Chapter 5

Vrraet had a fretful rest that in his opinion did nothing to help him feel refreshed. While the dreams were relatively tame, his morning achings were not. Maybe trying to do some research before he began to heal wasn’t a good idea, or perhaps that he was just too exhausted mentally to enjoy sleep with the vague visions now and then. Either way, his night within his chamber was not spent in bliss. He had planned to do some more work into the subject but his mind refused to cooperate, having spent far too long in a cramped room to focus at all.

As a result, despite his misgivings, he ended up on taking Elst’s offer anyway.

Vrraet also had an opinion that Elst spoke too much.

“As I said,” Elst stated, “What the colony needs is not more pointless conflict, but rather a way to secure a permanent source of materials as well as a way to make better use of them.”

“And unfortunately, conflict is here.”

“Not during winter. The land strider’s vessels will not travel into the ice and nor will we. We should work on improving the infrastructures of the colony, free up time and resources. A forge or some other way to remake these metal would do us good.”

The cave-in wasn’t particularly extreme. It was mostly dirt and gravel that had been dislodged from the ceiling when the explosion occurred, resulting in the chamber being flooded with rocks and muck.

However, it did mean that the ‘entrance’ resembled more of a pile of rocks than an actual cave. The excavation thus consisted mainly of digging, scooping and back to digging.

“Wasn’t aware you know ways to… forge metal,” Vrraet heaved another boulder off the entrance.

“There were land-strider manuscripts. Seemed to be preserved in some way that made it slightly more resistant to seawater, so I copied it all before the salt claimed it.”

“And you deciphered it?”

“Yes. Kusik’s effort on translating their words seemed to finally have a purpose, surprise.”

“I gather you found something useful.”

“Indeed. The land strider’s procedures and classifications of their metal seemed to be extremely complex. You know the orange metal bits that crumble easily?”

“Almost all metal do that.”

“Apparently not. Its a metal called iron that the land striders use to make most of their… tools.”

“Seems like a poor choice to me,” Vrraet absently commented. Off his back, he hoised a net-like object onto the dirt. When he extended it, it was revealed to be something distinctively oblong, like a tube that stretches for some meters. On it, evenly spaced, was numerous small beads of stone that bore a simple runic inscription upon it.

Vrraet set one end out into the open water and the other facing the entrance of the cave. After making sure no one was at either of its business ends, he laid a webbed hand upon its command sigil and activated the device with but a thought. Whirling, the tube of nets seem to come alive as energy surges through it, each rune sparking blue before settling into a nearly inaudible hum.

Certainly, when he was still a Bygail, this was beyond his hearing range. Now that Vrraet found himself to be Saighgair, he had discovered an entirely new spectrum of sounds he had been missing out on. He could hear far-away sounds of fish congregating, the sounds of sand rustling as the debris settled, Elst’s slow pacing.

His mind, however, was rather focused on the device.

As it churned, a current began to form within its tunnel. Modelled after the Bygail collar, this tool was designed to bring out sand and dirt through its artificial current, sucking it up before ejecting it somewhere else, preferably far away and out of sight. True to its purpose, gravel and sand began to lift off the clogged entrance and was drawn into the funnel. With quite a bit of speed, the thaumaturgic device began to uncover the rubble, tossing them out of the way, great plumes of yellow and grey billowing out under the diluted sunlight.

As an Iasgairean, sand and debris can be hazardous, particular to those of the Bygail. Having an option to clear out such locations from afar truly made it much easier to construct buildings and other structures. However, it couldn’t quite move larger and heavier objects such as collapsed entrances, so Vrraet ended up having to hoist the rocks himself.

Now that excavator was up and running, Vrraet stretched his arms and turned back towards Elst.

It was a cloudy day. Up above the surface of the water, the muddy sunlight filtered through the shifting waves, leaving only bare splotches of colour through it all. The ‘cave’ that Elst had so generously termed was based on a steep cliffside somewhere odd south to the Sanctuary’s perimeters, burrowing into the rock and whatever hard-shelled creatures that managed to survive before diving off into the sandy plains that were the signature of marine sceneries. There was little ocean life to be found save for the odd clam and crab scuttling here and there.

Even though his Saighgair physiology would be more prone for excursions, Vrraet still felt that age-old aversions to open water. Too vulnerable, and in his opinion, just a bit too much sand to be comfortable

Elst, however, seemed to have no particular abhorrence for it all. Standing somewhere off, weighed down by his collar and various equipment such as satchels and baubles, he watched with crossed arms as the runic device continued its work.

