Legacy of the Fallen

by Luke Chmilenko

  Item Quality: Good (+15%)

  Strength: +2

  Base Material: Copper

  Weight: 0.0 kg

  Class: Any

  Level: 12

  Amaranth queried sleepily while opening a single eye to look in my direction, his mental voice clearly unhappy to be awoken.

  “We’ve waited long enough,” I told the cat as I equipped the final pieces of my armor and tightened the straps, ensuring that it would stay in place. “We’re leaving either with Stanton and the others or without them.”

  My familiar stated, standing up from its curled position on the ground and arching its back into the typical feline stretch, his massive claws digging deep into the ground in the process.

  “You mean looking forward to it,” I teased Amaranth as I looked back towards the four Adventurers, the group having turned to watch a ranked duel between two teams of three Adventurers that had taken the field in our place.

  Despite the negative aspect to Mozter’s antics the other day, the spectacle that he had put on had given birth to what was shaping up to be a very competitive dueling culture between the Adventurers in the town. Something that I approved of wholeheartedly, seeing that it had already led to several improvements around the training ground with a group of Adventurers having created several stands to watch the fights from. I had even heard of a handful of them talking about approaching Léandre to create a proper stadium to hosts large scale fights and duels one day.

  Amaranth admitted, my earlier quip completely going over the puma’s head as I heard him sniff the air.

  “In that case, we really need to get moving,” I said, accepting my familiar’s prediction without hesitation as I tore my eyes away from the duel and began walking towards the Town Hall, Stanton having moved into one of the three rooms on the second floor.

  Moving away from the Arena, Amaranth and I crossed the length of Aldford, watching countless other Adventurers and settlers rushing about the town as construction proceeded at a breakneck pace, all the newcomers eager to have a place of their own to get out of the massive tent.

  If they keep this up, we might actually be able to get the majority of the buildings done by the end of the week, I noted hopefully, spotting Léandre’s familiar form in the distance as he directed a group of Adventurers towards the newest building site, each of them carrying various building materials and supplies.

  Continuing our walk through the heart of Aldford, we eventually passed by the now giant Ætherwarped oak tree that reached up far into the sky above, its azure branches and leaves almost perfectly blending in with the sky above. A large ladder stood leaning against the tree with a pair of Jenkins’ helpers keeping it steady as they craned their heads upwards.

  “Oh boy,” I whispered to myself, following the ladder upwards and seeing Jenkins high up in the tree, leaning on a relatively low hanging branch. Shifting my route towards the ladder, my approach caught the eye of one of the men holding it steady.

  “What’s going on here?” I asked, hearing Jenkins curse from high above us as a tool slipped from his grasp and fell to the ground harmlessly several feet away from us.

  “Trying to trim the tree,” the man replied with a resigned look before wincing at the fallen tool. “But she doesn’t want to be trimmed.”

  “Trim it?” I looked back up at the branch Jenkins was leaning against and noticed that it had grown long enough that it would start pressing up against the side of the Town Hall any day now. “What do you mean?”

  “Take a looksee at the tool that Jenkins tossed,” he said, just as a second tool came falling from the sky. “Or that one. You’ll understand.”

  Giving the man a curious look, I decided to indulge him and walk over to the spot where I had seen the tools fall, keeping a mindful eye up above in case more came raining down on my head. A few seconds later I found myself holding a shattered hand axe, its edge completely gone and the metal dangerously close to completely fragmenting.

  Amaranth said, looking at the axe curiously before pawing at the second tool that fell, revealing a bent saw whose teeth had been worn down to mere nibs.

  I agreed, glancing upwards at Jenkins and seeing that he had abandoned his attempt to cut the branch and was climbing back down the ladder.

  Grabbing the two broken tools, we returned to the base of the ladder just as Jenkins stepped off it, shaking his head at me.

  “So now you see my latest problem,” he began without any preamble, waving a hand at the tools I held. “I’ve broken seven different sets of saws and axes on the tree, trying to get that low hanging branch before it carves through the roof of the Town Hall.”

  “Damn,” I replied with a wince. “You can’t cut it at all?”

  “Barely anything,” Jenkins said with a sigh. “I could have sworn I managed an inch last night before breaking everything I had on me, but by the time I climbed up this morning, the tree had somehow healed itself, and I was nearly starting fresh.”

  “Really?” I exclaimed, looking over at the tree with curiosity. “That’s interesting. I didn’t know it could do that.”

  “Hrm,” Jenkins grunted, clearly not sharing the same sentiment as me. “My last resort is to try and use the stonecutting tools I have on the tree, but if that doesn’t work…I’ll have to tell Aldwin that we’re going to have to open up the roof of the Town Hall and give the branch a path through the building. It’ll be less work for me to do that, than to forge a mountain of axes and saws to get through the tree, assuming I could find enough metal for it.”

  “Hopefully that’ll do the trick,” I told Jenkins. “If you need any—”

  Amaranth interrupted as he turned his body away from me, at the same time making a raspy cough at the back of his throat.

