The horses and wagons disappeared as soon as they left the main road. Those who did not take the tunnel and set off on the long mountain ascent did so only for want of any other possibility, their stomachs knotted. Faces were filthy, hollowed by misery and hunger. The wretches walked in silence along what was no more than a badly marked path, stumbling over the stones and filth littering the ground. One had to be either the most miserable being in the world to embark on such madness, or a pariah of the Celestial power. The former, recognisable by their furtive gaze, were wary of the yellow eyes with which thieves of every kind watched them.
Though many among them did not possess a single gold piece, bodies were the object of the greatest greed, those of children whose tender flesh was roasted on spits, or those of adults who could serve as slaves. Teeth, kidneys, hearts, and many other organs were sold for their weight in gold on the black market. Physical integrity was all that remained to many, the most precious possession of all. Only death could put an end to the resistance of the victims, for they had nothing left to lose but life.
And yet that was not what affected Darok's spirits, he being delighted to venture off the beaten track. He trotted joyfully ahead, while Helios sought the slightest excuse to tear up a few tufts of grass with his teeth, wholly unaware of the covetousness he aroused. As the sole representative of the equine race, many would have liked to exploit his back to make him carry heavy loads, or cut him into pieces to eat his meat. Melio, who also risked ending up in the cooking pot, had understood that perfectly well and had taken refuge in his master's arms.
"I'm hungry!" Hichy declared shortly after they set out.
"So am I," his sister replied. "It drives me mad to be constantly dragged back to this need to feed myself. It weighs us down and makes us completely dependent on the resources around us. Sometimes I'd like to be able to swallow a pill and no longer feel hunger, and devote myself to something else, like not having to put up with my brother's whining for example."
"I'd like to eat a good big rare steak," the brother said, and the mental image of that chunk of dead animal only gave him an even greater appetite.
They were not the only ones in that situation, and the struggle for access to the scarce foodstuffs promised to be fierce. Hichy and Inata no longer possessed the slightest scrap of provisions, and crossing that mountain barrier might take them weeks. Fortunately, they at least had enough to drink at will, Inata having developed a technique for drawing water from the ambient air. If the humidity rate had been zero, they would have died with their mouths completely dried out. But by continuously drawing enough to make a little trickle of water run down their throats, they could use their power in perfect discretion.
"It's still stupid to have to drag ourselves miserably over the ground when we could be taking huge leaps," Hichy said.
"You know perfectly well that we would be spotted immediately," the twin replied.
"And yet that sign says they don't care about us anymore."
"What sign?"
"The one over there," he said, pointing to a large board raised at least ten switchbacks higher, one that only his cat vision allowed him to read.
"You are leaving the zone of protection of the Celestial Force," Inata read.
They walked for another hour before reaching the sign, near which many camps had formed.
"People gather their strength and stop here for the night before facing the worst," explained an old woman with a toothless mouth and a pig nose. "After that, it's hell. I already passed through it in my youth with my parents, and I lost two of my brothers there."
"Is there really no more control?" Hichy asked, his enthusiasm standing in diametrical contrast to the general gloom.
"None at all. It's a lawless zone where you can kill your neighbour without having anything to fear from the Celestial force."
"And yet our point systems are still active," his sister remarked. "Will they stay that way?"
"Of course! Otherwise, how would you go on existing?" the old woman asked, as though it were obvious. "Have you ever seen anyone live without the augmentation system? It's impossible."
"And yet..." the brother began before interrupting himself as Inata jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow.
Since the sun was declining, the twins decided to do like everyone else and make camp for the night. They spent their last gold pieces on a loaf of stale bread and a piece of cheese whose smell was far closer to rat droppings than to milk.
HP = 1, AP = 0, XP = 0, GP = 0
If Melio managed to sniff out a scrawny little field mouse, it was Darok who drew most of their pity. The poor animal was literally dying of hunger, which did nothing to diminish his joy but was beginning to alter his gaze. If the pressure in his stomach grew more intense, he would become once again the bloodthirsty wolf that had attacked them, not by choice, but by survival instinct.
"I hadn't thought of it before, but we're going to have a big problem," Hichy said, taking off his socks and massaging his feet.
