Whisperkid

Chapter 52: Whisperkid

/Ah yes, the many nations of Chronagen. There are big ones and small ones, warring ones, peaceful ones, neutral ones, scientific, and suspicious ones, but they all have some form of independence.

Many of our nations are ruled by monarchs, kings, queens, and everything in between. A single person at the helm, with many others who follow. A prime example might be the nation of the demons, who occupy essentially half a continent all the way to the west of the world.

Their leadership is made up of many, many rulers with many titles and equally many definitions. They aren't all equal, and most of them lead smaller sub-territories, constantly at war with each other to fulfill their cravings, or at war with the devils.

They are a perfect example of many, many tiny monarchies, constantly changing their rulers, while the 72 states of the demon world are universally accepted as unshakeable. Their wars are about territory and leadership, about power, both physical and political, but they are truer to tradition than almost anyone else, and it is said that the 72 states have been here since the first book, and will be here until the last.

Another perfect example of a monarchy is the empire to the east, the cultivators there enjoying to seclude themselves in their caves as they practice their mystical arts of elongated life and strengthening their qi. Or ki. Or chi. They use many words for it.

However, while they are fewer in number, there are other countries that aren't monarchies. some smaller countries have formed councils to lead them, and the nation under the protector largely governs itself. People reigning not over the people, but for the people.

But there are still more concepts, such as the warvoting practiced in many parts up north, where many tribes send forth their leaders with declarations of rulings, and they fight it out for each and every decision. It is an interesting game of stamina and demands, because multiple other tribes may oppose a ruling and fight to have it stopped, but it is a way to govern nonetheless.

And of course, I cannot neglect the many meritocracies, where depending on how much is paid into a shared pot for the entire folk, you may be elected as part of the ruling class to then distribute it. However, if someone pays more than you, you're out and lose that power. So very system like./

An excerpt from "Nations documented." by Limus Litus, a historian of the people.

- - - - - -

Mercury woke up a little while later. He must have passed out at some point, because he was still somewhere in the forest.

And he was pretty sure it was still some time after the fight. It had turned night by now, the sky darkened with the many familiar dots of light up there, the moon almost full. He'd have found it nice if his head weren't splitting.

Everything hurt. His head, his legs, his back, his tail, his jaw. All of it was painful. His tongue felt dry and heavy, almost fuzzy in his mouth, and his sight was bleary at best. It was a task enough just keeping his eyes open, he certainly wasn't moving from his spot.

For a while, Mercury just sat there, in the forest, enjoying the cool breeze and the starry sky he could see through the canopies. He sat around, just giving himself some time to rest, he had promised to do so, after all. Still, it didn't take too long before his sore throat grew enough to overshadow these pleasures.

He pushed himself up on his dirt-caked legs, his fur al stained with grime, and groaned as his muscles protested. But as everyone knows, it's better to hydrate than to diedrate, and Mercury still wanted to have some more time in this world. So, he took his weary legs, lifted them up, and pushed them forwards, step by step.

It felt like he was lifting blocks of concrete, like there were thick slabs of stone chained to his extremities, and just lifting them took everything out of him. His chest heaved after only a few steps, and our furry friend sucked in deep breath after deep breath of the cool air.

The battle and things he had just done a little earlier today were already more faded than he would have liked, replaced with slight delusions from his sleepiness. A flickering shadow here, something ducking through the brushwork there, maybe if he hadn't been so drained, he would have had the energy to be scared.

After a little while, the breeze turned into a chill, and Mercury shivered a little, as his fur raised itself up. Strange, he didn't feel that cold. Ah well, whatever, time to find a pond. He almost enjoyed the eerie silence, when even the crickets stopped their songs and the wind seemed to quiet down.

Was that a whisper he heard rustle through the woods? Nah, must be his imagination. He should have really gotten more sleep.

When some more time had passed, Mercury managed to find a small stream. There were plenty of them in the forest, running down towards the lake to the Northeast. It was decently clean, with a rocky riverbed, so he decided to take a handful of sips from it. The water felt like liquid salvation in his mouth, slowly creeping through him and making his steps just a little lighter.

But instead, Mercury decided to lay down. He still felt heavy and sore, and he was sure that one night in the forest wouldn't be too bad, even if it was a little bit of a colder one. His fur was still raised up, and even his <Intuition> rang a warning chime, but he was just too tired. So, so very tired...

It didn't take long for a dark fog to roll in, quite different from the one Mercury was used to. It wasn't red and murderous, like with the blood eclipse, it was grey, and heavy, seeking to extinguish the light around it. As it thickened, it even seemed to grow almost black in colour. Very nice, actually. Mercury had never liked sleeping with too much light, and the moon had been a bit too bright for him.

