Meko carried the unconscious Katarina securely on his back, her weight heavy but steady. Anya and Doren flanked him, moving on both sides of Meko down the street. The streets were now mostly empty, the late hour and the earlier arena disturbance having driven most citizens indoors, save a few curious eyes.
They moved quickly through the quiet districts, tracing their steps back toward the industrial blocks near the western gate. As they neared the familiar network of warehouses and alleys surrounding the Central Timber Yard, Meko's innate defensive senses flared.
The hair on the back of his neck prickled. It wasn't the distant rumble of the city or the sound of their own footsteps on the cobblestones. It was a cold sensation. Meko felt they were being watched.
The gaze was nothing like the arena guards, nor was it the chaotic, bestial rage of the Stonscur Bear. It was intensely focused, analytical, and unsettlingly cold. It felt like being studied by a predator.
Meko didn't dare slow or turn his head. He subtly shifted his weight, using the change in his posture to signal to Doren and Anya without a word.
"Someone is watching us," he muttered, his voice barely audible, aimed only at his companions. "High up, I think. Don't look around. Just keep moving toward the alley entrance."
Once they got to the alley entrance, they all stopped. In a whisper, Meko whispered, "Anya, you slip into the shadows ahead. See if you can get eyes on who it is, and check the stash," Meko ordered, his gaze locked straight ahead. "Doren, you stay on my blind side."
Anya moved with the swift, silent grace, melting into the alley's shadows. She cupped her hand, summoning a small, controlled flame that bounced lightly on her palm, illuminating the uneven ground just enough for her to navigate the gloom. She verified their supplies were untouched, extinguished the tell-tale light, and slipped back out, signaling her companions with a swift, upward motion of her hand.
Meko, Doren, and the unconscious Katarina immediately entered the confined space. As they passed the threshold, the feeling Meko had sensed intensified. The feeling was no longer a chill, but a tangible, cold weight on his back. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up on end.
Meko opened his mouth to shout a warning, but he was too late.
A massive, hulking figure materialized from the darkness above. It hurled itself down from the rooftop, landing with a jarring thud directly in the mouth of the alley, cutting off their escape and kicking up dirt.
The man was gigantic, easily ten feet tall, dwarfing even Meko. In the stark moonlight filtering down from the narrow opening above, his exposed skin appeared a shocking pale grey. His arms hung low, thick and powerful. Heavy, thick chains were attached to his wrists. He wore imposing, rough shoulder pads but was shirtless, revealing a torso covered in old, jagged scars. His pants were ripped and tattered, gathering in voluminous folds before being cut short, falling only to his calves.
His face was a mask of sheer menace, almost beast-like in its blunt features and brutal expression. Most terrifyingly, a dirty bandana covered his eyes, obscuring his gaze and making his appearance that much more chilling.
Doren stumbled back, his breath catching in his throat. The unnatural pale grey of the skin, so cold and unsettling in the moonlight, immediately reminded Doren of Leasie. Their skin colors are almost the same.
The figure stood motionless, a formidable, silent wall of raw muscle and malice blocking their path. They were trapped.
The three conscious companions hurried breathing was the loudest sound in the alley. Meko absorbed the details of the creature before them. The immense size, the heavy chains, the scars. But the most important detail was the dirty bandana covering the man's eyes.
He couldn't see them, Meko realized. This creature was likely relying on sound, smell, or some other acute sense.
Taking a deep, silent breath, Meko slowly turned his head to look between Anya and Doren. He raised one finger to his lips, making an absolutely clear, unmistakable gesture for silence. He needed them to be perfectly still and quiet.
Their goal hadn't changed, there was just another obstacle in the way. They needed their supplies, which were stashed deeper in the alley, and then they needed to sneak away from this colossal, blind threat.
Meko shifted his weight ever so slightly, the unconscious Katarina still a dead weight secured to his back. He mentally traced the location of their packs. They were just past a stack of crates on the left. The wind was barely a whisper, offering no cover for noise. Every fiber of his being screamed that the slightest scraping sound, the faintest shift of cobblestone, would instantly trigger the beast.
He waited, letting the silence settle, allowing the monster to believe the alley was empty once more. His eyes darted to Anya, expecting her to take the lead in silent movement.
Anya moved with the lethal precision of a flickering flame, her boots barely grazing the uneven stone. She had managed only a few silent steps back toward the crates when the stillness of the alley was shattered.
The giant didn't turn his head. He let out a bellowing growl that vibrated in the chests of everyone present. A sound more animal than man. With a sudden, violent burst of speed, he yelled and heaved his massive, scarred arms upward.
