"Lord who-what-now?"
"Cough… I said It's called 'Lord Strontium's Ambassador'!"
Queenie didn't know why, but it seemed to take a lot out of her to repeat the name of her sigil as her face was flushed. Maybe because she thought it sounded kind of silly?
"Oh. That sounds… amazing," Ran shouted as he held onto her shoulders. Of course, this kind of behavior was expected, but it still surprised Queenie that someone would be so interested in it.
"Yeah well, it only sounds like that because you don't have the proper context."
Queenie couldn't help but try to justify her sigil's name even though it wasn't necessary. However, this shook Ran.
"There's more!?"
Excited, he sat criss-cross-applesauce on the snow as he waited for Queenie to continue. Who doesn't like storytime? His mother never read him any stories and his father… well, I mean the man tried, but whenever certain subjects came up, he would become really irritated and he would just leave midway through.
Though it had to be said that most stories that were told to children were usually ones of war, tribulation, and just overall kind of malicious. So basically, they were like old-timey stories, good morals hidden behind what were sometimes eldritch horrors that ended up haunting every child's dreams.
Now, Queenie felt another itch in her throat, urging her to cough, but she just continued unbothered.
"Okay, fine. It goes something like this:"
"'While Lord Strontium doesn't rank high among all the elemental gods, it's mostly due to his reclusive nature. Due to this nature though, his followers are some of the most fervent and loyal in the cosmos.'"
"'His ambassador, his strongest representative, is his right hand and as such, is granted a portion of Lord Strontium's power'… or so it says."
"T-that's it?"
"Uh… yes?"
"So cool." With his eyes shining, Ran grabbed a handful of snow and profoundly watched as it melted under his body heat.
"Then, doesn't this mean you have the power of a god," he asked as continued looking at the melting snow in his hand. Queenie was surprised by this question, mostly because she hadn't thought about it in that way. After all, she was still very weak right now.
"I suppose so. Why? Is it important?"
To their magical society, the concept of gods was archaic, and thus, even the word god had much less importance attached to it. At most, it would be used as an adjective to describe someone with incredible strength and or power.
Even Ran was unmoved by the language used to describe the origin of Queenie's sigil. But then, something felt off to him, and thoughts quickly spun through his head, making him skeptical.
He stopped gazing at the melting snow in his hand and looked towards Ann.
"How about you? Do you know your sigil's origin too?"
"Mhm."
"You too, Bob?"
"Yup."
Ran didn't know why, but he went a bit pale. He realized that he was the only one that, in fact, did not know the origin of his sigil. He didn't get anything more than a small description of its function.
Now, what was he supposed to do with this knowledge? Nothing, of course! How could he anyway? He could feel the mysteries surrounding him pile on and on and on… I mean, it's almost as if someone was doing it on purpose. To obfuscate the truth behind all that is.
Hmm… I wonder who it could be.
…
"Okay, Bob, are you ready?"
"Yes."
Currently, Bob was the only one left to demonstrate his soul avatar. And not only that, because of the abstract nature of his sigil, everyone was left anticipating what amazing thing will appear. And though they were a ways from him, they still encircled him, making Bob feel as if he was the center of the world, albeit only for a second.
This was only because the next second, he activated the skill, diverting all his attention away from his peers.
Indeed, according to everyone's anticipation and expectations, something spectacular did happen.
Under the group's gaze, Bob was suddenly surrounded by wisps of all sorts of colors — pretty much the whole color spectrum surrounded him.
The wisps grew individually by color until they formed protective, two meter tall, specters.
The specters were frail and androgynous in appearance. Their skinny and flexible figures wrapped around his body like layers of a blanket. Despite the specters each containing their own emotion and corresponding color, the overall feeling to Bob was merely warmth. It was as if he had gotten wrapped in a quilt his grandma had especially made for him, except for the fact that he never had such a quilt or such a grandmother.
Of course, to everyone else, the only important thing was how cool it looked; even their eyes glittered as they were amazed by the sight of the ghostly figures surrounding Bob.
"Hey, uh, Ann?"
"Yeah?"
"Can I… uh—"
"Sure."
After receiving consent from Ann, because of course that was very important, Bob finally made his move.
Without any prior warning, the Spector's all turned their incomplete faces towards Ann before rushing towards her with their arms held out. However, because the skill was based on emotions, much like illusions, their effect was practically instantaneous. Everything else was more of visual effects—basically Ann, or anybody else for that matter, would not be able to dodge this attack.
The specters, much like a stereotypical ghost, entered her body and tried to possess her, surrounding her in a fluctuating aura. And yet, much like everyone expected, the attack failed.
At most, she felt the specters pull on her consciousness in every direction from the different emotions, but they couldn't do much. At her level, the only thing this could do was maybe distract her for a second or two.
Despite this though, Ann felt quite surprised by Bob's skill. This was because compared to the rest's skills, including her own, Bob's was the only one that directly initiated a powerful attack.
In fact, from her current state, she extrapolated that if she was a rank lower, if she didn't counterattack his skill, her soul would be directly ripped apart! This was certainly a powerful trump card for Bob.
Of course, because of the direct nature of his skill, instead of a timer that everyone else's skills relied on, meaning they use a set amount of energy over a given time period, his skill directly sucked all his energy into this one move.
As such, feeling sapped of energy, he let out a gasp of air as he felt a small wave of fatigue wash over him.
"You okay," asked Ran as he helped Bob who was seemingly about to fall on his ass. He really was just tired, and he definitely didn't think it would take so much from him.
"Yeah… just a little—"
"Tired?"
"Yes."
He then put Bob down on a log and gave him some water as he appeared to be thirsty.
"Hey Bob?"
"Yes?"
"Out of curiosity, what is your sigil? You don't have to tell me if you don't want to?"
"No, it's fine. I trust you enough."
Considering his background, it was natural for Bob to be a bit reserved when talking about something personal. But the bond between Bob and Ran, and even the rest of the group, was already good and it will continue to grow as well for the foreseeable future. Well, it was
that and the fact that they already knew his sigil, so it didn't matter too much to include the rest.
"Alright. If you want to know it's name, it's called 'Emotionless Cry'."