“Thank you for completing this quest of mine, young man. I see that you’ve moved up in the world a little, hm?” Diana, owner of the great Diana’s Apothecary and Alchemist, hummed while leaning on the top of her counter.
“Huh?” Alec turned towards her after pocketing his proof of Quest completion, tilting his head to the side minutely like a confused puppy.
In response, the elven woman merely let a larger smile overcome her features for a moment, her eyes seeming to see straight through him for a second before zoning back into reality.
“Your adventurer rank, you’re an [Iron-rank] now, are you not?”
“Oh! Yes, I am.” He nodded, showing off his ID as proof of his promotion.
“Congratulations, I know that going up a rank for the first time is always an exciting experience.” She said, lifting an ornate cup to take a short, quiet, sip from.
“It was, I’ve been taking Iron Quests for the past week and a half now.” Alec supplied easily, resting his weight on one foot.
It was likely the promotion, Diana knew of nothing else plaguing the teen that could be the cause, but Alec looked far more comfortable and at-ease with himself than when he had first come to her with the Twilight Bloom all those weeks ago. His body was just a little bit more languid, his muscles a little less tense and his expression a little softer, like a weight he had been fighting against had been lifted from his shoulders.
“Oh? And how have they been?” Diana probed, taking another sip of her drink while trying to silently encourage the teen to speak further.
“They’ve been good. Building up a nest egg for when it’s needed. I even got myself a new shirt yesterday.” He said proudly, getting the briefest, subtlest, of pitying looks from the apothecary.
She hadn’t lived in such conditions for a long, long time now, so she’d almost forgotten what it was like to be such a small fish in the world with barely a few silvers to your name.
Sure, her business was far from a multinational organisation, but it had long since reached a level where her profits outweighed her costs and with the more experience she got, the more she could raise both of those ceilings.
It was jokingly referred to as ‘The curse of the Old Lives’ in that their lifespans meant that, given enough time and practice, they would pretty much come to outright dominate any field they set their sights on.
Diana, personally, thought that anyone that took that ‘curse’ seriously could go get their head beat-in in a bar brawl for all she cared.
She’d been practising alchemy for over a few centuries at this stage and had watched many, many, people come and go that made her skill look absolutely abysmal in comparison. Children that watched her make a few batches of potions and could already point out if she’d grabbed the wrong ingredient by accident, teenagers that took to alchemical theory like a duck to water, adults that mixed ingredients together and got results that made even her head spin.
This world was one made up of thousands of monsters all interacting with each other day after day. Sometimes they worked together, sometimes they fought, sometimes they just walked right by each other, but they interacted, nonetheless. And it was that very knowledge, and belief, that led Diana to believe that the ‘curse’ was a load of poppycock made by someone that just couldn’t admit they were less skilled than a longer living species like herself.
She had no doubts in her mind that Alec would grow up to be one of those monsters as well, but right now he was just a teenager scrounging coins and innocently excited over a new shirt.
‘What a slap in the face from reality.’ She snorted to herself internally.
“Oh really? Congratulations once more then.”
“Thanks, I think I’ll be going now.” He excused himself, shifting his weight back onto both of his feet evenly and nodding to her before turning around to leave her shop.
“Do have a good day now, young man! And remember to stop by whenever you wish, my doors are always open.”
“Thank you, I’ll keep that in mind.” He chuckled, waving over his shoulder and walking out of her shop.
“It’s always good to see teenagers like him relaxed and in high spirits. I’m sure he’s making great strides in whatever he’s doing.”
XXXxxxXXX
Alec Dius was absolutely beginning to stagnate; Olivia Kio was certain of it.
She wasn’t sure what was bringing about this change in the blue-haired teen, and she was equally unsure on if she should actually be happy about it or not. Over the past two weeks the young man had been going on quests pretty consistently, Olivia could understand that –she sort of needed to go on a few herself– and she genuinely saw nothing wrong with that in the slightest. What she found a problem with though was the fact that with each quest Alec completed he seemed to just get more and more... content with where he was at. His solo training was beginning to slow down, his training sessions with the green-haired stamina monster had gone from a nearly daily occurrence to once a week, and even in practice she could feel herself slowly but surely pulling ahead.
