Slumrat Rising

Chapter 55: Very Reasonable Questions

Truth chuckled mirthlessly, seeing the notification. Time to explore the city, hit up the university, maybe start scouting districts for raiding.

Great thinking. Hey Genius, why don’t you take a look out the window.

Truth did. Blinding white lights lit up the area around the apartment building. It was night.

“Eh. Fuck it. I still want to check out the city. And I haven’t seen a hint of Ghūl either.” Truth muttered. He wheeled the iron horse out of the apartment, calling for Thrush as he went. Locking up thoroughly behind himself too. No way he was going to lose his brand-new nest.

No gangsters. Guess the scattered corpses served their purpose. Truth kept going down the stairs… and stopped. He looked back over at the midden in the middle of the courtyard. The corpses were gone.

Not that he had held out much hope for them as deterrents. The gangsters he remembered would have given approximately one-quarter of a shit, and only if they thought they could sell the corpses.

Brains burned out on bathtub potions and powders cooked over a stove and cut with whatever had more or less the right color and texture. Bodies ravaged by lousy food, bad living, bad everything but driven by the simple logic of the slums. If you weren’t a predator, you were prey.

It was just faintly starting to occur to Truth that those gangsters were predators to those around them and prey to those powers and forces that shaped their world. But he had never learned the words or concepts that would let him conceptualize his experiences and observations. He had never learned that others had seen the same sights, thought the same thoughts, and put words to those feelings and ideas.

He had no idea just what his schools stole from him.

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Shomburuti bothered Truth. It was just similar enough to Harban to trigger feelings of familiarity, but every time he felt he was understanding the place, some alien thing popped out at him and reminded him he was a stranger in a strange land. And he missed the sibs.

He was desperately worried for them, but he also missed them. The… immediacy they gave his life. Even when it was boring, the job directly connected to their well-being. Even when the job got a bit… nasty. It was ok. It was for the sibs. Had to get stronger for the sibs. And now, he couldn’t help them. Didn’t even know how they were. How long it had been. The clothes looked pretty familiar. Couldn’t have been too long, right?

And if he tried to contact them, tried to find out what happened, they would be killed. He couldn’t even find out what happened to them, or he would be the bad thing that put them in danger! Truth let out an explosive breath, and tried to focus on the present.

The two-wheeler’s seat was still busted. Truth had put up with it for a long time, not really caring about the physical discomfort, but facts are facts and busted is busted. Could he just… replace the seat? Surely not, not without finding the exact same iron horse. Or maybe they sold replacement seats somewhere? Could he find a mechanic? But then the communication problem reared its ugly head again.

“Thrush, is there a university in this city?”

“Of course, Master.”

“Lead me there.”

“As you wish.” The bird demon swooped out in front of Truth and led the way. The streets were a twisting mess at night. Much like home, light talismans were installed high up, armored, and very bright. So the Ghūl were a thing here. The streets were pretty empty too. If it was like at home, everyone would get together in brightly lit clubs, bars, and casinos or stay in their warded homes. High-end districts in Harban had well-guarded public parks, so the rich (and their children) could enjoy a moonlit stroll.

Not really a thing in the slums. In Harban or in Shomburuti. Although that did make him draw some comparisons between Harban and Shomburuti. They both had their gated communities within the city. Both had their sharp divides between rich and poor. The rich got stronger; the poor did not. The dream of fighting back wasn’t forbidden. It was humiliated.

The Free State. No law enforcement beyond what one could privately enforce. Organizing a force, trying to build some semblance of safety, those things were privileges. And even if you could, you were still at the mercy of those with spells. No wonder even small-time gangsters were summoning demons on loose chains.

“Master, the University is about twenty-five kilometers from here in a straight line. However, that straight line passes directly through a slum. The route most would take requires an additional five-kilometer detour to the highway, driving around the city's periphery, and coming in again at the exit closest to the campus.”

“Everyone in the slums Level Zero?”

Thrush was slow to reply. “I would expect that almost everyone in the slums was Level Zero, with a bare few Level Ones. On the other hand, if I was looking to hide someone, burying them in the Shomuruti slums would be high on my list of ideas.”

“Straight line it is.”

The iron horse whipped through the streets. The buildings were gray in the city glow, the bright overhead lights highlighting the hovels and tarp-covered heaps that were home to a worrying number of people. The transition between high rises and the slum was a single street. One side was broadly defined as prosperous. The other-

Wooden pallets nailed together to make walls. Covered with plastic sheets, corrugated metal stolen from construction sites, and siding taken from a dump. Roofed with tarps or more bits of scrap. Nothing built for purpose. Everything scavenged, repurposed, and reused. And yet, even there, it was brightly lit.

