Xavier stood in front of the portal to the frozen world. The necromancer he’d freed from the dungeon blinked at him, tilting her head to one side in slight confusion.

  She narrowed her eyes. “I’m not sure what kind of game you’re playing, Xavier Collins.” Romalda raised her chin. “But it looks to be a fun one.” She grinned. That same sinister grin she’d worn when she’d been freed only a few minutes ago. “Where are we off to?”

  Xavier retraced his steps.

  The frozen world was deserted. Xavier had left Volkarin there to keep an eye on things. These weren’t D Grade hunting grounds, which meant the likelihood of the dragon coming into any danger while there was very slim.

  The dragon reported that once the Denizens that had been hunting on that world caught wind of the fight happening nearby, they’d hightailed it to the nearest portals, getting the hell off the planet.

  As yet, there was no sign of reinforcements.

  The remaining remnants of the army Xavier had taken out were still under his mental command. They stood around the frozen landscape. He would release them soon, the moment he was back in Mareketh.

  It was a risk, returning to Mareketh without an adequate disguise. Xavier had, in the meantime, fast-equipped the swordsman’s armour. Looking down at himself, it was strange to see such armour on him. He looked like a completely different person. At least to his eyes.

  The meagre disguise would have to be enough for the moment.

  Romalda glanced at him quizzically, but didn’t question the wardrobe change. Instead, she looked at the battlefield. At the corpses. Her eyes were wide, gleeful. She took a step, paused, looked at Xavier. She gestured at the corpses. “May I?”

  Xavier raised an eyebrow at the woman. “We’re about to head to a populated, civilised planet,” he said. “Is it wise to bring an army of the undead along?”

  Romalda waved a dismissive hand. “Xavier, my friend, I will not be the only necromancer on this world. Civilised planets, as you call them, are used to undead venturing on them.” She tapped her chin with a finger. “Unless, perchance, the fine and ancient art of necromancy has been banned on this backwater planet we’re about to visit?”

  Xavier remembered seeing a necromancer while he was walking the streets of Mareketh. “No. They aren’t banned.”

  Still, he struggled to imagine what it would be like for Romalda to simply stroll through the streets with hundreds of undead at her back. Would the city guard really be okay with that?

  Romalda, however, didn’t reanimate all of the corpses. Instead, she began to walk around the battlefield, kneeling to touch one corpse after another, placing them into her inventory.

  She ended up only reanimating two of the corpses. Both melee fighters. They didn’t seem like straight-up zombies. The reanimated corpses appeared to have some autonomy. One of them was scratching his chin and looking around. The other was checking his weapons.

  Xavier examined one of them.

  {Ghoul Minion - Level 100}

  A Ghoul is a reanimated corpse brought back to life through either a curse, or the necromantic arts. Ghouls are not your typical, mindless undead. They have a mind of their own, though they retain no memories from when their body was originally alive, essentially making them an entirely new person.

  Ghouls may have minds, but they lack souls.

  Xavier’s forehead creased. It made sense that the Ghoul Minion lacked a soul. Xavier had reaped the corpses of their souls before he’d returned to Earth.

  The fact that the System mentioned they lacked souls made Xavier—not for the first time—wonder how many types of undead had souls.

  So far, he knew of only one undead creature that possessed a soul—a Wraith.

  Were there more? Were there Lich out there, walking around with souls?

  He didn’t ask Romalda. Though it interested him, his mind was elsewhere. On the next task.

  Volkarin, are these hunting grounds suitable for you?

  Volkarin took a moment to respond.

  No.

  Return to me.

  It didn’t take long before the dragon appeared in the sky, flying toward them. Xavier returned the young dragon to his Companion Cube. He looked forward to when he felt comfortable releasing the dragon on a world like Mareketh. Something told him it would be a little while until he felt that way.

  “Come,” Xavier said to Romalda. Now that the Portal Block had ceased, the portal back to Mareketh should have been back up and running. Clearly, other portals were, as Volkarin had reported that no other Denizens were currently hunting in this place.

  As he suspected, the portal was exactly where it had been when he’d come to this world.

  Before Xavier stepped through it, Romalda cleared her throat. “Why did you bring me here?”

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  “I want to get a sense for who you are,” Xavier said.

  “What does that matter, if you force a contract upon me? I’ll be tied to Earth and to you for a hundred years, per the terms we agreed.”

  Xavier didn’t respond. He simply stepped through the portal, and wondered if the woman would follow. A test, if a small one.

  It only took a minute for the necromancer to appear on the other side of the portal, on the platform in Mareketh.

  The woman gave him an odd look. “I’m still not sure what game you’re playing.”

  Xavier smiled. “You didn’t have to follow.”

  She frowned. “You could have come back through the portal. Even had I run as fast as I could, I doubt I could have left the planet faster than you could have come back to get me. I remember your words—if I don’t sign the contract, my death is final.”

  Xavier simply made a hmm noise. Not making this woman sign a contract could be a mistake. Could be a loss of a resource. It could also shoot a loose cannon into the Silver River sector. Someone with the knowledge of a B Grade, if not the power of one.

  “Do you wish to be returned to your former glory, Romalda Heralda?”

  “It’s the Great Romalda Heralda.”

  Xavier simply raised an eyebrow at her. “Are you sure that still applies?”

  That comment got him a death glare. He couldn’t help but chuckle. Necromancers, apparently, gave amazingly strong death glares.

  The woman sighed. “If someone had laughed at me back when I was first alive, I doubt I would have let them live.” She shut her eyes. “But I can’t deny that you are right.” Her head dropped. “I am but a shell of what I once was. The Great Romalda Heralda is no more.”

