Carlos hated being out in the open, exposed for all the world to see. Certainly, he wasn’t any more of a center of attention than anyone else in the market, and he knew that. However, from his perspective, it felt as if every single eye within the square was following his every move. It was all he could do not to use [Umbral Phantom], wrapping himself in shadows, before casting [Umbral Steps] to escape their prying eyes.

But that would out him to the public. His secret identity would be revealed, and everyone would know that he was, indeed, Asesino. And that just wouldn’t do at all. He’d spent years cultivating his dual identities, and he wasn’t about to let his own self-consciousness ruin his efforts. Still, that didn’t make his trek through the market any more comfortable, and the tiny hairs on the back of his neck stood perpetually on end until he finally found his way to the narrow alley that was his destination.

The moment he stepped into the comforting darkness, he succumbed to his instincts and wrapped himself in shadows. He wore them like armor, protecting him from both unwanted attention as well as minor attacks. For his money, [Umbral Phantom] was by far his favorite skill, even if it was mostly utilitarian in nature. His other skills were flashier, but being able to skate by unnoticed held an appeal that couldn’t be ignored.

For a long moment, he stood within the alley’s shadowy confines, taking one steadying breath after another until, finally, he managed to wrangle his nerves into something resembling control. Once he did, he dismissed the skill and strode confidently down the narrow alley. As he went, he heard the scuffling of various vermin, his enhanced senses the result of his racial evolution. Years had passed since he’d undergone the transformation, but he still often found himself taken aback by all the sounds and smells of the desert city. After a few twists and turns that marked his traversal of the maze-like back alleys of Jariq, Carlos reached his ultimate goal – an unadorned door that looked as if its hinges were only a hair away from succumbing to decay.

He knocked lightly, and only had to wait for a few seconds before the door flung open to reveal a fresh-faced girl in patched clothing. She was, at most, thirteen years old, and her skin bore the swarthy complexion so common amongst the denizens of the desert. In the old world, he might’ve categorized her as a Native American, but such designations held little meaning in the Radiant Isles, especially for someone who wasn’t even born on Earth. Even Carlos, who was of Puerto Rican descent, felt little connection with his racial origin anymore. Racism still existed, at least in some pockets, but there was something about the new world that made such things far less common than they were on Earth. Perhaps it was the danger inherent in mere existence, or maybe it was the fact that the population had been divided based on personal power, as opposed to generational wealth and misguided ideas about racial superiority, but whatever the case, it had become little more than an afterthought.

The girl threw her arms around his waist, hugging him tightly. “Uncle Carlos!” she screeched. “I have so much to tell you! I got level nine last week, and my mom says she’ll let me pick my own skill at level ten! I only need, like, a thousand more ratkin, and I’ll –”

“Easy, now,” he said, pushing Ciara to arm’s length. “You’ve been fighting ratkin? Where? And you haven’t been alone, have you?”

“No! I got a group!” she exclaimed with the exuberance of youth. “There’s Paul – he’s our meat shield. And Micah, who’s our rogue. And guess what? I’m our healer! It’s the holy trinity, like you always say!”

Carlos couldn’t keep the grin from spreading across his face. In his old life, he had been quite a gamer. In fact, back before he’d died, he had dreamed of joining the professional ranks. Part of that was because he knew just how much money they made, but almost equally as important were the games themselves. There was little Carlos enjoyed more than maximizing his gaming characters’ potential, building strategies, and executing them in a group setting. And he’d brought a lot of that into his new life when he’d been reborn. It was why he’d selected his skills and spent his attribute points so carefully.

To Carlos, there were few things more annoying than seeing people whose builds weren’t optimized, whose stats were all over the place. He couldn’t count the number of times he’d seen melee-focused stats coupled with ranged skills – it was ridiculous, and even more frustrating because life in the Radiant Isles wasn’t a game. People would die if they didn’t take their development seriously.

That was why he’d spent the past couple of years lecturing Ciara, who’d been born into the new world, on proper group mechanics and personal development. To see that it had been taken to heart – and what’s more, that she was using the same old gaming terms he so often used – was enough to put a smile on his face. Which it did.

“And it works well, doesn’t it?” Carlos asked. “Just like I said it would.”

Ciara answered, “It does! All I have to do is worry about staying behind Paul and keeping everybody healed. And guess what else? I’ve already decided that I’m going to take a group healing skill like [Circle of Mending] at level ten! That way, we can be more efficient and maximize our grinding time.”

