128:
Tom retreated back to the bend in the tunnel, before reaching for the elixir he had strapped to his waist and taking a small sip.
That was enough to restore the twenty nine SP he had lost after using Active Shroud—Maya on the cowering assassin. The elixir that remained would be just enough to top him off if he exhausted all his SP a single time and then he would be out of the life-saving drink.
A few minutes later, Zirel reappeared before them.
“How did it go?” Zirel asked, his brow matted with sweat. It appeared that sneaking around in the heart of the enemy’s camp without getting detected required more focus than Tom thought.
“The leader isn’t here,” Tom whispered in reply. “One of the tunnels branching off from the cavern leads to his quarters, which also happens to be the Shadow Guild’s treasury. Two warriors like the muscle bound axe-wielder you saw are stationed outside it. Whatever he’s doing in there, he doesn’t like to be disturbed.”
“So, what are you thinking?” Zirel asked.
“There’s a way we can finish the battle here before they’re alerted, but it’s not going to be pretty,” Tom revealed, his expression hesitant.
“Go on,” Aleph encouraged, a twinkle in her eyes suggesting that she was not at all opposed to any idea Tom could come up with.
“You’re supposed to discourage me,” Tom protested.
Aleph shrugged, “Nice Aleph is reserved for nice people.”
Tom sighed, before whispering back, “Okay, okay. So, I know I promised you the Heat Infusion Card, but I’ll need to temporarily add it to my deck if we want this to work”.
“That’s fine by me, it’s no use to me right now. My SP is already precariously low as is, but are you sure you can afford adding it?”
“Temporarily,” Tom replied. “Alright, I need you to fashion a crystal spear for me.”
Aleph’s eyes widened in realization, her reply coming as a sharp whisper, “The heated crystal idea. You want to use it,” She said, alluding to an idea they had mused on earlier.
Tom nodded.
“Why?” Aleph asked.
“These tunnels, not all of them are natural,” Tom replied, his palm landing on the coarse surface of the tunnel wall. “Do you know how they were mined?” He asked.
“A card that allows manipulation of earth?” Zirel offered, keeping an eye on the door from where he crouched, near where the curvature of the bend began.
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Tom shook his head, “No, that would be too SP intensive and would likely require months from an Uncommon card wielder. The main cavern is natural, but half the tunnels were mined later on.”
“Then how?” Aleph asked, a flicker of impatience passing through her gaze.
“Minor explosives,” Tom nonchalantly replied. “More than a few of those are stacked in one of those big tents. The one to the left. They occasionally need them to pioneer a new route and the Shadow Guild doesn’t stay in one location for too long to avoid getting compromised”.
“Oh, that’s disappointingly direct,” Aleph admitted, though her tone didn’t seem any less willing.
“What are the odds that your explosion causes the cavern to cave in?” Zirel asked, his gaze flickering towards the tunnel entrance they’d snuck in from.
“It shouldn’t. Those explosives have a fairly high melting point and they’re supposed to be concentrated charges. My guess is that it takes out the tents next to it and the shrapnel gets a few more,” Tom replied based on the memories he had managed to scour from the cowering assassin.
Overpowering his will had been easier than Tom had expected. His story was an ordinary one, that of a struggling rift pioneer who had reached the limits of his talent and was unwilling to hone his blade in the true crucible of life and death— until he stumbled upon a guild that promised him unparalleled power, fame and resources.
A guild that had thrown a common card at him to sell as if it were mere rabble, offering him a chance to obtain much more than that if he only joined their guild. It sounded too good to be true and deep down, he knew it was, but the next time he tried to delve into a tougher rift zone, he knew he would die.
The Shadow Guild’s admission test had been to accompany them on a hunt. It had not been a fair fight, as their arrows were slicked with poison and they had ambushed them with the aid of spotters. The man named Jarnel had delivered the finishing blow to an injured traveller because he had been commanded to.
As time passed, that changed. Jarnel, at his core, was a man who wished to survive. There was no place in his kingdom for ones without power, so he had desperately sought it. The Shadow Guild had introduced him to a dark path, but it was Jarnel who had grown into it. He was working towards earning an Uncommon card and joining the ranks of the Shadow Guild’s Enforcers and he was long past caring who he had to hurt or maim in pursuit of greater and greater power.
Jarnel would bow and scrape before the powerful, until he became powerful himself. There was no conviction behind his actions, no drive or burning rage that directed his fiendish actions. Killing was easy. Taking from the innocent was easier. Jarnel was no different from the nobles he despised and feared, but he found his own actions justified because they were in pursuit of his survival— an animalistic instinct that had enslaved a man with no real ideals.
Thankfully, Jarnel’s crooked nature had made him the ideal target for Maya. He had been observing the warriors or rather, the Enforcers carefully and had memorized particulars about their fighting styles that had been revealed to him, but more importantly, he also kept a close eye on the logistics of the Shadow Guild so he could skim off the top when no one was looking. Never important resources and only in small quantities was how he never got caught.
Tom’s gaze hardened as memories of those whose ambitious lives Jarnel had cut short for a reason as pitiful as his own perceived survival. He reached for his inventory and pulled out the Heat Infusion card before adding it to his deck holder and affirming the Divine System’s prompt.
“Here,” Aleph said just as he got done, offering him a sleek crystal spear with a wickedly sharp diamond tip that Tom would not be inclined to touch barehanded.
He wrapped both palms around it and called upon the new connection that had been temporarily made between his Soul and the Deck Card.
His palms tingled and slowly but surely, the crystal’s hue began to shift.
“The assassin whose memories I scried didn’t know too much about the Shadow Guild’s upper echelon, but it’s better than nothing,” Tom offered.
“Knowledge is power,” Zirel replied. “Tell me everything.”