Without recruiting Laplace’s demon to our cause, we can never know the future for sure. That doesn’t mean that we can’t anticipate things. I drop an apple, and I know that it’s going to fall. I stab someone thirty-seven times in the chest and I’m rather sure that they’re going to die.

The reason why I can anticipate these things so clearly, is because I’m the one who makes that future real. If I leave it to someone else, they might choose to hold onto the apple rather than drop it. They might think that stabbing someone ten times is enough, leaving them to be saved by a good samaritan.

If you want a clear view of the future, then you simply must have the will to make that future for yourself rather than letting others choose for you. In the end the most difficult thing to anticipate is the stupidity of others, so why let them lead you.

If your bus driver is slamming back bottles of whisky while shouting obscenities at their ex over the phone, only an idiot sits quietly waiting for their stop.

“How’s the mana shot?” I ask, licking the sweet sauce off my finger. Eshya looks down at the chunk of mystery meat hanging off of her fork, the mana quickly leaking into the air. She shoves it into her mouth the moment she realizes she’s letting it waste.

The meals here are severely lacking in proper mana, so I’ve had to take efforts to supplement their diets. Spicing their foods with mana just so happens to be easier, cheaper, and more tasteful than eating the mana dense monster flesh we’re likely to find in the ruins.

“It stings, and cuts.” Eshya says, chewing slowly on the mana, “But, it feels so good when it kicks in. I could be in liquid stage by the end of the month, if we keep this pace.”

Vii nods cheerfully, her mouth closed as she forces the mana down and dives into the rest of her meal, which isn’t quite as spicy.

“That’s rather doubtful.” Nel says, “We’ll likely be using a good deal of mana for the coming operation. Especially if we need to fight.”

She’s far better at disguising her pain as she digests her mana supplement, but her expressions are still rather stiff.

“This is criminal.” Adler moans, covering her mouth with her hands. Her eyes are watering as she looks at me.

She’s had much less of a mana shot than the rest of us, but it’s hit her hard. I’d thought that with her stronger mana form that she’d be better prepared than this.

“I’m sure everyone who’s powerful today, once used every trick available to them to get where they are now. Devouring every last drop of mana out of the world around them.” I say.

Adler hisses quietly and stares down into her bowl, but I don’t think it’s in response to what I’m saying.

“You don’t feel any of this? The pain? It hurts.” She says, her tearful eyes glaring up at me, “It’s not fair.”

“Oh, that’s all you meant.” I say, shrugging and relaxing back into my bed, “I feel it fine; it just doesn’t bother me.”

“How doesn’t it bother you? Any living creature with a soul should suffer from raw mana infusion like this. Do you know how skilled an alchemist has to be before they can create mana potions and pills that don’t cause this kind of pain?”

“And I can just vacuum up whatever I please.” I say, “I’m guessing we can’t get our hands on these potions and pills?”

“Not easily.” Adler growls, shifting on the spot uncomfortably, trying to supress the pain. “They’re mostly reserved for master mages or craftsmen who use mana in their work.”

We’re all sitting around in our dorm room, eating meals that Nel made using the facilities in the café below. Here we can relax a little easier knowing that we aren’t going to be overheard.

Adler quietly grumbles, but for once it’s nothing to do with morals or her affiliation with an authoritarian cult. It’s just her personal dissatisfaction with the unfairness of reality. Her soft cat ears are flicking about, giving away the nervousness that she’s trying to keep hidden.

She has the worst poker face I’ve ever seen.

“Why am I here with you?” Adler asks, staring into the empty bowl of soup. “You’re even sharing your mana with me. It’s not… that’s not normal.”

“You’re part of the team.” I say, “And as someone who worked with the welfare officers, you know them better than we do. If we’re about to make a serious mistake, I’m sure you can point it out for us.”

“This entire thing is a mistake… but I get your point.” She sighs, staring down into the ground before nodding slowly and sitting up tall, “Thank you for trusting me.”

