Out of the Fire, Into the Crucible

Pain.

There’s a mass in my chest, fighting against every breath I take. My skin feels flayed, hung against a biting, cold breeze. I can’t stop shivering.

The world fades in and out as I try to catch a grip of my consciousness, but I can’t tell what is going on. First there’s emptiness, a void that stretches to a firmament of clouds and twinkling stars. The sun hangs in the distance, flaring, dimming, fragmenting, light diffracting in rainbow auras.

Someone floats in the endless firmament, a lady with hair as freshly cut lumber, a tattered cloak of leaves and fur, eyes of shining silver. She floats closer, embracing us with her gentle presence. I hear her voice in my mind.

“I’m sorry. You arrive at a tragic time.

“Beware the eyepatched man.”

Then darkness, a hard surface, stone, asphalt? Steps echo, ghostly silhouettes gather around us.

I missed the moment when Kim vanished from my grasp.

A cold liquid washes over my back, biting, though the discomfort lasts for only a moment before vanishing along with most of the pain. My head rests on a soft pillow.

Someone is leaning over me. Kim? Her delicate features remind me of her, but her hair color doesn’t match, a dark red leaning towards violet or purple. I focus on her, captivated by her beauty, eager to open my eyes.

And slowly, my body finally starts to respond. First my fingers twitch at my commands, then my arm rouses and slides over the ground, feeling the grooves where stone tiles fit against each other. My chest remains tight, lungs aching, so I breathe in deeply and try to relax.

But the air scrapes my throat and I lurch on my side, coughing violently enough that I taste bile on my tongue. I claw the floor, trying to get a grip on myself. Once again, gentle hands rest on my back, rubbing, patiently reassuring.

I turn to the person comforting me. Her hair really is a reddish, dark purple, not unlike that of wine, framing a delicate, pale face. Dark spots hang from her rose-colored eyes, and her small lips are turned with worry.

My first thought is that she must be a nurse, though she is wearing an earthy brown robe with an unfamiliar symbol, like an arrow tied into a bundle with flowers and herbs, embroidered in yellow on her chest. Somehow, it reminds me of a clerical habit, a priestess of an unfamiliar religion.

“It’s okay,” she tells me in a soft voice. “You are fine.”

“Kim,” I blurt out between coughs. “Is she okay?”

The priestess looks away for a moment. “She is unconscious, but she seems okay.” She then leans in and wraps her arms around my shoulder, pulling me up. “More importantly, you cannot remain here. Can you stand?”

But my body feels tremendously heavy, too heavy for me, and too heavy for her. I barely move, but take the chance to look around.

I am on a stone platform in the middle of a wide, circular room. Each surface, floors, walls and ceiling are all tiled stone, with wooden pillars and beams holding up the structure. There are no windows, yet the space is well illuminated thanks to chandeliers hanging around the circumference of the room, but most notably by a shining, crystalline stalactite pointing down from the very center of the ceiling, which has been housed by a vaulted dome right above my head. Lenses hang from brass arms around the gemstone, focusing and refracting its green-golden glow around the place. It reminds me of an observatory of sorts, though I don’t remember there being any in town.

There are also other people here, about a dozen other priests and priestess judging by the identical robes they’re all wearing. I rake my brain, trying to remember if I had seen the style around the café’s street before, or if we were neighbours with a cosplay shop where they might’ve come from, but come up completely blank.

“Where… even is this?” I wonder aloud, though my voice is a bit raspy and weak. “And who are you?”

But before the priestess can answer, I notice Kim by her golden hair, lying unconscious a little distance away on the stone pedestal, surrounded by a couple other nuns. “Kim…!” I blurt out, though it catches in my throat with a fit of coughing. I take a tentative step towards her, but stumble, with only the steady grasp of the priestess on my shoulder keeping me up.

“She is fine,” the priestess reassures me, though pulls on my arm somewhat insistently, trying to drag me away from the platform. “More importantly, you have burns on your back. I’ve applied a healing salve but please follow me to a room where you can rest-”

“Are you done down here?!” calls a loud voice, a man’s, echoing from the vaulted ceiling. The priestess freezes. I hear footsteps and turn my head to spot the only entrance to the room, a simple doorway with stairs spiralling upwards.

