Toxic Influence

The rock ground of the stretch of land between Ethe and Yaon is somehow worse than the sands closer to the Relic Pillar. Voa's feet ache and just by standing still she can feel herself slowly dying a painful death.

But she knows it would be worse if Withania was the one forced to walk. The princess had been sharing Kimara with Nue, that was still woozy from his head wound. Voa preferred to suffer in silence her feet pain that have to listen to Withania crying about it, and she was sure Withania's would be much worse than Hers. Voa at least had walked somewhere before.

Nue had told them about the small village right at the border with Ethe, close to the coast and by the mountains, that there was an inn there that they could rest at before starting the journey to Diyu, the capital of Yaon.

So now they walked, with Kimara first, Arsu and Voa next and Bowdre at the back, the less pained out of all of them. She was even whistling something as they walked.

The need to ask questions had been nagging Voa, Bowdre was a new member to their party, even if she had joined merely for monetary compensation—something that Voa had not really thought about, because…what if there wasn't anything of value inside the Pillar? What if it was all knowledge and information but no treasures? What would Bowdre do then?

Bored and in pain, Voa finally gives in and stops walking so that Bowdre can catch up. Arsu gives her a look as she does, but then rolls his eyes and continues walking alone. Bowdre raises an eyebrow at her but allows Voa to walk alongside her.

"What do you want, soft-touch?" Asks the Nashoban and Voa is tempted to pout at the nickname.

"I wanted to ask about Nash" she says "I've only heard bad things, but it cannot be that bad"

"Nash was a punishment in the past, what makes you think there's something good about it?" Scoffs Bowdre and Voa frowns.

"Well…you and a bunch of people live there…if it was so bad, people would have moved away, right?" Argues Voa, why stay if it's such a terrible place? There had to be something…nicer about it.

"We were born there, most don't know anything else" says Bowdre, tone serious and eyes refusing to meet Voa's "We are born, we grow and then we die. People don't leave. Where would they go? To Ethe?"

She scoffs loudly and Voa tilts her head. Wouldn't Ethe be the obvious choice?

"Why not? Ethe is not that terrible" says Voa "Myrm is boring, but there's space for more people"

Bowdre stays quiet a second before bursting into a loud laughter, loud enough to make Arsu turn his head to stare at them with some worry and curiosity.

"Oh, soft-touch, what a good joke!" She laughs and Voa is confused. Bowdre must notice because she stops laughing to stare at her "Do you really think they would let us enter their kingdom just like that? They believe we are all criminals, even those that live in Old Fort and follow the Laws. No, soft-touch, they wouldn't allow us to leave Nash"

With that said, Bowdre speeds up, leaving Voa behind, still confused and somewhat remorseful, her feet still hurting and her throat parched.

Maybe, when she's done with this quest, she could travel to Nash and explore it. If she wants to be a true wanderer she should have visited the entirety of the continent. Even It's most distasteful corners.

"Would you…show me Nash? When we're done with this?" Asks Voa with some uncertainty and Bowdre scoffs at her with a glare, but Voa keeps her stare firm on the Nashoban, trying to transmit the seriousness of the request, and Bowdre raises an eyebrow at her.

"Maybe" she answers finally and Voa gives her the brightest smile she can muster in her tiredness.

"Great!"

With that said, Voa skips ahead, feeling energized simply by the acceptance of a future adventure. She reaches Arsu and ignores his questioning stare as she hums to herself and the pain of her feet becomes somehow bearable.

"You okay?" Asks Arsu and Voa smiles at him and nods. Yeah, she's okay. The sooner they reach Yaon the sooner they can rest, with Nue as their guide she's sure everything will go much more smoothly.

"How can you be so happy?" Groans Withania from up ahead, she was sitting backwards, leaning her back against Nue as she stared at them "Its so hot!"

"Better get used to it" chuckles Arsu with a smirk "We have a long way ahead of us"

Withania groans louder but Nue, clearly listening to the conversation, turns his head just enough to stare at Arsu and Voa.

"Not necessarily" he says simply and Withania brightens at that.

"Why? I though the desert was terrible in all of Tlao? Is the sun somehow less painful in Yaon?" She asks in a rush, question after question and making Arsu huff a short laugh.

"The sun hits the same in all of Tlao" answers Nue and before Withania can fully deflate in disappointment, he continues "But our journey to Diyu won't be under the sun"

Voa raises an eyebrow at that, curious about the information they had just acquired. Not under the sun? Voa knew that Diyu was one of the few underground cities in Tlao, so they would be able to escape the heat there, but they would have to cross the desert to get there, wouldn't they?

