As much as he wanted to, a school building on a weekday wasn't a place he could just tear apart as he pleased, even if he was desperate to find Bin before anything unforgivable happened. If David and Michelle Stevens became the cause of Bin's death, he would rip their limbs off, stitch them back together and then do it a trillion times over. Black rage pushed out tears as he spiraled.

Kids who had noticed the officers from Mission Central moving through the building were now at the doors to their classrooms, curiously watching the blue man walking through the hallway. Most of the kids seemed pretty scared as well, but one boy was gaping wide at the power oozing out of Eik, even as he held back on the intimidation aura and kept Profound Toxin on a tight leash.

"Who are you, mister?"

Eik turned his glimmering eyes to the boy, his legs never stopping. It was everything he could do to keep his voice from shaking. "I'm Bin's dad."

"Bin from class four?" the boy asked. "I know her. We play sometimes. Are you strong?"

Somehow, Eik managed to flash the boy a smile. "Very. Have you seen her today?"

He shook his head. "No, but her class is that way," he said and pointed down the hall in the direction Eik was already going.

"I know. Thanks."

Vanishing in front of the boy's eyes, Eik appeared outside the door of class four. Feeling like he was about to lose faint from fear, he opened the door quickly but carefully. Being the agitated A-ranker that he was, even a minor mishandling of his own power could result in fragments of the wood of the door or wall buried in the bodies of innocent children.

The first thing he saw was Bin crying her eyes out, an enormous man with an almost equally enormous war hammer in his hand standing over her. In that moment, Eik failed to hold back his aura for a single millisecond before he got it back under control as the crushing pulse of it slammed into the officer with the hammer, knocking him to his knees in an instant.

Eyes wide with shock, he whipped his head around and stared into Eik's brilliant blue eyes, face pale as a sheet. All of the kids, having been spared from the focused aura blast grew even more confused than they had already been.

Feeling the familiar sensation, Bin noticed Eik and dashed into his arms. Quick as lightning, a fine layer of Profound Toxin flowed across her entire body, concluding, to Eik's eternal relief, that she was completely unharmed physically.

He picked her up and held her close, running his hand down her fluffy hair. "I—" she sobbed into his shoulder. "I was really scared!"

"I know, I know, but it's all going to be okay now, alright, little Bin? It's all going to be okay, and your Eik is right here now. Don't worry about a thing anymore." A dreadful gaze sought the large Mission Central officer as half a dozen mid-sized Living Manifestations squeezed into the classroom, slowly approaching every single officer present. "I will fix this," he said to Bin, but his eyes said that the words were just as much meant for the officer who now looked terrified.

Now that he knew Bin was safe and unharmed, he finally found the calm to dismiss both his aura as well as the Backflow that had been coursing through him since he had taken off from the south gate.

"Kids, I understand that a pretty scary thing happened here at school today, huh?" Eik said, finding his smile again as he addressed Bin's classmates. "And I'm sorry if I scared you as well by running into the classroom like this. I promise that these cute little animals won't do a thing. In fact, if you're curious, you're welcome to pet them. They're Bin's friends, so you guys can say hi to them as well if you want."

A little more than half of the kids took him up on that offer, gathering together to stroke the smooth, gooey skin of the Profound Toxic beasts. The beasts leaned into the children's hands, even going as far as to alter the shapes of their bodies to get petted by as many kids at a time as possible.

"Ms. Morran," he said to Bin's teacher who had been trying to console the little girl. "I'm very sorry for this incident. Any damages I've caused will be paid out of my own pocket."

"No, Mr. Magnasen, I— I-I just don't understand… what happened."

He erected a sound barrier around Bin's head and in front of the rest of the children. "Someone has reported my daughter to Mission Central and framed it as a monster loose within Forest's walls. They were here to murder her," he said, completely unable to keep the venom out of his voice.

She gasped, horrified. "But… How could anyone—"

"We would never hav—" one of the officers began, but Eik interrupted him.

"We'll talk about it outside," Eik said and dropped the sound barriers.

He clapped his hands and put Bin on his shoulders. "Now, everyone! If you didn't know, I'm Bin's dad, Eik, and since it's been a very scary day, I'm going to make it up to you!" Eik shouted and released numerous balloons of pure poison toward the ceiling, the Living Manifestations dancing merrily around him like trained dogs.

Only his insane control made it a safe thing to do, although the officers from Mission Central looked extremely uncomfortable with what they knew to be the most potent substance of death humanity had ever seen.

The kids laughed and clapped as Eik simulated various magic tricks using the toxin, such as sawing a Living Manifestation in half only for it to still be whole, pulling a massive, serpentine drake out of a fist-sized coin pouch, and juggling snakes. The children loved it, and even Ms. Morran seemed to calm down a little at the drastic change in atmosphere.

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All of the officers were still being kept in place by the Profound Toxin beasts, including the ones outside where the titanic wyvern was keeping watch on them all. The presence of such a massive beast would surely cause quite a stir, but Eik had no intention of keeping quiet about this incident in the first place.

And he certainly wasn't going to just leave without first cheering up the kids. After a couple of minutes of entertainment, he clapped for attention. "And as an extra treat, I have an invitation for all of you," he said. "I don't know if Bin has already told you, but we have a nice little café, and we just so happens to make the best hot chocolate in the whole world and some of the best cake in the world as well! And guess what, you can come and have as much as you want!"

The kids went totally bananas. See, that's how you do it, guys. Cake and hot chocolate ad libitum beats a single slice of greasy pizza any day.

