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Quill
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Damn mask bastard. Fucker fought like a cornered rat. I’ve never seen someone punch so hard in my life.
Pain flares in the side I’m tenderly clutching as I hobble up a knight rise. The stone steps echo as I walk, the small passageway to the tier above not meant for someone with my bulk. I flinch in pain every time I bump against the wall. At least the bleeding has stopped, on the outside.
I wouldn’t even need to use this stupid emergency passage if it wasn’t for that masked fuck. The stocky bastard pushed me off the second tier while grabbing on to me. Asshole used me as a pillow when we landed, too. Then he was gone before the dust even settled.
I blacked out at that point. I might be nearly unkillable, but my mind can only take so much pain. My sense of time is thrown off too, so I’m not sure how long I was out. The kid better be alive. If he went and got himself killed somehow I’m gonna beat the shit out of him.
He’s nearly as durable as me though, as long as they didn’t get his head. I’m not sure the kid realizes it, though. Sure isn’t gonna be me who tells him, brat is suicidal enough as it is. Taking a hit directly from me, what the hell was that? I shake my head, finally emerging onto the second tier.
I start hobbling towards where I left the kid. The pain slowly fades as I walk, allowing me to pick up my pace. Thank you, Mama, I hope the gods are kind to you up there. Eventually I feel good enough to sprint. After that it doesn’t take long to get back where this all started.
The scene isn’t good. There’s craters all over the alley, and one of the walls is just gone, revealing the decrepit insides of the building. What really makes me worried, though, is the cold. I haven’t even entered the narrow space and I can feel the bitter chill from the kid.
In the back corner is a huge chunk of ice. It looks like a caterpillar got real chilly and spun its cocoon out of snow. The kid’s vague outline can be seen inside, unmoving. The ice and frost is spread all over the alley, icicles hanging from the buildings and huge crystals growing from the floor. Except in one spot. The dark object from earlier, which the men fought so hard to keep, lies where it fell earlier. The ground under the thing is totally untouched, like the cold is afraid of it.
I wait until nothing hurts anymore before continuing, I have a feeling I’m gonna need my healing. As soon as I step into the alley, the cold bites into my exposed skin. I feel frostbite spread over my skin just to be quickly pushed back by my regeneration. It’s horribly unpleasant.
Crouching, I open the dark sack. When I register what I’m looking at, I gasp. Inside is a girl, maybe in her late teens. Might be older, but I'm not good at telling people’s age. I reach out and check to see if she’s still breathing, and let out a sigh of relief. Her breath is steady and strong, she seems okay for now. Frost crackles across my skin as I stand to check on my other patient.
He’s really in there good, alright. The ice cocoon is rooted deep between the bricks of the walls and the stones making up the street. I need to pry it out then. Whipping my blade off my back, I move towards the frozen kid.
I wedge my blade between the corner where the wall and ground meet. I hesitate, there’s no way the kid himself will shatter, right? Not like I have much of a choice. The ground snaps as I throw my entire weight on my blade at once. The godsteel laughs in the face of mere ice and stone.
The kid’s pod pops off the ground like a huge fruit and rolls over. It thuds against the other wall and slowly starts putting new ice down, seeking to ground itself again. Absolutely not! I scoop up the girl and rush over to the blue mango.
I put the cocoon on my shoulder, like I’m carrying lumber. The ice rebels against my skin, biting and nipping at it. Thankfully my healing seems to be faster, as the skin heals before it can freeze thoroughly. With the girl cradled in my other arm I head off to the nearest knight rise.
【〓〓〓〓】
The medical knight isn’t pleased with my gifts. Of course it’s also the same one I gave him last time. He doesn’t even speak to me as he carries the girl to one of the cots. I walk a bit away, far enough the kid’s cold won’t reach them, and place the huge cocoon on a cot. Immediately frost and ice start to grow over the piece of furniture.
The doc checks over the girl first, eying the massive ice ball every so often. Once he’s convinced she’s stable he moves on to the kid. For a few minutes he just stands and looks at the oblong jewel of ice. His gaze slowly follows the growing ice, which has consumed the next cot over.
He raises his hands and does something. The ice rapidly starts to melt. Encouraged, he continues until he can get access to the kid. After looking over the kid’s wounds, his face goes pale.
“Gods above Quill, how is he still alive? He has signs of multiple organ failures, all his ribs are fractured, one of his lungs has collapsed.” He glances over his shoulder at me. “The Count should be informed, I can’t guarantee he’ll live.”
My stomach drops. Not from having to get the Count. The other bit. He might not live? The kid? My veins fill with ice, and not the kid’s kind. I look at the kid’s body. It’s covered in bruises and cuts. His right arm is at a very wrong angle. Reality rushes to my head.
Why are my toes wet? I look down at my feet to see a finger width of water rushing over them. What? I look up at the doc to see if he’s seeing this too. I discover the source of the water.
A large, very naked woman is laying on the kid’s cot. She’s barely covered by the carcass of the kid’s knight uniform. Her legs and arms are hanging off the bed. And she’s snoring.
】〓〓〓〓【
Zenith
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Amy told me that we’re not going to school anymore.
“Why would we? We’re planning on leaving here anyways, right?” Her eyes sparkle with determination, and excitement. “Not like Earth history will help us in this other world.” She pauses and tilts her head. “What’s the name of your world, anyway?”
“It's… It's, uh… I don’t know, actually.” I admit. The girl starts giggling furiously.
Her eyes squint in a large smile. “You don’t even know the name of your world?” Her teasing is strangely aggravating. I just turn away and don’t give a response.
“Awww… Is Zenith pouting?” She continues to merciles— wait.
“Did you call me Zenith?” I look at her in shock.
She tilts her head again. “Well, yeah, you said that’s your name right?” She says it like it’s a given.
