"Oh, finally. Jin!" Invisigal called out as Sean entered the building. There was a certain urgency in her tone, making him somewhat confused. "Golem said that you guys were attacked." Invisigal, Golem, and Punch Up approached him.
"We were about to head out and rescue you, lad." Punch Up asked with a smirk. "Of course, not that you would have needed it. I told you the lad didn't need help fighting someone. However, someone was worried." Punch Up nudged Invisigal with his elbow, while wagging his eyebrows.
She just scoffed with her arms crossed, though she did look him up and down as if to check him for injuries.
"Chase told us to stay. Apparently, you were at a coffee shop?" Golem asked.
"Yeah." He expected as much. After all, dispatchers could check your location. Though it was a bit surprising, they all seemed genuinely worried about him, even if Punch Up masked it with his humor. Good thing he came prepared. "I've got some desserts. Although it’s a coffee shop, the desserts are killer." He held up the numerous bags in his hands and handed them one. "Not sure what you like though, so I got a bit of everything." It had been a great idea to have already eaten. Otherwise, he would have had a hard time parting with those bags.
Invisigal snatched the bag, looked inside, and her eyes lit up at the sight. "Oh, damn. I freaking love you- sprinkled brownies. I love brownies! T-they are my favorite!" Her smile was a bit crooked, though Sean felt it suited her.
"Good thing I bought them then." He winked as the other two looked into the bag as well. They headed toward the kitchen on the second floor, placing the desserts on the counter for anyone to take if they liked, while some items had to go into the fridge.
After hearing someone got all kinds of sweets, there was a surge of people occupying the kitchen. Sean realized he would be trapped in there with the hungry mob, so he quickly rushed out to dodge the onrush of people. Luckily, he had foresight and got himself another slice of cheesecake.
"Seriously, a bunch of grown people storming to get some sweets. Ridiculous." Chase complained at the back of the line with his arms crossed as he looked at the mass of people. Considering his age, he was probably just too slow compared to the heroes of this company.
"…Here, saved you a cheesecake." Sean offered his plate with the fork inside the slice of cake, startling Chase, who seemed to have missed his presence until then. He looked at the cake before narrowing his eyes at him.
"You're really trying to butter people up, huh?" Although it sounded disapproving, he still took the plate out of his hands.
"Well, the job demands a tasty break once in a while, right?"
"Hmph, we deserve it."
"Yeah, you do." When he said that, he earned another look from Chase before the old man sighed.
"Thanks for the cake. You should take one before these greedy fuckers finish everything." With that, he left. Sean glanced at the clock before looking up any tickets that were up for grabs. Unfortunately, there wasn't anything for him to take. Due to it being a weekday, the other teams even did some of the more trivial stuff, while their team only got the leftovers.
For some reason, that arrangement ticked him off more than the previous days. There was a sudden surge of indignation and fury. Even as he glanced toward the people eating the food he had brought and Chase leaving with his cheesecake, he became strangely agitated. It wasn't something that should have bothered him much, but then again, the day had been stressful.
With that in mind, he decided to go somewhere quiet to cool down a bit.
…
"Visi, what are you doing in the men's bathroom?" Jin asked as he continued to wash his hands. It took a moment before she decided to turn visible again, sitting on the vanity countertop.
"How the hell did you know I was here?" She asked with a frown.
"I heard you." He dried his hands before glancing at her, raising his eyebrow. With some lessons from Coupé, she had reduced the noise she made to the minimum. Although she hadn't been loud before, she now thought she would have a shot at remaining unnoticed by those with super hearing. She had even gotten close to surprising Galen, whose entire schtick was his super hearing.
"No, shot, you heard me-"
"Why are you here?" Sean asked while tossing the now-wet paper into the trash can. She had been trying to play the subtle game, but the guy seemed to be adamant about playing oblivious. If it had been purely attraction, then she would have pulled this card earlier, but this was different. Despite not wanting to give this rising emotion a name yet, she didn't want to fuck this up. However, for some reason, she felt like she was falling behind every day. Call it womanly instincts, but someone was sniping him from her. No, she couldn't let him slip away. She wanted him, and she needed to be more aggressive about it.
"Oh, you know, just wanting to check up on you. See how much you're packing." Her glance rolled down his body before settling on his crotch, while her fingers slid between her breasts down to her exposed belly button, and even further until they rested on her waistband. For a moment, she hesitated before looking up at him. His eyebrow raised as if he wasn't taking her seriously.
Embarrassment mixed with the fear of rejection after going this far. "What? Feeling a little shy because you're… little?"
He snorted. Suddenly, he quickly approached her, startling her a bit. She backed up, sliding up the counter until her back hit the mirror. He then grabbed her leg and pulled her toward him before placing her leg around his waist. Her eyes shot open, and her heart started beating like crazy. His gaze felt challenging, as if to taunt her into saying this wasn't what she wanted.
