"Mono/Dialogue"

  'Inner thoughts'

  Narration

  [Message/communication apparatus]

  Date: Data not found

  Location: Data not found

  POV: Narrator

  Oripathy is the malignant disease or blight that is more than capable of toppling a world order with ease comparable to flipping the back of one’s palm.

  The source of infection is none other than exposure, directly or not, to the originium for an extended period. She is made worse if those actively in contact with it are not wearing yers upon yers of precaution and clothing.

  More damningly, a lot of infected themselves don’t know from where their oripathy was from. News about fashion designer vanished overnight due to oripathy suddenly seen on their body is not outndish. Gossip about nightlife workers being fired the next day due to it was more common than one could imagine.

  This disease, which is unique to this world, origin was still shrouded in mystery. The general popuce wouldn’t care, however, for their ignorance and festering fear had clouded their judgment.

  Several nations themselves are responsible for the worsening situation of the infected’s welfare and human rights.

  Rim Billiton with its MegaCorp government, or Corporatocracy, is notorious for its treatment of infected workers, specifically the miners.

  Ursus’ brutality doesn’t require more eboration.

  Columbia had their health pns and new nd expansion programs using settlers.

  Sargon, baring Acahual, are quite “unique” and “progressive” which is not saying much…

  Not to say that there isn’t anyone who cared about it. Several nations don’t have a problem with infected themselves, thus creating an interesting mirror.

  Minos’ popuce has no problem with infected, except for Heroes or Heroines Cult priests or priestesses who must step down while retaining full citizenship. This also entailed the right to join Hymnoi Wisdom, a national tournament and they lived a life of retive peace.

  Kjerag’s inhabitants are not shunning infected because it was never a prevalent issue and there was never a catastrophe there, to begin with. Infected can find work normally and the only thing required is to dress appropriately, which is pretty much the norm for everyone in Kjerag anyway, and do periodic check-ups.

  Acahual (a region in Sargon) is the most backward of them all and yet ironically they’re the most humane and understanding. Infected are being confined to their house, not to discriminate mind you, but to be taken care of their needs. Acahualn’ logic is that everything can kill you inside the forest, so what makes several patches of rock special when death can come anytime without warning?

  Thus it can safely be assumed that the infected themselves were never the problem. More like the whole stigma and stereotype plus the nature of Oripathy are always being maniputed to either enforce some political agendas or as a means to cause mass hysteria.

  Nations all across still Terra struggled to find the cure to this very day. It is less about funding and more about what is even this disease's true nature. It is worse than a tumor, more lethal than cancer, and is highly adaptable like fungi to boot.

  Except it is not a fungus and instead a mineral.

  This is the most mind-boggling fact of Oripathy, a nightmarish conjecture that it is possibly semi-sentient at a bare minimum. Research has been going from point A to B or from B to F and hell and back full circle nding at A, thoroughly confusing all of the intellectuals concerned with it.

  Conspiracy theorists had spouted wild assumptions such as this disease was originally a biological weapon, a relic of a forgotten era, or even created by a shadow government to enforce a convenient casus belli.

  Regardless of how creative their minds are, Oripathy’s effect on Terran is too pronounced that even when the cure was found, paranoia itself would still exist. Hatred already ran too deep, it would be a miracle to bury the hatchet as is without further misgivings.

  Oripathy is truly a horrifying and fascinating blight for the living, and they had no other choice than to accept and conform to life alongside it since there is no other recourse.

  But of course, there will be those who deny it and go against normalizing it in both a positive manner and a negative manner in regards to how one must go about it.

  The positives are those who tried their best to find the cure or at the very least lessen their burden. Negative’s camp however took a radical approach, eradicating those who suffered Oripathy.

  Arkell Jon Thomson is one of them who advocated a positive approach on how to handle this curse in all but name. Thus let us take a look at his point of view regarding this matter…

  Date: March 1080

  Location: Calville, County of Toron, Victoria.

  POV: Arkell Jon Thomson.

  “Sometimes I wondered if this woman is the same one known as the Grey Serpent…” I said to no one in particur. My eyes are currently focused on Nyx who is, despite being un-emotive as usual, teaching children how to write and other basics such as counting, those sorts of things.

  I’m not at the city where Vincent resides, but instead at one of the numerous outlying vilges that dotted the County of Toron as a whole. Catastrophe messenger works would often require me to travel long distances.

