Iris Cole.
23rd of Ianua.
***
"Compliments to the chef."
I looked at my dad, raising his fork between himself and Sam with a smile. Then to Sam, rolling her eyes. "You say that every time."
"But it's true." Dad and I said at the same time, making him laugh while I giggled.
Sam just made a face before she leaned over her plate to rub my head. "Thanks, Iris."
"No thanks for me?" Dad laughed. But Blude answered.
"When are we leaving?" she groaned. "We've been here for days."
Dad took another bite and shrugged. "Well, that depends. You've gotten used to everything?" he asked me, and I nodded super hard. "You've grown used to… all of this." He gestured around the dining area. "So, we'll do a bit of training tomorrow. Get you used to your magic, and-"
Redd shot out of her seat. "We have magic?"
"I believe the correct term would be Sorcery." Dad nodded. "But, yes. You all have magic. I'll teach you how to use it tomorrow. Then, we'll leave."
"What are we doing in Shujen?" I asked with a mouthful of food, making Sam rush over to clean my face and remind me about manners.
"I must train there for my Monk class," he said with a soft chuckle. But he didn't help me push Sam away.
"You're gonna learn how to fight?" I asked after succeeding in pushing her away.
"Like a monk, yes." He nodded, smiling.
"I wanna come!"
"Iris…" Blude began. But I already made my decision.
With a blink, an image of my body appeared on the table and split apart to show my few systems; my augmented circulatory and respiratory systems, my augmented brain, and my fancy new skeleton. I focused on what was mostly untouched, sending the other images away in favor of outlines of my skin and muscles.
I wanted my skin to be as strong as my bones and for my muscles to be even stronger. But I also wanted speed. I wanted to be able to move as fast as my dad. So I designed what felt like the perfect system and I blinked the augmented vision away.
I suddenly got really hungry after that. But not for food. Looking at my cup made my mouth begin watering. And when my eyes fell to my bowl, my stomach growled. So, quietly, I drank the rest of my water and pulled my cup below the table. Whenever someone spoke loud or coughed or something, I broke a piece off as quickly as I could and waited, doing it again and again until I had a big pile of glass in my lap. Then, I threw in a few coins and took a deep breath.
It was time for the hard part.
Piece by piece. I started eating my snacks and chewing as slowly as I could while I watched the others talk.
"-go there!"
"Why not?" Dad asked Blude with innocent eyes.
"It's dangerous!" I ate a chip as she slammed the table. "Drow and barbarians live there!"
"I'm Drow." Amun shrugged.
Blude crossed her arms and leaned back to look Amun up and down. "Are you?"
"Half." Amun shrugged. "But that doesn't matter. You're all strong now. And it'll be good training."
"You want us to come too!?" She screamed while I chewed.
"Of course." Amun laughed and I ate again. "I'm not going to abandon you four just to train. And it'll only be for about two months. It'll be good for you. And after, we'll go and explore and make some new friends, grow and train before we return."
"We're going back to Shujen?" Blude groaned.
"Until the middle of the year." Amun nodded. "Then, we'll watch the mid-year tournaments at the Bodhi Tree and have a party with the Legions. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Training comes first. For all four of us. So," he shrugged, "you can either stay on the surface with Lana and my clone. Or you can go underground with me to learn how to fight from drow monks."
I dared not chew through the short pause. But I thought about it.
"Think about it," Dad then said, and so I chewed. "You said it yourself. Drow are dangerous. Who better to teach you to be dangerous, than the dangerous ones?"
"Hmm. Fine." Blude grumbled, and I thought it was loud enough for my last chip, but…
"What are you eating?"
All eyes snapped to me. But it was Sam to ask.
"Uhm." I looked around nervously. "Nothing."
"Yeah, no!" she shot up, seeing the shards in my lap. "Is that… glass?"
Panicked, I stuffed the rest in my mouth and chewed before Sam could get to me.
"Iris, what the fuck!?" Blue screamed but Amun waved her down.
"It's for her upgrades. She'll be fine."
"Fine!?" Blude seethed, but Dad only smiled at me.
"What are you getting?"
"Um." I swallowed the shards. "Subdermal armor, Bird Bones, And Bundled Synth Muscles."
"Oh, wow!" Dad beamed. "Someone wants to be fast and strong!"
"Yeah!" I slammed the table and giggled after it cracked. "Cause I'm gonna learn how to fight with you!"
"Well alright. Now it's a party." Dad slid his empty plate over with a smile. "But you might want to make some more coolant so you don't overheat."
"Okay!"
"Well, if Iris is going, we're going too." Blude got up with a sigh.
