Heart of the Beast RP (IC)

Feeling clean and refreshed, Naya stepped out of the lake heading towards her backpack and clothes. Arbos appeared floating upside down at eye level, a smirk clear on his face.
“Hello pussycat, you wanted to talk?”
She jumped back in fright, growling with her ears flat. Arbos merely raised an eyebrow at her. She quickly covered her lady parts as best she could and ran over to where her clothes were heaped. She pulled them on over her wet fur and frowned at the spectre.
“Have you been there the whole time?”
“Maaaaaaybe.” Was his only reply.
Naya sighed. She really wished she could punch him in the face or something but she didn’t think that would work with him being a spectre. She tried slapping him but her hand met thin air, annoyed she started waving her hand through his face. This made him frown slightly.
“Stop it, that’s annoying.”
She considered continuing but let her arm drop.
“I had a couple of things I wanted to ask.”
Arbos rolled his eyes and mumbled under his breath but said “Sure, shoot” before sitting in thin air, crossing his legs and placing his hands behind his head.
“Why can’t I control the release as well as the others?” she asked.
He scoffed at this.
“It’s because you’re female. Female Nullmancers have always had bad control, could also be something to do with your Selkie blood. Next.” He waved his hand absently.
“What are you really? You possessed Kron way too easily, even if I was there to help. As far as I was aware spectres couldn’t do that. There’s also the fact that you were alive when you were sealed in the ring.”
His grin grew. “I have no obligation to answer that and this is why you’re still a novice Shaman, little pussycat. Anything else?”
Naya cursed under her breathe at him and looked away, thinking.
“When will the number of crystals we can embed increase?”
“Oh that’s right I forgot to tell you. You should be able to embed up to 25 crystals now, have fun!” with that he vanished.
Naya huffed and placed her hand on her hips.
“If he wasn’t so useful I would seal him and his big mouth away again.”
“I heard that! And as if you could pussycat” his disembodied voice taunted.
Naya growled and roughly pulled out her brush from her pack. Once she was happy her fur wasn’t going to turn into once big matted mess she left the pond and went back to the keep.

She arrived first so decided to embed some more crystals while she had the chance. The pulled off her pack and placed it against the stone wall, sitting down beside it. She pulled out her dagger and made some incisions in both of her upper legs. She placed both of the iron crystals and freezing crystals and one of the smaller electricity crystals. She bandaged them up then sat back satisfied. After 5 minutes of waiting and nobody showing up she began to practice on her release control. It was afternoon by the time the group gathered and woke Kali-en. They bid farewell to Bob and headed out to the nearest city, Mirenwood.

Naya expected Miren to be a bigger version of Eriur (which had been bigger than her people’s hamlet) but as they got closer and closer she realised how wrong she had been. Mirenwood was enormous (by Naya’s standards anyway), with tall buildings two or three times bigger than the ones at home blocking out the sky around her. They were only on the outskirts but there were already many people walking briskly through the wide streets, as well as a couple horse drawn carriages. Naya started to feel on edge in this alien environment, the frequent looks she was getting from any Cauhri that noticed her weren’t helping. She was glad when Arbos’ pulled them off the street and into a side street, for a moment anyway. Steal? She really didn’t want to have to steal from these people, but did they have another choice? The horse riding trip would be long and a pain so not really... She would wait to see how the others reacted to this news.

Everybody gathered at the edge of the camp, prepared and ready to set out. And with leaving came the goodbyes that had to be said. Bob bowed and gave Ashur a piece of paper with the location of the resistance in Sayrn.  Ashur bowed and gratefully accepted it. Ashur shook Bob's hand and the last goodbyes were said. They left their new friends behind, wishing them only the best. The thought of having friends supporting your cause gave Ashur a happy feeling. Maybe they would meet again someday.

The treck to Mirenwood was a short one, only a quick two hours. The village was definitely bigger than Eriur, but by no means huge. Ashur hadn't left Eriur very often, but he had been to bigger cities. The streets were lined with shops, pubs and inns. This wasn't unusual for a settlement with a magnarail station. Arbos confirmed that Mirenwood was quite a succesful place because of the magnarail. "Not a bad place to live, definitely." Ashur said as he looked around a little more.  He could see people staring at them, or more specifically naya. Selkies must be rather uncommon around these parts. Nothing they could really do about that.

Arbos led them to an alleyway, telling them about how he wished to continue their travels. Ashur had heard of citizen IDs before, but you didn't really need one in a place like Eriur. Their only option would be to steal these and the tickets if they wished to use the magnarail. Kali-en and Naya were their first to voice their opinions. Kali-en was unsuprisingly going to steal despite swinging the ethical hammer at them. Naya was more in favour of spending two weeks on a horse.

"Do we have any reason to hurry to Sayrn? If not, then I don't see why we should. It'd only give us more trouble if we were caught stealing." Ashur sighed. The spectre might be a master thief, but none of them were. "I don't see myself succesfully pickpocketing some poor soul though." Ashur himself did not really have any trouble with going two weeks on horseback, though two days by magnarail definitely did not sound bad at all.  "I don't think it will kill anyone if we take twelve days longer getting there." Ashur turned Zephyr and Kron, who had yet to voice their opinion, interested in their take on the situation.

As well as everyone else did, Zephyr also grabbed a few crystals and made various spots to place them. Two frost, another water, another electricity, and another wind crystal. Seemed fairly reasonable to himself. After resting a bit longer, Zeph woke Kal up (with what felt admittedly like a satisfying way), Bob bid them farewell, and they all started out.

Two hours of walking along, and fairly uneventful. Which was pretty nice considering. Zeph felt sure he'd been here before once, seemed like a spot he stayed in for a bit on the way to his post. Couldn't recall offhand entirely since he wasn't there long. Didn't bother looking around much either.

After entering an alleyway, they had a short talk about how they'd get along to the next destination. Thievery or taking the long road. "As fond as I am of the idea of mildly semi-upper class lazing, I'm not really a thief myself. Coming from parents who went out of their way to keep steady lives to take care of some child they found, it also doesn't sit well on the idea I'm likely stealing someone's livelihood. As far as I recall if you have one there's generally a specific reason for it."

He flicked his necklace for a second. "If we have to then we may as well do it anyway, but I sure as hell can't manage to do it myself I'd bet. So unless someone's putting in the work for me, off to the stables it is."

Kron was not dumbfounded at the sight of Mirenwood but he was certainly not familiar with it. Uncomfortable that he was surrounded by a crowd, he held the cloak he had thrown over his shoulders tight as to keep the secrecy of his conspicuous attire. Though the belt he wore was specifically designed to prevent any sound be produced by his knives, the clicking of the bolts of the crossbow he had lifted from the fort fed his paranoïa.
His arm was almost fully functional, largely thanks to the new water,smoke and sound crystals he had placed in his arms.
Listening to the others discussing on how to get to Sayrn, he couldn't help but be stupiefied by their lack of foresight. When Ashur  looked at him to hear his opinion, he answered with a shift in his eyes.
"Or, you know, if Arbos pulled his fingers out of his ass he could just possess the guy checking the IDs. If we stole IDs and boarded trains with them, they'd end up getting reported and we'd stand out like a lantern in a dark room. If we don't take the magnarail we'll also end up standing out as a group of suspicious strangers crossing every village of the continent. You really should start getting in your little heads that our ghost friend doesn't really have our best interest at heart."
Glancing at Kali-en he followed up saying.
"I'm starting to wonder if our wise guy is really that wise."

Naya frowned at Kron and crossed her arms over her chest.
"Possessing someone isn't as simple as that. He could only do it for you because I was helping and your mind was distracted by pain. Even if we were to try that, I would have to stand near the guy chanting and I'm pretty sure that would attract even more attention. But you have a point, stealing ID's would get us caught when we tried to board the train... especially for me, I doubt many selkies have ID's. Would it be possible to fake the ID's? If not then we could try boarding illegally?"

"The security is too tight to just sneak in unnoticed. The only regular entrance is through choke points where the IDs are controlled and there doesn't seem to be any other entryways. Even if we were to attempt at getting through smoothly, our maneuver would be blatant to everyone. As for walking up the tracks, we'd be spotted before we even reached the station. Besides, not everyone is good at hiding among us.
You're right though. If you were just to stand there after your turn it would just appear suspicious. I'm not sure about the range of your ability, but if it's large enough you could simply be the last of us in line, being close enough to do your thing until you have passed the controller. Else, we would need a reason for you to stay close to him, something obvious and that doesn't leave room for interpretation."

"I don't think we can let Naya just stand there for a long time under any normal circumstance." Ashur closed his eyes for a moment "If we want to do this we'll need to distract everyone somehow." But this was not going to be so easy. They had to distract a building full of people without attracting any attention to any of them. Honestly, Ashur had no idea how they should do this. Was there a way to create some confusion and strike? Ashur himself did not have a problem going horseback, but if this was what the group wanted he would comply.

"We're going to need more information on this place." Ashur turned to Arbos "Should be no problem for you right? Arbos snickered "But, dear sparkle, I don't have your best interests at heart right?" the spectre threw a glance at Kron "Why should this be in my best interest?"
Ashur sighed. Not unexpected in the least, that was for sure. But then again, he actually knew a little of how to deal with this troublesome phantom now. He waved him to come closer and whispered into his ear. "I've heard that Sayrn strip clubs are quite something. So, a cauhri stripper in two days or a Selkie for two weeks?" He grinned at Arbos, and Arbos facepalmed. "Yeaaaaaaah, man's got a point. buh-bye" With that the spectre dissapeared in thin air.

It took Arbos a few minutes, but he came back with the results from his surveilance. The person checking is in a separate office from where he autorizes the ticket sales. They would have to sneak in there and possess him. Afterward they could just walk on and buy their tickets. They could create a commotion by turning of the power to the station in the nearby sub station. There was also a machinery inside where they could print fake IDs, to prevent them being caught by a check on-route.

"I think we've got a decent plan now." Ashur sighed in relief. "Anything else?"

It was faint, but Naya's acute hearing picked up Ashur's comment. Her cheeks burned red with embarrassment and she scowled at Arbos and Ashur. How did he know about that anyway? Damn loud mouth ghost.
"That sounds like a better plan to me. Hopefully I won't have to do much to the guy checking the ID's."

Yo! Long time no see.

The voice startled him so much that Kali-en barely managed to stifle his yelp.
He was sitting alone in the bar, his coffee half empty, watching the lazy movements of the ID-giver. 

He had figured that simply stealing from a citizen was out of the question : he needed to look like the target, steal his ID, and ensure that the target would not report the thievery in the following days, which meant killing the guy, or incapacitate him, or threaten him enough to make sure he won't rat him out. He didn't want to kill him, as the shadow-guy might hear of it, and he didn't have the skills to incapacitate or threaten an eventual target.

So he followed some official who worked at the "registration office", where they refused more often than attributed citizenship. Its attribution was based on a lot of factors, mainly the amount of money you were willing, and able, to pay for the application's fee and how much people you knew in the government who might pull some strings.

Anyway, Kali-en knew, from a previous trip, that the office close at ten pm, and the guy in charge had to go to the machinery, responsible for creating the ID cards with all the newly accepted citizen's application.
The machinery would then, probably - he wasn't sure about that part - create the related official papers and ID card for each new citizen.
And so, there he was, watching and wondering why the hell was the ID-giver wasting his time drinking and smoking there. He was supposed to bring the three folders, scandalously placed to anyone's reach, to the machinery in the next twenty minutes..

You're so mean, ignoring me like that.

"Oh, so now you're directly talking to me? No more trying to make me think I'm insane?", Kali-en said under his breath.

I knew you figured that I couldn't hear your thoughts! Really clever, I'm glad I didn't was my time. And yeah, I figured it was useless to pretend anymore.


"What happened anyway? You were absent for more then 2 weeks".

Yeah, sorry about that.. I needed to.. uhm.. talk to someone. Anyway, you are being really lucky that the empire official citizenship giver is.. discarding his duty for the next fifteen minutes, if I were in your place I would have conveniently placed my own application folder with the others..


"So you had to report to some superiors for your mistake huh? The punishment was not too harsh I hope?
Yes, very lucky indeed. I wonder what's the price I will need to pay for that, and where would I find a folder like that ready? I'm pretty sure half the files in it originate only from the office".

Nothing much about the punishment, some of my objectives have just been changed, thanks for worrying.
Well, I don't know about the folder, but you might find one back at the registration office, where the refused folders have been thrown to the trash. About the price, I feel really generous for our reunion, how about that: just say out loud one of your name?

Kali-en knew that was a bad idea, he didn't know why, but he knew that saying one of his real name out loud, with the right inflections, would be as good as completely destroying a part of him, the part that lived by that name. And he didn't have much more left.

He got up and went back to the registration office, where he picked the lock of the back door easily without being seen, there he looked for the thrash bin and found 6 folders in there. One of them was conveniently clean, and he could easily use it. He switched the most important file with a new one he found at the desk and filled with his information (name, age, height, application fee, origins, reason for applying and other kind of bullshit).
He got back to the bar, where the ID-giver was still chilling, although his movements seemed a bit more agitated.

So?


Kali-en had no doubts that the ID-giver was being controlled and that he couldn't hope to cross the voice.

"Will I have the ID-card before the midnight train?"

That's delicate, with all the processes, the card will be made and validated at around eleven pm, which would give you an hour to scout the place and steal it.


He sighed, he didn't really have any choice.

"Arkayne".

He spoke the name softly, and every inflection, every sound making that name defined a part of the personality, memories and skills associated with it. Gone were his skills with the scimitar, his ability to hold his death-stare and his ease to walk through the nobility as if he was superior to them.
A dreadful feeling began to crawl back from the depth of his self, he felt a void create inside him. 
No, not create - it was already there, he had just forgotten it. But it was expanding, taking more and more of him. What would happen when the majority of his self would be the void?
What would happen if he lived by the Lord Arkayne again? 

Thank you kindly. You only have two minutes left.


"Damn it", Kali-en looked up and saw a group of men, probably travelers from the magnarail, enter the bar. Everyone got their attention taken by loud group, and he took that occasion to slid his folder with the rest, in the pretense to stumble too much drink while passing near the ID-giver.

He excused himself loudly, and walked idly through the tables until he seated himself at one.

The ID-giver abruptly got up and looked around, confused. He saw the folders and looked at the clock. His eyes wide with fear and surprise, he went out of the bar to the machinery, followed by a seemingly drunk nobody.

The small hand on the clock of the looming clock tower was getting dangerously close to eleven when the preparations were seemingly done for and with. Naya and Arbos were waiting patiently for the set time when the rest of the group who half an hour ago departed for the town’s sub-station. Finally at five to eleven Arbos clapped his hands and smiled.
“Time to get to work.”
Naya nodded and both rushed off towards the main building. Arbos quickly disappeared out of sight, going ahead straight through the wall of red brick, while the selkie crouched down by the window waiting for the lights to go out.

The seconds counted down way too slowly for Arbos’ liking, but soon enough the clock hands moved once more and the brilliant ringing of the bronze bell announced the time to the entire town. Eleven o’clock. …Nothing. Arbos looked around, catching a worried glance from Naya through the window and retreated back outside of the building. Minutes kept on slipping.
“They are late. Something’s wrong.” Arbos stated the obvious.
“Maybe they just didn’t hear the bell?”
“Riiight, because on top of being total idiots they are also utterly deaf, right, kitty? No. Even those fools are not quite that incompetent. Something’s up.” Arbos spit and then looked at the clock once more.
Twelve past. This was way off schedule. Maybe they should cancel the whole thing and try and leave by horseback as soon as possible. Arbos shook his head. There’s no way they would be fast enough to get away by horse. They were much faster than any horse and would catch the group in a matter of days. And then all of them aside from Arbos would die. No, the magna-rail was the only way to get out quick enough. Suddenly the muffled sounds of panic alerted the duo. In an instant every light in the building has gone out. Arbos smiled.
“Finally”
That said he flew off inside of the building, turning invisible as he went. Naya cautiously followed him by climbing through the window. Her eyes adapted to the dark nearly instantly, allowing her to notice wooden support that ran underneath the ceiling far above. In once swift jump she climbed up and chased after Arbos by quickly leaping from one support to the other, following a strictly memorized route the spectre briefed her on beforehand.

Arbos stopped just short of the target office and hissed at the couple of guards who were standing there with lit torches. This was not in the plan; at this rate Naya wouldn’t be able to get in unnoticed. Arbos sighed for a moment before shifting to a sinister grin – it was time to get his hands dirty. Without making a sound he emerged from the wall behind the guards and with a barely noticeable hiss extinguished their torches. One of the two startled guards immediately pulled out his sword, while the other was struggling with his pockets trying to find a firestone in this darkness. Arbos smiled once again; the rest was child’s play. He took a deep breath and then let out an incomprehensible hiss through clenched teeth. The ethereal sound echoed from wall to wall, twisting and malforming like a snake, finding its way into every nook and cranny like the whispers of the dead. The first guard shook and pushed his back against the wall, clenching his sword tightly with both hands. The other one dropped the newly found firestone to the ground and instead pulled out his sword as well. The intense, unrelenting feeling of paranoia and fear had tightened around their throats like the tentacle of a giant slimy octopus. It took all of Arbos’ strength to resist the urge to spring out engulfed in flames and scare the two mortals to death. Sadly this matter required discretion. He smirked and clicked his fingers, making the sound come from down the hall rather than from him. It echoed from wall to wall, jumping about and turned the corner, flying off deeper into the bowels of the building. The two guards, driven by the powerful nullomancy of fear rushed off after it their swords at the ready, convinced that some unearthly monster was on his way to slaughter the passengers in the main hall.