"Bring your parents too! And siblings! And I guess your nice teacher, Ms. Morran can come as well," he said with a grin, the kids laughing. "Officers, we're leaving," he announced. They obeyed without question. Although not officially, Eik was essentially the leader of Forest. He wasn't interested in politics but his influence was such that, whether he wanted it or not, he could take control whenever he wanted.

"Bin might skip a couple of days of school to go see her grandpa and hang out with us for a little bit," Eik told Ms. Morran as the officers from Mission Central were escorted out by the Profound Toxic beasts.

"I think that's a good idea considering everything that has happened," she agreed. "Take as many days as you would like."

"Thank you, but I think it's also important for her to come back and see her classmates again soon. Kids need to have fun with their friends after all, don't they?" he said with a warm smile.

"You're right, Mr. Magnasen," she agreed. "Children need to play with kids their own age regularly as well. It can help them return to a sense of normalcy after a traumatic event."

"There's no need to call me Mr. Magnasen. Where I'm from, we call each other by our first names. You can just call me Eik."

"I understand, Eik," she corrected with a chuckle. "You can call me Jessie, then. And don't worry too much. You're a very good father to Bin. She speaks so highly of you all the time, you know."

Eik nearly cried then and there. He hugged Bin a little tighter. "Thank you, I hope so. I try my best for her."

Jessie Morran just smiled.

"And, by the way," he added, his hand on the door handle. "I have gotten used to situations like this by now, but if this had happened to me before I Awakened, I would have been freaking out right about now. There's no shame in being affected by what happened here today, Jessie. I'll find you someone good to talk with about it if you need it, so contact me if you ever feel like taking me up on the offer."

"Thank you," she said sincerely.

"Anytime," he answered and closed the door behind him.

***

"You're Donovan Carver from Mission Central," Eik said.

"And you're Eik Magnasen. So this… "monster" was your little daughter?" Donovan asked, an enraged glare directed at Michelle Stevens and David still stuck in the chunk of crystal. "And you were aware of this even before you made the report?"

"Someone had to do something!" she snapped, fearful but remorseless. Eik almost had to be impressed with how solid her sense of moral superiority was. She seemed utterly impervious to shame. "And release my husband! He's hurt!

"She's a little girl!" Eik hissed, ignoring her order to release the husband.

"That is no girl!" Michelle shrieked. "How can it be lawful for something that is not even human to be around our kids? Officer Donovan, how can you justify something like that?"

Thankfully, Eik had already thrown up another sound barrier around Bin's head. Donovan sneered. "Some of us don't base our entire worldview on prejudice and assumption. And for the record, my boyfriend is red. Like, his skin is as red as blood. Not very human, is he?"

"Wha— But…" she struggled. "Release my husband right now!" she pivoted.

"You can't possibly think that it's over with this, can you?" Eik questioned. "You tried to kill my little girl, and you will pay dearly for that."

"But I didn't do anything wrong!" Michelle screamed, stomping the ground like a child as tears streamed down her face. "You can't kill me for doing the right thing!"

Seeing red, Eik slammed a fist into her face, rebreaking her nose and giving her similar injuries to her husband. Immediately, he healed her back up, the extreme power difference allowing him to completely fix her within seconds. Pulling David over next to her, he did the same to him.

"You barbaria—" Michelle shrieked, but Eik's fist flattening and crushing her nasal bone for a third time that day drowned out her words.

"You think you can just—" David raged, but he too was silenced when blood exploded from his mouth and nose as a left hook snapped his head to the side violently.

Eik healed them both up again. "Offi—" Broken jaw.

"How—" A fourth broken nose.

Twenty three more rounds of relentless assault followed by perfect healing left the couple nothing more than sobbing, drooling messes on the ground, their own blood pooling below them. Eik towered above them, his fists dripping crimson. On each round he broke nearly every bone in their faces. He couldn't kill them right here in the city, but he could do something that was even better. Make them feel like they were dying over and over again and leave them with the memories.

Bin had long since been taken away by Ihasu who had come the moment she had been informed of the situation. The officers from Mission Central simply stood by and watched, unsure of how to handle the situation.

"Pl-Please… don't kill… don't kill us," David gasped, terror dominating his mind.

Eik knelt and put his face in his, blue death crackling in his eyes. "There is only one reason why the two of you are not withered corpses right now, and that is Kathrin. Despite how fucking disgusting you are, I'm not going to rob a little girl of her parents in the same way you tried to rob me of my daughter today. You should thank her every day for that," he hissed into the man's ear. "But let me promise you, if you ever try anything even remotely similar, I kill you and bring you back to life again and again, for years and years. You have my word."

All they could do was groan and sob.

"And to make sure you remember." Two Living Manifestations slithered onto Eik's hand. With a movement like lightning, he opened deep gashed in both of their cheeks and sent a blue serpent into each wound before they could react. "With that, I will always know where you are, what you're saying, and who you're with. Speak a single word that I resent, and these guys will inflict unimaginable pain upon you. You can't escape it. Not even cosmic travel will sever the connection to me," he lied. He wasn't that good. Yet.

"Please, we're—"

"And they will kill you, painfully, if you try to do anything to me or mine again, isn't that right?" Eik asked, and the serpents both peeked out of the wounds and wiggled in the affirmative, Michelle and David screaming in horror. "I will be watching forever. You can take them away, Donovan," he said. "And make sure their little daughter doesn't have to go home alone today. She's not responsible for this. And keep Bin's name out of anything you tell her. They're in the same class for now, after all."

"Understood," Donovan said with a nod, preparing two pairs of reinforced handcuffs. "And you, Mr. Magnasen?"

Eik sighed as the blue army flowed back into his skin, including the gigantic wyvern. "I think I'm going to take a day off and play with my daughter today. Everything else can wait."

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