  I along with my colleagues are on our routine exploration along the countryside, researching and conducting surveys to anticipate potential signs of catastrophe that might occur in the future. So it is a repetitive but vital duty for us, as per our motto of ‘Saving lives above all else’.

  It just so happens that when we came here, we met our mercenary acquaintance. She has been hard at work, but weirdly enough she is not taking as many contracts as was predicted regarding the extermination of beasts and outws.

  The tter had grown rarer these days, so she is stuck with the former. There were also rumors about an unknown group that had been wreaking havoc all over the country, but it happens at so many pces and sometimes all at once that it’s doubtful she is the one responsible for it.

  Nyx is good, but there are still better mercenaries for numerous kinds of jobs out there that eclipsed her solo performance from a cost-efficiency standpoint. Her fame was mostly from extermination, thus her non-extermination contracts performance evaluation has been put on the back burner.

  There have been several reports of her failing contracts too, which is not all that weird for a mercenary. It does however lower her reputation for success rate here for quite a bit, which doesn’t stop her from getting commissioned here and there non-stop.

  Regardless of what is happening with her at the moment, one thing that is truly certain is none other than her commitment to adhering to her contracts.

  Why do I know so much? I wouldn’t be a catastrophe messenger if my information gathering and parsing had been falling behind you know. This job of mine demanded extraneous, almost herculean even, efforts.

  There are a lot of reports, news, tales, rumors, and gossip about incompetent CMs, and most of them didn’t end well. I had always accepted the fact that we, catastrophe messengers as a whole, would be the first to be bmed if things got dicey.

  Turning that over, we had long made peace with the fact that our job would be thankless most of the time. But oh well, a good 95% of CM employees never applied with glory in mind anyway, just trying to save the people as best as we can.

  Well, we’re getting side-tracked.

  Nyx is teaching the children how to write, she had noticed me ages ago but chose not to halt her lecture. Her current self is unlike what her mercenary occupation suggests, a total 180 if nothing else for that matter.

  Her temporary pupils are made up of both infected and non-infected. This is not surprising because when asked why she treated them the same way, she replied with a question of her own. It was something along the lines of ‘We walk on the same nd, trying to get a living alongside one another, and we all die leaving nothing but name, so what made us so different?’

  “Auntie, is this how I do it?”

  “Let me see… you should follow the outline first, then you can try making your own. It is good however, you just need to get used to it.”

  “Yay!”

  “Teach, James took my pencil!”

  “I – I didn’t! This is mine!”

  “Alright pipe down, here you can use my pen, Nina.”

  “Bit boring innit, bloody dam-”

  “Watch your nguage, Bruce.”

  “…aye…”

  “Um… um…”

  “What is it, Chris?”

  “I… I… tore my paper…”

  “No worries, you can take the extra papers I had made beforehand and continue where you left.”

  “Nyx, Gerard fell asleep again.”

  Nyx said nothing and just approached the napping kid quietly, the other kids were trying their best to not ugh. Their teacher then kneeled and whispered something, whatever it was caused the nearest kid’s face, privy to the whisper, to immediately go pale.

  Gerard immediately straightened up without any grogginess, he heard what she had whispered into his ear. Seeing that the children all ugh immediately, Gerard can only look down with a sheepish smile while hiding his pale face.

  Whatever Nyx had whispered appears to have knocked him down from the heavenly sky of daydream freefalling straight into Terra’s cold embrace of reality.

  This is the most puzzling thing, she has the competency to work in a non-military sector. So why did she choose to be a mercenary? If it’s about credentials and the like, she would have passed with a respectable result.

  If she has truly no other choice, it’s not like she can’t apply with PMC. Unless of course she just pops out from nowhere and has no heads or tails about what she can do, this is just a wild assumption from me.

  Even if that’s true, she might be a reclusive and isotionist Elder race. I had been watching her demeanor, it was very unlike the long-lived race of old. She can be rash and hasty but she never shows disdain for technological advancement typically associated with them.

  There is also the fact that she doesn’t have any qualms with standing by her values or drawing lines. She is brutal against anyone she deems to deserve it, which is retive to ordinary people's perception of deserved or not, yet now her body nguage is nothing but joy from teaching children.

  Thus I can only watch from the sideline like a good and respectable spectator. Not long after, the impromptu css was dismissed and Nyx was approached by the vilge chief who seemed to be thanking her profusely. Nyx only nodded and replied in a one-two string of words.

