Abyssal Awakening

"Unfortunately, as this is his work, our blacksmiths… lack the talents needed to repair this. It\'s not that the material is hard to get. But rather, their understanding of the inner workings of a device, like this one, is lacking compared to Lord Lothian. If they were to try, there\'s a greater risk that they break the device than repair it." He admitted as Alice nodded her head.

"So I\'m guessing I can\'t have this fixed them."

"Sadly no."

Taking the gloves back, Alice examined the mechanism and sighed out. She was regretting that she had held on so stubbornly and now risked breaking this weapon that Allura had gifted her.

"Is there perhaps anything else I can help you with instead?" The City Lord offered but Alice shook her head.

"I don\'t have anything on my mind right now." Picking up her teacup, she continued to sip the mead while waiting for Ria to arrive.

Not even 2 minutes later, there was a knock on the door as the City Lord gestured for them to bring Ria into the room.

As she entered, Ria was worried that Alice was in some trouble and yet saw her drinking mead from a tea cup while the City Lord sat opposite her.

"So… the guards didn\'t tell me what\'s going on. Did something happen?" Ria asked with a slight frown while sitting next to Alice.

"I want to employ your friend, Alice, to help with the clean up of the slums. There\'s been an outbreak of something unknown that Alice has some prior knowledge of.

I\'m hoping that with this knowledge and her assistance, we can resolve this issue as soon as possible so I can relieve the city of Martial Law." The City Lord summarised as Ria understood that he must\'ve wanted her to sign a Law of Agreement.

"He gave me a Law of Agreement and I wanted you to make sure everything is okay with it first. I\'m not too educated on this kind of stuff anyways." Alice shrugged while pouring herself another cup. At this point, she had gone through most of her bottle.

"I see… Alright, let me have a read."

Skimming through the contents of the Agreement, Ria was surprised how lax the conditions were and all it required from Alice was for her to provide information and assistance where she can.

A small price depending on what Alice asked for a reward.

"And have you figured out what kind of reward you want?"

"Nope. I wanted to ask for a flask similar to what your grandfather has but it seems pretty common so I changed my mind. Then apparently my glove was made by someone called Lord Lothian and his blacksmiths don\'t have the talent to fix it. And now I dunno what I want." Alice explained bluntly.

Widening her eyes, Ria didn\'t expect Alice to be this blunt regarding the blacksmiths.

Turning to the City Lord, she could see that he was still stone faced. Despite his slightly talkative nature at this moment, his expressions didn\'t fluctuate whatsoever.

"Well… the conditions seem fine. If you want to do it, you can. It\'s not like we can get out of this city before the Martial Law is lifted anyways." Ria shrugged as they had two choices right now.

They can help out the City Lord and get a reward out of it. Or, they could reject this and spend the next few days going to the gambling arena and earning some gold.

Tapping her chin, Alice decided to accept the commission and made a small cut on her finger.

Pressing her finger print down on the page, a familiar feeling washed over her as a connection was formed.

"Now that the agreement has been accepted, please let my secretary lead you around for now while I deal with the rest of the people in the hall. I will join you shortly." The City Lord nodded as he stored the Law of Agreement away for safe keeping.

"Ah before you go, what do I call you? Do I call you City Lord, your lordship? Or something else?" Alice asked curiously since she didn\'t know the City Lord\'s name.

"You can just call me Kallus." He replied as he stood up and adjusted his suit before stepping out the door.

Entering after him, was a woman with short dark greyish blue hair and a pair of cold eyes. Like Kallus, she wore a suit.

"Pleasure to meet you, I\'m Elyn. Please follow me as our first stop will be the autopsy room. Our doctors are still examining some of the samples that we have recovered from the Slums. Please take care when you touch the sample, even if you are wearing the protective clothing that you\'re given once you arrive." She bowed slightly as Alice nodded her head and finished her cup of mead.

Jumping off the sofa, she grabbed her bottle and started to drink the rest of it.

Raising an eyebrow in slight concern, Elyn decided to not say a word. If the City Lord has not said anything regarding her drinking then it was not her place to do so.

