1

A place vaguely resembling a modern subway station with various adjacent tunnels spread beneath the streets of Alderia. There were no trains running, of course, but there were various even more futuristic facilities, services, apartments, storage houses, and others to be found in this underground complex, so as to keep the surface from becoming needlessly cluttered. There were also gateways, small terminals here and there, through which the citizens of the mysterious island could instantly access a corresponding gate elsewhere in the city, and so greatly reduce the amount of walking. This was but one of the many mundane wonders that the elves had brought with them from their glorious dominion across the seas, long forgotten by men.

Needless to say, Alexander de Guillon, a native of the small, secluded barony of Ludgwert, had never seen a subway station before, any more than he had warp terminals, or other splendors of Amarno. Lacking a reference point of any kind, the view ahead only appeared eerily outlandish and incomprehensible to him, leaving the youth deeply overwhelmed and disoriented. The sight of tall people walking into apparent dead ends without a word, only to disappear in flashes of bright light, then to emerge out of nothing again elsewhere…He could only shut his eyes to it all and pretend he saw nothing.

Pulling his hooded cloak tighter over his head, Alexander hurried on along the tunnel sidelines, taking great care not to get in anyone’s way. His cloak, enchanted by the great Sage himself to elude the gazes of ignorant passers-by, allowed the young knight to go unchecked.

A few hours earlier, Alexander had shared his plan to his companions, or rather, to his only remaining companion, Stefan the knight sergeant, and Isa. He had been unwilling to disclose all of what he had learned to the elven woman, but Isa had forced the story out of him regardless. The young man was to procure evidence of the human kidnappings by breaking into the Royal Palace, and so help put a stop to the machinations under the surface. In exchange, the Sage would help the humans leave the island and return home.

“What an absurd tale,” Isa had commented with a deep sigh. “So Erekhigan seems to hold the King responsible for the kidnappings? That’s different from Caalan’s theory, isn’t it?”

“Seems like it,” Alexander had shrugged. “Though he couldn’t be sure either way. That’s what I’m going to find out.”

“How oddly cautious of him.”

“Well, it’s a complex matter.”

“That such a threat could exist without Erekhigan’s full knowing, it must be quite the enemy indeed,” Isa had said, shaking her head. “Normally, that man would have all the answers well before anyone could even think to present the questions, and then berate others for wasting time pondering such obvious things.”

“He didn’t seem that bad to me,” Alexander had replied. “Though I did get the feeling he was reading my mind.”

“Maybe we should think this plan twice over?” Stefan had suggested. “Can’t say we really know what we’re dealing with here. Or if this guy’s even on our side.”

“Of course, he’s not on our side,” Alexander had told him. “He’s on his own side, I can tell that much. But we’ve got no choice but to go along with his plan for now, if we want real answers. And if his tricks can get me into the Palace, then he’s already done more for us than I dared to hope for. Better yet, if he can get us off the island too.”

“If that’s your take on it,” the older knight had sighed with a shrug. “I guess we’d better get going then. The sooner the better, right?”

Stefan’s sudden courage had surprised Alexander. However, as valiant as the offer had been, he could only turn it down.

“Sorry, old-timer. But I’ve only got one cloak. You’d better stay here, in case my sister comes back.”

Resolved to undergo this challenge alone, Alexander had departed in the late afternoon. As he had been on his way across the front yard of Isa’s little house, the emiri woman had called after him from the doorstep.

“—You do know what’s really precious to you, right?”

“Huh?” he had paused at the odd question and looked back.

With a perfectly non-committal expression, Isa leaned on the door frame, crossing her arms, and spoke,

“Looking for justice and answers is fine and all, but do keep it in moderation. Risking your life and well-being for faceless strangers is idealism beyond common sense. I can’t claim to understand that sort of thing, but it tends to be popular among your kind. I knew somebody like that, once. And it didn’t end too well for anybody.”

“Really?” Alexander had twisted his brows, confused. “What are you getting at?”

“I wonder. I’m wasting my breath, that’s for sure. Suppose I just have a bad feeling.”

