“Oh piss off..”

It was the path that connected the arena entrance to the cage pit and I was at a T-junction, with my right taking me back to the arena, or my left taking me to the cages, where all the other murderous and rapey bastards were kept.

Hmm actually. Maybe I should set them loose. They may know a way to escape or at the very least, they would really fuck up whoever is left.

Originally I hadn’t even given them a second thought. Nobody apart from old Tommy and the poor lovers had shown a sliver of humanity left in them, but maybe there were a few good ones mixed in that deserved a chance.

So with little faith, I walked towards the cage pit and was surprised to see a few surviving guards scrambling about, gathering up what looked like healing supplies, a handful of weapons and packs of food.

Some of you shits look familiar...Hup, who do we have in here? Oh..

The first cage as I entered held Vamp. The cages were organised in order of people who were here the longest and that current title had been with this pale creepy fucker since I’d got here. He was unremarkable looking in my opinion, just really weird and comically vampirish.

Looks barely 18 years old, small, deathly pale skin, white hair in a dante-style middle parting.. And UGH, whoever gave him that fucking old fashioned, red, waistcoat jacket has to be the biggest comical cunt on this planet.

He spotted me and raised an inquisitive eyebrow and glanced over at the guards. His normally hazel eyes flashed a blood red, because, of course they fucking did, and he looked back at me and nodded a simple greeting.

No begging to be released. Hm. Okay Mr Cool Cucumber.

But I proceeded to let him out anyway, mainly as me having my hands full with Siya, but also perhaps he was up for some revenge. It was trivial really, as I walked up to the gate and my shields wedged themselves in between and twisted until the thick lock snapped under the pressure.

The guards didn’t even hear me doing it either, due to their haste and ambient noise from the other prisoners and the arena.

Vamp pointed at his neck as he looked at me and I shrugged and shook my head, to which he pursed his lips, twitching his mouth thoughtfully and nodding in acceptance.

His gaze landed on Siya’s sleeping face and the lingering look he gave her did not escape my attention. So I leaned down to catch his stare with a raised eyebrow and he snapped out of it, smiling apologetically and scratched the back of his head like an embarrassed school kid.

Jeez. THIS is the fabled Vamp? I thought he just LOOKED like a kid..

I motioned to the bunch of guards and he pointed to himself and then them and when I nodded, he shook his head and pointed at Siya and then himself and made a cradling motion then pointed at me and the five guards.

ARE YOU F-

Scoffing, I nearly barked out an incredulous laugh and just shook my head, rolling my eyes.

LIKE HELL am I going to hand over Siya to you kid…

Fine. I’ll do it myself.

I switched up my shield to config:ribbon and integrated surge in it, causing the pincer tip and edges to pulse and flow with a cold azure and black liquid fire. I decided to try and not make too much of a mess as I coiled the ribbon around me and unhesitantly Slipfolded towards the guards.

There was a short gasp and scream as I suddenly appeared, but they all reached for weapons and started glowing with various skills so I took that as my cue and violently uncoiled the shield ribbon. It whipped around and with a single fluid motion took care of the guards like an unhinged snake, ripping out the first guards neck, slicing the seconds face open so his jaw fell off and then the third it pierced the chest and I grunted as it lifted him up and used him as a fleshy battering ram, slamming into the fifth female guard that screamed as her dying comrade smashed into her. The ribbon flicked off the skewered guard and he rag-dolled into a cage and clattered onto the ground dead, trigger the inmates inside to whoop with joy and delight.

“W-W-WAIT!! PLEASE! DON’T KILL ME! PLEASE! I’M JUST A-P-PLEASE! I-I-I CAN H-HELP!” I swiveled to the guard woman and glared at her.

My senses alerted me to movement and without having to move a single muscle, my ribbon whipped back and snaked its way violently down, finishing off the gargling guard missing his jaw who was struggling to open a bottle of some kind.

I glared down at the whimpering bitch.

"PLEASE IM SO SORRY FOR WHAT THEY DO-D-D-DID TO YOU!"

Her guard uniform enraged me. It made me feel sick with anger. I wanted to burn anything that even remotely had the same scent, sight or taste of this wretched place. Anything that surfaced up memories of this cesspit I wanted to erase or hurt and I wanted to rip out the thoughts and images from my head and tear them to shreds with my bare hands and teeth.

