The Curze of Remnant

by M'Shen

A son of the Emperor is spirited away to a world of monsters and magic. The Unification of Remnant has begun. Rated M for Gore and Adult Themes. Best read with Times New Roman.

8. Chapter 7

"Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay
To mould me man? Did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me?"

~ An unknown heretic of Old Earth

---

Chapter 7

0926 hours, 6th Axial Rotation of Joo'Lie, Valean Time

Undisclosed Location, Mistral

Sienna Khan stared up at the red banners that hung proudly from the dark ceiling. Torches did their best to pierce the perpetual gloom in the grand hallway, and depending on where she looked, the colours of the room oscillated between light crimson and dark mahogany.

The gloom didn't matter. Sienna's night vision was excellent, even amongst her fellow Faunus. She could see in the dark as clearly as in the day and even better was her sense of smell. It was no secret amongst the Faunus community that some variants were superior to others in certain aspects, some even in most aspects.

The throne's red cushions felt soft on her skin. The leader of the White Fang sighed as she stretched her arms ahead of her, feeling her muscles tense and loosen as she did so. She missed the times she had gone on missions with her subordinates, back when the fresh iteration of the White Fang was in its formative years. As the organization inevitably grew, Sienna was forced to use her administrative skills to revamp the organization's chain of command.

One of her guards stepped forth from the darkness behind her. These four men were among the elite of her subordinates, and each was the equivalent of huntsmen. She trained them herself and knew each of them by name, and they were armed with the best weapons the organization could afford.

One of them stepped forth. Sienna's stare at the door did not falter. She did not need to look back — she knew the man by scent, just as she did with the rest of her guards. His name was Leonardo Saffron — the captain of her guards. The livery he wore was no different from the rest of the troupe, but there was a certain deftness to his movements that, when noticed, would immediately indicate to an observer that he was a breed apart.

"High Leader Khan, a messenger has arrived. She is waiting outside the doors," whispered Leonardo.

Sienna gathered her thoughts.

"Bid her enter."

"It shall be done, High Leader," acknowledged Leonardo. He straightened up and spoke into an earpiece attached to his left ear. It buzzed with a reply. The remaining guard stepped forth, out of the shadows. Their spears were held neither in any way menacing nor unprepared. They were silent, as still as a statue, ready to strike at a centisecond's notice.

The doors parted with the groaning of grinding, wrought-iron gears, revealing a tall figure dressed in a stark black stealth-suit with a sheathed sword buckled to her side.

An assassin of the White Fang. Sienna did not expect this. The Faunus was dressed in the formal livery that Sienna was so accustomed to seeing in their shadowy circle. She was a chameleon Faunus, highly sought after by the White Fang for their ability to blend in with the human populace. Assassins. Sienna feared their kind, but she could not deny their effectiveness in severing the heads of major Atlesian corporations.

The assassin strode across the carmine carpet with a steady gait that betrayed little emotion. She was slim but visibly muscular, and on the whole, her body was desirable, but not gorgeous. Her physical gifts were obvious, as with all of her kind. After all, assassins were a rare breed, and distinct phenotypes were the norm.

The assassin kneeled before Sienna at the pomp of her throne. She inclined her head to meet Sienna's scrutinizing gaze.

"High Leader Khan, I come bearing unfortunate news," said the assassin calmly.

"Speak."

"A group of low-ranking grunts in Vale were massacred in an alleyway by what I believe to be the creature from the pod," said the assassin.

There was silence.

"How much do you know of this incident?"

"Very much, High Leader," said the assassin.

"Tell me then. From start to finish. Be as detailed as possible," said Sienna. "Don't kneel. Stand."

The assassin rose from her knees. She stood in silence for a moment as she gathered her thoughts. After a few seconds, she spoke.

"Very well, High Leader. The grunts were assaulting a human woman. I was curious and decided to watch where it would lead. And then, I saw a boy approaching the trio to stop the crime. From what I remember, the boy said something that caused the grunts to attack him," said the assassin. "I thought he was suicidal at first, but…"

She paused.

"What happened then?" asked Sienna.

"I don't quite know, High Leader. One moment, the man looked as though he had killed the boy with a swing of his machete, but the boy did not fall. The next, the boy was standing over the man's corpse with his heart in one of his hands. He then...ate the heart," said the assassin. Sienna couldn't help but notice the slight quiver in her voice.

Sienna was taken aback by the news. A bead of sweat trickled down her nape, but her composure did not falter. Few among the largest Mistrali mafias would even consider such a savage act.

"You did not see him move?" asked Sienna, visibly intrigued.

"Slightly, High Leader. All I saw was a blur of movement," said the assassin. "I could have missed it by blinking."

Sienna had heard of such anecdotes in the past, of elite huntsmen and huntresses moving so quickly that, to the observer, they appeared to be blurs of colour. With that alone, the boy could simply be extraordinarily talented, a once in a generation prodigy who could defeat grown men before they could react.

Cannibalism was a different matter entirely.

"What happened after that?" asked Sienna.

"As I remember, High Leader, the boy chased the remaining two grunts down the alleyway with the machete from the one he killed. He decapitated one of the grunts and proceeded to…slam the largest grunt into the wall with so much force that the man was paralysed," said the assassin, reluctant to go further.

"And then what happened to the last grunt?" asked Sienna.

"High Leader, the boy…I think the boy spat onto the man's face. The man…his face melted away. He was screaming, High Leader, but I couldn't hear his screams. The boy picked him up while he screamed and…tore him in two," said the assassin. There was a quiver in her voice, whereupon Sienna had ascertained the existence of the fear in the assassin's heart.

Sienna slumped back into her seat. So, it was confirmed, then, that the boy was not a boy, but the creature from the pod.

"How old do you think he is?" asked Sienna.

"Around ten or eleven, High Leader Khan. Perhaps thirteen, if you considered his physique."

"And how tall is he?"

"Around five feet, give or take a foot, High Leader," said the assassin.

"Did you notice anything odd about the boy's appearance?" asked Sienna.

"He was quite different, yes. From far away, he wouldn't look very different from regular humans. It is up close, however, that the similarities disappear. I...I don't know how to describe exactly but...he has a very sharp and tall nose. He has black hair that reaches his shoulders. His face is rather ovular and is made up of many…exaggerated features, like a sculpture almost. He wasn't very muscular, only slightly more muscular than the average boy, I think. On the contrary, he was a bit lean, with some well-defined muscles, which is why I found it odd that he was able to defeat the grunts the way he did," she replied, almost reverentially. Despite the stuttering, she wasn't in the least afraid.

Sienna thought long and hard. She clasped her chin in the palm of her hand and stared blankly into a corner of the room, thinking of the assassin's words.

"But there's something about him that feels different. I got a weird feeling the moment I looked at him," said the assassin.

"And what feeling would that be?" asked Sienna.

"It is difficult to explain, High Leader. It was as though I could sense his aura without having to read it," murmured the assassin. "His aura was reaching out towards me. I could feel it."

"Interesting…" said Sienna. "How did you obtain this information?"

"I was looking out at the city atop a building, High Leader while on a scouting mission. I happened to see the scene unfold," revealed the assassin.

Sienna was silent briefly.

"Is there anything else you wish to say?"

"No, High Leader," said the assassin.

"Very well. You are dismissed," said Sienna. She watched the woman depart, a dark silhouette that seemed to merge with a puddle of shadows. The doors opened slightly with a faint creak, allowing slivers to light to hollow out the darkness and return the carmine splendour of the great hall.

Then the monoliths closed resoundingly in one swift motion, and Sienna Khan was alone yet again in the silence with statues for guards.

---

The Boy Who Would Be King

0857 hours, 6th Axial Rotation of Joo'Lie, Valean Time

#2-01 Azalea Condominium, Western Sector, Vale

The boy entered the bathroom, undressing after shutting the wooden door behind him. His gaze fell upon the area he had remembered in photographic clarity. A faint dark bulge, a dot of keloid tissue — nothing more. He pulled back his lank, black hair and saw his face. It was a pallid face, a solemn countenance of hard angles and Olympian features. Set into the canvas of marble were two brilliant opals that sparkled starkly, juxtaposed against the pitch darkness of the tiny room.

"You forgot to switch the lights on!" came a voice from outside. It was accompanied by a series of firm knocks across the painted surface of the cheap plank. "Or do you prefer it dark in there?"

"The latter," mumbled the boy, but the voice exited loud and clear. He heard Cynthia's footstep recede into the living room as he paced around the insides of the bathroom. The floor was hard ceramic, unlike the wood of Cynthia's bedroom, and the shower was simple and easy to operate. He hung the towel he received from her onto a steel railing to the left of the cubicle.

The boy dropped his bloodstained clothes into the laundry basket. They would have to be disposed of as soon as possible, clothes and basket. His footprints could be found in the slippers Cynthia had offered him. Those would have to go as well, and it was a good thing that they were disposable slippers.

