Chapter 430

A band played on a dark, cold stage, and Mark strode across the open floor, toward ‘the man who was the Resurrection Ghost’. Mark still didn’t believe it, because it was a lie. He had been there when Grey Ghost had died and the demon Leash had cannibalized his body, turning him into the Resurrection Ghost. What the fuck was Aluatha pulling with this shit? It had been half an hour since the Virgin Social had started, and people were everywhere; under the giant paper mache flowers that acted as decoration and lighting, by the food tables, and especially surrounding the main stage which was the VIP area with the Resurrection Guy sitting behind a bunch of guards. People were signing up with a bouncer to talk to the guy, apparently.

Addavein was not allowed here at all, which he had been slightly miffed about, but then again he wasn’t technically ‘virgin’ to these things, and yeah, he agreed he shouldn’t go. He still wanted to, though. But he had another date. Addavein was meeting Doomo at the Green House right now.

So Mark, his team, and a few others from his party, were here at the Virgin Social.

Upon stepping off of the tram they had been ‘politely’ besieged by various 18-to-20-something nobles and noble entourages. Mark had said ‘hello’ and ‘nice to meet you’ to a few of them, but he did not stop for anyone. He kept walking forward, toward his destination.

Sally and Lola got waylaid by people who really wanted to talk to Mark, but who were fine with talking to her, because some of them already had, apparently. They had contacted her through their company, Blackleaf, to talk about sponsoring teams. She eyed Mark, non-verbally telling him to move on while she stayed, clearly telling him to get all the details and to talk about it all later. A similar situation happened to Eliot, Tartu, Derek, Andria, and Tartu’s team of Lenny and Shawn, but for vastly different reasons. Andria had noble contacts that knew her, and Tartu had the same, and they wanted to talk about noble things; plots and whatever. Mark wasn’t sure. They wanted ‘secrets’, Mark was sure. Later, Mark would hear about Addavein and kaiju fights, the warrior teams and organizations that Sally had been funding with Mark’s money, and the infrastructure pursuits of Eliot. But Mark only cared about Jessie Stills, the ‘Resurrection Ghost’ of Memphi.

The guards around Jessie were only letting two people approach at a time; that much had been visible the second they stepped off of the tram. A pair of people were already talking to Jessie and his… father? Mark assumed. There was a family resemblance happening. The father seemed a lot happier about talking with whoever they were talking with. Jessie was pissed and quiet.

The coordinator beside the carpet leading into the VIP area, in the second ring of guards, was currently talking to someone, logging requests, and handing out numbers. He was a bouncer, and he was only letting people inside to see Jessie if they had an appointment.

Isoko wrapped her arm tighter with Mark’s, striding with him across the crowded field of people nibbling on foods and sipping on expensive drinks. A server offered her and Mark a glass filled with very clear ice and speared fruit slices. She declined and kept walking with Mark.

Isoko asked Mark, “Are we taking a number?”

“Yes,” Mark said, “Whichever one is right now. No more distractions.”

Isoko strode strongly, eyes judging everything.

And then some young guy with bouncy gold and green hair stepped away from his party, right to the side of Mark’s path, eyes locked on Mark, vector seriously focused as he rapidly said, “I want to help you take back Xerkona and kill Dominant and I can do it myself if I have your support!”

… Okay, Mark thought, this was a good distraction.

The stranger was with two other people, one older and female, the other a guy similar to the blond guy’s age. They were all terribly interested in Mark’s answer, and also practically red with embarrassment. They backed up the blond/green guy, though, standing tall and noble.

Mark said to the guy, “Name and contacts and I’ll get back to you later.”

“Xander Forester, of the Xerkona Foresters,” Xander said, rapidly adding, “Skills of Scramble and Speaker; Natural and Arcane. Specialized in single target takedown with capability in multi-target takedown. I’ve killed kaiju under their own weight before. Kaiju experience in Okuana in Citadel Xerkona, AKA Main Outpost, until the Dryad Sisasus killed everyone that lived there. The Fates made us leave, but my father stayed behind to fight for those who had done so much for us. He was murdered, just like everyone else who chose to stay behind.” Xander rapidly bowed as he pulled back and finished with, “Inheritor!”

Xander’s people bowed, too, the older woman softly saying ‘Inheritor’ while the younger guy couldn’t get his words past the lump in his throat.

“We’ll talk in a bit, Xander,” Mark said. “But I gotta see a guy about a Resurrection.”

Xander’s throat was closed up as he stood up and squeaked out, “How should I contact you, Inheritor, sir!”

“The company's name is ‘Blackleaf’. We got a site and a contact page.”

