The team of researchers was supposed to be small and yet they outnumbered us, even if it was only slightly so. There was six of them with their own wagon. The rumors of ruins within the forest had been substantiated on prior excursions of the city guard, but it hadn’t been explored. Whatever was inside needed to be evaluated with proper eyes. Most of the guard didn’t have those eyes.

Preparation for this excursion was easier than the prior one. It hadn’t even taken a full day before we departed, heading out on the road away from the city. It was in the other direction from my home village, per my understanding of the directions.

“How are we going to get to the ruins if we’re going by carriage?” I asked, sitting in the front with Javier. He had a steady hand on the reins, eyes fixated on the road and on my person. It was easier to look everywhere when one manifested chameleon eyes. Ostensibly, the only issue was viewing ahead, but the horse, myself and the positioning of his chameleon eyes negated any potential gaps in his vision.

“That’s just taking us to the camp site. We go on feet from there,” he grunted, encouraging the horse to move faster with a crack of his wrists.

Sure enough, there was a road that petered off through the forest. It looked haphazardly put together, felled trees still off to the side of the path. The road took us deeper and deeper, until the main road could no longer be seen, and even then that wasn’t the full depth we needed to travel. There was a ways to go before we reached the campsite still, per Javier’s knowledge of the reports.

The sun shifted overhead, having hit its peak as we pulled in at the end of the road to a wide clearing. We quickly set up tents within the perimeter, the researchers not as adept at their preparation as us. Experience paid dividends.

That would have us prepared for our return later that night, but the rest of the light was meant for exploring the ruins before any spike feeders in the area acted up.

Our steps through the woods were quiet, although the same couldn’t be said for our words. There was no stopping the researchers from talking. They had the desire, no, the need to share whatever thoughts plagued them. If Alain was here I was certain he would have wanted to question everything they said, although Mia was more content to gently prod and ask questions periodically.

One of the researchers, a short fellow by the name of Gunter, had closed the gap between us, unwilling to be walking with the other researchers. His hair was thinning on the top and his stomach drooped over his waistband, and yet, the smile on his face said that he didn’t care, that information was the key item above all else.

“Now I can’t tell you what we’ve been working on— it’s all hush hush,” he said, giving a hearty wink, “but I do know what’s always fun to speculate on. Tell me, what do you think is the origin of beast souls?”

“The doctrine says that they’re a gift from the heavens to fight against the spike feeders and to guide us to a proper way of living,” Vera said, seeing a window to spread the truth of the world.

Gunter raised an eyebrow and gestured for Mia to give her take on it. “I’ve heard— all rumors, mind you, idle theories here and there— that our beast souls aren’t bestowed upon us. They’re awakened, information lying deep within our bodies that the ceremony triggers. That information was planted in our bodies ages ago.”

“How can it be ages ago when we’re not even twenty yet, Mia?” Vera said, her voice wavering between instructing and tired.

“I don’t know, Vera, I told you it was just rumors. I didn’t come up with it. That’s all I heard.”

“What if one of our ancestors ate the animal, and that made them become part animal?” I wondered. “It’s not like there are any more foxes around for us to test this, or many of the other beasts only noted in the records. Maybe when you drive an animal to extinction its beast soul becomes available to be inherited by people.”

“Those are all good theories, although currently we have another one that might be proven true in our delve this afternoon. We suspect there’s a connection between the spike feeders and our beast souls, although we can’t say for sure to what degree. Hopefully the information in the ruins will bridge the gap of our knowledge and explain what we’ve been missing. If we can understand the origins of our beast souls or of the spike feeders, that should let us solve the problem of the attacks altogether. Wouldn’t that be great? No more worries, just a clear goal to accomplish.”

I couldn’t disagree with his claims, although I didn’t know how blindly speculating about the origins of beast souls was going to solve the spike feeder problem either. But that’s what researchers were for, to fill the gaps my brain couldn’t solve.

“That’s not the most interesting thing I know,” Gunter interjected in the silence. He motioned us closer with a conspiratorial wave, winking with reckless abandon. “There’s rumors that those who hit the top rank of their beast soul can have it evolve or mutate into another beast soul. It’s hard to say. This is based on rumors from distant lands, travelers telling tales of others with beast souls that have never graced our records, beast souls that perform incredible feats. It’s not an easy tale to corroborate, given beast souls evolve through combat, and I’m certainly not one to partake of violence with my squirrel beast soul.”

“You didn’t want to try and train it?” I asked.

“Even if has the potential, I’m not the one to unleash it,” Gunter said. That’s for someone else. Someone more attuned with squirrels. I’m certain somewhere there’s someone who’s kicking ass with their squirrel beast soul, but I’m not that person and that’s quite alright. I don’t need to be that person.”

Our brief walk through the woods lead us to a strange opening. It was a mound covered with a metal door, with a metallic rope looped through the handles. “Don’t you mind that,” another one of the researchers said. “It should be already unlocked.” Brunhilda was a tall sort, with broad shoulders and dark braided hair. Her eyes were a steely blue and felt like whatever she was staring at was pierced through. She said little up until this point, which made hearing her voice ever more the surprise.

