《In Darkness We Must Delve》 Appendix Aura: The life energy of the soul; it has often been compared to blood as it circulates the body, unlike blood, though aura can be redirected or channelled in different patterns, which enhances its potency or effectiveness. Entire fields of study have been dedicated to learning the different effects of aura patterns, which have been shown to cause temporary effects commonly referred to as runes. Due to how an average citizen lacks the effective control of their aura, aura leakage has been utilised as a renewable energy source. Awakened: Those who have had their aura ignited, removing the spiritual barrier. Typically, this is done by a parent or guardian at a young age; it is unusual for those past twelve to be unawakened and is just assumed. Being awakened allows greater control of aura and typically increases health and vitality. Bellum: A weapons training school in Turgida Darcend: Name of the world Dark Flame, The: A group not associated with one kingdom and is thought to be a criminal organisation, they pillage and steal those they disagree with in the form of justice. Those who are known to exploit their workers attempt to pay their way through regulation or increase their profit in legal but exploitative ways, so be wary of the Dark Flame. Drakonsbane: A kingdom known for its class structure, with some parts of the kingdom being exorbitant and other parts being barely able to afford food. It is said that the Dark Flame originated here. Healer: A type of Mythic that has a legacy that heals damage Kingdom: An area of land which is under a main political power that is protected from Shades. The main heart of a kingdom is typically surrounded by walls, holding the majority of the population, and while some villages and towns survive outside of these walls, they are mostly the exception. Legacy: An expression of the soul that enacts its power on reality; the way this power is presented is said to be impacted by a person¡¯s personality. General aspects of a Legacy can be predicted through eye colour if the previous host of their soul was recorded as the eyes are the window to the soul. Light Industries: The main weapons seller with the majority share of the market, they are known for their innovations in technology. Linked Souls: Linked souls are souls that typically reincarnate at the same time, the most common variant being soul mates. Manna Crystals: It¡¯s been theorised that Manna Crystals are the crystallised form of aura though the process of this is unknown, it has been used as a power source although occasionally have been known to have random effects, the cause of which is unknown. Mage: A type of Mythic that has a legacy that the general public describes as ¡®magic¡¯ or ¡®spells¡¯. Mythic: People who protect humanity from the monstrous shades, typically with help from their legacy. Paix: A weapons training school in Turgida Shadow¡¯s End: The main technology and weapons kingdom, what they lack in Mythics, they make up in technological might. They are the main supplier of weapons and are the home to Light Industries. If you meet someone who is not from your kingdom, they are most likely from here. Shade: a soulless monster with an innate hatred of humanity.
Grey Bone Shade: the lowest level of Shade as they haven¡¯t fully developed their basic white bone armour, making them relatively easily to damage. Beta Level Shade: sturdy bone armour has developed, and they have a basic intellect. Alpha Level Shade: has a more complex carapace and more specific adaptations like venom or toxic gas. Spawn Level Shade: can create grey bone Shades. High Spawn level Shade: has bone armour that completely covers the Shade without impairing its movement and is able to create Alpha Shades Specialised Shade: Shades that are incredibly difficult to take down due to its specific ability, less a growth stage and more a specific classification.
Speedster: A type of Mythic that has a legacy that makes them move faster Tank: A type of Mythic nicknamed after one of the Light Industries armoured vehicles, typically they have a legacy that can take a large amount of damage Telum: By most metrics Telum is the best place to learn to be a Mythic Academy, with the best researchers of aura, legacies, and Shades. It is famed for its training resources, and even fully qualified Mythics users use them. The Black Out: A tragedy caused by a black out in Turgida which resulted in panic and fear which in turn caused Shades to breach the walls casing loss and devastation as Mythics tried to protect the citizens, some at the cost of their lives. One hundred and fourteen people died in the thirty minutes including three Mythics. It is unknown what caused the black out. The Bright Eagle: Light Industries revolutionary airship design. Training School: Typically, the first step in becoming a Mythic where you learn the basics of fighting, weapons, aura control and Shades. While it is not necessary to become a Mythic, it is valuable in order to have a strong foundation of knowledge that can be the difference between life and death out of the field. Most Mythic Academies require a certain grade rewarded at this level in order to be considered. Turgida: The largest kingdom by population, home of Telum, the most renowned Mythic Academy. Vercult: Was known as the Kingdom of Art renowned for its architecture, food, and culture. It is now known as the Fallen Kingdom. Wruikreria: One of the main continents of Darcend
Characters Ace (he/him): eye colour, forest green, he is the pilot of the mission Kill and Night are on due to his legacy, psychometric which means he can absorb the memories of an item. The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. Alex Eye (he/him): eye colour, copper, legacy, he can control technology, Mythic name, Upgrade, weapon, drones. Ark (he/him): eye colour, orange, legacy, unknown, he is the Chairman of the Dark Flame. Blink (she/her): The speedster from Tatum¡¯s most famous team, her statue points towards the cafeteria. Cassie Rockheart (she/her): eye colour, amber, legacy can manipulate gravity, Mythic name Granite, weapon a giant mechanical fist also called Granite. She is the leader of the Legends. Charon Washington (he/him): eye colour, Hazelnut brown, the headmaster of Tatum. Chloe (she/her): A third year student, likes playing video games in the common room. Christopher Killjoy (he/him): Apart of Team Duck. Clover Fortune (she/her): eye colour, tree bark brown, legacy she can manipulate probability, so the best-case scenario happens for her, in simple terms she has an aura of good luck, Mythic name Lucky Charm. Crash (he/him): The tank from Tatum¡¯s most famous team, his statue points towards the stadium. Drei (he/him): The orphanage''s dog. Dr Jacq (he/she/they): eye colour, olive brown, legacy can make multiple copies of themselves but can¡¯t control the gender. Teaches about Shades. Dr Jacub Keter (he/him): eye colour, cobalt purple, addicted to caffeine, teaches about Aura. Edward Blitz (he/him): eye colour, fire red legacy, super speed through the use of personal time manipulation, Mythic name Reacher, weapon, has no specified weapons. Emily Cake (she/her): eye colour, grass green, legacy, can gain the powers of different animals by channelling them Mythic name Wild Spirit. Flint Lock/Kill Streak (he/him): eye colour, baby blue, legacy, unknown, weapon Scythe Minigun. Goon 1: eye colour, Pink, associated with the Dark Flame. Goon 2: eye colour, Yellow, associated with the Dark Flame. Jack Order (he/him): eye colour, mud brown, legacy, can make and enforce rules on a certain area or on certain people for a short period of time, Mythic name Ruler. John Douglas (he/him): Leader of Team Duck. Leo King (he/him): eye colour, platinum, CEO of Light Industries. Lilly Oak (she/her): eye colour, rose, legacy, can manipulate plants, Mythic name Grass Blade. Luke Knight/Night Strike (he/him): eye colour, Slate, legacy, can turn invisible but is unable to see conventionally whilst invisible, he can sense emotion, weapon S-class Sniper Sword. Mathew Hunter (he/him): eye colour, grape purple, legacy, can easily form his aura into patterns known as runes that are more stable than another could, these runes have been nicknamed spells, Mythic name, Rune, weapon predominantly daggers. Max Ukraine (he/him): Apart of Team Duck. Mechanism (she/her): The technopath from Tatum¡¯s most famous team, her statue points towards the shooting range. Miracle (she/her): The healer from Tatum¡¯s most famous team, her statue points towards the med bay. Miss Laura Howl (she/her): eye colour, apricot orange, teaches history. Miss Rose (she/her): eye colour, storm grey. Owner of the orphanage Thomas found himself at the beginning of the story. Miss Take (she/her): eye colour, indigo. The owner of the previous orphanage, Thomas, got kicked out of at the beginning of the story. Miss Smallwood (she/her): eye colour, ash grey, teaches wilderness survival. Nobody (???): ???? do they exist? Are they a Mythic? Has anti-memetic properties, seems to be friends with Jacq. Oliver King (he/him): eye colour, gold, legacy unknown but is likely associated with teleportation according to the database, Mythic name, Quiver, weapon Bow Staff. Patrick Eye (he/him): eye colour, lilac, legacy summons robot-like golems that can do certain tasks, works at Light Industries as head engineer and is Alex''s dad Samuel (he/him): eye colour, coffee brown, Sam was the head of the team that was sent out to save Night and Kill. Star Cranberry (he/him): eye colour, jade green, legacy, is a pyrotechnic, Mythic name Plasma. Thomas Walker (he/him): eye colour, lightning blue, legacy, super speed through the use of converting body to solid kinetic energy, Mythic name, Blue Lightning, weapon, shotgun gauntlets named Red Thunder he received from his mother. Yin Fortune (he/him): eye colour, leaf green, legacy, his legacy manipulates probability, so the worst-case scenario happens, in simple terms, he has an aura of bad luck. ?? (he/him): eye colour, ruby, legacy, fire manipulation, Edward¡¯s friend? Grace Mercy (she/her): eye colour, lime green, legacy, can travel through a linked deserted reality, is apart of the Dark Flame.
Shades Beowolf: A Beowolf is a warped version of a wolf. Its fur is in patches beneath bone armour that covers part of its body. What flesh can be seen looks black and decayed. Its legs look mismatched, with some having talons like a Harris hawk and some with overextended claws that are jagged and sharp. They are known to fight in pacts, with the oldest taking charge. Bonegrinder: A bone grinder is a vaguely humanoid Shade three times the size of an average man. It has been described as if you took a photo and stretched it out unequally, with its head being flatter and broader than an actual man and its arms thicker and longer. Its armour scratches against itself as it moves, making a sound of metal scraping. Dark Skipper: A dark skipper is a prey mantis-type Shade that blends into its surroundings, only moving when unobserved. It seems to move impossibly fast and can move multiple meters in a blink of an eye. The easiest way to deal with this Shade is in a group with at least three, keeping a visual on it the whole time and allowing each person to time their blinks. Draknid: A draknid is a hybrid between a spider and a dragon with aspects of a wolf. They are one of the more common types of shades as they hunt in packs, they are covered in patches of fur and scales with over extending fangs, as they age one or two in a pack develop weak breath powers that range from gases poison to fire. While they are weak and small when compared to other Shades in high numbers, they have been known to overwhelm. Hydra: A hydra is typically a serpentine monster with multiple heads. Be careful how you deal with this Shade, as if it survives the blow, the newly formed head will take on defensive attributes that prevent it from being killed the same way again. Infestation: This is a small, insidious type of Shade that typically is found in swarms. It is a small insectoid with a shell and a needle-like mouth. To deal with an Infestation, it is best to try and deal with the brood mother first, as they spawn quickly. It is best to wear protective gear around any orifices, as their method of attack is to crawl into any that are exposed to lay eggs and die. Man¡¯s Laughter: This Shade is a chimaera made up of a fox and a hyena. Its face is humanoid, stretched across its head in a permanent grin. It is the size of a regular fox and typically hides in shadows. It is most known for its uncanny laughter, which always sounds like it''s right next to your ear, regardless of the true location of the Shade. Nope: A Shade whose original name has been forgotten, a nope seems to prey on typical fears of insects, arachnids, and snakes, being a combination of the three with a jaw that stretches open like a snake showcasing its fangs before it swallows you, eight needle like legs that piece the ground as it moves and beetle like wings. Its armour typically is reminiscent of a crown and flames with oily scaly flesh revealing itself behind. It is quite large, being four times the size of an average man when fully grown, and its fangs produce a poison that can necrose flesh. Tusk: A combination of an elephant and a boar, it is known for its many different tusks and antlers that jut out of its head at seemingly random locations. Its main method of attack is charging and trying to impale you on its sharp tusks. It is roughly the size of an elephant. 0. Prologue The Kingdom of Turgida was eerily silent this close to the border wall, as civilisation gave the outside wilds breathing room. The only sound was the occasional movement of guards checking for any monsters that dared to get too close. The familiar routine kept their emotions in check to prevent any dark feelings from attracting the monsters to them. A squelching and cracking noise broke the silence. Somehow, inside the walls, bones and flesh were impossibly created from the darkness; like rotting wood caving under its own weight, they grew like cancer in the heart of a nearby forest. A dark creature formed from the night; its flesh black like the shadows from which it had emerged. This Shade, by which these creatures of shadows were known, was highlighted by its off-white bone armour that covered parts of its inky black body. The monster let out an ear-piercing scream and awoke a young boy in an orphanage. Mathew knew what the sound meant. Everyone in their right mind knew it meant to run or suffer near certain death, but for Mathew, it meant an opportunity. His eyes shoot open, his heart filled with childish confidence, overpowering the more rational fear. He shivered with excitement at the chance to test out his newly discovered skills and weapons, just like he had seen his favourite Mythics on TV. The beast moved towards civilisation, attracted to the spike in the more rational citizens¡¯ emotions, emerging out of the forest only a field away from the orphanage. Inside of which, the boy sneaked through to prevent anyone from stopping him, stole his weapon, and stealthily escaped through the front entrance. He looked up and froze. The beast now stood a few metres away from him, its shadow blocking out what little light the moon illuminated, covering the boy in shadows as it towered over him. A chill crept down his neck, which had nothing to do with the cold night air; he had never seen a Shade in person before. This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Although he had read, watched, and rewatched videos of famous battles of Mythics and Shades, it had in no way prepared him for reality. Terror gripped him for a few vital seconds as his brain finally comprehended the situation, the emotion pinpointing him like a beacon in a cave. The TV had not done it justice. Despite his confidence forgoing him, he knew what he needed to do. Luminescent runes appeared in the air in response to the boy¡¯s aura, his hands and eyes glowing at the power of the symbols. They resonated in the air, almost like an instrument playing backwards, familiar but alien. Though he had only recently learnt this ¡®¡®spell¡¯¡¯, it was spoken with confidence, like he had said it a thousand times before. He hadn¡¯t. The spell rocketed the boy back with so much unexpected power that he cratered next to the orphanage¡¯s door, knocking him out in an instant. The power caused a blast of superheated plasma to appear, engraved around the edge with the symbols, which glowed white against the purple. It hit the Shade directly; the impact caused a tremor in the ground as it went through the Shade. The Shade collapsed. The spell blasted the newly born Shade¡¯s head clean off, filling the air with the smell of roasted flesh. Despite this decapitation, it didn¡¯t seem too fazed. Black matter exploded from a singular point on its severed neck, replacing the remaining stump with two heads covered by more developed bone armour. The air nearby seemed to glisten like it was warping from heat. Without a sound to announce their arrival, a team of Mythics appeared. The leader spoke into a com on his wrist, ¡°A Beta Hydra, starting extraction and containment protocol.¡± With the two short swords in his hands, he cut a gateway into the air in front of them, causing the same glisten as before, and disappeared just as quickly as they appeared, taking the Shade with them. Only the carnage of the Shade¡¯s path and the smell of ozone remained from the losing battle. That, and an unconscious boy left in a blackened crater. The only other person to have witnessed the event was a well-dressed man with hazelnut eyes sitting at a desk far from where the skirmish had taken place. The man only smiled to himself, turning the recording off, noting the possible future of this boy with the correct training. He sighed. The damages meant more paperwork for him¡ªso much more paperwork. He could probably delegate. 1. Hello, Hell Hole 7 years later ¡°-Are you even listening, mister!¡± I took my earphones out as the song I was listening to reached the chorus: ¡°Of course I¡¯m listening. I respect what you say as much as you respect me.¡± The lady who was driving me to my next orphanage after chucking me out of the previous one choked on her rage, ¡°We wouldn¡¯t have had to have this conversation if you had just behaved yourself.¡± ¡°I¡¯m insulted that after all this time, you don¡¯t even know my name.¡± I replied with mock insult, ¡°I¡¯m a Tom, not a doorMATT.¡± I wasn¡¯t typically this antagonistic with people, but it''s just too tempting when you get blamed for something out of your control, especially when this was likely the last time I had to interact with them. She continued ignoring me, ¡°Just because you lost people in the Black-¡± I put my earphones back in and looked out the window. I watched the different buildings we passed by. I think she had done her research, as this particular hellhole seemed to be closer to the kingdom walls than most, which was slightly unusual as the orphanages were typically closer to the centre for relatively obvious reasons. I just needed to wait out the ride. I mostly didn¡¯t have too much of a gripe for the orphanages, as they were a necessary evil. What I did have a gripe with, however, was the people who were in them. They say hell is other people, and I¡¯m sure this new one won¡¯t be any different. We pulled up at the new orphanage, same as the old. It was a rather large building with a weapons range, reasonably large windows, which I think I could fit through if need be, and only two floors. It seemed to be a somewhat new building, a normal design for the area, based on the other houses we passed on the way here. With it having been made from wood from the forest nearby, which likely wouldn¡¯t be too difficult to hide in. The outside of the building was a bland excuse of a garden with only some bushes, a couple windows on the ground floor which looked easy enough to escape through, if need be, and next to the door, there was a dent where it looked almost as if someone had been launched into the wall, with there being a dip in the ground leading up to the dent. To me, it looked like an easy fix, but clearly, there were more important things to spend the budget on than fixing the aesthetics. It at least had some maintenance funding, considering the wood didn''t have anything growing on it yet, so it was less run down than the last one. I climbed out of the car, and they drove off as soon as I closed the door; it was nice to know they liked me enough to walk me to the door. Luckily for me, I had my stuff with me from the back already. I dragged my things to the rather fancy metal and glass door, which was in contrast to the front garden, which was even more boring up close. I could hear a dog barking when I rang the bell. A fairly pretty woman answered the door, restraining the dog by its collar as it tried to escape. Her eyes were storm grey, and she looked about twenty-five. ¡°Ah, you must be Thomas, come in, come in, before Drei escapes.¡± She ushered me in and closed the door while keeping the dog inside. ¡°My name is Miss Rose, and I¡¯m the one who''s looking after you lot. But before I can let you settle into your room, just yet, which is up the stairs on the left in case I forget, there are a few things we need to get out of the way. As I¡¯m sure you¡¯re aware.¡± I rolled my eyes involuntarily as I knew where this was going. Just like every other orphanage before, I just need to go through the formalities before I¡¯m inevitably moved to another for no real reason. Miss Rose took me to what I imagine was the dining room after leaving my stuff by the door for the moment and asked me to take a seat, and I complied. ¡°Let¡¯s talk about why Miss Take thought it was best for you to come here rather than stay under her care.¡± I definitely know where this was going. ¡°What¡¯s there to talk about,¡± I replied nonchalantly. ¡°I¡¯m sure it was just a Miss Take.¡± ¡°I¡¯m sure she loved that joke.¡± Miss Rose mumbled under her breath. ¡°The main thing I¡¯m talking about is how you broke someone¡¯s hand. And, how you somehow put chewing gum into that same someone¡¯s shoes, despite them being inside his locked room.¡± ¡°First of all, dodging out of the way of a punch so they hit the wall instead of my face should not count as ¡®breaking someone¡¯s hand¡¯.¡± I replied, generally annoyed that of all the things to get in trouble for, the main thing was something that just wasn¡¯t actually my fault; I¡¯d blame favouritism, ¡°Second of all, the door was locked as you said; maybe he put the gum in his own shoe? Maybe as karmic justice, it just accidentally fell in there?¡± After a look that said she clearly didn¡¯t believe me, she sighed and continued, ¡°Karmic justice, huh? Why would accidentally getting gum in his shoes be ¡®karmic justice¡¯?¡± ¡°Well, he did steal my money.¡± ¡°And let me guess, you stole it back?¡± I grinned, ¡°How could I? The door was locked.¡± ¡°Ok, let''s leave that then, I hope you don¡¯t have to resort to petty revenge while you are here. Most people here are a bit older and keep to themselves.¡± Her eyes looked back at me with a hint of sadness. ¡°There was another part that I need to cover about your mother.¡± If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it. My face felt warm, my face fell flat, and my eyes started to sting. ¡°What about her? She was just one of the unlucky ones during the Blackout.¡± ¡°I just wanted to let you know that I am here if you need to talk about it. I''ve had a few of the kids whose parents died that day.¡± ¡°She was a Mythic; she shouldn¡¯t have died in a car crash. If I didn¡¯t exist, then she probably would have been fine actually fighting the Shades rather than ferrying me to safety. Then someone had the audacity to save me instead of her, the useless kid who can¡¯t even get into a weapons school.¡± Miss Rose looked at me sternly in the eyes as I tried to avoid hers, ¡°Thomas, it wasn¡¯t your fault; it wasn¡¯t anyone¡¯s fault. The Blackout was unprecedented. No one could have predicted it.¡± I scoffed slightly to myself at the redundant sentence, in a way to ignore the actual topic, as I¡¯d heard it all over the years, ¡°¡®Ifs¡¯ don¡¯t change anything, only make you feel worse about yourself. Everything was chaotic that night. You don¡¯t know what changing one thing or another would do, so it''s best to take it how it actually happened. You were seven, emotions were rampant that day, and with that many Shades, things were bound to go wrong.¡± ¡°And I mock her memory by failing to be a Mythic like her.¡± ¡°Don¡¯t say that! Besides, if she were anything like the Mythics, she would probably prefer you living the mundane life,¡± She had a look of knowing in her eyes, ¡°the work isn¡¯t as glamorous as they make it out on TV.¡± She paused on that heavy note and got up, ¡°Ok, lets lighten the mood, do you want a tea before I show you to your room? That always helps me keep my mind off things. Then we can-¡± I closed the door behind me. *** After the door closed, I took a moment to calm down. Then, I grabbed my bags and went up the stairs to my new room. As I went up, I realised one of those door things to stop babies from getting through blocked my way; it was likely there to stop the dog from getting up to the rooms. The only problem being that I, a person who could pick a lock with only a paperclip, could not work out how to open the damn thing. The damn thing just increased my frustration. Miss Rose did appear to try and help me but apparently deemed that it¡¯d be best to let me vent my frustration on the door. I don¡¯t know how long it took for a boy around my age with blondish hair and a tired expression to come out of his room, annoyed, open it without saying a word, and then return to the book in his hand. He was wearing a graphic t-shirt with one of the local Mythic¡¯s symbols on the front and shorts, he seemed slightly shorter than me with grape purple eyes. He looked like the type who could read a new book in one day and then reread it to make notes. I opened my mouth to say something and then thought better of it; I decided to pretend that nothing had happened and went to my room. The said room was mediocre at best. It was split into two; one half had posters of planets, famous Mythics, and diagrams of Shades with weak points highlighted. There was also a bookshelf with some comics and books stacked on it and some daggers. The other side was empty, with only a bed and wardrobe to decorate it. I put my stuff on that half¡¯s bed. My roommate, it turned out, was the annoyed boy. He was reading a book with a photo of a bald man in a cloak in the middle of a spell circle for the cover. He looked up. ¡°So,¡± the boy said finally, ¡°the person who can¡¯t open a simple baby door after five minutes is my new roommate. That rattling was really distracting.¡± He looked up briefly from his book. ¡°My name¡¯s Matthew, by the way, Matthew Hunter.¡± ¡°Well, mine is Thomas¡­ Walker, Thomas Walker,¡± I replied, then decided I was going to be annoying. ¡°Nice to meet you, Mathew By The Way Mathew Hunter.¡± Mathew gave me a flat look as I grinned back before adding, ¡°And those doors are harder than you make it look; show off. Cool posters, by the way. I didn¡¯t think that Lucky Charm did signings.¡± I attempted to forget how I had made myself look like a fool and unpacked my books and clothes onto the bed. If I was going to be sharing a room with this guy, I might as well make an attempt to be friends with him, as being standoffish would only make my life more difficult. I have learned that through experience. ¡°So, what¡¯s that book you¡¯re reading? Is it good?¡± ¡°It¡¯s alright, though I guess I¡¯m the one who is meant to show you around,¡± Matthew stated matter-of-factly, looking up from his book again. ¡°Miss Rose usually puts that on the roommate. Dinner¡¯s at seven, breakfast at eight, and lunch at twelve. The living room is to the right of the stairs and the kitchen is to the left. We go to bed at around ten, but Miss Rose is relatively lenient with the rules. That¡¯s about it; you¡¯ll get used to it.¡± *** After I ate dinner, I went into the living room, a relatively cramped space with a clearly well-worn sofa that took up most of the room and a relatively old, blocky TV. Everybody was watching the news with great interest. There was an update on the newly infamous bank robber Mythic, Reacher. He had held a bank up and stole all the money in a matter of minutes. This was made even more impressive as he had done this without triggering any alarms, and this wasn¡¯t even the first bank he had robbed. Reacher, like all Mythics, had unique powers, known as a legacy, which he gained by awakening his soul. His power was some kind of super speed, though, and unlike most Mythics, Reacher used his power for his own needs rather than the people¡¯s. The majority of Mythics are hired by the kingdoms as a sort of elite force against the Shades, though they use them for other protection needs like as a deterrent to other kingdoms. I hung out in the living room for a short while before leaving as the news played older stories I had already heard so many times; honestly, it''s a talent how they make Mythics fighting a herd of elemental griffins boring. I went back up the stairs with other people to make sure I didn¡¯t have to mess with the dog door, as I still wasn¡¯t completely certain of my ability to open it. By the time I went into my new room, Matthew was already asleep, so I dived into my own to do the same. Then I realised that past-me was a lazy arse, as I still was yet to put my bedding on my bed. Even with the bedding, it was uncomfortable and lumpy. It took me ages to fall asleep, and when I did, I awoke again to a bright purple light. I opened my eyes to see that it was coming from Matthew. Strangely, the light made his skin look kind of weird as if it were covered in strange markings. Plus, his eyes looked completely purple with seemingly no pupils. In fact, he looked a bit like he could be¡­ ¡°YOU¡¯VE UNLOCKED YOUR LEGACY!¡± ¡°Scream a bit louder, will you,¡± Matthew whispered loudly after flinching from the sudden noise. ¡°The rest of Turgida didn¡¯t hear you the first time!¡± My mind boggled. This was massive. Only around half of those who even get chosen for the fighting schools even manage to unlock theirs and they typically have the right resources to have that high of a success rate. And my roommate was apparently one of them. But I was tired. It was probably about four in the morning. Wouldn¡¯t that make it early? I was not awake enough to do brain stuff. I guess I must have short-circuited because I fell back asleep almost instantly. Without purple light glaring into my retinas this time. 2. Hope It Doesn’t Rune A Potential Friendship I woke up the next morning in the same clothes as the previous day, as I had decided that they were comfy enough to be my pyjamas. It took substantial effort to drag myself out of bed for the scheduled breakfast at eight a.m.; in my brain, that was equivalent to being awake at four a.m. and certainly not waking hours. The promise of not having to deal with the dog door was the extra push needed to get up on time. I followed Mathew downstairs through the open dog door to the kitchen, ignoring any difficult thoughts that it was too early to deal with. The breakfast selection was the usual affair of bread, toast, and cereal, which everyone helped themselves to. One of the kids tried to start a conversation with me. ¡°Oh hey, you¡¯re the new kid, right? I¡¯m Al, so when did you-¡± I put my earphones in my ears as I was not awake enough for interactions. Al seemed to understand as he stopped trying to talk with me. I was given understanding by some of the ones with mugs of coffee, which I assume meant that Al was just one of those dreaded morning people. I just poured myself a glass of milk, downed it in one, and then poured myself another, which caused some of the other people to look at me in slight horror, but they, too, were too tired to call me out on my drink choice. I then poured myself a bowl of cereal. After I had eaten my cereal and drank my milk, I petted the dog, who seemed to love the attention he was getting, before he went on his walk with whoever was unlucky enough to have to brace the cold outside. After I was finished with what I counted as socialising, I went back to my room to change from my ¡®pyjamas¡¯, timing it with other people for obvious reasons. The dog was on his walk, so I thought it was fine to leave it unlocked. Walking into my room, the sight of Mathew¡¯s side reminded me of my rude awakening, which brought the thoughts I was ignoring to the forefront of my mind. Honestly, him being a Mythic is not that strange, I mean, there are a ton of them, I¡¯m sure. Although I personally hadn¡¯t interacted with many that I could remember, they were the ones who went to the weapons schools that I failed to get into. The idea of Legacies was slightly soured for me due to the fact that I was unable to unlock my own, but occasionally, I daydream as they¡¯re usually so cool. I¡¯ve heard that some can allow a Mythic to talk to animals or make portals to different continents as easily as breathing. I would even accept it if only my aura had unlocked, even though that was just the basic function of the soul, which was the same for everyone. It felt like everyone had at least their aura unlocked and that I had been missed somehow. Moving over those frustrations in my mind, I changed the topic before I got annoyed with things I couldn¡¯t change. Which then led my thoughts to what Mathew¡¯s could be, obviously something to do with that glowing symbol thing. Maybe he¡¯s like a human torch and can just create light, though that does sound dumb. I can¡¯t really see any Shades being killed by an atmospheric glow, though there probably have been stranger things. Though whatever it is, I would have liked a warning before being woken up at four a.m. then again, I hadn¡¯t even known him a full day yet, so I can¡¯t really blame him. Still tired, though. Shaking off the weight of deep thought that shouldn¡¯t have to happen earlier than ten, I went into my wardrobe and took out the first pair of trousers and T-shirt I could find, which was an orange T-shirt with the lettering ¡®CHB¡¯, which was in reference to a book series I liked, and some navy jeans. I went downstairs to watch TV, and the news was on. I sighed as the news was definitely not my preference, but I also didn¡¯t want to ask anyone to change the channel to something better, like a cartoon or something. While it was boring, with most of the same stories or variations of the same stories repeated over and over, it was still better than nothing. It was honestly impressive how they made things that should be interesting, dull, and emotionless. For example, how a Shade almost destroyed another village outside the walls, but a Mythic team saved the day or a new aura power use discovery. These should hold my attention, but their delivery destroys it. I turned my attention to the rest of the room, which had white walls, white carpet, drawn blue curtains, and a couple of warn sofas facing the TV. The room was bigger than a lot of the other living rooms I¡¯d been in and seemed to be where most people hung out. There were video game controllers around, randomly put away or next to the console. I scanned the room for Mathew, spotting him on the sofa. Matthew looked as he did when I first saw him: blondish hair, grape purple eyes (with pupils and whites), non-glowy hands, and regular whitey-pink skin. I went to sit down but the sofas had no space, so I remained awkwardly leaning against the wall, acting as though I never intended to sit in the first place. Most of them were younger than me, though a few were older; the only one who looked my age was Matthew. That¡¯s why they paired us together most likely. When I looked around the room, most people had bags under their eyes and were giving me dirty looks. That may have been my fault; I tried to look as apologetic as I could. If they had not known about Matthew, they probably did now, though I didn¡¯t realise I was that loud. I decided that I probably should not say anything. ¡°So, Matt, how long have you been a Mythic?¡± I asked out loud before I had finished my own thoughts. Dang. ¡°Since I was ten,¡± Matthew answered offhandedly like it was perfectly ordinary, his eyes not moving from the TV. ¡°Can we talk about it later? Team T.G.W.P from Drakonsbain just killed an Alpha Drakon that was lurking near kingdom borders, and they actually caught some of it on camera.¡± Stolen story; please report. He then seemed to have a thought and looked over at me, with a slight curious look on his face, seemingly mumbling something. His hands started to glow and hum faintly. A rune-looking thing appeared above Mathew¡¯s shoulder, disappearing as soon as I saw it. They then started looking at me strangely, mostly with confusion. ¡°What?¡± I asked defensively. ¡°How can you have eight different songs stuck in your head at the same time?¡± he asked, clearly confused. ¡°They¡¯re not even full songs. They¡¯re mostly just the chorus or one section on loop.¡± ¡°Wait,¡± I thought, ¡°is mind reading an aspect of his Legacy?¡± ¡°Yep,¡± Matthew answered without speaking. His response made me jump as I wasn¡¯t expecting the response. ¡°Would you mind not doing that?¡± I thought at him, assuming he could still hear me. ¡°OK, sorry.¡± He looked slightly guilty as he turned his attention back to the TV. I left the room so I could come to terms with having a roommate who could tell what I was thinking twenty-four hours a day. I hope it¡¯s not a passive ability. *** Because there was nothing to do at this point in time, I decided to practise using my bronze RK gauntlets, Red Thunder, in the firing range next door. So that everyone has at least some protection against the Shade if any Mythics were not around, everyone is issued with at least a dagger at the age of fourteen, but they usually break within the first month of receiving them. I was one of the few people who had their own weapon in my class because I inherited it from my mum. My ambition was to get into a training school such as Bellum or Paix, but I had not even awakened my aura, no matter how hard I trained. I failed the entrance exam twice. I probably should have reevaluated what I wanted to be, as it was almost impossible to train at one of the three kingdom schools to become a Mythic. Almost. The kingdom schools almost exclusively gain their students from the lower training schools. I could ask Matt how he gained his aura, as I was probably doing something wrong, and he seemed to know how. I thought about this as I was shooting at eight Draknid Shade targets, which were a dragon/spider hybrid with wolf fangs. Every shot hit. I quickly became distracted, as the targets didn¡¯t require much effort; they were only stationary. Before long, I had demolished the target row and was already prepping up the next to repeat the process. After a while, even blowing things up became boring since I did it often enough. The rest of the week went like this: I woke up, ate, and then practised. Everybody else was doing boring stuff like reading or watching the news. It just kept going on about the same old stories again and again, including the rumour that the terrorist group The Dark Flame had hired some unknown mercenaries. It was made slightly more bearable by the fact that Matt trained with me some of the time as well. We talked, usually using telepathy because my gauntlets were too loud to talk verbally over. He didn¡¯t have his own weapon, as his power allowed him to use some kind of glowing symbols, which he called runes instead. ¡°So, what are these rune things which are so powerful?¡± I asked after seeing him use a kinetic blast one, multiple times. ¡°Well, you know, coding with computers and stuff like that, well, it''s a bit like that but for the universe. Anyone can use them if they can shape their aura. It''s just that mine specialises in it, so it''s easier for me to use them. I only know about five runes ''spells¡¯ reliably, so it''s not as powerful as you might think.¡± He¡¯d obviously had to explain them quite a few times, judging by how rehearsed the explanation was. ¡°But still, with a power like that, why aren''t you at one of the training schools? You''d be a shoo-in.¡± Mathew stopped firing at the target to give me a look, which even made me pause. ¡°You haven¡¯t seen a Shade in real life, have you?¡± Mathew replied out loud after a long pause. ¡°Well, no,¡± I said apprehensively, feeling the shift in tone as we both shifted to speaking out loud. ¡°But even if they''re as scary as they say, I¡¯m sure you''d get used to it, especially if you''re constantly defeating them. It''s like being a main character in a video game.¡± ¡°Except you and your friends can die permanently.¡± He said bluntly. I went back to shooting to mildly distract from his point. ¡°Well, yeah, but it''d be for a worthwhile cause as you''d be protecting people who couldn¡¯t protect themselves, so they don¡¯t die permanently, you know.¡± I shifted back to thoughts as it felt like they had less weight to me, ¡°Plus, you get paid a lot, and you don¡¯t even have to fight Shades. You could just do the acting part or work with the police; my mum did a lot of that before¡­ you know.¡± He gave a look before he went back to firing and replied mentally, ¡°That''s exactly my point; I do want to help protect people. I''m just not sure the personal cost is worth it.¡± ¡°I mean, we should probably change the subject as we¡¯re kind of close to the wall, so why don¡¯t you use the training stuff.¡± ¡°Well, I have daggers, but who needs long-range weapons when I have this.¡± He gestured to the impacts he¡¯d left on the targets. ¡°Yeah, I guess you do have a point. Still think my gauntlets are cooler.¡± The days after my first day followed a similar pattern as the first as I fell into a routine. I became at least alright friends with Mathew as we talked while we trained. It was weird how quickly his telepathy spell just became normal. He showed me a couple of other ¡®spells¡¯ on some of the days, mostly his ¡®magic missile¡¯ type spell, which just released a blast, and his shield spell, but he claimed most of the other ones he¡¯d worked out had more niche applications. Other than learning how Mathew¡¯s Legacy worked, the routine was mostly the same as the other orphanages. That changed, though, when I was made to walk the dog. 3. Why Cats Are Better Than Dogs ¡°Ah, there you are, Thomas!¡± Miss Rose called out to me before I could escape, ¡°I hope you have settled in fine, Thomas. I see that you have made friends with Matthew, which is good. Though you do seem to spend most of your time in the shooting range, and while I know it''s good to practise your marksmanship, you shouldn¡¯t let it take up all your time. It¡¯s not healthy,¡± Miss Rose continued in a friendly, conversational way. ¡°But it''s a good thing I caught you, as I feel you¡¯ve had long enough to settle in, so now it is time you started to help around the place; I want you to walk Drei around the fields.¡± This is how it usually happens; they let you do what you want for the first week to get settled in (though for me, it was closer to the first month as I had been avoiding Miss Rose to get out of it) and then give you a chore that no one wants to do, ¡®cause its cold and dark outside. Usually, it was taking the bins out, but apparently, this place had to have a dog. Why not a cat? You can just let a cat do whatever and only have to do something when its bowl is empty. But they had a dog, and I had to walk it. ¡°OK, I¡¯ll walk the dog. Where is he?¡±I asked out of necessity. ¡°Drei is waiting by the door,¡± She told me, handing me his leash. I sighed; I wasn¡¯t getting out of this. Before I went out, I grabbed my headphones and hoodie from my room and hit shuffle on my music playlist. The sound of upbeat trumpets and guitar contrasting with the vocals filled my ears. I went downstairs and put the leash on Drei to the beat of the music. He vibrated with excitement at the prospect of a walk and stepped outside just as the chorus started. It was cloudy, cold, and misty; great weather for staying inside, and the dog seemingly agreed as he stubbornly tried to go back inside until we were a short distance away. Drei dragged me along where I needed to go, past the shooting range and into the field next to Bluebell Forest. We followed the river that ran by the field. The bank had a brown division from mud to grass, a sign of the recent flooding. The ground around it looked mildly frosty and firm, which confirmed my decision to wear a hoodie. *** I had realised that I had been walking for around fifteen minutes and decided that I should start heading back. My hands were beginning to regret the lack of gloves. Drei started acting up, barking at something in the distance as his ears turned. I turned down my music to see what was wrong with him. I thought I could hear some distant shouting over the tune and what I thought was an alarm. I walked a bit off the path to get a closer look, and because I hadn¡¯t been locking where I was going, I put my foot directly into a rabbit hole. I tripped, got my foot stuck, and cut it on a sharp rock. I had wedged my foot deep into the hole and could not try to remove it from the hole without a wave of extra pain hitting me like a ton of bricks. All other thoughts were forgotten in the pain. I dropped Drei¡¯s lead, and he ran off in the direction of the shouting, which was getting louder. My vision became tunnelled as the adrenaline kicked in, the shouting being swallowed by my attempts at dislodging my leg. In that moment, I felt an energy pass throughout my body, emitting from the centre of my chest. It was as if I had just woken up. The pain was still there but fading gradually. I felt more powerful. Then, without any warning, something hit me like ten rugby players at once. My leg felt like it had been ripped off, and the bone snapped in two. My jean leg felt like it was half blood, wet and sticky. The pain was several times what it was previously, and the feeling of power was gone. I blacked out. *** When I regained consciousness, I, somehow, was severely bruised on my chest, perfectly fine on my legs and had a bag over my head. There was the metallic taste of blood in my mouth from when I had bit my tongue in the struggle, it wasn¡¯t a new taste but it was still noticeable as I could feel where cut was when I moved my tongue. The feeling of humidity was strange, unlike how Turgida ever felt even in summer, and the bird song sounded off. I was dragged and then tied into a chair. The bag was taken off my head. I winced as my eyes adapted to the sudden light change. The previously muffled birds became clearer. A man who I¡¯d never seen before but somehow recognised was speaking, but his voice was weird. I could hear the words coming out of his mouth but could not make out what he was saying, though I could work out the occasional fractured sentence. ¡°Did he really think that he could sneak one of his students¡­ don¡¯t even know your legacy¡­ I¡¯m insulted.