As soon as they crossed the corner Naya silently dropped down from the ceiling right in front of the door.
“What have you done to them?” She asked cautiously.
Arbos shrugged.
“Nothing a decade or two of therapy and some hard alcohol can’t fix. Let’s go, the tricky part starts here.”
He once again turned invisible and went through the door, naya keeping an eye on the tiny slivers of light that were coming from the inside through the crack between it and the floor. Inside the room as small stout man was sitting at the table surrounded by various documents and machinery. He was bald and short of build, yet the tightly fit uniform gave him an imposing look. As was to be expected of an imperial inspector, Arbos thought to himself and blew out the small candle that was lighting the room. The very same instant Naya rushed in through the door, covering the distance form it to the table in one giant leap and softly landing on the table grasped the inspectors head with her hands – the barely visible green glow of her magic engulfing the room in a myriad of repulsive long shadows.
Arbos clicked his fingers once more, causing the door to shut tight from a sudden gust of wind then smiled once more, “Time to go down the rabbit hole” and disappeared inside of the inspector…


This mind was far from the clean blank whiteness of Kron’s. An untold number of constructs and buildings flickered in and out of existence and the selkie struggled to contain the trained mind of an inspector. Still, Arbos thought, she shouldn’t be having this much trouble with it. Once again he felt something was wrong, and rushed down the semi-corporeal cobblestone street that lay ahead of him. The street turned and twisted in unimaginable way trying to throw off the intruder and get him lost within the endless city that was built within the mind. Arbos however was quite familiar with said defensive technique and remained true to his course. Surely enough a few moments later he arrived at the mind’s eye, the centre of the mental control of the inspector. Just as he suspected his consciousness was still there. The inspector, or at least the mental representation of his consciousness, was sitting on the floor with his legs crossed, surrounded by a ball of pale blue light. Arbos smirked.
“Nice try, but futile. Once I burst your bubble you will be forced out of here and not remember a thing, Herr Inspector.” He sneered and moved towards the bubble when suddenly the world went still and blank. The ethereal city meant to confuse intruders disappeared and the entire plane was reduced to the endless emptiness of white. Confused, Arbos stopped and looked at the inspector once again. As much as he wanted to believe that it was Naya’s doing he knew well enough that she wasn’t powerful enough to push that much after already straining herself for so long already. No, he thought, the defensive mechanism was released on purpose to allow the mind to concentrate on something else. But that was impossible, for a mind to retain control at this point this little inspector of a tiny rural village would have to be…
The White Plains rumbled and shook as shards of the very space that it was made of broke off and started forming something in front of Arbos. More and more shards broke off, the holes left by them filling up instantly. Soon enough the formless pile collapsed unto itself and took the form of an armoured warrior made of black glass. It stood at over ten metres tall, clad in black and with a massive claymore in its hands. Moments later another giant formed… and then another… and another… When the rumbling stopped ten gigantic warriors stood between Arbos and the inspector. He took a step back.
“Obsidian Goliaths… and ten of them. Fuck me sideways… “ He looked at the Inspector. “You’re a fucking Mentalist! The hell is a Mentalist doing in Mirenwood?!”
Not good.

One of the giants stepped forward and raised his sword. Arbos looked on in horror as the monstrosity brought the massive blade down on him.
…And smiled.
“No matter!” Arbos again smiled as his hand easily stopped the sword. The impact shook the mind plane yet he didn’t even flinch.
“Truly an absolute defence against any kind of ghost or deity. Sadly for you I am a spectre. My nollomancy is still with me. Not to mention…” The nasty sound of cracking glass echoed throughout the emptiness, as the massive sword instantly shattered in Arbos’ grip. “…in this realm I am not restricted.”
The very next moment Arbos disappeared. Or at least that is what it looked like. Faster than the eye can see he jumped into the air, easily levelling with the giant’s head. He clenched his fist and smashed it into the goliath’s armoured helm – the force of the impact shattering the monster entirely. The other Goliaths rushed in their swords raised.

Arbos smirked – a small switchblade falling into his hand out of his sleeve.
“A swordfight eh? Let’s see who has a better blade!”
He once again disappeared, leaving only a dust of smoke behind him. This time he instantly dashed right past the monsters, stopping a few metres behind them. His move serenaded by the shattering sound of nine severed blades falling to the ground at the same time. Arbos smiled and put away the switchblade.
“Well whaddya know? Looks like mine is miles ahead.”

One of the giants turned around and dropping the useless hilt of the former claymore leapt into the air, aiming to crush Arbos. He only smirked and put out his hand.
“Don’t you know anything about gravity? Giants can’t fly.”
That said he brought his arm down, making the goliath instantly plummet to the ground, shattering into a million pieces. Three more monstrosities took the opportunity rush Arbos while he was open. With an ever present smirk he clapped his hands together, causing an explosive shockwave to shatter all three of them. The remaining five were still a good few metres away when Arbos twisted his body in an eerie way and unleashed something that blackened even the endless white plains. Deafening and unapologetically bright, a discharge of lightning – a two metre thick bolt of superheated plasma and energy instantly reduced the four closest giants to ash, their bodies shielding the last goliath from a similar fate. Arbos blew on his hand which was slightly blackened by the aftershock of his last attack then smirked at the remaining giant.
“Well, your move.”

The goliath however stepped back and took a fighting stance, silently challenging Arbos to a fistfight.
The spectre chuckled.
“I see mano-a-mano still exists even amongst the mental defence systems. Alright, I’ll humour you. On even ground.”

Arbos snapped his fingers and instantly covered himself in obsidian armour, identical to the one the giant was wearing. It kept growing thicker and thicker, way beyond the expected 1m control area. Moments later it grew to the size of the goliath himself.
“Well? Let’s begin!” Arbos’ voice echoed out from somewhere deep inside the gargantuan armour, and the goliath rushed at him landing a solid hit to the chest. Obsidian cracked and Arbos swayed back, but quickly regain his footing and grabbed the warrior’s head, pulling him in and kneeing him the gut. The warrior punched Arbos in the leg and pushed himself away, Arbos managing to put in a square hit in the warrior’s jaw – blowing away most of his helmet. The warrior stepped back regaining his composure and then delivered a crushing kick to Arbos’ exposed side. The armour cracked - pieces of sharp obsidian flying everywhere, but even without seeing his face it was obvious that the spectre was smiling. He immediately caught the warrior’s leg and with a devastating crunching sound smashed his knee with his fist, severing the leg. The detached limb fell to the floor, shattering as the giant struggled to keep from toppling over. Arbos lunged at him, his sharpened fingertips digging deep into the goliath’s armoured body and lifted the crippled giant above his head.
“T’was a great fight, warrior! I salute you!” Arbos belched out in furious ecstasy and brought the last Obsidian Goliath down unto his knee, shattering him clean in half.
With the last adversary dispatched in a truly glorious way, Arbos shed his obsidian armour, returning to normal size and approached the Inspector’s bubble. He then stopped and picked up the hilt of the giant’s claymore, a metre long stub of the former blade still remaining.
“No hard feelings Herr Inspector. I just find it incredibly amusing to break you using your own blade.”
With those words Arbos swung the broken weapon with all his might, cleaving the inspector and his bubble clean in half.
The world fell silent.

Naya fell back from the inspector, panting furiously. This was by far the most exhausting experience of her entire life. The little bald guy was not normal. She was sure he was about to force her out, when suddenly everything calmed and his consciousness disappeared. The inspector opened his eyes and stood up slowly, looking straight at Naya.
“A-… Arbos?” Naya whispered faintly.
The inspector frowned threateningly, sending a shiver down Naya’s spine. Have they failed? Are they all going to get arrested now? Her mind raced in such a way when the inspector suddenly grimaced in a very frustratingly familiar way and lit the candle.
“C’mon thunderpussy, we got work to do!”

Kali-en was walking toward the ID-giver, slow and unsteady, confident that he was doing a good drunk impersonation. The guy was getting scolded by a woman behind a counter, something about a chain reaction due to him being late.
“You will report first hour tomorrow to the inspector, and explain to him why, because of you, the ID cards were at least twenty minutes late – which they will be!”
The reaction from the ID- giver was weird. True, he ought to be scared, but this was plain terror, as if the woman had ordered the guy to his death.
“b-but I didn’t, it wasn’t what-“
“Be quiet, or I’ll make sure you get to see the inspector tonight”, the woman sighed, going through the different files, “Well, at least there’re only six of them, we should be able to make them in forty minutes”.
“Huh? But I only validated five today, it’s probably a mistake, could I-“
“Another mistake?”, her voice was without any particular tone but Kali-en, less than twenty meters away now, shivered.
“Hum, no no, I – I will just let you do your work madam”, the ID-checker looked down and all but fled from the counter – only to hit Kali-en and fall with him.
“Dammit”, he snarled, got up and kicked Kali-en two or three times before getting up and leaving.
Through the pain, Kali-en vaguely realized that one hand was holding a knife while the other a rather heavy purse. He cut the guy’s purse from his belt during their fall.
Nice one.
He was not even sure if he should feel more happy or angry at himself. He hadn’t known he was still capable of doing that kind of stuff, which was supposed to be Klein-exclusive. For that matter, he didn’t even remember making a conscious decision of stealing from the guy.
The problem was that the ID-giver would not take long to connect the dots and come back to him for his purse, and that time was going to be greatly reduced as he just entered a bar.
“Crap”, Kali-en got up, took three coins from the heavy purse and put them in his own. He then took off his belt, knives and anything that might incriminate him and put them, along with the heavy purse, in a patch of shadow thirty meters away. After some thinking, he went and retrieved a knife that he put in one of his pockets. He got back running, jump face first to the floor and resumed his drunken and recently-kicked-three-times state. An instant later, the ID-giver got out from the bar, looked around and went to Kali-en as soon as he spotted him.
He looked angry. He took him by the collar and slammed him against the nearest wall.
“Where is it?”, some of his saliva was leaving his mouth as he spoke. Kali-en only mumbled incoherently again and again as the guy continued to slam, punch, kick – even some headbutts now and then – him. Eventually, he got tired and started searching through his clothes.
He found Kali-en’s purse and emptied it, counting. He shook his head and resumed the search, until he found the knife.
“Tsk-tsk, very bad having a weapon like that. It is illegal you know? And it is my duty as a representative of the Empire to denounce you for that crime”, As the ID-giver said that, he seemed to wait for some kind of reaction, and so Kali-en, doing the perfect drunk beaten to a pulp caught red-handed for a serious offense, managed to make the appropriate sorry face.
“Although, I guess we could discuss some ways around our little problem”, again the dramatic pause to urge Kali-en, and again Kali-en responded in kind with a “I – I’ll do anything sir!” and those innocent, full of hope, eyes.
The ID-giver smiled, thinking that he was leading the poor drunk where he wanted.
He was an idiot.
“Well, first, I will need to drink enough tonight to forget our encounter. But I don’t think one night will be enough, so I will need to be in this state for the next few weeks. Sadly, I recently lost my purse, so I don’t have any money for all those expenses. And I would rather not use my own money to cover some unknown drunk, you know?”
“Y-yes, yes, I can pay you all I have here and come back tomorrow with more?”
“That would be perfect, but I will need insurance for that, for example your ID card?”
Without missing a beat, Kali-en started fumbling through his own pockets to find it, of course, he didn’t.
“I, hum”, he began to look around, pursued his lips and looked at the ID-giver with pitiful doggy eyes: “I can’t find it”.
“Well, that’s a bother. Hmm, how about that? I remember your face pretty well and I will keep your knife. Give me your name, and everything will disappear from my memory when you give me the money you owe me”.
“Yes yes, hum, my name is Arkayne, and, hum, I will be better off if someone like you could dispose of the knife, uhm, sir”, Kali-en fidgeted a bit more, as was proper, and looked down.
Ha! Very habile. I’d have loved to hear another Name though
“Very good Arkayne, well then, see you tomorrow!”, with a wide smile and a pat to the shoulder, the ID-giver went back to the bar, with Kali-en’s knife and purse.
With a sigh, Kali-en started going through his body to see if any of his wounds had been reopened. Surprisingly, even though none of them could be considered as healed, the beating he recently got only left him sore and hurt, without any bleeding or broken bones.
He only got the crystals yesterday; they were working really fast, maybe that stuff about healing a wound in two days wasn’t that much exaggerated after all.
 
Now, what was he supposed to do? It was forty past ten. According to the woman behind the counter, the IDs would be available – and dropped in the courier box in the back alley – at twenty past eleven.
Oh wait. Instead of trying to steal from the courier box, he might as well pose as a courier himself. Now what would a courier need? A bag certainly, probably a uniform, a red one? He would have to pay a little bit more to get his hands on a legitimate empire uniform, but he didn’t really care, he could afford it now…



Almost time. Kali-en approached the back alley on his brand new red uniform. He spotted the woman behind the counter from earlier and went to her. He slowed when he saw her. She was displaying nothing of the calm behavior from earlier and seemed more agitated, nervous. What did happen now?
He saluted her, empire style: “Madam. The usual courier is currently unable to perform his duties; I am taking his place for tonight”, she barely glanced at him before giving him the package as she spoke above her shoulder
“You four, escort him to the inspector at his office”.
Kali-en blanched: “Hum, madam, am I not supposed to take them to the checking office?”
She looked at him irritated: “you will do what you are asked for, or I will see to it that proper punishment is given, do you understand me?”
“Yes ma’am”.
“Something.. disturbing”, she said that as she hold her arms, shivering, “is currently happening in his office, you will go in all haste with these four soldiers, and report back to me anything you deem important”.
“Yes ma’am”, what the hell had he gotten himself into?
As he turned to follow the four soldiers, one of them dropped to the floor, his neck broken, another was looking, dazed, at a sword exiting his chest. Kali-en spun and jumped back from the other soldiers, looking wildly around to see – well damn, the would-be soldier was fighting with a spear against the third soldier and the brute was now facing off, a dagger in one hand, the last soldier.
The fight was over before he could count to ten, and they all turned to looked at Kali-en and the woman.
“Well, this is awkward. Hum, I don’t want any problems, I’m just a courier, so it’s okay if I just leave right?”, Kali-en started walking backward, his hands high in the air.
“No, actually it’s not, you could easily warn the whole cohort”, the brute smiled a wolfish smile and closed the distance in one small leap. He stopped short when he recognized Kali-en.
The woman narrowed her eyes at him. Damn it. He dropped his hand. “What the hell are you all doing here?”
“We could ask the same for you, with your bright uniform and your escort”. Although he didn’t attack him, the brute stance was indicating that he could start doing so at any moment.
“Oh give me a break”, he turned to look at the woman, smiled, and said, “I think that whatever happened to the inspector is because of those fellows here. Now since the said inspector seemed to be quite strong, I’d rather not go against the guys who defeated him right?”
The woman stayed still and silent for a moment before nodding briefly.
“Excellent! Could you tell me how much time it will be to just change the photos and names of all those ID cards I have here?”
“Well, we could probably do it in ten minutes”
“Such good news! Now could you please do it? Now?”
“No”, she took a deep breath and lifted her chin “I am an official mentalist in training, I may not be able to stop you, but I can certainly hold on long enough to prevent you from using the midnight magnarail, which I suppose is why you are all in a hurry. And you won’t be able to create or modify any cards without my knowledge”
Well, Kali-en could answer nothing to that; he knew that somewhere in his memory lay the ability to make real scary threats, but he didn’t dare use it, and he could never really go through the torture path. He was out of option.
The would-be soldier stepped out: “Oh come now, you’re saying that you wish to withstand at least a night’s torture just in order to prevent four guys to create four ID cards?”
The woman looked steadily at him: “four guys, of which three just assassinated in cold blood four soldiers of the Empire”
The would-be soldier winced.
The would-be leader gave it a shot: “Still, it does seem a little weird how loyal you are to the Empire. You will go through a night torture and probably die at the end, remember the cold blooded part, for what? You honestly believe the Empire is going to give you some kind of reward? Recognition? Not that it will matter to you, you will be dead. What’s the pointrReally?”, That seemed to affect the woman.
“I – I can’t, if the inspector learns of it, I will lose every chances to ever being a mentalist”
“But you will be alive”, the brute grunted. He had changed his posture toward Kali-en, but he wasn’t giving him his back either.
The would-be leader looked at him irritably, then continued gently: “Do not worry about that, we will make sure the inspector will be unharmed and that nothing will be tied to you, nothing at all. And when you look at it, the machineries are the same throughout the Empire, we might as well have knocked you out right in the beginning and used the machinery for ourselves if anyone asks questions…”, he looked at the woman questioningly, after what seemed to be some really deep considerations, the woman nodded and held her hand out to Kali-en. He took his own ID-card from the bag, earning another suspicious glance from the brute, and handed out the bag to the woman.
“Don’t you guys need any picture of the other one?”, he said, looking at the would-be leader and soldier.
“The other one?”, asked the latter.
“We already got hers earlier, no worry there.”
“Oh! You mean Na-“, he got elbowed by the brute, who muttered an “idiot” while going at the end of the alley to stand guard.



Fifteen minutes later, they were leaving the machinery, sprinting for the magnarail. They had left four dead soldiers and an unconscious woman back there. Thinking about it, one could wonder why the four soldiers were dead and not the woman, but Kali-en thought she was smart enough to come up with a decent explanation, it wasn’t that hard to find one anyway.
They arrived at the station five minutes before the departure. Naya was slightly apart from the queue, clearly exhausted, and clearly relieved when she saw them. After receiving her ID card, she went near the inspector he nodded and let her pass. The others went through the same pattern.
At Kali-en’s turn, the inspector stopped him with a raised hand.
“Hum, yes?”
“Ten coins, you think it was free?”, the recognizable evil grin all but set Kali-en off.
“Are you fucking kidding me? You’re gonna leave this body in 2 minutes, you won’t have the fucking occasion to use the money!”
“And?”.
“And none of them paid anything for it!”
“Last time I checked you were neither a bow wielding thunderpussy, sword swinging fairy nor a brooding man-bear-pig, or did you undergo a dramatic change of sex and/or personality while i wasn't looking?
Kali-en glared at him, took ten coins from his purse and gave them to the “Inspector” before boarding the magnarail.

the sub station was only a few streets away from the main station, making for a short walk for our dashing trio. Ashur glanced one more time towards the clock tower, 25 minutes till eleven. The sub station was a rather large building, though significantly smaller than the train station. The walls were tinted with a shade of light gray, and decorated with only a few windows on the upper floor. A dark spot on Mirenwood, which looked otherwise quite lovely. This building probably had a few other uses besides generating energy for the train station, but those weren't of interest to them.
As the trio approached the rather large wooden double door, the soft breeze turned into a short and violent gust, opening one of them completely. It was almost as if they were...invited.

