After taking advantage of his empty surroundings to get some thinking done, Fen followed Orphinia to make sure she made it back to the new Squad room before choosing to walk around the facility for a bit. His mind needed a break away from everything, but he couldn't think of anything that might distract him. For once, he didn't feel like training.
His body craved for rest but he couldn't bring himself to step inside the Squad room and come face to face with Amelia right now- the both of them needed some time alone to grieve. During that time, Fen hoped that she'd realize how much they needed each other, especially right now that Qin and Gray were-
Crack!
Blinking, Fen pulled out his fist from the wall and forcibly relaxed his quivering muscles. "...I still can't believe they're gone."
His mind had long since accepted it as fact but apparently, his body hadn't. Amelia was his only link to Earth right now, the person in this whole damned dimension who knew him most, even if they didn't completely understand each other.
Before he realized it, Fen let his body take him through the long and dark facility corridors while his mind stirred various grieving thoughts around his brain. When he refocused on his surroundings he found himself standing inside the Common Grounds, the scent of nature permeating the air around him while his bare feet were wiggling in the grass beneath him.
The ginormous room was much more empty than usual- probably because all the Opfer were still recovering from the aftereffects of the Archon's announcements. If he thought about it in that sense, then... in other words, the whole room was all for him.
Without letting his mind get the chance to think about anything else, Fen immediately started to walk absently in the grass- though he questioned whether intentionally walking absently still counted as absently or not- and tried to relax his bubbling frustrations.
He decided to not think any more about it and instead settled on his back to watch the Void in the sky.
His body was much more sensitive to external stimulus thanks to his completed transformation, and the sensation of grass against his muscled back was great even with his uniform on. It was like laying on a carpet that gently massaged his tense muscles while it caressed his other senses at the same time with nature-y noises and smells.
Time passed quickly while his body relaxed. The artificial sunlight beaming against his skin warmed him up, and a few Mana constructs resembling animals back on Earth wandered close to him, sometimes even nudging their heads or bodies against him. Because all the Opfer were still in their rooms recovering from the earlier announcements, the Mana constructs had nobody to interact with. Maybe they were lonely or were programmed to search for intelligent life, but they all started to crowd around him causing this scene of a single person being surrounded by so many blue animals.
But before he could completely give in to relaxation, Fen felt the presence of a second person near him. He opened his eyes and turned his head to see Amelia, who seemed just as surprised as he was to see him.
Fen raised himself from the ground and said, "Oh. I'll just go-"
"Stay."
The firmness in her voice urged him to stay, and so he did.
His eyes flickered at the resolve in her words before watching her carefully step over all the Mana constructs around him.
"It's pretty comfortable here," She said, watching Fen's reaction out of the corner of her green eyes. She didn't know how he'd react to her presence after all the things she said earlier and wanted to apologize, but she didn't know how to even begin that conversation.
She looked around the area and asked, "Isn't this the place we went to the first time we came here?"
Fen looked around for a moment before the memory came to mind. He nodded, "I guess it is. I thought it felt a little familiar."
She didn't say anything after he talked, and so an uncomfortable air hung around the two of them. It was so quiet that if she focused a little, she thought she could hear the soft sound of his breathing, but that tiny bit of knowledge made her feel all that more awkward. Having enhanced senses thanks to Mana was a gift, but in times like this, it felt like a curse.
After enduring the silence for a few seconds, she decided it'd be a lot easier if she just brought it up herself rather than waiting for a chance to talk, "Listen, about what I said earlier. I thought about it and... you're right."
The stress built up inside her hissed out with her breath, and she raised her hand to her face to swipe away at the red hair tangling down her eyes. "Orphinia, the girl from earlier, she told me how everyone was looking at us, like killing us would've been worth it or something- and to be honest, I didn't even notice it. I was too focused on what you did to that Chosen, how scary you were and how his blood didn't even affect you."
"I never saw that part of you before." She turned on her side to face him, realizing that Fen was already facing her with his dark eyes. For some reason, the image of his expression as he impaled the Chosen during the announcements came to mind and she finally noticed how different he looked when he wasn't fighting.
The suffocating viciousness that made the very air around him sink wasn't there, giving way to the loneliness that she didn't even know existed.
There was no trace of coldness in the dark of his eyes when they talked anymore, not like at the beginning of the Program when Fen lashed out at everything and anything. The anger he held against the Program was directed solely at the Program now.
Right now, he didn't look scary. He looked like somebody she'd find on Earth if she walked around a shopping mall for a while, maybe accompanied by his sister that he sometimes talked about.
'What happened to you, for you to not even hesitate in doing something like that?' Amelia thought, her heart panging from the idea of what it took to make someone do that.
After she finished speaking, Amelia finally realizing how close the two of them were.
