The Tyrant’s Heir

Prologue

The dark, smoky bedroom smelled of flames and failure. Bodies lay strewn across the floor in several places, none of which were dead. They groaned and twitched, desperately trying to get up, to escape, to do anything, but couldn’t.

Riffan wasn’t much better than the rest of them, though at least he could think straight. He could probably get up if he wanted to, but that would just make things worse.

His ears rang. He had been wearing earplugs, and yet they rang like gongs into his skull; a constant, painful sound that could leave him deaf for the rest of his life. At the moment, however, he didn’t care.

Among the bodies was fire, among the fire was smoke, and among the smoke was a single man standing in the center of the room, equanimous. He surveyed the results of the chaos, the chaos he had caused. He was a monster.

Riffan saw another man get up from his spot at the back of the room. It was Derrin, the mechanic. How had he found the strength to rise? Immediately, Riffan knew what Derrin was going to do, and he knew he was a fool because of it. The man had always been too stubborn to see when he had failed.

Derrin stepped forward and swung a fist at the other standing man, who watched the desperate attempt with mild curiosity. The mechanic’s strengthened arm was caught by the opposing man in mid-swing and twisted painfully. Derrin cried out and stumbled to the floor, but the man did not let go. He heaved Derrin off his feet and threw him across the room as if he weighed no more than a common nicrin.

Derrin flew through the smoke and flames uncontrollably to collide with the far wall near Riffan. Bones cracked. Derrin did not get up.

Riffan turned to see the other man again, who now strode towards the spot where Derrin lay. The fire parted unnaturally where the man walked, letting him through as if commanded. He stopped and stood to consider the mechanic for a short while, then turned his head to face Riffan.

Riffan wasn’t scared. The worst thing possible had already happened. At this point, death would be a favor. So Riffan sat up, coughing at the smoke in his lungs. He mustered what strength he had left and painfully got to his feet to face the man.

Riffan met the man’s cold eyes and could see the evil in them; a relentless evil that would wipe out whatever stood in its way. The man knew that he was evil, he cherished the fact that he was a monster. And his name was Korvus Albion Hezra.

“I hope you don’t blame me,” Hezra said, turning briefly to view the destruction again, “I was acting out of self-defense.”

Riffan didn’t say anything. This was the kind of man with a fragile temper, and upsetting that temper had grave consequences. He was right though, Riffan and his crew of nearly thirty had come to kill the man.

“I’m thankful, though,” Hezra admitted. “You have shown great courage and strength, all of you. I needed that. I needed proof that I was fit to rule.”

“What will you do to us?” Riffan finally said.

“You will be kept alive,” Hezra said through his metallic face mask, “For now, at least. I’m honestly surprised you can still hear me.”

Riffan had noticed it too. Everyone else in the room would likely be deaf forever. Riffan was the only loudear. It had drained his entire reserve of energy just to resist a fraction of the sound wave. His energy would also be locked for a while.

“What,” Riffan asked again, “Will you do to us?”

Hezra’s cold eyes showed amusement through his metallic mask. Riffan could tell he was smiling without actually seeing his mouth. “Don’t worry,” Hezra said, “You will be put to good use. There are many mechanics and forcers among you. I appreciate that.”

“I would rather die than give you my power,” Riffan said through gritted teeth.

“Unfortunately,” Hezra said, “It’s not really your choice.”

Riffan said nothing. He imagined the years to come, training in prison just to give his powers away to a horrible monster like Hezra. If Korvus had one good trait, however, it was honesty. There really was nothing Riffan could do to prevent the inevitable future.

“Someday,” Hezra said, stepping forward and leaning in close to Riffan, “Someday you will be glad to have your power held by the great worldmaster. You should be honored.”

“Someday,” Riffan said, “You will finally get what you deserve, and the world will be grateful for it.”

Hezra scoffed and stood back up. All the fire in the room vanished in a flash as the temperature plummeted dramatically. Riffan could now see the bodies of his companions and friends more clearly without the smoke. They had failed. They had all failed.

Hezra’s hand moved through the air with blinding speed, and Riffan was struck in the skull with a gauntleted backhand. Everything went dark.

