“I don’t know,” Sophia said slowly. “Amy, you know more about this than I do; is there something we should be looking for?”
“Not for you or me,” Amy admitted. “But I couldn’t pass up the chance at a Spirit Challenge for Dav and Taika.”
“None of them sound like summons,” Dav objected. “I’m a summoner. I can see why it might be good for Taika, but standing back and hiding isn’t exactly my role.” Sophia could hear the emphasis he put on the last few words. He was clearly saying he didn’t want to stand back and let others fight for him.
“You’re a summoner at the moment,” Amy agreed. “That’s part of the point of trying to gain Abilities from Challenges, they can help you change your Sphere when you hit the first upgrade or choose a new Sphere. I think a Spirit Ability might fit you well, especially since your Warp has something to do with telepathy. That ought to mean Spirit-related Abilities fit you well too.”
“Which one?” Dav didn’t sound convinced.
Sophia couldn’t blame him; she wasn’t sure which one fit him the best any more than she was certain which one she wanted. She’d definitely look at all of them just to see if she could figure them out, but the one she’d probably spend the most time on was Spirit Shriek … if all of the others were trying for Spirit abilities. If they weren’t, maybe she’d see if she could work on Stunning Touch while the others did whatever they were doing. It ought to be possible to “touch” anything in her aura with a spell, and that was probably the largest problem with that Ability.
Of course, that assumed it was a spell. Sophia wasn’t certain it was.
“I’m not sure,” Amy admitted slowly. “I just couldn’t pass up the chance when I heard there was the possibility of an opening that might let you get a Sphere that suits how you want to fight more than your current one. We won’t have another chance at this Challenge.”
Naturally, that was when Larryt spoke up, “Ah, we’re here. Watch out for the ridges on either side of the trail.”
Sophia’s question vanished as she stared at a thin bar covered in green moss that rose from the ground. A matching line ran parallel to it on the other side of some wooden planks that looked like they’d been set into the ground to reinforce and provide better footing on a trail. It reminded her strongly of train tracks.
When she stepped over the near rail and onto the trail, then looked ahead of her, the impression was reinforced. That mound of sticks ahead of her with a black opening where the trail met it like a tongue heading into a mouth resembled nothing so much as a train tunnel from a nightmare.
image [https://i.imgur.com/5AcvSQv.jpeg]
Dav paused just outside the path and looked down. “Those rails can’t be natural.”
Sophia was glad she wasn’t the only one who saw them that way.
“The ridges, you mean? They aren’t,” Larryt agreed. “They cross the Skylands, like the Old Roads. They probably date back to before the Breaking, just like the Roads. These are overgrown, but outside the forest you can see that they’re made of some sort of metal, or at least something that looks like metal. No one’s been able to break it, and the ridges go several feet deep into the earth. They’re always the same distance apart, too. We use them as pathways. You don’t have to worry about the ground breaking on a ridgeway.”
“A lot of the Skylands Challenges are on ridgeways or Old Roads,” Amy added. “Not all of them, but a lot. I bet if we walked around the Challenge, we’d see the ridgeway come out of the hill.”
“I did that the first time I was here, after we finished the Challenge,” Larryt admitted. “It looks like it goes into the Challenge, but it doesn’t. The ridgeway stops at the entrance. It’s odd, I’ve never seen a ridgeway just stop anywhere else.”
Sophia shook her head in disbelief. They had a centuries-old rail system that was intact and didn’t use it because they didn’t know what it was. That was insane; surely they could use it for animal-drawn wagons, if nothing else.
On the other hand, the knowledge of what the rails were had to have been lost for a reason. Maybe that reason was that they simply weren’t practical to use; after all, they couldn’t build new ones. What if their current towns weren’t where the rails ran? It wouldn’t make sense to take a longer route that required moving things from one vehicle to another or replacing the wheels to get on and off the rails, or maybe they just didn’t move enough stuff at once to make it worthwhile.
Sophia knew she shouldn’t assume she knew better just because she knew something they didn’t. That didn’t make it easy, but it did mean that she could figure out that this wasn’t the time. She’d ask about it once they were in Izel, but for now she should keep her mouth shut. Larryt was definitely not the right person to ask and this pair of rails was really too overgrown to use anyway.
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She wasn’t sure who the right person was, but surely there was someone in Izel.
No, wait, she had a good idea who the right person to ask was: Arryn, the old merchant who brought her and Dav from Old Kestii to Casterville. He knew a lot about the world and he was a traveling merchant. He’d know why they didn’t use the rails, and he’d be in a good place to spread the knowledge of what they were if the only reason was that they didn’t know what they were and how to use them. She could write him a letter, then talk to Izel’s Registry about having it sent.
Somehow, that made her feel better even though she hadn’t actually done any of it yet.
