The Sixth School.

Chapter Twenty four: A Pact…

Greg had understood it logically when Olivia had been explaining to him about life orders and the fact that all living beings fall into separate life orders, some with higher and some with lower. Right then, however, Greg understood right to his very bones what a difference in life orders entails. The very presence of the being observing him, even without exhibiting any malice, was enough to make his soul quake with fear.

Greg suddenly felt a sharp pain erupt right from the core of his being. He wanted to shout in agony, but in the presence of such a being, Greg wasn’t willing to even breathe loudly, lest he incur their ire. Turning to look down, Greg found himself looking at the oddest injury he would probably ever see on himself. Running from his left shoulder down to his belly button was… a crack. It was almost like his body was a porcelain vessel that had been subjected to just a little too much pressure, enough so that it cracked.

“I’m sorry about that,” An alluring feminine voice reached him.

All Greg had done was look away for a second and, somehow, everything had changed around him. He now found himself in a luxurious room furnished with the best that money could buy. He didn’t even remember doing it, but Greg was now seated in a supremely comfortable high-back chair facing a woman that looked like she was in her early twenties, with a face so perfect that it was almost eerie to look at. She was calmly sipping a clear liquid from what appeared to be a white porcelain cup. Looking at the table before him, Greg could see a similar cup with the same liquid before him.

“Even in my realm, soul fractures are a nasty business,” she said before waving her hand in his direction.

Greg felt the most potent, and at the same time gentle feeling wash over him. Greg would never in a thousand years look down on his teacher, the healer. But there was no doubt, that the kind of healing he’d just received was of such a higher grade that there was just no comparison. As the feeling washed over him, the cracks on what he now knew to be his soul slowly closed up, and the pain he felt ebbed away. Before long, his soul was perfectly whole again. How are they such a nasty business if all it takes is a wave of your hand to heal them? Greg couldn’t help but lampoon within himself. He, however, would never say it out loud to the being before him.

“I meant to bring you directly to this construct the moment you touched the staff,” the being before him explained. “Who knew that you wouldn’t even approach it? Instead, you used the mana construct copy of yourself to try and get rid of the staff. I was forced to pull your soul directly into my presence,” She explained. “I did my best to rein it in, but for a fraction of a second, you were exposed to a little of my aura, hence the injury,” She continued. In the mouth of anyone else, the words may have come off as extremely arrogant. With the one before him, however, they were just statements of facts. Greg wasn’t even sure why she was explaining herself. With the power gulf between them, she could tear him into a thousand pieces and there would be nothing he could do about it.

“I’ve found that getting off on the wrong foot with someone can make things a lot more complicated than they have to be,” She said. “You humans, despite being acutely aware of how weak you are, can be a rather strong-willed and rebellious bunch when not properly motivated,” She said “It may have been unintentional, but perhaps being hurt on your first interaction with me might be the only excuse you need to have a bad impression of me. Which would in turn make you reticent to abide by any agreement we have. You would drag your feet, and try to do the utmost to do the least that you can get away with and nothing more” She relayed. “An all-around headache that I would eventually have to torture and kill just to vent my frustration,” The words were spoken so casually that Greg almost missed the threat. Part of him knew that the being wasn’t even trying to threaten him, she was just plainly reporting what she would do in such a situation, a fact that somehow made the whole thing far worse. “Most of my kind would never deign to humor the whims of you mortals. But, over the eons, I’ve found that a simple, straightforward interaction with your kind tends to yield much better results than being mysterious or forceful. With your soul being that of a mortal and not another being like me, if all it takes is a wave of the hand to heal it, why not wave it?” she posed rhetorically. Both his wondering at why she was explaining anything to him and his lampooning of her healing him with the wave of her hand had been answered. The being had directly answered Greg’s thoughts making him realize that not even those were hidden from her.

“Indeed Greg, nothing about you is hidden from me,” This was the first time in a while that someone had called him by the name that he had back on earth. Greg immediately understood that she was indirectly letting him know that even his life back on earth was an open book to her. “So, I’d kindly ask that we skip the testing and prodding that you mortals try to do whenever you come across beings such as myself. As soon as the thought enters your mind, I will know of it. Any trick you might wish to try would be pointless,” She informed him. There was no threat in her voice. She might as well have been reading the words off a piece of paper. And yet, Greg couldn’t help the absolute terror that seized him at the warning. She might appear calm and composed now, but Greg didn’t want to know what she was like when she became angry. A smile slowly crossed her lips. “I’m glad we understand each other,” She said calmly.

