“Who the hell are you?” Words so simple, yet difficult to answer for Otto Steelheart.

Tension thick as blood permeated the air, the nobleman unable to collect his thoughts. It was as if every time he tried to gather some semblance of a train of thought, it would be immediately shattered like a hammer brought down against glass. How could he reform the shards now that they were broken into a thousand pieces?

In contrast to him, the man sitting atop the miniature cliff was completely disinterested. Aloof like a bird flying free into the skies.

“Oi, ya gonna answer the question?” Shockingly, the dark-skinned sailor seemed completely fine, unaffected by whatever pressure had been imparted onto Otto.

“...” No words came out of Otto’s mouth.

He took a deep breath. Then two. On the sixth, he managed to gain some semblance of coherence with his mind. After two minutes passed, Otto managed to give a response.

“I am Otto Steelheart. Second son of the main branch of House Steelheart.”

A pause.

“I mean…I heard you the first time.” The fisherman yawned, the straw somehow remaining perfectly level in his mouth. “I’m asking why I should care.”

…

This time, Otto simply had no response. Never had he ever dealt with someone like this! Someone who seemed to have no interest in the name ‘Steelheart’. As if to reiterate his point, the King continued in a sort of mellow rant.

“Noble house this…heir to that…descendant of Rezan’s tiny schlong. I don’t see what the big fuss is about. I mean, you’re all in here on your lonesome. How are connections and unreachable wealth going to help with anything?” The fisherman sighed, glancing at the nobleman again, this time without any form of pressure. “You kids are all the same. Easy to read. Shallow as a pan. Not worth my time.”

The King seemed to hesitate, as if looking for the next words to say. At least, that was what Otto thought until he realised the man’s attention had completely shifted to the now bouncing bobber in the water. Seconds passed before the fisherman would suddenly swing his arms upwards, pulling a fish with shimmering silver scales and almost a metre in length out of the water.

“Not bad.” The Estrian man smiled, pulling the caught fish in and grabbing it with his bare hands. The animal struggled, but his grip was like an iron vice. Moving closer to his hut, he grabbed a rather large knife. It was then that Otto discovered the number upon his orange-striped uniform.

102.

Setting the fish on a long wooden board, the high-ranker stabbed the fish without hesitation. As skilled and confident as a butcher. As his hands got to work, he looked at Otto and his comrades again.

“Still here? Got something to say?” The fisherman questioned, to which the nobleman gulped before attempting to respond.

“We are here to seek refuge.”

“Then go on. Take refuge here.” The nonchalant agreement paired with the sudden decapitation of the fish’s head caught Otto off guard.

He stammered. “J-Just like that?”

“Yeah. I mean, that’s what all these people did.” The Estrian pointed his knife at the two guides, as well as the line of huts on the beaches. “You people just have to make sure you don’t sleep near me or mine, and we won’t have a problem.”

…

Otto narrowed his eyes. “I see.”

Mustering what courage he had in his shaken state, the nobleman asked. “May I have your name, sir?”

The fisherman shrugged, peeling away the scales of the fish with what seemed like a steel bush of thorns. “Name’s Orochi. Since you Wisterians love to announce houses and so much, I’m of the house of ‘Katsuragi’. Small family living in the Isle of Dawn. Now do go away. I don’t like noise when I’m making lunch…or was it dinner?”

Dismissed, Otto made to leave, but hesitated when a small noise came from the fisherman’s hut. Seconds later, a child no older than ten emerged. Dark eyes and dark hair, two short antlers protruded from her temples and curved around her scalp.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

“Oro…is there food…?” The girl rubbed her eyes innocently, swaying left and right as she walked over to the man.

“Morning to you too, Tzuyu. I just caught a big one.” The fisherman answered back as he ruffled the girl’s hair. Somehow, the disheveled strands righted themselves with his touch.

“My tummy feels weird…” The girl said, a frown spreading across her heart-shaped face.

The high-ranker shook his head. “It’s probably because you ate all those weird fruits earlier. I told you, didn’t I? Don’t eat the weird stuff.”

“But I was hungry…” Tzuyu slammed her balled hands into the man’s side to no effect.

“Oy vey. What am I going to do with you?” Orochi shook his head, but his face was all smiles.

The following response only made his grin wider. “Feed me!”

“Alright alright. Just let me prepare it. This thing has a few poison sacks.”

Watching the heartwarming scene play out, Otto eventually turned and left. As he did, his mind worked furiously. “He seems to be taking care of that girl.”

A thought occurred to him, causing him to smile to himself, a devious glint in his eyes. “If I can somehow control that girl, then maybe I can also control him. It’s certainly worth a shot.”

As he moved away, both his comrades and the guides that led them in followed. Once a decent distance away and presumably out of earshot, Otto turned on the sailor and Greg. “Can you tell me about Orochi?”

