Chapter 66: What Remains

The light of electric lanterns was reflected in silent waves upon the surface of pond.

Fox statues stood at the water’s edge, their stone faces were turned inward, and ears were oddly sharp.

Beyond them the shrine-like abode was quiet. Made of wood, paper screen doors, and arranged like it wasn’t a residence but a memory.

The time was around five in the morning. The mountain air was cold enough to raise the skin, but Marcellus sat on the low slap with both feet in the pond’s water.

His dark robe was tied at the front, and he wore nothing else. The fabric fell open at the chest, in the pocket against his side rested an old keypad phone. On the stone beside his hip was a smartphone.

He had not slept at all.

After the bath, he draped over a dark robe and had walked Oroshi Yama until he had explored every part of the residence.

The outer buildings, garden paths, security posts, private rooms distributed through the grounds, everything. The original Marcellus’s quarters had been spare. They had magazines, books on personality and conduct, history.

He had keychains from places he had visited. The drawing room held what Zavian had expected, nunchakus, katanas, dummies, a wall of projection and other than that, nothing more fascinating.

When Marcellus closed his hand on every weapon in that abode, his body apparently knew how to work them out.

But right now, where he was...it was different.

This was original Marcellus’s mother’s abode. It felt more personal. It had photographs, belongings left where a living had had last set them.

There were Diaries in a language he did not understand.

He turned a page, and the smartphone’s translation lagged by a second behind his thumb, before rendering years of text, dates, short entries.

He read all of them without rushing. When a line required a repeat translation, he would use it.

Water moved around his ankles when he adjusted his weight, the lanterns light caught the wet stone and the edges of the diaries.

Maeve slept in the adjoining abode he had given her instead of corner rooms in the outer layer of Oroshi Yama meant for the assistants. He believed she had provided him enough value to just let her be all by herself.

The diaries belonged to a woman named Verity Vlinder. He had found her name on the inside cover of the oldest one. The name was written in cursive and pink ink, that had slightly faded.

The photographs inside the abode confirmed it. Verity had pink hair and pink eyes.

There were several photographs of her, taken at different ages, and the descriptions of her appearance were comically consistent. Apparently, people had a habit of telling her that she looked unreal, and that her features were beautiful, and that she was the sort of woman one remembered after seeing only once.

She had recorded every compliment with remarkable enthusiasm and diligence.

’Today, a woman at the market asked if my hair was naturally pink. She was so astonished when I told her.’

’Someone told me my eyes were beautiful today. I agreed, of course.’

’I don’t understand why people become embarrassed when complimented. If someone recognises a good thing, why should I pretend otherwise?’

Marcellus turned the page.

Verity had apparently spend several paragraphs describing the colour of her own eyes. The reactions her appearance tended to provoke were a bliss for her.

He continued reading.

Verity was an extrovert. She liked meeting people, visiting unfamiliar places, striking up conversations with strangers.

She also loved food. There were entire entries devoted to restaurants she preferred, ingredients, dishes. Japanese cuisine appeared more frequently than anything else.

’I asked the kitchen to prepare three different kinds of Japanese food today. The cook looked at me as though I had requested a military campaign. Namean says I should be considerate of the staff, ordering food is not a problem, but he’s against wastage.’

Marcellus’s thumb stopped against the screen of translated passage. He read it second time.

Marcellus’s mother enjoyed exercising authority over people who possessed considerably more physical power than she did. And there was no mention of her being an awakener.

Her complaints were playful, there was no indication that she particularly enjoyed making anyone miserable. She simply liked getting her way, and the fact that some people around her could turn countries upside down with just their words was not of her concern at all.

Namean Severan appeared in the entries long before Verity wrote about their relationship.

She had first met him during a trip to Japan, when he was still a child. He had been staying there for his studies, and she had encountered him again as he grew older. From the entries, Marcellus gathered that Namean had spent his high school years and graduated in Japan specifically because of her, and even continued living there for years afterward.

Verity thought of him as a student. There were several entries about him. Some described ordinary conversations, the meals they had shared, the places they had visited.

But the tone changed gradually.

She began mentioning how she looked forward to seeing him, how he remembered small details about her, and how he had a habit of appearing whenever she was in trouble. He was quiet, she wrote, and sometimes frustratingly difficult to read. But he listened when she spoke, and he never seemed bothered by her enthusiasm.

Eventually, she stopped referring to him as a student, and he became the man she loved.

’I am married.’

’I should probably write something more meaningful than that, considering how much preparation went into this. Unfortunately, I have spent most of the day meeting people who bow to Namean as though he personally invented the ground beneath their feet.’

’I have also discovered that my husband is an awakener.’

’It’s not that of a big deal. I think.’

’He told me about his family, his position, and his ranking. He explained it all as though as if it was some sort of syllabus.’

Marcellus raised his brows. At this moment he felt like reading a rom-com series. He had known that the Head of House Severan, Namean Severan was a top ten awakener. He hadn’t known that Namean had spent years living in Japan without revealing his identity to the woman he eventually married.

’I think I like having authority over awakeners.’