The cat closed his eyes for a moment, enjoying the silence and stillness of it all, especially after the hectic day. The quiet was enjoyable, though he did kind of miss the wind. Ah, there it was, whispering sweet nothings. How nice.

Little by little, Mercury drifted off further, falling into a doze and his breath grew slower and more regular. It felt almost as though someone was singing a lullaby to him, maybe with a few off notes, but he was too tired to care.

"Do you fear death?" someone whispered into his ear, to which Mercury could only reply with a heavy yawn.

There was a moment of silence, then the whisper again.

"Do you fearrrrr deathhhh??"

Mercury slightly opened one of his eyes, still sleep drunk.

"Look buddy, I'm trying to catch some shut-eye over here, so if you wanna have a philosophical discussion, wait until my brain functions are back online."

There was silence again, and for a while, no reply. Mercury had almost fallen asleep again when the whisper returned.

"Do you fear lossssss?"

"It's too late for this. Of course I'm scared of loss. There's always heartbreak and sadness with it, so yeah. Now, anything else before I can finally go to bed?"

His voice was tinged with just a smidge of annoyance as he spoke, but he was honest. Too tired for lies.

And for a while, there was silence around him again. Mercury curled his tail around himself a little bit, trying to stave off the chill some more. Subconsciously, maybe he wanted to be afraid, but his mind was too blurry to even conceive the notion.

"Do you fear the darknessssssss?"

The voice hissed after a while, and Mercury shook his head.

"I used to as a kid, but like, I kinda grew out of it. Sure, sometimes night can be scary, but that's more the lack of other people, so you think you might get stabbed or anything," Mercury said, his foggy brain slowly growing a little more awake.

"Do you fearrrrr... meeeeeee?" the whispers asked, now much more present than before, asking a shrill way that might have sent shivers up Mercury's spine if he hadn't been just so drained.

"Nah man, you seem pretty chill. But really, I gotta go to bed now, had a real rough day."

"I seeeeeeee..."

...

"Do you... like nights?" the whispers asked after a while, shaking Mercury out of his doze again. The cat blinked a few times, not seeing much difference between having his eyes open or closed, and then nodded in the end.

"Yeah, I guess I do," he said, "I like the stars, because of their pretty glow. I like the quiet and the harmony, that so many things all at once decide it's time to rest. I like the science behind it, the thought that we're on a ball, rotating at insane speeds, and that's why for half the time our lights are out... Yeah, I like nights. What about you?"

"Meeee...?"

"Look, you woke me up, you better contribute to this conversation," Mercury said, sneering in his thoughts. The voices he heard seemed like they were many, but they were also so... little. Kinda like kids.

He'd had a nephew and a niece before. His brother had married his highschool sweetheart, and the two had a pair of good kids. Twins, if Mercury remembered correctly. The girl, Millie, always bragged about being born just a little earlier than his nephew. She would be 10 by now.

Yeah, that's what the voices felt like, almost like a kid, experiencing something new they hadn't before.

"So, do you like nights?" Mercury asked, shaking himself awake a little and chasing some of the fog out of his thoughts.

For a long while, the whispers remained quiet. Eventually, they began to speak again, but only after Mercury was already having trouble staying up once more.

"I... not knowss... Nights stop the hunger, always hungry..."

"You're always hungry? That sounds real rough buddy."

"Mh. Eat fearr."

"Is it tasty?" Mercury asked, before he could think twice about what he was even saying.

"Teyhsty?"

"Like, you know... ugh, forget about it."

"What is... teyhsty?"

"Alright, or don't. Tasty is when your food is enjoyable. Like, you eat something and think to yourself 'man that was good'. Or 'woman', or whatever else you prefer."

"Män? Wumän?"

Mercury smiled a little inside himself. This was really like talking to a kid. He shook his head for a moment as he thought a reply.

"It's about identity more or less. Like, there's sex, which is your biological makeup, and there's quite a few of them. Then, there's gender, which is what you feel you belong to. You can be a guy, or a girl, or demi, so a little more attracted to one side than the other, or you can be agender, or bigender. It's long, and complicated, and I sure am not an authority on it, but it's essentially a group of terms to help people better define themselves."

"Self..."

The whisperkid, as Mercury decided to name it, grew quiet again. It seemed rather bright, he thought, taking time to think things over instead of just chasing ahead, as most kids do. It seemed curious and more focused, and Mercury could respect that.

"Who am I...?" asked the whisperkid, seemingly a little scared of the answer.

"Hell if I know," Mercury said. "Who do you want to be?"

"W-a-n-t...."

The whisperkid rolled the letters on its tongue(?) for a moment, seemingly thinking them over. What did it want?

"A star."

"You want to be a star?" Mercury asked, just to make sure.

"Mh."

