Storm Strider

Shouts came from the dimly lit room down the right end of the hallway, so Marisol poked her head out of the cell and looked left.

There was a blue and green stained window at the left end of the hallway, and it was looking really, really easy to smash through.

… Do I go?

[I know that man,] the Archive said plainly. [There is a one hundred percent chance he told you the truth. If you can reach the top of the city where vials of healing seawater are sold by the Imperators, he will let you go free.]

[What will it be?]

[If you stay, the Harbour Guards could charge you with destruction of property and attempted escape. If you leave–]

Marisol didn’t hesitate. There was an out, so she took it—skating out of the cell and zooming down the hallway, launching shoulder-first through the stained window.

It wasn’t like she didn’t think she couldn’t get to the top of the city in ten minutes.

Greeted with a rush of cold, rain-soaked wind, she fell two stories and screeched to a halt in the middle of a steep inclined street. Black rain struck her skin like icy needles. ‘Black Storm’ was still very much alive—thunder rumbled low and distant, the winds howled between tightly packed buildings, rainwater gurgled down narrow canals running along both sides of the street.

Frankly, she wished this wasn’t how her first good look of the legendary Whirlpool City was going to go. The sprawling, lantern-lit city was built up the side of the water volcano; the streets were winding and climbing in steep, crooked paths. Terracotta houses were stacked upon one another, clinging to the volcano side like barnacles on a ship’s hull. Wooden shutters rattled everywhere, iron balconies jutting out over the main street, and large stone watchtowers were erected here and there as though to serve as checkpoints between each section of the city.

It was all quite pretty, and she would love to just stand in the pouring rain, taking it all in, if not for the Harbour Guards shouting at her through the broken window.

You have a map of the city, right? she thought, stretching her arms, legs, and glancing down the street as she did. She was close to the harbour at the bottom; twenty metres down the street and she’d be at the docks lined with moored ships, warehouses, and distant lighthouses.

[It is five hundred metres to the top of the city,] the Archive answered, pointing straight up. [There is no need for directions. See the giant lighthouse at the very top of the crater?]

Yeah?

[That is your target.]

[Now go.]

She didn’t need telling twice. Just as half a dozen Harbour Guards burst out the steel gate on her left, she took off skating, dashing up the cobbled street with lightning charging her veins—metaphorically and physically.

It felt good to be stretching her limbs again.

As she hurtled up the street, she cut across closed stores with carved seashells on their iron-wrought signs, blacksmith forges with steam hissing from chimneys, and countless ‘potion’ stores with their windows alive with light. The potion stores she paid the most attention to. Jars and vials of luminous, glowing liquids lined the display shelves, and they were multicolour blurs of light in the corners of her eyes as she skated by. The main street was ten metres wide, five hundred metres long, and there was so much more to stare at: taverns with bolted chairs and tables spilling out halfway onto the street, pharmacies overrun with vines and alien plants growing down the storefront, and even a triple-story cafe with far-northern oriental architecture that stood out amongst the sea of two-story buildings like a sore thumb. Variety wasn’t lacking. The only thing that was missing were the people, and for good reason.

The midnight storm was simply too much for anyone to brave, so she almost felt like she was running up a ghost city with all the doors locked shut, the window shutters sealed, and a dozen Harbour Guards roaring at her to stay still from below.

They’re keeping up surprisingly well, eh?

They’re used to running on water.

Glancing behind her, she spotted the Harbour Guards practically skating up the flooded street as well, and they were all manners of half-ants, half-crabs, half-lobsters, whatever else a guard could be without looking too monstrous. Their heads were still normal human heads for the most part—that crab-headed man she decked three days ago was evidently just an anomaly—and they still held a big advantage over her head: they knew the lay of the land, and before long, she was reaching the first set of watchtowers at the two hundred metre mark.

A dozen Harbour Guards stood in her way, wielding crab-pincer spears and arranged in a wall-like formation. By the scowls on their faces they were fully intent on matching her head-on, a very movable wall versus a nigh-unstoppable spear, so even if she could be cleared of all charges by reaching the top of the city… she didn’t quite want to bowl right through them like she’d done with the Whitewhale Marauders.

As she neared them, they shouted at her to slow down. Maybe. She couldn’t really hear them over the thunder and the pouring rain, so just before she could run right into their spears, she launched into a mid-air spin and landed glaive-first on the wall of a building—skating over their heads as she continued her gravity-defying journey to the top.

