Chapter 30: The Depths of Man Slumber in Cities.


    Dolore was a city burdened and its burden was people.


    Nero had grown up in cities and yet he’d never encountered one as overpopulated as this one. It wasn’t that the population here was that much larger than it was back on earth, Stradale had maybe six hundred people tops, and Dolore would have been perhaps fifty times more populated at most,, it was just the lack of infrastructure and space on display. He supposed those were just perks of modernity he’d taken for granted.


    Well, at least our right of travel gained us entry.


    Nero was worried that the rebellion might make it invalid, and while it technically did, that didn’t matter when the people looking at it couldn’t read and judged its authenticity purely based on the banner


    He and Selvas were lucky in that they had fresteeds to make the travel easier for them, as people parted ways at the sight of several thousand pounds of muscle and sinew heading their way.


    It still didn’t give them much room to manoeuvre, and it didn’t save them from the deafening ocean of sounds that were the chattering, bartering and haggling of Dolore’s people.


    It didn’t save him from the smell either, god the smell. It was an assortment of scents, all pungent and revolting. He’d gotten used to the smell of Stradale, so much so that he barely even noticed it now, so the fact that Dolore had this effect on him was a testament in of itself.


    He almost thought that the Demon who ran this place ensured poor sanitation as a law in order to spite him. It was more likely due to negligence and apathy for the people who lived in the place, but Nero liked to imagine it was about him. It was less depressing that way and he was narcissistic like that.


    Selvas didn’t seem to be faring any better, nose wrinkled and face tight. It appeared that she as well was not used to the atmosphere of cities. “To think my Father was summoned here.”


    She’d explained during the journey that Hell Gates were used not just for inhabitants of the Inferno to travel between circles, but to bring forth the Damned, it was with thralls that they strengthened their work force and made quite a good amount of crystals by selling them off to the surrounding towns.


    It made Nero sick to imagine it, waking up scared and confused as he did, but instead of the friendly faces and hopeful eyes he saw, they were instead met with shackles and a life of cruel servitude.


    Around him he saw a pair of shackle-bound thralls, searched for the Demon under their control but found none, instead what he saw was a fat man in bright furs.


    Nero’s gut stirred with revulsion at the sight, he hadn’t even thought that other humans would enslave their kind as well.


    Why? It’s not like it didn’t happen back on earth.


    In fact, slavery was still a thing in the modern period, moreso than any other. People just looked the other way because it wasn’t happening right in front of them. He’d worked hard to keep them looking the other way in fact.


    He focused his eyes elsewhere in the crowd and saw something curious, an individual dressed in robes sat upon a fresteed. By his shoulder was a tiny green light that Nero thought might be an imp.


    So those were other soul forged.


    Cain had told him Imps were weak demonic creatures, often living in the woods and out of sight of humans. He’d asked if there had been any Imp that exhibited the traits that Ember did, the most pressing one being apparent memory loss and she’d told him that it was a side effect of the slumber, something that happened to a lot of Imps when their human suddenly died.


    They woke up with a foggy mind and fleeting thoughts.


    That explained a lot, and made him feel that much worse for Ember.


    He’d also asked about the Inquisition and she’d told him they were insane zealots and declined to speak further on the issue.


    “Hey why do some Magic users have Imps and others don’t?” He asked, remembering the Lightning Caster he fought.


    Ember turned to look at him. “Magic and Might are something most users are born with, soul forged are not, they make a soul pact with an Imp, and that allows them to use magic.”


    “Oh, why don’t more people do it then?” Nero asked.


    “Well, because we aren’t fucking mental.” Selvas snorted. “To soul forge means to tie your soul to a Demon, even if it’s an Imp, it’s still a Demon, the Imp has to see something in you that they deeply resonate with or they’ll eviscerate your soul rather than bond it.”


    Well, fuck, thanks for not destroying my soul, Ember.


