The Last [Mage] King - Chapter 39: - Shit And Magic (Patreon)

Cleaning other people’s faeces was not fun.

And yet, it was Sasha’s lot.

She’d done it yesterday. The day before that. And now, here she was again.

Crouched in the filth of a shallow trench latrine, armed with nothing but a dented spade, a half-rotted bucket, and a mind she tried very hard to empty.

The pit was barely two feet deep, carved hastily into thick mud behind the barracks. Flies swarmed like it was summer, though it wasn’t. The shit was layered—soft, crusted, fresh, frozen. A timeline of misery. Every scoop with the spade came with a squelch, a stench that stuck to the inside of her nose and wouldn’t leave, no matter how tightly she wrapped her scarf.

She tossed the waste into the bucket, watching it slop and slide against the rusted sides. When it was full, she would carry it—carefully, steadily, because the last thing she wanted was for it to spill—down the narrow duckboards to the edge of the cesspit, where she would dump it, throw in a scoop of lime, and trudge back to start again.

Sometimes the officers didn’t even wait for the latrine to fill. They just pointed and barked. Sasha. You. Clean it. As if her name had become synonymous with waste.

She didn’t know whose shit this was. Didn’t care. It was the same as yesterday’s. Warm. Human. Humiliating.

She tried not to think about it. About the smell that clung to her sleeves. About the soldiers who already saw her as beneath them, now shitting carelessly behind her.

It was a punishment given to rowdy soldiers, rarely ever set upon Mages unless they had done something truly horrible and were in need of humbling. What had Sasha done to be in need of humbling? Nothing, nothing at all.

She hurled the final bucket of warm, sludgy filth—pale and streaked like curdled meat broth—into the cesspit, where it landed with a wet slap that made her gag. Stomach churning, she turned and trudged back to the barracks, desperate to scrub the stench from her skin before it soaked in for good.

The walk could not have been more than a few minutes, yet each step took an eternity between them. The stench clung to her skin like a second uniform, flies buzzed around as if to celebrate her repulsiveness and she felt something wet and cold sliding down the crook of her neck and across her spine. She didn’t look; she didn’t want to know.

Sasha made her way past Captain Vlasenko’s tent, stopped, and felt a bile of anger, and indignation, and madness and more rise up her guts, burn through her heart and eat its way past her throat. It reached her mind and stirred her towards the Captain’s tent, reminded her of every clump and dribble of shit that she had to pick, who had made her do it, and for which reasons.Control yourself, Sash. You don’t want to do anything rash. You’ve come too far to risk it all.

So she did, drawing in a breath, and taking a step forwards—towards the Captain’s tent. It wasn’t really a decision she’d made intellectually—highlighted by the stupidity of it—but one moment she was walking to the baths and the next she was pushing past the flaps of the Captain’s tents and looking down upon her direct superior as he sat in front of a desk, overlooking maps of the terrain.

Captain Vlasenko rolled the map up at the sound of squelching boots in his office. He looked across at Sasha for a half moment, squinting—and she realised he could not even recognise her through the layers of shit and grime that she was currently drenched in. “Osin…” he noted after a moment, frowned and almost seemed to growl his next words. “What do you want?”

At the question, all that rage seemed to fizzle out. At the end of the day, he was a powerful man, and her, a girl who already wasn’t in good standing with the institution they were both in service to. Sasha hesitated before speaking. “I…Captain—I was hoping you might relieve me of latrine duty so that I may be able to focus on tasks that are more important to the Republic.” She tried.

The Captain seemed to relish every single word of hers. “Are you to tell me those who ensure the hygiene of our soldiers are somehow beneath you.”

“I—”

“That it is not a vital task?”

“N—no Captain. I just think that perhaps…it might be better suited to someone else.”

The edge of Vlasenko’s lips edged into a grin. “Oh, I think it’s quite well suited to you, Osin—after all, anything a man can do, a woman can, yes? Wouldn’t you agree?”

Sasha hesitated, winced, then nodded. “Yes, sir.” she whispered her defeat. There would be no manoeuvring her way out of this.

“Then we’re in agreement,” the Captain almost laughed. “You’re dismissed.”

Sasha turned around and headed for the exit. So this was her life now: to shovel shit in the mornings, to be humiliated day in and day out, and with no hope of escape. All she could do was wait until the Captain’s fury had dissipated. She reached a hand to push aside the flap and stopped. “No,” Sasha whispered.

“Excuse me?” the Captain challenged.

Sasha turned around, meeting his challenge with a glare. The bile rose up again, her heart burned again, and this time the sight of her superior did not send them scurrying away. “You’re a child,” Sasha growled.

