M.D.Syl
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Chapter 39 colorless
🕑 Added 2023-01-28 16:09:22 +0000 UTCChapter 39 The Rogue.
Never underestimate or overestimate an enemy.
Pride leads to defeat, fear leads to defeat.
A correct estimation of an enemy is the key to victory.
Nuriss, the maiden of war.
I can’t see anything, but I can hear clearly. These guys are just as confused as I am. A callused hand grabs my wrist and drags me along. I run with the hand’s owner. I hold onto the hand and get ready to blow it up should I need to.
My vision clears after a moment, but it still doesn’t do me much good. The whole allay is covered in thick white smoke. I can hear the teenagers behind me shouting in confusion and rage. I can only see the hand in front of me, lean but coarse, it belongs to a person who had a rough life.
The smoke begins to clear, and I can clearly see a lithe figure who leads me through a doorway. The figure closes the door behind us, presses me against the wall, and puts a calloused hand on my mouth.
We’re in a small stony hallway with a long staircase. In the dim light from the tall window above the door, I can see the guy clearly. He is slender and slightly shorter than me, no older than twenty if he is fully human. He has dark skin and slanted green eyes, and his head is cleanly shaved. A cloth made mask covers the lower part of his face, tied up high on his nape, hiding his ears.
He seems to be listening to something beyond the door he just closed. After a long moment, he lifts his hand from my mouth and releases his grip.
“You a dummy ain’tcha?” he asks, his tenor voice is full of mockery.
“I guess I am…” I answer with a smile. I can let him think he saved me even though I didn’t need saving. What I truly want right now is a friend I can trust, and he just became my prime candidate.
“Don’t go tell d’ gang ye have’ money on ya, you won’t survive very long… now gimme some o’ that money. A pay for savin’ your skinny hide.”
My skinny hide? You’re the skinniest guy I’ve ever seen! I chuckle and hand him a pair of gold coins.
He whistles in astonishment. “Real gold innit?!” He bites each coin a few times, then raise it up, looking at it in the dim light that comes from the tall window.
“Sure is!”
“Gold’s bad!” He stashes it in his pocket, “You have any silvers on ya?”
I hand him my only two remaining silver pieces, he whistles again.
“Weee! Savin’ your hide was worth it! Thanks! I’ll be goin’ now!” He climbs up the stony stairs inside the hallway.
“Wait! Where are you going?” I call out, following him.
“To hide d’ gold of course!” He replies, running upstairs, “don’t follow me!”
“Wait! I need your help!” I follow him upstairs through a series of stone staircases.
“Not ma problem!”
“I can pay you more!” The next staircase is a wooden one, unlike the three cold stone ones I’ve just climbed.
“You paid me. Don’t need more. Go away!” He opens a door a floor above me, and disappears behind it.
I follow him through the door onto the wooden slanted rooftop of the building. I catch sight of him jumping to another roof.
I stare wide eyed. That’s a three meters jump! Or maybe two? Still! That’s some jump!
He’s getting away!
Shutting off my innate fear, I decide to follow him on the slippery rooftops. This is the fifth floor, the way down is a long one. “Latsa ni” <lift me> I chant with a pounding heart. I weave four patterns and cast my new ‘Jump’ cantrip. I kick the slanted roof and land safely on the other side. I don't even hurt my feet for the stable landing. This is way better than a Lightweight spell...
I cross the next wide chasm between two buildings, chasing him. He increases his speed, jumping from rooftop to rooftop, and I have to pick up my pace just to keep him in my sight.
He reaches a very long jump. I finally cornered him, that’s at least five meters! It’s not a jump he can… What? To my astonishment, he jumps anyway and falls down, disappearing beyond the edge of the roof.
Panting, I reach the edge and notice a small balcony on the other side.
I put my hand on my chest. “Myrsha salfit.” <Gravity lightweight>, I feel as my body slowly turns lighter. “Latsa ni” <lift me> I jump toward the balcony with all of my strength. It’s a long jump, and I can tell I missed my mark. Due to my light weight, I jumped way too high, and am about to land on the other roof.
