The Silver Exoplion of the fallen knight Viryl of Zelfiria. For some obscure reason, Nomenas of the Hollow Oak let out a wicked grin upon hearing that name. He immediately composed himself and proclaimed: “Kids, you made an excellent choice!”
His bizarre reaction did not escape the attentive gaze of the two young knights. The office of Nomenas, the referent of the novices, consisted of a narrow square room filled with cigar smoke. It was on the second floor of the headquarters at the end of an interminable corridor, along which at least thirty recruits were waiting. About twenty had already met with him and were chatting in the courtyard, busy organizing their expedition.
Now it was Anker and Madja's turn, and the two novices, together more for convenience than for mutual sympathy, sat opposite the big man whose bulky arms took up two-thirds of the large desk. The cold autumn light filtered in from a window behind him, and dust danced wildly behind the untidy white bush of hair above his head.
Although Nomenas was quite intimidating, due to his size and prestige, Anker found the courage to reply: “Based on the list of Exoplions you provided, that is the one that interests both of us the most.”
“Yes,” Madja echoed: “The ‘levitation’ spell that is registered on that enchanted breastplate can improve my already excellent agility, while Anker prefers long-distance combat and would make good use of the magical projectiles of the ethereal spear-guns that the Exoplion gives the possibility to summon.”
“I do not doubt it, you are talented boys,” Nomenas retorted, intertwining his stubby fingers, “I am thrilled that most of you have seized the opportunity we have chosen to give you.”
The two knights would have begged to differ, but they simply stared into Nomenas’s dark eyes waiting for him to continue. The fear painted on their faces spoke for them. They were not stupid, and they knew well that the opportunity Nomenas was talking about certainly did not come cheap.
The Exoplia had to be reclaimed from fallen knights who had not returned them to the Royal Army despite this being against the law. These were mostly individuals who had been expelled from the Order for reprehensible or rebellious conduct: in the vast majority of cases they were people of ill repute from whom one could not expect a fair confrontation. People with whom not even the highest-ranking knights had wanted to deal. The recovery of those Exoplia had been imposed from higher levels, because a faction of anarchists had begun to steal them from their illegitimate owners.
And the recruits were nothing more than vanguards, pawns to be sent out to test the waters with the promise of an exaggerated reward. A great risk for a great gain.
Nomenas ignored the expressions of the two novices, and leaned forward from his chair to retrieve one of the sealed envelopes on a shelf to his right. He slammed it down on the desk with excessive force, and muttering to himself, broke the seal and pulled out the folder inside, “Let's see what the Royal Dispatch says…”
Squinting his presbyopic eyes and pushing the small writing on the file away from him, he gave it a quick read, then passed it to his young colleagues. Then he began to summarize the salient points: “Viryl is a war veteran—so modestly am I. He voluntarily renounced his title fourteen years ago and settled on an isolated mountain in Hither Sanchiria, where he raises sheep — ”
“He raises sheep?” Anker asked, barely believing his ears. Madja, who was now leafing through the file, nodded.
Nomenas shrugged and continued: “I‘m surprised as well. The mountain is called Horn of Morghorou, and the last scouts who passed through there a few years ago say that Viryl has settled on the path that climbs along the northern slope of the mountain, near a freight elevator that goes up to the summit, where there is an abandoned observatory.”
“Good. Here it speaks of Petratonna, a shepherd village on the slopes of the mountain. It seems to be the closest human settlement to Viryl, perhaps he hangs around there from time to time,” Madja observed.
“Yes. That could be a good base of operations for your mission, and you could gather some additional information among the inhabitants. Also, Viryl‘s birthplace is the citadel of Zelfiria, a few hours' walk from Petratonna. You could take a look around there too.”
“Is there anything else?” Anker asked Madja.
“No, I wouldn't say so,” Nomenas concluded, stepping between the two, then announced: “Well, I'd say we're done!”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“We thank you for the time you granted us,” Madja said, bagging the file and putting it in her belt.
“Duty. I wish you good work!”
Anker and Madja bowed their heads in greeting, then they pushed back their uncomfortable chairs, stood up and headed for the door.
“One last thing, kids. Have you decided how to choose which of the two will keep the Exoplion?” Nomenas interrupted them as they were at the door.
Pushing on the handle, Anker retorted, “As will everyone else — ”
“We'll duel,” Madja cut him off.
