Your claws – covered in bandages, unable to tear – dug into the coat covering you. They would have dug into your own arms if not for the pain you were in.
What have you done?
Humans. People. In front of you. Bleeding. Their blood on your hands. Their flesh on your lips.
What did you do to me?
His smile. Always his damned smile. You killed him. You killed him. You killed him. He shouldn’t be able to hurt you anymore. Why did he still haunt you? Why couldn’t you forget the feeling of his experiments on you?
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'Unintelligible cooing noises.' - The entirety of Cannibal Voyeurism
'What?' - Leovold of Trest
'YOU SHOULD VISIT HOME MORE.' - Lord Rakdos
‘Hilarious to have around, does instil a lot of loneliness when I y'know. Know the guy.’ - Viridian
'It's just like the real thing! It's small, squeezable, warm, and always encourages you to get out and have a little fun with that devilish smile. It's very easy to clean, which is good because I constantly end up spilling something on her and needing to throw it in the wash. It's like having your own personal devil on your shoulder, and it is worth every penny.' - S. Edmund
Embereye’s footsteps slapped against the pavement as she fled. She ducked down beneath low-hanging advertisements and darted around corners to try to put distance between her and the fight.
Her ear flicked as she picked up on a noise behind her. There were footsteps closing the distance. It couldn’t be Koda; Koda was never audible when there was danger.
A flash of silver. Embereye darted off to the left to avoid the crescent-shaped blade. She then ducked beneath the second one. The neon lights of the Undercity reflected off of both and warned Embereye about where they were.
The human looked wrong. Their glowing yellow eyes had no pupils or irises, but Embereye knew that the human was staring directly at her. Their long brown hair was tied back so that they were not distracted from their hunt. Underneath their light brown leather coat, their white shirt and pants were still unnaturally pristine, despite the fact that Embereye had seen Koda bury a knife in the human’s chest already.
Embereye slipped backwards out of the human’s reach. Her chest was heaving from running. What had happened to Koda?
The human continued their approach, their two silver sickles held at their sides. “Stop running, little monster,” they said, their voice echoing against the brick and metal walls of the buildings closing in. “It’s time to make one more plane a little safer.”
Embereye stepped back further into the alleyway. She knew that somehow it opened up elsewhere. She just didn’t know which specific turns to take to find safety.
“GET AWAY FROM HER!”
The human did not bat an eye at the interruption. “I’ll deal with you in a moment.”
Embereye’s attention flicked past them to Koda. He had shed his Thousand Faces Mask to return to his true form. Blood trailed down his left side from a new gash in his armor. Too much blood.
“Koda-” Embereye began.
The human knew to capitalize on the distraction.
Their silver sickles gleamed.
The blade met Embereye’s cheek.
And the darkness swallowed her whole.
You let out an agonized sound, half-roar and half-scream, as the Eternal Shepherd lunged. The shadows – not your shadows, your partner was a plane away – surged around one of your charges, one of your kids, and she was gone.
Your claws met the Eternal Shepherd’s back. Rip and tear. Dig into your foe.
They twisted around and caught you in the cheek with the butt of their sickle. Their voice, their irritating echo, rang in your ears. “I said I’ll deal with you in a moment.”
They began to glow white. They were going to planeswalk. They were going to go after your kid.
Rage, glorious rage, white-hot and searing, blinded your trifold gaze. Your hands darkened to a shade of harsh crimson. Even your lips felt as though they were burning.
You had not used the gift given to you by the Prince of the Rakdos.
Now you would.
Fire, overwhelming fire, poured out of your hands and claws in purple flames. You didn’t care how much it hurt. You just wanted to make sure it hurt them more.
That unnaturally perfect face screamed. You grabbed it with one hand, searing flesh. Another blade buried itself in your side, but you held firm.
They began to planeswalk again. The light was blinding. You could hold on and-
No. You couldn’t. Not anymore.
Your spark was elsewhere.
Maybe it had never been your spark. Maybe it had been introduced to you like the metal had.
You let go. The flames and light died. The enemy was gone.
But so was one of your kids.
You fell to your knees. Your hands and arms were burnt up to the elbows. Your manapool was empty and aching. Blood continued to pour from your side.
Agony was the only thing on your mind.
You didn’t care about the footsteps running towards you.
“Shit!” I snarled as I slid to a stop at the alleyway’s entrance. “Shit, shit, shit. Koda? Koda, can you hear me?”
No response. His eyes were still fixed on nothing and his breathing was short. The wound on his side was bad, but the shock would kill him just as quickly.
I muttered an apology as I dropped down beside him and slammed glorifier magic into the wound. “Breathe,” I coached. My magic sank deep and worked back out, restoring nerves and muscle and flesh. I didn’t bother with the burns on his hands and arms, those weren’t as bad as the stab and slice wounds. “In and out. Come on, come back to me. Lazaro will kill me if you die.”
He slid down further after a moment, still staring at nothing. I cursed and removed my coat, wrapping it around him to deal with the shock. “Talk to me, Koda. What happened?” I cursed myself once more for being too far away when all of this began.
“She’s gone,” he whispered. “She sparked and she’s gone and they might be after her and I can’t do anything about it.”
Shit.
I closed my eyes. I didn’t like how easily the training returned. I didn’t like how Theirsi’s hunting dog echoed in my mind. But I found the trail. The spiral of a new planeswalker’s first tumble into the Blind Eternities. Shadows just like Koda’s. Already fading fast.
I had two options. Stay with Koda and lose the trail but not be yelled at by Lazaro. Or go after the planeswalker and try to rescue the kid.
I opened my communicator and dropped my current coordinates into Vasro’s DMs. “Get here,” I demanded into the mic as I stood up. “Get your brother, make sure he heals up.”
I turned back to Koda. I snapped my fingers until his orange eyes locked onto me. “I’ll find her, Silencer,” I said, pushing towards his old Dokuchi codename to get through to him. “Vasro will be here soon. Trust me.”
His breathing was still short. But he nodded slowly. “Please, Earthquake,” he whispered.
