The sound of the train coming to a stop and the whoosh of wind that followed caused some distress for Aya. She stepped back, clenched her fists together, and cleared her throat.
“You okay?” I whispered out of the corner of my mouth. Even stranger was the fact that I could see their reflection in the train’s glass windows as it slowed, yet no one else could.
“I will be fine,” she said in a way that indicated to me that she would not be fine.
The doors opened and a few people, mostly hipsters, spilled out. We pushed our way in, and I almost offered the only available seat to Lady C. I caught myself in time, and sat next to a sleepy- eyed man reading a copy of the New York Times.
“I thought you would offer that seat to me.” Aya stood near me, one arm raised so she could hold onto a free handle bar. While they could interact with the environment, mostly notably with stationary objects, moving objects such as other people caused a very strange thing to happen.
Even now, as Lady Cassandra read her book, the bag of a woman standing next to her was pressed through her chest, which was unsettling to look at.
As I got more used to the Monster Hunt app when it was active, I realized why someone would make it illegal.
First, there was the fact that you could control someone else’s mind by using it. What if someone was able to figure out a way to control Aya or Lady C. remotely and they told me to do something that I actually did?
There was also the personal space of other people to take into account. If more people legally used Monster Hunt, it could cause quite a scene on something like a subway train. It could quickly become a public safety hazard.
“I’m going to be sick,” Aya said as the train started to pick up speed.
Dammit, Aya, I thought as she started to retch.
Lady C. looked over at her, snapped her book shut, and closed her eyes, her throat quivering as she tried not to vomit.
“I need to sit,” Aya said, but before I could offer her my seat, she bent forward and started vomiting all over a guy’s shoe.
“Shit!” I stood and was thankful, for once, that I was on in the New York subway.
Anywhere else, a dude standing randomly and cursing would have brought some attention. Not here. Hell, the guy next to me didn’t even look up from his paper.
Still not able to separate reality from augmented reality, I looked from Aya’s fresh vomit to the standing guy’s shoe, an apology on my lip. Of course, Aya’s vomiting sent Lady C. over the edge, and she projectile vomited through the woman standing next to her.
I heard the guy ruffle his newspaper next to me, but he still didn’t say anything.
“Fuck me,” I whispered as I grabbed Aya’s hand.
I sat, brought her onto my lap, and whispered for her to close her eyes and keep still.
“You guys want to go back to the Dojo?” I whispered.
Aya shook her head as she turned to wrap her arm around my shoulder. “No, we have to get used to this world.” She retched again and placed her hand over her mouth.
“Close your eyes,” I whispered to her.
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
“That was an ... experience.” I exhaled loudly as we exited the subway and turned to Brooklyn Bridge Park. The annoying thing about getting to this area was that it forced us to go into the city and then loop back. There was also a transfer, from J to F, which only complicated our time in the New York subway system.
I noted this, and planned to either use a bus or walk, if possible, whenever we traveled. Subway travel wasn’t avoidable, but I could at least keep things simple for their sake.
We left the Clark Street Subway Station, and as we walked, Aya and Lady C. started feeling better. At one point, I got a little ahead of the two, and Aya quickly caught up with me using her ghost limb, preventing me from going forward.
As real as this seemed, I wondered what it must have looked like for someone else watching me get stopped by an invisible force. I must have looked like a mime.
We reached the park and I told them to get ready. The temperature had increased, and I could smell meat from a hamburger joint not too far away. Rather than salivate, I focused on the task at hand.
“We make our first catch today,” I said as I looked down at my hand. It was charged, and as I stretched my fingers apart, a web of magic spread between them.
Lady C. unsheathed both her blades.
From what I could tell already, Lady C. was a bit faster than Aya, likely because of the weight of Aya’s huge sword, and she seemed to be the one that would chase the creatures out.
“And you won’t mess it up this time?” Aya asked me.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, and no, I’ll do my part.”
“Then stay back and let us do ours.”
I followed behind them now as Lady C. moved through the park. She stopped every now and then to examine something, from a trash can to a trampled leaf. At one point, she called Aya over and showed her a smudge mark on the pavement.
This really is like hunting, I thought as they moved closer to the water’s edge. I hope it’s not a sea monster.
Aya investigated the shoreline for a moment as Lady C. pressed forward.
A woman jogging along the main path passed them. She was dark-skinned and had her hair pulled back into a tight ponytail.
Lady C.’s eyes went wide as she looked at the woman.
“What are you doing ...” I started to whisper as she took both her blades from the sheathes on her back.
Aya unsheathed her ironing board of a sword and crouched, the blade resting against her shoulders.
A flash of magic and Lady C. was suddenly gone. I looked left to see her appear on the path in front of the jogging woman, both blades at the ready.
The woman stopped jogging and dropped her arms to her side in a defensive pose.
What the hell is going on? I thought as I started running over to them.
A puff of black smoke engulfed the woman and her flesh dripped away, revealing a female clad in tight black robes that matched her charcoal skin. Her head quickly morphed to that of a panther and her hands formed large claws.
Her stats appeared:
A Skin-Walker?
