Chapter 25

Chapter 25

I slowly felt myself coming out of a dreamless sleep, hoping that I wouldn’t find myself in the longhouse with Freyja again. My head felt light and my mouth felt dry, with a bad taste in it. I could hear muttering which to me seemed like a good sign as I slowly opened my eyes. I was in our tent, which was another good sign and I felt myself calming down. Amenthia and Enti were talking frantically while someone else placed a cold compress on my forehead.

“He’s waking up,” announced Cassandra softly. “You both can calm down a little, now.”

“How the fuck can we calm down?” Amenthia barked. “He could have died and there is no telling if he is out of the woods yet.”

Cassandra sighed, “When you are on the upper levels, you make sure to carry certain things with you. I once had a friend who made some of the strongest antidotes in our Pact house, but she hasn’t said a word to me since I was sent to Tyr’s house. I still had one on hand, so he is out of danger. I would be more concerned with the person he stabbed in the side. Just the tip was enough to almost kill Pathios and his stone didn’t extract him when his heath became dangerously low. The one that he stabbed will probably not survive, though I don’t expect we will hear about it.”

“Amenthia is sorry, Cassie, but she cares deeply about Pathios. I pity the fool who did this, because if they did survive and Amenthia finds them, they will wish they were dead.”

“Thank you for using your last antidote on me, Cassandra. I promise I will repay you in kind when I get the chance.”

Cassandra smiled, “Nonsense, you have done enough already. I understand their attachment, you are a sweet and caring man. For now, you will need your rest. Once we reach the village, I want to get you looked at to make sure there weren’t any lasting or secondary effects of the poison.”

“Cassandra, please reach into my belt and remove my emergency extraction stone and tell me what you see?”

She reached in my pouch where I kept it and was shocked that the stone was glowing red instead of the normal green. She looked at me and I saw the question in her eyes, as well as the fear.

“Something about the dagger I brought back allows it to block the abilities of the stone. This means they can kill if they need to and that is a terrifying prospect.”

I nodded in reply and laid back down, allowing sleep to retake me and hoped to awaken in our tent in the morning. I was happy to be in our tent when I awoke but saddened that I woke up alone. I stretched my limbs and was painfully aware of my wound but was happy to see that it had been treated. I grabbed my bag and removed a potion, placing it next to me before glancing at my bracer. As I suspected my health was still dangerously low, so I removed the seal and tossed back the contents.

It was bitter, but not disgusting, and left no aftertaste in my mouth. I felt more energy return and looked down to see my health back into favorable levels. I would have to be careful as we made our way towards the village, but I was confident that It would last us until we arrived. I made my way out of the tent and found Amenthia and Enti at the fire tending to food. The sun was still on its early morning rise, but I was surprised to see that Cassandra was not here.

Enti turned to see me up, “Pathios, you should be resting! However, since you are up, come over here and eat something. After all your health is rather low.”

“I took a potion before I came out of the tent, but I am starving. Where is Cassandra?”

Amenthia handed me a bowl as I sat down and gave me a kiss on the cheek, which Entivala did to the other cheek.

“She went to look at where you were attacked, though I don’t understand what she hopes to find.”

Cassandra appeared from the trees. “I wanted to get a sense of who attacked him and where they may have gone. I was unable to ascertain how they arrived, but I suspect that they used their respective stones to teleport out. I couldn’t find any tracks at all of them leading towards where you were.”

“Was there any sign that they could have used the trees to mask their approach?” I asked.

She shook her head, “Most of the branches aren’t load bearing and given the amount of leaves on the ones that were, there would have been an abnormal amount of fallen ones on the ground.”

“Casandra,” Amenthia asked softly. “If their weapons make the stones useless, how would they be able to leave?”

She shrugged, “I would think that theirs has been made immune to the effects of the knife.”

I sighed, “Since that is currently a dead end, we should continue on with the plan, but I will be careful not to get too damaged. We will go straight there; once we get there, I can get the rest I need and maybe we should head to the Pact house for safety.”