    Still, that meant she saw something within him that made her choose him to forge. Nero put that thought aside. It was too big by far for now.


    “Hey, this way.” Selvas called him out of his mind as she made a turn.


    Nero followed and they found themselves in front of what looked like an inn. He’d stayed in a few during his hunting travels with Selvas and had come to recognise them now.


    “Good place to ask around for news on the Death Rattle.” Selvas said as she slid down from her mount and rolled her neck.


    Nero got down as well. “Good a start as any.” He agreed.


    They entered to find a bar buzzing with life. Every table was filled with men and women engrossed in conversation while serving girls and boys filled their table with mugs of ale and bread.


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    The pair split up and Nero moved to ease himself into conversation soon enough. Back on earth he was a smooth talker, in fact he was so good at it that his source of income was directly proportional to the people he’d talked into fucking themselves over.


    Here, though, any conversation he tried to ease himself into had him met with odd glances and skeptical looks.


    It wasn’t that he was bad at conversing, no. In fact people were often open to him when things started out, but the moment he’d begun to steer the conversation into anything in which its legality was in question, Nero suddenly got hit with a dead end.


    At the end of the day, he met back up with Selvas in the hopes that perhaps she might have had better luck getting anything out of anyone. Much to his chagrin, she hadn’t.


    “They can probably tell I’m not from around here.” She sighed.


    Accents.


    Yes, that had to be why. Even here it seemed city-folk weren’t so fond of people from towns.


    “I mean, there has to be someone who’s willing to talk to people from Stradale.” Nero sighed and Selvas snickered, looking amused at something Nero had missed.


    “What?” He asked.


    “Nothing, it’s just… You say that like you think you sound like a Stradalian.” She noted.


    Ah. “Wait, then who do I sound like?”


    “Oh, like the Demons.”


    “Wait, what?” He blinked and that seemed to amuse Selvas further.


    “I assumed you grew up as one of their scribes or a particularly favoured servant boy.” She replied. “Most people probably did as well, it’s likely why the Chieftain and his guards took such a liking to you.”


    “A liking?” Nero frowned. “I certainly didn’t feel liked.” He countered.


    Selvas rolled her eyes as if he were being incredibly stupid. “The Chieftain addressed you personally and called you into his home.” She pointed out. “I’ve known him since I was a child and even I was rarely given that privilege.”


    “Oh.” It seemed that was one more similarity this place had with reality. This is reality. He reminded himself, his reality at least. He was stuck here till the day he died and if he didn’t act soon, that day would approach much sooner than later.


    Selvas sniffed, clearly still amused at the realization still on his face. “We should go get somewhere to sleep.” She offered.


    “We should.” Nero agreed, and they did.


    It was a small, dingy and stuffy place that seemed perhaps worse than even the cheapest of rooms in Stradale. And it cost more too.


    The joy of cities.


    It was not that they couldn’t afford a better room, it was just that Selvas refused to spend more money than they needed to. There was a version of Nero who would have complained, but he’d died somewhere between the Dark Forest and Stradale.


    It was early morning when Nero left the room, Selvas had long since given up any hope of finding aid amongst the city folk and was working on other ideas, but Nero was nothing if not impossibly stubborn.


    So he was out and about once more, this time alone in the streets of Dolore, save from the Imp hiding in his clothes. He felt more exposed than he’d thought he would without Selvas and it occurred to him that since they’d met he’d rarely gone anywhere without her, and where he had he’d always had Ember there to speak with.


    Both were out of reach now, Selvas in their room and Ember in his right pocket.


    A lot was changing for him in Hell and he didn’t know how it’d all end up. That was the most terrifying part, he was coming to think. Back on earth, there was a certain stability to his life, whether or not he had a good year or a bad year he was still going to keep his car, his house, his money and more.


    Now, everything was in a state of flux.


    Just like they were for the people I trampled upon.


    “You spineless cretin!” A woman called out and Nero whipped his head around to fall upon a sight that made his gut twist.


