Chapter 480 - The Talk

Hey! The German translation of Hedge Wizard 1 launches today. My fiancee and her family are German so I've been quite excited about having this. Other than them, I don't have any reach to that audience so if you are a german reader any ratings/reviews would be very appreciated. Thanks!

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The Sky Isles consisted of seven core islands, the most central and populated being Ivra. Acalin had selected a different location for them to stay, however.

The streets bustled as they passed, altari vendors calling from bright awnings while rune-lit carts floated over stone paths. Children darted between stalls, approaching Hump in height, their hair flashing with elemental hues, and overhead skyships hummed as they came into dock. The air smelled of strange spices, smoke, and the river mist.

“Jartis is has the largest connection to Urandel,” he explained as they crossed the large rope bridge that connected the two islands. “It should be a simple matter for me to find us a sky ship that will take us the rest of the way.”

“How far is that?” Celaine asked.

“If the weather holds, two days. If we get caught in an essence storm and need to land, possibly a little longer.”

“We’re almost there then,” Bud said. “Good.”

“That’s the part you’re focusing on?” Hump asked. “Not the essence storm?”

“I don’t know what an essence storm is,” Bud said.

“Exactly!” he turned to Acalin. “What’s an essence storm.”

“You’re world doesn’t have them?”

“We have storms,” Hump said. “We even have storms rich in essence. For the most part, they all consist of wind and rain.”

“Interesting,” Karo said. “I had assumed you’re world was richer in essence than ours, considering what you have told us about the strength of your people. Perhaps not.”

“That’s related to the essence storms?” Hump asked.

Karo nodded. “The exact mechanism isn’t known, but when a surge of essence rises from the fires, it enriches the environment above. At a certain point, the fire essence mixes with the ambient essence up here and creates a storm. We do have rain too, only it’s essence water from essence become too dense.”

“It must be incredibly dense to rain essence water,” Dylan said. “I wonder if it would be possible to reproduce it with other types of essence.”

“Are you interested in this topic?” Karo asked.

Dylan gave him a smile. “This is my interest. Magic and nature. Finding ways to utilise essence for the benefit of the world beyond fighting monsters and war. From what I’ve seen so far, your people seem to have done a far better job than we have already.”

“We are still at the very beginning. Until last week, the thought of travelling to other worlds hadn’t even crossed my mind, but now…” Karo shook his head. “The possibilities seem endless. My dream is to reconnect the world. Not physically, of course, but through people. For all our magitech advancement, we have failed to solve the issue of long distance communication, nor detect the essence surges before they happen, and new dungeons. I seek to construct an array that is able to both detect and transmit essence.”

“Fascinating,” Dylan said. “My own desire is both completely different but rather similar in scale.”

“Oh?”

“Are you familiar with the Remnant Realm?” Dylan asked. When Karo shook his head, he continued. “It is a world that was destroyed through war, leaving everything desert and barren. The essence there is the sadest I have ever experienced. It feels like death. Its intent is lost and confused, and with every passing day, it decays even further. I want to restore it to what it once was. I want to bring life back to this dead world.”

“You humble me to compare the scale of our work,” Karo said with the shake of his head. “Restoring worlds is beyond even my dreams.”

“It is a dream to me too, for now,” Dylan said. “But it will be my life’s work if I live long enough to see it through. The glimpse into your technology you can provide may be just the clue I need.”

“Then you and I shall need to speak more on this!” Karo said. “I believe we will be good friends, Dylan. I have been away from likeminded people for too long.”

“What do you mean by that?” Tamira asked.

Karo stared at her, considering his words very carefully. “Studious.”

Hump snorted. Good choice, he thought.

***

The accommodation Acalin secured for them was far from the inn Hump expected, but rather a villa perched along the island’s edge. A clear river cut through the ground beside it, falling off the edge of the island where it meandred through the air toward the next island, its mist carried in the air nearby. Tall trees and stone walls wrapped the property, providing enough privacy that Hump no longer worried about keeping the altari disguise active every moment. Here, they could breathe.

