In the third layer of Uthreth, Aboveground.
Bie's foot touched upon shifting white particles of sand as cool as a nighttime breeze. The atmosphere was saccharine as sweet tendrils of air found their way into Bie's almost unneeded lungs, the boy interested in just where the smell was coming from. He couldn't detect it though, as the scent was simply everywhere!
"Cough…cough…guh! This place is still as poisonous as ever, I see. How come you're not suffering?" Lapil's voice sounded out, breaking Bie out of his reverie and instead injecting him with a fresh spout of irritation. Lapil spoke to himself as he continued, musing although no one asked or even wanted him to speak as he ruffled his lavender locks.
"Oh yeah, you're an undead, so a place like this should be great to you. No wonder Sil had us come here, cough. I can't believe we collect some of this sugar when we have other avenues, though I guess it does taste and smell really appetizing if you can get over the harm it inflicts on the LIVING!" Lapil sputtered out a few more pitiful gasps of air while Bie just focused on ignoring him, instead looking at the large dunes and the crystallized white haze.
"Come on, Bie, we have to hurry up and get to the Eye of Gothul before Crystal Balls show up. You don't want to handle them at this point, and the Path of Renthia is a good choice for your current realm." Lapil kept on walking as his steps brought up clouds of sand…sugar? Sand sugar that fluttered up before blowing away as the haze carried it further down the environment.
Bie really didn't want to talk to the cowardly yet overconfident man, but bit the bullet anyways through pursed lips. "Why don't you want to encounter any Crystal Balls?" Was what he asked, as he was pretty interested in getting a warmup before he endured the looming task ahead of him.
Lapil stared at the sky that formed grey whirlpools that slowly oscillated, white flakes that rose from the ground occasionally forming clouds and then raining back down onto the sugary desert. A tear fell down his right eye as the rabbit ears atop his head twitched, as a reminiscing expression crossed his countenance.
"Because…I'm not your bus."
Bie regretted even asking, and instead focused on surveying his surroundings.
—
They trudged along, drawing lines in the white shining particles as they headed towards the depression known as the Eye of Gothul. A large hand reaching out for the sky vertically towered in the horizon, and Bie enjoyed all the pyramids that they passed on the way.
What's more, he saw plant life in the desert, which consisted of crystalline cacti and flowers like roses composed out of multiple sugary specks that somehow constituted a real biological herb. Bie wanted to taste the various things he saw, lead astray by the tender sugar that hung in the air, but kept his tongue held firmly in his mouth.
After all, even if he was undead and the poison did not have any effect on him, it could still be dangerous to just randomly eat whatever he saw. He figured he'd hold off on the cacti until he moved to another Ladder or two, firmly fixing a goal as he tore his gaze away from the confectionary structures.
Lapil let out peaks of coughs intermittently, unable to withstand the atmosphere of the Dead God Desert for much longer. Thankfully, the Eye of Gothul had much cleaner area, noting that they would soon arrive. He spoke to himself to break the silence and distract himself from the sugary clots that invaded his lungs.
"Only those Savior Corporation Messengers would be brave enough to set up a base in here. Hey, how much do you know about the Post Offices?" Lapil didn't expect Bie to answer, as it was obvious he didn't know anything about it. A smug look drifted about on his face while Bie laughed at him internally, simply because at least he was at ease.
"Savior Corporation, or the Savior Corps. for short, are one of the good Post Offices that are openly aligned with us Guides. They have a particular reverence for the undead, probably because they walk around dressed like grieving people at a funeral. Oh, and they have the power to inherit the abilities of corpses known as 'Saviors', though I don't know if this ability arose from a Path we gave them or a treasure or something that their leader, Wiede Claussman, found along the way. Either way, most of them are very polite folk, that Wiede Claussman and his closest advisors in particular…"
Bie took interest in Lapil's ramblings, now wondering about the members of the Savior Corps. The more he learned of this world, the more and more he wanted to know. And those Seers he heard about and felt an odd sense of hatred towards, what were they like? What was fighting them like?
"We're here!" They arrived at a deep gash and stared over the edge, before walking within the confines as they both slipped through the viscous barrier as they made their way down. Lapil took down heavy breaths as he could finally fill his lungs, spitting out all the sugar clusters that threatened to cling along the walls of his respiratory organs.
Before them, an open doorway with a rippling portal stood in sovereignty, a cross shaped lock shimmering in front of the portal.
"Go on, bring out your Torch and touch it." Bie didn't need Lapil's words, as he reached out to do just that. The world around him faded and disappeared, as he was sent hurtling through the portal as streaks and flashes of colors and shapes rapidly ran past his perception.
Lapil sagged and laid down flat on the floor.
—
This world was embroiled in war between the eastern and western ends of Renthia, separated only by their ideologies. The East believed in science, and the West believed in magic, or rather, magycks, as they called it.
You see, the Western Renthic Mages had absolutely no belief in science, seeing it as a pitiful and trivial primitive method of harnessing the powers they could so naturally evoke with a wave of their hands. They scorned the Eastern Renthic Scientists, their primitive bandages and healthcare, and their intellectual superiority complex.
The Eastern Renthic Scientists held the inverse beliefs of the mages, thinking that their usage of the powers of nature without knowledge of its inter-workings would lead everyone to ruin! That they were mere cavemen waving around big sticks, their books and tomes mere mockeries of the annals of scientific research they had.
Their disagreement naturally lead to war, and they would tear each other apart at the Divide, a sandy area formed from the result of magic explosions and scientific destruction. The area was wrought with destitute establishments, though it was a bustling space of economic opportunity despite its barren environment, as both sides had ways of preserving supplies.
So the Renthic bands of mercenaries lived in the few ceasefire areas, scraping together a living as they changed allegiances almost daily. Each day they could take a job, when they weren't bleeding profusely, they would fight with or against the bands they had fought with before. The mercenaries were dominated by humans, but there were demihumans among them.
Demihumans were humanoid monsters that were seen as nothing more than experiment subjects or so called "war-dogs" by both sides. The only way they could escape the blatant oppression from both sides was to reduce themselves to mere mercenaries, their bountiful strength ripping in to humans, and unfortunately, their struggling kin that was desperate to eke out a better life.
And even then, they still faced rampant discrimination.