  After some more pleasantries, she headed immediately my way while tossing a water bottle at me… where did she get that? I swear that her back was empty… oh well, I caught it and waited for her.

  “For you, just standing there should make you thirsty.”

  “Thanks and you would make a good teacher, Nyx.”

  “Don’t think so, that was more of a hobby.”

  “Yes, a bloodthirsty merc with a hobby of teaching children how to make doodles and alphabetical letters. No one would believe me said that unless they witnessed it firsthand.”

  “Yeah, whatever. So what do you need of me?”

  “Nothing, just a coincidence of meeting you here.”

  “Oh, really now?”

  “Yep, I’m in the middle of a routine survey.”

  “I see.”

  “But well, if nothing else. How about we just stroll to the pza?’

  “Sure, I see no problem with that.”

  Then we just walked away together towards the pza, the silence was not awkward since this is how she usually communicates. There are rumors that she is a lot more forthcoming, warm, and animated, but seeing her bnk face I doubt it.

  Well, it doesn’t take away from the fact that she is a very capable colleague to have when we, Catastrophe Messenger, or Vincent commission her expertise. Her repertoire over the years is more versatile.

  Despite her dark reputation of being borderline psychopathic, her everyday acts and conduct were rgely unremarkable. This made a very stark contrast to how she acted high-strung and completely unhinged in combat but turned into a slob or zy freeloader outside of work.

  Imagine my surprise at how zy she was st winter, this woman just sauntered outside with a long pants and tank top… in the middle of a blizzard… When I confronted her about it, she said it is a form of body conditioning to make her more used to winter’s coldness.

  Nyx said that as a Pythian, her body is too sensitive to cold. Probably a genetic thing she carried over from her family. That’s what she had admitted at least.

  Pythias were well known to be very unwelcoming to cold temperatures, conversely, they could just run around in desert regions with apparent ease. We felines had neither of their peculiarities, other than smattering needs for… let loose every once in a while.

  I will not eborate as to what kind of let loose.

  But that’s hardly important, we had arrived at the pza and there were traveling merchants already opening up shops… including weapon and supply merchants… Nyx immediately went that way. Since she doesn’t appear to mind my company so might as well see what she would do there.

  “Oh, The Grey Serpent herself has graced my humble stalls! What do you need?”

  “Spare antiseptics and maybe painkillers?”

  “Sure, how much do you need?”

  “2 bottles should be good, as for the painkiller… do you have a package of ibuprofen?”

  “Here you are…” The merchant handed her the requested medical supplies, interesting. Reports had noted that she is a robust individual, but it doesn’t dissuade her from getting medical first and foremost.

  “You got a spare combat knife, dagger, or short sword?”

  “Sure, hit me up with the specifics.”

  “30 - 45cm, less than 3 kilograms, straight bde, preferably for armor penetration.”

  “30 to 45… straight bde… aha, this one here.” The merchant handed her a dagger with a very narrow bde, a stiletto to be exact. She is inspecting and getting a feel of the bde, but her face can’t be read and not indicating anything.

  Then she starts making quick stabbing motions… yes motions, she thrusts the bde 4 times a second… No wonder she can annihite so many targets while being surrounded, her speed is truly outstanding. She then nodded while also inquiring for another.

  “Any disposable knife? Anything is fine as long as it is light and I can throw it with ease.”

  “Hmm… let me see…. Blimey, where did I put it… ah yes, here it is…”

  The merchant handed her a 12-centimeter throwing knife without a handle. Nyx inspected it and started pying around with it by juggling and practicing a throwing motion, of course, the nearby children were delighted to see her performance.

  Wait a minute… did her cheek turn a tiny bit of shade redder than usual? Huh, must have been my eyes pying tricks with me or perhaps my gsses need to be re-magnified or changed. It won’t do for my work to be inconvenienced by impaired vision.

  Seemingly satisfied, Nyx then motioned with her hand to get 15 more. The merchant obliged immediately, and the clerks and shop helpers started bringing out the requested goods and then packaging them. The merchant’s guards only look mildly interested, but just lounge about.

  She is not done and asks for another thing to purchase, she appears to be hesitant this time around, interestingly enough.

  “Do you have… originium magazine?”

  “Hmm… let me see… uh… no dice, sorry ss.”