The thought produced an instant definition from GoogleFace:
In Navajo culture, a Skin-Walker (yee naaldlooshii) is a harmful witch capable of changing into and possessing animals. Yee Naaldlooshii translates to “goes on all fours” and refers to the witch’s ability to shapeshift. Not much information about Skin-Walkers is available outside of Navajo culture due to the indigenous peoples’ reluctance to speak about the subject.
“Get that one!” I shouted, knowing all too well how beneficial it would be to have a shifter in my Fighting Party.
Her blades in front of her now, Lady C. engaged the Skin-Walker with a series of quick thrusts. The Skin-Walker was much faster than I thought she’d be. She avoided all but one of Lady C.’s attacks, her fast footwork allowing her to counterattack with a clawed uppercut.
“Shit!” I ran towards Lady C., who had hit the ground and tumbled to the right. The Skin-Walker caught her first glimpse of me and a sinister grin painted across her face.
Suddenly, she was Iris, her backpack over her chest, that kind look on her face. She wore an oversized sweater and a little skirt. Fishnet leggings ran down her legs and into a pair of Converse, and as she stared at me, she began to tilt her head to the side.
Running up behind her, Aya had her blade raised and was just about to swing it down when I cried out. “Iris!”
The smile still on her face, Iris narrowly avoided Aya’s blade.
“Get a hold of yourself,” I whispered as a scorpion tail grew from Iris’ lower back. The stinger bit into the ground, forcing Aya to jump up and away from its next strike.
“It’s not Iris,” I whispered as Lady Cassandra rolled to her feet and braced herself.
She took off towards the Skin-Walker, ready to finish the job.
&nbs
p; Coming up from behind the Navajo witch, Lady C. lunged for her stinger.
The witch cried out as Lady C. cut through her scorpion appendage. Purple blood misted into the air as the shape-shifting witch hit the ground and came up as a towering stone creature.
“Shit,” I said as I took in the creature’s form.
Easily ten feet tall, the creature had bulky rock muscles and its back reminded me of a turtle shell. One foot off the ground, it slammed its heel onto the soil, causing a small quake.
“Um…” Not quite knowing my role in all this, but figuring it couldn’t hurt, I started yelling at the creature and waving my hands.
“Hey! Hey!” I shouted as I took off towards the action. “Over here!”
The big bruiser turned to me, lifted both fists, and smashed them together, causing a sharp gust of wind to knock me over.
“Shit!” I hit the ground, my legs going over my head as I rolled backwards. Up on my feet again, and determined to give Aya and Lady C. the distraction they needed, I waved my hands at the shape-shifter and hopped up and down.
Growling now, the witch took a few powerful steps towards me, hellbent on crushing me with its big foot.
It was then that I saw Aya’s blade tear through the witch’s center mass.
The stone monstrosity fell to its knees as her form changed back into her original form. Before she could shape-shift again, Aya’s blade slipped out of her body, and Lady C., her swords held like open scissors, took her place behind the witch.
“Now!” Aya called to me.
Energy whirled around my hand as I lifted my hand to the Skin-Walker. A giant net made of light tore from the center of my palm, hit the witch, and the powerful mythcrea was gone in a flash.
My first capture.
“That was awesome,” I said, marveling at my glowing hand.
“That was very stupid of you,” Aya said as she approached me.
“But we did it,” Lady C. added, “and that’s all that matters.”
Chapter Five: I Want to be Attacked by Japanese Wind Gods
“How did you teleport like that?” I asked Lady C. as I sat on a bench looking out at Manhattan. New York, even though I’d grown up here, never ceased to amaze me with its beauty.
“It was a spell I taught myself,” she said as she sat down next to me. “And Aya thought reading the Book of Time was useless.”
“You’re the one that said it was too hard to interpret,” the Thulean warrior said. She stood in front of us, her buster sword sheathed across her back.
“I figured this one out. It’s like a teleport spell,” Lady Cassandra explained, “but it is actually a spell manipulating time rather than a spell propelling me forward. Anyway, it took half my mana to cast it.”
“Worth it,” Aya said.
“Definitely.”
My iNet screen flashed as I received a call from Iris. As soon as I accepted the call, a live video of her appeared in the lower left-hand corner of my pane of vision, as if someone had strapped a camera to her head pointed down at her face.
“Where are you?”
“Brooklyn Bridge Park,” I said. “We just caught a Skin-Walker.”
“Nice, let’s meet.”
I hesitated for a moment.
“What?” she asked. “I wanted to show you the app I got that will allow me to help you catch them. Also, we should check out your Dojo now that you have your first catch.”
“Where are you?” I asked her.
“At Pratt. My class just finished. I’ll be there as quickly as I can.”
“Iris is coming to meet us,” I informed the two Huntresses.
“Ooo, your girlfriend.” Lady C. slugged me playfully.
“Hardly.”
“We still have time to catch something else before she gets here and ruins the rest of the day.”
I had to laugh. “Really, Aya? You haven’t even met her yet.”