“Y… you seem to appreciate candor,” Greg forced himself to speak up, unable to help the slight tremor in his voice. “So I’ll just come right out and ask,” He said. “Who are you and why did you bring me here? And what do you want from me?” he asked one after the other.

“I can only answer one of those questions,” Came the reply. “The simple fact of knowing who I am will draw the attention of beings that, believe me, you do not want to look your way. So, I can’t tell you that,” She informed him. “What I want from you, I also won’t say as of yet as you are too weak to even be of use to me right now,” She said. “Telling you right now won’t achieve anything. You might even try to act in cross-purposes to my plans in a misguided attempt to break free of me. You humans do love your illusion of freedom,” She said, adding the offhand comment at the end. “Ask me again when you are at the same level as the healer,” She said, causing Greg’s eyes to widen. Just knowing what this being wanted of him required that he be a seventh-tier mage! Greg got the distinct impression that the being didn’t think much of the healer’s power. But to him, who hadn’t even touched on the first tier, it was like looking up to the peak of a mountain from its foot. “Until then, you are free to live your life however you wish,” She stated. 

“The answer to the question of why I brought you here is simple. You and I never had the chance to talk before I sent you into Roka's body,” She informed him with a smile. Despite the fact that it had been a suspicion at the back of his mind, Greg still couldn’t help the shock he felt when the entity before him outright revealed that she was the one responsible for his new lease on life. There were a thousand and one questions that he wanted to ask. Part of him, however, suspected that she wouldn’t be willing to answer ninety nine percent of them. As such, he only settled for the only obvious question before him. “You just said that I am not powerful enough to know what you want from me,” he said. “Why bring me into this realm then?” He posed.

“Three reasons,” she replied. “The first is to inform you, the second is to warn you, and the third is to reward you,” She went on. Greg nodded for her to go on. “I gave you a second chance at life, Greg,” She spoke calmly. “I didn’t do it out of the kindness of my heart or because I like you or some other flowery reason, I did it because I plan to use you,” She spoke plainly. “I have plans. Plans that will require your participation at some point in the future,” She informed him “When the time comes, I will call, you will answer, and do as I say, no questions asked!” She declared. “If you can agree to this, I will send you back to go on living your life as you please. Like I said before, I probably won’t call on you before you reach the same tier as the healer,” She relayed. “However, if you find this objectionable, now is the time to speak up. I won’t harm you in any way, I’ll just find another soul that is willing to abide by my plans to replace you,” she said. “Don’t answer immediately,” She cautioned. “I would advise that you think on this very carefully. Because if you say yes now and then, later on, try to backtrack on your word, you will have me as an enemy,” She didn’t add any threats on top of this declaration. She didn’t need to. The look in her eyes was enough to send chills coursing through Greg’s soul. “I will allow you the duration of this conversation to think it over,” she offered.

“Next is the warning,” She continued calmly, causing a look of confusion to cross Greg’s face. Hadn’t she just delivered the warning? He wondered. An amused smile crossed the being’s expression. “No, Greg, I didn’t. I was just informing you of the paths before you,” She replied calmly. “The warning, Greg, is that, For reasons that I am as yet unable to pry into, you have crossed paths with an inordinate number of powerful entities in a rather short amount of time. A seventh-tier mage, a primordial turned sentient, a Herald of the abyssal realm, and myself,” She listed out. Of the four listed, Greg only knew of the first one, the healer. And the last, simply because she was currently seated before him. Which primordial the entity was referring to, Greg didn’t know. And a Herald of the abyssal realm? Was that who was behind the staff that turned his uncle into a tier zero mage? Greg could only wonder.

“The majority of people go their whole lives without even seeing the least of these, the seventh-tier mage. And yet, in a little less than a month, you have come across four such entities,” She informed him. “Normally, when the strings of fate become so tangled, you are either meant for great things… or fate has noticed an anomaly that it is trying to amend,” The being calmly warned him.

“And by amend, you mean…”

“Kill you,” She finished Greg’s statement with barely any hint of concern for him.

Greg was quiet for a long while before he spoke once more. “You speak of fate as if it’s sentient,” he said.

“It’s starting to be,” Came the cryptic reply.

