Both Arden and the guards were red-tier. He was staring at them, but they weren’t able to see him. It was not because of any difference in skill, but rather a difference in equipment. The Headstone aspect on the Stoneflesh Shroud made it much harder to perceive any signs of life, making stealth a lot easier for Arden. That was why he was here alone, with Vera waiting somewhere else nearby.
He didn’t know how much more stealthy he was, but so long as he wasn’t caught testing the upper limits of the aspect’s effectiveness, it didn’t matter.
“I never thought I’d be trying to sneak back into the slums,” he said to himself.
He continued his observation for another few minutes when two more guards showed up. These two didn’t look half as professional as the first two, as they showed up bickering with each other. Arden couldn't tell what they were talking about, but it didn't matter. An extra two guards would make this operation a lot more difficult.
“Damn,” Arden said. “What do we do now?”
He ran through many different scenarios in his head. Fighting them was out of the question. Four on two looked bad, especially if the four that they would be fighting against were security. It was not a viable solution. Bribery was out of the question as well. The first two guards wouldn’t accept, and even if they would, Arden and Vera didn’t want to part with any of their Star Coins.
More ideas came and went, with most of them being bad, if not awful. Fortunately, a ray of light shined down on Arden, in the form of the two professional guards leaving. Arden heaved a sigh of relief. The two new guards weren’t reinforcements, but changing shifts.
“This just got a whole lot easier,” Arden smiled to himself.
He returned to where Vera was waiting for him.
“We’re in luck,” he said. “The two guards left. The two that replaced them aren’t anywhere near as professional as the first two.”
“What do you mean?”
Arden smiled and took her by the hand and led her to where he was watching them from.
“Take a look.”
Vera turned her attention to them. Two minutes later, she had seen enough.
“I can make that work,” she said. “Can you sneak past them?”
“Definitely. I wasn’t bad at stealth before, but with the Shroud I’m a lot better. What are you going to do?”
Vera smiled mischievously like she normally did while teasing him. Arden wasn’t sure if this was going to be a good plan or not, but either way, he wanted to see.
“I’m gonna be like you. Dramatic. Follow my lead. Literally.”
*****
Graf yawned, then started eating a piece of jerky. This job exhausted him, like everything. Guarding the wall was said to be the easiest job for his rank in the Association. All he had to do was keep people from going in, which was practically no one. Who would want to sneak into the slums? He practically jumped at the chance to be paid for standing around and doing practically nothing.
Now that he was actually on the job, he realized his mistake. He was bored out of his mind. All he had was a basic spear given to all guards, and all he was able to do was stand around and talk. He didn’t need his spear for that, but he liked having it with him. It made him feel powerful. And he knew he looked like a badass while carrying it, even though its intimidation factor was reduced by the piece of jerky hanging out of his mouth.
Graf’s wandering thoughts were interrupted by his partner, Sinnom, suddenly starting up a conversation.
“Hey,” Sinnom said.
“Yeah?”
“You ever wonder why we’re here?”
Graf swallowed the jerky and answered.
“It’s one of life's great mysteries, isn’t it? Why are we here? I mean, are we the product of some cosmic coincidence, or is there really a god watching everything? You know, with a plan for us and stuff. I don’t know man, but it keeps me up at night.”
Graf stifled a yawn and turned to look at Sinnom. Sinnom was looking back at him with a perplexed face.
“...What?” Sinnom said. “I meant why are we out here, guarding the wall?”
“Oh. Uh...yeah.”
“What was all that stuff about god?”
“Uh. Nothing.”
“You wanna talk about it?”
“No.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Seriously though. Why are we out here?” Sinnom continued. “As far as I can tell, it's just a wall. There’s hundreds of us guarding it already.”
“Well, someone has to protect the city.”
“No, I get that. But if there are enough Celestials to get over the wall, or they are strong enough to go through it, then why have red-tiers guarding it?”
Graf thought about it for a moment.
“You make a good point. What’s up with that anyway? If they wanted us to protect the city, why aren’t there any guards on the other side of the wall? I think it's a conspiracy.”
“You think the Association is gaming us?”
“I don’t know. It could be the Association. It could be the government. It could be something else. It doesn't make much sense.”
“You know what I think? I think we’re not meant to keep Celestials out. We’re meant to keep everyone else in.”
“But why though?”
Sinnom shrugged.
“You said it yourself. It’s one of life’s great mysteries. We don’t get paid enough to think about or risk our lives over it.”
“True that,” Graf said while offering Sinnom the bag of jerky. “Want some?”
“I’m good. I just ate.”