Sophia took one more look at the dark maw of the Challenge and realized that at least half the reason she was hung up on train tracks was that she didn’t really want to enter the dark tunnel, which was silly. There wasn’t going to be a train coming out of it; there was literally nothing to be afraid of.
She had to steel herself anyway. Once she had, she didn’t want to wait any longer. “Let’s get going.”
Sophia led the way into the Challenge. There was a moment of full darkness, which slowly cleared as she moved forward to reveal a heavily foggy scene. Twisted trees covered in strangely leafy moss filled the foggy sky, while lumps of greenery and flowers dotted the floor. It was a scene that fit the nightmarish entrance yet also seemed peaceful, foreboding yet also calm.
An insubstantial blonde woman dressed in armor and carrying a shield walked slowly towards the group. She floated a little above the ground, and while she seemed to walk, her steps didn’t quite match the way she moved forward.
Sophia took a long, careful look but was unable to find a weapon anywhere on her person; she didn’t even seem to have a knife at her belt. What she did have was a pair of slender horns that protruded from her head, reminiscent of a minotaur’s horns even though she appeared otherwise human. Symbols on her face and cheeks might once have been magical, but they were now simply decorative.
Sophia could feel the Death mana that surrounded her. The woman was definitely a ghost; there wasn’t enough mana around her for her to be a wraith, and few of the natural undead were so tied to a physical form that they would walk while floating. Fortunately, she didn’t seem at all hostile.
image [https://i.imgur.com/SSctrQg.png]
Larryt hurried forward. He seemed to blink in and out more quickly than he had on the long walk, probably because his concentration was on the ghost in front of them.
It was strange, really. Larryt seemed more worried about them than he was about the ghost; he kept glancing backwards as he hurried ahead of them. Sophia shook her head. “What’s wrong, Larryt? Isn’t this the spirit guide you mentioned?”
Larryt swung around to face them. Words spilled out before he finished the turn. “You must not…”
Sophia tilted her head, then glanced back to see what made him stop. She didn’t see anything odd; sure, Taika’s head poked up from Dav’s backpack the way it often did when he was paying attention, but that wasn’t particularly shocking.
“Er, yeah,” Larryt’s face darkened in a flush as he continued. Sophia had no idea what he was thinking. “I, ah, this should be the spirit guide for the challenge. Don’t, ah, don’t threaten her. That can go badly.”
Sophia stared at Larryt. That was what he was worried about, after he told them to expect a guide? “What, did you attack her the first time you tried this Challenge?”
“Um, it wasn’t her,” Larryt rushed to explain. “The spirit guide we got was a ghost bear, and uh, …”
“And you forgot everything you’d been told about the Challenge?” Dav supplied with a huge grin. “Is that what you meant when you said it wasn’t usually a combat Challenge? Relax a bit. We were listening, even if you weren’t.” Dav moved his attention from the transparent Cloud Clan scout to the ghost. “Hi there!”
The ghost nodded. Her movement was smooth and graceful, but it seemed almost formal. “Greetings and welcome to the Spirits of the Woods Challenge. I am Si’a, one of the guardians of this place. We stand in the Spring Woods.”
Sophia tried to fix the name in her head. It definitely wasn’t a language she recognized, even though Si’a seemed to be a blue-eyed blonde. Well, this was a world with a completely different history from Earth’s; the weird thing was that they spoke English, not that they had different names.
Si’a turned to look directly at Larryt. “One of you has been here before; are you here to participate or to watch?”
Larryt looked surprised. Sophia didn’t see what was so odd about it; the Challenge obviously kept track of who had been in it before, if there was a longer per-person lockout than the lockout between attempts. “Watch, I guess?”
Si’a nodded. “You may not interfere or even hint at anything that they could not learn without asking me. If you do, you will be removed. You will not be allowed to attempt any part of the Challenge, only watch their progress. As long as you do not violate the rules, you will not be removed until the last participant is removed. This will still be considered a Challenge attempt, as you gain the benefit of watching. If you wish to preserve your attempt, you must leave now.”
It sounded like a rehearsed statement, but Larryt seemed more and more bewildered as Si’a spoke. “I’ll stay, but … why didn’t the bear ask any of that the first time I was here?”
Si’a grinned widely. “The first time you were here, you tried to shoot your guide, lost quickly, and were removed from the challenge moments after you entered. When did he have a chance to ask?”
Sophia failed to suppress a snort at Larryt’s expense. That explained his surprise and also his overly dramatic attempt to get them to not attack the ghost. It also meant that she was going to take anything he said carefully; he clearly wasn’t above not mentioning things that made him look bad.
She already suspected that he wasn’t the best possible guide, but he was what they had. She’d just have to pay attention and remember that she could ask Si’a when she had questions. She was probably more reliable. It also sounded like Larryt wouldn’t be allowed to answer anything Si’a wouldn’t, which made her wonder what exactly the point of having him there was.