Aren couldn’t remember the last thing he saw or felt. It was all a fragmented movie, playing out in his head, buried beneath a haze of white-hot rage. One could live a hundred lifetimes and probably not be able to explain why he felt rage in that moment. The relief and liberation he felt after taking control of his destiny, in a way, became rage. Rage against everything and destiny itself. It was similar to feeling betrayed, and even the joy of regaining his dignity could not erase the stigma of having lost it in the first place.

In his heart, the spokeless wheel of revolution had turned, and in a blazing fury he had burned down the weakling that took shelter in the wheel’s shadow.

Eradicate the echoes of your own weakness, Leviathan said.

Now he felt empty.

When he cracked his eyes open, he saw Estella’s face and quickly realized that his head rested on her lap. She patted his head, a concerned glimmer in her eye. Aren’s gaze went from her eyes to her partly exposed bosom, and then, with the haste of panic, back to her eyes which now showed a small amount of displeasure along with concern. Certainly, he saw more than he bargained for, and even though the wardrobe malfunction could’ve been a lot worse it was almost enough to make a teenager like Aren transform into a complete idiot in under naught point one seconds.

There was the old age question of what happened, but Aren no longer cared. What happened? It didn’t matter! He was alive. Probably. Estella was beautiful enough to make waking up with one’s head in her lap the very definition of waking up in heaven.

His wounds were bound, he realized. The bandages on his right arm were tight enough to restrict blood flow. The tips of his fingers were tingling, and it was almost too painful to move them. The general exhaustion and weakness he felt in his body was a likely explanation of where all the time had disappeared — the missing sequence of events between him standing over the Rider’s corpse, and being here.

In the distance, the night sky was like a mirror of the blaze that burned below. The entire northwestern portion of the town was burning. Black snowflakes fell around and on the two survivors, but these snowflakes did not melt, for they were made of soot and ash. Buildings collapsed in the distance, with a distant, but audible protest of sound.

Estella did not ask any questions. She didn’t say anything, either. Estella’s dagger, discarded next to the two, was proof enough of what she had considered and what she ultimately decided.

Gazing towards the distant fires, which were like fishing fires against the dark canopy of night, she wore a nostalgic, thoughtful expression. There was something phantom-like and unworldly about appreciating the demise of a town. It was not schadenfreude, or anything of the sort. It was more like a respectful sendoff. The town was already dead — the orcs made sure of that. At least now it’s corpse could rest in peace. And Aren could rest on the lap of a fairy.

They remained like this for several minutes. Aren was faintly aware of Estella’s breathing, and, perhaps, he had taken a greater interest in her than the distant, festival-like sights of the burning town.

“Why didn’t you run?” she eventually asked, without even looking at him. Her tone was ghostly, soft, and wavering.

Aren shrugged. “There is nowhere left for me to run,” he said, honestly. It felt great to say those words. It came more as relief than desperation. It was as if he was in the acceptance stage of grief; simply admitting it was more catharsis than actually solving his situation.

How long had he spent living under the tyranny of fear? How long did he jump at shadows and sounds, and regard each new day as if it was something he didn’t even deserve? He was in a maze, created by the one thing that was supposed to guarantee his happiness — the chip in the nape of his neck — and any day now, he felt, as if Theta would cast its unfathomable gaze towards Aren and see him for what he truly was; and that would be the end of him. Ironically, the thing that freed him from this was also an AGMI. No, he really did not have anywhere left to run. It was either Theta or Leviathan.

He could only move forward now, because forward was the only thing Aren still cared about to the point that he thought it was worth fighting for — worth living for. Maybe someone would find such a thing foolish, and even Aren would have to agree with them — yes, it was foolish — but this was the only thing he had left. It was the only thing he could look forward to now.

“I want to show you something,” Estella said, after a long moment of pure silence — other than the collapsing buildings in the distance, of course.

[ Estella wishes to share her info scroll with you. ]

Aren blinked. You could do that? He looked at Estella, who now wore a ghostly smile, but it was clear that she was also somewhat cautious.

Mentally, Aren accepted the offer.

