6

The following day I awoke to the burning feeling in my fingers as the Grimoire's energy peaked and then settled without growing another page. Groaning, I stumbled into the kitchen and started on my traditional breakfast. I infused the meal with mana as I sat down and began to go over my plan for the day.

With Lung captured and Bakuda out of commission, the ABB was most likely down for good. While Oni Lee was a tremendous force projector, Lung allowed them to hold fight back incursions. With Lung's arrest, the Empire would push into ABB territory and start terrorizing the locals.

So that meant I had two options, the first was to hunt down Oni Lee, which would remove the ABB permanently, or I could fight some Nazis. While the second option was very appealing, the Empire had a massive pool of resources to call upon, not in the least was the largest pool of capes in Brockton Bay. That meant I needed to get more powerful before taking them own.

Besides the Empire, I had Coil, who I needed to deal with as soon as possible. With Coil's death, which would need to be death with him, the Undersiders would fall apart, and the PRT would not have a mole in the running for the director. Unfortunately for him, I knew his name; Thomas Calvert, all I had to do was rig up a tracking ritual, and I would be able to take him out.

That, however, necessitated the purchase of another compass, so I shrugged on my black sweatpants, green T-shirt, and black hoodie and headed down to the Boardwalk. On my walk to a store, I stopped by a Newspaper stand and picked up the local paper.

The headline read Armsmaster Caputres Azn Bad Boyz leader Lung, along with an accompanying grainy picture. Giving the newspaper back to the proprietor, I smirked a bit as I knew the idea of some no-name new hero taking out Lung and simply leaving him for the PRT.

The rest of the walk was calm as I headed into a small store that sold knickknacks, the tarnished bell ringing merrily. Looking around the store, I picked up a few items I knew would be helpful, a compass, chalk, and a few cheap gems. After paying, I left and started my walk back home.

Breathing in the sea air, a sense of satisfaction washed over me; while I still had a lot to do, I had over a month dismantled the Merchants and the ABB. Oni Lee was still out there; however, crushing his personality under the mass suicide teleport that was his power.

I just had to wait for him to pop his head out, then I would take him out. However, for now, I had a snake to catch, I soon arrived at my lab, and after locking the door behind me, I checked on the sigils, which were satisfactory. I then set my new compass on the ground and started to write out a circle with chalk and my dust and started to chant in german

"Ghosts, ghosts, come and find a serpent that squirms, come, find and find"

Lowering my hands, I beamed a proud smile as the compass started to glow slightly, and the needle spun around widely for a few moments before settling on downtown.

I picked up the compass and shrugged on my costume, a black void with two white pinpricks for eyes and a long crack in the black for a smile. Focusing on an alleyway I passed on my first day on Bet, I appeared a few dozen feet off the ground; with a quick Chronmancy spell, I could teleport upright on the floor instead of falling flat on my face. Brushing off the non-existent lint off my hoodie, I looked down at my compass and followed the needle to a large building labeled Fortress-Construction.

I raised an eyebrow as I had thought that was a fanon construction; however, with a shrug, I teleported inside the building and started following the compass needle. While repeated teleportation made following the needle more manageable, it was still nerve-racking. Around the two-hour point, I found a small secret door in the parking garage that several men had traveled through.

With a teleport, I was in; however, as I crept forward, I saw a man picking up what appeared to be an assault rifle as he geared up. I bumped into the man, and as he outweighed me by a couple of hundred pounds, I was knocked flat on my ass.

His eyes widened as he pulled his radio up and shouted into it as his other hand brought his gun to bear.

"Fuck!" I shouted as I vanished and appeared behind him as a smattering of bullets tore through where I was a moment prior. He grunted as he turned to face me and got a face full of words for his trouble.

"Hold still!" He bellowed as I was forced to teleport out of the way of another hail of bullets. Breathing out blue, I froze time and then, after glaring into his eyes for a moment, intoned, "sleep" in german. He then fell bonelessly to the ground; I heard boots storming toward me a few moments later.

I appeared on the other side of a group of mercenaries who were quickly walking toward the location of the man I had taken down. As my sneakers hit the ground, the four men turned toward me, guns raised.

