Chapter 102: When Escape Leads to Hell

It was another group of Renegades, and definitely not from the same camp as before.

“Well, look at that. A friendly little Renegade,” one of them said, grinning in a way that was anything but friendly. A blade gleamed in his hand.

“You guys gave me a scare,” Luke replied, trying to sound casual. “I just came to fill my canteen and, well, take a leak. I don’t like doing that near camp, you know? Feels awkward.”

Some of the men relaxed. A few weapons were lowered.

Whew.

But Luke knew. He was surrounded.

“Hey, friend, mind if I ask you something?” one of the Renegades said. “What did the sun say to the moon?”

…What?!

Luke froze.

Archers raised their bows again. Arrows began to glow. Mages whispered incantations, staffs flickering with latent energy.

“Well?” the man pressed. “What’s the answer?”

Luke swallowed hard.

“Uh… he said ‘Good morning’?”

The Renegade sighed and shook his head. “Wrong. The answer is, ‘Get your ass up and go to work, you son of a bitch!’”

And then, explosions.

Fireballs tore through the air. Luke dove and rolled across the dirt, scrambling back to his feet. A tree ahead of him exploded on impact, splinters flying like shrapnel. Arrows rained down. A few struck his back.

“FUCK!” he yelled, pain surging through him. He launched himself downhill, sliding over loose dirt.

“GET HIM!”

Voices. Footsteps. Closing fast. Too fast.

These bastards were trained. Paranoid as hell.

Luke used Dark Dash, vanishing and reappearing ahead in a blur of motion. Still, they were right behind him.

A flash. An arrow burst into light, blinding him for a second. Someone tackled him. They rolled in the dirt. The man raised a hammer. Luke kicked him in the chest and took off again.

Throwing knives zipped past him. One grazed his arm. He ducked, rolled, dodged. A stone orb landed in front of him and exploded in lightning.

“Shit!”

Spectral hands clawed out of thin air, slamming him into a tree. A mage’s conjuration.

Luke reacted by instinct. He flung a knife straight into the mage. It wasn’t a killing blow, but enough to break the spell. He broke free and ran again.

The forest swallowed him. Roots, rocks, mud. He ran like death itself was chasing him.

Then he stopped.

A cliff.

“Fucking hell, this place again?!”

Behind him, the enemy’s shouts echoed. Like an avalanche. The Renegades crashed through the trees, loosing arrow after arrow.

“WAIT!” Luke shouted, dismissing his kukris into the inventory. He raised his hands. “I’m not one of Bartholomew’s men. I’m just a newbie who arrived this year. I just want to go back to Earth, and I think Bartholomew knows where the mechanisms are, but he’s stalling!”

Silence fell like a blade.

The footsteps stopped. More warriors emerged from the forest, each one armed and ready. Luke tried to count. At least eighty. Maybe more. Archers with arrows drawn. Mages with fireballs hovering near their staves. Swordsmen with cold eyes.

Then someone walked between them. The group parted.

A man with a solid stance, dressed in militaristic clothes, a thick beard, dark hair streaked with gray. He was the only one not holding a weapon, but the way the others looked at him made it clear who was in charge.

“Well, isn’t it obvious?” he said in a calm, steady voice. “That false king is stealing even that from us.”

“You’re Marshall?” Luke asked, hands still raised.

“The one and only.”

Shit…

Without meaning to, Luke had stumbled upon the so-called Great Group the leaders always mentioned, the ones who traveled between camps carrying orders, supplies, and final decisions. And now, he stood face-to-face with the leader of the Renegades.

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Before him were soldiers of all kinds: men and women, young and old. But every one of them radiated the same hardened aura. A quiet, cold certainty in their eyes. They were ready to kill him at the first wrong move.

Luke didn’t flinch.

“I’ve spent days trying to find you,” he said. “And I’m not here looking for a fight. I just want to understand your side.”

Marshall stared at him with unwavering intensity but said nothing.

“Bartholomew tells everyone you’re the villains. Traitors. Murderers. But I’ve never been one to believe the version told by someone sitting on a throne. I prefer to see for myself. If you really do want to complete the mission and get out of here… then I want to help.”

Marshall took a slow breath.

“You know,” he began, his voice carrying through the trees, “years ago, I was one of fifty people who entered the fortress you now call Bastion.”

His gaze sharpened. He raised his hand, four fingers extended.

“Only four made it out. The rest died to the Midnight Wardens.” A heavy pause followed. The air seemed to hum with tension. “My brother was one of the dead.”

Luke felt the weight in his words.

“The survivors were me, a thief, Kruger, and Bartholomew. He landed the final blow on the monster. Took the item that keeps him on the throne now, at the cost of forty-six lives.”

Marshall turned and motioned behind him with a thumb.

“Everyone you see here? They’re the families of those forty-six. That’s how the Renegades were born. From the people who lost everything building that damned Bastion.”