Arc 3 | Chapter 115: Consequences Coming Soon

[

Step 4:

Complete!]

Well, at the very least, if Emilia assumed the system and its strange quest system were accurate, then she could rest assured that all the children had been gathered. None were missing, somehow disappeared from the city or hidden from the map’s view—after all, none of the buildings had dots moving around inside them, and Emilia knew people were wandering around inside half of them, awoken by all the fighting yet not bothering to even try to help.

Emilia wasn’t sure she trusted the system, was the thing. Had they been in her own world, she would have said sure, she trusted the OIC to keep things honest. The OIC was built into the world and its stupid raid system; therefore, if it happened to give her a quest—and thank the stars no such thing existed in real-world raids!—and marked it as complete, she would trust it.

This wasn’t the real world, however, and virtual raids weren’t governed by the trustworthy and often maniacally ethical OIC system. Instead, raids were ruled over by cruel maintainers, who could easily reach their grubby hands into the game and fuck with things. Emilia was already sure they had interfered and create—or even outright inhabited—the host of the kitchen challenge, after all. What would stop them from changing the direction of the raid again?

And even if they weren’t directly interfering, the fact that she and those visitors had ended up in the same city was just too much. The system itself may very well be the one fucking with her and the other visitors, something hateful programmed straight into it. She saw no reason it wouldn’t continue doing so if it had.

Either way, she was fucked and could trust nothing.

[

Step 5:

Find the homeless kids and hope whoever was chasing them isn’t a sociopath]

Who had named these steps? Had she done that? She must be tired, to have written

sociopath

into existence and risked that word becoming reality, especially given she was in a world where at least some people believed that shit. Writing such things down just seemed like asking for trouble.

“We should go to the other kids?” Emilia asked, looking to the Risen Guard, who was already watching her… or, she assumed he was, anyways. Bit difficult to tell with the mask and all. He was facing her, in any case.

⸂Yes.⸃

Talkative fellow.

…

“Fucking

fellow,

” she grumbled to herself, setting Caro and the other child she had been carrying down and gathering an anxious looking Astra back into her arms. “Hello again, little one,” she sighed as they shared a tight embrace, the girl’s legs wrapping firmly around her waist.

Emilia would have liked to say that in the twenty or so minutes they’d be separated, it had gotten easier to be away from the little girl. It hadn’t, and having the child back in her arms felt

right.

They were so fucked.

“Should we go first? Alone, I mean?” she asked, her weight naturally beginning to shift from side to side as she soothed the child. “There was that weird dot heading towards them, and—”

⸂They are not a danger.⸃

Emilia levelled her most unimpressed look at the asshole. “And you didn’t tell me that earlier because…?”

He shrugged, a small and silly movement on his frame of muscle and perfect posture. ⸂You didn’t ask.⸃

She was going to hit him. It had been a long time since she’d come to blows with someone in law enforcement, and she’d had to promise her parents—and then Olivier, after she broke that first promise—that she would stop punching them when they pissed her off. She was about to break her promise again because this man definitely deserved to be slugged.

Where though… the man was covered in armour, and while she had no idea what it was made of, the fact that he’d come out of two battles without so much as a scuff was kinda proof enough that his armour was tough shit. Maybe her one of her blood weapons would work? That seemed a bit excessive, though…

⸂I will move everyone in groups again,⸃ he continued, turning towards where Kelly and Stephy were sitting against a nearby building.

They had fallen asleep, their bodies either protecting them from the pain of their injuries or simply a result of sheer exhaustion. Between them, several other children had curled up to sleep. It wasn’t exactly the biggest issue, but she did wonder who had been standing guard, given everyone who had remained behind appeared to have been asleep when they arrived, save Astra, who was now asleep in her arms. Astra might have some magic, but it seemed insane to have left her in charge of guarding everyone.

Several of the kids had awoken after they began arriving, their eyes crusted with sleep that Miira occasionally reached out and rubbed from their eyes, her hands smoothing their hair and rubbing dirt and tears from their cheeks. They were cute, maternal gestures that made Emilia’s heart ache for her own mother.

