Restoration Berserker Chapter 5 (Patreon)

AN: And so, Marik meets a certain bunny.

Chapter 5: Meeting a Bunny.

The harsh sunlight beat down unrelentingly, turning the desert into an oven as sweat rolled down Marik's brow. 'I got too used to the shade.'

He grunted under the heat, tightening his cowl to keep the sun out of his eyes as he kept walking on, his sled leaving two trails behind that were quickly erased in the passing breeze.

‘How large can this desert be?’

It had been almost two weeks since he left, traveling night and day with minimal naps, following as straight of a path as he could follow with the stars as his compass, and he still hadn’t seen anything new.

Just sand, stone, and the occasional monster trying to ambush him. ‘It’s not like I need much sleep anymore, and at least the monsters keep me fed, but I’m long since tired of this sand. What I’d give for a book, even a dry textbook.’

Being superhuman didn't stop him from feeling discomfort; it only lessened the effects of said discomfort. 'Maybe I should whittle a flute from a bone or something? How the hell would I even do that? And if I ever find someone who enjoys sand between sweaty ass cheeks, I'd be shocked.'

One step after another, Marik traversed the sands, feeling like a speck in an ancient world with nothing but his thoughts for company.

The titanic golden dunes cast a mix of shade and sun that constantly shifted throughout the day. Winds occasionally blew with the distant calls of far-off monsters, and the heady scent of dry heat scorched his lungs with each breath.

He climbed dune after dune, turning each climb into a workout as he heaved his sled above his head and made his legs burn with the effort it took to run, only to jump on his sled to ride the way down with a holler of joy at the simple pleasure.

‘Gotta grind that Agility stat.’

After more than half a year of finding pleasure through wrath and stat growth, Marik didn’t know how to do much else. If he wasn’t fighting, he was thinking of ways to keep his growth going, and roaring for monsters got old when he realized his voice didn’t travel nearly as far in the open desert as when there were enough stones to echo it in all directions.

One step at a time, he trudged his path in utter freedom, embracing the world as it did him, until one day, that all changed.

On the evening of the twentieth day since he left his forge, he paused in his climb of a sand dune as something tickled his ears. 

Freezing still with his sled held above, Marik tilted his head and listened closely.

“…move…have…”

“I’ll….you….”

“Fight…..left…”

The voices were incredibly faint over the distance, but Marik was like a hound who smelled blood as the sand exploded from where he stood. In a blink, he appeared at the top of the sand dune, looking down at the next valley to see a welcome sight.

A caravan of carts, possibly a dozen in total being pulled by camels, like something straight out of a medieval movie appeared to his eyes, but Marik focused on the more critical parts.

People. Humans. Humans who spoke a language he fully understood. Humans currently being attacked by a dozen anaconda-sized snakes with purple-spotted scales.

Marik recalled what he knew of them. ‘Highly venomous, injects an immediate hallucinogenic as a slower agent shuts down the nervous system. Their meat is among my top three.’

Those two facts entered his mind rapidly as he took in the humans fighting back with swords, spears, and shields.

Marik narrowed his eyes on them. 'Sloppy.' He had no experience with cold weapons aside from his makeshift axe, and yet, watching what appeared to be around fifteen warriors barely manage to push back the snakes with ineffective swings and stabs of their bladed weapons. At the same time, two archers in the back failed to do more than strike harmless muscle irritated him. 'Just tear them apart.'

He unconsciously growled in the back of his throat. ‘I was ripping those things to shreds in my third month; what the fucks wrong with these morons? Get in there.’

Marik didn’t want to interrupt and possibly distract someone, he knew how annoying that could be from his own fights, and he didn’t really know what to say to the first human he would meet in a new world.

But those thoughts changed when he saw the snakes latch onto a man's leg and pull him into the shredder, the opening leading to three more men getting bitten, and Marik was moving just as an unpleasant voice shouted from behind the warriors.

000

Mercenary POV: Liam

"Retreat! Get us away from those Dream Vipers!" The unpleasant roar of the old raisin, Mr. Gillis, shouted out with his usual encouragement. "Protect the goods, you mangy dogs! You get paid by how many survive the journey!"

'You won't survive the journey, you half-dead old fuck.' Liam thought to himself in irritation as one of the blasted Dream Vipers bounced off his shield, their hisses sending chills down his spine at the outcome and finding himself put under their deadly venom. 'One bite, and I'll be sipping through a straw for weeks if I don't get eaten and that old fuck doesn't use me as bait next time anyway.'

Liam grumbled but still stepped back with his fellow mercs, an unwashed group of outlaws he had fallen in with back when he didn’t listen to his ma and ran off for an easy buck instead of working the family farm. ‘Who wants to grow mushrooms his whole life? I got better things to do!’ Those were the last words he said to her.

Things were great for a while. He sold off one of his family's heirlooms to pay one of those sleazy merchant gods for a Falna and began his life as a real adventurer! Only for him to get caught looting the first corpse he came across and accused of murder. 'Ok, having the rich kid's blood on my knife wasn't helping, but the kid deserved it for flaunting his wealth.'

