62 – Babysitting quest

The party didn’t have to wait long before Taiival got in touch with them, having found someone who was willing to share information with them, and by noon of the next day they were walking down the main street of Semiluminal apparently all the way to the edge of the city, where lonely stood a great white palace. As they got close to it, the city slowly shifted from a normal nameless town, where people were either farmers or miners who ventured down what was called the Obscure to harvest its precious minerals and gems, into a rich and flourishing seat of power.

The streets were clean and lined with plants, and the sound of rushing water guided the eyes to the hanging gardens. The houses were all of white and gold, made of marble and thick slabs of white stone embellished with gems and reliefs, and the trees that stood at the sides of the central walkway between the two canals were rich of flowers despite the season. In spite of it being early winter, in fact, here the air was warm and rich.

To the sides small roads led to narrow avenues and sloping alleys, and when one peered through and ventured a few paces inside they revealed their hidden vistas of calm rivers and trees and vines. The walls in the distance were like great giants of stone, guards that hid the horizon from the eye. Other narrow sights didn’t feature the walls, for they faced towards the chasm, and the horizon was clear and distant.

“Once again we are brought to the big mansion at the center of the city.” Ishrin said, shaking his head in disbelief. “It’s becoming a pattern.”

“At least this looks better than the other city.” Melina said. “It doesn’t give me the same chills.”

“That’s because we are in the rich neighborhood, Melina.” Ishrin said. “Can you please do the talking when we go in? I don’t feel very socially inclined today.”

Melina nodded, feeling his tired mood.

The guards of the palace were expecting the arriving party, and they led them inside to a grand hall where a table already full of various foods and beverages.

“Uh…” Ishrin groaned. “Another dinner with the rich guys. This is Obscuria all over again.”

“Come on, we need this information.” Melina said, taking her place at the table.

Lisette followed suit, taking a seat between her and Ishrin, who was left sitting at the far corner of the table. He was actually relieved to not be at the center of attention, and when the noble came and introduced himself and exchanged pleasantries with Melina and even with Lisette, Ishrin only half-listened while he ate the food and waited for time to pass. He was vigilant, but bored out of his mind, only the knowledge that something could sneak up on them keeping him alert. If anything, he did it so that he would not become complacent, in light of all the easy killings of the last few days. Lucius had been a meticulously planned murder, but it was easy even for an experienced mind such as his to assume that all fights against more powerful opponents would be that easy.

In spite of all his efforts, the noble was getting verbose, talking about his son like the kid was some sort of genius of the sword, then flaunting his enormous wealth, and even having the chef explain each dish as they were brought from the kitchen. Ishrin nodded distractedly, checking the food over and over again with a suite of spells and the full spectrum of his senses just to pass the time. The room had given up all its secrets long ago, succumbing to his prodding and revealing the flow of mana of the wards, the many spell inscriptions and arrays, as well as the hidden extra functions of the table and the seats. Functions that had been quietly disabled in a few minutes—the most entertaining few minutes of the whole meal.

A stray thought hit him: it was funny how the noble was singing the praises of his wealth to what he thought were simple adventurer, not knowing just how much money was hidden inside Ishrin’s inventory. A smile tugged at his lips at the thought, and he missed a beat in the conversation when everybody seemed to expect something of him. The last sentence had ended with a: “…so what do you think, Ishrin?”

He looked up, and the whole room seemed to be staring at him while he stared back with his dumb smile at a joke only he knew. There was the noble, his wife, the prodigy kid who was actually a teenager…

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“Sounds good to me.” he blurted out, then turned to glare at Melina for having asked him the question with a face that pleaded for some context.

“Very well, then.” Melina cleared her voice. “Thank you for your generosity, duke Elstrom. As token of our gratitude, we will escort your son, Sir Westys, and his party with us so that they may learn the art of adventuring on the field.” She said, taking care to enunciate the names for Ishrin’s sake.

Ishrin wanted to groan. He wondered, for a moment, what the power dynamics in his party were like now that most of their issues were resolved. Was Melina back to being the leader? He would very much like her to be, even considering the fact that she had just agreed to a task that sounded more like torture than anything else. She would later explain that she had to take the quest to follow an important lead, the only lead they had in light of an event that everyone knew was going to happen soon.

