PoV: Snow Okiyama - Ion
Stealing is, by far, my favourite crime.
Others are fun, too, of course. Arson has its appeal. Manslaughter is great for puns. And there is a certain amusement to including red crosses in video games, even if it technically was against the Geneva convention.
But none of them beat stealing. Because, in short, I gain nothing from any of them. Stealing can be a good thing even, so long as I use the wealth better than someone else. And I’m pretty sure that Raven is a bit of a scumbag.
Opal gives a long yawn, holding the back of their head. Their eyes are closed as they walk with me, gaze turned upwards. The Eyes stare down at us as they always do, giant glowing eyeballs covering the sky, big and small. Some of them seem to follow me, others look everywhere at once. It’s impossible to know what they’re looking at - because that’d be unfair.
“Tired?” I ask them.
They give me a grin, and shake their head. “Nah. Distracted.”
“By?”
“Thatch,” Opal says. Their face turns serious for just a second, the ever-present smile fading from their lips. “Think he’ll be alright?”
I nod quietly as we walk through the rainy streets. “Yeah, I think so. Inu went along.” Flobs huddle near us, sticking to buildings and pitiful shelter. It’s not that late yet, so people are out and about, and I’ve already dodged two pickpockets. They really are enthusiastic here.
“Really, she did?” Opal asks with a look of surprise. “Well, damn.” They scratch their goatee. “Sounds like I worried for nothing.”
“Maybe you should worry about Sylves,” I suggest.
Their eyes widen. “Oh no. We’re sending her to negotiate with Coldscar and Reign?” they ask. Richard is visiting Lucky. All I do is give a small nod. Opal groans. “This is gonna go horrible.”
“Now, now, we should trust in her a little. Sylves is a very reasonable and kind person,” I say, almost believing it myself.
Opal gives me a sideways glance, then a snicker. I feel the annoyance drain from them, as if it’s a flimsy thing they can’t hold on to. “Ah well,” they say calmly. “If it’s bad, we’ll bail her out.”
I smile and nod. “We will. Ah, that’s the building, we’re here,” I say, pointing at a simple wooden door. As always, the den stands simply. I know Raven is probably inside… Which is why Opal is here. They could teleport inside and back out in a second, and they will, but there’s one more job they have.
With a quiet warping noise, Opal’s [Bound Armament] appears in their hands. The sword hums with more violence now, metal gauntlets wrapping their fingers. Purple runes sprawl down the length of the blade, humming ominously. “Say, Snow,” they hum excitedly. “On a scale of one to ten, how much chaos am I aiming for?”
Looking at their expression, I can’t bring myself to give them anything but what they wish for. I am weak to that dang smile, after all. “A ten.”
Opal’s grin turns wide. “Got it,” they say. And then, they vanish. For a moment, there’s a person-shaped outline in the rain. A heartbeat later, every sign of them is gone. Until, of course, the door of the building in front of me blows off its hinges.
Gingerly, I make sure my shadow-mask is in place. My hood hangs far over my face, the shadows cloaking me as I wait. A dozen figures come crashing through the opening, and I hear a soft hum as purple slashes materialize where Opal left [Echoes] of them.
Blood mixes with the wetness from above, and I make sure to hug the cold, stone wall next to me. My body presses against it, and the shadows hide me alongside my own mana. I breathe slow, shallow breaths.
[Obfuscation 8 > 9]
Raven storms out of the den in a cloak of black feathers. I see Dove dive free from the building, still wrapped in bandages from when Sylves fought them. A dozen lesser members of Aviary join the fray, and rubble starts to come loose. Opal kicks up tons of dust, using their jewelcraft abilities to blow the dust in everyone else’s faces.
I smile as I watch for a few moments, seeing the way that Aviary’s birds start running around like headless chicken. “Get them!” Raven roars somewhere in the night sky. With casual steps, I quietly walk towards the den.
