The Conciege
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August Intruder- Chapter 83- Existence
🕑 Added 2024-09-27 18:43:54 +0000 UTCThe rain was heavy. Surprisingly, however, Melmarc felt nothing of the cold.
The street had a few people traversing it, walking with umbrellas over their heads or covered in raincoats of varying colors, mostly yellow. There were others that walked around in hoodies, allowing the rain to drench them.
It looked like a regular night in a business district. Wet tarred roads, black and shimmering, reflecting the lights from the skyscrapers around. The buildings were mostly covered in glass that did the same task of reflecting the light from other buildings.
The side walks were equally occupied with the movements of scanty people trying to get from one point to another. White floors, dark from the absence of daylight. The steady pitter patter of rain was a slight distraction to the slow mummering of constant movement.
Melmarc saw a bow with shoes he’d never seen before, not that he was some kind of master of shoes. The boy was a good head shorter than him and his hoodie was drenched to the point of dripping.
The tallest building held a television that displayed an old man with a fair skin that seemed to lean more towards a dark shade of orange than anything with a touch of blond hair, styled in a funny manner. He shook hands with a taller more stoic looking man who looked as if he would rather be anywhere but on television. According to what Melmarc was seeing, the Player was named Norman.
According to the information scribbled beneath them, one had been a former president of the United States—most likely the short man—and the other was a Player.
Despite Veebee claiming that this was Earth, two pieces of information told Melmarc that it was not. The first was the fact that Melmarc knew his presidents of his country, all of them, from the first to every be elected to the current one. Two, the word ‘Player’ was not of Earth.
It meant one of two things: Veebee was either lying, or there was something he wasn’t getting.
Melmarc had a feeling it was the latter.
“Earth,” he said in a small voice.
Still hovering beside him, Veebee nodded.
Melmarc looked around once more. On the other side of the road, just opposite where he was standing, was a food truck. Its lights were still on, and a corpulent man stood within. He looked bored out of his mind, resting his elbow on the counter and propping his face up in his hand.
“A different Earth,” Melmarc tried, believing he was correct.
Veebee nodded very enthusiastically.
Melmarc’s hair was wet now, drenched. The rain had soaked his clothes in the short minutes he’d been standing under it. Still, he wasn’t cold. He felt a night breeze, but it battered against his body like a summer breeze.
He would’ve assumed this world’s air wasn’t cold if not for the people moving around. They all seemed to shiver slightly. Especially those that were drenched like him.
Melmarc’s hand came up to rub his hair back, push some out of his face and he paused. He looked at his hand and frowned. Something was different. But whatever was different wasn’t necessarily his hand. His hand just happened to play a part in it.
His brows furrowed in thought, and he turned his arm one way, then the other. Nothing seemed different. Nothing seemed—
Did I get bigger?
Muscular would not be his word of choice but his entire arm was definitely larger than it had been a few moments ago. Curious at how much larger he was, he inhaled deeply. By the time he was done breathing in, the shirt he was wearing was beginning to feel a little bit tighter than he knew it should.
He had gotten bigger. A touch of worry slipped through his mind. If I keep growing like this, I might end up looking like a stereotypical tank.
Ending up being large was not a worry to him. In fact, he’d already come to terms with the fact that he was going to end up on the larger size when he got older ever since his growth spurt. But that was supposed to be when he was like thirty years old. Not sixteen.
Ignoring his worry, he wiped his hair from his face as he’d intended. “Why are we here, Veebee?” he asked.
Veebee turned its head one way, then the other before pointing at the massive screen. “We are here to meet him.”
Melmarc looked back up at the screen. “So let me get this straight. This is another Earth. One with different people from the one I’m from.”
“Correct,” Veebee confirmed.
“And I’m here to meet a Player. A person known from my world as an Intruder?”
“Also correct.”
“Because?”
Veebee looked at him, confused. “Because you said you wanted to know what an [August Intruder] is.”
“So he’s an [August Intruder]?”