“HA! Funny how you pieces of SHIT suddenly want to help me now HUH?! WHAT ABOUT BEFORE! WHEN IT WAS KILL OR BE KILLED! OR RAPE A PREGNANT WOMAN JUST TO SURVIVE!?” I felt unhinged as I bellowed out, causing jeers and more whoops to erupt from the cages. A couple of 'gentlemen' shouted out vulgar suggestions on where I should stick my shields..

“HOW ABOUT I OPEN THESE CAGES AND..AND..” As angry as I was, I couldn't help but stop, as I watched the woman, sobbing, crawling on the floor towards me, whimpering and begging me in whispers.

A betraying voice swam around in my mind, asking 'what would Marri think of you right now?' and that 'enough life had been lost' and "these people were trying to flee."

'They hadn’t killed the prisoners' - yet they didn’t try to save them either!

'But what if they were planning too' - SHUT UP!

SHUT UP!

SHUT THE FUCK UP!

STOP!

STOP IT!

STOP LYING!

STOP TRYING TO CONVINCE ME THAT THERE COULD BE A SINGLE SHRED OF INNOCENCE IN A SHITHOLE LIKE THIS!

“P-please, you n-need to move-”

THEY ARE SCUM. THEY DON’T..DEserve..to..live..

I glared at her as she trembled, looking fearfully up at me.

“You need to step away from the dead. Please. You’ll get sick and go insane. I..I’m sorry for everything they did to you..I..tried to never hurt anyone..I..only wanted to..I was too afraid..I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry..”

Dammit. She REALLY pisses me off..

"But please, I b-beg you. Y-you need to move back!"

Shifting Siya onto one arm, I held my hand out to the side without breaking eye contact in the most defiant ‘fuck you’ way I could manage. Quite a few inmates started freaking out, with the rest shouting warnings and jeers, and out of the corner of my eye, even Vamp himself had started to creep towards the exit.

The EXP pooled together and swirled, drifting towards my hand.

"Nononono! Please listen to me!-"

And as it touched me there was a chorus of cackles, fearful cries, jeers but mainly general panic.

"You'll go insane! Have you not seen them??! Please! Wait! OHH GODS NO! YOU..you.."

But as I stood there staring unflinchingly into the woman's petrified emerald green eyes.

The seconds passed and the shimmering EXP was silently vacuumed up and as more seconds passed with no obvious change in my nature, her emotions transitioned from absolute terror, to confusion, to wonder and finally shock.

"You..By the heavens-how?.. you're completely unaffected? But you killed FOUR and claimed it all.."

My shield ribbon slinked back as Vamp stepped closer, tapped on her shoulder and looked down at the woman, making her jump out of her skin.

"H-how did you-OH GODS-V-v! You're out of your cage?"

He nodded with a pursed smile at her, then looked up at me and stared.

"..What." I asked grumpily.

He pointed to the woman guard and raised his eyebrows. The inmates had changed tune and started to demand freedom, hollering and shouting at me to let them out.

"Hey keep it down, give me a second here! Oh for fuck..you can't talk Vamp?"

He shook his head and I groaned, frustration reaching a climax what with the stupid idiots barking and hooting and the bloody guard making me feel a sliver of guilt...

"Christ. I'm starting to see a pattern here-I SAID SHUT THE FUCK UP IDIOTS! OR I SWEAR TO GOD I'LL TAZE YOU ALL AND DUMP YOU UPSTAIRS!" I roared out, directed at the cages.

Most quietened down except for the classic hard man, so to set an example I switched to config:mirror and launched a single surge coated needle at him, knocking him out cold with a comical thud on the floor, doing minor damage.

He’ll be fine.

It got much quieter after that.

"OKAY. Right. You said you can help, what did you mean?" I sighed and spoke at the guard, who seemed relieved at the sight of Vamp.

She slowly got up and took off her helmet, releasing wet dark wavy hair and a soft friendly motherly face that looked mid thirties.

"Oh-um-y-yes. But..please. Please promise me you won't kill me, or send me somewhere to die when you don't need me anymore.." Her mild Italian accented voice trembled but for some reason I found it soothing.