He was forced to flee the plains for the desert and took up work where he could find it as a merc.

He’d be the first to admit the life of a merc wasn’t that glamorous, but it sure beats mushroom farming! ‘Plus, transporting special goods comes with all the benefits.’ A lecherous grin crossed his lips as he imagined all the fun he would have that night. ‘If only I could play with that loud-mouthed rabbit. I’d love to break her in. She’ll cost a fortune once she hits the whore house. Escorting premium goods is a pain in the ass.’

A deadly hiss passing by his head broke Liam from his trance as he dodged the viper that snuck up on him while he was distracted, leaving ole Joe to his left to get snapped up in the fanged jaws and pulled out of the line. ‘Shit, my bad. I’ll light a candle for you at the church, buddy.’

The best way to deal with Dream Vipers was to give them a meal while you ran, and Liam was just about ready to go with four of their numbers down when Mr. Gillis shouted. “We’re clear! Leave the baggage and get back here!”

Liam didn’t need further encouragement to step back and turn to start running, but the moment he did, he heard something else that froze him in place.

A bellowing roar rang out like booming thunder, and Liam wasn’t the only one momentarily deaf as something slammed into the vipers in an explosion of sand.

But Liam wasn't wet behind the ears. He focused his gaze as a figure was seen through the falling sand. Liam looked closely, trying to understand the situation, but when he finally pierced the sand, he found himself staring at the center of a back. His head tilted up, and then up once more, until he took in the full figure.

'Holy shit.'

A towering dark-skinned beast with muscles larger than Liam's head stood in the center of the Viper pile; thick clawed hands gripped a snake beneath the jaw in both hands, both squirming with all their strength yet doing nothing to change their stance.

Bleached platinum hair drifted in the wind as Liam saw the…creature…turn his way, golden brown eyes staring into his soul as twin cracks rang out, louder than the blood rushing in his ears, and the man dropped two fresh Dream Viper corpses like it was nothing.

The same monsters he saw as insurmountable a moment earlier.

A pin-drop silence rang through the clearing for a moment before the beast in human flesh opened its mouth and spoke in a deep, gravelly tone, sending a new wave of fear down Liam's spine.

“Hello.”

The fearsome Dream Vipers reared back in hesitation, and Liam couldn’t blame them. In the next second, the beast seemed to cough and then vanish from Liam’s sight, accompanied by an absolute slaughter of the monsters.

 ‘Maybe Ma had it right; mushroom farming doesn’t sound so bad.’ 

000

Marik cleared his throat with a cough, idly rubbing his throat with a hand. ‘Been a while since I’ve spoken.’

The surrounding men had frozen for some reason, and a hiss in his ears reminded Marik of the snakes. ‘Oh, they must be wary of these things.’

He turned to the snakes with a grumble in his stomach for the coming meal. ‘Come to papa.’

His foot stomped the ground as he moved faster than the reptile monsters could respond, bashing their heads into gory piles as he tried to preserve the bodies.

Not to give the reptiles a disservice, as snakes were known for rapid twitch movements, and a few managed to turn at the last second to sink their fangs into his flesh, but Marik ignored them to grab his axe, slicing their heads off from their bodies without a care for how they clung to him in death. 'These snakes look hungry, lucky.'

Marik’s eyes lit with joy. He hadn’t rushed over to save anyone’s life. He couldn’t give a shit about that. ‘These snakes taste better before they eat something. Their meat is weirdly gross while digesting food.’

The caravan had stopped moving as Marik worked, and it only took a few minutes for him to clean up as he snapped the last one’s neck.

By then, an older man, the one Marik idly realized was shouting orders from the caravan, approached on a camel, stopping a distance away with the warriors grouped up on his sides. “Ho, there, stranger.”

Marik turned to face the older man, idly debating whether he should remove the snake heads buried fang-deep in his legs. 'Their venom barely tingles, but it's wasteful to miss the opportunity to further my understanding of it.'

Even if he had anti-bodies, it sometimes took a few more tries to see how it worked to click with his brain and let him use it through Spider's Touch.

Marik didn’t realize he was ignoring the old man as he got lost in his thoughts, unused to communication as he was.

"Boy!" The older man snapped with flying spittle. "Who are you? Where's the rest of your group?" His beady eyes scanned the dune tops, looking for an ambush that wasn't coming.

Marik didn't notice that as he raised a hand casually. "Marik. No group."

"No group?" The older man replied skeptically. "Do you take me for a fool, boy? Your face is too youthful to be an old wanderer; what are you doing here?"

"Lost." Marik shrugged without further elaboration. "Looking for a town."

“Is that so?” Mr. Gillis eyed up the snake heads stuck to Marik’s body as a greedy look took hold. “Perhaps I can help with that.”

“Map?” Marik asked as he pointed to the snake corpses. “I’ll trade.”

"Trade, he says." A wheezing cackle rang from the older man. "I have something better you can trade. You've been pumped full of Dream Viper venom, boy. You won't be moving for a month." He waved to his men. "Someone throw some chains on this brat; he must be one of those pampered Familia kids searching for glory; he's probably worth as much as that annoying rabbit."

