Arcane Apocalypse

31 – Like the Wind

“Thank you for everything,” said Brent, nodding in thanks towards Avery and the bunch of rowdy people following behind her like a pack of dogs. “And sorry for the trouble we caused.”

“It’s fine,” the girl said. “Any last minute tips or things to look out for further in the city? I think we’ll send a little expedition today.”

“Avoid the manholes and always leave the monster corpses behind,” said Brent. “The goblins travel in smaller groups, the critters are solitary but the rats will swarm you. You can only throw them a bone and hope it distracts them long enough for you to run away.”

“Thanks, will do.” Avery ribbed her chin, then turned to her people with a shrug. “Let’s get ready, we have some food to loot before Viktor comes back down to annoy us into not going. I want ten of you ready in half an hour at the end of … “

The authoritative girl’s voice slowly faded into the distance as the group made their way towards the suburbs. Another half an hour and they’d be there at the house Mia grew up in. Just thirty minutes.

That sent Mia’s anxiety spiralling. Her ever so helpful overactive imagination came up with a dozen horrific answers to the question: ‘what are we going to find there?’

Would the door be ripped off the hinges, a werewolf from the nearby woods having made her mother’s house its den? Would the goblins have managed to sneak by Avery’s group of haphazard fighters and raided the place down to the dirt?

Her higher Cognity proved to be a curse this time, doubling the speed at which her thoughts slid off the rails and crashed into a train wreck of rising panic.

What if they killed her? 

Darkness crept in at the edges of her vision as dread grabbed her by the throat. Mia herself barely avoided death at least five times by now and she had a powerful Class and Jeff’s paranoid defences to protect her.

Her mother had a shotgun with a dozen shells and walls that were built five generations ago to protect her.

The odds weren’t good.

“Shit, hey, Mia!” Lina’s voice sounded distant, barely a whisper beneath layers upon layers of worst case scenarios playing out before Mia’s eyes.

She could smell the blood already, mixing with the old woody smell her mom’s house had. She heard the screams, those cackles goblins made, a growl.

All of that went away in an instant as a slap almost sent Mia sprawling but a vice-like grip on her shoulders kept her upright.

Her vision swam as her eyes went blurry with tears at the pain. “W-what? Why?”

“Oh, thank god!” Lina breathed out. “Good, listen to my voice, Mia! No thinking, just my voice alright? It’s alright. Everything’s fine.”

As Lina continued to whisper calming words into her ear, Mia looked around in a daze. Her face stung like a bitch and while she would have usually snapped at whoever was responsible, she was more confused than anything at the moment.

Carmilla hovered over her, the iron grip holding her upright proving to be the skeletal teen’s while Brent looked on with a mildly worried frown from a distance.

Mark was off to the side, looking like he had no idea what he was supposed to be doing. Mia was with him on that one.

Her gaze landed on the redhead at the end, finding her crimson eyes to be jumping between just about everything that wasn’t Mia’s face.

She looked sheepish. For some reason Mia couldn’t deduce. Considering that Lina wasn’t that strong, and neither man looked to have been involved in whatever this was, Mia had a suspicion though, that it might have had something to do with the slap that was thrice as strong as it needed to be.

I worried them this much? Or what was I doing before? Did I have a panic attack? Mia wondered, slowly relaxing into Lina’s soft hug and just did as she was told. She let the words of comfort flow into her mind without thinking.

The Familiar’s innocent worry for her safety flowing through their bond also helped. It was like a pet, showing its unconditional love in a way much more spiritual and intimate than any physical action could. It was a balm to Mia’s soul, along with the two girl’s clear worry for her.

It felt nice.

“I’m fine,” she whispered, squirming a little in the threeway hug. Funnily enough, Carmilla looked twice as uncomfortable to be taking part in the hug but she did so anyway. She’s a kind girl, I’m glad we found her in time to save her.

“You aren’t,” Lina said, pulling back with her hands still on Mia’s shoulders to stare into her eyes. “And that’s fine, it’s normal. No one should be ‘fine’ in this situation. Just remember that you’re not alone and that we are here for you. Okay? Will you do that for us?”

“Okay … ?” Mia said, finding herself unable to do much else but smile. That was probably the nicest thing anyone who wasn’t her family told her. It made her choke up a bit.

