Hospitality

—Ekkihurst the Sculptor375

Hospitality

“I beg your pardon, but might I ask if there is a reason why some among you are coated in excrement and the air reeks of raw sewage?” Ekkihurst’s question was innocent enough, and the vampire Legend was polite, if nothing else. From the glint in his glassy black eyes and the fullness of his mind and core, he already knew the answer.

The Greater Mana Leeches had been butchered, yet it had come at a cost. There was still a choking foulness in the air, and hundreds of slaves were dehydrated and in desperate need of medical attention. Worse yet, the surface district was completely drowned in a layer of excrement. A new sewer system needed to be installed as well, and the cleaning was going to be nightmarish.

Shiv thought.

“The geniuses in the Gate forgot to cast some anti-pest Biomancy spells.” Jessica’s scoff was one of casual annoyance. If she had no other virtues, he'd have respected her for her willingness to get dirty. Roland, meanwhile, was trying not to gag. He clearly appreciated both aesthetics and cleanliness by a whole standard deviation beyond Jessica. “They ended up pulling a rat king, and I ended up having to put them down.”

“With a sword?” Ikkihurst shuddered in sympathy. "I beg your forgiveness on the part of every Biomancer within this Gate. Truly, those who share my art have failed you deeply and entirely. And I would have come sooner if I had only known how dire the situation was.”

With every word Ekkihurst spoke, Helix' expression grew darker and darker. A primal rage was building inside the orc, one that started brewing when Shiv didn't simply order Ekkihurst to be cut down when he arrived.

It took Tulveg swearing an oath for Helix to let Ekkihurst through, but even then, he wasn't directed directly into the Gate. Instead, Shiv moved him to the Gate's oubliette and placed him in one of the rooms so that they could process him properly.

Ekkihurst submitted willingly to any measure of scan and search. He dropped his Magical Resistance so that Uva could slither into his mind. He allowed Shiv and the others to pat him down. He showed them his dimensional satchel in which he carried a series of surgical and experimental utensils. Then he did something surprising: he his body and revealed the vast, writhing dimension of flesh, bone, and meat within.

But it wasn't that his flesh magic was fused with Dimensionality or some other lore. Everything he possessed was created purely by Biomancy, and Shiv was awed by the Sculptor’s artistry. His mana field was of a bound variety, not unlike Shiv's Chronomancy. Yet it was a vibrant, ever-mutating thing infused with so much power that Shiv suspected he could spread and assimilate every bit of biomass within the Gate within seconds if he wanted—for Ekkihurst was far heavier than he looked. He had a few thousand tons to his body mass, and there was an entire realm of Biomancy hidden within him, swarms of strange and incomprehensible organisms swimming deep in his blood and marrow as an army of armies.

Ekkihurst called them his lesser children, the ones he created along the path toward the truly novel—a sort of hypothetical biological magnum opus. Though the Sculptor lamented how far he was from achieving such a goal, with thousands of Path-bearing monsters lying dormant inside his body, he was already realms beyond what even true geniuses of the craft were capable of.

As they spoke, a thing that resembled three wolf-heads attached to a basilisk’s body sprouted out from his shifting back to get a better look at Shiv.

“Ah, Cerbom! Cerbom, behave!” Ekkihurst’s chiding took effect immediately. The massive creature reeled back into his body and went dormant once more. “Forgive Cerbom; they are very excitable. They sensed your Aegis of Assimilation and thought you were a hydra. You look exactly like a person, but biologically, there are other aspects to you. Finer aspects. Not entirely human of design, I see. Hmm… An interesting enigma… Ah, wait, I understand now! You are one of Udraal’s works.”

Shiv's jaw dropped slightly. “You can guess all that just from taking a look at me?”

Ekkihurst laughed lightly. “Your creator has a very specific way of configuring genetic code, and on top of that, you have a skill that exclusively belongs to an awakened monster. And if you were a shape-shifter or a changeling of some kind, I would have sensed your nature. That leaves a narrow set of possibilities.”

The old man never raised his voice or revealed any hint of maliciousness through his explanation. Yet there was something about his mind and the coldness of his emotional core that told Shiv it was best to conduct this interview with proper backup present. And that was how Helix, Roland, Jessica, Tulveg, and Valor got wrangled into special immigration duties alongside Shiv and Uva.

“Valor!” Ekkihurst cheered as the lich entered the room as well. “It gladdens me to see that you are more yourself once again. It would have been a true tragedy for a peer of your caliber to be lost as a stone blade for the rest of time.”

