285 (II)

  Welcoming

  A second, more impressive surprise came in the form of Gate Piety itself. The development of the Gate had been progressing, even without him, Uva, or Adam here. When he left, parts of the Gate were still strewn with rubble, but pretty much everything had been cleaned up. There was no rubble anymore. Instead, there was a lot of nothing left, with vast expanses of the still kilometers-spanning Gate unoccupied, but there were bones of structures being built. Outlines of districts, grid plans painted from the top down by glowing mana lines.

  The plaza before the surface Gateway also held far more structures. The refugee camps weren't just a mixed assortment of repurposed buildings and tents anymore. They were now crude bunkers themselves, an interconnected series of domes lined with glass on the side. The plaza had several other essential structures, such as water treatment plants that drew in moisture from the air visibly, and what seemed to be some kind of open-air stadium to serve as entertainment.

  Slightly below and to the side of the level where the slaves and refugees stayed, the mercenary encampment had been expanded as well. It didn't seem so much like a prison facility anymore. Instead, it resembled a compound more than anything else. Vast walls surrounded its sides, and Umbrals and watchtowers loomed over every corner. But there was a set of main gates that stood wide open, and the insides had bushes and gardens planted along the way. That hinted there was at least an attempt on the Arachnae Order's part to provide their captives with some comfort.

  Shiv looked around. He was pleasantly surprised to see his basilisks housed in a crude enclosure as well. They'd been placed next to his meat holding facility, along with the industrial freezer that held a lot of the Court Leviathan flesh he'd been cooking. At least he did one thing right before he departed the Gate. He had prepared more than enough food for the people to last for a while. That filled him with pride.

  Then, finally, there was the Abyss gateway on the opposite end of the Gate. That too was layered in a bunker, but there was a massive force concentration there. It seemed like all Umbrals, Weaveresses, and automata of the Arachnae Order within Piety had been gathered. Trench lines were being dug by Geomancers, with more sections of the ground collapsing downward, spreading out in arcing strokes. The air was vibrating with glowing spells, charged with electricity and mana, and as Shiv drew closer, a flash of lightning drew his attention. He tilted his head slightly to his side and noticed a Weaveress flying toward him fast, riding upon a crackling storm cloud.

  "Hero Shiv!" Null Mont cried aloud. Her voice was pitched high and sounded just as obsequious as he could remember.

  Shiv sneered slightly, and Jessica noted his reaction.

  "You know this one?" Jessica asked.

  "Yeah," Shiv replied. "A spider that should have been born a rat."

  Null Mont descended and came to a sudden halt before them as her storm cloud forked bolts of electricity through the air. "Hero Shiv," she wheezed, trying to catch her breath. "When you returned, I could barely believe it. By the Composer, I was overjoyed. She has delivered you to us in our time of need once more. Praise be. Praise be her will and your glory and—"

  Shiv nodded along, barely able to hide his annoyance. "Yeah, yeah, praise the Composer. Listen, I need you to go to the Tutorial gateway bunker and help Adam with the refugee situation."

  "Refugee?" Null Mont said. "What do you mean, refugee?"

  "We managed to save what remains of Blackedge, and we got a lot of people coming in. You're more useful there. Anyway, I'm gonna go off and handle our vampire problem."

  "You alone?" Null Mont's voice was high with disbelief.

  Shiv pointed at Jessica. "Not really alone, but she's tagging along because she wants to and because they can't stop her. And I'm going there because the vampires can't stop me. Seriously, don't worry about it. We'll see it handled."

  "But," Null Mont choked, "wait." Her eyes fell on Jessica fully for the first time, as if she just noticed the other Pathbearer, and she looked her up and down once, twice, and a third time. And then Null Mont’s body began to shake. "You—Giantsbane." The breath left the Weaeveress as a chill of absolute fear formed a chain connecting Null Mont to Jessica.

  "Yeah…" Jessica let out a slight sigh. "Might have left a bit of an impression the last time I came down to the Abyss. But don't you worry that creepy little head of yours, spider. I'm here for the bloodsuckers, not to squish you flat."

  With that, Shiv picked up his speed, leaving Null Mont in his wake and surging toward the Abyssal gateway. But his curiosity grew, and soon, he just had to ask: "What did you do during the war?"