“Uh-huh?”

“Look. It’s a dangerous game you’re playing, boy. Don’t get yourself killed. I’d hate to break the bad news to your sister. I’ve done enough of that in my lifetime.”

“Hey. I’ll be fine,” the youth had replied, trying to sound as convincing as he could, before hurrying off.

Alexander had all but forgotten his earlier determination as he wandered in the maze of underground corridors. They all looked the same to him, and in no time at all, he had lost his sense of direction. Fortunately, there was no need for him to accurately memorize the correct path, nor was a map necessary either. Among other tools, the Sage had given him what looked like a compass. Instead of a magnetized needle, there was a tiny dot of light on the glassy display inside, which pointed in the right direction. As Alexander drew closer to the designated place, the dot grew steadily brighter, until it started rapidly pulsating near an inconspicuous wall.

“This is the spot, huh…? What’s here?”

At first, it appeared to be a plain wall, with no special features. But upon a closer examination, Alexander spotted a rectangular metal cover about six feet above the ground, with vertical slits, suggesting there was empty space behind. Glancing around, to make sure no one was nearby, the young man climbed a step higher using the protruding elements on the wall. After a moment of tinkering, he managed to pull off the metal lid, revealing an opening in the wall.

Beyond was a small duct.

Indeed impossible for any elf to access, it was too tight even for a grown adult human to squeeze through. But Alexander’s build was light and slim, even more so after the weeks spent crossing the merciless marsh, and he was able to climb into the narrow cavity with only a bit of struggle.

Soon, the young knight was fully inside the wall, pulling himself towards an unseen destination. As the duct was too tight to turn around in, he hadn’t been able to close the lid again, and could only hope that his entry wouldn’t be discovered.

“By the Divines. What am I doing?” he asked himself.

Was this really the hidden path the Sage had meant?

Even without claustrophobia, the experience would have been quite unnerving for anyone. Yet, using his elbows to drag himself on, the young knight kept going, on and on. He had to take frequent breaks, as the unnatural mode of movement was rather draining, and the way long. There were occasional sharp turns in the duct, which triggered in him a nigh intolerable fear of becoming stuck, but, one way or the other, he was able to keep going. Certainly, leaving Stefan behind had been the correct decision. The man never would have been able to follow Alexander through here.

Then, after an indeterminate time of laborious crawling, the young man came to a dead end.

There was another grate blocking the rest of the tunnel, framed by several small, red lights in two rows, on the left and right of it, respectively. There was no obvious way to remove the sturdy grate from this side, though Alexander could see through the narrow openings that the path continued behind it. Despair would have surely overcome him here, if the Sage had not already informed him of the obstacle.

Beyond this point stood the Palace itself.

“Let’s see...” Alexander recalled the instructions he had diligently committed to memory. “’To open the way, you have to activate something called ‘maintenance mode’.”

Alexander pulled out a small key Erekhigan had given him. It didn’t look much like a key despite being called so, only a slim metal bar with a small incision in the top end. However, looking at the shape of the key’s end and the grate, he noticed that there was a similar indentation near the right-side row of the red lights.

He fitted the key there and it went in with a click.

At once, all the lights changed color to bright yellow and started blinking, making the knight reflexively wince. Nothing else changed, however, and, exerting himself to overcome his fear, Alexander continued to follow the instructions.

“’Press the topmost lights on both sides and count to ten…’”

With some hesitation, Alexander pressed the lights. Surprised, he felt them sink in a little. Confused to an almost unbearable degree, he maintained this awkward posture and started counting. Perhaps he had counted too slowly. Already well before he reached ten, the lights abruptly changed color again, to pure jade green. Immediately after, the grate blocking the way let out a sharp, hissing sound, and jolted up, releasing a cloud of cool vapor into the duct, and giving the poor knight one more scare.

“Blast! Spirits take me…!”

