Chapter 415: What Brews in the Dark Beneath the World

In the starkness of a tunnel beneath the research castle, the petrifier prepared its attack.

It loomed above a growing horde of monsters within a vast chamber shrouded in darkness, and pressed into the walls on either side of it, were the dungeon cores granted by its master. And they shuddered, pouring their power into the walls around them. Monster after monster burst from the stone, each one as vicious as the last.

One core crafted bone-chargers; each hulking beast boiled from the walls and dropped to the cavern floor with a heavy thud. They milled about in shadow, waiting for a command that would drive them forward to flay the two usurpers who walked the surface above, unaware that their doom awaited beneath their feet.

The other dungeon core birthed a far more insidious creature: a spear-fly. Only a foot in length, and with their small size, seemed less deadly than their bone-thrasher kindred, but these Ravener-spawn were known for being the cause of the greatest number of mortal deaths over all the cycles of Thameland's endless battle. Insect-like, one of the smallest monsters in the Ravener’s arsenal, with two sets of kite-like wings, a tangle of spindling legs tipped with jagged blades for gripping prey, and a needle-sharp proboscis protruding half a foot in front of beady, white eyes.

They attacked at speed, aiming their rigid proboscises straight at any enemy in sight, piercing deep into living flesh—whether mortal or beast—then gripping their target with a cluster of barbed legs and sucking the blood and life-juices from their captured prey: a single spear-fly could drain a body of half its blood in less than sixty heartbeats.

A swarm?

A soldier, wizard—or even a Hero— would be a shrivelled, dessicated corpse in less than half the time.

Together with the bone-chargers, all affronts to the Ravener would be removed.

The brutish chargers would be first to erupt from the earth and grind all mortals in their path to paste. Spear-flies would come next, swarming from hidden tunnels and targeting spellcasters and archers, draining them dry. The Hunters were to take the role of attack dogs: sniffing out the usurpers for the petrifier to paralyse them with a beam from its eye-stalks, leaving them at its mercy, frozen where they stood.

It shuddered, overcome with pleasure at its next thought; seeing its master’s two enemies in its mind's eye, raked by the ray from its central eye, forever cast in stone. Though the two bold mortals would not agree, feeling the touch of its ray was a gift they would be fortunate to know in the brief time it took to eliminate their allies. None could be allowed to live. Perhaps, its new statues would be trophies it could present to the Ravener when the final usurper was found and eliminated…eliminated in the very same way.

When this phase of its master's needs were met, it would bury itself, secreted away in the cool muck, waiting to see if new usurpers would surface or if the time had come to destroy itself. Those were its most favoured cycles: calm, peace, coolness and nothing more to do but admire its own art.

"Hurry," it commanded the dungeon cores. "We will need the armies quickly."

The black orbs shuddered beneath its command, silently shrieking. New monsters poured from the walls, but not without consequence. A pair of jagged cracks ruptured weakened stone, running from floor to ceiling, tremors spread through the cavern; web-like fissures had been forming along the dungeon cores' already weakened surfaces. Stressed from the vast amounts of power the Ravener had poured into their centres, and now with the petrifier pushing them beyond normal limits, it was only a matter of time before they crumbled beneath the strain.

No matter: in time the overload of power would have shattered their mana pathways, so better to use them up quickly and have the army ready before its preparations were detected by their foes up above. It was a necessary sacrifice. The petrifier's eye-stalks turned to narrow shafts the dungeon cores had begun forging: the orbs had crafted a dungeon and were constructing spiralling pathways with great care to take the army to the surface.

The spheres cautiously shifted stone, avoiding underground quakes and stifling mana surges that the mortals would detect. The petrifier feared little, but it also valued caution, there was no sense in risking its mission by losing the element of surprise. The narrow shafts gave its Hunters a strategic place where they could hide and use their heightened senses and mana perception to scout the mortal stronghold unseen.

They would search any surprisi—

"Leader," a Hunter's voice called from one of the shafts.

The petrifier's eye-stalks turned upward. "What is it?"

