Not had as much time as I wanted recently to write and edit. Since it has been a bit since the last chapter, and this one is fairly long (should be the longest chapter once I edit it down), I decided to just go ahead and put out the first half.

Again, feel free to point out any errors. I always proofread at least twice once I’m down to a final edit, but I usually miss something stupid.

The second part will follow when I have time.

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Chapter 1-11: Freedom Through Blood – Part 1

No one gets in our way as we rush across the keep towards Hung’s chambers. Nyx remembers enough of the keep layout that we can make our way there without wasting too much time.

We have to slip into a side room once as we hear treading feet, but they pass us. They’re going towards the low rumble coming from behind us, to the pit. The Wilders are still quelling the slaves, giving us room to move.

We pass through the edge of Hung’s audience room, and down the hallway towards our goal. There are no forks or side paths after this on the way to his chambers.

I hand Nyx my sword. “Stay here, make sure no one follows, they’ll have to pass you to interrupt me. I need to get in and out fast as possible. If we’ve got any luck, Hung has vacated. If he’s in there… hopefully he’s a heavy sleeper.” I turn back with one more thought. “Might as well check around the throne for the control, could be there.”

She nods. “Be quick.”

Leaving Nyx there is a precaution. If Hung is still in his chambers, my only chance is to get in and out without being noticed. From what I know, I doubt if both of us would stand a chance against him anyway. We can’t afford to have one of his men alert him of the riot in the pit while I’m searching through there, I would definitely be noticed.

I slink down the dark hallway. The sounds of the riot grow quieter as I near the end. Either it’s calming down or the commotion isn’t penetrating through all this stone.

The massive door to his chambers is ajar. Good. There’s no light leaking through the crack, maybe he’s not in.

I nudge the door open more, enough to slip through. Before I go through, I peak into the room. The bed is empty and there’s no one by the cabinets. Nothing, there’s no one there. At least in the half of the room I can see.

I skulk inside, trying to make as little sound as possible. Then something stops me dead in my tracks as soon as I get halfway into the room. It’s… a voice.

My heartbeat achieves a rate I never thought it could. The pounding, thump of my pulse is loud and distracting in my ears.

Hung is here.

The giant is sitting at his massive desk, facing the wall on the far side. He makes me feel like a child walking through the castle of a giant, he’s taller than me even while sitting down.

And he’s… muttering to himself? Wait… no he’s talking to someone.

I didn’t think the Wilders had any kind of radio or other long-distance communication. Can’t understand what he’s saying, his voice is too low to make out.

Strange, his demeanor is unusually meek. He’s always radiating anger and command when he’s above the pit. I’ve never seen Hung look like this before. Who the hell is he talking to?

Whatever, doesn’t matter. At least he hasn’t noticed me yet. This room is large, with only his desk and bed near his side.

There are two very advanced looking rifles on the wall above the bed. They’re silver and finely machined. They look something like the handheld railguns the UTE military uses, but more… alien.

I saw them when I was in here before, but I’ve never seen any of the Wilders use anything like them. They’re interesting, but I don’t have time to care about them. I’m not here for those.

I need to search through the dresser and chests for the control fast, before he ends his conversation. I should be fine as long as I’m careful.

I can’t afford to make any noise as I sneak across the room. Once I’m there, my fingers dart around, searching through Hung’s belongings.

The control has to be here somewhere, it must be.

There’s nothing in the dresser but gigantic articles of clothing, one of these shirts could be used to make a tent. It’s all kept in remarkably good condition compared to what the rest of the Wilders wear.

The chests and cabinets are filled with odd items: tableware, devices of torture, pens, hides, and a number of strange metallic gadgets. These last ones look far more advanced than anything the Wilders could build. Perhaps they’re pre-awakening, like the collars and controls? Most of their technology is rather primitive, but occasionally I run across some things that baffle me.

I still don’t understand what Nyx meant when she said that, but the history lesson can wait until we get out of here.

My search is slower than I would like because I can’t make any noise. Hung may be distracted, but he isn’t deaf.

That’s all of the chests and cabinets on this side. Dammit! It’s not here, where is it?

I scan the room again, desperate to find it. When I look towards the side Hung is on again, my eyes fall upon something….

There! How did I not see it before? It’s on the chest in the corner, by the bed!

I sneak across towards it, carefully. Careful. If Hung sees me now I’m a dead man. Just have to reach my arm out and take it, simple. So simple. Just reach out, take it and….

