Knives & Levels - Chapter 92

The mist curled around Julia, its edicts swirling within the lingering mana like a signature of its origin. With Colt guarding her back, she could focus entirely on her task of analyzing the mist as they moved.

Nashville had never been her favorite place. Before the apocalypse, she'd spent her adult life tucked away with her computer, pretending the outside world didn't exist. Now, with friends and purpose, the city had transformed for her. Even as the cold mist sank into her flesh with its frostbitten kiss, she pressed forward, sampling as she went.

It was mostly boring work.

They would go a certain distance, about a mile, to get a feel for how much she would use her magic and then collect the mist and get a feel for how much the mana had decayed.

Magic had always been mysterious to her, whether it was in games that she played on her computer as she grew up or now as she was messing with this weird system-generated magic.

The idea of having mana and casting spells appealed to a deep sense of self to Julia.

In fact, it's why she thought that everything around her was a virtual world, to begin with, because it was just too good to be true. Of course, now she knew that was simple nonsense, but at the start, it would be an easy mistake for anyone to make.

As she wandered, her magic sampling of the decaying mana became increasingly tedious yet undeniably real.

This wasn't fantasy anymore—this was life. The wonder of manipulating water had transformed into a practical skill, one she could use to narrow the location of the dungeon they were searching for.

Every time they stopped and sampled, she would give a number about how strong the decay felt compared to what she felt before, and then Leon would faithfully mark it down on his map, slowly yet surely collecting more data to analyze.

In a way, the magic of what she was doing had been stripped away, becoming a matter of simple data collection, analysis, and execution.

As they moved, sampling mile by mile, she felt like they were getting closer and closer to the goal.

Colt stopped and held up his hand as he looked around.

“How much longer,” he asked.

Julia scratched the back of her head as she looked up at the sky and noticed for the first time that the sun was starting to set, not that looking up helped much. With the abundance of fog, she made out just the barest outline of the massive ball of light up there, obscured by the thick mist.

According to what everyone had been saying about how the world was right now and the troubles that New Nashville had been facing when the sun began to set, more monsters were supposedly out in the mists. They liked to take advantage of the darkness and used the opportunity to strike.

Julia tapped her thumb against her face and hummed to herself, trying to picture how far away they were from where they were going.

She took a moment and said, “We could be headed home now, but I feel like we're really close.”

She stopped and looked around at the dark mist around her at Leon’s angry face at her proclamation. He knew exactly what that meant if they were this close, and she truly felt in her heart that they were. 

Even now, she pictured them returning as heroes of the town by finding the exact location of the dungeon and then coming back to report that their problems were solved and that they could now confront the dungeon. Julia never fancied herself a hero, necessarily even in helping Colt, Nate, and Sarab rescue New Nashville from Denny.

But now, with her special skills and her magic, there was a chance, right?

Colt went silent momentarily, thinking, "He liked to do that, assessing situations, managing risk, and calculating just how dangerous something was." She valued this in him. She felt a deep, growing trust in him when under his leadership and in a squad.

His eyes saw the threats, weighed them appropriately, and then calculated the safest way for him and his group to confront them.

Even now, as Colt looked around and Leon got increasingly more anxious, she knew what his answer would be, knowing what the result would be.

“All right then, we'll keep going,” Colt said, gesturing to her, giving her permission.

“We can't do that,” Leon said, folding his arms.

Julia looked between the two of them as Colt raised an eyebrow at Leon.

“Well, you know, Colt just said that we could.” Julia prodded. The fact he was digging his heels in again was annoying. Though he was the scout, he was not in charge in her eyes.

“I don't think so.” Leon kept on with that false authority of his. “We've been out here long enough, the orders were clear, we head back.”

Julia felt a nagging sensation in the back of her mind as she heard the man argue with her, and she rolled her eyes. It did make sense to show caution; that much was true.

But they had the strongest people in New Nashville with them, and Colt had already dealt with one of these monsters that lurked in the mist. With her fighting with him and her specific skill set with water magic, she felt their odds were good.

Although she felt a certain sense of danger in the situation, it was not completely safe to be out in the middle of New Nashville with the ongoing threat of mist monsters. It was very much within her comfort zone.

She stopped for a moment and thought about that.

How much had her life changed since she was thrown into this new world?

She felt safe by this man next to her, who fought giant house-sized mimics with a single knife, and was confident that they could wander through the darkness and danger of all the monsters that lay outside of New Nashville, even now.

Striking.

Julia was no longer the same person she was, and sitting here listening to this, what would be a reasonably sane request by Leon and feeling annoyed?

Jeez.

Julia coughed and then looked at Colt. Feeling a warmth creep across her face as an embarrassment washed over her. Leon was clearly scared. Though he hid it with a facade of uncompromising strictness, she saw his eyes dart left and right as the mist continued to darken around them.

Were she in his place, surely she would feel the same sense of fear?

“You know, maybe we could head back. I don't want to make him uncomfortable if he can't deal with it. But, you know, Leon, we're safe. As safe as we can get. There is no real safety in this world now, but I feel confident that with Colt and with my magic, we can get through anything that comes our way.”

