-1 to Cognition
-5 to Pathos
Aleem blinked away the inopportune notifications. But there was more.
-1 to Will
The pavement was almost empty, and even the few persons walking by paid them little mind. This felt like a very good time for an ambush.
Almost as though he’d summoned them, a trio of boys stepped out from a side street behind him. Wispy, Big Nose and a black-haired girl stood with their arms crossed.
Aleem could already feel the exhaustion settling into him, that bone-weary tiredness that often accompanied fevers.
ALERT
You are suffering from mild Diminution sickness
Aleem very subtly angled his body in such a way that he could watch the boys ahead while also being able to glance with minimal movements at the ones behind him. The boys behind were closer and would only need about four, maybe less, dashes to reach him.
He did not have the time for this bullshit. On another day, he might have just stood there and waited for them to speak. “I’m sure you have a very good explanation for why you’re standing in my way, but it’s been a long day, and I honestly don’t care to hear it.” When they didn’t say anything, he held back a sigh. “I’m going to walk away now.” He turned to the side and made to cross the street, but the boys behind moved forward. “Don’t!” Aleem warned, trying to channel as much spleen as he could into his glare, and much to his surprise their steps faltered. “Don’t even think about it.”
“We wanted,” began the bulky boy holding the scabbard, “to have a conversation with you.” Neither his face nor voice seemed to bear any signs of his internal state, but Aleem thought the boy might be speaking through clenched teeth. Worse still, his hand appeared to tighten around the scabbard. Curly just stood beside Bulky, a sneer on his own face.
“If you come quietly, we won’t make a scene,” Wispy finally spoke up from behind Aleem.
Just the sort of dumb shit teenagers would say. There were few enough people around here for them to afford making a scene, but what did Aleem care about scenes? Still, he considered his options, mind working at the double. He wanted to insist on them moving aside, but he suspected they wouldn’t budge. There was something about being refused that hinted at weakness. It was probably silly thinking this way, but something had changed for Gwa.yao.rai after the events of two days ago. Aleem didn’t have enough context yet to deduce the specifics, but these boys gave off the feeling of people trying a different tactic. And perhaps there was also something to be said about bullies that ganged up on their targets.
He could make a break for it. Jet right. But beyond the very good chance that this body’s Agility stat was not quite as great as he supposed, doing so might send across the wrong message. Whatever relationship these mooncalves had had with Gwa.yao.rai, Aleem was not renewing his subscription. Nevertheless, he decided to reserve the ‘tactical retreat’ option as a last resort. As much as he didn’t want to appear weak, he also didn’t want to get pulped. Emanation ritual not withstanding, whatever fight Gwa.yao.rai had gotten into earlier had pretty much brought him within an inch of his life. So much so that the boy had been able to attain the [Last Breath] Skill. There were too many pieces missing, Aleem understood. But until he made sense of it all, he wouldn’t be taking any big risks…
Except for the invocation of a godling, of course.
Aleem tightly clutched his cloth-bag. There was glassware in there, as well as two other slightly heavy items. One unexpected swing might be enough to startle someone, but he wouldn’t rely on it for anything beyond an opening salvo.
He straightened and adopted a casual air, which was not as easy as it should have been. The diminution sickness was already working number on him. “Tell me what you want,” he said, looking at Bulky who seemed like they might be the actual leader of this wholesome get-together.
“I already told you.” The boy enunciated each word. Yeah, he was definitely speaking through clenched teeth.
“And I don’t suppose this has something to do with that little thing you have in your hand,” Aleem said, gesturing at the scabbard.
Nobody replied.
“Look,” he glanced back at the trio, “I don’t know what’s going on here, but I’m really not in the mood for it.” He pointed at Wispy with his free hand, “You. I know we got into a fight a few days ago. Have you come back for revenge? Is that what this is?”