He stepped into the shower cubicle and turned the tap. Freezing water poured over him from above, but no response, not even the slightest of shivers, could be elicited. The boy washed himself clean, watching the dried blood dissolve and drain off his skin, restoring its former lustre and pallor.

He did not use the shampoo nor the soap; they had a distinct fragrance that he could not quite identify, and the boy figured that the scent could easily be used to tie himself to Cynthia.

All it took was for a clever detective to catch a whiff of the smell of his hair and link it back to the soap that Cynthia had in her bathroom.

Indeed, it was a truly unique scent.

He was not foolish enough to let something as silly as his scent get her in trouble.

But the stench of blood remained. It was, perhaps, imperceptible to the lesser olfactory faculties of mankind, but the same could not be said for the Faunus.

He knew many things about them from the catalogue of all recorded Faunus species included in the history book he'd read at the library. He knew the extent of their strength and senses.

He found it odd that knowledge of the Faunus hadn't been implanted in him, unlike the empirical truths of nature, the laws of the physical world, the truths of substances and their particulate composition, the axioms and formulae of mathematics, and human language.

Languages unused in this strange world.

The moment he'd laid eyes on the human settlement was the moment he knew there were others like him in this world. But knowledge of the Faunus had to be learned. Knowledge of their existence shocked him to the core and their discovery had repulsed him beyond comparison, and yet, they resembled the humans so very much in mannerisms, emotions, and culture.

Indeed, it seemed as though he had never been created for this world. He was so very different from the people here. They were mere phantasms of his likeness, flawed copies, each a mixture of unguided evolution. He perceived the world in all its interconnectedness, those myriad laws and truths.

The boy carefully cleaned his nails, the raptorial talons that had grown quickly from meagre lengths. They were useful weapons, cleaving through skin and muscle without chipping. He needed to get a weapon soon. Preferably one that could be easily contained, like a foldable knife or a machete. A sword could also be useful, but size was a concerning factor. He stepped out of the shower, unclothed, watching the white floor mat soaking up the water in concentric wetness. He wrapped the towel around himself, drying his skin and damp black hair.

The curtains were drawn, and the room was lit only by the fluorescent tubing that striped the ceiling. He was doused in a bucket of freezing air from the air conditioner attached to a far corner of the ceiling. Cynthia sat on a chair in a distant corner of her bedroom, and a look of surprise appeared in her eyes as she caught sight of him. He looked angelic, now that he was cleansed of the filthy blood and grime and dirt he'd accumulated since his bombastic arrival.

"I need some clothes."

Cynthia reminded herself, "Oh right, Clothes."

She hurried to a wardrobe to the left of the boy. It was nearly empty, containing a few pairs of monochromatic outfits. Pants, long-sleeved shirts, and some skirts. Nothing expensive and flashy, but sufficient to her purposes.

"There's no underwear, at least, not for boys," giggled Cynthia. "You don't have to wear them if you don't want to."

"Your clothes will be too small for me in less than a month," said the boy softly as he changed into a pair of baggy black pants and a green flannel shirt that Cynthia had given him.

"A month?"

"A month," affirmed the boy. "Assuming they're tailored roughly to fit your proportions."

"How do you know that?"

How else could he know? The boy was somewhat tired of explaining things to her. He stared at her silently, and for a moment Cynthia felt as though she had said something wrong.

"I know because I've monitored my growth ever since I arrived in the kingdom. I grew an inch in three days, which makes an average of roughly zero point eight hundred and forty-six centimetres per day. If we assume a linear increase in height, I would be roughly twenty-five point four centimetres, or ten inches taller than I am now," said the boy.

"Uh-huh," said Cynthia. "But it wouldn't be linear growth, would it?"

"I was about to say that."

"So, you can't predict exponential growth?" asked Cynthia.

"No, at least not with the amount of data I have at the moment to create the function that models exponential growth in two dimensions."

"Well, you'd need at least a graphing calculator for that."

The boy did not reply. He tried on a shirt that fit loosely over him. He wondered if, owing to their natural endowment, the Faunus could sense her scent upon it. He certainly could. It was a bit loose on the sleeves, but the fabric was warm and thick. He tried on a pair of long, black pants. The fabric was strange, but comfortable on his skin, and the clothing was snug around his waist and the boy felt a wave of soft, loose hems sweeping generously over his feet.

"You were going to the cinema?" asked the boy, looking at Cynthia as he began to put on a pair of socks.

"Yeah, I was," she replied.

"Which one?"

"Goldbridge Cinema, near the Vale River," said Cynthia. The boy had heard of the location in the past while eavesdropping as a shadow amongst men in the first days following his arrival. It was one of the largest and most popular cinemas in the Western Sector.

"I see. You should take a shower," said the boy. A bookshelf stood right beside the wardrobe, and the boy eyed its titles curiously.

"I figured that you'd want to read something," said Cynthia. "So, do you want to tell me how you see the future?"

The boy peered at her curiously. "And why would you want to know that?"

There was a pause of a few seconds. Cynthia rubbed her hands, shifting uncomfortably under the boy's scrutinizing gaze.

"W-Well, since we have nothing to do…"

"I saw a detective, Cynthia. I do not know his name. I have no need to. He will be at your doorstep in an hour's time. He will ring your doorbell three times, and you will have no choice but to let him in. You cannot remain silent within your apartment and hope that he believes you are away, for he knows from the surveillance footage taken in the lift lobby that you have entered it. You cannot reject him, for that will give credence to his suspicions. You can only let him in."

The boy paused, noting the expression on Cynthia's face.

"After you let him in, he will ask you one question. He will question you on your failure to call the police. And then he will ask you some more questions," he finished.

"Why only one question?"

"That is what he will ask. But what he may ask afterwards is contingent on your answer to the question he asks first," said the boy.

"I…see," said Cynthia. "But that still doesn't answer how you see the future."

There was a look of surprise in the boy's once-stony face.

"I did. Is it not obvious? You ask me how I see the future. I gave you a reply detailing what I believe to be the nature of foresight. I see actions that will be done, but not the causal happenings that transpire before they do. I do not see how these actions came to be. They are timeless actions — actions with no apparent causal relationship with our universe. There are only outcomes, Cynthia. And yet, they always seem to pass," explained the boy. Cynthia doubted ever seeing it, but a look of pained sadness had flashed across his face in the time it took for her to blink.

"B-But have you ever tried preventing them from happening? If they're bad, of course," asked Cynthia.

"I am trying. I have engineered everything, from the speed at which we ran in that alley, to the rate at which I felled those fiends, and to the inflexion of my voice. I have taken into consideration dozens of variables, all to prevent a single future from transpiring," muttered the boy, a melancholic frown creasing his brow.

The conversation had certainly taken a graver turn by now.

"What did you see?" asked Cynthia, but she thought she knew the answer.

The boy hesitated for a moment.

"I saw you die," he said. "Bloodied and beaten, in a room. Tortured to death. I don't know their means of capturing you, but these visions have made it clear that someone is after me."

Cynthia opened her mouth to speak, but the boy cut her off.

"I have seen the fates of a few individuals. You, a huntsman I encountered, and a girl I conversed with some days ago," said the boy, his voice hushed with secrecy.

"And your own?" asked Cynthia, her voice quivering with emotion.

"That eludes me yet," said the boy.

"And have your…other visions come to pass?" asked Cynthia.

"All of them, yes," said the boy.

"Including what happened to me in that alley?"

"No," said the boy. "I did not foresee that."

"But you can see the future, can't you?"

The boy stared at her for a moment, his gaze melancholic and soulfully sombre.

"I can."

"Then why couldn't you foresee what happened to me in that alley?"

The boy made a displeased sound. "I'm not omniscient."

The boy's stare drifted off into the untrodden parts of her room.

"And what about the near future?"

"It depends much on the situation at hand. I can see my opponent's next move, either by pure intuition or unsolicited foresight. The truth is always laid bare. I always know where the next strike i—"

Cynthia's hand flew through the air, almost too fast for the eye to see. The boy caught the blow with laughable ease and obscene gentleness, clenching his bony white fingers around her wrist. He did not flinch, let alone duck from the blow.

"Ow, ow! Okay, I get it! Point made!" squealed Cynthia as the boy loosened his grip.

"In this case, I could have either relied on my natural reactions, seen your movements before they had unfolded or read the millisecond lasting hints of muscle tension in your arm," remarked the boy. "There may be huntsmen who are able to land a hit on me, though I have not encountered them yet. In other words, I'm open to the possibility that there are huntsmen out there who are either on par with or greater than me in terms of speed. And if I cannot foresee their actions, then I would be in trouble."

He frowned.

"You react oddly to being informed of your imminent death."

"Well, everyone dies in the end, right?" she asked, rhetorically.

"You won't like the way they'll kill you," said the boy, shaking his head.

There was a long pause.

