1% Lifesteal

With the life affinity and as many medicines as she needed, her sleep should be absolutely perfect. Yet, for whatever reason, she found her sleep becoming increasingly restless over the last few months.

Once or twice wouldn\'t have been too strange, but she was past believing that it was a coincidence.

Closing her eyes, she took a peek into her soul. As always, all she saw were the four beautiful stars, with a large pink ring wrapped around her first. The stars roiled with the pink glitter of life, the orange fury of fire, and the flickering green flames of lifeflame—her unique affinity.

Ignoring her stars, her satellite, and her abilities, she cleared her ethercosm and took a deeper look. Scouring every corner, she sought anything that even vaguely stood out. Her half-hour break came to an end, and for a moment, she contemplated leaving and continuing her work. But something about this situation was gnawing at her.

She left her ethercosm for a long moment and sighed. She pulled a small, shiny pill out of her storage ring and downed it. It was a soul clarity pill, a costly medicine used to thoroughly examine one\'s soul. With it, she should be able to spot even the tiniest of imperfections.

It was a huge sacrifice, but she knew better than to ignore her investigative instinct.

This time, as soon as she dove into her ethercosm, she immediately spotted what was wrong. The eyes on her projection shot wide open as she saw a tiny, almost imperceptible eyeball staring at her from a deep, dark corner of her soul.

Its pupils were square.

She immediately flew over to it and tore it into pieces. For the next fifteen minutes, she explored every inch of her soul to ensure nothing else was hanging around.

Once she was absolutely sure she was safe, she left. There was no relief to be seen on her face. If anything, a deep scowl had embedded itself into her brow.

That thing must have snuck into her soul way back when she had gone to that anomalous passage.

To think it had not only slipped past her vigilant guard of her soul but also gone undetected for so damn long… That was terrifying. And few things could make her feel afraid.

She guessed that—no, she knew that such a parasite must have invaded the souls of Mark and Nahar, too. And they most likely hadn\'t been able to resist the effects of whatever it was trying to do nearly as well as she could.

For a long moment, she considered helping them deal with it. It would, no doubt, further indebt them to her, but…

What would the point of that be… when the Kraven Clan was already on the brink of falling apart?

***

A decrepit man sat at his desk and drew on a paper. The only source of illumination was a slit of light that pushed its way through the shades on the window. The rancid smell hung like a fog, blending into the haze already coiled around his mind.

People refused to believe him.

That dumb motherfucker of a psychologist kept saying it was a symptom of the guilt he felt.

He\'d show them.

He\'d show all of them what the thing looked like.

He\'d prove them wrong.

His hand shook as he tried drawing the outline of the man for the umpteenth time. "Fuck!" he screamed as he threw the damn paper aside and tore out another page from the notebook. "Fucking shit! Fuck! Fuck!" He slammed his fist into the table over and over, cracking the wood in his violent rage. His breathing was ragged, but he did everything he could to calm down and try again.

Slowly, one twisted line after another, the image of a man appeared on the page. He was muscular and imposing, with shoulder-length, wet hair flowing down the side of his head and striking, square pupils staring deep into the viewer\'s soul.

That was what it looked like in his mind. But once he blinked hard enough, the hallucination vanished.

In reality, the image he was painting on the paper was more akin to a stickman a toddler drew. He laughed at it. His cackling grew manic as he tugged at his hair, only to pull out another chunk of the once-healthy blonde locks.

His alarm beeped away in his pocket, and only around ten minutes after it started, he caught on. "Time to go to work," he muttered into his chin as he went to the toilet to prepare.

He walked over a massive pile of shredded paper. Horrific images of twisted figures adorned the pages. Dirty clothes were strewn all across the bedroom, with only his uniform, which the servants had taken care of, remaining even half clean. He reached the knee-deep pile of plastic bottles resting beside the entrance to the room and waded through it, knocking them over with the sound of hollow rattling.

Then he stepped into the toilet. With a shaky hand, he flicked the light switch. Dust and filth had piled on every surface, and the floor was scattered with wet pieces of paper. Usually, the servants would have cleaned this, too, but he refused to let anyone into his home.

He couldn\'t risk one of them being an impostor.

Mark Afronte finally walked up to the mirror. It was filthy, with dried splatters of pus and blood from the acne he popped coating the surface. He grabbed a moist piece of toilet paper, spat on it, and wiped some of the muck off.

Underneath, he saw his reflection.

His face was gaunt and scattered with pockmarks. Acne littered his skin, part from his horrible diet, part from his stress, part from his utter lack of hygiene. The hair atop his head was thin, with noticeable bald patches.