A small red flush appeared on her cheeks before she pushed on with her words, saying, "I only saw you train like a demon was possessing you, and how you constantly threw yourself at the Scenarios to fight. I never really thought about 'why' you did so much, but then I remembered something that you told us- Qin, Gray, and me."
Fen finally opened his mouth to talk, "Are you talking about when I said I killed someone at the beginning?"
She nodded flipped her body around so she lay on her stomach and look at him, crossing her arms underneath her face like a pillow. His eyebrows twitched at the patient look in her green eyes, expecting him to start talking now and give his own explanation.
He took a deep breath before going into telling her everything that happened since the beginning of the Program.
He told her about Malique, the young college student who just wanted to survive like him. He told her about the cold feeling of his skin after Fen choked the life out of him. He told her about the grayness of his eyes, which were so full of life, and how they used to haunt him before the nightmares just... stopped. For some reason, he stopped regretting his actions and instead focused on growing stronger to survive.
He told her about what he felt at the beginning of the Program, and how he just wanted to live because he didn't want his family to see him like how he saw Malique- cold and lifeless. The idea that they'd see him like that terrified him, but just like with what happened with his regret at killing Malique, his fears lessened until they just disappeared.
He stopped talking then, but his mind continued to think about how he saw Death later in the Program after experiencing another person's memory. When he faced such a colossal being, he didn't feel much of anything. If he had to describe it, the only thing he felt was confusion from the things it told him rather than the experience of meeting such a being itself.
"The whole point of me gaining strength was just so I could go home and survive, nothing more, nothing less. But after spending so much time with the three of you, I wanted more. I wanted to gain the strength to protect all of you." Fen's eyes closed and shut out the world around him. "I failed, Amelia. I couldn't keep them safe. Even if I had to choose who to go to first, I should've been able to protect all of you."
Amelia touched his face with her hand, trying her best to look Fen in the eyes while his eyes opened up and looked only at the ground. The warm sensation of her palm against his skin reminded him he wasn't alone, but her warmth also reminded him of the happiness in Gray's voice when he laughed, or the way Qin struggled to crack jokes even after they all got to know each other.
"It wasn't your fault. You're not a God. You're a seventeen-year-old who's trying to do everything without taking a moment to realize how much they've already done."
She pulled on his face and finally forced his eyes to look at her. "Look at me Fen. If you didn't come to me then I would've died no matter what. I am alive- laying down right next to you- because of you."
"Can't you be happy that you at least managed to save me?" She smiled.
Fen reached up and took her hand into his before rolling onto his back, staring at the ceiling of the facility with a blank stare. Amelia looked at him before sighing and moving herself a little closer, still holding his hand.
He said, "When the Archon gave me the offer to gain even more strength, the only thing I could think of was Qin and Gray's faces. They're why I became a Principality. To gain the power to keep you alive even if I couldn't do the same with them."
"Then so far you're doing an okay job," she chuckled. "As you can see, my head's still on my body. So there, bare minimum, you can check that off!"
She stopped giggling after Fen flicked her with a sliver of Vital energy.
"Can I ask you for a favor?" He asked, watching as Amelia blinked in surprise at the unexpected nervousness in his voice. For one, Fen rarely ever let his emotions into his expression, much less his voice, and secondly, she didn't really have much to offer him for a favor.
"Sure." She propped herself up and listened carefully.
"Don't hate me."
"...What?"
"Being a Principality is everything that you think it is, and worse. I don't have a choice but to nearly kill a quota of Opfer every day just to maintain my authority. And if I don't, the Archon will use you to punish me."
His words made a frown appear on her face, twisting her expression as she realized another reason why Fen accepted Ellora's offer. "So she's using me to control you? Heavens, I hate being this weak that people can just use me like this..."
"It's not your fault. If it wasn't you, I'm sure she'd find some other way to control me." He chuckled bitterly. "Not sure if you've noticed, but I'm her strongest Opfer; there's not really a whole lot of options for Principalities. I couldn't say no. But... you didn't agree to my favor."
"Fen, what kind of dumbass are you? I saw what you did to that guy in the amphitheater earlier, and does it look like I hate you?" She swiped at him with a fireball that she manifested in her hand, scoffing after noticing Fen's nonexistent reaction to her magic. "...I'm gonna get stronger just so I can kick your ass."
Fen laughed, startling both Amelia and himself from his sudden outburst. "I guess you're right, it was just a stupid thing to ask. Alright, get off your ass. We need to sleep and I'm too tired to hear your voice anymore."
He helped her up, dodging her slow punch with an annoying smirk on his face. After sensing the amount of magical energy surging towards his Squadmate, however, his expression morphed into one of horror.
The Mana constructs that surrounded them broke into a run far away from the myriad of fire spellworks chasing a certain youth dressed in a black and silver uniform, and the enraged girl with hair a similar color as the fire around her stomping after him.
