Chapter 165: The City of the White Tree

Aegis and his party continued onward through the tunnel. It was incredibly narrow at some spots, and wide at others. On multiple occasions Aegis was forced to pull out his pickaxe and work on breaking apart some of the walls to make enough room to allow Snowflake to pass through along with them.

When they reached the section of the tunnel that traveled underneath the magma moat, it was very obvious. The tunnel turned into an oven for a moderately large section and the group was sure to rush through it, until finally the roof of the tunnel shifted from jagged, crudely carved stone into paved blocks and bricks, giving the sense that the very streets of the City of the White Tree were above their heads.

Forward still, the tunnel began winding and bending around the corners of building foundations until finally it came to a stop in front of a wide, light gray stone staircase that led upwards to a trapdoor in the ceiling.

Pyri held her lumina enchanted staff out forward in front of herself to illuminate the surrounding tunnel and the trapdoor itself, but tiny beams of dark red lantern light were managing to pierce through the creases between the dark wooden planks of the trapdoor.

The group stopped at the base of the stairs and listened carefully for any sounds, but it was completely silent on the other side of the trapdoor. Hearing this, Aegis turned to his party and motioned to the hood from their Seeker cloaks that they all wore.

“Don’t let the hoods fall, otherwise they’ll figure out we’re not Dark Elves and this quest will be over really quick.” Aegis whispered, and the group all nodded, adjusting their hoods in various ways to make sure they were securely up. “Ready?” He asked after taking a deep, nervous breath. More nods.

With that, Aegis turned and ascended the stairs, walking as light footed as he possibly could. When the trapdoor was in arm's reach, he carefully grabbed an old iron latch on it and gently pressed it to loosen the mechanism, then gave a little budge upward to lift it. To his surprise, it didn’t move at all.

He was thrown off by the weight of the trapdoor and was forced to use a lot more force than he was anticipating to get it to start lifting up, and as he did he felt weight on top of the trapdoor shifting with his lifting movement, as though something was sliding off of the top of the trapdoor.

He was sure to slow his lifting so that whatever was on top of the door didn’t slide off too quickly, but once it had shifted off it was very easy to lift the trapdoor open fully and allow him to peek into the room.

He poked his head up through the threshold of the trap door and looked around. It was a small living room, with a comfortable looking set of chairs set about. He then realized that what he had pushed off the top of the trapdoor was a round table with a single wide circular leg in the center that had been carefully placed directly atop the trapdoor.

The room had light gray stone walls, with several dimly glowing lanterns hanging off of them. The floor was a dark gray wood, and the furniture was a mix of both. The room had two windows with white curtains drawn shut, and several dark gray wooden doors leading out of the room.

Most importantly to Aegis, though, was that it was empty of any other NPCs or players. Seeing that, he climbed up the remainder of the stairs and stepped into the room, then motioned the others to wait down below. They gave him a nod, then he curiously began exploring the interior of the building.

One of the doors led to a simple kitchen, with shelves full of kitchenware and spices, and a stone, unlit stove. Another room was a single bedroom with minimal furnishings and decorations and another window with closed white curtains. Still, it was empty of NPCs, so Aegis went to the windows that flanked what appeared to be the front door, in the same room as the trapdoor.

He pulled aside one of the curtains carefully to peer out of the window. There, he saw the outside city street of The City of the White Tree.

One of the many branches of the tree was hanging low over the street, with its glowing white leaves acting as permanent lighting for the city and removing the need for any lanterns outside. The center of the street was paved with light gray stone, with small walkways of paved stone leading from the street to the various simple brick houses that lined it, including the house that Aegis stood in.

They were single story, small and simple houses, but Aegis could see the house opposite had additional houses stacked on top, with stairs outside to allow the residence of the houses on the upper floors to reach their front doors. This caused Aegis to look up at the ceiling of the room he was in curiously, thinking there was likely housing above as well, and possibly the resident was home.

There were Dark Elves walking around outside wearing simple common clothing, a mix of undetailed gray, white and brown, giving Aegis a sense that no one in this section of the city was particularly wealthy.

