Silence suddenly filled the space around Arson, and he found himself unable to move. The anger that filled his entirety fleeing his vessel in an instant. A sigh caused his blood to run cold, and a familiar voice spoke, making him know that he’d truly made a mistake of untold proportions.

  “Do you know what the problem with having favorites is?” asked Promethia. The woman stepped into view as Arson’s eyes cleared, revealing his surroundings to him.

  “Of course you don’t, you’re too young to know what it is to be a parent or a guardian…”

  Arson wanted to vomit at the sight of the carnage around him. Time literally frozen, capturing his rampage in a way that would forever engrain it into his memories.

  This was the second bloodbath committed within RaidCorp Coliseum within a handful of sunsets. Only Arson was unaware what his actions within the drug den that day would ultimately lead to.

  “The problem with having favorites is that they can disappoint you,” said Promethia, poking a dismembered leg suspended in air, causing the limb to drift off its current path.

  “So, what do you have to say for yourself,” said the Goddess, looking toward Arson with a frown that made him feel as if Almarine was staring him down, her gaze full of disappointment.

  “I am unworthy of being anyone’s favorite anything, maybe if you let go of your stubborn belief that I have value, I could live my life without further hindrance,” said Arson, still feeling the subtle effects of his primordial bloodlines bubbling to the surface.

  Promethia tilted her head in his direction, sucking her teeth in a disgusted fashion as she looked away from him. Arson knew the woman was beyond the realm of Cultivation entirely, finding her sudden mortal mannerisms to be strange when performed by her.

  “Is this what you call living without hinderance, killing off the peasantry like insects beneath your feet?”

  Arson felt his bloodline begin to surface again, his inner Fury raging at a torrential storm of feelings that refused to be ignored.

  “Your words are more revealing than you think, Pro, they hint at your own anger toward the weak and defenseless. For whatever reason you want me to become something I have no eagerness to ascend to, and I know that I am not the only one you are pushing toward this, the trials themselves have acknowledged this. Why not bother Symphony with this lust for a pupil,” said Arson, glaring at the goddess.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” said Promethia, gesturing around at the bodies that lay about in pieces.

  “He too is a killer, but you don’t enjoy it as he does, this will forever haunt you, and though he is powerful, in some ways even more considerably so than yourself, the problem is, none I have come across have your potential, not my siblings, not your mother or father, not even my beloved Zara, but none of this matters. Return to Endless now, or I will claim my favor soon, and it will be far more difficult a challenge than the next few thousand trials of your chosen path within Endless…”

  Her words made Arson mentally glance at the timer in the corner of his vision. The timer flicked between the abundance of time he had left, and no time at all, causing his heart beat to fluctuate; his fear of the trials and being taken once more from his family threatening to rip free the weak grip on his sanity that he clung to.

  “Claim your favor. I am not returning until I have no other choice,” said Arson, and Promethia’s smile filled him with just as much fear as the thought of returning to Endless, if not more.

  “I knew you would say that,” said the goddess. She took a step toward him, and with every additional movement the world around him changed, Promethia speaking with every change and step taken.

  “You love those around you, and that love is your weakness, child, yet even more worse than their existence weakening your potential, is your own selfishness.”

  Arson’s eyes stayed on the goddess, as he was teleported over and over. Each destination showing his friends and family.

  “You want so badly to be meant for nothing more, that you blindly run away from growth, only to stumble into situations that force you to be more of what creation and destruction need you to be…”

  He saw his siblings one after another. Their surroundings blurred, but the sadness that touched their eyes even as they smiled bled through, causing Arson to feel pain for individuals he outwardly hated, all while inwardly wanting to know more about.

  “You are nothing but a vessel of raw uncut potential, child, you could be a Cultivator of great power,” said Promethia; Arson seeing the version of himself portrayed in the portrait outside his room within the hotel they currently occupied. The version of himself controlling levels of energy far beyond anything he’d ever seen from any Cultivator, living or dead.

  The one Cultivator army used countless Gestalt forms to fight against a force thats troops seemed to be without end. Limitless power shared by the Cultivator and his many forms.

