46 A complicated turn of events

The trolls in Yharnam were dangerously strong. Surgit had trouble concentrating with all the voices mocking him. He tried to parry the troll but mistimed it. The statue hit him on the chest and the impact sent him flying. His back slammed against a wall and stars sparkled in his vision field. 'Stand up you fool!' said a lone voice in his head. He struggled to find his footing and the troll rushed him again. He rolled forward just in time to avoid the statue. It almost slammed him to the ground and finished him. The troll faced Surgit again and jumped at him.

The attack was frightening to behold; a frightening giant troll, holding a statue on one hand and jumping towards his foe in order to mash his brains and organs together. 'Shoot you fool!' said the voice again, and shoot he did.

The troll fell to its knees before it could deliver the blow. Surgit quickly used his sharp claws to destroy his enemy's insides then injected a blood vial. "I'm wasting too many healing items and THAT'S BECAUSE OF THESE ECHOING VOICES IN MY HEAD!" He had had enough of those voices. He needed to get rid of them but he didn't know how to do so. The murmurs had gone silent though and Surgit heard the music. It was the same tune he'd heard when he was at the fountain plaza. He pricked his ears to pinpoint its location. It was coming from someplace above him. The square where he fought the troll had a ladder which took up. "This is convenient," he said as he started climbing upwards. The music reached his ears clearer the more he climbed.

He finally reached the top and saw the gate that led towards the fountain plaza.It amazed him how the city was well organized. It felt like navigating a maze: a beautifully built one. He went full circle and somehow ended up back at the fountain plaza and he didn't even know how he got there. He saw the lever he had to pull in order to open the gate but he needed to investigate the music first.

He saw a red lantern hanging from a window and heard the music getting louder from that direction. He approached the window and heard a little girl's voice.

- "That smell, are you a hunter?"

- "Little girl, are you alone in there?" Surgit was still surprised at how people recognized him by smell. What smell do hunters have?

- "Yes mister hunter, my mum went out looking for my dad. She hasn't been back since then. I'm worried mister hunter. Would you please look for my mum?"

- "I will do so." Said Surgit, his sense of duty towards helpless children pushed him to grant her the wish. "Do you know which direction she took?" he asked as the voices inside his head were split between approval and mockery.

- "My dad is a hunter too. He's been out for a long time. My mum went out looking for him. I don't know where she went, but she must be here, in central Yharnam" said the little girl with her innocent voice.

- "Alright, I'll find your mum for you little girl."

- "Take this" the little girl opened the window and handed him a music box. "My mum plays it for dad when he forgets us. It's so silly of her to go out without it. Please mister hunter, find my mum."

Surgit left the little girl and wondered at the mother who would leave her little daughter alone at home on a night like this. He hadn't met any sane Yharnamite in the streets since he arrived. The only person he met was the crow lady. Her apparel didn't suggest that she was from the city. People in Yharnam gave too much importance to their looks. Even the mutating men he met in the street wore elegant coats and sometime top hats.He was afraid that the mum had lost her mind and killed herself somewhere in the city. He opened the gate then took the ladder back down towards the canals. He kicked the dead troll's body as he passed next to it. He almost died to it and felt angry since he missed his first parry. He needed to get better at it.

He crossed the bridge and came face to face with three crows. They were slowly crawling towards him. They still disgusted him but at least he knew how to deal with them. As soon as they tried to attack him, all he had to do was walk around them and behead them. After he dealt with the three deformed birds, he took the other ladder down towards the canals.

Surgit took the ladder down to the aqueduct. He reached a wooden platform on top of which he stood, witnessing one of the ugliest scenes he'd ever seen since he arrived to Yharnam. A pile of corpses were thrown down at the bottom level of the water canals. The water was shallow now but Surgit could swear that these corpses have been there for a long time, drowning there until the water level decreased. He jumped down and went to inspect the dead bodies closer. He jumped back as he saw all the bodies, a dozen in fact, crawling towards him. 'Heavens! Don't even trust a dead body here' he thought to himself, his heart was racing. He looked behind him and saw that the canals were leading towards a tunnel. He decided to leave the crawling bodies alone and head towards the tunnel. They were slow and wouldn't catch up to him anyway.

As he reached the entrance to the tunnel, Surgit heard a strange noise from the other end. He had goose bumps and every voice in his head told him not to go through it. He saw a ladder, attached to the wall in which the tunnel was carved. "Call me a coward but I'm not going in there" he decided to take the ladder up. "Great, now I'm speaking to voices inside my head like a lunatic" he spurted out as he climbed the long ladder up. As soon as he reached the top, Surgit found himself standing on the bridge he had spotted earlier from the fountain plaza. He was on the right path.

He approached the bridge and saw a bloody scene in front of him. Half a dozen bodies were on the ground, with burn marks on them. Was Karla here before? Or was it someone else? He clenched his saw cleaver and advanced. At the end of the bridge there were stairs leading towards what seemed to be an old graveyard. At the top, Surgit saw a dead troll and two other bodies. One of them was still breathing and badly injured. Surgit ran towards it. Karla was resting against a wall, on the verge of death.