Chapter 84: When In Rome
As Graff watched his band of thieves fall one by one, he realized he had to make a choice.
Run, fight, or surrender?
Although he was higher ranked, his abilities focused on power and recovery over speed. He saw that at least three members of the enemy team possessed high speed movement capabilities. He may eventually be able to escape, but would he survive fending them off?
The thought of surrender and escape rankled him. He knew, perhaps, within his rotted depts that his pride was built on the bones of the inexperienced and the weak. Graff didn’t think himself prideful—he was practical—yet his situation was unmistakable. To deny his situation deny his life for death. His mind churned as he surveyed the battlefield, searching for lifelines within the darkness that’d hold if he grasped them.
Graff made no move as Scar Throat breathed his last or as Lala screamed miserably in both mental and physical annihilation. Rushing to save either bandit put himself at risk. He may protect those around him, when appropriate, but it was a matter of mutual benefit, not camaraderie.
There was no winning path there: no survival.
Fighting, Graff realized, was also a doomed prospect. Those innocuous afflictions had begun to build. The teleporter with the thin black sword, whose attacks originally stung like mere paper cuts, had started to gouge flesh with every attack, even those that barely bit into his skin past his armor of fur. The longer the fight dragged on, the more dangerous she became. If he could not finish the three hounding him now, then he could not win when the rest of their comrades joined them.
“Wait,” he demanded to the two attacking him, “Wait a moment.”
They ignored him, sword and fist pummeling his repeatedly.
“Wait!” He said with a bit more urgency and force, “Don’t ignore me!”
*****
Nara felt she was developing a bad habit. A very bad, no good, terrible habit.
She didn’t want the fight to end. Not because she enjoyed fighting (she wasn’t that far gone), but because she enjoyed her own progress. Seeing her own improvement—both as numbers and percentages of progress in her status, and as her improving combat competency, scratched that ever present itch in her mind. Even as her muscles tensed and flowed and stiffened, the progress relaxed her, deep hands pushing into knots, untangling them.
It was so reassuring to know she was improving. To know that it was not all for knot—ahem, naught.
Was that all it took? If she could have seen an Intelligence stat moving upwards as she read and memorized, would she have dedicated her life to learning? Her Guide was not nearly so numeric, essences and essences abilities were not (the Guide was a translation of sensations, a representation of reality), but it was enough.
If she indeed had chosen her own racial abilities, then she had chosen well.
(She really shouldn’t be surprised that her soul knew herself so thoroughly. Duh.)
So she honed her sword and her abilities, reassured that it was improvement. Confident in progress.
At first, she developed her application of Infinity Domain, transforming it into a rudimentary cushion. She then focused on her swordplay, leaning more into flowing aspects of The Way of the Dancer. The flowing style of The Way of the Dancer contained aspects of force redirection and manipulation of Tai-Chi. Using your enemies’ strength against them was easier with direct physical contact, but Nara needed to apply it to her sword.
She observed; she saw that Sen’s fighting style contained traces of that concept. His staff was sturdier than her sword, and more easily able to redirect and block the strength of Graff’s attacks.
Direct parries were impossible for Nara. She didn’t have the boosted strength that Sen had from multiple abilities. Karmic Warrior had been building over the course of the fight, easing Sen’s burden and closing the gap in strength. He would never surpass Graff’s power, especially since Graff’s own abilities focused on it.
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Ability: [Karmic Warrior]
Essence: Balance
Awakening Stone: None
Special Ability
Cost: None
Cooldown: None
Effect (Iron): Gain an instance of [Agent of Karma] when subjected to damage or any harmful effect, even if the damage and/or effect was wholly negated.
* [Agent of Karma] (boon, holy, stacking): The [Power] and [Spirit] attributes are temporarily increased by a small amount. Additional instances have a cumulative effect.
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Combined with Sen’s Racial Ability Soul-Body Equilibrium, Sen was a monster in attributes, rounded out completely with no clear weaknesses.
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Racial Ability: [Soul-Body Balance]
When an attribute gains a bonus through a boon, the attribute with the lowest value additionally gains that bonus. Increased resistance to effects that decrease attributes.
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He was strong, fast, tough, recovered quickly, and his spells were powerful. This racial ability reflected Sen’s commitment to round is own abilities out. Sen trained everything, leaving nothing behind. As expected of Sen; he would not be Sen if he had a clear weakness.
(If Eufemia had a clear weakness, it was a trap. Or was it?)