His once healthy, spry physique of chiseled muscle was now far less impressive. He was still shredded, but a lot of the muscle mass was gone, and his body fat was so low that it made his body look almost fake, as if molded out of plastic.

He ignored his looks and tentatively washed his face. He wiped it with a towel that reeked of mold.

Ten minutes later, he was in his uniform and rushing to his station.

As soon as he left the living quarters and stepped into the deployment hall, he boarded the train. He gave his ID to a man waiting inside, who quickly verified it.

The ride was calm, with the train moving without as much as a bump of turbulence to disturb his trip. He leaned his head against the glass, watching the vast structures move by in a dizzying parallax of human achievement.

Floating structures, buildings that looked like they should topple over due to the way they bent and twisted in the air, and numerous floating platforms—either hosting parties, meetings, gatherings, lessons, or transporting workers from one area to another—filled the space before him, blocking the view of the endless blue sky above, which he could only see through the metal mesh keeping the dome solid.

The massive structure of transparent material protected the growing city from outside danger, with numerous archhumans stationed all across its surface to fight off aerial threats. He wasn\'t qualified to fight there. His station was outside on the surface, where thousands of people fought off a continuous swarm of monsters rushing to break through their barricade.

Once he stepped off the train, he walked through a narrow tunnel and made his way outside.

The golden fields stretched far. Vaguely, in the vast distance, he could spot hazy blue outlines of different biomes, including a massive ocean and a range of mountains reaching for the sky.

Starhold was built on an elevated plateau. Between the plains below and the concrete platform upon which Mark stood, a sheer cliff of super-reinforced concrete was located.

There was a buffer of around fifty meters between the dome and the drop-off to the golden plains below. Upon this buffer, a scattering of buildings had sprung up. They were primarily temporary outposts for medical help and officers standing on guard.

All across the concrete cliff, workers hung off harnesses and examined the wall. They used earth-affinity abilities to fix cracks and inspect the building for deeper structural integrity problems.

Some also visited and dove into the vents, ensuring nothing was blocking the air flow.

While few monsters could climb up that cliff, all of them gave it a shot. That threatened the lives of the men and women working to keep the structure safe—one of whom was Mark\'s father. He was a metal worker who worked on reinforcing the support beams. He was deployed in a different section that day, so Mark wouldn\'t be seeing him.

From his vantage point atop the mind-bogglingly large hundred-meter-tall plateau, the people fighting against the monsters looked like ants scurrying about, with the occasional flash of color sparking against the pitch-black backdrop of the burned fields.

In the immediate area around Starhold, the grass was all burned down. The grass was deceptively challenging to scorch, and it grew ridiculously quickly, so it had to be cleared regularly. There were plans to create a massive platform of stone at some point in the future, but things were working out as they were, and whoever was in charge of such stuff clearly didn\'t believe it was necessary to waste resources on that.

Not too far from where he was being deployed, he saw the sewage river flowing out into the distance. It was one of three such bodies of water.

All along the border of Starhold, right past the burned areas, were large towers. They looked small from his vantage point, but they were all over twenty meters in height. From those towers, ranged attackers worked to whittle down any monsters that tried to move past them, but naturally, they couldn\'t catch all of them.

That was where people like Mark came in.

"Group A31, step up!"

He stepped on the elevator and waited to be brought down with 14 other people.

While the fighters were deployed in "groups" of 15, these weren\'t teams. It was their own job to secure parties or alliances if they so wished, but they also had the freedom to simply work alone.

The others around him were all complete strangers. Maybe he\'d worked with one or two of them before, but he\'d been deployed hundreds of times by that point. He couldn\'t memorize every face, especially not with how often two-stars changed their appearance.

While most of the group chatted away, quickly bundling into groups of six and five, Mark and three more people stayed to the side, clearly intending to work alone.

When the elevator touched the ground, they left and ran into the clearing.

The two groups split up, covering a small area while Mark walked out toward the outer edge.

His massive sword slid out of its scabbard, and he held it casually to his side. Thankfully, he got the metal affinity once he ascended. While there was a 90% chance to get it at the second star, it was not guaranteed.

As the first monster reached him—a furry bear-wolverine thing with stubby limbs—it leaped at him. Mark swung his sword forward and cleaved the beast in half. Despite the muscle loss he\'d experienced, his strength was still impressive.

He had primarily worked on Compress Blade as his primary ability for the metal affinity and was already getting close to high stage two with progress. It was a simple ability that made a blade more narrow for a fraction of a second. It was a potent ability. It could allow ridiculous feats like cleaving through a whole tree in a single swing if timed properly. It was relatively cost-effective, with only 3% essence consumption, most of which was covered by his two-star satellite.

