NOVEL WEB Chapter 10: Trouble Brewing
Times New Roman – Trouble brewing
September 6 2003
Archen
I take back everything I might have ever said about magic. After a couple of weeks of trying to learn this type of sorcery, I've had enough. I'm not certain if it's due to the difference in thinking or if the native people of this reality are wired differently, but I can't seem to grasp whatever math wizardry they try to teach me.
The only progress I've made is that I've figured out how to teleport over longer distances, yet the way I do it is different from how they achieve it.
Whereas I can teleport to a previous location only as long as I have marked that spot, they are all able to teleport to whatever they have seen before. I do have one advantage over them. I can mark something with my power, track its location, and arrive at it even if the marked object moves, though it doesn't last all that long yet.
All my magical roadblocks had an unintended side effect that has made Gray act way smugger. While I've been winning all our fights by this point, she's been enjoying watching me struggle with navigating the Golden Dawn and dealing with all of Fay.
Navigating the maze they call their base is horrible. Those damn wards are getting on my nerves. When I asked Meredith, who is extremely gifted in this field of magic, for help in circumventing my issues, she told me in a great many varied words to just get good.
Yes, Meredith, I would get good if I could. But you're not helping.
She's been getting pricklier as time seems to pass, and I think her rose-tinted glasses toward being nobility are slightly wearing off. I don't know how to help her with this type of problem, and above all, I'm not certain she even wants help right now.
On the contrary, Fay has done a type of mask-off toward me, not in a bad way, but it still leaves me feeling conflicted. She's not doing anything harmful or cruel, but she has been fishing for reactions in more ways than one.
If I wasn't the new mark of her antics, I'd be either joining her in the chaos or laughing at the poor sod she targets. Still, being the new recurring focus of her attention-seeking had the side effect of bringing me closer to her brother.
He's always calm and collected, yet his sister's antics drive him up the wall. I think seeing my plight and how I played along with his sister made his opinion of me a lot better. Partially shared suffering, I believe. Our new closeness has given him the opportunity to teach me how to politely tell certain members to fuck off and die.
Seriously, people, I look fourteen, but I'm still technically eleven. Stop harassing me. Stop randomly dropping your family members close to me and pretending to suddenly be busy. It's not convincing in the slightest.
"Snrk. 'Thank you, young master, for helping my son with his footwork. If you ever decide to give your own lessons, please have the order contact me posthaste.'" My ever-faithful friend can't help but poke my sore spots.
I groan tiredly. Those types of conversations have become way too common lately.
"Gray, please, mercy." I don't sound desperate. No, sir.
"Feel my pain," she responds while not bothering to minimize the knockback of the branches she pushes past in our trek through the forest.
No mercy for the strong, huh? You've changed, Gray. The old you would have been nicer to me.
I sigh wearily. "Are you telling me where we're going yet?" I slap another offending branch rocketing toward my head.
"No, it's a surprise. I remember you being jealous, and today's the perfect day to make an attempt to rectify that."
Well, whatever it is, it must be good if she's willing to forgo fight night. Our fights are her favorite activity nowadays, and beating me is her newest obsession. Oh, how the tables have turned.
"Aaand... here we are," she says after a good fifteen minutes more of walking in silence.
As we turn into a rounded clearing, an almost full moon hangs above us, and the forest is filled with the sounds of life. I feel a soft summer breeze carrying the day's remnant heat while the darkened sky cools the putrid air.
"It's nice? In a bushcraft kind of way?" I hope we're not here for the view. I'm a city boy at heart, even if I had to adapt to the wild and untamed gardens of my teacher. I still don't appreciate just hanging out in one of them.
"What?" She just looks at me, confused.
"Never mind that. On this beautiful September night, we're here to get you your very own familiar!" She jubilantly tells me.
Wow, holy shit. I did not expect that to be our goal this evening, but I'm all for it. From the time she showed me her owl and especially now, after being a provisional member of the order, I've gotten kind of envious of everyone's familiars. Even if I know now, that hers isn't truly a familiar. She must have studied how to get one, to have an excuse ready if someone ever asked about her owl.
