Seth brought his sword up in a panicked hurry. Where the priest would strike did not come to him, and try as he did, no ideas came to mind. With the man gone from his attention for the briefest moment, he moved his sword so that he blocked his head, choosing safety over accuracy.
The priest’s cane took him in the ribs, and pain flared where contact was made. Seth gasped at the impact and staggered back. One hand released his sword to hold his side while the other remained. He was squatted now, hand to his ribs and gasping for air, unsure of when he had dropped to his new position.
Igor, for his part, returned to where he’d been standing at the beginning with casual steps. He had the odd dignity to give Seth a chance to rise, and Seth took it.
In his periphery a notification popped up.
----------------------------------------
Objective: [Defend Yourself Against Igor 0/3].
----------------------------------------
That’s not right, one of his minds noted.
We don’t think we should be worrying about the math and numbers right now, another replied.
The third, it seemed, disagreed. We think it is. What happens if it becomes zero over zero?
We fail the quest.
Event, a mind corrected.
We don’t think we will like the consequences.
But isn’t this pain the consequence?
“I don’t believe so,” Seth mumbled, rising.
Back on his feet, he took his stance again and met his opponent’s gaze. The black orbs of irises gazed back, strange things, like perfect blotches of ink stains on white canvases. It was terrifying but Seth held the gaze, regardless.
He watched, and waited.
Then Igor moved again.
This time Seth saw him move clearly. Sadly, he lost him again somewhere in the motion, and pain exploded in his knee a split second before he heard the sound of the priest’s cane strike him. He fell to the knee more from his broken stance than the pain, and Igor returned to his place. Disinterest echoed in his step.
----------------------------------------
Objective: [Defend Yourself Against Igor 0/2].
----------------------------------------
Seth frowned at the notification before banishing it away. When it disappeared from his view he paused.
How’d we do that? a mind asked. Each time a notification had popped up, it had always stayed until he was done reading it. But he hadn’t even read this one.
He wasn’t sure how he’d done it… he’d just wanted it… gone. It had annoyed him and he’d simply wanted it gone. Whatever Jabari had done to him, it seemed the priest had given him a level of command over it.
Are we very certain this was Jabari? A mind asked.
A response came easily from another mind. Who else could it be?
Us?
And why would we think so?
Seth came back up to his feet as they conversed. They had long since agreed that Jabari was the only one that could’ve done something to them. They would have guessed it was the seminary if they hadn't already been experiencing it before they had joined, according to his minds.
Seth found himself frowning at his line of reasoning. It was not because his minds were disagreeing again, but because he had been referring to himself with the wrong pronoun.
“I am a single person,” he muttered to himself as he came back to his feet, believing now more than ever that he needed to be reminded of this.
Exactly, his minds thought. It confuses us why we would refer to ourselves as many.
Don’t we do it all the time, though? This from another mind.
It is understandable when we do it, but not when we do it... If that makes sense.
A thoughtful silence followed before an answer came. Oddly, it does.
“Be quiet,” Seth hushed them, focusing his attention on Igor.
“You mumble too much, boy,” Igor said with a frown. “It is a bad trait in one such as yourself.”
Seth sighed, pain echoing in his muscles. “Tell me about it,” he muttered.
He moved the leg that had been struck, testing its stability, and found it wanting. It would not hold his weight for much longer. All this from a single strike, he wondered. The thought of it was terrifying.
“Any ideas?” he asked his minds.
The answer was quick and abrupt: No.
He sighed again. “Yeah. I thought so… Useless.”
What he had learned in the past few hours had failed him twice now. He did not blame the technique itself, merely his adeptness of it. His muscles were sore and the technique foreign. It would not have been a big deal to lose, but he was beginning to find that—quite honestly—he did not like being bullied so blatantly. That said, he made a conscious decision and chose to stick with it.
He parted his feet slightly, though one of his knees trembled. Then he firmed his feet as best he could, one stood an inch or two ahead of the other. Certain of his footing, Seth bent his knees, tilting them only slightly while he met the priest’s confused… perhaps intrigued expression.