Truth had to slow down as he passed through. The streets were more than just littered; they were also a sewer and construction site. It might have been the straightest route, but he was rapidly starting to wonder if it wasn’t also the slowest. Still, there was an energy to the Slums here that didn’t exist in Harban. He could hear music, thudding and thundering. People danced in bars, spilling out onto the street as they let the music carry them away. Bright clothes, bright patterns, bright smiles as they just enjoyed, for a blessed moment, being. Not living in the flinch, waiting for what was coming next.

Of course, there is always one bastard who doesn't get the mood. Probably some evangelical, blasting their church music.

“Thrush, where is that music coming from? Let’s play that prick a visit.”

“Which music, Master?”

“The church music? Loud as hell” He pointed roughly to his left.

“Forgive me, Master. Your doubtlessly superior ears have detected something your miserable servant cannot find.”

“Tsch.” Truth diverted to find it. It wasn’t like anything was open this late at night. Might as well explore. And dish out a little civic justice. The iron horse negotiated through bags of poop and discarded concrete blocks as he made his way deeper and deeper into the slums. Most of the shacks were built against each other, leaning on each other for structural support. Since each shack was built independently, there was no such thing as a coherent roofline. Just lots of light talismans surrounded by steel bars and homemade wards.

Then there were no more lights. No more trash on the streets. No more excrement. Just row after row of lightless shacks and almost deafening music. Truth looked a little closer. The shacks were actually merged together. Not just leaning against each other, but one continuous whole. A block-sized shelter.

“Ah.”

“Perhaps you wish to turn back? Sensible magi don’t fight with Ghūl.” Thrush suggested.

“A view I have never understood. I slapped ‘em dead minutes after breaking through to Level One.” Truth shook his head.

“Oh? Congratulations. I’m guessing you haven’t fought them since.”

“No, I had to kill things that could fight back.”

“Hilarious,” Thrush said, his voice bone dry. “Then, by all means, drive right on through.”

“Mmm. The music is coming from in there. I recognize it now.” He did, too. It wasn’t exactly the same as what he heard in Harban, but he’d bet a giant sculpture was in the block-sized shelter.

Then he gunned it and rushed down the street. He didn’t fear the Ghūl, but something was raising the hairs on the back of his neck, and he wanted a couple of good spells in him before he found out just what it was. Nothing came out and stopped him. Though if he had looked back, he would have seen thousands of rotting eyes looking at him. Fondly.

“Hey, Thrush. You don’t want to be anywhere near the Ghūl. My home city, a place that famously could not care less about the slums, made a point of burning down Ghūl statues. But I ran up on some Ghūls, and it was a straight-up good time. Just incredibly satisfying violence. So what’s up with that?”

Thrush went quiet for a while.

“I really don’t know.” It eventually muttered.

“Wait, what?”

“The Ghūl, to use an emotion you could relate to, scare me. Did you say you fought them right after becoming Level One?”

“Right.”

“Mmm. Then I would advise you to be very careful fighting them the next time you cross paths with them.” It looked as awkward as a small pitch-black bird can look late at night.

“Magic doesn’t work properly around them. It requires significantly higher-tier spells to have any serious effect. If you destroy their altars, they disperse for a time. The local numbers drop because they stop making more Ghūl. And since I am a semi-solid construct held in this realm by spellwork, I strongly prefer to stay far away.”

“They can banish demons?”

“In the most old-fashioned way. They torture us until we cannot stay in this world any longer. Why, I don’t know. I think they just do it for fun. Turn left here, by the way.”

“It sounds like the Ghūl have a higher level of reality than most, at least when it comes to surviving magic. Literal built-in magic resistance. Creepy, but why not go in and clear them out hand to hand? As far as I know, they can’t use spells.” Truth asked.

“Because most people don’t seem to have your… gifts… for melee. Imagine, for a moment, you are a Level One magus, and you are armed with a Shock Hands spell. You punch one in the face. Your spell splashes over the Ghūl but does no harm. And you are only as strong as an ordinary magus. What do you think will happen next?”

They drove in silence for a little longer. “I’m visualizing a sort of fleshy sack, strategically pierced with its own bones and yet, somehow, horribly alive and aware as they use it for the most violating and degrading purposes.” Truth guessed.

“Oh, you have fought them. I wondered if you were posing.”

“Still, though. Doesn't seem like enough to freak out a demon.”

“Think about it from my perspective. I am a being from another part of reality that operates on wholly different principles than this place. I am quite familiar with angels, beings from a third place. Everyone has their place and their own rules of operation. Except for the Ghūl.”

Thrush flapped in agitation.

“The Ghūl just turn up and do as they please. Bound by no place or law, I know. They can ignore my best attacks, know how to torture demons, and in the end, my vessel here will add to their… art. And I can’t prove this, obviously, but I would bet they let you win that fight for some reason. They have no concept of self-preservation, so letting you slaughter them is really no problem. Although a sensible human might worry some about what that reason might be.”

Truth had to digest that one for a while. Eventually, Thrush stirred.

“And here we have the university. Do mind the guard.” Which was a wise reminder, given their military-grade fetish and acid-slobbering spellhound.