Balgair's weary eyes drifted open as his head swayed to the side, the back of his head rubbing against the thick concrete pole.
What then greeted him were heavy, cold winds, the sounds of waves crashing against the platform they were on, the darkness of evening, and dark clouds only letting slivers of light pass and illuminate the figures of the boy-looking girl who was sitting down, watching him and Goldilocks, who was standing up and looking towards the sea. He looked down at the wire that squeezed him against the pole.
"Don't even think about it," the boy-looking girl said.
"Tch. Hyperwire?" Balgair raised his head. "Who the fuck are you?"
Goldilocks turned around and looked down at Balgair with the same non-intimidating gaze he had earlier. "I'm Aurelius. She's Cade."
Balgair raised his brows and tilted his head, his annoyance radiating through his gaze. "I didn't mean your names, dumbass. I meant, what organization are you part of? Why are you sticking your nose in my business?"
Then the boy-looking girl named Cade butted in, "Dumbass? What does the guy tied to a concrete pole at a dock have to say about someone else's intelligence?"
Balgair snorted. "Fuck you. I'm not in this shit because of intelligence. Also, off-topic, why do you look like that if you're a girl? Haven't you considered letting your hair grow, not ripping out your eyelashes, and wearing some tighter clothes? Then you'd maybe actually get someone to want your ass."
Cade jumped up to her feet like her weight was that of a feather and walked a bit closer before shoving the bottom of her shoe onto Balgair's left cheek. "You know, I don't really want anyone to want my ass, but I get where you're coming from. Projecting desires onto others is a common habit of less developed people, after all."
Balgair shook his head violently to get the dirty shoe out of his face, but it had no real effect except to make Cade push his face harder.
Then she continued talking, "And how do you suppose this doesn't have anything to do with intelligence? You're the dumbass going around stealing in broad daylight. You seriously never expected any trouble to come your way? Your type of weaklings should just stay inside and work some regular old job before they die."
"Hey, Cade, stop that," Goldilocks said from the side, putting a hand up but not moving an inch.
Balgair gave up trying to shake his head and tried kicking the Cade's single grounded foot from under him, which managed to get the girl to back away. He then wiped his cheek on his shoulder before spitting on the ground as the two individuals looked at him unpleasantly.
"What's your partner's deal? Is he mentally challenged or something?" Balgair switched his target from Cade to Aurelius. "Why did you chase me when you had nothing to do with the matter? And why haven't you turned me in if you're not gonna kill me?"
Cade tilted her chin up and crossed her arms. And before Aurelius could open his mouth, she answered, "He's not mentally challenged. A little unsophisticated, yes, but not unintelligent in the least. You see, he was the one who figured out your trick."
"What trick?" Balgair asked.
Aurelius showed a slight smile. "You can't actually do motionless magic. You're a fraud, but a very skilled one. I actually didn't think of that myself, and I'm not sure how. I thought I had mastered the basics, but you really opened my eyes there," he explained, gesturing with his hands in an erratic manner.
'Yup, he's nuts,' Balgair thought as he looked into those pair of frantic eyes that were directed straight at him. They were the eyes of a child. Or maybe more like those of an annoyingly curious baby that simply couldn't stop staring at you like you were some kind of alien creature.
"The fact that you're able to make do with your low affinity by simply having a constant supply you can manipulate as naturally as you breathe is just amazing. I mean, lowering one supply as you heighten another based on situational predictions in battle is super special."
Balgair's eyes widened as he saw the ability he had mastered with years of work, figured out by someone the same age as him after sharing one brief encounter.
"That's right. I was right," Aurelius said, turning to Cade and pointing at Balgair whose surprised look told the story.
"It seems so," Cade said with a tilt of her head.
Balgair sighed. "Fine, he's not stupid. But can you tell me what you want now? I hope you didn't bring me here just to confirm my technique before handing me over to the authorities or killing me and throwing my body into the sea."
The ends of Cade's lips curled up a bit. "I would normally have opted for the latter option, but my partner here has other plans."
"Like what?"
Aurelius opened his mouth. "I want you to help us with something," he said, a serious expression on his face for once. "I want to make Mircrest better. To help the people and get rid of injustice."
"So? What do you intend to do?"
"Well, me and Cade had the idea of a heist in mind. From there, we can use the funds to help the underprivileged and affect the political landscape of Mircrest. It's a democracy, right? So all we have to do is shape the conditions of the next election so that we can remove corruption and steer the country toward a brighter future."
Silence followed Aurelius' speech.
Then Balgair burst into laughter. "What the hell are you on? Did you come up with that plan all on your own? You lost to me in a fight. There's no way you can actually have an effect on a whole country. Especially when there's a crime organization like Numen around."