I closed my eyes, focused on the trail, and the earth surged up around me.
Her eyes slowly opened. It was dark, nothing like Towashi’s Undercity. The grass she was laying on was soft. The wind was gentle. The bugs were loud and not the ones of the Jukai Forest. The moon was not Kamigawa’s. The sky was not Kamigawa’s.
Embereye slowly pushed herself up into a sitting position. She raised a hand to feel her cheek. Her fur was matted by some blood, but not nearly enough to be dangerous. It already felt like the wound had scabbed over. She didn’t feel too dizzy either. She got to her feet. She brushed off her pants and looked around.
It was a field, like the Towabara Plains, but there were some groups of trees around along with the edge of some kind of forest. It was nowhere near the height of the Jukai, but it still seemed friendlier than the open land was.
But what drew her attention were the buildings nearby. They weren’t buildings that people seemed to live in. Instead, there were mechanized circles with depictions of horses that moved up and down on poles while the entire thing spun, wooden stands with a variety of foods that smelled so good, seats hanging down from chains on other mechanized spinning circles, and many more that Embereye couldn’t even begin to identify.
And the people! There wasn’t a human to be seen, and she was thankful for that considering what just happened. Instead, most of the people wandering the dirt roads between pieces of architecture seemed to be people with the heads of horses, but with longer ears. They trotted about on hooves but had hands like a human’s rather than hands like hers. The taller ones that were stationed behind counters or at doors or controls for the various things were probably adults, but a lot of them seemed to be kids like her. There were a few others around too – people that looked like squishy many-colored akki without shells, satyrs with different horns and deer-like feet, and smoky figures that reminded her of the forge kami. Those were also small like she was, though the squishy akki were particularly tiny.
She got a bad feeling about all of this. Her ears pinned back as her nerves fought against her hunger.
The latter won.
She moved forward carefully, trying to keep her footsteps quiet like Koda’s were. Despite her best attempts, she was spotted immediately, as the grass couldn’t disguise her bright white fur.
One of the horse-people trotted over but stopped when she hissed at them. Despite that, they showed their teeth in what she assumed was their version of a smile. “Another newcomer! You must be very lost, let’s get you some food!”
Her ears pressed back, and she did not make any move to get closer. She was pretty sure she wouldn’t make it if she ran off in another direction, and she didn’t know just how dangerous everything around here was.
Their eyes widened. “Oh, right, my apologies, I should introduce myself. I am Clot Coco, and this is my amusement park! My family and I look out for lost people and make sure they’re taken care of!”
Embereye’s ears slowly moved forward this time. That sounded a bit like what the Dokuchi Reckoners did. This was all still wrong-feeling, but she was hungry, and this seemed like the best route to find out where she was and how she could get home.
She hesitantly moved forward. “I’m...” She remembered what Koda warned her, about how names were important on some planes because knowing someone’s real name could let someone take it. She chose to use the name of an old nezumi hero from the stories Lethaltooth told them all. “I’m Cedarpaw.”
Clot Coco kept smiling. They gestured for her to come with them back towards the park. “A pleasure to meet you, Cedarpaw. Come, come, let’s get you some food and clean up your cheek, my sibling’s a healer and very good at it.”
Embereye’s eyes narrowed, but she carefully stepped closer. Clot Coco turned and led the way into the park with Embereye following. Her head remained on a swivel as they passed by “rides” that Clot Coco explained in great mechanical detail and “food stands” specializating in a variety of sweet or deep-fried foods each.
Then she began to notice something else. Some of the squishy-akki and deer-satyrs had features that looked more like the horse-people. The hooves seemed to be overlapping between all of them. Maybe they were also part of Clot Coco’s family? It sounded like all of the horse-people were related based on what they were saying... But it still seemed wrong, wouldn’t they look more similar to other squishy-akki and deer-satyrs if they were all also siblings or cousins?
Tony Fandango blinked blearily over his cup of coffee. She looked exhausted; Obscura work was running them ragged, and Dokuchi work was how he recovered afterwards. "I'm not sure. Vasro's talked about blinding whiteness and something to do with an eternal grey, but I try not to think about it."
"What's supposed to happen when you die?"
Ferlan's new wings fluttered. Xe was still having a hard time with xir new size, even many months after mantling the position of Honorable Judge. Xe brushed xir bangs out of xir face. "I'm pretty sure Eldrainian fae just turn into plants, body and soul and all. We don't talk about it a lot, but I hope I turn into one of those gnarled-looking trees.
"What's supposed to happen when you die?"
Lillie Short leaned her elbow on the table between them as she pondered that. "Spiritually? I don't know, that's never been a concern to the Cabaretti. Physically? My body is going to be interred under a sapling that will go on to provide food for the city, like every other druid's."
"What's supposed to happen when you die, Zenkuro?" Azzie's voice was soft, small, gentle.
The oni slowly exhaled, turning his gaze out so he could look through the window instead of at the rat that had come to be his closest friend. "I will simply cease to be. There is no returning. There is no soul. Not like mortals have. No matter what happens, I will not be able to follow any of you."
Their paw, so small, so fragile, settled on his arm. No further words were spoken.
He closed his eyes before tears could threaten to fall.
His name came as a death rattle upon the wind. He straightened, ears twitching in the direction of the sound.
"Who goes there?" His voice echoed strangely back to him. He was --
-- not in his place of usual imprisonment. Where he found himself was in a place of infinite twilight, stretching farther than the eye could see. His eyes widened. He was... free.
Vito.
He spun around, eyes searching the endless horizon for any sign of the one calling him. It was not the same voice as his god, he knew that much.
"Where are you?" he called. "Who calls to me?"
Vito.
"I am here!" he shouted. "Where are you? Who are you?"
He heard the sound of clattering bones. A string of them together, taken from a time unknowable and nigh unreachable to him. They clattered against armor more ancient than any of the written works of the church he once devoted his life towards.
