120 – Featherweight

A single bug landed on Mal's arm. It bit into the skin and a thin liquid traced its way into Mal's body from the bite. Pain shot up and down his arm, and he staggered backward before he caught himself and clenched the wound.

The bug, goal accomplished, floated back up to join the swarm. Within a few seconds, the pain had disappeared, but there was a noticeable paleness where the bug had bitten him.

Mal didn't want to guess at what would happen if he was completely consumed.

Mal readied himself for the next attack, when abruptly, the dome of bugs surrounding them shifted, and they swarmed outside.

"Oh, that's not good," he said.

"Wait, isn't this fine?" Rolam asked. "We should be safe now, shouldn't we?"

"If they're not going after us, then who are they going after?"

Rolam stiffened. His feet beat the wooden floor as he raced out into the street.

Two floating mystic lights provided all of the illumination that the thin alleyway would ever receive. The stone was wet, a stagnant puddle sat there for who even knew how long.

The stars flickered

The bugs were in the air.

Mal raced in the direction that he'd seen them going and came to a stop. There were a few people in ragged clothes surrounding a small fire in an alleyway. The bugs descended down onto the people, and Mal felt his heart stop in his chest.

A scream ripped through the air. One of the people fell to the ground, skin a dried up husk. Mal reached the remaining and swiped his dagger through the air with a trail of flame. The bugs backed off, only a scant few feet away from Mal and the rest of the people.

A green crescent slash hit the side of the swarm and the buzzing roared.

Mal looked back at the remaining people. "Get inside, now!"

One guy nodded, then grabbed two of his friends and dashed off toward the end of the alleyway.

The swarm made to follow when Mal flared his Fireglove and stopped it cold in its tracks. The swarm paused in mid-air, then split apart into two, then three, then four, then five.

Five separate swarms floating above them. The swarm then spread out, each of the five going down a different street.

Ah.

That's not good.

This had officially gone beyond their control. Mal racked his brain for a solution when he caught sight of a few familiar uniforms.

Aston had insisted on it. A standard dress. Nothing obvious, but enough to make it clear who they belonged to.

The boys who'd been training under Aston.

Mal ran over to them.

Rolam followed behind with a shout. "Wait, what are you doing?!"

Mal stopped in front of the group. They stumbled to attention and saluted him, hands in all the wrong positions.

"S—sir," the one at the front stepped forward. There was still a hint of youth in his eyes."W—We're just on patrol—"

"How quickly can you get back to the warehouse?"

They glanced at each other. The one at the front said something to another to the side, then turned back to Mal.

"About a minute, sir. Why?"

"I need you to get back to the warehouse and send out everyone we've got. Equip them with torches, anything that can make a flame."

"M—may I ask why, sir?"

"A necromancer has released undead bugs that have the ability to sap people of their life merely through a bite. We are to find and destroy them. Understood?"

The boy's eyes widened before he nodded. "Will do, sir."

He turned and nodded at the other. "L—let's go. The rest of you follow Lord Patoal and assist him in whatever he needs."

He took off running with his companion. The other four members of the squad looked at Mal. Mal quickly saw some torches off to the side, then lit them up with his Fireglove. He handed them out to each of the remaining soldiers. Most of them were teenagers, Mal would have guessed. Just on the cusp of adulthood. One of them still had acne.

Mal grimaced. It wasn't the fighting force he would have hoped for, but he didn't have any other choice.

He pointed at each of the alleyways. "Fan out, locate the swarm, and try to keep them occupied until reinforcements can come."

"Understood!" The one with acne squeaked.

They quickly fanned out. Mal looked back at Rolam. "We're taking the fifth alley. Come on."

Rolam stared at him, mouth agape. He snapped his jaw shut, then opened it. "Honored leader, what was that?"

"We don't have time for this, I'll explain later!"

Rolam swallowed, then nodded. "Yes. We need to stop those bugs."