“Good! Okay,” Lina said, nodding rapidly to herself. “Try to focus on the now, okay? Stay in the now. Don’t let your thoughts drown you, I know that if you let them, they’ll drag you as far down into the abyss as they can.”

Mia might have felt the need to bite back at that, the need to tell the girl she wasn’t the one whose mother might be lying in a pool of her blood just a bit away while goblins snacked on her. 

The levity with which Lina spoke stopped that urge in its tracks though, as did the fragile smile the blonde gave her. She knew. No, she understood. 

Mia let out a choked breath that might have sounded like something between a sob and a sniffle. 

“Sorry,” Mia whispered.

“Don’t be,” Lina said, her smile turning gentle as she pulled Mia back in for a quick squeeze. “That’s what friends are for.”

Right. Mia gave a brittle smile, vowing that she’d crush any mental barriers she needed to when the time came for her to be there for Lina. 

“Thanks,” she said, then turned to Carmilla and pulled the teen in for a hug too. The vampiress yelped in surprise and, after a moment, patted Mia awkwardly on the back. “Thank you too, but maybe use half the strength you did in that slap?”

“Y-yes,” Carmilla stuttered, gulping audibly as Mia pulled back. “Sorry I- uhm, didn’t really have the chance to practise holding back.”

“It’s fine,” Mia said with a smirk that made it apparent she was just teasing. Hopefully. Facial expressions and body language didn’t always work out as Mia expected. “You’ll learn.”

“Not that I want to ruin the heartfelt moment,” Mark said once the three girls seemed back to their usual calm. “But has anyone seen Sam?”

Brent’s eyes shot wide as he looked around in a hurry, quickly mirrored by the three girls with marginally less hurry.

The boy was gone, no trace of him remaining anywhere. People were still about, walking through the parks and parking lots in the distance. None of them had Sam’s look, and nor did Mia hear his voice anywhere.

Carmilla seemed to be a moment away from saying something, but snapped her lips shut instead with a frown. 

“What is it?” Mia asked in a whisper, tilting her head in askance.

“His scent is gone,” the vampiress said. “I should be able to track anyone whose scent I smelled before and if there is a trail.”

“Did someone nab him?” Mark mused, his voice a low growl as he glared back in the direction Avery disappeared behind the bushes. “Was that byplay just to distract us?”

“Natural means wouldn’t have been able to erase his scent this well,” Carmilla said, continuing to take cute little sniffs of air with her eyes narrowed. 

“And I would have felt a spell going off near me,” Mia said, then said the most obvious conclusion the rest of the group was probably thinking but was unwilling to voice. “He probably ditched us.”

“What?” Mark turned on her, his bushy eyebrows pulled into a glare. He was closest to the brat, Mia remembered belatedly. 

“We wouldn’t have felt a thing if he snuck away while we were distracted,” Mia said, keeping her tone calm and measured lest she angers Mark even further. “He had Air elemental Skills, right? One of them could have been one to erase his own scent.”

“He wo-“ Marks started then froze midway through. “Fuck. That was exactly what one of his Subskills does.”

The dwarf looked a bit lost, as expected of someone whose ‘friend’ just disappeared on them. Though, with how Mark was playing with the brat’s crush on Mia, she wasn’t sure whether she should really be thinking of the two as friends. 

“That is … “ Brent started, his face lined with a deep frown. “His choice, in the end. I suppose he felt he’d fit in better with Avery’s group.”

The man seemed to take that as a personal failure by the look on his face, but he was quick to shake the expression off his face.

While they did that, it was the girl’s turn to look awkward, exchanging glances as if to say.

‘What do we do?’ Mia asked with a glance.

‘I don’t know’ Lina gave a helpless expression.

‘I’m glad he’s gone’ Carmilla held back a smile.

‘So am I’ Mia supressed a breath of relief.

‘That’s mean … but same’ Lina frowned.

Mia was mostly relieved to be rid of him in a peaceful manner while Carmilla looked damned near gleeful. Lina was the only one feeling conflicted, well, conflicted enough for it to show.

It evoked a guilty feeling, but Mia thought their chances of survival as a group just went up with the brat’s departure. Carmilla could do everything he could and more, there would be no loss in utility abilities and variety.

“Let’s get back to moving,” said Brent with what might have been a sigh. “He made his choice it seems. If he wants to leave, I say we let him. No need to track him down and hound him. Agreed?”

With even Mark giving a reluctant nod, the group set off once more.

