“Personally, I love side characters.” Adam’s soft tone carried across the street and made its way over to where the two captains were.

  “Side characters?” Father raised an eyebrow at the enemy before him. “What do you mean?”

  Adam took several slow steps toward the captains and dragged his sword along the ground. It kicked up a bit of sparks and left a mark on the road. “You two are side characters.” He explained. “The plot doesn’t care about you. You’re not given any detail that stands out, and your actions have small rippling effects, unlike a major character. That’s one of the reasons I love side characters the most, however. A side character can win and get the glory, but they’re never going to be the main character. The driving force of a story, the plot, will never be on them to go into effect. A side character can’t kill the main character or the main villain. If you two want to leave, then I’d understand. Like I just said, you’re both side characters, and this is my story, so no matter what you do, you really don’t stand a chance.”

  “Great.” Laerton rolled her eyes. “An arrogant asshole with a God complex.”

  “I’m not a god.” Adam shook his head. “I’m just someone who knows how things work. For example, don’t you find it weird? I was about to fight you, yet now we’re talking again? What happened to the buildup of action? This chapter suddenly shifted? I’ll tell you what happened. The fight would have been short and boring, so this talk has to be added to give the chapter merit and weight. Don’t you find it interesting how an author can make things change during the blank time that we don’t see? I do at least.”

  Father opened his mouth, about to speak, but then stopped. “Honestly, you’re right. We shouldn’t be talking like this.” Then, without warning, he used a spell. “Row Absolute Air-Bullet!” The wind flickered and twisted into a bullet launching toward Adam. “We should be fighting!”

  “I guess we can.” Adam blocked the air bullet with his sword. “If that’s really what you two want, then let’s stop stalling and let’s not waste any more time. I’ll finish this in only a few pages.”

  "Ha!" Father laughed. "You think it'll be that easy?"

  Adam's eyes almost seemed to light up. "Father, I'll admit, you're quite a big fish, but you've been in such a small pond for far too long. Allow me to introduce you to the ocean."

  Adam Hawker gave them no time to act.

  One moment, he was walking toward the two captains, and then the next, he flashed forward with a Mana Step. Father grunted and swung out with his flaming sword, but Adam easily dodged to the side. With casual ease, Adam slashed upward with his longsword. Father managed to block it with the shield, but then the captain of the Shining Sentinels widened his eyes as he felt a tremendous wave of force press into him, and he was sent flying back.

  One swing from Adam was incredibly weighty, as if the white-haired man weighed thousands of tons more than he could have.

  Father felt his back collide with a wall, and he pierced through the side of a building. Despite being sent flying, he was mostly fine, showing no signs of being damaged.

  Father stood up and glared back at Adam. "Your mana might be intense but you lack power."

  Adam cocked his head to the side. "Power?" He lifted his hand up and balled it into a fist. Then he poked poked his pointer finger and thumb out. He placed them directly over his eye so that he could see Father between them. "How is this for power."

  Adam squeezed down with both his fingers, as if pretending to squish Father.

  It wasn't pretend, though.

  Father grunted as he suddenly felt a powerful weight settle on him. His eyes went wide and his knees buckled as he was suddenly slammed through the ground by an unseen force.

  "How's that for power?" Adam called out.

  He was about to use another Mana Step, but then he casually dodged to the side as Laerton stabbed out with her needle-like blade. Her eyes were glowing, and she stared daggers at Adam, watching as hundreds of invisible threads stretched out before her.

  There were two kinds. The first was a red string, and Adam’s strikes followed this string's path. This was the basic form of Instinct, the evolved form of Danger Sense. The red strings showed the ways a target would act, allowing someone with the trait to react to their foes.

  The second string was blue. Laerton was able to see this one as it stretched off of her blade and connected to Adam’s vitals, twisting in real time with both of their movements. Blue was an evolved form of red. If the red threading was the ultimate guide to an opponent's attacks, then the blue one was the ultimate guide to an opponent's defense. Blue guided her strikes so that they would land in a critical spot.

  At least they should have, but Adam was quick on his feet. “Are you reading my actions?” Adam’s smile was a predatory one. A smile that was clearly fake and full of malice. “How skilled you must be. This does bring back memories.” Suddenly, he began to speed up, getting faster and faster until his strikes moved quicker than the threading could react.

  Laerton struggled to dodge his strikes and put some distance between her and Adam, but his movement method allowed him to press forward, stopping her escapes each time.

  And what was his method? It wasn't a Mana Step, or at least it wasn't one that Laerton had ever seen before. It was something that reminded her of a cartoon as Adam would simply step behind some loose rubble or a lamp post, and then the moment he was out of sight he would reappear out of a different of pile of rubble next to her.

