NOVEL NEXT Chapter 248: The Slums.
Nero stepped onto the balcony of the apothecary's second floor. The wooden railing creaked under his weight, and he took a careful step forward.
Below, the street stretched out toward the edge of the Inner District, narrowing as it approached the border. There, the buildings changed. The neat, orderly facades of the city ended abruptly, replaced by leaning structures of brick and rotted wood. The roofs were patched with scraps of metal, canvas, and whatever else could be found. Smoke rose from chimneys unevenly as thick black serpents.
The closer he looked, the more the filth came into focus. Narrow alleys branched between the houses, dark and crooked, littered with trash. The streets themselves were uneven and pocked with open drains that carried waste. Rats ran along the edges of the road, skittering across boards and piles of debris, stopping only when something larger passed by. Their squeals pierced the low murmur of the slum, the constant grinding sound of a place left to decay.
In this moment, Nero's gaze stretched far and wide, seeing from the center to the corners of the wide outer district...
Nero's eyes traced the inhabitants moving about. Faces were darkened with grime. Hair, matted and unwashed, hung in thick strands, some stiffened with dirt. Their clothes were rags, layered in mismatched pieces stitched together or held by belts, rope, or sheer desperation. Children ran barefoot over stones and muck, darting between adults with sacks of food, scraps of wood, or stolen trinkets.
A cart rolled down one narrow street, its wheels stuck in ruts filled with water that reflected the gray sky above. The driver shouted at a boy who tried to jump aboard for a free ride. The boy disappeared into the crowd, his small hands gripping the edge of a wooden beam as he climbed higher into the structure he called home. Nero followed him with his gaze as he vanished behind a leaning building.
From the second-floor window, he could see the rooftops. A few ropes also hung between buildings, knotted and frayed, with laundry swaying above the street. Shingles were missing, doors hung by single hinges, and walls leaned against one another as though the whole place might collapse with a single gust of wind.
The border itself was marked by a crude stone arch and the remains of a gate, more symbolic than functional. Beyond it, the streets twisted into more narrow paths. Nero's gaze followed them as far as he could.
Theo stepped up beside him but said nothing. The older man's eyes swept the same scene with a subtle disgust nestled on his forehead.
"This place is a stain on our great city. God is not here."
Nero said nothing.
His eyes caught a man leaning against a wall, watching. He was thin, pale, and scarred. One arm hung limply at his side. He had a knife in the other hand and a crooked grin. The man's eyes followed Nero for a long moment, then he melted into the crowd.
Despite the despondence and the decay, the buildings themselves seemed alive.
The vigor of human life persisted even in the hardest and harshest environments.
With his incredible eyesight, he could see through broken windows into rooms filled with crumpled mattresses, empty bowls, and smoke stained walls. The smells of burned bread and rotten vegetables wafted outward, mingling with the stench from the street. From above, everything looked like a hive of desperate survival, stacked and pressed tightly together, sprawling into the distance.
Even from here, the infrastructure was failing. Water ran along the stone streets in thin, stagnant streams. Pipes burst in a few places, spilling brown liquid over the sides of buildings. Wooden beams sagged under the weight of roofs they were never meant to hold. Nero imagined what it must be like during a storm.
The horizon was a jagged line of chimneys, rooftops, and smoke. Black smoke, pale smoke, curling from a thousand fires. The sun barely penetrated the haze, leaving everything cast in gray light. Even the city beyond the slums seemed dimmer, distant, and fragile compared to the harshness of what Nero could see from here.
Here, theft was common and violence frequent. Nero's gaze swept the crowd. A man with missing teeth shoved another man aside. A woman dragged a child behind her, keeping a hand over the back of his head. Children huddled together in corners, trying to stay invisible.
Even the smells from the inner districts drifted here, mingling awkwardly with the stench of decay.
Nero noticed how the light changed. The upper floors of the apothecary gave him a vantage point, but shadows pooled in the narrow alleys. Even the midday sun could not penetrate some areas. Darkness lived permanently in those streets, hiding bodies, weapons, and desperate hands ready to grab anything within reach.
A dog barked somewhere deeper in the slums, sharp and sudden. It was answered by a chorus of shouts and the sound of running feet. Nero's attention snapped, but nothing else happened. It was just life. It was chaos and survival.
Theo cleared his throat softly beside him, breaking the quiet. He gestured toward the street leading further into the Outer District. "In this place, the only gods are coin, sin and murder. The Church tries its best to regulate them, but it has proved rather difficult lately.
Nero nodded. He didn't take his eyes off the streets. Of course it was true. Every sound, every face, and every shadow could tell a story. But those stories were often times dark and cut short by death or starvation.
The second-floor balcony provided a perspective he would remember. A world of desperation pressed tightly together, a city that survived by cunning and cruelty.
A place broiled in necessity.
A place where nothing was wasted, where nothing was forgiven. From this distance, Nero could see the chaos and feel its rhythm, the pulse of a society built solely on survival.
The city of Liedenstorm was different from this place and yet, it was the same.
These were the Slums.