Chapter 267: 265 – Idola Custos Pt. 2

Zefaris had significantly truncated just how much her traits list had changed since she had last checked it, not out of a desire to deceive, but merely to convey the information she had intended to in an expeditious manner. She intended to share her new list, in full, as soon as reasonable, but that time was not now - the time, right now, was to go to town and have a nice time watching the statues march. And that was just what they did, much like a notable portion of the population.

Indeed, a noticeable crowd of the city’s youth, their parents or grandparents, and a minority of workmen who had gotten back to town by now had formed near the northern gate. The crowd, though large, was kept apart by militiamen, forming paths for the statues to tread. Some were intact, pristine even, wielding untarnished silver-gleaming weapons too large for any human to use effectively, even wearing armor attached directly onto their forms as if it had been melted to the stone. Many were so clean, it was as if they had just been sitting in a warehouse somewhere, hidden away until they were needed. Even among these walking statues, one could notice a hierarchy - the simplest-designed or least lifelike among them walked stiffly, in an automaton-like manner, with multiple nigh-identical statues occurring as if they had been made en-masse.

Meanwhile, others moved almost like real people, and within the eyes of these statues Zelsys saw a familiar lilac glow that she chose to leave unmentioned. These were those which differed statue to statue, clearly depicting specific figures - both heroic and villainous alike, both adorned with shiny armor plates over simple clothes and poppy flower crowns or bound by tarnished chains and sculpted eternally into torture devices and manacles, meticulously detailed noble clothes and jewelry visible in the stone. Even these punished statues, these which doubtlessly depicted the reviled feudalists which Willowdale’s founders once cast down, wielded centuries-old, yet pristine weapons.

The duo progressively made their way through the crowd towards and through the northern gate, Zel’s prodigious size and growing reputation affording relatively unimpeded passage. Indeed, the wall of stone bodies in the field was as impressive as she had expected it to, unflinchingly facing… In the direction of Ubul’s Tomb. As if they knew. The largest statue there among them, clearly having been broken apart in places and now held together with magic, stood with its right hand held in an awkward position, grasping for a now-absent sword. Zel questioned the guards about it, the eldest of whom said it used to have a sword, but that it was long gone.

Zef saw a shift in Zel’s countenance and immediately knew something was afoot, and the living bronze statue of a woman knew that she knew, waiting until they had made their way out of earshot to speak: “I still have the Sister’s sword.”

“Alright, where’s the catch?” Zef asked. ”You wouldn’t wait if your idea was to just pull it out of storage and give it to the statue.”

Grinning, Zel said, “You’ll see. Give me… Maybe fifteen minutes.”

Zefaris already wagered what her counterpart would do, but yielded to the suggestion regardless. After Zel walked some distance down the northward road to get away from the crowd and spent a short while stretching in an overly showy manner while continuously increasing the pace of her breathing, she rolled her shoulders and took off running at a speed rivaling a horse, trailing Fog the whole way.

---

She saw the turn coming, but knowing that she could neither turn that sharply at this speed nor run at full speed through corn, she forcefully turned on her heel and willingly threw herself into a skid, drifting across the impervious cobbles and onto the dirt road before she rocketed off straight ahead once more. Her first idea was to just go far enough to pass the horizon, but that was a little too far for the trip back, so using the cornfield and abandoned barn to block the sightline would work just as well.

When at last she reached that place, she heard the familiar thumping, which fell silent once more as she approached. Vaceran was still here, and so, not in the mood to contend with his cautious nature, she called out: “It’s Newman, don’t fucking jump on me or I’ll turn you into a human pretzel.”

“What do you want?” his labored voice came from within.

“Just a place out of sight,” she responded, stepping in to see the man standing wide-legged before a meter-wide log of solid oak, surrounded by splinters, the log whittled down to half its width in the middle. His pants were pulled up to his thighs and bound down, his shins covered in scars. No… Those weren’t scars.

Her eyes stuck to the spots where the outer layer of his skin was clearly stripped away, giving way to grey, petrified scar tissue that shifted with his movement like a solid plate attached to the muscle underneath. A remark slipped out before she could think: “That… Explains why you don’t need arms.”

“Yeah,” he gave a grim smile, tapping the petrified gash that split his hairline. “Turns out some of that magic seeped into my skull, just short of turning my brain to a rock.”

Returning to kicking the log, Zel observed for a few moments, seeing chips of grey stone fly off his leg and reveal what seemed like granite underneath. Even between labored breaths, he still spoke, as if he hadn’t been able to talk to someone about this for so long that even a relative stranger was god enough, on the sole basis that they shared the connection of martial arts.

“All that… Geomancy… Had to go somewhere…” he said between kicks before he stopped for a moment. “So, the man who saved me bottled it up, taught me to sip from the flask… My arms can’t wield a sword, so I’ll make a sword of myself.”

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