Naaba–Home of the Croux–three billion dead–Tsunami from a controlled meteor.

-Page six

 

“Are you sure it is wise to answer his questions? For all we know, he is some… spy or something.” Athea asked Marrin.

“By that logic, for all we know, he is here to help us against the empire.” He retorted.

She crossed her arms and glared back at him.

“You know what I mean. Don’t be an ass.” She told him.

“I know, and I’m sorry, but this man risked his life to save one of ours.” He spoke.

“Yeah, but that was probably only to save his life.” She shot back.

“Athea, he saved Camilla after he found us. I saw this man running through the mob of Butchers with her on his back. He is a hero.”

“More like an idiot.”

“That’s a little rude.” I whispered. “That idiot is still sitting here.” I said, irritated.

Her crossed-arm glare fell on me… again. And I felt as small as an ant.

“I am going on the record saying that I disagree with all this.” She said to us both.

“You always say that…” Marrin said. “There is no recor…”

“I know, there is no record…” Athea cut him off.

The large man turned his gaze from me and back to the diminutive woman.

“Now, remove it, will you please?” He ordered her.

“Remove what?” I asked.

“That is a bad idea. He had a limiter for a reason.” She explained.

“Limiter?”

“Athea, tell you what. If we find out he lied to us at all, then you can kill him yourself,” Marrin said with a smirk.

I groaned, seeing her eyebrows raising in intrigue.

“I won’t kill him. But… perhaps some excruciating torture?” she asked with a scary amount of glee in her tone.

“Should I have stayed down there with the Butchers?” I asked.

“No torturing. Didn’t you learn your lesson after that last time?” Marrin asked.

“Nope.” She replied.

“And none of the times earlier?” He asked again.

“Nah.”

“Aren’t you the Mender or something?” I asked Athea.

“Healers make the best interrogators.” She replied.

Athea’s hand flicked behind me with unfeasible speed. Like a bolt of lightning, it was there, then it wasn’t. What remained was a faint image in the corneas, and it left me feeling quite unwell. My stomach was turning, like a hurricane tucked inside in gut. Dizziness came over me so heavily that I nearly fell from the table. I only remained thanks to Athea, resting her hand on my chest, stabilizing me. After a good minute, I saw Athea had something in her hand, tossing it up and down casually. Then I felt the pain ebbing from my back.

“What the hell!”

I reached back, but it was in that spot. That one spot that you can’t reach any way you try. The area throbbed with a dull, pulsating pain that hurt just enough to be annoying. What made it worse was the skin around where she stabbed him; it was now warm and excruciatingly itchy, at least I could reach there.

“Relax.” She spoke.

A loud clang rang out as she tossed the something on the table beside me. It looked like a giant bloody tack. Looking like a large tack, four inches of a bloody stem attached to a large circular head. It rolled back and forth, scratching into the surface of the table.

“You just stabbed me?” I accused the small woman.

She shook her head like I was the idiot, then walked out of the room.

“What the hell was that?” I asked. “What the hell is that?”

“Boy, she didn’t stab you. You had that in you this entire time.” Marrin said.

Heavier than expected, the pin weighed a good five pounds. Even stranger was that nearly all the weight was focused solely on the tip. I balanced it longways by the tip, it looked like some odd magic trick. When doing it, I spotted that the bloody tip was no longer bloody… strange.

“What is it?” I asked.

“It is a limiter.” He explained.

I looked up with a flat glare, waiting for an answer.

“It blocks out artifact power. It breaks the connection between the soul and the magic.” He explained.

“Magic?” I asked, rolling my eyes.

“Well… not magic. That is just a common name.” He said.

“What is it then?” I asked.

“Not magic.” He replied.

I gave him another flat stare, then he snorted.

“All right, I’m sorry. No, it’s not magic. It’s some highly technical technology.” He said mysteriously. “Please don’t bother me with my use of verbiage; honestly, I know nothing. No one does. We’ve been able to incorporate nanites into our bodies that give us strength, speed and more.”

“More?”

“Yeah, more. Shit like this.”