Greg was silent for a while waiting for her to go on. She, however, remained silent, not willing to reveal more than she already had. “Who is the primordial?” Greg instead asked when it became clear he wouldn’t be getting any more answers about fate out of the being before him. Rather than answer him, Greg felt a flood of new memories flow into him. Unlike his normal memories, however, this wasn’t from his own perspective. Instead, it was as if he was someone invisible standing inside the room. Those inside didn’t pay him any mind despite him being in their midst. Greg easily recognized this as the infirmary room in which he recovered. Greg got to watch himself as his face went pale white and he passed out. Immediately, Greg remembered that this was when he gained Olivia as a familiar. Was this the scene of how she came into being? Was she the primordial? Greg couldn’t help but wonder even as he watched Olivia’s form take shape.

This was only a memory, but every detail within it seemed to have been perfectly preserved allowing Greg to experience it firsthand. Which was why Greg froze when Olivia’s aura washed over her. Having been around her for the past few weeks, Greg knew that the aura of his familiar was nowhere near as powerful as what she was currently exuding. The differences, however, didn’t stop at her power. Greg was in soul form, but even he could feel the thick aura of lust that clung to this unfamiliarly powerful Olivia! She wasn’t just a sexy woman, it was almost as if Greg was looking at the very embodiment of lust taken form. Even though Greg knew that this was a memory and that the actual Olivia wasn’t here with him, Greg felt a deep unrelenting desire to copulate with her. Everything within him was crying out to fuck the woman. Greg was about to succumb and try to reach for his dick to jerk himself off when he felt a cooling sensation wash over his mind and rid him of the entrapment of lust that seemed to have taken hold of him. Greg knew that this was the being’s doing. She had cleared his mind and given him the resistance necessary to help him keep his mind and not be reduced into a lust-addled idiot.

With his faculties of reason restored, Greg could go over the memory with clear eyes. Greg couldn’t help his shock at what the short memory revealed. First was just how powerful Olivia’s original form was. When the being had called her a primordial instead of a ninth-tier being, Greg had suspected that it was because she was already more powerful than the ninth-tier. What he felt when she finally took form only confirmed this guess on his part. Even without having ever met a ninth-tier mage, Greg found himself suspecting that not even they were this powerful. Olivia’s original was in a class of power far above the nine tiers.

The second shock was the fact that the Olivia he knew wasn’t the original familiar that he was supposed to get from the system but a much weaker version of her. A part of him wanted to feel cheated by Olivia’s original. Greg, however, quickly remembered what had happened just a few minutes prior. Just the memory of her aura had been enough to render him bereft of reason and force him to succumb to his own lust. Had the original Olivia stuck around, Greg doubted that he’d even remember who he was by now. Rather than being Olivia’s master, he would have been a slave to her original. Ready to do anything she asked just for the chance to bed her. Greg couldn’t help the cold chill he felt at the thought. The fact that he was still lucid was only because Olivia’s original was interested to see how far he could go with the Eros system.

The third and fourth shocks were tied together. The third shock was that, from the way Olivia's original spoke, she was the creator of the system. And if that wasn’t bad enough, it was followed by the fourth shock. Roka, it seemed, wasn’t the only one that had the system. From the way she spoke, it was clear that she considered him to be among the more promising of her seeds, he, however, was by no means the only one. Greg didn’t know how to feel about this. He had never thought of himself as some kind of chosen one. Still, it would be a lie to say that he wasn’t a bit disappointed at the fact that he wasn’t the only one to have such a unique boon.

At the same time, however, Greg couldn’t help feeling a sense of threat and caution. Greg may not have been that old in terms of years, but that didn’t make him naïve. Just as the being before him had plainly laid out, most good things weren’t given out for free. Olivia’s original was clearly after something. What would happen to him if he failed to deliver? What if one of the other ‘seeds’, as she called them, managed to achieve what she was after and she no longer needed the rest, what would happen then? Not to mention the fact that it wasn’t even a certainty that the one that helped her achieve her goal would meet a good end either!

