Chapter 28:

Titus looked down at Alice where she sat in the center of her ritual circle. The weird glowing lights from the lines she had drawn on the ground unnerved him slightly. It was something he had never seen before. Not in his very long life. And, well, it was only one of many things that had changed recently, but he was starting to get a little concerned.

Was she going to answer him, he wondered? Speaking a fourth time didn't seem like it would get her attention, but suddenly, he heard her voice.

"Yes, I think it's working."

Her mouth didn't move, her voice instead seeming to echo through his mind. Her voice sounded terrified and uncertain.

"What?" Titus repeated out loud. "How am I hearing... what?"

A notification appeared in front of him.

[Your Bonded has reached out to you. The mana cost for maintaining the connection falls to you, the Bondholder. Congratulations, and treat your Bonded well. May your Servant/partner/worshiper provide you with great service.]

"What?" Titus roared, shaking his fist at the sky. "System, take this away. I didn't offer a contract. I don't want someone in my head," he yelled.

He poked at a thing he could feel in some ephemeral sense that was different in his magic. It wasn't just some change in the mana around like he'd thought when Alice had taken her class. It had followed her, and now that he knew what it was, he realized it was giving him a bit of information. It was pointing him to Alice and telling him a little about her emotions. She was scared, uncertain, and more than a little angry. Angry at him.

"SYSTEM!" Titus roared at the sky.

But even as his rage rose, he felt his energy levels dropping. His meager mana reserves were being used to keep the circle active. The communication was open, and he could hear an endless stream of not-quite words coming from Alice's thoughts as the link tried to interpret the images or however she thought in something he could understand. The pain in his mind started to mount as the gibberish became more incomprehensible, and his energy drained faster.

"No," Titus said, but his energy was draining, and his rage started to flicker, just like his vision. Suddenly, he knew no more.

***

Alice watched as Titus collapsed. The red energy powering the communication ritual around him faded.

"What the fuck?" she said as she jumped up and ran over to him. "How... What the..."

She paced back and forth, suppressing the urge to be angry at him. If he had known this was happening, she would be kicking him in the ribs. But clearly, he was just as taken aback as she was.

How the fuck is he my pact bond? I didn't agree to a contract with him. He didn't write the contract. The System made it.

The system had made them almost equal partners. In fact, there really wasn't any weird master-servant relationship in the contract at all. Just that Titus could offer a portion of his magic to her under certain circumstances, as long as she aligned with his goals. There was the point that she couldn't betray him, but that was kind of a given already. And if he betrayed her, she just wouldn't help him anymore. And he couldn't even take away these powers otherwise.

Alice still fumed at the thought. She had thought she was going to get a pact bond from the mighty System, something that was going to be powerful and make the rest of this trip easy, allowing her to quickly level up and become powerful enough to take on any monster before they got too strong. But no, no. How did Titus qualify as a being of ancient power? The System was really taking liberties with this.

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A sinking feeling filled Alice's gut, and she stumbled back from Titus. Was he really who he said he was? She knew he had been keeping things from her, but how much did she really know about him? Was he even human? Was he some sort of high-level monster designed to trick her? Was he a creation of the System, like the consortium, the bank, or the luminaries? Did he even exist before the world? Was he some part of the lore the System was building around itself so that the world had a backstory?

Alice backed up against the ATV and almost stumbled. She sat down on the lip of it and stared at Titus's unconscious body, wide-eyed and nearly hyperventilating. She sat there for half a minute, gathering her thoughts before she started to approach the situation differently.

Well, the question of if he was real would almost be as impossible to answer as if they were living in a simulation. Alice had chosen not to believe that particular idea, since it wouldn't be particularly helpful. As for Titus… well, she'd have to see what he had to say. She wasn't about to leave him here. She needed him too much. And as long as he helped her, did it really matter? Maybe. She didn't know.

Focusing on the little knot of something in her head that she associated with her class and her perception, she realized more of what it did. It wasn't just a connection to something; it was a channel, a very narrow channel. She could only feel a few things. She could tell that Titus was in front of her, and she had a vague idea of how distant he was. She could feel that he was unconscious but not hurt, just drained of mana.

And she realized what had happened. The mana powering the ritual had come from Titus, not her, and apparently, he didn't have as much mana as she would have thought an ancient and powerful being would have. Looking at him, he still blazed brightly in the mana sight, and she wondered if that might have something to do with the ancient power, which confused her. Did he just not having enough accessible mana to sustain this sort of thing? Because there was a lot of mana around him, more than anything she had seen, and it always bugged her.

Alice brought up the contract again and read through it. There was no way for him to order her around, and the only way he could take powers away from her was if she betrayed him. Well, it was a little bit weird, but it made her feel a bit better. But what powers would she lose? Would she lose the levels in her class? Would she lose whatever powers the pact bond was giving her? Would she lose all the skills of her class? She didn't really understand.

She focused, and suddenly, her [Mother of All] title activated. She suddenly knew it would be anything offered by the pact bond, but she wouldn't lose her levels, stats, or even skills. She sighed, not really understanding what she got from the pact bond, so the loss would be minimal anyway. She could always replace the skill if she needed to, but it didn't seem to be a central pillar of her class.

The first gift from [Pact Bond] made itself known. She had a new title. [Agelessness]. It did exactly what it sounded like. Her Bondholder had shared a bit of its—his—nature and power. Now, she would no longer age.

That had some pretty clear implications about Titus, and she felt a lot of pieces click into place as she read it. Still, those questions would have to wait until he woke up.

She focused, trying to get her title to activate again, and she really wished for a help menu. However, the intuitive understanding of system elements told her that there wasn't really a way to change her class. There seemed to be a potential of maybe upgrading it eventually or getting a second class, but she couldn't just abandon the one she had.

She sighed and stood up. There was not much to it now. She would have to wake Titus up and ask him. It was interesting, though, that this was the first time he was unconscious instead of her. Maybe if everything turned out okay, she'd tease him about it.

Alice walked over and crouched down, rolling Titus over to his back. He was still barefoot, having not had the chance to replace the boot he had lost, and luckily, his feet were calloused enough that riding the dirt bike barefoot hadn't given him too much difficulty. His jeans were a little dirty, and his t-shirt was no longer nearly as clean as it had been once.

This change of clothes had lasted him for a bit, but he would need to change soon, and he was going to need a shave. A couple of days of stubble had turned into almost a full, short beard.It fit his face well. His shaggy hair was covered in dirt now, and his eyes were closed.

She reached out, not sure how to wake him up, and tapped his nose. Then she shook his shoulder slightly.

His eyes shot open, and he froze, his hand halfway raised in a defensive position until he recognized her. They sat there, him on his back, her squatting next to him, staring at each other for several seconds.

Alice's brain kicked back on. She forgot the questions she was going to ask and instead asked in a whisper, "What are you?"