Chapter 113: Last hurdle (Third part)
“W- What did you say?” Paul asked with a shaking voice while hiding Alianelle who had suddenly become much paler.
“You heard me,” he replied with a mocking smile on his face. “I know what she is. Even if she tries to hide it, I know that she is a—”
*BAM*
The impact of my earth bullet against the wall just beside his head interrupted his sentence.
Paul and Alianelle both abruptly turned to look at me with surprise, but I didn’t lower my hand and kept my eyes fixed on this old man. My magic didn’t leave a single mark on the hardened wall of the mine, but it wouldn’t have been the same if it had landed in his head. Aware of this fact, the old man was now looking at me and at my raised hand, ready to summon a new magic, with the same cautious and calculating gaze that I had while looking at his twitching hands by his side.
His frail appearance was already ruined by his blackened hands, sharp and resistant enough to easily tear through rocks. In such a narrow cave, I couldn’t afford for him to close the distance.
“Don’t move and don’t say another word,” I threatened with my open palm still directed at him, ready to kill him this time if he made the slightest suspicious movement.
He didn’t have the time to react to my previous attack, we both knew it.
If I had wanted it, he would be dead already.
To be safe, I focused behind me, but the noise of my magic didn’t attract anyone’s attention. As I had anticipated, this kind of impact was difficult to differentiate from the noise made by a working individual.
“Easy now…” he started. “It wasn’t a threat. I just want to make a deal with you all.”
“A deal?” I asked, slightly taken aback.
“You don’t want me to say it out loud, fine. However, if I’m not wrong, then she has something I desperately need.”
He slowly raised his hands in surrender and made a motion with his head for me to relax so he could continue with his explanation.
I complied and slightly lowered my hand, but kept my magic ready.
“Thank you,” he sighed once he wasn’t under direct threat anymore. “Human… my ass,” he mumbled.
I ignored his complaints, too busy wondering how a man we just met could have so easily guessed Alianelle’s true nature. A single sideways glance was enough for me to confirm that her loose clothes didn’t leave any kind of clue about what was hidden under them, thanks to the bandages tightly wrapped around her waist.
Without having glimpsed at her wings, there was only a single possibility to explain his confident words leaving little doubt as to his certainty.
“How did you know?” I still asked in a cold voice to confirm my suspicions.
“How? Because she doesn’t know how to properly hide herself. I’m not as strong or as adept with magic as I once was, but my senses have not become so dulled yet to miss one of her kind just in front of my eyes. You must be either insane or desperate to have dared let someone of her kind into this city, let alone this mine,” he explained. “If the Ryunno clan learned about her existence then they would trample anything and anyone on their way to get her, which may be the only way left to save this city all things considered,” he chuckled.
The first Advanced town was created by the Ryunno clan to mine Elemental stones. Considering our current situation and the peril this city was currently in, I found it hard to guess why they hadn’t intervened yet. Their power would be more than welcome to save us all, but if what this man said was true then it would also condemn Alianelle without the shadow of a doubt as they wouldn’t have any trouble identifying her for what she truly was.
I had been suspicious of this point before as a Ryunno clan member had been able to sense her true nature when her wings hadn’t grown back yet, at a time when Alianelle herself had been unaware of her origin. Paul was reluctant to talk about it, but if there was a way to sense Alianelle’s true nature, then it made sense why he stubbornly kept her locked in her room at all times ever since coming to this city.
“If you just had any common sense, you would both take her as far away from this place as possible,” he continued in a grave voice as if trying to hammer this truth into us.
“As if that’s not what we’re trying to do” screamed Paul in anger.
“Doesn’t seem like it to me,” he mocked back. “Do you truly understand what the Ryunno clan would do for one of her kind? If you’re her real father, then you’re a wingless; a fallen. If that’s the case, then surely you must realize that what they did to trigger the wrath of the wilderness is nothing compared to what they would do to catch her.”
“Wait a minute,” I interrupted. “How can you know what triggered the wrath of the wilderness? You said you hadn’t seen the sky outside for twenty years,” I noted without hiding the suspicion in my voice.
“Guards speak and I have seen the world, boy. Rumors of the death of a Ryunno clan member have just started to spread here, but I have suspected it for weeks. Only the Ryunno clan can trigger such a land-changing phenomenon and they would only use it if the only racial law of this world had been broken,” he explained with a grave voice.
