“{Is that a four-figure-stat I am seeing?!}” Fray exclaimed.

‘Ah… it went up,’ Rakna remarked as he skimmed over the new addition. ‘So, another 100% bonus, huh? That makes it 500% in total. No wonder I feel light-headed. I have to get used to an even greater sense value...’

“{Good lord, your attributes are high as well…}” The fable writer was still stuck in the first half of the status. “{You must have eaten at least two more Drake hearts… And how many skills do you have at the Ascended Stage?! This is madness! And is that a new Nirvana Skill I’m seeing?!}”

Rakna rolled his eyes as he ordered through his eye for Allegro to pull the hood and cover his face with Scherzo without him having to move. ‘That’s old news already.’

“{For you! Not for me! Place yourself in my shoes for a moment. Higure must have suffered quite a lot in the last few weeks…}” He muttered. “{As for this Eye of Symphony… it is demented.}”

‘Agreed,’ Rakna replied as he flash-stepped near the entrance of a regular-looking building. His left eye turned black and red for a second and many silhouettes began to shine through the walls and ground in his sight.

[| 59 Potential Hostile Mana and Heat Sources Detected. 124 Non-Hostile Targets Detected. |]

A synthetic voice talked directly into the therian’s brain and he snickered. ‘Interesting… Hey, Eye, hack into this place and get me the map of the network. You can do that, right?’

[| Affirmative. Estimated Time Required: 26 Seconds. Acceptable? |]

‘Yes. Do it.’

[| Acknowledged. Infiltrating System… |] The eye started calculating and under the mask, the filter meant to camouflage it was disrupted lightly for the duration of the hacking. [| Access Granted. |]

Promptly, Rakna saw a digital three-dimension map superimpose what he was seeing. He looked around and even instinctively connected to the cameras inside the building. At the end of the day, this item was a symbiosis type. Rather than the eye doing the work, it felt like he was instead using a dissociated part of his own brain and ordering himself.

‘A bit odd but it’s not a bad feeling,’ he commented and looked through the cameras until he found a place with many cells in which he found tattered people; some better off than others. The women and children seemed better treated especially. He snarled quietly. ‘Better value as a slave…’

“{You will not go full shift again, will you?}” Fray asked cautiously.

‘Don’t worry about that. Last time I was just caught off guard. I’ve seen much worse things and did not go into full shift… Sometimes, the smallest of things can get you angry. You don’t really deal with anger the moment it comes,’ Rakna declared as he took out a few hearts and devoured them, their refrigerated state not even bothering as he bit through it.

His aura flared and small constructs of cold energy hovered around him. ‘You deal with it before it comes to you,’ he finished and the cold energy turned into needles. “[Koschei’s Mystic Needles,]” he intoned and the needles bossted by Mystic Magic whizzed away.

They pierced the walls and ground until they each reached their targets. Rakna lowered his hand and in the time it took him to do that, every hostile signature in his eye dropped to the ground.

He walked to the building’s entrance and kicked the doors open. He stepped over one of the men that had been in the hall when he cast his spell and went to a certain spot of the house. He coated his hand in dimensions with Rift Shuttle, extended his claws, and hit the floor right in a focal point, causing several meters of metal and concrete to collapse and reveal a passage.

He once again analyzed the trajectory with Eye of Symphony and flash stepped inside. Since he knew where to go, it only took him a few steps to arrive at his destination. He walked to the prison cells and stopped in front of one. He peeked inside where dozens of people were sleeping on cold hard beds.

Once again, in a show of usefulness, his new eye worked in tandem with Fabled Sight to scan their health and make a small bubble above each of their head with a condensed medical profile in it.

Rakna clicked his tongue. This was the cell where most men were kept. Unlike with women and children, their captivity was rough. The members of Crimson Gem were not as careful. He just had to look around at the other cells to make the comparison.

“{When it comes to women and children, their price is heavily swayed by their appearance. Some by their skills,}” Fray said rather sharply. “{Disgusting as always. You find this everywhere.}”

‘Everywhere indeed,’ Rakna replied as he dismissed Scherzo and lit a cigarette, which finally caught the attention of some of the captives, who noticed someone was outside. But they simply ignored it with a blank face. ‘No hope,’ the therian expressed in his mind and huffed a cloud of smoke.

He started drawing the lines for a constellation whilst smoking. Unlike the men who were lifeless in their behavior, the children and women were staring at him. They had never seen him before and several of them had noticed how quiet it had gotten a few moments prior. Where had all the guards gone to?

“Mister, what are you doing?” A young boy curiously asked from behind the bars.

“Milo!” A woman called him nervously and took him in his arms. “What did I tell you about--”

“Do you want to know, kid?” Rakna cut her off. The woman was obviously scared that he wouldn’t actually be on their side and lash out at them. But without even looking at them, he worked on his spell and began to tell a story.

“Across many mythologies, there is a sacred bird widely known as the Phoenix. They were said to resemble eagles with purple, red, and gold feathers,” he started recounting softly as he continued to draw the constellation. The captives started listening with mixed reactions.

