Draith
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Chapter 64 - No Slippage
🕑 Added 2025-04-03 14:00:13 +0000 UTCI didn't think the rope-cat would appreciate having dozens of people traipsing in and out of its room, so the first thing we did was bypass the room. Turned out that the kitchen was directly above the hallway that led from the Ways Between to the monster workshop, so I enlisted Nexxa's help and we drilled a two-foot wide hole through taking turns with the staff.
"Think I might recognize a couple of those spells," Nexxa said as we attached a rope ladder to a set of stone hooks we'd created for the purpose.
"Definitely get your thoughts on that later," I said, brushing off my hands. "First, we need to see if we can use Sculpt Stone on the peak. Gonna be a lot harder to hang the nets if we can't."
"It'll be fine. Just hang em down both sides. It's not that big up there," Nexxa said as she followed me up, actually walking the stairs instead of flying. Tunneling through the stone had eaten up a lot of mana, even for Nexxa. Not that flying cost her much.
"Probably doing that anyway," I said, looking out the windows as I led the way up. Windows that were actually made of some sort of stone I didn't recognize. They responded to Sculpt Stone, but my test had revealed that even slight modifications resulted in the surrounding stone going black.
Which had been enough for me to not even consider using them as a way to stuff anything outside. No reason to suck all the air out of the main stairwell. We'd started on the access shaft in the kitchen after sealing that window with an extra layer of stone.
When we got to the top, I inspected the surface, looking for somewhere that might not mess up the runes. Except, as I looked closer, I realized the entire peak was covered in linked runes.
"Starting to wonder if I should even be letting people walk up here," I said as I tried to figure out what the network of runes was even for. The ones that provided mana to the shield were only a small fraction of the entire surface.
The individual runes weren't that hard to decipher, but it was a bit like opening a parts manual to a random page, and picking a random sentence, then only reading every second letter in each word. The letters made sense, but otherwise it was usually a whole lot of nothing. Still, just like with a parts manual, there were patterns I could pick out. Most of the wards weren't tied to the shield, that much I was certain of. At least not directly. We'd have never repaired the shield if that was the case.
Also, they didn't take a lot of mana. If anything, they were the most mana-efficient runes I'd seen. Even the ones in the shield array hadn’t needed much mana.
"Huh. Those are subtle," Nexxa said, kneeling down and tracing her hand over one of the runes. "Or… maybe just worn down. I don't think they were always this faded."
"Makes sense. If they're as old as the rest of this place…"
"Yep. Might even be older than Felor," Nexxa said, taking a deep breath. "Wouldn't that be rifting amazing? Runes older than the eldest dragon-souled. Maybe they were made by the First Ones."
"Don't think I've heard of them," I said absently, tracing the runes along the top of the mountain. They weren't actually flat, having been arranged in such a way that they curved slightly, getting deeper. Which meant that when I got near the edge, they'd actually disappeared.
"First Ones are an old Elven myth, though they pop up under different names in other stuff. Point is, they were the first people to walk the surface of Ro'an. The people who built the Pillars."
"Ah. Pretty sure I've seen mention of them before," I said, kneeling down and pulling out my grimoire, channeling Detect Mana. The spell activated, and I thanked myself silently for the minor upgrades that made it usable. Despite the runes being buried, there was still active mana moving through the stone. It looked like Earth mana, but it wasn’t quite right. It was similar to Worlds mana, in that it had an extra sparkle compared to the regular brown. It wasn't one I'd seen before.
"Hey, do you recognize what kind of mana is running through here?" I asked, putting my grimoire away.
Nexxa pulled hers out in response, her eyes visibly glowing as her spell activated.
"Huh. Not sure," Nexxa said, kneeling down and tapping at the stone. "Definitely not Earth. Rare though."
"Yeah, that part I'd figured," I said with a chuckle. "Anyway, guess we're doing this the hard way."
"Almost seems… wrong, to just drag nets across here and then drape lizard meat off the edge," Nexxa said, her grimoire disappearing as she pushed herself to her feet.
"It's what I gotta do. Unless you've got a spare enchanted warehouse or two tucked away in your ring?"
"If only," Nexxa snorted.
We made our way down, and soon, I had a veritable chain of people moving materials up the once secret stairs. At first, there was a great deal of awed whispering, especially when they passed the windows or saw Keeper.
Didn't take Selvi long to smack them into shape.
"Hey, Dethi, don't just stand around stretching the rope," Selvi said, as she literally smacked the young man on the back of the head. "Work to be done."
"Throw yourself off a cliff," the young man bit back, though he did get moving.
"Kids these days," Selvi said with a long suffering sigh. "Wouldn't have been like that around the old Magus Dominus."
"Probably a good thing," I said, shaking my head. "I'd rather not rule by fear."
"Respect matters too," Selvi said, crossing her arms as she glared at the retreating figure.
"Fair 'nuff," I agreed. "You guys have things handled here?"