They stopped talking when they saw someone approaching them. It was a woman with incredible features. Bloody leather armor covered her body, but exposed her long black hair with light blue streaks running through it. She stumbled towards them like she had no more energy while dragging an old sword along the ground behind her.
“Woah,” Graf mumbled. “She’s hot.”
As Vera got closer to them, she looked between the guards and the tunnel with a vacant expression. Her eyes were red from crying so much already, but new tears started to fall again. A small sad smile creased her lips for a moment.
“I’ll be seeing you soon, Arden,” she whispered.
Sinnom squinted, seeing something linger right behind Vera. It kind of looked like a haze in the shape of a person. As soon as he saw it, it became more defined. It definitely looked like a person, but it also looked like it wasn’t there at all, like it was translucent. Like white noise had a physical form.
“Did you see that?” Sinnom asked.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“Yeah,” Graf said, putting the jerky back into his inventory. His grip tightened around the shaft of his spear, ready to use it if this person was a threat.
Vera tried to walk through the gap between the guards, but their spears crossed, stopping her from continuing.
“Please,” Vera whispered. “Please let me through.”
“I can’t do that,” Sinnom said. “Not unless you have some form of identification on you that says you have proper clearance.”
“Listen to him, pretty lady,” Graf said, backing up his partner. “It’s dangerous out there. There are a lot of Celestials beyond the wall.”
“But I don’t have any ID…Arden took care of all that stuff…”
More tears ran down her face. Graf and Sinnom glanced at each other in discomfort. They didn’t like the feeling of making a woman cry.
“I’m sorry,” Graf said. “But without any ID, we can't let you through. It's suicidal, even if you are a Starborn. Only the strong ones can leave.”
Vera grabbed one of the spears and aimed it at her neck. Tears flowed even more, and the thing behind her shimmered.
“Then kill me!” she cried.
“What?”
“I can't live without him anymore! It's been a year since his death, and I miss him more everyday. I still feel his shadow weighing down on me. It's fleeting…hollow.”
Her hand moved up to the edge of the spear. Blood trickled down her hand.
“This power, it's like a curse. It gives my emotions physical form. Now everyday, I see loss, represented by his body! But it's losing focus…I'm losing him.”
She fell to her knees sobbing. Her anguished cries rang out into the heavens. She looked up at Graf with exhausted eyes.
“I am going to die today,” she said.
“What?” Graf repeated, his voice quiet.
“I want to kill myself. But I'm also a Starborn! I might be weak, but I still am one! If I am going to die today, I'd rather die while fighting against Celestials than by killing myself! It's what my husband would have wanted…”
“Something like that happened…” Sinnom said, with tears trickling down his face as well.
Graf closed his eyes and looked away. He didn't want anyone to see his own mournful expression.
Vera looked between the two guards with remorse on their faces. She summoned two of her red-tier Star Coins, and gave one to each of the men.
“Take them.”
“How can we do something like that?” Sinnom cried. “You need them more than us!”
Vera sadly shook her head.
“I've told you already. Today is my last day to live. These would be wasted on me. I don't want to leave anything behind. Just please let me through. This is my last wish as a Starborn. Let me live my last moments as one.”
With tears running down all of their faces, the guards slowly lowered their weapons. They were openly sobbing when Vera hugged them both.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
When Vera was halfway through the tunnel, she heard one of the guards yelling for her. She turned around, expecting them to be in hot pursuit.
Graf bowed to Vera.
“I, red-tier protostar Graf, thank you for your service!”
Vera matched his bow.
“I, red-tier protostar Vera, thank you for yours.”
Graf held his head down for several minutes, until the sound of Vera's sword on the ground disappeared into the distance. He looked up, and as he expected, she was gone. He turned the way he came and began to walk back to his post.
‘That's why we're here.’
***
When they were finally clear of the wall, Arden stepped out from right behind Vera and burst out laughing. He didn't think that his armor hid his presence well enough to be passed off as an apparition, nor did he think that Vera’s acting skills were that great.
“I can't believe that actually worked,” he said.
“It wouldn't work against professionals,” Vera said with her leather armor returning to her inventory.
“It’s a good thing those guys weren’t professionals then.” Arden had a thought and laughed.
“What is it?”
“It’s gonna be a bit awkward when we come back here in a few hours.”
Vera shrugged.
“They’ll be more interested in the swarms of rescued women than the reappearance of the suicidal one. How do you feel right now, being back in the actual slums?”
Arden took a long drag of the air. The air tasted like it felt; heavy and dry. Like the rubble from crumbling buildings had suffused into the air.
“Familiar. I think we’re a few kilometers north of my old building.”
“The one that collapsed?”
“That’s the one.”
