<blockquote>


    Victor Squared


    are you really okay?


    i mean if you cant say anything abt what happened then its kinda suspect


    kansai


    type “i love kotone” if youre being held hostage


    Alexander


    It’s a complicated situation but I’m not in any danger


    Cultivator


    Are you sure? You *are* notorious for attracting needless trouble.


    Alexander


    I’m alright dw


    </blockquote>


    Someone knocked, interrupting my exciting conversation with the worrywarts back home. “Shen, it’s Empress.”


    Of all people I’d expect to bug me, she was near the bottom on my list. Either she drew the shortest stick or someone was holding a proverbial gun to her noggin.


    I dropped my phone on my lap. “What is it?”


    “I come bearing gifts,” she said, then paused for a moment. “And news. Mostly news.”


    Heh, she probably said the last part expecting I’d deny her. What was I going to do? Scream and shout at her? Maybe hop out of bed and flop dead on the floor? Fun ideas, but they would stay ideas.


    “Don’t be a stranger,” I said.


    Empress let herself inside, bringing in snacks and sugary drinks—the most dastardly contraband. She smiled briefly before turning on the isolation bubble, making sure our conversation would stay within these walls. She grabbed a chair, sat next to me, and put the basket down in arms reach.


    Our positions couldn’t be more reversed compared to when we first met. I had pinned her against the wall using my wit, now I was pinned to a bed thanks to my emotions. Definition of irony right there.


    “How—?”


    “Fantastic,” I answered her question before she could spit out another word. “My whole fucking life got turned upside down because of you people, so much that my heart couldn’t take it. Thanks.”


    Empress flipped from pity to guilt, and a knife turned inside my stomach.


    I looked at my dead legs and breathed. “I’m, erm, sorry. I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to lash out like that. I think we both know the answer to your question, but I’ll humor a conversation: I feel like shit inside and out.”


    “Yeah, that’s what I figured…” Empress glanced at the TV which absently played a random sitcom for background noise. She looked outside the window. She was staring at everything besides me. “Your reaction’s completely justified. I mean, extradimensional monster, having your big secret out in the open, that’s a lot for a person. Too much.”


    Understatement of the century. Being injured and having anxiety weren’t good for your body. Since I came to, I’d been wracking my head about how Sophos appraised my SSS-Rank [Skill]. I already figured out when and how: First Wave, when she had touched my chest and ended the conversation afterwards.


    Slayer System offered privacy and security that made politicians weep (in fact, multiple governments had tried enforcing a [Skill] registry to no avail). It was impossible to peek into someone’s [Profile]—let alone an [Unregistered] user like myself—and gain details about their [Skills], their wallet, their [Fabel Ranking] stats, and so on. Appraisal-type [Skills] didn’t have that capability. For Sophos to blatantly bypass the System’s security, she had to bypass the Planet itself…


    “How?” I asked Empress. “How did Sophos know about my [Skill]?”


    Empress tiredly laughed and leaned back in her chair. “It’s cosmo, but from what I understood, her appraisal power is tied to [Original Magic], and that is directly tied to the Planet. That’s how she went around the System.”


    God, the odds were so terrible that I had to laugh. Of all people, of all people in the entire world, I encountered the one midget with the exact powerset to expose me.


    There was one consolation to this mess. My dramatics had shifted the attention onto me, which meant the GMs would ignore Thea. However, I hadn’t spoken with her or Uncle since I woke up. For the second time I mean. They were likely arguing with the GMs about our future, so the content of their conversation was lost on me. Also probably why Empress decided to pester me—


    Something brushed the side of my neck. I flinched, and the sudden movement made everything ache again and I groaned.


    Empress pulled her arm back, retracting a bag of mini-cookies. “Sorry. I thought cookies would cheer you up. Plus, it’d be a waste to leave free snacks unopened.”


    It took guts to guilt-trip a mental patient, but alright. I’d be a dick to turn her down. “Fine,” I said.


    She opened and handed the cookies to me, how kind. “Now, truth be told, I lied a little about the news.”


