Chương 65: Chapter 64: A Silent Defiance.

I had thought about it. I had suspected. Sere had snuck up on us in the kitchen. I could accept her catching me off guard, but Violet? The girl who could see almost anything without using mana? That was harder to believe. Something had felt wrong then. Then, there was the fact that Sere had a very large amount of mana, to the point where the only person who had more was I. If Anias had said I needed to have a Gift because of how much mana I'd had, why would Sere be any different?

These two things made perfect, logical sense. The logic didn't do a damn thing to keep my surprise at bay when Sere just blinked into existence right next to me. I stared at her. She stared at me. If my chair had been lighter -something built for me, rather than the towering Duke Adrian- I might have made it fall over. Instead, I scrambled back in the chair, staring at the blonde-haired girl. She, for her part, looked completely nonplussed. She reached for one of the tarts and plopped it into her mouth.

"Sere…." What was I even supposed to say?

"You…how…..?" Sere shrugged, wiped her messy hands on her tunic, and pulled out her notebook. Gift?

"I…suppose it is." I stared at her.

"Can you do it again?" No sooner did I ask than Sere disappeared again. I focused and didn't have any more luck finding her this time either. Wait, what was I doing any of this for again? I shook my head. That meeting with Dorothy had gone well enough. Hers might have been a fledgling, insignificant paper, but it wouldn't stay that way for long with the kinds of stories I planned to have her be in the front row for. I needed to catch up on training.

However safe Count Vance made the expedition, it was still a trip outside the walls and into the Blighted Land. It would never be perfectly safe. Sere materialized right in front of me again. I blinked, stared at her. A dozen thoughts crashed into my head. Shadowed. Mind. The Godblade murmured even as my own thoughts slowly caught back up to reality.

"I…forgot about you," I said dumbly. This wasn't invisibility, even invisibility powerful enough to fool my senses. This was something much more. Sere was writing in her little notepad again. She turned it around. Bad?

"No, no," I said quickly.

"Of course not. I was just…I was just really surprised, that's all." I reached my hand forward and gently put my hands on her shoulders.

"Since when have you been able to do this, Sere?" She seemed to consider it for a moment and wrote it down in her notebook again. Don't know. I chewed on my lower lip. It didn't feel like this was something she could always do. It was a Gift, and an interesting one at that. This…was going to take more than just me to figure out. The late afternoon sun cast long, golden shadows across the dirt of the sparring arena. Funny, that I come to this place every time I need to think.

"My Lady, you are sure?" Estovan asked me, sitting cross-legged next to the sparring arena.

"I am."

"I'll believe it when I see it," Violet muttered next to me.

"There's nothing that gets past my eyes."

"Sounds like a lot did," Damian said snidely. Violet glared at Damian, then seemed to reach out to smack him.

"Guys, can we just watch?" I cut in, pointed at Sere. Everyone I could trust was here, except Anias, whom I'd sent into the city. Sere was standing a few feet away from us. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, occasionally glancing at the floor, making it clear she did not appreciate being the center of this much attention. That made the two quiet down.

"Sere, show us." Sere nodded hesitantly, blinked out of existence just as she had before. I paused, staring at the now-empty space.

"Why the hell are we just standing around?" Violet muttered.

"Esra, come the hell on. I'm booorredd." Violet grabbed my arm and began dragging me towards the sparring ring.

"Don't just grab her like that!" Damian objected. Practicing was probably a good idea, though I would have preferred to use the Godblade a bit, rather than just fight hand-to-hand. I needed to figure out everything it could and couldn't do.

"What an interesting ability," Estovan murmured behind me; he sounded thoughtful.

"An imposition on the world."

"What was that?" I asked. Sere materialized in front of us, her cheeks puffed out. She was pointing at herself. Violet jumped. Damian staggered back as if he'd just been punched. My surprise wasn't quite as severe, but it was still there. Violet stepped forward, grabbed Sere by the shoulders, and shook her.

"What the hell was that, kiddo?!" Sere's head bobbed back and forth as Violet shook her. She looked like a rather tiny doll in Violet's not-gentle arms. My head felt like it was reeling from being hit by a tiny hammer.

"It's her... Gift. Not entirely sure how it works yet, though." I said slowly. That was disorienting, though not as bad as it had been the first time. Damian stepped in next to her, hunching down as he inspected her all over. Did he expect to find a new set of arms? Maybe a pair of claws?

"I was hoping all of you could help me figure this out." I gestured towards Violet.

"You didn't see anything, right?"

"Nope," Violet confirmed.

"Not a goddamn thing. Fucking creepy th-" She paused, looked at Sere.

"Err…sorry. Didn't mean it like that." Sere didn't seem to mind. She fidgeted under Damian's scrutiny. I turned to Estovan. He stood now, his posture rigid. That tense movement probably said more than words could.

"You said her Gift was an imposition on the world. What did that mean?"

