FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCKKKKKK!
HE CAN’T KEEP GETTING AWAY WITH IT! HE CAN’T KEEP GETTING THE FUCKKKK AWAY WITH IIIIIT!
—Lord Scorn, after learning how a tenth of his personal Stealth and Awareness Legends ended up dead in a single night with the words “Adam Arrow sends his regards” carved into each body
VIII-13
Kayfabe
Maria Corcusa didn’t feel fear as most people did. There was an excitation there; a building tension that yearned to be released, like a bomb caged between her ribs. Yet, the bomb was a force rather than a crushing terror. It demanded action or thought but didn’t envelop her in impotence. Perhaps once she knew fright, but true terror had always been a stranger to her. Even the threat of her death came with a greater sense of lament and anger than anything close to the cold waters of horror.
And she knew horror second-hand through the minds she hijacked. She drenched herself in the nightmares of others toward the end of enlightenment. People were rarely logical when it came to reacting and acting. Everyone was motivated by the sensations within. It was simply a different assortment of feelings that provoked specific reactions when paired with the proper opportunities, motivations, situations, environments, and circumstances.
More than anything else, she hated not knowing. Such was why she loathed the Tutorial and its orcs. Not because of the pointless acts of cruelty that fed them, but because they were such unpredictable creatures. They didn't know true fear either. How could they, when death was a stranger to them? For the orcs, there was always another chance to try again.
It made her jealous to see them blessed so much by a loving god. Indeed, even if he portrayed himself as a supreme monster, their father was nowhere near as wasteful or cruel as Lord Scorn, the Lords of Law, or even most of the Pregenitors of the First Blood. He was not a selfish god. He was simply power personified, and he held no insecurity when it came to granting blessings upon those beneath him.
But Maria didn't come here seeking a blessing. No, she wanted an army of competent Pathbearers with the same goal as her.
Just two months prior, a portion of the orcs had turned and devoted themselves to another god. In this, the Challenger showed his love once more, for no vampire, perhaps no god, aside from the Challenger himself would have abided by such a betrayal, even encouraged it. A god who lived up to his own authority first and concerned himself with emotion second or not at all… that was a god worth worshipping.
If only Maria could put up with the miserable aesthetic.
Following the route offered by Belalu, she and her entourage left Vulketh with the help of Scorn’s Dimensionality and crossed over into a long-dead tomb world that held a functional gateway to the Tutorial. The dead world’s history was one Maria had been made familiar with. It was once known as Fa–Lor–Kan; a Legendary-Threshold world much like Earth, that built its foundations on travel, navigation, and bargains.
When the System destabilized Fa–Lor–Kan’s home star for whatever reason, its inhabitants, all given the same name as the world they lived upon no matter their species, used colossal engines festooned to the planet’s tectonic plates to launch it out of the reach of certain destruction, and from there, they fled across the phlogiston that made up their cosmology.
An entrepreneurial, explorer ethos took hold in their collective cultures. It reigned not only in the material but also the magical, causing them to venture across dimensions in search of companionship and trade. Such was how they struck accords with the Compact of Babel, and driven by that enduring spirit of wanderlust, they reveled in wealth for a millennium.
It was this good fortune that ruined them. First contact with reasonable Pathbearing aliens became their norm; everyone seemed inclined toward mutually beneficial business, and as they themselves were inclined toward empathy and nonviolence on a genetic level, a certain tragedy was fated to follow. But the first tragedy wasn’t their end: rather, it was those who protected them from it that turned into their executioners.
The Fa–Lor–Kan were soft but rich, and so the first time they found themselves assailed by a swarm-civilization of fanatical devourers, they were nearly overcome in an instant. They cried out for aid, offering grand wealth and offerings, but their enemy seemed unstoppable, and the death of their civilization was all but certain.
But then a perceived miracle happened; a mercenary found himself stranded on their world, great of might and gray of skin, and he offered an accord that the desperate Fa–Lor–Kan were more than happy to strike.
With access to gateways on their world freely given, the grayskins came and fought in their stead, dying by the billions to ensure their safety. The Fa–Lor–Kan assumed the act to be a feat of utmost generosity and nobility—acts they couldn’t repay through wealth alone. In a moment of grandest irony, they devoted themselves to the Challenger, pledging their hearts and souls to him in a gesture of faith above faith, forsaking all their own gods that came before.
