“Wait a minute. Phantasm Fox?” He turned to look at the fox. “Veil? You’re not a ghost, are you?” Jose asked jokingly.

  Veil gave him a dubious look and popped out of existence, a second later appearing on Jose’s shoulder, barking loudly into his ear as if to say, “Does it look like I’m a ghost?”

  “AH! Okay, okay, I get it. You’re not a ghost. But you can teleport,” Jose exclaimed as he petted the fox. Veil sat up straighter and puffed out his chest, uttering a small yip.

  Turning his attention back to his interface, Jose noticed a new line.

  [Health: 335/335  Ether: 72/72

  Level: 10

  Soul: Ancient

  Status: Bonded

  Race: Sapient

  Genus: Generalist

  Species: None

  Strength: 20

  Constitution: 23

  Endurance: 26

  Agility: 26

  Dexterity: 20

  Awareness: 20

  Wisdom: 20

  Capacity: 29

  Free Points: 20

  Skills: Strike, Volt-Gen, Bolt, Null-Bind, Overdrive

  Passives: Flux-Bod, Ether-Cell, Crafting (Beginner)]

  “Bonded,” Jose muttered. “I wonder,” he said as he clicked on the status.

  [Bonded - Phatasm Fox

  Name: Veil

  Level: 5

  Race: Sapient

  Genus: Canidae

  Species: Phantasm

  Skills: Dash, Blink, Covert, Bolt

  Genus Traits: Omnivorus, Cunning

  Species Traits: Ethereal, Deft]

  “Wow, Veil, you have quite a bit of skills, don’t you? And how come you already have a species assigned too?” Jose asked, more to himself as he still wasn’t used to receiving feed back from Veil.

  A second later, he received an answer to half of his questions. An image of Viel being born and opening his eyes to see the race, genus, and species rows of his interface already populated.

  “Oh, I see. So you were born with that information already filled in. Maybe inherited it from your parents or something. Make sense, I guess,” Jose mused.

  Veil gave a shrug and laid down on his shoulder, wrapping his tail around Jose’s neck.

  “You are going to have to show me what all of your skills do sometime soon, little buddy,” Jose said while Veil closed his eyes to sleep.

  “But for now,” he continued. “I should go ahead and assign all of my free points. Want to get a move on early in the morning.”

  Veil was already falling into a deep sleep with a soft snore. Jose petted the tiny fox as he sat back and began placing his free points. “Looks like you have the right idea bud,” he whispered. “Wish I could fall asleep so quickly,” he added softly as he chuckled to himself.

  ***

  They’d left early the next day, several hours into their trek, Jose felt a familiar pull on his senses. It was as if some force was calling out to him, begging to be found. He crested a dune and found a small crater with a familiar object floating in the center.

  A rough crystal hovered there. It was similar to the echo shard he’d seen at the start of the apocalypse. “Another Echo Shard? Or maybe an Abbarant Domain?… No, it’s an Echo Shard,” the Domain had felt more dangerous, like a predator inviting him in, he concluded. This felt more like a secret begging to be found out.

  He made his way to the bottom of the crater and set Veil on the ground. “This might be a little dangerous buddy. I need you to wait over here while I go study that rock. I need you to stay away from it and me, even if I seem to be in danger. Just let it run its course, okay,” he bade.

  Veil looked at him, then the shard, and back at him, seeming to take in the words. Before too long, he chuffed and laid down to wait. Jose received a message that seemed to convey, “Whatever you say, man.”

  Jose chuckled, “Sheesh, such attitude.” He mumbled as he walked to the shard and laid his hand on it without hesitation. He already had somewhat of an understanding of how these things worked, either an abbarrant domain would open up, or he would receive some kind of memory/vision. Either way, standing around hyping himself up was an unnecessary part of the process.

  ***

  Jose awoke at the same scene he’d left off at the last time. The auras clashed violently, causing ripples of power in the space around them. The tempo and power of the auras grew exponentially till the powerful beings destroyed themselves and everything within millions of miles.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  The scene expanded to show the widespread destruction. Entire star systems were suffering the same fate as the beings who’d started it all. Meanwhile, at the epicenter, a vortex was forming. In an instant, the destruction stopped spreading and collapsed in on itself, momentarily forming a singularity.

  The scene shrunk back in to show a very dense sphere of energies occupying the space the beings had been floating in. Lightning, ice, fire, and a kaleidoscope of other elements and energies churned and rippled within and around the sphere.

  A smaller explosion occurred as chunks of it ripped out into space. Jose followed one of the chunks as it sped away into space, becoming a meteor. The large meteor shrank as it traveled the cosmos, with parts breaking away and falling over other planets in its path.

  Every time these smaller parts reached a planet, they would envelop it in a golden light for mere heartbeats. ‘I wonder what that’s about,’ Jose thought as he and the object continued their trek across the vastness of space.

  Every few seconds the scene would blip and he would find himself and the meteoric chunk he followed in a different sector of space. Evident by the different planets he could see as they passed.

