5. Pathsight


    “Strictly speaking, there are a few more odds and ends I ought to apprise you of. Call it the basics of Wayfaring. However, I’d still prefer that you learn on the job. Go on, then. Head outside and see if you can’t make heads and tails out of this godsforsaken place.”


    Serac hastened to obey, mostly because she herself was getting antsy just standing in one place. Now that she was out of her cell, and now that the operator in charge of her Circlet was a ‘collaborator’ in the form of a powerful weapon, her entire world had expanded in size and scope. Time to see what the rest of the Damnatorium had to offer to a newly initiated and Karma-hungry Wayfarer.


    The first thing she noticed was the noise. The corridor outside the room-formerly-known-as-the-Pulverizer was still empty, but both its darkened ends echoed with forlorn wails and barked commands. The prison riot was still in full swing, which Serac could only assume would be to her benefit.


    “Which way should I go?”


    “As much as I’d love nothing more than to hold your hand through every step of our journey, I’m now paired to your soul, and therefore limited in my perception. Your guess is as good as mine, but I’m sure you’re perfectly capable of making your own decisions and living with their consequences.”


    I see Trippy is every bit as snarky as Mr Voice. Serac smirked, both for her own benefit and Trippy’s, then set about making some decisions. She had her choice of which end of the corridor to investigate, and it took no time for her to decide on the one that led away from her erstwhile jail cell. The road less traveled—and therefore the one that offered new possibilities.


    She made her way down the narrow passageway, one in which the surfaces formed a continuous floor-wall-ceiling—a pleated tube, not unlike the inside of an intestine. It even smelled like intestines too, and Serac was eager to pick up the pace and move onto a more pleasant area of the Damnatorium, if such a thing existed.


    As she progressed, the ambient commotion picked up in volume and intensity, until one of its participants jumped out of the shadows to bar her way. They took the form of an emaciated figure in tattered rags, complete with soiled yet distinctly red skin as well as a pair of onyx horns in varying states of deterioration. A Rakshasa like herself. One of her inmates, perhaps?


    But… something was amiss. The way they pitched and swerved from side to side in an irregular pattern. The peculiar angles at which their joints bent and shuddered with every lurching step. And perhaps most disturbing of all, their eyes—or the yawning red holes where their eyes should’ve been.


    “Perfect. Ready your arms, Wayfarer. It’s time to resume your education.”


    “Wait, you want me to, um, smite that? Shouldn’t we try to help them instead? They look like they might be sick!”


    An audible sigh.


    “You could try, if you wish. I won’t stop you. Like I said, the best lessons are learned the hard—”


    But Trippy needed not finish his sentence to have his point made for him. For that was when the newcomer lurched close enough to Serac to then lunge at her in one go, fingers spread and claws bared.


    “Whoa!”


    Once again, instinct guided the Wayfarer as she sidestepped the sudden attack. Beside her, the would-be bear-hugger grabbed a whole lot of foul-smelling air before blundering into a crevice between the pleats of the intestine.


    Serac then took advantage of her counterpart’s mishap to… sprint to safety, eating up a chunk of Stamina as she did. Even with two brand new weapons at her disposal, and even against a fellow inmate that looked even worse for wear than herself, she couldn’t quite overcome her meek prisoner mentality.


    An audible tsk.


    “A pathetic display, but it’s just as well, seeing as how it’s given me the opportunity to talk you through this fight. And you will fight, now that you’ve seen what this thing tried to do to you. Besides, why let a perfectly good source of Karma go to waste?”


    “But… what’s wrong with them? Can’t they see that I’m not one of the Jailers? That I mean them no harm?”


    “That doesn’t sound all that convincing, what with that gun in your hand. As to why this Penitent is behaving the way it is, you might find the answer written plainly upon Pathsight. Take a look.”


    Pathsight? Was that the name for these messages from nowhere that populated Serac’s vision? She looked, and sure enough, found a full red bar hovering over the other Rakshasa’s head, just as the latter managed to pull themselves out of the pleated wall. This one was labeled rather ominously: [Frenzied Penitent].


