Life and Death are Lovers on a Coffee Date

Chapter 26

Shen, Zarzaun, Higher Street Lake.

9:56]

"Excuse me, ma'am, is this Pantheousus?" I asked the beautiful lady,

"Yeah, you're not from here are you?" she asked, leaning in a bit, circling me as she gazed. With quick behind my back, I accidentally held out her hand quickly dropping them,

"I'm so sorry ma'am! I thought I felt something behind my back. Forgive me for intruding on your personal space." I bowed and bowed. This is my first time in Zarzaun and I don't want my first impression to be sullied with a bad reputation. Unexpectedly, she laughed loudly as she arched back hard, letting out a fit of laughter at the moment. I stood there awkwardly as the situation was new.

"You're a good fella, but you better keep the things you have here on watch but based on that occurrence, I guess not. What are you doing in Zarzaun anyway?" she asked leaning towards the trashed wall of what seemed to be a house, must be another one of their interesting architecture. Have to write that down later but for now,

"Ah! I'm finding the pit- "suddenly, her hand covered my mask before I could continue, muffling my voice in question.

"Don't talk about that in public, especially with the police enforcers all around." She removed her oil tasted gloves from my mouth as I ruffled through my bag showing a sign of request by a man named Sett,

"Follow me, we're going deeper in Zarzaun, and don't ever keep your eyes off of me, come on." Traversing through the streets as we went down, the surrounding land became rustier and metallic, filled with bystanders with ragged clothing staring at us, while resisting the temptation to wave a hand to the fellows, they seemed to stop as the lady gave them a kind of glare. Maybe one of body language or some sort of a wave? Writing that down in my notes later.

Going deeper and deeper the street became more exposed to sort of fluid and chemicals with children and adults playing fist fights, everyone seemed to be so good as they drew blood effects from their bodies, the steampunk engines can be seen anywhere too and more bystanders are on the side as they pull people into alleyways, as curious as I am, the lady keeps checking in on me as everyone eyed me like an eagle from a distance.

"Come." She then hollered me to a dark alley and then a bar, wasting no time, she went straight to the door just behind the bar. Pushing aside the curtains, a long hallway with stone pillars, lightened up with a few torches attached to them can be seen. A sort of distorted sound can be heard at the end of the tunnel.

"What is this place?" I asked, breaking the silence between us and the stone-cold hallway, only our footsteps resonating around the tunnel walls, but she was silent, speed-walking through the halls. As we go deeper into the tunnel, the distorted sound becomes more clear each step forward we take. It took me half a minute to realize the sound seemed to be a crowd and as the light grew brighter and brighter, there we were at an entrance of what seemed to be an arena.

I was met with two challengers fighting each other brutally and dirty, the sight of what seemed to be a bull hybrid towering over the lizard foe, the bull with the bat decorated with iron nails plunged his weapon into the lizard's body as he screamed in pain, his tail caught between the sole of the bull's feet and no longer can his body withstand such pressure and blood loss. He lost consciousness. The bull roared in victory while stepping on his unconscious foe. It was all too realistic for me, this isn't real right? I tried to cover my mouth so as to make no gasp escape against my will. A towering onlooker shifted in my direction realizing the lady I was supposedly following disappeared as I looked around frantically.