Marrin lifted his hand. Liquid metal flowed from his bare chest, forming into a thick gauntlet. Forming it into a fist, creating a flash of light, and suddenly, there was a brilliant four-foot shield strikingly similar to a templar. A kite shaped and a brilliant white, restless nanites flowed around it in a loose shape of a maroon cross.

“Huh.” That was all I could say.

“Our Hud allows us to customize our bodies, basically. We get assigned into classes and… yeah.” He explained.

“You… was that what you were talking about earlier? You said that you were a Tank. Athea was a… a Mender?” I asked.

“Yeah, I could sense you were not following what I said then. Now it makes sense.” He said.

“And what are those things? A Mender heals?

“Yeah…”

He trailed off as Marrin gazed at the two unconscious people at my side. I looked over at the two and then back at the large man.

“Everything all right?”

“Hmm? Yeah… I’m just thinking about how Athea was scolding us to bring them in here, then she doesn’t do a single thing to help them…” he said.

“Fuck you!”

We heard her muffled voice come from behind the metal wall.

“Are you… ARE YOU SIX? I can’t believe my daughter married her…”

With that, a few puzzle pieces fell into place.

“Anyways…” he sighed. “I am a Tank. It’s mostly self-explanatory. Earlier, I mentioned that I was focused. That means that I am a straightforward Tank. I soak up damage and dish out crowd control. In my biased opinion, it is the most useful of the Tanks. Those who try to get all fancy get people killed.” He said.

“Why is that?” I asked.

“Well, without going into too much detail, simplicity is the answer for most things. Many kids get their artifacts and jump into high-skill classes and subclasses. It’s flashy, and honestly, the most powerful beings in the empire are offtakes from highly skilled classes. What people don’t realize is that ninety-nine people die for that one that made it strong.”

The more I listened to him, the more it sounded like he told me a story from some old fantasy book. It sounded fantastical and belonged alongside wizards, orcs, and elves. I would have laughed at the man’s face and walked away if not for two things. First, the shield he appeared to conjure from the air. I could not explain that. Second, the evil creatures they called Butchers. I couldn’t remember much, but the simple idea of those things existing was preposterous.

“And the others?” I asked.

“How about I tell you about the basic classes before we go into more detail?”

I nodded.

“Beside the Tank, there is Mender. They are like healers but don’t tell them that, or they will talk your ear off on how they’re so much more than just healers. Don’t piss them off because they are in charge of keeping you alive. Some you will see in combat, but mostly avoid it like a Stray to a plague. Some can fight in need, though Athea is a bit strange. Most heal and can fight if required. She is Brawler type but focuses on healing, buffs, debuffs, and crowd control.”

“All right, that makes sense. A Brawler? And what’s a Stray?” I asked.

“You are a Stray. Well, sort of. Stray is the common name for regs or norms. Anyone without Artifact Power, without Huds. That is roughly ninety-nine percent of the entire human population.”

“Why is that odd out here?”

“We will come back to that, friend.”

I nodded again. My neck was aching.

“So, a Brawler is serious damage and in your face. Once you get out in the world, you will see that these names are just generic titles for fighter types.” He said.

“There is no set thing for them?” I asked.

“Not at all. There is an incalculable number of abilities. Many are repeatable, but there are more that are unique. Customizing your Hud allows you to narrow your abilities to a certain class type, but there is an element of randomness. Though the common opinion is that the Hud builds you around what you are best fit for. Abilities get stronger and more complex as you rank up, so sometimes, something may seem weak and lame. When they rank up, you’ll tend to change your mind. Many times, the weak stuff in the early ranks tends to be a high skill and high reward abilities later on.”

“All right. What is a Gunsmith and Swordsmith?”