I waved after her. "Goodnight!"
I wound up eating my dad's plate and a piece of the table before I went to bed. Making sure to eat more plants and give Skoll and Hati goodnight hugs before I climbed up to my room and powered down my systems.
***
Blude.
***
I looked in the corner of my vision, where a little picture of Sam appeared to bob along as she spoke. 'Hey, Blude. Breakfast is ready. We're all here. 'Cept you and Iris.'
Replying to her was strange. Almost like a mix of speaking in your head and humming as quietly as possible. 'What's on the menu?'
'Eggs, bacon, and waffles.' Her voice echoed in my head a moment later.
My face coiled. 'The fuck's a waffle?'
'Good good.' She laughed. 'Get Iris and come try it.'
'Kay.'
I gathered the rest of my things and started going downstairs. But hesitated once I saw those massive wolves staring right at me, growling and making strange sounds that somehow translated into words.
"Chako is afraid of us," Skoll said to Hati, replacing my anxiety with sheer curiosity and a need for answers.
"Ch-" I jumped downstairs to run up to them. "Who is that? I keep hearing- seeing that name."
"Having dreams?" Hati asked, nudging a massive nose toward me.
I reached out cautiously. "Uh. Yeah."
"Dreams of yourself."
"Is... that a question?" I tilted my head in confusion, but the wolves seemed to laugh and walk away.
"You will learn soon."
"You will soon see."
"Tch. Whatever." I rolled my eyes and turned away, only for my heart to drop to my feet upon seeing a black shroud towering over me. "Fuck!" I swung wide, hitting what felt like a stone wall before the floating… clothes went flying into the wall with a deep thud.
"Ow!"
"Iris!?!" I ran to her, rambling apologies. "I- I… I thought you were a… ghost or something! Are- are you okay?"
"Why would you punch a ghost?" She asked innocently, rubbing her unmarked head.
"Well," I stammered. "I guess you can't really punch a-"
"Ghosts are friends!"
"Uh- right. I'm sorry."
"It's okay! It didn't hurt!" She smiled. Then frowned as she gazed down to see the dangling sleeves and legs of her outfit. "I guess this does look kinda weird."
I began to reply but was distracted by the shimmers forming in her eyes. She looked this way and that for a few moments until finally, a pile of clothes plopped down in her hand with a flash of light.
She zipped up to her room to change before I could blink, returning moments later in a deep blue and white hooded tunic with cupped sleeves dangling from her metallic nubs.
I wanted to point out that it still looked a bit weird but was cut short by her raising her nubs skyward, creating swirling ribbons of beautiful blue energy that appeared to screw arms and legs into her shoulders and thighs.
"Woah! That was amazing!" I gasped.
"Thanks, Blude!" Iris beamed, making me melt a little inside. "They're my original arms. So I don't wanna change them. I'll make new ones instead."
"I... I can't wait to see them." I smiled, then held out my arm for her to grab. "Breakfast?"
She nodded wildly and took my arm to drag me towards the kitchen with strength that rivaled my own. But all I felt was the intense warmth bleeding off of her hand.
Beyond that, I could hardly enjoy the waffles due to guilt. They were stupidly delicious. I was able to learn that much. But I couldn't pay attention to Sam boasting about how she made it. Not after what happened earlier.
Her being fine was beside the point. And at the same time, it wasn't. I was a lot stronger than other humans. The events of the last month taught me that much. And it taught me about my anger as well. But…
"What happened to us?" my eyes shot up to Amun. Then to the empty plates scattered around the table, giving me a sigh of relief. "To me." I continued. "I'm… I…"
"You keep having strange dreams?" Amun rose from his seat with a knowing smile. "Come. Let me show you."
Eager to learn and suddenly realizing it'd been days since we left this hut, we nearly ran after him, paying little mind to the bustling atmosphere of the once dull town.
"Blude, Redd, Sam. Or, shall I say Chako, Orpheus, and Jima?" He smiled to himself as our faces undoubtedly grew more anxious. Then he gestured to the wolves. "They're like Skoll and Hati. Formerly normal creatures that became creatures of shadow when I was younger. Once my divinity awakened, they were changed again. Skoll and Hati became celestials. The others became my divine animals."
"What's the difference?" I asked.
"Celestials can travel to and from my divine realm and have… specific powers. Like these two," He gestured to the wolves. "They have powers of the seasons. Chako, Orpheus, and Jima, on the other hand, are divine Sky Orcas. And they've chosen you as, for lack of a better term, their Champions. They've linked their spirit and souls with you, giving you powers.