For a moment, he feared the tunnel itself was going to collapse. It didn't. As the vapor cleared, the young man could see that the way ahead was now open. Before him extended the rest of the tunnel, now cylindrical and slightly more spacious than before. Summoning what was left of his shaken courage, Alexander de Guillon crawled on.

2

Quite the crowd followed Carmelia’s every step through the Palace halls. Though she had agreed to assist in the investigation, it was glaringly apparent that she hadn’t been freed of suspicion herself. Had a detective play as absurd ever been seen before?

The sorceress decided to begin with the problem of the missing ptoleans.

Six emissaries there had been, on six separate levels of the spacious high-rise. The levels had been sealed each from the rest of the building, turning the emissaries’ sudden disappearance into something of a closed room mystery.

Each ptolean had held a vile crystal ritual within him, capable of causing untold destruction upon the bearer’s death. The lack of such chaos suggested that they were still alive, even if their present whereabouts were unknown.

On the other hand, leaving their positions alive meant going against their apparent purpose. They had stayed behind in order to force the Alderians to comply with their demands, as well as to ensure the safety of their camp on the city’s outskirts. Taking their leave meant that the threat was removed, and any reason to answer them together with it.

It made no sense. Either they had given up on pressuring the Alderians, or else their proclaimed intentions had differed dramatically from the true objective all along.

“What of Naliya?” Carmelia asked. “Has anyone been to her quarters?”

“The Dawnstar is in the garden,” Jordith replied. “No one will be allowed anywhere near her. Leave the child out of this.”

Perhaps it had been a needless concern.

To begin with, all the levels had been sealed and isolated, under the King’s orders. The ptolean emissaries had no conceivable means to leave these areas without inside aid, whether they wanted to or not.

Nevertheless, the fact remained that they were gone. The Palace systems and court arcanists could confirm this with irrefutable accuracy. Hiding in a closet somewhere was out of the question. The scanners would reveal the presence of foreign organisms, no matter how discreet.

The eccentric forensics crew arrived in a wide hallway, where Jordith pointed at the floor, explaining that one of the ptoleans had been there only a few hours ago. No visible traces remained on the floor to prove the claim. The stone-like surface was clear of all stains, footprints, scratches, or other markings. Moreover, there were no signs of combat. By whatever means, the ptolean had to have left of his own accord, or else he had been swallowed by the very building.

“I will begin by looking for lingering irregularities in spacetime,” Carmelia announced, raising her hand.

“You think our arcanists have not done so already?” Jordith retorted. “You waste your time. To begin with, opening a Gate is not in these savages’ power.”

Carmelia ignored him.

A radiant, golden wave passed through the air around the sorceress, starkly highlighting the abstract fabric of space, and all conceivable changes to the natural order. However, after a brief moment, the faint blinking and flashing around Carmelia’s figure subsided, and she canceled the spell.

Jordith had been right. Had the ptoleans used magic to escape the Palace, it would have left obvious changes to the energy wave forms and gravity fields, which any hobbyist magician could detect. But Carmelia had counted little on this trick. She was merely excluding possibilities in order, as per her innate spirit as a perfectionist.

Next, the sorceress crouched and placed her hand on the floor.

“I will cast a spell to adjust our perception of the scene. Do not be alarmed.”

The regular lighting on the floor abruptly shut down. In its stead, a faint, blue light emanated from the spot Carmelia touched, spreading smoothly out along the floor like seawaves. After reaching the walls, those azure waves climbed upward in undulating, irregular patterns that eventually covered the entire visible interior. The guards shifted anxiously, surrounded by the bizarre light show, while the court arcanists watched the lights wash over them with visible awe. Only Jordith looked unfazed, and gave no orders to move either, quietly awaiting the results of Carmelia’s analysis.

Under the blue light, previously unseen features sprung up from the floor and the walls, rendered in various contrasting tones of orange and red, painting an entirely different version of the surroundings. Carmelia stood and observed the emergence of the numerous glowing markings. The look of those shining spots was very familiar to her, and it didn’t take very long for the sorceress to read the story they told.

