He'd been beaten for sure; a black eye marred his face, along with several other bruises and cuts.

It didn't make sense, how did he get here? This wasn't like kidnapping a regular person. This would get you in big trouble, kill squad type trouble. No matter how big or powerful you are or what kind of boons you have. There's always someone out there with one that can counter yours. Kidnapping a Witch was exactly how one would get put together, either by the government or their coven.

In the past, an S class named Striker had gone insane and aligned himself with a Gate World. A hand-picked group of C-ranks took him down.

"What's wrong with your friend there? They never see a bit of blood before?" Bear asked.

Grim looked back up. She'd let herself slip and had been caught staring at Arcadia. Volk turned towards her, concerned. She wasn’t supposed to attract attention.

Volk just laughed, “They have seen oceans.”

Bear looked between the two, not sure what to make of that. Volk’s plan was good; any little bit of mystery they could add to the character she was supposed to be playing would help.

The Ferals had the numbers advantage and would win in a straight up fight if it came down to that, but if they thought Grim and Hazel were high ranks? They wouldn’t take the risk. At least, they hoped not.

She didn’t know what to make of Arcadia’s presence; she’d forgotten to ask before if he’d set her up. If he did? Then, he deserved whatever was coming to him. If he hadn’t?

There wasn’t much she could do, not at this point. She hoped he had because it would make this next part much easier on her conscious.

With the way Mari and Volk were reacting, she had to guess that they didn't recognize him. Whether that meant he was innocent or they had never interacted without a mask before, she didn't know. All it meant was that she was the only person on their side who knew he was a Boonwitch.

"I don't know what you guys want from me, but I have money and power. I can get you whatever you want," Arcadia begged.

Bear grabbed a fistful of his hair and painfully jerked his neck, "You already have everything I want."

He turned back towards their group. "Let's get this over with."

"Kneel beside him," Maribelle said.

"I don't kneel."

"Then we leave with the money, and you receive nothing."

"You wouldn't make it ten feet down this alley."

"Try to stop us," Maribelle said, her voice distorted and down-pitched by her mask.

For a moment, it looked like Bear would order his guys to attack. His eyes shifted to the weapons on Volk’s hip.

He growled instead and knelt beside Arcadia.

Grim looked at Mari, and she nodded. Grim walked forward, flanked by Hazel.

They stopped, with Grim in front of Arcadia and Hazel in front of Bear.

She already had both Boon slots filled, so she couldn’t take a boon into herself and trade it that way; she'd have to have a hand on both of them to transfer it directly instead.

She didn’t have that, so they were gambling on it working with Hazel.

"The name of the boon," Grim said.

"What are you going to do to me? I'm a Witch of the Black Skies Coven; you'll never get away with this. They’ll come for you." Arcadia said, actual fear on his face as he looked up at Grim. She was glad she was wearing a mask; this felt… wrong. He’d been a dick, but he didn’t deserve this.

Not to mention, she believed him. They would come, they’d just have to be gone when they did.

"[AS IN AS OUT], do with the others what you want," Bear said.

Arcadia shot him a look, “That won’t help you. It’s affixed, it’s mine.”

Grim hesitated, her arm halfway to his head. Volk nodded at her out of the corner of her eye, encouraging her.

This wasn’t right, but she didn’t have a choice.

She took a deep breath, and put her hand on Arcadia’s forehead at the same time as Hazel touched Bears.

She activated [CEDE], and it worked for the first time. With the Lizardman, she’d been lacking authority over it. Now? She had all of it she could want.

She pulled on the skill and felt it flare to life.

The alleyway disappeared and was replaced by a blank room with infinite space. A screen that stretched out forever appeared in front of her.

Names were stacked equidistant from each other, but the letters were unintelligible to her, as they flipped constantly. It was overwhelming, but she understood why she needed to know what she was looking for; this was everything. It felt like she'd been given a glimpse into the system, infinite but also only a tiny part of the whole of it.

Her mind stretched at the same time as her ego did, and her thoughts became hazy, as if trying to see through mud.

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

Everything was so big, and she needed to see it all.

“Grim!” A voice shouted.

She turned and saw Hazel. She looked different, similar but not quite a clone of her anymore. She couldn’t tell for sure, her head was covered in a fog that made thinking hard.

Hazel was beside her, but also infinitely far away, “Think of what we came here for! Forget everything else, it’s too much,”

Why hadn’t she warned her it would be this hard?

She let her anger guide her. She was doing this for a reason. Arcadia had betrayed her, and now she was getting her revenge. He was on the ground, at her mercy. She had the name of his boon, and it was now hers.

SURRENDER.

Her right arm smashed into the screen simultaneously as the letters flicked to [AS IN AS OUT]. She ripped into the circuits and pixels while the system tried to pull her in. They were in a tug-of-war, but she had one advantage: The system was holding onto something that didn’t exist.

Alarms blared as the screen shuddered. The white room took on a red hue as emergency lights came on. The whole place shuddered as she took a step backwards—

— She was back in the real world.

You have taken [AS IN AS OUT]. (Your durability is equivalent to your mental fortitude)

You have no available boon slots.

Replace a boon? Y/N

Before she could answer that, another system notification popped up.

