Neil

“Magic! Magic! Magic?” I shouted at the flying reptile as I sat in the tree branch.

The annoyed animal responded with a hissing honking noise that put me in mind of a Canadian Goose crossed with a boa constrictor.

“Magic! How do you magic you god damned flying lizard?!” I shouted in English.

Its only answer was to snap at me as it stood up on its hind legs in its nest flapping its wings at me and hissing even louder. The wind that came off of the animals wings was what I had been waiting for and trying to bait it into. It was much stronger than what it should have been able to produce just from flapping its wings and actually managed to push me back. Concentrating on the mana coming from the creature I tried to sense what it was doing and how it was doing it. Unfortunately seeing the end result of the creatures mana was about as helpful as seeing the end result of a carpenter building a house. Without more understanding of the fundamentals it was useless in telling me how it was doing what it did. The fact that I was distracted by the animal trying to kill me made concentrating on my mana sense a little more challenging as well.

Deciding that this was getting far too dangerous I slipped down the branches in the tree as quickly as I could keeping an eye above me for the Air Jack. It honked at me a few more times as I descended and sent a few more gusts of wind at me but it didn’t pursue, just as none of the others had.

In my rush to get down thought I lost my grip and fell the final 5 feet to the ground bouncing off a few of the tree branches as I did so. Landing hard on my side the air was knocked out of my lungs and I spent a few minutes coughing before slowly getting to my feet.

Taking a minute to catch my breath I stood up, got my bearings and walked through the jungle towards the distant campfire swearing quietly as several branches hit me in the face. When I had started trying to gain the air affinity the sun was just about to set. Now it was pitch black and I had annoyed every Air Jack within a half a kilometer radius of our camp.

I had spent the last three hours going from tree to tree and nest to nest climbing each one so I could watch the different Air Jacks in hopes that this time I could gain the air affinity.

It hadn’t worked.

The Air Jacks had all regarded me warily at first, honking and hissing at me but not taking any more threatening motions towards me so long as I stayed about 15 feet away from them. I had been worried they would simply attack me as soon as I approached their nests, but most of the Air Jacks couldn’t be bothered unless I got too close. I had learned that the hard way having been blown out of several trees by the aggressive lizard like birds. Or perhaps they were bird like lizards? I thought to myself as I pushed through a tree into the light of the campfire.

“It's me.” I announced my presence. I had managed to learned to announce myself after almost getting an arrow to the face the first time I had come back to the camp.

“Any luck?” Kallix asked frown on his face.

“Did you fall out of a tree again?” Talass asked smiling happily.

“No I did not fall out of a tree.” I lied. “I just climbed down quickly that’s all, and no; no luck.” Sitting down I groaned in frustration. This was the only chance I was likely to have to get the air affinity until god knows when. Tomorrow we were to gather the plants and head back as soon as we could, while we might not be able to make it all the way back to the Lamia village that same day, we should be well past here.

Renther handed me what looked to be a clump of dirt and a water skin. Taking them both I bit into the lump with a grimace wishing I had saved a few of the Allogiri. I had been assured that the Lamia travel food was healthy and could keep for almost forever, but at the tradeoff that it tasted like dirt mixed with seafood. We did have some dried meat and fish as well, but we were saving that for tomorrow night when we would likely be more tired and in need of a little pick me up.

“Well what are you doing wrong?” Talass asked bluntly.

“If I knew that I wouldn’t be doing it wrong now would I?” I snapped regretting it immediately. Talass and I hadn’t become friends on this journey, but we had at least had been acting professionally towards each other and I may have just spoiled that. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be an asshole, I’m just frustrated.”

“How did you get the magic you have now?” Kallix asked.

“I got the water affinity from the water rift on the top of the mountain, and I was able to figure out how to sense mana from using some potions, then I learned how to channel mana from talking to Jax.”

“Jax told you how to use Mana?” Talass asked sounding interested.

“Not really, we had a 1-minute conversation where he described what he does to use magic. I figured out the rest myself and then just practiced.”

“So you just looked at the sacred pool and got it just like that? Maybe you're doing something wrong here then.” Renther said.

Looking at the big lug I saw that he seemed to be completely genuine and probably wasn’t just messing with me so I tried to keep sarcasm and frustration out of my voice when I answered him. “Yeah I think I am doing something wrong. I just have no idea what I could do differently. I tried watching them and got nothing, I tried sensing them with my mana sense but unless they’re actually using magic there's nothing to sense. So I encouraged them to use mana and tried to sense that, but it’s hard to concentrate on their mana when their using mana to attack me, so nothing.”

“Well why would they use it in their nests? they only use it to fly, and hunt for food.” Talass said.

I had my mouth full of dinner at the time so I could only respond with a nod.

