Blood dripped down from a dirty ceiling. A human looked up and cringed. But not in fear, rather it was from fear of dirtiness. The woman had seen plenty of blood during the beheading of DAME. DAME stood for the dirty (corrupted) people, the assholes that were cruel to innocent, the monsters, the emotionless superpower human beings created from experiments.
The young lady mumbled something and waved a hand. The blood vanished. She walked slowly to the next room, which was similarly dark and dirty. There was an armchair in the middle of the room. Unlike its surrounding, it was brand new and clean. Someone was reclining on it. It looked like a human-size barbie doll, silent and motionless with pretty blond hair.
“Any news from Her Majesty?” the lady asked the doll.
The doll slowly opened its eyes and clear frosty blue eyes stared at her. It was a while before it spoke. “Her Majesty had already given you the information on the DAME.”
The lady waved a hand in an exaggerated gesture. “Yeah, yeah, I know that. But I had finished them off. Aren’t there any more assignments? I’m getting bored.”
The doll closed her eyes and did not respond again. The lady sighed and took off again.
*************************************************************
Wida yawned and almost fell asleep in the middle of the lecture. She found her university class very boring. Her head almost dropped off. Finally, to her relief, the bell rang. While the students clustered into groups of friends, Wida went out of the lecture hall by herself. With her gloomy expression, coldness, nerdy look and lack of enthusiasm for idle chitchat, she had no friend to relate to. Besides, she saw no need to have one. She had been weak before, but not now. She once had a few friends but most of them was stuck or died in the “Dark Hole”. No one knew exactly how much power she had and the fact that she detested humans.
As usual, she went straight for the library, her favourite sanctuary, other than the roof. Quiet, peaceful and with her favourite books, it was like heaven to her, even if it was crowded sometimes, like now.
Wida sighed in frustration when she saw the large amount of people taking up the tables, using the copying machines, or at the bookshelves. She was about to exit when the door opened suddenly and it banged into her. She summoned all her strength to withstand the force and prevent herself from falling on her butt. She hated to be embarrassed especially in the campus. She had too many such experiences in the past. She quickly regained her composure and glared at the one opening the door with ferocity.
Unexpectedly, instead of a rude dismissing student, she found herself looking at a sheepish looking guy with warm brown eyes and raven black hair who apologized sincerely and then left. Apparently, even he knew he was wrong. Her temper cooled down a bit. Wida knew there was only one thing left to do to improve her mood. Fighting with the monsters.
*******************************************************
It was mid evening when Wida got to town. Seeing an ice cream van nearby, her mouth watered and she headed straight to it. As she neared the van door, it opened suddenly. Thrown by surprise, Wida landed on the grasses. She had a strong feeling of deja vu. Without much surprise, she saw that the person who stood at the door was the male student from the library. He gasped and quickly held out his hand.
“I…I am so…so sorry…..Are you…alright?” he apologized, looking anxiously.
Wida took his hand and got up. “I am fine. Guess today is my day for knocking into doors.” She rubbed her forehead where it had painfully knocked into the door.
“I am so sorry. Can I do anything for you?” the student looked like he was the one in pain.
Seeing his expression, Wida could not gather any anger. “Yeah, I was going to buy an ice cream. Are you in charge of this van?”
“Yes for today. My mother owned this. She was sick today so I came here to work. What would you like to have?” he said, looking relieved.
“Chocolate,” Wida replied.
The student quickly went back inside the van and prepared it. Out of curiosity, Wida asked him, “What’s your name?”
The student was startled and almost dropped the ice cream cone. Wida was surprised herself. She never cared for anyone’s name. In the past, she certainly would not dare to ask for someone’s name. She was proud of herself, since this was a great indication of her changed self.
“Mike,” he replied softly.
Wida nodded in acknowledgement and wondered if she should tell him her name. What was the courtesy of name formality anyway? She shrugged and kept her name to herself. He had not asked anyway.
Wida took the ice cream from him and handed the money over.
Mike shook his head. “Please keep the money. This shall be my treat as my apology.”
Wida grinned. “Thanks! You are a good person.”
Mike blushed slightly and lowered his head slightly. He mumbled. “You are welcome.”
Wida turned around to leave and stopped midway. She turned her head around slightly and said, “by the way, if you have interest to know, my name is Wida.” Then, she ambled off.
Mike only looked at her with a slightly stunned look.