    A man in plate armor the colour of blood loomed over a beaten old woman. She was perhaps the age of Cain but lacking even a sliver of the Might that kept the other woman so active. A gash leaked blood from her forehead, a bruise told where she’d been hit across the face.


    Still, heaving and wincing, she glared up defiantly at the man and spat on his sabaton.


    Crimson Knights, that was what Selvas had called them. The elite human forces of the Demons. This one wasn’t wearing a helmet, so Nero could see the fury in his eyes as he raised his foot and brought it down on the aged woman’s knee with a sickening crunch, squelch and a throat-scarring scream from his victim.


    Nero turned away from the sight and walked in the other direction as fast as he could, eager to escape the cries of agony. They only seemed to grow louder however, a sign of the escalating torture that monster continued to inflict.


    He looked around to an unphased crowd. No… not unphased, avoidant. They reflexively kept their eyes away from the scene, shrunk their stature to seem smaller and gave both the hunter and its prey a wide berth.


    He sighed, made his way from the scene and only when he couldn’t hear it anymore did he try to focus on what he came here to do.


    Conversation about the Death Rattle Crew was still hard to lure out of people’s mouths. Adults had no business speaking to outsiders, kids and teenagers, however, were his second bet and they were more willing to speak.


    As far as he could tell, the crew had an altercation with some Knights which had led to them being rather cagey about their whereabouts lately. It was incredibly unfortunate that this was happening now, when Nero specifically needed them, but one did not become a gang of outlaws without drawing some attention.


    He tried to get more concrete information than that, but anything else seemed to be well beyond what a teenager was allowed to know and an outsider told.


    Come on, why can’t this be easy?


    He was getting frustrated now, every second he spent searching and not finding was putting Stradale at further risk. Stradale was ten days away on foot and they’d already spent one of those days just looking for the damn crew, and would need to leave soon if they wanted to beat the approaching army to the town.


    He kept on asking, talking, speaking to anyone who would listen and latching onto any hint of information.


    Night had begun to fall again and Nero finally decided to call it quits.


    Alone in the darkening streets of Dolore, disappointed and defeated, Nero found himself wandering back to his room.


    “Oi, I hear you’re looking for the Death Rattle!” A man called and Nero turned to see him. He was blonde, green eyed and wore a scraggly beard that made him look half man and half wolf. There was a skittishness to him that instantly made Nero suspicious. But he was desperate and tired, so Nero nodded.


    “It seems you hear correct things.” He replied.


    “Good, come with me then.” He said and without another word, turned and walked away. He sounded like a local, that was a good sign at least.


    Nero followed but found himself struggling in doing so. Even in the evening, the streets were still crowded, less so, but enough to make walking a hassle.


    The man seemed to wade through the crowd like water, and if Nero didn’t know any better he would have thought they were parting specifically to let him through.


    Nero, on the other hand, was bumping hard into shoulders and doing his best not to trip and fall. It was not a graceful display, but he managed to keep himself close enough to the stranger, that he could hear him when he spoke.


    “If you’re looking to hire the Rattle, then you’ve got to be ready to pay up, they don’t just hire anyone.” The man yelled at Nero, eyes ahead, not even bothering to look back.


    “Yes, I have that covered!” He replied.


    The man either said nothing back or whatever he did was drowned out by the crowd.


    They emerged into an alleyway lacking in people, but compensating for that in suffocating walls that pressed at Nero from both sides.


    The man kept on walking, then stopped once Nero was half way in.


    He turned, and those green eyes dropped on Nero like anchor from a ship. In his hand was a runed shortsword and he gripped it with intent.


    Nero turned for the exit and saw another man approaching, this one bigger, and with a runed axe instead of a sword.


    His eyes fell back on the blonde and the man’s face widened into a grin. “Why don’t you give us them crystals, and we’ll help you deliver it to the Rattle Crew.”