“These are traces of organic matter,” she explained. “The area has been cleansed with care, but the mess has been considerable, and a various scattered cells and molecules still linger on the floor and in the air.”

“What does it all mean?” the knight commander asked her.

“It’s flesh and blood, Jordith,” Carmelia answered him. “The ptolean who was here was killed. He was caught unaware, and hit by an attack which nearly disintegrated him. He did not leave of his own accord, but was a victim of murder, the corpse cleared away by his slayer.”

“Murdered?” Jordith repeated with distinct disbelief. “By who? We gave no such order!”

“I do not know.”

“Moreover, if what you say is true, should not the crystal within the ptolean have detonated, destroying us all?”

“So it should have. Yet evidently, it did not.”

Carmelia raised her hand, carefully adjusting the wavelength filter. The red-glowing stains faded away. In their place, tiny, tiny purple particles became highlighted, concentrated around a specific spot on the floor, with sparse dots hovering in the air, light enough to be kept afloat by the imperceptible draft.

“As I thought,” she said. “The crystal was destroyed."

“How?” Jordith asked. “I thought it could not be done by outside means. You told us so yourself.”

“So I did, because I knew no one capable of the deed. Theoretically, a magical attack of sufficient intensity can destroy both the eidos and the catalyst together, preventing activation. But it is not only a matter of raw firepower. To affect the information structure, the wavelength and frequency of the attack has to cover that of the curse. Meaning, it can only have been done by someone familiar with this particular type of magic. An arcanist of exceptional skill, versed in blood magic, the knowledge of which was lost thousands of years ago.”

“You mean, yourself?”

Carmelia scowled at the knight’s remark.

“...I assure you, Jordith, I am not the only thaumaturge in the world.”

“Well, there are none among us who would delve into such loathsome fields of study,” the knight commander insisted, and the disgust in his tone left no doubt of the purity of his faith. “Were the ptoleans fighting among themselves then?”

“Unlikely,” Carmelia refuted. “They would have little to gain from undermining their own plan. Doubt Koolon would be foolish enough to pick an escort he couldn’t trust with his life.”

“Stranger things have happened. These beings are not known for their wisdom.”

“We should move on. Perhaps there is more to be learned from the other locations.”

The crew investigated each of the six floors where the ptolean emissaries had once been, and from which they had vanished. With her magic, Carmelia was able to glean information from the scenes that had gone unnoticed by the others, although, what they were able to learn in the effort only served to augment everyone’s confusion. All emissaries had been murdered, it seemed, the crystal rituals within them undone by the arts of another magician. Who had been this mysterious defender of the elves, and why had they not stayed behind to claim credit for the deed?

No, it was clear why the agent had opted for secrecy.

Blood magic—that is, arcane techniques pertaining to the manipulation of living organisms. The emiri viewed such methods as despicable beyond measure. In the beginning of time, they had been the gatekeepers of the paradise of Gods, overseeing all creation. As far as they had fallen from their antediluvian glory, the emiri had not gone quite far enough so as to act against their origin. It was blasphemous to suggest that one of them would have studied ways to control and manipulate divine constructs for the sake of power and slaughter. And it was only a thorough understanding of such measures, which could have allowed the unknown magician to take apart the ptoleans’ spell.

Death.

Destruction.

There was the reason why the operator had hidden any sign of their involvement. Even if it was for the noble purpose of protecting the Royal Palace, such methods would not earn the one responsible any fame as a hero. No, they would be forced to answer a great many difficult questions on how they acquired such proficiency—and then be exiled for eternity.

While Jordith and the other emiri appeared to think that this excluded the idea of the perpetrator being one of theirs, Carmelia was reluctant to share their view. However, under the forces of circumstances, she couldn’t be too vocal with her own theories either.

“Can you prove then, witch of the fallen, that it was not you, who took apart the ptoleans?” the guard commander asked her. “You, who have doubtless acquired cursed knowledge that runs counter to all things holy in life, in your exile?”

To this, Carmelia answered nothing.

Instead, she made a different request.

“Show me where the King was last seen. It is time we sought his majesty’s whereabouts.”

