Emily

I reach out to open the door when it suddenly swings open and a girl on the phone walks hurriedly out of it. “...I hate you for this you know, PM and…” she is soon out of earshot.

After that little surprise, I enter the Bookshop. The shop is smaller than I had imagined. In the center of the room, some tables and chairs are arranged. Apart from that, the only other pieces of furniture in the shop are the bookshelves filled with books.

“Hello, I’m Hugo. Can I help you with anything? Any book you would like to read?”

I turn and see a muscular-looking man standing behind a counter, looking inquisitively at me. He doesn’t fit my image of what the owner of a bookshop would look like. When Ian had mentioned that he was walking in a bookshop, I had imagined a somewhat elderly, kind-looking woman wearing glasses as the owner, not this muscular man covered in strange-looking tattoos. Strangely though, he strikes me as a kind person as he smiles at me.

“Hi, I’m Emily, I-”

A slight frown appears on his face as he asks. “Are you Ian’s sister?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“No wonder. You two look so similar. So, what can I do for you?”

“I was wondering if I could see him.”

He tsks as an apologetic smile appears on his face. “I’m sorry he’s kinda busy at the moment.” He motions with his thumb to the door behind him. “I have no idea how long he’s gonna be gone, but you can take a seat and wait if you want.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

He nods at me and picks up a pen on the counter and begins writing on an open book in front of him. It kind of looked like a novel.

I take a seat and begin waiting. I suppose I should be unhappy that I have to wait for Ian, but to be honest I am quite relieved. Ever since I made up my mind to figure out what is wrong with Ian, I had been unable to think of where to start. Finally, yesterday I decided that since his job was one of the weird unexpected things that had happened to him, I might as well start here. I have no idea what to expect so I just decided to come here and wing it. I had asked for Ian but I didn’t have a good reason to do so. At least now I could think up a good reason for why I came to look for him. If he is here that is.

Hugo had made it sound like Ian was doing some work in that room behind him, but how come I can’t hear the sounds of someone working? It is pretty suspicious, but looking at him as he writes obliviously in his notebook one would think all is normal.

After some time I can’t help but ask. “Are you writing a novel?”

He glances up at me and nods. “I am. I hope to one day become a bestselling author.”

“Is that why you opened a bookshop?”

“No, I opened it because I like book-”

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A loud crashing sound comes from the room behind Hugo. It sounds like a lot of books falling to the ground. It is followed by what sounds like a curse, which is muttered by a voice similar to Ian’s.

Hugo’s expression immediately becomes stern. “Ian,” he shouts, “is everything okay.”

“Yeah,” this time I am sure it is Ian. “Sorry.”

Silence soon follows, and after a few seconds, Hugo goes back to writing in his notebook.

Now that I know Ian is here, staying here seems kind of pointless... After waiting for around a minute more, I stand up to leave.

“You’re going?”

I nod. “Can you please tell Ian that I came?”

He nods. “No problem. You sure you don’t want a book before you leave?”

I shake my head. “Nah. Maybe later.”

He doesn’t insist. “Okay, have a nice day.”

* * * * * *

Hugo

I stare at the girl’s back as she leaves, my mind turning rapidly as I try to figure out why she came here. She obviously wasn’t here for her brother. If I couldn’t detect something that simple then I don’t deserve to be a Guardian. Does she suspect something? I wonder before finally shaking my head. I don’t know enough about her to come to any conclusion, still, it was probably a good thing I played that little trick on her hearing. I make up my mind to talk to Ian about it. Hopefully, he has been careful with keeping what he is secret, else, I pity what could happen to his family.

* * * * * *

Ian

We seat in the Arena, our eyes trained on the stage as we watch Gabe introduce the fight. Like everyone else, he seems pretty excited about what is about to happen...

At this point, Lathia has already told me the reason for the fight. According to her, PM and his team were assigned a mission, and to improve their chances of completing it, a Teacher assigned Jade to lead the team. But PM wasn’t comfortable with that, since he believes he will be able to lead his team of more than three years better than a complete newbie to the team. Jade disagreed. And so he challenged Jade for the right to lead the team.

More important than that, Lathia explained to me a strange Laen rule which simply put is just: if you are strong enough you can do as you wish. Basically, the rule authorized the settling of all arguments through combat. On the condition that it must be done in the Arena. Fighting outside the Arena or other designated areas will lead to suspension, which is apparently really bad.

And so, PM and Jade’s disagreement finally led to this, whosoever wins the fight gets to lead during the mission.

Gabe says excitedly. “It begins in three, two, one…”

Gabe disappears as he counts down to one, leaving only the two combatants in the ring. Neither of them moves, choosing to stare at each other. PM then proceeds to close his eyes.

“What are they doing?” I ask after they maintain this state for a few seconds.

“Just turn on your second sight and watch,” Lathia says, eyes fixed on the stage.

I turn on second sight but don’t see anything strange happening on the stage. That is until PM opens his eyes. One of his eyes is glowing white while the other remains normal. It is such a simple change, yet I can tell it is anything but simple.

Jade smiles and settles into a stance.

PM’s face is completely serious as the noers on his canister begin to glow. An opening appears on the top and some small black balls with a purplish glow around them float out of it.

“What are those?” I can’t help but ask.

“His weapons, he calls them pyli.” Drew replies, confusing me a bit more. Those things do not look like weapons. They looked like floating bits of black oil with a purplish glow added in. PM raises his hand and five of the pyli attach themselves to his fingers before stretching out to form claws. Then he too assumes a stance.

They stay like that for some seconds more, studying each other. Then PM flashes. There is no other word I can use to describe the speed he uses to move. One moment he is opposite Jade, the next he is behind him, a clawed hand striking at his head. Jade dodges as he turns around to face PM. PM attacks his face once again with his clawed hand. Jade grabs the hand, moving it away from himself while hitting PM with his other hand.

As his hand touches PM’s chest I hear Drew exclaim. “Shit!”

I understand why a moment later when flames explode from the point of contact between Jade’s palm and PM’s chest, completely obscuring everything in front of him from view. I feel chills run down my spine as I watch the flames that look like they can consume everything. The flames die down a moment later and PM is gone. The only thing left of him was the hand that Jade had grabbed.

“What the hell!” the words burst out of my mouth before I could control them.

“Calm down, he’s fine,” says Drew reassuringly.

I’m about to argue when a human-shaped portal appears and PM walks out of it unharmed, the pyli still following behind him. The only thing different is that from elbow down, his right hand is missing. The hand in Jade’s grasp. That hand flexes and the black claws begin to spread, covering the entire hand with the same black substance they are made of. Jade promptly drops it like it’s diseased and it is consumed by the blackness. A second later, the missing part of PM’s hand begins to appear. Soon he is whole once again.

“They were just probing each other,” Drew explains.

That was just probing? I think incredulously. I try to put myself in both their shoes and quickly come to the realization that if I were to replace either one of them, I wouldn’t have survived any of their ‘probing’ attacks. On the stage, PM raises his other hand and five more of the pyli attach themselves to his other fingers, forming more claws. He looks at them and is apparently satisfied with what he sees. He turns to Jade.

“Are you ready?” he asks.

“Whenever you are,” Jade replies, a proud expression on his face.

PM nods and the fight begins.