Mal took off in a run, channeling mana through his body. Rolam ran alongside him, his movements noticeably smoother than Mal's.

Another scream ripped through the air. Mal skidded to a stop and flared up his Firegloves. A girl was backed up against an alley wall, eyes shut, and hands trembling. The swarm sped toward her at full speed. Mal ran as quickly as he could, but he knew that he wouldn't make it.

Air brushed his side. Rolam snatched up a wooden plank off the ground and slashed it like a blade. It shattered and a green crescent came out of the wooden remnants and seared the back of the swarm.

The remaining bugs split apart and turned back around to face Rolam. Rolam, off-balance, brought up his arms to try to block. Mal jumped in front of him and swiped his dagger, Fireglove activating at the same instant. The swarm of bugs backed off.

We need a way to kill them, Mal thought. But they're impossible to pin down. We need something with a wide range. If only I had a thin net. That would be ideal.

Mal looked at his Fireglove. If he could just expand it out in a wave, rather than the sharp, narrow strikes that it was limited to. Mal glanced down at the shattered wooden plank and an idea came into his head.

He swung his foot and the Airgrass boots activated at the same instant.

Splinters and wood dust burst into a cloud from the force of the blow, mixing amongst the swarm. Mal held out his hand and a small flame lit up the tip of his finger.

The wood dust, still suspended in mid-air, caught the flame and erupted into a ball of red and yellow.

For one brilliant moment, the alleyway had turned into the receptacle for a sun. A screech went up from the bugs as they were burnt to a fine crisp, before the flames died out and smoke filled the air.

Every single bug had been disintegrated. Sweat dripped down Mal's forehead and into his robes. The woman at the back of the alley stared at him open-mouthed.

"Are you okay?" Mal said.

She nodded up and down after a beat.

A single remaining bug drifted up toward the sky. Mal watched it and traced its path through the air, and saw in the distance a huge black swarm overhead.

They were regathering.

Mal ran back out into the open streets and immediately collided with one of his people.

"Sir!" the Cat's Eye gang member said. "I was just coming to find you. They managed to ward off any more attacks, but the bugs just up in—"

"—floated toward the middle of the quarter, I know." Mal pointed with his thumb at the large black swarm in the distance.

Rolam came to Mal's side and stared up at the remaining bugs. "You think that the trick you pulled with the wood splinters might be doable again?"

"I wish. But I doubt there'll be an easy way to get a bunch of splinters up there. Where would we even find them?" Mal faced back toward the Cat's Eye gang member. "How many Spellswords do we have right now besides Aston? Is he even here?"

"H—he's en route from the warehouse." he shook his head. "With the other thing, We're still trying to figure out how to swing a sword right. We don't know much about magic."

Well, there goes the aerial bombardment plan, Mal thought.

And that further proved how much of a prodigy Rolam was—being able to use ranged slashes after only a month or two of training? How utterly ridiculous.

Mal looked back toward Exodi Academy. It wouldn't be long before word got out to the other three quarters, and to the city guard about what was happening. Mal knew that they would take their time going into the Black Quarter. That was just the reality of it—any information about this section of the city was unreliable at the best of times.

But Mal didn't want them getting involved. They'd been getting ready to defend the Black Border from the other three quarters, but preparations weren't complete. If they were to come in and use the swarm as a pretense for "cleaning up their interests," it could turn incredibly ugly. Mal's only hope against that was that the city guard wouldn't allow such a mass movement from the criminal underworld.

No. They needed to clean this up on their own, and they needed to do it within the next several minutes.

But how?

Mal had resources in the Black Quarter, but nothing that could take down a bunch of magical resurrected bugs created by a necromancer.

“Honored leader.” Rolam inclined his head toward a pile of bags. “I know you dismissed my earlier idea, and I agree. Wood splinters would be hard to find, but what about—”

Ah. Clever elf.

Mal marched over to the bags and sliced open the top.

Flour.