  His enemies crushed by tidal waves. Smitted by storms of mana. Obliterated by spells and magical weaponry, and even drained of all energy to further the power rushing through Arson’s veins.

  “Or you can be what you want, what you know in your bones will result in nothing but your end, and maybe even the end of everything you know and love…”

  Another version of Arson was shown. Far different from the first. He sat in a throne, his face unseen underneath a hood that seemed to trap entire existences within its folds. Magical marvels floated behind him. The constructions of runes and unstable energies so terrifying that Arson dare not even glance in their direction.

  This version of him laughed a familiar laugh that made his blood run cold, and unlike any of the other projections Promethia had forced him to see as she stepped toward him, this one turned to him and spoke.

  The words vibrating everything from his soul to the environment around him and the goddess; Arson finding himself suddenly standing alone back within the hotel in front of his room as his ears echoed with what had been said.

  “It is time…!”

  …

  Troy and Vivid ran down the street to find Khalif standing at the edges of a crowd. She glanced at the building as it burned down, and nearly pushed passed Khalif, until he grabbed her elbow as he noticed her.

  “No point, he’s not in there, I’ve swept the shadows within a dozen times or more, he was in there and then he wasn’t, I’m thinking Jade came and grabbed him.”

  “Have you called him,” asked Troy, looking over to see a concerned look fixed on Vivid’s features; the young Cultivator seemingly overwhelmed by the sight of the burning building.

  “Yeah, multiple times, he’s not answering, and I think Xani said he’s back at the hotel but her message was weird, so I don’t know for sure.”

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “Noted, I’ll check with her then, just make sure none of this touches us,” said Troy, tilting her head toward the building, Khalif giving her a nod in response as Troy stepped away from the gathered group.

  Troy: Hey, is Arson okay?

  Xani: Absolutely, blood soaked, despondent, and unmoving. Pumping out so much mana that we can’t even get off the elevator on the floor he’s standing on. He seems great, just another normal moment when living and working for Sovereign Arson Omni.

  Troy: Are you okay?

  Xani: Nope…

  Troy: ???

  Xani: Me and Rob nearly died when the elevator door opened Troy, his power before he left was unnatural for his age, and he’s older now, but that apparently hasn’t changed. If it wasn’t for the fact that I connected my Overlay to the hotels controls, me and Rob would have bled out. Rob’s still knocked out and I feel like I just ran a marathon while getting punched for every step I took. You wouldn’t mind coming and checking on him, of all of us you are the most likely to be least affected by the mana?

  Troy: I would already be on the way but something’s off here, keep an eye on him and I’ll be back asap.

  Troy looked over at Vivid, watching the young woman speak to someone nearby on her flatscreen. Their eyes met, and Vivid offered an awkward smile, turning the screen of her handheld away from Troy.

  Going to act like I didn’t see you talking to a group of masked people with swords inscribed on their faces, thought Troy as she approached Vivid.

  “You good?” asked Troy. Vivid nodded, quickly stuffing her flatscreen in her pocket as a car floated up to them slowly; the hover craft landing before Seven opened the back door to greet Vivid.

  Troy’s eyes narrowed at the sight of a burn mark on Seven’s cuff. His normally perfect suit marred by what Troy could only imagine to be flames or energy powerful enough to effect the cloth Troy knew by the brand alone could protect from practically everything but a beheading.

  Hmm, seems like these two might be made for each other…

  Troy waved as the pair got into the car and left after making plans with her to meet up for dinner. She turned to find Khalif talking with Micro and a few of the Wretches, feeling as if it was the perfect time to go and check on Arson.

  Now let’s go see what is wrong with my stone-headed maniac…

  …

  The silence between Seven and Vivid was cavernous. One continually rubbing at his burned cufflink, and the other at her ear, a tick of nervousness that she’d mostly stopped after becoming a Cultivator until this very moment.

  Seven’s mind couldn’t help but drift toward his conversation with his Father. The brief interaction odd due to the mission given to Seven, and how angry his father was.

  You’re insane, dad, but you rarely show it, makes me wonder what’s going on.

