A tall trunk of black aspen grew tall from the mountain. Many of its leafless branches had snapped, probably from Vivi hitting the levelstone just now, and the remaining twigs didn’t offer much shade. The tall sky of red stone didn’t have bright facets, nor daylight gems. Instead, streams of bright ethereal lava lit the level all the way to the sky.
Dark, imposing buildings sprawled well into the distance along the declining landscape. A hot demonic city, very similar to the hellscapes that humanity believed all of demonkind’s cities to be. Vivi had seen paintings like the view ahead of her now, with lakes of bright lava flowing down the mountain in rivers across the city. Instead of usual hardwood, the tenents used a much more heat resistant black aspen.
Buildings were cramd together where there was space, but lakes of lava frequently divided districts, almost as if the city was a collection of close islands. Dozens of ballistic towers rose into the air, multiple in every district. The weapons inside were larger, far more sophisticated than Freyven’s ballistas that Shivenar had used prior to the slingshot launchers.
A whoosh echoed as a missile fired, leaving a trail of ether in the air. It shot toward one of the larger lakes of lava, where a mound of magma erged. Misty ether rose to the air, though individual auras were too far to differentiate. A battle followed, crashes echoing in the city as the monster hit with its large hands.
Ant-like figures walked all across the city, too far to identify with ether in Vivi’s eyes. Many citizens seed to be looking up, however, having been alard by the explosion.
There were people nearby as well, however. tal clanked as footsteps rushed from behind her, running down the mountain. Vivi turned her head, and realized that she wasn’t outside the city at all. At the very top of the mountain stood the tallest building of all, a dark, castle-like palace, the spires of which reached the sky itself. Sharp angles filled the architecture; the palace was like a monster overlooking the city below. Lava flowed steadily from a crack in the sky, straight onto the battlents, falling into the moat of lava from there.
Knights in runic armor ran down. Outside-veins lined the surface of their chestplates. Everyone had auras from the leaking ether. That alone ant they were definitely maxed out with a lot of ether to spare, probably being at least above the second elevation. Seeing Vivi, they had their hands on their sheaths, runeswords poking out.
They were all demons with long and angular horns poking out from their helts. Their horns were far larger than the average horns in Shivenar. Only one man had his face visible, revealing a dark-skinned demon with white and red eyes.
“Freeze!” he yelled, spotting Vivi. “Don’t move!”
She studied her opponents, and the demons eyed them back. Cael, Alda, and Lortel had all followed them out. The demons were trained fighters, but Vivi knew for certain that Dawnpour was strong enough to crush their armor. She wouldn’t need void ether to defeat this bunch. We should be safe, she decided. It looks like they’re down to talk. They would have attacked otherwise.
“Don’t tell them who you are,” Lucius said with a mischievous grin. “In their eyes, we just erged from the gods’ gauntlet after breaking levelstone. They’ll treat us as legends if we act like legends.”
I’m not good at acting, though, Vivi thought. We just need to get back to Shivenar.
“It will be beneficial to gain respect here regardless.”
Vivi thought about it. They hadn’t talked about plans. Nobody would know which roles to play if she were to pretend to be soone else. The demons stared at her while she thought about what to say.
Cael spoke first. “Is this the Stormkeep?” He stepped forward, eyeing the city below with an awed expression. The demons kept their hands on their swords, but Cael didn’t look deterred, as if he didn’t see the hostility in their eyes at all.
“That na hasn’t been used in thousands of years,” the dark-skinned demon said. “Who are you?”
“I,” Cael said, “am an artist.”
He received wary looks, to which he gave no reaction, continuing to study the city as if he was watching sothing amazing.
“Did you just break levelstone?” the demon asked.
“We have indeed,” Cael said. “The dungeon was growing boring. It was ti for us to erge.”
The demons glanced at each other. “Are you humans?”
“Sothing like that,” Cael said. “It seems the city has evolved from when I last saw it. Tell , who is the leader of the Stormkeep today?”
They looked at each other, hands no longer on their swords. Hesitation remained, of course, but they seed inclined to listen to Cael.
“Please wait here, legends of the underground,” he said. “Queen Adalene will accommodate you imdiately. We will inform her of your arrival.”
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“Yes, I would be most pleased,” Cael said. “And I am most interested to learn how baths and cuisine have evolved. I wish the Stormkeep welcos us with open arms.”
The demon bowed. “Allow us half an hour,” he said. “Gino, with . Everyone else, protect our guests!”
He took one of the armored demons and began jogging up the mountain, toward the palace. Six demons stayed to watch over them, probably to make sure nobody tried to escape or do anything stupid.
“Thank you, kind knights,” Cael said. “Allow us to inform our friends of this great discovery. We will return soon.”
He then turned his attention to the hole back into the dungeon, as if nudging everyone back in. Alda and Lortel went first. Vivi followed, and Cael went last. Inside, Drean and the spirits seed to be talking with telepathy
“Wow.” Cael’s tone went back to normal. “It’s actually Norfolm. What a city.”
“What was that about?” Alda asked, arms crossed. “You’re pretending to be so grand hero?”
