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DATE:25th of August, the 70th year after the Coronation
LOCATION: Concord Metropolis
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I put the shirt and pants in the dryer and returned to Alice's room to take a nap, but I was sadly interrupted by knocks on the door.
They didn't wait for an answer. They just burst in.
A different Inquisitor than the guy from the lab. This one was quite ugly—the kind of ugly that made description difficult. His broad snout resembled a bear's, while wide, pointy ears extended prominently from his head. His mouth stretched too wide, revealing sharp teeth and overgrown fangs that protruded noticeably. Sparse fur covered his face and arms, leaving patches of exposed skin between the coarse hair.
Some kind of animal hybrid, probably. I had no idea what his power was.
"Carter, you are required for questioning." He said it authoritatively, as if I didn't have a choice.
"Can't it wait? I need to sleep."
"You expect a whole division of the bureau of internal investigations to wait around for you?"
Ugh. Were they all pricks?
"Can you at least leave? You stink."
"What?!" His voice rose in pitch.
Oops. Didn't mean to let that one slip out loud.
"Look, if the whole division was sent, something big's going on. Some kind of conspiracy?" I said, shifting my tone. Trying to redirect. "It can wait. Give me an hour or two."
I turned away from him and covered my nose with my arm.
"You! Even if you are an Agency leader, to act so—" He sputtered, indignant.
I got to my feet. He was still taller than me, but at least we were facing each other now.
"No, I think you don't get it."
"Ultraman's Legion was and still is the strongest agency around. You know how badly that asshole from the lab treated me? Threw me around, insulted me, wouldn't let me see evidence related to a person I knew."
"That—I hope you aren't thinking of pressing charges." He said it dismissively, like the idea was absurd.
Of course he did.
"No, I'm thinking of pressing the trigger instead."
The mutant froze. Stared at me blankly like he couldn't process the threat.
I pointed toward the hallway.
"Get out of the way. I'm not tolerating your presence any longer."
"You can't mean—"
"Didn't you hear me? Who the fuck do you think you are?"
I started adjusting the janitor coveralls, making a show of reaching inside like I might pull something out. His eyes widened. Did he actually think I had a weapon stashed in here?
What a bunch of idiots.
I pushed past him, mostly just to make a point, but stopped a few meters down the hallway.
"Well? Where the hell is this questioning taking place?"
Suddenly all business, the mutant quickly got in front of me and started leading the way. He guided me underground, deeper into the Academy than I'd been before. We ended up in a part of the training hall I didn't recognize. At first I thought he was showing me the crime scene—we passed right by the dried blood from yesterday's murder—but we didn't stop there.
He led me into an all-white room with a table and four chairs. Not an interrogation room, though. The furniture didn't match the rest of the aesthetic. This looked like a simulation chamber of some kind. The kind they used for training exercises.
Three Inquisitors were already seated at the other chairs.
One was the golden-gun asshole from the lab. The other two were new. A plain-looking brunette woman in her forties, and a tanned guy whose hair was dyed only at the tips—bleached blonde at the ends, dark at the roots. His expression was smug. Arrogant.
"Wow! Mr. Untouchable actually came." He said it with that performative sneer. "And dressed as a janitor, no less. What, you cleaning up after yourself now?"
I glanced around the room at all three of them. Then my eyes settled on the smug one.
"You look like someone dipped you in bronze and dunked your head in peroxide halfway through. What a clown."
Silence. The woman looked uncomfortable. The golden-gun guy didn't react—probably used to this by now. But the bleached-tips asshole's face went red.
"You! You freak!"
"You look like a sunset that couldn't decide whether to happen. But I'm the freak?" I gestured at myself mockingly.
"Enough, Carter. Take a seat." The golden-gun guy's voice cut through. Authoritative. Tired of the banter.
No point in prolonging it.
The mutant left the room without a word.
I pulled a chair out and sat sprawled across it, one arm draped over the backrest. Asserting dominance. It was important to appear strong when outnumbered.
The plain-looking woman started.
"William Carter Jr., we summoned you here with no relation to yesterday's tragedy. We need to discuss another incident. One in which you were recently involved."
The gun-guy continued smoothly, picking up her thread.
"We are, of course, pleased to see such a promising hero survive the encounter with the Kingdom's traitors. But we have questions about how you managed that feat."
"It was Lifeweaver. He reconstructed me."
"But to recover from an exposure of that magnitude—" She leaned forward slightly.
I cut her off.
"Am I really the only hero with hyper-regeneration? Seriously? Why is everyone acting so shocked by this?"
