Legacies of light

“Oh well, Capti is a distant acquaintance of mine, that’s about it, we have no other connections.”

“Your hair colour is lime Orb, didn’t I tell you not to lie to me,” she says with her unbridled furry leaking out of her.

“That was just a joke, I wanted to lighten the mood.”

She growls at me in response to this. What the hell is she a wild animal, I shouldn’t have to deal with this, fuck you Capti. I really have been using the word fuck often, it is just like Capti said it slips into your vocabulary really easily.

She slams her fist on the table, and says, “Stop beating around the bush and tell me.”

“It is just that Capti gave me this letter to give to you.”

“Read it to me.”

“Yes, mam.” Opening the letter as fast as possible I start reading, “Hey Ai have you been taking care of yourself I worry.” Her face starts to lighten up as I read this, so I rush to the next part to see if it continues to calm her down.

“Remember, you’re not the young woman you were anymore, we are both fossils, especially you since your older than me.” When I read this I look up dumbstruck that this woman in front of me is older than Capti, but as her anger continues to grow I get back to reading.

“Speaking of our younger days, we were really wild back then, and to think that me and you used to fuck, I can’t even imagine doing anything like that with you now, especially since you're like my sister.” Her Anger is worse than ever, I may not be a master at the way of a woman’s heart, but I am pretty sure he has crossed a line men must never do.

“But I found someone who I love with all my heart who makes all the women I have slept with look like fish, to be honest, I barely remember anything before being married to her.

I hope that in these years I have been gone you have found someone that you feel the same about, but knowing you there is no way your old bitter and alone right?” Oh god, you idiot, just stop, Ai looks like she is on the verge of tears as her anger rises.

“And make sure to watch what you're eating you had an unhealthy obsession with eating cake especially while crying, at your current age that won’t do so you should break that habit.” Noticing the truth behind said words I give Ai a look of pity. But I see a volcano about to erupt in front of me.

“But more than any of that, I hope you're ok, throughout my entire life you have always been the nicest person to me, you have been there for me and my family countless times, especially those times when Draga was really mad at me.

Even when I set off for Fimbulwinter, you tried your best to convince me not to go and spend the rest of my time enjoying myself with my family, you even offered to live with me, thank you for all of that, to me you’re an irreplaceable member of my family and I think of you a lot as well.

So, I would like to beckon this kindest once again to ask you to please help this boy Orb, he happens to be another close irreplaceable friend in my life, take good care of him for me. And here are some of his embarrassing secrets that you can use to taunt him.” I immediately stop reading the letter and rip off the last part of it. No way in hell is that getting out.

I slowly raise my head to see how she has reacted to the letter, and to my utter surprise, she looks really bashful, her anger has completely disappeared, and somehow this really poorly formed letter has completely calmed her down.

“Captivant really said all those nice things about me,” she mutters quietly under her breath with a red face of elation.

He managed to make her docile. I make a fist under the table to celebrate my victory, you actually manage to flirt with her from the grave, you brilliant bastard.

“Orb, would you be able to tell me the rest of your connection to Capti, don’t lie now.”

“Ok,” I say as I begin to tell her what happened in Fimbulwinter specifically. “So after running from my house up there, a lot of other things happened which brought me here asking for your help.”

“Thank you for what you did for him, from the moment he set out I was worried that he was going to die a pointless death in the snow, but you allowed him to accomplish his final dream.”

“No need, I should be thanking him, Capti has given me way too much to ever feel like anything I could do would pay him back. He really is an amazing person.”

“Yes he is, but that stupid idiot just sent you into the world with very little protection, doesn’t he even know all the bad things that could have happened to a legacy like you, and he clearly left out information for the sake of giving you a surprise when you went into the world, I swear that man doesn’t think at times.”

“I have no real issue with that, I have been enjoying most of the things that Capti didn’t fully explain in his books, and I lucked out and managed to get coloured contacts, so as long as I don’t use my legacy in public I am good.”

“What a sweet boy you are, nothing like Captivant, that’s it I am going to help you all you want. But before we start all that could I ask you a question.”

“Go ahead.”

“Would you allow me to take responsibility for you?”

“What do you mean?”

Φ “I mean let me handle whatever issues plague you, I am assured I could come up with solutions for any problem you are facing, and you and your friends can even come live with me, it is a win-win situation.”

“Sorry, but I will have to refuse.”

“Huh, why?”

“Simply put, all my actions are my own responsibility, I didn’t leave Fimbulwinter to come and burden Capti’s friends, I came out to find my own path, all of my issues will be resolved by me, and all the promises I have made people will be fulfilled by me.”

