As Corvos head hit the pillow and closes his eyes to sleep, he is instantly forced awake, jumping at the world violently shaking.
"W-what!?" He shouts out loud in surprise, as well as in annoyance at having his sleep be distrusted.
'Oh yeah…. How could i forget.'
Corvos annoyance is swiftly replaced by expectation, and quickly gets out of bed to walk to the door of the room.
Reaching for the handle, he hears indescribable sounds coming from outside, bringing a chill down his spine and urging a from his instincts to stay away. Not to go forward and meet who he was supposed to meet.
Corvo pushes away these thoughts and fears to the back of his mind, carrying on with the task he has to complete, even if his heart is pulsating to the point of pain.
With a breathless step, corvo pushes the door open and is greeted by an eldritch looking view, so beautiful almost to the point of being unspeakable, if anyone could even comprehend it.
Outside, the houndpitts building seems to break away into a blueish dark void filled with random building, upward flowing waterfalls, patches of water carrying sea dingys as well as floating boats. There were Stairs on the other side of the wall Also, leading to a passage onto a clearing that doesn't exist in the real word. As if a chimera of multiple incompatible building are hazardously conjoined together.
Corvo continues up the stairs and into the clearing, where he's given a compulsion to wait there, to not continue further.
Before all of the sudden and without a sound, a seemingly ordinary man appears in front of corvo but Corvo can tell he is anything but, floating a few feet of the ground as if to show he superiority to mortal beings.
Arms crossed like a parent showing disappointment in their child, and dressed in a black leather jacket that seems worn down by time.
His eyes blacker than the void of space, like his pupils expanded his entire eyeball piercingly stare at corvo, seemingly looking into his very soul.
"Hello, Corvo."
The mysterious man's voice too is completely ordinary. Though it carry's a ethereal tinge as if his voice is powered by the winds making up this realm.
"Your life has taken quite the turn, has it not."
The man if you could call him that, states both to corvo and to the world itself as if to a hidden audience that only he could see, as a black aura billows around himself like lingering smoke.
"The Empress is dead, her precious daughter Emily is lost somewhere in the city, and you will play a pivotal role in the days to come."
A Mocking tone touches his lips, as if showing disdain, that would be if this being in front of corvo could truely feel emotion.
"For this reason, I have chosen you and drawn you into the void."
His voice becomes softer, less mechanical as he places one arm behind his back.
"I am the ôǔťșíðêř, and this is my mark."
With the wave of the outsiders hand, a searing pain burrows into corvos hand, as a cloud of an yellowish orange smoke etches a glowing rune onto the back of his hand.
Clenching his fist in its burning pain, Corvo steadys his breathing to ignore it and continue listening to the being in front.
"There are forces in the world and beyond the world, great forces that men call magic, and now these forces will serve your will."
As he talks the glowing of the mark starts dying down, revealing a pitch black tattoo, the same colour of the outsiders eyes.
"Use this newfound power, my gift to You."
"Now come find me."
The outsiders voice becomes even more ethereal as his body disintegrates and disappears into nothingness.
*sighhh*
Seeing the outsider leave, Corvo releases a breath he had been holding since the his appearance.
'Finally after 6 long months, ive got the mark.'
Corvo thinks to himself, observing the runic tattoo that was in graves on his hand. Trailing a finger over it, its texture indistinguishable from the rest of his hand.
Though in the process of looking it over, a stream of knowledge started appearing in his mind.
The first ability of his mark.
'Blink'
After a moment of standing there, eyes closed, accepting the information, Corvo walks to the edge with no direct Path leading forward.
Despite this at the edge he extends his marked hand forward and grasps the air, his mark glows the same colour as its engraving and power quickly fills his hand.
His hands starts shaking as he holds the ability and focus's on the next building ahead, of a familiar concrete gazebo.
He releases the power and in less than a blink of an eye, his body is transported to the very spot he was focusing on.
'Woah… that was a rush.'
Power: Blink-
a traversal based ability that allows the user to warp through the gaps in the void to archive rapid forward movement for short distance's.
'So essentially it is both a teleportation power, as well as a dashing power. Kind hard to quantify but basically a spatial ability in essence.'
Corvo shrugs at his attempt to comprehend something he's so new to and hardly understands, so he continues on the path the outsider, made?
Looking to the side, Corvo finds a chest and of course opens it, finding a blue potion bottle in a sleeker glass than sokolavs, and picks it up.
"Piero's spiritual remedy, pretty sure it's made of whale oil so it probably can't be good for you."
He says trying to escape the situation, but can no longer ignore the elephant in the room.
Looking down he finds a freshly dead Jasmine, the empress, at his feet with a piece of paper stuck to the blood beside her head.
Bending down to his knees, feeling the still warm blood on his skin, Corvo looks over 'his' dead lover, negative emotions of guilt not entirely his own yet continuing to plague his thoughts.