“You mean to say you will find him?” Jordith asked with doubt. “When not even our gifted arcanists have been able to locate any sign of his majesty?”

“Yes,” Carmelia answered, standing tall. “Because your devout arcanists seek only his mind and spirit. Whereas I shall look for him by his flesh. With the cursed knowledge that runs counter to all things holy in life, that I acquired in my exile.”

3

Arguing no more, Jordith led Carmelia to another floor of the expansive tower complex. Soon enough, the group arrived before a majestic, silvery doorway, featuring an enormous, detailed relief of the lost continent, by an anonymous artist. Before that door, Carmelia’s determination faltered for a moment, and she directed a questioning scowl at the knight beside her.

“The last thing his majesty told me was that he wished to be left alone,” Jordith answered her unvoiced question. “Right here. He said he was going to meditate in her majesty’s chamber. If you wish to proceed, you will need to do so on your own. After all, we cannot deny that you have the right. Though we are not willing to share it.”

Entering the High Queen’s chamber again was the last thing Carmelia wanted to do, but she had grown accustomed to overriding her personal desires long ago. Making no arguments, she walked on, as the enormous doorway soundlessly opened before her. As Jordith had declared, the rest of them waited outside, showing no intention to follow her. Thanks to this, no one was there to see the uncharacteristic look of unease on the sorceress’s countenance, as she passed through the connecting corridor to the gilded central chamber.

Then, the disfigured, half-veiled body of her mother was again before her eyes.

The High Queen remained as she was, suspended by the numerous silk ribbons from the ceiling. Each bind had been carefully positioned and adjusted to share her mass equally from all directions, with minimal stress and impediment to circulation. An absolute balance, achieved only by the subject’s continued inanimation.

On the outside, she looked to be at peace.

Yet, those with honed senses could perceive otherwise.

The air surrounding the Queen’s abused form was almost violently tense. Though her mind was absent, her consciousness somewhere far away, perhaps never to return——the body was alive, a vessel to a prodigious soul.

Even after eight hundred years of immobility, she lived, lived, with a persistent fire.

For more than thirty-eight thousand years that flame had been ablaze, growing ever brighter.

What was another eight hundred more?

Could there even be a definite end to such a being?

Carmelia shuddered.

She contained the flurry of grief, dread, and remorse welling up within her, dispersed it like morning mist before sunrise, and turned her attention to the room itself. Raising her left hand, she cast the same spell as before, to look for evidence of the emiri King’s past presence.

Though he was a King, though he was a member of the fabled aldervolk, even Quaran perspired, smelled, radiated warmth, and replaced his cells, shedding off the old and dead. Not perhaps the same way humans would, exactly, but these organic necessities could not be fully hidden or removed either. The King’s biosphere was familiar to Carmelia, and she now sought for that familiarity in the carpeting of imperceptible organic matter in the Queen’s chamber, by means of her magic.

The sorceress’s search was not without fruit either. The King had visited the chamber often, it seemed. The last time’s signs remained yet distinct, indicating his positioning and movements.

But it was in the pursuit of his tracks that the oddities began.

“He was about to leave. But something made him turn back...”

Carmelia observed the highlighted footprints, the residual heat’s dissipation rate drawing a clear chronology before her cat-like gaze. Yet, the harder she looked, the less sense it made. The King’s tracks ended before he ever left the room.

As if he had disappeared into thin air.

Carmelia altered the filter, the scale, and the intensity of the spell, but it showed only a simple, inconclusive path in the middle of the room, giving no answers regarding the lost ruler’s whereabouts. By all means, he should have been in the room still.

So where had he gone and how?

The Queen without a mind.

The King without a body.

There could only be one possible explanation to the mystery.

“The one who killed the ptoleans also killed Quaran and disposed of the corpse the same way.”