The mention of money had the mercenaries all perking up as they overcame their momentary fear, eyeing up Marik like a particularly juicy meal.

"Hm." Marik scratched his head. 'I already figured this group was sketchy with how they abandoned the others, but I didn't think they'd be this quick to violence.' His gaze moved past the group, none of them setting off any warnings to his instincts when he took his eyes off them as he looked closer at the caravan, only now noticing that many of the wagons had iron bars over them. And more importantly, there were plenty of eyes behind said bars staring back at him. 'Oh, I missed that part. That's not good, right?'

Marik had plenty of time to ponder over the months, and while thinking of whatever world he ended up in, he inevitably thought of slavery. It was a staple in most fantasy worlds in one way or another, and he had asked himself how he would approach it.

His eventual answer was that imposing his earth-born views on another dimension, planet, civilization, and species was illogical. He certainly didn't like it, but that didn't make him right and them wrong.

With that said, however.

"Come on lads! He's gotta be teetering now. Whoever gets the chain on him first is getting a bonus." Mr. Gillis waved a cane forward, and the mercs were happy to oblige, bearing unkind grins as they brought out thick chains.

'Does being human make them different from monsters?' Marik tilted his head as he watched them approach. 'Does being human mean I should treat them differently?'

"Easy there, big guy, no sudden movements, ya hear?" A merc reached forward to clamp some kind of iron on him, only to suddenly find himself hanging off the ground by his neck as he was now eye level with the creature before him. "Eh?"

“What is your name?”

Marik’s guttural voice shook the Merc.

“L-Liam.”

“L-Liam. I will remember it.”

“Um, it's just Li-…" Liam didn't get to finish his sentence as he was suddenly facing the sky, his neck snapped like a twig in Marik's grip. ‘Shoulda just farmed mushrooms.’

There was a moment of silence as everyone looked at the crumbled merc on the ground and back to the suddenly not-very-paralyzed Marik.

"He's on his last legs! Get him!" The old man's unpleasant voice broke the silence as they charged as one.

Marik casually dodged a stab of a spear, reaching out to rip it out of the merc’s hands while grabbing the wrist of the man and crushing it.

Marik grunted at the high-pitched scream that left the man’s mouth and lightly kicked him away, sending him flying with broken ribs into others.

A wildly swung sword was deflected with his hand, the blade not even drawing blood with the force the merc could put behind it before Marik swung the spear shaft and shattered both of the man’s knees.

A simple turn of his head dodged an arrow as Marik grabbed it out of the air and threw it back at the archer. The force of which made it a deadly projectile, but the aim being completely off had it smashing into the sand.

‘Never practiced with arrows before.’ Marik mused as he moved forward, not taking the mercs around him seriously as he smashed bones with his new stick. ‘These people are just sad. Monsters move faster, are more precise, more ruthless, and strike harder. How have they survived in the desert this long?’

Marik was honestly baffled. He knew he was strong, but Marik doubted he was hot shit. It wasn't his nature to arrogantly believe he was the strongest without proof. He was a man who trusted his instincts, as instinct was all that kept him alive, with wrath as the fuel to support that instinct.

But these people didn’t even make him angry. Didn’t light a fire in him. His instincts were silent.

Or at least they were until Mr. Gillis pulled out a tube from a pouch on his horse.

It took a bare minute of casual moving to break the limbs of most of the mercs, leaving only the old man and two more of his goons by the time Marik reached them.

“Distract him for me, and he’s ours!” The older man smiled fiercely and put the tube to his mouth as the two raised interlocked shields.

A green glow covered the tube, and Marik's instincts flared. Not enough for his life to be in danger, but enough to interest him.

If before now he was moving at a walking speed, now he was sprinting as the ground exploded in a cloud of sand. The two mercs didn’t have a moment to process what happened before they both went flying from Marik’s shoulder charge, each finding their limbs broken in the next second.

But just as he broke through, so too did the old man launch a projectile. A dripping dart pierced his chest faster than he could react, causing Marik to stop short a few feet away from the mercenary’s leader.

Mr. Gillis's wrinkled, dry lips pulled back in a nasty smirk, revealing pure black teeth beneath. "Ha! That be the venom of a level 2 Haunted Cactus, boy! I don't know what you're doing to be moving with all that Dream Viper venom in ya, but there’s no human nor monster I’ve met that walked away from-urk!”

The older man's words cut off as Marik's grip closed around his windpipe, lifted him off his camel and left him to dangle as his ride abandoned him.

Mr. Gillis’s eyes were wide in shock. “H-how are you moving?!” He choked out.

"Your venom tickles."

Unless he was in a world that unnaturally had a lot of cactus monsters in it, Marik assumed Haunted Cactus was the name of the monster who gave him his first taste of venom. 'Ironic that he'd use it here. I can use it to strengthen my immunity.'

“T-that’s-!” The older man couldn’t finish whatever he was going to say as his face turned purple. “P-please!”