"You're scared that your visions will all be true. I believe that your visions are not fixed," said Cynthia. "You feel the same way too, don't you?"

"Why do you believe so?"

"You have implicitly proven so," said Cynthia. "You doubt your visions. That is why you try to deny them."

Something stirred in the boy's stony visage. A faint chuckle left his lips, much to Cynthia's alarm.

"Well, how sure are you that your visions will always come true, no matter the circumstances?" she asked.

The boy was silent for a moment. He truly didn't know. The truth of the matter was, that he had only begun to care about them when he encountered Cynthia, back in that alleyway, or rather, in a place two weeks from now. He saw her dead in two weeks. The monumental efforts he had invested in preventing the dreadful outcome, and now it could have all gone to waste.

"I don't know, Cynthia," said the boy. "I'm scared. I'm scared of the fickleness of the future. In a way, seeing an event before it unfolds provides me with a sense of solace."

"So you're believing in it...without analyzing it from a logical standpoint?"

"You could say so," said the boy. "I have no idea what to do."

"Can I ask you a question?" asked Cynthia.

"What?"

"Why did you choose to save me?" she asked.

"Out of the goodness of my heart, I saved you. To put it bluntly, I slaughtered them because I felt that it was the right thing to do. I could have easily incapacitated them, but I killed them," said the boy.

"So you see, your creator programmed within you your humanity, along with a very strict moral code, even though you had no reason to possess such things," said Cynthia. "What for?"

"My creator…" The boy drifted off.

"What is he planning?"

"What?" asked Cynthia.

"Every night, I awake in cold sweat after a series of terrible nightmares. I see myself drenched in the blood of a million men. Always wearing that same, hideous suit of armour. And that voice that hammers against my head, calling for justice and conquest, justice and conquest. I see myself at the helm of a hundred ships, with the lives of a hundred thousand demigods at my command. I see myself drenched in the blood of sinners, and my insatiable lust for the blood of criminals grows," said the boy.

"Every night since my arrival has been the same. This pain, this agony, this terror...Why do I exist? Just to suffer?"

The boy's voice was the wispy rasp of a knife scraping against bone. "But I believe that my creator, that fountain of Gold, that being of Light, has designed these traits within me for…reasons. My creator has expended much effort in the process of my creation and design. I was sent here with a purpose to execute. How could it be possible that he wishes me to suffer? Perhaps he made me to suffer. Perhaps my suffering is the price which I have to pay for the strength I possess."

"This creator of yours. A 'being of Light', you say?" asked Cynthia.

"That's the figure who appears in nearly all of my dreams. A giant wreathed in golden light. I would always feel as though I've seen him before, somewhere. I would always feel some form of attachment to it, as though it were a parental figure. When I first saw it, I knew at first glance that such a being could only be my creator," said the boy.

"This situation is getting stranger by the moment. It almost seems magical," said Cynthia.

"Magical?" asked the boy.

"Yeah, you don't know what magic is?"

"No. What is it?"

"Well, there isn't a catch-all definition, but I would define it as 'the ability to control supernatural forces'," explained Cynthia. "It's usually seen in literature, cartoons, and movies."

"Would Semblances and Aura be considered magic?" asked the boy.

"Technically, yes, since they allow huntsmen to perform at superhuman levels while violating the known laws of physics in the process. For example, the fastest recorded running speed of an unaided human is around fifteen meters per second, while huntsmen can move at ten times that while their aura is up," explained Cynthia. "Which is why I'm so interested in you. You've demonstrated the ability to move at speeds that would render you invisible to the human eye, the strength to maim a human with the utmost ease, the ability to communicate telepathically, and the ability to see the future. Although you possess immense intrinsic strength, that wouldn't explain the last two. I suspect you're either using a semblance or some form of magic."

"Anyways, I can't tell if you have an aura or not as I've not unlocked mine," said Cynthia.

"I can assure you that I don't have an aura, or whatever it is that you think you're talking about," said the boy.

"No, that's impossible. All living creatures have an aura. The Grimm don't, because they are soulless in the first place and therefore there is nothing that can manifest as Aura," said Cynthia.

"All living creatures on Remnant, that is," said the boy. "And what's this about souls? What utter nonsense."

"Ugh, why do you have to be so obstinate? Souls do exist!" chided Cynthia, shaking her head. "Oh well, I don't know, maybe this 'creator' of yours made a mistake. Or maybe there were unintended consequences stemming from the inclusion of several features…specifically, your gift of foresight. Factors your creator could not have controlled," said Cynthia. "But surely...for a being possessing the intellect to create one such as you...I find it rather difficult to believe that he could not have discovered a solution to this problem."

A long pause.

"Even so, did my creator make me...knowing that I would suffer from these visions and nightmares?"

"It's also possible that they created you not knowing that you would be afflicted with such an ailment. If they created you knowing full well that you would go on to develop what you just described...then I don't know what to say. Perhaps it was a compromise," said Cynthia. She rubbed her temples, exhausted. "Like what you said: it would be impossible to keep you from suffering and endow you with the strength you have now simultaneously. Anyways, do you really have no memories of your life before you came here?"

"I do remember something...I think it was...a light," said the boy.

"Light?"

"Why would that be helpful information? You wouldn't know what to make of it anyways. All I saw was white, blinding light. But that's really all there is," said the boy. "That's all I can remember."

"Huh. That's strange," said Cynthia. "Honestly, do you have any idea why you were sent here?"

"A purpose envisioned by my creator?" said the boy. "Not in the slightest."

"Oh well. I'm all out of ideas. I guess I should go shower now," said Cynthia.

The boy did not reply. He stared at the ground, unmoving, like a statue of antique marble.

"I'm still curious as to where you read the Law of Vale," Cynthia muttered the afterthought as she rose from her chair and wiped it down with a sheet of wet tissue paper.

The boy was silent briefly and gave an answer, "A Quick Guide to Valean Law: Your Rights and Responsibilities, Second Edition, by Castor Watts, J.D. Page thirty-one," he recalled. A smile creased his cheeks. It was a rare sight for Cynthia. "A guide to Valean Law. Written by an Atlesian…"

Cynthia sighed. "Oh, come on, you don't have to flaunt your memory every time you explain something," She rolled her eyes as she approached the bathroom, back faced to him, as the eyes of the boy followed her out of the room.

"I was just being informative," he murmured, as Cynthia stepped within and shut the door behind her. He heard the sound of heavy, sweat-stained clothes dropping onto the floor, and the sound of feet padding — padding across smooth ceramic tiles. He could hear everything, from the slightest creak in the summer worn wood, to the silent hum of the air-conditioning, and to the halcyon beating of Cynthia's heart from beyond the bathroom door of warm lacquered oak.

The boy plucked a heavy tome from the cheap plywood shelf and sat upon Cynthia's chair. Its wooden legs groaned under his immense weight of three men combined, and for a moment the boy feared that it would collapse. A second passed, and two and three and four and five, but the chair held with respectable obstinance.

The boy's attention returned to the hardcover front of the book. Introduction to Computer Science, it read. It was authored by a man named Arthur Watts who had listed a generous serving of accolades and accomplishments next to his name in the introduction. He was a polymath, it seemed, with doctorates in medicine, computer science, and a master's in electrical engineering. One of the more intelligent specimens of the humans in Atlas, it seemed.

Curiously, the boy leafed through the pages, absorbing their contents in the blink of an eye. There was a generous serving of mathematics that, unbeknownst to the boy, went beyond the prescribed level of undergraduate study, especially at the higher levels. The explanations were terse and simultaneously elegant, and the boy noted that some text had been sparsely annotated by Cynthia's sloppy handwriting. Many of the pseudocode exercises appeared to be incomplete. But then again, Cynthia could have worked them out on a separate piece of paper.

They were easy problems — for him, at least — the boy understood that an intuitive grasp of the underlying axioms of the subject was required to solve many of them — not merely the mindless regurgitation of facts and definitions that he'd encountered in the elementary textbook in the Valean library.

Engrossed, the boy leafed through more and more pages, speeding up as he absorbed and understood the concepts instantaneously, much like how he had done with the books in the library. But now he was able to learn unhindered by the threat of discovery, at a pace now limited by the fragility of the textbook's frail, old paper pages.

Before long, the boy had reached the end of the book, having learned a year's worth of material in a little over thirty minutes. The sound of falling water was still loud and clear from within the bathroom, and the boy found it odd that Cynthia showered for such a long time.

Other books sat upon her shelves, old, mass-produced copies of classics written by Mistrali authors centuries dead and several expensive, paperback texts on topics ranging from vector calculus to elementary algebra.

Cynthia was indeed a well-educated individual, and by estimating the ages of these texts the boy deduced that his benefactor had read plenty of these texts in her late adolescence and early adulthood.

Carefully, the boy returned the textbook to its original place amongst the myriad tomes in Cynthia's five-layered bookshelf. It slid in with a protesting hiss as a puff of air was displaced.

