“You’re a Mage, right?” asked Sean, squatting next to a boy with a smile on his face. He looked like he was fourteen or so, yet he had a Class. That meant he was in the Calibration Stage.

Eve, Oliver’s child, didn’t have it. That was understandable. She was a child and was spared the Calibration by the System. On the other hand, there was someone who was probably not even fourteen, being thrown into a ‘death trap’, as Max described it.

He nodded, somewhat shy. His name was Nicholas and he was understandably Level 1. His Intelligence was high, Sean supposed, with a Mana Point value of 610 at full. He also had a unique Class, that being Great Mage —not Blue, but Great.

Whether that was better or not, Sean had no idea.

With round glasses, he looked awfully similar to a certain book character, but without the lightning mark. That, and he had both the ring and the necklace.

“What Spellbook did you choose?” asked Sean again.

Rex was surprisingly reliable, taking care of mostly everything. Sean was supposed to go make the cars workable so that they could search for people. At least that was the plan. He didn’t want to spend all of his Mana and be useless.

“Magic 101,” he said, “That was the logical choice.”

Sean remembered that one. It was the one he almost chose before he realized he could only choose one. It may have had the basics of all sorts of magics but he didn’t want to be stuck with only that —who knew how long it’d be until he gained another Spellbook?

Sadly, he was suffering because of his poor choice.

He raised his finger and a small Mana Circle formed above it, slightly increasing in size to become the same size as a large plate that you’d see on a Thanksgiving table under a turkey. He willed for it to activate, without a cue other than his focus, and a ball the size of a basketball appeared from it.

“Can you do this?” asked Sean. If he could, then everything would be far simpler-

“I think that’s one of the Standard Magics since your Mana decreased,” said the boy, slightly squinting his eye. He fixed his glasses with both hands on a part near the screws, “With Magic Circles. Umm… Runic? No, it shouldn’t be. That’s more along the lines of. Oh right, Theoretical! I think I can c-cast that.”

Even for him, it sounded like a load of jargon. Standard Magic? Runic, Sean knew. He’d have to ask him later as right now, they had something far more important to do.

After looking at thin air for almost a minute, he also raised a finger and from it, a Magic Circle appeared. It was slightly smaller than Sean’s but not by much.

“That’s awesome,” said Sean with a grin and a thumbs-up. He didn’t think he’d find someone that could do it.

“But why? Isn’t it basically useless?” asked the boy, “It’s a worse Fireball. I can cast them too.”

“It’s fine. You know how cars don’t work anymore, right? That’s because the fuel isn’t working. That spell is made of pure Mana that isn’t changed in any manner so it can make the fuel work again if it touches it,” explained Sean. That session with Marie helped. If he had to teach someone to create gaseous Mana outright, it’d be far more difficult.

“Why, though? The engine should be able to work as long as it’s flammable, right?” asked the boy and Sean furrowed his brows. He’d never thought of that.

“Yeah. I don’t really get how it works, though,” said Sean with a shrug, “I just came by that by accident.”

“Unless… c-combustible things don’t burn anymore?” said Nicholas, slightly tilting his head. That wasn’t directed by anyone. Then he shook his head and looked up at the sky. His eyes blazed blue —Sean knew that. He did that whenever he was casting a Spell.

After staring around the air for a while, he then looked at a car for a while.

“Oh. That makes sense,” said Nicholas out of nowhere as the blue light around his eyes dissipated. Sean, too, activated his Mana Sight and looked around but saw nothing out of the ordinary. The cars didn’t even get perceived, as they did not contain Mana.

“What does?” asked Sean. He narrowed his eyes slightly.

“There’s Mana everywhere but it c-can’t enter the car. The cooks were using matches and wood to make fire saying that their gas stoves didn’t work. That could mean that anything that’s not closed off will absorb Mana like a sponge, letting matches work because they’re exposed to the ambient Mana in the air while the fuel doesn’t work because they haven’t absorbed enough to be combustible. If we leave the valves open and the tiny specks that are floating everywhere manage to enter it, the engines might work,” said Nicholas. But after a slight pause, he added, “Of course, that’s considering that all flammable and combustible substances were being operated by Mana in the first place, without us knowing.”

That was… quite an observation.

“The same c-can be said for gas. Since it doesn’t have any holes to let the ambient Mana through, it can’t absorb the Mana to become flammable,” added Nicholas.

“That’s- that’s a good observation,” said Sean with a nod. He was good at some of the classes but he couldn’t quite make the connections himself even if he’d seen everything. He turned to his parents. They were middle-aged people, looking very much ordinary.

How they’d managed to not get separated, Sean didn’t know. Maybe a bit of goodwill from the asshole Noble or maybe just to give off the illusion of a normal family here.

“Also, you look almost as bright as that Vampire from before, mister,” said the boy, looking at him.

Did Evans have a high amount of Mana as well?

He eclipsed him in terms of everything physical and was also better than him in his specialty?

That was unfair.

“I see,” said Sean.

He was a scary kid, but the good kind. He got up to his feet from the squatting position and stretched, “Well, try to get the cars working. Just put some Mana into the gas tanks and it’ll be fine. I have something else to do.”

***

“Bah, he’s a stubborn mule, trying to be a hero and all. Just like his father,” said Jeremy, still reclined on the two comfortable chairs. His legs couldn’t remain on them and were placed to the side, on one of its armrests, making his pose look slightly uncomfortable.

Emma closed the door behind herself and walked in. It creaked loud enough to wake Jeremy —he was a man that had lived on the run and on the hunt for the last twenty years. A life in which waking up a moment sooner would save his life.

