Chapter 274: To the North (2)

Ketal told the Saint he would give his answer later and returned to his room. The Saint saw him to the door with a worried look that could not settle.

Ketal stretched out on the bed and stared up at the translucent panel hanging in the air above him.

𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

[Quest No. 789]

[Respond to the anomaly in the North.]

[Warning: If you delay, the danger may escalate.]

A Quest appearing by itself was nothing new. Ever since the beings from the Demon Realms had begun spilling into the continent, panes like this had surfaced whenever he brushed against their affairs. He had seen several since leaving the White Snowfield.

However, this time felt different. There was a warning attached beneath the line of instruction. It was not the first time he had seen an extra note. The last Quest he had finished in the Snowfield had carried something similar:

[Quest No. 784]

[Deal with what stands before you.]

[Info: Completing this Quest will let you leave the White Snowfield.]

Sometimes the panel included a hint or a line of explanation. Now it had returned to tell him, in its dry way, to go North and meet whatever had gone wrong there. Ketal tapped his chin.

“What are you looking at?” The Holy Sword spoke up, curious.

“Something only I can see,” he said.

“I cannot,” the sword said, baffled. “Is it your authority? With power like yours, it would not be strange if you held one or two such talents.”

“My authority, you say...,” Ketal repeated, making a face at the word.

He watched the panel a while longer. The truth was, he did not know what it was. It had been beside him since the day his feet touched this world’s soil.

At last, he said, “I want your opinion.”

“Ask me anything,” the sword said brightly. “I am the Holy Sword. I know many things.”

Ketal described the panel and the way it worked. The sword listened with real focus, asking a question here and there, nodding in Ketal’s hand as if a metal hilt could nod. Then it faltered.

“Ah. That is... unusual,” the sword finally said.

“Do you know what this is?” Ketal asked it.

“Not exactly. It sounds closest to a revelation.”

The gods could not act freely in the Mortal Realm, so they sent messages to the faithful, and those messages moved people. If the Holy Sword had to slot the panel into a known category, the word revelation fit best.

“Does it demand anything of you?” the sword asked, “or offer clear rewards, or impose any penalty?”

“It demands nothing,” Ketal said. “It presents a path and leaves the choice. There are rewards, but they are vague. The panel says they will come later and does not say what they are. And there are no penalties. I have ignored Quests for a time when I had other matters to finish, and nothing happened.”

The sword went quiet for a heartbeat. “That is odd.”

A revelation moved downward, from higher to lower. It came with expectations and the weight of consequence. There were rewards for obedience and pain for refusal. Ketal’s description did not match that pattern.

After a long minute, the sword spoke carefully. “Then it is less a revelation than a counselor. Or a guide.”

“I thought so too,” Ketal said.

“You already knew?”

“Nothing else explains it. That was my suspicion.”

“Oh,” the sword said, and its voice fell a shade. “Then I was no help.”

“You were,” Ketal said. “The thought is one thing. Hearing it from someone else lets me trust it.”

“Then good,” the sword said, instantly cheered. “Tell me whenever you need me.”

Ketal looked up at the panel again.

A guide... If so, whose?

he wondered. He chased the thought a few steps and stopped. The sword’s earlier phrasing returned to him.

My authority...

“Perhaps,” Ketal murmured, and let it go. He did not know, and he did not need to. One thing was certain—the panel had helped him every time. Without it, he would not have found a way out of the White Snowfield.

“All right,” he said.

He had never been betrayed by a Quest. They had always pulled him toward a solvable problem and handed him a thread to follow. If the same hand now added a warning, there was a reason. Barbarians held no charm for him, but that did not matter. He had enough cause to move.

He went straight to the Saint and said he would head North. The Saint blinked and tripped over the first words out of his mouth.

“So you are from the North after all...,” the Saint murmured.

He pictured Ketal returning home to defend his birthland. Ketal shook his head.

“No. I simply think I should go North."

“I see. Understood,” the Saint replied. He gathered his thoughts quickly. “There is a missionary in the North. I will give you his location and our crest. Go to him, explain the situation, and accept his guidance. He is a gentle man. He will treat you kindly.”

Within the church, the man had a reputation for patience. He did not raise his voice. When others made mistakes, he put a hand on a shoulder and spoke quietly until the panic bled out of them. Many had wept into his robe collar when he first left for the northern mission.

“I will go,” Ketal said.

The next morning, he was ready. The Saint came out in person to see him off.

“Travel safely,” the Saint said. “Our doors will always be open to you.”

“Thank you. I hope I have reason to come through them again.”

Cretein led three horses to the steps.

“The North is very far,” he said. “Even riding without rest, you will need months. Take these. They are the best we have, and they are yours.”

It was a distance that demanded fresh mounts every day. The church was offering its finest stock for free.

Ketal shook his head. “I plan to run.”

“You do not want a horse?” Cretein asked him, dumbfounded.

“I do not.”

“I... understand,” the Saint said, steadying himself. He knew Ketal was a Hero-level fighter and could travel faster than any mount if he wished. The distance made his mind balk anyway. To cover in a body what took months on a horse sounded like a story villagers told to make a child go to bed.

“How long will you need?” the Saint asked Ketal. “If it will take some time, I will send word ahead.”

“At that range,” Ketal said thoughtfully, “about a week.”

The Saint and Cretein both stopped moving.

“A week?” Cretein said.

“I will be running and studying the situation as I go,” Ketal said. “I intend to take my time.”

The panel had warned him to move quickly, but experience told him he did not need to sprint headlong. He thought he had at least half a year’s grace, perhaps a full year, before a delay broke something that could not be fixed.

That answer left both men blinking. Months on the best horses, and he meant to jog there in a week, and leisurely at that.

