"Ferzan,” I said, walking alongside him, under the floating glass spheres that contained orange flames bright enough to illuminate the streets. Streetlights.

  A spiral of flames graphic was on all of them; a company I wasn't aware of yet. It was good to know that there wasn't a monopoly on non-ether light(Light For All), though.

  “Yeah?" he answered.

  A mostly brown with a stripe of blue carriage slowed down. The painting of a pink warbird looked messy on it, but in a beautiful artistic way.

  Those in it peered through the window, looking at Ferzan in astonishment.

  I replied as I rounded a cluster of dry white bird poo, "What's your plans for the future? Like a goal. Like, what do you want to do with your life, other than being a good person?"

  He was actually paying attention, but when I said a good person, he shook his head, chuckling, like I was mocking him in a friendly way.

  He replied, “I don't really have many plans. I mean..." He took in a deep breath, ignoring the people calling him on the other side of the road. "I don't really control my life. I'm a Starworth in name. But Starlight in purpose.”

  "To be a pawn for them?"

  "I am not a fan of being called that, but sure." He grimaced. "It's just the nature of life. I don't mind it as long as I'm not pressured to do things that I would hate."

  "Really?" I noticed that some of the small crowd crossed the road, all speed walking towards us. "What if you're forced to marry someone you don't want. That would make me kill myself."

  "Don't say such repulsive things." he muttered. "I'm young, not something for me to worry about. And if I have to, then, eh whatever. As long as she's hot I guess."

  He laughed at what he said, "Man, I'm dumb."

  I lightly chuckled, so much for the serious conversation I was having. "You're serious? That's all?"

  "I mean... I don't know. There was this girl I liked, but she was a regular. My father didn't really care. He's cool, you know." He smiled. "Anyway, mom didn't like it, at all. So that was that."

  "That's kinda sad," I responded.

  "You got your eyes on someone? Being a vlandos is making you scared?" He asked, changing the subject quickly.

  I was pretty certain romance wasn't something I was going to be expressing for a relatively long time, not with this childish body of mine. Not when my peers were children.

  "No. I was just curious about you." I noticed a group of balding old men drinking at a nearby small bar.

  "Oh. Why?"

  "Why not? You're reliable, cool, and so self-sacrificing. I shouldn't just know the surface of you, I think those you help should know a bit more about you. To know you're an actual person and not just... an existence."

  That bewildered him, and his walking pace slowed. He didn't say anything, just blinked and then tilted his head down. "I don't think I want that."

  The admirers had reached up to him and barraged him with questions. Yet he kept walking, unbothered like there was nothing but the wind around him.

  He then made a communication line with me and said: 'If I do that, imagine how harshly people would judge me? They can't know too much about me, that's scary to even think about. I mean, they probably all judge me harshly, just hiding it.

  I was surprised he thought so. I had assumed he didn't care about admiration because he got so much of it, and it was tiring.

  And his voice, it sounded so... concerned.

  Ferzan smiled to the small crowd surrounding him, shaking hands with some, giving hugs to those that requested it. Typically, wouldn't he have given them a cheap smile and chat then escape?

  "I love you, Ferzan!" a girl shouted, excitedly waving at him.

  Ferzan came walking towards me as those people went own their way. "I don't know. It's a dumb worry. I would prefer if they only know as little as me as possible. The public side of me, not the ones my family and friends know."

  "That makes sense. I'm one of your friends right?"

  "Yeah. Absolutely."

  "Hm... I don't envy your life. It sounds like such a pain. And if I ask how Yellowbrim wants to use you, I would guess that's sensitive information."

  "You guess well."

  "If you all are planning to take over the world, please spare me."

  "You don't have to wage a war to take over the world, Vernisha." He passed his fingers through his hair. "Sometimes the biggest wars are done behind tables, appearing civilized."

  "Uhuh... You're a good guy, right? I really really don't want to have my emotions betrayed."

  He smiled brightly, glancing at a black cat that had been staring at me. "I'm not in any shady business. Well, you know what I mean."

  "I really hope so Ferzan." It would hurt my heart if I end up hating you.

