Chapter 348 - Hubris V

Porcius Pollux, the newly christened lord of the eponymous march, scratched the back of his head as he stepped out into the afternoon sun. It was well past lunchtime. There would only be a few hours before the goddess of the sun sank her way beneath the horizon, but the young marquis—a fledgeling warrior barely thirty years old—had only just awoken. His sleep schedule no doubt gave a slovenly impression, but he was unconcerned. He cared little for how he appeared in the eyes of his men. None of them thought him even remotely qualified for his new position in the first place. And frankly, he was of the same opinion.

It wasn’t like he stood out from his peers. Though his rise was fairly meteoric, he had stagnated at approximately the same level as everyone else. Past the mid to high eight hundreds, there was nowhere in the southern lord’s domain, or most of Cadria for that matter, where one could find ample amounts of experience. He had no relation to the former marquis, and they had never been close. Far from it, in fact. The old lord had kept him at arm’s length simply because he was unfamiliar. All of his other men had much longer tenures. Some had been replaced over the years, as they retired to the countryside or sought different lives, but most had been with him for a few dozen decades at least. It was they who held his trust, they who knew his business, and they who should have assumed the position.

And yet, the king had chosen Porcius and bestowed upon him the late marquis’ name.

Not one person in the southernmost state truly understood the appointment. Most suspected that the king had simply seen some sort of potential in the young buck, but that assumption was quickly called into question and overturned soon after he took up his position. No particular talent suddenly blossomed, regardless of how hard he worked.

So much confusion resulted from his clear incompetence that a group of his former colleagues travelled to the capital and begged to hear an explanation in person. But all they were given was the same brief response he had sent through the mail.

His appointment was made to prevent the march’s destruction.

When they begged for more details, the king only told them that they would understand in time.

Their hopes dashed, they begrudgingly returned to their lands and did away with their open complaints. Of course, it was only out in public that they refrained from further questioning. They bitched and moaned behind closed doors, with some of them even calling the king’s intelligence to question. It was a ridiculous affair. Just a few months prior, they had been celebrating his crowning with all their hearts, ranting on and on about the age of blood and conquest in which they would soon partake. But lo and behold, a few unfavourable decisions later, and they were badmouthing away. Despite knowing him as a brilliant general, they looked only for the flaws in each of his policies, bringing up again the rumours of mind rot that stemmed from his aspect status.

It was thanks to another lord that Porcius was aware of their treachery. Ephesus, the lord of the neighbouring lands, had brought him the details as his spies had found them. The fresh marquis was suspicious at first, but even he could tell from the passion and worship that filled the criocentaur’s voice, whenever he spoke of the king and the upcoming war, that he was a true fanatic.

Ephesus informed him that he would have to do something soon to ensure that his march remained united, and even knowing little of politics and law, Porcius was inclined to agree. That was why he caved to their loudest demand—seeing their old master avenged.

It was the sort of tomfoolery in which the young buck would have normally never engaged. He was hardly enough of a fool to pick a fight with a foe he knew nothing about, let alone one that could level a capital city overnight. Alas, he pressed forward. It was the only way to ensure the function of his newfound domain, and he couldn’t imagine how shameful it would have been not to live up to the god-king’s expectations. He couldn’t allow himself to be the reason that his idol’s judgement was doubted.

Fortunately, his newfound ally was there to supply him with everything he needed. It was Lord Ephesus that had served to mediate between Porcius and his master’s men, Lord Ephesus who advised him on the organisation of his troops, and Lord Ephesus that had discovered the enemy’s location. There was only one man backing him, but the buck felt as if he had all the support in the world.

His opponent’s abilities still worried him. The rumours claimed that the nameless warrior was something of a local god, and his wide-area attacks were powerful enough to kill every single one of the soldiers that had inhabited the city of Tornatus. Some of them had been far more powerful than Porcius, their levels ten or twenty higher and their experience a hundredfold. But he wasn’t worried. It was impossible for a mortal to perform such a powerful attack without preparation. It was no doubt contractual, like a beam spell, and likely declared a target well in advance. He was confident that he could escape its range unharmed.