"Mister Carter." Her tone was patient, clinical. "Do you understand how regeneration actually works? A cell divides, duplicates, and grows. Hyper-regeneration accelerates the process. But radiation damage is different. If the cellular structure is fundamentally compromised, how could it divide and grow normally? The cells should have mutated, degraded, or become something entirely foreign to your body."
She paused, letting the implication hang.
"Someone with your regenerative capacity shouldn't have scars after radiation exposure. You should have mutations. Deformations. Yet here you are with clean wound closure. That's... inconsistent with known biology." What a bore…
Was she trying to play the teacher?
"Blah blah..."
"Excuse me?!" Her tone went sharp.
"Look, are we really doing this? Superpowers aren't scientific. Why place useless biology textbook laws over actual superhuman abilities? What about my cousin? Ultraman? How do you explain any of his powers with your logic?"
"That's not what this is about," the gun-guy said flatly.
"But it kind of is." I gave him a smile. Big, obvious. Like I was talking to a child.
"She asked me a question, so I'll ask one back. My cousin, rest in peace." I raised my hand in mock solemnity. "He was the best of us. He could fly as fast as a jet fighter. Lift entire airplanes. And that's not even mentioning his durability. Can you imagine the cellular energy required? How densely packed his cells would need to be for that kind of performance?"
I leaned forward slightly, enjoying the moment.
"Shouldn't mere friction burn him alive? Shouldn't he need to eat more than an elephant just to maintain himself? Asking irrelevant questions like this is silly. Actually, it's childish."
The dyed-hair guy shifted uncomfortably.
"I have to intervene here," he said. "Come on. We all know why Ultraman was different. You can't just use him as a comparison."
So many people kept saying that. Same line, different voices.
"No, actually it's not clear at all. Why is everyone keeping secrets from his own family?"
The guy's expression shifted. Genuine surprise.
"Really? Nobody told you? You're not joking?"
"Just spell it out."
"Ultraman wasn't just a natural hero. His entire genetics were... improved. Enhanced by—"
"Secundo Manus." I threw it out there casually, like I'd just guessed.
The room went quiet.
"Yes..." He sounded uncertain now. "So you did suspect?"
Not really. But Secundo Manus was the only biologist worth anything in this city. Who else would be capable of something like that?
"I had my suspicions," I said smoothly, letting him believe what he wanted.
Still, this was huge. This meant he'd tested his methods on Alice first, then refined the process before using it on his next project: Kevin Heart.
A manufactured superhero. Made from some former wrestler. It rang so hollow.
I wanted to laugh at the absurdity of it, but I held it in.
The dyed-hair guy continued, eager to explain his discovery.
"Ultraman was already superpowered for a long time, but Secundo Manus elevated him into an idol. Into a symbol." He paused. "So him surviving a Ventium explosion was believable. Expected, even. But you? There are limits to what powers can do. For instance, Lifeweaver couldn't possibly have saved you from an exposure like that. What do you have to say about that?"
That was a good question.
A tough one.
"So Ultraman was manufactured," I said, shifting angles. "But how did the other powers appear naturally? How do you explain that with your logic?"
"That is..." He froze. Searching for an answer. "I'm not sure."
I smiled.
"See? So it's not all that surprising that I survived. Maybe it's just a difference in how powers manifest. I regenerate extensively, sure, but I'm not physically stronger than a regular human. That's my limitation."
"You say that," the gun-guy interjected, "but you subdued me earlier. And you were injured."
"Sorry, that just speaks of how weak you actually are."
He didn't like hearing that. His jaw tightened.
I leaned back in my chair.
"Look, what exactly am I supposed to say here? If you want the truth, just use whatever method you used to 'confirm' Ackerman's involvement. Use that on me."
The three Inquisitors exchanged glances.
"That is exactly what we were going to do, Anne?" said the tanned guy.
Anne—the plain-looking woman—rose from her seat and circled the table to get behind me. Without asking, she threaded her fingers between my hair to reach my scalp. I didn't like being touched, but there was nothing invasive about it. Clinical. Professional.
"Am I supposed to feel anything?" I asked.
Then she zapped me.
When I opened my eyes, I found myself face-down on the table. Drool pooled beneath my mouth. I used the janitor uniform's sleeve to wipe my face clean.
The tanned guy started laughing, genuine amusement.
"Man, you are just too much. I heard you were all serious business, but this is unreal."
I looked up at him, still tasting copper and electricity.
"I'm sorry that you're incompetent enough to think like that. Truly, I pity your parents. Dead they may be."
His laughter died instantly.
"How dare you!" He shot up from his seat, face flushing red with anger.
Anne grabbed his arm, holding him back.