  Back at the estate, I stood near Katie's bedroom door, and waved Ferzan good night.

  I opened the door and was hit with a smell of rotting rats and vinegar. Inside, at the corner of the room, was Katie with plastic goggles, leather gloves.

  And in front of her was a glass box that contained a bat... A grey bat. It wasn't grey because of its skin, but because of the exoskeleton hiding its flesh.

  I think that was a bonebat.

  "Holy shit, you're insane!" I nearly panicked. "You're going to get us killed!"

  "What?" she stood up in an oversized shirt that dragged to her knees. I was certain that was an older man's, because of the pink cursive text on it. *I love my wife's... wink wink.

  I responded, "That thing! What are you doing?"

  "Oh..." She turned to the glass container, then back to me and shrugged. "It's dead."

  "Yeah no shit. You're messing with the virus in it, ain't you?"

  "What are you on about?"

  "That's a bonebat, isn't it?"

  "Oh, I see the confusion," she crossed her arms. "They're not from Leiipava. The contaminated ones are from ages ago and in that country... Bonebats now don't have the virus."

  "Uh-huh. Sure..."

  "They don't. Research has been done. This isn't even from the Contma cave, which doesn't even exist anymore."

  "Yeah..." I stepped back. "I'll be sleeping outside."

  "Oh come on! Stop being such a little pussy. "

  "Oh my gosh, Vernisha. You don't want to turn into a melting zombie? You're such a pussy." I mocked her, pitching my voice up and making ugly faces(which was difficult 'cause I was quite cute. In my head at least).

  "Mocking me doesn't change reality. You would like it." She looked at the corpse in the container. "Upon death, the creatures' stomachs accumulate volatile gases as a byproduct of internal decay. These gases crystallize into a dormant, frozen state. However, if the stomach acids—rich in engineered reactive compounds—are introduced under specific conditions, they catalyze a transformation in the gas structure. When exposed to water, the newly altered gas violently rehydrates and destabilizes, triggering an explosive reaction. It goes boom."

  Oh. She was smart smart.

  I had a feeling these poor bats were turned into grenades during a war, or their stomach acid was harvested for such reasons.

  I asked, "So what are all these other liquids for?"

  "To see if I can make a bigger boom." She then clarified after looking at the tubes of different liquids. "Well, to see how big I can make the boom."

  ..."I see. But why in the room?"

  "I don't want to go in the lab." She stared me in my eyes, then said after a pause, "My mom doesn't allow me pass nighttime."

  Yeah, I wonder fucking why.

  "How big is the boom you're expecting?"

  "Enough to blow half of my face off." She grinned without smile wrinkles forming around her eyes, making her look like a damn ghoul.

  "Do you... do drugs?"

  "Performance enchantments? Or dopamine stimulants? Caffeine is also a drug, you know?"

  ... I didn't refute. I was too tired to have this childish conversation. So I rested at the corner of the room, near the door.

  There was now a new black dresser at the back of the bed, silver handles attached in the middle of each drawer. And my mountain of clothes was gone.

  "You don't want to see it? Damn, everyone's lame."

  "I'm tired, and I don't want half of my face blown off," I scoffed, finding her statement ridiculous.

  "Lame. Sleep well."

  I wondered if I was tired enough to sink into my sleep instantly. It felt so, but I didn't want to take a chance.

  So I got up, sat on the bed, and watched Katie's face light up. She went on, explaining that these bonebats used to be reared for their stomach acid to refrigerate stuff by the Coldstone company. The government had invested in it, to lessen the country's dependence on Vurmion's ice caps(they were also incredibly expensive) or Ice monsters(to lessen how much they relied on vlandos)... and also cause our own naturally produced ice on our plentiful mountains(most villages were built on the much flatter lands), had dangerous bacteria's in them, responsible for the Sleeping Man Epidemic a long, long time ago, and outbreaks there and then. Treating those Ice was tedious and expensive.

  Anyway, raising bonebats for that reason was just too expensive and inefficient for their little acid. How they were raised also had a role, affecting the quality of their stomach acid.

  She kept on going, but it just made me drowsy, which I appreciated. By the time I fell back on the bed, I was knocked out. That part of her reminded me of my eldest sister back on Earth, Namel, obsessed with science.

