Chapter 1: Chapter 1

As a mercenary, I expected battles in dismal weather with even worse odds, but this had to be a new low.  Water poured on my sword, ran down my arm in tiny rivers, then collected at my elbow before breaking apart.  The wind twisted around my body, carrying drops in a chaotic cyclone to the concrete road.

Five soldiers stood before me, barely visible in the depths of this cramped street.  Only the intermittent flash of lightning gave me their sight in detail.  They were Seitojins, like me, with light brown skin and somewhat flat faces.  Unlike me, this wretched city was their home.

“Lost, gamja?” said the man in the lead.  He was middle aged, and a gold insignia marked him as a captain.  A label on his coat identified him as Tetsuo.  A commoner, not that I cared.

“Clearing away the garbage,” I said with a cool smile.

“Typical mercenary arrogance,” Tetsuo scoffed.  “Why don’t you introduce yourself”—he drew the short sword from his belt—“so we know where to send the remains.”

“Once from House Seishin,” I said with a bow.  “But now with Nova, as a Knight, S Rank.”  My eyes flashed with a wicked smile.  “And I’m afraid I’ll be leaving your bodies on the street.”

I closed the distance in an instant, literally within the span of a flash of lightning, and hit hard enough to send the guard captain flying.  The crack was covered by the roll of thunder.  Tetsuo tumbled down the pavement, crashing into a market stall tucked in for the night.  Half a severed blade spiraled away before clattering on the ground.

In spite of my sudden attack the other soldiers were quick to respond.  A pair with firearms split from the rear, each leaping to a distant position in a single bound.  I went after the one on the left, closing so fast he barely had time to plant his feet before I arrived.  He tried to block the slash, but my sword shattered his rifle with little resistance.  Splinters of metal and wood scattered in the air.

The blade passed through his chest just as easily.  A wave of white light followed the cut, stitching the wound together near as fast as it was made.  His Vital Net down to around eighty percent.

The rifleman snapped away before I could land my second slash, then a bullet struck my neck as I turned to give chase.  A trickle of blood ran down my throat.  The rest of the volley failed to find an opening.  It took less than five percent.

I gave the second gunner a scowl, then sprang after my primary target.

Young Seishin.

The vision fractured.  Conflicting details crashed in a maelstrom of sight and sound, then settled into a discrete scene.

Tetsuo knelt on the ground, staring at me with a mixture of terror and contempt.  I saw my own hatred reflected in his eyes.

“So much for the code,” he spat.

“Now, now, don’t be like that,” I replied, trying my best to sound cool.  “Nothing says we can’t be reasonable.  How about you tell me the way to Lambda Complex, and I’ll let you go?”

“The reactor?” Tetsuo muttered.  He looked down, and I could see him think it over.  After a minute he hardened his shoulders and glared.

“Is that a no?” I said sweetly.

“Rot in darkness.”

“You first.”  I pulled my sword in line with my body, chanting a few lines from a cryptic poem to help me focus, then tapped a cloudy gem in a thin choker around my neck.  A mote of light fluttered from the stone, then spiraled into a delicate pattern over my hand.  I placed two fingers above the hilt, and a pale green fog erupted from my digits and wrapped around the blade, concealing its natural glow.  I slid my hand to the tip of my sword, coating the edge with an eery mist.

“The Toxic Arte.” Tetsuo flinched in horror.

“How about I sweeten the deal,” I said, aiming my sword towards his throat.  “Lambda Complex?”

“Captain!” A woman yelled behind me, and I turned to see her crawling up.  Her name was Natsume, if I recalled the label on her uniform correctly.  Blood oozed from a gash in her chest, leaving a scarlet trail in her wake through the rain soaked path.  She grabbed my foot with one hand, and with the other stabbed a long knife into my calf.  The pain barely registered.  “Captain!  Get away from here!”

I looked at the wound on my leg.  The blade was wedged between a pair of plates, light shimmering around the edges.

“If you’re lucky enough to survive a terminal blow,” I said.  “You should be grateful and scurry to safety.”  I shrugged.  If she didn’t want to live, who was I to deny her request.  I drove my sword through her neck.  The green fog trailed the blade, but was otherwise unaffected.

The young woman slumped to the ground as I shook the dagger from my leg.

I heard Tetsuo mutter, ”Natsume….  Why did you come back?”

“She had a crush on you, obviously.”  I shook my head.  Idiot…

“You’re a monster.”

