Axiom

by Dennis Vanderkerken

  He flipped a page, took a breath, and continued speaking, “The other individual of note was an old man in a dark blue robe. Keeper Irene found him still breathing next to the body of a deformed man that had a sizable gash in his chest and shoulder. It is the Keeper’s opinion that the man was spared due to being partially obscured and having the appearance of someone already dead. His breathing was found by accident when she was prying bodies apart for proper death count.”

  “Based on the high quality of the cloth, we’ve concluded that this must be one of the Fringe Elders. So, per the plans of the ecclesiarch, he is likely who we need to speak with pertaining to the greater effort. He has as of yet not woken, and while basic aid has been provided, we have no idea what state he may be in when he wakes up. Acolyte,” the young adult’s eyes bulged, and he needed to take a strained breath as he saw his own name noted, “Tibbins is responsible for the wellbeing of the Elder until a positive outcome can be reached.”

  A pleading look was in the Acolyte’s eyes, but his superiors were too laden with their own burdens to reconsider his plight. Defeated without any words, Tibbins continued, “Almost no bodies under burned and collapsed buildings could be recovered. The few we did find were indicative of having received crippling injuries rather than directly lethal ones.”

  He swallowed and rasped out more of the report, “Being burned in their homes was intentional. Consensus is that the additional cries of help would distract us from pursuit. To my great regret… I must report that this was a fairly successful ploy, and no actual adults were recovered. However, we found no bodies nor remains of any children. With the depth of the discovered tracks, we are of the opinion that the children were taken rather than slaughtered.”

  Vellum rustled as he’d gotten to the bottom of that section, needing to flip to the next page. “Temporary encampments are being erected, as our forces require rest. Morale is low from being so close to the scarred zone, though merchant intelligence indicates it has been locally renamed to the ‘Salt Flats’. Updated documentation shows that history past a few hundred years has been entirely forgotten or wildly misunderstood.”

  “Is it still dormant?” the tired commander inquired, wanting that off his chest now, as he hadn’t heard this part of the report before.

  The Acolyte calmed his worries. “Yes, Head Cleric, the scar is not expanding. The current state of the flats matches the scriptures.”

  Relief washed over the group.

  “Good. It would have been a horror if that dungeon woke up again. Can we safely conclude no deaths were on the scar itself?” A different, more wizened Acolyte nodded, older vellum embossed with golden text unfurled to compare with fresher notes.

  “Yes, Head Cleric, that is correct. No casualties were incurred on the flats, so there is no chance of the calamity coming to pass.” The Acolyte received a stern nod from the commander, who chuffed in reply.

  “Excellent. While that is good to assume, we must be certain. Establish a forward base rather than a temporary encampment. We cannot allow the possibility for these raiders to let misfortune come to pass due to their blithering ignorance! Tibbins, you’re in charge of making the Fringe Elder agree to let us stay here.”

  “I don’t care how inane some of the requests may be; the rules are twisted in this place, and we need both verbal and written consent… as far as I’m aware. So, if he wants to ride a pony, fetch the blasted horse! Don’t come to me with requests for permission; just get it done. Bill it to Keeper Irene, have it added to the expenses tally. If it’s truly egregious you may ask or, better yet, decline. Still… make him happy with us.”

  The hand of the fifth Acolyte down the bench rose. The Head Cleric snarled at being interrupted, “What is it, Mandell?”

  The heavy accent of the Acolyte gave away his centralized heritage. “Sir, I don’t understand. Why would a purely celestial dungeon waking be a bad thing? The majority of us have major affinities that align! From initial reports, I thought this place would be ideal for cultivation in addition to our daily chants and prayer.”

  Irene turned to give the Acolyte a leer, but couldn’t fault the young man for not knowing. Her tone was motherly, though cutting. “May I, sir?”

  The request to her superior was waved off with a, “Do as you please.”