¡± The man was, for some reason, difficult to describe even though I was staring right at him. I think he had maroon eyes and was moderately tall. Whenever I tried to look anywhere other than his face, it became hazy and unfocused, like I couldn¡¯t see anything other than baseline aspects. One thing I did know about him was that I did not like him. ¡°Now I¡¯ve more important things to work on other than to punish some student,¡± the maroon-eyed man said, this time more clearly as being straight up dismissed without much thought stung my ego. He left the room saying something which may have been some kind of one-liner. It was then I noticed that I was not the only person in the room; the people who I believe dragged me in had not left during the conversation as I had thought they had. There were two of them. That much was clear, but it was like they occasionally swapped sides without me noticing. One of the goons was a woman with pink eyes and a scar running under them, the other was a man with yellow eyes and freckles; he also had some of his teeth knocked out when I was struggling and his gums were bleeding. He grinned, clicking his neck. He punched me around three or four times in the face and one shot in the groin. Then he kicked me in the chest, almost knocking the chair over, only for it to be caught by the pink-eyed woman. She spun me ¡®round, punching in the same places as the man had kicked me, and pulled her fist back to hit me in the face again. I turned my face away, closing my eyes in anticipation. Only four seconds later, I realised that the punch still had not hit me. I opened my eyes. The woman was seemingly frozen in place, mere inches away from my face. Not only that, but everything had just stopped. I could not hear the birds outside anymore. The man was standing almost motionless, cracking his knuckles while giving me a bloody psychotic grin. I felt stronger and more powerful, and my injuries had practically healed somehow. Something had clicked inside me. I felt like someone else and me at the same time. It was right and incorrect. It was strange. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. ¡°Now, how am I going to get out of these ropes?¡± I noticed that the woman, who was still in the middle of punching me, had a knife attached to her waist, so I inched the chair closer to her until the knife was right where I needed it to be, although the reflection in the metal didn¡¯t look right. The woman¡¯s pink eyes slowly followed where I previously was, widening as her body weight followed through with the punch into the empty air where I once was a second ago. The man was also starting to look shocked, reacting in slow motion but slowly accelerating as my aura was depleting. I needed to hurry up. I cut the rope with the woman¡¯s knife, sawing between my wrists and accidentally cutting the side of my arm before I freed myself. I staggered to my feet, spitting blood at my attackers as they slowly turned to face me and ran out of the building, dodging random people who were in my way, ignoring what I''m pretty sure were cracked ribs, and when the ship I somehow knew should have been there wasn¡¯t, I just kept running. I didn¡¯t stop until I physically couldn¡¯t run any longer. I collapsed near a village I did not recognise, time returning to normal just before I blacked out. *** Beep, beep, beep. I opened my eyes to the robotic sound of my heart beating in a constant rhythm. I seemed to be in one of the local hospitals, which was near the orphanage. How did I get here, and what the hell was that thing I just witnessed? I still sort of felt the power of the¡­ dream. Yeah, a dream. What was that? I rubbed my wrists to make sure they were unharmed; I still could remember the ropes tied around them. I should have been bruised, but I wasn¡¯t. My leg felt peculiar, as if it weren¡¯t there. It didn¡¯t make any sense. Other than my leg, I felt perfectly fine, though a bit groggy. The grogginess was most likely because of some anaesthetic the doctors gave me while I was out. ¡°Great, you¡¯re up,¡± an unknown voice said with annoyance. You¡¯ve been unconscious for the last three days. The police were able to notify your guardians due to the chip on that dog you were with. You should maybe thank it the next time you see it, as otherwise that would have put way more stress on them, and you know what stress brings.¡± I sat up to see where the voice was coming from. There was no one else in the room. What did they give me that would make me hear voices? I looked again to convince myself that the medication was just making me slightly mad, and the thing I thought I heard talking wasn''t real, but it didn¡¯t go away. An impossible figure sat on a chair, his legs resting on another. He was wearing armour made from a strange crystal-like material I did not recognise. His body and clothing had clocks scattered on them, all running at different times and speeds. Not only that, his body and clothing were only one colour: fire red. Even his skin and hair burned the same, glowing slightly. It was as if he was made from static flames. The only exception to this fire red rule were his eyes, which were pure white. ¡°Who the fuck are you?¡± I exclaimed, surprised also by the coarse sound of my voice. Though, I had the faintest feeling that I recognised him. The beeping monitor sped up slightly. ¡°I guess we haven¡¯t been formally introduced. I¡¯m the asshole whose soul decided it wanted to join yours. I am¨C¡± ¡°Wait, you¡¯re Reacher!¡± I interrupted, the realisation clicking as I recognised the voice and the colour of his eyes from the news broadcast of the robbery I remember seeing; how I remembered that, I don¡¯t know. ¡°I see I¡¯ve got a fan.¡± Edward carried on, slightly annoyed at the interruption. ¡°My real name is Edward Blitz, but most know me as Reacher as you do. As for that thing you experienced, that was my most memorable memory. I am assuming that you went through a similar thing as I did for yours: blue blurs and car crashes. That wasn¡¯t me if you were wondering.¡± ¡°I thought your Legacy was super speed, not time manipulation. Also, how or maybe why are you here, and why do you look like that?¡± I asked, wanting answers. ¡°Well, you see¡­I have no idea. It may have something to do with me colliding with you, which joined our souls together because your Legacy was just unlocked, other than that ¨C no clue. What I do know is that only you can hear me or even see me, so you¡¯d better stop talking to yourself. As for why I look like this, I believe that this is just what my soul looks like; something to do with my ¡®time manipulation¡¯ Legacy. Also, it looks like someone wants to see you.¡± As if on cue, I heard a knock at the door. A stone-faced man who looked about thirty opened the door slightly and requested to come in. He had hazelnut eyes that seemed older than he was. He had the build of a warrior, tall and broad. He was wearing a casual suit that looked uncomfortably hot for the hospital room. A heavy aura of power radiated off him; this wasn¡¯t any normal person. ¡°Evening Mr Walker, my name is Charon Washington, and as you may be aware I am the headmaster of Telum, this kingdom''s largest and most influential training school. We train the next generation of powerful Mythics to protect humanity¡¯s bright flame from being extinguished by the soulless darkness which seeks to destroy us. May I ask who you were talking to just now? I was under the impression I was the first to see you after you had awakened.¡± Washington queried, his eyes seemed to keep flickering towards something on my face as he was talking. ¡°Well, I was ¨C I was talking to¡­ myself?¡± It was sort of the truth, kind of. Edward shrugged. ¡°You¡¯re probably not wrong, but you¡¯re also not right.¡± ¡°What¡¯s that supposed to mean?¡± I said back to Edward in my head. I assume he heard me as he shrugged again. ¡°It¡¯s strange, but you get that with a lot of Mythics that have just unlocked their legacy,¡± Washington said, ¡°Anyway, you may be wondering why I am here personally asking you to come to my school. Well, you see, at my school, we have many Mythics we train and teach, almost all of which have attended another training school like Bellum. Most of them are powerful, but judging from the raw energy radiating off you, you are on another level, even without training.¡± With the mention of raw energy, I sat up slightly higher. ¡°What do you mean ''raw energy'', also, my legacy? I thought I only unlocked my aura?¡± ¡°Historically, they coincide with each other before we worked out a less traumatic way of activating them, though the system apparently missed you. It must have been around the time of the blackout that yours was supposed to have been activated, for that I deeply apologise, my condolences about your mother.¡± ¡°Thanks, but the raw energy?¡± ¡°Ah yes, you may have noticed that the lights in here are brighter than you would expect. They passively run on loose aura, which is incredibly useful as the general population only has weak aura control, so the ambient aura that flows off them is enough to charge them. Yours is currently overloading them. My school will help with that and allow you to amplify that rejuvenating effect you likely feeling now your aura is flowing more freely.¡± There is only one other person I have met who I believe is as powerful without training, and he didn¡¯t accept my invitation to Telum Academy. I want you to change his mind; I believe you¡¯ve met. His name is Matthew Hunter.¡± 4. Taking Matters Into my Own Hands ¡°Well, that¡¯s bullshit if I have ever heard it,'''' Edward said as soon as Washington left the room. Charming; I know. ¡°He said that exact same thing to me when he wanted me to come to Telum, except for the Legacy and Matthew thing. Apparently, he was sooo impressed with my fighting skill. Matthew was your roommate, right? Old Wash probably doesn¡¯t even know what your Legacy is; I sure don¡¯t.¡± ¡°I haven¡¯t even unlocked it yet, though? So there''s nothing to know?¡± ¡°Oh, you have. Aura flows differently in the awakened, and it typically becomes active with big life events, that''s why you typically get a rise in mythics after tragedies. We just need to work it out.¡± I agreed to help Washington recruit Matthew as I honestly wanted to go to Telum. It would be my chance to become a Mythic and maybe even be put on a team. ¡°Why Matthew didn¡¯t accept the invitation to the academy, I haven¡¯t a clue. I thought he wanted to be a Mythic? Well, I could ask him when I next saw him, but first things first, I needed to get out of this hospital. I mean, other than a slight hit to the head, I was fine.¡± I thought. ¡°You might be in this hospital longer than you might want,¡± Edward told me in a slightly more serious tone than before. ¡°Well, how do I say this? After I crashed into you, you went flying back a couple of metres. Your leg didn¡¯t.¡± ¡°What do you mean by my leg didn¡¯t?¡± I asked him, not liking where this was going. ¡°Ok, this is going nowhere; maybe I could show you.¡± The room around us melted from my vision, and a field replaced it. I felt tired and hungry, and everything around me was moving in slow motion. Someone was shouting at me, but he was saying it too slowly for me to interpret. A small dog almost tripped me up as I was running, but I dodged it just in time. The same could not have been said for what happened next. I crashed into myself. Have you ever belly-flopped into some water? What about that popping sensation in your ears when they change in pressure? Combine both together throughout your body with your vision being blurred at the same time, and that is the best way I could explain what I felt when I crashed. Then I wasn¡¯t there. Well, I was, but not as I was previously. I watched as my body went flying back, and my leg snapped off just below the knee, tearing my trouser leg with it. My body went slack, and I winced in pain. Then the image deteriorated, and we were back in the hospital room. ¡°From what I can tell, your leg bone snapped in two below your knee and practically cut it off. The damage was too great to save your leg, but you also should have died. It is almost certain that your Legacy, whatever it is, helped keep you alive, or maybe that was why my soul attached itself to yours. Whatever the case, you¡¯re stuck with me here.¡± An idea went through my mind, ¡°If I¡¯m going to go to Telum, and I¡¯m stuck with you as you say, then can you help me become a Mythic? I don¡¯t really have the training or even have my aura activated, and I would probably be chucked out in the first term once they realised my fighting skill is subpar. Can you teach me?¡± ¡°Well, first off, you don¡¯t have your aura, that usually comes before your legacy? Your parents usually activate it for y¡­ I see the problem, even then wouldn¡¯t the orphanage do it for you? Well, that¡¯s an easy fix.¡± Edward placed his hand on the middle of my forehead and said some words that I didn¡¯t quite catch. A flash of lightning blue light filled my vision for a second, and the room became clearer for the first time. I became more aware of my surroundings; my body felt healthier and stronger than it had ever been. I felt an immense feeling of jamais vu from the experience, like something familiar but entirely new. Something was about to change. Just then, a nurse opened the door and walked in, realised that I was awake, and stated rather formally, ¡°Mr Walker, after your recent traumatic event, which was almost fatal, you were in a coma for three days. The only physical impact to your health was the loss of your left leg below your knee, which would fortunately only affect your walking if there wasn¡¯t anything to replace the lost limb. Luckily for you, Mr Washington left you a replacement as a ¡°token of gratitude.¡± You appear to be healthy enough to leave, but we will need to be checked over by a resident doctor to confirm that everything is ok and that your body is responding correctly to your new limb. Research has shown that replacing the limb quickly helps the body adapt quicker, we will help you in the first couple days to help the transition. I would recommend not doing any highly physical activities while you adapt to your current situation. You¡¯ll need a cane to help you walk for the time being, if you would like someone to talk to about the experience then speak to your guardian to arrange an appointment with the hospital.¡± ¡°You¡¯ll be a bit more jumpy than usual, but you¡¯ll soon get used to it. It will kinda be like being in a dimly lit room your whole life and then finally finding the light switch. Basically, you will notice more things than you have before. Secondly, yeah, I¡¯ll help you; I¡¯ve nothing better to do, nor do I really have a choice.¡± *** The next couple of days mostly consisted of tests and relearning how to walk with the replacement limb. Initially, it was slightly difficult as the new leg didn¡¯t have as much flex as the old one, plus the fact that I needed a new leg. I needed a new leg. That didn¡¯t sound right as a sentence. While yes, a lot of people lost limbs and needed replacements due to Shade attacks and just plain accidents like mine, I¡¯d never really considered how it would be to lose my own. The first day they put it on, I just stared at it while trying to move it. Edward did try to reassure me that it''s normal to feel at least slightly odd about it, and so did the doctors helping me adapt. What helped more was the fact that nothing in the situation I was in was normal, so losing a limb on top of that was par for the course. This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work. I had unlocked my aura. Watching it flow had helped calm me down, as had seeing how different everything looked and felt. My newly unlocked aura made me feel more aware of my own movement, which made it far easier to change how I moved in relation to my new leg. I managed to reach the doctor''s standard in record time, so they called up Miss Rose and dismissed me from the hospital. Mrs Rose met me at the front office. She seemed to have been incredibly worried while I was out, which was apparent from the bags under her eyes, which showed how little sleep she had had. The drive back to the orphanage was quiet, as she didn¡¯t seem to know what to say. She kept looking like she was going to say something and tried to work out how not to bring it up. She half-joked that I wouldn¡¯t need to walk the dog anytime soon and congratulated me on my place in Tatum, which I had half forgotten about with everything that had happened. Edward commented on how he liked the new scenery. The hospital didn¡¯t have much in the way of entertainment¡ªno books or even a TV. He apparently was bored out of his mind. To pass the time in the awkward silence, I talked to Edward. ¡°Soooo¡­ stealing, that''s illegal.¡± I started wanting to breach the topic sooner rather than later as I was stuck with the guy. ¡°Your point being?¡± Edward replied dryly. ¡°Uh¡­ why?¡± ¡°Well, it''s rather difficult to get money as a alive, dead person after my mission went wrong, and Old Washing Tub thought I was dead. The change in aura caused by a legacy activating messes with the tech they used to see if you''re alive, and I didn''t really have the chance to prove the tech wrong. I needed the money so¡­¡± ¡°That makes sense as to why you did it first but why you continue.¡± ¡°It made Wash look bad while only really harming the banks rather than stealing the food and I was trying to line up the places to spell F U. I know it''s petty but I was so looking forward to when they worked it out, I only managed the F though.¡± When we arrived at the orphanage, I went to my room. Luckily, the dog door was open, as I didn¡¯t think I would have been able to jump over it while I was getting used to my leg (or lack thereof). It was the middle of the day, so most people were watching TV or playing football outside, but Matthew was in the room reading a comic. He looked up, ¡°I think that going to the hospital because of your leg is a bit of an extreme way to get out of doing chores. You¡¯ve been gone for a week.¡± ¡°Didn¡¯t you realise something was afoot when I didn¡¯t return after an hour?¡± I responded. ¡°Really? You¡¯re making puns.¡± Matthew said, surprised at how seemingly lax I was about my injury. ¡°Yeah, my leg just left me. I am very tired.¡± Mathew groaned. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my reflection, but it looked slightly different from the last time I saw it. I still had brownish-blondish hair and no real marks on my face, but one of my eyes, instead of being the electric blue it always had been, had changed to the same fire red as Edward¡¯s. It was incredibly strange, but I remembered something my mum told me once: eyes are the window to the soul, and I guess I now have two due to Edward. My face even looked healthier, and if it weren¡¯t for the obvious, I would¡¯ve looked like I was in better physical shape than I had ever been. I thought to myself, this is going to be hard to explain. ¡°Yeah, eyes don¡¯t usually change colour without reason, except like soul trauma. You might have to invest in wearing sunglasses or a contact lens; people may be curious,¡± Edward informed me. ¡°Though, in regard to general health, your aura is passively fixing minor issues that your body didn¡¯t notice or couldn¡¯t fix before.¡± Mathew, as if on cue, asked, ¡°Hey Tom, did you always have two eye colours, or did I just not see that before? Though, I would have thought I would notice that.¡± On that topic, time to ask about Telum, because if I don¡¯t say it now, I will completely forget about it. Different-coloured eyes are the same as going to university, right? They both have pupils¡ªtime to mention it. ¡°So, Washington visited me in¡­¡± ¡°No.¡± Matthew interrupted me. ¡°You don¡¯t even know what I was going to say,¡± I complained. ¡°Washington asked you to ask me to come to Telum because he couldn¡¯t convince me himself. He probably thought that he could get two already unlocked Mythics for the price of one,¡± Matthew explained. What he was saying was most likely true, but I still needed to convince him.¡°I thought you wanted to be a Mythic and help people. How are you going to help people if you¡¯re just going to mope? From what I can tell, you¡¯re just stubborn. Why didn¡¯t you take him up on his offer?¡± ¡°He offered me a place when I was nine, and I had just fought a Shade for the first time. I lost that fight. I don¡¯t have a clue where that Shade went or how it was defeated because I knocked myself out trying to use my power. When he told me he wanted me to join the university I declined the offer, because I was too young, most people there would be at least seven years older than me. And I was still bitter about losing my first fight.¡± ¡°Ok, that makes me feel bad for arguing in favour of someone who wanted a child soldier, so I agree with your past decision, but last time I checked, you were older than nine, so what¡¯s holding you back now?¡± ¡°Do you know how old the average Mythic lives? Before you answer, it¡¯s not long. Defending those who can¡¯t defend themselves isn¡¯t the safest job out there, and that¡¯s just talking about low-level street thugs and burning buildings. Then there are the Shades, big hulking monsters which want to kill us. Have you ever seen one face-to-face? I have.¡± He said the last sentence monotone, with fear clear in his eyes. ¡°You speak like a regular life is so safe. Were you a Mythic when you fought that Shade? Even if you don¡¯t want to be a Mythic for selfless reasons, even if you don¡¯t dream of heroics, why not for selfish reasons: money, fame, and most of all, not to feel helpless when the next blackout causes a beacon of despair to the Shades. Why would you want to be a civilian and rely on others when you could be your own salvation?¡± ¡°I tried to talk myself out of it due to the danger. Miss Rose really didn¡¯t want me to go, and at that point, I agreed. But you have a point, and honestly, I do still want to be one,¡± Mathew said reluctantly, giving in as the fear in his eyes was replaced with a look of determination. ¡°But there is still one problem.¡± ¡°What¡¯s that?¡± I said, trying to keep a straight face with a persistent smile hindering my efforts. ¡°The ship to Telum leaves tomorrow.¡± Oh. 5. New FriendSHIPs ¡°Tom, it¡¯s time to¡­ WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO YOUR LEG?¡± Matthew yelled. I don¡¯t know about you, but when someone yells out in shock early in the morning, about a foot away from your bed, you tend to wake up whether you want to or not. So begrudgingly, I opened my eyes. ¡°Why are you waking me up in the middle of the night?¡± I asked, sounding like I had been rudely awakened because I had. ¡°It¡¯s only quarter past seven, not midnight. Anyway, the airship to Telum will leave in two hours. You need to pack,¡± Edward answered. ¡°Because we need to pack,¡± Matthew unknowingly repeated, ¡°And you didn¡¯t answer my question. What happened to your leg? I knew something happened, but not to that extent.¡± ¡°It fell off. Washington bribed me with a new leg, and that¡¯s it. I thought we went through this?¡± I answered. Said leg was scarred and a bit stumpy at the end but had healed. I had almost forgotten about it after only one day. Is that normal? The new leg was perfectly matched for my missing limb. How much was a tailored leg, anyway? Back to the matter at hand, not at leg: I needed to pack. Most of my clothes were still in the top of my wardrobe, where I had dumped them originally. I had only worn about five different T-shirts and a pair of jeans, not including the ones that were destroyed. From the pile, I grabbed some jeans and put them on. I was pretty sure they matched. I was too giddy at the prospect that I actually was going to Talum, which still didn¡¯t feel real. ¡°Only just,¡± Edward retorted. I stuffed the pile into the suitcase that had been next to my bed since I had arrived; there hadn¡¯t been anywhere to put it. I crammed my gauntlets, Red Thunder, into the case. It only just closed. I went to check how Matthew was doing with his packing, which was probably taking longer as he hadn¡¯t had the lazy/brilliant idea of putting all his stuff in one pile. He was just staring at something behind me. I turned to see what he was looking at; in the mirror, I saw myself, grinning with excitement but glowing with blue static trailing behind where I just was, almost like I was half made of lightning. When I stopped moving, the static faded until I looked normal. ¡°Well, that¡¯s new,¡± Edward stated, sounding disinterested in the revelation of my newly found skill. ¡°You unlocked your Legacy!¡± Matthew exclaimed, which was clearly a better response. ¡°It looks like you¡¯re a speedster type, considering how that took you less than a second, and you¡¯re just in time for Telum.¡± I guess we were going to have to get used to people with powers. We were going to a new school for that very reason. This was going to be fun. *** Miss Rose drove us to the airship port, which was about half an hour''s drive from the orphanage as it was nearer to the kingdom''s centre. Regular school didn¡¯t start for at least a couple of days, so she had time. We climbed out of the car and saw a group of at least fifty people, our age and upwards, packing into an airship. I had never been in an airship before, but these ones looked larger than the ones I had seen on TV. I ran to the line. The immediate change of scenery from only just being able to see the line to seeing it almost right in front of me made me disorientated, causing me to trip. Luckily, the only person who saw me trip and fall on my face was one of the two teachers, as it happened too quickly for the other people in line to notice. He was quite tall, leaf green eyes and choppy brown hair. He looked guilty, as if he were somehow to blame for my trip, and avoided eye contact with me, quickly going back to registering the other students. I stood up, dusted myself off, and pretended like it didn¡¯t happen. Matthew caught up with me a minute later with a slight glare for running off, I joked apologising for making a fall of myself. A woman with eyes the colour of tree bark and hair, like the man I first saw, was checking the people onto the airship. I recognised her immediately as Clover Fortune, aka Lucky Charm. I then remembered that I was wearing her emblem on my t-shirt: a four-leaf clover. I pulled my jacket tighter around me, hoping she wouldn''t notice it. Then, it was our turn to be marked off the list. ¡°Washington did say we had some late entries, and one is a fan, it seems,¡± she said with a smirk. Of course, she would notice it. She let us onto the ship and, as we were apparently last on the list, followed us on board. ¡°I would have warned you, but I thought she would like the compliment,¡± Edward casually stated. ¡°Well, thanks for the heads up,¡± I thought at him in the most sarcastic tone I was able to think. The ship was massive, with an open-air design. The few seats it had had already been taken, and there were glass windows either side. Due to the number of passengers, there wasn''t much room. I took the first spot that was clear at the window to try and get a good view. I realised after that I should have let a shorter person in front so I didn¡¯t block the view. Luckily, Matt was a shorter person, so I didn¡¯t have to talk to anyone new for this hour or so ride to Telum, which was only the other side of the kingdom. Unfortunately, other people had more sociable plans. ¡°Hi, my name is Alex Eye and this is my friend Oliver King, who are you?¡± said a boy introducing him and his friend who clearly had the same idea as me when talking to new people as Alex seemed to have to hold him by the shoulder to stop him leaving the situation. The boy had copper eyes, blond hair, and freckles and was considerably shorter than his friend. He wore a white hoodie with a blue vein design going up the sleeves. The friend, Oliver, had gold eyes, red hair, and a bow strapped onto his back. Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. ¡°I¡¯m Tom, he¡¯s Matt,¡± I said, motioning with my hand. In my head, I said, ¡°And the floaty, kind of on-fire person beside me, that¡¯s Edward.¡± ¡°Funny.¡± Edward verbally rolled his eyes. ¡°Sup,¡± Matt said, still looking at the ground passing by. ¡°Hey,¡± Oliver said, clearly having been dragged into the conversation. He looked behind him, noted that Alex had taken his hand away from his shoulder, then said, ¡°Look, there¡¯s a space over there by the window. Nice meeting you, bye!¡± ¡°He doesn¡¯t like meeting new people,¡± Alex explained to us. Well, more to me than Matt, as he was still looking out the window and clearly not listening. Then, in the direction Oliver had just gone, Alex shouted, ¡°You¡¯re going to make friends whether I have to force you or not.¡± ¡°Well, that was odd,¡± I thought to myself. ¡°You do realise that was the son of Leo King, owner of Light Industries?¡± said Edward, reminding me that I couldn¡¯t do that anymore. ¡°Who?¡± ¡°The people who make the top gear and weapons that most Mythics rely on,¡± Edward answered, explaining it to me like I was a child. ¡°You know, like the ones you put on your hands.¡± ¡°These are Light weapons? I always thought they were pretty heavy when I held them,¡± I thought, smiling at my own terrible joke. ¡°I¡¯m not even going to dignify that with a response,¡± Edward responded. I go back to looking through the window at the buildings passing by. Nothing overly interesting happened like any fights; most of the Mythics had been called to divert a herd of Blackheart Shades, reducing structural damage, and the rest mostly stayed behind to deal with minor things or because they would cause more problems than they would solve. I thought Lucky Charm would have gone with them, but I guess an airship full of excited teens with superpowers needed more luck than them. *** The airship landed outside a massive castle-like structure with a large gated, stone wall surrounding it. I could see the battle stadium in which training Mythics could brawl to test their powers or just general skills. Just past the stadium was a shooting range ten times bigger than the one at the orphanage and its own medic wing. The last one I myself will hopefully not have to use, though Edward said that I would get to know it well, which was unsettling. This place, Telum, is one of the main bases of operation for Mythics, not just those attending it. It has some of the best resources for training, so much so that a lot of active Mythics take over the facilities at times for their own use; it apparently makes them feel superior. Also, if you are going out of the kingdom, you have to run it through Telum to get permission. Not many people could be bothered, though, as it''s mostly there for when a Mythic has a power that may cause disruption or when they want to make a show of following the rules. The main gates opened to a grand courtyard with statues of the most famous group of Mythics who graduated from Telum and were one of the first to do so, each one a prime example of their power type. The team were in battle stances, weapons in hand and ready to take on whatever Shade came their way. They each faced the part of the school which represented who they were: Miracle, the healer, faced the med bay; Crash, a tank, facing the battle stadium; Culture, a magic type, faced the library, which was full of combat, history, and even plain story books; Mechanism, a technopath, faced the shooting range; and Blink, a speedster, faced the cafeteria, not just because she needed to consume a large amount of calories to fuel her power, but because she was almost a semi-professional cook. The statue was amazing; you could clearly see each Mythic¡¯s determined expression in the face of danger, with the level of detail they put into each of their faces with signs of tiredness, cuts and scars being visible like the artist had actually been with them during one of their battles. There was almost a focus on their eyes as each one of the Mythics had crystals which seemed to shine with their respective colours. Miss Fortune, as she likes to call herself, started the tour by going over the rules: no fighting outside the arena, no leaving Telum without permission from a teacher, no this, no that, blah blah blah. The usual. I listened to make sure there wasn¡¯t a ¡°Don¡¯t remove books from this bookcase¡± or ¡°Don¡¯t go into this side of the castle.¡± But no, only mundane rules. ¡°Can you speed up time as well as slow it down?¡± I thought, hopefully. ¡°Nope, you¡¯re going to endure the rules like I had to. There is no speed-up button,¡± the floaty person answered, then vaguely added to himself, ¡°though you might enjoy tomorrow.¡± He stopped answering me after that and instead ¡®let me find out myself¡¯, which is another way of saying he ignored my questions because he couldn¡¯t be bothered to answer. Miss Fortune showed us around, telling us where things were, like the training rooms and the stadium. After an hour of boredom, we arrived at our rooms. ¡°So that is the end of the tour. Tomorrow, you will be allocated teams and rooms. You will sleep here for the time being,¡± Her conclusion was followed by a groan and excited murmuring from the crowd as most were looking forward to seeing their new rooms. ¡°Oh, she is doing this thing,¡± Edward mumbled under his breath, though I don¡¯t know how that works with being a disembodied soul. ¡°What do you mean?¡± I thought at Edward as my interest was piqued at the thought of secrets. Edward chuckled, ¡°Now, I wouldn¡¯t want to ruin the surprise, would I?¡± Ignoring him, I turned to Matthew and asked, ¡°How do you think they pick teams, Matthew?¡± ¡°I¡¯m not sure; I overheard some of the other students talking about how hush-hush they were about the process.¡± ¡°Can''t you just do your magic thing and just mind-read?¡± Mathew looked at me flatly. ¡°My runes are not that discrete, and I¡¯m sure we¡¯re being watched.¡± ¡°Fair,¡± I replied, disappointed, ¡°Are you sure you didn¡¯t glean anything from what you overheard?¡± ¡°One of their older brothers warned about Bonegrinders, but I don¡¯t know how that would work,¡± Mathew replied after thinking for a second. "They¡¯d just be too big to hide. Oh yeah, and something about how they pair off students, so it''s likely I¡¯ll see you during it.¡± ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s not that much to work off of.¡± ¡°Anyway, let¡¯s just set up our sleeping bags; we¡¯ll find out the actual answer tomorrow.¡± After getting out a sleeping bag near the edge of the hall, I took off my leg and gauntlets and placed them next to my suitcase. I slipped into my sleeping bag, still in my clothes from this morning, and tried to sleep to get to tomorrow quicker. 6. Dungeons and Drakons I woke up to a loud sound followed by an eerie silence, more loud, vaguely animal-like sounds, and cold ground, which should have been the first clue to where I wasn¡¯t. I took a breath of air. It was dusty. The walls were covered in vines, and torches lit up the room; it had the classic castle dungeon look to it, plus the floor was as rough as sandpaper. The only things from where I actually went to sleep were my sleeping bag, my leg, and my gauntlets, which were by my foot. I put them on and took a look around. Was this a memory? No, I still felt like me, and I still had my gauntlets. Why was I here? Was this the team-choosing thing that was so hyped up? ¡°Bingo, you¡¯re on the money. You better start moving; a still target makes easy prey for Beowolves.¡± I pulled myself up from the ground and followed the left wall just in case Matt was more accurate than he originally released. Judging by the vines and moss alone, he had seemingly guessed the dungeon thing right. ¡°Remember you do have powers, you can test them out by scouting ahead,¡± Edward reminded me. In less than a second, I arrived in a clearing and to a fight already going on. I leaned against the wall to balance myself. Purple light and runes filled the room, illuminating a Shade known as a Nope. It had the distorted head of a snake with its mouth stretching unnaturally, eight thin needle-like spider legs and exposed beetle wings with bone armour making a flame pattern covering the main part of the body and crown on top of the abomination¡¯s head, all aspects combined slightly awkwardly. The Nope¡¯s body was covered head to toe in oily black glistening scales, peaking through its solid bone armour. The thing had poison dripping from razor fangs that were hanging out its mouth, and its body was at least three times my size, filling up most of the clearing. You could tell why this Shade was called the Nope. ¡°Tom! Thank the gods you are here,¡± Matthew exclaimed while fighting the abomination. ¡°Distract this thing while I heal up! Kill it with fire!¡± The monster, anchored to the ground by its legs to try and absorb the shock, moved only a couple of inches from the blast spell, dragging up dirt. Dust clouds rose behind it, kicked up by the impact. Matthew seemed to brace the recoil from his spell for a second and yelled another spell, which formed a metallic shield in front of him with the same symbols engraved into it. The shield sang in a sort of weird melody. Immediately, I activated my power and dashed behind the beast and, after stopping for a couple of precious seconds to regain balance, used my gauntlets to shoot at one of the Nope¡¯s eight leg sockets to rip it from its body, releasing black sludge blood from the open wound. That drew its attention. It spun away from Matt and gave its full attention to me. Its rotten almond-smelling breath washed over me, and I gagged from the smell. I had a full view of its serpent-arachnid features and its mandibles. Its eyes had no pupils; they were just blank and beady. This should have made it blind because this stolen adaptation was not designed for a creature this large. Light acting differently at this scale, but due to a weird fluke of nature, or indeed the lack of it, gave the Nope superb night vision. At that moment, I realised that I had not thought through a plan; I was mainly acting on impulse, not thought. ¡°Um, is there any chance I could call a time-out to think?¡± I asked half-heartedly. In answer, the Shade just shrieked in my face. ¡°I guess that is a no on that; good to know.¡± Suddenly, everything froze, or more accurately, slowed down so much that nothing was moving significantly. ¡°Here¡¯s your time-out. I know what to do, Kid; this isn¡¯t my first rodeo. Here¡¯s what you do: use the thing¡¯s leg to bash its fangs back into its jaw. If you hit enough times, the fangs might gain enough force and go through the bastard¡¯s skull or whatever the equivalent is for a Nope. That should kill it. If not, shoot it with your gauntlets until you run out of ammo. I hope Matt over there has something a little stronger than some blast spell in case you need help.¡± I held the leg like a cricket bat and swung it at the exposed fangs; about four hits in the fang broke. I could see the bone fracture in front of my eyes as I hit it more and more to build more momentum, making it into a projectile. Edward corrected my aim as I hit it in the direction I wanted it to go, making sure the fang hit the softest part of its pallet to cause the most damage. Regular time took back over, and the fang exploded out, and all the kinetic energy I had built into it was released. The Nope collapsed with a giant gaping hole in its head where the fangs exited the Nope¡¯s skull. To be thorough, I gave it a couple more complementary shots with my gauntlets. The Nope disintegrated back into shadows, leaving me standing there holding the air where the leg had been in both hands. The evidence of battle being the eight lines into the ground and the smell, which was going to be difficult to get out. What wasn¡¯t difficult to get out of, though, was the clearing, as the previously blocked exit was now clear. Matthew practically appeared beside me and said, ¡°How were you able to kill that thing in a matter of seconds? It took me at least ten minutes to move it an inch. And how were you able to even cut it?¡± Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. ¡°Um¡­ speed?¡± I shrugged. ¡°Anyway, let¡¯s get out of this maze thing,¡± Matthew said, clearly annoyed at my prowess in the battle and me outshining him and definitely not just satisfied with my answer, as it would make sense for a speedster type to be quicker. However, the comparison between us was a little unfair, as I had an experienced mentor and two Legacies on my side. ¡°So, left or right?¡± ¡°Go left.¡± ¡°Er¡­ left? Yeah, left.¡± I answered, taking Edward¡¯s advice as he seemed to know what he was doing. I led the way out of the clearing, with the minor Shade boss defeated and one companion acquired to my party. We turned left and immediately ran into a dead end. It turns out Edward wasn¡¯t always as helpful as he could have been. ¡°Right, it is then.¡± I backtracked with Edward sniggering in my mind at his ¡®joke¡¯. This was not going to be as easy as it probably should have been, with the ¡®help¡¯ not being any help. *** The only problems we encountered after the Nope were a couple of Beowolves, which we tried to go around as they weren¡¯t blocking the exit. That plan did not work, as without even seeing us, they seemed to sense where we were and pursued us. I had to run past them carrying Matt over my shoulder, which certainly was not easy in the slightest. There was still the trouble of not falling over every time I ran because I had practically no balance. I honestly was expecting to run into a Bonegrinder as Matthew¡¯s ¡®Dumb Answer¡¯ had predicted way too much already. What was his Legacy? Being a medium? ¡°I¡¯d say I¡¯m more of a large,¡± Mathew joked when I asked. ¡°I¡¯m actually a mage type, which is good because I don¡¯t actually want to be more correct than I already am. I''d heard they''d do an entrance exam, but I didn¡¯t expect this.¡± Luckily, there were no Bonegriders to be seen. When we arrived at the end of the maze-dungeon-thing and reached a waiting room of sorts, we found out that none of the other students were there yet; we were the first to finish. Miss Fortune and Washington were waiting, watching everyone else fight and complete the challenge. We weren¡¯t the only people to be blocked by Shades, as I could see Oliver and Alex from the ship fighting a Griffin and other pairs also fighting their own Shades. We may not have been the only pair to be put up against a Shade, but we definitely won the prize for the most tears and blood stains on our clothes. My jeans had frayed due to friction, and my t-shirt was split down the middle as it had clearly gotten caught on something during the fight without me noticing and was drenched in dirt and Shade gunk. The teachers, on the other hand, had no such problems; they even seemed to have a good night¡¯s sleep, seeing as they did not have grey bags under their eyes. We had no such luxury. With the adrenaline wearing off and my aura depleted, I slumped down on a chair that was conveniently placed there, and Matt did the same. It took a couple of moments for the teachers to register we were even there, as they clearly weren¡¯t expecting us this soon. Miss Fortune seemed surprised since most of the other students were still far from finishing, though some were closer than others. There was a clear divide between those who had unlocked their Legacy and those who didn¡¯t, as powers just gave a large advantage. There were some clear outliers, though, as some clearly met a bad match and had probably been too reliant on their legacy than they should have been. Washington was not surprised as the only acknowledgement we received from him was a head nod in our direction. ¡°Huh, there are quite a few more people with unlocked Legacys this year,¡± Edward commented, slouching in the chair next to me, a slight bit of annoyance present in his town. ¡°It clearly is a lot easier with them; killing Shades is not as hard if you can evade them with ease or pick them up with your mind.¡± ¡°You didn¡¯t have your Legacy?¡± I asked him. Fighting the Shades with super speed was hard enough. Doing so without it seemed like an impossible task. ¡°Nope, just regular weapons and my wit. Don¡¯t you remember? I gained my Legacy after becoming captured. Which was quite a bit after I had to do this.¡± I remembered that memory like it was my own. Luckily, I didn¡¯t have to relive it again for him. I decided that I deserved a nap as I had not had as much sleep as I needed; being transported into a dungeon in your sleep can do that. It also may have been due to using my Legacy so much in such a short amount of time and depleting my aura. *** It took about an hour for the rest of the students to finish their dungeon crawling, which was enough time for me to wake back up again. This annoyed a lot of the new students, who thought very highly of themselves and were not expecting someone to have finished before them, let alone have the audacity to take a nap. They did seem to take slight gratification in the sorry state of my clothing. After a set amount of time, the students who were not able to reach the end were saved by the teachers, and while this meant they¡¯d failed, they were just glad to be done with the ordeal.I recognised Alex and Oliver, and they sat next to us. They looked like they went through more Shades than Matt and I did. At least Alex did, though he had a huge grin and looked like he could do it twice over if you ignored the dirt and tears in his clothes. Oliver, on the other hand, only had bags under his eyes and a small amount of dirt on his t-shirt. His clothes were even intact! I went up to them and said through a yawn, ¡°Hey guys, how did you enjoy surprise dungeon exploring? Beowolves are really fun, aren¡¯t they?¡± ¡°So, you completed the dungeon first and way before anyone else? Interesting.¡± Alex replied, ignoring my completely serious question. ¡°You heard about that? I would have been quicker, but I wanted a lie in.¡± ¡°Anyway, I think we have to get going. They are picking the different teams right now. I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll get a good one, considering how you did. See you,¡± he said, turning to go. ¡°You should go to that; it¡¯s up the stairs and to the right. It¡¯s the room everyone is going to; just follow them.