“We’ll have to loot it when we get the chance.”
Arden chuckled.
“I doubt that there is anything intact left. It was a miracle that you were able to pull me and Sya out of there.”
“Yeah, if you didn’t have your healing power, you would just be a disgusting paint job.”
“What a needlessly graphic image.”
“Is that coming from the guy who eats people?”
“I don’t eat people!”
“Right, sorry. You don’t eat people. You just devour parts of them for nutritional value. I wonder if there’s a word that describes that.”
At the end of the meeting with Chorzo, he had told them to get equipment from the armory. Arden and Vera followed his advice. Vera, sword fanatic that she was, opted to take a mass-produced sword, figuring that a sword found in a guild’s armory was better than ones she found rotting away in a mausoleum. Arden however, already possessing a weapon and armor, took stuff that would help in the mission. He pulled out one of the items from his inventory now and strapped it to his wrist.
“I thought these were only used by the Association,” Arden said, starting up the communicator.
It wasn’t the first time he’d seen one. He had seen them up close what felt like a lifetime ago, when the fridge-like man detained him in what would later become Savish’s steakhouse. According to his memories, all Association personnel were equipped with these, so Arden was surprised to see them in the armory.
“Misconception,” Vera said, leading Arden further into the slums. “All official Starborn are given these upon registration.”
“Oh right,” Arden grumbled, booting up the holo-map function. “Registration. I’m sure that will go great for us.”
“The test will be fine,” Vera reassured him.
“It’s not the test I’m worried about. It’s getting that far. You still don’t have an ID. Sya is registered as a Blight Walker. I’ll probably antagonize the child of a reputable guild. Again.”
“When you say it like that…”
The holographic map lit up above Arden’s wrist. It showed where they were, just south of the wall. Arden swiped his hand several times to find where their destination was. When he found where he was looking for, he dropped a waypoint. A moment later, a route was generated.
“Alright,” Vera said. “Put those obnoxious thoughts away, and pull out your weapon. Let's go.”
The slums were definitely different from the last time they'd been in them. Before, it was like age and indifference had been the primary cause of disrepair, with the occasional marking of a Celestial. Now, there were nothing but traces of Celestials.
There were very few buildings that remained standing thanks to the unyielding efforts of the slum’s new inhabitants. The ones that were still standing had gouges and claw marks covering them and seemed to be ready to collapse at any moment but didn't. They stood as defiant middle fingers against the hordes of Celestials hellbent on reducing everything to dust.
As they traveled through the destroyed version of Arden’s already destroyed home, Arden made sure to take note of everything that had changed since his last time here. As it turned out, not much had changed. When it came right down to it, the only difference between a small pile of rubble and a large one was how many shovels and day laborers were needed.
A few red-tier Celestials appeared as they continued through the true slums, but they were hardly worth mentioning. The two Starborn won, and the Celestials died. Vera got two star cores, while Arden fully devoured the two protostar celestial corpses.
Arden pulled up his Status as they made their way deeper into the cesspool Arden once called home. There was only one difference between the last time he saw it and now.
Name: Arden
Starborn Tier: Red
Starborn Rank: Protostar
- Progress to next rank: 2/1000
Constellation: RedShift
- Rank: Paradox
- Description: Hidden
Protostar Ability: Devour
- Description: Hidden
His Status now displayed his progress to the next rank. From devouring the bodies of the two celestials, he was able to advance without the Star Cores.
“I don't think I'll ever get tired of seeing my Status,” Arden said, dismissing it with a wave of his hand.
They continued further. Arden frowned as they got closer to their destination. He hid it at first, thinking that he was just being paranoid. But as they got closer and closer, he knew it wasn't paranoia. His souring mood was not lost on Vera.
“What's wrong?”
“I need to check something.”
Arden looked at the communicator on his wrist and reopened the map. When he saw how close they were to their destination, Arden quietly swore.
“That guy is really trying to find creative ways to screw me over.”
“What is it?” Vera asked.
“We’re pretty much here.” Arden said, walking around the dilapidated building blocking their view.
When they made it around and saw where Yaan had been hiding his victims, they both scowled. Arden was hoping that he was wrong, but the sight in front of him confirmed his fear.
“We finally made it back,” Arden said.
He hadn't noticed it on the map when they were going over the plan because he had never seen a map of the true slums before. But when he started walking through his old stomping grounds, he kept retracing his steps.
Right in front of them was what remained of a collapsed high-rise building. It used to be an apartment complex. Even when it was annexed into becoming part of the slums, it still served the same purpose.
Until it was destroyed by Arden's doppelganger.
Now, Arden’s old home had been repurposed by Yaan.