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"Tymon, you didn't...."

"You weren't there," Tymon said defensively. "That man had no intentions of stopping. Had I not done anything, he would've continued to target innocent women. Is that what you want?"

Trik and I didn't answer.

"You two need to realize what world you're living in, and soon, before it gets yourselves or others hurt."

"No," I said with conviction. "That's not how we should solve our problems."

Tymon looked at me and shook his head in disagreement, but he still conceded.

"Fine. We'll do it your way for now, but you'll regret it at some point. You see us as heroes, but that's not what this is. Some people can only be stopped if they're removed completely."

"I don't believe that," I said as I picked up the vial off the rocks.

"Anyway, I'll get my mom and dad to look into these," I said, changing the subject. "So, this explains why some SVVL contenders have abnormally high EQNs and what Avarice did with the blood he took from Tymon, but why would he want Tymon's mark?"

I can explain that, Viraa spoke in my head.

Hmm. Must be important if you're offering an explanation, I said to her.

Indeed. I'd also like the others to hear, so if you would...

I turned on my holo-bracelet so Trik and Tymon could hear Viraa.

"To answer Lisa's question, you must first understand the difference between a Primordial's ascension mark and their cintracies," Viraa said to them.

She then quickly explained the difference between the two, telling them the same thing she told me the night I brought Tymon to HQ.

"Only the one the ascension mark is given to can use it, so while Avarice may have thought he was stealing Tymon's mark, in truth, he was doing something completely different," she stated.

Viraa paused for a moment. I could feel her contemplating, like she was carefully considering her next words.

"To understand, you must learn about Avarice's most dangerous power. He possesses a mystic cintracy called Xerox. It allows him to permanently copy the cintracies of others if he takes enough of their spirit energy. His body can only hold four at the moment, but that's subject to change as his body becomes more powerful with time."

"That doesn't sound good," Trik commented.

"When Avarice absorbed power from Tymon's mark, he copied one of Tymon's cintracies in the process," Viraa said.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"So now, Avarice has one of Tymon's abilities," I said for clarification.

"Yes, a power he seemed to have been searching for," Viraa replied.

"Normally..." Viraa continued, "One would die, and their reincarnation would be prevented when forcibly having the power from their ascension mark removed, but luckily Avarice didn't know what he was doing, so he didn't take everything which kept Tymon from dying during the process. And since Tymon was still alive afterward, his mark was able to begin replenishing itself slowly. Of course, since he was in a weakened state, he still succumbed to his other injuries later that night, but his reincarnation would still be intact. However, with most of its energy stolen, the mark took two centuries to replenish itself before Tymon could be reincarnated fully."

"So, Avarice didn't kill you," I excitedly told Tymon.

"Technically, he did," Trik remarked. "Tymon died from the partially healed injuries he received earlier that day. And they only killed him because Avarice weakened him."

"Oh, yeah," I said, dispirited.

"About my cintracies; how many do I have? How will I know?" Tymon asked.

"Oh, the marks on your wrist. That's what they signify," I blurted.

"If you concentrate, you can also sense them within you," Viraa added.

Tymon closed his eyes and concentrated for a moment.

"Yeah, I can feel five of them," he stated.

His eyebrows scrunched in confusion as he continued to sense for them.

"Three of them feel familiar, but the other two... This feels like... Hey, Viraa, what are my cintracies? Is that something you'd know?"

"I will only explain the ones you've displayed so far," she replied. "The first is your Dark Radiance. It's a eutierric cintracy that lets you give your spirit energy the qualities of darkness and grants you limited control over the element in general. The second is Last Breath, a temp cintracy that allows you to rapidly age and decay any living thing you or your spirit energy touches. At full strength, you could instantly kill most lifeforms on the planet. At its weakest, you can stop a weaker specie's heart or breathing."

"I've experienced that firsthand," I interjected.

"As for your third cintracy, it's the ability you refer to as Dark Shift. The name I had for it was Shadow Warp, but since you've grown accustomed to your name, we can keep it as Dark Shift. As you know, it allows you to essentially shadow travel by discreetly merging with shadows and rematerializing from a shadow near your desired destination. Sadly, it only works for places you've been to and requires a considerable amount of your energy. You can also take others with you, but it'll use even more energy, so be careful."

Viraa exhaled deeply as she finished her explanation.

Tymon summoned darkness around his hand as he looked at it with a new understanding.

"How do you know the names of his cintracies," Trik questioned Viraa.

Viraa laughed out loud.

"Well, I've named many of the known cintracies," she proclaimed. "My father possessed a temp cintracy called Scan that granted him the ability to read other's capabilities – things like their physical strength and speed levels along with what their cintracies could do. Combine that with my Temporal Sight, and we were able to work together to name many of the cintracies out there. Even ones that don't exist yet."

"You have a dad?! I never considered you having parents since you were so powerful. I assumed you always existed," Trik said as he looked astonished.

"That's ridiculous," Viraa said as she chuckled. "Of course, I have parents. But enough about me, now you all understand that what Avarice wanted from Tymon wasn't his mark, though that's what he believes. He thinks the marks are the source of a Primordial's powers."

"We know something Avarice doesn't; we know about our origin and the true nature of our abilities. If I know Avarice, he'd love to learn about it. He has a thirst for knowledge. He's the type of guy to see it as power," Tymon said as he appeared deep in thought.

"You're thinking of trading the information for Za'Fia" Trik asked. "I think it's a good idea if it'll help prevent a fight. I'd say we should go find the others first, but we don't know where to begin looking, and we don't know how long Za'Fia may have if they're forcing her to endure the same things you did."