Into the Old

[Alistair]

Ashan 75, Arc 719

The Underway.

For a long time, he had strayed from the thought of stepping through its corridors - broken and wrought with destitute fragments of the old - for fear of the retribution his curiosity may behold upon his life outside.

But with all that had occurred of late, those feelings had since changed.

Alistair no longer cared much for the Quacian regime, nor their law and order nor their perspective. They had no control over the titanic monstrosity of their fallen, underground Kingdom, and could never find him if he ever managed to break through the initial gaps of the Underway's tunnels. Knowing that he was soon to leave the Southern Continent for a long time, there was little in the way of hesitation when it came to exploring this inverted, collapsed-upon realm. Alistair knew that within lied magical secrets, artefacts of the old and inscriptions that detailed rituals and spells many had thought long lost. Like Sheor, Quacia had once been an Empire of magic that had pressed beyond what limitations scholars knew today.

And in the wake of... everything that had occurred, there was little more that Alistair sought but knowledge, and magic, and power. He had lost everything else that had made life worth living, and so within the iron grip of solitude the mage had begun to seek meaning elsewhere. He thought - perhaps wrongly - that these tunnels would provide him with a path forward. Some sort of... inkling on what could be done next, now that he felt he'd mastered his body, spark and mind as much as he feasibly could. Alistair had truly become a titan of late, of proportions he knew to be unknown to others. Yet as a man who sought and sought, and never stopped in seeking, meeting with such a milestone was anything but good and well.

He had become restless in his pursuit. As restless as the thralls that followed after him, unable to find peace in the stirred madness of their minds.

There always had to be more. More... than this. Despite what greatness he had achieved, he had proven unable to acquire the things that he sought. Even love felt beyond him; for though he had Kaelrik, he had lost Fridgar and Zarik to feelings of loathing, jealousy and mistrust. If he were a God - truly one - then he would not be vulnerable to such loss. He could compel minds to desire him and bring them joy, whether created naturally or otherwise.

Alistair was tired of the fragility of who he was. And in the Underway, he sought answers - discovery for what more he could become... if only he was willing to delve dark into a place from which none ever came back.

[Alistair]

He brought with him Jericho, his most powerful Revenant and most frequent companion into battle. Recently, as his spark's evolution into the Insider came to fruition, Jericho had acquired sentience and his intellect from before death had returned. His personality, therefore, had been rekindled and so the man acted as a constant source of companionship for the wayward mage. Other than Jericho, the familiar Gaunt Kingfisher - Phorcys - accompanied him.

And that was all. No one else came with him - not Darius, Damien or Kleine. Not Kaelrik. The mage wished for the solitude of the dead, a pleasant reminiscence that had always accompanied him in times such as these. Since the days of Rynmere, long ago... he remembered. The dead he would bring with him in the dark of night, in moments where he despised the men and women around him and wondered curiously of his purpose. This expedition through the Underway was much like those days - lonely, reminiscent, and forged both from loneliness and a curious mind.

Alistair and his living Revenant, and Kingfisher thrall, were all that were necessary to make this expedition. It was all the company he required.

"Alistair, what do you hope to find?" Jericho asked, staring into the dark depths of the Underway. They had delved through the initial hidden entry of Plenty, and now stood before an underground mausoleum of broken pillars covered in rubble and dust. Insects appeared to thrive down here - there were cobwebs everywhere and spiders that they belonged to. Everything was incredibly dark, save for the radiant light that appeared to extend from Alistair's form. He became his own source of vision, though Jericho had a torch on-hand for if they became separated, and the means to ignite it.

"Something worth looking for," the Paragon cryptically responded.

"That doesn't tell me much."

They carried through, stepping into the mausoleum. There was nothing of note -- it was still so early into the Underway, he imagined that anything that might have been lost here would have already been acquired by other treasure hunters or Seekers of a like mind. At the end of the ruined building was a flight of stairs, though, that ran far down into a deeper level. The cave walls shook as the weight of a heavy entity appeared to bear down from below, though Alistair already recognized the source. It was that... thing that screamed at the turn of every hour. Tapping the back of his neck to feel over the mark of Shirvain, he knew that the next hour would turn soon.