"You shouldn't talk that way to an Inquisitor," she said calmly.
"As if I owe him anything. I'll show respect when I'm given some. Where's the gratitude for taking out all those villains? For cleaning up this city's mess?"
"You should stop acting like you're the only hero doing anything for this city," The gun-man said.
I laughed—a short, sharp sound.
"Bitch, you should stop talking until you actually know how to fight."
Now he had his turn. He rose so quickly his chair scraped backward, and his hand moved to the holster on his hip. He drew the gun and shoved the barrel right next to my head, pressing it against my temple.
"Yeah? Try one of those techniques from earlier then. Come on."
His hand was shaking.
"Both of you stop," Anne said sharply. "You're mocking our institution."
I turned my full attention back to her, the gun-guy temporarily forgotten.
"You're a psychic, right? What did you actually see inside my mind?"
"Just as you said. Lifeweaver saved your life."
"Then I'm free to go." I said, rising from the table and turning toward the door.
"Wait a second." Her voice stopped me mid-step. I turned my head back. "That man. The one with the Ventium gun. He died and then he..." She trailed off, searching her memory. "He came back to life?"
So she actually saw through my memories. Judging by how she isn't injured, she mustn't have gone too deep.
"My current target is a necromancer. She puppeted the corpse to make the gun explode. I didn't anticipate it." I kept my tone flat, matter-of-fact. "She also disabled my suit before I could use it. Without her interference, I wouldn't have been caught."
Anne studied me for a moment.
"Alright. You're free to go." She said it simply.
Huh?
She didn't question me about Emily. Didn't ask about my suit's disappearance. Didn't mention the teleportation. Nothing.
That was... suspicious.
Whatever. I wasn't going to push my luck.
I headed upstairs to collect my clothes.
The English teacher was still in the lounge, drinking alone. She looked up when she saw me, but I cut her off before she could start.
"I'll be back in five minutes," I said flatly, brushing past her.
The dry cycle had finished long ago. My suit was already waiting, folded neatly on the laundry table. The person who took it out had some manners.
I changed out of Aku's coveralls quickly, glad to be back in my own clothes. They smelled faintly of detergent now. Better than the chemical stench from before.
I wasn't feeling another nap after the one from earlier. My exhaustion had been partly knocked out of me by Anne's zap anyway.
So what now?
I could ignore the English teacher, find a quiet corner somewhere. But she'd looked desperate to talk. And I needed information about what had happened with Sasha. About the Academy and what was happening.
Might as well get it from her while she was drunk and loose-tongued.
I found her halfway through a bottle of wine.
She was wearing a tank top with a low neckline and loose cotton pants—the kind of outfit that didn't leave much to imagination. Not that I cared. She was too old for me anyway. Still, it wasn't exactly appropriate attire for a faculty member. Especially if she was still the dean. I honestly couldn't remember her title anymore.
I took a seat to her right and kept my eyes on the TV, away from her.
"I really don't know, Willie..." She was slurring slightly. "Why are so many innocent people targeted in this world?"
"Because the world is cold," I said flatly.
I wasn't sure what she expected me to say.
"Well, that was cold." She sighed heavily, reaching for her wine glass. "We used to be like a big family here. And to lose two teachers in such a short span of time..."
"I don't think Zilliam died," I said. I wasn't actually sure what had happened to her. The information just wasn't there in my memory.
"That's not what I mean..." She drank more. "You were always such a difficult guy, William. Always so—"
"Surely—"
"Mhmm! In fact, I must say I don't know what Alice even saw in you."
"Well, that was hurtful." It wasn't.
She laughed—a bitter, self-aware sound. "I'm kidding. I do get it. You're the serious type. A good contrast to her brightness. Yeah, it makes sense." It sounded like she was justifying it to herself more than explaining it to me.
I decided to push.
"Do you really think Ackerman did it? Killed Sasha?"
She hesitated, swirling her wine.
"Adalbert?" She said the name carefully, like testing it out. "I'm really not sure. I just can't see why he would do that to Sasha of all people."
So she did know about his criminal history.
"Perhaps she got too deep into his mind," I said. "Psychic backlash or something."
"And you think he'd care about that?" She chuckled, reaching for her glass again. "Adalbert isn't the type to be bothered by someone else's pain. Mr. Perfect doesn't work that way."
She was right. He was the kind of man to gloat about his achievements, not hide in shame.
"You know, Will, Adalbert says he wasn't even in the training hall at that time. When Sasha died, he has an alibi."
"So then where was he?"
"That's the part that infuriates me." She drained half her glass. "He wouldn't say. Refused to tell anyone where he actually was."