"But first, we've got to do a ritual," she continues, completely upbeat.
...Ah, there it is. The other shoe drops. Am I being sacrificed, or am I at long last being inducted into her cultish religious family?
"Here." She hands me an assortment of items: a brass brazier she took out of her bag, some herbs, and incense. "You have to be the one to light the brazier and toss in the offerings, otherwise the familiar won't anchor itself to you."
Of course, I knew that. A ritual for a familiar. Definitely not a devil summoning. Mhm. Makes sense.
"I don't know anything about the ritual. Can I even do this?" I ask her, with a tinge of uncertainty in my tone.
"Don't worry. I know the ritual by heart and the way to lead it for someone else. You only need to throw the offerings into the fire at the specified parts," she assures me.
"This summoning would have worked even better if the moon was full, but with such a powerful numerical date, this should still be a cakewalk."
Ritualistic magic and all its weird quirks. How people can deal with it, I will never understand.
We talk slowly while setting up the ritual site, me just following her instructions to the letter as she tells me multiple times what the placements signify. At the same time, she explains my role in the upcoming ritual and that I have to think of my personal summoning chant.
Once we finish the preparation, she tells me to stand in the middle of the clearing, right in front of the brazier, to light the wood within. As the fire starts to burn, she stands just outside the circle and starts to chant in a low voice with an uneven cadence.
The words make no sense to me, yet I can feel the weight they carry. At the exact times she told me, I feed the charcoal, herbs, and incense to the flame. The fire grows higher and higher, unnaturally so, until, at the end of her hour-long chanting, it rises to the tops of the trees and suddenly goes out.
I know this is the moment I must call the familiar to me. But she didn't give me an example of what a summoning chant should be, only that it has to be short and sweet.
I get that this entire ritual is a serious thing and that she went out of her way to help me get a familiar for myself. But as I stand here, needing to use a summoning phrase, I can't help but blurt out.
With a gravelly voice, I intone, "Arise."
...
I think I visibly cringed at my own performance, but God damn it, I couldn't help myself.
With my cringe worthy summoning, the brazier flares brightly two more times and I can feel a connection forming, and it's at this point I understand what my familiar is.
Out of the space of my shadow, a white wolf with hetero chromatic eyes walks out. One blue and one purple. I can feel an echo of my powers being mirrored by her. In a strange way, she's an extension of myself, yet also an entire entity of her own.
My first words upon meeting her can be only one thing. "I name you Bianca." She nods approvingly, a silent understanding forming while already standing protectively in front of me.
Gray looks flabbergasted. She closes and opens her mouth, futilely trying to make up words for a scene that she apparently didn't expect.
"How... Why?" She lamely manages to eke out.
"I mean, isn't this what we were here for?" I say while combing through Bianca's incredibly fluffy fur.
"Yes, but no. The forms your familiar is supposed to be able to take are entirely different." She stutters out.
"I don't understand what you mean." I just shrug, too focused on my spirit animal actually being here with me.
"The ritual is not supposed to be able to summon a wolf. How did you get a wolf?"
I stop to think for a second, wondering how to explain this so she stops panicking. I start off slowly to try and give her my thoughts on the matter.
"All right, hear me out. I think that this might have happened due to my personality."
She perks up as she hears that I have an explanation for why her ritual has been hijacked into something outside of its designed purpose.
"You saw the brazier flare brightly twice at the ending, right?" I ask stoically.
"Yes, it's supposed to do that only once." She nods, accepting my observation.
"I think that is, because there were two possible summons for me, but in the end, only Bianca was strong enough to emerge."
She looks ready to interject, but I raise my hand to prevent her so that I can finish my story and we can discuss it once I'm finished.
"You see, there is a fight going on inside of me." I point to my heart with one hand while still combing through Bianca's fur with the other.
