Super Genetics

It took another hour to finish slotting the rest of Light Shift into his portal Skill, but the wait was worth it. When the notifications flashed in his vision, a satisfied smile touched his lips.

New Skill created: [Master of Light]

Quest Complete: [Create a Skill]

Create a new D-grade or higher Skill OR hybridize two cataloged Skills into a new D-grade Skill

Reward: D-rank

D-rank achieved! Status Sheet updated!

Two D-ranked Affixation slots awarded

New Talent awarded: [Versatile]

One talent point awarded

Before he could marvel at all the changes, his aura began to shift of its own accord. His Metal Telekinesis Affixation shifted to his left hand, while his portal Skill began to morph, occupying one of his two D-ranked slots.

The final D-ranked slot lay vacant, leaving him with Liquefy Metal in an F-slot, Metal Telekinesis in an E-slot, and portal in a D-slot. He had one slot open at each of the three ranks, though his only other F- and E-ranked Skills were his two Body Tempering Skills.

A prompt appeared asking if he wanted to Affix his new Skill and he accepted.

His aura began to remap itself, his skin itching uncomfortably. Minutes of pain passed, but he hardly noticed—all he could think about was his new rank and Skill.

When it was done, the Skill description appeared.

New Skill Affixed: Master of Light (D — Upgradeable)

Use aura to manipulate light’s shape and wavelength. Complexity of shape and degree of alteration are dependent on the caster’s mastery of electromagnetic radiation and aura manipulation.

Note: This is an upgradeable Skill. As caster’s rank, understanding, and aura control increase, so can this Skill.

An upgradeable Skill! He had hoped that property of Marlon’s Skill would transfer but hadn’t counted on it. But what was even more interesting was the Skill itself. It wasn’t like anything he had ever heard of or expected. He desperately wanted to experiment with it and figure exactly what manipulate light’s shape and wavelength meant. But there was one more unexpected notification demanding his attention.

With a thought, he focused on the new talent.

New Talent: Versatile

The user’s Affixation slots can be used interchangeably across ranks with a conversion rate of two grade-specific slots equating to a single slot of the next grade. This interchangeability carries regardless of Skill grade, such that four F-grade slots can Affix a D-grade Skill and vice versa.

He stared at that System notification in disbelief. If he was reading it right, then each slot basically carried a weight to it. If he considered an F-grade slot as one point, then an E-grade slot was worth two, and a D-grade slot was worth four. Considering his number of Affixation slots, he currently had fourteen points. That meant he could Affix three D-grade Skills with two points left, seven E-grade Skills, or fourteen F-grade Skills.

It was unlikely Affixing fourteen F-grade Skills would ever make sense in a fight, but the talent dramatically improved his versatility, just as it said. As if that wasn’t enough, he realized he had one more talent point. He focused on that and three choices appeared. There was an inherent feeling that these three choices had talent branches extending past them, but any potential future choices were obscured when he tried to focus on them. He didn’t mind, though; the three talents on offer were incredibly enticing.

Talent: Quick Shift

Optimize the user’s aura and genetic material to reduce Affixation time by half.

Talent: Condense Aura

Condense the user’s aura fractionally. Gain an additional slot one grade below current rank. This will increase as the user’s rank increases.

Talent: Mask Signature

Reduce the user’s aura signature. The user will appear weaker to aura senses and be more difficult to sense in general.

He felt stunned by how useful this new talent system was. Moving in order, he considered Quick Shift first.

It sounded useful if he ever found himself low on slots and needed to switch on the fly to increase his adaptability. But after some thought, he felt that there wasn’t as much utility in that talent as it appeared.

For one, cutting a five-minute process down to a two and a half minute process wasn’t exactly practical in the middle of a fight. If he had multiple minutes to swap his Affixations, he might as well just eat the full time and save a talent point. If it were something as dramatic as reducing Affixation time by ninety percent, that would be worth considering. But for now, he discarded Quick Shift as an option.