Quaran was a noble, not an arcanist. Creating tunnels in spacetime or hiding his own tracks was beyond his ability. Therefore, another person, one highly gifted in magic, had to have made him vanish. But rather than explaining things, this theory only made the situation that much more confusing. The one who had defended the Palace against the ptoleans had then turned on his master. While saving the kingdom from outside peril, the suspect had proceeded to commit regicide—the worst conceivable crime.

Who could have done such a thing and why?

Was there any way to explain such a maddening mystery?

——Drip.

It was a light sound, easy to miss. But in that otherwise soundless chamber, that faint note didn’t escape Carmelia’s hearing. A drop of liquid had appeared on the stone floor. A tiny, deep red spot. The cirelo’s eyes widened as she stared at it.

Yes. There was unmistakably a drop of blood. The spot had appeared right under the Queen’s immobile body, below her missing left arm.

Disturbed, Carmelia hurried to examine the Queen, to see if she was injured. However, she soon found that her initial assumption had been mistaken. The grievous wounds on Lebennaum had closed already centuries ago. Neither had any new ones appeared on her since. Even though regenerating the lost limbs was impossible, the High Queen’s vitality was as stable as it had ever been.

Nevertheless, the drop of blood was real, and by Carmelia’s earlier observation, it was still fairly fresh. Whose blood could it be, and where had it come from?

Kneeling, the Court Wizard touched the spot and ran mana through her fingers.

It was not the blood of her mother, the same blood which also coursed in her own veins; the spell confirmed this beyond any doubt. With a simple gesture, she altered the spell and began to go through the other options. But her work was hindered by a wild theory, disturbing in its stark improbability.

Nevertheless, Carmelia failed to fully reject it either.

The thought continued to live on and grow in the back her mind, spreading like a creeping shadow to overtake all other explanations. In the past, the High Queen had mastered all eight forms of combat, including the arcane, and possessed tremendous magical powers. There was no telling the limits of her knowledge. If there was anyone in the Palace who could have undone the blood magic of the ptoleans, and then disposed of the corpses—but no, it was impossible. Completely impossible. Out of the question.

Carmelia looked up at her mother.

She was tempted to remove the eerie mask, to make sure, but at the same time, fear stayed her hands. Instead, the sorceress probed the High Queen’s mind, with little reverence or caution. Yet, just as before, she found nothing. Instead of her mother’s familiar thoughts and sentience, she was met with a static, undisturbed silence, gray noise that completely lacked any signs of individuality, personality, or awareness.

Countless times had Carmelia ventured into that unbounded mist to look for the person within, only to come back alone. That she had come back at all was already a feat worthy of praise. Not every arcanist had been as skilled or lucky. They had become lost in the High Queen’s void, sharing her fate as bodies devoid of consciousness. It would have been easier to find a needle in Henglog than the lost mind of Lebennaum now. Just as incredible was the idea that she was behind the disappearance of the ptoleans and Alderia’s King.

This conclusion made things no easier for Carmelia.

Unless she could solve the mystery at the Palace, the emiri were likely to blame everything on her. In that scenario, she would never achieve the purpose of her visit, and the human guests would not escape with their lives.

There had to be a way.

However, before Carmelia could even begin to think of her next move, a red light flashed in her eyes. The chamber’s usual lighting was momentarily overtaken by an alert signal, which soon faded, followed by a general announcement by the Palace systems. An effeminate, neutral voice declared the news that only made the already bewildering situation that much stranger.

“Warning. Intrusion in the upper aft detected.”

3

The final obstacle drew aside, and Alexander reached the end of his arduous journey. After crossing a great distance in the cramped tunnels, he finally emerged out in the open. Around him spread a circular hallway. It was perhaps better described as a tunnel, heavily lacking in décor and lighting, but at least it was spacious enough for him to walk upright. Indeed, there would have been enough room for a dozen men to march past, side-by-side.

Though it was apparent that he was inside the Royal Palace now, the area looked quite different from the floors he had seen above. The walls were made of what looked like a mix of stone and steel, with countless glowing little panels and metal pipes coursing along them. Alexander could only imagine the time it would take for an average blacksmith to produce such a structure, or just a small part of it.

