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Chapter 53- To Cross A King
🕑 Added 2023-01-11 11:59:01 +0000 UTC~Jabal~
Jabal knew it had been a bad idea to come to American soil after being invited, and he had advised Kazi Alukai as such. It was inevitable, however, that the most powerful man on Earth would never listen to his warnings and Kazi Alukai had come anyway. While the Will of Earth had many admirable qualities, the ability to listen to advice was not chief amongst them, not even from the man he himself had appointed as an adviser.
And so when the American government had come bearing gifts as he had expected, Jabal had just sighed wearily and decided to patiently wait for the coming events to transpire. There was only one way they could go and he'd seen it happen too often now for it to surprise him. The predicted threats and assassination attempts that followed after their refusal to cooperate were laughable.
Literally.
Jabal could vividly recall just how funny Kazi had found the American's aggression, and he’d long gotten tired of the lame jokes that the man seemed to love cracking at their expense. That was why Jabal had such a heavy heart when he observed the four cloaked individuals standing in front of them.
Perhaps they thought their appearances were mysterious and scary to the beholder, but to Jabal, it just looked like they were trying too hard to be something they so obviously weren't. Maybe he was wrong, though, and the weird group would show him something interesting. That would break through the monotony his life had recently been.
But Jabal wasn't going to get his hopes up.
Though the eerie pressure the individuals in front of him were releasing was strong enough to make it difficult for him to move comfortably, it paled in comparison to the aura of the real monster that stood beside him.
An aura that was currently masked and repressed with iron control; which was sadly unfortunate for the group that had approached them. They would undoubtedly do something stupid when Kazi Alukai refused every offer they'd make, misleadingly thinking that they actually had a chance against the man. It was just sad to think about and so Jabal stopped employing his brain and prepared himself to enjoy the show.
“It's an auspicious night when one is graced with meeting The Will of Earth.” A distinctly female voice said as one of the robed figures stepped forward, arm outstretched for a handshake.
Kazi Alukai didn't make a move to take it and Jabal was too busy cringing at the strange way that the woman was speaking to care about his king's breach of decorum.
Why is she speaking like that? Is she a little slow? What do the Americans call it? Special?
Jabal simply could not fathom why the woman felt the need to speak like a second-rate antagonist from some bad eighties movie but if the woman wished to look like a fool, he would do nothing to stop her. Perhaps his English wasn't the best, but even he knew when someone was trying too hard. Kazi Alukai seemed to have no qualms and he began to talk, his voice taking on that strange quality it always did when he used the magical translator he’d gained during the tutorial.
"I wish I could say the same bitch, but alas my time is a precious resource that cannot be wasted on the likes of yourself,” King Kazi responded, his voice filled with quiet mockery.
Okay, maybe the translation wasn't quite perfect. Jabal was pretty sure Kazi would not call a woman he had just met a bitch. He’d wait at least a minute before doing so, one of his many rules, a king's grace he called it- the minute of indulgence. It seemed however that Kazi was not in the best of moods and Jabal hoped that the shit show that would follow his king's casual disrespect would be over quickly.
Jabal could see, even through the woman's dark robes, how her posture turned from one of weariness to one of barely controlled rage.
“Perhaps you don't know exactly who it is you're talking-”
The woman's sharp voice was interrupted by Kazi Alukai's dismissive hand.
“Yes, yes. Your type always seems to think that everyone should know who they are. Pathetic wenches, the lot of you,” Kazi scoffed turning from the group and looking at Jabal, “Come, my kingdom cannot govern itself and it's been too long since I've seen my baby princess. She’s probably driving the nanny crazy."
Ah, his obsession with his daughter. It’s the only thing normal about him.
"We should hurry. I’ve already entertained one idiot too many in my time here.”
“Yes, my king,” Jabal responded.
And whose fault is that? We should've never come here in the first place.
He would never be caught dead saying that aloud, though. Kazi Alukai was an unpredictable man at the best of times and a harsh one at the worst. That was why Jabal was surprised but not shocked by what happened next. The group of cloaked individuals, as if having come to a joint decision, leapt forward as one, their malevolent auras intensifying as they sought to end the lives in front of them.