Xander’s voice was too tight with emotion to respond more than a nod.

Mark continued on.

Jessie watched Mark come his way the entire time, though the people in front of him, currently meeting him, were trying to make him pay attention to them. Jessie’s older family member seemed to be fielding the current visitors’ questions, but his vector told Mark that he was out of his depth.

The bouncer watched Mark approach and his vector quickly solidified into a recognizable formation; he was appointed to this spot by the Empire itself, and he would not be bowled over. When Mark got close enough the bouncer tried, “Would you like to take a number, sir! I’ll put you at the top of the list! We have 3 minute meetings right now and the others are almost done.”

Mark planted his feet at the entrance to the VIP section, and… and he pulled back his instinct to just bowl the guy over. He told the bouncer, “Thank you. I accept.”

The bouncer’s heart hammered hard and he almost grinned. He tapped on his screen, feeling happy he had navigated a horror, saying, “30 more seconds, sir.”

Mark watched as the guards near Jessie stepped toward the current pair of people meeting him. The pair spoke faster, laying out a final pitch to Jessie. Mark (and Quark, who was writing subtitles into Mark’s vision) caught talk of ‘the mountains of Rocktower’ and the ‘safety of being away from Crytalis, while still adhering to Empire obligations’.

Isoko whispered to Mark, “I think Jessie might not want to be here.”

“Oh yeah,” Mark said, forming a quick picture of what was going on.

Aluatha had tried to capture Mark through several different means, from shavallian poisoning, to duping the Collective of paladins of the Pantheon to grabbing Mark, to a bunch of different, other shit. They had failed with him, but they had succeeded with Jessie.

Other party goers at the Virgin Social stayed a few meters away from the outer ring of guards, but they were still using either hearing devices or magic spells to hear what was going on. At least 3 people were looking at Mark, wanting to speak to him, but they were also highly interested in whatever was going to happen next.

Music softly played in the cold air. Whispers and talk flowed like gentle streams. The scent of a feast rolled across the Virgin Social. Further afield, big bonfires cast warm lights into the party, yellow light playing with the softer, colored lights of the big paper lantern flowers. The air smelled of smoke and food and softer things.

Mark had barely looked at the party until now, until he was asked to wait, and he supposed it was a nice party—

Pearl and the other ‘Witches of Domal’Takela’ were far over there, all dressed in shimmery black, all of them in a group with others and sipping expensive, fruited wines. Pearl locked eyes with Mark for a moment, and Mark knew he would be meeting her, too.

And, strangely enough, as Mark turned away from the witches, to Jessie, he saw some vector deep in the air, like the shifting of someone underneath covers, move around Jessie and his entire VIP section. And then it was gone. And then Mark noticed something else, in passing, that he hadn’t noticed while it was happening because Mark was focused on the vector moving in the air.

The people currently in the meeting with Jessie and the father-guy were backing down. They had been halfway to fury before the dreamscape flowed around them, and now they were pulling back, and also stepping backward from the VIPs. It was like someone had shifted the sand underneath an arena, moving combatants further apart from each other.

That had to be the Witches’ Welcome, preventing a fight before it happened.

Another second passed, and the guards in the VIP area told the visitors that their time was up. At that same moment, the bouncer told Mark that it was his turn.

Mark focused.

He strode up the white carpet, Isoko on his arm, and then up to the semicircular seating area with Jessie and his maybe-father. Jessie had a furious and hopeful vector, while his face was a mask of indifference—

“Hello Mister Careed!” announced the father-guy, still standing from his previous meeting, rapidly reaching out to shake Mark’s hand, which Mark allowed, but it felt weird even as he was doing it.

This guy was not from Daihoon, at all. You didn’t shake hands on Daihoon; too many vectors of attack that way. But some people, specifically those from Earth, were very adamant about shaking hands. It marked you as ‘normal’ to them, as in ‘not all fantasy crap like they are in Daihoon’. Superheroes and villains shook hands, after all, when they made up or between each other—

Ahhh. Yeah.

Mark recognized these guys in a new way. Mark absolutely did not know them, but he knew people like them, and yeah, Jessie and this guy could have conceivably come from Memphi, from under Curtain Protocol. Maybe that much of their own ‘Resurrection Ghost’ story was true.

“I’m so glad we finally get to meet you!” The guy firmly shook Mark’s hand with both of his own hands, smiling as he said, “We both are! I’m Hank Stills, and my son here is Jessie! We’re both big fans!” And then he realized he was still holding Mark’s hand and he let go, chuckling a little, saying, “Sorry. It’s all ‘no-handshakes!’ on Daihoon, ain’t it?”