Guiding Alice and Ria through the castle, she made her way down a flight of stairs surrounded by guards.

Every guard here had a minimum of three Sigils while a few had four.

"So how did you know about what happened?" Ria asked curiously as she didn\'t expect the City Lord to employ Alice\'s help.

"Just something I ran into in the past. I already told the City Lord that my knowledge is a bit outdated but he said any lead is fine." Alice shrugged.

Before Ria could reply, Elyn pushed open the door and a pungent smell immediately assaulted their senses.

Even Alice, who was prepared for this smell, visibly recoiled back as she covered her nose with her sleeves.

"There will be protective clothing in the changing rooms, please get changed. I will wait outside of the changing room once I have gotten changed myself." Elyn gestured to a set of doors as Alice nodded her head.

Stepping through, she could see several outfits of varying sizes hung up on the walls. Taking the set that seems to be roughly her size, Alice scrutinised the design and sighed softly as it was similar to what the scholars would always wear when operating on her body.

The outfit was a plain white and covered the entire body while paired with a set of gloves, some safety glasses and a mask.

Putting everything on, only Alice\'s eyes could be seen while everything else was hidden under the outfit.

"When we get in, just stand to the side if you can since I don\'t know how the new parasites would react. They might blow up, they might not." Alice warned.

"I\'m guessing I just punch anything dangerous that pops out?"

"I mean… You could do that but I wouldn\'t recommend it. If I\'m being honest I just don\'t want to be alone in there." Alice sighed.

Hearing this, Ria had a wide smile on her face as she jogged over and hugged Alice.

"Fufufu~ Of course I\'ll keep you company in there. Just let me know if there\'s anything you want me to help out with, okay?"

"Mnm."

Making her way out, she could see Elyn waiting by the side, already suited up with her own protective clothing.

Without saying anything else, she made her way down the hall while Ria and Alice followed behind.

Even though the mask helped with the smell, it was still present and got worse the further they walked.

"Try not to scream once we get in." Elyn reminded as she pushed open the last set of doors, revealing an operating room with several tables placed in the centre of the room.

On the table were corpses of several half beasts with their chests opened up.

Several doctors could be seen surrounding a few of the corpses while trying to examine the aftermath of the strange mutation.

Making her way to a table without any doctors, Elyn grabbed a tray of tools and placed it next to the operating table.

"If you have any questions please let me know and I will answer to the best of my knowledge. If you would like someone else to operate on the sample and you just observe, that can be arranged as well."

"It\'s fine, I\'ll handle it." Alice reassured as she didn\'t need to be delicate on the subject. After all, they\'re already dead.

The subject she was working on was an old man that was mutated beyond recognition. A strange white rubbery material acted as his skin while his facial features have been completely smoothed out with the exception of the eyeholes.

On his back, several cavities can be seen where he started to rot from the inside out.

Turning him around, Alice narrowed her eyes at the wound and plunged her hand in without hesitation.

Feeling the flesh, it was akin to a chunky mess as the flesh couldn\'t hold itself together.

\'The effects seem to be far worse than what happened to me. He\'s literally been turned to sludge inside his body.\' Alice thought to herself as she grabbed a knife and started to cut away at the body.

Seeing Alice carve away at the corpse so casually without any reaction, Ria couldn\'t help but applaud in her mind as just the sight of it was enough to make her want to throw up her breakfast.

Prying the body open so that she could get a closer look at the damage done on the inside, Alice noticed strange strands within the body.

Pulling them out, observed in silence as a theory started to form in her mind.

The original goal for these parasites were to \'copy\' her ability to resist the Abyss and make a medicine that could be sold to Hunters. From what she was seeing here, it seems like they were now a step closer as the body had become a cocoon that was concocting \'medicine\' within the body.

But rather than medicine, it was better to call it a poison as it doubled down on the corrosive reaction.

\'What are they planning…\' Alice frowned as she noticed something else within the body.

Digging through the flesh, she discovered a strange material that was being cultivated around the heart.