Chapter 186: Chapter One Hundred Eighty Seven

As expected I didn't have time to show off much. My gear was similar  to my initial loadout but with a hooded coat instead of a cloak as  Callie suggested. The sleeves were somewhat loose to give a similar vibe  and all in all I looked amazing, the crafter had paid special attention  to the detail work on the leather armor to make it harmonize with the  coat properly but I didn't have time to enjoy it because fucking Cicero  was calling us in for his nonsense mission.  I added an extra strike to  my throat punch tally for that mustachiod bastard.

We got  back to the cavalcade quickly enough, and Callie and I both stared at  Spruce Bunny from afar as we passed. He gave us a jovial wave, and we  waved back, feeling conflicted to be exchanging such jovial greeting was  a legendary monster who have been able to crush us in a fight even  years ago, nearly beating us one handed from across the room. Knowing  such a terrible combatant lay underneath that cheerful rabbit mask made  the entire image go from amusing to kind of terrifying.

When  we got to the cavalcade we were about to head in (just the four of us,  Cark was already starting to become known down here, and since the  people working with Melissa were enemies of the Militia it would be  stupid to bring him) but we were stopped outside the entrance and waved  over by a hooded figure. Since we were already in a mess down here and  it was unlikely we could make things more complicated. I checked with  Callie before we moved in, and at her nod we stepped up to speak to the  hooded figure.

Once we got close enough to see him through  the deep shadows of the hood (I suspected it was some kind of artifact  since our Perception should be too high for a little dark to be a  problem, especially at this range) I was able to recognize Emery, who  was standing placidly off to the side of the entrance, looking for all  the world like he was waiting for a cab. As expected of Cicero's master  of sneakery, the supposed assistant wasn't fidgeting or drawing any  attention at all, blending in easily by virtue of his surety.

When  we got within range he smiled lightly. "Good. You arrived in decent  time. Melissa is having one of her combat trials tonight. If you'd  missed it you'd have had to wait a week, and Mr. Castelton isn't the  most patient of men at the best of times, never mind when on such a time  crunch. Given we received word of the arrival of your new costumes we  decided to make sure you had the best chance of infiltration in a  reasonable time frame." He held out a hand, palm up, and passed us a few  small paper tickets.

I took the stubby red paper, a  square with a pair of half circles punched halfway up each side. I  grabbed them, passing them to the others. "Ok, so what the hell is this  trial anyway? You didn't say much. Do I need to worry about bringing all  my team members into this? Our healer is pretty scrappy admittedly, but  I don't know if she can keep up with someone like Abel. Not that WE can  keep up with someone like Abel. If the trial is beating someone even  half that strong there's no way we're passing."

Emery just  shook his head. "If that was the test no one would pass. If you think  there's even a fraction of a chance you could beat Abel he wasn't  fighting you seriously. Melissa is one of his devotees, but not on his  level, and you won't even be fighting her. Melissa prizes talent for  combat over raw power. You can gain stats, but instinct and creativity  are inborn. She'll probably put you through the mirror trial, it's her  most commonly used appraisal method. You'll be fighting a mirror  duplicate of yourself if she goes with that one."

That  sounded...awful. "What? How the hell are we supposed to beat an exact  copy of ourselves?" I had nightmarish visions of trying to punch myself  only to slam my fist into the fist of the other me when he tried the  same move. It sounded like the most frustrating exercise in futility I  could imagine. The only upside was it meant Jessie should be fine. Benny  I was less worried about given all his tricks, but Jessie's Might had  been falling behind recently. I'd been working with Callie to increase  Might, and had gotten twenty points of Vitality out of it for her twenty  point bump in Might, but I'd let Jessie fall by the wayside given  Callie's involvement in this whole mess seeming more direct.

The  worst part is fighting a mirror image meant my girlfriend's now one  hundred seventy seven points of Might wouldn't even be an asset. It was  effectively pointless. Emery finished filling us in on what he could  find out, but given they were in a rival faction he didn't have all the  answers. Sneaky or not, he was known to be loyal to Cicero, and that  meant Melissa's people watched their mouths around him. No one with  common sense ran their mouth in front of the enemy. Once he finished  filling us in he gave us a solemn nod and slipped off into the shadows,  vanishing. It was an impressive trick.

With that done we  headed into the circus, following the path Emery had mentioned to get to  the tent where Melissa held court. She tended to keep her people  together when possible, with the grouping only changing slightly as  people had to go and do work or tests. The trials especially she did her  best to have everyone attend. She was under the impression it would  build camaraderie for her people to see how tough new entrants were.  Anyone who didn't put on a good enough show to impress probably didn't  belong there anyway, and the ones who did would have a much easier time  winning respect from the old guard there.

