[Valerianne Yul]

“Where are you taking me?” I asked June.

“To the Rimmer Ship.” She answered.

“Why?”

“Only the Rimmers can oppose the Virtuous. If Legate Feuerstahl wants you back she will have to negotiate with Captain Nicodemus and I doubt that he will want to let you go.”

“Uhm.” I glanced at her. “You haven’t exactly sold the Rimmers to me with the whole evil, soul-editing business.”

“It’s good to know what vileness you’re dealing with before you get into it. You need to establish yourself somewhere. The Rim Academia of Magic is as good a place as any. As long as you don’t sign any unfair contracts with them, you should be golden. Scrutinize every word of the contract, don’t sign anything you don’t read. Don’t be a stupid fox like I once was, basically.”

“Okay, but what if they give me a crap contract right away, then what?”

“They will 100% give you a crap contract. We will have to convince them to edit it. Use the power of negotiation and perseverance. In this situation we’re actually quite lucky that the Rimmers are so Gods damned difficult when it comes to contracts and making deals. I reckon Legate Feuerstahl is probably going to argue with Captain Nicodemus all day about various business details today.”

“I see.” I said.

“You have to be a tough negotiator like the Legate - leverage your power, know your worth.”

“My worth?” I asked.

“Yea, you’re a very special girl! One of a kind! The thing is, you have something they really want - Void magic. As far as they know - you’re the only person capable of interacting with Void Dungeons. Don’t stress too much about it. I’ll totally help market you up. You can trust me! I’ve been in their Academia of Magic nearly a year until they’ve assigned me to Captain Nicodemus.”

“You just held me at swordpoint, and I saw you rob two people, so you’re not exactly extremely trustworthy from my perspective.”

“It was for your own good, girl!” June shrugged. “Look, when I joined the Rimmers, I was extremely hungry, desperate and stupid. I’m trying to help you avoid my mistakes. I didn’t know how much my Shadowmancy was really worth and I signed myself into debt which had blossomed into several debts when I tried to improve my situation. I have no hope of repaying my debts without your help. I need you to succeed so that I can be free.”

“Hrm.”

“Yes. I’m a Shadowmancer and a thief, but at least I'm honest about who I am. You were lying to yourself, refusing to accept the Void inside you and look where it got you."

I sighed.

"Do you know why I stole this Pearl of Inquiry?" June asked.

"To sell it?"

"A pearl like this is worth 100 times its weight in gold, but now that I thought about it, there is far better use for it. We can use it ourselves to determine everything about everyone! Why, this little baby is an incredible tool for finding stuff! I bet it would be pretty useful in a dungeon too. Information is power!" June bounced excitedly.

"Wait, you can use the Searcher pearl?" I looked at her with wide eyes. "Aren't you a Shadowmancer?"

"Already have been! Omni-tools like the Pearl of Inquiry don't require an affinity. Captain Nicodemus has a small one in his ring," The foxgirl grinned. "He he. First thing I did was scout your level. I know everything about you!"

"Hey not cool, I want to know yours too then." I grabbed at the pearl on her side, staring at her.

June Rim Maldiver

[Age]: 23

[Race]: Foxkin

[Level]: [36] Acceptable mediocrity [Shadowmancer]

Stats:

[Mana] : 16 [Shadow], 7 [Void]

[HP] : 36/36

[Affinity] : Shadow & Void

[Aura] : 78% Gray, 14% Black, 1% Green, 4% Blue, 3% Void

[Perks]: Edge-born. [Mana to blood oxygen catalysis]

[Bond]: Reiu soul-debt contracts

[Pacts]: Deathseer's Shadowpact [×10 in Shadowmancy]

Acolyte of the Void

Inventory:

Divine dagger of radiant Light. [Order of Virtue]

Divine Sword of Judgement. [Order of Virtue]

Divine pearl of Inquiry [Order of Virtue]

Acolyte of Virtue robe.

Sack with 396 gold coins.

Sack with 47 gold and 3 silver coins.

Hairpin lockpick.

"Oh, you are only a year older than I am and already a level thirty six, wow!" I commented.

When I thought about June's aura, the info window vanished and I could suddenly see her aura as a glow of different colors and shades, ghostly radiance dancing all around her body extending as much as a palm outwards in some places. Many parts of the aura weren’t visible due to the Virtue robe she wore. So that's how Searchers see auras and why Knight Rex demanded I undress in front of him. He was scanning my Aura! He probably had a smaller pearl on him.

Hum.

"What's the Deathseer's Pact? It looks potent." I asked curiously.

