When I woke up, I squinted at what looked like the sun, my body somehow freezing cold. I then realized I was encased in a thin layer of ice. I let out a sigh before slowly sitting up, ignoring the snaps and cracks of the ice around me. I looked around my immediate surroundings to see what looked like a train-sized snake dead asleep nearby. More specifically, coiled around me as if she was protecting me…
Shaking away my very cold headache, I looked around for Treia as one of Mia’s eyes opened.
I frowned at her. “What happened?”
“And let me guess, you held a grudge and decided to eat whoever shot you?” I joked, rolling my eyes.
I blinked, taken aback. “Eh?”
I stared. “Mia, did you at least leave them alive?”
She gave me a large nod before lifting her head and glaring at Treia, who had attempted to pat her from the side her eye was closed at. Treia froze before slowly waving at me.
“You’re awake,” she said flatly, as if it was offensive.
I groaned. “Let’s not do this right at this moment please. I already-”
“WHAT IN HELL CAME UPON YOUR PEA SIZED BRAIN TO BEAT UP OUR PROFESSORS?!”
I cringed. “To be fair, our combat teacher kinda deserved it. Plus, she’s the only person I beat up. Though, it was more of her tanking my hits. I probably could’ve done way more damage if I had enough Mana to spare.”
In my head, Systie grumbled, Well, it was your fault in the first place for portalling us that far away. Also, forget about all that cultivation garbage. I specifically got rid of that form of power since it was so clunky.
I sighed. “Your System’s no better.”
At least it can be improved.
“Sure it can.”
Hey! It’s a lot to handle, you can’t blame me.
Treia, who’d noticed that I was speaking to Systie, gave me a withering glare and I shut my mouth mid-sentence.
“Jason, do you understand what you just did? I could be disowned and exiled because of your shenanigans!”
I stared at her for a long second before I stood and took a breath. Mia, already noticing my annoyance, shifted between me and Treia, leaving Treia looking confused until I gave her a flat stare.
“You chose to come along. I told you not to come with me and now you’re complaining? What bullshit is that? Do you really feel privileged enough to just say that something you did is my fault now? I was only trying to get information for our damned quest. It’s not my fault you insisted on coming with me,” I said, making an enormous effort not to snap at her. “So, quit it with your privileged Princess self and be a normal person for once. We both fucked up, so quit complaining over what we can’t change.”
Treia looked at me, blinking. She then looked at her feet, clearly realizing some sort of truth in my words. “You know what. You’re right. I’m sorry, Jason. It’s just… I realized that even if I didn’t want to be Princess, I don’t want to not be a Princess, you know?”
“Nope. I don’t want to be a Prince, period. However, look at me now. Some random kid is now the future of the Abyss.”
Systie’s eye appeared next to me and looked at me quizzically. What makes you think that?
“I dunno, maybe the sheer joy and hope I gave to the person who is technically supposed to be ‘my Princess’ before tearing it away like a band-aid,” I muttered.
Right. Good point.
After a few moments of silence, Treia looked at me in object horror.
“You what?!”
***
With a long sigh, Jasmine stood up, glanced at her Level, and strode to the war room to look at the, still confusing, dimensional map. She focused on the Overworlds, then to Aurora, the Abyssals’ home planet taken by Humans and what-not.
When Jasmine became the next Abyssal Queen, she’d actually grown hopeful. Maybe Jason, her Prince, would come back to become her King. But he never did. In more than one way, it infuriated her. He was supposed to be with her! Every waking moment of her life, she’d been waiting for her Prince to finally find her. Then, when he did, he ran from her.
Jasmin shook her head.
“No point in thinking about that. I’ve got Valkyries to hunt down,” she muttered. She then cursed as she lost focus and let go of her hold on the map.
Refocusing on the map, she ended up slowly panning over what looked like a forest, but less… dark, like the forests in the Abyss were.
“How the hell did the probes get this far out?” she mumbled. “Did they multiply or something?”
Shrugging, she continued over the forest, searching for her target. She panned for nearly 10 minutes before she finally spotted something: A large glittering snake with ice blue and lightning white scales curled up around a very taken aback boy.
Is that… My Prince and his Serpent? Jasmine thought, utterly confused. And who’s that yelling at him?
Jasmine watched in confusion as the black haired girl who seemed to be yelling at him for some unknown reason. She watched in awe for a long few moments until Jason looked straight up at her, as if he knew she was watching.
***
I felt confusion radiate from Systie as she scanned our surroundings, multiple of her eyes scanning around.
