Over a thousand miles or so in an instant. Tyr had considered the distance, and planned accordingly – thinking it'd take days to gather the energy necessary to gate so far. Dimensional magic had a range, one of the laws that predicated the magic and why artifacts were used more often for travel rather than their own hands. If it was so easy, overland and mercantile trade would require no vehicles at all. Mages capable of dimensional travel weren't uncommon, but they'd be lucky to manage two hundred miles or so a day. In the process, they'd exhaust themselves to the point of requiring to be carried, as draining as the discipline was. It could also be prohibitively expensive, related to the mechanic by which they gather the energy necessary.

In summary, dimensional magic existed but it was by no means a 'go anywhere you want, whenever you want' kind of magic. There were hazards involved, necessitating lengthy calculations to ensure your gate sent you to the right place, in one piece.

A group of skilled mages could make easy work in crossing a kingdom, but to be lifted from one location to another in an instant over such a significant distance was plain incredible. Abaddon, whoever or whatever he was, was strong. Plucking Tyr from his estate and sending him across half the breadth of the successor states in an instant. No human mage was capable of such a thing.

His head spun at the sudden adjustment. It felt like traveling forward in time, with dawn already creeping over the horizon and bathing the land in dim light. The foglands. A 'haunted' land that lay on the eastern end of the successor states and ran north and south the length of the contemporary western continent. Nobody knew what lay beyond, but he didn't plan on plumbing it's vast depths. His interest lay in the outskirts. Regardless, they lived up to their name. Many scholars saw it as a wholly separate continent regardless of the straits that connected it to their own.

Foglands. Cursed lands. Taboo lands. They said demons lived within the monolithic wall of swirling mists, the same barrier separating the eastern and western continent. The same barrier that had expanded to engulf Trafalgar some time ago. Tyr cared not for demons, intent on hunting monsters of a different kind. Ones that actually existed. In that dramatic sense of the word, one only used by the misanthropist.

Humans.

The edge of the foglands were a hive of scum and villainy. On the edge, he could see the Spatha Sea that cut up to the north. It wasn't wholly connected to the greater continent, rumored to have been cleaved away in a jagged line by a primus in the far flung pass to keep its horrors where they belonged. Mist separated the boundary, where Asmongold ended and the foglands began.

Nothing more than a series of shoddy settlements housing pirates and bandits, apostate mages far too gone to exist elsewhere, and otherwise. Criminals and scum that raided up and down the coast even harassing the elves from time to time. Certainly, they were famous in Haran. Pirates that attempted to rob and pillage the normally peaceful eastern coastline.

Tyr would do as his master had suggested. Cull in the way of the shepherd, the gardener that cuts away the blight. It didn't take long to find the first settlement. A work of art in its dilapidation. He'd walked in cloaked, ordering an ale that tasted twice as bad as the place smelled. Everywhere was wet, a combination of both the mists and the sea-spray no doubt. In fact, he had no plans to kill anyone in this settlement, until the denizens therein had tried to rob him. Too close to Asmongold, the county bordering the fog. 'County', they called it, despite it being by far and away the largest successor state in terms of raw size. Not a lot of people though. If he'd been told, he'd have believed these were the counts men, lacking any real familiarity with his environs.

Fortunately, they made sure to set his knowledge of geography straight. A bandit haven, a sickly mass of moldy woody structures. They made his 'job' easier, seeing his well made clothing and sword – finding a mark in him. Granted, it wasn't a bad plan. Had he been a normal man, Tyr would be dead – catching an axe in the teeth like that, near splitting his head like firewood. Managed to nearly get away with it too, but instead of fleeing with the more obvious loot on Tyr's body they'd stayed to try to remove the bracelets from his wrist. They wouldn't come off, even when they chopped his hand off, the things seemed glued to his skin.

And then, Tyr had stood up, cracking his jaw uncomfortably and taking the first man in the eye with his knife. His trusty knife, always there when he needed it. They ran, of course. Near half of them running into the mist beyond the walls as their fellows were butchered. It was a wonder this place hadn't been cleansed by the primus' before. Varia was not so far away. A mystery that he didn't feel like solving. After all, what was he if not taking action in their stead?

He let the barkeep live, though relieving him of any coin he kept in the till. He wasn't innocent, all of this money had come from somewhere improper, not that there was much. There were no children here, thankfully. Not live ones, at least. Slavery seemed to be a common practice here, with cages full of emaciated people gnawing eagerly at the bread they were offered. Glazed eyes, any idea of escape long lost to them. Most refused to even leave their cages once opened, sliding them shut again with skeletal fingers and hunching back in their place. Full of filth and feces and dried blood, the scent of it nearly brought Tyr to retching. He did what he could, no slavers would be coming back for them, and it was up to them to do the rest.