*****
After the briefing with Nomenas, Anker and Madja organized their trip. They bought two tickets for a crystalway ride from Leapolis to their destination, and reserved space in the military carriage of the convoy for Onyx, Anker's favorite automaton, and their hippodrones.
The route was long, as it ran along the entire southern tip of the Velitasian peninsula, crossing the provinces of Leapolitania, Laverizia, Malbania, Fratta di Levante, to finally reach Hither Sanchiria.
They left on the night of the twenty-first day of the month of Dodrestes, and traveled for much of the following day.
The nearest crystalway station to Petratonna, that of Molinette sul Firello, was a handful of hours' walk from the village, and their ride left them there late in the afternoon.
They moved easily along the route on their military hippodrones, and even decided to make a detour to the citadel of Zelfiria, where their target's birthplace was located. They managed to sneak into the palace that had belonged to him without any problems, but it seemed to have been abandoned for decades. They did not find any new useful information about him.
Then they set off again towards Petratonna, and in about forty minutes they reached it.
In Petratonna they could do nothing but take a room in the only inn in the village, since by now there was not a living soul around. In the morning, however, they got up with a good will and immediately began questioning the inhabitants.
All the peasants in the village seemed to have an idea of who Viryl was, but the two knights couldn’t seem to find any useful sources. Some rumors claimed that he had stopped by every now and then to have a meal, to buy a lamb, or to stock up on supplies for a trip to unspecified locations from which no one had seen him return. But no one could say when his last visit had been.
After countless failed attempts, the name of an old shepherdess named Emia had come up, who said she often met him. They found her in a smelly hovel where chickens were scratching around freely.
The old woman, covered in brown, greasy rags, was busy preparing her second breakfast of eggs, onions, and lard in a pan blackened by the flames of the fireplace, and hadn’t deigned to look at them for several minutes. They called her from the door, but Emia was thinking only of her omelette. Then she sat down and began to eat it greedily with some bread.
Madja, impatient, entered, grabbed her by the shoulder and called her vehemently: at that moment Emia noticed the presence of the knights. Frightened, she pulled the pan towards her, as if they were there to steal it from her, and kicked Madja's sabatons vigorously.
A very confused exchange then began, with Madja trying to raise her arms in a sign of peace and the old woman screaming incomprehensible words and retreating further and further, spitting eggs from her toothless mouth.
From the other side of the road, a man had noticed the commotion in Emia's shack and approached. He also entered and said a few words in a dialect very distant from the current Ferlonian, immediately calming Emia. He then acted as translator for Anker and Madja.
Leaving aside the more imaginative and unlikely details of Ermia's grazing trips in the mountains, it was possible to glean two fundamentally useful pieces of information. The first was this: Emia’s last encounter with the man, who indeed corresponded to Viryl’s profile, had occurred at the end of the summer. The second was that the man had been forced to abandon his original shelter because of a landslide, probably caused by the thaw, which had made the northern route impassable, therefore Emia had met him while he was busy with some sort of relocation of his sheep to an unspecified point on the southern route, but much further from Petratonna than the first.
Having obtained what they wanted to know, Madja and Anker left. They bought some supplies for the long walk that awaited them and had lunch.
Finally they had arrived there, under the mountain, and were ready to begin their mission.
GLOSSARY:
Sympathion: a subatomic particle that magic users (Fekoro and grafted men) can transform into mass or energy at will.
Sympathionic device: a device in which the two main components are Fuligine Stone and a Memory Crystal. They are created by magic users, but in most cases can also be used by civilians.
Exoplion: a special sympationic device in the shape of a breastplate. As a standard an Exoplion is used to conjure an Ethereal Armor and an Ethereal Weapon, but on its Memory Crystal are also recorded additional spells that the user can cast without going through the process of learning them.
Leapolis: the de facto capital of the kingdom, on the west coast of the Velitasian Peninsula.
Hither Sanchiria: a poor, agricultural province on the eastern side of the Velitasian Peninsula.
Hippodrone: sympathionic device similar to a hovering motorbike.
Crystalway: a monorail system on which convoys travel propelled by sympathionic engines.
Automaton: a special kind of sympathionic device that necessitates the special spell “Soul Binding” to be created. It has an autonomous behavioral pattern.