Chapter 69: Beasts Below (Patreon)

Author’s note: Hi guys

Enjoy the chapter!

Chapter 69: Beasts Below - link: https://www.patreon.com/posts/106185537

─◇─◈─◆────────────────────────────────────────

Chapter 69: Beasts Below

"Well, I wasn't there myself, but . . . "

"Wait, you weren't? I thought the Labyrinth was in Labyrinth Square?"

Ria giggled at my silliness. "There's an entrance to it, but the Labyrinth itself is something the city is built on."

'Huh? What?' Trying to imagine a labyrinth that cities could stand on, I wasn't able to come up with anything other than one built out of bales of straw in a field, or the one from Greek legends dug into the rocks to hold the Minotaur. Inevitably, remembering what the woman from Tender Way had said about the beasts in the depths beneath the city, my eyes went down to my bare feet.

'Are they actually keeping a beast or several of them down there?'

Maybe, just maybe, it wasn't some assholes in the shadows trailing my tail that were giving me the creeps after all, but shitty beasts somewhere beneath my feet.

"Yes," Ria beamed as she noticed me testing the strength of the cobblestones with the heel of my foot. "Down there is a very old structure known as the Labyrinth. There are said to be twenty-six of them around the world. Though I've only ever seen Fallen's Cry."

'Damn, twenty-six?'

That was more than I expected. More importantly, though . . . 

"Fallen's Cry?"

"Oh, that's the name of the Labyrinth here in Castiana."

"And . . .  you saw it?"

'Didn't she say she wasn't there?'

"Just the entrance. Don't worry, you'll see it too. It's in the middle of the square. It's a big place, a busy place with seekers going in and out all the time."

Another unfamiliar term: seekers. I could have kept my mouth shut and pretended to know what the little kitare was talking about to maintain a modicum of pride. After all, it wasn't hard to piece together that the Seeker's Square, where City Hall stood, was named after these so-called seekers. But not asking meant staying clueless, not just appearing so.

"And these seekers are?"

Ria hesitated, thinking. "Some say brave warriors, some say fools. Enola says they're brave fools and that I’d better dream of a proper job, not like Timmy. He's a guide like me - two years older, though. All he talks about is how he's going to become a seeker and tease me for being weak."

Seekers, it sounded like there was a prestige to being one.

"I see, that's mean of him." Sad, but unfortunately, nothing unusual. There were always people who felt the need to prove their strength to the weak, and sometimes children could be quite cruel about it too, but unlike the adults not really realizing what they were doing.

"Yeah, it is mean," she whimpered, her ears dropped.

"Come on, cheer up. Let him be the fool he wants to be," I said and ruffled her hair a bit. "Instead, tell me why it's not smart to go down there?"

Her giggle was a caress to the heart - not so much what followed.

"Because there are beasts," she snarled, baring her fangs at me, claws flashing on her little paws.

To claim I saw through her playful act and didn't almost pee in my new undies would be a lie. In fact, I jumped back at her sudden scare and bared my fangs back. Of course, seeing my reaction made the little kitare giggle even more. My heart, on the other hand, threatened to burst out of my chest in fright. No doubt the fault of that sickening feeling giving me the creeps all over my body getting the better of me.

"Beasts? What do you mean by beasts? So, there's actually more than one?" I stammered, still a bit thrown off, rubbing the back of my neck while looking around.

"Why would there only be one? No, there are dozens, hundreds, and maybe thousands of them," Ria beamed, spreading her arms to show how many of the beasts were somewhere under our feet. While my little guide seemed thrilled about it, the thought only added to the chill crawling up my spine.

'Thousands of mossbear-like beasts trapped beneath our feet? Didn't Scoresby say that Castiana was one of the safest cities?'

"Don't be afraid, Korra," the little kitare said, striking a big sister tone. "Only humans can step in and out of the labyrinths."

"You sound pretty sure about that."

"It's how the labyrinths work. Sort of like a rule."

"Ah, I see."

There was so much wrong with what she said, so much that I could see could go - well, for lack of a better word, wrong. Yet I kept my mouth shut and tried to wrap my head around it. This wasn't Earth. This was a world twisted by the Lattice. For all I knew, there might actually have been some magical rule keeping the beasts down from escaping and not just some massive door that someone might forget to close behind them one day.

"So, the Seekers are going down to . . . what? Kill them, the beasts?"

"Um-hmm," Ria nodded, unperturbed. Honestly, pretty unnerving to see such a young kid take it as an everyday thing. Not as unnerving as the chills I was getting, though.

'Seriously, what the actual fuck!'

From the moment we left the bathhouse, that itch on the back of my neck was getting worse and worse, and now it was like someone was breathing down my neck.

" . . . but not just to kill them for skin meat and other parts, but the labyrinth floors themselves hold many resources. Actually, did you know that most of the Seeker Companies collect raw materials and do not . . . Korra? What are you looking at?"

Not really paying attention to my little guide and her passionate explanation of things about Fallen's Cry, I searched every shadow of the surrounding buildings, streets, and back alleys. Without any luck, though. No thug hiding behind crates that I could see, no thief to be too acting inconspicuously in a crowd that I could find.

'Perhaps it wasn't the stares after all, but the beasts down below.'

Or, it might have been a warning of something much worse to come - the beast waking up. And not just any beast, of which the depths of the underground beneath my feet were apparently full of, but the beast within me. Perhaps it had had enough of sitting in the dark corner of my mind while I was strolling around stranded in a city full of humans and was about to pounce, take control, and run free.

That, or I might just be losing it, all the shit I've been through getting the better of me and my [Indomitable Will] weave.

" . . . Korra? Are you still frightened? I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you . . . not that much."

The sad whimper of my little guide brought me to look at her. Much to my dismay, I found her with wet eyes full of guilt over something that was not her fault.

"It wasn't y-you, Ria," I said, not sounding too convincing even to myself. Fear seemed to take hold of me and seep into my voice. "It was NOT you, but something else." Something much worse than a little scare.

"Really? You’re not mad at me?"

'Shitty beast . . . or whatever!'

It just hurt another.

"Of course not. But . . . "

"But?"

" . . . I think we better find some city guards."

Hopefully, they would fare better against whatever was driving my fear than the mind bitch did against the beast.

─◇─◈─◆────────────────────────────────────────
                                                     Glossary

Previous Chapter . . . . . . . Table of Contents . . . . . . . Next Chapter