Veebee shook its head. “No, he is Sentient.” It scratched its jaw in a very human-like manner. “Could be Sapient one day… maybe. But not [August Intruder].”
It was a bit strange being able to hear Veebee so easily over the sound of the rain. It wasn’t even raising its voice in anyway.
“What’s that even about?” Melmarc asked. “Sentient and Sapient.”
Veebee gave him an odd look. “You don’t know what they mean?”
“Where I come from, they are similar to each other,” Melmarc said.
“How?” Veebee asked.
“Sentient simply means to be able to feel things, like emotions. Sapient is just a logical and intelligent version of that. Like, I’m sapient while a pet is sentient.”
“Oh.” Veebee developed a line for a mouth just so it could scrunch it up in thought.
Melmarc was getting used to its many forms of pretend expressions. He knew why it liked to talk and sound the way it did, now he was curious as to why it was going out of its way to mimic human expressions when it didn’t have to.
“Veebee thinks it’s similar,” it said finally.
“Similar but not the same,” Melmarc pointed out. “So what’s—”
<<Hey! Dude, are you okay?>>
Melmarc turned at the sound of the voice. He was met with the sight of a man maybe in his thirties approaching him. The man was only soaked at the feet, an umbrella held above his head doing its best to keep the rain from the rest of him.
<<You look lost,>> the man said. <<You shouldn’t be out on your own in the rain so late. You could catch a cold—>> the man stopped in his tracks, worry danced across his heavily bearded face. <<Is that blood>>
Melmarc hesitated before looking down at his side where he’d been cut by Caldath’s spear. The reason for his hesitation was the man. While he was dry, apart from the umbrella in his hand, he was very clearly homeless. He had too many clothes on. He looked like he was supposed to smell funny, though Melmarc didn’t smell anything. His wet shoes, on closer inspection, were torn and haggard, and his beard was the poster child for the word ‘unkempt.’
The man hurried forward. <<We should get you looked at. There’s a shelter just up ahead. What shelter did you come from?>>
Shelter? Melmarc finally looked down at his injury.
It was funny how he’d completely forgotten all about it. It was still bloody, and while it hadn’t healed, it wasn’t bleeding anymore. It was simply covered in its initial blood.
Moving his leg gently, he confirmed that the injury in his thigh was also still very painful. He also confirmed that it wasn’t still bleeding.
He raised his hand in front of him, stared at the hole Caldath’s spear had made. Still there.
But like his other injuries, it wasn’t bleeding anymore. There was still a hole he could see through, though. He hadn’t thought about it before but now that he was thinking about it, it was going to be a problem.
I’ll need a good Healer, or I’ve got to be wearing gloves from now on. He sighed. And I’m still just sixteen.
The man had stopped approaching him again.
<<Are you alright?>> he asked. <<Did you hit your head or something?>> he stepped closer, raised the umbrella so that it protected Melmarc too.
<<You’ve got blood on your neck,>> he added, reaching up to look at it. <<Did you hit your head? Tell me you remember your name.>>
With tattered boots and pants and a ripped-up shirt, Melmarc had a very strong feeling he struck the perfect image of someone homeless, too.
“I’m fine, sir,” he answered, taking a step back, unsure of how exactly to react here.
To the side, Veebee looked uncharacteristically unbothered. It simply watched the exchange, a curious expression on its face. Melmarc wasn’t sure if it was curious about the man or his interaction with the man.
<<We need to get you to a shelter,>> the man continued. <<Get you medical assistance. We have a doctor at the one I stay at. He’s a bit of a quack but he helps.>>
Melmarc continued staring at the man. He watched him go through the taxing task of worrying over him with his free hand while the hand with the umbrella remained raised to its highest to make sure the umbrella stayed above Melmarc’s head. It placed the umbrella a little too high for the man himself and the rain was already beginning to get on him.
For the first time in Melmarc’s life he looked down at a grown man on found himself with a simple thought.
He’s so small.