This pissed me off because for me it was like enjoying having a terrorist read you a bedtime story and I was about to agree somewhat reflexively but I stopped and blinked at her.

Hold up. What the fuck kind of leverage would a promise give a person in these times? Hmm. Nope. Not going to trust any fucker from here, especially some desperate, snivelling-‘wah, I just want to live so I’ll send others to die’-bitch..

Hmm. Rage has really consumed me huh. Fuck.

“Nope. Not going to promise shit to you. If you can help me? Fine. But I will swear this, if you try to kill me or her-” I nodded down to Siya “-or if you try to screw me or her over in ANY way, shape or form then..I’ll...”

I trailed off as I caught Vamp staring at me, grinning like an idiot. I was starting to regret letting him out already.

..Fucking weirdo, seriously.

“Thank you. Thank you so much.” She sighed in relief and wiped her face. “Back when I realised what was happening, I wanted nothing more to do with these evil bastards..but my Sister..” She hunched up and stared at the ground. “..She..changed, after all this started, she-”

“Yeaahh don’t really give a shit. What can you help me with and hurry up?”

Her face dropped like a bag of bricks.

“I’ve wasted an entire fucking month thanks to you cunts and you think I want to hear your sob story about why you became complacent towards countless, sick, blatant humanitarian atrocities and violations? No. In fact I don’t want to hear anything else other than you telling me the best way to get out of this underground shithole - if you please..then once we’re out, we can fuck off our separate ways yeah?” I stared her down.

Very pissed off Goduyne was out in full swing now.

Vamp just snickered and covered his mouth, looking away as if he was a child who’d heard a naughty word and a few inmates started getting riled up again but a snap of an azure glowing shield in their direction reminded them to shut the fuck up.

“I-I-uhh..sorry. I..yes. Of course. Okay.” She shivered and collected herself.

“We need to collect some supplies first then I’ll lead us out. I-If the gate locks still work I can open them, but I’ve never been past the gates and I d-don’t have the right rank..b-but! that’s the only way in and out of the citadel-”

Citadel?

“Hang on a sec, citadel? Ain’t we underground? And ALSO, what's with the Truman show shit up top?” I interrupted her, confused.

“Truman show?...U-um...mm…Oh, you mean the outer shell? I don’t know much other than it keeps anything they don’t want in - out. And it covers the entire citadel. The town, the walls, the gates, the tunnels, the fields and the arena. Everything. When we first arrived, they took us to a strange big warehouse and from there we were escorted blindfolded-”

BULLSHIT. With monsters running around? Why?!

“-and we were not given any descriptions of where we were going. At the beginning, they promised food, jobs and safety. They said everything must be kept secret for our own protection, they said we’d be helping..others…” she trailed off, apparently reading my scrunched up better-not-be-a-sob-story unimpressed face well.

“Sorry.” She swallowed nervously. “Let’s grab things and go, quickly. We’ll need to take the path through the fields and then it’s a 30 minute walk to the gate. People will either be flocking there or the town. That's if the sickness hasn't reached them yet..” She stood up and paused as she considered Siya.

“Does…your friend need medical help? Is she okay?” There was genuine concern on her face and voice, which surprised me.

“Eh. What have you got?”

“Well, there's Health, Stamina and Mana potions. Julinx there-” she pointed down at ‘jawless’’ and squirmed, taking a moment to swallow her anxiety or vomit down “-h-he looted the captain's locker and took them.”

Fuck sakes..The forbidden words.

Found one of your people Steve.

That thought made a smile twitch on my face.

“Alright, I’ll take a couple of each if there’s no complaints. I’ll give her one now..please.” I nodded to her with a bit less hostility. Her unprompted sign of concern for Siya bestowed upon her a brownie point.

A SINGLE, brownie point.

“HEY MAN ARE YOU GOING TO LET US OUT HUH?”

“YEAH YEAH DON’T LEAVE US TO DIE HERE MAN!”

As she passed me a glass vial I side eyed a couple of the shouters.

“Yeah, yeah, alright keep your knickers on. In a second!” I raised my chin at them sharply, dismissing them.

“Thanks. So..Hmm. I didn’t catch your name? I’m Godu.” I frowned lightly at the woman guard.

