Chapter 214 - Tentacles and Ashes VI

One full week.

One full week of fighting was what it took for Claire to grow sick of murdering eldritch monsters and seek the distant mountain. All their other business had long been resolved. They had informed the Cadrian vanguard of their discoveries, and the lyrkress had gathered as much experience as she efficiently could. The amount granted by the locals had fallen off the edge of a cliff once she passed level 350, and she had learned enough of their approach to combat that there was little to be gleaned from continuing to challenge them. It was following that realisation that she finally began spending her ability points. Sixty two were put into vitality, bringing it to the 5000 threshold and nearly doubling her maximum health. Spirit was raised to the same value to bolster her resistance to magic, but the rest was left untouched.

Claire was not the only one sick of fighting eldritch abominations. Sylvia had escorted the other three back to the previous floor so that they could battle against the gargoyles instead. None of them were opposed to the act of grinding levels itself; everyone but Matthias had entered the dungeon with growth as one of their primary goals, and fighting its creatures was the perfect way of doing just that. But the amount of experience they gained was simply too little to justify the ninth floor as an efficient source.

Being quite satisfied with his own power level already, the party’s resident mantis was more interested in the thrill of the fight itself, and would have been glad to hunt the tentacle-eyed freaks, but his responsibilities kept him tethered to his liege.

The group joined up again soon after Claire declared that she was done. Through the power of the magical fox hat and the wormholes she ripped in the dungeon’s fabric, Arciel, Matthias, and Natalya found themselves stepping atop the Claire express not too long after takeoff. There was, of course, no reason for them to drop what they were doing and join her, but they too were suffering from the lack of fresh prey. They weren’t hunting the monsters for money; if they wanted to grow, they would need to move on.

The better part of three hours passed before the party finally closed in on its destination. Claire had not proceeded at an idle pace, speeding up to the point where a bubble was needed to keep the winds from harming her passengers, but the sheer distance to be covered provided enough time for the others to nap.

They were still a ways away from the base of the mountain, twenty kilometers, maybe thirty, when the fog thickened. Its purple shade grew more intense, but it served as a veil no longer. It was the same phenomenon they had experienced upon entering the village’s boundaries, and it once again provided the ability to gaze upon the sights of an arviad civilization.

Around the giant triangular landmass was an incredibly busy airspace, crowded with all manner of birds going to and fro. Some were carrying cargo ten times their weight. Palettes of stone bricks, weeks of food, and legions of chicks were all common sights. But even more attention-grabbing than the disproportionate loads tied to the carrier pigeons’ feet was the city that lay at the mountain's base. It was an expansive metropolis that formed a ring around the towering summit. It was thicker in some places and thinner in others, but on average, extended two to three kilometers out from the base. And while it was certainly a surprise to see, Claire was not entirely caught off guard by its presence. She had understood, from all the villages she had wrecked, that the civilization lurking within Skyreach Spire was much like Kal'syr's fallen kingdom. It was an ancient settlement that had been taken in by a dungeon and incorporated into its geography.

In spite of being spirited away and locked behind the nests of powerful monsters, it was a wonderfully beautiful city, a civilization that had survived the tests of time and isolation. And while Claire certainly did see it for what it was, she also considered it an infinite buffet, a horizon filled with prey, ready to be devoured.

The dracoqilin allowed the delusion to last for a moment before shaking her head and purging the thought. There was no denying her urge to consume, but having given in three times already, she had resolved never to lose control again. It was too undignified, unbefitting a woman of her standing. Gorging herself on the abominable chickens was no different from eating only from a table's centerpiece—a breach of etiquette that only a child would indulge.

That was why her breath had been her weapon of choice. The magical glands in her throat ensured that she would not be able to feast upon the bodies of the dead. Boris had still pitched in, of course, but for the most part, he had been relegated to playing second fiddle. The lizard was fine with the arrangement. He was bored of the ninth floor already, and the less he had to participate, the more time he could spend napping his days away.

“Okay, first things first, Claire, we are not attacking that city.” Natalya spoke as she carefully looked over the settlement, sweeping her eyes from left to right.

“They’re monsters. Just stop thinking about it and it’ll be fine.”

“That isn’t what this is about. I gave up on thinking about morality when we toppled the first village.” The Paunsean sighed. “Do you see how many of them there are? They could easily take us out with wave tactics alone.”

“I know.” Claire recalled the thousands of winged monsters she had slain on one of the previous floors before she slowly descended beneath the treeline. Her frame was massive, but she was not the largest snake-thing flying through the sky. “All that means is that we can’t attack it without a plan.”

“Do you see how many of them there are?” Natalya pressed a hand to her forehead. “Whatever you come up with better be good enough to take out at least a couple hundred thousand soldiers,” she grumbled.

The claim was met with an excited chirp. “I, for one, think we might as well just charge in and push our limits.”