The next talent was interesting, not because it would add an additional E-grade slot, but because it would synergize with his Versatile talent to give him an additional D-grade slot. That would allow him to run all three of his D-grade Skills—not counting the Body Tempering he had learned from Silver earlier. With his portal, his Master of Light, and Light Shift, he’d have his three most powerful Skills available and could still Affix his Metal Telekinesis and Liquefy Metal. Without the Condense Aura talent, he’d have to give up Liquefy Metal to Affix Metal Telekinesis, or vice versa. But the more he considered, the more he wondered if he needed Light Shift at all; did Master of Light make Light Shift obsolete? Though, there were future implications on skipping this talent. Possessing an extra E-grade slot was decent, but when he ranked up, that would become an extra D-grade slot. Then a C-grade slot, and so on. Could he afford to miss out on something with that much utility?

The last talent was the most interesting and most ambiguous. There was a strategic appeal to appearing weaker than you were, but that didn’t mean he wanted to look weak all the time. But the flipside of that were the stealth implications. Harder to sense sounded like he’d be able to sneak around without his aura giving him away. And he had to consider the possibility that he might even be able to catalog other Awakened’s Skills without them realizing it. That last benefit was a stretch and maybe it would end up just reducing his aura signature slightly, but his imagination was running wild with the idea.

The ability to stealth catalog Skills would be the most amazing boon he could hope for.

After a few minutes’ consideration, he decided to select the Mask Signature talent. The Quick Shift talent he dismissed right away since it imparted little utility. As for the Condense Aura talent, after some testing with Master of Light and Light Shift, he determined that Light Shift was, in fact, redundant now. The extra slot from the talent wouldn’t be immediately useful and with the raid on Blood Alley looming, he needed to bias toward the here and now. Hopefully he’d be given another opportunity to select a talent in the future.

With a thought, he picked Mask Signature. His aura immediately began to shift, turning ephemeral to his senses. It wasn’t like it was being watered down, but more like it blended into the ambient aura of the world better. Almost as if it were learning to camouflage in its surroundings. When he expressed it around himself, it didn’t feel any weaker, just more…subtle.

He probed out with his aura, shifting space to form a small portal, then tying it off as he withdrew his power. When he ranged his aura back over the portal, he found that the properties of his masked aura still held for his working. The aura framework was much harder to sense and if he didn’t see it with his very own eyes, he might not have noticed it at all without some serious scrutiny.

A smile touched his face as he left the office. The others were in a huddle, talking in quiet but animated tones, when they noticed Terry approaching.

He felt their regards—both with their mundane and aura senses—and couldn’t help but notice little signs of disappointment.

They think I failed because of my aura, he realized.

Tania approached first, a forced cheer on her face.

“We’ve come up with a plan, Terry. We think it’s good but we wanted to run it by you first. Without knowing if you were gonna rank up or not, we weren’t sure what role you’d…” She trailed off as he began to laugh. “What? What’s so funny.”

He composed himself, turning to address them all.

“I did it. I hit the Ds.”

They shared surprised looks, their auras testing his own once more.

“Feel like an E to me,” Tristan said. “Actually, you almost feel weaker than before—”

Katie cut him off with a quick slap to the arm and Tristan clamped his mouth shut.

“What he means is, your aura just feels different, is all,” Katie said.

Terry snorted as they all shifted uncomfortably. He found himself more and more pleased with his choice, realizing just how useful it would be for making his enemies underestimate him.

“Here, let me show you.” His aura shot up into the sky, more free than ever. It was almost tactile as he reached past the Emperor’s working. Whereas before he had just ranged up and guessed when he was clear of the darkness, now, he could feel the magic in the air—practically see it with his senses.

He knew the moment he was above the darkness and he split space wide enough to fit a semi-truck. Brilliant, golden light streamed into the warehouse, eclipsing his previous portal with its sheer width. They held their hands up against the sudden brilliance, but Terry wasn’t done.