“Oh yes. I-I’m Kate…um. Good to meet you Godu.” She shrunk back slightly, worried her greeting would offend me.

It did. Everything in this fucking shithole offends me..But I force grunted back in a lazy affirmation.

“Okay Kate. Okay. Can you undo the collars?”

“Yes. I’ll need to touch them but only Tier 0 collars.”

“Tier 0? Are there more?”

“Yes. Vamp has the only Tier I that I know of.”

Interesting.

I glanced at Vamp who just pursed his lips and hopped his eyebrows, unsurprised.

“Hmm alright then. Well, I’m going to release this rabble and you can remove their collars okay?”

She paled, an obvious objectional fear squirming inside her, but that wouldn’t stop me from releasing them.

With a few conditions of course.

She pensively nodded, anxiously looking at the cages and shuffled behind me.

Hah. Who’s the fucking guard now huh?

I sniffed and then looked around at the cages. “ALRIGHT LISTEN UP EVERYONE! Freedom time. But there’s a few conditions. Listen carefully. Translate to your friends. I ain’t FUCKING about here when I say, follow them or I won’t hesitate to put you down.”

I paused and let the severity of my words flow through them. If I didn't currently have shields sticking out of my back whilst holding a literal moth girl, I would have died of cringe at my tough guy speech. But as it stood I could easily deliver on my words and they knew it. Still, a few snickers and snorts sounded out and one little shit had the audacity to whisper “cringey old man.” but, ignoring the snide comment, I continued.

“Obviously, DO NOT touch me, Kate, Vamp but especially, DO NOT touch my sleeping friend here.”

My shields shifted into config:prime and to show I had meat in my word sandwich, I slammed the shields into the nearest cage, snapping the metal rods like toothpicks with a horrendous grating and metallic screeching sound.

“YEAH!”

“AYYY!”

“HAHA!

“YES!”

A chorus of cheers sounded out.

“NEXT, I don’t care what you want to do after you are free, but I’ll give you heads up, the audience is still fighting upstairs and there’s a shit ton of monsters. So if you want revenge, it's up the corridor, go right up the spiral stairs, then follow the passage and you’ll come out in the stands. I haven’t looked anywhere else but I’m sure there’s an armoury somewhere. So, fill your boots."

*GRRRRRRIND-SNAP*

*SCRAAAPE-CLUNK*

Moving around the room whilst talking, I systematically destroyed the gates with Kate sticking to me like glue. Vamp was crouched and looking inside a box.

“AND FINALLY, I’m getting out of here and Kate here has volunteered to escort me. Their bagged supplies are mine, looting rights and all that. So after she removes your collars, again, do not fucking touch her, go find someone else to vent on.” I stared at the group as more people spilled out and I felt weird talking like this. It made me feel detached and not me anymore, like I'd actually died and was somebody completely different.

Maybe that's what's happened..or maybe I'm just becoming a disturbed pissed off old git..

Sizing everyone up, it was interesting to note there was a mixed bag of people.Men, women, young and middle aged.

There were 48 people in total that I counted, the ones at the front were the nastier looking types, violence and murder in their eyes. The crowd's mag levels ranged from 25-43 so I felt reasonably confident in my safety.

A few people had already started looting the dead guards, stripping them down clearly ignoring my fucking words and I noticed the guy I had tasered hadn't awoken yet, still lying on the ground.

But I couldn't give less of a shit. The supplies weren't really that big a deal for me and Vamp was guarding the po-tonics anyway.

“Alright. Any questions?-Guys, jeez, come on now, they’re already dead. That’s just..ugh..” Several people were kicking the crap out of the corpse of a particular guard and I grimaced as one of the women jump-stomped on his lifeless crotch.

Okay. That's just mean..Oh lordy, will this be another stupid mistake or..

I sighed and looked around, wondering who would be the first dipshit after their collars came off.

Silence. Well. Apart from the madness upstairs.

“Alright then. Please walk past Kate if you are going up top. She’ll tap your collars as you go.” I kept a beady eye on everyone as three particularly big guys with grim smiles pushed forward to the front, looking strikingly similar.

Here we go..Dickhead brothers 1,2 and 3.

But rather to my surprise, after staring challengingly at Kate who tapped their collars onto the ground, they looked at each other, fell to the ground briefly in pain, and then jumped into a teary eyed group hug before heading off down the tunnel whooping and laughing.

