Chapter 1 – Shrouded
It was a bright day, warm sunshine burst through the windows, enveloping the room as the curtains were opened, the same way as shadow did at the time the moon blocked the sun, as it did every day.
Kurt slowly opened his eyes as the light enveloped those too, flinching slightly and blinking, he then grew used to the rays, signalling the dawn of a new day.
“We need to revaluate our finances, perhaps we could –“
“No –“
“Maybe that’s for the best.”
“Yes – I’ll tell him.”
It was a morning like any other, Kurt thought. Now was the time his parents would tell him they’d be sending back some recently purchased contract, selling some items or taking on more work.
Kurt pondered this again as he heard his father’s footsteps echoing from the stair well, he quickly stood up, throwing his duvet to the floor on top of his mattress, the duvet landed as his door creaked open.
[Kurt, I knocked.]
“Oh, hey Dad, sorry I just woke up.”
[Is that so?] – He saw his Dad quickly scanning the bare room, noticing the crumpled duvet.
[You need some new bedding huh?]
“Never mind that Dad, I’ll manage, you wanted to discuss something?”
His Dad suddenly locked eyes with Kurt and adopted a more serious expression.
[Ah, you heard that huh….sorry, it seems I’ll have to take an evening job again, you’ll be able to manage alone right?]
“Of course, Dad, I was thinking of picking up my own job, I’m plenty old enough and school work isn’t too hard to finish on time.”
At that his Dad seemed to stop, his expression looked slightly concerned and then he wore a warm smile, warm like the sun.
[No Kurt, we’ve discussed this, you need to look after your sister, thank you for suggesting though.]
Kurt began to protest more but the expression that flashed across his Dads face caused him to hold back, after all, he remembered his Dad showing a similar expression the day his sister fell ill.
[Anyway Kurt, I won’t be back in the evenings starting tomorrow, my previous boss said he’d always welcome me back if we ever needed the funds, I’ll go back to construction.]
With that the door closed.
Chapter 2 – Light is warm
17 Years old isn’t young, I was pondering that and responsibilities that might be worthier of my age. Currently I attend school in the mornings and my sister and myself in the evenings.
I was once again in deep thought, after having breakfast, locking the door and heading to school I’m now here. Although my teachers have brought up my tendency to not focus on class, I still manage to do around average – perhaps slightly above, in their classes so they don’t mind me too much after my behaviour remained this way since I first entered the school. I used to be told how much I could excel if I really focused, since my sister fell ill though, I never really took school as seriously.
Suddenly a finger rested on my shoulder, Rex.
“Hey, hey Kurt, we get magic attribute classes tomorrow.”
A few seconds went by.
“Kurt, don’t tell me you haven’t realised class finished again.”
With that I slowly became more alert and noticed the class was empty, albeit for a couple of hardworking students remaining at the desk to finish the assigned homework before heading home.
“Sorry Rex, I have to get home, I’ve got to prepare meals for my sister before I head to the hospital.”
With that I stood up.
“Hey! Don’t be like that, I’ll head out with you. Besides, I feel your sister has been getting more appreciative of my good looks lately.”
“Right….the same way I’ve started to appreciate your sense of humour.”
With that Rex let out a small chuckle and playfully hit me on the back, with that we both proceeded to exit the classroom.
“One second Kurt…”
The teacher handed me some reading material about magic formation circles.
“Hand those to your sister, she enjoys these rights? – Also….maybe you could try giving them a read yourself.”
With that, I exited the classroom.
While walking back Rex continued discussing…rather, talking to me about the upcoming magic attribute classes. These were held at the end of every students 3rd year, to roughly coincide with their magical awakening age, 18. Generally, one would show hints as to their primary attribute before then, in small magical feats, I’ve had no such luck.
“Don’t be that way Kurt, you’ll have some sort of revelation, remember how I told you I got mine while taking a bath and suddenly the water got almost as hot as your sister.”
Naturally, I lightly hit Rex to discipline his light boasting, mainly because such boasting involved my sister, lightly, also meaning Rex ended up falling over my extended leg.
Although Rex did tend to grasp people’s emotions and hit the nail on the head when discussing my apprehension to the upcoming magic attribute classes, I knew I wasn’t a ‘prodigy’ by any means, I at least wanted some magical ability however.