  “Oh well, there was an attempt.”

  “It is not exactly prudent for us, small merchants, to carry that stuff around. Unless ye wanted more outws harassment,”

  “I get what you mean, so how much for everything?”

  “That will be 2,280 LMDs.”

  “That was cheaper than I thought, also not in Pound?”

  Cheaper my behind, Nyx. That much money is enough to feed a family, pay rent, and even purchase luxury goods for a month or two with leeway here and there… Her sense of money is weird, as expected from a merc… Wonder how much she got paid? I only got paid 4,000 pounds a month, clean earnings by the way…

  ‘Not like I need it, business is still booming and my wife doing mighty fine by herself… or she is doing better than I expected.’

  The average Victorian only needs to spend around 600 pounds a month at the barest minimum, and even less in the vilges. Our industry made a lot of consumer goods that are always flooding the internal market, not to the point it overflowed of course.

  “Eh, the government won’t care all that much. Besides mercenaries usually have more LMDs at hand anyway. M’self just a small traveling merchant anyway.”

  Nyx finished up her transaction through her PT (Personal Terminal) and the hefted all her purchases with ease. She then looks my way.

  “Not gonna buy anything?”

  “I… don’t know?”

  “Just buy something for Heidi…”

  “What thought? She only likes books…”

  “You’re her father… hah… forget it.”

  Why did you look at me like I’m a deadbeat no good dad who knows nothing about his daughter? Heidi rarely requested anything from me. Not to mention that there are no books on sale here, even regarding dress, she starts to be very picky at times and I don’t want to step on that ndmine.

  Well… I’ll buy Heidi something at the end of the survey, I’m too busy right now. With that we left the pza and headed to… apothecary? Huh?

  “Surprised? The chief asked me to look at an infected who got injured. The vilgers are too scared of taking a look, despite being friendly… Besides if worst comes to worst… I know the procedure of preventing Oripathy spread now.”

  “You do?”

  “I’m a mercenary yes, but killing people is not all I do for a living. I need to learn other skills such as mapping, pathfinding, first aid, and… originium hazard mitigation. It will look nice in my resume to boot…”

  “Well… you would certainly pass as PMC contractors with a repertoire that varied. So w-”

  “Why didn’t I apply for it?”

  “Yes, why? You would make a lot more and not be immediately seen as a source of trouble at first gnce.”

  “PMC is nice, but I’m not exactly keen with the regutions here. Also, I just value my freedom that much, and before you ask, I’ll not form a PMC group. The reason? I hate paperwork.”

  “An unorthodox outlook but not exactly rare per se…”

  “Touché, also we’re here. If you wanna follow inside better make sure your body is covered… is not something I have to say seeing you wearing that heavy trench coat you called uniform.”

  “But you’re just weari-”

  “Casual wear? Yeah, I’m not in the mood for getting accused of roping someone in case shit gets awry. Of course, I will still wear gloves and a mask, but not much else.”

  She then put on her mask, gsses, and gloves then stepped inside. There is a single feline-infected girl who got a nasty gash on her leg. Seems to be caused by Fangbeasts… I need to inform the rest about potential wildlife here.

  “Sit tight, I’ll treat your wound.”

  The girl just nodded, she appeared to be surprised to see a non-infected treating an infected. Nyx starts by giving the girl a painkiller. After that is done, Nyx starts cleaning the wound with sterile gauze, she is very careful to ensure no discomfort upon the patient.

  Said the patient seemed to be having something on her mind, she timidly asked Nyx…

  “E-ex-excuse me… are you… not… afraid… um… miss?”

  “Afraid? Sure I’m.”

  “…So… why?”

  “Because that won’t solve anything.” Nyx replied without missing a beat, her vision was focused on treating the patient’ gashed leg. She then continued her words.

  “Tell me, are you afraid of death? If yes, then you’re not that different from us.” That’s… surprising, I thought someone like her was not afraid of death. Well… the more you know…

  “Really? … Your reputation said that… erm…”

  “I’m more beast than human? That’s also true, but the moment you discard fear is the moment you die.” The gash is mostly tended, she is now going to sew it. Hmm, she can work as a doctor too, her resume is way too impressive for a mercenary… just who are you?

  “Let me tell you an old story of my life, a story of the coldest people in the world… I was once part of a conflict where I got captured and was an inch away from death.”

