Chapter 711 - No ill will

“Who is your Handler?” I ask Brich while waving at Victoria, who sees me and gestures that she will join us soon.

“No one well known, just one of the newer Handlers I got assigned to.”

“Didn’t try to change your Handler?”

Brich shakes his head wide. “I won’t. She was always nice to me and did her best. There were some more powerful ones showing interest later, even my guild tried to get me to change, but it isn’t happening. Do you think it is stupid for me to want to stay with her as Handler?”

“Why would you care what I think? Just do what you want. As for me, I honestly think it is a little bit cool.”

“You! I declare you my favorite A rank currently! And it isn’t only because of "black mana."” My voice slides in, filtering out the two words, and I start to wonder if this is the most genius thing I've ever done.

So far.

“So what is your plan with the sword?” I ask.

“Reverse engineering. We have some information on Ego items, but none of us has seen one with our own eyes. So the usual stuff! Eldrin, Isolde, and Silverweave want to examine it, while I will be carrying it and continuing to try to bond with it. It is surprisingly difficult, but possible for Ego weapons, even though Calvorn is quite powerful in the category. Plus, its devouring abilities are interesting in their own way.”

“Powerful enough to sacrifice a low pristine item for?” I ask, repeating what I heard from Weslin.

Brich nods excitedly and reaches out to his back to tap on the sealed sword. “Even multiple ones! I might even get them to offer you a low pristine item for a chance to study your "black mana" in detail. They’ll probably say no, pristine items are really hard to get, but I will try. If you were from a guild outside the top 10, they would probably ask me to kidnap you, but no one seems to want to mess with Primordial Knights currently!”

“Why the fuck does every guild in the top 5 seem to be fond of kidnapping? And why not? Because of Nyssa?”

“Especially her! But Morwag is also… unpredictable, and I talked to my guild and they think there is a high chance the Doc works on you as well. Stealing his test subjects, generally speaking, is not a good idea. You could even say it’s a really shitty idea.”

“They are scared of that Catboy?

"Very much so! Maybe even more than Morwag. You should be worried too. Eldrin and the others are attendees, but we all heard enough from our local guild members to be careful around anything connected to that guy. I heard that a hundred years ago, he tampered with the climate control in the headquarters of a top 20 guild, locked them all in, and basically fried them alive. Because they tried to steal his blueprints!”

Brich laughs at that and continues to blabber, “Then, about two hundred years ago, he was suspected of killing an S-rank with a rare metal that turned out to be toxic. They think Doc sold the stuff to the crafters’ guild through one of his contacts, and the guild used it to make an item for that S rank. The metal slowly corroded and released trace toxins into his bloodstream. The poor guy didn’t even make it to the end of his tutorial before it killed him. Apparently, all because that S-rank used to be with the Primordial Knights only so he could get an implant from Doc. Once he got it, he bailed without sharing any info about how the implant performed."

This time, I decide to stay quiet and not say out loud that to me it all seems somewhat reasonable.

That is when Victoria joins us, carrying a small plate of snacks she offers me. “You should eat some, Nathaniel, you must be hungry. Did you drink some water too?” she asks instead of greeting.

“Thanks!” I grab a few snacks and nod. “Of course I drank water, you know my head hurts when I don’t have enough liquids.”

“Good.” She nods seriously and turns to Brich. “Greetings. Allow me to extend the greeting to the Crimson Forge as well and tell you I bear no ill will against you for what happened during the event.”

Shaking her hand, Brich nods. “That’s good! There are some people who take these things too seriously and cannot let go of their ego. It is silly and it twists thinking, after all, not everything can go according to your wishes.”

Victoria nods in agreement. “Such emotions only ruin opportunities and murk logical thinking. I have heard you telling my brother about the Doctor. Knowing him, he was not aware of any of it.”

“Oh, he is one of those?” Brich flicks his eyes between me and my sister.

“Yes,” Victoria said with a nod. “Though he is perceptive in certain matters, he can be completely blind to others. For example, his current reputation and the way that thing above his head makes it even more exaggerated.”

“It is on purpose, Vic,” I defend myself.

“This is an answer I expected of you, but what I said still stands, Nathaniel.”

“And is your reputation something you are aware of?” Brich joins the conversation. When Victoria looks his way, he smiles at her and then looks at me. “An Absolute candidate, future S rank all but confirmed. Someone with a skill so similar to The Last Elf, who is hunted on sight, and with a mind powerful enough to handle that skill. How rare. Tell me, Miss Victoria, wasn’t it just a month or two ago that an elite squad from Silent Veil tried to kidnap you for a client, but ended up dead despite all their preparation?”

Not skipping a beat, Victoria continues to look at him. “And wasn’t it just two months ago that Crimson Forge hired one of the well-known mercenary groups to kidnap and deliver a certain attendee?”

