The further Ignis went north, the less arduous his journey became, as the Marais-Marches made way for a large stretch of land which had been cleared of trees. He had arrived at the planes of Gardienne, the western-most outpost of the Watch of the White Curtain. To his left, he saw the Ciel-Plateau, a mountain-range into which the wall had been integrated, and to his right, the great white wall stretched all the way to the eastern-most parts of the Foretblue. In front of him, Gardienne itself, a small village surrounded by a grey brick wall 1/4th as tall as the White Curtain itself, but not even close to its thickness.
Ignis knew that this was not the right way back to Teles but considering that he was still on the run from the guards, he figured that he would need to lay low somewhere else for a while until this entire situation had blown over. At first, one would think that hiding inside one of the outposts of the very same people one was hiding from in the first place would seem like a bad idea, but Ignis had already thought of a way to make him not stand out. He knew that the guards were probably on the look-out for a wizard with long, grey beard, a wizard's hat, and grey robes, so he decided to cut his beard short and hide his wizard hat in one of his pockets. Then he reversed his robe, as it was pristinely white on the inside, sans a couple of golden ornaments, such as an emblem in the shape of a fountain surrounded by 10 stars, with the one right above it bigger than the others, which was stitched both on the front, above where his heart would be, and on his back in the centre of the robe. It was these two marks which made him reverse the robe all these years ago in the first place, as he did not want any identifying marks on him in case, he needed to run from someone. Who could have anticipated that this decision would aid him for this very reason, as the marks would surely distract from the rest of his appearance?
'No one would suspect an old man in white robes to be anything but an ordinary traveller', he thought.
'Truly an ingenious disguise.'
He could not help but smirk at his slyness as he made his way towards the outpost.
Meanwhile, standing idly by the front gate of Gardienne, a rookie of the Watch let out a bored yawn, leaning against the wall and drawing shapes in the ground in front of him with his spear.
"At attention, rookie! We aren't paid for idling around!", the watchman to his right, who appeared to be his senior, barked at him.
"Yeah, yeah, I know. But seriously, Biggs? When I joined the Watch, I thought I'd be stationed at Värav, you know? Fighting criminals, going on expeditions into the forest? Or maybe even at Dranid, battling against those wyvern and arachnids and stuff. But this? Nothing ever happens in Gardienne!", the rookie lamented, kicking up dirt in frustration.
Biggs spit on the ground to voice his disgust about what he just heard.
"Tch, what do you think this is, some kinda game? We're providing an essential service, not only to the kingdom, but to humanity as a whole! If something were to breach this wall, all hell would break lose, not matter where that breach happened!"
"Hah...I know that. And the pay is okay, don't get me wrong. It's just... never mind.", the rookie sighed, returning to a more proper stance, and going back to watching the dirt-road leading into the forest.
"Oi, rookie! See that white robed guy over there?", Biggs suddenly blurted out, pointing at the old man making his way towards them.
"Hm? What do you mean?", the rookie asked confused.
"See the golden emblem on the front?", his comrade continued.
The rookie squinted his eyes as he strained to make out what Biggs was talking about.
"Now that you mention it, looks awfully like the Fountain of Magic. Think he's a mage of the Magician's Guild?"
"And not just any mage. I guess you got what you wanted, rookie! White robes are the trademark of an Archmage, the cream of the top! We got ourselves a celebrity!"
This caused the rookie to immediately change his attitude.
"NO WAY! What's an archmage doing here of all places? Aren't they usually holed up in some study most of their lives?"
"Beats me. But if it's something that made him come all the way here, we're probably in for quite some trouble. At attention, rookie! If you embarrass the Watch in front of an archmage, getting stationed here will sound like paradise for you in a few days. Just let me do the talking.", Biggs warned the other guard and straightened himself as well.
Ignis had to focus on keeping a straight face, as the thought of hiding right under the noses of the one's he was hiding from amused him to no end. His inattentiveness would have caused him to run into the closed gate, but one of the guards in front of it decided to loudly greet him.