The heavy iron chains attached to his wrists hissed through the air like metal snakes. As they reached the peak of his reach, silhouetted against the high moon, he brought them crashing down with terrifying force. They weren't aimed blindly. He had pinpointed the exact vibration of Anya's footsteps.
"Anya!" Doren's breath hitched in a silent scream.
Anya pushed off the ground, her reflexes fueled by adrenaline. She threw herself sideways, rolling through the grime of the alley just as the iron links crashed into the ground. The impact was deafening. The chains bit deep into the cobblestones, leaving jagged white marks and pulverized rock where she had stood a millisecond before.
The monster began to reel the chains back in, the metal scraping against the stone with a rhythmic, predatory screech. He tilted his head, his shaggy, black hair falling over the blindfold as he pinpointed for the next movement.
Meko's grip tightened on the straps holding Katarina. The quiet approach was over. The beast knew they were there, and he was faster than his size suggested. Meko knew he couldn't fight at full capacity with Katarina's limp body strapped to his back.
"I'm getting Katarina to a safe spot, I'll be back!" Meko bellowed, his voice echoing off the narrow walls. He slammed his foot down, and a pillar of earth shot upward like a piston, launching him and Katarina onto the rooftop above. He vanished into the shadows of the chimney stacks just as the giant's chains whipped through the space he had occupied a heartbeat before. The iron links pulverized the stone pillar into a cloud of grit and pebbles.
Doren stood in the center of the alley, his heart hammering against his ribs. Seeing the giant's raw power, he realized he couldn't just hide. He dropped to his knees, pressing his palms into the dirt, and channeled every ounce of the power he could muster.
"Get back!" Doren screamed toward Anya.
He manifested an angled pillar of stone that erupted from the ground at a forty-five-degree angle, driving straight into the giant's exposed, scarred gut. The impact was immense and the stone pillar shattered into a thousand fragments against the man's iron-like abdominal muscles.
The colossus didn't go down. He didn't even groan. He merely took a single, heavy step back, his boots grinding the shattered remains of Doren's attack into dust.
The blindfold shifted as the giant felt the direction of the attack. With a flick of his wrist, he didn't just swing; he flung the chain like a whip. The heavy iron weight at the end caught Doren squarely in the stomach.
The blow was heavy. He was lifted off his feet and sent skidding across the rough cobblestones, his body tumbling like a ragdoll until he slammed into a pile of discarded crates at the back of the alley. The air was ripped from Doren's lungs in a silent gasp of agony.
"Doren!" Anya screamed, her hands igniting with a frantic, white-hot glow.
The giant began to slowly turn toward the sound of her voice, the chains rattling as they dragged behind him like the tail of a dragon.
Anya put her hands outward, a stream of fire roaring from Anya's palms, engulfing the giant's legs and surging up his scarred, shirtless torso. The orange light illuminated the alley in a hellish glow, reflecting off his pale, singed skin.
The man stood his ground, a low, vibrating growl rumbling deep in his chest. He flexed his massive chest, shaking the flames off his body as if they were nothing more than annoying sparks. The smell of singed hair and scorched flesh began to fill the narrow space, but the giant seemed entirely unfazed by the pain.
Through the smoke and the flickering light of the residual embers, the man's head snapped toward the sound of Anya's heavy breathing.
With a suddenness that defied his massive frame, he gripped the cold iron links tight and leaped forward, closing the distance between him and Anya in two thundering strides.
As he moved, he spun both chains in a frantic, circular motion at his sides, creating a whirlwind of whistling metal that acted as a shield.
Just as he reached Anya, he crossed his arms and then violently threw them outward. The chains unfurled like twin metal whips, aiming to wrap around her and crush her against the alley walls.
"Too slow, little spark," the giant rasped the first words he had spoken to the group. His voice was like grinding gravel.
Anya ducked, the chains whistling inches above her head and smashing into the stone walls behind her with enough force to send a shower of sparks and rock splinters everywhere. She was trapped between the giant's massive body and the dead-end of the alley where Doren lay gasping for air.
The giant raised a massive, pale hand, his fingers curling into a fist the size of a boulder, ready to bring it down on the cornered elementalist.
Despite the agonizing ache in his chest and the lack of air in his lungs, Doren saw the giant's massive fist hovering over Anya. Pure, protective instinct overrode his pain.
Pressing his palms into the dirt one last time, he launched himself forward. As he ran, he pulled the minerals from the ground, coating his right shoulder in a thick, jagged layer of dense stone armor. He became a human battering ram.
