The man’s life force emerged from his body as a red glow; a good portion of it streamed away to be devoured by the darkness. As it did, the man’s flesh was visibly desiccated.
“There!” one of them shouted, pointing in the direction of the stream of life force. Bullets and powers erupted in that direction, just as the draining power came to an end. A shadowy figure emerged from the other direction, dashing forward to bite into an exposed neck with an ornate black and red dagger.
Farrah stopped and hid as she spotted a strange figure crossing the wooden bridge in her direction. It looked like a cloaked humanoid but made entirely of manifested darkness.
“Miss Hurin,” a voice spoke. “I have been sent to assist you.”
Farrah stepped out from behind the half-shattered wall.
“Assist me how?”
The figure tossed a small object at her, but rather than catch it, she dodged out of the way. What landed on the ground was a small key. Looking closer, she recognised it was crudely made, but conformed to the common design for a suppression collar skeleton key. She picked it up and pressed it to the collar at her neck, which clicked open.
She snatched the collar off and threw it over the edge of the building, where it fell away into the fog. Farrah immediately felt the relief of magic flowing into her for the first time in what felt like years. Her mana stores had long dried up, leaving her with a constant pounding headache, but finally, they started to replenish. She turned to the shadowy figure, which maintained a respectful distance, halfway across the bridge.
“My name is Shade. May I offer you a recovery potion?”
“You said you were sent to assist me,” she said warily.
“That is correct,” Shade said.
“Who sent you?”
Outside the astral space, the ritualist team that had been examining the apertures were reporting to Hector. They were standing in front of the aperture Asano had entered while the logistics team was preparing to assemble another tent.
“We have no idea what Asano did,” the lead ritualist said. “It didn’t open the aperture for us, though. We’ve explored every option in our knowledge base and the simple fact is those apertures are not going to open.”
The aperture suddenly opened, a dozen people pouring out of it, looking variously terrified, half dead or both. Moments later, they were surrounded by guns pointed at their heads.
“We surrender. Just keep whatever you sent in there away from us!”
On his way to the Swiss border, Adrien Barbou stopped his car to use a wi-fi hotspot and logged into a private chat room. Soon after, a second person entered and sent a video chat invitation. He accepted and the face of a stern-faced woman appeared on his screen.
“Mrs West,” he said. “It’s done. My remaining Network contacts have informed me that they accessed the dimensional space faster than anticipated, but things have otherwise played out as you directed.”
“The outworlder, Asano?”
“Yes.”
“That works in our favour,” West said. “The more value he has for them, the more they will believe that our goal was to obtain the other outworlder. Once they believe they have foiled our plans, they won’t be looking for our true plot. You did maintain that the outworlder was our goal to everyone involved, yes?”
“Yes, Mrs West. No slip-ups.”
“Good. You’ve done well, Adrien.”
“I’m surprised you were willing to sacrifice a team of elite converted,” Adrien said.
“The category twos will soon be out of date,” Mrs West said. “Anything below a category three is expendable for the plan. Now that your part with the Network is done, you’ll learn the rest once you arrive here. Your contact will meet you in Zurich, as arranged.”
“Thank you, Mrs West.”
In a Los Angeles branch of the Network, the Operations Director was standing by the window, her assistant, Cleary, standing next to her.
“Ma’am, we need to accelerate the recruitment of the outworlder. Once he’s acquired the other outworlder, Asano may turn his attention to Network activity. If he teaches the other branches how to accomplish non-core advancement, it will erode our advantage. Just having them know it’s possible is bad enough.”
“They always knew, Cleary. Most branches have someone determined to crack non-core advancement. It’s not like the process is hard to figure out. Physical training and meditation are hardly esoteric practices. They just lack the specific techniques to make those practices efficient.”
“Which Asano had already agreed to give them.”
“Which he won’t, because he’ll be joining us. Timing is everything, Cleary. He was never going to be responsive until the other outworlder was recovered. Now she has been, the time to take advantage has come. The Sydney branch has failed him and the Lyon branch has made an enemy of him. He is now primed to deal with the people who know what they’re doing.”
54
QUITE THE YEAR
Farrah felt a freakishly strong aura from above and looked up to see a sight that stirred a strong memory. A man was slowly descending through the air using a cloak made of star-filled darkness. He landed lightly on the bridge, in front of the shadow creature. Aside from the cloak, he wore dark combat robes and a sword at his hip that she immediately recognised. He pushed back the hood and she saw a face both familiar and alien.
The shadow man, Shade, had told her the man’s name, but she still had trouble believing, even as she looked right at him. The smug, perpetual half-smirk was the same, but was situated over an only slightly immodest chin. That chin had a scar, with another scar bisecting an eyebrow. The most startling physical feature was the pair of eyes, which were silver and faintly glowing. Compared to the aura coming off the man, though, the eyes were perfectly mundane.
She had never felt a bronze-rank aura even close to that potent. It was domineering, indomitable, and resolute, with an undercurrent she recognised with a shock as having been touched by divinity. There was the unmistakable feel of an essence user’s aura, but also distinctly something else. Like the man’s appearance, his aura was recognisable yet, at the same time, strange and new to her. It was solid in a way she had never felt from any other aura, as if it wasn’t a projection of a soul but the soul itself, standing right in front of her.
“What are you?” she asked.
“What?” the man said. “Not even who? Wow, that’s rough.”
“You’re not doing a great job of mimicking him,” she said. “It’s like you’re going by vague description.”
“Also harsh. You’ve missed a lot, Farrah.”
“You’re too tall,” she said. “Your complexion is too clear. I’m not sure what the scars are about, but it takes a lot to scar an essence user. Your voice is too deep, I can’t even describe how wrong the aura is, and the eyes are way off. You couldn’t even get the rank right. It’s like you copied him but couldn’t help making him more impressive than he really is.”