“I miss being able to do that,” The duke sighed. “With my own body.”
“You’d feel more energetic if you ate something sir.”
“I miss your mother’s cooking.”
“I can make something from her cookbook, what would you like?”
“I miss her smile… I miss her.” The old man closed his eyes. “I shall join her soon.”
“How about I make you her lamb stew?”
The duke sat back up, “Look out for your brother please.”
“I will.”
The emperor sat upon his makeshift throne, a mere imitation of his actual throne in the palace. The stocky man shifted his weight left and right until he felt comfortable. Two representatives stood at attention, heads bowed to avoid directly looking upon the emperor.
The curtains were drawn, letting in just enough sun to dimly light the room. The walls were lined with the emperor’s personal guards and attendants. Despite it being incredibly crowded for such a small space, nary a sound could be heard aside from the shuffling of cloth from the emperor’s movements.
After a few moments of thought, the emperor broke the silence.
“First off, I’d like to welcome you to the capital. You may look upon me.”
“Thank you sir,” The man in the dark green suit raised his head while the man beside him remained bowed. “I hope our product showcase was to your liking.”
“Straight to the point, you must be a busy man.” The emperor chuckled.
“No sir, I apologize. I know your time is valuable.”
“You like to think in terms of value do you?”
“I’m a merchant sir.”
“He’s a merchant, he says.” The emperor motioned for his attendant, two guards quickly placed a blackened leather armor on the large table in front of the throne. “Do you have a name, merchant?”
“Lanza, sir.”
“Lanza of Lancier, that’s easy to remember.”
“There’s no need to remember me sir, I am but a simple merchant.”
“Nonsense,” The emperor snapped. “I prefer to know the people I do business with. Where they’re from, what they do, who their family are and what ambitions they harbor.”
“Very well sir,” Lanza bowed again. “My name is Lanza Visario, I hail from the isle of Seneca to the south.”
The emperor remained silent, waiting, expecting more.
“I’m uh… I’m a third generation merchant, my family has been in the enchantment business since my great grandfather founded the company Lancier Arms during the second crusade.” Lanza continued. “And I hope to serve the empire in whatever way I can.”
“Very good.” The emperor ran his hand over the surface of the leather armor. “Impressive product.”
“Thank you sir.”
“I don’t recall Lancier Arms being on the approved list of armament manufacturers.”
“You are correct sir, we only create defensive pieces.”
“Ah,” The emperor picked up the armor and flung it at the other man who was still standing silently with his head bowed. The armor hit him in the head before falling to the floor. “Light weight too, our soldiers will enjoy that.”
“We produce an even thinner model that can be worn as an under layer.” Lanza kept his gaze focused at a point on the wall he had chosen.
“Pick it up and put it on,” The emperor growled. He walked over to one of his guards and drew the sword from the sheath that hung at his side. “I’ll wait.”
The man in the red suit quickly scrambled to don the armor, he struggled to fit it on top of existing layers of clothing. As he was tying the straps, the emperor stabbed the sword through the man’s abdomen. The man screamed in pain and crumpled to the floor, blood spurting out of his open wound.
As the blood began to pool on the floor the man stopped screaming as he realized that instead of the searing pain he had momentarily felt, there was only an encompassing warm numbness. He regained the clarity of mind to find minor fascination at the amount of blood spilling out of his gut.
“Would you look at that,” The emperor laughed. “You’ve got built-in pain killers.”
“We were able to stabilize the nerve agent within the regenerative enchantment.” Lanza recited a piece of the explanation the head of the enchanting department had given him.
The bleeding stopped shortly after and a thin blue epidermal film formed over the gash, holding it closed. The man quickly got to his feet and resumed standing with his head bowed.
“Impressive,” The emperor leaned in to examine the hole in the armor he had created. Aside from the torn clothing and blood splatters, he otherwise looked fine.
The emperor put the tip of the sword under the man’s chin and lifted his head. “Did you hear that- Nevis, was it?”
“Nerisson, your highness.”
“Ne-, is that with two ‘r’s or two ‘s’s?”
“One ‘r’ two ‘s’s, your highness.”
“I’ll remember that,” The emperor smiled. He swiftly lopped off half of Nerisson’s right ear. “Now, I ask again. Did you hear what our merchant friend said?”
“Yes your highness,” Nerisson stood motionless as half of his ear bounced on the floor.
“And what did he say?”
“They stabilized the nerve agent within-”
The emperor jabbed the sword into the man’s waist, leaning in once more to closely examine the cut transitioning from a gushing wound to a closed seal. “Before that.”
“Uh…” Nerisson gritted his teeth until he felt the numbness again. “They produce a thi-”
“Before that.” The emperor motioned for his attendant and two guards quickly brought out the armor that the champion had been wearing. The left arm hung lower than the right and a visible gap could be seen at the shoulder plate.
“They-” Nerisson took a deep breath. “Lancier Arms doesn’t have an arms license.”
“And?”
“And… they only create defensive pieces.”
“Mmhmm.”
“I’m deeply sorry your highness, I will investi-”
“Lend me your ear for a moment,” The emperor gestured towards the piece of the man’s ear that lay at his feet.
Nerisson quickly reached down but the emperor grabbed the back of his collar and yanked him to his feet.
