C.S.O Melbourne branch.

Dupont, as things stood, was not having a good day. But there was a small silver lining to it. She was one of the very few who knew today would not be a good day.

It would be the worst day.

The worst day mankind had ever had.

Shortly followed in sheer horror by the days preceding it. To know such a thing and keep it hidden from the world had been a heavy burden on her despite logic telling her it was the best course. She knew why they couldn’t inform the world. Because they weren’t allowed to.

The Administrators that handled their world’s integration had forbid it. Strictly so. She tried not to think about it, as hard as that was. Because she had a job to do. One that was being performed by about ten thousand other C.S.O agents across the world.

Spark requirement. Out of all the functions of the C.S.O., the organization considered this the most crucial. The facility she was currently power jogging through was built solely for that very purpose. To support Sparks in their growth.

Because they would become humanity’s lifeline in the grim future. They needed to be capable of defending Earth when the time came.

And for that goal, the nations of the world had pooled their resources to no end. Constructing thousands if not tens of thousands of underground fortresses with the facilities necessary to house and train Sparks to draw out their newfound abilities and latent potential.

But before they could just let them into the program, there was a screening process. One Dupont was directly in charge of. Criminal records, psychological reviews and rampant background checks were just the beginning. There are processes on processes that Sparks needed to be evaluated through before Dupont would be willing to approve them.

Right now that was her sole focus. Other departments of the C.S.O. were responsible for crisis management and civilian safety, working hand in hand with the military. They needed to prioritise the problems of now so she could worry about the problems of later.

Problems that were far more monstrous.

With that in mind, she focused on her heavy steps and reviewed her tablet. She swiped through names, reviewing the profiles of the initial Sparks that had heeded their advice and signed up to the C.S.O.

They were all still in the early stages of processing, but once that was through, the facility she had lived in for a month straight might finally start feeling less like a concrete prison. The crew that manned it was skeletal now, but that was only because it was intended to house Sparks.

Dupont rushed until she was up the stairs to the control room, greeting security on the way with a nod as she played with the security panel on the door to it slid open.

Inside was a litany on the walls, all spaced apart around a large table that was shaped as an eagle. The same eagle logo that was badged to her jacket. As she stepped inside, the usual warmth of industrial heating the facility held was replaced by a stiff chill.

“Major Aven,” Dupont said with a nod, greeting the Major who sat at the head of the empty table, watching the screens in silence.

“Agent Dupont.” The Major said, returning the greeting.

He didn’t continue, so Dupont let out a huff of cold air and let that responsibility fall on herself. Why the Major enjoyed the cold so much, she didn’t know. Maybe he thought it made him seem tough. Maybe it helped him think. It wasn’t her place to ask, so she didn’t.

“The initial estimates for requirements across the southern and eastern Victorian areas for Spark recruitment are higher than was predicted.” Dupont started, linking her tablet to on of the main screens so she could display the data.

The Major stayed silent but nodded for her to continue.

“However the north and western districts of Victoria seemed to have been hit harder by the fallout, causing a lapse in desire to seek us out. From historical data, I’m fairly confident the numbers will spike back up to expected levels once the public sentiment for the C.S.O. moves from suspicious to trustworthy. But for now, we are heading towards having a pool of recruits almost twenty percent smaller than predicted.” Dupont concluded, swiping her tablet to display the exact numbers on the screen.

Again the Major stayed silent, save for the nervous tapping against the large table. His eyes slowly moved between the numbers, taking them in carefully before he spoke.

“What of the Invited?”

Dupont felt the urge to curse under her breath but held it. She had hoped he’d have skipped past that part and moved on to the glaring elephant in the room. Apparently not.

“All three under our jurisdiction are…” She paused to search for the word. “...unreachable at the current moment.”

“Explain.” The Major directed her.

They’re all idiots. Dupont thought to herself, keeping her lips sealed. That wasn’t the complete truth, because the truth was much more confusing.

“Well, to begin with, Dennis Jourten has expressed that he doesn’t require nor want our help. We suspect that he has a Source that the C.S.O. as a whole would deem unsavoury.” Dupont stated.

