A Psychic's Scarlet Dream

Despite his serious expression, Ethan chuckles as he hears that.

Ethan: "A seer, seriously?"

Abgere: "Yes, I know how it sounds. But you have to know that Scrying is an ancient technique that is believed to have been forgotten in this day and age. However, what if, just like you claim the legends are, the whole thing about Scrying being forgotten is also just a myth, a lie or a cover story to hide something."

I"d make sense if that"d be the case.

Ethan sighs and looks at me as he asks,

Ethan: "Scrying is a psychic ability, isn"t it?"

Yes, it"s the ability you often see old hangs in fiction using by putting their hands on a crystal ball and telling a person"s future or their current location. We need the later application but not for a person, we need it for a library.

Ethan: "So, can you do it?"

Kais: "What!?"

Ethan: "Can you Scry?"

Kais: "I … doubt it."

Ethan: "Then I doubt this woman Abgere "believes" to be a seer is a real deal, either."

After a moment of silence because of the out-of-the-world logic that Ethan has just spouted, Abgere asks,

Abgere: "And how is this guy not being able to Scry and that old hag being a seer connected?"

Ethan: "Well, this "guy" right here"

He points at me as he continues,

Ethan: "is supposed to be the man capable of using all the psychic abilities in the world, no, universe. If he can"t Scry, no one can."

… Yeah, I don"t know what to say.

And I don"t know what to do about Abgere looking at me with an expression of surprise that says, "This guy!?"

Ethan: "I"ll have you know Abgere, our Kais here is quite the madlad,"

He looks at me with a smile, and then he looks back at Abgere as his smile fades away,

Ethan: "or will be someday."

…

Abgere: "Hah!"

Abgere, seemingly annoyed, says,

Abgere: "I don"t care about what you guys think of each other but the person I am talking about is a genuinely powerful psychic and not some cheapskate."

…

Sneha: "I don"t know. It"s hard for me to believe in Scrying. I don"t think anyone can do something like that."

Abgere: "Well, that clearly shows that you have never met a truly capable psychic."

…

Gabriel: "I"m one of the 10 h.e.l.lfires, you little s.h.i.+t, and even I can"t use Scrying. It"s all a bunch of nonsense."

Gabriel says with a confident and serious att.i.tude. Abgere replies in a mocking one,

Abgere: "I guess that"s why it"s so easy to kill one h.e.l.lfire after another, because even you guys are second-rate."

Gabriel: "Okay, you just crossed the line there!"

Gabriel tries to attack him but is stopped by Sneha putting a hand in front of him. He clicks his tongue in annoyance as he looks at Abgere with a face full of fury.

Abgere: "Of course that means that everyone other psychic who is not even on your level will be even worse than second-rate."

…

"A little help here, man?" I request.

"Yeah, sure." The voice inside me a.s.sures me.

Sona: "You might regret saying all that, Abgere."

Sona says with a smile akin to that of someone who is going to watch a movie they have been excited to see for a while.

Kais: "Abgere!"

Abgere: "What?"

As he looks at me, I look back at him and say,

Kais: "I didn"t know that two days later will be your birthday."

Abgere: "What!?"

Kais: "I also didn"t know that your mother was a poor collage graduate who got used and thrown away by Julius Rome."

Abgere: "Why you-"

As he tries to hold my collars, I hold his before he even covers half the distance,

Kais: "I also didn"t know that you were raised in slums and came to find out about the supernatural part of the world through meeting that old hag you just mentioned now."

Abgere: "Uh?"

Kais: "I also did not know that the old hag was your aunt, your mother"s sister, as you later found out yourself on the very same mission you found out about her being a seer. Hmm, makes sense why you are so defensive of her right now."

Abgere: "…!"

I let go of his collar and he just stares at me in shock. Sona smiles and enjoys the show from the side and Sneha and Gabriel look at me with surprised expressions.

Kais: "Well,"

I say, turning to Ethan,

Kais: "It seems like I can actually Scry, can"t I? My bad for not realizing this earlier!"