"Well, then you're going to have to get a lot bigger," he said with a smile. "After all, stars only look small because they are so far away."

"No! Don't want to be far away!"

When the whisperkid cried out, Mercury felt a sting in his head for a moment, like someone had stabbed him with a needle. It was uncomfortable, but bearable.

"Hey, that's alright buddy. No one's forcing you. What you wanna be is entirely up to you. If you want to be a star, but stay close to this place, that's perfectly fine, you be you."

"Be... me...?"

"Yeah. Just because all the other stars are in the sky doesn't mean you have to be. You can be a tiny star, and stay here. Or you can be something else entirely, maybe that something fits you more than being a star, you'll see. Just take one step after the other." Mercury gave what he hoped to be an uplifting smile, hoping he had given some kid out there some hope.

"A star..." whisperkid whispered, seemingly looking at the sky. "Mh. Step by step. I feel... full. Thank you."

And with that, the small presence Mercury had felt form next to himself slowly seemed to vanish, but Mercury didn't feel any loss. He knew it deep in his heart, he knew that somewhere out there, there would be a star made of the whisperkid, and he hoped just a little, that the star would think of him too.

Then, after a few more minutes, sleep finally took over Mercury's mind.

- - - - - -

The man with white gloves had talked to Otto for some time. It has been a quite nice talk, they had caught up with each other, gotten to chat a little bit about themselves. Otto was usually more of a quiet type, though he wore his thoughts on his sleeve. Well, not quite his sleeve, he just didn't bother hiding them, but you still needed some amount of awareness to notice.

For most people, he'd be hard to read because of his bestial features, but not for the Zyl.

His full name wasn't that simple, of course, but his nickname was. Zyl, he had always liked the sound of it. Much more so than his title of walking disaster. Like, man, that was kind of rude. But he did deserve it a little, after all, he used to have quite some problems with his temper. And also, the title was tied to a location, he wasn't known as a walking disaster globally.

That was lucky. If some of his colleagues caught wind that he was hated by everyone, it would make certain deals much harder. He didn't like politics too much, really, but there was just no way around it when you had even some influence, and he certainly had some.

He had upheld his bargain with lady Zeris, a small one, to be sure. Kick out a monster from her fields and she would keep him in good graces, offering him trade routes and such.

Zyl's country was small. He had built the nation himself, but he largely kept himself out of rulings. He made sure other countries were favorable towards them, offering good deals. He was... a protector, rather than anything else.

It was good like this. He never wanted to be a king, or a dictator, he liked having people united and seeing them hold together though. So, he did offer to resolve disputes, if people felt uncomfortable taking them to court. Things had been going well these past few years, but whenever rulers wanted to come and talk to him, he got annoyed.

If they visited him, they brought half an army for insurance, and if he visited them, he needed to give up anything that could even be remotely used as a weapon. Yes, he had smashed a table or two in his time, maybe thrashed a ballroom or another, and okay, there was one time he punched a hole in a caste wall and collapsed the whole thing, but he had his temper under control now!

Zyl sighed to himself again. Life had been good, but it was also a little boring, and when it wasn't boring, it was exhausting. Otto had been nice to him, though. He hadn't asked for much help, The "scorned" had come to him looking for just info. How were the demons doing? Were there any big territorial wars? Any large threats to entire countries?

The protector had helped the beast as much as he could, and in exchange, Otto said he'd give him a gift.

A really, really pretty rock.

It meant a lot to Zyl, because he knew Otto only ever picked up things he himself liked, so the guy was physically unable to give gifts that didn't mean anything to him. If he gave Zyl a rock, that meant that the rock was special to Otto in some way. Maybe it was the swirly crystalline pattern, or some sort of strong magical energy inside it, but Otto like it, and Zyl would treasure it.

He would never insult a friend by disrespecting a heartfelt gift.

Zyl smiled as he thought of friends. He asked himself how Lucia might be doing now, having headed off into a small warring nation. There was no point in keeping close tabs on her, after all, her force expanded so much further than just to her own person.

Out of all of them, she was clearly the one with the most people around her. She was practically worshipped as the symbol of the church, though the fire within her might be just a little too bright sometimes. And while Lucia wasn't perfect by any means, in fact, she was arrogant, proud, stubborn and had a poor attitude, Zyl respected her.

Simply because there had to be some reason she amassed that many people behind her banner. Some were more fanatic, sure, but many of them just believed in her ideology, that they needed some form of order to be truly free. He had also let the church of order establish a small church in his nation, though not many of the citizens went there very often.

Still, as Zyl was lost in thought, he smiled a little. Things like this made life interesting. It wasn't about freedom or responsibility to him, it was about the people you met and the stories you heard. And with that thought, Zyl smiled as the sun went down, looking forwards to what a new day might bring to him.