Chapter Ten
Siurad stood ten feet away. He didn't need status bars to tell him he was in trouble. His lungs were burning, his limbs felt heavy as lead, and the cold well of the Void in his chest was scraped dry. He was running on fumes.
Kel recovered from the shock. He looked down at his cracked, steaming armor, then up at Siurad. His eyes, visible through the slit of his helm, were bloodshot and filled with the desperate rage of a cornered animal.
"You think magic scares me?" Kel roared, his voice cracking. He began to spin the flail again. Whoosh. Whoosh. "I've killed mages before! I'll crush your skull like a melon!"
He charged.
The ground shook with each heavy step. Kel moved like a freight train. He brought the flail down in a crushing overhead arc meant to turn Siurad into paste.
Siurad didn't try to parry. You don't parry a flail.
He dodged left.
He wasn't fast enough.
The spiked ball missed his head, but the heavy iron chain whipped around and clipped his shoulder. The impact was sickening.
CRUNCH.
It felt like being hit by a widow maker. Siurad grunted, stumbling back, his boots slipping in the mud. Pain exploded in his shoulder, radiating down his arm in a blinding white flash that nearly made him drop his sword. His vision swam.
'...DAMAGE SUSTAINED,' Obi hissed, the Ring pulsing in anger against Siurad's finger.
'...HE TOUCHED US, SUCH FILTH. THIS IS AN INSULT. DISMANTLE THIS SAVAGE MAMMAL.'
The pain cleared Siurad’s head. The exhaustion faded, replaced by a surge of cold, focused aggression. It was the same feeling he used to get working the door at club in Chicago when a drunk patron pulled a knife.
It wasn't really fear; it was more like the toggle switch flipping from de-escalate to terminate.
"Okay," Siurad growled, rolling his injured shoulder. It popped sickeningly, but the arm still moved. "You want to trade hits? Let's trade."
Kel swung again, a horizontal sweep meant to take Siurad’s legs out.
Siurad stepped in and tethered to the shadow of Kel's own form.
Void Step.
Pop.
He teleported three feet forward, inside the lethal arc of the flail. The chain wrapped harmlessly around his back, but the ball missed him entirely.
He was now chest to chest with the bandit. He could smell the burnt metal and the sour reek of Kel's sweat.
Kel’s eyes went wide behind the visor.
Siurad dropped his sword into the mud. He grabbed Kel’s helmet with both hands, ignoring the heat still radiating from it.
WHAM.
He slammed his forehead into the faceplate.
The metal was brittle, the faceplate crunched. The iron crumpled inward, driving jagged metal into Kel's nose.
Kel staggered back, stunned, arms flailing.
Siurad didn't let up. He grabbed the bandit's collar and drove a massive knee into the brittle breastplate.
CRACK.
Shards of frozen iron flaked off like dry clay, exposing the leather gambeson underneath.
Kel was knocked breathless. He tried to bring the flail handle up to block, but Siurad was faster. He grabbed Kel’s wrist and twisted against the joint.
SNAP.
Kel screamed as his radius bone shattered. The flail dropped into the mud with a heavy splat.
Siurad stepped back, breathing hard, his own forehead bleeding from the impact. He stooped and picked up his black steel sword.
Kel was on his knees, wheezing, clutching his broken wrist. The center of his chest was exposed, a jagged hole in the armor where Yona’s magic and Siurad’s knee had done their work.
"Wait," Kel gurgled, holding up a shaking hand. "Mercy. I have gold—"
Siurad looked at the exposed chest. He didn't see a bandit. He saw a tree trunk with a notch cut in it. He saw the weak point.
'...THE V-CUT,' Obi commanded, his voice vibrating with anticipation. '...SHATTER HIM.'
Siurad swung.
Not as a swordsman, it was a lumberjack's swing, full rotation, hips engaging, gravity assisting.
THUNK-CRACK.
The blade hit the brittle armor at the edge of the hole. The remaining plate exploded inward. The sword bit deep, shearing through compromised metal, leather, and ribs with terrifying ease.
Kel gasped, blood spraying from the vents of his crumpled helmet. He collapsed backward, the heavy armor dragging him down into the muck.
Siurad stood over him, wrenching the blade free. Ready to strike a finishing blow. He raised his sword.
'...HALT,' Obi’s voice cut through his rage, cold and vibrating with a different kind of malice.
Siurad froze, the blade hovering inches from Kel's neck. "What? He deserves it."