    “Huh?” I blubbered, mouth full of sugar and chocolate.


    She plucked sour cream and vinegar for herself. Disgusting. “There’s none! Discussions stalled completely, but everyone’s stuck in the same room until they come to a compromise. That includes your sister, who asked me to visit you.”


    I brushed crumbs off my gown. “I’m guessing my uncle’s playing hardball.”


    “That’s…” Empress laughed, and that was a laugh of insanity. “He’s raising hell for you. I’d never seen a mil fight two Guild Masters. Normally, all the mils I meet are either pushovers or assholes. Your uncle, though? He’s…”


    “Different? Freakish? Terrifying?”


    “And more. He made Sophos shrink into her shoulders. Sophos! I… Gosh, now I understand how you threatened Glory without batting an eye.”


    I chomped down on a cookie. “Fighting above our weight class runs in our family.”


    One of her hands drifted to her stomach. She didn’t immediately respond. Surely, she was thinking about Flow Reversal but kept the obvious question locked tight. Even if it was out of harmless curiosity. That, however, was a stark reminder of my crimes. I’d used an Anti-Slayer Technique on her, attacked her, tried riddling her with holes and caving her head in. When she first walked through the door, I spat acid in her face. Hell, when I woke up for the first time, an apology was the furthest thing from my mind.


    It took a special idiot to bring a goody basket to the maniac who’d tried killing them.


    It took a bigger and worse idiot to pretend it never happened, all because he was feeling a little sad.


    “Shen—”


    “I’m sorry,” the words came out. I wasn’t thinking. Apologies, genuine apologies, had to be thoughtful. Intentional. Already fucked that up, and I was biting down the urge to not slap myself in front of the nice murim-in lady.


    Empress raised an eyebrow, confused.


    I took a deep breath and started again, “I want to apologize, Empress, for what happened last night. It was stupid and psychotic, call it what you want. You have every right to be pissed and screaming at me—”


    She put her hands up. “I’m not gonna do that—”


    “I tried killing you.” (“That’s not what happened—”) “I wanted to hurt you badly, I don’t care, the facts are right there. My emotions got the better of me and I freaked out; that’s the best way I could’ve phrased it. Fortunately, karma came around, and now, look at me. I’m so pale that I qualify to be a ghost.”


    Empress gestured at my sorry state. “I wouldn’t call this ‘karma’—” (“Consequences.”) “—shut up. You got hurt under my watch. I don’t care if you made it difficult; my mission was to protect you.”


    I felt plastic crinkling underneath my arm. My cookies. I put them aside. “Doesn’t make up for the fact that I was out-of-line. Go ahead and mock me all you want; hell, punch me while you’re at it. It’s the least I deserve.”


    “Really?” Empress threw her chips aside too, looking and sounding a little too eager about my sarcastic offer. “Let’s say I do it. Hard as I want, no holding back. Will this make us even?”


    Looks like I dug myself a hole, but I wasn’t in a position to fight Empress. Not this time. I exhaled, the air whistling through my teeth. “You’ll have to explain to the nun, but take your best shot.”


    “In that case.” She stood and clenched her fist. I expected a quick blow to the skull or to the leg—something that would make me cry—but instead, the punch was like a mom and an airplane. It tapped my shoulder and it was barely a touch. “Now we’re even.”


    I looked at her fist, then at her. “Empress—”


    She retracted her hand. “We’re even. In fact, we’re more than even. We’re starting from scratch. Hi, my name’s Leona Ryu, or Ryu Gyeong-hui (???), and I enjoy sleeping, long walks in the park, and reading philosophical treatises.”


    I kept looking at her.


    Empress cleared her throat and turned away, a little pink staining her cheeks. “At least go along with the joke. Use your big head and pretend I don’t work for Angels. I’m just an acquaintance who’s worried about you. I mean it. You’ve been through a lot, and your next steps aren’t that clear.”This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.