It was Bulky who replied, unsurprisingly enough. Where his voice had been void of any emotion before, now it cracked with something akin to rage. “You injured my brother. Dislocated his nose and fractured his arm.” His nostrils flared. “And even after that, he and Chem have been on latrine duty for the past two days. While what? You’ve just been taking your sweet time resting and walking around like you own the place?”
Even the thought of correcting the boy’s statement about him ‘resting’ caused the Geas to tighten around Aleem. He could not speak ill about Tanton. Aleem frowned. “Didn’t the soldiers stop them from—”
“You attacked us first you fucking lying sobo!” Wispy shouted, taking a step forward. Aleem blinked. What in the non sequitur was his problem? He hadn’t seemed so angry this morning.
“Chem,” said the black-haired girl beside him, placing a calming a hand on Wispy’s forearm. “Let Luogs handle this.”
“I’m just sick of him starting shit and getting preferential treatment,” Wispy, who apparently was Chem, said.
“So you’ve come to enact punishment,” Aleem said with a tired smile. What was the best way to play this? “But how are you sure this won’t get you into even more trouble though?” Luogs, the guy holding a scabbard, made to say something but Aleem spoke on over him. “I say this because I truly feel bad for your brother.” He glanced at Chem, “and you too, Chem. Toilet duty sounds terrible. But I need you to understand that whatever it is you plan to do here, I won’t take it lying down. And after we all part ways with new injuries, I’ll make sure to report every single one of you. I already know two of your names and can remember all your faces.”
“I knew it,” spat Curly, pointing an accusing finger at Aleem. “You’re a fucking snitch! I fucking knew it!”
Aleem looked at the boy like he’d just lost his mind. “Of course, I’m a snitch, you idiot. What, you thought I’d just let you walk all over me and suffer in silence?” He looked at Luogs. “And really what does it say about you that you’re willing to gang up on me. I’m just one guy. Do I scare you that much? You brought along your friends and a small stick just to intimidate me. Does that make you feel like a big boy? Huh? Are you incapable of using your words? Are you really that lazy? Soldiers are supposed to be disciplined, but what I see here are a bunch of children playing dress up. Let me tell you, you’re an embarrassment to that armour you're wearing.” [Trance] had triggered without him even noticing. He’d gotten a little carried away there. Aleem deactivated the Skill.
Curly was looking at him with wide eyes.
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Luogs though was heaving with ill-contained rage. He shoved the scabbard at Curly’s chest. “None of you step in,” he growled.
Aleem noticed belatedly that the scabbard was missing the hilt that’d been peeking out over it. Luogs had drawn the dagger at some point during Aleem’s diatribe. Uh-oh.
“I’m going to teach this mangey shoontau a lesson he won’t easily forget.” He flexed his shoulders and took a step forward, blade in hand.
“Now, hold on just a second,” Aleem began, taking a couple steps back.
“Enough talk, mangey. Let’s see if your fists are half as sharp as that tongue of yours.”
What the fuck! How was any of this fair? The traffic around them had thinned, and those who passed gave them a wide berth. He glanced around at his other assailants, foolishly hoping to find reason in any one of them. Not only had they all taken a whole step backwards, their faces were set, save for Chem, who looked uncertain.
“Luogs, wait.”
“Stay out of this,” the larger boy growled.
Aleem’s heart was thudding in his chest, his grip on the cloth-bag was tighter than even Luogs’s grip on that scabbard had seemed moments ago. His mind whirred. What were the chances that this boy or one of the others had enough stats in Agility? They looked like they might be significantly over 15, but he couldn’t be too sure. They probably all had Classes? Too many unknowns.
Still gripping the cloth bag, Aleem crouched lower and hopped on the balls of his feet. His mouth was dry. “I don’t have all night, sweetheart,” he said with a smile.
He was only barely ready enough when a nigh frothing Luogs leaped at him, dagger raised. Aleem sprung out of the way, jumping right into the street.
Then he crossed the street.
It barely took three strides.