Wida ate her ice cream and walked into a dark alley. If anybody looked at her now, they would noticed a slight change in her face. Her hair also started to frizzle out and curled slightly. She was now older by six years. She finished eating and wiped her hands on her shirt. Then, she checked that no one was around and then mumbled something.
A red glow surrounded her on the ground. In a flash, she disappeared. Wida then appeared outside a door. It was in what looked like a dimension. Nothing was around and "stars" floated all around. The door swung open by itself and she entered. She walked to a desk, which had her computer with a blinking blue screen.
“Welcome, welcome, Mistress,” the computer chirped.
Wida typed something on the computer and waited for a while.
“Your Majesty is now available. Connecting now……” the computer beeped and the screen turned black.
Then, it cleared to reveal a shining blue diamond crystal.
“Wi, I thought Tisana had told you about your assignment? Is there any problem?”
“Your Majesty, there is only one problem. The DAME in my namelist have been taken care of but one of the the specialists in charge of the ASH project had disappeared. Do you want her to be apprehended immediately?”
The crystal shone brighter and then turned red. Immediately, it turned back to blue.
“No, leave her alone. Blue Knight will handle her. I had another job for you. Come down to the headquarter tomorrow afternoon.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
The screen died. Wida typed for a minute and many words came out in a jumble. There were some strange symbols as well. This continued for a long while. Then, the screen turned black.
“Goodnight, Mistress,” the computer said.
Wida yawned and stretched her arms out. Her job for the day was done. She would continue on her Black Knight duties tomorrow.
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In this world, there now existed a worldwide organisation that protect the ordinary people and kept the "peace". It is called CHESS. The CHESS consisted of a headquarter with Her Majesty, the Knights, Rook, Bishops, who were otherwise known as specialists, and Pawns who were normal fighters and allies. They were in charge of ridding the world of monsters. Yet, the entire world did not know they had another dark side. The media helped them to hide the fact that they also killed humans, those who were truly evil and or corrupted, including specialists. The government, fearful of their power, turned a blind eye to their doings.
Specialists were humans with superpower or super weapons. They could have gotten their power through three reasons. One, their genes were modified by some reasons such as experiment, radiation or monster poison. Two, they were born with it. Three, they had absorbed Her Majesty's crystals. Those with super weapons had their weapons connected with the crystal.
Two years ago, Her Majesty made some crystals that contain power. However, they became unbalanced and then spread throughout the world. Her Majesty could not stop this from happening. Under special cirumstances of extreme stress, hatred, defense, the crystals would react to that person and be absorbed by him or her. Then, it would provide their source of power. Some crystals were placed into the weapon of that person and made it powerful.
Inside CHESS, the Knights and Rooks, who were specialists, were a source of respect and fear to the other specialists, as well as fighters and the assistants in headquarter. The Knights and the Rooks had a level of superpower that way surpassed the Bishops.
The Knights and Rooks had their real names hidden from others except among their group. False names or codes were used instead. “Wida”, “Tiffany” and “Victoria” were examples.
The White Knight not only had an intelligence of a genius but also had the power to create anything from monsters to non-living things. He had no interest to attack anything with his power so he mainly engaged in dangerous research unless Her Majesty ordered him to do something else. He was often expressionless and was silent, engrossed in his work.
Blue Knight, an elementalist, had the ability to manipulate weather and gathered energy from it to defeat enemies. She was energetic and cheerful, an unusual character in headquarter.
Red Knight was a strong swordsman who could cut anything including metals, as well as having an extraordinary fast speed. He could melt any metal as well as mould them. He was also merciless and could kill without blinking an eye.
There were only two people in the Rooks rank. Rooks were in charge of healing anyone and applied poison to enemies unknowingly. They could also mutate the human body for good or bad. They were extremely dangerous and important as they could refuse to treat the wounded if they were unhappy.
Wida was only friendly to the Blue Knight and one of the Rook. They were the first people Wida encountered when she was brought into custody in headquarter.
Black Knight had the ability to distort and manipulate time and space and destroyed things accordingly. She could change the time back to before the thing existed and hence erased the existence of that thing. Explosion was made possible too by speeding up the evolution of items. She could also change her appearance to which ever age she preferred literally. Her favourite though was to open a new dimension where she lived with her computer, which was given by Her Majesty for assignments and to regulate her powers.