If this had been something natural, if she’d pulled ahead while they were both doing their best and she just proved herself to be more dedicated then she wouldn’t have cared in the slightest. But that wasn’t what was happening, and the reality of the situation was starting to absolutely piss her off like almost nothing else ever had.
But in that same token, how the hell was she ever meant to do anything about it? Sparring with her clearly didn’t light a fire under him and it wasn’t like they could get away with a no-holds-barred fight in the middle of the academy.
Not to mention that getting the green-haired idiot to spar with him more was pretty much out of the question so long as the holding pattern between him and Glenn held on. No matter what he did, the stocky asshole was just going to butt in and tear him down all over again to make sure that his ‘rival’ never actually got up onto his own two feet and caught up.
As much as she hated to admit it, the strategy was a sound one no matter how morally reprehensible it actually was.
With a sigh, she closed her eyes and shook her head, turning around to leave the training field where Alec was just mindlessly going through the motions of his stances.
‘So, this is the kind of person that Alec Dius is. He reaches a safe point and just stops. How utterly disappointing…’
And high above, unnoticed by the both of them, a black bird dotted in glittering constellations and galaxies circled the academy, its gaze swapping from Olivia back to Alec once more; its pupil dilating.
XXXxxxXXX
“Oooohhhhh Greffffff~”
“Ugh.” An orange haired male groaned as he lay on a worn, barely furnished, bed with his head hanging off the side upside down.
With a tired mumble he lifted a hand to move the black cloth covering his eyes. His thumb looping underneath the bottom of the cloth and lifting it towards the ground to reveal a single, glowing, emerald eye with a soft cyan fractal pattern through the iris.
“If you’re going to wake me up, you could at least let me read.” Gref groaned, the fractals in his eye pulsing faintly in time with his heartbeat.
“You’d just do that and fall asleep again Gref, come now.” Noelle Kio smiled lightly, cocking a hip and crossing her arms.
“Damn right I would. I’m tired as hell.” He huffed, using his thumb to drag the cloth back over his eye.
“Well, I got a favour for you to help me with tomorrow.”
“Not interested.”
“I’ve already spoken to your brotherrrrr~”
“You are so lucky that I don’t want to leave you braindead.”
“You gotta get through my mental walls first. And not even those eyes just let you do so all willy-nilly~” Noelle giggled, taking a big step forward and tapping a finger on his nose. “So?”
“You say that like I still have a choice.” He sighed, rubbing a hand over his covered eyes and yawning loudly.
“Of course, you still have a choice~”
“No, I have an ultimatum. Either help you with whatever insanity you have concocted or deal with my brother infesting my room with Lava Ants again because I didn’t help his stupid rival out.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t call myself stupid. I was a solid A student at the Xyrtahnian Royal Academy~”
“Still not valedictorian.” Gref yawned again.
“Well, neither was your brother.”
“I know, and he’s still pissy about it. So? What is this insane ‘favour’ you’re volun-telling me to do?”
“Weeeellll~ Tomorrow I need you to-“
XXXxxxXXX
Dragon-Scale Academy, Two Days Later
“Are you ever going to explain?” Alec asked with a huff, dodging a strike aimed at his ribs and flipping his blade into a defensive stance to block the rapid return swing.
In response to his question, Callum’s expression only fell flat for a moment, his usual exuberance and excitement dying completely. His blade struck Alec’s and the teen was forced back a couple metres, his shoes gouging small trenches in the ground until he finally came to a stop.
The teen wobbled for a moment at the sudden lack of backwards momentum but wasn’t given much time to regain his bearings as Callum was, as usual, pressing him within seconds of ‘disengaging’.
“He’s a bully and an asshole Alec, he’s not worth your time.”
“Well, he’s worth yours, and his words seem to hit pretty hard.” The blue-haired swordsman shot back, blocking three more strikes and hissing in pain as the blunt edge of Callum’s wooden blade struck his forearm.
Odd. He’d never lost a match through that method before, had Callum improved?
“Just…don’t worry about that, ok? My issue to solve, you don’t need to push yourself to try and get involved.” Callum smiled regretfully, taking a few steps back and sliding into one of the starter stances of the Dragon-Scale style.
