Chapter 20: Oh, The Humanity

  The disastrous Starlight-Sun-Fire mix tore through everything and left no trace of anything that id in its path.

  Soon it faded, and the city could see again. I gasped, “Huff, haa, huff… Time to get the fuck out of here.” I grabbed my unresponsive left arm and pulled it close.

  With my mana being less than one percent, my body underwent a sudden weird change

  My hair stopped being crazy and calmed back down, and my antlers also retracted slightly into my head. I was surprised but honestly didn’t have time to have a look at my tiny horns.

  [Starlight Annihition] was my most powerful skill. Technically it was only a starlight-powered skill but by infusing other energy–fire and sun–it could be strengthened even further.

  However, the skill was also god awful for my body and soul, and this was the strongest version of the skill I ever fired. My left arm was a dishevelled mess, I’m gd I couldn’t see my internals and my soul ached.

  I could’ve been worse, I might have lost my arm if I didn’t have [Primal Guardian Lord] and [Unleashed Awakening]. But with my mana and starlight low and gone, I wouldn’t be able to chase after the st two Hood members who ran far away.

  Good news, the security equipment seemed completely fried, so I stole some clothes from a store. Just a rge jumper and baggy pants to hide everything.

  “Heal already.” I groaned. I stayed within the mall for a little longer, so my more serious wounds could heal.

  Then finally, I snuck out of the building, which was easy enough thanks to crowds of panicked and injured individuals and the ck of numbers in rescue personnel. Before I left, I deactivated [Unleashed Awakening] and the horns disappeared completely.

  I felt a wave of nausea flood through me and the regeneration weakened. I might have to reactivate the skill to heal everything.

  The healing factor provided by both skills wasn’t anything super special, but it was pretty darn good. I could heal organs, reattach arms, heal holes in the body, etc. But by no means was it perfect, it had limits. Unable to quickly regenerate multiple important organs at once and extremely bad at removing scars. I couldn’t recreate an arm, but I could fix a mostly damaged one with enough time.

  I found a building near the barrier with little surveilnce and rested in an alley with a decent view of the sky. My eyes stayed focused on the stars. I needed a tiny bit of starlight to recharge so I could break through the barrier again–without being caught…

  Then I looked up. I noticed it earlier but I was a little busy. The barrier was colpsing, [Starlight Annihition] did a number on it as well.

  It was disappearing from the top first–from the massive hole I made–slowly fading all away. I estimated it would take at least thirty minutes for the barrier to fade to ground level.

  It’s weak enough, I may be able to break through without [Disruptive Starlight].

  Soon loud sirens began to wail, and the response forces finally were able to get through the barrier.

  I should get out of here…

  I looked down at my hands and they looked alright… My left had a bit more life back into it, while my right hand’s fingers weren’t fused together anymore. Neither was perfect but I could buy some potions to deal with injuries on both, and time would fix the lifelessness of my left.

  Preparing to run home, I deactivated [Primal Guardian Lord] and looked at the stars for a little longer–to get a handle on my location.

  (“ Truly a fine night isn’t ”)

  Espoiramissa’s decration sent a shiver down my spine. All within a second I wondered if I accidentally didn’t deactivate the skill–I didn’t believe I was that stupid, but fear and worry are a powerful combination. After that stupid theory, I thought ‘maybe Espoiramissa forcibly activated the skill’, but I could feel it… neither skill was activated.

  “How are you speaking to me?” I asked in a cold angry voice.

  (“ I do have to say you did wonders. The amount of power required to kill the Malcroaza and its st words was staggering ”)

  I asked again, “How. Are. You. Speaking to me?”

  (“ Congratutions! You have passed level 110 for Primal Guardian Lord. So for now on I am able to speak with you without the skill being activated )

  I opened my unhidden soul page, and there was a lot to unpack but first, my thoughts darted to the bottom of the list.

  (“ Don’t worry I won’t talk too often ”)

  Name: Ceel Stel (Celestira Luxpoir) | Race: [Human?]Level 300 | AwakenedMana: 1% Starlight: 0%Vocation: [Stargazer]Skills:- Bzing Sor (VI | IV)- Starlight (V)- Gazing Upon The Stars- Disruptive Starlight- Star Mapping- Sleepless Nights- Fortified Stomach- Quiet StepBonded- Primal Guardian Lord [Lv 111]- Unleashed Awakening

  “Didn’t you say you were going to hold back the levelling?”(“ Which I did ”)

  I stayed silent.

  (“ Being ‘angry’ is fine, but don’t bme me. I’m only trying to help ”)

  I frowned.

