25 February 2024
Katalysis, 43rd Floor
I'd never felt more tense than watching the HP gauge of my fellow party member being drained to the red zone.
In fact, my eyes froze up just by noticing the green bar that started to recede towards the left at first. Tekion noticed the change just as it was turning yellow, and stopped working, his face turning serious.
The message we got from that was instantly obvious: She had gotten herself into some deep, deep shit.
We heard rapid knocking on the inn door, and I instantly went to get it. Alexis faced me with a similar serious look.
"You saw that, didn't you?" Her voice was urgent.
"No shit," I said. "Where's Meghan?"
"Already on the case," She looked across to the staircase leading below. "We've already tracked her location."
"Got it. I'll catch up." I nodded.
"Then I'll make a move first," Alexis offered. "We can still save her if we act fast."
As soon as she said that, she took off, her hasty footsteps echoing off the wooden flooring.
"Wait," Tekion called out. "It's done."
The blacksmith stood up, his hand touching the weapon that he was working on, as it gradually stopped glowing from the tinkering.
What emerged from the glowing shell of light was a double-bladed spear, its design looking way different than my previous one.
From just looking at it, the blades of the spear were differently coloured; a red one and a blue one, both closely resembling the top part of a sword, especially at the pointed edges.
Tekion picked the spear up with both hands. I went over to receive it, letting him rest its weight onto my hands for the first time. It felt pretty light, which was a good sign for wielding a weapon with ease.
Its pole body was the only peculiarity for a spear. Instead of a cylindrical shape that I had grown used to in the past, its shape was as if the cylinder was being half-flattened, such that its cross section would be the shape of an oval.
While the background colour of the pole body was silver, streaks of purple were randomly scattered all over.
Truth be told, I had never seen a spear take on this design before. While the blades were obviously made of the metals from those meteorites, the feel of holding the spear itself was unique to me. It's the kind of pole grip which, considering my experience with only holding spears with cylindrical pole bodies, could probably struggle to get accustomed to.
"What's this?" I turned the spear's pole body with my thumbs.
"It's an.....experiment," Tekion answered with a slight lack of confidence. "Well first off, it's custom-made. It's not your average spear out there, and as far as I know it's the only spear of its kind."
"Hmm....." I tried to spin the spear in a windmill. "Feels weird, but it's still wieldable, to say the least."
Tekion heaved a little sigh of relief. "Glad to hear that."
I made the spear stand on the ground on its red blade, and tapped onto it. The system description window popped out, listing the details of the weapon.
"Its name.....What the hell is this?" I touched the weapon's name printed on the system window.
"The system's always the one to generate names for crafted weapons, so I'm just as clueless." Tekion shrugged.
I quickly sheathed the spear behind my back. "We'll worry about that later."
Bolting out of the inn, I activated my Tracking skill to track Raku's location. Alexis and Meghan should have done the same, so I would expect to see them there.
Indeed, Meghan and Alexis were there, but Raku wasn't present. They were looking around with confusion, especially since the location was a short and dark alleyway between a couple of buildings that was completely empty.
"What the hell!" Meghan was slamming the wall of a building with her fist in frustration, and understandbly so. Alexis was staring hard at the location where Raku should have been from her system window.
"What's going on.....?" She turned to me. "She should be here.....or maybe....."
I could only deduce one other possibility that could explain this, and it seemed that Alexis had just realized it too.
"Underground."
The 3 of us stared down at the ground, at the location where Raku was supposed to be at.
Meghan slammed the wall again. "What the fuck!" Her face was renewed with panic. Alexis knelt down and touched the ground, looking calm.
"I heard that the city of Katalysis has an underground prison. The problem is, we don't know the location of its entrance."
I leaned against the wall and started to think about the current situation. "I'm stumped too, but I have a good guess."
"Should we split up?" Alexis asked.
"No. We stick together," I said. "And we do it fast. Raku went to the Gladorium to meet Tori, so we're going there for answers."
"She went to meet Tori?!" Meghan turned to me instantly. "By herself?!"
"She didn't want me to tag along," I leaned off the wall. "Said it was a risk she had to take."
"You could've insisted to join her!" Meghan's voice was getting louder.
"And she insisted that she would go alone!" I raised my voice to match hers.
"Guys!" Alexis slid right between me and Meghan. "Clock's ticking! We'll discuss this later!"
She was right. There simply wasn't time to argue about this. Although Meghan looked like she wasn't letting the matter go, it wasn't as if I'd ignore it too.
We rushed straight to the Gladorium. Empty as it was at night, the entrance was wide open as always.
As we stepped into the Gladorium, we paused, having sensed something coming our way. Sure enough, a figure rushed towards me in a blur, as I pulled out my new spear in reflex to greet the weapon swung at me.
My spear's blue blade collided with a long, curved blade, as I jumped back to meet my attacker. I expected the Reaper or that other scythe user called Acher to stare back at me, but my expectations were blown off.