  Irene’s chair *squealed* on the floor as she turned herself to face the recruit. “In ordinary circumstances, yes, you would be correct, Acolyte. Unfortunately, this dungeon doesn’t operate under the common behavior we generally expect from dungeons. It does not align with the reports we cross-referenced from the Adventurers’ Guild, and even the scriptures refer to what happened here in the past as ‘The Great Scarring’.”

  “This is why we’ve been referring to the salt flats as ‘The Scar’. This particular dungeon is strange in several ways.” She lifted her gloved hand to keep count on her fingers. “The scriptures say that at least a hand’s worth of centuries ago, a celestial dungeon awakened here. Not developed slowly; not came from the heavens. It just… woke up, and *pop*… it was there.”

  “Not only was no one ever able to locate the core, but clerics at the time couldn’t figure out if it even had one. Instead of building in layers, applying clever traps, or adding what we’ve come to expect as the usual gambit of monsters, those aspects simply never appeared. This dungeon only did two things, beyond absolutely ruining hosts of armies and emptying entire coffers of nations.”

  All the Acolytes, while tired, had latched on to Irene’s words with rapt attention. “The first thing—and the only confirmable thing that this dungeon did—was flatten every bit of area it could spread to. On this flattened area, sporadic amounts of highly desirable resources would slowly accumulate as the tides came and went.”

  “The tide—to this day—remains one of the great mysteries of the Fringe. There is no major body of water nearby, and the mapped rivers simply do not provide the amount of water that comes and goes as the scriptures describe. Over the next few days, we will be able to generate an updated account.”

  “One of the rare Mages in those days described the phenomenon as watching a great beast breathe during slumber. As people died by the droves over the pursuit of scarce, rare resources, the dungeon grew—and grew in width only. It snaked across the landscape, and wherever its rising waters touched… the earth slowly flattened to a very specific depth. In certain places, it split like the roots of a tree. Up north, the pattern seems designed more like an infection rather than any cohesive pattern, while down south, there’s nothing but straight lines and right angles.”

  A hand rose again, but she was just getting to the point and was sure she would answer the query before it was asked. “The second thing the dungeon did—something we’re still not certain about it actually being responsible for—is a phenomenon that we frequently see in celestial cultivators that don’t keep a proper balance.”

  “Every warrior, every single one, who stepped foot on the salt flats… slowly lost their sanity and the ability to see reason. They began claiming the land and resources as theirs and seeing themselves as superior regardless of established hierarchy. They also gradually physically withered when they failed to be present on the landscape the scar ‘owned’.”

  Irene pointedly motioned to the Elder in the blue robe. “Eventually, you end up looking like that. We actually have fairly detailed notes on the subject, which involves internal corruption problems. So, Acolyte Tibbins, please do take care to not let his corruption consume him before the Head Cleric has what he needs.”

  Tibbins nodded with a salute. This part was following orders; he could do that. Mandell still looked confused; he didn’t feel his question had been answered. “While that is certainly unfortunate, why would that prevent this area from being a good source of Essence for us to cultivate with? Our prayer certainly provides, but why would already present celestial Essence not be beneficial?”

  Irene had to think for a moment but was decently certain she had the answer
. “It is very beneficial. Had there not been a hidden trap that caused people to lose their minds, I would agree with you.”

  She squeezed the tips of her fingers together. “The issue comes from the interaction. By taking, we also give back. Any Essence we fail to refine fully returns to the dungeon. Unlike in a common dungeon, Essence density here is always low. A place where additional Essence suddenly depletes because of, say, the presence of a dozen cultivating clerics? Well, that may awaken a cycle we very much wish to avoid.”

  “The scripture is also clear that the Core was never found. The scar is vast, and worst of all, the spread of Essence is incredibly even. So using the adventurer trick to follow the path where Essence density is thicker to locate the core is unfruitful.”

