Author's Note: This chapter gets a little more violent than usual at the end. Nothing too intense, but thought I should give a heads-up.
THE ABYSS
Beatrice had wondered if she was cursed long before she fell Undead. Her mother, a prostitute, had succumbed to illness when she was very small. Afterward, she went to live with her father, who may or may not have been, and his a band of mercenaries. They had been betrayed and slain to a man. The rats and crows were already eating their fill by the time she felt it safe to leave her hiding place.
The witch of the nearby forest took pity on her and took her as apprentice. Under the old witch's tutelage, she grew to maturity and power. Unfortunately, that land would come to be a part of Vinheim, where the Dragon School had a monopoly on sorcery. Unlicensed magic-users were considered a threat to public safety and were stamped out. Yet, the bodies of the team sent to arrest the old forest witch were never found.
Beatrice's humanity roiled within her as her life played out again and again in her mind. There, they lived once more. The memories of Undead faded swiftly, but the humanity remembered. Mother, Father, Grandmother, Hans, Eldin, Ranc, and all the others were there, bubbling just beneath her skin. Saints and fiends who fed on others would be lucky to have a dozen fragments of the Dark Soul.
Beatrice overflowed.
NEW LONDO RUINS
"She's beautiful," a cold, harsh voice whispered.
"I would not have troubled you for less" a powerful but nasal voice replied.
"As always, you have my gratitude."
"If you are satisfied, then I shall depart before that doddering fool notices something is amiss."
"Now, then. Be silent."
The humanity shuddered to a stop. The shadowplay Gwyndolin had began faded to black, and Beatrice's eyes fluttered open. Some dipshit's hand was in her face.
"Piss off!" she shouted, headbutting the hand out of the way and rolling off of the stone slab on which she had been placed.
She looked around for an exit or for her catalysts. They rested against the wall nearby, so she grabbed one in each hand and brandished them threateningly as she backed toward an open doorway.
"If you would."
Several pairs of terrifyingly long skeletal arms erupted from the walls and wrapped around her, holding jagged knives against various arteries. Any resistance would result in a bloody mess.
"Let me speak. If you still wish to leave after I have finished, you will be allowed to do so."
"You're not really giving me much of a choice, shitstain."
"Please, don't sully your tongue with such coarse language."
What he was saying was at odds with his growling voice and wild appearance. He had dark, sunken eyes and a mop of untamed gray hair. His armor was made of the yellowed and broken bones of some horrible creature, and the tattered remnants of a cape trailed behind him. Though obviously human, his power had swelled him to the size of a demigod. Beatrice was deadpan.
"I am the Undead King, Jareel, master of the Darkwraiths."
"I can see you're a feared leader, because none of them told you how stupid your hair is."
"Language aside, you certainly have the appropriate dignity."
"Let me go, and I'll dignify your face."
"As you command."
The Darkwraith swept his arm and bowed. The long-armed ghosts released Beatrice and drifted away through the walls.
"Okay, what gives?" she growled, lighting her catalysts with energy.
"We have long awaited our Lord. There have been many Undead Kings following the Four who rose in New Londo. They were one and all crushed under the weight of their humanity and became wraiths bound to the Abyss. I fear this too shall be my fate. But you!
You bear a great deal of humanity already and are not burdened by it. You may yet live and become our true Lord. But allow me the honor of teaching you the Lord's art, Lifedrain, and this world will break for you."
"Well, I don't make a habit of hanging around kidnappers, but power is always a great incentive."
"A wise decision. But first, a test to measure your conviction. On a walkway overlooking this place is an old man in red, one of the Sealers who thought it better to drown an entire city than let us rule it. I cannot approach, for his magic wards against those sworn to the Dark. You have no such restriction. Bring him to me alive, one way or another, and I will show you firsthand the power of Lifedrain."
"Sure thing, Bedhead King. Beating up crusty old guys is a hobby of mine."
Beatrice kept her eyes on the Darkwraith as she backed away, passing through the low doorway. Sure that he wasn't pulling anything, she turned to get a handle on her surroundings. She'd entered a room with a number of the absurd decorative vases that were a part of Londo culture. Faintly glowing skeletal ghosts flowed through the walls while they watched her. Ghosts were typically rare.
It was possible for powerful and twisted sorcerers to create them deliberately using their mastery of the soul, but under natural generation required rare circumstances. In general, the soul to be transformed had to undergo emotional turmoil of such strength as to twist it and bind it to the world. The soul needed to experience such trauma that it was utterly incapable of other thoughts at the moment of death. They were more common before the Darksign became prolific. Traumatized Undead tended to cling to their physical bodies and become unusually powerful hollows called revenants instead.