“What kind of unsavoury?”

“The kind that involves rampant grave robbing. Since this morning that seems to have become Dennis’ hobby.”

The Major frowned, getting the idea. “Necromancy?”

“Yes, or at least something akin to it,” Dupont confirmed. “There have been similar cases from Invited reported across the C.S.O. The current theory is that whatever Aspect is blessing them, also imparts a command not to align themselves with us.”

They’d drawn that conclusion because there were similar cases presented across the fifty-five pre-integrated humans, many of which already possessed Aspects they were blessed by. In those scenarios, the clause to remain unaligned could be waived, but that wasn’t necessarily how it would be for Invited.

The fifty-five were special. All the Administrators for their integration had made that abundantly clear. That was why the selection process for each and every one of them had been so rigid. They needed people who could get the job done.

And yet now there’s another. They made it sound so important and then they just threw this wildcard on top of us- She was getting distracted.

“What about the other two?” The Major prompted, scratching his beard as he seemed to think through the potential problem that was Dennis Jourten. It was a delicate situation, especially if he was what they concluded.

One she would worry about later.

“The news of Jessica Mayves is neutral. By the time our department started making contact with Sparks, she had already left the city.” Dupont stated.

“Do we know why she left the city?” The Major asked.

“Some kind of road trip from what we can tell. One that includes another Spark.” Dupont said.

“What of that one.” The Major said, moving past Jessica to the problem child they had stuck in their lap.

Dupont’s reach surveillance and overall knowledge of the Sparks inside Melbourne was vast, to say the least. She had teams on teams of people scanning through information, footage, reports and data every moment of every day all for her to decide what to do with.

So she knew.

“Nicholas is dead.” She informed the Major, causing him to whip around in his seat with a look of surprise.

He planted his hands on the table as if to steady himself. “How?”

“A knife to the throat.” Dupont clarified. “Some teenagers found him in a back alley and by that time the blood was already dried. Police were in the middle of investigating it when integration began.”

“We’re sure it’s him?” The Major asked.

Dupont nodded. “We’ve acquired camera footage from the area along with all the eyewitness testimonies we could scrounge. We’ve run license plates and watched over the footage for any key persons of interest.”

“And you found nothing.” The Major concluded from her sombre tone. When she nodded again the Major snorted, twisting his frown into a scowl. “Today’s somehow going worse than I feared it would.”

“Major,” Dupont said.

“Yes?” He asked, holding his head in his hands. It was at times like this when Major Aven showed his age. Stress was a venom that dug into him much deeper than her.

She didn’t like to think it, but the man wasn’t going to be suited for his position much longer. The wrinkle lines weren’t the problem. The inability to cut to the point was. Dupont had a feeling that he’d asked her everything other than what he was most curious about, purely because it worried him so much.

It worried her almost as much.

But he wouldn’t bring it up.

So she would.

“Have HQ said anything about the fifty-sixth?”

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

***************************

It felt like falling.

Falling in every single direction at once.

There was a faint chime as the golden words announced the end of his timer, and then James’ world went black. Then he fell. The sensation was not removed from that of a Loop ending, which worried James slightly.

But it wasn’t the same either. It didn’t feel like he was heading towards a blockade. It felt like he was heading somewhere. Tumbling in the void towards wherever the Invitation desired.

The sensation of his body was there. But it also was not. In a strange paradoxical way, James' mind couldn’t quite comprehend. It felt like he was close to comprehending it. Just a step away.

[Mandatory Status check required]

Fantastic. Just what he wanted while tumbling through the void. More golden words that made promises they would deliver in the worst way possible. The looper was growing more and more sick of the system by the second.

[Paradox]

[Designation: James Matthew Groves]

[Age: 16,409]

[Race: Paradoxical Human]

[Class: Unclassed]

[Source: Loop (1)]

[Spark: ?]