Dropping onto the floor, he looked left and right, unable to tell which direction he should take. The Sage’s instructions didn’t help him much beyond this point. The young man ended up following the tunnel left, hoping the cloak’s protection would save him from any guards he might come across, as there were no places to hide in.

Fortunately, Alexander came across no one. The place was devoid of people and quiet, save for an unsettling, low hum, which seemed to emanate from within the walls themselves. Feeling as if the very building around him was a living monstrosity and he walking through its intestines, Alexander sneaked on, trying to find what he had been sent for, without the faintest idea what to expect. Then, he eventually walked into another dead end.

A massive doorway blocked the path.

Or, he hoped it was a door.

At the tunnel's end was a plain, even surface with no handles, no hinges, no keyholes, or anything that would have confirmed it as a door, as opposed to a plain wall. Had he picked the wrong way, after all? Grimacing, Alexander was about to turn back when he noticed something else.

A glowing circle of light, near the left edge of the surface.

Staring at it, struck by a bizarre idea, he rummaged through his pockets to take out another one of Erekhigan’s tools. This particular item looked like a steel coin on the surface, a little smaller than the young man’s palm, polished smooth all around and lacking any inscriptions. Nevertheless, Erekhigan had called it also a key, saying it would open any door in the Palace, a token from the time when he still held the King’s favor.

Though it was shaped quite oddly for a key, and although there were no keyholes visible, Alexander had already learned not to depend on his human intuition in such a senseless place. Following his gut feeling, thinking he had nothing to lose for trying, he approached the light circle near the wall and touched it with the coin of steel. He had imagined something like the light swallowing the coin, or something equally absurd, but instead the light merely changed color upon contact.

——“Ennou raasen,” a heavenly, feminine voice suddenly spoke from out of nothing. “Tereven nuo saamans, esire Wan Disiria.”

“Who’s there?” Alexander called out.

There came no answer. Instead, the enormous doorway began to move, sliding aside, and disappeared within the wall. Thus, the way continued again before the young man’s bewildered eyes.

Panting out of dread and astonishment, Alexander shook his head and put away the steel coin.

“Is this Hel itself?”

The knight proceeded down the new path. Embedded in the walls of it were clear glass tubes, where bubbles coursed, suggesting they were full of water. Their purpose eluded the Ludgwertan knight, who was certain nothing could ever surprise him after this ordeal.

Yet, it was only the beginning of surprises for him here.

Following the corridor, Alexander eventually stepped out onto the edge of a wide open chasm. Before his eyes opened a cylindrical room, deep enough to make him recoil with a fit of vertigo. Narrow stairs ran along the walls, both up and down from where he stood. The room was lit by countless panels of light, as before, and more enormous tubes filled with green-blue liquid, which painted all the surroundings with that same unnatural hue. Struggling with a bout of dizziness, fear, and nausea, Alexander had to lean on the nearby metal railing to keep on his feet, his eyes reluctantly taking in the baffling view.

“Seriously, what is this place…? Am I still in the Palace?”

Forgetting his mission, the young knight descended the stairs, witnessing one absurdity after another. A trio of bizarre machines, like giant mills, stood up from the center of the floor below, the covered rotors of them turning without a sound on their own, without wind to move them. Metal tubes larger than man dived in and out of the walls like a mighty sea monster’s tentacles, feats of inhuman craftmanship.

But though it was all very strange to the boy, it was hardly the worst of it all.

The real shock was only about to come.

As Alexander walked on, round windows opened up on the walls, as if reacting to his presence. They showed no outside scenery, but harrowing visions that made his jaw fall. Behind the glass panels were water containers, but not empty like the others he had seen. Odd shapes floated in those tanks, pale and eerie, like samples in alchemist’s jars. As Alexander went on, the shapes grew larger in size, more distinct, more familiar to him, and a horrifying realization gradually dawned on the young man.

They were embryos.

Unborn offsprings of living beings, in various stages of development.