  It was some sort of weird teleportion skill and it was only through her ability to see his threading that she managed to not lose her head as he would strike out with strangely weighty slaps that destroyed sections of the city.

  Luckily for her, Instinct wasn’t the only trait she had. Laerton twisted her body and rotated her sword. Her mana filled the air, and then those threads only she could see became visible and a tangible substance. Adam felt himself be bound up, his body tied down, right as Laerton thrust her sword toward his heart.

  Adam’s mana raised by a fraction, his power rapidly growing, and he snapped out of the colored threading just in time. He managed to jump out of the way, but the needle-like blade cut into his shoulder, and his blood was spilled.

  Laerton stopped dead in her tracks as she saw what spilled down Adamn’s shoulder. “Damn. Looks like you got me with a hit.” Adam rubbed the spot he had been cut, a black substance staining his white robes and palm.

  “Ink?” Laerton muttered.

  Of all the things to spill from Adam, ink was the last one she would have thought of. It flowed out, dripping down his body like actual blood. Mutant or not, he should still have regular blood.

  “Oil.” Adam corrected.

  Laerton’s nose twitched, and she confirmed that he was telling the truth. It wasn’t ink. It was black oil. Somehow, that was even more unbelievable than the ink. “What are you? Some sort of fucked-up robot?”

  “Cute.” He squeezed down on his wound with two fingers and it was gone, closed up completely. Then he flashed forward and swung his sword out as hard as he could. Laerton watched the red lines flow, and she took a deep breath. She shifted her mana and poured it out into her blade, forcing it back into its chaotic form as she performed a Mana Strike!

  Their blades clashed…

  She had been given the title of Captain due to her being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Laerton Eman knew the other captains held no respect for her and didn’t truly consider her part of their group.

  Many people consider her to not be a true captain. They think that because she is part of Phoenix Flight, her power is lacking. In a way, they aren’t wrong, as she was the weakest captain and lacked the signature gear, such as Knight Gear.

  Still, that didn’t mean she was truly weak.

  Before being a captain, she was a Spell Sword. Before being a Spell Sword, she was a soldier. Before being a soldier, she was an assassin. Before being an assassin, she was a blacksmith. And before being a blacksmith, she was a little girl who lost everything she held dear.

  Growing up, Laerton knew a lot about swords. They claim that when two people with blades clash, they refine the edges of their weapons with their very souls.

  Warriors can understand each other on a level that simple communication can’t hope to match.

  Laerton felt genuine terror as her blade met Adam’s. Her sword clashed with his, and in an instant, the world around her seemed to fade away. All that remained was an endless abyss of pure nothingness that gazed back at her.

  What the hell was this man? A monster whose weight didn’t match his appearance, a man who wore hundreds of illusions over his true form, and a person who bled oil instead of blood?

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  Adam Hawker was something that didn’t belong in this world.

  Laerton felt herself being pushed back as he easily overpowered her, but before Adam could put his full force into the strike and shatter her blade, a spell slammed into him.

  “Vil Absolute Weight.”

  Suddenly, gravity compressed and slammed down into Adam, causing him to buckle slightly. Laerton finally managed to get away from him, and she breathed heavily. Adam twisted around and stared at Father, who stepped out of the destroyed building.

  “Row Absolute Thunder.” A bolt of lightning dropped from the sky, but Adam sliced his blade up and split it in two. He then charged at Father and struck out with his sword, but Father used another spell. “Row Absolute Negation.” An unseen barrier twisted into the air, and Adam’s sword was deflected. “Row Absolute Slash.” Father swung his sword, and hundreds of buildings were slashed in two as an invisible wave of force tore its way forward. Adam would have been hit, but he saw the attack coming. Hundreds of red threads appeared before his vision as he also used the Instinct trait and avoided the direction of the slash. Father simply swung again. “Vil Absolute Flame.”

  A rippling beam of fire rocketed forward toward Adam and engulfed him, but Adam did the impossible. As the beam of fire hit him, he somehow defied all logic and grabbed onto two sections of the slashing thread and whipped it around him, creating a space that the fire couldn't reach.

  Many people considered Father to be the strongest captain. Not only did he have some of the strongest stats of all current Knights, with the exception of the Holy Saint, but he also had the strongest type of magic.

  Absolute Magic was a variant of Light Magic. It was extremely rare in the Helios family, and, as the name implied, it could do whatever the user wanted. So long as they had the mana and they were skilled enough. Father was very skilled. Not skilled enough, though.

  Adam was something else entirely... From the fire, he jumped out, his mana rising even higher as he simply upgraded his resistance to the damage. He swung his sword again, and Father blocked it with his shield and was once again thrown back. Adam then lazily ducked down as Laerton appeared behind him and tried to behead him.

