Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 99201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 496(@200wpm)___ 397(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 496(@200wpm)___ 397(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
Which is a lie. The chimera have always been sentient. It was the whole point of making them. Human-animal hybrids were how the gods started. It was the pinnacle of human knowledge.
And then it was their downfall.
Maybe, if they hadn’t treated the chimera like animals, the Glory War would’ve never happened. But then again, wars are part of the plan. There is no way to stop them because it is how the gods take and give power.
Callistina is not wearing clothes. She is wearing the required chains. But the chains have been made to look like clothes and everyone around me understands that this is not only skirting the rules, but asking for trouble.
The only thing stopping them from tearing her off the back of this pegásius is probably the beast himself. He still has his sharp hooves and his size is enough to intimidate anyone. They should fear me most, but they have no idea who I am and I would like to keep it that way.
In fact, I would very much like to just find the next set of doors and fall through them. Never to see this place again.
Once inside the city, I’m not sure what to do next. How long will we be here? Long enough to be hungry, that’s for sure. We ate the rest of our meat and cheese hours ago. Drank the rest of our water too. So I decide to find us some provisions.
I don’t want Callistina with me as I do that, so I settle on searching for temporary accommodations first.
Behind me, Callistina is ooohhing and ahhhhing about the grandeur all around us. “Look at that!” She keeps pointing things out to me like I’ve never seen it before. As if I wasn’t born here like every other god who rules the realms. “What are those buildings?”
I look at the tall towers. Seven of them in a circle around a massive fountain that spurts water three stories into the air. You can’t see the fountain from here, of course, but I remember it because the people in those buildings made me. My eyes scan up the side of building one, pausing at the top floor. I’m picturing the rooftop and what the city looks like from that vantage point because I have been on that roof and when I see it through Callistina’s eyes it’s glorious.
What a lie.
“They are the Sphere of Science and Glory buildings. They make… abominations in there.”
“Like me?” She whispers this over my shoulder, right into my ear, her soft words sending a prickle up my neck.
“Like me,” I growl back, ignoring all the feelings rushing through my body. Trying to, at least. It’s not just her, and the closeness of her, and the scent of her, and the touch of her—though none of that is helpful. It’s this whole city. I can feel the magic in the air. It’s like lightning, times a million. Sparks of it crackle though the breeze and swim around me, surrounding my body, bathing it in potential power.
Add in a few emotions and it would manifest into something. Something bad. It’s always bad. At least for me. Probably because the savage rage lingers inside me like a crouching tiger ready to attack.
I don’t think the humans feel it. They have no idea what they are fucking with when they create their little pets. When they arrange the genomes of their little beasts.
But the magic isn’t a part of them the way it’s part of me. And I guess, if I wasn’t bonded to it the way they aren’t, I wouldn’t much care about this feeling. If I thought that I could take the power without feeling the consequences—wield this power inside the safety of a crucible room—hell, I might do it too.
I might make a few beasts of my own. A whole army of them.
Slaves for days to wage wars for all eternity.
The Glory War. It was a time of suspicion, and lawlessness, and restructuring. Everyone lost power, then gained it again. Rules were made—too late—and then protocols were put in place to manage the mistakes that started the war.
Power was stripped, then passed on, then reorganized. It’s a cycle that has turned on the wheel four times now. Four Glory Ages. The Age of Breath, the Age of Wind, the Age of Earth, and the Age of Fire.
Then the Forgetting Time started.
I sigh, then spy a place that might do for accommodations. People are still staring at us, but this is a less than desirable ward in the city. They break the rules here, you can just tell. So we’ll probably get a pass on our own rule-skirting as long as we don’t fuck with anyone.
‘As long as they don’t fuck with me’ is a better way to say that. Because I am not in the mood to be provoked.