Nisha joined them by flying up through the waterfall. She emerged, wings spread fully, momentarily blotting out the sun before swooping down onto the terrace, wings flaring before she touched the ground with the faintest scrape of claws on stone. Hump waited nervously for some cry of alarm, but it seemed she had gone unnoticed. Or perhaps the people here didn’t care. Flying creatures were a common presence here, riders arriving in the city on giant birds, drakes, and creatures Hump didn’t recognise. From a distance, Nisha would beldn in reasonably well.

Once they were settled, Hump gathered his party into the largest chamber of the villa—a spacious lounge with wide windows that opened onto the river view. It was a good place to get away from all the excitement and momentarily forget all that had happened to bring them here. The air was calm, the only sound was the rush of water, and Hump let Greater Disguise fall, fully relaxing for the first time since docking in the Sky Isles. The illusion peeled away, leaving them once more as themselves.

“That’s much better,” Emilia said, looking over them all. “It was strange being surrounded by so many unfamiliar faces.”

“Couldn’t agree me,” Dylan said. “But that was effective, Hump. Good work on that spell. I’m genuinely impressed you were able to pull that off over such a long period of time. You may have more talent for illusion magic than you think.”

Hump smiled. “I’m more than a little impressed with myself honestly. I didn’t expect those charms to hold so well.”

Bud leaned back in his chair, looking dwarfed by the furniture. “This feels strange though. I feel like a child at the adults table. Even the table is about half a foot higher than I’m used to.”

“I don’t want to hear that from you when my feet don’t touch the ground,” Hump snapped, kicking at the air beneath his chair for emphasis.

Bud let out a full belly laugh.

“What did you want to talk about?” Celaine asked.

Hump’s expression became more serious. “Before we continue with the pathfinders, I think it’s time we shared what we’ve pieced together—about this world, the altari, Loften, and what it means for where we go from here.”

“Why do you say it so ominously?” Bud asked.

“Dylan, you recognised it too, right?” Hump said, glancing at the druid.

Dylan held his eyes for a second before releasing a sigh. “The brand?”

Hump nodded.

“What about it?” Emilia asked.

“I believe that brand was created by Loften to siphon the strength of his followers to use for a different purpose,” Hump said. “It would explain why so few altari achieve Soul Manifestation despite how rich the essence of this world is.”

Bud’s eyes were dark. “Why would you think that? You always assume the worst in the gods, Hump. How did you even jump to this?”

“Because it’s remarkably similar to something else,” Hump said, struggling to keep the irritation from his voice. “It is said that Loften created warlocks to be weapons for the gods. Chosen are also marked by a brand upon their soul, though we call them circles and blessings. It’s hard not to see the similarities.”

There was a long pause before Bud said, “I see.”

“That’s it?” Hump said. “No anti-blasphemous outburst?”

“No,” Bud said firmly. “I understand why you need to bring this up, as difficult as it is to hear. I won’t be as stubborn as I was before. The fact is, I can no longer argue that we have been raised on half-truths. The farther we travel our path, the more those truths seem to unravel. Ignoring such think is not a mark of my faith but stupidity. Though I should make clear that I don’t see it all as cynically as you do. Even if the gods have hidden things, I trust that it was for the right reasons.”

Hump nodded. “I can respect that. Honestly, I want you to be right. We have too many enemies already. Our enemies include an army of warlocks of whom we recently killed their leader, a ninth circle traitor Chosen that could be anywhere in this world or another at this point, Baelkor, the servant of an ancient god, and now we’re trapped in a world held together by the power of an exiled god of the Pantheon. What we need now more than ever is allies. Allies and information. We need to do more than survive. The decisions we make now could have repercussions in this world and our own.”

 “That’s a lot of words, but what decision do you want us to make?” Celaine said with a shrug. “So what if Loften is branding his followers? We can’t do anything about it.”

“Actually, we can,” Hump said. “Loften is exiled from the Pantheon by his own words. I want to get us all home, but seeing the brands has left me with doubts. Let’s say I’m right and Loften created warlocks, forged the chains with which Chosen are bound—” Hump held up a hand to silence Bud before he could speak. “—hypothetically. And now he binds his followers in this world. To put it simply, I’m concerned we could be trying to set free an evil god rather than a good god. I’m sure there are some shades of grey in there but I’d really rather we skew towards freeing good gods.”