TRANSFERRING [AS IN AS OUT]

The transfer finished, and Grim took a step back. She lifted her cloak, but her right arm was still gone. It had felt like it was back, what just happened?

Arcadia’s eyes opened wide in horror.

"What did you just do? You... it's not there. Why the fuck isn't it there? You can't do that. You're not supposed to— are you missing an arm? Wait. Are you the girl from the Gateworld? The bitchy one? You are, aren’t you? I know you, what was your name again?" Arcadia talked out loud, to her horror

Grim backed up, "Don't!"

"Grace? No, something weird. Grail? Wait, it was Gri-" Arcadia's head exploded and covered Bear's gang in the remnant of his flesh. Her ears rang as chaos descended on the alleyway.

She couldn't see who had shot, it seemed like a big gun, and she didn't know who had brought one of those. Clearly, Bear didn't either as he grabbed Hazel by the robe and chucked her hard enough to fly into one of the side walls of the apartments. She sunk into the concrete and stopped moving.

The rest of the group wasn't idle, and Volk had already run forward and delivered a vicious overhead hook into the face of another man; he was sent straight to the ground and didn't move as blood erupted from his face. Bear growled, and fur started to cover his body as he charged Volk; he hit him from behind and clotheslined him with a tackle.

At the same time, one of his gang got too close to Mari, and she hit him with a baton, which ripped a bunch of skin off him from where it hit.

Grim knew she was in trouble when she saw Cub and two other guys approaching her, each wielding bats or other makeshift weapons.

She stepped back and jumped in surprise. It was like she’d just stepped onto tacks, but there was none when she looked down. She took another step, and the pain came back.

"Fucking stupid Lego fuck," Grim yelled.

By the way, one of the people with Cub was smiling; she'd bet it was him who'd hit her with a boon. It didn't actually cause her damage, so she tried to ignore it as she turned tail and ran.

She made it about ten feet before realizing she wouldn’t be outrunning these guys. She tried to pull Hazel back, but she felt uncharacteristically strong resistance from her. She tried to pull harder, but she wouldn't budge.

"Hazel!" Grim shouted.

"No one's coming to help you," Cub said to her as he advanced on her.

Grim raised her hand and held it up to him, "Any closer, and I'll take every power you have."

Cub laughed, calling her bluff, "If you could've already, you would've. I think you have to touch me, and if you're close enough for that to happen, you'll already be dead."

"Try it and find out."

Cub frowned and nodded his head at the other two guys with him. They looked unsure, but after another prodding from him, they ran at her, one wielding a hammer and the other a machete.

She pulled on Hazel more and saw her stirring from her trauma-induced nap in the divot of the concrete wall. Grim didn't know how she wasn't paste, but she wasn't going to complain.

She could tell Hazel was trying to respond, but whatever was wrong was still interfering with her recall, Grim would have to buy time.

The man with the hammer had long hair, and she baited him into swinging vertically down at her, and at the last moment, she jumped backwards to dodge it. Before the guy could recover, she tried to jab in with her knife, but she had to abandon that when a machete came within an inch of her neck. She might have got him if the phantom pain from walking wasn't still hitting her whenever she took a step.

They were good at covering each other and were a helluva lot faster. She could tell that they wouldn't fall for another trick like that. Which was a big problem because she only had tricks like that.

"Volk! Mari! Help!" She yelled out.

"Busy!" Volk screamed back as he took an enormous haymaker from Bear to the side of the jaw. To her amazement, he barely moved and turned right back to unleash his own combo.

Mari had left one guy laid out and bleeding on the concrete. Another one was in front of her, warily waving a baseball bat while she held a bloody hand to her side, holding in a big hunting knife.

Fuck this.

She used [CEDE] on herself and was back in that white room. She didn’t let her mind wander, she didn’t have time to waste in here.

Her right arm was back, and she dug back into the screen, into [FRIENDLY SHADOW].

If Hazel wouldn’t respond, she would make her.

Hazel was hers.

“Wake the fuck up!” Grim shouted with the skill held in her hand.

The screen changed from the evershifting numbers into black smoke. Two eyes opened up in that darkness, gazing into her soul.

She heard Hazel giggling, “Oh, oopsie. I overslept.” A malevolent undertone perfused her speech.

Grim’s hand was forced out of the screen, her fingers intertwined with Hazel’s. Grim tried to let go, but Hazel held on and used her to climb the rest of the way through.

The creature that climbed through wasn’t Hazel, or the other version she had seen.

This was pure shadow.

With both hands, the creature shoved her out of the white space and into the real world.

She fell onto the ground as the man with the hammer stood above her mid-swing. Hazel held his arm, stopping him from hitting her.

A machete cut down, and Hazel let go, stepping back to dodge.

The thug with the hammer used the opening and swung at Hazel, who didn't even try to avoid it. The swing hit her on the side of the cheek and reefed her head to the side, causing her hair to cover her face.

She started giggling.

The Hammer-wielding thug froze, "What the fuc— "

— Hazel’s boot inverted his knee.

His arm went forward to try and counterbalance himself, and Hazel grabbed the hammer from his hand. She swung downward in that same motion on his face.

The man ceased moving beneath her.