Awakening
A room shrouded in heavy curtains, pitch-dark. With a single candle as the only source of light, several muscular men knelt on the floor. Astonishingly, the man they knelt before was a walking skeleton who looked like he couldn't survive a single punch from any one of those hulking figures. He was so shriveled and dried up that you'd believe it if someone called him a mummy. Equally distinctive were the tattoos that covered every inch of his body.
"Mmmmm···"
The gaunt man let out a light sigh and reached for the wine sitting on the desk. At even that trivial motion, the kneeling men trembled like leaves.
Gulp, gulp.
Only the sound of the man swallowing echoed through the silent room. Having drained half the bottle in one go, he slammed it down roughly and spoke in a low murmur, almost a whisper.
"Ahh··· So··· that little brat is gone?"
"···That's correct, Boss!"
A cryptic opening remark from the man called Boss. But his subordinates understood it instantly and snapped to attention, answering at full volume. No—what filled their trembling eyes wasn't discipline. It was terror.
"How long has it been since she disappeared?"
"Well, you see··· at least a month···"
CRACK!
The head of the subordinate who had been hesitating over his words suddenly vanished. The headless corpse knelt as if pleading for forgiveness, pressing its upper body to the floor and spilling fresh blood across it. And yet, strangely enough, no pool of blood gathered on the ground.
The Boss swallowed his boiling rage and forced out each word slowly, as if chewing on them one at a time.
"As you all know··· I am a generous man. Whatever mistakes you've made until now, if it was nothing serious, I let it all slide."
"···That's right."
"But this time, I find it very hard to simply look the other way. Did I give you a difficult order? Hey, Damian. Recite for me—what order did I give?"
At the Boss's summons, the bald muscleman at the far left began to speak, shaking like a leaf.
"You ordered us to··· keep watch on that little brat."
"That's right. I didn't tell you to coddle her. I didn't tell you to torment her, either. I merely said to keep her··· keep her very appropriately··· tethered to this slum until the time was right."
"···"
The Boss rose smoothly from his seat. Though he hadn't done a thing, the chilling murderous aura radiating from him made the kneeling men bow their heads even deeper.
"Was my order too hard to understand? Have I been working with idiots all this time?"
"No, Boss!"
The men chorused the exact same words at the exact same moment, as if performing a rehearsed choir. At the sight, the Boss sighed and sank back into his chair. Perhaps it was the flickering shadows, but the tattoos carved across his skin seemed almost alive, writhing like something crawling beneath it.
"I understand, you know. The city's been in an uproar lately. Expanding our territory has kept us all busy. I had to be away myself, so it's fair enough."
"···"
"No, no. The more I think about it, the less I understand. How do you fail at such an easy task? And you didn't even notice for a whole month? Does that even make sense··· I'm asking you!!"
CRASH!
Unable to contain his fury, the Boss smashed the half-full wine bottle against the floor. Watching the bottle shatter in that deafening burst of noise, the subordinates saw a reflection of their own future and shrank their necks into their shoulders like frightened turtles.
After a moment, the Boss seemed to recover his composure and continued in a calm voice.
"Enough. It was my mistake for entrusting work to idiots like you."
"We'll handle it!"
"One way or another?"
"Yep! One way or another we'll··· kgh!"
GRAB!
The Boss seized the throat of one of the shouting subordinates, twisted, and hoisted him clean off the ground. An impossible strength from such a skeletal frame. Despite being unable to breathe, the man had given up even the thought of resistance—he simply waited for his fate, his face turning ghost-white.
The Boss hurled him across the room.
CRASH.
"Handing things to morons like you makes me nervous, but··· there's too much to do. Fine. I'll give you one more chance. But—who took the girl?"
"A rookie guild member from out of town! Rank 8, sir!"
Another subordinate answered quickly in place of the man slammed against the wall.
"A rookie? Anything notable about him?"
"From what I've heard, the guild wanted to grant him Rank 7 but had to settle for Rank 8 because of his lack of experience. There's also a rumor he came in with a recommendation card from a Rank 5···"
"Starting out at Rank 8, so he's got some tricks up his sleeve. Well, whatever. It was probably done out of some petty sense of goodwill. Go offer him appropriate compensation and bring the kid back. Don't pick a fight and draw attention for no reason."
"Understood!"
"And if he still refuses to hand her over··· stand by and wait. There'll be no need to watch our step before long anyway. You can retrieve her then."
"Yes, sir!"
"Good at answering, at least. I'll be away again, so keep the territory in order. Hmm··· surely that brat hasn't gone and awakened while I was gone."
THUD!
The Boss stamped his foot once, hard, looking thoroughly annoyed, then opened the door and walked out without waiting for an answer. Only after he was gone did the occupants of the room—one headless corpse and one unconscious man included—finally heave a long sigh of relief.
"AWAKEEEENING-----! LENA'S AWAKE!!"
Lena leapt out of bed and bellowed, dancing a wild jig. Apparently unable to contain her joy, she even broke into a bizarre dance. Honestly, the noise, first thing in the morning.
"···Did you have a dream?"
"Awake! I'm awakened! Ajusssshiiiiii!!!!"
Ignoring my scolding entirely, Lena spun through a somersault to express her delight. Ha—awakening? That's not the name of somebody's dog, and after just one month?
It was obviously nonsense, but just in case, I figured I'd check—
Huh?
"It's real?"
The flow of mana radiating from Lena sent my drowsiness flying in an instant. Look at her however I might, Lena was in complete, perfect control of her own mana. Just yesterday I'd thought she still had a long way to go. How did this make any sense?
But mana didn't lie.
"Look at this!"
WHOOSH—!