Systie looked at me for a few moments before bonking Treia against the side of her head. Treia gave Systie a withering stare, but Systie ignored it.
I think there’s an important detail that I should tell you about, Jason. This also applies to Mia and partially to you too, Treia, Systie interrupted.
Treia, still outraged, snapped, “What could be more important than-”
Systie sparked with static electricity, taking a small bit of my Mana to shock Treia, who yelped, her facial muscles twitching.
What I think you don’t understand is that Jason isn’t a normal Abyssal Prince. He was, quite literally, thrown into the jaws of the Abyss and then told he was the Prince of a Kingdom he didn’t even know existed. He was told he wasn’t a Human after believing that he was for nearly 17 years of his life. You can’t blame him for not understanding the importance. You were born in this world, he wasn’t. He doesn’t understand or care for the culture here. The only reason he even gives any mind what he does here is because of you. If you weren’t his “girlfriend”- which, from the beginning, you’ve been horrible at being- then he’d probably be out there trying to get strong enough to either go back to the Abyss or cleanse {Corruption}. You’re a liability, yet he still lets you be around.
Do you want to know the only reason he hasn’t gone insane from the complete flip of his life? If so, you should know it’s definitely not you. If anything, you make it worse, reminding him that he can’t be the same person he used to be. But of course, with your sheltered life, you can’t understand that, so you always think you’re helping. You only see him as a Prince who abandoned his duties when, in reality, he’s a boy who needs help from someone who understands! And you clearly don’t understand!
I was about to interrupt Systie before closing my mouth. What she said was true. I wouldn’t have been as blunt, but the sheer surprise on Treia’s face told me that it was probably necessary.
Yes, I thought that Treia was a liability, that much was true. I really only put up with it because I cared about her. But, the truth was, if Treia, Leah, and Mia were in danger and I could only save two, no matter how hard I tried, I knew who I would save. And Treia wasn’t part of that duo.
I looked at Mia, who, even in her Serpent form, looked absolutely bewildered that an disembodied eye was yelling at Treia. I then realized that Systie had started to yell at some point. Despite the lack of emotion in her voice, I could feel her emotions loud and clear through our mental Bond. Despite being part of the one who ripped me from my world, she could only care. I was about to stop Systie when a notification popped up in front of my vision.
Systie, Eye of the System, has become your Bond. In her current state, she can use any of your Skills, but only has two Stats : Dexterity and Mana. In place of Health, she has Mana instead. She also has double the Mana Capacity than normal.
When you reach Level 125, she will gain a Humanoid form. More information on this will be revealed at Level 125.
New Title!
Not One, but Two?
You’re the first person in thousands of years to have more than one Bond. The stress on your mind must be insane, huh?
+ Shared Skill upgrade : Bonded Battling -> Bonded Battling II
+ Unlock Stat Effectiveness (300%-500%)
Bonded Battling II
When fighting with your Bond, every time either of you attack an opponent, both of you gain a 1% Damage Bonus. Stacks 12 times for each of you.
“Uh…” I stared at the screens as Systie suddenly fell out of the air and onto my lap. I could still feel her anger, though it was much more obvious now. I then turned to Mia, who looked even more bewildered than when Systie was yelling at Treia.
I slowly patted Mia as her confusion peaked. “Well, that happened.”
Treia, who looked at me, confused, asked, “What just happened?”
I shrugged and gave her a helpless look. “I think she got so angry, she involuntarily Bonded with me. That’s my best guess, since apparently, she’s now my Bond. I’m pretty sure when Mia realizes what that means, she’s not going to be so happy. Then again, neither will Sys.”
We were quiet for a long few moments as I placed Systie in my lap. After a few minutes, Treia gave me a strange look.
“So… we’re not going to talk about what Systie just said?”
I raised an eyebrow. “Do you want to?”
“...No.”
“There’s your answer.”
Another moment of silence.
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“Jason, I-”
She was then interrupted by Mia’s warning hiss and I heard someone yell from the other side of Mia’s gigantic neck. To put in perspective of how large Mia was, I was 177 centimeters (or 5’10’’ for you Americans), and her neck alone was nearly twice my height. So, when I say she’s the size of a train, I mean it. She may be slightly shorter in height, but she sure as hell made it up in length, being nearly 60 meters long, at a very rough calculation. I stood up and jumped up onto Mia’s back to look down at the person who’d just yelled before realizing I hadn’t disguised myself at all.
Well, damn it, I grumbled, setting Systie down on Mia’s snout, where she froze and looked at the dormant eyeball in confusion.