Two more villages fell. Calling them villages was perhaps an overstatement. More like a rickety wooden shack surrounded by chest high stakes. Disgusting as all the others, with the moist air causing fungal mold to bloom from the wood. It always rained here on the border, an unending storm that turned the ground to fetid, muddy pools.

They begged. Gave it their best shot as Tyr dragged them out of their hiding holes by their ankles and broke them. Women, men, young, old. They all sounded the same, squealing until their lungs gave out. But he could smell it in them. The things they'd done, been party to. Complicity was in near all of these people, the same people who walked by the cages and treated their own kind like dogs. Worse than that.

Every death was a tiny spark, they were all so small. But in such quantity, it served. Tyr's dimensional ring clicked in protest, full of corpses. Bounties meant gold. There was no point in leaving the corpses when there was gain to be had from their demise. With the help of Abaddon, Tyr bounced back between the capital of Asmongold and the various villages, all too eager to continue the reaping. Killing, turning in bounties, and killing some more.

Gilea, the capital, was in an uproar. Haunted by a blood drenched monster that alighted on the roof of their keep to fill the square with bodies. But Tyr was always gone before they could make heads or tails of what was happening. Leaving behind a corpse mound that nobody dared touch.

It didn't take long. In the first day, he'd killed over one hundred and fifty men. In the second, near two hundred. In the third, one hundred and twenty three before he gave up on the idea of keeping count. With them, yet more gold was added to his vault. Near all the men and women, human or otherwise, had bounties on their heads. He let some live. Those he had served to tell the tale. Abaddon's idea, his teacher said it was very important to do so. Tyr didn't know why, but he'd do it. One in ten were allowed to live, those with cleaner hands than their fellows. But everyone was filthy out here.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

A week passed, and a veritable legion of bodies poured in at such a speed that Count Asmon could barely keep up with the influx of it all. He knew who the young man was. Had to. He had assets and informants, gathering up those allowed to flee and then killing them anyway – but not before learning what had truly happened. A man capable of killing a thousand bandits and then some without a scratch, hair white as snow and piercing blue eyes.

Capable of warping to and fro across the countryside with no apparent effort. Only a primus could do that, Count Asmon laughing at the rumors that the prince of Haran had been 'powerless'. Not powerless. Far from it, the way that he saw it, this was a one man army – one they had sorely needed. Still, he couldn't help but celebrate the young man, paying far beyond the normal bounty rate after the eastern border of his kingdom was completely free of scum.

For Tyr, he couldn't stop. He'd stay here forever if this was the answer. Collapsing twice in the mud and muck to vomit. Growing feverish and hot beyond any illness he'd ever experienced. Expel viscous black liquid from every pore and orifice, stinking unlike anything else. One moment, he'd be killing, resting – and the pain would erupt within him. Turn his vision red and black and red again with no measurable pattern. Tyr screamed, a blood curdling howl that shook whatever frail structure he'd hid out in. One that could be heard for kilometers in each direction. It ravaged him, all of that energy all at once was unnatural and his body was forced to accept it all.

He was changing, and he wanted to change more. His bones were stronger, denser. Their poorly maintained blades would cut at his flesh only to stop, wedged clean. The prince had gone long past pain, feeling near nothing when they cut him. His body below the neck became a mass of twisted scar tissue and burns. Laughing in their horrified faces as he lopped limb from torso and head from neck. It was an addiction and an affliction.

They tried everything. Tyr wasn't a god, he wasn't much stronger than them. A mob might erupt, the prince would make a mistake and be caught. Held down. So many different ways to die, humans are a creative lot. They peeled him open like a citrus fruit and filled his abdomen with pitch. Burned him like latrine waste. Hung him thrice. Drowned him in a keg, but that wasn't so bad. It must've been decent vintage – Tyr ended up finishing it to the point where he was so drunk he'd soiled his own pants. That was funny, not comfortable though. It all sort of blended together, the sights and smells until his body was black and crusted in a second skin of sorts. All dried blood, and less savory things.

They beheaded him a few times as well, it had taken hours for Tyr to flush his unfortunate head out of a... Well... Descriptiveness isn't always best.

Eventually, he stopped, getting sick once again and feeling his bones creak. The telltale sign when they'd begin to shatter and run beneath his skin like melted wax. Changing and warping him under the force of all that he'd taken from them. Every time it happened came a powerful exhaustion, but also a new strength and vitality. His world energy became a dense mass, pushing down on itself with a great force before expanding once again with a brighter hue.

Slowly, but surely, he felt the energy strengthen and reinforce itself. Two thousand men before the exhaustion took him and he could reap no more.

