Chapter 39 – A Scroll of Answers
Monkey-like screeches and the deep croaks of frogs echoed through the lushly grown tunnel. The glow of the goldish-green patterned trail was waning; the Realm’s equivalent of twilight had started. Hoping the cycle of bright and dim light corresponded with day and night in the world he knew, Adam counted how long he’d been there.
His shoulders slumped. Eric’s birthday should be tomorrow, but I’ll never make it home in time, will I? The image of his gift—an actual fossilised tooth of an ancient reptile, carefully stored in the inn back in Gotterburg—flashed through his mind. He thought of how he planned to give Eric a big raspberry pie like always. Suppressing a groan, Adam realised fate had turned him into the one thing he never wanted to be: an absent father. He continued his way, staring at the ground in silence.
After a while, Adam, Emily, and Oliver found a clearing amidst the great trees with their blue and pink blossoms. Befitting the mind of a man who’d turned his back on the Starwing Order, the open space had a weathered and crumbling statue of Aves in its centre.
They made a campfire and some makeshift mats from branches, large leaves and other similar materials. The flickering orange light of the campfire was dancing on their faces as they warmed their hands.
Adam picked up the ammonite from his gourd pouch and rubbed his thumb over the smooth, dark green surface. “I’ve been wondering about these. Every time one of the Roots, Thalers, or servants of the Thuraum died, one of those green specks appeared. And all combatants from the battle seemed adamant on obtaining them.”
Oliver drank from his waterbag and looked curiously at the ammonite. “Any idea what they’re used for?”
“Nope, but they must be important somehow if the people around here take the risk to grab one in the middle of a brutal melee.” Adam idly rubbed the smooth, hard surface of the ammonite, which was oddly satisfying.
“Ah, interesting,” Emily said calmly. “Your ammonite looks less valuable than mine though.”
Adam’s mouth fell open. “What?”
“Yeah, I didn’t want to spoil your moment,” she said smugly as she put her hand into her gourd pouch and pulled out an ammonite with a glowing orb at the centre. “Ta-da!”
“Where in Avesname did you get that?” Adam asked, staring at her ammonite in disbelief.
A subtle, sly smile formed around Emily’s mouth. “Remember the peacock? One of those specks flew out when I killed it, so I grabbed it out of reflex.”
Adam’s face reddened a bit. “You WHAT? I was—”
“Oh, and these as well!” she said casually as she pulled two purple, leaf-like feathers from her pouch. “Look! They’re still shiny!” She waved them around a bit, the shifting shades of colour drawing everyone’s gaze.
A pulsing headache formed at Adam’s temples. “I WAS BARELY HANGING ON FROM THAT STUPID ARCH! And before you helped me up you grabbed some stupid feathers first?!”
Oliver shook with laughter, spilling water all over the place.
A mischievous smile played around Emily’s mouth. “Hey, feathers and an ammonite!”
Adam raised an eyebrow. “Oh, pardon, I missed the memo that shiny rubbish is clearly the priority over here.”
“Details, details… I did save you, right?” She flicked her hair back with a casual flick of her wrist. “Are you gonna tell me those big, strong arms of yours couldn’t hold out that long?”
Meanwhile, Oliver almost rolled over in laughter.
Adam sighed and massaged the bridge of his nose between his fingers. “You truly are hopeless, aren’t you?”
“Ha! And proud of it!” She stuck her tongue out at him.
“So, you just waited to show your ammonite until I found one myself?” Adam grumbled.
Emily shrugged. “Nah, after we escaped Desdemona and the snake, I wasn’t sure yet if I could trust you, so I kept it to myself for a moment.” Adam grimaced a bit at that. “Hey! Can you blame me?” She counted on her fingers. “Out of nowhere, those Penduli attack me in the Starwing Grove. The two of you storm in to tell me you fought my brother. We end up here. We have that cosy reunion with Desdemona who almost cuts us to pieces for something she thinks you’ve done. Oh, and you didn’t remember her. Seems like enough reasons to think some kind of weird betrayal is going on to me.”
Adam scrunched up his nose. Being deemed untrustworthy, even though it was a while ago, left a bitter taste in his mouth.
“And err.” She laughed sheepishly. “I kinda forgot afterwards. But look! My ammonite is fancy!” She showed it to Adam and Oliver. The notch at its centre was filled with a small orb that glowed in a familiar shade of green. As if it was aware that everyone looked at it, the fossil seemed to quiver ever so slightly,
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Oliver leaned forward and nodded approvingly. “Fancy indeed. Any idea what we could use it for, except to hang it above a fireplace?”
Emily shook her head and used the light of the fire to get a closer look at it. “Oooh, do you think this contains the peacock’s soul?”
“Hmm,” Oliver rubbed his chin as if he contemplated it. “Don’t know if that would fit in there, how much space do non-existent nonsense concepts take up exactly?”
Emily waved her hand through the air as if shooing his words away. “Aves hasn’t written anything about memory worlds either, so souls may exist just as well! Oh, I’ve seen a play once in which the heroic princess had to save her mother, whose soul was splintered and trapped inside THREE cursed crystals of DOOM! But she could only break inside the evil wizard’s castle with the legendary sword of the Chosen One and—”
Adam cleared his throat before Oliver could rant about the amount of nonsense in those sentences. “Emily, wasn’t there something else in your pouch we should talk about…?”