"I-I" Her mind was overwhelmed. This wasn't how she thought it would go.
"You?" His hand glided over her arm before resting at her neck. There was a strange glint in his eyes that she couldn't quite identify. Was he about to fuck her? Here in this bathroom? Right now? Most people were still enjoying the desserts he had brought and could pop in every moment. Her heart beat even harder at that thought. His thumb rubbed over her lips. The excitement built and she felt her panties going through a crisis.
However, "S-since when are you… this forward?" This behavior was what she thought she wanted, but now that it turned into reality, she just felt it was wrong. Perhaps she would regret questioning him, especially since he seemed to have been brought out of whatever horny state he was in.
"Forward? I'm just reciprocating-" It was then that his eyebrows furrowed. Then for a split moment, he looked like he was blinking away his drowsiness before he stumbled back from between her legs. "Though, I'm not- especially not with coworkers… I have a rule." He started, his brows furrowing deeper, his jaw clenched. "It's one I don't go around breaking willy-nilly after that incident at my previous job." Clearly, he wasn't just explaining it to her and was more like recalling something.
His eyes ran over her body, looking like he was still considering just taking her. It made her shiver, though not in a bad way. "Are you cold or are you perhaps… excited?" He finally asked, making her follow his gaze to her rock-hard nipples poking through her shirt. Without a second thought, she pulled her jacket shut.
"I-I need to go. L-let's continue this not in a seedy bathroom. Ha.Ha." Her attempt at a nonchalant laugh sounded fake the moment it came out. She slid down the counter and bolted for the door as if to escape the situation. Why was she leaving? Hadn't this been the exact situation she should be dreaming of?
With confusing emotions, she left the bathroom and headed outside, in desperate need of a smoke and some silence to sort her thoughts.
…
"Hey, Jin! The hospital just called. They asked if we could help with a few injuries, wanna go?" Malevola asked as she approached the meditating Jin. The sight had been an increasingly familiar one. If he wasn't eating, then he would be sitting in that chair in the R&R area and just meditating cross-legged.
Even the other heroes took notice of it and mostly left it unoccupied as a reward for his increasingly good behavior or because they just didn't want to deal with his complaints in case he was still a dickhead. Unlike usual, his eyebrows were furrowed, as if he were struggling. She could even see sweat running down his cheek. After some time, he exhaled before opening his eyes to look at her, his furrowed brow deepening, souring her mood a bit.
"The fuck is that expression? Someone pissed in your morning cuppa?"
"I-" He began before shaking his head. "No, sorry. It's just, I'm not in the right frame of mind… I'll also need some time to recover from my current injuries, so you can go ahead alone."
"You don't?" That was surprising. She had asked him the last two times, and he always seemed eager, even more so than her. Given the recent debacle with Blonde Blazer's spar, she figured he was a massive masochist who exceeded even her own… tendencies. Some late-stage masochism. It wasn't just pain, but he deliberately chose the most debilitating injuries. The more lethal the better. Even though their shift was almost ending, hearing him deny another sesh stunned her for a moment.
"Yes, currently I'm trying to figure out how exactly the injuries interplay with my powers, so I'll need to recover first." She did not doubt that the injuries were beneficial to his powers. It did help with hers as well, giving her a boost in magical prowess and increasing her toughness by a percentage relative to the damage. Of course, she too had started to exploit it to increase her strength, taking pleasure in gaining power. At some point, this pleasure extended to the pain itself, something she was sure had happened to Jin as well.
The rush of gaining power was irresistible, and at some point one's brain adapted to see pain as favorable, something that Jin probably knew all too well as well.
"If you say so." She responded disappointedly. It was nice on her own, but she had been rather ecstatic to have been able to share her… hobby with someone else. Just as she was about to leave, she saw him glance over her 'assets'. It electrified her for a second, and she couldn't help but tease him with her tail gliding across his shoulder.
Compared to Saiyan, who snuck glances at her, Jin had been a proper one despite his growing advanced masochism. He held eye contact and didn't let teasing fluster him too much. There wasn't much that could disrupt that quiet confidence he had gained overnight, so much that it was almost frustrating to not have him react.
"I still have a few minutes, though… is there something else you want to do?" Her voice easily dropped into the suggestive. Now having caught him lacking, she was sure to exploit it to the best of her ability.
"We shouldn't-" His voice stopped as she squeezed his thigh. His eyes turned away from her tail on his shoulder to meet her gaze. It was as piercing as always, though there was another glint in them.
For a second, she was certain that it had a red glow to it. It felt familiar, especially that smell... Something that made her wary, instinctively knowing that she wouldn't be able to extract herself if she teased him too much now.