  Cutting off my conversation with Jenkins, I turned my head towards the Town Hall and spotted Stanton walking down the path and in our direction, with both Samuel and Quincy close behind.

  “Sorry, Jenkins. I have to go. I’ve been waiting on him all morning,” I said, seeing the man nod understandingly.

  “Better you catching him now than him catching me while I’m trying to carve a length off the tree,” Jenkin stated as he motioned for the men holding the ladder to take a break and took the tools I was carrying from me. “I’ve yet to meet him myself, but based on what others have said, I’m happy to postpone that indefinitely.”

  “If only,” I replied, letting envy seep into my voice as I gave the man a wave goodbye. “I’ll catch you later, Jenkins. Good luck with the tree in the meantime.”

  Pulling myself away from the smith, I moved to intercept Stanton and his accomplices, the elder man spotting as I approached and giving me a curt nod.

  “Lyrian, I apologize for the lateness of the hour,” Stanton told me in a thin voice as he leaned heavily on his walking stick. “An old…injury, flared up this morning and I found myself unable to rise for longer than I had hoped.”

  Amaranth told me silently from my side.

  “Are you going to be able to travel today?” I asked, surprised by Stanton’s rather ragged condition. True to Amaranth’s words, the noble’s brow was covered in sweat, and his balance seemed precarious at best. Either the man was a brilliant actor, or there was something indeed wrong with him.

  “I will be fine,” Stanton assured me. “A bit of movement is all I need to get myself back into form.”

  “A bit of movement is walking to the river and back,” I told Stanton. “We are going on a hike for the better part of a day; we will be walking several miles before the day is out. You look lik
e you’re about to fall down.”

  “Perhaps a horse would be better, my lord,” Quincy interjected, causing Samuel to nod in agreement.

  “You cannot walk the terrain towards Crater Lake, or the forest beyond, in your current state,” Samuel added. “We know from experience.”

  “If that is the case, I will take a horse,” Stanton said, turning his head to glare at the two mages before looking back at me. “I trust we are ready to leave shortly?”

  “I can have everyone ready within ten minutes,” I replied while sending off a private message to Sierra, telling her that Stanton had finally woken up and was ready to leave. “But we can also take you another day if need be.”

  “Today will be fine,” Stanton answered curtly. “I dare not waste time because of my own frailties.”

  “Quincy, while Lyrian readies his guild to leave, please inform our Adventurers that I wish for them to accompany us on our trip,” the older noble continued. “They should be a part of this investigation as much as anyone else.”

  “Certainly, my lord,” Quincy replied with a nod. “I will see to it.”

  “In the meantime, Samuel, would you fetch me a horse?” Stanton looked towards the other mage.

  “Of course,” the younger man acknowledged.

  He’s inviting Lazarus and his group to come with us? I tried to hide my surprise as I watched the pair scurry off to fulfill Stanton’s orders. We didn’t discuss that earlier; it was supposed to be just Virtus escorting him. Unless he’s finally realized just how outnumbered he and Veronia are…

  “We’ll be leaving through the northern entrance, so we might as well start heading that way,” I told Stanton. “Everyone else will meet us there.”

  “Excellent,” Stanton acknowledged, taking a shaky step forward with his walking cane. “Let’s be about it then.”

  Amaranth told me as we slowly walked through Aldford and towards the opposite end of the town.

  I replied to my bloodthirsty familiar, realizing that he was still struggling to fully understand the concept of morality and how one couldn’t, or at the very least, shouldn’t simply kill anyone that annoyed him.

  Amaranth told me.

  I said, happy to have steered the cat away from cold-blooded murder.

  Amaranth queried, casting a look up at me as the three of us walked, Stanton completely oblivious to the conversation passing between us.

  I told the cat while letting a small smile cross my face at his curiosity.

  I did my best to explain the concept of divinity to Amaranth as we escorted a slow-moving Stanton towards the northern half of the village, the walk taking several times longer than it should have due to the lame noble’s pace.

  Thankfully he’s taking a horse! I exclaimed mentally the moment that we arrived, seeing that Sierra had already organized our group, Donovan, and the Virtus recruits we were taking with us. If he were walking on foot, we’d barely make it to Crater Lake by nightfall!

  “Hey, Lyr,” Sierra greeted me with Constantine and Freya following closely behind her as Stanton limped off on his own towards Samuel, who already had a horse waiting for him. “What’s up with Stanton? He looks a bit…rough.”

  “I’d say hungover,” Constantine added quietly. “But Marlin hasn’t managed to make a drop of alcohol yet.”

  “He said it was an old injury,” I replied with a shrug, letting them know what I thought of that.

  “Sure,” Constantine whispered sarcastically.

  “We still up for our…plan?” Freya asked, raising an eyebrow in Stanton’s direction as he mounted the horse. “We need to get the recruits used to our way of doing things and…”

  “Yeah,” I said with a nod, keeping my face steady as I glanced between each of them, our plan to show Stanton just what Virtus was capable of fresh in my mind.

