Chapter 58: Five Days, Nine Deaths
Eleanor woke early, like really early as she moved through the hall. She carried a specific pace that felt like staying here longer was going to cause her to lose her mind.
She kept walking and found Ryker waiting near the hall’s entrance when she reached there...
"I thought I might accompany you as far as the gate at least," he said, falling into step beside her with the same easy, unbothered charm he’d carried since they’d arrived. "The least I can do for guests."
"Not necessary," Eleanor said, though he didn’t seem like he cared...
Iris and Bertram fell into step behind them, both visibly relieved at the idea of finally leaving, and the small group made their way through the quiet, still waking Faction Zone toward the main gate.
Ryker’s guards pulled the heavy doors open at his signal ad morning light spilled through the widening gap...
When the gate was finally open, Eleanor stopped at the sight of what she saw...
Perched in the trees just beyond the wall, three enormous shapes hunched among the upper branches. Their wings folded against bodies that shone a dull, metallic grey as they possession armored bodies rather than flesh and joints she remembered facing until now...
Their eyes also glowed a faint demonic yellow, way different from the black eyes she had grown so used to seeing.
"Golems," she breathed, the spark of her skill faintly flickering to life.
"Avallion Golems," Ryker said, and Eleanor noticed something...
He was too calm for the sight in front of them. If she was imagining right, any other Leader would be yelling out orders right about now...
"New variant." He said, "still can’t get used to seeing these things."
"You knew about this, didn’t you?" Eleanor’s eyes narrowed, suspicion sharpening fast. "You knew, and you let us walk toward the gate anyway."
"I suggested you stay," Ryker raised an eyebrow before replying, unbothered by the accusation. "Repeatedly, if I recall. You were the one determined to leave."
Something about his calm sat wrong. It was too smooth, too convenient, and Eleanor felt the first feeling of suspicion that whatever was happening here, Ryker had known considerably more about it than he’d let on.
"Can’t your men clear them?" she asked.
"Unfortunately, no." Ryker shrugged. "They only just returned from an expedition yesterday. They wreyexhausted, all of them. I won’t send tired men against something that size."
"I may be a Tyrant but I’m not heartless enough to watch my people walk towards their deaths."
He paused, watching her carefully. "You could push through yourselves, of course. Three of you against three of those. I wouldn’t recommend it, but the choice is yours."
Eleanor studied the golems a moment longer and she weighed between facing familiar enemies that were somehow unfamiliar against the alternative of staying inside walls she already lost every form of trust in.
"Fine," she said finally, jaw tight. "We stay until they’re gone."
Something flickered in Ryker’s expression— a brief, satisfied, smile that was gone before she noticed....
***
The five days that followed unfolded with a strangeness that Eleanor recognized, piece by piece but she was too late to fully guard herself against it...
Ryker gave her one of the best rooms in the fortress. He seated her beside him at every meal, engaged her in long conversations about leadership, survival, about the particular loneliness of holding power that nobody else quite understood.
Amidst all these, she noticed something...
Every conversation circled back eventually to him saying things like she was remarkable or that few people carried themselves the way she did or that he found himself drawn to her in ways he hadn’t expected.
Iris and Bertram watched the whole thing unfold with anxious expressions, though neither of them found an opening to voice it directly.
And as you might have guessed, Ryker made sure of that.
He was especially keen on keeping Eleanor close at every gathering, every meal and every quiet moment that they feared something might actually be blooming between them....
"Ruling requires a certain distance from everyone beneath you. It’s isolating I tell you, in ways people don’t understand until they’ve lived it."
"I can imagine," Eleanor said softly. A part of her couldn’t help but understand what he said.
Ruling meant living as the image people saw of you. Especially if much is expected from you.
Ruling didn’t leave room for mistakes. And it damn well didn’t leave room for weakness either...
"You’d understand it better than most, I think. Being that you’re a faction leader as I am" He studied her for a moment then spoke again.
"It’s rare, finding someone who might actually understand the weight of it. Ruling, I mean."
She didn’t respond to that directly. Instead, she turned the conversation toward the state of his Faction.
The thin, hollow-eyed survivors and the fear that seemed to hang over every interaction like a knife was floating directly above their heads that would impale them if they gave too much emotion.
"You’re running this wrong," she said finally. She had remembered that on the day before, a woman flinched at Ryker’s approach across the courtyard. "Your people are terrified of you. That’s not leadership. That’s just and you are exploiting it because you all know out there isn’t safe.."