"It's a fight between two wolves. One of them is Bianca here. She is my light, and the other would have been my darkness." I continue gravely, with my companion standing straighter as if to show her approval of my claim.
"They fight endlessly to decide a victor. It's a fight to decide what kind of person you are, as one stands for your sins and the other for your virtues." At the last part, I pet my new doggo with gusto.
"This fight happens in all of us, even in you." I point at Gray, and she looks incredibly confused at this point.
"What I want to say is, to summon a wolf, you need to feed one of the two until it's strong enough to overpower the other. Once it has won, you can, if you are lucky, summon it outside of you." I nod sagely.
"That's stupid. What even... Agh, why did I even bother asking you for an explanation? It makes complete sense that you would know absolutely nothing about it." She paces around a bit, mad at herself for listening to my nonsense.
"Where'd you even hear random stories like that?"
"An old Cherokee Indian told me about it." Man, I'm on a roll today.
She stops her rapid pacing and looks at me with alarm. "You've been to America?"
"No, I've just heard about it. Why?"
"No reason in particular, but I think you shouldn't go there just yet... if ever."
That's not alarming at all.
"Sheesh, I won't. It was just a story anyway." I try to defuse the situation. It seems to work, as she somewhat calms down and quickly packs up her brazier and remaining torches.
"Well, that was weird but fun. I've got to run though, got an important meeting tomorrow. See ya." She starts to jog away, quickly trying to leave me alone.
"Hey, Gray." I quickly shout after her before she vanishes out of my sight. "Thanks for this. I really appreciate you helping me out."
She turns around and waves. Even in the dark, I can see the glow of the moon reflecting on her teeth, and she shouts quickly back. "Don't forget that if you ever want to call Bianca to your side, that word is now your call sign."
I should have figured it was something like that. Curse my brainrot. At least no one else will know my shame.
Octobre 2003
I've made a terrible and grave mistake.
In the scant few months that I have been studying at the Golden Dawn, none of the people here have noticed what my magic actually entails. I've been using a mix of both space and time spells, but I've tried to mostly use the spatial ones.
I haven't seen anyone else use time magic yet and I don't want to paint an even bigger target on my back. After a while of no one noticing the difference between my spells, I started to become overconfident, and now the one person I least wanted to find out has found out.
"And that's the end of today's revision of the different pantheons around the world." Elaine, my tutor, finishes today's lesson.
I can still feel the eyes boring into my back, the intensity only increasing with every passing minute. Her focus is unwavering, unwilling to let me out of her sight before she has dragged every answer out of me.
I still remember how she found out, as if it happened only a few hours ago.
She herself was already aware of most of my spells being space-themed, and in a fit of inspiration, she colluded with Meredith to use that against me.
They managed, through hiding certain parts of the classroom behind wards, to force me to be only able to teleport to places they had already trapped. The first spell that managed to hit me turned my clean white hair into a flaxen golden color.
Not wishing to be further hit by their prank spells, instead of teleporting to a marked area, I phased to a warded spot, thinking myself secure from the barrage as long as I got out of the firing zone.
Predictably, they stopped their onslaught once I escaped their set plan. Yet Fay didn't stop because their plan failed. She stopped because she understood that my last "teleportation" was fundamentally different from the ones I used before.
I should have noticed that her stopping was the weird part, as usually, she continues until the class starts, but I foolishly didn't think much of it and decided to accelerate the duration of their spell to get my hair back to its natural color.
Still blissfully unaware that I had poked the hornet's nest, I walked to my seat, hoping to quickly revise the last lesson about all the different types of monsters and how to recognize them.
That is until she practically teleported next to me, and in a show of her magical talents, decided to demonstrate that she understood what happened.
"Well, you've got us this time." She started off casually, and I still didn't notice the focus of her words.
I smugly replied, "You girls try things like this at least once a week. At some point, I'll learn how to anticipate and dodge your attempts." I shouldn't have been smug.
"You've had your moment of glory. Don't think for a second that I will allow you to rest on your laurels."