Not only that, her power had three levels to which she could open the seals to. Power one was time, power two was the ability to manipulate wind, and using it to protect oneself against everything. Every time Wida opened a seal, there would be a red glow occurring. Furthermore, there was only one power to which there was no seal required. She could summon her weapon, a scythe, in any place.
Lastly, there was Her Majesty. She was not a human being. She was a half-angel, half-demon, in crystal diamond form. She had a strong power called CODE. (Creation, Open of demon and hell portals. Destroy powers and Empathy power which took other people’s powers). She was the leader of the CHESS headquarter. She could be cruel or kind depending on the situation. She was also the one who located the special humans who had superpower or the DAME. The assistants would then try to find the specialists with the superpower and brought them to the headquarter in custody while the rest would destroy the aggressive and prevalent specialists.
It was also Her Majesty who found the Knights and Rooks, who all deceloped special abilities under special circumstances. All the Knights and Rooks had a dark past, which made them able to kill DAME.
********************************************************
The next day, Wida skipped her class and went straight to headquarter. There was an interesting activity there at that morning. Newbie would be training for their first test in the dangerous ground. Wida loved the thrill of fighting.
Over there, Wida summoned her mental guard up first. There were some telepathic in there and she liked her thoughts private. She passed the hall to the room at the third floor.
There were different colors of jackets for the different levels. The newbies and Level One wore yellow jackets while the higher levels wore red, purple and blue in ascending order. There were at most ten people in each level of ranks except the newbie level and Level One. As for the Blue Rank level, it had ten Bishops, as well as the Knights and Rooks. In contrast, there were numerous assistants, with no level among them.
Nobody knew Wida was the Black Knight. Black Knight always wore a mask when she was in the general meeting, whereby everyone was gathered. This was similar for White Knight, Blue Knight, Red Knight and Rooks. Only the Knights and Rooks knew each other identities. Hence, most in CHESS treated them as normal specialists with a Blue Rank jacket. Only the newbies, Level One and Two would bow in respect.
Yet, some people who wanted the rest to know that they were Knights and Rooks would wear mask during normal time too. Wida did not.
Before reaching her destination, a person suddenly stepped into Wida’s path.
“Hi, Wida,” she said cheerfully. She had blond curly hair and green eyes. Her pretty young face smiled at Wida.
“Tiffany! Why are you here? And where’s your mask? You always wear it on,” Wida exclaimed in surprise.
Tiffany shrugged. “My mask is under repair. I accidentally caused it to be struck by lightning. I am going to the library. I am a bit bored and Her Majesty had been keeping to herself lately.” Tiffany, like Wida, had a fondness for books. She was also on close relation with Her Majesty.
“Jinx struck again, huh?” Wida said wryly. Tiffany was a well-known jinx, causing small disasters to her and occasionally to others. With her power, it was highly dangerous, thus Tiffany kept to herself with her reading most of the time. It was unusual but she was still optimistic and cheerful. This was also the main reason Wida liked her. Tiffany was a determined person who never gave up on her dreary situation.
Tiffany sighed. “I am used to it by now. By the way, where were you going?”
“I am going to the recruit training room. I am always interested in how others fight.”
“Since I am also free, why don’t I go as well?” Tiffany offered.
Wida shrugged and continued on her way with Tiffany on her heels. They walked into a room marked “TRAIN”. The room was filled with computers and equipments, with a glass door at the other end. There was a huge glass window beside the glass door. The other room was the training room where monsters and ground were created through the computers. The computer would also analyze the recruits’ power and ability to fight and defend. The walls of the room were specially created to withstand any fierce attack.
The assistants attending to the computers saw them and greeted them. They knew from their blue jackets that they were just inspecting the new recruits. There were five recruits in the training room. Only five recruits being trained at one time until their powers were controlled and thoroughly examined. Then another five and so on. The assistants would then put them accordingly to their level of rank like Level One or Two or Three.
The recruits were concentrating on their powers and trying to gather them up to fight the computed monster. An assistant was instructing them the ways. For the next fifteen minutes Tiffany and Wida watched them. Then, Wida strode into the room with the recruits while Tiffany stood outside. Tiffany did not want to harm the recruits accidentally with her cursed character. Wida whispered to the assistant and he nodded. Wida started opening up her seal. As expected, a red glow glowed around her. The recruits were surprised and jumped back in alarm.
“Now, I shall be your opponent,” Wida said simply. She held out one hand before her and a wind force suddenly appeared and nearly blew away the recruits.