It was surreal. I never thought I'd see Tori, the Council leader, holding a weapon unlikely for her to wield.
"Finally!" Her eyes lit up with excitement. "I get to see the real you, Vanguard!"
"Vanguard.....?" I blurted out, having to take time to get what she was saying.
More players appeared around us, which forced our backs together, surrounded by them.
While Meghan let out a 'Shit!' that seemed to describe our predictament pretty well, Alexis was surprised at the sight of the Council appearing before her, but grabbed that chance instantly.
"Aren't you Tori, the Council leader? I heard that you met Rakuno a while ago, didn't you? Where's she now?"
The Council leader gave us a simple smirk.
"Bold of you to think that I'll tell you right now."
"The fuck did you say?" Meghan pulled out her sword, her anger getting the better of her, but Alexis blocked her with her arm.
"Then I hope you'll answer me this first. Why the hell are you wielding Shi's weapon?"
Tori's smirk turned into an expression of surprise, before turning back into a wider smirk.
"Oh, this? Just a gift from the Reaper himself. I'm a scythe user too."
She stepped closer to us, without any waver of her demeanor. "More importantly, I wonder.....what are you even here for? Huh?"
As if she didn't know. It should be obvious that she expected for us to go to the last known place that Rakuno has been to.
I stepped forth, facing Tori with a defensive spear-holding stance. "You know, I like getting straight to the point, so I'd like for you to tell us where the entrance to that prison is."
As I had expected, Tori's smirk was never vanishing at my blunt demand. Rather, she let out a few suppressed giggles, which were poorly covered up by forced coughing.
"First of all, I'd like to say that seeing you in this form feels really refreshing for me, Vanguard. I've always been wondering when you would ever pull your spear out."
"Is there a problem with that?" I asked.
"I can't help it, you see. Kira's been bugging me about it lately, about how you're so stubborn about not using the spear on your back and using a sword instead." Tori continued. "We've seen you struggling with the Piston Golems in a few of our expeditions, and that's got me, well, pretty intrigued."
I gave a little sigh. "Not you too."
"Well if you've been using your spear all along, there's literally no reason for Kira or me to deem you being sus." Tori shrugged. "You gotta admit that you're a spear user, man. Or is that spear just for show?"
At that moment, I was shoved aside, almost tripping over myself. Meghan stepped between me and Tori, as she glared at the Council leader.
"Is this fucking chat done?"
In split-second speed, Tori's scythe blurred towards Meghan. Alexis and I didn't even react to it; the swing would have been over before we even realized it.
When our eyes had quickly shifted to Meghan, she was frozen solid, her breath halted, as if time had stood still for her. Any slight movement she would make would drive her neck deep into the pointed end of the scythe, which was barely touching it by the millimetre.
Tori withdrew her scythe for a while, before stepping towards Meghan with her scythe's blade surrounding Meghan's neck.
"It's fucking done, when I say it's fucking done."
I don't think I'd seen Tori being pissed off before. It amazing to think that it's my first time to witness her anger. Her eyes were wide open, showing terror on her face.
She turned to me, while her face switched back to her smile. "Now, where were we, Vanguard?"
Alexis was about to say something or rush to help Meghan. Either of those actions sounded disasterous, which made me block her from coming closer.
"Let me through, Ze--" She looked hell-bent on wanting to go there, but stopped when she saw my face.
"The underground prison," I stared back at Tori with serious eyes. "Where the fuck is it?"
"Do I look like I'll simply tell you where it is?" Tori shook her scythe playfully, its blade ever so close to slice into the whole of Meghan's nape at once.
"Then let her go. We're done here." I declared.
"Hey, hey, what the fuck?" Tori turned aggressive. "You're pretty bold to run into the Council and expect to get off scot-free without a valid reason of why you're at the Gladorium at such an untimely hour."
"Our friend's locked up in YOUR underground prison!" Meghan snapped through gritted teeth. "Sounds fucking valid to me!"
Oh, hell no. I don't like how Meghan's starting to blow up in front of the Council leader, even more so with her neck literally being theatened to be sliced off.
"You know, I'm a fan of that kind of attitude," Tori placed her face close up with Meghan. "People who get straight to the point and face off against any adversity straight on. They're always the easiest to play with."
"Hey, I'll give you a deal you'll never refuse. If you can find a way to get your neck out of this in 1 minute, I'll personally lead you to the Witch herself. I'll even throw in the privilege that allows you to visit the prison freely."
"So she is in there....." I said. "But calling her the Witch feels a little--"
"She likes being called that, so why bother arguing?" Tori kept her eyes locked with Meghan's. "Anyways, you won't lose your head if you fail. You'll just lose your dignity, or pride......or whatever. Tempting, eh?"
