Joseph began to release flame around him pushing the shadows back. "FAE!" A girl ran past Joseph as she stared down at Fae's body. A stream of tears left her eyes as she turned around to face Joseph, a dangerous determination showing in her eyes.
At first Joseph was confused, but slowly he remembered who he kept seeing in Fae's memories. "Tess?" Joseph asked as he stared into Tessa's eyes, calling her by the nickname Fae had used.
"DONT YOU DARE CALL ME THAT!" Tessa screamed as she punched Joseph in the stomach knocking the wind out of him and causing him to fall to his knees. "How could you do this? WHY WOULD YOU KILL HIM!" Tessa shouted in anger as she jumped onto Joseph's head, wrapped her legs around his neck, and began to choke him out. Joseph began to release flames from his body again trying to burn her off but Tessa's shadows began to attack Joseph's flames and snuff them out. Joseph was no longer experiencing bloodline failure and his Mythic rank had dropped back down to its normal Human rank 8, where as Tessa was a TRUE Spirit rank 2, Joseph was easily overpowered in every regard.
"I'm sorry Tessa, don't do this, he saved me!" Joseph screamed trying to reason with Tessa. Tessa paused as she heard this and decided to loosen her grip on his neck just enough for him to speak. "What do you mean he saved you?" Tessa had only shown up and seen Fae's scorched body, she had no idea how everything went, and so Joseph began to explain everything.
***
While Joseph was explaining everything, an entirely different mess was happening at the Examiner's section. "None of you will interfere." A lady with dark hair and even darker eyes said as she had the Examiners stuck inside of her Shadow Lock.
"I wasn't going to anyways." Red replied in a bored tone as he easily broke through Ms. Phantoms Shadow Lock. The other examiners didn't have as much luck as even Arthur was unable to break out. "Thank you for stopping everyone, these idiots give up to easily. That kid isn't down for the count yet, I can feel it." Red said with a smile as he went back to looking down at the arena.
"Oh he better be down for the count." Ms. Phantom whispered as an evil smile crept onto her face.
***
"And that's all" Joseph said as he stared at Tessa with a fearful expression, he had just finished explaining what happened and hoped it wouldn't enrage her enough to kill him.
"So all of this happened, because you're a loser?" Tessa asked abruptly. "All of this could've been avoided if you had just manned up and worked through your own problems?" Tessa's shadows slowly crept up her body like armor. "But Fae saved you, and I won't let the last thing he did be in vain." Tessa said as the shadows vanished and she looked away. "He beat me, even with all that power I gained he bested me, I would concede defeat a million times. He won." Joseph said trying to get Tessa to understand he was hurting too.
"Well a win wont bring him back to life, will it." Tessa said coldly as she began to signal for her mother that it was time to leave.
***
"You almost die a lot." Crimson said with a laugh as Fae opened his eyes, seeing they were in the dark space that he was quickly becoming familiar with. "I'm dead?" Fae said as he looked around. "No, not yet, but you will be if something doesn't change soon." Crimson said as he began to walk away. "What needs to change? What's going on?" Fae said as he chased after Crimson. "Just walk with me Fae." Crimson said as he began to walk around the dark space, stopping in a specific spot as he turned to speak to Fae.
"Why do you fight? What are you doing all of this for?" Crimson said as he stared into Fae's eyes. Fae thought for a moment, but he had thought of this for awhile and spoke with conviction.
"To protect, to defend myself and those close to me. I refuse to allow myself or my friends go through what I went through my whole life. I'm better than that now." Fae said as he stared deep into Crimsons eyes and spoke his mind.
Crimson began to laugh relentlessly as he slapped Fae's shoulder. "You remind me of someone." Crimson said as an image of the golden light flashed through his mind. Suddenly Crimson's expression became serious as he continued to speak. "If you even dream of defending yourself than you need to become stronger, a LOT stronger." Crimson said as he placed his thumb on Fae's head, images began to flash through Fae's mind, death, pain, destruction, Fae was witnessing what seemed like the end of the world.
"People capable of this are hunting you Fae, you're different, and they don't like that. If you want to protect those close to you than you need to get stronger. FAST!" Once Crimson was finished speaking the images stopped appearing and Crimson vanished away into the darkness.
"WAIT!" Fae screamed trying to stop Crimson from vanishing, he thought he was finally receiving answers, but he was left with even more questions. Who did that? How strong did they need to be to pull that off? Why hadn't Fae heard of this before? And why did they want Fae dead? The questions spiraled in Fae's head but was quickly pushed to the back of his mind as he was suddenly able to hear what was going on around him in the real world. Joseph had just finished admitting that Fae defeated him when the system sent Fae a notification.
{Quest Complete: Prove Your Worth}
{Rewards: 1000 XP, Mythic rank up, new skill, new title}
{New Skill Granted: Cleanse}
{Cleanse: With a body forged for greatness, no ailment could befall me.}
{Skill Description: Cleanses your body of all toxins and negative effects below a certain level.}
{Passive Skill}
{New Title Granted: The Worthy}
{The Worthy: I've fought a billion battles and suffered a billion losses, who could be more worthy than me?}
{Title Description: When Host is in a tough spot gains a +10 increase too all stats}
As the system messages reached Fae he was slowly pulled out of the darkness.
***
"Well a win wont bring him back to life, will it." Tessa said coldly as she began to signal for her mother that it was time to leave.
"Actually, it will." A voice sounded into Tessa's ears as all the bloodline energy in the air rushed towards Fae and was absorbed into his skin, revitalizing him and causing him to break through to Human rank 4.
"Hey Tess." Fae said with a smile as Tessa ran into his arms and hugged him tightly. "What brings you here Princess of Shadow?" Fae said with a laugh.