Chapter 7-1 Alignment of Interest
The ugly truth of it is that none of us are in any condition for a new war. Not yet. Hence, we trade--we make nice with those we deem lesser rivals to find better angles. Angles with purchase. Angles that will let us better strike at the opposition when the war starts anew.
For now, that means we keep to our peace with the No-Dragons. That means we continue our trade with Sanctus--but watch for their Void-based operations still. Should those mad fools expand another stretch of the Sunderwilds, hire a third party to deal with it.
Some enterprising Fallwalker perhaps. Anyone desperate enough to disrupt things.
Our enemy--above all others--has and will always be Ori-Thaum.
Until they are dealt with, our path to true Usurpation will remain denied...
-Authority Uthred Greatling
7-1
Alignment of Interest
It was on their return to the Second Fortune that Avo and Draus discovered that the Guilds sealed Layers One and Two.
They had just switched aeros, leaving the barge behind the gutter and leaving in a cargo truck, when Layer One sealed behind them. Above, Layer Two followed immediately after. Between the hexagonal gulfs that allowed air traffic to flow, a series of tears opened up. All that passed through their thresholds found themselves in a spatial loop. Those that descended arrived at the top, diving down through an open gateway leading out the bottom of Layer Two. The opposite was true as well for those ascending.
Near to these Heavens, Avo felt his Soul resonate with their rippling warmth. It was like he was an island unto himself, and beyond the borders where his subreality still bore the likeness of shape, he could sense another Heaven spearing itself into the guts of existence, looping around itself as two points in space became one.
Trapped in the Spine of the Warrens, the holographic sky froze, the flow of clouds shredding away into splashes of code. Over the spectral shine of the sun, large bracketed letters fused into shape.
OUTBREAK, it said.
Moments later, the emergency broadcast followed. Dormant ghosts flooded out from every loci, every corner, delivering directions to the uncounted masses at the pace of an instant.
+ATTENTION: THIS IS A PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCAST: WOMBRASH OUTBREAK DETECTED IN SOVEREIGNTY - YUULDEN-YANG. PLEASE SEEK SHELTER AND REFRAIN FROM ACCESSING THE NETHER FOR (1) DAY(S). ADJUST VISUAL AND AUDITORY FILTERS TO MAXIMUM SETTINGS IF POSSIBLE.+
Draus frowned. Avo watched a shiver interrupt the flow of her mind's accretion. "Ah, hells. Been some time since the last one. Waving her hand, she expanded the visual feed playing across the screens of their vehicle. They were lucky. DeepNav displayed minimal traffic clogging the lanes ahead.
The air was infused with a lethargic blue, the color bled from a large advertisement for Sapphire Ocean. Some new salt-tasting perfume made by one of the No-Dragon subsidiaries, if its ghosts were anything to go by. Enshadowed in his coronal shine, distant aeros were as if fish swimming deeper down into muddy waters.
"Expected more outbreaks," Avo said.
She shook her head. "You got any clue how many died durin' the first down here? Before the colors managed to get their asses out of their heads and started bombing everyone with censors?"
"Know they stopped counting after five billion," he replied. The Regular shot him a look of muted surprise. "Operation too large. Logistical needs too high. Bigger means more leaks. Wasn't hard to dive deep."
"Still. Awfully risky to go peekin' at Guilder biz then," Draus replied. Besides, Ori-Thaum was in the mix. Thought you didnt tangle with their like.
Avo turned to glare at her. "My father was dying. Dangerous didn't matter. Was looking for a cure."
To that, she offered only silence.
The skies over Mazzas Junction were sparser than normal. Their drones were still bringing in new scans daily. Draus had cycled one out with a replacement after a traffic accident. As Conflux went, however, they held to a state of incompetent readiness. There were still gaps all over their defenses, and they set about ensuring their own safety by bunching up in numbers.
The weight of enforcers swelled within the block, with enforcers littering the district in unorganized detachments, each given tasks and delivered out into the wider Warrens. Some saw to patrols. Others went to guard convoys of stolen productmerchandise that only the Syndicates could produce thanks to stolen or expired property licenses.
From what could be heard over the Nether, more than a few Conflux deliveries got hit by unknown parties. All members missing. Like something swallowed them up and left nothing behind.
The Scalpers mightve already responded. The descriptions of the attack sounded close enough to how a Galeslither might operate. If such was the case, then Avo looked forward to the apex of the war, when everything was pushed beyond the point of skirmishing.
Chaos presented so many delectable targets to feed fromtargets that just wouldnt be as vulnerable when on guard during times of relative calm.
By the by, you wanna tell me bout that thing that yelled at you back there? Draus said, her question flicking out at him with all the rudeness of a switchblade.
What thing?
The voice, Avo, Draus said. The deep rumbling. Shit. Is your Meta fraggin? It sounded like something screaming from inside your skull. Made my teeth rattle. What this about it wanting to be whole, too?