Marik stared dispassionately into the man’s begging face as he asphyxiated. “What makes you different from a monster?” He looked past the man to the carts, where chained forms stood huddled behind iron bars.

A part of his mind said he should care and that it was wrong, but the larger part of him, which had been utterly reshaped and changed these last eight months, felt he was in the right.

‘I don’t need to justify my actions here. I don’t need to be a hypocrite. It doesn’t have to be complicated.’

If he was attacked, he would end the threat and move on. That was all.

"Hey, shitface."

Marik’s fingers froze an inch from finishing the job and looked over to the carts.

Far from the dozens of gazes peeking out of the other carriages, a single pair of red eyes locked onto him from within a sole-shadowed cart wrapped in thick iron.

Marik narrowed his eyes and stepped closer to get a better look. His feet leaving prints in the sand as he idly dragged the choking older man in his grip to step before a far sturdier cart than all the rest.

Chains dangled from all four corners, connected to each limb as the cart's sole occupant was forced to kneel in the center. Red eyes peered up at him as he blocked out the sun, staring defiantly from beneath a curtain of messy white locks. "Don't finish him."

The voice was deep with a husky yet oddly feminine tone to Marik’s ears. A deeper look made out the rounded face of what was clearly a woman.

Marik tilted his head as he locked eyes with the woman and asked without breaking off the staring contest. "Why?"

He was genuinely curious. Why would she stay his hand? Was she not a slave under the weak man's chains? 'Stockholm syndrome?'

Thankfully, it was none of the above, as the figure bared surprisingly white teeth in an unfriendly grin. "He has some information I want. I can't let him die before I know it."

Marik considered the request momentarily before nodding and dropping the sack of now unconscious useless meat on the sand. "Sure."

“Shit, seriously?” The figure blinked in surprise. "You’re really not going to kill him? I was just hoping here."

"He doesn't interest me anymore." Marik shrugged and plucked the needle from his chest. “His venom was weak.”

"Alright then…" The woman looked at him oddly before shrugging it off. "Well then, big guy, you mind unlocking these chains? I've had a cramp for days, and none of these weak pussies were man enough to try to go a round with me.”

Marik raised a brow. “You’re berating them for not raping you?”

“That’s not what I meant, shitface.” The woman grunted. “All I needed was some leverage to break these stupid fucking chains.”

"Ah." Marik gave the cage a considering look. "Does that mean you're strong?"

“Damn straight it does.”

Marik’s lips twitched upward in an unconscious grin. “Do you want to fight?”

The woman seemed to match his grin with an equal one. “Sweetheart, whether you want to fight or fuck, I’m game as long as I get out of this fucking cage.”

‘A woman after my own heart.’ Marik chuckled and experimentally grabbed the iron bars. A quick tug had them creaking, so he grunted and pulled harder.

“Um, you do know the keys are right over…..” The woman cut herself off as the wooden bearings snapped and the iron bars popped off the cage. “Or just do that. That works too.”

Sunlight poured into the cage, and Marik got his first good look at the woman.

Sun-kissed skin, white locks, thick thighs, a shapely figure, and floppy bunny ears. Marik did a double take at the ears. 'Right. Isekai.' She was dressed in the equivalent of a wool sack, leaving her generous cleavage on display.

“You just gonna stare, dipshit?” The woman gave him a challenging grin that he shook his head at.

Marik deadpanned at her. “Does everyone speak like you around here?”

"Nah, that's all me. I'm one of a kind." The proud grin spoke miles of how often she'd heard similar questions.

“Right.” Marik stepped into the cart and immediately felt a massive temperature difference. He looked around at the inside of the cage and saw all iron and wood before he realized it had traveled in the sun all day. He looked at the woman incredulously. "How are you not dead?"

“Spite.” The woman grinned wildly, and Marik was finally close enough to see the sweat soaking her from head to toe. The woman had been practically unable to move in an oven for who knows how many days.

Marik’s gaze was filled with a new level of respect that only made the woman smile wider before he turned to look over the chains. It was a thick cord stuck to her wrist and pulled up to a corner of the cart. Shrugging, Marik grabbed the manacle around her wrist and pulled.

“Wait, it was funny the first time, but the chains are much stronger than…” The woman trailed off a second time as she watched veins bulge all over Marik’s body, a golden tint entering his eyes before the reinforced iron was pulled apart with a shriek. “Holy fuck, what level are you?”

“One.”

“Shit, seriously? You feel like a two. How close are you to maxing out your strength stat?”

The woman's arm dropped with relief, and Marik raised a brow as he tossed away the scrap metal to grab the one on the other hand. "What's the max number?"

“How the fuck don’t you know that?” She flexed and rolled her free shoulder. “S999 is the max for every stat, not that nearly anyone actually gets there.” She added the last bit in a grumble, but Marik still caught it.

He tapped into his wrath state for another brief moment, his strength shattering his limits, and ripped the metal off her second limb before breathing out and releasing it. After the increase in his developmental ability, he was able to tap into up to 5% of his wrath state on command. Going above it required all the usual steps, but it was a work in progress.

