With a flip and mid-air rotation of her entire body, Sig severed Heskel’s arm by turning the blood-dagger in her hand into a metre-long blade of impossible sharpness. As she landed on the ground and the Wight’s severed limb thudded to floor some metres away, she only barely managed to catch his riposte with her golden arm, turning her body with the momentum of the fist’s impact to avoid breaking anything.
Sig danced around the next wide swing and sent a score of blood darts into the Giant’s body, where they burst apart the many-coloured and stitched flesh below his poncho-like robe, creating several fist-sized holes that would have been lethal to a mortal man. Unperturbed by the grievous wounds however, Heskel flung a knee into her chest, cracking several ribs and flinging her across the room.
Before she collided with the stone wall, she manipulated the blood within her own body to reorient herself so that she struck the wall with the soles of her feet and not her face. She immediately kicked off, launching back into the fight, while globules of blood released from her body and shot towards the Giant to create an opening for her.
Most of the blood-bolts were absorbed by the Monster’s strange attire, and she only narrowly avoided having her face caved-in by ducking low under a pre-emptive strike of his remaining arm, skidding along the bloody floor on her knees. The fabric of her trousers burnt away from the intense friction and the skin on her knees stung painfully.
But, to a being like Sig, pain was a motivator, not a deterrent.
She hurled her long sword at the Giant like a javelin, willing it to split into a hundred hair-thin fragments that each pierced through his body and skin-made attire, halting him in his step towards her. Before she could will the blood needles to coalesce and finish him off, she heard a fingernail scrape across taut leather behind her.
“Tchinn.”
Sig turned on the young Fleshcrafter as a hiss sounded across the room. It brought to mind a pouncing snake that, after a long hunt, had found its mouse-prey cornered and without escape.
It was like an invisible pair of hands clawed their way through her stomach and she felt herself be disembowelled. No matter how much she fought against it with her own flawless control of the blood within her body, she knew that she would lose to this entity the Boy had invoked. It felt like a paper-thin wound at first, but then, from one moment to the next, her stomach opened wide like a mouth and her pink-and-red intestines spilled forth alongside chunks of flesh and fat. The blood was only held at bay for a second, before the pain made it impossible for her to concentrate.
As Sig fell on her knees on the hard floor, amidst her organs and lifeblood, she fought desperately to lift the bone gauntlet the Fleshcrafter himself had constructed.
Before she could aim the Hemolatry weapon at its creator, a powerful hand seized her fist and crushed it alongside the weapon adorning it.
Then she heard another scrape of a fingernail across the strange book in the Boy’s hands and his lilting demonic speech.
“Tchinn, if you wouldn’t mind.”
----------------------------------------
While Jakob sewed Heskel’s arm back onto his clean-cut stump, he could not help but continually glance at the sunken-eyed and dark face of Sig of the Eyeless. A pool of blood surrounded her slumped body and her intestines lay before her like ropes, with the golden prosthetic frozen in the motion of trying to stuff them back into the cavity in her abdomen.
When the last stitch was done, the Wight performed the Amalgam Hymn himself and moments later he was flexing his fingers as though they had never been separated from his body in the first place.
“Mammon was wrong,” Jakob observed humourlessly. “The Flayed Lady never lets go once her claws have dug in.”
“Matters not.”
“I suppose it doesn’t.”
Jakob looked his companion over. His torso and legs were especially damaged wherever the demon-skin poncho did not cover.
“She really did a number on you.”
Heskel grunted in annoyance.
“Mistakes are to be learnt from, not ignored,” Jakob reminded him.
“She was strong.”
“She was… but she was also arrogant in assuming she was fighting only you.”
“Arrogance begets folly,” Heskel quoted Grandfather.
“Indeed. But there is a lesson in it that we all would benefit from, not just the dead fools.”
Heskel nodded shamefully.
“We should relocate. I am certain she is not the only one who predicted my thoughts.”
The Wight grunted his assent and then went to roll-up and transport the Tungsten Scroll.
Jakob meanwhile was still staring at the dead girl before him: her crimson blood, the gold-flecked brown hair, and the marred-and-bruised skin. Witnessing it drew from him strong emotions, not too unlike the first time he successfully managed to cut open a body without damaging the organs. It was overwhelming and exhilarating, like a drug. He found himself wrong-footed by the feelings inside himself and the way his face felt hot and flushed.
