It is like perpetual day in Kútmómɛ. There is no nighttime, there is only the pale blue glow of Kútmómɛ that persists in the beings animated through it, in the structures that organize it. They are ghosts, the beings of Kútmómɛ, they are wraiths, spectres, echoes of something that was formed and tangible in the Fonlands and so alive that the essence had to echo, the consciousness of it had to go somewhere when the physical vessel shrank into nothing. The wraiths of Kútmómɛ will not engage in philosophical debate, they know their metaphysical place, they do not see themselves as the beings that were their source. They know that they are just reserves, leftovers that need a place to exist, aware and thinking but not desiring or longing. The wraiths of Kútmómɛ exist until they do not, they are and then they are not after a long period of time. A wraith expires in its time, it cannot be killed.
These are the rules of Kútmómɛ before Maxx comes skulking through, trying to follow the Pristine’s directions and keep his mouth shut. He is buzzing, this new place processed through the constant flow of the lean that pulses through his body at all times is overwhelming and exciting. As the Superguardian who was manufactured on Bludon, Maxx is part Bludonian, part advanced bionics and his body is engineered to generate a lot of energy to be self-sustaining. His body also produces the chemical known as lean that heightens his awareness and eases any pain from injuries. The lean allows him to see through things, to feel things without touching, and coupled with the Superconsciousness, he can feel the consciousness of other things and the shape of the bodies that contain them. In Kútmómɛ, Maxx feels the constant buzz of consciousness, but it is unlike consciousness that he is used to and this is why the Superconsciousness is not able to analyze it. Normally, Maxx could rely on the yellow glow of the Superconsciousness to scan the neurological function of everything within its range and provide details of the functions of any thing that registers as a consciousness, but that technology is useless in Kútmómɛ.
But Maxx does feel something tugging at him when he does finally calm down. He doesn’t need the Superconsciousness to feel it. He feels the pull on his physical body, like there are hooks in him connected to strings that tighten their slack when he is walking in the right direction, and pull at him when he isn’t. Pultine’s instincts keep the hooks from pulling at him, she seems to be leading them in the right direction, along a broad walkway through large rectangular structures seemingly made of the glow of Kútmómɛ.
“What is this place?” Zacchaeus asks next to Pultine. “Is it a city?”
“Yes,” Pultine answers, “but not a city that we would recognize, obviously. Shini, are these structures the homes of the wraiths?”
“They house different locations of the Fonlands where the wraiths can dwell in their eternal loop through the existence they knew in life. This place where we dwell is mostly the dwelling place of the sentries of Kútmómɛ. Other wraiths are only moving from one structure to another.”
As they proceed, Maxx feels a tugging on his right side.
“We should go down this way,” he says, stopping the group in their procession. “As you said before, I did the spell, I have some connection to the objective even if I can’t quite explain it. I feel like we are getting further from it to continue in the direction we are going.”
Pultine changes the direction of the group. “What is it that you feel, Superguardian?”
“Something is pulling me. I can only assume it is the Blight Maker.”
Pultine doesn’t break her stride, but she looks back at Maxx and makes eye contact for a moment, then looks back in the direction they walk.
“Shini, is there any reason for us to doubt this pull that Maxx is feeling?” she asks. “Do you know of anything in Kútmómɛ that may be pulling at Maxx as a result of him tearing open a portal to this forbidden realm?”
“Good question,” Zacchaeus asks and waits eagerly for Shini’s response.
“Bypassing the fact that Maxx, or any being for that matter, getting their hands on the Blight Maker is a bad idea, there is nothing that I know of, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t proceed cautiously. Or, you know, try to find another way out of here.”
“You will only prolong our time here,” Maxx says with annoyance. “I mentioned before that the protection of the spell that got us here is temporary. We have to get our hands on the Blight Maker or we will be trapped here. You might be used to that, Shini, but the rest of us want to get back to the Fonlands. This way.”
Maxx is walking slightly ahead of Pultine now and she follows him silently. She observes him closely. She has known him a long time now. Pultine spent a lot of time on Bludon to help rid the planet of the Daemon of Endla, and she came to like him a lot, but he is not the Maxx she knew, he likes to remind them all of that.
Zacchaeus walks silently next to Shini, trying not to think too deeply about where he is, and focusing on keeping his eyes peeled for any threat. It seems that Pultine is very protective of him, but there is no need for her concern. Zacchaeus may be the most powerful member of their party that includes a prolific Black Muthi Sorcerer, a Supreme Mmoatia, and a Superguardian of Bludon. Zacchaeus draws power from the Needy, a primordial entity from his home universe that has taken residence in the caves of Sakpata’s Disc for the majority of the time that Zacchaeus has been in the Fonlands. The Needy’s powers are prodigious, birthed from the light of first creation and sustained by the sorrow of sentient beings over millennia, the Needy can do most anything that it sets its powers to and manifests on Zacchaeus as a black cloak with a hood that lets off smoke that intensifies with his anger.
