PreCursive

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  Tiers:

  Awoken (3): 5 Advance Chapters

  Csser (5): 10 Advance Chapters

  Precursor (10): 40 Advance Chapters

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  PreCursive

  After my little expnation and subsequent embarrassment when seeing Silvia without her mask, we picked up oraining again. Nothing heavy or physically strenuous again, she just showed me how to use the FAT. It was kind of fun, actually. It was like pying with cy, to aent. The mask could adhere to my face by itself, and using a small mirror you could hand adjust your facial features. Once you had reached a face you liked, you could freeze the mask into that figuration with a and word. The mask degraded though, so you could only use a single one a few times. Thankfully, Silvia had been given five of them for her mission, even though she didn’t have a use for them.

  Hooray for bureaucracy.

  That only took us about half an hour though, and now that we were done, we were preparing to head back to town. Silvia had told me that she was going to help me sneak back over the wall. In the meanwhile, we were just catg.

  “…and I don’t even know what a Precursor is,” I said to Silvia, adjusting the pouch with the FAT’s in it. “Sure, I know what Grey’s told me, but that isn’t helpful. That only tells me I’m supposed to be special somehow, and that we’re rare. But I don’t know why I’m here, and I don’t know the reason. Did a g me here? Did the System? I really don’t know, and sometimes I think Grey expects too much from me because I’m supposed to be some mysterious figure out of legend.”

  I don’t know why I was dumping all this on her. I hadn’t even spoken about this to either Grey or Azarus, because I didn’t want to ruin their expectations. I khat they’d been pg their hopes in me for some time now, and I didn’t want to spit in their face after how they’d saved my life. But Silvia? For some reason, I found myself spilling all of my garbage to her. Maybe it was because I’d just met her, or maybe it was because she was the daughter of the man I’d found myself appreo.

  Hell, maybe it was because she retty. I wasn’t perfect, sue me.

  Silvia paused putting her mask ba her face. So far, she’d only strapped the lower portion bato her metallic face. Right now, she was in the process of colleg her literally golden hair. “I uand, perhaps better than you know. All of my people do.” She mused. “We’re so young, and as a people, we don’t uand who we are. Not truly. Not yet. We only know what we don’t want to be, and that’s property. And so, we fight, in order to secure a future free from the yoke and plow. Perhaps…perhaps you o find something worth fighting for as well, Nathan. A path that you believe in.”

  I was silent, mulling over what she’d said. A path worth fighting for, huh. What would that be for me? I didn’t know. I don’t think I wao try a home to Earth. The only thing that really tied me back there was Dad, and I wasn’t sure if he’d survived my absehere were so many painful memories tied to it that I felt no particur fondness for my former home.

  “Maybe…” I whispered. “Maybe for now I just fight for a art. Maybe I just try and build a new life here.”

  “Perhaps.” Silvia aowledged, strapping the st of her mask on her head. “Sometimes just fighting for a ce to discover yourself is enough. It’s what we’re doing.”

  You know, for a five-year-old magical robot, Silvia came off as pretty wise.

  “But enough of that.” She tinued. “We o get you home.”

  Addersfield had never been a home for me, not even Azarus’s house. But I got what she meant.

  I nodded, but I’d fotten one importaail. Before I could even object, I found myself scooped up into another princess carry.

  Oh, whatever. Might as well enjoy the ride. I sat ba Silvia’s arms and watched the forest blur by us.

  ………………………………………

  Once we reached the walls, Silvia didn’t put me down immediately. Instead, she leaned down closer to me.

  “I will only remain at my camp for the wo days before I depart.” She whispered to me. “You are wele to join me for additional lessons in that time.”

  “Sounds good to me,” I whispered back.