We then proceeded to my house to cook the meal for my sister, nothing particularly interesting happened here. I had to remove Rex from a couple of areas he shouldn’t have been in regarding my sister and we played for a while on the console before heading to the hospital.
We left the house in the evening, my Dad would probably be at his job, discussing various things before properly staring tomorrow. Me and Rex continued down the road when we noticed a small figure in some sort of disagreement with two other middle-aged men.
“Hey Kurt, isn’t that Amy?”
Rex pointed at the small figure, it did indeed look like the girl from our class, Amy.
“Yeah, looks that way, she’s probably having some issues with a study group, we used to train in the same class in the past, she can handle herself. We really need to get to the hospital; my sister will be starving.”
As I said that, Amy had managed to grab the drifting hand of one of the men and twist his wrist until he was on his knees, upon seeing that the larger of the two men seemed to be getting more frustrated and raised his hand, in it, I could see a small ball of energy rolling about, unrefined but dangerous, it seemed like he was going to use magic on Amy.
“Hey Kurt, this seems a bit off.”
Before I could respond, Rex had run off to help, Amy was certainly capable, but as we weren’t fully capable of magic yet, the situation didn’t seem favourable. As the man directed the ball of energy at Amy, Rex ran in front and blocked his target.
That didn’t stop the situation, the ball of energy, seemingly a simple water ball, now that Kurt was closer, was now twice the size and was now hurtling at the two standing there.
“Move!”
Amy quickly grabbed Rex and threw him aside while using her agility to quickly roll out of the way, using her arms to maintain her balance during the manoeuvre and landing squarely back on her feet, just like Amy. Seeing this, the man had grown noticeably more agitated to his attack that had just dampened and damaged the stone floor where the two just were. Rex seemed to have been caught off guard, after having gathered himself, he seemed to generate a small flicker of fire in his hand, which quickly dissipated, he cursed at this.
(To be more descriptive, someone may learn of their magical attribute before 18, typically they can only harness mana upon their 18th birthday. Some researches believe this to be due to an adaptation within the body that occurs around that age, because of the recent appearance of mana. Due to this, Rex was having issues.)
While this was happening, Amy had already grasped Rex and lifted him up.
“In situations like these, you run!”
After hearing that Rex noticed the other man was now his hand in a claw shape and clenching his teeth, probably preparing a form of wind magic – Kurt thought. Kurt, during this had managed to carefully place the food he prepared and thought it would be better to help if it seemed necessary but getting involved would put him in a similar position to Rex, which didn’t seem good.
Amy and Rex made it to a corner, recent onlooker at this stage had all either fled, pulled out their phones or were simply watching, a few onlookers seemed to be calling the authorities, as naturally magic use like this was prohibited. While turning the corner and entering an empty park nearby, the previously prepared ball of wind magic had made its way to the two and collided with Rex’s ankle. After this he lost his footing and fell to the floor, either sprained or broken.
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“Rex, quickly, my house is just past the park, if we get there the authorities will capture them or my parents will do something about them.”
While saying this Amy had grabbed Rex and they were going through the park.
However, another ball of fire collided with Amy, who was more focused on Rex and set her jacket ablaze. She quickly threw it off, but it didn’t help that the force blew the wind out of her, she flew to the floor, dropping Rex.
“That’s right bitch, we tried to be nice but now you made us use magic, it’s exhausting you know? Still – we have enough energy to continue, thanks for bringing us to this empty park.”
Rex had now charged at the two but was quickly knocked in the stomach, as he fell to his knees, the larger man was about to place a knee straight into his face. As Amy struggled to get her footing there was a large bang on a nearby pole that lightly resonated.
“Hey guys, this doesn’t look like a friendly gathering to me, mind leaving my friend there alone?”
After seeing me there, the two men started to produce magic in their hands and throw them, I easily managed to avoid the balls of magic and was already in front of the larger man who knocked down Rex, hitting him square in the nose with a well placed right hook. The second man, noticing this had already reacted, just as his fist hit my face and caused me to stagger, Alice had regained her footing and was between the two. Quickly she turned to gather momentum and placed the heel of her shoe into the mans cheek, knocking him to the floor. While this was happening, I had already landed myn left fist onto the man’s chin, knocking him out.