He cleaved one monster after another in half as he proceeded forward with terrifying efficiency. Even in confrontations where a single mistake could cost him an injury, he didn\'t hesitate, he didn\'t fear or panic.

Nothing could compare to the horror of his dreams.

And, if he was being honest with himself, the desire to die had already slowly crept into the back of his mind. Maybe it wouldn\'t be so bad if he slipped up and lost a head or two one of these days.

Sadly, on that day, it wasn\'t fated to happen. He\'d have to settle for venting his cold, seething fury on the poor creatures driven by instinct.

Once his allotted two hours ended, he returned to the elevator. He briefly spotted the female observer tasked with keeping track of their contribution.

The woman averted her gaze once she realized he was looking at her.

Once he stepped into the elevator, the people inside looked at him strangely.

"Hey," a short man in light armor called. "You\'re pretty damn impressive." The man eyed Mark\'s decrepit appearance with a hint of confusion. "I don\'t wanna pry, but you have uh… You have a bit of a situation going on there, huh?" the man declared. "You know, if you\'re struggling, my family is hiring. I can give you a business card if you\'re interested."

Mark stared at the man for a long moment. "Can your family secure a spot in the Pearlore Academy once it opens?"

The man scowled. "That\'s a massive ask. Uhm… Maybe… I\'m not really versed in—"

"Then go away."

The man blinked. "Right… Well… Sorry for bothering you." Then, as he turned around and stepped away, he whispered, "Prick…"

There was one and only one reason he still worked to make it through every day—the promise his boss had given him was still on the table, secured by a contract. As long as Kraven still existed as an organization once the academy opened, they were legally required to secure a spot in the academy for his sister. This had been arranged a long time ago, under the supervision of an imperial adjudicator, so it wasn\'t something the Kraven could back down on.

But he knew better than to believe it would go without hiccups. Even though he believed Nahar, he had no faith in any of those other fucking pieces of shit.

"Let them try and pull something…" he muttered into his chin, attracting a few worried gazes from the other fighters. "I\'ll kill them all."

He made his way back to the compound and entered their underground headquarters. With each passing day, he came across fewer and fewer members of the Kraven Clan. They weren\'t getting killed off or anything—he could only dream—but they were instead leaving.

He couldn\'t blame them, he supposed. There was less and less reason to remain affiliated with the clan with every passing day. Those who remained were either diehard maniacs or milking the dying organization for all they were worth.

Those who came across him either snarled or sneered at him. A rainbow of resentful looks was directed his way every single day. They mocked him, teasing him like petulant children. They vented their frustrations on the dead-eyed bitch of the incompetent young master—the man who was, in their eyes, the one to blame for their continuous failures.

Nahar worked so much harder than any of these ungrateful bastards knew. Yet, Mark never rose to their provocations. They didn\'t deserve his acknowledgment.

Even if every single member of the clan left and went on their way, his deal with Nahar was set in stone. The academy would be open soon, and well within the period they still had protection from the empress.

Mark walked into Nahar\'s office.

There, he found the man placing things into a box. Nahar froze once he noticed Mark. "Oh… Hey…"

"What the hell are you doing?" Mark asked him coldly.

"Look," Nahar called, trying to force a smile on his face but producing something more akin to a manic grin. "I just can\'t fucking handle it anymore, Mark."

"Don\'t you fucking dare," the man spat, taking an aggressive step forward.

"Don\'t be stupid, Mark," Nahar chided. His expression turned sour as sorrow descended upon him. "I… I had so much faith in this clan. I was naive," he said bitterly. "We can\'t have any influence without a Lord. And nobody in the clan is even close to ascending. I thought Uncle Rahal, at least… but… it\'s not fated to happen."

Mark stood frozen, fearing the answer to the question burning a hole in his throat.

"Relax," Nahar said as he shot him a sour smile. "My uncle will take over once I\'m gone, and you\'ll still get your end of the deal." Nahar lifted the box and started walking. "I really hope we can stay in touch. But… yeah… I\'m looking forward to finally becoming a free man. Perhaps you could join me?"

"What if they try to pull something?"

Nahar froze. "Look…"

"Don\'t." Mark looked the man deep in the eye. "You know damn well Rahal will fight for every shred of power he can get once he becomes the leader."

"Look," Nahar stated more firmly. "Can I be honest with you… just for a second?" The two men stood in silence for a long moment before Nahar decided to continue. "I don\'t think you need this, Mark."

"It\'s not about me; it\'s about my—"

"Well, your family doesn\'t need it either!" Nahar spat. "Look. You can just… leave. Go back to New Earth. Settle somewhere. Get a fucking wife, dude, and let your sister live a normal life."

