Slumrat Rising

Truth fell over. He had only stepped about a centimeter, and crossed thirty meters in the process. Straight up. Through the ceiling. Which, unfortunately, put him half a meter above the floor. Which floor, he didn’t know. The way the sealed concrete smashed his nose didn’t inspire fondness or a desire for deeper understanding.

Everything hurt. Everything. He had been getting better, but this felt like being slapped over every millimeter of his body. Eyeballs and eardrums included. Truth fought through the pain, whipping his head around, trying to understand where he was. Looked like a hallway. Door to the right.

He scrambled over on his hands and knees, leaning into the door to push it open. It looked like an office for a necessary but despised person. No windows, chair with the ragged foam leaking through the even more ragged cloth. Steel and vinyl desk that was old enough to be Truth’s grandfather. Nobody here, but there was a half drunk coffee on the desk and nothing was put away. Did they just step away for a piss? Or was the building evacuated?

No way to know. He’d just hole up here for a bit. Get himself sorted. Damn did that hurt! No wonder Merkovah said people tended to explode when they used the Earth Folding Step- that would have crushed someone without his level of body cultivation. Truth managed a tiny smile through the pain. He did it, though. He did step further than he ever had managed before. Even through a solid floor.

Deep breaths. He thought about sitting in the chair, but he didn’t trust it. Besides, Dr. Sun said his traces would be extra obvious on metal. The further he sat from the desk, the better. He checked the pockets of energy scattered through his body. No worse than before, though a few of them were starting to get squirrely. He ran his cultivation, trying to keep them in line. Keep the process going, wearing down the energy. Turning it into usable power. Dumping what his apertures couldn’t hold into his body. Reinforcing that body cultivation.

He checked out his blessings. They hadn’t vanished, but he got the sense that until all the energy rushing around him was sorted out, they were going to be non-functional. Which wasn’t ideal. He had gotten very comfortable walking invisibly through the world. The one-two combo of Incisive and the Blessing of the Silent Forest, backed up by the Blessing of the Brass Sea, had been lethally effective. He’d figure it out. He’d been sneaky before his trip to Siphios, he could be sneaky again.

The office was dull on dull. Beige walls, no books, gray steel filing cabinets marked by years and nothing else. Not even a picture on the desk. Awful. Were they torturing this poor bastard, trying to make them quit? The only thing that could really put an edge on the institutional misery would be-

Truth’s eyes tracked up the wall. There was a recording talisman with a fisheye lens keeping an unblinking eye on the office.

“Oh cock.”

Truth hit the hallway, this time checking the corners. More recording talismans. He had stopped noticing them ages ago. They were sure noticing him now. Truth kept up a silent litany of profanity as he hustled as quickly as he could manage down the hallway. At the very least, he wanted to find a sign telling him where the Hell he was. Room numbers- 2-1003, 2-1005, 2-1007. Second floor then. But where? What was he near? What hospital was he in?

Oncology to the left, blood lab to the right. Allergy clinic to the right. Elevators to the left. Stairs… where were the stairs? You never, ever, take the elevator if you can avoid it. Not when you are expecting to get jumped. He kept moving, quick as he could. Hobbling for safety. He didn’t want to use Earth Folding Step again. He had a feeling it would be needed soon, and it took a lot out of him.

Stairs. Sign next to them “It’s good for your heart and good for your gut- take the stairs!” He once had the privilege of standing in an elevator in a hospital, keeping the door open so the elevator stayed on the floor. When his client had completed their very private consultation with a very exclusive doctor, they didn’t have to endure the indignity of waiting or crowding in with the poors. He didn’t even get a nod of acknowledgement for his two hours of tedium. He did, however, collect the mission reward, and shortly thereafter, a nice little elixir.

It really hadn’t been all bad, being Starbrite’s dog. He had a comfy crate, and the finest kibble slave labor could produce.

They would be looking for him to go down. Down meant the street, and the street meant out. He went up. Fingers crossed no one was watching the security feeds. Very secret things going on right now. Very important people who would not appreciate being recorded.

He sighed as he dragged himself up the stairs. He couldn’t bring himself to believe his own comforting lies. Tragic. The landing for the third floor had another recording talisman with a fisheye lens in place. Just no place for dreams in this brutal world.

Up he went. He wasn’t quite sure where he was headed. The roof, maybe? But Jeon hospitals could be tens of stories tall. The stairwell didn’t let him see up. So he didn’t know how far he would have to climb. Seemed like a losing proposition, especially if someone was sitting in security, guiding the search teams.

Seventh floor. He didn’t bother reading the sign explaining what was here. He just pushed on the ram bar… and nothing happened. He pushed again. Locked. Truth swore. He could cut it open, might even be able to smash through the wood, but that damn talisman was watching. He didn’t want to reveal any of his cards before he had to.

He dithered a moment, then decisively went up the stairs. When he was out of sight of the talisman, he pulled a knife from his ring. Not balanced for throwing, really, but it would do. He crept back down the stairs and flung the knife at the talisman, shattering it. Once it was out of commission, he picked up the knife from the ground (it had hit kind of sideways, the point never remotely close to the target,) and headed back up the stairs. As soon as he could just about see the talisman, he repeated the trick. Then on to the next floor. Same again. Dropped back one floor and carefully shimmed the lock. Once he heard that click, he was through the door.