“Maybe. Why don’t we change the subject? Want to see someone fun?” Even though he is smiling, I can see that gleam in his eyes. All of what he just asked was to test Victoria in a way similar to what he did with me.

“Did you come here to steal something valuable?” I ask him.

Brich shakes his head. “Not this time, but I agree that would be fun! If you look at that thylarin gentleman in black near the balcony, the one talking to a thylarin woman, well, you would be looking at the Ruler of Wrath in one of his Vessels currently in Beyond. I think he has at least two more, a human and a lynthari.”

Both me and Victoria look that way, and as Brich said, a thylarin with six arms wearing entirely black clothes stands there calmly, talking to a thylarin woman. There are likely some people who recognize him, but like Greed, he seems to keep his identity secret. Though I would say Greed hides it to a bigger extent than him, as I have not met anyone who knew it was her.

Looking at him with us, Brich keeps talking, “After I got back to my guild, I started digging for information on that Christoph guy and used the guild’s funds to do it. If I’m right, the Ruler of Wrath is his Handler.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” I say while Victoria continues to examine the Vessel of the Ruler in the distance and glances at Brich as if to see if he is not lying.

“And you are telling this to us because?” she asks.

Turning just a bit less cheery and more serious, Brich answers, “Take it as a show of goodwill and a warning. I don’t think either of you is dumb, but that man who started in Beyond is very dangerous, from what I have seen. More than usual S ranks. And with Wrath behind him, I don’t know, man, I would be very careful to cross him.”

“It does not matter,” Victoria says simply and looks at me.

I nod as an understanding flashes between us. “Not at all.”

Looking at us Brich just shrugs. “That’s the spirit! I will make sure to use my guild's finances to buy all the information I can get on your tutorial, because this will surely be amusing.”

“Just give me shards and I will tell you,” I say.

Brich blinks, flashing a grin. “Hell yeah, I will.”

As if remembering it again, the lumoran reaches out with his hand and taps the surface of the crown floating over my head. I let him do it and observe curiously, while no longer holding back the crown.

The S rank and Absolute Candidate, as every other S rank, tries to fight back and stop the crown from absorbing his mana while trying to observe the process. He does it in a way similar to how I did long ago, by using his own mana to observe it, but he cannot. Any mana used for observation gets absorbed and does not let any information escape.

His mana starts to get pulled as well. Even though the crown is not made from that much mana, and so the pull should not be that strong, it is made through a combination of my high-leveled and high-graded skills as well as my growing mastery over it.

So I watch it absorb his mana. At first slowly, but quickly hastening as his mana is added to the black crown, strengthening it and making the absorption faster, strengthening the crown even more. Brich is stubborn and has that curiosity I always admire in people, so obviously, he continues to push, releasing more of his mana and pulling on some mana batteries on his body. It is fun to watch, even without doing anything on my own.

When the crown strengthens to the point it starts pulling on the mana around us, I jerk my head slightly forward, feeling a gentle slap on the back of my head.

Victoria looks at me wordlessly, and I start to realize the attention we are getting. It is something she does not mind that much, but at this point, it starts to become a disruption to the party.

Disappointed, I expend more effort and put the crown under my control again, stopping it from reaching for the mana surrounding us or taking more from Brich.

That lumoran looks at me with eyes wide open. “I do not consider myself untalented when it comes to handling mana, but I have to praise your mastery over it.” Reaching into his shirt, he then takes out an emptied mana battery and hands it to me. “As a thank-you for letting me indulge in my curiosity!”

I take it without hesitation, quickly checking its price in the system store. It shows at twenty thousand shards for me to sell, making it a low arcane.

“Do you want it?” I offer the stone to Victoria. I already have the mana batteries I saved from the Armory before the Ruler of Diligence buried it, and they should be better than this. Well, not like I won’t offer them to Vic as well.

She takes it from me, too. “Thanks. While I have no need for it, I can give it to Gloria, who will surely find use for it.”

“By the way, Brich, Lyraen isn’t where he stood before,” I say to the lumoran.

That makes him turn around wildly, searching for the floating vyssari. Even though he surely doesn’t believe he would be attacked here, he seems nervous.

“Why do you have Calvorn with you here?” I ask, ignoring all that. “Wouldn’t it be safer in the guild?”

For a moment, the man straightens up and, surprisingly, winks. “It would be.”

After that, he waves us off and leaves toward other people.

“They likely use it either as an opportunity to display the prize, Natty, or to have him serve as bait.”

I nod. “There are at least three people constantly watching Brich, but instead of ill will, it seems like it is for his protection, or whatever they are planning after the party,” I say.

With disappointment, I watch Brich leave, envying his exciting and chaotic life.

***

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