“Climbing those trees was idiocy, you should never go near an animals' nest, especially not when they have young. You’re lucky Air Jacks aren’t aggressive, if they had, had young you would have been killed.”

“Well someone could have warned me at least.”

“You need to be warned not to approach wild animals in their nests?” Renther said. “Even children know that.”

Suddenly feeling extremely stupid I blustered my way forwards trying to sound confident. “I knew they were safe; I’ve spent time with them before. What do you take me for an idiot?”

Judging by their facial expressions Kallix and Talass did in fact take me for an idiot. Renther at least looked like he believed me.

Of course, I knew they were right, I never would have done anything like this back home, and I should know better than to try it here with unfamiliar animals. I just wanted the air affinity so badly I was taking stupid risks.

Conversation died down as I stared into the fire. I usually didn’t bother with fires on my hikes. It was too hard to find enough wood, and too risky. If something went wrong, I didn’t want to be the dumbass who burnt down half a province. I had to admit though it was nice to sit beside and watch, especially since I had no idea what animals, monsters, and other dangers we might be running up against.

‘This quest reward better actually help me, otherwise this entire trip will end up being a bust.’ I thought to myself.

Kallix, Renther and I took turns keeping watch, apparently despite the deep jungles reputation for danger few things would actually attack Lamia as long as they were in a group. The big problem was that the things that would attack, could easily kill dozens of people if they were caught unaware. As soon as we were finished with our dinner the fire was allowed to go out and Talass provided us with a small amount of a night eye potion. A quick examination of it showed me that it was made fundamentally differently than the ones I had made.

It allowed for a much smaller effect over a longer period of time, I was actually pretty curious about how they had made it. Was it with entirely different ingredients? Or did they just add something to it to make the effects happen over a longer period of time?

UnfortunatelyTalass refused to answer my questions, Kallix took his cues from her and refused to answer as well, Renther simply had no idea.

“These potions are the lifeblood of our tribe, we would never give them to an outsider.”

“Fine, I won’t tell you how to make any potions either then.” I replied to Talass who simply rolled her eyes dismissively.

“I’ve seen some of your potions, our children can make better potions out of ditchwater and dirt.”

Ignoring her I laid down near the edges of the still smoldering fire and laid down and tried to get to sleep. I didn’t think I would be able to sleep very easily but just a few minutes after I had laid down Renther was shaking me awake.

“Are you alright?” Renther asked me.

DING

For practicing with your affinity you have increased your Taint affinity! Keep practicing to improve!

Distracted by the window I nodded at him slowly.

“I think you were having a nightmare. You kept rolling and waving your arms in your sleep, are you sure your alright?”

“I’ll be fine, I just haven't been sleeping well.” I said standing, using the action to disguise swiping at the box.

“Well it's your watch now, you can wake us all when the sun starts to rise. Don’t fall asleep or Talass will never let you hear the end of it.” He said handing me the skin holding the night eye potion. “If what you had earlier has stopped working a small swallow should be enough for the rest of the night.” And with that he made his way to the far side of the fire and lay down. After a few minutes his breathing slowed and I was the only one awake.

Sipping the potion I was impressed that it actually tasted like some kind of a fruit juice, whereas most of my potions tasted like fermented berries mixed with dirt.

The dark slowly retreated until I found myself in what appeared to be a gloomy morning rather than an extremely dark night. Frowning at the shadows in the trees I mentally congratulated myself on making what I felt was a superior potion. My night eyes potion might have only worked for a fraction of the time as this one, but they had been powerful enough to even allow me to see in shadows. The Lamia could probably do something similar if they had wanted to, but chose to prioritize efficiency rather than effectiveness.

Standing up I walked to the edge of our campsite and leaned on a tree, hoping that standing might keep me awake a little better. The last few nights of only sleeping a few hours were starting to take their toll on me.

Stretching as I leaned on the tree I felt my lower back hurting again. What is this three times in three days? Had I pulled something? I thought as I rubbed at my lower back feeling a small bump.

Feeling the small bump on my tailbone I winced. It was the size of a large pimple and stung a little when I rubbed it, but it didn’t hurt too badly. “How the hell did I get a pimple on my ass?” I muttered to myself under my breath. I had only stopped getting them on my face regularly a year ago and I really hoped that I wouldn’t have to worry them ever again. Deciding there wasn’t much I could do without taking a potion, and not sure if that would even do anything to a pimple I put it out of my mind and focused on staying awake.

As I waited for the sun to rise I tried to keep my eyes open but despite myself my head kept slowly nodding forwards as I almost fell asleep over and over again.

“You’re on guard duty, stay awake Neil.” I said to myself as I started pacing back and forth, even going so far as to slap myself in the face.

Rubbing my cheek I saw a tree branch about 30 feet from me swaying. Looking at the rest of the tree branches around me I realized that they were all standing still and I could only feel a light breeze on my face, not enough to account for a branch that size swaying that much.

