Chapter 113: Ethos - Interlude

  Serval Kach walked briskly towards his office. Don’s mission had been a success, and that was a piece of good news amongst the shitshow that he’d been dealing with recently. In fact, from what Don hinted, Serval might have gotten more than he bargained for.

  Setting things up logistically was a headache. Assembling the team was easy; they were already on the payroll, and Don just needed to choose. The real challenge was the infiltration itself.

  Thankfully, due to the recent unexpected circumstances, Serval had elevated access, the same kind that the royalty did. So it wasn’t all that hard. Sure, he had to trust C a lot. But trust was not really an issue anymore. Considering the sort of stuff they were all involved in. If one went down, they all went down. In fact, they’d all doubled down on their goal at this point.

  Getting past the system was a non-issue because he was already inside it at the highest level. The problem was mainly to ensure that the maintenance company didn’t ask too many questions.

  Fortunately, C owned that company. Not literally, but figuratively. The owner of the company was all but owned by the hacker. He had a lot of dirt on him. The man was basically a puppet on strings.

  So, with their combined efforts, it was not a hassle to pave the way forward for Don and his team’s infiltration.

  It was a good thing that matters were going well on this front. His main concern was his voyagers, who were trapped inside the dungeon. It had been a week and a half since the second trial ended. And Serval and Celeste were worried sick for their people. But so far, none of their artifacts returned to Byrone’s armory.

  Their charges were alive. They were fighting. It was only fair that Serval was doing his bit on the outside as well.

  He’d given Celeste complete carte blanche on the preparation front. Her job was to analyze and secure the exact supplies that they would need. It was a silver lining amongst the dark clouds that they’d gotten their hands on Moira’s footage. It told them enough about what his team would need. And that was enough for Celeste to prepare as well.

  Oh, he was livid. Livid with the patrons of all those backstabbers and the snakes inside the dungeon. Cheel and his ilk wouldn’t be safe from Serval’s retribution. But it was not the time for that just yet. There were bigger fish to fry.

  He trusted Celeste; she was capable, and she was motivated. So his focus was on the larger picture, on bringing the dungeon down, and finding the answers to the questions that plagued his voyages.

  Once he reached his office, he sealed everything down. The projector in his office connected to his signet ring and displayed Don’s data packet.

  He skimmed through the mission brief. And wasn’t that the kicker? The Faceless Stewards, those mindless puppets, had mistaken Don for one of their own. It was a happy accident. Most definitely, C’s work with the access codes that Serval had provided him. It was funny. He’d need to talk to C and Zeten about all this later, once he reviewed the data packet completely.

  Serval fired up the recording next. And there it was. In front of his eyes, green-skinned people. Or at least a depiction of them drawn across the cave walls of all things.

  With rapt attention, he watched the production.

  The first picture showed a couple of green-skinned men standing in front of a tear in space. It was the same kind of dimensional tear that kidnapped their voyagers. The same kind that opened up when the dungeon’s keeper needed to intervene in case of wannabe escapees.

  But the depiction of these tears was very small. And as he followed on to the next mural, it was apparent that these things were tiny dungeons. Because the next painting showed a very small chamber with a crystalline center, and lots of fighting around it. People and monsters of all sorts engaged in melee. Humans, vampires, and fairies were a given. D’Raacs being inside the miniature dungeons alongside the green-skinned people was not that much of a stretch.

  What surprised him were other humanoids who didn’t belong to the species that he was familiar with. There were some with horns, some with tails, some with physical angelic wings, and even some with crystalline skin. All sorts of humanoids. None of this made sense. He hadn’t read anything about it in history. But of course, history was what the winners wrote. So, were these people winners or losers?

  The next couple of pictures told a vivid story. These events from the previous murals kept repeating. At first, people began removing the crystals from these miniature dungeons. And that created an opening for them to escape from the dungeon, but the dungeon still existed. There were physical signs of the dungeon existing in those pictures. And these dungeons kept opening. The cycle continued.

  Until finally, in one painting, one green-skinned person attacked the crystal at the center of the dungeon. This changed everything. The next picture showed a massive explosion inside the dungeon. And on the outside, the physical signs of the dungeon being there completely disappeared. None of the people inside the dungeon made it out as it exploded. But one of the green-skinned men was some sort of seer. It showed him projecting the past in a puddle of water. It showed what happened inside this specific dungeon. And they all understood what had happened.

  Now this became the new norm. The next couple of pictures showed similar sights. Small miniature dungeons opened. The warriors immediately went for the crystal, sacrificing themselves and destroying those dungeons.

  Serval understood that this destruction was more of a chain reaction than anything else. Because removing the crystals sent the dungeons into hibernation. It did not destroy them. But destroying the crystals caused a cascading explosion that wiped out the dungeon itself.