“Why?”

“Why what?” She rolled out her second arm to the sounds of pops and cracks, groaning in relief along the way. “Oh, that’s the stuff.”

“Why does no one max out their stats?” Marik idly looked down at her legs, tied down with three manacles along each thigh as she was forced to sit on her ankles.

“Are you fucking with me? Didn’t your Familia teach you anything?”

“What’s a Familia?”

“How could you not know what a…” The woman sent him an odd look before her eyes widened. “Oh shit, you’re one of those poor bastards, aint ya?”

“One of what?”

“You ever meet the god who gave you a Falna?”

“No?”

“Yeah, that settles it.” The woman shook her head. “Never mind, we can talk once I’m free and not dying of dehydration.”

“I want answers.”

"And you'll get 'em." The woman answered firmly. "You have my word on that, big guy. Rumi Luna never forgets a debt. Now back off and let me snap this fucking cage in half.”

Marik was far from being a people person after all this time in the wild, but intent was something he understood pretty well. He saw it every day in the eyes of the monsters he fought. Marik saw it in the eyes of the mercs he had just crushed. And now he saw it in the eyes of the chained warrior before him.

They were unwavering eyes without a hint of doubt.

Marik grunted in acceptance and stepped back out of the sweltering cage. “Good luck.”

"I make my own luck." The woman, Rumi as she said, called back with a smirk as the red of her eyes deepened. Veins popped up all over her body as she pushed against the floor and roared her battle cry.

Tortured creaks echoed from the cart as Rumi's legs trembled in their chains, the metal warping under a tremendous force. Wood snapped and cracked as Rumi grunted and pushed harder.

"Come on, you shitty legs! Push! Don't be a bitch!" She roared, and one by one, the metal chains snapped at the base, their forms being pulled straight through the wood and, as Rumi said, snapping the cart down the middle as it all came rushing down. "HELL YEAH!"

A split second before all the heavy iron fell inwards on itself, Marik spied a smug grin on Rumi’s face before she vanished.

Her body went flying out of the open entrance like a bullet out of a barrel, yet whatever landing she expected to have was ruined by her face sliding dozens of feet across the hot sand. A muffled “FUCK!” reaching Marik’s ears made him chuckle as he tossed away the pieces of flung metal that tried to impale him from where the chains snapped.

He walked over to the twitching woman. “You good?”

She mumbled something back that he couldn’t catch, so he hooked a foot under her side and flipped her over. “What?”

“Of course I’m not good, dipshit!” Rumi growled back while spitting out sand. “Wake me up when dinner’s ready.”

“What?” Marik couldn’t even get a word in before the woman passed out, leaving him standing there over an unconscious rabbit girl in a sudden wind. ‘Wonderful.’

0000

When Rumi next came to, it was to the night sky, the scent of food, and the murmur of over a dozen voices.

“Foooodddd." A zombie-like groan left her lips.

“Oh, you're up." Marik's gravelly voice called from the side, and she rolled over on the mat she was resting on.

Rumi blinked open blurry eyes as she took in the scene before her.

The golden glow of campfires lit up the night as nearly twenty figures huddled around them for warmth, dressed in wool sacks and covered in blankets. Yet for the first time since Rumi was forcibly joined up with the caravan, she saw smiles and heard excited murmurs from them as steaming pots of soup hovered over the fires as they ate their fill.

"Hungry?" The question came from beside her as Marik sat on a stone by a fire just for the two of them, idly poking at the fire with a stick with an odd amount of enjoyment. A half dozen skewers were roasting over the flames between them, the smell having woken her up, and she zeroed in on them strongly enough for Marik to notice. He smirked and waved his hand. “Feel free.”

“Oh, you beautiful bastard.” Rumi wasted no time jumping up and grabbing a skewer, tearing into it with wild abandon. “If this is a dream, don’t wake me up.”

"Funny enough, I've heard that line all day." Marik scoffed in amusement as he looked over the assembled women, who were keeping their distance. Most avoided his gaze, but the older ones sent him shy, if thankful, smiles. Marik didn't blame them. He doubted some would be comfortable beside a man for a long time. "They don't think this is real."

"Of course, they don't," Rumi grunted around a mouthful of food. "Being sold into slavery tends to be a one-shot deal. Once you're branded, your fucked."

“Branded?” Marik shot her a quizzical look as he hadn’t seen any brands.

"Yeah. Once you reach a training center, they brand you with a special magic item somewhere visible to mark your status. Unless you are strong enough to resist, anyone hoping to make a quick buck will jump you to sell you to the highest bidder."

“And that’s legal?” Marik questioned.

“Legal? Depends on the nation, but most will turn a blind eye for the right price. Not that it matters out here.” Rumi finished off her first skewer and grabbed a second. “Fucking lawless back end of the world.”

“And here is?”

Rumi paused mid-bite to look at him. "Damn, you really don't know shit, do you?"