  ***

  Jose took in a deep breath as he opened his eyes. He was lying on the ground, and Veil was licking his face. He could feel the weariness and consternation coming through their bond.

  “I’m okay buddy,” he reassured Veil as he sat up. Both the back and front of his body were full of sand he noticed as he stoop up and began shaking it off.

  [Quest: Find four Echo Shards

  Progress: 2/4

  Reward: Moniker: Seer]

  “Two more to go, apparently,” he said, reading the quest.

  “How long was I out,” he asked Veil. Veil barked and sent over a message of the sun falling and rising again.

  “A whole day, huh? That is much longer than I would have guessed. The entire vision was no more than a minute,” he mused.

  Veil barked and asked for food. “Well, at least you have your priorities straight, hah bud?” Jose answered with a chuckle as he fished out a few fruits and dried meats for them both.

  “Not sure how far this supposed city is, but if we don’t get there soon, we might need to head back to the oasis for more supplies and water,” he said as he turned in a slow circle, trying to glimpse any signs of civilization.

  Veil hardly even noticed him speaking as he tore into his food like a ravenous beast. “Hey, take it easy, buddy. If others saw you eat like that, they might think I was starving you or something,” Jose said while laughing.

  ‘It’s weird how the bond works. I suddenly know just how to make my thoughts known to him and how to block anything I don’t want him to know,’ he thought to himself.

  He studied the visions he’d received from both echo shards. The two beings at the start of it all, the way the stars were different from any he’d seen from Earth. How the power of the two beings clashed and, ultimately, destroyed many planets and even solar systems. The way the meteor he followed was headed for, likely Earth. The way the smaller chunks that fell away seemed to envelop any planet they touched in momentary light.

  A theory was forming: somewhere out there, two beings gained access to magical energies, to a godly degree. For whatever reason, they came to blows and destroyed one another, along with many solar systems. And now, a piece of that power had somehow made its way to Earth. But, how did the system play into it all? Who designed and implemented it?

  ***

  Several more hours of walking revealed a large metallic wall in the distance. Jose came to a stop and hid behind a dune.

  “Okay Veil, it’s time to find out what all your skills do,” he said, taking the fox off his shoulder and setting him down.

  “Dash, I guess, is like the skill attached to my rapier. It allows you to move overly fast for a short time and distance, is that right?”

  Veil barked a confirmation.

  “The teleporting skill you used before, was that Blink?”

  Veil Blinked several feet to the right confirming it.

  “What about Covert? What does that do?” He asked.

  Veil activated the skill and became nearly invisible to the eye. He seemed to trot right into the sand, disappearing altogether before walking back out several feet away.

  “Huh, so you become nearly invisible and can walk through things?” Jose asked.

  Veil reappeared and trotted over with his little chest puffed out as if asking, impressed?

  Jose chuckled at his companion’s antics and came up with a plan. “Okay, little buddy,” he began. “Once we are closer to the wall. I will need you to sneak over and take a look for me, see what’s on the other side and all.”

  Veil yipped and crouched low in front of Jose, facing toward the wall, acting as if to protect him.

  “My hero,” Jose deadpanned and ruffled the scruff of Veil’s neck. “But listen Veil, other humans might not be nice like me. So if you see any while away from me, stay hidden. Do you understand?”

  “Other humans not family?” Veil conveyed over the bond.

  “No, sorry, but most other humans are not considered family. Consider them more like predators until they are confirmed to be good people by me. Okay?”

  Veil whined as he reluctantly accepted what Jose was saying.

  With that, they moved closer to the massive structure. Looking left revealed the wall as far as the eye could see, and to the right, he saw much of the same. One difference was that a small section of the wall was protruding as if it were a small block.

  The closer they got to the protrusion, the more Jose realized it was, in fact, not small. The protrusion was at least twenty feet tall and protruded at least another twenty feet, but the wall was at least a hundred meters tall, making it seem small in comparison, especially from afar.

  They stood several hundred feet back from the wall as they approached the protrusion. When they finally reached it, Jose realized that he had found what he’d been looking for, a city in the middle of the desert.

  He put Veil back on the ground and looked at him seriously, “Okay buddy, I need you to take a look around inside. But Veil, it is very important that you remember what I said about other people, okay? I need you to stay hidden till we are reunited. Can you do that for me buddy?”

  Veil yipped an agreement.

  “Okay, go ahead and see what you can find out.”

  ***

  Veil turned and trotted toward the city; he didn’t get too far before activating Covert. It was a skill that he could use almost indefinitely as it only used energy when first activated and if he needed to pass through any objects.

  He was happy to have a new family after losing his last one. Red-eyes, as he’d begun calling the man, was nice and always had good food.

  But sometimes, Red-eyes confused him. He had told him his new name was Veil, but sometimes also called him Buddy. Who was Buddy? Was that Red-eyes real name? Or was that an extra name for Veil?

  Anyway, maybe this new place he was checking out would be their new den. Veil hoped that there was good food here too. If not, he’d ask Red-eyes to head back to the first den. He really liked the food there, and the water was sweet too.