Grinding. Few people thought of life in the Radiant Isles in gaming terms, and Carlos understood why. Most of the so-called “gamers” who’d been reborn into the new world had quickly found that it wasn’t nearly as forgiving as their games had been. There were no respawns. No do-overs. In the Radiant Isles, everything – including the pain – was real. So many had approached it like it was a game, and discovered just how big of a mistake that attitude was. In the best-case-scenarios, they’d only been injured. But more often than not, they bit off more than they could chew and ended up in some monster’s stomach. Couple that with the fact that many gamers weren’t exactly physical people in the first place, and it wasn’t that difficult to see why so few of them had succeeded in the new world.

But Carlos was different. He knew the world was real, and he took precautions. He’d adapted his gamer logic to the reality of the Radiant Isles, and he had achieved a degree of success that few people in Jariq enjoyed. Soon, he’d reach the pinnacle, and then he’d bend his efforts to finding the next step.

Because it was there. He knew it. He was one of the chosen, and so, he’d been given information that very few people had access to. He knew that life didn’t stop at level twenty-five. There were higher planes, and he intended to reach them. But first, he had to climb his way to the peak of human development. Only then would he be worthy of ascension. In the meantime, he focused on righting wrongs as best he could, usually as his alter ego, Asesino de Sombra.

Which was why he’d come to visit one of his only true friends. He said, “That’s great, Ciara. Is your dad home? He left a message for me at the guild, and he said he needed to talk.”

“Oh,” the teenager said, her smile fading. “This is about Rhoda.”

“Rhoda?” Carlos asked.

Ciara nodded. “Our neighbor,” she answered. “Or she was. She’s…she’s been missing for almost a month now. Her little boy has been staying with us.”

Carlos’s mood darkened. People often disappeared in the Radiant Isles, even more so in Jariq, where such thing were a matter of course. The gangs provided some semblance of order, but they weren’t concerned with keeping everyone safe. Rather, they only cared about protecting their own interests. However, there had been a marked increase in missing people over the past few months – an increase that Carlos couldn’t ignore.

“You’d better let me in, Ciara,” Carlos said. “It’s not smart to discuss this out here.”

With one last look around, he followed the teenager into the building. It was a cheap, run-down place, but it was clean and well-kept. More, when they passed through the kitchen, Carlos was happy to see that it was fully stocked. No one in Marc’s home would go hungry, that was for sure. He was a modest trader, but he had his priorities straight.

They found the man himself hunched over a rolltop desk, his nose only a few inches from a parchment. With broad shoulders and a bit extra around the middle, Marc was a perfect example of a warrior gone slightly to seed. He’d retired from adventuring, instead choosing to focus on living a quieter life. Carlos didn’t blame him; after what Marc had seen, there was never really much of a choice in the matter. And now? He had Ciara to worry about. No – his adventuring days were long gone.

“I think they write smaller every day,” the man muttered.

“Or your eyes are going bad,” Carlos reasoned. Marc had never had the opportunity to evolve, so he didn’t have the increased visual acuity that came with the transformation. On top of that, he was in his fifties, and while lifespans were often longer in the Radiant Isles, there was still some degree of deterioration that came with increased age. For Marc, it manifested as problems with his eyes. “You know, they make really good glasses down at the –”

“I don’t need glasses,” Marc insisted, sitting up. Then, he glanced at Carlos and smiled, “You got twenty-one, huh? Congratulations. Won’t be long, and you’ll be knocking on the door of twenty-five. Maybe you’ll even end up running Jariq.”

“Oh, God, no,” Carlos said, shaking his head. “I couldn’t think of a worse nightmare.”

Marc stood, knuckling his back. “I guess you got my message, huh?” he said. “You want to know the story?”

“Your neighbor’s missing,” Carlos said. “Ciara told me that much, but she didn’t go into any detail. Where was she last seen? And does she disappear often? Did she have any enemies? Did she owe anyone money?”

“As far as I know, she wasn’t on anybody’s bad side or anything,” said Marc. “Last anyone saw her, she was in the market. Then it was just…well, she was just gone. No explanation. No trace. I asked around, but nobody even remembers here being there in the first place. It’s the damnedest thing.”