“Latsa” <lift> I switch the jump patterns and cast ‘Minor Telekinesis’ on myself. I float down into the balcony, and cancel both spells as I land. I could fly like this… turn myself lighter and lift myself with ‘Minor Telekinesis’… No… this isn’t very cost-efficient… holding ‘light body’ too long drains too much mana… I’m nearly out of gravity mana anyway… this is my main weapon, it’s not smart to waste it all like this… But I’ve got some water mana and spells now… a little bit of fire and wind too... I’m somewhat safer…
I enter the room connected to the balcony.
The world turns white again. When my vision clears, I find out that this room is filled with thick white smoke, it's impossible for me to see or find anything in it.
“Ritsa” <push> I cast a 'Repulse' cantrip. There's no reaction to my magic, the ‘Repulse’ cantrip only works on things with a certain weight to them, and smoke is weightless.
“Felul” <Wind/breeze> I exhale a steady breath. The smoke clears and flows out of the room with a gust of wind.
This is a bedroom of some kind. There is a naked middle-aged couple on the bed staring at me wide-eyed. I ignore them and find my way out of the apartment.
Again, this leads to a narrow hallway with staircases going up and down. I figure he went up and probably climbed to the rooftop again… I follow suit and climb upstairs. After I look around and search for his slim figure on the nearby rooftops, I have to accept that I’ve lost track of him.
Dejected, I go downstairs.
I’m so naïve… this boy had to survive here alone on the streets, why would he trust a stranger? Let’s do this job… kill that Brutos the butcher guy, and get back to my studies… I don’t need friends, I just need to get stronger…
Yes, I better get used to being lonely… at least until I get enough power to ensure the safety of those I care about and go back to my family…Will the hag use my family against me when I go back to them? How long will I have to live under her constant threat?
Or my paranoia… this is nothing but my own fears! No, it’s not… nothing stops her from using other people… she doesn’t even regard them as humans… they’re all just animals to her…
I enter the apartment we passed through earlier and find the couple who are mostly dressed by now. When they notice me, the scrawny man picks an axe meant for chopping firewood, and aims it at me. “Get out!”
“Just wanted to pay you”
“Pay us?” He scratches his graying beard, his brown eyes narrow at me. “For what?”
“For…” I don’t know the word for ‘disturbing’ in Sinteo, “the unorder” I mumble awkwardly as I put a pair of gold coins on the nearby table.
He lowers his axe and eye the gold with obvious greed, he then catches himself. “What’s the catch?”
“I have a few questions.”
“About the guy you chased? Don’t know him. You can take your gold and leave!” He raises his axe again.
It’s weird… most people who saw me use magic cowered at my presence… I haven’t invaded those people’s homes though… he’s simply afraid… I can see the fear in his eyes…
“No. I need to know where a man named Brutos the butcher is staying. I can give you two more gold pieces if you tell me, but if you lie to me about it… I’ll come back and kill your wife, then you!”
He eyes his wife fearfully, licking his lips. The woman gulps, her brown eyes moving up and down on me sizing me up.
“You can choose not to answer. In that case, I’ll go away and you’ll never see me again, nor my gold. The choice is yours!”
A child no older than four springs comes from one of the rooms. He hugs his mother’s leg and peeks at me from behind her skirt. I can hear a baby crying inside. It instantly causes me to regret my previous threat.
Am I like the hag now? Giving people manipulative choices?! Threats?! The stable hand boy a week ago and now these good people?! What is happening to me? How did I stoop so low? If he doesn’t want me to harm him he shouldn’t lie to me… This couple saw my magic, they know I’m capable of harming them, and they’ll take me seriously at least. I won’t use them, and I won’t threaten them again! I refuse to be like the hag!
“If Brutos hear I said something about him, I’m a dead man!” The middle-aged man says after a long silence.
“If I know where Brutos lives he'll be dead within a week. I get it, you don’t have to tell me anything, I’m sorry for the… unorder, and the threats… I didn’t mean to…” I mutter in shame leaving the pair of coins on the table. I turn to leave, I’ll find my answers elsewhere.
