TBATE| The Walking Catastrophe

Chapter 8 - Half-human

"Welcome esteemed ascender!" Said an armored man who stepped forwards to greet me. 

I took a half-step backward, nearly falling into the absent portal behind me.

I lifted my hand up and pointed a finger at myself asking, "Me?"

In response, the guard nodded enthusiastically.

"While you're on the younger side, no one else could have come from that portal other than an ascender who has completed an ascent," he said, practically beaming from under his armor.

"Allow us to lead you to a rest stop, while we prepare your tempus warp," another guard said more gruffly.

I nodded slightly, then looked down at my still bloodstained clothes.

My shirt was utterly ruined and my hair was still caked with both dried and fresh blood as if the time in the last two rooms was nothing more than a few minutes.

"After you," I mumbled weakly.

Now that I was outside and my fight or flight response was dwindling, I was beginning to feel the mental strain of fighting for my life for nearly 2 whole days.

I begrudgingly followed the guards and I noticed that they kept nervously glancing back at me occasionally. When we reached the little rest stop, which seemed to be an entire hotel meant for ascenders to stay, the enthusiastic guard spoke up.

"I hate to ask you this...since you've obviously just lost your teammates, but would you please hand over your ring so we can inspect for relics?"

I nodded and handed my ring to the man.

"I didn't manage to get anything, and that Trident is my father's weapon," I said, melancholically thinking of my best friends' deaths upon their sudden mention.

After pulling everything out of the ring, the upbeat guard, who was no longer as preppy as before, solemnly nodded and handed me my ring back.

"I'm truly sorry for your loss Mr..." his voice trailed off.

"Aurelius. Aquamarine Aurelius," I replied.

The guard quickly fixed his posture and raised a hand to his helmet, "I will inform highlord Aurelius of your survival immediately!"

Then, the guards shuffled away in a half sprint, off to somewhere I couldn't see.

I wondered how the guard already knew to inform my father.

'Maybe word has already got out about the prelim gone wrong?' I thought as I dejectedly walked into the top-of-the-line hotel.

I mindlessly wandered through the hotel not even bothering to speak to anyone as I simply held up the note that the guard had given me on the walk over.

As I made it to my room I walked over to the washroom, flicking the switch to turn on the lights.

I began to remove my revolting red clothes as I sat down in the shower/bath. When I turned it on, I was met with converging streams of blissfully warm water that seemed to hit me in just the right places. I felt some of my anxiety disappear as I lay in the bath, contemplating my first ascent.

While I wanted nothing more than to get home and never go on another ascent again, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I couldn't help but be drawn to the relictombs. Despite the fact that it was utter hell to go through, and I'd lost 3 of my best friends in the process, I couldn't help but figure I would end up there again.

I knew ascenders had a word for this phenomenon, but the name had completely slipped my mind. I wondered how word about my survival had already gotten out. No one had ever died in a school-affiliated prelim before, so I was sure in a few days' time, word would spread of my lucky survival. But only the school should have realized that something was wrong by now.