“Well, back to the mistake. It’s time for us to take a risk.” I say setting aside my empty bowl and meeting their expectant gazes.

“Nearly getting caught by Adler has made me think over a few things, and I’m not willing to wait around any longer. So long as we’re careful we’ll be able to come right back to class once all of this is over, but one day we’re gonna fuck up. Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow, maybe a year from now, we’re going to make a mistake and we’re going to have to run.

“We need to plan ahead for that day. We need an escape.” I say, “I’ve considered stealing one of the ships but there’s too many powerful people on board. Even assuming we can find one without any hunters or warriors, and the passengers and crew don’t fight us, I have no idea how we’d get it moving.

“Lefue might manage something.” Vii says, “Isn’t she the one who crashed our ship the last time?”

“And you would have her crash us into another random world?” Nel asks, “It’s something to consider, but there are too many assumptions involved. Lefue being obedient to us is likely the most ridiculous of those assumptions.”

It seems that the nickname I’ve been giving her isn’t sticking. Maybe that’s partly my own fault, how was it that Chip was meant to read people’s names again?

“Agreed.” I say, a little bummed knowing that Red’s going to take some convincing to get her on side. I have the feeling I can manage something with her, and even in the worst case, I’m sure she’s not going to turn against us.

“So, what?” Eshya asks, “We fight whoever comes for us? It’s not like there are many other ways off this world.”

“We’re not fighting.” I reply, “We might be able to hide out in the ruins, and figure something out from there.”

“Another ridiculous assumption.” Nel points out.

“There is that thing Adler was saying about ‘the depths’ beneath the ruins.” Vii says, “What was that about? Maybe we’d be safer there.”

“And be stuck there for the rest of our lives?” Eshya asks, “I think I’d rather just fight, die, and be done with it.”

“We should at least figure out what these depths are and see if they’re safe.” I say, “Adler, what are your thoughts?”

“I want to see.” She says, “It’s something that we weren’t meant to see, and weren’t meant to know… I have no idea if they’d chase us there… actually, no.

“No, I think we’d be alright down there.” A particularly dark shadow falls over her expression as she gazes into nothingness.

“You weren’t so confident the last time we talked about this.” Eshya says, her gaze sharpened.

“It’s taking time to fully… comprehend everything. My mind has been twisted and confused for years now, going over everything from this new perspective—or is this just how I used to think before the collar?— Anyway, it’s taking time for me to adjust.

“I think we’ll be alright, because we’re… they’re understaffed, and more than a little broken. If we can give them the slightest reason to believe that everyone is dead, it’s likely that’s what they’ll accept.”

“So… a big explosion?” I ask.

“That would probably do it.” She says with a tired sigh, staring up at the ceiling. “So long as we aren’t unlucky. There’s always a chance that a particularly dangerous welfare officer takes notice.”

“What happens then?” Nel asks. Her posture and shifting gaze, staring into different layers of nothingness, suggest that she’s doing something in her new support device. Likely taking notes for us.

“We’ll be pursued until we’re found.” Adler says, “Even if we escape where they cannot follow, they’ll be constantly on the lookout for us. Tracking us in every way they can.”

“There couldn’t be that many competent welfare officers around,” I say, “and the only way to avoid being hunted is by doing nothing. Let’s just hope for the best and hold onto a few escape plans.”

“So our only two escape plans are to steal a ship with Lefue’s help, or crawl into the ground and never show our heads above the surface again?” Eshya asks.

“Unless anyone has something to add to the list?” I say, hoping for some new ideas. They’re all quiet.

“Our prospects for a safe escape are not the best.” Nel says, “But that’s just our lot.”

“Onto plans for the prisonbreak, then.” I say, putting aside the unpleasantness to come if we fail, “We should keep it simple. We break in through the ruins beneath, or around the prison, force Red and the others to pop a knockout potion, and pull out their Chips.”