¡± Edward suggested, pointing to the stairs. I followed them out of the lower parts of the school, leaving the Shades in their maze. Maybe there''ll be food; I was starving. 7. New Challengers Approach The room was packed. Bright lights lit up a stage dwarfed by the number of people and chairs surrounding it. Students, teachers, and Mythics were all here to see the new teams being formed. Unfortunately, there wasn''t any food. I took my seat. The scene shifted, but I was still in the room. What was off? I then realised I recognised some of the people around me as well-known Mythics, though way younger. The people in the crowd were not who they were a second ago. The boy next to me leaned over and said, "Ed, it doesn''t matter that we were the last out. You don''t know your Legacy. Of course, you''re not going to finish first. Don''t worry about it." He had ruby eyes and black hair; he looked familiar to me, but I couldn''t place him. From the way he spoke and my feeling of friendliness towards him, it was clear he was Edward''s friend, probably who he was paired with in the dungeon. His clothes were smoking as though he had been on fire, but he looked unharmed himself. You could see his dark skin showing through patches of his clothes where the fabric had burnt away. The scene shifted back to the present. The shift wasn''t gradual like before; it was like a light switch had been hit accidentally, causing the scene to revert to how it was. "What was that?" I asked out loud. "What?" Matt replied, turning to me. "Nothing," "Sorry, that might happen from time to time. It was a mental slip; ignore it." "Ok, then," I thought, ignoring it. When everyone was seated, the lights dimmed slightly, and the small murmur of voices died down. Washington appeared on stage. "You are all gathered here today to witness the next generation of Mythics acquire the ties they will use in their future to protect those who need it most. The skills they gain during their training at Telum will define the warriors and protectors they will become, just as it has done for the working Mythics that are here today." The crowd waited patiently for him to get on with announcing the new teams, as that was what they were here for; he gave the same speech every year with little variation, according to Edward. Once you heard it once, you''ve heard them all. The teams certainly were what everyone was interested in, and everyone wanted to see who they were paired with. "Now, from what I know, you have been waiting for the teams for which you will be spending most of your time at Telum." The people in the crowd sat up. "The current names are not permanent and can be changed later. Without any more dithering, the teams are John Douglas, Max Ukraine, Matilda Catt and Christopher Killjoy: you will form Team DUCK with John Douglas as leader¡­" Washington went on announcing each team and their leader, with each team member''s picture appearing onto the screen behind him, with a short summary of their power set, weapon, and training accomplishments. A combined team image and summary of the team''s strength then replaced the individual summaries. The people who hadn''t unlocked their Legacy had an evaluation of how strong their aura was, but for those who had their powers, there was a rundown of what was known about it. One guy could control water and condense it from the air to form a titanium-strength weapon. "¡­ Emily Cake, Cassie Rockheart, Lilly Oak, and Star Cranberry: you will form Team CROC with Cassie Rockheart as leader. And finally, but obviously, not least, Thomas Walker, Mathew Hunter, Alexander Eye, and Oliver King will form Team HEWK, with Thomas Walker as leader. You will now spend the rest of your time here at Telum in these teams and will share accommodations and training to help you as a group and learn how to work with other Mythics using strategies. Each student will be given a style classification based on multiple factors, which will help them train in the style of combat most suited for them. The styles are Scout, Warrior, Mage, and Support, though you will learn about this in more depth at a later date. This is the beginning of the rest of your lives: you will learn mastery over your chosen future, be it one of protection or one of healing. You will either rise or fall. The choice is yours." Washington finished his speech. "Wait, why am I the leader?" I said out loud. I would have chosen Matthew or maybe one of the other two. Also, how did they design the teams?" "Well, you weren''t meant to finish that fast. The dungeon is structured in a way that you choose a path that leads you to another student. You fight a Shade, defeat it, run into another bigger shade problem with another pair finding and helping you. That''s how they try and naturally integrate the teams which they designed before," Edward explained. "You, on the other hand, ran past the second hurdle leaving the other pair to sort it out for you, most of the time even speedsters have issues getting round packs in such close quarters. Luckily, they were able to sort out those beowolves. For why you''re the leader, you did mostly take charge of the situation." "Oh," I realised, "They were the other pair." *** After the speech all the new teams met to be assigned rooms and so we met up with Oliver and Alex. "So¡­" I started to get to the question on my mind, "What do you guys think of the choice of leader?" "Better you than me," Oliver stated, "Plus, Alex does not have the attention span for it." "Hey!" Alex complained, "But completely fair; you could have at least pretended that I was the leading type, though." "I can''t lie easily, Alex." "Fair." "What about Matthew, though?" I prompted. "My legacy requires too much concentration, plus you handled yourself well in the dungeon, so I don''t disagree with the decision." Mathew reassured, "The name though¡­" "It is spelt like the sound of someone throwing up," Alex stated bluntly, "Plus Hawks don''t really fit with our group, none of us can fly or have anything to do with vision." "Agreed." Everyone followed Miss Fortune to where we would be staying for the next couple of years. If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it. I opened the door with the key we were given. The room was massive. It had four beds, a fridge, a bathroom, and a window looking over a forest. We all had individual wardrobes for our stuff and mine even had holders for my gauntlets and my leg. Oliver''s was tailored for his bow and quiver, and Matt''s had hooks to hold his staff. Alex''s didn''t have any special adaptations, as far as I could tell, but it was still cool nonetheless. On each bed, there was a folded black cloak with different-coloured accents and a small icon in the same colour under the shoulder: silver with a winged boot on mine, gold with a staff on Matthew''s, red with a sword on Oliver''s, and green with a bottle on Alex''s. These were probably the styles that Washington had spoken of. "I wouldn''t have considered myself a warrior, the only warrior trait I have is that I''m alright at hand-to-hand combat, but I typically just fight with my bow, so I thought I''d get support or scout," Oliver said, as he put on his cloak. "It''s probably because you''re the most warrior-like on our team," Alex explained, "Or because most of your trick arrows allow for you to get in close to fight like a warrior, though I did think you would be a support as well. They probably just want one of each in a team, and we overlap too much." Our stuff had already been unpacked into the wardrobes (far more organised than I ever would have), and the fridge already had drinks in it, all of which were non-alcoholic. I don''t think I can get drunk anyway, as I believe my Legacy kicks my metabolism into overdrive. Speaking of metabolism: "As my first order as your new leader, I declare that we are going to go to eat. After we find out where the food is. I''m starving," I announce to my team. *** We arrived sometime later at the cafeteria after getting directions. Edward thought that I would have been able to find the cafeteria easily with his help, but, knowing myself, I probably still would have gone the wrong way, anyway. It was a buffet as, according to Edward, some Mythics had to consume a lot of calories to make up for the amount they burned with their Legacy, myself included. We filled our plates with food and sat at a table. When we all had sat down, Alex asked, "So why do you have two eye colours?" I shrugged and, in between bites, said, "It just happened after I unlocked my Legacy. It''s probably just weird soul stuff." "Fair. Also, I don''t think honey is meant to go on pizza. Or on beef." I became distracted as a girl who looked pissed off walked towards our table. She had dark skin, pink hair, and amber eyes. As soon as she spotted us, her eyes started glowing. At the same time, everything started floating like Edward. It was as if gravity was turned off, or more accurately as if I were falling with everything around me. "How the hell did you complete the maze so fast?!" she shouted at me. "Uh, who are you?" "How. Did. You. Complete. The. Maze. So. Fast?" "My Legacy is speed; didn''t you read the thing?" "But how did you kill the Shades?!" "Let me handle this," Edward stated. My perspective shifted from where I was floating to where Edward was, though my body didn''t move. The only thing which changed were my eyes; the colours swapped. Time slowed down and Edward, now controlling my body, pulled himself out of the area affected and calmly walked behind the girl, with everyone around us almost paused. He returned time to normal and calmly said, "Speed is a lot more versatile than just running fast, but of course, running fast is useful." The girl jumped, and everything fell back down as she lost concentration. I regained control over my body and used my own speed to sit back down in less than a second, though less gracefully than Edward. It was weird not to be in control of my body, even if it was just for a second. "I didn''t know you could do that!" I thought. "I guess you learn something new every day," Edward replied to me offhandedly. From the back of the cafeteria, a boy with blond hair and friendly jade green eyes who was looking wildly for their friend to prevent them from doing what they clearly already were doing shouted, "Cassie! Don''t get into a fight with someone because they finished faster than you! Or at least try not to punch anyone in your first week!" "Don''t worry, Star, I have it under control." The girl spoke through gritted teeth and glared like a pot being prevented from overboiling by a wooden spoon, not waiting for said wooden spoon to arrive. "No one is going to fly into the ceiling because I forgot to turn their gravity back on¡­ yet." It was clear that had Star not arrived, things would have gotten a lot worse, as Edwards'' form of de-escalation was more like using oil to put out a fire. Star stopped next to our table and took a breather. He had the look of a mum friend trying to prevent the inevitable. "Sorry about her, she''s competitive. You should have seen her when I beat her high score by one point in Street Racer; the console didn''t stand a chance. Anyway, I''m Star, and she''s Cassie. We are a part of the team Legends. We changed the name because CROC is too much like the footwear. You''re team HEu-WK, right?" "Yeah, though we are planning to change that. HEu-WK looks too much like a throw-up sound," Alex answered, turning to Cassie. "If you still want to fight, we don''t have any lessons or plans, so if you could meet us in about an hour and a half at the stadium, we could probably see who is better." "Sounds like a plan," Cassie replied before Star could take them back to their team. Star sighed as their prevention of a fight had only delayed it. We stared at Alex. Alex, in response, carried on eating like he hadn''t just arranged for us to be demolished by a team who had actually fought together and who probably all knew their Legacies, knowing my luck. "Alex, typically people try to avoid conflict as much as possible, not arrange a fight the first day of school," Oliver explained, seeing how he hadn''t cottoned on to what he had done wrong. "We can take them. Their main players are who we just spoke to: the gravitokinetic, Cassie and a pyrotechnic, Star. The other two Mythics in their team only unlocked their Legacy recently, but one can manipulate flora, and the other one can mimic certain aspects of different fauna. I believe we can counter the majority of their skill sets." I looked at him blankly. Matthew clarified in plainer English, "Star can create fire, Cassie can control gravity, Emily, who is over there, can gain the ability of different animals and Lilly, the person next to Star, can control plants." "Why didn''t he just say that then?" I asked Matthew. "He thinks that he sounds cooler when using all the fancy terms for things, and that''s how his dad talks," Oliver explained. "It''s called being precise." "It''s called unnecessary complexity." "So, how did you guys become friends?" I queried, as they clearly knew each other before Telum and Alex were not going to see the fault in his arrangement for us. "Our dads are friends, and he makes the designs for most of the weapons we make as well as the prototypes for them. We helped with the testing and became friends because of it. You?" Oliver answered, having just finished his food. Matthew responded, shrugging. "I was roommates with him, that''s about it. We just kind of became friends." Alex asked, looking at my leg as I stood up from my seat. "Tom, before we go to the arena, please may I take a look at your prosthetic leg? You seem to be having trouble with it, given the number of times you''ve tripped. I believe I could sort out the glitches for you." "Yeah, sure. Though, try not to break it; I''m rather attached to it," I said, smirking. 8. Legendary Encounter We arrived back at our room with around an hour to prepare. I sat down onto my bed and took off my foot, still feeling slightly weird that I could actually do that, though I ignored the feeling. As Alex walked into the room, I threw my leg over to him. I immediately regretted doing so. All the different ways in which that scenario could go wrong went through my mind. I cringed as I anticipated the thud of metal hitting the ground as Alex failed to catch my leg. There wasn¡¯t a thud. My leg was suspended in the air like someone had hit the pause button on only the limb, as everything else was still moving. ¡°I would rather not be kicked in the face while entering a room,¡± Alex said, looking at the foot just millimetres away from hitting his nose, eyes glowing copper brown as his Legacy activated, making the leg glow as well, as the power took effect. ¡°I might as well get on with it.¡± The limb was stripped into its simplest elements, with even the outer shell and screws being separated. The fridge in the room began to glow as Alex stripped it for parts, leaving the cans on the floor where it used to be. The different segments almost flew around the room with seemingly a mind of their own, pieces from my leg, the fridge and components which Alex had brought with him flying from one of his draws. They assembled into tiny intricate mechanisms as well as larger pistons and other fragments you would find in something like a computer or any piece of machinery. Using the parts from around the room, he reassembled my leg, which looked considerably different from how it started. It now had a blue bolt of lightning along one side and black metal everywhere else. It was just amazing. Alex, with the remaining parts which he had not used, rebuilt the fridge with the cans back in it. It, unlike my new leg, surprisingly looked exactly the same as how it started, as I don¡¯t think we were supposed to tamper with the equipment. Alex collapsed on his bed after this astounding feat of power, and my leg landed on my lap. Oliver, who had clearly seen Alex¡¯s power in action before, strolled over to the fridge and threw Alex a can of soft drink. Alex caught the drink in one hand and downed it in one. He sat up. ¡°I believe I have sorted out the flaws in the design. It should work fine now,¡± he told me, sounding like he had just run two miles in less than fifteen minutes, which was understandable. I picked up my newly upgraded limb and looked at it, bending the ankle to test that it still worked. It wasn¡¯t that I didn¡¯t trust Alex¡¯s craftsmanship, but due to the fact, it had been floating around in pieces seconds before and apparently used some parts of a fridge. I put it on. I felt a minute jolt of electricity, not enough to shock but still noticeable. I moved the ankle again, this time without my hands. It worked. ¡°Thanks for the new limb; hopefully, it¡¯ll help me not fall over,¡± I thanked Alex. ¡°Very well-articulated Tom,¡± Matthew told us after checking his phone for the time, ¡°But we probably should get going to the stadium as somebody,¡± He glared at Alex, ¡°thought it would be a good idea to arrange a fight an hour in advance.¡± ¡°It was actually an hour and a half beforehand,¡± Alex retorted, ¡°Though we probably should get going.¡± *** We arrived at the stadium around the same time as the Legends. Both of our teams seemed underdressed. It was only the first day, and therefore, we didn¡¯t have any appropriate uniform, only T-shirts and trousers. The only real sign we were about to fight were our weapons. We stood just outside the main entrance of the stadium, weapons in hand. As we walked in, I had to give pause, as I didn¡¯t expect what I was seeing. There was a crowd¡ªnot a very big crowd like the one at the team announcement ceremony, but bigger than I expected. The new students were there, as were a few of the older students. I¡¯m pretty sure I even saw a couple of teachers. ¡°Why is there an audience?¡± I asked no one in particular. ¡°Or, more importantly, how is there a crowd?¡± ¡°Well, it wouldn¡¯t be much of a fight if no one watched,¡± Alex answered, ¡°So I sent out a message on social media. Anyway, let''s start the fight!¡± My vision shifted. ¡°OK, let¡¯s set some ground rules! We have lessons tomorrow, so no serious maiming; a player¡¯s out when their aura levels go below forty percent, and the winning team is the team with the most aura after an hour if the Legends can last that long,¡± Edward taunted in my body before swapping back, a slight northern accent shining through as he spoke. Both teams went to opposite sides of the stadium to arrange tactics. ¡°So how are we going to win this?¡± Matt asked with his telepathy. ¡°What the¡­!¡± Oliver yelled out, flinching from the voice coming from seemingly nowhere. ¡°Matthew has telepathy,¡± I told him, unhelpfully, in my mind. ¡°I gathered that; also, what is that music?¡± Oliver replied out loud. ¡°Oliver, I think they¡¯re trying to talk tactics with telepathy to make sure the other team can¡¯t hear,¡± Alex explained. He was getting the hang of talking without talking remarkably well. ¡°Matthew, you take on Star since you can use your rune things to defend yourself against his fire. Oliver harras Lilly at range and try to tire her out,¡± I commanded, sending my team off to their duties. ¡°Alex, Cassie needs to concentrate to use her power; use that to your advantage. I¡¯ll go against¡­Uh¡­ animal-girl-person. Emily! That was it.¡± The rest of the team went to fight their assigned Legend, and I ran to Emily. Her grass-green eyes glowed with power, and she was clearly not expecting my greeting of ¡°Hi¡± as she yelped, trying to attack me with her claws as I just suddenly appeared to the left of her. She missed, obviously, her red hair smacking her in the eyes from the sudden change in direction. She was fast, but I was faster. Her movements seemed to reflect what animal she was channelling; currently, she seemed to be channelling some kind of big cat. Her fighting style was fluid and more reactionary as she seemed to change animals depending on the situation. The only things she was able to hit were sparks of blue energy left in the wake of my Legacy. I tapped her on the shoulder and waved. Being annoying was fun. A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. Trying to knock her over, I aimed a well-placed roundhouse kick on her legs, but this failed, as a silhouette of a cheetah appeared around her, and she managed to dodge the strike, staying on her feet. In one swift movement, the cheetah was replaced by a gorilla outline, and she delivered a powerful blow to my chest, launching me back a few feet, landing on my butt. Getting winded was not fun. ¡°I cat believe you¡¯re using gorilla warfare tactics, you cheetah,¡± I managed to joke through slightly shaky breaths. ¡°Animal puns, really? Like I haven¡¯t herd them all before,¡± She replied, smirking at her own. ¡°How is everyone getting on?¡± I heard in my mind just before I was about to run back to deliver a return blow. ¡°Bit winded, but other than that, peachy. You?¡± I answered though everyone¡¯s thinking voice sounded slightly muffled (unlike Edwards), so I wasn¡¯t completely sure who was talking. ¡°Star is slightly more relentless than I was expecting and we seem to be in a slight stalemate¡± he replied, ¡°I tried firing shields of water at Star, but it doesn¡¯t seem to be cooling him off.¡± ¡°Have you tried ice?¡± Someone, who I¡¯m pretty sure was Alex, suggested. ¡°Fair point, I might try that.¡± Matthew thought back. I ran back to my fight, changing my own tactics. I did what I did before, but this time, making sure I was too far away for her to punch when I said ¡°Hi¡±. She acted instinctually and tried to punch me where I was the last time, which made her overshoot, opening her up to an attack from behind. I took the opportunity and elbowed her in the back, followed by a strike to her right leg, which was her stabiliser. Long story short: she fell. I managed to land a few hits by the time she hit the ground, and she landed hard. ¡°I think you might need to work on your balance,¡± I told her after checking if her aura was below forty; it had only been knocked down to around sixty percent. ¡°Thanks,¡± she responded sarcastically as she tried to get back up. As she was already down, it was easier to land enough punches in quick succession to bring her aura down low enough to eliminate her. ¡°Anyone else need help? I¡¯ve eliminated Emily,¡± I asked, as there wasn¡¯t much point in standing around. I checked my own aura to see how I was doing: seventy two percent, not bad. ¡°Yeah, I could use some help; arrows are not that effective against plants.¡± I looked around for Oliver and saw a massive tree giant made of wood, leaves and thorns moving and dodging with a girl in wood armour. The giant matched her almost exactly, with only a small amount of lag between her movements. Its large limbs whined as they moved, and its leaves rustled as the plant matter that made up its joints warped and regrew to replicate her. The right arm was covered in small arrows as it had clearly been used to shield Oliver¡¯s attack, and a small amount littered the rest of the body. Clearly, some had hit their intended target, one particular example sticking out her right shoulder. Oliver seemed to have at least one thorn in his left shoulder. The girl was relatively short and stocky, contrasting with her armour, with brown hair and freckles around her nose; she had rose coloured eyes which were focused on Oliver as he fired more arrows to no avail, weaving between her legs as she also hadn¡¯t gotten many hits in. Neither side seemed to have the upper hand as both of their auras were around eighty percent. Vines wiped away arrows, and Oliver evaded the tree strikes; it was time to lean the fight in Oliver¡¯s favour. I ran over to Oliver and stopped next to him. His expression was thick with the concentration needed to dodge Lilly''s attack of thorns and to calculate the correct arc he needed to shoot to hit her where it would damage her aura most. He had only been able to hit his target a couple of times, the broken arrows stuck around Lilly¡¯s wooden chest plate, evidence enough. Both Oliver and Lilly still had their auras in the high eighties, though neither had delivered a meaningful blow to the other. ¡°Do you have any other arrows other than boring old vanilla?¡± I asked as I tried to come up with a suitable tactic. ¡°Ask about a grappling arrow,¡± Edward told me, breaking his silence since the fight began. ¡°Like a grappling arrow, maybe?¡± I repeated, thinking at Oliver. ¡°Yeah, I think I might have one of those, but why did you repeat that, and why would we need¡­ oh, you want to trip her.¡± ¡°Let¡¯s go with that,¡± I thought, scrapping my actual idea of using the arrow to run to the top of the tree mech. Oliver reached into his quiver, took out an arrow which had a metal cord attached to it, and fired it to the left of the tree¡¯s legs. I ran after the arrow, caught it and rerouted the arrow¡¯s direction to wrap around the tree¡¯s legs as well as keeping the arrow¡¯s speed, constantly giving it enough energy to cause it to trip Lilly¡¯s creation over. The organic robot fell over with a loud thud with Lilly still inside, which caused a slight dust cloud to be kicked up as Lilly yelled out in surprise. She fell out of the tree robot only to land on a patch of moss, which grew to cushion the impact of her landing. A chunk of her aura percentage was lost, but not enough that she was out of the game just yet. Suddenly, my feet missed solid ground, which would have caused me to trip if I was able to. Alex ran past me, ¡°Looks like we''re swapping. I¡¯ll help Oliver!¡± A vine wrapped around his leg, dragging him closer to the action. A small drone detached itself from his shoulder and cut the vine to free him. ¡°I finally found you. Let¡¯s see if speed is really as versatile as you say it is.¡± Time slowed down around me as I tried to think, which was incredibly helpful as Cassie was clearly about to slam me back into the ground. I was unable to use my actual speed as I was too far above the ground to kick off it. The only way I was able to attack was my gauntlets, but the recoil would throw me back as I had nothing to secure my stance. It clicked. I fired my gauntlets behind me and used the recoil to propel myself toward Cassie. The impact hurt like hell as I had used my non prosthetic as otherwise, it might have been overkill. It was supposed to be a sort of friendly battle. I was certain that I had broken a few bones in my foot and, at the same time, with my foot as it collided with her chest, which caused her to be thrown back. We were both knocked out of the match almost simultaneously, as both our auras had dipped below forty. My foot bent back in an awkward position, burning with pain. Somehow, I had known Edward would be right when he said that I would know the med bay well. The second day of school had gone quite well if you had asked me. 9. Interlude Night Strike: Out of the Frying Pan... Leaning against the cold wall of my cell, I looked through the metal bars that had been a near constant in my life, but not after today. The sound of a guard''s footsteps echoed down the hall towards my cell. Opportunity. ¡°You ready?¡± I asked my friend, tapping it out in Morse code. ¡°Yeah, " he replied out loud, ignoring my attempt at being discreet. The guard was too far away to hear us and was wearing earphones, but the protocol was to be cautious; she seemed new and was trying to stay calm, which is why today was the day. I disappeared. The guard walked past the few cells before getting to mine, stopping to look over them a few seconds longer than she needed. They were empty. She took a deep breath¡ª whispering ''ok'' to herself¡ªand looked into the cell labelled Night Strike, readying herself to see me. She didn¡¯t. She double-checked her list to make sure this was the right cell or if I was meant to be on a mission. I wasn¡¯t. ¡°Subject Night Strike is not in its cell; sound the alarm!¡± the guard shouted before unlocking the cell to check for signs of escape. Mistake. After I heard the click of the lock mechanism opening the cell door, I moved, knocking the guard out and swiping the keys out of their pocket. To an outside onlooker, it appeared she was being hit by a ghost, which wasn¡¯t that far from the truth ¡ª though I am far more effective than a ghost, I must say. I unlocked my friend¡¯s cell. His was labelled Kill Streak. ¡°You took your time! Three seconds; you¡¯re slacking,¡± he said, mocking me. Thinking about it, this was the first time I had been out of my cell without direct orders to assassinate some head of state or a Mythic who had gone power crazy. To make sure they disappear into the shadows like they were never there. To make all traces of them evaporate into thin air. You¡¯d be surprised how easy it is. I motioned him towards the weapon room so we could get our weapons. I disappeared. My invisibility was useful for entering places discreetly, but it was not without its flaws. A familiar darkness overtook my vision as my Legacy activated, light no longer affecting me and a new realm of vision being needed. When I entered the room, I sensed that there were several guards arming themselves with knives and guns, willing to shoot if they noticed anything wrong. They didn¡¯t get the chance. I knew where they were because I could sense their fear, hear their heartbeat and feel their body heat. It took seconds. I retrieved my S-class Sniper Sword and passed my friend his Scythe Minigun. He caught it and slung it behind his back with disturbing grace. He reached next to where his weapon had been previously and picked up a round of ammunition, attaching it to his belt for later. We were made for killing. Certain problems could be solved by the right bullet going through the right person¡¯s head. We were made and are used so that no Shade gets too close or Mythic gets too powerful. We had to kill or be killed and were used as tools. We didn''t like that. Killstreak took a flask from one of the guards that I had just taken out and took a swig out of it. ¡±I don¡¯t know what¡¯s in this, but I like it!¡± He exclaimed, pocketing it for later. Grimacing in mild disgust, I signalled for him to stop messing around; I could hear some more guards responding to a silent alarm. We needed to move. Now. We disappeared, the only proof that we were there being the missing weapons and the bodies littering the floor. The guards opened the door into the room, expecting a fight but only to be met with dead bodies and confusion. Seconds later, they found themselves on the floor with them. ¡°That should give us at least five minutes to give a visit to an old friend, right Night?¡± asked Killstreak, smiling a bloody smile at the thought, ¡°I wonder if he has ever eaten bullets before? I¡¯ve heard lead tastes sweet.¡± We moved into a long corridor lined with doors and stopped at the third on the right. It was locked. With ease, Killstreak shot the lock, and the door swung open, revealing a crowd of security guards facing right at us. The smell of steel and lead overwhelmed any other. They had us at 80:1. There was no point in staying invisible, so I reappeared into sight. The room was absolutely packed with guards pointing all sorts of weapons at us. I could see a small amount of panic in their eyes. Cute. ¡°Did you enjoy your little stroll outside your cell?¡± the man in the middle snarled like a chihuahua; he looked so small and sat at his desk with his feet up. ¡°Did you really think I was dumb enough not to take precautions to this exact problem?¡± The man we had come to see, who only referred to himself as The Director. I ignored him as I focused on working out how to get us out of this room. Killstreak was already twitching to kill the guards. The Director was trying to make us give in, but he forgot that we were literally trained for situations like this. I nodded. All hell broke loose. The guards shot wildly as we mowed them down with our weapons, killing them one by one. I took a shot to the shoulder, nothing I could not shrug off, though the guard soon regretted his fire. Killstreak was living up to his name; he had wiped out all the people who even came close to him, killing multiple people at a time. He felled them like he was harvesting wheat or barley, laughing though in a distinctly un-farmer-ish way. The fight ended soon after it started, and the only people left standing were The Director, Kill, and me. The former¡¯s face was noticeably less colourful than at the start of our encounter. This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report. ¡°So, when do the precautions come in?¡± Killstreak mocked, wiping blood off his hands and onto his clothes. ¡°I think we may have missed them.¡± ¡°How did you¨Chow did you defeat them? It doesn¡¯t matter; I have another trick up my sleeve,¡± The Director stuttered, pulling out a switch. ¡°I had hoped I would not have to resort to this, but I knew it was inevitable that you may turn against your dear old Director. There are tetrodotoxin pills located in your neck which will kill you near instantly when I flick this switch; I would say ¡®nice knowing you¡¯ but I¡¯d be lying, I¡¯ll enjoy seeing your corpses. Goodbye.¡± He flipped the switch, grinning as he did so. Nothing happened. There was a second before the Director flipped the switch again, frowning. He flipped it again and again and again; after the eleventh time, he gave up. He looked back at us, searching for an answer, his confidence deteriorating by the second. Kill shrugged. ¡°We had nothing to do. I was bored. I found a slight bump in my neck and cut it out.¡± Killstreak stated, showing a scar on the left side of his neck. ¡°I think Night did the same.¡± I nodded, revealing my scar to them in the same place. ¡°Though I would love to make your death slow and painful, I really cannot be bothered. I would say it was nice knowing you, but it wasn¡¯t,¡± Kill mocked. ¡°I want to get out of here; this place is leaving a bad taste in my mouth. Night, would you do the honours?¡± I aimed my sword at him. Given the amount of fear radiating from him, I could have aimed at him with my eyes closed. He was a shining beacon to any Shades in the area. ¡°Hey, hey, hey, I¡¯m not, like, the main guy, you know. I¡¯m only the guy who made you, not, you know, the top guy, not the guy in charge. You¡¯ll need me, you know if you actually want to get back at who actually, you know, did this to¡­¡± the Director tried to say before I pulled the trigger. For some reason, he couldn¡¯t finish his sentence without the top of his head. The side wall exploded. There was someone shouting orders, but that stopped abruptly when the dust settled. Three new people were staring at us and the bodies with a look of confusion. Then the person, who I assume was the leader, stated, ¡°We¡¯re from the Dark Flame. We were meant to be breaking you guys out.¡± Kill started screaming with laughter. After a while, the group still staring in confusion, he managed to regain his upright stance, wiping his eyes and shooting them a cocky grin. ¡°I¡¯d say you were a little late for that.¡± *** The group explained to us the flaws in our escape plan; essentially, where we were located was nowhere near anything on foot. No matter how good we were at killing, we wouldn¡¯t survive out there indefinitely. Even if we somehow miraculously managed to steal an airship, neither of us could fly it. Plus, wilderness survival isn¡¯t as comfortable a lifestyle than what they would offer us. I looked over at Kill, and I could clearly see him weighing the fun of killing a load of Shades with the effort of building a shelter or actually preparing food. Eh, they¡¯re probably less effort. ¡°You lot have a point. We should get these suckers to wait on us hand and foot, plus they probably have a reason to try and break us out. If they¡¯re lying, I could probably kill them anyway and steal their transport.¡± Kill smiled at me, ¡°Kidding¡­ Probably.¡± The leader gave a slight nervous chuckle, ¡°Well I¡¯d be glad to have you on our side, my name is Sam.¡± Sam looked like someone who had seen battle but had not directly seen death. He had a handle on his emotions slightly better than his team, but they weren¡¯t completely obscured. They took us to their airship and asked questions like, ¡°What are our powers?¡± and ¡°How exactly did we escape the facility keeping us?¡± It got really boring after a while. Kill managed to entertain himself by giving vague answers that didn¡¯t tell them anything. We arrived at a far-off, secluded facility. It was in a clearing of a jungle between two mountains, with Shades lurking between the trees. Occasionally, one of the brave Shades would appear in the clearing, only to be immediately killed by the people patrolling the area. The base itself looked like a stately home¡ªpristine. I wouldn¡¯t have been surprised if someone told me they teleported it from the centre of one of the kingdoms five minutes ago, as there were no signs of weathering from the surroundings. ¡°This place is cosy, just the right amount of Shades and not knowing where the fuck we are!¡± Kill stated as we landed. ¡°I¡¯m not answering any questions before you tell us where the hell we are and why you want our help? It''s been an hour or something; I would have expected you to tell us by now.¡± Kill lazily stretched as he continued, ¡°I would have asked earlier, but I was trying to give off a silent but deadly feel. Now it''s getting boring. Plus, you¡¯ve stopped flinching at my every movement. We could be in Wruikreria¡¯s main kingdom by now but, no, we¡¯re helping you with something we know nothing about. So where are we, and why do you want us?¡± ¡°We are in the Dark Flame¡¯s main base of operations in the Amazon rainforest. We are the only people who are able to survive in such a Shade populated place,¡± answered Sam professionally. ¡°As for what we need you for, I don¡¯t know. My team and I were only tasked to help you escape,¡± He paused for a moment before continuing in a slightly sarcastic tone, ¡°which you were clearly in need of, might I add, and to bring you here. You will need to ask the Chairman. I¡¯ll bring you to him.¡± The base was larger than I expected. It seemed to have only one main entrance but multiple windows that I could fit through. The rooms were labelled, and the corridors branched out from the centre, some leading to dark ends. Sam led us down a specific hallway, stopped outside a room, and knocked on the door. Shortly after, a voice was heard, allowing us to enter. A man who looked to be in his twenties was sitting at a desk in the middle of a cream-coloured room, drinking a hot brown liquid out of a mug with an emblem of a black fire printed onto it. I believe that the liquid is referred to as coffee, which is quite popular with a lot of leaders. The man had brown hair and orange eyes. I could sense a large amount of power coming from him and could tell he was expecting us. ¡°Hello there, Samuel. I see our guests arrived safe and sound. Hopefully, it was no trouble. Am I correct in assuming that they would like to know why we have brought them here?¡± he guessed in a friendly tone. ¡°You can call me Ark. I already know your names.¡± Ark offered his hand for us to shake. No one accepted it. After a few moments, he put his hand down. ¡°You are here because we need your help in trying to overthrow the main powers of the kingdoms. We believe they have too much control over their respective lands, giving them the resources to make more powerful armies, weapons, and to upgrade their Mythics beyond their usual limits with technology. There is also a rumour that Shadow''s End has developed a robot with a soul, though the scientist believes it to be his second son, as I¡¯m told and refuses to reveal his method.¡± Ark announced all this in a very formal manner. ¡°Where do we come in?¡± Kill asked, annoyed at the indirect answer. ¡°Stop dancing around the truth and tell us. I¡¯m sure if we tried hard enough, me and Night could survive on our own. So, tell us now, or we will be on our way.¡± Ark smiled. ¡°We need you to make an impression.¡± 10. Night Strike: … And Into The Fire Ark led us into a briefing room to explain the plan more after that brief statement that did not clarify much. Apparently, he had been waiting all day for us to arrive just so that he could say that one-liner. Ark explained that the Dark Flame needed resources and that they were trying to rescue a large number of lower class people, who were being treated as if they were below animals in the class structure of the kingdoms, solely because they do the jobs that are deemed ¡®unclean¡¯ to society. With our help, they could kill two birds with one stone and use the rescue mission to show the people who the true enemy was. In return for doing the mission, Ark agreed that The Dark Flame would supply us with enough money to do what we wanted but to work for them if they so needed us again. Sam and Ark left the room for us to confer. ¡°Well, we¡¯ve got nothing better to do. Seems a bit suicidal and likely to fail. Where would they even get an airship big enough for all those people? The idea is stupid, there might even be blood,¡± Kill stated with the slight look of humour in his eyes. ¡°Where do I sign up?¡± I shrugged my shoulders as if to say, might as well. *** I had not slept well. They had given me my own room, which had been decorated plainly. The bed they had given me was extremely soft in comparison to the metal frame with a sheet I had been sleeping on previously, so I slept on the floor of the room. The main reason I was having trouble sleeping was because I couldn¡¯t hear Kill¡¯s snoring; its absence kept me awake by the jarring void of silence that replaced it. Blood stained the bed from where I had lain, as I hadn¡¯t any spare clothing other than my damaged uniform. Most of the blood wasn¡¯t mine. The only non-cosmetic injury I had sustained from the battle was a gunshot wound in my shoulder, the pain more of an annoyance to me as it only made itself known when I tried to move my shoulder. I heard a knock at the door. Wincing as I stood up, I held my shoulder and opened the door. Outside was a clean set of clothes and a med kit with bandages and stitches. I took them into the room and took off my shirt, gingerly around my gun wound, and the fabric stuck to the blood, stinging as I pulled it off. I cleaned it, stitched it back up after removing the bullet, and wrapped it in a bandage to put pressure on it. I put on the new T-shirt. It was weird; I hadn¡¯t worn anything other than my uniform for as long as I could remember, and the T-shirt was clean, without any blood (mine or otherwise). I stood up from what I had used as a bed and walked over to a mirror on the wall to check my reflection: no visible scars (except on the neck), slate-coloured eyes, dark brown skin, and no clear differences since last viewed. I looked at a watch which had been in the clothes set: ten thirty. Ark had told Kill and me to meet in the briefing room at quarter to eleven before showing us the rooms we would be staying in. After picking up a knife, I walked to the meeting point easily enough as I had memorised certain aspects of the building, so I knew how to get out if I needed to. People gave me quick passing glances as I walked to my destination; I could sense the slight feeling of fear, mainly overshadowed by curiosity, before they carried on with what they were doing. I walked into the briefing room and saw that Kill was already there with Ark. He had also changed into a T-shirt with some Mythic¡¯s insignia on it. He was lounging on a sofa, his arms resting on the back, and the flask he had stolen from a guard in his hand, clearly relaxed. ¡°Hey, Night!¡± Kill called out, motioning to the area next to him, ¡°Apparently, Ark wants us to change our names as they are too murdery for him.¡± ¡°That is not exactly how I phrased it, but he is correct. I do believe it is appropriate for you to discard your mercenary names,¡± Ark agreed. ¡°We were just discussing possible replacements; Kill will fill in the details.¡± ¡°I agreed only if I got to pick the new name. How about ¡®Flint Lock¡¯?¡± I looked at him. ¡°What? It¡¯s a type of gun. You could be¡­ I don¡¯t know, Luke Knight?¡± I shrugged; it would do. ¡°Luke Knight, it is! Means I don¡¯t need to change anything. So Ark, what was that other thing you wanted to leave ¡®till Knight got here?¡± ¡°Ah yes, as you both know, the reason I brought the two of you here was because I need your expertise in retrieving some people who have been wronged by the kingdoms and have been practically left to rot. Well, I would like you to meet your pilot, Ace,¡± Ark explained as a red-haired boy about sixteen-seventeen with forest green eyes walked into the room. The boy, Ace, saluted and said, ¡°Yeah, as Ark said, I¡¯m your pilot as only a select few can actually fly the airship you¡¯re planning on stealing and, as luck would have it, I don¡¯t need training; I¡¯m a psychometric, which just means that if I hold onto something like a staff which a martial arts genius had held and perfected over years, I would have the same level of skill in seconds.¡± ¡°Cool,¡± Flint replied, with as much enthusiasm as a rabbit offered steak, ¡°so what do we need Ace to fly that is so difficult? We need a¡­ what did you call it? A psycho something? To pilot it?¡± ¡°Have you heard of the company Light Industries?¡±Ark clarified, ¡°Well, they are a tech company who supply the kingdoms with their defences against the Shades and, whether or not Mr King knows the methods of how his suppliers acquire his materials, use practically slave labour to mine the substances needed to make his weapons. We have leaked intel of their next big reveal in the near future of a technological advancement in the field of air travel, nicknamed the Bright Eagle, which has defences which were inspired by different Mythics¡¯ Legacys and can transport over a hundred people across kingdoms without the need for multiple Mythics on board.¡± At the mention of weapons, Kill, who was now Flint, sat up and clearly became more interested. I could feel his interest in the thought of specialised weapons being at his disposal; he had more investment because of the new toys he could shoot Shades with than why Ark wanted us to do the mission in the first place. ¡°From the intel we found out that only three pilots with specialised training were able to fly this beast of an airship.