Anvil stared at the body for a long moment before the quiet but unmistakable sound of glass breaking reached his ears, along with white mist flowing out of the stump of the imposter's neck. Immediately after the sound dissipated, the body crumbled into a pile of glass.
Soon, footsteps could be heard approaching him, and an old man poked his head around the room, scanning it, before his brown eyes landed on Anvil and drifted down to the pile of glass in front of him. Jest frowned deeply as he stepped over it and into the forge, his gaze landing back on Anvil.
"Are you going to explain what happened?"
Anvil stared at the glass pile for a moment longer before his gray eyes met Jest's brown ones.
"It was one of the others."
"Who was it?"
"It was you,"
Jest raised an eyebrow.
"How did you know it wasn't me?"
Anvil sighed and set his hammer down as Jest stepped over the glass pile, walked in, and stood beside him.
"Many things, for starters, he was using his right hand instead of his left, and he didn't ask if I wanted to hear a joke, nor did he tell a terrible joke at any point."
Jest nodded as he stared at the pile of glass with a frown.
"Well, that makes sense considering I'm left-handed…. No, wait a damn minute, hang on! What do you mean by a terrible joke?! All my jokes are great! It seems like every legacy is as stiff as a board, has the personality of a rock, and has terrible communication skills! My jokes aren't terrible; it's that none of you kids have any sense of humor, that's all!"
Anvil ignored his outburst and continued.
"That brings me to the next indicator that it wasn't really you. He told me he didn't like jokes and wasn't good at making them either. If he realized his mistake, he didn't show it."
Jest was silent for a long time as he tapped his cane on the ground, his eyebrows knitted together as he was deep in thought.
"Do you think it was that boy again? Do you think he was trying to pose as me like you suspected in your room three weeks ago?"
Anvil shook his head.
"No, I don't. Because the other Jest brought up the conversation we had three weeks ago, there are no reflections in my room, along with soundproof memories. There was no way for Mordret to hear us, unless he hid behind one of our eyes. Even if it was him, what would his plan be? No matter what rank his aspect is, the boy is merely a saint. Even if I were to lose my domain, he could not kill me as he is unable to wield will."
Wiping the sweat from his forehead, Anvil frowned deeply as he glared at the glass pile with contempt in his cold, steel-gray eyes and continued to speak.
"That means the other Jest had to have been roaming around fake Bastion with people acknowledging his existence and interacting with him for days. Which, in turn, made him stronger and more sentient. So much so that he could almost perfectly replicate your personality, so that no one would be able to tell that it truly wasn't you. That is, unless the other Jest stood in front of a reflection or if he made an error, as he did with me."
Jest frowned, but eventually nodded.
"That's a solid theory, but we shouldn't rule out that it wasn't that kid. He can make supreme reflections, after all, as he did with you when he attacked in the throne room a month ago. Besides, for all we know, he could be the entire damn population of this place."
Anvil shook his head again, tore his harsh gaze away from the glass pile, and met Jest's stare again.
"It doesn't matter what rank his reflections are; they lack will. Otherwise, Mordret would have gone for me instead of Morgan and you, which is why I said he cannot kill me. Besides, no matter how mad he is, the boy wouldn't make such a careless mistake by saying he doesn't like jokes while pretending to be you."
Jest nodded with a grimace.
"You might be right, and I hate it, because if you are…."
Anvil nodded with a dark expression, already knowing what he was going to say.
"Then it would mean the others have escaped."
Jest smacked his cane on the floor with an irritated expression.
"First, the skinwalker was trying to infiltrate Bastion for the past four years and almost succeeded multiple times. Then your son recently infiltrated Bastion and took gods know how many knights as his vessels right under our noses and attacked us in the throne room. It was likely to keep us distracted from something."
" Now, the dreamspawn is spreading his name. And to add icing to the cake, there's the possibility that the others have truly escaped and are roaming around in Bastion as we speak. Oh, and the cherry on top? For all we know, some of them could have made it towards the gateway inside the castle of the false Bastion and into the waking world. Do you think that boy let them out?"
Anvil brought a sword from the mountain of weapons. It hovered in front of his face as he observed it with a neutral expression.
"Perhaps,"
The situation wasn't ideal, n fact, it was terrible. The only way to tell if someone was one of the others is if they attacked someone unprovoked or if a knight spotted someone without a reflection. Even then, it would be a gamble because there was no way to know how strong it was, given that the others had no rank or class.
Jest rolled his eyes and pointed his cane at the glass pile by the door.
"Well, at least this one seemed to be low in rank, considering how easily you killed it. Wait, hang on, do these things even have a rank? You know a lot more about them than I do because of how many times you went into the great mirror in the castle of fake Bastion."
Anvil shook his head.
"No, they don't have a rank because they are made from nothingness, and Nothingness is neither divine nor profane. They can be as weak as mundane or as strong as a great nightmare creature or greater."
Jest threw his hands up.
"Well, that's wonderful,"
Anvil stared at him for a moment.
"No, it isn't."
Jest stared back at him for a long time, clearly wondering if Anvil was being serious or not. Once Jest realized that he was, he sighed and shook his head.
"Never mind that, are you afraid of who you might see if what you said turns out to be true?"
Anvil was silent for a long time.
