Shackled Exalted

Emil

Rain had already started to fall once Emil exited the Bank of Ardair. Heavy droplets pattered against the cobblestone roads with a hypnotic rhythm. An umbral gleam shimmered in the distance as light from the streetlamps refracted against the stone buildings.

I swear the public announcement said two hours.

There was no way his meeting with Graf had taken that long. The tense confrontation might have distorted his sense of time, but he couldn't have been in that office for more than twenty minutes. Realizing it was foolish of him to expect accurate predictions for something as finnicky as the weather, he tossed the hood of his night gear over his head and made way towards his destination.

The vacation that the witch promised him was cut short. The sense of betrayal squeezed tight against his chest as he stomped across the sodden roads. But in hindsight, Hortensia had acted exactly the way she always had. This sort of misdirection was completely in character for her. Emil was angrier with himself for being naïve enough to take her words at face value. The two months that he spent away from her presence must have dulled his wariness towards the witch.

Whatever.

He pushed down his frustrations and put on the mask of a Steiger Cleaner. It was time to work. Once Graf realized that the Courier he sent never made contact with Emil, the Steiger branch leader immediately assigned him to investigate the missing Courier's whereabouts.

That took him to southern edge of the Administrative District. Slowly, the surroundings grew darker. The distance between street lamps lengthened. The rain's umbral glint soon vanished. The size of the buildings shrunk and became noticeably more dilapidated. Even the carefully maintained cobblestone roads suddenly looked neglected.

The main area of Isarelle was divided into five sections. There were the three districts—Arts, Commerce, and Administrative—that served practical functions. Then there were the two residentials areas. One was the Noble's Quarter, a gated part of the city aptly named as the home of the wealthy elites, situated in the upper eastern quadrant of the city. The other was called the Black Shoal where the majority of the city's commoners lived. The Black Shoal was to the south of Administrative District. A smaller number of middle-class bourgeois were scattered in the practical districts depending on how they made their living.

Emil raised his head. Rain drummed against the arch of his nose as he tried to get his bearings. Over the dark horizon, the looming vestige of a spire towered to the skies. It stood upon the cliffside at the western end of Isarelle, overlooking the Administrative District and parts of the Black Shoal. Like an overseer, it radiated a sinister authority.

So that's Thanatos.

The daunting presence of the spire and what it represented pressed on him with an unnerving pressure. The Exalted from House Nacht were allegedly sent here after Isen had been found guilty for human trafficking. At least, that's what was detailed in the official records of this operation. From Emil's insider knowledge, the Nacht Exalted could have been just easily executed or absorbed into the royal family's forces depending on their talents.

Emil turned into a small passage off the side of the main road. Darkness engulfed the area. He narrowed his eyes and placed his hands on the wall. With a short breath, he exhaled, channeling a small bit of raw mana into the surface. A faint inscription, glowing in blue, soon revealed itself. It pointed to a tiny crevice at the end of the passage, hidden from view behind a set of densely grown foliage.

This is a little excessive.

He grunted with exasperation as he pried apart the vegetation. Behind it was a door.

***

The door hid a stairway that led underground. A strong, pungent stench filled the air as he trekked down the aged steps. As he arrived at the bottom, Emil found himself before a vast subterranean chamber. The sound of water rushing downstream echoed in his ears like the bellowing warble of a mythical beast. Despite being underground, he could still hear the rain pattering on the surface reverberating from the chamber's ceiling.

This was the Canticle, an underground sewer system that sprawled across Isarelle. The name was chosen because its architects thought the noise of water flowing through its channels during a rainstorm resembled a hymn.

A bit of stretch if you ask me.

The Canticle, unlike the abandoned sewers of Dannan, was actively maintained by the city and paid for using the tax dollars of its residents. With a canal and a volatile climate that rained all year long, the Canticle was essential infrastructure that prevented flooding and kept the city functional. But that was not its only purpose. Since the Canticle covered the entirety of Isarelle, it became an important way for Steiger agents to travel between different parts of the city in secrecy. Steiger also installed several of its own passageways to the sewer systems.

The hidden entrance that Emil had just used was one of the many spread across the city.

Emil examined the map in his hands. Graf had given him a copy of the sewer system with a line marking the path that should have been taken by the missing Courier.

Another maze.

He shook his head. The ground below his feet was already soaked. He could feel the water level slowly rising as the deluge poured into the underground system. He had to hurry before the entire subterranean chamber became submerged.

***

After twenty minutes of running down the length of the sewer system, Emil forced himself to stop. His stamina was normally greater than this, but the humidity in the air was suffocating. The water level was almost at his ankles now, but he was only halfway through the path marked by Graf.

