The forest ended not with a clean break, but in a scrambled tilt, the ground curving downward into a sunken valley several miles wide. Trees grew at odd angles along the nearby edge, defying gravity, as if the world had opened up and claimed all in its wake. Jagged stones jutted out along the sharp incline, adding to the illusion.
“I’ve been tracking every rumor of demons like us,” Frost said, leaning on one knee to peer down into the deep valley. “Supposedly one was here in the Swallowed City, and so we go looking.”
It seemed a joke to call such a place a “city,” but there was undeniable truth to it. Within that sunken recess were homes, pale and built of white stone. Their formations, though, defied all reason. The ground curved and roiled, like a stormy sea suddenly frozen in place. Buildings emerged at all angles, many half-buried in the soil. Several hovered just above the ground, suspended in the air, touching nothing. There were no roads, only the curving gaps between the squat buildings mashed together and sticking out of the ground like crooked teeth.
If there was life, Nick saw no sign of it. The Swallowed City was barren. Not even the creatures of the forest dared descend.
“Have you tried asking Cataloger?” Nick suggested. “She should know, right?”
Revealing the location of a former visitor would be an invasion of privacy
Nick frowned.
“Former?” he asked aloud.
“Enough,” Frost said. “Do not answer that, Cataloger. It’s none of your concern, and we both know it.”
I seek only to be helpful
By the way Frost rolled her eyes, Nick suspected they’d both heard that line before.
“And I seek my family,” she said, testing the slope with her heel. “And since she might be down there, I’m going down, too.”
“But why would your sister come here?” Nick asked as he gestured to the bizarre, half-buried city.
“I don’t know. Why are you here?”
“I’m here because I’m trying to learn about Yensere,” he said.
“Well then, follow me, because I’d say there’s plenty to learn down at the bottom.”
With a hop, she crossed the edge to the steep slope. Dirt gave beneath her feet, forming a groove as she slid. Her arms shot out, balancing her as she rode the decline halfway down. An oak shot out perfectly perpendicular from the slope, and she landed atop it and turned.
“You coming?” she asked.
Nick clapped his hands and stomped from foot to foot to psyche himself up. Just before starting, he tilted his head to one side, an idea occurring to him.
“Cataloger, do I have a statistic or skill for balance and climbing?”
Yes for both
“So what are my odds of joining Frost without face-planting into the dirt?”
According to your balance score of 6—forty-seven percent
“High enough.” He mimicked Frost, hopping over the sharp edge of the dirt and skidding in the same groove she had made. His arms waved frantically as the soft earth gave way, the speed faster than he anticipated as his heels dug in deeper. The jutting tree approached, and he realized he wasn’t entirely sure how to slow down, let alone stop. Just before hitting bark, he tried to kick off, thinking to land on the trunk. His aim was right, but his momentum far greater than he could control. The moment his feet touched, he stumbled forward, his arms circling like a panicked bird in an attempt to reverse his fall.
Frost stepped in his way before he went headfirst over the side, catching him in an embrace. They both scooted several inches along the trunk, then came to a halt. Nick exhaled in relief, then grew rapidly aware of Frost’s arms about his waist, and how close her face was to his, with their noses nearly touching. Her wide-eyed grin filled his entire vision.
“Seems like I beat the odds,” he said, and grinned right back.
“With my help,” she said, releasing him.
“Still counts.”
“Does it?” She sat on the trunk, her legs swinging over the side. “Try again, and this time, I won’t be there to catch you.”
She slid off, half running, half sliding the rest of the way to the chaotic bottom of the sunken valley. Nick imitated her start, his fingers clutching the bark as his feet swayed.
For this portion, the estimated chance of landing without injury is—
“Cataloger.”
Yes?
“Am I going to feel better or worse hearing that number?”
A long pause.
I am uncertain how to answer that question without causing distress
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”
Nick slid off, hit the steep ground with his heels, and slid toward the bottom. His knees ached, and he had to spin and flap his arms while twisting his waist to remain balanced. The bottom zoomed closer, as did a smug Frost, waiting with her arms crossed over her chest. As she neared, he dug his right heel even harder into the soft earth, grinding it down to reduce his speed until he skidded to a halt directly before her. He swung his arms out wide as if he were a gymnast nailing a perfect landing.
“I did it,” he proclaimed.
Frost clapped three times, patronizingly slow.
“I’m so proud of you.”
Once her back was to him, Nick called up his stats and noted with satisfaction that his balance score had climbed to 7.
Getting better, he thought, and followed Frost into the winding chaos that was the Swallowed City.
The buildings, which he assumed were homes, all shared a similar construction style. Their bases were perfectly square, and their windows were rectangular on the bottom and curved near the top. The white stone was stark in the daylight sun, like bleached bone. Oddly, no dirt clung to them. The tops of the buildings were flat but for the corners, which often bore little spires or flourishes, the only real decorations he could see.
