Chapter 156: You’re Leon Allistar

Leon stared. In all the places he had traveled, in all the things he had seen, he had never seen anything quite like it.

The thing was laughing. It was a low, slow, delighted laugh, and it rolled across the rooftops like thunder.

Above the machine’s left wrist, a small holographic map glowed in the air, and the giant was looking down at it, tapping the glowing screen with one claw.

"Eleven minutes and forty seconds," it said, in a voice that carried across the whole street. "Even I am impressed with myself."

A child began to cry somewhere nearby, and a door slammed shut.

Leon felt his muscles tighten. He did not know who this was, or why a giant steel monster had decided to hover over a quiet neighborhood in the capital of Berx.

But the feeling that had warned him inside the house had not faded. It was still there, buzzing at the back of his neck, and it was pointing directly at the thing in the sky.

He took half a step forward, putting his body between the giant and Iris.

"Adam..." Iris said.

Her voice was small. When he glanced back at her, her face had gone as white as paper, and her fingers were closed so tightly around the sleeve of his jacket that her knuckles had turned pale.

"No," she whispered. "No, no, no. It can’t be him."

"Iris." Leon kept his eyes on the giant and his voice low. "Who is that?"

Her fingers tightened on his sleeve.

"His name is Batnac," she said. "He is an S-rank player."

Leon said nothing, but something inside him went cold and very still.

"You know him?"

"Everyone knows him. Everyone in the west, at least." She swallowed.

"They call him the man who never leaves his chair. His talent lets him control machines, any machine that is close to him."

"Doors, cameras, lifts, transports, the gates at the hub. If it has a wire inside it, he can tell it what to do."

Leon looked at the two nozzles pouring white fumes behind the giant’s back. "He looks like a machine himself."

"His body is one, from the neck down. Some people say he lost his real body in a dungeon, and others say he built the new one himself. Nobody has ever been brave enough to ask him." Her voice trembled.

"I saw him once on a broadcast when I was younger. He stood on a platform for the whole interview, and he smiled the entire time. It was that same smile, and it never moved once."

"That is a very bad smile," Leon said.

"It is the worst smile I have ever seen."

’It is a wonderful smile,’ Medusa said, sounding delighted. ’A man has his face fixed on top of a machine and decides to keep grinning anyway. I like him.’

’You like everyone who is dangerous.’

’I like you, don’t I?’

Leon ignored that, because Iris was still talking.

"The Association keeps him on a long leash," she said.

"When something goes wrong in the west and nobody else can fix it, they call him."

Leon turned the words over in his head. An S-rank player had no reason to come to Aldreth on an ordinary morning.

There was no dungeon break, because the sirens were silent. There was no monster, because the sky was empty.

The only things on this street were some low houses, a handful of frightened neighbors, and a woman who sold nothing more dangerous than old books.

Which left only one thing that Leon did not like.

’He has not looked away from you since he arrived,’ Medusa said quietly. The amusement had gone out of her voice. ’Not once.’

’He is looking at the house.’

’He is looking at the man standing in front of the house.’

Leon did not answer. He told himself that it was a coincidence, because there were forty people on this street and every one of them was staring at the sky.

But Athena’s Blessing kept buzzing at the back of his neck like a hornet in a jar, and it refused to be talked out of anything.

Above the street, the giant had finally stopped laughing.

"Citizens of Aldreth!" The voice boomed out of the machine’s chest, so loud that a window on the far side of the road rattled in its frame.

"Please remain calm! This is an official matter of the Player Guild Association!"

Nobody remained calm. A man on the next porch dropped his cup and ran back inside, and a young woman scooped a toddler off the pavement and hurried down the road without looking back.

"You may return to your homes," Batnac said cheerfully. "You may also stay and watch, if you like. I will not stop you, but I will not be responsible for your laundry either."

The woman with the basket let it fall from her arm and fled.

"Now." The giant lifted his left wrist, and the little holographic map above it brightened. "So that nobody has any silly ideas, let us make one thing clear."

He snapped the fingers of one claw.

The air above the street shimmered. For a moment, Leon thought it was heat, but then the shimmer broke apart into hundreds of tiny silver discs, each one no larger than a coin, and every single one of them was floating in a wide ring above the road.

They hung at the height of the rooftops in perfect formation, and every lens on every disc was pointed down at the street.

A woman screamed. A man shouted something that Leon could not make out.

Leon kept his face calm, because the Mask of Many Faces did it for him. Inside, his stomach had dropped.

He had not noticed them. Even with his sharp senses, he had not noticed a single one.

’Two hundred and eleven,’ Medusa counted, in a flat voice. ’And I suspect there are more that you cannot see from here.’

’How long have they been there?’

’Since before you walked into the house, I imagine.’

"Well, would you look at that," Batnac said, with great satisfaction. "They are all so shy, and yet they are doing such a good job."

He lowered himself slowly toward the street. The roar of his thrusters dropped to a steady rumble, and the white fumes spread across the road in a cloud that tugged at the neighbors’ hair and clothes.

Eight metal arms swung gently at his sides. He stopped a few meters above the ground, well within shouting distance of the little house, and he turned his head from one side of the street to the other, like a man walking along a row of paintings.

The old man on the doorstep. The boy on the bicycle. A woman in a green coat. Leon felt the gaze land on him and stay there.

Batnac’s smile grew a little wider, which should not have been possible.

"Hello," he said.

Nobody answered.

"Hello?" Batnac tilted his head. "No one wants to ask me anything? I came all this way, and not one of you wants to ask who I am?"

The street was silent.

"How rude," he said, and the grin did not move. "Very well, I will ask the question for you. Do you know why I have come to this street?"

Still nobody spoke.

"Because there is a man standing in front of that little house with a very ordinary face," Batnac said, and he raised one metal claw and pointed it straight at Leon’s chest.

"And I have been looking for him for a very long time."

The air on the street seemed to stop moving.

Iris made a small sound, almost like a gasp, and her hand dropped from Leon’s sleeve.

"Do not be afraid, Leon Allistar," the giant said in a gentle voice. "I am not going to hurt you right away."

The words hit Leon like a fist.

He had heard that name spoken by strangers before, on a broadcast, in the middle of a crowd.

But this was different. This time it had been said to his face, in a clear voice, by a man who was looking directly at him, and the sound of it rolled down the street and into every open window.

"Leon Allistar?" someone whispered behind him.

"The killer?"

"The one who murdered his own father?"

Leon did not turn around. He kept his eyes on the giant, and he told himself that his face was calm, because the Mask would keep it that way.

He had to trust it. If it failed, there would be nothing else between him and the end of everything he had built.

Beside him, Iris was very still.

’Do you want me to turn him to stone?’ Medusa asked, almost cheerfully. ’I can do it in a heartbeat. I can do it in front of the whole street.’

’No.’

’It would be so quick.’

’There are drones on every side, there are neighbors in every window, and Iris is standing next to me.’ Leon’s thought was sharp.

’Spoilsport,’ Medusa muttered.

If he did something now, he would only he confirming Batnac’s accusation.

So he stood where he was, and he did the one thing that he could.

"I think you have made a mistake," Leon said.

His voice came out calm, with exactly the right amount of confusion. It was the voice of a man who had been mistaken for someone else on the street. He had practiced it a hundred times in front of the hotel mirror without ever expecting to need it.

"A mistake?" Batnac seemed genuinely delighted. "Oh, that is wonderful. Please say it again."

"My name is Adam," Leon said. "I am only visiting a friend."