A thing walked out of the gloom. Dessicated wings clung fast to its body, shriveled fingers locked into bits of ancient armor. Its face was half skeletonized, half flesh pulled too tight over whatever remained of its skull. At one point, it had to have been a human. Large fangs protruded from its mouth. One of its eyes was a deep, stinging red.
I am Xamanek of the Thousand.
Vito's eyes widened. He retreated a half-step, then fell to one knee in obedient reverence.
"You have come to retrieve me, then? For our master's crusade?"
No.
"No?"
No. You, Vito, will not be marching at the side of our god. He has deemed you unworthy of that honor.
"What?" Vito shook his head. "No, you must be mistaken. I-- I am the one who freed him, I am the one who restored him so that he and his children may yet fight and feast at his side, I am -- I am loyal!"
You are weak.
The champion approached. Vito stared up at the giant avatar of his god. He felt nothing but hunger and hatred radiating from his form.
It is the decree of our god that the weak must fuel the strong.
A hand, crackling as it moved, reached for him. Dread, so thick it paralyzed him, made his body feel as though it had turned to stone.
Right before the grasp could close around him, as the champion opened its ancient, fang-filled maw --
"No!"
A lance was in his hands. He rammed it up, through, and out, twisting as he went. It was a practiced and fluid motion. He wrenched the weapon free, backing away from the champion as he did so.
A hole had been punched up and out of its malformed skull. A red eye was fixated on him. He began to back away, clutching the lance in both hands, his eyes watching the avatar of hunger and suffering before him slowly begin to reconstitute its own face.
"I was loyal!" he roared, his voice echoing in this place between places. "I am the reason our master yet flies! I gave my life to him, and traded my unlife to servitude! I have been working to gift the church to him by turning its most faithful heart, and yet you seek to have me devoured?" He grit his teeth. "What have you done for him, Xamanek of the Thousand? Aside from rotting within his realm beyond realms? Aside from your death securing his own capture? What have you done for your god?"
The avatar took a step forward, wings peeling away from the desiccated armor with the snapping of twigs. He could make out etchings of other battles, now long since faded, accompanied by what he assumed to be trailing script, though it was unrecognizable to him.
My very presence has bred madness into the minds of the unfaithful and the unyielding.
"That presence which lasted only but days and was rebuffed by the might of the Venerable Saint!" Vito spat. "And now you come to seek me out to fuel you? As though I were the unworthy one out of the two of us! You have done nothing but sit here and rotted away for untold ages! I have preached in his name, I have been doing everything I could with everything I had for him, and you think me the weakling one?" He had the lance aimed right at the avatar's chest.
Such impiety for one of the chosen avatars of our god.
"If this is the fate he wishes for me, if THIS is one of the avatars our god chooses to accompany his side --" Vito paused. He looked away from the thing of death and destruction, eyes once again searching the endless twilit horizon around him. A voice echoed back.
"Your god abandoned you, Vito."
"Following after me would've been a fool's errand. You could've easily died or gotten yourself captured and then killed."
"We were wrong! We had committed a dire blasphemy and worked against the meaning our Saint meant for us when she gave to us the Rite and left to find the Immortal Sun. I am not above admitting that, even if you think yourself to be."
"You've done... so much. I'm struggling to hold everything together, even with the new delegations that I am trying, and now..."
When his eyes went back to the avatar before him, he saw its six wings now spreading wider, ready. He saw that look of infinite hunger and anger in its eye.
Any scrap of benevolence he had ever felt his god might've had for him withered and died in that gaze. He felt a weight lifting from around his shoulders.
"I thought there would be a brighter future if I had unified our kindred under the wings of our god."
There will be. But you deserve no part in it. You are too weak. You have been granted enough chances. Our god has no place for you.
"At least Elenda preached that all were deserving of the future she envisions."
She would have you starved and rotting.
"And you would see me devoured!"
He saw its clawed hand reaching for him again. He huffed, gritted his teeth, and once more thrust the lance, twisting, up and out, then wrenched it back. The champion made a strange noise between a choked growl and a hiss, ash falling from its mouth as it did so. Vito hardly saw it as he turned on his heel and ran, not even noticing that he was no longer in the form of the canonized as he did so.
He returned to his usual confinement with a start, gasping as though winded.
He shook himself out, taking stock of what he had just seen, cursing brilliantly under his breath.
"Mavren? Mavren!" he called, pacing around the confines of the enchanted jar. "Mavren!"
"Be silent," came a voice from beyond his prison.
"Mavren, please, you must listen! I have a warning! Mavren!"
Through one of the reflective lenses upon the side of the jar, he saw the tired and somewhat haggard face of Mavren come into view. Pinpricks of starlight were found in his gaze now.
"What is it?" he asked, sounding annoyed.
"Listen, this is going to sound insane--"
"Just say it."
"Aclazotz is bringing back his thousand champions," Vito said quickly. "You already know of one, Xamanek, but this is only a sign that others are going to follow."
"His thousand champions?"
"Yes! Do you not know of them?" Vito blinked. "Haven't you had--"
"Archaeological expeditions to the Core have been all but fruitless, no thanks to what you had done," Mavren answered plainly. "Explain."
"During the age in which Aclazotz was imprisoned, he fought another one of the gods of the people of the Core alongside a thousand of his most faithful. His thousand against that of the enemy god. Those thousand were elevated to such a status that they, in themselves, were divine."
"Like our Venerables."
"Stronger, Mavren. Each reflects a shard and aspect of him, aside from his most zealous of lieutenants. The madness that you dealt with and quelled alongside the Saint--"
"-- was a harbinger of a greater presence to come," Mavren finished for him. He paused, then frowned down at the jar. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Because--" Vito stopped. He looked right at the face of the man his stilled heart would beat for. "Because I have seen that I am wrong. Xamanek had come for me, and he sought to consume me so that he may be empowered enough to fight at our god's side. Please, I know this sounds insane and mad, but it is true!"
Mavren stared down at the jar for a long moment. "Have you come to your senses, then? At last?"