Doren slammed into the giant's side with a sickening crunch of stone against muscle. The force was enough to knock the behemoth off balance, his boulder-sized fist missing Anya by a fraction of an inch and smashing harmlessly into the dirt.
Anya scrambled back, eyes wide. "Doren, no!"
The giant didn't fall. He barely stumbled. The blindfolded head snapped toward Doren with predatory speed. Before Doren could pull back for another strike, the giant's massive, pale hand lashed out. With a grip that felt like a closing iron vice, the man grabbed Doren by the entire head.
The giant stood tall, his shaggy black hair swaying as he lifted Doren off the ground with a single arm. Doren's feet dangled uselessly in the air, his stone armor cracking and falling away as the giant's fingers squeezed his skull. The pale man tilted his head, the dirty bandana inches from Doren's face, as if he were sniffing the boy's fear. The giant rumbled, his voice vibrating through Doren's very bones.
Doren clawed at the giant's wrist, but it was like trying to move a tree trunk. The chains on the giant's wrists rattled ominously, swaying back and forth like pendulums. Doren kicked and clawed, his brain throbbing.
A whistle broke through the air as a spear of jagged rock whistled through the air like a bolt from a ballista, burying itself deep into the giant's massive, scarred shoulder. A spray of dark, thick blood hit the alley wall as the behemoth let out a harrowing yell of pain, his iron grip finally failing.
Doren plummeted, hitting the ground with a thud and instinctively rolling toward the safety of the stone wall, gasping for the air that had nearly been squeezed out of him and still recovering from being hit and thrown.
Before the giant could recover, Meko descended like a falling mountain. He leaped from the rooftop, his silhouette momentarily blocking the moon, and landed with a bone-jarring impact. As he landed, he stomped the ground with every ounce of his elemental strength.
The shockwave ripped through the cobblestones, bucking the earth upward. The giant, already reeling from the spear in his shoulder, found no footing on the shifting ground. He stumbled back, his heavy chains clattering uselessly against the heaving stone.
"Now, Anya!" Meko roared.
Anya didn't hesitate. She stepped forward, her eyes reflecting the white-hot core of her power. She unleashed a torrent of fire so intense it turned the alley into a furnace. The flames licked greedily at the giant's tattered capris and the dirty rag around his head.
As the heat intensified, the charcoal-smelling smoke rose, and the bandana finally disintegrated into ash, fluttering away in the rising heat.
The giant's face was fully revealed for the first time, and the sight was enough to make even Meko recoil. His primary eyes were milky and unfocused, looking in completely different directions as if tracking two separate worlds. But in the center of his forehead, a wide, horizontal slit had opened, revealing an eerie, pulsating third eye that glowed with a sickly, violet light.
The giant stopped stumbling. The moment the third eye was exposed, his movements lost their clumsy, beast-like nature. He stood perfectly still amidst the flames, the violet glow of his third eye cutting through Anya's.
"I see... Infinite power.." the giant whispered, his voice no longer a growl, but a chillingly calm resonance.
The violet light from the giant's horizontal third eye felt heavy, a cold pressure that seemed to dampen the heat of Anya's flames. Meko gripped his fists tight, his instincts screaming that this wasn't just a physical mutation. This giant's third eye was the core of its power.
Just as Meko prepared to launch a desperate assault, a calm, oily voice drifted from the shadows at the entrance of the alley.
"Don't kill them, Golgoth," the voice commanded. "We need them for the arena. The crowd hasn't had a proper execution in weeks."
Emerging from the darkness was a man clad in flowing crimson robes that looked like spilled blood in the moonlight. In his right hand, he gripped a heavy iron cane, which he tapped rhythmically against the cobblestones with a dull, echoing clack.
Though the three companions didn't recognize him the way the giant stood down at his word told them everything they needed to know about his power. This was the same man who had stood over a captive Katarina just hours before, calculating her value.
Golgoth, the pale giant, immediately went still. The violent rattling of his chains ceased. The horizontal eye on his forehead narrowed, its violet glow pulsing in a slow, hypnotic rhythm as it remained locked on Meko.
"You've caused quite a mess," the man in crimson continued, leaning slightly on his iron cane. "A broken wall, three unconscious guards, and a ravaged beast that took out four more of my guards! The Arena Master is quite displeased. But he's willing to overlook the property damage if you all come with me... quietly."
Meko stepped in front of Doren and Anya, his feet rooting into the stone. "We aren't going back there."