In a sudden rush of curiosity, Voa tries to run ahead towards Kimara and her two occupants, wanting to ask more about their journey through Yaon, but her legs are still tired and Voa tumbles to the hard floor and falls to her knees and forearms.

"Hey!" Shouts Arsu as he rushes to her aid.

But Voa is not listening to him, she is watching the rock and pebbles in front of her, as they vibrate unnaturally.

Voa has attended all the lessons required to be allowed to roam the desert as a scavenger and Ilex, the worrywart that he is, liked specially to ingrain in to all of them the first signs of a beast.

She opens her mouth to shout, but Bowdre at the back screams the same warning she was about to do.

"BEAST!" Shouts the Nashoban as she pulls out her axe-pistol from her back and brandishes in front of her "Everyone to the mountainside!"

Withania screams, Arsu grabs Voa by her arm and Nue guides a panicking Kimara as close to the rock wall as they can.

Voa is frozen. In the full year she had been a scavenger she had never seen a beast of any kind. She had always supposed she would deal with it with a calm mindset and bravery. But now…

She's frozen in fear. Her heart rushing and her breath shortening. And then, she sees it.

Not far into the desert, where the dunes rise like an eternal mirage, the sand moves and the shiny scaled head of a rattler appears, mouth open with fangs too long and eyes too sharp. Smaller than Voa had ever expected, had ever imagined, its whole head the side of Kimara's whole body.

A baby.

A hungry baby rattler, coming directly towards them, the interconnected scales and bones at its tail making the sound that gives the rattlers their name, a loud hiss coming from its maw as it launches in their direction.

"Come on!" Shouts Bowdre at it as Arsu drags Voa to the rock wall, where Nue has given a terrified Withania the reins of Kimara and he's dismounting and running towards Bowdre and-

Voa is panicking. Every sound echoes around her like when she would play in her bathtub and put her head underwater, everything moves slower than it should, vision blurry and head dizzy.

She's about to faint.

How…embarrassing. How could she call herself a scavenger if this was the first reaction towards a beast, a small one too. Ilex would laugh at her, probably, her father would stare at her with sympathy and her mother would scream to all the gods that were listening that she had been right and…

She can barely see as Bowdre and Nue try to distract the rattler and maybe get an advantage of sorts to kill it. But Nue…Nue is still hurt! And a single person cannot take down a rattler, not without sustaining some wounds of their own, and Arsu is right in Voa's face, eyes so worried and her cheeks sting with pain that hadn't been there before, and Withania is crying and-

Voa sees it, how the tail of the rattler curls and readies itself to hit whoever finds in its path—Nue and Bowdre—and she panics.

"Look out!" She screams, voice ragged and too shrill, Nue turns to her and Voa manages to get free from Arsu's hold as she runs to grab Nue—He had been moving so sluggish since he had woken up, he wouldn't be able to dodge unless she—and then, the rattler, that had been to busy trying to bite Bowdre that had been shooting her weapon at it for a while, reacts and suddenly the head is too close to Voa, its mouth to close to Voa's raised hand and then-

Painpainpainpainpain

The fang pierces her hand clean through the middle of her palm and Voa screams. The whole debacle gives Bowdre the perfect shot as one of her bullets shoots straight through the rattler's eye and the beast hisses and pulls back in pain, releasing Voa's hand and dropping dead not too soon after.

Voa falls to her knees as she stares at the hole in her hand. The wound bleeds, but what worries her more is the fact that the surrounding area doesn't hurt anymore and that, from the wound, black veins have started to climb out.

Her face is forcefully turned and she barely meets Arsu's panicked scarlet eyes, he's grabbing her head in his hands, keeping her still.

"Oh Hathor" he's whispering to himself "that's not good-"

"Step away, Ifran" interrupts Bowdre as Arsu disappears from her face and the Nashoban takes his place "Soft-touch, we need to cut it off, do you understand?"

Voa is no longer keeling but instead she's laying on the ground, face to the clear skies as her hand keeps going numb. She feels sick…is she sick? She somewhat feels something holding her wounded arm in place, laying straight on the ground, it feels like the limb has completely fallen asleep.

"Voa, breathe with me" she hears the echo of a voice that may have been Nue's. But she feels too sleepy to pay attention or to even follow orders.

And then the sound of a blade hitting something repeatedly and then-

She feels it.

Voa hears faraway screams that she later realizes are her own, but it hurts so much! It hurtshurtshurts! Make it stop!

But it doesn't, it gets worse.

And before she finally passes out—from pain or tiredness or maybe to never wake up again—she hears the voice of that Seer in her mind.

"This is the price a thief must pay in Olympea"