Been a second, last time our heroes dared to venture into the most deadly locale known to man: Higher Education!
Ruination: Return Chapter IV
Shadow Behind the Gilding Part III
Ezreal shivers for what feels like the thirtieth time since returning home. Some small part of him tells him it is because something is watching them, but surely if that's the case, Vayne would have noticed, as perceptive as she is.
The rest, he gives over to how wrong the city feels.
It is quiet.
It is empty.
He'd expected to see anything that gave a faint hint of the bustle and chaos that defines so many of his memories the deeper into the city he'd led the others into the city.
But there was no one.
Yet, somehow the city is pristine. All the hextech and clockwork chugging along rhythmically.
It didn't line up in his head, but as tempted as he is to crash into one of the homes they rush by, he keeps his focus on guiding the others. He has to.
"This place is like a maze." Olaf spits as they whip around yet another corner.
"Agreed." Riven mutters, "And I thought the Bastion was a morass."
"Live here all your life, and you learn it like the back of your hand." Ezreal states, sliding under an extended pipe, his compatriots, excluding Olaf dodging round it as well. The great barbarian…just ran through it.
The noise echoed through the alley, and he skids to a halt, waiting to hear if anything responds.
Nothing.
Not even the cry of birds or the squeak of a startled sump rat.
And again, a chill climbs up his back.
"Ezreal?" Gwen asks, turning to him.
"It…it's nothing." Ezreal remarks, "Or rather the nothing. I can't…wrap my head around Pilt being this empty."
"Then we had best find answers as to what has happened here," Vayne states.
"Right, this way." he agrees, continuing on, but he pauses as he sees Gwen start walking towards the edge of the tier they're standing on, eyes locked on something in the distance.
"Gwen?" he calls, and she turns, tilting her head slightly.
"Do you not see her?" she asks.
The others turn with him, looking out over the expanse of the city, and all he sees, which fills him with a tiny bit of relief, is a bird on the wing, flitting down towards the lower portions of the city.
"The bird?" he asks.
"N-are you sure we must go to the Academy?" Gwen asks, her eyes flicking back towards the edge.
"If we want to get down to the Undercity and find that piece, absolutely." Ezreal remarks.
"Very well…" Gwen mutters, shaking herself.
Ezeal narrows his eyes, glancing back out over the rest of the city, but he sees nothing, yet…once again, he feels something's gaze upon him.
And he swears he hears singing.
He shakes himself and surges forward, the others falling into step.
The Academy will have answers.
It has to.
As it turned out, all the Academy had at first glance was more eerie vacantness. The domed halls glimmered in the sun, the greenery was still pristinely trimmed, and the marbled stone was freshly polished.
Ezreal glances around, the others fanning out around him.
"More nothing," Olaf notes, spitting a loogie onto the stonework, "How far until we reach this 'Undercity'?"
"Otherside of campus, but we need to check the Sentinel building first." Ezreal states, pointing towards a smaller annex with the Sentinel symbol emblazoned above the entranceway.
"Then let us hasten out steps." Olaf remarks, marching towards the building with a grumble, "I had expected a battle, not a jog through a foul-smelling maze."
"Foul-smelling?" Gwen sniffs the air, "I think it smells quite lovely."
"Your nose is not sharp as mine, small one." Olaf growls, "Even without the burn of the Mist, this place reeks of corrosion, of stagnation."
He looks around, huffing, "Pretty on the surface, rotten at the core, like poorly preserved meat."
He looks to Ezreal, "Surely, having lived here, you know."
Ezreal taps his thigh, thinking about the Undercity and a lot of what he had seen growing up.
"Yeah…" Ezreal mutters.
Gwen shrugs, "I don't think that is the case. Very little is truly rotten all the way to the core."
"Ever the optimist." Riven remarks, with a soft smile towards the doll.
"I try." Gwen returns with a jaunty nod of her head.
"Sometimes too much," Vayne mutters, keeping her head on a swivel the entire time, eyes trained on the roofs and peering down accompanying alleyways.
"I would have preferred Bilgewater." Olaf grunts.
"And you're complaining about the smell?" Riven remarks, scrunching her nose.
"Those are natural scents, blood and bilge and the sea!" Olaf returns, "There is nothing natural about this city of glitter and gears."
They make it across the courtyard without further conversation.
Ezreal examines the door frame, looking for any signs of traps, but can't find a hint on the outside, at least.
