Seras didn’t return to the Inn after her meeting with Healer, instead she ended up walking around Cuprik at night. Partly because she was deeply engrossed in exploring her new divine catalogue of medical research and biological studies. She was having endless fun with it and discovered to her chagrin that some of the things she claimed Pallimustus to not have or understand were wrong. The notes of healer priest throughout the millennia had discovered both plant and animal cells.
A thing she claimed that Pallimustus was ignorant of.
Their understanding was as developed as Ruin’s in some regards, they had a full understanding of mitosis, cellular anatomy, and even a basic model of DNA. Though that last one was seemingly where their knowledge was a bit shallow.
They described everything else common on her world from organ transplants to bone grafting, though all with the huge caveat of being less effective than just magical healing. Things like cancer research were entirely lacking because there was a wide array of essence abilities that just got rid of it. Basically, any anti-poison power or affliction resistance eliminated the cancerous cells as well.
The second reason was that Seras didn’t think she could sleep even if she tired. It had been getting harder and harder, it wasn’t so bad after her increase in the strain, but as time went on it was becoming harder to dismiss or ignore.
The moment dawn cracked the small tailors shop she had been eyeing opened up and Seras promptly walked in after the owner. She gave the sleepy looking Smoulder woman a quick explanation that most of her clothes were either, melted, ruined by blood, or burned away. The woman made a tutting noise about adventures being reckless and had a new basic ensemble ready in less than twenty minutes.
The tailor had an essence combo made for tailoring and had conjurable needles and scissors that moved on their own with just a telepathic command. For mundane clothing she didn’t even need much of her attention to get the job done, which left her with enough free time to chat with Seras.
Seras told her about her little jaunt through the labyrinth and the dangers she faced and even showed the woman some of the Star-glider leather. And then when she heard Seras was from another world she proceeded to interrogate her for all the different fashions of Mantel. All of which she deemed as entirely too scandalous and inappropriate. Which Seras couldn’t argue with, though she did miss it.
The fashion of the five deserts wasn’t bad, and Seras was beginning to like woolen the hat and vest. But she missed a good crop top with leather pants.
With a more upscale outfit in her pocket space Seras made her way back to the adventurer society. She entered the campus and saw a different Leonid at the desk, this one was female and had a very polished svelte look to her, and the several magical rings on her fingers marked her as wealthy. Though Seras wondered why she was working as a mere receptionist.
“Hey, I’m Seras Cross,” Seras said as she approached the counter.
The Leonid looked up and seemed to scan Seras with her gaze, “ah, so you’re her.” She purred, less catlike and more like any other person to Seras’ disappointment.
“I sure hope so, I take it you’ve been told to look out for me?”
Her eyes crinkled up in amusement, “yes.” She said the second part more ominously. “One moment as I send out the word that you’re here.”
Seras’ friendly grinned never faltered, but below the counter she summoned a small grenade into her hand. It was irrational but this had all the hallmarks of a trap. “Yes, go ahead. And by the way I didn’t get your name.”
“Genevieve, Greenough.”
Seras frowned, “bit long and old-fashioned mind if I call you Jen instead?”
“Don’t you dare,” she growled.
Seras nodded as she hooked her finger in the pin.
Not two minutes later a tall blonde haired Elf walked into the campus area, one that Seras recognized. She turned but kept the grenade ready behind her back. “Miss Caras, now isn’t this a surprise.”
Seras had met Lady Alicia Caras after her induction into the Magic society, she had ranked the noble elf woman almost immediately with her usual attitude. The only thing that kept Seras from pulling the pin right then and there was that during the assault on the Omeda camp they had literally fought back to back. With Caras saving her life several times.
The tall elf pulled a single strand of hair back into place and smiled slightly. “Miss Cross, it is good to see you alive,” she gave Seras a smile and then glanced to Genevieve “that will be all Jenny, thank you for passing along the word.” Then she turned and walked up the stairs without looking back once.
Seras relished the aggrieved look on Genevieve’s face before following after. When they were in a more private space Seras seriously considered putting a gun to Alicia’s head and demanding answers, but she decided that nothing about this had gone that far. Yet.
“So, Caras, it’s a bit odd that you’d meet with me only minutes after I arrived, especially since I’m only supposed to be meeting with the Director and co.”
Lady Caras smiled, “yes, the director, the deputy director, and one other. Who do you think that would be?”
“To be honest I hadn’t put that much thought into it.”
Caras nodded, “evidently. I am the third member on your special hearing. As a non-affiliated third party who has witnessed your skills in the field, and a three star bronze rank adventurer, it only made sense for me to be here.”
