“You can pet Biscuit a few times if you tell me what those lines are,” I tell Maya.
“Sorry to tell you, but Biscuit is surprisingly cheap. He lets us pet him just for a few pieces of any sort of smoked meat. He tried to make some on his own, but it went pretty badly, so he’s been relying on us to do it.”
As she talks, her [Focus] completely turns off, and her expression shifts back to her usual one. A bit sarcastic in her way of speaking, but easy to talk to, and someone who likes to smile.
Biscuit’s terrible sense of economy aside, I'm really curious. Maya was the first to come up with mana armor and later, mana mechs. The [Regalia] I used to have, along with most of my mana weapons, armor, and the similar tools I’ve developed since, can all be traced back to her.
It’s probably surprising from an outside perspective since she doesn’t even invest most of her stats into mana. But there's a reason she started with [Focus] and [Armament] as her initial skills.
While it's safe to say I’m probably developing Armament or Regalia–if you want to call it that–type skills faster than she is, she shows more talent for them. And as awkward as it might feel, I always find myself coming back to her for new notes and sharing my own in turn.
After all, it’s not like I’m a parasite or anything.
Now that I think about it, I do that quite a lot, learning from others and borrowing ideas. I wonder where I’d be without them. While I refuse to say I would’ve been any weaker, it’s safe to say my arsenal would be very different.
“Did you buy any mid arcane passives to help with that stuff?” I ask, taking my best guess.
“Yup. One of them probably isn’t much different from your Reservoir, but it’s more like storage. It helps to store a bit of mana, blueprints of my armor and weapons, that kind of thing. The second helps with mana flow and my control over it. Combined with the rest of my shards spent on mana batteries and some low arcane items I stole from the Academy, it works pretty well.”“Plus [Focus],” I add.
“Plus [Focus]
,” she sighs. “I still don’t like it all that much, but I’ve learned to be more selective about how I apply it and used some upgrades to help me learn faster. And before you start having a heart attack, yes, I’ll use a detachment token and get rid of those upgrades as soon as I have a better grasp of what I’m doing.”“Good. Those tattoos look nice. So, does that passive help you to store anything? Isn’t that way too good? What’s it called? I want to check it out in the shop.”
I step closer, eyeing her forearms, where pale blue and purple lines are arranged in elegant patterns. On Maya’s darker skin, they look cool enough that I start thinking maybe I should get some of my own. I know there are tattoos classified as items in the system shop.
“Mana Archive, it...”
“The hell, that sounds cool. How did I not notice it?”
“...it, as I said, allows me to store mana, though not as much as your passive does. And it helps me to store the blueprints. I think you mentioned you wanted to store your arrays and constructs in your brain or something.”
“I’m a romantic, so I might just change my mind and store anything mana-related in my heart to show my love for the best attribute.”
“Alright.”
“Alright,” I nod.
Even though I know she’s fighting it, she sighs and smiles. “You can be such a childish ass sometimes.”
“I blame my environment and subconscious need to catch up on all the things I missed out on growing up. I think Izzy said something like that once.”
“Doesn’t sound very much like her. But seeing you bullshitting like this and in a good mood, did everything go well?” She asks, stretching out a hand so I can examine part of the blueprints she’s archived there.
“If I were aiming for a perfect score, I’m still missing one dead feylith and a thylarin, but there’s still time for that,” I state, taking on a more serious tone. “Sophie left a piece of herself in Faora’s mind, and she says that piece would’ve, in the next few years, erased Faora and taken over her body. I believe her.”
Maya shrugs. “We all know how scary Sophie’s abilities can be. If you think about it, the way we’re always letting our guard down around her and trusting her, she could probably, slowly and carefully, turn us all into her slaves before the tutorial even ends. And then walk away with some of Earth’s best listening to her every word.”
“It sounds disturbing, and somehow cool.”
“You’re the only disturbing thing here. But if we believe she won’t enslave us, it’s more than likely that, before the tutorial ends, our group will have the best mental defenses on Earth after training with her.”
“Sounds about right. Izzy is with Sophie, who’s currently working on putting the fragments of her mind back together. She should be up and running soon. There might be some injuries or side effects she’ll have to work through, but I don’t think it’ll be anything too serious.”
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Maya sits on a fallen tree nearby, and I sit next to her. “So in the end, she was lucky. It could’ve been much worse. And how’s Beyond?”
“I’ll talk about it later tonight, but it’s not bad. There’s a lot to do, a lot of information to gain, and plenty of opportunities. Do you regret not trying to get there?”
“Not really. If, after the tutorial, Earth ends up with 10-50, or however many people who survived Beyond, I believe I can still make it into the top thirty of those who only went through Hell difficulty. That’s enough for a very comfortable life.”
“I think you’re underselling yourself.”
“I’m trying to be more modest these days.”
“And if you aren’t trying to be modest?”
“If I don’t count some of the other members of Group 4 and a few monsters like your sister, Tacita, Savant, Jean, and the Kings, I don’t think there are many people from Hell difficulty who could stop me if I really tried.”
