Lightning filled the room. It charged the air like an overzealous heat storm. No crackling signs of electricity showed yet. There were no streaks or anything. Then the air grew cold, chilling. Deoti and David Swan breathed, mist leaving their nostrils with each breath.

Swan frowned, noticing it.

Deoti stood in place, waited for him.

"Now that you're all big and strong won't you attack?" she goaded. "I'm right here. And trust me, you do not want me to go first."

She watched Swan consider her words. He thought about it very quickly then lunged at her in a burst of motion. He was quick, speed befitting of his new class and rank.

Deoti was faster.

She stepped into his lunge and his strike missed her. She pulled up short at his chest, then slipped around him in easy steps. Speed was her ally. Experience was her companion.

She punched him in the side.

If Swan had felt it, he did not show it. Deoti doubted it. For all the glory and advantages that came with possessing the [Mage] class, physical prowess not one of them.

Swan turned, swiping at her.

Deoti ducked the swinging hand. She'd been in enough fights against larger opponents to know that dodging their blows simply involved going low. Even their kicks could often be dodged in the same way.

It was laughable, though. All big and strong and yet Swan was nothing but a bumbling idiot. He'd gotten new found power and couldn't even use it.

Deoti stepped to the side as the charge in the air increased and the temperature in the room dropped. She pulled herself back to her starting point, forcing Swan to turn again.

She gave him a challenging look. "I can't help but notice that you aren't using any skill. Is it that you don't know how to use them or you didn't get any new skills with the new class and rank?"

Swan lunged at her once more. He was beginning to froth at the mouth like some rabid thing. She dodged again easily. The [Basher] class was known for its strength not its speed. They were not slow, but their class did not give them any supernatural speed, only strength.

The temperature dipped again. Deoti took notice of it. The ice she had cast using her skill [Elemental Casting] was crystalline. Tiny almost imperceptible shards of the thing. They grew with time, clawing at her target as it filled the air. Not a lot of people noticed what was happening when she used it.

It would gather until you suddenly found your movements a bit sluggish as the cold seeped into your muscles.

"So, no class skills?" Deoti asked, sounding curious. "Sounds shitty to me."

She skipped back, avoiding another swipe of Swan's now meaty hand.

"You've gotten larger and stronger," she muttered, giving the illusion of contemplation. "If you got no skill, did you get some kind of random stat generator? Do you suddenly have the stat of a [Basher] just not the skill?"

Swan growled like a feral beast. It seemed he was losing some level of brain function, reverting to something more feral, more instinctual.

Was it a side effect or part of the class?

Deoti's current place put her in a position where she could see the stairs that led up the house. She saw Madness' wife coming down the stairs. Naymond was right behind her.

Madness' wife looked worried.

"I'm almost done here," Deoti told them, taking another step back from Swan.

Swan turned back at her words, looked at the new arrivals.

Naymond paused, he leaned forward, squinting at Swan from across the distance.

"Is that you, buddy?" he asked. "That's just crazy. I knew the pill would have side effects, but this is just… unsavory. You've put on a few. Did you pump some roids or something?"

Swan grunted something intelligible and Deoti wondered if he could understand what Naymond was saying.

"You should also cover up," Naymond added. "It's a bit embarrassing putting on all that weight everywhere except where it counts… if you get what I mean."

Deoti wondered just how much Naymond knew about the Romanians now. He had predicted the effects of the pill to nigh perfection.

Madness' wife ignored Swan and turned to Deoti. "How much longer?"

"He'll tire out soon," Deoti answered.

Swan roared. The sound shook the air. Deoti placed a finger to one ear from mild inconvenience. The roar had carried no skill effect in it. Did Swan really have no [Basher] skill or did he just not have the presence of mind to use them?

He turned abruptly and rushed at Naymond.

I guess he still feels the sting of betrayal.

In a blur of motion, Madness' wife was in front of Naymond. She caught Swan by his swinging arm. The snap of his bone was like a dropped shotput in a silent room. It was the only thing anyone could hear.

