Cover-Up (I)

-Valor Thann237 (I)

Cover-Up

In the aftermath, there was nothing in the world, nothing at all: no light, no darkness. There was only Shiv and a glowing mound of pristine, white dough. Strangely, he could the dough. He could feel it as if it were a part of his body, a limb that had been severed from him, but still remained connected through inexplicable means.

The Deathless tried to draw in a breath, but no air flowed through him. Yet he didn't choke, he didn't suffocate. This was a place devoid of atmosphere, devoid of oxygen, but it was bathed in vitality, in the translucent essence of Psychomancy, in an orange mana that began to suffuse deeper, igniting the dough from within.

And as the dough came alight, shining brilliantly like a new dawn before Shiv, he heard twin voices call out from the inner depths of the salt-white substance: Velly's voice was unmistakable, but it was soon joined by another.

Nornsong's voice sounded somehow broken, and the sorrow lingering inside her was in full blossom. Shiv grimaced, and once more, he had to remind himself that these were just echoes. But by the System, they were loud echoes. He could feel them, feel their wretched emotions, feel that final hit of fear and anguish that followed them just before they crossed the veil into death.

The Sage of the Enkindled Heart allowed him greater sympathy than ever. But in some ways, the skill was double-edged. Tasting another's existential hollowness and misery was not something Shiv wanted to do often.

the Fae-Knight’s voice sounded from Shiv's sigil. Shiv looked down in surprise, but it soon diminished as he remembered how interconnected skills were to their users. He didn't truly possess the skill himself; it was simply granted to him by the fae. How did these mechanics work? What limitations were there?

But it was clear that the Knight of the Summer Court was still bound to the skill and could be called upon by Shiv at any moment. More importantly, though, it might allow him to spy and scry on things through Shiv as well. He took note of that. Shiv thought to himself.

"Nornsong?" Shiv said aloud. "Can you hear me?"

A brief silence followed, but there was a shift in the air. A billowing pulse of translucent mana washed over Shiv. It was like a pathway connecting him to the dough, and he felt the presence of both Nornsong and Velly's shattered minds stronger than ever before.

Velly said. There was a lingering trace of fear and agitation in his voice. Nornsong didn't speak, but her anxiety was heightened all the same. For a few echoes, they reacted much as actual people did.

"I’m, uh… You might’ve known me as Marcus Unblood earlier. The truth is a bit more complicated than that…"

Velly repeated.

the Post-Anointed One declared.

"Constructs?" Shiv said, his patience thinning. "Is that what we're calling the dead people now?"

the fae said with an arrogant huff.

Velly suddenly asked. Velly sounded altogether confused.

Shiv didn't know nearly enough about religious theology, but based on what he experienced while facing the Ascendants, he sincerely doubted they had any kind of kingdom of glory that devoted believers entered after death. Shiv was almost about to tell them the truth on reflex, but then his Sage of the Enkindled Heart Skill triggered, and he thought twice about the burdens and perils of honesty.

Sage of the Enkindled Heart:

He did as the skill suggested and winced. There was a brittleness in the bread. There was a fragility there that told him, if he agitated or struck too much emotional discord into either Velly or Nornsong, there wouldn't be anything left in their minds. They would simply come undone and cease to be.

"Uh, yeah," Shiv said, going along with Velly's assumptions. "This is Harlock the Midnight speaking. You're in… heaven. Bread heaven. There’s some, uh, bread… stuff… happening right now.”

Sage of the Enkindled Heart:

But despite his shitty acting, it seemed that his words delivered a dose of comfort to both Velly and Nornsong.the echo of the elf whisperer. Nornsong almost began sobbing, and that made Shiv feel like absolute shit. He was taking advantage of someone else's faith, of people that, in his opinion, really hadn't deserved to—

Shiv paused.

Shiv's expression turned deadpan.

As the warm mana of the fae skill's magic spread across the entirety of the dough, two shapes began to writhe from both ends. One writhed and twisted, crawling out from the dense mound of soft and malleable white, arising to seem like a malformed version of the raptor chef. The other lingered on the ground behind him, uncurling from a mound of unshaped dough. Nornsong’s limbs were still ropy and unformed, but the vagueness of an elf could be seen if one truly squinted.