“I would not be using weapons that break so easily and last so short,” Vrraet said over the sound of water running as the two waited, “Would be a poor investment.”

“Iron ‘rust’ in water, but not so much in the air, apparently. It retains its hardy properties for much longer and is much more common above the surface,” Elst preached, “Which brings me to the point in that the Iasgairean lacks an equivalent resource that is both easily accessible and useful.”

“And the issue with bones and shells being?” Vrraet questioned, not quite understanding the issue at hand, “The tridents and other derivative tools have served well.”

“They served well but not quite enough. You, in particular, must have noticed the limitations in the diversity of weapons that Iasgaireans can use, especially when compared to the development of weapons that the land striders have access to.”

Vrraet thought for a bit.

True enough, with the latest development of these exploding, shrapnel-blasting weapons the land striders had been using along with their metal-plated vessels, it had proved that the current Saighgair armaments were obsolete.

“True, but my runes help counterbalance the difference,” Vrraet put forth his claim, “With ranged weapons and the ability to remove their ability to stay afloat directly, the warriors can level the hunting ground and create an advantage.”

“It's expensive and it takes too long for it to be constructed. That rune stone of yours must have cost an inordinate amount of effort and materials to create, no?”

“It is a prototype.”

“Yes, but until it can be produced in large amounts, it is pointless,” Elst waved his tendrils animatedly, “Without the ability to remake thaumaturgic materials such as gold, the efforts to increase the production is stunted. This is why I suggest that the colony needs an alternate source of power and better infrastructure.”

“And what is it that you suggest?” Vrraet asked, growing tired of the Bygail’s constant disagreement, “I do not see how having heavier and costlier versions of tridents would fare better.”

“It's not about the metal, Vrraet.”’

“And it is…?”

“Air,” Elst answered, simply.

“... Air?”

“Indeed.”

Vrraet slowly asked, “Elst, surely you are not suggesting to fully assault the surface lands, yes?”

“What? No, of course not. That would be disastrous.”

“Good. For a moment, I thought you must have died too many times to remain sane.”

Elst gave him an unimpressed stare, “Your jests are never amusing.”

“Wasn’t.”

“... I will say that death gave me perspective.”

“Truly?”

“Think of it this way,” Elst made a meaningless gesture, “I never grow old. I have yet to die of natural causes throughout my lives. And with that, I think that I have a rather fresh perspective on everything I come across.”

“I would say that you live half the life I do.”

“I do not grow old, Vrraet. My mind never dulls, my joints never ache and I have never had barnacle grow on my gills. Understand that I never had the urge to conform to tradition and preconceptions that you may have.”

Vrraet gave him an odd look.

“That is —”, he was prepared to speak when suddenly a chime rang out. Looking back, it was the scrounging device that made the sound. During the time of their conversation, the excavator had been busy relocating the various dirt and sand, signalling that it had near reached the end of its cycle and further decreasing its power.

“Would you look at that,” Elst mused, “Old device still useful.”

“Of course it would be, I made it.”

“If you so say. Let us not loiter then.”

The entrance to the cave now cleared out, it was revealed that it was a gradually lowering slope. There had been signs of stalactites but it seemed that the implosion had all but eradicated them. Elst grabbed a spherical object tied to his hips, shaking it a few times until it lit up in luminescence. While Iasgaireans can see well in the dark, fully enclosed locations still require light sources.

“How deep is your laboratory?” asked Vrraet, gripping the tube-like head of the excavator and letting it continue to extend.

“Not too far. Should reach it before the sun rises to its highest peak.”

“Agh, twenty, thirty meters in then.”

“... Meters?”

Vrraet paused.

“... A unit of measurement,” he said, holding his hands out in an approximation, “About this long. Had been thinking how we do not have such units in place even though the land striders had been using them for quite some while now.”

“How progressive,” Elst noted dryly, “Somehow I doubt you state such a thing in search of societal development.”

“No, I was thinking how severe the explosion was and if such a thing could be repeated,” Vrraet replied, “Unlike you, I had no desire to test if I return in the form of a Saighgair or not, and if whatever that caused the implosion occurred again, we will meet the Sgnirmah much earlier than expected.”

“You worry too much.”

