Remus felt as if he was being dragged by a hundred hooks planted into his skin.
Upon the arrival of the stygian vortex, he had flown upwards as far as he could. There was no way, no matter how hardworking of an Enkindled he may have been, that he would be able to fight back the tug of a God-Graced.
Violet had teleported out of there, and Remus cursed. If they had been in close range, she likely would have been able to warp him away too. This manic pair had sent them flying in opposite directions.
Remus’ mouth was numb, his nose was leaking Ichor, and countless lacerations had reduced his skin to a cutting board. And these madmen still weren’t finished with him. Intentionally or not. They probably hadn’t even registered his existence.
One of Remus’ shoes had been sucked into the pit. The darkness had consumed the article, and for some reason, Remus got the funny feeling he was never going to see it again.
Nevertheless, he was too far out of range for the magical pull to really deliver its full force on him. It felt like he was flying with weights attached to him, but inch by inch, he gained attitude.
At last, he left the field of effect. Possibly two hundred feet high, nausea ravaged his body. Well, it was either because of that, or the devastation taking place below.
It was like the Ravaged Lands was a cake, and some hungry behemoth had just taken out a slice. Thousands of pounds of earth continually fell into the void, and Remus got the impression the sect-leader wasn’t taking much notice of who was being caught up. In indiscriminate tugs, even his own men and women met their grim ends.
If this wasn’t the decider of the conflict, Remus wouldn’t be able to bear what came next.
Greed clansmen sprinted after fleeing members of the Fury Sect, protective waves of gold providing defence, as fireballs and fists of smoke came for their throats.
Suddenly, from the void, the Rage sect-leader blasted upwards. A floating stream of condensed mist had been her only barrier from a sour end. But how she had escaped needn’t be asked.
A vague giant of fog encompassed her entire form like a titan of mass destruction. In its clutches, a man struggled, devouring pieces of the form wisp by wisp. The abyss below dispersed, leaving behind a newfound cave-system in its own right. In the distance, the vague, hazy silhouettes of buildings danced, adrift with the sandstorm triggered by the rampage. An outpost of the Ravaged Lands, it seemed.
The only obstacle in his way was this raging duo.
Sprouting his own armour, the Greed Sect leader Remus still didn’t know the name of refused to go down without a fight. Fizzling into existence from all angles, jewels, trinkets, and hundreds of a kite-shaped object swept towards him. Tyrants, Remus identified the foreign currency. They were all of varying colours, indicating value. But as of that moment, Remus was far too busy flying between hurtled ores, unearthed out of the pit below, to admire the collection. The resources converged, melting down into a shimmering stream of gold that swirled around the man. Finally, as if a team of invisible blacksmiths had just completed the final touches on their best work yet, an oversized suit of armour settled on his form. It looked as if you could fit ten separate people inside that thing, but the cackling man manoeuvred within without trouble.
In a frenzy of limbs, the two brawled, remaining airborne through the sheer force they were exhibiting.
Remus didn’t dawdle. Flying out of there before something else threatened to kill him, Remus couldn’t remove the visage of their wicked smiles out of his head. It was like they were enjoying this. Hell, he suspected they felt no greater euphoria than in the heat of battle.
Before his Mark gave out — flying this high-up was exhausting, especially with projectiles threatening to cave his skull in at every turn — he pivoted towards a patch of ground a somewhat safe distance away. Landing, he was immediately enraptured by a blinding mauve. He blinked out the lingering dots in his eyes, resurfacing into reality, before Violet’s face met his.
“Who were those people?” He asked, taking in his new location. They were at the crest of a canyon, the warring God-Graced blips on the horizon.
“Gulliver of the Greed Sect, and Hilda — the self-proclaimed angriest leader the Fury Clan has ever seen.” She said it slowly, breathing uneven. “Give me a second to recover, and I’ll carry us further.”
Grimacing, Remus tried and failed to ignore the echoing cries of delight. “Are all the leaders here missing a few marbles?”
She shrugged, taking a sip from her waterskin. “Wouldn’t know. But Nova isn’t the sort to make too many appearances here. That’s probably how he’s gained so much political leverage in the last decade. He’s the only one not looking to break heads. Well, not publicly, at least.”
Sipping from his own canteen, and washing away the blood from his face, Remus frowned. “Who is the monarch of Hell’s Floor? Surely clans this rowdy would be hard to rule over.”
“That’s precisely the reason there is no set King or Queen. Not a soul here would agree with anyone sitting on the throne but themselves. Though the clan with the most influence . . .”