¡± Ace carried on, ¡°They had been training since Light Industries made the first prototype of the controls, which was just under three years ago. That was with advanced flight simulators that they made exclusively for this ship, and that was after they were specifically picked due to their years of experience. Which in itself is rare if you take into account how long pilots live for out there with Shades. Whereas I only need a few seconds to learn how to fly it in comparison.¡± I felt Ace¡¯s slight annoyance at the lack of reaction from Flint and me to his Legacy, which, though incredibly useful, doesn¡¯t immediately make him a skilled Mythic. I have met many Mythics with truly miraculous Legacys who were easily taken down, and many with seemingly useless ones utilise them in ways which make them who you would want on your side in a fight. Creativity is a powerful factor in a battle. Overconfidence kills. ¡°Cool, but can me and Knight get better beds, the ones you gave us are uncomfortably soft. I didn¡¯t get much sleep because of that and I don¡¯t think Knight did either. Plus you still haven¡¯t gotten me any more of that strong-smelling stuff I found. Whisky, I think you called it,¡± I nodded in agreement; we might as well negotiate some other things for our skills. From what I had worked out about the mission, I was how they planned on acquiring the aircraft without triggering any alarms, as I could take out any guards without being seen, and Flint was mostly for later on to protect our cargo. It seemed relatively simple, but I wanted to know one thing: how Ark got this information and how Ace, with the practically perfect Legacy for the job, became associated with him. From what I knew about the kingdoms, Ace should be a high ranking Mythic, why wasn¡¯t he? If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement. From previous experience, I knew how difficult it was to break into a Light weapons centre; they were the only other people who knew about me without relying on rumours. The Director had sent me to steal suitable weapons for Kill and I (or Flint and I, now I suppose). Their systems somehow managed to negate my ability, and they saw me just as I was leaving with the weapons we still use today. I signalled this to Flint. ¡°So¡­ where did you get this leak?¡± Flint asked on my behalf, which was obvious as his tone showed that he truly did not care. ¡°People. They are the weakest part of any system. One careless, seemingly insignificant mess up can leak all the information that is encrypted under eighty layers of code just because someone just put the translated paper in the bin. We kept an eye on the rubbish, messages, and conversations of the pilots and workers in Light industries. It was as easy as those multiple insignificant mishaps became significant and gave us the whole picture that we needed.¡± ¡°So, all we need to do is take over this ship with overkill security ¨C no, not overkill security, Light security,¡± He looked around the room to see if people got the joke and only got flat expressions in response, waiting for him to continue, he rolled his eyes and carried on, ¡°the company that can somehow negate Knight¡¯s power, and supplies tailored Mythic weapons, which if used correctly can kill elemental Shades with less effort than when I kill some untrained guard? We have to do all this while they are revealing it to the public in front of millions, which includes any Mythic watching or whoever could stop us. Then, after all that, you want us to go to another kingdom entirely on the back of a stolen, most-likely-famous-by-that-point ship to liberate some downtrodden people to recruit them¡­ sounds reasonable. About those beds, what time do you think you can get them? Also, can we get air conditioning? I¡¯m sweating my balls off in this heat. Cool.¡± With that said, Flint stood up and casually left the room, leaving Ark and Ace in almost confused silence. Ace looked at me as if saying, ¡°What just happened?¡± I shrugged in response and followed Flint out of the room. ¡°Well, it seems our mercenaries are in agreement with our plan of action. Maybe we should find someone to get our guests some firmer beds, as they asked.¡± *** I found Flint in what I believed to be the Dark Flame¡¯s cafeteria, which mainly consisted of fruits and meat from the surrounding jungle, though there clearly were some supplies from elsewhere. There was an area around him which people hadn¡¯t dared breach. However, I could feel their curiosity, respect, and even a slight feeling of concern radiating off everyone nearby like heat from the sun, as his wound had dyed the cloth around it a dark red as he had clearly not taken the same care to his wounds as I had mine. ¡°Knight, try some of the Flame¡¯s food; it¡¯s quite a lot nicer than the slop our mutual friend ever gave us,¡± Flint suggested once he noticed my presence. ¡°They even have that whisky stuff, too; try it.¡± He pushed a cup which was next to his plate toward me as I sat down on the other side of the table. I took a swig out of the cup. The liquid burned as it slid down my throat, and heat rose to my nose, giving me a strange feeling which wasn¡¯t too unpleasant. The feeling went away as fast as it came, and Flint looked at me expectedly, clearly hoping for some reaction. I took another swig, my face as neutral as if it was water. ¡°See, maybe these Dark Flame guys aren¡¯t that bad; at least their drink supply is plentiful. We can¡¯t fault them on that. Food¡¯s not bad either.¡± ¡°So, you¡¯re the ¡®big guns¡¯ Sam was sent after.¡± A woman who wasn¡¯t there a moment ago said while playing with the knife that had been attached to my belt, in an attempt at a power play. ¡°Ark has some nerve sending a team behind my back, but considering how it apparently went down, I¡¯ll forgive him this one time.¡± ¡°As much as we like hearing how awesome we are, and trust us, we know, could you get to the point a bit faster, lady?¡± She shrugged with a small smirk, ¡°Sure.¡± The change was instant, the typical flood of background information became silent, all the sound and emotion I was so used to feeling were gone. If I were anyone else, I would be unnerved, but I had seen dimensional or arena type Legacies used before, though it was incredibly rare. I didn¡¯t have any conventional weapons on me, but you don¡¯t survive through as many fights if something like that holds you back. A successful Mythic is deadlier with a spoon than a regular person is with a gun at point blank. This was not someone to treat lightly, at least if you cared about your own survival. That is why I turned to Flint, knowing how he¡¯d react. Flint just started laughing, ¡°Lady, if you¡¯re trying to intimidate us, you need to try harder than that. You can¡¯t kill us anymore than we are already going to die, so feats of how easily you can won¡¯t cut it on that front. I mean, that is a partial lie from me, but it gets the point across. What do you want?¡± ¡°What I want is simple: I want you to make sure this operation Ark has arranged succeeds as quietly and as humanely possible. I can¡¯t talk Ark out of it, especially now he found you. Even though he agrees that it won¡¯t change how they are viewed or that they will just be replaced as soon as we ¡®save¡¯ them. It¡¯s always the same argument of ¡®who else will help them¡¯ and that it will ¡®help the ones we do save¡¯,¡± She vented at us. ¡°He¡¯s too stubborn an optimist to argue with.¡± ¡°How this ¡®operation¡¯, as you call it, goes is relatively out of our control, but we don¡¯t really lose anything from trying,¡± Flint asked, wearing his sly grin; he clearly was enjoying the drama. ¡°So sure, we¡¯ll do what some random lady who apparently has power says, as we have nothing better to do. Though, what would you have done if we said no? Actually, retract that. We¡¯re now going to fail this as loudly and inhumanely as possible! What now?¡± She sighed, turning to me ¡°That¡¯s for me to know and you to have in your best interest not to find out. Keep your friend in line.¡± The atmosphere changed as the background information came flooding back, though there was an increased feeling of unease as people took quick glances in our general direction. ¡°We must have made an impression if people are already trying to intimidate us.¡± Flint joked as he wiggled his eyebrows at me to emphasise what he was implying despite the lack of evidence to the claim. ¡°Bet she wanted to check our allegiances. Or maybe she just wanted to check out the new meat.¡± I stole an apple off Flint¡¯s tray and stood up. ¡°They have training stuff on the opposite side of the building. It¡¯s a big room with the word ¡®gym¡¯ on the door. Just to let you know,¡± Flint called out after me, knowing how I spent my spare time. I left Flint to his own devices, eating the apple on the way to the gym. It didn¡¯t take me long to find it, as the building was easy enough to navigate. The gym was a large room, slightly better air-conditioned than the rest of the building. It had weights ranging from kilograms to some that were straight-up tonnes, a couple of running machines, a punching bag, as well as equipment for pull-ups and rest weights. The room was relatively busy, but the emotion was muted as people became entranced by the flow of exercise. I chose a running machine and mulled over the information Flint, and I gained that day. The Dark Flame wanted us to help them steal an airship which had the latest technology humanity was able to imagine, and that¡¯s all without considering the Mythics who would inevitably be watching the unveiling of Light Industries¡¯ new continental travel tech. The only way to succeed would be to either be far gone before anyone realises or use the confidence brought on by their superior security to take it while everyone is watching and make them think they are in control until it is far too late for them to do anything. They likely already accounted for the technopaths'' hijacking, as otherwise we would be using one of them instead of Ace. As a consequence, we won¡¯t need to worry about one fighting for control of the ship as soon as he''s on the controls. The Flame¡¯s plan seemed difficult to pull off but not as impossible as it could be. Despite this, even in a seemingly foolproof plan, Murphy¡¯s Law always seems to rear its head as anything that could go wrong likely will. In an endeavour like this, you always need a good enough imagination to improvise, otherwise even the most probable could become impossible depending on the circumstance. 11. Snap Back To Reality My leg hurt like hell when I came to. The adrenaline of the fight had long gone, so I felt the brunt of the pain. I had been the only one to break, not the greatest phrase to use, the no-maiming rule as I had clearly maimed my own leg. My skin also felt slightly raw from using my legacy as my body still wasn¡¯t fully adapted to it yet, and using it so many times in a short period of time made this fact actually noticeable to me. Highlights from the fight, clearly shot from a drone, were being replayed on a flat-screen television on the wall in view of my bed. The only person who fully acknowledged its presence was Alex, posing for the camera, though Oliver saw it and rolled his eyes, concentrating back on his fight. He was obviously used to Alex¡¯s showmanship. We had apparently won the fight, as I was the only person on my team to lose enough aura to be knocked out (metaphorically and literally). There was a machine attached to my leg, which seemed to be glowing lightning blue with flecks of red, as it seemed to be drawing my aura towards the injury. It felt a bit like pins and needles as it worked through, the pain lessening over time as I felt the remnants of the fight fix in my leg, in the correct places as a nurse must have realigned it right. My ankle stopped swelling and settled down until my leg no longer hurt. ¡°Um¡­ I think I¡¯m alright now; can I go?¡± I asked the nearest person of authority I could see. A guy with long blond hair turned to me and looked at my now healed ankle, ¡°You¡¯re free to go. Your ankle has healed nicely, and you will be alright to go to lessons tomorrow.¡± ¡°Thanks for the hel¨C¡± ¡°Where you can learn to kick without spraining your ankle.¡± The man said with a tone of annoyance, "You''re lucky you seem to heal faster than most, you know?¡± ¡°Um, yeah, thanks.¡± I shuffled awkwardly out of the room, giving the doctor a thumbs up as he glared at me like a misbehaving child. *** When I arrived at our room it was already pretty dark, and I realised that I didn¡¯t have a key on me to get into the room. I didn¡¯t want to wake anyone up, as they probably were already asleep by that time and I could have picked the lock but there wasn¡¯t anything on me to do that, so I just sat in front of the door until I could decide on what to do as I was slightly embarrassed. Five minutes passed as I contemplated knocking on the door and maybe waking my team when I heard someone walking down the hall towards me: Cassie. The Legends, it turned out, were only a few rooms away from ours. ¡°Forgot your key?¡± she asked. I looked up from my hard contemplation and nodded. ¡°Let me guess, you don¡¯t want to wake your team up but also don¡¯t want to sleep outside, and you don¡¯t want to go to reception and admit you lost your key on the first day?¡± her voice full of mirth voiced out my dilemma, seemingly amused by my plight. ¡°Yeah, but also, I don¡¯t know if it''s open this late, and I don¡¯t know where it is, plus it''s probably far. It would just be easier to knock and deal with it in the morning.¡± I rambled to try to explain my thought process. ¡°You do a good kick, though,¡± she changed the topic to distract me from making the situation even more complicated, ¡°enough to send me flying back even after I removed your local gravity. Annoyingly, that meant your team was able to beat us. I must admit it was impressive for someone to use my power against me, but don¡¯t expect to be able to do that again any time soon.¡± She looked to the ground by my feet, slightly mumbling, ¡°Also, sorry about what happened in the cafeteria.¡± ¡°Eh, don¡¯t worry about it,¡± I said absentmindedly. ¡°It¡¯s just that, I get slightly competitive with things like that,¡± She continued trying to explain herself, ¡°and I slightly struggled with the dungeon thing. You seemed to find it annoyingly easy, which might have been why I reacted that way.¡± There was a pause as she saw I was still stuck overthinking about the door situation and rolled her eyes. ¡°Anyway, I¡¯ll choose for you.¡± She knocked on the door before I realised I should react and walked off back to her own room. Alex answered almost immediately, and different pieces of machines floated around him. His eyes were glowing slightly which was seemingly the only light source in the room. ¡°Yo, didn¡¯t you have a key?¡± he said after realising it was me, ¡°Matt and Oliver are sleeping, so keep the noise down, but did you see the fight?¡± he took out his phone and started playing a recording of the fight before I had a chance of saying I hadn''t, ¡°Your kick was so cool! The way you used your gauntlet recoil to propel yourself, ingenious,¡± his eyes flashed with excitement as he replayed that part multiple times, ¡°and the finishing move Cassie used on you must have hurt; it left a crater in the ground.¡± he seemed to notice the time on the edge of the screen, ¡°Anyway¡­it is quite late so you should probably get to bed, our first lesson tomorrow is weapon training. Night.¡± He said this almost completely hypocritically as he immediately returned to what he was working on, whatever that work was. I went to my bed and practically fell on it, blacking out as my head touched the pillow. It had been a long day. This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. *** When Alex woke up the team to go to breakfast, he seemed to have no consequences for his all-nighter which was annoying as I was groggy from sleeping and had a dead leg from it hanging off the side of the bed. ¡°Wake up! You need to have breakfast,¡± Edward yelled at me inside my head. ¡°You missed dinner yesterday, so you¡¯ll collapse during training if you don¡¯t.¡± he continued to lectured me "You haven¡¯t been a speedster for long, but you will soon learn that you have its drawbacks as well as its perks.¡± As Edward suggested, I slumped out of bed unenthusiastically to get food with the team. Right after breakfast was our first lesson: weapons training. Now, what you might be thinking is, ¡®how can weapons training be tiring? It¡¯s just stand and shoot. Your arm might ache a bit, but that is all.¡¯ Well, Telum has a different style when it comes to weapons training. One where they test your endurance, dexterity, and how you use a combination of your Legacy and weapon in situations mimicked by AI. Mechanism apparently developed the system as he thought the previous training was lacking and digitised it to specialise for certain Mythic types and preferred weapons to ensure the best quality training. The best quality training hurts, though¡­ a lot. The training is also designed to help the Mythics who only unlocked their Legacy recently, aiding the body in adapting to the power and channelling it more effectively. At the moment, I still get some electric charring when I use mine. It wasn¡¯t as bad as it could have been, as I did become more stable when using my Legacy. Though it still needed practice, something which the A.I. did not let me forget. It always waited until I was off balance or distracted to attack. Edward helped warn me of some surprise attacks but wouldn¡¯t allow me to use his time manipulation as I had apparently become too reliant on it, saying he¡¯d allow me to when I could use my own power properly. Alex helped me use Red Thunder more effectively, analysing it with his power, and found a new mode I had been unaware of: ¡®finger guns¡¯, which were more precise than my punch shots at the cost of some power. The team training was mostly disorganised as I didn¡¯t really know how to lead; I had barely seen anyone on my team fight except Mathew, even with the battle yesterday. We were taken down by the A.I. in under seven minutes, which was impressive considering the utter chaos that was my tactic. Everyone was aching after the first lesson despite us only being an hour and a half into the first actual day. Fun. The next lesson was Shade identification studies. We took our seats in the lecture theatre, which everyone was thankful for as it meant we could sit down. The teacher stood at the front with a grin, his olive brown eyes not matching as darting between the faces of the students with a slight look of melancholy. He had a longish face, messy brown hair and wore an old looking silver amulet with a red ruby in the middle, though he looked young he gave the feeling of an old, tired academic. ¡°Welcome to Shade identification studies, my name is Dr Jacq and I¡¯ll be teaching you. I hope you enjoyed the last few days, especially those of you that partook in that unofficial fight as that was thoroughly entertaining. Typically, before lessons start, we only have the entrance exam for entertainment, which you have me to thank for.¡± He took in the glares like applause. Waiting a second to saver the moment before he continued with his reasoning. ¡°I believe that all students should experience coming face to face with a shade before they fully commit to becoming a fully fledged Mythic, plus it¡¯s a fun team building exercise and I''m sure you all had fun. It also gives us information on how you deal with unexpected experiences, as in the field you will have things go wrong and have to work things out for yourself so it''s tradition to not warn new students to keep the tests authentic. Which obviously has the added benefit of making the process funny as most don¡¯t expect it and every year someone wets themselves when they wake up to a Beowolf drooling over them; this year wasn¡¯t an exception.¡± With that statement, everyone looked around curiously at each other, which made Edward laugh. ¡°Well, do you know who he''s referring to?¡± ¡°Of course I do.¡± ¡°Who?¡± ¡°I¡¯m not going to say because it''s more annoying for you that way.¡± I sighed before shifting my attention back to Dr Jacq, who had somehow acquired annotated stills from the test. ¡°This, I¡¯m sure you¡¯re aware, is a Shade. Specifically, this is a grey bone Beowolf, chosen as it is the weakest form of the Beowolf.¡± He pointed to its armour that in the still was about to be hit by a student''s hammer, ¡°It is called this due to its fledgling armour that has not fully developed yet, and while I admit I am cruel, Washington at least made me only use this level of Shade in the exam as they are relatively easy to damage for novices. But believe me, there are worse out there.¡± He put up a separate image of a Beowolf. This one had more clearly defined armour that was whiter than the grey bone, which stood more in contrast to its black flesh, ¡°This is a Beta level, which has stronger armour and better intellect.¡± A third Beowolf appeared, and this one had weird growths and more interlocking bone plates. ¡°Alpha level is when Shades get more interesting. Notice the weird bumps on its neck? Those are poison glands, at this level Shades develop adaptations that you have to look out for as they are inconsistent even in the same species. I have seen one Alpha Nope out in the wild that had radioactive breath. You should see what that does to regular flesh!¡± He then put up two more Beowolfs, although this time they were illustrations rather than actual images, ¡°The next levels are spawn levels as they can create the lower levels and have more complex armour, you can tell them apart through how much black flesh is visible, the more complete the armour, the worse time you¡¯ll have.¡± He then sighed before continuing, ¡°I hate that I have to say this but Shade levels are a measure of how difficult a Shade is in comparison between members of its own species, don¡¯t underestimate them. The difficulty of taking down each type of Shade varies from the different types as a spawn Beowolf isn¡¯t as dangerous as Beta Nope if dealt with quickly enough. Also, watch out for specialized ones as they have specific methods of being defeated and, if not dealt with correctly, can become worse.¡± He then grinned, ¡°Also if you are one of those entrepreneur types, some of the higher Shades don¡¯t even dissolve completely when you kill them, sometimes leaving some of their armour or poison which weapon and medical companies pay big money for to research. I think that''s the basics, see you soon, for personal training.¡± He concluded his grin going slightly too wide. 12. The Games We Play After Jacq¡¯s lesson, we had a break before lunch. There was a main common room for all the students, with a console (the brand I didn¡¯t recognise) which some students were playing. There wasn¡¯t a TV, though, as apparently the entire section of the wall acted as the screen. I went over to the players, the first a guy with fudge brown eyes and short red hair with blue highlights and the second a girl with neon green eyes and long black hair. The game was a fighting game in which the two avatars were featureless blank models with the choice of several set arenas to fight in. The main thing that stood out to me was that unlike other fighting games I¡¯d seen before, the game had somehow been able to colour the avatars in the same colours as their eyes. ¡°YES!¡± the girl gloated after having apparently won the fight. ¡°I told you I could counter your shadow walking with my electricity, and it only took me twenty attempts,¡± The screen showed the guy knocked out next to the girl, most likely from the aforementioned electricity and a poor choice of shadow to emerge from. ¡°I have to admit putting metal rods next to the shadows was a good technique, though I doubt it would work a second time,¡± the guy replied. ¡°Those strategy lessons from Dr Keter have paid off.¡± ¡°Hey, what are you guys playing?¡± I asked, as the game clearly wasn¡¯t one I recognised. ¡°It¡¯s called Mythic Fight Simulator MKIII, or MFS3 for short; the technopath who made it wasn¡¯t very creative at the naming side, but he makes a good fight sim. You want a go?¡± the guy said, passing the controller to me. ¡°I¡¯m sure Chloe wouldn¡¯t mind a new challenge, though be warned: she¡¯s had extra lessons from Dr Keter.¡± ¡°Yeah if you¡¯re offering? Though be warned I¡¯m professionally bad at video games.¡± The guy, who introduced himself as Mike, showed me how to channel my aura into the controller so that the game could pick up my particular Legacy. The game apparently did this through the database to get an accurate record of each aura signature¡¯s powers. I followed Mike¡¯s instructions on how to flow my aura, it was similar to Jacq¡¯s machine only far weaker as it only required a small sample to analyse. The controller flashed purple and an error message showed on the screen. Mike looked confused, ¡°Huh, I don¡¯t think I¡¯ve seen that error message before. I¡¯d just try again maybe you just did it weird.¡± ¡°The analyser in the controller probably just registered both our auras at once, I had half a thought to stop you but I was curious to see how it would react. I¡¯ll just try and stop the device from absorbing my part and it should be fine,¡± Edward explained, before shutting down some other thoughts I had been starting to form, ¡°and sorry to disappoint but your plan to find out Oliver¡¯s Legacy from this game won¡¯t work as the database only has previous iterations of each Legacy. It¡¯s annoying but the current soul user¡¯s personality changes details of how the Legacy is expressed.¡± I flowed my aura again through the controller, though this time it felt more constrained as Edward filtered his aura away from the capture device. No error message appeared this time. My character appeared on screen in lightning blue, poised and ready to fight. Mike looked relieved ¡°Ok, nice, it seemed to have worked this time. I wonder what the issue had been. Doesn¡¯t actually matter, so what biome do you want?¡± ¡°Uh, I don¡¯t know, the mountain range?¡± Chloe laughed, ¡°Overheard the electric stuff, did you? Well, I¡¯m not that easy to counter, and now that you are done somehow breaking the game, I can show you the taste of defeat!¡± ¡°Please beat her, it would be so funny for all this smack talk to lead to her being defeated by a first year.¡± ¡°And? I have already shown that I can beat you, so if¡­ Uh, what was your name?¡± ¡°Tom.¡± ¡°So if Tom can defeat me then by the transitive rule that means you also are worse than a first year.¡± She turned back to me, ¡°Uh, no offence, by the way.¡± ¡°None taken.¡± ¡°Well, we will see won¡¯t we.¡± *** The fight went as expected, with me getting my ass handed to me multiple times, as I had almost no control over my speed. There were points where I thought I might have been getting the upper hand but Chloe quickly stopped any of the moves before I could plan any further ahead. Edward did not help in the slightest, laughing at how easily I was defeated, though he did seem slightly distracted by something at a couple of points. He had claimed that he would have been able to win a few of the matches but claimed that it would be too suspicious if I suddenly became amazing at the game and my avatar changed colours so conveniently he didn¡¯t have to prove his claims. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. Matt, Alex, and Oliver came over to cheer me on, only to switch sides when they saw how badly I was doing. I did, however, win at least three times as I gained a better grasp on the different arenas available and how to counter the lightning, although that could have just been luck or pity wins. Mike did offer to play any of the others in my team but the only one who took him up on the offer was Alex who wasn''t allowed to play due to the nature of his power. Oliver did look curious about how the game integrated Legacies but that interest waned when I told him that it relied on the database. He had thought it would be something like that but had hoped slightly. When the bell went, the score was eighty to four, which probably showed how much I had actually trained with my power (technically only three fights and a few times in between) and how long Chloe likely had in comparison. It was safe to say I had a bit of catching up; most of these people probably went to training schools before they came here as well. Edward did remind me that they were also third years and even those who had had more experience through training schools would have to have been a prodigy or something to stand a chance. Though my team still beat the Legends, so I had that win to my name. *** The lesson after the break was an interesting one as it wasn¡¯t in a classroom but in the forest on school grounds; wilderness survival. The lesson I hope I don¡¯t have to rely too much on if ¨C no, when - I actually get sent on a proper mission. The teacher was a tank of a woman called Miss Smallwood, a name which only half suited her, an observation that Edward luckily stopped me relaying out loud as she wasn¡¯t the type of teacher who you joked with. Her stern eyes were ash grey and she had dark short brown hair and had a belt with holsters for knives which were all filled. She showed us what plants were used for, such as food or poison and how to be physically and emotionally invisible, all knowledge she used regularly when on missions. The lesson was difficult to say the least as I had never had to gather my own food before as I had only ever just bought it from a shop. Nature seemed almost intent on poisoning us, as so many of the edible plants and poisonous ones looked nearly identical, with the distinguishing features being subtle aspects such as small flowers or leaf shape. Annoyingly, the other two members of the Legends, Lilly and Emily, seemed to thrive as nature seemed to be their element. Miss Smallwood took a liking to them as they genuinely seemed interested in what she said, and they seemed to know what they were talking about. Luckily, the emotional invisibility was far easier to grasp, though it was more theoretical than the more practical plant stuff. It was just more advanced meditation than what most of us were taught as kids, though Cassie had slightly more trouble. The rest of the lesson went without incident. Miss Smallwood gave us a book of plants to study for the next lesson, and then it was time for lunch. I piled random food onto my plate as I was starving and didn¡¯t have much complaint about how it was solved. I sat down at a table, and my team sat around me. Alex had small bits of machinery floating around him when he sat down, Matthew was seemingly practising different rune combinations (non-explosive, hopefully), and Oliver was reading over notes from Dr Jacq¡¯s and Miss Smallwood¡¯s lessons. ¡°Sowhatisournextlessonafterlunchthen?¡± I said between eating, blue sparks flying from my face for some unexplained reason. Everyone just stared at me. ¡°What?¡± I gave them a confused look, as I didn¡¯t know why they were staring while finishing off what I had piled onto my plate (though I still wasn¡¯t really sure what I was eating, I was still hungry and it wasn¡¯t awful). ¡°Tom, you may have thought you just said words, and they may have been words to you, but you might need to slow down for the rest of us,¡± Matt explained as it was obvious that I still didn¡¯t understand the cause of the stairs. That would explain the sparks. I really need to stop accidentally using my power when I didn¡¯t mean to, as that''s happened at least twice now. ¡°I said, what is our next lesson after lunch?¡± I repeated slowly this time. ¡°Oh, it¡¯s personal training with Dr Jacq, though I¡¯m not sure how he is going to train us separately considering there are at least twenty four of us and I¡¯m pretty sure the personal training is in separate rooms. Plus, the fact we just had him before lunch.¡± Alex informed me though for some reason he hadn¡¯t really eaten anything, though I saw he just had multiple cans of something. ¡°We still do have a break before then though and I would like to have a go at MFS3, I want to see if I could do any better against Chloe or whoever is playing.¡± ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure that hacking the game to make you win is against the rules,¡± Oliver remarked to Alex, breaking his plans. ¡°Come on! That was one time.¡± Alex complained. ¡°Yes, the only time we let you play on the company console and you decided to ¡®upgrade¡¯ it. I lost all my save files.¡± A large thump was heard on the table. Everyone looked over in the direction of the noise, only to see Cassie with a gauntlet. A gauntlet that should have been near impossible to carry, as it was almost as large as Cassie¡¯s torso. The thing looked like it packed enough power to dent tanks and looked rather impressive with a gold design and what looked like pressure valves coming out of it. Her eyes had a passive glow to them, which explained how she could use the weapon as she did. The weapon covered her entire arm and was practically attached to her shoulder, and she was casually using her knife to cut a bit of food on her plate. She looked up at us and said, ¡°Hey.¡± Star sat in the seat next to her, noticed his friend¡¯s gauntlet and said, ¡°Cassie, you forgot to take off Granit again.¡± ¡°What?¡± She asked, ¡°Oh yeah, I¡¯ll take her off later, it¡¯s just that it sort of weighs nothing to me so I kinda forgot that I had her on.¡± ¡°What do you guys think of Jacq?¡± Star asked after sighing, having given up on Cassie. ¡°He seems alright from what we¡¯ve seen from him; what do you think his personal training style is?¡± I replied, and as soon as I finished asking, the bell rang, signifying lunch was over. ¡°Well, I guess we¡¯re going to find out.¡± 13. Caffeine Crash ¡°A word of advice: prepare for anything,¡± Edward spoke, making me jump. I had been mentally preparing myself for Dr Jacq¡¯s lesson before Edward snapped me out of my overthinking. I stood outside the door that was listed on my timetable for slightly too long and just needed to push it open already. ¡°Jacq tends to use this time to test your limits and how you react to situations no one who you would consider sane would think of. Just be glad that your Legacy has already been unlocked; he likes testing his theories in that area of expertise.¡± I pushed open the door. An arrow came flying toward me, giving me a fraction of a second to move out of the way. The arrow thumped into the door, cutting my shirt on the sleeve. ¡°Jeez, that could have hit me!¡± ¡°You need to work on your reaction speed,¡± Jacq replied calmly as a fump of a bow revealed another arrow to my left, which I managed to catch. I threw it away immediately, my intuition (or maybe my aura) not trusting Jacq to not put an explosive or acid in the arrow. I was proven right as I heard a pop of explosives in the direction I threw it. I quickly moved out of the way of the door to give myself room to manoeuvre myself more easily. The room I was in seemed to be rather plain, with different raised platforms for a variety of battle scenery. In view of the door, a woman in armour sat admiring her hands. ¡°Good, you¡¯re one of the few who didn¡¯t fall for that trick the first time. Let¡¯s see your hand-to-hand combat,¡± The woman in armour quipped before closing the distance between us. She was fast and showed clear skill at moving in armour. The woman was around my height, her unflinching gaze level with mine, unnerving me as she approached. She drew closer, a reflection of her armour glinting in my vision. My eyes were drawn to a red ruby amulet that was embedded in her chest. It was familiar to me, my brain was slightly distracted trying to work out why. She tried to land a punch, but I blocked it with my gauntlet. She struck me as I left my side open when I blocked. I moved out of the way of another punch to my face and attempted to use this movement to land a sweeping kick, which was apparently too complicated for me to pull off at my skill level. ¡°A stomach hit aided by a gauntlet shot would have been a wiser move,¡± she advised as she struck down, knocking me to the ground. ¡°Your balance needs work.¡± I moved out of the way of a kick, causing blue sparks to trail behind me. I tried to use my speed to add extra force behind a body blow, but she caught my arm and used the momentum to throw me on my back, forcing all the air out of my lungs. ¡°Safe to say you need to improve your hand-to-hand combat, but not bad for someone from outside the training schools.¡± She put her foot on my chest, which prevented me from getting up. She looked down at me, revealing her olive brown eyes. ¡°We can fix that.¡± ¡°Wait, Dr Jacq?¡± I asked. ¡°The one and many. I would say ¡®only,¡¯ but that¡¯s not true for me. " Another Dr. Jacq appeared, this one male like I was used to, and continued, ¡°I¡¯m a duplicator. Why else would Washington pick me for personal training? I don¡¯t have a choice in my gender, though, but the peculiarities of my power aren¡¯t important. I have to say you fared relatively well for a first lesson, but we need to move on to civilian protection.¡± *** Civilian protection consisted of saving different Jacqs¡¯ from different dangers, such as fires and collapsed buildings, as well as protecting them from shrapnel and other projectiles which were flung everywhere from other students¡¯ fights. I was paired with Cassie, whose fighting style caused a lot of debris, mostly when she missed with her weapon and hit one of the columns or walls in the training room, which honestly was massive to fit all the different traps and scenarios in it; there was a reason why Telum was far from the main kingdom. Edward helped me to know where the parts flew and whether a ¡®civilian¡¯ was in the way but even, so I still missed a lot of them. Safe to say, after Jacq¡¯s lesson, everyone was exhausted and hungry. People were crawling to the cafeteria just to get some food (some literally, some were even carried by their teammates). Everyone¡¯s clothes were slightly ripped, and no one escaped without at least one cut or bruise. I felt the strain of overexerting my aura for the first time. I felt tired in my soul. ¡°You will get used to the strain as your body adapts to be more aura efficient, but the next few weeks are going to be hell for you as you use more aura than is needed. The time dilation you experience with my power will both not help and help with the adaptation.¡± ¡°Thanks for the ever so helpful info.¡± I thought as sarcastically as I was able. Our teams ate in exhausted silence as we shovelled whatever food we picked up, being too tired to care what it was as long as it was sustenance, even after judging me for that exact thing earlier, though I was too tired to comment on that. After we had eaten, we dragged ourselves to our rooms, yelling silent obscenities towards whoever invented the concept of stairs, and then we collapsed into our beds. Somehow, I remembered to take off my leg with a press of a button before I fell into dreamless sleep knowing I would regret it otherwise. Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author. A silent thank you rang out to whoever decided that Jacq¡¯s training was only bi-weekly in the first year. *** The sun unfeelingly assaulted us with its existence bringing us back to consciousness, making us aware of the previous day¡¯s workout. I hurt in muscles that I had been unaware existed before that very moment; I wished to be gifted back my blissful ignorance. I didn¡¯t even know you could get sore forearms before today. The only thing that managed to shift my carcass was a rumbling. ¡°Food!¡± I weakly ordered my team; Matt threw a pillow at me. I got up without registering the warning in my head before I almost fell flat on my face, my only response being, ¡°Oh.¡± ¡°I did warn you.¡± Alex helped me up and handed me my prosthetic. Apparently, he was less dead than the rest of us. ¡°Tom is right; we need food if we are to survive the morning and most likely coffee.¡± A pillow bounced off his face in response, ¡°If you have enough energy to throw pillows you have enough energy to get food.¡± ¡°Or, here¡¯s a thought: we can go back to being dead to the world.¡± With help from Oliver, we managed to drag Matt to breakfast. It was clear who was unfortunate enough to live through Dr Jacq¡¯s hell for the first time, as many had the zombified look of exhaustion. The older years were clearly recalling their repressed experience and were talking to some of the new students about it. The food went down the void, which was their stomachs. There wasn¡¯t much discussion as everyone half-heartedly shovelled food into their mouths, everyone¡¯s except Alex. Alex only really drank some strange liquid, though he did eat a small amount. I didn¡¯t think too much of it; he probably just has a more efficient aura. I had heard stories of some Mythics not needing as much sleep or food as most people, as their bodies just become more energy efficient. Luckily, the lessons of that day were not overly physically exhausting on our still recovering bodies as the first lesson was history, where we learned about the previous kingdoms and wars which led to their downfall as the present-day kingdoms came into power. Some of which we only know small amounts of information as the Shades destroyed almost all written information about them, and what we do know is how they interacted with the surrounding area and stories from slaves from those captured or sold by other civilizations. Facts about these fallen kingdoms and battles had to be regarded with a grain of salt, as information could have easily been exaggerated or been straight-up lies. However, any information we could learn to help protect us against the Shade is invaluable, so much so that many people dedicate their lives to finding forgotten fighting styles and weapons to help in any way. The lesson was taught by Miss Howl, one of these people, who in her classroom had many recreated weapons almost lost to the sands of time. Miss Howl had apricot orange eyes, blond hair and was average height, she had small square glasses and was very energetic, which did not mesh well with a class who were having trouble keeping their eyes open. Despite Miss Howl¡¯s best efforts to make her class fun and interesting, she was fighting an uphill battle, and by the end of the lesson, nearly half of the class was asleep. ¡°They always give me the lesson the day after Dr Jacq¡¯s training when it would be easier to teach to a brick wall!¡± She complained to those who weren¡¯t asleep yet as the bell rang to signify the end of the class. ¡°It probably would be more worth your while if you just had the day off to recover before returning to class.¡± The next couple of lessons went like a haze as my brain tried to focus, but I focused too much on focussing that I missed what the teachers were actually teaching until the lesson ended. Edward, however, managed to keep notes through me as he was less physically negated some of the mental fatigue brought on from the lack of energy. Still, nothing went into my brain, and before I knew it, we were getting food and sitting with the Legends. Alex brought over a tray over a tray of black sludge, which, according to him, was meant to be coffee, in an attempt to wake us up in time for the afternoon¡¯s lessons. ¡°I think this might be a lethal dose of caffeine if I¡¯d ever seen one; does it even have sugar in to mask the taste slightly?¡± Oliver inquired as he tipped the cup to show how viscous the liquid was, and with a nod from Alex, he downed the sludge, and the rest of us did the same. ¡°DON¡¯T DRIN¡­¡± Edward warned too late. I gagged at the taste of what used to be coffee. I quickly poured myself a glass of milk to mask the taste and felt the rush of caffeine as it flowed into my blood. It was like I could hear colour; the amount of sugar and caffeine in the concoction Alex had made most likely would have killed a non-Mythic, but I felt like I was made of energy. An unstoppable force of nature, the fatigue of the previous day gone. Similar to when I first activated my aura. I needed to do something with all this energy, and I knew that exercise would be wasted as my body, though not tired due to the coffee, hadn¡¯t recovered just yet. My mind went back to an earlier thought on efficient auras. The library seemed to be the logical solution at that moment as I could read about what I missed in training school without doing anything physical. I picked up a book on aura as I hadn¡¯t heard much about it despite the fact that most things use it as energy nowadays. I flipped through the pages skim reading until I found something useful, which apparently was something called aura weaving, which was a technique which essentially bound aura tightly to certain parts of the body, such as vital organs and muscles, to make them more efficient and improving health drastically (according to the small print this technique wasn¡¯t made common knowledge as if done wrong it could damage the body or if someone¡¯s aura is insufficient it may uses up all their aura draining them of what is keeping them alive killing them). The more aura bound to the muscles, the stronger you become and likewise to organs. Plus, less energy is used up, and the more tightly woven the aura, the higher the endurance. What people enhance also depends on their Legacy. As auras change when someone uses their power, it would make sense for different Mythics to enhance different parts of their body. If someone hasn¡¯t unlocked their power yet, then during training, only a basic weave is formed, which is easily undone when the power is unlocked. ¡°I¡¯m honestly surprised that you¡¯re using your speed high so productively. I didn¡¯t know what you would do, but I didn¡¯t expect this. Plus, it¡¯s quite impressive how fast you are actually going, though you¡¯re definitely going to have an aura crash soon, and it¡¯s only been a few seconds. From the slight strain, I can feel you¡¯ll probably black out from aura depletion any moment now; I¡¯d recommend staying away from caffeine.¡± With that note, I passed out. 14. The Art of Not Blacking Out I woke up back in the medic room and the first thing I saw was Dr Jacq¡¯s face in a chair near the bed I was in. ¡°Finally!¡± He exclaimed when he noticed I was awake, obviously bored with waiting. ¡°Please try to refrain from over-taxing your aura again; you¡¯re way too heavy. Now get out of bed, you¡¯ve missed two days of school, and you are now prohibited from any food or drink with caffeine in them for obvious reasons. Luckily it was only the weekend you were unconscious for, but you still missed some time when you could have been studying, or even sorting out your bad aura arrangement, which I can help you with.¡± With that, he got up and signalled for me to follow. ¡°Huh, wha?