by Jun Eishima
Ardyn had already been installed as chancellor, which brought him freedom to travel both within the empire and without, along with ample amounts of authority.
He urged the emperor to take an aggressive stance on Lucis. Countless numbers of Niflheim’s magitek creations were sent to the front lines, managing even to take down a portion of the Wall. Lucis was forced to pull the barrier back to Insomnia’s borders, so that the king could see it strong enough to resist further assaults. The empire then moved its forward forces to occupy the lands at Insomnia’s doorstep, and with those new bases as footholds, Ardyn ventured forth, daemonifying the former subjects of Lucis with the scourge and thus adding to his store of knowledge about the kingdom.
The murder of innocent lives brought him no feelings of guilt. The objections and criticisms he’d once cast at Somnus were gone, along with the self that had voiced them. Now, to kill was an act of no great import.
He was steadily climbing toward his goal of vengeance, on a stairway built with the blackened bodies of the Lucian people.
M.E. 734
His driver was not a particularly talkative man. It struck him as unusual. Most taxi drivers chattered on incessantly from the moment you entered the car, as if afraid to let you get another word in once you’d given your destination. The passenger ended up spending the ride with his mouth shut out of necessity, not volition.
“In other news . . . ”
Because this driver was of so few words, Ardyn could hear the radio broadcast in perfect, uninterrupted clarity.
“ . . . a member of the border patrol has been reported MIA since sometime before dawn this morning.”
It was a mildly inconvenient time for this particular story to break. Ardyn decided a bit of prudence might be wise. Men with guarded tongues often boasted sharp ears.
“The missing officer has been identified as twenty-eight-year-old Mars Sapientia.”
He rubbed at the tiny splatter of blood on the ID badge at his chest. For such men, sometimes it was not only their ears that were sharp. Ardyn briefly considered keeping a hand over the name on his badge for the remainder of the ride. Perhaps he could cross his arms and keep the badge concealed with that casual gesture. In the end, he did not try. A person’s memory was a fickle thing, plagued by uncertainties. Ardyn knew that better than any. A name repeated over the radio would be gone from a listener’s mind in minutes. No, an awkward attempt at concealing the badge would draw more attention than not.
“Although Officer Sapientia allegedly reported for duty at his appointed time, fellow officers say he disappeared soon after and has not been sighted since.”
At the reporter’s last line, he wanted to laugh, but carefully held back. The border patrol could search all they wanted. They’d not find their poor officer. The real owner of the guise he now wore had been a daemon for hours. Mars Sapientia no longer existed as a human.
Ardyn did not remember when he’d found himself capable of this particular trick or how, but over time, adopting the appearance of others had become second nature to him. Maintaining the guise of Officer Sapientia was no particular strain, and it was something he intended to keep up for the duration of the day’s events.
Should he happen to run into any of the officer’s acquaintances, the knowledge he’d gained from the man as he transferred the scourge would keep the secret safe. Even Mars’s closest friends wouldn’t be able to see through the ruse. Ardyn knew everything about him, down to the tiniest quirks.
Suddenly there was light, as the car came out of the long tunnel into the sunlit city. Ardyn grimaced slightly and turned away from the window. He normally took great pains to keep the sunlight from his skin, but the typical uniform of the border patrol left his face exposed. Well, that wasn’t quite right―a regulation faceguard would have been standard with the uniform, but it would have seemed a rather conspicuous choice inside the taxi. Ardyn leaned forward, pretending to be absorbed in the sights of Insomnia straight ahead, and in doing so, kept himself that much farther from the window and the rays that streamed in.
He’d not walked the streets of Insomnia before, but he knew the city well, its layout absorbed bit by bit with each soldier of Lucis who fell at his hands. Most men in the border patrol had set foot here at some point, and among Ardyn’s “informants,” there was even a man who had once been granted an audience with King Mors. Others had fought on the front lines under the command of Crown Prince Regis.