  I never really understood why. She just wanted to know why and how the world worked. And when I say obsess, I mean the word literally.

  If she could get away with killing animals so she could look at their insides, she would.

  Katie's voice faded away as I swirled into the land of nothing.

  Nothingness eventually became surrounding walls. Suddenly, I was standing amongst pieces of concrete, grey dust heavy in the air.

  Long wooden benches were broken under the weight of them, and what stood in front of me was a statue composed of stone, man, lion, sea, grass, wings... There was so much going on, I couldn't make sense of what it was meant to be.

  I stood up, ignoring the sweat that clung the white dress to my body. This was... a bad dream?

  I looked around and didn't see anyone. But it felt like there was someone, someone watching.

  Then I felt cold and bony hands clamping my shoulder, and so I turned around, looking up, half expecting it to be Caren.

  It wasn't. Of course it wasn't, why would've his fingers been bony? What stood in front of me was that Temple Defender I had killed.

  A skeleton in white. Back then, was he dressed in white alone? I couldn't recall. I didn't think so.

  It wasn't like these Balash Temples had a color code anyway. I stood my ground, aware it was a dream.

  He grasped my other shoulder and brought his face right in front of mine, growling, hitting me with the smell of dirt. "You will pay for what you have done..."

  "I doubt that," I responded.

  "You wouldn't even apologize?"

  "If you were actually him, I would. But you're not. You're made up by my mind."

  I did not really think much of it, but I had unjustly killed him. He acted in self-defense.

  And Tarnisha, somehow, had killed the rest. I... had a lot of innocent blood on my hands.

  If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  All those in the city that was also...

  Yes, I knew that.

  I was a bad person. I was very much aware of that.

  The world broke down, turning into a dust of red and white. Then that dust became a whirlwind that spun with me in the center. My hair and clothes fluttered and the warm air, mixed with cold air tickled my body.

  Then it slowly dispersed into the nothingness, the dust scattering away in the deep dark.

  "Why did you kill me..."

  Suddenly, I felt a cold chill down my spine and my mouth became dry.

  The voice came from behind me, but it was recognizable, so damn recognizable.

  I quickly turned, shouting, "I wanted to save you!"

  Ulah stood on a platform of darkness, holding his stomach in agony. His hands, wet from sweat, dampened his massive blue shirt.

  "Really? You're too naive... Really too naive." Natasha appeared, standing on my left, leaning on her left foot.

  "You..."

  Then suddenly she was gone, not in a way that felt natural for the dream characters to disappear.

  Then I felt it again, eavesdropping eyes.

  "Why did you have to make that deal with evil itself...? Don't you know how cruel they are?" Caren was now behind me, kneeling and staring at the 'ground.'

  "Why can't I just have an empty dream..." I grunted, running my hands through the little hair I had. "Stop it. Stop it... Just stop it!"

  Tears welled up in my eyes. "I did the best I could! The very damn best I could!"

  "You have no right crying! Not when you wouldn't even grief for me!" Ulah glared at me, his arms limp at his side. "If you really cared, you would be in misery, nothing but misery. That's how you grief, that's how you show you care!"

  My heart went cold, I wanted to refute that.

  I... didn't want to be miserable. I hated suffering, I hated having depressed thoughts.

  "We died... and yet all you can think about is what you want? You... You... You...?" Caren was suddenly up, his eyes dark and lifeless. "You're truly... A Darsean Cultist."

  "I... " My hands tightened around whorls of hair. I took in a deep breath of air and calmed myself. "You're right. I'm selfish. But I have a right to be, don't I?!"

  I screamed at them, "I cared, I really did. I hated you, Caren, God knows I did! Yet... I cried for you, I was sad, I grieved. I grieved for you more than Ulah... You know how pathetic that is of me?"

  My hands fell to my side, and I just shook my head. "You're all dead. Nothing I can do to change that." Then I stopped, suddenly unlocking a cabinet of memories. "Caren... I remember something."

  I slowly raised my hand in his direction, then unfurled my pointing finger at him.