Quietly, he shrugged. Dont know. Think it's coming from the Frame. The Heaven. Started speaking. Does it every time I eat another Sangeist.
The Regular exhaled. Aint gonna lie: that Frame of yours is startin to tickle me wrong. Best have Kae take a look at that. No sense in lettin it get worse, yeah?
Yeah, Avo said. Need her to help with new canons anyway.
Draus shot a look over her shoulder. The passenger section of the cargo aero was connected to a narrow pathway. In the back, the Rendsinks were secured. You know somethin? Hitting a knot? Droppin golems? Thats a job for a specialized kill team. At the least. Wouldve taken a dozen or more squires to pull off that run there. And even then, there would be fuck-ups; deaths.
Avo grunted. Telling me that we make a good team?
Im tellin you to keep track of just what you are, Draus said. Youre different, Avo. For a ghoul, and for a Necro. But bein a Godclad it drowns people. Makes it hard for them to tell where they begin and their Heavens end. Back there, when you turned off your Injector
--Still worried Ill go feral?
She shook her head. No. Ive seen your make. You held in the gutters, I knew youd hold here. But I didnt like what I felt after.
After what?
After you turned the Injector back on, Draus said. That hunger inside you? Felt that go away. But the want for the killin stayed. Like you had a want for it beyond just the pleasure now, and you d A flash of light suddenly manifested from their left. Her head snapped toward the distortion, the external sensors of their vehicle sending out warnings as the visual feed glitched.
Whatever words Avo desired passed into a place forgotten. What need for speech when spectacle consumed the totality of his attention? Through the feed, it looked like brightness itself was being shaped into form. Forged from the ambient lights that lined the expanse of countless districts, an abnormal growth came into form. Capped by an expanding umbrella formed from rungs of growing luminosity, strands of light sprouted free from below in mycelial growths. The entire thing resembled a fungus comprised of pooled radiance.
When next he blinked, the construct had already expanded. Each strand threaded through walls and blocks, snaking through sidewalks and deeper down into the gutters unseen. Each ran miles upon miles in length, and undulating beneath the glowing shroom cap, they expanded, unfurling into illimitable multitudes.
Scalpeling was always a wonder to behold. Avo had only seen it done twice before, and even now he remained silent. Yet, the past two times, the quiet earned from him was one of incomprehension and dread.
Now? It was for want and future possibility. How else was he to regard a power he could possess?
He knew that, with each shifting thread of light, thousands or even millions were dying. Death at a scale that he could not fathom at present, but felt curious to experience, wondering just how bright his Soul would burn if offered such tithe. The beast, meanwhile, was quiet at the provocation. But just as well. Its desires were primal. Focused. Simple.
What were a thousand lives extinguished? Or a million? Ultimately, it meant the same thing: more beings to torture and taste. More than he could comprehend.
The flowing light halted. The rings of light upon the cap inverted, its core growing brightest as the shine bled over from the outside. Its limbs retracted. Along branch-like lengths, mile-long skewers of unmoving bodies were rendered kindling as the core of the mushroom suckled them in.
In seconds, the bodies slipped into the light, going from smoking flesh, to shadow, and then dissipating motes.
How many did it get, Avo asked.
Draus, much like him, found herself enraptured. Upon her face was not wonderment, but exhaustion. Tired anger. Does it matter? Only ones they really use it on are the FATELESS anyhow. Do they matter?
Before the last word left her lips, the light faded. And so too did all those consumed. Their deaths matter.
Draus nodded. Yeah. That I reckon might be so. She titled her head at the place where the eldritch light used to shine. When I first saw that, I used to ask myself why they dont just empty the streets of filth. End the Syndicates. It aint like they dont got the power. They do. They just dont care. Not one bit.
How much death do you think itll take to see their desired end? Got me a thought bout that, Avo?
He considered the question for a moment. As much as it will take.
She nodded. Yeah. But I dont think so. I think the answer isnt how many deaths. I think the answer is forever'. Because theyll need people dyin forever to see it made true, made bigger, made stranger. Bigger the candle, the more wick that needs to burn.
Never took you for a humanitarian, Avo asked.
Draus scoffed. I dont give a shit in that way. But. Its just we couldve made it all mean somethin, you know? We come a long way from bein just slaves. She shook her head. Shame to just fuck ourselves to death here is all. Couldve proven ourselves better than the gods. Cept I guess it felt better bein them.
Her eyes met his. Her stares were as hard to read as ever. Just try to stay you, alright?
That request drove a light chuff of laughter from his chest. First time anyone asked that of me.
Virtue is a hard thing to have, Avo, she said. And it's mighty strange to find it bein practiced by a subhuman cannibal.
Touching words. I feel a tear. More compliments mixed with invectives. My favorite.