Seras’ eyes narrowed, and she wiggled the pin out a little more, “yes, but something strikes me as odd still. Were you the first person the director approached?”
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Alecia Caras turned and glanced down at the frag in her hands, she pursed her lips but said nothing. “Miss Cross, I’ll be frank with you. I’ve had someone waiting to alert me for your return, though not for malicious reasons. Trust that I’ll put in a fair word towards your skills and attitude. If your confirmed to skip the testing process then I would like to speak afterwards.”
Seras’ hand twitched, but she dismissed the grenade to her pocket space and relaxed ever so slightly. “Well then let’s be on with this.” She gestured forwards.
Lady Caras nodded and led Seras up to the third floor and let her into a spacious and official looking place. Sitting at a long table were two other people, one was Director Arlee, the third was a man with blue skin and runic tattoos, and the third seat was empty.
The Director and deputy Director stared evenly at Caras, though Seras got the impression that there was a bit of resistance to her being here. Though that could just be her own feelings.
“Miss Cross,” the Director began, “first off let me congratulate you on surviving the Labyrinth, with an extra burden as well. I would also like to inform you that the Akemi leaders have alerted me to the classified details of your time below, and we will not be needing you to recount them at this time.”
The deputy director nodded, but Alecia just pursed her lips in displeasure. She stared at Seras curiously, but Seras felt no need to tell her. The director’s desires in this matter were clear.
“With that said I think we should press on.”
The Runic deputy director nodded and pressed a blue tinted crystal. “The official record of Miss Seras Cross’ special admittance hearing has begun. Everything from here on will be record both audibly, visually, as well as an aura imprint of those within this room.”
Seras frowned; this was like normal recordings from her world. But the aura imprint would give future viewers a glimpse into whatever her aura revealed here.
The director cleared his throat, “Miss Cross, this hearing is to see whether or not you possess the skill and mindset to be a full member of the adventurer society. This is a special precedent in place for people like yourself with a bevy of undocumented experience and ability. Can you state briefly who you are, where you came from, and what experience you do have?”
Seras took a breath and let it out slowly. “My name is Seras Cross, and I am an Outworlder from the world of Ruin, the city of Mantel specifically. It has come to my knowledge that the adventure society might have some sparse accounts of my world but under the name Vestal instead. This became evident to me through the star story of the Silver hand man, Ronnac. Another Outworlder from my world. Ruin is a dying world, every year the air grows less breathable, and the climate around us is already in run-away extinction. My parents were petty criminals who died early on and left me in the care of a gang. The black bullets. Said gang is now dead.”
Arlee’s eyes widened at the mention of Ronnac, while Alecia and the Runic remained carefully neutral. The Runic shifted his papers, “would it be accurate to say you that you had a tough childhood.”
Seras frowned, “it was… fairly normal by Ruin’s standards, but here you would call it exceedingly traumatic.”
“Can you sum up why?” the Runic pressed.
“Do I need to for this interview?”
Arlee nodded, “it allows us to establish a background to explain attitudes in our members. At higher ranks your background and psychological profile might come into play in any promotion or behavioral hearing. Context as always is the key to understanding nuance.”
Seras considered how to quickly explain her childhood. “Well, to start I had no parents, only a gang leader and his subordinate’s. I was raised amongst a gaggle of other kids my age and made to do work as early as six, petty robbery, lookout, and some minor arson.”
The Runic shifted, “so you were a criminal?”
Seras shrugged “I had no other choice. I couldn’t leave, kids disappear off the street all the time, and we’re lucky if we never find the aftermath.”
“Did your world have no orphanages, no foster care, or temple congregations that could take you in?” he pressed.
Seras held up a hand a ticked off a finger at each point, “Orphanages are little better than forced child labor camps, mining, sowing, and dangerous maintenance. Foster care set ups were abandoned a century ago for widespread child abuse and a lack of funding. And on Ruin the Gods are dead, so what little religion is left are more drug abusing cults than helpful institutions.” Seras sighed, “maybe there was some alternative out there, but quite frankly, finding one on Ruin would be like stumbling upon a dimension essence in your backyard.”
Alecia frowned, “Miss Cross, my apologies, but your world sounds like an awful place.”
“That’s because it is. The world’s ending, the Gods are dead, and no one really cares anymore.”
Arlee held up a hand forestalling any more comments, “we could dig into that topic for a very long time. We have a schedule to keep. Miss Cross, after your childhood how would you categorize your professional life?”
“I was a Merc. A freelance agent who could be hired to do jobs. I was well known for infiltration, long ranged sniping, and extreme proficiency with firearms. I custom made all my gear.”