  "You treated Natasha like absolute shit." I glared and then a weird smile came over me. "And for some reason, memories of good came blasting at me, and I was thinking about what if you changed and all that... but now I remember.

  "I feel sick that I cried for you. You changed in the last second? So what. I don't care."

  All the memories were suddenly lighting up in my head. "So descriptive with your words, you were. So disgusting. How can you call your wife such things? And to say it in front of those you perceive as children too. I cried for you. I grieved for you..."

  My jaw dropped, I couldn't believe myself. No, I was disgusted. The idea of redemption wasn't lost upon me.

  I had done bad, but I wouldn't have expected forgiveness from my victims.

  In that same notion, I don't believe it was hypocritical for me to hate this man. And if it was? So be it, who gave a shit.

  I was sure I was a hypocrite in other things, and simply haven't realized it, or maybe I would become one in the future.

  I was human, species wise.

  He looked at me with eyes of darkness but didn't say anything.

  I responded to that quietness. "Atleast in the last seconds of your life, your human life, you felt regret." That was the least he could. I suppose I was atleast grateful for that. "Disappear, forever."

  And then I turned around and was faced with my little brother. Who didn't seem as eerie as before. He appeared lost, confused.

  I didn't say much, just, "You're not real either. I wish you were, so I could hug you."

  He liked affection, especially hugs. I was stingy about that since I was often dirty.

  No...

  That's a lie. A lie to hide from my regrets. I suppose I just didn't value hugs and the like. I thought giving him attention could triumph over that.

  He then said with a deep and dark tone, "We will not leave. Every time you sleep, you'll remember us."

  Caren added, "Because you're evil."

  I mocked a smile.

  I wish I had a distraction, really. Just some monsters to fight, to kill. I needed it..

  I grasped at thin air, feeling for the coldness of a knife handle. But of course, the comforting feeling wasn't there.

  Then I thought of something, remembered rather. "I made somebody happy today. So you know what, you're not wrong. But... I'm happy. And I'm happy the way making someone happy made me feel."

  "You will remember us..."

  "Because you're evil."

  "Evil evil."

  They kept repeating the same things before becoming dust and fading away.

  When I woke up, the room was filled with natural golden light. I moved to the edge of the bed, feeling the hard wooden frame of the bed and allowed my legs to dangle near the floor.

  It seemed early.

  "That makes no sense. You're making no sense." Katie's voice drew my eyes to the door, where Ferzan was... sketching an obsidian black giant.

  She sat near him, watching it with distaste.

  "Hello," I said.

  "You're up already?" Ferzan asked, his eye still on the sketch, pencil tight in his hand.

  "Slept early."

  "Awesome... You want to join?"

  Katie shook her head. "No no. In the next round. Hurry up, you got ten seconds remaining!"

  I got off the bed and walked over to get a better look at what they were doing. In Katie's hand was a graphic book with a ton of text andimages. The cover, despite being aged, showed a graphic of men and women sitting at a massive empty table, staring at us.

  Ferzan finished up his sketch by adding a fin to the giant's head, which made Katie upset. "Damn it."

  Ferzan smiled. "Sucker. Like I was going to forget that."

  I sat on the carpet and asked, "What's that?"

  "Titan Auguscandefmatag. We're doing a guess game, drawing important historical figures."

  "Oh... No idea who's that." I knew of Titans, otherworldly giant beings that invaded the other side of the world a long time ago.

  I believe it was around that time, special System privileges(heroes and such) became a thing

  Then I took a look at one of the pages and saw a very tall brown skinned woman with long curly black hair, reaching down the middle of her back; a Holvion. One with an incredible number of scars over her arms and face.

  I asked, "Is that the current Holvious queen?"

  "Hm?" Katie looked at the sketch. "No. The Lucky Queen. Holvious's first. I drew it, pretty damn accurate. Way better than Ferzan's drawings."

  "Get off my case," he sighed, then took a look at his pocket watch. "Got to go train."

  He pushed himself up and as he dusted his white pants, which had pockets scattered at the front of it. "Get ready for your classes too. You stink of death."

  Katie scoffed and then leaned back, keeping her upper body up with her arms.