She bit back a smile and glared at him from the corner of her eye. Just dont go drowning in godhood is what Im sayin. Youll get lost.
He thought about her words for a moment. He heard them. Understood them. But against the possibilities posed by his new abilities, they were like etchings upon a missile. He knew what she was asking, but not if he could achieve it.
He wanted more power. Probably always did. The only difference now was that he was capable of taking it.
The newest question he had for himself was simple: should a ghoul be granted the power to change, to grow, to feed unfettered, would it ascend past its desires into the fullness of personhood, or simply make up for the lack of its long-dead masters and finish making itself the apex predator it was dreamed to be?
In the quiet that followed, Avo contemplated his future beyond the Warrens.
No clear answers came.
***
They deposited the cargo aero and the container in Xin Yunshans docks. Aside from a few drones surveilling the area, the shine of thoughtstuff was noticeably absent; people were likely at home, awaiting the official end to the lockdown.
Still, though eyes were scarce, there were more ways than one to track a person in New Vultun. They held to precaution, with Avo leaving first and Draus taking another path after. Empty streets greeted him. Aside from lonesome bioforms standing as unmoving sentinels on rooftops and grafted eyes blinking at him from flesh-hewn walls, he dared say he walked unnoticed to the entirety of the city.
Should he get the chance, he should dig around and see if any street squires were looking to trade out their phantasmics. The sequence of an Incog remained much a mystery to him as until this point in his life, he didnt often find the need to blunt his noticeability with a sheen of slickness. Perhaps with time, he could have teased it out, but it would be far more convenient if he just traded for some.
The Second Fortune was alight with sound and fireworks with his arrival. Entering through the front door, he passed Sang whirling faux dragons made from painted papers on pointed spears. The self-eating serpentine bodies of the Sangs old oppressors danced through the air as juvs cheered and phantoms played bygone massacres overhead.
The jubilance never got higher than when the first No-Dragons began bombing the undersea nests of their ancient foes. Fascinating how tightly the bonds of a community could be forged from old wounds and present hatred.
Inching through the crowds packing the halls and entrances, the return toward his abode was thankfully empty of impediments or people waiting to ambush him with more untimely revelations.
One of his fangs ached. He might need to pluck it. He stretched and felt his back crack.
It would be good to get some personal work done. See about his Soul with Kae. Look deeper at the structure of his own Meta in the meantime.
As stepped out onto his floor and turned down the halls toward the apartment, he found Draus ahead of him.
Avo frowned. How?
Without looking, she lifted a steamed bun over her shoulder. He kept frowning because he could practically taste her grin. Cause, youre slow, ghoulie. Maybe try movin your legs faster next time.
He envied how she could go from asking him to restrain himself from being consumed by apotheosis and then insulting his walking speed in the span of mere hours.
The following verbal jab he was about her hurl back at her choked off as he noticed something out of place.
There were two accretions coming from inside their room. One was burning, breaking. Never intact. Kae. The other was well-warded. Protected.
Avo frowned. He had seen those defenses before.
River, Avo said.
Draus turned. You sure.
Wards. Should be hers.
Reluctantly, Draus unclenched her fists. Alright. Lets go see what shes got to say.
Avo sighed. Probably something cryptic. Lots of politeness. Not enough detail.
Draus scoffed. Shit, Avo, save some suspense.
The smell of green tea slithered up Avos senses as he entered the room. Around the entertainment system, Kae and Green River sat side by side. A small tea set was laid on the table before them. Four cups were laid out, each steaming with hot tea and marked by specific patterns.
Kae waved as she saw them, sipping from her fissure-painted cup. Green Rivers, then, held the design of a fox. The remaining two were parted between a Highflame symbol, and one that remained entirely blank.
Avos clicked his fangs together. The Sang loved their analogies. He wondered what Green River meant when she was calling him empty.
Friends. Come. Come sit down, Green River said. On her neck, the fox yawned and stretched. I was just talking with Kae about proper spying etiquette. And a fascinating new change of fortune for us all.
Change of fortune? Avo asked.
Indeed, she said, smiling beatifically. In a graceful sway, she produced a dormant locus and placed it beside the tea set. Our mutual benefactors have spoken once more. She leaned in. And their new interests pertain to our good friend. Jhred Greatling. Or Mirrorhead, if were going by play-names.
Avo and Draus shared a look.
Suppose well be havin this over tea, then? Draus said.
Green River sighed. Blame me not. I can be ignored for as long as I am unbothered. The Column, however, will not be denied. Her eyes turned to Avo by the way. And they arent nearly as omniscient as you so suspect. But I get ahead of myself. Your tea. Its getting cold.
Avo activated his Auto-Seance and started a session. +Draus?+
+Yeah.+
+You talk to her. Tired of being confused. Just want to eat her.+
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