The Derma layer smelt of fresh blood. Due to the disparity of time between the Epiderma and the Derma layer it was as though they had never left. Ruined walls gushed with blood. The remains of the City of Vocals was one colossal dilapidated fountain.
They arrived at the summit, gazing down from the base of the fallen spire. Frost lamented the loss in silence as Kissaria devoured the world with unmoved eyes. The world reflected off her crimson irises as the cavern mourned the dead with a guttural groan.
Kissaria’s expression did not change.
She had seen this sight enough where sorrow could not seep into her heart. Frost could imagine herself being so numb to the desolation. It consumed their vision as far as the eye could see, and it suffocated her.
“Does age change your perspective of the world? Because I don’t think I’d be able to keep accepting things like this even if a hundred years pass.” Frost solemnly spoke as Kissaria drew a finger from the carcass of the Big Red Heart all the way towards the gaping hole that was carved into the cavern walls.
“Age is experience. Experience is exposure. Exposure is ultimately what tempers us. We are beaten into shape by the hammer of life on the anvil of time. Your analogy of the world which shapes us goes hand in hand with this. But not everyone is made the same.” She said, descending from their carved peak, following it with:
“No one will console you if you let every little problem seep into you. That’s just how the world works. Let’s go. Your Atelier Item won’t make itself.”
“Is that really what you think? I can’t understand that mindset of leaving things as they are.” Frost sharply retorted, her emotions suddenly heightening as Kissaria simply stood in place and tapped her head with Frost’s big red heart.
“People want to live.” Kissaria said. “Why throw yourself in the way of danger when there’s nothing you can do? Do you see the difference between you and I?”
They descended the ruined pathways. Frost took Kissaria into her arms, holding her like a bride as they descended the shattered walls. A single breath was enough to cause tremors to permeate across the city. The Big Red Heart and Jury’s attack had left it in a precarious state.
It was like a crumbling sandcastle.
“I do. I’m not blind enough to know that not everyone can change things. It’s just unacceptable that there’s nothing else people can do but accept it. You’ve lived for centuries, so you must have seen it all. Do you think the world has changed for the better after all this time?”
Kissaria tapped on the lens of Frost’s goggles as she rode down the walls. Before long, they were on the no man’s land that separated the City of Vocals from the Triple Paw Complex. Frost unfortunately could not use magic so long as her Spatial Distortion was active.
She called this a Gateway. The triplets called it the One Way Ticket to Hell, in homage to the confirmed rumor of the disappearing trains. It was invisible to the naked eye, but if one looked close enough, they could see the light and space around its mock event horizon distorted.
“Here, it’s not bad. But the City of Spades is a window to the old world. Other parts are wonderful and so, so colorful you wouldn’t believe it. Others like the Derma layer will always be stained in liquid scarlet.”
They arrived at the base of the Big Red Heart. This was not the Heart of Ours itself, but it would have to do considering there were no other traces of the Heart of Ours. Frost placed her down and Kissaria began slicing the air again with her whimsical blade which could not be detected with Appraise Object.
Sand did not spill this time. With the goggles she watched several phallic-like organisms spill out. They were like sperm cells, or tadpoles for that matter. Their tails propelled them through the air as they wiggled themselves into the Heart of Ours, phasing right through its unbeating myocardium.
Frost unfortunately could not check them, as she could not use Appraise Object due to the effects of Spatial Distortion I.
< They belong to Kissaria. But they do not appear to be living creatures >
“I’m guessing you control them. Is that like golemancy?” Frost asked, interested in the swarm.
“Atelier Items don’t follow those rules. They’re automatons with only one desire. To give birth to the same materials within a Corrupted.” Kissaria said, hiding the blade as she curiously poked at the Big Red Heart. “Squishy. I really wanna keep this.”
“I can offer if it in exchange for information.” Frost said, causing Kissaria to raise a brow. She knew this wasn’t all she wanted. “Clearance level 0 puts you next to the Beholder. I’m guessing there are strings only you can pull.”
