When John came to, it felt as though someone had liberally applied a hammer to his brain, his whole body ached and his right arm felt… cold? He sluggishly rose to his feet only to notice that the lights in the room had apparently turned off again but he could still make out vague outlines of all the objects in the room. Something felt decidedly off, yet he just couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Stumbling slightly, he put his hand on a nearby table…
Only to feel rusted steel disintegrate under the force of his new arm, a deafening crack filling the room as enhanced fingers made short work of ages old metal.
John stared dumbfounded at his own fingers, only now noting the presence of something metallic that seemed to have fused with his very skin. Slightly panicking now John attempted to peel off whatever it was that ended up on his hand but to no avail, it was as though it had become one with his very flesh, indeed it was very much likely that it had in fact done just that. Running his normal arm over the other John noted it felt oddly normal for a mass of plate metal and odd cabling, as though it was the very flesh and blood he was born with. Slowly John began to come to terms with what had happened, there were stories of things like this, artefacts from the golden age of humanity that had a mind of their own, that would choose their own bearers, the weapons of great heroes!
…and monsters…
John stared at the thing on his arm which remained frustratingly silent, surely it wasn’t like that right? Maybe he just had the bad luck of touching a particularly sticky Relic, perhaps he could find a doctor in the city to peel it off? Though where he would find the funds for that well, that was an entirely separate problem of course.
There was another thing he had noticed, something that came with his apparent improved night vision. The eternal nausea that plagued him, one of the first signs of the sickness that plagued just about everyone who could not afford to live within the clean walls of a city, was gone like it had never existed in the first place. In its place was a strange warmth at his core, and though he felt tired and dazed still there was some sort of invigorating energy filling him. Had the Relic… caused him to Awaken? A million thoughts a minute rushed through his head, ever since all those months ago when he had glimpsed what lay beyond the mountain Wretches like him called Mortality he had been grasping desperately and aimlessly towards this goal. Now that he had apparently achieved it without even being awake for the occasion; a great emptiness seemed to fill his chest just as much as elation. It was a surreal feeling, the rush and euphoria of power and the sensation of being an imposter in one's own skin, a feeling that made him want to scream in frustration and triumph all at once.
Zhou shook his head, such thoughts were not useful to him right now, he would get the chance to explore his feelings on the matter later. Survival no longer felt impossible in the wake of his apparent Awakening, merely challenging, and what truly defined the tale of a cultivator more than challenge? Shunting a complicated mass of emotions to the side for later, he turned towards the door where he could now see the corpses of several rodents who had broken their jaws trying desperately to chew back to the safety of the Swarm. John prepared to face the mass of matted fur and screeching jaws once more, this time however he felt confident, this time he would no longer be prey!
Slamming open the door without caring for stealth, John Zhou grinned as he heard screeching echoes in the shadows alerted by the sudden clang of the door. Countless thousands of vermin each large enough to bite easily off a finger on their own charged at him and found instead of the soft flesh of a Ruin Rat the fury of a newly born cultivator in truth. Dozens of these creatures died with each strike and stomp with a rippling splash of gore, but for each destroyed ten more would take its place, and despite no longer feeling so much exhaustion from the exertion John was beginning to feel overwhelmed. He needed to rethink his strategy if he wanted to get out of this alive. Grimacing as he felt a lucky rat get through and bite at his heel while he was distracted by the effort to not get swallowed by the mass of jaws, just barely breaking enhanced skin, John got a sudden if perhaps not the wisest idea.
He was letting the rodents come to him at their own pace, he was defending against a foe with more than enough soldiers to defeat him in a battle of attrition, he was treating this fight like it was a siege. But cultivators were a different breed of fighter than mere mortals, he had been letting the swarm dictate the flow of the battle…
John lay his eyes upon the largest mass of rodents, each individual creature appearing more vicious than the dozens that had been attacking him so far…
But now he dictates his own fate!
Leaping towards the centre of the swarm with power he didn’t know his body could contain John rushed forwards and struck a solid blow with his metal coated arm reducing maybe 30 rats into fine mincemeat. His fists however did impact something more solid than expected and while reeling from the recoil of his own attack John saw two malevolent red eyes as large as his own glowing in the darkness from the thing that was hiding beneath its smaller servants. The thing screeched partly in pain but much more in fury and indignation, and the swarm obeyed its call screeching themselves into a deafening cacophony as they descended upon John.