Still, none looked oppressed. He wasn’t exactly sure what an oppressive tyrant’s city would look like, but he expected to see more malnourished, injured NPCs walking around with solemn expressions on their faces, and guards patrolling along with whips and angry prideful strides.

The NPCs looked healthy - normal even. He saw a few walking in groups, chatting with one another and smiling. Perhaps the lack of guards presence in this part of the city was what allowed these Dark Elves to live life normally? He didn’t think he’d understand it by just hanging out inside this stranger's house, though.

Concluding that it was safe, he returned to the top of the trapdoor and motioned everyone else to come up through and into the room. One by one they entered, with Snowflake remaining invisible and accidentally bumping over some of the chairs in the center of the room.

Once everyone was through, Aegis shut the trapdoor and moved the table to sit back on top of it, picking up the knocked over chairs along the way. With the table on it, it was impossible to distinguish the trapdoor from the rest of the floor, making it blend in perfectly.

“We’re in the city?” Rakkan whispered to Aegis curiously.

“We are.” Aegis nodded back. “Next step, find a tavern called the Pale Watch.” Aegis said as he moved back towards the windows and carefully peered out once more.

“How’re we going to find it? This city looked huge from the outside.” Darkshot asked.

“Hm.” Aegis paused to ponder, scratching his chin. “It doesn’t look like any NPCs are having trouble walking around out there. Still, a big group of us walking around with matching cloaks might look weird to any Elite NPCs that spot us out.”

“Better if we split up then, right?” Pyri suggested.

“Yeah, I guess. But everyone ought to be careful. And someone should stay here with Snowflake until we have a better feel for the environment here.” Aegis replied.

“I volunteer to stay behind.” Darkshot eagerly raised his hand first.

“Of course you do.” Rakkan shook his head and mumbled under his breath.

“Okay, good, that settles that.” Aegis shrugged. “Let’s leave one at a time, keep your party interface communication open and share anything relevant. Don’t do anything crazy, just try and find the tavern.” Aegis explained. As he did he saw a big excited grin creep up over Pyri and Rakkan’s face, while a look of concern grew over Lina’s.

“I’ll head out first.” Aegis declared once he saw they were all on the same page.

“Good luck.” Darkshot gave him an encouraging thumbs up as he moved to the front door of the building and grabbed the handle. With a deep breath to psych himself up, he turned the handle and edged the door open just enough for him to fit through, stepped outside, and shut it behind him.

Standing on the doorstep, he looked up and down the street around him and spotted only plain, normal NPCs, which helped him relax. He knew none of them would be smart enough to look at him suspiciously, thus was able to step out onto the street and begin walking along amongst them.

The streets were not crowded by any means, but at no point did he feel like he was alone or had any privacy either. The white glow of the tree made it possible to see in every alleyway around him, as well as forced him to squint slightly anytime he tried to look up directly at it. Slowly though, his eyes began to adjust to the light and just as he was coming up on his first intersection, he felt himself able to glance up at the glowing leaves and branches above him without issue.

All of the houses that lined the streets around him and the upcoming intersection looked similar. Small, single story houses with a front door and two windows flanking it, stacked on top of each other. A stairwell went up the sides of the housing stacks with small walkways set in front of them to grant access to the homes. Some stacks went up higher than others, reaching the height of the lowest hanging nearby branch. From them, a walkway extended out of the stairwell towards the branch to grant access to it, where another walkway existed atop it leading towards the trunk of the tree at the center of the city.

The streets of the city were paved around the branches, as each paved road appeared to travel directly beneath a low hanging, outstretched branch. Some branches were thin with small leaves and just had walkways constructed atop them, but others, as Aegis had spotted, were thick enough to hold structures themselves, particularly towards the center of the city where the trunk was.

There, Aegis noticed great differences between the buildings on the ground level around him, and the structures built up on the branches. The structures atop the branches looked much larger and luxurious, and he spotted many Dark Elf guards patrolling about the upper walkways. It gave Aegis a sense of segregation between the city’s lower and upper class.

Still, though, looking around him at what he perceived to be the lower class Dark Elf NPCs, none of them looked particularly unhappy. At least, that’s what Aegis’s initial impression was, until he spotted a pair of Dark Elf guards walking towards him from one of the intersection's four streets.

