The travel through the sewer system wasn't that bad, besides the fact that they kept running into some rats. Alan always had thought that those were mostly urban legends, they were not.

"[Hungry], [Swarm], [Protect next]..." Glory intoned as she pointed in a new direction, and as we had been doing, my body started moving before I could actually think about doing it.

It was a weird phenomenon, I knew that I wanted to move in that direction, to intercept the danger, but before I was actually thinking about doing that, my body was already moving in that direction.

The Core within my chest knew that I wanted to protect Glory against the harm, and her instructions were all my body needed to make my wish come true.

Muscles flexed and moved to puppet my body to the place it needed to move, the muscles in my arm becoming denser and the outer part of the skin hardening; I was using the following advice from one of the teachers that Father brought. A shifter, of all things, had taught me that if I could not change into nonorganic material, the organic world had a version of armor for itself.

Chitin.

An armor made out of sugar, of all things. They had explained to him how it worked from a scientific point of view, but all he knew really was that making these took sugar and that if it wasn't for his Core Power, he would be diabetic at this point.

Making these chitin armor took copious amounts of sugar, that he had in compressed pouches, sugar cubes that used the same technology of the MRE that the Blackthorn made.

A sugar cube was enough to make a fist protector, he needed to take two to make a whole gauntlet. And while he could keep them in his mouth without the sugar dissolving, all he needed was to bite hard, and the sugar pills would break and give him the materials.

*Splat*

And so, his fist turned from a normal one into one covered in hardened chitin, and so the rat that had jumped at Glory turned into mush.

The girl didn't seem that worried about it, Alan wasn't sure if it was the glasses or what but something was keeping Glory from reacting to the gore that they were seeing, he didn't mind it of course. Whatever it was, it was a godsend.

"Let's go Body! They are screaming!" Glory continued pulling at him, whatever she wanted was further beyond, they hadn't seen any other sidekick, minion, hero or even villain.

Glory kept moving them in winding tunnels, never keeping the same route, as if something was guiding her.

"Who is screaming?" He couldn't help but ask if someone was screaming...why couldn't he hear it? He had his senses heightened since they entered the sewer system.

"The victims!" Glory said, "I can hear their screams! They want help! She is in danger!"

"Who is in danger?" Alan asked as he ran after Glory, this...shouldn't be possible, as far as he knew, Glory's power didn't work like that, she could see some words that described people, they hadn't quite narrowed down what the words meant, or if they worked in some way or fashion.

Their trainers thought they could have great applications, of course, but that was purely theoretical for now.

As far as Alan knew, Glory should not have a way to listen to conversations with other people using her Core power, because that would imply that someone was actively changing what made them themselves.

And no one was able to do such a thing, or at least no sane person would be able to do such a thing. He still believed in Glory, and rushed after the girl.

And what he found at the end...it was a place filled with people, the alleged Zombies, walking in circles, each of them in a different direction, one circle clockwise, the next counterclockwise, repeating ad infinitum.

"Soul! Stand beh-" He started saying preparing for a gruesome fight, they were too many.

"No!" But Glory stepped forward in front of him, "They are victims!"

What?

They already knew that, they had been briefed, they were...beyond help.

"Soul? You know what happened to them, they...can't be saved." Alan said in a sad tone, it was a sad thing really, he knew...he knew that perhaps if they had access to an ancient house riches they may be saved, but none of these had such privilege, "I'll call for help, they will come and help us. We can go and wait away while they...provide the help."

He had already pushed the panic button as soon as they walked into this room, the signal should send someone soon enough, and then...They would deal with this, was it cowardice? To make someone else do the deed?

He didn't care, Glory shouldn't see this kind of thing.

"I came to [Help]," Glory started speaking in that weird double-sounding voice that he had started to notice after his Core triggering, some people spoke like that sometimes, almost like how Alexa spoke sometimes, in that weirdly mechanical tone.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

He had thought it was a quirk...till he heard the Theater Master speak like that at least.

"Soul?" Alan asked as all the zombies turned to stare at them, some of them having their eyes shine in the same color as Glory's, "What...is happening?"

"They are thanking us, they don't want to do this either...Their...[Consciousness ******]? I don't know the word, but they want me to help her." Glory said as her nose started dripping blood. "I will, I promise."

And as the words left Glory's mouth, the zombies started moving away, opening a path for them, Glory walked without fear, but he...he walked with trepidation, the eyes of the zombies looking at him, and only him.

It was as if Glory didn't exist for them, could she return alone? Perhaps. Would he let her go alone? Never.

It wasn't a matter if she was safe or not, it was the fact that while she may be somehow able to control these to some degree, nothing said she was inmune to the power of the rogue core user. And if these were here moving like that, in a pattern that seemed to make harder to arrive at the center...

It probably meant that whatever was in the middle was worth protecting.

"Body! The hatch! Open the haaaatch!" Glory said, pointing at another hatch in the middle.

What was the deal with the city management that put a hatch within a sewer hatch, it was one too many hatches if Alan was to be honest. But it was what it was.

He took a step forward and focused all his senses into making sure there were no surprises from the remaining zombies, none seemed to react to them when he opened the hatch.

"Let's go!" Glory hurried him, but that was the thing.

Should he let her go first? That would mean she would be exposed to whatever was down there first before he could help her.

But leaving her behind? It would mean exposing her to danger if these zombies ran berserk.

"Soul, let's get down together, the ladder is big enough." Alan ended up saying, giving some room for Glory to get into the ladder with him.

It was one of the good things of being this small, they could still fit the ladder together. He had no doubt that when they grew, this would no longer be possible. But for now? It was a good solution to what he needed.

So while Glory got on the ladder he kept paying attention to the zombies around, and to whatever was down, so far he couldn't hear anything.

