Chapter 185 - Chasing Memories

Earlier that day, prior to Deka’s failed reincarnation…

 

A vibrant sun shone in the middle of a bright blue sky, looking down upon an idyllic mountain range thick with jungle. Unlike the massive, sloping mountains in Kumin province to the east, these mountains had distinctly tall and narrow shapes. They rose out of the ground like natural walls and towers, their crumbling pale brown rocks covered in craggy bushes and twisted, resilient trees with needled leaves.

At the base of the mountains the jungle was thicker, but full of small villages and glistening, terraced rice fields that flourished along winding rivers. Villagers in wide conical straw hats tended to fields among black bison and long legged herons.

Here, deep in the province of Huan on top of a secluded mountain, a rift opened in space and a young boy with curly blond hair and deep green eyes stepped out.

He looked around, taking careful note of the shapes and layout of the mountain range around him. 

This mountain was on the edge of a cluster. Its flattened peak sat beneath several larger mountains to its west and south west. To the east there was a steep drop off in the height of mountains, revealing a broad landscape that stretched to the horizon.

A lazy river wound its way through a sparse jungle. Three peaks formed a triangle below him. The mountains in the northeast formed a natural wall around a small lake.

It was a beautiful landscape, but not particularly breathtaking compared to some of the vistas in the province. They were on the northern side of the continent where the soil was thin and hard to farm, thus there was no sign of people or civilization for kilometres around.

The peak that they had emerged one was one of several dozens in this part of mountain range, and was not remarkable in any way.

“It seems to be right…” Argus muttered quietly to himself.

A moment later a man emerged from the portal and closed it behind him.His name was Soong, a freelancer Astromancer that Argus had hired for the long distance journey. He wore a tailored, checkered suit typical of Noga style, if a bit on the outlandish side. The clean-shaven gentleman looked completely out of place in the rustic wilderness.

Argus himself wasn’t any better, though at least he wore a traveler’s cloak on top of his own formal suit.

“Nice here.” Soong commented offhandedly.

Soong’s thoughts naturally appeared in Argus’ mind. Indifference mixed with mild curiousity. A bit of confusion. He couldn’t see why Argus would want to come to a remote location like this.

“This should be the place.” Argus frowned. 

“For a picnic, perhaps?” Soong remarked casually, walking over to the edge of the cliff and peering down.

The vegetation on the mountain was overgrown but sparse, as there was not much soil on this rocky peak. A few twisted, wizened trees clung to the rocks with gnarled roots. Birds chirped softly nearby as a calm breeze blew across the mountain top.

This was the third location they had come to this day. The first two locations had been fairly innocuous, a stuffy library in the capital and an old but fairly famous temple. Both locations didn’t have anything of use to Argus, though this was not surprising. After all, he was looking for information on the mysterious entity at the bottom of the white world. 

The texts that he had found were ones that he already was aware of. Scriptures written during the War of the Five Kings, warning about hidden dangers deep within the aetheric plane. The accounts were vague and often second-hand information recorded by low level Exalted. 

Despite not learning any new information, Argus felt it was still a valuable use of his time to confirm the knowledge in his memories. A large portion of this knowledge was from the piece of his soul that Yuzu had helped him find inside the Great Library of the dead God of Knowledge. 

Being able to confirm that his memories were real gave him confidence that the merge with the soul shard was successful. After visiting these two locations he had the confidence to head to the next location.

This third location was the most out of the way, and unlike the other two locations was not part of any map or recent record. Argus only vaguely knew about it from the memories in his recovered soul shard.

There was something significant about this place, Argus was sure of it. If only he could remember the details!

A grating feeling drilled into his brain as he continued to scan the surroundings. Each small detail triggered his memory, forming the pieces of a puzzle, but the core of that puzzle was a blank, missing space. 

Argus’ teeth ground together subconsciously as he grew increasingly flustered.

On top of that, the freelancer was getting increasingly doubtful of Argus, and was internally considering suggesting that they go back. Soong idly wandered around the peak, gazing down the crevices with zero interest in their surroundings. 

As Argus continually failed to dig up the memories, a feeling of inadequacy began to intrude on his thoughts. Prior to meeting Yuzu he had felt lost and confused, but after she helped him merge with his soul he’d gained clarity into his condition. He was broken, he was weak. The memories he’d recovered didn’t give him any answers, they only made him aware of just how much of himself that he’d lost.

He began to tremble as his thoughts spiraled into despair and helplessness. Moreover, he was increasingly conscious of looking like a fool in front of the freelancer, who already considered him a child. It took all of Argus’ willpower to not curl up into a ball on the peak right there.