  I asked Ferzan, "Can I watch? Your training."

  He seemed surprised, then smiled, "Of course."

  It was better than doing nothing.

  He then said, "But first... we must eat."

  And so, we did that. We went downstairs.

  In the dinning room was Abella sitting at the table, her hair was now straight and still beautiful. If it wasn't for her tensed arm and pained look, I would've said she looked stunning like usual.

  She noticed us entrance and took a deep breath, and said to us in a neutral tone, "You all took long."

  I assumed acting calm made her hurt even more, judging by how much the odd purple veins around her golden monster seal pulsed greater than a second ago.

  The golden seal, aware it was a sign of a [Hero]. The painful veins were most likely the result of bearing Ferzan. Even though he said Katie's birth didn't make it worse, I assumed that was false since it wouldn't have made sense.

  "Good morning, mom."

  "Morning. We were busy with something." Katie took the seat on the right, three plates of food waiting for a diner.

  "Good morning," I said.

  It would seem everyone was lively, except Tarnisha. She was fast asleep, head tilted backwards on the chair.

  I took a seat near Ferzan, relatively close to Abella, and was surprised by how heavy the breakfast looked.

  It might as well had been lunch with the amount of green pasta, ground provision and meat it had in the main plate.

  If it wasn't for the fruit plate on the right of it, the smell of baked rabbit, mixed with beef, would've been dominating.

  Mine was mainly filled with long blue grapes, sliced mango that was basically the same as those on earth, except for how watery it looked. Moonpaes too.

  They were the C shaped grapes I had back at home, and oddly, merely seeing them brought back a lot of memories.

  They were a common fruit, so they didn't sell for much. There was this village, Plaintainmain(a silly name, but there was towns called Canefield and Massacre in my country back on Earth), filled with mostly older people because the soil around the area had become poor in quality(its believed it used to be incredibly rich, allowing for nutrient hungry provisions such as Clowdy Plantain Trees to grow quickly and in high quantities. The wealthier villagers, seeing an opportunity, made a Clowdy Plantains plantation. When wealthier individuals heard about the high yields, they bought up land in the village for the same reason. Over time, the soil was stripped of its richness, leaving it poor and difficult to grow anything in.

  Because of this, fruits of all kinds were sold for more there, but it wasn't like we could sell them for much since only the poor folks had remained there.

  I sighed. Life wasn't easy.

  Abella asked me out of the blue, her eyes lazily fixed on the Moonpae skewered on her Food Needle—its yellow flesh bulging, juices running down and dripping onto the other fruits on her white glass plate. “I heard you didn’t kill the Broken.

  "Saved him actually. A big thanks to Ferzan."

  She nodded. "Glad to hear."

  POV: Ferzan

  I didn't train on the rectangular battlefield near the house, but instead a good distance away from the houses.

  About North East of it, closer to the gate than to the houses.

  Vernisha stared at the circular field of scorched red rough stone.

  She asked me, "What kind of stone are these?"

  I looked at the ground, kicking a regular pebble. "Quartz Rain. It's a skill from my mother's Rockonquer monster."

  She slowly nodded, most likely unaware what kind of monster it was, but she didn't ask, so I didn't explain.

  It was just a final formed monster composed of white stones, shaped like a three story big spider. Merely shape similar to it. They lacked fangs or a rounded lower body.

  I then said, pointing at the mansion. "The mansion was made by my mother, using it and Sharpider monster."

  That one was humanoid in shape, but moved like a beast, always crutching near the ground as if to be stealthy, despite its reflective metal body making that impossible.

  Curious, she asked, "I thought that kinda thing was looked down upon."

  "She's a Starlight, remember?"

  "Ah." She didn't like that.

  Not that I blamed her. Stars and their families were praised and worshiped, completely contradictory to how people viewed other vlandos.

  There was this comedian, Le'mar. A human despite having the name conventon of a Punchio. He was adopted by a Punchio as a baby so that was the reason.

  Anyway, he once made this joke, "Being a vlandos got to be the worse in Terrafall. 'Cause, you got people like me and you clutching our bags when they walk pass us.