“We only have a small handful of replacement support devices. If we destroy their collars, they’ll be either unconscious, or left without translators and Skills.” Nel says.

“Then…” I scratch my head in thought.

“How many people are we taking?” Eshya asks.

“A whole bunch.” I reply, “Red, Bessy if we can find her, the humans, a few of the other intelligent people that might work with us.”

“We’ve got a beast taming class coming up.” Vii says, sitting up on her bed, “We could use that to figure out who’s coming with us. Maybe we can find an excuse to look around a bit too.”

“Yeah,” I say, accepting her input. “Then we’re back to the problem of dragging around the dead weight while trying to avoid a fight.”

“Bessy.” Adler bursts out with the name, earning all our combined attention. “She can help.”

“She can?” I ask, “Actually, I’ve been meaning to ask. With her size she wouldn’t fit in the parts of the prison we visited, where is she?”

“Her body is not quite… she’s not like you and I. She can compress her body down to a more manageable size, I don’t fully understand the magic behind it, but that’s not important right now.” Adler says, continuing in a rush, “If we’re able to secure her assistance, she might be able to carry others, many others.”

From what I can recall of that giant, physics-defying fluff ball, she should be able to hold onto people with her countless tentacles even if she’s a little smaller. She’ll also make for quiet the powerhouse if we end up in a fight.

We’ll need to get her collar off and recruit her into our quest before gathering the others, and for that we’ll need something to wake her up with.

“So, what we need is a list of people we want to save, a map of the region in and around where they’re being kept, and some escape routes to the port, and to the depths below the ruins.” I say.

“I’d also advise that we try and recruit a few others .” Nel says, “We can’t keep doing things like this on our own.”

“Step 1: Gather disposable minions.”

“We should get that training machine back.” Eshya says, “The one we found in the ruins, that used to teach all the ancient warrior elves. Could be useful in training those minions.”

“Step 2: Find Barry.”

“Barry?” Vii laughs at the name I gave the machine, “Do you think that armour would be finished by then? Probably not, it’d take more than a few days to make full suits of armour.”

“Step 3: Armour up.”

“Why are you all looking at me?” Adler asks, panicking a little before choking out a reply, “Ah, train more?”

“Step 4: Train hard.”

“I think that’s enough.” Nel says, gathering up our empty dishes, “If anyone thinks of something more that we can do to prepare, say so. Can anyone name some people that might be useful?”

“The strange combat course twins,” I suggest, thinking back to them. They were collared at some point, and proved themselves better than beasts apparently. Now that I think of it, they’re still collared now if that’s the case. “Leai, and ah, the other one. We might need to uncollar them though, so we’ll need the replacements as well. Test them first?”

“Combat students.” Nel nods appreciatively, “If we bring them to our base first, we can go from there.”

“Maybe introduce them to Barry, if we can find him again.” I suggest.

“Are there any other concerns?” Nel asks, looking around the group.

“I’d like to ask something.” Adler says. She’s sitting on the ground, leaning her back against Vii’s bed. “I’d appreciate it if you could consider peaceful resolutions. Before you say anything, I’m not an idiot. I know it’s not an option this time. I just want you to go through the act of considering it.

“It’s easy to form habits, and to just keep responding to things the same way that we always do. Just by pausing and discussing other options you can make sure that you don’t lose sight of who you are and what you’re doing.”

She looks down at her hands, and presses her eyes closed. Likely expecting some form of reprisal from us.

“I’d go further.” Nel says, cutting through the silence, “We should discuss what happened before and consider what mistakes we’ve made.”

“Sounds reasonable.” I nod, approvingly, “I think I did the right thing eliminating Orsa and her people. If we had more time and power, we could’ve captured them and confirmed whether or not they were a threat, but that would’ve involved too much risk for my liking.”

“If we’re discussing risk,” Nel cuts in, “The entire assault was high risk. We didn’t know what tricks they had, and if the beasts they sent against us were any more dangerous we might’ve died then and there.”