“And you do not,” Vrraet shook his tendrils in irritated dismissal, “We’ve wasted enough time. Lead the way and I’ll remove the debris.”

The trek through the systems wasn’t particularly complicated. While there were several instances of collapsed rock walls and choked-up corridors, the excavator proved to be more than enough in removing obstacles, turning what would have been a gruelling task into merely boring, repetitive work.

Occasionally, some tools could be found in the sand or being sucked up but most of them were already too damaged to be salvaged. There had been bits of metal, ivory carvings of what may have had been knives and some other unknown land-strider implements. It seemed that the explosion had destroyed quite a bit of the equipment that Elst was been using, scattering the bits and pieces across the stone and dirt until they were nearly unrecognizable.

Vrraet bent down and picked up one particularly large fragment of greenish metal, cleaning it of the sands that had gotten stuck in its surface. Closer inspection revealed it to be bronze, a metal that had proven to be much more resistant than the iron the land striders used. Interested, he asked, “What was this?”

“A piece of a salvaged container,” Elst replied, still holding up the globe of light, “I was trying to melt down the metal as described in the manuscripts. However, I had run into some trouble creating when fire.”

“Fire?”

“Yes, fire. I suppose you haven’t seen one?”

“I did. Some lives past, when I was observing one of the land strider’s surface vessels, but I do not understand their relationship with metal.”

“Fire creates heat and intense heat is required to forge metal, it seems. It is not the only thing needed but it proved to be one of the most challenging problems I’ve faced.”

“If you need intense heat, a rune would have sufficed,” Vrraet mused, “But to power it… that would be the challenge.”

“No, that would be too magically taxing. Fire is achieved with burning something called fuel, and we shall do that as long as we get acquire it.”

“But you did try the runic option, yes?”

“I did,” Elst gestured up ahead where the remaining ash was rapidly cleared out and revealing blasted stone walls, “And this was the result.”

Huh.

“Faulty construction?”

“No. The problem was that creating a fire within an enclosed environment proved to be an extremely hazardous action — one that I had failed to take into account.”

“Naturally. You couldn’t quite expect to master land strider techniques any time soon.”

Elst turned and gave Vrraet an exasperated look, “That wasn’t the only issue, Vrraet. It was that we couldn’t replicate their results unless the environments were matching. We had to deal with imperfect heat isolation, lack of fuel, lack of fundamental levels of knowledge with metallurgy. All of these problems stack up into an impassible net of obstructions.

“And what’s even more exasperating was that the Iasgairean lacks support and resources for this kind of development,” Elst continued agitatedly, “Our only advantage was that we couldn’t be approached from the surface and taking that away, we have little to work on. Day by day, the Iasgairean falls behind the land striders in both technology and population. Even our Sgnirmah-damned numeric system is based on their inventions.”

“... Population?”

“Yes! Vrraet, how many Iasgaireans do you believe exist in the Sanctuary?”

Vrraet gave it a thought but wasn’t too sure of the numbers. He knew most of the Iasgaireans — provided they hadn’t picked up new identities, so, therefore, “Five, six hundred?”

“Slightly less, but close. Now, guess how many do the land striders have?”

Vrraet could sense a rant coming. Pausing in his tracks, he gave Elst a pointed expression and spoke calmly “... Enlighten me.”

“Hundreds up to a thousand, Vrraet,” Elst said with his hands gesturing wildly, “Each little colony they have along the coastal areas can boast at least that much. In their larger ones, they can have up to ten thousand — twenty thousand. Do these numbers boggle you at all? We are minuscule.”

“That is an unfair comparison,” Vrraet frowned, his tendrils twitching in response, “We Iasgaireans do not die and information is retained. The land strider’s young too require schooling and their information will always be lost upon death.”

“True, but that is no way enough to compensate for our absolute lack of workforce!” Elst exclaimed, “The land striders cooperate, their information spreads and is developed across many thousands of individual while ours stagnate within the same two hundred. Not to mention, they had so much more access to ways of development than we do, their resources and their production techniques.”

“And yet they squabble, separate themselves and murder their own kind. Give it time and they will almost always inevitably revert back a hundred years.”

“Do not fool yourself. You’ve seen the results of their research. The Saighgair did not even stand a chance during their last raid.”

“And that is why I am creating this weapon,” Vrraet stated, “I have noticed.”

“Yes, yes. But do you understand why I am very, very concerned with how our colony is developing?”