“The Chaos Clan.”
Violet nodded.
“Alright, c’mon.” Remus urged, not feeling too comfortable being anywhere near Gulliver or Hilda. “I won’t be able to rest easy until we're a few miles aw-”
Remus clutched at his chest, grunting from the worst case of heartburn he’d ever had to deal with. Fighting off the impulse to drop to his knees, Remus’ eyes centred on a wounded man clad in the uniform of the Greed Sect, hand extended towards him.
A worming fear drowned his mind. The image of a heart being crushed in an uncaring grip threatening to split his brain into a panicked mess.
He couldn’t allow that memory to bleed into reality.
Before he could do so much as activate his Mark, Violet was already behind the clansman in a surge of purple. She had him in a headlock within seconds.
It was a strange sensation, when someone was trying to tear the heart of your chest. A ghostly grip entangled itself around the organ, and only by sheer force of will was he able to prevent it. Activating his Mark, Remus summoned a burst of flame to provide a protective layer over his heart. The grip loosened, harmed by the Ambition that was benevolent ro Remus, and Remus only.
The three of them froze, as Remus summoned a blast of fire in his palm. Was he to release it at the man? He’d never killed before, at least not another human being, and if there were any other means out of here, he wasn’t keen to pick up the habit now.
“If you stop attacking us,” he grunted through the strain, “and run as far away as humanly possible, we’ll forget this ever happened.”
The man spat towards Remus. A tiny strip of gold struck him, delivering no more harm than a light impact.
Violet grabbed his neck more aggressively. “If you don’t deactivate your Mark within the next ten seconds . . .”
The man was a Foot-Soldier, presumably, so Violet would have no trouble handling him herself. Especially when he was already bleeding heavily. They must have received the injury amidst the chaos, seeked refuge all the way over here, and Remus had faced the misfortune of stumbling across him.
Whatever Boundless Vault the man had cultivated, it was obviously no help to him. Whether he streamed Infinity through his body or not, it would be useless in comparison to the vast pool Violet possessed as an Unbounded. The clansman wouldn’t know this, but in a rush of hysteria, evidently realised he was outclassed.
In one last desperate manoeuvre, a void appeared at his feet.
Without a thought, Remus fired a trickle of fire into the man, concentrated in a bullet-like mass. Simultaneously, Violet twisted his neck at a gruesome angle. The man’s eyes rolled back, his arms sagged, and, once Violet let go, his lifeless body dropped to the floor. In that moment, the thumping impact was the most eerie sound Remus could recall hearing.
“We’re leaving,” Violet rasped, disgust scrunching her features.
Remus swallowed. “Oh. Oh right.”
An almost material silence hung over them, seeming to replace the marrow in Remus’ bones. Ignoring the body a mere foot away, Remus shut his eyes, as a familiar purple returned.
----------------------------------------
Aziel waited for nightfall, to set his plans into motion.
The rest of the rebellion had taken an early sleep as usual, besides the few on night watch, of course. When the only thing that filled your days was dread and the sight of soily tunnels, you tended to make them as short as possible.
Call him judgmental, but Aziel thought that was a major waste of time. There were limited hours in the day, and even if he didn’t have an extensive list of things to do down here, he still felt the impulsion to be resourceful. So he trained.
His Boundless Bank was almost fully evolved. Closing his eyes, the superimposed image of the structure was revealed to him. Leading into each of his bones, the white tubes advanced through his body in efficient patterns; an almost exact replica of the diagrams Aziel studied of the Vault religiously. The pearly white tubes ended abruptly in several places, but overall, he would say he was seventy-five percent done. Drawing in the Infinity dispersed across the room, he drew it through the incomplete network, focusing the mystical resource on extending the complex pattern tiny bit by bit.
It was oddly therapeutic. It gave him something to focus on. Something other than the injustice cast upon his clan. A few more Durations of pure training like this, and Aziel would be eligible for the front lines in no time.
He was in a meditative position at the very edges of their tunnelling. This way, via the sparse amount of light that filtered through one of the rebellion’s more risky creations — a tiny hole, approximately an inch in diameter, hidden beneath a rubble pile, but placed in such a way that sunlight would still slit through — he was able to gauge roughly the time.
Noting that nothing but darkness had veiled the expanse for a substantial time now, he infused himself with one more intake of Infinity.
