Reconnecting

The Gamer heard the Bluber drive off as he approached the front door. John knocked on the wooden surface a few times and stepped back. He instantly heard movement on the other side. And just several seconds later, it swung open to reveal Blair.

The young man raised a hand up as he was about to smile and greet her, but paused midway. Blair’s fair skin was contrasted by the deep, dark bags under her bloodshot eyes. She was noticeably pale and just overall looked like her body had forgotten the concept of sleep.

“Are- are you okay, Blair?” John worrily asked. He looked her up and down as the shadow pyromancer gave him a weary smile.

“Not really,” she admitted. “Today’s been rather shitty, to say the least. Here, we can talk in my Barrier. I’d rather not say anything while we’re still out in the open. But John?”

“Yeah?” He furrowed his brows with concern.

“I really am glad that you’re okay. For a bit there, I thought the worst might have happened,” she said. But before John could reply, she turned around and disappeared into her Barrier.

He blinked a few times. Then, as soon as the invitation to enter appeared, John immediately accepted. Blair led him into the Barrier version of her home, where she promptly collapsed onto a chair and rubbed her face. The Gamer glanced around, noticing that her workshop had become a mess since he’d last seen it.

While it had already seemed like a chaotic assembly of books, mundane chemistry equipment, and a fantastical alchemy workshop, it had at least been organized in its own way. But now it was just thoroughly disheveled with loose pieces of paper, beakers filled with various liquids, and many empty coffee cups randomly spread out.

John went over to the chair next to Blair’s. But before he could even sit down, he first had to gingerly remove a pile of books and move them to the floor. The Gamer wondered just what she had possibly been up to since this morning to cause such a big mess.

“Let’s see, where do I even begin with this shitshow?” Blair asked. John wasn’t entirely sure if she was really asking him or just speaking her thoughts aloud. He leaned back into his seat.

“The start, I guess? Since I’m assuming that all of,” he gestured around at the messy room, “this is related to why you were so worried about me?”

The young woman sighed and grabbed a half-emptied cup of joe. “Yeeep. ‘Bout an hour after you and Ganzac left, he suddenly gave me a call and warned me that he wouldn’t be coming back anytime soon. He said that at any minute, the Order would come knocking at my door and be up our asses for a while. So, for the time being, he’s keeping his head low as a precaution.”

“Huh. Does Ganzac have some way to spy on the Order or something to know what they’re about to do?” John asked. With a wave of her hand, Blair had a partially full French press and a clean mug float their way. The Gamer gratefully accepted the cup of coffee and took a sip from it as she answered.

“Nah, not in the direct sense anyway. He just has a wicked sixth sense, especially for anything that might be dangerous for me. I’m not entirely sure about how it actually works, though. I know that it’s part of the contract for how he serves and protects me, but only Ganzac would be able to share the actual specifics. But he hasn’t even told me. He just claims it works better the less I know.”

John’s eyes slightly widened with understanding as he took another sip from his coffee. ‘Ohh, I think I get it now. That explains how he’d be suspicious of me even with the meds suppressing my demonic aura. Muhtal said that he could only barely detect it while already knowing what to look for. But it makes sense if someone can circumvent that by just having a strong gut feeling.’

If the Gamer remembered correctly, the gut feeling of mistrust was exactly how it was described in the demon’s negative Relationship score. But that begged the question: what were other ways that could hypothetically get around the suppression? And were any of these methods something that the Order could potentially deploy to discover his secret?

Wentworth had said that she intended for him to infiltrate the Order of the Golden Rose. So she had certainly accounted for that already, right? For now, though, he shoved that worry into its own mental box. It was just something that he’d need to ask about the next time he saw his Abyssal master.

“But yeah,” Blair continued, “it wasn’t long after his warning that some of their agents came knocking. And hooooh boy, did they have plenty of crap to push onto my plate. Remember that class C assignment they had me rush to do yesterday?”

John nodded. He distinctly remembered her complaining last night about how the Order scolded her for taking too long even though she left the moment they called.

“So the initial assumption was that it was a random incursion event. Like the imp that attacked you. Sometimes demons can pop into our world even without a summoning ritual or finding a gate to the Hells. These tend to be weaker stragglers who can’t do much without Gaia smiting them down for being too loud with their actions against the mundane. But smarter, more powerful demons occasionally slip through as well,” she explained.

“So I’m guessing that it being a class C made it a moderate threat? Assuming that we’re going off an F to A kind of grade scale?” John asked.