–

Astrid and the others watched with wide eyes at what was occurring. After three days, it was hard to remain still and silent after yet another disappearance. She'd used the divination spell 'farsight' to observe what manner of mischief he'd gotten himself into.

She'd assumed, and Sigi too, that he was dishonoring them. Common adultery, but that would have been preferable. Anything was better than this. It was a horror show.

Even hailing from a land of warriors, where those who battled and killed were said to be the closest to the gods... Astrid had never seen such grim butchery in her life. Sigi, a proven warrior herself, had a grim line about her mouth and a paleness to her cheeks. Tyr was marching from place to place, killing without apparent motive and showing no mercy to those he found. They tried to resist, at first all swaggering and arrogant, large gangs surrounding Tyr. So much blood that he was red from head to toe with it. They'd bury one or another weapon in him and laugh.

Without care for the wound, the prince would wrench the blade free and administer to them silently. Taking a lurching step to swing the falcata by its blade to bury the spiked guard in the skull of the man who had held it. Arrows would rain down upon him, turning him into a pincushion, but he kept walking. Through sword, axe, spear, arrow, and flame, he'd walk. Men burst into balls of fire, wailing at the top of their lungs and doing anything to find an end to their suffering. The sound was dull courtesy of the magic, but it was there. More death than any of them had ever seen, the kind of fear that made a mess of the mind. Some tried to run, but more couldn't. It didn't matter, he'd chase them down like dogs and hack them into pieces. Cold, ruthless, uncaring.

Alex, disgust and no small amount of awe observed intently. Astrid would have looked away if it wasn't necessary for her to control the scene with her own eyes. Criminals or not, this was not the way things were done... Anywhere...

“He's in the foglands...” She observed. They'd all known this, otherwise they'd not have been able to divine his location after a lengthy series of guesses. As she said this, Tyr was laughing, beating a beastkin bloody with his bare fists. It was sick, what he did to these men. They could hear the cracking of bone, the wet groans and grunts, smashed lips attempting to beg for mercy.

“Do you know why?” Sigi asked. As impressed as she was at his capabilities, sometimes facing fifty men alone in his suit of archaic armor, it wasn't bravery. Madness was what it was. There was no honor in this, only slaughter.

“No.” Alex slowly shook her head. “I do not. I'm not sure I want to.”

She fancied that she knew Tyr better than anyone else on this earth. They'd been born and raised side by side, playing together as children. She'd known him for his entire life, and her own – yet when she looked at the image reflected back to her – she didn't see the Tyr she thought she'd known. One moment, he was studying a black book, and in another – he'd gone on a slaughter. Criminals who deserved death, perhaps, but... Why? She didn't know. It wasn't like him. He was dark and edgy and lost after the passing of his mother, but never so brutal. This went beyond cruelty. These were the actions of someone who wanted it, not someone doing what was right. Tyr had no reason for quarrel with these men, he did not know their names, couldn't possibly have known the deeds of so many.

He'd do this for days at a time, not eating nor sleeping, returning only to stack the corpses on the doorstep of Count Asmon's hall. The girls would take to bed under a pharmaceutical induced sleep, rising to see him still at it. There was no sense to it.

“I can't.” Astrid exclaimed. “I'm sorry.” With that, the light construct fueling her spell began to fade away just as Tyr began using a mans detached head to beat another to death. The roar on his lips rang in their ears until the spell finally dissipated into fragments of loose mana.

“Is it because he needs more money?” Sigi was confused. Clearly, Tyr was out collecting bounties. Fair enough of a task, but not necessary. He was proud, unwilling or unable to ask for assistance. Something she could understand – thus she had ensured that sufficient funds were added to the vault coffers. And yet still, he carried on. “Does he... Like doing this?”

Was this some kind of sick hobby? Astrid in particular felt a chill run down her spine as she considered the implications. She had never been given reason to fear him. He'd never made a bid to lay a single finger on her whether by force or otherwise. They hadn't even kissed at the ceremony as was custom, refusing to do so – and he had shrugged. His face as flat as the floor they'd stood on.

None of them had ever seen that side of Tyr. Those who had, such as Mikhail, would reveal nothing of the events that had transpired near the walls of the capital for all those years. He'd butchered a score of nobles alongside his 'blackguard', but this was something else entirely. Tyr had a right to vengeance against those houses, what he'd done wasn't technically illegal. With power came responsibility, and it was well within the crown princes authority to punish treason when and where he saw it. In any case, all of them were absolutely sure that Tyr had not been like this in the past, certainly not so... Indiscriminate...

Perhaps he'd done so much killing that he'd gotten a taste. An impulse he couldn't stop. Astrid feared that, but there was something else, too.