“It’s hard to imagine people living here,” he said. Nick grabbed a windowsill and hoisted himself up for a look inside. The interior was vacant of all but dust. No life, not even spiders or moths. He couldn’t see the floor, either, for the building was half-swallowed by a strange curve in the earth. Silence hung thick over the Swallowed City, so that their calm speech felt like screams.
“They clearly must have,” Frost said, though her tone was not as confident as her words. “I can’t imagine what my sister would be looking for, though, if it was her who came here.”
They followed no street or path, but instead walked where the city allowed them. The ground continued to sink, the overall formation reminding Nick of a sort of crater. Two buildings ahead of them tilted together to form an upside-down V, and between them, a third building lay on its side. The two walked atop it toward the vertical roof, where they could conceivably climb farther down.
“I’d love to help in your search,” Nick said as they neared the edge, “but you haven’t told me anything about her. What she looks like, what she might be doing here…I mean, I don’t even know her name.”
The brittle stone suddenly cracked beneath his foot, and he cried out as his balance tilted, his body falling straight for a sideways window before him. Frost caught his wrist, halting his fall. She held him steady, her expression unreadable.
“Irina,” she said, letting go once his footing was stable. “Her name is Irina. My sister. So she looks like me, just…older.”
Nick lowered his voice, and his smile drifted away.
“Why did she leave you?” he asked softly.
“She wanted a better life than what we had.”
Frost climbed down the overturned roof to the twisted ground, and Nick followed. A pathway awaited them, almost like a river had carved its way through the twisted and tilted buildings. He noticed the soil had taken on an ashen color instead of the deep brown closer to the cliff edges. It was as if the very essence of the place was being drained away, so that even the bone white of the buildings was dulling toward gray.
“What was this place?” Nick asked, his neck on a swivel. Buildings towered over them on either side, the tallest they’d encountered so far. Each of them had at least five rows of windows cut into their sides, and he assumed that meant they bore as many floors. “Any ideas, Cataloger?”
Location: Oeseli, the Swallowed City
Description: Once a thriving hub built upon—
When she did not continue, Nick paused and made a face toward the sky. For some reason, he kept thinking of her watching him from just above his head.
“Built upon what?”
Oeseli, now known as the Swallowed City, was built atop the ruins of the capital of the Sinifel Empire, which was destroyed during the war with God-King Vaan
“And what happened to Oeseli to make it look like”—he gestured to the sunken buildings jutting out in random directions—“this?”
An earthquake
Nick turned his attention to Frost.
“An earthquake,” he said, unsure if Cataloger’s answers were for him alone. “Right. Are you hearing this?”
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
“I am,” she said. “And it’s not the first time Cataloger has been cagey about historical events. Something about these supposed cataclysms seems to mess with her memory.”
Deleted and corrupted data are extremely rare occurrences when recording thousands of years of history
“She sounds defensive,” Nick said, leaping onto the side of the building. His feet skidded down it a moment before he caught himself. The angle wasn’t too bad, and he slowly started descending toward Frost. “But what do you mean, cataclysms?”
“From what I’ve learned so far, supposedly every thousand years or so, a cataclysm destroys much of Yensere, forcing the people to rebuild. Of the three main civilizations I’m aware of, the Majere, the Sinifel, and now the Alder Kingdom, all dealt with the destruction in their own way…or, in regard to the Alder Kingdom, by not dealing with it. Their god-king apparently froze the black sun in the sky and prevented it from happening.”
To constantly have a world destroyed seemed a bit ridiculous, but then again, he’d grown up hearing stories about the struggles of life on Eden prior to the opening of world gates and the spread of humanity across the stars, terraforming planets such as Taneth, Nick’s own birth world. Some disasters were real, and some, such as the supposed drought that baked half the world, were clearly fictional. For the people of Yensere to have their own tales made sense, as they would have their own gods, monsters, and creation myths as well.
But why wouldn’t Cataloger know about them?
“I guess I always thought Cataloger was all-knowing and infallible,” he said, jogging to catch up with Frost. He’d lagged behind, and he disliked being alone in the empty city. “Having giant gaps in your memory definitely prevents that.”
Visitors are making incorrect assumptions as to the extent of my database and its inconsistencies
“That so?” Frost asked. “Care to tell us what happens during a cataclysm, then?”
I cannot answer
A home lay on its side before them, blocking the way. Nick might have believed it fell if the ground itself hadn’t shifted with it and still clung to the base to form an enormous hill to their right. Frost peered up at one of the windows, which was just slightly above her head. She bent her knees, preparing for a jump.