Even in the worst case, they could simply abandon their ships and leverage their wings. Most flew far faster without the convenient fortresses.

The nameless warrior would surely fall once the attack was avoided. Some of the intelligence suggested that he was a decent close-quarters combatant, but even if that were to be the case, there was nothing he could do when surrounded by champions and elites.

It was not a strategy by which most would have been willing to abide. Downing a champion with numbers was dishonourable at best, and an insult to their culture at worst. But it was not a battle for honour that his men would be fighting.

All they sought was vengeance for their master and justice for the hundreds of thousands of lives that the knight had stolen away.

They had all lost friends and family to the unwarranted attack.

They had all shared in a moment of grief that had struck the nation without rhyme or reason.

And they would not be stopped.

Not until the guilty lay dead.

__

It took a few days to pass through Sunakprathese, but the party eventually worked through the dense jungle and past the dividing line. The country they entered was named Skarnia, and its border was marked by the Howler’s River. One could easily differentiate the two nations from the infrastructure alone. One side of the river saw nothing but trees, while the other was rife with cleared paths and wide roads.

Crossing the river was the most difficult part. There were no bridges anywhere to be seen. The Skarnians had tried to build them time and time again, but the xenophobic ferrets always tore down their efforts on account of a fear of invasion. It was an entirely unfounded claim. The Skarnians were certainly fed up by their neighbours, but they had no interest in war. Driven by the urge to collect shiny objects, their people birthed many merchants who wished for nothing more than to venture far and wide, exchanging their goods for coin. Alas, there was no business to be done with their southern neighbour. The worst part of all was that it amounted to little more than petty harassment. The crow-faced otters could easily head south through the western land routes or the eastern sea routes, the profitable detours of which accounted for an extra two days' travel in good weather. Realistically it was closer to five, thanks to the unpredictable conditions and all the business they did along the way.

It was precisely at one of those weather-based anomalies that the northern brigade was staring. The party’s cliffside path provided a picture-perfect view of the forest below, and more importantly, the tornadoes running rampant within it. There were three of them in all, lifting trees and rocks and water basins alike as they went wherever they pleased.

“Woah, what the heck are those!?” said Sylvia.

“Tornadoes. Idiot,” said Claire.

“Oh, come on! You know that’s not what I meant!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“It might not seem like it, but that’s a whole colony of monsters,” said Krail. “They’re supposed to be made up of an ascended subspecies of wolf that’s taken on a number of fairy-like traits.”

“Wait, really?” The fox’s eyes widened.

“Yes. I spent a solid three days trying to hunt one the first time I passed through Skarnia.” Krail pushed himself along with his staff as he spoke. “The third party I joined, roughly forty years ago, insisted on coming up north to see the sights, and they had us obsessed at first glance.”

“Did you get any?”

“Just a few. They’re not very strong, but they’re a lot sharper than they look,” he said. A bit of a grin appeared on the old man’s face. “Of course, they’re not really much of a match for us as we are now. Each of us could probably take down a whole colony by ourselves.” He glanced at Claire whose eyes were laser-focused on the closest group. “But that doesn’t mean we should. It’d be bad for the local ecosystem.”

“There is little time for such endeavours to begin with,” said Arciel. “We are nearing the next trial.” She walked in front of the group and stopped to bring it to a halt. “Griselda has informed me that the lake at the center of this canyon is where our next challenge lies.” She pointed at a rather large body of water, ten, maybe even fifteen kilometers across. “I must remark, she has also cited abnormal activity beyond the usual margin of error. I suggest we remain on our guard.”

“You think that means the Cadrians got here before us?” asked Ace.

“It is within the realm of possibility,” said Arciel.

“I doubt it's them,” said Claire.