  “Good,” Freya replied with a nod.

  “One wrinkle though,” I said to the group as I spotted Lazarus and his companions enter through the northern entrance of Aldford, escorted by Quincy. “Stanton invited Lazarus and the others to come with us.”

  “We knew that was a possibility when we planned this,” Sierra replied as we all watched Stanton say something sharp to the trio before kicking his horse and trotting over towards us. “We still have them badly outnumbered though.”

  “We do,” I finished, looking up towards Stanton as he came into range.

  “My group will watch our rear as we travel, with your guild in the front,” Stanton stated without any preamble. “Let us be off quickly. We’ve lost enough time for the day.”

  Giving orders already? I thought while looking at up at Stanton. Maybe he isn’t so sick after all.

  “Let’s get moving,” I said not answering Stanton directly while turning my head towards my friends and rolling my eyes where he couldn’t see. “We have lost enough time for the morning already.”

  Stepping around Stanton’s horse, I couldn’t help but shake my head in resignation as I heard everyone sigh quietly.

  “Here we go,” I whispered to myself.

  Chapter 16

  “So, I haven’t had a chance to fill you in yet, but I checked out some of the feeds coming out of Eberia last night,” Constantine said as we gradually descended towards Crater Lake, everyone having formed into their own clusters as we travelled, giving us some semblance of privacy from everyone else. “And one thing that Stanton and Lazarus have mentioned is true, Eberia is in pretty rough shape. If anything, they’re both understating just how bad it actually is back there.”

  “What’s going on exactly?” I asked as the rest of the group drifted closer to hear Constantine’s reply.

  “The whole city is practically on lockdown and at one another’s throats,” Constantine replied. “Each of the noble houses has set up checkpoints throughout the city and have outright banned other houses from entering certain districts. Regular citizens have to be searched before passing through a checkpoint, and they really don’t like that.”

  “Damn,” Halcyon commented from beside me. “What the hell happened?”

  “I don’t know for sure,” Constantine said with a shrug. “From what I’ve been able to piece together from multiple feeds, there was a massive street fight about two weeks ago between three of the noble houses, which only happened because the heir of one house killed the two heirs belonging to the others in a separate incident.”

  “But with that being said, I can’t find any stream that shows what happened between the heirs,” he continued. “Nor anything else that details the lead up to the conflict. It was just as if it all happened at once. Plus, there are wild rumors of demons or devils being seen in the city, but nothing to back it up.”

  “With that many Adventurers in the city, it was probably a warlock just fucking around with people,” Caius interjected.

  “As it is, I can’t imagine that there would still be that many Adventurers hanging around Eberia to see everything that’s going on, let alone bother to post their feed,” I said, understanding Constantine’s frustration. “With all the action happening in Coldscar or further out in the wild, staying in the city is a waste of time.”

  “Lazarus and his group stayed in the city,” Freya pointed out, her voice comi
ng from behind me. “I’ve seen their gear, and it looks pretty good. I think they have to be around level thirteen or fourteen.”

  “I wonder what they did to level so close to the city then,” Drace commented. “There was hardly anything higher than level four in the wild when we were out there.”

  “Who knows?” Constantine replied. “Maybe we’ll get a chance to ask them today if Stanton ever strays more than ten feet from them, or through private messages later tonight now that they’re logged in again.”

  “Let’s just see how the day goes,” I said as we finally reached the tree line and left the forest surrounding Crater Lake. “We haven’t even reached the Hub yet, let alone seen how Stanton reacts.”

  Scanning the shoreline reflexively for threats as we left the cover of the woods, I was happy to note that nothing of interest caught my eye. Over the last couple weeks, there had been countless Adventurers passing through the area as they made their way to the Webwood to hunt, which had a fortunate side effect of thinning the population of creatures that once infested the area. Glancing upwards, I checked the trees high above, seeing that they had successfully recovered from the temporary spider invasion that had left them coated full of webs when hordes of spiders had fled from the Webwood, fleeing from their Ætherwarped cousins.

  Satisfied that we could keep walking towards the Hub, we continued our journey around the lake’s edge and eventually turned north to cut through the gradually shrinking Webwood, which while still infested with countless spiders, was no longer spreading out of control and in danger of strangling the entire forest.

  “The memories in these woods will take a lifetime to forget,” Donovan commented wistfully as we carefully negotiated our way through the forest, only spotting a handful of spiders that the new Adventurers eagerly dispatched.

  “That they will,” I heard Samuel add, his voice sounding remorseful as he spoke. No doubt remembering the rest of the Mages Guild Expedition that had been kidnapped by goblins.

  With those memories now at the forefront of everyone’s mind, the rest of our trip to the Hub proceeded in silence, save for the new Adventurers and Alistair that excitedly commented between one another as they explored the area for the first time.