Undersworn
Chapter 8: Practice Makes Perfect
These questions we asked ourselves, but we never really wanted the answer.
"You expect us to believe that you're some reincarnated human, destined to save the world?" Lith asked Honor, disbelief in his voice. They were in a dry, well-kept cave, more like a house than anything else. Honor and Lith stood in the open center of the room, while Rail crouched in an alcove that looked as if it were completely devoted to chaos. Papers, dense with writing so small Honor couldn't read it littered the floor and the various shelves mounted in the alcove. Rail occasionally wrote on these papers, or crossed out something he had already written, and folded them into intricate shapes, as he had when the two monsters had rescued Honor.
"I don't expect you to believe me. I'm not sure I would believe me either." Honor said. "But I do need to stop Frisk, the other human, from getting to the end. If he does, he'll kill everyone."
"Rail?" Lith called.
"We're helping him." The childish monster replied, setting a stone paperweight on a stack of documents.
"Well there you go." Lith said with a shrug. "But what do you mean by 'the end?'" He asked. Honor clutched his head in his hands, trying to remember. How was it that he knew some things as sure as he knew his name, and others were clouded deep within his mind, if they were there at all?
"The barrier," Honor said eventually. "We have to keep Frisk from crossing the barrier."
"Easier said than done." Lith replied. "The royalists are under orders to let any humans go straight through to Asgore should they make it to the palace intact."
"You're soldiers though, right?" Honor asked. "You called yourself a sergeant. Couldn't you stop them?" Lith chuckled.
"If I got the human in front of me? It wouldn't stand a chance. But the royalists would stop us. There are only two of us, and dozens of them. I can't handle that many without accidentally killing one." Lith said, pacing back and forth.
"Two? There are three of us!" Honor said. Lith scoffed.
"Tell me, do you even know how to fight? I saw your face after we rescued you."
"Well, I—"
"You can't fight, and you're human, so you can't manifest any magical attacks. Well, not anything useful anyways. Your soul is strong—well, strong to the average monster at least, pitiful for a human—so you'll be able to take your licks, but why should you be out there in the first place? What am I supposed to do with yo—"
"Teach him." Rail cut his comrade off, surprising both Honor and Lith.
"What?" Lith asked.
"He doesn't know how to fight, you do. We're helping him, preferably without instigating his untimely death in the process, so the most logical course of action is for you to train him." Rail explained. "He can be taught. Look, he can even move like a soldier."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Honor asked. Rail spun, flinging his paperweight at Honor. It flew by his head, and it took Honor a moment to realize it had passed through the space his head had been a moment ago. He'd stepped to the side before he could think about it. Maybe he had inherited instincts from one of the souls.
"Maybe." Lith said, cocking his head. "But either way, even if I could train you overnight, three people isn't enough to storm the royal palace."
"We don't need to storm the palace." Gaster interjected into Honor's mind.
What do you mean? Honor thought.
"Removing your progenitors, the six human souls, from the equation should be sufficient for our purposes." Gaster said. "Frisk has committed to not killing any monsters, they cycle will not be complete without the souls."
How do you know that?
"My memory is not completely destroyed, and the wheel has turned enough times for many parts of the cycle to become… ingrained." Honor relayed Gaster's suggestion to the soldiers, without revealing that he had a disembodied voice in his head. They already thought he was crazy enough as it was. Lith put his hand to his chin, thinking. Rail just nodded.
"Good. We will steal the souls. And we three will not be alone in our excursion to the palace. I have arranged for some assistance to meet us here in a day or two's time." Rail said.
"Assistance?" Honor asked.
"Yes." Rail replied, not volunteering any further information.
"Alright then, well, with that out of the way, can either of you tell me who you are?" Honor said. A silence filled the room. Rail continued writing and folding, as if Honor had said nothing at all, and Lith shuffled nervously, avoiding Honor's gaze. "You're soldiers, so shouldn't you be under the king's command?
"No!" Lith spat, seemingly outraged by the idea.
"Then where did you get the rank of sergeant? And what kind of uniforms are those?"
"We answer to a… rightful authority." Lith said, choosing his words carefully. "One whose presence is not widely known." Honor considered that. Was there some secret military faction hiding in the fringes of the Underground? Gaster, do you know anything about this?
"Sadly, I do not." The doctor replied.
"So, are you different from Asgore's kingdom?" Honor asked.
"No." Lith said frimly. "We are citizens of the same nation as everybody else down here. The kingdom's laws themselves give us the power to do what we do." Lith paused, "Although, if Asgore found out we were capitalizing upon the codes this way, he might change them. That is why we prefer to keep ourselves secret." Lith shifted nervously, as if this was not something he talked about often. In his alcove, Rail knocked down a tower he had constructed from the papers, shuffling them and rearranging them again. "Anyways, that isn't important right now," Lith said, changing the subject. "We need to see what you'll be like in combat." Lith raised one hand, and five translucent flaming scimitars formed in the air around Honor. With a few dexterous finger motions, the attacks streaked towards Honor, stopping centimeters from his skin. "Huh, interesting. Rail, look at this." Lith said. Rail glanced over.