The door opened with a rusty groan and Cynthia stepped within the room, dressed in nothing but a plain bathrobe. The boy paid her no mind as she changed into a suit of pyjamas and wiped her cleansed spectacles dry with a sheet of tissue paper.

"Were you reading the book on programming?" she asked, staring at the shelf.

"Yes. I had hoped that you wouldn't notice. It was rather simple if you asked me," replied the boy. Cynthia rolled her eyes.

"Simple, you say? How much of it did you read?"

"I stopped on page ninety-eight."

"And you understood everything?" asked Cynthia, her face flushed with incredulity. "That's like…a fifth of the whole book."

"I think so," said the boy, matter of fact.

Cynthia released a deep breath of air as she sighed, perhaps angrily.

"I don't believe you. I was gone for…" she glanced at the clock.

"Thirty minutes, and you learned a year and a half's worth of computer programming from a textbook written for the brightest Atlesian adults, many of whom have learned multivariable calculus and ordinary differential equations by the time they were in eleventh grade, by the time I came back," said Cynthia, grabbing the textbook from the dusty bookcase. "Exercise thirty-five point one. The average exercise takes a few days to complete. I was never able to solve this one, and neither were most in my cohort able to. If you truly, and I mean truly understood the concepts, you would be able to complete it."

The boy stared at his friend in sombre contemplation for a second or so and got up from the chair, which gave a groan of gratitude at the burden released.

"You received a degree from the most prestigious university in your kingdom," said the boy. "But it's not enough for the job you desire?"

"Well, yeah, the situation's crazy over there. I was rejected from almost every job I applied to," said Cynthia with a rueful chuckle.

"Almost, you said," the boy remarked. "You were offered a job in your field of expertise?"

"Well, yeah, but it didn't pay as much as the ones I wanted, and with the cost of living in Atlas and all, I decided that it wasn't enough. Which is why I took up a higher paying job situated here in Vale," said Cynthia.

"And you never once considered moving to Mantle?"

Cynthia shrugged. "Nope."

"Why not?"

"There's a relatively high crime rate, especially in the poorer areas. There are no poor areas and no violent crime in Atlas," explained Cynthia. "Anyways, the company that first accepted me was located in Atlas, which meant that I had to take a plane there every morning if I wished to stay in Mantle. The plane ride was free, but I didn't want to live in Mantle for the aforementioned reasons."

"No violent crimes," repeated the boy. "Could you elaborate?"

"There is, however, a noticeable frequency of white-collar crimes. Fraud, money laundering, the like."

"I see," said the boy, his chin cupped in solemn contemplation.

"Most of the crime in Mantle is committed by Faunus. Those who are exploited by the SDC and have nowhere to go and stay but in the slums of Mantle. They are forced to work for the SDC to earn money for just the bare essentials like food and water, but the meagre wages they earn are never enough for a proper roof over their heads," explained Cynthia.

"I understand," said the boy. "Where are all the Faunus from?"

"They're born there. Where else?"

"That makes sense. Perhaps if they stopped reproducing, the SDC would be crippled due to a significant lack of workforce. After all, who would want to take a Faunus' job?"

Cynthia laughed nervously. "You're joking, right?"

"No, not at all. I am very serious. Also, it seems to me that the Schnee Dust Company is heavily dependent on cheap Faunus labour, and given the state of technological advancement in Atlas and the size of the company, it seems extremely odd that the SDC has not yet begun relying on robots to extract dust in their mines," explained the boy.

"Ah, now you see, it isn't so simple."

"What do you mean?"

"Mining robots which are commercially available have not yet attained the sophistication inherent in humans and Faunus that makes them so valuable to the SDC. In other words, they lack the dexterity that humans and Faunus possess. See, since pure Dust is an extremely sensitive substance, prone to detonation when even the slightest amounts of force are applied, a high level of dexterity is required to properly handle and extract the crystals. Fine muscle control is important, but the robots with these abilities are quite expensive. Besides, the Schnee Dust Company is very stingy," said Cynthia. "Besides, dust powder often interferes with delicate electronics, and it's no surprise that robots used in coal or iron mines often break down in dust mines because the fine dust powder in the air is able to enter the robot's body."

"I understand," said the boy.

"So, are you going to solve the problem or not?" asked Cynthia, grinning mischievously at him.

"I will. It usually takes a few days, you say?"

"That is what I said," shrugged Cynthia. "Exercise thirty-five point one. I took a few days to solve most of the questions I could. I could never solve this one."

"Very well. Exercise thirty-five point one."

Cynthia placed the book on her study table, right next to a pile of scrap paper. The boy sat on the chair. It grumbled under his immense weight, but the boy paid it no mind. With the pen in his hand, he gently retrieved a single sheet of paper from the container and turned the pages to the exercise Cynthia had told him about.

He knew the answer immediately. It was one of the more challenging problems from the text, but nothing beyond his abilities. His slender fingers gripped Cynthia's pen gently. He had never written before, but the intuition marrow-bound to the nerves in his fingers took control. The pen hovered above the paper for a moment, and then it fell.

"You're not…supposed to do it now," said Cynthia, as her voice rose an octave higher with incredulity. "You mean…you know the answer?"

"Hmm…probably," replied the boy, his hand working furiously as his thoughts were translated to ink. Cynthia gazed over his shoulder. The boy's penmanship was simple, but elegant, similar to her own when she had been a teenager.

"This...this isn't the type of question you solve in high-school exams...these are problems you think about at school, at work, when you're showering, when you're eating...how are you doing this?" asked Cynthia, astonished by the swiftness of his mind. The boy shrugged, and it was the first human movement Cynthia had seen him make in a long time.

"Done," said the boy, fifteen minutes and thirty-four seconds later.

Cynthia snatched the paper from the desk. She flipped furiously to the back of the textbook, where she knew the answers could be found. At last, she rested her eyes upon the crisp, long-untouched page where the answer lay, a solution so profound that she could not imagine herself coming up with it, even in her wildest dreams. Watt's solution was elegant, and many had agreed that it was the only logical solution to the problem. Ever since the textbook's publication ten years ago, there were only a surprisingly little number of students who could solve the problem and understand Watts' solution.

But the boy's solution was better. Although Cynthia couldn't admit it at first, there was something about the boy's solution that transcended Arthur's by an entire order of magnitude. So profound was it that Cynthia was surprised that she understood it in its entirety — though she knew, of course, that she could never replicate such thoughts herself.

A shiver ran down her spine. Until this point, Cynthia had always regarded the boy as human, notwithstanding how preposterous it was to do so. It was only natural to do so, to have her emotions cloud her rationality. The creature in front of her was no human. She had grown close to him in complacency and had forgotten almost entirely of the circumstances of his existence.

Arthur Watts was, without a shadow of a doubt, one of the greatest geniuses of modern history, having designed and coded all of Mantle's security grid entirely on his own. There were a few others who came to mind, who Cynthia believed rivalled his intelligence. There was Pietro Polendina, a famed Atlesian polymath whose ground-breaking work spanned multiple fields, including neuroscience, biomechatronics, and artificial intelligence. Alice Lockwood was another worthy example, a famed inventor of multiple biological weapons suited for use against the creatures of Grimm and a former child prodigy of abnormal giftedness. These were men and women whom Cynthia had suspected were three entire standard deviations above herself, and seven entire standard deviations above the mean of human intelligence.

All were embers against the sun when compared to the alien intelligence of the creature now sitting in front of her. This was simply a different form of cognition altogether, a higher order of thinking that amazed and frightened Cynthia simultaneously in its artificial beauty.

Cynthia was well aware of the many forms of Artificial Intelligence that Atlas had developed in its golden age of technological advancement. Many had been decommissioned in the days after their creation due to the immense energy requirements for their systems, but Cynthia knew well the first-hand accounts that the scientists involved had given of their interactions with the creatures who possessed intellects which, by all accounts, easily surpassed that of the aforementioned human polymaths.

Following the decommission of true Artificial Intelligence, researchers at the AIT had developed non-sentient artificial intelligence, such as the prototype Atleisan Knights —combat-ready androids which utilized a fairly simplistic, military-grade machine-learning-based computer vision software to identify and track targets. There was word of General Ironwood authorizing other combat-related projects amongst the faculty at the AIT, but no official statement had been given by either the General or the Atlas Military.

Systems such as these ran on highly sophisticated hardware and were energetically demanding. Nevertheless, dust remained a viable solution for such requirements. Cynthia was convinced that whatever was contained in the boy's cranium was far more sophisticated than the likes of such hardware. He was a different breed of genius altogether, an inhuman being whose intelligence formed far more parallels with that of full artificial intelligence than that which was typical of Mankind. Though it was possible for Atlesian researchers to design a being whose intellect which far surpassed that of humans, at least in theory, it was wholly impossible for them to design a being whose intellect was comparable to that of the boy and who was able to replicate his thoughts and their sheer originality.

