Date: February 5th

  “Are you sure we shouldn’t tell him.” Akira asks his wife while they are lying in bed.

  With a sigh she rolls over to look at her husband. “Yes love, at least not yet.”

  Yuki is waiting for a response but Akira is distracted by his wife open robe. “Akira!” With Yuki’s shout he snaps out of his daze. “We already went a round. I’m tired. So down boy.”

  “What were you saying...?” Akria mumbles to himself. “OH. Right, he was obviously confused about why we’re being so nice to him.”

  She places a hand on her arm. “I know. He is a nice boy, but knowing that our family is aware of his origins won’t help him right now. We were never even supposed to be involved. Him building a relationship with our daughter… Well, that’s just good fortune.” She says to her husband with a smile, under hear breath she says, “And my amazing luck.”

  This gets a laugh from Akira and he lays down. “Fine, fine. But I want to talk to him before they leave for school.

  The following day started normally for Helo. The room obviously had a different artistic design. Out with the modern cabin, in with the traditional Japanese. Other than that, things started normal.

  That was until he took a step out the front door with Lelai. Looking around Helo was a little too tired and comfortable to truly realize that he knows nothing about the place he finds himself. Not sure where to go for his run, he goes to the building that he saw people practicing katas inside.

  Reaching the building the inside is about as dark as the outside. “What do you think girl?” He asks the tired fox. She just gives him a tired glare. Not wanting to cause any issues, and have great night vision, Helo just opens the sliding door and steps in.

  Looking around the room he jumps slightly when he finds a man levitating in the middle of the room. Peering a little more through the dark it ends up being Akira. Now wanting to disrupt the man’s meditation, Helo finds his own place to sit.

  “Did you come here to practice Helo-San.” Akira’s voice rings out clearly and with a calming ring.

  “AH! What?” Helo looks hastily at Akira and is worried he might have interrupted something. “Y… Yes sir. Normally Lelai.” He gestures to the fox in his arms. “And I go for a morning run. But I don’t know the area.”

  “I see. A simple obstacle, but the hour is early.” He hums to himself and his body floats a little higher before dissipating. Helo is shocked and starts to wonder if he went insane. Only for him to see movement to his side. Akira is fazing into view by the practice weapon rack. He grabs two naginatas off the wall.

  Turning to Helo, he tosses him on. Stepping into the middle stance he takes a step toward Helo. Helo catches the blade and puts Lelai on the ground. Scrambling to his feet, he brings the tip up intime to parry a blow.

  Akira starts out slowly with very simple attacks. All his attacks flow into the next. A left slash into a downward cut. A spin of his blade and with a front slash. He is going between all the forms and transition.

  Helo at first was frantic but as he got into a calmer state of mind he started to do better. Slowly the fighting picks up speed until they are a mix of blocks, counters, and slashes. Eventually Akira’s speed goes past Helo’s sixty-four in agility and he starts to slip up. Blocking an overhead blow Helo lets out a grunt from the impact and barely blocks the slash coming from his side.

  Akira has yet to use any advanced techniques, all he was doing was building up speed. Not wanting to get left behind Helo activates his ‘Bloodline Awakening’ and he can feel power course through his veins. This power is his, well it was supposed to be his. It is what he should be, instead it was sealed away.

  But Helo doesn’t let the pain stop him. Advancing his speed to match Akira the two continue to fight. Eventually Akria is moving to fast for Helo again, so he starts to use the ‘Moon-Staff’ techniques.

  Being able to block on one side while getting into the next position, allows Helo to last for another few minutes. Finally, about eight minutes after Helo activated his skill. Akria spins his own blade along Helos and traps it on the ground.

  Looking at Akira’s calm and peaceful eyes Helo nods his head and takes a step back. He can feel the sweat pool on his body and the pain in his muscles. Releasing his skill Helo crumples slightly under the pain and has to stagger to catch himself.

  “It seems young Helo-San, that your skills ability to increase your endurance, doesn’t stop you from feeling extra effects afterward, along with the strain, and a period of weakness. That skill is dangerous; you need to be careful.” Akira says to him while studying him.

  “Huhhhh. I know.” He says along with his heavy breaths. “The skill channels my bloodline. But it hurts me.” He says with his eyes downcast and some defeat in his voice. “I don’t know what to do with it.”

