You have proven yourself in combat against the legions of Lamellan! +3 to VIT, END, and WIL!
You Have Gained a Level!
You Are Now Level 39!
You Have Earned +3 to INT, +2 to AGL!
You Have 2 Unused Stat Points!
System energy punched into his core, churning through the pages of his purple tome before spraying outward in streams of inky violet that sent his affected Skills and stats rising ever higher.
Years between levels and now Ive gone and gained six in as many weeks. Thangle pushed through the knee deep layer of ash and hobbled toward the rest of the company. What are you doing, old man? War, at your age? Pfah!
And yet he was but steps from attaining Journeyman Tier. Thangle could not help but feel a little eager for the next fight, so long as it pushed him further. If he continued to improve, he might see his two hundredth birthday yet. The thought warmed him as he picked his way down the hill, joining the groaning procession on their March toward the next Gate.
When the path diverged from an easterly direction, Thangle's stomach fluttered in nervous fear. When Zara led them to another low hill surmounted by stone pillars, his blood went cold.
Again?
With a sing-song word, the Dark Passages beneath the hill opened once again. A crack like the maw of a dread beast opened up, and the fetid breath of the earth filled the area with a faint miasma. Or perhaps that was his imagination.
Perhaps.
Thangle had seen and heard monstrosities in those dark pathways. Karp was not the only one to nearly fall off, or the only one to hear the insidious whispers of those...things.
"We must hurry," Zara was saying to the company. She held up a green stone that shone dully in the sunlight. "The road ahead of us is littered with more and more of these lures. For all their illegality, the Inquisition seems intent on limiting all pursuit however they have to; whether that upsets the delicate balance of the Pass or not. Or even puts two cities in mortal danger." She shook her head and stored the stone. Thangle could tell she'd done something to muffle its influence, but he could still feel the bright feeling of its Mana. "They have shown themselves prepared to do whatever it takes to destroy us, our city, and all that lives within. We must likewise be ruthless in our chase. I know many of you fear the Dark Passages, but they are a necessary risk. I will protect you all. Just stay close, focus on the path, and do not stray."
Without another word, Zara disappeared into the unnatural darkness. The Haarguard, despite grumbling and anxious glances, all followed behind. Thangle was among the last to enter, along with Karp, and the pair of them traded nervous smiles.
"I truly dislike this place," Thangle said.
"Then let's get out fast," Karp said. His jaw clenched spasmodically. "Swift as an arrow, true?"
"Let's."
The earthen portal consumed them, soon followed by the blue-green light of Zara's power. It blanketed them and illuminated the path forward, so that they all appeared ghostly. The magic didn't unnerve the illusionistin fact it fascinated himbut the fact that he could feel it made him truly fearful. Whatever place the Passages traversed, they numbed his senses in a way that made him feel almost Untempered. He couldn't even work is illusions within the Passage. Zara had mentioned the effect was worse the higher your advancement, but Thangle couldn't imagine that.
"You good, Karp?" he asked. The archer was gently pulling on his blindfolded avum, who remained fixed in place. He began tugging with greater intensity.
"Soon as I get this blighted bird moving," he grunted. "C'mon, what's wrong? We're gonna get left behind!"
"Wark!"
The avum's call was aggressive, and its crest feathers stood on end as it stared back the way they had come. Thangle looked into the dark without thinking, but instead of some slithering abomination, he saw a very surprised man in white armor and a crimson cloak.
"Wh-what is this?" he moaned in horror.
The scout survived!
"Redcloak!" Karp shouted, yanking his bow free and loosing an arrow in the same breath. The redcloak brought an arm up, and the arrow shattered on his plate armor.
"Heretics, all of you. You have taken me into a place of demons!" The redcloak, clearly an Initiate, surged forward on powerful legs in a serpentine pattern to avoid Karp's ceaseless arrows. "Free me!"
"No one asked you to come along!" Thangle hissed. He turned back to Karp. "We need to run! Now!"
"What? Why?" The archer cut himself off as he noticed what Thangle saw, and the both of them retreated. Karp gripped the lead of his mount and with a final tug it began to trot after them.
Beyond the Initiate, the path had begun to sag and fray, and in the dark...
"Run!"