Marik shrugged. He never planned to make it a secret. “I woke up in the desert close to a year ago and got chased by monsters into a stone pit. Been there up till a few weeks ago. I don’t recognize anything.”

Rumi gaped at his brief explanation. “Well, shit. You really are one of those poor fucks.”

“You mentioned that before.” Marik’s eyes narrowed. “What do you know?”

"Uh, not much, to be honest. Rumors, really." Rumi idly scratched an ear. "Stories get passed around about this desert. They call them the Lost Ones. People who occasionally turn up without memories, with an unknown Falna, and no idea how they got there or what anything is. Most of em are missing limbs or got some screws loose in the head by the time they're found, going on murder sprees the second they hit civilization and get put down quickly." She waved a skewer in the air. "Anyone with a working brain knows it’s just probably some gods experimenting with mortals, tossing around a Falna for shits and giggles. Fickle divine shits treat us like toys most of the time." She finished with a scoff before giving Marik an appreciative look. "You're the first I've met, so don't think I'm an expert or some shit. But a whole fucking year? Damn, dude, that's some hard-core shit right there. The longest I've heard of is a guy lasting two months before a passing merchant found his sorry ass, and he was practically a cripple.”

"Eight months." Marik idly corrected while thinking over what he was told. "No one's lasted longer than two months?" Was it because he had healing magic? Surely, people would grow stronger through survival.

“Ha! Two months is already an achievement, big guy.” Rumi tossed the second skewer. “This is the fucking east side of the Kaios Desert. A wasteland packed full of ambush predators waiting around every corner. Outside of those traveling clans of raiders, the merchant nation Israfan along the ocean to the west of the Nile, and the smaller nations on that side, there’s a grand total of two non-affiliated cities on the eastern half. This place is a death trap where criminals flock to escape the rest of the world.”

“Then how did those weak mercenaries get this far?”

“Ha! They stocked up on a shit ton of repels. An alchemical substance that drives off most weaker monsters.”

“But it didn’t work on the purple snakes?”

“Sometimes you just get unlucky.” Rumi shrugged. “Dumb fucks probably walked right over their nest. Repel or not, monsters will attack if you get close enough.”

Marik grunted in understanding before he raised a point.

"Why were they so weak, though? Shouldn't people grow stronger through the fights?" Marik asked and received an odd look in response.

"In skill? Sure. Maybe if they bothered to fight seriously and defeat every monster, but they mostly ran from fights. If you're talking about stats, though, then fuck no. Unless you got a god in your back pocket for updates, you're fucked stat-wise. Most people get updated once a year or two, if that."

“Ah.” Marik rubbed his chin in thought. ‘So that’s why those mercs were so weak. Is it because of my Falna Slate that it updates?’ He hadn’t ever thought about why his stats were updating all this time and just figured it was how the growth system worked. Without trying to give away too much, he asked the helpful rabbit. "Can we see our Falna without a god's help?"

"Hm? Sure." Rumi was stuffing her cheeks with her third skewer as she answered. "You can always just stick some paper to your back, and the tattoo will automatically transfer the current info."

“Tattoo?” Marik’s brow furrowed as he tried to turn his head to see his back. “Does everyone have one?”

“Yeah.” Rumi watched in amusement as Marik failed to twist his head that far. “Gods mark their Falna with a symbol for identification. Helps mark their territory and all.”

Marik grunted in failure and turned his back to Rumi. “Do I have one?”

A row of black text directly in the center of Marik’s back was clear to see.

“Yup.” Rumi popped the P and glanced at the text. “Can’t read it for shit. Only your god and you can read the details. But it's there in the normal place.”

“Whats the symbol?”

"Some kind of bird?" Rumi squinted at it in the light of the fire and shrugged. "Never seen it before, but there are hundreds, maybe thousands, of gods, and each one's got their own tweak of shit. Not like I care to memorize that kinda shit."

‘Couldn’t be that easy, could it?’ Marik grunted in acceptance and returned to his seat. “Is there any other way to see a Falna without a paper or god?”

“I mean, kinda?” Rumi swallowed a mouthful of food. “I’ve heard of some unique skills and shit that let people see their own Falna, one or two that let people see others Falna as well, but the second one is just a rumor.”

“And none of them can do updates?”

"Nah, that would be broken as shit…" Rumi trailed off as she froze mid-bite and looked back at Marik. "No fucking way."

Seeing the realization in her eyes, he shrugged. “Is it a big deal?”

“A big deal?” Rumi faltered for a moment before snapping the skewer in her hand. “Bitch, I think the majority of Rakia’s military would hunt you down just to stab you out of pettiness. Do you know how much effort we gotta go through for that fucking bastard to update us?” She seemed to scowl at something before refocusing and pointing a finger at Marik. “Don’t say shit to anyone. You’re lucky as fuck I’m the first person you met and that I owe you a life debt.”

Rumi's eyes practically glowed as she stared him down, and Marik slowly nodded in acceptance. "Sure."

"Good." She turned back to her food with an annoyed expression. Marik decided to give her a minute to calm down, going back to poking the first fire he finally had access to, using the broken cart remains as fuel.