    A part of me immediately thought she was prying for additional intel, maybe to tip the scales in her bosses’ favor. Angels had protected us but they didn’t have our best interests at heart. Hell, maybe they planted a bug in the room to record every dirty secret. Or Empress, knowing how vulnerable I was, lied about Thea asking her in an attempt to lower my guard.


    These were crazy, paranoid thoughts. I was doubting my sanity more and more as Empress continued to sit quietly in her chair, smiling at me like everything was going to be just fine.


    Empress glanced toward the door. “I won’t force you to say anything. You can kick me out anytime you want.”


    “No, it’s fine, just…” I shrugged, too hard at that and made my shoulders ache. “I don’t know what’s next. Before, as long as we kept to ourselves and avoided some places, we’d be okay. That’s why we moved to Ordo.”


    “So you didn’t stay in America?” she asked, leaning against the bed’s armrest.


    I laughed; I wanted to sound amused but I think I sounded depressed more than anything. “You did your research on me. You think I want to stay after riding through Oasisgate and the Riots? Plus, we aren’t on friendly terms with the Legends, and… And well, my uncle had unfinished business in the States. I didn’t want to get in the way of that.”


    “Guess we have that in common.” Empress winked. “Better here than Korea. Too many bad memories, bad people, bad everything. Where, though? If you’re leaving the Capital behind.”


    “Fuck if I know. I—God, even if we find somewhere nice and lowkey, I don’t think it’ll work out. Look, I…” I groaned and rubbed my eyes. “I realized something, Empress: I’ve been lying to myself. I thought a peaceful life was possible, it’s not. That went out the window when Hangzhou kicked off and I awakened that [Skill]. Trying to chase after it is like catching a shooting star. It doesn’t exist. Not for a guy like me, not for our family of freaks—”


    “Then join us,” blurted Empress.


    I blinked a couple times, spinning those three words in my head.


    Initially, I wanted to be pissed. I thought, “That’s her game all along! She wanted to recruit me!” Until that stupid look on her face proved me wrong. The weight of her words had sunk her caramel eyes to the floor, and her lower jaw hung dumbly. She wasn’t a calculating murim-in, she was a complete dumbass.


    I coughed, fire igniting in my throat, but I ignored the pain. “Repeat that—?”


    “Join Angels!” she fucking doubled-down and stood like she was going to “punch” me again. “If you’re tired of running away, then join us—”


    “Hold on!” I threw my hand out and immediately regretted it. Pain, aches, the usual. “I’ll ignore how ridiculous your request is and look at the logistics. You need Rector’s permission—”


    Empress thrusted a finger at me. “We’re not talking about Rector, we’re talking about you. You’re right about everything, Shen. Everything. Running away won’t give you a quiet life. Your SSS-Rank [Skill] paints a target on your back. You have enemies you don’t even know yet, and you’re too much of a vigilante to let things fly by.


    “And long before today, you already knew that. Isn’t that why you learned how to protect yourself? So I’m offering you the next step: fight. Get stronger so they’ll piss themselves thinking about you! We’ll give you everything you want: money, resources, connections—Angels Guild will protect you and your family—”


    “And how the hell do you know that—?”


    “Because they’re protecting the heiress of the Demonic Cult.” She put a hand over her chest. “And I promise you, they’re great people doing the best they can. They’ll take care of you, and you can make a life for yourself and your little sister. Even if you decide otherwise, please think about it.”


    I…


    ***


    “I was surprised to hear Empress’s invitation. I’ll admit: I never thought they would extend a contract first,” Uncle Ali said, hovering by the window. To keep his eyes busy, he watched pedestrians and traffic, and he fidgeted with a random pen he found. “It’s not a terrible proposition by any means. What Empress is offering—let me correct myself, what Angels is offering—is protection in exchange for our services. Practically-speaking, it’s a badge of immortality. Most will think twice about targeting us.”


    “It means we’re throwin’ our weight behind Angels,” said Althea. She sat next to my bed and helped herself to the goody basket Empress had brought in. I wasn’t going to eat and drink that stuff anyway. Too much sugar and sodium.