The fourmage, archer, avum, and Initiatebegan a mad dash toward their company and the brighter green-blue glow of Zara's magic. Behind them, the path fell apart all the faster, as if spurred on by the redcloak's frenzied screams.
"Heresy! Sorcery! Vile betrayal!"
"Shut up!" Thangle shouted back as they reached the edges of their group, who were just now turning back toward their altercation. "A blighted redcloak got in!"
"How?" Zara shouted as she pushed to the back, before she waved her question aside. "Night! I'm barely able to hold your fears in abeyance, let alone his!" Groans from around them shook the path even under Zara's direct influence, until it started feeling decidedly tacky underfoot. The Initiate charged at them with madness gleaming in his eyes. "Fine. Everyone be ready to run when I say."
An exhalation of thick Mana vapor poured from all of Zara's channels at once, and Thangle watched in awe as she wove them into strands of incandescent power, each one an enchantment that found their way onto the Initiate. Despite this desperate speed and reflexes, the enchantments layered upon the man until he frozen in place, unable to even lift a foot. Spinning her hands, Zara seized the redcloak in her remaining strands and hurled him bodily from the path.
Into the dark.
Where something opened an eye the size of the Sunrise Gate, and the man vanished into a mouth made from the stuff of nightmares.
"Now run. Bloody ashes, run!"
Never before had the Gnome been so thankful for military training, as the Haarguard moved with both speed and what precision they could wrangle from the jaws of their terror. Because all around them the Passages became a maelstrom of dark horrors, spindly limbs and hooked tentacles writhing around the dwindling protection of Zara's magic, while lamprey mouths flashed in and out of view, twisting among the throng of abominations.
Screams of the dead, the damned, of all their regrets called to them. Thangle heard voices he'd not put mind to in decades, centuries in some cases, but they slithered through his ears in agonized howls. The path wobbled and softened all the more as fear took hold, but he couldn't spare the concentration to keep track of who they lost. Avum, certainly. More than a few squawks were cut short. They slung spells at the beasts, but Zara only cursed at them for their efforts.
"You waste your Mana and merely draw more! Focus on the path! Only the path!"
The Socerer's magic bathed them all, but it waned the further they ran. She was clearly expending herself against the abominations, against the Passages themselves as they began to squeeze. Thangle felt it like a hand at his neck, and his meager Spirit could do nothing about it.
"There!" someone shouted.
A portal of aquarmarine light blazed into existence, perpendicular to their path. With a scream of effort, Zara twisted the path, and all of them stumbled. When Thangle regained his feet, the others were already running again. Karp grabbed him by the back of his robes, undignified certainly, but he wasn't about to complain.
The path collapsed behind them, and the darkness pounced, tearing into guards around them. Thangle pulled power from the purple tome in his chest and threw it out of the channels at his feet, shaping the lot of it into spears of augmentation Mana. Things snapped it up, twisting about themselves in their frenzy.
The portal flickered with each guard that passed. Dimmed. They reached it.
They leaped through
and directly into something warm, wet, and eagerly lapping at his face and chest and
A lake, he realized. Water.
Thangle let out a strangled sort of laugh as visceral relief rushed through his limbs. He rolled over, letting himself soak in the shallows he found himself within. He felt weak, his core almost empty, his Body an exhausted sack of flesh. Men and women were standing all around him, shouting, cursing, but Thangle simply stared up and praised the Twins that he still lived.
Until he noticed the sun. It was...on the wrong side of the sky.
It was dawn only two glasses ago. And we traveled in the Passages for less than a quarter glass. How is that possible?
Because the sun was now lost in the west, nearly about to set beyond the mountains. They had lost nearly an entire day in the Passages.
"Blighted Night," Zara said from nearby. "We've barely moved five leagues."
"How?" the Hand rumbled. Thangle sat up, his gut protesting. The two of them stood close, and the guards were all picking themselves and their mounts from the edge of a wide lake.
"Our plight forced my hand. Either create an exit or die." Her bright kingfisher alighted on her shoulder and whispered something to her. She shook her head. "We may die either way. The Inquisition have passed the Iron Gate. Our chase just became more desperate."
Thangle laid back down in the water and closed his eyes. Madness.