Divine Apostasy Book 7 - Chapter 27

Chapter 27

Ruwen wiped his eyes dry as the group laughter finally ended.

Sift pointed at the chest. “Should we leave it alive?”

Ruwen nodded. “It’s just doing its job.”

“It enjoys its job a little too much if you ask me. Now I have trust issues.”

The red welts across Sift’s face and chest from the creature’s acid had begun to fade. Ruwen opened his Void Band and rubbed his palms together, letting the dirt-adhesive mix drop into his Inventory. Then he used his fingers to squeeze the acid still stuck in his hair into the Void Band as well. Fractal would appreciate such a strong acid and powerful glue.

Tarot squirmed, avoiding Ruwen’s fingers.

“Are you okay? Did the acid hurt you?” Ruwen asked.

“Spirit-infused bile from a Corrosion Wyrm wouldn’t even warm my skin.”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

Ruwen closed his Void Band and stood up straight. He studied the Adepts, who had for the most part remained undamaged. The Adept with the broken rib had a cloth wrapped tightly around his chest, trying to keep the broken rib in place. Pain covered his face, but he didn’t complain.

Sivart’s advice about not using all your resources battled with Ruwen’s desire to follow the preferred path the Founders had outlined.

Ruwen locked eyes with the injured Adept. “We will suffer the consequences of our choices while using our keys, but once back at camp, I will heal you.”

The man looked relieved and Ruwen turned his attention to the group. They had clumped together as they discussed the trial.

“What went wrong?” Ruwen asked.

“With the fight or our choice?” Prythus asked.

“Both.”

“That thing—” Prythus started.

“Floot,” Sift interrupted.

“What?” Prythus asked.

Ruwen turned to Sift. “Flute?”

“Yeah, it’s fake loot,” Sift explained. “Floot.”

Ruwen frowned. It wasn’t the worst name Sift had come up with. Curious, Ruwen Analyzed the Floot they’d just fought, but the information displayed matched a common teak wood chest. He guessed to know its true name, he needed to use Analyze when it had changed into its offensive form.

Another idea occurred to Ruwen, and he opened his log, displaying their brief fight.

“It’s called a Greater Imposter,” Ruwen offered.

“Floot,” Sift repeated.

Ruwen sighed and motioned for Prythus to continue.

“That Floot removed most of the advantages of our training,” Prythus said.

“The Steps are not enough to keep you safe,” Ruwen said. “We should all invest time learning a ranged weapon. Or at the minimum something like the spear or staff that provides some distance between you and the enemy.”

“Isn’t that a strange lesson to teach us in our unarmed combat Master’s trial?” Nymthus asked.

Ruwen nodded. “It’s possible I’ve overthought this encounter, and the Floot is only a convenient adversary.”

“Regardless of the Founder’s intent,” Sift said. “Ruwen’s logic is sound. I’ve always looked down on weapons as a crutch the weak needed to compete, but they have a practical side as well. I’ll never touch a chest with my hand again.”

The comment made everyone smile.

Ruwen bet the Founders had meant to teach this exact lesson. Regardless of your talent, always use caution and be prepared. An excellent lesson all things considered.

They discussed the fight for another few minutes and decided on a method to approach the future Floots.

“Our logic on locating the token didn’t work,” Nymthus said. “But we’ve talked it over and we know why. The slope’s angles on the two canyon sides don’t match. The Floot side had a lower angle.”

“Don’t forget the canyon floor itself,” Sift said. “It varies in width between the canyon walls and has a slope of its own.”

Sift turned to Ruwen. “Now I understand why the math is difficult.”

“Does anyone have a solution?” Ruwen asked, hoping they’d noticed the same items on the journey here.

“It would be difficult to keep an even pace,” Prythus said. “But you could run down one side and up the other. Although with the difficulty of keeping an even stride, we’d probably need multiple people to run each one.”

“Excellent,” Ruwen said. “Normally I would let you do that, exhausting yourselves for a couple of days, but you’ve learned the point of this trial and I don’t want to waste our time. Did anyone notice the round stones on the canyon floor?”

Everyone shook their head, but they immediately understood the purpose and the smiles turned to grins.

“Even with everything we know, it still might take a couple of days,” Ruwen said. “There are over a hundred locations that are within my rough calculations as possibilities.”

“If Rung One hasn’t already figured this out,” Sift said. “They will when they see us searching. We can choose to hide our knowledge from them or push forward despite the risk of losing the token?”

The Adepts grouped together and discussed the options. Rung Four and many of the other Adepts wanted to finish the Master’s Trial quickly as obligations back home pulled on them. Ruwen sympathized with them and when Nymthus responded for everyone, it didn’t surprise him.

“We don’t want to hide from Rung One,” Nymthus said. “And we have a suggestion that hopefully means it doesn’t matter.”

“I love suggestions,” Sift said. “We have a box for them back home.”

Nymthus continued. “The Founders didn’t specify anything about being back by dark like they did in the first trial. If we worked through the night, could we try most of the likely chests on your list?”

Ruwen smiled. “Split into two groups of twelve. One group will move to the camp side, picking up three of the round rocks that litter the canyon floor. Sift will take one group and I the other. We will walk around the canyon on opposite sides and when we come to a possible location, I’ll signal, and whichever side has the stones will roll them one after the other.”

“Why three?” Prythus asked.

Ruwen explained. “With all the variables of dirt and terrain, I think three stones should provide a decent average. We will locate the token when the stone spheres roll between the group standing on the camp-side and the group next to the chest. Staying in a group of twelve should keep us safe from any more surprises.”

Out of curiosity, they tested the Floot chest and the stone spheres stopped three feet short of the Greater Imposter. Sift carefully removed his key from the Floot in case he needed it tomorrow.

“Which direction should we go?” Ruwen asked.