Maria imagined how the Challenger’s laugh may have sounded on that day. The existential irony of their chosen oblivion must have been palpable.
And grim though it was, there was more than a measure of humor to be found in their fate as well. The orcs didn’t butcher the Fa–Lor–Kan. Instead, they were all struck with Orcish Skills. Every single one of them, for the bargain made applied to their civilization as a collective. Every race, every species, every organic being and machine on their world was imbued with a skill that ignited an unknowable violence inside them.
Thus death came not from creatures beyond the stars, but at the hands of their nearest and dearest. Families tore themselves apart, kingdoms were obliterated themselves down to the sediment, and blood flowed like a flood of myth as an entire world embarked on a suicidal crusade against itself.
The ones who died served as a bitter pleasure; the ones who lived succumbed and became bestial parodies of themselves. And in that final bargain they struck, the Challenger won a monopoly over an entire civilization’s remnants, and perhaps a near trillion more orcs—if Belalu wasn’t exaggerating.
“We should be done with this place as fast as we can,” Hero-Shielder Methusala Drugun, Seventh-Generation Kindred to House Drugun whispered. His hands were shaking, much like those of Maria’s entire retinue of a hundred elites. Even the eight hundred expendable horrors around them were quivering like leaves brushed by passing winds. That metaphor was altogether unfitting to their actual situation, considering the atmosphere had long leaked out of the Fa–Lor–Kan; they needed to put up their own oxygen bubble to traverse its surface. Lifeless ruins sprawled from horizon to horizon, and there was only one light in the darkness of eternal night—a glow that seeped out from a crooked crevice fracturing the horizon.
Fa–Lor–Kan’s only remaining gateway to the Tutorial was a thing of asymmetry and counter-aesthetic. Made entirely from mangled pieces of ruined native structures glued together, it had seemingly been crafted by the hands of an enraged architect driven by spite towards vulgarity rather than any interest in expressing beauty. Rivulets of purple blood ran unceasingly down the frame, spilling out from the cracks and granulations of the incomprehensible matter. A pond of bright violet gore became the foundation of the portal to the Tutorial, and though Maria was no stranger to the macabre, there was something deeply wrong about the ever-spilling viscera.
Flowing blood was a thing born of injury and the seeping essence of life, rather than the final silence and hollowness within the husk of death. But there were no people left in this realm. Every denizen had been consumed by the Challenger centuries ago, and all other life that may have outlived them had disappeared along with the atmosphere.
And that was the problem. Gateways didn't bleed on their own. There was a significance, an expression, a meaning of some kind—and it didn't take a master interpreter to understand what the Challenger hinted at: What flowed in you once flows still at my whim.
The First Blood diplomatic detachment crossed over the urban wasteland without ambush or molestation. No sudden spells were sprung upon them. No gray-skinned beasts burst out to strip from them their skin and indulge in a feast of violence. In silence, across ruins they ventured, and from silence, into noise and a second set of devastation they emerged a breath after stepping into the portal of blood.
The Tutorial itself embodied destruction more than the dimension behind them. The vampires smelled blood in the air, thick and rich, flowing from all sides, caressing their senses as it glided in through the cave walls where their portal was located. Alcoves had been carved into the stone, and bowls filled with luscious red fluid awaited them, with each of their names inscribed below.
“How the hells did they know our names?” Hero-Psychomancer Pallas Orpheus muttered, her mana field spreading wide to protect them from any peeking mind-mages.
“Because the Challenger is a proper god—and we share a common goal.” While the others stood unnerved, Maria felt a building anticipation for what lay ahead. “Just as I yearn to know of him, so too does he yearn to know of me—and by extension, those who stand alongside me. Keep your fears to yourselves. Control your breathing. Still your blood. Don't provoke the orcs any more than you already have. They are watching. No matter what we do now, they are watching, and there is no hiding our approach. We do this boldly, openly. We state our terms. We strike this bargain.”
A grim smile sculpted her features as she gave words to that ever-present possibility of a final end. “And should that fail, then do not concern yourself with retreat or life. We will be consumed by the orcs or by the Orcish Skills he will inflict on us.”
