Lexie was full-on gaping at Professor Madswick for what felt like an entire minute.

She was waiting for the realization to finish sinking in, but it was taking its sweet time. She just couldn't believe that Professor Madswick was the weirdo from the Undernet.

On the other hand, it made sense.

They were both kind of kooky and obsessed with speaking to her; Madswick constantly wanted to talk about her soul, and the Undernet guy wanted to talk to her about Eldritch stuff.

He'd also offered her a soul contract to start with. Lexie didn't even know humans could make soul contracts with each other till then. Of course, he was a necromancer.

"I assume you've figured out my identity," Professor Madswick said, smirking. "Have you not?"

Lexie nodded slowly.

"I thought you were in prison," she exclaimed. "Or at least an asylum."

He snorted. "Is that what surprises you about this?"

"Well…one of the things, yeah." His statements on the Undernet had made it seem like he was locked in the worst hell he could imagine, a place where he was bored all day, and the only thing that gave him even a smidgen of entertainment was ranting about his Eldritch theories on the Undernet

He sighed and shrugged. "Well, this place is sort of like a prison. And the more time I spend here, the more like a prison it feels."

"Wait, you're forced to be here?"

"In a sense. It's the only way I can freely carry out the experiments I want to, and it's the only way I gain access to such interesting souls. Like yours."

Lexie gripped her hands and said, "I don't see what's so interesting about my soul."

"So many things, Lexie Sparrowfoot. More than you can probably imagine."

I should leave, Lexie thought, but she figured it was probably best to get this over with and find out exactly what Madswick knew about her.

That way, she and her father could plan a counterstrike to eliminate any problem that might arise.

"Have a seat," Madswick said, and Lexie obliged, sitting in a hardbacked chair.

"How did you know who I was through the Undernet?" she asked. "Did you hack my profile?"

"I don't think such a thing is possible on that platform," he said.

"So how did you do it?"

He gave her a mischievous look. "You're not the only one who likes to experiment with their powers, Lexie Sparrowfoot."

Lexie didn't know what that meant exactly, and Madswick didn't elaborate.

"I'll tell you later, but I want to talk about you first," he said. "You're a Chosen, aren't you?"

Lexie's eyebrows flew into her hairline.

What the hell?

That was even more shocking than the first surprise.

When Madswick showed interest in her soul, there were a couple of angles Lexie thought he would approach it from. She assumed he would talk about her soul contract, or even mention that he noticed the Eldritch presence in her soul.

She never thought he would guess her Chosen status from her soul. She hadn't even considered that.

"Um…" She blanked on what to say. She didn't even know how to begin to approach this.

Madswick held up his hand. "It's okay. You don't have to tell me, I know how Chosen rules work. But I assume that you've been a Chosen your entire life, correct? That's how it works, right?"

Lexie didn't say anything for some time and looked around as though expecting someone to jump out and tell her she was being pranked. How the heck did Madswick know she was a Chosen? No one else had ever pegged her as a Chosen, but then again, the only soul-expert she'd met was her father and Naem. Could other necromancers tell she was a Chosen? Was this going to be a problem?

"Don't worry," Madswick said. "No other necromancers can see what you are."

"Then how can you?" Lexie blurted out in a near-whining tone.

"Well," he spread his hands and then laced them together on his desk. "I'm peculiar. And I've met other Chosen."

"You have?" Lexie gasped. "Where? When?"

"The first was when I was very young, visiting District 7. He was a young boy with extraordinary powers and an overly mature way of speaking. I simply thought he was peculiar like I was, and I befriended him, but after some time, I noticed that his soul wasn't like other people's." He cocked his head. "You see, I have an extremely rare ability called Soul Sight. It's a passive skill, but it means I'm essentially always staring at someone's soul. I don't need body contact or a spell or intense meditation to see their soul; I simply do all that for the formality. I've been staring at souls my entire life, and I can tell what's normal and what's abnormal in a soul structure. Yes, souls are varied, but there are things to look out for, and your soul has a small tag that I've only ever seen in other Chosen."

"O...kay," Lexie said, gulping. That was creepy. "Can a lot of necromancers see it too?"

"No." He chuckled. "None of them can. You have to understand, I don't have that skill because of my necromancy. I became a necromancer because I had that skill. It's passed down my family lineage on my mother's side, so it's something I've simply always been able to do."

"Oh." Lexie wondered vaguely if he was like Dewie, if he had soul magic passed down from the Guardians, which was why he could see what he saw.

In which case, why wasn't his defective like Dewie's? Why wasn't it shortening his lifespan?

"When you see souls as often as I do," Madswick added. "You eventually become interested in learning how to manipulate them."

"Is that what your experiments are about? Manipulating souls?

"More or less. More so, I'm interested in learning about what it means to be a Chosen. I know that you've likely already received a quest from your guide. Can you tell me, or at least give me a hint, on what the quest is?"