    Even before Serac could give word to her thoughts, Trippy came back with an explanation, “Indeed, Pathsight is the catch-all moniker for the ‘system’ that was devised by a Deity some Kalpas ago, long before either of our times. Prior to the advent of the system, discerning the flow of Karma and therefore determining the appropriate dispositions of souls used to be an inexact art—more madness than method. At some point, even the Devas got sick of all the extra work and decided to streamline the process, in a manner of speaking. In any case, it’s thanks to Pathsight that a Wayfarer such as yourself can interact at a metaphysical level with the world around you—and perhaps more importantly, with yourself. I trust you’ve already taken ample notice of your own HP bar?”


    “That’s the red one, right? The one that hasn’t filled back up since Porky took off about a half of it?”


    “Given what you observed during the fight with the Jailer, I’m sure you can put two and two together. Hit Points are the numerical representation of the robustness of your physical form. Lose all of them, and you’re reduced to Souldust, forced to relinquish any Liminal Karma you’ve yet to internalize and to await reconstitution at the nearest Waystation. Just so you’re aware, your current total is 252/577. A couple of ill-defended hits would take you out, so do be careful.”


    “Wait, I can lose my Karma?” Serac cried out in dismay, thinking back to the strenuous efforts with which she’d earned her current batch. “That… seems like an overly harsh penalty, doesn’t it?”


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    (Harsher than death itself, though?)


    “If you have complaints, take it up with the Deity that first designed the system. There is a way to recover your lost Karma, but I’m hoping for that particular lesson to materialize in a more organic—look out!”


    The ‘Frenzied Penitent’ came for Serac again, along with an oddly strangled shout that sounded more animal than Rakshasa. Their movements were identical to their previous attack, however, and Serac easily sidestepped it again with plenty of Stamina to spare.


    “Let’s see how well you multi-task. Heed well my instructions and try not to embarrass me by dying to this pathetic excuse for a creature. Now, give your focus to REVOLVER. Then tell me if you’ve noticed something new on Pathsight.”


    “Something new? What do you—oh.”


    A new set of numbers. One that appeared to almost ‘wrap around’ her right forearm, becoming clearer and more prominent as her conscious thoughts attuned to the gun in her hand: [3|30].


    “That’s your Cartridge, the proprietary resource consumed by REVOLVER. Every Instrument is tied to a unique resource type, and REVOLVER’s happens to be Cartridge. The left number indicates how many bullets are currently loaded in the cylinder, and the right number is your spare ammunition.”


    “Spare? But I don’t have any—oh.”


    As soon as Serac gave thought to the concept of spare ammunition, she became aware of the belt around her Penitent’s rags, one that definitely hadn’t been there when she’d still been a lowly prisoner.


    It was of a sturdy (and spike-less) leather construction, much cleaner and more fashionable than the one Porky had used as a DIY weapon. A number (presumably 30, just a wild guess) of brass-cased cartridges lined the circumference of the belt, within easy reach of a Wayfarer who might be interested in reloading her firearm, should the need arise.


    “Right now, however, three bullets should be more than enough. Go on, Wayfarer. Give this Frenzied Penitent a divine taste of lead.”


    Jeez, this Trippy is a bit of an edgelord on top of being a snarker, huh. But the Penitent in question had come for her again, with the singular tenacity of a prisoner suffering through their prescribed punishment. The sight of her fellow Rakshasa, thus reduced to a mindless husk, woke in Serac a violent impulse of her own. An impulse, not to destroy, but to save.


    Aim. Lock. Fire. The fundamentals of marksmanship—oddly enough the only part of Serac’s new existence that she took to without hesitation, almost like second nature. The bullet found its mark, as she knew it would, spraying more decayed flesh from the Penitent’s body.


    [128!]. At the same time, their HP bar went down by nearly half. But the Penitent showed no signs of stopping, nor even of having felt any pain.


    “Again!”


    Serac stood her ground and fired a second time. [128!]. The Penitent’s HP went down by another large chunk, leaving behind just a thin sliver of red. Still, they kept coming, bloodied hands reaching for Serac’s throat, the hollows where eyes used to be pointed squarely on the object of their unknowable hunger.