After a second or two of silence, Ethan m.u.f.fles a laugh and says,

Ethan: "Alright, I guess Scrying exists. Our psychic here can do it after all."

All I did was ask within my brain for help learning this ability and, the person inside me, the "devil", was happy to help out. And so, I now know how to Scry.

Kais: "That said though, I have yet to master this ability. It might be good to visit this old h I mean, Abgere"s aunt."

Ethan: "Oh, sure. Let"s do that then."

Ethan says with a smile.

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Well, as Ethan said before, I have the ability to learn all the psychic abilities that have ever existed. And so, I will NEED to learn them. Hopefully, I won"t always need Abyss to inject the basics of the abilities into my brain. That is not a very healthy process and should be reserved for extreme situations, which I realize this was not but well, I really wanted to shut Abgere up.

Though, I suppose, I do kinda regret not just asking Abyss whether Scrying exists or not and getting the situation under control. I just had to go and tell him to inject me with knowledge and skills. I am paying the consequences of doing that now.

Kais: "s.h.i.+t!"

I curse as my back burns while I lay at the sofa of the living room.

And in order to distract myself from that pain, I my best to think about things relevant to the situation.

From my knowledge, there are about 60 psychic abilities in the world. Some are considered ancient and forgotten arts like Scrying and some are "in-trend", for the lack of my ability to come up with a better term, like teleportation or psychokinesis.

On an average, a Volcano-level psychic knows about 10 abilities and has mastery over 2 or 3 of them.

Walter Schmidt, according to the rumors, knows 50 psychic abilities and has mastery over 15 of them.

I know 20 abilities but have mastery over only two – Aura Reading and Teleportation. I mastered them in the time I had to wait for Sona to bring a jet to the island. I need to master other abilities as well as learn new ones.

I need to become as strong as possible, because our enemies are not going to be Volcano-level psychics. They are going to be almost Walter-levels of crazy and the tricks and gimmicks that work once will never work again (probably).

And so, while I think Abgere was trying to mock us a little too much, I have to agree that I am not that amazing in reality. But, I need to be.

Sona: "Kais!"

Kais: "Yes?"

Sona: "Why do I get the feeling you are thinking of something pretty boring?"

Kais: "…"

That"s because I am, I almost answer with that. But no, better not to say anything in response to that question.

Sona: "Anyway, do you really think a seer would be able to figure out the location of the Library. I mean, that"s not how the ability works, is it?"

Now that we are not in the same room as Abgere, Sona is openly questioning it without caring for anyone"s feelings getting hurt. So, I answer quite frankly too.

Kais: "No, there"s no way that a seer will just be able to tell us where the Library is. Scrying is only good as long as it is used on/at some person. It has little value if we are trying to find an inanimate object and no value at all when we are trying to find the location of something like the Library."

Sona: "Then,"

She sits on the sofa as she asks,

Sona: "Why are we going through with this plan? Isn"t it useless?"

Kais: "Almost useless."

I say as if correcting her.

Kais: "What we will ask that seer to find is a person with memories related to the Library. If she really has mastery over this ability, it won"t be a problem for her. And so, we will know who we should go to and ask about the library. It"s not the greatest thing in the name of a trail but it is something that can set us on the right path."

Sona leans back as she contemplates about it.

I know why she is hesitant.

Even though I now know Scrying, I can"t really be confident that this plan would work. It still somehow sounds ludicrous for everything that seers do to be possible in reality.

Still, what other choice do we have? The one other thing we can do is go to Reid Vezalius Rosevelt and ask him like we were thinking about doing before. But, from the image I have of that man, I doubt he"ll tell us anything. And he"s pretty d.a.m.n powerful so getting the information out of him forcefully would be pretty hard too.

That is why I think we should go with Abgere"s suggestion on this one.

Well, that, and there"s also the fact that our head of strategy has gotten a bit anxious and less confident in himself ever since he found out that this Bronzer guy could be working against us.

I don"t know what kind of person Bronzer is but I wouldn"t underestimate him, not if he is dangerous enough to make Ethan Kales lose confidence.

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