A whole bevy of questions and concerns filled his mind even as he finished reviewing the memories. “Wait a moment,” Greg spoke up as something else occurred to him. “How come she had never commented on the fact that I am from a different world?” Greg asked. “So far, she treats me as if I’ve been in that small town all my life. It’s almost like…”

“She can’t see the memories of your past life,” The being before him finished his statement. “It’s almost as if an entity more powerful than her has sealed away those memories so that no one other than you can access them,” She added with an amused smile. Clearly, she was referring to herself. “Did it never strike you as odd that you’ve never felt the need to discuss your former life with her?” She asked him.

Now that she mentioned it, Greg couldn’t help but notice it. It was indeed odd that he’d never once mentioned such a big thing as the fact that he wasn’t actually Roka. He was a soul from a completely different world and yet he’d never felt the need to touch on such a monumental subject! As it turns out, this was the doing of the entity before him. Still, Greg’s confusion remained. “Wait but if she has no access to my memories of my former life? Then how can she have made my system?” Greg posed. He could remember the look and feel of his system. No matter how he looked at it there was no denying the fact that the thing looked like a computerized interface. The mechanics of the thing may not have been a computer per se, given the fact that it was somehow merged with him at the soul level. But there was no denying the fact that the interface that had been presented to him thus far was of a twenty-first-century computer. If Olivia’s original had no way of accessing those memories, then how did she manage to make the system look that way? Were there computers in this world?

“No Greg, there are no computers in this realm,” came the calm reply. “Did you not notice the way she referred to the ‘systems’ as you call them?” The entity posed, clearly not baffled by the issue. “Seeds,” She answered her own question. “What you have within you is what we call a soul seed. Advanced magic that even your healer wouldn’t be able to make heads or tails of,” She declared. “The thing about soul seeds is that each has a unique way of presenting themselves and interacting with the one that they are linked to. Yours may appear to you like a computer interface. Someone else’s, however, may appear to them as a book, a scroll, or even a library for some. All that matters is that they present to the particular individual in whom the seed has been placed, all the information that they were supposed to,” She explained.

“Hold up,” Greg stated as something else occurred to him. “You sent my soul into Roka’s body just a month ago, how could Olivia’s original have planted a seed in it?” He asked.

“You weren’t listening, were you?” The one before him calmly replied. “I never said I replaced Roka’s soul, I said I grafted you into his body,” She said.

It took a second for Greg to process what the simple, innocuous-seeming, word ‘graft’ meant. When it did, however, Greg couldn’t help but blanch. “Wait! You don’t mean to say that Roka is still trapped inside the body?” Greg posed. Greg couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be a prisoner in one’s own body. To watch as someone else took it over and lived it while you were relegated to the position of observer for the rest of your life. The answer that came from the entity before him, however, was somehow even worse.

“Not for long,” She replied in a nonchalant tone. “Other than the small bit of Roka’s soul needed to keep the soul seed going, you are slowly assimilating the rest of Roka’s soul as nutrients for your soul,” She stated. Despite the macabre nature of what she was saying, she spoke with the air of one that was commenting on the weather. “How else do you think you have his memories and feel the same bonds of connection that he did?” She posed rhetorically.

“Are you telling me that I am killing Roka just by being part of his body?” Greg asked unsure how to feel about this revelation.

An amused smile crossed the face of the one before him. “Yes,” She replied succinctly. “However, you needn’t waste your time feeling guilty,” She added, clearly unbothered by what they had done to Roka. “It’s not like there was a situation where he would have come out alive,” She relayed. “Roka was dead the minute your uncle accidentally opened a doorway to my realm,” She declared calmly. “If I wasn’t interested in making use of the opportunity that the doorway opened to me, I wouldn’t have bothered to restrain my aura at all,” She declared. “Would you like to guess what would happen to a mortal that is exposed to my unrestrained aura?” She asked.

Greg couldn’t help but shudder at the thought of it. She had been restraining her aura and yet, Roka’s body had been in shambles for almost two weeks afterward. Even during this summon, when Greg’s soul have been exposed to a weakened version of her aura for just a fraction of a second, he had suffered a serious soul fracture! Hard as it was to swallow, Roka’s fate had indeed been sealed. Still, this didn’t make it any easier to accept the fact that he was currently consuming someone else’s soul.

