Chapter 39- Aftermath

Arthur woke up in an unfamiliar room, in a bed that wasn't his. He panicked for a moment, before remembering what had happened. They had challenged the lizard, things had gone terribly wrong and Arthur had somehow managed to defeat it, though his recollections of that event were still a little fuzzy.

And then Arthur had finally passed out after the ordeal from the lash back of consuming so many potions in such a short time frame, or maybe it had something to do with his distorted memories of the fight. He was already pretty certain he knew what the cause of his strange mental state had been, and he could only pray that his other titles didn’t have some strange side effects like making him think, or rather not think like he was an actual fucking animal.

That would mean that this was most likely Mira’s house, and she had probably brought him here to help him recuperate. He certainly felt better, if a little tired, and he looked down at his hands to see that they had been healed, the flesh now perfect and whole instead of the mangled mess it had been less than a day ago.

Arthur stretched and felt all his bones pop with a satisfying crunch as he sighed warily. He now had another problem to add to his quickly growing list, namely his half-breed title, and though he didn't want to, he’d have to get out of bed sooner or later to see what Mira was doing.

Getting to his feet, Arthur was glad they didn’t immediately give up on him. Walking slowly, his footing still unsure despite the hours it had been since he’d thrown his last kick, Arthur made his way out of the bedroom and down the stairs, taking a few moments to admire the Japanese-themed design of the place.

His journey took him towards the kitchen from where he could hear the sound of pans clanging together.

“Fuck.”

He heard Mira’s cursing just as he pushed open the door to see that she was in the process of spilling milk all over the floor. Looking at the absolute mess of the place and the cluttered cooking utensils, Arthur inferred that she had accomplished it whilst attempting to make breakfast.

It was obvious that Mira had no experience in the kitchen.

“Good morning.”

Arthur greeted Mira with false cheer, unsure of what else to say to the woman he knew so little about. Actually, I feel like I'm starting to understand her a bit. 

“There's nothing bloody good about it,” she muttered under her breath, but the words were perfectly clear in Arthur's ears.

“So you're finally awake.” She met his eyes, smiling at him.

“Took you long enough to stop lazing around.”

Arthur chose to remain silent instead of deigning that statement with a reply and moved to start cleaning up the mess around him. He wasn't a clean freak or anything of the sort, but it almost physically hurt him to see the absolute disarray around him.

It was like a group of monkeys had been locked in the room for a day and this was how they’d left it when they’d finally been let out. Mira let him work in silence for a bit before speaking.

“Is that it? No questions about what I used the monster's blood for, or the core I found inside of it.”

Arthur paused involuntarily at the mention of a core. If it came from a level 200 monster, he wondered exactly how much he’d be able to gain from consuming it whilst comparatively being at such a low level. He kept the greed out of his face however and tried to look as nonchalant as possible. He would gain nothing from letting Mira know how useful they were to him.

“I figured you’d tell me if you wanted to.”

He looked at Mira, who had an amused smile on her face as she shook her head in confused exasperation.

"You can stop trying to hide your green eyes. You look like you're trying to fart discreetly. I already know you have use for the core."

“You know, I just can't figure you out. It's like you’re a different person at times, sometimes a friendly, carefree idiot fresh out of adolescence and at other times a calculating, cold and cynical old man.”

“Which one’s the real you? At least my bipolar personality has a purpose behind it. Yours not so much.”

Arthur took a moment to consider her question. It wasn't the first time someone told him his personality tended to flip out at times. Elizabeth had once even suggested he go and check whether he had a personality disorder. She’d said it as a joke, but it had hurt at the time.

“I guess both of them. It just depends on how comfortable I am with someone, the same as everyone else.”

His curiosity finally got the better of him and so he asked the question that had been on his mind since waking up.

“So, did the monster's blood work or not?”

Mira smiled, apparently pleased that he had finally asked the question.

“You’d already know if you identified me. You really didn’t go to the tutorial, did you? To forget something so basic.”

Arthur berated himself for not doing so earlier; it was a bad habit of his, always forgetting that the skill existed. After using identify, however, he was left with just as many questions as he had received answers.

Human (Evolved Rank E) level 85- A human who has surpassed the limitations of her species, she has begun to touch upon the inherent powers that lie within her.

He could see that the elixir she had made had no doubt worked wonders as she had now evolved to rank E, but he didn't understand what was meant by the ‘Inherent powers’ that her description mentioned. Mira must have noticed the puzzled look on his face because she answered the question that was on the tip of his tongue.

“It’s called a trait, and before you ask; no I don't know what they are or what they do, except that they exist and are extremely useful. It's why I got into all this trouble in the first place, trying to acquire one. It means I'm special now, like you.”

Arthur listened to her vague explanation, before deciding to drop the subject.

Mira claimed to not even know what they were and even if she was lying, he didn't want to wheedle the information out of her. Besides, his plate was already overflowing with skills and monster cores to acquire without having an extra thing to worry about. Though he did add it to his ‘things I need to check out' list.

“So I guess the draconic blood worked then.”

Arthur returned the topic to its original discussion instead. Mira looked surprised for a moment that he had ceased to ask questions regarding traits but then replied.

“Yes, it did.”

“Thanks to you, even if you almost gave me a heart attack. You went off script and decided to duke it out with the Liverthion all on your lonesome. But I'm still alive so I guess I can’t complain. And I WILL do everything I can to repay the favour.”

She strongly emphasised that statement.

“That's what I wanted to talk to you about, actually. I need to teach you my alchemy and resurgence skills. I suspect alchemy will be much more difficult of the two to learn as mine is based around poison whereas you’ll have to adapt the skill a little to fall under healing.”

