The Crack In Heaven [A LitRPG Progression Fantasy] Chapter 51: Chapter 51: All That Is Cast Off

Read chapter 51 of The Crack In Heaven [A LitRPG Progression Fantasy] by Adamus_Auguste on NovelPedia.

Chapter 51: All That Is Cast Off Old Fen gripped the hilt of his sword. It smelled of rot and oil. Or was it his own stench? Did it matter? They had blended with him for so many decades that he couldn't tell them apart anymore. "Wait! ARGH!" A cry from below distracted him from his blade. He closed his eyes. Another of his men screamed for the last time on the ground floor. The others would follow. He would. Silma's threat shattered his wildest expectations. Now, he recognised, albeit reluctantly, that she was as dangerous as Brannick. Not necessarily stronger than this monster, but a different kind of dangerous. Beneath his mottled beard, a smirk curved his lips. Death it was. It had been from the moment this war started. He opened his eyes and rose from his chair. Not with the resignation of a doomed man, but with a back ironed straight. The lamplight didn't cast shadows onto his dirty, wrinkled face; it only reflected conviction. "How much would Garrick weep if he lost Silma and ten of his bearers?" He strode to the door. "A shame I won't see it. In the end, it all rots back to me." Between overturned rags, clotted blood smeared the ground. A faint scent of burnt flesh lingered beneath the stench of blood coming from the stairs, where silence replaced the wails of his men. Able-bodied, bearers, and wounded should have all died by now. He walked toward the stairs. Before crossing half the corridor, footsteps echoed. Still slow. Still mocking. Silma emerged first. They exchanged a glance, and while his smirk broadened, her lips curled like a knife. Her men followed in groups of three. Fresh blood dripped from their blades, spears, and cuirasses—that of his men, but not only. A wound cut across a man's forehead down to his chin, while another pressed his hand against his missing arm. Six ranks of three... Two of her twenty men had died, plus a heavily injured one. "I raised my Sump Dogs well." He chuckled. "You're taking their deaths quite well." Silma arched a brow. "Well, you won't have time to miss them. Do you plan to fight in that cramped corridor? Or is that foul bastard, Joss, waiting in ambush?" "Neither." Fen waved to the stairs. "I was about to join in the fun downstairs, so why don't we talk on our way?" "Of your surrender? We both know Garrick won't accept it. I won't either." Silma nodded toward the stairs, and her men descended. Fen walked beside her, his missing fingers wrapped around his blade. "Of course not. Is it because of Theda's teachings, or because I called you a bitch—" "Where's Joss?" Silma's voice cut through the small talk. "Gone," Fen sighed. "And you let him? My opinion of you was never higher than the sewers you crawled from. Now? I can't tell if I'm speaking to a gang leader or a fool." He laughed at her stinging remark, then shrugged it off. "You know how he is—always thought himself the wisest. If he believes he can escape the Black Cask and my dogs, good for him. But that's not what I wanted to talk about. Do you know where I came from?" "Another noxious gutter?" Silma spread her palms. "You'd better hurry if you want to speak about things no one cares about. We're almost on the ground floor, and I still have the rat-man you hid, and Joss to catch." Fen leapt down the last remaining steps. Corpses sprawled around the broken base of metallic pillars and the shattered door. Silma's men took positions in the broader space, shields raised at the front, bows drawn at the back, and blades and spears aimed at him. "Exactly. No one ever heard where I came from. I was a nobody. A man who knew he could achieve more than what his starving village could ever allow him to." He unsheathed his blade. "Do you know why no one will ever know where I came from? Because I burned it to the ground and fed the people who looked down on me to the dogs. I'm not like any of you; I choose the slums. And here, I became someone." Silma passed him by. She stood before her men, then whipped an imaginary tear at the corner