“That’s what I thought, Cat—”
The earth collapsed beneath her feet, swallowing her.
“Frost!”
Nick’s instinct to sprint after her was halted by the growing hole in the ground. He retreated several steps, waiting for it to cease lest it swallow him, too. When it ceased, he rushed to the edge. About a dozen feet below, he saw Frost on her knees in the center of what appeared to be the roof of another building, this one utterly claimed by the earth but for a slender portion at the top.
She was not alone.
Four men surrounded her, all holding shining swords with hilts wrapped in gold. Their heads were hidden underneath curved helmets topped with billowing horsehair plumes. Blue sashes marked their gold hauberks, matching the color of their trousers, boots, and the long scarves that billowed from around their necks.
All four flickered and blinked, their bodies translucent.
Specter: Level 5 Undying
Archetype: Knight
Special Attribute: Phasing
“Stay away!” Frost shouted, slamming her hand to the ground.
Spell: Ice Wall
Ice rolled outward in a circle, rising to form a perfectly smooth five-foot-high wall. Nick relaxed seeing it. Surely that would buy them time to figure out…
The four men walked right through the ice.
Phasing: Allows beings with this special attribute to pass through physical barriers
“Look out!” Nick shouted, his eyes widening. Frost reacted faster, her sword lifting to block a sudden barrage of swings from all sides. She managed to knock away two, but two others struck her armor, deflecting off her fine silver chain mail. Nothing visibly serious, barely any blood, but he feared the damage was beneath the chain mail, hidden bruises and perhaps broken bones.
Nick lifted his arm, calling to mind the lone spell he understood. I hope “chain” means what I think it means.
He aimed at one of the ghostly soldiers and unleashed a
Frost thrust her sword straight into the belly of the nearest. The soldier reared back, his mouth opening for a scream that did not come. His body flickered into static and then vanished as if it had never existed. A pivot on her right leg, and she slashed open the throat of a second, ending him as well. The remaining two assaulted her simultaneously, and she had to split her concentration between them, going fully defensive. Her slender sword was a blur as she blocked their attacks, until at last she found an opening. She cut along one guard’s arm and then extended her palm mere inches from his exposed face.
With just one left, Nick expected the battle to end quickly, but then two more specters rose straight from underneath the building to join the fray. One slashed with his sword, but the other held back, protected by his two remaining comrades. He held a wood contraption in hand: a crossbow, Nick realized too late. When he pulled its trigger, a thick bolt shot out to strike Frost in the leg. She cried out but stumbled onward, releasing more
Trusting Frost to handle the other two, even with an arrow sticking out of her leg, Nick focused on the crossbowman, who was busy cranking the side to reload a second bolt. He didn’t think he’d be able to hop down in time to prevent a second shot, but maybe…
Cataloger, does
No—a fifty percent potency increase will occur if you—
Nick didn’t wait for her to finish. He braced his legs, pointed his palm, and poured all his focus into that lone specter with the crossbow. Lightning crackled in the center of his palm, then burst out in another bolt, this one shorter and thicker than the last. It blasted the center of the crossbowman, crackling as it hit. The archer’s body locked tight, muscles spasming from the lightning. Seeing him wounded, Frost quickly finished him off with a trio of slender
Gasping from the effort, Nick watched Frost easily dispatch the first specter he’d wounded with lightning, then engage the final addition. Her sword batted back and forth, forcing the soldier’s own weapon out of position, before ramming straight into his neck, ending whatever life the ghostly soldier possessed.
With the final combatant dropped and vanished, Nick held back a gasp as his level bar filled with white.
Reassessment
Level: 7 (+1)
Statistical Improvements:
Agility: 3
Physicality: 4
Endurance: 3
Focus: 5 (+2)
Mana: 35 (+14)
Not the most exciting, but then again, he’d done nothing but cast his lightning spells a few times. Energized from leveling, and his head not aching quite so badly now he’d gained a bit more mana, Nick hung off the side of the crumbling house and then dropped to a hard landing.
“How we doing?” he asked as he shook off dust. Frost ripped the bolt out of her leg, choked down a scream, and then watched the bolt flicker out of existence.
“I’ve been worse,” she said, standing with a wince.
Nick could hardly believe she was able to stand after the blows she’d taken, but when he checked her health bar, it was still halfway filled. No number for it, just like there was no level. It seemed visitors like himself were afforded a level of privacy the regular inhabitants of Yensere were not.
“How about we take this a little bit slower?” he asked. Frost shook her head, laughing despite the injuries she’d suffered.
“Much slower,” she agreed. “And if you’re willing to go first, I’ll be happy to let you volunteer.”
“If you insist. Let’s see where this unknown tunnel goes.”