The Captain’s eyes darkened at that. “I’m going to give you a chance to apologise and let us forget this ever happened. I suggest you take it, lass.”

Sasha’s feet were moving again, and this time they stopped when she was in front of the man’s desk. Sasha placed her hand on either side of the wood and leaned in. She saw Vlasenko shrink back—not from fear but from repulsion—his nose wrinkled inwards and he almost seemed to gag on reflex. Good, he deserved to feel just even a fraction of what he’d put her through. “I will forever be grateful for your help, Captain. You stuck your neck out for me—not many men would think to, and fewer still actually would. But I will never, ever, feel guilty for what was done to you in retaliation. If you want me to, that’s a failure in yourself. And it makes you a small, small, man.”

“You’re in my personal space…” the man hissed.

And at that, Sasha took a few steps back, certain that she’d ruined everything for herself and feeling the dread of it all just waiting to overwhelm her. That was for later, for now, she would let the anger, the rage, and humiliation see her through her confrontation with the Captain.

The Captain turned his head to the side, spat on the floor and set his gaze back on her.“Are you done?” he asked, eyes still hot, voice hotter. 

“Yes.” Sasha replied.

“Then you’re off latrine duty.”

The words seemed so far out of reality, that Sasha was certain there was a blade hidden beneath them. She just cautiously waited for more.

The Captain looked as if he were spitting out a bitter plant. “I may have overreacted, Osin.” He grumbled. “We may not like the cards we’re dealt with, but we must still deal.”

“I…see.” She nodded. She wasn’t going to thank him, he’d done nothing but undo his own vindictive actions. That did not mean her opinion of the Captain had not risen somewhat. Very few men took to confrontation well—almost none took well to one from a woman, much less a girl.

The Captain nodded back, then growled. “Now get out of my office please, you smell like shit, piss and misery.”

###

In Tsaryovohrad you were never truly alone, because the people were always with you.

That was certainly the case for Exia, because he was being followed through the night.

His pursuers were skilled—perhaps the best the city had to offer—which was exactly why Exia had spotted them within five minutes of them starting to track him instead of the usual two.

Ten pursuers if he was right—he always was—probably highly skilled Mages—if he wanted to make it out of this with his balls intact he would need the Captain by his side. Bad news, as the warehouse was at the edge of the city and though he was in the more impoverished areas of Tsaryovohrad he was still quite a ways away from the true outskirts.

And by the pace at which they were closing in, their goals were not to follow but to incapacitate, or worse. If Exia had to guess, the only reason why they hadn’t attacked the moment he left the buildings was because they were in the upper class regions of the city. Now though, when the only people capable of being caught in the crossfire had a net-worth measured in single digit zlakta, it seemed they had decided it was time to throw around their magic.

So Exia prepared.

He took a left turn, taking him away from the squat city blocks and closer to the abandoned railways—always good to avoid civilian casualties when he could, it’d give Volkov fewer things to complain about when this was all done—though Exia doubted the lack of civilian casualties would do much to mollify the General once made aware of the flagrant violation of his orders. Well, a problem for another time.

The railway lay ahead like a dead vein—rust-choked tracks stretching between rows of gutted, hollow carriages. The air was thick with metallic bites of rust and damp earth, like the place had been sweating iron for decades.

He ducked between two crumbling walls, tugged his gloves on, and waited for his enemies to come. And come they did, boots crunching, gloves on—that he could see from the gaps in the carriages.

Their red and greys singled them out as Republic men—the way their attire was styled narrowed them even further down as members of Consul’s personal guards—the Vysokogo. A not insignificant number of them were selected due to whose cock they either came out of or sucked, but there was still a strong enough selection factor for Mage Magnitude and skill within this lot that Exia knew getting out of this would be no easy feat. He would probably be looking at an average Magnitude in the mid sixties or higher.

Why did they follow me? Was I recognised? —no. One problem at a time. First he would kill the Vysokogo, and then he would get to the bottom of this. Or he would die and it would suddenly not be his problem anymore.

“Spread out!” The commander roared and the ten men scattered into the night, surrounding the carriage and boxing Exia in. Their motions were deliberate, their skill practiced, and their methods smooth enough that Exia was half tempted to applaud them. He was too busy trying not to die to. He had words for them however, though he doubted they would like them.

Smite!

The sky split apart, as if a deep gash had been torn through it. Out of it spat cold blue and hungry chaos. The flames poured from the wound like a falling star, striking the earth and tracks and rending through mud and metal like they were one and the same. The world was instantly on fire—the kind of fire that stole heat rather than gave it, the kind that refused to die even as it ran atop snow, the kind that birthed screams from the men it sat upon.