Vito hesitated. He felt something rippling, like a stone scattered on water. He nodded. "I- listen. I still believe there is much to reconcile with in terms of the church and its doctrines, but... but yes, yes, I see it now. I saw nothing but death and hatred in his eyes. I saw... I saw how truly worthless I was to him, to Aclazotz, to everything. And I remembered what you had told me after I confessed about what sent me down this path and..." He looked away, his voice softening. "I was wrong."
Mavren's mouth twitched. He could feel his scrutiny, and he looked back to face it more fully.
"Do not think that this will be close to enough to atone for what you have done," he said sternly. Vito nodded.
"I know, but Mavren -- look. The Thousand are coming. Not tonight, perhaps not even in the next month, but they are coming, and they are coming soon. And when each awakens, we will all suffer for it. Not the humans, not the peoples of this plane, but us. Each represents an aspect of our nature but writ large. Xamanek is one of his oldest lieutenants; others are sure to awaken and follow in due time."
"You know how to defeat them?"
"Not to defeat them, but who they are, and which to watch for." Vito pressed a hand against the jar. "Let me show you. Please. I can not do it while confined here."
Mavren once again laid his scrutinizing, dark eyes on him. Vito waited. He heard a very long, tired sigh.
"Once I release you, you will tell me everything. And I do mean everything. And then, if what you say is true, and this holds a key to bringing the church and to bringing Torrezon back together, then I will consider bringing this to the rest of the clergy and see about having you on a path of truer redemption."
"I hardly care about that," Vito said with a scoff. "I -- Mavren, I must make sure that you are safe, and I know I will not be able to protect you if I side in his camp. Nor would I be able to preserve any of what I love here in Torrezon. I... I do this for the same reason I freed him in the first place. Because I still love you."
Mavren's look was hard, but Vito saw his jaw soften, even if his eyes didn't. He felt the enchantments woven around his prison become undone, and soon... he was standing before Mavren. He carefully took his hands in his own, wishing he could feel them more properly again.
"Tell me everything you know about them," Mavren stated. He spoke a word, a book and pen opening nearby. "Let this be the record of the testimony of the Arch-Heretic, first of his confessions to wipe the damned stains from his soul." The pen dutifully recorded his words, and then Mavren focused on Vito again. "Begin."
Vito looked at him, then at the book, then back again. He saw the exhaustion writ large over him. He saw the heaviness that the office of Pontifex had put around his neck and shoulders, and he saw the mask that he wore so often affixed firmly to his face.
But he also saw the glimmer of something else. Something more hopeful, more kind, more...
He shook his head a little, then nodded. He opened his mouth and began to speak.
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The splitting of wood echoed through his mind. A long time had passed since it was this quiet. No more Diana. She was dead. Vasro had seen to that. At last, his mind was his. He grabbed another log, setting it on the stump. He raised a simple ax, and with another thunderous split, the next piece of wood went.
A voice came from behind him. "Just trying to kill some time?"
"No. Preparing."
Campfire Gesserith approached, staying out of the axe yard. "Really? You aren't actually going to attempt that again, are you?"
"No. Not yet. Later, I hope."
"Every time you think that, it always happens a week or so from now."
He sighed. "I know, I know. Just... maybe this time it'll be different. Maybe I can master it."
He shook his head. "You don't need to, you know. You can just let it go. No better time than the present."
"Me? Let something go? Come on, you know us better than that." He raised the ax. Another log split.
"Fruitless hope, I guess." He moved around the ax yard. "No halberd? Just feeling like trying something new?"
"Something simple," Gesserith Prime replied. "No fancy magic. Just wood and iron. And my own two hands." He set up another log. "Back to basics."
"And how did that work out the last time?"
"I turned my life around and now live with a wonderful daughter and an organization filled with people who hate me."
Campfire Gess snickered. "How poignant. At least you went with the radical acceptance route and not the stabby murdery one. On the note of that, I assume you've taken note of the papers? What's your plan with that?"
"Vigil," he replied, followed with another splitting log. "Post myself nearby one of my work sites. Wait for the culprit. They always wait until a week after work starts. Which will be soon. Keep an eye out that night; catch them in the act. I'm the hero. Everything is saved. Everyone is happy until they remember what I did."
"And so the roundabout circles on."
"And so it does." He nails the ax in the stump. "Enough for tonight."
"So you'll be back before bed?"
"...yeah." Gesserith Prime sat by the fire, followed by Campfire Gesserith. "Why can't I just make it work like I used to?"
"Because you're not who you used to be." Campfire Gess popped open a beer bottle and handed it over. "You're a new man."
"I tell myself I am. I'm doing it right now. But I just make the same mistakes. Chasing some future that doesn't exist."
"The future doesn't exist, you idiot. That's why you're making it happen."
Gesserith Prime takes a long, slow drink. "I... I want to just sit back and let it happen. Let the world pass me by and forget. But I can't. I can never let go. I won't."
"Then why sit here and complain about it? You just looking for companionship after she left?"
"Because. Because... Because I know I'm lying." He sets down the beer. "Because I know I can and I refuse to let myself fade away like that."
A small smile came across Campfire's face. "Go on. Keep going."
"Because I won't let other people pass me by. I'm better than enough of them. I'm stronger than enough of them. I may not be the best in everything but I'm damn fine in a lot. And that's better than a lot of people can say."
Campfire Gess leaned in closer. "And...?"
"Because I know that I am needed. I'm a lynchpin. Keystone. If I go, everything else goes with it."
He drummed his fingers. "You're an idiot, Gesserith. Aside from Shadowstep, what else? They promote a replacement for you. The controversy around your name dies down. Everyone forgets about you. Story over. Why do you never want to be forgotten? Why must the fire keep burning?"
"Why doesn't it burn brighter?" The fire responded to Prime's words, slowly growing up and out. "Because there's not enough fuel. It chews through it and spits it out. And so I keep the fire small." It shrinks back down to what it was, cold seeping in. "So it doesn't burn too fast."
"So why go for the flame? You swore it off. Every time you go for it, it burns you. You keep saying that it'll be the last time. When will it ever be enough?"