Alistair began to descend, and Jericho followed after him. It was only a few steps in that the mage realized the dangers of the ancient architecture; the stairwell felt it would collapse beneath his immense weight, and there was certainly no way Phorcys would be able to follow down. With that in mind, he ordered the thrall to jump to the depths below, knowing that even if it crashed and was nearly wholly eliminated the Kingfisher could reform itself within trills. It followed his command, and an immense thud shook the cave structure yet again as the being met with the ground.

In the distance, the heavy thuds grew more severe - the creature noticed the intrusion, certainly.

Alistair and Jericho continued to quickly pace down the stairwell, until they met with a ledge at the broken end of the steps that would allow them to wrap around the second level from the top. It appeared that everything down here had been built very high, wrapped around the shape of the cave with infrastructural feats that could not even be replicated now.

But the ledge was only a platform for greater stability. Alistair did not need to run down steps or wrap around the balconies; he crafted a bright white-gold light through Brilliance and projected it to where Phorcys was, to illuminate through the darkness. Then, opening a portal for he and his Revenant to follow through, the mage quickly joined his fast-reforming Kingfisher's side.

[Alistair]

The thuds that quaked the Underway's already worrisome foundations eventually ceased, as though they were in a wide and open area the entrances to it were thin and many of them were collapsed. Realizing that such a large creature could likely not follow them through the broken tunnels, Alistair nodded and gestured for his thralls to follow after him as he flung his Brilliance across each of the entry shafts in order to see which one appeared the most preserved.

Settling on the northern tunnel, Alistair beckoned again for his thralls to come - though this time he suggested Jericho lead due to his regenerative abilities. They traversed through the unsteady corridor and Alistair grimaced as he observed Phorcys nearly bringing the shaky walls down around them. Still, he felt prepared enough to handle such a situation through Rupturing, and carried onward with a degree of caution.

And he wandered. Through that corridor, and others, and through large empty areas and broken temples seemingly dedicated to deities other than that of the Wounded God. Places from before -- when the Theocratum did not reign and the Arkenstones held absolute power. Castles belonging to them, and other Nobility, and estates that he could tell for certain acted as places of gathering for the Kingdom's elite as well as administrative halls. Treasuries with outdated, irrelevant coin, with ledgers written in Old Vahanic of taxes collected and payments owed.

Even in the older times, before the Cataclysm, it appeared Quacia was unjust. The opulence demonstrated within one quarter only to be completely thrown back to huts and hovels in another, clearly showed to him that the Kingdom was built upon rotten foundations. It was no wonder why it collapsed, and continued to fall - only the Nobility ever truly had anything worth fighting for in the first place. The Heaps had always been poor, uneducated, withered souls.

Finally, he came upon a room that was nearly perfectly preserved with walls that remained firm and tall. An untouched gem made from architectural genius, built to stand the test of time. It was then, upon reaching this room, that Alistair and Jericho began to set up camp for the night as Phorcys watched from outside. They'd not encountered really anything thus far - just insects and odd reptilian crawlers that seemed to bear them no ill will. Knowing this, Alistair felt safe enough to sleep so long as he had a watchful eye around him.

For the bugs. Of course, the fucking bugs, who had assailed him from the moment he'd Revealed in fascination of the light he emanated. Unfortunately, for all the nights he spent in the Underway with how many of those creatures were around him, he would have to deal with the feeling of their tiny legs marching upon him... and the distaste.

[Rakvald]

Comments

A very atmospheric set of exploration scenes. I enjoyed the narrative commenting on the civilization having built on the foundations of old, and how things really haven't changed all that much in the advent of the Theocratum. There was always injustice.

Knowledge

Navigation: Navigating underground
Navigation: Navigating tunnels
Navigation: Determining a direction in a four way split
Navigation: Navigating safely through ruins
Fieldcraft: Avoiding known threats
Fieldcraft: Setting up camp underground

non-skill:

History: The Quacian Underway

Loot

no

Injuries/Overstepping

bug bites, nothing major

Renown

no

Wealth Points

no

Experience

10/10 these points may not be used for magic