Dawn in the Fourth Sector was terrible.
The air, thick from magical smog, seemed like a suspension of lime dust and burnt wool. Every breath scratched the throat.
I was dragged out of the dungeons like defective cargo.
Two guards in faceless steel masks gripped my elbows and hauled me forward. My feet barely touched the stones; the shackles made of cold iron felt as if gravestones were tied to my ankles.
This iron was the curse of the Order. It sucked out heat (a good development let's take it remembered).
I felt the cold crawling from my wrists up my forearms, turning the blood into thick prickly ice. But...
I caught myself on a thought that would have scared me a week ago: I wasn't afraid.
My pulse was steady. Palms didn't sweat. The feeling is excellent.
"I want you all to die," — this thought got stuck in my head.
This bloodlust was the only thing that gave me warmth in this icy morning.
As always, the cart was waiting in the center of the courtyard. I was thrown onto the dirty straw, stinking of old urine. The impact echoed in my ribs with a sickening wave.
Opposite me sat Richter.
He gripped the hilt of his sword so hard that his knuckles turned white.
"You don't even imagine how much I want you to twitch," rasped Richter. His voice was dry. "Give me a reason to puncture your lung. I don't care about Kane's protocols. I just want to wash your stench off me."
I remained silent. I felt Zeno's key gripped in my fist — a tiny fragment of steel, on which I pressed so hard that its edges cut through the skin.
Words of Zeno immediately flooded my head:
"Save yourself, kid. Don't worry about me, just run not looking back. Run."
"But my escape equals your death! I can't do th..."
"You can," he cut off. "Don't think that I will also just hang around here for nothing," a thin smile hung on his face. "Let's meet there, in freedom! Iron."
Zeno... why... — stung a fleeting thought.
The cart jerked. The screech of ungreased axles bit into the skull, as we rolled towards the Whispering Rocks.
An hour passed. Maybe, two.
The only anchor of reality remained the dull glint of Richter's blade in the gloom. Every time the wheel hit a pothole, he flinched, and the point dangerously approached my throat.
The skill tried to break through the suppressing field of the lead walls and shackles, every impulse felt like an electric shock to the base of the skull.
"In the Central Block they won't just put a Seal on you. Kane will cut out those parts of your brain that are responsible for 'want' and 'don't want'. You will walk. Breathe. Even use your cursed magic on command. But inside? There will be emptiness. Absolute silence."
He leaned slightly forward, curling his lips:
"And honestly speaking... I envy you. In this hell, silence — is gold."
I looked into his dilated pupils. He was at his limit.
"My first impressions of him were wrong," I pronounced mentally.
The air outside changed sharply. The hum of the wheels became voluminous, reflecting off invisible stone walls. We entered the canyon.
The pressure in my temples jumped. The shackles on my hands emitted a thin, barely audible glassy ring. The suppressing field collided with the chaotic energy of the mountains, and the system glitched.
The numbness in the fingers was instantly replaced by searing pain — blood rushed back into the deadened tissues. It seemed, thousands of glowing needles were driven under the nails.
My face remained stone.
Using this moment of weakness of the field, I began slowly, millimeter by millimeter, to insert the fragment of the key into the keyhole of the shackles. The lock was jammed with hardened dirt. Metal scraped against metal.
Richter caught the movement. His gaze darted to my hands.
"Hey! I said — do not move!" he barked, and his face twisted with rage.
The point of the sword poked into my shoulder, piercing the fabric of the jacket and going into the flesh.
"Hands! Show the hands, scum!" Richter lunged forward, raising the blade for a real, hacking blow.
At this moment the cart jolted.
The wheel fell headlong into a deep crevice in the stone road. Richter was thrown right at me, his sword hit the lead floor, striking a shower of sparks.
This is my only chance.
The lock jammed completely, and I lacked the strength of numb fingers.
Then I leaned in with all weight and intentionally twisted my own thumb, breaking the joint, to create an ideal biomechanical lever.
The crunch of bone drowned in a loud metallic click.
The heavy iron of the shackles parted, freeing the wrists.
But instead of relief followed. Chaos.
Without the suppressing field, mana surged. [Will to Live] howled. The world before my eyes instantly flashed gray-white.
Mana flooded the channels. The skill gripped the nervous system. Trying to prevent critical points.
Richter piled on top. His heavy armor pressed me into the lead floor. I heard a dry crunch — another rib, damaged in the reactor, finally gave up.
"Creature!" he growled, spitting saliva in my face.
He had no room for a swing. He hit with short, stabbing blows, trying to nail me to the floor. The first blow slashed along the side, the second plunged deep into the thigh. My mouth opened in a silent spasm.
The pain should have switched off consciousness, but [Will to Live] didn't allow it. It forcibly reshaped my neural pathways, ignoring the overloaded receptors. And, what is the most terrible, I didn't care about this pain.
The chain, still dangling on my ankle, whipped around Richter's leg.
"Point of support. Lever. Application of force."
I jerked with all my might, putting the whole weight of my body into the movement. Richter's joint twisted out.
I reached his neck. The fingers barely bent, but I forced them to close on his throat. Come on... break...
"Hey! What do you have there?!" — the voice of the driver reached from somewhere outside, through the hum of the wind.
The cart skidded. Through the gaps in the back awning I saw how the gray wall of the canyon goes into nowhere. Richter backhandedly struck me with a steel-bound elbow in the temple.
"Your... Order..." I rasped, spitting blood onto his visor. "...will die..."
The Whispering Rocks woke up.
Search spells of the Order already slashed the canyon — they detected my colossal release of mana.
"Brake!" frantically screamed Richter, realizing that at such speed the cart will simply crash into the abyss.
I looked at the rear flap. Behind it was only emptiness, hidden by fog.
"Nine chances out of ten — lethal outcome. But this is my chance."
I let go of Richter's throat, grabbed his own sword lying on the floor and, when he tried to cling to my jacket, drove the heavy crossguard of the hilt right into his face.
Sounded the crunch of breaking bones. Richter recoiled, pouring with blood.
I stepped back forward. Straight into the void.
The icy wind knocked the remains of oxygen out of the lungs. I saw how rapidly decreases the cart, wrapped in the blue smoke of the Order's alarm.
And then — impact.
Against a stony shoal.
The left shoulder took upon itself all the kinetic energy of my weight. The joint was smashed into splinters.
[Will to Live] issued a critical error, saving the brain from pain shock. In the eyes it became absolutely black.
I rolled down. Sharp stones tore muscles, prickly bushes lashed the face.
The skill burned out its reserves, to keep my spine intact.
From above, through the howl of the wind, screams reached.
I spat dirty silt out of my mouth. Clinging with the only healthy hand to the slippery, moss-covered stones, and crawled forward.
After a while, a thought struck me:
“If Richter had his entire arsenal, like at the Pass — there would be nothing left of me.”
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