  (“ However, if it makes you feel better, I do give you permission to throw your anger in my direction ”)

  Espr's giddy voice soured my frown even more.

  (“ Anyway don’t be upset, you’re just a step closer to your destiny. Besides that, you’re physically stronger and have achieved other boons ”)

  I snarked, “Yeah?” My thoughts went back to the top of the soul page, “Why the fuck does it say ‘Human?’ Why is there even a question mark!”

  (“ Please you know why, but look you managed to have your [Fire] reach tier VI. That’s a massive achievement ”)

  … I did a double-take and checked [Bzing Sor (VI | IV)]. As the skill was a combined form of [Fire] and [Sun], it provided some benefits rather than having them separate–mostly just saving soul space, but it does also make it easier to use combination skills between the two energies.

  The element energies ‘normally’ had tiers from I-X, one through ten. With each tier allowing for a greater deal of control. Allowing for more mana to be saved, more dangerous magic skills to be used and greater wide scale manipution.

  But tiers VI-X were the truly dangerous and powerful levels.

  However, levelling up the tiers was a notorious nightmare. Tier V was considered the normal cap, and that was even hard for many people to reach.

  You could count the number of people who had reached tier X on both hands.

  “I guess it's alright.” I was extremely happy.

  (“ Trying not to sound excited? I told you, you could have reached Tier VII or VIII with your talent and all the madness you caused on my surface if you stuck with one energy. ”)

  “Quiet now, I need to focus,” I told Espr to shut and thank fuck it did, I was tired and didn’t want to deal with them anymore.

  I didn’t know if my retionship with Espr could ever be positive without one of us losing first… without me losing first…

  Anyway, I had numerous things I needed to do.

  I wanted to stay by Mel’s side but it would be best if I went home to comfort mum. All Tel would have seen was multiple massive eruptions in the location where her daughters were.

  Okay, time to go home…

  I sneaked my way home, thankfully [Quiet Step] was basically nothing to use at the lowest level of power. The panic also made it easier for one person to move about without being stopped.

  I had hoped Tyell had made his way home… But when I finally reached the house, from the ck of noise from inside… I didn’t seem like it.

  I charged inside and reached the lounge room, “Mum I’m here!”

  “Ceel! Ceel!” Mum cried and ran towards me.

  “Are you okay!” Thank the stars she couldn’t see my injuries underneath the long-sleeved jumper, “You're alive right?! What about Mel, is she safe?! Please let her be safe.” The tears kept rolling.

  I spoke calmly, “Mel is alive.” Now was the hard part, “She is with medical staff, and she will keep living. But she is injured… badly. I know where she’s at, and we can visit once she stabilises.”

  “...O-okay.” Mother cried, “As long as she’s alive.”If things went on schedule, she should be taken to the hospital soon and we would get a call within a couple of hours and be able to visit tomorrow morning.

  With Mel’s safety conveyed I asked, “Has Tyell contacted you yet?”

  Mum’s face twisted, “All he said was ‘I’ll be home as soon as I can…’ But he hasn’t shown up yet.”

  Dammit bro. “Do you know where he works?” I asked.

  “Yes…” Mum answered, frowning with regret in her eyes. “It’s not in the best of pces… I should’ve made him quit long ago…”“It’s okay Mum.” I tried to comfort her but it seemed like something she had been dealing with for a while. Tel seemed okay, so I went outside again and found my phone in the grass. I picked it up and saw Tyell and… Beatrice had messaged me. Fuck it’s not the time…

  I added a talk with Beatrice to tomorrow’s list of things to do.

  I opened Tyell's messages, “‘Tyell is currently sick, he will be home tomorrow–his work friend’.” Argh, why can’t you make this easy? He might not even be at his work anymore.

  “Mum, Tyell seems alright.”Panicked mum asked, “Really?!”

  “I got a message, he will be here tomorrow…” I sighed.

  After that mess, I didn’t tell mum exactly what happened and asked her to keep it a secret that I went to help Mel–which she agreed. I kept the story simple, I went and broke through the barrier and rescued Mel from the mall.

  For the time being, I focused my efforts on recovering. Going to the backyard, I told mum I needed to rest, which she easily understood.

  Argh dammit, why did a Malcroaza have to appear?

  (“ I’ve been listening all this time. You would have be able to figure out what happened if you weren’t on the brink of exhaustion ”)

  Fine… I stopped being an arse and just listened and thought. I recalled the events of the night in my head.

  They wanted the sealed Malcroaza, or maybe something else from the buried museum… Why would anyone leave such a dangerous item there?