Estella hesitated and then reached into the air in front of her, and pressed something with her index finger. A small, transparent window materialized in mid-air and then Estella pushed against the frame of the window, on the left side, turning it towards Aren.

It said:

[ Divine Warfare: Legendary Minor Class Set. Primary abilities: [Divine Warfare], [Judgement] and [Retribution]. Current progress: Advanced. ]

Aren’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. A legendary skill set. Aren looked up at Estella, who seemed pleased with Aren’s reaction. She leaned to her side, her face dangerously close to Aren’s now, so that she could see the window also.

This was not heaven. This was hell.

Estella pressed her finger on [Divine Warfare].

Another window popped up over the previous one.

[ [Divine Warfare]: Unique Primary Major Class Ability. ]

Unique. Aren’s eyes shot wide open. Unique? She was practically the Yan Li of Divine magic!

It was as if Estella was reading his thoughts, and quietly giggled at Aren’s reaction and nodded. “It is a secret though, all right?”

Aren nodded. Why did she share this secret with him? What prompted her?

[Divine Warfare]. Judging by the wording, it was the Divine type of [Arcane Warfare], the ability that made Yan Li famous. There were many types of magic in the world, but there were two general categories. Divine and Arcane. The general type described how a caster got the energies for fueling their techniques and spells. There was also a third type, which mostly warriors used, called Spiritual, but it was not an energy type casters could use for spells; it was only for warrior types, and it was the resource they used to fuel their physical techniques. Aren used Spiritual energy when he used Reaping Sword. The important distinction was the fact that one could not use [Arcane Warfare] with Divine magic. They were incompatible types. Arcane casters fueled their spells with the Planar energies that made up the cosmos. Divine casters used the energies wielded by their deities, albeit, at orders of magnitude less power than the deities could. One had to have a high rank just to be able to generate the second order energies, which was also why Cassandra couldn’t use resurrect.

Resurrection. Is this how Estella was alive now? Did she have a self-resurrect ability in that set?

But why was it a Legendary set if it had a Unique ability? Because it was a minor — AKA subclass — set?

“How do you…” Aren pondered. He didn’t even know how to explain what he wanted. He gestured at the window, indicating the entirety of it. “How do you do that?”

“Hmm? You don’t know?” Estella asked, amusement glimmering in her eyes. “I can show you,” she said.

[ Estella wishes to temporarily link your info scrolls. Note: Most actions will be prohibited and will require authorization from the owner of the scroll. ]

You can do that too?! He looked at Estella, wary.

“Don’t get any funny ideas,” she said, noticing Aren’s look. “This doesn’t mean we are a couple or anything. I am just showing you how to do it.”

Oh, so that’s what that function was for. Aren felt stupid for even thinking about doubting Estella.

Once more, he accepted the offer.

Estella smiled, and leaned down some more, her face even closer now. This was a terrible idea.

“So you press here,” she demonstrated, pressing the empty air. “Doesn’t have to be exactly there. But you just press it like there is something there. And you think about your class sets, the way you would normally do it when you pull up the information.”

A scroll rolled open, displaying two entries. [Lightning Blade] and [Arcane Territory]. There was no sign of the Calamity entry. So the mental version and the scroll version were different, it seemed.

Estella stared at [Lightning Blade]. “Can I see it?” she asked, her finger hovering over the entry.

Aren nodded. “It is only fair,” he said.

Heaven Realm Unique Calamity Main Class Set, was the first thing that stood out to Aren when the window popped open; and it was a long, long window. Estella’s only had a few lines, but Aren’s was overpopulated with information.

Aren was fairly certain that Estella already knew he was a Calamity. The dagger he saw earlier, in Aren’s mind, there was only one possible conclusion as to why it was there. Perhaps two, if she used it to cut the bandage that she used on Aren’s arm. The other option was that she considered, and decided against, claiming the Calamity reward for Aren. She knew his secret — the one thing that could utterly destroy him. Instead, she chose to share her secret with him — the one thing that could likely destroy her. He understood then how this situation came to be.

He smiled, satisfied. He didn’t mind showing Estella Lightning Blade. She has already proven that she was a friend and a comrade. Their fates were bound together.

