Zeifar had been maybe too focused when the Luxeour car went ahead.
[Initiate ‘Mirror Void’ Skill Mirroring to ‘Nine Eyes’ again?] the System asked.
‘No.’
[Then how do you wish to proceed?]
‘Initiate Observatory Infinity, and mirror Luxeour car’s speed.’
[Understood. Initiating…]
Sometimes to surpass a certain level, you need to reach it first.
Xavier faltered a bit when the red car matched up his speed.
‘No, I’m an A-Ranker—Initiate ‘Honored Light’.’
[Initiating Lvl.50 Skill: ‘Honored Light’.] his System window showed.
****
“Wow…so I was the only one who didn’t know about others’ skills,” Zeifar muttered.
[Those who are not Categorized do not usually know of others’ Skills.]
“…I see.”
Yet, even the Categorized could not directly speak to the System.
****
“This is the last lap, Zeif, you and McRae are tied,” Adrian spoke into the com.
“I saw that, Adrian. What about it?”
“…nothing, do you remember the feint trick?”
Zeifar’s eyes widened, “…ah, of course.”
The ‘Feint’ trick that had gotten Adrian into his prime. Of course, he had not taught her all his tricks—she was still his competition. But the Feint was an astonishing one. A tricky, pretty risky little swerve towards a car in close range—it looked like a mistake which could lead to an accident—but it wasn’t a mistake, if anything.
The car closest to her was basically right next to her—Tokyo-sono. They had beaten Royale many times before the new team’s debut.
Zeifar sighed, ‘Time to stop relying on skills.’
[Ceasing all Skills currently at use.]
‘Thanks, System.’
“Time to use my little brain, I suppose.”
****
The ‘Feint’ Adrian saw on the screen was different. It didn’t have the calm, unexpected air his swerves did—but it was sharply calculated—more of a jerk. It looked as if the car would truly collide with the other. It made the other car slowdown in fear—an easy overtake.
“How was that, your Highness?” Zeifar asked.
“You’re an interesting student, Ms. Nadir,” Adrian laughed.
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
Zeifar couldn’t care less about overtaking the Tokyo-sono. Her eyes were on the flashy white car still ahead…too close to the finish line.
‘If I use a skill to win this…which skill…?’ she wondered, her eyes squinting. Would a risk be worth it? She could try, right?
‘System, Summarize Xavier McRae’s Skill currently at use.’
(*A Category.)
She wasn’t really sure if ‘Summarization’ would work that way.
[Initiating Lvl.1 Sub-Skill: ‘Summarization’.]
[Xavier McRae: Using Lvl.50 Skill: ‘Honored Light’
‘Honored Light’(Lvl.50): High-level A-Rank Buff Skill. *Knight Skill used to maximize speed. Potentially increase speed 80x. (Showing more info requires more time.)]
“Oh it works,” she mumbled.
“What?” Adrian asked.
“Nothing.”
‘Initiate Mirror Void.’
[Initiating Lvl.28 Skill: ‘Mirror Void’.]
[What/Who do you wish to Mirror?]
‘Mirror Lvl.50 Skill Honored Light.’
[Mirroring Lvl.50 Skill ‘Honored Light’ from Xavier McRae to your level of understanding.]
An interesting part of the ‘Mirror Void’ was: the more Zeifar understood something and knew the details of whatever she was mirroring, the more perfectly she mirrored it.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
‘Mirror current speed to ‘Nine Eyes.’]
****
“What the—!” Xavier had to swerve out of the way—without being able to process what had crossed him before it passed the finish line an entire second before him.
Zeifar Nadir, No#10, Royale.
That was what had crossed him.
****
“McRae what the actual—” his teammate on the com began to say,
“—she used my skill.”
“…what?”
Xavier blinked a few times and glanced at the red car next to him, and repeated,
“She used my Skill.”
****
“How’re you sure she used McRae’s Skill?” Ethan asked.
Adrian’s eyes were dark, focused, “It’s more than visible, Ethan.”
Ethan stared at him quietly. Adrian was the ‘young protégé’ of racing, they called him the ‘one true Speeding Genius’, especially since his impossibly precise car designs were shown to the world. He was observant, an ‘Angel’ Category, calm and collected. Not only one from the smartest Category, but he was also one of the youngest S-Rankers—and still levelling up. The list never seemed to end.
“I’m not as calculative as you, but McRae is a Knight, Zeifar’s a Demon,” Ethan said.
Adrian looked down at the floor with an odd expression,
“Unless, of course, we consider the chances that she’s not a Demon either.”
“Two people may have similar skills, but it’s not possible to have the exact same skill,” Ethan added, becoming more confused.
Adrian considered it for a moment, and the more he tried to solve the more he got lost into the scribbles of his thoughts. It was like a never-ending labyrinth. How the heck had she copied the exact Skill?
“We’ve got to Finals, so what’re our strategies…?” Zeifar yawned.
The room had an odd atmosphere. The same hunting eyes all staring at her with a sharp, threatening curiosity—as if they were all wondering why they could not understand her, as if they were asking, ‘Are you a wolf in sheep’s clothing?’
An impulsive part of Zeifar wanted to tell them, but her other part won this time.
It may have been due to that glorious rush of adrenaline when knowing she could confuse ones above her—in a way, control them. Like how a child feels when outsmarting the school rules, well, except children don’t think, whereas Zeifar’s mind was calculative—and she was certainly a great liar.
“What is it, Kaz?” she asked her Captain.
“Nothing, the line-ups and everything have been sent to your phones, you can go,” Kazerin answered discreetly.
“You’re all acting weird…did I do anything wrong?” Zeifar blinked.
Kazerin looked up at her, “No, of course not…” but Zeifar’s dim eyes which returned hers said clearly that she’d caught on, that something really was wrong.