“Hello, little one.”

Little Emilia, drawn in fuzzy detail in her memory, had looked up to find a woman in a beautiful floral jumpsuit—although Emilia hadn’t known the word for it at the time—looking tentatively at her from the doorway to the room she’d been confined to. She’d punched the new boy in the nose—broken it—and he’d be rushed to the clinic, herself sent to sit in silent contemplation.

The woman had been the most beautiful person Emilia had ever seen. Wavy blonde hair had flowed down her back, those always perfect curls only just beginning to grey the last time they’d seen each other, decades after this first meeting. The woman had looked sad—nervous in a way the adults who visited her first home rarely were. The good ones were always nervous, in both the worried and excited way. Most of the adults who had visited Emilia’s first home were not good adults.

“Hello,”

the little her of her memories responded.

“You aren’t supposed to be here.”

The woman who would become her mother had looked surprised before telling Emilia she had permission. It had been the truth, but not, and when Emilia had pointed this out, saying she didn’t want to get in more trouble for entertaining visitors who shouldn’t be there, the woman had simply smiled and slid into the seat across from her. It had been too small for her. The chairs in that room weren’t meant for their hateful caretakers to sit in.

“Neither of us will get in trouble. My husband doesn’t know I’m here, is all. He won’t be mad, I just didn’t tell him.”

Little Emilia had examined her so seriously that the details of her mother before she was her mother were burned into her brain, even without the aid of her Censor pulling those details out of her. Perfect, pink toned makeup, a mole under her left eye, lips too dry. She had looked tired, still nervous. Older than most of the adults who visited that place, by at least four or five decades, although Emilia would later learn it was more. Despite her age, she hadn’t yet begun to form more than the finest of wrinkles—those normal marks of age came quick, though, once her home filled up with problem children, her own and the friends who followed.

It had amazed Emilia, when she was younger, how quickly her mother’s face had filled with lines. She’d blamed herself, tried to keep the chaos to a minimum so the woman who had opened her heart to her wouldn’t age because of that kindness.

“My silly girl,”

her mother had laughed, when Emilia had finally confessed her concerns to her.

“Do you see how my lines move and shape?”

she had asked, a bright smile tugging over her features, all the lines of age pulling into ones of happiness.

“These are not lines from hardship or sadness or stress, my silly child. Well, maybe a

few

are from stress! You are quite a little menace, you know! But I never want you to change because what you bring my life is happiness. My bright little star. These aren’t lines of age, but of love and contentment.”

Emilia sniffled into Astra’s hair as the Risen Guard spirited away their group in pieces, Miira assigned to gently wake up the sleeping children so they could be moved as well.

“Your husband doesn’t know you’re here?”

her little self had asked, unimpressed.

“You can’t just… decide this sort of thing on your own.”

“Oh, I know…”

the woman had replied, blinking wildly, like she hadn’t expected… something.

Hadn’t been expecting so much snark or knowledge of how these things worked, perhaps. Whenever Emilia had asked her mother about that first meeting, wondering what the woman had been thinking, all her mother would say is she remembered being impressed with her. That seemed like looking at the meeting through rose-coloured glasses, if you asked Emilia.

“I—”

the woman had started, looking away.

The silence had lingered and Emilia had gone back to doodling. She’d only been given a tiny scrap of paper and a black pen, so her lines had been small and precise, the entire page filling up with her lines. The caretakers never told them how long her punishments would be, so she always had to make the most of what she was given. Make it last.

“I came to see, for myself, what my husband saw. Truth be told, he may not have said as much, but I think he already decided this… thing on his own. He’ll never tell me that, of course, but I can tell he left a bit of his heart here.”

“You can say no.”

“I heard

you

say no.”

“I do.”

“Perhaps you would like to tell me about that? About why you say no?”

Emilia remembered looking up, seeing the pure acceptance on the woman’s face. It hadn’t been something she was used to, adults listening to her—adults caring about what she said and what she wanted.