Between the two heavily armed guards stood a line of three manacled humanoid NPCs. Two Plashrim, and one Dark Flf, all looking malnourished and hopeless, following the guards along obediently.

Aegis felt a strong urge to intervene and break them out, but looking around at the city once more, he knew how little it would accomplish in the grand scheme of things.

Once they walked by and were out of his sight, he continued forward exploring the city. Despite the many winding streets, the large tree in the center and the tall outer walls were always visible to Aegis and served well to help him navigate the unfamiliar civilization.

Not long after he began exploring, he received messages from Rakkan, Lina and Pyri letting him know that they too had begun their reconnaissance, but none of them were finding the tavern.

In fact, after 30 minutes of wandering around the ground level of the city, they hadn’t found a single tavern of any kind, nor were there any shops or other public establishments. Aegis was quickly reaching the conclusion that the ground level was solely for the homes of the lower class, and began eying the walkways that lead up onto the branches.

Seeing the many guards patrolling the upper walkways, he wasn’t particularly eager to ascend upwards and begin exploring them, but it was becoming increasingly clear to him the more he checked out the lower city that it was exactly what he needed to do.

“The tavern’s gotta be up on the branches somewhere.” Aegis messaged to his party, “Head up, but be careful, the guard presence is heavy. Don’t do anything to stand out.” He finished, getting a few messages of confirmation.

He spotted a narrow, dark wooden staircase near one of the intersections that other Dark Elves were using to go up and down from a large branch above and hesitantly walked towards it. He climbed up the stairs with his head down, trying to act as natural as possible and mimic the mannerisms of the nearby Dark Elves.

At the very top of the stairs, flanking the walkway on both sides stood two stoic [White Tree Guard - Level 120]’s, spears at their sides and longbows and quivers over their shoulders. Aegis held his breath as he walked between them, and to his relief they didn’t react to his presence. From there, he found himself standing on a dark gray plank walkway that was nailed into the white glowing branch below his feet.

It was painful at first to look at, like walking outside after a snowstorm on a bright sunny day. Even after his eyes had adjusted, he felt himself needing to squint constantly. Luckily, the dark gray planks that made up the wide walkway over the branch helped dull the light coming from below him. However when he looked at the other Dark Elves walking around him, he noticed none of them were squinting, so he did his best to look around normally.

He traveled along the walkway towards the trunk of the tree that towered above him, hanging down from the ceiling of the cavern. The closer to the trunk he got, the thicker and wider the branch became, and it wasn’t long before it was large enough to sustain structures that lined the wooden walkway Aegis was traversing.

Here, for the first time, he began spotting non-residential buildings. Simple shops that sold foods and crafts. A small part of him had the urge to enter the shops and explore what sort of foods and styles the Dark Elves had, but the threat of being caught held him back and he did his best to focus on the task at hand.

It wasn’t until he got right up to the trunk of the tree that he began spotting restaurants, crafting halls and taverns.

Walkways with wooden railings wrapped themselves around the trunk of the tree, winding up and down between the base of the many branches that extend out from it. It made it easy to travel between the walkways on the many branches simply by utilizing the stairs and paths that creatively intertwined with one another around the tree’s trunk.

The branches were not all on even levels, and the higher up the trunk Aegis looked, the thinner the branches became. Despite this, though, it looked as though the fancier, more luxurious structures were built higher up on the tree, and some he could see were built directly into the trunk itself.

“This place is amazing.” Pyri whispered into the party interface. Awestruck from the scenery once she too had reached the walkways on top of the branches.

“I was expecting a lot more shadows…” Lina replied to her nervously.

“It’s hard to look at this tree.” Rakkan commented.

“Try not to squint too much, or we’ll stand out. The other Dark Elves aren’t squinting.” Aegis replied to them. As he did, he saw a patrol of two guards walking towards him and awkwardly lowered his head so as to not be seen by them. Once they’d passed by him he took another deep breath and continued forward, looking closely at the signs of the buildings around the base of the trunk.

He didn’t need to travel very far before he spotted it - a small stone storefront sticking out of the trunk of the White Tree with a dark gray plank walkway extending out from it towards the larger, main plank walkways that served as a street of sorts.