"My Lady, do you remember what I told you about Edicts and Tenets?" Estovan asked instead.

"Yes?" I paused.

"Tenets are your Gift used on yourself. Edicts are your Gift used on the world."

"Just so." He glanced at Sere.

"There are people with Gifts like this. People who can blind the eye. They almost always use their Tenet to make themselves invisible. It's not a common Gift, but it has been documented. This…." Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

"This is an Edict." I finished for him. Violet was staring at me, and so was Damian. Actually, Sere was too. Honestly, I still wasn't sure I understood everything this meant. I grasped some of it.

"She's manipulating the world itself." I finished.

"Rather than something like…going invisible, she's telling everyone'I am not here'?" Estovan nodded slowly. I got the impression that he was vaguely…sad? Or perhaps he was angry. It was hard to tell in this moment. I looked at Sere again, who was just listening to all of this with open curiosity. She wanted to know more about her Gift, too, it seemed.

"I'm not sure I understand," Damian said finally as he stepped back from her.

"It's barely any different than just disappearing."

"That's why I call you rockboy." Violet snorted.

"Your head is as thick as a rock." Damian glared at her. A small stone spike protruded from the space between his feet. Violet just grinned.

"You wanna go then? Don't come crying to me when I beat your ass again."

"Violet, relax," I muttered, stepping between her and Damian.

"I'll fight you. You don't need to provoke everyone else." I turned to Damian, crossing my arms.

"It's not just disappearing. We literally forgot she'd been there, didn't we?" Damian slowly nodded.

"We did. It didn't even seem strange at the time, but-" He paused, his eyes slowly getting wider and wider.

"I can't see her with my Gift. And Violet couldn't see her either." I mused. Paused.

"Wait, Estovan. You didn't seem to forget."

"I am somewhat accustomed to people bending the world," Estovan answered.

"And I do admit I was somewhat prepared for it. Had I not been, the result might have been different."

"We need to test exactly how this works," I said.

"Violet, try to catch her."

"With pleasure," Violet grinned, cracking her knuckles. She leapt. Sere immediately puffed out her cheeks and blinked out of existence. Violet lunged into the empty space. Her fist stopped mid-air. For a split second, my brain felt scrambled. A wave of mild vertigo hit me, and my eyes wanted to slide away from the empty space, focusing on the trees or on Violet instead. Why had I made her punch the air anyway?

"What the hell is wrong with you? There's nothing there." Violet grumbled.

"Why the hell did you even listen?" I shot back. Violet yelped and stumbled forward, instinctively rubbing her side. Sere stood right behind her, now visible, her small fist raised in a punching motion. Thoughts slammed into my brain. That was a test. Right. That was the point. It was terrifying how quickly my mind had adapted to this power.

"Ow! You little brat!" Violet spun around, glaring at the now-visible girl.

"So an attack breaks the illusion," Estovan noted.

"At least temporarily. Once the brain registers physical trauma from the source, the Edict shatters." We did a series of tests after that. Sere's Gift affected anyone within about one hundred metres. Anyone outside that bubble was unaffected. Moreover, her Gift prompted people to rationalize any odd behavior around them. If you tried to walk into her, you would instinctively take a different path rather than run into her, rarely questioning it yourself.

If she turned her Gift on and off, you would want to just think you were simply seeing things. There was a limit. If a distortion grew too large, you could see through it. If Sere punched someone, they could see her, though that only happened after she'd actually punched them. After that, Sere could vanish again, but their brain stayed hyperaware, making the power less useful. Sere could maintain this ability for 30 minutes at full range. I had no idea how long she could at closer ranges.

Estovan was eventually able to see through this ability fairly regularly. Out of the three of us, I could sometimes see through it too. Or rather, I realized that something was off. There was no explanation as to why. Eventually, I started to retain the memory much better. It seemed repeated exposure dulled the effect of the Gift a decent bit, though I could never actually see her. By the time the sun started to dip below the walls, Sere was yawning, rubbing her eyes with dirt-stained hands.

Estovan had left some time ago. The First Sword couldn't devote all of his time to my whims, after all. Damian was awkwardly trying to show Sere a basic martial stance favored by his family.

"Keep your weight centered," he instructed.

"Don't just use your arms. Use your hips." Sere watched him intently, her brow furrowed. She widened her stance and mirrored the motion. The movement was a little awkward, but Damian didn't seem discouraged by this at all. Violet was staring at me.

"What?"

"Pretty dangerous Gift, don't you think?" Violet folded her arms.