There had been one person, several weeks earlier, who was the same. A man, his hair already greyed over, sitting in a slightly larger chair as he escaped the chaos of the event happening outside.

“Why aren’t you out there?”

A man, smiling in quiet apology as she told him, telling her she was so very kind for the

why

of it all. A man—a husband—looking back at her like he didn’t quite want to leave her there, but knowing he must.

She wouldn’t go alone, and he couldn’t take her without… something, his words trailing off, a quiet

“sorry”

floating through the room as he disappeared.

She hadn’t expected to see him again. Certainly not the

something

—the

someone

—he needed permission from, either.

“Sure,”

her little self replied, turning back to her drawing. Even the little, six-year-old version of her loved multitasking, drawing as she told this not-so-random woman the story of her life and others, the reason why she couldn’t be chosen, no matter what. As she told the woman, she hadn’t expected to be chosen.

She had already met one person capable of saying yes to her demands, and even if the woman was his wife, she hadn’t expected to find a second person in her soft sadness.

⸂Emilia?⸃

Emilia blinked up to find Benny, who had been entertaining the grumpy children Miira had woken with his {Blood Slime}, staring up at her. He was looking up at her with concerned eyes, and she glared down at him.

“You know I know you touched the heartcore, right?” she asked the little brat. He had been doing a relatively good job of hiding the fact that he’d acquired the ability to hear, but not good enough. The fact that he could apparently hear her crying was just too much to overlook, however.

The boy froze, looking like he was also about to burst into tears, which definitely wouldn’t help things.

Emilia sighed, awkwardly squatting down to glare at him. “You know that was dangerous, right? And as far as I know, this is permanent, and it could have been something worse.”

⸂I know…⸃ he said, voice wobbling so much that Emilia took pity on him and pulled him into an awkward, one-armed hug.

⸂He will likely be taken in by the Risen Guard, when this is all over.⸃

Emilia looked up to find the Risen Guard returned and standing nearby. There were only two groups left, she realized, the man having moved fast as she contemplated whether having a full on breakdown over missing her parents in the middle of the street would make her feel better or not. It probably wouldn’t, but then again, maybe it might?

She cocked her head in silent question.

“Is there any other way?”

Then the man vanished, the penultimate group vanishing with him. Well, as far as head tilt questions went, Emilia didn’t blame him for not understanding her.

“Do you… want to join the Risen Guard?” she asked softly, eyes glued to her map, watching for the man’s return. This wasn’t a conversation for his ears, not that she had any idea how far his hearing went, if his map could cover the entire city.

Benny shook his head. Nodded. ⸂I don’t know…⸃ he said, voice tight as wetness slid over the skin of her shoulder. ⸂It would… it would be a home—not to mention there would be lots of adventures, and I like those! But… I don’t really like them. But, also,⸃—the boy pulled back to look at her, rubbing the filthy cuff of his shirt over his tear-filled eyes—⸂that guy seems different? He’s a lot nicer than the Risen Guard in Livery are… were?⸃ Benny frowned, eyebrows pulling together in thought, and Emilia reached out, rubbing a bit of dirt off his cheek.

“Okay,” she whispered. “Then we’ll figure something out.”

The boy had only been there because of her and the other visitors, and she had known, as they passed through that room, the risk of the kids touching the heartcore. She had told them not to touch it, but the reality was that she needed its power—not just for the raid as a whole, but to protect them. Touching it had been risking passing out, and when she’d woken slumped against the cavern wall sometime later, she hadn’t been surprised. No one had said any of the kids touched the stone, but she had felt the lie in their words, several pairs of eyes flicking to the children sleeping against another wall.

Curiosity kills, or in this case, potentially ruins a child’s life.

Emilia had no idea if she could stop the Risen Guard from taking the child, but she would figure something out. Benny deserved a choice as to where his life went, even if something told her he would be happy with the Risen Guard—would be happy with the adventures they could offer him.