“Physical types… mobile, enhanced attack… huh,” Estella read the entries partially. “You must have some kind of analysis ability to see this much information. Huh, you don’t even need a focus for your lightning magic, that is… unfair.”

She pressed her finger on Focus Independent, an entry under Arcane Types.

[ Focus Independent: If both and are present in the ability types, treat as instead. ]

Both Lightning Manipulation and Lightning Blade had the tag present. Lightning Blade also had . They were also both . The only other ability that had the tag, but not the tag was Vessel-Breaker Palm.

Next, Estella pressed her finger over the Special Type Calamity Synergy.

[ Calamity Synergy: ??? ]

Estella chuckled. “It really is unfair,” she said. “So that is the difference. I feel like my secret cannot even compare to yours.”

Estella dismissed all the windows with a gesture of her hand and at the same time unlinked their info scrolls. Perhaps noticing how close they were, she cleared her throat and straightened up.

An awkward silence followed, and it wasn’t so much as going back to watching the fires as much as looking at anything but each other. It really was unfair. Why did Estella have to be so pretty? Aren convinced himself that in his heart there was only one person.

“Where are you from?” Estella asked, after the awkward, silence-filled moment dragged on for a bit too long.

“Prometheus,” Aren said. “Sec-nine.”

“Huh,” Estella hummed, nodding.

After a long pause, she added: “If I was also from Prometheus, would you consider meeting up?”

Aren pondered Estella. Many things went through his mind at that moment — each thought was like a fragment of an air-burst grenade going off in his mind. Questions such as motive, opportunity, and such plowed through his mind like an APV could plow through an old world building’s walls.

But mostly, Aren felt certain that Estella was not from the Arcologies. There was something archaic about her, and Aren simply couldn’t put his finger on exactly what it was. Certainly, in the Arcologies, one would be hard pressed to find a person like Estella, with her stoic and cold outward behavior. Now, of course, Aren knew that there was more to her than the cold outer shell she showed to others. Living outside of the Arcologies, and not benefitting from the Commonwealth stipend program — poverty probably couldn’t even come close to describing what that must be like. That question, it was at best just wishful thinking. A what if armed to the teeth with regret, but wearing the super-alloy kevlar of hope.

Besides, Aren had already planned for them all to eventually move to the same place. For security reasons, mostly. Meeting a friend? Surely, that wasn’t a bad idea.

“Mm,” Aren said. “If we were neighbors, why not?” He swallowed. “Nissa and Fang are also from Prometheus. We could all meet up.”

Estella nodded. She didn’t say anything. In fact, for the rest of that evening, they didn’t speak. It was just half an hour of blissful silence and wordless understanding.

Eventually, Fang sent a message to the group chat that they would take a break that evening, as returning to the town proved more troublesome than it was worth. He didn’t quite suggest it, but he implied that it would be better if they continued regrouping the next day.

Both Estella and Aren took the hint and logged off, after saying farewell to each other.

___

That night, a blonde-haired girl with jade eyes left her Sim Pod, and smiled enigmatically to herself. Looking at her, it would be difficult to imagine that she was a native of Sector 16 — she looked too western. Her name was Stella, but in the prestigious household her father had married into, she was known as Kaguya Mei, an old world aristocrat of the Independent Shogunate.

There was a knock on the door of her chamber, and a female voice called out from beyond. “Young mistress, do you require anything?”

Stella tangled her index finger into her hair and thought about the question, her enigmatic smile ever-present.

“Mistress?”

“I want to go live in the Arcologies for a while,” she called out.

___

Aren's Lightning Blade class:

Lightning Blade _-/ Main Attributes -_ Physical Types Overt, Mobile, Physical Power Enhancement, Linked, Chaining Arcane Types Planar, Minor, Greater, Focus Independent, Automatic Special Types Evolution Capable, Calamity Synergy, Unshareable, Unique Current Rank B- Potential Rank A+ Heaven Realm Unique Calamity Main Class Set -=[ Primary Abilities ]=- Lightning Blade

A Tier Main Class Ability Novice

42% Lightning Manipulation

C Tier Major Class Ability Novice

31% Reaping Sword C Tier Minor Class Ability Novice

32% Vessel-Breaker Palm

B Tier Minor Class Ability Novice

28%