With this, I brushed myself off and sent a small smile to Alice, to show my appreciation for her stepping in. Afterwards I walked over to Rex to help him regain his footing and supported him to a nearby bench as his leg was still injured.
Seeing this, Alice came to his other side and assisted, upon sitting him on the bench, she looked at me with a smile.
“You’ve gotten better Kurt, I could hardly recognise your movements just then, especially the speed at which you closed the distance before striking!”
This seemed only natural to me, my parents noticed my lack of magical aptitude at a young age, so we decided to focus on physical aspects, it’s hard to survive in such a world and people with low magical ability was rare, my case with no magical aptitude whatsoever was simply pitiful. After standing up and making sure Rex was recovering, I started to leave.
“Apologies, my sister will be incredibly hungry, I left her food around the corner which I expect has been trampled on or taken, so I’m going to go buy something, regrettably.”
“Sorry Kurt, maybe next time.” – Rex gave a grimace but smiled through the pain.
After checking finally on Alice and Rex, I stood up to gather the food I placed earlier, when I rounded the corner I saw a flicker on a nearby lamp. It seemed particularly unnatural, I mean, can lights appear to flicker when the light itself doesn’t seem too dim? After confirming the food was missing, I moved to a nearby store and purchased a few ready meals containing prawns, sis’ favourite.
I made it to the hospital in relatively quick time after that, a light jog was good, I underestimated my opponent earlier and he managed to get a small hit on my face, albeit weak, it did damage my pride.
Since I learnt to walk, Dad used to train me in martial arts and street fights, typically as I had a non-existent magical presence, jobs were impossible to procure. Cleaning was performed by magic, cooking, even businesses required a small aptitude of magic to use the equipment, I really was considered a useless entity by society. Naturally my time was focused into combat, after all even without magic a skilled fighter could easily overcome a novice mage, one benefit of my condition was generally people underestimated me which allowed for a quick victory. Dad was quite adept at fighting, but I quickly overtook him in that area, I eventually was placed into physical activity classes for most of the time. I wasn’t particularly interested in fighting, no one can really beat me in combat unless they know my capabilities and use magic, everyone uses magic.
Just as I was entering the hospital I saw a silhouette of a cat on a nearby fence, which seemed to shift into a form of a dog and finally receded into a small speck before dissipating. While I focused on that the remaining light seemed to coalesce and suddenly become shrouded in shadow, it didn’t make sense, before I could react I had already fallen, landing on a that bed of shadow.
The feeling only lasted momentarily, or so it seemed, I found myself outside the hospital door. Almost as if I’d fallen to the same position, I didn’t understand it, I put it down to a misinterpretation of the senses after confirming that the shadow I saw earlier wasn’t present. Putting those thoughts aside I proceeded to my sister’s room, there she was, my beautiful sister, her brown unkempt hair flowing down her shoulders slightly resting upon the bed. Noticing my presence, she focused her green eyes on me and smiled before continuing to greet me.
“Brother!! – It’s good to see y-“
She instantly stopped and focused on the graze on my cheek, her expression seemed to become more perturbed. Noticing that I waved it off and told her what happened with Alice and Rex earlier.
“That so? – I wish you would stop worrying me like that.”
After that, I saw something I hadn’t seen before, she smiled, although the smile seemed to be filled with something, something dark, it was an ugly smile. As if reading my thoughts, my sisters ‘smile’ faded as quickly as it came.
My sister has an illness, only seen in a society like ours, whereas I had no magical capacity she had an overwhelming talent. This caused distortions in her vicinity, anything functioning on magic failed to operate. This meant any devices were useless and as the magic itself was causing the sickness, most modern means of medicine were rendered redundant. It’s a cruel twist of fate, such as having too much of a good thing, although I feel the phrase wasn’t intended to be used in situations such as this.
The purpose of the hard work was down to research into administration methods that could help my sister, magical extraction devices worked on the principle of magic and became distorted before use, simple needles of materials holding magic absorption properties were dissolved at the sheer pressure of the magic residing in my sister. This also caused problems for doctors, as people absorbed magic and used it as a mage, which was a fundamental principle of this world, coming near her caused headaches and loss of motor skills and general consciousness which only got worse as you got closer. Naturally this meant Rex and Dad couldn’t see her up close and doctors couldn’t administer medicine very easily.