'...DEATH IS A RELEASE,' Obi hissed, the Ring pulsing with a heavy, vantablack darkness that seemed to suck the light out of the air. '...IT IS TOO CLEAN. TOO QUICK.'
Kel looked at the pulsing ring, his eyes widening in primal terror as the temperature around him dropped further. "What... what is that?"
'...FOR VERMIN OF THIS CALIBER, WE DO NOT GRANT PEACE,' Obi continued, the voice echoing in Siurad's mind.
'...WE GRANT OBLIVION.'
'...WE CAN OPEN THE DOOR,' Obi whispered to Siurad. '...THE VOID CONSUMES ALL. LET IT FEED.'
Siurad looked at the dying bandit, then at the Ring. The hot anger in his chest cooled into something darker. Something final.
"Fuck it," Siurad said.
He stood over Kel, his eyes reflecting a violet light.
"To the void with you," Siurad whispered.
Kel's rant cut off into a single, high pitched shriek. He began to flail once the shadow beneath him stopped being shadow.
It thickened around his boots, black and cold and impossibly heavy. His heels carved trenches through the mud as it dragged him backward by inches. He clawed at the ground, then at his own armor, then at Siurad.
The darkness did not rush. It did not need to.
It simply made less room in the world for Scrap Iron Kel.
The only thing left was his axe, clattering onto the empty dirt.
It was clean. It was silent. It was efficient.
Yona stared from her crate, her mouth slightly open. The playful smirk was gone. She looked at the empty patch of dirt where a three hundred pound man had just ceased to exist, then up at Siurad.
"Remind me," she whispered, "never to piss you off."
"Yona," Siurad said, his voice level, though his hands were shaking as the adrenaline crashed. "Get the kids."
Yona didn't move immediately. She sheathed her sword with a sharp shing and stalked toward him, her boots crunching in the mud. Her face was a mask of wariness, excitement, and something else. Fear.
"Okay," she said, stopping five feet away. "We need to talk. Ride or die, or whatever you call it, is one thing."
She pointed a bloody finger at the empty patch of dirt.
"That... was boogeyman stuff, Siurad. That was suck you into the floor stuff."
She took a step closer, poking him hard in the chest. "So you tell me, right now. Was that you... or am I now traveling with the spooky shadow god full time?"
Siurad looked from her finger to her face. Her eyes were deadly serious. She wasn't asking if he was dangerous. She was asking if he was gone.
He then opened his mouth and found he didn't have the answer. Because he wasn't sure. The cold had felt like his. The decision had felt like his. But the part of him that had watched a man dissolve into the dirt and felt nothing, was that him, or was that the thing wearing him like a coat?
He didn't know. And that scared him more than her finger did.
"He was keeping children," Siurad said, his voice hollow. "It was a... correction. I... I couldn't allow..."
"Don't," she snapped, her voice low. "Don't you ever use that correction talk on me. I'm not a flaw, big guy. I'm not a variable to be solved.” Her eyes glittered in the firelight. "I'm your partner. And partners don't absorb each other into the ground. Are we clear?"
'...HER FEAR IS A FLAW, HEIR,' Obi's voice pulsed, cold and immediate. '...SHE IS COMPROMISED BY EMOTION. SHE WILL BETRAY YOU. ELIMINATE THE VARIABLE.'
Siurad's rage, a reflex now, spiked at the command. He shut Obi out, slamming a mental door on the god, and focused entirely on Yona.
"You're my partner, Yona," he said, his voice sounding steadier than he felt. "And I don't eat partners."
Yona held his gaze for a long, tense second. Then, slowly, the manic, bloodthirsty grin returned.
"Good," she breathed, clapping him on the shoulder. "Because that was the most terrifying, amazing thing I have ever seen, and I am so in. Nine hells, big guy, you're going to be fun."
She turned, her levity back, "Right. So, what's the plan for the... 'uncorrectable cargo'?"
She looked at the huddle of terrified shapes. "I'll handle them. I'll get the locks off, give them some food, and point them toward the main road. The King’s Guard patrols that route. They’ll be picked up by morning."
"No," Siurad said, straightening up.
"No?" Yona paused. "Siurad, we can't drag fifteen kids on a dungeon crawl. They're baggage."
"Leaving them... that's just a different kind of failure," Siurad said, the logic forming in his mind as he spoke. "An incomplete correction is still chaos. Leaving them to die in the woods is a flaw. The Great Work isn't just about destroying chaos. It's about replacing it with Order."
He looked at the Ring.