Valor, meanwhile, was far less enthused by Ekkihurst’s presence. “I could offer the same reply to you. When we last encountered each other, you were a smoldering corpse skewered atop a rampart during the War of the Five. I saw Ser Ilona cleave your head from your body before crushing your skull underfoot.”

“A lamentable encounter,” Ekkihurst tutted. “But I hope you did not actually expect me to perish from so meager a setback, Valor.”

“I wouldn't exactly call getting my head cut off and then smashed on a pole a meager setback,” Shiv commented. The doubt he expressed made Ekkihurst's grin grow ever wider. His empathetic core glistened with anticipation. Though he was devoid of all things related to morality or shame, he did feel some semblance of appreciation and affability towards the others around him. If nothing else, Ekkihurst burned with a constant desire to befriend all those around him—which made Shiv ever more wary. “Most people don't really come back from that unless they're undying. Or me.”

“Or you indeed.” Ekkihurst chuckled. “Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that you perish. You only return after death, and so we are not exactly aligned in terms, are we? You don’t escape death, you ignore it. There are borders between being blessed and skilled.”

The vampire’s tone was teasing, but Shiv was too practiced to miss the subtle arrogance that glowed within Ekkihurst. Where Longinus was bombastic in self-presentation and uncontrolled in his urge to declare his greatness, it was a quiet and insidious emotion in Ekkihurst. He wanted you to be aware of his mastery over Biomancy, but he never really pushed; he always just hinted, and his ego was so dense and unreachable that Shiv doubted that either insult or threats would shake his demeanor.

the Harbinger earned.

But the prospect of a direct battle against the Sculptor caused Shiv’s instincts to coil. Where he thought he had even odds against the most brutish of the Dragon-Brokers, his battle-lust curled like a dying insect when it came to Ekkihurst. There was something about him that inspired the same kind of intuitive foreboding Shiv felt toward Hymn.

That was the miserable thing about facing someone who was built on a foundation of healthy arrogance: They never betrayed themselves or their capabilities, and ignorance before a dangerous foe was a terrible thing.

“Oh, do not be so severe, Deathless!” Ekkihurst laughed like an old and gentle man, much like how he portrayed himself. But Shiv knew better—even Master-Tier Biomancy allowed a skillful practitioner to nullify the physical symptoms of aging indefinitely. To Ekkihurst, the flesh was but a canvas. and thus everything about his physical form was by design. “I do not intend you violence. I come seeking to challenge the Vicar’s spite against our good man Roland Arrow.”

Roland’s eyes narrowed at the fang-filled grin Ekkihurst fixed him with. “I don’t think I have ever heard your like proclaim kinship with me.”

Ekkihurst sighed—and his mournfulness was genuine. “True and tragic. But we are kindred. Especially for what is to come.” He regarded Shiv once more and shook his head. “I heard it was a decade not many days ago, but now I see the Incursion is less than two years away. So much acceleration, caused by a single individual. I must offer Udraal my congratulations on what he has achieved with you.”

“Rather you didn’t,” Shiv grunted. “Rather you’d just try and kill him instead.”

“Ah. Neglect and poor relations.” Ekkihurst clicked his tongue l. “Shameful, but expected. I suspect he has a great many more works like you—or made in your image, now that you have proven successful.”

The very thought filled Shiv’s stomach with wrathful fire. Imagining Udraal somewhere out in wider integration, creating more Deathless Pathbearers—ruining more lives to make Omenborns that would be hated and scorned by those around them—made Shiv want to butcher his creator with hateful slowness.

“But I reiterate: I am here to face the plague and see about acquiring potential students.” Ekkihurst locked eyes with Tulveg. “And since one of my greatest disappointments speaks so highly of your willingness to suffer any horror, to sculpt the body in any fashion for an advantage, I thought I simply had to see you with my own eyes.”

Shiv Psychomantically connected to Tulveg using his Harbinger. he asked.

Tulveg muttered.

Shiv cut him off.

Tulveg seemed genuinely regretful, and with each exchange, the Legendary vampire felt ever more like a kicked puppy to Shiv for some reason.

Shiv pinched the bridge of his nose. “Alright, Ekkihurst—ah, would you like me to call you the Sculptor instead or something?”

“Whatever you prefer. Titles are superfluous for a student.”

“Okay. Great. A few things: One, this Gate is manned by the Arachnae Order and forces from Weave—”

“I will swear an oath to see my Biomancy sundered if that would fill them with reassurance,” Ekkihurst interrupted. “I understand that relations are foul between my kindred and our… mistake.”

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Uva’s voice echoed through the room, drowning the atmosphere with a psychic chill.