    “One more!”


    Serac fired a third time, now at point-blank range. By then, the Penitent’s hands had nearly reached her, and indeed, one of the claws even grazed against her cheek. But this third and final hit of [128!] had finally reduced their HP to nothing, and the claw stopped short of drawing blood, as it and the rest of the Penitent’s ‘physical form’ dissolved into Souldust.


    Serac stood her ground and watched it all happen, with her own intact eyes still aligned with REVOLVER’s sights. She watched, expressionless, until the last particle of her fallen foe’s soul faded into thin air.


    That was how a newly initiated Wayfarer learned—the hard way—that not every instance of ‘smiting’ was created equal.


    When Serac had dealt the finishing blow to Porky the Jailer, she’d felt one part surprise, one part confusion, and a massive dose of relief (and maybe even a drop of genuine satisfaction). Now, however, as she killed (let’s call it what it was) a fellow Rakshasan inmate she knew neither the face nor name of, the foremost emotion was that of sorrow.


    For she knew that this ‘Frenzied Peninent’ could easily have been her. Perhaps in another life. Or perhaps in this very one, had a sentient six-shooter not fallen into her hand.


    Somewhere along the edges of Serac’s consciousness, Pathsight diligently displayed the practical outcome of a Wayfarer’s latest kill. [80 ?]. A pitifully small number compared to the hulking Jailers that had driven this prisoner to frenzy. This number joined Serac’s previous total, indicating that she now had [380 ?] of ‘Liminal Karma’.


    More questions flowed into Serac’s mind, but she didn’t voice them immediately. Trippy, for his part, also remained silent, perhaps sensing and acquiescing to the source of his mentee’s somber mood. In the end, Serac was the first to break the silence.


    “What happens to souls when we die?”


    “I should think that you already know the answer. As should all sentients who roam the slopes of Mount Meru.”


    “Teach me, please. I just need to learn it again… the easy way, this time.”


    “… Very well. When our physical forms perish, we become Souldust, to be resorbed into the Interstitium that fills the metaphysical spaces left behind by the physical world. Then, depending on the soul’s status, one of three things can happen.


    “Most souls are firmly Anchored. After enough time has passed, they’ll simply reincarnate in the same Realm where they died. Then they’ll have another opportunity to see if they might improve their lot in the afterlife.


    “Some souls, as you’ve recently discovered, are Wayfarers. They’re monitored by Pathsight, and provided they’ve met the conditions for it, may ascend to a higher Realm upon reincarnation. You, Serac Edin, are still a long way off from even thinking about ascension, but when the time comes, you can count on me to guide you through it.


    “Still others, by the whims of the larger universe that none of us—not even the Devas—fully understand, will be Reborn into the mundane—an entirely new plane of existence. No one knows for sure what happens to these souls on the other side of Rebirth, but suffice to say, they would’ve shed all memories of the Kalpas they’d spent toiling in the afterlife.”


    Serac found herself frowning, absent-mindedly and without really knowing why. As far as she could tell, Trippy had been generous and sincere with his summary, and yet, something about it caught against memories that might or might not have belonged solely to her. One of three outcomes? Really? Wasn’t there also a—


    Serac shook her head, dispelling a thought that was as unsettling in its implication as it was murky in its origin. She quickly changed tack, “That Penitent I just killed—”


    “Smited.”


    “Killed. Do you think… they’ll ever find a way out of this shithole? If not in their next life, then maybe the one after that? And if not in that one, then maybe…”


    Her words trailed off, along with any thread of coherent thought. Even Trippy, at least for a moment, seemed lost in contemplation. When he spoke again, his words, as characteristically stoic as they were, nevertheless contained within them a touch of unexpected warmth.


    “Back where I come from, there’s an old saying: the Ksanas are long, but the Kalpas are short. I suggest, Wayfarer, that you take this journey one Ksana at a time. Keep your focus on the present and the immediate task at hand, lest you lose yourself to time’s great and indifferent scourge. And I suggest also that you reload your weapon. The cylinder should’ve emptied by now, and you’ll need more ammunition for what’s about to come.”