A different group of about a dozen more people are entering the room, though in contrast to the clerics already present, each of them looks like a display from a military museum. Their forearms, legs and chest are dressed in steel, with dark red, twin-tailed coats over their armor that flow down to the backs of their knees. Sabres and what seem to be old pistols hang from their belts. Most wear helmets with visors hiding the face, seeming as modernized knights stuck somewhere between the medieval era of full-plated warriors and the sharply uniformed, gunfighting soldiers that substituted them in later eras.

I can only stare, entranced by their presence, the details of their armor and arms like a child watching figures from fairy tales and history books come to life. Add them to the clerics attending to us, and this awe-inspiring room with a grand-vaulted ceiling decorated in brass and crystal, and there is no way I would not consider a certain possibility, as implausible as my reason might consider it.

Have Kim and I been transported to another world? Have we been summoned to play the part of acclaimed and respected heroes?

The knights approach, stepping onto the central platform with us. The one in the lead is the only one not wearing a helmet, a warrior of tall stature, unruly white hair, and an eyepatch covering his left eye. Unlike the other knights, he carries a spear with a curved blade at its tip casually resting on his shoulder.

“Let’s see here,” he says, stepping towards the priestess and I. “Who do you have there, sister?”

“...an outworlder,” the priestess responds, her voice small.

I stand a bit taller despite the lingering heaviness of my body. “My name is Leo,” I say. “Sorry, but may I ask what is going-?”

The man suddenly grabs my jaw, interrupting me, forcing my head aside as if inspecting me. I try to pull myself away from his grasp reflexively, yet he forcefully holds me still until he finishes. “This one’s injured,” he comments.

“Yes, though that was beyond our control,” the priestess quickly explains. “But I’ve assessed that the injuries are treatable, so there is no need to be concerned.”

“Okay,” he states, finally letting go of me.

“Ack, there was no need for that!” I blurt out, rubbing my sore jaw, though my pride feels the most wounded.

But the man doesn’t even seem to listen, already stepping towards Kim. The nuns looking after her quickly scamper out of his way, and I don’t fail to notice the fear in their eyes. “How about this one?” he asks, prodding her shoulder with the butt of his spear.

“Hey, watch it!” I protest, taking a small but defiant step forward. The priestess holding me yelps, pulling me back.

The next moment, I’m staring at the tip of the man’s spear, its fine edge hovering mere fractions of a distance from my face. He glares at me, and the glint of his red eye makes my blood run cold.

“Watch your tone,” he calmly warns me. “I’d like both of you outworlders, but could afford to kill one, if motivated.”

Overwhelmed by everything, I had forgotten the warning I got from the lady in the void, which now burns vividly in my mind.

Beware the eyepatched man.

It’s not like I am a complete stranger to violence; fits of anger between children, the physical struggles of sports, even faceoffs against bullies and troublemakers, I’ve had my fair share of threats and physical violence.

But a true threat, one aimed squarely and unmistakably at my life, I now find is quite a bit different. Like most people, I had dared to be cautiously optimistic of my chances in such a situation, picturing the clever things I might say or the daring tactics I might display to turn things around.

Instead, all I manage to do is raise my hands defensively, gulping down the knot in my throat. “H-hey sir,” I hesitantly say, choosing my words carefully, “I’m not a threat to anyone.”

And Eyepatch simply… smirks. He can see past my crumbling veneer of confidence and savor the fear beneath, and for it he gloats, no better than a common thug. Once more, the hit to my pride is what hurts the most.

Eyepatch pulls back his spear, resting it once more on his shoulder. “Bring him and the girl,” he commands.

One of his knights steps forward and picks Kim up, flinging her unceremoniously over their shoulder. “What about the clerics?” another one asks.

Eyepatch looks around the room for a moment, letting an ominous silence hang. A monk standing off to the side dares raise his voice. “We did what you asked of us! We did our part, so please leave us alone.”

Yet Eyepatch scoffs derisively, turning his back to the clerics. “No witnesses. Kill them.”

A collective gasp echoes through the room, followed by the rasp of blades as they’re pulled from their scabbards. The knights advance without hesitation, sending the room into a hellish panic.

The two nuns that were helping Kim are the first to be caught. One barely climbs to her feet before a knight grabs her hair, pulling her back into the tip of his blade, which skewers through her chest with a splash of blood. The second’s knees fail her, and another knight slices her back open as she desperately tries to crawl away.

