What Happened Backstage (I)

  Olivia Dawkins curiously followed the sprawling white halls of Babel Medical’s intensive care ward. It was still fairly bright out but that didn’t seem to have much of an effect on the buildings operations. Gurneys whizzed past her to and fro, the sound of their wheels wobbling and rubber screeching against the floor scraped by her ear ever so often, though she didn’t seem to mind it in very much.

  The sudden supply of patients didn’t have anything to do with Cyril’s battle against the infernal. Thanks to the boy’s quick thinking, the only inconveniences the hospital had suffered came in the form of a shattered doorway, a few destroyed support pillars and a moderately scorched lobby—all of which were interpreted as a fairly decent outcome considering the rank of the monster in question.

  Babylon city was the only place in the world with technology that was capable of controlling, predicting and directing gate formation with near perfect accuracy. However, that didn’t mean that they could outright stop the gates from appearing completely, at best the grid established by the ‘towers’ could delay them, but eventually the task of clearing it would naturally belong to hunters.

  Needless to say, the towers couldn’t affect the difficulty or properties of the dungeons themselves, the most they could do was provide a bit of leeway for the hunters to better prepare for them. That was why even in this city, the world’s most elaborate ‘hunting ground’, there wasn’t much one could do to prevent the cruel realities of dungeon diving. Casualties and fatalities were still a given—though in comparison, it was on a much smaller scale compared to anywhere outside the city’s walls.

  Olivia had long since made her peace with the harsh realization. That was why even now, as she continued pacing herself through the chaotic clamor of metal and medicinal lingo, the pleasant expression on her face hardly ever wavered.

  The only time her expression did waver was purely by chance, in the all too frequent instances when her eyes locked onto the patients lying atop the mobile contraption being scurried off by swarms of people wearing sterile white clothing. She watched men and women of various sizes and ages being hauled off as they were, dressed in get-ups that seemed almost fictional; from full armor plates to polished chain mail.

  Regardless of what they were wearing, the one thing they all seemed to share were the blotches of red seeping through their clothes. In some rather extreme cases—some of them didn’t even manage to return in one piece. It was a fairly common occurrence, especially here of all places—the most coveted healthcare facility in all of Babylon City. That was partly why children under a certain age weren’t allowed on this ward, for obvious psychological reasons.

  In Olivia’s case, she had no particular qualms about such things—being an S-rank hunter herself, grotesque injuries were things she was fairly accustomed to seeing. That wasn’t the cause of her discomfort, it was something deeper.

  At the end of the wide hallway, the unchanging path finally diverged into two separate routes, one heading east and the other due west—both dedicated to different wings of the building. Her destination was neither, she didn’t need to change directions because she was heading for the two large doors lurking at the end of the hall.

  The cold metal doors of the elevator were fairly inconspicuous amidst the backdrop of alabaster walls. The same couldn’t be said for the man standing before them however—adorned in yet another pair of his preferred charcoal grey suits, he stood like a soldier, keeping his back turned to the mobile contraption.

  Their eyes met shortly after, prompting Wilhelm to swiftly turn around and punch something into the digital keypad. The doors slid open just in time for Olivia to pass through unobscured, she smiled pleasantly and walked in first.

  "How kind of you, Wilhelm. I see you still have that chivalrous attitude. You have my thanks." Olivia said simply, chuckling to herself.

  “Old habits, that’s really all it is. More importantly Olivia... ”

  As if sensing the gravity of the conversation that was about to unfold, the metal doors clamped together ostentatiously, isolating them from the outside world. Their closure marked the moment of departure, accompanied by the soft hum of the elevator’s mechanisms and a subtle shift in the air pressure.

  Awaiting his word, the principal’s eyes shifted to the glowing floor display on her right.

  The numbers sixteen through one were all highlighted by a ring of white light, indicating their desired destination. The digital control panel above the glowing keys was displaying the words ‘Priority mode’. It didn't take her very long to interpret the information being conveyed by the floor display, thus she came to the only logical conclusion—their conversation wouldn’t be interrupted.

  “...what do you think about him, Cyril I mean?”

  At first, Olivia raised a brow, but the urge to deflect the question faded fast and she relented. “I figured this is what you wanted to discuss after all. You’ve certainly taken a roundabout method but...” she paused, curling a finger to her chin.

  “...he’s different now. That’s what I felt when I met him earlier—I’m not talking about his hair changing to silver or his scar disappearing either. It's something deeper than that, it almost feels like he’s slowly being transformed.”

  Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

  “As I thought, there really is something strange going on with him. Truth be told, I actually paid him a visit before he regained consciousness, that’s when I first felt the changes. They were a lot less subtle back then, his mana felt a lot more intense—charged as if it were wriggling under his skin.”

  A grave expression lingered on the chairman’s face, one that appeared to tug at his vitality.

  “There’s only one thing that comes to mind. I’m sure you can guess what it is too.” Olivia proclaimed indifferently, her gaze fixed on the blinking number twelve on the floor display.

  Wilhelm slowly wriggled the words stuck in his throat. Once he was ready, he answered in a tone that sounded both terse and hesitant. “Yeah—Project Lamplight.”