  “I see. That is a problem that many individuals with powerful bloodlines can have.” Akira fades away into mist and now he is casually siting down in front of Helo. “I was in a similar position to you. The Kashiwagi and Hayashi clans have always been close. One was the care takers, the other the protectors. Two minor branch families got sent here when the earth was first opened.” Waving his hand, he shows of an image of two families one with attractive vulpine features and the other with tan skin and nature magic.

  “Your first years of growth require a lot of resources. Especially those with powerful bloodlines that have been weakened with time. On earth we only have enough resources to awaken a small number of our clan. Same with the BrightMoon, that is why Calain has started to hate Alli. We have to choose people who have inherited the most strength.” Akira says with a sad smile.

  Helo gives him a surprised look but Akira continues. “Yes, I know about that. But that is not what we are discussing. The two families started to inner marry on earth. Eventually we became Kitsunes with nature magic, and dryads with fox fire. My family line, the Kashiwagi were originally the dryads with connections to trees. But when I first touched on my mana my fox fire was already awakened.”

  He pulls out his hand and it starts to glow with an eerie blue flame. It flickers with shades of green and white as it sits over his palm. Around them the world starts twisting and Helo starts to see vines and branches reaching for him from the corner of his eyes.

  Waving his hand the foxfire vanishes. “This is usually a boon; it shows a strong connection to your bloodline and no need for resources to awaken it.”

  “But in the moment, my mixed bloodline was a curse. My body wasn’t born with enough resistance to my own affinity. I would burn away my own spirit, whenever I used my ability. For some it is okay, certain elements are easy to work with initially, and you can gain resistances. But I was too young and foxfire to insidious.” He says while looking Helo in the eye.

  “I had to go into special training.” At this Helo is a little excited So there is a way forward?

  “They needed a lot of resources to integrate my body with the blue flames, and I had to fully awaken my bloodline.” He leans forward. “I would recommend the same for you.”

  “So. You want me to integrate my bloodline into my body.” Helo asks him, a little confused by what he is saying.

  “Yes, your bloodline is who you are. It should already be integrated. The only reasons it wouldn’t be is if you are like me and were born with an aspect of your abilities awakened, or if you had it sealed. My mother argued for the elders to seal my bloodline away. Then I could slowly acclimate to it.” Akira adds while rubbing his chin. “If you are born from the originator of the bloodline or someone above tier 6, then you can be born with it fully unlocked. Otherwise, it is a tossup, or you have to do it yourself.”

  “I believe mine was sealed. It seems to be sealed in my heart.” Helo adds.

  “Well don’t mess with it. We don’t want you to accidentally kill yourself. But go to the library and find texts about how to integrate your affinity into your body.” Akira gets up and returns the naginata that was laying across his lap. “Also, with your speed and dexterity I’d ask you to switch to a sword, but the defensive abilities of the naginata are already too great.” He says while leaving the room.

  Helo sits on the mat pondering what he has learned. Bloodline are complicated and seem difficult to understand but it makes sense, that if you are born at tier 0 with the bloodline of a divine creature, that is a hundred generation old. Maybe you need to have certain resources to access that.

  From what he heard from Akira’s story it also makes sense that if his own bloodline has been sealed away since birth, then it might make sense that it hurts his body.

  Next, he thinks about Akira’s parting words. He considered switching to a longer weapon. But his kukri were gifts from Bernard. He doesn’t want to give them up.

  Finally feeling better, Helo gets up and heads through the central courtyard. Passing the main house, he can see servants and employees going about their tasks. Entering his own home Helo goes to his room to get cleaned up. Helo takes a nice bath and relaxes for a while. Using his ‘Bloodline Awakening’ skill left him feeling strained.

  Eventually getting down stairs Helo finds the party sitting around the kitchen table and going over a bunch of folders.

  “Were looking at prospective teammates!” Alli says with an excited tone.

  In front of them there is about fifty folders. They are all looking over them and making notes. Not really feeling like looking at new member Helo gets some food and sits in the couch.

  He was happy to learn that both BrightMoon and Kashiwagi families are from the Divine Beast Empire. So, the tablets and systems are all built the same. Pulling out his tablet Helo looks at different ways to integrate his bloodline into his body. There are tons of references when he looks it up. Most come from actual monsters and beast that have some type of bloodline innately awakened since birth.

  Going down a bit of a rabbit hole Helo starts making a list of different creatures with similar affinities to him. Eventually he gets pulled from his research and Hinata takes him on a tour of the Kashiwagi territory.