Picking up my spear and concentrating I grasped my Mana and started to channel it. I could feel what I now recognized as taint affinity on the edge of my perception. I tried to only channel my water affinity but some of the taint began swirling into my magic as well. Not wanting to face whatever was in the jungle without magic I simply let it. It hadn’t negatively effected any of my spells so far, and I really didn’t want to face whatever this was without magic so I would just have to hope a little bit of the taint affinity wouldn’t be too dangerous.

Stepping away from the camp I thought about waking the others, but I could just imagine what Talass would say. “You saw a tree branch? Was it an aggressive tree at least? Did it wave at you threateningly?”

No, I at least needed to make sure I wasn’t just imagining things.

Looking up at the trees I saw fluttering leaves, and swaying branches casting shadows that were gently crawling back and forth over the branches despite the night eye potion.

Eyes scanning back and forth and still not seeing anything above me I turned around and slowly started making my way back to the camp eyes still scanning above me. I was about to give up when I saw it. A reflection from the dim coals on something in the trees directly above us.

Seizing my mana I channeled it into a water whip and thrust it toward the glint in the dark it struck the leaves with a small thwaping sound. Pulling that water whip back I looked through the thick foliage for any sign of movement.

Something in the branches began to move and the branches shuddered as I saw a long dark shape begin moving away from us shaking branches marking its path as it moved away from us, and judging by the noise it had been fairly large.

Returning the water spear to me I reformed it into a simple sphere in front of me so that it would take up less space. I could feel the taint affinity coursing through my veins and magic along with the water affinity. The water affinity felt easier to control than it had before, it was coming to me effortlessly, responding to my thoughts and commands easily as if it were another limb. At the same time the small amounts of taint affinity made me feel like I was slowly being covered in oil.

It wasn’t my imagination thought, the taint was making my water affinity much easier to control.

I hadn’t thought of it at the time, but the water spear I had used against the large monster after escaping from the underground had been much more complicated than anything I had done before. Yet it hadn’t given me any trouble at all, it had actually been easy.

Releasing the water and allowing my mana to dissipate I could still feel the residue of the taint in my soul. Was this what had destroyed humanity here? The people must have realized the affinity was dangerous and tried to avoid using it, but if they were like me and had been using it while sleeping, or simply been tempted into using it because of the extra control it offered then maybe that was how it infected people?

Still how could it have infected everyone? I got it from the rift but surely most people wouldn’t get it from that? It had been under the city in a secured area for crying out loud. There must be other ways to gain affinities, maybe even ways to force others to get them. It could have started like an infection, slowly spreading until everyone had it.

Trying to put it out of my mind I walked around the edge of the camp keeping my eyes peeled for any movement while listening for anything. The rustling of the wind caused me to jump a few times but nothing else approached us and as I saw the sun start to rise over the trees I finally started to relax.

Gently shaking Renther awake he looked around blearily before his eyes focused on me, sitting up he wiped at a small patch of drool. Moving onto Kallix I gently touched his shoulder and he snapped awake as soon as I touched him. Pulling away from me his hands moved up towards where I had been a few seconds ago, before his eyes opened the rest of the way and he looked at me in recognition.

Walking over to Talass I found her curled up on the ground in a tight coil facing away from the others. She was breathing heavily and her tail was constricting.

A nightmare?

II shook her shoulder and she let out a soft squeaking sound that turned into a soft moan. ‘not a nightmare then.’ I thought to myself.

Shaking her a little harder I spoke again. “Talass, it’s time to get up.” Tightening my grip on her shoulder as I shook her a little harder she awoke, her eyes fluttering open. She stretched up, her shirt riding up exposing her stomach as her dress had fallen below her hips showing off where her skin and scales met.

Moaning in pleasure as she stretched she looked at me when her arms were over her head, pausing as soon as she registered that I was the one waking her.

Squeaking in shock her arms flew down in front of her as she backed up from me, her long body carrying her far from me. She stared at me for a few seconds then looked around her as if she had forgotten where we were and what she was doing.

“Good, you’re up. We should eat and then get out of here as quickly as possible. Something visited us in the middle of the night.” I said standing up.

“What was it?” Renther asked as Kallix looked up from his breakfast still chewing.

“I’m not sure, I didn’t get a good look at it. But it was big and it was in the trees over us.”

“Why didn’t you wake us up?” Kallix asked.

“It was scared off pretty easily so I thought I should let you all get some sleep.”

“You still should have woken us, if it had attacked...”Kallix said trailing off.

“But it didn’t, and I took care of it.”

None of the three Lamia seemed happy with what I had done, but they also stopped complaining. We ate a quick breakfast of the Lamia travel food, a hard cookie like disk that had bits of fish and vegetables sprinkled throughout it and washed it down with some water from a nearby stream and were off.

