The revontulet is, without a doubt, the same fox I saw back in the Void Fog.
I don’t know if this is the exact same one I saw back then. If each revontulet look similar enough, then it probably isn’t. Still, it’s an incredible surprise to see a creature I’d glimpsed back across the Alps.
If there was any doubt the Fog ignored the logic of distance, it has now departed. There is the possibility one found their way to our side, but I find it unlikely. Somehow, the idea that the Void Fog can surpass any barrier just seems more believable than a revontulet rivalling Hund’s strength would go unnoticed. Especially considering their unique body shape compared to the other races across the Alps.
Does this mean there’s a way to travel across the Alps through the Fog? That would be so much better than needing to use the tunnels. But… how could I find it? The last times were spontaneous, and I’m no longer being changed by it, so it has no reason to appear around me as it did last time.
Would it even welcome me? The Void Fog assisted me last time, but assuming I could even find a way in, would it remain on my side? I can’t help but feel the answer is no. The Void Fog did as I wished because its creation in New Vetus was connected to my desires. It was intricately linked to me. If I found my way in, it would no longer follow my will, but that of whatever creature the Fog is changing.
It’s disappointing, but I’m not about to get an easy path back.
Now that I think about it, why don’t I consider the Void Fog itself as trapping? It’s like an entirely separate world locking me within. Of course, I know how to escape, but I should still have a similar response to the thought as I would about diving into the tunnels… but I don’t.
Exactly what are the conditions for something to ‘trap’ me?
I shake my head. Not the time to be thinking about this. We still have the revontulet ripping flesh from the corpse it stands upon.
It has somehow caught an absolute mammoth of a bird. Easily five times larger than Grímr’s body, the bird of prey — or the preyed upon bird — isn’t something I’ve seen before. The centzon lead us far around the revontulet and its catch.
The revontulets are the other race the mermineae are terrified of. But unlike the centzon, I didn’t have a method to find them. Now we have. Could we convince them to help us too? The one I’d met in the Void Fog hadn’t been hostile. Uncaring, maybe, but not hostile.
“You think we might get a revontulet to help us?”
“If it were a teki, then absolutely, but it’s better to leave the revontulet alone,” Tzilac says. “They are a grumpy lot, but they won’t bite as long as you keep out of their way. Having a revontulet by your side is no better than tying a noose around your own neck. They’ll turn on you in a moment of whimsy.”
Ah. So they’re strong, but unreliable. I wonder if Spenne would get along with them?
I’m self-aware enough to know my growth has been unnaturally fast. Even with a perfect environment for energy consumption, I’ve probably grown more than normal. The blocks I’m facing with my control and heat, I just somehow know I skipped it for my energy growth.
I’m not totally sure what is the source of my improved growth, but no doubt it is a part of me that was changed by the Void Fog. Considering the only other person I know that survived the Fog with their sapience intact is the strongest ursu — by far — I have to assume the revontulet from the Fog is of comparable strength.
“How strong are they?” I ask, trying to get information about a species that may prove dangerous in the future.
“Hmm… you’ve seen the cult leaders, they’re about as strong as them on average.”
I can’t help but widen my eyes at that. “Their entire race?”
“Well, sort of.” Tzilac scratches the side of his head. “Those called revontulet are simply ice foxes of the northern Icebelts that have lived long enough to gain sapience.”
That is a surprise to hear. I’d never considered the possibility that a creature not born with intelligence could grow into it. That surely couldn’t be the case for all creatures. The arachnids down under the Alps were all dumb as rocks, despite being terrifyingly dangerous and likely old.
I send a glance toward the buzzard. How intelligent are the Titans? Do they realise how many lives they end with a simple movement? Do they have a reason to care?
I doubt I’d be able to remain unmoving for long, even if I knew countless lives depended on it. If they weren’t people I knew, would I even care?
We continue with our detour, all except for Grímr remain hidden from view. There’s no chance the fox hasn’t seen the bird, but our obvious avoidance is apparently enough for the revontulet to continue gorging on its meal and ignore us.