As he activated Master of Light, he could feel his aura shift forward in a ball of power. Everywhere it touched, he could sense the electromagnetic radiation that made up the light in that space. The sheer amount of information playing across his senses was staggering. He couldn’t just sense the visible light reflecting off surfaces and into his eyes, but also the invisible light waves bouncing around, through, and inside the domain of his Skill.

The varying waves didn’t announce themselves, but he could see the subtle differences across the spectrum. One form of light felt large in his senses and seemed to penetrate walls and other surfaces. Another felt tighter and was emanating not only from the ambient air, but from their bodies, too.

It almost felt like…heat.

He found that the auras from the others blocked his attempts to alter the light reflecting and emanating from them. But his own light easily shifted with a thought.

Pushing ever so slightly, he shifted the light around him, altering the shape until it didn’t reflect but rather diverted. It was a subtle change, but the visible effects were stunning.

His hands seemed to distort to his eyes, like he was looking through a fisheye lens. The others gasped in surprise, but he focused his aura, continuing to shift the light approaching him.

But as he pushed, not only did his own body begin to disappear to his eyes, but so did everything around him. Darkness began to creep in and in seconds, he found himself practically blind. Only his aura and other mundane senses remained to indicate the others’ reactions.

“Holy shit!” Tania yelled out.

“No way…no freakin’ way,” Tristan muttered.

Terry shoved the forming panic down, recognizing that he wasn’t actually in darkness, but had simply refracted all the visible light away from not only his body, but also his eyes.

“What are you seeing?” He turned his head to experiment, but no matter what direction he looked, it was all black.

“You’re invisible, Terry!” Alan cried, his voice high with excitement. “We can’t see you at all!”

A sense of giddiness filled him, but the total black of his vision needed to be addressed before he could call it a success. With a focus of his aura, he shifted the bubble of power so that light still entered his eyes. As his vision returned, he spotted Katie’s shocked face, then Alan’s. But his view was tunneled, only revealing a narrow space in the center of his vision. Slowly, he continued to shift the magic away from his face until his entire field of view was restored.

“How’s that?” he asked, turning to study their expressions. “Am I still invisible?”

“This is freaky…” Tristan replied.

Katie shifted forward, seeming to peer directly into his face.

“It’s like you’re a floating head, Terry,” she said. Then she shifted around him, gasping in surprise. “You’re completely invisible from this angle though!” She came back into view. “I can only see your face within about a ninety-degree angle.”

Terry smiled, more than pleased with that news.

“I can’t believe you unlocked invisibility, dude,” Alan said in disbelief. He bumped Tristan playfully. “Why can’t you do that?”

Terry worried Tristan might feel resentment that he had more control over Tristan’s element than he did. But the man simply laughed and shrugged.

“I’ll get there one day. But this is incredible. Even Flore couldn’t bend light like that!”

They discussed his new Skill for a few more minutes, then turned back to the task at hand, their moods slowly sobering as they remembered just exactly what they intended to do.

Apparently, the team hadn’t been idle while Terry had been working, and when they told him their plan, a satisfied smile touched his face.

The suckers didn’t know what was coming for them.

Whipvine’s fingers caressed his weapons as he approached Blood Alley. His senses alerted him to the vamps well before they saw him. The smell of blood, decay, and unwashed flesh overpowered. The sound of scurrying feet on rooftops reminded him of rats in a nest. Even the air tasted of copper.

His nose furled in disgust, his aura surging in righteous anger.

“Damn you, Terrence,” he muttered to himself as he passed between the two buildings that signified the start of the sanguine domain.

He didn’t take any measures to hide his presence, but all the same, the vamps were slow to notice him. It spoke of a lack of discipline and frankly, an arrogance that only fueled his anger.

They felt themselves untouchable in Wichita and they flaunted that invincibility with a casual disregard for scouts, defensive structures, or any semblance of order.

But what galled him the most was that they were right. Despite his distaste for them, he was powerless to do anything about it. Terrence had been forced to invite them into his domain and they had run rampant in the city for over a year.

No longer.

