Liberi Reader

Out in the open wilderness, sand rides along with the wind, bringing with it a salty, finny smell.

Sunlight pokes through gaps in the dark clouds, while long-dry riverbeds boast only a few bushes and shrubs.

Some rustling among them proves that this so-called wasteland is not completely devoid of life.

The young man pulls out a rope and ties together a few planks. Once done, he steps atop them and takes a leap.

All of a sudden, the wastes come to an end. A great cliff has sundered the earth.

As he looks down, Isidro sees a pallid white sea.

With all his strength, he climbs down the cliff. Once he touches down onto the pale 'sea', he reaches down and sticks a hand into the bone-dry 'seawater'.

There is no water here. There is only pale salt, studded with countless skeletons. The remains of whatever unlucky creatures were swallowed up by this place.

But the only thing on his mind is that somewhere, in some nook or cranny he cannot see, there is something flowing, rushing.

He stops sliding on his makeshift sandboard and reaches for the sword at his waist.

The ground beneath his feet shudders slightly, and the layer of salt slowly subsides around him.

The trembling intensifies as an indentation in the salty ground approaches him at high speed.

A gigantic beast breaches the salt, catching him off guard. Its sail-like dorsal fin looms overhead, and its pointed, armored snout is shaped like a colossal lance.

It barrels into him, and he is thrown off his feet. His organs feel like they are being rearranged as he arcs through the air, before he slams into the ground and blacks out.

As his consciousness fades, he sees the giant finbeast dive back into the salt, leaving no trace in its wake.

A gust blows past a pile of salt and dust, revealing two motionless legs sticking out from beneath it.

The girl sifts through the man's wallet, finding only a few silver reales alongside some foreign coins and a meal voucher with 'Rhodes Island Cafeteria Soup Ticket' written on it.

At the bottom of the wallet, a glimmering gold coin catches her eye.

She reaches down to grab it, flipping it a few times as she retracts her hand.

On one side, there is a circle split by a horizontal line. On the other, an inverted triangle.

The moment she hears a sword being drawn, she knows it is too late to run. She looks behind her, her body trembling as her muscles refuse to move an inch.

A cleric of the Inquisition walks towards her, his handcannon and rapier decorated with ghastly bleached bones, a deep contrast to the usual solemnity and grace of his colleagues.

All in Iberia know the sheriff's name, but also know how close to madness his mind runs. None dare call him by it to his face. Behind his back, they only ever call him by his title:

'The Alguacil'.

The unreasonable, unfeeling, uncaring Alguacil. The Alguacil that inlays his weapons with the bones of criminals as a warning.

The Alguacil that will chase a criminal to the ends of Terra and back.

The Alguacil's rapier sweeps across her face, but before it presses against her neck, a black sword swoops in from behind, knocking aside its point.

A golden liquid drips from the black sword's edge, sizzling as it eats away at the salt on the ground, an acrid scent spreading from the splash.

Isidro pats down his body. In the depths of his pocket, he feels something small yet hard.

An irregularly-shaped piece of metal. At first glance, it looks like detritus from a factory, but careful examination reveals the fine alchemical symbols etched all across it.

The layers of rust on it appear to have once been some kind of liquid, but even so, it shows a gleaming luster under the sunlight.

The Alguacil turns his rapier toward Isidro, his severe expression shifting towards quizzical.

Isidro considers saying something, but the Alguacil's rapier is already pressing against his throat.

The Alguacil pulls back his sword as he shifts his center of gravity forward. The blade in his hand spins once before coming down in a brutal chop.

Isidro's intuition as a swordsman tells him that this man is a lunatic. Not even the most unorthodox of fighters would wield a rapier in such a crude manner.

The cold gleam of the blade's edge flashes past his eyes. With an instinctual flick of his wrist, he blocks the savage blow.

A rapier is not made for slicing. Isidro laughs inwardly. Brandishing it like that will only cause it to snap.

But then comes a brittle screech of shattering metal, and he sees it is his own sword that has snapped in two.

Half his fractured sword is stuck point-down into the salty soil. Blood drips down his cheek.

The Alguacil casually brushes aside the rock the girl threw at him. The second he does so, Isidro runs off to gain some distance.

As he runs, he senses familiar vibrations coursing through the layer of salt underfoot. The pain in his jumbled organs crawls up his nerves once more.

The Alguacil's footsteps approach him as the chase continues. Isidro's mind races. He grits his teeth, and without looking back, he sets his sights on a giant skeleton in the distance poking out of the salt.

As he runs from the man hounding him, Isidro holds his broken sword high, doing his utmost to fend off the Alguacil's attacks.

He looks behind his pursuer and sees the layer of salt subside, a familiar furrow appearing on the ground once more.

The Alguacil stops. He too has sensed the vibrations.

Before the words have finished leaving his mouth, the colossal finbeast breaches the ground in front of him, sending its prey flying.

As he flies through the air, the man's limbs splay out like a ragdoll. After a moment of soaring, his graceful arc through the sky comes to an end as he meets the ground.

A puff of salty dirt wafts through the air as the sound of his landing echoes through the dry air.

He has not fallen on the most comfortable spot in the Salt Flat. A sharp bone spur has pierced his body. His blood trickles down the skeleton, staining the pale salt below red.

The girl senses the underground vibrations closing in on them once more. A towering dorsal fin breaks through the salt and sand, rapidly approaching them.

She gawks at him incredulously, but he looks back with steely certainty.

The cloud of salt and dust swallows up the fleeing townsfolk as they scream in fear.

Soon after, a colossal saltfin parts the cloud, revealing two people riding on its back, one in front of the other. The young man in front pats the saltfin as he extracts a broken sword from its body.

The saltfin digs into the salt crust with its pectoral fins, giving the man a resentful glare before it departs.

He pays no mind to it, instead meeting the townsfolk's fearful gazes as he approaches them.

Between bursts of vomit, the girl stuffs the badge back into her bag.

A wayward glance shows Isidro a dozen or so of the Alguacil's belongings within bag, alongside a few bottles of his own popper potions.

He is not entirely sure when she took them off him.

As he voices his doubts, he hears a clattering of footsteps behind him. He turns to see the entire street devoid of people.

As he sweeps his eyes across the street, doors and windows slam shut one after the other in raucous cacophony.

The scent of dried blood upon a sharp bone spur has drawn all sorts of small, bloodthirsty beasts. They cannot stop themselves from crawling towards the gruesome wound.

First come insects bearing wings, landing upon his chin, crawling across his pale lips, then his cheek, before finally stopping atop his eyelids.

Just as they are about to enjoy their meal, the man's eyelashes begin to twitch.

The man slowly pulls himself off the skeleton, the bone barbs and hooks tearing at his flesh as he does.

But he does not tremble in pain. Not even once.

Anastasio walks deeper into the Salt Flat. Behind him, the beasts hungrily paw at his trail of blood.