Nearly 2200 years ago, Akaivia was visited by someone who would change the course of time forever. Nobody knows how Ronulai the Shifter got there, where she came from, or who she was, but whatever she did had brought energy to the planet, a kind of energy that had never been seen or heard of before. People called it ronulan energy, prospect energy, Akaivian energy, or, most commonly, xithian energy.

Chapter 1

Blink

The copper serrin flipped up into the air, ringing musically as it spun. Blink caught the coin on the way back down and pocketed it. A few hours of hard work had given him what he needed for a good meal today.

Blink was thankful for Kelton and his family’s kindness. If it weren’t for them, he would have become a common beggar.

On the way to Blink’s destination, he passed several beggars. This was one of the few parts of the city where they were still permitted. As he watched them sleep against the brick walls or huddle up in the warmth of the trash piles, he felt somehow connected to them, as if he belonged there with them. He considered giving away a coin or two, but that would attract the attention of the whole street. And plus, fights sometimes broke out among the beggars when one of them was given a coin.

Blink walked through and out of the slums that surrounded the city's edges. The streets and homes in the more urban parts of Hezria were much nicer and well-kept, which made Blink feel even guiltier about leaving all those beggars behind. They didn’t deserve their lives of poverty, and he knew it.

“Back again, are ya, lad?” A familiar voice said, “What’ll it be today?”

Blink looked up, pushing his thoughts aside, and saw the friendly butcher at the shop smiling down at him. Moey was a very large man, at least a foot taller than Blink. 

Blink stepped up to the outdoor counter and placed six of his eight copper serrins on the wooden surface in front of Moey. It always felt odd parting with money that he had just earned. He felt like keeping the money as a reminder of his hard work, but if he did that, he couldn’t pay for his own dinner.

“I’ll have a sausage burrito,” Blink said, “No wild sauce or peppers this time, just the meat and cheese.”

“Alright,” Moey said, selecting the nearest hunk of pig, “Will that be all for ya?”

Blink considered getting a cup of grape juice as well. With all the money he had, he felt rich, but he knew it wasn’t wise to spend all of his money right after earning it. “Yes,” he finally said. “Thank you.”

Blink watched as the butcher put together the delicious burrito with incredible speed. He had obviously done this several hundred times. When he was done, he took the coins and handed the burrito to Blink.

“Have a good day, lad,” Moey said with a smile.

Blink accepted the meal and turned to go back home, but when he did, he noticed something a little ways down the street; constables. They weren’t really constables, actually. At least according to Blink they weren’t. They were nothing more than thugs and bullies, causing more crime than they prevented. They were too close for Blink to avoid, and they would obviously try to bother him, so he quickly thought of a plan.

“Actually,” Blink said, turning back to the butcher and placing his last two serrins on the counter, “Can I get a fake burrito, too? Just bread stuffed with paper or something?”

Moey looked a little confused, but put together the ridiculous burrito anyway. When he handed it to Blink, he only took one of the serrins, kindly letting Blink keep the other one.

Blink thanked the man, then hid both of the burritos in his shirt. He began walking towards the constables, keeping his head down to avoid attention.

“Oi,” one of the officers said as Blink passed them, “Stop right there!”

Blink sighed and lifted his head to see the four men approaching him, “Yes, officer?” he said.

“What’s your name, kid?” one of the constables asked.

“It’s Blink, sir.”

“Well, Blink, you look like a nice boy. We’ve had quite a long evening, and that sorta thing can tire a guy out. You mind paying a little something for your local officers?” One of the other thugs snickered at their leader’s factitious kindness.

“I-I-I don’t have anything right now,” Blink stuttered.

“Oh, I see how it is. You think we’re idiots, don’t you? You just came from the butcher’s shop. Obviously you’ve got somethin’. Now pay up.”

Blink put a fake blush on his face and acted embarrassed, then apologized to the man and pulled out his burrito. Not the real one, but the fake one. He planned on eating the real one for dinner that day, and he wasn’t going to let four thugs with uniforms stop that.

The constable snatched the burrito out of Blink’s hands and handed it to one of his cronies, who chuckled a bit. When the constable turned to Blink again, he backhanded him in the face, sending pain through Blink’s cheek.

“That oughta teach you not to lie to your superiors,” the man said, “Now run along, boy, and thanks for dinner.”