Nara pulled from both her skill book and from Sen. He was a live demonstration of the effect she was trying to achieve. She started to use Infinity Domain not only as a cushion, but as a redirection to shift the direction of incoming attacks in a way that allowed her to deflect attacks. Infinity Domain allowed her to compensate for her mistakes and inaccuracies. Whether she wanted the attack to slide off or miss completely, she could nudge space itself to adjust for the final outcome.
Her experimentation wasn’t without hiccups. She mismanaged a deflection attempt, and a large strike send her directly into the ground, her back caving in the dirt beneath her. The impact disoriented her. If she had lungs, it would have knocked the wind entirely out of her, beyond the time she wiped out on her boogie board at the beach when she was young. At the time, the thought of being sucked below the waves, air knocked from her lungs, had terrified her. Now, not so much. She had other things to fear.
A shield saved her from a follow up attack, buying her enough time to teleport away while John used his Fountain of Life ability to repair her broken bones. Nara rested for but a moment and got back up (always get back up, always move. It’s what Amara had taught her).
Healing two fights simultaneously would have been too much for John if not for the new ability he awakening from an Awakening Stone of the Avatar.
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Ability: [Healing Avatar]
Essence: Life
Special Ability
Cost: None
Cooldown: None
Effect (Iron): Maximum mana is increased. Mana regeneration is increased.
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The ability compensated for John’s outworlder origins which had almost no benefit in combat. Most healers were elves or runics (or humans, whose racial evolutions tailored themselves to whatever role they adopted) whose racial abilities provided more mana and mana regeneration from the start.
Thanks to this new ability, John had the additional mana and mana regeneration edge that allowed him to handle simultaneous fights. With all other fights out of the way, the burden on John had considerably diminished.
*****
Graff knew it was over.
There was only three iron rankers fighting him, but another three waited in the wings in case the original three needed help. The healer now had his full focus on the original two, which improved his supporting accuracy and reduced his mana expenditure. He saw Lala’s burnt, battered, and bloodied body curled on the ground. He didn’t care that the woman died, but that meant her opponent, the beautiful wine-haired celestine, stood off to the life, looking on Graff with the disgust one expressed when accidentally stepping on dog poop with designer-brand shoe.
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The scarier iron ranker was the human waiting off to the side, conjured sword resting in a non-conjured sheath. That human had eliminated Scar Throat with the ease and grace a professional dancer that also happened to be both captivating and decapitating his audience. Scar Throat had been the only adventurer trained essence user among them, and he had been reduced to crawling on his knees begging for his life to be ended as a mercy. What it gave Graff was a spear of dread in his gut.
He took a massive leap back, and held is bear arms up. His transformation slowly undid itself, returning him bare-chested if not for his plush carpet of chest hair.
“Look,” he slowly began as the adventurers eyed him warily. They were battered as bloody as much as him, but they were together. He was alone (except for that idiot Chester, who was sitting on the ground absentmindedly with shackles around his wrists. What was he doing?) “I apologize if there’s some sort of misunderstanding here.”
Nara wanted to roll her eyes. A non-apology, of course.
“There is no misunderstanding,” Sen said coolly, “We have found and identified the bodies of the adventurers inside the bunker. Do you claim to have no part in that atrocity?”
“Of cour—”
“I don’t believe you.”
Graff resisted the impulse to glare, and forcefully suppressed his irritation. He had barely gotten a word in. “I didn’t even say anything, young man. Aren’t you a bit hasty?”
“It matters not if you claim you did or did not have a hand in what occurred. We offer you two options.”
Graff ground his teeth.
“Won’t you give me a chance to explain?”
Sen looked unimpressed, and waited. His eyes spared no glance for lies and trickery, and Graff felt his cautious, desperate hope shrivel.
“What options?” Graff finally forced out.
“Your surrender or death.”
“That isn’t much of a choice young man. What exactly am I surrendering for?” Graff looked around the field, “You are the ones who’ve committed crimes here. I’m going to report this matter to the nearest adventurer society. If you cooperate, I’m sure we can resolve this misunderstanding. I’ll admit, I am not familiar with these temporary companions of mine. They may have committed crimes, but I don’t think I’ve done anything to warrant this attitude of yours.”
“Choose,” Sen said.
Graff took a step back, ready to run.
“Uh uh,” Nara said, poking her sword into his bare back, “If you run, you’re just making this more fun for me.”