"Won't have any slippage, long as I'm here," Selvi said, giving me a hard nod. "Though they might need some help in the vale. Sounded like some scavengers were poking around."
"Right, we're on it," I said, heading downstairs. I passed a pair of villagers carrying a huge bundle of ropes, then another with equally large bundles of fabric. Wouldn't be long before they were ready to start lowering the meat. I almost wanted to stay and watch, to make sure nothing went wrong.
It was a lot of meat.
But these people lived on a cliff. If I couldn't trust them to dangle a little meat off a mountain, I was never going to get anything done.
Nexxa and I took the stairs, walking past the rope-cat, which was curled up near the window, basking in the sunshine. It raised it's head when I walked past, releasing a burst of noise much like the sound of paper rustling.
I froze in place as it stepped towards me. Yet it didn't have any extra tendrils out, so I waved Nexxa back and waited. A second later, it pressed its head against my hand and I realized…
It wasn't Balthum's guardian. It was the Magus Domini's. It was bound to the beacon. And I could feel its affection through my hand. And its demand for scritches.
Ignoring the fact that it could've easily scratched itself with its rope tendrils, I glanced over to Nexxa while obliging it. "Uh. Could you check on the vale. Looks like activating the beacon had an effect."
"Huh. Neat," Nexxa said, not taking a single step. Then her gaze moved to the workshop. "Guess that means this is all yours now. Didn’t even get to blow anything up."
"Guess so," I agreed, finally letting myself take a closer look as I continued giving the rope-cat scritches behind its satin-feeling ears. I'd deliberately avoided looking too closely at any of the gathered materials, since I didn't want to tempt myself. Not until I was certain I could neutralize the rope-cat I was now scritching without damaging the room. As I'd noticed when I first entered, most of the essence materials were bone. And they were almost universally tier three materials. Every affinity I was familiar with had a representative, along with several I didn't. There was even a nearly obsidian femur that had the same unknown affinity as the runes at the peak.
It was labeled in neat lettering as a Granitas affinity tier three essence material. Rare.
"Ever heard of Granitas?" I asked, nodding towards the sample.
"Hmm," Nexxa said, taking a step closer. The rope-cat responded immediately, a hissing sound suddenly issuing from the top of its head as its ears laid back. Nexxa stepped back, holding her hands up.
"Guess you don't get a pass," I said, frowning as I addressed the rope-cat. "She's a friend. Family."
My words didn't seem to have an effect, the creature still hissing when she stepped forward only quieting as Nexxa once more backed off. "Nice kitty. And no. Never heard of Granitas. Probably has another name."
"Yeah. Not super important," I said as the rope-cat suddenly pulled away from me, moving back to its spot in the sun. I let it go, motioning towards the door, Nexxa and I passing back through to Mistvale.
"If you grab the sample, I could take it back with me, have the Captain get an expert to take a look at it," Nexxa said. "Might be a few months, but at least I can get you an answer."
"Might take you up on that," I said as I looked around. It had been barely two hours since we'd returned to the village, and yet, the villagers had already strung out enough rope and nets to lift the entire massive carcass from the forest floor. They'd even put out barrels, which they were filling with blood. Not even the barrels were touching the forest floor.
The canopy was visibly bowing under the stress of so much weight, yet I suspected it wouldn't break. Not unless Myris was feeling in that sort of mood.
"Uh… that's kinda impressive," Nexxa said as two teams of villagers took turns jumping up and down, holding a corrugated rope that sawed into the flesh of the massive lizard. They were supported by another team that was sinking wooden hooks into the meat, pulling it away in great strips.
A howl drew our attention away.
"Right. Scavengers," Nexxa said, cracking her fists as lightning crackled along her arms. "I'll handle them. Nice to have problems I can just blast."
Not leaving me time to respond, Nexxa rocketed into the air.
"I… cannot wait to reach Pegasus," I said, shaking my head as I moved towards the work. Tanis was waiting nearby, a larger blowgun held ready.
"Hey boss. Things are going good. Just saw a yellow bellied swallow dart past," Tanis said, shooting me a thumbs up. At the same time, a peel of thunder washed over the camp.
Work stopped for a second as everyone's gaze shifted towards the west. Sure enough, a flash of lightning was followed by another rolling wave of thunder.
"It's just Nexxa," I yelled out. To my surprise, that was enough for most of the villagers to return to work.
As I looked over everyone there, and thought about how many people I'd seen inside the mountain, I realized Tanis hadn't just mobilized a few people. The entire village had been put to work. I even spotted Calbern and Bevel near the dead mist rex's head, hanging off a net as they removed its eyes.
"Where can I help?" I asked.
Tanis shrugged. "Keeping everyone safe. That's what the Mag-us Dominus is supposed to do, right boss?" he asked, taking the time to pronounce each syllable of Magus slowly.
Another flash of lightning and peal of thunder rolled over us.
"Think that's all of them!" Nexxa called as she floated back into sight. "Perry, come help me tidy up."
"Well boss, guess you got something to do," Tanis said, clapping his massive hand on my shoulder.