That being said, there were other aspects of the boy that perturbed Cynthia. For starters, he was extraordinarily strong, stronger than his sculpted physique would suggest. But his muscles were of a different quality than that of baseline humanity. Cynthia remembered the last time she had felt his skin, and the muscles of bodybuilders and seasoned huntsmen felt soft in comparison to his.

Cynthia wondered if it was someday possible for Atlas to create organisms similar to the boy. Sure, her country was highly advanced in certain fields, but it was simultaneously lacking in others.

"But it gives a different solution here," said Cynthia, squinting at the boy's solution. "But your solution seems to work, I think, for some odd reason. At least I think it does…by the Gods, this is a novel solution! How did you come up with this?"

The boy shrugged again. "Gods?"

"Well, it's what people say when they're surprised, but that's beside the point. You just solved one of the most challenging problems in the history of course 7.01," said Cynthia. "Do you know the magnitude of what you just did?"

"I solved a problem you deemed unsolvable by your abilities," said the boy, eliciting an outburst of nervous laughter from Cynthia.

"Gods? What are Gods?" The term was alien to his ears and mind and soul. He knew, of course, what the term meant, from the many arguments in favour of their existence that he'd read in the library, but the feeling of alterity and contempt lingered deep within him.

He simply wanted a different perspective.

"Powerful beings. Deities. Many believe in the existence of different versions of these creatures, some do not believe in them at all. Worshipped by hundreds of thousands of people across the continents," said Cynthia.

"Worship?"

"They honour and show reverence towards these beings," explained Cynthia.

"Has anyone seen these beings?" asked the boy doubtfully.

"Well, no experimental evidence exists of their existence. At least, I've never read a study that proves the existence of a deity," said Cynthia.

"Interesting perspective. Oh well, I'm sure that many have turned to non-empirical means such as philosophy and logic to prove the existence of such a deity," said the boy.

"Once, I heard of an argument that an all-perfect being exists out of logical necessity, by virtue of the fact that existing in reality is the greatest possible state of existence. In other words, it states that god's existence is self-evident," said Cynthia. She chuckled. "Probably the most interesting one I've heard so far, but then again there are plenty of good arguments against this. One might even conclusively disprove it."

The boy made a displeased sound. Then, he chuckled for a few seconds.

"What is it?" asked Cynthia. "Have you already found a rebuttal?"

The boy did not reply. He looked at the digital clock that sat upon Cynthia's bedside drawer. It was a simple machine of utilitarian design. The colours grey and black decorated its dusty exterior in planes of mild colour, and upon the smooth metallic face of its back lay printed a disconcerting symbol.

"The alarm clock is from Atlas?" asked the boy.

"Well, yeah, it's what every student gets from the AIT orientation pack. What about it?"

The boy made another displeased sound, startling Cynthia on the inside.

"I see. I was just curious," replied the boy. He moved closer to the clock, picking it up in a chalice's grip of bony white fingers. For something so simple and cheaply manufactured, it sure had plenty of functions. The boy lost interest in the object and placed it back onto the wardrobe.

"We may have to leave the city one day," said the boy. "I do not wish to hurt the police. Their cause is noble, and their intent is reasonable."

"But you still have to do something about them, right?" asked Cynthia. "Besides, you still haven't told me about much of your plans. What do you intend on doing in the days to come, other than dealing with the White Fang?"

The boy stared ahead and thought for some time. The creatures of Grimm had been a plague on this world since time immemorial. By all accounts, for thousands of years, there had been no eyewitness accounts of Grimm reproduction and more importantly, humans had no clue on how these creatures came to be. At least, nobody who found out ever lived to tell the tale.

It was simply impossible that there was a limited supply of these creatures. Mankind and Grimm had fought for thousands of years, and yet there was no shortage of the creatures. They had to spawn from somewhere.

"Do you have any idea where the Grimm are coming from?" asked the boy finally. He had been silent for a whole minute now.

"No idea. Nobody knows. Nobody has seen them reproduce in the wild or in captivity," came the reply. "But they have to be continuously generated, right? There couldn't possibly exist a large enough population for us to kill over the past millennia, right? Otherwise, there would be Grimm everywhere."

"It appears that we are on the same wavelength."

"Yeah, and the size of the population that a lack of reproductive phenomena points towards is truly enormous. Humans and Faunus would have never made it past the stone age if there were that many of them!" she exclaimed. "So, what do you think about the Grimm? Are you planning on killing as many Grimm as you can for the time being?"

"Short term solutions are not enough. I need to know where they are spawned. Upon discovering such a geographic location, or multiple locations, the chance to either severely limit their production or ensuring their extinction shall arise. Cut off a head, and two more shall take its place. Waging an all-out war against the Grimm is an exercise in futility. I shall have to devise a means of defending the humans against the Grimm for the time being until I have ascertained the locations of these hypothetical breeding zones or reproductive sites," explained the boy.

Cynthia nodded in agreement.

"Talk about big ambitions. First, you want to deport all the Faunus to Menagerie, now you want to kill all of the Grimm," remarked Cynthia.

"I do this for the good of the human race," he maintained. "They can wait. I have more pressing issues at hand as of now."

"Such as?"

"Evading capture. Finding allies. Stopping crime. Vale's crime rate is relatively low compared to Kingdoms such as Mistral and Vacuo. The VPD can handle most of the cases here, but Mistral is corrupt to the core. There's a large criminal organization known as the Mistralian Mafia. It is involved in crimes such as kidnapping, murder, assassination, human trafficking, and it also has ties with the White Fang. I would like to destroy this organization."

"Mistral is corrupt to the core, huh...I think that might be an overstatement..." said Cynthia.

"Perhaps it was. Nevertheless, there are many dangerous towns and cities in Mistral. Kuchinashi is one city that immediately comes to mind when one thinks of cities with a high rate of violent crime," said the boy. "I can name several others. But first, we need allies."

"Allies? Hmm, maybe you'll be able to find some 'allies' in the form of hired huntsmen, but as people who would follow you out of actual respect? I don't think you'll find many of those…" remarked Cynthia.

"Why do you think so?"

"There's no denying that they're scared. People want answers, especially after the media's grown silent over the incident. It was a bad decision on the media's part to tell everyone that the creature had human characteristics…" said Cynthia. "If they find out you're killing-"

"I can kill as many criminals as I want in the public and the media won't do a thing about it," said the boy.

"What?" Cynthia was confused.

"Do you know why? Let's suppose they announce the killings to the public in order to get them to track me down and become their secret police. Of course, everyone loses their minds, and what do you think happens next?"

"The Grimm invades and kills us all...Don't tell me..."

"That's right. I'm effectively holding the city hostage. There is no shortage of criminals in the Vale Maximum Security Prison. If I slaughter a thousand murderers and display them in the most gruesome way imaginable to the public, the amount of fear caused would cause the largest Grimm invasion in recorded history. This is what I shall threaten the Council with. The media cannot allow the public to know of my existence, but now that that's been done, everyone in the city is on edge, and with that brings the threat of Grimm. So the most logical option for them would be to convince the public that I no longer exist, that they've killed me - so that everyone can sleep well at night. And that's exactly what I'll demand of them, first by sending a little gift to the VPD Headquarters. And then our silent little war will begin. They will comply with every single one of my demands, or else I unleash hell upon this city."

"But that means that you'll need a steady supply of inmates. And not just any inmates - the worst kind of inmates. How are you going to get those?" asked Cynthia. "If you attempt to kidnap them from the prisons, then they'll just begin to guard the prison so that you can't get any."

"Ah, but you're only seeing one facet of my plan. There is another source of criminals. The streets, of course. Naturally, the police would want to rapidly diminish the supply of 'candidates', so to speak, so what do you think they'll do to achieve that?"

Cynthia stared at the boy, utterly astonished. Her eyes were wide with shock, and she slumped back into her chair.

"They'll start implementing harsher laws and penalties. But that's exactly what you want! All according to plan..."

"That's right."

"Y-Y-You're...a genius," said Cynthia.

The boy ignored her praise.

"Now, you said you had a brother in Atlas. When was the last time you spoke with him?" asked the boy.

"T-Two days ago. Why?"

The boy did not reply. "What job does he hold?"

"He's Atlas Military personnel," said Cynthia.

"I see," said the boy, letting out a sigh. "That complicates things quite a bit. What about his rank?"

"He's a Specialist," said Cynthia.

"Well, that certainly complicates things even further. Do you know what he's been up to lately?"

"I don't know. He's been saying the usual stuff."

"Such as?"

"Well, as far as I can remember, he updated me on what he's been eating, how's life, that kind of stuff. But for the past three, four days he hasn't been answering my calls. Ever since…you came," said Cynthia.

"Well, that is to be expected. The Atlas Military should be in quite a hassle after the incident," said the boy.

"True," replied Cynthia.

"Well, what else do you know about your brother?"

Cynthia stared at the wall ahead as she sat down onto her messy bed.