  Jessica just laughed. "Well, I could tell you, but I think I'm about to give you something of a demonstration in a few minutes. And seeing is believing."

  The Deathless scoffed. "Alright, you want to make this interesting?"

  "And how are we going to make it interesting, kid? You want to have a kill-off with me?"

  "I bet you a meal that you can't kill as many vampires as I can."

  "A meal, huh?" Jessica stared up as she considered his offer. "Alright, but I gotta warn you. I cook a mean can of beans."

  Shiv almost doubled over in disgust. "A can of beans is not a felling meal."

  "Fuck yeah, it is," Jessica retorted, sounding offended. "I cook a real good can of beans. Some real great beans. That's—"

  Shiv was about to have a conniption. Georges didn't die for this shit.

  "I'm going to win,” he said, cutting her off before he could grow nauseous. “I will not be insulted by a can of beans."

  "I'm afraid you will, kid. I'm afraid you will." Jessica nodded solemnly. "But trust me, it's really not that bad."

  "No, fuck you," Shiv said. "No canned beans. Never canned beans. I'm gonna win this out of spite just so that you can eat some proper food."

  A sheer outrage broke Jessica, made her nearly fall off her flaming wheels while she was flying through the air next to him. "Don't make a promise you can't keep, kiddo."

  Shiv was about to snarl how his words were a fact, not a promise. But then he remembered something. He remembered promising Georges that he would save him if the head chef just held on a while longer. And Shiv fell silent as any playfulness inside him died.

  Jessica noticed immediately. "Hey, you alright? Did I say something wrong again?"

  "No," Shiv forced out, not wanting to deal with this. "Let's start killing some vampires."

  He slammed down in front of the Abyssal gateway's bunker with a resounding impact. The ground fractured. Shiv didn't care about the damage he left behind. The Geomancers would patch it up. The Umbrals nearby flinched, and a few poked their heads out from the trench lines. Others had already noticed him and were loudly cheering his name. The Weaveresses guarding the bunker froze and invoked the Composer.

  Shiv grunted at them and told them to open the path.

  "But Hero Shiv," a Weaveress coated in stone armor said, "the enemies on the other side have been massing. They will be pressing us at any moment now."

  "Yeah, and in a few seconds, they're going to regret every last choice they made across their entire life," Shiv answered. The Weaveress was clearly taken aback just slightly by his tone, and he shook his head. "I'm in a mood. Sorry. But it's not you who's going to pay. Now, open the way so that I can share a thing or two I learned about grief with the First Blood."

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  And that was all he needed to say.

  The Geomancer waved a long forelimb and unleashed a series of spells, causing the bunker's entrance to open like an unfurling flower. Petals of metal expanded, revealing a straight shot across to the other side of the gateway.

  Shiv proceeded forward. As he marched, he began shaping something from his Aegis of Assimilation. He'd accumulated a considerable amount of biomass during his fight against the Outsiders, and he also gained an Eldritch Physiology skill, though he wasn't sure what that did exactly. It was time to experiment and find out.

  As he projected his newly acquired biomass from his Aegis, he meshed everything together and sculpted it to his desires. It had been a while since he'd created a weapon of his own design, but now was as good a time as any to get reacquainted.

  A horrific cancerous whip took shape within his mana hydra, and Shiv kept the entire thing fused to his hand at the base, making it something of an extension of his body. It was a disgusting thing, filled with teratomas but also pulsating, black Fingerling flesh. Eyes poked out from its sides, glowing gold and glaring wide, while the corners of the eyes festered with bubbling tumors.

  Jessica made a gagging noise. "What in the hells is that supposed to be?"

  "Oh, this?" Shiv said. "This is my new cancer flail."

  "Cancer flail," Jessica repeated flatly. "And what in the hells is a cancer flail?"

  "It's a cancerous flail I hit people with," Shiv explained as if she were simple.

  "You have problems, kid."

  "Yeah, and? I'm a Pathbearer. Ain't I?"

  She considered his response and shivered in disgust once more. "I want to teach you how to use a proper weapon. Frying pans, cancer flails… You're not screwing with me, right? Because of the whole bean thing?"