Within both their chests was a core, a core of emotional resonance, but also a core filled by the ruby-red glow of vitality, further encircled by a sphere of protective Psychomancy. It seemed that what was left of Nornsong and Velly's minds was deposited into each half of the dough. The vitality, ensuring their enduring existence, was slowly flickering away, but it didn't drain nearly as fast as Shiv's vitality golems did.

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Both of the bread-formed chefs looked at the Deathless, and they looked upon him with great confusion.

"Forgive me, Harlock," Velly said, kneeling first. "But you do not resemble any form you have taken in scripture or popular depiction."

“I uh…” Shiv racked his brain. “Yeah, you know, that's the point of being Harlock the Midnight. You want to surprise people. Stealth is sometimes also stealth when it's a disguise."

Deception 38 > 39

the Fae-Knight said, gasping with disbelief. When he spoke, however, neither Velly nor Nornsong reacted. They couldn't hear him.

the Fae-Knight said with a haughty snarl.

the Faebread nearly shouted back. caught himself.

Shiv really didn't like the sound of that.

The Anointed Knight laughed.

Shiv muttered. Suddenly, he was having mixed feelings about this skill. It might let him infuse life and activity into ingredients, but if he had to murder, harvest soul-traces from his victims using a messed-up heart-thing, and then jam those lingering remnants into a food item…

Shiv wasn’t soft by any measure, but some things felt a little far, even for him.

Nornsong lifted her head, and the dough that composed her new body receded into itself. She looked just as she was before. But still, she was undressed. Mainly because she was covered in little more than grease, bread crumbs, and cooking oil when she died. A foolish thing based on the assumption that the fae bread couldn't see her that way. There was a look of great uncertainty on her face.

Shiv reluctantly took advantage of her apprehension. Shiv cringed with every word, and from what he could feel using his Sage, the Anointed One was cringing along with him.

the fae hissed.

Shiv said defensively.

The fae shuddered.

Shiv continued speaking with the bread-chefs. "So… Uh, you guys passed the test. You're going to Heaven!" Shiv declared. "But before that, there's one final thing I want you to do. It's like a commemorative thing for how you've lived your life. You're adventuring chefs, and your cooking is pretty awesome."

“Pretty awesome,” Velly said, taken aback.

“Uh, shi—I mean, that’s what the—the people say these days, right?” Shiv tried to remember how Harlock spoke during their brief encounter. The Ascendant was one of few words and absolutely didn't sound like Shiv did right now. But who was to say what Harlock’s personality was actually like?

Shiv thought to himself.

But even with Shiv's absolutely atrocious acting, both of the fallen remnants accepted his words. They kneeled, lowering their heads before him.

"We will do as you command, Harlock. It will be our honor to serve you a final course," Velly said, looking at his hands and slowly balling them into fists. "We will be willing to offer ourselves as the final course unto you as well, for the glory of the Republic. Simply speak your will, and I will do everything within my power to see it done.”

"For the glory of the Republic," Nornsong echoed.

Shiv wondered if either of the two was this loyal in life. He didn't know them very well at all, but something told him that the bits of Nornsong's personality might have ended up inside the head chef's mind as well. They were both a little too similar to each other when it came to degrees of faithfulness.

The Fae-Knight chuckled darkly.

Shiv really didn't know how to reply to that. This entire endeavor was beginning to feel more and more questionable. Suddenly, the world around Shiv began to tremble. Everything rippled like the surface of a disturbed lake, and the orange matter spilling out from both Velly and Nornsong's new bread-forged bodies formed an aura around them.

Everything burst apart, and Shiv found himself back in his original body. His skill sigils were flaring bright on the back of his hand, and with the final splash of mana, he found himself standing before two newly shaped forms. Nornsong and Velly had rejoined him in the world. They looked as he remembered them, both of them examining themselves and looking around the kitchen.