  (“ Irresponsible for sure, but truthfully not that dangerous. As long as the seal wasn’t damaged by certain skills, the Malcroaza would never have escaped. Their race is terrible at breaking out of magical seals ”)

  Sealed creatures, sealed in an artefact with a low chance of escape… They wanted the artefact the Malcroaza was sealed in... I knew of magical artefacts that were powered by sealing monsters within them, but they were also usually unreliable–too unreliable. But if the seal had a low chance of breaking, it made a powerful weapon or… what happened today, a bomb.

  So they partly failed, if they took the now creatureless artefact.

  (“ In that perspective yes, but didn’t they have another mission? ”)

  Huh? I thought back again, ‘Objective A1 comple–’. “They also had an assassination target.”

  It was the te afternoon of the next day and across the city, the news channel began its official report on yesterday's events.

  “Yesterday night an unknown organised terrorist attack occurred at Helious Mall.

  Reports state at least three thousand individuals are dead, and there a further thirty thousand individuals are in an injured state of varying degrees. This is excluding the victims of the sudden dramatic heat rise which has hospitalised another fifty thousand, but these people are in a state of near guaranteed recovery.

  The band Bzers, which was performing, after the initial incident, intercepted the terrorist, but one member of the band, their leader–Aluber Songfield has been confirmed dead. With two more members in a state of unconscious–”

  One person was watching the news in the small room, with a red couch and widescreen tv.

  Another person walked in through the door, “Aluber, Jordan is awake.”“Finally, took him long enough.” Aluber followed his friend into the room next door. Turning the tv off in the process. The tv in their private medical room was also dispying the news.

  “Afternoon Jordan,” Aluber welcomed his friend back.

  “Arg–Morning? Afternoon, argh. My head is fucked.” Jordan groaned as he leaned up, “What did I miss?”

  Aluber said, “We were saved and Boss is dead.” After the explosion of fire, Aluber and Jordan were knocked out, and Jordan received intense burns.

  Jordan yelled, “Fucking dammit! That idiot, why did we listen to his pn.”

  “Cause we were scared,” Susan replied sadly.

  The band Bzers consisted of Aluber, Susan, Boss and Jordan. Boss, however, was known as Alex, even on most important documents, but in the band, they referred to him by his original name.

  Aluber had an attempt on his life seven months ago and ever since then, they tried their best to up security. But that wasn’t enough for Boss, who considered Aluber his best friend.

  Not only that, they got information that the group who was after him was able to kill one of the level 400s. The highest level in record history was 632. But currently, only twenty people were above level 400, which was only because their lifespan had greatly increased.

  Whoever was after him had the capability to kill people in the upper echelon of power.

  “What are we going to do now,” Jordan asked.

  Aluber growled, “Payback.”

  “Are you sure you want it to be decred that you’re dead though?” Susan asked, “It’s an absolute pain to be cssified alive after the fact.”

  “Yes I’m sure, they were there to kill me so it’s best if they think I’m dead.” Aluber replied, “I’m not letting Boss’s sacrifice be in vain.”

  Boss’s Vocation had been secret for the longest time, thanks to his skill making it possible to hide it.

  The Vocation [Copycat], and his skills allowed Boss to copy parts or the entire soul page of other individuals, and copy their appearance. However, copying other people’s soul pages didn’t give him their skills, but he did have one skill which let him copy one skill from someone he was already copying.

  Using these skills he could pretend to be Aluber–while Aluber wore an item to disguise himself–and with his name being Boss, no one would think he wasn’t Aluber if one of the band members called their ‘leader’ Boss by accident.

  Susan smiled, “Okay then, what’s our first step.”

  Abuler announced, “We need to figure out who our enemies are. ‘Course we have some clues, but we need to confirm them. Then we need some allies.”

  On the news which had been continuing throughout this entire exchange.

  “Through confirmed reports, an individual named Celestira had saved multiple individuals from the fire and fought against the terrorist group–”

  Susan mumbled, “The human monster's name was Celestira, huh?” It was she who confirmed Celestira appeared in the concert arena, but she didn’t know her name. Susan didn’t stay around for long, the moment Boss died she ran carrying Aluber and Jordan out of the building, due to finally having a distraction–no matter how much it hurt her to leave Boss’s body.

  Aluber pointed at the tv, “And I have an idea that might help both our objectives.”

  Arc 1: Reunion--Fmes Of Family (End)

  Bobple

  Arc 1: Reunion--Fmes Of Family. My first ever completed and posted arc of a story. 28 chapters long, over 40000 words... Honestly I still can't believe I did it.

  …I thought about going in depth about what led me to writing this story, buttt. I’m just going to stick to talking about just this story. Also here is the only mention of grammar in the afterword! I need to improve.