“Oh, shut up, Matthias.” The cat pressed the pommel of her blade against her forehead. The cool steel was nice and relaxing, just the right temperature to take her mind off the incoming headache. “I’ve had it up to here with you.”

“Shame. I would’ve expected a berserker like you of all people to understand the beauty of pushing forward.”

“I am fairly certain that you are the only one that sees any beauty in slaughter,” said Arciel. She slid off Claire’s back as she spoke and planted her feet firmly on the ground.

Unlike the two Vel’khanese locals, who had immediately returned to supporting their own weight, Natalya slid onto the qiligon’s snout and looked her in the eyes. “So how are you going to put together this plan of yours? I figure you’ve got something in mind at least already.”

The lyrkress nodded. “First, we’ll have to infiltrate the city and gather information. It’ll come together from there.”

Lia buried her face in her hands. “That’s as good as saying you have no idea where to start.”

“I concur,” said Arciel. “We look nothing like them. Any attempts at infiltration are likely to end in failure.”

“Don’t worry. She can fix that.”

Claire magically floated the foxgirl off her head and held her up in front of the critics.

“H-huh? I can?” asked the half-elf.

“You just have to make us look like the locals, with your illusions.”

“Oh… ohhhhhh… yeah, I guess that means I can.” She stuck out her tongue and awkwardly scratched the back of her head. “I totally forgot.”

“Of course you did. Stupid fox.”

“Hey, that’s rude!”

“No it isn’t. It’s just the truth.” Both halfbreeds shrank down to their usual sizes as Claire magically tossed the cat off her face. “Now stop yapping and do it.”

“Ughhhhhh… Fine.” Grumbling something or other about tyranny and unfairness, the half-elf brought her paws together with a muffled, fluffy clap. She repeated the motion rhythmically, a slow beat with a brief pause before every third smack, eventually adding her voice as another instrument. It started as a low hum, reminiscent of the songs passed down through the mountainfolk’s lines, but it transformed as she continued, its melody growing wilder and more haphazard. Their surroundings were filled with illusions, their eyes flooded with visions of lives led by others, culminating in a gradual crescendo whose final note was left unplayed.

They were all birds by the time the performance was complete, each with a web of lies burned into their minds. Claire was a carpenter who had pursued the craft after escaping a household made entirely of smiths. Natalya was an underperforming athlete addicted to performance-enhancing drugs, Arciel was a merchant that engaged in shady dealings to stay afloat, and Matthias was the daughter of a well-off landowner, kidnapped by the aforementioned shady merchant. Even Boris was given a role; he was turned into a metal statue, a piece of stolen artwork that the carpenter had taken from her old home. Merchandise aside, the group had met after joining a nameless, criminal organisation, and had agreed to work together to secure the most profitable ventures.

“Why did you make all of us men? Except the stupid mantis?” asked Claire.

“Wait, you can tell?” The fox had turned into a giraffe ball, albeit one with glasses on all of his heads to signify his relative intelligence. “And how did you even know that one was Matthias!?” Each of her words were spoken by a different head, sometimes with an awkward pause between them.

“It doesn’t take much to put two and two together,” grumbled the tawny owl named Clarence.

“Well uhmm… I thought it’d be kinda fun,” said the giraffe ball named Sylvester, with a giggle. “And it’ll be a better disguise too, since even if we do something, they’ll probably be looking for a different group or whatever.”

“We really do look just like the locals,” said the tentacle-winged hawk named Nathaniel. “This is incredible, Sylvia.”

“Thanks!” chirped the orb. “This is actually only the spell’s second level. There’s a third level above it where I can make you forget that you’re you and stuff so you can be even better at sneaking around.”

“It would allow us to correct our manner of speech, perhaps, but I suspect that such a drastic change is unnecessary,” said the monocle-adorned crow named Arthur.

“Yeah, and not to mention, I’d rather not forget who I am, even if just for a bit,” said Nathaniel.

“I’ve heard it isn’t as bad as it sounds,” said the discoloured puffin named Matilda.

“I’d rather not,” said Clarence.

“Yeah, I know! That’s why I didn’t do it,” huffed the giraffe-fox, with two heads on what must’ve been his hips. “Now let’s go!” Another three pairs of heads grew out of the side of his body and flapped like wings, carrying him back into the sky.

When Clarence followed suit, he found his movement irregular. His wings felt a lot weaker than usual, like they weren’t able to push the wind as well, and his body continued to move even when he stopped flapping, slowly drifting through the air, following a trajectory almost identical to that of the giraffe’s.

“Oh, and uhmmm… try flapping your wings like, once every two or three seconds, since that’s how it’s gonna look most natural. None of you are really flying, only kinda sorta fake flying?” Sylvester tilted one of his many heads.

