Published at 20th of September 2024 7:07 am

Book 2 Chapter 65: I Win

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Dantes walked through the threshold. There were a few dead men in his path as he walked into the building. He could hear what few men Mondego had left struggling against the guard outside as he moved deeper into the manor, but inside was quiet.

They made their way toward the basement where Jacopo had found Mondego’s offering and the magic mirror. Dantes remembered the layout from Jacopo’s exploration of the Manor what seemed like ages ago, but had been less than a month ago in reality. He rolled up his sleeve to check his vermin marks. They were all nearly empty, but he had a few slivers left. He then cycled through the wands he had left in his arm. There were only two. One was a simple push spell, and the other was a rust spell. Next time he’d have to invest in more offensive options. Mondego’s resources had to be similarly depleted by this point, otherwise he wouldn't have run back into his Manor after blasting all of them back.

Dantes saw a number of empty vials as he reached the steps into the basement. Potions of some kind, meaning that Mondego was likely refreshed, healed, and possibly even enhanced down those stairs. Dantes stood at the top of them, starting to gather all the nearby vermin to him, at least all of those he could afford to gather. Once he was as ready as he could be, he walked down the steps with his pistol in his hand. The eyes of his accompaniment glistened in the faint light of the hallway.

About halfway down he could hear Mondego talking.

“-everything I have. Every scrap of gold, every carpet fiber, every servant, every piece of silverware. I’ll give it all to you. I’ll give every single scrap of everything I have. Just let me kill that bastard. Let me put my hands around his neck and watch his eyes go dark.”

There was a pause, and Dantes heard only the sound of his own and his vermin’s footsteps as they went downstairs.

“Greed! You fucking OWE ME! I’ve done all that was asked of me! Just let me kill him.”

Dantes reached the bottom of the stairs and entered the wide basement. He could see the shattered mirror against the wall, the massive pile of gold and goods, and Mondego kneeling in front of it.

“Greed doesn’t give a fuck about you,” said Dantes aiming his pistol. “You’ve already served his purpose for you, and now the only value he has left to extract from you is your soul after you’re dead. He wants me to win. He wants to collect.”

Mondego slowly stood up, but didn’t turn around.

“Where is she?”

“Who?” asked Dantes in a voice that pretended innocence.

“Don’t fucking play with me.”

Dantes laughed. “That’s all that there’s left to do with you is play. That’s all we’ve been doing this whole time. Just like when we’d chase each other through the streets as kids. The only problem is that you raised the stakes. So come on. Face me and let’s finish the game.”

“Not until you tell me where Mercedes is. I know that you know or you would’ve lied to me and said something about her waiting for you in your bed.”

“She did offer, but you’re right, I do know where she is. She’s in a boat at the bottom of the harbor. If you don’t believe me,” Dantes pulled Mercedes’s finger from his coat and tossed it, making it land perfectly just in front of Mondego and to the right. “There’s her finger with the ring that matches your own.”

Mondego turned around. He was covered in mud, his eyes were bulging, his tusks were pushed forward, and a scowl deep as a ravine was carved across his face.

“She was mine.”

Dantes shook his head. “She owned herself and now she belongs only to Greed. Just like you will when I send you to him.” He fired his pistol, but the shot went wide and hit the pile of gold behind Mondego causing it to scatter.

Mondego summoned a metal shield and a mace into his hands and rushed toward him.

Dantes threw his pistol at him and drew his dagger as he sent the small army of vermin he’d summoned to attack.

Roaches and rats began to swarm up Mondego’s leg, several of them being crushed under his boots as he ran, and pigeons and bats flew toward his face, but a half dozen were killed instantly as he smashed them aside with his shield.

Dantes raised his wooden hand, sharpened the tips of his fingers into points, and extended them toward Mondego’s face.

Mondego smashed them aside with his Mace and closed the distance with Dantes. He raised his mace and tried to bring it down on Dantes’s head.

Dantes sidestepped the blow and managed to slash against Mondego’s stomach with his dagger, leaving a shallow cut.

Mondego followed it up with a dozen more strikes that gave Dantes almost no time to react, forcing him to dodge backward until his back was against the wall. He was faster than he had been, likely as a result of all of the potions he’d just drank.

