Chapter 53

A message appeared in Michael’s field of vision as soon as the process was finalized.

Michael frowned. This was different than your usual run of the mill system message. This almost felt… personal. He pulled up the full skill description.

What is going on here? Whatever system is displaying these messages almost sounds… angry and sad about this whole skill debacle.

Reading the skill’s description, Michael almost lost all enthusiasm. This had been a fortuitous discovery for him, but at the same time he had worked hard to understand the faint glimpses of energy he had seen in his master’s moves. Yet, to the system, this was barely worth recognizing as a skill.

Thinking about it, Michael realized what the system was telling him. It was a simple matter of connecting the dots. First, there was the stale magic he sometimes saw in the air, or in the weak aura of some people.

Then there was the content of the skill’s description.

Magic was not coming to Earth for the first time, this much was clear beyond any doubt. It was returning.

The combat arts must have degenerated once people lost access to magic. Chi and Jing still work without mana, but their effect is muted, almost like a gentle whisper. With the advent of modern weapons, it was no longer enough. Masters died, knowledge was lost. This is what’s left of it.

There wasn’t much he could do about it right now, however. If anything, he felt his motivation return. Now he knew that if he worked hard to learn and improve, eventually he could try and transcend whatever limitations there were to the modern styles, recovering what the system adamantly claimed had been lost.

After training with Stephan, Michael went straight to the dungeon. According to Old Dave, this was the first day the land was officially his, and the difference was immediately visible. As soon as he got close to the usual parking spot, he was stopped by armed guards, declaring that the spot he was trying to visit was no longer open to the public.

His driver, Bob, was clearly expecting this. He waved a badge and was swiftly let through. They were led to a temporary building right where the old parking spot used to be, filled with armed guards and stern faces. He was led inside without much fanfare and given a badge of his own.

“This badge is an all-pass. I don’t know what you did to get it, but the boss said to let you come and go as you please,” the guard sitting at the table was a stern woman, muscled and tanned with a frown etched into her face, “still, listen to me. Watch where you go and what you do, you hear me? And most of all, whatever you see around here, you keep your mouth shut about it when you leave. The boss’s boss, the owner… he doesn’t take kindly to snitches. Not that we’re doing anything illegal here, just saying…”

Michael nodded along, but inside he was wondering just what sort of things Old Dave had told the employees about him. To the side, he could see Bob standing there with a very serious expression, as if the driver didn’t know that Michael was the actual boss.

He’s probably laughing on the inside. I gotta commend his acting skills, though. He’s making me question whether he knows or not.

“Of course,” Michael said, going along with Dave’s plan not to reveal him as the actual boss and owner of the land. It would allow him greater freedom and the opportunity to test the loyalty of the staff, which did wonders to soothe the paranoia that had been creeping up on him as of late.

Reading the guard’s nameplate on the woman’s military style uniform, he was very pleased with Jennifer.

“Are you the head of security around here?” he asked her.

“That I am,” she said proudly, showing pearly white teeth as her dark eyes glinted in the sterile light of the room. “Now, you might be the boss’s favourite, but you ain’t won my love just yet and I got work to do. The quad bikes are in the back.”

Quad bikes?

Michael was ushered out of Jennifer’s office without resistance, instead choosing to ask one of the random guards milling about the place. His badge gave him authority, after all, and he was not one to waste what was given to him.

The only reason why he hadn’t used his authority to literally order Jennifer to answer his questions was that he felt like he could win a very loyal and—supposedly—capable follower if he managed to win her trust and respect. Meaning: no flaunting around his badge to force her to do things she thought he did not earn.

It helped that he agreed with her philosophy. It was very similar to his own: hard work should be rewarded and respected, what you gained was yours. To her, his badge had not been something he had worked hard to get, no matter the real truth behind it.

The lower-level grunts, however, were more than happy to blab about all their secrets to the holder of the all-pass.