Finally, they turned and noticed the Fae-Knight standing in his cage. Shiv tasted a surge of animosity coming from both the chefs, but he cleared his throat and drew their attention back to him.

"Welcome," Shiv said, swallowing as he tried to keep his bullshit train going, "back to your kitchen. I had this place shaped to give you that final trial of, uh, ."

"Of course, Deepest Midnight," Velly said, bowing his head. "We will do anything you ask.”

“Anything," Nornsong repeated.

Adam leaned in next to Shiv, and he asked with a voice barely louder than a whisper, "Shiv, what did you just do? Why do they think you're Harlock the Midnight?"

"I'll tell you in a minute," Shiv said through clenched teeth. He regarded the two bread beings before him and decided to set a few things straight: "Ignore the Faebread for now. He's been defeated and caged by the Republic's glorious justice."

“I am undone,” the Fae-Knight said with as much enthusiasm as a parent forced to listen to their child go through faith choir after the eighteenth false start.

Despite Shiv's rambling awkwardness, both Velly and Nornsong accepted his words with resolute bows. Shiv also caught the fairy rolling his eyes, but the eye roll froze halfway through as he realized Shiv had seen it. Suddenly, he looked down at the ground and re-assumed the role of pensive prisoner.

"Alright, the first thing I need you to do is…" Shiv gave Nornsong and Velly a look-over. "Felling hells, we’re going to need to find you some clothes. But before that, I need to… To see if you two can be baked.”

Both of the chefs snapped to attention and betrayed no hint of fear.

Velly held his head high and stood tall. "Of course, great Harlock.” Yet, suddenly, the lizard chef was unmoving. He seemed lost for a moment.

"Is there something wrong?" Shiv asked as his own worries rose. Would this be the moment where they realized he was full of shit?

"Forgive me, O Deepest Midnight," Velly declared, "but I—" And the tension in the room grew. "I don't quite recall how bread is prepared."

Shiv blinked. "You don't?"

“Neither do I,” Nornsong said dreamily. The left part of her dough-ass promptly fell off and landed on the carpeted floor.

“Well, that’s a scene that’s going to come back to me in a nightmare at some point,” Adam muttered from behind Shiv.

"The awakened are made from partial remnants and echoes," the Fae-Knight explained from his timeout cage. "They often need direct guidance and commandments. They do not possess their original skills either. Understand that you still must be the one that judges them, that leads them. They do not have specific knowledge, only bits and fragments of who they were. The deciding hand must still be you. You must command them to act!”

Shiv gritted his teeth. It felt weird ordering a spiritual echo harvested from a dead person you knew to cook itself. And then you had to actually walk it through cooking itself. But Shiv's life was nothing but weird by this point.

Drawing in a breath, Shiv began navigating the moral and ethical ambiguities of the current situation as best he could.

"Well, alright, Velly, so I, Harlock the Midnight, happen to remember how to make bread."

"That is wondrous, O Deepest Midnight," Velly said. His voice briefly became monotone, and his gaze lost focus.

Shiv thought.

"That is wondrous, Deepest Midnight," Nornsong echoed. She wasn’t much more animated.

Shiv thought to himself.

"Okay, so here's what you're going to do."

Adam tugged on Shiv's arm once more: "Shiv, what are you doing?”

“Gonna find out if I can make bread to make itself.”

The Gate Lord’s eyes grew wide. “They’re people, Shiv.”

"Yeah, well, the customers downstairs still need to eat, right? Otherwise, they'll come in to find out what’s taking so long." The look on Adam’s face got ever more incredulous. Shiv shot the bread-chefs a look, then turned back to Adam. "Would it help if I told you that these people are not really themselves anymore? Just like fragments?"

Adam looked extremely uncomfortable. “But… It still seems…”

"Well, I feel the same way, but, uh, you know, I—I just—

"You want to use them as ingredients and to bypass the Curs?" Adam asked.

"Yeah, something like that," Shiv admitted with a slight hint of shame.

Deep struggle played across Adam's features, but ultimately, he just sighed. "Well, let's see if we can make these bread people bake themselves."