Path of Transcendence 1: Ultimatum of the Nameless God (39 page)

The plaza in front of The Postmen's tower is as busy as ever, but different from a normal day, there is a man standing near the doorway, with The Postmen' logo embroidered into his grey surcoat. Beneath the surcoat, he is wearing silver chainmail, and he is carrying silver washed spear. As we approach, his eyes are fixated on Perzey.

“You the envoy?”

The man's stare shifts to my masked face. “You're Brand I take it?”

“I'm sure the old faggot gave you my description. Who are you?”

The man frowns, hostility visible in his eyes. Strangely, the hostility shifts into satisfaction, after a moment. “I'm Trantor. I'm a troubleshooter for The Postmen.”

The Postmen's troubleshooters are supposed to all be badasses. I do not know if it is accurate, but supposedly, it is impossible to kiss-ass your way into the position.

“You have my money?”

Trantor takes out a rather large leather pouch and hands it to me.

After opening the drawstring to make sure that coins are golden boats, I do not bother to count it. I really do not care about the money, or if The Postmen are trying to cheat me. The only reason I am doing this is to get an easy boat ride to Jinmu's base.

“I need to buy a party charm, before we leave. Where is the nearest location to get one?”

Trantor points over his shoulder, with his thumb. “Inside at the main counter. The Postmen deal in most of the common player invented items. Our people were heavily involved in the research project for the party charms, whisper charms. and guild bracelets.”

I knew they were involved in the research, but I never know you could buy them at the post offices. After all, I never did pay enough attention to what most of the other players were doing. Thug Horde and their trash feeder guilds were the only ones I ever kept tabs on, and that was just so that I would have a better idea when they would be coming after me.

I walk over to the main counter, with Perzey at my side. Standing in the doorway, Trantor's reflection is visible in the crystal cover of a bulletin board. His glare is more hostile than the one he initially gave me. Something is not right here, but what is it?

The girl behind the counter is barely over five feet tall and slightly built. Most anyone would consider her pretty, and her professional smile is perfect for a customer service position. After a quick glance between Perzey and myself, her eyes settle on me.

“Welcome, sir. How may I help you this fine day?”

“I need to buy a party charm.”

The girl's smile broadens and she take out a display box from under the counter. “We have a number of styles.”

I gesture at the case. “Pick what you want.”

Perzey's looks at the box, and points to a bracelet. After the girl takes it out a fastens it on Perzey's wrist, Perzey holds it up for me to look at.

I shrug. “If that's the one you want, it's fine.”

Perzey frowns, and turns to the girl. “Which is most expensive?”

The girl's smile threatens to turn into a smirk, before she schools her face into a bland mask. She reaches into the box, taking out a pendent in the shape of an eight pointed star, with red gems in the center and yellowish gems along the rays.

“This is made from pure platinum. The center stones are rubies and the outer ones are yellow diamonds. It costs eight hundred golden boats.”

Perzey gives the girl the bracelet and takes the pendant, turning to me. “Perzey wants this one. Brand told Perzey to pick the one Perzey wants. Brand sucks, so Perzey wants this one.”

I take out the bag of coins that Trantor gave me and count out eighty stacks of ten golden boats each. As the girl watches me, her face maintains the professional smile, but she cannot hide the greed in her eyes. She must get a commission from what she sells.

“Thank you, for your business, sir.” The professional smile is not quite so professional at the moment.

Perzey holds the chain with the charm on it out to me. “Put this on Perzey.”

I take off my gauntlets and drop them into a dimensional storage.

After releasing her grip on the chain, Perzey turns around and pulls the waterfall of hair away from her neck. The clasp is rather small even with my bare hands, but I can feel the strength in the chain.

“Steel is cruelty. Steel is pain.” I whisper the words under my breath.

The chain has been Patterned, but it is a different pattern from the charm. Considering the feel of platinum chain, its pattern is meant to strengthen it to an obscene level. As impressive as the chain is, I could probably duplicate it. The party charm is a whole different animal. I do not even know where to start to begin unraveling that pattern. The people who designed the party charms have knowledge far beyond mine or Roderick's.

Thorrin was supposed to be part of the group that created the whisper charms, party charms, and guild bracelets. Once I get out of the Labyrinth of Yggr, I need to take the time to talk with him.

Perzey turns around, grinning at me. She touches the locks holding my mask in place and pushes it up. The locks are specially attuned to me. She should not be able to manipulate them, and I cannot see how she is doing it. When we are alone, I will have to get her to demonstrate the technique for me.