So he'd been doing something illegal. Something he wanted hidden even from the Inquisition.
But that created a problem.
If he wasn't there, then how was he caught? That psychic woman from earlier—Anne—she must have looked through someone's memories. But she shouldn't have seen the actual murder if Ackerman wasn't present.
This meant two things.
Either her power wasn't actually memory-reading, or Ackerman had been mind-controlled and forced to confess.
The second option didn't make sense. If someone had controlled him, he'd have no reason to hide his real location. His cover story would be part of the control.
So what did Anne actually see? Why would she need someone who was already at the scene?
Wait.
What if she never used her powers on Ackerman at all?
Of course. Why hadn't I thought of that immediately? She needs direct contact with the scalp to deliver the electrical signal and interface with the nervous system. But Ackerman—he was made of elastic material. His body was entirely different from a human's. His brain probably wasn't even centralized in his head like a normal person's.
Yes!
She couldn't use her powers on him.
So who else was there?
The victim obviously.
She observed what Sasha herself saw in her last moment. She must have seen Ackerman attacking her.
But here's the problem: who says that was actually Ackerman? I remembered being stalked once by someone using rubber masks—perfect replicas that could fool anyone. What if this was the same thing? What if someone with similar equipment staged this whole scene and pinned it on Mr. Perfect as a convenient scapegoat? It would explain the frame-up, the convenient evidence, the speed with which the investigation moved.
The only remaining question was why the entire Inquisition division got deployed for a single counselor's death. Were they scared of the Academy specifically, of something happening to the institution that trains the next generation of heroes? Possible. But I had a feeling the real reason was somewhere deeper, something they weren't saying out loud.
The rest of the conversation with the English teacher wasn't worth remembering. She spent twenty minutes complaining about her love life, struggling to find a man who could satisfy her apparently, and I had a hard time not rolling my eyes at the whole thing. I excused myself as quickly as possible and left.
I needed to prepare for the evening, though there wasn't much to do. Without the aspirin in my system, my body would naturally begin shutting down—my heart would stop, my breathing would fade. It was a waiting game at this point, a countdown to whatever death qualified as for someone like me.
I had to prepare for the evening.
I say that, but there wasn't much to do. Without the aspirin in my system I would naturally almost die. It was just a waiting game. I kept the jar close despite that.
Hmmm…
I still had a few hours until nightfall.
Time to experiment with the pills.
I knew how the other drugs worked. Bullet Time required holding my breath—oxygen deprivation triggered the manifestation. Perfect Time was the opposite—emptying my lungs completely. So how did the aspirin work?
It was a painkiller, not a stimulant. Calming, not activating. Could I sleep into it? Meditate? Or did it require some kind of gesture—screaming, maybe?
Where to test it though? I didn't exactly want the Inquisition showing up if something went wrong.
No. First I needed to understand how it stimulated my body at all. Start from sensation.
The cocaine and methamphetamine mixture had flooded my entire system with energy. My hands tingled. My feet buzzed. My eyes felt like they might burst out of their sockets. Everything was too much, too fast.
The caffeine was different. My chest felt like it was imploding. Nausea crawled up my throat. My heart strained visibly, pounding against my ribs. Breathing became difficult, labored. The whole experience was violent and uncontrolled.
So with the aspirin? Theoretically there should have been nausea, vomiting, cardiac arrest, blurred vision. Classic overdose symptoms.
But I felt none of that.
Which meant the dose wasn't high enough yet. Wasn't enough to trigger whatever mechanism waited inside me.
But I needed to purge it from my system before meeting the ghost. I needed that death-state.
Hmmm.
What if I overdosed on it? Took the entire jar? Wouldn't that accomplish the same thing? Force my body into whatever state I needed while also testing the pill's actual limit?
I wanted to do it now. Test the boundaries while I still had time to recover.
But I couldn't risk the Inquisition catching me mid-seizure or mid-cardiac event. Not when I had a ghost to meet tonight.
I'd wait until evening. Closer to the time I needed to slip into that state anyway.
Guess I'll read a book or something.
_____
That was a mistake.
I thought the library would be empty. But that hog was sitting right by the entrance, blocking the way like some kind of guard.
I couldn't avoid her eyes when she looked up.
"William? You're back?" Her voice matched her body—bloated, heavy, taking up more space than it should. Ugh. Why would anyone keep their power active if it disfigured them like that? Mutants would be malding at how she wears this grotesque form like a badge.
"Yup. Looks like it." I kept moving.
"I hope you don't think this institution is some kind of motel for rough patches. The homeless shelter isn't in Cordon." She said it like I'd violated her personally.