"I was never very close to him emotionally. After our parents died, we simply…drifted apart. We never really hung around each other at school, and at home, we simply treated each other as…roommates," said Cynthia. "He found a friend, and I found my group of friends. Gradually, we grew distant, and now we talk only once in a while."

"I see. Which school did you go to?"

"Public School 1.1," said Cynthia. "Nine years of accelerated studies, beginning at the age of seven. A feeder school for the AIT."

"This friend of his, who are they?" asked the boy.

"A girl. A biologist," recalled Cynthia.

"Is she a powerful person?"

"Well, she is a renowned researcher with access to plenty of resources, if that's within the scope of such an abstract concept as power. She's a very odd person."

"How famous is she as a researcher?" asked the boy. "And what do you mean 'odd'?"

"She was the winner of the last Golden Sceptre in 78 AGW, which is very impressive, considering her age," said Cynthia. "She was the twelfth youngest in history. She has made great contributions to the field of applied Grimm physiology, so the Atlas Council has spoiled her in terms of grants, equipment, and funding."

"How many resources are the best ones granted by the government?"

"Well, it depends very much on whether or not they are working for the military, as well as the subject of their research. There are less than fifty researchers of similar productivity and value to the Atlesian government, which is why they are given so much by the government. Alice herself has her own ship, a state-of-the-art laboratory that spans three stories, and a team of huntsmen and soldiers of her own choosing to escort her wherever she goes. My brother is on that team. Augustus hasn't told me much, but the last figure he gave of Alice's salary is around a hundred thousand lien a year, but the funding she receives is far in excess of that. Which is to be expected, given her sheer research output and the number of highly dangerous missions she embarks on every month," explained Cynthia. "In general, researchers who work on militarized applications of their field of study are paid far more than their non-military counterparts."

"That is a lot of money and a lot of resources," remarked the boy.

"Well, in Atlas you could earn a similar salary if you have a business degree and 5 years of experience. And most senior pen pushers in large companies earn a few times that, so while it's still a very good salary coupled with what is probably one of the most prestigious jobs on the planet, it isn't extremely impressive if you're just comparing salaries," explained Cynthia.

What are these missions that you speak of?"

"Alice is a polymath, like many of the other eminent Atlesian researchers you'll become aware of in the days to come, but her favourite subject is Applied Grimm Physiology. Every month she embarks on several missions outside the kingdom to uncharted territories in the areas between the kingdoms. She studies the Grimm in the field and orders her team of soldiers to capture any specimens of interest to her and, after administering a powerful cutting-edge sedative designed to put the creatures to sleep for more than a day, imprisons them on her airship and brings them back to her lab in the AIT to perform experiments on them," explained Cynthia, scratching her head.

"That sounds exciting," said the boy.

"Look, I know that you may come into conflict with Atlesian Government in the future, but you should be warned that Alice is just one of the dozens of the intellectual powerhouses who work for Atlas. James Ironwood is considered to be one of the greatest Atlesian Generals in the nation's history, and his subordinates are no fools either. So, if you are ever engaged in a battle of wits with them, it wouldn't be wise to underestimate them," warned Cynthia.

"I'm well aware of that, though some information would be useful. Do you know much about the Atlesian Government? Their military, technology, population, and demographics?" asked the boy. "All the information I have about Atlas was obtained from an old history book, which was published a long time ago, back in 65 AGW. It's currently 80 AGW, which means that the information in the history book is 15 years late. Do you have a history book or something similar to that?"

Cynthia thought for a second, preparing her words. "Well, I don't know much about the Atlesian Government, except that it consists of a five-seated council, of which the seats are competed for every four years in an electoral process. Major decisions are made by the council after a majority vote. The military consists of an air force, infantry, and navy, and it's headquartered at the Atlas Academy. But I think you've already learned this."

"I have. I need specifics, which were included in the book but are probably outdated by now," said the boy.

Cynthia shuffled over to her shelf. She paused in front of it, trying to remember where she had placed it last. There were indeed many books in the bookcase, which consisted of eight large storeys containing more than a couple dozen books per row. It resembled an Atlesian office skyscraper, but the window-frames were too large and there was no entrance.

"So much I've read, so much I've forgotten. Ah, here it is," mumbled Cynthia. The boy heard her loud and clear. "The Updated History of Remnant. At least, that's what they call it in every new iteration."

She handed the book over to him. It was heavy, with over a thousand pages in total, and it was bound in a glossy material that had the feel of plastic and paper. It was published a year ago. The boy flipped it open and noticed that Cynthia had bookmarked it on page 779, under the chapter entitled 'Modern History – Causes of the Great War'. He closed the book, leaving the crimson ribbon had been placed.

"This will be useful. Can I borrow it?" asked the boy. "It appears to be an introductory text to the History of Remnant. This will be interesting."

"Do you really have to ask?"

"I suppose not," he replied. "Well, I'll be taking a look at your bookshelf, if you don't mind."

"Take what you need, just don't leave it here when the cops come knocking," said Cynthia.

"Of course," said the boy, getting up. He scanned the rows in an instant and turned to Cynthia. "These will be useful. Texts on engineering, programming, physics, and mathematics."

"Why would you need them?"

"I need to design my own weapons and armour. I don't enjoy the benefits of an aura, unlike huntsmen and huntresses, which makes me vulnerable to damage. With the knowledge contained within these books I will be able to design weapons of war that this world has never seen before," said the boy.

"But your ideas, profound as they may be, will forever be limited to the drawing board if you cannot acquire the resources to bring them to life," remarked Cynthia.

"That is true. That is why I must ask someone to create them for me," said the boy. "Do you happen to know how to forge a sword?"

"No, not really. I was taught the basics in the past, but I never really wanted to become a huntress, so I never took any of the additional weapons design and forging classes. And even if I knew how to forge a sword, I don't have the equipment to do so," said Cynthia. "But…I do own a sword."

The boy stiffened in excitement. "Where is it?"

"I must've left it in my wardrobe. Hold on…"

Cynthia closed the gap between herself and the wooden wardrobe. After opening it, she crouched to open another narrow, nondescript drawer.

"Ah, here it is," she said, her gaze settling on a dusty bag that measured a few feet long.

The boy peered curiously over her shoulder. "Why didn't you tell me about this earlier?"

"Well, we weren't yet on the topic of weapons, were we?" said Cynthia as she patted the dust off the black bag, feeling the hard scabbard of the weapon.

Carefully, she unzipped the bag and removed a long, unused sabre.

"It's ornamental, but it's still sharp as heck," said Cynthia, presenting it to the boy, who unsheathed the blade as he began to stand.

In an unconscious display of prodigious skill, the boy made a fluid flourish that startled Cynthia.

"Hey, watch it! You nearly cut my head off!"

"I don't think you were in any danger. This is much better than the machete those animals left me. How did you obtain this?" asked the boy.

"It was a gift from my brother. It's a classic Atlesian Sabre that he bought several years ago from a forge somewhere in Mantle," said Cynthia. "By the way, how did you do that? I've never seen anyone spin a blade with such skill before, not even when I visited Atlas Academy."

"I don't know. I just did it out of instinct," said the boy.

"You mean you were biologically engineered to use a sword," said Cynthia.

"I will take that as a compliment," said the boy, sheathing the blade. "Aren't there rental forges in those department stores for weapons? As you brought up, I need a place where I can bring my designs to life."

"Now that you say so, I have a friend who owns a small forge in the Western Sector, a twenty-minute walk from here," suggested Cynthia. "Maybe he could be of some help to you."

The boy was silent for a moment.

"That would be one more person involved in this covert enterprise. I'd like to keep this operation small for the time being, with a gradual build-up of manpower and a militia. However, since such a facility is crucial to my plans, it is important that we associate ourselves with him," said the boy slowly. "Who is this man?"

"His name is Quintus Slate. He's an ex-huntsman from Beacon Academy. Now he forges weapons for customers on a commission by commission basis," explained Cynthia. "He obtains his metals from an Atlesian mining company that both mines and manufactures metal bars and rods for blacksmiths and weapon designers such as him."

"Is he in regular contact with his teammates from Beacon? I heard that the students from Beacon are grouped into teams of four which will remain together for the rest of their time at the academy," remarked the boy.

"No. Why?"

They don't even come to visit?"

"No, they parted a few years after graduation, a few years ago. He's never heard from them ever since," explained Cynthia. "Maybe they died during a mission. He never talks about them."

"And what makes you think he'll be willing to join us?"

"Join us? Who said anything about joining us?" asked Cynthia.

"I hope I don't have to explain this to you. Every stakeholder involved in this operation has the potential of betraying us, which is why we cannot allow them to walk freely."

"Right, fine," acknowledged Cynthia. "Maybe he'll be willing to join us."

"What if he isn't?"

"He is, and he will," said Cynthia.

"How do you know this man?" asked the boy.

