New Mission

When Blake thought he was going to be annihilated in the next second, the increased gravity abruptly vanished. His adrenaline has already reached its peak, with his heart pumping blood through his arteries at an insane rate.

Without hesitation, he bolted into the forest and refrained from looking back. After 30 minutes of running at full speed, he turned around and did not see the bull. His adrenaline finally receded, making him feel exhausted.

He kept his guard up. In the moment of weakness, Hecate might try to possess his body, as his body was weak from the effect of the multiplied gravity.

"Don't worry, I won't try to possess you. If I try and fail now, you will ignore risky treasures in the future," Hecate affirmed while Blake peered into her eyes suspiciously.

"Why are you looking at me like that? I won't lie petty lies." Hecate smiled at him.

"Just like the owner of a lion telling you to walk past the lion. 'The lion doesn't bite,'" Blake muttered as he sat down, finally ignoring her.

"Okay, let's see if the blood-dripping method I read on the internet works," Blake mumbled to himself and bit the tip of his index finger. He sat down with cross legs and allowed his blood to drip on the basketball size crystal core, and he held it with expectation.

The crystal core absorbed the blood like a sponge, and nothing happened. He waited for a while. When Blake's patience was running thin, he suddenly felt a fluid running into his body through his veins.

"It worked!" Blake exclaimed happily.

The core began to decrease rapidly. Blake felt comfort that made him close his eyes to relish in the pleasure. An hour later, Blake opened his eyes and found out the core had vanished into thin air.

He squeezed his fist, feeling the increase in strength.

A text appeared in his eyes.

***

[Element Unlocked!]

Gravity: 1/10 cores

Note: 9 cores remaining to unlock the gravity element.

———

[Level Up Requirements: 1/100 crystal cores of Awaken Beasts.]

Time Left: 199 days.

Reward: Elemental bow.

Failure Penalty: Body disintegration.

———

[Congratulations! Primary Host Control Gained: +1%.]

Primary Host Control: 9%.

Secondary Host Control: 91%.

———

***

When reading the last section of the message, his lips curved upwards in a happy smile.

Now he knows how to wrestle with control against Hecate.

A wave of dizziness hit him. Although he felt energetic after he absorbed the core, it couldn't make up for the loss of blood and adrenaline.

He tried to resist but soon fell asleep. Unbeknownst to him, he was being trailed by the blue bull from a distance beyond his vision. The blue bull felt its only element suddenly vanish when it trapped the puny being that stole its trophy. The gravity element, which it got a century ago, is what made it dominate its domain. After living for five hundred years, it was the strangest thing that made it feel fear. It decided to trail the puny being in the shadows. When it saw that the being fainted, it made up its mind to appear.

The blue bull walked towards Blake slowly and vigilantly, for any unexpected event.

However, when it was about ten meters from the puny being, it saw something that made his jaw drop, and his eyes pop out.

Hecate, another puny being according to the bull, came out of Blake's body.

"Except you want to leave your life behind, scram out of my face," Hecate said calmly, however, her eyes were glowing red like heated metal, making the bull feel fear. It shivered and ran as fast as it could. It felt death hanging over its head. A feeling it has forgotten.

When the bull had gone very far, Hecate turned to Blake and stared at his face with complicated emotions. She told him about the Universal system but did not mention to him something important. The emotions, meant for the Cyborg race to feel, went for her instead. She felt all of his emotions. Hecate shook off the daze and disappeared into his body.

———

When he woke up, he lost track of time.

"Hecate, how long have I been sleeping?" Blake asked no one in particular.

When he didn't receive any reply, he sighed helplessly.

Suddenly, the red button on the bracelet started blinking on and off with a red light, intermittently.

"Bomb!" Blake blurted out in shock.

Without thinking about the danger in his surroundings, he bolted towards the entrance of the forest.

He ran as fast as he could. When he got to the border of the forest, he jumped out without hesitation. When he was out, he saw everybody standing in an orderly line. His interruption was abrupt, which made everybody turn to him.

But he wasn't fazed a bit. He kept a deadpan face and walked to the back of the queue.

When he got closer to the front, he noticed the students submitting a core and the teacher recording.

"The core!" He unconsciously blurted out, remembering Scarlett's threat.

Everybody turned to him, making him realize he shouted.

"Sorry," He apologized with a straight face. Being a stage performer and an actor made him immune to being in the spotlight.

When he got to the front, he saw the man with a heart-shaped face that glared at him. His face was angular from afar.

He had short brown hair, brown eyes, and a long heart-shaped face. He was about 1.85 meters tall, with a manly and muscular physique.

Blake scanned him thoroughly because of his glare.

"Your core," He said calmly.

"None," Blake said with a straight face.

"You can go," He said calmly.

Blake stared at him in disbelief, before walking past him. However, when Blake was beside him, just a step from walking past him, he whispered, "I'm Ethan Connor. Remember the name,"

Blake almost blurted out, 'Why should I remember a stranger's name?' But he held his tongue. Maybe there is more to his name.

Scarlett just ignored the whole matter, standing from a high platform like an enchanting goddess.

They entered the train and it took them back. It took three hours to get back to Brooke City. By this time, his stomach was screaming at him angrily.

When the train halted, everybody came down and went their separate ways.

