Slumrat Rising

Chapter 123: Thick Skin

“Out of the chair?”

“That was Etenesh. I’m starting to think she has some kind of mothering, nurturing thing going.” Truth had managed to gingerly walk into Merkovah’s office/cell without crutches, but it was slow going.

“You think? You think? May the Lord Almighty preserve that poor girl. She’s going to be ice-skating uphill with this one.” Merkovah dramatically looked heavenward.

“Siphios is right on the Equator. What do you know about ice skating?”

“Enough to know it’s a madman’s hobby. Ah, poor Etenesh. How she can look so happy, I don’t know.”

“She is teaching me how to give her massages.”

“I bet she wants to massage you right back.”

“I’m not ready for that.”

“So she gets to be lavished with your attention. Dim room, scented candles, you warm the oil between your strong hands before pressing them to the lovely curves of her back. How am I doing so far?”

Truth clapped his hands once, loudly. “So. We debrief the mission now?” He asked in a bright voice.

Merkovah nodded. “We debrief the mission now. Good news- It was a resounding success for Siphios. Bad news, it was a so-so success for my personal goals. However, knowing you as I do…” Merkovah handed over an envelope and a box. “The rest of your fee and the elixir.”

The tension visibly drained out of Truth. “Ah. Thank you.” He immediately counted the money, ensuring It was all there. He examined the elixir too. He couldn’t judge by sight and smell alone, but the pill was faintly haloed with golden light and had a faint smell of cedar.

“You know, some people would consider that rude.”

“Oh.” Having satisfied himself that the payment was complete and correct, Truth carefully put the money and elixir away. “Alright, so let's debrief. If you don’t mind, could we start with why I got so messed up there and why I am still recovering?”

“We will get to that, but the order is important. From the top. You blended in with the street scene well. Infiltrated the shop. Brained the shopkeeper, then drugged him. Good job there, by the way. Completely clean from the street- our observers had no idea it had happened until you sent the signal.”

“Thank you, Teacher.”

“Though was it really necessary to use a model of Nag Hamadi to do it? I’ve been getting looks.”

“He wanted nine Birr for it. It’s not even a good sculpture.”

“WHAT! Nine Birr for that crap? Nag Hamadi is one of the oldest, finest temples in the world! There are far, far better souvenir models available for a better price.”

“I, too, was moved by outrage.”

“He wouldn’t lower the price?”

“He would not.”

“Haaah. OK. From that point, you searched the back room. Did you find anything?”

“Nope, just the passage down.”

“Which you found by punching through the wall rather than locating the trigger to open the door.”

“Yes, it’s a common practice for breaching a building. The doors will often be trapped or armored, so where possible, go through the wall next to the door.”

Merkovah considered that point, then nodded. “Rings a bell. Alright, you went through and down. Then what?”

Truth described his brief exploration of the sub-basement, then walked through the fight. Merkovah nodded steadily, occasionally asking questions. He seemed particularly concerned by the descriptions of the anti-magic explosions that radiated from the anti-theists.

“About that, what should we call them?”

“The name of their organization?”

“That too, but… they definitionally aren’t cultists and anti-theists is just an annoying thing to say. Cabal? Coven?”

Merkovah shrugged. “Cabal sounds good. The names change, details change, and the heresy remains the same. So they could launch this… explosion without any tools, sigils, or the like?”

“Not that I could see. Was there anything on their bodies?”

“An enormous number of tattoos and scarification. We are examining them now. Some even lived long enough to get treated.” Merkovah grinned nastily. Truth didn’t care to imagine the present condition of the Cabal members.

“Let's get to why you feel so wretched and how we can turn a negative into a positive. You feel like crap because they hit you with a double whammy. The basement was covered in one of their special wards that excludes cosmic rays. Any spells cast in there would fizzle out, and anyone not equipped to deal with the environment would quickly empty out their reserves of cosmic energy. Combined with that… explosion thing… which depleted even more of your cosmic energy, and you were hollowed out.”

Merkovah sat back in his chair, steepling his fingers. “The pain in your chest that you reported was your apertures starting to collapse. No need to fret. You weren’t down there long enough for there to be any permanent damage, but that’s what was happening. A lightning-quick acceleration of the natural outcome of not cultivating steadily.”

“But the rest of my body, my muscles…”

“Are seething with cosmic energy. That’s what body cultivation is- making you more real. Closer to God. And crammed full of cosmic energy to power it all. I must say, they are an ingenious bunch. We used to clear them out by sending body cultivators into their nests. Looks like they worked out a counter.”

Truth frowned at that. He had felt that the mission prep had been sub-standard, even by his jaded standards. Had they really been relying on his body cultivation to carry the day?

“One did call me a Templar.”

“Hah! That takes me back. Not in four hundred years, more’s the pity. The Poor Brothers of the Temple of St. Ghertsip, also known as the “Templars.” A militant fellowship, though they did raise a great deal of money for charities. The Temple used them as… well, as a private military company, to use a term you would be familiar with. Eventually, their duties were folded into the Office of Temple Security, and finally, the order disbanded. Sad, but such is life.”

“Sword-wielding body cultivators?”

“Body cultivators, yes, but they preferred heavy armor, heavy shields, and heavy maces.”

“Nasty.”

“They really were.” Merkovah smiled with fond nostalgia, then shook it off.

