For the next two days, Cyril continued heading northeast inexorably. Plates of sandstone armor covered most of his body, providing excellent camouflage; its natural weight didn’t bother him much, especially after he Lightened it with his Mass technique. He resisted the urge to transform into a golem again, choosing to Reinforce himself with Mass. Now that the Dominion was deep into the Second Sphere, the Cantrip filled him with a comfortable feeling of dense strength. The golem transformation may have sped up his progress, but it also made him far more visible.
Some of the more esoteric concepts of the Dominion of Water, like Firouza’s control over reflections, could also provide scrying and farsight across vast distances. No doubt they were spending several fortunes’ worth of time and resources hunting for the primary instigator behind the conflict at the oasis. Pouring Mass qi into his own body leaked far less of his aura than transforming himself into a massive golem. The fewer traces he left behind, the more difficult he would be to track.
He took a break only once, when an errant sandstorm whipped up about him all of the sudden; after bunkering down in a bronze sphere-room, he meditated for a few hours until it cleared up. The brief respite helped restore enough of his energy for him to trudge along for another day. The monotonous dunes and sandstone outcroppings were a source of comfort for him, exactly what he expected in a remote part of the desert. Here and there, an innocuous cactus or shrub assured him that he wasn’t walking in circles.
There was one consistent landmark--the blot of darkness far back on the horizon. The young drow woman was still breaking through to the Fourth Sphere. It provided a better compass than the stars, reliably at Cyril’s back. It was visible even in the nighttime as a tenebrous blur, somehow blacker than the surrounding darkness.
The lack of food or variety to the landscape were minor concerns for him. A Middle Condensation Stage cultivator could survive for months without eating. More concerning was the loss of his water. Already, it felt like his mouth was full of sand, his tongue hot and swollen in his mouth. He was half-sure it was all in his imagination, but the lack of sleep wasn’t helping matters either.
Without much else to do, he practiced his willshaping as he walked. His attempts at writing in the sand or forming perfect spirals remained sloppy, but each attempt seemed slightly better than the last. When the mental exercises grew monotonous, he switched to flipping through the scrolls of his Mind Scroll Cantrips to refresh his memory and attempt to glean new mysteries from his records. The loss of the Beljezan tablet, along with the rest of his supplies, still stung, but at least he had the contents safely stored away.
He stretched his senses out as far as they could go, searching for slight tremors beyond his own footsteps. Outside of the mystical darkness of the drow ascending, his spiritual senses detected nothing, no matter how much he strained. Though he didn’t expect to detect much in the middle of the desert, he wanted to know if any scrying techniques managed to catch sight of him.
Despite all of his precautions, he caught no sign of any monsters in the area. Even on the outskirts of the Wandering Phoenix Tribes, one could expect to encounter the occasional jackal or sand elemental if they ventured far enough. The patrolling guardsmen were always quick to respond to such intrusions, but it was an inevitability of living in the desert.
More than anything, the absence of monsters concerned Cyril. A few safe areas existed within the desert, often centered around sites of divine significance and the cultivators who attempted to exploit them. As far as he was aware, this approximate location wasn’t one of those areas.
The local tribes had either grown powerful enough to thoroughly dominate the region, or the Cult of Leviathan’s influence spread deeper than he thought. Either way, it meant that he was likely near civilization, though he wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. Other people meant answers, and it also meant exposing himself. According to his calculations, he wasn't too far off where his tribe had last been situated. It was possible he was only a short trek away from his tribe, though in his heart, it felt as if he was still far from home. He doubted he would be satisfied until he saw his family with his own eyes.
Late into the second day of his escape, he came across a caravan. At first he mistook it for a mirage, but on closer inspection he realized it was a short train, two wagons and a handful of surly camels. The wrinkled old man behind the reins of the front wagon looked to be the head of the meager expedition. A guard in rawhide leather armor stomped beside the animals, spear resting casually across his shoulders.
Cyril considered approaching them, but thought better of it. The risk of endangering random folk by making them aware of his existence outweighed any potential benefits. He followed far behind them, keeping low to the ground and minimizing the flow of qi through his channels. The caravan guardsman was only in the Early Condensation Stage, a cursory presence given the lack of monsters. While it was unlikely the guard could manage to spot him, Cyril was more worried about the hidden eyes of the Cult of Leviathan.
He kept pace with them for the next several hours, until the silhouette of a distant settlement broke across the horizon. A small fortification, encircled by low walls, likely home to less than a hundred people. Not much, but it was civilization.
The sight sent a cold thrill down his spine. He licked his cracked lips and resisted the urge to break his cover. The last stretch of the journey as the caravan plodded toward the settlement felt like it took longer than the rest combined.
Finally, the caravan came to a stop at the main entrance. A pair of guards stepped forward to inspect the newcomers; both were in the Middle Condensation Stage and possessed higher quality equipment compared to the defender of the caravan, with their monster-hide armor and the gleaming steel blades atop their halberds. While they posed no real threat to Cyril, they must have been an imposing sight for the mundane locals.