“Wait!” the wife calls out. “There’s a slaughterhouse, Queen Nulka street. He lives in his slaughterhouse.”
“Thank you,” I say adding four gold coins on the table. “Brutos will disappear within a week, you have my word.”
I leave the apartment. I have a job to do, and I want to go back to my meditations and hopefully studies.
I find my way to the slaughterhouse they spoke of. The building is a large elongated two-story workshop. Even at this late evening hour, this place is busy. Loud men carrying slabs of meat, children who run between them, and animals. Lots and lots of animals, animal wastes, and hanging meat.
I can’t approach directly, my green velvet dress stands out way too much. I really need to get myself a few sets of ragged street clothes for these assassination missions…
I enter one of the nearby buildings and climb to the fifth floor. I go to the apartment with a window pointing toward the slaughterhouse and knock on the door.
A beefy man in his late thirties with thick hairy arms opens the door, he has a short black beard and a bald head. “Who’re you?!”
“I need your place. Your apartment, I’ll be buying it.” I approach the subject directly as I hand him a handful of gold coins.
His non-existent brows furrow with suspicion. Fifty gold coins are enough to buy an apartment in a much safer area.
“Pack your things and leave within a day!” I continue as I enter the apartment acting like the noble-born girl I used to be eight years ago.
He takes the money and disappears into the inner room. There is a young teenage girl inside, I can hear her excited screams alongside his loud exclamations that they’re rich now or how he can’t wait to leave this slum. The father daughter pair pack their things and leave within the hour, I don’t even need to wait a whole day.
*
I have the place to myself. It isn’t a very large apartment, mainly made out of wood with the only exception being the stone fireplace and the floor around it. The fireplace is connected to a chimney that stretches throughout the whole building.
The place has two basic rooms. a living room with a connected kitchen, and a bedroom. As for other needs, these people use washbasins and chamber pots, which got emptied through the window. I eye the half-filled water barrel at the corner with a smirk, happy for the fact that I can conjure water now. These people have to drain their water from a nearby well, then pull it up the stairs five floors high.
I spend most of my days sitting near the window, wrapped in a blanket against the cold. I watch the slaughterhouse, hoping to catch a sight of the man with the death mark on his head.
But it’s been three days now, and still no sign of him. I am beginning to wonder whether or not the couple had lied to me.
As for the nights, I can't help but hear the loud moans from below through the thin wooden floor. My neighbors are having their fun and I can't sleep. One night I want to break into their apartment and kill them both just to have my blessed silence. While the other night the sounds combined with my loneliness and envy makes me wish I could join them, or at least have someone to share my bed with. But it isn't why I am here.
There is one more thing I do in the past three days. I get myself a small pile of hemp clothing that are proper to the slums, and learn to dirty my face and hair with soot so I won’t stand out too much when going out.
*
{27} Kilako (October) the 18th
It’s dusk. The red rays from the setting sun glitter on the wet rooftops. Today is just like the past three days I’ve spent looking at the slaughterhouse. I am getting sick and tired of seeing goats and pigs entering alive and exiting as slabs of meat. We're all just slabs of meat for the slaughter aren't we? All of these people down there are just the goats and pigs the hag or the mages will eventually eat...
The man I am here to kill still hasn’t shown his hairy face, and that either means that couple lied to me - which I doubt… or that man never plans to leave his safe house?
A familiar slim figure catches my eye on the opposite roof. The boy who ran away after helping me out three days ago. He crouches on the roof, and observes the slaughterhouse from the other side.
The slaughterhouse is two stories tall. It’s an elongated workshop, and the five-story apartment building towers near it. The boy is crouching on top of the towering building.
What is he up to? I eye him. Before I form my next thoughts, he jumps off the ledge and scales the building downward, a rope tied to his waist. He lands softly on the workshop’s roof, a moment later, he disappears under a hatch leaving his rope behind.
He just gave me a way in! I get up and run to the other building, I climb the stairs to the rooftop and follow the lithe guy’s footsteps.
By now night had fallen, and scaling down ten meters of a slippery wall with a rope is a lot harder than I expected it to be. My palms hurt from the rope’s friction, and my arms are sore from supporting my weight.
