Chapter 10: Province 927
The auroras of Province 713 faded behind Bullet as he staggered out of the ice cave, leaving the frozen tundra and the Ice Hound's corpse behind.
His bare feet touched down on something completely different...obsidian. Black glass, smooth and warm, so different from the ice, it was like stepping into another world entirely.
Province 927 spread before him.
A city of black glass towers rose toward a sky choked with smoke and ash. The towers gleamed despite the haze, their surfaces polished by wind and time and hands long forgotten. Everything here was sharp angles and twisted spires, beautiful in a dangerous way.
The pull surged in his chest instantly, that familiar burning force which never let him rest. It pointed him forward, deeper into the city, toward some horizon he couldn't see.
But his body was screaming.
His shoulder dripped blood from the gash the Ice Hound had torn open with its teeth. The wound was deep, still seeping despite the cold that should have helped it clot.
His arm hung fractured at his side, the bone grinding with every movement. He couldn't lift it properly anymore. The pain was constant, sharp when he tried to move it, dull and throbbing when he held still.
His thigh wept from a deep tear, one of the Ice Hound's claws had caught him there, ripping through muscle. Blood ran down his leg in steady rivulets.
His ribs had been broken, multiple fractures from the beast having raked its claws across his side. Every breath was agony, a sharp stabbing pain that made him want to stop breathing altogether.
His leg bore the black marks of frostbite from the cave...skin that had turned dark, dead tissue that would likely never recover. Every step sent waves of pain through the damaged flesh.
The serrated pipe shook in his good hand, its metal surface scarred and dented from Province 391's mirror fights and Province 713's brutal battle. Blood flaked from its edge, some his, some the Ice Hound's strange blue-black blood.
The shard, with its etching, pressed against his thigh through his pocket. That circle bisected by a jagged line. Still a mystery. Still pulsing faintly with warmth.
The unetched shard sat beside it, its glow a reminder of debts he'd never repay, of a young woman who'd trusted him, and whom he'd left behind.
No name beyond what strangers had given him. No past he could remember. There was only the pull, the scar over his heart, and the world that seemed designed to break him piece by piece.
---
The tundra of Province 713 soon faded into memory, while the obsidian labyrinth of Province 927 loomed ahead, its menace a new test. The pull urged him onward despite what his body signaled to him.
Stop. Rest. You're dying.
But the pull didn't care if he was dying. It only cared about forward.
The city was a maze of black glass.
Towers twisted at impossible angles, their surfaces reflecting the smoky sky in distorted patterns. Arches spanned between buildings, sharp and precarious. Spires pierced the smog overhead like accusing fingers.
Everything was smooth, worn by wind and time until the obsidian gleamed like dark mirrors, each surface a blade waiting to cut unwary feet.
Bullet's bleeding feet left streaks of crimson across the black glass as he walked. His leg wound burned with every step, the pain from the Ice Hound's claw mingling with the lingering agony of frostbite. Frozen flesh met the radiating heat of the city in a maddening contrast.
Because Province 927 was hot.
Magma flowed somewhere beneath the obsidian streets. He could feel its heat radiating upwards through the glass, causing sweat to mix with the blood that coated his skin. His cloak was stuck to his shoulder gash, the fabric crusted with dried blood and sweat. The broken ribs ached worse in the heat. Every breath felt as though he was breathing fire.
The reflections in the obsidian were everywhere, unavoidable. Every polished surface showed him his own face-scarred, hollow-eyed, marked by too much violence and too little rest. The images disoriented him, made it hard to tell which way was forward, which reflections were real surfaces and which were just tricks of the light.
The air was thick with sulfur, and every breath burned his lungs. Every inhale was a rasp. His throat was raw, on fire. His fractured arm pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat, great waves of pain coursing through him.
Molten fissures crossed the streets, their edges glowing angry red. He had to leap over them carefully, the heat blistering the soles of his already damaged feet. When his blood dripped onto the hot glass near the fissures, it sizzled and steamed. The frostbite on his leg screamed in protest at the heat, black tissue cracking and weeping.
Obsidian shards would shoot out from the spires overhead from time to time, launched by some mechanism he couldn't see. They slashed through his tattered cloak, cut fresh lines across his arms, drawing more blood to add to the mess he'd become.
Some walls weren't just reflective, they were scrying surfaces, rippling with visions that tried to pull him in. He saw flashes of wars, of voids, of things that couldn't possibly be his memories but felt disturbingly familiar anyway.
The scar pulsed each time, the pulse grounding him and pulling him back to reality before the visions could trap him completely.
It hummed with a watchful pulse, as if the city knew he was walking its streets. Glass beneath his feet pulsed in response to his heartbeat. Every turn was a risk. Any alley could be a trap.
This place was alive, in its own way, as the mirrors of Province 391 had been alive. Sentient. Cruel. Designed to break minds as efficiently as it broke bodies.
Bullet staggered, his feet slipping in his own blood on the smooth glass. The pipe deflected obsidian shards that shot at him from above, but his arm trembled with the effort. His shoulder continued seeping blood, leaving a trail behind him.
The heat was oppressive, draining what little strength remained in him. The sweat poured down his face and mixed with the blood that flowed from cuts on his cheeks and forehead.
A scrying spire loomed beside him, its surface rippling with visions.
Bullet with the crown, leading armies into war. His face was cruel, confident, nothing like what he felt inside.
Bullet sitting on a throne of glass, a tyrant ruling over broken people, who cowered before him.
Take aim like a thief in the shadows, eyes cold and calculating, stealing from those who are desperate.