Here, I started to notice her tone change in parts of her speech, and I still didn't think much of it. I'm starting to believe that I'm somewhat clueless.
"After all, the day is not over yet, and before nighttime, you will have your comeuppance. Tick-tock, your clock is ticking, and time waits for no one."
Yeah, at this point, I finally understood the implications of her words.
Luckily, she couldn't do much until the lesson ended. Before Elaine gave the go-ahead to leave, she passed me a new quest.
"Archen, one of the Golden Dawn's important associates would like to talk to you. It would be held on our terrain, which would minimize the danger you could face, but in the end, it's still your choice."
I can read between the lines, lady. This "request" is more like a nicely worded order. I've been a part-time member for some time already, and this type of favor is something I've been expecting.
"When would be a good time to have this conversation?" I ask, wanting to have it done sooner rather than later.
She hums noncommittally. "She's staying in one of the guest quarters. If you want to have the meeting right now, you could wait in the conference room, and I'll convey your willingness to talk."
I nod in acceptance, packing my bags and making my way out of the door behind her. Before I fully leave the classroom, my shadow ripples and my familiar makes her way toward Gray. When I look at her, she nods back to me in understanding.
"We'll wait here for you. I still want to ask you a few questions." Fay calls, this time without the gremlin vibe I've gotten used to.
During the thirty-minute wait for the "associate," I've had some time to think and have mentally prepared myself for the confrontation to come. The fact that they've gone through the official channels to have this "talk" diminishes the possibility of violence greatly. Yet, at the same time, it makes the upcoming meeting a factional thing, and I am definitely not fully equipped for politics.
At the same time, I've been trying to figure out what it might be that they need me for. I don't think I've done anything noteworthy enough to be noticed by other factions, and the only way they could have otherwise known about me is if they already have informants in the Golden Dawn.
Whatever their reason for approaching me is, I need to tread carefully and approach the meeting as a possible trap.
My pessimistic spiraling thoughts are interrupted when a beautiful older woman walks into the room. She has long flowing purple hair, while her eyes seem to radiate like molten lava. Her attire, consisting of a business casual look with smart-looking glasses, gives off the impression of a no-nonsense CEO.
Yet her first words remind me of one of the scant few things I know about this world.
"Oh my God, it's a shota." She breathes out heavily as her posture changes from this imposing and calm figure to what I can only describe as a pervert.
With her words and reaction, she's managed to make me fully realize that yes, I'm in an ecchi shounen world.
I can't help but audibly groan and slump in my seat, having pumped myself up expecting an extremely tense and carefully worded conversation, only to have the rug completely pulled from underneath me and to now have to deal with this kind of person.
Trying to keep my cool and not wanting to engage in whatever fantasy she seems to be concocting in her head, I stand up and make a formal bow while introducing myself.
"Pleased to meet you, Miss. I'm Archen." After which, I gesture to the seat opposite mine and tell her, "Please take a seat so we can discuss your inquiries."
"Oh, so polite!" She croons happily while sitting down neatly and pulling something out of her cleavage to hand to me. "Here, have a piece of candy."
Don't react. If you do, you'll lose.
She keeps looking expectantly at me while I hold the warm-to-the-touch coffee-flavored candy. Urging me with her eyes and silence to eat it.
Fine, whatever. I slowly unwrap it as she perks up at my acquiescence, and I put the warm treat in my mouth.
This seems to satisfy her enough to at least introduce herself. "I'm Penemue, the official liaison of the Grigori, but you can call me elder sister instead." She unabashedly starts her own introduction.
"I'm here to investigate a rare phenomenon that happened during the solar eclipse." I try to keep in any sort of reaction I might have had to that particular tidbit of information. But apparently, it was not enough, as her next words confirm that she noticed my flinch. "But don't you worry, cutie. We are only interested in knowing what transpired. Nothing will happen to you, big sis will make sure of that!"
I can't deal with her. She is so utterly unlike what I expected this conversation to be that she is just leaving me drained.
