Chronicles of the Exalted Sun Child Book 12-12.3: Three’s A Pattern

The entrance chamber was empty, Alejandro noted.

Crunch.

He stared at the cavern floor, which should have been slick and slippery with a thin layer of water that was perpetually enough to make it hazardous, but not enough depth to create drag.

No, instead of that, there was a thin layer of rough ice that gave good enough traction that he probably would not have slipped even if he’d taken to walking in his socks.

“The Ice Magus is either stronger than I thought or much more foolish,” Lady Mondero noted, “I appreciate not having to walk too carefully, however, but they are still violating the rules.”

Alejandro nodded, but then said, “They may not be locals.”

Lady Mondero gave him a asured look. “Lord Martelli, are you insinuating that those two do not co from the Arcadia Region of the Great Continent?”

Alejandro shrugged. “Despite spanning millions of leagues, Arcadia is not the entirety. You know that as well as I, Lady Mondero. Besides, not every mber of the region follows the sa rules. I posited that because I did not recognize the language they used and from their use of intermittent Wojan, they are only in the process of learning our local variant of Arcadian.”

They walked towards the first tunnel even while chatting idly. Alejandro paused at the rising water. The rough ice just stopped abruptly while the tunnel angled down. He knew that the water level varied wildly, and even defied reason. One chamber could be half subrged while right next to another that was ankle-deep. There were a few that sort of followed how water sought the lowest level, but that was only near the entrance.

The water slowly rose to knee-high, and it was ungodly cold. The four of them trudged through it, with Lady Mondero barely reacting to the near-freezing water.

The Blue Slis were absent, and considering that they dissolved into liquid, the reason the water was so cold might have been because the Ice Magus froze them to death and they took up all the heat in the water.

Splash!

Swish!

Skreee!

Battle sounds in the distance. The tunnels were never straight so line of sight was limited to ten to twenty paces at a ti. And when the Adventurer group finally caught the fight in their sights, it was over.

The bronze-skinned man with the spear was at the vanguard while the golden-haired woman stood just a couple of paces behind him.

Oh. Both of them were standing on top of the water. Huh. Why would they waste their focus on that? Well, it did bring them out of the cold water but the Ice Magus should be reasonably resistant in the first place. And the spearman–well, Alejandro didn't know what Elent he used. Oh, there was a bluish tinge around his weapon, bluish-green? Certainly a Wind variant of so sort. How did he enhance his body to that extent though?

The noise of their passage drew the couple's attention. They were wearing nice clothes, now that he had a good look. Enchanted, of course, else why wear them inside a Chaos Fount?

"Greetings," he began, only for Lady Mondero to interrupt.

"Are you two aware you are violating Guild law, and Bresian law, by entering an overflowing Chaos Fount during an event without allowing it to be drained, and without permission or even notification to the local branch?" Her words were fast and clipped but in perfect Wojan.

"No," the Ice Magus said after a mont of silence while the young man simply shrugged. "We are not from around here."

"That is quite clear, but your altruism is noted," Lady Mondero continued, even though Alejandro was sure she had a lot of misgivings.

While there was so suspicion, this did happen hours after the overflow began. If these two were Chaos Magi, then they might be here to retrieve whatever their compatriots put in place to cause this.

Making Founts overflow was one of their standard thods. If the process also did not produce a little bit of Life Essence at the bottom of the Fount then perhaps the Republic and every other nation within the Arcadia Region would have hunted down the heretics long ago.

"In light of that, please join us as we safely disable the Fount."

The golden-haired woman nodded. "Gladly. I am Gwendith Sharine, it is a pleasure to et you."

"Heron Muryh," the spearman said.

"Alejandro Martelli, Waterlow Adventurers' Guild, Waterlow branch master."

"Laura Mondero, Adventurers' Guild Vigilant."

"Earth."

"Stone."

Lady Sharine and Lord Muryh exchanged a glance, then the Lady gestured towards the front, “Do you know the way to the…er, bottom?"

"Unfortunately, an overflow does change things up a bit, but the general the does not," Alejandro answered. "Lord Muryh is a vanguard, I take it? Please continue in the lead as there is little need to change things up."

The two didn't protest the integration into the delver team, giving credence to their action as simple ignorance rather than willful malfeasance. Still, better to remain on guard. He absently patted his scale mail coat.

The sextet continued down the tunnel. The two foreigners stopped walking on water but, Alejandro noticed a minute later, that their boots weren't getting wet. Wet leather and cloth did have a distinct scent.

"So," Lady Mondero said casually, though Alejandro caught a whiff of nervousness there, “Do you happen to know the Radiant Go…Magus floating above the town?”

“You an Yuriko?” Lady Sharine said with not a little bit of amusent as she gave Lady Mondero a sideways glance.

Alejandro felt his spine stiffen as he worked through the scent profile both won let out. Lady Sharine was definitely amused while Lady Mondero had a sudden spike of elation, and not a little bit of attraction. Not to Lady Sharine, he was sure, but probably to the potential power she could gain from talking, and learning from this Yuriko.

“Lady Yuriko? She is beyond the Magus level, is she not?” Lady Mondero continued.

“Yes, I suppose you can consider that,” Lady Sharine said just as casually as though she spoke not of a being that had transcended beyond most people. The Magus level was the watershed that divided the normal from the elite. “Yuriko is our leader…and friend.”