  But real quick inspirations. Pretty much every modern/slightly in the future story with dungeons. Fun to think to about how those stories go after the camity is fixed. Some monster evo stories, and just some other really good stories I read.

  Overall I’m happy with how arc 1 turned out. Could some things been better in certain areas of course! But the pacing and plot I’m mostly happy with.

  Now characters! Ceel has changed slightly from how I originally envisioned her. Still a little insane, completely hostility/fear to death, and average-maybe above-smarts. But I feel like the insanity has been dialled a little back, eg. First chapter she said shit like–

  ‘Which partly surprised me. Slightly tiny insignificant violent thoughts? Been having those for years. But having these thoughts on another human? I know I hadn’t interacted with any in a long time but…I mean yeah, thinking about how to get revenge and crush the bastards on my TBEB (To Be Exterminated Brutally) list happened occasionally.

  Well, I wasn’t acting on these thoughts. So everything was fine.’& ‘But of course! I never let it show on my face, what sat before the three officers was a stone-cold refined woman.’

  But current Ceel is definitely less likely to act like that.I did reference this again, because of this thought.‘My first time killing a human. Didn’t feel much different than killing a monster. Wasn’t sure if that was due to it being a Dominous Hood member, or I’d lost my regard for human life. Honestly, at the moment, I didn’t care.’

  But she still has been doing some crazy/insane actions soooo, it's still there. I’ve decided to see it as Ceel had some normal points added to her due to interacting with her family. Which might fade away when off on her own again. Her family in way bring her back to her younger self, even though she still acts differently.Besides that. I’ve enjoyed writing Ceel.The only other issue, I did have was that I wanted her to interact with other people, which will be happening more next arc as she deals with well more people. But speaking of people–well not a person! Espoiramissa / Espr.

  Ceel’s best friend!!! Is a character I had been waiting to introduce, but I didn’t want to put them into the story right away. As that would interfere with the initial half of the arc plot of Ceel being home and regaining her family.

  Anyway with Espr fully online now, expect it to appear more often, but not too often. It only really likes to talk when its "right".

  Now the Stel family.Tel I was initially not happy with, but the st half did help me like her a lot more. SCM 3, also shows Ceel did get some of her violence from her mum.Tyell… is difficult to talk about. But I did like what happened, with his character-an uneasy but still loving retionship with his family, and then a fuck up.

  Mel, nothing bad for me to say. I like what I did for her. It did help that she was the first family member Ceel spent time with, which helped with her development.

  Like I said a while ago. I thought about the possibility of one or even two of the family dying in this arc. Thinking long and hard about every possible way the story could develop. What each surviving character would do… but didn’t do that. Honestly saying I thought about the possibility is incorrect, I had pnned for at least one of them to die. But changed my mind long before I actually started writing.

  Tyell and Mel will get some more development… Cause yeah. There family of the mc.

  Also it might seem weird I’m saving the confrontation of Tyell and Ceel for the next arc, but I have multiple reasons for that! Which I won’t get to all here. But the climax of Tyell arc in this arc was realising what he was doing was wrong (pretty simple I know), and that it would eventually (now) harm the people he cares about most. Which just happened, in the nearly the worst way possible.

  Also yeah, if I haven't made this clear enough Mel is alive, if I was going to kill her off, she would be very clearly dead. Not that I don't mind having a character fate being ambiguous, but because I've mentioned this multiple times about my thoughts of killing one of them off, figured I would make it extra clear in this afterword.

  Besides characters I did wish I made the sci-fi elements more sci-fi? In some areas, but Metous was pnned to be a more down to earth, simir to just a more advanced current earth tech. But next arc we will be going off pnet again… to a different pnet! I wonder which one.

  Also arc name. Reunion, cause family reunion, make sense.Fmes, cause one Ceel main things is fire. Tyell prophecy.Family, I don’t think I have to expin this one.And Fmes Of Family, cause Mel had her arm and legs party burnt away (they were also squashed but yeah). And family warmth, the families connected hearts. The passing down of the fme, due to the dad passing.Multiple different reasons, but the question is. How many did I just make up on the spot for this afterword?

  Besides that I think I’m going to end it here (I have more things to talk about, but I should stop). I might talk about some of the things I didn’t talk about here in the start of the next arc’s chapter. But beside that. Everyone have a good day/night.

  [colpse]I hope you enjoyed the afterword, now if your curious if I have any future pns besides The Stargazing Witch & The Dungeon Pnet.

  SpoilerYes! But it won't effect Stargazing Witch schedule.

  [colpse]