Capítulo 1277: 38
Abjuration 4.3
I brought the first test subject to an open steppes field in the northern hemisphere of Earth M.
A large tent was set up here for my experiment, on top of a wooden platform. I had the subject tied to a chair, gagged and blindfolded.
He coughed and spat when I removed the gag.
"Listen carefully if you want to go free," I said.
That got his attention. "Alright, I'm listening. Not like I can do anything else tied up like this," he said.
"I like to think I'm a reasonable man. I don't enjoy putting people in jail. Most people think you E88 are just a bunch of irredeemable racists," I said. He looked ready to protest when I continued, "But I know better than that."
"What? You secretly agree with us or something?"
"No. I know that you are redeemable. Everyone is, and everyone deserves a second chance. Even scum like you," I said.
"What the fuck, you some kind of feel good hippie?"
"One would think you wouldn't insult the person offering you a chance to go free."
He was silent for a bit. Then, "Okay, so what you want me to do? Renounce the Empire, confess my sins, and promise to be good?"
"I want you to obey my every command for one week," I said. "And in that week I will reform you. After that, you may go free, regardless of how you think by the end of it."
"Yeah right! You want me to be your fucking slave for a week?"
"You may think of it as harsh discipline. You must commit to accepting my teachings for one week. If you truly believe in the ideals of the Empire, you should not falter so easily after a mere seven days."
"Don't you try to feed me that bullshit. I've read all about what they do in re-education camps!"
"What do you have to lose? If I were ready to use the methods you are imagining, would I even need your consent? I offer you this opportunity in good faith, but if you refuse, then perhaps it will be necessary to resort to more drastic measures."
He stopped responding to me. For the next ten minutes, I sat there waiting for him to change his mind. Eventually, he did.
"Fuck. I'll do it. You'll really let me go for sure?"
"I will. In fact, we can make a blood oath. You E88 like that sort of thing, don't you?"
"Where in the hell did you hear that? We don't do blood oaths."
"Not even for initiation?" I asked in a surprised tone.
"What do you take us for, a frat?"
"Hmm…well no matter. I will give you a blood oath to prove my sincerity, provided you do the same."
"Fucking hippie…"
"Did you change your mind? You want to stay as my prisoner?"
"No, no! I'll do it!" He shouted. Then he muttered under his breath, "Der mist!"
"Good," I said. Then I removed his blindfold, and released one of his bindings so that one hand was free.
He looked at me with contemptuous eyes but I didn't show any signs of noticing, especially behind my Coil mask.
I stood in front of him, and slowly removed one glove, then made a small cut on my palm.
"I hereby swear that you will be allowed to go free exactly at the end of one week from now if you abide by the terms of our contract by obeying my every command for the next week," I said solemnly.
Then I gestured for him to give me his hand. "Now it's your turn. Do you agree to this contract?" I asked.
"I agree to obey you for a week if you release me at the end of it unharmed and without doing anything else to try and stop me from going back to the E88 or wherever I want."
I nodded, and then cut his palm, and shook his hand with my own bloody palm.
I inwardly smirked at his attempt to make sure there weren't any loopholes. He obviously realized that as a cape, I might somehow be able to enforce the contract.
"Satz. Wächter, Meine Worte sind gefallen, lass den Vertrag zustande kommen. Weiß ist schwarz Richtig, Peitsche. Die Vergeltung des Himmels," I said, channeling prana into his hand and blood.
"The fuck? You trying to speak German or gibberish?"
'I don't think that worked,' Agate informed me. 'Not feeling any connection.'
'Must have gotten the chant wrong,' I thought back.
'I don't think the chant really matters,' said Agate. 'I think the problem was his consent. He didn't technically agree to the contract you spoke. Or maybe he was lying and didn't plan to actually follow through.'
"Your first order: punch yourself," I said.
"Don't fucking mess with me, you bastard! You said you weren't going to do that re-education camp bullshit!"
"Shut up, I said nothing of the sort."
"Where's your fucking good faith? I knew you were bullshitting!"
Oh well. I couldn't expect the first one to work.
"Well, you failed already. You can reflect on your failures and try again later," I declared.
"What the fuck? Is this a joke?" He shouted.
I sprayed him with sedative.
O O O
"I agree!"
"Setzt. Wächter, meine Worte haben den Vertrag. Weiß ist schwarz, richtig lässig peitschen. Die Vergeltung von Himmel," I said, channeling prana into his hand and blood.
"What?" He asked in a confused expression.
'Nope.'
'But he clearly agreed this time. It must be the chant then. Maybe my pronunciation was off the first time, I'll try the first chant again.'
'I really don't think so…'
"Satz. Wächter, Meine Worte sind gefallen, lass den Vertrag zustande kommen. Weiß ist schwarz Richtig, Peitsche. Die Vergeltung des Himmels."
"I can't understand you, can you just speak English?"
O O O
"Yes."
"Satz. Meine Worte bilden den Vertrag. Weiß ist schwarz Die Wahrheit. Himmlische Vergeltung," I said, holding out Agate and placing his bloody palm on her.
"Not everyone in the Empire speaks German…and what's with the stick? Is this supposed to be a lesson about touching black stuff?"
'That didn't work either.'
'Damn it. How are we supposed to figure out what Rin chanted like this? I barely remember any of it. There must be millions of possible word combinations.'
Agate transmitted an image of Rin facepalming to me, followed by an animation with sound as she held one fist to her waist with a big tic mark on her forehead. 'Shirou, you idiot, stop practicing the pronunciation! The aria doesn't matter! It's just a hypnotic device!'