She wrenched open the door, leading to a dark hallway with a single flickering source of light overhead. The torch was in a round container burning ever so softly, the flame unwavering. The light it cast was feeble, but it would have to be enough to traverse down the stairs into the heart of the ruins.

The stairs were lit by more torches, our bodies carried deeper and deeper until we opened into a larger room. It was empty barring the doors lining the wall, one in each cardinal direction, including the one behind us back to the surface.

“Where should we start?” Javier asked. He was nominally in charge of our routing. When it came to matters of life or death he could intervene and restrict movement, but if things seemed relatively safe, the researchers would direct our movements through the ruins.

Gunter, Brunhilda and the others huddled together, whispering and pointing rapidly, before coming to a consensus and choosing the leftmost door. We followed along into a hallway filled with shattered glass on the floor. The walls were lined with three large containers, broken glass matching up to the containers. At the top of the broken objects sat vessels that wound up to the ceiling. The researches evaluated the objects with awe, my eyes studying them with a lack of understanding. I had no idea what was going on nor what we were seeing in this building.

“Mia, stay with a few of the researchers and keep them safe,” Javier directed. “The room look safe for the moment. If things escalate, escort them further along. Come on the rest of you, we can’t spend the whole day only in this room.”

The researchers grouped for consensus once more, leaving two of their brood behind to study the implements in the hallway before the rest of the group continued deeper into the ruins.

The next room was a platform elevated above a deeper room filled with far too many spike feeders. The gray bodies plagued the ground below us. It would take maybe ten of me stacked head-to-toe to reach the floor. “Should we turn around?” I whispered to Javier.

“They don’t seem to be conscious, so I think we can continue to advance, as long as the group doesn’t do anything to try and wake them. While we could handle them, defending the researches at the same time is a bit of an ask.”

We relayed the message back through the room, continuing over the spike feeders below. They were located sporadically about, some standing upon the black aisles that fed into chimneys. The researchers whispered excitedly to themselves, some sketching the room, others taking down notes so that no memories would be lost. I personally hoped we could continue on and stop chancing fate.

“I think we should continue along,” I implored, tapping Javier. He nodded and gestured for the group to move once more.

“This isn’t the place to idle about. Come along then,” he said, ushering our group into the next room. The researchers grumbled, Gunter having a look on his face as though he was considering bargaining with us, but Javier’s repeated demand quashed all consideration, forcing us to continue along the platform to the other end and filter through that doorway.

We emerged in a sterile room, a solitary light flickering above, going out for brief periods of time. Against the walls were boxes with black surfaces in the middle of them, propped upon a nondescript table. There were also various glasses and tubes strewn about, a corner of the floor covered in a strange growth next to the remnants of a shattered flask.

Even though there was less to stare at in this room, that didn’t stop the researchers from chattering animatedly, splitting off to investigate every little thing within the ruins.

“Should one of us monitor the other room? Given there’s no other way to exit?” Vera asked, sounding anxious.

Javier nodded, giving her permission to stand upon the platform on the other side of the door, leaving the two of us alone with the rest of the researchers.

“This could be everything we need,” muttered Gunter. “If only we were sure of what we were looking at. This raises more questions than it answers, but what is the job of a researcher if not to answer said questions. I just don’t know how we’re going to study this. Whatever we’re looking at here is indescribable. We just don’t know what we’re observing, which makes it harder to try and evaluate what everything’s purpose was. At the very least we can take a culture of the growth in the corner for further study.”

At his statement, Brunhilda took a blade and sheared off some of the material, storing it in a container she had brought with her. It was a coarse wooden thing, capped with a cork after the material was deposited in. “I would love to get a sample of one of those spike feeders,” she muttered. “Why are they catatonic?”

“That’s a good question that we probably shouldn’t tamper with,” Javier stated, preparing to admonish Brunhilda further, when Vera burst back into the room.

“Boss, I don’t know why, but there’s some movement below. I don’t know if we should linger about,” she said, words spilling out of her mouth faster than she could think, her body reeking of panic.

“You heard Vera. Start moving. Your lives are more important than the ruins. If you die here, you can’t review all we’ve learned,” Javier commanded, starting to usher them out of the room. “Go meet up with Mia and check up on the others. Our priority is to make it out with whatever data we’ve gotten. All for the city, no, the good of everyone living within the city.”

I took his words to heart, pushing past the researchers. Down below I saw what Vera was referring to, the beasts ambling about, some walking into each other, incidentally tearing out stray chunks of flesh their spikes caught before continuing around, unaware of the ichor leaking from their wounds. It didn’t seem as though they were fully present, but that didn’t mean we should take them lightly.

I pushed on through to the first room, seeing Mia staring with a bored expression with her face that slowly shifted to confusion. “What brings you here, Perry?”

“Spike feeders are moving about in the other room. We’re making a tactical retreat, once the others arrive. At least, I presume we’re doing that. I was only told to check on you all.”

She bit at her lip, brow furrowing into a deep frown. “Guess I’ve got to prepare to fight then. Come along you two. Take whatever it is you were going to hoard and pocket it for later.”