Whether Meghan was still seething with rage from this obvious taunt, I couldn't tell. She wasn't taking any chances to move an inch, so much so that even speaking might bring her neck to touch the scythe.
"Don't take the deal, Meghan!" Alexis shouted. "Please!"
The gap between Tori's scythe and Meghan's neck widened a little. "So, will you take the deal?" Tori gave a wide smile. "You have 10 seconds."
Alexis and I could only watch in silence as Meghan took a few deep breaths, before staring back at Tori. I noticed that her sword hand was now trembling.
".....I won't take the deal....." Meghan's voice trembled with a tinge of fear.
The scythe around Meghan's neck pulled away, as Tori leapt away from Meghan, spinning it playfully.
"A wise decision. I mean, let's face it. You'd slice your own neck off trying to get out of that. I'm not fucking kidding. But as consolation, I can tell you when you'll see the Witch again."
"And when will that be?" I asked.
"Pretty soon, actually," Tori replied. "The next Gladiorium. In fact, we're setting up a stake for her to burn in! Well, if she loses her matches, that is."
She said this, right in front of Meghan, knowing full well on how her reaction would be. Tori stared hard at Meghan's face, giving the most sadistic smirk I'd seen from her ever.
"If you turn back in 30 seconds, I promise I'll close an eye over this incident. Or else, I guess you're getting a solid trip to the prison. Oh wait.......that's where you've been wanting to go, after all!"
I imagined that the trip to the prison would be the same kind that Raku had gotten. That would suck, totally.
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26 February 2024
Katalysis, 43rd Floor
SLAM.
If the door of the girls' inn room had been from the real world, it might have almost fallen off from its hinges.
No one spoke about anything in the walk back from the Gladiorium. As pissed as we were, we couldn't do anything. I didn't even dare to steal a glance at Meghan's face. I was satisfied with imagining the stress she was going through in her helplessness to save her friend.
The way Meghan held the door knob was as if she was crushing it, and the swing should have let out some of her anger out. Either way, thinking about the current situation with a cool head was essential. At the very least, we knew that Raku wasn't going to die that easily.
"Damn." Tekion couldn't help but turn towards the sudden noise. "That was Meghan, wasn't it?"
"Who else?" I shut the door gently, before letting myself fall onto my bed.
"You don't need to say anything, I got a rough idea on what happened," Tekion laid onto his.
The both of us stared at the ceiling in silence for a while.
"Let's think about this in the morning," I finally said, while turning in. "My brain sucks at working at midnight."
When I went to knock on the door of the girls' inn room in the morning, there wasn't much of even the sound of footsteps in there. Alexis took the door a full minute later, as she stared at me with nothing but a frown on her face.
".....I just woke up." She muttered.
"Didn't you sleep?" I asked.
"Do you think I could, with Meghan being noisy as she was?" She rubbed her eyes.
"Where's she?"
"Already out on expeditions with Shi's party. I decided not to go, but I couldn't stop her from going by herself."
".....I see."
"Isn't she breaking the party's only rule to never go out alone?"
I gave a sigh, as I pressed my hand onto my forehead. "Raku did the same thing. That's why we're deep in this shit now. Though, if going out and killing mobs helps her to calm down, then it can't be helped."
"And.....she was right. I take half the blame for letting Raku into such an obvious trap."
I went to open the door to my inn room. Tekion was still ever so busy in his crafting endeavours, looking at his own weapons intently.
"For now," I gestured Alexis in. "Let's discuss the next course of action with what we have left."
Alexis sat on my bed, automatically turning to Tekion's mini anvil. Tekion was still hacking away as usual, occasionally pausing to search for crafting materials from his inventory.
"Don't mind me," He said as he worked. "I'm listening."
"Well, first things first," Alexis started off. "I'm sure everyone on the party noticed that Raku's back to full health, which really gives us time to relax for the time being."
"Yeah," I gave another sigh. "I hope that can calm Meghan down."
"Well, that just means she's clearing out her anger because of you, isn't it?" Alexis threw me a straight glance. "The very reason Raku got locked up in the first place....."
"I believe I warned Raku about meeting Tori alone. It wasn't like she was naïve about it either, " I crossed my arms. "I did think about tailing her to meet Tori too, but that might make matters worse. Would you want me locked up too?"
Alexis gave me a slightly unnatural smile. "It might make things better if you're the one locked up instead of her."
"Oi," I raised an eyebrow, being pretty annoyed at her opinion. "Do you really hate me more than Raku?"
" 'Hate' is not the right word, rather......" Alexis pondered. "Meghan and I are definitely more comfortable with Raku than you, naturally."
I gave her a more distinct eyebrow-raising look. ".......Um, okay. We're getting off track here."
I tried to clear my throat in a professional matter, the kind before starting off an office meeting, probably.
"Whether you like it or not, if you wanna save Raku, you'll gonna have to work with me anyway. So.....shall we?"
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