Chapter 86: This place

Malum laughed to his heart’s content before he began speaking again. “Oh, Riven. It has been declared that if you want to be his disciple then you must take first place in the recruitment process that will properly screen up to two thousand people.”

Riven stiffened. His heart began to beat fast. “And if I can’t win first place?”

Malum shrugged. “Then you can’t be his disciple. Those in power hold higher standards. You are then free to do whatever you want. Join the Faceless Ones? Go into the Shadowwood to hunt? Anything. The Lord already anticipated something like that, so he recommended that you enter the Faceless Ones even if you don’t take first place.

“They are powerful organizations and will sponsor you.”

Riven sat back down. His heart began to beat fast. He realized that the Faceless Lord, while setting the task, did not have high hopes that he would take first place.

Riven frowned. ’…I want to be the most powerful. Then shouldn’t that mean that I should take first in everything?…’

He nodded firmly. “Very well. I will take first place.”

Malum pretended to yawn. “That’s good and all, but you have a problem.”

“What’s that?” Riven asked.

“You can’t win the number one spot. It’s impossible to do so as you are. One of the requirements for joining is that you must be either rank two or three. So it’s safe to say that a rank three will take the first spot.”

Riven sat back. “I’m not a rank three.”

Malum shook his head. “No, you are not. But then, that’s what we are going to take care of.”

Riven raised his brows. “How?”

“The requirement is going to start in three months. I want you to forget about everything else and just focus on what’s in front of you. We are going to deal with the problems later. You want to save the damsel in distress? Then you will have to do it while you have the power needed.”

Riven scowled. “I’m not…”

“You want revenge? Then we will give it to you. I mean, the Faceless Ones have the power to give you that, but only if you are worthy of taking it. And you are already under the attention of a lot of people. Joining the Faceless will give you shelter. At the very least, somewhere to hide.”

“Then the three months…?”

Malum seemed to smile, and Riven felt it through the bandage on his face. It must be a sinister smile. He shivered.

“For the three months, I will be the one to train you. Let me tell you, boy, at the end you’ll either be dead or you’ll be a rank three. But there’s also the option of you turning into a cripple or entering a state of half-dead.”

Riven flinched. The way that Malum said it, he knew it wasn’t a joke. He might really end up like that. But he took a deep breath because he had come to realize that only those who take risks can take power.

Riven forced his shoulder into a shrug. “Alright. I accept.”

Malum clapped. He seemed strangely happy. “You can trust me on this, Riven. The training will be hellish.”

The whale turned away from the Faceless city and began to fly toward the west, before slowing down and dipping to the ground.

They climbed down, and Malum returned his monster back to his face. “We are here.”

Riven looked around at the “here,” but he was only surrounded by broken buildings and trees growing on hard ground. “Where?”

Malum shook his head. “You’ll see. Follow me, Riven.”

With that, he picked his way into the first building in front of him and stepped inside. Riven shrugged his shoulders and followed him into the building.

The building was desolate, the stone cracked and everything else rotted.

He walked to the middle where Malum had stopped. The man pulled his bandages apart and revealed the eyes that were only a red gap.

He reached inside and brought out a chain. But the chain was different. On it, enchanted words were written, and they glowed a soft silver.

He laid it on the ground and then looped it around, curling the chain on its head until the two heads were touching. Then he whispered some words. A light appeared in the middle of the chain and expanded into a full portal.

“We will be going through this to the training ground. You should count yourself lucky. This was one of the training grounds that my master used when he was growing.”

Malum reached into his face again and pulled out an undead monster that looked like an overgrown cat, the size of a man.

“It will guard this place till we return in three months. Come, Riven. Leave your troubles away and focus only on power.”

Riven took a deep breath and did just that. He shed away all the reasons and motivation that he’d given himself and thought of only one thing. ’…I’m going to train and gain power because it is power…’

Then he stepped forward and into the portal.

After Malum stepped through, the portal closed and Riven found himself underground. He looked around. The ground wasn’t made of rock but some kind of black material.

The wall was of the same material, same as the roof. There was nothing else except for the far corner, where a pool of milky white rippled gently. “Where is this place?”

Malum crouched and knocked on the ground. “Some time ago, a whole city was wiped away because of a disaster. With that many bodies, they couldn’t even bury them all.

“But they had an idea. They called the most powerful necromancer they could find, and he turned all the bodies into undead. Then he gave them power relics and had them work on their burial ground.

“They hollowed out a mountain, and then lots of them fell in one after the other. A city’s worth of dead. They filled the mountain up, and then, with the necromancer done, they returned into their death state.”

Riven shivered. “This place.”

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