"Our Order."
There was a long, cold silence from the jewelry.
'...YOUR LOGIC IS INTERESTING, HEIR,' Obi's voice said, laced with a new, unnerving curiosity. '...PROVE IT.'
Siurad walked past Yona, toward the cages.
Siurad approached the cages. The metal was rusted and cold, and it smelled of misery. Inside, fifteen children huddled in the furthest corner, a trembling knot of rags and terror.
They weren't looking at Yona. They were looking at him.
They were looking at the six foot four nightmare clad in black leather, stained with mud and blood, who had just fed a man to his own shadow.
Oh god, Siurad thought, his stomach dropping. I look like the final boss. I look like the guy the heroes kill in the cutscene.
He tried to smile. It felt unnatural, like his face was made of cracked plaster.
Don't smile, he corrected himself frantically. You're covered in gore. If you smile, you’ll look like you enjoyed it. Be... comforting. Be safe.
He knelt, his knee crunching loudly in the wet mud. The sound made the children flinch as one, a collective gasp of pure fear.
"You are safe," Siurad said.
He meant for it to sound gentle. Instead, his voice came out deep, rough, and vibrating with the lingering resonance of the Void. It sounded less like a reassurance and more like a tectonic plate shifting.
The smallest child, a boy with tear streaked dirt on his face, buried his head in an older girl's shoulder and started sobbing.
I am failing, Siurad panicked. I am traumatizing them. I have zero Charisma.
'...THEY DO NOT NEED A FRIEND,' Obi’s voice thundered in his skull, cold and dismissive.
'...FRIENDS ARE CHAOTIC. THEY NEED STRUCTURE. THEY NEED AUTHORITY.'
I am not an authority, Obi! I’m a guy who worked security at a nightclub! I don't know how to talk to kids!
'...THEN ACT, VESSEL GIVE THEM A NARRATIVE.'
Siurad looked at the terrified faces. He realized Obi was right. He couldn't be the nice guy right now. He was too scary for that. If he tried to be soft, they wouldn't trust him.
But if he were, authority... maybe they would feel protected.
He took a breath. He shoved the panic down into the pit of his stomach. He put on the mask.
"Silence," Siurad said. The word carried across the clearing, and dropped the temperature in the air. The crying stopped instantly, choked off by the sheer, physical weight of the command.
"The men who took you," Siurad preached, his voice echoing off the trees. "They were a Flaw."
What am I saying? his internal voice screamed. I sound like a cult leader. I am literally quoting the villain from a video game.
"They were Chaos," Siurad continued, rising slowly to his full height. “And Chaos... is inefficient. It is cruel. It allows the strong to prey upon the weak."
He gripped the iron bars of the cage, he tore the door off with a casual twist of metal, tossing it into the mud.
Please don't run. Please don't scream.
"We are not saviors," Siurad lied, channeling every ounce of quest Giver energy he had. "We are the Correction."
He swept his hand toward the carnage of the camp, the smoking craters, the broken bodies..
"You were not saved," he intoned, his voice devoid of doubt. "You were liberated by the will of the Obsidian Authority."
The children stared. The terror in their eyes was shifting. It wasn't gone, but it was changing into something else. Awe. Confusion. They were listening to the structure of his words, clinging to the certainty in his voice because it was the only solid thing in their world.
It's working, Siurad realized with a sick lurch of guilt. They don't want a hug. They want to know that the monster who saved them is bigger than the monsters who hurt them.
"Remember this night," Siurad said, leaning in, his dark eyes scanning the group. "When the world tries to break you... remember that order found you. Remember that the flaw was removed."
He stood back, gesturing to the open door.
"You are not victims. You are survivors. Stand up."
Slowly, hesitantly, the eldest girl, Mara, stood up. She looked at him, really looked at him. She didn't see the panicked gamer wondering if he was doing the right thing.
She saw the avatar of order.
"The Authority..." she whispered.
'...EXCELLENT,' Obi purred, the ring pulsing with a dark, satisfied heat. '...THE SEEDS ARE PLANTED.'
I feel like a fraud, Siurad thought miserably as the children began to file out of the cage, moving with a newfound, eerie discipline. I feel like I'm lying to them.
'...THE TRUTH IS A VARIABLE,' Obi corrected. '...YOU GAVE THEM PURPOSE. THAT IS BETTER.'
"Right," Siurad muttered out loud, turning away so they wouldn't see his hands shaking. "Let's move out. Two columns. Keep it efficient."