Exploring The City 3

I close the window grimly, appreciating the XP despite the situation. We sit there in silence for a while, thinking everything through. I take another look at the ramshackle hodgepodge of buildings, now seeing everything in a new light. Cracks show through the materials used to build the small structures, betraying how they’ve been destroyed and rebuilt many times.

Nothing looks particularly well built, which makes sense. Why would they put in the effort to build something that looks nice or is well constructed, when they know that it’s going to be torn down again anyway? The people look just as sad and defeated as the space they live in. It’s an awful way to live, and it’s having a tangible effect on us.

Eventually, we manage to work through the emotions and process the stories. With a promise made amongst ourselves to do the best we can to help this place and make things better for all the people in the sanctuary, we raise our hands and exit the barrier. We go to a nearby convenience store within the station and get an ice cream for each of us, to help us feel better.

“Hah, you’re gay.” Mia jokes when she sees that I’ve chosen a Golden Gaytime ice cream. “We’re literally dating.” “That’s pretty gay.” I shake my head as she hands me her selection, a rainbow paddle pop. “See now that’s pretty gay.” I point out. “Yes, I’m pretty and I’m gay. Now buy your girlfriend an ice cream.” She demands. “Brat.” I pay for the ice creams at the counter and we all sit down on a bench to eat them.

After we finish our ice creams, we get back on the train, headed for our next destination: Hyde Park. We get off at the next stop from Central, Town Hall Station, and begin the short walk to the park. “This place has a strange beauty to it.” Ivy comments. “You find beauty in everything.” Skylar replies dryly. “There is beauty to be found everywhere if you look, my love.” “Touche.” Comes the response from the shadow mage.

We make it to the park quickly, and take in the sights first. The wonder with which Ivy looks at the soaring trees, the beautiful scenery, the peaceful artificial lake in the centre, the various statues and the Anzac memorial building, is adorable. I hope she never loses this sense of wonder and awe at the world. Her happiness is infectious and soon the rest of us are smiling and giggling along with her.

We walk around the park for a few minutes, enjoying the lush green sights and the sounds of various birds that have made their home among the trees of the iconic park. The fact that some of the trees don’t have leaves due to the season being winter, has no effect on how beautiful it is, and neither does it dampen Ivy’s enthusiasm in the slightest.

Once we’ve all had our fill of walking around and gazing at the park, we find a relatively secluded spot (more to do our best to be hidden from abyssals than because we need to stay out of sight of mundanes when entering or creating a barrier, Gaia makes sure that’s a non issue). We raise our hands and attempt to enter a barrier.

Immediately the lush trees and beautiful monuments are replaced with charred stumps and wrecked statues. The place isn’t completely destroyed, but it’s still an absolute war zone. I look around horrified for a split second, before I notice the explosions, yelling and fighting coming from a couple hundred metres down in the park.

We take cover behind a few felled trees and try to figure out what’s going on. The flashes of light, fire, explosions and various elemental attacks make it difficult to make out what’s happening, aside from the obvious fact that somebody is fighting. “We probably don’t want to get involved in this, but it might be to our benefit if we can figure out who’s fighting. Thoughts?” I propose to my guild.

“Let’s do it.” Skylar agrees. With nods from Mia and Ivy, I affirm the course of action. “Alright. Keep low to the ground, we try not to let anybody notice us. Anything you can do to like cloak us or something Skylar?” She shakes her head. “I’m not really skilled in that yet. Besides, it would only help at night.”

“Yeah fair enough. Stay quiet, stay low.” I remind them, before heading off myself. They follow my lead as I cover hop, staying low and moving fast. There probably isn’t a huge risk of any of them noticing us anyway, given how all the magic being thrown around obscures the view quite a bit. I’m moving confidently till I hear an angry hiss coming towards me. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing!?”

We turn to see a woman with a mass of red hair, wearing a dark red leather coat, a corset of the same colour, black leather pants, and a very annoyed expression on her face, storming towards us. “Belle? What’s going on?” I ask, holding my hands up in an attempt to show that we mean no harm.

“What’s going on is that you’re putting yourselves in a lot of danger right now, not to mention that you’re in my fucking way!” She says, marching straight up to me and staring me down. She’s almost as tall as Ivy, but the confidence and annoyance in her body language makes her seem much taller than she is.

Her presence is intimidating, and while I’m not as outmatched as I was the first time I met her, something tells me that she would still have no problem wiping the floor with all four of us. “I’m sorry, we didn’t mean to. Can you tell us what’s happening?” I ask calmly. She sighs and starts tapping her foot in annoyance. She gestures over to the people fighting.

“That is a pair of gangs duking it out for the prize of getting to claim this as their turf. I got rid of the gang who previously held it, and now these people think they’re entitled to it. These idiots haven’t noticed that I have control over the barrier now, and that they can’t escape. Once they’ve weakened each other enough…” Her expression turns into a vicious smile and she makes a throat cutting motion with her thumb.

“I’ve been watching you. I know you’re doing good work, but that does not give you the right to interfere with MY work. Keep your noses out of trouble and stay the fuck out of my way. Got it?” We all nod. The sheer strength of her magic radiates out of her for a moment, emphasising how much stronger than us she is. It would be a really stupid idea to argue with her.

Her expression softens ever so slightly. Not that she doesn’t still look like a hardened predator, wolfish, ready and eager to take down her prey. “Good. Now get out of here.” She orders. We raise our hands and leave the barrier, walking quickly through the park and back to the outskirts just to make sure we won’t get pulled in again.

“Well that was slightly terrifying.” I remark once we’re at a safe distance. “Am I the only one that got a bit turned on by that?” Mia asks. “No, but she’s still terrifying.” I giggle, while Skylar and Ivy laugh at the ridiculousness of the question. “She did seem concerned about our wellbeing though.” Ivy comments. “More concerned about her mission I’d say.” Skylar says. “Whatever the case, let’s not go back in there.” I affirm.

With that, we start the walk to Darling Harbour for our third major landmark of the day. On the way there, we periodically stop and try to enter barriers to check what the general situation is like in some of the less recognisable areas of the city. What we find is pretty sobering to say the least.

Of the two types of groups that we encounter, one of them is the large, poverty stricken groups of abyssals similar to the ones at Central station sanctuary. We do our best to balance asking questions about each area and moving quickly, so as to not waste too much time. Their stories are similar, albeit on a less grand scale: gang raids keep them poor and they don’t really have anywhere else to go.

We find that often people from these groups are **** as slaves too, a detail which the old man from the sanctuary hadn’t mentioned. The conversations are depressing and we try not to let them drag out too much. Through talking to these people, it’s pretty easy to get a decent idea of what life is like for most abyssals in the city.

The second type of group of abyssals that we encounter are the gangs. Each of them let us leave without a fight, mostly due to the fact that they never spotted us. As observe makes clear though, it seems like the more powerful gangs make their homes in the more well known landmarks, while the less powerful gangs make do with the random buildings strewn throughout the city. Of the three gangs we find, two are called “The Aussie Dogs”, which is a bit funny to me.