“Same thing, actually. A Weaponsmith is a class. Sam is a classic Gunsmith, all guns, more guns, and sometimes he uses other guns. He is simple stopping power. Camilla there…” he said, pointing toward the other unconscious one. “Is the same class but the opposite. She and Mika are both technically Swordsmith Weaponsmiths. Camilla uses two swords, while Mika uses a single two-handed axe. Both are high-skill, high-damage classes. Crushers are among the rarest classes you will see, which is why I deal with Deckel shit so much. They are probably the quickest on their feet, have the highest mental stats, and just… well, they’re just good at everything, which makes them cocky and annoying as crap. They also have the widest range of skills as a class goes. Deckel uses a mixture of abilities with a variety of unique guns and blades. They are powerful, but like I said before, high skill with high reward. Other than that, there are Casters. We don’t have any, though that is not from lack of trying. Casters are the rarest class. They are what they sound like. In fact, the common descriptor of magic comes specifically from them. Their Huds tend to build them up in gaudy armor and give them arcane and elemental abilities. While all the rest use the nanites to form their weapons to abilities, Casters are a complete mystery.”

“Got it. So, what is a Hud?” I asked. “You never explained that.”

The large man nodded to himself and then continued his explanations.

“Huds… well, they’re the controller for the Artifact Power. I didn’t understand how you never knew what it was because the idea of a Stray here is… well… it is unlikely. But the Hud is the common name for the interface. It allows you to see your stats, build yourself how you want to, and make parties. It appears to each person differently, but for most, it is a tablet or screen that only they can see. There is a micro screen that is in my special view, but when I have my shields summoned…” he shook the massive wall attached to his arm. “I can gather much more information than just the micro screen shows me. ” He said.

“You said earlier that an ability evolved? When were you blinded?” I asked.

“Mhmm. That may be too much, but your Hud can change itself for you. That sounds like an unsatisfactory explanation, but that is exactly it. You see it more on Huds with higher mental skills, which I do. I am a great example; I was blinded where healing couldn’t help. One of my abilities evolved. It was a passive ability that allowed me to see how my parties’ physical states were doing in the middle of combat. When it evolved, I could now passively absorb the Artifact Power around me. It is powerful in combat, but now it is a little lack luster. I am hoping at a higher rank I can see normally again.”

“Interesting. Now, where or how do you get the Artifact powers?” I asked.

“You…”

“Yes, I really don’t know…” I interrupted.

He snorted, then continued.

“I don’t know much; like I said, it’s some form of tech. It’s a small device that bonds with each of us.”

As he explained this, he gestured to a small lump above his heart that I hadn’t noticed earlier. He placed his hand below the lump and the skin split open, not spilling a drop of blood. A small beetle-like creature jumped out and into his hand. Circular, like a dung beetle, and only about half an inch around. It skittered around his palm, then paused, staring at me. The little critter surprised me as I leaned forward to get a better look. It consisted of tiny, layered plates, gears, and wires.

“This is a Hud. Each of us has one. If you were to look inside our bodies, you would see that these little beauties are the controllers of our powers. Our nervous system, skeletal system, muscular, cognitive, and so on are all connected through this little fella.”

He lifted it up, and the Hud jumped back onto his chest. It crawled around and back into the cavity. The skin sealed up, leaving behind unblemished skin under a small lump.

"Your abilities become limited when you are in that state. Though your increased strength, speed, and cognition will remain, you will be limited in your capabilities. But speaking of being limited, you had that limiter in your back.” He said, looking down at the spike.

I felt my chest and no lump from one of those beetles Huds.

“Yeah, the limiters, they block the Artifact powers. But I don’t have any.” I told him.

“Yes, which begs the question of why you had one. There are stories of some ancient human races with an innate power that the limiters would suppress, but that is more fable than history.”

I thought about that momentarily, returning to the bloody hell in the heart of the Butchers. I was… I am stronger than an average human; that was obvious. I could fight in ways I could not explain; it was like my body worked faster than I could think and did things with such agility that it ranged on the superhuman. But now, I see that they’re actually superhumans. Besides all that, what stuck out the most was the simple fact of my healing that I had to have. Now, I’m not sure if I died, but the Butcher did tear out my throat, not to mention that Camilla blew a hole in my shoulder, barely slowing me down.

“Marrin?”

“Yes?”

Having no memories, I paused, unsure if I should tell him, but the simple fact was that I was lost.

“Do you have a knife?”