The trek back to Peterny was a long one. The sun had begun to set by the time the weary travelers had returned to Peterny, but there was still time left to travel.
On the way to the trading town, the group agreed that they would borrow a wagon and drive it to Airyglyph. There, they would pick up Albel and spend the night in the city.
Clair, Tynave and Farleen awaited the group at the west gate of the town. Once the group arrived, Romeria walked away from the group to join Clair’s group.
Nel smiled as she addressed her superior, “I leave Her Majesty in your hands.”
“Of course,” Clair responded.
“I do not believe this is a trap, but nevertheless, be careful,” Romeria warned.
As they said their goodbyes, Clair’s group walked away to begin the last leg of Romeria’s return trip to Aquios.
Not even a few minutes passed before the group heard a soft rumbling nearby outside the gate. Looking back into the wilderness, they saw the same ominous skeletal cage that they rode back at the Shrine of Kaddan. The bones retracted back into the ground to reveal Sophia and Thanatas, as well as a nauseous looking Lyra. “Ugh, I’ll never get used to that…'' Lyra moaned.
Twilight placed a gentle hand on Lyra’s shoulder as she addressed her companion, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah…I just…ugh…need a moment.”
It took about a minute for the aquamarine mare to regain her composure. She took a deep breath then let it out. “Alright, let’s continue. We can explain what happened on the way to Airyglyph.”
About twenty minutes later, the group had boarded a wagon that was large enough to carry all twelve members of the group and Nel took the driver’s seat. Nel flicked the reins and they were off.
On the way to Airyglyph, Sophia mostly explained what happened in the depths of Mosel. She was especially careful to leave out the world-shattering parts that she learned down there. At the same time, a psychic conversation was had between Sophia, Lyra and Twilight.
“To begin with, Sophia’s been tapping into our psychic conversations for the past few days,” Lyra began.
“What?!” Twilight mentally shrieked. “This is bad! This is really bad! This means that she may know about things she’s not supposed to know about!”
“Would you calm down?” Sophia demanded. “Neither myself, nor Thanatas, intend on giving away your secrets. I don’t know about Thanatas, but my mind is pretty secure by this point and will continue becoming so as my powers develop.”
“You don’t understand, I never even told Lyra much of anything about my top secret projects! Now my secrets might be compromised because of your power!” Twilight began to hyperventilate, leaving the others in the wagon to question her behavior.
It took the combined effort of both templars to psychically soothe the alicorn’s panicked mind.
“Are you okay?” Cliff asked.
“Yeah, I just remembered something important that I forgot to do back home,” Twilight lied. Thankfully, the others bought her story.
“This is not the time for you to start Twilighting,” Lyra scolded. “We still need to see to the safety of the three Leingod experiments.”
“Twilighting?” Sophia asked. Twilight looked away, doing her best to avoid revealing her blush.
“Twilight’s always been prone to fits of panic attacks since I’ve known her,” Lyra explained. “I think it has to do with her upbringing. She has gotten better over the centuries, but they do surface every now and then.” Twilight did her best not to pout in front of everyone.
Sophia continued with the conversation. “So I’ve heard that this universe is something that you made as an experiment because the previous records were destroyed by some Xel’naga named Amon. But why do you treat it like an MMORPG?”
Twilight paused for a moment to gather her thoughts. She stared at Sophia and tried her best to get comfortable. “Creating universes and nurturing them are the primary functions of the Xel’naga. Without the records written by our predecessors, as well as the fact that we alicorns are the last of the Xel’naga, we have to carry on the traditions of our predecessors blind. Our methods will never be the same as our predecessors so we can only make guesses in order to keep the Infinite Cycle going.”
“Infinite Cycle?”
“The Xel’naga create a universe and populate it with life. We then choose two races from that universe and nurture them. One race must possess great psychic power, while the other must be capable of great change. As the two races are nurtured by the Xel’naga, they are eventually brought together over the millennia. One day, beings would be born from the two races coming together and possess characteristics of both races: powerful psychic power, and the ability to change and adapt. From those born with those traits, the Xel’naga give the chosen their essence where they would ascend to become a Xel’naga and carry on the Infinite Cycle.”