'Should I have been more careful with my abilities?' Perhaps. But Marik wasn't one for word games; he had to find out somehow. 'Better to do it here where I can silence the witness if I have to.'

Marik didn't save Rumi and the others for some noble reason. He saved them because their slavers attacked him, and he needed information. He would have likely moved on and not gotten involved if neither of those things applied.

If Rumi proved a threat to him, he would end her. No hard feelings about it. Eight months of life-and-death fights taught Marik to act decisively. The only joy he got out of a battle was a challenge. For the rest, he just did what he needed to do and moved on. Whether that was eating raw meat and blood, inflicting himself with dozens of types of venom to build antibodies, or walking over the corpses of others to grow stronger. 'Maybe Rumi had a point by saying the Lost Ones all had screws loose. Is it growth or regression that I feel nothing about killing her?'

He turned to the others, around twenty women of all kinds of races. They were human-looking for the most part, with odd animal additions such as ears and tails from dogs, raccoons, cats, and others. Some he thought were children were actually just small people, Pallum's, they called themselves. 'Then again, I'm not exactly on Earth anymore. If slavery is so common here, who knows what the normal state of mind is?'

“Oi, shitface.” Rumi’s abrupt voice brought Marik’s attention back to her as she worked on her fifth skewer, much to Marik’s amazement of where it was all going in her thin waist. “Is that updating thing why you survived this long?”

Marik considered the question for a moment and decided to go all in. “Probably. I can use healing magic. It was on my Falna when I woke up after my first fight. Kept me alive long enough to heal for the next fight. I didn’t realize the Falna didn’t update on its own.”

“Of course you didn’t.” Rumi groaned and pinched her brow. “Please tell me your magic is self-heal only?”

“It worked on you.” Marik pointed at her body, causing her to look down and blink at the fact that she wasn’t actually in pain, only starving.

“The fuck? When did you heal me?" Rumi started patting herself down in amazement. All her accumulated damage from her journey into slavery was healed. "Shit, even the paralytic venom that fucker kept shooting me up with is gone." She flexed her toned legs in pure joy. "Almost forgot how that feels."

"While you slept." Marik's eyes flickered to the other women, who were keeping a respectful distance. "One of the others asked if they could use the mercenary's healing potions, and I didn't see a reason to deny them."

“Softy.” Rumi scoffed in amusement. “But you healed me?”

“Mn.”

“Why?” Her red eyes peered up at him. “You some kind of hero wannabe? I can accept freeing me as it was in your way, but no one helps for nothing.”

"You promised me answers," Marik answered simply as if that was all the reason he needed, and Rumi found herself appreciating that frankness.

“Alright, I can accept that.” She hopped to her feet and stretched out, only then noticing the state of her clothes, being dressed in a clean robe with a slit instead of her dirty sack. “Did you seriously change me as well? Cop a good feel, did ya?”

Marik rolled his eyes and jerked his chin at one of the older women. “Asked them to do it. Merc’s had lots of cloth.” He wrinkled his nose. “You smelled like shit too. They scrubbed you down while they cleaned themselves.”

“You try getting held captive in a tiny fucking oven and forced to shit through the hole beneath you for a couple weeks.” Rumi shot back as she waved in thanks to the woman in question who looked over. “Nice lady, shame how they suffered under those fuckers.”

“Hopefully they get some closure.” Marik commented as he turned his head to a recently dug pit.

Rumi followed his gaze and smirked. “Let them finish the job, did ya?”

“Not my fight.” Marik shrugged. “I only broke their limbs. What the women did to them is their business.”

“Fair enough. You save the shitty raisin for me?”

Marik pointed to her destroyed cage. "Wrapped him in iron over there. He got loud, so I stuck him with his fancy needle. Got quiet after that."

“Ha!” Rumi laughed loudly at that. “Stupid old fuck loved tormenting everyone with how potent that Walking Cactus venom is. He used a minor dose of that shit to keep my legs weakened all this time.”

"You didn't build antibodies?" Marik looked at her oddly and got an odd look in return.

“No? Who the fuck can do that?”

“…”

“Of fucking course.” Rumi sighed and looked at the moon above. “You’re one bullshit big fucker, you know that?”

“Is that a compliment or insult?”

“Yes.”

The two matched gazes and chuckled in amusement before Rumi bowed her head, an action that seemed wholly unfamiliar to her.

“Thank you. Doesn’t matter why you did it, but I owe you, big guy. If you want to fight or fuck to repay you, I’m game.”

Marik stared at her for a long moment before shaking his head. “You really do speak that way all the time, don’t you?”

“Says the guy who sounds like your voice is mixed with gravel. I can’t tell if I’m turned on or ready to fight when you speak.” Rumi shot back with a grin.

“Isn’t it supposed to be ‘Fight or Flight’?”

“What’s Flight taste like?”

“Wouldn’t know.” Marik grinned as his brown eyes locked with Rumi’s red. “My name’s Marik. Marik Grim.”

“Fitting.” Rumi didn’t back down. “So what’s it gonna be?”