Not like the miscarried goat fetuses Alexander had seen on the farms near home once or twice, but most likely those of the masters of this place, deceased, and stored for whatever abominable purpose, unintelligible to a man of logic. As Alexander forced himself to carry on, and came across samples of more mature stages, ready to be delivered, he looked at their distinctly shaped ears, seeking confirmation to his disgusting hypothesis.

“What in the Hel’s chilling kettles…!?” He suddenly paused, holding his breath, his face twisted in disgust and horror.

The baby he stared at looked only to be asleep, even if deprived of healthy complexion, only a ghastly phantom of a life terminated at its beginning. He looked at the ears, the only part that could tell it apart from human children in the same phase of development, and no matter how he tried to deny what he saw, the child’s ears weren’t pointed or elongated in the least, but the regular, round ears of a conventional human baby.

And there, Alexander de Guillon had his answers.

Where had the kidnapped humans gone?

Why were they taken?

What had been done with them?

In much wisdom, there is much grief—had truer words ever been spoken?

“AAAAAAAH—!”

Crying out, unable to help himself, Alexander staggered back, losing his balance. He’d had enough. All he could think about now was getting out of this house of terror before the ones responsible for the atrocity should come back. Quickly struggling up, he turned and ran back up the stairs, the way he had come. Though soon out of breath, he rushed on, as fast as he possibly could. And then the young man ran into a wall.

Not into a literal wall.

An unknown elven woman stood at the mouth of the tunnel out. Alexander couldn’t tell when or where she had appeared from, but they were suddenly face-to-face, with the elf cutting off his escape. She didn’t look particularly surprised to bump into the intruder either. As if she had, in fact, been expecting him.

Before Alexander could react, the emiri took a long step forward, slammed her palm against his chest and flung him back. Thrown off the floor lightly like a little child, Alexander was cast over the railing, into his apparent death.

But again, his expectations were wildly subverted.

Instead of falling down, the young man was caught in the current generated by the turbines at the bottom. The uplift halted his descent, instead blowing him straight up at the ceiling with continuously growing velocity.

“WAAAAAAAAAAH—!”

Alexander braced himself for a painful death, when the ceiling suddenly split into smaller segments and pulled aside, allowing him to pass through unharmed. Quickly closing again underneath him, the floor blocked the current and he fell flat down on his face. It was quite painful on its own, but at least less deadly than the alternative.

“By the Lords’ all graces...” For a moment, Alexander laid on the floor, gasping for air, wondering if his sister would ever believe the bizarre adventure he had been ended up in, should he live to tell the tale. His recovery time was left brief, however.

Suddenly, the lights in the room flashed red, complete with an eerie sound, as if a horn being blown in the distance. The change was brief, and everything soon returned to normal, but the odd shift was then followed by an announcement of the heavenly voice he had heard before.

“Oneron. Conoloni baasta ni tanvasta dearun.”

“Give me a break!” the young man cried. “What next—wah!”

At the same time, a part of the wall drew aside on his right.

Beyond was a narrow, upright tube, brightly lit by tiny spotlights. By prior observations, Alexander could recognize it as an elevator. How had it opened on its own, with no one inside? It reeked of a trap, but he saw no other way out of the round-walled chamber he was in, which lacked even windows.

The worrisome signal and the threat of the floor parting again compelled Alexander to hurry into the elevator, the door of which closed immediately after him. Even the destination had been picked for the human visitor in advance, as the tube quickly began to ascend, nearly making him lose balance again.

Alexander thought he was going to go mad out of sheer dread.

What was happening?

Where was he being taken?

It was almost as if they had known of his coming, as if the whole building was alive and toying with him, throwing him here and there, guiding him to a horrible death. Would he emerge before guards, to be taken captive, tortured for the whereabouts of his companions, and then killed for his lawless intrusion? Why had he ever listened to the Sage? The elves were all mad, sadistic villains, the whole lot of them, above and beyond the common sense of men!

At least one thing was certain—he had seen too much. Even Alexander himself could agree with the fact. Should they catch him, he would never see home again.

Nevertheless, much more still was he about to see and learn before his end.