Dantes leaped up, and shifted into a bat, spinning to narrowly dodge another strike, and then reformed behind Mondego. He raised his wooden hand and sent his will through one of his two remaining wands, hitting mondego with a push spell that caused him to smash face first into the wall.

Dantes swapped wands and was about to follow up the push spell with a rust enchantment, but Mondego very suddenly jumped, spun in the air, and landed on the ceiling before bringing his mace down toward Dantes.

Dantes’s wooden arm was smacked aside, as he just barely managed to save the wand within it, but he himself whipped around from the force of the blow, and then scrambled to get away on all fours as Mondego chased after him swinging rapid blows at his head from the ceiling.

Dantes used the last of his vermin marks to rally those creatures with him and have them attack Mondego.

They complied, clinging to him, biting, scratching, pecking, and doing whatever damage to him that they could.

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Mondego turned his focus to them, and started to strike them down with his mace and shield, each creature's death causing a steep decline in the favor left in Dantes’s vermin marks.

Dantes didn’t take the time they bought him for granted and reformed his wooden arm as he charged forward with his dagger. He leapt up and stabbed into Mondego’s shoulder, dragging him off the ceiling and slamming him onto the ground. He attempted to rip the dagger free, but it was stuck in bone.

Mondego dismissed his mace to slam his fist into the side of Dantes’s head.

Dantes rolled with the blow to reduce the damage and create some distance between them. He was out of favor and those few vermin that were left, all began to flee back up the stairs. Dantes aimed his last wand at Mondego and sent his will through it. A concentrated gust of green mist flew out of it.

Mondego blocked it with his shield, which immediately began to pit and crack as the spell took hold.

Dantes ran forward and kicked out both of his legs.

Mondego raised his shield again, but it shattered from the impact and he flew backward with rusted shrapnel cutting deeply into his arm.

Dantes started to form his wooden hand into a spike again, when Mondego raised his now empty hand.

Dantes could see that most of the magic rings on each of his hands had vanished, likely losing their potency as Mondego burnt out their enchantments. There was only one left on each hand. One of them had to be his mace, but the other, Dantes had no clue.

The ring began to glow, and Dantes began forming his wooden arm into a shield.

Jacopo could sense instinctually that what Dantes was doing wouldn’t be enough. Some fear response inside him told him that whatever was going to happen would be fatal. He shifted into batform and flew directly at Mondego’s face.

Mondego jerked at the last moment, and a cannonball fired from his hand.

The projective went wide, but It still shattered Dantes’s wooden arm and threw him back several yards into the back wall, dazing him.

Mondego roared as he grabbed Jacopo and ripped him from his hair before throwing him against a wall.

There was a crunch, and Jacopo went still.

Mondego, panting, began dragging his mace toward Dantes.

Dantes tried to stand by bracing himself against the wall, but fell. Then he tried again. He started to reform his arm, but the damage it was taken was severe and it wasn’t regenerating as quickly.

Mondego ran the last few steps toward Dantes and slammed the mace into his side.

Dantes felt ribs break as he was thrown to the ground.

Mondego tossed the mace to the side, and straddled Dantes, wrapping his hands around his throat.

Dantes attempted to fight him, but he was never as strong as Mondego, especially not one handed. Still, he flailed the shattered wooden arm at him, cutting his arm and leg with the splinters of it as he tried to tear Mondego’s hands from his throat with his good hand.

…

Jacopo could see himself leaning against the wall. He could see Dantes struggling with Mondego, and he could see the thread that connected him and Dantes. It was thick, and strong, like the trunk of a tree. He was…floating somehow, in the basement, and he wasn’t alone.

A man wearing a dark blue cloak with his face concealed aside from his mouth stood at the halfway point between Jacopo’s body and Dantes’s.

He looked at Jacopo and gave him a little wave and a smile.

Jacopo cocked his head in response.

The man produced a key from his hand. He looked at it from all angles then shook his head and tossed it behind himself. Then he took out what Jacopo recognized as lockpicks. He took them, and started to tinker with that trunk like thread between Jacopo and Dantes. He sunk his hands deep into it, smiling as he worked until there was a loud and audible click. He drew his hands back from it, and slid the lockpicks back into his sleeve. He looked at Jacopo with a widened smile, and pulled back his hood for just a moment, so that he could wink at him with an eye the color of night, and wave goodbye.