For his sword—though it was not what he was used to—he moved it to his left hip. With his left hand he held it in place so that it served as a strap. He took its hilt in his right, and waited. He had to focus now. Distractions would prove deadly.
“That means all of you must shut up,” he told himself, and his minds obeyed.
In the silence he watched Igor. He watched a mild seriousness settle on the man’s face in response to his stance. Eyelids narrowed around black eyes that watched with a new vigor absent in his previous attacks. For a moment Seth wondered if this was going to end worse than the last two times; if perhaps he should’ve continued with what the seminary was teaching. He decided not to dwell on it. After all, he had two more tries.
Igor’s eyes twitched very slightly to Seth’s right before he moved.
Seth watched the man move, unsurprised when he was gone from his vision. The man had looked to his right but there had been something in the twitch of his hand before he had moved. Something that spoke to his instinct but not his logic.
Seth did not dwell on it.
His hand tightened on the hilt of the sword that still felt odd in this stance. He felt his muscles, or lack thereof, grow taut like the chords of a tightly woven rope. With a quiet mind, he struck, knowing the attack was coming.
The draw came, oddly powerful. The weapon was light in his hand and he drew it with the fury of thousands of draws performed over half a year.
The false blade of his wooden sword came free of his hip and arced through the air. It met no resistance as it moved. Before it completed its arc another pain howled in Seth’s arm so that he was forced to drop the weapon.
The sound of the wooden sword clattering to the ground, rather than the pain, drew Seth from whatever focus he’d been gathering and he cradled his right arm in his left, fighting back the tears in his eyes born of the accumulated pain. His ribs hurt so much he feared Igor had broken one in his first attack. His knee still throbbed and he knew he would not walk well for the rest of the day. And now his right arm hurt terribly at the elbow.
Why was this being done to him? he wondered. The others had been released after one attack, two at the most. So why was he being forced upon with four?
----------------------------------------
Objective: [Defend Yourself Against Igor 0/1].
----------------------------------------
Igor looked down at him more from the height difference between them than anything else, and Seth saw something he couldn’t quite place in the priest’s eyes. Was it interest? he wondered. Was it curiosity?
He didn’t want any of it. All it did was ensure something similar would occur next time. Still, there was an odd sense of unnecessary stubbornness in his mind as he picked his sword up, surprised that he had not been struck for losing it.
Igor returned to his place but there was nothing casual in his steps. When he turned to face Seth again, Seth did not miss the look in his eyes: Determination and curiosity.
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He did not like it.
He met the priest’s determination and curiosity with blatant defiance. He might not have liked much of his journey to the seminary but he’d be damned if he backed down from an attack when the draw was his technique of choice. Be it in attack…
… or defense, his minds finished.
“You are intriguing, child,” Igor said, his voice gentle with a touch of condescension. “But only so.”
Only so?! Seth’s minds snapped.
“Be quiet!” He hissed at them.
He understood the anger that bristled his minds but needed none of it. He was a child, not a fool. Even calm and collected he would not win against a priest. Even in his best condition he still would not win against a priest. He was as angry as his minds in their collectiveness. But he had to control it. Worse, if his anger showed disrespect, he could well be sporting a garish injury as Fin before him.
With his right elbow still throbbing, Seth moved the sword to his left hand. It was strange to find that it fit quite well. The touch was natural where he had expected it to be out of place. He flexed the arm gently, eyes ever fixed on Igor who showed all signs of waiting patiently, and found it satisfactory. Slowly he eased into his stance so that his left foot was ahead of his right, and fixed his sword against his right hip. This, too, came naturally.
Igor blurred immediately after, and Seth drew his sword.
The sword arced as it always did. There was no clacking of wood to announce his victory and he fought all his silent minds to pay it no heed as the point of his wooden weapon reached the acme of its draw. Barely there, he drew it back with a flick of his wrist, the feeling of it bringing a subconscious smile to his face as it returned.