"GREETINGS, MASTER ARCHMAGE!", he shouted with a bow, the other one, a slightly younger looking man in the same uniform, copied the gesture.
Ignis did not know who this 'Master Archmage' was, but he decided to play along, if this meant he would get past them.
"Erm... hello? Would you kindly open the gate for me? I'm kind of in a hurry."
"Of course, right away! One question though, if you don't mind. What has brought you to us today? Is there problem?", the guard asked, after motioning the younger one to open the gate.
"Problem? Oh, no, of course there is no problem. Nope. Especially nothing of the troubling kind. Just an old man passing by, nothing special.", Ignis answered, growing visibly more nervous as he tried to keep his cool.
Unbeknownst to him, the guard in front of him read the wizards nervousness as him being on his way to face a danger beyond anything imaginable while trying to keep any information about this a secret, as to not cause a panic.
"We understand. Do not worry, Master Archmage! If there is anything we can help you with, just give the command, we will do it without fail!", he answered with another bow.
"...right. Well, now that you mention it, could you lead me to the main gate and open it as well for me?", the wizard asks, still slightly confused about the situation. Meanwhile, the gate to the village had opened and the rookie assumed his previous position.
"Of course! Please, follow me. Rookie, you watch the gate, I'll send my replacement!", he said to his comrade, who answered with a salute.
As he traversed through the gate, the guard excused himself, as he needed to send his replacement to the front gate. He asked the wizard to wait, though as soon as he was out of sight, Ignis took off, heading for the massive cullis-gate serving as the entrance to the desert.
'Damn my good looks! Why do I have to look like some important figure? Never mind that, I need to get out of here!', he thought as he sprinted towards the gate.
Despite his age, his life near the forest made him quite nimble and heightened his stamina, making him only dry-heave for air for a few seconds out of exhaustion after running through the back-alleys of Gardienne to the gate facing Ceruceil.
'Eurgh, I should have just used
Having caught his breath and no longer seeing stars at the corner of his vision, he hid in the alley and observed the gate. To his luck, it seemed like merchants had just entered the gate from the desert with a large caravan, and the gate was still open.
'Hehe, it's all coming together.', he thought, as he did not forget this time to cast the
'Now I only need a distraction...', he mulled over his plan.
'Maybe you should light yourself on fire? I bet they won't see that one coming.', a voice hissed in the back of his mind, but he waved them off.
'I think I have a better idea...', he answered them in his mind, a mischievous smile making its way on his face.
----------------------------------------
"Salutations, gardes du Rideau Blanc! 'ow may we be of service today?", the merchant, a middle-aged man clad in the gaudy attire of the merchants of Ceruceil asked with a fake smile in the accent of the west.
"Just a routine inspection, sir. There have been reports of drugs and even slaves being moved from up north through Ceruceil via the desert trails, so we have to take a look at your wares.", one of the guards answered, as his comrades started to prod the carriages of the merchants.
"Oh, merci de ne pas! Dere 'as got to be a different way, no? We carry easily spoiled goods! If you open zhe chests, zhe refrigeration spell will surely suffer. We cannot afford such a thing to 'appen, we rely on zhe moni we gain from dem!", the merchant begged, his smile starting to waver.
"I'm sorry sir, we cannot bend the rules.", the guard stated, adamant in continuing the search.
"Dere not something we can do? Some... compensation, no? We are certain we can make it worth your while!", the merchant asked, continuing his charade and making the universal gesture for money to underline his insinuation.
"Sir, trying to bribe us will only make us search more thoroughly!"
"Oh, no no no, you seem to misunderstand, mon ami! We just want to... how you say? Speed up the process, oui. Don't want you to waste your precious time, no?"
"Hmm, there sure are a lot of carts...", the guard trailed off, as he took in just how many carts were in front of him.
'Gotcha. These cretins would do anything to cut their work short. I told the higher ups that this route was superior to the one through Värav. The guards here got lazy due to their boredom, so there's not even a need for a bribe. Now they have to promote me! ', the merchant thought to himself, his victory within his grasp, as suddenly, one of the carts behind him exploded into fire.