"Is anything down there Soul?" He asked as Glory started to move down, at least she was keeping the same pace as him while going down.

Which was not a very fast pace, since he didn't want to rush, but also didn't want to be surprised by anything up or down.

"No," Glory answered, "They all are telling me to hurry, to move."

Who was? he doubted it was these zombies, if he was to be honest, he doubted whatever Glory was hearing came from these.

"Good," Even so, Alan answered and as soon as they got clear from the hatch he closed it again. It would slow them down when returning yes. But he didn't want to keep an open way for the zombies to attack them.

They didn't seem of the dexterous type, so with some luck this would slow them down.

As soon as he closed the hatch he started moving forward into the darkness, "Okay, I'll rush a little, don't get all the way down till I tell you." Alan told Glory as he allowed himself to descend faster.

The ladder was kind of long, which was worrying in its own way.

It meant that whatever the original design of this site was, it had been made with the intention of isolating fully whatever was here, it was a problem.

It meant that whoever was setting this particular place wanted no one to find it...or to ensure it would be fully isolated...Meaning...

Alan extended a hand and made it turn into a claw, the nails on it sharper and thin as he could get them, to ensure as much sharpness as he could. When he was happy with the result, he stuck it into the wall.

"Hard....and solid.....till..." He said as his claw was continuously repaired as he dug deeper and deeper, till he got to an open spot filled with "...Explosives...thank good they are expired....or ruined."

He came into contact with some chemicals, and by taking them into his body, he could know some of their composition, but not enough to differentiate what they were, not specifically.

But he had studied most common used chemicals used by villains, and most of the exotic toxins. All so he could neutralize them and or know when to run away.

What he found from the chemicals of the explosives...was that it was a common formula, one you could get in most black markets, meaning...

"We don't know who made this, but either was a small fry that couldn't get personalized explosives, or someone smart enough to know that using personalized types is a mistake." Alan said aloud sighing, "Still nothing Soul?"

"Don't look up!" Glory screamed as she kicked him on the head when he had attempted to look up, the girl wasn't even wearing a skirt or dress... "And no, but I can't hear the voices of those above us."

...Great.

"So either the thing blocks the Core powers...or they no longer are going to ignore us." Alan said sighing, the floor was still far away, "Let's continue."

They continued descending the ladder and after almost five minutes (He kept checking the walls to find out if they had explosives all the way down...and if they were expired too.

They were, which meant that whoever set up this base either forgot to replace them, or it was an abandoned base. Alan hoped it was the second.

"....Crap," Alan said closing his eyes and groaning, "It was indeed a super villain base? I had hoped for it to be a black site..."

"Happy meal project?" Glory said, reading the former neon characters that stood at the very bottom of the ladder when they got off the ladder.

They no longer shone since it seemed there was no electricity, but the wording was obvious. Whoever had built this was sick, an area designed to welcome people in?

This far into the sewers? There were only two types of people who did these, mad scientists and supervillains.

And from the flair, "Any signal? This may be a supervillain base after all," Alan said, asking yet again.

He was not sure if the tracker would even work this far in, they were under ton of concrete after all.

"...[Sad], [Mad], [Angry], [Hopeless], [Vindication], [Antagonist]..." Glory said while pointing towards the building they had found within the sewers.

Great, another marked word that the theater master had asked for. This was great.

"Okay...then more likely than not, the rogue core user is here." Alan said sighing, he walked towards the ladder and carved a small opening in the wall behind the ladder, in that spot he put his tracker. "Soul, do you have your tracker?"

"Yes!" Glory said, clutching at her chest, "Safe and comfy like you said I should keep it."

"Okay, turn it on, please." Alan said, nodding at the girl, "We will go in and scout around, but if I say for you to run, you must run away."

"Turning it on," Glory said nodding, but then stopped and turned to look at Alan, "But I will not leave you, your tags are shifting from [Stable] to [Side Character] and to [Mob], my core says that is dangerous."

...He did not like those labels at all. They sounded...dangerous for a long life, or a happy life.

"Anything we can do to keep them in stable?" Alan asked as he saw Glory turn on her tracker, "Let's move, we don't want to stay in open spaces if possible."

What did that even mean? It was a problem that someone like the theater master used those type of words, at first Alan had thought that it was because his power followed some type of conditional type of thinking.

That he saw the world as if it was a stage, and as such he used such labels. But now Glory also was using them, and her power didn't seem to be the type to see the world as a stage, it meant that...both Core powers tapped into the same type of setting? Power? Mindset?

"I think...My Core power seems to think that if we...do nothing, we will be okay?" Glory ended up saying.

"But...you wanted to save someone, right?" Alan said, confused, "Shouldn't we at least do that?"

"She isn't here yet." Glory said shaking her head, "And the people upside said that I would know when she came."

...So she wasn't even here? What was happening? Was Glory's Core more...complex than he thought?

It was already a metaphysical type, and those got more confusing the more you learned about them.

"Who are we saving then?" Alan asked, sighing, "And if we are to do nothing, how will we save them?"

"Hmm....I don't know, they said I should help a caring person, that is why I said that we needed to rush." Glory said shrugging, "But if we move too much, I think your [Label] will stabilize in something bad, I am doing my best to keep it in [Stable]. Something tells me moving it to a [Main Cast] will be bad."

"Okay." Alan said nodding, he...really would need to speak more seriously with Father, perhaps he could do the first return to his peak when this mission ended, it would probably convince the man that this was a good idea, but he couldn't continue flying in the dark like this.

He needed more info about the Theater Master. If Glory's power worked like his, he needed more info about him.

And more information about this main cast that both Glory and The Theater Master spoke about, if being one was dangerous, he needed all the information that he could find to prevent himself from falling into such a label...And to keep Glory away from one too.

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