John was barely a true cultivator at this point, unlikely to be above the bare minimum for the seventh step of the Wretch realm, and so even if at most each of the vermin could do but a single cut to his flesh a thousand of them still proved too much. As he felt the swarm rise around him like a tidal wave he tried to dodge but was not yet fast enough. The wave of rats crashed into him, knocking him prone, and then they proceeded to bite at every single part of his body while he tried to regain his footing. John could not even cry out in pain for he knew the moment he opened his mouth one of the rats would try to tear out his tongue, he could only watch in helpless horror as a mangy creature that was almost as long as he was tall slowly walked up to him and bit down breaking flesh and bone like mud and chalk in the process.
[SIGNIFICANT DAMAGE TO HOST DETECTED… TEMPORARY SHUT OFF OF USER SAFEGUARDS APPROVED…]
[NERVOUS AND ENDOCRINE OVERLOAD INITIATED]
Before John could question whatever… that… was, a wave of searing pain rushed over his body followed by a rush of raw energy that struck him with the impact of a falling boulder. The rest of the fight was a blur, chunks of rodent flesh flew through the air, blood soaked the floor until it resembled a pond in appearance and depth. Standing over the defeated body of his opponent, gripping a small golden organ he had torn out of the largest beast in his fist, John felt immortal! Invincible!
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Then the high wore off and all he could feel was pain, just his luck he supposed as he collapsed once more to the floor as a bundle of agony, exhaustion and growing hunger.
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He did not know how long exactly it took to find his way back to camp, but eventually he did make it. The rats were… distinctly unpleasant to eat… but it was moderately better than starvation. Every muscle still groaned in agony with the slightest movement, he was feeling eternally nauseous, exhausted and oddly cold but at least he was alive. John looked towards his metal coated arm, while one of his worse suspicions had been confirmed the living Relic did at least save his life, unfortunately clearly it was not very talkative and had remained silent ever since the encounter with the Screeching Swarm. He doubted he could get it off anyway… did he want to get it off? He knew not the intentions of the machine if it even had any but he would be dead without it, surely it wasn’t all that bad? Led by the slightest hint of non-stale air and the lightest breeze wafting through the labyrinthine hallways John slowly made his way up lost in his thoughts. He was interrupted from his thoughts by a blinding ray of sunlight piercing through the rusted entrance of the ruin and the dumbfounded expressions of two fellow Ruin Rats, Jamie and Alice if his memory was right, honestly it was hard to tell with the revolving door of Ruin Rats, staring right back at him,
“SUPERVISOR! QUICK! JOHN IS ALIVE AND HE HAS… A RELIC ON HIS ARM I THINK!” Jamie cried out causing an even larger commotion behind the door. The silhouette of an old thin man that resembled a spider, no doubt the Supervisor, looked down the tunnel and stood still as a stone for a moment as if trying to check if what he saw was real. He then ran with speed that did not quite match his form and jumped into the ruin before tackling John with a hug that would have easily knocked him over if not for his new strength,
“I thought you had finally bitten off more than you can chew, boy! Where in the Great Spirit’s name did you go?” the Supervisor asked as he squeezed John tightly, a large smile on his face even as tears streaked down bug-like eyes.
“I found a new section of the ruin and I uh… was trapped for a while because of a Screeching Swarm…” John awkwardly explained, “I got some sort of relic stuck to my arm now, I don’t think I can take it off, but it helped me survive and I think it helped me reach the 7th step of the Wretch Realm…”
Two of the Supervisor’s arms moved towards the relic and poked and prodded at the plates where they fused to flesh, “I see… we had truly believed you dead, you were down there for nearly five days John! You could have run off to live a nice life in the city with the coin that Young Mistress gave you but you were so insistent on this foolishness… still I am glad we don’t have another child to mourn.”
Approaching the door John felt his eyes adapt more to the light, he could see the dried blood and ugly purple bruises coating his pale skin like a layer of paint and the dull plates of metal separated by cables the colour of long dried blood choking his arm. The Supervisor helped John through the door and followed soon after skittering across the floor much like a spider. Shutting the door behind him he turned to the Ruin Rats gathered at the entrance and began to speak.