They’re not really good at… stopping me, she mused, glancing behind her as she skated sideways on the walls, dropping back onto the street once she was well past the checkpoint. Are they really esteemed guards of the city? Do they… you know, have any way of actually catching someone like me?

[People like you do not show up very often,] the Archive remarked. [Maybe once or twice a year, and even then, there are three ‘sections’ to the city. The Harbour Guards have jurisdiction over the lower city—which is the bottom two hundred metres of the city consisting all the docks and factories and lower status households—but the Harbour Imperators have jurisdiction over the upper city, which is the three to four hundred metre section of the city consisting of higher-class stores and households. Past that checkpoint you just crossed, you have now entered the upper city. The Harbour Guards will not pursue you any longer.]

Sweet! And terrible! Does that mean–

The answer to her question showed itself as her ripple sensors caught wind of someone running alongside her, in the street next over. Her ears perked as she tried to squint between the buildings, trying to catch a glimpse of the shadow, but she couldn’t see them; even if it was a Harbour Imperator, though, she wouldn’t let them catch up to her.

But…

…

… It is prettier around here, ain’t it?

As she pressed up, she noticed the upper city’s buildings stood taller, more elegant, more graceful. Grand arches framed the entrances to manor houses, and she passed by lush courtyards, gardens of cypress trees, and even fountains spurting glowing aquamarine water. It was so, so different from the lower city below her. The water-draining canals weren’t overflooding. The street itself was wider, paved with smoother stone and engraved mosaic tiles. She could hear clinking of glasses inside the houses and laughter that echoed faintly through the run, and she knew—this was a part of the city where ‘Black Storm’ was but a mere backdrop to opulence.

There were disparities between households everywhere on the continent, her own desert town notwithstanding. The Whirlpool City simply didn’t bother with trying to hide it.

Once she passed the second checkpoint of watchtowers—and this time, there were neither any Harbour Guards nor Imperators standing in a wall trying to block her way—she was well on her way to the very top of the city. Her eyes immediately sparkled as she caught sight of her destination: the colossal half-metal half-stone lighthouse that stretched fifty more metres into the sky, a giant banner with the crest of the Harbour Imperators hanging on the wall. The sides of the street leading up to it were all sorts of armouries, barracks, or a combination of the two. This was the final hundred metre stretch to the swung-open front gates.

If she could just get inside, her ten-year-long dream would come true.

But, of course, it wouldn’t be a fitting end to a ten-year-long journey without a final obstacle.

Right before the entrance to the lighthouse, a man stood in the rain with both hands clasped around his walking cane. His long brown coat was tattered, his trousers were shortened to the knees, and he was bandaged in white cloth from head to toe—quite literally, she might add. There wasn’t a single inch of his skin exposed to the rain, and coupled with the feathered cavalier hat he was wearing, he looked like one of those Tamera bug-trainers from the far east: exotic, eccentric, and prone to bust out a magic trick to catch her off-guard.

Still, she couldn’t help but shiver as she skated up towards him, flickers of lightning sparking around her glaives. There was no doubt he was the man who’d talked to her and broke her out of prison, so the fact that he was standing up there and she was still down here, well… somehow, she didn’t like the idea that a fellow speed demon would be her final obstacle.

Archive!

The Archive sighed on her shoulder. [Just do it. War Jump that guy. If you can get past him, he’ll certainly pay for your vial and your ride home.]

I wasn’t asking for permission!

A dream ten years in the making. Nearly three whole months on the great blue. She was attacked by a fairy shrimp, Blackclaw Marauders, a giant remipede, Whitewhale Marauders, and even a Mutant on her way here; she put all of her strength, her speed, and her desperation into one explosive launch, spinning the final ten metres up with her arms crossed over her torso, tears squeezing out of her eyes.

She’d do it.

She’d felled even a Mutant with her lightning glaives–

“You’re not half-bad. You really are a water strider after all.”

And it happened in the blink of an eye. The man whipped his walking cane out, and it was with speed like nothing she’d ever seen before—he slapped her kicking lightning glaive away, poked her three times in the chest, and then he took a step past her to hook her neck with the curved handle, jerking her down to the ground.