“Yes, I do. And you are being too pessimistic.”

“I truly am not, Vrraet,” Elst said with a shake of his tendrils, “And do not think of me as one who worries little ever again. I am desperate and I do not know how to proceed.”

“... Then what do you hope to find here?” asked Vrraet, gesturing at the tunnel around them, “I doubt any of your notes would have survived.”

“Ah, it's not about the notes. I have made copies in case of such events.”

“And what is it about?”

“You’ll see,” Elst shook his tendrils, gesturing upfront, “My laboratory is just ahead.”

True enough, through some hard squinting Vrraet can indeed see an opening somewhere through the gloom. It slowly led upwards to a shimmering sheet that gently lapped at the sides of the exit. Surface, Vrraet realized, the tunnel had led to some kind of underground pocket of air.

However, while the water around them was plenty breathable, the air within the isolated chamber could prove to be an entirely different story, one that he had no intention to test.

Warily, Vrraet questioned, “That air, is it safe?”

“Probably not, seeing that I had died in it,” Elst stated, “Going up there without sufficient protection would be a terrible idea.”

“And you did not see fit to warn me?”

“I assume that you have enough intelligence to recognize the hazard. Here, take these,” Elst rooted around his satchel for a moment before producing another device. It resembled some sort of cobbled-together sea urchin, all spikes and pointy tips, except that it had numerous holes and tubes that pock-marked its surface. Within his hands, the thing looked particularly large and comical.

“And this is?” Vrraet questioned dubiously. It pulsed in an odd, unpleasant way that reminded him of a beating heart. Simply looking at it gave him the urge to recoil.

“A cleansing ritual, except it is in a ball.”

“...”

Vrraet waited for the Bygail to answer.

“It is a sacrifice. It’ll take in the toxins and return air back to its original breathability.”

If it was even possible, Vrraet’s tendrils curled up in an even more doubtful expression.

“Do not give me that look, Vrraet. I am an expert in this field.”

“... I am not touching that. And you couldn’t have used it to clear away the rubble?”

“This one wasn’t made for it. Magic is a fickle, definitive thing.”

“...”

“Oh fine. Just stand back then.”

Vrraet obliged without a second of hesitation, stepping back several meters, holding the end of the excavator to his chest as if it could serve as a weapon.

Elst twitched with judgement before facing away in disapproval.

Swimming forward, the Bygail took the fleshy globe and thrust it upwards so that it barely protruded above the water level, hidden by the layer of ash. Immediately, a queer, keening wail emerged from within the confines of the thorny sack of meat, echoing into the water like some monstrous infant being tortured.

Without heeding the crying flesh globe, Elst began to speak.

It was a language that Vrraet wasn’t all that familiar with, all smooth sounds and flowing with syllables that would sound odd coming from the jaws of an Iasgairean. Yet, with practised grace, the words tumbled out and seemed to froth with the screams of the orb. Phrase by phrase, the organic pulsing hitched and convulsed, wheezing with great effort as it drew in air into its sacs.

A strange thrum of sorts settled over the watery cavern as Elst continued his chant, the very walls seem to shiver as something occurred. Vrraet felt himself shift, restless as the performance of unnatural magic spikes of unease through him.

He had never liked this sort of magic. Too unquantifiable, too unpredictable, just being in its vicinity causes his tendrils to shrivel instinctively. Elst, the ever-so aberrant Bygail seemed to have found a knack for it, however and had been using it on occasions. While Vrraet himself understood the basics and theory of using materials in such a way, its twisted, shifting nature continued to elude his grasp.

Subsequently, it was also Elst who had been the premier user and developer of this thaumaturgic technique. How and where did Elst procure such an… ingredient, Vrraet dared not ask for it was rather foul.

It didn’t help that by the end of his chant, the malformed ball of flesh had been gradually melting away like ice, strips of red, black and foul yellow sloughing off in so many layers of rotting flesh. Before it could reach him, Vrraet hurriedly pointed the end of the excavator at the mess, siphoning it far, far away from the duo.

Gradually, lazily, the fog that hung above the water surface slowly drained away just as the sound of the orb began to lessen until both finally fade away.

When the procedure was finally finished, Vrraet felt like he had just swum for half a day despite having only stood there, watching. The Bygail didn’t look worse for wear, however, the what-ever-it-once-was having paid the price for the power used in the chamber.