  "But if it's a damn Starlight, especially a cute one, we're all like, 'hellllllllllllllllo. I'm willing to die for you!"

  Vernisha looked around at the massive estate. "So your mom got this piece of land a long time ago?"

  "No, It's my father's. The original mansion was made by Eren as a gift for him. But..." I lingered, then decided not to elaborate. "Stuff happened,"

  I wasn't born yet, but from what I heard from my relatives, Eren was very displeased with my father's relationship.

  Disgusted even. And when my mother and father became married, the mansion came tumbling down like the foundations had fallen asleep.

  For a long time I wondered why, but I was never given an answer. No, the answer was worked to be kept away from me.

  I thought hard about it and came to one theory that made a lot of sense. First Grandma had a massive family. And through out history, there had been many other Starlights spotted, before they were integrated into us(most of them anyway).

  The Starbright family on the other hand was infinitely smaller. Perhaps a few hundreds compared to our tens of thousands.

  Despite Brandon's jealousy, and previous envy, there was nothing he could do about it. No amount of his power could make him a suitable wife capable of surviving childbearing.

  That wasn't even the biggest issue, there would almost always be pregnancy issues, killing the woman, regardless of her level. Regardless of modifications made to herself. Not even reality skills could change it.

  It's said that he had even became a woman to have children, thinking that would bypass the issue.

  And he was right. Marshall, Temkukin, Markreeli.

  However, I didn't know what happened else. Perhaps judgement from his other peers, angry at his desperation, infuriated at the option he was forced to take, worry he would be remembered as a woman—not Brandon, whatever it was, he gave up on that method despite its success. And just kept trying, leaving in his wake thousands of dead bodies.

  With that in mind, its possible Eren wanted to create his own linage, where that was destroyed in an instant. But my father had five half and full siblings that wanted to create lineages, so that put a little issue in my theory.

  That aside, my trainer had finally arrived. An old man with two circular scars above his eyebrows.

  When he was a teenager, he and his brother sought cosmetic surgery, giving them catcow horns, thinking it would make them look cool.

  His grand uncle, who they lived with, was disturbed and sawed it off himself.

  Kaen waved his golden cane at us, "Who's the young girl?"

  "Think of her as the newest family member," I said.

  Of course, he didn't need a cane. He saw the Vumion's traders all having canes, so he bought one off them.

  "Nice to meet you." Vernisha stood up, dusting the back of her green hard leather pants, which fit well with the blue hard leather long sleeve shirt.

  Even if Kaen wasn't as stoic or as knowledgeable as Farel, he was still a good teacher.

  He finally reached us, walked on the rocks. With both hands on his cane, he eyed Vernisha, posing as if he was getting ready for a photoshoot.

  "Level 20..." he nodded impressed. "You're not from any family?"

  I noticed he examined her face, hair neck, and hands for any group markers(notable families, and so on). Above his eyebrow was the tattoo of fairy wings, composed out of tiny letters, symbolizing he was a Fairy Hands corporatator.

  Vernisha raised an eyebrow and said, "Noble family you mean?"

  "Or Corporator. Seems not... Abella has been training you on her own accord?"

  Vernisha realized the basis of his questions. "No. I merely work hard."

  He said nothing for a short while, surprised, and maybe not believing her. So he looked at me with a single eye, and I nodded.

  He then said, "Impressive... so you're training with us today?"

  "Just watching... for the most part."

  He nodded. "I see. Out of curiosity, what life buffs did you go with?"

  She seemed confused by his question, genuinely puzzled.

  Her lips turned curved into a shallow smile before saying, "[Inspect] and [+100% Mentality]."

  If I had to guess why she smiled, it was because he couldn't read her like my mother and grandmother did.

  Wait a second. Did I hear that right?

  I asked, unable to believe she would do something so silly. "You didn't choose [Personal Space]? That wasn't an option? What was the other choice?"

  "Oh, it was. You were spying on me yesterday, so you should know why I chose that and how I was able to do what I did."

  I said nothing. To be frank, it was hard to see what was going on because of the dense feathers covering the small part of the forest.

  But her statement made it clear, she could handle the minds of multiple monsters.