He wasn’t feeling too dumb about turning his back to an armed opponent. He didn’t spare himself so much as a parting glance at them, but they seemed taken by surprise, only rallying and shouting after he’d made it to the other side. He wished there were more vehicles on the road to slow them down. No such luck, however.
Aleem pounded the pavement like his life depended on it, and maybe it actually did. Had that fucker really just pulled a knife on him in the middle of the street with people watching? He was beginning to notice a trend.
Aleem had a new plan now. Well, sort of; nothing had actually changed. If he could make it to the chaplet before they caught him then he could invoke Shallentlan. That would be the equivalent of tossing a grenade into a bathroom after finding a cockroach in it. But in his case, he’d already intended to toss the grenade into the bathroom anyway. Finding the insect there was just collateral. Oh dear. Fever brain was infecting his analogies already. He felt [Trance] trigger once more, but instantly deactivated it. He couldn’t afford to slow down.
Aleem cut into a street, the image of the map still firmly in his mind. The map was not in the slightest bit comprehensive; it gave an overview of the base and did not account for the unintuitive layout of the blocks and paths. These boys would very likely have far better familiarity with the base than Aleem did. He would have to avoid running into any blind alleys.
“Come back here you, coward!” Luogs roared.
Aleem thought up a few snippy comebacks, but he was already out of breath. Holy Dorothy was this body out of shape!
“Block him off!” A female voice called out. “Chem, Uffin, go round back.”
“Yeah! We’ll nail him at salriway.”
Not if you keep announcing your intentions, fuckwits. Aleem looped into another street, the foot traffic here was more significant but still nothing compared to earlier in the day. He whizzed past people, not even so much as apologising as he bumped into the occasional stranger. He hated it, but couldn’t afford to waste his precious air apologising.
Jolons had confirmed that the chaplets, much like those in the game, would have a large wooden circle atop them. Aleem spotted it now. The poles he’d seen the night before stood tall with green agitated flames squirming atop them. He jetted across the street, almost getting run-over by a wagon. The driver hurled accented imprecations at his back.
The chaplet was an unassuming building, and but for its defining graven image he might have missed it. Every thing looked terribly similar here; worse so at night.
Two Olomti women and a man in the common military garb were having an involved discussion by the entrance. He only took note of them because they were in his way.
One woman, shorn of head and broad-shouldered, looked over and noticed him pumping his limbs and wheezing like some beast. Her eyes travelled behind him and she frowned. “Hey!” Her companions followed her gaze. “Hey! Don’t bring that shit here!”
Aleem didn’t spare any attention for the woman, he tried to slip past her but she picked him up as easily as one might a coat on a chilly evening, instantly arresting his velocity. Literally scruffed him, though her other hand held him under the arm. She tossed him back and he fell on his ass. “The fuck did I say, huh?”
“Chasing. Me,” Aleem pushed out between breaths, pointing in the general direction he’d come from. “Knife. Dangerous.”
“Don’t care,” she said, folding her arms and frowning down at him.
“This is no place for roughhousing,” the man in leather armour added, a look of distaste on his face. “And your kind aren’t welcome here.”
“Yup.” The Olomti woman agreed. “Take that shit elsewhere.”
“Uffin! Uffin, this way!”
Aleem scrabbled off the floor and faked left, it was needless, the Olomti had already diverted her attention behind him. He could hear the pounding of his pursuers feet or maybe that was just his heart. He darted behind the woman and she whirled at him, face too blurry for Aleem to note the expression on it.
She shouted something. The younger pursuers behind him shouted other things. He pumped his limbs. The chaplet door slid open. A dark-skinned woman with a bulky equipment upon her back made to step out. The woman squeaked in melodious surprise as Aleem jumped for the door. She managed to glide out of the way at the last moment.
He tumbled down the steps. The brightness within was gentle. White swathes of steam and incense suffused the entire vicinity. Rolling and swirling about. It had a lemony scent. Reminiscent of Haimol’s den and the apotheca. He was inundated with a sense of unwavering calm.