Swan roared in pain. It was a sad sound, like a wounded beast.

Madness' wife looked at him with hate in her eyes. "Kneel."

She shattered one of his kneecaps with a kick.

Swan knelt.

Now she looked down at him, into the pain in his eyes.

"We're not done with you," she told him. With that, she placed a hand to the side of his head and casually shoved him aside.

Swan shot through the air, crashing into the wall at the furthest end of the room.

"Get what you need out of him," she told Deoti as she headed for the main door. Naymond walked quickly behind her. "When you're done with him, you can hand him over to the detectives. They also have intentions for him."

Deoti was confused. "He is to live?"

It made no sense. He had almost gotten Melmarc kidnapped and experimented on. How could Madness' wife let him live?

Madness' wife looked at Swan getting up and pushing himself off the wall.

"If he dies today, Mel will find out." She looked at Deoti. "And he will know. I will not teach my son to kill everyone that offends him."

"He almost got him killed!" Deoti hissed.

Madness' wife sucked in a deep calming breath. "And we will kill people who do that to us. Why? Because we are monsters. We have to be. We are necessary. Call it hypocrisy, but I will not make monsters of my children."

She opened the door and left, Naymond following behind her.

Deoti frowned. A mother's love? Was that what it was?

She shook her head, not knowing.

There were a lot of things she didn't know about motherhood. Yet, Fendor remained insistent that she would make a great mother.

True or not, ultimately, it didn't matter.

She looked at Swan. What mattered was that she didn't kill Swan.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

"You hear that? I can't kill you." She cracked her knuckles as she approached him. "But I guess everything else is fair game."

…

Melmarc stared at nothing. The voices continued to echo in his head. What made them annoying was the fact that they were his. They were not random voices trying to convince him. He was, in fact, talking to himself.

Each opinion had a point. Ariadne was as much a culprit to be punished for her actions and a victim at his hands.

Punishing her came first, though.

Killing her was the most viable decision. It wasn't about right or wrong, it was about what was reasonable. She had bullied him, then bullied him again when she met him again. Then when asked to stop bullying him and giving her word, she had tried to bully him again.

People like that didn't change unless something changed them. Some of them couldn't be changed by something.

Breaking her spine was the better option.

Melmarc paused. Was he negotiating with himself?

Was he really negotiating between killing her and rendering her unable to do anything for the rest of her life?

Modern medicine has come a long way. There are [Healer]s that can heal shattered spines.

He sighed at that. It seemed crushing her spine would not suffice.

Getting up, he walked up to Ariadne. He had bound her with a length of wire that he'd gotten from the kitchen. It had belonged to an electric kettle. It was a thick thing.

She flinched when he got to her. He ignored the action. Fear was a normal response when you were at the mercy of someone else. Who didn't fear God?

You're not God.

He placed his hand on her ankle just as he had been doing for a while now. From the little he knew about broken bones, it was in a bad state. The swelling was also getting worse.

"You don't have to do this," Ariadne said. "You can still change your mind. This isn't you."

She had been doing this ever since she'd woken up. She'd come at him with different methods. Appealing to his fear of government laws. Appealing to his fear of societal shame. Appealing to his humanity. Appealing to his sense of…

Melmarc wasn't sure what the last one was supposed to be.

"What will you do if someone comes in right now?" she pressed.

Melmarc looked up from her broken ankle to the stairs. He got up to his feet.

"Someone is coming," he told her plainly.

He could hear the footsteps from upstairs. Anji had woken up. He had already known, though. It was in the pain. The moment the boy had woken up, he had felt the pain from his fight with Melmarc. In turn, Melmarc had felt the pain he was feeling, just the way he was feeling the pain in Ariadne's ankle.

It was an irksome thing. He continued to have a dislike for it.

He paused and pulled up his interface as Anji began his descent down the stairs. From the corner of his eye he saw Ariadne look back at the boy and a hopeful smile touched her lips.