Naturally that didn’t apply to me, I had no magical aptitude and always knew it because of my sister, I always saw it as a benefit and never resented my shortcomings due to that simple fact, I was able to treat her as anyone else did.
My sister is older than me at 22, therefore I always treated her as a role model when I was younger, she received her unnatural magical prowess at 18 like anybody else and has been bedridden ever since.
Today was different though, she always used to take the food and silently eat it while I discussed my day and any advancements regarding her condition, today however, she was simply holding the food.
“Hey, Kurt.”
Suddenly my thought process was broken in that way, she gave me a look then, thinking back I should’ve known she wasn’t quite my sister, I didn’t want to admit it though at that time.
Suddenly her voice became distorted, like an overlap, imagine two people speaking identically but with a slight delay between the two, like two identical waves slightly out of phase.
“I never wanted to do this Kurt, but the constant studying of my body, the looks you gave as you lived, the happiness you a Dad shared while I sat in this bed. I appreciate you never forgot me, however I cannot sit here any longer.
She smirked a smile pasted with evil intent, once again my world went dark.
Chapter 3 – Light is Dark
TIME PASSES ----------------------------------------------------------------
It’s been a while since I ventured through the forestry this close to civilization, food has been rather scarce as of late, therefore I have been killing monsters further from my designated camp, I crouched down to survey the surrounding for any animal tracks close by, suddenly I saw somebody emerge from the forestry close by.
I instantly stood, taking an offensive stance I gave the girl a stern look, upon closer inspection the girl seemed to be carrying an older woman who had a few arrows protruding from areas that wouldn’t be considered ideal. To be perfectly honest she seemed dead already. The girl finally seemed to notice my presence and immediately leapt at me, I knocked her aside with ease, but she immediately regained composure and charged again, she seemed desperate. As she approached my face I knocked her to the ground with my fist and rested my knee on hers while restricting her arms behind her back.
“Mfu nf hr!”
I don’t understand what she’s saying at all…
Suddenly the woman nearby began coughing up blood.
“OPUIFS!”
I slowly released my grip to try and show my non-aggressive intent but the girl simply pushed me aside and ran to the woman and continued to scream.
The nearby thistle started to rustle again and this time two men holding swords emerged and instantly noticed the two on the floor, one of them, a tall brown human-like man donning blackened Armor shrouded with an equally ominous cloak approached the woman and lifted her up by her shirt while kicking the girl and knocking her aside.
The second man wearing the same armour but of smaller stature with an equally humanoid appearance approached the girl and gagged her, they either hadn’t noticed me, or simply didn’t care. As the girl was being forcefully detained she seemed to be weeping heavily while trying to grasp at the lady who had just been thrown to the floor and the solider, who I just realised was wearing a red scarf, we’ll call him red, was raising his sword and pointing the tip at the lady’s throat.
As he began to lower it with the intention of impaling the woman I decided which party I was going to side with for now there and then, I took a low stance and kicked off the floor with my strongest leg and dashed, before they noticed what had happened I grabbed Reds wrist and using both hands I gave it a strong forceful push to snap the bone.
“Errg!”
“You’ll pay for that b-“
I snapped his neck.
Seeing this the other man, we’ll call him Black, dropped the girl and ran at me with an axe raised, as he approached I already closed ground and planted my hand into his solar plexus, causing him to throw up and fall to him knees and collapse, unconscious.
After this the girl initially gazed awestruck at the scene but quickly placed her vision upon the wounded woman on the floor, after a few seconds mostly consisting of me stripping the men of any useful equipment, it may be worth mentioning here, I typically find the brutish weapons on display here useless, they’re heavy, strangely weighted and simply slow down my strikes, needless to say these were hastily tossed aside. A few more seconds passed as I took some money from the assailant’s pockets, picked up a sack I owned nearby that I had thrown to ground previously and began to depart.
As I began leaving I heard the older woman whisper something in my direction…
“P…Please wait”
She struggled to speak with the blood gathering in her mouth and lungs, poor woman, perhaps I should finish her off, thinking this I had already started to approach the woman with my dagger equipped, I did have a few of my own weapons that had much better craftsmanship on my person, typically I used it to skin animals and end their suffering, as I was doing in this instance. The girl seemed to notice my intent and stood between me and the woman.