"I met him online once, on a forum site about weapon design and engineering, after I made a technical query. I was a weapons engineer once, in my undergraduate days, but more on the programming side of things. I used to be involved in an interdisciplinary research project for the Atlas Military, as all AIT undergraduates are. I worked with people from different departments on designing a turret gun for the military," recalled Cynthia. "It turned out that he was rather competent at weapons design as well, and since we both shared an interest in weapons, we became friends."

"I see. So how long have you known this man?" asked the boy.

"About four years."

"Does he have a family?" asked the boy.

"No. Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

"The answer depends on how cynical you are," said the boy.

The two chuckled in unison.

"You have a dark sense of humour," remarked Cynthia. "So, you said that a member of the police would be coming. Where is he now?"

"It seems like there will be more than one."

The doorbell rang a single, unmistakable tune that pierced the stark stillness of the apartment's atmosphere.

"I will meet you in the morning, at sunrise. Until then, Good-"

He stopped mid-sentence – ears perked. Without a second to pause, smoke engulfed the boy's form, and the column of black smoke darted out of Cynthia's room immediately, drowning out every light in the apartment in its wake.

The main door caved in and fire roared through a thousand and seventy-eight splinters of broken wood.

Cynthia screamed at the deafening explosion in the other room. Not a second passed before light filled the room – a burning globe of artificial light that drowned immediately in the torrents of darkness that flooded the room.

Arms far stronger than they appeared upturned Cynthia from her feet and caught her in a vice-like embrace. The boy picked her up and shoved her under her bed where she could not be seen.

+ Don't come out until I tell you to! +

Through the wreckage of the blasted door, four figures sprung into the room in perfect formation.

Huntsmen and huntresses. The boy recognized what they were, neither from the forms of their livery nor their exotic weapons, but by the quality of their souls. Their souls were far stronger than that of the average human or Faunus, even exceeding ordinary huntsmen by a wide margin. Unlocked auras, without a doubt.

They were dangerous.

Each of the four assassins wore identical, black jumpsuits with masks, and the boy could tell from the outlines of their bodies that there were two huntresses and two huntsmen.

He spied them from the narrow doorway that led into Cynthia's bedroom as they panned out across the living room, in the shadow behind the door, unmoving and deathly silent with the sabre grasped masterfully with bone-white fingers.

They had sensed him. Yes, they knew that he was somewhere within the room. They could feel his fearsome presence. The grandness of his being. The feebleness spreading in their joints. Yet, they had no clue where he was. As the boy watched them in the dark, it became clear to him that they had some form of night vision, probably using the electronic goggles that they wore on their head, given how they managed to navigate the living room without bumping into anything. It was obvious that none of them was Faunus.

Their weapons were simple and practical, unlike many of the outlandish ones the boy had seen at the weapons store. Most of them carried pistols and swords of a standardized appearance, though not the same size, which felt strange to the boy, who had grown accustomed to the highly personalized weapons of the huntsmen and their teams.

Someone had hired them, obviously. The boy recognized the deftness in their movements and the skill with which they handled their guns and knew at once that they would be a far greater foe than the untrained thugs he'd killed in the alley.

The back of the assassin disappeared behind the door to Cynthia's room. This was his chance. He shot out without warning and without a sound, emerging from a pool of shadows. With his sabre in hand, he swivelled fluidly around the side of the wooden door to Cynthia's bedroom with the grace of a Mistrali dancer.

The boy struck out, faster than the eye could see, with the hard edge of his hand in a knife-handed blow to the assassin's neck. It would have been a mortal injury if not for her passive activation of aura, and the assassin howled in pain and alarm as a bright green field fizzled around her body.

Her head smashed into the wooden door beside her, and a wave of pain stabbed her body. She swivelled around in defence and began firing. He swerved, but he was not quick enough.

The supersonic rounds pierced deep into the boy's skin, and a wave of stabbing pain engulfed his torso. The flow of blood stemmed almost immediately, and the bullets shot out through his back.

The huntress lashed out at the boy's chest with a wicked stiletto blade, and it pierced straight to his armoured ribcage, then stopped immediately. The pain was excruciating, but the boy was unfazed but suddenly drowsy.

The huntress ripped the envenomed blade from the boy's chest. Blood pulsed from the horrendous injury and the boy caught the steel blade as it left and snapped it in two with his thumb.

Her eyes widened at the display of immense strength, and by this point, the huntress' teammates were well aware of her distress, and the boy knew he had to act fast.

She was already turning, her aura regenerating, but he attacked first with his right hand, smashing it into her face in a controlled release of the destructive energy pent up within him.

The woman's emerald auric field shattered instantly. She screamed.

The boy grabbed a fistful of the woman's hair, and without pause, plunged his sabre sideways in a great, forceful motion into the huntress' unprotected back, dragging her body against the blade. He heard the breaking of a thick, flexible bone, and then the woman's body went limp. Or at least, most of it.

It had all happened in the blink of an eye, and all her teammates saw were the three feet of bloodstained steel that had suddenly protruded from her chest. The woman's jaw was slack in shock at the impact, and tics erupted over her face as the boy held her close.

There was something erotic about the nightmarish scene, as the boy pulled on the woman's raven-black hair and spasms shook her arched back, and as the blade straddled her broken spine, that frightful tableau was invincible.

The boy ripped the blade from her half-dead torso, and in that instant, she fell without a sound, dead within seconds and bleeding as fast as she could through the wound of a severed backbone.

Her last expression had been one of undignified surprise. The pungent smell of urine filled the room as the huntress' bowels voided uncontrollably, and a dark spot was spreading between the legs of her corpse.

Trained huntsmen and assassins they were, and yet none could have prepared them for the quick death of their friend.

They stared, dumbfoundedly, at the corpse of the woman they had trained for years with. Everything had happened so quickly, and she had died so easily. It was as though she had gone down without a struggle.

Such a manner of death was almost unheard of in the world of huntsmen and huntresses, where the outcome of total aura depletion required a long and arduous battle.

The sabre flourished, raining blood onto the walls.

It was then that they charged.

One raised his pistol – a wicked amalgamation of a sleek steel chassis that supported a streamlined body and a cylindrical suppressor – and fired.

A salvo of staccato shots pierced the stillness of the standoff. The rest charged in unison, leaving cracks in the flooring as they pushed off, accelerating from zero to more than fifty kilometres an hour in a heartbeat.

The boy exploded into action.

Silver flashed like lightning as the sabre flashed through the air, swatting away the bullet seeking his head, but ten thousand volts of electricity shot up his arm, and the stench of burning blood filled the air as it cooked off the warm blade.

His footwork staggered, and for a fraction of a second, his focus on the rhythm of the battle disappeared, replaced by a murderous spike of pain that radiated across his upper torso.

The remaining bullets broke apart in sparks of metal the boy as he swatted them away in the nick of time, each sending a jolt of electricity up his spine.

Lightning-dust, the boy thought. Stun. Paralyze. Capture.

It was then that it dawned on him – that these huntsmen and huntresses were not here to kill him – they were here to capture him. Of the two possibilities, this was more likely. Perhaps that's why the woman's blade was poisoned - it was meant to paralyze him, not to kill. Did that mean that their employer knew of his regenerative abilities?

The delay was all it took for the huntsman to get within an arm's length of himself.

He caught the boy's nose with a powerful right hook, breaking it with a wet crack.

The gush of blood clotted in an instant, and the boy shrugged off the pain of the injury.

Reason fled his mind as anger replaced his inhibition. Every instinct screamed at the boy to kill, kill, kill the huntsman whose fist now flew slowly towards the boy as his posthuman reflexes brought him to a new height.

The boy unleashed the murderous strength that he had so far suppressed in a single, destructive step, punching his aggressor so hard and with such speed that the man's auric field shattered instantly.

But that was not all.

Bones went to dust in an instant, and he flew into the plaster wall behind him, smashing through the intermediary layer of plywood beneath and crashing through the final layer of bricks and mortar.

He fell onto the ground of the concrete alleyway beyond the wall, every bone in his body either cracked or shattered, and his flesh pulverized.

Another fired his weapon thrice at the boy. The boy watched as the bullets exploded out of the matte-black suppressor in slow motion, even as they moved so quickly to the huntsman that they did not seem to move through the opposing air.

An arc of plasma danced from the shiny silver casing against the supersonic wind. The boy was already moving, turning, sliding across the smooth wooden floor of Cynthia's apartment, sliding towards the man.

The huntsman abandoned his gun and drew his sword. The future poured in like a maddening torrent into the boy's visual cortex, and everything slowed down as the boy accelerated.

The man bolted forward, his movements nimble and fast. He swung the sword sidelong at the boy, who parried the blow with an upward swipe of his sabre.

Immediately, the huntsman smashed his fist into the boy's face, cracking his cheekbones. But that was all he could do.

Unfazed, the boy returned the favour with a heavy blow to the man's chest, staggering the huntsman. He stumbled backwards, and his aura flickered dangerously as it protected him from the worst of the boy's monstrous strength.

