CHAPTER 565: BLAKE IN THE EAST

Blake Nimitz wandered through the ‘holy city’ of the Eastern continent, his mind split into five parts. His patron god, Psion, had gifted him with a divinely enhanced ‘Partitioned Mind’, and exploring it had already been revelatory. Transformative.

Each section of his five part brain wasn’t ‘20%’ of the whole. He had become more, greater than the sum of his parts. The ability to circumvent his ‘command’ function, to delegate sections of his perception and mental calculating, free’d him to focus on more than one thing.

And so he began to understand his synthetic overlord in a way he couldn’t before—a slow comprehension of how the mind of the robotic god might work.

Of course a man’s brain was a divided thing, too—a collection of neurons and glial cells, of lobes and layers and stems. But there was a completely dominant, central control.

It was that command function that blocked out the noise and kept one’s thoughts and perception focused. It was the reason men (and likely many animals) thought of themselves as ‘I’ and not ‘we’.

After all, wasn’t a human being really a collection of genes? But that isn’t how they thought of themselves. They identified solely as the central function that controlled their conflicting priorities.

But not Blake. Not anymore. As he walked the dirty streets of the holy city, his Mental Influence drifting from person to person, he had learned to delegate the functions of his mind.

A pretty girl distracted his eyes. His stomach grumbled. He was worried about his brother and his orc lover Ilya back in her tower. But every distraction went into a new mental box, locked not with shaky will or temporary distraction, but with certainty. Like computer files locked in a new folder.

He could also use several powers at the same time. He could think about multiple things and jump between them at will. He could take away his own emotions, like his fellow player Annie with her ‘void’ power, except he could return them just as easily.

He felt in control. Truly

in control. For the first time in his entire life. He felt like a god.

Yes, he could have sworn he heard ‘Psion’ whisper in his ear. They begin to understand.

They. Not ‘he’. Was he still Blake at all? Was he a handful of Blakes? How many times could he split before he lost track of his ‘command function’ entirely? Before all that was left was a collection of parts? Of ‘subsystems’?

Who would make the decisions, then?

The thought sent an existential shiver down his spine, and he squished his Partitions back towards the central core. The physicality of his own existence returned, and he blinked and licked cracked lips. His feet and back ached. He ran a hand over his sweating forehead and scalp.

The East was hot and dry like a desert. There were busy people everywhere, with civilian and player (and the occasional undead monstrosity) in guard uniforms on every street. The walking corpses stunk like rot.

Apparently, at least according to Blake’s new civilian lover and servant Carla, they’d arrived a few weeks before, a silent army ordered in the gates by the emperor himself. No one in the city was happy about it. But they all kept their mouths shut.

Emperor Jeong was firmly in control here, and his people had long ago stopped questioning their emperor out loud. Blake saw a city of misery and fear, the barest façade of normality plastered over every face and business.

But his brother Mason was coming. Blake had seen enough thoughts to know that many welcomed it. That anything would be better than Jeong and his cronies in charge. Others, though, were equally afraid of ‘The Wolf of the West’. They’d seen the videos from the Neutral Zone—seen Mason’s wolf eat a man alive, and even his shapeshifted jaw chomping on a player’s face.

Death by fang wasn’t the greatest PR. But Blake was confident they could turn things around. He had several ‘servants’ working for him now, finding Jeong’s civilian ‘zombies’ that he somehow used to fuel his power. Blake intended to find them all, and then find a way to disable them in the critical moment.

It was only a matter of time. But time was a thing Blake may not have much of. He felt the imminent clash coming in his bones. Smelled the danger and inevitability like salt in the air. Mason was coming for a fight with Jeong, and only one of them was leaving alive. Blake had to put the odds in his brother’s favor.

It was these thoughts in his mind as he detected a familiar presence and froze. He had walked all the way to the ‘Palace of Man’, Jeong’s patron hall and fortress, doing his best to spy on important minds without being detected.

It only took a moment’s work and thought to scan the list of his Mental Influence targets. Blake could see through the senses of anyone his mind had ever touched, and he drifted to his Korean lover Seul-ki even before he saw her name light up green.

She was here. She was close. He swapped to her eyes, curious if she had some kind of mental power that might stop him.

“You’re from where?” said a player guard at the front of the palace.

“From the West,” Seul-ki answered, looking up at the larger man. “I’ve come to speak with the emperor.”

“No one speaks with the emperor.” The guard didn’t sound impressed. “Go and put your petition with the Office of Civilians. First floor, admin building. That way.”

They went back and forth until Seul-ki managed to explain in several ways she was a defector. A person of interest. A source of information. A spy.

The guard got his superior, and Blake’s heart pounded in his chest. But he didn’t move or try to interfere. He didn’t understand what was happening or why Seul-ki would betray him. Had she taken his…sudden departure so hard? All she had to do was wait, to trust him. He’d never lied to her about anything important. She was his ally. His lover. His…friend?

But Blake Nimitz was not a man to panic. He understood lies and chaos and betrayal. And so, like the synthetic overlord he felt he’d begun to understand, he waited. And he watched.

