Chapter 9:The Winter Monstrosity
"Mephis!"
Her voice echoed as she pushed open the frail wooden door, sagging from years of neglect. The room inside was no better. A small rat hole marred the wall, cracks spread across it like veins, covered in green mold. A single bed stood out, oddly nice amid the ruin. The window sagged with broken glass patched by tape. The stone floor stayed clean, and the room felt arranged, but the roof leaked where sunlight filtered through.
This place looked worse than dilapidated, even for the slums. Living conditions there were usually better. She wondered how Mephis had stayed here alone. How did he survive the cold through that broken window or the rain from the leaking roof? He must have gotten sick often, always refusing to leave with them. She had supported him, but now she regretted it, seeing the trash he called a comfortable home.
What really goes on in his head? she muttered.
She searched the empty room again. Her mind drinking in sadly the conclusion..her worst fear hit her—he wasn't here. She collapsed onto the bed, the golden vals in her pouch clinking.
Had the inquisitors taken him? Her fingers pressed against her face, eyes widening as tears threatened.
Earlier, as promised, she had waited at the broken wall. And waited.
That bastard, ranting about escaping in a blip, only to end up...
Her throat tightened, eyes watering, body trembling.
Capture by the inquisitors meant one of two things for slum dwellers: imprisonment a decade,for that dummy or slave trade.
Guilt churned in her chest, her heart burning. She had sold him out.
What had she been thinking? She bit her lip until blood drew. Tears slid down her cheeks, clear and colorless, tracing a damp path over her twisted lips, leaving a final drop on her jaw before falling silently onto the white mattress. The wet spot grew.
Just like her guilt.
"Mephis... what a nice name for a slum dweller." The words cut into her thoughts. Her head snapped up, body shrinking back.
Her eyes widened on a man—broad-shouldered, blonde hair slicked back with a few strands hanging over his forehead. He wore a fitted waistcoat over a white shirt with sleeves rolled to the elbows, and dark trousers. A pocket watch dangled from his hand on a chain, attached to a crucifix engraved on the back with an inverted form ending in a divided sun enclosing a decagonal star.
A small bird perched on his other hand. His sapphire blue eyes focused on it with detached intensity.
She swallowed hard. His fine clothes and healthy skin marked him from the noble realm.
What was he doing in the slums? These rich sly vermin...
Her eyes fixed on the crucifix and the split sun with the decagonal star.
She recognized it as the sigil of The Church of Hallowed Beginnings. But she had never seen him before, only the dark-haired priest who approved her Ascension rite request, and his choir.
She was sure no one else was there.
Who was this person? Without thinking, she reached for the bread knife in her pouch, breath held.
Folks from the noble realm..never means well except for a few..
"It rolls off the tongue, a name like nobles, borne by a commoner. Quite strange, if you ask me," the blonde man muttered, releasing the bird. It fluttered out the window with a chirp. "And you seem to know him. An acquaintance, I guess." Noon light cast a glow on his blonde hair. He exhaled, and the pocket watch ticked in the room, an eerie beat.
It matched her pounding heart.
"Forgive me... uhm, what was your name? Au..." He paused, as if recalling. "Auriel, that's it, isn't it? Anyway, Auriel, pardon my intrusion,I am William Frankenstein." His blue eyes glowed with the sigil of an inverted cross and a serrated iris, a terrifying blue, glancing sideways.
Her hand shook on the knife, nearly dropping it.
"But most folks call me.. Steins."
---
The West Arctic, Atticus Province.
The swirling vortex faded, darkness vanishing with its stars and lights. It left a dark silhouette of a man, clad in shadow, his face hidden by a horned helm twisted like a vortex. His figure stood out against the raging winds and snowstorm that covered the snowy peaks. No life existed here except distant dots of Everfrost trees, their barks lined with sharp, poisonous icicles, visible from his high vantage point.
His gazed wandered to the huge cave, darkness filling its depths. It loomed colossal, as if carved by a Arbitrary Titan into the mountain. The entrance rimmed with frost, rhythmic gusts of cold wind blew out.