  ‘Hold on, Nyx had been dying once? Why did she tell this piece of information nonchantly?’ I quietly said in my mind, this sort of information might not sound like much. It is about to whom it belongs that dictates its worth.

  “I was really sure that the grim reaper would be dragging me down to hell… and they came, the combat medics… from the enemy side.” The girl is too focused on her recount of the…past. Well, that’s not important at the moment. That she didn’t realize that her wound was being sewed… huh, clever distraction there.

  “The most surreal thing was that… I can feel their hatred the moment they see me ying on the ground, with their dead comrades and mine also strewn all over the bloodied soil… but the moment they see my wound, they, without hesitation, bring a stretcher for me and evacuated my dying body off the battlefield. It didn’t end there no, the moment they id me in their aid station…”

  Nyx then starts dabbing more antiseptics on the wound to prevent potential infection or flesh degeneration. The girl is too enraptured with Nyx’s story to even notice her sewed wound had opened a little, thus prompting Nyx to add further medical treatment.

  “Their gazes turned cold and empty, almost mechanical even, but not due to scorn or hatred… it is coldness a doctor reserved for a patient… me, an enemy combatant, being seen as nothing more than wounded person truly felt different… I won’t fault them for just killing me there and even torturing me… no, they have shown professionalism to an enemy combatant and managed to swallow their brewing hate.”

  Seeing that the wound had stopped its bleeding, Nyx continued with her sewing and wound treatment. Was she enrolled in a medical school before? I can’t tell, but I can see why Heidi once said that she had enjoyed Nyx’s company for creative literature activity, she has stories to tell.

  “I was convinced there and then that doctors, medics, nurses, and all medical staffs are the coldest people on eart- Terra… They’re cold to ensure no emotion would affect their duty… Because I know one thing for sure, if a doctor gets too close with their patient… if they fail, misery and despair shall follow and hammer down their psyche… Heh… they’re truly a hard bunch you know?” Holy… did she just smile!? Damn, I guess that rumor has some truth in it…

  The story ends… but it feels like there is more to it, the girl had also noticed that her treatment ended way faster, the girl’s eyes locked on her now bandaged leg. She still has a hard time walking so Nyx just scooted her into a princess carry, uncaring of an originium rock that dotted her left arm touching Nyx’ right arm.

  “Uh! Um, I-i-can wa-”

  “No, you will point me where your home is, capisce?”

  “C-c-capisce?”

  “It means “Understood” young dy.” I answered in her stead while Nyx just nodded a little at my answer.

  “Uh um… I don’t want to impose but… please…” And there we go… Nyx had snagged another one, with effort, yes but the point still stands… Well, this Pythian dy never shows overt interest in other people regarding more biological or intimate needs…

  “Snagged another eh? You’re a sinful woman you know that?” I joked at her… and she just nodded… not even flustered.

  “What can I say, man and woman wanted me, a most natural thing. Given enough time, I might get Heidi too.”

  Hey! She even taunted me! Also, no way in hell I’ll let you have her, I will never give my daughter away. I’ll even move mountains, boil the ocean, and go on accompanying my daughter’s shopping spree for a whole decade!

  …

  …

  …

  Ok, I duly regret betting and swearing on the st one… Seems I’m psing back on my real self. Fate is strange, if that incident never happened I wouldn’t have been here.

  “Over my dead body then I’ll let you have her.”

  “Rex, I’m just joking.”

  “Hah… whatever, so what now?”

  “I don’t know, I’ll be back on bashing someone else’ skull open if nothing else… also did you know that stopping the blood flow to the brain for mere seconds can cause brain damage?”

  And there it is, her mercenary persona is back on the job… Seriously, how could she flip from being very caring and understanding into callous and cold with such ease?

  Ah well… Victoria is still as safe as usual, no catastrophe signs were detected here at the moment… I’ll be going on my further survey tomorrow with the chaps from Toron… My life as a catastrophe messenger is as fulfilling as always…

  [END OF CHAPTER]

  Author’s Note:

  Sup, this is me, myself, and I, the author who gets anxious when life suddenly turns calmer… am I neurotic?

  Well, regardless of my mental state, this chapter is meant to show just how she behaved outside of combat with a much clearer and succinct contrast in mind.

  Update as usual, see ya ter.

  Ciao.

  FUN FACT: One of the Feline's needs is... scratching every once in a while...