Chương 57: Shadows of Jeruem

It was 7: 00 in the morning when I woke. The sun greeted me with golden warmth I had missed dearly. No clouds marred the sky. I looked upward, letting the light filter through the leaves around our small encampment and chase away the last shadows of yesterday. I stretched, feeling the pleasant ache of travel in my recovered muscles. Then I focused my Heart Flame into my arms, testing their limits anew. it had turned out that i can use ninety percent of my usual strength.

The charcoal tone had faded back to my normal fair skin, that i so much prefer. I was indeed deeply thankful, I had not missed that dark, burned look at all. The healing cream and the soothing waters of the Rift Lake had worked wonders. My arms moved with far more freedom than before. The Rift Lake's minerals had accelerated everything. We ate breakfast in comfortable silence. Iskatot had prepared a simple but filling meal: dried meat, flatbread, and some of the sweet fruits we still carried.

After eating, we packed the carriage with care, relieved ourselves properly, and by 8: 42 we were back on the road, moving at our steady, cautious pace. The biome changed again after only twenty-one kilometers into our journey. The forest thinned, replaced by lush green grass dotted with white and yellow flowers that swayed gently in the breeze. The transition was gradual but striking. Sunlight poured freely onto the land. Clusters of delicate blooms filled the air with a sweet, natural fragrance.

This had to be the outskirts of Jeruem's lands. Yet tension lingered beneath the beauty.

"In one hundred fourteen kilometers," Iskatot said quietly, "we must leave the carriage behind. From there we go on foot. Too much noise is dangerous. No loud talking. No telepathic speech either they can hear it. We whisper only." When we reached that threshold, we left the carriage hidden and continued on foot. Iskatot air-walked ahead to scout, teaching us his signals with quick gestures meaning duck, dodge, or change direction.

He drilled the dangers of the Nightmare creatures into us again and again, like a strict teacher warning his students that one mistake could end their path. With the slow, careful tempo and constant training, we covered only forty-eight additional kilometers by the end of the day. Thirty-five kilometers remained. The ruined silhouette of the city was already visible on the horizon.

That night I slept well, my dreams filled with excitement about the Nibelungen and the treasures said to lie within Jeruem's Ancient City. Galer, however, barely rested his mind turning the same thoughts in a far more cautious, bleak direction. Iskatot slept the least of all, keeping watch over us. The next morning brought grey, thick clouds that closed off the sun. It was a darker start than yesterday, but it did not dampen our momentum.

We ate a heavy breakfast of dates and sweet fruits with no breaks once we entered the city. Small conversations passed between us: my expectations were bright and hopeful, Galer's were guarded and bleak, while Iskatot remained carefully neutral. After eight more kilometers on foot, the city finally stood before us in full view. It was broken everywhere. Vegetation had reclaimed almost every surface with vines, moss, and wild growth crawling over limestone walls and stone foundations.

Once-prosperous houses still showed traces of their former glory: sleek white stone accented with blue and copper details that spoke of wealth and craftsmanship long faded. No signs of life stirred within. Only silence and the slow creep of nature over the old ruins. We moved closer to the place of answers, our nerves stretched to the breaking point. The moment we slipped past the first ruined building on the outskirts of Jeruem, it appeared. The Nightmare came to view and It was far larger than I had imagined.

It floated through a collapsed wall of what must once have been a grand human dwelling. The creature simply drifted forward, its body phasing through solid stone as if the wall were nothing more than mist. A faint ripple spread across the ancient masonry where it passed, then faded. The building itself looked fake unreal. Iskatot's earlier warnings had not prepared us for this.

The creature stood roughly two-point-seven meters tall from the tip of its elongated head to the lowest trailing edge of its dark, mist-like lower body. There were no legs. Only a long, singular torso of living shadow-black as midnight oil mixed with deep amethyst, slowly twisting and flowing as it patrolled. Thin tendrils of purple-black vapor continuously bled off its form and dissolved into the air. But its head…

In Michaelanius' name, its head was the stuff of nightmares and matched her my coined term of name Nightmare all so more. The face was disturbingly human in structure, yet grotesquely stretched forward like the beak of a monstrous bird. Dark charcoal-grey skin held a faint metallic sheen. Two glowing amber eyes sat unnaturally far apart on that elongated skull, both locked upward toward the sky as it drifted along its patrol. We crouched low, hearts hammering.

Then slowly, unnaturally for some unknown reason to us the creature turned. Its head rotated in a way no living thing should be able to move. Our eyes met. For one frozen second it stared straight into me, as if peering into my very soul. I stayed perfectly still in my crouch, barely breathing. Galer suddenly grabbed me and yanked me backward into the nearest ruined building with desperate strength. The Nightmare remained frozen in place, still fixated on the exact spot where I had been crouching moments earlier.

Iskatot seized the opening.

"Move now that we have made contact, that by the way I have never seen it react like that before. We use this chance... now." We ran with our might. Deeper into the ruined heart of Jeruem we sprinted, hearts pounding, the image of those glowing amber eyes burned into our minds as a warning to ourselves even prepared you can still be caught. Weirdly, I felt it wasn't even looking at my face at the time while running looking back retrospectively. It was staring deeper all together straight into my pockets.