He looked down at his hand while the man kept his attention on him. If the man wasn’t Gifted, Melmarc could crush him if he didn’t handle him carefully. It dawned on him now that he truly had become powerful. He’d known this already, but he’d never truly appreciated just how powerful.
He was now powerful enough for his mistakes to cost a person their life.
It already cost Claire hers.
The man seized up all of a sudden. He stood still, like a statue, eyes empty.
Melmarc gave him a curious look before taking a cautious step away from him.
“Veebee,” he said, not taking his eyes off the man. “Is this normal on this Earth?”
It was still weird to be fully aware that there were more than one Earths. Then again, his father had told him something similar once upon a time. When he’d still been in the hospital, healing from the attack to his home as a child.
“No,” Veebee answered, coming to hover next to him. “I stopped him, but only for a moment.”
“Is that safe?” Melmarc waved a hand in front of the man. The man remained unresponsive.
“Very safe. Veebee promises.”
“Then why didn’t you do it before now?”
Veebee shrugged. “Veebee curious. Veebee want to see what kind of Sapient you are. If you care for Sentients that are not friend or not.”
Melmarc gave it a pointed look. “Why?”
“So Veebee know if Veebee care for random Sentients or not,” Veebee said as if it was the most logical answer there was.
Melmarc wasn’t sure how to feel about that.
“If Veebee follow Melmarc,” Veebee continued. “Veebee have to be on best behavior. Is only right. Is honorable thing to do.”
Honorable, Melmarc thought. Not so long ago he had been called ‘One without honor’ by a creature he deemed without honor as well.
“And what if I hadn’t cared?” Melmarc asked.
Veebee tilted its head to the side. This time, the action looked a bit ominous. “Then Veebee not care. Not like Veebee care now.”
Unwilling to attend to that, Melmarc changed the subject.
“How do we get to the man in the screen?” he asked, while the homeless man stood motionless in front of him, hand held high with an umbrella while the rain pelted him.
“We not go far.” Veebee pointed at another tall building in the distance. “We go there. Player on roof.”
Melmarc walked around the man in front of him, paused, looked at him. “You’re sure he’s going to be alright?”
Veebee nodded. “Very.”
Melmarc didn’t feel comfortable leaving the man out here just standing in the rain.
“What happens if I pick him up?” he asked.
“Nothing happen.”
So Melmarc picked him up. He raised him from under the arms as if picking up an overactive child and began moving him. The man was as light as he was small.
Only then did Melmarc realize that the street had grown significantly empty. He could only see maybe a handful of people around. They gave him odd looks as he moved with the man. But no one approached him.
They are treating us like homeless people.
Even back home, you didn’t get involved in the things homeless people did. If you saw two homeless people fighting, most people just left them alone, giving them a wider berth than usual.
Melmarc wasn’t sure how to feel about being viewed as homeless.
He walked the man all the way to a corner where a building had a shade—it was a closed store, or at least he thought so—and dropped the man under the shade there.
Done, he turned back to the road. At this point he could only see one person. She was on the other side of the road and staggered as if she was drunk.
More interesting than her was Veebee. Melmarc caught it looking around as if it was a tourist.
“Everything okay, Veebee?” he asked, slightly worried and amused.
“Everything fine,” Veebee said, turning back to him. “Veebee just never been to sentient world before… or any world.”
That was surprising.
“But you brought us here,” Melmarc pointed out. “And you know where everything is.”
“Veebee mean proper world not broken world.” Veebee stood in the air, but something about the way it stood made it seem in a hurry.
“Which way did you say we were going?” Melmarc asked.
When Veebee pointed at the building once more, Melmarc started walking under the rain. Veebee was more than happy to move with him.
“So, what did you mean by broken world?” Melmarc asked.
“World that not have apocalyptic event,” it answered. “Or world that survive apocalyptic event.”
Curious, Melmarc asked, “Where does my world fall?”
“Not have apocalyptic event,” Veebee answered without missing a beat.
“And this one?”