Cade nodded with a slow blink in acknowledgement. "Numen is certainly a problem. However, there are still measures we can take to have an effect."
"Like what? It's Numen. They control almost everything, and the almost is there only because of the people they just straight up merc with barely any reason. They have branches all over the country that have the military power of the wealthiest houses around. We try to mess with them, and we are dead. You've seen the newspapers about that governor's family, right? They nailed them to the courthouse's wall by the backs of their mouths." Balgair gritted his teeth, and his face crumpled up as he put his words together like he was lifting bricks. "They did that to even his children. And you wanna go after them? What the hell is wrong with you?"
Aurelius looked at Cade nervously. Cade looked back at him briefly, but her face hadn't changed a bit. "I know what type of people they are. That's why I'm doing this."
"You'll get yourself and everybody you love killed," Balgair said with a low voice. It wasn't a threat or anything that carried bad intentions. They were honest words of prediction.
"I love nobody. My life is all I am putting at stake, and it is for a cause I am ready to die for."
"Why do I care?" Balgair shook his head. "You're just a crazy motherfucker trying to die in a heroic way. Not like you can actually do anything to change the world."
"Is that what you think?" Cade asked as she walked to the side, where two duffel bags were, before pulling out a box and revealing a set of vials filled with black liquid. "Just last week, we were in the Thropes handling a mission, and this is what we came out with. All without a single scratch on either one of us."
Balgair furrowed his brows. "Enhancers? The two of you killed a cursed beast? And without injuries? Ridiculous."
Cade put the vials back and began walking towards Balgair. "Oh, that's right, you wouldn't be aware of what we're capable of yet."
Balgair watched with no real expectation but almost forgot to breathe once blue streaks began coalescing into the center of Cade's palm, replacing the faint illumination in the area with an unnatural, unstable blue luminescence. And as she walked closer, the mass of essence grew larger and larger, even though its mass seemed to be condensed as much as possible.
Balgair kept a calm, unimpressed look as she approached, but it was really the first time he had seen essence handled so naturally. And it was all motionless!
Balgair had simply heard of motionless magic before, and that had been from the individuals with the highest status he knew. He had separated from those people a long time ago and discarded their talk as simple myths after having tried to practice motionless magic for months to no avail.
But now it was in front of him. He couldn't deny that the mass of essence was fake as it was right in his face.
The streaks started to look more and more like lightning as Cade got closer, and the mass kept growing. Balgair could no longer remain calm. His sense of safety was crumbling as logic no longer mattered when that mass, which now seemed just barely controllable, approached.
"Do you understand it now?" Cade asked.
Balgair tried backing away by leaning to the side and trying to frantically push himself back with his feet.
"Answer," Cade said. "Say it!"
Balgair stared at the mass that had grown to the size of a human head. It was probably the most beautiful thing he had seen in his entire life, but his mind could not process the unbelievable masterpiece that was shoved in his face, as it was too consumed by the fact that any moment, that beauty could spread off and explode his being completely out of existence.
Finally, he gave in.
"Stop! Stop!! I understand!"
The streaks died down, and the mass faded from existence, leaving only Cade's dark figure standing over Balgair, who was drenched in cold sweat.
"Well?" Cade asked. "Will you join us? Aurelius wants to know more about your technique, and you're obviously ridiculously overqualified for a petty thievery. I'm not particularly interested in whatever story you have, but I know that if someone in the underworld has your fighting skills, he is bound to have a lot of experience that translates into connections and knowledge. Now, we're in need of those connections and knowledge, so it's your lucky day. You'll get a 5 percent cut of the heist profit, and you can go on your own path from there. You won't have to get involved with big, scary Numen if you're too afraid."
Balgair did his best to slow his breathing before gulping. "Before I answer, I want to know you. I don't do business with strangers. Let's start with origin. Your partner looks like a Zalfarian royal, but since you're so desperate for funds, he's got to be banished or something, right?"
"Eh, I'm not from the Great Zalfarian Empire," Aurelius said from the side, pointing at himself.
Balgair's gaze turned to him with wide eyes. "You're not?"
Aurelius tilted his head. "No, I've lived in the Thropes my whole life," he said slowly, processing all the new information as he spoke.
Balgair chuckled lightly to himself as some shivers went down his spine. "Goldilocks, how old are you exactly?"
"Ah, I'm 16 years old," Aurelius answered nonchalantly. "Why do you want to know?"
Random pieces of information Balgair had picked up throughout his studies connected and formed a picture that brought an unintentional smile to Balgair's face. He glanced at Cade, whose inquisitive expression answered Balgair's question.
'She doesn't know,' he thought.
"What is it?" Cade asked.
Balgair looked down for a while and collected himself before gazing back at Cade with a neutral expression. "Ah, nothing... I've made my decision. I'll join you."
