Are you all brain-dead? Why is everyone so obsessed with eating crap?
Rhod genuinely couldn't understand it. He'd already thrown three Thunder-stones—why wouldn't she believe him?Is a sudden prodigy that hard to accept?Why not take the deal—let me walk, I report you, then we go our separate ways and see who survives?Why won't you listen?
He wanted to keep talking, but she was closing too fast. He had no choice. He hurled the fourth stone.
"What—you—"
The Black Priest was so shocked she didn't even try to dodge. The stone exploded right in her face.It was a two-thirds charge. Blue lightning ripped outward, punching through her fog-ward and blasting a twenty-meter circle.
She went flying and hit the ground hard.
This time Rhod was better prepared; he had already hopped back. A stray fork of lightning clipped him, numbing his limbs, but Spirit's Recovery kept working—the emptiness of his soul cooled and refilled like a body lowered into a cold spring.
Opportunity!
He plunged his hand into the gray pouch—then his heart sank.
He was out.The Watcher had only given him ten stones. He'd thrown six earlier, four just now. None left.
He looked up. The Priest wasn't dead. Her fog had thinned, but it was still there.Beneath it—just like the soul-orb vision and that soul-arts instructor—she wore nothing. White skin; the butterfly mark on her chest, exact to the last curl.
Rhod felt nothing but disgust. A death under a peony held no romance for him—better to live in a cesspit than die to this snake.
He thought of the soul-rifle, then dismissed it.He'd tried that already. Even a clean hit wouldn't punch through the fog.This wasn't some middling foe.
A single option flashed through his mind—a bluff.
Act like he still had stones. Look like he had the kill-shot in hand. Scare her—then bolt into a side drain.
He shoved his hand back into the pouch and wreathed his arm in energy.She'd never once opened soul-sight; likely a "stone-wood core" who relied on brute strength. Even so, the performance had to be convincing.
The Priest pushed herself upright. This time, fear bled openly into her eyes."Who… what are you? That depth of power—the Watcher himself didn't have it. You can't be a new recruit."
Rhod snorted. "You don't need my name. If you don't want mutual ruin, let me walk. We don't cross paths again."
"No. Impossible!"Her face twisted beneath the fog."At least tell me who you are and what you want!"
Rhod refused to waste breath. Every second handed the initiative back to her."Hmph." He let iron edge his voice. "Then die. Let's see how many more stones you can eat."
He tensed as if to draw his hand out. Misty light climbed to his shoulder, power thrumming.
Her pupils shrank. "Wait! Don't—wait! We can talk!"
Rhod layered on more glow, telegraphing bottomless reserves.
She bit down hard, color draining then flooding back.
At last she sagged and rasped, "Fine. I accept. Go."
Rhod kept the posture, turned, and strode away—quick but steady. Not a hint of panic.Once he broke her line of sight, he'd duck the first side tunnel. There were dozens. She'd never find him.
Two steps.
"Little worm," she snarled, voice gone feral, "you dare trick me!"
She lunged.
"What are you doing? I'm throwing!" Rhod shouted.
She said nothing.
Cold spiked through him. He ran.
Wounded or not, she was a match for the Watcher—far beyond a novice like Rhod.She skimmed forward on her toes, covering meters at a stride. Slowed and stiff, yes—but still faster than him.
Within seconds she had him.
"You're finished."Her beautiful face was a mask of hate and ruin.
"Karamon, bring the black blade. The rite begins."
She seized Rhod by the throat and hoisted him up.His kicks and punches vanished into her fog, but not the hatred burning through it.
"I, Balistan Sermi, Fourth Black Priest of the Profaners, will split you open, cut out your heart, strip your bones, and offer your brain, your eyes, your windpipe, your bladder to the Book of Destined Death—so that, in the seam between the spirit realm and the waking world, a shard of God may show its trace. Light will wither. The world belongs to dar—"
Schlk.
A black knife burst from her chest, dripping red.
Her face froze.
She turned, unbelieving.Karamon stood behind her, the Profaners' ritual blade buried to the hilt.
The black in his eyes still churned—but confusion swam there too. He murmured, "You're not a good person. Rhod is a friend. You're not a good person. Rhod is a friend."
"You—you broke the Profaning?"Horror widened the Priest's eyes."No. Impossible. Your soul-sight is only nine. You can't pierce the Mist Crystal's veil. Why? Why?"
Then, in the next beat, Karamon's voice dulled again:"As you command, my Lady. You are my all. You own my soul, rule my flesh. Your word is everything."
He slid the knife free, flipped it, and held it out.
Pfftt—She vomited a gout of blood and understood."Half broken…? No wonder you keep disobeying. How—?"
She reached to take the blade, to order healing—
Karamon snapped his hand back."No! You're not a good person. Rhod is a friend."
Schlk.
The black knife drove into her chest again.
Rage and pain crashed over her, wiping thought clean. She slammed a palm into Karamon and shattered half his body.Her own wounds tore wider. Blood gushed. The fog around her blew away.
Two grievous strikes in a row—her energy unraveled. The ritual blade's corrosive toxin had already chewed into her soul.
She knew: if she didn't return to the Blackwater Pool now, her spirit would scatter. True death.
She spared nothing for anything else. Her body burst into dense mist; she snatched up the giant heart and shot through a grate in the ceiling, fleeing the sewer.
Silence fell—only the drip of water in the tunnels.
Rhod stood there, dazed, as if the escape were a dream he might wake from.Not the time to marvel.
He came back to himself and looked down. Karamon lay with half his body missing.
Rhod sighed softly."Karamon… you did good. Rest now."
He set a hand over the young man's eyes—but after a few tries, they wouldn't close.
"Can't even die with your eyes shut, huh? Don't worry. I'll avenge you. That woman never loved you—she used you, nothing more—"
"Uh… Rhod."The black light had guttered from Karamon's eyes. He scraped together the faintest voice."I think… I can still be saved…"