NT Rangers - Lad 27 - Enter the Odyssey (Patreon)

Lad ran his hands along the pod. It was smooth and made entirely of a white composite material, fitting the aesthetic of the rest of the ChesAn Arcology. There was glass for viewing and among the dozens of pods lined up there was a ChesAn soldier unconscious in as many as three that he could see.
“These things are-”

Lacy was sat behind a terminal. Only her tall, red ears with white tips were visible. She was tapping at the keyboard in front of her.
“As soon as we knew what we were looking for we had a simple thought. If many souls that are passing on are being sent to a place, like a prison of some sort, that means that we can potentially break in.”

Lad suddenly felt sick. He looked down at the unconscious men. “Then that means-!”

“No no. Relax. They are in a death-like state. They are not truly dead. We wouldn't do something like that, okay?” She clicked her tongue.
“To be honest... This is the first time I'm hearing that a soul is a thing that is real and not superstition, so it was a little bit of a trial and error.” She sounded sad as she sounded sad as she said.
“To be fully transparent. A man died before we fully understood what we were dealing with.”

“He died?” Lad asked, looking to Kai. She was involved in the project so she had full knowledge of this happening.

“She's right. The death happened as a result of us not knowing. When the soul left, it was kept and we were unable to bring him back. With that in mind we developed fail-safes to avoid anyone else getting trapped. Now our people can go in and out as they please... And we can too.”

Yeong shot her a look. “What do you mean? Isn't it just a prison?”

“In a sense.” Lacy said.
“But not exactly. You'll see, okay.”

“How does it work?” Lad asked.
“This death-like state.”

Lacy stood up and pulled a clipboard with her, working as she walked. “Basically, we allow the body to die, but without any of the pitfalls of death. The heart stops and the blood stops flowing but all of the important products of those things are injected artificially, which allows the state to be maintained. So long as this facility retains power you will be able to be brought back.”

Lad gulped. “So... When you said death-like, what you meant was 'real death, but with none of the downsides.'”

Lacy smiled. “Your brain continues to function. Your cells, including immune cells continue to function. It is as if-”

Kara injected herself into the conversation. “It's just astral projection for people that haven't learned the trick, to be frank. Monks in Aoia have already found ways to bring themselves to a death-like state through meditation. Their body continues it's function through aura in those cases, though. Still, the spirit leaves and can move around free of the body. I actually plied some of my old contacts. Clanswomen. I didn't hear about this or think about it, but such meditation has actually been banned for a long time except by Masters... Apparently it's been the case for over a thousand years that if an inexperienced person attempts it their soul will get lost. It's probably due to this.”

“What are we going to see in there.”

“A tested it myself for a bit. In short... It's incredible. You'll have to see it.”

“Got it. We're going in?”

“That's right!” Lacy nodded, opening four pods.

“So is it-” Lad began.

“I'm coming.” Kara stated.

“What about protecting the facility?”

Kara shrugged. “I got a hunch. Aside from that this isn't a suicide mission. If we go in we can be brought out at any point in an emergency.”

“It even saves our place like in a game, though the world doesn't stop after we leave like one.” Kai remarked.

Lad climbed into the rightmost pod. Yeong was beside him and Kai beside her. Finally Kara climbed in hers.
“Kai, if anyone asks your a Dog.”

“Got it.” Kai nodded.

“Wait, why does that matter?”

“You'll see.” Kara smirked.

- Inside -

When Lad opened his eyes he was staring at the inside of a wood room. A man dressed in what looked like peasant clothes, but was in reality a ChesAn guard he recognized approached.
“Welcome, Sir. It's a bit jarring at first but you get used to it. We've taken time to establish ourselves here. So we aren't without enough coins to manage our objectives. We've even secured this building.”

“I'm sorry, what?” Lad rubbed his head. He got up and walked over to the window. Outsider there were people in old clothes walking around an old, stone city. It was like the Dregs, but older. There were no buildings in the skyline and the smog was gone.
“This is-”

“Welcome to old Orr, sir.”

Kara walked in. “So far as we know, the space that we are in is designed to place people roughly where they 'should be.' When I first came I woke up in a place that was something like the area around the World Tree in Demonkine, but different... I left before things got too strange.”