Huh. Unexpected.

Vamp dropped a couple of backpacks and leaned against the wall with his arms folded as we watched everyone walk up to Kate, all staring daggers at her as she shakily undid their collars, causing them all to experience the same brief agony. And yet, not a single person tried to shank her with Majik or tear her face off, and after a mere few minutes, everyone had lost their collars and departed.

All except 4 people that stayed behind and for reasons I could only speculate, Vamp hadn’t shown a single shred of interest in leaving either, deciding to continue leaning against the wall politely looking around.

“Okay. Done. That was quick and uh, painless…” I trailed off and looked at the remainders who had stayed until last and moved back after having their collars removed..

A young woman, dirty pretty face with filthy blonde hair and blue eyes.

She looks feral.

Next to her was a young man, sticking close to her, dark haired, dark eyed. Timid.

A couple?

The final two, a mid 30s stern looking woman, dark hair and blue eyes, Bayonetta without glasses and a heavily tanned man that had mega chad-like handsome features, grinning with a grey flecked dark beard and neat hair, bushy eyebrows over dark eyes. 40s.

Another couple?..And how the fuck is his hair so neat..

They all sharply nodded.

“Thank you so much for letting us out.” The man held out his hand as he walked forward but chuckled awkwardly as Kate kept her hands down and Vamp just waved. His accent sounded Nordic, possibly German.

I had my hands still full with Siya so I just bobbed my head in greeting.

“No problem. I haven’t seen you around here before, group name?” I asked.

“None.” He looked back at the other three and rubbed his head. “We were ambushed last night. But already we’ve seen and done..” He breathed out his nose and looked down. Bogged down with responsibility. Tired. Fed up.

So no time to build up a loathing and fundamental hatred, but just enough for a day's worth of psychological trauma.

He pushed it all aside and refreshed his attitude.

“It doesn’t matter. Only, that it is a blessing that you freed us. Truly we are grateful, thank you.” He gestured to himself and then introduced the others. “I’m Kjell, and this is my wonderful wife Viki. The young lady is Erika, our granddaughter, and that strapping lad is her boyfriend Sonny. We came over for our holiday and then everything went crazy.” The others waved sheepishly except for Erika or just glowered, looking like she was ready to catch a rabbit with her bare hands and eat it raw.

Granddaughter?

Erika and Sonny looked at least 18 and I switched back and forth between her and the two grandparents in obvious confusion.

“Hi. I’m Godu. Uh don’t mean to be rude but, did you two find the fountain of youth or something?”

Kjell and Viki exchanged surprised glances and a smile.

“Hah. Yes. Something like that. I take it you haven’t seen many old folk have you?” He mused.

Well..yes..Because they are dead obviously? I nodded with a frown of confusion.

“Well, believe it or not. Young man, I’m 83 and Viki here is 72.” He folded his arms and stood there grinning. “Every day we become healthier and younger thanks to the Magi.”

Ah. That does make sense. Presume Magi is Majik.

“Huh. To be honest, reverse ageing really doesn’t surprise me..Alright. Enough chit chat. This is Kate and Vamp. Kate, let’s get a move on please. Do you four need any weapons? Healing p-..tonics? Anything?”

He shook his head. “Just want to get as far away from here as possible. I’m the only one that uses weapons but I’ll find something on the way.”

“Alright. Cool. I hear ya. Can’t wait to be out of this hellhole myself..” I looked over and saw Vamp carefully accepting a backpack from Kate who shouldered one herself.

I noted a sense of either respect or perhaps a friendship between the two.

Vamp caught me looking and gave me another chirpy smile. As if everything was hunky dory and we were just a bunch of hikers about to go on a walk.

“Well, if there’s nothing else, lead on kate. We’ll follow.”

She nodded and pulled a rectangular block from her trouser pocket and it neatly unfolded out into what was evidently a Majik pistol of some kind and marched towards the exit.

She has had a gun all this time. Also noted.

“Okay everyone follow me.”

…

..

.

We made it to the first hallway before snarls and roars echoed down towards us, giving us a hint that the monsters and possibly the corrupted were on their way.