“Before we leave,” he replied, an eager smile upon his lips. “Let us not squander the gift we have unwittingly been granted.”
He wanted to possess her. An ultimate affront to one who viewed servitude as the death of the soul. He hoped that she could somehow still perceive what happened to her in death, because the idea of her anguish at seeing what he would reduce her to made him grin from ear-to-ear. She would eternally repent for her heretical worship and beg the Watcher for salvation.
Some hours later, the pair moved through the Meat Market with their new companion in tow, her abyss-black eyes staring dully at her feet as she meandered behind them a few paces.
The slave-trade had not suffered from the incursion of monsters from below, nor the dispossession of thousands within the metropolis. Rather, it seemed to be booming, if the many shouting traders and sellers were anything to go by. If not for their Grand Undertaking, Jakob would have seized on the golden opportunity it offered, as prices were sure to be low and less questions asked thanks to the overabundance of ‘wares’.
Since Heskel had deciphered the requirements for the ritual to summon Nharlla, their first stop was Haven district. It was but one amongst several stops they would make.
“Do you reckon we can acquire two of the Esoteric Tolls in Haven?”
Heskel grunted indifferently.
“I suppose we just have to see. But still,” Jakob scratched the corner of his eye with the demon-flesh glove, wherein subsided the soul of a gelatinous Greed Demon of Squire rank named Purll, “these requirements make little sense to me.”
After all, they were going to Haven in search of ‘Relic of Virtuousness’, and, if they were lucky, ‘An Eye that has Witnessed the Divine’.
On the list of Esoteric Tolls they required were also: ‘Thirteen Skinned Faces Given Willingly’, ‘A Sincere Childhood Dream’, ‘The First Branch of a Thousand-Year-Old Tree’, and a fourth one that Heskel said they already possessed, though he would not elaborate when prompted and Jakob could not decipher the Chthonic sigils himself, much to his chagrin.
“Esoteric,” Heskel replied, putting emphasis on each syllable of the word.
Jakob chuckled. “Esoteric to whom though? How are we supposed to gather these if we do not understand what exactly to look for?”
Heskel shrugged his big shoulders, the attire on his body shifting with the motion and the visage of his ruined and multi-coloured skin beneath startling a passer-by, who quickly hurried off while pretending to not have seen anything.
“Very well, we will have to simply trust that the Watcher will guide us well.”
The Wight nodded and brought them down an alleyway to where a manhole led to the sewers below. Jakob was slightly apprehensive about delving into Grandfather’s demesne, but he trusted that his Mentor had learnt from his loss at the hands of the Crown to stay clear of the uppermost tunnels of the undercity, though he doubted the Old Spider was defeated yet, as patience and tenacity were virtues he extolled. Moreover, he perceived the passage of time differently than humans and would simply bide his time to strike again. Hopefully, by then, Jakob and Heskel would be well-clear of his reach, as they had plans to leave the metropolis when they had all the ingredients for the ritual.
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The short trek through the tunnels was uneventful, though evidence of battles fought in the dark labyrinth of filth were abundant. For every corpse of an adventurer or guardsmen they found, there were more than a dozen of Grandfather’s chimera and halfbreeds. They would undoubtedly have been caught up in the skirmishing if not for the strange time-distorted dimension of Mammon.
“Have you determined how many days or weeks we missed?”
Heskel grunted, in a way to suggest that it was a meaningless expenditure of time to bother figuring it out.
“I’ll take that as a ‘No’,” Jakob replied. “It must have been more than a week, perhaps even two, gauging by some of these bodies.” He still could not shake the feeling that, while only half a month might have gone by in Helmsgarten, they might have spent over a year within that endless mansion of Greed.
The Wight grunted again, but not as a reply, rather a warning. Jakob stopped behind his Lifeward, then saw what he had noticed: a man who still drew breath, despite clearly being on the brink of death.
“A stomach wound,” he assessed, crouching before the prone figure, whose chest moved imperceptibly with each laboured breath. “He will suffer a while more before perishing.”
“Living subject for graft,” Heskel suggested.
“Excellent idea,” Jakob replied, seeing that the man had hands that were only slightly bigger than what Sig’s hands had once looked like.
A little while later, with Sig’s ruined left arm fixed with the grafted hand and wrist of the survivor they had found, they reached one of the crossroads of the Haven District sewer complex. Jakob knew from their previous foray into this part of the city that the path that continued onwards would eventually lead to the cisterns wherein the Ratmen had nested, so he guided them down the narrower tunnel that curved right, which, after some more wandering, led them to a manhole ladder.