  “Last I heard, the project ended in failure, but given the current circumstances—especially since Alice has passed, things are starting to line up a little too perfectly. Could this be some kind of a delayed reaction?” Olivia probed, glancing at him with only her eyes.

  “I can’t say for certain. Doctor Miller was wondering the same thing but we haven’t found anything conclusive as of yet. That’s why I plan to confirm my suspicions as soon as he’s discharged from here.”

  "Oh? You intend to have him re-evaluated again? I can understand your train of thought, but it’s been done dozens of times before, and the results have remained consistent. I’ve had him personally evaluated at my school, and the results still didn’t change. His records all say the same thing, on paper he’s a D-rank deviant."

  Wilhelm chuckled audibly, leaving his old comrade behind for a moment and indulging in the echo of his mounting glee. He stifled the gesture for the sake of courtesy before returning his sights to her.

  “...I see that you’re finished now. Care to enlighten me on what it is that you find so amusing chairman?” The principal remarked sharply, her eyes pulsing with a dim glow.

  Wilhelm took a moment to collect himself and adjust his tone before speaking again. “You misunderstood me, Olivia. I’m well aware of his previous evaluation records—hell, I’ve read them all myself. But the thing is, those records were all meant to assess the power of a regular deviant. The results of his previous evaluations were consistent, but they never really made much sense if you think about it. The Index threshold for D-ranks falls somewhere in the 1.0 to 2.9 range, and Cyril's Index is, and has been well over 4.0.”

  Olivia’s eyes slowly parted in disbelief. For the first time in a long while, her perfectly tuned expression, a mask of delight had crumbled under a wave of shock.

  “Then...you intend to evaluate him as a saint?” Her words emerged fragmented, wrapped in a layer of incredulity.

  “Not exactly, it's far too soon for that. I'm going to give him a few tests first to see how things play out.” Wilhelm affirmed confidently, leveraging his gaze with the large metal door.

  “The higher-ranked a deviant is, the more sensitive they are to mana fluctuations. That’s why only Saints possess the ‘Mobius’ skill. You and I fall just a step short of that—but our perception is still far beyond that of the average deviant. That’s why I knew you’d notice it too—Cyril's mana is behaving abnormally. And not just that. The infernal he fought was an upper C-rank monster. If he really was just an ordinary D-rank then there’s no way he would’ve been able to defeat it with his bare hands.”

  His brows furrowed, and his thoughts faltered. Every part of Wilhelm’s body was focused on finding answers, a struggle betrayed by the words he fought to suppress.

  “If those evaluation results were actually correct, then he would have died."

  The chairman’s words—although spoken quietly—dominated the elevator’s serenity with a chilling finality

  “That movement technique he used in the video, was that a skill?” Olivia responded, her question adding to the tense atmosphere.

  “I can’t say for sure but as far as I know, Cyril doesn’t have any skills. Although, that’s going off what I knew, things may have changed over these past few days. He was clearly omitting things from his explanation earlier.”

  “How very astute of you. I was intending to keep quiet about that but I suppose nothing gets past you, does it chairman?” Olivia teased, once again settling her tone and her expression.

  “We can’t afford to be flippant about this Olivia. The existence of a sixth saint could very well turn the world on its head. I’d like to prevent that if I can, but more importantly, I don’t want Longinus to catch wind of this, especially not after how the district incursion went down, I’m still not buying their excuse from back then.” Wilhelm grated the words through his throat; it sounded as though he was angry at a person, not the entity itself.

  “Agreed. Cyril is a precious child but he is still young and reckless. It’s best if we get to the bottom of this as soon as possible and come up with a way to keep it under wraps.”

  “That was the plan.” Added Wilhelm, his tone flat.

  “Lovely. It’s good to know that we’re on the same page my dear chairman.”

  Olivia’s eyes strayed on the elevator’s control panel, patiently waiting for the blinking number one to fall into a steady rhythm. Her patience was rewarded in what must have been microseconds. The pressure around them slowly returned to normal and the weightless sensation disappeared, banished by the power of gravity. A low sounding metallic whoosh signaled the divergence of the elevator doors, and the climax of their isolated journey.

  Olivia stepped out first, but stopped two paces later. With her back still turned, she gave a declaration in place of the standard farewell.

  “Chairman, I trust you’ll share your findings with me as soon as possible. I may not look it but I have quite the soft spot for passionate children, and that boy in particular has way too much passion. I refuse to let him relive the dark days of that project—not after he’s come this far, because he’s one of my precious students now.”

  "Of course, I intend to. I've contacted Miller about his upcoming reassessment, feel free to stop by if you find yourself getting impatient."

  "Oh, and how exactly do you intend to assess him this time, Wilhelm?"

  "Miller already has a good amount of data on his index, this next assessment is more or less being done for the sake of finality. He'll need some kind of promotion to fit the narrative because of the video that's going around, nobody will believe he's still just a D-rank after that."

  "Interesting. If that's the case, then I would like to partake in his upcoming assessment myself, this clearly isn't something I can afford to overlook."