I frowned at the boy who looked at Mia in terror, not even noticing me. I took the moment to quickly disguise myself and sit down on Mia’s back. However, he still didn’t notice me and was stuttering at the confused Serpent, who had already forgotten about him as she enjoyably balanced Systie on her nose.
This overgrown snake really has no thoughts in her head, huh?
***
Lucas, upon seeing the largest Serpent he’d ever encountered, froze in terror.
There’s… n-no way that isn’t a Dragon. It must be acting like a serpent.
“D-d-dra-dragon-” he stuttered, taking multiple steps back.
There was a sigh. “Are you going to fall on your ass next? Well, you’re fine; no need to have an internal crisis over a big snake.”
THE DRAGON’S SPEAKING TO ME!
“I-I-”
“The snake’s not speaking to you either,” the bored male voice muttered.
There was a shadow above Lucas as a tall form fell from above, landing in front of him and creating a small cloud of dust. Lucas coughed, waving the dust off to reveal a tall looking Dark-Elf who looked mildly impressed with something.
As any normal Elf did when confronted with a Dark Elf, Lucas involuntarily drew the bow from his back and pointed it at the Dark Elf, trying to seem threatening.
“S-stay back! Not another step-”
Before Lucas knew what was happening, the bow was ripped from his hands and the Dark Elf suddenly had it and was examining it with interest. Then he frowned and placed it onto the ground. He then looked up at Lucas again.
“Don’t draw your weapons for no reason. I didn’t even do anything!” the Dark Elf complained. “Don’t tell me you’re racist?”
Lucas looked at the bow on the ground and back at the boy, who was muttering to himself, terror nearly consuming his emotions.
Lucas, Lucas, you can’t be scared of everything that seems bigger and badder than you. He’s just a Dark Elf, an ally of the Abyss… the Humans may have pardoned them and the Wolf-kin… well they’re just Wolf-kin. Not much to say about them.
“..lo? Hello?” the boy was saying. “Hey, Tree, I think he’s in shock.”
Just when Lucas was about to ask who Tree was, a form came tumbling down from the Dragon. The boy had a second to slap his hand onto his face before he caught the falling figure in his arms and gave her a flat look. She groaned as she clung to him, clearly disoriented. The girl had the physique of an Elf, but was clearly Human, seeing as an Elf’s most defining feature, their ears, were absent from the sides of her head.
“Why is she so big?” the girl asked, the boy setting her onto her feet. “And why are you harassing him, Jason?”
The boy, named Jason apparently, shrugged. “He pointed guns at me first.”
“That’s a bow. And you probably would have caught the arrow out of the air if he had shot you.”
“Pshh, same difference; they both shoot projectiles that are meant to kill,” Jason said, waving his hands through the air, which, strangely enough, didn’t have the same sort of spindlyness as a normal Dark Elf’s hands.
“You-” the girl snapped her mouth shut before looking at Lucas, who moved back a bit, as she gave him a scary-looking expression. “Anyways, what are you doing here, Elf?”
The boy named Jason looked interested again and looked back to Lucas from the large Dragon, which, upon further inspection, seemed to be trying to balance some sort of orb on its snout, taking great joy in doing so, the seemingly endless coil moving about.
“M-me? I was told to investigate the giant frozen swathe of forest by my superiors.”
Both the boy and girl froze and seemed to look around at their surroundings for the first time, bewilderment evident on their faces.
“Oh,” the boy breathed.
“That’s why it’s so cold. I was confused for a bit-” the girl stopped speaking. “Wait. We’re in the Elven Kingdom?”
Lucas frowned. “Well, yeah? You didn’t know? The Capital is a few kilometers from here.”
The girl looked horrified while the boy looked pleased. “We’re all the way on the other side of the continent?!” “Holy hell, you’re faster than I thought!” they said over one another.
The Dragon looked up at the boy, strangely uninterested in the orb already. They looked… proud of itself. The boy walked up to the Dragon's snout, lifted up the orb, and rubbed the Dragon’s scales.
Lucas gulped as he expected the Dragon to snap up the boy, but, to his utter surprise, the serpentine Dragon purred and pressed into his hand, nearly knocking him over.
“Yes, you’re the greatest Serpent ever, Mia, and, yes, I love you. We need to test your full capabilities speed-wise when I’m not black out.”
With an even louder purr, the Dragon actually knocked him over and set her head on top of him as he laughed. The Human girl shook her head and stared at the Dark Elf with something akin to longing.
Lucas then stuttered, “Why do you travel with a Dark Elf?”
The girl looked at Lucas and frowned. “I mean, I may have slightly forced him into it, but he’s my ‘significant other’, in my mother’s words. She loves him for some reason, probably because he turned out to love Runes.”