The interior looked about as bad as the outside, murky and sad. The lighting inside was dim, which gave an eerie impression. They were on their guard, they had to be. They had to at least expect a few guards here, but nothing they couldn't handle. According to their ghastly scout, their target was the basement. They just had to make their way towards the stairs. There was more than enough time to shut down the generator, dance the tango and still be back in time to make the train. Everything was under control, they thought.

But that thought waned as they heard a scream, filled with terror, and then there was silence. "the heck?" Zephyr thought aloud.  This silence was probably even more eerie than the scream was. What was happening here? The echoing halls made locating any noise here a tough chore. Should they go and find out what happened here or beeline the generator? And what if those two goals were to coincide? Who were they kidding, they probably would. Nothing would ever go that easy. "Let's just go on for now." Ashur whispered, they would have to proceed with caution.

The hallways seemed to go on for what seemed like an eternity, was the tension doing a number on them? Ashur felt a soft tap on his right shoulder. Looking over this shoulder he looked questionably at Kron. "Something wrong?" Ashur said softly. Kron looked at him "why do you ask?" Ashur swore that someone had taped his shoulder. He hoped he wasn't going crazy here. Last time he checked, he was mentally stable, he thought...

As they were nearing the end of the first hallway, they would find an open door. The wooden door had been decorated in a color the trio knew all too well, bloody red. They looked at eachother, something was clearly amiss. They snuck towards the door, Kron took it upon himself to carefully look around the corner first.  He found out he was leering into a small guard station, with two guards lying on the floor. They entered, crouching over the bodies, unconscious and dead. the one close to the door had his innards rended by a knife that sat firmly in his belly, explaining the stains on the door. They looked through the room once more, they were definitely the only ones here. But then... the door closed.

Ashur violently shook the knob over and over, but the door wouldn't open. The door had no lock. "Leave this to me" Kron said as Ashur stepped aside. But before Kron could do anything their ears would be tingled by the sound of a laugh. "Hee hee hee" It sounded as a young girl, not older than six or so. But by the second the laugh grew louder and more... maniacal. All objects in the room started shaking, like an earthquake. But an earthquake it was not, as all loose objects in the room suddenly started to float into the air: two chairs, a table, a small plant, some small miscellaneous objects and two bodies. "fuck..."

It was all circling to the air, swirling faster with every second that passed. The maniacal laughter acting as a rhythm for the object to dance to in the air. It was a first for Ashur, a first for all of them probably. But they had found themselves a case of paranormal activity. And none of them could say they were particularly enjoying it. Where was their ghost-whisperer at times like this? Goddamn thunderpussy.
The laughing stopped, as out of nowhere something was etched into the wall "WELCOME". Obviously, none of them were actually feeling welcome here. "PLAY?" Zephyr rose his hand "we're kind of busy so... another time maybe?"
Their ghostly host did not really take kindly to this, as the only thing that followed was a loud shriek, capable of breaking glass. The swirling objects changed trajectory, flying towards them at a high speed. "You idiot!" Ashur cried out as he avoided the table. Kron managed to leap to the left and avoid a set of chairs.
It was what one could call a dance with death, and none of them wished to end their lifes by getting their head cracked by a chair. Over time more messages would be etched in the wall "BORING" "HATE", some of them were drawings, some others were etched in a way that was hardly legible. But they didn't have the time to look away. A bell could be heard during this whole predicament. Damn, they were late.
But Zephyr proved less lucky this time as he got hit by one of the guards after dodging some smaller objects. This caused him to drop something that was on his person: the famed can of beans.

All objects were dropped as the can slowly floated into the air. Ashur then noticed the door slowly opening "It's distracted, run for it!" None of them had to be told twice. They quickly ran outside as fast as they could. As Kron looked back, he could just in time avoid a lightning fast can, barely grazing by his face. The can crashed into the wall, leaving significant cracks in it. The can itself, of course, was completely fine. But it seems the can had piqued the interest of the ghost, as it got lifted into the air again. "Run for it!"

They sped through the halls, followed by a floating can of beans. They avoided doors opening left and right, opened by seemingly nothing. But they knew better. The sceeaming of the spirit grew louder, more violent, with every second that passed. "What will we do now chief?!" Zephyr yelled at Ashur through his panting "Run faster!" The stairways were at the end of this hallway. All they could hope was that the spirit would cut them enough slack to shut down that generator.

They reached the stairs and made their way down as quickly as they could. Jumping down anywhere possible to make their descent faster. Unfortunately for them ghosts didn't need stairs. And their pursuer was only inches away as they entered the basement. The basement was one large room, in which the generator stood prominently in the back, large and glinstering with electric crystals making a brimming sound. the three spead out, but the can of beans followed Zephyr. The ghost probably wished to reunite it with it's owner... in the most bloody fashion. "STOP" got etched in the wall, the ceiling, the floor, everywhere. It had gone haywire. They had to stop the generator somehow with an angry spirit on their heels.

But this time Zephyr had an idea. He ran towards the generator, the beans following him in an angry fashion. Just as he got in front of the generator, he jumped away, causing the can to crash into it with full force. The blow caused the can to ricochet, leaving a huge dent in the generator and caused a few crystals to fall off. The brimming sound stopped as the lights went out. Zephyr reached for HIS can of beans, before the ghost could pick it up again. "Let's hurry!" kron yelled as he already made way for the stairway. Ashur and Zephyr didn't want to stay behind either. The ghost's laughter was replaced by shrieks and cries, probably angry at it's new toy being taken away. Everything loose started to float again, but the trio had already started running up the stairs. They had no second to lose, they would get out of this freakshow. `They ran through the hallways. The exit was their only goal now.
They would find the door wide open as they headed towards the exit. But their playfull house spirit was ahead of them, as it slowly closed the heavy door. "Don't think so" Kron shouted as he lunged, punching the door into pieces with his metal arm. The trio rolled outside, the ghost shrieked as any object passing through the door lost it's momentum and fell to the ground. The spirit was seemingly bound to the building itself.

"I've had it with this town, let's get out of here." Ashur exclaimed as he got up. Kron and Zephyr nodded as they headed off towards the main station.

Naya dropped down through the layers of the Inspectors consciousness until she was hovering over a replica of the city. The city looked tiny from her position and had a slight green tint from her mental shield surrounding her. She felt Arbos enter after her and opened a path for him, clearing away buildings and streets with her mental ability. She gasped slightly as something hard rammed into her shield, causing it to warp and bend under the strain. She turned her attention away from the city below slightly and looked to the side. The bald Inspector was sat in his chair, eyes closed, surrounded by his own mental shield that was pushing into her shield. As she removed obstacles from Arbos’ path, he added or modified new ones, creating a weird patch work city filled with blank spots. She felt her body quiver under the mental pressure. She abandoned the city for a moment and pushed back against the inspectors shield. The strain was intense and she could feel sweat forming on her brow from the effort of fighting back. Her Master had taught her to fight mentally but learning was different to the real thing. Eventually she managed to push him back. He grunted in slight pain, the noise echoing in the area above the city, and his eyes snapped open.
“Bloody heathen!” He spat.
They continued their fight over the city until Arbos reached the centre. Naya had expected him to fight harder over this area but he disappeared, allowing Naya to completely clear the Inspectors mind. She had done her job, now it was up to the spectre.

Arbos gave the final strike and she could feel the world start to crack and break down. She jumped out quickly as the Inspectors mind was destroyed, tumbling off the desk and landing painfully on her tail. She nearly lost consciousness right there as the exhaustion washed over her. Her vision blurred, her arms trembled and her tail throbbed with pain. Her vision cleared as her attention was drawn to the now standing Inspector. There was no sign from Arbos and the Inspect wore a deep frown on his face. Had they failed? She was done for, she didn’t have the energy left to fight him. A very familiar cocky grin spread across his face.
“C’mon thunderpussy, we got work to do!”
She sighed loudly and slumped against the floor as the fear disappeared from her body. She covered her eyes with her forearm.
“Don’t scare me like that! You made me waste some energy.”
He only laughed at this. With a small smile on her face, she grabbed the nearby machinery to help herself up. On slightly wobbly legs she left the building and headed towards the main boarding plafom. They didn’t have much time before the Magna-rail left.

Naya arrived first to the platform and rested against a supporting beam, away from the queues. Arbos walked around spooking unsuspecting passengers while she was resting before taking his place in a small booth designated for an ID checker. She had never been so tired in her life. She hoped that she would never have to do that again, but in the back of her mind she knew it might be necessary in the future. Finally after fifteen minutes the rest of the group arrived. They handed her the ID card and she went straight to join the queue for the magna-rail. When it was her turn she stepped forward and presented her ID card. The man looked at it then looked her up and down then back to the ID again with a frown. Shrugging slightly the inspector nodded and let her pass; Arbos was clearly enjoying himself acting the whole thing out. She stepped into the train and sat down in the first empty compartment she could find. She left the door open slightly so that her companions could join her then let her exhaustion drag her into sleep.


*Note* I cbb reading over this so there might be slight mistakes or something, too tired to look at it now.

Even more ghosts. Just what he wanted. Bloody hell, Zephyr was damn happy to finally be on this train. Train seemed like an off word for it though, seeing as how it was essentially a moving city. A city caravan or some such. Whatever, either way it had damn near anything you could need or want from one, split among several dozen cars the size of small buildings.

He looked around somewhat surprised, but then it registered that since it'd take a few days it was probably the best way to make that less tedious. This was after all some sort of "classy" way to travel or whatever. Zeph couldn't bring himself to care either way, as long as they were done with getting attacked for a few days. He hoped.

He looked at the group for a moment, and he figured it might look weird for them to just hang out together. Plus depending on who did what after arriving to their destination, they might either be together a lot longer or never see each other again. Regardless, he wanted to meander around anyway. Maybe he'd finally get some actual clothes or something.

"Welp. This looks like an interesting spot. 3 days, might as well find something to do. I wouldn't think we'll need each other for anything but assuming we do, I'll probably be lazing around in a tea house or beverage hall or some such nonsense. Or hell if I know. Figure something out."

With that, Zephyr started walking off. He did manage to see the dog of some old lady urinate on Ashurs boot though as he started. "If that's any clue this should be funny if nothing else."

It was a damn huge thing to walk. He should have checked if there was some sort of transport, and where it was if so. At some point. Tons of shops, buildings and all kinds of things. It also seemed logical that workers would just live on the thing as well then. He pulled out the menial amount of money he had left, and realized he likely should've waited until they got some cash. Oh well. While walking yet more he noticed he came to another car.

This one seemed like a spot for tons of places to eat and so on. Guess he'd have to remember what "car" it was since he said to find him in some spot like this. Walking sucked, so he scouted around a bit and found himself the way people transported apparently. On the sides of the car were four tube like things, two on each side. One on each side went toward the front car, one on each to the back. It was crowded as hell, but wasn't much else to be done he felt.

At least there was a car listing posted near the loading spot, and a large time clock with the current time as well as expected arrival and departure times. He noticed one that said "Casinos and other". Zeph smiled slightly "Sounds like my ticket! Hopefully. Luck can't be that bad considering how things have happened. Mostly. I'd better get some better clothes first though. No casino is gonna let someone who looks like a hobo in."

First stop: Market "district". It was still hard to act like this place was a city no matter how he thought of it or they marked things. He barely managed to buy some black pants, a sleeveless white shirt and a long blue coat that split from his lower back down to the end. "I'm not exactly high class, but I don't look god awfully broke either. Albeit, now I entirely almost am." He went back and got himself transported to the aforementioned Casino car, hoping to get a little bit of spending money on his own. He didn't know where the hell the others would be anyway, except maybe Mister McGhoul in some bar or strip joint. Funnily enough, that was likely part of the "other".

He arrived and was surprised, the area he got out at was relatively higher class than he expected. "I shoulda figured though, there's plenty of well off people on here. I bet the other half of the car is seedier." He wasn't wrong. It was also the place someone like Zephyr would need to be however. He found his target, the place was clearly not as highly established as the first one he saw, and the neon lights mocking the "motion" of a woman's leg marked that quite obviously. He walked in past the bouncers, but was stopped at the desk by a woman underwhelmed by the entertainment of filing her nails. She glanced up and faked a "Pleased to meet you, Welcome!" smile.

"Weapons please. We don't allow weapons or fighting here, we don't care who shot first. We also reserve the right to detain anyone we deem or have reason to suspect of cheating, hiding anything, or harassing the workers. Follow the rules and welcome to "Wicked House of Chumps and Malevolence."

Zephyr handed over the spear, and realized that the name was absurdly fitting. He hadn't noticed the name of it outside, then again half the letters probably didn't work. Like the car itself, the place seemed split in two halfs. Even the signs were "charming." It read "Left for strippers and tippers, Right for Poor man's plight or rich mans delight." Zeph facepalmed. "Who the fuck thought that second one was clever?" He went right. He went and found himself what he felt was always the simplest game to gamble on: Blackjack. He checked himself, and realized he had eleven silver left. "Oh fuck. I blew ten of what I even had. On friggin clothes even. Bollocks."

He walked up to the table, felt stupid for not noticing the "chips only" sign beforehand, left to the counter in the back, exchanged them and went to try this again. He placed the four silver chips down, got two cards. Ten and two. Staying on that is useless. The other ten he drew said otherwise. "Son of a bitch." He thought for a moment and toggled with his necklace. Then he had an idea and thought to himself "Oh hot damn. I haven't tried that in a while. I wonder if that works here." He took a moment, bowed his head shortly and prayed to Kitanar. Numbers flashed through his mind shortly. He placed his seven chips down. The two cards he received were the first two that flashed. Eighteen. The third one he was was a six. He decided to stay and watched as the person beside him drew a six.

"Well that's good to know." he thought to himself. Another quick prayer, another hand played. From seven to twenty eight. A rather noble looking blond woman sat next to him. He couldn't help but notice how out of place she was, including her looks. Without thinking he placed all twenty eight chips down while chatting her up. "Oh wow, hello there milady." She glanced over, and smiled warmly. "Oh hello sir. You're rather well mannered despite your looks. Disregarding the "wow" you drooled out anyway." Zephyr scratched his head "Er, that part come out loud? Well oops." Without paying attention for a moment he tapped the table for a hit. She chuckled at him quickly "That didn't seem the best move. Maybe you should stop staring for a moment." Zephyr cocked his head for a moment and looked at the table. Seventeen, with the dealer drawing him a card. "Aw shit!" The card landed. Four.

She laughed out loud at that one. "You seemed to be a lucky guy for that one." Zephyr noted himself that she was entirely right there. Once more should be more than enough. He placed all fifty six winnings in for one more, quickly praying as he bowed his head pushing them forward. "Not lucky enough I'm afraid, I haven't won your name yet." The woman crossed her arms and leaned back. "Mayhap this last hand tells you if you won it or not." Two cards, somehow he got two twos. Interestingly enough, he also knew he'd draw a four, a five, and an eight. And so he did. An "impressive" 21 if ever seen, tallying him up to one gold and sixteen silver, among the cheers of a few onlookers.

"Well that was interesting." he said out loud. A big bulky man in a fancy suit laid a hand on his shoulder and verbally agreed. "Yes it was. More than just the crowd seems to think so. We'll need you to come with us." Welp. That wasn't the best end to his foray. A second man collected the winnings and pushed em in a box, following Zeph and the original man."

They sat around for a while, and they certainly weren't listening. "I don't know what you really want, you can't find any proof of anything, you can't find anyone who says they can back anything up, AND despite checking several times you've found nothing to even hint at me cheating. Can we move this along or get me the hell out of here? Not the most entertaining thing I've done lately." The fancy white suited business guy in the chair still had it turn away from him. "Do you have any idea how often anyone goes from essentially broke to being able to live well off for a while? Especially after an absurdly lucky play like that?" Zeph retorted "Is there some reason I should? It's not like I've gambled before or work here. Unless you want to pretend my can of beans had some super secret role in winning at black jack."

A knock at the door. "Sir, this is simply the only person who says they have any sort of info relating to this." The lady walked in after a moment. The chair swiveled around. "I hope you have something meaningful to a-" he stopped mid sentence and seemed to become very apologetic. "Ah. Lady Waltz. Forgive me, but we really would like to have an actual lead on this." She scoffed at him mildly and spoke in a rather blunt to the point tone: "I didn't realize I was marked as a waste of time for anything here. I'd have thought I was considered a bit more than so easily dismissed. Although I suppose being the person right next to him clearly wouldn't have any relevance."

The man slightly sank in his chair, as Zeph stifled a small chuckle. She was tearing into him so regally. "I guess you would be the only one to know." He glanced over at Zephyr. "Well, if she says you're clean then you can leave with her. There's nothing more to be done if the only testimony we get is to your innocence." To which she looked at Zeph as well and said "Let us go then. No point in stalling you here any longer, correct? I assume you have his winnings ready for him to take." The man solemnly pulled out a gold coin and the few extra silvers, and placed them on the edge of the desk then turned away again.

"Ahem. Well ah, thank you for that madame Waltz. Sitting there was such a pain." She chuckled a bit and said "It's Sonia. Suck ups tend to use a more formal last name. I would think you have no reason to. Albeit I would need something to call you regardless." Zephyr entirely forgot he hadn't even given his name. How silly. "Ah forgive me. I'm Zephyr, and you have apparently saved me from a headache despite not knowing me." Again Sonia smiled a bit. "Anyway, seeing as how you were scrounging up for money, I assume you've not found a place to retire to. You may feel free to use one of the beds in my estate." Zephyr almost tripped. "E. estate? wha? I figured there was a fancy or high class car or something but.." The lady stopped for a moment and actually laughed out loud "Well, perhaps that word is a big fancy. It's simply a big fancy house, sort of a mansion. Not anything I'd label as an actual "Estate" though. It just sounds good."