Mark easily said, “Generally true, yes, and while it’s nice to see people who aren’t all about precautions, laxity will get you killed on Daihoon.”

“Oh it has!” Hank said, beaming, and then he indicated Jessie, “But my son brought me back! Three times so far!”

“Four,” Jessie corrected, finally standing up.

“Oh that doesn’t count; I died too fast that second time for it to count twice!” Hank happily said. And then he happily told Mark, “We used to live in the North Western Bloc. All the housing for the poor, you know? Just on the western side of the Mississippi? But then the Battle for Mempi happened and— Well you were there! You know what happened.”

“I do know,” Mark said, remembering that event vividly. “I was with Titanfist, supporting him and holding back multiple clouddlefish by the gate district, and then Lawful Goose came in and honked and Titanfist killed them. And then we hurried across the Mississippi into your district where two more clouddlefish and millions of smaller cuttlefish had broken through. We made short work of the giant ones and as much as we could do with the smaller ones…” Mark paused, because Jessie was pissed off, now. Mark continued, “And I couldn’t kill them all before I was called away to deal with the Apocalypse Beetle with Archmage Blackthorn.”

“You should have let the fucking gate fall,” Jessie said to Mark, almost angrily.

…

Mark had a blank sort of moment, trying to understand what Jessie was saying, and belatedly, what type of anger Jessie was feeling. Jessie’s anger was a cold sort of anger. Deep-seated, solid, but currently taken a back seat to current situations. He was much more angry about sitting here behind guards, having his life controlled, than he was about Mark.

Mark was a convenient lightning rod for hate, though.

“Oh, son! Ha ha! They couldn’t do that!” Hank said, trying to play his son’s anger off as a joke, but he knew that Jessie absolutely wasn’t joking at all. He said to them both, “And we survived, and you came back and saved the day even more!” He told Mark, “Jessie had to hide for a long while, but he’s not hiding anymore, are you son?”

Jessie’s layered anger suddenly multiplied. Rage vibrated around him, through him, hitting his father and Mark and everything, before crashing back into his body, crushing under the weight of his need to be polite, like a snail retreating to his shell. His vector turned internal, his eyes dead, his voice subdued as he said, “No hiding anymore, Dad.”

Hank seemed a lot more well-adjusted than his son, but he did see his son’s anger and then that deep, deep sadness. He told Mark, “Aluatha has been good to us, but there have been some completely reasonable issues.”

‘

Mark almost felt as if the ground were shifting underfoot, positioning him just so, trying to make him back off—

No, Mark mentally said to himself, and then he focused, and the world stilled.

He was in control of his own social situation, thank you very much. Perhaps later Mark would allow himself to be moved, but not right now. Not for this important question.

Mark asked, “So they captured you?”

Hank winced. “Noooo—”

“Yeah,” Jessie said, and then reluctantly he added, “But it’s… okay now.”

Mark wasn’t moved by the Witches’ Welcome, but Hank and Jessie were.

Mark told them, “They told me I’d learn to like the yoke on my neck, too.”

Jessie snorted, almost hatefully. “But were able to fight against it! It’s a lot easier to get away from people when you can cut them up. All I can do is make them whole again.”

Mark flickered his Dreamsight on. First, he ignored the shifting background of the world right now because he knew that was the Witches’ Welcome. He needed to get a good look at Jessie, now that he was sure this wasn’t a trap for him, or at least not a normal trap, so that’s what he focused on.

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from NovelFire. Please report it.

Jessie was a soft whiteness that folded in on itself. He was images of people and places and things appearing and disappearing too fast for any real clarity to stick in Mark’s mind. It was like looking into the dreamlands; fractal and varied. It was, perhaps, one of the most unique souls and Powers that Mark had ever seen, and though it looked like chaos it was ordered.

Mark had done a lot of soul-gazing since he had gotten back from Endless Daihoon.

Based on the whiteness of Jessie’s soul, which was kinda like the whiteness of Isoko’s soul, he could tell that Jessie and Isoko were pretty similar at their base, though Isoko was much more platinum-shaded than Jessie. They were close enough to the same to call them both multicolor-white, and so Mark was rather comfortable labeling Jessie’s mana type as prismatic mana.

Aurora Valen had the same basic coloring, too. Isoko and Aurora’s soul-color was a lot more blended than Jessie’s, though. With Jessie, Mark saw actual things. Mostly faces or flesh, sometimes plants and places, and not always in flesh colors or landscape colors, as they flickered past his ordered soul.

He was basically a kaleidoscope.

Figuring out what type of Power he had was a bit more complicated.