Blink did as told, turning and shuffling away from the constables as any sad, recently punished boy would do. But as he turned his back to them, he couldn’t help but smile at the fact that his plan had worked. The idiots took the fake burrito!

Blink quickly turned left at the nearest intersection to get out of sight from the constables. Shortly after he did, he heard one of them yell something nasty. Blink started running, but laughed as he did. They had probably taken a bite of the fake burrito and found that it was filled with trash. Verrit would applaud Blink for his genius trick.

Blink kept running, but before he could reach the next intersection, the thugs spotted him from behind and called out for him to stop in the name of the law. Blink didn’t obey this time, he just kept running.

The constables gave chase, but Blink was quite a ways ahead of them. When he rounded another corner into a dark alleyway, he whipped out his carrier, a fist-sized metal ball on the end of a rope, and swung it into the air, holding onto the end of the rope as he did.

Blink pushed kinetic force into the ball as it swung upward, which propelled it much further than it naturally should have gone. Because he was holding on, though, it pulled him into the air along with it.

The device was specifically made for forcers, like Blink; people who could increase or decrease an object’s kinetic energy as it moved. It didn’t take much of his energy reserve to pull Blink onto the roof of the nearest building. He landed softly and laid flat against the stone.

Below him, Blink heard the constables round the same corner he had taken. He carefully peeked over the side to see them stop in confusion. They were probably boggled out of their minds. Ronulans like Blink were rare in the outer parts of Hezria, so the cops couldn't have guessed that he had just hopped onto the roof of a house. Plus, they obviously had no energy of their own, so they wouldn’t be able to chase Blink even if they discovered him.

They spun around a bit, looking for places Blink could have hidden, then cursed and began walking back to the main street to bug some other poor kid.

Blink felt victorious, so much that he did a little victory dance when the cops were safely out of sight. He jumped off the wall with his carrier, used negative energy to slow the fall of the rope and ball, and landed safely on the dusty stone pathway.

Choosing the opposite direction from the way the constables went, Blink began running through the alleyways back home. He smiled as he ran, ignoring the fact that he would probably cross those thugs again someday, and when he did, they wouldn’t be nearly as nice.

Blink passed the vague border into the slums again, where beggars and homeless people were scattered about on the streets. He did his best to ignore the pleadings and hungry groans as he ran by.

When he approached the very edge of the city, where not even the beggars stayed, he ducked into the special alleyway he knew all too well and approached a large, double dumpster sitting at an angle against the end of the alleyway. Nobody had used the dumpster for as long as he could remember. It had been put there back when people still occupied these parts of town. He slipped past it to find a dark hole in the ground, completely obscured by the mass of the dumpster. The hole had a staircase in it, which was built about five years ago to make descending much easier. Blink stepped into the hole and started walking down into the darkness below.

It didn’t take long before the deepening pathway became lit by firedust and torches on the walls. Blink jogged along the underground pathways until he reached the network of intersections and cave entrances which created the secret base of the insurgents. He was home.

Ronulai was worshiped as a goddess by some, although those religions are long past. To most, she was a wise leader and teacher. With her power to control all ten forms of energy, she protected her land and her followers, quickly forming the most stable and loved civilization in all of Akaivia. After several years of her reign, Ronulai chose ten worthy followers to inherit a portion of her power. Each one received one form of her energy. The amount each one received determined the unit of measurement that is still used to this day. They each received 1000 xiths, and became the first generation of Ronulans.

Chapter 2

Verrit

“Looks like we’ve got a game on our hands, now don’t we?” Verrit said, rubbing his hands together “How much will it be today, fine competitor?”

Ian smiled confidently and slapped five copper serrins onto the stone rock they used as a table. He was still in his teenage years, several years younger than Verrit.

Verrit whistled, “Feelin’ bold, today, now are ya?”

Ian nodded.

“Well, what if I told you that I, too, am feelin’ quite bold myself?” Verrit said, dropping his own small handful of five serrins onto the table.

Ian cracked his knuckles, ready for a good fight. Verrit smiled at the boy’s spirit and pulled out his two wooden cages, setting each one on the table. Inside each cage was a nicrin. Nicrins were nasty little buggers that infested the insurgent caves like rats. He had cornered and caught each one himself, and was quite proud of it.