“Yeah. In a one-on-one, a class C is generally considered a tough case for me. But for determining the class, the Order has its own methods for detecting these incursions. It allows them to measure the ripple effect of the incursion and get a good estimate of how powerful that demon is.” Blair took another sip from her coffee.

“It’s a bit of a vague scale, though. If they ever find out about your Gamer abilities, I’m sure they’d contract you for just your power to see Levels. I can only imagine how useful it’d be to be able to know the Level of their members and allow them to efficiently form better strike teams. But like I said, the assumption was that it was just another one of these occasionally stronger incursions.”

She tapped a finger against one of the loose pieces of paper. “As of this morning, however, that default idea was tossed out the window. When we dealt with the class C demon, it was alone inside a Barrier it had created. They didn’t mention it to me at the time, but the Order must have decided that something was off about that particular incident. So they did some guessing, and discovered that this demon actually did come across as the result of a summoning. But one that was just modified to seem like an incursion event.”

‘Well, crap. That doesn’t sound like anything good, John thought to himself. But he didn’t say anything yet and allowed Blair to continue.

“Now if the Order’s good for anything, it’s having a sharp nose for anything they deem as evil. So it didn’t take long for them to actually find the lair of a couple of Abyssals who seemed to be responsible for the summoning. Or at least these guys were one part of it, since all the Order apparently found were a few people seemingly left behind in a mostly cleaned out Barrier. Poor bastards are probably getting ‘interrogated’ as we speak,” Blair said as she gestured the quotes around interrogated.

For how a large organization of religious zealots got information through interrogation, John didn’t really want to imagine what kind of **** methods they likely used. Mundane **** was already bad enough, but who knew just how much worse it could get with the boundless creativity of magic.

The Gamer recalled how Wentworth had the ability to conjure a projected image of his soul to inspect it, right before they formed their contract. Just that had felt like a cheese grater was being rubbed against his very being, and she didn’t seem like she’d be the sadistic type to cause more pain than necessary for a simple procedure. But if someone else had the same tool and used it maliciously to cause as much pain as possible…

John’s hairs stood up from just the thought of it. The Gamer mentally swore that if he confirmed that the Order did have that capability and his secret was ever exposed, then he’d rather die fighting than let himself be captured. And even if they didn’t have the ability to directly mess with one’s soul, **** was likely still preferable to any other **** methods they had likely had in their repertoire.

“Why would anyone want to take the risk, though?” the Gamer asked. “It sounds like that basically everyone knows that the Order is the local powerhouse here in Springfield. So wouldn't it just be common sense to do any demon summoning elsewhere or at least know for sure that you won’t be caught?”

Blair shrugged. “Most people who dabble in the demonic usually have at least one screw loose. Me included, of course. But it’s probably the same logic as when you watch a crime show and see how a murderer thinks they’re a genius the police are too dumb to catch. It’s not hard to find Abyssals that have that kind of inflated ego.”

“Hmm. So if they’re part of a bigger group that just left them behind, does that automatically mean they’re part of a guild? I’ve only really learned about three big non-combat guilds,” John started, recalling Wentworth’s explanation of them. “Though I still haven’t really taught myself too much about them, so I’m not sure if there’s a difference between a guild and just a random group of people.”

Wentworth had instructed him to learn more about the guilds of the Abyss. So hearing news about a group of demon summoners sounded like a good opportunity to be taught more about the subject in general.

“Eh, kind of? Just a pair of independents working together could call themselves a guild if they really wanted to. What really matters is how others perceive you, though. But generally speaking, you go from a random group to a small but recognized guild once your membership reaches the double digits. Yet that can easily change if you have someone particularly strong as one of your members, so there’s plenty of exceptions to that rule of thumb.

“But John,” Blair continued. Her expression turned serious as her face darkened. “One of those cultists managed to slip away for a while before getting caught. For a while, all I heard was that they captured someone with demonic taint not too far from your school, not long after you said you left class early. So when I was told that a male with demonic energy was captured right after your text, why do you think I got so worried?”

The young man stared at her with widened eyes. He opened his mouth, but then closed it again. The Gamer worked his jaw, not sure what to say to that. The seriousness of what Blair had just said wasn’t lost on him. While the Order was slow to update her on what was happening, it was easy to see how her nerves would quickly become frayed.

“Oh,” John finally said. But not knowing how to put his feelings into words, he spoke with his actions. He hurriedly reached out and clasped the woman before him into a tight embrace. The Gamer felt Blair momentarily tense from his sudden hug. However, she quickly relaxed and wrapped her arms around him in turn.