"Vayne, I ne-" he pauses as her sharp eyes burrow into him, "I am going to try the door. If it opens, I need another pair of eyes to make sure I don't trigger something on the inside."
"When you are ready, then." Vayne nods, sliding up to be pressed tightly against the side of the door frame.
"Be ready," he remarks, looking to the others, each unsheathing their weapons, a grin crossing Olaf's face.
He checks the keyhole, drawing a bit of tech from the kit on his hip, but after a cursory test realizes that it isn't trapped and is already unlocked.
"Here we go," he states, slowly turning the handle and drawing the door slowly forward.
Vayne peers within and flicks her eyes to him, "We're good."
Olaf grumbles and sheathes his axes while Ezreal pulls the door open the rest of the way.
The interior is warmly lit, the light flickering ever so slightly as they enter. A central desk was sitting before them, with a door behind it, and two halls curved to the left and right.
Vayne looks about, eyes narrowing.
"Have you ever been within?" she asks, looking at Ezreal.
"Nope. They never let me." he remarks, with a bit of a smirk, "Stated I was too 'disruptive.'"
"And that was just the Sentinels?" Riven asks.
"Might have been a good chunk of the Academy," Ezreal admits, rubbing his head.
Gwen giggles, and Vayne rolls her eyes.
"Then we go room by room. Quietly." she remarks, "Olaf, right, Gwen, and Riven, left. You are with me."
She points to Ezreal and the door sitting directly beyond the desk.
The others nod, Olaf, sniffing the air with a look of discontent, "Good hunting."
He lumbers down the right hall, pushing open the first door and ducking inside while Gwen and Riven make their way left.
Vayne vaults over the desk and tries the door, which opens without any resistance.
"I'm really starting to hate this." Ezreal remarks as he follows her.
"I had thought you would enjoy us not fighting for our lives right from the start," Vayne remarks, eyes scanning the interior, which appeared to be sleeping quarters, two cots pushed against separate walls, a locker in the far corner, and a table in the middle of the room, with two chairs and a smattering of books and papers covering it.
"Perhaps." Ezreal remarks, moving to check the locker after a cursory look under the beds. She moves to the table, shifting papers aside with narrowed eyes.
"But I expected the Mists, monsters, haunts." Ezreal states, "Not…a ghost town. It's worse somehow."
"Because you do not know what happened?" Vayne asks, lifting a book and flipping through it rapidly.
"Yes." he returns, trying the locker and finding that it stuck, "If it were Viego's followers hollering and blabbering, then I'd know, but it's like the whole town has just…."
"Vanished." she finishes, looking up at him.
He nods.
"Let us hope that this building has answers." she remarks, setting down the book, "Though I don't think Madarda trading manifests and flyers for a 'musical event' will be of much help."
"Madarda?" Ezreal asks, looking back as he manages to finally get the locker open, "Big trading family, ties to Noxus. Why would the Sentinels be investigating something like that?"
"Hunting monsters does not end with Mistwalkers." Vayne remarks.
Ezreal turns back to the locker, finding it to be pretty sparse outside of a set of civilian clothes, a framed picture of two women tightly hugging one another, one with purple hair and the other with pink, dressed in Sentinel garb.
He goes to turn away and then catches something gleaming against the light buried beneath the clothes.
Reaching in, he draws it out and smiles, as in his hands is an audio recorder with several disks hastily stowed beneath it.
"This might be something," he remarks, rushing to the table and pulling back a chair. Sitting down, he flips the recorder in his hands, examining it for any faults or breaks.
"What is that?" Vayne asks.
"An audio recorder." he offers, holding it up to her, "It can record messages, music, et cetera, using these."
He holds up one of the disks.
"With magic?' she asks, eyebrow-raising.
"Not exactly, but that isn't important." Ezreal states, "What is, is whatever messages could be stored on these."
Vayne leans onto the table, "Go on, then."
After one more check, reassures him that the machine is functional. He picks up the first disk and inserts it into the machine.
The disk begins to spin, and a lower-pitched female voice begins to speak.
"This is Sentinel Dess, making a recording for the archives. Word on the docks is that unusual weather patterns are moving toward the city from the South East: black clouds and green lightning. Never seen a Harrowing before, but that sure as the hells sounds like one. The Boss says we should be prepared. Ada…is excited, but when is she not. Outside of that, some interesting events have been happening at the Intersol. Noxians and Medardans seen handing over crates marked with our sigil. Gonna look into it before this 'Harrowing' hits. Signing off.
