Margot and I were surrounded by roughly thirty trog corpses. I knelt. My hand pressed against the wet cold concrete. My eyes glowed red as I leaned on my internal systems and put them into active use. Margot hung back, standing by my shoulder. 

I drew on the akashic data for the sewer, the adjoining sewer treatment plant, the nearby river, and all their contents. My internal-os populated a log that recounted the history of the entire area and all its inhabitants. Thirty seconds later that information was simplified and I then passed it through my end of the tether into Margot’s mind. 

“ Is...Is this a minimap?!” 

“And a quest log too. I figured you’d like that.” 

“Well, uh...I-, I don’t not like it.” said Margot. Flustered and fidgeting. Her expression looking bothered despite her body language telling me that if she had a tail it’d be wagging right now. 

“Hmph, I suppose that’s fine then.” said I. Resisting the urge to laugh.

A look of concentration passed over her face as she began accessing the interface that I’d created and installed onto her wetware. From her perspective her view was likely currently being occupied by the map and the menus that were parcelled with the interface. 

“Man, this is so cool...How did you even do this? Did you like...make me half cyborg or something?” said Margot. Using a tone of voice that made it hard to gauge whether she would have been ecstatic or upset if that had been the case. 

“No. You’re still completely organic. Not that that matters. I’m hypertech...Never mind today’s tech. Assuming that this earth’s humans don’t wipe themselves out before then, the technology they come up with tens of thousands of years from now will still just be apes clacking stones together compared to what I’ve got going on. Hold up, you should know this. Did you check out what your body can do like I asked you to?” I said. My smile fading and turning a frown as something occurred to me. 

Margot jumped and then her gaze shifted towards the side. I crossed my arms and leaned towards her. 

“Well? Did you?” 

“Yes… No. Kind of. After we had our big talk and you went dormant I had a lot of thinking to do and a lot of planning to do...So maybe I wasn’t as thorough as I could’ve been.” 

I sighed the sigh of any person who’d ever done a job for a client only for them to fail to see exactly how impressive the finished product actually was. 

“Alright...I guess that’s fine. Just know that when we get back we’re having a training montage.” 

“Huh?!” 

“Don’t ‘huh’ me. Do you have  any idea how dangerous it is that you’re walking around right now with no clue of what you’re actually capable of? Honestly, if I hadn’t installed so many safety-measures I’m pretty sure we’d both be getting chased by the Corporation’s private army by now.” 

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“Eh!? And I’m just hearing about this now?!” said Margot. Her voice shrill. Echoing throughout the tunnels of the sewer. 

Now it was my turn to look chagrined. Somehow it felt it awkward to get out of my kneeling position, so I just stayed down there. Twiddling my fingers. Looking slightly to the right of where Margot was standing. Randomly becoming interested in the fade mildew covered posters on the sewer walls.

“W-, Well...I’d sort of figured it’d come up after you tested your powers out and saw what your body could really do. So uh...Technically aren’t you the one at fault.” I said. Shamelessly trying to pass the blame back to Margot. Despite the fact that now that I was thinking about it, this was all seeming bit like those one times where I made devices and vehicles with special options like transforming or self-destructing and failed to warn the buyers. 

“Muuu…” Margot didn’t say anything to rebut me. She just glared at me before blowing out a huffy breath. 

“Fine...When we get back to the school. Before we do anything else I’ll test myself out to see what I can do. Th-, though you know it’d probably help if instead of ‘waiting’ for me to discover you just tell me what I’m supposed to be able to do. Okay?” said Margot. 

“No problemo.” I said. Finally rising to my feet. Giving Margot a mock salute and finding myself oddly charmed to find that Margot had a stern side. 

“An-...Anyway, so what are these ‘quests’?” said Margot. Returning her attention to the AR menu that was being projected into her mind by the interface. 

“Oh, so...there should just be two. The first is just a basic one, where we kill a couple more trogs and slimes and then get the heck out of here. You can ignore that one. I just sort of added that one because it felt weird not to. Basically that first quest will be considered complete and close on its own just as soon as we do what we originally planned.” 

“Which is?” said Margot.

“I just said it didn’t I? Kill a few trogs. Kill a few slimes. Go collect our pay. Well at the very least that quest will be useful for keeping track of how many trogs and slimes we’ve killed. You can look at the details and…” 

“Oh, I see it...Wow! Did I really already kill over fifty-three slimes?!” said Margot. Looking down at her palm with a look of muted awe and expectation. 

“Yeah...But what did you expect? You’re much stronger than the average junior mage. At the very least I trust you’re already well aware of that.” 

Margot nodded. Gathering aether in her palm and letting it dance across her fingertips like lightning. 

“I think...if I’d had this much magic when I was younger, my aunt and uncle would have probably just killed me out right...Either that, or the old timers in the family would have stepped in and sent me to one of the more elite schools to prepare to be the future head of the family.” said Margot. Her voice free of inflection as she spoke of her family. 

For a moment, neither of us said anything. I looked up at the ceiling to ease my growing discomfort and avoid saying something that I shouldn’t. Then Margot cleared her throat and said, 

“So...what about the other quest?” 

“Oh, that one’s a two-parter. You’ll need to clear out all the slimes and the trogs.” 

“C-, Can I really do that?! I mean, it’s just you and me here.” 

I laughed as I heard the trepidation in her voice. 

“Yeah, there’s me, an aeon of yore. And there’s you a junior mage with over five thousand years of intense training and more aether flowing through your core than some archmages could ever dream to have. Trust me, M. You...Me...We can do this. But only if you want to, of course.” 

Margot stared at me and I met her gaze. My expression a determined one. A hopefully reassuring one. 

If she believed me, if she let me help her and play the part of a familiar, the whole world could be at her feet. 

Sure, I’d made her powerful but she’d already been a good seed when she called me, otherwise she wouldn’t have been able to call me. Now her possibilities...our possibilities...were virtually infinite. 

“Is...Is there a reward?” 

“....What?” I said. Confused. The visions of glory and terror that danced through my mind crashing to a halt as her voice brought me out of my daydreaming. 

“These are supposed to be quests right? In the games if you complete a quest you get a reward.” said Margot. 

I regarded the young woman in front of me and then I smiled. My teeth gleaming brightly in the darkness. 

“Oh, my dear sweet little contractor, we’re in this together. If there’s one thing you need to know about me, it’s that, I, Monty the treasure-king don’t ever work for free. You best believe any quests I embark on will be ‘quite’ rewarding indeed.” 

“Okay...then I guess I’ll take option two.” said Margot. Giving me a look filled with trust, ambition, and hunger. The same ambition and hunger I’d seen in her eyes the very first time I met. The same ambition and hunger that let her reach my door, her voice extending past the limits of time and fate and causality.