"Never. You know that better than anyone else. All of you do. It's never enough. And even when it is, when my life is looking up and all's well, something happens. Someone dies. Someplace blows up. And I have to clean it up."
"No, you don't."
"I don't. But I find catharsis in it. It keeps me ready. Reminds me of how lucky I am to even breathe, let alone carry my Spark. When one falls, we continue. When. Not if. The world will go on without me. But I'm going to make my mark- another mark. A good one. They will remember me as the man who redeemed himself in the end. I'll be a story. A warning and an ideal."
The fire crackled around the two. Minutes of silence. "...you really think you can do it?"
"If I didn't, I would have already died. One way or another."
"I meant the fire. But sure, Prime."
"Oh, that?" Prime laughed. "I'll keep it there. You will, really. Stoke it and keep it happy. And if I need it, then I'll use it. No more burns. I'll pass the trial."
"I have no doubt you will." Campfire finished his beer. "You make me proud to be you."
"You're just saying that."
"I'm not the one with opinions. I'm just your base thoughts. I can't lie."
"Oh, you can. You most certainly can."
"True. But you wouldn't be fighting if you weren't in the mood to hear me anyway."
"I'll see you later, then. Wood's not going to chop itself."
Campfire laughed. "Who do you think keeps the fire ready to go? You? Nah, my job. You just show up when you need the beer and reassurance. Or some time off. You have so many you's. Maybe try checking in on them. Maybe you'll find something that'll surprise you."
"...I really am something, huh."
"You have no idea."
"Tell Irina I say hi."
"Tell her yourself. I'll see you when you're ready."
"Hm?" The High Marshal looked up from tending to his weapon. There was something in the way his name was said. "Something on your mind, lad?"
"Do you ever miss it?" Arturo was leaning against a wall, idly moving his spear about.
"Oh, I miss a great many things," he said, carefully adjusting how he was holding the blade between his legs before he went for a bit more oil. "You'll have to be more specific."
"Fighting, I mean."
"Growing restless, are you? Well, Her Majesty wants you all back, and there will be plenty of fighting--"
"No, I mean." Arturo frowned a moment. "Before all of this. Real fighting."
Guitirre paused. "You mean in the conquest?"
"Yes," Arturo said, pushing himself away from the stony wall of the bastion behind him.
"In part, I do," Guitirre answered, gently taking his weapon and setting it aside, as well as the cloth he was using to clean it with. "It felt good. It felt easier, too. We were just made into things to be pointed at and told what to kill."
"No famine, no schism," Arturo said, now doing more practiced and fluid movements. "We simply marched together, fought together, bled together, and fed together."
"It seems that way in hindsight, eh?" Guitirre asked with a small chuckle. "Don't you remember all of the logistical troubles and waiting around keeps and sieges we had to commit to?"
"I remember," Arturo said with a nod. "But that still felt... better. I felt more useful." He waved with one hand, making sure not to accidentally wave the spear he was holding. "Far more useful than I have been, anyway. I was put into this place for a reason."
"Then it seems as though the Church and the Legion have failed you," Guitirre said, crossing one leg over the other. "What makes you think you haven't been useful, lad?"
"I was stuck in recovery for months," he said. "I've been stuck here for weeks doing nothing. I was standing idle in garrison waiting for this bastion to be finished, only for nothing to come of it, making this the third or fourth event now that was supposed to be an interplanar threat and had nothing happen."
"You were recovering after delivering the Pontifex to Alta Torrezon because you are the only rider we have who can manipulate the horses in the way you know how," Guitirre said. "And you've been trying to do your duties as a watchman. Something plenty of cavalry have been doing. As far as I am concerned, you have been doing what is asked of you."
"But I am not fighting," Arturo said, now gesticulating a little with the spear. "I am not commanding or leading in the capacity that I should be. I should be out with a company driving us into the hearts of the enemies and breaking them in the name of the Saint and the crown."
Guitirre nodded. "Times are changing, Arturo. And this is what I meant by saying the church and Legion have failed you. You see yourself as weapon to be wielded, and you dislike when you are not."
"I am not--" Arturo paused, hesitating. Guitirre's eyebrows rose at him. He shook his head.
"You are not alone, lad," he said. "The Legion were raised to be the united striking arm of the crown and church. All of us were taught how to be weapons and how to be pointed in the direction of our foes. Times are shifting. We now move away from ceaseless war and conflict into a different and uncertain future. One of peace and diplomacy after our own internal schism is finally handled."
"I dislike being called a 'weapon'." Arturo had a bit of a scowl on his face, and he looked at the silvered spear he was holding.
"And yet," Guitirre said, putting up a finger with a wink. "That is what you lament to be. You like being utilized. I've seen how protective you've been with your man as of late. You like feeling like a protector as much as you are a soldier, yes?"
"Yes, but that is different."
"How so?"
Arturo paused, thinking and momentarily wrongfooted. The paladin blinked slowly. "Lazaro is my love. He is my life and he is my family, now. We are--" he paused again, taking a careful look around before leaning in and lowering his voice. "We are going to be building a family together, and I want to make sure he is safe."
"Do you not already have one with those two young lads?" Guitirre asked, raising a brow.
"Yes, but this is... different. This will be our first child that is of our blood, and I want to make sure he isn't... you know. Going to suffer for carrying it. Or be called a woman for it. He isn't one, and I don't want him to be mistaken as such."
Guitirre nodded, looking rather placid and non-judgemental. "Everything will be put right once the child is here, I assume. Unless you are going to have another child?"
"Yes. If there is another child, I will carry that one," Arturo said, looking a bit proud. "I would've carried this one, but Lazaro didn't want me to be away for longer than I already have since I've been serving."
"A wise point," Guitirre said with a nod. "Her Majesty is the one who's really been on my backside about that, you know. But if you had decided to do this, Arturo, know I would've given you the time once it was time for you to leave. Just give me a word of warning is all I ask."
"Thank you," Arturo said, bowing his head. "But, still, I... like being able to protect him and our soon-to-be child. That also makes me feel good and useful."