The disk spins to a halt, and he looks up to Vayne, "Sounds like the beginning of the Ruination."
"If they were selling Sentinel artifacts…." Vayne mutters, "Continue."
He plays the next.
"Sentinel Dess. It's definitely Harrowing, the sky is black as oil, and there are actual screams in the wind. The city is in a panic. The Council is locking down the Conveyors, ordering people to their homes, and even clearing the Golemns off the streets. To make matters worse, Professor Heimerdinger has vanished. Not sure why, but that is a job for the Wardens, not us. Whatever was going down in the Intersol went bad. A fight broke out. This guy covered in tattoos with blue skin cracked open one of the crates and ran with what was inside. Can't worry about it now, need to be prepared for the storm. Ada is…far less excited than before. But we've got this."
Vayne nods for him to keep going, even as questions ripple in his mind.
"It…it wasn't just a Harrowing. It was taking people, changing them into these…things, and forcing them to fight for it. We tried, but…the Boss is gone. One of the Walkers sent him off the Canal Bridge. There's only a handful of us left, but…I think…I think it's over. I don't know how or why, but the Mist was forced back. People are claiming the Golden Boy made some machine that is keeping it at bay. Been weeks since we've seen sunlight, and now I get to walk in the noonday sun. Folks are scared, and they should be cause it isn't gone. It's just been pushed back. No one has heard from the Council in about as long, and there are rumors of even worse trouble down in Zaun, but that is nothing new. Ada and I are gonna head down there and see if we can't be of some help. Ada doesn't believe the rumors about some machine being our savior. So probably gonna need to look into that too."
Vayne, "What did it?"
"There are stories, hundreds of them, myths mainly, of a spirit that lived in the land that became Zaun, and eventually Piltover." Ezreal remarks, "And after everything we've seen, I'd say it isn't a bad idea to think there is truth to the fiction."
"A demon saved your city?" Vayne remarks.
"Spirit." Ezreal corrects with a flat expression, "They say she is a God, a guardian of Sailors and Sumpers. I don't recall her name, but I'd put more money on that than it being some Hextech miracle."
A gentle breeze flows into the room, and they tense, Vayne looking at the door harshly. She knocks back an arrow and continues staring at the door.
"Continue."
He picks up the second to last disk.
"Something is very, very wrong with the city. It's just me and Ada left. I don't know what happened to the others. We split up to cover more ground after the Intersol Coneyor spat out a bunch of Ruined Zaunites. Ada and I went to join up with the Wardens, unload part of the Cache, and give them a better chance to figure out what was happening in the Undercity. The others were to go to the Council building and the main Annex. The former never returns, the latter are splattered across its steps as we speak…and there was this…music that made my head spin, and the next thing I knew, Ada and I were flat on our backs, and the weapons were gone. The Mist is gone, not even on the Horizon anymore, yet things are only getting worse. We can't hail the other chapters. I don't know what we're going to do."
Without a word, he presses the last disk into the player, a sense of dread overcoming him.
"It's quiet. The city is quiet. It's not right. But there is no one in the streets. At least not topside. I can see the fires rising in the Undercity from here. They took her. In the middle of the night, these…things were just in the building. Like they'd come out of the walls. They took Ada, and there was nothing I could do. I'm going after her, despite the music, despite the gleaming eyes I've noticed staring at me from between the chimneys across the street. Yeah…yeah, I see you! I see you. Cobbled together what we had left into one hell of a gun. I'm going to get her back. But you need to know the Mist isn't gone. It NEVER left. It's in the p-."
There is the sound of frantic movement, likely Dess stowing the recorder away, and then that was it.
Ezreal blinks and looks up at Vayne.
"The whole city is…."
"Rotten." Vayne finishes, firing a bolt at something in the far corner of the ceiling.
A twitching form of gears and Black Mist drops to the ground, her bolt sticking out of a singular clockwork eye.
"And it knows where we are." Vayne remarks, "We need to leave now!"
He nods, pocketing the recorder and the disks and darting out of the room alongside her.
A faint humming fills the air, and his head begins to swim as something tries to tug at it, but he pushes it away.
Vayne reaches into her pouch and pulls out several rune-marked earplugs.
"Put these in now," she orders.
"How did you-" Ezreal begins, only for her to cut him off by shoving them into his hands.