"Uh…" Lexie hesitated. She didn't have a quest because she wasn't officially a Chosen, but telling him that would lead to more questions and would eventually lead to them uncovering that her father had illegally spliced her Chosen soul with that of his daughter.

Therefore, she had to jump to the next best thing and said, "It has to do with Card magic. I think that's all I can say."

"Interesting," Madswick murmured. "I wondered why a Chosen would be given such a weak skill and relegated to being a C-Rank Card mage. All the ones I've met so far have had the potential for world-changing power, so I watched you and waited for your true skill to be revealed. Though I have to say, I'm impressed with the card you made for Jett and how you thoroughly managed to hide its true intention and its signature by simply having it appear as a blank card. Very clever, indeed."

Ah. So he wasn't lying about the card being blank. Great. That must have been Naem's doing, and it was good thinking on his part, too, because Lexie hadn't even considered it.

"So," he said. "What end do you want? What do you want the world to look like under your regime?"

Lexie swallowed. Tate had said that the Chosen determined the end. She hadn't taken it to mean that they could literally redesign the world, but now she was thinking maybe that was the case?

How?

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And who was running this system? It couldn't just be the ISTS. She didn't think they had that kind of power.

It was bigger than them and bigger than any human. Was it the Fae? Another alien creature?

"My end is just that I want things to be fair," Lexie said simply. "And everyone to have access to magic."

Madswick looked disappointed.

"That's fairly generic," he said. "Did you experience a lot of unfairness in your world?"

She nodded. "Yes, and a lot of people around me did. It was a dog-eat-dog world, where the rich and powerful make the rules and everyone else is forced to play by them."

"Hmm. That world doesn't sound too unlike this one."

"It's not."

Madswick nodded, humming in thought.

"The Chosen you met," Lexie asked. "Where is he now?"

Madswick sighed. "He is unfortunately dead. As are the others."

"Dead?" Lexie blinked. "How?"

He shrugged. "Mysterious circumstances." As Lexie continued to stare at him, he said, "I didn't kill them if that's what you're wondering."

"I wasn't wondering that at all." But now that he'd mentioned it... "All of them are dead?"

"Yes. Well, you know what happens if a chosen loses all their fate points, don't you?"

"Fate points?" Lexie blurted out before she could catch herself, and Madswick raised an eyebrow.

"I mean, yeah," she corrected herself. "Yeah, I know." In her head, she was frantically asking herself what a fate point was, and wondering why Tate hadn't explained it to her.

She wished he had, so she wouldn't have made a mistake, and Madswick wouldn't be giving her that suspicious look right now.

"Your guide didn't explain what fate points are?" Madswick asked.

"Not they did," Lexie said. "It's just that I forgot. It has been years after all, and I was more than a little disheveled when all the explanations were going on."

"Ah, of course." He nodded, seemingly accepting that explanation. "Well, you don't have to worry about losing fate points. I'm sure you have more than enough, considering that you have a very strong contract with an Eldritch Lord."

So he could see the contract.

"It's well hidden," he said. "Most other necromancers won't be able to tell, but like I said, I'm peculiar. Not to mention the Lightlark boy has been sniffing around you enough that, even if I wasn't peculiar, I would guess that he sensed a higher Eldritch power there."

Lexie remained silent, neither admitting nor denying it. She still didn't trust his intentions.

"You told me you would explain how you knew it was me over the Undernet," she said.

"Ah." Madswick stared off at the trophies on his shelf and asked, "You know I was a chess prodigy when I was young."

"You were?"

"No, that's a lie. But I was very talented. Not as good as some people, but I was the best in my village in District 8. If you'd asked me at that time, I would have told you I was the best in the world. That was until I met Giorgio Asin."

"Who?

"You wouldn't know him." Madswick waved a hand. "Now, he doesn't play much, but back then...he was fierce. He'd beaten me several times and mocked me while he was at it. I was so frustrated that I cried after every game. That was until I realized something very simple, the key to winning." He shrugged. "I could simply cheat."

Well, that was certainly one way. "How?"

"You see, I noticed that I could sense Giorgio's soul shifting depending on what strategy he was going to employ. It was subtle shifts, but it let me know which was leaning. So I spent the next few games studying it, and with that, I could predict him perfectly. So I knew how to beat him."

"Oh."

"Oh, yes. I humiliated him on a world stage, and after that, I went on to rise in the ranks, defeating even more opponents using the same strategy. However, I dropped out of the final."

"Because you realized what you were doing was wrong?" Lexie surmised.

"Heavens no," he snorted. "I dropped out because I was bored. Winning all the time had gotten dull, especially winning the way I was doing it. There was no challenge, no thrill. So I left that world behind and relegated chess back to a simple hobby. Nevertheless, I had acquired this new skill and was interested in exploring it. I did so over the next few decades, studying how to predict people's actions using their souls. I noticed it was easier to run using a medium, and while some used ancient tarot cards or books, I preferred to use the game of chess. And then eventually, I started learning how to do it backwards. How to read a soul through playing a game."

"So that's how you read mine?"