Or rather, King Regis. Mors had passed some five years ago, and it was Regis who now sat the throne. Ardyn smiled at the irony. He perhaps knew more about the Crown City and its doings than any of the kingdom’s residents.
“What about you?”
It was the driver’s voice that interrupted his reverie. The man’s words took a moment to register.
“Shouldn’t you be lookin’ for your buddy?”
Of course. The missing soldier. So the driver had been paying attention to the radio broadcast after all. He’d failed, however, to notice the name on Ardyn’s badge. Typical.
“Oh no,” Ardyn replied casually. “I’m on special assignment.”
The taxi was already cruising through downtown Insomnia. This seemed as good a spot as any.
“Pull up over there, if you would.”
No sooner was the door open than he found himself plunged into the bustle of the city. There was laughter, faint strains of music, the sound of cars rushing this way and that. Ardyn climbed out. The sunlight stung. It was a revoltingly fine day.
“Home sweet home at last.”
Two thousand years. Not a trace remained of anything he’d ever known. Gone were the golden fields of wheat, the birdsong, and the smell of soil carried upon the breeze. Instead, he saw skyscrapers and streets of gray, lined by rows of trees spaced with artificial precision. And everywhere the kingdom’s banners flew overhead.
“So this is the city Somnus built,” he mused to himself.
People thronged the roads and plazas, eagerly celebrating the founding of his brother’s kingdom.
“Built on the back of his own flesh and blood.”
All those around him were caught up in the atmosphere of revelry, spirits high, so oblivious to the truth of their homeland. Everything they knew and cherished was built atop a foundation of lies and betrayal. How little they knew of their history. How little they knew of anything.
“Just look at them, free of care and unaware of the war beyond their Wall,” he sniffed. “What need is there to worry when brick and mortar blind them to the suffering outside?”
Surely the residents of the district of Galahd in Cavaugh had once thought the same. Never had they imagined a day might come when their happy home would no longer be protected by the Wall. Yet, nine years ago, the barrier keeping Lucis’s enemies at bay was scaled back to the ramparts of the Crown City, and Galahd enjoyed the protection of the Wall no more. Demise was ever a swift thing. It might arrive without warning, yet even if there were signs, no one ever paid them heed. The creature known as man was all too eager to avert his eyes from the unpleasant.
“Trapped within these walls, they cannot even see how wide the world truly is.”
Beneath this sliver of blue crowded by skyscrapers, the citizens of Insomnia chattered away with empty heads. They’d never known hunger. They’d never known cold. They hadn’t even faced the terror of disease. They were fools to the last, and nary a thought had entered their minds beyond where they might turn for their next moment of excitement, their next laugh.
“What a dismal existence.”
Amid the laughter and music came the chirp of a loudspeaker. “Welcome to the Founder’s Day Festival. In a moment, the parade will begin making its way through the city.”
Ardyn smiled. He’d show them something more exciting than rank after rank marching down the streets. Soon the whole city would dance in red. A garland of flames for
every man, woman, and child. Together, they would celebrate Insomnia’s demise.
“Now let the fireworks begin!”
His right hand shot into the air, to summon forth Ifrit, the God of Fire. Soon fear would fill the city. The Infernian would be a storybook myth no longer. The people would stare upon the god with their own eyes, and then they would tremble and scatter in glorious panic.
Yet nothing happened. The citizens around him continued their merriment, vapid expressions intact.
“Oh dear,” Ardyn mumbled.
In fact, no one had even paid his now-embarrassing display the slightest attention. Well, almost no one. There was a single small child staring at him, a look of confusion on her face as Ardyn stood with arm still upstretched.
“That’s odd.”
Ardyn tilted his head, but the mystery was soon solved. A chorus of screams arose―but from a wholly unexpected direction. The ground rumbled in the distance, and he heard the shattering of glass and shriek of twisting metal coming from buildings nearing collapse. From a side street in the distance licked tongues of unearthly flame. And then the Pyreburner was there, on the grand boulevard for all to see, fire curling around his colossal form and the massive blade he wielded in one hand.
