Chapter 6: The Will to Stand Up and Fight
Cliff
CLIFF trudged down the road to Shoulder Coast Station, dragging his heavy feet with each step. The horror he had only just encountered replayed vividly in his head and sent his stomach roiling. He could’ve been killed—brutally murdered with a sledgehammer or torn to pieces by a demented Stone Golem. His chest squeezed just at the memory of it, suffocating him.
Dread and fear bit at his heels, feeding an all-consuming need to get as far away as physically possible—even if it meant abandoning Gandolf.
“Cliff, hurry up and run away!”
Lovel’s words haunted him. He had done just what she said.
“I’m saying you’re in the way without Gandolf!”
She was right. The Golem he had devoted the better chunk of his childhood to creating was annihilated without a fight.
Who was he kidding? He wasn’t even the one who activated Gandolf. When he actually stopped to think about it, he and Lovel were from completely different worlds. Even worse, the boy he called master and friend had turned into a totally different person in the span of a single week.
I was stupid to think I could join their fight… Cliff convinced himself he wasn’t needed. He shoved his hands in his pants pockets and trudged on.
The point of contention—the red cube—jostled inside his right pocket. He had stashed it there the second Ouka showed up. Every time his fingertips brushed its smooth surface, his heart screamed at him. Traitor, coward, it seemed to say with each thud.
After his long, weary trek, he finally arrived at the station he made his home. He stopped on the platform above ground and stared at the stairs descending underneath.
Until just three days ago, he had lived a relatively carefree life in this underground station. Though poor, he peacefully pursued his dreams. Sure, he might’ve half given up on that dream, thinking it’d never come to fruition. Sure, he might’ve lived a boring life using his dream as an excuse, pretending he was content with the way things were.
But what’s wrong with that? He descended the steps pondering his life decisions.
Somebody called out to him when he reached the bottom of the staircase.
“You’re late, street rat.”
Startled, Cliff jerked his head up. Two evil-looking men loomed in the badly lit underground station.
It’s the Rabbis! Cliff instinctually made a run for it. But they caught hold of his arm before he made it up the stairs and yanked him back down.
“Where’d that little girl go?!” a Rabbi snapped at him.
“D-Dunno…” Cliff barely managed to answer.
“He says he doesn’t know. How do we deal with him?”
“I heard he used an Illegal Golem.” The Rabbis nodded to each other.
“You’re coming with us, street rat,” one told him. “We’ll hear what you have to say for yourself at the Church.”
Cliff gasped. Golem Artificers apprehended by the Church would never be able to obtain a Golem Manufacturer license again. If that happened, his dream would be lost to him forever!
“Stop it! Let me go!” He jolted into action and smacked the Rabbi’s hands off him.
Infuriated by the unexpected resistance, the two Rabbis drilled into him with their livid glares.
“You have some nerve to raise your hand against the Rabbis!”
Both Rabbis threw punches at him faster than they finished their curses.
“Guagh!”
Their heavy fists sank deep into Cliff’s gut. He involuntarily buckled over, spit flying from his mouth. The Rabbis followed up their punches with sharp kicks to his sides. Pain coursed from every part of his body. In a haze, even the hopeless thought, if I pass out here, the pain will go away, occurred to him.
Then the Rabbis’ assault abruptly stopped.
“…?” Cliff warily lifted his head from the ground. One of the Rabbis had fallen to his knees. The second, bewildered Rabbi was taken down by several small shadows.
“URAAAAAAHH!” roared the pack of shadows—the street children who called the station home—as they hurled punches at the Rabbis.
“You guys?!” Cliff cried out as he clamored to his feet.
The street children looked down at the Rabbis with contempt and spat accusations at them.
“Oi, Rabbi scum, yer the ones with some nerve!”
“Don’t ya go all wild doin’ whatever the hell you want in our lair!”
“Did y’think we were just figurines decoratin’ the station?! Quit the crap!”
But the Rabbis scrambled to their feet and drew their quarterstaffs from their belt. The street children’s faces stiffened, a reflex reaction seared into them from the beatings Rabbis had given them over the years.
“You accursed street filth…! We’ll toss you all in jail!” one of the Rabbis bellowed, raising his staff overhead.
In that same second, a lighthearted voice suddenly came from atop the staircase. “Okay, that’s far enough.”
Cliff turned around in his pain to find Ouka standing there.
The other Rabbi raised his voice in surprise. “Torah Officer Ouka Baraki!”
“I have a message from Torah Lord Spinoza. Let that boy off the hook.” His statement took not only Cliff but the two Rabbis by surprise.
“Why should we?!” one of them stubbornly protested.
Ouka calmly clarified, “We’ve apprehended the girl Lovel. Spinoza and the others are in the process of questioning her. We’ve discovered that boy there is unrelated to the case, so he’s been acquitted.”
“But he’s still guilty of the Illegal Golem charge—”
“I told you to back down, now do it.” He gave them a pointed look, his eyes gleaming with fierce intensity. The Rabbis reluctantly acquiesced and grudgingly ascended the stairs together, leaving Ouka behind.
“…What’s going on?” Cliff asked him.
“I made a deal with Lovel. In return for her dutiful cooperation with our investigation, we’ll overlook your crimes.”
Cliff’s eyes opened wider than saucers. “No way. Lovel did that for me?”
“Basically, you’re just an outsider who got pulled into a big mess. Accordin’ to her, she’s the one who imbued that Golem with the Engrave Incantations, yeah? What happened to it?”
“It’s probably been…destroyed.”
“That’s perfect then.”
Ouka’s choice of words pissed Cliff off. “That’s perfect?! How could you say that?!”
“That Golem was showin’ signs of going berserk soon. Though you probably didn’t realize it.”