Lena reinforced her body with mana and leapt skyward. The top of her head brushed the ceiling by a hair. It was unmistakably superhuman physical ability—the kind of performance you simply couldn't show without an awakening.
"No, really··· how on earth did you awaken?"
"I don't know! I just went to sleep and woke up like this!"
"You might be the only person in the history of the world to awaken in their sleep···"
And so I started my morning with an utterly absurd turn of events.
···
The inn's courtyard had grown so familiar by now that it felt like our own private training hall. We scarfed down a hasty breakfast and hustled outside. Unbelievable as it seemed, the awakening looked real—so we wanted to run every test we could. The results were staggering.
"Not bad at all···"
"Is that good?"
"Honestly? Way better than the rookies at the guild. At this level, joining won't be any problem at all."
Barely a few hours after awakening, Lena was already handling her mana with practiced ease. Her movements had always been nimble, but she was still, after all, just a girl, and there'd been limits—now, though, her reinforcement efficiency seemed excellent, and she bounded around like a flying squirrel. Even after thirty minutes of full-power sprinting, she could still keep going, which meant her mana reserves were top-notch too.
Next up: the strength test.
"Hit my palm. No mana."
"Hyaaap!"
THUD!
Lena's adorable little fist slammed into my palm. Strength and precision beyond belief for a child. If I closed my eyes, it felt like a hulking musclebound man swinging at full power. My palm stung faintly.
"Your baseline strength has improved a lot too."
Awakening tended to elevate the whole body across the board. In other words, you became something like a new human. But the degree of improvement varied enormously from person to person, and most people chalked that difference up to talent.
'She's exceeded the average reinforcement gain. And if we stack mana reinforcement on top of that?'
At this level, Lena wasn't physically outclassed by the guild's rookies in the slightest. Considering that even Rank 10 guild members were typically healthy men who'd trained for years—Lena's results were truly remarkable.
Just as we were about to head straight to the guild and submit her registration, Lena tugged carefully at my sleeve.
"Um, I think I got an ability too. It's hard to put into words, though."
"An ability?"
I stared at her, dumbfounded. Getting a formalized ability right off the bat at awakening? No, sure, Noah had gained her healing power from the start too—but I'd been told that wasn't a normal case. It felt like pulling a top-tier character on your very first gacha pull.
"An offensive ability?"
"No, not that kind of··· Ah! You'll just have to see it. Let me use it once."
"Fine. Use it on me."
I was genuinely curious what kind of ability it could be. Something defensive, maybe?
···
"Here I go! Hnngh!"
With Noah stationed nearby as a safety measure just in case, Lena activated her [Ability]. As she clenched both fists and let out a battle cry, a strange-textured mana came pouring toward me. It was sticky, clammy—like jelly.
Wobble~
What was this mana? I reflexively tried to block it, but after snagging for a moment against my aura, it slipped through without any resistance at all and infiltrated straight into my brain.
This is danger—
"Huh?"
In an instant, I was flung into a completely different world. A world brimming to its edges with Lena. Everywhere I looked, in every direction, the whole world was stuffed with her smug little face. And for some reason, staring at that face made my blood boil.
'That's it. I'm going to punch her. Just once.'
Even with my vision blurred, I knew exactly where Lena was—her mana was still linked to mine, even now. And after all, I'd left the carrot out last night.
"Snap out of it!"
"Ghk!?"
The instant Noah's voice pierced my ears, the dizzying world shattered like breaking glass. Only then did my clouded mind return to normal. What had I been doing?
Noah was holding me tight, her head detached and floating at my side—when had she even come over?
"···What was that?"
"You don't remember? You just tried to attack Lena."
"I did?"
"A form of mental control··· no, I believe it's a Taunt."
"Ugh··· I knew it!"
According to Noah, after I'd fallen under Lena's ability, I'd charged at her at full power. No matter how she called out to me, I was completely unresponsive, and somehow radiating murderous intent, so she'd had to restrain me for quite a while. A whole five seconds of it.
"[Taunt], huh. That's about right. I really, really wanted to punch her just then. And isn't this an incredibly useful ability?"
"Right? Right? Isn't it awesome? It seems you can designate multiple targets at once, too. The power weakens as it's spread out, but still."
Even with that drawback, it was a phenomenal ability. Effective whether in a one-on-one or against a crowd. On top of that, it carried the property of ignoring defenses. ···Come to think of it, it had a lot in common with the Evil Cultists' techniques.
"Anyway, at this point, guild membership is a done deal. The doors should be open by now. Want to head straight there?"
"Let's go!"
There was plenty I wanted to know. For instance, probing Lena's exact current specs through a sparring session. Or why the additional symptoms of her Mana Blockage that she'd described before had never appeared, and how she'd arrived at her awakening so naturally.
'But none of that can't wait for later.'
For Lena—practically a street urchin until now—what she needed most was to join the guild. Once she was a member, she'd receive the protection that came with it, so even if something happened to Noah and me, she'd be safe. It was the same feeling as winning the lottery and rushing straight to cash the ticket because you couldn't afford to do anything else first.
···
"Yahoo—! I'm a guild member now!"
Needless to say, Lena's joining the guild was a foregone conclusion. She breezed through every standard test they threw at her, and at fifteen, shattered the record for youngest ever registered rookie in the history of the guild's Volston branch.
"Please put her in our party."
"Of course, sir."
"To all you bastards who told me to go sell my body! You can all eat dirt!! Nyahaha!"
Receiving her black card—the badge of a Rank 10 guild member—in the usual reception room, Lena went absolutely feral. Well, today was a happy occasion, so I supposed we could let it slide. Thank goodness this room was well soundproofed.