A few of her least-trusted bodyguards graced her with glances of uncertainty and fear. Today was not the first time their cowardice was noted. They'd been selected because they were expendable, much like her in certain ways, but the difference was that they were also installed in her group as informants and agents of other Bloodlines. If there was to be a failure, then Maria would bring shame to her entire ancestral lineage. If she was to succeed, well, it would be a collective effort, much like all the collective efforts before.
Though the taste of the offered blood was sweet and enticing, it took little effort on Maria's part to wrangle the more pathetic blood-whores and draw them back from succumbing to their inhibitions. The diplomatic detachment carried on, choosing thirst rather than slaking their desire; they walked into the bleary light of reality, dry and thirsting—unprepared for what lay ahead.
For how could they be? The First Blood was capable of many things, but the murder of an entire world, forcing several civilizations to betray themselves on such a level, that was a dream, that was an atrocity, that was artistry unparalleled. And that was just what they needed if they were to overcome Gate Piety.
In the open, on unfamiliar ground, death could come at any point, at any time, from any direction. With the power possessed by the Challenger, he could unmake them all with a single gesture or less, just a breath, a passing thought. Yet what greeted Maria was not a display of overwhelming might, not a calamity that sloughed down upon them, that swept them away like rats spilling into a realm where they were unwelcome. Instead, she saw the firmament, red lightning whipping sores and open wounds in the rust-red sky above, bodies plunging through those gaps, crashing down upon the land in waterfalls of ruined bodies.
Inverse from the plunging corpses rose edifices built as altars to war; melted blades and rusted husks molded together to form great towers. The worship of the orcs was performed through a singular expression: bloodshed across the land, steel and screams flowing from rim to rim, from sky to bedrock, from land to sea.
This was a place consumed by its own ideology. This was a place that never knew the touch of peace. This was a place that was war embodied, war unending.
Yet somehow, in the grim domain belonging to the God of Strife, there was a joy in the air, an effervescence that echoed from the voices of the orcs. They died with glee. They howled their pains with pleasure, and they continued on with excitation and verve. They wanted this—they yearned for this. They savored this, for it was who they were in body, in expression, in heart, in mind.
But all that paled before the one who waited to greet them.
They found him just 200 meters beyond the cave, seated upon a throne of bones and resting atop a mountain of corpses made from his weaker kindred. Their bodies were pulped and broken, bones jutting from tents of upraised skin, their death rites locked in expressions of jubilation. While their eyes gazed on empty and hollow, extinguished of light in the aftermath of death, their expressions promised that would be back again soon.
But one remained, one endured still. One stared upon the cohort of vampires from his vantage point, like a vulture sizing up rotting flesh. Somehow, even compared to other orcs, his form was massive. He wasn't particularly taller, standing at a good three meters, but he was sculpted like an exaggeration of strength—like a bull with a myostatin deficiency, nothing inhibiting continual growth of its muscles, and no fat to be found anywhere.
Stranger yet was how, juxtaposed against a sky of war-choked black and crimson veins of lightning, the lonesome orc’s attire was colorful, bombastic, and full of presence. His eyes burned like small stars, but not of that piss-yellow color which defined most orcs. It was a fiery thing, a near-golden glow that hinted at Chronomancy but so much more.
They were also the only thing visible of his face, for he wore a mask. Not a helmet of any fashion—the thing was all decoration, embroidery and patterns. It was artistry on display: aesthetics first, functionality never. Its material seemed to be tanned leather harvested off the bodies of his fellow orcs, flayed, cleaned, and then painted, displaying foes he'd bested in small portraits of him bringing them up into the air and slamming them down.
The rest of his attire blended in with his mask as well. It was an affair of great worship, but not worship dedicated towards the Challenger. Rather, it was self-worship, a tapestry of history made into a costume.
The cape that flowed out behind him showed a grand vista of his fists and blows landing upon human, upon machine, upon elf, upon goblin, upon Vulteg, upon humanoid insects and wolves, upon every race Maria had ever seen or heard of and then some.
His boots then were sharp-tipped things of bone, decorated by plumages of crimson styled as backward-angled wings.
As he rose from his throne of dominance, the world around him rattled and crackled. A great explosion rose like a mushroom just behind him, cast not from the lore of flame but that of Necromancy. Corrosive bursts filled the air behind as they became fireworks, further serving as a backlight prompt.
