The First Mage

In a way, Arax was spot on. We were overly reliant on water scripts. Specifically, on how they had previously incapacitated every enemy we faced. It was always an all or nothing deal, where hitting our target was all that mattered. It was like a gun. But that wasn’t necessarily what a fight had to look like.

The discolored fur suggested that Arax hadn’t come away unscathed. If she was somehow storing a massive amount of mana in her body, protecting her in combination with the script on her chest, a mana based attack wouldn’t easily damage her. However, it would use up that mana. A fact I had completely glossed over. Nobody’s mana reserves were infinite, and if you didn’t have enough to block an attack, that would be the end. Through resignation, frustration, and feelings of helplessness, I had forgotten that you can also kill someone by slowly chipping away at them. Essentially stabbing them repeatedly. Was this possible though? Before I could decide, there was one thing I needed to ask her.

“There’s one thing I need to know before I can agree to a partnership...” I said to Arax, “I need to know your end goal. I refuse to go into anything blindly. And I will need to know it anyway if I’m supposed to develop scripts tailormade for that purpose.”

“Oh?” Arax walked closer and crouched down next to Berla. Raising her arm, she held a single claw next to Berla’s neck, pressing it against her skin. “Are you sure you want to make demands of me?” she asked, cocking her head.

My heart began beating faster. She could kill Berla in a heartbeat—any of us—and the murderous glint in her eyes told me that she wouldn’t hesitate. She was presumably playing a long game. Right now she wanted my cooperation, but she could also do with the second choice. Nothing was certain.

I took a deep breath and stood up, raising myself above Arax for the first time—if just barely. She looked up at me with curiosity, while the beast behind me started growling. It was a menacing sound, indicating that it was ready to launch at me any second. My heart sank, but I had to bear it.

“I would appreciate it if we could stop with the threats,” I said. “Unless that collaboration you propose is more of a master/slave relationship, we should be able to talk, right? That will be easier for everyone involved.”

Arax seemed to think for a moment before retracting her hand and raising herself in one smooth motion. Back to her height of about three meters, she stood a few heads bigger than me once more.

I was usually the largest one in the room in my previous life... I’ll never get used to this.

“You’re right,” she said. “Where are my manners? That’s what you get if you spend all your time among beasts. You know your place, don’t you?”

“I do, but I don’t know your place, and that bugs me immensely.”

Arax grinned, baring her large teeth. “You don’t know about the conflict among the powerful of this world. Very well. It’s simple really. We’re all after the same thing, gods and lesser beings alike. We want to leave this place.”

I frowned in confusion. “Leave? As in go to another world?”

“That’s right. We’re in the Inner Realm, a place for the powerless.” She looked around, scowling at the people around us. “We all have to fight for our survival, some more, some less. But even just ascending to the Mid Realm is life altering. And past that...” She looked up into the blue sky longingly. For a moment, it sounded like a dream of peace and tranquility. Until she continued, her voice slick with bloodlust. “Past that, lies true, limitless power. Here and everywhere. To do as you please, and judge as you like.”

A shiver ran down my spine. I didn’t have a proper concept for what the Outer Realm was, but it being the place for the architects of worlds, a beast like her aspiring to make it there and to other worlds sounded like a terrible idea. Assuming that it was even possible.

“Limitless power is great and all,” I said, “but... what then?”

“You become a god of gods. Able to bring life at the snap of a finger—or death. To anyone.”

It sounded like she was holding a grudge, and perhaps she needed more power to either take revenge or make sure whatever happened wouldn’t happen again.

“Seems like someone really did a number on you...” I said absentmindedly.

“Maybe I will tell you one day. But there’s much to do before then. What do you say?”

Guess I won’t get more out of her.

It wasn’t much, but I had learned at least something. The “powerful” aimed to ascend to higher places. And both Gallas and Arax had hinted that scripts and the ability to understand Omega were vital in this process. The interesting question was “Why?”. Or rather, how the entire system even worked, and how the realms played into it. I didn’t have the time to think about it, however.