"It\'s not that simple…"

"You\'re obsessed, Mark."

"You have no goddamn idea how dangerous it is to be anywhere but at the top," Mark asserted.

Nahar scowled. "Yes, I do, Mark. I\'ve learned my lesson."

Mark couldn\'t stop himself from laughing at that. "Oh really? You think you know anything? You think playing the patriarch of a dying clan is enough to know what it\'s like to be a fucking serf!? If a three-star—if you wanted to force yourself on my sister, you think I could do anything to stop you!?" he screamed. "You think the adjudicators would punish you!? Even if you slaughtered my whole family, you\'d get a slap on the wrist!"

"Come on…"

"No. You will never understand. As long as you live, you won\'t get what I\'m trying to say until you see it yourself. I have my contract—I don\'t need you," he declared. "Goodbye, Nahar." He saluted his old boss and marched out of the room.

Later that day, Nahar held his parting speech before the remaining members of the Kraven Clan. Before he could get three sentences in, he was shouted off the stage and chased outside. Mark watched the whole thing happen with cold eyes.

Then slowly, like a hero foretold in legend, Rahal got up and walked up on the stage.

The cheering was deafening.

His coronation as the clan patriarch started with a speech on integrity. He reminded everyone of the clan\'s history and the power they held before—the potential they still had within them. He directed a speech at the diehards who decided to stay behind, focusing on their bloodline and loyalty, promising great rewards and status to those who still believed in their principles.

He painted the purging of the unloyal like a blessing; with the "unfaithful" being expunged, he promised a stronger, more unified clan than ever before.

And then, once he buttered them up enough to bake a fucking cake between their asscheeks, he started talking about his future plans. They were pretty radical. The man planned to effectively pull out of Starhold. They would sell off whatever stakes they still had left and reestablish themselves in Pittersville. He hit the audience pretty hard with all the bad news, only to then immediately go into a calculated justification for his actions.

It was a pretty reasonable plan. With how much power they had lost, remaining here was clearly not a viable option. They would get chipped away into nothing until they were forced to disband. Clearly, Starhold was above them as they were at the moment.

But Pittersville, their old headquarters, wasn\'t a bad place to return to. With all the superpowers focusing on Starhold, traffic had to go through the bustling metropolis. Their status was much more solid there, and nobody had the power or the incentive to chase them out, even without a Lord in their midst. They just had to bide their time until a four-star rose from their ranks again, and then they would return to chasing higher peaks.

Frankly, Mark didn\'t care what they did. He wouldn\'t mind returning to Pittersville as long as his sister was in the academy. And if he was being honest, Rahal was putting forth a pretty solid plan.

He heard people whispering that Nahar could never show such leadership and that the boy had doomed them from the start. It was easy enough to say that now, given that all the people who had been staunchly against such a retreat had left the clan.

His attention was snapped back to reality as he heard Rahal say something strange. "—to that end, I believe it would be prudent to disband Kraven Industries and liquidate the assets."

He immediately shot up to his feet and raised his hand.

Murmurs of discontentment echoed all around him, but Rahal waved the people down as he pointed at Mark. "Greetings, Mr. Afronte. I believe you have a question for me."

"Yes, sir." Mark anxiously fixed his uniform cap as he straightened his back. "I have a contract signed with Kraven Industries. What will happen with that contract once the company is disbanded?"

"That is an excellent question, young man." A cruel smile flashed on the man\'s lips for a brief moment. "Once the company is disbanded, the contractual obligations, such as your deal… will be passed on to the legal owner of the company."

For half a moment, Mark was almost relieved. Then he realized it.

Nahar was the owner of the company. He was the one who had to deliver on the contract. Naturally, he could also choose not to disband the company, as it was his, but pretty much everything that the company owned was simply an "investment" from the clan members, who were the actual owners of practically everything.

Except for the obligations.

Obligations that Nahar was powerless to fulfill.

Mark found himself staring into the man\'s striking blue eyes. Within them, he saw… triumph.

That was why the man had passed the leadership unto Nahar so easily.

From the very beginning, he had planned to do this exact thing.

Mark\'s lips twitched and pulled apart into a nasty grimace. "You fucking monster…"

Rahal made a hand gesture, and in the blink of an eye, two three-star elders held Mark by his arms as they dragged him away. He kicked, snarling and screaming. "I\'m going to fucking kill all of you! Let me go! You fucking bastards! You\'re all dead!"

Just as he was being dragged through the doors, he watched Rahal\'s lips twist into a wicked smile as he waved and mouthed, "Say hi to my nephew."