"So you like being both the sword and the shield," Guitirre said, tilting his head. "I wouldn't doubt that if your man asked you to maim someone, you wouldn't ask twice."
"Of course not," Arturo said, frowning again. "Wouldn't you do the same for your wife?"
"Oh, aye, lad, but not without making sure all was well," Guitirre said with a nod. "I like to look and think a little before ramming the sharp end into someone, you know."
Arturo grunted at that. "I trust Lazaro."
"I know you do. And I trust Casilda. Regardless," he made a wave with his hand, "back on topic. You lament the days of old because it felt as though you could be used more easily. And now we're in a time of mud and ink, and it's harder to tell who you can and shouldn't swing at."
"Yes."
"Do you resent your current place in the Legion?"
Arturo hesitated, thinking. "No," he answered. "I do not."
"Know that the future of your position is going to be a lot like this, lad," Guitirre said with a broader gesture. "Our glory days of war, conquest, and blood are over. We committed to a conquest that the Saint is horrified by, and we now have to work to do right by her proper teachings and in her image."
"I know," Arturo said, sounding a little frustrated. "And I accept that, I just..."
"Wish things were easy, eh?" Guitirre asked, chuckling. "Don't we all, lad. But think about it this way; we're building a better land for our children and grandchildren and their children to come into. We fight so that others may live. The Legion has always been so, but now it is more important than ever. We need to realize that we are more than just the blade or shield of the crown and clergy, but that we're our own men and women. We need to think about what legacies our families will remember us by, centuries on, if and when we're either still here or not."
Arturo listened to him and went quiet, looking at the spear in his hand.
"Building a better world is difficult work," Guitirre said. "Ask your nephew about that, I think he's aged an extra half-century helping to manage for your son here. I am not disparaging you for missing when times were simple, but I will ask you to think about why they felt simple. What were you being used for then, and to what purpose are you being used now? Can they be reconciled? And, most importantly, how do they contribute to how you will be remembered?" He looked up and around a corner, brows raising as someone called out "High Marshal!". Arturo followed his gaze.
"It sounds like the scouts are back," the paladin said.
"Aye. Perhaps with news this time." The High Marshal stood and stretched, rubbing his missing shoulder. "I know I've asked some big questions, but I want you to think on them. You and all those under your watch need to reconcile with them, as does the entire Legion. The time for us to be unthinking weapons is coming to an end, and the time for us to be proper guardians and true paladins is now." He patted Arturo on the shoulder as he left, and Arturo watched him go.
His mind ran a little as he looked back to the weapon he was holding. It was a beautiful piece of holy artifice, even if the one who had forged it was somewhat of a little prick about the whole thing. He had taken special care of it, occasionally setting it down and taking up a different weapon when he knew it wouldn't be of more use to him. Not because he thought it would be useless, but rather because he wanted to preserve that unique edge and blade, one his people had yet had the time or progress to properly replicate.
Perhaps that was a more apt analogy to how he was being used. He had unique gifts when it came to what he had been capable of, and the Legion seemed to be very hesitant to use him to his fullest extent. Perhaps they wanted to wait until they had redundancies. Arturo couldn't imagine what would've happened had his weapon broke in the battle with Braras during the Darkest Night.
That fight was nothing more than a haze, anyway. He was already well beyond his limit with exhaustion; the only thoughts in his mind were that his father was in danger and that he had to fight Braras back. He didn't even remember if he properly killed him this time or not.
But did he want to be a weapon? He didn't like being rendered down into nothing more than a tool, but... Guitirre was right. That was how he had defined his existence. A blade of the crown and church, a conqueror, a taker of lives and eater of men. And now, Saint Elenda was trying to guide the church and crown away from such things. The Pontifex was with her, heart and soul, but Her Majesty... Arturo wondered if she thought as Guitirre did. She probably didn't. She wanted her weapons to remain sharp and unyielding.
After all, she was demanding to have her kingdom restored to her.
Maybe Guitirre was alone in that sentiment, at least outside of the Church's purview. He did wonder what the other paladins would think of what he said. About legacies and all. He knew plenty wanted to be remembered as proud warriors and knights and conquerors. How many would want to give that up?
It was a good question. Perhaps he could tease the answer out while they were waiting for the courtiers to finish doing whatever their business was. His mind did briefly flash over to Calisto, who seemed utterly dismayed to hear that he might be part of the Legion's recall to Torrezon. Maybe there were other paladins like him out there who'd rather be something other than weapons.
He looked back at the moonsilver spear, at the prayers painstakingly inscribed into it, and he set it aside. He'd retrieve it if he needed it, but he noted that even Guitirre had gone on without his own blade. Leading by example as always. And, as ever, Arturo would do his best to follow.
Ryoichi laid back on his bed and scrolled back up to the top of the group chat he had set up for himself, Renaissance, and Freddie again. Every single message there was a new burst of something really, really strange. So he took a deep breath.
"Okay," he muttered, starting from the top. He had told them what happened on his way to work a few days prior. "Both of them were willing to do research, and I told them about the weird stuff with the little kami and oni. And apparently the little kami are their brothers somehow. And they're siblings. And also siblings with the landlord. Who is also siblings with the guy that's apparently Shimatsu's biological son."
He rolled over in his bed to bury half of his face in his pillow. "That's already weird. And my old man being with Shimatsu means I'm kinda their stepbrother? Which is also weird. And how am I supposed to tell him that the person who killed his dad is now kind of his stepchild through a series of really weird adoptions?" He felt like he should, since it didn't seem like Renaissance wanted to be the bearer of such bad news and Freddie...well, Freddie didn't seem to have the best memory. Or even a mediocre memory. Not that Ryoichi could judge too much.
"But hey, at least the kami priest guy is willing to come by." That was, surprisingly, the easiest part of it all. Koda Hayashi had explained that he would be busy the next few days, but he would be by the apartment building tonight. He didn't know what Koda would look like, but he knew what kami priests wore, which is what he imagined Koda would have.