The other priests and priestesses scatter in whichever direction they can, but the room only has one exit, the stairs, and the knights have it blocked. One by one, they are chased down, cornered and butchered, pleas for mercy falling on deaf ears. Blood runs down the grooves of the tiled floor.

“Ariadne curse you, you traitorous dog!” yells a monk as he is dragged down to the ground to be killed. “You gave us your word!”

And I stare, helpless, body still tense from the fear that gripped me when I stared down the spear, wishing I could wake up from this nightmare.

One of the killers approaches, blood dripping from their blade. “Step aside,” he commands.

Soft hands grip the back of my shirt. That’s right, the wine-haired priestess is still here, seeking cover behind me. Though I can’t stop shivering, I stand my ground and wave my head ‘no’.

“I said move!” insists the murderous knight as he seizes me by the collar of my shirt and tries to throw me aside.

Eyepatch could very well kill me. If any doubt of it remained, there is most definitely no room left for it now. Yet despite not knowing the details, it would seem that I am nonetheless more valuable to him alive than dead. Would one of his minions so easily make the call?

So when the knight pulls, I lunge at him, wrapping my arms around his waist to capture him in an obtrusive hug.

My gambit pays off, because instead of immediately cutting me down, the knight entertains my grapple, awkwardly struggling back. “Bastard, let go!” he furiously commands, striking my skull and shoulders with his armoured gauntlet and the pommel of his sword. It’s a terrible, painful position for me, but I grit my teeth and endure it, knowing what will happen if I give in.

I push all my weight on the knight, desperately trying to force him back until he finally does take one retreating step. That’s when I seize the opportunity, swiftly wrapping my leg around his to capture his step. His center of gravity shifts back, losing his balance, and he gasps as he realizes he’s going down.

But I don’t follow him down. I simply release him, swiftly freeing my hands and letting him drop with a metallic thud. Panting and sore from the strikes, I take a step back in front of the priestess and raise what I stole from the knight’s belt as he fell: his gun.

I point it to the nearest other knight, who had been watching us struggle without bothering to step in. Them and the one holding Kim respond by pulling out their own guns and pointing back at me. Their hammers cock back ominously.

Nobody shoots, putting us in a standoff. It’s a good thing my own gun wasn’t primed, or else my shivering ass might’ve pulled the trigger already.

The knight I dropped tries to crawl away, cursing under his breath.

“Stay where you are!” I command, begging my voice not to crack. The crawling knight stops and shows his hands, cautiously keeping his focus on me.

Though I don’t know for certain what type of gun I’m holding, nor can I be certain it would work in any way I’d recognize considering where I am, it looks like an old flintlock, the type that holds only one shot. I could take down one opponent, but then I’d be out of options for the other nine. Shooting our way out of here was never an option, but I can still try to threaten our way out.

“I’m walking out of here with my friend and the woman behind me. Let her down and stand back!” I command to the one carrying Kim.

No response, no movement. The two killers aiming at me hold steady, both to their guns and to Kim. Frankly, I’m not sure what to try next.

“Or what?” Eyepatch steps past the two knights, steps echoing in the now deadly-silent room.

A shiver rocks my arm. “I’ll shoot!” I warn him, pointing the gun at his head and cocking back the hammer to show I mean it.

Yet Eyepatch doesn’t seem to care. “Okay,” he nonchalantly replies, taking another defiant step towards me, followed by another, and another. “Then shoot.”

“I’m warning you!” I say again, though I’m the one forced to take a step back, bumping into the priestess.

I must shoot, don’t I? Eyepatch advances undeterred towards me, but there is still enough space for me to shoot. If anything, the closer he is, the more surely my shot will pierce through his head. Then I’ll be without a bullet, and perhaps I’ll be the next to be gunned down, nothing else I can do about it. But I’ve made a threat, and what can I do if not make good on it? Kim and the priestess whose name I don’t even know are counting on me to protect them.

So I squeeze the trigger… but the gun’s already been struck out of my hand.

I took too long, or perhaps misjudged how far Eyepatch could swing his spear. Either way, the look in his eye tells me he was never concerned.

Right as my hand starts to flare up in pain from the strike that took the gun, his second swing lands on the side of my head. It’s only with the shaft of the weapon, but the hit pops my ears and knocks me out for a few seconds. When I realize what has happened, I’m already on the floor.