¡± I answered as I had not fully comprehended what was said. This was due to the fact that I just opened my eyes a few moments before. ¡°He¡¯s saying that he will help you make your body more aura efficient.¡± Edward translated for me, having learned what Dr Jacq¡¯s ramblings meant from when he was taught here. ¡°You probably should follow.¡± I grabbed my prosthetic and tried to catch up with him. We arrived at a large room (with some directional help from Edward) with a machine which had a large screen and an arm hole. ¡°As you were asleep when the rest of your classmates took their aura test, due to you passing out multiple times in your first week here, which I would say is impressive, if it wasn¡¯t common in those who awake their aura later than typical as they usually don¡¯t have the pathways formed or their bodies used to that much aura.¡± Jacq explained, ¡°Anyway just stick your hand in and feel your aura flow, though I have to warn you, you¡¯ll feel incredibly drained, but trust me the way they measured it before was way worse.¡± The process of showing the amount of aura someone had was relatively simple as sticking your arm into the machine which unravels any aura which naturally lingered at certain parts of the body depending on how a person used their aura subconsciously. Mechanism built it as he absolutely despised the previous method. In fact, he hated it so much that he built it as soon as he unlocked his power. His first creation has since been adapted to each of the schools, replacing the old way. As I placed my arm in, I felt something flow through my body. It started from my centre through what seemed to be a circuit which passed my eyes, heart, lungs, legs and finally my arms. When the flow reached the arm in the machine the flow was interrupted, like a wall being placed in a river, as I could feel a flow of energy leave my body as it fought to finish the circuit but failing, first only a trickle of my aura left at first, the machine gaining a hold on it as it passed my arm turning the trickle into a stream. It felt like I had a vein cut and was losing a large amount of blood. My aura flowed through the machine through wires which glowed electric blue to the middle as it filled up with aura. Then the flow slowed down as I was being drained then a second feeling of energy started to flow through my circuit. I heard a grunt of pain in my mind as Edward¡¯s aura began to supplement my own, my centre hanging on to keep me alive, letting the new power flow past which felt simultaneously hot and cold like ice fire as it flowed past into the circuit. The new aura reached the arm in the machine; the colour of the aura changed first to a purple colour, as the two mixed slightly, then to fire red as it made its way to the middle of the system. The struggle of the aura stopped as the pull ceased and the aura was allowed to complete the circuit, the strain of the process dissipated instantaneously, and I let go of a breath I was unaware I was holding. ¡°Fuck.¡± I breathed out as I took my arm out, I felt heavier than I had ever felt due to the large amount of aura not in my body anymore making it unable to augment my muscles as it passively does. ¡°I forgot how bad that was.¡± Edward thought, his ¡®voice¡¯ sounding more strained than typical. ¡°Huh, so this is why Nobody recommended keeping an eye on you; you¡¯re the first person I¡¯ve seen with dual aura types and trust me, I''ve seen a lot of people. So how did you end up with Reacher¡¯s aura?¡± ¡°Honestly, I have no clue.¡± ¡°Really? Uhhhh! I thought I at least had a loose grasp of souls and then a curve ball like this appears out of nowhere, souls are meant to be picky and not like sharing, though the defence created with this would likely be incredible. There must be a reason why your two are getting along so well. Maybe it has something to do with¡­¡± Jacq started rambling to himself as he looked over the data. Three other Jacqs, two which were male, and one female appeared next to the original to check the data faster. *** After the fatigue of the aura drain had mostly worn off, Edward recommended leaving as Jacq had seemingly forgotten that I was still there, lost in studying the aura mixture. Or at least I thought He was distracted until one of him appeared just as I left the room. ¡°Just before you leave, go bother Keter about your aura weave, I doubt he¡¯s doing anything important,¡± Jacq said before disappearing again, giving a thumbs up. ¡°His office is near the library,¡± Edward told me as he knew I had never been to his office before. If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. ¡°Great,¡± I thought back, ¡°Just one problem, where¡¯s the library?¡± ¡°You know what; hand me the controls.¡± My view shifted as Edward took control, he walked quickly to wherever Keter¡¯s office was. Though using our Legacies would have been quicker, we still hadn¡¯t fully recovered from the aura drain, but despite that, we were still at their office within a couple of minutes. The perspective shifted and I was back in control, which gave me slight motion sickness in my soul. The door we¡¯d arrived at had an engraved name plaque with the name Dr Jacob Keter and a symbol of a crown engraved on it. After a couple of seconds to adjust to regaining control back, I knocked on the door. ¡°Come in,¡± A tired but cheerful voice spoke from inside. I walked into the room and the hit of coffee and energy drinks was so strong that what had regenerated from my aura was making everything slightly sluggish and made me leave a small trail of sparks. ¡°Jacq did warn me that they were sending someone for aura training. Or, more accurately, they told me about you and then yelled at me to go to bed and that ¡®quality not quantity¡¯ doesn¡¯t apply to sleep. But I¡¯ve gotten at least eight hours this week. ¡± The office was a mess with mugs, cans, books, and paper all over which may have had an order but only Dr Keter would know, diagrams of different Shades of all levels were haphazardly placed on the walls with different arrows crossed out in a different coloured ink alongside older prototypes of Mythic weaponry and attack plans. Dr Keter himself was a man who appeared to be in his thirties although based on what I¡¯d heard of how Mythics age he was likely much older, he had large bags under his cobalt purple eyes. ¡°Anyway, to begin, sit on the floor and tell me what you know about aura patterns.¡± ¡°Well¡­ they exist for one and they have something to do with aura.¡± Dr Keter looked at me for a moment before concluding, ¡°You didn¡¯t go to a training school, did you?¡± He paused for a couple of seconds too long, before releasing he might come off as rude. ¡°Which is fine. We¡¯re just going to have to start further back than I initially thought.¡± He got up from behind his desk up to a seemingly random paper pile, and moved a few bits around to reveal a book named ¡®Aura 101¡¯ by Alex Lottle, ¡°I should probably explain where aura comes from first as they typically don¡¯t think that knowledge is useful outside of training schools¡­¡± *** He explained that aura and by extension Legacies are the by-product of the soul¡¯s connection or anchor point to the body which in most people is mostly closed off and is typically opened by an outside force. The soul works as a filter from a dimension of effectively pure concept and energy through the crown or Keter down through the tree of life down to the kingdom or Malkuth where the concept is translated to reality through the soul¡¯s anchor point. This is also where Shades derive their name from one of the leading theories into their existence is that their anchor point is through the shadow of the Tree of Life; disconnected enough, that they are seemingly immune from basic universal laws, such as the square cube law and some aspects of gravity. This allows them to grow to otherwise impossible sizes and may explain their strange attraction to negative emotion, as the node¡¯s shadows are still technically a part of the tree, just twisted in some regard. Each soul has different concentrations of each node on the tree which is thought to be the cause of differences in people most prominently their personality and why everyone¡¯s eyes are unique in colour; aura and Legacies are expressions of a person to the extent that even reincarnations of a person show similar, yet different, Legacies, as they experience things differently than in their previous life. That is where aura patterns come in. Aura patterns allow a Mythic to control their aura more efficiently by controlling how it flows throughout the body effectively by overlaying its identity more strongly over organs and the Mythic¡¯s cells basically increasing their potential; muscles become stronger, eyes see clearer, thoughts are quicker, and the body heals faster, though each aura affects a person differently depending on who they are and their Legacy. However how much aura ¡®upgrades¡¯ someone is severely limited by how much aura they can produce, as if a Mythic¡¯s pattern is too thin the neglected parts undergo aura starvation, the effects of which are typically told to be hope you don¡¯t find out. After going over the basics of what he knew about aura and Legacies, we ran out of time before getting started on the practical application, but before I set out Dr Keter went over a simple loop pattern to help contain my aura. I had so much leaking that it was mildly overloading some of their aura tech; it typically isn¡¯t subjected to so much energy as most learn at least some semblance of aura control at training school and didn¡¯t typically have as much Aura I had to begin with. The technique involved concentrating on your centre, which is where most of the aura was, and taking a strand of the aura and looping it back around to the centre after passing through some of the main organs and muscles. The technique simply spreads out the energy around the body which allows the body to absorb it more easily, in turn reducing how much is let out into the surroundings. Edward helped with the pattern as he could see the aura flow, probably due to being astrally detached, which made it easier. The aura sight was also helpful in correcting the pattern already created when my aura was tested, which was relatively crude as I didn¡¯t have much control when I made it. I went back to my room as it was late, I only got lost a couple of times but managed to find my room only to realise that I still didn¡¯t have a room key. I knocked on the door; Matt opened the door. ¡°Oh! Our glorious leader has decided to grace us with his presence,¡± Matt told me, ¡°I don¡¯t think Alex should sort out our drinks after what happened, isn¡¯t that right, Alex?¡± ¡°Sorry, you guys were just so tired,¡± Alex replied from inside the room sounding not sorry at all. ¡°So how long have I been gone?¡± ¡°Only really a day; you didn¡¯t miss much,¡± Matt said. ¡°Although Jacq did say that you would need to read this book to help catch you up.¡± Matt materialised a textbook called ¡®Shades for Dummies¡¯ by Dr Stephen Christopher Patrick Jacq which made a thud when it hit my bed due to how thick it was. ¡°It¡¯s their personal version; they signed it, especially for you. They also warned that there will be a test on it but only for you specifically. They didn¡¯t mention when.¡± I turned the front cover of the book and on the first page was written, ¡®Don¡¯t miss my lessons :)¡¯ 15. Mask of Your Own Face The night was a mix of Aura control practice and revising the textbook Jacq gave me. Edward¡¯s power was useful, but having to loop aura took far too much concentration. I had to actively look inside at my centre; both Auras were almost reacting with each other as they blended and separated in my centre simultaneously. It was slightly hypnotising to watch like a lava lamp, which would have been useful for actual meditation but not for aura control. The combination was more than the sum of its parts, and while it gave me a huge pool of aura, the con was that it was at the cost of less control. It¡¯s easier to control the flow of a pool than a lake. I managed to get through about a third of the behemoth of a textbook. Luckily, a large chunk of it was illustrations of different Shades, how each type typically changed if it went up the rankings, and notes on practically rare variants. Each logged Shade had its own special combat procedure, which listed recommended Mythic types and skill levels, special annoying traits of that Shade and recommended containment and escape routes of particularly brutal types, which typically invoked alternative attacks such as creating a zone of non-emotion or using disease to convert organic matter to attack. By the time that morning arrived my brain felt overworked from splitting my attention and from reading all the info, who knew taking notes was so taxing. Unfortunately for me, coffee was still banned, so I needed an alternative to caffeine to wake me up. However, the evil grin Matthew gave after I asked him to wake me up probably should have warned me not to say yes when he asked to confirm whether or not I was sure I wanted his help. After swapping out of my now cold, drenched clothes, I did feel more awake, but definitely would prefer an alternative next time. ¡°One method I¡¯d been recommended, mostly from Keter, is to try looping aura to your brain. Though there are some side effects if done wrong, and it¡¯s very easy to mess it up.¡± Edward unhelpfully recommended, ¡°A less effective method is to slowly diffuse your aura into your brain like a gas rather than its activated liquid form. I¡¯d ask about that next time; Keter does try most things so as not to have to sleep.¡± Gassiest aura was a step above what I¡¯m currently able to do, but it might be a useful idea later. From what Keter had told me about aura, the general gist was that for unawakened people, the aura was solid but leaked as it was used as it isn¡¯t pulled back to their core, whereas for awakened people, their aura is liquid, so it is pulled back, to the core after use. With higher control can cause it to become gaseous, which has the lowest amount of leakage. My team and I went down to get food with Oliver leading, as he seemed to be the most directionally competent. Alex was keeping track of the time as we had early morning classes with Miss Smallwood, and it took about ten minutes to get to where she taught her wilderness survival class (technically, it would take me a lot less time if I ran, but you know, my team is heavy). I had a loaf of bread and breakfast tea (Edward said that tea had an acceptable level of caffeine), and the rest of my team had regular meals, except Alex, who, apparently, drank that coffee sludge regularly. ¡°So¡­¡± I asked after finishing my loaf, ¡°What are your guy¡¯s actual powers? Because I don¡¯t actually think I¡¯ve asked.¡± I felt slightly awkward as I felt as though I should have known this earlier. ¡°¡¯cause I know the basics like Mathew does glowy symbols and stuff happens, Alex does things with tech and Oliver¡­ does something with arrows?¡± ¡°I¡¯m a technopath, which means I can control technology, and Oliver hasn¡¯t actually been fully awakened yet, but based on his eyes, it¡¯s likely it will be linked with teleportation, based on what records we have,¡± Alex replied, as the rest of the team had to finish their food before they could answer. ¡°His Aura is unlocked, but his power needs a catalyst.¡± ¡°Those glowy symbols are known as runes, as I¡¯m a rune mage.¡± Mathew paused as though this should be answer enough, I motioned him to continue which he did with a sigh, ¡°Which means I can write things known as spells with my aura. The database is quite sparse when it comes to examples of the spells, though, so I either must stick with what I have or try and find some more through experiments.¡± ¡°Neat, from what I can tell, mine makes me part lightning, which makes me fast,¡± I say, noting that Mathew finds me calling his runes¡¯ glowy symbols¡¯ annoying and to remember to do so more in the future. ¡°Based on what I¡¯ve seen of your power, I think your aura converts your matter into kinetic energy, which makes you far lighter and able to move at such high speed. If you want to be more precise, that is.¡± Edward corrected me. ¡°So, what you could say is, my power makes me part lightning.¡± ¡°Sure, if that¡¯s easier to understand for you.¡± ¡°I¡¯ll ignore that implied insult to my intelligence.¡± I switched topics as the power talk is probably better visually seen than just using words. ¡°Anyway, Alex, how are we doing for time?¡± ¡°We have fifteen minutes and twenty-three seconds left, so we probably need to speed up a bit,¡± Alex replied precisely like he was reading off a digital watch, which likely wasn¡¯t too far off from reality. We finished up our food and headed to class, which Alex had helped us prepare for this time by printing off some of Miss Smallwood¡¯s online notes of the database, which I wasn¡¯t aware were available. Not that I looked. Plus, they had pictures! Which would make the game of spot the difference that was foraging far easier than it was in the previous lesson. We arrived around the same time as the Legends, which in seeing them reminded me that we still hadn¡¯t changed our group name from throw up noise. ¡°Hey, have any of you come up with a better team name in the last couple of days?¡± Mathew started, ¡°What about team Blackout, for obvious reasons? ¡°A slight glean appeared in his eye as he clearly thought of a better name: ¡°Or the Babydoors, as we¡¯re so difficult to get through.¡± Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. ¡°Hey! It wasn¡¯t my fault it wouldn¡¯t budge, blame the manufactures! Does anyone have any better suggestions?¡± Oliver looked over, ¡°What about the Spotters? As we have a lot of powers that would be good at supporting, or maybe the Unstopables, as we¡¯re difficult to stop once our Legacies start.¡± ¡°Huh, I like your second suggestion.¡± I gave a slight pause as Miss Smallwood clapped once to get everyone¡¯s attention, ¡°We can think more about it later, though.¡± ¡°Right, you lot! Today¡¯s lesson, we¡¯re going to focus more on emotional invisibility as it¡¯s the more important of the two halves of my course,¡± She began, placing down a travel bag, which clinked as it moved, Alex sighed as he put away the notes we no longer needed, ¡°Foraging is more preparing you for when missions go wrong and you don¡¯t have food, though it is fun. Plus, I recently got a delivery of these buggers.¡± She opened the bag to reveal it was full of small glass jars, each containing a small black insect. ¡°These are known as Infestations, and they¡¯ll be our visual aid.¡± Each of the small Shades were crawling around their enclosure, their slightly shiny shells reflecting the light slightly though they were too small to see much detail at the distance I was, ¡°Like all Shades, they are attracted to negative emotions, just these little lads fly right at the source, making a slight buzzing sound. Typically, you¡¯ll see a whole load of them as they swarm out the brood mother. They like crawling into every orifice you have, making them one of the worst ones to see the aftereffects of, so hope someone else is called up instead of you.¡± You could tell from her facial expression she had seen what happened, but there was no reaction from the Infestations. ¡°They¡¯re a right sod to deal with but useful for this. Grab one and pass it around.¡± Once the bag was passed to me, I got a better look at the Infestation. It was a creepy little thing with beady red eyes, a shiny long shell, a long needle-like mouth, and a mosquito-like mouth. Its front legs were long and thin, but its back legs were short and thick, like a locus. Once each student had a jar, Miss Smallwood placed the bag to the side. ¡°Oh, and before we begin,¡± she started flatly in a monotone voice. ¡°I¡¯ve been told I must warn students before I try to cause the emotions that you must cover. I¡¯ve done a little research on each of you since the last lesson, but I¡¯ll start off easy.¡± ¡°Just concentrate on your meditation and how our aura flows, and you¡¯ll be fine.¡± Edward reassured, ¡°It¡¯s not about not feeling emotion; it¡¯s about acknowledging it and moving past it. Don¡¯t let it linger. As long as you let the feeling pass after acknowledging it, they won¡¯t react.¡± What followed was an almost elimination-like game with images of different shades and creepy music, which was easy to ignore, followed by general images of a ghost village after being devastated by an attack. All the Infestations were calm until Miss Smallwood revealed that the devastation was preventable, and only due to the political negligence of the village leader pocketing the defence funds was the village put at risk. Disgust and anger eliminated a few students, including Cassie, buzzing sounding from their jars. This went on with more and more students failing and reacting negatively, causing the Infestations to sound until it became personal. Oliver and Alex were eliminated with evidence of one of Light Industries suppliers¡¯ use of horrible working conditions in Drakonsbane, with the crystal miners not being supplied with proper equipment or living areas. It was a low blow that got me. It was a picture of Mum in remembrance. Mathew won, if you could call it that, you could see that Miss Smallwood gained no pleasure in what accounted for practically emotional torture. All those who were in the lesson were given a small reprieve in the form of dessert items and other things to help them come back to a better emotional level, with some of the students who lasted longer talking to some of the staff from the mental health side of the medic area. I declined their offer to talk about it as I had already talked about those feelings enough times. Most seemed emotionally drained by the experience, but had a determined look to become better as it was a necessary evil, as in a real life situation an emotional flare up may be the difference between surviving and being overwhelmed. All the Infestation jars were collected, counted and put back into the bag. Miss Smallwood stood in front of the class and waited for the sound to die down. ¡°Well done. All I have to say is well done, most years I don¡¯t have to go that far. While I don¡¯t envy you having to go through that, you should be proud of yourselves with the control you have. Next lesson we will have a more natural survival focus, and you¡¯ll be glad to hear that you have the rest of today to recover.¡± Relief appeared on the faces of the students. ¡°Only some of you need to learn slightly better control, and even then, some situations and fighting styles do require you to purposefully spike your emotion to draw a shade¡¯s attention off of someone else.¡± As the lesson ended, the team and I caught up with the Legends. ¡°Hey, guys.¡± I started, slightly interrupting Cassie¡¯s rant to Star, ¡°I was wondering whether you could help us with our name situation to help keep our minds off the lesson¡± Star looked over, ¡°What names are currently on the table?¡± ¡°So far, we only have two, those being the Unstopables and the Spotters.¡± ¡°Actually,¡± Mathew interjected, ¡°We have two other suggestions I gave.¡± ¡°So far, we only have two actual suggestions.¡± Cassie smirked, ¡°What? Is team ¡®Dry Gag¡¯ too good for you?¡± ¡°What do you think?¡± I replied sarcastically, glad that my distraction was somewhat working, if only at my own expense. ¡°I think I could think of a few more options for you. What about team Sleep?¡± ¡°Matt already made a joke about how I keep blacking out.¡± ¡°Ah, really? Ok, what about¡­ uh¡­ yeah, I¡¯ve got nothing.¡± ¡°What about Bright Sparks?¡± Emily chimed in, ¡°¡¯Cause of your lighting and half your team¡¯s association with Light Industries.¡± ¡°Yeah, that is a good suggestion,¡± I turned my thoughts to Edward, ¡°What do you think?¡± ¡°Huh? Oh, yeah. Those are alright.¡± Edward replied, sounding distracted. ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± ¡°Nothing, I just keep getting the feeling I¡¯m being watched, and every time I look, it¡¯s like my thoughts feel like a dream for a couple of seconds, like there should be thoughts, but they¡¯re not.¡± He sounded unsure. ¡°It¡¯s probably nothing to worry about.¡± I looked in the direction of where he seemed to have been looking. ... 16. Nobody Is there ¡°Tom. Tom? Tom?¡± Mathew prompted, bringing me back to reality. I snapped back to reality, ¡°Huh, what just happened?¡± Mathew mainly sounded confused, ¡°You sort of blanked out for about a minute?¡± ¡°Sorry, I must¡¯ve gotten distracted by something.¡± ¡°It''s ok if the lesson affected you, and you need longer to think things through,¡± Mathew reassured me as he put his hand on my shoulder. I don¡¯t know what they did for you, but if you need to talk, I¡¯m sure any of us are willing to talk.¡± ¡°I definitely appreciate that, and I¡¯m here for you guys as well, but I¡¯m fine. My brain just blanked for a few seconds, that''s all.¡± I felt something in my hand that I was pretty sure I didn¡¯t before. It was a small piece of paper with writing on it that just said ¡°Ask Jacq¡ªNobody¡± and a simple drawing of an eye on top. It felt slightly creepy in that there shouldn¡¯t have been a way for it to have gotten into my hand. I looked over at Edward to see if he had an explanation, and he felt as confused as I was. ¡°So, as you clearly weren¡¯t listening,¡± Mathew continued, saying whatever he was saying before my mind went empty in a mock scandal of the interruption. ¡°We all decided that we¡¯re going with Team Bright Sparks. Any last-minute complaints, dear leader?¡± ¡°None from me, but I still liked Unstopples.¡± I was mostly just glad we came to an agreement to get rid of the previous name, as we had been planning on changing it for a while. Also, completely tangentially, I just got a note that says to ask Dr Jacq about something. Does anyone want to come with it?¡± Alex¡¯s eyes showed a slight shine, ¡°Yeah, sure, I''ve heard from my dad that Dr Jacq has so much weird tech stuff. I think they just keep the weird junk that previous students have made that they leave because it''s broken, not what they intended or just weird junk that they didn¡¯t care what happened to.¡± ¡°Huh, makes sense. Now I¡¯m interested in that too as well.¡± *** We arrived outside Dr. Jacq¡¯s office after I confirmed that Bright Sparks is a good name. Mathew and Oliver went to the office to change it, and the Legends went to the common room. Cassie still needed to vent some anger, though her frustration had lessened over the course of helping us come up with a name. I knocked on the door. A male voice answered, ¡°Come in. Unless it''s Wash, then no, I haven¡¯t done it yet.¡± We entered the office. It was as you would expect of an easily distracted academic: shelves of books with pieces of paper sticking out, random open draws, and white boards with random equations and drawings written on them in various stages of completion. I half-recognised some of the illustrations of Shades, one of which reminded me of my aura channelling, with the two separate types interacting. The room had a slight dusty smell with a hint of mould. Many different mugs of tea were spotted around the place, some with the bag still in it. Each was in a different state of life, as a few had clearly been there a while, and a couple had weird growths on them that Dr Jacq had started to take notes on. Alex clearly had been right. There were weird-looking things scattered around, such as a stone monkey, a robot seemingly fighting a flower and losing, and a partially taken-apart watch. The robot clearly had caught Alex¡¯s eye as he discreetly moved towards it. Edward leaned against one of the walls, ignoring all the weird things on the shelves. He gave his attention to Jacq because he wanted to know what was watching us, and it clearly unnerved him. He had been more aware of it for longer than I had. Feeling like you''re being stared at when no one should be able to even see you definitely would be a cause for concern. ¡°Huh, hi? It¡¯s Tom Walker. I got a note that said to ask you about something on a note which was signed¨C¡± ¡°Nobody?¡± they interrupted. ¡°Did it also appear out of nowhere or in a weird place?¡± A female version appeared right next to Alex. Also, tell your tech friend not to touch my stuff.¡± Alex¡¯s eyes went back to normal as he was clearly about to mess with the robot-looking thing on one of Jacq¡¯s shelves. He stood to attention as he was caught, eyes still looking longingly to work out what made the thing tick. ¡°I learned my lesson to let an Eye have free rain on my collection.¡± His tone is like an older sibling trying to prevent his toys from being messed with. ¡°Yeah, you have to keep an Eye on them,¡± I smirked at my own joke that eye alone liked. Everyone else gave me a flat look, clearly eye rate. ¡°And also, yes. It appeared in my closed hand after I apparently spaced out for a second after feeling like I was being watched.¡± Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. ¡°Understandable why they sent you here then.¡± Jacq started knowingly. ¡°I¡¯m probably the one who knows them best or even has a vague idea they exist. The fact that you were even conscious of their presence is in itself impressive.¡± ¡°So¡­¡± I began waiting for Jacq to carry on with their explanation, and when they didn¡¯t I carried on, ¡°Who is Nobody?¡± Jacq answered with a grin, ¡°No clue.¡± ¡°What.¡± Both Alex and I looked at him blankly. ¡°Ok, I lie. I have about one percent of a clue.¡± Jacq appeared at a draw and opened it, revealing lots of small pieces of paper with writing on them. ¡°Tell me one thing written in this drawer.¡± ¡°Ok?¡± I looked more closely at the drawer and read the first note I saw, ¡°It says¡­ wait, I need to read it again¡­ uhh what?¡± When I looked at the piece of paper, it was like trying to remember a sequence of random paint splodges. I could read the words easily, but as soon as I tried saying them out loud, the words just went out of my head. I took one of the papers to get a closer look and took a few steps away. Alex and Jacq looked at me expectantly. ¡°Why do I have a piece of paper in my hand?¡± ¡°Exactly!¡± Jacq yelled, making both Alex and I jump. ¡°Nobody has an aura of forgetfulness that affects information about them. They might be a Mythic with a slightly unfortunate Legacy or something else.¡± The mention of ¡®Nobody¡¯ made me realise the note in my hand was signed with that name. This explained why I randomly had a piece of paper in my hand; I must have been caught in one of their lingering effects. ¡°Only a few people are even able to be aware of them, and after a point, even their notes become forgettable. I think they might have influenced my research by making me think one of me wrote things, I am only vaguely aware of them because small notes occasionally bipas the effect of their power. It seems to be similar for you, with you feeling their effects. You don¡¯t need to worry about it if you ever just forget why you''re doing something or going somewhere that might just be Nobody helping.¡± ¡°Thanks for clearing that up then.¡± ¡°By the way, congrats on the name change. Bright Sparks is a good name, and I don¡¯t think I forgot about your test.¡± *** ¡°So, we might be being stalked by someone that even arguably the most powerful member of staff after maybe Washington only knows little about. Definitely settles my nerves.¡± Edward said after we left. I nonchalantly mentally reply, ¡°Well, if they trust them, then it''s probably fine. It''s not like we can really do much about it. Plus, we have a secret person who maybe helps us because they find us interesting. Just try and focus on what we can impact.¡± ¡°If you say so.¡± He replied clearly that he did not agree with my assessment. Thinking of assessments, while I hadn¡¯t thought the threat was idle, it had reminded me to look over my notes again. As we still had the rest of the day off, it would be good to keep my mind off Nobody and Miss Smallwood¡¯s lesson. ¡°Alex, go catch up with the rest of the team. I just need to stop off at the room to grab my Shade notes.¡± ¡°You got it, boss.¡± Alex gave me a mock salute before reassuring me. ¡°Besides, it sounds like you have nobody to worry about, according to Jacq. Plus, on the bright side, I did manage to look at some of the code of his stuff which means more autonomous buddies in the future, so I¡¯m glad you let me tag along.¡± ¡°I probably would have gotten lost anyway if you hadn¡¯t.¡± *** The rest of the day consisted of looking over my Shade notes and making use of the extra free time. Tatum seemed to be trying to ease the slightly more taxing lessons on us by throwing us out at the deep end, seeing if we¡¯ll float then letting us recover after. I¡¯d only been here a short while, and it was already considerably different from my previous education. That had mostly been exhausting because of the volume of work, whereas here, it was more in less time. I don¡¯t know how different it was from the academies, but it certainly was a leap for me. It¡¯s extremely weird, now that I had a slight break, how I am actually here. I had thought becoming a Mythic had become a pipe dream, but now I¡¯m actually able to follow my mum¡¯s footsteps. I looked at my hands and wiggled my fingers, causing sparks to fly as they moved faster than what should physically be possible. Honestly, it was just neat. Matthew yelled across the room, ¡°Hey, Tom! Now that we¡¯ve gotten a proper team name, have you thought about your Mythic name?¡± I grin. ¡°Of course I have. It''s been in my mind longer than the team name. I¡¯m going simple; as my powers give off blue sparks, I¡¯m going with Blue Lightning. It''s simple and classic, a colour plus a thing.¡± Oliver answered next, ¡°I might not have unlocked my Legacie yet, but the archive says it''s likely something to do with teleporting, and I use a bow, so Quiver.¡± Alex got up and put one leg up on the table giving a pose, ¡°Mine will clearly be the best, I will be Upgrade!¡± ¡°I¡¯m a rune mage so Rune,¡± Matthew said with no fanfare. He then turned to the Legends, ¡°Hey, team feet, what about you guys?¡± ¡°Granet, because rocks are heavy and gra-¡± Cassie answered before stopping her explanation as her brain caught up with what Mathew just said, ¡°Team feet?! Why team feet?¡± ¡°Blame Tom, he was laughing to himself earlier about how Legends is spelt leg ends, hence team feet.¡± ¡°Well, Blue Lightning is a dumb name. It sounds like you''re throwing up lightning and fits better with your old team name.¡± Cassie mumbled, annoyed at the nickname. ¡°Hey! It''s a good name.¡± I strike back, ¡°Anyway, what about Star, Lilly and Emily?¡± ¡°I¡¯m going with Plasma because Plasma is hot, and Cassie wouldn¡¯t let me choose Sunny,¡± Star replied matter of factly. ¡°And I stand by that. Sunny sounds too much like a kindly grandpa, who¡¯s too into art history, than a Mythic.¡± ¡°Maybe people want to be saved by a grandpa,¡± Star said defensively. Lilly replied next, ¡°Same Cassie shot down my original idea of Treeson, saying the pun doesn¡¯t even work in context, so I¡¯m being boring and going with Grass Blade.¡± ¡°And mine is Wild Spirit,¡± Emily answered finally. ¡°Nice, that''s good then, as tomorrow¡¯s lesson is about our Mythic identity; luckily, we all have at least a starting point.¡± 17. Mythic Public Relations The lecture on Mythics identity and relations was relatively well packed; the lecturer was a working Mythic called Jack Order, also known as Ruler. He was in his usual costume which consisted of a set of armour with blue highlights, a helmet fashioned into a crown, with a crown and scroll insignia also on his chest. He gave the impression of a dad with an almost permanent grin on his face, large, broad shoulders, and stubble. His mud brown eyes showed laughter lines which was an intentional aspect as aura and legacies slow down ageing unless you let it. I distinctly remember seeing his poster on a few walls of some of the rooms in a couple of the orphanages I¡¯d been in. He was currently attempting to work out how to use the big screen. He looked slightly comical in the chair, which was slightly too small for him, squinting at the computer. Oliver had stopped Alex from helping after the first minute as he still had a couple of minutes before he had to start. Alex¡¯s wincing from the pain increased more as it went on. After the third time, the screen had come down and then back up. I saw Alex''s eyes glow slightly, and the screen was on, revealing a picture presentation. Mr Order took off his glasses in triumph, ¡°Ah, I knew I¡¯d get it eventually.¡± He turned to face the audience, ¡°Well, welcome. It¡¯s great to see the next generation of protectors of humanity and the kingdoms. I¡¯m here to teach you the other side of being Mythic. While killing Shades does make up a large part of our job, the, for lack of a better term, political aspect is just as important, some might even say more important. How the general public views us can have a massive effect on how easy our job can be.¡± I had the distinct feeling I recognised his voice from somewhere, but I couldn¡¯t place it. I¡¯d probably seen or heard him on the news at some point. He changed the slide to show a picture of his posters, action figures and other memorabilia. ¡°While a lot of you probably can¡¯t see the value of this sort of stuff outside of the obvious capitalist aspect, there is more to it than just money and funding. Think about it. These things are predominantly bought for children who, during a Shade situation, are the main source of negative emotion.¡± The next slide was a cartoon drawing of a child crying with a Beowolf nearby. A purple cloud around the child was attracting the monster. The slide after was the same situation, but the child had a Mythic doll. The cloud around the child was far smaller, therefore not alerting the Shade. ¡°In situations like these, the amount of comfort a toy can give is extremely valuable. In some cases, the parasocial aspect can even change a member of the public''s viewpoint. Instead of thinking that thing¡¯s going to murder me and alerting the Shade to their whereabouts, they might think, I wonder which Mythic is going to save me. Of course, this can backfire in some respects, dumb bravery can kill, but the pros outweigh the cons.¡± He then showed a slide of different Mythics with labels pointing out different aspects of their costume, including his own. ¡°As you can see on the board, I¡¯d like to point out some key aspects of costume design, more specifically public costume design, as some Mythics have alternative, more practical designs when doing less public missions. Bright colours are common in designs to be more visible, as the public being aware you are there is often more important than any stealth advantage against Shades that darker colours may give you. There are some exceptions to this as sometimes a black motif gives a ¡®rule of cool¡¯ that appeals to a teen demographic, but for the most part, bright, broad, appealing colours are the best.¡± He motioned towards his emblem on his chest, ¡°In regard to emblems, simplicity is king if you excuse the pun. You want it so a child could draw the symbol without difficulty, or at the very least a bad drawing still be recognisable. Themes are always a great idea, such as Miss Fortune¡¯s ladybug theme or my royalty theme, typically your theme is based on your legacy as it gives people a general idea for what you can do. Ladybugs represent luck, and my powerset is making rules, so I¡¯m a Ruler.¡± He paused for the groans. ¡°I always love revealing why I picked my theme. Obviously, themes aren¡¯t ironclad but it helps if your theme does fit, my friend Icecold had a costume with red and orange colour design, as they apparently had an ¡®autumnal complexion¡¯. Confused everyone when they joined in fights, as they expected her to have fire powers, not ice.¡± The next slide was illustrations of other aspects of public relations. ¡°Moving on to actual actions to promote your images, these include clean up, such as clearing debris from roads, or just cleaning up rubbish, helping the authorities, mostly fire and hospital services and guard duty during events. These help make the public aware you exist and help with the other aspects as well. In later lessons, you will be sent on these sorts of public relation missions, plus one lucky team is being sent to be a part of the guard for Light Industries unveiling of their new technology.¡± ¡°In terms of what you personally need to do for your public relations, luckily, as students of Tatum, we have a lot of resources to help, including designers, marketers and researchers for things you can do to help out in the community and while a lot of what I have talked about sounds extremely corporate, it does make all our lives easier as even things such as charity work decrease the amount of negative emotions which reduces the risk of any Shade breaches.¡± This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. He reached the end of the slides. ¡°That''s the end of the lecture,¡± he said, putting his glasses back on to read a letter in front of him. But before you go, could Thomas Walker stay behind?¡± *** The lecture theatre slowly emptied. The rest of my team said they¡¯d meet me after I¡¯d done whatever I was being held back for in the common room. I waited at the front until everyone else had left. ¡°Ah, Mr Walker, it''s nice seeing you,¡± he said with a friendly if slightly pained smile. I was friends with your mother. It''s a terrible shame what happened to her. I was in another kingdom when it happened, though I wish I could have helped.¡± It clicked in my head where I recognised him from: ¡°Wait, you''re the one my mum always complained about with your food crimes! We went to your house for tea, and she said something about someone saying that for someone with such a rule-based power, you followed none when cooking.¡± He said sheepishly, ¡°Ah yeah, it was probably about the cheese milk. But ignoring my culinary history, the reason you stayed back was because¡­ [NO LEAVING BEFORE FINISHING YOUR TEST AND NO CHEATING.]¡± His eyes flashed as the rules were set. ¡°I''m sorry. Dr. Jacq gave me this test you need to complete, and they''re paranoid that you¡¯d cheat by grabbing your textbook, so he asked me to take measures against it.¡± He handed me the test. As I thought about maybe escaping and grabbing my textbook, which I wouldn¡¯t have thought about if it hadn¡¯t been mentioned, I felt a great pressure as the room seemed to contract. ¡°Yes, even thinking about breaking the rules triggers a lesser version of the punishment.¡± ¡°Got it, break the contract, make the room contract.¡± His eyes reacted with annoyance, ¡°Ah, I knew I forgot something, banter during fighting helps people calm down. That was a good one, I¡¯ll have to use it myself. Anyway, get on with your test.¡± I sat down at one of the seats and took out my pens. I had actually been revising for this test since I got the ominous warning in the textbook. I was sort of expecting it soonish after Jacq reminded me of it. The test mostly consisted of naming the different attributes of the different types of Shades, what to do if I encountered certain special ones and some open-ended general situation questions. A couple of them were mostly trick questions, scenarios where I¡¯d be in over my head and anything but running and getting out of the situation would be pointless heroism and somewhere a particular order of events impacted how successful I¡¯d be. The test seemed to be trying to reinforce the idea of the lesser of two evils. The questions seemed to lean towards self-survival rather than being the hero but dying, in the textbook it had raised the idea that saving one village at the cost of your life typically meant that more may be destroyed later due to you dying and not being able to help. It was a morbid point of view especially when contrasted with the lecture I just had. There were a few questions with which I had a slight issue. I was going to ask Edward about them, but apparently, that counted as cheating in the eyes of the rules. I filled them in as best I could. The test ended up taking me only around twenty minutes, which was faster than I was used to, but that was before my legacy. Passively speeding up was definitely useful for things like this. I handed in the paper after looking over my answers a couple of times to make sure none of them had any obvious mistakes. After I was pleased that I had answered to the best of my ability, I gave them to Mr. Order to be marked. He was reading a book of some kind when he looked up. ¡°That was quick? Well, if you think you¡¯re done I¡¯ll get this to Dr Jacq, I don¡¯t know when you¡¯ll get the mark back if ever, they occasionally just give out tests to force people to think about things that have no true right answer. They also could just use that as an excuse to not mark, you never know; they''re annoying like that.¡± He paused for a second contemplatively, ¡°It is good to see that you¡¯re alright. I would have gotten you if I thought that would have been good for you. I was just never in one place long enough; it probably wouldn¡¯t have been much different. But I¡¯m glad you''re alright; your mum would have been proud.¡± *** I met the rest of the team in the common room. Mathew and Oliver were reading, and Alex was messing with some kind of tech. They looked up as I came in. Mathew said flatly, ¡°You were a while, was it the Jacq test?¡± ¡°Yeah, it wasn¡¯t too bad,¡± I replied, relatively confident in how it went. ¡°What did you think of the lecture?¡± Oliver asked. Alex piped in, ¡°It was awful. Projectors are not that difficult to use. I was cringing at every wrong button he pressed. It was impressive that he was able to change the slides successfully without accidentally turning the thing off.¡± Oliver sighed, ¡°Alex, we know how you feel about those who are tech inept. Not everyone is as tech proficient as you. I was mostly asking Tom about the actual lecture.¡± ¡°Oh,¡± Alex answered again, ¡°The lecture part was alright.¡± I agreed, ¡°Yeah, the lecture part was good. Who do you think will get the guarding gig?¡± ¡°Eh, probably us ¡®cause of nepotism; my dad is head of the company.¡± ¡°Oh yeah, I forgot about that, but wouldn¡¯t they make a point of not picking us because of those allegations?¡± ¡°Nope, the only reason Light industries are letting ¡®one of the teams¡¯ have the chance to guard is because I¡¯m here, he''s not a subtle man. He might let two teams at a push, but it''s mostly just going to be security theatre, as it''s practically impossible to steal. We even tested it against Alex.