    I commented, “That’s lot of risk.”


    “There’s gonna be risk either way. We’re basically picking ‘tween jumping into a lion’s enclosure or swimming in a pool of piranhas.” She rolled a candy wrapper between her palms. “The thing is, if we want their full protection, we gotta give ‘em our biography. Your SSS-Rank [Skill], my SSS-Rank [Skill], our family history, everything.”


    Uncle clicked hard with his pen, the ink-blotched tip shining in the sunlight. “That’s a given if we want to be serious partners with Angels. Or more aptly, employees. Agents, like Firebrand and Empress.”


    “We’ll get caught up in their business.” Althea leaned back in her chair and yawned.


    I chuckled. “Thea, look at me, we already are.”


    “I mean more caught up, idiot.” She playfully kicked my bed. “C’mon, we don’t know what they’re planning or why they decided to conduct a cosmo experiment. It’s all unknowns. I wanna trust Angels, but things are always different on the inside.”


    Uncle turned away from the window. “Let’s also see things from their perspective. They’re also taking as much risk as us. From out of nowhere, the Mother Alt targeted a random civilian. This random civilian and his immediate family happen to hold quite dangerous mysteries. How are they related to the Jianghu? What enemies have they made already? These are a few questions they have.”


    “They already have Empress on their team, protecting her on Cheonma’s behalf,” I mentioned. “That’s all we know so far. The rest of the team are blanks, but…”


    I looked at both of them. Althea was popping a chocolate caramel bomb into her mouth and Uncle Ali was cleaning his glasses out of habit rather than necessity. They weren’t taking the offer as negatively as I thought; well, this was our future we were talking about. We had to look at the situation as impartial as possible.


    I asked the big question, “What do you guys think?”


    Thea gulped, licked the caramel on her lips, and sighed. “I think we oughta take it.”


    Uncle Ali barely reacted; he expected this answer. “Why’s that?”


    She gestured at me. “I think it’ll be great for Alex—” (“It’s not about me.”) “—it is about you, dumbass. This whole fuckin’ thing is about you! Everyday, you keep saying how I’m meant for ‘great things,’ but I can’t expect the same from you?”


    I shook my head. “That’s different, Thea—”


    “Bullshit, it’s different!” She rose higher in her seat. “I never liked you working a corpo job ‘cause y’know why? It’s not you—” (“What do you know about me?”) “—I’m your freakin’ sister, dipshit. It’s not you and you could be doing a lot better—”


    “Like what, chasing after movie deals and royalties—?” (“That’s not what I mean.”) “—I don’t give a shit about stardom or a fat wallet—”


    “That’s not what I mean!” Thea yelled over me. I shut up, and she calmed down and stared at me with her big, stupid eyes. “Seeing you like this fuckin’ hurts, you know that? You… You feed me, take care of me—you do everything, and you want nothing but the best so I can finally live a happy life again. A-And I just want the same for you, because I’ve seen it, Alex. Living how you are right now, it’s not gonna work. Not anymore. Like fuck, this might be a blessing in disguise, hehe…”


    She wiped her eyes, laughing it off. Guess I really am an asshole, huh? Ignoring my sister’s feelings for so long, but maybe she was right. This was a blessing in disguise.


    Uncle Ali put a comforting hand on her shoulder. “It’s alright.’


    “I’m fine, stop—I’m fine, really…” Thea inhaled, sniffling. “I think I made my point, yeah, heh. I think we should do it, and I mean it. We, us, together. I’m not gonna budge on this.”


    I… Alright, I don’t have any grounds to argue. Didn’t have the energy anyway. A part of me wished we made this decision under better circumstances, but this was the best we would ever get.


    Yet, what did I think about the offer? With my dwindling brain-cells, I’d been combing through what Empress said, turning my thoughts around and around, playing out contingencies and worst-case scenarios. Since Hangzhou, we have been “protecting ourselves.” We were the sleeping bear you didn’t dare poke, but unfortunately, a bunch of hunters wanted our hides.