Before the durability of his body against magical spellworks could be tested, Fen sprinted out the Common Grounds to escape his pissed-off Squadmate. The pain tolerance training he did regularly worked well enough with preventing the heat from bothering him too much, but the Mana infused into her spellworks was no joke when they were all focused on a single part of his body.
"Whose voice are you calling annoying?! Get your ass back here!"
Well. It was a bit of shame that the only living Squadmate he had left was the violent one.
****
Fen quickly adapted to the changes in his schedule. Before and after he attended his Lessons for Knight training with Raisen and his Mana Lessons with Teresa, he just needed to find a few Opfer and bring them to an interface to transfer a portion of their points to his own rapidly growing stockpile and fulfill his quota as a Principality. The first time, he just knocked an unlucky girl unconscious and brought her to the golden particles, but unfortunately, when he tried that Ellora's face popped out the interface and scolded him for trying to cheat the system.
His duty as a Principality didn't just end when he knocked out his target; it went even further, and he had to make them feel enough pain to understand their own weakness more thoroughly. That day, Fen's quota was doubled for his little 'experiment'. The Archon was somehow monitoring his actions and the effects on the Opfer's psyches he had, recording them and making him change his methods to more effectively erase the passive mindset that most Opfer had.
A Principality's work wasn't difficult. Not at all. All Fen had to do was stand nearby while he manipulated his Vital energy to drill through certain vulnerable points in an Opfer's body while using the sounds of their screams to make the Opfer even more afraid of him while fermenting his role as their torturer. His body didn't get tired thanks to the ever-lasting circulation of Vitality fueled by his Vital core, but the toll his actions had on his mind wasn't small. Every Opfer he tortured made him feel like he was slowly losing a part of himself that he needed- like it was one of his last connections to being human.
But he plugged the voices of self-doubt away and continued. Every point he stole was for the greater good, and the Opfer were benefiting from it too. Yes, every bolt of pain he made them feel was slowly shifting their views until they understood the necessity of growing stronger as fast as they could to protect themselves and the people they cared about. Thinking about it that way, Fen was the good guy in this situation!
But even those delusional thoughts weren't enough to alleviate the dissatisfaction inside him. He never cared for other people, but at the same time, he didn't hate them either. Doing what a Principality had to was the same as being a walking icon of fear and hatred in a facility full of Empowered people with abilities that the people of Earth could only dream of.
The only good thing about his new role in the Program was that he wasn't alone. Nine other Principalities did the job alongside him, but Fen rarely saw the ones outside of his own Squad. He and Marcus quickly bonded because of their similar personalities and views about the Foundation and its people, much like what the VPF intended when they paired the different Principalities into different Squads.
But just because they didn't see each other didn't mean that they never met, however.
There was Lisa Urmin, who he met before the Archon made all those announcements in the amphitheater. She was short and had a bad temper that reminded him of one of his Squadmates but besides that, she didn't stand out much. She seemed like a nice enough person for someone who went through two different Tasks and experienced part of the Void spawn invasion, but Fen's standards for niceness were a little skewed after everything that happened the past few months.
Bernard was another one of the Principalities who he didn't really like; before Fen kicked that Chosen's ass in front of all the Opfer he was friendly enough, but after he looked like something was bothering him every time he looked at him. Based on his instincts, the guy was jealous for whatever reason, but there was so much of a gap between them that it was hard to tell what exactly he was mad about.
His abilities? His skills? His power? The list went on and on and he couldn't be bothered to ask someone that pitiful.
And there was, of course, Marcus Aldeni. Among all of them, he was the oldest at eighteen; the rest of them were either a little younger or seventeen.
Among the Principalities, seven were Mages making that the prevalent Class among them.
The guy from earlier, Bernard, was one of the only two Warriors of the Practicalities while Fen was the only Knight. Actually, now that he thought about it, maybe that was why he was jealous; the Stage one Warrior couldn't control energy yet.
The only other person of any interest was Nora Serivel, the only other Stage one Warrior. The only reason why Fen remembered her was because of all the equipment she carried around with her at all times that reminded him of himself before every Task.
A large bag hung beside her waist and was filled with various items and tools that might be useful in a variety of situations; the bag itself looked like it could be used as a weapon if she swung it with enough strength.
There was another reason why Fen remembered her, but he didn't feel pleased about it. After the Archon introduced the Principalities to one another and what their goal was in the Program, Nora smiled and walked over to him to start a conversation, seemingly unaffected by Ellora's words that they'd have to basically torture their Opfer peers.
Apparently, she had wanted to meet him ever since she heard his name over the announcements in the facility and how he killed three Chosen in the Tasks.
She was older than him at eighteen, but an age difference that small didn't really matter in a situation where every day was a struggle for survival.