Jackal Among Snakes

Chapter 642: Hopeful Man Smiles Pleasantly at House Guests

After Argrave gave his somewhat insistent request that the Hopeful should speak, the unceasing tide of darkness coming from all portions of the man’s body waned somewhat. In particular, the writhing shadows near his face started to lessen, revealing a teeth-revealing smile. Argrave thought the pressure might lessen in intensity once his features were revealed, but the strain upon his fighting locusts of blood felt all the denser as the shadows pressed them harder.

Argrave opened his mouth to speak and said something. Yet… every word that left his mouth was lost to him. When the Hopeful responded, he was only confused.

“You say that, yet you come here fighting so desperately against this realm that I have carved out to spare our kind the endless hunger.” His voice was the same affectless drone that all others possessed, yet that only made it seem all the more frightening. His lips never met, and he never ceased smiling. “Why should you be allowed to persist?”

Argrave’s eyes felt like they were bulging out of his head. What had he said? Why couldn’t he remember saying it? He certainly remembered talking, but the words that were spoken had been lost to him. He couldn’t even remember the question as it had been formed inside his head.

“Argrave.” Anneliese placed her hand on his shoulder, and he spared a glance even as he worked constantly to fight against the Hopeful’s suppression. “I saw it all—he consumed the thought you voiced, prying it free of your mind. I don’t think he can control it. You said that you and he made natural allies, and that you should collaborate.”

Even amidst the dull ache of pain brought about by the locusts, Argrave felt a terrible chill assail him. The Hopeful had done more than hear his thought—it had taken it within itself, stealing it from Argrave and responding. If that were true, this being’s hunger was so deep it possessed a power equal to Gerechtigkeit or the gods.

“I’ll repeat your questions back to you,” Anneliese said, trying to keep her breathing steady. “But you need to tell me to repeat them back, because I’ve said it aloud and I’ll forget it.”

Argrave’s lips moved and air flowed out, forming words that were lost to his mind like a river flowing into the sea. Anneliese nodded insistently but said nothing, and he was able to rethink what he said—he told her just as she’d instructed him.

Argrave looked back to the smiling Hopeful, with new recognition he was dealing with a monstrous opposition. That didn’t necessarily mean it was an enemy. He spoke again, then…

“Your word of neutrality alone is not enough. Something more is required to assuage my fears enough to allow you free passage.” The Hopeful leaned closer. “You must allow me to eat a memory sufficient enough to prove your intent.”

He didn’t quite know what he’d said, but Argrave felt a sheer terror at the notion of giving this thing free access to his mind.

“You said we didn’t come here to antagonize the Shadowlanders, only to bypass them seeking out Traugott. Just like the so-called Manumitter disrupts the Shadowlands, he intends to use the Shadowlands to disrupt our realm,” Anneliese repeated, then wiped sweat from her brow.

Argrave spoke again.

“I would only need to touch you with my bare flesh,” responded the Hopeful.

“You asked what that process entailed,” Anneliese said.

Argrave was immediately on edge. It was clear this big fellow needed an equivalently big diet to sustain his gargantuan body. One doesn’t stay big if one doesn’t eat big, and this man was hungry enough that he ate the thoughts directly from Argrave’s head. If he’d known the final chapters of this journey of his would have so much mind-interfering stuff—be it Erlebnis, the Alchemist, or Lindon—he might’ve put more focus on it at the very beginning.

If the Hopeful did touch Argrave, and did begin extracting thoughts, it was quite obvious that there was a blunt imprecision to the whole process. Anneliese herself had said it didn’t seem like he could control it. He kept himself doused in these shadows of his own making, and they ate everything around with such a fervor that the whole realm that Anneliese and Argrave had carved out fell apart. He was the guy that all-you-could-eat buffets feared the most. He was the man that bankrupted lobster restaurants around the world.

All in all, Argrave rather liked his memories. He wasn’t entirely eager to offer them up on a silver platter. As his hands spawned locust after locust to eat away the impending darkness, he did wonder if he shouldn’t just turn the bloody firehoses toward the Hopeful. This was the Big Bad. But the Big Bad seldom travelled alone, and Argrave expected that, if he did, they would be beset upon by his lieutenants. And there wasn’t any guarantee of winning the fight against the Hopeful alone, given his display of prowess here today.

But… perhaps there was another way out of this. He had managed to dispel Lindon after the ancient Gilderwatcher entered his mind. This had been at his instruction and direction, granted, but Argrave’s blood magic was proving similarly effective against the shadows that the Hopeful created. With the Fruit of Being empowering him, there had to be some way he could guide the crude instrument that the Hopeful intended to employ to extract memories.

Argrave first imagined something extremely brutal—using blood magic on his brain. He moderated that idea by considering using simple healing magic that had been infused with blood. But time and experience had demonstrated that physical prevention wasn’t the solution. Memories were something deeper than the mind alone, at least on this side of reality. There was an aspect of the soul alongside the mind in what made memories and existence. The two examples of mind-melding he’d dealt with came to mind—Lindon and Raven.

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When conversing with them, he had existed within his own mind. He was a little projection of himself inside his own head. Nevertheless, he’d been capable of doing very real things to both of them. He’d ejected Lindon from his psyche, and he’d conjured a gun and shot Raven. The latter was very strange to think about, but it had been done.