The two researchers looked at each other, as though they were considering putting up a fight before their tense bodies relaxed and nodded, giving up in deference to our expertise, just in time for Javier to enter the room with the rest of our cohort. “Any sign of trouble here?” he asked, eyes constantly glancing to both doors in the room.

“Nothing yet. This was the first we heard of anything,” Mia replied. “Should we leave?”

“We’ll back away from the hallway behind us, at least. It must feed into somewhere else in the ruins, even if we were only able to access it from above. We need to make sure our exit isn’t impeded if we’re going to do any further research here, because we may not have nearly enough guards to handle a facility of this size and this many researchers.”

“Now you listen here,” Brunhilda said, poking her finger into Javier’s chest. “You were brought here to guard us and help us investigate the ruins, not to make us leave at the first sign of trouble. Do your job so that we can do ours.”

She was shaking with rage, cheeks flushed a deep red, blond hair coming loose from the ponytail it was kept within, loose strands laying down in front of her eyes. Brunhilda was ready to fight Javier, risk be damned. The prospect of not researching was worse than the threat of the spike feeders, given how she refused to back down.

“My job is to keep you safe, not to leave you to your deaths,” Javier said, words cold as his glare. “If you aren’t alive to continue your research, then this mission dies with you. Your lives are the mission. We can always return with a larger task force, perhaps even tomorrow if we spend the time doing some more reconnaissance, but we can’t in good faith allow you to continue unfettered.”

All of Brunhilda’s rage seemed to deflate from her when the prospect of continuing tomorrow was proposed. She sighed and nodded, motioning for us to continue towards the entrance hallway. As a precaution I called upon my electroreception, to confirm if there were any threats coming.

To my surprise, or perhaps just defeated hopes, there were two signals on the other side of the door to where we had entered the ruins. “Two monsters on the other side,” I whispered to Javier. “Don’t know how they got there, but they’re there.”

He nodded and motioned for the rest of the room to back up to the other door in a silent gesture, his skin rippling as he faded from sight, blending into the wall behind him. While Vera remained vigilant in her fixation on the door behind us, the door in front of us slowly opened, the spike feeders on the other side not even looking in our direction.

He was silent, no noise could be heard other than our cautious breaths, blood pounding in our ears. I sure didn’t want to lure the spike feeders to us, let alone somehow rouse the ones that lumbered about on the floor behind us to action.

That, however, didn’t mean that the spike feeders even had a chance to see us. I took a deep breath, thinking it was best to not even breathe until Javier had settled the matter, when one of the spike feeder’s heads collapsed from an invisible force, followed shortly thereafter by the other. The two corpses fell to the ground, collapsing forwards, Javier’s form appearing in the other room.

“Here, you can get your samples now, if you’d wish. I think we should keep moving nonetheless. We can break for you to collect your specimens first though, if it ensures you won’t resist us for my following commands. We don’t know where the other rooms even lead.” He seemed quite calm for having put down two spike feeders with ease.

Gunther sighed and motioned for his group to go and pull apart one of the corpses, stuffing pieces into their surprising amount of wooden containers stored amongst the many of them until a stripped down corpse sat on the ground, a blunt reminder of what had just transpired.

“If they’re spilling out here, I think it’s best we exit the ruins,” I suggested, ignoring Gunter and Brunhilda’s glares. Gunter opened and closed his mouth many a time, no doubt seeking the words to rebut my suggestion. I thought he was about to take back any goodwill we had gathered on the walk over when another one of his colleagues smacked him in the back of the head, whispering something into his ear.

“Fine. Let’s head out for now. We have materials to work with and we know where to come back if we need to research more, and let me be clear on that. It’s not a matter of if, but when we’ll be best served to return.” He scowled all through his speech, but as we started up the stairs to exit I could see tension starting to flee his body, limbs loosening up from the rigid defensive state they had been locked in.

We popped outside, my electroreception scanning the ruins the whole time we had moved, taking note of the movement patterns within. “It was for the best we left when we did,” I whispered to Javier. “More were amassing in our direction, from what I can sense. Sorry for not thinking about it on entrance.”

“Well, we didn’t expect the ruins to be infested with spike feeders from the prior reports. It seems like our colleagues didn’t do enough research. I’ll have to speak with Amalaris on that matter when we return…” His eyes gazed off into the distance, unfocused eyes seeing past the trees.

Javier snapped out of his thought, clapping to our assembled party. It was already starting to get dark, our time inside longer than it had felt within those walls. “Alright, set up camp. You know our shift rotation. We’ll leave early in the morning as to try and minimize our time here, and I am not having us leave tonight unless it’s an emergency, understood? The ruins are teeming with more activity than expected, and we can’t properly have you investigate it further until we have an appropriate amount of resources dedicated to cleaning out the ruins.”

The researchers grumbled in agreement, understanding they couldn’t win this argument.. We set out to prepare to last through the night, as our return was guaranteed for the next day. Our mission had come to a swift end just as quickly as it had begun. I only hoped what we found was worth it.