My feet moved with a sense of desperate purpose as I made a beeline for Livia's location. It didn't matter to me that I was running towards a literal deathtrap. All that mattered was that I did something to at least make the visions go away.*FWOOSH! FWOOSH!*The sound of fireballs materializing into thin air boomed in my ears as my eyes picked up on even the most granular of details. The way the flames coalesced in his palm, the tongues of fire rippling across the two suns' surface, the way the Prime hid the smug sense of satisfaction from his face as he stared at me like I was some sort of fool...It was all clear to me.Following his eyesight, I avoided the first attack by briefly flitting towards the nearest available cover; the fireball exploding on contact with the charred wood as I resumed my mad dash towards my
"What's taking them so long?"In the middle of the town hall, Lace paced back and forth across her main office as she let her nerves and anxiety take root. While being the leader of the medical corps was usually a nerve-wracking experience with the constant fight against life and death, nothing could ever compare to the burning dread of not knowing just what happened to the people that you care about. Not that she was worried, of course, but the fact that she had heard nothing from them for this long was starting to make her think that something did go horribly wrong. The last missive her sister sent her was also doing nothing to alleviate the growing fears.The Emperor had apparently laid down an ultimatum on the Prime Thirteen to wipe them all out before the month was over. While she knew that Love wouldn't really care, and would actually defect come the time of the attack,
Olivia was never one to hold a grudge.Granted, she never once had an experience that could warrant such a thing to manifest, but as a child, she never expected herself to be able to harbor such an intense amount of hatred for any object or person without growing tired of it. It was simply too boring to hate something for anything longer than a few days. Maybe even a week if it really warranted such hatred. And throughout her stay in the orphanage, Olivia was content in simply following whatever her betters had told her to do. They were nice people, and the older kids played with her a bunch whenever she wanted.That was, of course, until she was drafted as a Denominator.She didn't even know what the word meant, only that she would be in service of the Empire for the foreseeable future. Taken away from her home and her friends, it was during that
The world between the living and the dead had always been some sort of myth to me. Until I actually died the first time and saw that endless expanse of darkness and non-space, I always thought that nothing was waiting for humanity after we've perished from our own scientific hubris and lack of fucks for the future generation. I mean, sure, I was born and raised in a religious family complete with spending a lot of hours being a regular choir member, but despite the constant preachings and hours upon hours of sitting through sermons, the conflicting ideas in the scriptures were simply far too glaring for me to ignore to the point that I was essentially agnostic in all but name. It was kind of scary, having the vast majority of your family and immediate social circle be religious. The moment they realized that I wasn't really a believer anymore, I was pretty sure that they'd ship me to the nearest minister to give me a good talking to.
Pain.Complete and utter pain was the first thing that came into my mind as I opened my eyes to the annoyingly bright light of the mid-morning sun. My mouth and throat moved to scream at the unadulterated amount of suffering that I was feeling across my whole body, but all attempts at voicing out my opinions were dashed as I found out the hard way that my mouth was bandaged shut.What the fuck?"You're awake!"I winced at the sudden output of volume to my side. Looking at the source of the screaming, whatever amount of anger and annoyance I had quickly melted as Livia greeted me with the biggest smile I had ever seen her sport in a long time. The tears, of course, I could do without, but it was still such a splendid sight to see despite my whole body feeling like it was lit on fire then thrown straight into a tub of sea
"So, we are all in agreement then?"I feel like I'm forgetting something again."How're you feeling, Sis?"It's been a few days since I first woke up in this damn bed, and at this point, it's starting to feel more like a prison instead of the supposed comfort it's supposed to be as I found myself shackled to the same damn room twenty-four hours a day.I gave Livia a brief nod of recognition as she poised the spoonful of liquid nutrition towards my mouth. Even after a few days of recovery, my throat and jaw were somehow still sore enough to prevent me from speaking. I could chew some basic stuff, but it'd aggravate my healing jaw bone enough that I'd be back to square one in terms of recovery if I did it. Couldn't do basic sign language either since my limbs were in an even worse off state than my head at this point.
"As the name suggests, there are thirteen members to the Prime Thirteen, myself formerly included."Hoo boy. The obligatory exposition chapter's here. I was honestly waiting for something like this ever since I knew about Love's existence. Although, we already knew about... four or five Primes now including her? Which would leave us with eight more Primes unaccounted for.This's gonna be a reveal and a half, assuming that Love knew every one of her colleagues."Starting from the Thirteenth and Twelveth, Arjay and Arya."I instantly felt my blood boil at the sound of those bitches' names. While they're both- Oh right, Arya's alive somehow. That's gonna be a problem."Aren't they dead already?" Bart asked, his curiosity taking note of the fact that Love spoke in a way that implied that one or
"What's that?"Was this some kind of cosmic joke? I cannot, in good conscience allow them to use that book for planning! I mean, it was true that it'd be a massive help in planning and coordinating logistics and tactical formations, but I was pretty sure that the whole collective was far from ready to conform to disciplined military doctrine!Yes! That's totally the reason! Don't think about anything else!"This, Lady Emerald, is the 'Art of War,'" I inwardly cringed as the former Prime introduced my plagiarized creation to the peanut gallery. "A guide written by Lady Crimson about the intricacies of waging wars and winning battles."Oh my fucking god..."Wait, you mean Crimson wrote that?" Bart asked incredulously. "How do we know that?"Hey now. I take offense