Only the flickering lamppost refused to submit to the silence that devoured the street. It sizzled, as if to force out the sound of men and women clutching shirts and pants to stop their limbs from trembling, to stop their clothes from rustling.
Kael glared past the twelve corpses. Scarlet pools spread on dirty ground, giving undeniable weight to his words.
No one had dared to come out. Even the three he had noticed froze in their spots, hoping stillness would turn them invisible.
Good. He had turned attention into fear. A fear that Jake's and Jones' groups once inspired, but darker, a death sentence. Stories would spread—a freak lived in the third beggar street. And he'd lie low with Tonio until non-witnesses doubted them.
They don't know about truths, or they would have built their own gangs.
Kael shook his head, and the idea with it. This scuffle shouldn't have exposed them. The nail marks could. He twisted his lips at the five lines carved on the chest of a dead beggar. He couldn't hide them.
He turned toward Tonio, his brow creasing. The rat-man ran across the street, unbuttoning shirts and digging into pockets. Scavenged knives, scissors, copper coins, and tokens engraved with Kythra's sun, Morvana's thread, or Kraghor's frost.
"At least push them to the side." He grabbed a corpse and slid it to the closest wall.
Though blood helped, he huffed through the effort. How heavy were bones? Because the bastard was just that: skin on bones. Or was he that weak?
Tonio frowned, paused, then flung the plundered corpses in an effortless arc. They crashed beside Kael, and he jumped back. Blood sprayed an inch from his shirt, as if Tonio playfully answered his question.
There were the nail marks, gone in a nightmare of bones protruding through broken flesh. His paranoia eased, not his frown.
I'll become stronger. At worst, I'll anchor a truth like Brannick's...
The more he glared at the mess, the more his chest tightened. He couldn't. Even without reading his ledger, he knew his passive endurance would clash with the active truth. Then? Goodbye, Kael; welcome anchor-ghast.
Groaning, he pressed his bare foot against the dead men's shoes. All too big, soaked in blood. He shook his head and walked to his shelter.
"Throw the corpses in the burial pit. Take whatever they left in Jones' home as payment."
With a shout that echoed louder than it should against the silence, he stepped inside. Tonio skipped behind him, more interested in the token he twirled between his fingers than the slaughter he committed. Yet, his red eyes lingered on the shoes, then on Kael's feet.
The moment the cloth fell in the doorway, Els jumped in front of him. Her hands, quivering like her lips, gripped his. "Are you wounded? Do you need to lie down? Water? Ah! We don't have any left."
"Tonio did almost everything." Kael wrapped his hand over hers. "My knuckles hurt a little, but that's it. This place is ours now."
He winced when Els stroked a thumb on his knuckles.
"Who boasted about not planning to get hurt?"
She wasn't teasing. Her worry hardened into something else, something that called for action. When he opened his mouth to answer, she had already flung his hand down and was standing in front of Tonio.
"You don't look wounded either. You're strong, right, Tonio?"
"Strong," Tonio repeated as if the word defined him.
She pointed her finger at Kael, her other hand pressed against her hip. "Teach him to be strong as well, then."
The token Tonio had been playing with slipped from his fingers, while Kael gasped.
"Kael suck. Not even rat. Mouse. Baby mouse?" Tonio's words were knives stabbing Kael's pride.
Weaker than a baby mouse...
He wanted to protest, to tell them how he dealt with Tovin and ash, or even say he had survived Tonio's nails. But the last battle replayed in his mind, stealing the words before they reached his lips. Survived? Two strikes. Three days bedridden, smoldering from the inside, freezing outside, unable to drink without feeling like drowning.
And Tonio hadn't even tried...
He pressed his palms against his temples, exhaling false confidence and delusion. "I'm weak. Help me become strong." He held Tonio's gaze for a second, then two. Silence stretched.
Tonio broke eye contact first. He exchanged a glance with Els, who tiptoed to rub his head with a gentle smile.
Eventually, his features hardened into a serious nod. Not the seriousness before combat, but something more profound, both kind and stern. "Tonio train Kael. Sit." He pointed a dark nail down and shoved relic 78 inside Kael's shirt pocket.
Unsure if it'll work out, Kael obeyed silently. Els sat beside him, leaving Tonio standing alone.
"Lesson one. Strength. Explain."
"Hmm?" A brow raised, Kael answered with the obvious. "Beat others, defend what's yours, feel safe."
"Bad!" Tonio screeched.
Els answered hesitantly. "Like Garrick? Be so strong that none dares to fight you?"
"Bad!" Tonio raised three fingers. "Giovanni smartest. Weak like Kael. Garrick give rifoneco... rinrero..."
"Rhinoceros blood?"
Kael slid the word, and Tonio's eyes brightened.