He lifted his arms high, his hands open in a gesture of pride and beckoning as he locked eyes with Maria. The other vampires around her shared looks of confusion and admiration for his display of strength.
“Well, I certainly can’t fault him for his fashion,” Hero-Shielder Drugun muttered.
“SO COME THE SUCKERS, SEARCHING FOR THE GREAT TEATS OF THE CHALLENGER!”
The mysterious orc’s voice hitting them like a typhoon. A few of their weaker blood horrors forming their perimeter turned to puffs of red upon impact, and even Maria found herself bracing as to not be driven back. The Orc followed his explosive statement with a series of loud suckling noises, as if pretending to be a vampire searching for the Challenger’s missing nipples.
“WE SEE HOW IT IS; WE SEE WHAT YOU ARE. COMPACT’S DETERMINED TO PLAY IT LIKE ONE OF THEIR LITTLE SPREADSHEETS! SCORN’S TOO BUSY TRYING TO DIVINE WHAT TO DO FROM THE CRUST-PATTERNS IN HIS CUM SOCK—YEAH! BUT THE CHALLENGER! THE ORCS! WE’RE JUST TOO RISKY FOR YOU, YEAH? JUST TOO THREATENING, HUH? WELL, NOW YOU’RE HERE, BECAUSE WHO ELSE’S LEFT? WHO’S GONNA WIN YOUR LITTLE WAR?”
The strange orc held a hand up to his right ear and waited expectantly. From all across the Tutorial, the answer crashed down upon the vampires like a well-timed tidal wave.
“ORCS!”
“WHAT’S THAT?” the orc asked, pretending not to hear.
“ORCS!”
“WHO THEY GONNA NEED?”
“ORCS!”
“WHO’S THE ONES THEY FEAR?”
“ORCS!”
“AND WHO'S GOT THE SUCKERS BY THE FANGS?”
“ORCS!”
“THAT’S RIGHT—YEAH!”
Maria narrowed her eyes and tried to Analyze the orc—but the moment she did, a steel chair smashed into the back of her head at the speed of a lightning bolt. The air detonated. A pocket opened in the sky. A shockwave flung those nearest to her to the ground, their bodies toppling in the most dramatic manners, accompanied by the rising cheers of an unseen crowd. The back of her skull burst and folded inward; a gurgle of surprise slipped out of her, and her bodyguards broke into defensive actions after picking themselves up from the ground—crying about an ambush. The blood horrors were set loose; her elites defied her words and attempted to mount a defense. Then, a scrawl of massive, red text exploded into existence in front of her.
DARE YOU BREACH THE VEIL OF KAYFABE AT YOUR OWN PERIL!
What is… kayfabe? Maria’s bleary thoughts burst as the other vampires charged the orc like a murder of crows. She'd fallen at some point, her brain matter pouring out from her cracked skull like yolk out of an eggshell.
It took all the bloody mush that had spilled out from her less than a millisecond to reverse its course back through the breach in her skull and again as long for her to be back on her feet, prepared to join the battle—
Only far too late. Maria's breath was wrenched out from her lungs as she witnessed the fate of her army.
No one had died. The orc hadn't struck to kill.
Currently, he held the Hero-Shielder meant to protect her person with everything he had and lifted the man up into the air in a rising suplex. Drugun kicked and thrashed, his legs broken at odd angles, bones jutting free, healing at an accelerated pace. None of that mattered, however, for the orc’s hold was unbreakable.
“Put me down! Put me down! Put me down, you bloody animal!”
The vampire's screams inspired only laughter on the part of the flamboyant orc. “Oh, sucker, you're gonna REGRET that phrasing! But sure, I'll do it. I'll put you down just like I did your little buddies. Shall I put him down, boys? Shall I drop him?”
His last words rose high into the air as a question. It resonated as a shockwave. It shook the air, but also something more. The ground beneath Maria quaked and quivered, not like soil or stone, but like a stage. An explosive excitement filled the air as distant cries and affirmations arrived.
"Drop him! Drop him! Drop him!"
The world cheered. It was more than the voice of orcs. It was something greater, something grander; a chorus, an audience watching from somewhere unseen, lusting to behold violent spectacle.