She had a pretty good point. Eventually reaching it, she wasn't lying. The thing was huge and damn fancy looking. It was still VERY early morning, but he hadn't slept a lot since before all the nonsense from the station and even beforehand. As they walked in two maids were at the ready. While it was obvious they were curious who the hell he was, as trained they simply did their usual orders of taking their coats and doing menial other tasks instead of questioning their lady. Sonia snapped her fingers and said "Show him to one of the guest rooms. I assume they're clean despite never being used, just let him be in one." She turned "You seem pretty exhausted from whatever you were busy doing for the day. Rest until you feel needed. You may stay here until you reach your destination, but realize that this is no invitation for anything beyond a place to rest and relax." Zephyr nodded "I might be a vagabond, but I am certainly not so uncouth as to go where I'm not invited."

She chuckled again, and replied "Good. Anyway, I have work to be done so do as you want. These ladies will let you in if you should head out and return." Zephyr remembered quickly offhand "Ah crap. I forgot my spear there." Sonia glanced over at one of the maids "Someone will need to go acquire his belonging, find someone or do it please." That single maid nodded, then the several other maids nodded, and Lady Sonia walked off.

Zephyr laughed a little to himself and said slightly out to himself "Some luck indeed, eh?" One of the maids looked at him slightly, smiled and went back to work. He was led off to the room he was given and sat down decided if he would sleep a bit or wander off again. There was plenty of time and still a while left for this trip after all.

The magnarail was bigger than what Kali-en remembered, did they add another car?
Anyway, he didn’t have to stay with them until the last day, and so, as soon as he entered the car, he went on to where he stayed the other few times he had to take the train. He would need the remaining of the day to completely recover, and another one to try again on this nullomancy stuff, he figured that trying every other day was bound to give him some results, or so he hoped.
He moved to the Casino, where someone interested in news, like the actual political situation, of their destination might buy some information by playing the right games.
As he entered, he spotted the different areas: the “leg” was mostly interesting if one was looking for rumors and hearsay. The “circle”, locally named so because of the disposition of the table of the different games, was a den for the Empire spies. Only an idiot would go there, or someone new to the politics game.
Kali-en aimed for the “moon” area. Probably named because of the huge sign at the entrance in which were engraved the letters “MOON”. He took off his belt, pouch and knives and handed them to the bouncer - you had to stay legit in this place. He examined the pouch and handed it back to Kali-en who, with a nod, went to the second guy and got thoroughly body searched, you had to stay legit in this place. Once cleared, he went to the counter, handed the fee – ten silver coins – changed another ten silver into chips and went in.
He spotted the game he wanted: roulette. To require the information of the “official” political word, one has to bet on a black number and red for the “underworld” situation. The number bet on corresponds to the city/town code. Once the bet is done, whether you win or lose, you had to bet two more times, as a confirmation of the request, on the 16-black. Apparently, there wasn’t any official government in that town.
After betting, and losing each time, Kali-en went to rest on a nearby bench.
Half an hour later, nothing happened. The waiting time was half an hour, right? Did he miss something? Was he supposed to sit somewhere specific? He was sure his memories were from Klein, who had an excellent memory.
Wait.
To access Klein’s memories, wasn’t he supposed to act like Klein? Does that mean he should have stolen the chips rather than change them with own money, albeit stolen.
Wait.
How did he know those memories were from Klein and not himself? Why did he dissociate himself from Klein? He knew he should not behave in some ways in order to prevent the voice from taking over him, but why did he have different behaviors in the first place?
For that matter, what was the behavior specific to Kali-en? How was he supposed to know how he should behave if he didn’t  –
 “Hello there, do you mind me sitting here?”, Sonia said as she seated near Kali-en.
Sonia?
“Huh, Hi”
“Still nervous in front of women?”, she said with a sly grin. She had a glass of red wine in one hand, and a close letter on the other.
He lifted his chin, “That’s what I want them to think”, and then looked at her with a malicious grin on his face.
She lifted her eyebrows: “Them?”, she raised her glass to her lips and took a sip in a way that elicited a lot of uncontrolled thoughts. Well crap.
“Am I to understand you do not consider me as a woman?”
“Hum, no – it’s not really, I mean”. He flushed and decided that he might as well shut his mouth before saying anything else.
“I have a message for you, well, two actually. The first one is in this letter, it contains all the information you asked about Sayrn from those past 3 weeks.”, she handed him the letter and paused.
“And the second message?”
“You are to leave this casino in the next ten minutes, and never come back again. Apparently you pissed off Ash a great deal. Honestly, why did you do to have him pulled strings all the way inside the magnarail?”
Kali-en face darkened, and as the words left his mouth, his voice sounded cold, even to him “He crossed me. We had a perfectly legit agreement, and he crossed me”. Wow. He hadn’t realized how much anger he resented against that guy.
Sonia looked at him intently, then shook her head. “There’s something about you I will never be able to understand”
“What do you mean?”
“Like right now, you seemed almost surprised to remember he had crossed you, and even more to be angry about it.” After an instant of hesitation, she sighed and got up: “Time for us to part ways”
Kali-en got up, turned to leave, said “See you next time” and got out of the casino.

“I certainly hope not Kahl, for both our sake.”

Naya slowly opened her eyes a fraction. She was tired, so tired, but her eyelids refused to shut again. She opened them further and looked to the side. She was a massive room littered with plush arm chairs, tables and partitions. Everything was either black, white or a grey colour in between and there was a dense fog covering the floor. She lifted her hand in front of her face and saw that it was slightly transparent and surrounded by a misty aura. Ah, that’s right. She remembers now. She’d fallen asleep in the first comfy thing she could find. She’s slipped into the spirit world in her sleep again. She gets up slowly from her arm chair, swaying slightly on her feet. Her balance regained, she heads to the exit of the room. A flash of colour catches her attention and she looks to the side while she’s stood in the door way. Sat on a scruffy brown arm chair is a cauhri man in a cheap looking blue suit. His head is bowed slightly and his eyes stare lifelessly at the ground. He’s gripping a rolled up newspaper in one hand and his other hand is gripping his knee. While she’s staring, the mans eyes look up and meet her own. Recognition flashes across his face and he starts to stand up. Naya escapes out of the room as quickly as she can, she really doesn’t want to be listening to the regrets of the dead right now.

She wanders aimlessly along the Magna-rail. She passes hundreds of blue living spirits, and quite a few dead ones (which she avoids at all costs). Nothing was happening. No sign, no weird phenomenon like last time. If fact, the weirdest thing she found was a really fat kid in a bear costume holding a bright red balloon in the food court. He’d run away when he spotted her oddly enough. After a while she gave up wandering around and sat down on a bench. After the last time she had expected to see the strange spirit again, but no. She was thinking of ways to put herself to sleep again, or knock out her spirit body when the giant wolf walks past her. She stares after with her mouth open. It was at least six and half feet tall. It has white fur covering most of its body, with black fur running down its back to its tail, which had a white tip. The back of the ears are black and its feet with the black fur continuing up the back of its legs. It stops a few meters ahead and looks back at Naya. The face is white with black around the eyes and joining with the back of the head. Its eyes... The eyes are like liquid gold surrounding an onyx core. She can feel it staring at her intently. She stands up slowly and takes a step forward. The wolf snaps its head forward and walks away again. Not waiting a second, Naya follows after it. She has to nearly jog to keep up with its long stride.

They end up in the lower end shopping area, or some kind of market area. This car is filled with even more popping blue spirits. The wolf walks through them all, even walking straight through the stalls, making random turns here and there. Naya starts running after it now. She can’t walk through objects like the wolf can so she dodges round the stalls as quickly as she can. As she rounds one stall, (it looks like it might sell pottery or something) she finds the wolf sat in the middle of the main path way, the only path wide enough to fit its size. It stares at Naya for a second before it lifts its head to the sky and howls. She covers her eyes against the insanely loud noise. Muffled as it is, Naya thinks the howl sounds a bit sad. Once the wolf finished, it turned tail and ran away.
“Wait!” she yells after, one arm falling down in front of her.
That’s when a hand lands on her shoulder and jolts her into reality. Loud noises, hundreds of voices and strong smells assault her senses. She’s out of the spirit world but she’s not sat in the arm chair like she was expecting, she’s stood by a stall in the market still. She turns around to look at the owner of the hand on her shoulder. A greasy looking man in a brown shirt with a white apron around his waist is looking at her expectantly. He’s short, even by cauhri standards, and has to stretch to grab her shoulder.
“What?” she asks him confused.
“I said ‘are yer gunna pay for that, or not?’. We don’t treat thieves well here, cat.” He didn’t bother to hide the threat in his voice.
She realized then that she had something clutched in her left hand. She opened up her palm and sat there was a black stone wolf pendent. It was curved into a semi-circle with a white marble chip for an eye.
“How much?” she asked dumbly, still looking down at the pendent.
“Three silvers.” The stall keeper replied.
It was expensive, but Naya didn’t really care about that right now. She fished around in the pouch on her belt and handed him the coins.
“Do you have another one?” she asked quickly. She could tell there was another half to the pendent.
“No, jus’ that.” He said, turning away towards his trinket stall.
“Wait!” she grabbed his arm and turned him “Where did you get it from. I need to know.”
He shoved her hand away.
“I ain tellin’ ya. Now get lost cat, yer causing a ruckus.” He said sourly.
She turned around and was surprised to see a small crowd had gathered and was staring at her, some whispering to one and other. She thanked the stall keeper quickly and ran off in a random direction. She ran for a few minutes before slowing to a walk and trying to get her bearings. She had no idea where she was. She walked around a bit before stopping by a clothing stall to ask for directions. He pointed her towards the entrance and she headed off again. By the entrance she found a map of the magna-rail cars. She stood there deciding where to go next with the wolf pendent safely in her pouch.

The size of the magnarail was definitely astonishing. Ashur had heard tales of it before, but this was just grotesque! Every car was huge and housed its own share of facilities for everyone to enjoy. Ashur had quickly lost sight of the rest of the group, each of them going of somewhere on their own.  Ashur didn't really see a reason for them to stick together here anyway. They would be fine if they all just stayed out of trouble, a feat more difficult for some of them definitely.
Ashur wandered at a slow place, looking around for a place of interest. He hadn't seen anything that he was really interested in visiting till now. He took a look at a few stalls but didn't really find anything he needed. He passed by a quite a few casinos and strip clubs, one of them probably housing everyone’s favorite dead pervert. One could truly notice this place was made for those with a little too much pennies in their pockets. Unfortunately they weren't those people.

Maybe one day.

Maybe Ashur would find something interesting to charge a crystal with, thus far the only thing he wanted was the magnetism made by the magnarail. This was not something best done on board however, he had to wait until Sayrn. But who knew? Maybe there was some other interesting charge to be found in this place. He would have to wait and see. For now he might just find some way to enjoy himself.
It took Ashur a while before he walked past a not too fancy looking pub, rather unusual with all the places designed to rob all your money. He looked in his pouch: he was not a rich man, but you didn't need to be rich to drink.

The place was rather empty. The only other customers at that moment were two men sitting in the corner of the pub, negotiating a deal that would not be able to bear the sunlight. On the background a relaxing piano tune could be heard, probably played from some sound crystal jukebox.  Ashur took a seat at the bar and took a deep breath, he just needed a moment of relaxation. Ashur had enough for a few days; that substation was supposed to be an easy job. How could that goddamn ghost not have noticed a freaking poltergeist flying around?

"A drink, handsome?" Ashur looked up, straight into the eyes of the barmaid. "Beer please." Ashur took two silvers out of his pouch "coming right up." Ashur's eyes followed her and she walked to the tap and back to him. "Rather quiet here at the moment."  The barmaid shrugged "so now and then, this place is rather popular amongst people without enough metal to visit the fancy ass places. Enough people with no need for all that stuf. Manager likes to keep things here simple." She spoke in an accent more often heard in east Zengar. Quite a rare thing, most of them thought twice before moving anywhere closer to the empire.

Ashur took a rather large swig from his glass, savoring the taste as it went down his throat. Exactly what a man needed: rest, beer and a pretty sight. Yes, that barmaid definitely was a sight for sore eyes; the type of gal that Arbos probably would stalk for a glimpse in the shower. Rather tall, pretty face and a pretty nice figure. Her long black hair was tied up neatly in a ponytail and her eyes green as emeralds. He actually wondered if that invisible bastard wasn’t leering over his shoulder at this very moment; he wouldn’t be surprised, that’s for sure.
"Will you be on the rail for long?" she asked. "I'm headed for Sayrn, so only a few days." He took a sip from his beer. "I see. Returning home or got business there?" She was rather nosy for a barmaid maybe, but Ashur couldn't blame her. There wasn't really anyone else for her to talk to either. Ashur did rather enjoy a good conversation anyway. "If I had to choose, I guess business." The look on her face showed a puzzling expression. "A lot happened..." he added. "Anyway, do you live here on the magnarail?" she talked while cleaning some glasses: "Only for a few months, then I’ll go back to my family in Althers." Ashur finished his glass "Funny, my dad came from Althers, haven't been there myself in over a decade or so." Maybe Ashur would take this chance to go there someday now that he left, but that depended on what would happen now.  Althers was a good distance to the southwest of Sayrn, but at least closer than Eriur was.   "Maybe I'll head there afterward. Oh, I'll have another beer please." Ashur reached for his pouch. She smiled and tapped him a new glass.

Three more customers walked in “three whiskey!” they shouted as they took their seats on a table “alright.” Ashur returned his attention to his glass as she poured the glasses. “Lookin’ great today as always, Rose.”  Ashur could hear them talking behind him “Up here, good sir.” Her outfit wasn’t exactly revealing, but some guys just were like that, after all. She returned to the bar, the look on her face showed faint signs of annoyance.
“So, name’s Rose?” She smiled at him “Rosalina, everyone just says Rose though.”  Ashur smiled back “Ashur. Get stuf like that a lot?” he kept his voice down, inaudible for the men behind him. An easy task considering they were a rather loud folk. “More often than I would like.” Rose sighed “Well guess there are worse jobs.” Ashur laughed “You tell me, my last job involved a damn poltergeist, creepy little things I tell you.” She laughed a little “What job did you do again?”  Ashur scratched his head for a moment. Yeah, what exactly WAS his job anyway? “I guess a traveler, heading with some other village people to the big city for work.” What he was saying wasn’t exactly a lie, right? “Will the jobs involve that thing?” she pointed to the sword. Ashur laughed “Potentially I guess, depends on what needs to be done. Do you mind me having a sword here?” – “Sheathed, no.” She smiled.  Ashur nodded “Not a problem. Oh, another beer please.”  Rose once again got him a new glass.

“So, what’s Althers like?” Ashur asked “I only heard a few things about it from my dad.” Rose thought for a moment “peaceful and rather dull I guess, empire’s pretty lax there even though it’s close to the border. Why, what did he tell you?” Ashur thought for a moment “He told me of this huge castle in a big, open field. He said I should definitely take a look there if I ever visited.” Rose’s eyes widened a little “fort Darkcrown? From what I remember the empire prohibits anyone from ever going near that place, even soldiers themselves are prohibited. They say it’s cursed.” Ashur laughed “Now I certainly want to go there! Sounds like there’s more than meets the eye!” Rose obviously didn’t expect that response, which did make a smile on her face as well “Up to no good? Interesting.” Ashur grinned “That place sounds too fun to explore for an empire to stop me.” His grin grew a little wider “C’mon, don’t say that a cursed fort doesn’t sound interesting to you!” Ashur was getting a bit cheerier, without a doubt the first few beers were having their effect. ”Dangerous to be honest, though can’t say I’m completely uninterested.”  He nodded “Danger’s part of the fun though.  And I doubt there’s anything in there I couldn’t take… as long as it isn’t a damn ghost again.” Rose smiled “So you’d protect me from the big bad fort?”  Before Ashur could answer though, Rose got called away again, more whiskey. Of course those men wouldn’t behave any better, not from whiskey at least.
“So where were we?” she sounded rather happy to be back. Ashur grinned a little “The big bad fort. Yeah I’d protect you.” Rose was kind of flattered “What would you be protect me from though? A dragon?” she was flattered,  yet kind of skeptical at the same time, men talked big way too often, especially drunk ones. “You kidding me? If we find a dragon we’d run the hell away.” They both laughed.  Ashur emptied his glass once more and looked at his coin pouch. Not quite empty, but spending too much would probably be a horrible idea. He then looked at the clock, it was rather late. On the other hand, he didn’t really feel like leaving yet.  Ashur was weighing his options, when Rose came up to him, whispering in his ear “if you stay till after closing time, I’ll offer you some drinks on the house now.”

It didn’t take Ashur a second to actually consider that offer “Won’t your boss mind though?” She grinned “Out for today, I’m calling the shots.” Well, that made things kind of easy, didn’t it?
Even though the bar was open for only an hour or two, more people started flooding in.  The quiet bar was suddenly getting filled. This unfortunately meant the two didn’t really get to talk much, though Ashur still got his occasional drink. Ashur took this time to think about everything that had happened to the best of his intoxicated ability.  Murdered sister, taking on a fort, killing an imperial nullomancer, canned death poltergeist;  Ashur wasn’t  happy about what had happened to him. He had always wanted to go into the wide world, but not in this way.  He could only wonder about the future, would Sayrn bring him anything good? His mind wasn’t in any state to help him though.  There wasn’t really any use to thinking about it now.

Then came closing time, and the bar slowly emptied. A few rowdy customers were quite attached to their seat, but eventually Rose was able to shoo them away.  She closed the door and locked it “Ah, finally, some peace and quiet. “She sighed and then looked at Ashur, the two were completely alone now.  “Sorry for the long wait… let’s go up.”  Ashur followed her up a set of narrow stairs, leading to a hall and a room above the bar. There were a few coat hangers in the hall, with a single coat and a pair of shoes beneath them. “Just leave that here too” she pointed at the sword. Ashur took of his shoes and put his sword against the wall; he then entered a rather spacious room. The room was simple, containing only the necessary things needed: bed, table, chairs, fridge, small kitchen, closet and a small nightstand.  There was another door most likely leading to a small bathroom.   The whole room could just be described as plain, however, the bar music that she hadn’t turned off, along with the dim lighting, still set a reasonably nice atmosphere.
“Take a seat” She said as she walked towards the fridge. As he seated himself, she came back with two glasses and three big bottles of… something…. Expensive something. “Snagged some from downstairs.”  She said as she filled the glasses, then sat down next to him. “I really need a drink myself now, otherwise I’ll just collapse.”  She drank it in one quick gulp, then filled up again before Ashur even had a chance to take a sip. “Just what I needed” she sounded a lot happier after that.