“Yeah, the HQ is pretty spartan right now, just a repurposed shipping container. You wouldn’t believe if I told you, though, that it wasn’t here yesterday. We got the HQ, the barracks, the weapons storage, the fence, gate and quad bikes set up in one night. Ah, the power of money, am I right? Rumour has it the boss is friends with the CEO of a multi-billion dollar corporation. Can’t beat that.”

Michael hummed, feigning surprise. “Really?”

“Oh yeah,” the guard said, rolling his shoulders and adjusting the weight of his rifle, “by the way, if I may, what’s your badge all about? You’re friends with the big man or something?” the guard laughed, “nah, can’t be. You didn’t even know he was friends with Travis Tyrell himself… you must be friends with Mr Chestermill, then.”

“Why should I be friends with anyone? Couldn’t it be that I earned this badge?”

The guard laughed again. “Ha! Right. Let’s pretend, shall we?”

And with that, he was gone, leaving a sour taste in Michael’s mouth.

“What an idiot.” Came a voice from behind.

“What?” Michael said, having spun around at the sudden too-close voice to come face to face with a grizzled man. Little did the man know, he was about to get a water bullet in the face.

“Kevin there, he’s one of the new boys,” the man said, proffering a hand. “Name’s Trevor, by the way. One of the not-new boys.”

“Not-new?” Michael raised an eyebrow.

“Yup. I have seen enough to know that a badge like yours isn’t for show. People like Kevin, they see the badge and try to butter up whoever happens to hold it, but in truth they can’t help but resent you. They think you got the easy life handed to you.”

Michael’s face darkened.

Trevor smiled. “No, I know it’s bullshit. I can see it in your face. They don’t. They are too green. But at the same time, if you can whip them to shape, they make the best goons you could ever ask for. Loyal, capable.”

“And you think you can?”

Trevor shrugged. “Alone, maybe. With Jennifer here? I don’t know what strings boss-man managed to pull, but she’s good. Just give us some time, alright? If you don’t like the younger guys after a week or two, you can always ask Mr Chestermill to replace them. Although I get the feeling that you don’t need his approval to get them removed.” He winked knowingly.

“Alright,” Michael said, “but I will tell David to keep an eye on things. The last thing we need is a security breach now.”

“Speaking of security,” Trevor said, “we are still working on it. The land is huge, and we can’t really secure it until we blocked off access.”

“Just do your thing.”

“Sure, boss,” the man said with a twinkle in his eye.

He knows, doesn’t he? Did he figure it out on his own? Oh well, he’s not telling anyone. I like him already.

Michael had not forgotten about Jennifer having mentioned quad bikes, but it turned out that it was still too early to use them. They were parked right in front of a gravel ramp leading to a manned gate, which in turn led to nowhere. There were trucks filled with dirt and gravel, and heavy equipment was being hauled in from the main road, but it was clear that construction of the gravel road from there to the dungeon had barely even begun.

Hiking it is, then. He thought, slightly disappointed. But why am I disappointed? Did I get used to way too much comfort already? Am I getting complacent?

He thought about it on his way to the dungeon.

It’s true that I value hard work, but surely NOT mindless dumb work. And walking to the dungeon every damn time is exactly that. Work smart AND hard, not just hard. That’s why I’m having the road built.

After thinking about it, he also felt better about his plans for the day. Even though it was a cowardly move, he still didn’t dare go back to the second floor. Even though time still flowed on the second floor, going now would be neither hard nor smart work, just suicide.

Besides, I don’t think a healthy dose of cowardice is wrong per se. It’s just that cowards tend to be slimy assholes. It’s like cowardice is the telltale sign of many other shit personality traits.

Michael was not a coward. He was simply a sensible individual. The situation on the second floor required careful consideration, and considerable personal power. To that end, rather than running away like a coward would, Michael chose to train.

He challenged the ever more difficult floor multiple times that day, and he would continue to do so until he felt ready to tackle the seemingly impossible hurdle that had appeared between him and his goal of unifying the glyphs that made up the Unity.

In the distance, he could see hired security guards patrolling the area. None of them bothered him. They had been informed about his presence, and all of them had been instructed to keep away from the cave at any cost.