And it was only then that Maria noted the rest of her forces. In the near-instant it had taken her to regenerate, they'd all been hammered into the ground, groaning, limbs broken, bodies buried in rubble and soil. The blood horrors shared a similar fate as their true Pathbearer masters, but even for them, no deaths befell them. They were all spared. They were all brutalized, dominated, but given life in return.
In a moment of unbelievable finality and uncharacteristic mercy, the orc dropped Drugun down, and he slammed his victim against the ground with such a devastating blow that the entire world beneath their feet seemed to tremble and fireworks detonated in the distance. A corrosive spray of pyrotechnic glory filled the air, and an imprint of the scene lingered as an afterimage flashed and imprinted upon Maria's eyes. She saw her bodyguard kicking and struggling. She saw the orc's face mask, glowing bright, inscribed, branded with the expression of his newest victim, and then he crashed down.
This became a moment of history, a testament to the orc's strength, the vampire's weakness. When he landed, there was an explosive sound: bones breaking, the world shivering and trembling, domination given an audible… taste.
But the orc wasn't done: as Drugun coughed and groaned, he was not allowed to rise, for the orc rolled over him and held him down, pinning his shoulders into the soil as another chorus rose from all corners of the Tutorial and beyond.
“ONE!”
The first syllable was accompanied by the hammering of a hand, a hand that crashed against canvas, a hand declaring the orc's victory.
“TWO!”
The second came with the ringing of a bell, proclaiming the end of a match that wasn't announced in the first place.
“THREE!”
Finally, there was the blowing of a whistle and cheering from all across the world.
The strange orc lifted his hands once more and flexed. His muscles bulged, his eyes gleamed bright with pride, and he stared Maria down as Necromantic fireworks painted the heavens behind him and shrouded her in the dusk of his majesty.
She'd thought herself prepared for anything when she ventured into the Tutorial. She'd come to strike a bargain, to make a deal with the Challenger, but there was no world, no dream, no fever or death throe that could have imbued her with the imagination to predict this. Maria often used silence and stillness as a shield, but rarely was she rendered so utterly speechless.
“Well, well, well. It's only the Legend that's left. Looks like I wiped away the chaff too soon. Sorry, but the Breaker doesn't waste time mopping away the crumbs! I'm a main-course kind of guy, and even if you're a Legend, you look more like a morsel. Are you just a morsel, Legend-Assassin? Are you just a little yapping dog that's come to lick up the bloody nipple nectar of the Challenger? Or did you actually cut yourself some teeth? Are you willing to do some biting or your own?”
Then Maria's moment of speechlessness passed. She was beginning to understand: This was a performance, yes, but one done for a comprehensible reason—empowered and enforced by a Skill. She suspected it was Legendary at the least and likely Narrative—Fae in origin—if she had to guess otherwise.
It was clear that saying no would see her condemned to a miserable fate. She needed to engage. She needed to face the orc on his terms, to play his game and keep his interest.
And so, she bared her fangs and took a half step back. This wasn't to be a battle in the conventional sense that she knew. Instead, it was to be a contrast, a moment of strife between two rivals. Even if she wasn't his equal, she could instill a bit of tension into the dialogue.
She equipped two blades: the first a short sword, leaking liquid shadow and drenching a part of the world in rising vapor of black. The second was a Dimensionality-Biomancy rondel dagger infused with First-Generation blood and charged with space-slitting enchantments. Maria considered calling upon her summons but decided against it. It would make her seem inferior to draw upon help, and that might work against her favor if this orc actually had a fey skill rather than a legendary one. “I assure you: my teeth work quite well.”
The orc finished flexing, raising his arms high and laughing dramatically. “Let’s see them, then! And if they're larger than mine!”
His words projected a physical pull on her will. Her emotions, her mind, were all drawn toward a single inexorable outcome: conflict. Even so, she noticed it, and in noticing, she decided how she was about to engage. He clearly wanted her to stride forth and deliver the first strike. For whatever reason, that would give him an advantage that would allow him to fuel his skill.
So let surprise be my ally, then. As it was for him.
“No,” Maria retorted, lowering her weapons. “You show me your bite first.”
The orc paused; she caught an erratic twitch in his left eye—a hint of frustration. She still had no clue what kayfabe was, but this orc wanted her to play along, but in this instance, the price of her compliance would be his advantage. Everything he did so far screamed of style but also intent.