Thus, after less than a meter of failed scaling, I cast a ‘Jump’ spell and land on the roof with a light thud.
I open the hatch, and climb the ladder down to the silent hallway downstairs. I’m finally inside… Now I only have to find where my target is staying…
The dark stony hallway is filled with doors leading both left and right. There’s a wooden door at the far end to my right, and a staircase leading down to my left. These rooms on each side have people in them since I can hear laughter, chatter, or huffs.
“Looky here! I’ve caught a rat! I’m about to break your fingers little rat!” the voice behind me makes my racing heart miss a beat. With an adrenaline rush, I quickly climb up the ladder, back to the night outside.
Judging from the loud shouts and the unique click of the street guy’s smoke devices, I figure that they hadn’t caught me, they caught him. And whoever caught him doesn’t have their hands on him yet.
A minute later I can see the slender guy leaving through the main door. He throws metallic objects on the floor behind him. The objects are sharp enough to pierce the shoes of his pursuers. “Venomous snakes!” “Ya wetyar!” “I’ma wring yer neck peabrain!” “ya visit Tiyadi tonight!”
The colorful painful swearing is loud enough to attract the attention of all the nearby thugs. The metallic objects on the ground don’t fully stop the large gang of thugs from chasing the guy.
The perfect distraction for me… With a pounding heart, I climb back down. I look at the long hallway again, I figure that if they have a boss his place must be at the end of that corridor. Just as I am about to reach the said door, it opens on its own.
A shaved shirtless man with a hairy belly tiredly steps out, rubbing his eyes. “What’s all the c… who’re you young lady?” He asks me with a narrow gaze.
Damn! “Brutos the butcher! Where can I find him?” I catch my wits and decide to ask directly. At worse, I can blow this man up and pay the gems fee of the hag.
“That’d be me. Now, why won’t you tell me which one of my men hired you? I was very clear when I said they aren't allowed to hire younger girls.” He rubs his brown eyes again, as if unsure whether he’s dreaming or not.
At least I guessed the door right, so that’s why I couldn’t see him! No wonder! He shaved! He looks different from my drawing! And from the angle I was looking, it was hard to discern anything…
I shake my head. Not important! Kill him and get out of here! I move my hand toward his hairy chest forming my mana patterns.
He catches my wrist and twists it, sending a painful spike through my shoulder causing me to crouch and whimper in agony. “My men didn't hire you did they? No... What are you doing here? Tell me!”
I did not expect him to do that. I’ve started to treat normal humans as weaker than me, but his strong grip on my hand reminds me how wrong this assumption is.
“Ritsa!” <push> I scream focusing the repulsive effect on his head. The force isn’t enough to push him too far, but at least he lets my hand go as he stumbles back.
I stand up, adrenaline, anger, and fear well up in my chest. “Folo fotyr!” <flying fire!> I exhale a cone of roaring flames in his direction.
With a pained raging scream, he charges forward. His clothes caught fire, but it doesn’t stop him. His hand violently covers my mouth and the flames coming out of it. My nape hits something hard before I manage to form any more mana patterns. I let the spell go, a taste of ash in my mouth.
He hugs and pushes me against the wall, burying me underneath his massive figure in order to restrict my movement and smother the flames. His other hand catches my right wrist, he moves it upward and away from him.
I channel the mana patterns into my left hand. Unlike other spells, my fine control over ‘kinetic burst’ is perfect, almost subconscious. “Myrsha ritsa!” <gravity repulse!> *THOOOMP* I release the blast into his abdomen and the cantrip lets out a dull thud.
The man groans in pain. The touch of his hairy belly turns into a torrent of blood and wet chunks of meat. The warm fluids soak my clothes. Growling, the man squeezes my head and repeatedly knocks it into the wall.
The world turns white, it feels like someone continually hits my head with a hammer. I struggle but I can’t concentrate enough to cast another spell.
After a time that feels like forever, the strength leaves the man’s arms. He lets my head go, takes a step back, and collapses amidst his broken inner organs. Blood pools on the cold stone under him, his brown eyes stare at me, screaming vengeance and hatred until the life leaves them.