As Orb says this he has an expression I don’t really like so I say, “Don’t worry about all that crap, you’re a kid, so be more selfishness and lean on adults.”

“No need, and I am not really that young I am only sixteen, historically and even in most countries today you come of age at fifteen, so me and you would both be considered adults.”

There is weight behind those words that shouldn’t be there, Capti you’re always about the light you can see in the future, but forget the path that must be walked to reach it, just like always I am going have to clean up your messes.

“So you think yourself to be grown up, ok then, from this moment on any benefit I was giving you due to being a child is gone.” I am going to have to teach him a lesson right here.

Φ After Ai says this her energy completely changes as she reforms her posture, looking at her I feel this strange pressure like I am almost about to be crushed; it seems she is taking me seriously now.

“So, Orb what would you like to take about.”

“Sixteen years ago, two dragons landed on Terrafide and I want to locate one of them, to my knowledge she is a girl.”

“To your knowledge, that is a rather weird thing to say, since I am sure Cyrus Damavand would a hundred percent know the gender of such a person.”

Shocked I say, “How do you know his name?”

“I have my ways, but it was smart of you to try and give me as little information as possible, it seems your learning little one.”

“Stop that, where having a conversation.”

“Ok, ok, but now, I am just going to guess you would like to know where said girl is located.”

“Yes, I would.”

“You know dragons are extremely hard to come across, and most people won’t even see one in their lives. A normal person is more likely to run into a legacy than a dragon, so as you can imagine the location of one of the only dragons on Terrafide, would be extremely coveted information.

Ok, now let’s say I somehow know the place where this sister could be. What would you be able to give me to obtain such information?

“Information. As you said information is your lifeline, so if I can offer you something worth what you're going to give me, think that would allow us to make a deal.”

“That would be fine, but it will have to be something I don’t know before.”

“Don’t worry I am sure I have enough information of that type.” This is good I have control over this conversation, the only question now is what I will give her, I could give her info on when the basileia crystals go for sale, or information that the Gaia sky bandits are permanently out of business.

No, I have a better idea, I can use the info going around about Maples village Aplos, to create a false narrative. If I just change some things up, I could even have Ai spread false information about Aplos, which could get any idiot who would dare to come looking away.

As I am about to speak, Ai interrupts me with, “Before we get started, I would like to just share a few things that have been on my mind.”

What could she be at?

“Did you know there have been rumours flying around that Magnolia's descents have been found, this news has rather rocked the world, anyone well versed in history knows that Magnolia disappeared with all his research papers. So, lots of people have been setting out for Fimbulwinter to look around for them.

At first, I thought all that information was fake, the fact that humans can’t survive on Fimbulwinter is undisputable, or was undisputable until just a few minutes ago. So maybe all of that wasn’t a lie. Ohh your hair just changed colour am I on to something.”

I quickly take the scarf from my new clothes and use it to cover my head.

“Smart choice, but you should have never let me see your hair if you were here to negotiate, your actions have all but confirmed my suspicions. Though regardless of whether I personally believed it, I still followed up on said rumours, and those rumours eventually led me to hear that said decedents were sold as slaves to Morgan Elia, the elderly queen of Basileia.

Due to Basileia's tight security, it is very hard to get in and out unless they let their guard down, and we didn’t feel like whoring ourselves out to any noblemen, so us members of CN had to wait to sneak in during a big ball.

And when we were there, one of us saw that someone else had staged a revolt and was trying to escape with all the slaves, member of CN even said that a giant black dragon appeared which froze and shattered, isn’t that all super strange?

But eventually, I had to stop paying attention to the whole Magnolia's decedents thing, because something else that shook the world has taken place, and all the basileia crystals went missing.

It utterly perplexes me many how such a thing could happen, did the dragons steal them, but how could a race that never interacts with us even know their value?

But you see regarding that issue, I have some ideas of what could’ve happened. Maybe someone used a legacy that allows them to store things in a different space, or shrink objects, and they used that to take all the Basileia crystals with them, and just off intuition, I am going to guess the people who planned the revolt are behind this.

During the attack on Basileia many high-profile people were in attendance and they are pissed, not only because they almost died, but because that one of their most important resources went missing. If they were to find the person responsible they would hunt him down with all their strength, which would make said person an enemy to most of the countries on Terrafide.”

“Are you blackmailing me?”

“No, I am just saying that if said person was to maybe want something from me, they would have no bargaining power, because said person's life, rests on the palm of my hand. I could quite literally request anything from this person, and they couldn’t say anything, wouldn’t that be funny,” she says with a smile.