Whipvine wasn’t one to look on the bright side. But were he so inclined, he would at least take solace in the fact that their reign of terror was over in Wichita. Done. Finished. Though, it was little consolation for the dozens—possibly hundreds—that had been drained by the vamps.

Still, he allowed himself to feel a bittersweet pleasure at his role in the affair. He was the one that got to deliver the news to the elder and that, at least, was something.

As he strolled casually through Blood Alley towards their nest, he could hear the calls from the nearby vamps, hear them rush towards their elder in the guise of delivering a warning, though he knew from the fear-pheromones released in that air that it was really protection they hoped for.

That also gave him some small hint of pleasure. He enjoyed their fear and he hurried them along by cracking a whip against the side of a building where some of them lingered too long.

The outskirts of Blood Alley drained of sanguine, in the same way they drained their victims. Dozens of cowardly spawnlings raced toward the safety of numbers, the uncertainty of Whipvine’s arrival hurrying them forward.

Had he come to parlay or exterminate?

He let that question linger in their minds as he took his time approaching the center of Blood Alley. Dozens of sanguine voices reached his ears; questions, doubts, and shouts of fear.

A smile twisted on his face, his scars stretching painfully.

He was on the hunt now, looking for any errant vamp to fall into his sights. Even snagging one with his whip would give him some small amount of satisfaction—make this trip not a complete waste of time.

But they had fled too quickly, the cowards.

So, with a discontented sigh, he entered the sanguine nest, his System-enhanced eyes picking out every little detail despite the blanket of darkness laying across the warehouse.

He stopped in the door threshold, taking in the sight of nearly a thousand vamps churning around the open space. The smells of death, fear, and blood mingled into a heady cocktail that made his fists clench. Discarded bones littered the floor and his eyes landed on one particular femur that was too small to belong to an adult.

His blood burned, his aura broiled, and his whips called to him.

But Terrence had known what he was sending Whipvine into. He’d given the revenant a compulsion—for his own good, the Emperor had said.

It was difficult not to hate his old friend in moments like these.

Damn you, Terrence, he thought for the millionth time.

But there was no backing out—the compulsion was too strong. And when he imagined tearing through the suckers with his whips, the compulsion flared even stronger. Only in the face of violence would his compulsion be released.

There was nothing for it but to grit his teeth and deliver the Emperor’s proclamation.

With a tight jaw, he entered the sanguine nest and approached the makeshift throne at the center of the warehouse.

The elder’s aura felt drawn in, pulled tight in the face of his arrival. To hide his fear or in preparation for a fight, he didn’t know. But it did make him smile to see the elder on the back foot.

“I come from the Emperor,” he said, his voice echoing loudly in the wide open warehouse. “For the attack on his grandson and the affront given to his hospitality, your invitation has been revoked. You have until the morning to return to your home. The Emperor will provide the portal—”

“This is an insult to all sanguine!” the elder hissed. “When word of the bone lord’s hospitality reaches my people, he will lose all credibility in the Underworld!”

“All the same,” Whipvine said, his tone hardening. “You’re being sent back to your hole. Be thankful it is in one piece.”

A deep hissing sound echoed around him, the sanguine letting their displeasure be known. The elder leaned forward in his throne.

“Your Emperor wouldn’t dare attack us. It is him who should be grateful to us for allowing his spawn to leave our nest alive.” The elder slammed a fist on his armrest, shattering the bone material into dust. “He is lucky I didn’t demand that whelp’s head! Hmm, perhaps I should. A condition of our…peaceful departure.”

Whipvine’s hands gripped his weapons tight, the magical leather squeaking quietly from the force. The compulsion prevented him from lashing out, but he strained against it all the same.

Before he could reply, a dim light flashed before him and he nearly whipped out on instinct. A moment later, a figure materialized, resolving into a familiar shape.

Terry stood in front of him, staring down the elder with a smile on his face. He glanced back, winked at Whipvine, then addressed the sanguine. His voice echoed strangely, as if coming from high above, giving it a sense of imperious proclamation.

“I heard someone calling for my head. Ask and you shall receive!”