William pressed down hard on Sayed's blade, but the swordsman didn't budge in the slightest. Instead, he pushed up against William's axe, throwing up and off and causing him to stumble into the wall. William grabbed onto the cold stone of the building, and as he did so, he saw several slaves running out of a nearby room.
"No!" he yelled, reaching for his whip with one hand.
They were freeing the slaves. Those slaves were William and Roy's hard work running out down the hall. He started after them, but something caught his leg. William tumbled to the ground, rolling and dropping his axe at the same time. He stopped on his back, facing up at the ceiling.
Puff.
"You will leave those people alone." Sayed appeared above him, both swords in hand.
"Those slaves are my property!" Willaim threw his palm out. "Form Arrows!"
Puff.
A multitude of sharp objects shot out from his hand, each one in a 'V' shape. They blasted through the air randomly, but most were centered on the swordsman. Sayed brought up his swords, cutting at the missiles in a fury as he was pushed back.
"You lessers don't understand." William pushed himself up, calling his curse to his hand again. "Form Scythe."
Puff.
A long weapon with a flat end that stretched out far formed in his hand, with a secondary blade just below it. A lesser person might call it an upper case 'F,' but William knew better. It was the true form of a scythe, and he would use it to harvest the swordsman.
"You've ruined all of our hard work." Willaim's breath came out in ragged gasps. "My brother and I have made a life for ourselves out of our place in this system. We've fought hard and long to make it to where we are today—you outlaws are just here to ruin it. You don't respect the hierarchy. You fools don't know your place!"
He pushed himself up from the ground on the scythe and assumed his stance, ready to bring the scythe down on the swordsman or hit him with the blunt end to set up his next attack. Either way, when the swordsman came for him, he would have a way to react.
"You're the fools." Sayed held both arms out, pointing his blades toward the ground and letting his head hang. "You think that this is a world of order. You think you have a place in it because you are not bound, so you bind others. That is the fool's path."
William hesitated, leaning on his back leg and preparing for the strike. He knew that the swordsman would come for him soon. He knew that the attack was coming, but Sayed's stance was full of holes. William could reach out with a thrust and follow up with a slice, and it would all be over.
It was too easy, and thus, it had to be a trap.
"Desert Mirage."
As the swordsman said it, the heat around his body doubled. Sweat erupted down William's back as a wave of hot air crashed into him. Around Sayed's body, four additional arms flickered into existence, each one holding a copy of his swords. William eyed their blurry forms. They were obviously fake.
However, he then noticed that the rest of Sayed's body had taken on the same wavy blur. Now, he couldn't see the difference. William licked his lips. He knew of mirages. They were common on desert islands that had extreme heat. They were illusions and nothing more. He just needed to know where Sayed was coming from and what sword was real, and he could handle that illusion with no problem.
"You think you can beat me with such tricks?" William asked, smiling as he pulled his blade back and put the scythe shaft out. "I am above such petty things because I see the true world. I know the forms that are higher than reality!"
Sayed raised his swords, not responding to William's provocation. William watched him line up the six blades so that they were at one point in front of him. The tips of the blades touched as he leaned forward. The fool was going to charge William, and William would just catch him on the end of his scythe. Even if he had the illusory swords, that wouldn't stop William from striking him hard center mass.
Fools would be fools. That was their station in life.
"Mirage Thrust!"
Sayed shot forward, his swords coming in like an arrow targeted at Willaim's chest. William stepped forward, lashing out in a thrust of his own with his spear's shaft. However, his spear only met with air. It crashed against Sayed but kept going. The illusion passed through William, the sword going through his chest before the image flickered and disappeared.
William's heart raced, and he searched the hall for the swordsman. The illusion had been a fake out, meaning he had to be elsewhere. His eyes flitted back and forth until he saw the wavy lines of air off to the side.
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"Devil's Wind!"
From the wavering air, Sayed shot out. He was to the side in the narrow hall, but it was just enough to avoid being a head-on strike. William had his shaft thrust out at the illusion and swung it to interpose between them, but it was already too late.
Six cuts reduced his scythe to broken pieces falling through the air. Six cuts sliced across his skin, sending waves of fire down his nerves. A single slash cut across each of his limbs, followed by a searing hot pain that burned brighter than a branding iron. Finally, two cuts slashed an 'x' across his chest, and he fell back and to the ground against the wall.
The smell of burning flesh reached his nose as he lay on the ground, gasping for air.
"I do not believe in reducing my enemies to bondage." Sayed cast a long shadow over him, both of his blades burning a bright orange in William's swimming vision. "I will not leave you in a cage of your mind or any other."
