Arson moved through Osiris’s workshop as fast as he could. He knew where all of the populated areas were within the workshop from his time learning from Merlin and Magnus, as well as Thinker and Bloom’s time sharing notable locations with him through their discussions, after each of his Gestalt form's individual training sessions with the masters.

Arson was halfway through his sweep of the warehouse when he heard Acu yell. Arson froze, for the briefest instant, truly wanting to share his current plight with the man who’d trained him to become a far better shot with a bow than he would have become otherwise. Yet the thought of not following through with Carter’s wants came with a memory of pain that pushed him forward.

“I said stop!”

Arson continued to tap all of the workers he could find, placing the explosive barrels in his inventory all throughout the workshop as he moved. He was surprised that Acu didn’t immediately catch up with his much taller figure, but Arson’s agility had increased to a super speed level of maneuverability since his training in Origin had begun, leaving Arson unaware of how fast he could move.

Sorry master, but I have to do this!

Arson managed to place all the bombs, only for Acu to begin firing, making Arson’s options much more limited as he moved through the workshop. Regardless of his speed, Acu was still able to predict Arson’s movements, arrows narrowly missing him from head to toe; only his Closed Eye Dominion gave him enough of an advanced warning for him to avoid being shot.

“Bloody embers, stop, boy!”

Arson raced through the workshop, dashing for one of the many flying trains speeding through the room. He’d long ago memorized the paths the train cars followed, targeting an empty area that he knew would soon be occupied.

The car landed and Arson dove toward the open door just before it closed and the train took off into the sky. His stomach slammed into his chest as the chaotic path of the train car jostled him about, the experience meant to be had while buckled in to one of the many seats on board.

Arrows began piercing the frame of the train car, with Arson crawling along the bottom in an attempt to make it toward the controls at the front.

“Can you hack this bloody thing,” yelled Arson.

“Already on it, but I’m starting to think that your family has an issue with stealing trains!”

“Shut up and get us the sparks out of here!”

“Aye Aye, captain!”

Arson barely made it to his feet before the train lurched to an immediate stop, launching him to the back of the train; his back slamming into the rear of the car.

Really,” he yelled, rubbing his head as he rolled to dodge another series of arrows that entered the range of his sensory ability.

“Sorry, had to reset it to take control!”

Arson jumped to his feet and rushed to the controls, only to be knocked off his feet once more as another train slammed into the side, t-boning the train car he was inside; the flying train spiraling through the air on a collision corse with the ground below.

“Ana!”

“I’m working on it,” yelled Anastasia in response as Arson was flung into the roof of the now bent train car, dropped to the ground once more as Anastasia managed to stop the car’s plummet, only after it had smashed through an airborne storage container which now had a new giant hole spraying goods through the air as it crash-landed in a spinning nose dive.

“Work faster,” groaned Arson, struggling to his feet.

“Eat sparks, you brat, I’m trying!”

…

Acu continued to fire on Arson, growing more and more enraged by how seemingly elusive the young man was. If it wasn’t for the outrageous scene in front of him that played out with Arson being tossed about like a rag doll, Acu would have started to believe that his disciple’s veins were filled with liquid luck rather than blood.

“Acu, what are you doing!”

Acu glanced to see Merlin gaping at him shooting at the train car that held Arson inside, deciding to yell rather than let anymore distance be gained between him and his target.

“Something is going on with the boy we have to stop him!”

A boom was heard and Acu was forced to duck as Merlin flew pass him at speeds that buffeted him with air, nearly knocking him over in the process. All at the same time the train car began to move again, and gain speed at an alarming rate.

He’s not going to…?

Merlin cursed as the train burst through the exterior wall of the workshop. A spacial rip occurred, causing an explosion that caused Merlin to be knocked backward, as the train car was catapulted further outside of the workshop’s interior.

