Ebony's Fable

“Netherfae!! What is wrong with those mammoths?! Even emperors..no saints monsters shouldn’t be that big! Grandmasters?! Their mass alone can kill emperors.”

“Young master, it's unsightly to shout in the middle of the road.”

“Shut up, these peasants don’t even understand Gia.”

“That’s no reason to excuse your unsightly behaviour.”

“Piss off.”

“As for the mammoths, that is why most planets have their forbidden regions. I must say, I have not encountered such a massive species on land but that size is not rare for aquatic monsters. Their mass can do nothing to Grade 4 and above Kings who can simply dodge. But the duo alphas of the race are surprisingly Grade 5 Kings. They shall be one of your goals this trip.”

“Tch, stupid cold. That was already my third trip, I’m taking a month off. At least this capital isn’t as shabby as their planet.”

“It would be wise not to test the Ebbing Wave’s waters. The Barrier King earned his fame.”

“Bah. One of you go find us good grub and the other better get good lodgings this time.” Percival Gearhart got alert and stared at his steward who lost focus and looked elsewhere. As dismissive as he was of this Ancient Worldcore that posed no danger with his steward, Ezekiel Gearworks present. This steward was actually even more arrogant and had rarely even focused on any object or creature in this young world.

But Ezekiel was staring.

And it was a person, which piqued Percival’s interest even more.

That’s when Percival set eyes upon the person. A woman with bodacious curves and rare black hair for this mage-dominant planet. Her proportions that was completely his preference aside, something about her made him frown. She was familiar.

But he had never met such a distinct person before, at least he should have recognised the mask.

Percival smirked. ‘This fossil is interested in a person…I needed a woman anyway.’

“Get her for me Ezekiel, she’ll warm my bed tonight.”

“I’m only here as your bodyguard when you’re in mortal danger, young master.”

Percival heard this line so many times in the few standard years he had been here and was honestly tired of it. However, Ezekiel wasn’t his subordinate but his father’s. And the damn fossil would do nothing except push him to level and refine his skills, nag, or get him out when he was really about to die. Otherwise, he wouldn’t do anything at all, not even listen to his orders.

‘If he’s not doing it then I’ll just have to do it myself. Poor woman but I haven’t had one for months, I hope she’s not fragile like the others.’

“Young master. She is oddly familiar, we’ve seen her but I’m not certain when. But what I do know now is that she is one of the Masked. The Xengs.”

Percival stopped in his steps. If there was anything to note about this planet, it was the pilgrim of the Wandering Celestial Monastery and the Xengs. He had been warned many times, but the pilgrim was of no concern. The Wandering Celestial Monastery would only move if the pilgrim was going to die, anything else that happened to the planet was none of their concern because that was the pilgrim’s path.

As for the Xengs, they shouldn’t be here. All that was left was a vacation spot and ancestral home…and their children. He was forced to stupidly recite the information about Xengs like a damn child. This masked lady did not fit any of the people he was forced to learn about.

Then, Ezekiel surprised him with a little tidbit of his omnipotence on this planet.

“She doesn’t feel Xeng. I highly suspect she is that infamous quarter-blood, although the hair colour is different from records. The Xengs will not care, they might even rejoice but only her death not her shame. Tread lightly.”

‘Does he want me to make a move or not? Is this one of those tests?’

“So what if they are the Xengs? They have 3 Saints, maybe 4 at best. We have dozens.”

“Young master.” Ezekiel glared at Percival with bulging veins on his face. “Have you not learnt to keep your mouth shut when talking about them as a whole? We’re lucky I’ve been splitting us away from this space from the moment I saw her. If you’re going to slight or insult them, do it to the individual, not their collective. Are you trying to doom your family? Our families? Our worlds?”

She could be listening.

The odd creature.

No, their whole species was odd.

Regardless of Ezekiel’s warning, it was clear that the steward was pushing him to make a move on her. Possibly due to the faint feeling that they’ve both seen this lady. As for why, Percival’s pent-up lust stopped him from thinking.

