Chapter 254 – The Ruined City

The usual practice for an expedition into the jungle was to be as stealthy as possible. There was, however, an alternate approach for when that was impossible: sound like a Godsdamned thunderstorm.

As the thousands of people made their way into the Jiandzhi, they brought out drums, gongs, and a brass instrument that looked a lot like a trumpet, but was different. Together, they made a cacophony that sent almost every creature in the jungle running.

There were, of course, the kinds of myrvites that saw the noise as a beacon, but Zhuan was prepared for them. While marusaurs and non-combat personnel stuck to the center column, the combatants could move up and down the sides. Every tenth marusaur was carrying a shield engine, while the escorting arcanists added their own shields to a line of rifle infantry. The rifles were a mix of Akanan—high caliber spell-rifles, using hunting bullets designed for taking down large myrvites—and older Zhighuan flame-rifles, which consumed fossilized myrvite charges to shoot out gouts of intense flames. They used an outdated battle formation where the front row of flame-rifles knelt and the project rifles stood behind them, firing in volleys. Any nearby arcanists not tasked with shields could add in their own spells.

Since the nastier myrvites had high spell resistance to contend with, arcanists usually used spells in less conventional ways: cutting down trees to land on top of the myrvite, blowing dust into their eyes, or magnetically levitating spiked steel balls into the mouths of the creatures.

Mirian was surprised to find she had little enough to do. “Let me know if you want me to intervene,” she told Zhuan.

“Yes,” the older Prophet said. “One day from now, there’s a lesser titan attack that kills fifty-three just before dawn. Song says this is something you can handle.”

“It is,” Mirian confirmed.

Zhuan looked at her. “Was your original plan to simply catch the moon by yourself?”

“That would certainly simplify things. If I thought it was possible, I’d try. But no, it just turns out having an immense amount of magical power is useful for solving a lot of problems. I’ve found it unavoidably necessary for delving into the Labyrinth, for example.”

Zhuan nodded slowly. “Hmm. The leylines are down there, aren’t they? I haven’t bothered to look. Plenty of miraculous things are attested to being in the Vaults, but nothing that seemed it would solve this particular problem.”

So she’s still unfamiliar with relicarium, Mirian thought. Has she considered how Sun Shuen would have created a soul-bindable object? “There’s items that can grow perfect crystals and that can absorb massive amounts of energy. I’ll need them to help build the leyline regulator.”

Somewhere down the line, they heard the crack of rifle fire as men and women shouted out orders.

“Lone oniwyrm,” Zhuan said. “No deaths. The next one will be petal demons near the head of the column. Fourth Response is already getting into position.”

A moment later, a line of three hundred or so infantry trotted by, followed by several arcanists. Up ahead, Mirian could see people getting a shield engine set up out of marusaur saddlebags.

“How many attempts did this take you?”

“I’ve been refining this particular maneuver over fifty-two cycles, while running smaller experiments in parallel. My previous investigations into social mobilization and revolutionary tactics helped, of course, as did the social experiments I ran prior to that.” Zhuan clearly wanted to discuss her theories more, but was restraining herself.

And yet, the other thing that’s crucial is your future knowledge. She thought of Ibrahim’s comments. How much of your success is because of that, and how much of it is purely based on your theories of change?

The one thing that Mirian did like about the latest chapter she’d read was how Zhuan compared social forces to a mundane force diagram. That got the mathematical part of her brain working, and it helped things make more sense. Much like the leylines were out of balance, so were so many social forces, and it was leading to the same catastrophic collapse.

The conversation died as Mirian retreated further into thought, and Zhuan had to go adjust orders after discovering an anomaly in the line. The next morning, she and her father ripped apart the lesser titan, and once again, people started looking at her differently, Zhuan included. It was one thing to know, and another to experience.

The march continued on.

***

The next day, the expedition shed the boats and its logistical tail completely and pushed forward using only the supplies on hand. The military term for this was a ‘flying column,’ which was not to be confused by an ‘airborne column,’ which was what referred to the literal act of deploying flying troops. They continued to move alongside the raging rapids of one of the rivers. Zhuan wasn’t an expert at math, but she’d put the work in to optimize exactly how many bullets and fossilized myrvite charges were needed to precisely repel the attacks on the expedition, as well as exactly how much food they needed to pack and how much they could get from butchering and cooking the myrvites they were killing. Petal demon flesh and lesser titan were both toxic, but Mirian learned there was a way to cook oniwyrm flesh so that it didn’t kill you.

They could also butcher the marusaurs. Once, that would have bothered Myrian, but she found that the screams of the feathered lizards didn’t bother her. Like so many other things, it was necessary.

Two more days of travel saw them hiking brutal slopes and crossing precipitous ravines, and the expedition shed a full half of itself, sending that group back to reduce the logistical requirements of the forward group. Twice more, Zhuan called on Mirian to take out a threat that would have normally inflicted heavy casualties.

Then, the expedition established its permanent camp by one of the mountain streams.

“We’ve arrived,” Zhuan told the other Prophets.

***

Immediately, Mirian took to the skies, lancing a passing mist jelly with fire rays as she ascended, then looked around. At first, the landscape seemed identical. The Land of Spires was defined by just that, and here, she could just see more of them, draped in a thick tapestry of jungle plants and shrouds of vines. They were in an elevated valley between two mountains, with dozens of stone spires spread between them.

Then, she realized that there was a strange regularity to the rock towers. These didn’t follow the pattern of erosion.

She flew closer. Behind the veils of plants, there were regular gaps in the spires. The stone was concrete, not the natural granite common here.

Mirian circled around.

The spire was damaged on the east side. Scorch marks, cracks, and missing chunks attested to that side of the building being subjected to intense heat.

Gabriel joined her in the sky, holding his levitation wand steady. It took him a moment to see why Mirian was looking so closely at the spires, and then his eyes widened as he looked around. “Five hells. This was a city?” he said. “Even the Triarchy at its height didn’t—couldn’t… it’s too big.” He shook his head. “I could have walked right past these all and not even spared a glance. Especially at the ground level with all the foliage.”

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Not all the colossal towers were still standing. Most were at least partially collapsed, and others, entirely gone. Locating the Elder Gate was trivial; the burn marks formed a circle around it, all pointing to where it would be. In that same circle, there were more missing and collapsed buildings, many just piles of rubble covered in forest. She descended, heading that way.

Zhuan joined them in the sky, crystal-topped scepter in hand, and Gaius a moment later. “Interesting,” he said. “This isn’t the one I know about. That’s even further east, and a little north. On the other side of those mountains, I think. That explains why I never found the Gate.”

The Zhighuan Prophet turned to the necromancer. “There’s another Viaterrian city?”

“Several ruins, though none of them are quite what I would call a ‘city.’ I thought we were heading to Porgejen. That’s where I found—” He stopped, looked at Mirian, then looked away. “Well, some interesting devices. Porgejen has approximately ten towers, though much shorter, and several squat buildings. That was the largest settlement I found.”

Zhuan shouted several profanities. “Why didn’t you say so sooner?”

“I thought it was just a mapping error and we were already heading there,” the necromancer muttered. “Do you know what the ancient Lorcadian name of this place where the Viaterrian vessel is attested to be?”

“Jhulu.”

“Ah. Never made it that far, because I was coming in from the north. Hmm… that shouldn’t be far from here. Another twenty miles east, according to my reconstructions of their maps. Should be nestled in a valley surrounded by mountains on most sides. I always wondered why it was said they made boats there.”