Not too far from there, another tunnel led upwards into a destroyed house. Aziel hated that pathway. Not because it was dangerous, all of them were, but because he was forced to take notice of the obliterated remains of his sect whenever he was obliged to trod through. The same could be said about any path leading into the razzed outdoors, but still, it left a sour taste in his mouth.
Emerging into the house, he replaced the stray plank of wood that disguised the hole, and compressed his back against the wall. After a heart-racing second, he confirmed, as well as he could, that there was no one in the vicinity.
Sneaking through the darkness, making sure to keep by the areas more infested with rubble, he left the clan’s perimeters.
It was a long walk. Aziel had made sure to leave his destination far away, lest The Wild Sect were to discover it.
It was raining, which largely was a help. Sure, being pelted by moisture was a slight irritation, but it would disguise Aziel’s image. Ignoring the squelching sound from the muddy morass below, he finally stopped at a wooden post in the ground. It was ramshackle, looked as if any drab of rain would knock it over, and the letters he had inscribed were barely legible.
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She deserves better. He thought with a frown, kneeling by the gave, his mother’s name level to his eye. Her body wasn’t beneath, but with no knowledge of what The Wild Sect had done with the bodies of the dead, curse the lot of them, it was the best he could do.
“When we get the base again,” he spoke softly, “I’ll arrange you a proper grave, with a funeral service. You and everyone else who died.”
The thought was the only thing keeping him going most days. More than anything, he refused to live in a world where the dead were mistreated. Even if he had to wait in the dark for their day of glory to arise, he had to hope the Ambition Clan would succeed. He had to believe.
Finally, Aziel addressed the burly man at his side.
“I assume you’ve known about my trips here since the start?”
Brison nodded. “At first, I was afraid Remus hadn’t gotten across to you. I will not lie, I believed you were planning on throwing your life away for a brief moment of revenge against The Wild Clan.”
“I’m not that idiotic,” Aziel sniffled. “I just couldn’t rest easy until she had something. It's not nearly good enough. But it’ll serve for now.”
Through the curtaining rain, Aziel had never seen the man look so sober. “I’m not going to tell you that this is dangerous, because you have the sense of mind to already know that.”
Aziel kept silent.
“And I won’t stop you from coming here, either. It's your safety being put at risk, and you’re well past the age needed to choose to take it.”
When Aziel turned his head to address the man, something rather strange occurred.
Between the two of them, a tiny Unbounded appeared. Immediately, instincts snapped him into action, and flames enveloped his body. His half-functioning Bank swept Infinity into his skeleton, reinforcing his body with impossible might.
Aziel would have crushed it in an instant, if the pearly apparition didn’t speak.
“Remus has safely left the Ambition Clan’s base, without interception.”
With that, the creature dispersed, in an explosion of Infinity.
“Well.” Brison seemed slightly troubled. “That was strange.”
Aziel found that to be the greatest understatement in the world. “That was a Projection. A Projection . . . carrying a message for a human.”
“Indeed.” The sect leader was never much for words, but at that moment, he seemed at a loss of them. “This does provoke some intrigue . . .”
“But Remus — he got away safely! Maybe, if the universe decides to hand us a bone for once, this could actually work out after all.”
Brison appeared less than convinced. “I don’t like hinging all of our success on a long-shot, but then again, we don’t have much else going for us.”
The older man smiled. “I think a little hope wouldn’t be too audacious.”
----------------------------------------
The first outcropping of civilization wasn’t as far as Remus had perceived it to be.
In little less than an hour, motivated by generally staying alive, he and Violet found themselves on the outskirts of a tight-knit community. Dropping to the dusty ground in a heap of sweat, he caught himself, taking in the new environs at the same time.
He couldn’t tell which clan ruled over the area. There weren’t many buildings, merely an inn or two, by the look of the towering structures, a few huts, and a tavern at the centre. Remus deliberated on entering for a drink, before the state of the place sunk in.
Windows were shattered, empty bottles littered the stairs leading up, and the door swung uneasily on its ageing hinge. Decades of being slammed daily by drunkards hadn’t appeared to do the doorway much good. Suffice to say, no matter how ravenous Remus was, nothing was going to make him enter that saloon.
Homeless looking men fought with nothing but their fists, a small crowd cheering them on. No Marks were activated, probably because of some arbitrary rule for this brawl, though neither of them looked like much of a threat. They faced difficulty standing upwards, let alone throwing a punch.
Violet appeared at his side. “Lovely vacation spot.”