“If you wish to blame anyone for what has happened to Roka, Greg, feel free to blame me,” She declared. “Whether it was your soul or some other individual’s, I would still have used Roka’s soul as nourishment for them. You didn’t have any part in what happened to the boy. You are just a poor soul that was caught up in a game they weren’t prepared for,” She relayed. “And if it helps ease your guilt, know that my aura wouldn’t have just affected the area immediately around the portal. That mountain and everything on it that couldn’t withstand my aura would have perished,” She informed him. “It wouldn’t have just been Roka who died. His mother, his sister, and everyone else in that little town would have been reduced to nothing just seconds after the doorway was opened,” she relayed. “A single soul lost for the sake of hundreds of others is a fair trade, wouldn’t you say, Greg?” She calmly posed.

Greg had been paying attention when Olivia told him of the indifference of deity-level beings to human life. Whether they flourished or perished meant nothing to these lofty beings. Listening to her speak without the slightest care about what would have happened to the whole town if she had not restrained her aura, and then using that as justification for using Roka’s soul as nutrients for his, drove home the spine-chilling truth of Olivia’s words in a way that a simple explanation never would have. From the calm smile that remained on the face of the one before him even though she could read his thoughts, it was clear that she didn’t really care whether he thought of her as cold or not.

“W… what is a herald of the abyss?” Greg forced himself to move on from the thought of what had happened to Roka. Even if he decided he didn’t want to go on living off the poor boy’s soul, it wasn’t like he would gain his life back. All that would happen would be Greg being replaced with another soul that was more willing to take advantage of the offer this powerful being was offering.

“The title of the third most powerful beings in the abyssal hierarchy. Above the Heralds are the Archeons. And above the Archeons is the Hegemon,” She relayed. “Heralds are at the very least as powerful as Olivia’s original. Most are more powerful than she is,” the being added. “If ever you go to the abyssal realm, try to keep as low a profile as possible. No matter how powerful, Abyssals are known to be vindictive to an absurdly petty degree,” She relayed. “Your uncle is little more than a worm in the eyes of a Herald. He was nothing more than a toy that the Herald would have amused themselves with for a short while and then forget as soon as it was broken. You, however, broke that toy. It’s not enough of an offence for the Herald to actively pursue you. If, however, the chance ever presented itself for them to harm you, you better believe that they won’t hesitate to do so,” The being informed him with an amused smile.

Greg could feel his scalp go numb as he processed the information. One high-tier mage and three beings above the tiers in just one month. Was he really so much of an anomaly that he needed to be eliminated at all costs? Greg found himself wondering. With those kinds of powerhouses, Greg didn’t harbor any delusions of grandeur. Just a sneeze from any one of those beings would mean the end to a mundane human like him. Two of them were using him for their own, unknown purposes, One was a vindictive powerhouse from a realm that sounded nightmarish even just by the name. And the last one was a mage with her own secrets. Secrets that could probably lead to his death a hundred times over if he was to involve himself. The more he looked at the larger picture laid out before him, the less Greg was inclined to believe that it meant that he was fated for great things, In all likelihood, he was an error that fate was trying to correct!

“Finally, we come to your rewards,” The being cut into his thoughts, bringing Greg back to the present.

Greg couldn’t help his brows furrowing with suspicion as he regarded the one before him. “Rewards for what?” he posed. “I haven’t done anything for you as yet,” He added.

“I believe the correct term from your former world would be an investment,” She replied. “Think of these rewards as my investment in you. I do realize that you have a long road ahead of you before you reach the seventh tier. A road that, if not trodden carefully, could very well mean your second death,” She relayed. “In that time, however, I won’t be available to you,” She declared. “Until you become a seventh-tier mage, you probably won’t hear from me again,” She informed him. “Think of these little gifts as my way of making up for my absence in that period. That way, you won’t resent me and do something stupid when I come calling once you’ve reached the seventh tier,” She explained.

Understanding dawned on Greg. She was relaying that she wasn’t a backer that he could call on whenever he needed. Until he was useful to her, he would be on his own. The gifts he was about to receive were just her way of placating him so that he didn’t feel abandoned in that time. With this new understanding, Greg simply nodded in acceptance.

“The first is the secret room,” The being spoke up with a wave of her hand.

Greg’s brows furrowed as he felt a small measure of discomfort in his head. It took a while for the feeling to go away, but when it finally did, Greg could understand what was meant by a secret room. The easiest way to explain it was that, a section of Greg’s mind had been hidden behind layers of nigh-impenetrable protection. While he could easily access it whenever he wished to, Greg doubted that anyone else could.