“True! I’m one of the big 4s! They call us the T4-Artificers. We make up the metaphorical heart of the Abyssal Mother. My job is primarily to repair items. You won’t find anyone out there that can repair a Corrupted Item.” She boasted. “Whadday need from me?”
Trust. Frost made it clear that she wanted trust above all else, and their sworn allegiance with the Golden Index. There was little else she really required except for as much information as she could gather about ImpulseWorks, the state of the Ateliers, the Impuritas and the Aberrations.
Also, she wanted to know if she herself knew how the Corrupted formed.
One by one, as chunks of flesh were stripped from the Heart of Ours, she took a seat on a nearby rock and began to unload what she knew. There was a rule that insisted they cooperated with the Archetype at all times written in their manuals.
“Nowadays we are less overt in the perversion of our ideals. ImpulseWorks originally suppressed inert desires. Lust was one of them. Our Beholder went through stages of periodic tempering before she understood the weight of her depravity. Unlike many, she sunk into her aspirations. She endorses lust and all the impulsion of desires. To make up for her wrongs. I believe it’s selfish.”
She commented.
“What about the Ateliers? Scarlet Logic’s working with the Impuritas. Your dungeon monsters. How come they’re not under scrutiny like Justica Arms or Inflow Direct?” Frost asked.
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“Do you have proof that Scarlet Logic is working with them? It sounds like one big conspiracy.” She mocked, but she never dismissed the idea. “Retrofitter’s dying. Eclipses disappearing. Healers not arriving. Scarlet Logic personnel ignoring our calls for help. Caldera Industries suddenly arriving in the Nex Megalopolis at the same time our friends were assassinated… It’s a step up from the usual bloody politics. As you can see, we have 3 suspects.”
She found it difficult to believe Frost that they were working with the Impuritas. Even with her heart-tugging ability, she could not convince her of this fact. But she never completely shrugged the idea away because these were indeed strange times.
At least in Kissaria’s perspective. Everything was always strange to Frost.
An exchange of life and blood was typical between the Ateliers. Only Frost and her group were aware of the Scarlet Logic’s involvement with the Impuritas. There was not a single shred of evidence that Frost could show to the world.
In fact, attacking them head on would only cause other Ateliers to take their side. Each action had major implications, and this irritated her proactive side. While ImpulseWorks stood with the Golden Index, they had their eyes set on other Ateliers.
They took the stripped pieces of the Heart of Ours, which were like giant chunks of jerked meat, towards the Gateway. Kissaria revealed much about the Impuritas. Of how they never once were an issue until the arrival of the Ateliers.
The Hearts were perversions of an Atelier from what she knew, spawning from the disasters of the past which fermented and sept so deeply beneath that it formed the Hearts. They were the impurities of not only an Atelier, but the world itself, made possible because of the Ateliers.
“It’s a secret because we can’t deal with them. The Ateliers polluted the world with misery. The Hearts then formed, and now they pollute our world just as we did. Underneath every major civilization you will find traces of them. Working in the underbellies, whether here or afar. They’re intrinsically tied with our world now. Much more than us.”
They clambered wall after wall. Frost hoisted the material on thick, metal ropes thanks to her strings. Eventually, they arrived at the Gateway location and Kissaria mentioned the Aberrations.
“They’re everywhere and nowhere. High concentrations of Nex tend to attract em’. Without them we’re as good as dead in the water. They’re impossible to get rid off since they can’t exactly die. So, little Abyssal Mother arrives one day and asks for their help. To temper the desires of her Workers, she had to forfeit her own ability to desire. Now we live in a weird… Weird…”
“Symbiosis?” Frost found the right word for her, causing her to snap her fingers just as they passed through the threshold.
Traversing the Spatial Distortion caused everything to distort all around them. Frost felt ill trying to interpret the imagery, and ended up closing her eyes. Unfortunately for her, she could still see, and it did not help that she had a thousand observant eyes.