The swords came down on William, and then he knew no more.
----------------------------------------
Erin followed Artur into the first room, one door before the room they had both broken out of. Artur had pushed ahead without asking, and she wouldn't question it. He held out his sword in his right hand and pushed forward with his shield in the left. However, there were no enemies in the room.
There were people. A musky odor assaulted Erin's nose as she looked through the dark room. The light from the hallway illuminated it, but she could see several shadowed figures inside. However, the first thing she could perceive was that they weren't in cages.
She needed light.
"It's very late," Artur said. "Barrier Activate."
A soft blue light emanated from his shield, lighting the room in a pulsing glow. Erin looked around the room in the new light and nearly bit her tongue when she saw what was inside. Several bodies lay stacked on the far side of the room, motionless. They were the source of the smell and were completely naked as they lay piled up in massive heaps.
Her breath caught in her throat. Flesh upon flesh, stacked together, no different from items in a storehouse. It wasn't so much the death that surrounded her but the casual nature of it. She had seen plenty of death in her time, but to treat people like objects, to throw them in a pile, that was monstrous.
It wasn't that different than how the Coven treated shades, and the Coven had turned out to be as monstrous as they claimed shades were.
"What in sha-om happened here?" Erin whispered as she walked further into the room.
She had a hope that at least one of them would be alive.
"Grgh," a man tied to a rack, his arms above and his legs bound below, groaned.
"Right here, right here," Artur whispered, moving closer with his shield. "No need for you to fear."
Erin followed him forward, opening her gate and embracing the energy that flowed inside. Vibrant growth twined through her body, and her hands glowed with a green light as she approached. If the man were alive, she would be able to help him. His back was covered in long red lines that seeped with blood. He barely moved as they approached, but Erin still reached out with her hand.
The power of growth coursed over to the man as she touched his back. His wounds puckered and stitched together rapidly, scabs growing over blood before the skin closed. In moments, the cuts were gone, though scars remained.
"Aah." the man sighed, collapsing against the rack but still bound by his restraints.
"Alright, help me get him out," Erin said.
She and Artur sat at his binds, removing each one. Once finished, Artur sheathed his sword, threw the man over his shoulder, and started for the door. Erin checked the bodies, making sure that none were alive, but the reality was stark.
About ten people, both men and women, lay in those piles. Their skin was sickly pale, and not a single one of them breathed. Some had the same markings as the man, while others had their throats slit. No one would leave that room alive.
She followed Artur out, and Artur made his way toward the next room, still carrying the man. Erin jumped forward, blocking him off and motioning for him to take the man to the warehouse area. She could handle the next room on her own.
"Are you certain?" Artur asked. "He is not a burden."
"I'll handle it," Erin said, suppressing the shudder she felt walking back into the hallway. "I'll handle all the locks in there, and I think Roy is long gone."
Artur nodded, turning and carrying the man toward the open door. Erin closed the door and took a deep breath, letting the hallway's comparatively stale air waft over her. The dank smell of death clung around her, and she wouldn't be fully rid of it until she had several baths.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
Thankfully, the rain continued outside. That would help once they left the building. She rushed to the next door, taking her tools from her pocket as she walked. The slaves they had left behind looked up to her as she entered, and for the first time that night, she felt a little hope rise in her chest.
"One at a time," she said as she approached the first cage. "When you get out, head down the hall until you see a man with a sword and shield. He'll take care of you all until we can get out of here."
"Thank you," the woman in the first cage whispered, her bony fingers patting Erin's hand as she worked.
She finished unlocking the cages in a few minutes. It was quick work and distracted her from the contents of the adjacent room. When she finished, she stopped, looking over the cages in the darkness.
Slavery lay at the heart of the Twelve Kingdoms. Many people captured out in the Fringes were later transported to the Twelve Kingdoms and used to fuel the nobility's insatiable desire for labor. However, Erin knew that labor was often unnecessary. Automatons and machinery could often do the bulk of heavy work throughout the Twelve Kingdoms and would only need relatively few to operate it.
However, the stagnation enforced by the Scions, the enforcement of their hierarchy, made it so that there were always lessers to the nobility. The lessors needed to be used, or they would become corrupted and turn to immorality.
That was the ideal that William espoused so loudly back on the shuttle. Standing surrounded by the cages, she reminded herself why she had sided with the revolution. She reminded herself that her fate would have been tied to those cages if she hadn't run away.
Leneski had saved her from that, and the cages around her reminded her of that debt. She needed to contact the People's Revolution again soon. However, that would have to wait until after they escaped the warehouse. She left the room, checking once again for more doors before returning the way she had come.