  It is beautiful and unlike the BrightMoon territory, it is on the side of Mount Fuji and inside of it. Not in a valley on a mountain that is in the center of a valley surrounded by mountains. They also have a much smaller territory because of the nearby cities. But the buildings are all beautiful and traditional. There are gardens and paths all over the mountain. The inside is a mass of caverns and tunnels.

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  One thing that he does notice is that they seem to have a much smaller population. He asks Hinata about this and is surprised by the answer. “Well, Alli’s clan is very militant. It has to do with their pack leadership and respect over seniority. But for us we are more mystical and connected to nature.”

  She says that as what Helo can only assume is a fairy flies out of the froze blossom trees. It is only a few inches tall with wings twice the size of its body. The fairy is wearing a tiny blue winter coat. It flies a circle around Hinata as three other fairies chase it. All four of them are letting of twinkling laughs that sound like wind chimes.

  “Like I was saying, you might see wild beasts in Alli’s territory, but this, this is unique. To keep the spiritual and mystical mana, we need to limit expansion and population sizes. So, we naturally have a smaller community. More people live in the mountain, but the rest of the world isn’t aware of the mountain community.” She leads him through beautiful and color gardens, even in the midst of winter.

  Helo sees foxes playing, fairies dancing, deer walk right up to him without getting scared. “So, when it comes down to the integration our clan won’t have much of an external presence. But have you ever heard about the fae?”

  “Yes?” Helo says with a questioning look.

  “I mean the real stories, not children’s stuff.” She asks him.

  “A little? Like summer and winter courts? Something about fairy woods. It was a small note in a book Elder Shelby had me read.” He speaks

  “Well, they say that you don’t fight a fae in their own woods.” As she says this, she releases her mana into the atmosphere. To his surprise the unique mystical mana in the air responds and Helo can see the world around him come alive. The plants are moving and he keeps seeing things from the corner of his vision, only to turn and there to be nothing.

  “We might not have a big army, but we have a home field advantage.” She says with a smirk. Taking a breath she complains to Helo. “Doing that takes a lot out of me. Haaaaaaaa. My father’s connection to the spirits and nature is really powerful. You should see him when he gets upset. It’s like the entire world start bending to his whim.” She says with a smile, before leading Helo to finish the tour.

  Getting back to their house around the center courtyard, Hinata and Helo find everyone exiting. They are being led by Hinata’s mother Yuki, “Oh I’m glad your back sweetie. I was about to come find you. A rift just opened that is a perfect practice run for you all.” She leads the group down a path to a waiting vehicle.

  They all get in and Yuki explains to the group. “Some of you know what this is about.” She looks at Alli and Hinata who are talking in the back seat, she stares at them until they stop. “But this is for everyone else. Not all dungeons are the same. Some are what we call classic dungeons like the BrightMoon’s, some are towers that you need to beat strong foes to climb higher, some are instance dungeons where many people enter their own little world. Every type has its own strength and weaknesses. Dungeon masters have different ways to control them and exploit the resources they offer.”

  “Well, ours is a rift dungeon. Essential all over the Mount Fuji area, rifts will appear. Depending on the mana concentration they will be between tier 1 and 3. These are constantly spawning and you need to enter and clear them. Once you do you get a large exp boost and a reward. Which is different than the BrightMoon dungeon, where you only get exp from killing monsters. If you don’t clear a rift, eventually it will break and monsters will spill out.”

  “Mrs. Kashiwagi?” Helo speaks up to ask something.

  “Call me Yuki dear.” She gives him the ‘don’t make me feel old look’.

  Looking and Hinata and Alli, he takes a second to answer. “Yuki-Sama. What about the core?”

  “OH.” She looks a little lost before nodding and answering. “Normally we don’t tell people this, but it is actually under the main house. There is a tier 3 rift that has been heavily modified by a previous dungeon master to make it permanent. It is my husband’s training ground and the location the core is in.”

  When she finishes, she pulls off the road and leads them into the woods. They walk through the trees and snow for about ten-minutes before the enter a clearing with a massive rip in space. Helo isn’t even sure what he is looking at. The portals in the BrightMoon dungeon are large black swirling things. But this is like a fluctuating tear in reality. The edges are black and jagged.

  Holding in a gasp Helo can hear as Cody and Gabi don’t. “Well, everyone. This is a low to mid-tier 1 rift. Have fun.” After that she just leaves.