Turning her head so that she does not bang her face on my open helm, Perzey kisses me. I do not hesitate to return it, but I keep my eyes open. We are not in friendly territory.

The girl behind the counter has a look of disgust on her face, as she stares at the scars on my face. She is one of the Possessed, her pattern has the same distinctive gaps as Perzey's used to, the gaps of a mind and soul out of sync with the body.

Dropping out of Jinmu's group, I create my own. When I invite Perzey, she accepts with a broad grin. We can rejoin Jinmu's group when we need to.

As I turn back to the entry, Trantor averts his eyes, but not before I have the chance to get a good look at them. His lust filled eyes had been glued to Perzey. He wants my woman. Fuck him. Perzey belongs to me.

“Take us to your courier ship.”

Trantor stares nonplussed at my face for a few moments, before his gaze flickers to Perzey. He turns away and starts walking.

“Follow me.”

Lowering the mask over my face, I follow. Perzey walks at my side, with a pleased smirk on her face. Her humming reminds of a song I heard playing on peoples phones and watches, when I was a college student. It has been too long for me to remember the name of it, if I ever knew it in the first place.

* * * * *

The Postmen have a private wharf in one corner of the harbor. I do not know whether they rent or own it, and I really do not care. Each time I visited Tallifer in the past, there were always four of five ships docked there. They were normally small schooners.

While Battleground ships come in every class and size of non-mechanized ship known on Earth, and some not known on Earth, schooners are the most popular ship in Tallifer. I am not an expert on sailing ships, but I do know that schooners are among the faster ones.

Trantor leads us onto a ship that is about sixty feet long. It has a crew of only ten men plus a captain.

“Sir Trantor.” The captain salutes him as he boards.

“Captain, are you ready to set sail?”

“We can sail at any time, Sir Trantor.”

“The get us underway.”

“Aye, sir.”

The Tallifer zone is an entire world, that is about 90% ocean. Tallifer Island is not the largest island, but it is by far the most populous. Twelve fixed destination teleport gates surround Tallifer Island. All of them are over the horizon, even when you are at the top of the tallest of the city's cylinders. Inside the ring of teleport gates there is no land other then Tallifer Island.

In the far north of the world of Tallifer, there an unlimited teleport gate. The only problem with an unlimited teleport gate is that it can only take you a teleport gate that you are already attuned to, and that means you can only travel to places you have already been to. I may or may not be attuned to the places I once went as Talon, since I do not know if the required attunement is of the body, mind, soul, any of the three, or all of the three.

Outside the ring of teleport gates are hundreds of other small islands, and Jinmu has made one of those his base. If Jinmu's island has a name, I do not know it, nor do I particularly care to. It is not a large island, maybe ten or twelve miles long. The west and south are mostly cliff and a small mountain. The entire island is likely the top of an otherwise underwater mountain.

A small town on the east side appears to survive by fishing and cultivating the land around it. They probably have a trading ship or two that ply the lesser routes along one or more of the trade corridors as well. Most small towns on this world have at least one such ship.

Jinmu's base is in a ruined fort, that has been partially restored, built on the southern face of the mountain. Below the fort, there is a small sheltered bay, with a pier carved out of the cliff side. The courier ship is currently moored at the wharf.

I did not recognize the people who met our ship at the wharf, but they clearly were familiar with Trantor. He did not introduce Perzey or myself, and I had no interest in making our identity known to them either.

As we pass through the fort's gate, a well ordered training scene opens up in front of us. There are nearly a hundred people engaged in small unit drills. Separated into squads of six combat adepts and one or two casters, they are engaged in drills or squad vs squad sparring. Another fifty or so people are engage in various non-combat tasks: preparing food, cleaning clothes, equipment maintenance, and one Smith forging a new sword.

A group of thirteen people are gathered in the northeast corner of the courtyard, where Jinmu is conducting strategy or tactics lessons at a sand table. According to Jinmu, the Japanese have long had the opinion that business is war. He is an expert in works on tactics and strategy, such as
A Book of Five Rings
,
Thirty-Six Stratagems
,
On Guerrilla Warfare
,
The Rommel Papers
, and
The Art of War
.

Turning his head, Jinmu sees us entering the gate. Saying something to his students, he walks toward the gate. Even though he is smiling, his expression seems a bit strained.

Stopping a few feet in front of Trantor, Jinmu nods. “Trantor. Have you been well?”