Veebee looked around. “This one have big event, terrible event. Destroy two countries and one continent. But not apocalyptic event. They also not have apocalyptic event.”
An event that destroys two countries and one continent sounded like an apocalyptic event to Melmarc, though.
Still, the world looked fine.
“When did they experience it?” he asked. “Is there a way to tell?”
“Mana in air can tell.” Veebee fell quiet for a second before speaking again. “Twelve years ago.”
“What happened?”
“They got portal. First portal. Big portal.”
Melmarc winced at that. “What rank?”
“Rank?” Veebee paused. “Oh. Rank. Your world use rank. This world use category. With rank it is S-rank.”
Melmarc was surprised. It sounded bad but not bad enough to have caused such damage. Not even if it had turned into a Chaos Run.
“Why didn’t anyone close it?” he asked. “I’m sure someone could’ve handled it.”
Veebee shook its head. “They not have anyone to handle it. First portal is first wound to world.”
Melmarc didn’t understand.
“They not close portal on time so portal evolve.” Veebee made a vague gesture with its hand as if looking for a word. “It became Chaos Run. Always like this with small world. So when portal—”
“Veebee,” Melmarc interrupted.
“Yes.”
“Can we use normal speech for this one?” he requested. “I really want to understand what happened.”
“Can I go back to talking like this when I’m done?”
“Yes. But why?”
Veebee shrugged. “I like it. It rolls off the tongue.”
It certainly did not roll off the tongue as far as Melmarc was concerned but he didn’t point that out.
“So what happened with the Chaos run?” he said, instead. “Why didn’t they stop it on time?”
“Because their weapons weren’t strong enough,” Veebee answered as they crossed a road, drawing closer to the building. “So it took them time to get strong.”
“Even with their S-rank Del—Players?”
“They didn’t have Players at the time,” Veebee explained. “This world did not have mana. It was barren of mana, barely sentient.”
Melmarc’s thoughts froze. The realizing was a terrifying one. An S-rank portal appearing in a world without Gifted. That was terrifying. More terrifying was an S-rank Chaos Run that would come from it.
It would’ve been a terrible massacre.
“How did they survive?” he asked, because they looked like they hadn’t ever gone through such a terror.
“They eventually got their Awakened. Here they call what you call Delvers Players and what you call Gifted Awakened,” Veebee explained. “So they got their first Awakened who started fighting back with their skills and their weapons. It helped stall the destruction enough for more people to Awaken. In the end, they avoided destruction. The continent and countries are still destroyed, with monsters and lesser things running around. They sometimes use them to train new Awakened.”
“And all this happened twelve years ago?” Melmarc asked.
“Twelve years ago.” Veebee nodded.
“And when did they start getting their Gif—Awakened?”
“Twelve years ago.”
Melmarc had another question to ask. He knew the answer but just needed to confirm it. “Did the portal give them powers.”
“Not at all,” Veebee answered. “A portal is like an injury. A Chaos Run is what happens when the injury starts getting infected. The Portal didn’t give them powers, the Chaos Run did.”
That was a very worrying thought. It meant that the Chaos Run had been inevitable. The destruction and mayhem had been certain.
“Veebee,” Melmarc said, the very word slow. “How did my world get Gifted?”
“Too many years ago your world got a portal that became a Chaos Run and you got your Gifted.”
That existed very differently from what they were taught on Earth. Back home they were taught that there had always been Gifted, that the Gifted existed even before the first portals. That the Delvers were called Delvers because of the first Gifted to ever go into a portal.
This was a lot to take in.
“But your world has done very well ever since,” Veebee said, as if trying to reassure him. “And look, they’ve made their first Sapient being and [August Intruder].”
They were closer to the building now. Maybe two roads away.
Melmarc shook away the concern that they had not only been carrying the wrong information over the generations in his world but that there was a chance that someone had been doing it intentionally.
“That brings us back to what the difference between a sentient and sapient being is,” he said.