The wall to the workshop lit with runic patterns and began to reassemble itself brick by brick in front of Acu. He wanted to rush through the hole before it closed, but instead raced toward where Merlin had crashed. An impressively sized crater formed where she’d impacted with a miniature assembly line filled with now burning clothing.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” said Merlin slowly coming to her feet, coughing as she dusted herself off.

“I’ll be back to check on you once I catch the boy,” said Acu turning away once Merlin had righted herself, feeling no need to worry further over his love, until he remembered the bombs that had been placed all throughout the interior of the workshop.

“Can you handle the bombs,” said Acu, looking over his shoulder at Merlin while he pointed at one of the many barrels in the distance filled with a material unknown to him.

“Bombs…?”

Merlin’s eyes went wide as she looked back to see the barrel filled with liquified mana.

“What’s going on? Why would Arson—“

“There is no time, I have to stop him. Can you deal with those?” yelled Acu, running off after Merlin nodded.

“Don’t die!”

“You’re the one playing with bombs, my love!”

Acu’s heart skipped a beat at what he said, but he forced himself to focus, not seeing the blush bloom across Merlin’s face as she yelled back to him.

“Noted!”

…

Arson’s ride on a flying train didn’t last much longer after breaking through the workshop’s wall. The controls stopped working after he made it a mere block away from the formations inside the workshop, causing yet another crash to occur.

Bricks and furniture flew about as the train collided with an apartment building. Arson felt like everything was occurring in slow motion under the effects of his Closed Eye Dominion, and though his life was in jeopardy, Arson hated how his mind fixated on the structural integrity of the buildings the train smashed into; as only the walls they struck in the train car were affected, many of the buildings stayed upright.

Arson and Anastasia screamed as they destroyed a series of shops, Arson doing his best to steer through the structures and not land on anyone. Luckily for him the majority of the shops he crushed the walls of were empty with the exception of the last one.

The train finally stopped, three floors up from ground level. The mixed use building topped with apartments that Arson managed to park the train directly inside.

Arson stepped out of the deformed train car into a showering woman’s bathroom. Her wide eyed gaze turning from silent terror as he approached her, into a holler that managed to make Arson’s ears ring.

She began to throw everything in reach at the young cultivator, Arson dodging easily. Forced to swat away a well aimed bar of soap, tapping the woman on her arm.

She vanished and Arson sighed heavily, wishing that this was his first awkward bathroom experience so far; struggling to push down the memory of the man who tried to throw his own excrement at him after Arson kicked down his door to grab him.

Anastasia laughed and Arson rolled his eyes knowing that as long as he had her on his wrist, he would never be able to live down recent events.

“Oh man, if I had a body, I would be in tears.”

“Happy for you, but we aren’t done here, where do I go next?”

“You honestly only have a few streets left, including the street the Stealth Guild is on, Acu’s manor and the bank.”

“Yeah… this is going to suck, isn’t it...?”

“Yup, I’m sure Rebellion would have stopped you if he weren’t in the dungeon with his students right now, and Magnus and Merlin are probably going to try and hunt you down shortly after they let Osiris know that you planted bombs in his workshop, and I bet Breaker is going to cut you in half if Acu doesn’t shoot you first, just depends which way you go, I guess…”

“Wow, I thought this was bleak before, but chef’s kiss. That was ten out of ten stars for the most demoralizing summary I have ever received…”

“Wow thank you, I am actually proud of that one, but I didn’t give myself an A+ because I didn’t get to add how Carter may kill you if you actually manage to plant the rest of the bombs…”

“Wow, do you even want me to survive?”

“Of course, but my programming is analytical and the bits of my soul that survived me becoming a sparking watch were all rather angry and spiteful… so… go team, I don’t know what you want from me here?”

“Yeah yeah yeah, just give me the nearest point I bet—“

Arson dove out the window as an arrow shot into his sensory abilities range.

“Son of a!”

“Yeah… closest place is Acu’s manor, make a left up here and it will be a few streets down and on the right.”