Trantor's eyes flicker in my direction, before he says anything. “As well as can be expected. We have a job, that we would like you to undertake. Our intelligence indicates that Brand will be invaluable in completing it.”

Sulius gave the impression that The Postmen have never worked with Jinmu before, but Trantor seems quite familiar with him. Something is not right, but what game are The Postmen playing?

Jinmu claps me on the shoulder. “This armor looks well made. You completed your training as a smith?”

I take off my helm and put it in my belt pouch. “I've learned everything Roderick had to teach me. We can head for Alkhalazen's Demise, whenever you're ready.”

Jinmu grins. “Then, we should have a party.”

“Wait! What about the mission?” Trantor has a confused demeanor.

Jinmu looks at him. “I am not sure we will be able to perform your mission. You are welcome to stay for the party. We can discuss the mission afterward.”

Perzey links her arm with mine, walking on the opposite side of me from Jinmu. Pulling the party charm out from under her armor, she lets it lay prominently on the impressive bulge in the chain armor covering her chest.

Trantor has a decidedly irritated look on his face as he follows.

“Tarna. Crystal. We are having a party tonight. Get everything ready.” Jinmu's words are directed at two women, who seem to be in charge of the food preparation.

“Oh? What's the occasion, Bushou?”

Jinmu puts his arm around my shoulders. “My good friend, Brand, has completed his training as Smith, and now, he has returned to us.”

Trantor stiffens, behind me. When I glance over my shoulder, he is glaring at me, but he quickly wipes the expression off his face.

The man who was forging the sword stops his work and walks over. “Hi, I'm Carlson. I'm Divine Wind's Smith. Where did you train? Who trained you?”

Carlson is red haired, freckled, six inches shorter then me, and wiry. He looks absolutely nothing like what you would expect a Smith to. Still, he has an aura of strength and power in every move.

“Roderick of Tallifer.”

Carlson's face turns cold and hostile. “If you don't want to tell me, just say so. There's no reason to lie to me.”

Perzey bristles at my side, but when I put my gauntleted finger over her lips, she does not say anything. After looking into my eyes, she tilts her head slightly, smiling.

Carlson looks ready to explode, when I turn back to him.

“Believe me or not, I don't give a fuck. I don't any reason to waste my energy lying to you.”

Carlson's eyes shift from myself to Perzey and back again. “Roderick can spot a player, when they walk in the door. He won't train players, and he won't even do work for them. You're a fucking liar.”

Why is it that some males, I am not sure if they qualify as men, get upset seeing Perzey hang on me the way she does? She is on the better side of average. Pretty, but not the kind of pretty to make most men stupid. Of course, the way she is now, you would have to be a faggot to not get a hardon just looking at her.

My grin is nasty.  “I'm not a Possessed. This my real body. I came to the Battleground from Earth by choice.”

“Do you think you can lie to me? I'm a Smith like you. I can see patterns.”

“Have you looked at mine?”

Carlson mumbles under his breath. I cannot understand the words, but it has to be his secret. A faint glow touches his eyes for a second, before disappearing. As he stares intently at me, his mouth slowly falls open.

“No fucking way! You're like Jinmu.” Even whispered, the intensity in his words cannot be missed.

“Do you know how to get back to Earth? Can you take us home?” His shout echoes from the walls of the courtyard.

My derisive laughter is louder than Carlson's shout. “I don't know and don't care how to get back to Earth. I like this place. Why would I want to go back to that fucking cesspool?”

Everyone around the courtyard stares at me. Their faces showing a various mixes of disbelief, outrage, anger and hate. You can take the Earthlings out of the Earth, but you cannot take the Earth out of the Earthlings.

Only Jinmu and Perzey have differing expressions. Perzey is thoughtful, not something I have seen much of in her before. Jinmu's face is a non-expressive mask.

“You dropped out of the party.” Jinmu sounds surprised.

“Perzey's party charm was lost. When I bought her a new one, I made a new party, since I couldn't invite her to yours.”

Perzey hold up the gem encrusted star, with a wide smile. “The first present Brand bought for Perzey.”

Jinmu looks from one of us to the other. His face has a complicated mix of emotions I cannot decipher.

“I will have someone find you a room. We will have the party tonight, but I have business I need to attend to before then.”

I nod and watch Jinmu's back, as he walks away.

