The Wayward Moon began the slow trundle back towards the towers, the days' expeditions thankfully over. Alex had seated himself on a pile of crates near the centre of the deck, whilst his friends had found similar spots to rest nearby, scattered around on the floor or resting on barrels. Erwin had put his backpack over his head in an attempt to get some sleep. The constant thrumming of the ship's engines was making that difficult, and Erwin had groaned repeatedly from beneath his burlap facemask.
The deck itself was packed. The knights that had remained behind were working almost exclusively in the local region, trying desperately to keep the machina under control. They were joined by a swarm of guild staff, the clerks made up of dozens of nearly identical wyldkin sisters. It was a little disconcerting to see them gathered in groups, like reality had split and stretched one person across dimensions.
Alex watched the forest drift away into the distance as the Moon began to move. Or at least, what was left of the forest. There were still patches of trees left miraculously untouched by the fires, but they were just tufts on a thick bed of ash. With the countryside scorched like this, Alex could just make out the towering mushrooms of the swamps in the distance. He found that he longed to return there, to explore out further from the places he knew. There was a simple joy in somewhere new, one that Alex missed.
“We should go on an expedition,” Alex said to no one in particular. “See the world.”
“Are you sure that's wise? Every time you go somewhere you stir up trouble,” Cassius said. The cannoneer was sitting on the deck, his back against a crate filled with stun bombs, their silver casings catching the sun as it vanished behind the horizon. “Knowing your luck, you’ll probably find, I don’t know, a giant ghost or something?”
“A giant ghost?” Casey said. “So, the ghost of a giant, or a regular person’s ghost that just happens to be big? What were you trying to get at there?” Casey was sitting atop a barrel though she was rapidly reassessing her decision. The airship rumbled slightly at it moved, the damage to the Moon robbing it of its normal smooth glide, and the barrel was wobbling disconcertingly.
“I don’t know, I was just giving an example. Honestly, a few months ago I would have said that was just as likely as finding other people out in the aether.”
The mention of those who called themselves the chosen people caused Alex to turn his head, looking across the prairie to the collection of tents near the base of the mountains, a wall of wood and metal enclosing them. The council had ordered the handful of prisoners taken after the battle to be enclosed in the camp, the Towers themselves lacking anywhere to hold them. They had dissembled the hastily built defences of the Towers to provide materials.
Alex didn’t like it. It reminded him of his own world’s history, and whilst he understood the council’s reasoning, it put him on edge. The Chosen had just accepted it, moving into the camp with no resistance. There was no fight in them, not anymore. Their holy war had come to a devastating end, vast numbers of them wiped out in moments. As a final insult, a Deus had exploded out from the mountain, felling more of their number. To a people who considered the Deus avatars of their gods, it was like they had been disowned by those same deities.
“You know,” Casey said, hopping off the barrel, “Horton said that this will happen to Earth, eventually. That the aether is leaking into there from here. You think that means people will start seeing machina in Wembley or something like that?”
“Who knows. Are the machina and the aether even linked?” Alex said. “Maybe the machina were around beforehand and adapted to it.”
“The ancient fables say they appeared after the aether came,” Cassius said.
“Yeah, and the ancient fables said you were alone. They’re probably not the most reliable things.”
Not much about the history of the chosen people had crept out. Most weren’t willing to speak, and the council was controlling what got out from those that were. It was common knowledge by now that the two peoples had once been one. Tower myth maintained they the old god Berat-Kor turned on the others, savaging the land until the new gods arrived and slew him. The Chosen maintained that Berat-Kor had been benevolent and that the new gods had usurped him in an act of profane betrayal. Those still loyal to Berat-Kor had left, wandering into the wilderness and forming their tribes and clans. Resentment had festered over millennia into hatred and as the aether parted to reveal a route, the clans had come storming back towards their ancestral home.