“Tonight we celebrate two things, the survival of one of our own and the first Ruin Rat to reach the 7th Step over my 16 years watching over this group!” he announced loudly while lifting John into the air awkwardly, “Search parties are cancelled and celebrations are in order! There is much to do but for now there is no need to explore any further today, I will give each of you four Steels as recompense from my personal funds as recompense for lost profits, go on and enjoy yourself for now we end our mourning!”
The cheers were almost more cacophonous than the Screeching Swarm and a half dozen of his fellow Rats surrounded him instantly to drown him in hugs and fawn over his new arm. John did not take great notice of what they were saying to him however, for his attention was drawn to the eyes of the Supervisor which wordlessly said something he nonetheless understood with perfect clarity; they needed to talk.
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The night was spent with laughter, cheer and storytelling… lots and lots of storytelling. John did not know how a near death experience managed to become boring but somehow over the course of maybe thousands of repetitions it had achieved just that. With his throat sore not to mention his wounds still aching and sleep gnawing at the edges of his consciousness, he excused himself from the party thrown in his honour and snuck out to the edges of the camp. It was there he saw the Supervisor, one hand holding a knife, another a small lantern and in his last a small block of wood that he was carving into some sort of small animal. The Supervisor nodded to acknowledge John’s presence and beckoned for him to come closer. Under the soft light of the lantern John could see a tapestry of scars, pock marks and other small blemishes highlighted with flickering shadows on the Supervisor’s face which told a story of a life long and tiring.
“I take it you have not given up on those foolish ambitions, boy?” He asked in a way that made it clear it was not a question, nonetheless,
“No, Supervisor, sorry.” John replied
The supervisor gave a mirthless chuckle, “You were in those ruins far too long, even before you got cornered by the Swarm weren’t you lad? I can’t say I blame you, I was like that too you know… once…” the Supervisor’s hands paused and he gazed towards the stars with eyes that seemed ten thousand miles away,
“Aren’t you a member of the Lead Cave as well, Supervisor? Why do you discourage me then? You yourself said you were like this once!” John decided to push, pressing his luck.
The supervisor had an unknowable emotion flicker upon his face for a moment before scoffing, “Was I really this much of a brat as well back then? Let me put this in terms you can understand, I see you are very injured right now even after as you surely would have noticed your healing speed has improved dramatically, am I correct?”
John slowly nodded,
“I can sense a core in your pocket. That was a low level Spirit Beast, correct? You were lucky to even make it out alive against the weakest and least vicious of monsters… and yet they still pale in comparison to the worst enemy of all… Tell me John, what is the worst enemy of a cultivator?” His voice had gotten quieter.
John pondered for a moment, cautiously replying, “Other cultivators Supervisor sir?”
The Supervisor seemed to consider this for a moment, “Close son, really close, in fact you did better than I expected but unfortunately not quite…” he said as he carved the last detail into his little sculpture and brought his light closer to it, “Say this little critter represents you, and the light is the power of cultivation, the promise of strength, the promise of a legend and yet…”
The Supervisor opened the glass case of the lantern and placed a foot of the sculpture within. Very slowly it began to smoke until all of a sudden a corner lit aflame. With a technique John had never seen the Supervisor do before in his life he took a deep breath, closed the lantern, and blew on the sculpture engulfing it entirely in flames.
“The path of the cultivator is to burn brightly, all but very few exceptions also burn short. No, the worst enemy to a cultivator is themselves, and I have seen too many brothers and sisters burn to in good faith suggest a child to take on this path themselves! Surely you know the perils, you barely survived against the lowest of foes you are to be expected to face, are you truly ready to accept what lies ahead?”
A million thoughts ran through John’s head before finally reaching the rather unsatisfactory answer of, “I know, I will be better.”
The Supervisor laughed bitterly, “I remember saying that once… very well. Once your wounds are healed, come visit me at dawn and instead of joining expeditions, I will be giving you the training I wished I received before applying as a disciple. If you do well enough hm… how about I give you my name young John?” the Supervisor said with a chuckle, even though there was a hint of a deep sadness in his eyes. John’s eyes widened significantly with that unimaginable offer, he knew that everyone had their own name, but the Supervisor was always Supervisor in his mind,
Of course John accepted, but for the first time since his meeting with Cobalt there was a slight hint of doubt nestling in his heart. He looked up to the heavens, the tapestry of stars that went on forever…
Never before did they seem so close and yet so far out of reach.
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