and valuable, not to be discarded over something this small ... but the Shadow didn't know that. He thought the infamous Rogue Prince was both rash and petty enough to maybe just go through with the implied threat.
“N-no my Prince,” the Shadow said. “The investigation was quick, it only took four days.”
“FOUR DAYS?” Arwen kicked the man in the head, fuming in rage. It had little effect, the man’s Rank 5 constitution protecting him from the prince’s strike even if he had his Ki coursing through his channels, not that he did. “Give me your report without missing a single detail. You’ll be cleaning the fucking sewers for a month afterwards, but if I found out you lied or withheld anything from me even the stars won’t be able to save you from getting quartered and spiked up over the four gates of the capital. Understood?”
“Yes, Lord Regent!”
“Now give me that damned report,” Arwen said, still fuming as he leaned back over his desk and looked over his bleeding palm with a scowl. He sent a surge of Ki into the limb, manually pushing out all the glass shards before he made it heal his wounds.
“Yes,” the man said. “Upon further investigation, we found that Sir Gabriel was neither the first, nor the last person who passed through the barrier while they really shouldn’t have been able to. By our estimations, upwards of eight hundred people, ranging from Rank 2 to Rank 3 at the highest, passed through.”
“We managed to capture three of them just as they were halfway through the barrier and pulled them back. Interrogation revealed that every one of them shared the same Title.”
[Shar’An Kal, Shadow of the Kingdom wishes to share a System Window with you. Do you Accept?]
[ Yes / No ]
Yes. Arwen thought, his scowl deepening. His eyes quickly raced through the description and grew wider and wider with each line, but they threatened to pop out at the last of the effects the peculiar Title had.
***
[Forerunner (Earth)]
* Desc: You are a pioneer from an un-initiated world, one of only a thousand taken from your home a year ahead of your Realm joining the System. You are a pathfinder, a trailblazer of your people. Be the first to grasp the mysteries of the six — soon to be seven — Realms of the System, be the first among many to rise to greatness and power and when the time comes, be the bulwark of your kin against their would-be oppressors from the myriad worlds outside.
Effects:
* Enhanced experience gain for the first year following your integration into the System.
* Access to the ‘Forerunner’ Questline
* Access to the System Shop for the duration of this first year.
* Free passage through all System-made barriers on your home planet: Earth.
***