Scarlet

Neither Tar nor I end up getting any real ideas about what Titania’s main magic was before the next question comes around. And then the next. And the next.

After the first couple questions, the rest feel like they go by a lot faster. And each one is something that is not common knowledge already.

A question about how old exactly the System is.

One about where the idea for the System came from, which turns out to actually be another world that is more advanced than Earth in technology.

Another question about what’s powering the System. One whose answer shocks everyone as it’s not just the life energy of those killed within the System.

It’s a dragon’s core and the Farshore itself.

The fae’s realm.

Then there’s the question of how void creatures are classified by the System.

That they’re actually given a unique identify result to mark them when they aren’t from a corrupted Fracture. And that they don’t give EXP to those who kill them.

And the seventh question is how long ago Titania first thought to create the System. Which no one manages to answer correctly, since as it turns out, it was so long ago that Gramps wasn’t even born by then. The oldest living demon or human.

According to Nyx, it was when Titania first learned about what was happening in the void with the void creatures.

Almost three thousand years ago.

The eighth question turns out to be about whether or not the void creatures have skills. Which is a simple yes or no question, so pretty much everyone gets that one. Since it’s just a process of guessing. What with everyone having two tries to answer it.

With the answer itself being a no.

And the ninth question is actually one about administrator and moderator rights for the System. One only Leonidas answers correctly. Because the only person on Earth or Tartarus with moderator rights is Oberon, with Gramps having some benefits as well. And no one at all having administrator rights.

The answer turns out to be the ability to tap into the System’s own power to teleport anywhere in the universe. With limits, that is. Limits that apparently stopped Gramps from just teleporting over to Earth and killing everyone.The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

They also get the ability to turn off System Assistance for anyone around them in terms of common through rare skills. Meaning only epic and higher rarity skills actually can be used on Oberon and Gramps so long as Oberon turns System Assistance off.

Meanwhile a third and fourth ability they get are the ability to personally create one transcendent skill after maxing out a single mythic skill for their contracted partner, and to initiate anyone into the System with or without a fae to contract them with.

That last one not really being an ability that matters much when most of everyone on Tartarus has a fae partner. What with Tartarus being the world that’s completely open to the fae to enter, Fracture or no Fracture.

I cross my arms with a frown on my face at that question. Because it really was biased with Leonidas being the only one who could possibly know any of that.

And that’s because whenever I asked Gramps about it a while back he just said he wasn’t allowed to say. So Leonidas had to spy on his father to figure it out.

An act that apparently doesn’t surprise Gramps, since I see him just kinda sitting in the corner of the hall. And he looks like he expected that.

Unfair.

Nyx completely ignores the disgruntlement of both me and a bunch of other competitors as she moves on, saying, “Now we only have one more question left. And this one is the most important question of them all.”

I blink at that, feeling a little surprised.

More important than all of the shocks you’ve given us up till now?

Wow.

“It’s gotta be big for it to top the others at this point,” Tar remarks, making me nod my head in agreement.

To my and everyone else’s surprise, Nyx’s form suddenly begins to blur.

Wait, what?

Then another black dragon just like her appears somewhere else in the hall that looks exactly like Nyx.

The audience immediately grows silent. And the silence stretches on and on as ‘Nyx’s’ form continues to blur.

After a few seconds of this absolute and rather eerie silence, ‘Nyx’s’ voice returns, “This last question is a rather… odd one. But at the same time, it may make a lot of you question what’s been going on this entire competition.”

My eyes begin to narrow as I try to rise from my seat, only to surprisingly find a powerful force pushing me down and keeping me in place.

I scowl at ‘Nyx’, who I’m really beginning to wonder if is actually Nyx. Especially considering the second Nyx who appeared.

‘Nyx’ goes silent again for several seconds before she begins to float up into the air, her form blurring more and more.

“Now, on to the question itself,” she continues. Meanwhile her blurred form begins to shrink down from the size of a miniature dragon to a much smaller yet still too blurry to tell what is size. “It’s a question about the creator of the System herself.”

Her form continues to morph and blur and shift until it finally starts solidifying into a surprising form. One that isn’t a dragon.

She ends up in a blurred form of a relatively human sized humanoid with what look like very thin wings from her back. But she’s still blurry, so it’s hard to tell.

“The question is,” ‘Nyx’ says before her form suddenly solidifies completely, no longer blurry as she’s revealed as what looks like a fairy. One with long and flowing red and black hair, red and black eyes, and two damn-near paper-thin wings fluttering behind her while she wears a pitch black dress. A dress that flutters in the air just like her hair. “When did the creator of the System die?”

The silence stretches on as everyone stares at her without making so much as a sound.

Huh.

Guess I know now why I’ve felt something was off about her ever since coming back.