A slightly foul scent of human waste hung in the air as Phaolo drug himself near on of the long flaming chains that crisscrossed the caverns. A middle eastern looking man sat facing the chain. He wore a white and blue plaid shirt heavily stained with blood toward the waist and a simple loose pair of dark brown pants that were faded around the knees. A black tattoo of thin wires formed intertwining waves around his neck. He sat cross-legged with his hands in his lap while his head hung down. The man mumbled to himself as Phaolo struggled to push himself into hearing range and reached with his jagged severed limb.

“Help me!” he cried with a raspy voice.

The praying man looked up and stared directly into the chain, “And who are you that I may help you? What do you need that I could possibly provide you in this place, this House Of The Lie?”

Phaolo went limp and his cheek rested on the cool granite. He didn’t say another word. The stranger turned from the warmth of the chain and looked over the body. His lip twitched at the dismembered parts resting on Phaolo’s back and observed the hollow expression of a dying man.

“I can help you, but tell no one of my services. From what I have read, my threads will not heal you, but they will buy you some time and enable your movements. But will you be fine in trusting me? If not, then I have no help to offer you. I will not be angry, as I understand that where we are is not a place of hope. But without your trust it is best for you to move on.”

Phaolo raised his head slowly to stare at this strange man, at his dark mustache and dark eyelids that looked tired. A small black bag sat curled in his legs. Was he a doctor?

“I’ll trust you,” he said, “What should I do?”

“First tell me your name in truth.”

“My name is Phaolo Ngo.”

The tailor pushed a finger coated with dried crimson as if pressing a button. A screen manifested. He began to swipe. For a long moment he stared while rubbing his chin and stroking his thick black mustache. Flecks of dried blood scraped off his fingers. Eyes widened as they scanned the screen and his mouth listed open slightly. The gaze that returned to Phaolo softened.

“I see. And you’re also branded. I’m sorry. Set your hand and your foot before me, then lay on your back. I’m a tailor. I’m going to use my skill to sew you back together.”

“You’re going to do what?”

“It’s your choice, let me work, or no?”

First, the foot went straight with the sole against the granite. The hand laid on tight fingers still holding the pill bottle. Acid belched up from the stomach onto the tongue and burned across the throat as he pushed himself to sit, then turned his body before laying on his back.

The tailor shifted over towards Phaolo with his case in his lap. It clicked open to reveal spools of red, brown, and white threads. He grabbed the severed hand with his clot coated fingers, took a sharp looking glistening needle, and pushed it through the cool necrotic flesh that had dried around the flash burns. The needle wove through and around the flesh just above the wrist to tighten it. The work moved slowly as Phaolo watched.

“How exactly is this going to help me?”

The tailor kept focus on his work; his eye pierced the same flesh that the needle wove through, “We have been given a chance to escape the House Of Lies. Perhaps we were not so good, but not so bad either. Perhaps. Have you not checked your skills?”

“So, purgatory then? And yes, I have checked them.”

“Then you should check mine. My name is Zirakzadeh Zavan. When I still drew breath in the world of the living, I was a wealthy tailor from the city of Yazd. But I suppose I valued my business and wealth too highly, so I find myself here. You?”

“I’m from Ho Chi Minh city,” Phaolo said, “But I died in Hanoi. At least I think that’s what happened. I suddenly found myself standing around here in this cave. Then something hit me and I woke up like this, but in the most intense pain I’ve ever felt in my life. That demon did something to me, a giant needle in my stomach, and the pain abated. The same demon that appeared in Hanoi before Linh died, and before I died.”

The tailor finished circling the hand with thread and tightened it slightly to test the durability of the work. With a pull of the threads the fingers tightened over the medicine bottle.

Phaolo opened the index while the tailor checked his work. He didn’t see many names, just his own, Zirakzadeh’s, and Linh Hoa! There was one more name that wasn’t blurred out, Nguyen Wen Chien! He wiped his sweaty forehead with his good hand as the tailor leaned forward holding Phaolo’s severed hand and a needle laced with thread.

“In this house of lies, I will strive to tell the truth. My work will not feel pleasant, even after it is finished. Nor will it last long, perhaps a month at most before the flesh is too rotten to hold.”

“May I check your skills first?”

“You have my blessing.”

Zirakzadeh Zavan

Sew-Sew Tailor

Skill Description Tailoring Novice 01

Your repairs to clothing provide slightly greater stat bonuses than normal.

Patches Novice 01

Your patches have increased endurance and will always be a little bit stronger than the patched material. Tearing them off will require slightly more exertion than needed to tear the original material.