Its door hangs on its hinges. There are still people inside, as well as a flock of ravens in cages. They’re ready to pour out within moments, but they don’t, standing as sentinels in the den. Because, well, Raven isn’t stupid.
But already, even now, Kuro spreads. Their shadows slighter into the cracks between bricks when no one notices. They dampen the lights - until, all at once, every single candle in the room winks out. Every source of light extinguished.
And then, I slip inside.
Panicked voices start roaring in the room, and people ask for fireballs - but I dispel them. Any magic that begins making light is broken apart to its constituent pieces. I slink forward quietly, keeping to the darkness, Kuro wrapped around me and perfectly matching the shadows I move through.
Until, after a dozen breaths, I am at the cages.
Order has largely returned. The flobs are beginning to try mundane lights. My time is running out. I reach for the cage where Raven drew a sigil from before, grabbing the lock that holds it closed, and flooding it with my mana, pushing the pins up to pick it. After a quick mental twist, there’s a soft, quiet click, the enchantments dying down.
And an axe at my throat.
Owl stares at me. Eyes poke out from between white fur, large, wide eyes observing my every move, every twitch. I breathe carefully. No one has heard. Owl has been utterly silent. Something I was betting on.
I could take her. I could. But there’s no need. She’s like me, she gets it. And so, with very slow, predictable motions, I reach for the mask…
And pull it off.
Owl’s eyes widen even more. The axe quivers at my neck. I sign at her, abridged signs with my only hand, mouthing the words as I go along. “Yuki.” I point at myself. “Sigil.” I point at the cage. Somehow, the tower translates sign language and lipreading, too, apparently.
She stares. The axe I made for her still rests close to my skin. Her wings hover carefully in the air, splayed wide as I give her a pleading look. Very, very slowly, Owl takes a step back.
One doesn’t make it out of the fifth ring without owing a debt or two.
So if I must owe someone, I’d like it to be someone who understands me.
Within a single step, Owl vanishes into the darkness, but the silence lingers. A field of hers, one that silences all noise. In fact, it tastes vaguely familiar, like an authority but not quite. I ignore it, and pull open the cage I just picked.
Instantly, the raven inside begins complaining, loudly. But despite the way its beak moves, there’s no sound. I reach in, [Suppressing] its movements as I push into a hidden cupboard. I watched as Raven did it. They hid it from my sight, but not my [Observation].
Three heartbeats pass. I take out three sigils. The amount we need. Then, my mask appears on my face again, the cage shuts, the lock clicks back into place, and when the first lights begin to overcome the shadow, I’m already leaving again.
They catch a glimpse of my coat as I head out into the night, of shadows that wreathe around me, but when they try to follow, I make Kuro manifest a solid blockade against the door. It only stops them for a few seconds, but that’s all I need. By the time they’re free, I’m gone.
All I see is Owl’s eyes looking after me, holding tight onto the axe that I made for her. She nods, and I nod back. Then I vanish.
- - -
“I gave ‘em hell,” Opal coughs with amusement, their body covered in tiny cuts and holes.
“Looks like they gave back just as well,” I note distantly.
Opal rolls their eyes and laughs, even as more blood leaks from them. Their vessel is spent entirely, and I can feel their authority having run itself ragged. It feels flimsy as it brushes against me, their freedom strained. Having run away from multiple climbers and a couple dozen strong flobs will do that, apparently.
With a small smile, I show off the sigils, and Opal brightens even more. “Yes!” they say happily, taking one of them. “Awesome! I love stealing!”
At that, I laugh, just a little. “Quiet down,” I say with a snicker, as the guards start to pour into the rubble behind us. “We walk away calmly.”
“Snow, my legs are fucked,” Opal laughs, if a bit quiet. Despite it, they smile. “You’ll have to carry me.” They spread their arms wide.
I look at them. They look at me. I shake my head in disbelief, then snicker. “Alright,” I say. Then, in one swift motion, I sweep them off their feet, to Opal’s great delight. They giggle and grin the whole way as I walk with them through alleyways, staring up at the sky.