“I will put us back into this space.”

Percival pushed through the crowd of peasants to get to the half-masked lady unsightly stuffing her face with skewers. He didn’t even notice the man standing beside her and handing her more skewers, only having his eyes on the woman’s body.

“He-”

Perhaps the moment Ezekiel put them back into space, the temperature flared up drastically and before he knew it, the woman was in the skies. But he didn’t chase. He couldn’t fly but he could levitate after her; however, something held his shoulders.

Someone.

“How dare you touch me peasant?” Percival kept forgetting that these peasants didn’t understand the common language.

“Mana--young master. That is a battery. We--you must obtain it.”

“You do it.” Percival did not like getting ordered around, even by the superior elder.

“I cannot and will not interfere with anything here. I repeat, that thing is the top priority. Do not see him as human, he is not.”

Percival swapped to his Elcrian with a thick accent, “unhand me peasant.”

He stared at the creature in human skin and finally noticed what Ezekiel meant when he locked eyes with the creature. Deep dark nothingness. That was what he saw from that pair of eyes.

“I see.”

The creature replied nonchalantly.

Percival almost missed the instant glance the creature gave Ezekiel.

Then the bodacious-bodied woman who suddenly lost some mass on her chest landed back beside the human-shaped creature.

“Xin, allow me.”

Percival’s elbow moved up reflexively and guarded his neck and face, he didn’t see what moved. A punch or a kick.

But that does it, a peasant actually dared to lay hands on him.

“I’m the one that was caged.” The lady voiced out.

Percival blocked the outdated metal longsword with his aetheredge but the metal blade surprisingly didn’t melt. The power of steam kicked in while the Gearheart clonked within him. A pure blood like him didn’t feel any discomfort when shifting the gears in his body.

Aether and mana were technically the same thing but living creatures born on different planets usually take up the properties of the mana that the Worldcore produced. It didn’t differ drastically from planet to planet but there were still some regions that has energies unique enough that they are known by different names.

The Aether cannon he formed and shot was too slow so he opted for a faster firearm but these two who suddenly attacked him were not susceptible to straight projectiles. He missed every shot. He didn’t even know when but both of them pushed him to the skies before a force pulled at him and sent him tumbling on a farmland. They had been in a crowded street just moments ago.

Percival didn’t care about peasant casualties but an open area was more suitable for him anyway.

He hated to use the monocle but he knew the importance of information, the two already proved they were not random street peasants.

‘Neatherfae, she’s burning the air up…can’t breathe. And my gears are slowing down? They are freezing. Damn mages. I thought I already conditioned my aether against cold…it isn’t enough if some chump is freezing me.

The heat wasn’t an issue, the Gearharts were moulded by heat and sulfur and their home planet was volcanic. As 3rd son of Gearhart himself, his aether was already fully accustomed to heat surpassing Grade 5. And they were empowered by steam themselves.

‘But why can’t I hit this creature?!’ Percival thought he would’ve landed hundreds of precise and deep injuries by now but he couldn’t even touch the clothes on the slower and weaker creature.

“Young master, that thing walks the Path of the Formless and he’s very deep in. I suspect he already borders Grade 5 on the Path of the Formless.”

“Path of the Formless? Are you serious? Is he a higher-being?”

“...he is not.”

That was all Percival had to hear. No matter how talented the lower being was, they were beneath him.

‘Path of the Formless, nearly Grade 5. With my abilities…that means I can’t touch him unless I’m 3 to 4 times faster than him. No matter, just a more competent lower life form. That’s not the problem…why are they turning invisible…no, I’m forgetting them. What in the neth-’

Percival was not a hardworking person, but he was self-aware. Being a higher-being did not make him omnipotent and he was still a young 97-year-old man with a respectable achievement of wielding his family’s Art at high proficiency. The Path of the Formless was said to be one of the hardest paths to walk, the creature he was facing may very well be a thousand-year-old monster.