The swarm bobbed overhead. It inched to the side and Mal realized that it was about to make a break for it.

He turned his head to Rolam. “Find the others. I’ll distract the swarm.”

“Wait, honored leader—”

Mal jumped into the air and wind burst from his boots and propelled him up to a rooftop. He grabbed his Nettleleaf dagger and swiped it across his arm. Blood splattered from the strike across the roof tiles and stained it a bright red.

The swarm stopped, then circled, then buzzed and circled around him.

“That’s right,” Mal said. “Now why would you want to leave, anyway? Your boss told you to take me out, and I’m right here.”

Mal didn’t know how intelligent the bugs were, but whatever it was he’d said, it seemed to have worked. The bugs took up that dome position again. Mal brought his hands up, hands devoid of fire or heat.

He sniffed.

Flour.

A white cloud of dust abruptly filled the air. He quickly slammed his foot into the roof and fell through an open crack. Overhead, he held out his hand and activated his flames.

A roaring fire ripped through the cloud in a brilliant blaze of light. The red and yellow seared through the open hole and chased after Mal before the tendril of fire died to a smoky crisp.

Mal finished his fall and hit the floor of the roof.

A bed creaked from behind him. A young boy and his mother stared at him and backed up against the bedpost.

Mal raised a hand in greeting.

He looked back up toward the hole. Then at the woman.

“Go find the Cat’s Eye Gang, they’ll compensate you for this.”

“…what?"

Mal didn't deign to answer. He jumped into the air and the Airgrass boots, miraculously, still had enough charge to propel him out. He hit the top of the roof and stared out across the open night sky.

Nothing. The bugs had been turned into a fine crisp.

Mal wiped the sweat from his brow.

He felt something drill holes into his back. He turned around in response to the sensation.

Rolam was standing with his arms crossed, Aston sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck behind him, while about a dozen of the Cat’s Eye Gang foot soldiers stared at each other, then back at Mal.

A window cracked open, and a young man peered up through the darkness at Mal.

Well, this is a bit awkward.

“You’re the head of a crime family?”

“Technically, we’re puppeting the head of a crime family. There’s a bit of a difference.”

“Honored leader, with all due respect…. What in the name of Eternus are you doing?”

After the untimely events of the night—and after appropriately compensating the old woman, along with anybody else who’d been injured in the fight against the undead bugs—Mal had been unable to get Rolam to go back to the school. Especially with Aston standing there, still as a statue, refusing to answer any questions.

As such, Mal had been forced to go back to the Cat’s Eye Gang hideout, Rolam in tow, then forced to give some kind of explanation for what had just happened.

“Aston, my Spellsword teacher, works for you.” Rolam pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re both criminals of the highest order.”

“It’s only temporary,” Aston said. “We'll go legal eventually. Besides, it’s debatable how much crime we’re actually doing. We don’t do the really bad stuff. We just sell magical herbs at a cheaper price because we don’t have to pay a tax on it like normal.”

“It’s still illegal.” Rolam dug his hands into his red hair. “I can’t understand why neither of you seem to understand this!”

At this, Mal walked over to Rolam. He placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Rolam,” Mal said, “I do not care one iota what you think of me or my moral failings. I can promise you right now that what I’m doing is far, far less evil than the things I could be doing. I am capable of much, much worse.”

He squeezed Rolam’s shoulder tighter.

“So I would appreciate it if you limited the grandstanding to an acceptable degree.”

Rolam slapped Mal’s hand off, a cold ice in his eyes.

“You can’t tell me that you’ve done no wrong, leader. The path you’re on is one stained with blood.”

“Yeah, I killed people, and they damn well deserved it."

Rolam staggered back, eyes wide. “You—”

“All right, boys. Break it up.”

Hemp strode between the two. She set a hand on her hip and glanced back and forth between Mal and Rolam.

“Hemp,” Mal nodded at her. “Did you come here because of the explosion?”

