Chapter 98: Chapter 98

It was a familiar feeling at this point. Falling off a cliff, legs flailing, arms waving, heart lurching as air rushed past my body, drowning my ears with noise and fear. At least this time I was accompanied by a never-ending cascade of ashen gravel and rocks. You know, to spice up the free fall.

My lungs were on fire. From exhaustion or sharp particles, I wasn’t sure. Coughing like crazy, I twisted my body along to shield my front and face from the debris. I tried to arc back towards the cliff, but my body was pushed around by the falling earth. Luckily, the chaos and pain didn’t make me completely stupid, and I used earth magic to shield my body properly. I needed magic hands to pull myself close to the mountainside, and managed to hit a couple of footholds with some effort. I raced down the mountain, slowly reducing my momentum, before hanging off the side with my hands, gasping wildly for air.

I had to splash my head with water magic. To wash off the debris, cool off my emotions, and remind myself I could not afford to rest. Droplets laced with ash dripped off my eyelashes, plummeting to the clouds below like hail. I ignored my screaming body and forced my muscles to push my upper body off the incline. Poised like an Olympic runner, I began my mad dash up the mountainside. I was burning through my magical energy by using so much balance magic. But I didn’t care. So what if I couldn’t fight Noel once I reached the top? I’d heard what she said. I knew what she meant. I needed to get up there, fast.

I reached the lip of the mountainside still running. I tripped on the edge and rolled over the meadow, tufts of grass and disturbed earth rubbing on my body like roll-on deodorant. I ended up like a starfish in the middle of our battlefield. I grit my teeth, ignoring my body’s cries for rest, and sat up by pulling myself from the elbows. My eyes darted around the ruined landscape until they came to rest on the dark mountainside where I’d last seen Noel.

The mountainside had collapsed onto the meadow like a tidal wave, spewing its dark rock and gravel in a line straight to the edge. It must have taken Noel a great deal of energy to make sure the rocks went so far. Judging by the lack of a pile of rocks right where Noel had been sitting, I knew she was fine. She’d protected her body, which meant she’d been preparing this for about as long as I’d been talking to her.

I cursed under my breath. Noel was nowhere to be seen. There were no footprints, no tattered bits of clothes, or any other markings that I could make out from this distance. I remembered the way she had mouthed goodbye, cursed myself for not knocking her out cold and tying her up or something, and finally let my body recede into the darkness that was beckoning to me so invitingly.

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I awoke staring at an open, empty, nighttime sky. Neither the moon nor the red star were up, and the stars that were sprinkled all over looked muted and dull. As if they were covered in a thin film or cloth. My body was aching all over, but I didn’t feel as fatigued as before. My magical energy was back up to a reasonable level, and my mind was much calmer now as well.

I decided to make the journey down the mountain the old fashioned way. Climbing down one limb at a time was less daunting now that I had my balance magic to rely on. Going through the motions felt therapeutic, in a way. The best part was, it still required my undivided attention, so my thoughts didn’t wander towards Noel, her words, her actions, and my worries for her.

I left the mountain range known as the ‘roof of the world’ while the world was still dark and on the cusp of the storm that had been shaping up for the past while. When the first drops of rain fell on my shoulders, I didn’t stop to seek shelter or to make a makeshift umbrella. I ignored the rain and kept walking on.

The rain made the marshes even marshier. The water was higher, and more putrid. The earth was soggier and splotchier. The trees, the grass, the strange flora and fauna, all felt swampier and more bogged down. I waded through the murky waters, warding off flocks of insects with my pointless and constantly extinguished wooden torch. I managed to catch some fish, though, so at least I had something to look forward to once I left the marshes.

Dawn still hadn’t broken by the time I stepped onto solid land. Although, the rain had apparently followed me here, turning the solid land mushy and muddy even as I tried to walk through it. At this point, I was soaked to my bones, and almost regretting my decision not to wait out the storm. My moccasins were holding up, although my feet were well and truly drenched by now. I ate my fish and rested again.

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Water streamed down my face. I trudged through the last leg of my journey, until I could make out the strange hill on top of which the ancient humans had decided to build their temple. I didn’t think anyone would be keeping watch from the hill in the rain, but I didn’t try to hide myself either. My light magic was useless in these overcast conditions, so I couldn’t even disguise myself. Let the humans see their deified elf hauling half his weight in mud, I figured. What better way to convince them I was just as pathetically mortal as them.

I wasn’t worried that Noel had come back here to kill off all the humans, like she had previously threatened to do. Noel had realized that the best target for her revenge were the immortals. Specifically, the God or Immortal of Evil, and the Immortal of Madness. The humans would be safe, at least for now.

As I approached the stone guardians that sat on either side of the entrance to Bek Tepe, I noticed some movement within the rain. Soon, a couple of men approached me, one armed with a copper dagger, the other wielding a flint-tipped spear. Apparently, the humans had not let the rain get in the way of their duties. The two men approached me warily, at first, before almost falling over themselves trying to ingratiate me once they came up close.

They followed me up the path all the way to the main Bek Tepe complex. Many humans were taking shelter under statues, walls, and other sturdy pieces of stone. The monster-hide tents were not very useful in the rain, although I was sure I could help them fix that with some brain-tanning.

Before elder Kezler could panic about Kelser, I told him he was safe and that I had returned to get some help retrieving him. I was tired as hell and did not trust myself to bring him back on my own. We gathered a small party of hunters, and despite my fatigue, I forced myself to go back for the red-haired little boy.

I avoided all questions about the journey, especially ones about Noel. I promised I would tell the human tribesmen all the details once I got back, and told the hunting party that was accompanying me, that I would like to be left alone. It wasn’t hard to get them to respect my wishes, so we managed to make it all the way back to the ‘roof of the world’ in relative silence.

The storm had not relented at all over the past few days. Many paths and riverbeds were now flooding, making most of my journey feel as mushy and mucky as the marshes. The marshes had flooded over as well, which meant we actually had to circle around for quite a distance to find a path through it.

Eventually, I came back to the mountain that housed the remains of the elfin Jora tribe, and looked around for good places to shelter from the rain. Sure enough, I found a nice hidden cave nearby, with a disheveled but healthy looking Kelser, sleeping soundly inside. I woke him up, asked him if he was alright, and made the hunters take care of him for a while.

I scaled up the mountain to the cave at the peak. As I stepped inside, I felt the air itself was lighter and less humid. Perhaps it was the altitude. I lit a torch.

The whole cave was empty. All the skulls and bones, the lifeless corpse of priest Oxi, everything was gone. I didn’t know if Noel had come back here and cleared everything out or if the immortals were involved again, but I didn’t care.

The storm clouds parted as I descended the mountain. The journey back to Bek Tepe was uneventful. I went to the tent the elders had given me and collapsed onto the bed of dried grass and leaves like a sack of unpeeled potatoes.