¡± Alex gleefully imputed, ¡°Yup, it took them about five models before I was unable to take control of the ship in under ten minutes.¡± Mathew replied, ¡°Neat, so we get an easy gig then.¡± 18. Happiness and Laughter The second and last lecture of the day had a similar theme to the previous one in that it covered how to help prevent Shade attacks but with a more kingdom-by-kingdom, systemic point of view. Dr.Keter was the teacher heading the talk. Keter stood at the front drinking what looked like a mug full of pure espresso. Somehow, within the time he had waited for the class to arrive, he had drunk at least three mugs of coffee as evidenced by the three novelty mugs on his desk, which had the remains of a drink left in them. He had a fourth in his hand from which he was sipping. Why he couldn¡¯t have used the same mug each time was beyond me. ¡°We used to joke it was some kind of higher level aura control method that we weren¡¯t expert enough to understand,¡± Edward commentated, amused by the familiar sight. His face seemed to be a permanent expression of tiredness, and unlike when I met him in his office, his aura had a slight expression of boredom and an almost longing to get back to his research. To Alex''s relief, Keter managed to set up the projector with minimal fanfare. He then presented graphs and references to help illustrate his points. ¡°Right, ok,¡± Keter started in a flat voice, leaning against his desk, clearly much rather being somewhere else. ¡°Economics, whoooo. I know it¡¯s everyone¡¯s favourite topic, but it¡¯s on the syllabus, so deal with it. You guys need to have at least some sort of idea of what the people in charge of you are attempting to do to make your job easier. Plus, they¡¯re the ones writing your paycheck, at least in this kingdom.¡± He clicked the clicker in his hand, changing the screen. ¡°First of all, how do we measure how the economy is doing?¡± A few hands went up to answer, which Keter saw but ignored them in preference of getting through as quickly as possible, ¡°Well, in old money, that is, before Vercult fell, it was the gross domestic product, also known as GDP.¡± As I looked around the room I noticed more and more eyes get glassed over with every word. This was probably going to be a long lecture. Dr Keter continued with the basics, ¡°Basically, we just counted up everything made and bought each year in terms of cost, then adjusted it with inflation, and if each year the number was bigger, job¡¯s a good¡¯un.¡± He moved his hands as if to mimic a scale, ¡°On the one hand, GDP was easy to calculate, easy to compare between Kingdoms, and good when we were warring more often.¡± My mind wondered as he went on, surprisingly the rest of my team were actually concentrating and seemed to actually be invested in the subject, especially Alex and Oliver. This did make sense as they might actually need to know this stuff due to both their dads¡¯ work. Maybe interest increased when you had more money. Dr Keter moved on to the cons, this hand sinking lower than the pros hand, ¡°But on the other hand, it only really gave us a vague idea of how the people were actually doing. Even that vague idea was distorted by what you actually could count as increasing the amount of stuff bought.¡± Keter looked around to see if we understood what he was getting at, but clearly, not enough of the class had, so he elaborated his point, ¡°So getting more profit by polluting or underpaying your workers was good, making stuff that doesn¡¯t break quickly and actually lasts was bad. See the issue?¡± Keter started pacing while taking a couple of sips from his mug, which had a cute coffee creature on the front with coffee beans for eyes. He continued sarcastically, ¡°But it was soooo easy to calculate, and the companies loved only having to deal with just getting more money from their workers, which was supposedly great for the economy, like the economy was its own separate thing from the people.¡± He paused a moment for that idea to sink in, then scoffed, ¡°Drakonsbane still thinks like that, and they wonder why they need those massive upgrades to their walls and have to invest more heavily in their army than the other kingdoms.¡± He paused, pinching the bridge of his nose, ¡°I apologise for that rant; it was unprofessional. I just get passionate when I disagree with something. And when it¡¯s stupid. And when there¡¯s an obviously better method.¡± He put on a cheerier expression that didn¡¯t reach his eyes and carried on with false enthusiasm, ¡°Anyway! Onto the better system that the non prideful stubborn kingdoms use, the national happiness index or the NHI.¡± While his enthusiasm was still fake, there was less disdain seeming into his tone as he explained the other system he clearly preferred. ¡°While it certainly also has its flaws, like being more difficult to measure and compare, it at least gives governments a better perspective of a goal than endless growth on a finite planet.¡± While he spoke my eyes drifted, even though I was still concentrating on what he was saying as it may come up later in a test, I couldn¡¯t help but notice the ever-increasing amount of mugs cluttering his desk. Where were they even appearing from? He took a sip from another mug of coffee, as he continued to explain the current system, ¡°The NHI is typically measured with survey information of the general population, which while difficult to keep reliable, does give a general idea of how a population feels, this is combined with mortality rates, average leisure type, education level and, unofficially, rates of Shade attacks.¡± He changed the screen to two new graphs of three intersecting lines, with a triangle shaped region shaded in the middle. ¡°With the new metric in which to measure came new policy. We focused more closely on aspects of policy such as externalities, both positive and negative, which are mostly the effects of an exchange that impacts a third party. We introduced a universal income, which meant it wasn¡¯t mandatory to work to live. That probably was the largest decrease in Shade attacks we saw, as it seemed to decrease the average amount of stress for people, which we think was an aspect we previously missed. We¡¯ve also just made it easier to form a union.¡± He sighed, ¡°There were, of course, pushbacks for these policies by those who despise ¡®freebees¡¯ as they called it. The main argument was almost a moral one of ¡®if I didn¡¯t get this and had to work, why should they?¡¯ but our isolated experiments showed largely positive results even in efficiency and somehow employment, which felt contradictory but multiple control, the difference in difference tests between neighbouring areas showed similar results.¡± Keter flipped to a screen with his references listed. ¡°Well, that¡¯s all I¡¯ve got on this topic. You can read the studies if you want. Do you have any questions? No? Good.¡± He finished before anyone could ask questions. ¡°Oh yeah, Dr Jacq wanted me to get two first year teams to help deal with a shade that has come up from the lower dungeon as they think it would be ¡®good experience¡¯¡±. Keter scanned the room and spotted me, ¡°I recognise you, so your team will do, and you also.¡± He pointed to Cassie. ¡°Meet at the dungeon entrance. It is located at the same place the entrance exam finishes. If you have trouble finding it you can ask someone else on the way there, try to go as soon as you are able.¡± Dr Keter sighed sleepily as the students left the lecture theatre, looking sadly at his fourth empty mug, ¡°I need another coffee.¡± *** Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author. Edward criticised Keters¡¯ drinking habit after we were generally out of earshot: ¡°He is one of the best researchers here, but I don¡¯t think I heard a single instance of him sleeping in my time. Plus, I heard he has his coffee with seven shots of espresso. That man is the backbone of the coffee economy.¡± ¡°Hey, do you think Dr Keter¡¯s bloodstream is half caffeine with the amount of coffee he drinks?¡± I replied out loud, then stole Edwards¡¯ joke, ¡°That man is the backbone of the coffee industry.¡± Mathew replied in an amused tone, ¡°Ha, yeah. We don¡¯t really need to prepare for this, do we? At most, grab our weapons and meet Dr Jacq and the Legends at the entrance.¡± ¡°Sounds about right.¡± I said, not seeing anything wrong with the plan, ¡°Plus, we can meet the Legends on the way there, their room is near ours. We can also get snacks.¡± ¡°Huh.¡± Alex interjected with a sly grin, ¡°How do you know where the Legend¡¯s room is? You don¡¯t know where anything is?¡± ¡°Cassie helped me find our room after my first black out after the fight, she was just nearby,¡± I replied flatly, ignoring what was being implied. ¡°How did Cassie know where our room was?¡± Alex sang mockingly at me. ¡°Because I said when she asked to help.¡± I ignored the fact she was actually helping because I lost my key. ¡°I didn¡¯t realise you were into enemies to lovers,¡± he said unsubtly. Oliver sighed and interjected, ¡°I''m sorry about him. He enjoys being annoying; it¡¯s fun for him.¡± ¡°Don¡¯t we all? It¡¯s probably just revenge for the bad puns I¡¯ve made with his name.¡± I replied dismissively, ¡°Anyway, let¡¯s get our weapons. Mathew lead the way!¡± *** We got our weapons and made our way to the dungeon entrance, which still smelt cold and damp. As we approached, Dr Jacq, who was currently female, sighed. ¡°He picked you because he recognised you, I¡¯m guessing?¡± ¡°Yup.¡± I dryly replied. ¡°I shouldn¡¯t have expected anything less.¡± She rolled her eyes and then after a moment concluded, ¡°I guess it doesn¡¯t really matter who he picked.¡± She waited for the rest of the two teams to enter the room. ¡°I¡¯ll give you the rundown.¡± Dr Jacq began once everyone was seated, ¡°Tatum was built upon these dungeons after Vercult fell to Shades, as a school and an allegiance to stop the fighting. Before this act of peace, each of the Kingdoms fought without considering the consequences. None of them thought it possible that it would escalate to the degree that one of humanity¡¯s last havens would fall. It was a wake up call for them to not take the status quo for granted. I had warned them previously, but unfortunately, a more practical example was apparently needed to really call home the impact.¡± She hand waved this history lesson. ¡°All of that is just to say that these dungeons were mostly used in cases of Kingdoms fighting on our home turf; it¡¯s essentially a maze that was meant to confuse foreign Mythics. We only rely on the top part, but sometimes the lower levels spawn Shades, and occasionally they get to the top. This causes problems if left too long. I just thought that first year teams would appreciate fighting a new type of Shade, it¡¯s called a Man¡¯s Laughter.¡± I raised my hand, slightly confused, ¡°Do you mean a Manslaughter?¡± She held the bridge of her nose, ¡°No, I don¡¯t mean a Manslaughter. That¡¯s a typo that never gets fixed. But yes, in the textbook, it is written down as Manslaughter, much to my annoyance. Every time I try and get it fixed it always goes back to the wrong name eventually. Though with that, good luck.¡± She disappeared out of existence. Everyone turned to me to explain what a Man¡¯s Laughter was, as I clearly knew. ¡°Uh, a Man¡¯s Laughter is a Shade that looks like an off-putting fusion between a fox and a hyena, its face is stretched into a permanent smile and it can throw its voice. It likes hiding in shadows and typically hunts in a pack like a Beowolf, but they¡¯re more of an unnerving threat than a dangerous one by themselves. I¡¯m guessing because Jacq asked for two teams to deal with it, it¡¯s likely Beta level on average with maybe an Alpha, but not any higher, otherwise they¡¯d have asked for more experienced teams. Bigger groups are more likely to eliminate the threat quickly so that they don¡¯t freak people out and attract an actual physical threat.¡± Another Jacq appeared out of nowhere, ¡°Correct, Mr Lightning here knows at least a slight bit of what he¡¯s talking about. I should threaten exams on more people. If you¡¯re not competent enough to succeed, there is backup, but it would be embarrassing for you, so again, good luck.¡± They disappeared a second time. I took the lead, ¡°Ok, is everyone ready?¡± Looking around the room I could see that Lily was covered in bark armour, Cassie had Granite on, Star and Emily had their regular armour, Alex had a couple of small drones flying behind him, Oliver had his quill full and a small crossbow attached to his side and Matthew was muttering spells. ¡°Oh yeah, Mathew, could you set up your communication spell? I think it¡¯d be useful.¡± ¡°Sure, though, everyone be warned, Tom has weird taste in music,¡± Mathew responded, then started muttering some more of his weird backward music spells. Emily pulled a face, ¡°What relevance does Tom¡¯s weird music taste have to do with¨C Oh.¡± She turned to me, ¡°Why do you have the bard core version of that song from Dogs stuck in your head?¡± ¡°It¡¯s not my fault that it¡¯s catchy,¡± I replied. ¡°Anyway, let¡¯s go kill that Shade.¡± *** The dungeon was just as maze-like as it was when we were doing the entrance test. I chose to search for the Man¡¯s Laughter in small groups that kept relatively close to avoid us fully splitting up but still gaining some speed in the search. The areas that had clearly been used recently had a weird smell to them as the lingering scent of a Shade''s demise still lingered. We even passed the room that Matthew and I fought the Nope in, with the marks on the floor that Mathew made still visible. It took about half an hour till I heard soft giggling right behind my shoulder. Instinctively, I looked over to see nothing. ¡°Guys, it¡¯s near me.¡± There was a shuffling near the door as Mathew came in. The giggling got louder, and more voices were added to the chorus. The room got colder. ¡°Hey, I know I¡¯m funny, but I¡¯m not that funny,¡± I said out loud to alleviate the tension and calm my nerves. It didn¡¯t help; they knew where I was. The giggling became snickers, and more of them arrived. It sounded like they were right by my ears, almost like they were breathing down my neck. Then I saw one. In the shadow of the room, I saw its face, stretched across like it had too little skin, grinning at me in the darkness. In the dim light, it reminded me of a week-old corpse, its flesh squirming like maggots. Its bony legs looked malnourished, feral. My disgust gave me away as its red eyes landed on me. I shot it with my gauntlets before I looked at it too long. The chorus of laughter was one less after three well-aimed shots, but the intensity became more manic like they were suffocating themselves with laughter. ¡°Got one, would appreciate help. These things are freaky.¡± ¡°On our way.¡± The rest of the team arrived, which made spotting things far easier as the dungeons were mostly dimly lit, and the Shades seemed to expertly dissolve into the shadows. We couldn¡¯t use our ears to guess where they were due to them being able to throw their voice and always sounding like they were right next to us. Star¡¯s flames and Alex¡¯s torches were incredibly useful in finding out where to shoot. Despite being Beta¡¯s they had little in regards to actual defences other than their uncanny ability to just dodge by distorting their bodies, they evaporated in a couple of shots and we were able to deal with the majority of them quickly. As we killed more of them, the laughter became more frantic, and more voices were cut until we got it down to one. The alpha was similar to the beta Man¡¯s Laughters but seemingly more defined in its bone armour. Its stretched face had almost helmet plating and was larger. We managed to kill it right as a bony leg was peacing through its stomach into reality. It was finally quiet. ¡°Is that all of them?¡± Lilly asked, her armour covered in the black gunk, which made the wood look almost sickly. ¡°I hope so, as otherwise the way I¡¯m feeling will probably attract something worse,¡± I warned. 19. Secrets Spelled Out To make sure all the Man''s Laughter were dealt with, we carried on searching for another half hour before fully confirming that they had all been killed. While they hadn''t been physically difficult to deal with, it was mostly the unnerving nature of them. The mental attacks had warn us down, as we had to ignore our ears as the laughter constantly felt all around us, making us reliant on our other senses, which in the dimly lit dungeon was also difficult. It would have been slightly more difficult if I hadn''t experienced Mattew''s mental connection or read up on them previously. Although, Mathew''s spell was a double-edged sword, as it meant that Edward was unable to help to keep his cover from being blown. We finally were able to get back to the entrance after only a couple of wrong turns, mostly made by me. Honestly, it felt like my brain was unable to handle a change in direction. The different perspectives made the rooms nearly unrecognisable to me. It would have taken far longer to get out if I was by myself. Luckily, that was not the case, as the rest of my team and the Legends did not have this issue. We all collapsed in the chairs, clearly exhausted. The non-dreary light was appreciated; even Cassie had taken off Granite. The only person who seemed least physically affected by the fight was Alex, but I guess he mostly gave support, as far as I could tell, with his tech lighting up the shadows. Dr. Jacq appeared after five minutes of everyone resting their feet. They were carrying a vial of vile, black liquid. "Thanks, everyone, for helping to clear up that mess. I hope it was a valuable experience," they said, not looking up, almost as if they were reading a pleasantries script after being reminded that we were here. "Keep up the good work." With that, they disappeared again. After a second of tired silence, I spoke, "That guy has a bag full of cats." Mathew looked at me. "What?" "You know, like the opposite of the cats out of the bag?" I said, defending my statement. "It sounded better in my head." "I''d disagree." Edward chimed in, floating upside down next to me. "I thought you were being silent." I thought accusingly at him. He pointed at where Mathew was sitting. "The spell ended." "What? How can you tell?" "The weird, grape purple symbols went away." Even though his eyes were pure white and his paused flame-like face was only slightly humanoid, I could tell he was looking at me like it was the most obvious thing in the world: of course, he could see Matthew''s Legacy. I looked over at Mathew, his eyes were back to their regular non glowyness. "Huh, that''s useful; I forgot to account for Mathew''s spells." I paused as I remembered something I wanted to ask at the back of my mind that I had forgotten about till now, "Though that being said, isn''t the only person you''re conspiring against Washington? How''s that going, Jacq basically already knows, I''m not great at hiding my eye colour, who''s to say Washington doesn''t as well?" I felt a wave of confusion coming from Edward, "You think I''m conspiring against Washington?" He flipped back around to normal eye level. "I may not like the guy, which I do think is reasonable as he did send me on a practically suicide mission, but that''s a personal grudge. I''m mostly here because I''m stuck with you, plus I enjoy not having to just survive anymore. I''m basically a ghost, and I have no obligations. Mentoring is also fun." "Wait, then why are you basically hiding?" "It''s just easier; I get to talk to less people. It''s not like I was much of a socialite before, I only had like one friend." "Can I tell Mathew then?" "I already know." A new voice chimed in. Hearing Mathew''s voice suddenly made me jump and almost fall out of my seat. "What," I spoke out loud. Mathew sighed, "You''re terrible at keeping secrets, and the eye thing''s you''re a giveaway if you know what you''re looking for. Plus, both of you are so loud in your thoughts." Looking sheepish, he looked away. "I may also have been trying to practise my thought spell on you and half been using you as a radio, trying to isolate one of the songs that you have stuck in your head, and I heard you talking to Edward." "I do have good taste in music," I began to feel weary of the time. We should probably talk, think, whatever, when there''s less people to look oddly at us." I looked around the room and loudly smacked my legs. "Right. Does anyone else also want to go get food?" The rest of the group responded with shrugs and tired thumbs up. This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. *** Cassie looked at my plate with obvious disgust, "Is that really what you eat, or are you guys messing with me." Mathew looked at her dryly. "He''s just like that; he claims it''s a speedster thing." "You can''t bully me, I''m your leader." I wined. Alex responded, pointing out the obvious, "That hasn''t stopped us before, plus you''re not the Legend''s leader." "Does that mean that I have a free pass to bully you then, or do you have any other defences?" "I''m dyslexic?" I weakly defended. "Ok, it''s just easier to fit it on one plate, plus pork does traditionally go with apple, so there''s that!" The rest of my team did not back me up. Even Oliver replied, "While yes, you would be correct, but not when it''s apple pie." Cassie continued with what she was about to say before she had been distracted by my perfectly normal choice in food, "Ok, ignoring Tom for the moment, I''d say we did well working together." Oliver suddenly looked suspicious, "While I certainly agree, I feel I know where you''re trying to go with this." Cassie put on her professional face as she stopped with the small talk, "I''ll cut to the chase then; the Legends want in on the security mission." "Well, obviously, that is not in my control. I''m sure you could convince Washington or Dr Jacq to-" Everyone stared at him. "Ok, fine, I''ll email my dad to see if he can make it two teams." "Thanks, you''re the best." Oliver looked over at Alex expectedly, Alex nodded giving a thumbs up. "Email sent," Oliver confirmed. I looked at both of them, "Is Alex basically your secretary, then? Oh yeah, I have something to tell you when we get back to the room." I turned to the Legends, "We should work together another time. This was fun." After the rest of the team finished their food, we went back to the room, with Mathew still in the lead, as I still wasn''t certain of the directions. *** I stood in the middle of our room in front of my team, trying to work out how to phrase the situation exactly, "Ok, right, yeah, how am I going to say this? Um, yeah." Edward sighed, "I''ll do it then." My perspective warped as Edward took control, and my eyes swapped. The sensation of floating took hold. My face formed from slightly nervous into a bored, almost sarcastic looking expression. The whole room had a weird glow to it, and colours seemed almost distorted. I could see the flow of everyone''s aura as a faint glow under their skin, and their eyes became more vivid. There was a slight lightning blue resonating out of my body, attaching it to me like a loose string. "I keep forgetting you can do this." "Hi, everyone. I''m the other soul accidentally possessing Tom." Edward introduced himself with a mock bow, my voice coming out with a slight accent. You might know me better as Reacher or even as that guy who was almost constantly on the news for stealing a while back. I''m here to help if you want it, as I''m basically forced to tag along with Mr. Blue Lightning here. Any questions?" Alex spoke first, "So is this why he constantly had music playing in his head?" "Nope, he''s just like that." Oliver looked deep in thought, "How long has this happened for?" "A couple weeks before we got here." "Ok, cool. Does this change anything in regards to the rest of the team?" "Nope. It just means I don''t have to be quiet when Rune here uses his intercom. If that''s all the questions, I want to go back to being ethereal, Tom''s sweaty." "Hey! I''m not sweaty." I shook my fist at him, or whatever equivalent my current form had. I got distracted by the sparks trailing my current movement as they reminded me of a sparkler. Then, just as suddenly as before, my perspective and eyes shifted again, and I was me again. I sat down as the weird senses I was just feeling went, and I was mainly just disoriented. Edward went back to floating. Mathew clapped his hands together. "Right, now that''s sorted. Does anyone else have any secrets they want to reveal?" Alex put his hand up, and Oliver looked like he was about to stop him, but he spoke before he could, "Yeah, I''m actually a robot with a soul." "What," Mathew said flatly. "Yeah, look." His eyes glowed slightly, and before Oliver could stop him, he deconstructed his arm and then reconstructed it, revealing gears and wires hiding beneath his skin. "See." "Alex! We talked about this; Dad doesn''t want info about you getting out!" Alex shrugged. Oliver let out an exasperated sigh as he held the bridge of his nose. "Uh! I knew this would happen eventually, so I might as well explain." Oliver looked at both Mathew and me. But you have to promise to keep this under wraps." "Of course, I at least would gain nothing from exposing this information, plus you already have mine, soo¡­" "Oooo, this is getting interesting!" Edward said, suddenly more interested in the conversation. "Neither would I." "Ok then, basically Light Industries were trying to cut out the middle man by making a completely automanus Mythic as then we could just sell them directly to governments instead of to the public, the only thing that couldn''t be replicated was Aura and Legacies because you need a soul for that. My dad put Alex''s dad to the task. He knew of all of the stories of people using souls for nefarious needs, so he was just starting small. One robot as a proof of concept. He wasn''t trapping souls or dissecting them or anything like that. If the stories of the Angels, Arc-Angels and Shades had any lick of truth, he wanted nothing to do with that method." Alex interrupted, "And blah blah, there are lots of failures till me, blah blah, I''m proof the project wasn''t viable because souls mean free will, blah blah. Long story short, I''m basically his kid now and the project was shelved as the original plan was basically slavery and was no better than those dark organisations that kidnap children to create and control Mythics." Oliver glared at Alex, "And to get to the point then. All of the research and notes were destroyed, and the only thing left of the project is Alex, who should learn to keep his mouth shut unless he wants someone to try and deconstruct him for the method to make more of him." After a moment had passed, I said, "Huh, that actually explains a lot of things that I was ignoring. Anyway, no need to worry; your secret seems more important than mine." Mathew had an epiphany: "So that''s why it was more difficult to link you to the communication spell. It probably needed to translate your thoughts because you''re a robot. I just thought that your Legacy just made your thoughts slightly encrypted." 20. Luke Knight: Killing Time Freedom was weird. Was this freedom? I wandered the Dark Flame¡¯s facility, mostly keeping to myself; adjusting was hard. Everywhere was just loud and bright, and the mesh of emotions, smells, and voices was a lot to adapt to. Ark and Ace were doing their best to handle the transition. They replaced my mattress when Flint, another thing to get used to, complained for me. The preparations for the mission were going suspiciously well. Light Industries was being extremely lax in security for the event, using it as a training mission for the CEO¡¯s son and his team, who hadn¡¯t even completed one year of training. The intercepted emails mostly complained about the blatant nepotism rather than any concern about safety. Ark laughed when he found out, muttering something about Washington always overestimating his students, though he did warn us against underestimating unknowns. The information that we were able to get on the kid and his team was that they consisted of those that notable people have taken a note off. Washington himself advocated for the leader despite their lack of prerequisite credentials, and Dr Jacq took an eye on them. The power sets were also intriguing. While we trained for the mission, the other half was being prepared for at the facility. The gathering of extra resources and other precautions that needed to be taken place as if we were successful, a mass of poorly treated people would be arriving soon, which had many aspects to address. Health and comfort were a main issue, with that many people in a new situation, Shades are likely about to become a higher issue than they were currently. I walked past new rooms and added facilities being implemented. The smell of laundry detergents felt suffocating. None of the workers noticed me. There were so many aspects I was just not used to. Flint described the place as homely and posh. He had adapted better than I. If I wanted to find him, I just needed to find where they kept the alcohol or where there was a loud crowd. I mostly kept to the side. There were benefits to the facility other than being able to explore, while Flint indulged in alcohol and crowds, drank coffee, and used the gym. Flint occasionally tried to get me to join him, mostly because he found how I unnerved people funny. Many had compared me to a Dark Skipper, which only moved when unobserved, as I tended to be silent when I moved. The only thing I had to kill here was time, and with it being so long, I was itching to kill something, at least, so I went to the side of the facility where they were keeping guard. My sword was in the building next to them; I probably should warn Ark about how easy it is to get at the weapons. I left the confines of the facility, the sounds of humanity fading away to the sounds of wildlife. I turned invisible to enhance my senses as sight faded away. A pang of hatred highlighted the direction I should go. I stopped to turn visible and gave a flat look to the left. ¡°Ah, I thought you were getting sloppy with all this luxury, but alas, tis I whom is the sloppy one it should seem,¡± Flint said, making himself known, overemphasising his language. I turned invisible again. ¡°Don¡¯t be like that,¡± Flint smirked, ¡°I knew you¡¯d also want to fuck something up. I can¡¯t believe that Ark wants us to do the mission as least murdery as we can. Why¡¯d he chose the most murdery people to try and save to do it is beyond me. Probably, we¡¯re the best at infiltrating for Ace to gain control. I certainly know I¡¯ve already infiltrated a few things here, if you know what I mean.¡± Even without being able to see, I know he''s wiggling his eyebrows. I roll my eyes, reappear, and motion for him to follow before disappearing again. I ignored the lesser feelings of hatred and the small feeling of intrigue as I moved towards the main epicentre of the emotion; I didn¡¯t feel like swatting flies at the moment. Flint had no such objections, as they were quickly extinguished as we moved on; only the swing of his weapon could be heard. When the radiation of hatred was a mountain in front, I stopped and crouched down before reappearing to get visual information on how best to eliminate the threat. The Shade was a Tusk, its antlers and tusks jutted out at weird angles, sharpened against its foes. It looked like a mash up of a boar and an elephant, its armour around its face and jaw fashioning its expression with a permanent scowl. Parts of its armour were warped around its skin from refusing together from breaking in previous fights. ¡°Ah neat, it survived a few Tuskuls,¡± Flint wandered into the clearing with no regard to stealth, causing the Tusk to turn towards us. It growled deep in anger, smoke coming out of its extended snout. ¡°Get it, Knight? Tussles, but like with a tusk in it? Eh, that is a slight stretch, I admit.¡± He leisurely readied his weapon as it clawed at the ground to charge. ¡°Is this really the most difficult you could find, Knight? Look at it; it''s just a baby, a toddler at most. Dis. a. point. ting.¡± He shook his head, tutting as his scythe trailed on the ground, walking towards it. It kicked off, moving impossibly fast for something of its size towards Flint, who casually stepped out of the way, bringing the scythe across, cutting through its leg joint like butter, causing it to crash as the limb slid away from the rest of its body. The Tusk¡¯s body twisted in Flint¡¯s direction as the scythe went through, the antler missing by a couple of centimetres, the breeze moving his hair slightly. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. The Tusk''s red eyes bulged in anger as its flesh began to steam under its armour, rage physically boiling the trees around it. Around the Tusk, you could hear the hissing and popping as it grew angrier. The ground became black from char before melting. The ground seemingly drew in shadows as newly born smaller Tusks, with less defined armour, crawled out of the molten pit, screeching with the same anger. Flint rolled his eyes and looked over to where I was watching the fight unfold, ¡°You going to help?¡± I move from where I was leaning against a tree just outside the clear, lightly jogging towards the Shade, I use my sword¡¯s recoil to boost a jump hitting one of the lesser Tusks, killing it, as I swung it into the main Tusks face cracking its armour. I leaver myself onto its back and kick myself away, feeling the heat seeping through my boots almost unbearably, the sooty air making it slightly difficult to breathe. ¡°I meant, like, shoot it from afar, not be all fancy,¡± Flint complained. In response, I reloaded and shot it in its neck area, shattering it, the black liquid seeping out where the shards pierced its flesh. Flint sighed and, after using the emerging Tusks as stepping stones, swung his scythe, cutting off the Tusks head and landed next to the molten pit. He then made some room before setting the scythe to its minigun mode and unloading the bullets into what remained of the Tusk and the lesser Tusks until he could see the tell tell black smoke rising from the corpse with a bored expression. ¡°I was honestly hoping that would be more difficult; at least with people, there''s always an unknown factor that makes it more interesting.¡± Suddenly, I could hear clapping. Ark appeared from the other side of the clearing, ¡°Bravo, thank you for helping us deal with that Tusk. There certainly is a difference between hearing of your exploits and witnessing them in person, far more style than I expected.¡± ¡°Ah, great. We have an audience.¡± Flint looked round at the remnants of the battle, ¡°I¡¯m not cleaning this up.¡± He paused and then said, ¡°Knight might, though. Isn¡¯t that right, buddy? Just say no out loud if you disagree.¡± I gave him a side eye. ¡°That won¡¯t be necessary,¡± Ark carried on, ¡°I hold no attachment to the state of the forest, only in the danger it represents. I¡¯m sure you¡¯re wondering how I managed to watch without your friend Knight noticing.¡± ¡°No, not really,¡± Flint replied matter of factly. ¡°Well, you see, as most trained-¡± Ark started before catching himself after he registered what Flint actually said, ¡°Wait, did you just say no?¡± ¡°Yeah, what''s it to me? If Knight fucks up, that¡¯s his issue.¡± Ark returned his cool and turned to me, ¡°Well, Knight, then, the reason I was able to keep hidden from your view was because I, like most classically trained Mythics, am trained in emotional invisibility. I knew of your escapade due to the guards you slipped by reporting your missing weapons.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t think he cares either, but since you¡¯re here, do you know of any more Shades we could kill?¡± Ark held the bridge of his nose and sighed, ¡°Fine, there''s a den of Draknids nearby which needs clearing.¡± *** We spent the next hour or so dealing with different infestations of Shades in order to make the rest of the organisation¡¯s work easier. After the first two Ark brought out Ace in order for him to learn how we fort, we had done some group training using some software that Ark had, but that lacked different sensory aspects that I believe are essential, and it¡¯s difficult to encode each of our legacies. In person fights are a completely different beast to the simulations. Ace was able to mimic some of our combat moves, which enabled us to break through the different Shades'' armour more effectively. He mirrored my moves exactly, hitting the exact same spots. We brought back the trophies that remained after the Shades, which were useful for materials and research. While the mission dictated that we use non-lethal tactics, at least for the most part, this was still useful for the team in case we ran into anything in the air. Ace was still working out my nonverbal communications, which were not helped by Flint mistranslating them, which caused a couple of unnecessary attacks to leak through. Ark mostly just observed the fights, making notes as necessary and pointing out weak points as he went in order to improve our style, though it was mostly for Ace¡¯s benefit. While Ace could copy exactly, he lacked the experience that was needed to know why each move was chosen or the muscles that were developed in service of fighting. I could easily take him down even if he mirrored my moves perfectly, he was less willing to endure pain and damage needed in order to win when fights got nasty. As was evident when we arrived back at the facility, Flint taught him in a one-on-one fight that sometimes you have to stab yourself in order to get one over your opponent, which was one of Flint''s favourite moves. He used to boast after his missions that he psyched out his target through wedging their weapon in his side in order to disarm them. His body was littered with many scars due to this fact. Ace wasn¡¯t likely to need to fight if things went as planned, as his main role was as the driver. Flint and I were the ones needed for our infiltration and killing skills. At most, he would need to man some of the weapons against any flying Shades on the way to the pickup point. But of course, that''s reliant on things going to plan, and Light Industries was not one to underestimate. Despite what the intercepted communications suggest, it was likely that there was information we were missing. As the late director often knew, you always have to account for deceptive incompetence. The man was paranoid for good reason and never trusted information unless multiple sources confirmed it. Even then, he was always weary of deception. Things almost never go to plan; always anticipate the worst. 21. Training Montage While the reveal of Alex¡¯s status as a robot hadn¡¯t changed our dynamic as a team, making them aware of Edward certainly did. It was evil to have my team conspire against me to give me more experience with actual fighting and exercise. The rest of the team also benefitted from Edward¡¯s guidance between lessons. Apparently, the liminal space that either Edward or I occupy whenever we¡¯re not the main one in control allows either of us to see auras and legacies. Mathew made use of this new sense the most in improving the efficiency of his spells through trial and error, changing the pronunciation of each spell to see which caused his runes to be more precise or how it affected the outcome. He managed to cut the aura cost by about fifteen percent. Alex also saw an improvement. Under aura vision(?), his tech legacy looked like many arms and hands. Through Edward¡¯s and my tutelage, he managed to produce more arms with less aura, especially when using his drones, which took less aura upkeep than what he was using. We weren¡¯t able to improve the initial cost, though. Unfortunately, my team thought my aura awareness needed improving, as that was one of the lessons I missed by not going to a weapon training school. It was an incredibly useful skill, as it meant that you could dodge attacks that you couldn¡¯t see directly. Most people have a weak version of this that makes them aware that someone is watching them, but with training, it can work as a sort of danger sense. One method that Edward recommended was to blindfold me and have me guess which shoulder a marble was thrown over and use my aura to see it. It was difficult as I had been putting my aura in loops around my body as per Dr Keter¡¯s recommendation, but that caused my aura to mostly be kept inside my body instead of defused out, which is normally better. In the aura sight, my body looked almost like chainmail glowing purple, though you could see the distinct red and blue pattern up close. After a while I couldn¡¯t work out how to diffuse the aura around me to make the method work so I just started guessing. My team caught on relatively quickly as eventually every guess was wrong instead of just fifty percent of the time. I took off my blindfold which revealed they were just throwing the marbles above my head. When Mathew saw that I had worked out their treachery, he sighed, ¡°Come on, Tom, guessing won¡¯t help you train. Repetition may be the mother of learning, but you actually need to practice. Have you tried, I don¡¯t know, making a bigger aura loop that links outside the body?¡± ¡°Yeah, but that only works in a certain area and is difficult to maintain without landmarks. When I tried it before, it was more like a tripwire.¡± ¡°We could just ask Keter,¡± Alex suggested, looking bored, ¡°considering it¡¯s his technique that¡¯s causing you the problems.¡± ¡°That¡¯s actually not a bad shout.¡± I turned to leave to go do that and quickly turned back. ¡°You guys will be alright on your own?¡± ¡°Yeah, just go bother Keter; he¡¯s likely in his office.¡± *** I arrived outside Dr. Keter¡¯s office after a few wrong turns and redirections from Edward. I swear that this place was a maze, and everywhere just looked the same to me. As I went to knock on Keter¡¯s door, I overheard talking in his office. ¡°Yin, I respect you, but you need to find a way to rain in your Legacy. It¡¯s extremely inconvenient. I almost lost a whole month of research last month due to the file corrupting. If I had been the only one with that file, it would have delayed everything else.¡± The second voice just sounded tired as they sighed in response, ¡°It¡¯s not like I don¡¯t know Keter; I¡¯m just glad it¡¯s not something worse. Do you know how many times Jacq has threatened to tape my sister and me to each other to neutralise the effect? Just be glad I got everyone into the habit of backing files and increasing safety operations around here. None of the previous mes had the Legacy to be so passive, trust me I researched it thoroughly.¡± ¡°Ok, I¡¯m still planning on trying to get Washington to send you on a mission when the final tests are happening; I don¡¯t want those resources being wasted because of stray bad luck.¡± Through gritted teeth, Yin replied, ¡°While I completely understand, fuck you, hope you didn¡¯t accidentally pick up decaff by mistake.¡± I stood to the side of the door to get out of the way of his exit. As the door opened, I quickly dodged out of the way, and it almost hit me. The man looked back and apologetically said, ¡°Sorry!¡± I shrug it off and go and knock on the door. ¡°Come in.¡± I walk into the room and see Keter at his desk. He looked at his mug suspiciously before taking a sip, his face relaxing slightly. ¡°Sorry if this isn¡¯t the best time.¡± ¡°It¡¯s fine,¡± He sighed, just looking annoyed, ¡°what do you need?¡± ¡°Uh, I¡¯m having trouble with my aura awareness, and I think it might be because of that aura technique you taught me.¡± Keter opened up a drawer in his desk to look for something, ¡°Which technique, I teach a couple?¡± ¡°The looping chain mail type one.¡± ¡°Ah, that one¡¯s expensive. I see the issue. The technique does take a lot of aura to use, and therefore, those who try it typically fall into the precision pit full.¡± He put a book down on the desk and opened it to a specific page. This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report. ¡°You see, while clean loops in your case are more aesthetically pleasing to look at, they lock the aura too close to the body, so to help with your sense issue, you mostly just need to make the loops more hazy. This also helps as the looser defined loops cover more of the body, therefore making the technique more effective in the long run. Obviously, there is a limit to how hazy you can make it, but I¡¯d recommend slightly larger loops as you move out, as that helps cover more around you. Your legacy is well suited to a closer aura pattern, though, as you need less warning than most to react to.¡± ¡°And how do I make the loops more hazy?¡± Keter waved his hand annoyedly, ¡°Uh, didn¡¯t they teach you this in weapon¡¯s¡­ Oh yeah, your Jacq¡¯s pet project.¡± His voice took a more dull tone like he was reading a simple textbook definition: ¡°Aura predominantly relies on intent, so just loosen it when you¡¯re doing the technique.¡± Keter was clearly done with interactions currently, which bled through in his tone, ¡°Is that everything you need? Yes? Good. Shut the door on the way out.¡± As I walked out of his office to try and make my aura intent more hazy(?) I heard Keter mutter under his breath when I closed the door. ¡°I need more coffee.¡± *** I met back up with my team where we had been training to see Alex attempting to use his drones as stepping stones. He managed to get to two as I came closer, with Oliver cheating him on. I yelled after them, saying, ¡°Keter says my technique intent is too rigid and needs to be more hazy. Also, Alex, while that does look cool, what¡¯s the purpose?¡± My interruption caused Alex to lose his concentration, and he tripped on the third drone, which fell back, landing half awkwardly. ¡°Tom!¡± Alex complained, ¡°I was so close to getting that right!¡± ¡°Uh, sorry?¡± I apologised slightly, cringing at how Alex had fallen. ¡°I was just asking why you were doing it in the first place?¡± Oliver answered, ¡°Well, you see, Mathew had the idea of using the drones in order to gain a height advantage where we¡¯d more easily attack or cause our hits to have more impact.¡± he gestured towards Alex, who was still sitting on the ground. ¡°We were using Alex as a ginny pig as he¡¯s the heaviest and has to concentrate on multiple things at once, so if he can do it, it means it¡¯d be possible for anyone on the team.¡± ¡°Except Tom, maybe.¡± Alex interjected, ¡°Your speed might kick the drones out of sync.¡± ¡°Eh, probably more like it would just be a more one time deal; I¡¯d be out of the way by the time physics kicks in,¡± I corrected. ¡°The only annoyance would be after and the fact you wouldn¡¯t be able to correct the placement as I do it.