"The most important thing, I guess, is that level 2 system access you want. Here it is."

She clicked her fingers and suddenly a small piece of parchment appeared between them. It was a golden-yellow-looking colour and completely unassuming, something he'd use to doodle on. She handed it over to him.

"Put some Ether into it and you should get a notification."

Arthur did as asked and almost dropped it when he saw the flowing golden script appear in front of his eyes instead of the standard blue system text.

Congratulations!

You are now the lucky holder of Ascension ticket 04. Hold it for 6 more hours to cash it in.

Reward:

An anonymous teleport to a [Serako] funded assembly where you'll be introduced to key concepts of class building and your place in the wider universe. Career advice will also be given and there will be a Q&A session with one of our finest employees. Your identity shall be protected throughout.

As one of the ten golden ticket holders, you may use it to redeem a system level-up or other Reward/s which will be displayed at the venue.

We eagerly await your arrival.

Arthur's eyebrow raised as he read through the flamboyant text.

"I know," Mira groaned. "They need to fire the idiot that designed that. And no, before you ask, I don't know any more than you do. All I have left is to teach you some alchemy."

Arthur nodded his head as he put the paper away. Instead of going into his pocket, it disappeared and left a faded insignia on his palm. So that's where Mira got it from. She doesn't have a storage device. Or does she?

He had a lot of skills he’d have to learn, from both Frank and Mira, and he wasn't sure exactly how long it would take. It could be anything from a week of dedicated study to an entire year. He just wasn't sure. Mira began talking again.

“If it's okay with you, I think it's best that we start the process next week, on Monday. It’ll give both of us the time to prepare ourselves and I suspect that you’ll need a break after the fight with the lizard just as much as I do after evolving for the second time. Plus you'll get a acclimate with any changes your tier 2 system will bring.”

Arthur considered her proposition. Frank had said the same thing, that they should wait a week before trying to learn anything so that he could better prepare himself for the teaching process. Arthur had agreed, though reluctantly, that it was a sound idea. He couldn’t be impatient. They’d get nowhere if neither of them knew what to do.

Now Mira was proposing the same course of action, and while Arthur was itching to learn some new skills. He could wait for a week. Plus he suspected he’d be extremely busy shortly if his predictions for the Zaibatsu corporation were anywhere close to what they had planned for him. Or maybe he was just overestimating his self-worth. Will they come looking for me or have they found someone else?

Arthur finally voiced his opinions.

“Sure, I can wait a week before doing anything.”

Mira sighed in relief when Arthur agreed with her plan. Though she looked completely fine, she wasn't ready to even go close to anything ether related for a while yet. Nothing was wrong with her body anymore thankfully, but she thought that it was in her best interests to at least rest for a while before using magic of any sort. Now she just needed to do some damage control.

"Arthur. I'd like to apologise. Maybe I could've come up with some bullshit excuse instead, but I think honesty is the best policy going forwards. I know. The words sound so shallow and fake coming from my mouth, dripping in deceit, and I can't judge you if you think that's the case."

"But if there's one thing you can trust, it's my selfishness. I'm self-serving. You're too valuable an ally for me to lose. You can trust me to never..." 

Mira's words trailed off into mutterings that Arthur could barely perceive. She shook her head as if steeling herself for something.

"Fuck it. I can't believe I'm falling into bad habits again. I really need to learn to just own up sometimes."

"I lied to you. The chains of servitude aren't what I led you to believe. They're not some sick mind-control tool or anything. I fed into your paranoia and told you some anti-system propaganda. The chains prevent the use of unstructured magic. Sure some idiots will tell you that it's all a conspiracy for control but they're filled with shit. They just-"

Arthur raised his hand to cut her off. 

"I figured you were lying to me. It became pretty obviouse after I thought about it for a bit."

"What? How?! Then why did you still help me?"

"Because I'd already agreed to. A deal's a deal, even if I made it under false pretences. I could have left you out to dry but then I'd be a hypocrite. I've made plenty of transactions by letting people feed into their fears. Sometimes you're the conman, sometimes you get conned. 

"That's life. And I can hardly say I'm getting a bad deal here."

Mira looked at him in shock. Genuine shock, not the weird act she usually put on.

"You're not reacting like I thought you would. I... I honestly don't know what to say."

"Well, coming clean was a great start." Arthur smiled. "And your apology wasn't so bad."

The smile dropped from his face.

"That's not to say it's a clean slate. You started this relationship by betraying my trust, what little I had for you in the first place. It's going to be difficult to get that back, if ever."

Mira frowned but nodded her head in agreement.

"Yes, that makes sense. I can get behind that. I can hardly expect you to forgive me so easily. But still. I'm wondering. How exactly did you figure out I was lying to you? You're smart, I'll give you that. But obvious? Are you sure you're not exaggerating things?

Well, I wasn't a hundred percent certain until after the fight. But I'm not imagining things. There are significantly fewer chains present on my soul since I levelled up. Since I grew stronger. But there's no reason to tell her that.

"Well, it just took a little critical thinking to realise that the system you painted just wouldn't work. Sure the chains sound great on paper but they'd fail in practice. With all the planets the system's integrated since its inception, I find it hard to believe that a single planet wouldn't start a rebellion. All it would take is one outstanding individual to start the spark of revolution. One individual out of TRILLIONS integrated. That's not to mention all the existing tier two and three worlds. Sure, some people might be dick heads, but everyone? That just doesn't make sense. People would never stand for that sort of abuse."

Mira scratched her head sheepishly. 

"Well, when you put it like that, it makes it sound so stupid I guess. Thank god you don't feed into that bulllshit." 

She smiled. 

“I'm glad you agree with me. Now that just leaves the monster core to deal with.”