Bullets flew through the air as I teleported behind the men and breathed blue, freezing them in place. Feeling my world slip through my hands, I sent out a salvo of words before the blue slipped away, followed by stretching out the men's timelines.

Slowed down to a crawl, they could not dodge my White Magic which swiftly rendered them unmoving on the floor.

Darting down the hallway compass clutched in hand, alarms started ringing in the base. A tingling started to fill my body as the energy began to overflow. I fell to my knees as Grimore's power started to burn as it coursed through my body.

Staring down at my hands, I saw the flesh dripping off as if it was molten wax; there was a plop sound as a small white half-melted orb hit the ground and splattered everywhere. I felt my stomach drop literally as I teleported forward a few feet.

I could feel that my body was much lighter as I saw a small pile of discarded flesh and organs looking back. My now metaphysical stomach attempted to jump up my throat. However, I did not have anything physical to throw up.

Looking at the polished ground, I could see a simple skull with green flames burning in the eye sockets. Looking at my hands, I saw the same result, bone with naught flesh or muscle. Pushing back the horror, I stumbled to my feet and started back down the hallway. I still had to deal with Coil. Horror over the raw, visceral fact that I wasn't human anymore could wait.

Creeping around the underground bond villain base, I could avoid most of the mercenaries, and the ones I couldn't sneak by were swiftly dispatched by White magic and chronomancy. While it took over thirty minutes to find the top office, I eventually did.

As I stepped into the office, my vision blurred, and I saw an empty office devoid of life and a timer on the desk counting down from 5 in one world; in the other, I saw Coil sans counter.

Freezing for a moment as I attempted to reconcile the two sights, Coil's smooth sauve voice slithered out.

"I don't suppose you have a reason to invade my base and slaughter my mercenaries."

As he finished his sentence, the bomb in the first timeline went off, forcing me to teleport back to my lab, luckily not falling far, and I cringed, taking a step back. Coil then paused before speaking further.

"What can I do to assist you?"

"I need all your backup plans in case of your death," I said while sending a burst of mana to my eyes.

"I don't see why I can-" Immediately my vision blurred, and I was only in my lab and not in Coil's base.

"Fuck! Godammit!" I swore as I sent a smattering of words and the far wall. I got cocky and didn't plan for his timeline bullshit. I then pulled out my compass and started to teleport in the direction that the needle was pointing.

Appearing nearby while seeing a small sedan with blacked-out windows and the compass pointing towards the back seat. Appearing on top of the van, I sped up my timeline and the breathed-out blue freezing time for the truck.

Using the same method I did to take out Lung and Bakuda, I spun words into reality and sent them soaring at the top of the van. As my blue fell from my grip, I stretched out the truck's timeline to slow it down.

The other cars on the road swerved out of the way as the van slowed down and its top blew off. Jumping off with short teleportation, I could see the figures inside slamming into the van's insides.

Checking my mana amount, I could see I was under half and would need to finish the fight soon before the PRT showed up.

Raising a skeletal hand, I sent a cascade of words into the van's right side, which blew it open. I could see the four figures open fire, which I could avoid by teleporting to the side of the bullets.

Letting a grin grow on my face that wouldn't be seen, I called out.

"Coil, be a dear, would you, and step out. I promise it will be painless!"

As I spoke, I felt a searing heat as something burned through one of my rib bones, and the cold rage caused three other ribs to burst into dust. My head turned to the driver, who held a rifle with a small attachment on the barrel.

Breathing out more blue, I sent a small hail of words at the driver, which caused him to slump over, eyes unseeing. Another shower of bullets narrowly avoided me as I teleported a few feet to the side.

Retaliating by slowing them down via timeline expanding and following that up with another storm of White Magic ended the threat they posed. Striding towards the stopped van, I heard scrabbling as a tall, rail-thin black man pulled open the doors and started to flee.

I appeared in front of him, which caused him to raise a small pistol and squeeze a shot before I knocked the gun out of his hand. Reality blurred as time was split in twain. In the first timeline, Coil attempted to kick me in the chest; however, a blast of words stopped him to the head, and in the other, he froze.