I smile at her. “Thanks.” She just shrugs.
She drags me into another room. It’s quite large and empty, the floor is polished wood and the space echoes.
“This will be our laboratory!” She points at the sky, doing an odd pose. I snort at her nonsense. “So, oh mighty wizard, what do we need?”
That’s a great question, what do we need? Even if I figure out what we need, will this world even have it? That woman that used me accidentally created dungeons trying to get her portal to work. I’d rather avoid that.
She made that massive dias, I’m sure there’s no need for it to be so big… probably. Memories of the woman ranting about materials not being a good enough… insulator, that’s it. The materials that she could use weren’t good enough insulators. Maybe Amy will know that word, I’m pretty sure that woman was from here anyways.
“Amy, do you know what an insulator is?”
【〓〓〓〓】
An hour and a few subway rides later Amy and I make it to a hardware store.
“I guess it’s like if a blacksmith’s shop, mason’s, and carpenter’s had a weird three way baby.” I stare in horror at the young girl who imagined such a thing so casually. “We can get a great insulator here, the internet says PVC is good.” Amy tries to tell me what PVC is, but the explanation just makes things worse.
“Alright, forget the chemicals, it’s basically like wood and metal mixed.” Her similes aren’t very helpful, either. She sighs in frustration. “Just focus on the fact that we can build your thing with it.”
We walk through a pair of doors that open on their own.
Inside the building cool air assaults us. It’s actually nice. This world does have some advantages. Once I finish marveling at the nice air I take a look around.
The building is tall, very tall. Our manor’s first four floors could fit inside here, height wise, anyways. Huge metal structures with objects stacked on top of them fill the massive space. Boxes and crates are scattered throughout the store. Amy grabs a strange cart made of metal wires, it reminds me of chain mail.
“C’mon, Zenith, stop gawking like a tourist.” She’s right, we’re here for a purpose! I follow after my red-headed guide. She leads me confidently between the towers of iron and wood. And then between two more towers, and then another.
“Amy, do you know where the ‘PVC’ is?” Amy blushes and ignores me. Her pace picks up as she pushes the cart away from me.
Eventually we find what we’re looking for. Amy points out hundreds of white tubes of different lengths and diameters. Every one of them is hollow, and Amy shows me how they can fit together. This might work!
Amy picks up a decent size tube. “How many meters do you think we’ll need, anyway?” I blankly stare at her. “Oh, right, what units do you use to measure distance?” My face flushes as I avoid her disbelieving gaze. “You’ve got to be kidding me. What exactly do you know about your own world?” She snorts at me. “Anyways.” She reaches over and picks up a shorter tube. “This is a meter.”
I look the length over. “Well, we need to build a structure, so probably quite a bit.” She nods at me.
Amy leads me and a cart full of, in my opinion, too many PVC tubes to the counter. The man behind the counter looks at our cart and grimaces. He looks down at Amy with pleading eyes.
“Miss, can you just tell me how many meters are in there? I really don’t want to scan all those.” His voice reminds me of when Jet described what a lich sounds like.
Amy nods with a smile and rattles off a number. The man just shrugs and touches what Amy said is a ‘computer.’
“Alright, miss, that’ll be three hundred.” My eyes go wide at the number but Amy doesn’t flinch. She pulls a card out between her breasts and hands it to the lich. He looks disgusted but feeds it to the machine all the same. “All good.” He really doesn’t sound alive.
Another set of subway rides with an unwieldy bundle of pipes and we get back to Amy’s house. She had me run over to my body’s house earlier to tell its mother I’m working on a project with her.
We toss the PVC into the ‘laboratory’ and sit down.
Amy’s the first to talk. “Well… Now what?”
I frown. “I don’t know, I didn’t hear her say anything else useful.” My memories of the woman’s rants run through my head again. “Actually, she did say she needed something of Earth as a focus. Something still connected.” Amy groans loudly.
She pouts. “How the hell are we supposed to get something from the place we’re trying to get?” She has a point. We don’t have anything from there, except my memories. Wait.
“Magic!” I feel excitement run through me. “What if we used my magic? I don’t think it’s from Earth, maybe that’ll work? But we need a physical form to work with.” I sit back down. The only physical form of magic back home I know of is monster crystals. “Amy, do you have any white crystals?” I look over at her.
She gives me a sad smile. “Oh, yeah, plenty.” She leaves for a few minutes before returning with a box. She dumps it out on the ground. Hundreds of pieces of jewelry flood the floor, all having nothing but white and clear gems. “My Dad always buys me this junk. Says it’s diamonds, but it’s just quartz.” She sighs. “I don’t get why he bothers, maybe he thinks I’m just that stupid? It’s not like he can’t afford diamonds, either…”
I pick up one of the rings and look closely at the small gem. My mind drifts inward, to the whirling mass of different magics filling me. Instead of splitting off the necessary magics I need for a spell, I try the opposite. I try and direct a small part of the whole storm.
Instantly the mental strain is almost unbearable. Managing multiple magics is nothing compared to this. Sparks crackle on my skin as I slowly push the magic out into the world. The second it hits the air the almost alive worm of magic tries to run rampant. Mentally grabbing it, I roughly shove it into the small gem in the ring.
The crystal holds, swallowing the magic with shocking ease. Ravenously devouring the stream of power, the gem takes almost a whole minute to fill. I instantly realize when it’s full, because the mental strain returns. I wrestle the remaining magic back inside me. The pale white crystal now glows with every color without becoming muddled.
Smiling, I turn to Amy, feeling my chest fill with pride. Her mouth is hanging open in shock. She closes it with a ‘clop’ sound. I start laughing, loudly. Soon the two of us are laying down, almost to tears over the stupid sound she just made. For the first time since I woke up here my heart feels light.