People who tread the Path of the Formless also known as the Path of All Forms were the most troublesome fighters throughout the universe. When they got as deep as Grade 3, most warriors with the same physical strength and speed couldn’t even touch them in combat anymore. At Grade 5, they transcended the limits of close combat and are ‘formless’ within a large range.

Most importantly, it was the most hated path for uncountable close-ranged fighters because those on the Path of the Formless made others look like babies waving their arms and legs around.

“Hurry up Xin, two more hits and we got to go. Have you called-”

“She knows, she’ll get us out once we’re done. The…syphon is still greater than I can withstand but enough for now.”

“Don’t hit him so hard that he can’t forget us,”

The veins on Percival’s face trembled, he was listening to their secret conversation with his earmuffs and he was busy getting information with his eyepiece but their information was fading away and he was having a hard time even registering their presence. Something was messing with his mind and he was sure it wasn’t these two.

“EZEKIEL!”

Percival yelled at the threat of a mind attack, already forgetting the battery with a chilled blade slashing at him or the oddly familiar cage floating above him with a gravitational pull dragging him in.

The burning blades didn’t put a scratch on his aether suit but their fading presence made it impossible for him to react until the attacks landed.

‘That was a tiring session, I’ll rest for 3 months before going back. But Ezekiel’s nagging is going to tear my ear off.’ Percival nonchalantly got back to his original train of thought before he realised he was in the air for some reason. Oddly, his gear shift was in defence mode and his body was aflame.

‘Where am-uff!’ Percival took in his surroundings and first noticed that Ezekiel was around but hiding out of sight since an individual who was rated Grade 6 Hazard was not allowed to interfere with a natural Ancient-ranked Worldcore. Next, a heavy impact rammed his right arm and smashed right into his sides but his head knocked onto an invisible wall.

“Leave it, we gotta go!” A woman’s voice alerted him and he saw the white mask on her face. A space mage.

Percival was lifted and rammed against thick bars of metal before he fell out of a gap of sorts.

He cursed out loud, burning the space mage’s mask into his memory.

“Young master.”

Before he could dish out the complaints he had at his bodyguard, his bodyguard pierced him with a glare. “I remember…th.”

“What?” His stomach lurched at an odd sense of disconnection.

“There is someone messing with our minds…both of us. That Xeng space mage, Kong clan if I’m not wrong. That’s your only lead.”

“Where is she?”

“Gone.”

“You can’t trace her?”

“I can. But this is your task. I will not and cannot interfere unless you’re dying.”

“Even though someone capable of a mind attack on you is here?”

“Irrelevant. That is my business. It won’t happen again. You focus on yourself. Don’t you want to leave this pathetic lands? Hurry up and get an official Grade 4 rating and we can both return.”

“Tsk. Easier said than done.” Percival was more concentrated on the Xeng who tossed him on his head than his assignment. He didn’t feel a gap in his memories but his sudden appearance in this location made his memory gap more obvious.

The official rating that Ezekiel mentioned was not referring to an individual with a bunch of tier 4 skills. It was the threat level that individuals were assigned by the Nebula Watch. One could have dozens of tier 5 and 6 skills but still be classified as a Grade 2 threat and the reverse is also true. An individual with the right skills, be it tier 1 to 3 could still be a Grade 4 or 5 threat.

That was Percival’s assignment. To become a Continental Hazard. Ezekiel himself is a Planetary Hazard and he was here on official business so he is always being watched.

“Where in Nether are you two fools!?” He tapped his earmuffs twice and called the only two servants he was allowed to bring. They were pathetic Grade 4 Kings in terms of skills but the Nebula Watched deemed them as Grade 2 threat at best. Good at fighting but not destruction on a large scale, it would take them some effort to level mountains.

“Come! Trace this aether and find me that Xeng space mage!”

Percival scoffed at his assignment, payback comes first.