Chapter 322 - Ascendance

Frantic firelight illuminated the thick black smoke that billowed out from the doorway to the ritual chamber. The conversation between the three Exalted was cut short as they were overcome with an overwhelming sense of danger and impending doom.

“There’s no time to hesitate.” Firuzeh said with urgency, “We must deal with the ritual.”

She sounded more confident than she felt, acting based on how she felt Rados would guide her. Running was not an option in her mind— They were too close to the danger, and they were inside a sealed space. The danger was already at a terrifying level but they had not yet been attacked. This was a significant detail that meant the best course of action was to counterattack before the enemy established themselves.

She was stopped as Cecil abruptly raised his hand in front of her. His expression was grim, pupils flickering in frantic contemplation.

“We’ll fall back for the moment.” He said firmly, “Stay close to me.”

His fingertips glowed with a prismatic light as he drew out a complicated rune in the air. It was as if he were a calligrapher, the tips of his fingers dipped in glowing ink that left ribbons of light where they moved. His fingers moved independently of each other, crafting the complicated rune in a breath of time.

The world shimmered in saturated reds and blues around them. The flames grew hot and bright red, the blood on the floor—Firuzeh’s blood— shimmered with intense vitality. The cold stones in the hallway and the black smoke lost their luster— the spiritual plane reflected the physical world, but the presence and weight of inanimate and spiritless objects were diminished.

Cecil tilted his head up his gaze extending through the roof. Through his command of the rune the three Exalted were propelled toward the ceiling by an invisible wind. They passed through the stones and earth, quickly arriving at the surface.

Cecil dismissed the rune as their feet landed on the ground, flexing his aching fingers. The world quickly returned to its normal colours. Travel through the spiritual plane was draining for him even in normal situations, and even more so while bringing two companions with him.

They had emerged a stone’s throw away from the old building that served as the servant’s quarters. Cecil took off down the path toward the staircase that led up to the main estate. Firuzeh and Cheen followed his lead, breaking into a jog to keep up with his hurried strides.

“We cannot disrupt the ritual.” Cecil said curtly, preempting Firuzeh and Cheen’s questions. He sighed in frustration, knowing that they wouldn’t be satisfied with such a statement.

“The reason we’re here is because of an immortal inheritance that has been sealed in this location.“ Cecil gave a pointed look at Cheen, indicating he was talking about the Trial of Succession, “The seal is such that an immense amount of power is needed to break it.”

“You’re a part of this?” Firuzeh asked sharply, barely holding in the anger that was flaring within her.

Sacrificial rituals were barbaric and detestable, and Firuzeh had nearly become a victim of it herself. The feeling of her soul being drawn by the blood ritual was terrible and violating. It made her tremble violently just thinking about it.

“No, I’m not. I just know what is happening here.” Cecil replied, grimacing slightly, “Though stumbling upon the ritual site was not part of the plan.”

“What do we need to do, Cecil-joon?” Cheen asked, the youth’s eyes focused on the ground below them where they could feel the energy pulsing through the earth.

“Get to a safe distance, wait for the seal to break, then find the location of the inheritance and grab it.” Cecil replied.

“And they’re just going to leave us alone and let you take it?” Firuzeh asked skeptically.

“The forces at play here are complicated. These arrangements were made a millennia ago by powers beyond our ken.” Cecil said, “Trust me, the Clockwork God’s followers are not interested in us, as long as we aren’t actively trying to disrupt their ritual. There’s a possibility that they might not even be aware of the inheritance.”

“Oh, so they just happened to conduct a forbidden ritual here?”

“Exactly.” Cecil said, looking into Firuzeh’s eyes with confidence, “As per the will of divinity.”

Firuzeh frowned, her eyes narrowing with skepticism. Her lips twitched as a far off thought came to her mind, and she whispered, “The White Maiden sent you?”

The question took Cecil by surprise. However their spiritual intuitions triggered an alert before he could come up with a response.

Glowing white lines appeared in the paved ground around them, extending out in a sphere. A subtle aura of starlight and the deep void of space filled the atmosphere. The sky above turned black as a dissonant chime rang out.

“Close your eyes!” A soft voice suddenly spoke directly in Firuzeh’s mind.

She obeyed just as the world around Firuzeh collapsed in on itself. A nauseating sensation filled her as she was transported by a mystical force to a new location.