Arson dropped down and rolled once his feet touched the cobbles. He pushed his legs to move as fast as they could, only narrowly missing the rain of arrows that began to descend all around him.

Man, I wish I could have learned how to do that…

Arson’s ability to escape Acu’s shots was like a rollercoaster rider’s own consistent shift between perceived safety and outright battling the perception of being moments away from death.

He continually grew more capable of evading, then Acu would swiftly increase the severity of each of his shots toward Arson, noticing that his disciple was constantly gaining a feel for the level of combat. Arson even managed to catch an arrow aimed at his throat, all while spinning through the air after running up a small perimeter wall of a manor near to his very own home.

Arson eventually made it to the open gate of Acu’s manor, darting over the bridge that lead inside the small compound of enclosed forrest.

“Arson!”

Arson pushed to run as fast as he could in a straight line, trying to close the distance between him and the tree line in the distance, making it halfway before a series of incredibly powerful shots were sent at his back.

Arson jumped, flattening himself aerially; his body physically pushed upward by the pressure the arrows emanated while speeding beneath his body. He heard Acu curse when he landed, continuing to run without a pause in his momentum.

Guy nearly splits my torso with those arrows and he’s cursing me…?

“Sorry, master, if I had any other choice, I would have never been a part of any of this!”

“Place any of those bombs near my home and my grandfather, boy, and you will give me no choice!”

Arson looked over his shoulder at Acu, shaking his head as he set the first bomb meant for the area at the edge of the tree line, and Acu fired.

Arson hadn’t seen the explosive power of the barrel as Acu had, but still moved through the forest with every bit of alacrity that his body was capable of, knowing that the moment the barrel was punctured that nothing good would arise.

Then it came, a pressure at his back unlike any other he’d ever felt before. The concussive force of the bombs ignition rippled outward, and Arson knew his life was at risk immediately. So much in fact that he immediately took flight.

He flew as fast as the mana available to him would allow, finding himself well above the canopy of trees in a blink. By the time he stopped and turned around, an odd silence had permeated through the monster-filled forest, and Arson’s eyes gaped at the sight before him.

He’d known the barrels were bombs, but the extent to which they were capable of destruction had remained a mystery until that very moment.

Nothing remained but a half circle of burning trees left at the edge of a now ash-filled ring. Arson’s eyes met Acu’s and narrowed, as the two stared each other down. Arson nodded in a confirmation of the conflict that he now felt far less inclined to remain one sided, summoning Jack from his soul realm as he dropped another barrel from his watches spatial inventory.

A rage that Arson struggled to keep within since his childhood was reborn in that moment. He’d felt betrayed by his family, knowing that his siblings wished him dead or gone. By his adopted parents, and even Almarine for allowing for him to be taken from the orphanage by people without good intentions for him.

However, this pain was a new kind of pain for Arson; his anger blinding him from the fact that Acu was unaware of his reasons for his current actions. Instead he contemplated leaving the city his master loved behind, letting the catastrophe Carter had planned for Origin reap its bounty in full.

Unluckily for Arson, he knew no way to trigger his continuance through the trials of Endless and was stuck in Origin until he managed to push through the end of the trial sequence. So instead, he set himself to following through with what he now knew would be an event of cataclysmic proportions.

“Got it, old man, consider this my parting gift. I appreciate all that you’ve taught me…”

Arson shot off into the sky, leaving behind Jack and one of the barrels filled with liquified mana. Acu glanced toward Arson and back toward the Living Hand Construct that held the bomb aloft.

“Well this situation may have just gotten out of hand…”

Then Jack broke the sound barrier as the construct sped through the now open space directly at the edge of the forrest toward Acu.

Acu tried to fire a few arrows, only for the construct blurring toward him to dodge the projectiles easily, leaving Acu with but only one option.

What are you doing you idiot? Run, River!

“Yup… definitely backfired!”