The storefront, a simple rounded door with a stone archway around it and a stone sign jutting out of the trunk above it, had a sign with the words ‘Pale Watcher Tavern’ carved into it. Beside the archway was an extended stone wall with multiple windows carved into it, allowing Aegis to peer inside the tavern and see the tavern floor. Nothing about it stood out, there were round tables with stools set around them, and a few patrons scattered about.

“I found the tavern.” Aegis announced to his party interface as he stopped and stood in front of it.

“Where is it?” Pyri replied first.

“Uh…” Aegis glanced around for some sort of landmark. “I don’t really know west from east down here. But it’s on the lower branches, built into the base of the trunk.” Aegis explained. “I’ll head in first. If we all enter together it’ll probably be suspicious.” He added.

“Be careful.” Lina replied worriedly. He nodded to himself before stepping forward towards the tavern entrance, and swung the door open to step inside, closing it behind him.

Once the door shut, the sound of the outside hustle and bustle was silenced and he was left with the quiet murmuring of the patrons mixed in with the sounds of clunking mugs, and a soft flute being played by a Dark Elf bard NPC in the corner of the tavern.

Aegis looked around at the patrons, and several servers that walked from the tavern’s kitchens on the far side behind the bar towards the patrons. None of them were paying any attention to him, to his relief. The disguise appeared to be working.

He walked forward across the floor towards the simple dark grey wooden bar and took a seat on a tall stool, waiting until he had the bartender's attention.

It didn’t take long for the old, gray haired Dark Elf wearing an apron to walk over to him and lean over the bar, eying him up and down carefully before speaking a word. [Barkeeper Kog’hal - Level 25] stood above his head, Aegis once again relieved to see it was a non-elite NPC.

“You’re an unfamiliar face. What can I get for you?” He replied with a skeptical stare. Upon being asked the question, Aegis’ mind suddenly drew a blank. For a moment, he couldn’t recall the words he was told to say by Iuonok.

“Uh…” Aegis paused as a dumb expression grew over his face. “Oh.” It finally clicked. “I’m seeking a place to rest.” Aegis whispered. Hearing this, the bartender pulled his head back and it to the side like a curious puppy, continuing his skeptical stare.

“We’ve got a room available for you. Free of charge. Up the stairs, first room on the left.” Kog’hal eventually answered. From behind the counter he grabbed a plain iron key with no label on it and placed it on the bar before sliding it forward toward Aegis.

Once Aegis grabbed the key, Kog’hal did a light head nod in the direction of the stairs leading to the second floor of the tavern.

“Thanks.” Aegis replied as he stood up from the stool. He did a double take between the stairs and the Barkeeper who’d already lost interest in him, then walked up the stairs to find himself in a long hallway lined with numbered rooms. The first room on the left, however, had no number on it.

Aegis carefully slid the key into the door's lock and turned it, making a loud clunking noise, then slowly pushed the door open. He was expecting to see a small tavern room, like the one he’d encountered back in Kordas. Instead, however, the room had no furnishings and contained a spiral staircase leading downward. With a shrug to himself, he shut the door behind him and began climbing down the stairs.

“I’m inside. Tell the Barkeeper that you are seeking a place to rest, and he should let you in. Looks like a secret room of some sort.” Aegis reported through his party interface to the others.

When he reached the bottom of the spiral staircase he found himself in a round room with a single wooden door leading out of it. So, with nowhere else to go, he opened the door.

On the other side of the door was a large open room that resembled another tavern floor, with a bar on the far side. However, upon entry this time, the patrons were not so inviting. The moment they saw him standing in the doorway, they all stood up and drew their weapons. Some had spears, some had longbows. Mugs of ale toppled over and spilled onto the floor due to the sudden movements of many of them, but they didn’t care.

They glared at Aegis and he quickly and cautiously raised his hands in surrender. The names of the NPCs showed that though they were all lower level than him, averaging at level 115, many of them were elite.

“Who the hell are you?” A deep Dark Elf voice spoke once the sound of weapons being drawn and drinks being spilled quieted down. Aegis looked across the tavern to see the source, [Kagil’aktos(Elite) - Level 150]. The moment Aegis spotted him, he got a quest completed message.