“I respect your guts,” Eyepatch says. His knee lands on my spine and I cry out as the pain tenses up my whole body. “But if you’re going to shoot, shut your mouth and just pull the trigger.”

He picks up the pistol from the floor next to us and throws it back at its owner. “Here,” he says. “But you can expect discipline for this.” The fallen knight bows his head and stashes it back in place before climbing to his feet.

As for me, Eyepatch pulls my head back by my hair. He forces me to look at the wine-haired priestess, now on her own, fearfully retreating as two murderous knights approach her. Her legs soon fail, frozen in terror, and she falls on her knees.

I try to look away, but Eyepatch holds my head in place firmly. “No no,” he says, “since you cared so much, I’d hate for you to miss anything. See, I don’t care who you think you were back where you’re from, but here, you belong to me. Resist, and bad things will happen.

“Welcome to my world.”

The knights surround her, blades held at the ready. Her eyes sink. I try to yell at her to run, but the only thing I can mutter is a pathetic whimper.

The priestess lets out a long breath. For a moment, she seems almost peaceful. She turns to me and mouths her final words.

“I’m sorry.”

She then closes her eyes.

“STOP!” I cry out desperately.

“CELMUND!” echoes a woman’s voice across the room.

The knights pause, turning towards the entrance. I feel Eyepatch shift as well, releasing his grasp on my hair. “Oh bother…” he murmurs.

Angry steps quickly approach, sounding like more than two people, though I don’t rush to turn and look as my neck feels strained.

“May I know what in the name of the Divines do you think you’re doing?!” the woman demands. I hear her steps right next to us.

“Get lost, Cethlenn,” Eyepatch retorts, sounding annoyed. “I’m handling things here.”

“I can see that, you’ve wasted near everyone already! Has your brain already rotted from the bloodlust?!”

“Oh shut up.” Eyepatch rises from my back, letting me gasp in relief. “They would’ve snitched us out to the glassheads, maybe even the capital. We aren’t ready for that much heat.”

“Haaah,” the woman sighs. “Always so small minded. There are other, more productive ways to silence people, which I could’ve told you if you hadn’t rushed ahead doing whatever you like!”

“Fuck you,” scoffs Eyepatch. “Who cares, anyway? The outworlders are the only ones that matter.”

There’s a brief pause. “Outworlders? Plural?” the woman asks, interest overruling her anger.

“We got two,” Eyepatch responds smugly.

“Is the half-dead guy at your feet one of them?” I hear the woman step besides me. She pokes me with something hard, a pole, and forcefully turns me over to face her.

And for a moment, I wonder if I am dreaming. I see a woman with long and smooth pink hair, the same tone as a beautiful flower, wearing a tight-fitting outfit that accents her curving body wonderfully, with a short cape hung from her shoulders. The pole I felt was actually a long, wooden staff with an opaline sphere wrapped at its other end.

She’s absolutely stunning. I can’t help but stare, even as my vision blurs and wobbles still from the hit I took.

But all that stares back at me from her emerald eyes is a cruel coldness that sees me merely as a thing.

“Is all that bleeding your doing?” she asks, focusing on my head. It’s only then that I properly notice the warm dampness soaking my ear.

“Heh,” chuckles Eyepatch. “He’s got spirit, but he should know the pecking order around here now.”

“Well you better hope you didn’t go overboard and turned him stupid.”

They’re bickering. Neither of them is good news, yet they’re not in sync, not regarding any of this. If the pink-haired woman had a different idea for us, could the priestess still be saved?

My head’s throbbing and my eyelids feel heavy, but there is still one gambit left in me.

“...heh,” I breathe out, curling my lips into a defiant grin. “It would take… more than this.”

“Oh?” the woman coos, her lips curling into a malevolent smile. “You’re right, he does have spirit.”

“I won’t cause… any trouble.” I attempt to sit up, but only manage to lift my back off the floor. “But… I have one condition.”

“Pfft, is he trying to negotiate?” Eyepatch mocks.

“Quiet, Celmund.” The woman barks.

Celmund, eh? That is Eyepatch’s name. Celmund.

“Fine then,” she says, intently locking her emerald eyes with mine. “State it.”

“The priestess, the one with wine-colored hair… spare her. In exchange, I’ll do anything you want.”

“Heh.” Her grin widens. “If you truly mean that, then…” She crouches next to me, low enough to reach her hand in front of my face. “It’s a deal.”