  Then, Silvia got a glint in her eye that I was beginning to lear mischief. “Then, for now, I bid you goodbye.” Before I could say anything iurn, she reared me back with me in her arms and tossed me straight up and over the wall, as if I was a ball. I flew with surprising speed, easily clearing the top. I barely mao hold in a scream at the abrupt throw, and doubly so as the ground began to rapidly close in on me. With a muted thud, I mao stumble my way into a trolled nding, leaviting on my ass. Staring at the wall in disbelief, I shook my head. That woman was going to be the death of me, I swear.

  Wavering to my feet, I activated Thorn Cloak. With o g the wall, I started making my way through the forest to Azarus’s pce.

  ………………………………………

  I came back out to Silvia again, over the few days. I found I ehe lessons that she would give me. I actually e more than the sporadibat training that Azarus put me through, every so often. As part of our training, Silvia took the time to involve me in her surveilnce of Addersfield. She called it extra training as a scout. The cool part of it was that she had an actual extendable ented spygss. Part of those ents included some kind of night vision entment, allowing us to see things clearly in the dark of night.

  It retty cool, holy.

  Silvia pointed out the shed she had written about to Grey. It didn’t seem like mue. It just looked like a ramshackle wooden building, barely rge enough for a cart to fit inside. Certainly didn’t look like the secret entrao a potential underground ste bunker. Since all our training sessions took pce at night, we were the right time to see a delivery disappear inside. But what did I know? I took her word for it.

  Part of that surveilnce was actually of use to me, though. Silvia let me use her spygss to ihe mansion ily. The entire point of this training was to get me to infiltrate it, after all. While I was studying the manor, Silvia pointed out features and rooms on the mansion that she had suspis about. One of the most useful things she pointed out to me was the servant’s entrahat was likely going to be my entry point. After all, sves were kind of servants for these people

  It was a rge building, especially pared to the rest of Addersfield, but it wasn’t that big. There were only so many rooms that my objectives could be in. She indicated three rooms in particur, one on the sed floor, two ohird. One, she suspected beloo an important official, based on the amount of time she could see firelight dang in the windoarently, the oct had a tendency to work te into the night. If her suspi was right, that one might belong to the Seneschal, Orinbar. Vandimar’s uncle.

  Silvia strongly suspected that the other two rooms beloo Magnus in some way. One robably his personal chambers, and the other? Well, the other one might just be the room the Ward Stone was kept in. But I couldn’t just work off of assumptions. I was still going to have to infiltrate the manor. When, if, the time came for us to set off our pn to escape, I would need certainty on the location of both the trol Ste, and the Ward Stone.

  Too bad that Silvia couldn’t do it for me. She was without a doubt the better stealth specialist. Unfortunately, you needed a specially attuned pass device to bypass the wards around Addersfield.

  Silvia told me she had actually held up a messenger from Addersfield not far from the town. She’d pilfered both his pass key, and a number of dots from him. Upon iing it, that had been when she’d realized they o be attuned. Sadly, the dots had been useless for her too, to her ter regret. They’d been written in a code that she wasn’t able to break. She’d them with her when she left in order to get the papers deciphered.

  But beyond even that…

  I spent a lot of time just speaking with Silvia. She was just…so easy to talk to. It’s not like I was just pining to her, either. We spoke about our individual childhoods quite a bit. Well, hers was much shorter than mieically, her ‘childhood’ as she called it was the first two years after she became aware, before the Uprising began. It was iing, and holy kind of amusing, to hear how Grey had acted as a sudden ued father to a magical struct with the maturity level of a te teen. Apparently, that’s the level of personality that all Sculpted came ieh.

  Iurn, I told her about Earth and my life ba it. Things that were muo me, were fasating to her. Looking ba it, I agreed. While Vereden wasn’t as unfortable for me to live as I would expect a swords and sorcery fantasy world, it wash. God, what I wouldn’t do for modern air ditioner.

  Wait.

  That should be possible, from my uanding of Enting. Project for ter.

  Moving on, I think I could definitively say that I’d made a friend. It felt…good.

  As all good things do though, our trainiually came to an end. After we had finished our st training session ohird day of it, Silvia had surprised me with an awkward hug. I…didn’t expect that out of her. She hadn’t struck me as a particurly physically affeate person. I’d awkwardly retur.