I lean back on the wall as I pant and gasp for air, my head throbbing, and my heart bursting out of my chest. This was close, he almost killed me! Never going to look down on mortals again… Mortals?! They’re human beings! Don’t let that hag twist your head… Mortals, humans, it doesn’t matter! The only reason I managed to kill two mages is that they looked down on me, I shouldn’t make the same mistake! I shouldn’t look down on people without magic. Everyone can kill me if I’m not careful.
I let out a sigh and eye the gory mess at my feet. I kneel and press the glassy bottle into the dying man’s lips. Like last time, the moment I channel my mana into the diamond stopper, the bottle fills up with a weird viscous silver liquid which now I know is called ectoplasm.
It’s time for me to leave the place. I wrap my glassy bottle with a pounding head and trace my steps back toward the ladder. I use ‘Light Weight’ and ‘Minor Telekinesis’ cantrips to help myself climb back the way I came from.
I should circle through the rooftops… so I won’t run into any of those thugs…
Night had fallen by now, and finding my way on the dark slippery rooftops without a speck of light seems impossible. Although I can create light or fire with my magic, that would defeat the purpose. After passing a few roofs, I go down and use the streets like a normal person.
Unlike the rooftops, there are a few torches near the entrances of some of the buildings. The gloomy light at the foot of the tall buildings gives me the chills. It’s not enough to see clearly, but the dim light is enough to navigate the streets.
I circle around the thugs, their shouts and search for blood are loud enough to wake the dead.
I arrive at my building covered in blood and gore. “Revissor” <Light> I say the moment I enter the dark staircase room. Instead of lighting a candle, I got magic. The ball of soft white light makes me smile in nostalgia as I think of Sina. I miss those times… I actually visited home again… I miss home… I miss Kolag and Lezere…
I climb to my apartment. The single ball of light above my hand feels so lonely, I twin the cantrip and add another ball of green light, just so the white one won't be lonely. I almost died tonight… maybe I should’ve died… no one would care… not even the hag… she’d just get another apprentice… Stop that! I’m alive! I will find my way home again! I will get stronger! And I’ll survive! Giving up is worse than failing! Now wash up and get some sleep! I enter the bedroom room, take off my bloodied hemp clothes, and drench a clean cloth in the washbasin to wash myself. At least I wasn’t wearing one of my dresses, it’d be a nightmare to clean this…
The wooden windows open with a night breeze from the outside. The cold wind causes me to gasp as I turn sharply toward the window. The thief whom I wanted to befriend stands on the thin window sill. A rope is tied to his slim waist, while his green eyes wander over my naked body.
“Nice jugs!” He says, I can tell he has a perverse grin behind his mask. “A little too small for ma taste, I know a guy who…”
“Ritsa!” <push!>
The shockwave knocks him out of my window, the rope holds him halfway down as it dangles from the roof above. I can hear him laughing maniacally a floor or two below.
I pull the blanket to my chest while he climbs back to my window sill. “What do you want?” I ask in an attempt to ignore the heat on my face.
“Wanna know how you kill Brutos, an’ why”
If he’s willing to risk getting close to me for that information it might be important, and if it’s important then maybe I can gain something from it. I can assume Brutos probably owned one of those masks… is this man working for another mask owner? “And what are you going to give me for that information?”
“Some gold maybe?” He jumps into the room with the rope still tied up to his waist, and shamelessly offers me the pair of gold coins I gave him the other day.
“Nah ah, I’ve got plenty of gold.” I reject the idea.
“Then tell me whatcha want?”
He has a point, there’s not much he can offer me… actually, there is! “I want you to work for me!” I declare after reaching a conclusion.
“Work for you? What kind of work?”
I’m glad and surprised he didn’t outright reject it. “I’m working as a killer for a… strong figure. I don’t know why that figure picked me for the work, but they did…” I take a deep breath forming my thoughts and trying to translate them in my head as I speak. By now I am capable of mostly understanding what people say or at least I can fill in the blanks, but forming long explanations myself is harder. “I’m sure you can tell that I’m not used to street life.”
