Chapter 42 - 43: Uninvited

Chapter 42: Chapter 43: Uninvited

The group splintered apart near the Association’s outer gates, exhaustion and adrenaline both finally draining out of everyone in equal measure.

"Give me your number," Cassius said, already holding his phone out.

"Figure we’re due for round two eventually, and I’d rather it be on purpose next time."

Jason traded contacts without hesitation. "Try not to get surrounded next time."

"No promises. It’s part of my charm."

Skyler rolled her eyes, Reeve clapped Jason once on the shoulder, and then they were all peeling off in different directions, the day’s strange, exhausting Chapter finally closing behind them.

---

Jason walked home alone, the quiet settling over him in slow layers.

His mind kept circling the same problem.

’I’m at the second Level now.

Which means Reeve and Skyler’s usual Gates are going to feel like stepping on ants.’

He turned the thought over carefully, weighing it against everything the system had shown him so far.

’I’ll get no reward for killing something beneath me.

Not to mention my own personal growth.

If I want the system to actually notice, and if I want my own strength to mean anything, I need real threats. Things that can actually hurt me.’

’Which means higher-rank Gates. Which means strangers who’ll immediately notice I’m punching above a First Level reading, unless I fix that.’

He turned the problem over slowly, piece by piece, the way Darius had taught him to turn over an opponent’s stance before ever committing to a strike.

’Veil can hold a false reading now. Good. That solves the cultivation problem.’

’But the spear’s a marker as well.

Enough people have seen me use it that word travels.

If I show up to a random D-Rank Gate wielding the exact same weapon everyone already associates with me, that’s a surefire way to leave traces back to myself.’

’A new weapon then.

Something nobody’s seen in my hands yet.’

He didn’t say any of it out loud. Didn’t plan to, either.

’Nobody needs to know the plan until it’s already working.’

---

He reached his street a short while later, blood dried stiff across his shirt, most of the actual wounds beneath it long since closed over by the time he arrived.

A few faint pink lines remained if anyone looked closely enough. The blood itself told a louder story though.

Novaria and Judith were both in the front room when he stepped inside, and Novaria’s eyes went straight to the state of him.

"You’re covered in blood," she said, already wheeling closer.

"Most of it’s not even mine."

"That’s not reassuring."

"I’m fine," he said, and meant it this time, lifting his arm to show the absence of anything serious beneath the stains.

Judith was already gathering her things. "I should head out, then, now that you’re back in one piece."

"Thank you," Jason said. "For today. I’ll send your share of the money over tonight."

He was still mid-sentence when his phone buzzed.

[Payout Notice: Due to the scale of materials recovered, individual compensation has been increased from 12,000 to 15,000 pounds.]

He blinked at the extra 3000 pounds.

’I could make considerably more if I didn’t have to pretend I’m barely fiirst Level every time I want to join a raid party.’

He tucked the thought away with the rest of his evening’s plans, said a proper goodbye to Judith, and watched her head out the door.

---

He turned back toward Novaria, already pulling together the words to explain everything that had actually happened that day.

Then he stopped.

Something pressed against the edges of his senses, heavy, enormous, a weight that didn’t belong anywhere near an ordinary residential street.

Novaria felt it too.

He saw it in her face, the way her breath caught, the way her hands tightened slightly against the arms of her chair.

’That’s not possible. Nobody should be able to feel that from this far away.’

The pressure built steadily, deliberate, unhurried, nothing about it hidden or softened.

This level of pressure was enough to kill Jason at his current level if the other party wished to do so.

Most cultivators at that level would mask their aura out of simple courtesy.

The same way a person learned not to shout in a library.

Whoever this was had no interest in courtesy.

’They want to be felt. They want everyone around them to understand exactly how small they are.’

Jason’s blood ran cold the instant he placed the signature.

He knew it. Intimately. From a lifetime ago, before the seal, before the Gate, before any of it.

’Father.’

---

The knock came a moment later, measured, unhurried, exactly three raps against the door.

Jason crossed the room, every step heavier than it should have been, the aura pressing down against him like a physical weight settling over his shoulders.

He opened the door.

Loran Veryon stood on the other side, immaculate, composed, every inch the picture of effortless authority, his presence alone enough to make Jason’s knees want to buckle on reflex.

"Father," Jason said, forcing the word out level. "This is a surprise."

"Is it." Loran’s voice carried the same practiced calm as his expression, pleasant on the surface, hollow underneath. "May I come in?"

"Of course."

Jason stepped aside, straining visibly against the weight of the aura filling the doorway, and Loran stepped past him without so much as glancing at the effort it was costing his son to remain standing.

’He’s not doing this just to remind me I’m weak. He already knows that. There’s no point proving something that’s already settled.’

Jason’s mind raced even as his body struggled, piecing the purpose together.

’He’s using it to sharpen his own senses. Pushing his Perception through me harder than it needs to go.’

’He could do this gently. Quietly. He knows exactly how. He’s choosing not to.’

The realization settled sharp and cold.

’He wants me to feel every second of it. He wants me to know exactly how much of a disappointment I still am to him.’

---

"How are you, Jason," Loran asked, settling into a chair without waiting to be offered one, voice pleasant, eyes anything but.

"Managing."

"Managing." Loran repeated it slowly, tasting the word. "You registered as a Hunter. Strange decision, for someone in your condition."

"Had to do something with my time."

Loran’s gaze flicked briefly toward Novaria, a flash of something unreadable passing behind his eyes before it vanished entirely.

Jason noticed, with quiet, grim clarity, that the aura pressing down on the room carefully avoided her completely, a precise, deliberate boundary drawn just short of where she sat.

’Even now. Even doing this. He’s keeping it off her.’

’A single stray edge of that pressure would kill her outright in her condition, and he knows it.’

Then Loran reached into his coat and withdrew a small, worn compass, setting it deliberately on the table between them.

Jason’s heart lurched.

’That’s a dragon-seeking compass.

It looked like a higher quality version of what kane had.’

His pulse spiked, the panic arriving faster than he could suppress it.

’If that thing reads anything at all, if the bloodline leaks even a fraction past Veil-’

He held himself perfectly still, forcing his breathing even, watching the compass’s needle with a dread he didn’t dare let show on his face.

It didn’t move.

It sat motionless on the table, registering nothing at all.

The pressure in the room finally began to recede, slow and deliberate, the same way it had arrived.

Jason exhaled, carefully, quietly, relief flooding through him before he could stop it.

Loran pocketed the compass without comment, rising from his seat with the same unhurried grace he’d entered with.

"Well," he said, offering a thin, practiced smile. "I only came to see how my son was adjusting to married life. Good to see you’re well."

Nobody in the room believed a single word of it.

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I’m so sorry you guys

I made a mistake in the order of posting my Chapters