Her eyes glow with a strange green shimmer. An uneasy feeling runs through my body.

But I reach up and grasp her hand with what strength I have left.

A bolt runs up my arm, tensing every muscle and locking my fingers in place. There’s no backing off from it now.

“Tell me your name,” she commands.

“...Leo,” I hesitantly answer, feeling colder and colder by the second.

“Alright Leo,” she continues. “I am Cethlenn, known to my enemies as the Witch of Agony. In exchange for the life of a priestess, you shall serve me from now until the day you die.

“With this, our contract is sealed.”

Her words echo in the distance, quickly fading as I pass out once more.

—

Shudder, drop, tumble. I am lost in a strom, winds buffeting me violently like an orphaned leaf. Hurled, dashed, I strike the stones, bending me out of shape. I’m but a rag doll in a mad child’s hands.

Flying through the air, past torturous cliffs, jagged cliffs and darkened clouds, finally, a speck of sunlight, just ahead. I reach for it, shuddering, dropping, tumbling, aching…

And I slowly open my eyes to the glare of a powerful sun.

I shrink away, turning my head to try and hide my face in the pillow. The headache is killing me.

“Ah!” I hear a soft voice gasp. “You’re awake.” Gentle hands grasp me, guiding me back to my original position. “I will put up something for the sun. Just try not to move.”

It’s easier said than done, as the light bites right through my eyelids and the floor does not stop quaking. My fingers tap it, no longer feeling the hard, tiled stone from before, but stiff, rickety, vibrating wood.

The sun darkens. I pry open my eyes a bit and notice a tarp hung and spread over me. The glare of the sun still pierces through enough to hurt, but nowhere near as bad as before.

“...couldn’t I have woken back in my bed?” I say, trying to laugh but only managing to cough. My throat feels terribly parched. “Water…”

“Here,” the soft voice says, and the edge of a bottle touches my lips, wetting them with fresh water. Slowly, I take a drink and sigh with relief as my throat relaxes.

“Thank you,” I whisper, glancing at the person helping me and recognizing her now familiar locks of wine hair.

The priestess nods with a small, forced smile. She looks even more exhausted than before. “Your head injury is already healing, but please try to rest.”

Everything continues shaking. The floor suddenly jolts, making me bounce painfully. “Ack, where are we?” Glancing around, I notice we’re completely surrounded by wooden bars. A cage? And just beyond it, a huge wall of jagged stone stretches above us as we move across its face.

We’re on a cart, caged at its back, as we slowly trudge along a mountainous dirt road between a cliff wall and a precipice. I cannot see who is driving or what is pulling us, though I believe I do hear the clopping of hooves in front of us.

“We’re in transit to the city of Zedia,” the priestess explains. Her gaze drops. “I wish I could tell you the reason.”

The bags under her eyes have only grown heavier since last time, I note. “Are you okay? Were you hurt?”

She turns to me and gives me her best reassuring smile. “Please, don’t worry about me. I’m okay thanks to you. Though…” She hesitates, pressing a hand over her heart. “I’m sorry you had to pay such a price.”

“You mean my deal with that woman?” I try to mimic her smile. “There’s nothing too serious about it. Honestly, I’m just thankful she honored her part.”

The priestess looks at me, her smile fading. “…you don’t seem to understand. A deal with a witch is a very grave thing.”

“How so?”

“Since you pledged your service, your life and fealty belong to her now. You cannot simply wave it off, or else you will suffer terrible consequences.”

In any other circumstance, I might’ve laughed. I would’ve said anything to save us at that moment, so I wouldn’t have particularly cared about the deal, nor worried about the hit to my karma for breaking it.

But with all that's happened, I can no longer take things for granted as I once did. If I’ve truly been summoned to another world, then things will work differently.

“What sort of consequences?”

She doesn’t say anything, but her tight lips and sorrowful gaze are telling. Frankly, I’m not sure I could handle the details right now. There’s too much to think about already.

“...I don’t understand, I really don’t understand at all,” I admit. “Would you mind explaining to me?”

The priestess lets out a long sigh. “Where should I begin?”

“How about…” I pause, thoughtful. “How about your name?”

Her expression shifts, surprised, but seems to relax a little. “Rosa. I am sister Rosa, priestess of the Divines.”

“Sister Rosa,” I repeat, committing it to memory. “Nice to meet you, I am Leo.”