Then looking over an empty piece of paper mad ravings start an assault on his mind and clouds his vision in front of him.
'YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAVE HER YOU CANNOT SAV-.'
"AHHHHHHH!!! SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!!"
Corvo shuts his eyes and grasps his now shorter hair pulling it with a force that causes pain, a mad rage almost consuming him that instantly breaks him out of the illusion.
*gasp* *gasp*
He's left panting on the ground, blood pouring out of his nose and a stream of red liquid trickling down from hid eyes.
Deciding to continue on the route of ignoring his problems to they consume him corvo intends to carry on. Though going to take one final look at the empress before getting out of there, he noticed that all the blood as well as the corpse disappears, like all of it was a bad dream.
"Ha ha ha, yes, how hilarious my suffering must be."
Wiping away the blood on his face untill the only thing left is a much colder frown plastered on, a simmering heat behind his eyes.
So he keeps on moving.
He blinks across the floating fragmented building, going past the frozen image of the empress' daughter, Emily, being dragged by two men with similar looks to lord Pendleton.
Though learning from his mistake, Corvo only gives a brief glance before moving on.
Going past the lord regent in a broken war room with a massive table before him, as if planning something, as well as smashing things in anger.
Then past men wearing building height mechanical stilts and carrying bows armed with incendiary bolts, wearing armour.
Then blinking up to climb a cliff, walking down some floating set of steps, past some more broken building and to another clearing when the outsider disused to appear once more.
"In the days that follow, your trials will be great, Corvo. Seek the ancient runes bearing my mark in the lonely places of your world and at the shrines raised in my name."
He pauses to make sure Corvo was listening before continuing on.
"These runes will grant you power beyond those of other men. To help you find theses runes I give you this…"
The outsider uncrosses his arms, bringing his hand out as the black energy swirling around his body starts to condense in his palm
"The heart of the living thing. Molded by my own two hands."
And then a heart with a window to the inside of it showing a mechanical frame work of a machine stuffed in the the organ.
With other pieces of metal all over, as well as wire tying the Aorta as if to stop blood if it has any left, from leaking out of it.
"With this Heart, you will hear many secrets, and it will guide you toward my runes, no matter how they may be hidden. Listen to the the heart now, and find another rune."
Finishing his speech the outsider promptly disappears again, leaving corvo to his thoughts.
Looking down at his left hand, corvo suddenly found himself in possession of the Beatless dead heart.
But when faced in a certain direction, he feels the heart beating Madly, it's sounds silent to everyone but himself, pounding in his ears.
He quickly opens the chest next to him, finishing out another blue potion before following the direction the hearts tells him to go.
Corvo heads in the direction of the rune, free running over obstacles on his path and blinking over to those out of his reach.
But as he makes it over the large building and onto the last stretch towards the rune, the heart starts speaking to him, in an echoey ghostly voice that he found grossly familiar.
"This place is the end of all things. And the beginning."
Ignoring the eldrich truths the heart spouts about the void, the voice itself causes corvo to freeze on the spot and nearly send himself of into the depths.
If not for the timely blink to safety he would very well be as good as dead.
*gasp*
Laying on his back down on a floating platform, Corvo takes a minute just to catch his breath, to calm his emotions.
'I knew this, knew it would be her voice. But I didn't plan for the effect it could have on me…. This is becoming a problem.'
He thinks to himself knowing that if he freezes up like this when out in the field, he would die. So corvo decides to bite the bullet.
Squeezing the heart, Corvo coaxes the whispering truths out of the heart that houses his deceased lovers soul.
And she speaks on command.
"All of time is meaningless here. Neither seconds nor centuries."
"Someday, this place will devour all the lights in the sky."
"The one who walks here is all things. Cradle songs of comfort and bones gnawed by teeth."
"This is the place From which those who dabble in the black arts draw their power.
And this place is their doom."
"The face of the void was forc—."
Corvos head rings at both the emotion thee voice calls out in him, as well as the meaning the truths lead to.
But the voice abruptly stops midway through her sentence, perhaps runnings out of things to say about the place, or she was silenced.
*sighh*
Deciding he has had enogh and wants to finally be allowed the consuming embrace of sleep, Corvo carries on, forgetting all else.
Blinking across the final platforms, he finally makes it to this rune.
The hearts window glowing with and beating madly thorough his grip.
Letting go of the heart, it dissolves into an orange, yellow smoke causing corvo to panick for a moment. But he can feel it's presence, her presence in the back of his mind, ready to answer his call again.
Now ready, he takes a step forward and grabs the rune, taking it into his hands.
With it in his grip corvo starts to feel a vibration inside the piece of bone. Something calling out to him, like a song his soul understands but his ears do not.
He dives deeper into the silent meleody released by the rune, and as he does so, unknowingly begins to create a further connection and closer attunement to the void, allowing for the absorbsion of the power inside the rune.