He ignored her. Why she had hope was beyond him, not because he did not understand but because it was stupid.

August Intruder Skill

[My Gift to You]

Pain should be shared. The August Intruder stores up pain inflicted upon them and releases it in a blast around them.

He had thought that the skill was designed to return pain given to him but what if that was not all that there was to it. What if the pain didn't have to be given to him? Inflicted upon him. But by whom?

His eyes slipped over from the interface to Anji.

What if I only have to feel the pain?

"Sit down, Anji," he said simply. "The fight is over."

"Anji, this kid is mad!" Ariadne cried out. "He's insane and trying to do horrible things to me. He's been looking at me wrong."

Dissonant.

Melmarc ignored the thought, he didn't need it to tell him that she was lying. Half the time he'd been here was spent paying attention to ignoring his own ideas.

Anji stood frozen on the stairs. His mind was contemplating. Melmarc's was contemplating something else. His current situation helped with the state of his voices.

Anji took another step and Melmarc placed a casual foot on Ariadne's ankle. Melmarc's attention moved back to his interface, his August Intruder Skill.

"Would you like to know something interesting, Anji?" he said. He was calm, worryingly calm, yet he wasn't worried.

"What's that?"

Melmarc felt the pain in Anji's voice. For all his class, his recovery wasn't very good. Then again, neither was Melmarc's. You didn't expect someone to recover from broken bones so easily. Melmarc felt the injury, allowed himself to feel it.

It was an uncomfortable thing but not an unbearable thing. It felt like taking pain while [Knowledge is Power] was active. Pain not damage.

His eyes were still on his interface when he answered. "I'm aware of three things right now. Two of which I am fairly certain about."

Anji frowned. "Fairly certain?"

"Certain enough." Melmarc dismissed the interface and looked at him. "The first is simple. You are in pain. A lot of it. I would say that I can't handle that level of pain and still be standing but I know better now."

He's not sitting down.

Sit him down.

Break his leg.

Melmarc's eyes crossed so suddenly that everything doubled, almost disorienting him, before returning to normal.

That was annoying.

"Anji, sit," he grumbled. Without the distraction of the interface, his opinions were spilling out regardless of the pain. "I can't think clearly with you standing."

Dissonant.

Tell him how you were taught how to pick a lock but can't remember.

Melmarc gritted his teeth.

"I won't think clearly with you standing," Melmarc said, correcting his earlier dissonance. "So, sit… please."

"Don't!" Ariadne shouted. "He's crazy. He wants to—AAAHHHH!!!!"

Melmarc applied a little more pressure on her ankle.

"Stop!" Anji called out, hands held out in front of him in a placating gesture. "I'll sit. I'll sit."

"The second thing I know," Melmarc continued as Anji lowered himself down to one of the steps cautiously, "is that I can win if we go another round."

Anji paused before his ass touched the step. "You said what?"

"I didn't stutter, Anji." Melmarc could feel more of the boy's pain. It filled him to the point that he could feel the cracks in his own bones even though he knew that they were not there.

"I held back," Anji said. "Ariadne's a bitch so nobody deserves a serious injury because of her."

Melmarc sensed no dissonance. That changed a few things, but not a lot of things.

"Fair," he agreed with a nod. "That brings us to the third thing."

SIT YOUR FUCKING ASS DOWN!!! He hissed, barely keeping the words from spilling out, eyes on the gap between Anji ass and the step. Or I could get you a flower. I wonder if he likes hibiscuses.

"What's the third thing?" Anji asked, and Melmarc realized that he had been quiet for a while.

"The third thing," he said. "Is that I can most likely take you down in two moves. Three moves max."

Melmarc waited for a moment. His mind offered him no dissonance, only pointers of how to plant a flower in Ariadne's broken spine. It was… not disconcerting?

A slow grin stretched Anji's lips. "Wanna bet?"