“I may have succeeded in keeping your thoughts and memories about your former life hidden from the primordial, but in the future, you might have other secrets that you’d rather not have shared. Either with her or with some other party,” She explained. “The secret room will act like a safe where you can keep all the problematic memories and thoughts that you don’t want to be known. Any thoughts you have, memories you review, or plans you make within the secret room will be completely inaccessible to anyone other than yourself,” He stated. “Unless another being comes along more powerful than myself, no one will be able to break through the barriers I’ve set up,” She informed him. “If you were to meet someone more powerful than myself, however, the barriers will be the least of your problems,” She added with an amused smile.

Greg could see the utility of the secret room he now had in his mind. Much as Olivia and her original hadn’t shown him any malice, Greg couldn’t afford to be so naively trusting in the goodness of others. Especially when he was still so weak!

“Your second gift,” The being continued, not allowing Greg to get lost in his thoughts. “Is the appraiser’s eyes,” she informed him. Unlike the last time where she only waved her hand, this time, a pair of eyes appeared floating above her palm. The two orbs were white just like any other human pair of eyes. The uniqueness of this pair of eyes, however, immediately became clear when one looked at the irises. Rather than taking on any particular hue as the eyes of most creatures tended to, the irises seemed to be glittering almost as if a nebula of stars were gleaming inside them. The more one looked at them, the more they’d feel like a whole galaxy was hiding in those eyes. “I took them off someone who forgot their place and thought they could plot against me,” She gave a brief explanation. “As you might guess, they are a bit special. They only have two abilities. The first is treasure appraisal,” She informed him. “No matter the item, if it has any value, these eyes can appraise it and figure out what that value is,” She stated. “The other ability, and my personal favorite, is that whatever these eyes have seen before, they will never forget. Faces, items, writings, patterns, and so on, once they are seen, they are recorded forever,” She explained.

“Now, the being I took them from was powerful enough to not buckle under the weight of all the information they had gathered over the eons. The same, however, is not true of you, especially while you are still a mundane human being. I have both modified and placed seals on the eyes. The special abilities of these eyes are usually always working passively. The modification, however, made it so that they will only work when one channels mana into them. Otherwise, they’ll be no different from normal mundane eyes. The seals placed on them are to prevent your mind from buckling under the load of information already within the eyes. To break through any given seal, all that is needed is simple mental fortitude. Once you can push through a seal with your mental fortitude alone, then you bear enough mental strength to carry the load of knowledge placed behind the seal,” She explained. “You could also get someone else to push through a given seal for you,” She added. “There is, however, a very real chance of going senile if you gain access to more knowledge than you can handle, so I’d strongly advise against that,” She said calmly.

Half of what Greg had just heard made no sense. How or why a pair of eyes would be able to independently appraise treasures, let alone have memories, was a complete mystery to him. He, however, was the soul of someone that had died on earth, was brought back to life in a world of magic, and was now seated across from a being powerful enough to be considered a deity. He had left the realm of what was rational and made sense a long time ago. As such, he didn’t raise any objections, once again, he just gave a simple nod.

The bestowal of the first reward only offered slight discomfort. The second one, however, was nowhere near as pleasant. Flying from the being’s palm, the eyeballs slammed into his own faster than Greg could blink and began to fuse. Clenching his jaws tightly, Roka tried to ignore the pain of feeling his eyeballs merge with a pair that was not his own. It took a few minutes, but in the end, Greg managed to make it through without screaming his head off. Gasping for breath and with eyes red from irritation, Greg looked at the one before him. Part of him was curious to see if there would be any difference from before. The only difference between now and before, however, was that his eyes were much more irritable.

 “As I said before, Greg, the eyes are modified to require mana,” She relayed. “Just looking at something without mana being injected into the eyes, won’t achieve anything.” She explained. “Also, if you don’t want to blind yourself, I’d recommend that you don’t try to look at deities with those eyes,” She added. Despite the ominous nature of her words, Greg couldn’t sense any anger, threat, or malice behind the words. It was almost like it was off-hand advice that she’d chosen to give on a whim. Whether Greg abided by it or not was his prerogative.

