CHAPTER 103: CERIS’ REVIVAL

The village burned, and Charon walked through it like a shadow.

The clamor of battle carried without touching him, no heat, no ash, no bite of the smoke in his lungs.

The screams, however, reached him as sharply as if he stood beside each victim.

Alastor’s soldiers moved in rigid formations through the streets, their steps perfectly matched, the sound more like a clock ticking down than a march. Purple light pulsed from their chests in a slow rhythm, the glow spilling across the cobblestones in waves.

’They are perfect soldiers, built with murder and obedience as their only job. Is this what I’m supposed to build? Will my skeletons one day be like these machines, unfeeling and loyal to any command?’

He didn’t know if he liked that notion, and he didn’t know if he liked how readily he accepted a level of apathy towards it.

Instead, Charon refocused on Alastor’s minions.

He passed between them like a ghost.

His boots made no sound. His shadow did not fall.

His winces drew no eyes.

A toppled fruit stand lay to one side, the spilled produce rolling lazily in the ruts of the street. A soldier stepped through the mess without breaking pace, its steel foot smashing through apples to leave a mess behind, and causing others to bounce.

The fruit’s slow spin continued untouched.

Down the main road, a group of villagers dashed from a side street, weapons in hand. Their battlecries cut through the din, the same way it had the past five times.

"For Achlys!"

For a heartbeat, the square seemed to pause. The soldiers shifted in eerie unison, their guns raising as they aimed, then fired.

The villagers fell before they’d crossed half the distance, bodies frozen mid-motion as violet light consumed them.

No one turned. No one looked toward the man moving silently among them.

Alastor remained near the temple entrance, the priest’s body lying at his feet. Charon caught only glimpses between the shifting lines of soldiers. He held thin metal tools that looked like small parts in the large creature’s hands. Using them, he made deliberate movements, as if he were an artist with a canvas.

Further down, a child emerged from between two houses, eyes wide and unfocused.

She ran toward a figure crumpled in the street, calling words Charon couldn’t make out. A soldier intercepted her, its visor tilting slightly before it fired.

The girl was gone in an instant, leaving nothing but the faint ripple of heat where she had been.

Charon forced his gaze forward, stepping past the scene without slowing.

Shadows swayed along the walls as fires spread, but they passed over him without dimming his form. Doors slammed, shutters rattled, and here and there, the glint of a drawn blade caught the light, brief flares of defiance before another beam ended them.

From somewhere deeper in the village came a heavy, splintering crash, followed by the rhythmic shouts of coordinated fighters. Soldiers peeled away from the main force, their movement smooth and measured, heading toward the sound.

Charon didn’t follow, too repulsed by everything he had seen to force himself to witness more.

An hour passed before everything grew silent.

Alastor rose from his position, his men ordering themselves in neat rows. Something stirred at his feet, two metal hands pushing a macabre torso from the cobbles.

Gone was the white beard and long hair, replaced with a steel cap and face mask that disguised the man beneath.

’Just who the gods is that being?’

It was impossible to consider how fast he had taken a living, breathing man, excited to preach the word of their god, and converted him into another machine.

Charon would rather die than suffer such a fate.

The new creation straightened with a stiff, unnatural grace, its movements jerky yet precise, like a marionette guided by an expert hand.

The steel plates grafted to its frame gleamed faintly, each seam welded in uneven but deliberate lines. Where flesh had once been, dull silver and black metal filled the gaps, threaded with pulsing violet cords that twitched with each motion.

They spread as Charon watched, twisting around like worms beneath the surface.

He began to rub his arms and shoulders without meaning to, his hands shaking.

’This isn’t... this isn’t right!’

It turned its head in small, mechanical increments, scanning the battlefield with the same glassy detachment as the other soldiers.

The mask over its face was featureless, except for two thin slits that glowed faintly from within, hiding whatever might remain of the priest’s once-vibrant eyes.

Charon studied it for longer than he meant to, unsettled by the knowledge that moments ago, that thing had been speaking, breathing, defying the enemy with a staff in his hand.

Now it was silent, another weapon in this beast’s legions.

Alastor tilted his head slightly as though admiring his work.

The copper in his wrist joint caught the firelight, flashing once before vanishing back into shadow. His free hand flexed slowly, tendons of metal and sinew shifting like snakes beneath paper-thin skin.

The purple orb in his chest pulsed once, and the reanimated priest straightened further, falling into line with his new family without a sound.

The street around them lay still now, save for the distant pop and crackle of burning wood.

Bodies remained exactly where they had fallen, their final expressions frozen in half-formed shouts or grimaces. In some places, the ash from disintegrated villagers had settled in uneven mounds, the only marker that they had existed at all.

Charon’s eyes traced the village’s edges, taking in the ruined market, the splintered beams, the empty windows that stared back at him like hollow sockets. The mist that had once shown him the town alive had retreated entirely, replaced by the thick smoke curling lazily up into the sky.

Without the bustle of voices or the movement of life... it was just like the rest of the Dead Lands.

He lingered on the thought longer than he wanted to.

’How many times has he done this? How many towns end like this without anyone left to remember?’

The soldiers shifted again in perfect unison, their heads turning toward Alastor as if awaiting the next command. There was no impatience in their stance, just stillness.

Charon took a step back, his mind already trying to fix every detail in memory.

He had no weapon, no way to strike or save anyone, but information... that could matter. He could share it with Emerius and Annie, and pray that they had heard how this monster had died.

If he ever got out of this vision alive.

The thought chilled him, but not as much as Alastor’s next words, his tone bored and detached.

"Void protocol."

His soldiers set to work, their weapons re-energizing as they readied to fire. Their targets weren’t more survivors, but rather everything left in the village.

The corpses were burned up, their pools of blood vanishing alongside them. Fallen shop wares were treated similarly, their existence removed for some unknown reason.

Walls were blasted numerous times, converting their wood and stone into the onyx the Dead Lands were known for.

Even the temple, holy as it was, was defiled, their god nowhere in sight to save them.

Only once they finished did Alastor give it all a nod of approval, his long unnatural legs carrying him further down the road, a final command on his lips.

"Any... more survivors... are to be brought to me... we need more... playthings..."

Charon watched him leave with righteous fury burning in his eyes, happy to see him go.

The burst of thunder above brought his gaze upward, where he saw a wave of darkness cover the sky. The sun was hidden by the veil, the only light stemming from red flashes.

’So this is how the Dead Lands took this town...’

It was one question answered, but it left many more uncertain.

Like, why was Annie’s map so wrong? Why were the Dead Lands now here, where they shouldn’t be?

And where was Alastor now?

They floated into his mind and stuck there, demanding that he find answers. By the time he finally found the guts to chase the army’s commander, he was long gone, his legions marching off into the horizon.

He didn’t have time to contemplate the others for long, the pale mists returning with a vengeance, the destroyed town vanishing in its unforgiving embrace.