"His soul?" The childish monster asked.
"Yes, his soul."
"It isn't appearing."
"That's what I'm asking you about. Human souls appear in the presence of monster attacks, right?"
"You are correct."
"And this is a human."
"Still correct."
"So why isn't his soul appearing?"
"It is too weak. It cannot leave his body."
"Would you care to explain yourself to those of us who do not have the privilege of being you, Rail?"
"Of course." Rail replied. "Monster souls are tied to our bodies because it provides the magic that sustains them, and our souls are too weak to travel outside the controlled environment it creates for itself. Humans have physical bodies, with souls much stronger than monster souls. Most humans, if properly trained, can move their souls about within a certain distance from their physical body. A few yards, for most of them. Some monsters can magically restrict this field of motion, at the cost of much exertion. When presented with a Class I magical attack, as is the case right now, human souls generally pop out of their bodies, and start moving around according to the human's will in order to avoid them. Since this has not occurred, there are three possible circumstances. First, that Honor here is secretly a monster. This possibility can be ruled out, as Honor possesses a body of flesh and blood and bone. The second possibility is that Honor has undergone a Zahel Binding. My observations have proven that to not be the case."
"Zay-hell what?" Honor asked. Lith ignored him.
"Finally, Honor's soul could simply be too weak to leave his body. This is almost certainly the case." Lith nodded.
"Alright then. You can't dance the souls. I guess we'll have to teach you to dance with swords." Lith grinned. "I know much more about this. Now, I want to see what I'm working with here. Get into a stance."
"Now?" Honor asked.
"Now."
"But I don't even have a weapon. How am I supposed to learn how to fight without a weapon?"
"You'll get a weapon when I say you're good enough not to kill yourself with it. Now get into a stance." Lith spoke with iron hard authority, the insecurity from before gone completely. Honor bent his knees slightly, holding his hands out in front of him, clenched into fists. Lith walked in a slow circle around Honor, surveying him. "Those fists won't do you any good. Open hands." He said, showing Honor the proper position for his hands and arms. Honor corrected himself. Lith stopped, standing off to Honor's side. He shoved Honor with one hand, sending him splaying to the ground.
"What was that for!" Honor grumbled, scrambling to his feet.
"Your stance was atrocious. Get lower, feet staggered. If you stand up that high you'll get knocked over by a strong breeze. Stance! Again! And do it better this time!" Honor followed Lith's directions, getting lower with his feet staggered, one farther forward than the other. He was still adjusting his feet, trying to get them exactly right, when Lith rapped him on the back of the head with his knuckles.
"Ow!" Honor cried.
"I said get lower, not to bend over at your waist. Back straighter, eyes up. No! Don't straighten your legs, you need to be ready to move!" Honor rushed to obey the soldier's instructions, correcting himself as the criticisms came. Lith stood in front of him and summoned a curved saber, about three feet long and wrought from crimson flame. "You need to be fast." Lith said.
"What's that for?" Honor said.
"Motivation." Lith swung the sword and Honor ducked, the movement coming easily from his coiled position. He stayed there for a second too long though, staring at Lith, eyes wide, before Lith shoved him with his foot, leaving Honor sprawled on his backside.
"Get back in your stance." Lith said. Honor caught a glimpse of Rail smiling as he stood up again. "Feet too wide." Lith said casually as he kicked one of Honor's feet outward, sending Honor crashing onto one knee. He pulled himself back into the stance without Lith telling him to this time. Lith stood back and watched Honor. He cocked his head to look at something behind him. "Hey, is that Frisk?" Honor's head snapped in the direction Lith had looked. The next thing he knew, the cool stone wall of the cave pressed against Honor's back, and Lith was grasping him by his shirt. "Don't get distracted. You lack focus." The flame monster stepped back with a sigh, letting go of Honor. "In combat, if you become distracted, you will be killed" Honor watched Lith warily as he rubbed the spots where the cave wall had jutted into his back.
"That was a cheap trick." He accused.
"In a fight, no trick is cheap, so long as it grants you victory," Lith said, as if reciting something that had been told to him repeatedly. "Your opponents will talk to you, try to get inside your head. You cannot allow them to do so. If you do, you will die." Lith rubbed his temples slowly. "But how am I supposed to teach you to think? By Stars I'm just a soldier!"
"By Stars?" Honor asked, curious at the expression. Lith waved a hand of dismissal.
"It's nothing—" He began, but was interrupted by Rail.