*****

“And you have a runic-model too? Not just an Elemental Skill?” Mia asked, curiosity practically dripping from her words.

“I do,” Carmilla said with a shy smile, seemingly both enthusiastic to talk about the topic and unsure of how to actually do it. “Vampires all inherit the basic runic-model of their Progenitors, if the Progenitor has one to inherit that is.”

“Uhhh, is it rude to ask what your affinities are and what spells you know?” Mia asked.

“Maybe?” Carmilla shrugged. “If you’re willing to share then so am I.”

“I have Superior Arcane affinity,” Mia said without a moment’s hesitation, far too eager to finally talk to a ‘real mage’. As her book would say. “I know Arcane Bolt, Blast, Explosion, Shield, Mage Hand and Mana Familiar. Most of those spell names are self explanatory.”

“Well, uhh, okay?” Carmilla seemed bemused at Mia’s enthusiasm while Lina just looked on with a smile. “I have Superior Water affinity and Major Blood. I … don’t know that many spells, only Gather Water, Water Blade, Blood Healing and Blood Bolt.”

“Ohhh, you can cast spells from two different elements?” Mia asked. “How does that work? I read that if I add a rune of a different element to my Arcane runic-model, it’d implode.”

“Blood is an advanced element of Water,” Carmilla shrugged, looking unsure whether that explanation was enough. “I guess I inherited a, uhm, non-basic runic-model. I think, my Progenitor was certainly damned proud of it.”

“What?” Mia asked, her face stiffening.

“What?” Carmilla asked, looking confused.

“You spoke to your progenitor?” Mia asked, remembering that she herself probably had an angry ancient ancestor somewhere out in the cosmos. Well, she did if the System just didn’t pull its flavour text — aka, the history in its descriptions — out of its ass.

“Vampires can leave memories in their blood,” Carmilla said. “I can view them while sleeping, as dreams with varying stages of lucidity to them.”

“Wait a second!” Lina shouted, whirling around on the two whispering amongst themselves in the back. “You mean to say our ‘Bloodlines’ that the System ‘Awakened’ really originate from someone out there in a different Realm?”

“Yes,” Carmilla said. “If you have a bloodline the System bothered to awaken, then your ancestors probably got stranded on Earth just like mine.”

“Huh, yep! Pretty sure that’s right. I even have a book that dedicates a chapter to my bloodline and important members of it in the ‘Mystic Realm’.” Mia made an interested sound. “Anyway, how is that dream-memory-diving thingy? What’s your Progenitor like? Are they the Dracula type of vampire or the sparkly kind that sits around in highschool for centuries stalking teenage girls?”

“Dracula,” Carmilla said with a strange smirk on her lips. She stared into the distance, her smirk growing. “Yes, certainly Dracula.”

“Uhh, seeing as you aren’t too weirded out by it, I take it they won’t be a monumental asshole the moment you meet them?”

“Meet him?” Carmilla asked, stiffening.

“I mean,” Mia said. “Vampire progenitors probably live for a while, right? And he is from one of the System’s Realms right?”

“Yes?”

“So you’ll probably meet him, no?” Mia said. “I mean … wouldn’t you be interested in some distant descendant of yours popping up in a Realm that is just getting integrated into your ‘world’?”

“I guess,” Carmilla said, humming. “Should be … fine? Yes, it probably will. I hope.”

Glad mine probably won’t care. Why the hell would a ‘Great Spirit King’ care about a random descendant when he has hundreds if not thousands of those after all. Mia had earlier skimmed the summary about her own progenitor in her book about Halvyr history.

Anachreon ruled over millions, if not billions, of souls. Thousands of those were elves, most of them being his own distant descendants, and hundreds of Fae, who were more closely related to him.

He has no reason to care … though I guess neither does Carmilla’s progenitor. 

“He might not care,” Mia said, doing an about face with her opinion. “I mean, he probably has thousands of descendants. You’ll be perfectly fine. Anyway, what do your spells do? Can you pull water out of the air?”

“Eh?” Carmilla startled out of her thoughts. “Oh, that? No, not yet. Magic has this weird thing where it takes exponentially more mana to affect things as they get smaller and smaller. It’s about at the same rate as the cost increases for affecting things as their size and mass grows larger and larger.”

“That’s … interesting,” Mia played with an unruly lock of hair as she thought it through. “Damn, the knowledge download you got with your Class must have been even more extensive than mine. I didn’t know that.”