“Based on one of those instances, upon reaching 500 years of age, the bird would build itself a nest at the top of a palm tree, using incense and cinnamon bark, ignite everything, and meet its end by the fire. Amidst the ashes, a Phoenix would be reborn. Some say that they simply resurrect, and others say that they give life to a child,” Rakna said and finished the constellation.

He looked back at the boy who was listening excitingly. “Do you want to know what I believe?”

“Un!” The child nodded.

Rakna smiled faintly and flicked the constellation. A bell-like sound echoed and a ripple coursed through the spell formation. “Flames give life,” he uttered and the constellation transformed into a majestic bird with blue, red, and golden feathers. It cried out as if it was singing and shrouded the entirety of the underground area in bluish flames.

Everyone reflexively tried to protect themselves from a heat that never came. Instead, the Phoenix sang even louder. The young boy watched everything without blinking and witnessed the battered men inside the jail cells wake up with healed bodies and minds.

“Scoop the ashes, ignite them, and proudly wear them,” Rakna said as he approached the cell that held the young boy. The flames opened a path for him and he crouched in front of the child. “Hey, kid, which one do you think is cooler?” He asked with a small smile and the Phoenix deployed its wings behind him in a grand display of majesty.

“Yours!” He replied with a wide grin.

Rakna’s smile widened a little and his pupil rotated once. Right away, the electrical locks of all the cells opened with a clink; including the one belonging to the door that separated him and Milo.

The Phoenix cried out one last time and disappeared. When the flames started dying out, Rakna slowly put his mask back. “Well said. Better to live on than to be reborn,” he said and paused for a moment. “Kid… do you have a wish?”

“A wish?” The boy tilted his head and the captives who had been healed by the spell began to come out of the cells. Some of them began to cry in joy, others went to tend to their loved ones or their friends, but the majority quietly watched as the therian and the child chatted.

“Yes,” Rakna nodded. “Any wish,” he said with squinted eyes, which flickered from purple to black for the split of a second. “For free… You will be my first guest.”

“Then… I want to be a Phoenix!” Milo shouted enthusiastically.

“Your Wish…” Rakna uttered and his hand became covered in crystal. He extended it toward the forehead of the boy and tapped it. “Shall Be Granted.”

Immediately, a crimson and golden flame erupted from the child’s body and formed a pair of wings on his back made out of ethereal fire. The spectators gawked at the sight and it faded away as fast as it came.

Milo blinked in a daze and looked at himself. “Eh? I don’t feel any different… Am I really a Phoenix now, Mister?”

Rakna stood up and inspected his crystallized hand as it melted back to normal. He clenched it a few times with enough strength to audibly stretch the fabric of Andante and turned back to the young boy.

“Yes… yes, you are. One day, when you find your own nest, you will see for yourself. Have a good eternity… kid,” he said and disappeared from the room right as the flames of his sub-spell were extinguished for good and the enforcers barged into the building.

* * *

Rakna sat at the edge of a roof, with the rain in his close vicinity turning into snow, watching as the enforcer group apprehended the criminals. He hadn’t killed them with his needles; at worst, they would be paralyzed if they didn’t have a good defense.

“{Well… it seems my little escapade in the depths of my library was not of that much use to you if you managed to do something like that with so little guidance,}” Fray commented as both he and his soul host looked at a system window.

❮ ◈ ❯

You have gained a new title!

---

Chalice of Wishes

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Note: The power at the origin of this title surpasses the System’s storage and encoding levels.

❮ ◈ ❯

“I guess…” Rakna muttered whilst gazing at his hand in thought.

“{So… will that boy truly become a Phoenix?}”

The therian sighed and cleared his mind. “He will. I don’t know how; but I can tell you for sure that he will… no, he is a Phoenix. He simply needs to find his ashes… that’s what my instincts are telling me at least."

“{Ah, but of course, how could I ever forget about those instincts of yours? Then what about the price? Should there not have been one for you to grant a wish?}”

“The Sage offered his first guest the same deal,” Rakna answered with information that he didn’t even know he had. “Since this kid was my first wish… I could also give it for free,” he explained as he spotted Milo coming out of the building while in the care of the enforcers.

“{Without making it sound like you have done something wrong; do you think it was a good idea to use that opportunity on a stranger?}”

Rakna looked at the stormy sky and twisted the corners of his lips. “What do you think?”

“{…?}”

“If I could go back in time and offer this opportunity to Vivi, I would do it a thousand times over.”

“{Vivi…?}”

“An innocent girl who wanted to see the outside world,” he replied and Pronos took on a sad face at the reminder. “For all intents and purposes, she was a stranger. One that I failed to save. Would it constitute a good-or-bad-idea question if I wanted to give her a wish?”

“{…}”

Rakna snorted and pushed himself to his feet. “There you go. You got your answer. Ruminate on that, Exalted Quill,” he quipped and flash-stepped away.