Verrit patted the top of one cage, admiring the pink ratlike creature inside. Nicrins had no eyes and no nose. They sensed things through vibration, so it jumped a bit as Verrit's hand slapped the wood. “This little freak of nature right here, I like to call Ruth, short for Ruthless. Specifically trained in the art of winning Verrit enough money to buy a sandwich in a bet, Ruth will tear your weakling to shreds.”

“Did you just refer to yourself in the third person?” Ian asked.

“You got a problem with that, son?” Verrit said in a manly voice, “Verrit does what he wants, and if he wants to refer to himself in the third person, he’ll do just that. And besides, I’ve been thinking of that intro all afternoon.”

The nicrins each hissed and scratched the wooden cages. They would have their fun soon enough. Verrit and Ian each grabbed their competing nicrins and brought them over to the “arena”, which was a shallow stone pit in the ground where Verrit had held several similar fights in the past.

Ian and Verrit placed their competitors into the pit, which was just deep enough to prevent them from crawling out. The pests weren’t poisonous, but they could cause quite a bit of pain.

“Three, two, one, fight!” 

As Verrit announced the beginning of the fight, both he and Ian opened the doors to the wooden cages and pulled their hands back, careful not to get caught in the violence.

“Are you kidding me?” Someone shouted from the hallway, “Another nicrin fight?”

Verrit didn’t turn to face Blink. He could recognize his best friend’s voice anywhere. “Hold on, it just started,” Verrit said, eyes focused on the fight.

Blink joined Verrit and Ian by the pit to watch the nicrins. The battle started out a little dull, but nicrins were extremely territorial, so they would try to murder each other eventually. Ian’s nicrin left its cage first, hissing at the human onlookers, then scuttling around to examine its surroundings. When it discovered the opposing nicrin, both of the small, pink creatures raised their jaws threateningly and screeched.

Ruth started the fight by hopping out of its cage and onto Ian’s nicrin. A series of scratches, bites, and hisses commenced as they both tumbled over each other aggressively. Verrit found it difficult to keep track of which nicrin was his.

Nicrins were a member of the aush family, which constituted four types of blind, predatory animals. And, being an aush, they were naturally extremely durable. You could spend an hour hitting a full-grown hogbite with a sledgehammer before its skin got bruised.

The fight continued for quite some time. Verrit tried some cheerleading for Ruth to make it more interesting, but the continuous bites, screeches, and clawing got repetitive.

“Didn’t your father tell you not to do these fights anymore?” Blink asked eventually.

“Since when do I give a hog’s butt about what I’m not supposed to do?” Verrit replied, still focused on the duel.

“You always obey when your father’s around,” Blink said. Verrit didn’t respond. Blink didn’t continue the conversation. Instead, he pulled out a sausage burrito and started munching on it.

“You smuggled that past the thugs?” Verrit asked, amazed.

“It’s actually a pretty good story,” Blink said, “I’ll tell you after the fight.”

One of the nicrins, Verrit was pretty sure it wasn’t Ruth, got a lucky swipe in and managed to flip the other nicrin over. Verrit, Ian, and Blink leaned forward in excitement as the vulnerable animal tried to get back up. It was too late for her, however. Ian's competitor quickly took its advantage and bit down on the soft underbelly of its foe.

A horrible screech came from the wounded nicrin. It managed to flip itself over and scurry away before more merciless attacks came. Ian’s nicrin didn’t let it run away that easily, however. It scuttled towards its opponent once more and swiped at its face.

The swipe did virtually nothing. Ruth’s skin was still very tough on top, but it was obvious now that Ian had won. With a devastating blow to the underbelly, Verrit’s competitor could no longer fight and would probably bleed to death sometime soon. Ian laughed maniacally.

“No! No! No!” Verrit yelled at his nicrin, “Get out of the corner, you dirt-brained cretin!”

Ian smiled and gathered the ten serrins from off the table. Verrit didn’t stop him, he just put his hands to his face in shame as Ruth hissed her last breath.

Ian’s nicrin reared up and screeched triumphantly, but before it could enjoy its victory by cannibalizing its opponent, Verrit scooped it up with a cage. It would fight again another day.

“You lost,” Blink said, “Again.”

“What do you mean “again”?” Verrit asked, “I’ve won the last three battles.”