  They all look at one another but their gazes are different. Hinata, Alli, Aiko and Luna are staring at Cody, Gabi and Helo with amusement. They have obviously already seen these rifts.

  “Well come-on! It won’t clear itself!” Alli shouts before diving into the rift.

  “WAIT!” Luna shouts before dropping her head. “Dammit Alli, the front lines or scouts are supposed to enter first.” After saying that she enters the rip in space.

  “Sometimes there are monsters near the entrance.” Hinata says to Helo, before also entering the rift.

  Looking at the rest of the group it is Aiko that gets them moving. “Well… Come-on. Alli was right.”

  After that the final members enter the rift. Stepping through Helo can feel as reality presses in on him. Then with a sucking feeling and a sudden lurch, he is now gagging on the ground of rift entrance. It feels like his insides are all mixed up and everything wants to come out. Coughing on the ground he looks up to see the amused faces of the girls. At least to his side Gabi and Cody are also having trouble.

  “Yeah. That happens. You will get used to it.” Aiko says.

  Taking a minute his body starts to feel normal again. With one last cough Helo heaves himself to his feet with a stagger. While on the ground he could hear the girls fighting, but at the time it didn’t seem all that important to him.

  Looking around he can see that they are in what looks like a ruined town, the sky is overcast to the point of being dreary and the area looks sick. The girls are fighting what looks like shambling bodies, he uses his new ‘Detect Weakness’ skill.

  Undead Zombie

  Weakness: Head, INT.

  Using his aura Helo can feel that they are weaker than himself by a fair margin. He guesses that they are around level 20. Not wanting to get close to the Zombies, Helo uses his ‘Dark Blade Projection’. A foot long black throwing dagger starts to form in front of him.

  As he is summoning a blade he watches the fight around him. Everyone seems to be doing okay. Alli is using fire, Hinata has her semi-physical illusions, Lelai is even using small condensed mist balls from her circlet. Everyone else is fighting in their own ways and nobody is being overrun.

  His ‘Dark Blade’ forms from the shadows around him Helo’s aura goes from inspecting the undead to wrapping his blade. He still doesn’t have the mental alacrity to use his aura in multiple ways at one. Using his bloodline, aura and skills all in a seamless tandem isn’t something he can do yet.

  He has to shift between them all, even making it so that his aura isn’t affecting his teammates spells takes a small constant mental push. It is almost an unconscious hold, but when he is pushing his mind to its limit, he can start to feel everything that is taking his focus.

  As his aura wraps the blade, he uses its innate connection to darkness and a slight movement of his hand to pull the blade in front of him. Clenching his other fist in a grabbing motion, Helo uses ‘Mental Grasp’ on the blade. With his aura and telekinesis coating the blade made from physical darkness Helo looks for an enemy to strike.

  In front of him his team is fighting. There are arrows, light bolts, explosions, constructs and people all in the line of fire. Finding a zombie that is alone and off to the side Helo pushing both his hands forward with a growl.

  His left hand is holding his conceptualized aura and his left is his telekinesis. Pushing both out the dried leaves in front of him flutter along the ground like they were hit by a tiny breeze.

  The blade launches forward like it was shot from a bow. His aim wasn’t perfect but Helo takes off a chunk of the zombie’s skull. With a spray of brain matter and clattering of ripped bone, the blade dissipates as Helo realizes his abilities.

  Happy with his practice Helo summons another dagger. Looking around he can see zombie shambling from all over the town. The noise that they are creating is calling them. Due to the zombies relatively low level there isn’t a chance that his team would be over run. But if the zombies matched them in level, they might have to start kiting them. By the sound of the zombies and the aura’s he can feel around him, Helo estimates there is anywhere from one-hundred-fifty to two-hundred zombies.

  Helo continues to summon blade after blade. His aura’s ability to manipulate the blade is getting quicker and more definite and his ‘Mental Grasps’ ability to stay locked onto a moving target is rising. Helo can feel that this aspect of the skill is tied to his own focus.

  If the target is moving and he looks away, it will be easier to lost his mental grasp. As his skills grow better Helo starts trying new things. As Hinata is sending out a slash toward a zombie, she is blocking another with her ‘Unconscious Shielding’.

  Helo knows that she is just fine. Her upgraded shield skill can hold against some zombies. But he is enjoying his first time as a ranged fighter. Also, he has no desire to get close to the zombies. His senses are powerful, and he thinks that their scent might be their true weapons.