"For example." Amun paused to hop off the ground. But instead of falling, he continued rising and rising above the buildings. "Swim up here."
My face contorted angrily. "Huh?"
"Just try it," he said in almost a pleading tone. "Imagine you're in the ocean and swim up to me."
"Ugh. Fine." I groaned. "But if I look stupid I'll throw something at you."
"Your conditions are acceptable."
With a deep sigh, I did as instructed and began waving my arms around as if I was wading. And, feeling utterly ridiculous, I jumped, utterly confident that the ground would return to my feet a second later. But… no. Something enveloped my body in a cloud of… pressure. Not like air, but not like water either.
"See?" Amun snickered, much to my dismay. But, I did see.
The ground. I saw the ground just meters below my feet. Unmoving. I kicked and it receded a little. I waved my arms and the ground distanced itself a little more. I swam… and thus I flew.
"You can swim through the air as if it were water." Amun continued. "And conversely, you can treat the water as if it were air. You can breathe it and it won't get you wet. You can speak to marine life too. As well as any other creature beloved by moonlight."
"Like wolves." I gasped.
"Can I talk to animals too?" Iris buzzed around him like a bee without legs. Or wings.
"The animals in my engineering domain." He nodded with a charming smile, then looked at us as he began drifting away. "But that's just the start. Follow me."
We struggled in swimming after Amun as he drifted towards the coast, and strangely so. It seemed more like he was being dragged through the air rather than flying or swimming like Iris or the rest of us. But at least she helped us deal with orienting ourselves and helped us when we grew nauseous.
Instead, he told us to focus inside ourselves to feel for strength or power that wasn't there before. It didn't take long to find it. Not as long as it did to manifest it.
"Aim your palm at a tree and imagine a force shooting out from it," he said. "Like a burst of eldritch power." He even demonstrated with blasts of darkness and lightning. But it took us several minutes to fire anything. Well, it took me several minutes.
Iris got it almost immediately, shooting out a beam of deep blue light from her hand that obliterated a small tree.
'But she was… her.' I thought. The three of us did, evidently. As our skepticism, our inability to tell when Amun was joking or being serious kept us from realizing the truth.
In a way, though, it was that skepticism that made me realize my power. I went without his instruction to look inside myself for strength or power and instead searched for a presence. Chako. I imagined, over and over, my first dream of her charging through the sea, then sent that very image through my arm.
In return, my arm began to glow with a silvery-blue light and form a fall of water at my wrist, only to then disappear into my hand before a powerful geyser fired from my palm. It looked like a pillar of glass as it crossed the distance to a young tree. And like Iris' display, it shattered into uncountable droplets and shards of water and wood.
After sharing my findings, Sam went on to fire a powerful jet of steam followed by Redd firing a blast of ice shortly after, bringing about a proud look from Amun and some celebratory cheers from Iris. Then we went on to practice and practice some more until we could do it on command.
We went on for the rest of the day, learning that the undead shadows couldn't die before we killed them over and over again with our enchanted tridents or spears, because that was Amun's favored weapon. And as his chosen, we had to use them too.
Like his, the handles could become longer or shorter, they could be controlled telepathically, though by different means; and their blades could be dulled or sharpened at will. And yet we also had other weapons. Iris got a strange bow. Sam got a fancy pair of knives. Redd got a mace that was also a bunch of tools.
I got my gloves.
"Huh?" I looked at the fine leather wrapped around my hands. They looked completely normal, dyed the same silvery blue as my magic, and made exceptionally well. But they weren't weapons.
"Clench your fists and flex a bit of magic into them," Amun instructed.
I did and began laughing like a crazy person as four spikes grew out of the knuckles. "That's bad!"
Terrible, they were terrible. The things those gloves, our weapons, and our magic did to the undead shadows were terrible. And we terrorized them all day. Only pausing to take pointers, eat lunch, and use the bathroom until we returned to the hut for dinner.
It was a dinner like any other until it came to an end and Amun suddenly got serious. He told us to never let anyone bully or step on us. Even to someone of royal standing or someone of immense power, we were to stand up for ourselves. For we were of royal standing. We were of immense power. And so, we were to stand our ground. And doubly so when we went to Shujen.
"If anyone tries to do something to you that you don't like, something that makes you feel unsafe or uncomfortable, tell them so. If they continue, protect yourself at all costs. Even if you have to kill them. Do any and everything to defend yourselves from harm. Don't let anyone hurt you. And if they do, never let them get away with it. Understood?"
"That's like music to my ears."
"Good." Amun grinned wickedly. "We leave tomorrow."