Exia chased one of those screams. Shadow of Zcigmagus: Burst. The world slowed, Exia quickened and he was upon a man desperately trying to pat out the blue fire now eating away at his forearm. He caught sight of Exia late yet was still skilled enough to leap to the side as a stream of flames chased him. It caught him in the shoulder rather than the everything, sending him spinning and screaming even louder than before.

Before Exia could rectify this man’s breathing situation, he caught the sight of crackling lightning from the corner of his eye. He ducked, punished the offender with a tentacle wrapped around his neck and brought him down on a new pest who had decided to leap at Exia. The two masses churned the earth on impact like it was water, but were not dead—not yet.

And before he could rectify that as well, more came—like moths to a flame—and Exia was more than happy to burn them.

Bolts of fire, lightning and wind chased Exia. He dodged one, blocked another, took another to the face, stumbled back and felt his teeth bloody. 

The ten pounced like vultures—completely oblivious to the fact that they were leaping straight into their hunter’s trap. Drain. The dark smoke around Exia expanded, swallowing all of the Vysokogo. And then the killing began, and Exia thoroughly enjoyed it.

A tentacle leapt for one bastard, caught him before his sluggish form could react and pulled him towards Exia. He pressed his palm against either side of his victim’s head, and right as the man was about to release a panicked word—a plea, a prayer, a defiant cry, Exia didn’t care—he let out fire from both hands.

The pressure was what killed him, not the fire, folding his skull inwards with a crunch and leaving pink gore to burst forth from his ruined brain-case.

At the sight of their comrade’s execution, few froze and most attacked with a ferocity—they would be the first to die. Magic met Exia’s skin and birthed blood, gashes and tears where they did. Oh how he loathed fair fights. A lashing foot sent a man flying straight through multiple carriages, he twisted another Vysokogo’s head all the way round and received a flame to the face by his comrade who screamed, cried, and roared at the sight—as it it were somehow Exia’s fault that the bastard had decided to attack a Magnitude Eighty-fucking-three Mage. 

He slipped from the impact, leaving him just vulnerable enough to take another two bolts to his form from yet another group of bastards. Exia slid along the dirt, rolled up to his feet, and caught several streams of fire and lightning and wind to the face—or rather he would have had his shadow not began eating the magic.

Seven Mages pressed their magic from all directions—a mixture of deadly colours pressing against the dark fog from everywhere. He saw their eyes widen, from confusion, to shock and now caution as they saw the ineffectiveness of their magics. 

“So…it really is as they say about the Abyssals,” their leader whispered through bloodied teeth— Exia pondered how to make his teeth even bloodier.

He could feel the magic filling his shadow, like jets of water pumping their way into a tank. And much like a tank, his shadow had a finite capacity of magic it could horde. Exia was approaching that now. Still he waited, waited, and waited, letting the pressure build, the strain grow, and only when he was certain he could hold no more did he slip to the side and let loose. 

“Echo!” he growled and his shadow listened, seven distinct streams of magic leapt forth from the fog, spitting out in every direction and carving through the carriages, earth, poles and anything else unfortunate enough to be in the vicinity. It caught all the Mages on its journey, sending each and every one to the ground—after all, not a single one had seen such a spell up close before and could not react in time. 

It stopped, and Exia was on them before they could rise, stretching his palms forth washing two with fire before they could so much as move. Their blood curdling screams painted the night black, and Exia did not stop until they were finally silent.

He was on the remaining five just moments later yet they did not go down easy, They went down all the same however, and he sent them to Zcigmagus as broken twisted things. Exia leaned against a half melted carriage, panting, heaving and covered in the warmth of life’s blood and surrounded by corpses.

It seemed there was a development, and an unfortunate one at that: Leonid knew he was here. That was it then, he needed to get out of the city, he needed to get to the Captain, he needed to book the first train back to Lyubov, they needed to abandon the mission.

Exia made his way out of the train tracks, body tired, each step a laboured thing. Fool that he was, he’d let himself believe this was about as bad as it could get. Wrong. Before him—at the edge of the residential regions and just before the train tracks—was a sea of red, grey and gloves. The soldiers stared down at Exia with rather little love in their eyes, and he imagined they would continue to do so with even less when they saw the creative ways in which he’d folded their friend’s corpses.

“Remove your gloves!” someone within the faceless mass of surrounding bodies roared.

Exia could disobey. It would be very funny. He could already imagine the faces of the first few men who were torn apart by a clearly outnumbered Mage. But then he'd most surely die in the effort, and that wouldn’t be very funny at all.

Carefully, Exia Vanfoster removed his gloves, let them fall to the ground, and could only watch as the Mages surrounded him. Ah, bugger.