The blood horrors and the other vampires lay in groaning heaps, unable to rise. Literally unable, judging from how hard her Heroes were straining. It seemed like a band of invisible force kept their backs magnetized to the ground. There’s something about being pinned by the orc that makes it so, she noted silently.
Likewise, he engraved imprints of victory as moments on his costume’s colorful tapestry—a display of his dominance. Everything he did folded into his performance, and so her instincts told her to engage and taunt rather than escape and reject.
“I allowed you to perform such underhanded tricks on me to gain your measure,” Maria declared with boisterous confidence, struggling not to spew bile as she lied outright. She spoke with far less finesse and precision than she was used to, but what to do in her present circumstance when everything was pointed against her?
“You? You let me?” The orc threw his head back so far he almost looked backward and laughed. “You let me like the sky lets the sun rise! You’re just the illusion, the canvas to my substance! I am the art and the artist. The only one here doing the letting, sister, is me—yeah!”
Why is he always growling “yeah” every few sentences? Maria pushed aside her annoyance and committed to the farce. “Yes, I let you. Just like I wanted to see what might happen should I allow that pitiful ambush to strike me.” She briefly looked around, trying to find the steel chair that had caved her skull in, to no avail. Fell out of existence post impact, it seems.
“The Breaker thinks you're more dragon than sucker, sister, because you’re breathing a lot of hot steam!”
“Hardly. It’s just that you’re so… unimpressive.” Her words affected his muscles like a needle would a blow-up doll. A whistling squeal interrupted her reply as the Breaker visibly shrunk, and was followed by a loud “Ohhhhhs” and chants of “Fight back, Breaker! Fight back!”
This might be a trap. Or it might be working. Hm. Let me try something… Maria lopped her left arm off. The pain burdened her far less than the wariness of going too far. She could regrow the arm at any moment, but in that narrow span of time, the orc could unleash any number of attacks on her. Because he did defeat my entire escort. In under a second. And more than defeat, he overpowered and pinned them. All of the individuals—his eyes. Chronomancy. Esoteric enough that my Legendary skill didn’t notice or counter his. Ominous.
Her severed arm struck the ground without ceremony—as intended. For that was the opposite of the established order. Everything she did was dull statements, no exhortations, single actions, all to counter and taint the waters of his performance. Veins of outraged crimson swelled and usurped the gray of the Breaker’s skin, and he shrank in both size and hype at once.
“A-ahem! Cut the mic!” The orc's declaration and gesture of slamming his outstretched fingers into the palm of his other hand were accompanied by a static crackle, and then his booming tone faded to a soft whisper. “What… are you doing?” he hissed, holding a hand beside his mouth as if to hide his voice.
Maria struggled not to sneer. “Rising to the challenge.”
“No, no no no—I’m the heel!”
“You’re an orc.”
Judging from his body language, the Breaker was barely holding himself back from lunging forward and tackling her. “A heel is the villain. The dominant villain. That’s me.”
“I disagree.”
“You—you can’t disagree!”
“I can. My evidence is that the System had to intervene on your behalf and throw a chair at me to stop me from humiliating you.”
“You—” The Breaker bit his tongue and tensed as a truly booming laugh sounded from high above.
“Come now, Breaker. Let her play. I wish to see more of her nature. Hold to your fast; keep her alive. But indulge yourself in struggle otherwise. She’s proven herself to be perspicacious. Now, I want to see what kind of carnivore she is.”
The Breaker suddenly snapped into a salute—and his entire costume changed. Instead of a colorful assortment of paintings on treated orc skin, he gained a measure of armor bearing the symbology of… an orc. He was an orc wearing an armored representation of an orc.
Shifting from Skin-Game to Jingoist Era.
“This is going to be most aggravating,” Maria muttered, biting back a sigh. She didn’t know what any of these words manifesting before her meant, but it felt like she was being forced into someone else’s—
Rusted pillars erupted out from the ground in a circle around them, and wire shot out, connecting each edifice to the next. A cone of Necromancy came down on her like a corrosive spotlight that nibbled but didn’t yet burn, and the Breaker aimed his salute at the heavens before extending an arm out by his side.
“Orcwing Clothesline!” he bellowed.
Maria blinked. “A-are you naming your attack—”
He flung himself at her—and then pulled out a revolver mid-flight and emptied its chamber into her groin.