“What the fuck, Nara?” Eufemia exclaimed. “It’ll be more fun?”
(Nara arched eyebrow. As if you don’t enjoy battle too.
Eufemia glared back. I enjoy winning.
And I enjoy improvement. Ta.
Well, that’s what she imagined Eufemia would say.)
“Look, my personality sort of went wonky after that trial,” Nara said, “I sort of enjoy challenge now.”
“That’s good for an adventurer to have,” said Sen approvingly.
“Don’t encourage her!” Eufemia snapped.
“As if you’re the one to say that!”
“John? Back me up!”
John held a hand up in surrender, the other still holding his shotgun. “What do you want me to say? I agree with her.”
Graff didn’t even sense the iron ranker sneaking up on him. Granted, she was unassuming compared to her spectacular teammates, but the sharp blade tracing a slow, menacing line down his back was anything but. Without his transformation, and with the accumulation of all of the afflictions, that blade would rip into his vulnerable spine.
“Well? I’m waiting,” she said, interrupting his thoughts. “Give it a shot, run! I haven’t had to chase a criminal before, could be fun. I’ll cross it off my bucket list. I’m trying to see how many cliches I can hit before going back to my world. It hasn’t been going all too well. The arrogant young master I thought was going to be an antagonist turned over a new leaf pretty quickly—good for him of course, that’s always better than being a cliché. He even saved John’s life, which I’m eternally grateful for. Now I’m waiting for some third-rate villain to tell me, ‘You’ll regret this!’, but I really don’t know that many villains. Surprisingly hard to find when you’re living the straight and narrow. Not that I’ve been looking.”
“What are you even talking about, young lady?” Graff ventured cautiously. There was still a sword there, even if it was apparent she wasn’t quite right in the head. What is a list of buckets for? How many buckets did one need?
She pressed her lips into a disapproving line. “I think you understood all that you needed to understand. Sen’s already given you your options, those are non-negotiable. Tick tock, bear bandit, time to choose.”
Graff ground his teeth together, internally seething. If he couldn’t detect this woman so close to him, then there was no way he could escape her now. He needed to bide his time and wait for another opportunity, “I’ll surrender. We can discuss this situation now, right?”
A thick metal collar was tossed onto the blood splattered dirt in front of Graff. He recognized what it was—a suppression collar.
“Now this is restricted goods, young man,” Graff said, mustering a tone of disapproving authority.
“I’m a diamond ranker’s grandson, you think I care? You don’t know who you’re dealing with. Spare us this pointless whining and do as you’re told like the good little bandit you are.”
Graff couldn’t tell if the young man was lying. If his evaluation of whether he was telling the truth was based on looks and skill alone, the young man scored full marks in both categories. He reached down, cautiously eying the self-proclaimed diamond ranker’s grandson, then crushed the collar with his bare hands.
His power was that of strength. Overwhelming strength. With metal twisted beneath his hands, his heart steadied.
“Now what?” Graff said with a smirk, “I’ve gotten rid of these restricted goods for you. You should be thanking me.”
Encio tossed another on the ground.
“Last chance.”
Graff reached forward to smash the collar again before Encio interrupted him.
“Don’t misunderstand, it’s the last chance for you. I have more where those came from. I’ll take your next action as indicative of your choice.”
Graff grasped the collar again, feeling the smooth metal beneath his fingers. The suppressive power tingled beneath the metal, waiting just as six iron rankers did. Some watched, others looked bored, peeling flakes of dried blood from leather armor, and running a hand through hair to brush aside dirt. He could crush the collar again. Then what? A blade in his back? The futile fight of a six versus one melee where he had struggled just three?
Seething, Graff slipped the collar over his neck, and it locked itself in place.
*****
Suppression collars didn’t suppress supernatural strength, which was integrated into the body on further rank ups. Graff and Chester, the only two bandits still alive, both had strength boosting abilities like Sen.
The two were both outfitted with thick manacles and bindings, tied up like dumplings and slung over the back of Aliyah’s dragon familiar, Ensi, like they were door-dashing a criminal bounty in a fantasy world. Nara kept her afflictions growing on Graff and Chester, as a precaution. They did no damage, so they could not die from the afflictions, although it would make them extremely easy to kill later if they tried to escape.
Graff’s frustrated and enraged expression was enough to assure Nara he wouldn’t.