Emilia leaned forward on the table, resting her chin in her palms. “It’s impossible to make a judgement right now, isn’t it?”

“Feels a bit like that,” Hump said. “And the stakes are high enough that I’m terrified of what happens if we make the wrong one.”

“You don’t hunt in unfamiliar terrain,” Celaine said. “Especially not in the Fallen Lands. You know your prey, know your weapon, and know your pack. Right now, we have two of those three, which I think leaves us in a fairly good position.”

“What do you do to make up for the latter?” Hump asked.

“Two choices really,” Celaine said. “Go ahead with the hunt, which of course is sometimes necessary, like when we went into that acidic dungeon or went after the lich queen. Both times I almost died. Or we take our time learning what we can. In this case, speak with Acalin and his party, meet with the high priests, learn more about this world.”

“Loften said he would speak with us again too,” Emilia added. “We should prepare some questions. I want to know why he was exiled for a start, and what the reasoning behind branding his followers. It’s possible he requires their strength to hold the world together, in which case, I completely understand.”

“That’s a good point,” Hump said.

“The technology of this world is far more advanced than I expected too,” Dylan said. “We may be able to discover another way for us to get home.”

“Exactly!” Emilia nodded enthusiastically. “We have options. I know you’re looking at this as a desperate situation, Hump, but the Twelve Seals are already destroyed. The veil is open. The warlocks are far, far away and not our problem. Godfrey is hopefully stuck out beyond the veil still, or on another world. The point is, you are talking about the stakes being high but for the first time we have some breathing room. We can take our time and figure this out without worrying about any cities exploding.”

“This is an opportunity for us to reflect on our growth too,” Bud said. “We’ve seen more combat in the last few months than the rest of our lives combined. We’ve advanced more than anyone should in such a short time, and no doubt that’s left some holes in our foundations.”

“What about our friends?” Hump said. “Lorissa doesn’t know Dylan’s alive. I promised Mav I’d save his sister. Vivi will think we’re dead too. And there’s still a war to win—the battle for the stronghold in the Remnant Realm could still be ongoing. The Path to Heaven is open and the warlocks want it. There are things that need doing.”

“It’s sad,” Dylan said softly. “And I hate not being there for everyone. I hate leaving Lorissa without answers, and making my master worry, and leaving our friends to fight for themselves, but what else can we do? Taking our time, figuring things out, and focusing on our own growth is what’s most important now.”

Hump rubbed a hand over his face. He knew they were right, but he hated the lack of control. There was no telling how soon the warlocks might reach the Path to Heaven, or what lay at the end of it.

“I know how you feel, Hump,” Bud said. “I feel it too. I think we’ve grown so used to being pulled toward the enemy that now that the way forward is unclear it’s like we’ve stagnated. While the warlocks make progress toward their goals—toward the downfall of our people—we’re here enjoying a luxurious villa in a foreign world.”

Hump stared at his friend and sighed. “Yeah. That’s about right.”

Bud smiled. “Don’t forget, that despite all our progress, we’re still small fish in a very big lake.”

“A lake that has connected to a bunch of other lakes now that the veil is open,” Dylan added.

Bud nodded. “Point is, there are far more powerful people than us working toward stopping the warlock plan. We need to trust them for now and focus on what we can do.”

Celaine leaned her shoulder against Hump’s. “You see what you’ve done? You’re making Bud be the calm and patient one in the face of evil. That’s never a good sign.”

Hump snorted. The warmth was comforting. “Turns out he’s pretty good at it.” He met Bud’s eyes, then everyone elses. “Thank you. I was overthinking things. We don’t need to make any decisions now, do we?”

“No,” Emilia said. “And it’s not like things would go according to plan if we did anyway. Nothing ever does. But for now, we stick with our objective. Meet the high priest that Loften spoke of. Hear him out. That’s a good place to start planning a little further.”

“Agreed,” Hump said.

“What if the people that set Acalin up try to cause more trouble?” Dylan asked. “They seem like nice people. I’d hate to see them suffer.”

“That’s easy.” Hump shrugged. “Sounds like there are very few silver rankers in this world, or at least around Urandel. If someone tries anything, we deal with it.”