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Chapter 602: Darkness, My Old Friend

Altair paused after the opening, looking around at everyone else, until finally, Bastion

pounded the table impatiently.

"Goddammit, Altair. Lay it on us already. I\'m already committed to this thing!"

Stifled chuckles filled the room, and Altair obliged, continuing the story from where he had left off.

"The boy was unlike the rest in perhaps the simplest of ways, but he would have you know he was abandoned from birth for that difference - a defect at birth."

Altair sighed, perhaps channeling the emotion of that nameless child. The shadows moved, giving off a depressed feeling.

"I refer to him as the boy, for all his life he would be nameless, existing but leaving no evidence that he had ever done so. His verdict was a painful life, if a life at all. Some believed he would soon die, for the world was too cold and unforgiving for a deaf child to walk the earth. In such times, there were no methods to assist those born with defects, and they were seen as unfit regarding the Way of Ascension."

Ezra frowned while listening to the beginning of the tale. Unwittingly, she rubbed her shoulder and tensed, seeming slightly unnerved by the supposed treatment of the boy.

And Altair, he continued.

The shadows portrayed what he spoke.

"Defects were seen as a weakness in the ancient Age; perhaps that has changed now, but we know too little. During his youth, he was hidden, and darkness became his friend in that lightless chamber. Eventually, his eyes would hurt, erupting with excruciating pain whenever he would gaze upon light. A sublime torture that made him question everything: Why? Why did he have to be born? Why did he have to be hidden? Why could he not walk in the light? Existential questions that shaped his mind."

"Whoa... was he a bastard child that some royal family was ashamed of?" Nemean questioned, biting into a slice of juicy fruit. Flavors gushed in his mouth, and he slurped ravenously while equally enraptured by the tale.

"Nothing of the sort. The boy was ordinary, born to two commoners, some would even say paupers. The child was believed to be their ticket out of darkness, but the Land of Promise usually delivered empty promises."

Everyone remembered the Land of Promise; it was said to be the most robust Land in Xenith, home to the headquarters of many illustrious organizations, such as the War Deity Council. Its other name was Enira, and they spurned the weak.

Only promises amongst the strong, talented, or valuable were honored.

"Born to fools, the child too became a fool, believing the words of those operating from the shadows, worshiping the darkness - the Order of Ancient Umbra. How could you trust people who idolize dark things? Their macabre rites were inhumane. No one should endure that pain -the pain of having their eyes burned out and sealed with molten dark stones."

Everyone winced after hearing of what Altair endured during his Advancing, but Kieran\'s reaction was unlike the rest. His gaze deepened, and his presence intensified.

He suspected the Order of War and Flame couldn\'t be the only Order present during the Trial\'s time. If the Order of War and Flame had links to a Fiend, the Order of Ancient Umbra was where the source of Shadow Dancer was cultivated.

However... what was the proper form of a Shadow Dancer?

Meanwhile, Altair continued his tale while his shadow added unequivocal substance to his words.

"The child was offered to the Order after being promised to heal the boy. That would be the last day he saw his parents, and that would be their last day to walk the earth because the Order of Ancient Umbra operates from absolute secrecy. Those who peer upon the gates and don\'t join are to be forever silence - killed, if you didn\'t catch my drift. They are part of the negative unseen, skulking the lands outside the perception of many people. Using the Night to roam freely."

Kieran nodded.

That was likely where Altair\'s ability to traverse the Night was born from years of being trained, tortured, and groomed by that ancient Order.

"The initiation ritual is called the Darkening, where your world becomes forever black, and your eyes will never open again. You emerge a Sightless, bereft of physical sight, all in hopes of you awakening Nightsight or the Eyes of Darkness, using shadows to peer into the world from the Looming Night."

Kieran caught parallels in Altair\'s telling.

Whereas he had been Voiceless, unable to speak of the cruel misdeeds of the Flame, Altair became Sightless, deprived of two senses, sight and hearing. The disorientation he must have felt was nothing short of mind-numbing.

"Ascending the ranks of the Order was complex, and the mortality rate was absurd. Death was almost guaranteed. If not by the grueling tasks you\'re made to complete, by demented peers that want to trim the competition.

Altair leaned in, his expression darkened by the shadows moving fluidly over his facial features. It was an ominous and riveting sight to behold.

"But the boy was stranger than most. Unable to see or hear, he was perhaps the most pitiful and thus targeted the most and left for dead. His world was darkness, and his world became his only friend. His parents had hidden him from the world, keeping him in a dark place before shoving him into an even darker place. Darkness became his friend, and when he spoke... it somehow began to talk back."

The spectral presence that lingered in Altair\'s shadow.

Kieran had thought it to be an awakened ability, but perhaps it was something unique to the boy Altair role-played as. That presence was probably a figment of the boy\'s imagination designed to combat to crippling weaknesses he possessed.

A resourceful utilization of misfortune. Turning bad luck, adversity, and affliction into a source of power.

It took an absurd amount of willpower to perform that feat, but it also required a broken mind to be pieced back together while accommodating that imagined friend.

"Darkness became his eyes and ears, far better than his original could have ever been. He trained in the ways of lethality, shadowing, and silence. By the day he grew deadlier, colder... and satisfied with his only friend, he was free to view everyone else as an enemy."

Nemean and Bastion were hugging one another by this point, shivering from the invading chill of Altair\'s aura. It was bone-chilling, effortlessly piercing their bones and organs, but Altair was not weaponizing it, thus it dealt no harm.

Ezra rubbed her arms, attempting to warm up, and Alice... she was expressionless and silent, but her foot tapped underneath the table.

"When you are trained to maximize the darkness within, meld it with the darkness without, and hone your ability to assassinate without any precursor to your intent... killing comes easy. The thoughts that enter your mind become harrowing and heartless, and the Great Umbra starts to take over, darkening whatever is too soft."

Kieran arched his brow in question. "The Great Umbra, is that your Source?"

Altair nodded. "The Ancient Umbra, the greatest creature of darkness to have ever been born. They say a piece of it resides in each shadow, and it siphons power from those heedless

things."n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

"The story ends with that boy rising to the occasion, surviving the Night Crevasse, and entering the Temple of the Deathless to become a Night Traveler. I don\'t know any more of

his tale because at that point..."

Kieran and Altair\'s gaze met, and Kieran answered for him.

"You journeyed to me, and the Trial\'s events veered from how they truly happened."