~The Third Academy, Mirror Reality Thirty-Four~
Matheson was sitting in a different room to the dark prison he first found himself in. Functionally it was the exact same: no windows, doors or anything of the sort. The only difference was that this room was square instead of round, and came with a stone table, some wooden chairs, as well as a luminous orb embedded into the ceiling.
A small upgrade as now he could see better - however he couldn't move.
His body was encased in a black cocoon of some strange silk he had never seen before, and it seemed to be sticking itself to the wooden chair he was currently sitting on.
“Probably the work of more variants.” he thought, as he strained his muscles against the black silk, each time it dug into his skin and threatened to lacerate it.
After some time to think in the darkness, he had realized that he had been kidnapped by variants as he connected the dots - though to call it a kidnapping was inaccurate as he had willingly jumped right into their clutches when he entered the portal.
Still, he had no clue what was going on, only that something grand was happening all around him and it didn’t involve him; it was like he was in the eye of a storm.
A small part of him still believed there was a powerful treasure to be won, which is why both the variants and the mage hunters were at Losla in the first place, but as for their success in finding the treasure, he wasn’t sure.
Either way, he was caught. There was no way he was getting it. Right now, his life was all that mattered.
For all he knew, that woman with the gravity magic could still be fighting off mage hunters outside the portal as she waited for something.
For now though that didn’t matter; he was sitting quietly in the room, silently waiting for wherever would happen next.
Once again, his fate was in the hands on others.
Little did Matheson know that he was being watched from another location.
Norgrim scratched his chin, wondering what he would do as he gazed at a floating projection of Matheson, “So, Anya said he’s an exiled noble... he can’t be worth much then… Did you check his class?”
“No. He did have an impressive rapier so it's some kind of melee class, but we were waiting to see what you would want to do with him.” Evelyn said.
“Hmm...” Norgrim scratched his bear for a moment, “He's quite a low level for a noble brat. Seems like they didn't power-level him...”
Evelyn nodded back, “It seems that he has levelled himself up, as there were no guardians or servants with him. Quite a hard worker.”
Norgrim thought silently for a moment more.
“Alright, leave him with me.” he added, “and send Sylvia over.”
Evelyn gave him a concerned look, “Sylvia? Isn't that a bit...” she paused, deciding not to say it, “...I will send her over shortly.” she bowed her head before leaving.
Sylvia was a micro-type magic user, and her class specialized in parasite-like constructs. Due to the nature of her parasites, she was feared at the academy.
Most parasites had a symbiotic relationship with their hosts, or benefited without affecting their hosts at all - these range from harmless to even beneficial for good health, and most people walk around with these happily living inside them.
Some of these parasites have a specific host in mind, such as a glade deer, and only use other species, such as birds, as a forms of transportation while they wait in either a dormant stage, as an egg, or halt their growth at a certain part of their life cycle while they bide their time under the skin or in the stomachs of what is called an intermediate host - the birds in the example.
The next type, which most people feared, were those which lived off their host. This type would kill the host to feed themselves and propagate. However, it wasn't like this type of parasite was trying to kill the host. It simply had to eat.
Sylvia's magic was worse than all of the natural varieties of parasites, and she was feared at the academy for it; rarely ever did people request to form a party with her. They even felt sorry for the victims of her magic - despite them being monsters.
When she was low level, her magic was only able to summon a single flesh-eating beetle. It would find its way into an oblivious monsters body, feed, replicate, and soon enough the monster would burst open with these beetles squirming around - though they would soon die as soon as they left the body, as Sylvia was only able to sustain one beetle with her skill level and mana.
When Sylvia levelled up though, she's didn't only get more beetles to play with... as her powers grew, so did her creativity.
Flesh-eating was just a start, and eventually she created mana-eating, mind-eating and armour-eating varieties - she could now kill monsters which didn't even have flesh.
This only spurred on her imagination, and soon she created parasites which targeted certain parts of the anatomy: nerves.
After flicking a small handful of these nerve-eating bugs at some monsters, the same monsters would chase her - but only for a little while... soon they would crumple to the ground, crying out in pain as their nerves were chewed away, and as these parasites got to the spine the monsters would lose the ability to run; they would soon have no feeling in their legs at all.
Helpless, they would spasm from the pain on the ground as Sylvia's parasites worked their way up the spine, every moment one of intense pain until thankfully they would make it towards two certain nerves which control the heart . Depending on which of these nerves was eaten first, the heart would either speed up until it failed or slow down until it stopped; it was as if the monster hard partied too hard in Vegas.
Other times, she would simply send one parasite into a village of goblins - over time, each one would be covertly infected without even realizing it. After a day or two, Sylvia would sense that all the goblins had her bugs inside them, and she would activate phase two. In no time, all of the goblins would helplessly drop to the ground, their lungs would be consumed and they would die without even realizing they were being attacked.
Either way, it didn't matter to Sylvia. Causing the pain and suffering of monsters was something she quickly grew used to, and as a third-year student she was quite accustomed to it.
However, she did it all for her research, and this wasn't enough.
She spent months, almost a year creating a new parasite which would disable a monster without killing it. This was her first step - first, she had to disable a monster, and then soon enough, with plenty of research, she would be able to control it.
Someday she wished to have her first prototype parasite, created to controlled monsters.
For now though, she only had one to disable.
This new disabling parasite was a revolutionary step for her - not that anyone gave her any credit or even so much as acknowledged her breakthrough. Most didn't even know about it since no one talked to her.
After disabling a monster, she could now study it up close, learning the weaknesses in its flesh so her bug-like constructs could get inside, while live-dissection allowed her to learn more of a monsters anatomy, specifically relating to its nerves. Needless to say, the disabling parasite allowed her research to progress much faster.
But how did this fit into what Norgrim was going to do?
*knock*
Sylvia knocked once on the door.
Norgrim raised an eyebrow, unsure if the noise was simply the door creaking or not, “...come in?”
Sylvia opened the door with a cold glare.
She was short with shoulder-length dark hair, but she created an uneasy pressure whenever she was in a room as if he was a giant.
While he gaze was cold, it wasn't that she was angry, this was just how she was. An odd girl, a feared outcast.
Most of the other adventurers avoided her and gave her plenty of space. They didn't want to risk catching one of her parasites if they stood too close. Some of the more paranoid students believed that the whole academy had already been infected by her tiny creatures, and if she snapped her fingers they would all be hopelessly massacred.
However, Sylvia herself was oblivious to the fear she created in others, though she wouldn't have cared either way, as she was focused on her research.
She closed the door as she entered the room, and instead of sitting down, she simply stood there right next to it, staring awkwardly at Norgrim from across the room.
“Hi.” she said quietly.
Even Norgrim felt a little uneasy, but ignored her odd behaviour as he knew what she was like, and that she didn't mean any harm. She was simply misunderstood, like most of the variants were.
“Sylvia, good to see you. I have a little job I think you'll be interested in...” he leant forward on his desk with a smile.