It was a while before Greg could comfortably open his eyes without the irritation. When he finally could, however, Greg noticed the look of indecision on the being’s face. It was almost as if she was unsure whether to proceed with something or not. Greg didn’t say anything. Instead, he waited for whatever decision the entity would make. In the end, he watched a small golden crystal the size of his pinky’s nail, form atop the woman’s palm. Before she even said anything, she flicked a hand forward sending the crystal flying at his chest faster than a bullet. Greg’s eyes had reflexively closed as he’d been expecting pain. Much to his surprise, however, there was nothing. Forget pain, Greg didn’t even feel like he’d been touched by anything. This, however, didn’t put Greg at ease, not in the least. While the crystal had been on the being’s palm, Greg couldn’t feel a thing from it. Now that it was embedded in his soul body, however, Greg could feel the indescribable amount of power that was locked within. It was almost like a nuclear power plant had been shrunk to the size of a fingernail and placed inside him.

“What is this thing?” Greg couldn’t keep quiet any longer and was forced to ask.

“That… is a fragment of divinity,” came the reply.

Greg’s eyes shrunk to pin-sized at the revelation. His shock, however, quickly turned to a mix of rage and fear. “Take it out, now!” This was the closest that Greg had come to shouting at the being. Greg could quite clearly remember what had happened to his uncle as a result of forcing his mundane body to interact with powers that were way beyond him. Olivia had also warned him about the fate of all tier zero mages. As vast as the power he felt inside the crystal was, Greg wasn’t the least bit tempted by it. To him, it was no different from a pill full of cyanide.

An amused smile crossed the being’s lips as she regarded him. None of his thoughts were hidden from her. “If I wanted to Kill you Greg, there are easier and far less wasteful ways to do it,” She said, clearly having seen through his fears as to what the fragment of divinity would do to him. Greg calmed down a bit at her words as he realized that the being, so far, had no motive to kill him. “You are right though, as you currently are, that fragment would kill you a million times over,” she went on to say, crushing what little relief Greg had just been feeling. “That’s why the fragment is sealed,” She informed him. “Until you reach the fourth or fifth tier, depending on how firm your foundations are, you shouldn’t try and access what’s sealed inside that fragment,” she cautioned him. “And before you let your imagination run wild, the answer is no! The fragment won’t grant you great power. At least, not directly. As the primordial warned you, you humans are not built to handle the kind of power that we possess. All that is locked away in that fragment is knowledge. Once you unlock it, you will gain not only a greater affinity for but also a deeper understanding of magic and its principles. How you convert that knowledge into your own power is entirely up to you,” She relayed.

“If it is so harmless,” Greg spoke up, in no way placated by the being’s reassurances. “Then why were you so hesitant to give it to me?” He asked, not bothering to hide his suspicion. She would pick up on it from his mind whether he wanted her to or not.

“My hesitation is not borne out of any danger that the fragment itself would cause you,” The being spoke up. The smile faded from her lips and her expression became serious even as she continued. “My hesitation is because of what danger it might attract your way,” She went on to say. “You may not know this Greg, but fragments of divinity are highly sought-after items. You cannot even begin to fathom just how precious an item it is. Planar wars have been fought over far inferior fragments to the one that I’ve granted you,” She relayed. “So while the fragment might not harm you directly, believe me when I say that it will be the certain death of you if you are ever stupid enough to reveal that you have it,” She declared gravely. “No one, and I mean no one, not even the primordial, is ever to be trusted with the knowledge that you have it, is that understood?” Greg could only nod at the dire warning. It was clear that even the one before him took this seriously, unlike the carefree way she had spoken about most other topics.

“And now we come to the most important part of this discussion,” The being continued calmly. “Do you wish to go on with your new life knowing that eventually, I will call on you to serve me, without question or reservation?” She posed calmly.

Greg was silent for a while before he spoke up. “A few questions before I answer,” He said.

The being nodded once in assent, clearly not bothered by this. “Do your plans involve harming the innocent?” Greg asked.

“My plans care not for any ‘innocent', as you put it,” She answered candidly. “I have no intention of targeting the innocent if that is what you are asking. However, whether some people get hurt in the process or not, really makes no difference to me?” She relayed. “Besides, you will be my agent, the one who executes my plans on my behalf. Whether you do it in the most bloody manner possible or shed no blood in the process, it makes no difference to me,” She informed him. “So long as my end goal is met, then the details don’t matter,” She concluded her answer.

