ALL NOVEL 11 – Of Molten Red
Raun immediately shook his head and rushed toward me. Before I could do anything, he pulled me into a tight embrace.
“Goddess, Ast! W-Where have you been!? Six years, six whole years! I-I thought you were dead!”
“Calm down, Raun. I’m not going anywhere.”
It was at this precise point that Petra and Raun’s girlfriend—Amelia, emerged from the stairs.
To be honest, I was quite shocked that Amelia still stayed with Raun after all these years.
“Raun!” Petra shouted as she pried Raun away from me. “I know that she’s cute, but you shouldn’t hug girls just like that—especially with your girlfriend here!”
Yeah, she was right. Amelia was literally shaking right now; her eyes looked like they could tear up at any moment.
So, Raun did the only sensible thing and went to comfort his girlfriend.
“Amelia—don’t worry. She’s just a friend.”
“R-Really?”
“Yes. A fr—”
“I’m pretty sure this is the first time you’ve met her,” Petra suddenly interjected.
Before things could get worse, I decided to intervene.
“Actually, Raun and I were friends.”
“Huh?”
“We were best friends before I uhh…enlisted.”
While Petra was pleasantly surprised at the amazing coincidence, Raun was not.
“You WHAT? You enlisted!? Where?!”
“Lumaria’s tits, calm down. Just the Northwestern frontlines.”
“Northwestern frontlines? JUST the Northwestern frontlines!?”
I actually forgot how far-removed from war people like Raun were. Seriously, it wasn’t as bad as he’d thought. All I did was kill some people and possibly make countless children into orphans. Nothing too extreme.
Whatever the case was, there was a lot of explaining to do…
.
.
.
.
“So, let me get this straight,” Raun said as he rubbed his temples. “You met my sister in the war, and you’ve been living with her ever since?”
“That’s about right.”
Then, Petra spoke.
“Okay, my turn. So, you and Raun were best friends until you decided to run away from home and enlist?”
““Pretty much.””
“Okay then.” She clapped. “This makes things much easier.”
Petra kneeled down right before me with a small box in her hand. It looked like she was proposing to me.
In fact, if I hadn’t heard what she said downstairs, I would’ve thought so.
“Ast, will you be my family?”
Petra opened the box, revealing a legal adoption document. Yep, I didn’t know why she’d make it so much like a proposal.
Since Petra was only twenty-five, she was definitely asking if I wanted to be her sister.
So, with little thought, I took the document out of her hand and nodded.
“Yes, I will.”
Then, she leaped up and hugged me. This time, her hug was more affectionate than before.
One bad thing about this situation was that Raun and Amelia were definitely feeling like outliers.
“Hey, what about my opinion?”
At Raun’s question, Petra simply jabbed his shoulder lightly.
“Like you’d object.”
“But I haven’t seen her for six years! Who knows if—”
“So, you don’t consider me your friend anymore?” I glared coldly at Raun.
He gulped.
“N-No, I still do! Forget I ever said anything.”
“Good.”
.
.
.
.
It took Raun and I literally a day to get back to where we were before—essentially, joking around like friends. Though, we had to spend a little more than a week to assure Amelia that I wasn’t going to snatch Raun away from her.
Anyways, today was the new year, and that meant the Awakening Ceremony was open to anyone above the age of eighteen.
“Are you sure you want to go with only light makeup?” Petra asked with worry.
“I’m sure.”
Actually, I’d have preferred it if I didn’t put on any makeup at all. It was annoying—especially in this rainy weather.
“Okay, so are you sure you want to wear that outfit to the ceremony?”
I stared at her weirdly. I was just wearing my old white military suit—just redesigned a bit to not make it look totally like camouflage.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“I— nothing. Do as you like.”
With everything prepared, I went downstairs with Petra. There, I saw Amelia and Raun already waiting.
Amelia was wearing a dress, and Raun was wearing a suit.
I literally glanced at them for a split second before deciding that it wasn’t worth my time scrutinizing their clothes.
Anyways, since Petra didn’t have a car, we had to rely on the saving grace of good public transport—which luckily, the Capital had. After a fifteen-minute bus ride, we arrived at the Awakening Venue—a Church.
It was the Church of Obscura—the Goddess of Darkness. It wasn’t as if Petra’s family followed that Goddess or anything; just that it was the nearest Awakening Venue to her house.
We went inside the church. There were what seemed like hundreds of people lined up for the Awakening Orb that was placed on a long table. Some were screaming their lungs out since they probably got good talent or Affinity.
After observing the lines for a while, I picked the one with the least people.
Still, we had to wait for three hours before it was finally our turn.
The first to awaken was Raun. He placed his hands on the orb. And, after it glowed for a bit, he muttered,
“Tanker.”
Then, he removed his hands and received a piece of Parchment from a Priest. Immediately, he ripped the parchment apart.
A translucent blue screen appeared as soon as he did so.
===
Name: Raun Knovski
Bloodline: Human (100%)
Overall Growth Rating: Heroic-
Rank: G (MAX: UNCHECKED)
Strength: G (Heroic)
Agility: G- (Common+)
Stamina: G (Heroic+)
Intelligence: G- (Common-)
Mana capacity: G- (Rare+)
Class: Tanker
--
Affinities:
[Heroic - Earth]
--
Skills:
-NONE-
===
“I guess you could say that I’m really down to Earth.” Raun chuckled.
Of course, no one really laughed at his terrible joke. Even Amelia only gave him a slight laugh out of encouragement.
Still…
“Your Earth affinity is good. Congrats, I guess.”
…He was slightly better than the average person, so it was still noteworthy.
Then, it was Amelia’s turn. Unlike Raun, she whispered, “Healer” before removing her hands. But similar to him, she ripped the Parchment as soon as she received it.