“I didn’t think we had any chance of laying low and sneaking in,” he said. “The next best bet is to confirm good relations with the Queen. I apologize for taking the lead, Vivi. I tried my best not to lie about anything.”
“You did well,” Vivi said. “I agree that was a good move. I was thinking of sothing similar.”
Cael nodded. “I can handle negotiations if all of you play a role as my quiet followers. Our goal is still to get back to Shivenar. We can probably negotiate sothing with the queen.”
“I can always trade runeswords for favors,” Vivi said. “It shouldn’t be too difficult to convince them I’m the best runesmith available.”
Judging from the outside-carved armor, it didn’t seem like Norfolm had invented inside-carving either. Vivi could make a na for herself.
“We can probably use our real nas to make acting easier,” Cael said. “Nobody down here has heard of
or Alda. What about Lortel?”
“I have visited, and I have friends here,” Lortel said. “Enemies as well. It might be safest for
to avoid showing my face.”
“I think you should co,” Cael said. “Your presence could add to so mystery. Not to ntion, it will be a struggle to follow us on your own."
“I am not forced to return to Shivenar, or travel with you,” Lortel said. “I may leave if it makes life easier for you.”
“I don’t want you to leave,” Vivi said. “You’re a good friend. You should only leave if you don’t want to travel with us anymore.”
A slight smile showed on her face. “I suppose I will continue working with you, then. You may treat
as a naless seamstress. Servants are often not called by their nas. Lortel, is however, not the na I went by in Norfolm. You are free to use it as well.”
“Great,” Cael said. “What about Vivi?”
“People here might have heard of ‘Vivian Runeblessed’. We can probably go with just Vivi.”
“And what about you, Drean?” Cael called.
“We will remain here,” Drean said, still looking apprehensive. “Though it seems we should expect visitors. The dungeon is open. A hunt for the gods will comnce.”
“Very well,” Cael said. “Can we trust you to keep Aolinn and Helegar safe for today? We will return for them before the night.”
“They will live the best life one can in this dungeon,” Drean promised.
“Thank you,” Vivi said. “You’ve been a huge help.”
“Hardly,” Drean said. “We are the ones who should be grateful. The walls of our prison have been blown open, yet I struggle to find myself excited. I have not prepared myself to react to such an event. We will require ti. Know that we are thankful.”
Vivi lowered her head. “If this is the end, I hope we et again one day.”
Drean nodded. “You should be warned, Vivi. If this is not controlled, you may have invented sothing catastrophic. If levelstone is broken, the world itself will collapse. Levelstone is never to be broken. Even this little hole… it scares .”
Vivi couldn’t disagree. The current slingshot launchers weren’t too dangerous to destroy the world itself, but the technology was far from perfected yet. If a more powerful iteration was created, a wrongly launched missile could have severe consequences. Or worse, soone could possibly abuse the weapons to purposefully collapse parts of the levels.
“If the gods learn of your creation, you will find yourself in grave danger,” Drean said. “One of the gods’ many purposes is to ensure the world’s levels hold firm. It wouldn’t be unheard of for an extermination to happen to rid the world of such a piece of weaponry.”
Oh, Vivi thought. That might be a problem.
“The Gauntlet is now open as well,” Drean said. “I will warn you, if this dungeon were to be cleared, by a miracle of a strong militaristic force, the gods will learn of who broke the seal open.”
Vivi glanced at her friends, all of whom shared a similar reaction. They silently thought about Drean’s words.
There wasn’t much they could do about that now. They’d already destroyed levelstone and broken out of the gauntlet. They had to, or they’d spend the rest of their lives down in so cave. In Vivi’s opinion, she would risk offending the gods, who were sleeping anyway, if the alternative was to rot for her entire life. People needed her on the fifth level. Maybe even on the surface.
“Well, if the gods are upset, we’ve already upset them,” Vivi said. “I don’t think we have any reason to worry. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life praying and atoning either. If the gods don’t like my invention, I hope they’ll discuss what to do with it over tea and snacks.”
Cael chuckled. “Interesting way to look at it. I agree, though. My father has certainly never lived by Ythar’s rules. He is yet to be punished.”
It felt odd to fear entities that Vivi had never even seen. Ythar was a real being, asleep in his palace, but these other gods? Who was there to say they hadn’t just died in sleep?
How much ether do you think we’ll need to ascend with to defeat Ythar? Vivi asked. Hypothetically.
Lucius gave her a look in her core. “I am fairly certain that would be impossible. The gods can ascend with more ether than our cores can carry. Ythar literally created all ten thousand spirits.”
Maybe he’s weakened? Vivi thought.
“We are not defeating him,” Lucius said. “That is an impossibility. Nothing you do will make you strong enough to fight a true demi-god.”
She shrugged. I guess we’ll have to not worry about them and hope they don’t worry about us either.
They continued discussing their next imdiate plans. According to Cael, the most important act for all of them to keep up was to just act like ignorant ancient beings. Norfolm would undoubtedly have codes that nobility expected to follow. The correct move wasn’t to nervously follow those, but to ignore all of them as if they didn’t exist, while still remaining polite.
Vivi agreed with that. They erged back into Norfolm, where a convoy awaited to bring them to Queen Adalene’s palace.
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