The challenge of the violent. Melmarc could feel it, the need to prove a point. You could back down, but you wouldn't. It was there. Interestingly enough, he was the challenger, not Anji. He was the instigator.

Melmarc pressed down on Ariadne's ankle. Why? Because.

Ariadne screamed. Anji moved, crossing the distance in the blink of an eye. He had been holding back.

Melmarc allowed the pain of Ariadne's ankle fill him. His ankle hurt. The pain of broken bones and swollen skin. Broken ankle. Cracked ribs.

He felt it all as Anji threw a punch at him.

Melmarc stepped to the side and took his turn.

[You have used August Intruder skill My Gift to You]

The same sensation he got whenever he used [Knowledge is Power] was how he felt. A force left him. It had no visible appearance that he could take note of, but he knew how far it reached.

Anji's eyes closed tight shut in pain. His thrown fist faltered, losing strength and momentum. His feet gave out beneath him. Ariadne screamed in pain, ever so noisy.

Anji hit the ground with a groan. He held onto his head with one hand and reached for his ankle awkwardly with the other.

Ariadne wailed in her pain. Anji groaned and moaned. He was in pain, tears slowly clawing at the corner of his eyes.

Melmarc looked down at him. "I guess that was one move."

That was cocky and wrong.

Melmarc paused. He wasn't wrong. It was time to kneel down.

Someone spat. He heard it more than he felt it. Looking down, he saw spittle dripping from Ariadne's lips. She hadn't spat at him. She had tried to spit on him. Her screams had died down to barely suppressed groans.

Unrepentant.

She won't change. She can't change.

Ruin.

Melmarc placed his foot on her knee without thinking about it and pressed down. The crack was loud. Ariadne's cry of pain was louder.

Her knee bent at the wrong angle, and she wept.

Noisy.

I don't like noise.

He stepped over her and bent down. "I'll break your spine now."

His words pierced through her haze of pain and her head shook in terror. "No, please," she managed to croak out. "Please."

Melmarc nodded. Pleading was a sign that someone was still human. And all humans could change, they had the potential for it. They could change. But that was no guarantee that they would. The potential for change was not a guarantee for it.

It did not change what would happen. Probability was not an assurance for forgiveness. It was not enough certainty.

He turned her around.

She struggled against him but failed.

In the end, he had her on her stomach. She was sobbing, crying. He could feel another type of pain from her, now. The subtle pain that came with fear.

[Increase in Optimum Existence detected.]

[Optimum Existence 23.03% > 30.02%]

[Optimum Existence is now 30.02%]

Melmarc ignored the notification, even as the fear he felt from her intensified.

He placed his hand on the soft of her back and pressed.

"NO!"

The main door of the house flung open. It banged against the wall as people rushed inside. Melmarc recognized the voice.

It was enough to make him pause.

Mummy is nice. And rich.

Melmarc ignored the thought, looking back. "You're late."

He returned to his action.

"But not too late… right?"

Melmarc paused again. Was she too late? He looked down at his hand on the small of Ariadne's back. The woman was still crying.

Her spine was not broken.

She's right.

She was not too late.

"[Sage]," his mother said. "Close the door and do your job."

Melmarc looked back at Naymond. What was his job? His mind moved over to his time inside the portal. He thought about it.

"Marc," Naymond said in a cautious voice after closing the door.

Melmarc kept his eyes on him. He followed his movements until Naymond got to the couch closest to him.

"Sit or stand?" Naymond asked.

Melmarc didn't have to think about it. "Sit."

Naymond sat.

His mother stood where she was, unmoving, eyes watching.

"I will stand in favor of Ariadne and Anji," he said. "Anji, remain where you are. I cannot vouch for your safety if you do not."

Ariadne moved. "Nay—"

"Shut up," Naymond said, voice still calm. "You are not important here, simply the bone of contention."

The room was suddenly silent.

"So…" Naymond met Melmarc's gaze, held it. "Shall we begin?"

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