“Obviously, a ward like that has enormous military applications. More pertinently, it could utterly screw Starbrite. It will take a little extra doing on my part, but I think I can still ensure the technology falls into my hands.”

“Yes, Teacher.”

“Likewise, a big weapon they can use against us. It would just shred summons and spiritual beings.”

Truth nodded. Not his department, really, but that all sounded plausible.

“Alright, there will be a lot more to pick through in the coming weeks, but none of that is your job. Let’s discuss your pain and how to turn it into gain.”

“I’m slowly, passively, recovering from cosmic energy depletion.”

“A remarkable bit of healing. Good job.” Truth declined to mention that his body was doing it without his control. Seemed… unnecessary to draw attention to. “I notice that you are a truly diligent cultivator. Your progress through Level Three has been quite quick.”

“Ah, it’s my nightly habit. I had hoped to do it outside, but it didn’t seem like there was a good place to cultivate.”

“Oh, have Nag Hamadi show you where the roof garden is. It’s not very popular, but a couple of people do cultivate up there.”

Truth nodded. He would do that. He liked cultivating under the stars. Just felt better, somehow.

“But it does lead us to my point about how to turn this into a good thing. How has your progress on Incisive been?”

“Haven’t succeeded in creating the scales yet, Teacher.”

“Let's drill on that for a while. I’m upping your tutorial time to two hours a day. I am also arranging for you to have a special cleansing. This will help gently rebuild your internal systems- muscle, flesh, tendons, tissues. It will also be an opportunity for you to practice the scales. It’s a good idea to look at actual snakes for inspiration, but do remember to be flexible in your thinking. Botis is a viper, yes, but also a highly intelligent being that considered Incisive for uncountable eons. There will be layers of subtleties to it.”

Truth nodded. It made sense.

“Truth… hah. Still feels odd calling you that. Truth, I will be as candid with you as I can. Things are spinning out of control faster than even I anticipated.” Truth sat up straighter at that.

“One of the oddities of becoming so old- we are quite used to things suddenly spinning out of our control, have many more tools available for managing things that spin out of our control… and we hate it far, far more than we did when we were younger. It almost feels like a personal insult.”

Truth nodded slowly. He could believe that.

“So. Things are spinning out of control, spinning badly out of control. The Shattervoid, the weakening of the planet as a whole, spreading civil unrest, crop failures, increased military activity by several nations, and the increasingly vicious desperation of the plutocrats. It all adds up to a grand collapse. It may well turn into an extinction-level event. Certainly for the more spiritual species, but quite possibly for us too.”

“I assume there is something you want to do about it.”

“Collapse is inevitable. How we collapse is not. My determination to kill Starbrite, the C-Suite, and the System Astrologica is unchanged. Our timeline has changed. I will need you combat deployable in three months or less. And frankly, I am almost certain it will be less. I am cashing in old favors at an alarming rate, but your body and soul will be thoroughly improved in the next few weeks. You will be considerably harder to scry even if you don’t advance with Incisive, but the benefits will be incalculably better if you do. Learning the Sword of Moshe… well, I will teach you, but I’m afraid you will have to self-study a lot of it. You will, however, be level four. Insanely fast. You have been level three for what? A year?”

Truth just shrugged. Merkovah shook his head.

“Yes, I don’t really know what else I was expecting.” He paused. “I know you strenuously avoid discussing your past, but I can tell I overlap with someone in your memories, someone you distrust and despise. If I may ask, what is it that makes us so similar to you? I have a hard time imagining there were people like me in the place you are clearly from.”

“He made his victims feel special. Showed them, carefully and deliberately, how special he found them. He genuinely considered himself the “good one.” And I don’t think any of his victims lived more than two years after coming into his care.” Truth smiled. “Etenesh said I understand the world as violence- either the act or preparing for the act. I think it might be more accurate to say… I am used to being both predator and prey.”

He stood from the table. “Same time for the tutorial?”

“Same time. What’s your plan for the day?”

“Stretching, light exercise, meditation. Then I’m being handed over to Jember before he sends me to Etenesh.”

“Oh? Say more.”

“I am to be dressed, and styled. Jember is up on the latest fashions and has a keen eye for what works. Once I am prettied up, Etenesh and Jember are hauling me out to a club. Etenesh says she has been very patient and giving, which is true, and, quote: “It is past time I put certain moo-ing missys’ in their place.” She also said, and again, I’m quoting here, “I got a pretty, pretty man, and I’m going to show him off.”

“Nice. Very nice! Good for you, Truth.”

“Thank you. It… still feels unreal, somehow. Like I want to believe it, and maybe I can half believe it, but it doesn’t quite reach all the way in, you know?”

“That you are neither predator nor prey but a desired partner for a dance between equals?”

“Yes.”

Merkovah smiled a bit. “Have fun with that feeling. There is nothing quite like it. Ah, but allow me to help young love on a bit.”

He ignored Truth sputtering his denials and fished a small box out of the bottom drawer of his desk.

“Repeat after me- “Back sheaths are dumb.”

“Back sheaths are dumb.”

“That’s not how swords work or arms.”

“That’s not how swords work or arms.”

“You would leave yourself wide open to draw that way.”

“You would leave yourself wide open to draw that way.”

“I am not dumb.”

Truth looked Merkovah dead in the eye and said, “I am not dumb.”

“Damn right, you’re not. Here. From one predator to another.” Merkovah passed over the box. “Play with it some. And enjoy!”