That single thought kept repeating in my head as we crouched ran in the open ruins. Then, one minute later, the Nightmare behind us screamed. The sound was hollow and pulsating, rolling across the area in waves that pressed against our chests. It knew we were here as it stopped looking at the position i was at. It started to rushed toward us... much far faster than any of us could run.

"Cellar!" Iskatot hissed, already air-walking just three meters above the ground, as all plans had fallen flat and we needed a new path. We dove into the broken building's basement. Galer clamped his hand over my hyper excited chest, forcing my heartbeat into a slow, regulated rhythm so the creature wouldn't sense us. We held our breath. Two minutes later it passed directly overhead twelve meters away. We could feel it. The air grew heavier, colder.

It was snooping, weighing every existence buried in the ruins like a hunter searching for hidden prey. Its wide, lipless mouth beneath the stretched beak was slightly parted, revealing needle-like teeth that shimmered coldly. In its right appendage it held that monstrous scythe elegantly curved, forged in impossible royal golden-silver that seemed to drink in what little light existed and reflect it back with unnatural luster. The Nightmare drifted right over us.

For twenty-four agonizing minutes it lingered, then finally continued onward, swaying with calm, almost priestly grace. Its golden-silver scythe trailed slightly behind, the tip barely scraping stone and leaving thin glowing lines that quickly faded. Even as it left, those amber eyes remained fixed again on the sky. We thought we were safe for a while, but as we turned to move again... only to freeze. Ten more Nightmares had appeared ahead of us. All identical. All terrifying. Sweat poured down my face.

This was the worst kind of fear, the kind that made you feel your own weakness, your complete inadequacy. These weren't even Emperor-level. The thought alone filled me with deeper dread on how we move in deeper with those and that many around. Galer lightly slapped my sweaty cheek, snapping me out of it. Iskatot motioned urgently for us to follow a different path. While dodging the patrolling horrors, we stumbled across twenty-nine freshly butchered mercenary corpses.

Their bodies were ravaged, skin torn open, items scattered around them. Whatever had killed them was no ordinary beast. We gave the site a wide berth. Galer activated his Animo reading eyes. His face twisted in pain almost immediately, since their Animo were so overwhelming, it felt like his brain was about to implode.

He forced himself to continue for a few moments, then staggered back, needing water and a short break to stop the damage on his brain and the short nosebleed he just received for scanning beyond his limits. When he recovered, he whispered, "One-point-seven kilometers ahead… there's a weak Animo signature. A man. Alive. Inside a building not far from us." Iskatot's expression darkened. He clearly didn't want more "baggage to walk with in such dangerous place." We still needed answers about the fresh corpses.

Meeting the man could give us valuable information or at least help us navigate the dangers ahead with new perspective. After a brief, silent discussion, we decided to approach. We moved slowly and warily toward the building. Its roof had caved in long ago, leaving broken marble columns and scattered stone debris. In the shadows against a shattered wall sat the man. He looked around thirty-nine, lean and tough, with a face hardened by wind and long travel.

Sharp analytical eyes sat beneath fine lines, and a trimmed salt-and-pepper beard covered his jaw. His deep pale skin glistened with sweat. He wore a heavy knee-length tunic of dark-teal waxed wool reinforced with thick leather patches. A complex harness of treated leather straps crossed his chest, holding coils of hemp rope and small iron picks. Sturdy hemp trousers disappeared into heavy calf-high ox-hide boots fitted with ironcoal cleats.

But the strangest thing was strapped across his chest: several narrow, hollow cylinders made of polished translucent horn. Inside each one swirled a murky amber liquid that shifted with his breathing. A notched brass plunger protruded from the top, sealed with treated leather, while the bottom ended in an impossibly thin, sharp silver needle that glinted coldly. I had never seen anything like it in all my travels across the Orbis Terrarum. Galer and Iskatot stared with the same open curiosity.

Galer's hand moved before anyone could stop him. The moment his fingers neared one of the strange cylinders, the man's eyes snapped open. He looked perplexed for half a second, then his hands flew toward his harnessed tools hidden on him. But he froze when he properly registered us: a sun-charged warrior, a pale noble-looking man, and a dark-red-haired teenage boy. Slowly, he lowered his hands and stood.

"I am Aemilius Tietäjä," he said, voice smooth but guarded, "wandering scholar from the northern Snow Nation of Runsor." Sweat ran down his nose. He harrumphed, pulled a handkerchief from his pouch, and dabbed his face. Then, with an arrogant little laugh that echoed too loudly in the ruins, he continued:"You must also be Nibelungen enthusiasts seeking the Truth. That is what I presume, looking at you lot?" His eyes flicked over each of us intensely, analyzing.

"And from the entrance you took… you must have seen my group's rather surprising demise. They killed each other over coin that they found, can you believe it?" He let the words hang, still studying our faces.

"Let us go somewhere safer," he said suddenly, clapping his hands together.

"I was heading there anyway. Perfect timing, I seem to have found new adventure enthusiasts in these dire, dark times. Hohoh!" We followed him, wary, but with little choice into a deep underground tunnel he claimed to have discovered recently before he took a break. As we walked, Aemilius began asking questions. Who we were. How much we knew about Jeruem. What we had heard about the "Nazarai, that plagued this ruin with their presence." And at that time, an uneasy feeling settled in my gut.

Something about this man felt… off.