Greg turned this over in his head for a while. It wasn’t the best answer he could have hoped for, but at the very least, she seemed to have been honest with him. Greg also liked that he would have a choice in how to go about the missions. This would allow him the flexibility to go at them in the most optimal way possible. “Second question,” He spoke up. “How long will I be in your employ?” He asked. “Do you plan to have me as your lackey for the rest of my life after I’ve reached the seventh tier?” he asked.

“Serve me well, and you will have the chance to earn your freedom,” Came the concise reply. Once again, there was no hesitation on her part in answering. It was clear that she wasn’t hell-bent on convincing him or trying to win him over with pretty answers. To her, he was a tool in her hand that was very easily replaceable. If he wanted to work for her then she would allow it. If he didn’t she would just replace him with someone else that would.

Greg couldn’t help but clench his jaws a bit as he moved on to the next question. “How can I earn my freedom back? And how long will it take?” he asked.

“You haven’t even begun to serve me and already you seek a way out,” She stated in an amused tone. “As I told you, Greg, you’ll first have to get to the seventh tier before I let you know what I need from you,” She replied calmly, not offering anything beyond this.

“Can I tell anyone about you?” Greg asked after a while of silence.

“The first question you need to ask yourself is if anyone will believe that you sat across from a being such as myself and had such an amiable chat,” She countered. “And if they should happen to believe you, can you handle the danger that being associated with a being such as myself will bring you?” She went on to add. “If the answer to both questions is yes, then feel free to tell whoever you wish to about me,” She allowed in a carefree tone. She didn’t care one way or the other.

Greg thought on her words for a while, realizing that not only would it be hard to get anyone to believe this encounter, but worse still, it wouldn’t necessarily be an entirely safe thing to do. Greg didn’t know what kind of being would qualify as an enemy to the entity before him. Nevertheless, one thing was for sure, such a being could kill him ten thousand times over. Heck, they wouldn’t even have to be his enemy, they’d just have to think that they could gain some benefit from doing so, and boom, he’d be in a world of trouble. And with the sealed fragment of divinity hidden in his soul, they wouldn’t be entirely wrong about benefiting from his death.

“What if I die before the seventh tier? Greg asked his final question.

“Then you probably weren’t going to be of any use to me anyway,” Came the blunt reply. The two held each others gaze for a long while, but the being made no effort to soften her reply. She’d said it and she definitely meant it.

Silence reigned in the luxuriously furnished room for a long while before Greg let out a sigh. “Fine then, I’ll do it!” He conceded. Much as he was being given a choice in the matter, Greg knew that she held all the cards in this negotiation. If he wasn’t willing to do as she asked, he’d be replaced faster than one can snap their fingers. And as much as Greg would have liked to pretend like he didn’t care about this second chance at life that he’d been given, the simple truth was that he did. Greg just simply couldn’t bring himself to give up on a second life in a world full of magic! A life where the roads to power led to heights that were simply unimaginable in his former life. Whatever challenges lay ahead, he would face them head-on, however hard they may be. Giving up, however, just wasn’t an option for him.

A smile crossed the expression of the being before him. “Don’t look so down, Greg,” She said. “The rewards I’ve given you already should be proof that I can be very generous with those who serve me well,” She declared. “I may be demanding, but I am not stingy!” She added. When Greg offered no reply, she simply smiled and waved her hand at him. Greg immediately felt a tug from far away and his soul started fading from this realm. “I wonder why they never take the tea?” the being posed as she looked down at the cup full of a clear liquid that had been set before Greg. “It’s positively delightful.” She said as she brought her own cup to her lips.

These were the last words Greg heard as his soul was being pulled back into Roka’s body…

***

When the clearing came back into view, it was as if barely even a second had passed. Olivia was still smiling as she worked on the carcass of the dark crawler. By all indications, she was blissfully unaware of the monumental events that had taken place just a few meters away from her. His clone was still crouching down with his hand on the staff, trying to pull it into its storage ring. Somehow, despite being used as a conduit to get to Greg, even it didn’t seem aware of anything that had just happened. The connection to it that Greg had broken in a bid to protect himself was once again there as if he’d never broken it in the first place. Worst of all, the horrid stench of the dark crawler’s innards was still there!!

Greg, however, barely even registered the nasty smell. Still reeling from what had just happened. Greg was uncertain how to feel at this moment. He, however, wasn’t given the chance to dwell on it. An urgent message from his clone back in town made Greg grimace. “It’s just one thing after the other today,” He muttered in part annoyance, part frustration…