Black Market Romance (2)

---------------------------------

Below is a summarization of the history of GATES written by a netizen known as "DaPPyDanNCer_899".

GATES. They are portals to other dimensions that contain regions infested with creatures that have a variety of powers. Some may have the power of an elephant inside the body of a tiger while there may be sloths that are as fast as cheetahs.

These cracks in space appeared 53 years ago and were spread all over the planet. At that time, the governments around the world gathered together to debate on how they should research the phenomenon.

As everyone knows, politicians take years arguing about one thing and almost never make any progress. They spent over 3 weeks arguing about who should go into the portals, what equipment should be taken in, and other logistical things.

No country wanted to take the risk first and the public was getting impatient as people spread fear. They called the appearance of GATES the start of the apocalypse, the end of days.

They weren't wrong as, after 3 weeks, the monsters from the GATES broke out. Modern machines were not enough to fight against certain monsters.

The global population went down from 13.7 billion to 5.2 billion before humans could fight back.

After 2 years, 4 months, 2 weeks, and 3 days, the first instance of superpowers began to manifest randomly within the remaining human population.

Once superpowers became prevalent among a considerable amount of humans, cities were taken back, rebuilt and gates became heavily guarded. Superpowered humans surrounded them at all times until the first pioneers into the GATES were sent off.

They came back with the data needed to continue sending expedition after expedition into the unknown. As we learned more about hunting down monsters and the requirements to permanently close GATES, these dimensions became integrated into society as a business.

The mana crystals and monster parts are used for research within the weapons, energy, and medical fields.

The first generation of superpowered humans is known as Linears while those who came after them are known as the Extractors.

-Posted to Rodeettt.com on November 8th, 2029-

(Authors Note: I tried searching for this site but received no results.)

---------------------------------

As Cynthia stood in front of the pale green portal, with a diameter of 10 feet, she looked down at the smartphone. This post has become the most memorized piece in the minds of students across the globe.

It answered all the basic questions that appeared on history tests and didn't contain many dates. This was because people were too busy running away from monsters during those chaotic times to keep dated records.

That's why tests don't ask for corresponding historical dates when it comes to certain pieces of history that refer to those years that humanity was dwindling.

For unknown reasons, the government does not reveal these dates either after they uncovered them. The history available from the years of fighting and reconstruction was very vague and vastly unavailable to the public.

"Are you ready?" asked the guard in the black suit. In order to be qualified to get her silver card, she had to go into a GATE with someone she hired or by herself.

She had to hunt one of the animals on the list, all of which could be found within this one GATE.

Cynthia nodded her head and put forward her slender and flawless wrist. The guard then placed a metal bracelet on it and claimed it shut. The bracelet adjusted to the size of her wrist and became skin tight.

Despite heavy metallic gray shine, Cynthia could feel not much weight from it. If she looked away and forgot it was there, she would never be able to confirm its existence without visual confirmation. This made sense as they didn't want someone's performance to be lowered by extra weight.

"This we'll track your location within the gate and allow us to send a rescue team if necessary. It can also track how many monsters you kill.

You may hand in all that you kill to the black market and we will buy it at a fair price. You may also choose to keep the bodies if you pay the appropriate price. You are cleared for entry."

Cynthia walked forward and entered through the portal and disappeared from view of the bodyguards and Natsumi.

Natsumi sat there quietly, praying silently for the safety of her friend.

'Please God, if you exist, please let her come out unharmed' She was quite nervous, more nervous than Cynthia. Her hands were hugging each other tightly as small beads of sweat dripped from her forehead.

'Why do you have to be stubborn?!! What is that you need the black market for? Why are you so confident about powers that you only unlocked yesterday?' After the prayers, Natsumi only had questions for her best friend.

She could not fathom the large changes that were happening to and around Cynthia in no more than a day. Once she came out, Natsumi promised to cling onto her like a parasite until she sucked out all the necessary answers.

She did all she could to stop her friend from making such a drastic choice but still had trust in her.

She knows that even though Cynthia is stubborn and childish, she would never make decisions regarding her personal safety without a thorough delipberation.

If Natsumi could not understand Cynthia was in a serious situation, then the 10 years they had sept together would be useless.

About 5 minutes later, the doors to the pure white room they were in swung open as the panting figure of Thomas entered.