"Well, since you asked so nicely." His hand wrapped around her tail and pulled her to him. With a yelp, she fell toward him. Her hand caught onto the backseat of the couch, and one of her legs was between his legs. His hand had driven up her tail and wrapped firmly at the root just above her butt. While slightly pulling at her tail, sending electric shivers up her spine, his eyes flickered to her lips with a smirk on his face. A smirk that seemed to convey he knew what she wanted and that he was the one in control of whether she would get it.
"Th-this- I was just joking-" His arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her closer, making her chest press against his face, smothering him. "Wait- t-this isn't funny anymore." Her breath had turned a bit shaky, and her words were forced through her mouth as she bit down on her lip.
"This isn't supposed to be funny." His voice sat deeper than usual, rumbling without humor as his arm wrapped around her waist tightened the hug. His voice vibrated in between her breasts, making her feel hot and bothered. "How about we continue this somewhere else?"
"I-" Completely overwhelmed with this sudden turn of events, she wasn't sure what to respond. Fortunately or unfortunately, at that moment, she received another ping from the hospital asking when they could expect her arrival. Her waning strength came back in full force, and she pushed him back onto the couch.
It wouldn't be clear if she could have escaped his grasp if he intended her to stay, as he was clearly much stronger than her, but it appeared he took her shove as part of the play. In one swift motion, she dismounted him. "I have to go. The hospital needs me." With that, she practically stormed away.
…
'That wasn't normal,' Sean thought as he stumbled into a room while holding his head. An increasingly painful headache announced itself. He took the liberty to call himself injured for the rest of the day and withdrew into an empty meeting room. It was his meditation and the subsequent interaction with Malevola that finally clued him in. His hand reached into his inner pocket and pulled out the wrapped-up ancient dagger, which he took from Stacy.
There was some influence it exerted on the one holding it. That was for sure. It also made the user forget or made them see their new actions as normal. If it had been just that, he might have never realized something was wrong. However, it was also feeding off his Ki and causing it to be more sluggish.
Although the Notice-Me-Not charm was still active, it didn't seem to be able to make him not notice he was getting weaker. Perhaps it was a natural inclination of Saiyan's desire for strength or his body's natural defenses. Every time he was on the verge of forgetting, he was immediately reminded of it through a subconscious flex of his Ki.
Obviously, the only thing that had changed that day was him carrying that suspicious dagger, so he knew it had to be the source of his strange behavior and Ki loss. He placed it onto the table and stepped back until he leaned against the wall next to the door after locking it. Just the distance made him breathe easier. With his position, he had the entire window wall in sight. He would have preferred finding something without windows to the inner courtyard, but the other option was running around the office in hopes of finding a better spot, while risking running across anyone else still in the office.
It wasn't something he was going to risk as he realized that the dagger had changed, had possibly grown more powerful through his Ki. Even just standing there, it almost felt as if it were observing him with malicious intent and promising greatness. It tried to pull him in.
His Ki didn't flare outward and instead was guided gently but with a firm and conscious effort. Stacy unfortunately didn't answer his calls, so he sent her a text asking her more about it, while thinking about the SDN guidebook about what to do with dangerous artifacts like this dagger. There was a point about calling a special agency for containment if it couldn't be handled by SDN's storage of the villain's equipment. However, he didn't have the number for it or remember what the agency was called.
For a moment, he wasn't sure what to do, but decided it was best to ask his boss. Since he didn't have her number, he just used the SDN app to contact her. Unfortunately, there wasn't an option to call her, so a text had to do. It took him a moment to detail the current situation, its effect, and the possible danger of it. Hopefully she would see the message. It was already late, but during the first week, he had noticed that she was working longer than most people, so he wasn't too worried.
He wasn't sure if the dagger actually needed direct contact or just proximity. With a warning not to let anyone close easily, as he didn't know whether it would have any permanent side effects, he waited for her response.
Just to be on the safe side, he looked up to see which dispatcher was working the night shift, in case Blonde Blazer was already out of office. Greg, apparently some former fireman, who quit after some accident. Just as he was about to write him, someone tried to push open the door. "Occupied." He called out as he continued to type.
However, it was then that the dagger started glowing, making Sean wary. With his hand raised, he telekinetically formed a sphere of influence around it. Since it was feeding off of his Ki, he was hesitant to fire anything at it, and telekinesis had to have some influence on other branches of psychic energy, right?
His attention was divided between keeping his Ki under his control while exerting his new telekinetic ability. The one outside was stubborn and somehow opened the locked door and entered the room before closing the door behind her. Out of the corner of his eye, he could tell who had entered the room in the worst possible moment.
"Mandy, you should leave." He forced out, making her glance at him in panic.
"One moment, until he passes- what are you doing?"
