Story:Kings of Strife/Part 15

Part Fifteen
Recreating the era of an ancient utopia; mercilessly shaping the new world.

The soldier's wide blue eyes scanned and re-read the sheet of ragged paper he held in his dirty hands. He let his grip lighten unconsciously and the paper drifted to the floor slowly upon the wind. He looked up to the sky while his hands met to shield his open mouth.

The sun was up by now, had been for a while, and the light threatened to illuminate his position. The urban passageways throughout Straits City were remarkably empty for this time of morning, but it seemed like the ever-present graffiti, vandalism, and urban shadows throughout the area took the place of actual residents. Even without people on them, the streets always felt crowded and alienating to him. Vikcent Hyusei looked blindly into the distance, his entire being consumed with concerned thought. He looked back down to the paper, his eyes open and his hands now resting in his mat of short hair. He bent down lower and looked at it with a fearful temerity.

''Devastation will hail from the stars... Civilization now facing ultimate calamity... We shall be relentless. Anxiously awaiting the time of the Next Ones, we must purge Terra of those who cling to their ways. And at the time of darkest night, We shall bring about the brightest day, Forever and Ever.'' He read the lines over and over again, barely able to understand them. He began to speak to himself without noticing. "What does this even mean...? Why did he even..."

What he was reading was a note Vik had stolen from Hasey while on the boat ride to Straits City, in one of the rare moments that the skinny boy had let his guard down. The thievery was impulsive and unlike Vik’s usual behavior, but he hadn’t really expected to see much more than a possible clue on the boy’s origins. He did not expect to see such avant-garde, almost blasphemous words.

"Does this have to do with Ouroboros? If that's true, then..." His worst fears must have been truth. At this point it was obvious to him that Hasey had betrayed him, had meant to do so right from the beginning, just as that mercenary – Silverius – had mentioned. That would explain why Hasey had conveniently disappeared when the Black Knight attacked Vik, and why Silverius’ friend attacked at first sight. Things were getting clearer, yet new questions continued to spring up. Vik tugged on his ragged tunic and vigorously ran his thumb over his eyebrow's scar. "So... all this time, he really was..."

"Dammit!"

Now he lay his head on the wall he was leaning on, his hands free to linger at his sides. Besides the fact that he stole the crystal Vik held, the contents of the note were ominous at best and eerily dangerous at worst. Just what kind of things was that kid getting himself into? Was Ouroboros really just a criminal organization, or were they a group of terrorists with scarily lofty goals? It was appalling to him, just how little the world knew about these sinister characters.

Vik's eyes wandered to the dirty note again, but this time they glanced over the bottom words. There was still a passage or two left in the paper that he hadn't read. The soldier picked up the dingy sheet and squinted at it.

''Ponder none save your assignment. The Lance will be scaling the Mirage Tower two amanights hence from this date, upon the high moon, to retrieve the Dreams - you are to retrieve the Flame and return with the Vapor. Kill all who oppose you.''

More nonsense, Vik thought as he stared at the words. They seemed to dance around the page and disappear with the light, but this was most likely an effect of how tired he was. The words "Mirage Tower" sounded interesting and ran a few bells, though. He stood up and stuffed the note into his pocket before dusting off the back of his pants.

"First, I get some rest... Second, I look into this 'Mirage Tower', and..." He didn't say what his next goal consisted of, for even in his thoughts, he couldn't bear to. He didn't want it to be true, but he knew it was the sole purpose of his travels now. It was distressing, suffocating, how the power he once held had taken over and clouded his mind and true intentions. No matter how he told himself otherwise, he knew that he was no longer looking for Hasey or for forgiveness, or at least not entirely.

He was trying to get his Crystal back.

****

The next morning did little to relinquish him clarity of mind, and even less to replenish his physical condition. He felt sore and his body cried out with every movement. Soreness was not something he experienced, usually, but at the same time he didn’t usually experience so many life-threatening battles in such a short time. Or perhaps, he reasoned, the side effects of the Crystal being gone must have a quick downtime.

Vik drew looks from the innkeeper as he left the cheap inn at the break of dawn, and it wasn’t very difficult for him to understand why. The soldier hadn't changed clothes since a few days into the ship ride to Straits, and his battle wounds reflected that. His primary attire was simply the undergarments of the Nneonian body armor, a blue tunic with khaki pants and brown boots, but his pants and shirt were torn and almost completely discolored from wear and tear. His shirt hung off his shoulders more than it clothed him. No real big deal, it'd be easier for him to move in, he reasoned. There was sadly no way for him to justify the slight smell his clothes held, though.

Now outside in the quickly crowding Straits City streets, he began to wander towards the city gates and ponder his next direction. There was no longer anything for him in this city. Without the Crystal, he had no reason to talk to his contacts and investigate it, which was his original plan for even traveling to the urban location. Once again his thoughts wandered to this Mirage Tower. With how familiar it was, the soldier was sure that he had heard it before, but he couldn’t place just where. Something told him to check his map, and so he pulled the wrinkled piece of yellowed parchment from his back pocket. All Nneonian special forces soldiers were required to carry around some form of navigation, a habit he hadn't broken since his departure.

His teal eyes scanned the paper, dancing past the Inusian Desert and returning there quickly. The Desert... There was a sketch of a tall tower in the middle of the wide desert on his map, its base surrounded by sandstorms. This was worthless and meant nothing. The map was old and it held many such exaggerations of the world’s landscapes; there were clouds on the edges of the paper, huge icicles on the snowy parts of the earth, undressed savages in unexplored islands, lava flowing from Mount Gulg...

“...Lava flowing from Mount Gulg!”

Vik looked up with intensity flaring in his eyes. Suddenly everything was clear to him and he knew what he had to do. This map may have been built on superstitions and old entertaining legends, but every legend once had an ounce of truth in it, and after seeing what he did at Mount Gulg, there was nothing he couldn’t believe in anymore. If lava could flow from the base of the world’s tallest mountain, perhaps there really could be a tower of mirages in the middle of the world’s largest desert.

Awkwardly, he remembered just how he had dealt with the eruption of Gulg. In light of all the news of families destroyed and landscapes ravaged, all he could bear to do at the time was run from the problem and focus on Hasey. That boy, whether Vik wanted to admit it or not, had helped lead him through that trying time, and it was indirectly his actions that now drove the soldier to go on yet another death-defying journey. Now, though, Vik knew he was stronger. All those people in Mountanus who had died because of Gulg erupting were casualties that lay on Vik’s heart, all dead because of his own weakness and actions, but he had to continue onwards. With the things he knew and the amazing sights he had seen, it was only Vik who could stop Ouroboros at this point. He was stronger now, and would use his strength in ways that only he could.

I can be strong again... And I can beat them. That was his plan, his new mission - no more room for moping about betrayal, or anything else. The time for weakness had passed, and the time for strength had risen up in its ashes. I'll find this new Crystal, and I won't let anyone get in my way.

...End of Part Fifteen.

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