If the others truly did escape from this place, then who would he see? His brother Madoc? His late wife Gywn? Would Anvil see his father? Broken Sword? Heaven? They were here in their youth when they were all in the same cohort. How would Nephis react if she saw her parents, whom she thought were dead for most of her life, only to find out that they were reflections of them?
What about Uncle Jest? How would he react if he saw his dead wife? After all, she was here once in her youth as well, and being here once was all this place needed to create a reflection of someone.
No matter how much Anvil tried to harden his heart and bury his emotions, the thought of seeing them again weighed on his mind, and he felt something stir in his heart. It was something that he hadn't felt in decades since he gained this curse, the spell called a flaw. It was something he wouldn't acknowledge, something he refused to acknowledge. He couldn't allow it to surface; he wouldn't allow it to. And so Anvil of Valor met Jest's eyes with a hard stare.
"No, I'm not."
Jest stared at him for a long time before shaking his head with a sigh.
"Then you're a damn fool. You can lie to me all you want, but don't lie to yourself. I don't care what you say about supreme beings having to be confident. You and I both know that you're afraid."
Anvil didn't meet his gaze and walked away from him to the window and stared at the shattered moon as he buried whatever emotions he was feeling at the moment before turning around to face the old man.
"Go find Morgan and make sure no one leaves Bastion and enters the waking world, including Saints. There will be no exceptions for anyone, not even you. Keep an eye on the people around you whenever you are near any reflections. Do not speak to anyone other than Morgan or me unless you are sure they are human. If you see that someone lacks a reflection, kill them. Do not hesitate, no matter who it is."
Jest stared at him for long time.
"Will you also follow that last rule?"
Anvil didn't respond, making Jest sigh.
"That's what I thought. Anyway, do you wanna hear a joke?"
"No,"
Jest grinned.
"Alright, what did the- no, no wait, I got it. Why did the bicycle fall over?"
Anvil turned away.
"Silence,"
Jest burst out laughing as he ignored Anvil.
"Because it was two tired! You get it? Two tired?"
"You're not funny,"
Jest frowned and waved him away.
"Bah! I'll find someone who enjoys my jokes eventually, I just know it. I heard one of Ki Song's girls likes to tell jokes; she would definitely enjoy them. In fact, I know she would, considering that the kid's true name is Comedic Timing."
Jest paused as his expression became serious, making Anvil raise an eyebrow.
"What?"
The old man was silent for a long time before suddenly grinning.
"Do you think she's my long-lost grandkid?"
The corner of Anvil's lips twitched momentarily.
"Go,"
"Come on, work with me, boy! I might be onto something here!"
…
"Two days, two days we've been here, and yet it somehow feels like we've been here for months, mostly because I'm already sick of this place.
"Well, I certainly don't miss the terrible weather in Ravenheart, but I do find myself missing Seishan more than I thought I would. And before you say anything, yes, I know I'm incapable of truly holding love for her or anyone else for that matter, but there's nothing wrong with trying, is there?"
Receiving no response, the beautiful man smiled.
"You know, other than the pathetic creature that calls me brother and shares my face and that divine woman I met in my first nightmare. I realized that Seishan is the only other person in both worlds who loves me. She loves me despite knowing I can't love her back, and I will never know why that is, but I do know that if I felt love again, it would certainly be for her."
Mordret took off his uniform, leaving him in a black shirt, ran his hand through his raven black hair, walked towards the kitchen, and pulled a spare chair to sit at the dinner table.
"I know, it's surprising, isn't it? Hearing such things from a creature like myself? It would seem very out of character to anyone who knew me on a surface level. Well, believe it or not, I can be emotionally vulnerable when I want to, even though I don't have all my emotions. Surprising, right?"
He was met with more silence before nodding with a chuckle.
"Yes, I agree, I can surprise myself sometimes. Hmm? Oh, why am I telling you all of this? Well, if I told you that, then I'd have to kill you."
Mordret glanced at the several lifeless bodies that had various stab wounds, missing fingernails, and gouged-out eyes. He smiled pleasantly as the white mist continuously flowed from their bodies and towards him.
"You all are very good listeners. It's not often that I can voice my thoughts without being interrupted. Anyway, before any of you say anything, yes, I know I'm not affected by the weather in Ravenheart because I'm a saint."
"Well, I suppose the weather isn't all that bad, I mean, sure, the sun is out most of the time, but unfortunately, it is perpetually cloudy, and it really brings my mood down, you know? I'm just glad it hasn't been snowing over the past four months. But never mind all of that, I must ask, where does nothing come from? What happened to the last two great-
Mordret stopped mid-sentence when he heard a window shatter from the front of the house.
He slowly stood up, grabbed his previously discarded kitchen knife, and used the sleeve of one of the corpses to wipe off the blood, and walked past the dead pet dog that lay on the ground with a knife in its stomach as white mist flowed out of it.
He made his way to the front of the house, where he was met by a young woman who had already climbed through the broken window and stood there, staring at him with dead eyes and an emotionless expression.
It seemed like the castellan had finally caught him. Eerily enough, the young woman smiled.
"Who said anything about a Castellan, boy?"
I'm back again, sorry for the wait. It seems like burnout is getting to me. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the chapter. :)