They agreed, given what had happened, so we closed up our camp and began our trek towards the village. The girls decided to adjust our course to keep away from most of the mobs this time around, but it did add nearly an hour to our travels. We all breathed a sigh of relief when we were inside the village but there was still the chance of attack here. We still were able to collect more materials for Cassandra, though not as much as we had originally planned, as well as a few drops. We kept a watchful eye as we made our way to the Guild check-in area. As we entered there were only a handful of people there, so we got in line to check in our drops. We ended up getting two thousand, six hundred and twenty gold for our troubles. With that done, I turned to my companions to find them all looking at me expectantly.

“So, do we want to stay here? Or do we head back to the house to talk to Tyr and Brot’k?”

“I think we should return to the Pact house,” Amenthia answered. “That dagger needs to be given to Tyr.”

I looked to Enti and Cassandra and they both nodded in agreement. With that decided, we made our way to the transit tube and returned to the Pact house. We arrived in the atrium and we quickly made our way through the corridors to Tyr’s room. I knocked but did not receive an answer. After two more tries with no reply, I closed my eyes and prayed to Tyr, hoping that the urgency I conveyed would be enough to call him. After a few minutes, I had begun to give up hope, then I heard “Enter” called out from inside the room. I nodded to my companions and we made our way into his room, finding him sitting in his chair in front of the fireplace.

“I am sorry to have called you away from whatever you were doing sir, but this had to happen. I was attacked while we were camping for the night. We don’t know who they were, but they made light of the fact that I have been interfering with their plans. I believe that they are involved with whatever group the Council believes is responsible for the deaths that Jonta had bragged about. There were two of them, though I only ever saw one. I fought one while the one hidden in the shadows threw blades at me from the shadows. I was able to dodge one knife thrown at me, but not the other. We believe that the blade is coated in poison. We also believe it is designed to block the stones from evacuating dangerously injured adventurers.”

Cassandra pulled the blade out of her bag and handed it to Tyr, who carefully accepted the blade from her. The cautious way he handled the blade from her spoke volumes and my worries about what was happening increased.

“The blade is not of normal make,” Tyr whispered. “It is bloodsteel, but there is something different about it. The usual properties have been distorted to create a negation effect. The blade has been coated with a very potent poison found in creatures on the fortieth floor, but it has been concentrated and made more potent than what can be harvested.”

He placed the dagger down and snapped his fingers, causing the blade to disappear in a flash of light.

“I have sent it to the Council, and I hope that there is something that they can find to track down the culprits. For now rest and take this, it will ensure that the poison is truly gone from your system.”

A vial appeared in Tyr’s hand, which I gratefully accepted. It was a semi-translucent green liquid that seemed to sparkle in the firelight.

“After the incident with you and Jonta, we had the sisters of the Knowledge Center go through the documentation they had on him.”

“You mean like you showed me,” I asked carefully, “before I met with the Council regarding the attack?”

He nodded, “Exactly so, Pathios. They were able to see first-hand who he dispatched and, so far, it looks to be at least six people. The startling thing is that there are portions that are missing, which should be impossible.”

The four of us looked at each other in shock. It was public knowledge that the bracers recorded everything and that they were bonded with us. That was how they were able to see through Jonta’s eyes. That would be a very difficult, if not impossible thing to do, but the Council did believe that there could be Gods who were part of or assisting this group.

“With this evidence, we expanded our search. So far, we have found thirteen other people with these lapses and they have been collected for punishment and questioning. From those thirteen, the death toll sits at fifty, but we fear there are many more people who are part of this group. You need to be careful, I fear that, if they could bypass the stones then there is a good chance that they will not be picked up by the bracer. Fratis has been interviewed and has given us all the help he can muster. He will be punished in a public event two days from now. There will be at least three or four other guilty members of the investigation.”

Though I had a feeling I knew, I asked anyway, “What are they going to be found guilty of?”

“Treason,” Tyr said grimly. “They conspired not only to go against their Pact House, but they also conspired to go against the council. There is only one sentence, which is unanimous with all five pantheons. Individuals found guilty of treason are to be put to death. The council will determine which punishment these individuals will be subjected to soon.”