“It is an assumption I will keep until I’m proven otherwise.” She turned away, a thin smile on her face. “Now, down by the water, I was tracking something before…”
“She’s taking an aeros. She’ll literally be here in like five minutes,” I told her.
“Fine, I’ll just train then.”
Using her ghost limbs to suspend her body, Aya lifted herself up into the air. She tossed her body forward, and practiced landing while drawing her blade.
Meanwhile, Lady Cassandra pulled a book out of thin air and opened it across her lap.
“What are you reading now?” I asked.
“It is a history of the Thulean race,” she said quietly, so Aya didn’t hear her.
“Really? Why would you choose that subject?”
“I am curious about the ghost limbs.”
“They’re just like invisible talons, right?”
“In a way, but I’m interested in the split between Thuleans and dragons and why they later became close. Tritania has so much history.”
“Cool.”
A message from the Monster Hunt app popped up on the left-hand side of my pane of vision and my eyes naturally gravitated towards it.
The message reminded me that I had just captured my first mythcrea and it offered me steps in caring for it.
I opened it and briefly scanned directions.
Congratulations, you have captured your first mythcrea! Be sure to see to your Dojo and make it a comfortable place to live and train. Once you have five mythcrea you may start entering tournaments. We recommend taking the tournament tutorial here. You may also learn more about how to merge mythcrea to create stronger members for your Fighting Party here.
“Ha!”
I glanced up to see Aya drop from the air, flip backwards, and land with an attack that caused a small percussive blast.
“That was great, Aya,” I called over to her.
Lady Cassandra looked up at the Thulean. “Impressive. That should help us flip an enemy, if that’s something we ever have to do.”
“Flip an enemy?”
“Like a giant turtle,” she said.
“Or mama bearadillo,” Aya said as she raised into the air to practice the maneuver for a second time. “I will kill that bitch.”
I started to laugh, “She was just protecting her cub.”
“I will kill her cub too.”
“I want to keep her cub as a pet. Can I keep her as a pet?” Lady C. pulled at my arm. “Please, Chase, please!”
“Sure, if we can capture the mother without killing her, you can keep the cub as a pet.”
Lady Cassandra hugged me. “You’re the best, Chase!”
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
“Aya is standing over there,” I told Iris as soon as she arrived.
She wore the same pair of glasses she had yesterday, but now there were two tiny black sensors attached to the frames.
“She is moving up and down, right?”
“Yeah, I believe she is practicing what it would be like to kill you and, um, body slam you with her ghost limbs.”
Iris laughed. “That’s nice to know. And Lady C. is next to you, correct?”
“Can she see us?” Lady Cassandra poked at my shoulder.
“Not exactly,” I explained. “She has installed something on her glasses that allows her to sense where you are, but she can’t outright see you.”
“So, she can’t see me waving my book at her?” Lady C. flapped the book in the air, causing her breasts to bounce.
“No, but she can sense that you are moving.”
Iris nodded. “I can’t hear you either, but you can hear me, correct?”
Lady C. considered this for a moment. “Yes, I can hear her, but I don’t really like the sound of her voice.”
“What did she say?” Iris asked excitedly.
I cleared my throat. “Um, never mind.”
“I really need to get a code, but they are so rare nowadays,” Iris said, her face dipping into a frown.
“And you can’t buy one?”
“Sure, i
f I had twenty thousand dollars in cash lying around and someone actually willing to sell theirs.”
“We really, really should have bought gear instead of having me install this. I can uninstall it and give you mine,” I suggested.
“Don’t do it,” Lady C. said, tugging at my arm again. “You’ll lose us if you do that.”
Aya stopped going through combat drills and looked over at us. “He’d better not try and unload us.”
“You can’t give it to me anymore,” Iris said, the wind rustling her curly blonde hair. “Trading won’t work with the codes I got if you’ve already installed them.”
“What do you mean?”
“To stop the resale of Monster Hunt codes, this year’s release of codes doesn’t allow for the code to be sold or transferred once it is installed. If I were to buy a code, it’d have to be an older one. Or someone would have to give me theirs without first installing it. Anyway. We’ll cross that bridge when we get there.” Iris pounded her fist into her open palm. “Let’s get hunting!”
Aya passed right through her.
“How is the cute little sweater girl supposed to help us?” The Thulean turned back to examine Iris more closely. “It would be odd if I were this short. She does have a nice figure though, but her clothes are too baggy. Do you think she is sexy, Chase?”
“I agree with Aya about the baggy clothes. And there’s nothing wrong with being short and sexy,” said Lady C. “You should take her shopping, Chase, treat her.”
“What are they saying?” Iris asked, her eyes wide with excitement.
I swore my glasses had started to fog up. “They are saying that, um, that you are beautiful and that your style is cool.”
“Thanks, ladies!”
Aya snorted. “I would never compliment a female on her frumpy sweater. And about both of your glasses: I would suggest that she get corrective surgery from one of the Mind Mages in Porthos.”
I chuckled. Having two “invisible friends” would take some getting used to, especially if they were talking shit.
“What is it?” Iris asked.
“Just some mindless banter.”
Monster Hunt NYC: A Fantasy Harem Adventure Page 4