Perhaps he could do the same thing here. But before allowing the glutton into the buffet, he ought to give him some food samples. To that end, he needed to see if he could prevent the lesser thefts—that which came during conversation.

Argrave retreated into his wiki slightly as he formulated the next question. He made sure to ask something that was reasonable enough to not draw suspicion, but irrelevant enough it merely stalled for time. Then, he tried something.

“That doesn’t matter to me.”

“You asked why you’d risk your life to come here if you weren’t seeking Traugott, considering that you had nothing to gain and everything to lose by fighting them.”

A failure. Argrave asked another question. The Hopeful gave another answer, and Anneliese another recitation of his question. Again and again he tried, seeking out that sensation of retreating within the mind that had been so familiar with Lindon and Raven. He scoured Erlebnis’ wiki for further answers, incorporating its vast data into his own attempts.

Eventually, as Argrave began to ask a question… he could feel, as clear as day, a black hound lunging out at his mind. The image was so vivid he paused mid-word, but then he recovered. In his mind’s eye, he conjured forth a sword of blood magic, then continued speaking.

“How should I fight Traugott if I can’t remember what he’s like?” Argrave heard himself say, and felt a sense of immeasurable triumph as he killed the hound of hunger seeking to pry his thoughts away. “No—don’t answer that.” Anneliese was about to repeat his question, but Argrave interrupted her. “No need to repeat. I heard what I said.” She looked quite surprised.

“…you stayed my hunger,” said the Hopeful in surprise, that smile on his face not diminishing in the slightest. “How?”

“The same way I stay these shadows. My own blood,” said Argrave determinedly, fighting a three-front war—one of conversation, one of the encroaching shadows, and one in his mind, versus the hounds of hunger.

“You were testing me. Probing,” said the Hopeful. “An interesting outcome. But my answer remains unchanged. I must eat a memory you possess of Traugott to even consider the notion of allowing you freedom of passage.”

“That’s fine. More than fine. Better than fine. It’s amazing,” Argrave rambled, testing his might against these hounds that came charging to rip the thoughts out of his head. He could feel his vitality drain away as he did so, and knew he was genuinely using the power the Fruit of Being had bestowed upon him.

After a long while of rambling, during which the Hopeful watched on with that eerie smile, Argrave finally came to something.

“It’s clear to me that we have a little dilemma in our hands,” Argrave said, having some difficulty thinking quickly while the hounds hunted the thoughts in his head. “You possess overwhelming power. I imagine that Traugott is genuinely no match for you, if you came upon him. Yet… somehow, he possesses the ability to break the hierarchy of subordination you’ve created. So… so, you can’t approach him recklessly,” Argrave guessed.

The Hopeful said nothing.

“You need us to kill Traugott. We might be the only ones who can here in this realm without being broken free of the chains you use to bind. It’s clear you aren’t the type to inspire robust loyalty,” Argrave’s monotonous speech quickened as he grew more skilled at beating back the hounds. “Meanwhile, it’s clear to me that we can’t travel through this realm much further than what we’ve already carved with you and your lieutenants shadowing us.”

“Even understanding this nuance, the situation remains unchanged,” the Hopeful answered. “You are as large a risk as he to the hope I’ve built. But you, I can kill. You are an inconvenience.”

Argrave grit his teeth, looking at the locusts of his blood fight against the encroaching shadow. For now, it seemed like the Hopeful wasn’t wrong. And he wasn’t disguising his intent to kill them, long-term. Once their usefulness was expired, he was certain the Hopeful and the Shadowlanders under his thrall would turn hostile, seeking to eliminate another threat to their Hopeful peace.

Even despite all of that…

“I’ll let you take a memory of Traugott,” Argrave decided. “But that’s all that you’re taking. Be sure of that. Don’t get your hopes up that you’ll take more than you’re asking for.”

The Hopeful raised his hand. His index finger shed darkness, revealing the abyssal black skin all the Shadowlanders possessed. While his smile loomed large above, he slowly brought his finger forth.

“Very well. Let us see if you can endure the hunger that we all have for any amount of time, invader. If you can, you will have earned a small amount of my respect. Only with the shadows embracing me can I cope with my hunger. And you… you’ll experience the hunger as I do. As we all do. Let it have new flesh to sup upon.”

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As the gargantuan finger neared, Argrave felt his field of vision narrow, darken. Before long, it was all that existed—it was as if he and the Hopeful, that towering figure, existed alone in an endless void. And then Argrave was in his mind as himself. Behind him stood his memories—mostly whole, with some minor technical issues patched up with Raven tape. And in front of him…

The black hounds of hunger ran across the hills of his mindscape. White saliva spilled from their mouth as they saw a meal. Black malignance shined in their eyes. Pain reflected in their actions—pain brought about by starvation that could only be remedied by tearing into the juicy prey in front of them. These black hounds that seemed to come from hell stampeded across Argrave’s mindscape…

And Argrave stood alone, bloody sword in hand, ready to beat them all back. He reached behind himself, grabbing a throwaway memory of Traugott. He pulled it free, and it plucked free of his mind like a strand of cotton candy. He held it out like bait, grinning like a fool.

“This is all you’re getting!” Argrave shouted. “Be good boys, and you might get a treat.”