“You used to lose almost every single one,” Blink said, “So now your winning streak is over and your losing streak has just begun. Why don’t you be a little smarter for once, and maybe stop doing these?”

“Phh!” Verrit scoffed, waving his hand in dismissal, “These battles are how I pay for lunch most days.”

“You don’t need to pay for lunch,” Blink said, “Your parents provide meals for you every day.”

“But they never give me those nice salami bacon wraps,” Verrit said, “The ones you get at Moey’s place, with the bonfire sauce and garlic bread. Delicious.”

Blink sighed and continued eating his burrito. Verrit knew that Blink couldn’t win a debate. He made sure he never lost an argument by continuing long enough for the other guy to give up.

Once Ian had gathered the serrins and added them to his personal backpack thing, which he carried around wherever he went, he left.

“So,” Blink said, trying to start a new conversation, “I had quite an encounter with the constables earlier.”

“I suspected as much,” Verrit said. He sat down on a small stone lump and put his feet up on the table. The seat was too small, however, so it wasn’t nearly as comfortable as he made it seem.

“At Moey’s place,” Blink began, “I was just getting a sausage burrito, right? But right before I walked away, I spotted the…”

Blink continued, but Verrit didn’t really pay attention. He was busy concentrating on ignoring him, which was actually quite difficult. To purposefully try to ignore someone while they were talking meant you were thinking about not thinking about them, and that was just confusing. The fact that it was confusing, however, gave Verrit something to ponder, which made it easier to not pay attention to Blink.

Blink kept talking. Verrit sighed, watching him while thinking of other things. Blink had a strange habit of non-stop blinking whenever he was focused or excited. That was how he had gotten his nickname.

Verrit had given Blink that name, and for that, he was proud. Several times in the past, Verrit had pretended to be Blink’s father, justified by the fact that he had named him. Blink didn’t really have a real first name. For a while after the insurgents found him, they had no idea what to call him, so most people just referred to him as “The kid.”

“Pretty cool, huh?” Blink said, obviously finished with his story.

“What?” Verrit asked, “What’s cool?”

“You weren’t listening, were you?” Blink said with a slight frown.

Verrit yawned, “Nicrin fights are exhausting, mate,” he said, “I need to save my precious attention span for tomorrow.”

“That’s not how it works.”

“Yes it does,” Verrit said with a wicked smirk.

Blink made a little grumble and walked out of the room. Verrit loved messing with him. They were like brothers to each other, but sometimes, when Blink stalked away like that, Verrit wondered if he had actually somehow offended him. Maybe in the future he should be less of a pain in the rear. The far future.

Slang terms and nicknames arose quickly throughout the world, but the ten types of energy Ronulai brought to Akaivia were, and will always be the same. Potential, kinetic, thermal, sonic, nuclear, gravitational, chemical, electromagnetic, mechanical, and xithian. Each one was able to manipulate different aspects of energy, with their own advantages and weaknesses. Kinetic ronulans were called forcers, potential ronulans were called bursters, thermal ronulans were called hearthers, electromagnetic ronulans were called seers, sonic ronulans were called loudears, chemical ronulans were called surgists, mechanical ronulans were called mechanics, nuclear ronulans were called decayers, gravitational ronulans were called floaters, and xithian ronulans were called roigons.

Chapter 3

Savreen

Silence was everywhere. When everyone in the city was asleep, that sort of thing tended to happen. Those were the times when Savreen performed at the best of her ability.

People had asked her how she managed to stay up all night and still have time for things during the day. Savreen wasn’t quite sure how to answer those people, but she did get more sleep than most people assumed. Some nights when she didn’t have a special mission like this one, she could rest for a while. And during the day she often snuck naps into her schedule.

Tonight, Savreen was not tired. She was never tired when she had a job to do. Tonight, she would go further than she had ever gone into restricted territory. Her assigned mission was to find, infiltrate, and spy on the iron assailant camp.

Nobody had assigned her this task, and that annoyed her. As the most skilled spy in the insurgent base and one of the most powerful ronulans, she needed more of a responsibility, so she assigned missions to herself. People didn’t question her on that one.

Savreen pressed her back to an unfamiliar wall and listened. While she did, she looked up and noticed that all three moons were up that night. Kazeon cast a soft, eerie glow that made the city look haunted, while Kaozar shrouded the reflective buildings and streets with a yellow hue. The third moon, Kozab, was barely noticeable in the night sky. It was both the smallest moon and the furthest away.