"Seeing the death of my grandfather, father and brothers triggered my Shadowmancy. I read about it at the Academy - a sacrifice of three generations of my kin had to occur during my awakening." She muttered.

"Sorry to bring it up." I apologized.

"Yeah, life's a bitch. I was really eager to level it up at the Academia too. I put everything into Shadowmancy. I wanted to learn as much as possible while being unseen. My high level is one of the reasons why I'm in so much debt. See, the Adventure Guilds are run by the Church of Virtue for free to exterminate monsters and gather monster and dungeon cores. Rim Academia Instructors, on the other hand, sell training Quests to novices in exchange for soul-debt currency called Reius."

"That's kind of crap." I commented.

"Yeah, a lot of powerful Rimmers are kept in check by their massive debt to the Brotherhood."

"How?"

“A debtor can feel pain akin to standing in a fire if they are asked to repay the debt immediately and they cannot. Also a lot of debt contracts include control clauses similar to obedience collars.”

“I see.” I looked down at the cobblestones beneath my feet, while still holding onto the pearl.

Bridge to the Convent of the Light from Kleinburg.

Reinforced with Builder runes of binding.

Strong to: Fire, Air, Water, Ice and misc other Nature Elements.

Weak to: everything else.

[HP]: 88'689 / 90'000

I looked up at the sky.

Voidstar.

Black hole.

[HP] : ∞ / ∞

"Oh you are right, it's giving me information about everything! Amazing!"

"Yeah. It's a damn powerful pearl of Inquiry!"

"Hang on, how did Alyssa not detect you under the table?"

"The pearl needs line of sight to read someone. I know this because I’ve been running from Searchers half of my life. I'm pretty sure there are Searcher specific functions in here too, but I have no idea how to activate them." June shrugged. “Whatever, the Rim Academia Librarium will have the books for lease that will tell us how to operate the pearl.”

"Books for lease?"

"Nothing is free in the Rim of the world. It's a dog eat dog world under the mainland."

"You know the more you talk about them, the less enthusiastic I am about going to the Rim."

"What, you think you have a choice?" June waved her hands. "Do you like being alive?"

"Yes." I said.

"Then run. Run as fast as you can with me and as far away from the Virtuous as possible! You're a level zero for Gods’ sakes! Get stronger! They will end you, snap you like a twig or cut you in half!"

"But Alyssa… the Legate said that they can cleanse me." I let go of the pearl.

"Did you already forget that you've got a Divine Void spirit in your body? I've talked to her. She is treating your body like her domain, her property!" June pointed at my heart. "I've studied this stuff at the Rim Academia. Spirits cannot be purged from a domain. Do you think that the Triumvirate or the Rimmers never tried to end avatars of the wild? They just reconstitute after a few months or decades from other trees or rocks! Nox is likely permanently bound to you until your death and even then she just might pilot your bones from what I know about spirits!"

I frowned. Killing myself suddenly became far less appealing. I didn't want my body to become a lich.

"Nature spirits start as energy, information, belief. Rim Archmages create really basic ones in their labs, experiment on them! As long as someone defines a place, refers to a forest by a name, it will have a spirit! Rimmer Academic Keppler proposed that the only way to destroy a spirit is to obliterate all terrain where it resides, destroy language and then never think about, never define a place. Pretty impossible, I would say."

"How can something like that be in my body? I asked.

"I don't know everything. Maybe Nox is an exception, a rule breaker of sorts?" June shrugged. "I've never read or heard anything about Void spirits before yesterday. She's straight up using your level zero body to weave mind manipulation spells. I don't even know what level she is! The pearl isn’t saying anything about her when I look at you. It's like she's not even there!"

As we talked about my Void passenger we left the bridge and walked through Kleinburg to the docks. Ah. I remembered. Quests! She was talking to me through quests, I totally forgot that in all of this craziness. I looked at the...

Quest: [A] If you have enough neurons to understand me, cancel this quest. Reward: 0 points.

I thought about it for a few more minutes in silence and cancelled it. There. Hopefully she was indeed just a nature spirit and I wasn’t making a terrible mistake colluding with evil.

We crossed the docks and arrived in front of the Rimmer ship. I saw a silver sign “The Resurgence” painted on the side of the large, wooden sailboat. Colorful flags fluttered in the breeze coming from the river delta.

“Tamara! Lower the gangway! I gotta come in! It’s urgent!” June yelled.

"Oh hey, is that you June? You know Nicodemus told you to fend on your own while in town, right?" A girl in a gray tunic met us at the gangway of the Rimmer ship after it came down. “Ha! Did you steal robes from the Virtuous?”