As I reach for the control, a large drop of blood falls from my shoulder. Shit, the cloth I wrapped around my wound earlier is soaked through with blood.

Before I can do anything, the drop lands in a thin metallic vase, it hits the bottom with a loud *pang*. The sound of the metal vibrating is loud and clear. My hand stops the vibrations, but….

My blood runs cold as I turn around.

Hung’s eyes meet mine. He’s standing up, staring at me. He’s angry. I don’t think he liked being interrupted.

His hand moves up to tap his ear. “Nothing Roman, just an ant that snuck into my room.”

Hung starts walking towards me, I’m out of time, but I finally got it. Dying now would be pathetic. And dammit, if I don’t get out of here, Nyx will die too!

Some way out, there must be some way. Or something to kill him, perhaps I should have brought Nyx with me but… no, overpowering him isn’t an option. He can snap me in half.

Wait… maybe those! I have to go for it.

I point the control towards my neck and activate it. My collar pops off with a hiss. As soon as it’s off, I drop the control into my pocket and leap up onto the chest, grabbing for one of the strange rifles on the wall.

Hung stops moving when I aim the weapon at him.

“You….” A smug grin spreads across his face. “That arm, we remember you. Still not dead? Interesting, how did you get out of the pit? We did notice a bit of noise…. Told them not to interrupt us.” He turns his head to the side and scratches his chin. “No matter. What do you think you’re going to do with that?” He laughs with a hand on his stomach while he points at me. “Go ahead, shoot me!”

Well that’s not the reaction I expected. Is it not loaded? Broken? Or is he screwing with me?

I don’t know what kind of gun this is, but it should be bad for whoever is on the other end. Nothing left to do but try it. The second my finger rests on the trigger--

A robotic, female voice comes from the gun, “Gene-lock released. Activation authorized.”

It talks? This was definitely not made by the Wilders.

Hung freezes and his eyes go wide. He’s not smiling anymore. “You… can use it? That’s impossible. Are you… from the ring? Did Jophiel make you?”

I don’t respond to him. I have nothing to say to this bastard.

He glances around for a moment, mumbling to himself and scratching his head. When he looks at me again, he has an angry glint in his eye and a mad grin on his face, which reminds me again that this monster is a complete lunatic.

He stamps on the floor, cracking the stone. “ANSWER ME, BOY!”

I brace my body to fire the rifle. “Go fuck yourself!”

His body stiffens and his muscles bulge. “Fine, I can make you talk later!”

We stand there motionless, staring at each other for what seems like minutes. Hung moves to pull his pistols, but he’s too slow. The second he moves a muscle I pull the trigger.

There’s a brief electric screech, followed by a muffled sonic boom from something cutting through the air. There’s absolutely no recoil when it fires.

While there’s no feedback from the gun, whatever I shot at him tears through his torso. His right shoulder turns in a mist of blood and his upper right arm falls to the floor.

The force knocks him backwards onto the ground while the blast continues through him, into the stone wall disintegrating it and throwing up dust. The wall is left with a massive hole in it, with web-like cracks spreading outward, the entire wall looks like it could collapse any moment.

Shit, my aim was a little off. I was trying to hit him in the center of his chest. Whatever, he should bleed out from that anyway. It’s impressive that he’s still alive, twitching on the floor and cursing.

Faint light shines onto the prone giant from outside. For the first time since I arrived here I can see the wilds, dense forests stretching into the distance. Hung’s room is on the Northern end of the castle, overlooking the cliff.

In the distance I can see a huge swathe of land that appears gouged out, trees splintered and torn apart. Did this do that?

Don’t think I should try firing this again in here. As much as I want to perforate him, I might end up bringing the entire keep down around my head.

I move try to dash out of the room, as I’ve wasted enough time here already. No doubt plenty of Wilders heard that shot.

But Hung appears in-between me and the only door out, kicking it shut.

Shit! He moves faster than I can follow with my eyes, amazing for someone of his size. How the hell did he even stand up?

He’s lumbering towards me like a beast. One of his remaining arms is holding what’s left of the one I blew off. Part of his lower right arm is sheared off as well, it’s hanging limp at his side.

He’s not hemorrhaging as much as I thought he would from that wound. It looks like his blood has already coagulated, sealing it. That’s impossible; he should be bleeding out on the ground like an animal, he’s missing a quarter of his torso.

His eyes are bloodshot and crazed as he grabs for me. “You’re too valuable to let go!”