With Heskel at his side and Sig staying behind to secure the manhole exit and guard the Scroll, Jakob moved towards one of the large temple-like buildings that crowded the district.
For reasons he did not know, the Wight had been adamant that they could find the relic they sought within this particular church.
It was nearing dusk, with worshippers, clergymen, and faithful thronging the limestone streets in large flocks, their voices like rippling thunder. There were more of them than when last they had visited the district, but he was unsure if it was because today was a special day or because the people, troubled by the recent events, had staked their safety on a higher power that they might have forsaken during times of peace and prosperity.
Though their robes were not similar to the people around them, they fit in well enough to avoid the watchful gazes of Haven’s Holy Guardians who stood at every major intersection and street in parade formations that lined the thoroughfares. They were clad in white robes and silver chainmail, wielding long ornamental halberds. The ones who guarded the temples and churches were slightly better armoured with strange domed metal caps featuring a veil of silver chainmail that fell down their shoulders and neck, leaving just their faces exposed.
Only a short procession of shrouded faithful was queued before the Heroic Saint’s Church, but it was also one of the smallest temples in Haven. It was still quite a grand edifice though, and Jakob felt it rather wasteful, given the frivolous worship in question.
“So, what is the relic?” Jakob asked once they had passed through the tall open doorway. The church was built from enormous pieces of limestone that had somehow been transported here and then sculpted to feature countless reliefs of scenes that he was unsure of how to interpret. The sculptures covered both inside-and-out, and when he looked up to where the domed ceiling stood some five metres above, he saw that the sculpting covered even there. It must have taken decades to accomplish, he thought, which seemed a colossal waste of time.
The Wight pointed a finger at an altar that stood at the very centre of the oval church interior. Supplicants knelt side-by-side around the small glass box that sat atop the altar, as they muttered in overlapping prayers.
“…absolve us from our sins and cleanse this cradle of vice…” he overheard one of the worshippers beg the object within the glass box.
It was a mummified hand with half of the forearm attached, which was frozen in a gesture of middle and index fingers extended and the rest curled into the palm. It seemed bizarre that people were praying to the corpse of some long-lost hero, and not even the entire body at that, when True Gods watched as their planet turned and a single word from their formless lips could wipe away all life in an instant.
It was so absurd that Jakob could not help but laugh. The people nearby drew back from him, then caught on to his disturbing attire that moments before had seemed akin to the modest pure-white robes they wore. Even clothes like his could blend-in perfectly until people looked straight at it, and, clearly, his washed-out orange-yellow hooded apron was nothing alike to those of the adherents.
“Heskel. Grab the relic and let’s go. I know how to find the Eye we need, just make sure to not look up.”
Heskel grunted and stomped towards the altar, while Jakob walked back out of the pitiful church.
As he crossed the threshold, he spoke to the Demon that lived in his hooded apron as well as the one that dwelled within his right-hand glove: “Marll, defend me. Purll, grant me claws.”
From within the flesh glove, the gelatinous Greed Demon shaped its essence and sprouted bone-like white claws from the tips of the fingers, while the Demon in his robe sprouted a tail that moved around, seeking anything that might harm Jakob.
A sound of glass being shattered and people screaming in alarm and outrage came from within the domed church, causing the two statuesque guards by the door to wake from their blank-stare reveries. But, they managed only to turn before Jakob gouged out the throat of the nearest one and his newly-sprouted tail gripped the other by the face and smashed his head into the limestone wall, damaging one of the sculpted reliefs and leaving behind a chunky crimson stain.
The guard with the carved-open throat sputtered and gargled at Jakob’s feet and his lifeblood quickly flowed down the ramp where faithful yet waited their turn to enter and hundreds were gathered in the longer queues that led to other larger temples. Screams were sounding from within and without, and to Jakob it was like a prelude before the true orchestra played.
Heskel emerged from within, his body covered in blood, and ran down the ramp to engage the guards that were already making their way towards them.
Jakob stayed at the top of the ramp and meticulously removed his scent-mask, while his demonic tail swished back-and-forth, killing or injuring any of the worshippers that ran out of the church entryway behind him. Then, after drawing in a deep breath and tasting the fear and blood that choked the air, he began the Hymn.
Like a preacher before a mass, he lifted his hands into the air to encompass all who crowded the plaza before the Heroic Saint’s Church, while more-and-more of the Holy Guard emerged from nearby temples and houses.
