Chapter 1: The Irony of a Blessing

Another day in paradise, I mused.

My eyelids drooped. Pain wracked my body. The number of nights spent on the meathook were long lost to time. My only solace were memories of a life long lost. 

As I forced my eyes open, the all-too-familiar cage came into view. Beyond it, the loathsome target of my disdain unhurriedly strode into one of the many halls surrounding the circular torture chamber. The hunched figure clad in draping black fabric walked with a rhythmless gait. Keys clattered against each other on the keychain hanging from his belt. The creature was my jailor. My torturer. 

My divine punishment.

He whistled a happy tune and dragged his skeletal fingers clad in brass thimbles against the wall. A metallic screech rolled across the room, painful and unavoidable. 

My mouth was drier than the desert. As I tried to call out to the figure, only a couple of incomprehensible dry heaves escaped my chapped lips. I was desperate for any kind of moisture. 

“Why is this happening…?” I whimpered as his figure strode out of view. 

Each word sent a jolt of pain running through my body, culminating in a spot between my shoulder blades. I glanced up at the rusty chain which held me a few meters above ground.

My gaze wandered to the ceiling; it was unfathomably high with a small hole in its dome-like zenith. Rays of golden light stretched down like the fingers of God over an altar of lusterless, dark stone with crimson veins. The altar towered like a solitary mountain in a lake of blood.

A tortured woman was crucified to the altar by spikes of stained metal. A pair of nasty-looking tongs pried open a gaping wound on her stomach. 

No matter how I tried, I couldn’t understand why they let her corpse hang. She was here when I first woke up. And apart from the wretched jailor, she was my only company. 

“A corpse and a madman…” I winced, and studied the woman’s body. 

Her soot-black arms created a stark contrast against the otherwise snow white skin. Sickly blue veins pulsed some sort of liquid to her arms. 

In the beginning, I figured she was alive. Otherwise, there was no rhyme or reason for injecting her with that… violet slush. But still, after what must have been weeks, she never moved. Not once. 

I closed my eyes. There was no point to this waiting – this suffering. If only I could fall asleep, then this fucking nightmare would come to pass. I was sure of it. 

“Hey, you.”  

The voice was so faint I hardly believed my ears. I shuddered and pried my eyes open. No matter how I turned on the wretched hook, I couldn’t spot the speaker. There was no one here, no one but the crucified woman. 

I shook my head in resignation. A few hairs came loose and tickled my eyes, the rest of the dirt-blonde mop had practically fused together with my sweat-crusted skin. It had grown much longer than I liked. At least it helped disguise my misery from the sadistic torturer.

I sighed and muttered with a raspy voice, “Have I finally lost my mind?”

A chortle echoed. I whipped my head around to see the woman’s blazingly red eyes roll at me. 

“It would take a lot more than this to kill me,” she said matter-of-factly, lips cracked. Her face looked as if she’d been left in the sun for years, ravaged by the unrelenting warmth.

The world around me spun, “You’re alive? This is not some nightmare?”  

Large swathes of her face began to peel off but were stubbornly held fast by glistening strips of fat and sinew. A pair of thumb-sized horns peeked out from under her draping white hair. 

Her lips curled into a grin, “Very much so. I'd pinch you if I could,” she chuckled. 

“You’re not mad, at least not any more so than the rest of the world.”

She spoke down to me, like one would to a child. 

“Why me?” I whimpered. 

She went quiet for a moment, studying me with incredulous eyes, before bursting into laughter. The sharp edges of her ribs threatened to poke through her abdomen with every convulsion, “Oh please, you weren’t chosen. Don't flatter yourself. You were just at the wrong place at the right time.”

My face scrunched up involuntarily, “Where are we?”

“Far from your home. The seventh layer of the underworld to be exact.”

I already suspected as much. Obviously I ended up in hell. I would never be forgiven for what I did – no matter how much time I spent repenting with the old Priest or Joanna. Some sins were just too grave.

“So I've died…” I sighed. The knot in my throat untangled. I never thought death would feel so freeing. “I kind of figured Hell would be worse.”