“You’ve got a point. I was never really big into religion myself. They were just stories from when I was a child. I've been to some ceremonies, some weddings, but it's not for me. No offence to those who believe, but I kind of grew out of believing the stories,” Cassius said.
“Like Santa,” Casey said.
“What’s a Santa?”
“It’s an Earth thing.” Alex put his hands on the edge of the crate, the wind picking up around the airship and causing it to rock gently. “There’s this story they tell kids. Basically, there’s a magic man who knows if you’ve been good or bad. If you’ve been good, he sneaks into your house one night a year to leave gifts.”
“So, let me get this right? You tell kids that if they’re good, someone is going to break into their home?”
“And leave presents,” Alex said, feeling the need to clarify.
“That’s creepy.”
“He’s got a point,” Casey said. “It is kind of creepy when you think about it. Especially the always watching you thing.”
Alex hadn't given it much thought. It was just something you told kids because your parents told you. That was how myths worked, passed along by momentum more than anything else.
The group fell silent, each watching the horizon and pondering the events of the past few months. Only now were they starting to feel like knights again, rather than warriors, soldiers in a war they never wanted.
“God, could you lot be any louder,” Erwin said, his words muffled beneath the backpack. “Some of us are trying to nap here.”
“Why are you trying to nap? We’ll be back at the Towers soon, and the sun is only just going down.” Alex still found it strange that the aether lands had the same twenty four hour cycle as Earth. The presence of a sun and a moon rising and falling told him that it was a planet at least. That did raise some questions in Alex’s mind about the rest of this dimension’s celestial bodies. If the people of the Towers boarded a starship and headed off towards the nearest world, would they find it free from the taint of the aether?
“I can’t sleep properly on those beds. They’re too tough.”
“Oh, we’ll have to ask Esmeralda to crack out the memory foam then, get things a bit more comfortable for you,” Casey said. She kicked the bottom of Erwin’s boot playfully.
“I’m not like you pair. You act like you’ve lived here your whole lives. I can’t do that. I miss Earth. I miss my flat, my friends, and yes, my memory foam mattress. Let’s be honest, if Horton found a way back tomorrow, would you go? Would you take that trip home?”
Alex opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. He had wanted to say yes, to say that he would head home in an instant, but something had held his tongue. Deep down he knew that it wasn't true. Back on Earth, he wasn't anyone special. Here in the aether lands, he was a knight. It meant something.
“I don’t know,” Alex said finally, the truth working its way out. “I honestly don’t know.”
“I wouldn't,” Casey said with typical swagger. “Here I'm as close to a superhero as I'm ever going to get. Can you really say you haven't dreamed of going on some adventure in another world?”
“I’m just glad it didn’t involve being hit by a truck,” Alex said.
***
The atmosphere in the Towers was different. Muted bordering on oppressive. It had been a welcoming place when Alex had first arrived, but over the past few months, a dread had begun to creep in. It didn't help that in every tunnel and by every lift a militia guard stood senti
nel. The Towers didn't have an army, not until the Chosen People had come marching south towards them. The knights had stood and fought, bearing the brunt of the losses, the militia intended to be a final line should the worst happen.
That desperate day had never come, but the militia had remained, its volunteers and the council that funded them unwilling to lay down their arms. There was a fear that another army could arrive at any time, another unknown menace wandering out from the aether. The intentions were pure, but to Alex, their constant presence felt wrong. It didn’t help that the council had shifted a large portion of the guild’s funding to the militia, souring the morale of the knights more than it already had been.
“Feels off around here,” Cassius said, putting voice to Alex’s concerns. “We didn’t need this…militia, before. Why do we need them now? We chased off that army without them.”
“Can’t blame people for wanting to protect themselves,” Erwin said, stretching his arms as he spoke. Behind him people were sitting at tables, Esmeralda’s tavern busier than usual. Normally when it was this full it would be bustling with excited energy. At the moment everyone looked sullen, staring into their drinks or playing with their food. “It’s how it works where we’re from.”