  "No, this is just how I fight. These are the Weapon Proficiency skills I have."

  "Stop talking before I start crying. You don't wanna see that. Whatever you feel about me cooking cans of beans, I feel about your Weapon Proficiency Skills twice over. Broken Moon, I need to do something about that. Fucking cancer flail..."

  "It's more effective than you're assuming," Shiv said. "I'll show you in a moment."

  "Yeah, you better show me pretty good, because right now, I can't imagine you using that messed-up, cancerous flail to do anything more than make someone else puke. To be honest, you're probably better off just using that Biomancy of yours to bludgeon someone into submission."

  "Oh, I'll be using that too, Jessica. I'll be using everything. Vampires picked a bad day to do this invasion. A real bad day." And with that, Shiv started glowing gold as he called upon his Strider of the Unbending Path. “Now. I’m gonna work my Chronomancy to get a head start. You try to keep up.”

  Jessica just giggled. “You know what, Shiv? I think I like you enough to give you a head start. You run wild for a while. I give you thirty seconds.” She spun Rusty in her hand. “After that, I start cutting.”

  “Sure,” Shiv replied as he stepped through the gateway. He intended to make an impression upon the invaders and remind them why they needed to stay far, far away from Gate Piety.

  ***

  Hero-Elder Edmund Gnaeus, Fourth Generation to Bloodline Gnaeus, stared out from the bridge of his Court Leviathan. Tendrils of flesh were fused into his brain matter, connecting him to the beast's senses. All around him, his lessers worked, using their Biomancy to focus and wheel the monstrosity to his will. He stared upon the gateway, now undefended, with what paltry defenders and dimensionals it had at its disposal turned inward, retreating to fight a final stand inside.

  It was all so pitiful. The Composer's scurrying spiders and her absurd slaves had overreached. They had somehow seized this Gate from Compact, but they'd also clearly exhausted themselves in the process, and with intelligence reports suggesting that the so-called Deathless One was missing, Weave no longer had a wild card to wield against the First Blood.

  And so it was time for retribution. The attacks on First Blood territory would not go unanswered. This would be the first in a long string of victories and blood-soaked feasts that would see the Umbrals and their mistresses driven to their brink. Eventually, Weave itself would be sacked, burned from top to bottom. Its people returned to their rightful place in chains at the bottom of the Blessed Blood's heels. As for the Composer... Well, her divine blood would be harvested for nourishment and ambrosia for the greatest Elders to savor in private.

  But before that, Edmund wished to distinguish himself. He'd pushed ahead with his Court Leviathan, ignoring the foolish orders of his so-called superiors. He was meant to play it safe, to linger behind along with the others, to make a creeping approach, seizing every bit of ground they could in anticipation of a potential angle of counterattack that they hadn't discovered yet. But Edmund knew better. The Composer's forces were lacking. They didn't have the resources or the capabilities to occupy another Gate. No, the army inside was but a skeleton, and with a casual kick, the entire rotten structure would collapse inward.

  Edmund intended to deliver that kick, so he dispatched orders to his lessers, commanding them to be ready.

  "It is time," Elder Edmund Gnaeus declared, his voice deep and gravely. "Soon you will be free to feast, to feed, to butcher and bleed to your heart's delight. But remember this: the Gate must be secured, its Lord slain. We will take hold of this for the glory of the First Blood and to the humiliation of the Spider Goddess. And when we do, we will be the ones rewarded. I rise through this glory, and you through me. Let our coward-blooded kindred suffer the embarrassment of being a step behind. Know that you have been chosen to be bold. And through me, I will see you delivered to greater glories. Glory is beyond your wildest reckoning."

  With the brief speech finished, Edmund smiled as he stared at the towering static portal. He was only a kilometer away, and soon he would place his Court Leviathan atop that gateway. He would shroud it in a cocoon of flesh and then directly inject his forces across, unleashing blood horrors in a ceaseless tide until everything inside was wiped away in a tsunami of crimson.

  And absolutely no one was going to stop—

  There was a sudden flicker of gold before everything went to hell.