=====
Name: Amelia Virr
Bloodline: Human (100%)
Overall Growth Rating: Legendary
Rank: G (MAX: UNCHECKED)
Strength: G- (Common)
Agility: G- (Rare-)
Stamina: G- (Common-)
Intelligence: G+ (Heroic-)
Mana capacity: G+ (Legendary+)
Class: Healer
--
Affinities:
[Legendary - Life]
[Rare - Light]
--
Skills:
[Saintess of life] {SS}
The skill granted to one chosen by the Goddess of Life Livida. This skill amplifies the effect of any healing-type magic by a factor of five. The owner of this skill is also blessed by the Goddess of Life, raising their Life magical affinity to Legendary rating. The user can also sacrifice their life force to further raise the potency of healing magic up to a factor of fifty.
===
“””””A-A Saintess!?”””””
Four people exclaimed this: Petra, Raun, Amelia herself, the Priest that was watching her, and I.
Before anyone else in the venue could see it, the Priest hurriedly grabbed Amelia Status and cracked it in half, making it disperse into thin air. Then, he turned to all of us and said with a stern voice,
“DON’T utter a word of it to anyone. It’s for your friend’s own safety.”
Saying that, he rushed deeper into the church, presumably to find a higher-up.
While Petra and Raun were congratulating Amelia, I was panicking.
‘She’s a Saintess of Life and has a boyfriend named Raun. Fuck…don’t tell me…!’
Amelia was most likely a future member of the Hero of Light’s Yuri Harem. In other words, a Heroine.
Worse, Raun would die because of her.
The protagonist, despite being made fun of in the academy for being a commoner, made a good friend - Raun. However, 2 months into the academy, an incident occurred in which Raun had to sacrifice himself to save Amelia.
Horrified by the sudden death of her long-time boyfriend, Amelia froze on the spot and almost got herself killed by the same monster that had just killed Raun.
And of course, the main character, with her utterly dogshit timing, saved Amelia at the last second.
After a series of consolations and sweet words from the protagonist, Amelia started to develop feelings for her before eventually joining her harem.
This…was definitely bad. I wanted to save Raun—yet, doing so would conflict with the plot. As I was struggling to come up with a solution, I felt Petra tapping my shoulder.
“Are you okay? You seem…disturbed.”
‘Right, let’s leave that for another day.’
“I’m fine.”
Saying that, I walked up to the Orb and placed my hands on it. My vision temporarily changed to darkness, but I’d been warned of this beforehand, so I wasn’t really shocked.
After a while, several white texts appeared in the dark space.
[SELECT YOUR CLASS]
{Crosslance Knight}
{Crosslance Knight}
{Crosslance Knight}
‘Huh? They’re all...'
I focused on the texts to try and see the description.
[Specializes in the Crosslance]
That was it. The description was the same for the three of them.
‘How very useful. Well, if that's what Status thinks is best for me, then I guess I have no other choice.’
"Crosslance Knight," I muttered.
Soon after, my vision was returned.
“So,” Petra said as she looked at me. “Crosslance, huh? I’m surprised. You’ve always liked the Sabre…”
I nodded and took a Parchment from the table. However, I wasn’t stupid like Raun or Amelia. No matter the situation, one must never let others look at their Status. The only exception to this would be the ones that were closest to me—which only comprised of Mom and Petra at this moment.
And since Petra didn’t care for my Status—and Mom was…gone, I only wanted to show myself my own Status. So, I went into a confession booth (which was repurposed for this very reason), and ripped the Parchment apart.
=====
Name: Astrape “Gray” Knovski
Bloodline: Human (97%) | Vampire (3%)
Overall Growth Rating: Rare+
Rank: G- (MAX: UNCHECKED)
Strength: G- (Heroic-)
Agility: G- (Heroic+)
Stamina: G- (Common+)
Intelligence: G+ (Heroic)
Mana capacity: G (Rare-)
Class: Crosslance Knight
--
Affinities:
[Heroic - Lightning]
[Heroic - Space]
[Rare - Time]
[Rare - Blood]
[Common - Wind]
--
Skills:
[Magic Eyes of Fear] {C}
Instills Fear in the user’s targets. If the targets are of higher rank than the user, the effect will be greatly diminished.
(BONUS: +50% Effectiveness on Monsters and Void Beasts)
[Mana blood] {F}
A degraded version of the innate skill [Fertilus' Blood] {A} that every pure-blooded vampire has. Due to the user's barely sufficient concentration of Vampiric blood in her system, she is granted the inferior version of the skill.
Enables the user to recover Mana quicker than the average person.
===
“FUCKING YES! HAHAHAHAH!”
What luck! I really had Space affinity!
Being able to learn a literal strategic weapon of a Martial manual aside, I took a closer look at my skills—specifically [Mana blood].
…It seemed that I had a lead on who my father might be.
As I was about to leave the confession booth, a flickering blue screen caught my eye.
[Would you like to fuse “Affinity: Space” and “Affinity: Time”?]
‘H-Huh? Fusion? Of course I fucking would!’
After all, fusing Affinties would always be the correct choice. But…I’d never heard of anyone fusing Space and Time, though. Well, it was too late now to change anything.
[Fusion completed.
Lost: Space | Time
Gained: Space-Time (Heroic)]
After that, I left the confession booth, all giddy and shit.
“Oh, did you get something good?” Petra asked as soon as she saw me.
“Of course! Who do you think I am?”
With a Status like this, I had every right to be arrogant.
So, after refusing every attempt Raun made at prying out information about my Status, we returned home.
The Ceremony ended peacefully just like that.
However, I still couldn’t rest. After making up some excuse, I caught a bus to go out of the Capital and into one of the towns near it.
‘Let’s see what our Protagonist is doing with her Ceremony…’