Novels2Search
Island Core
Chapter 22: Brave Soldiers

Chapter 22: Brave Soldiers

Fire.

Fire engulfed the lemur village. The dry, worked reeds were desperately flammable, and the flames raced along each bent branch. Lemurs went screaming into the night, fleeing in all directions.

The saurian walked past them, torch in hand. Nobody dared approach her now.

She set light to the totems of bone and sighed in satisfaction as the quest completed:

[Sun-Quest]

Destroy totems of the Kanaka Aihue Iwi lemur clan (3/3)

Reward – Spirit of the Housekeeper.

But as she turned, her back ached. Blood trickled from the places the bone knives had stabbed her– some of them were still embedded in her skin, and she had tried and failed to dig them out with her claws. It was like they were burrowing into her flesh.

I dimly recognized them. This was the same evil that had plagued the ape.

The bones of the massacre victims. The lemurs must have discovered their poison nature and learned to use them as weapons…

Disgusting.

By the time the saurian reached my territory, she was beginning to twitch spastically. The bones made a horrible itching sensation as they dug into her, and no matter how she tried, her claws could give her no relief, only brought more blood welling up as she dug at her skin.

With each step her balanced, predatory stride grew less confident. She took on the uneven gait of someone mad or drunk.

A prowling junglecat turned towards her, watching with reflective eyes. It paced after her as she stumbled past– she did not notice.

Her sharp and dutiful mind was consumed by the pain. Motes of sickly energy unfolded from her aura, drifting around her like the spotting of a diseased liver. The blood that ran from the wounds was a tarry black.

The final stretch– she did not remember. She saw nothing, her eyes blurring. She only knew when she was home by the presence in the air and the taste of mana-rich atmosphere.

She collapsed forward, and dreamed no dreams worth speaking of.

— — —

When the saurian awoke, Kahula was dancing nervously upon her back.

She rolled– he took flight. Her hand shot up– and stopped before she crushed him in her palm. Something about his lack of fear stilled her killing instinct.

“Er, yes, hello! Very scary! I am terrified! But… Are you okay?” Kahula twittered as he flapped and hovered in the air.

She relaxed. Another of the maker’s creations. “I am…” She paused. The pain was relieved. Her back itched to the point of madness. It had felt like the blood was dripping directly into her brain, robbing her of the ability to see anything but red. “I am… better? Did you do this?”

“Yes yes! I tried, anyway, and all we can do is try!” Kahula came fluttering back down and landed on her arm. Her reptilian eyes shifted, the slit pupils contracting. “You seemed very sick and I thought… Well…” He paused and nervously preened his feathers.

She barely gave him a glance. She looked to the blood-stained lengths of sharpened bone that lay in the grass beside her. Pulling them out would have been no small effort– they looked dull, but they had cut through her scales like butter, as if their will was to pierce flesh and burrow deep.

“I must dispose of these bones before they are put to evil purpose. Thank you for saving my life, now begone. You no doubt have tasks to do and should not be kept from them.” She flicked her arm and sent him back up into the air. With a groan, she rolled onto her hands and knees, pushed up, and cracked her neck left and right as she stood.

Long after the saurian had collected the bone knives and walked away, Kahula settled on a branch and sighed.

“I thought you were too pretty to die…” He said to no-one but himself.

— — —

[Sun-Quest]

A golden bird has been caught in a spider’s web. Find and free it before it is eaten.

Reward – 2 random Common Schema.

My creations spread out through the jungle. For this, the saurian needed help. My lemurs moved with her, hunting through places high and low.

They searched high and low for most of the morning and into afternoon. They found countless spiders.

The species of the jungle were bright-shelled and long-legged. Some had developed ‘caps’ of woven thatch, silk, and other materials that they used to plug their underground dens, leaping out to drag prey under. Others wove webs that could indeed catch birds in flight, if a bird was so unwise as to fly into the steel-strong threads.