Shots rang out behind the boy, but the bullets reached him first before the sound did.

The boy was faster than both of them. Or rather, he had already known of the individual destinies of the bullets in the pistol's magazine long before it was loaded by the huntress.

Darkness engulfed him, and the silvery rounds struck the thin fold of smoke that the boy had become. The bullets passed through harmlessly, straight towards the huntsman who the boy had been fighting, who reacted in the nick of time to swat them away with his sword.

Behind him, the huntress stared on incredulously at the boy's sudden metamorphosis. Her face paled, and fear screamed into her mind, locking her movements. The boy was no longer a ghost, and now he grasped in bony white fingers the blade of his sabre. He spun around immediately, graceful as a dancer, and watched as the air around his sabre pulsed and distorted as he threw it at the woman.

There was a tremendous bang as it sailed through the intervening air, and a shockwave radiated from the tip of the blade. In an instant, the point of the sabre had punched through the strongest of the huntress' auric fields.

Then it pierced through skin and muscle and bone, passing out behind her and pinning her hand to the wall.

The huntress screamed at the pain of the injury. Several of the bones in her right palm had been either broken or sliced in two, and the sabre had been embedded in several inches of concrete. Tiny beads of blood dripped down the length of her forearm, but for the most part, it was a bloodless injury.

Footsteps behind him drew the boy's attention. He was not fast enough to dodge them, and five electrified bullets slammed into his back in quick succession, and the boy grunted as they thudded against his armoured ribcage, cracking it open. Blood gushed from the wound in a torrent as it began to seal itself shut, but this time, the boy did not falter. He had become accustomed to the pain, which was now a mild annoyance in comparison to what he had endured at first. His wounds were fully healed in a matter of seconds, with only dots of scar-tissue to mark their locations.

The huntsman fired three more into the boy's chest, but they did not slow his advance in the slightest.

He darted towards the man whose aura was slowly regenerating. It was not enough for the next part. The man unsheathed his sword again and swung it him frantically.

The boy sidestepped the blow and jabbed the man in his chest almost casually. As expected, the auric field fizzled once more and finally shattered, and the man cried out in pain, throwing a fist at the boy in a ditch attempt to inflict as much damage as possible.

Almost too fast for the eye to see, the boy sidestepped the blow and caught the arm as it returned to its owner.

He tugged on the arm almost languidly – it offered some resistance for a split second – and ripped it from its socket with a wet pop. The huntsman fell to the ground screaming madly as blood sputtered and gushed wildly onto the floor in a torrent of crimson.

The boy released the man's arm in disgust, and it fell to the floor, holding the huntsman's sword in a vice-like grip.

Now that all the huntsmen had been either killed or rendered unable to fight, he had some time to breathe. There was nobody outside of the apartment, but the police would've been informed by now by the neighbours. He bent down and pried the huntsman's sword from pale dead fingers that belonged to a pale dead arm and examined it carefully.

It was a beautiful longsword, meant to be wielded with a single hand. The grip had been made from fine leather, and it was gentle on the boy's palm. It had been custom-made, but it was suitable for his hands. The silvery, fullered blade was strong but elegant, and the steel quillons had been designed with practicality in mind. This solidified the boy's doubts about their membership in the Valean Police Department. As far as he was aware of, it did not employ huntsmen.

In a flash, the boy had the huntsman pinned to the ground by the sheer force of his bodyweight. He bent down and unclipped the longsword's scabbard from the man's waist. After inspecting it for a few seconds, he clipped it on his own pair of pants that Cynthia had lent him and sheathed the blade of the longsword with an oily rasp.

The boy kicked the pistol from the fallen huntsman's grasp. Looking down at the man, the Primarch could feel nothing but hatred in the huntsman's eyes.

He sighed, and gently stamped on the huntsman's sprawled elbow once, shattering the joint within.

Crack!

The huntsman screamed like a banshee, and tears darkened his mask. The huntress' eye widened in horror.

"Please, stop! We'll give you anything you want! I'll promise not to attack you if you'd jus-"

Crack! - the man's left knee caved in as the boy applied a little pressure. The man released another bloodcurdling scream, spit flying from his mouth. It was a monstrous, insane cry that must've shredded his vocal cords. And then he screamed some more, wheezing pathetically and wordlessly.

Every scream was a blow to the boy's heart, but he knew what had to be done. Although aura could regenerate large gashes at an astounding speed, the same could not be said for broken bones. If the man was able to regenerate his aura, he could potentially attack with the same ferocity as he had before. The boy needed a way to put him down for good, so that he may never move again, at least, not for a long, long time.

"Please," pleaded the woman, tears streaming down the length of her cheeks. "We'll swear never to come back! Please, please! Spare him!"

The boy's face was expressionless as he held his foot above the huntsman's right knee. She was beginning to get annoying.

+ Do you know how much I hate that word? + he asked, not expecting a reply. The psychic might forced itself into the assassin's mind, and she clutched the right side of her head in agony. He stared down at the huntsman's quivering body.

He was quivering too.

He was quivering with rage.

"W-What?"

There was no warning.

The boy was upon her in an instant.

He drew the blade from the wall - through her hand - and shattered her right shinbone with a heavy kick.

He seized her neck as she fell and threw her across the living room. She struck a steel fridge in Cynthia's kitchen with the force of a highway collision, breaking several ribs and dislocating her shoulder.

The boy stared at the cowering form of the huntress beside the fridge. A shallow dent had been made on its surface, but the woman was very much alive.

+ I hate that look on your face, that bovine intelligence in your eyes. I hate that word you keep saying. You wouldn't have shown me mercy, would you? No, you wouldn't. This is obviously not the first time you've killed people for money, for your personal profit. This is not the first time you've ignored someone's pleas for mercy, is it? How many people have said 'please' to you? Dozens? Hundreds? So why demand something that you cannot reciprocate? But that's enough talk, the police will be here soon enough. +

He sighed. Letting out that rage had felt so good, almost euphoric to him. He wanted to beat her to death, savouring every blow he landed on her, throttling the life from her with his bare hands, watching her scream, but that would overstep the bounds of self-defence. These urges sometimes terrified him, and the boy would sometimes wonder why he'd experience them at all.

But something else intrigued the boy. Certainly, elements of individualism were banned in the VPD. Their black jumpsuits were undoubtedly expensive, more so than the VPD's budget would allow. Their weapons were definitely of premium quality, and they fought with the strength and speed of true huntsmen, even going so far as to inflict several wounds on his body that would undoubtedly be fatal to any human.

But what interested the boy were the similarities in their equipment.

For example, all of them used a pistol and a sword. There were no exceptions to this general rule. Upon closer inspection, the pistols were vastly different from each other, each of a different design and manufacturer. Some were even capable of transforming into weapons such as knives and batons.

Noting these similarities, the boy wondered if they had been taught together in the same huntsman academy, wherever that was.

He shifted his attention to the man, cowering on the floor and doing his best to stem his murderous injury with his shirt. The woman behind him eyed him nervously. The adrenaline that spiked her blood kept her very much awake.

The boy turned to the fallen huntsman on the floor, scanning the man's torso to the point where it terminated in a ragged, bloody stump.

+ Why have you come? You're not an operative of the police, are you? I don't recognize your uniform - if it even is one in the first place - and neither is your equipment considered the standard issue. Who hired you? Tell me! +

The thought invaded the man's mind, deafeningly loud. His eyes widened in terror and shock, their pupils dilated, and his heart pounded mindlessly against his temples.

"G-Go to hell, you monster."

The boy didn't know why, but suddenly a rush of anger made him lose control. It was that simple.

+ Not willing to talk? Your impudence will cost you your life, then. Needless to say, your friend will be a truly useful source of information. +

Reason fled his mind in that instant, and the boy unsheathed his sword, his hand moving so quickly that it could not be seen at all.

Before Esteban could say anything, a flash of mirthless silver appeared to fly through the air.

He blinked.

What was that?

He had the fleeting impression of something very light and thin and bright moving through the air before he did so, but then he doubted his memory.

Suddenly, he felt so very light in the head, and he noticed that the pain had disappeared from his severed arm.

He couldn't feel his chest, not his good arm, not his legs, not anywhere.

He tried to move, but no strength could be summoned.

Esteban was paralyzed.

His eyes flickered frantically around their sockets, and he saw the boy's hand grasping the sword that had been stolen from him, and Colleen screaming, and something felt wet on his neck.

But the boy's hand was not where it had been just a moment ago.

His arm was outstretched, and the sword was pointed sidelong, and the blade – the blade was stained faintly with blood.

His blood.

The boy had killed him so quickly that Esteban had missed it by blinking —

— And as the terrible realization of what had just happened dawned upon him, darkness filled the huntsman's vision for the very last time as he fell.

---

AN: Credits to Unsettling A.I.R for proofreading and critiquing this chapter.