Hearing the sound of hushed conversation, Savreen ducked down to blend with the shadows. The voices were coming from the other side of the wall, or maybe on top. With her soft, soundless shoes, she adjusted her position and peered onto the thirty-foot wall protecting the palace grounds from invaders.

There were three guards currently above her current location. Likely, two of them had come from other posts to chat or gamble. They had done that in the past. They must’ve been quite bored to go to such lengths. If Hezra discovered that his night watchmen had been slacking, he would kill them without hesitation.

Carefully scanning the other nearby positions on the wall, Savreen didn’t spot anyone else. That was good. She picked up a pebble from off the street and quickly thought of a plan.

Still concealed by darkness, Savreen silently hopped up onto the nearest building and threw the pebble at the guards. Usually, something as small as a pebble wouldn’t be able to go very far, but Savreen had manipulated its gravity to make the rock travel further.

The pebble did its job by distracting the guards, likely bouncing against their game table. They quieted for a bit, looking both at the mysterious pebble and the general area where Savreen was standing.

As the guards looked for her, however, Savreen was no longer standing atop her shadowed building. She had leapt into the sky with the weight of a feather. If anyone had been looking up at that time, she would have looked like another bird in the night sky; a tiny black figure soaring over the wall.

Before Savreen could be carried by the wind like a real feather, she increased her weight by a few pounds, letting herself drop like any normal item to the floor. The guards were busy looking the other direction and didn’t notice her when she landed. Just to be sure, however, she decreased her weight at the last second to silence the fall. That was simply muscle memory for her now; becoming nearly weightless whenever she landed a fall so that it wouldn’t hurt her, and so that no sound was created.

Savreen observed her surroundings, quickly taking cover from any nearby sources of light to avoid being seen. According to information she had gathered from similar spy missions in the past, the iron assailant base was hidden somewhere around here…

Footsteps. Savreen ducked behind a large mechanism used to open and close the huge steel gates. Hopefully it would provide enough cover if someone walked by.

Sure enough, as the footsteps approached. Savreen could see a figure emerging from around the bend of the path. The figure was clad in thick iron armor, with absolutely no joint holes. The breastplate was smooth and silvery, with the red and black symbol of Hezra’s army painted onto it. The helmet was just as thick as the armor, with only two small slits for the eyes and another for the mouth. It didn’t matter how strong or athletic the man inside actually was, anybody who put on a suit of iron assailant armor would look like a juggernaut ready for war.

Savreen kept as silent as possible. She was usually a master at escaping dangerous situations, but if a guy like this went after her, she wouldn’t have a chance.

Iron assailants were the top grade of soldiers in Hezra’s army and protective forces, below only Hezra himself. Using Korvus Hezra’s own technique of “Hezra theft”, people recruited as iron assailants could obtain multiple forms of energy. Not all ten, like the mighty tyrant himself. A few was all it took to make them unstoppable.

Savreen carefully watched the soldier as he strode past her. He took off his helmet as he walked, revealing a relatively normal human face that looked way too small for the massive suit of armor. Sometimes, it was hard to remember that people like this were actually human beings.

This guy, though, seemed to think he was in a safe zone within the walls of the inner city, otherwise he wouldn’t have taken off his helmet. Savreen considered shooting him now, while he was vulnerable, but that could cause all sorts of troubles, so she left her handgun alone.

Little was actually known about the iron assailants. It was obvious that they possessed multiple ronulan abilities, but it wasn’t quite obvious which ones they were. In open battle, they were known to jump extremely high, which meant they either had gravitational or mechanical energy, or possibly something else with a similar ability. Some newer models of the assailants even had strange contraptions connected to their arms that somehow fired destructive beams of orange light. A big problem with observing the iron assailants up close was that it was hard to do so and live.

That was why Savreen assigned herself this task.

The fact that she spotted an iron assailant in this area told her that she was on the right track. The soldier was most likely either walking from the hidden assailant base, or towards it. Savreen quickly decided which one was more likely, and started following him.

The man kept walking. It took a while before he made any turns on the unfamiliar street. Savreen followed precariously, stepping as softly as she could and keeping a very safe distance.