"Yes I'm aware of my place in life, Tamara." June growled. "There is a problem."

"Problem being?" Tamara raised an eyebrow.

June pulled my hood down.

"Oh hey, it's our wilderness survivor girl, Nox." Tamara smiled.

"Yep. Anyways... She has a dark affinity." June stepped close to Tamara, whispering at her. "The Virtuous know. I barely got her out of their convent." She pointed at the oversized sword sitting in a scabbard on her hip.

"How dark are we talking about?" Tamara whispered back.

June made a sign with her hand on Tamara’s chest.

"Infinity?" Tamara mouthed.

June nodded. Tamara grabbed my manacled hands dragging me inside the ship. June followed. Tamara raised the gangway and shut the cabin doors one by one behind us, tapping a magic ring on black metal panels.

We finally stopped inside of a fancy office within the ship’s depths. Tamara sat me down on a plush couch, raised a hand, pointed it at my head and said one word. "Sleep."

[-=Nox=-]

"Hey! What'd you do that for?!" I heard the annoyed voice of my acolyte as I opened my eyes.

"I wanted to talk to you about her Void without… Wait. How are you awake already?!" Tamara stammered, blinking at me in confusion.

"Why wouldn't I be awake? I had a nice, long restful nap." I yawned, stretching my human limbs. "Where are we, foxminion?"

"Rimmer ship Resurgence, Goddess!" The foxkin was quick on the upkeep.

I leaned towards her and kissed her, getting more Void mana into myself. She looked like she was enjoying the kiss quite a bit this time. The Void in her soul was getting stronger. Bits of it were already showing up as beautiful, liquid ferromagnetic-like spikes of pure darkness dancing in her aura.

“Did I muck up the spell?” Tamara muttered. She pointed her hand towards my face and said. “Sleep.” This was a pretty potent sleep spell too, enough to knock out two elephants. A blue spell circle manifested in front of Tamara for a split second as the spell activated.

This time, I was ready for unprovoked magical attacks upon my person. I wasn’t going to take this sleep spell bullshit lying down anymore! While I was stuck in the Convent’s waiting room I set a few magix matrices to slowly wind themselves into my blood and mitochondria. They were now ready for activation. I knew that I couldn't affect my exterior without exploding, but my interior was an entirely different thing. My human’s blood cells were sufficiently infused with my Void radiance. I activate the spell in my blood.

Time slowed to a crawl. The sleep spell was slowly gliding from Tamara’s hand into my head. I saw that I was wearing white, magic-cancelling manacles on my wrists. How convenient. I swung my wrists up, striking the spell out of the air. Then I moved forward and struck Tamara in the side of the head with the manacles. The blood acceleration spell ended.

Tamara collapsed sideways, falling down towards the wooden floor.

“Thank you for believing in me while I was weak, Tamara the human.” I looked down at her. “This is your reward - I won’t murder you, this time! But attack me again, and I will end and devour you.”

June paled. “I don’t think she can hear you, Goddess, but I will pass on the message.”

Her heart was beating very quickly. She was scared of me, I felt. She’s likely never seen a level zero human move so quickly. My human muscles were burning with pleasure. I likely sprained and tore some muscles and ligaments while I moved so quickly.

I cupped her adorable face with my hands. “Don’t be afraid of me, my acolyte. I would never hurt my precious disciple-in-training. Now, how about another kiss since some human jerk interrupted our last one? I have only a few void mana in me and it’s quite painful to exist.”

She nodded. I leaned towards her mouth and kissed her, collecting her gathered Shadow. It wasn’t very much.

“You’ve been slacking in the Shadow mana harvest department, acolyte.” I disconnected from her with a sigh. I had 40 Shadow mana in me now. Not amazing. I compressed them into 4 Void.

“Your human host was captured by the Church of Virtue, Goddess! They were torturing her into rejecting your divinity!” June reported. “I rescued her and uh, you from the Convent of the Light. It took a lot of Shadowmancy.”

“Oh you are a good girl!” I looked at June, finally feeling that someone around me had lick of competence. “And here I was about to chide you!”

I stuck out my tongue in her direction to confirm something. “Also, seven Void mana? Someone’s been feeding on me.”

She nodded, turning red.

“This is normal.” I told her. “Keep it. I ought to teach you some Void spells. Human fools keep trying to challenge our authority.” I nodded at the body of Tamara.

June smiled excitedly, wagging her tail. Ah, happiness. That’s what I like to see in my acolytes!