Broken

Chapter 50

Almost immediately after I got back to the guild, I went on the hunt for Aiden. To be honest, he really wasn't all that hard to find. Much like most of us here, he was a creature of habit and usually could be found in one of two places when not in an instance: The infirmary, or in his apartment.

Like Yejun and I, Aiden had an apartment within the guild building. I didn't think it was his only home, but it was the one he spent most of his time at. He was the guild's main healer, after all, and needed to be on hand at all times given the shenanigans the other guild members got up to. Myself included, probably.

Putting the man's private quarters aside for a moment, I decided to start with the infirmary. It was the most likely spot anyways. Actually, I found myself spending a disconcerting amount of time here as well...

Not surprisingly, I found him there right away. Aiden was organizing the guild's potion stores in the backroom, shuffling bottles and vials around and checking the information on a clipboard. Chaos wasn't as lucky as the Northern Paladins, and we didn't have an alchemist on hand, meaning the guild had to sink a lot of money into purchasing potions.

"So, what you're asking is if I know a way to block a Higher Power out?" He asked after I explained my predicament. He set a vial of red liquid down on a shelf of similar vials and seemed to ponder for a moment. "I don't think you can... they are called a  Higher Power after all."

I shook my head. "I mean, that would be nice, booting him out entirely, but I was just hoping you might know a way to stop him from messing with me..."

Behind his dark rimmed glasses I saw an eyebrow raise over a violet eye. "He shouldn't be able to do it at all. Not here on Earth at least... there might be some argument to be made for when you're inside an instance, but even that should be near impossible."

That didn't make sense though. It felt like Misfortune was able to do tons of things, especially when it came to my skills. 

"I might only have three new skills at the moment, but all three seem to be altered from the original skill to align more with Misfortune. Two of them have his damn name slapped onto them. I find it hard to believe that he didn't have any say in that at all."

"Hmm. Well, in terms of the <Indexed> skills being more inline with Misfortune's values, I think that part can be explained."

"Really?"

Aiden nodded, the clipboard now held loosely in his long fingers while he rubbed the side of his tattooed neck with the other hand, thinking. "All of us tied to a Higher Power are influenced by them. Misery, herself, hasn't explained much, but I have learnt over time that my own skills often reflect my Higher Power's values, even when the original skill-stone or grimoire I leaned them from were different."

"Hm." I guess that made me feel the slightest bit better, as it explained a small portion of what I had grievance with...

"Though, I can safely say that none of my skills have Misery's name attached to them either. From what I've been lead to believe, it's the system itself that controls those things. And as far as I know, even the Higher Powers can't mess with the system. Not easily at least."

I felt annoyed now. "So, what you're saying is that Misfortune is just so dedicated to messing with me that he even went though the time and effort to override the system?"

Aiden shrugged. "That's how it looks to me. Though, as I said, even that shouldn't be possible at all outside the instances or- especially- the tower. Whatever he did, must have cost him a lot to have done it outside the tower. I have to say that I'm rather impressed with his dedication to trolling you."