"Sure isn't. I just didn't have spare clothes on me."
"Did I ask you for an excuse?"
Well fuck you.
I turned and walked deeper into the library, ignoring her.
"Hey! I'm talking here!" She raised her voice, but I kept walking.
Her screams faded as I moved between the shelves.
Like why did I even bother? Why did I go out and fight villains, take explosions, get torn apart by power I couldn't control? It's not like I did it for praise or gratitude. I knew better than that.
But suddenly I have a few scars and I'm treated like a threat? Like I'm the problem?
How does that make any sense?
Even if her body is some kind of husk, how can something be this fundamentally unlikeable? How does she manage it?
This place sucks more than I remember.
I found a quiet corner and sat down, opening the first book I saw.
I spent the last hours of daylight reading in the library. The math teacher never came back. I figured moving from her chair would have required too much effort on her part.
At about 10 PM, I headed toward the garden.
I could barely move. My body was already failing before I even took the pills.
One step after another. My legs felt like lead. I collapsed three times on the way there, each time taking longer to get back up.
I fell face-first into the grass near the flower beds. My hands were shaking so badly I could barely grip the pill jar. I managed to open it and dump the contents into my mouth—dry, no water. Twenty pills left, maybe more.
Almost two times the lethal dosage.
If this didn't bring me to the ghost, nothing would.
I swallowed hard and waited.
My lungs felt like they were drowning. Each breath was an effort. I suffered so much, survived so much, and for what? To be blamed for not dying when I was supposed to?
Is power really so terrifying? I suppose it must be.
I thought the effect would be gradual, building slowly.
It wasn't.
It hit all at once—a colossal, overwhelming urge to vomit. I performed a glottal stop, blocking my throat to keep it down. But now I couldn't breathe at all.
My vision blurred. Colors bled into each other. Nausea rolled through me in waves, each one worse than the last.
Then I heard whispers.
Voices speaking all around me, overlapping, incomprehensible. But I was alone in the garden. No one should be here at this hour.
Was this schizophrenia? Another symptom of the overdose?
I opened my eyes wider and saw them—dots of light scattered throughout the air. Tiny, luminous points moving erratically, each one wandering as if searching for something. They were beautiful in a distant, hallucinatory way.
Then I saw a larger light in the distance. Brighter. More defined.
That had to be her.
But as my body continued to fail—as my stomach churned and my vision spun—I noticed something odd.
My limbs didn't hurt.
Despite everything, despite the overdose and the nausea and the suffocation, my arms and legs responded perfectly. No pain. No weakness. It was like I wasn't even injured anymore.
My scars had stopped itching too.
Whatever state I was entering, it was overriding the damage.
As I got closer, her form solidified.
The scattered dots of light coalesced, combined, reformed into something with shape and substance. A silhouette. A figure. Her.
The interaction was completely different than the last time we'd met—when I was riding the cocaine high, everything had been sharp and immediate and violent.
Now everything was muted. Distant.
She still had that frail figure, that same pale complexion. The locks of hair falling around her face. I was surprised I remembered her so well, considering I couldn't even recall her existence earlier. The memory was there, just buried.
She froze when she saw me approaching. Frightened.
I was lucky she didn't decide to move on to the afterlife right then.
"You seem... different than when we last met," she said carefully.
"Let me guess. The scars?" I kept moving toward her. "Everyone's got something to say about the scars."
She shook her head and pointed at my chest.
"Not that. I'm surprised about your internal state."
"Is that a good thing?"
"Debatable..." She studied me like I was something under examination. "You appear closer to a corpse than the last time we met."
So the magic was unraveling. The aspirin was pushing me toward death after all.
"Wow. A ghost criticizing me about my state of living. How poetic."
"Why did you come to meet me, you..." She paused, searching for words. "...thing."
"Yeah. Last time you called me something. The 'cursed by'... something. What entity was it?" This made her eyes go wide.
"You... forgot?"
"Kind of? Look, just tell me. I don't have much time before the overdose gets off the edge."
She opened her mouth to speak, then stopped. Her expression shifted.
A grin formed on her face.
Not a friendly one.
"I remember you left last time without hearing anything I said. So here's a test. If you can't answer it, we have nothing to discuss. What is my name?"
What sort of game was this?
"Does it even matter?" I asked flatly.
"Yes. It very much does. It is the basis of respect. We met three months ago. You cannot possibly have forgotten already."
I couldn't stay silent. That would just make this worse.
"It was Anna, right?" I grasped at the memory, hoping something would stick.
She laughed—a sound like wind chimes in a storm. Her white dress rippled with the motion, as if the fabric itself was mocking me.
