Bendicia. The Black City. The crumbling jewel at the heart of the Painted World. When I came to, I found myself within its walls, the gates still sealed shut behind me. It took me a while to gather my thoughts and memories in order to remember how I got inside.
I put my hand around my wrist, feeling for the changed and ever-evolving flesh. I felt strange, as if my body was both unfamiliar to me and yet the same it's always been. As I did so, I recalled faintly the echoes of infinitely distant memories of a most cruel injustice. It was Atebid who stood before me with a bleeding, sharp grin as he severed my hand, my only weapon, from my wrist after my attempt to attack him. The hand, with a good portion of the lower arm, was sliced clean off by some invisible force and was flung high into the air before it made contact with the earth. I bled profusely from my wrist when he shut the gates right in front of me, leaving me for dead. Death by bleeding out. Or worse, by getting mauled by whatever vile thing would be to reach me first.
I remember how I despaired. I sank to my knees and cried bitter tears of betrayal and loss. I wasn't only about to lose my own life, about to be damned to an eternity of suffering, but also about the loss of Nephethys and the bond that I thought was real between the three of us. I was truly a hand's breadth away from giving up and accepting my fate, when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement in the dust. My severed hand was twitching. Somehow it stayed alive and, moreover, as I touched it, I could feel myself touch my hand, severed as it was. Suffice it to say that this was probably the strangest physical sensation I had ever felt with such a clear and literal disconnect between me and it. Yet, the connection itself somehow remained intact.
Immediately, I tried to reattach it to my wrist but it was in the process of closing the gash that Atebid left behind. Apparently, the changes my body underwent resulted in excellent healing capabilities, if nothing else. And then, I noticed something very peculiar about my disembodied hand. Because it started to grow flesh out of its sliced-up end and would soon become the beginnings of a full, disembodied arm. How it did that, I was uncertain. However, I started to have some faint semblance of an idea as to what I could do with it. In my mind, there were two ways how this unexpected development could turn out. Firstly, it could grow into some sort of independent creature, if given the time, that may or may not be friendly to me and help me. That would not explain my ability to feel everything it felt, but I have absolutely no idea about the particulars of such magic. I may never fully understand it. However, the second way it could turn out was that it could grow a surrogate body in my image, which I deemed to be more likely, given how blood magic could be used to distribute souls into fleshy vessels.
If it did grow a copy of me, ready to be used, I was uncertain of how to use it, however. I imagined that I would have to get my spirit to touch it somehow, just how I was unsure of. And then it dawned on me. The only way that I could control my spirit directly was to die. And the only place that seemed to exist in both planes of existence at once was the city. I breathed in deep, made up my mind and tossed the hand with its lower arm portion already grown over the gate. I listened for a thud, which came, and waited.
I had done risky things in the past before. I had put my life on the line countless times. But what I never did was kill myself - or let myself be killed. And I had only this one chance of doing it right. It was a long shot, the long shot of all long shots, but I had to try because everything else would have meant certain death. I resolved to throw my hand over the wall and estimate the time it would take for this new body to grow back to a degree at which I could occupy it. Then, seeing as its regenerative abilities were quite capable, I had to kill myself in order to die before I got obliterated by the beings from the sea - I would rather end it on my own terms instead of being eaten alive. Ultimately, my spirit would have to find the city again, enter it and find my new body to complete the process. I remembered from my past experience that the gates were open in the spirit realm so I should not run into trouble in that respect. I just didn't know if any of this would work at all. I could only try.
Now it was up to me to look for a method of reliably killing myself in time before I got torn to shreds. I had lost all my weapons during the last few battles and I couldn't use my hand to slice my throat or behead myself. I observed my surroundings. There was barren wasteland from where the creatures came with but a few ruined structures and the city gates themselves with the guarding statues. They did hold weapons but they looked dull and were made of stone, so those were no good even if I could somehow reach them. I decided to take the risk and make for the ruins some ways off, cutting short my time to do it by a few minutes at least. I set foot into one of the destroyed houses. Coincidentally, I recognised it as the one with the caved-in ceiling that Nephethys and I had taken refuge in when we hid from the scavenger.
There were several loose rocks and stones on the ground and some of them looked sharp enough to perhaps produce a deep enough cut to let myself bleed out reasonably quick. I stooped low and reached for a particularly pointy bit of debris that must have dislodged from one of the walls judging from its colour and texture. It had broken off in such a convenient way as to work like a very primitive shiv, with one side being long and thin at the edges, with a fine tip at its end. I held it in front of me and pondered on where exactly I should make the cut. The throat would probably be the best and most efficient option, if rather painful and gruesome. Then again, the wrists could, if sliced the proper way, produce a prodigious volume of blood in a short time, perhaps enough for me to bleed out before my body could close the wounds. I decided, against my better judgment, to try for the throat first.