¡± ¡°Also, you¡¯re not that dexterous on your feet.¡± Matthew said, ¡°Judging by the amount of times I¡¯ve seen you trip since knowing you.¡± ¡°Hey! That was the leg. Alex sorted that out ages ago, remember?¡± ¡°Sure, I believe you.¡± ¡°I¡¯ll prove it; let me try, Alex!¡± Alex shrugged, ¡°Sure, try not to break the drones, though.¡± ¡°Or black out.¡± Mathew joked. Alex lined three of his drones into a staircase, and I gave myself a running start. Blue sparks radiated off my body as I successfully pushed off the first drone and landed on the second. I managed to propel off the second to get to the third. I felt like a master omnivaulter as I leapt from the last drone, thoughts of gloating to Alex and proving Mathew wrong in my mind. ¡°You forgot about considering how to land, didn¡¯t you?¡± Edward sighed. ¡°Alex is metallic and didn¡¯t need to consider the chance of injury.¡± ¡°Huh? Oh shit.¡± The ground was getting ever nearer as Edwards¡¯ words registered. Landing, ok, landing? How am I going to- *** The main thing on my mind as I woke up in the medical wing was the fact that this was the third time I had blacked out. The doctor on staff was the same as before, and as he realised I was awake, he gave me a look of disappointment. ¡°I regret telling you that you heal fast,¡± He said with the tone of an annoyed medical practitioner, ¡°I feel like if you actually suffered the consequences of your actions, you would learn not to be as impulsive with your health. As much as I believe that the effect of moral hazard is overblown, you might be a particular case.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t actually feel any pain,¡± I said, looking at my body, which showed no sign of injury or pain. ¡°And I don¡¯t think I¡¯m currently injured.¡± The doctor sighed, muttering to himself, ¡°Of course, no consequences. Love the miracle of aura techniques but I hate only ever dealing with the consequences of other people¡¯s actions, when will I get to my own?¡± He pointed towards the exit. ¡°Yes, you are dismissed. And I hope I don¡¯t see you back too soon.¡± ¡°Annoying the person who has to cure your injuries is ill advised.¡± Edward joked. ¡°I am aware.¡± ¡°Don¡¯t worry too much though they deal with dumb asses a lot, it¡¯s a good thing we had been working on your aura technique though; you weren¡¯t out for long. I do have to say belly flopping on solid ground was almost the worst thing you could have done.¡± ¡°I panicked and couldn¡¯t think of what to do, which I think turned my legacy off, giving me even less time to think.¡± I paused in thought. ¡°Also, I didn¡¯t belly flop; I kicked off the ground and then fell over.¡± ¡°Same difference, you should probably catch up with your team. I think it¡¯s tea time.¡± *** I met with the team at the cafeteria with the Legends, and once they clarified whether or not I was okay, they went straight to making fun of me. Money was exchanged, as they apparently had bets on how long it would take me to black out again, with Mathew apparently winning. I mostly just went through landing strategies for when we try the technique again and safety precautions that we should have already taken. No one had thought about it, as it was mostly Alex who was in the most danger, which meant that safety was slightly less of a concern than it should have been. Alex was used to being the testing dummy. Luckily the only thing that broke was me, Alex¡¯s drones while suffering some damage were easily fixed so even with me pushing them with a lot of force at a high speed it wouldn¡¯t be too costly in a fight, with the addendum that we don¡¯t abuse it too much. The first drone did take the most damage and would only be able to take it one or two more times, the rest about two or three more times without being fixed. After food, I went back to our room to try to edit my aura, following Keter¡¯s advice, taking the haziness into account. 22. Murphy’s Law Aura patterns were difficult, and trying to make the loops more loosely defined was hard to do in practice. Originally it wasn¡¯t too bad once I got the hang of it, it felt like what I thought crocheting would be like, but going over previously looped aura to give it new intentions was just annoying. I¡¯ve heard it said that your soul and, by extension, your aura reflected the person. That''s why tech that used it as a power source acted weird, like lightbulbs shining brighter when you paid them attention. The problem was that I worked best with more rigid rules, as then I knew I wasn¡¯t doing something wrong, so when I loosened the intent, my aura just stayed in the original pattern. Edward¡¯s red aura went as far as to become more defined out of spite. It was frustrating. It was almost as bad at trying to get myself to stop procrastinating when I needed to do work. I needed to change tactics. I flicked through the book that Keter had given me previously for advice, looking at the chapter on redefining patterns that I had only skimmed before. Rereading it gave me more insight into what I needed to try, so instead of relaying the new intent on each of the aura loops, I started the pattern at my centre. I redefined the pattern as if it were a cooking recipe, the measurements and timing of which were easier to take as just guidelines, ever-changing as I learned new things or wanted to do random things. As I followed the pattern with this new context, Edward¡¯s aura stayed more spitefully defined, and mine became more dynamic, almost jumping between loops with an idea of rules. This new push of meaning became more and more difficult as I followed the flow further and further away from my centre, the will be inflicted on the aura lessened, I then got a second wind as I felt a guiding push behind me, giving me more power to help direct the change. I managed to make it through to the end of the pattern back to my centre. I relaxed as the newly defined pattern settled; a wave of mental exhaustion hit me. I fell back onto my bed, feeling the cold breeze pass by, making me aware of my now sweat drenched t-shirt. I felt Edward also become unconscious as both our body and spirits were worn out by the power play against ourselves. My last thought being, ¡°Thank fuck, it was only completed in the torso.¡± *** I woke up with the sound of Edward groaning back to consciousness, ¡°Uh, fuck me, it feels like I went on one of Jacq¡¯s training courses while having a hangover.¡± The usually bright static red flames of his spirit seemed to be duller, with the area around his white eyes being the brightest, and the further away, the less lustre he had. Even the clocks that littered his body were seemingly moving slower. The redefinition of the aura technique had more cost than I¡¯d initially thought and would likely take longer to recover than just a single blackout session. I also felt weaker, closer to how I felt before awakening. The extra strength I had grown used to evaded me as my soul recovered from being overtaxed by the technique. The best course of action was to use our auras and legacies as little as possible to get back up to where we were before. ¡°Tom, wake up!¡± Mathew yelled, with what sounded to me like evil glee, ¡°Or we¡¯re going to be late for Jacq¡¯s lesson.¡± ¡°What?¡± I replied, still half asleep from exhaustion. ¡°Isn¡¯t it tomorrow?¡± ¡°Well, it would have been if you hadn¡¯t spent the day asleep yesterday.¡± Edward and I simultaneously had the same thought, ¡°Shit.¡± *** I, honestly, just felt heavier and slower as we walked to Jacq¡¯s lesson, my leg almost dragging as it weighed me down more than it usually did. The rest of my team were not faring much better. Matthew burned his tongue at the cafeteria, making his spells more difficult to pronounce, and Oliver somehow managed to get a papercut right on his bow fingers. Alex was the only one who had seemingly not suffered. Apparently, it was a special lesson, as everyone was in the stadium rather than in separate rooms, as was typical. Judging by the bags under people¡¯s eyes and people with pained expressions, a lot of other people also made bad choices recently. Jacq, who is currently male, held a far too bright expression as he looked over the crowd of students, causing some of them to wince in pain. Stood next to him was the man with grass-green eyes I saw the other day, with the apologetic look that seemed to be his default. ¡°Good morning, everyone!¡± Jacq began, his unwarranted cheer seeping into his voice, ¡°I¡¯m sure a lot of you are regretting recent decisions. Maybe you forgot about this lesson, got food poisoning somehow, or have any other bad luck. It¡¯s no coincidence that so many of you are not in the best condition as this lesson is to teach or, at the very least, see how you are at your worst. I got my buddy Yin here to remove some of his control of his legacy.¡± Recognition ignited on people¡¯s faces. ¡°I thought the fortune twins were identical?¡± Edward thought with tired confusion. Yin just looked tired, with bags under his eyes. Some of his clothes looked slightly frayed, with what looked like small stains. He took a breath before he started speaking. Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author. ¡°Yes, as Jacq stated, my legacy is bad luck. You¡¯re probably more familiar with my sister, Lucky Charm, as good luck is more favourable.¡± Yin stumbled on his words, ¡°So yeah, every year Jacq wants to test how students perform when they¡¯re not in the best condition, as they think it¡¯s a better show of how teams would be in the field, as you¡¯re more likely to not be on top of your game then or something.¡± ¡°Yup, today¡¯s lesson is saving mes from wreckage. There are no Shades, but let''s just say you are emulating the evacuation of people after a fight or attack after another group has dealt with them.¡± Jacq gestured to the rest of the arena, ¡°As you can see, we¡¯ve kitted out the area to look like the aftermath of a Shade attack with collapsed buildings, broken floors, and trapped people.¡± On cue of Jacq saying trapped people, a female voice was heard from the rubble, ¡°Oh, despair, I am trapped; please save me!¡± Jacq smiled at the audience, ¡°See?¡± The crowd looked on with unimpressed, tired expressions. ¡°Uh, you guys are no fun. Anyway, you have an hour to save as many people as possible. The team who saves me the most wins. Try not to add to the wreckage. There are a lot of domestic things to look out for, such as electricity and water, which can cause fires, so watch out.¡± Jacq disappeared as if to show the start of the timer, but as soon as people moved to start, they reappeared. ¡°Oh yeah, I forgot. Yin is the one judging you on technique and skill, plus he¡¯s not turning off his Legacy.¡± Jacq spoke, paused for a moment, and added, ¡°He¡¯ll also tell you when to begin.¡± Jacq disappeared again. Yin looked put on the spot, as he was also moving to the side the first time Jacq disappeared, not expecting to be back in focus. He almost tripped but managed to catch himself. ¡°Oh ok, um, yeah. Just watch out for broken electrical lines, work out a safe place to put the civilians you save. I¡¯ll give you five minutes to discuss with your team before you start.¡± He shifted himself so he had a more stable stance, ¡°I¡¯ll yell start when your prep time is done.¡± I brought my team into a huddle. ¡°Ok, Alex you seem to be the most able at the moment, I¡¯ll leave you to handle the heaviest things to lift out the way, plus, there must be at least some tech that you could use inside the collapsed buildings to help. Mathew, any spells you have available for this?¡± Mathew glared at me. ¡°Really, nothing?¡± I shook my head, ¡°You''re taken out of commission by a too hot chocolate; my, how the mighty have fallen. Not even any sign language spells?¡± ¡°Thereth a chanth that if I do try, it might back thire.¡± he replied, annoyed with his swollen tongue. ¡°It hothully will havth healed in around hath an hour.¡± I gave him a sorry look as I held back a laugh, ¡°Ah, misspellings, my greatest enemy, and I thought I was the dyslexic one.¡± I turned to Oliver. ¡°Ok, Oliver, you seem to be the second most able. You can still use your bow at a push, though the only way I can think you¡¯d need it is maybe leverage with rope to help pick up more heavy stuff, so I¡¯d say you¡¯re best suited to just help out Alex.¡± Oliver replied, ¡°Sounds like a plan, but what about you?¡± ¡°Well, despite being practically unable to use my speed, I¡¯ll scout out the Jacqs with the Aura vision with Edward. Mathew, are we at least able to secure a telepathy connection?¡± ¡°I than try.¡± Mathew''s eyes started to glow as the symbols started to appear, though slightly more crooked than typical. The sound of an instrument playing in reverse was heard softly but less skilled than the previous times I¡¯d heard the spell. Mathew was concentrating more than he did usually as he tried to make the sound right to connect our thoughts. The runes seemed to click in place. ¡°Di-... -t.. -ork?¡± I heard in my mind, like having a weak signal. ¡°Yeah, though the connection is a bit spotty.¡± I thought back. ¡°Wa-... -unes¡­ -shully conect-... -¡¯ll do¡­ -or now.¡± he thought at me, then gave up and said out loud, sighing, ¡°I gueth the wunes conethed slightly.¡± ¡°The runes connected partially; it¡¯ll do for now?¡± I repeated back at him, and he gave a confirming nod, ¡°Ok, with the weak connection and the fact I never got around to getting us actual coms, just try repeated simple messages over thoughts till Mathew is healed enough to re-establish the link properly, that good with everyone?¡± My team nodded in response, ¡°Good, once we start then I¡¯ll run ahead to scout out the Jacqs, everyone else do your best to get them out and to a safe place.¡± I felt secure in the plan I had come up with, even with the hiccups caused by Yin¡¯s bad luck. ¡°So, Edward,¡± I looked over to where Edward was lazily floating, ¡°Are you ready to do some Where¡¯s Wally with Jacq¡¯s soul? Just point in the direction of the olive brown. It should shine a beacon to where they¡¯re hiding.¡± ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m ready, though I feel you¡¯re underestimating the severity of how the bad luck can and will have on everything you are going to do,¡± He replied in a warning tone, still sounding tired but now with more focus than he had a moment ago, ¡°Especially with the higher likelihood of miscommunication with a shoddy form of communication like Mathews unstable spell. Bad luck is a real problem; that¡¯s why people typically say no plan survives the enemy. Do not underestimate it.¡± ¡°Okay," I took a breath as I tried to logic my way around the issue. " To double-check that the telepathy spell is actually going to only cause minor communication issues, everyone just try saying their name to everyone else twice.¡± ¡°Ma-..ew..-thew.¡± ¡°Oli-.. Oliver.¡± ¡°01000001 01101100 01100101 01111000, 01000001-... 01111000.¡± ¡°Yeah,¡± I put my face in my hand, ¡°This is going to be an issue.¡± ¡°I¡¯d say,¡± Alex said, ¡°I just got part of that song by They¡¯re Probably Dwarfs in response. Professor Worm, I think it''s called, but I could be wrong.¡± "Alex, that''s not important now, but it looks like I need to simplify the plan," I sighed, gave up on complexity and said with a hint of defeat, ¡°I¡¯ll just yell; we¡¯ll hopefully get partial-¡± ¡°START!¡± Yin yelled. 23. Jacq Of All Saves ¡°START!¡± I jumped at the unexpected loud noise. The other teams rushed off immediately, some wincing as they moved towards where we were told the Jacqs were. I turned back to my team, slightly panicky, as I knew the timer had now started, and anything other than action was time-wasting. ¡°Ok, I¡¯ll find the Jacqs; you guys save them.¡± I summarised before moving towards the wrecked building. My team nodded in agreement. ¡°Ready to use the aura vision?¡± I thought at Edward. Edward replied, focused but slightly sleepily, ¡°I guess I¡¯ll have to be, but stop a second. I want to try something.¡± I followed his instructions and stopped; I was next to one of the crumpled buildings. My vision then became blurry, like a 3D movie without the glasses. Edward had effectively half-possessed me, causing both of us to see in normal vision and aura vision. I could spot the different instances of Jacq¡¯s soul under the rubble in front of me and around the arena. It was slightly satisfying to see that some of the teams were wasting their effort. ¡°Huh, I wasn¡¯t actually expecting that to¨C what?¡± Edward said out loud, making me jump as my mouth moved without me expecting it to. ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s weird; you do the taking.¡± ¡°Ok, ignoring that,¡± I started, mumbling, ¡°Guys, there¡¯s two under here!¡± Alex and Matthew started moving the rubble near where I was pointing. I then moved closer to another set of soul fragments, which seemed easier to reach: ¡°Oliver, Jacq here.¡± There seemed to be some Jacqs who were trapped only in the buildings that were still standing and required only some things to move. ¡°Oh, my hero!¡± Jacq said as he spotted us. ¡°Now get me to safety.¡± I was just about to move a wooden beam before my body froze. ¡°Careful, that¡¯s a support beam. Move that, and the rest falls.¡± The advice was helpful but still slightly creepy. In response, I changed my plan and moved the parts around the beam, making sure that it was still stable enough by getting Oliver to hold it steady while making enough room to get Jacq through. ¡°Uh, it¡¯s always funny when they make that mistake. Good job avoiding it, though,¡± Jacq said, sounding slightly disappointed that we avoided the gotcha as I got Oliver to look after them. ¡°We should probably check the Jacqs for injuries,¡± I said, as I suddenly remembered something my mum mentored about things like this, ¡°and keep them distracted, as that would be something we need to account for in real life, to limit the number of Shades that the ¡®villagers¡¯ seeing their village in such a state might attract. We might get marked for things like that, as I¡¯m sure that counts as technique.¡± ¡°Good point,¡± Oliver replied, ¡°I¡¯ll stay with the ones we save.¡± As we left the building, we saw that Mathew and Alex had also saved theirs. ¡°Where next, boss?¡± Alex said when he spotted us giving a mock salute. ¡°Leave them with Oliver, and¡ª¡± I looked around. A couple that I¡¯d seen before had been saved, but the next biggest area of olive brown was under a building that looked like a prison. It also seemed to be the biggest area away from any of the other colours. ¡°Over there, it looks like there¡¯s four. Start near the middle.¡± ¡°Sure, thing boss, though we might need to speed up slightly, the Legends have already gotten five of them out while we have three.¡± Alex updated me, ¡°What do you think, divide and conquer or focus on the big groups together?¡± ¡°I¡¯d say our best bet is to focus on the bigger groups,¡± I looked over at Mathew, ¡°Do you agree?¡± He nodded in response, looking slightly frustrated that he wasn¡¯t able to make his spells work without the verbal component. We then got to work quickly to rescue these Jacqs. *** The rest of the test was similar as we uncovered different Jacqs and gave them to Oliver to look after. Only a couple of the other teams had a similar plan, though that could have been caused by them copying us or by that team member being the most out of commission due to the bad luck. I did half lament not being able to use any speed, and though I was tempted, I didn¡¯t try it. Edward warned me that even if I had access to it, my particular Legacy still might not have been a good idea, as there may be stray ruptured gas lines that we¡¯d likely have the bad luck of running into with a stray spark. We didn¡¯t go completely bad luck-free, as when Mathew¡¯s tongue healed. He immediately tried to reconnect the telepathy link, which, of course, lined up exactly with when I was working around another support beam. I jumped accidentally, knocking the beam and causing the area around it to start to collapse. This meant that Alex and I had to quickly try to hold up the ceiling as we tried to get Jacq out, as he looked at us judgingly. You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. ¡°And I thought you¡¯d accounted for support beams.¡± The mental expletives caused Mathew to sheepishly say, ¡°Sorry.¡± as he came to help. The saving did go more smoothly with access to Mathew¡¯s shield spell, which we used to add stability to the structures. Alex helped us avoid potential electrical dangers by moving the electronics away from the water. The actual moving of rubble went far easier than I was expecting as I had apparently become stronger since I¡¯d last checked. The added reinforcement of my muscles with aura caused a noticeable improvement in how much I could lift even without directly weaving into my arms and legs yet, which was certainly motivation to continue with the technique despite how exhausting it had been. When Yin yelled, ¡°Time!¡± We had managed to save around fifteen Jacqs, which seemed to be one of the higher amounts. The Legends annoyingly seemed to have saved the most despite our aura vision advantage; their legacies seemed to be better equipped for tasks like this. The saved Jacqs disappeared as everyone appeared in front of Yin to be judged. His eyes dimmed as he reestablished his control over his Legacy. ¡°You¡¯ll be glad to know I¡¯ve stopped my bad luck now,¡± Yin started, ¡°and you¡¯ll also be glad to know we won¡¯t leave you hanging too much in how you did.¡± Dr Jacq reappeared next to him with a clipboard. ¡°Right, team Legends saved me most and from my perspective, team Duck caused the least amount of extra damage.¡± ¡°That seems similar to my perspective,¡± Yin confirmed, ¡°but I¡¯d also like to mention that team Bright Sparks seemed to cause the least amount of damage per you they saved, plus they were one of four teams that looked after the Jacqs they saved which is a vital part of these rescue operations. They also seemed to be the most accurate in finding where they needed to dig to get you out, which contributed to how they were able to save as many of you as they did.¡± ¡°Nice, now with the negatives. As the timer ended, eight of me were still stuck. I¡¯ll remind you that speed is certainly needed in these situations as trapped people panic, may need medical attention, or only have a limited amount of air. Also, at least one team unintentionally made the situation more dangerous for at least two of me while saving a different me.¡± ¡°Right,¡± Yin responded, ¡°and the team Work Saw caused the most unnecessary damage, but I do have to take that fact with some leniency, as the power make up of Work Saw is less suited for recovery work, but even so, try to limit your structural damage in the future.¡± The team standing to the right of us, who I assume were team Work Saw, looked guiltily to the ground. I could definitely see Yin¡¯s point, as looking at the team, it seemed like the team¡¯s powers seemed far more suited to combat and causing damage. The leader looked over two metres tall with hands that could change into boulders. ¡°All of you seemed to deal with the unexpected bad luck reasonably well, still being able to work effectively even with injuries that limited how you could use your weapons and powers, plus, of course, headaches and tiredness. While you certainly can improve in the future, you should be proud of where you are currently.¡± Yin concluded. ¡°You¡¯ll receive more personalised notes later,¡± Jacq added at the end of Yin¡¯s speech, ¡°so you can be not as terrible in the future.¡± *** As typical, after Jacq¡¯s lesson, everyone dragged themselves to the cafeteria, limbs dead, the adrenaline wearing off. The only one of my team still unaffected as much was Alex, as usual, which felt unfair, but there wasn¡¯t much that we could do about it. Despite being the member of the team who was the second most robot, I did not benefit from this fact. Using the linked vision with Edward gave me a headache. It was like I¡¯d watched a movie cross eyed for an hour, an experience I would not recommend. It may have helped my team, but I had suffered the consequences. I wouldn¡¯t recommend it. Mathew was staring at his tea as he didn¡¯t want a repeat of the morning, ¡°You know, I don¡¯t think I appreciated not having a burnt mouth as much as I do now.¡± he took a tentative sip of his mug before putting it back down, ¡°Accurate pronunciation of syllables was not something I¡¯d taken any thought in really before today. Especially the vocal part of my spells, I know it¡¯s possible to do without that aspect, but it was just so much easier with it that I think I got lazy. Plus I probably am over reliant on the spells.¡± I smiled at him, ¡°I thunder whath broughth thoths thoughths thon.¡± He threw a roll at me, deservedly. Unfortunately for him, I just caught it and took a bite. ¡°I don¡¯t think a team leader should make fun of his teammates.¡± ¡°It was an hour ago, so I can, and it¡¯s funny.¡± Mathew rolled his eyes in response, but luckily for me, he didn¡¯t roll me again. ¡°But yeah, I get it; I feel I might have been starting to get over-reliant on my speed, but during the test, I was fine without it. Then again, it most likely wouldn¡¯t have hurt.¡± I paused as I remembered Edwards¡¯s warning, ¡°Except maybe if Edward was right about the potential gas leaks, but I guess we¡¯ll never know.¡± ¡°I¡¯m of the opinion that, most of the time, you don¡¯t need a Legacy,¡± Oliver added in. Alex looked at him, ¡°Of course you¡¯d have that opinion.¡± ¡°Damn right, and I¡¯d probably contradict myself as soon as mine unlocks.¡± He replied, ¡°It¡¯s getting to the point where I¡¯m tempted to take Jacq up on his offer despite what people say.¡± Edward chucked me out of my body as my vision changed perspective. I saw my eyes flip colours: ¡°Don¡¯t.¡± I was suddenly back in control. ¡°I mean, it can¡¯t be that bad,¡± I said, immediately contradicting him, ¡°and yes, Edward is boring his eyes into the back of my head as I say this; why do you ask?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t think I¡¯d be able to ask them directly, anyway,¡± he said, shrugging his shoulders, ¡°They¡¯re scary.¡± He then looked behind himself, ¡°Huh, to be honest, I fully expected Jacq to appear behind me.¡± ¡°Yeah,¡± Alex agreed, ¡°That does sound like something they¡¯d do.¡± ¡°Anyway,¡± Mathew interrupted, ¡°Tomorrow seems like a more lax day; we mostly just have history with Miss Howl.¡± ¡°It should be fun. History seems to be one of the less taxing lectures we have here,¡± I replied. ¡°It¡¯s mostly cool stories, kingdoms falling, and trying to learn how not to do that.¡± 24. Call of the Darkness Festival Miss Howl stood in front of the classroom, looking pleased with herself as she looked over our not exhausted expressions. ¡°I managed to convince the admin to move this lesson so you would actually be conscious for it rather than having it smack dab after Dr Jacq¡¯s monstrosity of a lesson plan. Especially for this topic,¡± She began, looking excited. ¡°A topic that still impacts us to this day! I am, of course, talking about the Call of the Darkness Festival, which happens every four years.¡± There was a slight murmur throughout the class, curiosity permeating each of the students. The Call of the Darkness Festival was a celebration of negative emotion in a safe environment. It was held in one of the kingdoms every four years and consisted of creative works that were written to instil fear and tragedy. This was to help the population work through these negative emotions so they did not fester and grow. The festival consisted of many parts, such as horror attractions, creative work screenings, and occasionally controversies that otherwise were deemed dangerous to reveal. Plus, personal celebrations typically take place, such as celebrating the recently deceased. All of this was allowed as Mythics from across kingdoms travelled for the festivals to deal with the Shades that the event lored towards the kingdom. The festival served two purposes: to cull the local Shade population, advertise new protective technology, and show the might of each kingdom and the second purpose was to allow the release of pent up negative emotion so that the kingdom¡¯s mental health is better supported as it had been shown that repression and stress caused adverse health outcomes. Miss Howl waited for the chatter to quiet down, ¡°The origins of the festival started with the fall of the Kingdom of Vercult, where the kingdom was overwhelmed by masses of Shades. What was the cause of such an unprecedented swarm is hotly debated in the literature, but all you need to know for this lecture is that it happened and that the other kingdom¡¯s leadership met and discussed how to prevent similar circumstances from happening in the future.¡± A student that I recognised but didn¡¯t know put their hand up, and I felt a flash of dread about what they were about to ask. I tried to rationalise my thoughts in that it was recent history; It obviously will come up. Despite the fact that just hearing about it shouldn¡¯t matter, I just did not want to think about it. She spotted him, ¡°Yes, Max, do you have a question?¡± ¡°Yeah, if the festival is supposed to limit Shade populations, then why was the Blackout such a disaster?¡± My heart rate spiked; I just needed to push the emotion back down. ¡°As in, why were there so many?¡± The rest of my team noticed that I was uncomfortable as it was clear on my face and breathing. I did not like this topic. I heard Mathew¡¯s voice in my mind, ¡°Are you ok?¡± ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m fine; you don¡¯t need to worry.¡± It was clear from his face that he didn¡¯t believe me, but he left it there. Miss Howl answered the question, ¡°While yes, the Blackout was a massive tragedy, based on historical precedent, it is argued that its magnitude was greatly lessened by the festival. Although there are many who argue that we should reduce the amount of time between the festivals from four years to two as only reducing the Shade population for each kingdom every twelve years allows too much time for them to build up.¡± ¡°Then why don¡¯t we?¡± Max replied. Miss Howl sighed, as she had clearly expected the question, ¡°In a perfect world, we¡¯d be able to; the main issue is the expense of the festival. Administrative costs are extremely large due to the difficulty of inter kingdom travel, and the number of Mythics that are needed means that there is a cost in regular protection, not to mention the difficulty of populations outside kingdom walls.¡± ¡°Of course, in more recent years,¡± she continued in a more positive tone, ¡°Improvements in technology have reduced a lot of the expenses, with easier communications helping both sides of the festival as creatives can work with more people outside their respective kingdoms and Mythics are easier to contact. As I¡¯m sure you¡¯ve heard, Light Industries are also finding a solution to the issues with travel, which hopefully means that we will be able to celebrate more regularly.¡± Alex put up his hand. ¡°Yes, Mr Eye?¡± ¡°While yeah, technology is great, but doesn¡¯t it also make everything more difficult as well as make things easier? Such as online leaks to the other kingdoms; hasn¡¯t that caused more attacks in the less protected kingdoms? Every innovation has its benefits and negatives.¡± ¡°Good point.¡± Miss Howl answered, ¡°While you are correct in that over the last couple of festivals, there have been a few issues with some of the creative works spreading further than their intended audience, the increase in attacks is small enough that they are within each kingdom¡¯s regular defensive abilities. Plus, encryption technology is improving to help stop unintended access, but I will admit it is a cat and mouse chase between those who want to leak it and those plugging the leaks.¡± She looked around at the students, ¡°If no one has any more inputs, I¡¯ll continue, though feel free to interrupt if you have any more questions,¡± She waited a beat before continuing, ¡°The festival, overall, seems to have been a success as on average Shade attacks have reduced in magnitude compared to before it was started. Of course, there are some who disagree and believe that the magnitude would have decreased even without the festival, they are in the minority of the literature. That hasn¡¯t stopped those who agree with them being incredibly vocal.¡± If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. At just the implicit mention of the protests, there was a feeling of irritation felt by the majority of the students. A lot of moral panic had been surrounding the festival as some people felt that horror material had detrimental effects on the population and inspired depravity. Arguments have broken out over how those who partake put everyone in danger despite studies showing the opposite, with those who consumed the media having a lower overall likelihood of attracting Shades as they had experienced the emotions in a more controlled environment. ¡°While yes most of their claims are refuted by the data, traditionalists do have an impact on celebrations; therefore, some accommodations are needed. Most commonly, it is Mythics who have more crowd control legacies to try and calm situations before they break out of control.¡± She continued onto a slightly more contentious part of the festival, ¡°A similar protocol is also needed in difficulties that typically arise when the festival starts in a kingdom. With the extra protection afforded against Shade attacks, there is a larger amount of controversies that arise as public outcry is easier to manage. That is also why you see a lot more charity work or typically temporary direction changes with politicians and companies to pre-empt the backlash. Some believe that the protests are partially funded by these people to either distract or to voice their views indirectly, but there hasn¡¯t been any evidence to support this claim.¡± The bell rang to signal the end of the lesson. ¡°Ah, that seems like it¡¯s time, if you have any questions I¡¯ll be here a few more minutes, but I covered what I wanted to cover. There are extra readings online.¡± *** ¡°Are you sure you are ok?¡± Mathew asked after the lecture. ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s just old emot-¡± My perspective warped as Edward took over in the middle of my sentence cutting me off, ¡°-ions. Uh, really?¡± ¡°Nope, but he¡¯s just trying to repress the memories.¡± Edward answered for me, ¡°Trust me, as someone who was accidentally forced into them, there¡¯s a lot of unresolved trauma in here.¡± He patted my head like it was the boot of a car. ¡°Hey! I¡¯m fine, I dealt with it ages ago, no one needs to worry about it.¡± ¡°He¡¯s saying that he appreciates the concern, and he wants to talk through it with you guys as he can trust you as a team.¡± ¡°Stop saying words with my mouth!¡± ¡°Kid.¡± He thought at me with a more serious tone, ¡°As someone who also went through traumatic shit as well, talking helps. You may not have gotten therapy yet, but you¡¯re getting therapy whether we have to force healthy coping mechanisms or not.¡± I regained control of my body, ¡°As I was actually saying, I¡¯m fine. It¡¯s just old emotions.¡± ¡°Trauma.¡± Edward corrected. I mentally repeated myself, ¡°It''s just old emotions.¡± Alex replied, ¡°It¡¯s fine you can talk when you¡¯re ready, I¡¯m sure any of us would be willing to listen or even any of the Legends. We¡¯re your team, and friends were supposed to support you.¡± ¡°I¡¯m fine.¡± ¡°Ok, we¡¯ll leave it there.¡± *** After that intervention, we went back to our room, as history had been the last lesson of the day. I decided that the best course of action to deal with the free time was to extend my aura pattern to my arms. It also let me just keep to myself more after the lesson. I double-checked my timetable to make sure there weren¡¯t any lessons that required my Legacy or even the use of my arms. This was just in order to prevent a repeat of last time. There wasn¡¯t that much of an issue this time though, as according to the book Dr.Keter lent me, the difficulty peaked with the torso. The second most difficult being the head which I was leaving till later. I likely had an advantage in dealing with my head, as I was able to almost get an outside look with Edward. I just thought doing my arms was a safe bet, as it had the least amount of risk. Was it smart to mess with the pattern so soon? It probably would be smart to wait till my body adapted to the previous changes first before adding on more, but who said I was smart? I looked at the instructions one last time before I started the first step of the process, which was grasping the ¡®thread¡¯ closest to my right arm. I kept the mental association of a cooking recipe to make sure the threads were not too defined as they were previously, and I pushed the aura into loops as I covered the length of my arm. The hazy blue and defined red flowed into the pattern as my concentration increased, and I got into the repetition of the actions. I could, in the back of my mind, feel Edward following me behind, correcting small mistakes that made the whole thing more cohesive. I finally got to the last loop as I reconnected my right arm back to the torso pattern. The exhaustion hit me; it wasn¡¯t as draining as it had been the first time, but still, my arm was dead. It felt like it was going to be stronger with time, but incredibly weak at the moment like I had just lifted heavy weights for hours without breaks. I didn¡¯t even know your forearm could become numb or even that you could be aware of it. It made me aware of muscles I never knew I had. The mental exhaustion was also considerable; I didn¡¯t think I had the mental fortitude to go through it again. I just didn¡¯t have it left in me. I could tell Edward was also tired, as when I told him that, I could tell he heard, but he didn¡¯t react. Edward did seem to be handling it better, though. I assume this was due to the fact he hadn¡¯t needed to help me as considerably as before. Don¡¯t get me wrong, he still seemed exhausted, but he was more defined than he had been after the torso. That being said, he, too, didn¡¯t seem fit enough to go through it again for the left arm, so we¡¯d have to leave completing the arms to another day. This just meant I¡¯d have a stronger right arm for a couple of days, which, I hoped, no one read too much into. 25. Running on Creativity As the term went on, my team and I settled into a routine while training together, trying to make our skills mesh as easily as possible. From what I could see, this was similar across the year, especially with the Legends. We occasionally competed in things such as accuracy or speed of taking down Shades in the simulations. However, despite the fact that our teamwork was improving, the routine did have the negative fact that we had slightly too practised battle tactics and our personal fighting styles too defined. At least this is what Dr Jacq had complained about; therefore for their next lesson was a one on one in which we were not allowed to use any of the fighting techniques we¡¯d shown before. Mathew needed new spells, Alex, new tech, Oliver, new arrows, and I needed to learn how to actually fight. Knowing Jacq, we knew that this would be enforced; my guess was that he was going to use Ruler again, though I didn¡¯t know his range. Alex and Oliver seemed to have the easiest time with the task, as Alex was excited for the excuse to test out new things. Mathew begrudgingly hit the books to search for examples of aura manipulation or to see if his previous incarnations had written anything down. It was mostly a task of research and translation for him and, of course, finding something that would actually be useful. My problem was that I wasn¡¯t really a planner. When it came to creativity, I was more of an improv fighter. That being said, I did fall back on a basic fighting style, which had served me well so far. We headed to the library, which seemed to be a popular destination for our year, as the pressure from Jacq was enough to motivate most people. Each of my team members went to their separate areas to research and agreed to meet up later, as it would have been difficult to find a table for all of us with how busy it was. After about five minutes of wandering around, I found a free seat and took out a pen and paper. ¡°Ok, what is my Legacy exactly?¡± I thought to myself, ¡°So, I¡¯m fast, but how?¡± ¡°Well compare it with mine,¡± Edward said, making me jump as I wasn¡¯t expecting it, ¡°My Legacy alters my personal time to be faster, yours actually alters you as you use it.¡± ¡°Oh, yeah! The sparks! I could use that as an attack,¡± I thought excitedly, ¡°While I run, I could build up static and add a shock to my punch.¡± ¡°Good start; how are you storing the static?¡± ¡°Ah, yeah.¡± I paused for a moment, ¡°I could just ask Alex to add a battery or something.¡± ¡°While, yes, that could be a good idea that might just add bulk you don¡¯t need, a better idea could just to see how long you need to store the static.¡± He continued like an instructor; it was strange that he was actually being helpful without any tricks. It was almost suspicious. ¡°Why are you being so helpful?¡± I asked directly. ¡°Can¡¯t I just mentor you like we agreed? Is that so weird?¡± he responded, apprehended by my questioning. I gave him a look. ¡°Ok, this is the first time I¡¯ve actually seen you try and plan something rather than running ahead and dealing with the consequences after.¡± He thought at me, rolling his non-existent eyes, ¡°I know you¡¯re more of a pantser and not a planner, but I thought I could cultivate this change. And you sort of remind me of my friend with your floundering around.¡± I paused for a second before replying, ¡°OK, ignoring how that sounds slightly patronising, I do appreciate the help. We could try going to the arena to test the static.¡± ¡°Sounds good.¡± *** I left the library for the arena, where people were also trying out new techniques, the majority of which I only vaguely recognised from lessons. The arena had been set up with training dummies and an obstacle course for practice. The dummies clearly had been through a lot with char marks, and I could swear I saw one with bite marks, human bite marks. I acquired one of the dummies that someone had upgraded with sensors so I could see how much static I could put into a punch. It could measure current, heat and pressure, which was incredibly useful for seeing how bad I was at regular punching. I quickly got distracted trying to increase my score with a regular punch but apparently, I needed my speed to make them hit hard enough to be helpful. I spent slightly too long not doing what I was here to do, but I do think I managed to get my regular punches to be reasonable. Edward reminded me to get on with it. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. In order to build up static, I ran while trying to focus on the aura in my arms. As I moved, I could feel the pressure building up, and once I felt a tipping point, I unleashed the energy onto the dummy. At least, that was the plan. According to the sensor, only a small amount of the electricity was transferred; the rest seemed to just dissipate into the surroundings. It wasn¡¯t a complete failure of a first attempt; it was successful conceptually, as I could feel my hairs standing on end. The problem was that it wasn¡¯t concentrated, so it was far less useful in an actual fight. It took me about half an hour in real time for me to work out how to make the electric punch useful in a fight. I needed to focus on the aura in my hands instead of the full arms, and although it was an effective attack, it was slightly too one-and-done as it only lasted for one hit, especially with how it needed a build-up before I was actually able to enact it. So, as a fighting style, it failed, but it did count as a good starting move and may be useful in a group fight. ¡°Ok, while it was successful, that idea is basically a bust,¡± I complained to Edward. ¡°It¡¯s an alright start, though.¡± He replied, sighing slightly, trying to give a positive spin on the situation, ¡°Plus, it¡¯s still usable.¡± ¡°Yeah, but I need enough new stuff to have a chance to survive Jacq¡¯s class.¡± I complained, ¡°I mean, what is my usual stuff? Punching and kicking and hoping for the best?¡± ¡°Probably more just hitting a lot and evading. You probably could practise actually using your legs more, your preference for your arms is likely a thing you need to work on. Plus, your prosthetic would deliver a mean kick, though it¡¯s probably why you don¡¯t kick much.¡± ¡°So basically, I just need to do the Can Can as a fighting style?¡± ¡°If that means kicking, then yes.¡± ¡°Uh, fine. I¡¯ll try different kicks.