She giggled and nodded at my chest, “You're not dead. Not yet. The mad wretch marked you as a blood offering.”

I blinked in surprise, trying to follow what she was saying. Mad wretch, blood offering? I followed her eyes to my chest – just like she said, there was an ugly burn mark marring my skin. I came to terms with it many nights ago. Seeing the mark there didn’t surprise me. So this is a blood offering’s mark… 

She rolled her head around in a stretch, “And this isn’t hell either. The Legions find slaughter easy to justify if they label their enemies as something monstrous. Make no mistake, hell is fiction. This!” she declared pompously and nodded upward. “This is the underworld of the Layered Empire.”

I groaned, “You’re not making any sense. You’re just as fucking crazy as I am.”

Her smile faded. A heavy silence settled between us. Neither of us spoke for a good minute, but I didn’t stop studying how her brows fell into a tight knot. How the corners of her mouth twitched, or how her eyes darted around when the silence got to her. 

She moaned, “What about your home?”

I snorted, “I hardly think this is the right time or place.”

“Oh, quit whining. You've only been here a few days. I've been here for years. Humour me.”

There was obviously no way someone in her condition could spend years in a place like this, in a state like hers. Whatever the case, I didn’t feel like arguing with her. 

I complied with a sigh, “I was born in London, but I never really liked the place.” It reminded me too much of my family. But I couldn’t say that. I wouldn’t unburden myself. This plight was mine alone to bear. 

She looked to the hole in the roof longingly, “Is that your home?” There was a softness to her voice. For the first time since she opened her mouth, I pitied her. 

I shook my head, “Home is a town in northern France, small enough that it doesn't even have a name. I'm sure it used to, once,” I followed her eyes to the small hole. “I have a cabin near an old church. It's nice and quiet. The priest who runs it, and his daughter Joanna, make for good company”

Her eyes shone with curiosity, “What is this ‘France’ place?”

“It’s a peculiar country. Everybody takes their time. There’s a large forest where I live. It has trees as tall as some buildings in London and bushes of lilac that bathe large patches of land with their perfume. There’s a lot of cute animals – oh, and more birds than you can imagine.”

I closed my eyes and felt the wonderful smells of lilac wash over me, the twitter of birdsong, the soft feel of green, mossy grass underfoot… Talking about home made me forget about where I was, but only for a second. 

“Sounds like a peaceful place,” she sighed and interrupted my reverie. “A shame, what's about to happen...”

I jolted back to awareness, “What do you mean?”

She snickered and stared off into the distance, “I pity you, you know? The Legions are a callous bunch. They need bodies, and your world has more than a few. They care not about the consequences of creating a bridge between the worlds.” 

“You’re not making any sense again.” 

“You should have noticed a shift already, in your people.”

“The blessed?” I asked, with a pained moan. Talking made the hook shift my insides around.

“Yes…” she said disdainfully and shifted on the great altar. “Ironic, isn't it?”

I raised my eyebrows.

She smiled and chuckled, “Blessed being dragged to your idea of hell. It’s a cruel twist of irony… You know, you were supposed to be one of them.”

“Me? Blessed?”

Now wouldn’t that be something. Me, a super human war machine fighting to uncover mysteries and bring back riches from the world beyond. Maybe that would be enough to free me from the clutches of my serpentine family.

“Yep,” she beamed. “In that regard, I am sorry about you ending up here. But your circumstances fit the mould of my needs. One desperate and reckless enough to free me from my plight.”

 I groaned, “I’m afraid you've lost me again.”

Her words grew harsher, her smile more wicked. “You're here to free me.”

I chuckled. the hook rattled my insides. It hurt. It hurt like hell. The smile faded from her face. Her silent stare unsettled me, but there had to be a limit to her insanity. Some clarity to her confusion. 

I shifted nervously, trying to get the hook into a less agonizing position. “Come on, why would I be here for that?” 

“Fate?” she chuckled. The smile spread across her pale lips once more.  

I sighed and played along, “Look… Lady… I’m not saying it is, but if me being here is fate, then you’re out of luck. If you haven’t noticed, I'm kind of just hanging around.”

