The air thrummed with a profound power, a sound like a thousand whispers whipping through fractured spacetime rifts. Bishie and Ruby were the first to emerge, collapsing onto the cold floor. In contrast, Ian, Sam, and Nova landed with composure and balance, their eyes fixed ahead. The remaining mages staggered out of the portals after them.
Bishie, disoriented, managed to rise and look around. The room was a somber-looking space. Thick, dark wood paneling lined the walls, and the high, arched windows cast long, dusty rays of light across the space. Heavy wooden pews filled the room, and a raised bench for a judge and a row of seats for a jury created an eerie sense of judgment. Every mage who entered the rift was facing this stand, their backs to the entrance.
"Is this a courtroom?" Bishie mumbled, still dazed.
"Something like that." A voice came from behind. Bishie turned to see a young woman emerge from a small side door. She was no taller than his chest, with a sturdy build and a face that was more stoic than friendly. Her brown hair, styled in Dutch braids, fell over her shoulders. Bishie wondered if he had guessed right, "Dwarfmen?" In her hands, she held a blank, leather-bound book.
Before Bishie could regain his bearings, Gala tapped him on the shoulder. "Don't say anything. Just turn around and kneel."
Bishie, confused, complied. When he turned, the sight stole his breath. The entire front half of the courtroom was gone, replaced by a churning, black void. He could sense an overwhelming presence in the room, so suffocating that it drowned out his other five senses.
Who is that? he thought, his mind reeling.
"We will now begin with the hearing," the dwarf woman announced. She moved among them, approaching the five members to the left of Bishie. They each touched her book. When she reached Bishie, she ordered, "Touch the book, boy." He hesitated, but still touched it. She continued until every mage had complied.
What now? Bishie wondered.
"My name is Fable. I'll be your stenographer today and always," the dwarf stated as she sat at a nearby table and opened the blank book. "You may raise your heads and look upon his grace."
Everyone raised their heads in unison. The mages, their faces void of emotion, said in sync, "Sir."
"What are you guys looking at?" Bishie whispered, his voice trembling.
"Him," Nova stated, his stare unbroken.
Bishie looked into the void, trying to focus on the source of the overwhelming power. Gala's whisper provided a hint: "He's what you're feeling."
It clicked. The void wasn't a void at all. He wasn't gazing into emptiness; instead, he was staring at a celestial body too vast for him to comprehend. As he focused on its power, he realized he wasn't seeing the entire body, or just its head but rather its eye—its pupil.
A low scoff echoed through the chamber, a sound that shook the very foundation of the room. "It took you that long." The immense manick joules that had been filling the space suddenly dissipated, exiting like a vacuum. Bishie's chest felt lighter. He looked forward to see a tall, tan man with dark brown hair and green eyes, a body composed entirely of condensed manick joules.
"A human?" Bishie breathed under his breath.
"How perceptive, Bishie. And before you inquire, yes, of course I know your name." Jenti's voice was as smooth as marble. "As for the rest of you…"
The mages tensed, their faces showing fear. Jenti gestured to the chairs at the back of the room, and they glided toward the mages. "You may be seated." Everyone took their seats.
Jenti's gaze fell on Nikola. "I see you're not faring well, Nikola. What happened? And do not lie."
"I was killed in the sect by a lethal machine," Nikola answered.
"Interesting. And how did you, head of security, not know this machine was in your sect? It must've been quite a shock when it killed you."
"I did know, sir. I've known for a while. But I intended to capture it and study it." Nikola's voice was shaky.
Jenti's eyes narrowed. "So you perished due to your own foolishness. Expected."
He turned to Nova. "How long was he dead before you found out?"
"Three days, sir, and remained dead for three more months," Nova stated, unshakably.
"Three days! You must have been busy with missions, correct?" Jenti's tone was laced with sarcasm.
"No, sir. We were all in the sect."
Jenti let out a deep groan that caused the whole room to tremble. "So it is my understanding that Grimsnow is still the most incompetent sect in my territories. I do not need to hear the rest of the story from all of you; I will read it in the report."
He walked over to Fable and gestured for the book, but she did not give it to him. "Sir, there are other matters that must be addressed, such as the boy in the middle."
"Their protocol calls for the termination of the boy, so he'll be killed in the end." Jenti gestured for the book again.
"Sir, I have read through part of the book. I implore you to ask about the full story."
Jenti turned back to the mages, an exasperated expression on his face. "Continue."
Nova began, "Well, sir, after I found him and alerted the others, our plan was to get help from nobody."
Jenti sighed. "Expected from the worst of the best, amazing performance but terrible ideas."
Nova continued, "I admit that due to my own pride, I wanted to handle this somewhat independently, so I informed the S.O.G. that Nikola had been captured by an unknown enemy and sent them on a wild goose chase."
Fable shouted from her stand, "That is a lie! The story never mentioned that!"
Jenti curled his finger, and Nova's chair was pulled closer to him. Jenti stared at him with fiery fury. "I've already said, do not lie, Nova."
Nova stood and stiffened his posture with unwavering vigor. "I didn't lie, sir. I did this behind my team's back, so the story that involves all of us wouldn't mention it."
Fable asked, "When did you have time to do this?"
"A few days after we slept in the library. It takes S.O.G. a week to even discover what's happening in the sect."