From the spike in Lord Muryh’s scent, as well as Lady Sharine, there was little doubt about the insinuation. It was honestly a confusing mix of scents from both won and Lord Muryh. Earth and Stone…were scentless. Were they…golems? No, it couldn’t be. Artificial creations cannot tap into the Arcana.

“I would like to et with Lady Yuriko,” Lady Mondero said. “After the town is secure, of course. May I inquire about your purpose?”

“Well,” Lady Sharine humd while she swept her hand sideways and conjured a dozen daggers made of pure ice. The daggers darted towards the incoming Blue Sli, half of which had humanoid forms. Each of the daggers pierced the Sli’s outer coating, and froze the entire thing solid.

Then, sothing else happened that made Alejandro’s brows rise to his hairline. A stream of sothing violet flowed from the dying Sli onto Lady Sharine’s other hand, which she jabbed at another set of Slis. A solid bar of heat slamd into them and vaporized a line through the bodies, great gouts of steam expanded from the dead. Lady Sharine gestured with both hands at the sa ti, and hundreds of violet tendrils flew towards her, forming another orb of violet fla. At the sa ti, the steam clouds condensed into water, then shards of ice.

Those things flew towards her, too, then congregated into ice daggers, while she then flung towards the rest of the Slis. Heat tendrils flew back, enlarging the orb’s size, and a mont later, it was apparently enough to use another bar of near-solid fla. The cycle repeated another ti, then there were simply no enemies left.

Lady Sharine shook her hands and shed the built-up heat and cold off her hands. Then, they continued walking down the tunnel.

Alejandro was speechless with surprise. That kind of spellwork, without a vocal component and very casual somatic components, if they were anything more than mnemonic gestures, those were the hallmarks of a powerful Magus. He wasn’t sure if she was higher than a Magus, maybe Advanced Magus? True Magus was beyond that, but he wasn’t sure what made them more powerful. Well, other than having thirteen intrinsic spell circles rather than the eight an Advanced Magus would have.

The next ti they found Blue Slis, it was Lord Muryh’s turn to fight. Well, he wasn’t as destructive or efficient as Lady Sharine, but he fearlessly waded into battle, sweeping his spear that adjusted its length to fit the tunnel’s width. And when any Sli managed to slip past the spear’s reach, it encountered a hexagonal barrier that looked like hardened Wind. So that was confirmation, Alejandro supposed. The startling thing was that the man was able to output that much strength using Elental Wind. One of his strikes slapped the water after he put more force than necessary, and it resulted in a montary cavity that exposed the bare floor. The water had been nearly thigh-high then.

These foreigners were exceptionally strong. Frighteningly so. At least for their purported level. Any True Magus could output the sa, and more. An Advance Magus could do it, too, if they had one of the more aggressive Elents. It was honestly the speed and efficiency of their casting that was admirable, and probably the result of their origin’s secrets.

Lady Mondero continued to probe Lady Sharine, though she was a bit more subtle this ti.

“...I’ve started training when I was five,” she said. “Not in Bresia but in Xotha. Ah, that’s the country southeast-ish of the Republic. I learned at one of the Orthodoxy’s monasteries.”

“Orthodoxy?”

“Ah, a religion surrounding the Gods and Goddesses of the Bright Elents. That’s Light, Fire, Lightning, and Air. Well, there are minor Elents included too, but they aren’t as prominent as the four,” Lady Mondero answered easily.

When they ca to the first fork, they pretty much went left arbitrarily. There were so Chaos Founts that had passages that trapped soone following the left-hand rule in a perpetual circle, but those were rare unless their monsters were intelligent enough not to fall prey to the trap.

Alejandro was one of those who believed that the Founts had so kind of intelligence controlling them, though there were just as many who believed otherwise. So say that complex patterns the tunnels ford were a pattern found anywhere in nature, but the aggression, and low cunning of the beasts' insides, and the nearly deliberate placent of the passages spoke of the sa. Of course, not all Founts led to labyrinths. So were wide open plains and jungles too.

Sure enough, the left-hand rule eventually led them to the deeper passages. It took them several hours of fighting. Each adventurer took their turn to fight, and when they ca upon the bigger passages, they all worked together to clear the Blue Slis. Eventually, the passages began to converge and they arrived at the deepest part of the Fount.

In the middle was a humongous Blue Sli that was the size of a two-storey house. It was huge, tough, and quite fast for its size, but also near brainless.

It simply charged at them, skipping over the water while sending tendrils of itself slithering underneath.

Stone raised several walls and a platform to keep them above ground. Alejandro blasted away with his shotgun, Earth sent dozens of bullets. Lady Sharine froze a significant part of the water, and with the Heat she drew from them, blasted away at the giant. Lord Muryh stepped forth and t the Giant Blue Sli’s charge head-on. And the Sli was the one who bounced away.

It was a simple fight. Hold it back and blast away at it. Eventually, after a couple of hours, it died and revealed the Fount’s core: a twisted, spiralling crystal set on a pedestal at the end of the chamber.

“Well, there’s so fortune at least,” Lady Mondero said, pointing at a glimr underneath the crystal. When they approached, Alejandro couldn’t help but smile. It was a droplet of Life Essence!

“Eh, Ambrosia?” Lady Sharine and Lord Muryh murmured under their breaths, though Alejandro still caught the words. It made his hackles rise.

Ambrosia was what the Chaos Magi called the Life Essence.