The largest of them was the size of a hound, a vivid opalescent blue. It perched on its web, skinny limbs extending farther than the length of a man’s arms if he held them out fully– it hissed, chattered, made warning noises as the saurian approached; it’s mouth was a pair of knife-curved mandibles covered in white stubble, which tapped together to make a distinct warning ‘click’.

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The saurian paid it no mind– the spider lunged for her and she caught it by the jaw, ripping away a mandible as she threw it to the ground. Her foot stomped down until the carapace was cracked and yellow guts spilled steaming onto the jungle ground.

Cruel to the spider. Kind to the creatures we freed from its web.

But there were no golden birds among them. As my creations searched the island the sun dipped lower and lower in the sky, and time was running out.

But just when the orange of sunset engulfed the horizon– one of the lemurs stumbled into a secluded glade. It had been dug out by a trickling stream that fell from a cliff face, slowly carving a shallow valley of oasis underneath the cliff. At a casual glance it was invisible– only looking down directly from the cliff would allow you to see the hidden valley below.

Within there were carnivorous plants of incredible size, and massive insects. Stickbugs with carapaces covered in moss-like protrusions blended into the environment, their long bodies the size of horses. Burrowing beetles chewed on tree roots as they clawed the earth aside with their horns. Ferns and grasses sprouted taller than buildings; pitcher-plants yawned open massive pink mouths, waiting for prey.

My lemur lurched from one near miss to the next– a centipede lifted its head from the dirt, reaching to grasp it with poison tendrils. The lemur managed to scuttle away, but nearly stumbled into the water, where a massive flat-headed fish suddenly emerged from the mud, its mouth yawning open like a cavern. It lunged– my lemur flung itself aside.

Its heart beat like a drum inside its chest.

But lying on the ground in front of it was a single golden feather.

Seizing the prize, the lemur scrambled back out of the valley, seeking reinforcements.

— — —

On my eastern shore where the island lay shallow and flat against the water, a visitor arrived. A massive sea turtle slowly lugged herself up the pebbled beach, her shell a green-yellow fortress, segmented into dull pyramidal spikes with a hole at the point, like a volcano. Steam poured from the gaps in her shell. Her skin was wrinkled and obsidian black, her head dominated by a blunt-pointed beak like the grip of a set of pliers.

Iokua watched her from a distance, curious. While the rest of the island quested for the golden bird– his hunt was for Rare Schema to add to my growing collection. And this visitor seemed, to his eye, exquisitely rare.

As she trundled through the wash of the sea, a massive tide pool octopus disgorged itself from a hidden pit in the ground. Its squishy, rubbery body unfurled, tendrils spilling up as its balloon-shaped hood dragged out of the tiny cavern.

The turtle did not seem to notice. But as the octopus lashed out for one her legs, trying to engulf her in its sucker-laden tendrils–

With a thunderous PHOOM a blast of steam erupted from the nearest volcanic structure on her shell, spraying across the rubbery limb. In an instant the flesh was seared and stripped away, cutting the arm in half–

The octopus let out a wailing blubbery chirp and went running across the rock pools, fleeing for its life.

The turtle simply trundled on.

And above, Iokua leaned forward. If before she had his idle curiosity– now he was fully paying attention.

The turtle began to dig a hole in the sand, slowly clawing and stomping the dirt away with her blunt feet until she had a made a shallow impression. Iokua saw fortune in his future as the first egg dropped down into this nest…

It was made of solid sapphire. A glimmering, flawlessly smooth crystal, the shape of the infant visible below like an insect caught in amber.

He took wing and flew back to me.

— — —

A centipede flopped, broken in half. The flat fish with its ugly face full of teeth and its wide eyes had been impaled and torn open down its belly. The inhabitants of the grotto were either driven to mad hunger by the smell of blood or fleeing in all directions.

But the spider held fast to her web.