“Sounds like a strange and convoluted type of reproduction,” Sophia commented.
“It does, though we ponies seem to break the mold in some ways. My old foalsitter, who is also a Xel’naga, actually gave birth to one.”
“So if you Xel’naga can reproduce normally, why the Eternal Sphere?”
“Because I wanted to try to recreate the records as best as I could and give us and future Xel’naga a purpose. I don’t imagine us ruling our nation forever. I founded a research institute for the purpose of creating and maintaining the Eternal Sphere. However, running an institute doesn’t come free, so I had to repurpose the universe as a subscription based MMORPG in order to keep us funded. Government funds could only get us so far, but since maintaining the universe requires cutting edge technology, the upkeep would have impacted the national budget.”
“What do you plan to do with the Eternal Sphere? What’s your endgame?” Sophia asked.
“I want the Eternal Sphere to become an independent universe, I just need to figure out how to do that. If I can make the universe independent, I will seek out psychic and chaotic races within the Eternal Sphere and try to nurture their development, provided that such races were created.”
“And if not?”
Twilight sighed, “Then I will just have to try again.”
Eventually, the wagon came to a stop and everyone emerged from the wagon to be greeted by the bone-chilling winter winds of the Traum Mountain Path.
As they walked toward Airyglyph City, the group was relieved that the guards were being cooperative in allowing the group into the city.
Twilight’s communicator went off again which meant that it was time to add on three more inventors to the list of people that she needed to recruit later. She pulled out the device from her pocket and opened it up to see the new profiles.
The first on the list was an impressive chef in many ways, both good and bad. The creature was known as a drowglynn, an odd-behaving race with green skin, who didn’t give a proper name for his profile. Instead, he went by the disturbing name, Killer Chef. The description did not give Twilight confidence that she wanted to be anywhere near him as the summary included the words ‘blood’ and ‘violence’. The description led Twilight to believe that the artisan’s guild had recruited a psycho chef.
Thanatas looked over Twilight’s shoulder to see what she was reading. “Hey, I know that guy! I saw him wandering around Surferio. He gave off this vibe that made me want to recruit him for the body choppers division of my flesh golem assembly line, despite him being alive.”
Twilight’s face turned green. “Uhp…too much information, Thanatas.”
The death knight decided to leave Twilight alone for the time being since she likely had enough to think about anyway.
Twilight discovered that the only thing that Killer Chef wanted was a keenly sharp kitchen knife, but a tool of such quality did not exist on Elicoor.
Still, the profile indicated that he was a cooking prodigy with one of the best ratings in his field.
Up next was another disturbing case. This one appeared human at first glance, but he wasn’t. He dressed in black and gray and carried around a bat umbrella. More off-putting were his dichromatic eyes: one golden, one scarlet. His name was Cornelius and he applied to the artisan’s guild as a writer. Though his level of talent was somewhat decent. He also had difficulty finding the right words to say a lot of the time, so perhaps a dictionary might help him out.
The last entry was, thankfully, not disturbing. This one was a middle-aged menodix named Balbados. He was an appraiser of antiques who had honed his craft over the years. He tried running a business in a human town once but failed miserably. Still, he was a peddler but was unlikely to take handouts. If she could find something worth appraising, however, he might see things her way.
Balbados was last seen traveling the Mosel desert. Twilight didn’t have a reason to go back there, so she simply kept the general location in mind for now.
On the way to the castle though, Twilight did make a few detours, offering a young blacksmith named Lias some startup money for a contract. She also, reluctantly, showed a fake bomb to the senile old man, Dejison, wandering the streets. She really didn’t want to, but she also wanted to give each inventor their fair chance.
With those small matters out of the way, the group approached the entrance to the castle. The guards barred their way, demanding that they identify themselves.
“We are here on request from His Majesty to pick up Albel Nox so that he may accompany us on an important task. My name is Sophia Esteed.”
The guards looked at each other, recalling their orders. “Wait here,” one guard ordered before he went inside the castle to check their claim. The guard returned a few minutes later. “Count Woltar is expecting you inside. He will lead you to Albel.”