"Not at all. You couldn't be more wrong."
Fuck.
"Then... Serena?" I guessed.
She shook her head disapprovingly.
"Silvia?" I was running out of options fast. My mind was drawing blanks where her name should have been.
She turned her head to the side, considering me with something like pity.
"Peona?" I tried another name, another desperate attempt.
She crossed her arms. I could see it in her posture—she was about to leave.
Then, from the right side of her face, a smile formed.
"I just got an idea," she said. "Although I am deeply disappointed that you thought so little of me, there is something you can help me with. A way to compensate for your failure."
Fuck. No. Not another side-quest.
I didn't have time for side missions. My heart was already failing. I already had too many problems.
But what choice did I have?
"Go on," I said, keeping my voice level despite the urgency clawing at my chest.
"I want you to help me get back into my body," she said. "I've spent the last twenty years trapped in this garden. Can you even imagine the suffering?" I think I suffered for more time in total in those dreams, but whatever.
"Sure, princess," I said mockingly. "But how exactly? I'm not a magician."
She sighed at my joke and settled herself on the air, resting her head against her hand like she was lounging on an invisible couch.
"You just need to bring my body into the garden when the moon is shining. I will do the rest."
"When is the next time the moon shines?" I asked. Was this part of some ritual? What kind of powers did she even have?
"How am I supposed to know? I was bound to this place. Ask an astronomer or something." She said it like I should've figured it out already. I doubted she even knew what a cell phone was.
"Have you developed any spiritual powers in the meantime? Anything useful while you've been stuck here?"
She started giggling—an edge to it that felt almost manic.
"You don't look like the type who actually wants to hear the technical details. Aren't you a servant? Just do your thing and we'll talk after."
What does she mean by servant?
The aspirin was making me aggressive. I felt the urge to hit her, to wipe that smug expression off her ghostly face. But she was already dead. What good would that do?
I breathed in slowly to calm down, trying to think rationally.
She probably wasn't calling me her servant. Not literally. She had to mean something else. That I was serving someone. The entity that had resurrected me. The thing controlling me from inside.
That made more sense.
"Whatever. Fine. I'll find your body and bring it here during the full moon or whatever."
"Oh, and my name is Pamela," she said, almost as an afterthought. "If you forget it again, I will be genuinely angry with you."
I wanted to ask why she cared so much about a meaningless person like me knowing her name. Why it mattered at all.
But I already knew the answer.
Everyone wanted to matter to someone. Even ghosts trapped in gardens for twenty years.
It's arrogant, but I don't. The strange part is that I'm not sure why.
"Yeah, sure." I turned to leave, but she drifted up from behind and wrapped her arms around my neck—still floating, still not quite corporeal.
I tried to spin around, but she moved with me, rotating in sync.
She started smelling me from the neck downward, like she was trying to catalog something.
"What the fuck are you doing?"
"There's something about you..." She paused, considering. "I think spirits are attracted to you. Are you haunted?"
Tell me about it.
But she was wrong. Those weren't spirits circling me. They were memories. I'd confirmed that with Dumas already.
"I'd say that's putting it lightly. Now get off me. How is a spirit even able to touch me?"
"Aren't you almost dead? I'm not touching you. I'm touching the ghost underneath the corpse." She said that so casually I was dumbfounded.
" So now you're calling me a ghost?"
" A ghost puppeting a corpse kept alive unnaturally by magic. What else do you call a ghoul?" She said it like it was the most obvious explanation in the world.
Now it was my turn to scoff.
"So you admit I have a soul. Last time you called me a soulless husk."
"I think you're misremembering..." she trailed off, her attention wavering for just a moment.
I took the opening.
My hands shot backward and grabbed her ass through the dress, squeezing slightly.
The sensation was strange. Not like touching real flesh—more like pressing into foam, something with give but no substance.
She shrieked and flew backward, hovering above me like a wooden plank. Her arms crossed over her chest defensively, as if I might leap up and grab her again.
Her cheeks were glowing.
An ethereal blush.
What a joke.
"How could you do that to a woman?" Pamela said, her voice sharp with indignation.
"Oh, fuck off." It wasn't like her husband was even alive anymore.
"Well, I would if I could!"
"Then go on. Do it."
"Dumbass. I literally can't leave this place. You go."
I turned away from her floating form and walked back toward the dorm without responding. I didn't know why, but I was fuming. Wasn't aspirin supposed to be calming? Wasn't overdosing on painkillers supposed to dull everything, not sharpen it?
At the dorm entrance, I found an Inquisitor.