The recruits were not easily defeated and gathered all their energies to go against Wida’s wind. Wida only used a little part of her wind power, not wanting to overwhelm them. Not long after, the recruits could use their respective powers to withstand Wida’s wind and stood firmly. Wida smiled a little in appreciation. She stopped.
“You have all passed,” Wida announced and nodded to the assistant, who accepted this and gestured to the assistants outside. The recruits all cheered and slapped each other palms. Wida could see they had a strong team spirit and power. Wida got out.
Tiffany grinned. “You let them go easily, didn’t you? Gotten a bit soft-hearted, aren’t you? Did any happy event happen recently?”
Wida snorted. “I marked by abilities not by people.”
Tiffany only continued to smile.
They went off for food before attending the meeting with their masks. Although it
was for the Blue Rank level and others of high level ranking, everyone still felt secure wearing a mask. It was held in the conference room with Her Majesty, who was in crystal form, at the end of the table, held by Tisana, the doll-like figure.
Tisana was Her Majesty’s creation, a doll who transmitted Her Majesty’s instructions to the specialists who could not contact with her directly like the lower levels or when Her Majesty was in temporary recluse.
This meeting was on the ASH project. ASH project was one which increased specialists either for commercial use or research purpose. However, it caused a large number of people to suffer from after-effects of experimenting with potions. The effects included turning human into the “monsters”. Hence, Her Majesty had banned the ASH project from being carried out. However, some DAME gathered as an organisation and organized the ASH project to create an “army” to fight them, as well as to increase their power and ruled the world. The specialists from ASH often brought disasters into the world such as collapsing bridges. All of these was unknown to the rest of the world save for governments.
Her Majesty glowed brightly before her voice called out. “Thanks to the help from everyone here, most of the ASH projects were stopped. We had also captured a member of the ASH project. However, she refused to leak information. Thus, I need everyone’s help to gather more information on the other ongoing ASH projects, especially in regards to the leader of the DAME.”
Everyone nodded silently. Her Majesty continued, “Blue Knight, use your elements to search and report any abnormal level of power. Red Knight, capture the DAME specialists and force them to speak. And I repeat, DO NOT kill them yet. White Knight, continue on researching for solutions to gather information from the DAME’s tight mouths. Black Knight, you shall resume your disguise as a twenty years old lady and act as informant in the university.”
Everyone chorused in agreement and started to leave.
“Black Knight, can you stay back for a while?” Her Majesty asked as Wida got out of her chair. She sat again.
“I know that you extremely hated the ASH project and the DAME involving in it. You were one of the experiments and you know better than most how painful it is. However, do restrain yourself from going after all those DAME yourself. Do you think I do not know what you were doing all this time? I just do not wish to interfere in your business.”
Wida only stared at her stonily and then got up. She spoke quietly, “I can never forgive them. They cause me to lose my identity, my family, my memory, my human heart.” She paused. "And my only best friend." She left.
Her Majesty glowed blackishly, a sign of sorrow.
*********************************************************************
Wida yawned and got out of bed. She glanced at the silent computer and knew today was going to be one boring day. She sighed and prepared for class.
At the door of the lecture hall of the university, she knocked into someone who was beside her, entering the door too. With much surprise, she found herself staring at Mike. He looked surprised too.
“You….”Wida could not finish her sentence as someone from behind her pushed her and made her move to a seat. Mike went some distance away, perhaps to his friends.
The lesson went on as usual. Wida had a strange feeling she wanted to stretch out her neck to see where Mike was. That was so bizarre and unlike her that Wida snorted silently in disbelief. She ignored the weird sensation and concentrated on the lesson.
The class was dismissed. Wida left the hall and headed towards the library. She selected a book and sat down on an almost empty table. As she opened the book and began to read, a shadow cast over her. She looked up.
Mike fidgeted uneasily and gestured at the seat opposite her. “Can I sit here?”
Wida was a bit surprised but upon looking around saw that the library tables had become full while she was busy reading. Only the seat opposite her was empty. Wida nodded at Mike to sit down. Mike sat and gathered things and books onto the table from his bag. Apparently he was going to write a paper.