“Oh, cursed be the wavering whims of the gods,” he moaned. Though a daemon under Ardyn’s control, the Astral yet managed to carry out commands only in the ways he saw fit. He refused to come obediently when summoned and seemed always a wild stallion, ready to throw off the reins and run mad at the slightest opportunity.
“Oops,” Ardyn said, jumping to one side.
Jagged bits of rubble pierced the spot where he’d just stood. The Infernian continued to attack whatever portion of the city was closest to hand. The daemon god seemed wholly unconcerned as to whether the wreckage would fly in Ardyn’s direction.
Tides of flame surged across road and plaza, charring black anyone whose flight was not sufficiently swift. Shrieks of panic no longer filled the air. Now Ardyn listened to the agony of death: anyone near enough to hear was either forever silenced or soon to be so.
“Now, then,” he said. “It would seem the Infernian has things taken care of over here.”
Ardyn proceeded down the boulevard, opposite the path of the fleeing citizens, mentally listing off the next steps to take. His to-do list distressingly long.
“Ah. I almost forgot.”
He turned and caught sight of a stalwart member of the Crownsguard, doing his best to stay his own hysteria and direct the flow of panicked citizens. Ardyn flagged the man down, asking, “Could I borrow that?”
The man’s look of disbelief was soon replaced with anguish as his body collapsed to the ground in a black haze. Not a soul around seemed to notice. They were all too absorbed in their own flight from the flames to care what happened to anyone else. Ardyn picked up the fallen soldier’s radio and checked to see it was on.
“Ah, so glad to finally find one,” he mused. Officer Sapientia had, much to Ardyn’s dismay, carried a different model―one not attuned to the frequencies used within the city walls. “Good. It’s all coming in loud and clear.”
Every channel was a confusion of yelling and barked orders. It grated on his ears and also brought its own delight. Ifrit had only just arrived. It would be a while before anyone grasped the full situation, and longer still until any organized response would form. Confusion among the city’s leadership was patently apparent.
“Do enjoy yourself, my infernal friend,” he said, waving cordially. “You seem to have everything well in hand here, so I’ll go on ahead to prepare.”
Phantasmal leaps brought him easily to the top of a nearby building. From that high vantage, the extent of the inferno was easy to see. And what a wonderful sight it was. But he had other business to attend to. The memories of a certain technician, recently deceased, informed him that elevation was key when hijacking a broadcast signal. Gigantic screens mounted throughout the city all showed a close-up of a female news anchor. Her eyes darted about nervously and her mouth was tight as she delivered her report: “Attention, all citizens. An enormous, unidentified life-form has appeared near the Citadel. The creature has begun emitting flames, turning the area around the Citadel to a sea of fire. All citizens must evacuate immediately. I repeat: Attention, all citizens . . . ”
The screens flickered blank, and then the woman’s words were replaced by another, deeper voice.
“Testing, one, two, three. Is this thing on?”
Another flicker, and now it was Officer Mars Sapientia on display throughout the city. Ah, that wasn’t so difficult. Ardyn smiled to himself. It was quite amusing to see himself on-screen, speaking with another’s voice and likeness. It certainly made for a novel experience.
“Greetings, people of the Kingdom of Lucis! Do forgive me for interrupting the festivities, but I must tell you this day of rapturous revelry shall be your last.”
He saw one citizen stop, bewildered by these new words, only to be quickly engulfed by the flames around him.
“Call it ‘divine retribution,’” Ardyn continued. “False kings and fraudulent nations are fated to perish.”
The Infernian’s great blade sliced through yet another building, and a cascade of rubble crushed several lives below.
Ardyn smiled. “Sins of the past must not go unpunished. The time of reckoning is at hand!”