Ryoichi took a deep breath and got up to pull a brush through his hair. He still wanted to ask Shimatsu to help him cut it down sometime soon. After he had done that, he tossed the brush back onto his desk and took a moment to readjust his binder so his chest was as flat under his shirt as possible. "Deep breath, Ryo," he reminded himself. "Hopefully this guy knows what's going on."
There was a knock on the door to the apartment.
Before Ryoichi could answer it, he heard Clayton call from the kitchen area. "I've got it!" Ryoichi opened the door of his room and stepped into the short hallway anyway, emerging to the main living space in time to see Clayton open the door to answer it.
Ryoichi opened his mouth to say something, then stopped and stared when the kami priest stepped into the apartment. He didn't pay much attention to the formalwear of the priest or the Reckoner tattoos covering the slightly older man's left arm. Instead, he gaped at the other human's alarmingly similar skin tone and hair and eye color, just with the latter two being darker. "...Why do you look like me?"
Koda inclined his head slightly. "That's something else we should discuss. Also, hello Mister Winters, sorry for not giving you the heads up. Ryoichi reached out to me with questions about the kami."
"Mister...Hayashi," Clayton greeted back. "Uh, have a seat, we've got...toast."
"I'm actually on a fast right now, but thank you." Koda shut the door behind himself and turned to Ryoichi. "So, would you prefer the explanation for why we look similar first, or help with the magic analysis first?"
"The similar part," Ryoichi finally got out. He noticed that Koda moved completely silently, and he didn't walk so much as he prowled towards the chair near the hallway. Even sitting down, the young man was completely silent. Ryoichi shook his head and plopped down on the couch, bouncing slightly from the force of it.
Koda folded his hands together and leaned to rest his elbows on his knees. It made him seem less like something unnerving and more like a Reckoner boss. "So, I'm about to say a bunch of deeply alarming shit, just know that I did not expect to find it or for it to lead to you. I was tracing what happened with my own bloodline after dealing with Ichiro Hayashi and Yuna Suzuki, who unfortunately are my maternal biological grandparents."
"The assholes who kidnapped my old man, yeah," Ryoichi responded slowly. His mind jumped to the worst case scenario. "...Are they my grandparents too?"
"No. Great-uncle and great-aunt, actually." Koda reached into the pocket of his hakama - Ryoichi did not realize that hakama had pockets - and withdrew an entire folder, which he handed to Ryoichi.
Ryoichi reluctantly took it and flipped it open. He was relieved that it was written in katakana, at least. Unfortunately, that meant that he could read it.
There were blood tests, some of the few records stored at the Undercity clinic he was born in and some that seemed to have been stored by a Reckoner gang showing Koda's. Official Imperial Court health records of the previous Emperor, Ichiro Hayashi, and Yuna Suzuki. All of them bore similar hereditary health risks.
Ryoichi flipped past more records until he found an assembled family tree. There they were, names in black and white. Kohei Hayashi had two sons, Ichiro and Jiro Hayashi. Jiro's name had been stricken out and replaced with the Emperor title, as always happened. Ichiro had one daughter, Ayame, who had one son, Koda. Jiro had one daughter, Enko, who had one son...Ryoichi.
"...Well. Shit." Ryoichi straightened out the papers and put them back in the folder. "Alright, that's. That's a lot."
"I was also surprised to find out that I had a cousin," Koda remarked. "Er, well, blood-related second cousin. The adoption stuff I'm involved in has gotten a little out of hand."
"Yeah, apparently two of our neighbors and our landlord are all your siblings?" Ryoichi gestured towards the back room. "And, uh, your oni dad and my old man are pretty obviously together."
"Ryoichi!" Clayton admonished, his fur bristling slightly from embarrassment.
"It's really obvious, old man. Anyway, so does that also make me your stepbrother?"
Koda hesitated, which was the first time he had done that since he got here. "...I guess?"
Clayton's forehead thumped quietly against the counter. "Angels on high...I'm barely qualified to be a dad, what do you mean I'm now a stepdad..."
"I should add a clarifier to that," Koda said, clearly thinking on it. "Shimatsu is my father, but all of my siblings were adopted - or born to - Mum and Pops, the nezumi that raised me after Mom died. So unless Shimatsu adopts everyone that Mum and Pops adopted, the only one you're technically a stepbrother to is me."
"Oh," Ryoichi said. "That's more manageable."
"Right. Let me tell ya, family get-togethers have become a nightmare to schedule. Normal nezumi family issues." Koda sat back up and folded his hands together properly, seemingly slipping back into the role of kami priest instead of Reckoner. "Now, about that magic of yours. I'm going to use my own magic to study it, but I need you to cast something for me." Koda's fingers and hands turned a dark blue color as he began using his own magic, pulling open a technomancy hologram screen from nowhere.
"Right." Ryoichi didn't know if summoning drinks actually counted as casting a spell, but he focused on his hands and snapped his fingers. A case of Cryptid energy drinks appeared in his hand. He set it down and repeated the motion, summoning a bottle of sake that he placed next to it. Another snap, a gallon of oat milk. Snap; a plastic bottle of engine oil. Snap; tomato sauce in a paper cup. Snap; a bucket full of custard.
Koda finally nodded, so Ryoichi stopped snapping. "Well, that's certainly not the usual application of kami magic I've seen. But it is kami magic."
"...The kami don't care about me, though?" Ryoichi said, scooting the bucket of custard away with his foot. He'd drop that off for Old Man Dirt later. "At least, none of them cared when I was living on the streets."
"Well, there are many ways to access kami magic. Channeling or bonding with a kami, using Futurist tech to pull directly from the spirit realm, using Upriser tech to coax it out...or being half-kami."
Ryoichi immediately grabbed the folder and opened it up again. "You know, the half-kami thing feels like a big jump. I'm not...weird-looking."
Koda snorted. "Neither was I until recently. Apparently half-kami, like half-oni, don't actually look that different from their non-kami or non-oni parent. We found out the hard way that half-oni traits develop later, but half-kami almost never do. Like with Seimei, who was integral to the development of onmyōdō as a practice, who may have been half-kitsune instead. Same deal there with never developing traits belonging to both sides."