“Push myself?” Alec mumbled; an eyebrow raised in curiosity as he slid into his own stance.
Did he think that Alec’s immediate response to trying to help was going to be violence? He knew that he couldn’t exactly take Glenn on in a straight fight thanks to the way that he’d shut down his attack on his lackey, he wasn’t stupid enough to run into such a one-sided fight.
“You’re not exactly a social guy, Alec.” Callum snorted, trying his absolute best to inject some levity back into the conversation as he shot forward.
The teen in question only pressed his lips thinly together and stepped forward, getting a surprised jerk to the side from Callum as he invaded his personal bubble far too quickly for him to get a proper strike off. The younger teen’s blade only missing his armpit thanks to a quick, very panicked, dash to the side that nearly sent the green-haired young man to his ass.
“Yeah yeah, I get it.”
“Finally! I’ve been wondering how to break the news to you for days now!” Callum crowed joyously, some of his regular exuberance filtering back into his movements as he re-engaged the Kairahlian teen once more.
‘Well, I’m about to get my ass kicked in a minute flat. But at least he’s back on his feet…metaphorically.’
And, like clockwork, Alec’s mental pause to correct himself led to him being laid out on the dirt within a couple seconds flat. His blue eyes focused on nothing but the sky as he blinked a couple times, a little stupefied despite himself.
He’d expected himself to have at least been able to hold out for a minute, had Callum really pulled that far ahead in a couple weeks? He had to congratulate the young man, he really did, but as he went to get up a dark –insidious– voice within his own mind piped up. A whisper that silenced a thousand shouts, a sharpness that sliced through a hundred castles, a ruthlessness that cleaved through a city of innocents.
If Callum has pulled this far ahead, how far has Blessed Catalyst progressed?
Like a golem syphoned of all its mana, the teen’s body locked up. His eyes blank and unseeing and his mouth ever so slightly ajar as the realisation, the sheer unknowing estimation, struck him like a stake through the heart.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
He had no idea just how far Blessed Catalyst had gone in the nearly two months he had been gone. He had no idea what they had done, who they had met or how they had progressed. If he, the one that had the slowest development of the entire party, had ranked up within a month then that meant they would probably be somewhere in the mid-high [Iron-rank] range, wouldn’t it? At the very least they would have learnt new techniques, probably about the existence of Magic Contracts and Power Stances too, and they were likely beginning to have enough party funds to actually start buying some quality gear.
‘-if, of course, Angelica and Felicia haven’t spent it all on mana-ink and religious iconography.’ His own mental monologue cut in with an amused snort, finally giving him the last push he needed to actually zone back into reality.
“-ec!? Alec you ok man!? Holy crap you weren’t responding for a real long time!” Callum exclaimed frantically, his hands waving all over the place as he knelt on the dirt beside him.
The green-haired young man looked about ready to cry at the idea that he might have actually injured Alec for real.
“I- Yeah no I’m fine. I- I’ll be back.” Alec muttered in reply, hopping to his feet and taking off two steps short of a dead sprint.
“Alec! Alec wait!” The shouts of Callum quickly turned to nothing but the whistling of the wind as he ran through the streets of Zenik, making a beeline for the Adventurer’s Guild building.
The moment the building came into view he cut his sprinting into a brisk jog to avoid setting anyone off into high alert, hopping up two steps at a time and practically leaping through the open double doors. Blowing right past a familiar pearlescent haired young woman on his way to the small stand offering copies of World Quest.
His gaze scanned the covers of the magazines quickly, the teen utterly unaware of the confused and annoyed look Olivia shot at his back from his weird behaviour.
At the end of the day, Alec’s weirdness was his problem and his alone, it’s not like this was going to involve her. So, with a small huff and a roll of her eyes she looked away and started to climb the stairs.
“Here, the most recent copy. There’s a section here for upcoming parties isn’t there?” The teen muttered to himself, flipping through the pages rapidly.
Advertisement, advertisement, general warning from the Guild, upcoming parties, [Tungsten-rank] party clears large scale- Wait a moment.