“ … right,” Carmilla looked awkward as she nodded. “As for the spell, all it does at the moment is collect water from an already existing source into an orb that floats over my shoulder. It acts as a sort of ammo box for the Water Blades.”

“Does it take just the water, or does it take dirt and stuff along with it if you use it on a muddy puddle?”

“It takes everything,” Carmilla said. “Why?”

“Bummer,” Mia said. “You could have used it to make clean drinking water out of almost any body of water.”

“Oh, hmmm.” Carmilla tilted her head. “Maybe I will be able to at one point. Seems complicated, it’d need a filter and a part that defines water as more than just ‘something that is fluid’.”

“Can you use any fluid for it?”

“Anything with about the same consistency of water as far as I know.” Carmilla shrugged. “Like Blood.”

“If you can use blood for Water spells, what would be the difference between doing that and using a dedicated Blood Blade spell for example?”

“Blood spells cost some lifeforce along with mana and they eat into the target’s too.”

“Oh, you mentioned that before,” Mia said. “‘Lifeforce’ what’s that?”

“I guess … It's like the superglue that keeps your metaphysical body, mind and spirit stuck together. It’s also the ‘inner energy’ that is part positive and part negative energy.  Your knowledge download covered that, right?”

“Uhh, a bit?” Mia said. “But I read a book on elements, so I know some stuff. Huh. And, uhm, won’t it be a problem if you suck that out of me? For me, that is?”

“It regenerates,” Carmilla said all too quickly. “And I’d just need a drop of blood or two every … day? The lifeforce in that should be so little you won’t even notice it not being there, it’ll regenerate before you even notice it’s gone.”

“I can verify that,” Brent said without turning, striding at the head of the group down the streets of the narrow suburban area between the Mur river and the woods the werewolf claimed for himself. “The Ki I use for my Skills is practically lifeforce, and the paltry amount in a shed drop of blood would be unnoticeable.”

“Ki is tainted,” Carmilla scrunched up her nose. “Uh, not in a bad way, but it feels weird. It’s like your mind corrupted your lifeforce. Or a part of it at least.”

“Because that’s exactly what Ki is,” said Brent. “Overflowing lifeforce that is under my mind’s control to do with as I wish. It can’t be projected outside the body, not at our level … or rather, rank, but it is much more potent than mana for body enhancements.”

“Thanks Brent,” Mia said with a smile, feeling a bit warm on the inside that everyone was so generous with knowledge in the group. “Alright then. I’ll … drip a few drops into a glass I guess? Sorry, I don’t want to get bitten.”

“It’s fine,” Carmilla said with a spring now in her steps and a smile on her lips. “It’ll do just fine. More than fine. Thank you Mia.”

“Sure?” Mia shrugged with an awkward smile, unused to receiving the straightforward pure appreciation Carmilla was radiating like a star.

“Oh, what would happen if I lost too much of it though?” Mia asked, her thoughts jumping right back into theorycrafting. “Or rather, what would happen to someone struck by your Blood spells?”

“Well, lifeforce is mostly what makes up your energy channels,” Carmilla said. “It is also how you connect with your spirit. Without it, most Skills and magic don’t work. Though, most people would be far too dead by that point to care about such stuff. The imbalance would kill you long before that.”

“Imbalance?”

“The Body, the Mind and the Spirit.” Carmilla said, looking like she was digging up some dusty piece of knowledge and quoting someone. “The mortal Trinity. When one of them gets into too much of an imbalance, or gets destroyed, you die.”

“But the System said I didn’t have a Spirit before I got integrated?”

“What?” Carmilla froze. “How? That- that shouldn’t be- hmmmm.”

“What are you thinking?” Mia asked.

“I don’t know,” Carmilla said, looking embarrassed. “Sorry, by my knowledge, that should be impossible.”

“It was the same with me though,” Lina said from the side. 

“Same here,” Mark said. “ERROR! Null value for Spirit Attribute detected.”

“I believe it was the same for us all,” said Brent, sending a pointed glance at the vampiress as if to ask why that wasn’t the case for her.

“I- uh, it could have been the same for me,” the redhead said, scratching her cheek in thought. “I was … unconscious when I got integrated. I don’t remember it at all, to be honest. Just waking up with the System already in place.” 