The floor beneath him was rugged. The incense was dense, yet it did not impede his heavy breathing in the slightest. He could barely see a couple yards in any direction. A huge shimmering arras, much like the one he’d seen in Kulaan’s tent, hung in front of him. It extended from the ceiling to the rugged floor, oblong and crescent patterns running along its surface.
“You should take off your shoes,” a melodious voice called from behind him.
Aleem paid the speaker no mind. Rasping, he scrambled into the dense, breathable smoke. There was some commotion outside, but he could only faintly hear it. His [Trance] Skill had activated once more. When had that happened? He moved through the arras; it was an illusory curtain of light that offered no resistance to his entry. Beyond the arras was a sectioned off space, an altar to either side of him and yet another shimmering curtain up ahead.
The altars were nothing majestic. Just slabs of black stone against the walls, coming to about the height of Aleem’s shoulders. Head-sized holes were hewn into their bases and symbols inscribed on all their apparent sides. Neither one was Akeshi’s, so Aleem hurried through the second arras.
“Great One,” Aleem croaked, still not finding his target. He would just start the invocation early. Like before there were two altars on either wall, their inscriptions marking them as belonging to other gods.
He moved onto the next partition, head whirling from side to side. Not here either. “Palm of Akeshi. Daughter of antiquity.” Aleem tumbled on his feet, but did not cease his invocation. “Steward of Yore. Of Lore. Of the Before.”
Something trickled out of Aleem, and so subtle was the flow that he might not have noticed if [Trance] wasn’t running. It was cold.
“I call upon you. Not to entreat. Not to implore. But to demand audience. Do not deny me.”
The thick clouds of smoke seemed to clear up significantly. Even the arrases shimmered a little, turning opaque before letting light through at certain points of their illusory fabric.
“Do not deny me,” he repeated. He clambered deeper into the chaplet. He’d moved through eight arras partitions, none of them bearing the markings of Akeshi. His sides hurt from all the running, and despite how fresh the air here was, he still laboured to contain his erratic breathing.
In the ninth partition relief washed over him. On his left was an altar whose inscriptions were arranged in such a way as to portray a serpentine creature … or a wall gecko, if he squinted just right. Subtlety wasn’t really the point with these things. Pristine reptile indeed. There were a few items atop the altar but he didn’t care for that.
A sense of misgiving had begun to worm its way into his heart. He’d completed the invocation already; there ought to have been a response of some kind by now. [Trance] kept his panic at bay even as he heard footsteps clambering down the steps at the chaplet’s entrance.
“Where’d he go?”
“It’s too foggy! I can’t see anything!”
“Great One,” Aleem rasped out, beginning the invocation once more. “Palm of Akeshi.” He tripped on his face just before reaching the altar. “Daughter of Antiq—
q/q/q/q/q/Q/Q/Q/Q/QQQQQQ
A weight of greatness descended upon Aleem. Descended upon the entire chaplet. And he knew deep within his being that everyone in this vicinity had been measured and found wanting. The thought infiltrated his mind and with it came a knot of foreign emotions.
Scorn. Amusement.
§ºª•¶§∞Á†∂ß∆˚¬µ∫ΩØ«∏≈Ω∑
ERROR¡
PLEASE WAIT
[Hijack] Protocols Implemented
Oh no no no. Fuck no. “I revoke—” Aleem was slammed unto the rug by a powerful pressure. He gasped greedily. “I come as an envoy—”
He was slammed into the ground with even greater force. He scrabbled for air. There was none.
This sort of ostentatious display was not Shallentlan’s way. Not as she’d been portrayed in ‘Tales of Woe’. There was little room for doubt. Batshit terror strained within his chest eager to find expression in the presence of one deserving of its existence. He could think of only one entity that would try something like this.
LO!
You have invoked a Representative of AKESHI [The Pristine Reptile]