“Then this is goodbye,” Ketal said. “We will meet again.”

He set his foot and pushed.

The step cracked the stone and threw a gust down the steps that turned robes into sails. The Saint and Cretein crossed their arms in front of their faces and grunted as the wind slapped their cheeks. Dust swirled, settled, and left the courtyard in a hush.

Ketal was already gone, a dot that had skipped the horizon and slipped out of sight.

***

The continent lay in turmoil. Demons pressed in, kingdoms crumbled, and cities fell one after another.

This specific kingdom, too, was caught in the same ruin.

A roar like a scream rolled along its wall, then turned ragged. A young man clenched his teeth and drove his sword forward. The blade punched through a monster’s chest. He wrenched it back and chopped down hard.

The monster came apart in two sloppy halves. Blood burst and painted him from throat to thigh. The gold of his hair blackened in clots.

Monsters pressed closer from every side, and claws flashed through the dark as they reached for him. He hit the cobbles and felt air leave his lungs. A mouth opened above him, wide enough to take his head.

“Prince!” someone cried. “You bastards, get off him!”

A soldier stumbled into the snap of teeth, swinging a spear like a club. He did the thing he had meant to do. The monsters peeled away from the young man and turned toward the noise that had struck them.

However, that angered the monster. Its jaw found the soft flesh of the soldier's neck and tore.

“Revan!” the young man shouted.

He cut the monster twice and three times, and the bodies thumped to the ground in ugly shapes. Revan lay where he fell and did not move.

“Your Highness! You need to go back to the keep!” a knight yelled, coming up limping and dented. The plates of his armor had lost their clean lines. “It is too dangerous to hold the streets. We cannot do more here!”

The fight had gone badly. Soldiers had broken under the first rush and then done what they could, and what they could do was not enough.

“All units!” the prince said. He gulped, and when he spoke again, his voice carried. “Fall back! Return to the keep!”

Formations tightened and moved. The gate swallowed men, then slammed. Many did not make it that far. The prince sagged down on a bench inside the wall and breathed.

“Prince Pasika,” a maid gasped, rushing toward him with cloths and water.

“I am fine,” he said. “See to the others.”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

Her hands went where they were needed. Everywhere on the stone, men groaned.

Pasika’s face drew tight. He was the first prince of the Kingdom of Peridoan. He had met Ketal by accident, had traded a few words, and had seen the Guildmaster of the Mercenary Guild, the Saintess of the Sun God, and the Tower Master’s only disciple gathered in one place. He had left in a hurry, feeling that he had stumbled into a hall where he did not belong.

Then the Holy Sword had been drawn and broken. In the blur that followed, he had not become its bearer.

He had returned home in a black mood that had lasted exactly as long as it took him to reach the capital. When he arrived, the city was already ringed with demons and beasts.

“What is our status?” he asked now, turning to the captain of the knights.

“Twenty knights dead,” the captain said. “Soldiers, a hundred or more. Less than half of our total can still fight.”

“And theirs?”

The captain’s mouth went thin. “No losses to speak of.”

Pasika looked out over the wall. The ground outside crawled. Bodies in every size poured from a maw in the distance that did not close. Between those faceless ranks, there were even two named demons.

The captain stood there alone, a Transcendent leaning on the last inches of his strength. He could hold one of those named demons at a time. However, he could not hold both.

Everyone in the city understood that Peridoan could not stand alone against what pressed its gates. If nothing changed, the kingdom would die.

“Your Highness,” the captain said quietly. “You must run. We cannot let the line of the kings end here.”

“You want me to live alone?” Pasika said. “No. Send my mother and my sister. The blood will carry through them.”

He had hobbies he did not voice and habits that would shock the court if they were shouted in a hall. That did not make him a villain. He loved his people and the small rituals of the city more than he loved his own name.

“Our kingdom will fall,” he said. “We will not run. We will stand and die on our feet. Even if the world forgets us, the gods will remember.”

The captain bowed his head. “As you command.”

At dawn, the horns sounded. The demons’ all-out assault began, and the beasts came on. Pasika’s throat hurt, but he raised his voice anyway.

“Listen,” he called, and the men on the wall turned their heads. “We will likely die here. Do not fear it. The gods will remember our struggle and our sacrifice!”

He dragged his sword free of the scabbard and held it high. “I will die with you! Follow me!”

The men roared.

However, from beyond the range of arrows, the demons answered with laughter—cool, amused, as though the first prince’s speech meant nothing at all. The laughter carried its own message: courage was useless here, and every one of them was already meat.

Just then, someone stood at Pasika’s elbow. He had gone unseen until he chose to be, and it was he who admired them instead.

“Beautiful,” the voice said. “The very shape of noblesse oblige.”

Pasika jerked. “W-who goes there?”

He had not felt the man approach. He fell back two steps and looked up, eyes widening.

“Ketal?”

“It is good to see you again,” Ketal said, smiling.

“I was passing through and saw a kingdom under siege,” he said. “I did not expect it to be yours. This is your home, then.”

“Yes,” Pasika said, then stopped, flustered. He did not know how to ask why Ketal was here, or how, or what it meant. He looked past Ketal’s shoulder and saw the black tide gathering.

“The situation is not good,” he said mildly, following Pasika's gaze. “Since we are friends, I will help.”

Before Pasika could answer, Ketal took a step. The flagstones cracked with the sound of a dropped anvil. Pasika staggered, thrown off balance by the tremor.

Ketal launched like a shell toward the snarling front. The monsters screamed and rushed to meet him.

“Excuse me,” Ketal said, almost politely, and set his heel.

Before the howling monsters, Ketal lightly infused his step with Myst and brought his foot down upon the earth. The ground surged upward like a tsunami and crashed over the horde.