Balgair's weary eyes drifted open as his head swayed to the side, the back of his head rubbing against the thick concrete pole.
What then greeted him were heavy, cold winds, the sounds of waves crashing against the platform they were on, the darkness of evening, and dark clouds only letting slivers of light pass and illuminate the figures of the boy-looking girl who was sitting down, watching him and Goldilocks, who was standing up and looking towards the sea. He looked down at the wire that squeezed him against the pole.
"Don't even think about it," the boy-looking girl said.
"Tch. Hyperwire?" Balgair raised his head. "Who the fuck are you?"
Goldilocks turned around and looked down at Balgair with the same non-intimidating gaze he had earlier. "I'm Aurelius. She's Cade."
Balgair raised his brows and tilted his head, his annoyance radiating through his gaze. "I didn't mean your names, dumbass. I meant, what organization are you part of? Why are you sticking your nose in my business?"
Then the boy-looking girl named Cade butted in, "Dumbass? What does the guy tied to a concrete pole at a dock have to say about someone else's intelligence?"
Balgair snorted. "Fuck you. I'm not in this shit because of intelligence. Also, off-topic, why do you look like that if you're a girl? Haven't you considered letting your hair grow, not ripping out your eyelashes, and wearing some tighter clothes? Then you'd maybe actually get someone to want your ass."
Cade jumped up to her feet like her weight was that of a feather and walked a bit closer before shoving the bottom of her shoe onto Balgair's left cheek. "You know, I don't really want anyone to want my ass, but I get where you're coming from. Projecting desires onto others is a common habit of less developed people, after all."
Balgair shook his head violently to get the dirty shoe out of his face, but it had no real effect except to make Cade push his face harder.
Then she continued talking, "And how do you suppose this doesn't have anything to do with intelligence? You're the dumbass going around stealing in broad daylight. You seriously never expected any trouble to come your way? Your type of weaklings should just stay inside and work some regular old job before they die."
"Hey, Cade, stop that," Goldilocks said from the side, putting a hand up but not moving an inch.
Balgair gave up trying to shake his head and tried kicking the Cade's single grounded foot from under him, which managed to get the girl to back away. He then wiped his cheek on his shoulder before spitting on the ground as the two individuals looked at him unpleasantly.
"What's your partner's deal? Is he mentally challenged or something?" Balgair switched his target from Cade to Aurelius. "Why did you chase me when you had nothing to do with the matter? And why haven't you turned me in if you're not gonna kill me?"
Cade tilted her chin up and crossed her arms. And before Aurelius could open his mouth, she answered, "He's not mentally challenged. A little unsophisticated, yes, but not unintelligent in the least. You see, he was the one who figured out your trick."
"What trick?" Balgair asked.
Aurelius showed a slight smile. "You can't actually do motionless magic. You're a fraud, but a very skilled one. I actually didn't think of that myself, and I'm not sure how. I thought I had mastered the basics, but you really opened my eyes there," he explained, gesturing with his hands in an erratic manner.
'Yup, he's nuts,' Balgair thought as he looked into those pair of frantic eyes that were directed straight at him. They were the eyes of a child. Or maybe more like those of an annoyingly curious baby that simply couldn't stop staring at you like you were some kind of alien creature.
"The fact that you're able to make do with your low affinity by simply having a constant supply you can manipulate as naturally as you breathe is just amazing. I mean, lowering one supply as you heighten another based on situational predictions in battle is super special."
Balgair's eyes widened as he saw the ability he had mastered with years of work, figured out by someone the same age as him after sharing one brief encounter.
"That's right. I was right," Aurelius said, turning to Cade and pointing at Balgair whose surprised look told the story.
"It seems so," Cade said with a tilt of her head.
Balgair sighed. "Fine, he's not stupid. But can you tell me what you want now? I hope you didn't bring me here just to confirm my technique before handing me over to the authorities or killing me and throwing my body into the sea."
The ends of Cade's lips curled up a bit. "I would normally have opted for the latter option, but my partner here has other plans."
"Like what?"
Aurelius opened his mouth. "I want you to help us with something," he said, a serious expression on his face for once. "I want to make Mircrest better. To help the people and get rid of injustice."
"So? What do you intend to do?"
"Well, me and Cade had the idea of a heist in mind. From there, we can use the funds to help the underprivileged and affect the political landscape of Mircrest. It's a democracy, right? So all we have to do is shape the conditions of the next election so that we can remove corruption and steer the country toward a brighter future."
Silence followed Aurelius' speech.
Then Balgair burst into laughter. "What the hell are you on? Did you come up with that plan all on your own? You lost to me in a fight. There's no way you can actually have an effect on a whole country. Especially when there's a crime organization like Numen around."
