Arc 3 | Chapter 113: A Five Part Plan

Step one of the

Find All the Kids and Meet Up With the Other Group and Hope Whoever is Coming for Them Isn’t a Sociopath Plan

was, all things considered, the most dangerous step until the fifth and final step.

[

Step 1:

Find the Risen Guard and help get rid of the man he’s fighting]

They needed help, more help than Miira, Gale and Benny could offer. Luckily, Kelly had been able to talk Astra into staying with them, arguing that Emilia would need both arms to carry the other kids back. The girl hadn’t liked it, but had plopped sadly down beside him after Emilia promised to come back.

It felt weird being without the little girl. The child had been practically living in her arms since she’d snatched her and Benny off the street, in the first moments of the stampede. To be without her now felt… wrong. Worse, even as time dragged on, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing. Probably, it was the result of her own stress and trauma from the ordeal, her soul clasping onto someone safe to connect with.

Hopefully, that connection would fade. They were going to have serious problems if they couldn’t detach by the time she had to leave.

Emilia’s heart clenched at that thought, but thankfully, they’d arrived a few blocks from where the Risen Guard was still fighting her stalker.

⸂

Stalker?

⸃ Gale had asked, unimpressed when Emilia wrote out the word. At first, she’d assumed such things didn’t exist here, but they did. Gale was just confused why anyone would want to stalk

her

.

Benny had come to her defence, informing the group that she was ⸂

totally cool enough to stalk⸃

, as he caught up with them after he’d stopped to dig through a garbage heap in search of something to help him carry his ⸂

new toy.

⸃ What he’d found appeared to be a net that wrapped tightly around the jar he was storing the {Blood Slime} inside, the ends forming into a loop that he was using as a shoulder strap. When Emilia asked about how he’d managed to find a net in the exact shape he needed, Benny had informed her he’d only found the rope and had tied it into the net form himself.

Industrious little

fellow

.

…

Fuck, Emilia missed V. Now she was using

his

words. Worse! She still couldn’t place where the term

fellow

was commonly spoken! Instead, she was left to hear it wiggling in her brain, like an itch she couldn’t scratch.

⸂Should we help him?⸃ Benny asked as he peeked out at the fight. Emilia would have preferred to keep the kids out of this, but her hair was just too bright, and she was forced to rely on the fearless boy to be their spy. His hand wrapped around his maybe-weapon, and Emilia quickly scribbled that if anyone would be helping the Risen Guard get rid of her stalker, it was going to

only

be her.

Benny deflated, but accepted his fate of hero in the making, watching from the sidelines.

⸂You’re gonna go, though?⸃ Gale asked, peeking over Benny’s head, their respective brown and black hair keeping them hidden in the shadows.

“Yeah,”

she scribbled out, digging through her bag for the specific weapons she wanted. After a moment of thought, she handed a {Blood Needle} over to Gale, darting down instructions of how to use it, which effectively amounted to:

throw it at something that’s far away,

and

don’t blow yourself up.

While some of the blood weapons seemed to need a bit of energy to activate, many more simply existed—such as her {Blood Dagger} or the {Blood Hammer} that V had been carrying, and speaking of which, where had his bag gone? It had been dropped down the shoot at the water slides, along with everyone else’s clothing and belongings, but it hadn’t been there after their nap.

Emilia blinked into space for a moment before shaking the thought off. Something to worry about later, she supposed. Hopefully, the labyrinth had just disappeared his bag to wherever he had gone. It hadn’t taken any of their missing member’s clothing, but perhaps moving the bag had been a kindness on the part of the labyrinth.

Unfortunately, with her and V’s luck, that was unlikely.

Regardless of where her missing companion’s weapons had gone, her {Blood Needles} were of a different, mixed type. They needed a bit of energy to make a big explosion, but they did just fine exploding when they collided with anything, something about being

thrown

activating their abilities.

Gale tentatively took the weapon, nodding when Emilia held out a note that read:

Only in an emergency.

A moment later, she was gone, bolting through the street, one of the weapons picked up from the silverstrain girl’s corpse gripped in her hand. The Risen Guard skirted backwards, his map having obviously alerted him that they were close. Her stalker, on the other hand, didn’t see her coming.