Woltar waited for the group at the entrance. “Welcome to Castle Airyglyph. Follow me and I’ll take you to Albel.”
The interior resembled that of an early medieval castle. The stonework was a little rough and showed to favor practicality over elegance, unlike Castle Aquaria. The hallways were spartan, there was little to no decor around. In the sense of the stonework, it somewhat reminded Twilight a little of the Castle of the Two Sisters.
While everyone else was looking around the castle like tourists, Lyra was focused on following Woltar. The Count noticed this, and he felt the need to ask, “Young lady, you seem to behave as if you have been here before, unlike the others?”
“I was, I was actually wandering the castle freely as I was busting Fayt and Cliff out of your dungeon. I also got to explore most of the castle, including the throne room,” Lyra said.
The implications were not lost on Woltar as he paled a little. The mare behind him could have easily assassinated the king and the three brigade leaders in one fell swoop if she wanted to back then. It was then that he deeply regretted asking Lyra that question and remained silent as they entered the dungeons. He was also glad that she was no longer their enemy.
It was only after a minute of walking that Woltar had brought the group to Albel’s cell. He used the keys he had on him to open the cell. “Albel is in here.” He then opened the door and went inside with the others behind him.
The interior of the cell was much like the majority of the castle, spartan and nothing remarkable. Albel stood by a wall in his cell with his arms bound in manacles that kept his arms raised. The chains of his bindings went through a hook on the ceiling.
“Wait here,” Woltar ordered before he approached the prisoner. “I’ve got an errand for you, boy.”
Albel slowly raised his head to look Woltar in the eyes. “What?”
“You have been given a mission to accompany these people to the Urssa Lava Caves. If you complete this task, you will be acquitted of all charges.”
Albel looked at the group in surprise. “With those scum!? Those…Aquarian scum!?”
“Nice to see you again too,” Sophia replied dryly.
“Do you not remember that they are the enemy, you senile old fool!?”
“Airyglyph and Aquaria are currently observing a truce,” Woltar explained.
“Impossible! There’s no way that warmonger would ever permit a truce!” Albel growled.
“Vox is no more,” Woltar stated.
“What!? Did they end him?”
“While they did engage him in battle, the killing blow was dealt by another.”
“Who? Other than these Aquarians and myself, there’s nobody else in this world who could possibly–”
“The enemy is not of this world,” Woltar quickly said.
“You really are senile! From another world? Stop with this pointless attempt at humor!”
“A lot of us aren’t from this world either and we can prove our claims if necessary,” Sophia said. “That metal object that crashed into the city, for example, uses technology that not even Greeton is capable of yet.”
“Tch! Whatever. So tell me you old fool, why should I take them to the Urssa Lava Caves?”
“In order to combat the enemy, we must unite the power of our air dragons with Aquaria’s runological weapons. But their strongest weapon requires the cooperation of the Marquis in order to bring it into the sky.”
“The Marquis!? That monster!? What you ask of me is suicide!”
Woltar turned away and smirked, “The way you brag about your skills, I would think that the Marquis would be no match for you. Am I wrong, Albel the Wicked?” He then nodded to a nearby guard who walked up to Albel and undid his manacles.
“Rotten old man…” Albel grumbled.
“I’m sure your father would have risen to the challenge, and you will have the assistance of many powerful allies. If you work together, I’m sure you will be able to overcome him.”
“Don’t you dare use my father’s name to provoke me!” Albel snarled as he grabbed Woltar by the collar.
“Make no mistake boy, a new, incredibly powerful enemy has appeared,” Woltar warned. “They seek to plunder this world and they are capable of wiping out everyone. No more Aquaria and no more Airyglyph; this world will be wiped clean, if you fail.”
Albel forcefully released Woltar and growled in resignation, “Then I must go.”
Woltar turned to the group. “Looks like everything is in order now, try to get along.”
Albel begrudgingly walked toward the door but momentarily stopped when Nel spoke. “I don’t like this any more than you do, Albel. But Her Majesty has given the order and I must obey.” She smirked, “Just don’t get in our way.”
“Bah!” Albel spat.
“We’ll be spending a night at the Airyglyph inn before we head out to the Barr Mountains,” Sophia said.