He chuckles. “Ye you a dummy”
“So I need you to help me sneak into places or cause an… unorder at the right time” I explain.
He raises a finger “One job! And you answer my questions.”
“I already answered your question, it was a killing job. I will pay you five gold for each job, deal?”
“You didn’t answer, how you killed him?”
“I’ll throw that one for free after the first job.”
His shoulders slump. “Don’t need gold. Bring da same amount in silvers, and bring food. The kind rich men eat.”
I smile “I can do that.” That’ll be fifty silver coins…
“Deal!” he spits on his palm and offers me his hand.
I copy him, not letting the disgust show on my face and shake his hand back. He keeps standing there after we shook our hands, staring at me.
I hug the blanket to my chest, coughing awkwardly, but he doesn’t get the hint. “Anything else?” I ask after a long minute of awkward silent
“When do we start?”
Right! He’s waiting for us to start. “I just finished a job… I don’t know when I’ll get the next one. I’ll leave you a note in this apartment once I get another job. In the meantime feel free to use the place, I won’t be staying.”
“A note? Like the sheepskin with drawings rich men use?”
“Yes… wait you don’t know how to read do you?”
He shakes his head.
“Ok. How about you check this house every three days, I’ll come and stay here when I have a job”
“Ok!” He exclaims cheerfully. “But you answer me after d’ job!”
“I promise!”
“I don’t need promise! If you won’t, you won’t see me again.” He jumps through the window using his rope, I can hear him climbing on top of the wooden rooftop.
*~*~*
Imari’s jump
Names: Imari’s jump, jump.
Element: gravity
Sub element: exception
Level: 0
Words: latsa ni
Translation: lift me
Patterns: 4
Requirement: caster with the weight above 10 kilograms and below 100 kilograms
Range: self
Target: self
Duration: Instant/five seconds*
Effect: allows the caster to make a higher or longer jump than usual, also land safely from higher vantage points. The effect is instant for the jump, but five seconds for the landing. The amount of height or length the caster can jump, varies by the affinity and weight of the caster. The highest recorded is 14 meters high, and 19 meters long jumps.
Cost: 8 gravity gems.
Altered cost: 5 gravity gems.
*~*~*
Power level: 2nd stage apprentice.
Mana pools status:
Crown-knot: Affinity 10: formed: 1 gem replenished per five minutes.
Neck-Bridge: Affinity 6: formed: max amount of gems drained per day: 66
Abdomen-storage: Affinity 5: formed: 6 gems. Conversion ratio: 6:1
Air: Affinity 4: formed: 18 gems
Fire: Affinity 2: formed: 9 gems
Light: Affinity 3: formed: 14 gems
Water: Affinity 6: formed: 27 gems
Earth: Affinity 1: opened: 3 gems
Wood: Affinity 2:
Gravity: Affinity 9: formed: 41 gems
Cantrip known:
Air: Shavi’s Breeze, Shavi’s Sword. Shavi’s Hair Dryer, Aria’s Enhanced Hearing.
Fire: Nuriss’ Flame. Effrat’s Firefly, Effrat’s Fire Breath.
Light: Noxi’s Light, Lako’s blinding light.
Water: Water Evocation, Water to Ice, Ice to Water, Water to Vapor, Vapor to Water, Mayan’s Icy Spike, Ayla’s Water Jet.
Earth:
Wood:
Gravity: Lumina’s Kinetic Burst. Tukado’s Repulse. Tukado’s lesser shield. Imari’s Minor Telekinesis. Imari’s Jump. Leo’s Pull. Leo’s Grounding. Alino’s Light Body. Alino’s Heavy Body.
Focus capability: 10 patterns
Social status: apprentice to the maven of mysteries.
Wealth: 311 gems. 1318 gold coins, 0 silvers, 0 coppers.
Items:
Two simple healing potions.
Two potions with unknown effects.
An enchanted belt with eight pouches, the enchantment keep the pouches’ content fresh.
Various spell materials.
Companions: Alone?
Injuries and scars: Back, lightning scar.