The enormous humanoid wolf looked at me with a smile, expectantly. If I went along with her plan, I was presumably certain to survive for the foreseeable future. I couldn’t be sure about anyone else though, and I would never trust Arax. After all, she was the one who killed me and Lilana just to instill terror in Tomar. There were also a range of possibilities for things she could do without me knowing, regardless of what kind of deals we made. And ultimately, she wanted to become so powerful that nobody could ever stand up to her ever again. Her, a being that didn’t even pretend to have moral values. No, nothing good could come from biding my time. Our position could become less advantageous than it already was, she would learn more about us and our powers, and she would grow stronger yet as well. And so I made a decision. Even if it endangered the people around us, I would try again right now.

I fixed my gaze on Arax, determined. Estimating distances, reactions, and collateral damage, I prepared mentally. Without any further warning, I stood sideways and raised my arms, aiming at Arax with my left and at the other wolf with my right. Two streams of water shot out from my hands and hit both of them, sending them flying.

“Berla, Ria! We’re going to hold Arax back while we deal with the weaker ones! Go!”

Berla’s head snapped in my direction and after a nod immediately back to Arax, barreling into the crowd near the office district. The other beast meanwhile slid over the ground and came to a stop a couple meters before the people. Screams could be heard from both directions.

Lower stance, less leverage, shorter flying distance...

“But the scripts are too weak!” Riala complained while Berla jumped to her feet.

“Keep hitting them! It just takes a while!”

I hope...

The three of us turned towards the beast and ran in its direction. I directed Riala with gestures and we approached it from two sides, while Berla ran straight at it.

Standing up, it briefly shook its head before noticing us coming for it. It was visibly surprised to see us and snarled, but it was nothing in comparison to the deafening roar that came from the other direction.

“Raaaaaah!” Arax screamed.

I ignored it to the best of my ability, unable to turn my back at the beast right before me, but it took a lot of willpower not to look at Arax in panic. Berla was steadfast as well, but Riala was understandably shaken by the sound and stopped in her tracks.

First things first. Giving this one another smack.

The second I arrived in a good spot, I took aim again and shot at the wolf. This time, however, it evaded. I had aimed carefully at its left though, forcing it to go right, where a kick from Berla connected with its face. It didn’t seem to do much damage, but it was enough to stun it for a moment, during which I fired again. Using a stronger script, the wolf flew much farther, giving us a second to breathe.

“Miles!” Riala shouted.

Looking in Arax’s direction, I saw that two beasts had suddenly joined her, while the people fled the main square in droves.

A rallying cry?

My eyes widened as I spun around. Coming flying for me was the second wolf from the market district, claws and muzzle blood caked. In a split second decision I jumped forward in its direction, diving under it. Rolling on the ground I turned around and shot water at the position where it would’ve come down, and it got hit before it could turn around, flying in Arax’s direction.

She walked towards us slowly, unperturbed by its minion lying in her path. Her expression was one of fury. “Miles!” she yelled, before changing her stance.

Oh shit.

I knew that she was about to sprint in this direction, which meant that she would arrive in front of me in a matter of milliseconds, and that could be the end. Raising both my arms I aimed at her at first, but just as I took a shot with one arm, I moved the other one slightly to the left, where I hoped she would evade towards.

Both streams traveled in their direction, but unfortunately, neither found its target. I only saw a white blur to my right. Before it could reach me though, it suddenly flew in the direction of the temple, knocked back by another stream of water.

“Good job!” I said to Riala.

I quickly took stock of the situation. Berla was running towards one beast, Arax was down for at least three seconds, while two beasts started running in mine and Riala’s direction. Assuming that Berla could take care of herself for a couple of seconds, Riala and I faced the two wolves first.