“Fine by me, I need to get this arm repaired before it can be of any use to me.”
Woltar returned to his room in the castle while the group, now with Albel, headed to the barely warmed inn in town to get some sleep before the big day tomorrow.
Sophia woke up in the middle of the night when she sensed someone trying to get into her room. She frowned and got out of bed to address the would-be intruder. The door soon opened slowly and Albel, his weapon at the ready, tried to sneak in…
…Only to find Sophia in the middle of the room glaring at him. He clicked his tongue and put his sword away.
Sophia noticed that Albel’s left arm was missing, likely after pressuring the local blacksmith to do an overnight repair job on it.
“What do you want, Albel?” Sophia asked warily.
“Come with me, don’t ask questions,” Albel demanded.
Sophia could feel the anxiety from the man before her. The intensity of it felt like sitting too close to a blazing fireplace. He was definitely worried about something. She shrugged and followed the angsty warrior into an alley beside the inn.
Albel looked around to make sure there was nobody else but himself and Sophia. Once satisfied, he turned to face the templar.
“Ready to explain why you were trying to break into my room?” Sophia asked.
“Do you hate me?” Albel asked, ignoring Sophia’s question.
“You pulled me out here just to ask me that?” Sophia dryly asked.
“Just answer the question, fool.”
Sophia rolled her eyes, “You want my honest opinion? No, I don’t hate you. It’s more like I pity you. You are the most insecure person I have ever met. It seems like you lost your way when you lost your father and your arm to some dragon. I know you want to be rid of those insecurities because deep down you know that’s what led to the incident. You hide your anxieties by pushing everyone away by acting all edgy toward everyone. You fear that you will lose any friends you make one way or another so you make yourself out to be the biggest jerk in the world just so you can avoid the pain of loss like you felt when your father died. I can tell that you are not at all honest with yourself either because I sensed that glimmer of elation when Woltar came in to bail you out of prison.”
“You think you know me so well, don’t you?” Albel growled.
“It’s not hard when your mind is an open book to me. And before you try pulling out that sword and attacking me in frustration which will only serve to prove that I was correct in my analysis of you, I will make you a promise that everything that was said in this alley stays in this alley.”
Albel wasn’t sure he could trust Sophia to keep her word. He was far from ready to open his heart to anyone. However, since she already knew so much about him, he figured that he might as well talk more about his problems.
“Fine! So tell me, how should I deal with my insecurities since you know so much?” Albel asked sarcastically.
Another eye roll, “Obviously, having friends around to support you would help. But you will also need to forgive yourself for your father’s death. What happened in that incident was an unfortunate accident and you simply weren’t ready to bond with a dragon, a fatal mistake that your father made. You aren’t going to be able to move forward with your life until you are able to forgive yourself. I can’t tell you how to do that because that’s something you will have to work out on your own.”
Albel growled softly as he looked toward a nearby wall. The city was silent for a moment. “You have…given me a lot to think about. I’m going back inside and I suggest you do the same if you want to avoid freezing to death.” He then walked out of the alley and back toward the inn door.
“Good night to you too, Albel.” Sophia said. She then followed the angsty warrior back into the inn.
The next morning, the group got ready to leave. Albel returned to the local blacksmith, mentally bracing himself for the excruciating pain that he was about to experience when they reattached his metal arm. The others stocked up on necessary supplies before they regrouped at the gates of Airyglyph.
Outside the gates, they noticed a mounted Dragon Brigade soldier standing guard in the area. As the group approached him, the guard addressed them, “If you are the travelers who came here on that wagon that was parked here, we had that placed in storage. The road between here and Kirlsa has become more dangerous as of late with territorial porcupines migrating into the area.”
“Porcupines?” Fayt questioned.
“They may be small, but they are a major hazard to travelers. Their quills could easily destroy the wheels of a wagon,” Nel explained.
“Nothing but vermin who have yet to learn their place,” Albel commented.
“Looks like we’re walking to the Barr Mountains,” Sophia said.
The group of thirteen traveled down the road that most of them have traveled before. However, they also had to deal with the new creatures that had moved in. Among them were armored humanoids that walked while crouched down and carried axes. Nel called them kobolds. There were also more berserkers, tarantulas that looked much tougher than the ones encountered on the way to Aquaria, more monster trees and the previously mentioned porcupines.