We could see that there was much on his mind and not much else we could say, so we bade him goodbye. We left the room and made our way to Brot’k’s shop.

The information that we found out from Tyr about the current status of their investigation and what they had uncovered so far was shocking and now, once again, I had a target painted on my back. I had barely been here a few months, with three attempts on my life.

I knew that this would be a dangerous new start, but I had always assumed that the danger would come from the monsters and creatures that I would face in the Dungeon. Instead, my greatest threats so far had come from within my own Pact house and looked to be expanding out into the population of the town. The problem was, with the multiple towns and countries, there was the chance that the attackers could be from somewhere other than Kortinos.

We entered Brot’k’s room to find the back wall was being taken down, and I was surprised how much room he had back there. It looked like a quarter of the room had been hidden behind that wall and, with it gone, there would be more than enough room for all three of them to work. Since he would be making things to order, he wouldn’t need so many storage shelves either, meaning he could move the counter forward. Placing the counter in the middle of the room would allow them to display goods and have room for everything they could possibly need to make anything we would need. Brot’k was amazing with leather and good with weapons to a degree, Cassandra was well versed in metal armor and even better with weapons and Fra’tilia was one of the best with cloth. The only thing missing would be someone who could make ammunition and accessories.

“I see you have gotten started already,” I called out, hoping to draw his attention to our arrival.

“Pathios, Amenthia, Entivala, Cassandra! Welcome back. Yes, I figured why wait? The wall needed to come down before we could start, and I was getting tired going behind the wall all the time.”

Cassandra laughed and replied, “No doubt. Did you get my Raven? The mobile smithing set was Pathios’s idea.”

“Yes, I did, and I think it is ingenious, but they don’t readily exist, I am afraid. There have never been adventurers that were smiths, either one or the other.”

“What about the pickaxe?” I asked as my mind started to drift into my sea of thoughts.

Brot’k gave me a peculiar look for a moment, then I saw the spark of realization he always got with my ideas.

“You’re talking about using the same kind of miniaturization magic on that, though it would be far more complicated. To do it would be simple as a runesmith, but Cassandra is not high enough in level to even attempt that, let alone have it succeed. I do know of a few people you could reach out to; they could enchant the items, but it wouldn’t be cheap.”

Cassandra sighed. “That won’t work, I am afraid. When I was moved to Tyr’s Pact house, even though it was not my choice, I was shunned as if it was. They stripped me of my skills, my levels, my shop, my tools, everything. When we went to just get the tools, I needed for collecting materials in the Dungeon, they severely overpriced it because it was for me, then banned us from there. It will be the same at any other shop we go to, which is why I reached out to you. I figured that you would have a better chance to get the things we needed, especially if my name wasn’t mentioned.”

“That is tragic and stupid,” Brot’k said, shaking his head. “Tyr knew that, even with the Council’s support, there would be things like this. I haven’t had any trouble lately with getting what I need, but who knows if that will change. I will do what I can to get what you need, but I will need at least thirty thousand gold to cover the costs, to start.”

I nodded and made the transfer without batting an eye, shocking both Brot’k and Cassandra on my casual attitude on the matter. Amenthia and Entivala simply smiled knowingly, which caused me to blush slightly.

“It will take me a day to make my inquiries and another one to have your order made, maybe two. I will let you know as soon as anything pans out, including if we may need additional funds.”

We thanked him and said our hellos to Fra’tilia, who was working on some items that I couldn’t identify. We asked how she was doing and made some small talk before leaving to eat. As we walked to the dining hall, I decided to drink the vial, as Tyr never mentioned that I had needed to eat anything with it. I pulled the stopper and took a whiff of the contents of the vial, pulling away at the ripe smell. It was strong and smelled like rotten meat. Biting the bullet, I tossed the liquid back, trying to spare my taste buds the horror. I failed, and yet was surprised that there was no real flavor to it but wondered what had caused the smell. Cassandra watched me and laughed at my reaction when I swallowed it.