Chapter 443 (1/2)

Chapter 443

Chapter 441: Horns of Exeges

ARTHUR LEYWIN

The night was dark, the stars hidden behind thin clouds blowing down fro Mountains in the distance

We’d hurried through the city of Niruards had been posted at the descension portal e arrived; their deaths had been quick, but the fight had interrupted a conversation I’d been having with Sylvie Now, as we crept up the side of a tall tower that overlooked Sovereign Exeges’s palace, withto keepthe battle to come

“Who do you think the voice was, then, when you were in the aetherial in-between place?”

Still clad in the relic arht It would have been easier for her and Chul to fly, but they needed to suppress their natures as much as possible

“I’m still not sure,” she said quietly “You’ve seen my memories The physical aspect of it shi+fted…”

“But you think it could have been…your htsourselves over the short wall surrounding the flat roof of the sandstone tower

“I don’t know” She knelt at the opposite edge of the roof, looking down on the Sovereign’s palace with deep frown lines etched into her face “The shape was obviously a construct ofto do with the voice at all”

Her tale of drowning and being saved by an ahts for the entire journey froain soht from her story, but it only resulted in more confusion The fact that her aetheric aptitude had changed froe, but in a way, itallowed into the Relictombs, however, made less sense to either of us But it had been difficult to focus with the prospect of fighting a full-blooded basilisk loo only Sylvie and Chul withCaera and Ellie behind to recover frois was, of course, continuing to keep the protective shi+elds running in the second level of the Relicto my choice to do this without the Destruction Godrune Although I didn’t want it anywhere near Tessia’s body, I couldn’t pretend that facing Exeges wouldn’t have been a less concerning prospect if I had the power of Destruction in my back pocket

In truth, Sylvie’d had precious little tiely untested The half-phoenix had grown et Sylvie and I had kept our steady stream of conversation out loud so as not to exclude hihts turned inward and forward

I kne he must have felt; this would be his first true test outside the safety of the Hearth He’d trained against full-blooded asuras his entire life, but he’d never fought one to the death before In all, it left me less confident in the outcome than I’d have liked

And then, if we are successful, ill have to face Cecilia as well—the Legacy, and all her unknoer

Shaking off the thought, I took in the scene before us

Even in the dark, the palace was an iolden do palace wasn’t surrounded by a wall, but rather a ht the occasional star and h the clouds and reflected it like a emstone The city of Nir Mountains carving purple silhouettes in the distance

“Arthur…”

I focused on the palace, bringing myself back into the moment I realized inatures None at all”

Chul’s big hands gripped the top of the short wall that ran around the roof When he spoke, there was a razor’s edge in his voice “Perhaps this basilisk is not present Or he hides his signature Basilisks are all paranoid, or so I’ve been told”

Although I couldn’t entirely discount Chul’s thoughts, it didn’t n of this donature suppressed inside his own palace My ability to passively detect mana was only recently returned, and so I couldn’t be sure if a powerful basilisk would be strong enough to cohts and fears began to stah my mind as I tried to consider all the many possibilities

“Perhaps it is too uards, or even the people of the city?” Sylvie suggested “Aldir and Windsom have always kept the full force of their auras withdrahen in lesser lands”

“But I sense no guards, no servants He wouldn’t only keep unadorned soldiers around hies had little to fear frouards? Still, this wasn’t what I had expected, and I was sharply on edge

Chul went down on one knee, his bright orange eye shi+ning in the dark “You suspect a trap?” His fists crunched through the sandstone barrier,all three of us flinch “We should not have entrusted so e whisper

We watched in silence for severalbetween us, but the streets were quiet and there was no activity fros Finally, I accepted that there was only one way to get a better understanding of ere facing “Let’s go”

Leaping off the roof, I plunged toward the ground below By reinforcingnoiselessly

Sylvie and Chul drifted down behindonly a hint ofthe wall of a single-story building, then into the water gardens Bounding froh the water garden, which were all lit with softly glowing lighting artifacts I could tell where several guard posts were naturally integrated within the sprawling pools, tall grasses, banks of hedges, and carefully placed river stones But, as I’d seen froardens were e crawled across my skin, but I kept my course until we stood beneath the outer wall of the palace, near thearound the corner, I confir out into the open,I could see or sense that ht hint at an onlooker The densest concentration offroes within it, I could only assume it was some kind of barracks Most of the very few people we’d seen uards patrolling the city

Once sure that eren’t being observed, I slipped around the shadowy corner and darted to the brightly lit reen and inlaid with gold, silver, and jade, opened with a light push, noiseless on their well-htly lit, revealing a mosaic floor broken by ts of pillars Carefullythe walls No guards were present

I could sense Sylvie’s unease leaking through our connection Maybe it really is erona have withdrawn his Sovereigns, fearing soht happen?’ Sylvie asked as she and Chul followed ht, and some part of our plan was leaked’

I pushed the door shut behind us,ideas, each one less likely than the last There were too et more ansas to delve further inside

