70 – Momentary Respite

By now, they had caught on and regrouped back to back near the remnants of the campfire.

He could charge in and kill one, perhaps two by leveraging his sheer physicality, but that wouldn’t be enough.

A war-knife’s center of gravity was a little strange for throwing, but with some effort and his momentarily superhuman strength, Sigmund was confident that he could throw it hard enough to skewer two people. He threw his war-knife and did, indeed, skewer two of the soldiers where they stood, hearing one’s breathless gurgling and the other’s pained screams echo into the night as he used the momentary distraction to unceremoniously rip the bayonets off two of the Grekurians’ scatterguns to use for himself.

Armed as such, Sigmund stepped out of the bushes, revealing the ravaged state of his form to the last two of his remaining opponents. His beard smoldering like steel wool, skin clinging to musculature, his skin charred black and veins shining orange like the last sparks of a dying ember, Sigmund took what could have very well been his final stand.

There was not a protracted exchange of blows, or a pitched duel of one against two.

The Beast of Embers slaughtered those last two soldiers like they were cattle, using their own comrades’ bayonets. That night he fell to the ground amongst his freshly-slain foes believing he would die, only to wake up in a colossal amount of pain and with no memory of the events of the night prior.

Sigmund woke up in a colossal amount of pain, wracked by terrible hunger… In a bed.

On the nightstand, there was a glass of light-green Liquid Vigor and a bowl heaping with steaming-hot porridge.

The next day was… Staggeringly uneventful, all things considered. Zelsys had nothing to do but wait - wait for her wounds to heal, wait for the Tailor to finish with her order, wait for Collier to figure out how to produce more shells for her, and most importantly, wait for the Governor’s agent to contact her.

She was perfectly content doing nothing and just lounging around with Zef, and for much of the first half of the day, this was precisely what they did. Even after their respective morning routines of hygiene and a breakfast of porridge along the remnants of the fruits they had bought yesterday, they still returned to their room and spent the coming hours in idle comfort.

At one point, an idea sparked in Zel’s mind. Why not just reload the shells she already had? And so, with Zef’s aid and expertise, they took doing precisely that. In Fog Storage, she had not only the three shells that she had fired, but also the shells that had yet to be loaded when she took them from the bunker, plus a number of appropriately-sized lead balls.

“Well, we’ve got the shells and the lead, now we just need the powder…” Zef pondered, clearly trying to remember whether she had any loose gunpowder beyond that already contained in paper cartridges. However, Zel remembered as clear as day, that among the shell loading supplies she found in the bunker was a powder horn - one which she had placed into Fog Storage when she left.

Out of the Fog vortex it came, and soon enough, they had managed to reload the first of eight total shells, which was rendered far easier by the presence of a marking on the inside of the shell that signified how much powder should be poured. Zel had to use her Fog-breathing to produce sufficient pressure to push the ball far enough and in doing so compact the powder, but when all was said and done, the shell looked as good as new.

“Seven more to go,” she sighed, placing the satisfyingly weighty shell on the desk.

The next hour and a half was spent reloading the remaining seven shells, with Zef taking the opportunity to practice her Fog-breathing while pressing in the lead balls, clearly taking great satisfaction in the fact she could manifest such superhuman strength. Halfway through loading the third shell, they noticed that the powder horn didn’t ever seem to run out, and sure enough, tapping it on the table produced a hollow ringing of much greater magnitude than it should’ve.

It was just like Makhus’ Rubedo bottle. “Huh. Guess we’re not running out of powder any time soon,” Zel remarked, then got back to pouring gunpowder into the shell. By the time they were done both their hands were covered in pitch-black residue, and they spent a good few minutes each washing it off whilst they discussed what their plans for the rest of the day would be.

“It’s almost noon,” Zef said just as Zel was washing the last smudges of blackness off her palms. “Y’wanna go out on the promenade? Maybe get some lunch?”

Zelsys wasn’t quite sure, having intended to spend most of the afternoon resting and trying to improve her breathing method. Once she stepped out of the bathroom, however, seeing Zef in that sundress was more than enough to make her say, “I don’t see why not.”

After leaving the store they just kept walking straight, eventually crossing the crossroads at the bridge. They eventually found a small establishment situated in the basement of an apartment building, its entrance a steep three-step stairway into the bowels of the earth only made noticeable by a large, colorful sign above the doorway, depicting a cartoonishly masculine man with short blonde hair and a mustache holding a metal skewer with many pieces of meat and vegetable.

The veracity of the sign was confirmed when they entered the establishment, and the first sight to greet them was the counter, behind which stood a musclebound Ikesian with dirty-blonde hair that was slicked back, as well as a mustache even larger and more luxuriant than it was depicted on the sign. The place smelled of meats, vegetables, and spices, and was far from full, with only seven or so customers in sight. The chef’s icy-blue eyes pierced them whilst he chopped away at a cut of meat whilst several metal skewers sizzled away above a bed of hot coals right next to him.