You have received an S rank boon! [Friendly Shadow]

"Are you okay?" Arcadia asked from above her, reluctant concern on his face.

Grim pushed herself up and put her hand to her head. She wiped her eyes and swallowed the saliva in her mouth. "Yeah, I'm fine; it's just hot out here."

Arcadia frowned. “Blood loss probably isn’t helping. I’ve got some extra water you can have.”

Grim declined as she stood up and took a small sip from her canteen, “I’ve got my own. I’ll be fine.”

"If you're sure, the first time can be a little rough," Arcadia backed away. “If you're comfortable sharing, what'd you get?"

Grim looked at her status.

Name Rank Age Grim E 18 Boons Friendly Shadow Empty

Okay, so this must be some kind of joke.

She looked through her status over and over again, willing it to show her something different but it didn't change. She'd have to get somewhere private to test her skill and see what it actually was. The system was kind of fucked as is, and it probably wasn't the first time it displayed the wrong rank skill. What even was [FRIENDLY SHADOW]? She'd never heard of it before, so it probably wasn't very good, even if it was true. She felt her heartbeat start to pound in her chest as she began to get very warm. Stupid clammy hand. She wiped them off on her pants, which were not clean on account of all the blood and dirt she'd been rolling around in.

Arcadia cleared his throat, and Grim twirled around to face him. She'd forgotten he was still here. She racked her brain for E-rank skills and came up with one as cover: "[DEFT WEEDING]."

"Ah, yeah," He scratched the back of his head. "Can’t be too surprised; most E-rank skills aren’t going to be anything special. Still, I’ve heard of worse. One guy apparently got one where his spit changed into whatever he drank, went home after to have a drink and ended up dying in the hospital before they could pump his stomach.” Arcadia laughed.

Grim stared at him as the moment stretched on.

Arcadia broke the silence, “It's been a long day. Why don't we get out of here? I’ll call E-Tech for you.”

“No, don’t. I’ll be fine once I get home; I don’t need to go to the hospital,” Grim said a little too quickly. That would be way too much money to be a good idea.

Arcadia seemed confused, but after a moment, he seemed to understand, “Ahh, well, let me call you a cab at least, my treat.”

Grim was reluctant, but she really wasn’t in any condition to walk home at this hour; there was too high of a chance of something bad happening. Although, she was already covered in blood, so she’d probably scare off anyone who'd want to fuck with her. Still, the reasonable part of her looked up at him and nodded.

He finished making the call in the short time it took to find the exit to the gateworld; the portal was a bit jarring walking through it, but she mentally gave herself a pat on the back for not throwing up this time. The full moon was out and giving off a good bit of light. Outside, the portal was enclosed by a high metal fence; the whole thing was about a small park in size. The only other thing in the area was a neatly trimmed lawn and a concrete walkway leading to the gate. There was security, but it was just an E rank manning a small booth; the place was barely worth guarding. It was too dangerous for people like her, and the people who were strong enough could get a pass if they asked for it. It wouldn’t cost them much, either.

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Arcadia thanked the security guard as a hover taxi landed outside the park. Gravitropic thrusters lowered it to the ground.

“Huh, that was quick,” Arcadia mumbled to himself as he ushered her into the back. The seats were leather, and the interior was well-maintained. It was nicer than anything she'd been in before. The driver was a well-dressed older fellow, except for his beard, which had gone too many days without being trimmed.

"Get home safe, okay? Sorry about the bad luck on the boon," Arcadia said as he closed her door. He didn't wait for her reply.

The driver took off a second later, and her thoughts turned back to her newly gotten boon; she rechecked her status, which still displayed the same thing. She didn't go so far as to activate it yet; who knew what it could do, and the last thing she needed right now was to blow up a taxi. Especially since they were very much in the air. She did try to interact with her system, but the stupid thing barely worked on a good day. From what she’d been told in school, some group had tried to modify it and instead blew themselves and half the continent up.

Friendly Shadow You can summon your shadow

How did she do that? She tried to interact with it more, but nothing else came up. She’d have to do some research later but at least she could bring up a description, however lacking it may be. She didn't know what summoning her shadow entailed but it shouldn't blow anything up when she did so. That was the problem with some of these boons, and it wasn't unheard of for someone to hurt themselves and others after receiving a new boon. Technically you had to register any boon you had with the government on paper but in reality they didn't care until it was higher then E-rank, there was almost nothing dangerous that low to warrant all the paperwork they'd have to do.

For the rest of the ride, she thought about what her power could be and, more importantly, what she would tell Jin and Louis. If she could leverage her skill into work or something, she’d be able to help around the house with bills and stuff. At this hour, Jin would probably be asleep, but there was a good chance Louis wouldn’t head to bed for another few hours. They'd been travelling for around fifteen minutes already if she had to guess, and it wouldn't take much longer to get home-

-Wait.

She never gave them her address.

"Where are we going?"

"Hmm?" The driver turned up the radio and flicked a switch, which caused a black divider to rise between them. It closed just as Grim slammed into it, causing her to bounce off the hard plastic.

"Hey! Let me out!" She pounded on the divider some more, but it didn't budge. She looked around and saw that the backseat was clean but bare. On her person, she had her bag with a first aid kit and her everyday carry stuff. None of that would help her here, so she grabbed the knife in her pocket. She tried the doors and wasn't surprised that they were locked, so she flipped open her knife and jammed it in the locking mechanism.

She couldn't accomplish much besides stabbing it a few times and damaging the finish. She didn't have enough leverage with only one arm to stab into it and mess with the electronics.

She felt the car start to land, and an adrenaline spike hit her. This was not good; the only chance she had was to wait until they opened the door and make a break for it. Grim waited with her knife in front of her, crouched, and readied to launch like a spring at the first person to open the door. The hover taxi touched down, and she heard the car shut off and the driver get out. Her skin prickled as she strained her ears to hear through the thick material of the vehicle. As if in response, footsteps travelled from the driver's side door to outside hers, and another pair met them. The voices were muted through the material, and she couldn’t understand what they were saying.

She waited for almost a minute before the voices outside started to yell.

"A fucking D-rank skill? No one’s going to pay for that. What the fuck were you thinking?" A voice filled with gravel asked.

"I'm paid to move whoever gets in my car. If it's not who you wanted, then it's your problem. Just get her out of my vehicle," her driver replied.

Whoever gets in her car? Did Arcadia set her up? Fuck, he did seem to be trying too hard to be nice. She shouldn't have trusted him, but this was still okay; if there were only two people, she could hit the first person with her knife and then do a runner. Pop her skill if she needs to; the only thing she'd need to look out for is any boons of their own. Much higher than D rank, and she was screwed no matter what, but she'd burn that bridge when she got to it.

They continued to argue as she heard one of them go to open the door; she pushed off the floor and jumped right as it opened, sticking her knife into the stomach of one of the men. Blood stained her knife as she looked upwards and saw she'd gotten her driver. His face was a mask of surprise before changing to anger.

The next thing she knew, she was sprawled out on the dirt, looking up at him as her head swam. He ripped out the knife from his gut and threw it away. It still bled, but a lot less than she was expecting it to. Definitely a D rank. Shit.

Grim spat out some blood and smiled, her teeth covered in blood, "Can we talk about this?"