  They had been searching for clues regarding the green-skinned people, and instead, what they stumbled upon was the secret to destroying the dungeon itself. Not that it was easy in any way. There were a lot of logistical problems involved. And Serval didn’t want to sacrifice his voyagers. But this was a start. They had something now.

  Nonetheless, he kept watching. These murals had a lot more information than he bargained for.

  The next series of paintings showed that many such miniature dungeons presumably realized the threat to their existence. They clustered together to create bigger dungeons. And these dungeons, before targeting the people, began cannibalizing each other first. The paintings showed the story of four massive dungeons at the end. They were all that remained, the culmination of all the other dungeons.

  And these four coalesced into one supreme dungeon. The biggest one yet. The one that presumably was active even now. And one of the first things it did was to completely swallow a large settlement of the green-skinned people alongside the surrounding landmass itself. Because what the next painting showed was that, beneath the crack in space, there was nothing but a massive crater where the settlement was. The next couple of pictures showed the same; the dungeon opening up in various places and swallowing up the people along with the landmass. It showed these land masses being reorganized, forming the individual levels of the dungeon.

  And this was a game-changer. The dungeon kept dragging people into itself indiscriminately. They were stuck inside, unable to reach the crystal chamber. Unable to destroy its heart even though they knew how.

  Serval could not comprehend the sheer scale of the horror. It seemed that if what these murals were saying was true, then the dungeon did not have such long hibernation periods. It kept on attacking without breaks.

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  By now, he was sweating, his heart rate elevated, his entire body under stress at the reveal.

  The recording continued, unbothered by his state. Outside of the dungeon, it showed a D’Raac with a crown teaming up with the remaining green-skinned folk. It showed him speaking to them. And it showed the green-skinned people performing various kinds of magics at his behest.

  The next series of paintings showed the crowned D’Raac and the green-skinned people building large chains. And once they were finished, they approached the massive tear in space.

  A massive battle unfolded as the dungeon began spewing out monsters at them. But together, they all managed to bind the dungeon with the chains. It still existed as a tear in space, but it was deeply muted in its bound space. It was hardly a minor scratch in the air.

  Then they all got together, apparently in a heated discussion. It then showed the crowned D’Raac working with the green-skinned people once again. They all built new things. Things that Serval was intimately familiar with. They were making the artifacts. And the picture following that was grand. There was Byrone’s boon, the Augury, and surrounding it were all one hundred artifacts.

  It was clear that the crowned D’Raac was Byrone, and the green-skinned people helped him make the artifacts. He didn’t do it alone. That itself was a major shock to Serval. His entire life, he had been listening about how Byrone was a peerless artificer. And sure, he definitely worked together with those people in the painting. But there was no reason why history didn’t mention any of these helpers of his. It baffled him. Was it all just to boost Byrone’s status?

  Leaning closer to the projection, Serval noted that there was something written in the augury. It was ancient D’Raakan, and he was passingly familiar with it. But he used the translation function in his signet ring to translate what was written inside just to be sure.

  The Augury in the painting said the following words: The dungeon will awaken in a hundred years.

  So the sealing was just a temporary measure? They weren’t able to completely contain it, but they had prepared for the future. Had they been preparing their descendants to fight the dungeon?

  The next picture was almost a copy of the previous one, but the difference was that all the artifacts were glowing, and all the green-skinned people were glowing alongside. The next series of pictures showed the green-skinned People standing next to an artifact each, and pouring all their mana into the things. And in the final picture, they all lay dead on the floor right next to the artifacts.

  The last picture showed a very detailed depiction of a crying Byrone K’Wul.

  After that, there was just one word scribbled beneath Byrone in ancient D’Raakan. The word said Etheons.

  Serval was not familiar with that word, but he didn’t get time to ponder on it, as his ring chimed with an emergency notification.

  The Augury is revealing a new entry.

  Once again, the Augury’s timing was uncanny. It was no coincidence. Whenever his skepticism rose, events immediately conspired to hammer it down. At this point, he couldn’t help but truly believe. He opened the Augury’s app immediately and glued his eyes to the live footage.

  Chains rust over time. They weaken. Even weakened, they perform their duty. Yet, how long could rusted chains hold? Hunger cannot be fought with hunger. If one does not understand that, then the end is nigh.

  This was in standard D’Raakan and not in Serval’s cipher. So, the warning was meant for everyone.

  Serval leaned back on his seat, tired of it all. The implications of everything he’d learned were staggering. If the dungeon was so much of a nuisance in its sealed state, then how much of a problem would it be, unbound? Why was it allowed to exist for so long? Despite the people in charge knowing the method to destroy it?

  Before he could think more about it, the Augury continued. Just like last time, the second message was meant for him, given that it was in his personal cipher.

  My faithful will guide the way. You’ve learnt a new word. Use that word to open the door.

  After that, the Augury went inert. But immediately, Serval got another notification.

  Access granted to secure document.