"Containing an evil magical artifact trying to influence either your or my mind." Sean quickly explained as he felt something press against his telekinetic force.
"That's… not a joke." She realized as she looked at the glowing dagger.
"Unfortunately, not."
"Have you already contacted the ACB?"
"Nope, wasn't sure which agency to call and didn't have their number. I've contacted Blonde Blazer, but she hasn't responded yet."
"Blonde- Right. Never mind, I'll call them." With that, she pulled out her phone, called the ACB, and informed them about the situation with Sean, supplementing any information she didn't have. The way she handled that swiftly reminded him of Blonde Blazer. Seemed like easily handling stressful situations ran in the family.
After she finished the call, the glow seemed to intensify. He decided that distance would be best, and with a wave of his hand, the table flipped and shot through and out of the window.
Bang
The table splintered into thousands of pieces. Fortunately, Sean was vigilant. His telekinetic force wrapped around the hovering dagger that pierced through the wood. The blade pointed at him, and he could feel it trying to reach him. The glow was still strong, and his Ki sense tipped him off that it was using what it had stolen from him as fuel. That fuel exceeded what little psychic powers he had developed over the few days since he had unlocked it. As a result, his psychic powers started to wane a bit, while it remained strong, only diminishing slowly.
Using telekinesis with that much effort wasn't something he had experimented with. There was no reason until now. In destructiveness, it was just too inferior to Ki, and for convenience, there weren't that many uses for it. Now, he had to put everything into it.
The dagger and its strange sigils carved into the blade became his only focus. Barely noticing his blood dripping over his lips and into his mouth. There was no point in keeping it, he finally realized. Perhaps he only realized it now due to the aftereffect of whatever magic the dagger was embedded with.
Psychic powers weren't something he was familiar with. He wasn't sure if he could create a telekinetic blast. So, there was only one method that came to mind. His telekinesis wrapped firmly around the dagger and started squeezing and pulling. Just trying to shatter it.
Unfortunately, the force that tried to stab him was used to counteract his attempt. The dagger slowly advanced toward him. Shoot it with his Ki? What if it just absorbed it and grew even stronger? A single change in focus towards a Ki blast would free it from his telekinetic force, and with it, he wasn't sure how fast it would be. Could he dodge? What if he was stabbed and it drained him?
Four meters. Three meters.
His mind suddenly flashed with images and voices. The dagger was trying to force itself into his mind. He couldn't hold on for long.
At that moment, a flash of golden light impacted the dagger. His telekinetic connection snapped. The dagger was embedded in a stone bench. The dagger suddenly wiggled. Another light headed for the dagger. A red sphere appeared, blocking the light. The sphere seemed to be made out of his Ki and whatever magic it was fueled by.
A continuous light beam pushed the dagger to the ground. Sean looked up to see Blonde Blazer firing at it. He quickly turned back toward the meeting room, trying to find Mandy, but she was nowhere to be seen. Even his Ki sense couldn't pick her up.
Raargh A ghostlike screech sounded out, accompanied by a sizzling sound. The red light of the dagger seemed to be melted away by the golden light as if it had found its natural enemy. Some form of ghostlike wisp escaped the dagger before it disintegrated by the light.
It was then that the dagger lost its luster and clattered to the ground like a mundane dagger. The whole ordeal happened too quickly, and despite seemingly being over, his breath became ragged. His heart was beating like crazy as he tried to think about that weird environment depicted in those flashes of images.
Ping
His phone indicated the incoming message, pulling him out of his thoughts. "You okay?" Blonde Blazer asked while keeping her attention on the dagger with her arms raised.
"Yeah, great timing…" He said as he glanced at the dagger, specifically the hilt. There was a sudden urge to turn the dagger and inspect it. Fortunately, his common sense won in the end.
"Blonde Blazer!" A voice suddenly called out, and Sean noticed that there were two Ki signatures he hadn't sensed before.
"In the courtyard! The dagger seems to be neutralized." Blonde Blazer responded before a zap of lightning flashed, and on the rooftop, a person in a trench coat and a wizard's hat appeared. The other Ki signature came from a woman on a broom, hovering right above them. She was dressed in a suit, looking like some businesswoman and not the apparent witch she was.
Sigils appeared in front of the guy's hand, while the witch pulled out a book that had to be a grimoire and a wand, saying something in another language as the book flipped through its content on its own.
The dagger rose due to their magic, giving Sean a split moment to look at the hilt and the symbol he had somehow completely missed beforehand. "Could it be?" He spat out in disbelief, earning himself a curious look from Blonde Blazer and the other two.
"Can you show me the hilt? That symbol." He asked, and the woman seemed to want to argue, but Trench Coat waved his hand. The dagger spun toward him. "You gotta be kidding me."
At the hilt, the round point of it at the bottom showed a familiar symbol.
A wavy M.