  “Scripture says that the Mage in the area proclaimed the dungeon dormant rather than dead. Specifically, when its expansion fully ceased after years and years of the Church and the Guild deterring people from entry.”

  “The region isn’t named ‘The Fringe’ due to some landscaping design. It is named such because this very scar brings someone to the fringe of sanity. Delusions of grandeur and grand heroism are recorded to have been declared by cultivators rapidly rising in rank. Their intent to do well and invoke the best for us all was devoured and overshadowed by this place. It is one of the well-kept secrets the Church does not want the populace to be aware of.”

  “Could you imagine the rumors? That a celestial dungeon, a gift of the celestial above, drives people insane? Makes them commit great acts of violence in the name of what they consider to be right? The Church prizes and relies on its relationship of goodwill, its values of great virtue, to remain in the hearts and minds of the people. The Fringe is one of those secrets that has been obscured with misinformation to soothe the minds of those who don’t want to know. This place isn’t on the map because the Church does. Not. Want. It. To be on the map.”

  She put her finger down hard on a fat book. “The scriptures complain for an entire volume of notes and complaints that not a single bastion or permanent stone building could be erected! If there was any semblance that something important was here, permanent structures would have given it all away. A full chapter is devoted to disgruntled scribes going on and on about how movement was constant and tensions were always high!”

  “Not only did they need to keep themselves from venturing into the scar despite the glint of prizes clearly visible in the distance, but they had to keep everyone and everything else out as well. Why do you think we still haven’t seen a single monster? Eradication was widespread. As you must have clearly noticed just by glancing, the scar is utterly massive. The manpower and coordination that took made fully devoted scribes complain. Fully. Devoted. Scribes. Were… complaining.” She trailed off with a soft sigh.

  “I have never seen a scribe complain about anything in my decades with the Church, and these are written accounts.” Her finger repeatedly pressed down hard on the volume. The importance of her words was not difficult to discern, even for the tired. Irene leaned forward in Mandell’s direction. “Do. Not. Cultivate. While. In. The. Scar. Near might be fine, but certainly not in. Is that understood, Acolyte? All of you, in fact?”

  Mandel’s stand and snap to attention was textbook. His chair screeched back, and in an instant, he was in the official salute position. “Yes, Keeper, sir!”

  The others gave mumbled responses. Irene let Mandel be at ease and return to his seat, handing the reporting back over. “Acolyte Tibbins, please continue.”

  Tibbins had lost his place on his report vellum and scrambled to find his lines again. The reporting continued for another hour until a fresh recruit announced himself with the news that temporary camp was set up. The meeting was dispersed, and the priests went to rest as a guard rotation of the least exhausted was set up.

  The camp was sizable. Four dozen clerics had been housed in tents with only a handful remaining in the longhouse as the construct was not considered structurally sound. As soon as the majority of them had acquired some much-needed rest, the real work would begin.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The Elder continued rising from the depths of the small coma he had been trapped within.

  “You win this one as well, shiny sky orb.” The old man kept his eyes closed after stirring from slumber. He had opened them only to find a ceiling he didn’t often see. A spike of light sunk right into his sight, and the chorus of complaining voices was wholly unfamiliar. He sort of heard most of it but didn’t pay real attention—he wasn’t able to.

  Illusions and ghosts played across his senses, and he instead vividly experienced the memories of past conversations as if hearing them for the first time. He knew all the words of the conversation; he heard the retorts and quips that would lead to some juicy gossip. The giggling of children came and went with the usual swiftness as they swirled across the floor, carried by a haze on an unseen wind. In short, reality fled from his mind.

  The unwelcome was truth pushed aside, and the old man’s mind found nothing but shards with no idea how to put it all back together. Why bother? His imagined conversations of warm nights and welcoming stew were rudely interrupted by words and flashes that suggested that the village burned down. A pang of discomfort struck the inside of his head, and the old man found it best to relieve the pain by remaining still. Swiftly, long-past conversations and warmth returned with the obscuring certainty of steam. The haze lazily veiled over once more and was welcomed dearly.