“That was a joke,” He threw Nerisson back. “Just listen.”
The emperor took a deep breath and sighed. He sat back down, looking defeated for the briefest of moments before the angry snarl returned. Lanza continued to stand where he had last been instructed and stared at the same spot on the wall that he had become quite well acquainted with.
“Where do I even begin with this shit show…” The emperor sighed again. “We’re going to need to fill the papers with fluff pieces for weeks. I came all this way to have my experience commemorated and distributed. Now what do I give the people?”
The emperor got up and started pacing. “What went wrong here? Did I not give you enough budget?” He pointed the sword towards Nerisson. “Speak.”
“No your highness, you gave us plenty.”
“Was it a lack of quality materials?”
“No your highness, our mines have the highest certification of purity.”
“Poor craftsmanship then?”
“No your highness, our factories have the highest certification of quality.”
“Ah, that just leaves the overseer then.” The emperor held the sword tip up to Nerisson’s eye causing the quivering man to step back. A spear tip at his back prodded him forward, a mere two finger widths away from shimmering steel. “Are you the problem?”
“No your highness, I-”
“I think you are at least part of the problem,” The emperor closed one eye to take aim. “Your job is to oversee the process and ensure everything is being done well. And if there are problems, you are supposed to know about it and report to me, or better yet, fix it. Actually just fix it, I don’t need to know unless you can’t.”
“Yes yo-”
“You don’t seem to be doing a lot of overseeing,” The emperor steadied his arm. “I shall give you a memory that stays with you.”
Lanza couldn’t see what was happening behind him but he could guess from the conversation and the screaming that followed. He continued to stare at the spot on the wall.
Sain sat on the floor in the corner of the shower room, cold water ran down his slumped over body, dripping off of his fingers. The water was clear, with no signs of blood as it flowed into the drain. The other men finished their showers and silently left, leaving Sain to ruminate in peace. The last man out turned off the shower Sain was sitting under and dropped a towel onto his head before leaving wordlessly as well.
Raube, a large man with a weathered and scarred body, walked in and saw Sain sitting in the corner with a towel draped over his head.
“Hey Sain,” He dried off the younger man’s hair and tossed the towel into his lap.
“I’m sorry,” Sain mumbled.
“Don’t worry about it,” Raube shrugged.
“I’ll pay back whatever the damage is.”
Raube chuckled and shook his head before patting Sain on the shoulder. “It seems to be a little more complicated than that.”
“I’m sorry.”
The larger man was silent for a moment. “Can I ask why you went off script?”
Sain was silent for much longer, but Raube waited patiently. “It’s complicated.”
“Fair enough. We need to work on your approach though, you’re going to get swatted out of the air every time if you jump in like that.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Otherwise, you did good today. I’ve got a debrief to get to-”
“My father was watching.”
“Ah,” Raube smiled. “Did he come from far away to see you?”
“Yeah.”
“Well go on then, he must be waiting for you,” Raube pointed to the door.
“What’s going to happen to you?”
“I’ll be fine.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop it kid,” Raube put a hand on Sain’s shoulder. “If it wasn’t today, it would be next week, or the showcase after that. The armor broke, that’s not on you.”
“I-”
“You had no force multipliers in your set up.”
“I did.”
Raube sighed, “You had one force multiplier in your load out. That armor was advertised to hold against three thousand kilonewtons. Let’s pretend you have the most godly punch known to man and you’re hitting a hundred and fifty kilos on a naked punch. Are you telling me your one force multiplier is at least a twenty x?”
“No…”
“You were hitting two hundred kilos at best Sain, and that is giving you a very generous forty percent on your multiplier.” The large man sighs. “This has nothing to do with you. Do you understand that?”
Sain remained silent.
“Answer me Sain, that’s an order. Do you understand that this has nothing to do with you?”72Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡclAEW8eNnJ
“Yes, sir.” Sain nodded.
“Get changed and get out of here,” Raube pulled the young man up on his arm and pushed him towards the door. “Don’t make your old man wait for you.”
Lanza kept a brisk pace as he left the arena back rooms, two soldiers followed behind him as motivation for the continuation of his pace. It was clear to Lanza that they were not there for his protection, but simply to ensure he complied with each instruction he was given during the exit process and to expedite it as much as possible. He respected the desire for efficiency.
Sign here. Fingerprint here. Face the crystal. Don’t smile. Lanza’s shortblade was returned to him as he was escorted out of the building. The soldiers turned without a word at the door and returned to their posts, leaving Lanza the firm impression that they wanted nothing to do with him.
While the young Senecian would love to do nothing more than return the sentiment, his trip home would need to wait a while longer. His curiosity drove him to seek out his competitor’s headquarters. Imperial Arms may have faltered in their material sturdiness, their power output was undeniably impressive. The way he knew of achieving such a result could only yield one or two that would pass the mark out of a hundred units produced. Surely they weren’t just drowning the whole thing in stabilizers. Just trying to calculate the cost made his stomach queasy.
Or perhaps it was hunger gnawing at him. Lanza had forfeited both breakfast and lunch, his fear of an upset stomach during his meeting with the Emperor overpowered the hunger pangs. Corporate espionage would have to wait, Lanza followed his nose towards a much needed meal.
ns216.73.216.62da2
and then Add to home screen.