Oi…. it’s none of my business if she likes to see people suffer, what a strange little girl. Upon closer inspection she seemed to have rags as clothes, multiple cuts decorating her frail figure, brown rough hair that seemed to brighten in shade towards the tips and for what it’s worth a blossoming bust. I couldn’t be bothered to deal with conflict on things I wasn’t particularly interested in, so I placed my dagger back into my new pair of boots and once again went on my way.
The girl, seemingly seeing my intent once again got in my way. What’s with this girl? She’s getting on my nerves. She didn’t seem too much younger than me, I had been calling her a girl and little and using such terms, in this instance though, it was more referential to her weak build, the weak never survive.
“M..Mum xbout up talk”
There is it again, she speaks a weird language, I guess that woman is her mother huh, sometimes I wonder why I bother with these situations, probably to honour Rex.
“What do you want lady? Be quick, it’s almost dark and I’d prefer not to be caught up when those ugly bastards show up.”
“Take Nfmmz….my daug-“ *ack!*
As she says that she pulls out a red gem from her clothing, is that what those ‘men’ wanted? She is offering me this in exchange for taking her useless daughter, I didn’t live this long being stupid.
It appears to be one of those magic stones, useless to me it seems, I still have zero aptitude for magic. I began to turn to leave but I was suddenly frozen in place, I quickly turned around and saw that little shit again.
My shadow began to creep towards the gem and approached the lady, seeing this she withdrew the gem slightly, then as if she knew what is was, placed the gem onto the floor as it slowly got enveloped by my shadow before receding into the ground and resuming its normal form, allowing me to move once again.
Doing this stuff on his own prerogative again, I’m not taking responsibility for this guy’s movements, suddenly something I hadn’t felt came over me and tears started streaming from my eyes.
“Mum!!!” – It was the girl.
She was crouching by the dying woman and crying, wait, I’m crying? Me? I don’t get it. What the hell was that damn gem anyway. I approached the lady again with the full intent of ending her misery this time.
“She’s a naïve girl, especially for her age, I beg you though, I know it’s selfish to force her upon you, she will be useful to you though, man of shadow.”
The girl was grasping her hands and frantically trying to pull the lady up on her feet and trying to help her walk, this lady was done for though, they knew it. I hadn’t been called that ‘Man of Shadow’ since my days with Rex, it left a sour taste in my mouth.
“What do you know of me!! Better yet you old crone, why do I have to look after this useless girl!”
The girl was glaring at me at this stage and I felt intense anger, there it was again, I’ve never been this emotionally affected since Rex was killed.
“You’re connected, that gem was our family heirloom containing our legacy, Nfmmz here has now been entrusted by me, to finish off our mission.”
I have no interest in missions, is the connection referring to this sudden influx of emotions, that’s a pain, I guess this girl must die here too, as I felt such things however, an ominous feeling came over me, suddenly my heart felt strained slightly.
“Not just emotionally, man of shadow, you cannot approach each other with the intent to harm. Else any damage inflicted will rebound and kill you. “
I just noticed, but this woman seems to be stringing together coherent sentences without coughing lately, seems she’s sustaining herself with the fleeting magic I sensed around her, yeah, she’s dead soon.
The girl seemed to notice this and began sobbing heavily, the woman seemed to talk to her, something about following me as necessary to complete her mission, about coinciding goals and the like, I didn’t really care, I wont kill the girl if I can’t, seemingly I had to protect her somewhat too if need be as her death wouldn’t kill me if it was indirectly caused, it would however incapacitate me in some form permanently, which in this world is the same thing.
As the conversation neared its end and the girl’s tears had all but stopped due to exhaustion and the bodies inability to produce anymore fluids, the woman looked at me and left a smile, it wasn’t much but it reminded me of my mum somewhat back in the day, the woman died. I hadn’t noticed till now, but tears had been streaming down my face the entire time, it probably looked a little unnerving as my outward appearance looked the same as always.
After a few minutes of trying to separate the girl from the woman due to the encroaching darkness and what came with it, she eventually went limp and collapsed, probably exhausted, I seized the opportunity, placed her upon my shoulder and set off deeper into the forest.
Looks like my problems increased.