  Seven had just gotten done with his mission before heading to meet Vivid for lunch. The placement of bombs throughout what he felt to be an unreasonable amount of trash shoots, waste transportation vehicles, and even numerous laundry bins inside multiple levels across the entire resort, made Seven wonder if his father was about to perform a terrorist plot unlike any other magnitude of crime he’d ever seen the man design previously.

  Everything had gone off without a hitch, until one of the many Swords he was forced to work with, tried to shove a runic bomb far too large down one of the many trash shoots.

  It wasn’t until that very moment when Seven knew that he had to retrieve the lodged bomb from within the shoot, that he began to wonder why they were throwing away enough explosive material to reduce a small city to ruins.

  He climbed into the shoot, thankful that his suit couldn’t be smudged by the disgusting materials that lined the narrow pathway; lowering himself until he found the bomb stuck mere inches above the opening that lead into the landfill below the resort.

  The sound of the bomb becoming stuck had rippled up the shoot before Seven and the Sword member had even gotten the shoot door closed and tried to walk away, and though Seven wanted to ignore what he instinctually felt was an inconsequential detail that could be dismissed, he’d couldn’t do it.

  His father’s plans were constructed from various angles and made to near perfection, and Seven refused to be the cause of any plan set into play by Alister Kim to go awry. Whether he was his son or not.

  Seen him scalp people for less…

  So not knowing how else to dislodge the cube from the tight space, he began to jump on the bomb, before quickly realizing if he managed to kick it free in this manner, he may end up plummeting to find himself stuck in a landfill entirely filled with bombs.

  So instead, he wedged himself upside down, and began pushing the corner closest to being free from the opening of the shoot. The device slowly began to grind against the edge, scraping the metal as Seven strained, finally managing to push the bomb free as his finger brushed against the one rune he didn’t want to touch.

  The sound that emanated from the box as it fell told Seven he was in trouble, as he knew without immediately setting a timer on this style of runic bomb, he only had a few blinks before it blew.

  “Oh by the bloody-”

  Seven’s curse was cut off by an orb of blue light expanding through the air rapidly as he barely managed to cross his arms in front of his face.

  He was pushed further up the shoot by the concussive wave the bomb’s multiple phases started with. He was thankful in that moment, knowing that if he’d been touched by the bomb’s concussive wave that the flames and pressurized heat of the second and third phase wouldn’t be able to span the distance toward the trash below, ultimately setting off a chain reaction that Seven didn’t believe he would survive even if he somehow scrambled up the length of the shoot .

  In the end all he received was a slightly burned cuff that slightly melted his cufflink. The burn mark bothering him more than scabs he’d received as a child.

  All that just to find out that the old man was planting far more bombs than he even sparking needed… Should have called to check before I hopped into the ember loving shoot! Next time the job is this ridiculous, I’ll be getting far more details before I leave….

  “You okay?” asked Vivid, still rubbing at her earlobe as she pulled Seven from his thoughts.

  “Yeah, you?”

  Vivid nodded, even as thoughts of her morning hunting for the group that stole her father’s drugs raced through her mind.

  “I’m okay…” lied Vivid. She was far from okay.

  Her previous conversation with her father had gotten her far more trouble than relief. Honzo had been unaware of her attachment to Seven, and had not pursued the young mortal only due to Vivid’s promise to help him find both his missing product, and the opponents trying to undermine his operations within the dark of RaidCorp Coliseum.

  So far all she’d found is absolutely no clues, with the exception of a group of five that she and a few of the Swords had stumbled across within one of their many customer’s tenements.

  They’d only stopped by to see if those that roamed the streets had come across anything alarming recently. To instead find a kicked in door and dozens unconscious and sip tied.

  Vivid and the swords had entered to find many within amidst a battle for their very lives. The squad of masked individuals all held Swords, but instead blocked gunfire and spells with large shields made of hardened light and mana. The very same shields they used to strike their opponents into various stages of unconsciousness.

  The sight was odd and struck Vivid as wrong, and she wished she’d told her people to not confront the group, but the Swords had charged into battle, feeling as if they were defending their territory from what Vivid could understand of how the Swords operated.