"Stop with the timeline bullshit, or I will kill you."

Forcing words out of his mouth, he stuttered.

"W-What are you talking about? I don't know what timeline stuff you are going on about." Another timeline opened and was ended by the creator's death. I heard sirens singling out as law enforcement approached our location. Locking eyes with him, I sent mana into them and chanted sleep in german with a sing song tone

He then slumped into my arms, pushing out blue. I started to creep away from the crime scene.

Arriving back at my warehouse around an hour later, after taking many looping pathways, I was almost out of mana and needed to seal Coil. Setting him down in part of the empty room, I quickly drew out the ritual circle and locked him inside before sliding down the wall, non-existent sweat beading my forehead.

I knew that I had a few options now; I could kill Coil as that would be the easiest option; however, his power was useful, which meant the other option was to hit him with as many methods as I had to control him, which was not many at the moment.

As I sat pondering, I felt a tingling in my fingers, which grew to encompass my chest. Tearing off my shirt, I saw an upside-down white heart within my ribcage, and I knew this to be my SOUL. However, as I clutched my ribcage sans four ribs, I saw a tiny hole in the middle of my SOUL.

Leaking out of it was a new white, a white that reminded me of the terrifying in-humanity of the full moon. Scrambling over to my Grimiore, I pulled it open and saw a new page grow into place. It was labeled Brunestud

Powers Gained

Undead-Traits

You are undead. Between life and death. Your flesh and organs have long since rotted from your body, leaving you as naught but bones, animated by your own soul. Your soul remains within your body as a result of countless rituals and spells performed over your form prior to and during your burial. As an undead, you do not age. You have no requirements or ability to do bodily functions such as eating, drinking, sleeping or breathing. You have no organs to damage or blood to bleed. The only way to kill you would be to smash up your bones till nothing the size of a skull or larger remains.

You are enchanted so that, even despite lacking muscles or skin, you can move with superhuman strength and speed, as well as move and think at all. Whilst many lesser Nehekharan undead require the presence of a Liche Priest to maintain awareness and only have the most basic of personalities, you have no requirement for support from a Liche Priest and you maintain your full cognitive functions in this form. However, as you are just old bones, you are quite vulnerable to fire, despite the relative sturdiness of your form.

Brunestud

Crimson Moon Brunestud. The Ultimate One of the Moon, who made a pact with Gaia in order to create a race - the True Ancestors - to corral humanity. But this luminous being had its own agenda, wanting to make a suitable vessel able to exist within Gaia's laws and possessed enough purity for it to take over and then enact his own will upon the world. There are three suitable vessels on the planet - Arcueid Brunestud, Altrouge Brunestud… and you. Whether your body had enough 'purity' for Crimson Moon to consider as a candidate for being their vessel or you were some misbegotten attempt at replicating the True Ancestors, a 'fragment' of Crimson Moon exists within your soul. This fragment is a mix of of your own and Crimson Moon, so imagine yourself except more vampiric and with a persistent desire to wipe out humanity in any form. While you may use their power as per the perk Brunestud normally and regardless of their approval, being able to reconcile or come to an understanding with this personality will enable that fragment to grow stronger at a faster rate, becoming more and more of what the Ultimate One once was

First, you are able to manifest a copy of Millennium Castle Brunestud, a piece of Type-Moon's Reality Marble where his influence is the strongest, at will (curiously, even if you lack MarblePhantasm) and dwell within it. You may change the interior of the castle to your will, making anything from a luxurious manor to an eldritch hell only a monster could find comfortable. Your connection also causes your power, even those not tied to your nature as a True Ancestor, to wax and wane with the phases of the moon - during the night of a new moon, there is no change, but during a full moon, your strength and powers are magnified several times over. And when you dwell within the Castle itself, your power is always at its peak from this boost, functioning the same as the night of a full moon. An ordinary human (as miraculous as it maybe) with this could lift a tank one-handed on the night of a full moon. The might of a True Ancestor is likewise increased even further than before in the light of the moon, letting you outmatch others of your kind save for your two 'siblings'. Perhaps in a few centuries, this fragment' could grow into something matching the original...though that night is far, far away.