Flipping back three pages, Alec sucked in a small breath, his blue orbs flying over the pages before stopping on a single point and widening.
It was a small blurb, really just a singular sentence tucked away in the corner of the page. Yet to Alec it felt like a punch in the gut, because it only proved how tunnel-visioned he’d been; of how utterly naïve he had been to believe that his friends wouldn’t continue growing.
<[Iron-rank] Party “Blessed Catalyst” continues to wrack up completed quests despite losing founding member.>
Alec didn’t know how to feel. On the one hand he was incredibly happy for his friends that their efforts were finally being acknowledged and, likely, rewarded. On the other hand, the deep pit of self-disappointment was cold, oily and vast in its depth.
The realisation of what had occurred hit him like a freight train, his grip crumpling the magazine in his hands slightly and a quiet, hoarse, laugh leaving his lips as he tilted his head down.
‘I did it again, didn’t I? That vice of mine…’
That vice in question being what Angelica had affectionately referred to as ‘gifted kid syndrome’. Essentially, where his natural talents had let him coast for so long that he didn’t know how to keep pushing and applying himself without some kind of outside factor. That first month after leaving his friends, he had Alexandar around to act as an external motivator and his nightmares another, less healthy, external motivator alongside him. But now Alexandar was gone and his nightmares, while not gone, had certainly diminished in quantity over the last few weeks, and unlike Peter, Felicia and Angelica he didn’t have any kind of internal motivator that constantly pushed him.
The words of Alexandar and Calliope had filled in that particular blank for him; his friends all, in some way or another, enjoyed what they did.
Unlike them, however, the only internal motivator that he had was not being left behind by his friends. Which, he could at least recognise, was a very reactionary motivator and historically very, very bad at actually helping him keep up with them. Without those external motivators around, and his internal motivator temporarily pacified by his recent quest successes, he’d started to grow complacent, and his work ethic had started to drop.
“Shit…Shit. I’m so fucking stupid…” He muttered beneath his breath, burying his face in the cover of the World Quest magazine as he tried his best to keep a cool outward composure in the middle of this very public space.
“Oh? Is this a bad time, perchance?” A coy, feminine, voice snapped Alec out of his internal misery.
Eager to temporarily focus on anything except his minor self-loathing, the teen turned around only to freeze up in confusion.
It was that very same pearlescent haired woman that he’d met before his quest to slay the Criten two weeks earlier, accompanied by a blindfolded orange-haired young man with a chronic slouch and a weariness that seeped through even with half of his face covered.
“I- Uh, No. Can I help you?” He asked a little awkwardly, trying to brush off his previous actions.
He wasn’t ignoring them, that he promised himself, but right here and now wasn’t exactly the best time to grapple with and attempt to rectify them.
“Well, my name is Noelle, and this is Gref.” The woman introduced herself with a shallow bow and getting a half-yawn half-wave in return from the young man.
“Well, you clearly already know who I am.” He said, quite callously if he was going to be honest with himself.
He wasn’t in the best headspace right now and the reminder that this ‘Noelle’ knew him before he’d introduced himself was far from calming.
“So, you do remember. Oh, how nice.” She smiled, clapping her hands together. “Well I’ve brought my friend-“
“Blackmailed slave.”
“-Gref here to help me with something. I was hoping to gain your assistance as well.” She smiled, unsuccessfully trying to hide the twitch in her eye at the blindfolded sloucher's butted-in remark.
“And that would be?” He asked, crossing his arms and giving them both quite an unimpressed and suspicious look.
“Just a spell combination, nothing dangerous.” Noelle laughed, attempting to wave off his worries. “I know that as the rival of my sister you’ll at least be able to hold your own quite well.”
“Your sis- eh?” The teen stammered over himself, confusion evident.
Of course, his gut instinct was to go to Olivia, it was really all that he could think of. But she’d also called him her ‘rival’ and he was very, extra sure by this stage that wasn’t the relationship the two of them had.
“In fact… I saw her earlier and she’ll be a great help as well. Gref you stay here with Alec and I’ll go grab her.”
“Do I-“
“Yes. Yes you do~” She grinned, giving him a playful wink before running off to a set of stairs, leaving the two males all alone in the very busy building.