“That wasn’t so bad, wasn’t it?”

“It was terrible,” Vrraet answered honestly, “How was your hand? You had lifted it above the water.”

“Such brief exposure will do little harm. Now, put that down and move up.”

His tendrils twitched once in annoyance, finally letting go of the tubular frame within his grasp as it would only serve to pump out the air once he breached the water level. Giving Elst an unimpressed glance, he took the glowing crystal from his hands and swam upward in a decisive thrust.

Stale, cool air greeted him as he surfaced, water splashing here and there onto the dry, dark stone. With the light in his grasp, he could see the way the walls stretched into a shallow roof, curving around into a roughly oval chamber. Grasping the edge of the entrance, he hoisted himself onto the landing.

Around him, he could see a typical workbench — or at least, what once was. It was clear that something that was once on it had blown everything within the chamber apart, starting with the table. Shards of metal and tools could be found entrenched into the walls and ground, forcing him to gingerly mark out the spots that could be walked own.

Most of all, dominating the room was a lying figure. Bygail in nature, the body was quite definitely dead, slumping over the ground with half its torso missing, organs spilling out in a writhing wreck of bones, flesh and vermilion goo. Little movements could be found within the cadaver, pale forms dart in and out of every orifice as they continued to strip away the rotting meat. Whatever that was intact was swollen, bloated in death, turning white as black dots began to infest it, leaving scales to hang loosely on the bones.

“Oh look, my dead body,” Elst noted, having made his way up as well.

“You are disgusting and so is your corpse.”

“Ignore it. I got others somewhere.”

Delicately, Vrraet moved around the steamy, bubbling carcass, holding the light up high. Beyond the sour smell of rot and decay and pools of strange bodily liquid, the dour glow of the orb pierced through the darkness. Next to the shattered table were prime examples of broken apparatus and metal bits. Flash-fried parchments made of fish skin can be found scattered around the chamber, now soggy in the aftermaths.

Flipping through a few of the unpleasant remnants, it revealed that the scratchings on it were all turned to mush by the extremes of temperature, completely illegible.

What appeared to be a half-hearted attempt of a kiln sat in the corner, its shape contorted as the initial blast blew the shoddy bricks into dust. Burn marks peppered the ceilings, searing it black as remnants of smoke and chemicals lingered around the edges.

Within the kiln itself sat a rune, carved deep into some dark crystal and sitting dormant, dead until revived by someone. Upon closer inspection, Vrraet could see that it was an admittedly intricate weave of lines, arcane words of power and the remains of some charred organic matter. While he did expect the runes to survive, as per its nature of adhering itself into the world than anything should have, the sooty materials inside were rather unexpected.

Carefully, he prodded at the darkened heap with a finger.

It crumbled at the touch, revealing it to have welded itself onto the crystal as if it was solidified tar.

“Elst,” Vrraet stated, looking back at the Bygail who was busy looking at the floor, “Your runes on their own shouldn’t be able to produce such an explosion. The Varme rune and the linked Forsterke, it is impossible for it to channel enough power. Did you attempt to use something as a catalyst?”

“... Yes, I did,” Elst admitted, moving closer, “I had to. I need to find a sustainable source of power that wouldn’t burn out immediately and have to be recharged.”

“You could have asked me to aid you. You should know that mixing thaumaturgy with runes would be a terrible idea.”

“Bygails do not feel jealousy, you should know,” he recited, crossing his arms in the fashion of a land-strider, “And now, here you are.”

Vrraet stared back.

“True,” he spoke simply, “Yet I do not think that you were here to speak of your research.”

“And how did you come to this conclusion?”

There was a pause after that question.

“... This place is a ruin,” Vrraet gestured at the former work table, “The only thing that could be possibly salvaged from here was that rune stone and I doubt you brought me out here for it. Any other Saighgair would be able to handle this.”

“Couldn’t it have been just a conversation?”

“Not from you. Especially after your rather passioned speech since the start of this expedition,” Vrraet leaned back, tendrils curling again, “All these urchin-brained schemes of… of development, of conquering, of fire. You are leading me towards something and you are not as subtle as you think you are.”

“Never said I was,” Elst admitted, “Though you are were half correct. I did not have much here to recover but what I had in mind did pertain to this topic.”

”Could have started with it.”

“Not particularly. Had to have you see this, hear this yourself.”

“Get to the point,” Vrraet all but growled.