How he had missed this.
His sword struck something on its return, hindering its naturally guided path back, and shock ran up the length of Seth’s arm as he was met with the resistance. He bore an inkling of what had happened and forced the wooden sword in continuation of its path.
Everything had happened in no more than a split moment.
His command met a force as his muscles tightened, his grip on his weapon growing, fighting to compound in force against his competition.
The sound was loud as it rang in the air, announcing his achievement to the world in a resounding echo as if in a hollow room filled with nothing but emptiness and stale air.
In the end, his sword did not return to his side, instead it was flung from his hold to sail off into a corner, dropping to the ground wherever it had chosen to fall. Seth stood where he was, proud at the absence of new pain.
Before him, Igor stood merely a foot away. The man looked down on him without expression and he looked back. He had to tilt his head slightly to meet the man’s gaze, eyes filled with unfazed defiance, newly bred from his insignificant victory.
Between them hovered a new notification.
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Objective complete: [Defend Yourself Against Igor 1/1]
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He fought a whisper of a smile as he watched it while watching the man on the other side of it. A moment after, Igor turned and walked away from him. The notification withered away into the breeze and another took its place.
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Event: [Four Strikes].
A test has been put to you by Reverend Igor of the Seminary. He has brought it upon himself to test your ability in physical contest. The decision has been made that you defend yourself against him. Do this to the best of your ability.
Objective Failed: [Defend yourself against Reverend Igor 1/4].
Event [Four Strikes] Failed.
Consequence: Pain.
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Seth sighed. He was really hoping the pain it had been referring to was the pain of Igor’s attack. The notification faded away slowly and he took his first calming breath. When another notification came to life as a replacement, it shocked him.
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Event Update Inbound.
Event Recalibrating… Event Recalibrating… Event Recalibrating…
...
Event Updated: [Four Strikes] is now [Igor’s Interest].
[Igor’s Interest].
A test has been put to you by Reverend Igor of the Seminary. He has brought it upon himself to test your ability in physical contest. The decision has been made that you defend yourself against him. Do this to the best of your ability. Failure has been performed spectacularly and has garnered Igor’s attention. Again, you must defend yourself from Igor.
...
Objective Updated: [Defend Against Igor: 1/2].
Consequence: Pain.
----------------------------------------
Seth had barely started reading before panic set in. The notification disappeared from his sight without thought. All he’d grabbed from it was that there was only a consequence and no reward. That, and the numbers had changed.
“What’s happening?” he asked, confused.
That’s not what we should be worrying about right now, a mind warned him in rushed panic. We must defend ourselves.
Seth’s confusion became panic “Why?”
NOW!!!
This is going to hurt terribly, another mind muttered in resignation.
Something troubled the atmosphere and Seth focused, truly focused. Igor stood before him, returned to where he should be. But everything about him was different, so much so that it hurt Seth’s eyes to look at the man. It sent a chill up his left arm so that it trembled and he was forced to hold it with his other hand.
Before him Igor stood frozen in a stance, an actual one now, not the casual, instructional one he’d been using since the lesson began. He stood sideways, crouched low, feet astride beneath him wider than his shoulder length so that while one bent at the knee towards Seth, the other was extended out behind and to the side of him as far as it could go. His empty hand was held out in front of him, bent at the elbow as if holding a shield when there was none. As for his sword arm, it was extended behind him so that his sword pointed back and away. A scowl marred his expression and around him space seemed to warp, reacting to him like air above the flames of a bonfire. This, Seth knew, was the reason the man hurt to look at.
“Now…” the priest said with a voice of steel. “Show me that move again.”
Seth tried to back away, to move, to do anything, but the chill had crawled up his arm to root him to the ground. Paralyzed as he was, he could do nothing more than breathe, and even that was sluggish. It pulled him back to his memory of when he’d started learning his breathing technique from Jabari; the feeling of breathing through mud.
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[You Have Been Stunned].