“Eh-“ Soong muttered.

“I don’t know, okay?!” Argus snapped. His high pitched voice was swallowed up by the air, sounding weak and flat.

Soong raised an eyebrow at Argus, unaware of the boy’s internal turmoil. After a pause he shook his head and pointed down the crevice that he had been peering down, “There’s something down there.”

“Something…?” Argus blinked. He rushed over to Soong’s side and looked down the cliff.

The peak of the mountain was not a solid shape, but instead had a cleft that cut into its side, a crack that split the eastern face in two. The angle of the afternoon sun was such that it illuminated a small strip within the darkness of the crack.

That small band of light revealed the pillars of a structure hidden in the mountain crevice.

“Hold on.” Soong said, placing his hand on Argus’ shoulder. He snapped his fingers and they were swallowed by a rift.

The next second they were at the bottom staring up at the entrance to a stone temple embedded into the back of the crevice. A large arched stone door with complicated symbols was framed on either side by free standing stone pillars.

“You were right after all.” Soong said with a look of wonder on his face.

The ancient structure had a deep feeling of mystery about it. The thin slit of sunlight that penetrated through the crevice only illuminated a small section of the door. The rest of it was obscured in a deep shadow.

The temple’s walls and pillars were hewn from smooth grey rock blocks with a subtle marbling that sparkled where sunlight hit, as if it were embedded with gems. The complicated runes were engraved most heavily across the front of the door, but they were also present on the pillars and walls. The scent of dust hung in the hazy air.

The rock was not sourced from Huan or anywhere on the continent that I can think of. The architecture as well is hard to place. It seems familiar, but I am not aware of any civilization that uses runes… Argus contemplated to himself. There are three dimensional runes on the gates to Okuron’s Great Library, but these are not quite so intricate…

Argus turned around and looked at the sky out of the side of the crevice. There were no peaks in sight to the east that overlooked the crevice, and the temple was inset deep enough into the crevice that it would be impossible to see from below. There were also no paths leading up to this place. The temple’s location would be impossible to stumble upon. 

How long had this temple been here, hidden away? Who had put it here?

Despite successfully finding this spot, Argus was unable to feel relief or elation. He frowned as he turned his attention back to the temple, deep in thought.

He didn’t know the name of this building, its history, or what it contained.

How did he know about it in the first place? What part of his past was connected with this mysterious, isolated temple?

“Seems a bit out of the way for a study trip.” Soong muttered to himself more than anything. He side-eyed Argus curiously, “What do you think could be inside?”

After receiving no response from the boy he commented again, “I’d really like to see what’s inside… What if I opened a portal?”

A glimmer of a memory tingled at the edge of Argus’ mind. An itch that he couldn’t quite grasp onto.

“Okay.” Argus said calmly.

Soong rolled up his right sleeve and then stretched out his hand toward the wall. A rift started to open up on the wall revealing a darkened interior, but it suddenly distorted and fizzled.

The astromancer frowned as he tried again, to the same effect.

“There’s interference.” Soong said, rubbing his chin with a concerned expression. “Unless you know more about this building, it could be dangerous to proceed further.”

“No…” Argus replied in a distracted tone, “I don’t know anything about this building. But…”

From the corner of his eye Soong watched Argus pull out an oversized gold pocket watch from his pocket. The freelancer pretended to be focused on the tower as Argus flipped open the lid, revealing an ornate watch face with the shapes of constellations on its face instead of numbers. Its two long hands were spinning in excited, unpredictable motions. Argus’ eyes widened as his body suddenly tensed up.

As soon as the pocket watch was opened, the spiritual intuitions of both Exalted triggered. Their gazes jerked up to look at the center of the stone door, where an arcane symbol had begun to glow with a bright blue light. 

The circular symbol was composed of numerous equal-sized circles arranged so that they looked like they formed six petaled flowers. Soong had no clue what it meant, but Argus recognized it as soon as he saw it. 

This was the same symbol that was engraved on the doors to Okuron’s Great Library.

“Watch out!” 

Soong immediately stepped away as a beam of light burst out from the symbol. The bluish white light engulfed Argus, who calmly stood in place. He was overcome with a sense of familiarity and deja-vu as he stared up at the glowing sigil.

The light flared brightly, extinguishing all the shadows in the crevice. Soong shielded his eyes and turned away.

A moment later the light faded away and the crevice was draped in shadow once more. The sigil glowed briefly before disappearing. The temple became calm and inert as before.

Argus had vanished into the light.