The tent we got  to was orange and black striped, as opposed to the green of Cicero's  tent. I wasn't sure if that had any sort of special meaning or if  Melissa just liked the color, but regardless, it was definitely the  right place because when we stepped in the similarities ended. Where  Cicero had been in a mostly empty and quiet tent (aside from the fucking  deathtrap labyrinth he had in that weird annex) Melissa's tent was a  riot of color, sound, and energy.

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The other members of her  faction stood around a giant dirt ring, drinking, cheering, and  hollering as a blue haired boy around our age danced around a huge  roaring bear in battle armor, dodging it's blows by skating over the  ground on small waved of water under his feet. It was my first time  seeing a water element cultivator since I'd come up as far as I could  remember. Unlike pyros hydrokinetics weren't flashy or overly impressive  by nature. I knew that there were more than a few out there, it was a  big universe, but none had been good enough to catch the eye of the  people or Rajak that I'd seen.

Apparently I was now seeing  different. The blue haired guy was holding his own well against the F  ranked bear, and I wondered how the actual fuck they kept that thing  under control. The armor, on second look, had chains on it, and might  have been some kind of restraint system, and I was pretty sure the  weight slowed the bear down a bit. Under those conditions it was  actually kind of interesting training, drawn out combat with a much  stronger opponent to try to figure out how to hit hard enough to damage  it.

Sadly for blue hair, punching up ranks wasn't so easy,  and he hadn't even managed a small cut through the bears thick pelt  yet. I saw Jessie's eyes narrow at the big beast, and I felt for her. I  didn't like seeing them use an animal like that either. Ferocious or not  that bear was a living thing, and being trapped and attacked every day  sounded like hell. I'd have used a zombie or something. I put a hand on  Jessie's shoulder and squeezed. It was shitty to ignore it, but we had a  job to do. We could negotiate with Cicero to free the bear after we  helped him cut off Melissa's faction.

She gave me a sour  grimace but nodded, and I sighed in relief. As much as it sucked we were  way outclassed here. These people were all combat fanatics and there  were LOTS of them. We took a seat off to one side of the ring, waiting  for the trial to start, and the water guy lasted another five minutes or  so before he slipped and got tagged in the arm by a paw. I could almost  hear the bone shatter over the crowd as I watched his arm almost get  powdered and the people on the other side of the ring hauled on the  chains, dragging the bear back as a healer rushed to his side.

I  was curious how their healers power worked, but when he arrived at the  blue haired guy's side he just held out a hand and encased the limb in  some kind of light cast. I was expecting it to fade, but once the cast  was on he nodded to the guards and they picked up the blue haired  fighter as best they could without disturbing the limb and carried him  off behind the seating to who knew where. I turned to look at Jessie,  being our resident healer I was sure she had a better idea what that had  been than I did.

She  saw my head shift toward her, and even without seeing my face she got  it. She shrugged. "Healing powers are pretty varied. Powers like mine  that work directly with life force aren't common. Most healing powers  you see come from synergizing with a first aid skill, but without a life  based ability like my plant growth. You end up with something more akin  to a regeneration buff. The ability amplifies the Vitality of the  recipient rather than using the power to directly heal. Of course,  nothing is perfect. Powers like that are useful for long term  engagements or large crowds. My power is much more draining to use."

I  could see how larger forces might find some use for that, but I was  glad we had someone like Jessie. I hadn't realized she was so impressive  in terms of healers, though looking back it should have been pretty  damn obvious. Her lifeweaving ability was insane in terms of scope. I  wondered exactly how she ended up with it. Was it really just a random  combination of her ability and Skills? Horticulture couldn't be that  common, but still, I would have figured if there was such an overpowered  path people would know about it. I wondered if stat totals and similar  factors played some part in the way abilities evolved or if it was  really just a Skill and power addition sort of thing.

That  was a question I wasn't going to get an answer too anytime soon though,  so I just shook it off to focus on the dirt pit. As we watched, the  crowd quieted down as the bear was led...somewhere. As it left a woman  came stalking out. Tall and lithe with leather pants, a bright red crop  top, and a red full face mask with no features save eye holes, as soon  as the others saw her the fell silent and the woman stalked out into the  center of the circle. When she reached the middle she threw up her  arms. "My friends! It's that time again! Time to see who comes to join  our number."

Her  hip length red hair was shot through with bright yellow streaks, and I  wondered if she had a fire ability like Cark, given the obvious themes. I  was pretty sure this was Starbreaker. I had to hand it to her, she knew  how to work a crowd. She had a pleasant and energetic voice that  thrummed with excitement, like she was playing a song to get everyone  psyched. She scanned the room slowly before turning back to the crowd.  "So, any of you that are here to compete please step forward." I could  hear the wicked grin on her covered face in her very words. "We can't  wait to see what you all can do."

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