The Thing From Beyond swam about and wrapped itself around his soul, and forced him to understand, simply pushing knowledge into him. Barzai thought he would split in half and depart for his next life, leaving his astral body as food for the Things From Beyond.
It did not come to pass.
He awoke back in his hut, hacking up his lungs and blue-burning sludge, covered in astral gunk… And with knowledge of the Liminal Coil’s possessor in his brain. Brunhilde Krahe.
It suddenly made sense why That Woman had resisted the Sign of the Great King of Terror, why her Astral Body was… Well, like that. Truly, that inverted image of the Dark Invoker had been fitting.
Ibn Ghazi Barzai had long divorced himself from the Liminal Coil, and he had long resolved to a hermetic life. As he saw it, things were out of his hands. Nonetheless, his fear for the safety of the Liminal Coil’s inheritor hadn’t been alleviated, merely replaced with something else: A desperate, abiding hope that whatever unshakeable convictions had granted her access to the Coil wouldn’t lead her down a path of ruin… And that she wouldn’t think to seek him out.
Sighing, he spent several hours to rid himself of the diving apparatus and replace his old Gulf Key. Then, he cleaned up his home and removed the angle-web.
When it was done, and everything fully sunk in, a bitter laughter reverberated through his hut. Barzai slept well for the first time in weeks, and thereafter dredged up flasks of liquor from the swamp, flasks he had put there just for this occasion.
It was, despite everything, a cause to celebrate. The Thing From Beyond the Gulf was gone, back where it belonged, and he no more felt it tugging at his soul. Even the System reflected his severance from that abomination.
By Zavesh and Igaria both, he truly hoped that She would not come to seek him out in search for the Coil’s counterpart… Or, at least, that by the time she figured it out, he would be dead.
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What he had feared was coming to pass. Cassius had chosen to call in a certain incident of his own volition, only to find himself called to meet with the incumbent inheritor of the Hashem Family in person. On the surface, it seemed like a friendly meeting at one of the heir’s hedonistic parties, which was already in full swing by the time Cassius arrived. Drink, drugs, pretty women from human to inax and saurian. A pair of low-level Mamon Knights beating the tar out of eachother; one was a purely insectile type with stingers on his arms, the other a locust with a mantis-like blade and a heavy-lift exoframe cladding his upper body.
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The tension that took hold the moment of his arrival, however, was palpable. Cassius was stripped of his firearms, ushered to sit down near Semzar, and surrounded by his men. Men. Big, burly men, exuding power and violence. That wasn’t Semzar’s style. Even his own personal guards were eye candy. Sure, they radiated a dangerous aura, but they were, first and foremost, there to look pretty. Semzar himself was only recognizable because of his position, manner of dress, and his face. The body was new, similarly macho to his guards. His face was nothing like his previous body, but it was recognizable in its unnaturally handsome features, which clashed with the body’s rugged hands and bearlike build. He emanated a threatening, powerful aura, different from before, but also far less in control. The bulging, purple tendrils under the skin of his neck, hands, and forehead were subtle by some standards, but they proved he’d gotten sloppy compared to his old self.
Cassius didn’t know how many bodies Semzar had gone through, but he was certain of one thing. He felt cornered, and was desperately trying to get stronger. That was the only possible reason why a baneworm would start burning through one host after the next. Such a method could work, but not for long, and he would pay for it dearly in the future, but knew better than to expect this spoiled brat to look further into the future than the next suck and fuck.
“Wait, so let me get this straight,” Semzar started, leaning over the table towards Cassius. It lost some effect since they were still separated by enough distance for Semzar’s guards to act before Cassius could do anything. “Blackhand just… Waltzed into your bar and you… You let her go?”
Semzar spoke as if suppressing a manic laughing fit. His tendrils writhed and made themselves known, deforming his skinsuit’s face in absurd ways. One of them snaked out next to his eye, and only when Cassius carefully pointed it out did the mafioso snap out of it. The desire to maintain his self-image was stronger than his anger.
“That is… Not how events transpired, no. She came into my casino, and I ordered my people to encircle her right away. Habib, that fool, got ahead of himself and tried to attack her first on his own, and lost his life because of it. She… Fried him. Just shoved her hand into his back like he didn’t have wards at all and boiled him inside out. Then she turned into smoke and ran out the front door. We all shot at her, but it just went right through.”
“Turned into smoke?”
“Yeah. Like a person made of it, not a cloud.”
Semzar returned to his seat, calming down. It seemed, for a few moments, as though his peril was coming to an end, but after drawing from a hookah filled with an unknown blend of herbs, the heir cast a razor-sharp stare Cassius’ way.
“Did you get a good look at her face?”
Cassius felt a chill run down his spine. The question was pointed. Purposeful. Despite many being ordered to target the woman, nobody had gotten more than a description, or at best, an artist’s rendition… And they weren’t exactly close to the real thing. Her appearance was distinct enough to tell it was her if you had the signature visual traits memorized, but it wasn’t anywhere close to a real photo. His hesitation to answer tipped the mafioso off.