  “I don’t mean to alarm either of you two,” Adam deflected her sword away from him. “But I haven’t even used a single spell, and I’m still far from using the full extent of my mana. Aren’t you two captains? Shouldn’t you be better?”

  Laerton barely blocked a strike and felt her bones rattle as she was sent rolling. She landed next to Father and grunted.

  "Man, seriously fuck this guy."

  Now that both Knights were next to each other, Adam once again did the impossible. "Since you want to play with fire, let's play!" He slapped up toward the sky and somehow that worked. The black darkness above cleared away and shattered revealing the blue sky above. It didn’t last long, though, as Adam kept reaching up and up and then wrapped his fingers around the sun! Suddenly everything went dark as it became night and Adam held a ball of fire in his hands! He was clutching the sun! "Catch!"

  the sun flew forward, as small as a baseball now and both Laerton and Father barely dodged it, their eyes wide.

  the star detonated off in the distance creating a massive mushroom cloud which somehow didn't reach them or the town, despite how close it should have been.

  "Whoops." Adam reached up again, grabbed something and tugged on it. There was a clicking sound and the sky lit back up as he turned the sun on again, making it day time. "That's better."

  "Okay... What the fuck." Laerton breathed out.

  "Cartoon magic?" Father muttered.

  "What?"

  "I think he has some sort of cartoon magic." Father explained. "Teleporting by vanishing out of sight, slicing lightning in two, being able to clutch fire, and grab the sun, not to mention that slap stick strength he has... He's like a cartoon character. It looks like he bends reality around him, but there seems to be some limit. We haven't died from his strikes so my guess is he can manipulate the space and the air but he can't do it to people. The sun also returned and you were able to get a clean hit on him, so he isn't some Godlike being."

  "Yeah." Laerton nodded. "Still something isn't right. He isn't saying any spell names. They're just happening. Does that mean it's a trait or is he some kind of monster? The only monster I know of that can bend reality are the dragons..."

  The dragons... Powerful entities who wrote reality and the world to be whatever they wanted. They created the laws, and determined how matter operated and funcioned.

  Was Adam a dragon?

  Laerton shook her head. "No. That's stupid. All the dragons are dead. Haru made sure. Let me try a few more things."

  "Got it. Let's pull off a combo." Father grunted.

  Laerton took off, using several Mana Steps to appear around Adam. Adam watched her easily his eyes darting back and forth.

  "You wondered how I can do the impossible? It is simple really. I write that I can. I hold the quill and therefore I decide the rules. What can you do?"

  “Row Thread Cutter,” Laerton responded to his taunt and tied razor-sharp threading around Adam’s neck, but his defense had increased to the point where she couldn’t cut his flesh. Instead, she twisted her arm back and flung him toward Father. “He’s heading your way!”

  “Row Absolute Strike!” Father forced a ton of mana into his flaming sword and went to slam it down onto Adam’s back, but the man managed to catch his footing on the ground, and he did a full twist of his body, avoiding the strike. The entire city shook and tilted when Father’s blade slammed into the ground, and a section of it dropped down, breaking into the sewers below. “You’re a slippery little bastard, aren’t you?”

  Adam used Mana Step and put some distance between himself and the two Knights. “What can I say? I try to be as annoying as possible to people I don’t like.”

  “You’re not going to win this fight.” Laerton appeared next to Father with her own Mana Step.

  “I’m not?”

  “You’re not,” Father said, determined. “We’re going to beat you and avenge all the people you hurt.”

  “Now, saying that is nice and all, but can you back that up?” Adam questioned. “After all, this isn’t your story.”

  Laerton glared back at him. “As annoying as he is, I have to admit he’s strong.” She muttered quietly so that only Father could hear her. “Think it’s time to bust out the Saint?”

  Father scowled and shook his head. “No way.”

  “We need her, though…”

  “We do not.” Father awkwardly pointed a thumb back at himself despite the fact that he held a sword and a shield. “I’m all that we need. Look, I have a plan to wipe out not just him but all the other baddies here as well. Think you can hold him off for a small bit of time?”

  Laerton sighed but nodded her head. “Busting ‘that’ out? Sure. I’ll give you all the time you need.”

  “Good.” Father sheathed his sword and placed his shield down. He brought his hands together and began to pray. “I’ll wipe this bastard out in a single strike.”

  Adam watched the exchange, his smile growing. “This chapter’s getting a bit dull. Why don’t we go see how the others are doing?”

  ***

  Meanwhile, with the others…

  Pretty Face’s magic created a large slab of solid air, which they all rode on. Both she and Pock stood near the edge, staring down at the site below. The forest was on fire. Flames spread among the many trees, eating them up, and dozens of carriages had been tipped over, their metal forms starting to melt.

  A crowd of people were down below, many dead, and the rest still struggling to fight as waves of puppets descended down on them. The puppets came in different forms, some animal, others people-shaped.