He wore a striped blue suit and a mask with sharp, angular features—something that resembled a Coulobre. Professional. Intimidating. Clearly here for a reason.
"What are you even doing here?" I asked, not bothering to hide my annoyance.
He raised a tablet. Words appeared on the screen, glowing in the darkness.
_I have orders to keep watch on the dorm in case the killer returns._
The message was formal. Clinical.
"Alright? Goodnight then." I tried to move past him.
He stepped directly in front of me and tapped the tablet again.
_I also have permission to stop and question anyone I find suspicious. You are walking in at a late hour._
"I literally just took a walk in the gardens half an hour ago. Why are you being so difficult?"
_You have a strange presence._
Yeah. No shit.
"I am literally Aionis. Stop making this so difficult."
He put his free hand in his pocket. I heard the knife unsheathe—a metallic whisper in the quiet night.
I didn't bother creating distance. This guy couldn't possibly be stupid enough to attack me.
But he was.
He lunged forward with the blade. I leaned back and his slash passed inches from my face. My right hand shot out and slammed his knife-hand against the wall, pinning it there.
He let go of the tablet and pointed his right finger at me.
Then my left hand exploded with pain.
Not sharp pain—something worse. Something that felt like my muscles were tearing themselves apart. I fell to my knees, clutching my left hand against my chest, my body shaking by pure reflex.
This bastard had a dangerous power.
I could still move my fingers, but the damage was done. I wondered if I'd need to go to the hospital to see John. Hopefully not.
The Inquisitor clenched his right hand again.
My entire body was yanked upright against my will—muscles contracting, limbs moving without my input. It was like being a puppet on strings.
He dropped the knife and drove his left fist into my gut. Hard. I fell backward, slamming into the ground, the wind knocked out of me.
He picked up the tablet and squatted beside me, showing me the screen.
_I'd appreciate it if you don't play the tough guy._
Yeah. Like he wasn't the one playing tough. Like he hadn't just attacked me without provocation for simply walking past him. Like he hadn't used his power to disable and beat someone who'd identified himself.
The anger was overwhelming.
I couldn't control it. This wasn't like me.
But the aspirin was changing that. Making me volatile.
"Man, fuck you!" I snarled, pushing myself upright despite the pain, despite his power trying to keep me down.
Instead of pressing his advantage, he stepped back and placed the tablet on the ground.
He took a fighting stance.
I recognized it immediately. Zipota—a local military sub-branch variant from Languedoc. His weight was balanced on the balls of his feet, heels barely touching the ground. Light. Springy. Explosive potential in every fiber. His hands floated high and open, relaxed yet ready for anything.
Despite the surface similarity, he couldn't have been further from Balmundi—the open-hand style I'd learned.
The key difference was hand position. His hands hovered closer to his chest. Mine rose to eye level. That single shift changed everything about how the styles worked. It changed the geometry of defense and offense.
My blood felt like it was boiling.
The rage was incredible. Uncontrollable.
At least he was willing to face me without using his power. I could respect that. I'd humor him.
I dropped my feet to hip-width apart, toes forward. My knees bent just enough to stay mobile—not locked, not too deep. My back heel lifted off the ground, weight shifted to the ball of my foot, ready to explode forward or pivot in any direction.
Weight stayed even between both legs. Perfect balance.
My hands rose to eye level, open and relaxed. My elbows stayed tight against my ribs, protecting the core from strikes. I tucked my chin slightly and angled my forehead forward, presenting the hard bone of my skull to any incoming strike instead of the vulnerable face.
Shoulders loose but high. Ready.
Then I moved.
I shot forward and feinted a right-hand punch—commitment in the motion but false intention. The Inquisitor took the bait perfectly. His head snapped backward to avoid the strike.
In that split second, I drove my knee upward toward his groin.
He didn't react to the pain. Didn't flinch. Didn't even seem bothered.
Instead, his left hand shot down and trapped my leg between his thighs, clamping down like a vice. Immobilizing it completely.
His right fist came up toward my temple.
I defended with my left hand, blocking the strike.
But the impact didn't stop at my arm. It transferred straight into my skull, bypassing the block entirely. His power was still active, still working even in hand-to-hand combat.
So much for playing it fair...
He leaned forward and used the momentum to take me down. Both of us crashed to the ground, and his left hand wrapped around my neck—controlling the clinch.
I hit the concrete hard, the wind knocked out of me. I started gritting my teeth from sheer rage.
This bastard was trained. Actually trained. Not just someone with a power who threw it around—someone who knew how to fight.
It was totally different from that loser flashing his gun.
He started raining punches from above, a relentless barrage. I shifted left and right, using my arms to deflect and absorb where I couldn't dodge, trying to protect my face and head.
