62 Unsettlement

Orou devoured his morning meal quicker than usual, with a single gulp, half of a deer carcass was gone. The black strands from his meal expanded his body, making his core spin even faster and process the old strands into black mist. He had gotten slightly used to seeing everything in black and white and at times, it was amusing to look through three different visions at once. Once he finished his meal, he flickered his tongue at Grizz who was preparing to head out himself and excitedly slithered out into the streets.

As was expected, the streets were desolate. Fortunately, Orou had remembered the path towards the city centre, so he had no problems navigating himself through the rugged road. As he went further and further into the city, he noticed something wrong with the beastman around him. Usually, the beastmen walking back and forth were quite jolly, joking around and laughing at various things in front of them, but the mood that was hanging around the crowd was clearly different. It was more solemn, none of the beastmen had smiles on their faces, instead, fear and unsettlement were rampant within the crowd.

The beastman scurried along to complete the various tasks they had to do and while a few noticed a large snake slithering through the street, none had enough spirit to crack a joke or even wonder at what he was doing here. Orou was quite interested in what had upset the citizens, so following the source of anger and dissent, he headed towards the west. He didn't have to travel for long before he saw what the problem was, a huge crowd of beastmen were standing next to several guards, who were guarding the barrier.

The crowd looked like it might erupt in flames at any moment as Orou could hear intense shouting further towards the west. Slithering through the crowd and scaring more than a few beastmen, he saw a wagon with several horses parked right next to the barrier. A man with flashy and expensive looking clothes was berating two guards, who were standing next to the barrier, weapons crossed.

"What do you mean I can't exit? I've just delivered several bolts of fine silk and linen to the palace and they're expecting another delivery in a few days. Do you know how strict both the king and the king's advisers are these days? The responsibility is going to be on your hands once I make an official complaint." The man had several mercenaries of his own by his side and that apparently gave him enough confidence to scream at the royal guards, scolding them from head to toe. While one of the guards was dealing with the situation with a neutral expression, the other was practically fuming.

"Those are the king's orders so whether you like it or not, you have to comply. Don't try to make a scene here, I don't care whether or not you're someone important, I will have your head and the king will even compliment me for it. Shut your mouth and walk on back to where you're staying," the fuming guard erupted in emotion, laying it all on the wealthy merchant in front of him. The rest of the guards were looking at the argument with a smirk on their faces, not intending to stop or involve themselves in it.

As the shouting progressively got louder, so did the mob of angry beastmen. More and more people were attracted to the barrier and once they learned that they were trapped here, they joined the crowd in angry protests. The whole situation escalated when neither side was willing to back down and apologise and when the guard shoved the merchant, all hell broke loose. The merchant's mercenaries drew their swords and those who had various weapons in the crowd made their ways forward. The royal guard didn't seem to have a leader, so when they saw swords being drawn, they jumped into action.

It was over in a second. While the merchant tried to retreat, the two royal guards moved with an impressive speed which could rival Grizz's. One of the guards turned his attention to mercenaries, while the other turned to the merchant himself. While one of the guards was distracting the mercenaries, the other barreled through them, making his way towards the merchant himself. With a quick sweep of his blade, the merchant's head came flying off, his eyes still wide in shock and surprise. The several people who were about to jump into action stopped dead in their tracks and stared at the lifeless body of the merchant, afraid to go further and provoke the rest of the guards.

The guard who was arguing with the merchant walked over and spat on his corpse, looking provocatively at the rest of the crowd as if asking if there was anyone else who would like the same fate as this merchant. Seeing that no one else was saying anything, he got to the dirty job of dragging the corpse away to who knows where. A few seconds after he did, the crowd erupted in nervous whispers and conspiratory speech, the news about this would likely spread to every corner of the city in hours. Orou saw several beastmen standing by the side and poking the barrier with their swords, trying to move it by force. Of course, none of them succeeded but this inspired the crowd to start discussing alternate ways of getting out of the city.

The crowd dispersed after a few words of warning from the guards, though more than a few beastmen were staring at the guards from a distance, most likely plotting something or other. Orou didn't want to linger for too long as this wasn't news to him, but as he went back to the city centre, he heard whispers about a revolt. No one knew where these whispers spread from, but as soon as there was mention of it, the whole city square seemed to be almost infected with them. One by one, the evil deeds of the king were being laid out. The merchant became an example of how corrupt the guards were and that this needed to stop.

A few people even publicly addressed the crowd, spreading the information that the revolutionary army was getting close and that perhaps, they needed to change and surrender to the army, replacing the old king with the new. The guards that were patrolling the streets tried to quell the chaos and capture those, who publicly spoke out about the king, but there were simply too many beastmen gathered here for the guards to effectively do something. More and more fear spread upon learning that they were trapped here while the revolutionaries came and all of the sudden, the idea of surrendering to the revolutionaries wasn't as bad as it sounded before.

Once this sort of crowd started going, there was no way of stopping it. Orou watched for several minutes how several beastmen popped up in various parts of the crowd and started addressing the merits of not suppressing their feelings and giving in to their wild side. Of course, the idea of going feral was unacceptable by most folk, but one by one, the people started getting converted. The same few people tried to incite the crowd to rise up against their evil king and escape his tyranny, but their speech was cut short by tens of guards splitting up the crowd and hunting those who spoke up. Try as they might flee, at the end of the day, there were several more heads lifted up as examples in the city square.

This drove fear into the crowd but did nothing to stop the discussion about the revolutionaries. Although no one dared to openly speak of it again, the idea of finally being free and not punished for letting out emotions was spreading. As a result of that, Orou saw an influx of black mist that was rising in the air, corrupting everything around them. Orou was quite confused on which side to support, on one hand, you had the king who ordered people to suppress their emotions, but on the other hand, if the beastmen let their emotions run rampant, the city would be corrupted in no time. Debating the issue on which side he agreed more, he started wandering the streets, wanting to hear more of what the beastmen said.