"What is it?" his sister asked.
"Melio can leap as far and as high as we can. Besides, he's light, and we can carry him in our arms. But how are we supposed to manage with Darok and Helios if we want to make use of our powers?"
"That's true, but we can't abandon them. In that case, we have only one solution left: mix our DNA with theirs the way we did with Melio."
"Cool! I'd love to have wolf powers. But as for Helios..."
"Donkeys are not any stupider than other animals!" Inata snapped. "I'm sure we'll find extraordinary abilities in his DNA."
Hidden from sight behind a large rock, the three animals and the two human adolescents pressed brow against brow. Helios did not quite understand what was happening, but he was happy to be part of the group. He let out little cries of pleasure as he watched his friends.
The twins had to join their strengths in order to cross the barrier between species and merge their deoxyribonucleic acid on so large a scale. The mixing lasted far longer than the first time, and when they had finished, Hichy staggered as he straightened up.
"What?! What are you laughing like that for?" he asked his sister.
"Your ears."
"What's wrong with my ears?" Hichy asked in alarm. "Don't tell me that..."
"Yes! You've got two lovely donkey ears."
"And yet I can't feel anything," he said, running a hand over them. "Do you think..."
"Admit it, I really got you there! If you could have seen your face! You don't need to mix your DNA to be a donkey every day."
"You, the worst little pest I know!"
While they were bickering, Helios watched them with a reproving look. Something had changed in his gaze, and there was something of the old sage in his eyes. Exhausted, the band lay down directly on the ground, huddled against one another to fight the cold that had grown sharper with the altitude.
When they woke, they found that most of the other travellers had left at dawn in order to try to pass unnoticed. They crossed the invisible barrier separating them from civilisation, freed from the weight of the Celestial forces' permanent control. They barely had time to launch themselves into the air before they perceived the attack being prepared against them. Wolves can scent other animals from miles away, and those bandits poorly hidden behind the rocks were not going to surprise them. They advanced innocently, pretending to have seen nothing, like prey too trusting to realise it was about to be devoured.
Four burly men swooped down on them as they passed between the big blocks of stone, brandishing carefully sharpened butcher knives. The twins disarmed them with a single glance and leapt aside to avoid the impact. If Melio was used to performing pirouettes in the air, Darok and Helios discovered their new extraordinary abilities with delight.
The twins landed a little farther off and came back toward their attackers to take them from the rear. Confronting such masses of muscle and nerves was certainly extremely impressive, but all the strength in the world is useless when your bones are broken. It took only a gesture of the hand from the two adolescents to shatter the brigands' shins, and they collapsed to the ground howling.
"You don't have the right!" the chief protested.
"And you do, perhaps, to attack us?" Inata asked.
"We didn't want to hurt you," added another, "just tease you a bit."
"Great idea!" Hichy cried. "Let's tease them a little in return. What shall we start with? Make their eyes explode?"
No atrocity justifies another atrocity, and the twins put an end to their threats by demanding the complete and unconditional surrender of their opponents. They seized their provisions, which included a large piece of dried meat that the wolf devoured with great snaps of his jaws. Then they abandoned the four mastiffs to their sad fate.
HP = 2, AP = 2, XP = 4, GP = 0
"They certainly stole that food from some poor defenceless souls," Inata pointed out. "By stealing what they stole, we're stealing from them."
"Didn't you learn to avoid repetition in your essays? Golock insisted a lot on that during his lessons. In any case, how do you expect us to find those people? They're surely already dead, and one person's loss is another's gain," he said, biting into a nice juicy apple. "I can't wait to meet our next opponents."
"This isn't a game! Am I the only one who thinks it's wrong to take what doesn't belong to us, even from a brigand?"
Neither the wolf, nor the donkey, nor the cat, nor the boy replied. Delighted and proud of themselves, they wished only to keep going farther and higher, hoping their next enemies would be less disappointing than those they had just faced.
"You boys are unbelievable!" the young woman sighed. "You think of nothing but fighting."
"You broke their bones too," Hichy pointed out.
"Yes, but in a non-violent way."