“Yes,” Ekkihurst said smoothly, “mistake. We have the capability of making creations of cellular design to serve us in so many ways. The art is inherent to us—at all our fingertips. Yet so many of those through whose veins flows the blessed ichor are determined to cling to their mortal tastes and desires. But what good can come of demeaning another creature but the souring of one’s own ego? Slaves hold little purpose when servants can be shaped from the ground up. There was no point in enslaving you. There was no point in creating you to begin with, in my opinion, for the pain we inflicted on your kind in turn became an atrocity of degeneration upon ourselves.”

Uva’s Psychomancy strings were drawn taut with twitching disbelief. She didn’t know what to be outraged by—and struggled to process his worldview.

“Oh, yes, philosophically, I of course cannot possibly claim that,” Ekkihurst agreed immediately. “I just mean that mechanically, evolutionarily, and practically, there was no reason for your kind to be made. That is our mistake. Your continued existence, however, is a matter between you and the Composer.”

Feelings of untrammeled dissonance went off inside Uva like a chain of bombs.

“Indeed,” Ekkihurst said, though he looked confused as to where she was going with this.

“Well, I had need of subjects to further my art, and I have studied individuals of every race to be found in our world and many more. Worry not that you and the Composer’s children were singled out in any way. It was not a malicious thing, but one of learning and enlightenment.” Ekkihurst fell quiet. “I refused to go too deep into philosophy, for my current Master-Tier insights have proven grim. Do you know the statistical odds that you will live a life of unparalleled misery upon being born in Integration? Too high. Far too high! And to be Pathed as a Slave from birth or taken by my Kindred is an unkind fate indeed—one that might be inescapable for so many.”

Shiv's mouth was open again. “Your justification for torturing hundreds and thousands of people to death during your experiments is that you… stopped thinking about it philosophically after it made you uncomfortable?”

“Ah, no, you are misunderstanding again—and I elaborated poorly. I experiment on various organisms because it is convenient and I wish to learn. A vampire’s body is too resilient against permanent change to fully uncover the secrets of blood and flesh. The philosophy aspect is simply a matter of personal discomfort. It is the same reason why I sculpted my pre-frontal cortex to render my empathy conditional.”

Shiv didn’t have the words.

“This is pathetic,” Helix interjected. All heads turned to him, and he gestured animatedly at the vampire. “What? It is! A true Biomancer would never need to alter their own brain to enhance their passion for the art; the passion would have always been there!”

“Ah, yes, I believe you are committing a fallacy, fellow student,” Ekkihurst said. “And you are also putting the mental before the material, when it is the brain that determines the shape of the mind.”

“You test me in biology?” Helix was a tea kettle on the verge of exploding.

Ekkihurst winced in discomfort at the orc’s emotional instability, but showed no fear otherwise. “I do not doubt your interest in the subject, but something has clearly compromised your judgment for you to make several outright fallacious statements. For one, using my art to reduce an operational deficiency is nothing if not itself an expression of how glorious Biomancy can be. Why, how many other individuals can use their magic to alleviate the emotional inflammation they suffer from performing necessary actions?”

“Necessary,” Roland breathed, aghast.

“You dare accuse me of being emotional! I’m not emotional! I’m not!” Helix’s gray face got impressively close to a cherry red as he began to physically tremble. “Insul! Throw him out! Reject his request for hospitality! He is clearly an amoral monster—a danger to this Gate and all those who dwell inside it. To let this psychopath inside is to put everyone at risk! Who knows what calamities his presence might bring—or who he might hurt!”

By the time Helix’ diatribe ended, all eyes and senses in the room were locked to him. Tulveg coughed, suffering increasing doses of secondhand embarrassment. Roland, already infuriated by what the Challenger had done to his son, glared at the orc like he was some kind of roach demanding the local termites be thrown out.

Ekkihurst, meanwhile, frowned. “I do not appreciate those words. They were very hurtful, and I do not think I deserved them. I was nothing but cordial to you.”

“You challenged me!” Helix screeched. “You, with your perfectly regenerating body and your lack of consequences! What do you think you know of Biomancy!”

“Not nearly enough, and if you are a proper student of the art, I know you would say the same.”

“I…” Helix’ anger came to an abrupt pause as he struggled to rebut that statement. “I feel it more than you do!”

“Well, that’s good, then.” Ekkihurst nodded once. “I am glad that you have such a lust to learn—that hunger to grow! My joy goes to you. But I still remain confused about where your animosity originates.”

Helix’ right eye was twitching as he struggled to articulate just how much he hated the Elder vampire and why.