  His aura range is only up to fifteen-meters, and the further from his body the weaker his aura becomes. This is especially true the manipulation and force needed for controlling his blades.

  Walking closer to Hinata as his blade forms, Helo stops six-feet behind her. He is well within his range to accurately control his blade with his aura. Pushing his left hand out in a half circle, as his other hand follows the blades trajectory. Helo uses his aura to send the blade in a crescent arc around Hinata. As the blade gets close, his aim wasn’t perfect, but he uses his ‘Mental Grasp’ skill to finish the attack.

  Pushing forward and slightly to the side while the blade is in flight, Helo piercing the zombie directly in the center of its forehead. This is a small trick he picked up in the few minutes. Using his aura to start and guide the flight, and a burst of speed and direction from his ‘Mental Grasp’.

  Happy with himself Helo looks around as another blade is forming. The formation is faster when he is holding his daggers, but without them it takes a few seconds. He can see piles of human corpses surrounding his team. They are not being overrun, but they are slowly moving backward to avoid the bodies piling up.

  As the blade finished forming Helo can tell that his reserves are starting to drop. His aura drains energy from all his reserves, ‘Mental Grasp’ from his mental energy, and ‘Dark Blade’ from his mental and physical. All that combined means that Helo is using energy far faster than normal.

  His usually fighting style is using his fit and healthy body to move and attack. He uses intermittent abilities when needed like movement skill or increased piercing bloodline. But those skills tend to be internal, or directly on his hands or weapons. But this external energy-based fighting is draining.

  Feeling some extra respect for casters like Alli, Helo gets back to work. Eventually an hour after they entered, all that is left is a trickle of walking dead and piles of bodies. The smell is starting to get overwhelming and Helo just wants to get out of here.

  Walking behind his party as Helo gets to the bodies he can feel something in his aura. A slight resonance with the energy they are releasing. During the fight he checked if they released vitality, but they didn’t. Helo didn’t look any further because he was busy, and had no interest in feeling around the corpses with his aura.

  But while passing by he can feel his own dark aligned aura skill have a small connection to the undead. Stopping for a moment, against his own desires, Helo studies the bodies.

  The energy feels corruptive, invasive, all-around appalling. It’s a mockery and perversion of life. His own life bloodline aspect feels appaled. It makes him want to gag and rage at the same time.

  Fighting down his instincts Helo feels more deeply, it is his curse, the dark alignment that merged with his bloodline, that almost feels a kinship. Helo knows that his bloodline was changed by whatever the ‘Dark Curse’ in his status is.

  But based on what he is feeling, it wasn’t just his bloodline that changed. His curse feels nothing like this horrible amalgamation of mockery. His curse’s darkness is his most used affinity. Well, part of that is because his curse smothers his golden energy and he can only use it when he drains excess vitality.

  But still his dark energy isn’t this. But still… he can feel a resonance. Feeling sick by what he can feel Helo starts to dry heave into the ground.

  His party rushes back, Alli and Hinata each take a side. “Are you okay!?” Alli asks.

  While Alli is freaking out Hinata just runs her hands in his hair.

  “Yeah, I just found something else out. Something about my past.” Helo says after coughing.

  His party stands around him and looks expectant. They know he has a powerful bloodline, they also know he has some kind of curse that blocks mana.

  “We all knew that my curse, is the origin of my dark affinity. I felt… not a connection. But a resonance between my energy and the zombies. I think whatever cursed me used something similar to undeath.” Helo says.

  Nobody is sure what to say to Alli hugs him. The rest of the party lisenting quietly and doesn’t say anything.

  He still isn’t sure. But at least now he can guess that his bloodline is supposed to be much different. He can guess that both his bloodline’s golden and black energies used to be something else. But his golden energy purified his black energy, and his black energy turned his golden energy into something it wasn’t supposed to be. Maybe this is the true reason my bloodline was sealed and it damages my body.

  For a second Helo has a strong sense of loss. He starts to think about what could have been. But he shakes his head. The inside of a rift isn’t the place for this. Getting up he says to the group. “I have a lot to think about. Let’s get out of here.”

  For the rest of the rift, Helo doesn’t do much. There are not many enemies left and he is lost in his thoughts. Even the exit that is guarded by five more powerful variants are defeated quickly and they exit the rift.

  Having to walk back to their house, the end up walking for an hour before arriving back at the Kashiwagi residence. Heading inside the group enjoys a relaxing rest of their day while looking over the new perspective party members.