It turned out that the little beasts were more resilient and dangerous than the skeptics gave them credit as their quills could pierce armor and they were like buzzsaws as they rolled around. The power of their quills was demonstrated when one launched a few at the group who dodged and allowed them to deeply punch into the bark of a monster tree behind them.
Albel’s serpentine movements allowed him to dodge the quills and use his katana to throw the beasts into the air where Maria blasted them repeatedly with her gun. The porcupines vanished before they landed.
Fayt and Adray burned the trees down with their Blazing Sword and Efreet spell respectively. Cliff and Roger worked together to take out the berserkers while Peppita dealt with the kobolds by creating an illusory star with her magic and smashed it against them.
The group had time to take a break when they reached Kirlsa. Since they needed to go toward the Bequerel Mine, they would have to use the Kirlsa Caverns to get there.
Meanwhile, Twilight had some more inventors to recruit. She found the chef Rigel scrutinizing the ingredients in a local grocery store while silently complaining about her hunger. Twilight was glad that Grape had distributed food preservation capsules to the workshops on the continent because she figured that the dish that Roger and Peppita invented would have ruined by now otherwise.
Twilight presented Rigel with the curry dish, looking as fresh as if straight from the kitchen. Rigel looked at it with wide eyes and some drool escaping her lips. Twilight made the deal and Rigel signed on while leaving the starving noblewoman to chow down in the middle of the grocery store.
Albel saw the dish that Twilight presented and remarked that it looked a lot better than what the wenches at the Black Brigade base served. This reminded Twilight of something important and told everyone to wait in town for a few more minutes before she vanished in a flash of light and a ring of a bell.
The same sight and sound invaded their senses again a few minutes later to announce her return. She was slightly tired from the back to back long-distance teleportations, but she said that she would be fine in a few minutes. When asked, Twilight mentioned recruiting another chef to the roster of inventors.
Once ready, the group entered the Kirlsa Caverns where they returned to the control panel. They borrowed a series of haulers to reach the exit where Gregory continued to stand guard.
As they started to leave though, Gregory got their attention. “You are the ones who helped me clear out the tunnels a few days ago. I never got to repay you for your efforts.”
“It was nothing, really,” Fayt humbly replied. “You don’t need to repay us.”
“I insist, young man.” Gregory then pulled out an old-looking necklace from his armor and handed it to Fayt. “I found this while I was inspecting the tunnels. I have no need for it so you may have it. If you want, you can take it to an appraiser and see how much you can get for it.” He forced it into Fayt’s hands before he returned to stand guard in the area. He didn’t seem inclined to answer any more questions.
Fayt put the necklace in his pocket for the time being before they exited the caverns and entered the Bequerel Mountain Path.
As it turned out, the same creatures that had migrated into the Traum Mountain Path had also driven out the creatures wandering around the Bequerel Mountain Path, forcing the group to fight through more porcupines, trees, berserkers and kobolds as they make their way past the Bequerel Mine entrance and up the pass to the Barr Mountains. Once they entered the mountain pass, the creatures from before stopped harassing the group.
“Looks like they won’t follow us this far,” Cliff noticed.
“That’s because the dragons claim this area, fool,” Albel said. “They wouldn’t dare encroach upon the dragons’ territory.”
Cliff shrugged, “Fair point.”
The path forked many times during their exploration of the mountain area. Along the way, they encountered more of the small-winged dragons like the ones they encountered in the Bequerel Mine. These had tougher scales though. However, they attacked the same way as what they encountered before so they weren’t as challenging as before.
They also encountered hostile miniature dragons. They moved fast and they were determined to pick a fight with those who had invaded their territory.
“Do we have to fight them?” Twilight asked.
“They won’t let us go without one,” Nel said.
Twilight had reservations about fighting the little dragons as they reminded her of Spike when he was young. She felt bad that they had to invade their territory, but she knew that they had no choice if they wanted to meet the Marquis.
Albel grabbed one of the mini-dragons by the neck and lifted it before unleashing a blast from his palm, obliterating it.
