[The Second Day of Destruction, 00:30] [Merchant's Row — The Vaulted Bunker]
Lucina stepped into the line. Rhythmic footsteps hit the stone floor in perfect synchronization. This steady cadence matched the dying heartbeat of the city itself.
Deep beneath Merchant's Row, the concept of commerce had lost all remaining nuance. A reinforced steel bunker offered a private air pocket for the wealthy elite. Ten feet of compacted earth separated these aristocrats from the apocalyptic horrors unfolding upon the surface. Aged wine completely failed to mask the stench of panic filling the underground room. Expensive perfumes mingled poorly with cold sweat.
Marcellus had spent forty years calculating the precise weight of human greed. Swirling a crystal glass of vintage red wine, the veteran merchant evaluated the chamber. His fingers twitched compulsively. The motion served as the vestigial habit of a man accustomed to balancing gold coins on a brass scale. He recognized rival caravan owners occupying the velvet chairs alongside well-dressed syndicate bosses. These men kept the shadow trade routes clear.
The noble families are gone, Marcellus thought. He stared at an empty, ornate chair meant for Lord Valerius. Those cowards utilized private teleportation scrolls the exact moment the Outer Wall cracked. They abandoned us to foot the bill and burn.
Taking a deep drink, Marcellus hoped the expensive alcohol would quell the churning acid in his stomach. The vintage offered no relief. He cursed the boundless arrogance of the Slane Theocracy. The ruling Cardinals had provoked a monster they could not possibly comprehend due to their fanatical righteousness.
His deepest venom remained entirely reserved for the Sorcerer Kingdom.
Marcellus had lost three entire trade caravans to the shifting borders surrounding E-Rantel over the last two years. That skeletal tyrant named Ainz Ooal Gown had single-handedly ruined the delicate economic balance of the continent. The undead ruler utilized low-cost skeletal labor to manipulate the regional markets. Skeletons did not require sleep. Zombies did not demand fair wages. Death Knights did not steal from the cargo wagons. The undead labor force shattered the profit margins of human merchants. Now, those same monstrous subordinates were physically tearing down the greatest city in the human world.
"Master Marcellus," a nervous voice whispered.
Turning toward the sound, the merchant located his assistant. Hannes normally possessed a sharp wit and a keen eye for a bad bargain. Tonight, the man looked like a corpse. The young assistant clutched a heavy ledger tightly against his chest to use as a makeshift shield.
"Do you think the vault doors will hold?" Hannes asked. "The concussive impacts outside are vibrating the bedrock."
"They will hold long enough," Marcellus lied.
Keeping his voice steady required utilizing decades of professional deception. He was a master merchant. He was intimately accustomed to selling a false sense of security.
"We survive this night, Hannes. Regimes fall. Kings die. Capital always survives the fire. Someone will need to rebuild when the dust finally settles. We will be the men holding the coin to fund that reconstruction."
The air pressure inside the bunker vanished before the young assistant could reply.
No physical impact shook the heavy steel door. A sub-harmonic frequency pierced the reinforced metal entirely. The psychic pulse of the [Eye of Vecna] phased through ten feet of solid earth as if the dirt were made of parchment.
The crystal glass slipped from the fingers of the veteran merchant. It shattered against the flagstones. Red liquid splattered across his polished boots to mimic the appearance of arterial blood. A metaphysical weight dropped directly onto his cerebral cortex. Agonizing pressure drove Marcellus to his knees.
He tried to curse the Sorcerer King aloud. He attempted to weaponize his hatred to fight off the mental invasion. The compulsion proved absolute. The artifact ignored his immense wealth. It disregarded his anger. It bypassed his emotional centers entirely.
His analytical mind struggled to process the overwhelming command through a haze of unnatural logic. The relic hijacked his merchant sensibilities. It filtered the subjugation through the exact vocabulary of his profession.
Looking at his assistant, Marcellus watched Hannes stand up. The heavy ledger dropped to the floor and was instantly forgotten. The chin of the younger man tilted upward. His breathing became shallow. The rhythm synchronized perfectly with every other merchant occupying the bunker.
They all rose in unison.
Marcellus looked at his business partner. He no longer saw a human colleague. He perceived only a unit of kinetic energy. The emotional centers of his brain shut down permanently. A cold directive installed by the artifact overwrote his personality.
Inventory is in motion, Marcellus thought. The concept echoed through a rapidly hollowing mind. High-volume transit. Zero overhead. The transaction is finalized.
Hatred for the undead vanished into the void. Fear of imminent death evaporated completely. He accepted his new role as a resource to be spent in a trade where the terms were non-negotiable.
Marcellus stood up. His pupils paled into a dull, iridescent white.
"The line must remain straight, Hannes," Marcellus whispered. His voice resembled the dry rustle of old parchment. "Efficiency is the soul of all enterprise."
The wealthiest merchants of the Slane Theocracy unsealed their own bunker one by one. They pushed open the heavy steel doors. They merged seamlessly into the burning streets above.
High above Kami Miyako, the true scale of the harvest revealed itself.
Smoke parted to expose the grand avenues of the capital. The massive bronze doors of the great sanctuaries opened simultaneously. The Cathedral of Earth, the Cathedral of Fire, the Cathedral of Water, and the Cathedral of Light regurgitated their occupants into the night.
Endless rivers of humanity began to flow from these holy structures.
This organized exodus represented a macabre masterpiece of distribution. Tens of thousands of people marched in terrifying synchronization. They produced no chaotic clamor. A singular cadence echoed across the ruined capital as thousands of boots hit the cobblestones.
The wealthy walked shoulder-to-shoulder alongside the destitute. Wounded soldiers marched in step with the priests who had sacrificed their mana to save them. Children held the hands of complete strangers. Every face bore the identical slack stare of the damned.
They did not speak to one another. They refused to cry. They ignored the burning buildings collapsing into the avenues beside them.
The city resembled an intricate web of glowing embers from an aerial perspective. The streets served as the silken threads. The marching citizens acted as the prey drawn inexorably toward the center of the web.
They left the perceived safety of their gods behind. They abandoned the sanctuaries built to protect their families. The great rivers of humanity bypassed the rubble and the flames without hesitation.
Every column converged upon a single black void located in the center of the capital.
The Cathedral of Darkness awaited the flock. Its massive doors stood wide open. The cursed sanctuary remained perfectly ready to receive the absolute entirety of Kami Miyako's population into its bottomless maw.