"More or less. It took me decades to master, and it took even longer for me to do it over the net, without even seeing the person. Journeyman was the key who helped with the final stage of that journey. He taught me Elven techniques and naming traditions and helped me perfect that skill. He also gave me that Crystal ball over there." He pointed to his shelf. "So, using that, after the brief game we played, I could figure out your name, but nothing else about you. Of course, the name Sparrowfoot is well-known thanks to your father, so a little NET sleuthing and I found out who you were. Learned about your escapades. I assumed it would end there, but imagine my surprise when you showed up in the academy. Like fate." He grinned, and Lexie pursed her lips.

"That soul reading thing," Lexie said. "Is that something you can teach?"

"Not without you having Soul Sight first, and even then, it would take years to master. But I can teach you so much more, Lexie."

"You can?"

"I can." His eyes glittered.

"Why would you help me?" Lexie asked.

"Because you're a Chosen. And if you win, perhaps I get a say in what the world looks like too," he said, voice eager. "Work with me, Lexie. Let's reshape the world together, and in return, I can help you find your Uncle."

***

Lexie needed time to think about the offer, and she went away from that meeting feeling conflicted about Madswick.

Sure, he was a weirdo, but it was more in an obsessive way than an explicitly evil way.

Plus, it felt like he didn't actually know how weird he was. Or was that just her being nice and naive?

She didn't know, but after actually having a conversation with him…well, she didn't like him per se, but she didn't dislike him either.

She was conflicted about whether or not to tell her father about his offer too.

Her dad was currently DND, but she wanted to speak to him about the fact that Madswick knew she was a Chosen, and he also mentioned something called fate points. Searching the NET didn't yield any results on what that was, and she didn't want to search the Undernet quite yet, because she knew Madswick could somehow track her activity on there, and she didn't want him catching on to the fact that she didn't know what a Fate Point was.

Lexie was in her lab, her leg bouncing while she waited for her father to be available again. She also needed his help assigning her newly acquired leveling points to her intelligence substats. She had an idea of how she would distribute it, but she wanted his opinion before she finalized anything.

While she waited, she drafted a few cards, another telekinetic card for herself, and a potential healing card. She also drew up a plan to refine her warning card to also have a trapping effect that would drain mana from whoever it caught.

At one point, she got a little sleepy and decided to take a nap.

She was thinking of fate points as she dozed off, and perhaps that was why she had the dream she had.

It was nighttime, and she was on a long, lonely street, surrounded by houses.

She stalked after a boy who was walking away from her.

She would know that back anywhere, that bouncy black hair, though he was a lot tinier than she remembered.

"Tate!" she called out, and her voice was younger than she remembered, too. "Tate, wait!"

"Go away, Lexie."

"Wait, I didn't mean to."

"That doesn't change anything! Don't you understand? It doesn't change the fact that you have all my fate points, and I have almost nothing, and I'm probably going to die!"

"I'm sorry," Lexie felt so bad she was nearly sobbing. "Please, let me help."

"You can't. Just go home, Lexie."

"I don't want to. I don't know those people."

"Yes, you do. You just had an injury. You'll remember them again."

Tate turned a corner, and Lexie hurried to follow, but then she heard a voice screeching with panic from behind her. "Lexie!"

She spun around and saw the woman who called herself her mother, Lara, running toward her seemingly at the speed of light.

Lexie's heart sank. She couldn't outrun Lara, and couldn't escape even if she wanted to.

The woman grabbed Lexie's shoulder when she reached her and shook her lightly.

"Why would you do that?" she demanded. "Why would you run away like that when I was asleep? Do you know how terrified I was, baby?"

"I don't know you," Lexie said numbly, tears rolling down her cheeks. She felt like she'd said that so many times, but no one was listening. She'd also cried so many times, her throat was hoarse. "I don't know you."

Her mother's face twisted in sorrow, but she shook her head and got herself under control again.

"I know," she said softly. "I know it feels like that, but...we really are your parents. I swear. I'll wait as long as you need for you to regain your memories. Can you just give us a chance? Please?"

Lexie stared at the woman with her pleading eyes, bleeding with love and sorrow. Lexie's real mother had never begged her like that before.

Lexie exhaled and nodded.

It wasn't like she had a choice anyway. Tate was her only way back home, and he'd just left her in the dust.

"Thank you," Lara said, drawing her close into a hug. "Let's go home."

"Are you going to tell him I ran away?" Lexie asked Lara. 'Him' referred to her husband, Aiden, and he was a lot more emotional and over-the-top than his wife. If he knew she ran away, he would probably be sad, cry, and make her feel guilty for the rest of the night. He'd probably refuse to go to work again, too.

Lara smiled as though she could tell what Lexie was thinking. "No. For today, we can just keep this from your father."

***

Lexie's eyes flew open as she jolted awake, sitting up instantly.

What the heck?

Tate had told her about fate points! A long time ago, before their meeting in Arcadia.

It had to be after one of her soul injuries, but definitely before this last one.

She'd known Tate before her last awakening.

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