Chương 24: Investigative delves

"Mommy, what are you doing?" Serel asked as she came closer, Howl padding quietly at her side. Vera looked up from her sketch, slipping the charcoal back into her Vaultring. It looked like Serel had finally tired of playing queen.

"I'm just drawing something simple," she said, holding out the parchment. The girl scooted closer and craned her neck, peering at the sketch of herself on the throne with a wide smile, Howl seated loyally before her.

"Wooow…" she breathed it out, staring. Then her eyes darted up.

"Mommy, you're amazing! You can draw anything!"

"Well, not quite anything. And this is pretty rough even for a sketch. But I'll admit—it turned out better than I expected." Serel hardly seemed to hear her. She touched the edge of the parchment lightly with her hand.

"Mommy, can I…" She hesitated.

"Can I have this…?"

"Sure," Vera said.

"It's yours." She expected excitement, but instead Serel stayed quiet a moment longer, tracing one tiny finger along the drawing of herself with obvious care. Charcoal dust darkened the tip of her finger. Vera watched her, not quite sure what thoughts were flickering through the girl's head. While Serel focused on the sketch, Vera also pulled a cloth Caldrin had packed for them, dampened it with a flask of water, and wiped her own hands clean.

"Here," she said eventually, pulling the parchment slightly back.

"I'll keep it safe for you, and you can look at it more later." After a small pause, Serel let go of it. Vera stored it in the Vaultring, then took the girl's hand and cleaned the charcoal from her finger before she could smear it across her clothes or face.

"Mommy…" Serel asked as Vera wiped her hand.

"How are you so good at everything?" Vera blinked.

"…I'm not, really."

"But you are!" She let go of the girl's hand, tucking the cloth away and rubbing the back of her neck.

"I'm decent at some things and pretty good at others, sure. But far from everything. Everyone has things they're good at, and things they're not."

"Even me?"

"Ehm…" Vera smiled faintly.

"Yeah, even you. But that's not a bad thing. In fact, it's great. It means you get to practice, and maybe even specialize. The things you're not good at now can become the things you excel at later, if you put in some time."

"Have you practiced much, Mommy?"

"I have. Lots. Lots and lots." She fell silent.

"…If we're talking drawing, I started when I was your age. That, and music. But I stopped a few years back." It might have been her imagination, but she thought Serel's voice dipped with a shade of concern.

"Why did you stop?" Vera considered her for a moment, then reached out to ruffle her hair.

"Life got in the way. It happens." Serel ducked under her hand with a squeak, raising her arms.

"Stop it, Mommy!" Vera chuckled.

"Alright, alright. Sorry. But, do you still want me to teach you how to draw?" That brought some excitement back to the girl's face. Serel nodded hard.

"Mmm!"

"Then we can spend a bit of time on it before sleeping tonight. Speaking of which…" Vera glanced around the chamber, then down at her wrist. If she were Caldrin, this was where she could have gauged the time to look smart—or at least pretended to. Unfortunately, she was blind to it. By her guess, a couple of hours had passed since they'd come down here. It had been moving toward evening when they arrived, which meant night couldn't be far off. Or maybe it had already arrived.

She'd learned firsthand that she had a tendency to get caught up in exciting things in this world. Still, might be a good thing to get moving. If they didn't return, someone would eventually notice.

"I hope you've had fun, but it's about time we start heading back up," she said, turning back to Serel. She wondered if Serel would protest, but the girl just nodded.

"Okay!"

"Before that, though, there's something I want to check." Vera studied her for a few seconds.

"…Do you think you'll be alright with Howlie for a few minutes?" Serel gave her a confused look before nodding again.

"Mmm. I will."

"Great." Vera brought out Stillwake and used Mark of Hollow Reach, bringing Serel and Howl back into the first chamber they'd arrived in. She turned to the wolf.