Talass seemed to be fairly stiff and sore from the hike yesterday, but a quick sip from a healing potion in her waterskin helped to get her back to normal. Despite how angry she looked when I woke her she almost completely ignored me throughout the morning. She gave me food and water when I asked, and answered my questions with short answers, but aside from that I may as well not have even been present.

The trail from this point on was wider, combined with the fact that it was slowly sloping downwards and the canopy above us kept the sun off of our heads it was actually a pleasant hike. After almost two hours I walked into Renthers back when he suddenly stopped in front of me.

“Hey, what’s up?” I asked.

“We’re here.” He said shifting to the side letting me see the distant temple.

It was everything that I’d hoped for. In the distance there was a gigantic four-sided pyramid with large terraces on the side and set of steps leading straight up to the top. It had clearly been abandoned for years judging by the number of trees, vines and other plants that were growing in it. Between us and the temple was a small city with abandoned, overgrown buildings, a large squat fortress like building in the middle of the city, and a river cutting through the middle of the fortress and the city.

Taking a deep breath I felt my spirits pick up. Now this was what I had been hoping to see! Abandoned cities, and temples! Who knew what kind of loot could be there?

“This is amazing, abandoned temples, ruined cities, epic quests! What kind of traps does the temple have? Are there any guardian spirits or monsters?”

“What?” Talass said sounding confused and giving me a look. “Traps? Guardian spirits? Do human cities or temples have traps in them? People lived and prayed here, why would they have traps in their streets or homes? And I’ve never even heard of such a thing as a guardian spirit. Let’s just get what we came for and be on our way.” She said slithering past me.

As much as I wanted to explore the city, I stayed close to the others and we made a bee line straight to the temple. Even that was an amazing experience. We walked through long deserted courtyards, through the half collapsed fortress, winding our way through rough stone hallways, then over a surprisingly intact stone bridge that crossed the river, this left us at the end of a long straight road that led to the base of the pyramid.

The road slowly led up towards the pyramid, and there were several sets of stairs carved directly into the ground, it was flanked on both sides by ruined statues. They had once been over 10 feet tall and had depicted Lamia in various heroic poses, but time and the elements had taken their toll on them and they were now barely recognizable as statues.

I was going to ask the others if the statues had been made of specific Lamia heroes, warriors, or great leaders, but when I looked to them I saw that I was quickly falling behind and the others hadn’t even stopped to look at the statues.

Rushing to catch up I walked beside Talass who simply looked straight ahead at the rising temple, ignoring me.

I wanted to ask a million questions about this place, Lamia religion, what they grew here, and a thousand other things I hadn’t thought to ask before we arrived. But I could tell from how the others were behaving that this wouldn’t have been a good idea. Maybe on our way back they would be willing to talk, but for now they were all focused on the mission, as I probably should be.

I honestly didn’t see what they were all so worried about, aside from whatever was examining us the night before and the Air Jacks we hadn’t even really seen any wildlife.

At that thought I stopped, looked around and listened. There was no bird song, nothing running around the forest foraging for food, there were barely and birds in the air above us.

In this jungle that wasn’t normal. There should always be dozens of sounds near you, the fact that there wasn’t likely meant that something large was nearby.

Adjusting the bow and arrow so that my hands were free to hold the spear I regretted taking the damn weapon. I didn’t know how to use a bow, all it did was weigh me down, and get in my way. Stupid peer pressure.

Holding my spear, I concentrated on my mana and found that it once again responded to my control almost instantly, practically leaping into action, pooling in my stomach and ready to be converted into affinity.

Taking a deep breath and allowing the mana to dissipate I kept a closer eye on the buildings on either side of the road as we quickly made our way to the pyramid. When we reached the base of the structure instead of walking up the stairs we approached a large door set into the side of the pyramid.

Talass took out the waterskin of night eye potion and took a sip, passing it around we each took a swallow before passing it back to her. When we were all ready Renther approached the door, grabbed a large stone ring set into it, braced himself with his tail against the wall and began pulling at the handle.

Despite how much the large man pulled the door didn’t budge, even when Kallix gave him a hand.

“Well? Aren’t you going to help?”

Looking at the womans sour face I spoke. “Look out guys I got this.”

Channeling my mana into water affinity I created a flood of water in front of me. The two looked at me before slithering out of the way quickly.

Letting the water flow over the ground it moved through the cracks in the doorway and wall. When I had enough water on the other side, I wrapped it around the door and began pulling with it. The force of a thousand pounds of water slowly forced the door open, a loud scraping sound echoing throughout the abandoned city.

When the door was finally opened we were left looking down into the depths of the pyramid the night eye potion illuminating just enough that we would be able to make our way down.

“Well now that’s not ominous at all.” I said as the others held their weapons tighter and prepared to go into the tunnel.