He watched them from a distance, taking note of their procedure. The settlement guards searched through both wagons before letting the caravan through. They lifted the iron portcullis just long enough for the last camel pass. Unexpectedly professional.
Cyril lingered far from the settlement until close to midnight. Only a sliver of the crescent moon shone overhead, and heavy winds threw up sheets of sand that blocked out most of the starlight. The torches of the patrolling guardsmen marked them as surely as their weak auras. More of them circled about the settlement than he had expected at night. Perhaps they were on edge because of recent news from the Cult of Leviathan.
Fortunately, unlike their evening counterparts, most of the night crew seemed to take their roles less seriously. Every once in a while, a pair of them would come together to chat at the end of their respective routes, or they barely glanced about during their rounds.
After observing their patterns for a while, Cyril slipped through a wide gap in the patrols along the back of the settlement. He planted his palm against the stone wall and Transmuted a section of it into sand. After slipping through the opening, he sealed it behind him with an identical expanse of the original material and moved on.
His infiltration didn’t appear to trigger any wards or alarms. Though important sections of the wall, particularly around the main entrance, glowed with empowered runes, Cyril had discovered more than a few potential points of entry. The defenses of the settlement were respectable, but in the end, it was still a small collection of buildings in the middle of nowhere.
Careful not to let his guard slip too much, Cyril proceeded deeper into the settlement, hiding himself in the gap between two squat buildings. While he despised skulking about like a thief, he was in no shape to interact with others. His golem transformation had shredded the final scraps of his clothes, and walking about in earthen armor would draw more attention than he wanted.
He made his way through the compound slowly, throwing his senses wide to detect any tremors or qi within the vicinity. None of the residents occupied the streets in the middle of the night; the only other people he saw were the patrolling guardsmen making their rounds.
One of the largest buildings in the compound leaked light and music through its shuttered windows, but Cyril avoided a closer investigation. The wooden walls of the establishment were heavy with runewards, far eclipsing the protections plastered onto the main entrance of the settlement.
His creeping about eventually revealed what he took to be a clothing or leatherworking store. Its protections were sparse, and Cyril sensed no signs of life within the building. Hopefully the owner lived in a residential building elsewhere.
Fighting back his resentment at skulking about, he Transmuted part of one of the building’s side walls into sand and slipped inside. As he had suspected, the store contained a variety of clothing and accessories, most of them of acceptable quality, stretched across display stands and stacked on shelves along the walls.
Cyril searched through the inventory until he discovered the shabbiest set of robes and slippers, bundled away in a forgotten corner. After dismissing his sandstone armor, he changed into the outfit and added a threadbare head wrapping. He caught sight of himself in a mirror and frowned. His height, as well as the refined features peeking out from beneath his beard and shaggy hair, prevented him from looking like a complete vagrant, at least. If no one peered too closely, he could be mistaken for a humble pilgrim.
Before he left, Cyril materialized a coin from E-grade copper and left it in place of the set of robes and slippers he had stolen. While base metal currency held no inherent value in the desert, the higher-grade material made it worth more than most of the store combined. Even a mundane resident would sense the hint of spirituality within the metal at a glance.
To ease his guilty conscience, he left another coin in place of the headwrap, tucking it into a cranny where it hopefully wouldn’t be discovered for a few days.
Cyril adjusted his outfit and departed the same way as he had entered, resealing the exit on his way out. He resisted the urge to head toward the establishment he had marked as an inn, though its light and warmth called to him. His mouth felt like a desert, and he would have traded his spear for a gulp of stale wine, but he still saw no signs of other residents wandering about. Most likely, the settlement had enforced a curfew on the streets.
Instead, he forced himself in the direction of the second-most warded building he had discovered: a small, one-room house in the dead center of the settlement, as if everything else had been built around it. It was built from old, weathered stone without a hint of spirituality. Vibrant plants and flowers sprouted from the packed earth on either side of the path leading to the front door, forming a small garden in defiance of its drab surroundings. A small fountain burbled at the foot of the path; Cyril licked his lips and resisted the urge to drink greedily of the pure water.
The hundreds of wards etched into the house, the path, the fountain, all betrayed the humble abode’s true nature. The foliage and water emitted the faintest golden glow, hints of purity that resonated with Cyril’s Dominion of Earth. Cyril knew at a glance that it was a temple, one that had been around for centuries, if not millennia.
On the door was that sigil of the Cult of Leviathan, identical to the marking he had discovered in the oasis. The symbol looked fresh, as if it had been recently carved into the wooden door. The only sign of the Titan of Water’s influence was a swirl of cerulean qi within the fountain, like a seed that hadn’t yet taken root.
Hopefully, the person inside could answer some of his questions.