“You really hate this job , huh?” Ashur  said as he looked at his glass “Yes, very sharp.” Rose joked “But truly, long work times, no coworkers, and most customers are just horrible.”  She immediately emptied her second glass “Seriously, most of them are just asses, lechers or both. Some of them think they can do anything ‘cause they got some money. Luckily most of them go to fancier places but still, makes me sick. Manager’s worst of the lot. Really haven’t seen a decent person come in here since the day I stepped aboard.”  She drank much faster than Ashur did, she’d quickly catch up to his moderate level of intoxication at this rate. “Just some days with a full bar of ‘em, horrible I tell you!” She was silent for a few seconds “Sorry… I didn’t bring you here just for my rants.” She looked quite saddened again  
Ashur emptied his glass quickly; he didn’t really like the thought of her massively out-drinking him like this.  The drink had an insanely sweet taste,  which almost made you forget that it was alcoholic.  “I don’t mind really, I know what a shitty job is like. I was a sword instructor for a garrison back in town. If you want slave drivers, don’t look further. Wage was horrible too.” Rose listened attentively “Doesn’t sound any better either.”

She smiled “Anyway, it’s nice to have someone to talk to who isn’t just a complete asshole... “ she took only a small sip this time, though she already had about one and a half bottle at this point.  “Every day here is just so boring… and lonely.”  She softly leaned her head against him. Though she didn’t look at him directly, Ashur could read the uncertainty she was feeling. Instinctively, Ashur put his arm around her.  Her uncertainty made place for a comfortable smile and they just sat there for a few minutes, silently, unmoving.  She wasn’t the only one that had craved this kind of attention. Ashur had always been depended upon, yet that was all lost in one fell swoop only a few days ago. This felt so familiar to those times, yet different, very different.  Ashur’s other hand slowly searched for hers.  As her hand folded into his, Their heads turned to each other roughly in sync. Their faces were so close now. “You’re beautiful” Ashur whispered as he stared deeply into her eyes,  Ashur drew her in closer, embracing her tightly as he touched her lips.
Their sense of time completely warped; the seconds felt like ages, yet it was still far too short for the two of them. When they stopped and opened their eyes, they immediately kissed once again. Would they reach an eternity if they just continued like this? Probably not, but it was a nice thought.
She entranced him; he was hardly controlling himself at this moment. Their movements were getting wilder; he wasn’t sure if it was his doing or if he just followed her pace at this time. Not that he cared, he savored every moment.

Their breathing had gotten heavier and Ashur’s heart was pounding. For now, he forgot all his worries, all troubles he had. At this moment only this room existed with the two of them in it.  This boring room, only made interesting by the presence of the other, was all they needed. Their lust had become a sort of greedy desire, ever growing stronger. “Ashur…” she said as she rose from her chair. Her seductive voice was taking over his mind; he followed her to her bed.  In front of it, the passion continued. Ashur kissed her as he began to undo the buttons of her uniform.  However, the first piece of clothing to hit the floor would be Ashur’s, revealing his upper body. “What are those?”  Rose wondered as her hand ran over one of Ashur’s crystals, embedded in his arm. Oh boy, he had some explaining to do.

“Well don’t freak out now.” Ashur said calmly. “This isn’t just some bad taste In body art.” Ashur thought for a second, he never had to explain a nullomancer to anyone else. Heck, even he knew nothing more than the basics. “I’m a little different from a normal cauhri… you could say.”  Ashur reached out and managed to grab one of the glasses on the table. As he held his hand above it, the glass filled with water which he handed to her. “Think we’ve had enough booze for today.”  Ashur tried to explain nullomancy. “So basically, you put crystals in your body, and you can release them whenever you want?” Rose looked rather bewildered, but at least she wasn’t making him out for a freak. Ashur nodded “Basically. I hope you can keep a secret though.”  She smiled seductively “If you want something, you’ll have to work for it.”  She giggled and she pulled him atop of her.  An answer Ashur was definitely content with. And with that, the last pieces of clothing were littered on the floor.

The first thing to greet Ashur next morning was a hangover, oh wooptiedoop. As he tried to get up, he found out the sleeping Rose had wrapped herself around his arm. Ashur got back down, not wishing to wake her, she was cute when she slept. However, she would awake soon enough “good morning, handsome.” She smiled at him. Ashur turned to his side, facing her and ran his hand over her cheek. “Slept well?”  She nodded as she closed the little distance between them, pressing her body against his. Definitely not something Ashur minded, of course.  “Won’t you stay here, with me?” Ashur could only shake his head “I have to go to Sayrn.”  She was disappointed “I can’t leave here yet, my family is in dire need of money itself…” Rose paused for a few seconds “I don’t want to be alone here.” Ashur smiled as he embraced her “Then how does this sound, I’ll come for you in Althers, when you’re finished here.” He kissed her on the cheek “I want to explore that fort now anyway.”
Rose’s face shone with happiness “Promise! And now that’s settled.” Rose crawled atop of Ashur  “Where did we leave of?”  Ashur smiled “Don’t you have a bar to run?”  Rose pressed her body against his and whispered into his ear “Closed for two days, handsome.”

Kali-en kept wandering for hours, moving from one car to another, until at some point he realized he was at the entrance of the whorehouse.
“What the fuck?”
Looks like his body was telling him he was horny. How weird. From what he remembered, he had never needed any incentive in that particular field.
Could he afford it though? He checked his purse, then the whorehouse with a critical eye. His body wanted a luxurious one apparently.
He sighed, he didn’t have anything else planned for the rest of the trip, might as well go for it. He went to open the door.. and was suddenly looking at the clear blue sky.
Wait.
It’s supposed to be night time. Probably a fake sky then, how come he never realized it?
Wait.
Why am I lying down? And why is my head hurting so much?
“Sir you were right, it’s an imperial purse”
“Of course I was, this idiot must have stolen it from an unwary soldier. What a shameful act. Take him, we’re going to report him.” Wow, his voice was full of scorn. Kali-en looked around to find a man standing at a safe distance. “High nobility” was written all over him: his clothes, stances, neat hair, the contempt on his face, his fat gut. He was flanked by two soldiers on their guards, while a third one was holding his purse. And checking it.
“Uhm, sir, the purse is still half full”
The soldiers’ eyes brightened at that news.
“Ah, interesting. Well, you can count yourself lucky today, I will let you go”. The noble made his way around the still lying Kali-en, with his bodyguards eyeing him warily, to the whorehouse’s door.
Kali-en laughed.
“Fat old man, you really think you can rob me like that?”, he got to his feet in time to block one of the bodyguard’s kick aimed at his face. He took some steps back and glared at the noble while still keeping in check the three bodyguards spread in a semi-circle around him.
“You must be an idiot to think that an unwary soldier had some much money on his purse”, Kali-en looked intently at the noble, forgetting everything else, before adding with a mad smile a cold “sir”.
The noble, who was red with fury, blanched and backed all the way to the whorehouse. At the same time, the bodyguards all drew their sword and put on a defensive stance.
Now, was Kali-en not completely off his game, he might have noticed how professional those bodyguards looked, how they had spread in the most efficient way to deal with him while not suffering any injuries, how each of their sword’s handle was worn out from a daily use, how they were still sharp and clean from an intensive care, how each of those bodyguards’ eyes were calculating, not showing any fear or apprehension.
Instead, he just put a throwing knife on each of his hand, and took on his own stance, ready to launch his deadly assault.
“D-don’t kill him, I don’t want to deal with them, especially on this car”. Although his voice was still quavering, his body stance indicated that he felt safe behind his wall of bodyguards. Not that it mattered in any way to Kali-en.
“Yes sir”.
With a hysterical laughter, Kali-en jumped right at the bodyguard in front of him. He was not looking at him though, his gaze, and his attention, was still aimed at the noble, as were both his thrown knives.
The noble shrieked and put his arms above him, uselessly. The rightmost bodyguard had moved at the same time as Kali-en, using his sword to divert both knives, the center bodyguard slashed vertically at him, while the last bodyguard had put himself slightly behind Kali-en, waiting him to step back from the obvious attack.
He didn’t. He jumped at the bodyguard on the right, tackling him to the ground. He got up immediately, and ran right at the noble, his mad grin still carved on his face. Once again, he had launched a series of knives at him, and once again, the expert bodyguards had anticipated him, or had reacted with terrifying speed. The two bodyguards still up were in front of the noble, one in front of the other and slightly on his left. The closest to the noble was stopping the knives, while the other went to intercept Kali-en’s charge, and the third one, up slightly after, was putting himself slightly behind Kali-en to wait for his next retreating step.
This went on for some time, until eventually, Kali-en didn’t have any knives, or breath.
He stopped right on his track to the closest bodyguard, and looked around, confused.
“Uhm, what is going on?”. The bodyguards didn’t miss a beat, and used this moment of hesitation to close in on Kali-en and put him down, roughly.
What was going on? He didn’t have any knives left. In fact, it looked like they were all scattered in the same area near this terrified noble.
Oh right, the noble had robbed him of his purse. A shame, but he could not afford to fight any longer. Especially against those three guys, they looked like pros.
Especially as they had already pinned him to the ground.
Especially as he had no weapons left on him, apart from the crystals on his belt.
Especially as he was completely exhausted, and his thoughts were spinning weirdly in his head.
Hey! He could try this Nullomancy superpower stuff; he didn’t have any other options anyway. He fell into himself, his usual trance allowing him to feel everything on his body.
Everything.
Especially each one of the blows the bodyguards were giving him.
They hurt.
Nonetheless, he tried to go a level deeper. He was almost there, managing to ignore the pain, until a hit landed on his groin.
That really, really hurt.
What kind of men hit another one in this place? That was really low. You see, there is what one could call a code between men fighting each other, and in this code was the fact that the groin was a forbidden area.
Or so he thought.
Any attempts to gather his thoughts were rendered void by the pain that was slowly moving up on his body. On a small part of his mind, he managed to think that he found really weird that the only member allowing the reproduction of his race, and giving off a lot of pleasure in the act, was such a weakness.
He lied in a small alley some time later, utterly beaten up. He managed to find most of his knives when he went back to the whorehouse some time later, and sighed at the fact that he could not answer to his body apparent needs.
After snatching a purse, he had gotten the knack of it, from a drunk leaving the whorehouse, he found himself sitting on a bar.
"Well, you're even more useless than I thought."
An unfamiliar voice spoke out suddenly. Kali-en turned to the bar and looked at a stoic old man sitting on one of the stools. His white beard was carefully groomed and expensive clothes reeked of aristocracy. However, despite that, he had an air of a military man around him, humbling and controlled.
The man turned to face Kali-en and grinned in a very familiar and unsettling manner.
"...Aww shit...."

“So whose body is that anyway?” Kali-en asked cautiously as both he and Arbos quickly made their way through several cars.
“An old rich guy” Arbos shrugged “Normally I’d avoid taking over an aristocrat but after chasing this damn train for over an hour I really didn’t give a fuck.”
“Aristocracy? That’s not really smart. Someone will notice that he’s acting weird.”
Arbos grinned again.
“No worries there. Lord Admiral Merryweather just happens to have an acute sense of hearing, courtesy of a long career in war, so when he retired for the night the entirety of his staff was moved to a separate house until morning. Hehehe.”
“Well that’s convenient…” Kali-en thought to himself. “Where are we going anyway?” He asked.
Arbos said nothing.

Fifteen minutes later and two cars later the two have finally made it through the last civil car and stopped before a thick metal door. It was guarded by a half-asleep soldier with a dull shock glaive. Arbos stepped forward, took a breath and belched out.
“On point, Private!”
The soldier jumped up at the voice, awake only in appearance – dull eyes gave out a man whose brain was still struggling to wake up completely.
“Yessir!”
“Open up this here door for me son, I intend to inspect my cargo.” Arbos commanded firmly, shifting his shoulder slightly to reveal his Merryweather’s Admiral Epaulettes.
The guy paled and immediately proceeded to fiddle with the locks. A moment later the heavy door swung open letting in a chilling outside breeze. Arbos confidently stepped through, signaling Kali-en to follow him. He then turned to the guard once more.
“Close this door and do not let anyone through until I am finished with the inspection son. I will knock six times when I’m done and you will let me back in. That is an order.”
That said Arbos pulled the door shut before the poor guy had a moment to respond. He waited for an affirming click of the door locking and smiled.
“Idiot.”  

Arbos and Kali-en quickly made their way over the connector bridge and climbed a ladder to the top of the first cargo cart. Despite being only a fraction shorter than the gigantic cars of the civil sector, this car was still essentially a gargantuan metal bucket filled to the brim with hundreds of tons of uncut null crystals – the main export of the north on its way to Sayrn for refining.  
Arbos strolled cautiously to the side of the car, crystals crunching under his boots much like gravel, and looked over the edge. A few dozen meters below a massive electric storm danced violently. Millions of lashes of blue plasma were shooting out from the coils at the bottom of the cars, inevitably drawn to the metal machinery of the guiding posts buried deep into the ground. From that chaotic exchange a powerful magnetic field was born that carried the massive monster train on its course.
“Well? Why did you drag me here?” Kali-en shivered slightly under the piercing wind and pulled his collar up.
Arbos turned to him. He wasn’t smiling.
“I’ll be blunt, little brigand. You are too weak. You have no strength, and even less brains. From here on out your enemies will be far worse than some three bit bodyguards of a six bit merchant. Regardless of whether you stick with the Sparkly&Co – as a null you will be hunted. A fact you were fortunate as sixty fucks to not have found out tonight.”
Arbos stepped forward and pointed towards the inhabited cars.
“You need to start using your brain kid! THINK before you ACT. Or you will DIE. Had you showed a single speck of nullomancy back in that fight you wouldn’t be breathing now! Magna rail has nullomancer security officers who would’ve ripped you to shreds in seconds. That is if those goons didn’t just hack you up with their swords while you were groveling on the ground trying to throw badly formed rocks at them!”

Kali-en snorted.

“That is not funny.” Arbos’ face darkened. “If it was just your pathetic ass on the line I wouldn’t give two shits. But had they found you to be a null – we’d be greeted by a full company of Imperial Marshalls upon arrival in Sayrn who would then test every single person on board for nullomancy. And detained all of us.”
“The hell was I supposed to do then?!” Kali-en snapped.
“You should’ve thought ahead. Nullomancy is not a straight power-up. It’s a multiplier. Strong become stronger, weak remain weak and stupid become a danger to themselves. In that fight you had only two options: Assess the guards, realize you can’t take them by yourself and back away. OR use nullomancy to murder all of them quicker than the eye can see and make sure no one saw you do it. Rushing head first into half a dozen veteran blades with only a dozen throwing knives to your name was not an option.” Arbos grimaced.
“Wouldn’t have had any problems if the damn thing worked.” Kali-en spat out and mumbled to himself.
“Exactly.” Arbos grinned. “That’s why I decided to give you a crash course in nullomancy. Power you up to the same level as others… or maybe even higher. Alright?”
Kali-en stared at him for a second. “Alright.”
“Alright!” Arbos clapped his hands together. “Now, the key to the first lesson is Armor Up.”
“Armor up?” Kali-en gave him a puzzled look.
“Armor up!”
“What does that-“
“Armor. Up.” Arbos stared back without blinking.
“Wha-“
“Le Armor. Le up!”
“What are you talking about? This makes no sense!” Kali-en snapped again.
“This makes no sense?” Arbos grinned. “Nah mate, this is nullomancy!”
Now it has to be said that despite his considerable age, the Lord Admiral Merryweather kept himself in quite a remarkable condition. One could argue that he was more fit and athletic than even the youngest of soldiers. He was also faster than most people. And certainly he was more fit, athletic, faster and stronger than a backstreet thief from Sayrn slums. This was a fact Kali-en realized quite soon after a blindingly fast kick to the chest sent him hurling over the edge of the cargo cart and into the lightning vortex below.
Kali-en pondered at the fact that he was just kicked right off the mega train by a two hundred year old ghost in the body of a seventy year old admiral as he was slowly falling towards certain death. Indeed, in retrospect, the events of the last few weeks (and the last five seconds in particular) were quite neatly summed up by a single thought that raced through Kali-en’s mind. A single, simple thought, that he just had to vocalize.
“WHAT THE FUCK?!”

Time seemed to slow down as Kali-en’s mind frantically searched for a way to survive. Luckily even through the blur of the fall he managed to single out a line of pipework that ran along the outside of the cart. At the very last moment Kali-en threw his hand out and managed to grab on to it with all of his strength. But it was too late. Even as his hand was squeezing the pipe Kali-en realized that he was too low, and his body would still swing into the vortex. Damn. What a crappy way to die – pushed off a train by a ghost. Kali-en was sure that if afterlife existed he would be a laughing stock. And all because of that damned spectre. Spouting his nonsense... “Wait…” Arbos’ words ringed in Kali-en’s ears as he was slowly engulfed by the lightning storm.

And it looks like something deep inside him answered.