The stench of black smoke filled her nostrils, her skin burned from the heat of flames. The world around her burned. Even without seeing it directly, Firuzeh knew without a doubt that they had been brought back into the ritual chamber.

Cecil uttered an urgent prayer beside her in Fortus.

“Goddess of beauty and purity,

Grant me your protection,

And steel my soul against evil.”

Firuzeh felt a wave of energy pass over her and she opened her eyes as her spiritual intuition told her she was under divine protection. A twisted, blackened brass ring bounced on the stone floor as she saw that Cecil and Cheen were still beside her.

“Why attack us?—” Cecil grit his teeth, his fingers frantically inscribing a glowing rune in the air. He didn’t even have a chance to complete it when his chest was suddenly pierced by a thick copper rod, as thick around as a human arm with a sharp arrowhead tip.

The tall mage grunted, his face pale as he was lifted off his feet. Cheen had to duck as the copper rod swept horizontally across the room, carrying Cecil with him and smashing him into a blazing shelf at the other end of the room.

His body disappeared in the billowing smoke and embers.

The ringing of metal upon metal rang out as Cheen blocked a second, thinner spear with his two short swords. He was thrown backward as he barely deflected the copper shaft.

A third spear, thick with a blunt end shot out toward Firuzeh. She ducked under it with cat-like grace and cast her eyes toward the center of the room.

A gleaming copper cylinder dominated the center of the room. It was constructed of multiple layers of rotating curved plates etched with lines that glowed golden in the flame light. The plates were not completely solid, with cut out lines and shapes that revealed the complicated machinery behind them. They rotated independently in arhythmic, stilted movements, like the ticking of a clock.

An intricate machine of gears and rods whirred and clicked behind the plates, controlling their movements in an inexplicably chaotic yet precisely calculated fashion. Dozens of strangely shaped rods stuck out at odd angles like the segmented legs and antennae of an insect.

Every time a plate temporarily shifted into place, various lines on the plate would glow white, linking with the other plate, antennae and internal machinery to form an incomprehensibly complex rune.

Even with the protective spell of a goddess on her, looking at the runes for any amount of time caused Firuzeh’s thoughts to unravel and her flesh to quiver and bubble as if there were insects crawling underneath her skin.

The three spears that had assaulted the group were connected to the central spindle, spinning freely around the axis. The spear that had taken out Cecil retracted back into the spindle, its polished surface slick with blood.

The mechanical construction of the three spears reminded Firuzeh of the hands of a clock. They were fast, but their motion was restricted making their angle of attack predictable. After the initial surprise attack Firuzeh and Cheen were able to avoid the attacks unscathed.

Though she had heard of steam machines across the sea, Firuzeh had never seen or heard of anything like the contraption before her. She didn’t have any idea how to attack it - Despite its complexity it seemed to be quite sturdy in construction. Such a machine would have needed many people to build it…

As these thoughts passed through Firuzeh’s mind in a flurry, the doorways around the circular chamber were darkened by the appearance of dozens of men and women. The estates’ servants, dressed in their plain gowns, filed into the room holding candles on bronze candlesticks. Many of them were unarmed, though some held sextant-like talismans constructed from clock hands.

Firuzeh saw hatred and fear in their eyes, steeled by devout zealotry. They looked at her like an invader, an outsider— the look that Char Char had so aptly noticed when they had arrived on the estate. Their voices trembled as they all spoke in unison, enunciating a prayer in broken and unfamiliar Fortus.

My Lord blesses me with strength

My Lord blesses me with power

For the bounty of immortality

I give my blood to the Clockwork god!

Steel flashed white as Cheen launched himself at a group of the followers. They cried out and backed away as the blade of his short swords whipped out like ribbons across the room. He aimed to kill, but the blades were stopped against an invisible barrier.

The wide-eyed servants, seeing that they had been protected from harm, thrust their implements forward and shouted their prayer with even more vigour. They surrounded Firuzeh and Cheen in a circle pressing forward as an electrifying hum filled the air.

A door slammed open. The elderly head servant stepped out, causing the servants around the doorway to gasp in shock. She was soaked in blood, her right hand clutched at the deep gouge in her neck. Her left held aloft the brass shell, the crystals in its machinery glowing brightly.

That wound… She shouldn’t be standing— Firuzeh felt dread build up in her as the head servant lifted her chin in proclamation,

“Brothers and sisters! The time of our ascendance has arrived!”