  It wasn’t until she felt forced to engage that she realized just how well trained the group of masked individuals was. She fought against a mortal from what she could tell, the only mana coming off the woman the shield she held. Yet Vivid was unable to hit the woman.

  The mortal woman dodged, and battered Vivid with the shield, even while holding a katana that she never even attempted to use in Vivid’s direction. Only after jumping free of a seven story window and rushing to meet Troy, did Vivid realize that the unused swords were far from normal.

  Is somebody trying to frame the Swords…?

  …

  Promethia walked through the hallway of the hotel her disciple walked through, and sighed. The labyrinthian halls filled with hotel rooms was unsettling for Promethia for multiple reasons, one of which she couldn’t ignore.

  “Why are you hiding in this place of all places?” said Promethia, stopping in the middle of one of the many crossroads within the hall she trekked down.

  “Believe it or not, I’ve only recently been able to leave, but with who made my exit possible, I’ve felt it to be more advantageous to stay and, meddle…”

  Promethia turned to face a portrait holding a beautiful woman, a woman with red eyes that stepped free of the canvas to stare down at Promethia’s already tall figure.

  “What could trap a primordial of your caliber within these walls,” asked Promethia laughing as she spoke. She didn’t have to turn to see more and more individuals step free of their portraits. The hallway in all four directions she could walk down all slowly filling with more and more figures.

  “Beings who despise me of course child, beings who eat time rather than be controlled by its touch,” said the woman, leaning forward to look into the goddess’s eyes. The words spoken echoed simultaneously by every form around Promethia.

  Is she speaking of my parents, she can’t be, they are both still battling within the heavens from what I know?

  “You cannot have him, Legion, he may have the mark of your father Gestalt upon his heart, but that mark is his own, not—“

  “That mark is mine!”

  Promethia dare not look up at the growing number of forms that float above her. The crowd around her in every direction so large in number that Promethia began to wonder how such a powerful being could be held within the realm they were within.

  There must be something within this space that is out of reach of my senses, thought the goddess. She dare not try and extend her senses to discern what may be so special about where she stood currently, knowing that the primordial before her may see that action as disrespectful.

  “That boy received my father’s mark as he lay on his deathbed, forced outside of time and natural space, secluded within a realm so feeble that all he could do was rot, and you dare say his retrieval of my father’s mark was anything but luck…”

  The voices battered against Promethia with such force she felt her soul disrupted by the verbosity alone. As a goddess herself, she knew what it was to be powerful, yet a single one of the forms around her could summon forth enough mana to drown out her own anywhere from ten to a hundred fold, and though separate as they were now, every form around her was only a small part of a much larger being.

  “I dare say that he and he alone may be the only Cultivator I’ve ever seen worthy of your father’s mark, as you Legion were born a god before you ascended, were you not?”

  Laughter rang out around her to the point that her ears began to bleed. Promethia wasn’t afraid that she was going to die yet, however, knowing that though Legion was unfathomably mighty, the wrath of her parents was enough to allow her safe passage through this exchange.

  For above the Primordials were beings known as Pinnacles. Beings who reached so far above godhood that they could no longer live anywhere below the Mythic Realms, the original home of the realm known as Endless.

  “Leave, child, don’t worry, my meddling will only make that boy powerful enough to face me in honorable combat, for that is the only way I will be able to reclaim my father’s mark…”

  Promethia nodded as the being known as Legion returned to its portrait, its vast number of forms all disappearing into portraits down the many hallways for as far as her eyes could see.

  Promethia dare not move until all the figures were gone. The being known as Legion was one of many Primordials that had connected themselves to the realms in a way that allowed them to have Icons.

  These Cultivators were given the title of Icon. Able to claim the name of the Primordial in any realm that the original wasn’t currently residing in, giving them a direct link to a fractional portion of the mana that was connected to the power base that their namesake controlled.

  There was a lesser form of Legion within Endless currently, and being plagued by a underling of the Primordial wasn’t ideal for Promethia in any way shape or form.

  She sighed, and opened a portal home once silence returned to the area around her, cursing as she stepped back into Endless.

  “What am I going to do with you, boy…”