His figure seemed tiny before the gigantic entrance.
How diminutive...
A swirling vortex rose from the ground below, woven with stars like a dream. It was Vortagem. His eyes shifted to her through the helm. Instead of the familiar crow, she mirrored him—obsidian dark flowing hair, eyes black as night, skin pale enough to contrast the cave's darkness yet match the snow's white, all in a feminine form.
Why had Vortagem...his helm tilted sideways
"If you wish me to change my form..O lord,I, without hesitation,shall.."Vortagem said with a slight bow. "I merely assume this to ease my burden on your shoulders, Lord."
"I see." His hand moved to pet her obsidian hair, smooth like the crow Vortagem's feathers. "I care not for that, Vortagem. I granted you free will, didn't I?" He pulled his hand from her shoulders. Her head rose slowly, eyes down in reverence, avoiding his gaze. "After all, whatever form you take would still be, in my eyes, perfection."
His eyes moved from Vortagem to the dark cave, where the next pawn waited. Not the checkmate, but the perfect path to it.
"Worry not, Lord. It probably sensed our presence." As if to prove her words, a great rumble shook the mountain. Another followed.
The ground trembled under their feet, cracks splitting the ice like spiderwebs. Loose snow shifted, then roared into motion. An avalanche thundered down the slopes, boulders of ice and rock tumbling in a white wave. The air filled with the deep groan of shifting earth, snow hissing as it slid faster, building into a deafening roar that drowned the wind.
Vortagem swirled into darkness, wrapping around him like a cloak. She pulled him away from the crumbling ledge, shadows twisting to carry them through the chaos. They reappeared at a distance, among the Everfrost trees. The trees' shadows stretched long, like fingers reaching toward them in the dim light.
A low rumble echoed across the ice terrain, rattling the trees. Branches shook, icicles cracking and falling with sharp pings. Then silence fell, heavy and absolute.
The avalanche's force triggered a violent snowstorm. Winds howled louder, whipping snow into a blinding wall that uprooted weaker trees, their roots snapping with loud cracks. Branches flew like spears, slamming into the ground. The storm battered everything, snow stinging like needles, visibility dropping to nothing.
He stayed shielded, enclosed by Vortagem. She drew on people's dreams and wishes for protection, shaping them into a barrier. Reality bent to it—a dome of unseen force that held back the fury. Snow piled against it, winds screamed but couldn't touch them. Inside, the air stayed still, the roar muffled.
When the storm finally died, winds easing to whispers, the shield faded away, dissolving like mist. Snow settled in drifts around them, trees leaning at odd angles, some uprooted entirely.
Amidst this rose,The Architect of the Ruin
A gigantic form that drowned the light amidst the rapid winds. It towered toward the heavens like a branched, hallowed monolith, turning day to night.
It was a towering structure of bone and flesh, skin dark and pale, dripping black ichor that eroded the ground, melting snow to reveal rocky surface below. Bipedal, with jagged white bones protruding. Its chest held a white orb, suspended in desolate interior darkness, enclosed by gray rib-like talons.
Muscular arms extended to its knees, ending in dark claws the size of a man's arm. Its face looked triangular, with rigid bones on each jaw and harrowing teeth, between two blazing gray eyes. Behind the two-horned head spun two dark halos, connected by spikes. Its back crowned with thorns, a rigid bony tail protruded like a flexible spine, ending in a tapered blade.
A mere minion compared to the Star Weeper.
How pathetic.
His hands tore into the space before him, drawing out Death, the Unholy Sword. The moment the world felt its presence, time itself stopped first. Then everything withered—trees crumbling to dust, snowflakes hanging frozen in the air, the ground cracking and eroding beneath. He held it back with his will, a quiet effort, or it would have consumed more.
But amid the death of all things and the stillness of time...
The creation still moved. Its gray eyes traced his silhouette, its presence ignoring the end around it, even the death of time.
He smiled, hidden behind his dark helm of fate.
As expected from his Pawn of Chaos...
The winter monstrosity,as deemed by the sentient omniversal recorder..
A corrupted with the Rank of Harbinger..