Apparently, he had magic, his brother had the ability to speak the local tongue, but neither had system access—or if they did, it didn’t include maps.

Her weapon, a strange piece of dark red fabric, snapped through the air, colliding with the man’s arm. Unfortunately, his magic and the shadows surrounding him made it impossible for her to get close enough to snap his head off, but the sharp edge of the fabric slid through his upper arm like it was butter. It wasn’t quite enough to remove the limb entirely, but he did scream in pain, darting away from her.

The Risen Guard darted with him, swerving and trying to make the most of the man’s momentary weakness, his arm lying limply at his side. It was too shallow, however, and quickly, Emilia could sense the system healing him back up.

She wasn’t going to give him the chance to fully recover.

{Blood Needles} shot out of her hands, the Risen Guard given mere seconds to get out of range by her yell of “Look out!”

The other man tried to get clear of her attack as well, and he did manage to avoid a direct hit. The needle shot through the place he had just been standing, colliding with a nearby building. It was a risky gamble. The buildings might be resistant to normal magic, but for all she knew, blood magic could seriously damage them—hurt or kill the people inside, even.

Luckily, the gamble paid off, and the explosion left little more than a bloody burn across the building, most of the energy instead redirected outward. Debris from the nearby alley went flying, as did her stalker. The man skidded over the city street, covered in rough paving stones. An assortment of objects sent flying landed on top of him, and the man released a long stream of creative expletives.

Had the situation not been so serious, Emilia would have laughed. For as much as the man was strange and dangerous, he had been dressed relatively well, his clothes perfectly styled before the fight. To see him now covered in the garbage that the residents of the city seemed to be constantly dumping into the side streets was rather amusing.

He didn’t seem to think so.

“You!” he growled, pushing off his stomach to glare at her. The shadows surrounding him burbled, bubbles of rage dragging lines of damage through the aether before they were surging towards her.

The Risen Guard was coming—trying to get between her and the attack, presumably.

He wasn’t going to make it.

He didn’t need to.

Pure energy shuddered out of Emilia, slicing through the shadowy magic as though it were nothing. She smiled, pleased with the look of shock on her attacker’s face. The Risen Guard had also startled to a stop, and Emilia wished he weren’t wearing a mask. The expression he must be making under that thing…

Cores were cores, regardless of what world you lived in and how utilized they were. Even among people from the Free Colonies who used their cores regularly, Emilia had rarely come across anyone outside of lavender codes capable of using their energy in the same pure, forceful way she could. Very few people had ever seen her use her core like this, but every one of them was always shocked, their faces contorting into the most amusing shapes, shifting into the silliest of shades of horror, disbelief and awe.

“You know,” she sighed, looking back to her stalker as he steadied himself, her blast of energy having spread far enough to temporarily disrupt his core and magic, “I killed your brother, just a little while ago.”

The man’s eyes widened, his lips twitched, and then a stream of laughter was slipping out of him. Whatever emotion Emilia had been expecting from the man, it wasn’t laughter that sounded almost… happy. Two options—Emilia had imagined there were two options for how the man would react to learning his brother was dead, each a checkmark against his strangeness. Was he actually someone separate from his family—someone removed from their vendetta against her and V—or would his brother’s death spur him forwards towards revenge?

Her stalker’s laughed was a bit deranged, sure, but there was no cruelty in it—it wasn’t the kind of laugh to be followed by,

“Well, you just sealed your fate! You just added another reason to my list of reasons to kill you!”

Instead, what followed was a single, “Good.” Then, with all the suddenness one could imagine, his eyes blew even wider. “Wait—” he began to say, but his words were too slow, cut off by his abrupt disappearance.

“Uh… where did he go?” Emilia asked, looking to the Risen Guard. Across her vision, her map updated, the man’s dot seemingly gone from the area.

⸂Someone removed him from the city,⸃ the Risen Guard said darkly, head turning to look in the direction of the children. ⸂You may come out now. It is safe.⸃

Three heads poked out from the alley, Benny’s eyes shining in hero worship, although for whom, Emilia wasn’t sure.