What–

Her momentum was cut short. Her eyes felt like they damn near popped out of their sockets as she slammed spine-first into the ground, her back arching, a gasp of pain tearing through her throat. She was about to groan and try to claw back up when she felt the handle of a cane pressing against her neck from above; the man was standing over her, staring down at her. Black rain trickled off his feathered hat and onto her face, making her wince and squeeze her eyes half-shut.

“Since you escaped from the Harbour Guards’ prison, though, you’ll now be subjected to the full force of their laws: escape from custody, attempted escape, destruction of property, and public nuisance, just to name a few,” he said, shrugging nonchalantly as she glanced down the street. There were Imperators clad in blue and white uniforms running up with firefly lanterns in their hands, trying to catch up to the two of them. “The Imperators probably won’t be happy you trespassed in the upper city without a proper permit, either. You did kinda break through the checkpoint with brute force. Most likely, they’ll toss you in a cell and leave you there for at least a few weeks—it’ll be a while before you get a chance to dance in the rain again.”

She growled at him, trying to slide her neck out from under his cane to no avail. He tracked her movements perfectly even through his bandages.

“And what are you hassling me for?” she snapped. “Just… let me go! I’m this close! This close! I don’t care who you are or what your job is, but my mama… my mama–”

“You have an Altered Swarmsteel System in your neck,” he said bluntly. “It may be unofficial, and you may be unregistered, but you have gotten this far only because your Archive recognised you as the legitimate successor of Antonio Saranno. Say you are a Hasharana. If you do, I can place you under my ward and keep you out of any cell, Imperator-run or not.”

“... And what do you want with me?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. “I just want a vial of healing seawater and go home. That’s it. I ain’t no Hasharana or anything–”

“There is a reason why ‘Black Storm’ is still underway,” he said, glancing around at the stormy winds as he did. “The Whirlpool City is in grave danger, and we need all the manpower we can get. Now, the Imperators want you, but I don’t want them to have you—they’re a problematic bunch for people like us—so I’m giving you two options: I step aside and let those boys drag you back to your cell, or you say you’re a Hasharana and I’ll make sure to have a vial of seawater sent back to your mother. What’ll it be, Marisol Vellamira?]

“...”

She looked back and forth between him and the Imperators, gnashing her teeth together.

Archive.

What do I…

…

No.

She didn’t need to consult the Archive for a decision like this.

It’d already told her the man wouldn’t lie, so if he said he was going to help her mama…

“Fine,” she hissed, grabbing his cane as she glared up at him. “I’m a Hasharana. I’ll stick with you. Happy? Now get me up and–”

He yanked his cane up and her along with it, pulling her up so fast she barely even registered she was now standing on her glaives. The three Imperators screeched to a halt just a few metres below her as the man held out his cane, stopping them in their tracks—and then he grabbed the top of her head with an iron claw, making her bow and yelp in pain simultaneously.

“She’s a Hasharana, boys,” he said, shaking his head in feigned dismay as the Imperators scowled at them. “She’s got one of them thingies in her neck, you know. An Altered Swarmsteel System. She’s too dangerous for you lot to handle, so I’ll take her back to the inn and question her until she’s cleared.”

One of the Imperators clicked his tongue irritably. “She broke out of the lower city prison. By law of the Whirlpool City–”

“It’s late, boys. Just take it up with Lighthouse Seven tomorrow if you’re so inclined,” the man cut them off, dragging her by the collar down towards the upper city with a dismissive wave. “Besides, your Whirlpool City laws don’t apply to those with special exemption—case in point, the Hasharana within the Worm God’s ranks. You do know the Imperatrix personally told me to deal with the lass, right?”

“...”

The man laughed as the Imperators stood around awkwardly, not running after the two of them, but not exactly going anywhere else, either. Marisol simply glanced behind her while rubbing her throbbing back, wondering why the legendary Imperators she’d read about since she was a child were so powerless in the face of a… well, a living mummy of a man.

So, as he continued dragging her back down the street, she shook his hand off her collar and mumbled ‘I can walk by myself’—she wasn’t a child, and she didn’t need his coddling.

Still, she was a little curious about the man who’d chased her all the way up to the top of the city, and she remembered what the Archive had said before she broke out of prison.

[... He is Victor Morina,] the Archive said, appearing on the back of his hat. [As of the Year Ninety-Four, he is one of the twenty Arcana Hasharana; the twenty strongest bug-slayers in the entire world.]

[He is titled ‘The Chariot’, ranked seven amongst the Arcana Hasharana.]