Sew What Novice 01

You have the ability to sew any item penetrable by a needle to living flesh. The beneficiary of the ability will be able to manipulate said items via mana usage. The threads will transfer mana from the host to the inanimate material.

Skill Description Dead Threads Novice 01

When your threads connect living flesh to dead, the decay of the dead part will slow by half. However, The living part will become twice as susceptible to infection and necrosis.

Needle Strength Novice 03

Your strength and agility when working with a needle and thread increase by thirteen percent.

Eye For Detail Novice 03:

When working with a needle and thread. Stats of visual and touch perception increase thirteen percent faster than normal.

Curse Description Severe Asthma 01

Your lung stamina will be reduced by half in stale air environments and further in proportion to the impurity level. Lung stamina growth rate halved.

Vital Statistics # Substat # Substat # Substat # Substat # Substat # Substat # Perception 94 Sight 99 Hearing 85 Touch 109 Awareness 99 Spiritual 99 Nil Nil Strength 01 Arms 59 Legs 31 Torso 41 Back 53 Grip 74 Nil Nil Toughness 54 Blunt 51 Slice 61 Pressure 50 Nil Nil Nil Nil Nil Nil Stamina 40 Heart 31 Lungs 43 Arms 57 Legs 21 Nil Nil Nil Nil Speed 53 Swim 11 Swing 42 Run 15 Think 78 Nil Nil Nil Nil Agility 76 Arms 81 Legs 57 Torso 67 Back 49 Fingers 99 Nil Nil Fortitude 78 Magic Def 65 Mental Def 88 Stability 60 Nil Nil Nil Nil Nil Nil Intelligence 61 Emotional 89 Scientific 27 Spiritual 99 Interpersonal 94 Bestial 39 Creative 74 Magic 75 Fire 75 Ice 75 Water 75 Wind 75 Earth 75 Nil Nil Spirit 78 Restoration 68 Illusion 78 Life 18 Dark 88 Light 88 Resistance 88 Luck 63 Money 68 Combat 21 Magic 80 Relational 57 Nil Nil Nil Nil

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Phaolo held his arm out, “Do what you can. I trust you.”

The tailor tightly pinched the end of the needle that held the tied thread. A strong hand grappled the upper arm above the wound. The burnt flesh squeezed outward slightly from the strength of the grip and even a bit of blood oozed through the cauterized, sewn, and scabbed wound.

“I must be honest then. While you were sleeping, I sewed your arteries shut as they spewed blood. I sewed whatever the fire had not burnt shut. But I had not expected you to survive. I felt as if I was performing a cruelty, but then again, it may be that dying here sends us deeper. I don’t know. But you should get these wounds properly cared for. May my threads give you the time needed to seek a healing miracle.”

The needle stung as it pushed through healthy skin. The thread ran through the hole until a single thread connected his arm to his lifeless hand. The tailor wove the thread through the ring he had sewn in the cool flesh, then brought it out, to the side, back in and then out through the bump again. The needle reached back to the arm pierce it for the second attachment. Phaolo grimaced as he held his arm out straight.

This painful sting itched repeatedly with every return. Breathing became labored and desperate as his toes pushed against his shoe. Zirakzadeh pull a handkerchief from his back pocket and offered it with unwashed hands coated in blood. Phaolo took it and bit down. The work continued until, finally, mana flowed into the threads.

Phaolo felt a tingle, then a burn, and the muscles of his arm twitched as severed bone rubbed the side of severed bone. The fingers of the dead hand released, twitched, and then clenched. The movement proved stiff. A gap remained where the threads bridged the flesh living and dead. But Phaolo could move his hand again. Now it was time for the foot.

“So, you don’t think we’re in hell? Honestly, I wouldn’t expect to meet someone like you here. Maybe we’re in purgatory.”

“Perhaps it’s as you say,” the tailor examined the splintered end of the severed foot and peeled the stockings away from the cold burnt flesh until he found solid pale skin.

Phaolo closed his eyes, “If you don’t mind me asking, how did you get here? Or how did you die? I was caught in a gas explosion at a BBQ restaurant. The place must have burst, because I was there and then I was here.”

The needle led the thread in crisscrossing the flesh just above the ankle. Phaolo flexed his hand as he felt mana flow from his body through the threads into the wrist and up the fingers. He had no sensation in the hand, but by using mana he could manipulate it.

Finished wrapping threads around the upper ankle, the tailor pulled the string and readied himself to attach the foot to Phaolo’s leg. A whispered chuckle made the tailor’s chest vibrate.

“I was vacationing in Tyre. A beautiful stranger wanted to contact me to play a game at her hotel. She gave me a pager. Who was I to refuse?”

The needle pushed firmly through Phaolo’s leg.