Carlos ran his hand through his dark, wavy hair. He’d heard about the increase in disappearances, but he hadn’t investigated it yet. Now, though, if Marc was asking, he would have little choice in the matter. After all, he owed the warrior-turned-trader. And besides, what if it was someone like Ciara, next? He couldn’t stand idly by and let kidnappers operate with impunity.

“I’ll look into it,” he said, already formulating a plan. There were plenty of information brokers in the city, and if Carlos was lucky, he could find some kind of pattern. And that pattern might just lead him to whoever was behind the kidnappings, if that was what they even were. But he had to acknowledge, if only to himself, that he might just find that disappearances were mundane in nature. Perhaps a monster had moved into the area. Or maybe people had chosen to leave Jariq, looking for greener pastures elsewhere. Anything could have been the culprit, but something tickled at the back of his Carlos’s mind, telling him that there were people behind the disappearances. And usually, his instincts were spot on, so he’d learned to trust them.

“What do you need me to do?” asked Marc, standing to his full height. At well over six feet tall and pushing two-hundred-and fifty pounds, he cut an imposing figure, even if he had a bit of a gut. There was still plenty of muscle under the layer of fat, and what’s more, Carlos had seen the man in action often enough to know that he could handle himself.

“Nothing,” Carlos said. “Just take care of Ciara.”

“With all due respect, mister level twenty-one,” Marc said, punching his meaty fist into his open palm. “No. I won’t stand by while you look for my friend. She’s a good woman, and she deserves my best efforts. I won’t get in your way, though. Besides, I know people around here. They won’t talk to some fresh-faced kid who looks like he hasn’t seen the sun in a month.”

Carlos was about to argue, but he recognized the fire in his friend’s eyes. Once upon a time, they’d been on the same adventuring team, and Carlos had long since learned when to pick his battles. Marc had his mind set on helping, and nothing Carlos could say or do was going to change that.

“Fine,” he said. “But when it comes time to fight, you back off. Asking questions is one thing, but I’m not going to let you put yourself in any more danger than absolutely necessary. You got me?”

Marc raised an eyebrow, then feigned wiping a tear from the corner of his eye. “They grow up so fast,” he said. “Wasn’t that long ago, you were just a skinny kid with dreams of being a superhero. Now look at you, giving orders.”

Carlos rolled his eyes. “Oh, shut up,” he groaned. “So – you know the area, huh? Where do we start?”

Marc knuckled his chin as he gave the question some thought. Then, he said, “Park Street.”

“That’s Tempest territory,” Carlos stated, referencing the gang that controlled that area. They were known for taking weather-based skills, which they used to control the produce market, both for mundane crops as well as more illicit plant life. That wouldn’t have been a bad thing, except that they were known for killing anyone who tried to muscle in on their perceived territory. “You think anybody there will talk to us?”

“They’ll talk to me,” Marc said. “I’m the source of their salamander blood. Trade with a farm down by the Lake of Flames; the Tempests, they use it to make fire crystals.”

Carlos sucked in a breath. Fire crystals were a drug that had taken the dregs of Jariq by storm, mostly because it was a powerful enough narcotic that it could cut through even the most potent vitality. On top of that, it gave insight into fire skills, sometimes even sparking the way to a skill evolution. It was a modest money maker for the Tempests, who were the sole provider of the drug, and they wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize their supply of ingredients.

“That’ll do it, then,” Carlos said, shaking his head. “Okay – so, we go down to Park Street and talk to…who?”

“I know a guy,” Marc stated. “Just give me a couple of days to set up. Then, we head over there, you put on that shadow armor of yours and get to looking menacing. I’ll take care of the rest.”

Carlos was on the verge of arguing, but he stopped himself before he said anything. He was used to working alone, but if Marc could grease the wheels of their investigation, he wasn’t going to stop him.

“Alright, that’s the plan, then,” Carlos said. “Hopefully, we’ll get this thing solved in a couple of days.”

“Will Miss Rhoda be okay?” asked Ciara, who’d remained silent while the two older men talked about the plan.

Marc turned to his daughter and said, “I don’t know. Maybe. But…”

“But she’s probably dead already,” Ciara said, the statement breaking Carlos’s heart. That any teenager would be able to so bluntly acknowledge the death of a family friend as if it was a common occurrence was a horrible consequence of living in a world where the end came so easily. “I know. Just…if you can, save her.”

“We will,” Carlos said. “If we can.”