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There. Even if they were watching the stairwell feed, they couldn’t be sure which of the floors he went into. Until he showed up on one of the hallway feeds. So the best thing to do was…

“Absurd. Simply absurd.” The words sounded like they were spoken in his ear, but with an echo and timber to them. He had a feeling everyone in the hospital just heard that. There was a thrumm of magic he could feel through his skin, vibrating his eyelashes, making his teeth chatter. A wash of green light came through the walls and floors. He didn’t know what it did. He really didn’t want to find out either.

“What is the meaning of this, Frobisher!” A voice boomed. This one did come through the floors.

“You refuse the toast, only to drink a forfeit. The customary courtesies weren’t for my benefit, Elgin. They were for yours. You wish to dispense with them? Very well. Lets.”

“Do you think you can do as you please? This is Harban! Behave as a guest, or be treated like a bandit.”

“I serve the King of the World. I am a diadem in his crown. I am Frobisher, The Starbright Knight. And I am on errantry. I go where I am needed, and do what I must. And you, Whoreson, stand in my way.”

“I always knew you were cracked. Starbrite’s addled your brains. Well, I know a cure for mad beasts.” Truth could feel waves of energy building and crashing. There was a sizzle, like something being etched into stone. He really, really didn’t want to find out what.

There was an unearthly chuckle. Indulgent, patronizing. “A boy playing at Lordship, so proud of his petty power. Let me give you a gift. A final thanks to Jeon for all its years of service. Let me show you what true power looks like.”

Nope. Nope, nope, nope. I’m one hundred percent out of here.

There was a chime, a vibration, a sense of the world shifting subtly. A chant, seemingly random notes falling between impossible highs and abyssal depths. All combining perfectly into a song of praise. A choir of angels. Not just one, a whole damn choir.

“Oh Elgin. Is this really the best you can do?”

Truth hobbled down the hall. Cunning plans be damned, he wanted to find an exterior window right this goddamn second. Any hunter-killers still in the building-

There was a sudden silence, and a white light nearly blinded him. He could hear a sudden rush of city noise, and some unnamable smell. Like lightning and burning stones and what the desert sounds like in midafternoon.

Any hunter-killers in the building had best know their place. The big dogs ate first. Even if dinner was still on the run.

“Now then, watch what happens when I change it up a little. Clench your teeth, little lord. This might just hurt.”

Oh I remember that tone. Dad usually didn’t get that kind of cute, but he sure put it on at least a couple of times. What a shame I was born with only two legs.

There was another pillar of light, this time tinged with gold and the texture of a wedding ring you could never afford to buy.

“Weak. Simply weak. Try this!” Elgin bellowed.

A jet of fire smashed out. Truth had seen a phoenix the first time he saw the other side of the sky. The flames washing through the remnants of the hospital had some thin shadow of that extraordinary being’s might. He sincerely hoped the hospital had been evacuated. He could stand the heat, more or less. No bets on anyone else.

And now everything was on fire. The recording talismans must be broken, right? That’s a silver lining.

He staggered over to a window, and just had the presence of mind to drop to his belly before looking out it. He would be obvious, silhouetted by the fire. Can’t have that. This was a stealthy exfiltration. Wasn’t Dr. Sun in the basement? Hope that undying bastard can make it out okay.

There was a rich chuckle. “Oh I remember this. Vermillion Bird Thousand Feathers. A combination of three whole spells! A legacy Royal combination technique. I am moved, truly. It was originally intended for concubines, wasn’t it? A small trick to keep their king amused when he tired of their somewhat willing flesh.”

Truth could hear Frobisher’s voice as clearly now as he could before the start of the fight. The thrums, thuds and shrieks of a dying hospital were more muffled. Lost under the white noise of the fire.

“Let me show you the might of a true Imperial Combination!”

The moon fell down. Truth kept enough awareness to know the moon didn’t actually fall, but the rest of him, every sense in his body, every spiritual speck that could interpret the weavings of magic around him, all said the moon was falling. He could smell it, feel the pressure on his body shifting as gravity itself seemed to move and pull him in different directions.

There was another angelic cry, multilayered, rejecting. He lost track of things for a moment.

When Truth recovered his senses, he was buried under a pile of rubble. He tried to shift it. Didn’t move. He hurriedly checked the packets of explosive energy inside of him, and was alarmed to see they were already running wild. It would be a job getting them back into line, not to mention healing the new damage. He swore, but since he was stuck here, he might as well get to healing. Could he use Earth Folding Step through all this?

It… required movement. Even if it was tiny, you had to take a step. Well. That was a problem. One that would have to wait.

“And that’s that. Was Elgin the last royal descendant? Never mind, I don’t really care. Release the animals. Retrieve the Secondary Anomaly, or find its traces.” Frobisher’s voice remained crystal clear. It seems like Earth Folding Step couldn’t wait.

There was a furious murmur below him. Truth tilted his head to one side and, by means of intense use of peripheral vision, glanced down through a hole in the rubble. Which is how he came to give side-eye to a furious angel.

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