Chapter 269 – Procurement (Part 2)

Jiandzhi, West of the Gate – Duala 27

“It’s coming! Run! Run!” Qian said, and began sprinting east through the trail. Behind him, he could hear the thunderous steps of a lesser titan crashing through the jungle. Not for the first time, Qian wondered what egg-headed fool had decided to call these terrifying beasts ‘lesser.’ He also wondered who this woman was that she could convince the great Zhuan Li to do something as foolish as lure beasts to them in the Jiandzhi.

Though perhaps he was the greatest of the fools, because in the end, the marusaurs weren’t baiting the trap, he was.

The jungle blurred as he ran, like a tunnel of green, and all his focus was on making sure he wasn’t going to trip on a root or catch his shirt on a thorny vine and get entangled. Even a few seconds of delay, and he feared the booming footsteps behind him would be on top of him. When he glanced back, he saw the others who were running, and behind them, the heart-stopping glimpse of movement. Not like a bird flying, or a simorian leaping from branch to branch, but like an entire house was moving behind the leaves.

Qian ran faster. His lungs were burning as he moved through a gap between two bushes, leapt over a log, then risked another glance back.

A wing-like appendage burst through the lower canopy and snatched up one of the men. He was gone before he could scream.

Exalted save me, he thought. And not just because that was the traditional phrase. The rumors were that Zhuan had become a new exalted. How else to explain her miraculous escape from prison? How else to explain the way she’d made the Akanans look like fools? But even Zhuan Li would have trouble with one of these.

He heard another shout behind him, and hoped that another man hadn’t just died. His lungs were straining, each breath painful. His legs felt weak.

Qian had known what he was doing was stupid, but for the first time, now he realized he might actually die.

And then he emerged into a small clearing and saw the woman. She was hovering in that gap between the canopy and the dark forest floor.

Before, she’d seemed normal enough. Intense gray eyes, the kind that looked into one’s soul, but he was used to that; Zhuan was much the same.

Now, her eyes were glowing silver, bright enough they were hypnotizing, and it wasn’t at all the same. She hovered there, with certain death stampeding towards her, with absolute calm and confidence. A spellbook floated by a casually held hand, the metal filigree also shining, but more pearlescent than silver. Her presence was powerful enough he nearly missed Zhuan Li herself levitating just behind the woman.

Then the woman raised her hand, and Qian swore he could feel the power building up, feel it with the arcane sense his second aunt had talked about. Only, he’d failed the arcanist’s entry examination. Not sensitive enough to his own aura, the examiner had said.

But he could feel this.

As Qian collapsed to the ground in exhaustion, he looked back to see the tree behind him part. The lesser titan burst into the clearing with a roar.

Then the air filled with fire and lightning.

Spells were supposed to come from the caster, but these spells came from every direction. Lines of fire came raining down, burst up from the ground, struck from an angle, materializing out of seemingly nothing. Lightning flashed so bright Qian had to throw a hand in front of his face, and then he thought his ear drums might pop from the cacophony. Waves of heat washed over him, and he thought he might burn. He tried to scramble back, but found his hand bumping into a thigh, then his head hitting a shield, and belatedly realized that he and the other runners were being protected—just that the spells were so intense it didn’t feel like it.

He closed his eyes, and the world flickered. He began to sweat from the heat, skin feeling like he’d been out in the summer sun for hours.

Then, darkness.

He opened his eyes, ears still ringing.

“Good. That’s another one down,” the woman said. She was holding some sort of device that was wrapped in celestial runes. “Five more to go.”

Qian blinked. He must have misheard her. He looked back, and saw the burning hulk of the lesser titan. It looked like a pig that had been roasted over an open flame for two days longer than it should have. Its skin was blackened and ashy, more like coals than flesh, and he could feel the heat radiating off it. Emperor’s blood, he thought. No wonder Zhuan had allied with her. How had he not heard of an archmage of that kind of power? The Akanan sorcerers wouldn’t stand a chance.

But what in the hells were they doing that required them to hunt multiple lesser titans?

Well, clearly, this was all above his station. For now, he could lie on the mossy dirt and stare up at the canopy until his lungs didn’t hurt so bad.

***

Alkazaria, The Great Temple of Eintocarst – Merisheth 6

It was a warm, sunny winter day in Alkazaria, and Bishop Saban hated it. He was tired of being relegated to a second tier city. Alkazaria may have been Baracuel’s second capital, but Palendurio was where the real power was. He had thought he was nearly done with this place, but then the Praetorian strike-team had disappeared, and his contact in the Department of Public Security hadn’t stopped harassing him about it. As if he knew anything! Then, several of his sources in Falijmali had gone dark.

Now, something strange was happening in the Luminate Order, and he couldn’t figure out what. The first sign of it had been someone messing with the flow of funds that was going towards the New Order. However, he hadn’t heard anything from the bishops he knew in the Grand Sanctum. Hadn’t heard anything back from his contact who usually talked to Decian Corrmier for him. All he knew was that things were ‘delayed.’

By now, Kallin Corrmier should have been in charge of Palendurio. The revitalization of Baracuel should have begun. Instead, things were slipping out of his control. The latest of which was that huge shipments were coming into the Citadel, almost all of which were going into the Temple of Eintocarst. It couldn’t be like his own smuggling operation. Everything was too out in the open. But it wasn’t sanctioned—couldn’t be!—because then it would have passed through his office.

That was why he was here. To find out what exactly was going on so he could start putting an end to this nonsense. He passed by the Luminate Guards who let him through the temple doors, then made his way into the central chamber.

As soon as he entered, though, his expectations had to be thrown out the window. The inside of the Great Temple had been completely renovated, and the main chamber had large sheets of cloth hanging about to block what was going on inside at a glance. He pushed aside one of the sheets to get a better look, then his jaw dropped.

The Cults of Shiamagoth and Eintocarst were here in full force, wearing each of their cult’s regalia. Dozens of priests roamed about with tools, both holy and mundane. Celestial runes had been carved on mechanisms all over the room. They were in plain sight, in clear violation of the Order’s dictums. But beyond that, he couldn’t understand what they were making. He recognized some of the runes, but the huge crucible at the center of the room, the bellows, the foundry—it looked like someone was opening a blacksmithing practice. The cavernous chamber that usually held a chill was hot.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

There were bronze ingots lined up on one wall, and coming out of one forge—is that orichalcum? But that was to be made only in the Grand Sanctum, and only in the secret chambers. He’d never even seen it made himself, only distributed as part of the agreement between the Luminate Order and the Praetorians.

Then he saw the other ingots that had been stacked in preparation. The silver-colored ingots were much smaller than actual silver, steel, or even titanium. As he got closer, he realized they were marked with the sigils for iridium and platinum. The small containers next to them—those would contain the trace elements that only the best alchemists could isolate.

They’re preparing to make adamantium? But why? And who authorized this? And how have they secured such a blessing? And why are there crates of myrvite parts stacked everywhere? Has the Luminate Order become an artifice business?

A group of priests approached him. That was good. He could actually get some answers.

“What is going on here? Why wasn’t I informed of this? As bishop of the second order, I must demand an explanation. None of this has been authorized by my office.”

“Ah, Bishop Saban,” the lead priest said. He was a portly man with dark hair. He looked like he was from the region, but Saban didn’t recognize him. His robes indicated he was from one of the orders in Palendurio. “It was good of you to come here. It saves us quite a bit of trouble.” He beckoned at someone.

“Trouble? What are you talking about? Did you not hear me? I asked for an explanation.”