Cade nodded with a slow blink in acknowledgement. "Numen is certainly a problem. However, there are still measures we can take to have an effect."
"Like what? It's Numen. They control almost everything, and the almost is there only because of the people they just straight up merc with barely any reason. They have branches all over the country that have the military power of the wealthiest houses around. We try to mess with them, and we are dead. You've seen the newspapers about that governor's family, right? They nailed them to the courthouse's wall by the backs of their mouths." Balgair gritted his teeth, and his face crumpled up as he put his words together like he was lifting bricks. "They did that to even his children. And you wanna go after them? What the hell is wrong with you?"
Aurelius looked at Cade nervously. Cade looked back at him briefly, but her face hadn't changed a bit. "I know what type of people they are. That's why I'm doing this."
"You'll get yourself and everybody you love killed," Balgair said with a low voice. It wasn't a threat or anything that carried bad intentions. They were honest words of prediction.
"I love nobody. My life is all I am putting at stake, and it is for a cause I am ready to die for."
"Why do I care?" Balgair shook his head. "You're just a crazy motherfucker trying to die in a heroic way. Not like you can actually do anything to change the world."
"Is that what you think?" Cade asked as she walked to the side, where two duffel bags were, before pulling out a box and revealing a set of vials filled with black liquid. "Just last week, we were in the Thropes handling a mission, and this is what we came out with. All without a single scratch on either one of us."
Balgair furrowed his brows. "Enhancers? The two of you killed a cursed beast? And without injuries? Ridiculous."
Cade put the vials back and began walking towards Balgair. "Oh, that's right, you wouldn't be aware of what we're capable of yet."
Balgair watched with no real expectation but almost forgot to breathe once blue streaks began coalescing into the center of Cade's palm, replacing the faint illumination in the area with an unnatural, unstable blue luminescence. And as she walked closer, the mass of essence grew larger and larger, even though its mass seemed to be condensed as much as possible.
Balgair kept a calm, unimpressed look as she approached, but it was really the first time he had seen essence handled so naturally. And it was all motionless!
Balgair had simply heard of motionless magic before, and that had been from the individuals with the highest status he knew. He had separated from those people a long time ago and discarded their talk as simple myths after having tried to practice motionless magic for months to no avail.
But now it was in front of him. He couldn't deny that the mass of essence was fake as it was right in his face.
The streaks started to look more and more like lightning as Cade got closer, and the mass kept growing. Balgair could no longer remain calm. His sense of safety was crumbling as logic no longer mattered when that mass, which now seemed just barely controllable, approached.
"Do you understand it now?" Cade asked.
Balgair tried backing away by leaning to the side and trying to frantically push himself back with his feet.
"Answer," Cade said. "Say it!"
Balgair stared at the mass that had grown to the size of a human head. It was probably the most beautiful thing he had seen in his entire life, but his mind could not process the unbelievable masterpiece that was shoved in his face, as it was too consumed by the fact that any moment, that beauty could spread off and explode his being completely out of existence.
Finally, he gave in.
"Stop! Stop!! I understand!"
The streaks died down, and the mass faded from existence, leaving only Cade's dark figure standing over Balgair, who was drenched in cold sweat.
"Well?" Cade asked. "Will you join us? Aurelius wants to know more about your technique, and you're obviously ridiculously overqualified for a petty thievery. I'm not particularly interested in whatever story you have, but I know that if someone in the underworld has your fighting skills, he is bound to have a lot of experience that translates into connections and knowledge. Now, we're in need of those connections and knowledge, so it's your lucky day. You'll get a 5 percent cut of the heist profit, and you can go on your own path from there. You won't have to get involved with big, scary Numen if you're too afraid."
Balgair did his best to slow his breathing before gulping. "Before I answer, I want to know you. I don't do business with strangers. Let's start with origin. Your partner looks like a Zalfarian royal, but since you're so desperate for funds, he's got to be banished or something, right?"
"Eh, I'm not from the Great Zalfarian Empire," Aurelius said from the side, pointing at himself.
Balgair's gaze turned to him with wide eyes. "You're not?"
Aurelius tilted his head. "No, I've lived in the Thropes my whole life," he said slowly, processing all the new information as he spoke.
Balgair chuckled lightly to himself as some shivers went down his spine. "Goldilocks, how old are you exactly?"
"Ah, I'm 16 years old," Aurelius answered nonchalantly. "Why do you want to know?"
Random pieces of information Balgair had picked up throughout his studies connected and formed a picture that brought an unintentional smile to Balgair's face. He glanced at Cade, whose inquisitive expression answered Balgair's question.
'She doesn't know,' he thought.
"What is it?" Cade asked.
Balgair looked down for a while and collected himself before gazing back at Cade with a neutral expression. "Ah, nothing... I've made my decision. I'll join you."