⸂That was so cool,⸃ the boy cheered as he ran over, looking mostly at Emilia. Well, considering how much the homeless children, and even many of the homed children, seemed to dislike the Risen Guard, it wasn’t too surprising the child would be more interested in her.

⸂Thank you for helping,⸃ the Risen Guard said, slow steps bringing him to their little foursome.

Emilia nodded, refusing to startle when [

Step 1:

Complete!] popped up across her vision. “Yeah, well, we were kinda hoping you could help us in return.”

The man nodded as another notification lit up across her eyes: [

Step 2:

Hope the Asshole Risen Guard can give everyone maps].

“So…” she sighed, glaring between the Risen Guard and the strange notifications that had been floating across her vision since they’d embarked on their mission. “Did your map give me extra access to the system? To a quest system, perhaps?”

The man cocked his head, and despite the lack of laughter, she felt like he was laughing at her nonetheless. ⸂Yes. I gave you temporary access to the Risen Guard system, although I only activated the map. The quest system is activated at random, as the system sees fit.⸃

Well, that made sense. Emilia wasn’t sure why it still felt like the man was laughing at her about it, however. “Cool, cool,” she said, rather than smack him for being an ass. “So, we need help finding a bunch of the kids. Can you give these guys access to the map as well? Not sure how much you were able to pay attention to us while fighting, but there have been some, uh… problems.”

⸂I noticed.⸃ He said nothing more, but Benny’s gasp of awe a moment later was telling enough that the children had been granted access to the system. If that wasn’t enough proof, the [

Step 2:

Complete!] that popped up a moment later was.

⸂So cool…⸃ the boy murmured, spinning in a circle before bolting down a nearby alleyway.

⸂Do you think it’s a good idea to let him go alone?⸃ Gale asked, the frown that had been written over her face near constantly since they'd left the others deepening as she examined the Risen Guard.

To Emilia’s surprise, the man nodded slightly to her. Gale scoffed and looked away.

⸂Fine,⸃ she muttered, turning and trudging off in a different direction.

Miira looked between Gale, Emilia and another alley. ⸂Should I…⸃

“Go,”

Emilia signed, preening slightly when she felt the amusement of the Risen Guard fall away into confusion.

“Your friend needs you.”

The girl hesitantly nodded before chasing after her friend, quickly catching up to her and pulling her into a slightly faster pace—at the rate Gale had been moving, they would be lucky if they found even one of the missing kids.

“And then there were two,” Emilia muttered, eyes sliding over the man. “Can I trust you?” Might as well get the big thing out of the way.

⸂Depends.⸃ Not exactly the best answer, but certainly better than an outright lie of,

⸂Yes, you so totally can. I’d never betray you!⸃

Still, Emilia rolled her eyes. “You know what happened in Livery?” she asked, watching as the man tensed, his already perfect posture growing strained and angry, as though he were preparing to pounce on an enemy.

⸂Yes,⸃ he said, the sound short and clipped and oh so fucking pissed. Good.

“That’s where the kids are from, if you didn’t know.”

⸂I didn’t.⸃

“I picked them up there, during the stampede. We accidentally ended up in the labyrinth, then here,” she said, fumbling with her bag. These weren’t relevant facts, simply the truth filling the time it took for her to pull the {Blood Loop} from her bag. “That guy’s brother caused the stampede. They followed us here. He’s dead, and I got his stuff.”

Emilia held out the loop to him. She really, really didn’t want the thing, with all its terrible destruction ringing through it, and in the brief space of time when she thought the man might not take it—some law or rule perhaps forbidding him from accepting it—her heart dropped, and time stopped. Then, a gloved hand extended, accepted it.

⸂Thank you. Most visitors do not—⸃ he cut off, looking away in the direction of one of the children bolting through the city. ⸂I must go,⸃ he said, before bolting off in their direction.

Emilia couldn’t be sure the man really was heading for the child, but given the way the child’s dot suddenly swerved down a main road when they’d been bolting down alleys the rest of the time, she was almost positive he was.