Eventually, the man's paths became so seemingly random through the dark alleyways that Savreen had a hard time memorizing the course. Left turn, right turn, left again, left again, right, left. Wait, was that another left turn? It was hard to focus while trying to keep the information in her head.

Finally, after Savreen gave up on memorizing the directions, the man stopped. Savreen had a little panic attack as the assailant began to look around, supposedly making sure nobody was watching. She quickly ducked behind the corner and held her breath.

After counting to five slowly in her head, Savreen carefully peeked around the corner once more.

The iron clad warrior looked down at the floor and stood there for a second, then a large section of the cobblestone street opened up under him and swallowed him. It was like a trapdoor built into the street, pushing back up to seal again.

Savreen stood in silence and awe, not exactly sure what she just witnessed. She approached the spot where the man had vanished with no clue what to do. Either someone underneath the street had sensed him and let him in, or he had used some form of ronulan energy to trigger the trapdoor. She had to admit, whatever this contraption was, it was a very impressive one, hidden in the middle of nowhere with an invisible entrance. It hadn’t even made much noise.

Before Savreen could try anything, she heard more footsteps approaching. Completely driven by panic and instinct, Savreen decreased her weight to nearly nothing and jumped, flying backwards deeper into the alleyway. Before she could smash into the dead end, she caught the corner of a windowsill and halted herself in place. Her feet weren’t even touching the ground.

Hopefully, being next to the normal-looking window in the dead of night wouldn’t draw attention. It was the dead of night, everyone was asleep, so someone wouldn’t look over at a window on a wall to see if someone was trying to blend in next to it, right?

Savreen held perfectly still as two more people approached the secret entrance to what she assumed was the iron assailant base. One of them was clad in iron assailant armor, just like the last guy, but the other newcomer wasn't wearing such protection. They were in a hushed conversation, but Savreen could neither hear them nor make out any distinct facial features.

The conversation they were having seemed to make them forget to look around for spies, so they simply stepped up to the camouflaged trapdoor and paused for a bit. Just like last time, the door in the floor swung open, engulfing them as they fell into it. Savreen watched carefully to see if anything odd happened before entering the hidden room, but she discovered no clues. There was no light visible from the other side of the trapdoor, so she couldn’t see into it either.

The door closed again and Savreen was left in silence, the three moons in the sky basking the street in eerie light as she waited quietly. After what seemed like half an hour, she approached the trapdoor. Or, at least, the spot she was pretty sure the trapdoor was. Carefully inspecting the surroundings near the trapdoor provided no useful information.

Savreen had been working on this mission for several days. She wouldn’t back down now just because she couldn’t find a way in. If the iron assailants really did keep their secret base right here, they would probably have a separate exit somewhere else. She was pretty sure it wasn’t a one room base, too, seeing how no light came from beneath the door.

With careful and hesitant consideration, Savreen eventually decided to find a way in. If she somehow managed to open the door, and she fell right into a secret discussion between the assailant, she would be doomed, but she was fairly certain that wouldn’t be the case. This alleyway wasn’t completely vacant, and as such it most likely had the occasional person walk through it. The iron assailants wouldn’t logically exit through here without risking their secret being discovered. Now, if she could only find a way to get in.

Savreen tried to consider every possible thing the assailants could’ve done to trigger the door opening. Perhaps they tapped their foot a few times and some sort of vibration sensor inside registered it? No, such technology was fiction. And even if Hezra did have such advanced machines, Savreen was sure she would have noticed if the assailants tapped their feet before entering. All they did was look at the ground for a second and the door opened.

It was probably something they did with their ronulan powers to trigger the door, but if it was, it probably meant she couldn’t trigger the same effect, unless it was gravitational energy they used…

Savreen increased her weight to about five times the normal amount. Surprisingly, the floor beneath her caved in and gravity pulled her with alarming speed. She covered her shocked yelp as she fell.

Just as the iron assailants had done, Savreen fell right into the dark pit, which she could now see was very deep. This contraption, along with the fall, made it so that only floaters like her could enter the base through this entrance.

Before Savreen could splat against the ground with five times her usual weight, she decreased the gravitational energy affecting her to make her weigh less than one pound. The impact of the fall was silent and harmless.