"And are you really trying?" I ask.
Looking at her hands and the lines covering them, she closes and opens her fists a few times while searching for an answer to that question.
When she looks back at me, she says simply, "I am."
What a nice expression.
Maya doesn’t talk about the training or the effort she puts in, but I can sense the effect it’s had from the state of her expression and hear it in her voice.
Ever since the first floor, she’s always preferred relying on others to make decisions and following along. It’s a part of her I don’t like much, but I don’t hate her for it either. I’m sure the others have things they hate about me, too.
But over time, I’ve come to see how Maya’s picked up the slack, and all the ways the personality that once needed someone to follow has grown more confident in itself.
Her subclass is Patience, the same as Savant’s, and it shows in the way she’s learned to patiently decide what she wants to do and then stick to it. I’ve seen it in the way she trains.
Once she decides on a target, she makes a schedule she sticks to no matter what, and progresses in ways that demonstrate an impressive level of determination. Out of all the members of group 4, she’s also the most "technical" when it comes to using weapons or martial arts, and likely when it comes to creating armor from mana. Everything is well structured, prepared, and practiced.
I don’t know if it has anything to do with her previous job as a personal trainer, or if it’s a remnant from the time she first started exercising and sculpted her current body from the person she still calls a sad slob
. Or maybe it’s a result of her love for music and her ability to play multiple instruments.Even after all this time, I find it fascinating how these little thoughts continue to float through my mind as I learn more about these people.
I decide to stay a day longer. During that time, Izzy stays near Sophie, who’s still working on her mindblender stuff and hasn’t awoken. Lily shows me the progress on her skele-suit, even though for some reason she still refuses to call it that. It’s not something she wants to use most of the time, since she has her mantle, and her body alone is currently more durable than any armor made of her bones that she could quickly deploy. But she says she’s doing it so that at some point in the future, she’ll be able to create a multi-story mech grown from her own flesh and bones. Possibly something as tall as mine and Maya’s.
It’s something we’ve talked about before, though I mentioned it mostly as a joke. To my horror and fascination, this petite, black-haired maniac actually wants to do it. And I respect her determination to make her powers as creepy as possible.
Her [Disintegration] has also gotten stronger again, her progress seemingly inspired by whatever Fragment Luan used against her during that fight.
While we're talking, I overhear the twins joking that in a year they'll be as old as I was when the tutorial started. A sudden, shocking thought hits me. I do the math and realize that Lily is now 19, almost 20, but as I get to that number, my brain just refuses to accept it, and almost shuts off.
I know close to two and a half years have passed. I know she was 17 and one of the twins’ classmates when the tutorial started.
But there’s just no way.
Maybe it’s because she’s still petite, even though she’s grown a little. Or maybe I just still see her that way. Or maybe it makes me feel old, since I’m also approaching 24 years old?
It’s straight up stupid. Why am I here, panicking about age when I’m on track to live hundreds, possibly thousands of years? The ticking time bomb that is my construct problem, aside, of course.
And doesn’t that mean Min-Jae’s almost 18, and Izzy’s almost 13?
I quickly cut off those thoughts and proceed to reject that reality.
We spend some time together in the living room, where I share as much information as I can and learn what they can tell me about this floor.
We, mostly Tess and I, make some plans. I leave some arms with Lily so she can use them later as needed, and as she takes them from me and puts them into the bag, the twins are still calling The Armory.
I look at Lily and wonder. Would I still look the same as I do now if I had an ability like hers to change the structure of my body? Or would there be a person with looks comparable to Lioren and Channeler standing in my place, if not surpassing them entirely?
I eventually come to the conclusion that I’d stay the way I am now, maybe with a few small tweaks here and there. A touch wider at the shoulders, slightly bigger calves. Nothing too unreasonable, I think. Everyone knows calves are fair game. Those things just refuse to grow properly. I mean, why is my ass getting rounder and firmer as I exercise, but my calves stay nearly the same?
With Maya, I examine her Mana Archive. It’s cool, and I think it fits her, but it doesn't make much sense for me to pick up. With my [Manifestation] and the mental exercises I’ve been progressing with, it only makes sense for me to store them in my mind.
While I talk to the twins, Tess sits with Biscuit, and Maya and Lily exchange ideas with Min-Jae, things based on what she’s learned from the demon’s body. It finally happens. I sense two figures approaching the room we’re in, and I’m not the only one. Gradually, the conversation dies down as everyone’s unique senses pick up on it, and we all turn toward the door.
Izzy opens them wide and, holding her hand, she pulls Sophie inside. Izzy’s eyes are red, but she has the prettiest smile I’ve ever seen her wear.
And Sophie herself is a bit pale and slimmer than usual. Her green eyes seem a bit wet, and she also moves somewhat awkwardly.
As the others rush in to greet her, I just watch, and for a moment, she looks my way. That short moment is enough for me to confirm one thing. And as Lily crashes into Sophie and nearly throws her to the ground, I step slightly back to avoid the commotion and noise, if only a little.