“I will get you down if you pledge to free me.”

I scoffed at the horned woman, “A deal with a devil? How cliché…”

“I’m no devil, you knave.” A dark glint flashed in her eyes. “Making me change my mind would be a poor lapse in judgement. When the wretched Jailor is ready for the ritual, he will skin you alive.” 

I gulped.

She leaned as close as the bindings allowed, “You'll be kept that way, skinned, bathing in the toxic fumes of the alchemists. Your muscles will rot, your blood boil, but he will not let you die. He will heal you until the very last dregs of your sanity drain away,” her white teeth gnashed against each other with each word.

I shivered, “Why would he do that?”

The dark glint in her eyes vanished as if it was never there. She flashed another mischievous grin, “Does it matter?”

It didn’t. 

Her mood shifted, quick as lightning, “Take my word for it; for one such as I cannot lie,” she giggled. Behind the narrow slits of her eyelids her already striking eyes blazed with conviction.

If there was any way out of this place, this might be it. Salvation in the form of a rambling albino woman with horns. It didn’t whether I believed her or not. If there was even the slightest sliver of a chance that I could get out of here, then I owed it to them. 

Whatever the price.

“This … This pledge. It wouldn't make me offer up my soul to burn in eternal hellfire, would it?” I asked, just in case. 

“Of course not!” Her answer came quickly. Almost too quickly. When my gaze didn’t waver she added nervously, “I swear it on my true name.”

Whatever the hell that meant. 

“Speaking of names… what’s yours?” I asked. If we were going to make a deal and escape together, I might as well know her name. 

She stopped for a second to think then grinned, “Call me Sera.”

That was obviously not her real name. “How mysterious,” I snarked, “I'm Cal. It's short for Caleb.”

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Cal, it's short for Caleb. Now, what do you say?”

There was really no point in her asking. She already knew my mind was made up. “Alright.”

Sera nodded in satisfaction, “Good, good … Do you, Caleb, accept the terms of this accord as previously mentioned?”

“I do.”

The red cracks lining the weathered floor shuddered in response to my answer. The pool of blood surrounding Sera surged violently. A single drop defied the laws of gravity, slowly floating toward me. 

I watched with wide eyes as the droplet neared my chest. It stopped just out of arm's reach, its marble-like surface twisting and rippling until it morphed into a crimson needle. 

Suddenly, it didn’t feel like she was quite as mad as I made her out to be.

I gulped, “This isn't going to hurt, is it?”

I received my answer before she had a chance to reply. The needle pierced the distance between us in less than a moment. It tore into my chest without any resistance. It was unlike anything I had ever felt. While painful, it was also pleasant. Like stretching after a good workout.

My blood stopped and reversed. It converged around my heart as if holding my life in a tight embrace. My arms and legs screamed for oxygen – to no avail. I clawed at my chest and gasped for breath. 

After what felt like an eternity the dam around my heart burst. Blood roiled through my body like a raging river. The feeling of oxygen rushing back to my limbs was exhilarating.

“Not honouring this pledge would mean death,” Sera remarked, waking me from my stupor.

That was all for a fucking contract? I mused while greedily sucking stale air into my lungs. 

I blinked in surprise, “I can't seem to recall that part of the deal?”

“Of course not, I invoked it long before you arrived,” she smirked. “Enough about that. Let's get this over with.”

She pursed her lips, and pulled against her constraints. 

Her arms vibrated as the skin began to rip apart; it sounded like the strings of a guitar breaking. Her muscles strained against the joints and sinews holding her arm together; they snapped and tore while letting out crackling pops. 

The conviction burning her eyes grew vile and perverse. She screamed. 

I felt my stomach churn as her arm ripped free, leaving the hand dangling alone, still held firm by the cruel spike.

She pointed her stub at me and whispered with a dissonant voice. The air shuddered as a thin veil of something incorporeal faded into existence. 

Red runes scrawled themselves into the veil vertically. I didn’t know what they were, or how they were. 

But I could understand. 

Initializing.