    Logically, the next step was to “fight back.” It made sense on a rational level, but our SSS-Rank [Skills] scratched the surface of the Shens’ family history. “Fighting back” wasn’t that simple—impossible for a family like us—so the most we could do was survive. To do so, we had to change everything about how we lived. How I lived. I was going to be an official, licensed Slayer, finally putting my [Skills] to good use. I might be a celebrity. I might remain unknown. Anything could happen in this business, but one thing was certain: I will fight breachers and people and institutions far greater than me, beginning with the Mother Alternate.


    Joining Angels seemed like the “correct” choice—even though my heart continued to twist and waver—but it was going to be obscenely difficult. I could always decline and return to the familiar and wait until another extradimensional monster came around. But…


    I swallowed and looked at my uncle. “What do you think?”


    Uncle kept his hand on Thea’s shoulder, looking down at the floor. “I think striking a deal is inevitable, either now or in five years.”


    Thea looked up at him. “What d’you mean?”


    “Let’s look at our situation in a broader perspective. If we genuinely want to avoid all confrontations, we’ll have to live like hermits. It’s possible even in our day and age, but…” Uncle tensely laughed and patted my sister’s shoulder. “It won’t be a satisfying life, nor do I want that life for you.”


    I followed his train of thought, “So if we continue living like how we always had…”


    “Someone will eventually knock on our door, someone who won’t be as friendly as the Angels. We’ll be no match for them, and I can’t protect you forever. I wanted more time to prepare and think through our options since you left for Ordo, but our legacy caught up to us.”


    Thea said, “Guessing you made a list?”


    Uncle nodded. “A short one, a list of organizations that won’t immediately enslave you. If I had the freedom to choose, it would be Angels Guild. They have a great track record and their resources are unparalleled. They’re intelligent, honest, and share many of our adversaries.”


    I never thought it that way. Uncle was right, our current way of living wouldn’t be enough to survive. Even if we move again, someone else would come along and they wouldn’t be as nice as the Angels. We had a choice; with anyone else, there would be a gun pressed against our heads.


    “So…” I started, not really thinking about my next words, “...either way, we’re signing a contract.”


    “Guess that makes the decision a little easier,” Thea said, smiling sweetly at me. One of the few rare smiles she’d give me.


    And she was right. This was our uncle talking. If he vouched for Angels Guild, then that was just as valuable as Kosmos personally recruiting us—and that was no hyperbole. Everything pointed toward Angels. The logic, our characters, the world, everything said to [Register] under Angels.


    No more working as a corpo. No more hiding. Everything in our life thus far had led up to this. Mom and Dad, the Hangzhou Disaster, Oasisgate; it was all for this single monumental decision.


    Uncle brought us into a close hug; it was awkward for me, as I was still chained to the bed, but it didn’t matter. “I think we made our decision. Whatever happens next, I’m proud of you. I’ll give my life to protect you kids, and I’ll do anything I want to make this transition as easy as possible. Hopefully, we’ll find out why the Alt targeted Alex.”


    We quietly laughed together.


    “I’m ready as I’ll ever be,” Thea said. “I’m kinda excited.”


    Meanwhile, I felt… Honestly, I didn’t know what I was feeling. “I’m tired, that’s how I feel. But I’m barely ready.”


    “Alright.” Uncle patted our backs. “I’ll tell Rector.”


    ***


    “Shens,” was the first thing Rector said when he reentered my prison cell. “I apologize for everything. Genuinely. From Sophos being a little gnome to Empress giving you a heart attack, Alexander. She doesn’t have the authority to offer you a place in Angels, don’t worry—”


    “We accept it,” my uncle said, speaking for us. “We accept Empress’s offer.”


    “I know you’re going to deny her. The last thing we want is more stress on—” Rector stopped in the middle of his sentence and stared straight at him. “What.”


    “We discussed it, and we’re accepting her offer.”


    “I—hold on, are you out of your damned minds—?!”