I smiled back.  “Probably.  Now, where were we?”  I glanced at my sword.  “Ah, yes, that.”  I gently sliced his cheek.  The green fog poured into the wound, dissolving the surrounding flesh.  A pulsing web of light shimmered as tissue sloughed away.

A wave of chaotic emotions.  Horror.  Revulsion.  Satisfaction.

The scene fractured.

Young Seishin.

I stood amongst a ring of ruined structures.  Nearby, the mangled corpse of a Seitojin woman.  A mechanical thing sparked feebly at my feet.

Young Seishin!

Now the mountains, crimson peaks loomed in the distance, kneeling at the side of another body.  My hands dripped with blood.  This one was familiar, it was…  I was…

 

---

 

“Young Seishin!  You want to sleep, do it on your own time!”

Hitori shot from his desk.  Standing in front of him was a short Seitojin woman, his teacher.  The other students were laughing, but she silenced them with a glance.

“Yes, Ms. Athens!” Hitori bowed.  “I have no excuse.  It will never happen again.”

“Some promise,” Ms. Athens said.  A few of his peers chuckled.  “Last class before you graduate and you finally plan to stay awake.”

Hitori blushed.  He hadn’t meant that as a joke.  He wasn’t being truthful either, but rather forgot he was graduating this year.  Assuming he passed the exams.

Ms. Athens sighed and walked to the front of the room as Hitori returned to his seat.  This wasn’t the first time he’d dozed off in this class, though he’d never been so pleased to snap out of it.  His daydream took a turn for the macabre.  Even the intimidating glower of his teacher was an improvement.

Li Athens was the youngest instructor in the Nova Academy.  She was only a year older than Hitori, who recently turned eighteen, but graduated five years ago.  She was rather short in comparison, with the stereotypical narrow eyelids and brown eyes of a Seitojin, unlike Hitori’s deep blue.  Her skin was a shade darker than his, more beige than olive, and her hair was black.  They were both very muscular, although the teacher was leaner.

On her face was the silver marking of a Nova mercenary, something Hitori currently lacked.  She also had a black tattoo somewhat akin to a snake slithering up her neck and ending on the opposite cheek.

“Not like it matters anyway,” Hitori muttered under his breath.  This was a first-century history course, taken at the academy’s insistence.

“What, you think you’re headed to Nova East so you can act like a potato?” his teacher said.  That branch was considered the lowest posting in Nova.  It was on the Eastern continent, a place with only a scattering of isolated villages.  His assignment wouldn’t be decided until after graduation, but the worst-performing students ended up there.

“No, it’s just I…” Hitori looped his hand as though reeling in an answer.  “I’m already so familiar with this stuff, you know?  I’ve got a real passion for history.”

He got a few chuckles from his peers.  Even Hitori didn’t think he sounded credible.

“Is that so?  Then would you like to give us a summary of, oh, let’s say the events leading up to and shortly after the Fading?”

“The Fading?  Sure, easy, no problem,” Hitori wracked his brain trying to remember the cheat sheet a friend made for the last test.  “There was a war, between Seitoji and Duroterra, and Seitoji was winning.  So Duroterra, uh, used biological warfare to win?”

Ms. Athens glanced at another boy in class, Hitori’s friend Protius, and frowned.  He shrugged innocently.  She looked back to Hitori and sighed.  “I’m not sure where to begin with you.  Does someone else want to try?”

There was laughter as several students raised their hands.  The first up belonged to Bridget Ó’Hea, as usual.  She was the picture of Mairtalan beauty: fair skin, sparse freckles, and large blue eyes.  Her hair was light-red and spun together in a braid that stretched past her waist.  Unlike the other students, she had a sincere and earnest expression.  The teacher motioned for her to answer.

“The war was between the Wahuang Republic and the Minerva Imperium, two nations that later coalesced into the city-states of Seitoji and Duroterra.  The Republic gained the upper hand with a material known today as myriaite.

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“To regain the advantage the Imperium weaponized medical nanotechnology under development by Dr. Vitani and Dr. Magnus.  It’s unknown exactly what happened, but it is believed Dr. Vitani had a problem with the project leadership and released the technology, after adding a self-replication feature.”

“You can stop there, Miss Ó’Hea,” Ms. Athens said.  Bridget frowned but nodded.  “Does someone think they can finish?”

Again several students raised their hands, and the teacher selected one from the back row, a young woman.  She looked distinctly Duroterran: olive skin, brown hair, and a wide face with a strong chin.  She was well built, likely the most muscular person in class.