Well. It is what it is, he thought. Perhaps Melina and himself were on equal decisional level with veto powers. He liked the idea.

With the formalities done, they went back to eating and making small talk. Melina handled the social situation like a natural, feeling completely at ease in the environment as she told the duke and his wife stories about their travels, half made up and half revisited to be more palatable, and tales of their exploits. Her skill as a former guild master was not something to be overlooked, and Ishrin was grateful that he could just be left to think, lost in his own world, for a while. There were dark thoughts on his mind, that had left him tired and weary despite his body being perfectly rested.

Far away, on the other side of the city, oblivious as to what was going on and especially as to what was going to happen, Taiival was sitting on a stool beside a half-opened crate of pixie dust, and his skull suddenly burst open and his molten brain began to drip to the floor. His associates in the other room heard the sound and went to check, only to discover to their horror his mutilated body still sitting next to the crate. Then they looked at each other, and horror turned to greed as each of them rushed for their dagger.

“Yikes, he actually used it.” Ishrin said out loud, but low enough so that only Melina and Lisette heard him. Considering that the noble was at least Tier 3 and his son Tier 4, no matter how worthless being of such Tier could be if one did not train and cultivate properly, Ishrin had to be really quiet, barely making a sound, but it had been enough to be heard by his Tier 6 companions.

“What?” Melina said, later when they were walking towards an inn to pass the night.

“The ‘payment’ I gave to merchant. He’s dead.” Ishrin said.

“You don’t seem happy with that, though.”

She was pensive, but she had spoken with confidence, making Ishrin wonder just how she could read him so well. “How do you know?”

“Nobody says ‘yikes’ seriously, Ishrin. I know you’re upset.”

“I might be. We just lost a potentially valuable contact, and also potentially created a mess big enough that it might reach Syrma eventually. I know it was the right thing to do—in fact, I think we gave him way too much wiggle room, but I wonder if one day ‘doing the right thing’ will get us killed.”

There was silence after that. Lisette broke the spell when they were close enough to the inn that the landscape around them had changed from the decadent opulence of the noble district to the utilitarian efficiency of a municipally-funded housing district.

“Did you kill many people in your universe?” She asked.

“Oh yeah,” Ishrin said. “Tons of them. In cold blood. Sometimes for no reason. And of course, let’s not forget the ritual that wiped out a whole planet and almost spread to the wider universe.” He did not mention that the planet had already been empty by then. Some things were better left unsaid. “But here, in this new…” he looked at himself. “Life I have? I thought I could be different.”

“You can’t. It’s how the world is.” Melina said solemnly.

Ishrin frowned. “You of all people—”

“Yes. Me. Some people are better off dead. Some people will want you dead. You can blame magic, and the guild, and the Tier levels if you want. But it’s like this and you need to accept it.”

“Morally grey, as always.” Ishrin said after a while “I’ll get over it.”

“That’s not all.” She said, seeing through him. “You are thinking about Liù.”

He nodded. As Melina’s mind healed, overcoming the trauma and the doubt that had poisoned her mind ever since the incident, she had only gotten better at reading people. Sometimes, it felt like a preternatural ability she had, like a spell or an affinity that she used, but Ishrin had never detected any magical, mundane or otherwise anomalous activity from her when she performed her miraculous actions of empathy and understanding of other people. In the end, he had to concede that some people were just that good, or perhaps he was rather bad at peopling.

“You know what hurts the most?” Ishrin turned to face her, stopping dead in the middle of the wide street lit by the halogen-mana lamps. He put his hands on her shoulders and squeezed, and his eyes were misty and wet. “It’s like I can still feel her.”

Melina’s eyes widened. “Maybe she is alive!”

“Melina…”

“No, I’m serious. Follow the feeling. Where does it lead?”

“Everywhere.” He said. “And nowhere.”

Melina deflated. “That’s… not very helpful.”

“Yeah.” Ishrin said.