Something sharp flickered in his eyes, replaced by that same easy, practiced charm. "Perhaps you could show me how it’s done properly, then."
"That’s not what I meant."
"Isn’t it? You clearly have opinions on the subject. Strong ones too." He tilted his head, studying her as his interest had multipled ten times over.
"I’d genuinely like to hear them."
She hesitated then she remembered a few more things that had happened here that made her chest ache: A boy near the well who flinched at raised voices that weren’t even directed at him and guard who apologized three times before answering a simple question.
It piled d up, day after day into something she couldn’t quite justify ignoring.
"Fine," she said finally, reluctant. "I’ll help. I’ll only give you advice. Don’t expect a full input.."
Ryker couldn’t help but let his smile show. A wide victorious smile stretched across his face. "Fine by me. Butt bear in mind, I am still The Tyrant. I won’t go along with anything that’ll tarnish my image."
***
In a forest still recovering from a fight that had left the ground scorched and destroyed, Lucas wiped blood from his knuckles as the latest Bora finally stopped twitching in the dirt.
"That’s another beast," Mark said, breathless. "This place isn’t running low on things trying to kill us anytime soon, huh. Fucking hell."
"Doesn’t seem like it," Lucas admitted, sinking down into the floor, exhaustion pulling ing at every part of his body.
Five days. Nine deaths....
At a point, he had stopped trying to take note of the toll it took on him.
Because at this point, only the tally sat in his memory anyway. The records of how many times he’d drawn his last breath and how.
From the Bora that had pierced him through the side to the desert sinkhole that had buried him alive.
From a Makara that had drowned him in a river he hadn’t known was that deep to three separate deaths to Avallion Golems that was caused by his glitched system.
Two more from a cliff that resulted from him trying to drive a Bora away from Pyra and once from this beast they had just killed.
Truth be told, each failure, each death— as it always did,bought knowledge. Every regression handed him back a little more understanding of whatever new horror this Edgewalk had thrown at them.
However, it didn’t make any of it easier. It didn’t erase the certainty and fear of dying and it sure as hell didn’t erase pain of it either. And somewhere along the line, a small exhausted part of him had started expecting to die before the fight even started.
And every single time, he’d had to explain over and over another impossible piece of knowledge to two people who were clearly losing patience with his excuses.
"You did that thing again," Pyra said, settling nearby and studying him with the same searching look she’d worn more and more often lately. "Called out where the beat was before it even showed itself."
[Player is not allowed to reveal Regression ability. Violation means death.]
Lucas glanced at th warning before turning back to her...
"Lucky guess," Lucas said and he flinched at how easily the answer came, worn thin from overuse...
"You’ve had a lot of ’lucky guesses’ this week." Mark said, his face carrying a certain suspicion he didn’t try to hide.
"Very unlikely at this point," he added. He said this because every time Lucas had done something that would otherwise have been impossible and gave the excuse of it being a "lucky guess", he and Pyra would exchanging glances every time it happened as growing suspicion they both harboured became harder to ignore.
However before Lucas could answer, his system bloomed into view. The same taunting crimson interface appeared as words glitched into existence.
[Ding!]
[You have been marked by the Grim Reaper.]
[Prepare to be hunted.]
He stared at it, old dread flooding back in immediately, the memory of that void and the last chase creeping into his mind. He hadn’t felt the Sovereign’s presence since the last mark, and he knew that whatever that entity was, giving up was probably not in it’s vocabulary.
"Lucas?" Mark’s voice came soft and careful as he caught the shift in his expression. "You good man?"
"I’m good," Lucas managed, as he exhaled "I’m fine..."
A second chime sounded a moment later, and this time they all could see it’s contents.
[Ding!]
[The Goddess has marked a Faction Zone. Advance towards it.]
Lucas stared at the words, something setteled in his chest akin to relief.
"She’s alive," he said,. "She’s out there, and she found something."
"Of course she’s alive" Mark said as something close to a laugh escaped him.
He might not have shown it but he was genuinely worried about her. "Elle. You’ve done it again. I finna give you a hug when we meet." He said to no one in particular before adding.
"Alright. Let’s get moving.... Let’s go find our Goddess."
Pyra glanced between the two of them before standing up and falling into step beside them.
"We’re going into new territory." Lucas said. "Stay sharp."
’But first...’ Lucas glanced at his own system window, the crimson interface sitting there smug and absolute.
He gritted his teeth... ’I’ve got something to take care of...’