This path continued as they traversed the twisting, winding, treacherous pathways of the Barr Mountain Path. They encountered more brass-colored dragons and mini dragons. They also encountered flying dragons like the ones the Dragon Brigade rode. About the only creatures in the area that weren’t dragons were red porcupines who were a little tougher than the ones from before.
They quickly realized that the area was also the porcupines’ nesting area because they also encountered juvenile porcupines, except these were blue.
Their exploration soon took them to a small area with a number of dragon bones scattered about and a flying dragon was drifting around the area like a vulture.
Fayt was the last to notice the dragon and in his carelessness, ended up grabbed by the talons of the dragon and carried off somewhere.
“Careless fool!” Albel grumbled.
“We need to go after him,” Sophia said.
“How are we gonna do that? None of us can fly,” Cliff said.
“I got it,” Thanatas declared before she raised her sword into the air and channeled necromantic energy into the bones in the area. The bones assembled themselves into four skeletal dragons, though some were missing some bones since some were lost over the years. They were still in good shape to allow the group to ride them after Fayt.
Since there were four dragons, each of them had to bear three riders. Once boarded, the dragons flapped their skeletal wings, which had the support of Thanatas’ magic, to allow them to lift. The group was soon airborne and chased after Fayt.
It wasn’t long before they noticed that the dragon they were chasing dropped Fayt into an area teeming with mini-dragons. The little ones looked ready to swarm Fayt and have him for their next meal.
As the small dragons closed in on their prey, Sophia landed between them and glared at the dragons. To even her own surprise, the little ones bowed their heads and respectfully backed away. Fayt finally had time to recover his wits after being abducted and dropped into a nest and rose from where he lay.
“Thanks for the save, Sophia. How did you make them back off, though?” Fayt asked.
“I’m not sure…I wanted to use some of my psychic power to force them to back off, though I didn’t expect them to do so as if I were their master.”
“You probably mixed some of your Zerg abilities with your psychic power to exert a sort of dominant aura on instinct,” Thanatas hypothesized as she glided down to the ground with her wings. The others landed with as much grace as they could manage which meant, in Roger’s case, a face plant into the ground.
“Huh,” Sophia hummed. “I wasn’t sure at first about mixing the two types of powers, but when I did it felt so right.” She also considered when she was in the previous shard’s memory, when she combined the strengths of the three races to create a force that her grandfather struggled to stop and realized that it made sense that the three worked best in harmony.
With the mini-dragons respectfully giving the group space, they were able to freely move around the area.
While looking around the area that was littered with bones, Sophia felt the presence of a shard nearby. She sensed it buried in the ground underneath a pile of bones. She suddenly remembered Melt’s words:
“Does the sacrifice of the winged messenger of the gods gaze at hope or despair?”
It made sense because the area appeared to be where victims were offered up as sacrifices to feed the mini-dragons.
After tossing aside the bones, Sophia dug through the dirt and soon uncovered the sixth shard. Since this wasn’t a good place to view the memory, she placed the shard in her pocket.
She could sense the seventh and final shard in the general area, but the feeling was faint and was likely in a cave somewhere and with it, a hint about her true form when her bracelet came undone.
Their walk brought them through a small cave and out onto a path that led to another cave that would lead them into the mountains. The cave was very dark and devoid of light.
“I’ll go first,” Fayt said.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Fayt,” Sophia warned.
“Don’t worry, what’s the worst that could happeAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Fayt said as he entered the cave. His screams grew distant before a heavy impact was heard below.
“You could fall into a hole,” Sophia said dryly.
“I hope he lost a limb when he fell,” Thanatas said, failing to hide her excitement. “It would give me a chance to experiment on him to see if I can find a way to bypass the body’s rejection mechanisms!” She nearly squealed as she said that.
Everyone but Sophia cringed when Thanatas said that, even Albel. Sophia chuckled as she shook her head. She figured by this point that her cousin loved making morbid jokes. “Let’s get down there and make sure he didn’t break anything on the way down.”
“Pretty sure his pride is broken after that,” Peppita said.