Ryoichi scanned his blood test again. It looked...like a blood test, alright. He didn't actually know how to read it for information that wasn't plainly spelled out. "...Is there any way we can get confirmation on that besides just...theories?"
"The scientific way would be to let Doctor Tosari Itomi - a member of my Reckoner gang and our primary medic - do some further blood tests, but that would involve coming back to Kamigawa or them bouncing back and forth to here, and frankly I don't think Vasro has the patience to do that. The other way is for me to let Haruko, my kami partner, out, and she literally pokes you for a few minutes before telling me what she thinks."
"How honest is she usually?"
"Decently."
Ryoichi looked over at Clayton, whose ears had gone flat at the idea of either of them returning to Kamigawa. "Let's go with the kami poke option then," he decided, hoping that would alleviate some of Clayton's clearly-ever-growing concern.
Koda nodded and leaned back in his seat. The shadows around him darkened dramatically.
Ryoichi was going to make a joke about how edgy that looked before the shadows peeled away from the objects they were supposed to be attached to. Thin limbs that were as gaunt as a corpse emerged. From somewhere in the shadows, a featureless golden mask emerged.
Clayton let out a small distressed noise. Shimatsu equally appeared from nowhere, placing himself protectively by the leonin.
Ryoichi just stared at the newly-manifested kami for a few moments before he looked at Koda. "Can I learn how to do that? Because that was cool as fuck."
Haruko's mask moved up and down, her shadowed shoulders shaking with silent laughter.
Koda looked exhausted. "Maybe. There's a small chance you can already do that and just haven't figured it out yet."
Haruko wiggled her fingers in Ryoichi's direction. He laughed. "She already seems like a riot."
"You have no idea." Koda glanced up at the shadow kami. "You were listening to the whole convo, Haruko. Please do the thing."
She stepped over as silently and daintily as a cat creeping around a puddle on the floor. Her fingers, when they touched Ryoichi's head, were cold yet not uncomfortable. It was more like ice cream on a hot day than the grip of winter's winds.
Several minutes ticked by. Ryoichi tried not to fidget, but he was getting bored.
Finally, Haruko pulled her hand away and turned back to Koda, as though communicating silently with him.
Koda looked surprised and deeply exhausted at the same time. Ryoichi was starting to think that exhaustion was Koda's core emotion. "You sure?"
Haruko reached over and flicked him in the nose.
Koda rubbed his nose. "Alright, alright, gods and kami..." He turned to Ryoichi. "So, neutral news and deeply awkward news. Haruko says you are, in fact, half-kami. Unfortunately the way she was able to recognize that is because she knows the kami that fathered you. And apparently my gang reveres him alongside Haruko and another kami."
Ryoichi blinked. And then blinked again. "...It's really weird how entangled our lives are despite never fucking meeting."
"I imagine the myojin have a really deranged sense of humor about it."
He couldn't argue with that. "So who is he?"
Koda took a deep breath. "Kosui, the Kami of Jealous Thirst."
Ryoichi sat there for a few moments. Then he looked down at the liquids he had summoned. Then he thought about the arguments he had kept accidentally escalating or cooling down. "...Are you fucking shitting me, why is it that obvious?"
"Sometimes the kami really are that straightforward," Koda sighed. "So, you know how to contact me on the communicators, but I'm going to head back to Kamigawa and kick his ass for being a deadbeat father."
Ryoichi decided that he liked Koda. "Can you get me his contact information so I can also kick his ass for it?"
"Absolutely. Hold on, I'll text you his communicator contact information so you can heckle him later. Maybe Clayton can wrestle child support money from him. I know that bastard can cover it."
Clayton's voice was still slightly distressed and half-muffled by the fact that Shimatsu was still basically hiding him. "I don't want to anger any kami over money."
"I can do it for you. But on the topic of money." Koda leaned forward and fixed his gaze on Ryoichi alone, sliding back into looking like a Reckoner. "As a member of our bloodline and technically connected to the family kami, you have all rights to use the Hayashi name and be included in the clan, granting you access to some of the money from it. Technically we have a Regent, Calisto Vazante, that the management of our clan's...stuff...goes through. Would you like in on this?"
Ryoichi crossed his arms and raised a brow. "You're asking a guy who grew up on the streets if he wants to pass up free money? I'm not an idiot, sign me up."
"Great. I'll speak with Calisto and let you know what comes of it, but hopefully it won't be too much trouble." Koda sat up again. Haruko's shadows curled around his shoulders. "Any further questions before I leave?"
Something finally occurred to Ryoichi. "You said half-oni traits develop later, but you still look human."
"...Ah, right." Koda pressed his thumb to his chin. Reality seemed to ripple for a moment like a rock tossed into a canal. He pulled a featureless silver mask away from his face, and his entire body had changed. He now bore orange skin, three orange eyes, a shock of blond hair, and antler-like horns. His shoulders seemed broader and his arms more muscular, but he still bore Reckoner tattoos. The coloration was different between them now, but they still looked strangely similar despite that. "Thousand Faces Mask. It's a whole other story. But I prefer to look like my mother when traveling. A lot less stares that way."
Ryoichi shrugged. "Fair enough. Pretty cool thing though, can't say I've heard of a mask like that."
"That's because I had to invent it." Koda pressed it against his face again. Once more, reality rippled for a moment, and he appeared as a dark-haired dark-eyed human once more. He stood up, and Haruko's shadows settled down as she vanished. "Let me know if anything else starts happening with what you can do, and I'll see if I can find anything on the Kamigawa side that might help."
"Thanks, man." This had gone...strangely well, but also rather insane. Ryoichi just waved as Koda passed Shimatsu and Clayton. Shimatsu nodded to his son, who nodded back, and Clayton looked a few seconds away from trying to get a new identity.
The door opened and then closed, and that left the three of them.
"No joke." Ryoichi got up and stretched. "Alright, I'm gonna go have a crisis about my father being a kami while I take a shower, I'll be back out in about half an hour."