----------------------------------------
"Haha, there we go! Now I just need to use the commotion and escape through the gate!", Ignis exclaimed in delight as he sneakily made his way past the burning carts.
----------------------------------------
"Merde! Sauvez les chariots de drogue, crétins ! L'Hydre nous tueront s'ils découvrent que nous avons endommagé la marchandise!", the merchant screamed at his subordinates in shock, as he realised just which of the carts had caught fire.
Though he used the Western Language, which had long been replaced in Éclat with Common and thus was mostly forgotten there, he was exceptionally unlucky on this day, as he found himself in front of a man whose parents had fled one of the regions still fluent in this tongue during the Edenian War.
"Drug carts, eh? And you work for the 7-Headed-Hydra as well? Seems like we got our hands on quite the big fish!", the guard mentioned smugly, unsheathing his sword, as did those among his comrades, who were not currently busy dousing the burning carts with water.
Before any of the merchants could react, the gates were already closing, cutting off their only escape route.
"Merde...", the 'merchant' cursed loudly, before holding his hands up in surrender.
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"Phew, barely managed to get through. Now let's see...", Ignis mumbled, as he examined his surroundings. North, east, west, no matter where he looked, there was nothing but sand in front of him.
A brick road, barely visibly poking out through the sand, cut a path through the never-ending ocean of yellowish white in front of him.
'Hmm, following the road will probably lead to another guard outpost or something. I should probably go somewhere else.', he thought and instead of heading down the path, decided to run north-east.
The
'Aw man, it's gonna take decades until it becomes this long again.'
Silently mourning the loss of his beard, he looked through his pockets to find his water skin. Instead, he snatched an apple, which had his pet rat dangling from it, as it had just sunken its teeth into it. Mira gave of a low-pitched squeak, as if to signal that this was her apple, but Ignis waved her off.
"Don't worry, I've had enough of apples for a while. Can you go back in and get me my water skin? I'm parched.", he asked, and his companion complied, immediately diving back into the pocket.
Seconds later, the rat re-emerged with the water skin in her mouth. The old man grabbed the water skin and emptied half of it.
Stolen story; please report.
'Huh, didn't realise how thirsty I actually was.', he thought, while giving some to his rat.
"Hmm, what now?", he asked his rat, who squeaked at him.
"I guess you are right, Mira. I do not think that the water I have with me will last that long."
Another squeak.
"I know, I can just make more. But remember last time, when we got lost in that cave? Do you really want to taste those awful arcane rations again?", he asked, bringing the rat closer to his face.
The rat sniffed the air, then retched.
"See? I am not touching that filth either. At least not as long as we have options. Now then, could you, per chance, have been here before? It would be great if you knew where we are right now.", he continued, lifting the rat above his head.
Mira looked left and right, sniffed the air a few times, then started to squeak again.
"No luck, eh?", the wizard followed up with a deep sigh and brought the rat closer to the ground again. Mira looked at him, then squeaked again.
"Hm? Water? Where?", he asked, and the rat pointed its face into a random direction.
"...I see. Think you can bring me there?", he inquired.
His companion gave off one last squeak, then jumped to the ground.
"Splendid! I knew I could count on you, my furry little friend. Let me just... AUGEO!", he shouted and cast the same growth spell he had all those times before, causing his rat to grow to the size of a horse. Ignis climbed the back of Mira, who gave of a low-pitched growl, then pointed forwards with his staff, as he grabbed a bushel of fur with the other hand.
"Onwards, my trusty steed!"
The giant rat growled and rose to her hind legs, mimicking a horse, then jumped forward and ran towards what Ignis believed to be the water source she mentioned earlier.
As he tried to become more comfortable on the back of his pet, Ignis tried to remember information he had heard of the desert he found himself in, as it could help him to navigate through it. Though his memory had become hazy, Ignis remembered he had found a book in the ruins of his home in Teles, which briefly mentioned the desert in one of its chapters. Thus, he retrieved the "The Age of Heroes" from one of his pockets, and decided to re-read it:
> Many myths surround the great desert of Ceruceil, as nobody knows for sure how it came to be. The oldest scripts talk of luscious planes of green grass and mighty forests while talking about Ceruceil, but nothing today would indicate any such thing, as many refer to it mockingly as Cercueil instead, the western word for coffin.