“He’s courting you?”
The girl snorted in the most un-girl-like way imaginable. “Oh hell no. If anything, I’m the one courting. He’s newly Integrated, so he really doesn’t understand nor care much for the culture of this world. He just sees me as someone to care for and protect, though even that aspect is being strained.”
Newly Integrated? Lucas thought, looking at his fellow Elf. Maybe I’m too quick to judge. I mean, he speaks weirdly, but now that I know that…
“Anyways, we were coming to the Elven Kingdom so we could complete a Questline. Something to do with a {Corrupted} Dungeon.”
“Y-you know about {Corruption}?”
The girl gave Lucas a strange look. “Yeah? You know about it?”
“Er… yes. The {Corruption} is common knowledge here. Well, mostly because it spread from the Dungeon and has infected the Queen.”
The boy froze in place from his position below the Dragon and gaped. “Excuse me? How did you idiots manage to get your damned Queen {Corrupted}?!”
Lucas was about to retort before he deflated. “I… you have a point.”
“Oh, to hell with it. We should introduce ourselves.” The Dark Elf pushed the Dragon’s head off of him and rolled from below it. “I’m Jason Andromeda and this is one of my Bonds, Mia, though she’s for some reason still in her Draconic form.”
“Bonds?” Lucas said, before freezing as the Dragon began to shrink, almost immediately shifting into a small girl with one eye ice blue and one white and flickering with lightning around the edges. The same could be said about her horns, which were the same color as her eyes. The most interesting part was her, nearly white, light yellow hair.
She scrambled up into Jason’s arms and he shook his head as she pressed her face into his chest. The girl who had been talking to Lucas sighed.
“And I’m Treia. Treia Kia,” she muttered.
Lucas’s eyes widened. “L-like the Princess who rejected our Prince? That Treia Kia?”
Treia groaned.
***
I internally was panicking when I heard that the Queen of the Elves had been {Corrupted}. However, I simply listened to Treia and the boy whose name I still didn’t know speak quickly to one another about what I assumed was the Elven Kingdom’s current affairs. However, I was more concerned with the new addition to my Status Page:
Bond Status : Systie
Name : [Redacted] Nickname : Systie
Level 99 | Tier 4
Race : System’s Eye
Mana Capacity : 184/2938880*
Bond : Jason Andromeda
Stats
Dexterity : 9184
Mana : 4592*
*Mana cannot be regenerated normally. Mana can only be restored by Bond.
Skills*
Split - Level 54 | Tier 2, Void Aura - Tier 4, Substitute Combustion - Level 40 | Tier 1
*Some Skills are shared with Bond
Noticing the very low amount of Mana Systie had, I funneled half my Mana Regen into her. After about two minutes, I felt Systie stir in my hand before the normal purple light that usually shrouded her flickered back into existence and I heard Systie groan in my head, like usual.
Why do I feel like I just ran headfirst into a truck?
“You don’t even have a head. Nor a truck to run into,” I responded, lifting her to my face. “Anyways, you good?”
No. Why do I have a Status screen? And when the hell did I Bond with you?
“Emotional Damage.”
She simply stared at me for a long few moments, emotions churning through the small eyeball. Eventually, she lifted into the air and rested in my hair, staying silent.
I shrugged as Treia and the boy seemed to come to some sort of agreement. Treia waved at me and Mia, walking quickly towards me.
“Do you have anything I could use so I can change? I’m going in as the Princess.”
I frowned. “I don’t think so-”
Suddenly, an oversized portal to my storage space opened and a giant sheet of metal fell from the sky. It hit the ground with a thump and stayed embedded a few inches in the ground. Both me and Treia stared at it as I felt some sort of smug emotion radiate from Systie.
Yes. He does.
I blinked. “I… completely forgot about that. That was when your Mom was attempting to show me how to make metal shape itself. I ultimately failed, since it was overly complex, but I was able to get it to bend around predetermined lines. Just inject the lines on the inside with a bit of Mana and they’ll fold inwards.”
Treia simply frowned. “How much space do you have in there?”
“Even though I usually count in meters, it’s 80 by 80 by 80 feet.”
Treia stared at me for a few moments before walking up into my face. “Teach me.”
~~~
Half an hour later and a very disheartened yet refined Treia walked in front of me as a few of Systie’s eyes surveyed the area around us.
Some weird hump half a mile to our left. I think it’s some sort of underground structure. There’s also a few people watching from the trees. Jokes on them, I’m watching them too.