Marcellus sighed.

The dates progressed as Marcellus turned pages. The entries became less frequent in some places.

There were notes about preparations at the abode, changes to rooms, and discussions concerning the future.

Eventually, the subject of her child appeared.

She wrote about the pregnancy. She had opinions about the arrangements being made for her. She also wrote about Namean, he appeared to be more anxious than she was.

The next few entries were ordinary. The language remained lively, the complaints familiar, and the affection for her husband was apparent even when she was making fun of him.

Then the dates moved closer to the end of pregnancy.

There were no final declarations, no farewell, no entry announcing that she had reached the end of her journey.

The writings...simply stopped.

Marcellus scrolled back, turned pages, but the last entry had been recorded before the delivery, though the exact interval wasn’t clear from what she had written.

That was all.

Verity Vlinder had simply stopped writing.

Marcellus lowered the phone, watched the lanterns reflect in the pond, as their light broke whenever the water shifted around his feet.

He looked at the photographs he had clicked through his smartphone just moments ago. They were the pictures of photograph frames of the woman. A woman with pink hair and pink eyes.

Thanks to her, the mother of real Marcellus, he had learned a considerable amount of information about this world.

But he had also begun despising himself more than ever. She had written the name Marcellus in her diaries a lot, that even before the child was born, he had become a part of her soul. He hated the fact he was living her son’s life, and even death wasn’t able to pull him off the child’s body.

There was someone who loved this child before the world got the chance to judge him.

He took a deep, and long breaths, and set the diaries and phone aside.

The awakened world had never been governed by a single authority.

Three major powers hold the world of awakeners in equilibrium, and each possess a different form of influence, and none are capable of disregarding the other two without concequences.

The first is Austerity. Governed through the The Syndicate International, commonly abbreviated as TSI.

Austerity is an assembly of powerful families whose competition resemble corporate empires. Each possess their own assets, personnel, commercial holdings, and awakened combatants. They manage military contracts, controlled resources, operated trusts, and maintain influence over industries that ordinary corporations can hardly compete with.

The Severans belong to this order.

The second power is the Union. The governing authority of the awakened world. Its jurisdiction extends across national boundaries, and regulate matters that can not be left to individual families or organisations. It also recruits unaffiliated awakeners, seeking out talent before powerful families or rivals could claim it.

The third is the Pledge.

It is the central power of awakened underworld, maintaining connections with criminal organisations across the globe. Gambling, illicit markets, illegal transactions, underground competitions, and countless other fields within its reach.

All three of these powers have their own methods, yet, there is one rule none of them can violate.

No family, organisation, or individual is permitted to deliberately oppress ordinary people, wage their wars through them, or use them as expendable pieces in disputes between awakeners.

The Pledge can maintain its networks, but cannot treat ordinary population as their prey. For even that is a violation of their own code of conduct.

And the rankings are not merely a measure of personal achievement, they represent the relative combat capabilities of individuals whose actions can alter the course of conflicts, fortunes of organisations, and the stability of entire countries.

An awakener with the world’s top five hundred possesses enormous value. Such individuals are coveted by powerful families, recruited by Union, sought after by the Pledge.

Those within the top hundred are considered country-level assets. Their affiliation matters, but their existence alone is enough to establish their own command and their own powerful organisations.

The top twenty occupy a narrower circle still. Many of them are direct disciples of the world’s strongest awakeners, having spent years learning under people whose abilities place them beyond ordinary measures of strength.

Then there are the top tens.

Four belong to the Austerity. Three led the Pledge. The remaining three belong to the Union.

Ten divided among three powers. They are not simply powerful combatants, they are walking catastrophes, capable of confront forces that can overwhelm almost everyone.

Namean Severan is a top ten.

His position gives Severans influence far beyond. Through TSI, the Main House possesses a governing seat within Austerity, allowing it to participate directly in decisions affecting the wider consortium.

There was no particular mention of gates, whether they be type one or type two, in the diaries. Marcellus concluded that that information was beyond Verity’s network. Despite being the wife of a top ten, she was a normal human.

But...The Severans are an institution in their own right.

Namean held its head authority. Beneath him, the Council of Five govern internal equilibrium. Four major branches stand alongside the Main House, Rain, Basran, Veys, and Garde.

The designated Main Heir represents future of the Central lineage in this Cut-throat world, and that position is held by Marcellus Severan.

Marcellus realized the life of old Marcellus when he explored his room, but now all pieces fell in place. His combat limitations had made him an uncomfortable heir in an organisation that valued power above almost everything else.

He is the son of Namean Severan, a top ten awakener.

He is also a healer now. And there are only three recognised healers in the world. Two of those cannot even restore a shattered core.

A healer could preserve lives, but Marcellus can preserve capabilities of people whose injuries would otherwise end their careers. For organisations built around powerful combatants, such an ability is invaluable. He could restore fighters whose loss would weaken an entire organisation, and allow the strongest individuals to return to battle after injuries that would have removed others from it permanently.

The world had reasons to keep Marcellus Severan alive, not knowing he hated the very thought of living himself.