“You don’t think we did the right thing?” I ask.

“We definitely did the right thing.” She replies, “We caught them off guard and eliminated them before they had a chance to come up with any means to appropriately counter us. Acting quickly also indicated to our allies, few as they are, that we will go to great lengths to protect them and avenge them.”

“Not that the stupid humans saw that.” Eshya grunts, “No offense, Kyra, but I don’t like any of the other humans. They’re boring and weak.”

“Fair.” I reply, not bothering to make excuses for them. Eshya is already fully aware of their circumstances, it’s just that she doesn’t care.

“I… ah. I didn’t…” Vii struggles, looking down at herself as if ashamed, “I’m not used to killing people.”

I don’t wait a moment before leaping to her side and wrapping her up in my arms. She doesn’t cry, or weep; she doesn’t say anything just hugging me back.

“It’s okay.” I say, running my hand down the back of her head, “In fact, that’s a good thing. I shouldn’t have pushed you into it.”

“You can leave that sort of business to me.” Eshya says, sitting over beside us. “I’m the good soldier, remember?”

Vii nods, still seeming rather unsettled. Understandable, since I pressured her into committing a couple of murders not a day ago now. It was justified, but still.

“I was also unprepared for it.” Nel says, considerably calmer, “I think… I’d like to learn to overcome my hesitation.”

“You don’t have to.” Eshya says.

“I want to.” Nel replies firmly, “They deserved their fates. There was no good reason for me to hesitate.”

“There was.” Adler insists, “There was. That hesitation let’s you consider other options. It lets you be sure about what you’re about to do. It’s a good thing.”

“I already knew before we found them that they deserved death. Hesitating in the moment only put more risk on myself and those around me.” Nel insists, “I get what you’re saying, but a fight isn’t the time for it.”

Adler looks just about ready to step in and say something more, but she pauses, and looks about in thought. Her lips twist and her eyes dart about, seeing nothing as she just pauses and thinks.

“I… okay.” She admits, sitting quietly back down on the ground.

“You want to keep us from becoming evil beasts?” I ask Adler, looking down at her feels wrong right now, so I slide down from my bed until I’m at eye level. “You’re concerned about moral codes. I… admit that I don’t give that sort of thing enough attention. Not recently at least.”

“Why not?” Adler asks, her big eyes shining as she looks at me.

I think back to the wild world our ship crashed into, where people are too busy struggling to survive against the forces of nature. Predators and neighbours, all competing for the same resources you need to live.

I think of the welfare officers, and this world with a strange, and vaguely strict, yet somehow loose set of rules. Where fear is used to keep people obedient. This society that would make us soldiers in their deficient army, to die for a civilisation that doesn’t care about us.

“No one else cares.” I reply, meeting her eyes, “I’ve been powerless, and pulled into violent conflict, then told that I have to fight as a soldier for a civilisation I barely know. I don’t see any morality to any of it. Just power, and the people without it.”

Adler nods, as she slowly closes her eyes. It’s not that she’s not paying attention, rather, it feels like she’s trying to put herself in my shoes, trying to see the world that I just described.

“You want the power to change things.” She says, “You said that to me before, and asked me what I would change if I had the power. I’ll answer that now. I’d remind people of their hearts. What it means to care about each other and support each other. That’s what I would change, not only in society, but in you.

“I want you to care about people, so that you don’t get lost to that power that you’re chasing.”

I think we’ve found the ‘heart’ of our team. Only time will tell if she’ll succeed in keeping us from murdering our way through the many realms.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Skills & Stats

~Mana Form:

Current mana density: 738 units

~Mana distribution:

Catagory Current Max. Skin 25% 25% Muscle 0% 12% Mind 0% 65% Cardiovascular 0% 11% Misc. 0% 10% Efficiency 25% 79%

~Favourited Skills:

-Chip Shredder

-Mana surge movement

-Mana surge punch

-Infused Delayed Casting

-Fire burst punch