  “Please, look after my father.” She had whispered in my ear. I’d promised I would.

  The m, Grey, Azarus and I decided that it was time.

  I was going to break into the manor.

  ………………………………………

  “Seriously?” I said incredulously to Azarus. “I don’t?”

  Azarus shrugged. “Yep. Ya don’t need different clothes. The manor sves don’t have any kind of special uniforms. Based on my impression of him, Orin would just say that’s a ‘frivolous expense’. Dwarf’s kind of a spend-thrift.”

  “I ’t believe I just wear my normal clothes,” I said, shaking my head. Said normal clothes were a simple white ce up tunid brown breeches.

  “irely true.” Grey cut in. “You won’t be able to wear your shoes. After all, there’s no use wasting good footwear on a sve of all things.” He rolled his eyes.

  The three of us were gathered around the kit table, going over the pn for my infiltration. We’d gotten up so early that the sun wasn’t even up yet. Things were going uedly well.

  “God, security is so sloppy here,” I muttered to myself. Part of my training with Silvia oh and infiltration had necessarily included some knowledge of what I o infiltrate. In other words, I was actually able to uand just how poor Addersfield security was. “If it wasn’t for the wards, this pce would have spies waltzing in and out every day, no problem.”

  “Well, that’s simply the way things go, normally,” Grey told me. “The all-enpassiility of most wards renders many security practices moot. After all, you typically tuhem to achieve the desired effect without installing inveniences like suffit precautions.”

  “Their fuck-up is ain,” Azarus grunted. “What else does he need?”

  “Well, I have my FAT,” I said, ign Azarus’s chuckle. I didn’t bme him. “But that does nothing for my hair, just my face. Grey?”

  Grey nodded and sat two full vials oable. “As requested, I took the time to brew some simple hair c. This one,” He poio. “Will darken your hair to a near pitch bck. A very frequently shade among the on citizenry. The other will reverse the c. Simply apply either potion to your hair, and it will absorb and ge the hue rapidly.”

  I took the vials and stepped away from the table. I took a deep breath. “All right then. I’m going to go put the FAT on and apply the potion. I’ll be ba a bit.”

  Exging serious nods with Grey and Azarus, I exited the kit and walked up the stairs to the washroom. Entering it and closing the door, I got started. First, I used the potion on my hair. Sure enough, the tents of the vial were rapidly absorbed into my hair. Seds ter, it had darkeo a very dark bck. After that, I took out one of the FAT’s that Silvia had given me. I’d gotteo houting them after our practice, so it didn’t take me long to rearrange my facial features. When I was finished, a straared back at me from the mirror. It was a little discerting, actually, nnizing yourself in the mirror. Self-sciously, I reached up to trace the scar I had received from the Bde-Rack Hart those months ago. It robably my most noticeable facial feature these days, and now it was hiddeh a yer of false skin.

  I shook it off. Daylight was burning, and I o get his done.

  I exited the washroom and walked dowairs to find Grey and Azarus waiting for me.

  “Who the hell are you?” Azarus said. “How did ya get in my house?”

  I rolled my eyes at him. “Well, you know, the windoide open,” I said sarcastically. “I just couldn’t help myself.”

  Grey ignored our banter. “And you have yger?” He asked anxiously.

  Turning away from Azarus, I him. I patted my hip. “Yeah, It’s right here.” Said dagger was in a simple sheath strapped tightly to my thigh. Holy though, if I ended up needing it in the manor, I robably fucked. I was taking it more as a tool than a on.

  Grey took a deep breath before letting it out as a sigh. “Well then. That’s it.”

  “Nothing to it, but to do it,” I said with a faint smile, knowing full well I was making a referenone of them would uand. They still nodded solemnly though, as if I had said something profound.

  It’s the little things, sometimes.

  Gathering my ce for the st time, I left Azarus’s house.

  Time for a sneaking mission.