A snicker escaped Remus’ throat. Vacations. The concept was foreign to all but the top percentile of society. Namely, people like Damosh. And even then, you didn’t have much choice for locations that didn’t risk your rapt assassination.
“Come,” Violet led straight towards the tavern.
Remus dawdled for a few seconds, before shambling into a follow. “We’re going there? This place might be slightly more civil than that fight we just slipped through, but we’re newcomers here, Violet. We’ll stick out like a sore thumb.”
“This place is commonly travelled through,” she reasoned, “and besides, we have no choice.”
Remus was about to enquire on what exactly she meant, when she brushed through the door. Sighing, he entered behind her, the clamour of the inside deafening out his own thoughts. Ignoring the reek of old liquor, Remus still had to blink rapidly and focus his hearing. The place was an attack on every one of the senses.
Chattering men and women gathered by rounded tables; the clang of bottles resounded from the bar as a small team worked frantically; and arguing groups ganged up on one another. Up above, a chandelier glowed with a brightness putting the darkening afternoon outside to shame. All in all, it was enough to give Remus a headache. He activated his Mark ever-so slightly, just to be on the safe side. You never knew when it would be you being pressured like that poor gentleman in the corner.
Stalking up to the bar, Violet placed a pouch filled with Inklings on the desk. A burly man with an apron examined it idly, cleaning a mug with a washcloth. His salt-and-pepper beard was impressive indeed. Swaying with every swipe of the hand.
Remus eyed the money-pouch with growing tension. Is she planning on wasting all our funds on, gods forbid it, beer?
“How may I help you?” The barman spoke sceptically. His gaze focused away from Violet for a split second, and onto two arguing men in the corner, but he quickly met her eye.
“I was wondering if you would be willing to convert any of these into the Tyrant equivalent.” Remus felt a wave of relief at Violet’s words. “Any assistance would be most appreciated.”
He scowled. Not the most reassuring of signs, but the man put down his half-washed mug to examine the contents. For a minute, he counted the coins, creating stacks after considering each one.
At last, every Inkling they had managed to salvage throughout their travels was gathered there. A pang throbbed at Remus’ heart, as he looked upon the amassed collection in woe. In some fortune, since setting out from First Rite, they had managed to preserve most of their savings — instead relying on flavourless rations, gifted to them throughout their travels, or the dubious offerings of nature. Still, it wasn’t much, and their supplies had reached their end. The hospitality of others, sadly, wasn’t reliable. They would have to eat into their savings.
“I don’t have much use for Inklings myself,” the man admitted, an angry curse from behind snagging his attention for a moment. “But, seeing as people like me serve as the only means of conversion in this damn city, I’ll see what I can do.”
He moved to the back, leaving his assistant to mind the bar in his absence.
It had occurred to Remus that asking a bar-owner to exchange currencies was a strange means of doing so. Though, upon recalling how unstructured the Ravaged Lands thus far had been, he wondered if there was a standard place of conversion, even in Hell’s Floor. Asking Violet about this, she confirmed his suspicions.
“There’s a central bank in Eclipse — the only other city where Tyrants are commonly used — where you can transfer from Inklings to Tyrants, and vice versa. But apart from that, businesses on the outskirts of the Ravaged Lands are the only accessible way to do so. Like this establishment, for instance.”
A raucous uproar from behind snapped Remus out of his intrigued reverie. The two men in the corner were grasping at one another now, and Remus felt his heart skip a beat. A purely black Mark across the bigger fighter’s face glowed. Before the other brawler, who had been obviously stalling for his life for minutes on end, could do so much as activate his own in response, he screeched in agony. Dropping to the ground, they writhed in fitful screaming, like a dying worm.
Before Remus could catch his breath, he stumbled back in horror. The two opposing gangs in the back were in the midst of their own scuffle, completely unrelated, and the victor was obvious. Complexions turning a sickly green, one group toppled over in tandem, clutching at the nearest objects in sight. Oversized boils broke out all across their skin. A few spasmed with no hope of survival.
Tables crashed down, innocent civilians flooded out, and the weakest of the bunch died with nothing more than a painful splutter.
The staff shouted for the owner, who, dashing into the fray, screeched at the top of his lungs. Faint etchings in his face blossomed into blazing colour, stretching across every visible section of his skin. The man possessed a Tapestry, the trademark of a Mercenary Ranked. In summary, it was a Mark on steroids.
The grey colours exhibited nothing but swarms upon swarms of sleeping mortals and Unbounded alike.