It was unusual for mercenaries to be into body-building, so her physique stood out amongst the other students.  Her presence was something of a mystery, having transferred in halfway through the year.  She hadn’t made any friends or joined a team yet, so no one knew where she transferred from.

“That nanotechnology, called a restructor and responsible for a person’s Vital Net, worked correctly as far as healing was concerned, but the power system had unintended consequences.  They use malhahons—a kind of exotic matter—for energy and structure, but can’t produce it themselves.  Instead, they convert part of the host’s brain for that purpose.  Unfortunately, in around ninety-five percent of the population that change eventually caused the Fade, or more technically Malhahonic Dementia. 

“It leads to insanity, but not before giving the victim an intuitive ability to create malhahonic constructs.  These people became the first Arteficers, able to craft crude but powerful artes that could obliterate whole neighborhoods.  Obviously, extreme power mixed poorly with absolute madness.”

“Thank you, Miss Peri,” Ms. Athens said.  “And you too, Miss Ó’Hea.  I’m glad to see some of our students taking Esper’s history seriously.  We don’t want you embarrassing yourself when working with cultured clientele.  Some of your classmates could learn from you.”

A few people laughed as a gentle three ring tone sounded.  The students began chattering as they retrieved their weapons and books.  “Hitori, I need to speak with you before you go,” the teacher called out over the clatter.

 

---

 

A young man was waiting outside the classroom when Hitori emerged a few minutes later.  His face had Seitojin features like Ms. Athens’, but his skin was pale.  Black hair hung in loose curls over his face, and his eyes swirled with grey and black.

“What’s up, Protius?” Hitori said.  The sixteen-year-old was the Arteficer on Omega team, which the pair formed seven years ago.

“What did Ms. Athens want?” Protius asked.

“She wanted me to come to her office tonight, before the party.”

“Well, that’s either a very good sign,” Protius said as he nudged Hitori with his elbow.

“Or a very bad one.”  Hitori rolled his eyes.  “She’s not my type, and I’m definitely not-“

Li left the classroom and brushed past without so much as a glance.  They waited in silence until she was out of sight.

“You know, I can’t say I’ll miss her when we move to Nova East,” Hitori said.

“Eastern?  Aren’t you optimistic?  It’ll be lucky if we make it to Southern,” Protius said.  There wasn’t a Nova branch on the desolate Southern continent, in fact there were hardly any people at all.

“Yeah, you’re a riot.  Anyway, I’m off to the Training Center.  I’ll see you tonight.”  Hitori spent most of his free time there, which he suspected was the main reason he remained at Nova Academy.  That, and his lineage.  He was the son of the world famous mercenary Maia Seishin, although she died when Hitori was only a few years old.

“Wait, I’ll go with you.”

“Really?” Hitori said, and then laughed.  “Are you sure you remember where it is?  You’d better, because the loser’s buying drinks after we graduate.”

Hitori shot down the hallway towards the stairs.  Before jumping down the first flight he spun and waved to Protius, who started levitating towards him.

“Why don’t you try running,” Hitori yelled as he disappeared from view.  Hitori cleared the five flights in seconds, his feet barely touching each set of stairs.  When he reached the bottom he nearly plowed into Protius.

“Running is for chumps,” Protius said.

“Your face is a chump,” Hitori laughed.  “You didn’t decide to come just to show off how good you’ve gotten at Shifting, did you?”

“That wasn’t the only reason.”  Shifting referred to a technique which relocated its user by transforming them into a malhahonic network.  It was one of many feats possible with malhahonic devices known as artes.

“Alright, let’s try this again,” Hitori said as he maneuvered Protius into an impromptu starting line.  “And no cheating!” he yelled as he launched out the door.

The pair burst from the ten story Academic Hall into a crowd of students lingering after their last class.  Hitori deftly maneuvered between his peers whereas Protius pushed them aside with a wave of his hands, drawing a chain of startled gasps and curses as he passed.

After they cleared their classmates, the pair headed south towards the dormitories.  The dorms were in a long, six-story building, used by both the students and staff of the Academy, as well as graduates who were stationed at Nova Main. 

They ran into another crowd at the entrance, this time the students of Dragon Battalion filing out the building.  The steady beat of helicopters could be heard in the distance, prepared to whisk them away to some combat zone for their field exam.  Hitori thought they might have been doing their test with the Eastern branch.