Emily looked a bit glassily at him, then she snapped her fingers. “Right! I was, err, just getting to that!” Out of her gourd-pouch, she took the scroll from the Thaler they had questioned. It was made of a beige parchment and closed with a wax seal in the shape of the Thaler’s spiral. Emily casually broke the seal and cleared her throat. “ ‘To General Seijek Caineborn III. Campaign report against the Childhood Thuraum, sector Mohena-82. The Thuraum and its Corrupted attacked several Associations, like the one that connects the Eric Node to the Node of Lord Caine’s mansion. Our defences successfully managed to avert the assault. Sadly, our attack on the Thuraum’s Association to the Halls of Self-Image within the Palace was unsuccessful. The House of the Mothers remains untouched by the Thuraum itself, luckily, although Vera’s presence is noticeable. Several of the Thuraum’s Corrupted assaulted the vacation Node by surprise. Although they’ve been eliminated, four happy memories with the family have been lost. The investigation into the mystery of the Roots continues. Some of the Roots are able to send and receive Commands as well, which hinders our efforts. The search for the ‘Core of the Overgrowth’ and the supposed ‘Lord of the Roots’ remains unsuccessful. For the prosperity of Caine, commander Kehuan Mikhaelborn XII”
Adam smiled as a sense of academic pride came up. He leaned towards a grumpy-looking Oliver and wiggled his eyebrows. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say that confirms a couple of our ‘hypotheses,’ eh?”
Judging by the intense, frustrated frown, Oliver tried to think of a way he could weasel himself out of it. Then he sighed and his shoulders slumped. “It seems so. Yes, yes, all hail Adam the All-Knowing.” He droned with a dry sarcastic voice, rolling his eyes.
Emily sharply looked up from the scroll. “Hey! I thought of several things as well!”
Oliver sighed, even though he couldn’t suppress a small smile, and continued in the same voice. “Hear, hear. All hail Emily, the Truest Beacon of Wisdom in the Social Firmament. May her insight be a lighthouse in the sombre darkness of human stupidity.”
Emily nodded approvingly. “Sounds about right. I gotta write this down somehow, might be useful when I apply for a new job sometime.”
Oliver laughed and his face lit up. “Well, if we manage to get out of here, I could talk to some higher-ups within the Starwing Order? I’m sure I can arrange a higher position for you. That worked out well when I talked with the Avurions of Taleshire, eh?”
Emily smiled, but she closed her eyes and shook her head. “Ah, I was just joking. I really appreciate it! But if I want to rise some more within the ranks, I prefer to earn it myself.”
“Ah okay,” Oliver said, seemingly deflating just a bit. “Just know that I’m happy to help.”
Adam read through the scroll a couple of times. “Hmm, I think we can presume that the patterns in the ground are called Associations. Makes sense, since they connect Nodes with subjects that Caine associates with each other. And the monsters that serve the Thuraum are called the Corrupted.”
Oliver took some strips of dried meat from his pouch. “Hmm, I agree. I’m especially intrigued by these Halls of Self-Image within this Palace of Origin. Sounds like those contain info on how Caine sees himself!”
“Probably as some king of the world, around whom all society revolves,” Adam grumbled. Although after the Thuraum had shown him a glimpse of Caine’s past, he wasn’t too sure. “It’s interesting that the Roots are such a mystery to the Thalers, so whatever psychological concept they represent, it is relatively new.”
Emily frowned. “That could be true, he didn’t look well at all when he attacked us.”
Adam rubbed his beard. “And the Thalers are still searching for a ‘Lord of the Roots’ and this ‘Core of the Overgrowth,’ so the Roots seem to have some form of intelligent leadership. Maybe under a Shepherd chieftain or something?”
“Sounds like an even bigger Root beast than what we’ve already seen, lovely,” Emily said dryly. “I do find this ‘House of the Mothers’ harder to place. Like, it’s plural, so who would all those mothers be? Anyway, I can’t imagine a cosy visit to my mom, or whatever version of her is in there, would be a happy tea party. So, let’s avoid that if possible.”
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While Adam was making a new knife, Emily fashioned a new spear from the materials at hand. She added the shiny purple feathers near the top, hoping they would distract enemies from the razorsharp tip.
When they were done, the group had a training session near their campfire before they went to sleep. Oliver was sitting in a meditative pose, as traditional within the Starwing Order. The air around him shimmered as he gathered Oquira around him. With one hand in the Gaolom gesture and one in the Shrike gesture, he’d conjured three of the silver, star-like orbs that floated around him. Frowning in concentration, he practised his control over their trajectories.
Emily and Adam were assisting each other in their training. She wanted to practice her skills with Gaolom, to conjure small, concentrated fields of it in particular. As Adam’s physical exercises gradually got easier, an increase in gravity was just what he needed. When he placed his hands on the ground amidst a sky-blue field of Gaolom, his handstand push-ups were more than twice as heavy. As sweat was beading on his forehead, he puffed out his cheeks from the effort.
Even though Adam’s belly was visibly slimmer and the power behind his punches had improved, Adam was far from satisfied. For every exercise, pestering thoughts reminded him of how much better he used to be. The haunting memory of his old prowess made his every form of progress seem weak.
Since he had little choice but to use Instinct anyway, he felt the pressing need to practice his Invocations. Training and having control over one’s abilities could mean the difference between life and death, after all. Who knew what kind of bizarre opponents they’d face in here?
Furthermore, the damned Crimson Urges had already made him write in that stupid book. If he wanted to stay in control of his own actions, especially during combat, he’d better learn as much as possible about what he was dealing with.
However, even though Oliver had his eyes closed, he’d definitely notice if Adam would use Invocations.
Adam sighed and weighed his options. He has no authority over my actions, of course, but some open communication wouldn’t hurt.