Seeing one ghost was a unique experience. In some occasions, phenomena like entire ghost families were not unheard of. The number of ghosts floating about even the building in which Beatrice found herself was unspeakable. A hand went to her mouth as her own traumas came to mind again. She swallowed the bile building in the back of her throat and continued.
The archway on the left led deeper into the building, but the one on the right led to a hallway and another archway that opened to the rest of the city. New Londo had been built in a massive cavern. Its original purpose had been to sequester a society of philosopher-sorcerers who sought to learn the ways of the soul. In time, they found the need to share their discoveries, and as their interaction with other nations grew, the city grew larger and less closed. Eventually, it became a grand metropolis ruled by philosopher-kings but populated by the many people who supported their way of life.
Though the city remained a secular one, it kept strong ties with the gods in Anor Londo above. The sorcerers sought to become more godlike without falling into the blind fervor that so often overwhelmed the clergy. In recognition of their work, the Lord of Sunlight gave the Four Kings a fragment of his soul to study and to share amongst themselves. Only, they soon delved into the Dark as well as the Flame. The "wise and noble" Healers sealed the city on orders from Anor Londo and flooded the chasm before the Kings – or any of the countless civilians – could learn of their plan.
The slick stone was covered in mold and moss, and the black, brackish water went on forever. The sorcerous lights had long run dry, and the only light came from a hole in the cavern roof an impossible distance above. The path to the right had collapsed, so Beatrice turned to the left. Ahead was a long staircase leading to a sheltered walkway. From the top of the stairs, the walkway continued to a balcony.
Directly ahead was indeed one of the red-robed Sealers, a long beaked mask covering his face. In his right hand was the long, pointed catalyst of his office, and in the left was one of the wickedly sharp knives created of the ghosts' malice. He turned to face the witch as she approached.
"Well, this is a surprise. I don't get many visitors, except for ghosts. Do you have some business here? My name is Ingward. I'm an old man, bound to these parts.
But I don't mind a chat. I may even be of some help."
"How do you justify it?" Beatrice hissed. "All these people clamoring about the Dark, the Dark! They say the same things about that stupid shit pyromancy, you know. Isn't the real danger the sorts of people who think they're so right that they purge anyone who doesn't belong? Tell me: why shouldn't I blast you off that ledge and let you drown like you deserve?"
"The Darkwraiths are the enemies of Man and any living thing that has a soul!"
The Sealer took a defensive stance but didn't make any sudden moves.
"Oh?" Beatrice said vacantly. "What do they do? Kill a few people here and there? Even the damned Knight of Thorns doesn't have a whole city to his name!"
"I see. I thought to give you the benefit of the doubt, but you did come from below. It's already gotten to you, hasn't it? The Darkwraith I've kept trapped in the great hall."
"You arrogant shit. You don't even consider King Fartmeal human anymore, do you?"
"That creature abandoned its humanity the moment it made a Covenant with the Dark."
"I don't think humanity means what you think it means, prick."
Beatrice's blank white eyes shimmered. The lighting in this cavern was much more amenable than the horrid gleam of Anor Londo. The glow of the Sealer's soul was the harshest light in the chasm, though the faint glow of countless ghosts illuminated the internal lake. A small shadow writhed under the Sealer's skin, with eight pinpricks of light staring at her.
"Four sprites," the witch said plainly. "Pretty ordinary amount. But how many did you have in your prime, to have lived this long?"
"I don't understand."
"That's right. You don't."
She thrust her tin banishment catalyst forward threateningly.
"That's-! So, you're hunting us! You will not have the Key to the Seal!"
The Sealer raised his own catalyst and formed a mass of souls above his head. Beatrice was faster, though, and fired the Moonlight Butterfly's scattershot laser, the needle-like beams piercing through his limbs. His souls dispersed, and he fell to one knee.
"If it's come to this," he snarled, "perhaps I should give up on waiting for the Chosen One to defeat your Dark masters! The Seal will never be opened!"
He tore a silver chain from his neck. A key dangled on the end. He threw it into the endless depths and glared back at Beatrice with a desperate grin.
"I have no idea what you're talking about, you self-absorbed shit!"
She fired a flaming soul arrow at his good leg, and he collapsed, screaming. She approached grimly as he tried to drag himself to the edge. Before he could throw himself over, she stabbed the spear-like catalyst through one leg and held him back.
"Funny story, though! The Chosen Dipshit is one of my pals! Guess you should think things through more carefully! Like drowning an entire godsforsaken city!"