Which gave Shiv an idea. A terrible, vicious, bastard of an idea. “Hey, Helix, new plan: You'll be in charge of assuring Ekkihurst’s moral behavior while he's in the Gate. Ekkihurst, you will make sure Helix doesn’t do anything bad, and he’s allowed back in too. Both of you are going to swear a skill-pact with me, and if either of you breaks this thing, then it’s bye-bye Biomancy.”

Scheming Bastard 24 > 25

“W-what!” Helix wailed.

“Most acceptable!” Ekkihurst declared without hesitation. “Although I would like some reassurances on your end as well—namely, that my research needs are supplied. Eh, I understand you have slaves here too?”

Several people drew in sharp breaths. Shiv held up a hand, holding their words and fury at bay. “No. Not slaves, but you can experiment on me.”

Suddenly, the Sculptor’s eyes came aglow. “Truly? You mean this? You would submit yourself to be my altar of knowledge and metamorphosis?”

“Yeah?” Shiv replied, unnerved by Ekkihurst’s enthusiasm.

“Then, all things are settled! You will have me here under whatever conditions you desire as host—within reasonable boundaries, of course. Ah, we will do great things together! Great and incredible things! The works we will make and the knowledge we will obtain from our trials will redefine the nature of Biomancy and our understanding of life and evolution. Perhaps we will return to the peak of the ancients—exceed it, even! So many exciting things lay ahead! Ah. But I must contain myself. Quick, quick, begin the skill-pacting ritual. I consent. I consent.”

Helix folded his arms as he stomped across the room, shouldering both Jessica and Roland aside. “Insul! This… this is an outrage! I am the one who will show you the ways of Biomancy, not some… demented bloodsucker!”

Ekkihurst’s eyes lit up—but from understanding rather than offense. “Ah! It is jealousy that has made you respond so viciously. I understand. I do not desire to steal the Deathless from you. After all, it is best that a student has multiple masters, so that he can pluck the ripeness of their virtues and avoid the rot of their flawed fruits.”

And the way Ekkihurst shrugged off Helix’ anger only needled the orc ever deeper. “He is clearly pursuing some manner of demented scheme. How else can he be so gleeful!”

“Helix,” Shiv said, patting him on the arm. “I know that you’re suspicious. And I know you hate vampires. Practically everyone in this room hates vampires—we get it.”

“Eh, I do not,” Ekkihurst noted. “To hate a culture for its ill developments is understandable, but racism and species-based prejudice are terrible qualities to develop. It is also redundant, for through targeted eugenics, everyone can be made better. Except for automata.” The Sculptor’s lip quivered in true sympathy. “There is nothing I can do for the inorganics. Such a horrid, horrid fate.”

“Didn't you just say racism is bad?” Jessica asked, confused.

“Yes. It is. I do not judge the poor mechanoids and unbiologicals. I feel sorry for them. I also wonder how sapient they truly are, for the functions of their consciousness clearly work differently from mine.” Ekkihurst squinted, as his thoughts led him to new and questionable territory.

“Holy fuck,” Jessica muttered as she pressed a hand to her face. “He’s one of those.”

Uva ground out over their link, gagging on her very emotions.

Shiv replied.

Uva’s discomfort, again, was understandable. But he didn't feel that there was a choice.

She saw his point, but where her mind was pulled toward him, her emotions remained pinned in place by a lifetime of conflict. A faint trail of enkindled fire formed around Uva’s mana threads, and she let out a gasp of discomfort.

Shiv snarled.

she answered—and after a beat of hesitation, she let out a disgusted scoff.

A heaviness descended upon Shiv—a weight he didn’t much enjoy bearing, but needed to accept.

She still didn’t want to agree, but his points stood: Who else were they going to throw at the plague victims? What else could they do for Adam right now? He felt her relent in silence, but knew she would be watching them carefully as well. Shiv didn’t blame her. Especially after what happened with the Challenger.

“Alright,” Shiv said aloud, facing the others. “I think we should call Still Water here, and if we get a final say-so from her, Valor, can you do the honors of doing the skill pact? Because I want Ekkihurst to take a swing at the plague as soon as he can.”

“Certainly,” Valor said, considerably less worried than anyone else in the room. That didn’t mean he was without tension. “Legend-Sculptor Ekkihurst.”

“Yes, Legend Valor?” he asked innocently.

“I want you to know that you will be on your finest behavior here. And that if any of your actions offend, I will see you split not of flesh, but of soul, and deprived of that which gives you joy. We know each other. I say no more. This is not a threat. This is simply how things are to be.”