Since they were already there, the team decided to clear out the monsters in the other sections of the ruined town. They had cleared out monsters near the exit they fought at in order to eliminate and chances of interference, but hadn’t touched the rest of the town. Even if there were no contracts for the monsters, a single looting ability meant monsters were money. With two looting abilities, monsters made bank.
Well, made bank for iron rankers.
Night had already fallen, transforming the nearby forest and ruins into the setting of a horror game. Lumi glowed at full power, casting warm fire light over a large area, like a miniature sun, its warm glow changing the genre away from horror into something more introspective and meditative. Eufemia’s Light Rays shot out like red hot knives bullets piercing through the darkness, their bright light seared both visually and physically into the monsters she shot them at.
They took a rest within Nara’s domain door. The team was exhausted from their fights. It would be dangerous to be inattentive with a bronze ranker around, even bound up, so they would rest before returning to East River Quarry Village, then Sanshi.
Graff and Chester were brought inside. Nara couldn’t force them inside, but they had the choice to be left outside alone to their fate of any spontaneous monster manifestation, or sleep inside where it was safe and pleasant. Graff had launched into his usual staunch protest to try to wrangle some sort of deal before he realized the team was perfectly willing (enthused, even) to leave him outside, tired from both his bullshit and their fights. They all passed the threshold of the door, including Chester, who was marveling at the space with childlike wonder. Graff had to roll himself through the domain door like a pill bug, left on the ground where he slept. A cage of iron formed around him, preventing him from rolling himself right back out the door.
*****
The next day, Roan’s body was delivered to East River Quarry Village. The equipment that the bandits had stolen was displayed for his relatives to pick which pieces were Roan. Eufemia kept an eye out for any people that attempted to falsely claim an article, but no one did.
The other bodies were laid out for the village chief along with his aide to see if they could identify any other faces. None of the other dead adventurers had come from their village, although the chief noted which nearby towns also had recently decreased adventurers. The team wouldn’t make a personal trip to those villages, but take the bodies to Sanshi instead. The Adventure Society would contact kin, return personal effects, and organize burial arrangements, whether they opted for the traditional adventurer burial or the family’s own tradition.
A bronze rank criminal was not something the village could handle, so Graff and Chester were taken to Sanshi. The team was given free passage on one of the stone barges heading from the village to Sanshi, courtesy of the chief. John had also gone through and cleansed afflictions and healed villagers free of charge, so they received a grateful send-off.
With matters mostly settled, Nara had a bit of time to contemplate recent events. Namely, she had killed a person for the first time. Now that it was The After, the time where she could contemplate and think.
She wasn’t as affected as she thought she would be. The bandit’s death didn’t weigh on her conscious. There was many reasons that the bandits should die, and humans were masters of rationalization.
The mirage chamber and monster fighting had diluted the impact of attacking a person. Flesh and bone was flesh and bone, no matter the creature it belonged too. Nara was already used to the sensation of severing flesh with her sword (and a ranged weapon, like a gun, would probably have even less impact. If she could handle it with a sword, a gun would be nothing).
No matter how she tried to think about it, no matter how she tried to make herself feel guilty, she could not. She played devil’s advocate with herself to evaluate her own feelings and morals, playing a bit of internal introspection.
When it came to the safety of friends, Nara was surprised with how decisive she was. It was possible the person she killed was forced into banditry due to terrible circumstances, perhaps they were destitute, poor, and providing for their family. The strong and privileged often forget the struggles of the weak, and what they must do to survive. (But a bandit with full essences wasn’t underprivileged, and wasn’t weak. They may not make it as an adventurer, but there was plenty of other labor options in both villages and cities.)
Nara didn’t care much about their circumstances, but she decided on a balanced approach. If she could avoid killing, she would. She didn’t take pleasure in killing, so she may as well let others handle it. Maybe it was unfair to others, but other than John, the others didn’t particularly seem to mind. They weren’t bloodthirsty, just realistic. Or what the standard of ‘realistic’ was in this world.
Adventurers killed monsters.
She was drifting further and further from the life she once had on Earth. The people on this world didn’t give a rat’s ass whether she killed someone or not, but that view wasn’t shared on Earth. In fact, the team got stranger looks for having a captive bandit over just killing them outright.
Would her family look at her the same way if she knew? She’d worry about it if she ever made it back. Even if they didn’t, she didn’t think she minded.
She had never chased the approval of her family anyway. She was as she always had been, content with herself. She couldn’t control what others thought of her. She could explain—and they made that decision for themselves.
For now, when in Rome…