I sighed. This was going to take a while.
'Maybe you're trying too strong a compulsion. Rin never made Shirou do anything, right? She just stopped him from trying to save Sakura.'
'True, but that's just the end effect. What Rin made Shirou agree to was obey everything she commanded while allies for the war, as far as I remember.'
'Well, maybe it's because they didn't truly agree, still. They have to really mean it. Like, I bet these guys are holding out, thinking that some awful commands they're just not going to follow when it comes down to it, whereas Shirou seriously meant that he would obey anything Rin said. For example, we know you can't actually use the spell to force someone to kill themselves like with a Command Spell, but Shirou would be okay with agreeing to possibly sacrifice himself. Even if he thought about commands that went against his ideals, he might think something like, "If it's Rin, there must be a good reason, so it's fine" and that way his mindset while agreeing to the contract would be 100% consent.'
'Hm…that sounds plausible.'
O O O
"Hello, Grue. I hope the team is doing well."
"Boss? We haven't heard anything from you for days."
I finally found Brian back at his apartment, and took the chance to contact him alone. Aisha had gone to school.
"Yes. I apologize for being unreachable. For a number of reasons, it was not safe to make contact sooner. Recent developments in the city have been very disruptive."
"Yeah, I can see why that could make things difficult. The team's fine, but we've been keeping on the down low while we couldn't get in touch with you."
"You made the right call. The city is now in a state of open war between the gangs. The fallout from Lung and Oni Lee's capture has been beyond even my expectations. The military is being prepared to mobilize, and the PRT is in a state of continuous high alert."
"No kidding. I've been hearing gunfire and explosions throughout the day."
"I have a new job for you now, if you feel comfortable with a quick trip to the docks. The chance of any combat on this one should be very low, but the area itself is fairly dangerous at the moment. I just need you to create darkness cover at a designated location and time."
"That sounds pretty easy for us. I don't think anyone on the team will oppose," he said.
"The rest of your team isn't strictly necessary. The only thing I need is your darkness. You can bring the others for safety if you want, but either way I am paying you a fixed $15,000 for the job. It's your call if you want to split it or do it yourself."
He hesitated for a moment. "There won't be any combat?"
"Unless you get caught up in a gang fight, there shouldn't be. All you have to go is go there, cover the area in darkness for a few minutes, and leave. That's it. Escape is what the Undersiders are best at, isn't it? You can also cover more than just that area in darkness if you want to give yourself more cover."
"Alright. I'll take the job."
O O O
"Bakuda. How are the ABB doing? Any issues with the shipments?" I spoke into the phone.
"The ABB is doing great. And I need more supplies."
"Really? I heard on the grapevine that you're still losing territory."
"That's none of your business, Coil! Stop fishing for information. We don't need that useless territory anyway, all we need are my bombs."
"Bakuda, do I need to remind you of our agreement? You need to avoid endangering civilians and reduce forced recruitment. I don't have any problem with you making more bombs, but word is that the military is watching the situation now. If civilian casualties start piling up, it won't be good for anybody here if the PRT comes down hard with out of town heroes."
"I've kept to the agreement, bastard! If it weren't for these restrictions I'd have wiped the E88 off the map by now! Is that all you called to say?"
"No, I actually have intel you might be interested. You know about Grue, yes?"
"Grue, of the Undersiders? Why the fuck would I care about him?"
"He has an interesting power, with a useful effect. If you could make bombs that replicated his darkness, it would have strong strategic applications for assisting your forces in retreating from after an engagement. It also has signal blocking properties, something that might trouble your bombs if you don't find a way to counter it."
"Don't beat around the bush all the time. You obviously want me to make bombs based on his power for you."
"I admit that is one motivation, but you can't deny that there are benefits to you as well."
"I'm going to need to access his power for scanning to make those bombs. You think we can capture him?"
"No, but I know exactly when and where he's planning to be for a job. He always uses his darkness to make his escape, so if you just hide nearby, you can scan his power while it's covering his retreat. There's hardly any risk of confrontation if you play it safe."
"I'm not afraid of fighting the Undersiders."
"But why risk it when you're low on manpower, when you don't have to? Better to get what you need than risk E88 or PRT coming along to interfere."
"I'll make that judgement for myself."
I smiled. She took the bait, as I expected. This would make things easier. "Then, he's going to be at…"
O O O
Araliac and Skitter carefully hid themselves near the designated spot I sent Grue to.
The darkness expanded quickly and covered a block of the street at the docks.
After waiting for a few minutes, Skitter spoke into her comms. "Found her."
With this, Skitter tracked Bakuda all the way back to her workshop, and combined with some more spying from Agate, we learned about the tricks she had up her sleeve. Hidden control mechanisms, override remotes, warp bombs, agony (higher intensity) bombs, full time stop bombs, chain disintegration bombs, siliconization bombs, etc. Things that she didn't sell to "Coil", but nothing special that I wasn't already expecting. Still, it was best to be cautious.
On the street, things weren't looking good for Bakuda. While her offensive power was extreme, she wasn't turning any of that into successfully claimed territory and profit. Instead, as the war dragged on, the E88 had successfully taken out even more of her gang assets.
Unlike canon, Bakuda didn't have the leadership capability to really manage her gang. Without Lung, she hadn't been able to recruit nearly as many people, even by force, or deploy them effectively, on top of the restrictions from her agreement with "Coil".
Her core ABB members were dwindling, and the forced recruits were not effective combatants.
By Saturday night, she had agreed to a face-to-face meeting with "Coil".
O O O
Status de energia semanal
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