They ran at us at high speed, but watched our every move. They reminded me of the moderators, ready to dodge our attacks. Luckily, we had discussed this particular problem after our last fight with intelligent beasts. Just before they reached us, both Riala and I suddenly focused on each other’s beast instead, and with the shots coming from unexpected angles, both beasts were hit in their sides and were blasted off their feet.

Arax.

I turned towards the temple. This fight would be a balancing act, keeping all enemies at bay while we tried to slowly whittle them down. As if on cue, Arax stood up after getting knocked into the temple wall. She started moving towards us again, but at a much slower pace than before. Both Riala and I gave shots off, but she evaded every one of them as she inched closer. She was deliberately going slow to have more control.

Glancing to our right, the other beasts were already getting up again as well, meaning that we would have to act fast. If they all attacked us at once, we would almost certainly be done for. While I was still thinking about this, however, Arax shot past me. Barely following her with my eyes, I only saw Riala getting punched and flying through the air in a large arch. She landed dozens of meters away, hitting the ground hard, rolling, and finally coming to a complete standstill. She was unmoving.

“Ria!”

“Enough, Miles!” Arax warned.

I pried my eyes off of Riala as my breathing grew ragged. I heard Arax utter something. Maybe she still wanted to convince me, but seeing Riala in my peripheral vision, her words didn’t register, and I started shooting everything I had in quick succession.

Hit her... Hit her! HIT HER!

Most shots missed, Arax evading where possible, but somehow it seemed like I hit more and more as time went on. Simultaneously, I kept firing shots at the other two beasts, managing to get hits in on four targets at once by some miracle. I didn’t know how I was doing this. I didn’t know how long it went on for. But what I did understand was the expression on Arax’s face, turning from fury to apprehension. Something was happening. She was overwhelmed, and more and more spots on her fur started to fade into gray and black. She started putting more distance between us, but I kept shooting, a fire burning inside me. A fire that was slowly consuming me. I realized I had crossed my pain threshold when the searing pain flowing through my entire body reached my brain. But I couldn’t stop. Not until Arax was lying face down on the ground.

I was determined to keep going, but as my body ached more and more, and I started having trouble seeing, I eventually found myself on all fours. I had difficulty breathing, and I could barely perceive what was happening around me anymore.

Looking up through squinted eyes, I saw a mostly gray beast before me. Her eyes wide, Arax looked down at me, her face something between fear and hatred.

“Damn scripters!”

She kicked me in my side and I rolled over, coughing. I tried to raise my arm to give off another shot, but she quickly stepped in and onto it, so hard that I could hear bones crack. In my current state, however, the additional pain barely even mattered, and my other arm refused to move all on its own. I closed my eyes, every cough causing pain to shoot through every fiber of me. I was done.

“Tsk. That’s it then. No deal for you,” Arax said.

Yea... No deal... “Fuck you...” I whispered.

I felt her grip around my throat again, lifting me into the air.

“You threw away your life. Was it worth it?” she spat.

I pried open my eyes slightly to look at her. “Would’ve been if I had managed another minute or two,” I croaked.

Anger flared up in her and her grip tightened, her claws digging into my flesh. I was convinced that this was it. That’s when I heard a quiet voice in the distance.

“S-sis?”

Ria... You’re alive? Thank god... Wait... Sis?

“She survived that?” Arax asked, perplexed.

As she turned her head, I could see Riala staring at Zara, lying on the ground near her. Her head then snapped in our direction, where Arax was holding me.

“No!” Riala cried out in panic.

She got to her feet and looked between Zara and me.

Don’t so something stupid now... Be smarter than me...

Weirdly enough, my thoughts fell on deaf ears. Riala’s expression suddenly changed and her aura spiked to twice its normal size. The air seemed to grow hotter and started to waver.

What...

I desperately clung to my consciousness as sparks started swirling around Riala. I looked on in wonder as she raised her arms and flames erupted from them, coming straight for Arax and me.