She was fat and round-shaped, with bristly fur that glittered green like a peacock’s feather and extended in spikes from her body. Her fangs were cobalt blue. The golden light of the bird hung in the depths of her funnel-shaped web, which filled the mouth of a cavernous entrance, every step lined with adhesive threads.

My saurian warrior crouched at the entrance, one hand on the ground. She had learned her lesson about blindly diving into the depths of enemy territory. The spider would not come out, however– and she was hesitant to step forward.

Her ‘trick’ of fire would not work here, with a hostage bound in the webs…

And there was no starving the spider when she had plenty to eat. That was exactly the problem.

Considering, she grabbed a lemur by the ear. The troop was gathered behind her, nervously meeting the spider’s eight eyes.

“Mud and sand. Bring earth and cast it upon the webs.”

She was proud of this plan, for it reminded her of my own thoughts. If there was no safe path– she would build one.

— — —

The humans were as busy as my bees. They dug roots out of the earth and baked them in the coals of their fire, wiping away the charcoal dust to reveal a rich, browned sugar that had wept out as the root was cooked. The caramelized skin and the soft green-white pith of the root was tossed into water in a cauldron they had made from layered fern leaves and mud. Peeled fruits were added, giving more sugar to the brewing mass of crude beer.

Alcohol.

One of humanity’s highest priorities.

Maleko was hunting for more flavors to add to the mix, cutting away leaves from saplings with his knife and tasting them. He was remarkably willing to try anything– once. His skirt was folded up into an apron pouch where he collected unripe, sweet limes.

Mele followed him. I was not yet willing to let the humans roam without someone watching over them, and Mele had been commanded to keep a close eye.

Yet curiosity was getting the better of her…

“How many islands are there?” She asked. “And how many have no humans.”

“Long ago there were seventy-seven islands, from the seventy-seven scales Hoku Kahiko stole from the greatest of all serpents. And all of them have been lost. The ocean ate them all, little one. More were made by the gods of the forge to house their fleeing people– but the ocean ate them too. Those were the days of the hungry wave and the terrible storm…”

“And yet there are obviously still islands.” Mele retorted. “Speak clearly.”

“Ah, that is because we are living in the past. This is the time before the ocean eats us, you see?” He had come to an oblong boulder lying on the ground, its side covered by furred green moss. He knelt down to examine it.

“If this is the past, where is the present?”

“Coming for us.” He answered. “Always it is coming for us.”

“That’s the future.” She bluntly replied, clearly growing frustrated. “If the present is ahead of us, it can’t be the present, it has to be the future…”

“If you say so, little one.” He grabbed the stone and began to heave, straining. It barely budged in the mud. Too many vines and roots had anchored it in place.

“How many islands are there? Now, I mean.”

He grunted and stepped back, sweat dripping down his reddened face. “I do not know. Seventy-seven, I hope.”

“There! Finally, a straight answer.” She tilted her head. “And now what are you doing.”

“That is a simpler question. This is a boundary stone. It marks the leylines, and…” He grunted and pushed against the stone once more. This time, it moved a little further. With a gasp he fell back. “They keep the land happy.”

With one final heave he managed to stand the stone up, wedging more and more of his body against it as he levered it up from the dirt.

As he did–

A ripple ran through the island. Subtle, but unmistakable. As if a clogged stream had suddenly been allowed to flow free again.

— — —

Akamai was dropped into a massive nest. All around him, small, flightless birds crawled. Their skin was rubbery and pink. Their eyes were closed– but they sensed him on some primal hungry instinct.

One by one they began to struggle towards him, craning their scaly necks. Their beaks snapped open and shut, revealing tooth-lined gullets.

Akamai could barely see himself. A dim haze of death had already closed over his view. The blood that wept from his chest took all his strength with it and left barely enough strength to lift his own limbs.

But even sleeping I had some tenuous connection to his mind…

I could give him only words. These were the words I spoke:

FIGHT. LIVE.

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