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His eyes, despite their pain, were held transfixed by the wrath of the man before him, ignoring the notification. Fear held him like a hook through a man’s shoulder blades, and he knew there would be no surviving as a heavy pressure pressed down on him.
We’re too young to die already, one of his minds panicked.
We still have so much to live for, another wailed. For Snaffle’s sake we’re still virgins.
In the growing despair, another exclaimed, Fuck Natalie!
Then another notification popped up before Seth as he watched the look on Igor’s face morph to something he couldn’t quite place.
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Event Update in Progress...
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Seth almost wept.
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Updated Event: [Igor’s Interest] is now [Igor’s Ire].
[Igor’s Ire].
A test has been put to you by Reverend Igor of the Seminary. He has brought it upon himself to test your ability in physical contest. The decision has been made that you defend yourself against him. Do this to the best of your ability. Failure has been performed spectacularly and has garnered Igor’s attention. Your defiant reluctance to defend yourself has garnered his anger. Now you must protect yourself from Igor.
Objective: [Defend Yourself Against Igor: 1/2] is now [Protect Yourself: 0/1].
Consequence: Pain.
...
Bonus Objective: [Defeat The Priest].
The man before you threatens the state of your very existence. If not stopped your life may cease as you know it. Preserve your life at all cost. Your opponent must be put down.
Reward: Unknown.
Consequence: Death.
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This is madness, Seth forced, and every fragment of his mind agreed. He couldn’t even breathe right now and he was supposed to do what? Defeat the priest in front of him? For fuck sake he couldn’t even move.
We really don’t want to die like this, a mind cried. We’ve got to do something; our arm is still moving.
His mind was right, his left arm still trembled when the rest of him couldn’t move. But what use was a hand that did nothing but tremble.
He was still trying to feel the arm when the pressure stopped abruptly. Air returned to his lungs and he gulped it like a man starved. Igor, on his part, had returned to a casual stance with hooded eyes that concealed a lot.
“That will be all for today,” he said calmly, addressing the children. “Pick yourselves up and find your way to the dining hall.”
With that, he turned and left them.
It was then that Seth heard the groaning, a lot of them in different voices. He turned around and behind him the boys were picking themselves from the ground, dusting their dirtied clothes. Save the fat boy, they all looked deathly pale.
The fat boy didn’t seem to be struggling too. Though he held his hands above his ears seated on the floor, he kept his eyes on Igor’s departing form. Still, there was always a chance the boy had been affected more than he let on. His brown skin, after all, couldn’t pale like the others. Oddly, he'd been engaged against Igor for only a brief while, yet it had sufficed to make him forget the other children.
When Seth returned his attention to where Igor had been, he found a new notification waiting for him.
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Event Update in Progress…
Event [Igor’s Ire] is now [Igor’s Interest].
Event Update in Progress…
Event [Igor’s Interest] is now [Four Strikes].
...
Bonus Objective [Defeat The Priest] is null.
Reward: None.
Consequence: None.
...
Event: [Four Strikes].
A test has been put to you by Reverend Igor of the Seminary. He has brought it upon himself to test your ability in physical contest. The decision has been made that you defend yourself against him.
Objective Failed: [Defend yourself against Igor: 1/4].
Event [Four Strikes] Failed.
Consequence: Pain.
----------------------------------------
It took a while, but the children finally picked themselves off the ground and trudged along in some direction.
With no knowledge of what was next, Seth followed them.
A mind spoke as he walked. By the way, what was that about?
What was what about? Another replied.
We mean, we know we have issues… but ‘fuck Natalie!’… Really?
Seth remembered it and found he was curious about that too. Fortunately, he knew better than to indulge his minds. Instead, he focused his attention on the fat boy who continued to steal glances at him.
I really thought we liked Natalie, his minds went on.
We do, another piece answered.
But…?
Seth continued following the children to the dining hall, waiting for the answer.
It never came.
So he cast his mind to a more important question. What had just happened? Why had the events evolved only to dim back down. Had the notifications somehow affected Igor’s actions or had the man’s actions somehow affected the notifications?