“You twisted ghostly son of a bitch! Pull me up!” Arbos grinned at the angry shouts and looked down. Way below Kali-en, engulfed in a thin layer of rock was hanging off a pipe. The licks of electricity pelleted him mercilessly – explosive changes in temperature causing his rock armor to snap and shatter. Poor bastard was clearly struggling to keep on bringing out enough to plug the holes.
Arbos whistled.
“Daaaayum son.  That’s it?! That’s all the physical release you could muster? I’d be damned. Looks like even with nullomancy you’ll be useless.”
“Stop fucking around and pull me up!” Kali-en screamed from below.
“Let me think…” Arbos stroked his beard, grimacing a look of deep contemplation. “eeeh… How about no?” He then clapped his hands together. “You will have to help yourself up.  And here’s how you do it. All nullomancy techniques can generally be divided into two archetypes: Anchoring and Infusion. Anchoring is when you connect your physical release to your body with nullomancy as if it is anchored to you by a metal beam. There’s a fuckton more to that really, but since your physical release is utter shit I’m not gonna bother explaining it now. I’ll teach the fairy later and you can listen. NOW. Infusion (or “Infection”) techniques are where shit gets interesting. When you release something stored in ya you can control it, as long as at least a part of the release remains within your area of control. I explained this to you yesterday. An example would be a fire snake you shoot out at your opponent. You can control it mid-flight easily because its “tail” is always connected to your hand. Simple? Simple.  Now let’s say you want to control something that you didn’t release. Like split the ground under your opponent, separate the water of a lake to pass through… or bend a lightning storm away from yourself?  Haha. Well what you would do is release the matching element in a million little streams and infuse it with what you want to control. Like a parasite taking control over a host. That’s why when a null casts wind you get hit by a massive gale and not by a blow-dryer gust from his hand mmkay? That is what you will do now.  Release your electric charge gradually, mix it with the vortex and bend it away from yourself.”

Kali-en, who miraculously managed to stay alive throughout the tediously long monologue, only grunted in response.  Having nothing to lose, really, he decided to give the confusing technique a try and released his charge.



Grueling half an hour later, still steaming from the heat and twitching from the occasional charge that slipped through the cracks Kali-en crawled back up to the top of the car and collapsed unto the crystals. His rock armor crumbled away – his stone reserves exhausted.  
Arbos stood over him with an evil grin and clapped slowly.
“Impressive kiddo, I was sure you’d fry. Now…” He crouched down and ripped a small pouch off Kali-en’s belt. He hadn’t even noticed that Arbos managed to attach it to him before kicking him off.
Arbos open the pouch up and grinned even wider at a handful of crystals glowing with pale blue inside.  
“Now we can play…”
By this point Kali-en came to and shook his head. He could feel a growling rage slowly come over him. Before you know it he jumped up and rushed at Arbos with his fist raised in the air.
“Don’t rush.” Spectre smiled and flicked one of the crystals at the thief’s feet.  With a slight crack the crystal immediately discharged, zapping Kali’en and making him fall over face first. Still furious he got back on his feet and rushed towards Arbos once more. The spectre evaded him, took a few steps back and flicked two more crystals at Kali-en’s feet, zapping him.
“Breathe, moron. And pay attention.”
Kali-en stood up again, panting, and took a few deep breaths. Fresh air, a few slaps on the cheeks and the moonlight in the clear sky sobered him up a bit and he took off towards the spectre once more.  Arbos flicked another crystal at Kali-en, but this time the thief managed to jump out of the way at the last second, escaping the discharge. Arbos smiled and took off as well, running around Kali-en, flicking more and more crystals at him which the thief jumped around dodging.

Finally ten minutes later the crazy dance stopped. Kali-en was breathing heavily, exhausted from all the jumping. Arbos shook the pouch upside down a few times to see if he had any more crystals left, then shrugged and threw the empty bag overboard.
“Huff.. Looks… like you’re… out of ammo… fucker…” Kali-en grinned; Arbos responded in kind and raised his fists.
„Well, come at me then.“
Kali-en took a deep breath and with whatever strength he had left lunged towards Arbos once more. He could practically taste it – the sweet satisfaction of burying his fist in the bastard’s face. Kali-en was only a few meters away from the spectre when the ground under his feet rumbled and suddenly the world went dark.


The stars were still shining bright, despite the red tint of early dawn that was slowly crawling over the sky. Kali-en liked the stars, he never really got to see them much in Sayrn, so it always felt special when he could just look at them like this. Even though he never could understand why people try to find insane combinations and tie them to real world. To him the chaotic beauty of the starry sky was the best part. Indeed he could just lay here and stare at it forever… but sadly the grinning face of the shitty ghost in his new bodysuit got in his view. Heh. “Body”suit. Classic.
“Oi, you awake kiddo?”
Kali-en tried to get up but his limbs refused to move.  It was safe to say that he exhausted all his strength for today, and even borrowed from tomorrow.
“What happened?”
Arbos grinned and sat down next to him.
“You rushed in without thinking again. We are on top of a giant pile of crystals yanno. Whenever you dodged a discharge, the excess power that you would have otherwise absorbed with your body got absorbed by the empty crystals on the ground. I manipulated you to charge up a large field and then had you run right into it. When you stepped on the charged crystals they got pressed into the empty crystals underneath and discharged. Like a land mine. All because you didn’t think shit through.”
Kali-en laid there for a second in silence, lost in thought.
“So I only had two options: Get hit and be knocked out. Or dodge and make a minefield for myself to fall into and be knocked out regardless. I was bound to lose from the start.”
“Moron.” Arbos groaned. He then pulled out a still glowing charged crystal and threw it right at Kali-en. The thief tried to get out of the way but his body refused to move and the crystal hit him squarely between the eyes. But unsurprisingly enough it bounced off his forehead and fell to the ground harmlessly. “Start thinking like a Nullomancer, dumbass.

(OOC: Up to "Aww shit.." written by Balis. Rest - by me.)

Ashur's eyes opened by the sound of a voice he knew. Why did he hear it? That voice should be gone from this world. All he could see was darkness, was he dreaming? He wanted to look around him, but his body refused to move. Where was he? "Ashuuuuuuur~" He heard that voice again. As he tried to speak, it turned out his lips were the only thing that could move. "Luna?" He heard her giggle as she appeared before him. "Poor, lonely Ashur." It was only the two of them in this dark void. She moved closer to him, her eerie smile creeped him out. "How I have missed you, dear brother." She put her hand on his cheek, her touch was the coldest thing he'd ever felt.
"You're dead..." Ashur spoke softly, he didn't know what else to say in this situation. "I'm dreaming. You're not real... right?"  The creepy smile did not change a little, Ashur had never seen her smile like that before. "You're not happy to see me? Didn't you miss me?" Ashur tried to shake his head, but he still couldn't move. "I miss you, I really miss you."
She giggled again "Oh I know, silly."

The scenery around him changed. Now he was standing in the streets of Eriur. "Do you remember our time together in this village? Well, of course you do." She smiled "For what other reason did you leave than the pain of remembering every time you would've walked through here? You don't want to remember, right? What you once saw as happy memories now hurt you too much, right?" She was right.Ashur didn't want to see this sight, not now at least. He needed more time to give it a place, that was certain. "Who are you?" his voice was trembling. This wasn't his sister, it couldn't be.

The scenery changed again. He was in bed, Rose was next to him. That's right, this was the second night. They spend the entire day together. Ashur thought he might be awake now, but he still couldn't move. The image of Luna appeared next to the bed, and sat down on the edge. "This child prays to Aluthea on a regular basis, you see." She stroked through Rose's hair. Her voice wasn't Luna's anymore. It was a masculine voice. "For that reason I am to watch over her." he...she... it paused for a moment as it bowed over him. “That is the only duty of us shepherds. Some of us do not interfere directly like this, but as you can see I am not one of those.” Ashur stared back at the creature “So what is it you want me to do?”
The creature’s creepy smile disappeared, Luna’s face turned more serious now “You gave yourself several months’ time to decide what you want. I however, shall only give you one day. For this child shan’t have hope for months only to be abandoned. You shall not visit her if the feelings in your heart aren’t pure. You shall either choose her or leave her today.” Ashur could of course not be happy with this ultimatum “Why am I the one being questioned, even though I do not know if she loves me as well?” Rose had been lonely as well, or did this mean her heart was already set? The creature’s face looked rather angry “You are questioning the divine, kid. The only one I care for is the sheep put under my care. I only care for her happiness. This means I do not care if she dumps YOU instead, capiche?” Ashur would nod, but he was still in stasis. “Good. Now that your options are clear, I shall leave you. Your dream shall go untold to her, clear?” Ashur’s vision went black as his dream came to an end.

"I'll be watching you, stray sheep."

Ashur woke up with a headache. God damn it.  Divine intervention was the last thing he could use now. He doubted the divine could actually understand the feelings of mortals anyway. He could hear sounds from the kitchen; Rose was already awake. Today was his last day on this train. Which meant only one thing: he had to make up his mind today. Was it possible for a human to just simply decide in a day? Ashur did not truly expect the gods to understand human feelings, anyway. Rose came out of the kitchen, the smell was hypnotizing. "Breakfast's ready!"

Rose eyed him with a worried look as they ate "Are you really alright? It looked as if you had a bad dream." Ashur sighed “Don't worry about it, I'll live." Her expression didn't change "You were talking in your sleep. You sounded really sad. Won't you tell me?" Ashur stopped eating "I dreamt of my sister, she died not too long ago." Rose looked shocked "I'm so sorry." - "Don't be." The rest of breakfast transpired rather silently. She had no idea what to say to him now. He was reminded of that awful dream.  That was definitely not the least awkward situation ever.

Ashur put the dishes back in the kitchen as they finished eating. “Is there anything that needs to be done today?” He questioned Rose, he needed something to do. He needed to focus on something else. He wanted to get out of this room for even a moment preferentially. “Eh? Oh, well I still need to shop for dinner for tonight.” Ashur sighed a little with relief “Then let’s go.” Rose nodded.
They walked to the next car, which contained a lot of market stands and shops. The stands were manned by enthusiastic salesmen and there were many customers to look at their wares.  They went to the food salesmen first, and within minutes Ashur was carrying a bag full of groceries. His other arm was locked into Rose’s. “Would you mind if I looked through some souvenir stands?” Rose shook her head “I don’t mind.”  
Ashur looked around. There was this one thing he wanted. He wasn’t sure if they’d have something like that here but eventually he’d find it. He bought a decently sized jewelry box, seemingly made from granite. It wasn’t the prettiest thing, but it was made from a good material, which was more important. “Why a jewelry box? Rose questioned him. Ashur laughed “Let’s just say I have something I want to try. Not something I’d discuss in public.” They walked on, though they had all what they came for. Ashur was just enjoying the moment; and maybe he’d find something else nice. Maybe he could find something to give her, but his funds were very limited. Whatever he saw was either too expensive or just not good enough.

No matter what he tried to distract himself with, his thoughts would continue to flow back to that one thing. What was he going to do? If anything it was certain, it was that time was running out. Maybe he should just give up on her if he wasn’t sure anyway? At the same time, he really enjoyed his time with her. He looked at her as they walked back. Her pretty face looked happy, was it because of him? Would she be sad if he left her now? Would she stay happy if he stayed with her? He needed more time, yet at the same time he felt like time would only make matters worse. He felt the shepherd was right. But even so, how was he to just tell her that? Or maybe he should just tell her that? One thing was certain, something had to be concluded before he left. He felt pathetic, but he didn’t want to show it, anything but that. He didn’t want her to see him worrying. He didn’t want to worry her. He just hoped she’d stay happy.

“Dinner’s ready.” Ashur was the one that had cooked this time. “Smells good.”  That it did, but Ashur really did not have an appetite. “Are you feeling well?” Rose had noticed his slow eating. “I’m fine, really.” Rose looked at him “Really?” Ashur took a bite, taking some time before his answer. “It’s just… the last day, you know.” Rose nodded. The conversation fell silent for a few minutes, but then Rose spoke up “How about we go somewhere after dinner.” Ashur looked up from his food that he had just been playing with. Maybe this was the opportunity he needed? “Sure!”

Night had fallen when they arrived in a rather large park two cars away from the bar. It was a funny thought, something like a park on a train. Ashur hadn’t imagined something like that being even possible. The park was filled with lush green and many other vibrantly colored flowers.  They sat down in the middle of the part, at the side of a small lake. Ashur’s heart was put at ease by the rest this place emanated. “Ashur…” Rose said softly. He turned to face her “I really enjoyed myself these days.” She moved closer and softly pressed herself against him. “So have I.” Ashur said. Rose looked at the lake, reflecting them with its clear waters. “I was so lonely that I just wanted someone nice to accompany me, even if only for a short time.” Rose did not look at Ashur, she looked away. Ashur very well knew this already though. “I figured you wouldn’t reject me, or force yourself onto me.” Ashur looked away “I wasn’t much better though.” His voice was slightly trembling “I was lonely as well, I suddenly lost the person most dear to me.  I had a hard time coping with that.” Rose answered “your sister?” Ashur nodded slowly.
“But Ashur, I was really happy. Happier than I’ve ever been.” She turned to him, smiling. Her smile was soft, unsure. However, it was definitely genuine.

”I only care for her happiness.” that fucking shepherd

What had he been thinking of? Wasn’t it her reaction that concerned him? Wasn’t it her feelings he considered with whatever message he wanted to tell her? Why had he been worrying anyway? Why had he questioned himself today? Wasn’t the answer obvious by just looking at himself?  “I care about you, I really do.” Ashur answered “I don’t want to leave you.” He embraced her. “Being with you made me feel alive again.” Rose embraced him as well as she softly whispered “I love you.” Ashur’s embrace tightened “Me too, I love you too.” Ashur’s cares seemed to have flown away from this world. Who cared about some divine power? They didn’t need that to tell them what to do. (Or maybe they did… yeah…)
Ashur reached for his neck and undid himself from a small necklace. It was a beautiful yet simple necklace, golden with a small circular ruby. “This is the only thing I can give you. It was my mother’s.” He put it around her neck. He couldn’t explain why, but this necklace suited her well. “Then isn’t this important to you?” Rose questioned him. He smiled “Just more of a reason why I want you to have it. I will vow upon this necklace that I will come for you in Althers when you return.”  And that vow was then sealed with a kiss that made them forget time itself, any worries they had. This moment was more important right now than any of that. What was there for them to worry about?

Upon their return they made their way to bed after a long day. There they simply fell asleep lying next to each other. They were content with just this for now. Today they felt happier than the other days. Rose looked at him well one more time before she closed her eyes. Tomorrow he would have to leave. It felt like such a shame. She would miss him, but she was happy knowing his true feelings. With that thought, she slipped into a dream.

“Well look who is back.” The image of Luna appeared once again. It was in the same spot as when she first met it yesterday: a humongous flower patch of red roses. Despite her name, she actually didn’t even like roses. However, Rosalina did of course not know this was Ashur’s sister, or to be more precise a being that had stolen her appearance. For her this was a being that had slipped into her dream yesterday. “It seems you have made your choice, sheep.”  She wasn’t really happy being called a sheep, but it didn’t seem this was going to change anytime soon. “I am surprised though. I really thought you’d choose differently. Are you truly sure you can love someone you have only known for such a short time.” Rose nodded “I have made up my mind.”
The shepherd nodded “Are you sure this will make you happy?” Rose smiled at the creature “I surely am.” The shepherd smiled endearingly back at her “Then my wish has been fulfilled for now. Even though I am only obliged to keep watch, I did care for your happiness this time, my sheep.”
“And his happiness?” Rose wondered “Couldn’t care less.” The creature answered and laughed “For he is not one I watch over, although a very interesting child indeed.” The creature distanced itself from Rose, floating up into the air above her. “Though your futures might be arduous, I have chosen to interfere no more. May Aluthea’s grace guide you both toward the happiness I wish for you.” With that the shepherd departed to allow Rose to return to the true realm of dreams.

“I will be watching you, my darling sheep.”

Considering that it wasn't actually that long since he had boarded, he said screw it and went to sleep. Zephyr really didn't have anything specific to be done or doing anyway, it was early, and the only thing he HAD needed to settle was the first thing he had done. He wasn't even sure if he had ever seen a bed this comfy. Out like a light, he woke up what had to have been the latter half of the day.

He woke up and walked out of the room, heading into the big main hall he arrived in. Inadvertently, as he was arriving to the hall, so was Sonia. She walked in through the front doors taking off a rather fancy looking coat, handed it to a maid and noticed Zephyr walking ever so slightly off kilter. She chuckled a little. "Just getting up sleeping beauty?" He looked at her "Oh, hello. Yes I am, although that nickname isn't going to be my favorite." She cocked her head a little "What, you don't want me to think you look good?" He thought for a second, "Didn't think of it that way. Do I?"

She stood up straight and crossed her arms. "No not specifically." Zephyr frowned at her. "Damn, straight out. Cold." The lady replied rather simply "Well, it's not like I have a reason to be warm. I may have helped you out but it doesn't magically mean we know each other on some hidden, indistinct emotional level." This lady cuts to the point. "Oh. Time to fix that then I suppose. Let us go!" Zephyr pointless jabbed his finger up into the air as if he was making some sort of point. It seemed like Sonia actually lost her composure on such a random idea. "Wait what? I'm sure I have things to get done and-" He cut her off "Nope no time let's go." Zephyr grabbed her what looked like a far more casual jacket hanging near by, grabbed her hand and pulled her on out. Some of the maids seemed unsure of what to think. One or two laughing to another looking horribly worried, with several actually smiling and another who dropped something.

He had no clue if she really needed the jacket, and the fact he just woke up probably wasn't helping his case. Seemed like something spontaneous was gonna work out a lot better anyway, heaven knows what a lady of this class would need to do or think about if he actually asked. It also didn't do him any favors that he just dragged out someone who spends lord knows how much time on this thing out for a night on the town of a town he, frankly, knew almost jack squat about for entertainment and reasonable places to take a lady. Good news was there was that listing, but damned if he knew anything about what she liked either. "Hot Jesus what was I thinking, this idea was horrible!" She raised en eyebrow looking over at him. "Shame. I didn't think me just being here ruined your day." Zephyr looked over slightly worried he had irritated his... date? Acquaintance? The hell was she at the moment?! She was simply smirking at him about her comment. He slightly sighed of relief. "You would. Why mess with the guy who aimlessly tried to show you a good time? So mean." She actually mussed his hair a bit and chuckled. "Oh I am having a good time. It's just entirely at your expense so far. Freaking out about how you brought someone familiar with the place out for a good time while not even knowing anything about it."