The Soldier nodded. “Yes Ma'am. As far as we know, as soon as we have an 'anchor' we are able to bring people in and out as we please. An anchor is simply someone who's soul is able to be connected back to the location in the real world.”

“Like a checkpoint in a game...” Lad sighed.
“Okay. I think I understand, so all of us are togeth-” He heard a girly scream from the next room over. Lad rushed out and burst through the door.
“Yeong.”

“Why did this happen...” She whined, looking down her pants, then over her body.
“All my hard work.”

“What?” Lad noticed someone that sounded quite a bit like Yeong, just a little different. She looked quite a bit like Yeong with long black hair tied back in a ponytail, but she was a bit less feminine and a bit more androgynous.

“Uuugh...” She whined. Her voice was still made feminine, likely through habit.

Kara scratched her head as she walked in. “I was wondering if this would happen. Basically the space is programmed to bring the Core as is, and recreate a body around that. Since yours was originally male, you're a boy again.”

“W-well what about Kai!?” Yeong shouted.

Kai walked in, looking as pretty as she did outside. Possibly a little more. “I had CIS, so my Core isn't incongruent with my body, here. That's why I appear like that.”

“B-but-”

“You technically don't have CIS... Your Core is male.” Kai explained.
“You were brainwashed into being female.”

“Doesn't this prove the Orc Religion wrong?” Lad wondered out loud.

“A lot of things do that... We don't need to try.” Kara sighed. She walked up to Yeong and gave her a hug.
“Sorry, honey. We'll figure out a way to fix it along the way.”

“Okay..” Her shoulders slumped.

“You said along the way... Where are we going?” Lad glanced around.
“Are they nearby.”

“About that...” Kara chuckled.

A few minutes later the party was staring down at an old parchment flier advertising and expedition. Lad read.
“To all those of an adventurous nature, His Imperial Majesty Paul II has sponsored an expedition that will take several ships to new lands. Yadda yadda... This expedition is headed and operated by Marrien Vara, the High Chancer of the Empire and the Marchioness of Cheshire. Her two children will be accompanying her: The famed Heroes, Fin Vara and Fiona Vara. All capable individuals may sign up. The pay for an entry level worker is-”

“That part isn't important.” Kara stopped him.
“Point is, Fin is the Hero...”

Lad smiles. “Easy, we sign up for this expedition.”

“It already left.” Kai pointed out the date of the posting and the date of disembarkation.

“How far away could they be?” Yeong asked, holding herself uncomfortably. She had found some nicer clothes to wear and began to look more akin to her old self with the help of some makeup that was bought by a Soldier at the market.

“This place is big...” Kara offered seriously.
“Really, really big. It's not inaccurate to say that an entire world was constructed in this space.”

It almost did not even get through to Lad how monumental that was. “I'm sorry?” He looked up from the fliers.

“What they've done is they've recreated the cycle of life and death. I am guessing there was a small initial investment of Aura into this project by a few powerful individuals. But, once they had a small space big enough to make a country they would have been able to harness the cycle by having people live out lives, have children, die... It's all been happening in here for over a thousand years AND they've still be intercepting souls along the way. This world is like ours, but it has it's own history. But something started when Fin entered the simulation.”

Lad gulped. “Because this place was built for him to begin with... Why?”

“Not sure.” Kara sighed.
“I'm sure it has to do with the power of the Turais that only the planet can impart. If they can subvert and take it for themselves they can probably go so far as to create a world larger than our own. At that point maybe they just suck everyone inside... Who knows. We have to get Fin out, because I'm not willing to wait around and find out their plans.”

“So we need to charter a ship and-”

Kara smirked. “Actually, there's another expedition being formed right now by the Patrician of Orr.” She slapped a second flier down on the table. It was a poster with two lifelike renditions of a twin boy and girl, and the words WANTED above them. Lad read.

“Looks like the Patrician of Orr is organizing a fleet to investigate the death of his son. These two twins are implicated in the death. It says there'll be an investigation, but...”

“Doesn't matter.” Kai smiled.
“We'll get there with them and at that point what can they do?”

“That's a fair point, but what can we do?” Lad wondered out loud.

“Your bodies lost the development that you have made, but you retain your traits, skills and knowledge thanks to the method in which we arrived.
“I am basically our only life-line, since my power can be used to great effect in here. Aside from that, we can train you all up to be able to handle common threats.”