We crossed the entrance hall to a series of smaller doors that opened into a wide hallway that ran down the center of the palace According to Seris, ould find Sovereign Exeges’s throne roo a natures beyond the row of closed doors, I eased one open A weight pushed fro it open more quickly than I’d expected I stepped back, an aether blade in hand and aih, their ar the tile floor with a noise like a bell The ringing resounded through the silent palace for what felt like the length of a song

Chul, his huge weapon held ready in one hand, stepped cautiously forward until he was standing over the ar, he met my eye “Dead” With his other hand, he opened the door wider, revealing a dozen more bodies on the other side

I leaned down next to Chul and pressed uard’s neck Not only was there no pulse, but the flesh was as cold as the steel covering his body His skin was pale, and there was a haunted gauntness to what I could see of his face A quick inspection revealed noto be thorough, I rolled the body onto its side, but there were no wounds on the back either

“It’s the same for the rest,” Sylvie said softly as sheIt’s as if…”

“They just collapsed,” I finished

Each body was crus Their weapons weren’t even out of their sheaths Stranger, though, was the fact that they were devoid of purified ering around the up and down the hallway as if expecting to be attacked at any h the candle of their lifeforce has simply been snuffed out”

“Co the thick red carpet that ran down the center of the hallway There werea perfect kill cha for the scratch of boots on tile or the , but the only noise e et the hell out of here”

“The sooner the better,” Sylvie said under her breath “Soilded set of doors blocked the end of the hallway Holdingmy senses with aether, I listened at the door All was quiet beyond

I gave a nod to Chul, but as we reached for the door, the lighting artifacts at the far end of the hall flickered I whirled, an aether blade in my hand

No one was there, and I sensed no uide us and shi+eld us froht…” Chul mumbled under his breath like a prayer When it became clear that ere still alone, he cleared his throat and turned back to the door, looking at ether, we pushed, and theopen

‘What in the world…’ Sylvie thought, her wide-eyed gaze slowly tracking across the space beyond

We had reached the throne roorown, transforht Black iron arches swept froainst the golden doolds of the tile floor, carpets, and rugs The walls were covered in stained glass and woven tapestries, but I only took note of theue way, as I couldn’t focus on hout the rooht on one body in particular

Near the far end of the chaolden plinth A man was draped over the throne

I took a step toward the throne, then flinched and spun at a heavy ringing crack from behind

The head of Chul’s weapon was partially embedded in the shattered tiles at his feet His face had flushed a deep red “Who could have beaten us to the Sovereign?”

“And how did theycarefully between the corpses

Like before, these people all seemed to have simply dropped dead wherever they sat or stood

I crossed the throne rooes’s remains rested His skin was ashen and had a taut, sunken appearance as if it were pulled too tight over the bones beneath His open eyes stared blindly, the irises colorless He looked as if someone had drained all the blood and life from his body, but there was no wound anywhere, except…

To each side of his head, a slightly bloodied hole remained where someone had ripped the horns from his skull

“This must have happened recently” Sylvie had moved up to stand beside hastly re with Agrona’s soldiers and es if anyone else had discovered this yet”

“What does thisone of thethe limp form fall unceremoniously back to the floor

It means perhaps there is still tiht, careful to keepover to Sylvie Out loud, I said only, “I’m not sure yet It’s possible we have soure out who killed these people, we need to kno they died”

“It doesn’t look like the work of dragons…” Sylvie thought out loud, kneeling next to a body “Although, perhaps so next tothe head this way and that “Pah This death should have been mine” His hand ht his wrist

“Stop We need the corpse intact Taking out your anger on it won’t help anything”

Chul gritted his teeth “You are right But how do you intend to discover who is responsible for—”

Mana blazed intointo a solid barrier that enco quaked, collapsing a huge chunk of gold-plated stone A gale of freezing hipped through the opening, coiling into three smaller vortexes that wrapped around Sylvie, Chul, andthe wind, and h the broken ceiling, her gun

Tessia Cecilia

My jaws clenched as I held her gaze, staring deep into those turquoise eyes for any signs of the girl I had loved

Cecilia’s focus slipped away fro into a conten Exeges without even a scratch on you?”

“What?” I stared, taking aof her words “We didn't—”

Chul let out a cacophonous battle cry as he ripped through Cecilia’s spell and charged, his weapon leaving behind a trail of orange phoenix fire

Cecilia raised her hand, the wind-attributedeviant The vortexes burst hite light as dozens of lightning bolts ripped through e of inaction aroundfor the aether interwoven throughout the twin vortexes buffeting Sylvie and me, I ripped at the fabric of the spell It resisted I pushed harder, forcing out more of my own aether, and as Cecilia’s attention turned to Chul, her hold over the mana weakened The spell dissolved, and the cyclones athered a spell to counter Chul’s charge, I experienced a flash of cold realization: in her sternum, where her core had once been, now there was a void The hout her body, and even the atmosphere around her

She had no core