"I've been fighting the things in the shadows for a lot longer than you, kid." she states, "Earplugs, now."
She puts two into her ears, and he does the same, and immediately the sense of vertigo vanishes.
Forgoing stealth Vayne calls out, "Olaf!"
There is a tense moment of silence, but right after, the barbarian emerges, clutching his head and munching on what appears to be a smoked sausage.
"Take these." Vayne states, pressing another set of earplugs towards him, which he takes without question.
He shakes his head and nods to her, "Thank you."
"Where did you get that?" Ezreal asks, pointing to the food in his hands.
"The pantry." Olaf returns.
"How old is it?" Ezreal asks.
"Fresh." Olaf remarks, "All the food is freshly purchased, or rather prepared from somewhere. Troublesome, no?"
"But the Mistwalkers don't ea…." Ezreal begins when the sound of a bursting pipe draws their attention.
"We have to find the others," Vayne states, and together the three race down the left-hand hall.
Gwen was uncertain of what to make of Piltover, but there was something of comfort about the city. She felt a connection to something gentle and kind in a way she hadn't for quite some time.
A motherly energy that she had long sought.
So she hadn't fully been concentrating when she pushed the door open at the end of the left hallway and found herself in the room from the Message.
There were numerous tables with alchemical equipment covering them, and sitting with his back to her was a gaunt, older man.
Gwen reaches for her scissors as the man turns slowly, a mask wrapped in bandages peering over his bony shoulders.
"Oh, hello," he states, his voice a soft whisper, almost comforting, but something about him had her on edge. There was a table beside him, mainly hidden behind a sheet.
"Hello?" Gwen returns, "I did not mean to intrude. Are you a Sentinel?"
"No, no, I am not." the man returns, standing, revealing the table before him to be covered by all manner of medical equipment and several glowing tinctures, "But I take it you are?'
"Yes, do you know what has happened?" Gwen asks, edging around to try and get a glance behind the curtain. As she moved, the pipes about, the room groaned and squeaked.
She glances up.
"Pay them no mind." the man states with a wave of his hand, "But yes, I know what happened though it is quite a lengthy tale. May I finish my work first?"
"Your work?" Gwen returns uncertainly, "Is that why you are here?"
"Yes. My old workshop was not so…peaceful," he remarks.
The pipes groan again, even louder.
"Doesn't sound very peaceful," Gwen mutters.
"You grow accustomed to it," he mutters.
"Gwen?" Riven calls out, entering the room, "Who are you speaking t-"
She stops, and Gwen turns, seeing Riven's face locked in a mask of fear, her knuckles white as she goes to draw her blade.
"Riven?" Gwen asks.
"Get away from him," Riven whispers.
The man turns to her.
"Well…I had hoped to keep things calm." the man mutters, picking up one of the vials and flipping it in his hands.
The pipes groan once more.
Gwen reaches for her scissors.
"As I said, don't mind the pipes." the man remarks.
They burst open, Black Mist pouring into the room.
"They've been like this for some time," he mutters with a chuckle.
He steps back as two semi-mechanical figures drop out of the Mist. Both women, the one scrappy with immense metal hands, the other tall, standing atop legs that end in a bladed point. Both wore the marks of Viego, but the former had odd purple eyes and glowing purple veins atop her forehead.
"Make way!" a voice cries out, and Gwen whirls as Olaf barrels into their midst, a mad gleam in his eyes.
With a startling deftness, the man turns and flings the vial directly at Olaf, the gleaming purple liquid spattering across his face and causing him to stumble into the awaiting punch of the first woman.
As he whirls, he gasps, clutching his head as purple and black veins begin crossing his face and racing through his veins.
As the others skidded to a halt in the doorway, Olaf bellows with rage and confusion.
Singed smirks beneath the bandages as the looming Sentinel grows taller and rounds on his former companions.
The Black Mist had brought him many gifts.
This was just the latest.
How he loved field testing.
So…what the fuck was that, you might ask?
That would be me decided Singed is a fucked enough fellow that he would gladly work for and play with the Black Mist without needing any true compulsion from Viego, unlike the true villain of this little mini-arc.
Next time, our heroes must face down the Black-Shimmer-infused Olaf and the other Ruined as they attempt to escape the Academy. Luckily, Time is on their side.
As always comments, questions, and critiques are appreciated. This has been VerBeeker, signing off!