>
> After the cataclysmic event that fragmented Tella Mundi, the great continent of Moros, into 6 smaller pieces, Ceruceil had become a flourishing kingdom under the rule of one of the two Liberators of Mankind, the heroes chosen by the Gods to prevent humanities extinction.
>
> The hero in question was King Rainier de Léones, or as he was more commonly referred to in the Common Language, the Immortal Lion, a moniker he received due to his wild appearance and sheer inhuman vitality. It was him, who usurped the throne from its previous ruler, a man whose name had been eradicated from history for selling his own people to the monsters of the land to secure his own safety.
>
> After Rainier had culled the creatures who dared to enslave humanity, he continued his crusade and freed the entire northern continent, living up to the title of Liberator of Humanity. During his reign, he remained undefeated in combat, with only the Liberator of the South, Freya Andrea Sangdracon, having managed to force him into a stalemate.
>
> Nevertheless, at the height of his power, he vanished from the face of the planet for unknown reasons, and with him the prosperity of his nation. As if cursed by the gods themselves, the once fertile earth around the capital city of Ceruceil, Hadena, began to dry up and crack, and from the cracks burst forth ghastly monsters who thirsted for human blood.
>
> The survivors of the massacre that followed built new settlements near the last remaining water sources, the river flowing through the region, known as Embrasé, the river of the north, Louplabas, and the Mitis Ocean in the west, as these monsters seemed to shy away from water, even actively evading it.
>
> Many believe the calamity that befell Ceruceil to be the work of the very monsters which Rainier had dedicated his life to rid the earth of, but a curse of this magnitude could not possibly be conjured by some lowly monsters. The only one who can say for sure what happened is the one known as the Immortal Lion himself, wherever he may be.
"Pfft, as if. Just because they called him immortal, doesn't mean he is one. What a stupid book.", he chuckled, before throwing the book away.
'But that river it mentioned sounds like a good place to hide. I wonder if we can get there before nightfall.', he thought as he looked back to where he was headed.
"Oi, over there!", he yelled out, pointing away from where they were going, at what looked like a lake to him not too far in the distance.
A low growl answered him, causing him to furrow his brows.
"What? Who is this Father Morgana, and what has that to do with anything?", he asked the rat, but received no answer.
"Fine, have it your way. But if we do not reach some water soon, I will make you eat arcane rations for a week.", he continued, slightly annoyed at how his companion seemingly did not care in the slightest for his input.
This seemed to spur on the rat, causing her to go even faster.
After about an hour, as the sun had risen to its zenith and Mira began to slow down, Ignis managed to make out some green in the distance.
"This time I am certain! Are you seeing that?", he yelled out, but his rat only managed to wheeze in response.
"No worries, this last stretch will be no problem! You have earned yourself some rest, my friend!", he explained as he jumped of his pet's back. With a quick poke of his staff into her side, Mira shrunk down to her normal rat size, and Ignis stuffed her back into his pocket.
"Alright! Let us advance!", he mumbled to himself, and started walking towards the green spots he had noticed in the distance.
About four hours later, the green spots turned out to be weirdly shaped trees, which looked like snakes with green wigs, which Ignis had never before seen in his life, with grass and bushes growing in-between them.
It was not the river from the story, as he thought it would be, but a small lake next to a large, weirdly shaped rock, which, if observed from the right angle, reminded one of a sword that has been driven deep into the ground.
'An oasis in the middle of nowhere, thank the gods!' he thought to himself, as he sprinted towards the water. Right before he jumped into it, however, he stopped himself, as a warning some adventurer had given him years ago as he had just drunk from a puddle on the floor came to mind:
"Don't just drink from any water source you find, old man! Who knows what's in there!"