“All eyes avert thy gaze from the Great One Above!”
The soldiers seemed to slow down as his voice echoed across the plaza, reaching perhaps most of the district.
“Look not upon its visage, burn not thy eyes on its glare, flay not thy skin to escape its grip, bite not thy fingers to flee its temptation, fling not thy soul into its maw! Do not look above!”
Heskel seemed the only being not drawn under the spell, as he continued to pummel his way towards where Sig the Reanimated waited dutifully some streets away.
“Feel its gaze bristle thy skin, feel its glare burn the hairs on thy scalp, feel its tempting snare. Grab hold of its offering!”
He let the echoes die down before drawing in a deep breath, knowing that he would perhaps never witness devastation on this scale ever again. Then he closed his eyes and shouted the final verse.
“Behold! The Great One Above bears witness!”
An orchestra of damnation filled the air as thousands of voices twisted together in a choir of screams, shouts, terrified yells, and unintelligible sounds of those dying as their minds were split open from within by what they saw. The sounds echoed all around him, making him wonder if indeed the entire district had looked up to witness the Watcher manifest.
He shuddered in delight when he imagined what sight he might see when he opened his eyes. From the wet ripping-and-tearing sounds that accompanied the inhuman howls, shrieks, and cries, he envisaged utter pandemonium, akin to Mammon’s final moments or the Realm of the Wrathful Saint.
Slowly, he opened his eyes and looked upon the new Haven, reborn by the curious gaze of the Great One Above that held no equal. He distantly wondered if the Watcher could even comprehend the devastation that his attention caused. It was power on such a scale that no mortal King nor Demon Lord could fathom to possess.
Beyond the ramp that led to the desecrated Church of a once-was Hero, was a roiling mass of bodies, some alive and attempting to writhe their way to safety, and others spasming as they underwent a post-mortem transformation. It was hard to tell where one body ended and the next began, as the close proximity of the gathered crowd had ensured their bodies melded into clumps, as though a terrible use of the Amalgam Hymn had been performed by a sadist with no sense of propriety. Heads were spliced together, most often resulting in death to all those involved, but a pitiful few souls remained alive, despite the fact that the bodies they were attached to were dead-and-gone.
The melted human fat and flesh, as well as effluvia, lay like puddles all about, and there were partially-melted bodies and faces visible at the centre of many of them. The devastation seemed to have grown exponentially from his first use of the spell, perhaps due to the overabundance of souls offered up as a Toll. After all, the Hymn of Devouring Madness was fuelled by the devastation it caused, but it also seemed to grow stronger from it, creating a strange feedback loop. It was however also possible that each time the spell was invoked, a new Eye of the Watcher manifested and thus the effect was variable.
As he continued to stare at the aftermath, he heard the audible crack of bones and joints, as some of the faithful were turned into absurd creatures that defied reason, but who, despite their constituent parts being very much deceased, began meandering about the corpse-strewn plaza, searching for sustenance perhaps.
Some were like many-legged horses that manoeuvred clumsily about on hands and feet that were fused into one, and others were bizarre unipedal towers of confused flesh with twenty-toed feet that crawled like directionless spiders. It was as though entities from the darkness of space had followed the opening his Hymn had created and were attempting to discern how to exist in a world defined by physics. It was quite possible that the Eye manifesting was not the cause of the destruction, but rather that the gaze itself acted like a lamplight for these incoherent entities. It would go some way to explaining why almost every ‘creature’ that he beheld was unique and as alien to each other as they were to him.
A scarce few of the victims, primarily the former guards it seemed, were human in shape, but possessed now additional limbs or joints, and were entirely absorbed in a meaningless struggle with the others of their kind, not too unlike the first time Jakob had invoked the Madness Hymn.
He was so absorbed in studying the catastrophe that it took the arrival of a phalanx of Holy Guards at the far end of the plaza to break him free and return his mind to his task. The newly-arrived guards immediately engaged one of the bizarre abominations, as Jakob wandered over to one of the least-damaged corpses he could find nearby and severed her head with a quick swipe of his clawed glove.
He cast a scrutinising glance at his prize, ensuring that it was exactly what he had been seeking. It was safe to say that the eye of someone who beheld the Watcher would fit the criteria Heskel had told him.
Grasping the second Esoteric Toll by the hair of her severed head, he went to join up with his companions.