Savreen looked up just in time to see the trapdoor close, submerging her in darkness. Her heart was beating like a drum. She had not expected to find out the secret that quickly.

Her powers as a floater could increase or decrease the effect that gravity had on her, so when she made herself ‘heavier', it actually made her fall faster. If she didn’t have incredible reflexes, she probably wouldn’t have survived the fall, since her increase in weight had made her fall five times as fast.

Savreen stood silently for a moment. She had already come this far, she would have to continue. Feeling around at the walls of the stone room, she eventually found a path that led forward. She followed it.

The path went on for a bit, then took a sharp right turn. Thankfully, Savreen had been cautiously advancing through the tunnel with her hands up, so she did not smack into the wall at the bend.

After pressing forward for another minute, Savreen saw light ahead. She slowed her pace and crept closer to the torchlight very carefully.

A new room opened up, and Savreen could hardly believe her eyes. She had hit the spying jackpot. The walls of this new large room were covered with iron assailant armor and gear. Dozens of the strange arm guns rested on a table. Several stone chairs sat in a circle as a meeting room. This was most definitely the iron assailant base, or, at least, one of them. There could very well be multiple in the vast city of Hezria.

Thankfully, there weren’t any iron assailants in the room when Savreen found it. They must have already left. Although the room did have one closed door on the far side, if people were still here, they were probably in whatever room the doorway led to.

Savreen didn’t know where to start as she examined her surroundings. A smile of pure victory and excitement clung to her face. She felt like a treasure hunter who finally found his cave of gold and jewels.

She took a moment to take in the scene, then stepped over to a table and grabbed one of the weird guns off of it. The insurgent elders and eldesses had been trying to figure out what these were for quite a while.

After Savreen pocketed the gun, she walked over to a wall covered with iron armor. It was very smooth and reflective, with just a few slits in the face. Honestly, they didn’t look very comfortable. How were you supposed to breathe through a tiny hole like that for up to several hours while you fought a war?

The door on the far wall opened.

Savreen almost yelped again, today was just a jumpy day for her. Instead, she did the smart thing and leaped backwards across the room and into the hallway to hide behind the corner.

Whoever entered the room didn’t say anything, they just walked in and set something down, as if they forgot to put it away before they left. Savreen glanced around the corner when she thought the person was leaving again. She didn’t recognize him; it didn’t look like anybody she had seen earlier.

Just before the man left again and closed the door, Savreen saw through the open doorway into a much larger room. Standing in that room and giving orders was Amrea Hezra, the Kingmaster’s sister.

Savreen stopped looking immediately. If Amrea spotted her there, she would have absolutely no chance of surviving what came next. It was common knowledge that Korvus Hezra, the Kingmaster, had a younger sister, but wasn’t she supposed to be in Roihaven fighting a war? Why had she come back to Hezria?

Amrea was undoubtedly the second most powerful person on the planet. People estimated her base energy to be somewhere around 17,000 xiths, while the average was only one-hundred to two-hundred. Aside from all that, Amrea was a murderous psychopath. She laughed whenever she took a kill, and was definitely not sane herself.

Hezra was a tyrant, yes, but the fact that he had brought her sister back from Roihaven made this entire city twice as dangerous for the insurgents. Savreen had to get out of here as fast as possible.

Ronulai was functionally immortal, with a steady age of about 30. However, even though her body couldn’t age, she could still be killed by common weapons. She was killed nearly 110 years after she came down from the sky and brought light and magic to Akaivia. The rebellious murder of the Shifter started the first ronulan war, which lasted several years. The killer was a man named Baron Stryke, who was the grandson of the first hearther. The thing that had granted Ronulai’s immortality was her use of mechanical energy. This skill was passed on to only one person before she was killed; her apprentice, Quinton Gausse. Quinton was the very first Mechanic, direct ancestor of every natural mechanic that lives today. Some still think he is alive, but most do not. The first war drove him into hiding, and he has never returned. Stryke, on the other hand, was proud of his supposed victory, killing Ronulai and scaring away Quinton. With the rising population of Ronulans, Stryke wanted to be the first mortal to rule over the Ronulans. He called his followers Brogans, and he and his army fought long and hard to seize the temple of Ronulai, but in the end, they failed. Even with the end of the war, however, Quinton Gausse did not show himself.