“How long does it take for them to become sapient?” I ask.
“About a hundred years? Give or take,” he says. “I don’t envy those of them that decide to have children. Who’d want to deal with a feral beast for a century before you can even start to be proud of them?”
“You have kids?” Grímr asks.
“Yep. Five. My oldest is amongst the group headed west. He’s been a Palotl hunter for a few years now.”
Tzilac talks at length about his children. My attention falls away to the horizon, not caring that his second daughter is at the top of her class, or that his youngest recently made their first gizmo. Besides the revontulet behind us, there is very little of interest to withstand my boredom.
Well, back to training. I have to get past these walls sometime.
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Finally, after days of running, we arrive at the second city. Resting along another gorge — I wonder if it’s the same long canyon as the other regna? — sits two towers. This city has a whole extra tower. Separated by a greater distance than the last regna’s width.
With the regna still far in the distance, the centzon pull us to a stop. Tzilac waves to one of the hunters by his side and they step forward, unstrapping the large contraption from his back.
The hunter places the flat bottom of the metal cylinder on the ground. With a grunt, he tugs a section from the side, which twists into place with a click.
Now, the log has a crank.
The centzon leaves the handle alone for now and places his hands on both sides of the contraption. With a quick twist, another click is audible, almost satisfying to the ear. The weapon slices into three sections. No, ‘slices’ is wrong. The parts remain connected, but they slide along one another with ease until the contraption is leaning away from us, while remaining upright.
The hunter kneels low behind the weapon and seems to make tiny adjustments when looking toward the towers. His hand returns to the crank and he winds it until the machine creaks under the pressure. He presses a few odd switches and buttons before reaching into the back pocket of his heavy coat and pulling out a tiny, stone marble, barely the width of my finger, and shoves it in a slot near the top.
He rises back to his full, slouched height and just when I think he’s done with whatever he’s doing, he kicks the thing. Instead of toppling like it should, a loud crack rings out and the something speeds out the top of the weapon, too fast to see. It reminds me all too much of the whip-like snap of Remus’s tentacles.
Seconds pass before a low, droning hum returns from the towers.
The centzon wait, so Grímr and I do the same. The droning noise slowly dies out and after a few minutes a slow, repeated bell’s gong replaces it. Everyone finally moves again, so I take a closer look at the contraption that just sent the stone well over a thousand metres.
“Is that what it’s for?” I ask as I crouch beside the centzon, who in a few motions, has it looking like it did originally and back in his hands. “Why didn’t it topple when you kicked it?”
The hunter looks over my shoulder to where I feel Tzilac nod his head with a shrug. Instead of slinging the contraption over his back, he pulls it up for me to see and tugs out the handle once more.
“Its mortar mode is far from the most impressive thing this beauty can do. Here, try winding this.” He gestures for me to the crank while he holds it in one arm.
Doing as invited, I place a hand on the crank and try to spin it. It doesn’t budge. I try with both hands. It doesn’t budge. Not wanting to fail a third time, I shove as much control and weight into my arms and shoulders as I can, and push. It moves, but hardly anywhere near as much as I wanted.
The centzon laughs. “You got quite the bit of strength for a young elemental.”
I stare at him oddly. “A what?”
“You know, the creatures that surpass the binding threshold of their bound element. Quite a few revontulet have reached that point with ice in the past. There are also some unique ones to the east.”
Wait, so any of the other races could become like áed if they raised their binding with fire? Huh. Does that mean these other elementals might know how to raise one’s binding? The Void Fog was a short-cut for me, but I don’t know how Elder Enya raised hers, so I don’t think I’ve been able to raise it since.
Maybe I should try to find them one day. Well, only if I can’t get back to the other side of the Alps. If I can get back home, I should try to find the Agglomerate and ask the elders there how I might reach the next threshold.
The hunter places his own hand on the crank and spins it, this time not while grounded. He lifts the base so I can watch as a flat metal ring twists into a drill and rotates a good arm's length out of the contraption.
