Chapter 655 - Of course

“Define ‘something’,” he says.

“Skin. Tissue. Blood. A few left arms? I don't know what you're looking for. No sedation. Nothing lethal. You look, I learn.” I gesture at his notebook. “I want all of your notes. And I will be asking a lot of questions.”

The branch leader raises an eyebrow. “I don’t think this is a good...”

The Doctor is already moving like he wants to cut me open right here.

“No sedation?” he says, almost breathless. “You’re letting me? Is this a trick?”

“I want information. I’m not afraid of needles.” I extend my left hand, palm up. There, I compress a bit of my mana, push further, and turn it into a tiny black orb.

The lynthari maniac's eyes gleam as he leans in so close it looks like he might touch it with his nose.

“If your skin tries to grow teeth, please warn me,” he whispers absentmindedly and puts on a different set of glasses. These ones are dark red.

He also takes out a small glass rod as long as his finger. It looks very fragile, and wisps of white smoke bounce inside of it.

With absurd care, he moves it closer towards the black orb. The white smoke inside of the rod turns darker, and he moves it even closer until it touches the orb hovering over the palm of my hand.

Then the rod shaped crystal cracks. The white smoke inside of it disappears and gets pulled inside the tiny black orb that grows a little from the surprising amount or quality of mana. Then the tool cracks more and snaps in half.

The Doctor stares at it.

“...Okay,” he whispers. “That’s new. There goes 200 thousand shards. Or was it 600 thousand?”

The Doctor stares, motionless, eyes wide.

After a while, he finally exhales. “I’m going to need a lab, a containment array, four extremely illegal grimoires, maybe a vyssari or two to sacrifice, and some assistant stupid enough to ask the right questions without dying halfway through. And I’ll need gloves. Better ones. Preferably made from the skin of anything at least distantly related to a wyvern. And maybe someone to kick me if I stare too long.”

Without waiting for an answer, he leaves and heads back to the lower floors, calling out and asking for someone to take him to the treasury.

As I begin cutting the black orb off from all mana to starve it out, the branch leader calls to me.

"I think we should quickly sign your contract before he finds out."

Just hearing those words starts draining the energy from me, and I call out to my current favorite intruder in my mind.

(Sophie, time to pay rent.)

(You know how I told you this part of me holds my dark impulses?)

(As if you're actually skilled enough to pull something like that off. Face it, you are just a simple copy of you, loaded with the memories you didn’t like.)

(Maybe I should take over your mind just to show you how wrong you are, Nat.)

(Go ahead. What do you think will happen if I manifest myself in my mind? I'll kick your self-pitying, sorry ass and drag you back to your body if I have to.)

(You're such a dick.)

(Heard that one before. At least try to be original.)

(Arghhh, for fuck’s sake. Fine. Let’s check out this contract these lunatics came up with.)

With her cooperation secured, I turn to the branch leader. "Let’s go, then."

"Great," the branch leader says with a smile, pointing me upstairs as we begin walking side by side. "I already have word from Sir Weslin, and thanks to Doc, Nyssa seems interested as well, so you can expect a decent offer. There’s no need for testing, but of course, you’ll have to fight for the best possible contract."

His heavy steps make the stairs groan, and his smile grows wider. "Ah, I love this part. Don’t you think signing contracts is like a fight? A clash of wills and wits, each side trying to gain an advantage. You wouldn’t believe how many contract variations I have. A few hundred years ago, the leader of the Primordial Knights at the time paid an insane amount of money to one of the best contract specialists to create templates for nearly every possible combination. For S-ranks, A-ranks, B-ranks, and lower. For people with one primordial energy, two, or rare monstrosities with three. And many more. These templates were all made with one intention: to secure the best possible deal for the guild. Do you know why?"

He stops, and I do too. I have to look up because of his height.

"To either entrap the sucker or make you fight against the guild?"

"Exactly!" he says with delight.

"Was that guy a demon?"

"The contract specialist? Surprisingly, yes. So was the guild master," he replies, starting to walk again. I follow. "Isn’t that a beautiful idea? So perfectly fitting for demons. If you are, as you said, a sucker, you’ll leave soon, and before that happens the Primordial Knights will squeeze as much value out of you as possible. But if you’re a proper member, you’ll push back, and you’ll keep challenging the guild. In the end, the one who is right is the one who proves stronger."

The longer he talks, the more my good impression of him fades. He may be part Velnar and part human, but his eyes gleam with the same maniacal shine I've seen in demons.

(Did these lazy lunatics really not change the contracts in who knows how many hundreds of years?) Sophie asks.

(I think it’s safe to say at this point that the contracts don’t matter all that much.)

We reach the office, and once we’re let inside, I sit down. Opposite me, behind a massive table, the branch leader takes his seat as well. He places a few smaller piles of papers on the table and smiles.

"Let’s start then."

***

I leave the office five hours later, holding a contract in my shaking hand. Sophie’s presence is gone, possibly dead after the fight we just went through. My body feels like it got run over by a bunch of Lily-shaped bulldozers, and there’s a constant ringing in my head.

Besides the contract, I’m also carrying multiple sets of white and pale blue clothes in different styles, so I can pick whichever suits me best.

With a one-year contract signed, a base salary of 500 thousand shards, and a myriad of performance bonuses tied to my rank, tutorial floor progression, beyond floor progression, and who knows what else.

I’ve officially become a member of the Primordial Knights.