"Continue keeping an eye on her, okay? I'll be back soon." Howl dipped its head in acknowledgment. Vera closed her eyes. Mark of the Stillbound Veil. Like the previous time she'd used this, Resonance pulsed out in a widening wave, expelling throughout the chambers and walls. She pushed harder, further, dozens upon dozens of presences filling her mind as the Mark explored the Marrowvaul, until she found the same thing that had stuck out to her before.

Fixing it in her mind, and the location where it was, she swept Stillwake through the air again, burning through a not insignificant amount of Resonance. Mark of Hollow Reach. She stepped through the tear that formed, and a momentary dim darkness swallowed her. The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Mark of Ember Sight. The world brightened. Her vision lit with a warm ember glow, details sharpening in smoldering hues of red and orange.

Shadows deepened into crisp lines, the world tinged as if by fading coals. She stood in a large, hollowed-out expanse of stone, lined with channels of black bone that arched like broken wings through the walls. The channels converged on a massive basin in the center. The pit was wide and shallow, filled with some sort of weakly shimmering liquid that caught the ember glow of her vision and reflected it like oil. She could feel a well source of Resonance stirring within, but it looked empty.

Figures surrounded the pit. Tall ones. Dozens—maybe more—of unmoving shapes standing in deliberate ranks along its rim and beyond. Their bodies were thin and long-limbed, built of mismatched shades of bone and dark resin. Some bore jagged protrusions, others jointed limbs bending at strange angles. A few seemed only half-formed, like statues abandoned mid-carving. Above, long cables of twisted matter dangled like roots, some connecting to the figures, others dipping into the pool. Vera could only stare.

What the hell was this? Her eyes swept across the silent shapes, trying to pin their appearances to something she recognized from the game, but nothing specific came to mind. And that pool… She frowned. The Resonance from the liquid was potent. More potent than almost anything she'd felt since arriving in this world. And yet… she somehow got the sense that it was drained. Like it had once been even greater, and only the dregs remained. More troubling, its nature was familiar to her. Very familiar.

It carried the same flavor as much of the ambient Resonance suffusing the Marrowvault—but sharper, more defined. To be even more specific, it was almost identical to the energy she'd felt bleeding from the Silent Votaries. This… probably wasn't good. Her eyes narrowed as movement flickered at the edge of her vision. From one of the figures. She stilled as a pair of silver-white eyes snapped across the chamber, locking with hers.

A whisper rolled out of it, thin and sibilant, like a voice carried through bone flutes. Dozens of heads turned toward her at once. … That probably wasn't good either. The chamber filled with that same whispering chorus, overlapping until it scraped like teeth across glass. Vera set her jaw. One of them moved. She was surprised by how fast it was. The thing hunched, limbs coiling unnaturally, then launched itself. In one bound, it cleared a quarter of the chamber, slamming down before her.

Its thick, gangly arms came crashing down with a quake, stone cracking beneath the blow. Vera had to leap back as fissures spread from the impact. It lunged after her—just as the rest began to stir. She slipped aside from another strike, gaze flicking to its arms. She noticed now that there were sigil-scars carved all over them, like her own. But where hers burned with Resonance, these were raw, cut into the flesh itself. Exactly as the Pale Reconciliation were known to do.

Another landed beside her with a bone-jarring thud, then two more. Four of them lunged at once. Binding Coil. Stillwake swept out in a spiraling arc, dragging her into a controlled spin. Wind howled around her, catching the creatures in a vortex that bent their strikes aside and shoved them back in staggered steps. Several more, mid-leap, were flung wide by the swirling force. Breakstep. Crescent Severance. She shot forward, chaining one form into the next.

Her halberd rose in an overhead swing, afterimages splitting into four crescent moons that converged as one upon the nearest foe. The strike tore through it—shearing off an arm, rending a deep crevice across its chest and shoulder, and carving half its neck away. But it didn't fall. The creature hissed a grinding whisper as it dragged itself forward. Mark of Ashen Slip. Her form blurred, velocity spiking as she vaulted past a hail of clawed limbs, another Breakstep snapping her a dozen paces back in the air.