“This couldn’t be maintained,” Elst continued his explanation, “The continued direct offence will not be able to carry far. We need subterfuge, we need more options and with every conflict, we lose materials, resources that become even more difficult to acquire. You have seen my efforts and you do understand it is difficult, yes?”

Vrraet stayed silent, quietly keeping his eyes on the Bygail before him.

Taking it as a sign, Elst resumed, “And to do it, we need something new, something strange. So I thought, if we couldn’t produce it ourselves and taking it by force would be too difficult, why not devise a way to have them give it to us willingly?”

“And how do you plan to do that?”

“Your rune, Vrraet. The body theft, the memory altering effects. Whatever that you did the secret to all of that.”

“What rune?”

“Do not take me for a fool,” Elst said bitingly, “After your ‘return’, I had been the one to receive your artefacts. Understand that you too had a moment where you had been wiped from the collective memory of the Iasgairean. During that period, I had seen your new weapon. Your new rune stone — and that thing.”

Oh.

So that was why the Bygail was so curious.

Forcibly stilling, Vrraet said, “I do not know what you speak of.”

“That pattern, Vrraet!” The Bygail all but screeched, “Had you any idea what you made? The broken loop, the one that pushed and revise and —”

“I did not create it.”

“ — What?”

“I did not create the sign,” Vrraet shook his head, now watchful of Elst’s increasingly rabid attitude, “The other runes, the ones that had been pushed to the side, those were of my making.”

“... Impossible.”

At this point, there was little reason to keep the secret, “I myself do not know of its making. I would apologize for having to disappoint you, but it might take some time before I unravel it.”

“Do you mean to tell me,” Elst demanded leerily, “That you truly do not understand how to recreate it?”

“Yes.”

There was a lapse.

Elst seemed to droop at that. The former delirious strength that coursed through disappeared into nothing. Taking some time to gather his thoughts, he eventually asked, “.. How? How did you even —”

“How did the rune appear?”

“... Yes, if what you said was true.”

“I do not know,” Vrraet answered with complete honesty, “I had set off with my version and an entourage, probably the missing Saighgair. While I know not what had occurred, when I returned, the stone already bore the mark.”

“That is… That is impossible.”

“The truth is the truth. What were you trying to do with it, anyway? You are much less proficient in using them than I. You could have approached the Sgnirmah instead —”

“No. No, we cannot.”

Vrraet’s tendril tensed at that, “Explain.”

“The Sgnirmah would never allow its making to spread if she knew its origins. When you cannot explain its functions, she will have it purged along with you.”

“... You speak of dangerous thoughts.”

“Just as you hadn’t told her that you did not create the rune?”

“Doubtless that she would also pursue her own investigations.”

“Not with such a volatile thing, Vrraet, and I do not aim to present incomplete work until it is proven to function as intended.”

“And what was your intention with… this?”

“Subterfuge, taking over their leaders, anything can work as long as it does not pertain to pointless violence. Though, now that the mystery is cleared, it appeared that I had mistaken. I hadn’t been sure, but it is now.”

“What is it that you speak of, Elst?”

“That whatever this sign is —” Elst spoke softly, walking over to the kiln. With a single claw-tipped finger, he traced a shape through the accumulated dirt. As he finished his drawing, Vrraet suddenly realized that he had drawn out the sign, the curve and jagged into the ash, continuing, “— It wasn’t a rune.”

“Nonsense.”

“It is not simply a rune, I shall rephrase it. It is something else. It is —”

He stopped moving for a few seconds, leaving his words hanging. Then, Elst abruptly bursts into motion again, “Vrraet, I must ask this again. Are you certain that it hadn’t been on your rune stone when you set out?”

“It wasn’t.”

“Well then.”

“...”

“Vrraet, I am not too sure as to how to say this but — “ Elst slowly pointed at the shape that he had scribbled into the ground, eyes staring back up, “This wasn’t some base rune. With all my thaumaturgic knowledge of the unnatural, I can tell you this with utter certainty”

“What is it?”

Under the dim light of the sphere, the atmosphere was particularly ominous. While some part of Vrraet wanted to comment on it, he too felt an unnatural chill crawling up his spine, as if it was stilling in anticipation.

“It is a name. A name of something great.”

That is when it clicked inside his head.

“And I don’t know about you,” Elst said with great profoundness, “But this sign? It is definitely stuck in my head.”