The question was clear cut, and so was the response.

“Not much to tell.” Greg said. “He fishes. He takes care of the little lady. And he can take your head off with a flick of his fingers.”

The nobleman blanched, his mouth drying at the thought.

Was such a thing possible? Most definitely. After all, he had seen his great grandfather perform even greater feats.

“I see…”

“Best advice. Keep ya distance.” The tanned giant of a man said, departing for the entrance without looking back. “Don’t fuck with any of them. People higher ranked than ya have already tried and died.”

Otto watched the man go, glaring at his back. “I’m not just anyone. I’m a Steelheart.”

----------------------------------------

Elsewhere…

Clinks and clanks of metal were joined by the crackling of electricity in the darkened halls of the Carnivorous Caverns. Bouncing off the walls, the genesis of these odd sounds came from a room isolated from all others. Located at the end of a hallway laden with the corpses of a hundred pinheads, Zexus could be found hunched over what appeared to be a box.

Fingers busy fidgeting with wires, the amber-eyed man had his complete and utter attention on the device before him. Only, his surroundings were…different.

Instead of the darkened room one would walk in to see, he saw a world of mist around the box. A world he had been to in the hour before and had not been all too fond of.

“Blue wires to blue ports…I should connect this to the main console in order to transfer the electricity over.” Zexus worked, disregarding everything else as knowledge he never knew he had flooded his brain.

He did not question it, at least not until he walked out of the ‘Generator Room’ with a fully charged battery in his arms. The box weighed more than a person, but he carried it without issue, all the way back to the Medical Centre he had left Sally in.

Once there, he did as his mind’s knowledge advised, opening the end of the pod and connecting a handful of wires to various ports. When he flipped the switch, a whir sounded out from the capsule, a sign of its return to life accompanied by dim, flashing lights and mist filtering into the tube that kept Sally’s corpse.

“It’s working.” Zexus observed for a moment, alert for any malfunctions that may arise.

When nothing out of the ordinary occurred after five minutes, he began observing his holobracelet.

“The last horde of enemies attacked an hour from when the first group was sent in.” The time shown by the small hologram was five minutes to the hour. “If it isn’t a one-time thing, I’ll need to defend this room. I also don’t know if it’ll be the same creatures.”

He looked up, his gaze sweeping over the shelves and furniture lining the walls.

Wasting no time, he ran up the stairs and began pushing and pulling everything he could towards the door. Time flew by as chairs and desks were stacked on top of one another, forming what looked to be a mound of garbage that completely blocked the view of the door.

It was somewhat overexcessive, given that the objects together likely weighed tens of tonnes. That said, Zexus would prefer to remain overly cautious than caught unawares.

“Fortune favours the prepared.” His mother would always say.

When the clock hit the hour, just as he assumed, the alarms went off again, joined by what sounded like yet another wave of monsters sprinting through the hallways outside. Silent as the grave, Zexus heard the creatures pass his room from the left. From the sounds they made, the monsters appeared to be the same as before, joining their brethren, alive or fallen, in the pursuit of participants.

That being the case, few screams or shouts of terror and pain were heard this time. People had likely learned to hide or at least get to a place they could defend more successfully. For his group, it was both, and with Lavenna’s presence, he had nothing to be concerned about. At least, he hoped not.

A minor portion of his Soul will always be worried for his wife, but the part that bound their spirits together told him that all was well for the moment. She felt quite relaxed, in fact, perhaps even sleeping.

“I’ll need to bring her here…” Zexus thought as he moved over to the capsule that held Sally.

The glass was clear as cold air with tints of red filled the inside of the pod. He noted that the vials he had placed in the ports under the leather bed had all been emptied, instead exchanged with Sally’s wounds all being sealed by clots of sickly red. Her body was healing it seemed.

“But it doesn’t seem to be enough.”

Hand to his chin, his mind clicked every other second. “I’ll head back and see if any of them found these liquids in the storage. Otherwise, I’ll probably need to check the other areas around here.”

Decision made, Zexus waited by the door until the sounds of the pinheads vanished into the distance. Once he felt comfortable, he unblocked the entrance.

Peeking his head out, he looked left then right before stepping out. He dragged a shelf out behind him, using it to block the shut door before he departed for base.

Virtually nothing eventful happened on the way there. Two to five pinheads here or there, he dispatched everything he came across with relative ease, having already grown accustomed to their patterns. It was odd, really, how they all seemed to charge at the same pace, angle and strength.

“An intentional ‘standard’ for mobs.” Zexus thought, sending yet another pinhead crashing into the walls with a front kick to its gut. He gave the fallen creature a considering look, before moving on to the blocked off storage room.

“There’s no way the monster waves would just be this…what are they up to?”