'Hmm... How shall I test this.', he contemplated as he kicked a pebble into the lake, which weirdly enough, did not cause the liquid to splash.
"AHA! I got it!", he yelled out, and started to search around in his pocket.
Having found what he was looking for, a dead albino Saltpeter Salamander, which he had picked up the day before near his house as he wanted to study its discolouration.
"Alright, little guy! Now is your time to shine!", he mumbled, as he dropped the small amphibian unceremoniously into the emerald-green waters of the lake.
As soon as the salamander made contact with the water, it started to bubble, smoking and sizzling shortly after, as the carcass disintegrated upon submerging into whatever fluid the lake was made of. The wizard looked at the space which had just been occupied by the salamander and sunk back into thought.
'Hmm... was that because of the water, or was that just something these salamanders do when they touch water? Only one way to find out!'
'Yes, go ahead and take a big sip! '
The old man ignored his head's occupant once more and looked around, before deciding to rip out one of the larger leaves sprouting from the ground. He slightly touched the surface of the lake with the leaf, and it quickly burst into fire, causing him to drop the whole leaf. He threw a few more things he found into the lake to see what would happen, and, after a while, decided that this was indeed not water.
"Well, guess it is arcane rations again. Please let it be at least edible this time", he muttered a short prayer to the Gods, before drawing a circle into the ground before him with his staff, closing his eyes, and chanting the spell he dreaded so much.
"Magna arcana, forma re ad voluntatem meam!"
He felt his energy leaving him, forming the complex spell circle needed to create this kind of magic, as he continued the incantation.
Ignis disliked casting spells vocally, as he was perfectly capable of doing so in his head, but for the spell
The wizard only had to use this spell twice before, and both times he was struck with bad luck, spawning food in taste akin to sawdust mixed with earth, and water that, though completely tasteless, suspiciously looked and smelled like clean toilet water. It was the only magic that made him envy clerics, as there exists a miracle the gods bestow upon the followers of the
Ardent Path that allows them to choose what kind of food and drink the spell will procure.
This time, it seemed that Goddess of Luck had smiled upon the wizard, as within the circle he drew, with a flash of light and some light smoke, a rather large loaf of bread and a jar of clear, auspicious looking water appeared. He sniffed the loaf of bread and the water, just to be sure, and, upon finding nothing out of the ordinary, broke the bread in half and drank some of the water. The old man sat down and chewed down on one half of the surprisingly fresh bread, which was apparently filled with some kind of dried vegetable, and stuffed the other one into the pocket which his pet rat called her home. The rest of the water, he poured into his water-skin and stuffed it into the same pocket, knowing that Mira would drink her fill if she needed to. Upon being emptied, the jar turned to dust, as the container holding the water one conjured through this spell was highly volatile and would always immediately turn back to Mana once the fluid was removed.
"What to do now?", he asked himself, looking around the oasis. Ignis strolled around, looking for anything that caught his mind, but upon finding there to be nothing, decided to take another nap.
He leaned against the massive rock in the middle of the oasis, made sure none of his possessions could accidentally roll into the lake, and closed his eyes. Before drifting off, however, his head sunk into the rock, as if being swallowed, causing him to jerk forward. A loud mechanical noise caused him to jump up and look at where he had just sat. A dent had formed within the stone where his head had rested, and a small opening was revealed to its left, with a staircase leading seemingly underground.
'AHAH! No more boredom for this old man!', Ignis thought with glee as he grabbed his staff off the floor and made his way towards the opening.
Upon noticing, that the doorway was closing again, he hastily made his way through it and, realising his surroundings to be completely dark, cast the
Finding nothing, he just shrugged his shoulders, and started to carefully climb down the staircase. After about 3 minutes, as the stone around him turned into bedrock, he became bored with his descend and started to count the stairs he had tread. It took 343 more steps to reach a large room, the walls of which were decorated with all kinds of magic runes. In the middle of the wall across the staircase, Ignis noticed 2 enormous dragons being carved into the wall. The carvings gave off the image of guardians protecting a door, and their gem-stone eyes seemed as if they were watching the wizard approach them.