But fortunately we went in the opposite direction, away from the arena and hurried down until we came to a similar door to the one at the arena entrance.

Kate put her hand on a particular part of the wall and the door disassembled.

"Looks like the doors still work." She flashed a smile but it dropped as the unmistakable sound of corrupted and some of the freed prisoners' screams bounced off the walls.

The hurrying intensified.

Shit. Did I warn them all that there WERE corrupted up top?

I don’t believe I did..

Whoops.

We closely followed Kate and passed through several more doors. I was at the back, mainly because I didn’t want anyone to put a knife in mine, but also because..Hmm nope, that’s pretty much the only reason.

The doors stayed open behind us as we jogged through and when I called up to Kate to ask if we should be shutting them, she reassured me they would close automatically.

However, the shrieks and periodic wails that floated down and were getting closer and louder begged to differ.

“Okay, here’s the final door!” She took a deep breath in her nose and placed her hand on the wall and the door disassembled in front of us-

“SHIT!”

“SCRAAAAAAAGHH!”

“AHHHHHHHHH!”

*THWACK-CRACK*

In the space of a few seconds, a corrupted man had appeared out of nowhere and lunged for Kate the moment the door cleared. But Vamp had blurred in front to defend her with both arms up that instantly shattered under the crushing force of the corrupted, brutally tearing his sleeves off his jacket and forcing him backwards but sparing Kate's life who had been thrust back into the other four. Vamp, as quick as lightning, rolled back with his absolutely wankered floppy arms that were like wet noodles, and righted himself onto his feet.

But instead of taking the hint, he proceeded to FUCKING SPEAR-HEAD into the corrupted’s stomach - FACE FIRST!

*CRRRRACK-CRUNCH*

There were sounds of rocks crunching as the corrupted staggered back with Kate unleashing several fast moving projectiles in the blink of an eye that sounded like metal being super cooled. They impacted doing minimal damage, but splashes of ice exploded over its eyes disorienting it, and, like a feral animal spotting a chance, I Slipfolded close and took a swipe with one of my shields with a flurry of instincts telling me ‘NO, we can’t go back the way we came. YES, we need to push through at all costs. MAYBE, putting those 5 points for III NEC was one of the best decisions you ever made. Tenfold damage and defence against corrupted right?

Unfortunately, my shields didn’t so much as give the thing a paper cut, but it was enough to snap its head back as if I’d mega slapped it in the face with a lead shovel, causing it to flop onto its back, maybe stunned? Maybe concussed?

Fuck knows but-

“SCWARRGGHH!”

More were close by and coming in fast.

“RUN! RUN! MOVE!” I bellowed out, although it wasn’t strictly needed. Kjell and his family unit hadn’t survived for this long based on luck, they already had a few metres head start kicking up dust as they continued to fully sprint off.

Kate grabbed the back of Vamp's dirty red jacket and heaved him up with minimal effort as they took off as well. I took a step forward and clutched the still unconscious Siya close as I did a short Slipfold on the spot and met no resistance as I severed the recovering corrupted man's head in half.

I raced after Kate and Vamp, with Kate struggling to get a healing p-TONIC down his throat, splashing it about, but apparently getting some success as snowy-crimson shimmer washed over him and his flaccid blackening arms started to move in time with his pumping legs and regained their ‘normal’ ghost white colouring.

Finally having a chance to look around as I ran, the sight was bewildering as I found myself out in an open plain with rolling hills and woodlands with several picturesque mountains peeking out in the back. In the distance to our right appeared to be a large town sitting elevated with rising smoke and flashing lights bouncing around its immediate atmosphere, in front of us were crop fields and root vegetable patches and to our left were more hills and woodlands. I glanced back from where we came feet thudding on the grass, and saw our small square exit embedded in a very flat wall that extended endlessly into the sky.

Which is..yup. Still a ceiling there.

The surroundings were painted in the exotic colouring of my night vision ability, indicating that it was very dark, but I could see a clear footpath framed with lit torches that led up to the town, with the town still looking like it was having a rave disco.

But we were certainly not headed there. Nope nope nope. As, for in said direction, steaming towards us were a crowd of corrupted with their yes rolling around, mouths gnashing and clothes torn and bloodied.

Nopety nope.

I leaned forward and put my legs to work.

…

..

.