Path of the Deathless (Book 3 Completed)

29 (I) City

, Weave Tabloid29 (I)

City

The was a disgusting book. Vile on so many levels. It was a document of torture and agony inflicted directly into the minds of its readers. And Shiv absolutely loved it. It was everything mentioned above, but also extremely educational, mainly because the elderly vampire he had learned was called Sculptor Ekkihurst was so detailed and meticulous in his teachings.

As Shiv jumped from body to body, experiencing death time and time again, he learned the finer nuances of the circulatory system first. What followed was the importance of the heart, the general layout of blood vessels, and how veins and arteries both mattered for specific reasons. He also learned about vampirism.

One of the vampire students opened their chest casually, cutting themselves open and exposing their heart. Though the organ pumped, Sculptor Ekkihurst next opened Shiv’s heart and made a comparison.

“As you see,” the Sculptor began, “this is a pure organ. It is an organism of matter. It is essential for their vitality, but more like an anchor, a vessel. This”—he gestured to the other vampire’s exposed heart—“this is the Lineage Core. This is why we can use our bodies the way we do. We are part of a collective whole, and we are family for each other, eternally, and expand our power with our growing lines.”

Shiv blinked. Something about the vampire’s words made Shiv recall a thing Georges complained about before.

Ekkihurst continued. “It connects me to you, and especially connects you to your sire. That is why we grow stronger with every new member we bring into our fold, and why we can draw on the powers of blood even without a spell component nearby.”

A component, as Shiv realized, was flesh or blood—anything organic, really. Biomancy didn’t work without something to affect—that was the entire meaning behind the name: biology, and for manipulation. Apparently, all vampires had a small micro-dimension inside themselves, or something like that, and from there they could draw more things out of themselves, recomposing their bodies. It also connected them to their elders in ways Shiv didn’t grasp yet.

And to make matters even more peculiar, it seemed that vampire ichor was smart enough to do a lot of the work itself. The way Ekkihurst described things, it was as if the ichor flowing through their veins was intelligent, rather than their brains. “Not quite so for humans,” Ekkihurst continued to explain. He examined Shiv in detail, flaying him open over and over again, having his students kill him repeatedly, and through it all Shiv learned as well.

This was documented material specifically to enhance a vampire’s knowledge of how to manipulate and even heal their victims. For despite the way the vampires treated other people like cattle, cattle still had worth, and vampires, despite everything, abhorred waste.

For what felt like hours, Shiv experienced various modifications made to his body. Most of them ended with him dead—either suffering a brutal stroke, his heart popping, or his veins simply pulling apart, leaving him internally hemorrhaging and perishing soon after. But all this allowed him insight into the nuances of his biology. His Biomancy did not grow, but his basic understanding of Practical Metabiology leapt forward by two levels—a remarkable gain from simply reading a single chapter from a book.

Practical Metabiology > 3

s served as a safety measure in case someone fell.

To his increasing surprise, he noticed a few other things. There was a higher concentration of Umbrals than Weaveresses, and there were also far more of the smaller, male weavers than Weaveresses. He'd barely seen any of those in the Symposium Principality, so he was rather surprised at that. When he asked Uva why that was, she explained that weavers were mostly relegated to the lower-importance jobs in the city and held lower social standings. As for the former point; it took a long time for the spiderfolk to reproduce—requiring a gestation period within a final host body after they’d finished being feral larvae, otherwise they would be born feral. It had resulted in a demographic problem: not enough people were dying anymore. With the city’s advancements and more people reaching Adept Tier for Physicality early in life, deaths by natural causes or disease had flattened substantially.

Shiv could see why that was a problem, so he started to speak, then stopped himself.

“Yes, it’s about how it sounds,” Uva said. “The Composer did not choose her form exactly. She has always been honest about this. However, she is not a cruel goddess, and she does not want to force the breeding on anyone.”

Uva fell silent. “Thus, we have a demographic issue. Projections show far more feral weavers in the next few years, and not that many Weaveresses or non-feral weavers.”

“What about feral Weaveresses?” Shiv asked.

“If you become feral, you don’t become a Weaveress. Their biology doesn’t express itself that way.”

They landed in Culture Valley a short while later, and Shiv found himself walking down a thoroughfare filled with musicians, hawkers, advertisers, swindlers, people peddling wares, and more. Once again, every day down here felt like the Festival of the Eclipse back on Blackedge. But to the people, it seemed like they were going about their everyday lives.

“So much noise,” Shiv said. He managed to keep his hands from shaking this time, but then he noticed something about Adam. The Young Lord was practically flinching every few seconds—Shiv realized.

“You all right?” Shiv asked Adam.

The Young Lord clenched his teeth. “I’ve been to the capital. I’ve endured that. I can endure this.”

Despite his words, Shiv’s Psychomancy picked up an imprint of strain, stress, and also strength. Adam Arrow could be sour, could be mean, could be a grudge-bearer, but Adam Arrow was a Pathbearer, and he had pride in himself—a positive pride in being noble and decent.

Shiv thought.