Chronicles of the Exalted Sun Child

Book 7-13.3: Delving

Yuriko frowned as Lucian and his posse postured near the entrance gate.“What are they doing here?” She asked Faeril.

The Sha’ledras boy nodded to her and said, “Lucian and his crew were the ones to trip the alarm and cause the increased Warforged aggression.” He held up his hands as Yuriko started to retort. “It was an accident. And they are the ones who know where that panel was.”

Yuriko shifted her stare to Lucian, who scowled at her and crossed his arms. He kept his wary distance though.

Yuriko sniffed. “So why are they…?” She trailed off, remembering the Hollow’s tenets that Vaeril mentioned. They would accept anyone who came here, as long as they followed the rules. And even then, only a few sanctions were given if they were broken.

When they arrived here, Lucian had attacked without provocation, but his punishment was only to be denied use of the hot spring pools and easy access to the Hollow’s food storage. From what she remembered of the Foreign Quarter and what Edmund Sevier said, fruiting trees could be harvested all year round. So the man’s punishment was a minor bit of inconvenience.

“Bear with it for now,” Marron scowled. “If they try anything we’ll deal with it.”

“We could just look for it ourselves,” Yuriko muttered but shook her head afterwards. Going for it alone would take more time, and honestly, she’d just rather get this over with.

Seeing her frown, Marron nodded in agreement. “Let’s just get back home.”

Since she didn’t continue her protest, Faeril gestured towards the gate. About a dozen groups of five or six had formed up. They were to defend against the Warforged Drones and keep their return path clear.

“Sky spirits, land gods, ancestors, and the Great Trees guide you on your task.” The elderly Vaeril said as they passed the gate. He gave each of them a firm handshake as they exited. Once the last warrior was through, the gate snapped close with a silent hiss.

Faeril led the way, followed by Yuriko and her team. The others trailed behind, at least a dozen paces away from each other. Their footsteps were light, and they kept noise discipline firm. The strange thing was that each of them were clad in antiquated armour. Not platemail or anything like that, but metal breastplates, leather skirts, and metal arm guards and greaves.

Faeril had put on a shirt but was otherwise clad similarly to how he usually was, except that he had a sword sheathed on his hip. It had a narrow blade and a basket hilt and looked far too flimsy to fight the Warforged. Well, he also had a recurve bow slung across his chest though he didn’t have a quiver.

Perhaps he used Animus constructs as projectiles?

The reflection of the Radiant Sun was just climbing up from the eastern cavern wall as they made their way along the Crafter’s District’s side roads and alleyways. Yuriko could hear a few of the Warforged Drones footsteps from a couple of blocks away. Faeril’s ears twitched to and fro, seemingly tracking the sounds. He would pause and signal for them to hold still and stay in the shadows cast by the buildings every now and then. They moved like that for about an hour, until they reached the southern border.

While they walked, Yuriko let her thoughts wander about. She was lithe and graceful enough that her footsteps were no louder than a whisper if she even made a halfhearted attempt. Gwendith and Desire actually made the most noise, but against everything else, it wasn’t that loud.

The underground city felt disquieting to Yuriko, and it had bothered her ever since they first entered. In the first place, the wind was far too regular. It blew from east to west at a steady clip, then switched directions from north to south after an hour. Then west to east, and finally south to north before reverting back to the original direction.

There were few sounds other than the Warforged in the city. No animals of any kind, and certainly no insects, rodents, or other pests. No cats or dogs too.

It only made sense though, since the city was completely enclosed, not to mention underground. But that fact was hard to internalize, considering Radiant energy continued to fill her reserves from basking in the morning sun.

While they had been planning this foray, Gwendith had asked the elder why he didn’t try to do something instead of just hunkering down in the Hollow.

“I’m not a young man anymore,” Vaeril muttered, “I haven’t the vigour to cast so many spells away from the strength granted to me by the Hollow.”

He was the strongest amongst the two hundred odd residents. Further, most of them didn’t really mind being trapped here. His grandson was one who wanted to leave, but considering how young he was, at seventeen or so, that was understandable. The others desperate to leave were those from the Federation.

There were two other Chaos Lords in residence, Worshiper of Fanciful Dreams and Delighted Sleeper of Sorrows, and she met both of them yesterday. They were…strange.

Not like Desire at all, or the Chaos Lords she’s fought and killed. Dreamer had a pipe and puffed out cloying smoke every time he spoke, and he spent most of his day sitting beneath a palm tree puffing away.

Sleeper, well, he slept. Practically all day and all night, on a hammock slung between a couple of trees. He had been clad in similar clothing to the others, a shirt, shorts, and thonged sandals. If not for the way ambient Chaos drifted around them, she wouldn’t have thought they were Chaos Lords at all. And on a more important note, she wanted to know how they lived without draining someone else of their Animus.hough, wary of drawing their wrath. They would be easy enough to dispatch but ultimately pointless. Where did they bring their loads though? Certainly not to the Crafter’s District.

The next tunnel they went through was the last one. They went down one of the mining branches, with the lead team holding orbs of Animus to light the way. They went deeper and deeper before the direction reversed and they started to go up. The path was long and twisting, and it took several hours.

It wasn’t more than a couple of hours that they ran into the first corpse. Afterwards, there was a veritable trail of them. Insectoid, bestial, reptilian, and a rotting mixture of all of them. Each one was beaten to death with blunt instruments, and a few even had fist imprints on their torsos. A rather blatant attempt at intimidation from Lucian and friends, Yuriko decided.

And, a couple of hours later, a small group of the twisted creatures rushed out of a side passage and barreled towards them, and knocked Gwendith and Desire off their feet. A burst of icy blue light came from the blonde girl and the insectoid, an ant man, turned into a block of ice. Meanwhile, the other one visibly desiccated as Desire drained all of its vital force from it.

The others were quickly dispatched by Saki and Marron, leaving Yuriko blinking in surprise.

“Can’t let you have all the fun,” Gwendith smirked as she got up and dusted off her bottom.

Yuriko grinned back. Some excitement, at last?