The rain was deafening at this point. The subterranean chamber had shrunk into a junction of narrower passages. Azurite stones were scattered along the walls to provide illumination with their signature blue glow. Emil was about to take out Graf's map again until he spotted a shadow in the corner of his eyes.

He turned, channeling mana into his Azurite pendant. The light revealed a body dressed in all black sprawled against the walls of the junction.

"Trace."

Seismic Sense activated. A wisp of mana crawled along the ground, revealing indentations and footprints scattered on the floor of the chamber. Clearly, this passage had been used often. Emil frowned, however, observing that the range of Seismic Sense was noticeably shorter than usual.

It must be the water.

Water had a slight dampening effect on the movement of mana. It wasn't strong enough to suppress the use of Gifts, but the difference in efficacy was obvious when using a sensory ability.

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Luckily, Seismic Sense didn't detect any abnormalities in the area. Still wary, Emil slowly approached the still figure as his eyes darted the vicinity. The glow from his Azurite pendant flickered with the dip and rise of his chest as he trudged through the waters. Once he was close enough and convinced that nothing was going to jump him from the darkness, he crouched down to examine the body.

He pulled back the hood covering the body's face. A bundle of hair spilled out. A woman. Emil pressed two fingers against the woman's nape to check for any vital signs. Silence. No heartbeat. She wasn't breathing either.

I figured.

Steiger Couriers were hand selected from Exalted who had Gifts that enhanced speed or granted them a boost in mobility. The fact that this Courier had gone missing for a day was enough to assume that she had been compromised.

It was probably safe to guess this was the person that he was looking for, given that no sane individual would be traversing this deep into Canticle alone. While it was mostly safe, monsters sometimes emerged from the ambient mana radiated by the Azurite stones used for illumination. Steiger tolerated the risks as it served a valuable deterrent against misuse by civilians. For the sake of due diligence, however, Emil carefully lifted her hair. A tattoo was inked on the back of her head.

Marseille, it read.

Yep, that's her.

Steiger Couriers were unique in the organization since they were the only agents who had their names printed on their bodies. Because they were responsible for delivering important orders and items between Steiger agents, it was important to know which messages got lost if any of them got compromised.

With that being said, a Steiger Courier dying in the field was rare. While Couriers weren't trained to be combat specialists, their mobility Gifts allowed them to easily retreat if they found themselves in trouble. Marseille's death was concerning. Especially since she met her end in the Canticle.

Assuming that her body hadn't been tampered with post-death, she must have been ambushed.

The corpse looked ragged—its limbs were twisted unnaturally. Emil found a vicious hole right above her chest that trailed a nasty scar running down the length of her abdomen. Something huge must have assaulted her. She likely died instantly.

He winced as a droplet of water splashed against the top of his head, reminding him that the torrential rain was still ongoing. The water level was past his ankles now. Yeah, time to leave. If I dawdle any longer, I might have to swim back while carrying her body. The thought was unpleasant to say the least, so Emil reached down to grab the dead Courier.

The water suddenly stirred.Emil froze. The ripples brushed against the side of his leg. It wasn't unusual—the water level was continuously rising due to the influx of rain. But this wave felt abnormal. He couldn't quite explain why exactly, but his instincts raised alarms.

"Trace."

Seismic Sense barely covered a few feet from his position this time—the range was becoming more and more suppressed by the growing volume of water. Emil clicked his tongue. It was good that he discovered a limitation with his new sensory ability, but the timing couldn't have been worse. He raised his Azurite pendant into the air instead, trying to project the light further down the passages from the junction.

A shadow lunged.

"Bastion!"

A stone wall shot up from the ground of the subterranean chamber, standing between Emil and the assailant. The shadow slammed into the wall. Water splashed everywhere. Its mass must have been enormous as the rock structure immediately fractured upon contact.

"Impale!"

The shadow bellowed with deep groan as stone protrusions in the shape of spears plunged into its side. Emil narrowed his eyes, watching its reaction. Despite his attacks landing, he didn't catch a single spray of blood or trace of red in the waters. Something was off. Before he could deduce what was going on, the shadow suddenly expanded.

Whatever he was fighting was growing larger. Feeling its presence above, Emil realized that his foe was threatening to crush him with its sheer mass.

Mana flooded his legs as he launched himself to the left. The shadowy mass descended.

Boom!

The entire labyrinth seemed to shake. Stone fell from the ceiling of the subterranean chamber. For a moment, Emil thought the chamber was going to collapse. He hastily erected a set of barricades to block the oncoming waves of displaced water.

What the hell am I fighting?!

His Azurite pendant and the few Azurite stones affixed to the walls provided minimal lighting. Frustrated with the poor visibility, he conjured Blaze.

