Chapter 444 - Far Future Ch. 154 – Fitting in Like We Belong There... (1/2)

Walking through a drow city was an exercise in looking threatening enough that someone wouldn't casually want to mess with you. If you didn't look threatening enough personally, then whoever you were affiliated with had to be threatening enough to do the job if you were messed with.

If you were someone that didn't have anyone backing them, like four breshkt in outlander garb and towing behind them some Disks laden down with expensive stuff, you had to look pretty dangerous, indeed.

We looked totally intimidating, because we didn't look concerned at all.

Pickpockets and snatch and grabbers about to have a go at us saw fingers rise, a head slightly turn, and their blood went cold and their eyes elsewhere. Some thugs with muscle and guns thinking they saw an opportunity saw our eyes just glance over at them and move away without the slightest indication that they were a threat, and swallowed their words and let us pass right on by. Some cocksure bravos who thought they were dangerous with bodyguards and fawning attendants came into our paths, four sets of eyes leisurely set on them, and they got out of our way like someone had spiked their balls.

Drow have an acute sense of don't-fuck-with-me. Intimidate checks at post-50 set off their little spidey-senses and highly honed survival instincts, and accompanying degrees of shamelessness sent them scampering out of our path, thinking thoughts of revenge and humiliation and how they'd get back at us, while we walked on by.

Reading the signs and indications wasn't all that hard, and the local version of a Band was among the things I had retained from the dead pink-haired slaughter sisters. So, we made our way unerringly to a fine merchant with no hesitation whatsoever about buying a highly prized commodity like hoverboards from us for a fair amount of money, while the whispers about what we'd done flew out ahead and around us, and certain individuals began to look askew at us and start plotting how to use us.

All the more fun for us.

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She was a fallen gladiator from the higher arenas, a blade-witch who'd been cut up and stoned out too many times, and no longer had the edge or appeal to compete before the ruthless upper crowds. The faint shriveling of her black skin showed that her willpower was failing, and soon she'd go barmy and start a wave of slaughter that would end with her being shot to pieces by disinterested parties for target practice.

Happily, she never got to that point, because Celestia stepped into the fighting ring across from her.

She might be falling, and her pink hair going bloody magenta, and her eyes all crimson, but she was a highly trained killer of the high arenas, who had dueled all manner of foes, and was perfectly used to slaughtering larger numbers of lower born and less trained opponents. She was drugged to the gills, dancing on the edge of the killing madness and combat high that was sucking in her sanity, and finding a breshkt stepping into the arena across from her earned only a sneer and a mocking laugh from her twisted lips.

”A half-breed dares step into the arena across from me!” she shrieked out, as if this was a personal affront to her, her reputation fallen so low that even breshkt dared to face her. ”I will bleed you slowly and watch you die in pain!”

The three of us quickly placed our bets as the crowd of drow, sixteen different species of aliens, breshkt, umbvar, and some Warped creatures that could have come from multiple species all howled out at the display and clamored with their bids.

Well, this wasn't going to take too long, so we had to bid quickly...

Chill dropped into Celestia's hand, a thirty-four-inch dual-edged blade of Full-Tempered Adamant flowed out of the Sword Focus. Harsh, metallic silver light hissed in the runes on her Blade, and she didn't even bother to bring her buckler Out into play.

Or her Arakne Arms. Or her Tails. Or her Philosopher's Might Tats. Or her Halo Crown...

She just glared.

She wasn't a slave to her Talent, but the fact was her Talent was Ice Cold. Her natural emotional state was as hard and cold as diamond. She had been a completely cold and harsh bitch with the uncaring social mindset of a dagger until her Charisma reached 30 and she was able to slice off a thoughtstream that actually had some emotions and could empathize and relate to normal people. As a Rantha and having the same foundation as all her sisters, she was aware of how different she was and what her Talent did to her. She loved her sisters, and kept a sharp eye on her moral leanings and how her natural hardline emotions veered towards doing unconscionable things without batting an eye, and so engaged in introspective self-analysis with her Wisdom thoughtstream constantly.

She had very little faith to go around, but probably none of the other Ranthas engaged in as much constant introspection about the fate and color of their soul.

Her soul had belonged to a ruthless manipulator of her family and students, a psychopath willing to do almost anything to get ahead. She had inspired fear in her family, siblings, fellow students, and even instructors... but at the same time she had been a horrible recruit for Amourae, because she considered the plunging into sensualism and emotional release utter weakness. She had forced the headmistress to dominate her personally to make her submit, making her one of the last of the girls of Wendlerton Academy to be subverted, and only then by catering to her fantasies of power and dominance.

She had not been a good person, and it was entirely likely she would have been Warp-fodder on death, and the epitome of a ruthless noblewoman with distant bloodstains on her hands had she lived.

She had been weak... a slave to her own personality and Talent, and too low Level to defy the Headmistress.

But she was a Rantha now. She could split her own mind, make thoughtstreams that were not bound by her Talent, and open herself to the full range and joy of emotions that her sisters felt, even if she rarely ever showed it.