Natural Powers, like Union, or Farmer, or Prosperity, were a lot less ordered than Jessie’s Power.

For example, Isoko’s tri-Talent of Union, Sky Shaper, and Platinum Body were platinum and solid and windy, stretching out like a billion threads and an invisible wind at the same time.

Aurora’s Telepathy and Supreme Telekinesis and whatever her supposed third Power was, was like looking at a rainbow lensing around the white core of her mind, with something special going on in her general area. Mark was pretty sure that ‘something special in her general area’ was an Arch Power, but he didn’t know for sure. Some people thought Aurora had Reality Manipulation, but Mark didn’t believe that at all, not really. Aurora absolutely had a Mind Power and a Shaper Power, though. The concentration of Power at the space where her brain would be in the real world was a good indication of that.

Jessie did not have a Mind Power, or a Shaper Power. The jury was out on Natural Powers at the moment.

Body Powers, like Sally’s Titan’s Strength, were rather concentrated at the field of her body. She had a lot of other stuff going on, but the main part of her Power was like something suffusing her muscles, bones, skin, and everything else. Sally’s Natural Retribution was the only thing throwing off an easy categorization.

Eliot, with his Man-made Manipulation and Castellan was like looking at a normal human standing in a field of his own strength. His Power was in his touch. Eliot was actually really hard to look at and gauge what he could do, unless you knew him, and then you realized that yeah, he was an Arch and Natural.

Arcane Powers were solidly regimented, and Eliot had that, but his solidness was more like gelatin and less like Bolter or Necromancer.

Mark was pretty sure Jessie was closer to Arcane than Arch, but maybe not.

Lola, with her broken Body Power and tacked-on Chosen System Union, was like looking at a cloak of gold around the normal dimness of a weaker central body. But that cloak was pretty fucking strong, and Freyala was right there with her. Mark was pretty sure that Lola’s ‘gold cloak’ was even stronger these days than it used to be.

Whatever fractal thing that Jessie had going on was either a weird Arch Power… but the orderliness of it made Mark think ‘Arcane’. Arch Powers were stretchable. Moldable. But Arcane Powers were solidly made, and simple. Arcane was the subset of the Power Hex that the demons had directly decided as ‘powers that exist as we make them exist’.

Eliot and Sally and Andria’s various Arch Powers made their souls look rather ‘flowy’.

All of that passed through Mark’s mind in a moment, as he gazed deeply into Jessie’s soul.

Jessie probably only had one singular Power, and it was Arcane.

There were no separate parts, or flows, or designs, to the singular fractal infinity that gently roiled inside of his body, and barely outside of his body at all.

So he wasn’t Chosen, either.

Perhaps, if he had been Chosen, then Mark would have heard of him before now. One of the only people more confused by Jessie’s sudden revelation than himself was far back there. Jessie was news to the Pantheon, for sure… or at least news to the normal Pantheon.

Did Thrashtalon know about Jessie?

Maybe.

Hank, meanwhile, had some sort of dark brown Body Power, ready to burst to strength underneath his skin if needed. Mark easily categorized that one as ‘Basic Brawny’. Maybe a 4x Strength score? Maybe a little higher. The guy’s muscle definition in his suit wasn’t that great, which meant he had let himself coast on his Strength modifier and he didn’t stress his body at all. With a high Strength modifier you had to work out to keep any sort of strong-looking body, which meant specialized gyms that not everyone could afford.

If Hank and Jessie really were from the poor districts of Memphi, then that made sense.

… And now Mark recalled those clouddlefish attacking the districts beyond the Mississippi a bit better. Mark was 90% sure the clouddlefish had attacked a rich district, with mansions and parks… But… Maybe there had been bloc apartments in the distance? Mark was pretty sure there had been of those. Maybe those had been poor neighborhoods? The smaller, monstrous cuttlefish had gotten pretty much everywhere, and Mark hadn’t cleared them out nearly well enough before he had been forced to take a teleport to the other side of Memphi to help kill that apocalypse beetle.

Mark wondered how much of ‘Resurrection Ghost’ story was true, but he left that to the side.

Instead, Mark asked Jessie, “What’s your Arcane Power called?”

Hank winced, remaining quiet.

Jessie snorted darkly, mental wounds opening, voice laced with hate, “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

Mark almost answered in the affirmative—

“We were told to keep it a secret,” Hank said, thinking he was defending his son.

Mark scrunched his face, wondering why Hank thought Mark was attacking Jessie… and then Mark just came out and said, “The Resurrection Ghost stuff was a lie, so why are you here, claiming power that is not yours to claim?” Mark knew that Pearl and her witches were looking right at them from across the party, but he did not return their look. Mark knew that people were listening in, but he didn’t care about them. Mark asked, “are some witches of Aluatha backing this story? Why is backing this up?”

