2520 Underground Fortress (Part 2)
Alas, it took Lith until the 4% to gain a sufficient understanding of the seamless rune strings that comprised the countless overlapping arrays in front of them. Luckily for him, after a while another portion of the sensory load disappeared, bringing Lith and Nalrond a short relief that brought the latter's complaints to a halt.
'Solus?' Lith asked, feeling a familiar yet silent presence in his mind.
The static returned as suddenly as it had disappeared bringing the burden back. Both Nalrond and Lith lost their breathing rhythm from the surprise and the sudden flaring up of their brains.
This time they bled not only from their noses, but also from their eyes.
'What the fuck did you do?' The Rezar managed to keep the mud funnel and prevent the loss of the collected air by the skin of his teeth.
'Nothing. I just tried to-' The static cleared again and Solus' mind processed her share of the information, stopping the bleeding. 'Contact Solus.'
Instead of making another attempt, Lith waited for her to start the communication yet nothing happened.
'Why isn't she talking or at least using Soluspedia to… Fuck me sideways. Neither of us can use it to drop messages since I'm underground now.' The answer dawned on Lith's mind. 'Probably she can feel my presence as well but for some reason, she can't use the mind link.
'The only possible explanation for what happened earlier is that she forcefully cut off the communication to not blow her cover.'
'I don't care why Solus did it.' Nalrond snarled. 'Another stunt like that and we are as dead as doornails.'
Lith wanted to check his theory, but he could feel how the combination of the Eyes, mud funnel, and sharing the air with him had brought Nalrond near his breaking point so Lith decided against it.
As soon as the scan progression reached 4%, the flow of information became much more bearable and the meter's progression sped up at an astounding rate.
'How is this possible? The flow of world energy is still the same. Did the tower recover another floor right now?' Nalrond asked.
'I wish.' Lith inwardly sighed. 'It's just that until a while ago, I had to study the magical formations as a whole. I need to have a clear understanding of the various arrays and how they interact with each other if I want a chance at cracking at least one.
'Once the scan covered an area wide enough to ensure me that there's a limit to how a single array influences its surroundings, I could restrict the scan to the magical formations in front of us and cut off the rest.
'The Eyes are still the same. Our load is lighter and the progression is faster simply because there's much less to decipher now.'
Soon they could discern six types of different arrays whose runes were interwoven in order to share their effects with each other and create a defensive system with no gaps.
There were sensory, dimensional sealing, cloaking, defensive, offensive, and world-energy-focusing arrays. They were arranged in a honeycomb structure with their fringes overlapping in order to share their respective mana flow and area of effect.
Any tampering of a single array would trigger a chain reaction in those surrounding it that would instantly spread to the whole complex. It would not only unleash a devastating barrage of spells created by weaponizing the accumulated world energy, but also alert the complex's populace.
Lith waited for the scan to reach 100% before uttering a single word.
'Let's go back to the surface. We can use a break and the help of Faluel and Ajatar to crack this thing.' Lith said while putting the Eyes away and making Nalrond almost cry for the sudden lack of pain.
'On it!' Going up turned out to be easier and faster.
The Rezar now only had to focus on the ground above them, using that below like an elevator that steadily pushed them up.
Also, since they now moved toward the air bubbles instead of in the opposite direction, the airflow reached them fast enough to create a surplus that soon allowed them to breathe normally.
The only sour note was that as soon as Lith dispelled the Hands of Menadion, the static returned and Solus' quiet presence disappeared from his mind.
'Hold on. I'm coming for you.' He thought, clenching his hands all the way up.
"How did it go?" "How big is it?" "Did you find a way in?" "Is-" The barrage of questions abruptly stopped as Lith and Nalrond reverted to their respective human forms.
Until that moment, their thick scales had hidden both the pallor of their skins and the signs of the recent bleeding that now stuck out like a sore thumb.
"By the Great Mother, what the heck happened down there?" Faluel rushed to them, using her breathing technique, Lifestream to check on their condition.
She discovered that aside from exhaustion and a light brain fever they were otherwise okay.
"My bad." Lith needed help to sit down without falling whereas Nalrond had no care for appearances and dropped back-first to the ground, panting. "I overestimated my abilities and Nalrond paid the price.
"I used the mind link to share the burden of my bloodline ability and he didn't take it well."
Friya kneeled behind the Rezar, putting his head on her lap to use it as a pillow as she fed him tonics and nutrients to recover. She had helped Lith and Solus with the Eyes many times yet the aftermath had never been so bad.
Friya had lots of questions, but Morok's and Ajatar's presence forced her to silence.
"Did you at least discover something?" Ajatar asked.
"Well…" Lith tried to open his eyes, but after being in the dark for so long, the natural light burned at his cornea and made his headache return stronger than ever.
He hid his face behind the palms of his hands before answering:
"I have what we need but I can't work on it. Not now and definitely not alone. I need a few minutes of absolute rest. Please, shut up." Even the attempt to conjure a layer of darkness and a Hush zone made him so light-headed that if not for Faluel's help he would have fainted.
He tried to speak, but his tongue was so swollen that it seemed to fill his entire mouth. The attempt to spark a mind link set his brain ablaze, making Lith double over in pain.
The Hydra cast both spells for him, making sure to cover Nalrond as well. The Rezar had already adjusted to the surface, but the shade brought relief to his teary eyes as well.
Due to the aftereffects of the Eyes, every noise sounded like a boom of thunder and every ray of light was a cruel blade stabbing at his skull.
'What about Invigoration?' Ajatar asked Faluel through a mind link.
'I too thought about that, but probably Lith wants to save his strength for the infiltration mission. Even if I'm the one who uses it on him, it would be his body bearing the burned and waste one of its charges.' She replied.