“Does that mean mutual agreement or somethin’?” Kissaria said as Frost dragged the material back into the red dome, swiftly sealing her Spatial Distortion off.
Just for that while her MAG DEF was set to 0. This was due to the fact that she had zero mana, meaning she was technically vulnerable… technically because there was no way someone was going to eat through her insane HP value.
“It means you both coexist together, and benefit from each other. They help temper the Workers, and in return, they gain Nex.”
“You know more than I do about em’ then! Should I clap?”
“Yes please.” Frost sighed. “Don’t forget about the Corrupted. Unless you need to work right now?”
Kissaria didn’t answer immediately. She hauled the goods after Frost slashed her strands away, allowing the woman to toss them onto the workstation. From there, she tapped her goggles and activated the zoom function.
“So long as we can think, then the Corrupted will never disappear. CogitO whole goal is to stop the concept of thought. But between you and I, I think that’ll just make even more Corrupted.”
“What about emotions? Stories? Folklore? Legends?”
“Like I said – If we can think about them, then they exist. But emotions can make them too, I guess. Never heard of a story. It’s hard to tell, but we know they originate from the living and the ordinary. That’s all we know. And it’s because they originate from the deepest recesses of our minds is exactly why they’re so dangerous. The mind is a terrifying thing.”
So they knew after all.
“Partially. Because as we both know, many people have suffered in this place but there hasn’t been a Corrupted encapsulating their woes. Corrupted don’t appear on a whim.”
It’s a criteria we’ll have to probe for huh. I’m satisfied they’re at least aware.
Kissaria added that this revelation was the reason why the Ateliers were required to make significant changes when it came to their Nex generation, and enacting their philosophies. But because this rule was so inconsistent, Ateliers like Caldera Industries continued swallowing villages until Galia personally stepped in.
No one truly understood what created them. Perhaps there was a catalyst, or an Advent that enabled this.
Finally, as the material began to fold into itself, stripping away the excess like meaty sawdust, she asked the most important question.
“Can people become Corrupted themselves?”
Her visor cracked as she instantly shot Frost a twisted look.
“No. Never has been. Never will. There is no such thing as a Corrupted person.” She said with vehemence, as if sensing the answer to this existential nightmare in Frost’s question.
Kissaria feared this truth and denied it with every fiber of her being. This was the only piece of information that moved her. She angrily scrapped the Corrupted material and restarted on another piece, her hands trembling the longer she allowed this truth to digest in her anxious mind.
“People… can’t just become Corrupted. That can’t be true. I would have become one myself. So don’t tell me otherwise. What’s wrong with you? Trying to make a grown lady… shit. Shit shit shit SHIT SHIT SHIT!”
She began to smash the table, swearing in a foreign tongue before she swiftly grasped Frost’s shoulders and stared into her eyes, begging for her to console her with a lie. But Frost needed this truth to reach people like Kissaria. That way they could understand the repercussions they could face if things continued as they were.
But this also brought Frost into scrutiny.
Because there was no way to tell if this was caused by Frost herself.
* * *
After hours of tempering the Atelier Items were finished. Additionally, the Coat of Prejudice also saw itself return to its former, feathery glory. On the table were two items. One in the form of a pale stethoscope –
Die Agnosis
Atelier Item
< Salvation is a holistic approach >
ORIGIN : The Amalgam
AFFINITY : Ego
TYPE : Tool
< EFFECT: Upon interaction with the heart of the target you will be sent into their emotional state of mind. Determine their woes. Face their fears. Lend out your helping hand or bury them in despair >
– And the other was a simple, decorated cupcake.
The Taste of Mortality
Atelier Item
< What does it mean to be alive? >
ORIGIN : Nav
AFFINITY : Desire
TYPE : Fulfillment
< EFFECT: It will be waiting for you. Can you imagine the sweetness of mortality? >