Zephyr was actually surprised, he hadn't met a woman this absurdly on point before. He also realized at this point if she already knew then there wasn't a point in pretending otherwise anyway. "Ah so you know. Good, now then, let's go eat." Off they went to the dining places. He figured at the very least he might  as well attempt to take her to some spot that it seemed like she wouldn't visit often. Amid all the varying places, some obviously higher class than others, he noticed several places that were essentially stalls with seats. That was different to even him. "Oh there we go. That looks mildly entertaining." Sonia looked around a moment, nothing she could see was particularly high class. "Huh? Where? You can't mean one of these.. boxes? Doesn't seem particularly decent.." He grabbed her hand lightly and led her over to one. "Pshaw. If I can't have an idea of what the hell to do I can at least try to do something random and different." The lady took a seat. "I'll.. give you that much I suppose."

And so they ate. Zephyr actually sort of thought she'd be picky or some such, but she went right in. Seemed to even enjoy the change. After which he paid and they left. Then back to square one. He decided to keep the random attempts rolling. So off they went to the entertainment places. Tons of names, he had no clue what most this nonsense was. Although he saw plenty of signs for Opera, Musical, Plays, so on so forth. "Classic Comedy" said the one that caught his eye. Sonia asked "I can tell what you're eyeballing there. What's it mean though?" He shrugged "I dunno what the hell that means either, but here we go." And so there he dragged her. Puns. Puns everywhere, with double entendre and pies. Lots of pies. With a clown or two. He felt mildly clueless, but some of it was genuinely so bad he laughed. He would've felt awful if he hadn't heard a few snickers from the lady, it just might have been dumb enough that she couldn't bring herself to outright laugh.

They exited. Despite her horrible attempt at looking unamused,  it was obvious it entertained her more than such. She had one hand over her mouth while the arm was propped on the other. The lady tried to nonchalantly rub her eyes a little.

Still part of a night to kill, though it had gotten fairly dark. At least he was pretty sure, he looked up to check the sky, which was dark. It also had ads kind of hovering around on what he noticed was a screen simulating the night. Among them were "Eat at Joel's", "Shop at Costmo", "Rest with us at The Bunker", and a neatly placed slowly spinning clock in the middle. So now he knew the time itself. He must have woke up fairly late, the food and show put them around late enough to head back soon. Still, there must've been something simple he could do on the side just before they did.

Ah. A cheap trinket or something. "Perfect! Off to the markets." The poor lady was being led around again slightly. Must not have cared too much seeing as how she hadn't protested or left yet. Without a second thought based on how things went so far, he didn't even glance at anything that looked fancy. Yet once again, knowing nothing about much of anything with women probably wasn't helping. Zephyr felt keeping the general rule of "simple thing she would never get or bother with on her own" was a good move, so he pointlessly moved around til he found a neat little wristband with a silver bell. What's more simple than this? And so he bought and handed it to her. Sonia took it, looked for a moment incredulously, then started laughing at him straight out in his face. "Now what did I do?" She was huddle over, crying even from it. "You're so simple. This is a cat collar you simple person." Zephyr slowly lowered his head sliding his hand up his face until his forehead was ever so gently in his palm, then shook his head slightly. Barely catching her breath she pocketed the item and slowly grabbed his arm. It was actually the biggest smile yet on her face, so at least his screw up did that much. Her voice was amazingly jovial. "Let's go back. Apparently someone didn't sleep long enough. You know, despite it being half a day. At LEAST." Despite her entertainment from it, he still felt like an idiot. Albeit he took comfort in that having been ever so fun for her.

Finally arriving back, most of the maids were busy moving around still doing their usual tasks and whatnot. As the door opened they all stood in line, quite a few of them with those "knowing" smiles people get when their friend has finally been with that person they've wanted to be. Zephyr looked over and actually was surprised to see her slightly blushing as she turned away to put up the coat. He couldn't see it, but she gave them a look as to knock it off. Several lost the smile, others didn't, but all of them went back to working on their tasks. It didn't occur to him they all, including the lady Sonia, probably knew each other like sisters or something. None of them looked new or as if there was anything they had any questions about knowing how to do it around the place. Sonia placed the coat up, coughing a bit to cover resorting herself out to being "The Lady Sonia" as opposed to some young woman just getting back.

She then turned to Zephyr and spoke to him, noticeably more relax and just right out to him. "I'll admit at the least, it was certainly different. Most suitors are the usual high class bores who like trying to give me everything I already have. Not to say I couldn't do anything you've introduced me to on my own or with someone else, but it hadn't crossed my mind. At any rate, despite you rushing me out of here it was fun. As an aside I was... well. Would you like to join my in my chambers perchance?" Zephyr cheered a little inside, for he was a man, and that's what they did when this happened with damn fine women. Zephyr tried to be clever and witty. "I bet you say that to anyone who entertains you." He, very clearly, was not. She cocked her head a bit. "A bit rude to say that to a lady no? Albeit, to finally answer you once, no. Only one other person did I like that much. Now are you going to ruin this for yourself or shall we go? It certainly doesn't matter to me either way." Zephyr stalled any stupid thoughts he had, smiled and bowed for the lady to lead the way.

Kali-en slept through the whole day, his recharging crystals taking a toll on his already exhausted body.
 
When dusk came, Kali-en was finally able to get up and walk without problems. He now grasped this Nullomancy stuff and how to use it.. 
He had it all wrong from the beginning. He thought he had to locate "the source" of the power inside of his body and tap into it whenever he wanted, but it was wrong. 
When it mattered the most, he just willed his body to become a rock. How weird of an experience it was. He had to stay focused all the time, and form a mental image of his body, of his skin, layered in rock. The result was so absurd that it tired him a lot faster than his second experience.
Although more complicated, controlling the vortex was easier to do for him. It was like having his consciousness separated in billions of tiny bits that would merge with the electricity. And each bit would instinctively respond to his will, without any complicated reasoning required for it.
 
According to Arbos, Anchoring was not his strong point; he might as well try to focus on Infusion.
He knew he could do it with electricity, and he had already found some useful applications to it, but could he do the same thing with rock? And wind? And heat? And water?
Let’s try the heat and water before doing anything complicated first.
As he did with the electricity, Kali-en gradually released water around him.
“There’s supposed to be water in the air, so even with what I currently have, I should be able to create a pretty huge one”. He extended the water he had released until he reached his limit. It felt like he suddenly grew limbs out of his body that reached five meters away, he was starting to feel tired.
Maintaining the control of the water around him, he did the same with heat, and when he judged he had enough of it, he merged both the water and the heat in one go.
The entire area around him suddenly went dark, with no visibility.
He’d need to do it several times to get the hang of it, but this method was far more efficient than the gloves. With training he might even create the steam only around the head of enemy or something like that.
Awesome.
Now could he do it with the wind, and to what extent?
When he tried to release and control it, he was surprised by the charge and force that was accompanied by it.
Right. It’s a wind crystal, not an air one. How could he control it? As soon as he released it, even a tiny bit, the wind charge would go straight and away from him, too far from his area of effect.
Funny fact, he had a limited area of effect.
Obviously.
Even so. If he were to try the Infusion technique with the wind charge, he would need to keep it inside his area before trying all the mystical stuff.
“Ah! Sometimes I love myself!”.
As released his wind charge, he immediately took control of it by spinning it in a little sphere around him. He then gradually separated some of the spinning charge and sent it, still spinning, above him, creating some kind of light tornado. Using the Infusion technique, he multiplied the size of his tornado by 3 before judging he was close to his limit.
“Awesome!”.
In light of eventual enemies in front of him, he just had to… wait. What was he supposed to do now??
The control of the spinning wind was getting harder as it had begun to move on its own.
“Crap! Crap crap crap crap crap!”
In retrospect, a tornado was not such a bright idea. Even if he was protecting himself from a lot of projectile, the exertion its control was requiring was too much, he couldn’t even move himself. And, if there were people he didn’t want to harm, or by his sides, it would be too dangerous to use.
Now, if he wanted to use the tremendous force he had at his disposition he had to direct it, but his control was not good enough to impose a direction to the spinning wind, or to stop it anyway. He still felt his “limbs” inside the tornado, so he could still influence it, but how?
That’s when he saw him, the shadow inside the old geezer. He was running toward the wall at the end of the car. Kali-en could not believe his eyes, or ears, but he did see him jump right at the wall, head first, and shouting right before hitting it: “GERONIMO!”.
He did not have time to wonder what that crazy ghost, or specter, or whatever, was doing.
Well, he might as well try the only thing he could think of. Preferably before being ripped apart by the force and pressure that were being created inside the tornado.
Using his different wind limbs, he tried to create a tunnel of wind and impose a direction.
But it was too much, way too much for him. He couldn’t hold it any longer.
And then he could.
“What the fuck”
"Moron. The adult is here to fix your shit. 'Bsides if you struggle it'll only hurt more. Now move aside and let me manhandle your body."
It was suddenly so easy. The tunnel began at the highest point of the tornado and slowly descended, going around it.
That was so awesome. Given how easy it was, separating the tornado in three or four parts would be a piece of cake. Just by slowly placing his limbs in different directions, and then adjusting them so..
“Hands off!”
The blow felt like a mind slap, and it hurt.
As the tunnel of wind reached him, “he” sent it in front of him and unleashed his control at this point.
The tornado collapsed on itself, sending a gigantic blast of wind in front of Kali-en. Unfortunately, the same blast sent him against the wall at the other side of the wall. Where he saw the shadow-guy above him, snickering.
 
“I can’t say that your ideas are stupid, but you are a moron, so you might want hold on a little bit.”
“huh. Yeah, I’ll do that.”
As Kali-en was trying to get up on his feet, he saw the old geezer inert some meters away.
“Um, what did you do to him?”
The shadow-guy looked like he was just waiting for that question.
“Well, someone HAD to take care of him while I was possessing your body, something I won’t ever do again by the way, no offense but your boobs are not big enough, and since there were no one, I ko’ed him.”
“Um, okay. Ah. Can I ask you a question?”
He raised his eyebrows.
"Shoot."
“The –thing- you did with your voice, back at the Keep, and yesterday while training me, was it Nullomancy too?”
The Shadow-guy nodded two or three times, then looked at Kali-en and waited.
And waited.
Again.
“Well, if that’s all, I had some plans tonight, bubye!”
“Huh? Wait! You didn’t answer!”
"Just listening to yoru voice is torture enough, now i have to ANSWER too?!"
“What! But that doesn’t make sense! Why listen if you don’t have any plans to answer?”
“But I’d love to answer, just don’t go and think it’s free information. I’m not your teacher or a good Samaritan.”
“But yesterday-“
“Was because if you didn’t have at least a little bit of training, you’d be a dead weight to everyone, and potentially dangerous for them. See? Necessity. Giving you the information you require is not at all a necessity.”
“What do you want in exchange?”
“Let’s see, ah! Give me the story of the Thirteen. If it’s false, I won’t give you anything”.
 
The Thirteen? Again with those? Kali-en knew that some other part of him believed in this story, and knew it by heart, but which part? He was afraid to access a memory he should not and to go again in this blind rage, or whatever it was, like in front of the whorehouse the other day.
Should he risk it? The thing the shadow-guy does with his voice is bound to be powerful, he knew that. Even if Kali-en could not master it, he HAD to know how it worked in order to be prepared, even if a tiny bit, the day it would come against him.
 
Kali-en sighed, “Fine, but I want you to answer to two questions instead of one”
“Oooh, look who's getting al cocky n shit. First tell me what i want to know and then MAYBE i'll consider answering your damn question and not just kick you the fuck off this train into the nearest canyon. Fine. what was the second question?”
“How are the charges in the crystals created?”
 
He searched for it, for the memory of an old time, in those sewers, surrounded by a group of orphans like him, desperate and hungry, like him. All close together to hold and share the scraps of heat among them, listening to this old man they called the Storymaker.
 
That night was special, he would always remember it. By the end of his story, the old man died right there in front of all the kids, without any apparent reasons.
The last story of the storymaker started by repeating six times thirteen different names, urging everyone listening, imploring them to etch those names in their memory.
 
That is how Nielak retold the Story, sitting with his back against the wall of the car, eyes that were seeing nothing but the deceased story maker.
“The story begins with thirteen names, that must be repeated six times…”
 
                                               ******
 
“Well, that was weird”, Kali-en said, as the Shadow-guy was leaving, evidently surprised by the story. He still told him how it basically worked to create a charged crystal though. “Maybe the story isn’t completely right?”.
 
Anyway, it was the middle of the night, he still had one day and a half left to train before the end of their trip in the magnarail.
He knew he would later go into the vortex at the center of the car to create new electricity crystals, those would be invaluable to silently take care of someone at close range. He wondered if he could get his hands on light crystals. If he could increase his controls over his limbs when using the “Infusion” techniques, it would render him the perfect thief if his theory on light turned out to be true.
 
Kali-en spent the rest of the night working on the Anchoring technique for the rock, when he was finally able to maintain it long enough, he went in the vortex with 5 empty crystals in a pouch. Once charged, he put them in his body, between two ribs.
“One thing done, let’s work on my limbs now”.
 
By the end of the trip, Kali-en was able to extend his “limbs” up to 6 meters and still control them perfectly.
 
                                               ******
 
As he went to leave the car, he just remembered that the old geezer was still there, unconscious – or dead, the guy did stay “unconscious” for more than 24 hours – and Kali-en did not really have any means to exit without being noticed by the guard.
 
“Well, time to try out my theories”. Even though exhausted, Kali-en opened the door of the car, positioned himself out of sight, and called out to the guard.
“Help! The Admiral’s hurting!”.
 
The guard came rushing inside, and stopped some meters away from the door, taking in the situation, his sword drawn. Kali-en crept up on him, raised his right hand and held it a few centimeters away from his neck. Focusing, he took control of his limbs, of electricity, and concentrated them in one point before launching them at the base of the guard’s neck. A brief blue flash later, the guard was collapsing on Kali-en’s loving arms.
“I love this!”
He took his keys and closed the door before leaving.
 
                                               ******
 
Even if he did not look like it, Kali-en was exhausted, as were some members of the “group”, oddly enough.
“So.. here we are. What’s your plan now?”.
 
 
As their short conversation with their “leader” ended, the citizens began to leave the magna-rail, one by one, under the scrutinizing gaze of the fifteen guards who were waiting some meters away from the station.
Wait.
Fifteen guards? That’s quite a lot. Were they here for them? Anyway, it was too late to try anything, they were already on the stairway.
 
The cat-woman left the magna-rail first, without any problem. Next was the “leader”, who was stopped by one of the guards and had to show his ID card before getting released.
 
As Kali-en left the magna-rail, a very stylish, very neat guard went to meet him, as the rest of the guards circled him.
“Hello there, long time no see Klein. I have to admit I had given up on arresting you since I had never managed to get any proof, and here you are! Riding a Citizen-only magnarail! What’s gotten into you? Seriously? Getting dull? Very bad Klein, very bad”.
As the guards came behind Kali-en and took his hands to cuff him, the memory came back to him: Adril, a noble highly indebted to Ash, who, instead of killing him, decided to make him his lackey and put him as a high rank officer in the Imperial army.
“Shit! Wait wait wait Adril! I am a Citizen now! I have an ID card to prove it!”
“Of course you have, it can’t be that easy to arrest you, now can it? But guess what, we recently received information regarding a highly trained thief who had managed to break into Miren’s machinery and forge himself a brand new ID card! And look what I find here on this magnarail coming directly from Miren? A highly trained thief who should never have been able to get Citizenship, with a Citizen ID card! Can’t be a coincidence right? Right? So, as a very good detective and thorough officer, I have to arrest you, at least for the time during which a real investigation will be done on how you got your Citizenship. It should probably take one or two months to have any results on this investigation, so in the meantime, I recommended my superiors to directly put you in a prison..”
 
As the guards took Kali-en, he whispered to Adril “I assure you Adril, you will regret it.”
After a brief hesitation, Adril smiled broadly and answered “Nah, I don’t think so”.


 

“I did as you asked, so why are you here again?” Ashur pondered as he stared into the shepherd’s face again. The dream was more pleasant this time around, though it didn’t really make Ashur that much more comfortable. The creature was still using his sister’s appearance after all.  At least this time he was able to move around. “Not the nicest way to say hello. Well, I guess you are not to blame for that.  In any case, I am just here to say congratulations!” Well, that was something Ashur did not expect.
“Thanks… I guess.  I wasn’t really sure if you were going to like it.” Ashur scratched his head. The shepherd shrugged “It is not a matter of me liking it or not, for I am a shepherd. My watch over my sheep shall continue, and I shall feel delight in her happiness.”  The creature smiled. Ashur liked seeing the smile of her sister, even though it wasn’t really her. “You really care for her, don’t you?”
The shepherd looked away “I am just performing my duties, the duties given to me by my goddess.”  Ashur laughed “then by all means. Go ahead, because I’m unable to do so right now. I am leaving her in your care, shepherd.”  The creature looked at him, and then sighed “I am not here for your convenience.   Anyway, this will most likely be my last time here. I shall take my leave.” Ashur grinned ‘Oh by all means, stop by again. Next time I just hope you do something about that look.” The shepherd nodded “My appearance changes based on the strongest feelings present for another person. Therefore, take my form here as a testimony for the deep love you had for your kin. May she have found peace in the underworld. Farewell, sheep.” They took one good look at eachother before the apparition vanished and the dream was over.

Ashur woke up to the feeling of a warm breath tickling. It was Rose’s; her head was softly resting against his chest. He stayed still and watched her as she slept on, not wishing to wake her. However, she woke up mere minutes later anyway.  They looked each other in the eyes and smiled. “Slept well?”  Ashur put his arm around her and gently stroked her hair. She nodded and cozied up against him. This was something the two of them wouldn’t be able to do for a very long time. Right now, all they could do was spend those precious last moments they had as well as they could. Ashur’s chest felt tight. He couldn’t tell whether he was happy, sad, or both. He wondered how she felt right now.   “Do you want breakfast?” She said, well at least she felt hungry.  Ashur embraced her a little tighter “Not yet.”  She squirmed her way upward, meeting him eye to eye. “Then I’ll eat this, for starters.”  She started nibbling on his ear.  The more Ashur was enjoying himself the faster time seemed to go by. Oh how he wished he could take her with him, but this was not possible either. They both had things they had to do.  Not to mention that going with him right now was anything but safe. Their time would come. Not today, not tomorrow, but it would come for sure. The time where they could do these kind of things without being concerned about time, about everything that worried them.  The present was not their time; they were destined for the future, he hoped.