She took her sturdy old wooden staff in both hands and took a golf swing at his head. He screamed again but stopped struggling, so she kicked his knife away and slid his catalyst toward herself. With a grunt, she pulled the matching one from his calf and bent over to pick up her new acquisition. She slid them both under her arm and grabbed the Sealer's foot. She dragged his insensate body behind her as she descended the stairs again, his mask clattering against each step as his head bounced off the edges.
She dragged him into the long room where the Darkwraith waited without hesitation, his crimson robes collecting shattered bits of bone as they dragged the floor. The massive Man raised his eyebrows when he saw the trail of blood behind them, but he bowed as Beatrice dropped her prey.
"How brutal, my Lord. I, myself, am more fond of dismemberment, but such is your prerogative."
He stooped over to lift the Sealer onto the slab on which Beatrice had awoken not so long ago.
"Do your worst, Darkwraith," he coughed.
"Oh, I will, rest assured, dear Ingward. But first, I must show my young Lord the basics."
Jareel turned to face Beatrice and raised his left hand to her eye level.
"For one as attuned with the Dark as I, there is no visible sign of my power, but for a beginner, it looks something like this."
Something black began to ooze from his hand like congealed flame, and it emitted rays of a sort of anti-light.
"The Dark is hungry, so for those who haven't learned to control it, it disperses and tries to glut itself on the ambient energy nearby. One can use this behavior to defend oneself."
He held the back of his hand forward, and shadow pulsed from it. The darkness whirled in the air and distorted the space around it, creating a plane of solid force.
"But Dark is a fundamentally consumptive, inward-focused force. It's at its strongest when it's kept in its place. These poor fools unwittingly created the perfect bed of Darkness when they sealed New Londo. The humanity of its inhabitants had nowhere to go but down. The Abyss here cannot be compared to any of the others.
It drains away the humanity of any living intruders, and those who have sworn to the Dark are immortal within. Such power will be yours in time, Lord. Rather than open it and let its shadows disperse, better to let it fill a worthy vessel until the true Dark has fallen. To that end, we must strengthen you with still more humanity, Lord. Behold, the art of Lifedrain."
The Darkwraith placed his hand gently atop Ingward's mask. Abruptly, his whole arm tensed like rigor mortis, and the Dark light that formed the features of humanity sprites shone from his fingertips. The Sealer gasped as one of his humanity sprites was ripped from him to join the pitch-black morass that floated calmly beneath the Undead King's flesh. Another was consumed and another before Jareel released his victim and stepped away.
"He hangs to life by a thread. I leave the last for you, my Lord."
Beatrice tossed her metal catalysts aside, keeping a firm grip on her old wooden staff as she placed her free hand atop the Sealer's mask. She focused carefully on the remaining humanity within his body and let the enormous mass within her do as they willed. Her fingers flared with the ghastly unlight, and the last bit of Dark within Ingward jumped to join her own. Bereft of fuel, his soul began to sputter. Bereft of hope, his soul collapsed upon itself and burst into its component energy.
His body lurched forward and moaned mindlessly. Jareel smirked and reached for a massive tarnished scimitar on his belt. With a quick slash, he decapitated the hollow, and it fell back to the slab.
"Excellent, my Lord. Your talent is true."
"Well, that was fun," Beatrice said grimly. "Really. You deserve a proper reward."
"Lord, I could not accept-" the Undead King started.
The witch whirled around and reached up to jab her fingertips in his eyes. Her own blank eyes shone with the Dark light of humanity, and the countless sprites within her were stirred into a frenzy.
"You're a monster too! I don't know what you were expecting shit-for-brains!"
"Don't think a youngling like yourself has the sheer weight of humanity to unseat-!"
Jareel was one of the greatest Darkwraiths since their inception at the fall of New Londo. He had slain hundreds in his time, but he had been tithed as the others had. He had suffered occasional death and loss of humanity as the others had. Eventually, he had been trapped by Ingward and had been forced to let his humanity dwindle. Beatrice had died but once and was young and hale.
Until she had come to Lordran, she had never stopped gathering humanity. Something black began to ooze from her mouth. She licked her lips. The sprites that Jareel had been suppressing grew restless within him. As he struggled to resist the sheer gravity of her humanity, she lunged forward and tore into his throat.
The Dark rushed out of him, and he withered as his power fled, his armor hanging loosely on him until he could bear its weight no longer. He collapsed in a heap, but Beatrice followed him down, blood smearing across her face. She gave one last jerk, and he stopped moving, a ruined husk. She rose, wiping herself clean with the back of her sleeve. The ghosts drifted about aimlessly, still not seeing her as an enemy.
"Now," she said, voice cracking, "I wonder where the others are."