"Don't tell me you didn't think about it." I knew what she was getting at. An ability that allowed one to go unnoticed was the perfect tool for infiltration or… something like assassination. Estovan had been genuinely impressed, which meant my estimate of this ability wasn't that far off. On top of that, Sere was as weak now as she would ever be. How far would this ability go with time? The thought was terrifying. How many problems could be solved in an instant if Sere just…

killed someone before they even knew what hit them? Greenward had started to close the noose around my neck. The simplest solution, by far, was for him to have an accident. From what Anias had told me, the man himself wasn't very strong. Why did I need to put all these careful plans in place if Sere could slip past his guard and- I shook my head, sickened by my own thoughts. I looked over at the small, blonde girl awkwardly mirroring Damian's stance, and my chest tightened. A thought occurred to me.

Were Gifts truly random, or did you develop what you needed? Perhaps Sere had developed it because of her mother. Maybe she had just wanted people to stop looking at her. And I had thought about turning her into an assassin. I hated myself for even going down that line of thinking at all. It had come so naturally, too.

"Yeah," I murmured.

"But it's dangerous to her too."

"How's that?" Violet asked.

"My Gift is different, but…it's not like I can do that much yet. Sere's Gift…if someone found out, they could use her to do all kinds of things. That's why I-" Violet sighed.

"Yeah, yeah. I get it, I get it. Don't need to explain that much. I'm not an idiot." It was rather nice to have someone who was usually on the same page with me, even if she was sometimes on a different paragraph.

"But…you're going to have to tell her that smartass."

"What?" I followed Violet's gaze over to Sere, who'd left Damian and stood just off to my side. She was busy writing in her little notepad. I come? It took me a second to realize what she was asking. I wished I didn't. I hoped I was wrong.

"Come where, Sere?" I asked gently. She frowned, started writing again. Fight. Out? I froze. Slowly remembered to breathe. I plastered a smile on my face as I looked down at her.

"Sere, if you mean on the expedition then…." I shook my head.

"Of course you can't." She must have been in that room for quite a while then, and had listened in on everything. Though someone with Sere's Gift could find out anything they wanted, couldn't they? Sere frowned. She pointed a small, firm finger directly at Damian, and then at Violet. She scribbled on her notepad and held it up. Why? What could I say to that? After all, I had decided to take Damian and Violet along.

The danger might not have been that extreme with all the men and women we would have around us, but it wasn't like the danger was zero. People did die on expeditions, even if the casualty rate had been getting lower in recent years.

"I-" I swallowed, shook my head. I looked at Sere, but I didn't see her, nor the grounds surrounding us. I was in that alley, where I'd first found her. A helpless girl being dragged around by her mother. Perhaps that mother had not been as monstrous as I'd thought, but the death had still been deserved. I was in the darkness of that warehouse. I saw the blackened, emaciated husk of a child locked in a cage. I looked at Sere, and for a second, I saw her inside it.

Her bright blonde hair turned to ash, her massive mana drained to nothing to fuel a madman's delusion. In my mind, Sere's face had no expression at all. I read an accusation in it anyway. The memories stunned me for a second. Made my heart beat faster. I almost reached for the Gift. Don't. Lie. The Godblade warned. I forced myself to stillness. Forced myself to meet Sere's gaze.

"You might get hurt," I said lamely. It was a pathetic excuse. I knew it the moment it left my mouth. It was, however, the truth. Sere's shoulders trembled. The air around us grew thicker. Dust began to swirl around our boots as her massive mana pool flared outward. Beside me, Damian instinctively took a defensive half-step back. Even Violet's eyes widened in surprise. I was compressing mana, but I needed to channel more mana still to get some of that suffocating weight off.

My father had once said that you could tell a lot about what a person felt just by the taste of their mana. This was the first time I'd realized what he'd meant. The air tasted like anger. She glared up at me, her knuckles white around her pencil. A ragged breath hissed through her teeth -the closest thing to a shout she could manage. She flipped to a fresh page and pressed down so hard I could hear the paper tearing. Snap. The graphite broke, leaving a jagged black smear across the page.

She shoved the notepad toward me. NOT. CHILD. I stared at it, understood exactly what she was saying, and yet… not wanting to accept it. The Godblade pulsed violently in the back of my mind. My right hand twitched, my fingers aching to curl around a hilt that wasn't there. The sword agreed with her. It wanted her to fight. No, perhaps it simply wanted me to see something I should have.

"Sere, I just-" Sere glared at me harder. Her eyes shimmered. A single tear ran down her cheek. The heavy, suffocating pressure of her mana vanished. She turned, and she ran. Sere must have been compressing mana, because she ran fast.

"Sere-" I raised a hand, slowly let it fall. What was I supposed to do? Chase after her? What right did I have to do that, when my decision was still the same? Damn it.

"You really have no tact." Violet sighed, not with any real anger. Odd that she, of all people, was saying this.

"Guess even you can be fucking stupid sometimes."

"I'll try to find her," Damian said quietly, face grim. He jogged to catch up to her. I stood in the darkening courtyard, the weight of the Godblade still throbbing in my skull. I had promised myself I would never be like my mother. I couldn't escape the sickening feeling that I had just acted exactly like her. I also couldn't escape the feeling that I was right.