Sift pointed left. “You wanted to go right, and based on the fact your previous choice almost killed us, we should go the opposite way.”

Ruwen almost said something sarcastic to Tarot, thanking the golem for the bad luck, but Ruwen had chosen the Misfortune golem knowing the consequences. And, as the Shade’s First Rule clearly stated, he only had himself to blame.

“I can’t argue with that logic,” Ruwen said. “Let’s go.”

They all moved to the left, going counter-clockwise through the canyon. Twenty-eight chests later, the sun dipped below the horizon and night overtook them. The darkness slowed them down as only Ruwen had the senses and Perception to see through the combination of darkness and fog. He used the passive Sphere of Influence from Rami’s third Codex of Perception to speak with Sift telepathically and direct the Adepts on the other side.

Echo found them shortly after nightfall, undoubtedly curious why they hadn’t returned. From her heartrate and posture, Ruwen knew frustration consumed her. Rung One had used all their tries for the day and would need to wait until midnight before copying what Ruwen and team had discovered.

No one complained as they worked late into the night. Around ten o’clock they discovered a chest where the stone spheres stopped a foot away. They performed the test six more times with the same result. They all met at the canyon bottom and discussed what to do, eventually deciding to use one of the remaining twenty-five keys.

Ruwen offered to use his key, and with the Adepts all holding large stones, he unlocked the chest. Using a flat rock, instead of his hand, he pried the lid open. Once again, the chest transformed into a Greater Imposter but he easily dodged the creature’s tongue, and because he used a rock to pry the lid open, he didn’t get stuck.

The Adepts made short work of the Floot, pelting it with stones. In under ten seconds, it had retreated to its original form, and they continued with their search. Ruwen guessed all the chests that almost met the criteria would be these dangerous creatures.

At midnight, Rung One began, and part of Ruwen worried they would steal the token out from under the other Rungs. The Adepts around him had tensed and he guessed they felt the same.

As they strode to the next location, Ruwen spoke into the still night. “One of the lessons of this trial is Energy. The Founders wish to teach mindfulness of its creation and use, and anxiety and worry are not beneficial sources. In addition, I think they intended for us to work together. Rung One is not our competitor, but our brothers and sisters. Their victory is our victory.”

That relaxed the Adepts somewhat and Ruwen passed on the speech for Sift to convey to the Adepts on the other side of the canyon.

At three in the morning, they caught up to Echo and two Adepts from Rung One. They stood at one of the locations Ruwen had mentally marked, but he didn’t tell his team as he figured it would only worry them that Echo knew the likely locations as well. Echo shouted at the four Rung One Adepts on the other side and they started their test.

Despite the speech earlier, Ruwen’s stomach tightened as his competitiveness surfaced. He stayed focused on the next possible location and quickly moved toward it.

Five minutes later, Echo and her two Adepts ran by them as she scanned the canyon walls. It took all of Ruwen’s willpower to not race after her.

“She moves too fast to properly search,” Ruwen said. “Calm your minds.”

Ruwen prayed he was right as they passed Echo testing another one of his possible locations. She had, despite the darkness and speed, successfully detected the next viable location and he wondered if she cheated somehow.

Listening to Echo and Rung One was easy, as she needed to shout across the canyon to her team. Echo decided not to open that chest, and again started their run toward him.

Echo’s ability to pick out likely chests changed the dynamic, and his competitive nature overwhelmed his desire to ignore her.

“Who feels like a run?” Ruwen asked.

Everyone immediately broke into a sprint, not bothering to answer. And Ruwen told Sift to run with his team.

This time Ruwen reached the next likely chest before Echo and they quickly started their test. Before they’d finished, Echo dashed by.

The next hour was spent in the same pattern, each team running past the other to the next location. Echo somehow detected the same ones as Ruwen, and as the number of chests dwindled his nervousness grew.

At five in the morning, only ten chests remained, and the two teams had become frantic.

As the sun broke the horizon the two teams had almost circled the entire canyon and only two chests remained. Ruwen cursed his bad luck. After fighting the first Floot, they had chosen their direction for exploring based on his bad luck, but if he had picked the direction he originally wanted, these two chests, the last two chests, would have been the first they encountered.

Now as Echo stood in front of one, and Ruwen in front of the other, they each had a fifty percent chance of gaining this level’s token.

Ruwen’s team rolled their first sphere at the same time as Echo. He studied both intently, trying to judge their destinations. Echo’s stone stopped first, inches from her chest. He turned back to his stone just as it struck the chest.

How hard did it strike the chest? Ruwen sent to Sift. Did it just tap it or did it have a bunch of momentum?

I don’t know. I don’t like getting close in case it’s a Floot.

Ruwen nodded at the Adept next to him and they started the next stone rolling. He focused back on Sift. Get closer so we know.

Why? Sift asked. You said these were the last two. The outcome has already been decided.

That’s true, Ruwen said. We’re coming over.

“Let’s go,” Ruwen said.

Ruwen strode down the steep slope to the canyon floor, going slow enough that the Adepts didn’t injure themselves following. Echo mirrored Ruwen and ran toward her chest as well.

A minute later the two teams faced each other, a few hundred feet separating them. One of their chests contained the token.

“Defensive positions,” Ruwen said.

The Adepts circled the chest, all of them holding a stone in each hand.

In the distance, Echo kneeled in front of her chest, her key glinting in the sun.

Ruwen nodded at Prythus and he strode forward, crouching in front of the lock. His hands shook as he removed his key.

“Regardless of the contents,” Ruwen said to the group. “I am proud of the way everyone worked together.”

The scrape of Echo’s key entering her chest reached Ruwen’s Diamond Fortified hearing. He nodded at Prythus again and the Adept placed his key in the lock.

As if linked, Echo and Prythus turned their keys together.