[Aspect: None]

[Court: None]

[Guild: Unaffiliated]

[Body: 9]

[Mind: 13]

[Spirit: 20]

[Loops: 1]

[Feats: None]

[Skills: [Second strike](1), [Second Life](1), [Second thought](1)]

Still human. Good sign. James thought, breathing almost a mental sigh of relief. He hadn’t had a look at his status since he’d received it in the car, and he’d only seen the brief mention of his race. Paradoxical Human was still definitively human in his books. That was a good start.

His age was not the nicest thing to be reminded of. The Status was the only place he could be reminded of his age besides his memories. In the mirror, he didn’t look a day older. Only inside these golden words did his ancient nature shine through. Because he was ancient. Older than most countries.

I should qualify for the senior’s menu. That probably wouldn’t exist for much longer, considering what was happening.

Class was a new term to James and the lack of it almost pushed away his attention. Having no Class meant it didn’t do anything for him. He didn’t know what a Class was when he would get it or why he wanted it. So the looper couldn’t really find a reason to justify caring about it. His tumbling would end eventually and parts of his Status seemed much more important.

Why does my Source have one next to it? Odd. Did he get more Sources? James sincerely hoped not. The first one had well and truly fucked him over well enough for one lifetime. Was it some kind of tracker? Maybe a show of progression?

This thing should come with a manual at least. James cursed. It was vague and the looper could tell that was intentional. Part of these Trials was clearly adapting to the system. A system which had been nothing but a pain in his ass till now.

Aspects? Of the three he’d heard, Aspects had always confused James the most. He’d tried to get that information out of Dupont. He’d tried to hack into the C.S.O data banks to acquire it too. It both cases his search came up short. His interrogation of her had been quite brutal and ended in him getting all the names of Invited and Sources present within Australia. She hadn’t told him. It had seemed like she wanted to tell him, and yet she still didn’t.

Very strange.

At the time the looper hadn’t cared much, but now he thought on it James realised just how odd it was. The memory wasn’t the nicest between the screaming and the blood but he could distinctly recall her begging something to be able to tell him.

Did the system… stop her? Or more to the point, did the beings that brought the system to Earth stop her? Was she under some kind of contract not to speak on those things?

She could disclose the location of people, but not information about the workings of the system. That made sense, in a way. It also did not. Whatever the case, Aspects confused James. Mainly because he hadn’t a clue what they could be.

Guilds and Courts are… fairly straightforward. Because Earth had Guilds and Courts. He could draw from history to get a guess at what they were. Aspects? Not a clue.

And then there’s-

His thoughts were cut off by the sound of another chime in the void.

[Zenith’s Calling]

[Invitation Description: Called to Zenith by power and promises, you are among those elite who have been gifted with an opportunity to prove themselves on the fields of Zenith. By her mighty grace, you have been given a stage to prove your species' worth. You will find yourself on the Outer Ring of Zenith, in a separate territory belonging to your race and three other races. In this territory sits four Conclaves, which are the heart of your first Invitation.]

[To succeed in this test and create a Spire to Zenith for your race, you must bring Lumina to the Conclave’s Heart. Doing so will allow it to grow from simple ground protection to something mightier that might connect your world to Zenith itself.]

[Lumina can be found within the Fractures littering Zenith’s Outer Ring. Splintered lie there, waiting to hunt you as you hunt them.]

[You have also been granted one Lumina, as have all others of all races answering the Zenith’s Call. If you are killed, your Lumina will be transferred to the responsible race. If you are to kill a member of another race, their Lumina will transfer to yours. Accredited to you.]

[Primary goal: Fill your Conclave’s Heart with Lumina]

[Secondary goal: Extinguish a Fracture]

[Secondary goal: Obtain the highest amount of Lumina among all the races]

[Paradoxical Goal: Display Finality]

James wasn’t given time to think on the words that were zipped in front of him. He read them as themselves across his vision and the reality snapped back into being.

His feet stopped falling. Instead, his boots stamped into something… mushy. It gripped them slightly as he pulled his feet up, blinking and cringing at the ample amount of sensation around him.