Given the choice of means to get to Fayt, some chose to jump into the hole while those like Sophia and Albel, who had no idea what he was getting into, took Thanatas’ bone transport into the cave, then there were Twilight and Lyra, who simply teleported to Fayt.
When the skeletal elevator emerged from its brief transit and the cage opened, Albel had to run to a corner and dump his lunch on the cave wall.
Fayt had to be looked at for injuries, but was relieved that only his pride was hurt after that fall.
The group explored the cavern and encountered a red variation of the aquaregia, who were nowhere near as tough as the green or yellow variations. They also encountered more berserkers who wore purple clothes.
On the way out of the cave, the group heard a dragon’s roar nearby and took their battle stances…
…only for a baby dragon to emerge from around a corner.
The baby dragon had pink scales and a white underbelly. Its horns and claws were yellow. The sight of the creature reminded Twilight of the old days when Spike was a baby.
“A baby dragon?” Fayt asked.
As the baby dragon walked away, Thanatas followed after it. “He wants us to follow him.” The group did so and found an exit to the cave. The baby dragon chirped something that nobody but Thanatas could understand for some reason. “He says that if we want to speak to his lord, we need to invoke sounds that appeal to their emotions. Somewhere in the cave we’re in is a door that will take us to the ruins where some evil people lived.”
“How can you understand what they say?” Nel asked.
“Depending on how things go, you may find out.”
“Let’s keep looking,” Sophia said.
The group left the cave and explored more of the mountain pass. As they explored, they found a run down workshop and a robed woman walking around it mumbling about something. As they approached her, Twilight discovered that the woman fit the profile of Misty Lear, the mysterious alchemist who refused to give her age.
The woman mumbled something about saving the soul of her daughter.
“I think I might be able to help with that,” Thanatas said. She then took out a clear orb with a dark, foggy outline and showed it to Misty. “This is a soulstone. It can be used to store the soul of anyone within. I’m sure with your talents, you might be able to use it to save your daughter.”
“In exchange for signing a contract to work with me on alchemical matters,” Twilight added.
Misty eagerly took the deal and signed the paperwork while Thanatas left the soulstone on a table in the workshop for her.
Their journey through the mountain pass eventually ended in a cave that reeked with necromantic energy. Looking inside, they spotted a lot of dragon bones within and a blue dragon zombie guarding it. Thanatas exerted her dominance over the zombie and ordered it to return to its rest. The undead beast complied and lowered itself into the ground, leaving the small cave open for exploration.
As they looked around, Nel eventually found what she was hoping to find, a small, hollow, tube-shaped bone. “With the right tools, we should be able to turn this into a musical instrument.”
“Oh, I get it,” Sophia said. “We can make a flute out of it and play sounds that reflect emotions.” The then smirked as she turned to Fayt. “Looks like those flute lessons you took in school are going to come in handy here.”
The group returned to the workshop and got to work carving the bone into an instrument. Misty Lear was too busy with her own work to notice anything around her. Once the work was complete, Fayt tried the flute. However, it produced no sound.
“Let's test it out with that baby dragon,” Cliff said. “I have a hunch that it’ll work in the cave.”
The group returned to the cave to find the baby dragon still standing near the exit. Fayt took out his flute again and tried playing it. The sounds it produced were melodic and beautiful. He then tried a number of different melodies. Depending on how he played them, the baby dragon’s expression changed to match the sounds played. It went from happy, to playful, to sad, to angry. He then nodded, chirped something, then left the cave.
“He said you’re ready to open the doors in the evil ruins. My services are no longer required,” Thanatas translated.
After a few minutes of searching the cave, the group finally came across a relief of a dragon that looked cheerful. Remembering the baby dragon’s happy expression, Fayt played a happy melody in front of it. Once the cheerful sounds reverberated throughout the cave, the relief vanished, opening a way deeper into the mountains.
As they moved ever closer to the Marquis’ lair, Sophia felt anxiety, knowing that a number of things would be coming to an end soon: their time on Elicoor, her journey for the shards and answers, the time she had spent with the Elicoorians, and any hope she might have had of returning to a normal life.
And yet, she also had a foreboding sense that where some things ended, more, even greater dangers loomed over the horizon.