  Blood erupted from Edmund's mouth. Confusion followed—pain exploded in his stomach. Something had lodged itself in his gut. Something was gripping his spine. Something tightened its grip. His spine shattered. Edmund tried to scream, but his lungs had popped as well. A chaotic haze of agony and motion tore him through the room. Screams were erupting all around him. Edmund's mind reeled. He didn't know what had just happened. How did he end up here? He lay on the ground bleeding, his body broken in several ways. His ruined flesh tried to heal, but then something slammed down on his back once more and wrenched him off the floor.

  Lifted up into the air, he was used to batter and bludgeon one of his lesser kindred until she was a bloody paste against the wall, until her lineage core cracked against Edmund's skull, bursting in a spray of miasmic blood. Edmund sobbed from the agony, sobbed from the uncontrolled frenzy of violence. A half-second ago, he had been sitting on his throne within his bridge. Now, he was broken. What had happened? He hadn't even seen his attacker. It was like time was missing. Chronomancy? That shouldn't be possible. The Court Leviathan was armed with significant wards.

  Edmund smelled him before anything else. The stench of humanity and something more. Then he heard him, a loud heartbeat, thundering so powerfully it sounded like cannon blasts going off in Edmund's ears. The Elder’s neck healed just enough for movement, and he turned, looking up at the nightmare that butchered his people.

  In the moment he did, a line of text crawled across Edmund's eyes.

  Hidden World Quest Activated: Slay Tanner “Shiv” Lowe, the Deathless, before he…

  The Deathless. He'd been here. He'd been here all this time. It was a trap. And Edmund had been a fool. He'd been a fool, blind and stupid, to think that they would just let him crawl so close to their Gate.

  The bridge of Edmund's Court Leviathan was riven in broken bones, in crushed bodies, in death. Worse yet, Edmund couldn't sense any of his lessors' lineage cores. It was like they had been ripped away from existence. In contrast, twelve crimson serpents crept out from behind the Deathless, and inside them, small glinting lights filled with concentrated Biomancy radiated as if distant stars. It was then that Edmund realized the Deathless had used his Biomancy to subsume the lineage cores.

  And the Deathless himself was a horror made manifest. He was too large to be a man. Closer to an orc in size—and still growing larger. His body radiated with white, red, and golden mana, and the pressure he exuded was beyond potent. Flashes of distant terror—of a Deity wailing in misery as the Deathless mutilated her—scarred itself into Edmund’s mind.

  The Elder’s bravery failed him; he soiled himself.

  "Please, please wait!" Edmund coughed. Blood spilled out from his mouth, his body broken and struggling to heal. The sheer amount of damage he'd sustained left him little more than soup on the inside, but the Deathless simply looked down at Edmund as if he were nothing at all. Edmund couldn't see his eyes behind that skeletal helmet, but he could feel the hate there. Cold hate.

  "I don't know how many times I need to teach you leeches this lesson," the Deathless said. "I don't know how many times you have to be hurt before you learn. Today was not the day to invade. Today was not the day. Today... today I'm going to hurt you. You and every other godsdamn bloodsucker I get my hands on."

  A loud thump followed as a disturbing length of tissue unfurled from the Deathless’s arm. Edmund’s eyes widened as he realized it was nothing but tissue and bone and cancer. Its thick head slammed against the ground, cracking bone and radiating with powerful Biomancy. Hungry Biomancy.

  "No, please, I—I can be traded! I am an Elder, a fourth-generation Elder," Edmund begged.

  "Traded?" the Deathless growled. "Alright, yeah. You know what? Maybe I will have you deliver a message for me."

  Against all odds, a flare of hope ignited inside Edmund's chest. "Yes, yes, you can! I'll do anything, I'll convey any message."

  Before he could finish speaking, the Deathless reached down, seized Edmund by the throat, and then slammed a fist through his chest, gripping his lineage core.

  "Don't need you alive to deliver that message, though. And it's going to be real simple. They don't even need to hear me say it."

  Edmund choked. He clawed weakly at the Deathless's face. But he was a gnat trying to defy the will of a storm.

  "This gate was never yours to conquer,” the Deathless finished.

  And then he closed his fist around Edmund’s core, and the Elder ceased to be altogether.

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