The man smiled, a thin, cruel expression, and raised his iron cane, pointing the heavy head of it toward them. "Golgoth doesn't like it when people say no. And with that eye open, he doesn't even need to swing those chains to break you."
The man in the crimson robes tapped his iron cane, and the world buckled. He commanded the alley with a terrifying, fluid precision that made Meko's own powers feel like a child's tantrum.
"Golgoth," the man whispered. "Release the Voiders."
The pale giant's horizontal eye flared. Golgoth, a twisted Dark Elementalist, didn't fight with just chains, he was a dark elementalist as well. From the cracks in the masonry, hundreds of translucent, skittering Voiders, horrifying, spider-like entities of the deep dark, poured out, their hissing filling the air as they swarmed toward Doren and Meko.
The man in crimson slammed his cane down. The cobblestones flowed like water, rising up in jagged, concentric rings that trapped the three companions in a shrinking arena of stone.
"You are outmatched," the man sneered, his iron cane glowing with a dull brown light as he manipulated the very foundation of the city.
Meko struggled to keep his footing on the shifting earth, still burdened by the unconscious Katarina. Doren was backed against a wall, his face pale with fear as the Voiders closed in.
Then, the air grew incredibly hot.
"Get back," Anya said. Her voice wasn't a scream but a low, dangerous growl that cut through the chaos.
Anya stepped forward, her hands turning into pillars of pure, white-hot localized suns. She became a supernova.
With a primal yell, she slammed her palms together. A massive shockwave of flame erupted from her body, expanding in a perfect circle. The Voiders didn't just burn; they evaporated into ash before they could even screech. The liquid stone the man in crimson had created was instantly baked into brittle, cracking glass.
Anya didn't stop there. She reached out toward the giant, Golgoth, and clenched her fist. The oxygen in the alley ignited. A vortex of fire swirled around the giant, the heat so intense that his heavy iron chains began to glow orange, then yellow, becoming too hot for even him to hold. The man in the crimson robes stumbled back, shielding his face from the blistering heat.
Anya stood in the center of the melting alley, her hair whipped by the heat-currents, her eyes burning with the same orange intensity as her flames. She had created a temporary wall of fire between them and their pursuers.
"Meko! Doren!" she shouted over the roar of her own inferno. "The building is going to blow from the pressure! Grab the supplies and move! There are people in these buildings!"
The fire vanished as quickly as it had ignited, replaced by a suffocating, pitch-black curtain of soot and timber smoke. By the time the haze cleared, the alley was empty. The three companions were gone.
For a moment, there was a deafening silence. Then, the man in the crimson robes began to tremble with a cold, vibrating fury that seemed to make the very walls of the alleyway groan.
"Humiliated…" he whispered, the word sounding like a death sentence. "By a girl. A common, gutter-born flame."
He turned his glacial gaze toward Golgoth. The giant was still recovering, his singed skin peeling and his iron chains that were glowing a dull, angry red. The horizontal eye on his forehead pulsed slowly, looking dazed.
"You let them walk away," the man hissed. He leaned his weight onto his heavy iron cane.
With a sickening slurping sound, the ground beneath Golgoth turned to a liquid silt. Before the giant could even grunt in surprise, the earth swallowed him. The mud solidified instantly, locking him in place. Golgoth was buried up to his neck, his massive head resting on the cold cobblestones like a severed trophy.
The man in crimson stepped forward, his fine leather boots clicking softly until he stood directly over the giant's face.
"Do you have any idea who I am, you pathetic, pale sack of meat?" the master roared, his voice finally breaking into a scream of pure rage. "I am the Architect of the Pits! I don't lose my investments to children!"
He raised the iron cane and brought it down with a wet, bone-cracking thud across Golgoth's jaw. Blood sprayed onto the crimson robes, but the man didn't seem to care.
"Look at me with that cursed eye!" he spat, striking the giant again, this time across the temple. "I am humiliated! The Master will have my head because you couldn't crush a few elementals! You are supposed to be a Dark Elementalist, a terror of the Void, and yet you stand there and let a fire-brat singe your eyebrows?"
He began to rain blows down on the trapped giant's head, the iron cane whistling through the air. Each strike was accompanied by a string of vile curses.
"I should leave you here for the crows," the man panted, his face twisted into a mask of hate. He leaned down, his face inches from the giant's ear, his voice dropping to a terrifying, venomous whisper. "If they flee this city, I'll make sure you don't leave your cage until you're bones."
He turned away, wiping a smudge of blood from his cheek with a silk kerchief. "Get out of the dirt. Bring them to me in pieces if you must, but do not let them reach the gates."