Eventually Rose got her wish and breakfast was served, their final meal for now. “Have you ever been to Sayrn?” Ashur asked, just as a conversation starter. “No, I hear it isn’t the most pleasant place on earth either. By the way, you still haven’t told me why you are going there. Won’t you tell me?” Ashur thought for a moment, and then replied “I guess I should tell you a little more about why we left.”  Ashur told her everything, about the fort, why they attacked the fort, and how they were now basically on the run from the empire. Rose listened attentively as they ate, but disbelief could be read from her face. “Four men overrunning a fort, killing a troll… that just sounds crazy.”  Ashur shook his head “Not for nullomancers, no. And we were unlucky enough that they actually had one of their own in there. If I know anything it’s that the empire is fearsome. I am pretty sure that the resistance force that holds the fort now won’t be able to hold it for long. I’m not sure how much they will find out about us, but they will certainly find out something’s off. If anything, at least I’m headed to Sayrn to lay low. Maybe build up a new life there, maybe move on. I don’t know. Anyhow, I at least want to try mastering these powers, and Arbos is the only one that can teach me.”  Rose nodded, though she did seem disheartened, which was rather understandable. Ashur’s situation definitely wasn’t the rosiest (ha, puns). “Will you really be fine?”
Ashur grabbed her hand, looking at her seriously “I will be. But Rose, I trust you. So please never tell this to anyone else. Pretend you don’t know me and that you have never heard of nullomancy.  You will only endanger yourself otherwise. Can I trust you?”  His look turned from serious to endearing, Rose nodded “All your secrets are safe with me, I promise you. But please, just stay safe.”  She sounded worried, understandable. Ashur tightened his grip on her hand a little “Don’t worry.” However, she immediately answered “I will worry!”  Her tune gave away her fears. In spite of that, Ashur did kind of feel happy.
He had told her he was a guy with weird powers who had killed many empire soldiers and was now on the run. Yet all she felt was concern. Honestly, she was more than he could’ve asked for.  Honestly, Ashur had no idea what he had expected by telling her all of this. Maybe he just wanted to be honest, let her know that his life was not certain. Or maybe he just wanted to share his story so far with someone. Either way, he wasn’t really comfortable leaving her like this either.  “Come here you.”  Ashur got out of his chair, and pulled her out of hers, hugging her tightly. “I will be alright, I promise you that. Nothing will happen and in a few months I’ll be standing on your doorstep. Got it?”  She did not move, she spoke softly “you’d better.”  The fear in her voice was audible, yet she had become calmer. Ashur felt relieved.

A few hours later the two of them would make way for the first car. Here Ashur meet with his companions to exit the magnarail. His sword was on his back again for the first time in three days. He would have to start training again once things settled down; he couldn’t afford to get rusty.  His nullomancy was also in dire need of more training. He had been doing some minor things with his nullomancy, things you also could’ve done with everyday crystals. He just wanted to get more used to using them normally. He had already made preparations for the next crystals he wanted to add to his collection. From what he knew of this magnarail he should be able to make something useful with the jewelry box he bought. He just had to find a good moment to execute it, or otherwise wait for the next magnarail.
He wondered what the others had been up to. Everyone had pretty much split up immediately after entering. He also hadn’t seen Arbos for the whole trip. What had that sneaky ghost been up to? Was there anything important enough for him not visiting him at all? One thing was certain, that bastard had been enjoying himself. He could feel it.

Ashur was the first to arrive; they had arrived here rather early after all.  As the end of their time together was nearing, they both were at a loss for words. As the group grew larger all he could do was introduce her every time a new companion came. It would’ve been weird if he didn’t after all.  Within ten minutes from Ashur’s arrival the whole group would be complete.  “I think I have to get back to the bar now. We have to open today.” Rose said a few minutes before they would’ve been allowed to exit. Ashur nodded and hugged her “I’ll write you.” Rose smiled Ï’ll be waiting. Stay safe, handsome.” He smiled back at her “naturally. You too.” With that she walked off. Ashur watched as their distance widened. She looked around a few times; they waved at eachother before she finally disappeared into the crowd. Ashur sighed. It was sad he had to let her go for now. But now all he could do was return to business at hand.

It wouldn’t be long before they would be allowed to exit. It was best if they’d discus their plans for now. Kali-en was the first to ask this. Ashur responded “The very least I want to do is charge a few crystals. It’ll require some quick sneaking around after we leave here.” Ashur looked around to be sure they wouldn’t be overheard. His plan was to sneak to a place further down the rail, away from prying eyes, where he could place down a jewelry box filled with crystals. Doing this, the crystals would fill with a magnetic charge. Of course, this would require them to act quickly, before the magnarail left, or wait for the next one. Ashur would prefer to have these new crystals at hand quickly though, he had some plans.
Other than that, all they had was the address of the resistance in Sayrn; it was basically their only go-to place at this moment. There wasn’t really much decision making involved unless others also had plans like his.

Leaving the magnarail went rather smoothly. All that happened was that Ashur had his ID checked. This however proved to be no problem at all.  That was until Kali-en had to leave the magnarail. He was apprehended by a rather fancy-looking guard. It seemed he was the only one seen through, as he was known around these parts.  Ashur worked out the options they had. Should they try to help him? That would basically be admitting they knew him, and therefore might be accomplices. Could they risk being caught after just entering the city? Fighting fifteen guards in the middle of a crowd was an obvious no-no.  Maybe they should just let Kali-en go with them for now? Possibly send Arbos after him to know his location and to communicate with him from his cell? Who knew, maybe the famous thief would be able to escape from there himself. It depended on the cell, and the skills that Ashur really hadn’t seen any of so far.  It would also allow Ashur to execute his plans, though those could be postponed.
This thief definitely brought his share of troubles already.

Two days earlier.

“Is this all of them?” A man clad in a sharp black uniform quietly asked of his companion. Both of them were standing in front of a series of neat rows of cloth bags laid out on the ground. The dim blue hue of the moonlight gave hints of another several dozen men in similar uniforms patrolling the area.
“Yes sir. A total of two hundred and seventeen casualties.” With a quick snap of the fingers the companion made a small fireball appear and hover in mid-air, dropping light on his young face and the clipboard in his hands. A white insignia of a dragon swirling around a crystal flared on his chest as the light hit it. “What a horrible massacre… So many lives lost…”
The first man, separated from the rest by intricate metal bindings on his forearms shook his head.
“Don’t let it get to you, Sergeant. We will get the monsters responsible, nobody shall escape. What bothers me, however, is this…”
The officer kneeled down at the body that was separated from the rest. He slowly pulled the cloth away, revealing the disfigured face that once belonged to Lerim.
“Augustus Daverus Lerim. A housecarl to the Draenor family of Xilithar. A distant cousin who was gifted with the family’s blood.” He rubbed his eyes and sighed heavily. “Those royals are not going to like this.”
The sergeant corrected his round spectacles then nodded towards half a dozen metal cages that hugged the treeline. Tens of dozens of people were tightly packed and locked inside. Most were still living. Most.
“Do you think they got the drop on him?”
The leader shook his head again.
“No. It’s an iron truth that only a null can kill another null. These rag wearing simpletons wouldn’t be able to even scratch him on their own. No, they had help from a nullomancer.”
Sergeant raised his brows in surprise.
“Surely you don’t think that one of our own… A random awakening perhaps?”
“Impossible. Someone with no guidance or training would never be able to do this. Every single person in the world with any knowledge of nullomantic secrets is either among us or locked away where the sun don’t shine. We’re most likely dealing with a turncoat.”
The man stood up and turned to the sergeant.
“Were there any disturbances from the surrounding area?”
The sergeant flipped through his notes.
“Nothing really major. There was a small power outage in Mirenwood followed by an incident involving the Imperial Inspector 3rd Class who was stationed there. Apparently he got drunk in the local whorehouse and then beat a bouncer to death with a bar stool before setting the place on fire. “
“Hmm… any chance that he was manipulated in any way?”
The sergeant shook his head.
“Out of the question. The officer in question was a recorded mentalist. No outside influence is possible. Most likely just a neurotic breakdown. He’s been restrained and committed to a mental institution with a severe case of personality disorder and amnesia.”
The leader grunted.
“Oh those damn things… Messing with one’s head to such an extent is always a recipe for disaster… And what of the mogul who was in charge of the mines in this area? What was his name again?..”
“Sir Rowlington survived the massacre and was last sighted in Plardon Port, getting on a ferry across the Narrow Sea in order to make his way into Karudun.”
“Hmm… good. Have him intercepted on the way and brought in for interrogation. Make sure it’s under the radar don’t want that fat bastard raising a-“

A sudden rustles of leaves interrupted his orders as a man jumped out of a nearby bush. It was Bob, his leather jacket torn and forehead bleeding heavily. He was holding two heavy pistols, one in each hand and breathing heavily.
“You’s heartless sons o’ bitches! ‘T least I’ll take yous two with me!” He yelled out and pulled the triggers. Twelve shots fired off one after another but the two Marshalls didn’t even twitch. Not a single projectile reached them. Next instant, the sergeant appeared behind Bob, covering the several hundred meters of distance faster than the rebel could see and raised his hand to knock him out. In a display of agility beyond his age Bob let go of the guns and twisted around and pulled out a dagger. With all of his might he attempted to plunge it into the marshal’s heart, but before the blade had a chance to connect some invisible force ripped it out of Bob’s hands and sent it flying off into the darkness of the woods.
“Gods damn you all!”
In a last ditch effort Bob kicked the sergeant in the groin and pushed himself away, using the momentum to try and get away. He started running as fast as he could towards the wood, where the darkness of the night would protect him but all of a sudden his body swayed, his vision blurred and soon there was nothing but darkness.

As Bob collapsed on the ground the Leader lowered his hand and turned to face the sergeant.
“Throw this one in with the others and prepare the Nuri hounds to transport the cages with the prisoners. You and ten of your men will escort the convoy to Davendale. Once there I want you to send a report to the Royal Palace and request the information on deployment locations of all our nullomancers. Me and my men will stay here and take care of the last rites for our fallen comrades. And reassure the men, we WILL find this turncoat and bring the entire might of the Order of Imperial Marshalls on him, or my name is not Arthur Krieg!”


An hour later Krieg entered his tent and poured a glass of brandy for himself and his guest – a pale man of thin complexion dressed in minstrel’s clothes. The man politely refused the drink, choosing instead to play around with an old fiddle he held in his hands.
“I still don’t know why you decided to look into this matter? It’s a bit out of the ordinary but surely nothing important enough for you to come here personally? I mean, your kind generally stays out of mundane business.”
The fiddler’s thin tight lips formed an eerie smile.
“Oh you know, I was just in the neighbourhood, doing this and that. Fiddling around as one might say. Besides the screams of massacres that you mortals so readily produce make for some brilliant songs that just have to be preserved.”
The words sent a shiver down Krieg’s spine, but he showed no signs of it, choosing instead to remain silent.
“Either way,” the minstrel fiddled a quick tune, still smiling creepily. “Do you know who might be behind this… tragedy?”
Krieg took a sip from the glass then nodded.
“Indeed, I believe it to be a rogue nullomancers. This far from civilizations the corruption of the rebellious ideas is stronger than on the home continent. There are no other possible options.”
The Fiddler chuckled.
“Is that so? You have your work cut out for you then.”
He stood up, bowed politely and headed out of the tent. Kried furrowed his brow.
“Do you know something I don’t? If so, it is your duty to tell me, be I mortal or not is of no importance. Even deities have a duty to the empire!”
The fiddler stopped at the exit and looked at the marshal over his shoulder – the eerie smile still present.
“My only duty is to the true leaders of this world, the puppet kings in cardboard castles mean naught to me. But I will humour you with this little bit of advice: that man going mad in a village… you’d be wise not to look into it too much, what waits on the other end is beyond you.”

Krieg spat on the ground, gave the minstrel the evil eye and spoke through his teeth.
“I’ll take my chances.”
The fiddler chuckled. “Your funeral…” And left the tent.

OOC: and so it begins...  

After spending the night in a cheap hotel, Naya decided to spend the rest of the journey training. She did some basic nullmancy techniques, releasing as much as she could and trying to control it. Her fire control was pathetic, really. It was so hard to control it, it just ended up one massive blaze. Could still come in handy in a fight as a last resort but she certainly won't be doing anything delicate with her nullmancy powers. Groaning in frustration she sat down on the (slightly hard) hotel bed. She should just concentrate more on what she's good at: Shamancy (Even though she never fully finished her training and never got a summon spirit). Getting out the herbs she had gathered before, she brewed herself a tea. She made it only quarter strength, she didn't want to fully go into a trance just meditation to boost her mental capacities. By the time she came back it was already past midnight. Feeling tired she headed straight to sleep again. On the last day of the journey she spent the whole day exploring as much as the magna-rail as she could. When they were getting close to Sayrn she headed to the exit to meet with the others.

Naya was the first one to leave the train. She slung her backpack and box case on her back and headed down the wide walkway. When she reached the end she stopped as her foot landed on the station floor and shivered violently. Recovering, she quickly flashed her fake ID and walked past the security. Everyone else managed to get out fine until Kali-en stepped of the magna-rail. He was taken away by a group of guards, one of them in much nicer uniform tahn the others. The group continued on a little while seperatly, trying not to draw attention to themselves. Once they were safely away from prying eyes Naya spoke first. "What are we going to do now? He was meant to show us around."

Zephyr woke up and looked in front of him. Nobody was there. "Well damn, I had hoped that wasn't a dream." He stretched a bit, then got out of the bed and stood up, Scratched his head while yawning, and heard a slight jingle as an arm wrapped around his shoulder and hung down. He noticed a specific cat collar on said arm. It did make him feel a little better and he smiled. The lady spoke "You sleep an awful long time. I have no clue how you manage to do that so carefree. It's already afternoon." Zephyr checked and she was most assuredly correct. It was a rather good thing that there wasn't anything to be done for the day, although tomorrow he'd have to actually pay attention to this sort of thing.

He shrugged. "Must be the time of year I guess. Or just that the last several days have been running me ragged. One of the two." She took her arm off him and moved over to a mirror. Zephyr hadn't actually seen her until he turned around, and her form fitting dress was a pleasant first sight. Regardless however, he got himself dressed up and tried to think of if there was anything he had to do. Nothing specific, although some training would be fairly nice. Wasn't really sure of any specific areas that looked reasonable, nor could he recall any. Screw it, he'd just get annoyed over not practicing later when he was fighting for his life. As he looked over he saw Sonia finish putting on her earrings. "Oh, getting ready to go do Gods know what again?"

She chuckled. "Sadly, as fun as your pitiful attempts were, I have business to get back to and work to be done. Maybe a rain check for some day, yes?" Zephyr simply said "I'll hold you to that. Though how long and if circumstances will even permit it are pretty unknowable." He could tell from her face she knew there was more to that than just the basic simpleness it denoted, but she didn't pry either. "I see. Well regardless, I'll be around to see you off tomorrow if nothing else. I do however have to be going." With that she gently kissed his check and left off. Come to think of it, now what WAS he gonna do anyway?

Seeing as how he spent an entire day making someone do something they usually didn't, he would try the same. Surely she had a Library or something. Not so much in that he didn't or couldn't read, he just never really ever put time aside for it. There was a time he read plenty. He didn't specifically search for anything, but some of it seemed pretty out of place for what he had expected. He found a book about weaponry and various war tactics stashed in there somewhere. Some other book about some "Legendary" group of people who could control the elements themselves. That was oddly specific, let alone ironic. It also sounded like a book he hadn't expected to exist seeing as how the empire worked about such things. He skimmed through them both for the night to simply try to get an idea or few for things he could do. Likely the most training he was risking as it was. Admittedly, it was nice to just have a quiet break of a day. He had even gone out of his way to throw on a robe and find a big fancy looking chair with a light by it. Damn, he felt fancy.

Zephyr also felt like an idiot when he realized Sonia showed up later on and saw him. She lowered her head, shook it and walked on. He had meant to bother her, maybe try to partake of another night with her, however he actually ended up falling sleep in said chair. Which probably looked silly.

The next thing he knew it was morning, and he was being awoken by a most sweet sounding "Mr. Solinea, you might want to get up, it'll be time for you to move it along, yes?" He groggily looked around, then promptly felt like an idiot. Wait last name? That's a new one. She pulled him up out of the chair, ever so lightly slapping him on the cheek a couple times. It was fairly annoying, but it did work as intended. Actually despite them having spent a decent amount of time together, he couldn't recall telling her his last name. As he got his bearings, she handed him his ID. "You likely want to keep a better tabs on this thing. If you lose it any night you have a tryst... well I suppose it won't happen often." He flatly replied "Most likely not. And no, your humor is not lost on me." The two set off. Finally at the point of disembarking, they shared a kiss, and he heard the bell as she waved him off.

Everyone had gotten off fine and dandy until Kali managed to screw things up somehow. The hell's with this guy, for a thief he sure did seem to get caught constantly. Nobody really knew what they should do about the issue either. Wonder what happened with that anyway. Him getting captured made Zephyr think back for a moment on wondering how Sonia knew his name, and he looked at the card he had in his hand.

"Are you fuckin serious?" Deadpan and loud enough to get a few looks. He rubbed his temple with his hand. Maybe his passive role in things wasn't the best move. Traveling with fake IDs that had their REAL names on them wasn't the smartest choice his "companions" had made. "Who the hell put you guys in charge anyway?" He knew the answer, which made him mildly sad. All of this nonsense aside Zephyr put forth his input. "I don't know if anyone's deciding on bothering with saving him or not yet, but either way we'd better find a spot to lay low before anything else. Especially since we can't lie for fuck all with these worthless things you made us."

Zephyr sighed, for this visit felt like it was suddenly going to have more hassle than necessary. The only good news was apparently they weren't super wanted criminals by name. Yet anyway. They shortly thereafter made their way out of prying eyes to attempt discussing what to do about him.