[Lord Grania’s Palace—Grim’s Chambers] The sun was at its highest peak. The rooms of the Palace automatically dropped down their walls to allow more air inside for a much cooler environment since the Granians depended on the weather for their body temperature. More sunlight and cool winds shone in, making the Palace ideal and more comfortable for the blazing afternoon hours. At this hour, the Palace was quite busy with hundreds of workers, Council Members, and soldiers moving up and about. Amid this busy beehive, a couple of Granians escorted each other to their quarters while discussing the unfolding of the events that occurred in the morning hours. "I saw something quite worrying, Helda," Lord Grim and his lady love Helda escorted each other to their quarters as they discussed the horrifying occurrence Ace had just displayed. Amazed but incredibly terrified by him breaking the Blood Mutant Blocker, the two began devising new ways of keeping the Mutants under their control. "Yes, he did break through the Blood Mutant Blocker, which was expected of him though it happened too early, but he also exhibited signs of tapping into Eneraflux." Helda’s eyes widened, frightened by the word Eneraflux being used on the subject known as Ace Underwood, the strongest of the four Blood Mutants they possessed. Her heart started to race quickly and this started to affect her maternal instincts. "This news is upsetting, even the child in me is moving about recklessly," she gasped and slowly let her body fall into Grim’s hands. "If he’s tapping into Eneraflux without anyone teaching him, he could become uncontrollable. We need to create a solution for this." "What if we don’t?" Grim asked while placing Helda’s body on his bed. While pacing the room, they continued talking more about Ace. "Other than him breaking through the barrier and what I thought was him using Eneraflux, he didn’t exhibit any signs of hostility. He could have easily transformed and taken my life. I was in his hands, my life was in his possession for him to decide on whether he’d take in or not but surprisingly, he didn’t." "That still doesn’t answer my question, Lord Grim." She sighed. "We must come up with a solution for controlling these Mutants. He’s already gaining the strength that cannot be limited by Blockers anymore. What if the others follow suit next? What if they become like the first two? Remember, it all started before. As soon as they gain that strength, they’ll become a threat. These humans hold grudges and I doubt that they’ll forgive us easily no matter what we do." "Imagine what will become of us when they see the first two," Grim sighed too before falling into a state of deep thought. The Granian Warrior thought long and hard about what could be done. If what his mate said was to come true, he could stand at risk of having their weapons turn against them. "This question needs to be addressed to the Council. We need their advice and that of Lord Grania as well." At his request, Lord Grim set an appointment for a Council Meeting set to happen at dawn, giving him enough time to come up with as many questions and solutions as possible. In the meantime, he also ordered a few female Granians to watch over Helda while he moved out to observe the other Blood Mutants. ************************ [All Stats have been increased by five points.] [Blood Strength:102] +5 "Haven’t you had enough yet?" standing over Cherry, Ace looked down on her as she remained motionless, her body drenched in sweat, dust, and dirt. After their time-wasting engagement with the Granians, the Blood Mutant siblings challenged each other to a dual where Ace would only use his raw strength while Cherry used her Blood Clones. So far, the female Blood Knight was able to create over twenty clones at once and each one lasted five minutes before they reverted into puddles of Blood. In those short minutes, she’d unleash all her Clones at her brother who partially struggled with keeping up. In the end, the Blood Bishop gained a few stat boosts while the Blood Knight learned how to create and control a large number of clones for a given time period. Creating and controlling clones did take a toll on her strength, hence the reason she remained motionless. "That’s...unfair...you know...you have more...energy than...I do..." Cherry panted heavily while staggering like a drunk on her feet. "The energy pool between...you and I...is large. But I’m not done just yet...." "Then perhaps you’ll be more interested in something else." Ace’s heart skipped a beat, his fists tensed and his eyebrows narrowed while he quickly turned his head to see the person that spoke to them. Behind him and Cherry was the Granian/human impersonator Lily, one of his ’schoolmates’. Like Chris, she was sent to infiltrate the Gifted Academies in search of the Blood Mutants ever since they escaped, especially Ace, given that he had the system. [You cannot use your Blood Abilities.] Nᴇw ɴovel chaptᴇrs are published on 𝓷𝓸𝓿𝓮𝓵•𝑓𝑖𝑟𝑒•𝙣𝙚𝙩 "For my safety," she flaunted another Blood Mutant Blocker before approaching the Mutants. "I have to hand it to you, Ace. You’ve grown strong...very strong. If you exhibited this strength back on Earth, you could have been a real pain to capture. I’m sure Jason would think twice before taunting you." "You know her?" Cherry asked, being the most confused of them all. As for Ace, he glared wildly at the female Granian who was currently in her ’human form’ looking at him with the same look she’d use back on Earth. "She was one of the many students that would taunt Skyler and I due to our ’weak states’," Ace answered while carefully considering on whether he’d get revenge on the girl or not. He did promise to harm her when still on Earth, so now would be the perfect moment to do so. Afterall, it was already proven that he didn’t need his Blood Abilities to do so. "You’re brave for coming here all alone...by yourself...with no supervision...standing before me." Ace’s eyes glowed red and his fists tensed even harder. Despite his current strength, Lily wasn’t scared one bit even though she had seen and heard of the Mutant’s strengths. Even after watching him go toe-to-toe with Grim it didn’t scare her or make her think twice. "Yes, is there a problem with that, Ace?" she smiled and approached even closer, her breath hitting his face. "You’re not going to try and hit me now, are you?" [Blood Lust activated] "When you said something else, what did you mean?" Cherry stood between her brother and Lily, being more interested in what the human impersonator had to offer. "Did Grim send you here to tell us what we could do in the meantime?" "Actually, this is something personal and I’m sure you two would be the right choice for the job." She replied with her eyes still glued on Ace. "It’s nothing harmful, just a little trip into the Granian tunnels in search of beasts." "Beast hunting?" Ace asked. "Like on Earth?" "Yes and no. the beasts on Earth were too weak and not worth any of my time...and with your strength, they wouldn’t be worht your time either. These beasts are more powerful, sentient, and intelligent. It would be a perfect excuse for you to grow stronger much faster, don’t you agree?" "We’ll take it," Cherry agreed but her brother wasn’t easily convinced. "You’re not someone that we can trust so easily, Liyl," he grunted, after thinking long and hard about the type of person standing befoe them. "All along we thought you were a human but in reality you were a Granian sent to find me and her. You used to deception and completed your mission objective but what strikes me is that you think I’d be so willing to follow you into tunnels just to hunt beasts." Lily looked into Ace’s eyes and chuckled before responding saying, "I did complete my objective, that’s true, but this is a completely different case. If I do anything to harm you, Lord Grania will have my head and I wouldn’t want that to happen. This is something that’ll benefit me, you, and her. Trust me, these beasts are strong and you might just be able to achieve something. I’ve already informed the Higher ups about me needing your help. Provided I return you two by night fall, I won’t be questioned. But if you’re not interested, I’ll take my leave and go." [Quest: Kill and survive as many beast attacks as you possibly can. Each beast killed will come with a high reward.] Now that his system was urging him to go with the Granian, Ace had no choice but to accept, despite his senses not feeling comfortable about one of the most deceptive people he had ever met. If it weren’t for his need to grow stronger, he wouldn’t have accepted Lily’s offer. "Fine, we’ll do it." He accepted. "We? I was gonna go whether you wanted to or not." Cherry mumbled and together, they were transported from the Granian Palace’s vast fields and into the Granian civilizations.