The racial law.
I didn’t know anything about it until Jazor forcefully explained it to me when I tried to rescue Alianelle on my own after her kidnapping by a Ryunno clan member.
The only law binding all the races together.
An absolute order to not harm a Ryunno clan member under any circumstances.
Because this taboo was broken, our Advanced town was wiped out and the wrath of the wilderness was triggered.
“The world is changing,” he continued gravely. “The last time they demonstrated their power was just after the end of the great war. Ever since that day, all the races have submitted to their rule. However, now that the racial law has been broken, everything will change.”
“Nothing will change,” countered Paul. “The Ryunno clan can’t be challenged,” he declared with an absolute certainty born without a doubt by his encounter with the Ancestor of this clan, the man who had taken his wife away from him in front of his eyes after a display of absolute power.
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“Someone just did. They answered the death of their brethren with their usual ferociousness and cruelty yet the culprit still eludes them. If not they wouldn’t be controlling everyone willing to enter the Dorell Kingdom. Trust me, even if I haven’t seen the light of the day for years, even if I’m nothing more than a slave waiting to die down here, I know. They are afraid.”
“Them? Afraid? Impossible!” once more denied Paul.
“Of course they are. Like all the rulers throughout history, they are afraid to lose their power. They know that the time to once more fight for their dominance will soon come. That’s why I said you’re severely underestimating the risks you’ve been putting your daughter through. Her feathers have the same influence on the surrounding mana as the Elemental stones, they absorb, purify and magnify it. In short, just like high-grade elemental stones, they are a fatal attraction for the Ryunno clan, now more than ever.”
A heavy silence settled after his words. If he intended to frighten us to make us more willing to listen to him then it was certainly effective as Alianelle had her arms tightly wrapped around her waist while Paul had nothing more to say to counter him.
“What do you want?” I finally asked after a few seconds of this uncomfortable silence.
“One of her feathers,” he simply answered without any laugh or taunt this time.
Despite his previous explanation, neither I nor Alianelle really understood the true value of what he was asking, but Paul clearly did if his reddened face and his clenched fists were any indications.
“Why do you need that?” I asked genuinely curious before Paul could intervene.
“For the same reason as the Ryunno clan; for the same reason that caused the great war and the extermination of the third clan decades ago,” he started. “I need it to help me mature this,” he declared while rummaging through his dilapidated clothes that apparently had some pockets left.
As soon as he took it out and showed it to us, I immediately wondered how the magical senses I was so proud of could have missed the presence of such an object.
“What is that?” asked Alianelle while poking her head from behind her father’s back.
“An Elemental stone,” answered the old man.
The small piece of rock easily fit into the palm of his hand and didn’t appear special in any way except maybe for the slight bluish light it gave under the flickering light of the torch on the wall. However, for anyone able to sense mana, this rock was anything but ordinary. The vast amount of mana it constantly emanated would make it shine like a beacon in the middle of the sea if I closed my eyes to focus on my magical sense.
Moreover, it wasn’t just about the quantity of mana it emanated.
I also felt a strange attraction toward this stone, as if it was calling me.
It was as if everything I had been through in this life was for this moment as if this stone was destined for me.
I just had to reach out with my hand and it would become mine.
Neither Paul nor Alianelle would object and the current owner of this miraculous stone didn’t have the strength to stop me.
All I had to do was reach out.
My mana started to burst forth just as the old man clenched his hand and put back the elemental stones inside his tattered clothes with a swift movement. He was done in an instant and immediately after, the continuous almost hypnotizing wave of mana disappeared.
“Sillath?”
Alianelle’s voice brought me back and made me realize that I had half-raised one of my hands. Whether it was to take the stone or kill its owner, even I didn’t know.
“Are you alright?”
I hurriedly nodded and lowered my hand while doing my best to ignore the curious and slightly frightened gazes that everyone around was giving me. Apparently, even the owner of this stone hadn’t anticipated this kind of reaction and didn’t seem to have any more idea than I did to explain it.
“This is an Elemental stone of the first grade,” he awkwardly resumed his explanation. “We mostly mine third and second grades here, but a few years ago, I was lucky enough to find it while I was on my own.”
“No one sensed its presence,” curiously asked Alianelle who despite her inexperience was apparently also able to sense the incredible mana that this stone was constantly releasing.
“They definitely would have if I didn’t have a little trick up my sleeve to hide its existence.”