“This is… much more difficult than I had always assumed,” said Arthur. His feathery black wings moved strangely. They would never undulate when he flapped them, like any of the others, behaving instead as if they were made of long pieces of wood.

“Oh uhmmm… that’s just because you’re trying too hard to control them,” said Sylvester. “Just relax. It’s supposed to be mostly automagical.”

“That is much easier said than done,” muttered the crow. “How is it that the rest of you have already mastered it?”

“Claire and I have wings, and these operate in much the same way,” said Matilda.

“Geez, what the heck Matilda! You have to call him Clarence ‘cause we’re in disguise! Actually wait, you shouldn’t even know what his name is. So… uhmmm… you should call him mysterious kidnapper B!” The giraffe brought one of his heads to his chin. “Oh and you guys’ wings are more real than the other two because you actually know how to use them.”

“That certainly explains their lack of difficulty, perhaps, but Nata… Nathaniel’s movements appear no less natural,” said the shady merchant.

“I don’t really know what I’m doing either,” replied the hawk in question. “I’m just flapping them, and I’m not really sure why it’s working.”

When Arthur raised a brow, the most giraffe-like scoundrel breathed a sigh and pressed a face to his brow. “I told you! It’s ‘cause you’re trying too hard. You just gotta let the wings do their thing if you want them to work properly. They’re not like your hair-tentacle thingies that need you to micromanage them all the time.”

“I do understand that, but could you please reconfigure them like Clarence’s and Matilda’s? I suspect I would have a much easier time if I was given more granular control.”

“Oh, fine.” Sylvester puffed up his cheeks. “I guess I might as well since you’re gonna look all weird and stuff anyway.” He clapped two of his heads a few times before continuing. “There, all done.”

“Thank you.” The crow flapped his wings backwards; the tips appeared to lead the bases, which moved around on the bird’s body in a way that couldn’t possibly have been natural.. “That is much better.”

“Yeah, but now they’re all squiggly…” The giraffe ball was despondent at first, but perked up as he gazed upon the city, one of his heads stretching ten its previous length. “Wait a second, what’s that over there?”

“Where?” Nathaniel cast his hawk-eyed gaze in the giraffe’s direction. “It appears to be some sort of procession…”

“A procession? Whatever for?” asked Arthur.

Nathaniel scratched the back of his head. “I’m not sure, but it seems rather important. There are locals perched all around and watching them go by.”

“Then let’s get closer and find out,” said Clarence, after failing to make his eyes perform their usual telescopic functions. “We should blend in well enough.” His ears were just as impotent, and the sensory deprivation as a whole left him too fidgety to settle down.

“Yeah, come on! Hurry up!” Sylvester was already flying on ahead, one of his heads spinning like a propeller.

“Wait, hold on!” shouted Nathaniel. “Don’t we need some sort of vehicle or something if we want to transport Matilda while staying inconspicuous?”

“Oh yeah, right.” A small box appeared in the air in front of them when the giraffe hummed. It was a tiny enclosure, measuring about a meter in each direction. “We can just cram her in here. Oh, and the statue of Borbola too.”

“That looks a little too cramped for both the lizard and I,” muttered the victim.

“Yeah, that’s the point! Oh, and don’t worry it’s a lot bigger than it looks on the inside.” The giraffe grabbed the puffin and shoved her into the container before she could object any further. The floating statue was jammed in right after, in part through the application of a little bit more than a little bit of force. Once the lid was set, he strapped the whole contraption to a random part of his ball and resumed his airborne trek.

Closing in on the city revealed that its buildings were made primarily of sticks, with bits of mud and clay to fill the gaps. They were entirely primitive, but few of them looked the part. Each home and office had its own unique design and floral arrangement, and looked as if every homeowner was trying his utmost to outdo his neighbours. The sheer amount of freshly picked foliage required to put everything together was made possible only by the dungeon environment. Without the infinitely regenerating forest, they would have long bled their surroundings dry.

The various shops and office buildings were all the same way, and the flowers were often arranged in such excess that it was impossible to tell where one building began and another ended. But while the decorations and the busy housewives actively working on them were certainly sights worth beholding, the group’s attention was stolen by the parade marching down a particularly wide-open street.

It was even fancier than they had first imagined. There was even a marching band playing in front of the cavalcade, its avian members sporting a wide variety of instruments. There were horns, drums, and even lutes, albeit strange ones made of clay, shaped so that they could be easily manipulated by a pair of talons.

Arthur watched enraptured, paying careful attention to the strange but lively music played by the band’s members. Clarence, Matilda, Nathaniel, and Sylvester, on the other hand, had frozen for a completely different reason.

Their movements had stopped when they realised that it was a coronation. Atop the throne, held up by a dozen muscular flamingos, sat a newly christened queen, one that was not a bird, but a bovine of the sea.

One whose name, most would have agreed, was either Marc or Marcelle.