Flames snapped into existence, sprouting from the back of his body. The monstrous conflagration was noticeably tamer than usual, however, likely quelled by the abundance of moisture in the air. Still, the flames burned bright enough to illuminate the area.

The shadowy figure was finally unveiled. Emil narrowed his eyes. His assailant towered to nearly eight feet with width comparable to the length of a caravan. His stone spears from earlier protruded from its body, but it seemed unaffected by the attack. It was less than a living creature and more like an agglomeration of viscous matter—a disgusting combination of sewage, trash, and water mended together.

Mana was apparently the glue holding everything together. A blue glow pulsated across the surface of its vessel as the localized sections of the creature's body moved and contracted on its own. Emil fought the urge to puke at the disturbing being.

A Gutter Slime.

It was a rare monster. It typically formed in areas that with high ambient mana and bacterial content. The microbes absorbed mana in clusters, letting it morph into a living abomination as it gathered non-living matter from its vicinity into its fold.

The monster was notoriously troublesome to eliminate. It had near immunity to most physical attacks—the non-organic matter that made up of its vessel acted like a makeshift shield to protect the microbial clusters from damage.

It was logical why an attack from Bulwark had been ineffective. Luckily for Emil, he had another Gift in his arsenal.

"Incinerate!"

The flames on his back surged. Emil poured mana to fuel its voracity, forcing it to bloom despite the wet conditions. The conflagration engulfed the Gutter Slime whole. The monster bellowed in response. It lacked intelligence and pain receptors due to its microbial base, but it still reacted to the blistering heat. As if sensing its imminent demise, it suddenly spread itself thin into the water.

Steam fizzled as water doused the flames.

"How annoying!"

Emil flicked his wrist up. The ground beneath the Gutter Slime began to shake. A second later, a section of earth rose into the air, carrying the Gutter Slime above the heightened water levels.

Before it could run, Emil erected a series of walls to prevent the creature's escape. Caged and separated from its salvation, the monster could do nothing as it was cooked to death by the rising temperatures.

***

It took an hour before Emil finally backtracked his steps and found the hidden entrance where he descended into the Canticle. With Marseille's body weighing him down and the water levels of sewers rising to his knees, the trek back was excruciating.

Exhausted, he stepped out of the underground, relieved to be met with air that didn't smell like foul piss.

The rain remained persistent; each droplet added to his accumulated fatigue. He wanted nothing more than to collapse onto his bed and drift off into blissful sleep.

Instead, he had another journey back to the Bank of Ardair to drop off the dead Courier's body.

Emil trudged onto the main road, lamenting the long walk ahead. After a few minutes, he suddenly stopped. There was a figure standing in the center of the road. An umbrella in hand. Under the dim glow of the closest street lamp, Emil realized the person was wearing a pair of specs.

Graf.

"You found her," he said, seemingly indifferent as he approached Emil.

"Yeah. Not alive, unfortunately," Emil said, slightly alarmed by Graf's presence as he scanned the vicinity, "How did you know I would be here?"

"I have eyes around the city. And I was waiting. I thought that Steiger's rising star likely wouldn't have disappointed me with an unsatisfactory result."

Emil scoffed at the condescending remark. "Then how about those eyes of yours help me with her body? It's not exactly easy carrying a corpse for an hour while wading through knee deep waters."

Graf raised his hand. A moment later, a couple of Steiger agents cladded in black emerged from the shadows. Emil gently handed Marseille's body over to them.

"Careful. Her body is falling apart," he said, grimacing, "I wanted to keep her in better shape, but a Gutter Slime appeared right after I found her."

"Was that how she died?" Graf asked.

"I don't think so. She has a massive hole in her chest cavity. A Gutter Slime generally isn't capable of such a high precision attack. Her limbs were broken, but that might have occurred after her death. I found her corpse at the mid-point junction area. It's possible that she died elsewhere but was swept away by the rain water," Emil explained, "By the way, are Gutter Slimes common in the Canticle?

Graf shook his head. "Very rare. It's definitely an unusual occurrence. We sometimes have small monster infestations because of the mana radiated by the Azurite lamps. But those pose very little threat to an Exalted. We have monthly extermination patrols in the Canticle specifically to prevent these monsters from proliferating."

"Well, this is ominous," Emil stated plainly.

The sudden emergence of a rare monster in the Canticle right before the Aurous Festival was definitely not a good sign.

Graf didn't respond. Instead, his eyes were fixated on Marseille's corpse.

"Well, I'll be taking my leave then if that's all. I have an important meeting to attend to tomorrow."

"Right, good work," Graf said. It was faint, but Emil caught the slightest of quiver in his voice. He might be an asshole, but at least he has some capacity to mourn for his people.

He began the journey back to his tavern. His mind was preoccupied with how he was going to approach the dreaded meeting with House Belle.