The next goal is to stay here for some certifications. After that, I’ll be assigned a partner to start working on this floor’s quest, so I can finally enter the fourth one, where Nyssa can head up from the fifth to meet me.

But before that, there is the Doctor I want to meet.

***

POV Weslin

I return to Beyond exactly two weeks later, after just some usual checks on the 13th floor of the tutorial. But even now, there is no progress. The floor’s quest is just too messed up, and it makes complete sense why barely anyone is able to clear it before the end of the tutorial. The difficulty might not even be much lower than entering the 6th floor of Beyond.

I remember Nyssa telling me once that she could clear the 13th floor if she wanted, but that would mean finishing the tutorial and getting sent home. And of course, that maniac wants to enter the 6th floor of Beyond before that. As the second person in a thousand years after that guy, Adrian.

Demons…

But speaking of demons, I wonder how that maniac is doing. It should already be almost two weeks since he joined the guild. By now, he should have gone through some basic introductions, gotten some information, taken tests, and likely got assigned a partner. Maybe even a quest, though I'm not that sure. They probably just threw him onto the 3rd floor to clear the quest and move on to the 4th.

I appear in my room in the Black Tower, and it’s just as I left it.

There is no need to laze around, so I open the door only for it to hit someone I recognize.

“Oh, Sir Null King!” the man says with clear excitement, balancing a plate of food in his hand so it doesn’t fall. “What a nice coincidence.”

“You…”

“It’s Talon, Sir Null King!”

“Call me that again and-”

“And there will be consequences, surely! I apologize, but most people like it, so it stuck with me. Is Weslin okay?”

The speed with which he runs through thoughts and sentences clearly shows his entire intention was to talk to me using my name and create some sort of familiarity. Maybe even to make it seem like we’re close in front of others.

What a shrewd guy.

“What do you do here?” I ask him instead.

“Someone from the higher-ups liked my Primordial energy, so I got some preferential treatment!” he smiles. “Stellar Wind is rare! I also already shared some information from my status with the branch leader, so please don’t suspect I might be lying. Everyone thinks so already and…”

“Sure, sure,” I wave him off. “I have to go, so don’t annoy me.”

“Of course! Are you looking for that guy? Mana boy?”

There can only be one person he means by that. The way he says it, it’s like he thinks it’s something I’d want to know.

“Tell me,” I nudge him, feeling like I’ve lost against this guy.

“I came here just a few days ago, but I heard it’s already been a week since he got locked in the Doctor’s rooms in the basement, and no one has seen him since.”

“Well, whatever,” I pass by him, and I'm about to head to the branch leader for some information.

But somehow, I find myself turning right and heading downstairs toward the basement.

What the hell is that bastard doing?

***

A few minutes later, I find said bastard. He is sitting comfortably in a chair and, upon noticing me, looks me over with that familiar expression.

“Oh, hello, Weslin.”

“Hello, newbie.”

The Doc near him curses. “Control your mana more! It's biting at me.”

“Don’t be so dramatic, it isn’t biting anything,” the newbie says. “Just endure it a little. You will heal.”

The chair he is sitting on is made of a material I know is difficult to break, and very much so at that. His hands and legs are tied to it.

He is shirtless, but more than that, there is a hole cut into his chest, revealing his strongly beating heart behind the ribs, though it's located in a different place than where the heart is usually found. The skin is stretched by silver slats, and wires are moving from a nearby panel directly into the heart.

“Newbie. What the fuck.”

“You mean the fact I’m shirtless? I apologize, but it’s annoying and expensive to go through that many shirts, so…”

“Do you want to get beaten?”

“Not currently, but we can spar later for sure.” Then he jumps as a bit of golden flame washes over his heart. “The fuck are you doing, Doc?” he turns to the lynthari.

“Your natural defenses are so annoying! These working conditions are terrible too!”

“Happens,” the newbie says before turning back to me. “Did you know this crazy lynthari over here specializes in things called implants? Some of them are really interesting.”

“Obviously. I also know what usually happens to people who get them.”

Another wave of golden flames washes over his heart, and the newbie closes his eyes, letting out a painful groan he tries to suppress. A golden circle glows around his eyes as he looks at the Doc.

The Doc rushes to the panel and starts adjusting some settings while mumbling, “Yes. Yes. I know. I know. I know what I did wrong.”

Then the newbie turns back to me. “Of course, it’s not like I need more things to mess up my balance.”

“Your body is already beautifully messed up,” the Doctor nods in agreement, then runs back and stabs another needle into his beating heart instead of the one that had already melted.

Nathaniel ignores him. “And also, I don’t like to rely on items. Even though implants are technically items, they’re fascinating, and I can pick up a thing or two. And as crazy as this catboy is, he has some knowledge, so we’re trading.”

“I get to cut him and he gets some low level knowledge I’ve gathered!” The Doc agrees happily.

“Hell no. Mid to upper level, or you’ll never see black mana again.”

“Cheater!”

They keep talking, but by this point, I’m already halfway out of the basement.

After leaving the lab, I run into the branch leader’s assistant, who wordlessly hands me a piece of paper, my assignment. It seems word of my arrival has already spread.

I channel a bit of mana into the seal before opening the envelope, which would have burned if I hadn’t done that.

Inside, the assignment is laid out in simple terms, along with the name of my partner.

I glance down the hall toward the lab and groan.

Of course.

***

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