“That must have been horrible,” Mia said with feeling, reaching up to pat Carmilla on the shoulder and earning a smile in response. I’m getting the hang of this consoling stuff. Yey for progress.

“It was livable,” Carmilla replied with a shrug that seemed a bit forced even to Mia. 

Mia staggered, her bones rattling as a sound crashed into her like a landslide. It was more than a voice, a mere sound, it was a feeling. More than that, it was a CALL.

It lasted for almost five whole seconds, keeping up in intensity for the first three while it petered out at the end. That was when Mia actually heard what the sound was and as she did a shiver ran down her spine.

It was a howl, a long, deep howl that spoke of a body far too large to have been made by a regular wolf.

Her eyes snapped up and to the side, towards the forested hill rising up above the line of houses only a few hundred metres away. If she squinted, she could see the treetops trembling, as if quivering in fear near the hilltop.

The moment she snapped back to herself, the whiplash sent Mia on her knees and she barely managed to get a hand out before her face got introduced to the asphalt.

She let out a groan, her ears still ringing and echoes of that bone rattling sound still haunting her. 

“The fuck was that?” Mark shouted, his panicked voice slowly coming into focus as Mia’s ears stopped ringing.

“I suppose that would have been that ‘werewolf king’,” said Brent, gazing up at the hilltop with narrowed eyes as his hand fiddled with the pommel of his sword. 

Carmilla hissed in distaste, looking livid at something Mia couldn’t parse as she glared at the hill. 

“Mia, you alright?” Lina asked. “That seemed to hit you harder than the rest of us.”

“I felt it just the same,” Carmilla said through gritted teeth. “It’s trying to call everyone with certain bloodlines to itself. Probably to form a pack, or something.”

“‘Trying’?” Mark said. “I think it more than fucking succeeded. Look.”

People were bursting out of the houses all the way down the street. From teens to balding old men, dozens came out just on the street they were on and gazed towards the hill.

Some didn’t even bother. A woman wearing nothing but a set of underclothes and a fluffy feline tail bounced onto the rooftop and shot off towards the forest. A few more followed, but most of the people fought back down whatever urge they had.

Mia couldn’t help but notice that most of the people who didn’t seem to hesitate were the ones with more prominent animal characteristics.

Closing her eyes, Mia felt around for any strange need in her heart to run off into the forest like a lunatic. Thankfully, she found none. 

“Is it mind control?” Mia frowned, the thought sending a shudder of revulsion down her spine. The one time she experienced Jeff’s mind fuckery was already horrid enough, she didn't plan on experiencing such a thing ever again.

“No,” Carmilla said quickly. “Nothing as crass as that. It’s more like … the call is appealing to a primal urge most people don’t know how to control yet.”

“You know all that from those bloodline dreams of yours?” Lina asked suddenly, looking somewhere between curious and suspicious.

“Bloodline memories.” Carmilla shrugged. “Some are random memories of battles, but most are intentional lessons my Progenitor passed down to his descendants. Like how the pack mentality of Beastkin and Shifters work. They need a pack, a clan, a family as we need air to breathe or they can go mad from the loneliness. Well, there are some solitary species of them, but canine beastkin are one of the most social of their kind.”

“And that cunt up on the hill just invited them into his raider cult,” Mark said. “Stellar. A bunch of furries coming together to make a nuisance of themselves … wait! Do you think Sam left because he got caught up in that thing too?”

Mark looked sickened by the idea, a total 180 from the disdainful look he sent towards the hill just moments before. 

“He left long before that call came,” Brent said, patting the dwarf on the shoulder. “He left on his own. Nothing we can do about that.”

Mark looked like he was chewing on a lemon, but he nodded reluctantly, his gaze still occasionally landing on the towering trees covering the hill.

“Anything crazy like that I should know about my race?” Mia whispered to Carmilla, not wanting to interrupt Mark’s brooding. “I won’t turn into a ghost when the full moon comes, or something as silly as that, will I?”

“Uhhh, I don’t actually know what exactly you are, soooo.” Carmilla whispered back, scratching her cheek.

“Halvyr,” Mia said.

“ … nothing I remember, I barely even have anything about that race at all.” Carmilla hummed. “Must be pretty rare.”

“Alright ladies, enough chatting,” said Brent, his voice tense. “We are running. I want to put more distance between us and that hill. I’m not liking how boxed in by the river we are here.”