'Hmm... I wonder if my trusty door-opening spell will work on this door as well. It looks quite secure, seeing as there is neither a gap indicating that this was a door, nor a keyhole of sorts. Hmm...', he started to contemplate his next action.
"Eh, I'll just wing it.", he mumbled, and pointed his staff at the door, chanting the spell he used to open doors in his head, as he had so many times before.
As he did so, the gemstone eyes of the dragons before him, started to shine brightly, and the wall around the dragons began to crack. The long tails of the carvings started to peel off of the wall, as did the legs and wings of the statues depicting what is known and feared by all mortals as the rulers of all dragons. Seconds later, the bodies and heads of the stone dragons removed themselves from the stone as well, their mouths now revealing 2 rows of razor-sharp teeth. The two statues shook some dust and rubble off of themselves, then greeted the wizard with a shout so loud and bone-chilling, that any lesser man would have lost consciousness right then and there, as the two golems were indistinguishable of the real thing. Before they could attack, however, Ignis started to smirk, as he had finished his preparations.
"Let us knock first, as the customs dictate. ICTUS!", he shouted, releasing the spell known as
The heads of the stone dragons suddenly snapped backwards, as if hit by an unseen force, and crashed into the wall they had just emerged from, now embedded even deeper into the hard stone than they were before. The bodies of the golems still moved, trying frantically to remove themselves from it, but Ignis was not done yet.
"ERADO!", he shouted, his face contorted from the strain put upon his body from casting two high Tier spells in short succession, as he released the spell
The arcane orb then flung itself forwards, crashing into the wall and, upon making contact with it, expanding to ten times the size, consuming both the wall and upper half of the dragons in the process, causing the golems to stop their movement as they returned to being lifeless statues.
The second spell had revealed an even bigger room beyond the wall, which was illuminated by Lucranum crystals embedded into the walls and ceiling of the hall, a special mineral that starts to shine brightly upon coming into contact with arcane energy. The wizard would have been in awe of the sight, if the enormous consumption of his own arcanum did not cause him to become weak on his feet.
The entire room began to spin before his eyes, as the wizard grew more and more nauseous. He clutched his staff and drove it into the ground, trying to stabilize himself with one hand, as his other hand vanished into one of his pockets. Moments later, he retrieved a small glass vial, containing viscous, sky-blue liquid. He removed the cork which sealed the vial with his teeth, then downed the entire liquid in one gulp.
He had just consumed an Aeroides-Arcana potion, a highly sought-after brew mixed together by a master of alchemy from a multitude of different high-grade ingredients which sped up the recovery of one's arcanum-reserves significantly, among many other beneficial effects. He had been given a set of 7 of these valuable concoctions by someone claiming to be a merchant, whose life he saved many years ago, but had only drunk one of them until now, as he disliked their taste.
The merchant, who suspiciously reminded him of a highwayman, as he was clad in clothes no different from rags and covered in scars, almost seemed to regret his choice of compensation, as the wizard immediately spit the contents of the first vial he tasted into the man's face, but remained adamant on the wizard keeping them, even if only as good-luck charms. His insistence made the wizard even more suspicious about them, but as he felt the effect even though he spit the contents out, he decided to keep them, as the "merchant", who had taken a look back from where he came from, hastily said his goodbyes and ran off into the forest. Shortly after his encounter, a group of guards, who Ignis assumed to have been the escorts of the merchant, asked him of his whereabouts, and seeing how nicely he was treated by the merchant, he immediately sent them after him.
Ignis shivered as the vile taste filled his mouth, but its effect hit immediately, and he quickly felt his head becoming lighter and his nausea dimming down. Nevertheless, he knew that casting any more magic without proper rest could become risky, so he decided to move into one of the corners of the smaller room, which now resembled more of an entrance hall, and sat down, examining his surroundings.
Since there was no movement, or anything resembling any danger, he decided to close his eyes and dove into the world of dreams. Just as the old man had fallen asleep, the floor suddenly began to glow, as another spell, which had been engraved into the floor, activated.