“Difference is they don’t stand on every street corner,” Alex said. “Not in most countries anyway.”
“I’m with Cassius on this, we don’t need them.” Casey was staring off at the bar and drumming her hand on the table impatiently. “If another attack was coming, it would have happened by now. With the fires out they aren’t restricted to the pass anymore. Not that they could take it if they wanted to. You have to wonder exactly how far they had to march to get near us.”
“Right, ‘ere you are, loves. Sorry for the wait, but things are a bit tight in the kitchen these days.” The familiar voice of Esmerelda boomed as she walked across the tavern, balancing a tray with an impossible number of bowls resting on it across her thick arm. The tavern’s owner was a retired knight, though she had donned her armour to help Alex and Casey when they had battled a Deus that had attacked the Towers. She had taken the pair under her wing, letting them, and later Erwin as well, stay at her tavern. It was nominally in exchange for anything new and unusual they discovered whilst out in the field, eager to improve the offerings of the tavern’s kitchen. She hadn’t pushed them to keep up their side of the bargain in recent months, aware of the limited options that knights currently had.
She placed the bowls onto the table. Esmerelda has underplayed how bad they were. They were filled with a thin broth that was little more than water, spare chunks of two different kinds of vegetable floating inside.
“I am sorry, but deliveries ‘ave been slow recently, so this is all we got.”
“Deliveries?” Alex said. He had always wondered where the food in the Towers came from. There was never any meat, which made sense considering there were no flesh and blood animals, but it wasn’t like the Towers were surrounded by vegetable farms. “Where does all this come from?”
“You've seen 'em floating islands in the sky nearby, right?”
Alex nodded. It was one of the first things he had noticed upon his arrival in the aether lands, immediately after some machina had tried to kill him. He knew that on occasion the floating landmasses came drifting out from the aether, eventually vanishing into the thick cloud at its boundary.
“The two just beyond the towers, near the infinite, they’re trapped in place. Haven’t moved for as long as anyone can remember.”
“Aye, and up there is where we grow all our vegetables ‘an the like. Thing is with airships out of commission, a bunch of them sent off to follow that Dues gods know where deliveries ‘ave slowed. And that’s even getting me started with the militia pilfering stuff.”
“The militia is taking food?” Alex said.
“Claim it’s for emergency supplies they do. Personally, I think that’s rubbish.” Esmerelda tucked the now empty tray under her arm. “The sheer amount if it is too much.”
“We should check it out,” Casey said. “Go up there and keep an eye on deliveries. Make sure the militia aren’t taking more than their fair share.”
“On what authority?” Cassius's face was wracked with incredulity. “You think the guild master is going to sign off on that? I can't imagine he's eager to start another fight with the council.”
“Still, someone should be looking at it.”
“What if we found another food source?” Alex said. The seeds of an idea were sprouting in his mind. “I mean, we can’t find anywhere else to put farms, but think about it, the chosen had to be getting food from somewhere. Most likely they brought it down from where they came from, but that means there has to be food there.”
“Where the enemy army came from?” Cassius said. “I hate how I'm always the voice of doom, but that's a worse plan than Casey's. There aren't enough roots in your stew so you want to go and cross who knows how far to beg from people who wanted us dead? Just wait, once the militia has filled whatever quota they have, there will be plenty again. There's more than enough to go around usually.”
“Cassius does ‘ave a point. It’s just an inconvenience.”
“No, see I'm thinking forward. We're going to have to send someone out there anyway, eventually, right? Even if it's just to learn more. This is the perfect excuse. The food doesn't even matter anyway if Cassius is right,” Alex said.
“I usually am.”
“It's a front, isn't it, one the council can't say no to. We can bundle the exploration together with offering a trade, food for the release of prisoners. It's a win-win for the council, they get to keep building their stockpile, and if it works food gets easier to get for everyone else, whilst also getting rid of those prisoners they need to keep looking after. If it doesn't work, well they don't lose anything, and we still get to poke our noses around.”