I put the sharp edge of the rock to my right artery and began cutting. It was terribly painful and the slight jaggedness to the blade tore my skin apart rather than cut cleanly. I tried to cut deep enough to slice across my throat but try as I might, I could not stomach the pain and stopped halfway through, leaving me sore and slightly bleeding, but still very much alive.
In my second attempt, I tried the artery that ran along my arm. I forced the rock into the flesh starting at my inner elbow and under screaming and profuse sweating tore the flesh down to the stump. I lost grip of the stone as it exited the stump in front, sending it flying against the nearest wall together with scraps of flesh and splatters of blood. I became dizzy immediately, and in my delirium I suddenly remembered that I was physically unable to give my other arm the same treatment. What eventually caused me to become unconscious, whether it was the sudden bloodloss or the sight of what I had just done, I could not tell. Shortly after, I saw only darkness.
-
When I next woke up, I looked at myself and my surroundings. I felt terrible. My arm still hurt, pounding with agony, but it appeared to be mostly intact. I could still see the tool that I had used and when I got up, I saw the city in the distance, gates closed. It didn't work. Moreover, the horde of creeping nightmares has drawn considerably closer. I could already hear their unnatural sounds and the clawing of their limbs. I was running out of time.
In order to get a better look at the situation, I attempted to climb the broken roof of the structure and from there, reach the highest point of what was still intact of it. I grasped at stones and broken, wooden support beams and pulled myself up the roof, probing for weak spots to avoid breaking it further. It was a struggle, but after a while I managed to reach the highest point, that being a little steeple-like structure sitting on the very top of the least impaired area of the roof. Looking out at the horizon, the sight was dismal. The horde of things that crept towards me has drawn way too close for comfort. I was running out of time. The shambling masses of bones and decaying flesh and sharp fangs stretched as far back as the horizon. Even if I did somehow manage to fight some of them off, there was no escape. I believe that even Shthelith, or Atebid, would run into trouble going up against this many.
I needed options, and fast. I had profound anxiety about being eaten alive, so I hurried off the roof as fast as I could. In my haste, I overlooked a weak spot in the structure. There was a loud crack and then the roof underneath gave way, sending me tumbling down. As I fell, I felt a strong pain in my chest and a sudden shock traveled throughout my body. I looked down and discovered that I had been impaled through the heart by a broken support beam that was jutting out of the debris. Smiling, I claimed my prize and as I observed my blood running down the wood, I lost all sense of body and mind, dispersing into nothingness.
I had a sensation of being flung in between worlds and rose to my feet next to the site of my death. I inspected a shadowy thing on the wooden beam which I took for my body and then looked out into the eternal gloom of the nether realm. No creatures in sight, the gates to the city open. I didn't hesitate for even a second and made my painful way towards the underworld version of Bendicia. The pain in my chest was still very strong, but much more manageable than having to walk there without skin as I had done before. It took me a while before I reached the city and stepped through the gates. A familiar sight of strange, almost nonsensical design in architecture struck me. But my focus lay on finding my body that the hand must have regrown while I was busy committing suicide to survive.
Inexplicably, the hand still maintained a connection to me. Not to my body, but to my soul or spirit. Because amidst the darkness and the shadows, I could feel its presence quite clearly. It was almost as if a part of my soul was living inside of it. And judging from all of the crazy magic in this place, I wouldn't be surprised if it was. This trait helped me in locating it even if I could only barely see it with my eyes. I soon found it, got too my knees and reached out. As my spirit made contact with the flesh of the hand, I felt a connection reestablish itself between me and it. A pull, a tugging on my entire, ethereal form towards it. The reality around me began to fold in on itself - and on me. The sky was being crumpled like paper in a clenched fist, the ground dissolved into a liquid, black void. All that was left was my body and the hand attached to it.
When I came to, I found myself within the city walls, the gates still sealed shut behind me. It took me a while to gather my thoughts and memories in order to remember how I got inside. And as I remembered, feeling for my hand, my wrist and my changed body, I made a most inconvenient discovery. Throughout all my careful planning in order to enter the city, I forgot one crucial detail. Forwhy the hand was able to regrow my body. Not, however, my clothing. So there I stood, alive, with a fresh, athletic body of impressive physique, but altogether naked in the face of what may very well be my greatest adversary. I found myself exposed to the elements and the cold stone of the architecture around me. Having everything laid bare, even for the distinct lack of possible onlookers, was surprisingly uncomfortable. But I did wonder briefly if, had she been there, Nephethys would have taken some appreciation to that. Whatever the case, I knew that I needed to find some protective wear, or at least anything to cover myself with, before I could properly attempt to conquer the black city of Bendicia and its lord
Replies