  “Losses of the village are borderline total.” A hollow distortion of the speaking voice reached him. The pang of discomfort returned with greater strength, and the misty haze blew apart as a strong gust sundered it. The laughter in his thoughts wavered, the emotions and ability to express repressed as grief found no foothold on the shattered glass shards in his unwilling mental state.

  No, no, no. He didn’t want to be here. There was just nothing left.

  “The children were taken rather than slaughtered.” These words rang like a gong through the empty halls of his mindscape, painting chaotic color over and over on unseen walls. Hope arrived on screaming wings. The Elder felt overwhelmed. Unreal, ghostly steps approached from the other side of his closed eyelids as again he sunk ever deeper into malaise. A fall ended when you hit the bottom, and for the Elder, that was in a space between madness and self-reflection. It was time to save his mind. It was time to give someone else the reins.

  Dizziness struck even though his body was unmoving. The Elder’s view altered drastically as he meandered through an imagined hallway of memories. The scenes replayed in sudden flashes, and he fully experienced the images and accompanying scents and tastes. They bombarded against his mind with each additional step. Another step, and another, and one last one were taken before the familiar and comforting rasp of a whetstone reached his ears.

  *Scrape*

  A large flame was centered in this stable mental space. Moving towards the burning representation of his will to live, the old man that came into view near the fire had a considerably stronger back—a younger back. His back, from many years ago. The large fire licked at the dry, wood-shaped memories in the center, burning through everything with all the time in the world, sampling the flavors of ancient happenings soon to be forgotten.

  Many more figures surrounded the fire, and they all appeared as younger, more youthful versions of him. All of ‘him’ was obstructed in a partial or complete, snowy haze that obscured their individual features. They were the reflections of his old self, the blurring corruption on them a representation of aspects long forgotten and traits willfully abandoned. He wasn’t those people anymore. Those identities. Not completely.

  *Scrape*

  The whetstone personality paused sharpening its weapon, prompting the Elder to step forth and join the circle. He seated himself on one of the many cut stumps as darkness and blackened doors surrounded him. He recognized the whispers coming from behind those chain-closed barriers. They contained all of his regrets. His
many, many regrets. The doors strained and shook inwards, threatening to burst even as he watched.

  “I didn’t expect that I would ever use this philosopher’s trick again,” his wordless voice spoke to nobody in particular. He was talking to himself, after all. There was no need to explain himself. This place was purely to accept that once again, he’d failed. The little crevice in the mind was the best imagined space he could construct to cope and convince himself to try again. You didn’t become a philosopher and not make tricks to protect yourself from infinite existentialism. When you come to the realization that you know nothing, your world has a tendency to fall apart. There had to be stability, even if it was fabricated.

  “I can’t do this anymore.” The current perspective’s hands folded together and tearfully sighed, head dipping low in shame. It took willful effort to right himself again. He turned on his stump and faced the next empty seat to relinquish more than a mere question. “Can you?”

  Slowly and with deliberate intent, a copy of his current appearance formed on the stump. An exact replica of his current voice replied in kind, “I believe I can. I can find the way.”

  The original nodded and asked, “Where did I go wrong, old friend?”

  The copy slowly stood, and the perspective shifted. Focus faded from the eyes of the original and instead saw from the eyes of the new copy. “Nowhere, Elder. You did everything right, and we all know well that you can make no mistakes and still lose. That’s not a weakness or a failure. That’s just life.”

  The abandoned original remained seated on the stump. His time was over, and his mind needed to go elsewhere to move on. “What will you do?”

  The new perspective folded his hands behind his back, adopting a slightly hunched posture to answer his own question from the version which had passed the torch. “What we chose to do. What we learned over all these years. That we hold to the ideal. That we make the decisions we will not regret. That we always, always hold promises to those dearest to us.”