Panda had expected them to make contact ten days after their most recent triumph, but his calculation was made under the assumption that both parties kept moving, and the brigade had been stalled for nearly half a week. By Claire’s estimate, that likely meant that they had pushed the encounter back by at least a day. Time was still ticking, of course, but they had another two or three mornings before the clock struck twelve.

Asking the raccoon would likely have produced a more accurate estimate, but nobody had seen him since the lyrkress’ last encounter. Once again, he had vanished without a trace.

“Either way, we’ll be needing some weapons,” said the swordsman. “Miss Penhorn and I are still both shit out of luck.”

Neither warrior had been able to acquire any replacements in the ferrets’ country; every city they entered had been just as unfriendly as the first.

“It’s a bit hard to see from here, but there’s a town by the lake,” said Krail. “I can’t promise you that you can get exactly what you want, but you’ve got a pretty good chance of getting something decent.”

“All we need is something of the right size,” said Ace. “And the Skarnians aren’t much bigger than the sunaks. Don’t look like they’ve got the right frame to use swords either.”

The elf grinned. “You’re forgetting. They’re merchants, and good ones,” he said. “Don’t you worry, they’ll get you something good. This staff of mine is from way back then too.”

“Wouldn’t that just mean that it’s outdated, as far as performance goes?” asked Chloe.

“Performance, performance. Always the performance.” The elf sighed. “Is performance really all you kids care about these days? Listen here, girlie. Sometimes, a familiar piece of equipment that isn’t quite as good can often serve you much better than something you’re not used to. In fact, this exact staff has saved me at least a dozen times before. The first was when…”

The elf descended into a long-winded rant. He went on and on about his most perilous encounters as they continued down the path and eventually made their way into the emerald-green chasm. Slowly but surely, the forest changed as they descended. The trees turned broad-leaved and spiked up in height. Most of the individuals above the basin were ten to twenty meters tall, but those that lived within it were ten times that. The wildlife was abundant within the jungle, featuring everything from the flying squirrels darting around the trees and the hawks chasing after them. 

They were only exposed to so much of it, however. The wide path they followed cut straight through the forest and led into a bustling town. Unlike most other settlements, which were surrounded by walls aplenty, the Skarnian city was built right into the forest itself. That was not to say that the people lived in trees, though some of them certainly did, but rather that their buildings were constructed in such a way that the vegetation wrapped around it; the bazaar blended naturally into the forest, even though the whole thing was effectively an oversized trade centre.

The marketplace was quite the sight to behold. There weren’t too many different species roaming about, largely thanks to the ferrets’ proximity, but there was still a rather impressive collection of people. Huskars talked business with the native crow-otters, while dwarves and fairies fluttered around the city in whatever way they pleased. Tripedal owls, bipedal pigs, and unipedal giraffes could be seen working the many stalls and booths spread throughout the settlement.

Far more diverse than the people themselves were their ridiculous mounts. Insects appeared to be the most common, with massive, four-seat ladybugs making up nearly half the total. In the wild, they likely would have been red or orange, but the Skarnians had them in all different colours and combinations thereof. Even their shapes varied to some extent. There were thinner ladybugs with tiny faces, fatter ones with extra chairs installed, and even long-legged ones that could walk above the rest. Second in terms of popularity were the rhinoceros beetles. From their relative scarcity, they appeared to be the luxury equivalent. They were even fashioned with fancy pelts and leather chairs over the typical cloth-covered seats installed within the commoners’ vehicles.

It only got more exotic from there. Obese butterflies, insectoid geese, and gunpowder-powered grasshoppers were seen outside of noble establishments. There were even large millipedes present to serve as public transport, carrying dozens of civilians on their backs at a time. The insect boom was so great that Claire turned towards Matthais and considered throwing a bridle around his face. He certainly might have wound up humiliated and confused, but it would enable her to present as a lady from a wealthy family.

“W-what?” he stuttered.

“Nothing,” she said.

Shaking the reverie from her head, she returned her gaze to the shops and checked them for decent weapons. They needed to procure them as quickly as they could.

They needed to clear the dungeon before their enemies arrived.