His scar was burning hot enough to make him gasp, the visions shattering like broken glass. The images dissolved into smoke and haze. The pull urged him forward through sharp alleys, refusing to let him stop and stare.
Another scrying wall flickered with different visions, worse ones:
Patch stood over him, accusing, as blood pooled at her feet. "You left us to die." her reflection said.
Quarry, his chest caving in, reaching towards Bullet with desperate hands. "You could have saved me."
Glow, snapping her vines one by one as she screamed. "You abandoned me to the jungle."
Thorn, in Province 713, his tears freezing on his cheeks. "You let me believe the lie."
Frosthawk, his trust fading to disappointment: "I warned you about Shade, and you didn't listen."
Guilt slammed into him like a physical blow, doubling him over despite his broken ribs. His scar flared hotter, burning away the visions, but the damage was done. The faces lingered in his mind even as they faded from the glass.
The hum of the city seemed to mock him, pulsing with satisfaction at his pain.
Then the Obsidian Shades came.
They erupted from the reflections themselves...figures made of liquid black glass, their bodies continually shifting and reforming. Where faces should have been were smooth surfaces marked by veins of glowing embers pulsing like exposed circuitry. Their limbs ended in gleaming blade-edges in the smoky light.
They were born from the molten core of the city, Bullet grasped instinctively. They fed on despair, on guilt, on the negative emotions dredged up by the scrying walls. And at this very moment, they focused wholly on him.
The first Shade surged forward like smoke given form. Its blade-limb slashed across his chest, opening a shallow cut that immediately welled with blood. The pain seared through his already broken ribs, making his breath catch.
Bullet swung his pipe, muscles burning with the effort despite his injuries. The steel struck the Shade's core, a pulsing ember visible through its liquid glass form, with a sharp crack.
Dark splinters exploded outward like shrapnel of molten fire. Some nicked his cheek, drawing fresh blood that dripped warm down his jaw. His fractured arm screamed in protest at the impact, pain shooting up to his shoulder.
But the Shade didn't die. It reformed in an instant, its liquid body coiling back together. Its blade arced toward his throat, crimson light glinting in what should have been its eyes.
Bullet ducked, his frost-bitten leg slowing the pivot. Glass shards from the Shade's reformation grazed his arm, drawing more blood. The cuts mixed with burns from the city's ambient heat in a cocktail of pain that blurred his vision.
He staggered, his feet slipping on glass slick with blood. The movement grated his ribs against one another. The hum of the city vibrated through his chest, in time with the rhythm of the scar.
Another Shade arose from a nearby reflection, coming into the world as if birthed from dark water. Its blade-limb wrapped around his leg, and where it touched, his skin began to burn.
Acid. The Shade's touch was acid, eating through the frostbitten black skin on his leg. White-hot pain tore a scream from his throat that echoed off the obsidian towers. His thigh wound wept fresh blood, running down to mix with the acid.
He stabbed the pipe into the Shade's core in desperation. The impact jarred his fractured arm so badly he almost dropped the weapon. Splinters burst outward, black shards slicing into his shoulder, making his existing gash gush more blood. His ribs creaked as he twisted to avoid a second strike from the Shade's other limb.
The Shade dissolved, liquid glass splashing across the street. Its ember veins dimmed and went dark.
But the acid persisted on Bullet's leg, resuming its burning into skin and muscle. Every step anew became a fresh struggle, frostbite and chemical burns clashing in that selfsame damaged flesh, his vision blurring from the intensity of the pain.
A third Shade morphed up from the ground itself. Before he could even react, its blade slashed across his back, a deep cut sending pain flaring down his spine.
As he turned, his leg began to drag along the ground, now barely able to support his weight.
Bullet roared...part defiance, part agony...and swung the pipe in a desperate arc. It struck the Shade's core with a wet crunch. Midnight glass splinters sprayed outward, some embedding themselves in his face, joining the collection of cuts already there.
His cloak was actually smoldering now from the heat of the city, thin trails of smoke rising off the fabric.
More Shades crowded in, their number increasing. The clicking was incessant, neither truly mechanical nor organic, but fundamentally off. Their blade-limbs flashed in the smog-filtered light as they forced him deeper into the maze of streets.
The air around him was so warm that it would warp and create mirages, making navigation even more difficult. The pulse of the city became a threat that wrapped around him, a constant heartbeat of a predator.
He stumbled down a narrow alley, his feet barely clearing the ground anymore. He was leaving a continuous smear of blood, rather than individual footprints. The pipe deflected more shards that shot from above, but each impact sent jolts of pain through his ruined arm.
The alley's surfaces pulsed with scrying walls, showing him more visions.
Bullet's character as a traitor to everyone who had ever trusted him.
Bullet as a hero, saving countless lives through sacrifice.
Bullet, something void-bound, consumed by darkness, becoming a monster.
A shadowed figure, familiar somehow, crafted shards with careful hands, pouring light into them. The vision tried to pull him in, but his scar burned hot enough to stop it.
He tore his gaze away, guilt weighing upon him like physical weight. Patch. Quarry. Glow. Thorn. Frosthawk. Twig. All the faces, all the people he'd left behind. Ghosts reflected in the glass around him.
He sagged against a spire, his chest heaving with the effort of breathing. Every one of his wounds pulsed in time with his heartbeats...a symphony of pain. The auroras managed to pierce through the smog overhead, painting everything in violet and green light. His scar pulsed beneath them, still driving him forward.
That is when the dwellers appeared.