He brought in a gust of hot wind as his speed was beyond human. He looked around and only saw the two imposing bodyguards in black suits, the pale green portal, and his cousin sitting quietly on a posh chair.

"Natsumi, who was it that went in there just now?!!" his tone was both serious and energetic. It contained worry and urgency. The complete opposite of his weak and energetic voice from earlier.

It felt like he had chugged a gallon of energy drinks.

Natsumi took off her mask as her expression started to change from nervous to worried. Her golden eyes seemed to shine with a dangerous glint.

"That was Cynthia. My best friend. What's wrong?"

"Sh*t! That was Cynthia Duketh! Mother is going to hang me!" Thomas brushed his hands through his hair in a frantic manner and messed up his neat style.

"WHAT'S WRONG?!" Natsumi had no patience for things related to her loved ones. She did not like it when her cousin did not answer her but rather went into a panic attack.

Before we continue, why does Thomas already know who Natsumi was despite her mask and cloak? That's very simple.

If you remember, she swiped a black card at the entrance to the black market. This color of the card was not mentioned on the list. This is because it's exclusive to family members.

Thomas just didn't say it openly earlier as he had to maintain the rules in place that did not allow him to call the 'customers' by name. It didn't matter now since he was not thinking clearly and it is an emergency.

TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK!

The sound of multiple people in heavy combat boots could be heard and seen entering the room. They all wore full-body combat suits and had an assortment of weapons on them from swords to spears and bows.

When Thomas saw the group of 4 women and 5 men in black combat outfits and the red M on their chests, he calmed down and stopped muttering crazy things under his breath.

His eyes widened and he started to take deep breaths. It felt like he had some sort of dual personality disorder with how quickly he changed expressions.

He stood up straight and looked at the group in front of him with fierce eyes like that of a commanding officer.

"An intruder from the Frontera group has entered GATE 9-19. You must capture and stop the intruder from killing the majority of monsters inside. He must not be killed or severely injured.

You must also protect a customer of ours who has just entered. The intruder is a teenage male while the customer is a female."

Every single word oozed with authority and showcased his superiority over the super[powered beings in front of him. Beings that could slaughter him in seconds but were subservient to his wealth.

They all nodded and walked towards the portal. They entered together while holding each other's hands.

It was common knowledge to all Extracts that if those entering Gates do not keep physical contact while doing so, they will end up in different locations in the dimension.

As soon a the group of 9 men and women with fiery gazes and stoic faces were gone, Thomas' knees buckled as he fell flat on his but. he laid his back to the wall and let out a long, tired sigh.

His energy was depleted and he wanted to either sleep or consume a cup of black coffee. He started muttering strange phrases about his mother killing him under his breath again before he was interrupted by Natsumi.

She had her arms crossed in front of her while she made an angry yet surprisingly cute face. She was too much of a babyface to take seriously as she entered expression was more like a pout.

"What is happening?!!!" she demanded as her voice sounded like the screech of a tire. It broke his daze and he looked up at her directly.

"Ryan Frontera sneaked into the gate that your friend is using. We didn't notice him until it he was already in," he replied before looking back at the ground and muttering once again.

"Ryan Frontera..." Natsumi tried to rack her brains as hard as she could to remember who this is. She was sure that she had heard of him at one point.

About a minute later she had finally realized who it was and it left her face frozen in a confused expression as if someone had told her a joke she didn't understand.

...

As soon as Cynthia was no longer blinded by a bright light, she was greeted with the sight of a vast swampy forest filled with vitality in front of her and a glimmering sea of blue behind her.

Under her feet was who knows how many feet of sand. Sh had spawned on a beach that's stretched on both her left and right for a distance that was out of sight.

She only took in the beautiful scenes, presumably undisturbed by humans, for only a couple of minutes. She had seen many locations much more scenic than this one.

Cynthia had no time to waste as she had 2 goals to accomplish while in this place.

One was to get used to this body that felt out of place as she had a decent amount of toned muscle and was taller in her adult body. She had a body better geared towards combat but not at this moment.

As she walked into the mangrove swamp, she lamented the fact that her past self was seriously lazy. The current her was pretty much the same as well but at least knew how to manage her time better.

DING!

[Welcome to the Lestine Swamp. It is located in the Kingdom Of Lorencia, Darthmire Continent, Planet Misteri. exact coordinates are unavailable.]

The system interrupted her thoughts as she stared at the screen in front of her with eyes wide open. Her thoughts started to run wild.