“…”
“…”
“Sooo….Anything interesting in that issue of World Quest?” Gref finally broke the silence, sounding like he’d rather be doing anything else except talking to him.
Alec could relate.
‘He can see through that thing? I thought he might have been blind…’
“Uh…The party Sky’s Liege just ranked up to Tungsten?”
“Huh, neat.”
“Yeah.”
“…”
“…”
Alright Alec was leaving, this was ridiculous.
“Noelle! Noelle let me go! I had a ques-“ Olivia Kio exclaimed, tripping and stumbling behind the gently smiling older woman as she was dragged by her wrist, a quest poster clutched in her free hand.
Her exclamations and refusals, though, died the moment her eyes settled on Alec. A jumble of about six different emotions seeming to pass through her expression in the span of a single second and she seemed to sway like a drunkard for a second when Noelle finally let go of her; evidently having not expected the sudden lack of forward momentum.
“Alright! Here we are! Are you two ready?” Noelle asked, clapping her hands together once more.
“No.”
“No!”
Both Alec and Olivia, respectively, responded. Both teen’s arms crossed over their chests and hard looks levied on Noelle.
“Oh, come now, one itty-bitty spell trial and I’ll let you both go on your way afterwards, hm?”
“No.” Both teens responded, this time far more in-sync in both timing and volume.
“If you both agree, I might even agree to take you on a [Gold-rank] quest and share some of the payout with you. I’m sure you both know how much that is.” The elder Kio sweetened the deal, getting a twitch from both of the teen’s expressions as their walls began to crack.
Even 10% of a [Gold-rank] quest’s minimum possible payout was well beyond what even the best [Iron-rank] quest could offer. This was, almost literally, a once in a lifetime opportunity for the both of them.
“I’ll even hide that from mum and dad so that they don’t come yelling at us and dock your allowance too, ‘Via~” Noelle grinned, placing a single finger over her lips while winking.
The older woman’s words only got a darkened glare from the teen before she closed her eyes, took a deep breath in, and then let it all out with a heavy sigh as she turned to look over at Alec.
“Just agree, Dius. She’s going to keep pestering us until we agree. Fine, Noelle, you win.”
“Uh, I guess I agree too?”
“Awesome! Alright, you heard them gentlemen! I’m all good!” Noelle called out, giving a thumbs up to three Guild employed guards that stared at the four of them silently as a magic circle lit up beneath their feet.
“Huh? A magic circle?” Alec unfurled his arms from their crossed position over his chest and held them out to his side as he looked around wildly.
From his side, Olivia just sighed once more and tilted her head with her eyes closed.
“Have you ever teleported before, Dius?”
“No!”
“Better hope you have a strong stomach.”
There was a flash of light over Alec’s vision and the next thing he knew he was standing in an empty meadow, a slight feeling of vertigo washing over him.
Not quite strong enough to bring his breakfast back up but still strong enough to make his knees weak and his head a little fuzzy.
“Huh, you handled that better than I thought you would.” Olivia mumbled as she looked over at him.
She sounded a little disappointed, had she wanted him to vomit?
“Alright then, let’s start with Olivia first, shall we?” Noelle suggested, a smile as sweet as honey across her expression.
“Yeah, I thought so. Alright, so what do I do?” She asked, taking a few steps forward.
“Not much, just make sure to stare into Gref’s eye for me, ok?” Noelle instructed, bringing both of her hands together and curling both of her middle fingers down, a magic circle slowly beginning to form off to the side of the clearing.
A dark look passed across Olivia’s expression as she saw the magic circle, her gaze quickly snapping back around to look at Gref, only to see one of his glowing, fractalized eyes staring at her with the other locking eyes with Noelle. Like a lizard both of his eyes looked in completely separate directions, a slight shudder going down the girl’s spine at the sight that just seemed to stretch on for a full eternity.
“Hoh-ho. So, this is the creature you consider your greatest rival, Olivia?” Noelle asked with a raised eyebrow and a grin, her hands falling to her side as her gaze moved away from Gref and towards the magic circle she had made.