**

Seul-ki stepped through the beautiful marble halls of the Palace of Man, an armed escort all around her. The East had both player and civilian guards, which was very strange but also logical.

Players couldn’t hurt civilians, after all. A determined civilian might therefore simply run right past them, or even harm another civilian in their presence, without ‘triggering’ their viability as a target, depending on whom they hurt.

She was surprised, though, to see some of the civilians glow with ‘civilian killer’ aura. There had not been any civilians murdering civilians in Nassau, and she hadn’t known it existed. One of the men beside her had an aura so thick he glowed blood red like Mason.

“The emperor won’t see you himself,” said her player escort, an older man wearing Jeong’s House colors. “But Minister Michael will be more than happy to listen to everything you have to say. He will decide whether or not you’ll…”

“I apologize for the misunderstanding,” Seul-ki said, stopping. “I will only speak to the emperor. What I have to say is for his ears alone.”

The bald, grey-haired warrior stared as his teeth clenched. His eyes flared with another identification power, and again Seul-ki allowed him only to see her civilian mask. She doubted he was worried for the emperor’s life. But he would have procedures, and multiple masters. And to make a mistake in a place like this, it could mean the end of his career, or his death. Seul-ki had to make it easier. More tempting.

“The emperor will be extremely pleased to hear what I have to say about his rival. I will be happy to tell him who he has to thank for his good fortune. The man who wisely broke protocol for his benefit.” She gestured at the gold plated ‘Captain Rodrick’ name tag on the man’s uniform and smiled.

The captain met her eyes and stared. After a few tense moments, he turned crisply and barked at the others to follow him, and led the party down a different hallway. Seul-ki’s stomach fluttered and she tried to gather her thoughts. The meeting would not be easy. But she believed it was still the best chance of a safe outcome.

For her, and for Blake.

They led her to a simple wooden door with no indication of importance. The guards spread out and Seul-ki saw a bead of sweat on Captain Rodrick’s temple. His mouth moved silently, as if he was rehearsing in his mind. He finally knocked.

The door opened so quickly it was as if someone had been waiting. Yet there stood the Emperor of Mankind in a simple robe. He blinked and stared at the captain as if he didn’t understand the situation. The man’s mouth opened and closed like a fish as he licked his lips.

“Sorry to bother you, emperor. But…I have a civilian. From the West. She’s asked to meet with you personally. She said you’d…”

“Do you have proof she is who she says she is?” Jeong’s eyes flicked to Seul-ki and back, and her pulse raced. “Has one of my ministers met with her?”

“No, Your Worship.” The captain’s face was red now. “I thought…I thought it best to bring her to you personally. She said she had information only for you. About…your rival. If she’s lying, I’ll have my men end her life instantly. Please just give the order and…”

“Send her in.”

Just like that, Jeong turned and walked away, and the captain stared at Seul-ki with some impossible mix of terror and threat and hope. Seul-ki gave him an encouraging smile, and walked inside.

“Do you like tea?”

Jeong had crossed the room in a blink, and was pouring two cups from a steaming kettle.

“Yes, thank you.”

The emperor seemed to float as he walked, his body small but obviously rippling with power. His eyes blazed with golden light, and between the color and the whiteness of his robe, he looked like a saint or an angel.

The door closed behind her, and Seul-ki dropped her disguise. She stood there waiting until Jeong turned and looked at her. He blinked and froze. One of the cups fell from his hand and broke on the floor. He stared at her, eyes moving up and down, mouth agape.

She smiled and let some of the impossible emotions touch her face and eyes, not bothering to fight the tears. She looked very different, she knew. A woman now instead of a girl. How many years had it been? Ten? Fifteen? But she could see he recognized her. He knew.

“Hello, Oppa,” she said, using a Korean term of endearment for an older male. She had always called her older brother Oppa.

The great emperor who was once a strange but very clever boy, seemed to transform before her eyes. He marched forward now without the floating gait, struggling towards her as if pulling a thousand pounds of chains.

“Joo?” he whispered, blinking as if he couldn’t yet believe his eyes.

Seul-ki nodded, unable to speak. Jeong and Joo. Always said in the same breath. Inseparable as children. Their mother had always liked names that started with J.

She hadn’t known how she’d react when she saw him. If it would be the good or the bad, the love or the anger, the shame or the loss. But she saw that very confusion reflected in her brother’s eyes, and she knew she couldn’t hate him. That their meeting would be more than just a move in a game. But a family reunion of sorts, a hopeless descent through grief and tragedy.

Jeong crossed the gap between them so quickly. He’d thrown the other cup away as if it was nothing, the liquid spilling as the brittle thing struck stone and shattered. She thought he might kill her, then. It had always been a possibility and she had accepted that risk.

His arms went around her chest. The emperor of man buried his face in her neck, body shaking as he gripped her gently, like a porcelain doll.

She stood still and did nothing until her brother sobbed. Then she put her arms around him, too, and she wept for the first time since her mother died.

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