Inside his own mark, corvo starts feeling the presence of two abilities that can be unlocked by the power of the rune.
'I don't plan on confronting anyone in direct contact unless necessary, nor getting injured, so vitality isn't a must for no, I'll pick dark vision then.'
Power: Dark vision-
Activate to see in the darkness and to reveal living beings through solid walls. You can also see their fields of view, as well as granting a visual representation of the sounds you make.
The knowledge quickly starts trickling into Corvos mind as he stands there, a process he will become intimate with sooner than later.
Finishing with the rune he stands there, waiting.
The outsider doesn't make him wait long though and appears again to spout his wisdom at Corvo.
"How you use what I have given you falls upon yourself, as it has done to those before you. And now I return you to your world, but know that I will be watching with great interest."
The outsider leans closer to corvo while speaking the last words with a near smirk.
And with a wave of his hands, Corvos vision shakes and the world goes dark.
—-
{9 hours later}
Corvos eyes slowly open as he wakes up, bringing his hand up to his eyes to rub away the sleep.
"yawwwwwn"
A big yawn escapes his lips as he waits for his mind to fully wake up.
Sitting up on his bed, he checks his hand just to confirm and is met with the runic tatto, his gift from the outsider.
"Good, it wasn't a dream." Corvo voices his thoughts out loud with smile, a deep and rough tone of voice escaping his mouth from not drinking water for so long.
Now finally awake he starts to seek the piercing noise that plagues his ears.
Looking around the room, small bone fragments made out of the same material as the runes are scattered about all around.
On the table next to him, on the storage containers across the room, on chairs. Everywhere basically, totalling a whopping 12, along with two mysterious artifacts.
One in the shape of a fish next to his head, and another a whale.
'Must be from the outsider, probably just messing with me but I won't refuse at this point.'
Corvo touches the fish artifact next to him with his marked hand, and when the two comes in contact the fish figure rapidly disinterested and merges with Corvos body, giving him a chilling sensation.
'Wooaahhoho… that was weird! I'm pretty sure their purpose is to increase the bone charms you can have equipped and then be active.'
Yes bonecharms. Weird little artifacts made in similar ways to runes used to enhance the abilities of those marked by the outsider.
There effects are often random and incredibly varied, but there effects are often positive, with them being passive they cost nothing to keep on your person and collect.
Other than the noise which can attract void sensitive beings when you equip too many at once with a low limit.
Luckily the noise gets cancelled out by tbe users own passive aura release so they don't go insane by the constant song the bone charms give off.
Corvo quickly collects all the bone charms in the room and absorbs the other figure, then chucks them onto the bed for the minute.
'Ive got nothing to attach em' to just yet. But piero did mention something about bringing clothes with the upgraded equipment. They should be outside my door right?'
And so he quickly checks, going outside the front entrance to his room, and quickly spots them.
Neatly folded military clothes with accompanying boots, a crossbow, a pistol as well as the skull mask which the smaller lens changed from just one to two exchanging lens overnight.
'Well.. let's get suited up them shall we.'
Corvo thinks, bringing all this equipment back into his room and taking off the nightware clothing the maid gave him while he was in the bath.
'Though I appreciate it, That was a bit inappropriate. Didn't exactly hide her gave either did she. I'll take it on the chin though and see if as a compliment.'
Placing the four bottles of mana potion that seemed to travel back with him? On the bed with the bone charms, Corvo swiftly gets suited up in his gear, bar the mask.
All kitted out, corvo starts moving about to check the ability of the equipment out and see if it could be used properly in stealth and combat.
'Mm, not bad. Pretty stylish too.'
The boots are as good as his bare feet when it comes to noise reduction, Perhaps even better. The coat jacket is flexible but keeps him warm, it's fabric also breathable to resist any harsh weather conditions. Also providing a slight armour effect, it won't stop bullets or a sword, but it will resist there effects to get in the way of damage.
A hood is also attached to the collor that can be hid away inside and pulled out to aid in hiding his identity, along with the mask.
'Now for the bone charms.'
Being twelve in total, Corvo knows he can't equip all of them. Also with how most of them not being entirely usefull or just discusting when sensing their effects, he decides to just equip the few that's effects will aid him.
What he picked were:
River affinity- increases swim speed slightly.
Void Chanel- Increases power duration by 20% and increases the range of Blink and Windblast
Good lungs- slightly increases your lung capacity.
'Yeah when I find some on missions, I can instantly equip one I find usefull on the move instead of wasting time.'
The rest of the bone charms corvo bags up and throws in a container at the corner of the conjoining room.
Now, with his outfit on, bone charms equiped, Corvo attaches his weapons and ammo pouches to the custom belts fitted to his clothes, he uses the heart to lead him to the rune at the end of the courtyard, blinking to reach the gap, then returning to the entrance of the houndpitts pub ready to meet the admiral once again.
—-
Word count: 3,165 😈😈😈