Like a moth drawn to a flame, both Alec’s and Olivia’s eyes moved in the same direction, their bodies tensing up at the light purple mana construct that stood there with a tensed body of its own and fully slit eyes.
There, made of glittered purple mana, stood a Wyvern with two strong wings and a well-toned body. Its head low to the ground and its teeth bared at the younger Kio with its wings spread out wide.
“Well, that’s enough of that.” Noelle snorted, snapping her fingers and unravelling the construct in an instant, its roar of defiance silenced by the unravelling of its very throat before it all faded away into sparkles of light.
“What-….What was that?” Alec asked, blinking rapidly in shock a few times as he looked between the other three.
“My magic. My qualification is [Summoner] so I’m especially good at summoning and creating mana constructs of actual creatures. I wanted to see if, using Gref’s special eyes and my abilities, I could create a construct of an actual creature. Power, mannerisms and all.” She hummed, looking quite proud of herself.
“Why did you get rid of it?” Olivia growled, whipping on her sisters like she’d stabbed her pet dog right in front of her.
“Because I just wanted to see if I could, ‘Via. After Alec, I can always summon it again if you’re that keen to fight it.” The older woman grinned, raising an eyebrow almost mockingly at the constipated expression that crossed her younger sister's face.
“Well?” Noelle challenged, not saying anything as the younger girl just clenched her fists at her side and stomped over to Alec’s side, almost as if using him as a human meat shield to deflect her elder sister’s attention onto.
And it worked an absolute charm.
“Are you ready for your turn, Alec?” Noelle questioned, bringing her hands together once more and starting to form the magic circle.
And, just as Olivia had, Alec looked into Gref’s lone eye. Jolting a little as he felt the sudden presence of something in his head that he could clearly tell didn’t belong. Knowing the cause of that feeling helped to calm him down somewhat but he still couldn’t shake the instinctual flexing of his muscles in preparation to move at a moment's notice.
Idly though, he couldn’t help but wonder what sort of creature would show up. Noelle had used the word ‘rival’ before hadn’t she? What creature would be his rival? It would surely have to be a Criten, he couldn’t think of anything else that fit the criteria.
“W-What the hell!?” Olivia’s startled shout instantly caught Alec’s attention, the teen looking away from Gref in an instant and whirling around with his hand on his blade.
And his gaze went up, and up, and up once more. A choked gasp came from Gref behind him that Alec never even heard, his hand sliding limply off the handle of his blade.
‘This thing is what Dius considers to be his rival creature? How the hell does he expect to ever fight-‘ Olivia’s red eyes turned onto Alec as the creature roared, vibrating the ground and shaking the trees.
The glittered purple plates of chitin over its form seemed as if they would deflect any weapon thrown its way, its long, massive form seemed large enough to crush even the Adventurer’s Guild building, and the undulating rows of bone in its mouth looked strong enough to turn even a cube of iron to powder in seconds. She had no doubt that Noelle was hampering its magical capabilities, but even then, its magic felt overwhelmingly dense and all-encompassing, like an aura of pure, lethal power.
Alec’s knees struck the ground, the rest of his body following numbly as all the strength in his body left him. His arms limp at his sides and his magic unwilling to move at all, like an abused puppy huddled in a corner to hide from an abusive owner. A cold sweat broke out across his entire body in an instant, his pupils thinning and expanding constantly at a rate that couldn’t have been healthy in the slightest.
“Alec!” Olivia’s voice reached his ears, but not his mind, static having overcome his every sense.
Another roar left the creature as its mouth aimed towards Alec, only for its form to unravel in an instant much the same as the Wyvern from earlier, the beast exploding into a shower of particles that didn’t so much as get a twitch out of the teen.
Everyone in the clearing had been frightened by the creature, something which was plainly evident to all of them just from a simple glance. But none of them even came close to the catatonic, all-encompassing fear that currently had Alec in its clutches.
For the second time in his life, Alec had come face-to-face with a weakened Dune Worm, and yet again the creature had done nothing but wrap the ice-cold grip of pure, primal fear around Alec’s heart.
A reminder that no matter how far he thought he had come, he hadn’t even moved off the starting line when it came to the real world.