“That one’s easy. A sentient being is something with a high level of self-awareness and possesses a chance of being able to harness mana. Ultimately, they belong to their world and are bound by its laws. Their world protects them and in return to work for it. Without their world, they cannot be unless under the protection of another world.”
“And a Sapient being?”
“They are beings that exist outside those rules,” Veebee explained. “They are protected by their world but are not bound to it. They can exist independent of their world and can exist in any world under less demanding circumstances. In summary, a sentient being solidifies its presence by the existence of its world and a sapient being solidifies its existence by establishing its presence in its world.”
“So what’s the difference between a sapient being and an [August Intruder]?” Melmarc asked.
“The [August Intruder] is the representative of their world,” Veebee said. “Not because they are of the world, but because they, by themselves, have gained the innate ability to exist on their own. Think of it like this. The world keeps the sentient alive, the sapient know how to keep themselves alive in the world. And the [August Intruder] has solidified its existence in existence itself. The [August Intruder] is one of the few beings that are capable of telling the world move and it will move.”
That sounded like a very important position to play.
“And once an [August Intruder] establishes their presence, existence itself becomes aware of their world and that brings its attention to more terrifying things.”
“Doesn’t that mean it would be better for a world to not have an [August Intruder]?”
Veebee shook its head. “No. A world has better protection against Intruders and stands a better chance of surviving its apocalyptic event if it has an [August Intruder]. It also reduces the number of injuries it has and prolongs how long it takes for a Chaos run to appear. Still…” It gave it a thought. “An [August Intruder] also speeds up the arrival of the apocalypse. But the world at least gets updated about the apocalypse long before it comes. So that should be a good thing.”
It sounded less like a good thing and more like a silver lining in a very stormy cloud.
Melmarc wasn’t sure he was ready for more. But it felt important to know more.
“And how is all of it supposed to work?” he asked, adjusting his shirt around the collar, this place gave him that odd feeling, as if his shirt wasn’t worn properly. He didn’t like it.
“I can’t say more than that for now,” it answered. “What I can say is that you’ll have to meet all your Oaths if you want your world to be perfectly ready. If you can go off world and secure the help of another powerful sapient being, that would even be better.” It turned thoughtful again. “Maybe the [August Intruder] of a world that survived its apocalypse. Maybe a [Demon King], although those are among the rarest sapient beings, and are just not very nice in general. But that could help. I’ll also help when I get designated to you.”
Ark crossed Melamarc’s mind. I guess I won’t be alone in this.
They came to a slow stop in front of the building. The lights were currently off, the streets quiet.
Another thought came to Melmarc’s mind. “Why haven’t you ever been able to come here on your own before? You said you’ve never been to these worlds before.”
“Because I’m invincible inside the path between worlds,” it answered. “But to make these trips, I need a sapient being. I never had one. At least not one that was a friend.”
Melmarc nodded. He had more questions, but he kept those aside for now. He had a player to meet, after all.
“So, what happens when we meet this Player?” he asked. “Is he supposed to be like an ally or something?”
“Nope,” Veebee answered. “From what I’ve noticed, it has the closest mana signature to yours, which makes it arguably the biggest threat to you.”
“Oh.” Melmarc was nervous… and excited. “And does he know I’m coming?”
“Nope.”
Melmarc’s brows furrowed in suspicion. “Veebee.”
“Yes?”
“What are we about to do?”
“Nothing outlandish,” it answered casually. “You’re just going to kill it and drink its blood.”
Comments
Signspace
Is this gonna be the hero that caught his Mum? The one who he got his skill from?
Con
“Maybe a [Demon King]” hmmm, I wonder how we could possibly find one of those
Zero
Uhhhhh, VeeBee that is quite outlandish for Mel here he is still a baby. A muscular superhero with mana blasts but still baby. Thanks for the chapter
Adam Davies
Nothing outlandish at all…… :)
Dual.
wonderful kill it and drink its blood, nothing too out there, of course
Mr. Iron
Vampire Marc!
