Irene was having a headache as she played against Athelei.
'The way it plays is... unique. Are all angels like this?'
Her headache came not from Athelei's shocking skill, no. It simply came from the fact that he did not seem to be playing to win. She could not figure out what was going on in her opponent's mind.
Every game developed completely differently.
Every game ended in a wacky manner she had never seen before.
Every game had uniquely different scenarios, giving Irene different kinds of headaches each time.
Sometimes she won, sometimes she lost, and sometimes they ended at a draw. But each time, she felt as if she wasn't looking at a chessboard. Instead, it was as if she was watching the lives of the different chess pieces. She noticed that when Athelei decided to protect a piece, it would remain alive despite all the threats it could experience.
If she had been playing against a human, she would've sworn to God and hoped to die that her opponent was messing with her intentionally.
'But this is Angel I'm talking about here...' Irene would always attribute it to this single thought as if it could explain everything instantly.
Though it made sense, for the unique playstyle was most certainly something worthy of Athelei's identity.
As for the being in question, it is easy for us to figure out what the madlad was trying to do: He was manipulating endings and fulfilling his fantasies. His first human creed promised to the world that things would end on his terms. Athelei was using his time playing chess with Irene to enact upon something he could only dream about at the moment.
After a dozen or so mind-gruelling games, Irene had enough. Just in time too, as the pair could innately sense that the stone tablet had finished recharging.
Irene went through the routine of reading and singing as Athelei watched by the side.
When the red orb reappeared, Irene did not do anything this time. They both watched intently as the orb simply floated around the stone tablet, illuminating line after line, and letter after letter.
Athelei had his nonexistent brows scrunched when he noticed a pattern to the orb's flight pattern. As a non-humanoid cloud of fog, such a flight pattern was more apparent to him than for Irene.
He looked closer and noted down how it was illuminating specific parts of the requiem one by one. It did not follow the original song, but Athelei's eidetic memory allowed him to remember what each note sounded like.
He played the song in his head and sang its lyrics.
Irene observed that Athelei had noticed something she hadn't. She allowed him to focus, up until the red orb dissipated into nothingness.
"What did you find?" This time, it was her turn to ask in curiosity.
She watched as the grey fog around the pedestal swirled and formed a humanoid shape. On what normally was a featureless face was a pair of grey lips.
It was smiling at her again, but this time, Irene did not feel a chill run through her.
"Let me sing you a lullaby..." Athelei spoke to her, "A hymn of hope and rebirth."
He began to hum a tune. It bore the weight of the original requiem in its notes, but those emotions were in the process of transition.
As if all their despair, pain, and drive for vengeance was flowing through a cycle. Clouds of emotion were condensing, and when they reached a certain density, they rained as righteous anger, rebellious hope, and a radical rebirth.
Irene heard all of this, but midway, she felt the song grip her heart bearing malice and doom. Those raining emotions flooded her soul, as if all of those sensations were all chasing after her and her alone.
She felt the pressure of sitting under a sky-high waterfall.
Athelei noticed the blood that leaked from Irene's nostrils, his inhuman voice dissipating into echoes bouncing off the dungeon walls.
"It seems like..." Athelei mumbled as he allowed Irene to stabilise herself. Thoughts were running through him like mad.
"...Like the writers of this piece harbour a grand hatred for humans." Irene completed the thought. A shiver ran through her when she did. Her mouth tasted like iron, her throat was dry, and her ears were ringing.
The legends were real... and they did not look to be friendly.
.
.
.
Athelei was back in his room on the hilltop mansion owned by Lady Karire and Sir Xiu. He was up much earlier than usual as he stared at a screen that irked him ever so slightly.
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
- Analysis Skill, Inspect has reached maximum level!
- Skill requirements for promotion have all been met...
- Detected a lacking Interface Authority Level...
- Promotion to Tier I has been postponed.
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
"Hah," Athelei sighed as his excitement was snuffed out like a candle being blown. "I have heard nothing about this at all. Insufficient Interface Authority Levels? It seems like the people of Oxhor truly don't care about the Cosmic Interface that much. Even with their small and foggy Nebula Gems, they haven't reached a high enough Rank to encounter this kind of event."
On top of that, Athelei was now sure that his Trinity Gem had harder conditions for Promotion. They could easily achieve Tier I with their low-quality gems, while he could not. He also had to first max out three Analysis Skills and then another special Analysis Skill before he was even eligible. Other Users only had one Analysis Skill to level up, even if they did so rather slowly given their differing priorities.
Ever since Athelei had learned of the Cosmic Interface and its Nebula Gems, he had always been looking out for them as he went. It was one of his earliest obsessions, and those fierce chills were still ever-present when someone used their Cosmic Interface near him or at him. It kept the subject constantly in his mind.
He relished the process of 'levelling up' and seeing his growth so clearly on a screen, more so than training in one of the three classes that the people of Oxhor all drool over.
"Status," Athelei muttered for the first time in a while.
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
=} User: Athelei (Tier 0 User) {=
=} Interface Authority Level: 0.35 {=
=o=o=o=o=
=} Skills {=
- Cyan Analysis Skill: Examine (Level: 5/5)
- Purple Analysis Skill: Appraisal (Level: 5/5)
- Orange Analysis Skill: Judgement (Level 5/5)
- Trinity Analysis Skill: Inspect (Level 5/5)
=o=o=o=o=
- Note: Please achieve an Interface Authority Level of at least one (1) to undergo [Promotion].
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
"I need three Nebula Gems of a higher quality than the ones I have already absorbed..." Athelei mumbled as he took out the grain-sized orange Nebula Gem he kept on his person.
'This one won't do,' He thought to himself and recalled the more promising marble-sized purple and cyan Nebula Gems he had hidden with his Nikiri Mist identity, 'I need a better orange Nebula Gem, but none of the stores sell higher quality ones...'
The control that the countries placed on orange Users went further than limiting its sales. They were also hiding or somehow discarding any decent orange Nebula Gems. All that Athelei could get his hands on were grain-sized and opaque ones, which no longer suited his needs as they only supplied 0.2 Interface Authority Levels.
His purple, marble-sized, and opaque Nebula Gem gave him about 0.35.
His cyan Nebula Gem was also at 0.35 given its similar size and clarity.
When Athelei recalled that, and saw that the combined sum of his initial Trinity Gem was equal to one of his decent Nebula Gems, he let out another sigh. Just a bit more. All he had to find was a marble-sized orange Nebula Gem and he would meet the requirement once he combined the three.
'I wonder if I can find a decent gem from that teenager?' thought Athelei as he flopped onto his bed. He stared at the part of the sky that could be seen through his windows.
The sun was already rising on a new day.
'How can I contact them? Should I find that weird, scarred man?'