7 Worlds: The 4th World Vol. 1

Nicole was out enjoying a new kind of typical day. Prior to the events that had occurred between her and Cian, she had followed a defined routine for months. Every Saturday she went to piano lessons in the morning, followed by a relaxing walk to the local coffee shop for her favourite chocolate cupcake, her cupcake. However, after the incident with Cian, Nicole decided to discontinue her weekly lessons to pursue a quest. Her quest, of which she had decided on herself, was to further research the effects the 4th World had throughout the city. Cian had enticed her with details he had relayed regarding the 4th World the last time they had talked and Nicole’s curiosity had gotten the better of her the last few days. While her parents weren’t terribly impressed with her decision to quit her lessons, she had grown weary of her usual monotonous routine and found herself drawn to and craving an exciting new adventure.

As she strolled around town, she poked her nose around, looking for anything slightly out of the ordinary. It was difficult, there were a lot of unordinary things going on, especially after that massive fire a few weeks back. The city was, however, rebuilding much faster than expected even with a large portion of the manufacturing district in ruins. She kept searching, confident she would find something. It wasn’t until she had passed the same spot five times that Nicole had noticed her first verifiable abnormality.

“I know that this road leads to the coffee shop. Why haven’t I been able to get there yet…?” She wondered aloud as her heart began to pound in anticipation.

Pausing for a moment, she carefully examined each step she had taken. Nicole quickly realized that no one else had been around for a while. It was around 9 a.m. and there were usually people around this part of town at this time of day. Her heart began to pound harder as she noticed that a small concentration of air was smoggy in one particular area, so she crept closer to take a look.

“That must be it! Maybe it’s one of those barriers Cian told me about. I believe he said ‘if it’s a weak barrier you should be able to slip inside as long as you are aware of its presence’ but I guess he also said I probably shouldn’t ever enter one,” Nicole remarked to herself. “Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained I suppose,” she reasoned with herself.

Suddenly, someone flew out of the barrier falling on their rear end. Nicole gasped, wide-eyed, her eyes fixated on the man covered in obnoxious yellow armor with electricity pulsing around him.

“Aww, damn…I messed up,” the man said as he stood up, and then, he noticed the girl standing behind him. “Man...I REALLY messed up…” he said once more, sighing and brushing the dirt off his bottom.

A giant fist came out of the barrier but the man managed to dodge it, albeit clumsily, and kick it back into the barrier.

“Bad timing!” He yelled towards Nicole. “Seal of Lightning!” He commanded, his attention returning fully to his current priority.

“Yes my Master,” a robotic voice replied.

The man placed his hand on the barrier and as a strip of runes surrounded it, it shrunk and vanished. Immediately, the smog also began to vanish, as did the man’s armor. Suddenly people were visible again, walking around without a clue of what had just occurred. Nicole was dumbstruck by the expediency of the event that had just unfolded in front of her.

“Wh-who are you?” Nicole questioned, breaking her long silence.

“I’m Zypher. Sorry, that must have been scary, are you okay?” The man responded.

It didn’t take long for Nicole to collect herself and assess the man however. His demeanor seemed friendly and inviting, allowing her a sense of security regarding the situation. At the very least, he didn’t seem threatening to her, but she kept her guard up regardless.

“I’m ok, this isn’t my first time experiencing this…” Nicole said, shrugging without much concern.

She continued studying her surroundings as if waiting for something else to occur, but nothing did.

“Not the first hm? Well, you don’t seem like a guardian. Do you know one?” Zypher inquired with a skeptical but assessing gaze.

Nicole wasn’t sure how she should respond.

“Cian did say to keep it a secret,” she thought to herself, leaving the silence to grow until it became too awkward to ignore.

“Yes, I do know one,” Nicole responded with brevity.

Nicole figured that it might act as a decent deterrent in case he decided to become aggressive towards her for some reason. Zypher stared at her, assessing her as she had him.

“It’s fine, you don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to. You seem quite mature for your age but try to be more careful. You really don’t want to get caught up in any more barriers because it might not end up nearly as well as it did this time. I’ll give you this though,” Zypher said, slipping a small card into her hand.

“Since you can see this much, you must be aware of quanum and have some potential yourself. Only those with the talent can see the details on that card. Also, the card will get warm if you approach a barrier so try to keep it on you as a warning. Take care!” Zypher said, lightning arcing around him as he started to levitate into the sky before flying off.

Nicole looked at the card, it had his contact details but there was another number listed as HQ—‘Headquarters?’ She thought before slipping the card into her pocket.

“I’ll have to give that HQ number a call when I get home…Do they even have phones in the 4th world?” Nicole thought to herself.

Nicole remained in the area to investigate, but found nothing noteworthy. She found it peculiar that a presumably undisclosed organization would freely distribute their contact information so easily. It appeared highly suspicious she figured it was more likely attributed to incompetence rather than malintent. She continued on to the coffee shop, this time managing to arrive disappointingly without incident.

Nicole sat at a table in the shop staring out the large front window, her newly acquired culinary delight mostly finished. Across the street through the window she noticed Alden searching around strangely so she quickly finished the last bite, shoving it into her mouth, and ran after him.

“Thanks for coming! Have a great day!” she heard from behind her as she sprinted past an employee that had been sweeping and burst through the door.

Nicole saw him turn a corner that headed down an alleyway and quickly followed him around the corner but he was gone—This better not be one of those cliche alleyway moments…I hate those.