Blake was thinking of running, but the bomb on his wrist made him stay back.

"I thought you would run," Scarlett said with a smile.

His stomach grumbled at that moment, making him blush even with his thick skin.

"Let's go and eat," Scarlett said while walking away.

Blake tagged along. The city's curfew has already been lifted. When they were eating at a fancy restaurant, Blake pleaded with Scarlett, multiple times, to take off the bracelet. However, her reply was a mesmerizing smile. It irked Blake, which made him eat without conversing with her, making her perform a monologue in front of him.

After eating his fill, Scarlett called a man to take him to his room, before leaving in a black off-road vehicle.

After walking in silence for a while, the man initiated a random conversation about him and the school rules. This made Blake realize that the man was talkative and simply reserved around strangers. His name is Bob Herbert. He has some light wrinkles around his eyes.

Everything was going normally until the man suddenly switched the conversation topic.

"Who are you to Miss Scarlett?" Bob asked solemnly.

"Nobody. Just an acquaintance," Blake said nonchalantly but inwardly wary. He doesn't know Bob's stance or motives. Maybe the random conversation was to make him drop his guard.

"You know Ethan Connor?" Bob questioned with a raised eyebrow.

"The Angry dude with a heart-shaped face and brown eyes?" Blake asked, confused by the abrupt change of topic.

"Yes, that one. He has a strong crush on Scarlett," Bob said seriously while gazing at Blake to see his reaction. He was disappointed by Blake's nonchalant act.

"How is that my business?" Blake stared at Bob weirdly.

"Scarlett has never talked to him the way she talked to you, talk more of eating private dinner with you. Ethan is a cunning and ruthless fellow. You are chasing his 'woman'," Bob said sternly, stressing the 'woman'.

"I will call the cops," Blake blurted out unconsciously, forgetting the era.

"What cops?" Bob asked with a confused expression.

"Just gibberish. I got your warning. Also—"

Bob interrupted Blake while opening the door of a white and purple duplex, "We are here."

Blake followed him inside. He saw three boys in the room. One was playing a game with a virtual keyboard, another was reading, and the last was performing a monologue.

"Boys, this is your new roommate. You guys should cooperate," Bob shouted like the regular teachers passing an announcement in the dormitory.

Bob left before Blake could say anything.

"Now, I'm forced to attend school," Blake muttered, totally depressed about the series of events that took place.

Since he didn't have a bag, he walked to the free bed and sat down.

The guy performing the monologue approached him.

"Hi, I'm Jake Johnson, the most handsome. The one playing the game is Mathew Nelson, while the bookworm is David Robinson. We are the three sons of the room," Jake said with a broad smile and a stretched hand.

"I'm Blake Shaun, and nice to meet you," Blake shook his stretched hand.

"Blake Son? You heard that, guys! We have the original son in our midst. We are now complete. The four sons," Jake yelled like an idiot.

"Nobody is normal in this room," Blake muttered with a scrunched-up face.

"It's Blake Shaun!" Blake growled.

"Oh! What a pity. Nevertheless, there is this girl I want to take out, but she…" Jake started talking up and down about various topics; mostly girls.

It filled Blake with hidden information. The place they went previously for the trial exams is called the 'Awaken Hunting Ground', which is a forbidden ground. It is a forbidden ground because it has a set of rules. For example, anything above the Awaken rank can't access it, including weapons. It is also the only place with Awaken beasts. As for the reason, Jake was unaware.

What made Blake angry was that the bracelet, which was used to threaten him, was just a communication tool in the Awaken hunting ground. The red button was the alarm button for distress calls, while the green button was used to display a holographic map.

There were three zones on the map: the green-colored part of the map is the hunting zone; the red-colored part is the danger zone because nobody has ever made it out alive; and lastly, the blue-colored part is the unexplored zone.

Blake wandered into the red zone because of a lack of information.

'How could an Awaken survive those beasts? I luckily survived,' Blake pondered in a daze.

Blake, unaware of Hecate's intervention, gave the credit to his luck. In his mind, Hecate is an evil being that crawled out of hell to take over his body.

'No wonder, I asked her for ways to remove it, and she started smiling. I was like a village illiterate asking about how to operate a mobile phone. She should have told me at least, or I would have died in the red zone,' Blake thought in both shame and anger.

However, Scarlett assumed he knew how to use it, and that's why she didn't tell him. Even kids know how to use it in the transcendent era.

A string of text jolted the dazed Blake, who wasn't listening to the blabbing Jake.

***

[RANDOM MISSION ALERT!]

MISSION: Steal something important from Scarlett's house.

N/B: Scarlett can annihilate you within a second.

TIME: 4 days.

REWARD: 2 crystal cores of Awaken Beast.

PENALTY FOR FAILURE: None.

[ACCEPT] or [REJECT]

———

***

Blake accepted the mission without a second thought. After all, no penalty. However, the next rows of texts reset his mindset.

***

[RANDOM MISSION ACCEPTED!]

MISSION: Steal something precious from Scarlett's house.

Note: Scarlett can annihilate you within a second.

TIME: 4 days.

REWARD: 2 crystal cores of Awaken Beast.

PENALTY FOR FAILURE: Lose 1% control of the Universal system.

———

***