“Yeah, I woke up to one of the boys about to break down my door. Everybody was put on full alarm. When you said to gather everyone, they took that to mean everyone.”

“Great. And your mistress is in on it too? Why am I not surprised?”

“What—?” Hemp’s face turned a bright red. “I’m not—”

She coughed into her fist and the color receded. “We’re going to correct that assumption later. For now, can I know why you two are yelling at each other in my warehouse at two o’clock in the morning?”

“I am simply showing righteous indignation over the fact that I've been following a thief and a murderer!” Rolam cast his hands out. “You are absolute scum, Mal!”

Hemp tilted her head and looked at Rolam from the corner of her eye.

“That scum got me out of a real bad situation and gave me a steady job,” she said. “So, I think you should watch your mouth, shithead.”

Rolam glared down at her. “Normally my code forbids hurting women, but I think for you I could make an exception.”

At this, Aston got between the both of them and laughed, the sound strained and awkward, as one would expect.

“Okay!” He clapped his hands together. “Hemp, terrible de-escalation skills. Rolam.” He faced toward the elf in question. “Seriously, I get why you're shocked about what's happening. I also consider myself to have something of a code.”

Rolam's hard gaze softened.

“This isn't a place that I think any of us want to be in,” Aston said. “We're here by desperation, not because we genuinely believe it's the right thing to do.” He glanced back at Mal. “Right?”

Mal sighed. “Yes. If I didn't believe this was necessary, I wouldn't be here.”

The words struck a hollow chord inside of Mal. Something inside of him tightened, though he couldn't quite place it.

“Is this really the only option?” Rolam said. “Mal, maybe I could look aside if it truly was just the selling of magical herbs. But you admitted it to me—you've gone far beyond the right in the pursuit of whatever this is. I—”

A knock at the door.

The gang member guarding the door said something in a low murmur.

A voice came out from behind the door, then the one in front of it nodded.

He opened up the door, revealing three people, another gang member, and two people who were clearly not a part of their organization—a mother and her son—walked through it.

They were dressed in rough clothes, and the woman was carrying a small pouch clenched in her right fist. When she saw Mal, her eyes brightened, and she paced forward, son in tow.

“It's you,” she said. “The man from the roof.”

“Oh.” Mal turned to face her. “I did mention compensation. If you don't mind, can you wait a few minutes to—”

She thrust the bag into Mal's chest. Mal stared down at it, then back at the woman. “What is this?”

“Payment.” Her hand trembled. “My daughter. She was out there. She told me what you did, how you saved her. Saved us. Not only that, but you're the one who's cleaned up the Black Quarter. Everybody's been wondering how it happened, what changed. It was you, wasn't it?”

Mal blinked again.

There was some part of him that was deeply lost as to what was happening, even though it had just been clearly explained to him.

“I think you're confused,” he said.

“No, definitely not. Thank you.”

She brought the pouch into Mal's hand and clenched and wrapped his fingers around it. “Please, take it.”

Mal nodded, blank-faced. The woman smiled, a few tears at the corners of her eyes.

“Thanks for saving my big sister,” the boy beside her said. “She had to rest, but she said to tell you thank you.”

Mal stared at the pouch, then back at the boy.

“I think you're confused,” he said.

The woman laughed and wrapped her arms around him.

What… is this?

Mal stiffened like a log. After several seconds that lasted an eternity, she let go, then grabbed her son's hands and walked out.

Mal wasn't sure how long he stood there in silence.

“Well, that was nice,” Hemp said. “What did she give you, anyway?”

Mal unwrapped the small bundle and let it spill onto his hands. Five copper coins.

“Not very much,” Mal muttered.

“That was probably all they had.”

Rolam walked forward and inspected the copper coins for himself.

He chewed his bottom lip, then tossed his head to the side.

“We'll talk about this later.”

He walked out of the warehouse, leaving Mal alone with Hemp and Aston.

The copper coins were the lightest thing that Mal had ever held.