"We must shift direction," the Hunter growled. "We listened to the stone as you tasked us to do and heard odd sounds and detected powerful mana in the earth. And when we moved closer, we heard voices. Mortal voices: the enemy has tunnels below the surface, and our shafts will breach theirs if we keep digging in the same direction."

Six of the petrifier’s eye-stalks twitched, but kept focus on the Hunter, the fourth pair turned to the ceiling. It saw nothing but unbroken stone. It tried to imagine how close the enemy's tunnels could be. "Are the usurpers in those tunnels?"

"No," the Hunter growled. "They are elsewhere on the surface."

"Then—"

"There's more, leader."

The petrifier's eye-stalks twitched in irritation. More complications? "What is it now?"

"There are other chambers in the stone and earth between us and the tunnels, but these do not have the stink of mortals. Some of our shafts have broken through to them." The Hunter's claws flexed. “Inside we found strange small creatures that looked like balls of blue flame and made thin, high noises like rodents. They had much mana and showed us no fear."

The petrifier searched its memories, recalling vague images of creatures that looked like blue flames. But, they were harmless: they did not help mortals, nor did they interfere with Ravener-spawn unless pressed first.

Considering its next move, the petrifier reared up to its full height. "I will close off the shafts that lead to those chambers. Do not interfere with the blue-flame creatures. If they are provoked, they could be troublesome. As for the enemy's tunnels…I will move all of our shafts around them, but the mortals in those passages could still reinforce the usurpers’ base. So. This is what we do."

"It's unnatural. Too quiet," a grey-bearded dwarven engineer grumbled. "What the hell is the point of tunnel-building when you can't hear the echo of a pickaxe on stone?"

"The point is to actually build the tunnel, you old codger." A younger one glared at him. "If we only used pickaxes, we'd be down here for ten years and still not close to being done. Earth magic gets things done in hours that’d take picks weeks to do. Just be thankful we've got so many wizards to work with."

"Hrmph!" the older dwarf snorted. "That's the problem with you youngsters: getting too lazy relying on fancy shiny lights. You'd all be bloody helpless without wizards and the like to help you."

He shook his head and marched off to oversee the wizards heating the stone and soil. "Oi, watch it. You don't want to melt it too fast or you'll bury us in mud!"

Several of the fire mages—including Tyris Goldtooth—looked at each other. There was no need for words. The old engineer's younger companions chuckled and turned toward the end of the tunnel, discussing the next steps. Ahead of them, Prince Khalik and another dozen earth mages were shaping the soil and stone to tunnel deep through the underground. In miles beyond the shifting wall of rock and earth, another team of mages and engineers were burrowing toward them from a distant watchtower. The two teams would meet at a midpoint, completing one of the tunnels leading from the research castle.

At first, it had been fascinating watching the process: tons of stone, earth and clay flowing like water to form the hardened ceiling, walls, and tunnel floor; the dwarven engineers using advanced levels and instruments to monitor the tunnel's slope, direction, and grading; the fire mages’ flames softened the earth around them and kept everyone warm beneath the wintery landscape above.

There was even a 'navigator' holding several stone tablets on which a wealth of underground maps were etched: some indicated veins of minerals, others places where sinkholes might form, and still others revealed blue cap burrows the wizards had promised to leave undisturbed.

All in all, it was a wondrous site...

...for the first hour.

But now, Theresa was bored.

And she wasn't alone.

Thundar yawned beside her, leaning against a wall. "Never thought I'd be wishing for a monster attack."

"I hear you," the huntress agreed. "It gets a little monotonous, doesn't it?"

"Yeah," the minotaur peered at Prince Khalik. "Even our friend looks bored, and he's actually got something to do."

A glance at the prince revealed a slightly distant expression on his face, like he was daydreaming of things that weren't rock and stone.

'Probably about things involving 'leaves' and 'trees',' Theresa thought a little wickedly. 'Can't blame him, though.'

She glanced down the tunnel at their backs which she and a group of warriors and mages were guarding. Darkness lay in their wake, broken by forceballs floating at twenty foot intervals along the tunnel, banishing most of the darkness, reducing it to merely shadows. She listened for any sounds approaching from behind, but...there'd been nothing—suspicious or otherwise—for hours.