And though Ekkihurst’s face remained cheerful, in Shiv's eyes, a very visible chain of fear extended out from him back to Valor—a chain made from corrosion. “My oath to you as well, Legend Valor. To all of you.” He then tilted his head and smiled brightly at Roland, displaying his fangs. “Now. While we are under the miseries of bureaucracy, describe the conditions of the sickened to me, Legend Arrow.”

“Master Arrow,” Roland corrected.

Again, no change came over Ekkihurst’s expression, but his heart churned with ire. “I have one request—one besides my need for subjects and a place to test them: Please don't lie to me. There's nothing I hate more than a liar. And we all know you are no mere Master. There is no room to play pretend among equals, Legend Arrow. Now. Describe the sick, so I might see about tearing them out of death’s embrace.”

A mana-warded circle, two skill-bindings, another rant from a furious orc about why vampires will never be true Biomancers, and two elite Umbral guards assigned to “service and monitor Ekkihurst’s every need” later, the Sculptor descended into the bowels of the Perch and took his first stop at Isabella’s bedside.

There, he said nothing while Helix fumed at him, muttering ceaseless hisses of outrage and loathing under his breath. Instead of casting spells right away as Shiv had expected, Ekkihurst merely observed Isabella as she shivered and coughed, her lungs shriveling inside her chest, barely able to sustain her need for oxygen, her other organs faring no better. Her body temperature spiked to searing highs and frigid lows every other second.

The others in the room were no better off. All who were touched by the sickness seemed destined for ugly ends.

Time dragged on. Ekkihurst continued his silent examination while Roland and the two Umbral guards loomed over his shoulders—towering over the vampire’s almost imperceptibly, but still actively shrinking height more every few minutes.

the Harbinger said.

Shiv grunted.

A sudden chortle broke the silence. Ekkihurst threw his smooth head back and laughed. “I cannot cure the entirety of this plague. Well done, Vicar Sullain.”

Roland let out a gasp of sheer misery.

“Yes! He shows his incompetence immediately!” Helix pumped his fist.

Outside the room, Shiv caught sight of Tulveg, who frowned slightly, clearly not expecting this.

“But I can keep them from dying,” Ekkihurst added.

Shiv felt as if he had been flung off his feet only to be picked back up and dusted off. “Sculptor, can you elaborate?”

“Oh, Sullain is a genius—this is beyond my ability to dispute now. His knowledge of the lores is substantial—”

“Was,” Shiv said. “He’s dead. Udraal made sure of that.”

Ekkihurst winced in pity. “Ah. What a terrible waste. I would have loved to sift through his brain and the knowledge within.”

“You would have never gotten the chance,” Roland said grimly. “If Udraal didn’t slay him, I would have.”

“So much hate, so much waste,” Ekkihurst mused. “Emotions are kindly servants but dangerous masters. Ah, but my opinions aside, though his mastery of the lores was potent, he was not dedicated to the art of the flesh. This plague is a shifting contagion of three main parts—it has aspects of all the lores, but it affects the victim’s flesh first before damaging their mind, while being rooted in their souls. With how layered Legend Sullain's spell-shaping was, I cannot break the working without causing a catastrophic result. But I can impose my own spell upon them. A plague to eat a plague, so to speak.”

“You’re going to hit them with another plague?” Shiv blinked in disbelief. “ your solution?”

“HE’S A QUACK!” Helix cheered.

“Ah, not quite a plague, more like an enhancive bio-virus that allows the body to counteract all the negative symptoms mid-stream. I am certain I can disrupt and reverse the physical damage Sullain has done to this child and all the other victims. Their bodies will function, and they will return to full health with the right nutrition and chemicals. However, there is little I can do for their souls and the expression of their minds beyond the purely neurological. My limits are of the flesh and the flesh alone.” Ekkihurst sighed. “Sullain is a tragedy. A mind so brilliant as a mage, it would take three average Legends of their respective lore to match him in each. But so ruined by his broken heart that he deprived others of life—and himself of eternity in the end. He should have committed to the art. He should have done what I did.”

Ekkihurst shook his head. “It is a wretched thing, being a slave to your own biology. A terrible thing indeed.” The awkward silence lasted a few heartbeats longer before Ekkihurst perked up, demeanor switching in an instant. “Deathless! Hero Helix! Tulveg! Would you like to assist me in the creation of this new spell?”

“Me?” Shiv grunted.

“Assist?” Helix said, on the verge of turning into the first orc tomato in Integration.

Tulveg just cringed. “If I am to recall, Master, you cast me out for my lacking commitment.”

“Ah. Yes. I recall. But now things can be different. Yesterday has passed.” Ekkihurst smiled even more broadly than any of the times before. “Today is a time to make something new! Of ourselves, and the situations that abound. So. Let us begin with this great work.”