The Runic frowned, “So breaking and entering, assassination, and common violence.”
“To put it uncharitably, yes.”
The runic ticked a box in his sheet.
Alecia quirked a brow, “none of that makes you sound very good. Are there any standout examples you can give us to cast a more favorable light on your work.”
Seras shook her head, “I can’t. Any good I did was ultimately coincidental. I killed terrorists and serial killers, but that was for pay. I once saved a bus of children, but that was while working a job. The only thing I can say in my defense was that usually the opposition on most jobs were just as bad. Drug dealers, con artists, killers, rapists, thieves, corpo scum. But that’s just how bad things on Ruin are. ‘Good men are easy to find, you just need to check the gutter where their lying dead and worthless’.” Seras quoted that from Nightmares treatise on Merc work. He was the forerunner who laid down a lot of what it meant to be a mercenary in the midst of a societal collapse. It had a lot of good quotes, Seras’ favorite was his line about ‘Sin and Misery’.
Arlee tilted his head, “and yet I have it on good authority from Dustin Westbrooke and Flint Stone that you have in the past jumped directly into harm’s way for people. Your friends in the caravan crew, strangers on the road, and you even volunteered for the Omeda mission despite the dangers. I even know that from your time in the labyrinth you experienced a severe outburst when you found the remains of the kidnapped village folk the Omeda were trafficking. Why?”
Seras opened her mouth and closed it, “I, I don’t have a response for that. It’s just that, here on this world I’ve been forced to trust people with my life. And they’ve been really good about not betraying me. That’s new.” Jonah, Cash, Frost… Seras squeezed her eyes shut. “it’s, easier to do the right thing here.”
Arlee glanced to his Runic companion, but the blue skinned man just scowled. Arlee turned back to her, “Miss Cross, you mentioned having an ‘extreme proficiency with fire arms’. Can you explain what that means?”
Seras summoned her rifle into her hand, “this is a firearm, a rifle to be exact. It can launch a roughly 45-gram metal projectile out at extreme speeds. With the force behind the bullet it can pierce through almost all normal ranked flesh with ease, and augmented with essence abilities it can pierce the hides of weaker bronze rank monsters. With magical enhancements and essence abilities I was able to bring down a bronze ranked creatures with tough armoring.” Arlee nodded indicating that he knew which creatures she meant.
The she summoned a grenade, “this one is a hand held explosive with an effective zone of a few meters, fragmentation, pyro, concussion, and gas, most things within its range aren’t getting out unscathed.”
The runic looked unimpressed, “is that all?” he asked flatly.
Alecia turned to him, “deputy director I can confidently say that her weapons are very deadly for a bronze ranker, especially given that she made all of them from scratch with poor materials. I think given time they will only become better and deadlier. Miss Cross is already a senior associate of the Magic society, that’s after not knowing magic prior to coming to our world.”
The Runic looked grudgingly impressed. He turned to Seras, “is there anything you would like to add before we finish this hearing?”
Seras shook her head, “you know what I’m about. There’s little else I can add at this point.”
Arlee nodded, “then we move onto our decision. I for one personally approve of Seras’ abilities that’s she’s demonstrated. While her past, unsettling as it is, is the events of another world and shouldn’t have hold on to our decision.”
“I disagree director,” the Runic countered. “We have before us an admitted murder and criminal. Just because her sins are from another world that doesn’t exempt its baring on her time here going forward.”
“Yes, but as we’ve heard Miss Cross’s world is a dangerous and rotten one. I feel like that is enough extenuating circumstances given that she’s been nothing but noble since arriving here.”
Seras tried to hide her wince at the last bit. That wasn’t true, she wasn’t a good person.
“I vote against allowing her to join.” The deputy director said with an unshakable finality to his tone.
They turned to the tie breaker Alecia Caras.
Alecia tapped a fingertip on the table, “I find myself agreeing with a lot of what the deputy director said. Though none of her crimes will receive punishment here it may reflect poorly on the society if she returns to old patterns.”
Seras sighed to herself, already preparing for the blow. While having an adventurer society membership was not a must in her future plans it would have made a lot of things much simpler.
“But while on the assault against the Omeda, when their chieftain was committing all their power to a suicide attack, Seras ran across the battlefield to save a single person. This left her and that person trapped in the labyrinth. Seras and this Athena girl then emerged many days later, both alive and whole, with the exception of a missing arm on Athena’s part. That means miss Cross was defending her charge diligently the entire time. I think that is all more telling about what kind of adventurer she might be. I vote to let her skip the usual process and join directly.”
Wait, what? Were her ears broken, or did Alecia just get Seras into the adventurer society?