¡± *** While I had a basic idea of how kicks worked based on what I had seen on TV, I thought it¡¯d be best to look it up in the library. I ran into a couple of dead ends, such as when I picked up one manual that had the name ¡°Pumped Up Kicks,¡± but that just turned out to be song lyrics, which weren¡¯t helpful. After finding the correct section of the library for what I was looking for, I managed to find a book on martial arts that focused mostly on the basics of kicks. The manual did mostly focus on kicks designed against humanoid and therefore might not be broadly applicable to all fights, it still was good for what I needed it for; more ways to kick. Pleased with my find, I went back to the area to test the moves on the dummy. While the guidelines for the kicks were thorough, copying them from a still illustration was difficult. I was finding it difficult to put enough force into the kick to make it useful in a fight. I just couldn¡¯t work out the follow-through. It got to the point where Edward apparently had enough and swapped our places so I could see how it was actually done. It was actually incredibly helpful, as with the aura vision, I was able to even see how the flow of the aura affected the kick as he moved with my body. After going through one of the kicks a couple times he gave me back control so I could try again, I almost got it correct. Edward then made me try again, giving me sight adjustments as I kicked until I perfected the move. We then went through a routine of me finding a kick and trying it out. Edward showing me how to actually do it, then me trying again, and then Edward made small corrections, rinse and repeat, until I got it. I managed to work out about four different kicks before Edward decided that I needed to combine them into actual fights rather than just some disconnected moves. Then it was just me vs. the dummy, or, as Edward put it, dummy vs. dummy. I worked out how to input a ranking system into the dummy as it registered the impacts of my moves so I could see how I was improving as I went along. It took me about an hour to have relatively consistent scores. My prosthetic increased the impact of my kicks but not enough to be over reliant on it, I worked out a good pattern of kicks that seemed to work well for me and was even able to introduce the static punch into the move set. I was quite pleased with my progress of planning a new move set, but I was getting sweaty with the amount of exercise so after a bit I decided to go check on the rest of my team to see how they had been getting on. I found most of them in the library, Mathew was surrounded by paper and books, and had his hands covered in ink. It seemed to me like his main focus was on trying to learn a kinetic energy rune, and from the slightly manic, unhinged, pleased look on his face, I think he managed it. I don¡¯t know how long it had been, but I feel it wasn¡¯t long enough for him to look like that. Oliver, when I found him, seemed to be trying to unlock his Legacy by the look of his notes about different methods of teleportation, as the system seemed to suggest that was likely what his flavour of powers was going to be. He didn¡¯t seem to have had success yet. I asked where Alex was but apparently, he had been kicked out of the library for trying to use the computers as parts, Oliver suggested the gun range to look for him next. When I got to the gun range, Alex had already been checked out there for a similar reason to the library. Luckily, because Telum has had experience with technopaths before, they had a storage area with random junk that no one needed, and I managed to find him there. He had been trying to make what seemed to be rocket boots, which, in my opinion, was quite cool. While he was able to make a working design, using them seemed to be a different beast, according to him. He just hoped he was able to practically use them when it got to Jacq¡¯s lesson. Out of the team, Matthew and I seemed to have been the most successful in our research, followed closely by Alex. Luckily, though, we still had time before Jacq showed us all the flaws we missed. The main way I thought would be a good way to minimise this was to show the rest of the team what we had been working on. Practice makes perfect, and we really needed the practice. 26. Kick It Up A Notch The day of the lesson arrived, and I felt confident. My team¡¯s research and planning had paid off as we were able to integrate our new fighting techniques into our fight simulations. Unfortunately, Oliver had still been unable to unlock his Legacy. He had had to cut his losses on that angle and chose to focus more on close combat as he had been neglecting that side of fighting, using his bow as a bow staff. The main theory we could come up with was that as his Legacy was linked to teleportation, he just hadn¡¯t been in a situation where his soul had felt truly in danger. He has always had enough resources around him, or even Alex, to protect him. This prevailing theory was why we really did not trust Jacq to fix this issue; Edward had horror stories about students with similar issues to Oliver, which Jacq had been able to find a solution to. What made the stories worse was the fact that he had been successful with his solutions. We all went to our respective rooms to start the lesson, and as I stood outside the room, panic started to creep in. Was my confidence warranted? Did I prepare enough? I used my breathing technique, which I¡¯d learnt from meditation, to calm my mind from the uncertainty. The worst-case scenario was that I failed, and failure was a good teacher; success was preferable, though. I touched the door handle, and suddenly, rules appeared in my mind, almost like an RPG quest condition. [Only use techniques Doctor Jacq has not seen you use previously; regular body functions do not count as techniques; running, walking and dodging are permitted] It¡¯s so nice of them to allow us to dodge. I hadn¡¯t even considered it to be against the rules, but I guess Jacq has seen me dodge before. I opened the door. ¡°How the fu-¡± I stepped on the mossy floor of a forest, my brain taking a moment to adjust to the scene. A moment Jacq was not going to give me. Warning bells sounded in my mind as I felt my aura react, causing me to duck before my brain caught up, the woosh of an arrow nicking my hair. ¡°Ha! I almost got you.¡± I heard the snark from multiple places at once as I ran through the trees. ¡°I know I said no old techniques, but I don¡¯t think quick reactions count. You were almost better the first time.¡± Ok, so they¡¯re in the trees. I had practised kicks; how do you kick that high? I could make a clearing to give them less places to hide. Time to punch some trees? I heard movement above me. Time to punch some trees. Time slowed to a crawl as I started clearing trees for my clearing. I tried to hit the trees so they fell in opposite directions to each other, giving them extra hits to make sure they were out of the way. I heard Dr Jacq grunt slightly as the trees they were on suddenly were far less stable than they had been. Though my plan worked, and Jacq was now grounded, I hadn¡¯t expected the fatigue that immediately followed using Edwards¡¯ power to be as bad as it was. I was still fine with continuing; it was just unexpected. ¡°I see you realised your weakness and acted accordingly,¡± a female Jacq spoke as she walked into view. ¡°You really need better ranged attacks, though your team typically can alleviate some of the issues like that.¡± She had given up on the bow and was currently wielded daggers, armoured with manoeuvrability in mind. ¡°I see you gave up on hiding, and that hide was your best bet.¡± I quipped. ¡°Well, no, metal armour and more defensive tank armour is the best bet against you,¡± She replied, ignoring my joke, ¡°But this is supposed to be a lesson on showing me what new things you¡¯ve come up with, so I didn¡¯t want to stack the cards against you too much.¡± She ran at me with daggers aimed at me. I moved back out of the way of a blade to the throat. I needed to move out of my defensive mode and actually start properly attacking, as so far, I hadn¡¯t managed to land any direct hits on them yet. I moved around the clearing to get a better shot at them and to actually give myself enough room to kick. This had the added benefit of allowing me to build up static in my leg for when I eventually did land my technique. It was difficult to get Jacq to open up as they just kept wriggling out of the position. I wanted them in; it was like trying to hold a forty-pound flapping salmon. Then, finally, I was in position to do a sweeping kick to knock them over, and as I did it, the room seemed to close in on me as the distinct feeling of wrongness of the move almost caused me to stop until I corrected my stance and the pressure immediately left. Jacq became airborne as their legs left the ground, and they were hit with all the built-up energy stored in my leg. Seeing an opportunity for an extra hit, I elbowed them in the stomach using the recoil from my gauntlet for extra damage. ¡°Oh yeah, didn¡¯t you fail to do a sweeping kick before?¡± Edward commentated. Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. ¡°Not the time.¡± The Jacq disappeared at my feet, and four new Jacqs entered the ring. ¡°Ok, I¡¯ve seen how you have dealt with projectiles, one on one close combat and the environment, let¡¯s see how you deal with multiple goons.¡± The middle Jacq said, each of them looking like they were having fun, giving a cartoonish snarl to give a brawler look. Obviously, fighting them all at the same time would be dumb, especially because I couldn¡¯t just punch and run as I¡¯d done that in past lessons. Divide and conquer was definitely an idea, as two on one was easier than four on one. The ground was too wet to make a dust cloud. I could obscure their vision with leaves instead, but that would take too much energy, and I had already used too much to create the clearing. So, how do I split them up? When dealing with a group, the open clearing most likely wasn¡¯t the way forward. Going back into the trees would give me the advantage, as that would obscure their vision without me having to use too much energy. I had mostly just thought of sticking with the clearing because it¡¯s already here. Although who¡¯s to say there aren¡¯t any more Jacqs in the trees? Then again, this is mostly a lesson to try new strategies. Why be smart when I can just be new? I aimed for the one in the middle as I ran full pelt at their legs, blue sparks following me as I went. My rugby tackle lifted them off their feet, and I think I saw a genuine look of surprise on their face as they were carried away from the other three, my arms wrapped around their legs. The clearing became larger as another tree fell. That move had hurt my shoulder and I don¡¯t think I could get away with it a second time¡ªthree Jacqs to go. ¡°That was certainly new, though I can¡¯t really see many practical uses for that sort of technique.¡± Jacq queried. ¡°Let¡¯s see what else you¡¯ve got.¡± I was breathing heavier than normal, and my mouth tasted slightly metallic. ¡°Yeah, let¡¯s see.¡± *** I was face first in the moss as my body refused to move. The kicks had paid off, but they left my legs bruised, and the adrenaline that allowed me to fight the remaining Jacqs had left me as I finished off the final Jacq. I don¡¯t know if I won through the skill of my new techniques or just because Jacq let me. Let¡¯s go with my own skill. ¡°Rest is always important, but I don¡¯t think the floor is the best for that kind of thing,¡± Jacq said, completely fine, sitting cross-legged next to my alive but arguably dead body. ¡°Do you want some juice or a fizzy drink, you know, for energy?¡± I heard the footsteps of another Jacq as they put a pint glass of squash next to my face, ¡°It¡¯s orange squash and lemonade.¡± I turn my head to it. I did not have the energy to sit up yet, but my mouth was certainly dry. ¡°And here¡¯s a straw.¡± They put a neon pink curly straw in the drink and angled it to my face. They had their own glass, with its own straw and even a small paper umbrella in it. They were sat like this had just been a casual picnic with a flowery shirt and sunglasses. ¡°You did good, kid. I always like these lessons.¡± They sounded nostalgic in their tone, ¡°They always make people think outside the box more; that tackle was especially fun.¡± I grunted in reply as I sipped my drink. My shoulder hurt at the mention of the tackle. There was a moment before they continued, ¡°You guys really need to learn how not to be exhausted after these lessons. I mean, yeah, it¡¯s intense training, but I think not over-exhorting yourselves is a valuable skill when it comes to fighting, as you never know if you need to fight again afterwards. But yeah, you¡¯re not the only one who needed a break before they could leave. Your team does not do half measures.¡± It took around ten minutes for me to gain the ability to sit back up. Despite the damage caused by my fighting, the forest scene was actually relaxing. It was a cool temperature, and there was a slight breeze wafting through the leaves. I could hear birds in the distance, soft light casting shadows through the trees. You could easily forget that this was just a classroom. I finished my squash, trying to limit how much I moved as each movement was painful. I was gradually getting my breath back, though, as the minutes went on. We mostly sat in silence. Jacq probably had something better to do but had decided to wait until their students were able to leave by themselves, although he could do both with his power. Man, that Legacy was overpowered. *** It took me at least an hour and a half before I was able to leave that room. It was still less walking and more dragging myself back to my room to just sleep. Each step was still pain. You could tell who had been in the lesson by the classic tired faces. Everyone else mostly had an expression of empathy for our situation which I mostly just ignored. I had apparently been the last to our room as the rest of my team were already gone from this conscious world. All except Alex, though he did have at least the decency to look tired. You could have a guess of how their lessons went through their torn clothing and different developing bruises. I¡¯m pretty sure Mathew had a couple of burn marks on him and what could be soot smudges on his face. He handed me a can from the fridge, ¡°Hey boss, how¡¯d you find it?¡± I made a noise of acknowledgement. ¡°Cool, I thought it was fun, especially using my new toys. My arena was a sort of city type which was fun, I have no idea how they can make the rooms that big. It¡¯s amazing.¡± I gave him a thumbs up as I was still too tired to give a verbal response, at least one that would actually make sense as a sentence. I was currently head empty, no thoughts other than the fleeting response to stimuli. All that was in my head at that moment was: cold drink nice, I¡¯m tired. I finished the can, then another, and then I laid down, so my body could actually heal. I didn¡¯t black out this time, though. 27. Interlude: If Quizzes Make You Quizzical? Cassie stood outside the classroom. The main thought on her mind was: Why were doors always so skinny? She adjusted Granite to fit through the door frame, awkwardly crouching and shuffling sideways as she opened the door. [Only use techniques Doctor Jacq has not seen you use previously; regular body functions do not count as techniques; running, walking and dodging are permitted] ¡°So that¡¯s how that¡¯s being enforced.¡± She spoke as she walked onto the loose rock that fell into darkness. She caught herself before she joined them. It was almost as if the door she had just walked through was the entrance to a cave on the side of a cliff. In front of her were multiple mountain islands in a sea of rock of different heights, and perched on one spear of rock was Dr Jacq, who had just fired a bow. With only under a second to react, she managed to block the arrow with Granite, which splintered near her face. ¡°Good,¡± Jacq yelled. ¡°Your reaction speeds improved. Let¡¯s see what else has.¡± They disappeared from view. Cassie groaned internally. She had hoped she wouldn¡¯t have to try out the technique Star had suggested, but with slight hesitation, she put her foot flat against the wall and shifted her relative gravity. *** Alex was having a great time. The terrain he had been given was perfect for him. Huge glass skyscrapers with random tech junk in them looked like they fit visually, but the illusion faded once he got near enough to sense them. His¡­ rocket boosters? Fire jets? Air walkers? Whatever they were, they were fun and allowed him to fly. He was not as graceful as a Legacy, but he was enough to allow him movement that he could use against Jacq. Plus, he hasn¡¯t crashed as hard as he had during practice. He really should have thought about dodging projectiles, but he has only been hit by three out of ten so far. The main problem he had was multitasking, as controlling himself in the air took more thought than he had given credit to. While he had managed to hit at least a couple Jacqs it had made him lose control slightly like a dog on skates. Glass was a lot tougher than people give it credit. Jacq was yelling at him about something, but between the sound of the jets and the concentration it took to stabilise himself, he couldn¡¯t make out what they were saying. Maybe next time, it might be easier to make a whole suit instead of just boots and gloves. Ooo! Maybe he could develop auto stabilisers and shoulder projectiles! Another arrow hit his shoulder. ¡°Ow,¡± Alex said instinctually. This is why teammates are so useful: They think of the current moment, whereas he could think of more interesting things. There was also an issue with the lesson format for him, as it didn¡¯t trigger his battle code, making him unable to give the fight his full attention. What he really needed at this moment was a weapon that he hadn¡¯t used before and didn¡¯t require as much thought as flinging the junk at Jacqs. If only he could use the flight to fight. Wait! He could use the jets to fight, as fire hurt. It was so simple. Though he would need to get closer, which did get rid of that advantage, the fire would change his current velocity to the opposite of where he pointed, which may be less stable and easier to dodge. It could also work to his advantage, as he could attack and run simultaneously. More data was needed. Time for attempt number one. *** Mathew was not having fun. He did not deal well with heat and was being surrounded. Jacq had decided that the main area he needed to work on was dealing with multiple targets rather than one big one. Unfortunately, that observation was apt. He was being put under pressure and needed to fire off spells while moving and avoiding the lava around him. The terrain also tested his endurance. He was unable to stop for too long due to how hot the floor was. Any area he managed to cool enough was not cool for long due to the molten rock pools around him. He had already caught alight multiple times and had the burn marks to prove it. Mathew¡¯s main challenge was not falling back on old habits. He kept instinctually reaching for his tried-and-true spells, but that dam rule. He wasn¡¯t as practised in the new ones as the ones he¡¯d used for years, so he got a blast from the past as they occasionally destabilised with varied consequences. In all honesty, he hadn¡¯t given the rule the respect it deserved, as he couldn¡¯t think of how it could be enforced. So when the rule appeared in front of him, he cursed a bit. He had been completely thrown off after he tried to cast a blast spell. The resulting punishment almost made him sick, which would have been embarrassing. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. His research had borne fruit, though, with a few new spells he could add to the mix, and the rule didn¡¯t completely remove his access to his typical spells, just using them normally. He had already used the blast spell to move across a lava pond. It had been a shot in the dark, but he had learned that as it was formed using his aura, it couldn¡¯t harm him directly if he didn¡¯t want it to. This was extremely useful information, but not so much immediately. The Jacqs taunted him as he ran. The running commentary got tiring, as every mistake was lampshaded as he made them. There were some compliments when he managed to do something interesting, like hitting multiple Jacqs with lava through a blast spell, but they were far and between. He had been proud of that, but it hadn¡¯t lasted long. He needed more. Could he adapt the shield spell? That might be able to work as a way to knock a few Jacqs away. It likely wouldn¡¯t be too much mental strain to keep up, while using the other arm to attack directly. Maybe he¡¯ll get lucky with the lava around him. He can only try, though Jacq¡¯s yelling tips and encouragement were definitely distracting. *** Cassie was becoming more confident in her new technique; while initially, it had been disorienting as she timed the shift incorrectly, as the lesson went on, it got easier. She was having more fun with it as she got used to the feeling. Some of the pillars were certainly easier to walk on than others and she certainly wasn¡¯t as agile as some of her peers but it allowed her to jump between each rock spear while Jacq was only able to walk on the tops of them. It certainly wasn¡¯t easy. Cassie felt that Jacq might have been going easy on her, but the lesson definitely opened up more possibilities that she hadn¡¯t considered. She did get a little cocky with it, jumping between the islands and shifting her gravity as she moved, which lasted until she missed nearly face-planting as she got the timing wrong. Jacq pretended that they hadn¡¯t seen that, but she saw his held laughter. She knocked over the offending rock in response with Granite who tired her out more than he usually did as her usual technique of making him light Jacq had seen and therefore was not allowed. She had forgotten how heavy he was on her arm. She may have been improving, but she grew more tired as the lesson went on. She had to wipe the sweat from her eyes and smudged her makeup. There were still more Jacqs to face as she deflected the projectiles they sent at her, both with Granite and by changing their gravity, making them under or overshoot. She got closer to the main rock island, which was larger and flatter than the rest, and had the main group of Jacqs to meet her. The end was in view. *** The damage was adding up. Alexes¡¯s plan had worked, but at the cost of a few shots, he was going to call lucky from Jacq. His difficulty hearing had also been used against him, and while he managed to dodge on time due to his aura sense, he had not noticed the female Jacq sneaking behind him. He still had plenty of energy, but he was going to need to limit the number of hits he was going to take. He could use the junk around him to patch up some of the holes, but it would be better if he could prevent the holes in the first place, which was obvious but annoying still. With the amount of Jacqs steadily increasing, he had been having a more difficult time getting away and so he made the decision and went into one of the skyscrapers. The confined space allowed him to concentrate the Jacqs, making them easier to deal with the disadvantage of reducing his available escape routes but also made it more difficult for him to be crept up on. ¡°Finally, you turned of those loud engines, you know I don¡¯t appreciate being ignored,¡± Jacq complained as the fought their way through the different levels of the skyscraper. ¡°But if you actually want to use those out in the field, try and make them quieter. Though your group would be at less of a disadvantage, it¡¯s still necessary to hear your surroundings.¡± ¡°Good point. I have had many ideas from this lesson,¡± Alex replied. I can¡¯t wait to tinker with them. I think I¡¯ve got enough data for a orientation software.¡± *** Mathew was breathing heavily; he had whittled Jacq¡¯s numbers down to three. He was covered in soot and sweat, making his clothes cling to him uncomfortably. He stared them down. His throat itched with an upcoming cough. He had formed gauntlets over his arms like Toms; he thought he might have enough energy to finish them. ¡°You¡¯ve done well despite your clear disadvantage in this test.¡± The middle Jacq said, then looked slightly thoughtful for a second, ¡°Maybe the lava was mean, but then again, when have I been nice? Anyway, you¡¯re near the finish line.¡± He readied himself for the final push. *** ¡°Well, that was certainly tiring,¡± Alex said out loud, stretching a bit. ¡°Your classmates are going to hate you,¡± Jacq just laughed, ¡°Most of them are nearly unable to get up, and you call it ¡®certainly tiring¡¯. Classic.¡± Alex didn¡¯t think too much of it and made his way back to his room. Surprisingly, he didn¡¯t spot any of his classmates, and everyone else who saw him looked slightly dumbfounded. Unfortunately, he wanted to get to tinkering, but he needed to concentrate on fixing himself first. He was also running slightly low on energy. It took a slight while for the rest of his team to return. Each only gave him a passing glance before crashing onto their beds. The last of them was Tom, who was covered in grass stains and smelt vaguely of ozone. He passed him a can from the fridge, which he seemed grateful for. ¡°Hey, boss, how¡¯d you find it.¡± He grunted in response. Alex assumed that he was tired like the rest of the team, though he wasn¡¯t surprised, as he had taken the longest to get back and looked terrible like the rest of them. Alex half understood what Jacq meant by saying that the others would hate him, especially how exhausted they got. He knew he was lucky in that he was more durable than average and was able to last longer and recharge quicker, but it always surprised him to the degree that was. ¡°Cool, I thought it was fun, especially using my new toys. My arena was a sort of city type which was fun, I have no idea how they can make the rooms that big. It¡¯s amazing.¡± He responded with a thumbs-up and crashed into his bed like the rest of them. 28. Security Theatre The following couple of weeks were largely uneventful as everyone consolidated what they had learnt from the test and worked on improving the flaws that Dr Jacq had unearthed. Alex especially spent three days straight upgrading and changing his rocket boots before Oliver dragged him out of his cave to socialise. Mathew spent a lot of time practising his less-used spells, as Jacq¡¯s test really showed that he had been slacking in those areas. Oliver had started to get restless over his still-locked away Legacy, and while he had a clearly easier time with the challenges we had faced as he had had to be creative to make up for it, he still just wanted the cool powers already. Lessons carried on as normal, with lessons on economic history focusing on the societal factors that developed into the current system, such as the rate of technological growth causing jobs to be unstable due to how easily people could be replaced in certain sectors. Change, while necessary, often caused problems in the short run as people felt losses twice as strongly as they viewed gains. It was so easy to convince those who didn¡¯t understand fully that what benefited them in the long run was actually bad through appealing to emotions and scapegoats, especially when it inevitably results in an increase in Shade attacks in the beginning as the kinks get sorted out. Some kingdoms were better at change than others. Multiple guest speakers also gave lessons on battle strategy, resource management, and damage mitigation. Mr Fortune was the most enlightening about all the different redundancies that had been introduced into different parts of local infrastructure and how to use them when they failed. He had the most experience of missions going wrong due to his Legacy, which also meant he had a better idea of how different people react to the chaos that brings and how to best deal with them. If prevention fails, then the best thing to do is to know the early warning signs when things are going wrong and how to use this to your advantage. While all the many improvements that had been caused through the use of aura technology, aura as a power source had many unpredictable qualities to it when it leaked or broke. Aura takes on aspects of the soul it is creative from, and while these factors can be refined for more delicate tech and becomes more homogeneous the longer it¡¯s been away from its source, most of the main uses passively collect from the population. This means that build-up can be catastrophic or behave in weird ways, so it is best to try to stabilise or move away from it if it''s going to blow. It also is why some technopath tech sometimes doesn¡¯t work for anyone but their creator, as their aura stablises it. Edward and I got some more fundamentals of fighting down to an acceptable degree and extended the aura pattern to more parts of my body, this time with fewer unfortunate timings. We had settled into a routine with the rest of my team for training, which occasionally got interrupted by things like Oliver''s new methods of unlocking his Legacy. The main methods tested that had been unsuccessful had been gaining an item from a previous incarnation of him, trying to drop him from the highest point of Telum (which failed as Washington had predicted that people would try that method, so had preventative methods), trying to overload his aura by storing it then putting it back in, and other methods that tried to focus on how we were pretty sure it was teleportation related. Dr Jacq mostly just gave us a notebook rather than anything to stop us. I could be wrong, but I was pretty sure I saw him taking notes in the corner of my eye a couple of times. I occasionally found notes that gave more suggestions that were probably him, as well as relevant books on things that I don¡¯t remember taking from the library. As the weeks went on, the mission for Oliver¡¯s dad drew closer, so my team and the Legends had extra lectures on top of the regular ones. Alex¡¯s dad specifically came to make sure we understood what we would be guarding. *** Alex¡¯s dad stood at the front of the classroom. He wore a red leather jacket and looked like he was trying to be cool. He was leaning against the wall and took off the sunglasses he was wearing indoors to reveal his lilac eyes in a way that I think was supposed to resemble an animated character. ¡°The name''s Patrick Eye, and I am the head engineer for the White Whale project that you will be guarding during the unveiling. This monumental airship configuration that has innovated on the previous iterations by magnitudes. Our blue ocean strategy has allowed us to eclipse the competition in¨C¡± ¡°Uh, Dad, we don¡¯t need the marketing pitch,¡± Alex interrupted him, making him jump in the middle of his pre-rehearsed speech. We just need to know what security it has that we can use.¡± ¡°Ah, yes, the security,¡± Alex¡¯s dad took out his notes to get to that part, ¡°Yes! Here it is, security systems on the White Whale are speciality grade and cutting edge, sometimes even literally. It has the standard energy shields but also adaptive attack models that can work with a Mythic¡¯s Legacy; it works best, though, if the Legacy works over time rather than a one-and-done type. So while it technically can boost the range of my summons, it''s not any better than if I just summoned them normally, whereas a Legacy such as yours, Mr Hunter, would be mighty useful onboard, especially with your spells.¡± If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. I put up my hand, ¡°So how do we use those systems.¡± He laughed, ¡°Oh no, you won¡¯t need to use them; both teams will mostly be standing guard to prevent any of our competitors from getting too close a look at our systems. The AAM is mostly for potential Shade attacks during actual travel which won¡¯t be happening for a few months after the unveiling. You are mostly going to be security theatre and won¡¯t be expected to actually do anything meaningful. If we actually thought anything was going to happen, we¡¯d hire established Mythics; we''re doing it as a PR stunt. It''s supposed to be a symbolic new generation of technology with the new generation of Mythics, type thingy.¡± ¡°But what if something goes wrong?¡± I said. ¡°It won¡¯t.¡± ¡°But what if?¡± ¡°Well, we have many redundancies available in the unlikely happenstance something goes differently,¡± Mr Eye waved off my concern. The worst that might go wrong is that the pilot catches a cold or something, but that would just mean we would show off different aspects rather than how it flies, which certainly would be annoying but nothing too bad.¡± Alex put up his hand. ¡°No, we don¡¯t need you to test the system against technopaths again.¡± Alex put down his hand. ¡°Oh, yeah! If you guys wouldn¡¯t mind consenting to donating some of your auras to research, as from what I could see on your files, almost all of your files would seem compatible with the AAM.¡± He started taking out some contracts out of his bag, which had been off to the side before Oliver gave him a look. ¡°Or we could sort things like that out closer to the time. But yeah, I guess if there was a Shade breach or something, honestly, just jump into the White Whale, lock the door and let the more trained Mythics handle it. We are not expecting you to be anything other than being there. Honestly, you¡¯re just a reassurance for the public; you won¡¯t even be a last resort, in all honestly.¡± Alex¡¯s dad then went on to describe some of the other aspects of the airship using a diagram to point out the different systems, the multiple power hearts and other finer details. I did feel at least a little disappointed that my first actual mission was just for show. I mean, I got the idea that anything to calm the audience''s reaction was necessary, but I could tell that I wasn¡¯t the only one who wanted more out of it. It certainly did not help how he clarified about how we were not even being considered as a last resort, as that did hit the ego. ¡°I know I¡¯m the only reason we got this gig, but honestly, it feels like we''re being babied,¡± Oliver sighed, then continued almost under his breath ¡°, I almost hope something does go wrong so I can unlock this damn Legacy, I just need danger for it to click.¡± ¡°To be fair, though, what is the worst that could happen.¡± I heard Edward cringe when I said that, ¡°Other than the obvious like death, everything blows up or some rogue Mythic somehow, against the odds, manages to take over.¡± Mr Eye perked up at overhearing my muttering, ¡°Ah, Mr Walker, even those concerns have been taken into account. The ship can¡¯t be piloted by anyone other than those we''ve trained, and we¡¯ve only trained two of them. We have taken every safety measure available to prevent and stop any chance of blowing up. Plus, you¡¯re going to be more likely to die being struck by lightning than defending this airship.¡± ¡°So less than one in fifteen thousand three hundred?¡± Alex replied. ¡°Well, obviously, I don¡¯t have an exact statistic, but probably yes.¡± Mr Eye replied, seemingly used to Alex being pedantic. ¡°But yeah, that covers the basic schematics of the ship that you need to know, but remember kids, all you¡¯re doing is just keeping an eye out for nosy journalists or maybe the occasional curious onlooker. You''ll be bored out of your minds, I guarantee it." With that, the lecture concluded, and we went to get food as there wasn¡¯t really anything we needed to do at that moment in time. We also lacked motivation due to how dull the mission was likely going to be. Star tried to spin it into a positive, as even Cassie looked slightly less enthused than she had been. ¡°I mean, it will get our faces out there, which will be useful for getting missions later on.¡± ¡°Plus, you won¡¯t be stranded outside of the kingdom with all your friends and the people you know thinking you were dead.¡± ¡°Yeah, I suppose so. It''s still disappointing, though.¡± ¡°To be fair, though,¡± Mathew replied, ¡°we will get to see the White Whale up close. I¡¯ve heard that tickets for the unveiling are going for hundreds, and that''s even without the scalpers. It could be worse.¡± Oliver replied, ¡°Plus, there is other entertainment. It''s not just a press release. My dad also hired some singers. Don¡¯t ask which ones, though; I can¡¯t actually remember.¡± *** The next few days were regular lectures, and behind the scenes, all the paperwork was being filled out for the unveiling. More info was gradually revealed about the event, including who they had gotten to present; Alex said that his dad had wanted to, but it was deemed that Light Industries should hire outside and that the head engineer would only need to do a quick interview during the show. I believe this was done to maintain a neutral perspective for the audiences at home and also because Alex¡¯s dad was not the greatest public speaker¡ªa fact that he was allegedly slightly miffed at but understood. The show was going to be live across multiple kingdoms as the While Whale was set to be one of the first commercial aircraft that will do regular trips between kingdoms, as well as a less public version that just transported goods. A lot was riding on this going well, or as I should put it, a lot was riding on this going whale. The show had a lot of porpus-ful thought put in it, and hopefully, all this planning will hold water. 29. Memento Mori With the mission fast approaching, I decided that it would be best to work on the last part of my aura pattern so I wouldn¡¯t be going out on a mission with incomplete protection. The reason I had put it off so long is because the head is supposedly the most difficult part of any pattern. If I get it wrong there could be a myriad of effects, the majority of them negative and if it''s so bad there''s a chance I would need to break the pattern and start again. That would be incredibly frustrating. ¡°So,¡± I started my thought turning to Edwards''s floating body, ¡°How do you think we can cheat at finishing my aura pattern, or, option two, do you think we should just do what we''ve been doing already but just very carefully.¡± He gave me a long flat look, ¡°I think I can see what option you want to pick.¡± ¡°Sooooooo?¡± ¡°What do you even mean by cheating?¡± ¡°You know¡­¡± I paused dramatically in my head, ¡°Aura Vision?.¡± ¡°That''s not going to be as effective as you think it''s going to be,¡± He flatly replied, ¡°at least not any more than it has been for the previous parts. We¡¯re going to have to stick with option two as we don¡¯t really have a method of cheating even with aura vision.¡± ¡°Even with what?¡± ¡°Aura vision.¡± ¡°What is that? I don¡¯t think I¡¯ve heard of aura vision.¡± ¡°You¡¯re just trying to be annoying to mask your disappointment aren¡¯t you?¡± Edward mentally sighed and gave in. ¡°Even with¡­ Aura Vision ?. Happy now?¡± ¡°Very,¡± I replied, before sighing myself, as I had been hoping for an easier time, ¡°well let''s do it the boring way then.¡± *** I started my meditation as I had practised with my other sections of aura. It had certainly gotten easier as I got back into the flow of moving my aura from the centre into the pattern it needed to be, the rhythm came to me after repeating it however many times I had to repeat the same steps. I could feel Edward slightly behind my pattern, correcting any small mistakes I may have made, making each loop more of a cohesive whole. Then I got to my brain. The change in feeling almost threw me off, ruining weeks of work but I managed to avoid making a mistake. Despite not wrecking everything the difference certainly made things more difficult. It was like my aura was cleaning my brain pathways but unevenly, like suddenly having a random leg muscle replaced with a professional athlete¡¯s and immediately trying to run. I had to slow down and move the aura more methodically otherwise I might overshoot as the tactile feel of my aura became inconsistent. Edward was a lifesaver, fixing what mistakes slipped through with more ease than I could due to the changes in my mental processing speed not affecting him as it did me. The process felt like it took hours; it just kept going and going. More and more precise aura loops each connecting with the last. Then finally¡­ The loop connected to my centre. A moment passed as my body and brain caught up with that fact, and then the pure exhaustion of the process hit me as it was given the reprieve it had been silently screaming for. I passed out. *** I woke to the concerned looks of the rest of my team. My bed seemed like someone had poured a bucket of water on it, and it had seemed as though I¡¯d thrown up some sort of black bile while I slept which had dried into the bed sheet I was on. Despite what I probably physically looked like, I felt amazing, like recovering from a bad migraine. I had felt aspects of it during the process but due to how thought intensive the process was I couldn¡¯t appreciate it. My team watched as I sat up out of my sweat and bile, I was suddenly far too aware of my smell, my senses seemingly upgraded though being attached to the pattern. Mathew was the first to break the silence. ¡°I¡¯m guessing you finished your aura pattern?¡± He asked as more of a statement than a question. ¡°No, why?¡± I lied because I thought it was funny. ¡°Because you went ¡®I¡¯m going to do the aura thing now¡¯ before sitting in your bed and pulling this face.¡± Matthew retorted, pulling a face that looked almost constipated, ¡°Then two hours later we found you basically glowing purple before you passed out for nearly a day. Which, to be honest, isn¡¯t really that out of character, we did double check with Keter but he said that the body needs to aluminise itself with being so aligned with its own aura, so it¡¯s expected; plus he forgot to warn you to finish somewhere easier to clean so be grateful that we found your new sheets.¡±This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. ¡°Ah, well¡­¡± I started but I had no retort, ¡°Thanks, I¡¯m going to shower.¡± As I moved out of my bed the feeling was extremely strange as I moved as I thought with no delay in between. Which is great unless you¡¯ve always¡­ not done that. I was going to have to relearn movement, as it was like having a too sensitive game controller. Getting to the shower was an ordeal as I kept overshooting my steps. Luckily my balance had also upgraded with the pattern, so I managed to catch myself in time before actually tripping. It was going to take time to get used to and I was so glad that I decided to do it with adequate time before the mission, but before I get used to it I guess I¡¯ll have to move like a professional athlete who is also a toddler. *** I had only really recently gotten used to showering as I needed to take my leg off to do it and manoeuvre using handlebars so I didn¡¯t fall over. Now with my aura pattern complete, it was even weirder as I could balance perfectly standing without my leg so I didn¡¯t actually need to lean on anything. It was far easier but came with its own issue of trying to walk on my non-attached limb and smacking my face on the towel rack. I hadn¡¯t done that for months, I think I had been relying on my imbalance as a mental queue that I had it on. Luckily, no one saw that mishap, though they may have heard a thump and a ¡°I¡¯m fine!¡±. Then I got a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that I should check on something. I hadn¡¯t heard Edward since waking up, so I mentally checked our link feeling slightly guilty that I hadn¡¯t thought to, when I woke up. He was fine; if only still spiritually knocked out from the effort of completing my aura. This makes sense as I did borrow a lot of his energy, I don¡¯t want to know how many mistakes he had to correct. With that cleared from my mind, I dressed myself into clean clothes, an action that took far more effort than I was willing to admit with my new fluidity. Now my mind was actually able to keep up, it should have been easier to move without too much difficulty, but evidently not. I must have been too busy concentrating on putting on a T-shirt or something, as for some reason, I had a note in my hand telling me to meet Dr Jacq near the dungeon once I¡¯m ready. Mathew must have given it to me. I had nothing pressing to do so I finished getting dressed and headed to the dungeon entrance. *** I saw Jacq, who was currently a she, at the entrance. They smiled when they saw me though it didn¡¯t seem to fully reach their eyes. ¡°Ah, great I was hoping that would work,¡± they said, ¡°I had worried I might have had to send someone to actually get you.¡± ¡°Hoping what would work,¡± I replied confused, ¡°didn¡¯t you just ask one of my team?¡± ¡°Yeah sure, let¡¯s go with that.¡± They dismissed my question with a hand wave, it wasn¡¯t really important enough to clarify the specifics, so I let it go, ¡°Anyway there¡¯s something I need to show you, something I feel the need to show every leader before their first mission.¡± They made a ''follow me'' gesture and we made our way through the dungeon. Lights proceeded our path, as torches lit where we needed to go. This would have set the atmosphere if I hadn¡¯t seen the effect was just different Jacqs lighting them and disappearing just out of view. Just out of view had I not just improved my vision through my completed aura. I chose not to ruin the illusion. We walked for a while in silence; the ambient sound of the dungeon around us. The sound of our footsteps rhythmically sounded as we made our way. Until they stopped. We stood next to a wall that didn¡¯t stand out unless you were actively looking for differences. It had the vaguest impression of a handprint which Dr Jacq placed theirs onto for ten seconds before it popped open. Jacq stepped back. The door opened as another Jacq pushed it from the other side revealing a room. ¡°We¡¯re here.¡± They ushered me inside. ¡°This is what I believe everyone who leads should know.¡± Jacqs voice felt accusatory though not solely directed at me, ¡°These missions have a purpose, Mythics have a purpose and this room represents that.¡± The room was massive but seemingly empty, it was a room of interconnecting hallways that seemed to go on and on, most of the walls were rough with small patches of smoothness. ¡°This room has all the names I could find of those who have died on missions, because of failure or necessity.¡± Looking closer at the walls I could make out the writing, but the amount of names covered the walls, thousands and thousands littered the walls. ¡°Every Mythic, every civilian and every soldier.¡± Each name had an icon next to them to signify who they were, there were so many. Far more than should be possible in a single lifetime. ¡°Everyone.¡± Their olive eyes seemed so old, far too old for their face. ¡°Everyone I knew, and each one I had at least a hand in.¡± There was a moment of silence before they continued. ¡°Just don¡¯t unnecessarily risk your or anyone else¡¯s life.¡± Those old eyes stared directly at my soul, ¡°Heroic sacrifices end up with more blood than they save most of the time. In their unlived future, they bear the cost of what they could have done if they hadn''t already spent their life unnecessarily. Be a brave coward and make sure you and your team survive.¡± With that Dr Jacq disappeared leaving me to think about what they said. I gained a new kind of respect for Dr Jacq but also far more questions. While there were no dates attached to any of the names that I could see, purely from the wear on some of the writings and some of the spelling, you could tell there was a history to the room. Plus they were known as a leading expert in Shades, some of the information in those textbooks has certainly saved lives but how did they gain that information? How powerful was their Legacy? How old were they? I stood in that silence until I was made aware of another presence. ¡°So," The tone was almost a bitter laugh, "someone did care.¡± I saw Edward floating, his full attention on a section of one of the walls. I moved closer to see what he was looking at, though I feared I already knew. Edward Samual Blitz *** I spent what felt like hours in that room. The air was heavy, and only as I left did I feel the weight of the moment leave me. No one said anything else, as there wasn¡¯t anything else to say. Edward had looked through the rooms and I didn¡¯t pry for what he had been looking for, but I felt a wave of relief after a while. I just know I would not want to have any reasons to return to that room.