  Behind the horde of killer puppets, a naked woman stood, holding an elderly man, who was eagerly watching the slaughter. The intense mana was coming from the two of them. The old man held power that rivaled a captain, while the woman’s mana was around the level of a vice captain.

  “This will be tricky.” Pretty Face muttered. “In terms of strength, I’m also on the level of a vice captain, so dealing with that woman down there should be a fight that can go in either of our ways, but the real threat is that old man. I can’t beat him.”

  “We have to try.” Pock insisted.

  “Of course we do, but we need a plan.” Pretty Face sighed. “Even if we team up, I doubt we can win. Maybe if we wait for Tori to get here, the three of us might be enough to keep him at bay, but even that is debatable. Damn it, why did a captain-level threat have to be here?”

  “You have us three.” Olivia pointed out. She stood next to Bruno and Ken.

  “Yeah.” Ken nodded. “It’ll be a five on two-”

  “No.” Pock and Pretty Face both said.

  “Why not!” Ken demanded. She was closer to the back and hadn’t gotten to even see what they’d be fighting. The mana in the air was intense, and it felt familiar…

  “It’s just too dangerous.” Pretty Face rolled her eyes.

  “Why even bring us then?” Bruno questioned.

  “Mostly because we didn’t think it was that big of a deal.” Pretty Face frowned slightly. “That other Squire stayed alive, so if he was able to survive, then the Captain figured it must not be a massive threat. How were we supposed to know several captain-level enemies would be waiting for us? Besides, even if this wasn’t a serious threat, I doubt we’d still let you get involved. The captain wanted you to see high-level combat so you’d know what strength you need to strive for.” Pretty Face said directly to Bruno. Then she addressed Ken and Olivia. “As for you two, I think your captain just didn’t care if you’d be put in danger or not…”

  “We want to help, though,” Bruno argued back. “People are dying.”

  “Exactly. And every second you sit here whining, more die.” Pretty Face turned away, and her wings expanded out, gently flapping. “So stop crying, sit there, and watch.”

  Both Pretty Face and Pock jumped off the platform of air and began to fall toward the battlefield below. They instantly started to engage with the puppets and quickly got the attention of the Lord of Threads and the naked lady.

  Olivia groaned and folded her arms. “If we aren’t even going to get to fight, I wish we could have stayed with Davi.”

  “Do you love Davi?” Bruno asked casually, catching Olivia off guard.

  “W-What?” Olivia’s eyes widened, and her face suddenly became red. “W-Why would you ask a stupid question like that?”

  Bruno laughed. “So it’s true?”

  “N-No!”

  “Really?” Ken rubbed her chin. “So can I have Davi?”

  “No!”

  Ken snorted. “You’re too easy.”

  “Screw you!”

  “Maybe.”

  “What?”

  Bruno laughed as he watched the two girls. “I’m glad that you’ve found some friends, Olivia.”

  Olivia stopped and then also gave a soft smile. “Yeah. They’re pretty great. All of them are nice, and they’ve helped me out a lot. I’m glad I met Davi, Ken, and even Sieg.” This time, it was Ken’s turn to look away in embarrassment.

  Bruno’s grin grew. It felt good knowing Olivia managed to surround herself with good people. He turned the other way and gazed out at the battlefield. “It’s a little crazy to see those two fighting.” He noted as he watched Pock and Pretty Face easily tear their way through the horde of dolls. “I mean, they’re destroying so many puppets.”

  “Puppets?” Ken suddenly froze.

  “Yeah?” Bruno glanced back at her. “They’re fighting puppets-”

  He was shoved out of the way as Ken practically threw herself forward. She stood at the edge of the barrier of wind and glared down toward the forest below. The fire had blocked most of the view, and she honestly hadn’t cared to learn who the enemies were until now.

  Puppets.

  As far as the eye could see.

  Very familiar puppets.

  The image of Raven filled her mind, but it faded when she saw him. As if he knew she was looking his way, the Lord of Threads casually gazed up in Ken’s direction. Their eyes met, and he smiled.

  “Ken?” Olivia gave her friend an odd look as she noticed Ken’s mana spike, and fire began to flow off her flesh. “Are you okay?”

  “He’s dead.”

  “What?”

  Ken suddenly exploded, her hair turning golden and her eyes igniting as her fire flowed. “I’m going to kill him!” And without any warning, Ken launched herself off the barrier and entered the fray.

  ***

  A story can come in many forms. It can have many different meanings or plot beats that all weave a tale together.

  A quill tipped into the ink, and it began to scratch words across the page. Adam’s story was reaching its peak, brought on by his excitement at meeting one of his antagonists.

  A miracle was about to unfold.

  The impossible was about to become possible.

  The story was about to take a turn.