“They get to look good regardless. And we get to go back to being proper knights, exploring the frontier,” Cassius said. He rubbed the bottom of his chin, contemplating the idea. “Depends on if Horton is going to go for it.”
Esmerelda chuckled. “Oh, ‘e will. I’ve known that man since he became guild master and if there’s one thing I know about ‘im, it’s that ‘e loves to go poking around where ‘e shouldn’t.”
“When did you get so smart?” Casey said, punching Alex in the arm. “All this smoke and mirrors stuff isn’t like you.”
“I don’t know, I’m just trying to think of ways to get out there again. You must be sick of getting your armour covered in ash and soot.” Alex knew that wasn’t really a problem, at least not for those from Earth. One of their abilities was storing outfits in the same pocket dimension as their items, summoning them out as preset outfits. It saved all the effort of trying to strap yourself into armour and anything put into the void came out looking brand new.
“I do kind of hate that constant smell. It's like burnt hair but stronger,” Casey said with a smile, aware that Alex was trying to sway her. He didn't need to. “We'll go to the guildhall tomorrow, see if we can convince Horton to let us go. We are technically third-grade knights now, an expedition like this should be within our remit.”
“Just barely,” Cassius said. The guild normally operated on a strict grading system. Expeditions were ranked based on difficulty and offered to knights of the matching grade or lower. Knights could increase their grade on occasion by proving themselves on semi-regular tests, in reality just higher grade expeditions offered to knights who the guild thought were ready to advance. The system had gone out of the window when the war had begun, and only recently put back in place.
For their efforts in the battle, the party had been increased to third grade, except for Cassius who was already beyond that. Horton had deemed it a suitable reward, which was high praise coming from him. Normally the guild master was a stickler for the rules.
“You know they deserve it. Don’t be an arse,” Esmerelda said.
“Tomorrow mor
ning then,” Alex said. He picked up the half-empty tankard before him, lifting it into the air. “To new adventures!”
The others did the same, raising their flagons. “To new adventures!” they said in unison.
Chapter Three
Boat Party
Horton had watched Alex as the knight explained his plan, hands clasped together, elbows resting on his desk. He hadn't said a word, watching silently as the petitioners before him made their case. They had finished now, and Horton had sat motionless as he considered their words.
“No. That’s the stupidest idea I’ve heard in a while.” Horton lifted his elbows from the desk. The wooden top was covered in dozens of books, groaning under the weight of the tomes. “Your idea of destroying the pass in the mountains was good. I have no idea what…this, is. I suppose a fifty-fifty ratio isn’t too bad.”
“What's wrong with it?” Alex said. He had expected Horton to pounce at the idea, after all, it was a return to the guild doing what it did best, whilst also ingratiating itself with the council.
“Why would the council care? If they were worried about the levels of food, do you think they would be taking a tithe like they are? It’s hardly a bad idea, stockpiling in case of a siege. I’m no fan of this militia, but I do see the logic in it.”
“Can you at least try? Maybe they’ll surprise you and go for it?”
“The council is anything but surprising. This might be another world, Alex, but some things never change. The councillors will do whatever serves their own agendas best, and that usually means trying to get re-elected. How does this help them do this?”
Alex shrugged; he had never paid much attention to politics. “Do hungry people vote for the person starving them?”
“More often than you would expect.” Horton stood up, pushing his white coat to his sides as he did. “Come, walk with me a moment.” He stepped out from behind the desk and began to walk through the chamber that served as his office. It took up the entire top floor of a tower, a much-vaunted location. The room was filled with tables covered in beakers, books and machina parts, a dozen experiments underway on each. The floor of the room was a mess, scrolls and tomes creeping across the stone like they were alive.
Aether Knight: Desolation: A LitRPG Light Novel Page 2