It was an admirable, yet futile attempt at restoring their lost honour, if such a thing mattered to such filthy individuals, and they had barely moved a single meter before there was a flash of light, so bright it appeared that the sun had come down to Earth for the briefest of moments. The light vanished as soon as it had appeared, leaving Jabal blinking rapidly to try and get used to the darkness that once again surrounded him.
Kazi Alukai continued walking forwards and Jabal quickly followed him. He didn't need to look back to know that the four strangers were already dead, disintegrated into nothingness for daring to attack the man in front of him. He did briefly wonder why his king had not spared these aggressors like he had so many others and quickly received his answer from the man's low mutterings.
“Fools, selling their humanity for such measly strength…”
The rest of the sentence was spoken too quietly for Jabal to catch and though he was curious about what Kazi was saying, he didn't let it concern him. He had a kingdom to run after all.
There was no way he’d be leaving that job in his king's clumsy hands.
~Arthur Ward ~
As he followed the government official walking in front of him, he took a moment to admire the results of working so hard for the past two days.
Regeneration (Uncommon) Level 3- Use healing Ether to regenerate your body at 1.4% of max health total per minute of usage. Efficiency drops by 50% when used on another individual.
Cost of usage on host: 25 Ether/minute
Cost of usage on another: 35 Ether/minute
Secondary Effect: 140 healing affinity Ether may be stored as OVERHEALTH in the target of this ability to be used for recovery when the individual is injured. This stored Ether works under Host-Use efficiency levels. Overhealth cannot be stored in the host.
After his admission that he would be unable to finish healing Tamo by the time the operation would begin, it was decided, though reluctantly on Selena's part, that his time leading up to his job would be better served in assisting the government in dealing with all the strange wounds and maladies that afflicted their agents during their deployment in dangerous situations. Doing so without arousing Toshiro's suspicions was perhaps the most difficult part of his job so far.
It had allowed Arthur to deal with a variety of injuries that he would have never seen if he’d continued working in the hospital which pushed him to stretch the abilities of his regeneration skill to the utmost limits. His growth was a testimony to that and also the main reason he was here.
With the operation only twenty-four hours away, it was decided that Arthur would stop using ether to heal and instead use the skill's secondary effect and start storing healing affinity ether in the personnel who would participate in subjugating Shade.
That had been the initial plan, the reason he'd been selected for the job, and yet when Arthur had told Selena’s superior officer exactly how his regeneration skill worked, he was told that he would use the ability's primary effect one more time before he started distributing out his healing ether.
Arthur had no idea who it was he’d be using the skill on, as no one had decided to inform him and that was why he was following the man in front of him through the government facility. Arthur marvelled at the underground bunker he was in, one initially created for use in the event of a nuclear fallout but now modified into a base of sorts since the system's arrival.
Looking at its sturdy structure, Arthur could see why. Even a level 150 monster would have trouble getting in here. All this crazy security however begged the question. Who, or what was he being taken towards and why were they stuck here?
It's almost like a prison of sorts.
With a sinking feeling in his chest, Arthur realised that the sturdy walls were perhaps there not to keep things out, but to keep something locked in. Still, the man he was following, Bryan, looked completely at ease and Arthur tried to calm himself down. The government wouldn't ask him to heal an unstable criminal now, would they?
Screw that, they totally would.
Arthur prepared himself to say no if he was either asked or blackmailed into doing something he didn't want to, though he hoped the government had at least learnt something from that last time they had tried to force his hand. It hadn't worked well for them then and Arthur would make sure that this would be a repeat event if they tried anything similar this time.
Still, he hoped he was wrong, and everything would go as well as it had been for the past few days, though Arthur didn't get his hopes up. He’d been let down one time too many to put his trust in the fickle mistress of fate, and he wasn't naive enough to think there were any good guys and bad guys in the world, let alone that he was serving a group of the former.