  It was from the Official Tavan Archives. It was the same kind of notification that he got a couple of minutes after his clearance level was upgraded. But that time, it was blanket access to almost the entire archive based on his clearance level. This time, though, the access was highly specific.

  It was still the same sender. So, he opened it without hesitation. The secure document was deep within the archives, buried within files within files. Serval first checked the metadata. And it seemed that currently, he was the only person with access to it. This file itself was a video created a few days ago, and before him, the access belonged to the generic masked ID of a Faceless Steward. The person had given access to Serval and then revoked his own.

  Byrone’s faithful. Of course, it would be a Faceless Steward. But this brought into question Don’s mission itself. The way the Faceless Stewards accommodated him. Was that an accident, or was that by design? The way things were going, it looked like the latter.

  Unsure of what he’ll see, but unable to step away, Serval opened the video.

  It didn’t play immediately. Instead, what he saw was a pop-up that asked him to enter a password.

  Remembering what the Augury said, and remembering the murals that he had just seen, he entered the new word he’d learnt: Etheon.

  Incorrect Password. You’re almost there. Type it like it’s a secret.

  He paused for a second and stared at the error message in annoyance. He then typed the same word, but this time after mentally encoding it in his cipher.

  The video began playing immediately, and it showed a dimly lit chamber with Byrone’s Boon dead center in frame. A Faceless Steward walked in and placed a mana crystal and the Delusional Sleuth at the foot of the statue.

  The man then walked up to the recorder and picked a mummified hand from out of the frame. He uncorked a vial and poured an ounce of blood onto the shriveled hand. Right after, he opened another vial and poured a glowing golden potion atop the blood.

  Serval watched in astonishment as the Byrone’s Boon lit up with its signature golden hue the moment the potion made contact with the blood. It triggered the mana crystal and the Delusional Sleuth in turn, and all three began glowing in unison. One spot on the statue glowed the brightest, the spot that had an engraving of the Delusional Sleuth.

  There was a short pulse from a tattoo on the shriveled hand, but he couldn’t make out what it was. The shriveled skin, the blood, and the potion made it hard to see what the pattern was. But he didn’t need to. His breath hitched as he understood what was happening.

  The black ops agent was triggering a false redistribution scenario somehow. Which was not supposed to be possible.

  The second redistribution round had just ended a few days ago. Nobody had picked this artifact. And they’d somehow managed to fake the presence of a voyager to trigger a succession fight.

  This was absurd. He glanced at the timestamp on the corner of the screen, and it showed that it had happened just a few days ago, matching the metadata of the file.

  Soon, as was the norm for a redistribution round, a simulacrum of the voyager began taking shape, with the mana crystal at its core. And going by the silhouette of the shade, it was clear as day that the timestamp hadn’t been faked. The simulacrum being reanimated was the echo of the same voyager that had targeted Serval’s team just a week and a half ago. The reason why they were stuck inside the dungeon.

  The biggest question was, how did these faceless stewards pull this off? Was the Dracolan even aware that his subjects were doing this? How do they even obtain the knowledge to pull this off? However, the Augury had just mentioned them. It was no coincidence that they were immediately guiding him, as it said. Who knows what other kinds of backdoors Byrone’s prophecies had given these people? It sent chills down Serval’s spine.

  For a few moments, the construct stood still, the artifact hanging from its hand. It then slowly began swinging the pendulum. Serval thought that since this was just a recording, and not happening live, he didn’t look away.

  That’s why he was so surprised when he felt something brush against his internal mana. It was as if somebody was gently knocking on the door.

  The construct lifted its other hand and mimed just that, knocking on an invisible door. This just kept getting weirder and weirder. The past few minutes had gone way beyond the threshold of normalcy.

  The artifact was a strong one. Its illusory capabilities were really good. That the magic could work over a hologram, he didn’t know until now. And it was not the instant application of the illusion that the artifact would apply face-to-face. Maybe due to it not being direct eye contact, it was weakened. Just that it could do it, though, was crazy in itself.

  However, it made sense. Because in the final tourneys after the dungeon run, the illusions were captured on camera after all. He just thought that it was all dynamic rendering using mana. But it seemed like the cameras did capture the illusion. Instead of projecting the illusion directly to the viewers, the government must have cut the magic out and rendered it directly onto the tape instead. Crazy post-processing.

  In fact, if the illusions could work through such a medium with impunity, then it would have been a cakewalk to manipulate the masses. Even more than it already was for these assholes.

  Right now, he didn’t have anything to fear. He was inside a sealed room, and he knew the method of breaking free of these illusions. So he concentrated on the mana that would never escape his D’Raac body and allowed the incoming probe.

  Right on cue, the illusion gripped him, and he was transported to a different place.

  He was no longer in his office. Instead, he was in a very opulent throne room. Atop the throne sat Byrone K’Wul, the emperor of emperors. The peerless seer. And apparently not the sole developer of the artifacts.