Stillwake almost thrummed in her grip as she leveled it, watching the creatures' heads turn in eerie unison to follow her. They were tough. That had been a First Seal form, and far from a finishing move, but still more than enough to kill most things she'd encountered in this world. She didn't think these were quite at the level of the Hollowmaw Sentinels she'd faced, but they were definitely above Han, the woman she'd faced at Hollowstone Table. The question was what they were.

And why they were down here, so far beneath Marrowfen? A thunder of creaking bone filled the chamber as dozens of the creatures launched into the air at once, the mass of bodies surging toward her like a living storm. Vera tightened her grip on Stillwake, the halberd steady in her hands as she cut a pale glowing glyph. Mark of Hollowspike Cascade. A clean line of bone lances erupted upward, forming a wall that skewered a dozen of the leaping creatures.

Limbs flailed, torsos split, and resinous ichor splattered across the stone below in a macabre spray. Vera barely spared them a glance, focusing on those that slipped past. Hollowfall Sweep. Stillwake swept low, Resonance spilling into the ground. Gravity warped, and the creatures closing in were dragged down toward her sweep, slamming into the ground hard enough to rattle the chamber with wet cracks and shattering bone. Crescent Severance. Her halberd rose in another blazing overhead arc.

This time, more than a dozen crescents trailed the strike, crashing into the clustered mass. Rock split, flesh burst, and fragments flew in all directions, the things reduced to churned meat and shattered bone. Even then, some continued twitching. Cinders burned hot through her veins as she carved another glyph, this one burning a pattern into the air. Mark of Ember Flame. With a shudder of heat, a tornado of fire roared to life, devouring the creatures in a single heartbeat.

It raged for a single breathless second before collapsing inward, leaving drifting motes and scorched husks behind. She waited, scanning for more movement. When there was none, she turned her attention back to the impaled creatures still writhing against her Hollowspike Cascade. A small grimace crossed her face. That was the sort of sight that would have haunted her before. Stillwake carved more fiery glyphs. Mark of Ember Flame.

Three more infernal vortices howled into being, and when they vanished, the rest of the creatures were nothing but ash. Vera exhaled, lowering Stillwake to her side. Then she moved. Breakstep. A single step was enough to bring her to the edge of the shimmering pool at the heart of the chamber, staring into its depths. She had thought the Pale Reconciliation was gone. Snuffed out with their leader, his lord, and their grotesque rituals.

She didn't recognize whatever this pool was, but if that cult was tied to it, then it was bound to be bad. There was the possibility that it was some leftover from the first expansion, a relic of when they'd been active. But it didn't feel like that to her. It didn't feel dead. The Resonance within felt too… fresh. Too sharp. Like it had been active only recently. For what purpose, though? And did this mean that there were still cultists running around the city?

Judging from the potency of this pool, whoever was responsible for it wasn't some minor straggler. Whatever they were doing here, it was big. How they'd managed it without anyone noticing wasn't something Vera could even begin to answer. … What was she supposed to do about this, though? If she were Veralyth Mournvale—the player character—this would be the start of a questline. She'd dive in, fight through waves of cultists, save the city, maybe kill a raid boss at the end, and grab all the loot.

But this wasn't the game, and it was still up in the air just how much of her was 'Veralyth'. She also wasn't sure she was really qualified to go after a cult alone. The game had rails to follow—quest markers, clear objectives. Here, she had none of that. She was good at hitting things, sure, but she didn't even know how good she actually was yet. And that was most certainly not the same thing as having a plan. So… should she report this? That seemed like the responsible and reasonable thing to do.

But whoever she told would want answers about her, too, and that would make it harder for her to keep a low profile. Maybe the only option was to reveal herself completely, then. To stop hiding. But honestly, she didn't want to do that. Not yet. She stood there for a long moment, staring into the pool, thoughts circling. Finally, thinking about Serel, she came to something resembling a decision. Stillwake rose, tearing open a rift with the flicker of Hollow glyphs. Vera cast one last look at the pool.

Then she stepped through and let the chamber vanish behind her.