Despite the extra time needed to be polite, Hitori made it inside a few seconds before Protius, and went straight across the foyer to the rear stairs.  He had to dodge students wandering between the first floor amenities: a pool, exercise equipment, table games, a quick-service restaurant, and various workrooms equipped for a multitude of hobbies.

Hitori ascended the stairwell straight up the center, forgoing the steps entirely with a chain of techs—special techniques that used a person’s Vital Net to move their body at great speed.  Protius, with the help of artes, was able to glide ahead and made it into his room first.  They both emerged about a minute later, having changed out of their plain clothes into Nova-issued armor.

Their gear was based on their CAST Roles, groupings of combatants by technique.  The system was developed a few centuries ago to simplify mercenary contracts but worked its way into regular militaries as well.

As a Knight, Hitori wore a black one-piece outfit made with a durable fabric.  The cloth was used as scaffolding for dozens of small myriaite plates, which added incredible toughness and almost no weight.  These protected most of his body.  He always carried his sword with him, a weapon he inherited from his mother, but kept his dagger with the rest of his gear.   He also added a dark choker with a red gem.

The Arteficer set Protius wore was simpler.  It called for a two-piece combat suit, also black, and had myriaite plates for the chest and wrists.  It also included a black cloak, which Protius did wear, although it was eschewed by most mercenary Arteficers.  Protius kept a knife as a backup weapon, a common choice by his peers, although he never used it.

The race was still on, even as they were changing, so they wasted no time sprinting out of their rooms towards the end of the hallway.  They both ignored the stairs, aiming instead towards a large window.  Protius opened it with an arte, but Hitori was the first to arrive and launched himself out the fifth floor.

Hitori spent a second savoring freedom from the earth.  He watched his teammate float through the window above him, coasting through the air.

I wonder why Protius still hasn’t mastered the Flight Arte.  He certainly has the malhahonic reserves for it.

Right before landing Hitori twisted his body into a near-standing position and prepared the Impact Tech.  He struck the ground like a spring.  His Vital Net dampened the force, preventing injury without wasting energy.

A split second after touching down, Hitori snapped west towards the Training center.  Protius glided along above him, floating with the use of the Levitation Arte.  Although Hitori was faster on the ground, he had to divert north around the Forum—a multipurpose hall—while Protius was able to land on its roof and continued in a straight path.

Protius took the lead but was still a few stories up as he neared the goal.  The Training Center didn’t have openable windows, so he was forced to drop the remaining distance at the speed of gravity.  It wasn’t fast enough, and Hitori dived under his feet to land in front of the door before him.

“Come on, son,” Hitori said playfully.  “I’ve seen Gels move faster than you.”  Gels were a type of metafauna, specifically a colony of single-cell organisms controlled by restructors.  They moved about as slow as the description implied.

“Oh, suck it,” Protius sighed.  “I should have popped the door open and slid in.”

“Too late for should haves,” Hitori said as he opened the door for Protius and pushed him inside.  “Now enjoy your walk of shaaame!”

“Hitori wins again?” a girl sitting at a desk near the entrance said with a giggle.  Her skin was darker than Hitori’s, and her face had the somewhat square appearance and brown eyes typical in Bachija—a city on the Northern continent—but her hair was pure white.  “You’re not very good at racing Zizi.”

Protius rolled his eyes—she was the only person who called him that.  Still, he smiled when he replied, “I’d be a lot faster, but Hitori doesn’t think Shifting counts as a real method of travel.”

“Teleporting in a race doesn’t count as a real method of travel you clown!”  Hitori waved his arms dramatically.  Protius laughed with him.

After they settled, Protius said, “So, Chandra, how’ve you been?”  He did his best to lean suavely against her desk but was too short to make it work.

She groaned. “I’ve been hammering out the final project for my electrics design class,” Chandra said, then planted her face in her hands.  “My system’s security class was so much easier.”

“Well, at least you’re good at the useful stuff, right?” Hitori said.  Chandra was his team’s Paladin.  They weren’t suited for combat, so Nova trained them in various specializations.  In Chandra’s case this was breaching electronic and mechanical locks, as well as digital systems.

“Yes, Hitori, that’s what’s important.”  She sighed.  “Anyway, you two want to do your usual exercise?”

“Nah, this will be our last time here as students, so surprise us with something awesome.”

“Something awesome?” Chandra said with a devious grin and steepled fingers.  “I have the perfect thing.”

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