“I’d assume the second part is more important,” I grumbled. “Also, you sound very annoyed.”
Are you not annoyed that I unintentionally Bonded with you? Systie snapped. Cause I’m definitely annoyed at that, among other things.
“Hm… Not really? I’m honestly fine with it, along with, and surprisingly, Mia,” I responded. “Plus, if it’s related to the explosion of emotions I felt from you, then I think it’s fine.”
Jason, there’s a reason I don’t like multiple Bonds. It can destroy a person’s Soul from the inside out. That’s a fate that even I couldn’t imagine doing to someone. I may not care much for Human emotion, but there’s boundaries even my true form wouldn’t cross.
I shrugged. “I really don’t care. I think I can stand it.”
Mia’s moods already affect you enough. There’s no way you can just “stand it”.
I frowned. “Do they? I don’t feel much different.”
Haven’t you found it harder to relate with other people lately? Like, they just seem far harder to feel similar to? It’s just going to get so bad that you won’t even be able to be in a normal relationship with Treia.
I tapped my head, forgetting that I didn’t have horns. I instead picked at my, mostly hidden, segmented jaw. “I mean-”
“Jason, are you talking to Systie?” Treia asked, giving me a curious look. “It’s weird hearing only one side of a conversation. What’re you talking about?”
“Something to do with ripping my Soul to shreds. Don’t really understand it,” I responded, shrugging while sniffing the air. “Also, why does it smell like lemonade again? That’s not you, since you smell completely different. It’s…” I stuck my tongue out. “Slightly bitter.”
Treia gave me a confused look, a slight blush on her face. “Did you just taste the air?”
I blinked. “Yeah. I see what you mean now, Sys,” I muttered, looking at Mia, who was also tasting the air after my comment.
“Oh, those are just the sugar lemon trees that surround the city. They keep away things like Forest Dragons and Wyrms,” the boy said.
Mia hissed.
“Who’s Armindaene?” I said, the name coming out strangely, like I had more than the usual vocal cords I should. “Oof, that felt weird to say.”
“First of all, there’s others? And secondly, why is it that Wyrms are hated so much? I heard about that in the Guild.”
“You’re in the Adventuring Guild?” the boy asked.
I gave him a flat look. “Thirdly, I’m pretty sure it’s common courtesy to tell people your name. Or is that just not a thing in this world?”
His face went red as he stuttered. “O-oh, right. I’m L-Lucas, a scout of the Elven Palace Guard.”
I nodded. “EPG… that sounds like fun. What do you do there?”
“Scout?”
I looked at a nearby tree for a moment. “Ah. That makes sense.”
Treia looked back at me with a flat expression. “I thought you’d know about how Palace Guards worked by now.”
“Er… I really only paid attention to them if they actively engaged in conversation with me, which didn’t happen often. So I don’t know.”
Systie, who was still perched on my head, seemed to be enjoying herself as she shocked the Elves who were closely watching me though the copies of herself with her newfound power. After letting this happen for a few more minutes, I sighed.
Snapping my fingers, I opened a few portals, one after another, dumping all the people who were watching in front of me and giving them annoyed looks as Systie’s copies flew the portals as well, Systie herself complaining while hitting me with many of her eyes. Ignoring her, I looked at Lucas, who stared at me with object horror on his face.
I shrugged as I said, “I can’t open more than four or five portals at once, but it’s good enough to bring ‘em all here.”
Treia looked at me, annoyed. “What? You’re able to open more than two input portals?! I haven’t been able to get more than two!”
I looked at her pensively. “You’re thinking of them as opening and exits. They’re just gates. You tell it what to do since it doesn’t control itself. Like how when you pour a cup of water into a strainer. It goes through multiple holes but ultimately ends up in the same place. But, no matter how simple it may seem, Mia can’t seem to understand how to do anything but freeze things or smack them with her body.”
Mia gave me an affronted expression from my arms, clearly not happy with that. I rolled my eyes.
“I’m not saying that it’s not effective…”
Treia, on the other hand, was clearly trying to make sense of my words, clearly trying to suppress her spines. Eventually, she looked over to the pile of people who were just getting up.
“You could’ve just had the common courtesy to escort us, you know,” Treia stated loudly.
One of the Elves groaned as they stood up and I looked up to the portal I’d opened, realizing how high up it actually was.
Hmm.
As I contemplated this, Treia and the Elf started to speak. As they spoke, I could hear one of the groaning Elves curse in French (Elvish, Jason. Elvish)
“Damnable Dark Elves.”
Rolling my eyes, I responded in perfect French, “Not my fault you’re so easy to spot.”