Broken

Chapter 32

Yejun sat on the edge of the sofa in clean clothes, his hair damp, and a towel draped around his shoulders. He stared at me wide-eyed and at a loss for words. I didn't blame him, I had just dumped a load of mess on him after all.

"So that's what I have been up to." I said with forced cheeriness. "How about you? How was your school trip?"

Scared eyes turned irritated. "Don't change the subject." He sighed, rubbing his forehead as if he had a headache. "I know you get sucked into trouble all the time, but even for you this is a lot. I mean... a Depraved?"

Yejun's face went pale again, as it had when I told him about the Selection. I didn't go into the gory details, but I hadn't hidden anything from him either. Normally I glossed over the dark things that could happen in instances, but to not tell him this time felt like lying, rather than just protecting him. He wasn't a child any more, and had even entered the Tower himself.

As if reading the frantic thoughts racing through my head, Yejun said: "Now that I have come face to face with monsters and the like myself, I thought I had a clearer grasp on the stuff you must have been going through all these years. But this is all so far beyond what I could even imagine. I can't believe you had to go through all that..."

I set a comforting hand on my brother's shoulder. "I won't lie and say I am fine... but I am pretty good at compartmentalizing. I decided to focus on looking for an opportunity to punch Misfortune in the face the next chance I get."

Yejun groaned and fell back against the couch. "That isn't even funny. What good would punching a demon do? Stay away from demons!" He sighed, clearly thinking that I would still punch a demon if I saw one, regardless of his advice or wishes. "So, what about these changes to your skill? Did you use the skill saving feature already?"

I nodded. "Right after I got back home. I had a temporary <Identification> skill that seemed would be useful. And who knew what trash I might get next."

"And?"

"I don't know if Misfortune can mess with it directly, or if it automatically gets changed, but it's hardly the same skill anymore. At it's current level I can see a person's name, level and their mental state..."

"Mental state? That's out of the ordinary. Can you see their stats or skills? That would be more typical for higher tiered <Investigation> type skills."

"Nope, nothing so useful. I am able to learn a secret from the people I use the skill on."

"A secret?" Yejun asked, looking at me like I was a bug.

"I haven't used <Honesty> on you." I drawled, rolling my eyes. "Besides, it isn't like it tells me big, life changing, take-to-your-grave type secrets. They seem to be just slightly embarrassing secrets. Like being afraid of clowns, or that they pick their nose or something. It's only marginally worth reading. Other than Argus, I haven't used it on the Chaos members either. I really do not want to know their embarrassing secrets, and still have to look them in the eye every day..."

Yejun chuckled weakly and offered me a small smile, looking as tired as I felt. "I guess we now need to work out what it is that we are going to do next..." He sighed. "We might have to move out of our apartment if the media has it steaked out. Especially since public opinion towards Depraved is especially bad. For all we know, there could be crazy people looking to take you out or something. There are people out there who think the Depraved are evil incarnate you know?"

"About that..." I said, folding my legs under myself on the couch. "I have actually received  a couple invites from organizations. The Association for one. But, both Chaos as well as the Northern Paladins have made offers too. I'm also willing to bet that, if I hadn't asked Carson to keep everyone away, there are other guilds who have probably been looking too."

"Really? Even the Northern Paladins? They are super famous though... I can understand Chaos. I mean, we are staying in their guild right now, and you are friends with the twins... But is an 'unlimited potential' rating really something to take that big of a risk on? They must think you are secretly hiding some kind of epic skill for them to do that."

I nodded. "I told the twins and Carson about the basics of <Broken>, but they are the only ones I've told. Neither the Paladins nor the rest of Chaos know anything more then what the association has released publicly. So their offer seems a little premature. Both of the offers from those two guilds have been quite favorable towards you."

"Me?" He asked, confused.

"Yeah. You are a pretty promising magical engineer you know? You shouldn't sell yourself short."

Yejun clicked his tongue dismissively. "My talents aside, I can't say that I am overly happy about being used as bait to get you to join a specific guild."

"Questionable motives or not, they're good offers. For the both of us. You are my main concern, but it isn't a lie to say that being out on my own without the protection of some kind of organization would be bad for me right now. No matter how high my potential is, I'm a sitting duck right now. A sitting duck prone to having bad things happening to them on a daily basis."

"That's true... So, what are these offers then?"

We spent the next twenty minutes or so going over what the Association, Chaos and the Paladins had brought up. Yejun had been astounded when he learned of Gordon Mills, but also got stormy faced when he learned of the older man's attitude. To my surprise, he didn't even seem slightly tempted by the Northern Paladins' offer, glossing over it like it meant almost nothing.

"So what do you think?" I asked him once I felt we had gone over everything. I had thought that he would jump on the Northern Paladins as the best option, but that didn't seem to be the case at all.

"Well..." He said, contemplating. "Shouldn't we just stay here?" He asked.

"Here? Really?" I mean, I didn't mind. Chaos had been good to me so far, and I already got along well enough with Greyson and Eric. Plus, there was Aiden who was also a Depraved, even if he was presumed to be a masochist. I hadn't thought Yejun would be so ready to just say 'yes' to them. He was the type to think things out more before making a decision.

I had actually expected him to suggest feeling out other guilds while he contemplated the Paladins offer. I knew he appreciated the twins looking out for me, but he also wasn't exactly comfortable with their high energy and objectively crazy personalities either. So his decision to just roll over and accept joining them without a thought was rather shocking.

"Well, I mean... you like the people here right? And even though they claim to be a small, newer guild, they are pretty well established. Not many new guilds could possibly have a building like this one right?"

I narrowed my eyes on my brother and his speedy rambling. He was a god awful liar, and it was always easy to tell when he was hiding something. Why the hell was he getting red around the ears?

"Hmmm?" Was all I said, suspicious.

Yejun went beat red and jumped to his feet. "Its nothing!" he said, waving his hands some what frantically. "It's like I said, it just seems like the best choice is all. Nothing more to it! Um... I'm gonna go take a shower!" He said suddenly, dashing back to his temporary room. Though , if we were staying here, I supposed that it was not going to be temporary anymore.

I raised and eyebrow and smirked, trying not to laugh. "You just had a shower!" I shouted as his door snapped shut.

For the first time I was tempted to use <Honesty> on another person, just to see what the 'secret' function would reveal about my innocent brother, and what was making him so embarrassed in conjunction with the Chaos guild. For some reason the image of Alex bending down to whisper into Yejun's ear back at the Tower flashed through my mind and I snickered. Was that what this was about?