I was also curious about this point and dearly wanted to know what he had used to completely disrupt my magical senses, however, it was obvious that he didn’t want to explain it any further.
“So you want to use one of my feathers to make it evolve, is that right?” asked Alianelle, perplexed and clearly not convinced that her feathers had this kind of ability.
“Yes, I do,” he genuinely answered. Probably the most truthful words that came out of his mouth ever since our encounter. “The difference in grade between Elemental stones becomes more exaggerated the higher the grade. A first-grade stone is a miracle, but the grade beyond that — the grade at the pinnacle of Elemental stones — probably can’t be found in nature anymore.”
“The grade beyond?”
“A Primordial stone…” mumbled Paul somberly in response to Alianelle’s query.
“Is that what you want to create? Why?”
“That’s not something I wish to discuss,” he simply answered.
“And why should Alianelle help you, if you’re able to tell us that much,” I asked, annoyed and not completely beyond the strange sensation that assaulted me as soon as his Elemental stone was within reach.
“Because I can help you in your search for Elemental stones.”
“You want us to believe that you have a way to find Elemental stones that no one is aware of?” Paul scoffed at him.
“You would be surprised what twenty years of the same task can help you develop. I’m certainly not the only one to have discovered this method, but I’m definitely the only one willing to share it as all the other slaves lucky or competent enough to have found a way to find more elemental stones, and thus shorten their time spent here, would never disclose it to anyone out of fear that the Dwarves will lengthen their sentence.”
He had a point.
“Moreover, if all the Elemental stones you find aren’t enough to prevent this town’s downfall, the power of a Primordial stone will be the only way for you to survive,” he concluded before we could comment on his previous proposal.
I knew Paul didn’t like the idea of helping this man with one of Alianelle’s feathers, but his proposal certainly had merits even if I had my doubts.
“I agree.”
Before Paul or I could speak, Alianelle took a step forward from behind her father’s back and accepted the deal without any hesitation or fear.
“Alianelle…” started Paul, apparently to try to dissuade or at least warn her.
But Alianelle didn’t let him finish.
“We have lost too much time already. If our only other alternative is to blindly search for Elemental stones while hoping to get lucky like all the other people that came down here with us, then it’s worth it.”
Paul didn’t have anything to say to contradict her anymore.
“Moreover, if this man can sense what I am, then maybe others can. The sooner I’m out of this mine the better.”
I opened my mouth, but before a single word could come out of it, I met her eyes.
I knew what this single gaze meant.
I didn’t need her to say anything, proof of just how much we had learned to know each other.
“No one is near,” I simply said after checking once more the entrance of our small cavern with my senses.
That’s the only signal she wanted to raise her clothes just under her breasts and to unravel the white bandages covering her stomach. A few seconds later, her wings were set free and spread on each side of her waist. They had grown once again compared to the last time I saw them and no longer had anything to do with their previous growing form. Of a sparkling white, they now clearly emitted a soft glow making the flame on the wall appear desperately dull. They clearly hadn’t reached their full length, but they were now nearly enough to touch each side of the cave if they were completely spread.
Even the insolent old man who had constantly been belittling us and rejoicing at our misfortune now had a solemn look as he was bathed by the new radiance of these majestic wings.
With a gentle touch, Alianelle stroked her right wing, the feathers bending under her slim fingers despite their crystalline appearance. She finally settled on one and with a resigned look, she pulled on it. The expression of pain flashing on her face lasted just an instant, but I didn’t miss it. If the old man had seen the pain that pulling out this single feather had provoked, he clearly didn’t care as his gaze was completely transfixed on the hard-looking feather that Alianelle was handing out to him with her outstretched arm.
He carefully took it and hid it in his dilapidated clothes just like he did for his Elemental stone.
In the meantime, Paul and Alianelle busied themself with properly folding her wings around her slim waist and constraining them once more. They rushed their movements, but not enough for me to miss what they had obviously been trying to hide from the old man, too preoccupied with the feather in his possession to notice anything.
The feather that Alianelle took out was already growing back, and I suspected that by the time Alianelle lowered her loose clothes, it was already back as if nothing had ever happened.
“Now, your turn,” finally harshly declared Alianelle without flinching.
Thanks to her, the old man we found deep within this mine became our ally in our search.
Whether his help would change anything for us and for this city remained to be seen.