I swallow the piece of candy as her hand already reaches into her cleavage once more, taking out a second one, intending to continue playing out her fantasies.
"All right, shoot. What would you like to know?"
And the questioning starts, all kinds of questions about the solar eclipse and whether I had noticed anything around it. My explanation about the rotting monster seems to give her a slight pause, but nothing really noteworthy. She only asks whether I had studied under Scáthach but doesn't pry into what it entailed or other information about my time there.
All in all, the conversation goes really smoothly, albeit tiring for a whole different set of reasons. The only part that has me scratching my back is how she continuously keeps trying to give me sweets whenever I answer one of her queries.
I already know that she is a fallen angel. In my lessons here, I've had a primer on all the big factions, and as the Abrahamic faction is one of the more active ones, the crash course I've had on them is fairly extensive. Sadly, I've never had any information on the personalities of the cadre, but her name has been mentioned as one of the "diplomatic" ones.
As she starts to run out of valid questions to ask, she begins trying to sound out my likes and dislikes. More and more of her probes start to be about my life here and how I am doing.
"Thanks for your time, sweetie. The data we got will be very useful for our research." She tells me while we both stand up, preparing to part ways. "These particular details will need to be verified, so I'll be staying around these parts for the foreseeable future. Maybe you could help me out at some of the locations, for a reward of course."
After all the babying and uncomfortable "innocent" innuendos, I really can't be bothered spending more time with her, especially if I have to deal with her antics all on my own. Yet, at the same time, I do want to start having more contact with other factions, and she has been vetted at least somewhat already.
A bit world-wearier now than when I arrived here, I don't stop to think about what her invitation entails.
"Sure, as long as I'm allowed to bring others with me to these meetings." I tiredly respond, wanting to have some backup in case they are trying to do something nefarious.
"That's fine, but we won't be paying them unless they have a useful expertise." She instantly and happily accepts my demand.
"Bye-bye, little charmer. I'll try to get a time for our date as soon as possible." She says while suddenly pulling my face between her breasts.
At this point, I barely react to her antics, and just as quickly as she grabbed me for a hug, she opens the door and leaves. Not giving me any time to change my mind or even return her farewell.
...Why did I accept so easily?
Later that day
?
"Hii Azzy, I've found our missing link, and you will not believe it, but both of the mysteries are connected to each other."
Ah, good to finally hear from her. I forgot how lax Penemue is when she's on a non-time-sensitive mission.
"Good, I've received the report. Is there anything not written in the file that I should know about?"
Making sure certain things are not written down is a good way to keep secrets contained, you know.
"Hear me out, Azzy. He's a shota, and he is super attached to his little friend group."
...I forgot about her proclivities. This situation pushes too many of her horny buttons.
"That's good to know, but what about the research?"
"Research?" I can hear heavy breathing coming through the speaker. She's already stopped caring about that part of the mission, huh.
"Oh yeah, the research! I've invited him on a date to 'investigate' some of those spots where we detected the breaches."
Ok, she at least tries to somewhat continue the task, even if she's obviously using it as an excuse to keep interacting with him, a neglected young church project who is in a few years going to be in a happy relationship.
"He's such an innocent boy. He tried so hard to not react to all my teasing, but I wore down his defenses enough that he started answering personal questions." Her breathing is getting audibly heavier. You can liken it to panting at this point.
Maybe sending her wasn't the best idea?
"And before I forget, send me more funding and some toys that boys his age will like. I promised to pay him for his help in our excursions, but you didn't tell me the target was such a cutie."
I can hear the accusation loud and clear. She should be happy that she's even on this case in the first place. Although now I do wish she wasn't.
Why are all my subordinates such big fuck ups again?
"Acceptable, don't forget to at least try to get some more data while you're playing around. As long as you keep that up, funding shouldn't be a problem."
"Bye-bye~ ...Oh, before I forget, he gives off the same feeling as those Agares devils."
Well, well, well, isn't that an interesting development.