It was the headwhisperer, staring down right at Luma with that unreadable mask of theirs.
Bastards, Luma thought. The win felt hollow, like a piece of his heart had been sold in exchange for it. They had slain an innocent instructor in cold blood, they had slain his instructor in cold blood, and for that they would pay.
The rough stone walls came down with a clap from the headwhisperer. Only 14 of the initial 30 candidates remained, the corpses of those unrisen a charred pile of flesh at the feet of deathstalkers.
Some had been seniors that Luma had played with once or twice, others he had fought with, but nonetheless these were the people of his tribe. He had gone into this knowing that some would die trying to rise, but with the death of his instructor came a cold realization.
These outsiders were culling them off.
It would've been different had it been by the hand of those they loved and cherished, at least then it would've meant something.
But these... whisperers were so long removed from any tribe that he wondered if Inferi truly lay behind those masks, or if they were one of the thinking machines created by the angels.
"Hey, Luma, you made it," a voice whispered to him.
He turned to find Tova grinning from ear to ear, his stimulant floating on the rock pedestal infront of him.
Luma remained silent. He felt that if he spoke now, screams would come out instead of words.
Every passing second just seemed to heighten his hate for these people who had invaded his village, his hate towards his own people for not having noticed this earlier.
Wait, is that a—?
Right at the bottom of Tova's pedastal was a leather flask— a water container. Luma swept his gaze over the other candidates and found that everyone else, including those that had perished, had them as well.
His eyes widened in realization. That was why there had been a commotion when the trial started, why the adults— why Guzla, had been shouting Alrakhem.
They set me up.
His heart roared, pounding so hard he could barely hear what the headwhisperer was currently annoucing. His muscles whined and twitched, begging him to move, to avenge, to kill and slaughter.
He grabbed the floating blue liquid infront of him and flung it into his mouth. It was a thick sticky liquid, that tugged at the flesh of his throat as it went down.
It won't be enough, he thought, not giving his body time to process the stimulant.
"Luma, what are you doing?" Tova whispered, however Luma was already at his pedestal, grabbing his stimulant.
This is as much as I can get, they've already noticed, he thought, watching as all the whisperers turned their attention to him.
Strangely, they did nothing, simply turning to look at the headwhisperer. The deathstalkers remained still as well, those mindless things could only obey their masters, another advantage.
The adults on the audience platform began to stirr, moving towards the ledge as if it would give them a better idea of what Luma was thinking.
And then it began.
Luma's heart came to a painful stop. His blood ran like a frozen river, freezing his limbs and turning his skin porceline white. The light seemed unbarable in that moment, and the sounds, as small as the simplest whisper from the adults above, were like thundering drums that stabbed at his ears.
What, what's going on?
His mind expanded, leaking into an abyss he never knew surrounded him. Streaks of lights, pathways, stretched and intertwined before him, drowning him in images of future yet unlived;
An obsidian masked figure bowed to a crimson sun. A planet of green and blue, brimming with life he had never known. Large metallic objects, floating in a black expanse. Banners of the kanuit raised by an army of violence.
These images were blurry, his mind could not process the finer details, and already he could feel them fading from his memory.
More images followed, and they got more detailed... more real as the microseconds ticked by.
A deathstalker —face tornup exposing flesh and bone— attacking. A beam from a mining artifice firing at it's eye. A bloodied silver mask gripped by a pale hand. The roars of his tribe in unison.
It all smelt of death.
The images began to overlap, he could not discern one scene from another, and he found his mind slowly weakening.
He tried to focus. Willing everything he had within himself to glimpse just a few more seconds of this strange vision.
There was an old tattered book, lying open on a brown table.
The words on the page read:
And there shall come one, that once touched by the sun will strip kings of their authority, and bring ruin to the enemies of his people.
The words brought a strange weight to his mind, the streaks of light tying around him like anchors, pulling him even futher down into that abyss.
As his mind slipped from this infinite dark plane, he heard a whisper.
"For I whisper unto you. But who will whisper unto me?"
.
Reality came back to him like tunnel storm; first slowly and then all at once.
Everyone was in the exact same position he had left them. It was as if not even a second had passed.
He still felt that poisonous hatred against the whisperers and all his people. But now it came with a cooling confidence.
What did I just see? he wondered.
The headwhisper nodded, before pointing down at him. With that, a deathstalker began prowling towards him, each step so fluid he could not discern one from another.
Once the deathstalker was just two steps away from him, he made his move.
His body was a feather, his leg muscles contained explosions screaming to be unleashed.
Within less than a blink he was in front of the deathstalker.
His way of fighting was that of the sand strider, the little insect that braved the darkest depths of the lower caves. It's power lay in speed as much as the courage to face certain death.
He spun, his footwork quick and light, before throwing out the heel of his foot.
Right as he did this, he flicked out his wrist, and shouted "Program 2, extraction."
Heel and beam hit the deathstalker at once, square in the face. It's mask was torn apart, revealing silver wiring, blood red flesh, and protruding white bone.
Not wasting a breath, he moved to grab the raizer.
I've done it, he thought.
However, the raizer did not budge from the grip of its owner. And once the emissions from the beam cleared, Luma stood face to face with an unfazed deathstalker.