I attempted to pull him down and roll, trying to reverse position and get on top.
His superior strength shut it down immediately. He didn't budge. Didn't shift. Didn't even strain.
He used my attempted roll against me. His right fist came down hard against my cheek. Before I could recover, his left followed, another punch landing clean.
Then, suddenly, he stopped.
He pushed himself up and stood, creating distance. He assumed his Zipota stance again, waiting.
Was he testing me?
Rage filled my chest—hot, suffocating, all-consuming. I could feel heat radiating from my face. My hands were shaking. Everything in me wanted to destroy this man, to make him bleed, to—
I forced myself to breathe.
I took a stance and approached him again.
I advance with a combination: jab, cross, hook. All three land on his guard. He doesn't give an inch. Then his right hand slides past my defense—a counter that catches my cheek. Numbness blooms across my face. I taste copper.
I try again. Jab, low kick, uppercut. He blocks the jab, sidesteps the kick, and his left fist rockets toward me. Another hit to the same cheek. My vision swims.
This shouldn't be happening. The way of the open hand evolved from medieval arts like Zipota precisely because it's more brutal.
So why am I the one getting carved up?
I shift tactics. I drive forward low, aiming to catch his legs in a takedown—a fundamental from the open hand's grappling arsenal. He sees it coming and sprawls backward, using my own momentum against me as his fist crashes into my temple. Spots explode in my vision.
I push through it and try a neck lock, the kind we're taught to use when distance closes. My arm wraps around his throat. For a moment I think I have him. Then his elbow drives back like a piston and hits my ribs. The air leaves my lungs.
He shrugs me off and follows with a straight punch to my gut, then another to my jaw. My head snaps back. Blood fills my mouth.
I attempt one more technique—a brutal one, the kind taught only to advanced practitioners in the open hand. A temple strike followed by a knee to the groin, designed to chain incapacitation. He couldn't possibly resist a second hit there. I commit fully to it.
He reads it like I announced it aloud. His hands flow around mine, redirect them harmlessly, and then his fist explodes against my cheekbone. Once. Twice. Three times in rapid succession. Each one sends me backward.
I'm barely standing now. My legs feel like water. One eye is swelling shut. I can taste my own blood pooling in my mouth.
But the anger—gods, the anger.
It rises in me like something alive, something that doesn't belong to me. It claws at my chest, screams in my throat. I want to scream. Not a shout of defiance or a battle cry—something more primal than that. Something that wants to tear itself free from my ribs and consume everything in front of me.
My hands are trembling. Not from fear. From the sheer force of wanting to unleash something I don't have the power to unleash. From hating him with an intensity that feels like it might burn me from the inside. It wasn't even anger towards him specifically but to all of this. To everyone. To the whole world.
I stood there, fuming, shaking with rage I couldn't contain. The anger writhed inside me like a caged animal screaming to get out.
So I let it.
I opened my mouth and screamed—a silent scream. No sound emerged. Nothing audible.
Instead, something else happened.
The bricks beneath me and around me on the ground pulverized into dust and debris. A shockwave—invisible, violent, radiating outward from my body. The Inquisitor caught the edge of it and was sent backwards, airborne, toward the dorm building.
He hit the wall.
He went straight through it.
The sound was sickening. Wet. Organic.
Everything in a fifteen-meter radius was obliterated.
I analyzed the blast radius. This wasn't an ultrasonic scream—if it had been, the range would have been much larger. The windows would have shattered. The sound would have carried further.
But this was contained. Precise. Only that small circle of destruction.
Interesting.
Yet only in that small radius.
Wow. Releasing all that stress felt really good. Now I felt surprisingly Serene.
At least the blast hadn't caught the building itself. The dorm was just outside the radius. Lucky.
Still I should see what state that bastard is in.
I pushed through the doorway and into the ground floor lounge—the first-year common area.
The Inquisitor was a mangled mess.
His body was crushed under bricks and rubble, flesh compressed and torn, limbs at angles that didn't make biological sense. Blood pooled around him, dark and still. He wasn't even recognizable as human anymore.
A shame.
Explaining his death tomorrow will be a pain.
Oh well. At least I got to see the ability of this drug. Should I at least clean this place up? My hand went towards the cleaning room but my body didn't move. Ehh, guess I'm not feeling it.
Right, tomorrow. Tomorrow is also a day.
Covered in grime and dried blood, I put my damaged clothes into the washing machine and changed into the janitor outfit.
I returned to Alice's room and collapsed on her bed.
And what a sleep I had! I haven't rested like this in a while.