“What do you think? About him trying to save everyone?” asked Jeremy.

“We’ll see,” said Emma. She took a seat on the table and glanced at the map on the table carefully, “Maybe it’s possible now. Guns without silver bullets didn’t work on them before but I’ve seen signs of damage on the corpses that weren’t made by silver. Like those explosives from the Coalition.”

“Their tech is impractical. Spending so much on disposable weapons. If people knew that they were paying tax for that, they’d throw a riot,” said Jeremy.

“But that’s not the point. The point is that they’re capable of doing that with magical nonsense now,” she said.

“Carmilla alone has more than a thousand. The Russian Nobles have like… three thousand? Then there should be almost five thousand from Asia and another three thousand from the rest of Europe. That’s not even counting the Nosferatu and the other kinds,” said Jeremy. He let out a deep sigh, “That makes more than ten thousand, probably all gathered in the Undercity. Unless we can whip out an army of at least a hundred thousand that are at least as strong as Jason, then we’re hopeless.”

“We’ll see,” said Emma. She stared at the map again, this time looking at a possible route out. If they took the river, they could make it out. There weren’t many large ships, but in the best possible scenario, a few thousand could make it out.

“Sean might die out there doing dumb things. You fine with that?” asked Jeremy as he finally managed to get up. Three hours of sleep was enough.

“He won’t die,” said Emma, as sweet as ever.

“Would you please enlighten me instead of acting like only you know what’s coming with that smug smile on your face. Gods, I don’t understand that brat Jack. What does he find attractive about that?” said Jeremy, rolling his eyes.

“You’re only two years older than him,” added Emma not-so-helpfully, with that sweet and gentle tone she was so used to speaking with.

“I’m still his older brother,” said Jeremy. He extended his hands to the bottles on the table, shook each one a bit, and then shook the last one vigorously —as if that’d make something appear inside it.

Emma slightly pursed her lips and pushed the curtain of one of the windows aside.

“Do you think Jack’s gotten to his destination safely?” asked Emma as she looked out the window. She hadn’t had a good night’s sleep lately and it showed. Her eyes looked tired, though there were no blue bags under them.

“Who knows? He might return, or he mightn’t. Especially with all this new nonsense. Those vines look sketchy,” said Jeremy. The Blood Vines seemed to have grown overnight and were covering even more space, having grown to almost twice its size.

“Sean is coming,” said Emma.

“Tell me why you aren’t worried,” said Jeremy. He hopped up to his feet and looked out the window. Sure enough, he was coming and there were dozens of people outside.

What the hell was the kid even planning?

“He doesn’t have some bullshit Heart Factor like Madison. You only ate four. I insisted you eat more but you didn’t,” said Jeremy. He clicked his tongue and gave her a tongue-in-cheek look. It was a serious one.

“He’s friends with a Noble Daywalker,” said Emma.

Jeremy’s brows furrowed.

“He what?” asked Jeremy. His brows furrowed far more than necessary, “He’s compromised then.”

“As I said, friends,” said Emma, “Charlie spied on a meeting he had with her. But he won’t turn on us. He didn’t wet his pants back in the auditorium.”

“So he’s resistant? That doesn’t even matter if he’s already been Charmed,” said Jeremy. He clicked his tongue.

“He seemed to have common sense back there. Maybe the Charm was weak,” said Emma, “She’s been keeping an eye on him ever since the incident with the other Noble. He seemed to have other things in mind, so that’s a start. Especially with what he’s doing now.”

“He says he killed something inside his mind last night and now has the black marks. It’s like he’d been possessed and got the demon dragged straight out of him the good ol’ way,” said Jeremy. He furrowed his brows, “Maybe he broke free. If it was an old Charm, it could have been broken by a Purification Chant at the Vatican.”

Emma remained quiet.

That was when Sean came in. He didn’t bother to sneak, as there was no real need to.

“You’re up,” he said, looking at Emma, his eyes filled with stars.

Angsty little kid, always trying to bite things he couldn’t chew —but then again, he was a kid. Most of them had the audacity to hunt Nobles back when they were children, only to be snapped back to reality by their first meeting with a Knight, or a Nosferatu.

But these kids were different. They could drop the mindless ones like flies. And that meant they were even more confident in themselves.

If only he could be that optimistic again.

“I am. There was quite the ruckus outside,” said Emma, putting her typical smile on her face. No one knew if it was a genuine one or if she was so used to putting on fronts that it didn’t register in her mind anymore, “I see that you’re busy.”

“Umm, yeah,” said Sean. He glanced at Jeremy, gave him a slightly sharp look and looked back at Emma. Almost comical, “I- I found out that monsters might be making a move starting tomorrow so we’re ugh, gathering people so that we can maybe fight back. At least minimize the damages and-”

“Go on. Good luck,” Emma said and turned around. She placed both hands on the .

“That’s… all?” he asked, his mouth wide open. He clearly forgot to close it.

“Yes. That is all. Good luck,” said Emma.

“So I was thinking that maybe you could help us,” said Sean.

“We can’t help you any more than the next person can, Sean. We can’t do a whole lot of things. What we can do, you can do now. We’re only really good at killing things,” she explained, “Take your Aunt Charlie with you, though. She’ll love helping.”

“Ugh… okay,” said Sean and dashed off with a hurried pace.

Jeremy frowned.

“You aren’t going to stop him?” he asked, finally finding a bottle that had a little liquor left.

“It might work out. If push comes to shove, better apologize after the deed than ask for permission,” said Emma.

He supposed that was the easiest way to go about handling this.