So it digs into the ground. That’s why he was fine with kicking it.
He slaps a switch on the side, and the drill snaps back into the contraption. “How bout I show you some of the most useful modes?”
As we walk toward the regna, he does exactly that. He twists what I thought was supposed to be a weapon into a bunch of configurations that I don’t think anyone could consider as such. A mode for fishing, digging, and even some weird method of telling the time. He never showed me any weapons, not that I believe for a second it doesn’t have any, but I guess the centzon do have some wariness within them.
Honestly, I’m relieved. Until now, they’ve been far too welcoming. It’s kinda creepy, in a way. If I was in their place, I never would have let the possible dangerous people into my home. Nor would I have been so quick to listen.
The slow, rhythmic bell chimes as we approach the closest tower. We would have been well into the field of traps at the last regna by now, so in curiosity, I pass a tongue of flame over the surface. It takes no time to find a crack and my flames soon envelope a contraption right beneath my feet.
I stop in place, but the centzon continue on without care. Despite the hazardous earth, not a single trap triggers. I spread my flame further through the cracks in the ground, careful not to melt away the contraptions this time, and find the heavy stone gears and axles unmoving.
So they’ve deactivated the entire field for our approach? Is that what this slow alarm is for? To indicate the approach of friendlies rather than enemies.
I hurry to catch up to the others and ask, “did that stone somehow tell them to deactivate the traps?”
Tzilac glances down at me. “Yes. It’s a method we use to communicate. We hit one of the hidden bells that informs of our intentions. We are safe to approach as long as their tower’s bell is ringing.”
Centzon hunters await our arrival at the base of the tower. One rushes forward once we are close and grabs Tzilac in a headlock. Without breaking free, Tzilac takes the hunters in a headlock of his own.
“Ah, brother, it’s good to see you again.” The new centzon twists his head within the tight grip, appraising each of us standing behind Tzilac. “You didn’t bring Xipil? Shame.”
They separate and Tzilac laughs. “No, I’ve left an important task for him. He can’t stay by my side forever. Now, we have some important business of our own to discuss. It’s best not to wait around.”
“Of course, of course. Come.” Tzilac’s brother leads us towards the elevator.
The tower appears similar enough to the last. A mix of metal and stone rising high above. Hinges, gears, valves and levers decorate the walls the entire way up. Like last time, many of the contraptions that I’d assume are there to interact with, are far out of reach.
Why would they place them there?
My curiosity must be obvious as Tzilac calls out to a centzon standing by a wall of gauges, “Atl, take the girl for a tour of the tower. She seems interested. Her partner here, Grímr, should be enough for our conversation.”
I glance at Grímr, but he just shrugs in return. “You’d rather stay up here, right? Try not to burn anything.”
I return a glare at his unfunny attempt at humour.
Before long, I’m left alone with these centzon I don’t know. I shouldn’t feel like this. I spent weeks on end without Grímr being by my side in the tunnels. But I can do nothing about the bubble of concern as I watch Grímr descend away from me.
“So, you’re interested in our tower right?” the centzon, Atl, says jovially. “I’m sure you’ll like it; the view is incredible.”
I somehow doubt the sight from this tower could beat that of flying, but I follow him up the stairs, anyway.
The slow, repetitive bells finally cut out as we make it up the last flight. Likely giving warning to the field of traps’ reactivation.
Atl talks about how each lever has an important purpose, but I lose my focus over the plateau. I was right, it really isn’t much of a view. All there is to see is the gorge behind us and the Alps ahead. As with every time I look over the giant mountain range, my eyes eventually fall on the Euroclydon.
The hard gaze of the predator locks far to my north. It is clear as day when it decides its prey. The hunt has begun.
A loud, screeching siren blares from a horn right beside my ear. The ground beneath me jolts as the tower shifts. Centzon rush around, shouting, and I cannot tear my sight from the buzzard.
I belatedly realise just how dangerous this situation is. I’m in a tower, about to be hit by a gust that can tear trees to splinters.
The Euroclydon beats its wings.