The smell of scorched debris and burning flesh reached him on his high perch. Today marked the final day of the history of Lucis and the first day of his retribution upon the world.
“Well, time to set to work. I beg you, good king and people: do struggle. It will make this far more satisfying for me.”
Now they would watch as he undid a nation grown vast in his two-thousand-year absence. And it would take only a single day. Nay, it would take but a few hours.
The screen flickered again, returning to the female anchor, her face now stricken with astonishment. That, too, would be gone soon. Either the monitors would crack and burn, or the woman herself would be charred black. It was hard to say which might come first, but that knowledge was assuredly only minutes away.
“Attention, all units. This is your captain speaking. Code red. I repeat, code red. Follow your commanders’ orders and get the situation under control.”
One clear voice rang out amid the turmoil on the Crownsguard frequencies. The initial confusion seemed to have passed.
“Every word, clear as day,” Ardyn said, admiring the stolen radio. “The wonders of technology!”
The radio chirped again. “Clarus here.” Clarus. Ardyn had heard the name somewhere before. No . . . he’d seen it somewhere before, among someone’s stolen memories. This voice must belong to the leader of the Crownsguard, Clarus Amicitia.
“Have you identified the creature?” Clarus asked.
A subordinate replied, “Not yet, but we believe it to be daemonic in nature.”
“A daemon?!” Clarus exclaimed. “But how could it possibly withstand the daylight? Why is it here now?”
Why? Because I summoned it, Ardyn thought, stifling a laugh.
“For now, help the citizens evacuate. The Royal Guard will take care of the giant.”
“Absolutely, sir.”
He’d wanted to spend a little more time on his perch above the city, looking down on the suffering below, but it seemed he could afford to dawdle no longer.
“Evacuate? Well, we can’t have that, now, can we?”
Every last subject of Lucis had to die. There could be no survivors.
“Yoo-hoo! Oh, Ifrit!”
The Infernian drew near, and Ardyn dove, plummeting back to ground level. Between the two of them, the Crownsguard mobilizing at their current location wouldn’t have a chance to reach the fleeing civilians. Slay those trained to organize the evacuation, and there wouldn’t be much of an evacuation left
to stop.
The strokes of the Pyreburner’s great blade tore through the guards’ ranks, leaving the better part of their number ablaze.
“My, but the gods’ might does inspire.” He beamed, as Ifrit continued to ravage soldier and city. “Though I must admit, they’re not much for detail work.”
A lucky few soldiers managed to avoid each strike, but their luck was short-lived. In the god’s wake came Ardyn, who dispatched the remaining troops one by one, their movements so dull and predictable that to him, they might as well have been standing still.
“The Crownsguard is almost wiped out, sir. Target is still on the move.”
“Special forces are on the way. Try to hold out until they arrive!”
“Special forces” undoubtedly referred to the Royal Guard. He’d encountered them before on Angelgard, and again at Verstael’s facility. Clad in black, with faces obscured, they were also combatants of significantly greater skill than their Crownsguard brethren. Ardyn realized they’d be a bit of a nuisance once they arrived. He was anxious to have the rest of the fodder mopped up before that happened.
No sooner were the last of the Crownsguard units downed than several black-clad soldiers warped in. A new voice came over the radio. “Engaging the target.”
At Ardyn’s first blow, the same voice spoke again, its timbre changed. “He’s so strong.” Ardyn heard the words twice, once with a slight delay. He realized the soldier he was hearing on the radio was the same man he was attacking just then.
“Sending backup!” Clarus barked. “Don’t let him get away!” But by the time the order came, the man was dead.
“So sorry to disappoint,” Ardyn mused, “but I think I’ve had enough of being restrained for one lifetime.”
He felt another enemy at his back and dodged the incoming blow without turning. Then he was circling, shadowstepping in a great arc to get behind his assailant. Or rather, assailants. As Ardyn closed in, he realized there were several. Not that it mattered. They’d die all the same.