Leon didn't let up completely, but the brick wall of emotion started to fade, and his face softened. However, he kept himself closed off with his arms and that frown.

There was a tense moment as Colt let his silence hang in the air. Not yet voicing what he thought about Leon’s protest.

The man lived in blissful ignorance of that. After all, he’d done and changed within New Nashville, he’d begun to develop a reputation. Many people felt a certain overwhelming weight in the air when with him outside of their group.

He’d become a face and a force that most would agree was the strongest person in the walls. And that reputation carried everywhere.

Time ticked by slowly yet surely, and Julia knew the darkness problem would soon worsen.

“If we really need to head back, that is fine. We can. But I’d expect we’d be back out here tomorrow morning. There’s no point in putting more people in danger by waiting; it’s just this has seemed more fruitful than we could’ve imagined.”

Finally, Leon broke and sighed.

“You know, I didn't know what to think of you two when we first had out here. But seeing the way you took down those monsters, I'd be lying if I didn't say that. I feel a bit ashamed of myself. The information we've gathered will change many things when we head back to New Nashville. But if you really believe that we can find this place tonight… Who am I to stand in the way.”

Of course, he muttered this last bit, perhaps reluctant to agree with others' plans but agreeing nonetheless.

Colt went over and clapped him on the shoulder, giving him a broad grin. “I knew you had it in you. We're already so close. You can see it on your map with what we’ve marked. We've been getting closer every single stop. Why not drive it all the way to the finish line?”

Julia nodded her head to confirm this.

She told him how the mana felt, and as they recorded the man's signatures as they moved through the mist, she realized quickly that this technique was more efficient than ever imagined. When focusing on the magic in the air, she’d improved. Her senses even give her an intuition on which way to head.

Now, with her grasp of magic, she felt like a predator, tracking down their prey in the middle of this misty forest. She could taste the blood in the air or the magic in the mist and knew they would soon arrive.

The rumor of Nashville being dangerous at night was probably just that: a rumor.

Many of the people in New Nashville had adopted an almost superstitious attitude to their lives following the beginning of the apocalypse. In fact, she'd even heard of some churches starting to erupt, declaring now the end times and magic to be a sign of God taking his eyes upon their civilization and condemning or blessing them, depending on who you asked.

She did not have any strong feelings either way. If they wanted to think this was an act of God, then she assumed that was valid.

How could she discount anything in a world where she slung water magic with a thought?

With Leon pacified, Colt gestured for her to continue. Of course he would—he always finished what he started.

The fully committed party returned to their task: sampling water to narrow their search perimeter. Day's dull gray surrendered to inky darkness, forcing them to slow their pace through the forest. Any moment, a monster might materialize from the mist.

It did, briefly. An Orc reared its head and was cut down in a matter of seconds before Colt’s blade.

Leon winced over the entire thing but plodded on regardless. Committed and trusting in their protection.

With Colt watching out and their muscle, she had the time and space she needed to focus on her task. As they worked and sampled mist, she gained a new awareness of water magic.

The air was oddly cool as she let it filter and cycle through her core; her Edict echoed ever so slightly with the odd phenomenon that was occurring around her, as if it were surging toward the source, eager to see what was spawning so much magic and Edict.

Without a doubt, they were getting closer.

There was a slight tug on her mana and Edicts as every new sample became fresher and more vibrant; she felt the new Edict skin her mind like a shock of cold water when one plunged into those ice tubs.

She’d done that once, back when she ran in high school. It was supposed to help recovery, but when she stumbled out of the ice bath, it felt like her muscles refused to move… It wasn’t only until a minute after the traumatic affair that she felt a rush of shock and joy from the experience… Though she couldn’t bring herself to dive back into one of those things anytime afterward.

Her lungs filled with icy coolness as they stalked closer to her prey.

An almost second sense began to wash over her as she led them through the mist, stalking the ghost that caused all of this.

Deep into the night, Julia collected her cleanest sample yet. The water felt as if it had spilled directly from a frozen mountain peak—colder, purer. Her exhaled breath billowed white in the winter-like chill.

The mana here showed almost no decay at all.

The Edict tugged at her senses, unmistakable in its pull.

Through the thinning mist, familiar architecture emerged—Vanderbilt University. Her chest tightened with recognition. She'd nearly attended on a running scholarship before it fell through, before the gap year that stretched into years of isolation. The campus where her future might have unfolded now stood transformed by forest, yet unmistakable.

"This is it," she whispered, certainty crystallizing in her mind.

"Shit." Colt's Edict was already wrapping around his blade, warping reality in preparation. "Trouble."

Her gaze followed his. Phantoms. Half-formed people hovered in the mist, ghostly figures drifting across the campus grounds before suddenly accelerating toward them. They'd found their dungeon—and it had found them.

Julia raised her staff, looked back at Leon and his scared expression, and gave him a wild grin. “Don’t worry! We’ve got this!’