  Xavier began to move away from the portal, gesturing for Romalda to follow. The woman trudged behind him, her shoulders slumped. For someone who’d just been freed from her dungeon, one would think she would be a little happier.

  Though Xavier imagined he would feel similar, if he were in her shoes. To fall so far after being powerful for so long—it would be a stab to the gut.

  Before passing through the portal that would take them down from the floating platform and onto the street, Xavier handed the woman a Communication Stone. Just a planet-wide one. So that they could talk without drawing any attention to themselves.

  Romalda: [You’re in disguise, aren’t you?] the necromancer said through the Communication Stone.

  Xavier: [I’d appreciate if you didn’t use my name while we were on this planet.]

  Romalda: [Someone is after you.]

  Xavier: [A lot of someones.]

  The last time Xavier left this platform, he’d expanded his wings and simply leapt off. Now, he wasn’t sure if The Collector had knowledge about him being a dragonkin. He should have, what with Xavier leaving two of his Elite Hunt Squad breathing. That meant there might be others who knew. People on the lookout for a male dragonkin with his features. And with The Collector still after him, they would be paid handsomely for his whereabouts.

  So Xavier kept his wings hidden, as much as he hated doing so.

  Romalda: [I couldn’t help but notice the Denizens you sent into my dungeon were D Grade. And powerful. You… You took a whole army of them out by yourself?]

  Xavier: [I did]

  Romalda was quiet for a long while, simply following behind Xavier as they walked through the streets. Xavier had only walked these streets once before, but he knew exactly where he was going.

  When Xavier reached their destination, he stopped. Romalda halted beside him. She frowned, looking at the sign. “A bookstore? That is where we’re going? The way you walked, I thought we were going somewhere important.”

  “Bookstores are always important,” Xavier muttered before stepping into the place.

  The proprietor, Elitsa Flian, greeted them not long after they entered. The woman was a Level 102 Inscriber, and her class was the very reason he had come here after acquiring the corpse of the swordsman.

  Recognition lit up in the woman’s eyes as she saw him. She didn’t remark on his change of armour, though she did glance down at it with a curious expression. “Ah, back so soon, are you? Did you enjoy the selection you bought?”

  Xavier smiled. “I did. They were right up my alley.” He paused. “They actually sparked my interest in writing again, so I have to thank you for your recommendation.”

  Elitsa looked at him anew. “You’re a writer, are you?”

  Xavier shrugged. “I dabble.”

  “I have some books on the subject, if you’re interested.”

  Romalda had walked off, her hands folded behind her back, to inspect the stacks around them, her two Ghoul Minions lazily following behind her.

  “That isn’t actually why I’m here,” Xavier replied. He glanced back at the door. “Is there somewhere we can speak… Privately?”

  Elitsa tilted her head to the side. Xavier couldn’t help but feel a hint of fear waft off her. “What exactly would you wish to discuss, privately?” Her posture didn’t change, and her voice didn’t betray the slight fear Xavier had identified.

  Xavier frowned at the woman, wondering why she would fear him. What she could be worried about. “I won’t harm you.” He figured there was no point talking around the issue. “I can sense the fear in you.”

  The woman’s eyes narrowed. “From the moment you first walked into my store, I knew you weren’t what you appeared to be. I knew you were dangerous. It was, however, none of my business. This world is full of people who disguise who they are. I do not know what you wish to discuss, but before I take you to the back room, first you must sign a contract.”

  Xavier wondered what, exactly, the bookstore owner had seen in him to make her think that. All the more reason for him to go through with this, he supposed.

  The contract was simple enough. Neither would harm the other, and whatever they discussed in private would remain private unless otherwise agreed upon in the future.

  Xavier signed it quite willingly. It made the rest of this process easier. He’d intended to make the woman sign a privacy contract, after all.

  Once the contract had been signed, the fear the woman had been feeling dissipated, and the smile she’d first worn when he’d walked in once again adorned her face.

  “Follow me.” Elitsa turned and strode up a set of stairs, heading to the next floor of her bookstore.

  Xavier looked over at Romalda. “I trust you’ll still be here when I return?”

  Romalda eyed him suspiciously. “I’ll be here.”

  Xavier inclined his head. “Good.”

  The back room of the bookstore was larger than he’d expected. So large, in fact, that Xavier thought there must have been something strange going on. Perhaps a sort of spatial storage was it work.

  There was a luxuriously decorated office in one corner of the room, while the other corner had a lounge, several armchairs, and a private collection of books shelved along the walls. There was another door in the back room that headed deeper into the building. Xavier wondered what was on the other side. Perhaps this woman’s apartment.

  “So, what exactly can I do for you, Xavier Collins?” Elitsa asked as Xavier took a seat across from the woman’s desk.

  Xavier didn’t blink. He didn’t shift in his seat. He didn’t give any outward notion that he was surprised by the woman knowing who he was, even though his mind whirled.

  He cocked his head to the side. “You know who I am?”

  Elitsa gave him a sweet, somewhat innocent smile. “I told you that I knew you were dangerous the moment you walked in. I never said you were dangerous to me.”

  But you felt fear, Xavier thought. That had been real, hadn’t it?

  Something in the room seemed to shift. Almost imperceptibly. A change in the air. A subtle colouring in the light that hadn’t been there before. And… did he feel lighter?

  Something shimmered along the woman’s skin, very briefly.

  Xavier had a bad feeling. He’d be a fool not to, after all.

  He cleared his throat. “You’re not a humble bookstore owner, are you?”

  The woman across from him drummed her fingers on the table. “I consider myself to be rather humble, considering. Life, the universe, all the possible futures, have humbled me greatly.”

  Xavier blinked, then.

  All the possible futures…

  This woman, he was sure, wasn’t who she appeared to be. And he had a feeling he knew exactly who she was.

  Accidental Champion!

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