Before sight or sound, James felt something much more distinct in his array of senses.

Heat.

It was humid. Infectiously humid to the point that James could already feel his body begin to drip with sweat. The looper's brain immediately ticked this a problem. Because it didn’t feel like he was standing in lava. The heat didn’t feel to be from some source nearby. It was atmospheric. Oppressive.

Inescapable.

Chronic dehydration as the first problem is not an optimistic start. James mentally frowned, blinking until the overwhelming light from above became tolerable. His eyes adjusted to see an uneven and very unfamiliar around him.

The sticky sensation was mud, thick mud-like clay that was clinging to his boot. Roots were steeped in it, crawling all across the ground around James and leading up to sprawling trees. Their trunks were a deep brown that slowly turned to grey as they grew. Thick trunks with dense leaves made it impossible for James to see far forward in any direction.

Fauna extended out the ground the same way the roots did, coloured a soft and deep purple same as the leaves on the tree. Bushes, weeds and other greenery obscured everything around James and made him hesitant to move.

Not to mention the vines that hung down from the trees.

Jungle. Was his first thought, but that thinking seemed too linear. Not to mention the dirt was filled with moisture and collapsing under him. It could be a bog of some kind. Or a marsh. The looper couldn’t know for sure until he saw more.

And the sound… was soft. There were low reverbs of wildlife and insects, buzzing and chirping and scratching around him but none of it was loud. Loud enough to draw concern.

The soft rumbling above him did draw James attention but the deep purple leaves above his head hid the sky from him.

Then there was the smell. In a word, it was unpleasant. Not enough to cause James’ nose to scrunch but certainly not the kind he’d like to put up with for long.

Shitty Invitation. James cursed, lowering himself to the empty ground and steering clear of all the bushes around him. He kept one hand on his shotgun as he examined himself and his belongings. He went through all the items in his backpack and on his person, inspecting them until he was sure they were all in order, then took a swig from his water canister.

Bringing more than one was a damn good idea. The first two were for drinking purposes, while the second he’d put in his backpack in case he needed to wash off any wounds.

The looper took in his surroundings again as he drank, slower. Taking in all the gaps between leaves and vines to see if he could spot any sign of movement. Once he was sure there was none, he let his body sink into idle readiness as his brain mulled through everything the golden words had told him.

This is the worst. The worst situation he’d imagined Zenith’s Calling could put him in. Away from his friends and family. He wasn’t with them any more. The system had moved him, for whatever reason, to compete in this…

Death match. It’s a death match. The descriptions were nice and it danced around the hard truth with flowery words. But the hard truth was that this was a death match. That much was blatantly obvious.

The game was simple. There were four races here, including humans. All of them wanted Lumina for their Conclaves. All of them possessed Lumina.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out where that would lead them all.

The system was bringing races here and pitting them against one another. That was the Invitation. James saw through the garbage about the Spire and the roundabout way Lumina was dangled in front of them as justification for murder.

The system just wanted them to kill things.

And it just wanted other things to kill them.

That was all this was.

It felt like a game.

Was this all just a game to it?

Dark emotions boiled against the sea of emptiness in James’ heart, threatening to spill over as his brain realised just what this was. The system had torn him away from his family and friends when he was protecting them so he could take part in a deathmatch. His family was safe for now.

But that was for now.

What if a meteor hit near them?

What if glass zombie Splintered came?

What if Sparks came?

He was meant to be there. All his plans had involved him being there. This was never meant to happen.

James slammed his fist into the mud as hard as he could, blinking himself back into reality as hatred and insanity clawed at him. He didn’t have time for this. For reflection. For worry. He steadied himself back to reality.

He stood. The heat assaulted his every movement. That was good. It made his first course of action clear. The looper needed to find water as fast as he could while trying not to die. The thickets of bush and weeds lay beyond him, along with who knew what dangers.

But James didn’t have time for any of it. He had to get back to his family.

With that in mind, the looper drew his machete and set upon the thick jungle of Zenith.

Ready for whatever horror lay within.

End of Book 1