“Nice to meet you too.” She smiles gently.

“So, Sister, what happened to us? How did we get here? Why?”

Rosa nods to each question and pauses for a moment, pondering how best to begin.

“We call our world ‘Tellus’. You and your friend were summoned here by the will of the Great Divines in order to aid us in a time of crisis.”

“What sort of crisis?” I ask.

“Our nation, the Tereosin Empire, is going through a turbulent time. Our last emperor passed away five years ago, leaving no clear successor to take up the throne. The government has fractured into several factions struggling for power, while several provincial lords have taken the chance to rebel and declare independence. At this point, people fear that we might be on the brink of an all-out civil war.”

“Whoa, wait a moment, and I’m supposed to do something about that?” I blurt out, tensing. “I haven’t even finished college!”

“I…” she hesitates, picking her words carefully. “I wish I could tell you what the Divines intend, but only They could say for certain. Nonetheless, I’m certain there was a good reason, something that maybe even you don’t see about yourself.”

“That’s… reassuring,” I state sarcastically. But I try to relax; it’s a bridge I’ll cross when I get to it. Rather, it just leaves me with a more important question. “But if I’m supposed to help, why am I in a cage right now?”

“Had you been summoned at the imperial capital, I imagine you would’ve been welcomed with honors,” Rosa continues. “But regretfully, my fellows and I were forced to perform the summoning ritual by…” She pauses, closing her eyes. Her lips quiver.

I can guess. The eyepatched killer and the beautiful witch with pink hair. “Celmund and Cethlenn.”

She nods, wiping a tear off her eye. “They claimed to have come to our temple to pay respect to the Divines, and we welcomed them because we believed them to be commanders of the imperial army tasked with helping pacify the region. But they repaid our hospitality with violence, pillaging, killing, torturing…” Rosa’s voice strains as she attempts to describe what happened, and I give her as much time as she needs.

She shakes her head sadly. “They are nothing but traitors now, serving nobody save for their own base ambitions.”

“So,” I say, pondering on what she’s told me so far, “if the empire is crumbling, I guess those two are also trying to get something out of that whole… state of affairs. And they interfered with the summoning so that no pesky outworlders would get in their way.”

She nods again. “Normally our temple would have nothing to do with the summoning, but they somehow knew that brother Elmer, who had once served as a renowned scholar, was living his retirement with us. They… forced him to share the secrets of the summoning, made us perform the ritual, most likely to prevent you from becoming an obstacle, as you say. Perhaps they even hope to use you for their own ends.”

And if that’s the case, then my deal with the witch was precisely what they wanted. My heart sinks.

I take another glance around the cage. That’s when I notice that Rosa and I are the only ones inside. “Wait, where’s Kim?!”

“Kim? You mean the woman that arrived with you?” She presses her lips sadly. “She was… taken away.”

“Taken where?”

“Not with us. I’m sorry, I wish I could tell you, but I just don’t know.”

We’ve been separated. Even in the best possible scenario where I somehow manage to escape, they will still have Kim.

I lie back, cursing under my breath. “Idiot, I should have included her in the deal…” I whisper.

Rosa averts her gaze. “I’m sorry,” she murmurs back.

“Huh?” I look at her, setting aside my frustrated mullings. “What for?”

“If it wasn’t for us, you would not be in this situation, and if it wasn’t for me, you could have focused on protecting your friend, you wouldn't have been forced into such a terrible deal...” Her voice cracks.

“Hey hey,” I reach for her hand gently, interrupting her. “I don’t blame you; none of this is your fault, and regardless of what I had to do, I don’t regret saving you.”

My words seem to ease her, if only slightly, and she’s not the only one. There is next to nothing I can do and I don’t know what will happen to us from this point on. Worst of all, I lost my friend, Kim. 

But I’m glad I could save someone, anyone, even if it was only one person.

The cart shudders as it takes a turn. Rosa glances out through the bars. “We’re almost there.”

I prop myself up enough to look for myself. As the cart turns a corner on the precarious road, we find ourselves on the inner walls of a massive crater, surrounded on all sides by sheer cliffs. At the bottom, set around the shores of a murky central lake, every bit of surface is covered in houses and huts that climb and reach over each other as they struggle for a view of the open sky.

“This is Zedia,” Rosa explains, “the penal mine-city.”