Hank winced.

The Witches’ Welcome responded, centering on Jessie.

Jessie snorted darkly again, thinking he was leading Mark to his own doom as he said, “Maybe were lied to, huh? Maybe you’re lying right now! You already lied about trading in dragon parts, and now you have a dragon walking right alongside you, that shit with Endless Daihoon? Did that even really happen? Bet not! Bet you didn’t even kill any goblins, either! Why the fuck do get a goblin friend, huh?”

… Mark had no idea what was going on with Jessie’s words, exactly, or what kind of insult any of that was supposed to mean. The part about having a ‘goblin friend’ —which could only mean Goofy Goblin?— was weird.

Mark decided to say, “Nice to meet you.”

And then Mark turned and walked away, unsure of what, if anything, had happened back there, though his Unionsense was still locked on Jessie and Hank in case Jessie called him back.

Jessie or his father did not reach out.

Jessie had been hateful by the end of it. Hank was mad, too, but at Jessie. Quark caught Hank telling his son, quietly, that Jessie could have handled that better. Jessie didn’t respond; he retreated into himself.

Mark stopped by the bouncer, asking him, “Does he have an information portal, or contact?”

“Yes, sir. I will send the information to Blackleaf’s inbox.”

“Thanks,” Mark said, feeling kinda nice, but still weird. The bouncer had known Mark’s company’s name… which shouldn’t be all that surprising, he supposed.

Mark walked on, stepping out into the party, into the space between all of the little cliques of people talking by tall tables and drinking fancy drinks. No one approached him right now, which Mark thought was smart of them. He wasn’t sure how he would react to the next person trying to talk to him.

“Are we busting him out of here?” Isoko asked, threading her arm around Mark’s.

Mark sighed, then he chuckled, feeling some kinda way—

“I have received the information for Jessie Stills, sir,” Quark said, at Mark’s shoulder, taking the form of a silver dollop and speaking loud enough for Isoko to hear. “There are many videos of Resurrection experiments, all available online and for United Sapients viewing, and from my brief study of the videos and speaking to others, we believe he is not the Resurrection Ghost, but he is very close. Also, he has been kept in a ‘golden prison’ for the last 5 months, ever since they found him. It happened while we were off in Endless Daihoon.”

Isoko and Mark listened intently, just like several other people nearby who were using listening magics or something similar. Their vectors undulated in time to Quark’s words, so it was rather easy to sense when someone was listening in, unless they were very, very good about vector control.

Mark said, “We’re not busting him out of his golden cage but we are contacting him through whatever online portal he has set up.” Mark looked around, saying, “I have some witches to talk— Ah. Hello.”

Pearl was three steps away, her black pointed hat angled over her piercing pale eyes.

“We welcome discussions with the Inheritor,” Pearl said, gesturing down the way, past some decorative giant paper flowers and soft party lights. The other two witches were down that way, visible beyond the flowers, watching Mark and Isoko and Pearl. “Amy and Uva await, and we are eager to dispense with this mandated courting.”

… What?

Mark said/asked, “the ‘three people who know each other’ that Walaria told me I needed to talk to. The ones… she’s trying to set me up with? Romantically?”

“I’d call it more a ‘joining of power’ than ‘romantic’, but romance is achievable if you desire,” Pearl said.

Isoko blinked, and then she laughed and unlatched from Mark, saying, “I’m Isoko, and your performance was nice.”

Mark felt unmoored.

Isoko was being… pleasant?

Pearl’s attitude had been slightly cold, but now she warmed up a little, saying to Isoko, “Thank you. I loved your review of Shimmerslick’s new fall blush collection. Amy got to my stash before I did, otherwise I would be wearing it now.”

Isoko’s grin turned genuine as she started walking toward the other witches, saying, “I love your dresses. Is the black necessary for witch work, or just part of the mystique?”

Pearl walked with Isoko, saying, “Both! We have been in a band since we were 12, always dressing in dark colors and with a witchery about us, but when we took the Tutorial 4 years ago our pageantry ended up creating reality, and we couldn’t be happier. Black is a great color.”

“Black is a good color,” Isoko readily agreed.

As Mark walked with them, as Isoko interrogated-without-interrogating and as Pearl answered a lot more than she needed to answer, something like anger, or maybe depression, seemed to roll away from Mark, like an unburdening of problems. Yeah, he was deep in the propaganda right now, but…

Maybe this Winter Ball was going to be okay.