There were only individuals with different ideals who made the right or wrong choices, and so Arthur hoped that he would continue making the correct ones, or rather, that life allowed him to do so. Bryan suddenly stopped walking as he spotted two figures approaching from the distance. They were still quite far away, but Arthur could see that they seemed to be scientists or researchers of some sort, dressed in white lab coats.
As they got closer, Arthur saw that they were an elderly man and woman, with silver-grey streaks in their hair though they walked with the vigour of someone half their age, no doubt thanks to investing in strength and vitality. One of the greatest boons of the system's arrival was that old age no longer resulted in a frail, weak body.
The elderly pair stopped in front of Bryan, and Arthur was surprised to see the man lower his head slightly as a show of deference, not quite a bow, but halfway there. If Bryan, one of the leaders of the upcoming operation showed respect to these two, then that meant that they weren't the ordinary scientists that Arthur had first taken them for.
“I’m sure my secretary already called ahead of time to inform you that I’d be making a trip here,” Bryan asked the elderly pair.
“Yes she did, though the girl never said why you’d be wasting our valuable time,” the severe-looking woman scoffed, looking down at her wristwatch as if it physically pained her to talk to the younger man.
Bryan actually looked abashed by the woman's scornful tone, and Arthur's perspective of the scientists shot up even higher.
Do not piss off the nice old couple.
“Well you see,” Bryan started before being interrupted by the woman.
“No, I don't see very well, thank you very much, you buffoon.”
Bryan swallowed dryly at the interruption and Arthur almost pitied the man for a moment. He tried to talk again, this time skipping any pleasant manner of speech and going straight to the meat of his dialogue.
“I have with me a healer that can probably deal with your subjects.”
The reaction to his statement was far more drastic than Arthur had expected as he observed the researcher's faces cycle rapidly through excitement, joy and curiosity before finally settling on one of weary indifference.
“What says he won't be like the rest of the riff-raff you brought in before? She asked, looking at Arthur with disdain.
It seemed that he wasn't the first healer that had been called in for this job and it made Arthur a little excited to try and succeed where so many others before had failed. A challenge was always welcome when it didn't endanger his life. He didn't let his excitement blind him, however, and kept his cautious outlook. Bryan smiled triumphantly.
“Because the young man here has evolved his regeneration skill and further levelled it three times.”
Arthur could practically hear the smugness in his voice and he looked in amusement at the looks of disbelief on the old researcher's face.
“Are you sure the boy's not lying? Such high skill levels should be numerically impossible to achieve in such a short amount of time. He'd need to be twice his level to possess the ether for that to make sense.”
The old man's voice was deep and cracked a little from receiving such little use. His partner now had a look of disgust on her face, unable to understand how Bryan expected her to just accept such bullshit.
“The boy's not lying,” Bryan argued back, “The kid's a damn miracle worker. I saw him regrow a man's lungs in three minutes right in front of me."
The researchers looked surprised at that and the old man nodded his head slowly.
“Perhaps we should give him a chance, after all. It wouldn't hurt to try."
"Worst case scenario, you’ll just look like a fool, Bryan, for trusting him.”
Arthur was following the conversation with rapt attention, wondering what the hell was going on. The three individuals suddenly turned to him, and Arthur almost took a step back under the pressure of their combined stares.
“Arthur, we’ve already trusted you with a lot of information, so I’m not going to force you to sign a contract of silence or anything of the sort, okay," Bryan said carefully.
Arthur nodded his head to say he’d received the message loud and clear. He’d keep his gob shut alright. The woman took over and Arthur could tell she was the more sceptical of the pair. She hadn't believed a word that had come out of Bryan's mouth.
“Boy, you might not believe what I’m about to say, but you’ve already seen what happens when a dimensional breach occurs, right.”
Arthur nodded his head again, not understanding why the woman had brought this up. A question he would soon have answered it turned out. The old woman smiled wickedly as if she knew that her next words would fuck with Arthur's head.
“So what happens if it isn’t a monster that comes from the other side?”
She paused for a second, trying to build suspense.
“What happens if it's a sapient species?”
"An Alien."