Alden and Nicole weren’t exactly friends, but they did interact at school on occasion. Usually when she was talking to Cian alone Alden would appear—uninvited.

“Alden is part of the track and field team so if he ran somewhere…but that’s still pretty fast,” Nicole thought to herself before continuing on.

Nicole carefully headed down the alleyway, doing her best to observe and soak in every last detail.

She headed towards the familiar broken fence at the end of the alley and squeezed through. It was a path taken by her and most kids on the island as it led to the creek. The other side of the fence was covered in tall wild grass and weeds, but she could tell by the way the grass had been moved that someone had passed through recently. She started to follow the same pathway through the grass towards a dirt path along the creek when suddenly something grabbed her arm and tugged her down into a kneel.

“Wait, don’t move,” a voice said quietly.

Nicole silenced her impending scream as she turned to see Alden crouched down in the grass watching the creek intently, her arm still clutched in his hand.

“What are you doing?!” Nicole hissed out in a whisper, agitated.

“Look carefully, there’s a monster in the creek. It’s not very strong though, but it is very fast. I’ve been trying to catch it all day,” Alden whispered back, ignoring her tone.

“Wait, what do you mean a monster?! Like one of the things Cian fought before? Did he tell you about them too?!” Nicole whispered louder, barely giving Alden the chance to respond.

“SHHHHH! Yes, I know, Cian told me already and to answer your next question, yes, recently, now be quiet,” Alden whispered back, moderately annoyed. “Here, throw this at it so I can catch it as it tries to run,” Alden whispered once more, handing her what looked like a rock.

“Okaaay…” Nicole replied in confusion. “Was it a guardian trait to be this accepting of things?” She thought to herself before throwing the rock.

It was a crappy throw but the noise it made was enough to scare the monster into a frenzied dash in the opposite direction. Suddenly as if appearing out of thin air, there was Alden directly in front of it, his sword slashing it in half horizontally, its body dissolving into the air.

“It didn’t look like you needed my help at all!” Nicole shouted across the creek, annoyed.

“I didn’t, but it was more fun this way wasn’t it?” Alden shouted back, chuckling.

“Well come back over here, I have something to show you!” Nicole shouted again.

Alden jumped back across the creek to join Nicole and she excitedly handed him the card that Zypher had given her and explained what had happened earlier.

“Interesting…we should meet up with Cian and figure this out. A new guardian? Shouldn’t be a problem if he’s friendly I guess,” Alden said as he continued inspecting the card in his hand.

“Come on, let’s go. Things are finally starting to get interesting around here,” Nicole said, grinning with excitement.

“Do you even know where Cian’s house is?” Alden asked, curiously.

“I do,” Nicole responded curtly as she began heading off in that direction.

“Really? You’ve been before?” Alden asked, genuinely surprised as he followed.

“No, is it that strange for me to know where he lives? We do go to the same school,” Nicole said, her tone slightly irritated at his line of questioning—or maybe it was because it was him asking the questions.

“Do you know where I live?” Alden asked pointedly, a smirk spreading across his face.

“No comment,” she stated, giving Alden a side-eyed glare before continuing on.

“Curious, very curious,” Alden said, nodding his head and scratching his chin sagely.

Ignoring him, Nicole increased her walking speed, she knew engaging with him was a pointless endeavor.

--------

“What do you want?” I asked, after opening the front door to see Alden standing there, unfazed by my abruptness.

I was busy doing chores when Cadeyrn warned me that it could sense Alden approaching. I decided that it would be a fun idea to try opening the door as soon as he arrived in surprise—clearly that failed.

“Wow, rude man, we’re just here to show you something interesting,” Alden said laughing.

“Well the last time you did that it ended in trouble and I’m the one who got it all,” I said annoyed.

“Hey, that’s because you decided it would be a good idea to blow it up,” Alden chuckled more.

“Wait- we’re?” I asked, as I just then noticed Nicole hiding slightly out of view.

“Uhh…Hey Cian,” Nicole greeted me awkwardly.

“Oh, Uh…H-hey Nicole…Anyways, let's go up to my room. This is no place for this conversation…” I replied awkwardly as I led them into the house and up to my room.

“Here,” Alden said, abruptly shoving a small card into my hands as soon as we entered.

“Where the heck did you get this thing?!” I demanded while examining the card.

I immediately noticed it was created so that only those with quanum could see the contents. It had details of a person named Zypher and Xiphias, the organization which managed the 4th World’s Guardians.

“I...I received it from another guardian I bumped into,” Nicole said nervously.

“Cian, sit down,” Alden said immediately, recognizing that I was about to launch into an angry tirade of questions.

I sat down, taking a moment to breathe through my anger, while Nicole explained the events leading up to now.

“I don’t think it’s wise for you to search out Guardians Nicole. I didn’t tell you what I did so you could try to put yourself in danger,” I lectured, my tone harsher than I intended.

“I assessed the risk, and besides, as I said before, I came across him accidentally,” Nicole rebutted, her tone matching mine.

“Look, what’s done is done man, let's move on. It’s not like you wouldn’t have done the same thing,” Alden said, pointedly.

“Point taken…Then maybe we should call this Zypher dude?” I asked, renewing my intrigue.

“Well, we clearly shouldn’t do it here,” Alden responded sarcastically.

“Obviously, so where can we do it?” Nicole said, brushing off Alden’s response.

“Feel like another cupcake?” I asked, grinning.