“It is there,” Maxx says after the group walks empty streets and avenues of the glowing city for a long time in silent vigilance, ready to defend themselves if they encounter another sentry. But Maxx stops them as they stand in the shadow of the glowing castle that seems to be in the center of the city. They are not directly in front of it, there are sentries at the castle’s recessed entry that is behind columns supporting levels of the boxy castle above.
“I don’t know what this structure is,” Shini says before anyone can ask him, “but its prominence in the city and its sentries suggests that this is an important place. I don’t think laying hands on the Blight Maker will be easy.”
“We can’t kill these things, right?” Zacchaeus asks. “Maybe I can just tie them up for long enough to get past them but if Shini don’t know, ain’t no way to know what’s inside that place. And it probably won’t even make sense to us, look at the shape of that thing.”
The structures of Kútmómɛ are mostly boxy, but the surfaces are jagged, like the glowing material of their structure is jagged like broken stone, and the castle is like stacked boxes of this rough stone but glowing steadily like the surface is glass illuminated from the inside. It is difficult to decide if it is naturally occurring or if it was constructed to be this way, and the same is true for all of the structures of Kútmómɛ.
“It’s inside,” Maxx says confidently, “we must go inside.”
Pultine nods and looks to Shini who has a pained look on his dark face that reflects the glow around them.
“It is all we have,” she says as kindly as she has ever said anything to Shini. “If you ever want to see Ahdis again, I don’t think we have much choice.”
Shini nods and then the group cements their plan to infiltrate the castle.
Maxx can see the Blight Maker clearly in his mind. It is part sword, part axe with an elaborate hilt that is a weapon in itself. He sees the shape of it, he knows that it rests on a glowing platform that rotates but the details of it are obscured by the brightness of the glow around it. He balls his fist, claws digging into the flesh of his hand, aching to grip the Blight Maker as Zacchaeus runs from the cover the group enjoys, and he sends out inky tendrils from his body that are reminiscent of an octopus but made of an oily black substance that manages to wrap the sentries that guard the castle entrance. Zacchaus is successful at subduing all of them and even the ones that emerge as a response to his appearance. The wraiths are strong and it is obvious that Zacchaeus is giving all of his concentration to keep them from attacking him, and Maxx leads the charge of the others to the glowing entrance that is under a ceiling of light that seems amplified in the small space. Maxx blinks furiously, his eyes struggling to adjust the closer he gets to the entrance.
“It’s hard to see!,” Maxx yells, now unsure if he is headed in the right direction. He was sure that he’d seen the dark entrance carved in the wall of the glow that isn’t as soft as the rest of Kútmómɛ because of the light from the underside of the structure that is supported on columns that also glow. It isn’t brighter than anything Maxx has seen before, but they have been moving slowly and deliberately through Kútmómɛ and their eyes have adjusted to a a much lower level of lights.
Maxx feels a hand on his shoulder and then he hears Shini at his back, “Keep straight. We will pass right through. Hurry, Zaccheus is almost at his limit.”
Maxx moves faster and soon passes through the threshold that becomes more visible the closer he comes to it. As soon as he enters, the intense glow dies and the group finds themselves in front of a large stone wall that stretches up as high as the ceiling that is far away above them. The room is lit by a single torch on the wall and when they turn to see if they are being pursued by the sentries, they find that the entrance has disappeared. They are in a stone room with the lone torch, and there are two pathways to walk on either side of the wall that bears the torch. They are identical hallways of stone and it is not clear where either of them lead.
“Where do we go from here?” Pultine asks.
Maxx is already walking in a direction that feels right to him and he grabs the torch from the wall, then walks toward the hallway to the right of the wall. As they walk, they eventually come to a hallway that leads to many forks, high walls that make new highways.
“It is at the heart of a labyrinth,” Shini says. “I hope the pull you feel helps us to navigate it. We are likely to wander forever without some help.”
“I will follow this feeling to the prize I seek,” Maxx says confidently, but he is stopped in his stride when Zacchaeus puts a firm hand on his shoulder. He turns and looks him in the eyes.
“Maxx, we been riding together a long time now,” Zacchaeus says sincerely and the two are close to one another. “Before we came to the Fonlands, I trusted my life to you, and you did the same, you trusted me. I know you changed, but I know that the bond we share endures whatever mess you done got mixed up in. Tell me you still care for me, Maxx.”
Maxx puts a hand on Zacchaeus’s chest. “Even under all of the darkness that I have cloaked myself in, I still feel for you Zacchaeus. I feel the beating of your heart and it brings me joy. I am not leading you to a purgatory of wandering forever in this land of the dead. It is fate that you are here with me, you have been by my side at every pivotal moment of my life since I lost Dexxx. I have been at my peak, lean warping everything around me,” he puts a hand to Zacchaeus’s cheek, “I had forgotten the details of your face. It is how I avoided the reality of the descent that I allowed myself to slip into. But I see you now, Zacchaeus. It may have been folly that led us here, but we are here, and I know how to get us back safely. I know where the Blight Maker is and it wants me to wield it. You can trust me now, Zacchaeus.”
He puts both his hands over the hand that Maxx has on his chest. “Lead the way, then.”
PRL Serials 