“Bleeding in your arms, staring at a cloudy sky full of eyes,” they say with a content sigh. “What more could an enby like me with for?”
“A cape,” I say calmly.
“Oh my fucking god, yes. I need a cape. A red- no, a purple one!” they say, excitedly. “You’ll enchant it for me, right? Please. Pleaseeee?”
Rolling my eyes, I snicker, and nod. Opal cheers in my arms, which almost makes me drop them, given how much taller than me they are. But I hold on. That power stat is good for something, after all. On the way home, Opal chatters on for a little while longer, talking about all the things they enjoyed, and how the fight went.
I listen to all of it, smiling slightly. There is something so endearing about someone so… alive. And it makes me smile.
Even if it’s a little scary that they talk about murder so casually. Well, I should be scared. But when looking into their eyes, their desire to be a hero, to fight big monsters and protect people, I find it hard to feel any fear.
“I envy you, Opal,” I whisper quietly.
They smile at me, and nod. “As you should!” they boast, instantly. Then, though, they still ask. “Why?”
“You make it look so easy,” I say.
And Opal gets it. Their smile turns a little sad, and they smile at me as my feet fall in half-formed puddles. “I do, huh?” they ask, staring into the sky again. “Well, Snow, I’m jealous of you, too.”
I tilt my head. “You are?”
“Mhm,” Opal nods. “I get so lost all the time. You pick the quickest path. I admire that.”
A small snicker escapes me. I can’t stay jealous, for too long when they look at me like that. Sighing softly, I sit down on the wet cobblestone. Water seeps into my clothes as I cross my legs, but I don’t care. Opal’s head rests in my lap, and they look up at me. Slowly, the shadows crawl higher around us.
There’s nothing to say between us. They know what I mean, and I know what they mean. “You’re a dummy, Opal,” I say quietly, as the darkness crawls higher.
They smile brightly. “Yours truly. You’re silly, too, Snow,” they fire back.
And I, too, smile. Then, one by one, I heal their wounds. After a long silence, we head back.
- - -
Sylves, Thatch, Inu and Richard are all waiting for us. Opal appears in the room with a [Blink] before I even open the door, forcing me to take the stairs on my lonesome. Zinc eyes me for a few moments, then shakes her head, muttering something about climbers. I ignore all of it, and push open the door to our room.
The bunk beds I called home for the last month. My mournfully depleted headphones resting on the bedside table, right next to my mournfully depleted phone. Bay really needs to come up here soon. With slow steps, I walk to the bed, then sit down. My eyes drift over them all.
“Everyone successful?” I ask.
All of them, one after another, hold up the sigils. Two for me, bought from Raven. Four for Jean, by all the guilds. Two that Thatch beat out of Bloodstain, and three that Opal and I stole.
Raven was hoarding them after our little stunt with the guards, because getting more would’ve been harder. And now, they’re a bit screwed, but that’s no longer my problem. I smile, looking at all of them, and give a slow nod. “Then we’ll climb tomorrow.”
Richard holds up a hand, and I blink at her. After another moment, the little hiy’ht smiles at all of us. “I wanted to say that I am very glad to have come along with all of you. You’ve proven to be a very reliable hive,” she says, simply.
Instantly, Inu breaks out into a bright smile. “I like you all, too,” she says happily. Thatch blushes and looks aside. Opal laughs. Sylves gives a happy giggle. And I bring a finger to my face.
I think, for some reason, I’m smiling. How bizarre.
Softly, I shake my head, clearing my mind as I lay down on the bed. I need to sleep now, since Perpetual Pursuit has already kept me up for a few days straight. Just one quick nap before we climb. And then, tomorrow, we’ll stop hiding.
Tomorrow, we’ll head into the monolith.
Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!
Use arrow keys (or A / D) to PREV/NEXT chapter