"It is far from nothing. Us monsters used to worship the stars. Well, not exactly, but that statement comes as close to the truth as any other of its length." Rail stood up from his crouched position in the paper-strewn alcove. "I can teach you to focus, in the same way that you, Lith, learned yourself from our shared master." Lith reluctantly stepped away, letting Rail step up in front of Honor, measuring up well over a foot shorter than the human in length. "Don't worry," Rail said with a smile, "my teaching does not entail quite so much physical trauma." Honor nodded, glad.
"I want you to close your eyes," Rail said. "your mind is cluttered with thoughts and emotions. In order to utilize your mind at its full capability, you will need to ignore them."
"How can I ignore my own thoughts?" Honor asked.
"I am about to teach you. We call it the void."
"The void?" Gaster asked in Honor's mind.
"It is a concentration tactic," Lith continued, oblivious to Gaster's comment, "devised by Tam— well, it doesn't matter. You just need to know how it is done. Now, close your eyes." Honor closed them. "Imagine your mind as a void. In the center of that void is a flame," Honor imagined the flame. "Feed your thoughts, your emotions, and your worries into the flame. Let it consume them, until the void is empty of all except for you and the flame." This is ridiculous. Honor thought, but he followed instructions, mentally feeding his thoughts, including his doubts about this "void," into the flame. In his mind's eye, the flame seemed to grow… purer, as it consumed his thoughts. Eventually, the void was dark and empty, except for that flame in the center. Even as he concentrated—no, it wasn't concentration anymore, it just was—the flame split into six. Six flames of six different colors, joined at the base by a single white-hot coal. Bolts of lightning arced between the flames.
"You see it, don't you?" Rail's voice echoed through the void. Honor heard the words, and understood them, but did not reflect deeper upon them. Thoughts flowed across the void like water, crossing his consciousness, but not pooling there. "Your SOUL. It can appear in many forms, depending on your training, but this one will suit our purposes. Open your eyes." Honor opened his eyes, meeting Rail's intense crystal gaze. His eyes took in his surroundings, but his mind held the void. A smile tugged at Rail's lips. "Alright Lith, he's ready for you." Lith straightened himself from where he had been leaning against the wall.
"Stance!" He called. Honor fell into the stance he had earlier, knees bent, eyes on Lith, with his muscles somehow feeling loose, and taut at the same time. A stray thought crossed his mind that this should not have come this easily, but it skittered across the top of the void and fell into the flame without Honor dwelling on it.
Without warning, Lith rushed toward Honor, shoulder dropped. Honor sidestepped the charge easily enough, but then a prompting filled him, and consumed in the void, he did not question it. As Lith passed him, Honor's hand shot out to push the soldier off balance. His blow connected, but Lith twisted, using the force of Honor's push to spin, swinging his flaming saber in Honor's direction. He danced backward, feet never leaving the floor for more than a fraction of a second, dropping back into the stance.
"Better." Lith admitted, begrudgingly. A proud smile crossed Honor's face, and the void broke. Lith's next strike was at Honor's feet, making Honor leap into the air with a yelp. In the moment before he landed, in a swirl of crimson flame, Lith was behind him, holding the saber to his throat. "But don't get cocky." He dismissed the blade, and Honor let out the breath he didn't know he had been holding.
"Find the void again," Rail said. "Using it takes practice, but mastery of it is as useful as any skill with a blade."
"You won't touch a blade if I can help it." Lith said. "At least not until we clean up your protective footwork. Many monsters are much shorter than you. Your legs will be prime targets. Back into your stance! Now, watch me…"
They trained like that for a couple of hours. The void never came to Honor again so easily as it had the first time, and when it did he did not fare so well against Lith as he had that time either, but it helped. Lith taught him footwork, and admitted that Honor was faster than most beginners to the art of combat. Rail went back to his peculiar habit of writing and folding, hands delicately creasing the paper, dancing across the edges with his fingertips so as to not harm the eyes on his palms. Eventually, Lith proclaimed that their training was completed for the day.
"I am done working with you for now," He clarified. "If you hope to be of any help when we relieve the king of those souls, I recommend you work on the things I showed you as often as you can."
"Just as well." Rail said, standing up. "There are a few things we need to do."
"What are we doing?" Honor asked between heavy breaths, wiping sweat from his brow.
"You are staying here. Me and Lith are gathering intelligence." Rail said. Lith nodded, and followed Rail as he strode to the reinforced oaken door at the cave mouth, opening into a rock face just beyond the fringe of the capital.
"Practice the forms!" Lith called as they left. "If they are perfect, I might teach you how to wield a stick tomorrow!"
Chapter Appendix (because "Author's Note" is too mainstream): You just got a taste of two of my original characters. If you can figure out why they got the names they have, kudos to you. One of them has a deep poetic reason, and the other is a bad pun. Another homage in this chapter, if you have read the right books to recognize it. Reviews/comments are nice, especially if you throw in your favorite and/or least favorite moments. I'm an author-in-training, I need feedback to grow. Y'all are awesome for reading this far, thanks for wasting your time on a little writer like me. (Huh, I think I might start using that more, "y'all")