"I wouldn't say no to a fight," Marik responded. "But you can consider your debt cleared by teaching me of this world."

“You got yourself a fucking deal, shitface.”

“I just told you my name.”

“What’s your point?”

A hint of gold entered Marik's eyes, and Rumi only smiled broader in excitement.

“Woman, I will break you.”

"You will try." Rumi cackled as her eyes gained a tint of red, and she held out a hand. "I think this will be an interesting partnership, shitface.”

"Against my better judgment." Marik took the hand, and for the first time in a long while, it felt like he grabbed something he couldn't easily crush as she gave it as good as she got. "But logic didn't get me this far."

“That’s the spirit! I sense a kindred spirit in you.”

“Fuck off.”

“Exactly.”

Veins bulged on both of their arms as their strength kept increasing until a voice yelled from the side.

“JUST FUCK ALREADY!”

The two came up short and snapped to the side at a Pallum girl who shrunk and hid behind an older woman who smiled awkwardly at the stares.

The momentum was gone, and each pulled back their hands at some unspoken truce.

Marik jerked his chin at the women. “Not sure what to do with them.”

"You could just leave 'em be." Rumi shrugged. "You gave them the mercenaries stuff, right? They got enough to get to a city."

“Will they survive the journey?”

“Eh.” Rumi waved a hand. “Fifty, fifty. I did say this place is crawling with monsters.”

Marik chewed on his lip for a moment. “How far is the nearest city?”

“A couple days. We were pretty close to arriving.” Rumi smirked as she looked at him. “Don’t feel like leaving them to fate?”

 "I'd feel responsible; I killed the fodder." Marik admitted. He didn't care, but he took action and felt the consequences were his to handle. A man lived by taking responsibility for his actions, a lesson he took from his father.

“Heh, you really are a softy, ain’t ya?” Rumi needled and idly hopped out of the way of Marik’s fist. “Sensitive too~. What happened to treating a girl gently?”

“You don’t want gentle.” Marik rebutted.

"Ha! You got me there." Rumi walked back up without a care. "Knew I liked ya, big lug. I would have stuck around if you tried to ditch these women anyway. Kinda bonded over shared misery with some of em during the trip."

“You could have just said that.”

"I'd rather get a feel for the crazy fucker who I just signed up my services to."

“Don’t make it sound weird.”

“Don’t like the sound of this sexy chocolate bunny at your beck and call~?” She brushed up against him with a smirk. “Could be fun.”

"Not all men will break between your legs, Rumi." Marik shot back and flicked the woman's ears, enjoying how they twitched at the touch.

“Oi, my ears are sensitive, you fuck.” Rumi grumbled and rubbed them. “And I have yet to meet a man my level who could stand up to that claim.”

“Must be lonely.”

“Oh, fuck you.”

“Fight me first.”

Rumi wasn’t sure if she should scoff or laugh and settled for a small smile. “I think you’re the first dude I propositioned to say that to me.”

“I have a feeling any man you propositioned didn’t survive the fucking long enough to realize it was a fight.”

“Touche.” Rumi flicked a finger like a sword. “You’ve got me pegged, big lug. I’ll give you that.”

"Better you than me," Marik mumbled but Rumi still caught it and grinned at him with a twinkle in her eye. "Anyway, back to the part about keeping these women alive."

"Right." Rumi thought about it and shrugged. "We can just escort them to the city. None of 'em got Falna's, but with the money and supplies the Mercs had, they can settle down in the more civil area of the city, for what it's worth, or get passage by ship out of this fucking desert. Unless they're idiots, they won't be caught again."

 "And how did you get caught again?" Marik teased, but sadly it fell flat as Rumi's eyes darkened.

“Got stabbed in the back. Don’t feel like talking about it right now.” She grunted and changed the subject. “Speaking of which, the fucker who wanted to buy me is in that city. I’d love to pay him a visit.”

Marik ignored the promise of violence in her eyes and shrugged. “Alright. You can teach me about the world on the way there.”

“Sure thing.” Rumi nodded briskly and walked over to a cart to grab a map she brought back, opening it to point at where they were. “We’re heading for Santorio Vega. After I deal with my shit, we can grab a ship and head up to Rakia-controlled land. By then, I should have you caught up, and we can go our own ways."

“You’re from Rakia?”

"Yeah, got my Familia from Ares and everything. I'm even an officer, if you can believe it. Just gotta find the fucker who betrayed me, and I'll be good." She shrugged like it wasn't a big deal, so Marik didn't dig. "Anywhere you're aiming to go, big guy?"

His eyes roamed over the map and froze on a particular name.

Orario.

His finger came down on the city.

“Here. I should find answers here.”

“Orario, huh?” Rumi raised a brow. “Well, if you wanna die, feel free.”

Marik turned his focus on her. “Tell me about it.”

“Eh, now? I’d rather sleep.”

“Rumi.”

“Alright, sheesh. What do you know about adventurers?”

Chapter end.

AN: No ETA on the next update. But I'm currently active, so fingers crossed.