They silently went about their business. After about thirty minutes, Wida finished half of her book and decided to put it back. Unfortunately, she accidentally knocked against the table with her knee. The table, with quite a large bump, tipped up on one side. Wida cringed as some of Mike’s items went flying down onto the floor. Hastily, Wida put the book down on the table and bent down to help him pick up his items. Without warning, their heads bumped into one another. Wida whirled backward and rubbed her head. Mike picked up his items and rubbed his head too. They stared at each other for a second before breaking into smiles. Wida placed his items on the table and whispered an apology. Mike nodded in acknowledgement and did not blame her. Finally, Wida exited without anymore fuss.
Wida breezed into her room and her computer immediately light up.
“Her Majesty had an announcement. Reply immediately. Reply,” the computer repeated.
Wida sat down onto her chair and pressed enter on the computer. The screen flashed twice and then showed a blue crystal spinning slowly.
“Black Knight, there’s a new assignment for you. There would be a Magixa exam this coming week. You shall be in undercover. You shall be in this group too and supervised them to see who had extraordinary quality.”
Magixa exam was a test for Level One specialists onwards and others who did not have any special power. It tested for potential high Magixa who would then would get a license issued personally by Her Majesty. Once they got the license, they did not have to work in CHESS but could work in any place in any country easily even without sufficient experiences. In addition, they could easily get high salaries or huge political influence or both by using their license. This was thanks to the huge power Her Majesty wielded throughout the world. Hence, the Magixa licenses were in huge demand. Each person only had two chances to finish the exam and acquired the license. After that, they were disqualified.
However, not everyone could get a license from the exam. It was estimated that only one or two out of fifty participants could gain one. Thus it was extremely rare. The exam did not look at one’s special power to qualify. It looked at the person’s character, like determination, strength either in magic or physical and etcetera. Certainly, the specialists might get some advantages but these advantages mostly could be used in only twenty to thirty percent of the exam.
There were three ranking for the licenses. The participants would get the rank of their licenses through their result and how easy they passed the exam. The higher the rank was, the rarer and the more influence and "money value" you could get. The lowest one was the "T" license, in which the person had quite low result and had a hard time on passing the Magixa Exam. Next up was the "A" license, in which he or she had quite high result. This license was normally and mostly limited to potential CHESS members, when they were invited to join CHESS. The highest was the "S" license, the most precious. The person must have very extraordinary abilities and powers to get this rare license.
Yet, no matter in which rank the license was as long as you had the license, you would wield power almost equal to the government all around the world.
The Knights undoubtedly had licenses. These licenses were of S types too. Some of the high rank specialists in CHESS headquarter had the Magixa licenses too.
“Why do you choose me for it? I know every year there was a Magixa exam but I am never in charge of it. Why is it me this year?” Wida asked in bewilderment.
“White Knight was supposed to oversee the examination but there were some new developments in the ASH project. He had no time for other assignments. Red Knight is too reckless for new potential Magixa. Blue Knight had others distractions to handle. Thus, you are the one most suitable for this assignment.”
Wida was still for a moment before saying, “Yes, Her Majesty. I will attend the exam.”
“Good. Remember to be inconspicuous. Don’t use your magic too often.”
The computer went blank. Wida reclined back on her chair and brooded over it. It was not that she disliked the Magixa exam. In fact, she was curious as to what it was about. She did not enter in the exam even though she had the license. Her Majesty knew it was too dangerous for her to summon magic in front of anyone especially for new members. That time Wida had no seals on her powers. Hence, she was given the license immediately and became the Black Knight. After sometime, her powers were then sealed into three parts. Wida was just worried about how to use her power without the rest seeing her summoning it. Wida was weak in her physical strength so she needed to summon part of her power to support her. Wida kept thinking about this even in sleep.
The next week came soon.
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The girl with the mask and a red eye kicked the door open and stomped into her chair. She plucked her mask off and scowled.
"Those old geezers think they are so great with all those money. They think they called all the shot just because they provide all those funds for the ASH project. Their name of "Generals" are not because of their hard work. I am the one doing the hard work! Just watch, I will make you all regret the day you cross me!" the girl mumbled angrily.
There was a knock and the door opened. The maid from previously bowed her head.
"Is there any instruction for me, Missus?"
The girl leaned her head slightly backward. "Can you bring me a cup of tea? I got a headache coming."
The maid bowed her head and assented.
The girl typed something on the computer which instantly lighted up. "There is news, there is news! Magixa exam is coming up!"
The girl finally grinned but with an evil smile. "Finally something to look forward to....."
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