…

Dantes kept struggling. He clawed, spat, and wriggled trying to escape, but Mondego’s grip wouldn’t break.

“You’re nothing Dantes,” said Mondego through gritted teeth. “You’re just the son of a whore. You could never have done what I’ve done, but I can do everything you’ve ever done and more. When the guard finds me down here standing over your corpse and sends me to the Pit, I’ll be running it in a fucking week!”

Dantes’s eyes widened as he saw a figure appear behind Mondego.

Mondego caught the reflection in Dantes’s eyes and turned his head just in time for a massive fist to strike him across the chin and knock him off of Dantes.

A man, a mutt like Dantes, stood above Mondego. He was naked, with long brown hair, thick muscles, and gold eyes. He stood even taller than Mondego, and his face was contorted in unrestrained hatred.

“Jacopo?” asked Dantes.

Mondego tried to stand, but Jacopo kicked the dagger still embedded in his shoulder and forced him back to the ground. Then, he just started hitting him. His strikes were unrefined and wild. Kicks, punches, slaps, scratches, he rained them down on him one after the other.

Dantes dragged himself to his feet and joined him. In spite of his exhaustion, and the damage he’d taken, he gained a second wind and put all of it toward inflicting as much damage on Mondego as he possibly could. He kicked him, twisted the knife in his shoulder, stomped on his hands to break the fingers and when they were both done he spat on him.

Jacopo crouched down and yanked the dagger from Mondego’s shoulder, handing it to Dantes.

Dantes took it and smiled.

“Thanks my friend.”

“You’re welcome,” Jacopo responded, in a voice that was tasting words for the first time.

Mondego groaned, unable to even open his eyes because his face was so swollen from the beating.

Dantes leaned in close next to his ear and whispered.

“I win,” before driving the dagger into his heart.

…

Dantes sat there for a few moments, looking at Mondego’s lifeless corpse. He’d done it. All of those that had betrayed him were dead by his hand. He’d taken their minds, their successes, their security, and their loved ones from them. He’d heard many stories about revenge as a child. His father had told him of a sea-captain’s son that had killed his father’s old crew after they’d killed him with a mutiny. He’d heard dozens of stories of wives killing or poisoning cheating husbands from his mother while she was gossipping with the other whores. He’d heard so many descriptions of how people felt after the revenge was completed. They were regretful in some cases, vindicated in others, and sometimes they simply felt hollow. Dantes felt… relieved. The obsession he’d carried with himself for almost six years was done. His mind could finally look to other things, he could see past his hatred and look into what future lay beyond it. The gnawing hunger that he’d been feeding was finally satisfied.

He pushed himself to his feet, Jacopo helping him up as he did so. Dantes took another look at the tall, muscular mutt that Jacopo had shifted himself into. His skin was tan rather than gray, and his features handsome, marred only by a face that wouldn’t cease twitching as he scented the air with his weaker nose.

“I can’t believe you’re better looking as a man than I am,” said Dantes walking a few steps toward the pile of gold in the center of the room.

“This makes sense. I was better looking as a rat as well.”

“How did you do this? Become a man?”

Jacopo shrugged. “The man in the blue cloak, the one from our dreams. He unlocked something between us. Becoming a two-leg was… painful. The other forms didn’t hurt nearly as much.”

“Well, now you know how I’ve been feeling,” he took a few more steps toward the gold. He could feel that strange taint that seemed to infuse all of it. Still, he had to admit he was tempted to pocket what he could.

“I wonder if we could destroy this somehow. I feel like letting the guard expose itself to it would be dangerous.”

Jacopo didn’t respond, just cocked his head a bit and looked at it.

Very suddenly, the gold began to change. It became shimmery, then cloudy. Soon black clouds of smoke were where the pile had just been, threaded with gold. It smelled of blood and metal, then it disappeared with the sound of coins being poured onto a table.

“Well… that solves as many problems as it raises questions.”

Jacopo looked toward the stairs where footsteps were starting to draw closer.

Dantes nodded at him, and they shifted into rats to slip past the guards and into the night.

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