The smog hit him like a wall.
It was thick and yellowish, reeking of exhaust and rotting refuse. Rian coughed, covering his mouth with his sleeve, but it did no good—the stench seeped into everything: lungs, clothes, and skin. In the slums, the residents carried it in their blood.
The street was narrow and cobbled, slick from the night's rain mixed with oil and sewage overflowing from the gutters. On either side stood rows of leaning, three-story tenements with cracked walls. Graffiti covered the lower levels—gang signs, insults, and warnings.
The noise was deafening: vendors shouting their prices, dogs barking, and the rumble of wooden carts pulled by emaciated horses. Somewhere in the distance came the sound of an explosion—perhaps a firecracker, perhaps a bomb.
Rian kept to the left sidewalk, hands buried in his coat pockets. He passed food stalls offering rotten fruit, fly-blown cuts of meat, and baked cakes of questionable origin. His stomach tightened, but he didn't have a single cent.
"Hey! You!"
He turned to see an old woman behind a stall waving a freckled hand. She wore a filthy apron and a toothless smile.
"Cakes? Three for two coppers."
"I haven't got the money, gran," he replied.
"Then bugger off."
Rian let out a short, dry laugh and kept walking.
After twenty paces, he passed a group of young men leaning against a wall. They wore red armbands—the Red Knives, one of the local gangs. One of them, a gaunt youth with a twisted face, spat on the cobbles right in front of Rian.
"Lucky bastard," he muttered, eyeing him. "They didn't catch you yesterday."
Rian stopped and glanced at the boy. "What?"
"The Zealots. The Executioners," the boy said. "Word is they made quite a stir in your quarter. Supposedly looking for some mage."
"I'm not interested," Rian said.
"Just telling you what I heard," the boy shrugged. "Word is someone tore the air apart with magic and slaughtered half a squad. The Zealots won't forget that."
A cold shiver ran down the base of Rian's neck. Yesterday. Yes, yesterday there had been a fight. He didn't remember exactly how it ended, only that he'd had to tear the Rift open wider than usual. And that it hurt—it hurt like hell.
"I'm telling you this because someone was here today," the boy continued. "A tall man in a black coat. Asking about you."
Rian's jaw tightened. "Who?"
"Don't know. Didn't introduce himself," the boy said. "But he didn't look like a Zealot. No insignia. He had plenty of money, though. Left a message."
"What message?"
"That if I see you, I'm to tell you to lay low for a while. That they're looking for you."
Rian stood motionless for a long moment before nodding. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it," the boy spat again. "Now get lost. I don't want you bringing trouble here."
Rian turned and moved down the street, faster than before.
He reached the main square—a wide, filthy plaza surrounded by stalls and crumbling buildings. In the center stood a fountain, long since out of order, filled with stagnant green water and trash.
Rian stopped by it, leaning his hands against the cold, cracked stone.
The Zealots were looking for him. Of course they were. He had killed people yesterday. He might not remember exactly how, but he remembered they were dead. And he remembered using too much Ether.
And now someone else was looking for him too—someone with money. That could be even worse.
He looked at his hands. Black veins pulsed beneath the skin, and the copper bracelets glinted dully in the pale light filtering through the smog.
He had to get money, and quickly. Two silver by the end of the week, or better yet, five or ten, so he could leave this city before the Church caught him.
He had no goods to sell and no contacts who would trust him on credit. He had only one option left.
The old factory.
On the outskirts of the slums, in an abandoned, scorched district, stood a massive, ruined chemical factory. It had been deserted for ten years. The locals avoided it like the plague, claiming the walls bled poison and that mutated rats the size of dogs lived in the cellars.
But Rian knew there was something else inside.
An unofficial source of wild Ether. A Rift that had opened spontaneously years ago and never been sealed. It was unstable and dangerous, but if a person knew what they were doing, they could draw energy from there, trap it in vials, and sell it.
Or be burned alive in the first minute.
Rian let the air out of his lungs. "Fucking hell," he muttered to himself. "Bloody perfect."
He had no choice.
He turned away from the fountain and headed toward the eastern exit of the square, toward the scorched quarters and the old factory.
The sun broke through the smog, casting pale, yellowish streaks of light onto the filthy cobbles. Rian walked quickly, hands in his pockets, head bowed low.
No one stopped him. No one noticed him.
And in the distance, beyond the scorched walls, the factory loomed—a massive, dead skeleton of brick and rusted steel. It was waiting.