There'd been nothing in all the days they'd been digging down here. She and Thundar had taken to calling it light duty. But light duty often meant boring duty.

"Anyone bring a deck of cards?" Thundar asked. "Grimloch?"

A loud snore came from where the sharkman was leaning against another wall with his arms crossed. Eerily, his black, doll-like eyes were still open even though he was clearly fast asleep.

"Well," Theresa said, looking at Brutus asleep near the sharkman. "There goes that idea."

"Yeah, no meat and no fighting makes Grimloch a dull boy, I guess," Hogarth said from his seat against the wall. Svenia was nearby, sharpening her weapons and polishing her armour.

"These quiet times are good for making sure your equipment's in good order," she chided Hogarth. "Lady von Anmut would be disappointed that you're not using your time productively."

"Ah, leave me alone, Svenia," Hogarth snorted. "I polished every single piece of my kit to mirror shine last evening." He held up his feet. "You see these boots? I could use them as a mirror to shave if I wanted to. Lady von Anmut could even use them as a mirror to put on her lip colour."

Svenia rolled her eyes, jerking her thumb at the soldier. "Don't follow his example, kids."

"I dunno," Theresa said. "The last thing I want to think about is weapons right now."

She glared balefully at her great-grandfather's blades. If any progress had been made with them...well, it was a secret to her. Every day she'd tried to remove her preconceptions about them and see them for what they actually were. And every day they’d remained cold, lifeless steel with no sign of sudden magical or divine powers.

At this point, she needed a break. She'd think about looking at the two swords from another angle in the new year. If a month passed and she couldn't figure anything else out...then it might be time to admit that maybe there was nothing special about them anymore, and look for new weapons.

It'd hurt to put them aside, but if she had to, they’d be given a place of honour in her room. Perhaps, that was where they belonged, anyw—

She paused.

What was that?

She strained her hearing, cocking her ear toward the full length of the tunnel.

"Hey, you missed a spot," Svenia pointed at one of Hogarth's boots. That bit there looks like bird shit.

"It's just a bit of extra polish," Hogarth shrugged.

"That doesn't make any sense," Svenia said.

"Neither does bird shit, it's bloody winter."

"Hey, maybe it's from Najyah."

An angry shriek echoed through the tunnel as the large eagle glared at them. Khalik's familiar perched on the edge of a large cart where the team had stored precious metals, gems or anything else they'd pulled from the rock as they magically warped their way through the earth.

"No offence." The blonde woman held up her hands to the bird. "I just meant—"

"Shh," Theresa said. "Quiet for a moment."

The other guards quickly fell silent, with all signs of lethargy fading.

"What is it?" Thundar asked. "Your ears are a hell of a lot better than any of ours, except maybe Grimloch’s.”

"It's...I thought I heard something." Theresa placed her hands on her blades and slowly crept down the tunnel.

Her eyes cut through the shadows...but she saw nothing. The hairs on the back of her neck began to rise as she remembered the invisible marauders that had lurked deep in Crymlyn Swamp. Closing her eyes, she cocked her head and held her breath, trying to listen above the dwarven engineers' calls and the grind of rock and earth flowing to reinforce the sides of the lengthening tunnel.

She could have sworn she heard a sound coming from the tunnel wall. Something like a shift in stone.

But now, there was nothing.

"I think the boredom's driving me a little crazy," she said. "I'm hearing things now."

"Ugh, don't say that," Thundar said. "Now there'll definitely be something out there waiting to kill us. Enh, well at least it'd be a quicker death than from all this boredom."

"Yeah..." she said, peering back down the tunnel. "Yeah, it's probably nothing."

Deep within the earth, Gwyllain's eyes went wide as he stepped into the dark cavern.

Ahead of him, the blue caps were swarming about like angry bees.

"What has all of you worked up, I wonder?" he asked.

His heart sank.

He had a bad feeling this was going to be just like the windmill incident.