She felt a chill run down her spine.
The entire room was silent.
“I see, Goodnight then,” Zeifar said, not even looking back as she left.
None of them had seen her angry, she was the happy-go-lucky newbie. What they saw was not exactly anger, but it was the closest thing to her anger they had even seen, only a fraction of her capability, yet the cold gaze that had been in the room a moment ago still left the atmosphere freezing. They weren’t sure if it was disappointment or something worse.
****
“System, may I ask a question?” Zeifar asked.
[Please do not ask for permission to questions. Proceed.]
“Oh, okay,” she laughed, “Why do you exist?”
[…]
Huh. The System did not usually respond with silence.
[The System exists for many reasons.]
“Oh, so no specific answer,” she sighed, “Well then, I suppose I must do manual research.”
[The System advices to avoid research and wait for the answer to come by itself.]
“…goodnight.”
[Goodnight.]
****
Telling the System goodnight did not help Zeifar sleep.
She couldn’t stop from wondering why the System existed, what sort of tech it was.
Most of all, she wondered why she of all people could talk to the System, why could she interact with it? Why her? And she could not figure out why these ‘Skills’ and all this knowledge about the System had not been disclosed to the public.
It was all so confusing.
“Dammit.”
****
Adrian sat in the balcony, almost forgetting what sleep was.
“Why doesn’t it work on her?”
‘Truth-Teller’, one of his Skills, was just what the name suggested, a thought-reading lie detector.
But it just would not work on Zeifar.
What’s worse, all he could hear were his own thoughts. He was one of the youngest S-Rankers in the world, his max being SS, yet his Skill would not work on an apparent C or B-Ranker. Even with a fancy Skill, and Archangel-Skill could only be budged by something on its exact level or something much above.
“You’re wondering something, aren’t you?”
Adrian fell out of his chair.
“Dearmotherof—WHY ARE YOU ON MY ROOM’S BALCONY???!!” he screamed from the floor.
“Sheesh, you’ll wake up the people in the hotel, calm down,” Zeifar sighed, jumping into the balcony, “And to answer your question—I climbed down.”
“I’m sorry you did what?”
She looked at him as if he’d asked her the answer to 2+2 and said,
“Climbed down???”
He blinked at her without processing for a solid minute, before silently walking to the balcony’s edge and looking up to see exactly where her room was.
“…2 floors,” he mumbled.
“Huh?”
The eyes staring into hers had the anger of a very tired mother. Not very pleasant.
“You climbed down 2 FLOORS? DO ELEVATORS NOT EXIST ANYMORE?”
“Takes less time to climb though.”
“I thought you were a Demon, not an animal,” Adrian sighed.
“And I thought you were an Angel, not my mother,” responded Zeifar.
His eyes darted back to her, “I’ve never told you my Category, have I.”
She shrugged, “If it makes you feel better, dear mother, I’m here to explain.”
Zeifar felt that she owed Adrian at least a fake explanation, or she would forever be at place of distrust in his eyes, and that wasn’t very…’convenient’ as she said, or in a simpler manner, it made her feel guilty.
****
“So you’re saying you’ve got an A-Rank Skill that works as aa type of mental shield and a B-Rank Skill that lets you see basic info on people?” Adrian summed up.
She nodded. It wasn’t a full lie, except she had no idea what Rank any of her Skills were.
Adrian’s eyes looked down at the floor,
“Do you promise not to lie to me?”
“I don’t see why I would.”
“That wasn’t a proper answer.”
Zeifar sighed, “Yes, Adrian. I will not lie to you.”
His eyes changed to surprise when he looked back up,
“…why did my Skill work?”
Zeifar sighed, staring at the ceiling,
“Because I turned mine off for a second. Though I must tell you, I can only keep it off for 5 seconds.”
Adrian tilted his head in confusion,
“What do you mean?”
“It’s constantly on, I can’t turn it off, I can only pause it for a bit.”
And pausing it was, as the System said, not advised.
[Warning: Pausing ‘Mirror Void’ frequently may result in Noviar Effects!!!]
‘Noviar Effects?’
[Noviar Effects: Restricting laws to keep power-balance. These rules and laws affect all Ranks starting from S to above. Level of restriction varies on Rank.]
‘How much restriction does pausing Mirror Void cause?’
[As a Legendary(L) Ranked Skill currently, pausing a Skill that is part of your conscious as well as body will result in 15% restriction.]
Adrian stared at Zeifar.
She had not lied to him, truly not lied.
But something still didn’t feel quite right. A-Rank Skills could almost always be turned off. Un-pausable Skills were High-Ranked Skills so powerful that stopping them would cause a multi-dimensional power-balance shift. Noviar Effects were the only things preventing that.
But, Noviar Effects only affected Ranks above S.
****
“Jack Dalton, your world has been observed for years now. What you wish for is quite risky,” the heavy, toneless voice laughed.
Dalton asked, “Are there any consequences?”
The voice began laughing, sharp, cold, “Ah, funny boy you are, Dalton. Everything has consequences…The balance shift will cause what people of your world have known as fictional to become reality, and we ask for only one thing as a price: Entertainment.”
Dalton’s mind was an odd one. He’d gotten to the top with nothing but his brains, all pure talent and hard work. He’d stayed at the top through…different ways, but nobody could deny he was a genius. The problem with arrogance like his was that it often resulted in dissatisfaction to anything slightly below his expectations.
The SSS-Ranker believed he deserved much more, that what his world gave him was the bare minimum. And well, with situations so uncertain—maybe he was not wrong.
“So, Jack Dalton, do you wish to proceed with the contract?”
“…yes.”
There was a hint of laughter in the voice, “Remember, your answer {cannot be changed after it has been said.}”
****