“How? Training didn't do me much good in real life. I'm not a fight.”

“Relax.” Kai turned up her nose proudly.
“We're cheating, obviously.” She waved her hand, a swirl of magic followed her finger.

“You can use magic!?” Yeong uttered jealously.

“You still have all your martial arts knowledge still, dummy...” Kai scoffed.

“Oh...” Yeong grinned and began punching the air.

“What we call CIS is actually just Kai being a natural Fox. She has the Core of a member of the Coven. It isn't too uncommon, but it means she's like me. Both of us have no Aura, but we're able to draw Aura from around us and control it with a little effort.” Kara explained.

“Plus.” Kai grinned.
“This place is actually super similar to the Wired space that I use to hack without a HanComm. Kara and I conceptualize our abilities differently. I don't know about gathering Aura, but the fundamentals of this world are that it was programmed with latent Aura, and it's the same for the Wired generated by ChesAn's world tree. So I can manipulate things a bit as if I was hacking.”

“Feels like a 'Admin' should come in at any second and bust us.”

“We'll see.” Kara cocked her head back and forth, then stretched.
“It's enough of a possibility that me and Kai can't go too crazy. Not unless it's an emergency. Anything big is gonna get picked up by the people running this place.”

“Okay. Where do we start?” Lad asked.

“I like your enthusiasm, Young Hero!”

“Hero?” He looked at her with confusion.

“Regardless of what it is, any mystic that can see your Core will recognize you to be a Hero, Lad. You have the trait. With a bit of tweaking we can make you the main character of this little adventure.”

“The main character?” It boggled his mind.

“I want to be the main character.” Yeong grumbled.

“Relax over here among the side-characters.” Kai joked, grabbing her shoulders.
“Even Kara isn't complaining.”

The Fox grinned. “I'm a born and bred side-character. But I have a bad track record with mentoring Heroes so you all tell me if I'm doing something wrong.”

Kai lifted her hands to Lad. He stared at her curiously. “We gonna adjust your Core. Like I said, it's like hacking. Whoever runs this place does this with all the souls that come through, so I can, too.” She closed her eyes.
“What weapon?”

“Uh... Any input, guys?” Lad glanced over at the self-proclaimed side-characters.

“Nun-chucks are cool.” Yeong commented.
“Or fists.”

“How about a spear?” Kara smiled.

“Go for it.” Lad waved his hand. It did not really matter to him. As he said that he felt martial knowledge pushing it's way into his mind. He remembered years, not hours or days, of training. His body shook. His muscles itched to move and practice and fight with the skills he learned.
“This is-”

“Mastery.” Kara stated proudly.
“It feels good, right?”

Lad's eyes were stuck open. He did not feel like he needed to blink. “It does... I didn't know it could feel like this.”

Yeong complained. “If you can do that, make me a girl.”

Kai shook her head. “For Lad I'm just weaving a foundation and a false past spent training intensely and even that is taking a tremendous amount of effort. Changing your gender and body here would be more like shifting the fabric itself. More effort, more visibility.”

Yeong sighed. “Fine.”

Kara patted her. “Sorry, honey. We chose Lad because of his unique drive and willpower. You're useful as you are. There's a foundation of training already to support the skills you have in the background of this world. It was created when you got in. Same for the Soldier and for me. When souls enter, if they are fully grown and not born they are given jobs that match the skills their Core has imprinted. The Soldiers that came in all became town guards.”

“Oh! So I'm-” Yeong blinked as it came to her.
“Wait a minute, I'm a slave!?”

“Orr wasn't a nice place.” Kara shrugged.

“What about you two!” She pointed.

Kai smirked. “Prophetess. Wanderer. Cultist.”

“The world thought I was Coda, so I have to lay low.”

Yeong glared. “Halmeoni, your 'job' is 'God?'”

“Yep yep.” Kara said casually.
“Anyway we got a decision to make. We can sign up for the expedition as labour, or our Hero can build acclaim by gaining accomplishments. At that point, if he's noticed we could get special treatment.”

“The expedition leaves in a week...” Lad flexed and relaxed his muscles. It was the first time in his life he felt strong. Really strong.

“I believe in you either way.” Kara smiled.