Debts

As dream slowly crept into Cobalt's mind once more... he debated what weird scene he would see this time, would dream bitch return? He hoped not, Cobalt despised her... not for any good reason though, he just simply had enough of her... existence.

Luckily for the Dream Bitch, Cobalt instead didn't dream at all. That was weirder than anything he could of seen, but it had to end eventually... he was simply done things interfering with his goal.

As per usual, his first thought of the day was...

' Awaken. '

It might as well be a catchphrase of Cobalt... but he doesn't really say it out loud, more of a habit then... along with him in the room was his rifle who laid lazily around his bed, wrapping its tentacle mass on the floor nearly coating the surface.

Cobalt removed the flimsy sheets off his body, quite a battle yesterday... it just took a weird amount of time though, it was too hard or anything... but the thought of Transference still ached his mind... what was it? Was it simply because of Nidus? Weird. Very, very weird.

He grunted in a hushed tone... " I'm already having to figure out another damn mystery... ugh... " Cobalt clearly no longer enjoyed having to constantly play catch-up with the world... and soon he would have to do it again. It was inevitable, him and the many other players stuck in this war event would have so much new stuff it might just drive them insane.

Cobalt could only assume so much, just earlier he had his years in ' hell ' revealed... he simply thought it was 10-18 years, not 27! If that was the case, there was no telling how much has changed... sure, 10 years? That's a lot of development... 27? It might as well be a different eon.

Finally, Cobalt got out of his bed... his morning sulk would end now, and to make sure... just a cup of coffee to encourage him! With a little pep in his step now, he decided to make rounds with everybody he knew... starting with Dice!

Exiting his dormitory like installments, the warm late-morning air refreshed his soul, it smelt of mint and rosaries... lovely, that must be the Air Purifier at work! What a lovely little device, even though the design was simple enough and very expensive considering it's worth... Cobalt was already thinking about making upgrades to it.

Something could be made better, that much was true, but Cobalt didn't have much desire to do it right away... instead he began his trek in search of Dice, its been a long time since she was a centipede yet it still has remained a staple of her titles and abilities... unlike... Cobalt...

You would think that 'BloodKing' Cobalt would have more inclination to use blood magic, but rather he often liked using different types of magic, it gave him variety and more importantly allowed him to flex on other mages who couldn't.

Walking through the hasty streets, Cobalt did eventually come across Dice... he would of approached her but... she seemed occupied with lots of paper work. Did she ever do paper work? Cobalt swore someone else did it... but it was what it was. At least she is doing OK.

Well, next on the check list was to check in with Anise and the captured Mage. That would surely be fun, Anise had surely developed something over this time or maybe even started practicing Desolate Energy! That would be exciting, after all... it seemed like Ether would be impossible for Cobalt due to his... condition.

Oh, how he longed for that power... Arch displayed it, and what a show... a brilliant display of light echoing his refined skill with the blade...

If Mana was a reflection of the Mind, Ether was a reflection of the Soul.

Ah, it was nearly entrancing...

Not as much as the smell of a freshly cooked meal, time had already passed considerably while making his walk... he noticed only by happenstance that it was nearly 2 and he had grown rather hungry.

He was almost to Anise's place however, he'll just get a meal afterwards at some food vendor's shop... actually, now thinking about it... Cobalt noticed he couldn't recall seeing a dinner or even a food cart... they were everywhere before he was stolen away from the world but he hasn't even seen a single one yet, did such a thing change?

What could cause that entire industry of meal production fail? Lack of produce? Lack of interest in the market? Did better options show up? Maybe food was just scarce in this... encampment.

Either way, a light meal would be appreciated by Cobalt. Before that however, he still had the pleasure of walking about another 15 minutes to Anise's place, it took quite a while but he was very close... close enough to see the building.

' What a lovely day', Cobalt remarked aloud to himself, ' it would be just terrible for some god forsaken calamity to fall upon us right now...haha! '

Unfortunately, despite his taunting... no such thing happened, and as such... he peacefully made his way to Anise's place.

Knocking on the door, Cobalt greeted Anise from outside as usual. In repose Anise clumsily fell over some objects and opened the door for Cobalt, leading entrance to the clustered and dusty mess that Anise lived inside. Noticeably there were no traces of... the mage.

But that's that, this was just a basic check in with Anise to see how she was doing.

Anise peeled apart her dirty and unkempt hair from her face, revealing her extra set of spider eyes above her rimmed glasses, Cobalt wasn't exactly the best with hints or other such things with girls, but he did know that messing with hair was a big sign that something was up.

Cobalt greeted and hugged Anise, and despite her stutter and flustered expression Cobalt talked and talked away about everything that had happened the last couple of days, he inquired about the mage and other such things to mumbled response... so, Cobalt did ask what seemed to be the issue.

- " Is... everything alright Anise? Anything coming up that I should know about? "

" O-Oh..., uhh.... well... I guess tommorow is... Dice's... 29th year of being your tamed creature... she uh... said something when she brought it up... "

- " Oh? Like an anniversary? Neat. So, what did she say? "

" It... ah... well... "

- "...? "

" She asked that... we don't... Jotun and I... that we don't uh, interfere... with... "

- "...? "

" She ...basically asked that... she is going to... ah... geez... she was going to ask you out on a date for the time.... "

- " Oh? Cute. I'd never imagine little Dice wanting to go on a date with me, does she mean in the sense of just a day out on the town or as lovers? "

" I don't know... at that's why I'm... "

- " Worried? "

" Y-... yeah... "

" About what? "

...

" N... never mind... "