Jenti looked at Nova with a confused sort of anger. "So you deceived the unit that is supposed to help you with issues like these?"
"Yes, sir. Only because I did not want to have to resign from my position, I knew if you were to find out that would be the end of my story at the sect."
"So what happened next?" Jenti asked.
"It took us three months to find and specifically select Bishie. We went off of students who wouldn't be noticed if they were to disappear."
"Ouch" Bishie added.
"and we planned the day accordingly to get him into the sect without anybody batting an eye," Nova said sitting back down.
"Interesting. So why is he not dead yet?" Jenti pushed Nova back while bringing the others forward, lining them up again. "Well?" he asked impatiently.
Sam spoke. "Half of the team wanted to keep him alive."
"And?" Jenti questioned.
"Well we argued, and now we're here."
"So you disobeyed the prophet of your sect, treating this boy as one of your sectmates." Jenti's voice rose to a shout. "You mages came from the worst of the worst and the lowest of the low! This also does not excuse your incompetence, Nova. It does not matter how you do it; I want that boy dead by the time you get back to that sect."
As Jenti turned for the book again, Sam stood and pleaded, "Sir, if you could excuse us this one time, we'd like to keep Bishie as an honorary member of the sect."
Jenti stopped. "Your impudence knows no bounds. But entertain me once more, child. Why should I take in that boy as one of my own?"
Sam remained standing, his gaze steady on Jenti despite the god's towering presence. A cold dread settled in his stomach, but he pushed it down, channeling his focus into his words. He knew this was their one chance.
"Sir," Sam appealed, his voice gaining strength. "This sect may be incompetent, as you say. We may have disobeyed a prophet. But perhaps it's because we aren't willing to throw away the most exceptional talent we've ever seen. We've come here to beg for Bishie's life, not because we see him as a friend or an equal. We see him as what he is—a prodigy."
The room was silent. Sam took a deep breath. "He is not one of us. He is something more. We, your mages, felt the tsunami, but we couldn't see the ocean."
He gestured back at Bishie, who was still seated in his chair, watching him with an expression of stunned bewilderment.
"But Bishie," Sam affirmed, "A boy with no formal training, saw it. He saw your celestial form. He didn't just feel the power; he sensed its source. It's a natural perception of something far greater than us humans. It is not our impudence that brings us here, but our duty. A duty to protect power that should not be wasted. You are a liberator. How can you demand the termination of a boy who sees the runes of this world more clearly than any of us?"
Sam finished and sat down, his whole body trembling. The silence that followed was heavy, more suffocating than the manick joules had been moments before. Jenti stood motionless, a silent pillar of compacted power. The air around him shimmered. He turned his head slowly toward Bishie, his eyes, those familiar green jewels, narrowing. A flicker of something unreadable crossed his face—not anger, but perhaps… curiosity.
He walked past the seated mages, his gaze never leaving Bishie. He stopped a few feet away from him, his presence overwhelming. The court fell into an even deeper hush.
"A prodigy, you say?" Jenti mused, his voice a low rumble, the sound echoing within Bishie's skull. "Or a curse."
He leaned in, his green eyes burning into Bishie's. The raw power he had been suppressing was no longer a tsunami but a focused, intense beam, aimed directly at him. The other mages sat upright in their chairs, their composure unwavering despite the immense pressure. They knew Jenti was not lashing out in anger, but in intellectual curiosity.
"You have seen the truth of my essence," Jenti reasoned, "Tell me, boy. What do you see when you look at me now?"
Bishie, still reeling from the events, could only stare into Jenti's eyes. His sense of sight was at full power, and he saw everything.
"I… I see a human at peak physicality," Bishie stammered, his voice hushed in awe. "No, not a human. A man who had reached immortality by worship. A god."
Jenti's mouth twitched, not into a frown but something akin to a smirk. He turned his head slightly to address the mages behind him.
"Your plea is not one of blind loyalty to a comrade, I find that… refreshing. Your competence may be lacking, but your clarity of vision, in this singular instance, is not."
He turned back to Bishie, the smirk gone, replaced by a profound solemnity. "This 'sight' you possess is a gift but it will also isolate you. So, I will not terminate you."
Ruby, Gala, Nikola, Ourania, and Sam collectively let out a sigh of relief. Fable closed her book, her face still stoic.
"But," Jenti continued, his voice a hammer of authority, "You are a threat to my domain as you are one of the ignorant non-worshippers. You are now beholden to me. This is not a mercy; it is a duty."
Gala and Sam exchanged a look. Their relief was palpable, even if they would not show it. "Thank you, sir," Nova murmured, his voice respectful. "We understand."
Jenti turned, his form beginning to dissipate back into the black void. "Consequently, you will be summoned to my domain from time to time. Your purpose will be made clear when the need arises." The void swallowed him, and the courtroom instantly returned to its original state. The chairs the mages sat in, which had been pulled from the back, were now back in their places.
A heavy silence filled the room. The mages all surrounded Bishie, who was still sitting in his chair, staring at the spot where Jenti had been.
"You heard him," Nova stated, his tone no longer laced with sarcasm, "We'll have to get you threaded soon."
Bishie looked around, then back at Sam and Nova. His mind was still trying to process everything, but he understood the new dynamic. He was a soldier of a god.