Dammit, I’ve got no choice. I point the gun at him and pull the trigger again. “Screw you!”

It cuts right through his pelvis, tearing off his left leg in the process. Guess he’ll have to change his name. That feels good.

The projectile continues past him and into the door, tearing off the hinges and turning it to dust. Then it slams into the wall of the hall, shaking the entire keep. A deep rumble emanates from all around me, and I can hear cracking.

Shit, that’s what I was afraid of, the place is coming down. The power of this weapon is excessive, it’s not meant for indoor combat. Probably not even for anti-personnel.

Time to go. I escape through the gap the projectile blew through, as the stone ceiling falls around me.

I look behind to see Hung being buried under massive slabs of stone as his room collapses. A fine grave for him.

Another large stone falls in front of me, nearly crushing me under it. The hallway is collapsing as well, no idea how much of this keep is going to fall. That last shot went through a good portion of the castle.

I break out into a full sprint to escape being buried alive.

Nyx is running down the hall towards me, she heard the noise. It would be hard to miss the sound of that blast.

I motion towards her. “Run!”

She skids to a halt while the distance between us closes. We sprint out of the hallway and into the throne room together.

The massive chamber is collapsing in on itself now, just like the hallway. Chunks of stone are falling from the arched ceiling with thunderous concussions and the huge stone columns lining the room are cracking and splintering.

We barely make it out before it completely caves in on us. We keep running, not stopping until the rumbling stops and the rubble settles.

I’m gasping for air after running half-way across the castle for my life, Nyx seems fine though. What is she, a robot?

She turns to me with an annoyed glare. “Real subtle. The hell happened?”

I tuck the rifle into my armpit and grab the control out of my pocket, showing it to her. “I got it.”

She swipes the control and uses it to release her collar, smiling as she pulls it off. “Still doesn’t tell me what happened.” She chucks the collar through an arrowslit in the wall.

I hold up the rifle. “Hung was in there, this helped.”

“Good,” she says with a grin, “they’ll have to dig his ass out. So that brought the place down? What is it?” She nods towards my weapon with her chin.

I shrug. “Not quite sure, found it in his room. It’s a weapon, but I don’t recognize it. The power’s crazy, two shots and the place was falling apart.”

“Wait… that looks like….” She runs her hand along the gun, examining it. “You shot Hung in the head with this?!””

“Uhhhh… no?” I cock my head to the side. “I didn’t shoot him in the head but he doesn’t have legs or balls anymore and he’s missing an arm. That should put him dow—“

She punches me in the gut. “You didn’t hit his head?! You idiot!”

I clutch my gut, barely able to resist keeling over. “What was that for? Hung’s dead, isn’t he?”

She stares me down. “You didn’t kill him!”

What? What the hell is she talking about? No man could survive that.

“There’s no way he’s alive! He’s buried under tons of stone!”

“The only way to kill a mad god is to cut their fucking head off, mince them into paste, or bash their brain into mush! Any other wound will regenerate within days!” She spins around in a frothing rage, like she’s about to grab and throttle me. “You missed a chance to kill that bastard!”

Nyx punches the wall with a *crack*, blood sprays out from her fist.

No… it can’t be.

I grab her arms, trying to stop her. “Stop. STOP! This place is already falling apart, stop! Calm down! You mean he’s ACTUALLY immortal?!”

“Of course he is!” She starts shaking me. “Where the hell are you from that you don’t know that? Hung and the other mad gods have ruled over this continent for 30 generations!”

Shit. I didn’t think he was literally immortal. And I certainly didn’t think he would be able to recover from wounds of that degree. What kind of monster is Hung?

At times like this I wish Cizin was a bit better at history.

“I’m not from here!” I remind her in protest.

“There’s nowhere among the satellites that the mad gods haven’t pillaged or ruled!”

“I said I’m not from here! Not from anywhere on this godforsaken rock!” I repeat, and then yell out in frustration. “FUCK! I’ll just go back and kill him again. I’m not letting that motherfucker crawl away from this.”

She grabs me by the collar before I can turn around and go back. “We don’t have time, nor can we go digging through that rubble. Do you want to bring the whole castle down while we’re in it?” My body is being dragged away from the rubble. “We’ve got to go now if we want to make it out before Hung’s men catch us and rape us to death.”

“But—“

“No. You missed your chance. We’ve already wasted too much damn time!”

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Been listening to Uzu by Yamantaka // Sonic Titan. Some very cool experimental music, if that’s what you’re in to.