* * * * *

A company member brought Perzey and I to a room. If the girl mentioned her name, I did not notice. My mind was focused on how odd it feels to be in this keep, surrounded by these people. This is Jinmu's company and the members are all his people. I am not one of his people. I do not belong here.

Inside our room, Perzey strips naked, only keeping the bracelet and pendant on. Her fingers are gently caressing the pendant.

“Perzey wants to say thank you. Brand should get naked too.”

I laugh once, and undress.

Perzey moves closer but keeps a slight distance. Her free hand caresses the scars on my chest. She does not quite meet my eyes, looking at my mouth or chin.

“Brand should feel more than pain. Brand is already strong. Brand deserves to feel good sometimes. Perzey wants … I … I am Perzey. I . . . I want to make Brand feel good.”

Perzey looks up at me, her eyes shining with unshed tears. She is trembling, and something seems to be breaking lose inside her. “Brand will . . . you will always grow stronger. Even if you have more than just pain, you will get stronger than everyone.

“I am not like Brand, like you. I want to get strong, but I am scared. I don't want to give up everything. I want to feel good. I want to be held and caressed. I want to feel love.”

Perzey's tears start to fall. “I'm afraid. I'm always afraid. You're strong, but you won't be here forever. You will throw me away, when you don't want me anymore. I am afraid of being alone. I am afraid I won't be strong enough to survive.”

The hunger, the wildness, and the madness are still in Perzey's eyes, but now, there is more. One thing is not there. The one thing that every woman or girls has is missing. Even though she is afraid, she still does not seem to be disgusted by my scars.

I do not know what to say to Perzey. I did not expected this was hiding behind her voracious need for strength. I never thought she had these insecurities and fears. I do not know where my path will take me, but I do know that I will never settle down and play house. I do not say anything.

Perzey trembles, when I put my hands on her cheeks. She hungrily returns my kiss and clings tightly to me. I sit down on the small bed and draw Perzey onto my lap. She moans as I enter her, but the silent tears are still rolling down her cheeks. I do not think we are making love. We do not love each other. Still, we are not fucking like animals, the way we normally do.

Perzey clings to me when she orgasms.

“I love you!” The fierce whisper seems to thunder in my ears, as the tears fall on my neck and shoulders.

* * * * *

Leaning against the wall in the keep's main hall, I watch the ribaldry and antics of the Divine Wind members. Most of them have already had far too much to drink or done far too many drugs. They are acting like fools. The low tables piled with food are the only furniture in the hall. Anyone sitting is sitting on folded blankets, furs, or cushions.

Jinmu had Perzey and myself seated at his table on the dais, along with his consort, Delilah, and Trantor. Jinmu and Trantor are busy discussing Thug Horde's current activities, but I am not really paying attention.

Delilah is leaning against Jinmu, who has his arm around her waist, but she is not paying attention to the conversation. She gives the impression that she is watching and cataloguing the activities of everyone in the hall, especially who is talking to who.

Five of the Divine Wind members formed a band, and they are not bad. The woman singing for them is more than plump, but her singing voice is amazing. At times others have performed acrobatics, juggling, and knife throwing to the cheers or jeers of their compatriots.

The male to female ratio in  is about two to one. Several pairs of the females seem be homosexuals and are busy undressing and fondling one another in between mouthfuls of food and alcohol. More than half of the rest of the females seem to be playing two or more men against one anther, or engaging in group fingering, licking and sucking with multiple partners. Xenia is among them, but I do not see Sigurd anywhere around.

The remaining half of the females are either paired up with a single male, or gathered in groups trying to not get involved in the sexual antics.

I notice Delilah squirm around until she can comfortably slide Jinmu's hand through the split skirt of her dress.

Perzey is wearing one of the near transparent dresses she took a liking to in Tallifer, and most of the males without any female company are eyeing her impressive tits.

*The castoffs are staring at your tits.*

*Perzey doesn't . . . I don't care. Let them drool. They cannot touch me.*

Perzey slides her hand along my chest. I am only wearing pants, boots, and a vest.

* * * * *

When I tried to dress in my normal concealing clothes, Perzey became upset. She was almost crying, while holding a vest out to me.

“Brand hides Brand's scars. Why? Is Brand ashamed? Brand's scars show how strong Brand is. Weak people hate Brand, because they fear Brand. They see Brand's scars and know they are not strong enough to survive Brand's pain. Helen was like them. She feared Brand, and hated Brand, because she feared him. Don't hide. Let everyone see how strong Perzey's man is.”