Realisation clicking into place, Remus knew what god this man was of, and what he was teetering on doing, seconds before it all played out. The surviving fighters blinked blearily, eyelids drooping as if they’d just been startled out of a decades long slumber. Then, as if wondering what they were doing awake in the first place, fell face-first onto the floor ahead of them. Marks deactivated, and suddenly, the room was very quiet indeed.
The barman breathed in deeply, the chandelier clung overhead, and Remus swore he could hear crickets.
“Apologies,” the man muttered, turning to face the kitchen in the back. “Carry them out.”
Slowly, with methodical grace, the team heaved the dead bodies onto makeshift stretchers, carrying them out to gods’ knew where. The surviving fighters, one of them drooling onto the floor, were tossed down the stairs at the entrance. Remus heard them stir slightly at the impact, groaning, before submerging into unconsciousness yet again.
The bar may have been a mess, but hey, at least they were efficient.
“Please excuse the trouble,” the barman said, “standard business, you understand.”
Even Violet appeared a little spooked. “Right. Is it always this bad?”
“This is the Ravaged Lands after all. It’s more blood and guts than sunshine and rainbows. But the power of the Fatigue Clan usually keeps things from going too far. Brute force is the only way to marshal this lot in relative order, anywho.”
His choice of words didn’t do much to settle Remus’ shock. If this was business as usual, what constituted being too far? Remus swallowed, doing everything in his power not to glance at the drops of Ichor dotting around the floor.
Finally, the man placed a small chest by their Inklings. “Again, sorry for keeping you waiting. I can’t exchange everything, it wouldn’t be worth it.”
Pushing down his disappointment, Remus forced a smile. Presumably, these personal converters profited from taking a little extra money for themselves. Then, when they had stockpiled a sizeable amount, making the trip worth it, they would exchange it themselves at Eclipse. Still, Remus wasn’t confident that they could survive off this much alone.
Hell, he was barefooted now after losing his shoes. Call him wasteful, but walking around with one boot was terribly inconvenient. Remus had been forced to desert the other, primarily so he didn’t trudge around with a limp.
Remus didn’t know the exchange rate between the two currencies, but the man handed an array of Tyrants, piled in various colours. They may have been smaller, but outnumbered the amount of Inklings they’d possessed tenfold.
“‘Lot of Tyrants . . .” He mused.
“One Inkling is worth five of them. Red is one Tyrant, purple is two, and with each additional colour, the value doubles.”
Remus was left scratching his head.
“It sounds confusing, but you’ll adjust. I know the amount might be a burden to carry, but I seem to have only reds and yellows on me at the moment.” He sounded too sincere for a resident of the Ravaged Lands, to the extent that neither of them had the heart to complain. “You two are new to the city, I presume?”
Violet nodded.
“You’ll hear this a lot, but be careful. This little outpost is managed by people just trying to get by, so you’ll be able to rest without a large risk of dying in your sleep. But other places, those tending to be closer to Hell’s Floor, they’ll put on an innocent front, and kill you for all you have. My own clan included. Be careful.”
An uneasy air about them, the two departed after thanking the man, sidestepping the array of bodies still out cold.
It was getting late, and, even if it was pricey, an inn sounded much more appealing than yet another night of camping. They entered the building, and half-awake after the long day, bought the cheapest rooms possible.
Their chambers were opposite each other; just two doors at the end of a repeating corridor that seemed to replicate itself exactly on each floor. Inside, it was more a cubicle than a memorable hotel experience. Though, this place likely would stick in Remus’ mind, but not at all because of its quality. A bed and walls. That was it. Remus had been in prison cells less compact than this.
Right before heading to bed, both Violet and Remus met in the corridor. The issue was obvious.
“We’re dirt poor.” Violet said plainly.
Wincing, there was nothing Remus could say to refute that. “We won’t be able to travel far if we barely have enough to eat. We need to work.”
Violet wrinkled her nose. “You have your background in carpentry, but I’ll probably be stuck cleaning that damn bar. Not many job prospects in the middle of nowhere.”
An involuntary yawn left Remus. “Tomorrow, we’ll have a look around. Who knows? We might even be able to travel as we lend a hand from place to place.”
Neither of them said a world, not wanting to admit how unlikely that was.
Some inward part of Remus screamed.
Here they were, ready to fight against the entire world, and what was the largest obstacle in their paths? Monetary gain.
With a sigh, Remus entered his room, too tired to check for traps. He fell asleep before his head hit the pillow.