"Rhinoceros blood! Rhinoceros strong. Big. Riccardo strong like Rhinoceros. Give Pangolin blood. Defense." Tonio pointed at himself with his thumb. "Not strength, not defense, not smart. Tonio fast. Always fast."
Kael wrapped his fingers around his chin. "So speed is strength?" He paused, his eyes widening. "No, it combines strength and defense. That's why you brought your brothers up."
"Good!" Tonio rustled Kael's dark hair. "Speed, survival. One strike win. Two strikes, trouble. Kael learn one strike. Good defence. Weak body. Up. Up!"
Tonio forced Kael up by the arm, stepped back, and hurled a punch at the air. His sleeve let out a booming sound, then another. But Kael didn't follow the fists. His blue eyes locked on how the rat-man spun his feet and hips and how he opened his shoulder to use his back with each strike.
After ten punches, Tonio lifted his palm in front of Kael. "Hit!"
"Huh?" For a moment, Kael observed Tonio's furry palms. Just like that? No, the sooner he started, the faster he'd learn to defend himself. But more importantly, Tonio was right. Speed for defence, speed for offence, speed for survival.
Only the first strike matters.
Ironing his new understanding in his mind, he copied Tonio's stance: left foot in front of the right, right fist protecting his chin.
He spun, his left fist cutting through the air. No booming sound or impressive flap of his sleeve; just his fist meeting a palm. But the sensation was so different from his random punches. More muscles responded to the movement. It was faster, sharper.
Not enough for Tonio, who adjusted Kael's posture with his foot. "Again!"
It wasn't a command, but an eager shout betrayed by red sparkling eyes. Perhaps others learned under Tonio before him. Or did he feel the warmth of training with his brothers even though the memory itself had long faded?
His chest tightened, and he hurled his right fist as much to forget it as to improve. Confidence slowly replaced awkwardness, not that it made him faster or produce more than muffled sounds against Tonio's palms, but his knuckles hit the same spot more frequently.
After fifty punches, Tonio caught Kael's fist with a satisfied nod. "Not tired. Endurance, good. Training alone, bad." He fished relic 78 from Kael's chest pocket. Sliding the round glasses on his face, he released his grip and walked to the door with his altered appearance. "No food, no strength. Meat best."
He left without another word.
"Where did he go?" Els, who watched Kael become less terrible, leapt to her feet.
Kael scratched his head, his breath already steadying. "I guess he's getting the rat-meat he's been harping about."
"Won't he mess up alone?" Els hurried to the door, but Kael grabbed her shoulder midway.
"Trust him. Or you can try to restrain him." Kael sat against the junk wall with a chuckle. "Good luck, Els. I'll watch from my premium seat."
"Ha. Ha. Funny... I guess you're right." Els clicked her tongue. She stood in the middle of the shelter for a moment, then raised her palms. "Say, want me to help you? I stand like him, and you punch."
"Not now." He pulled his ledger. Between his hands, the ethereal cover instantly hardened into leather etched with interlocking arabesques. Time to look at how much his stress had increased.
"Ah! You still have the magic book!" Els cut through his worried exhale.
"It's just a normal book."
"Of course, as normal as Tonio." She rolled her eyes, and he simply ignored her.
He flipped to the first page, his eyes running across the sky-blue ink.
✦ Truth of Endurance ✦
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Core: I persist.
Anchor: Memory of Nessa
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Stress on Anchor: 35%
Risk of Breaking: Low
────────────────────────────
Cost: Cannot voluntarily yield.
Price: The warmth from the memories of Nessa.
────────────────────────────
Unowned truths of the Instigator and Turning Edge conflicting with truth of endurance. Predicted stress on instigator's anchor upon anchoring: 78%. Turning edge: 64%
Predicted price range for Instigator: mind-related.
Predicted price range for Turning Edge: body-related.
────────────────────────────
8%... He pushed his head between his hands. The increase was lower than when he took revenge on Tovin and Ash, but still too high to his liking. Instigator... because he knew Jake would return? What was Turning Edge? Throwing knives? Maybe... Not important. Only the stress on his anchor was.
The urgency to mutate his truth gripped him by the stomach, shaking his intestines until his face paled. But both Giovanni and Riccardo had failed. It was too risky. He needed more experiments. On who?
Tonio? Never.
His eyes trailed to Els. She returned his glance with a gentle smile.
Even less.
There had to be something, someone he could use. He couldn't find it. Not now. Yet, a somber idea took root in his mind; the kind of idea that made his blue eyes glow in their tight slits. He needed the stress to build up, and the gang war burned its way toward him. An opportunity to set up his truth mutation... or to die.
When he detached his eyes from Els, a token drew his attention to the ground. It shone under the flicker of the lamppost, strange, wrong.
He picked it up. No sun, frost, or threads on the circular iron. Instead, a set of scales. On one side, a stack of coins, the other a small heart, both hanging in uneasy balance.
"To what bastard does this belong?"