The two looked about, but finding no way into the building they stood upon, Frost aimed her fist straight down and launched two quick
“That isn’t the roof,” he said, pointing above his head. “That’s the floor.”
“Fascinating,” Frost said dryly as she landed beside him. “Come on. Let’s just confirm Irina isn’t hidden somewhere and then get out. This place makes my skin crawl.”
It was awkward, descending stairs that were upside down, but they made do as they scaled the multiple floors to the “bottom.” The door had broken from the hinges and lay wedged at a slant, blocking the way. Together, Nick and Frost pushed it aside and then emerged from the building. They hardly made it a step before they both froze. Nick’s jaw dropped as his mind struggled to make sense of the sight before him.
Another city was underneath the one above, made of the same square stone buildings, only this time, they were all upside down. They seemed to grow from a rocky ceiling, a bizarre mirror reflection of what they had seen above, only more chaotic and random. Where rooftops would have once met sky, they instead just barely touched a smooth sheen of brown rock that lifted and dropped so that every building was properly supported.
“Unreal,” Frost said. “It’s like the city just…folded in on itself.”
“How can we see?” Nick asked. They were fully blocked from the sky by a suspended ceiling of rock, and yet all the upturned buildings were brightly lit from no apparent source. Frost shrugged, looking equally baffled.
“It…it’s like the world thinks sunlight reaches down here, and so it does.”
Nick doubted they would get a better an answer than that. Something had happened here, something that left the place…broken.
“I think we have a welcome party,” he said, pointing ahead. Three specters, garbed similarly and flickering in a now familiar way, came rushing out of what looked vaguely like a temple.
“For Oeseli!” one shouted as they raised their swords.
Nick and Frost lifted their hands.
The combined attacks blasted them apart. They broke like static, a flicker of black and white that left nothing—no blood, no dust, and no ash in their wake. Nick shivered and wished the pain in his head would lessen. According to his little bar, he still had <19> out of <35> mana left, but already he felt the strain like a distant migraine. It gave him a newfound appreciation for Frost’s capabilities. That she seemed perfectly fine despite her injuries and the number of spells she’d cast meant both her health pool and her mana pool were far beyond his.
For now, he thought, a little bit of lightning crackling across his fingertips.
They still had to wind through the various buildings, and with no real destination, Nick guided them roughly toward where he thought the center of the city might be. They passed by several homes, and he glanced inside, surprised to see broken furniture, toppled dressers, and, in one, what looked like a rocking chair. Curtains fluttered over more windows, too, the cloth stiff and drained of all color.
“It seems the closer we get to the center, the more…life…remains,” he said, keeping his voice low. He did not know how many more of those strange phantoms might remain, nor did he wish to fight them if they could avoid it. “At least, signs of it.”
“I’m not sure I would call these soldiers ‘alive,’” Frost muttered.
“Wait.”
Nick froze in place and pointed upward. Above them, clinging to the stone ceiling in defiance of gravity, was an elaborate four-tiered water fountain in the center of beautiful blue-painted tiles. Water billowed across it in multiple streams and founts, all of them traveling upward instead of falling.
All around it walked flickering ghosts of the past. Not just soldiers, but men in long white-and-blue tunics and women in pale dresses wide at the shoulder and narrow along the hips and legs. They moved in eerie silence despite the feeling that there should be noise. Children ran about, scurrying past and sometimes even through the legs of adults. Friends waved at one another. Along one edge of the clearing, several men and women stood with rugs laid out, too distant for Nick to see what little trinkets or jewelry were being sold atop them. The sellers shouted and gestured, doing all they could to steal attention their way.
The figures flickered, faded, and then disappeared. Water vanished from the fountain, leaving it cracked and dry. Dust swept through the empty clearing, carried on a wind that should not be.
“I don’t like this place,” Frost said, her voice piercing the silence. “It’s too…sad.”
A loud banging noise came from a building to their right.
“What was that?” he asked.
“Sounds like something being knocked over.”
“Your sister?”
She shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”
The pair approached the upside-down building. It was enormously wide but only a single floor high, so they could still reach the front door. Nick tried to guess the building’s purpose, then gave up. He’d have his answer soon enough. Stairs above their heads, he slipped to one side of the entrance while Frost flanked the other. He lifted his free hand and used his fingers to count down. Four. Three. Two.
On “one,” he kicked the door open and rushed inside, his sword held aloft and lightning crackling across the palm of his left hand, a
Inside might have once been a library, given the multitude of shelves that lined the walls and many more standing shelves throughout. The vast majority were barren, and what standing shelves did contain books had been dragged to the center of the library and tipped over, spilling out their contents. Dozens of books lay in a heap, their black-and-brown bindings weathered and torn. The lettering was sharp and runic, a language he did not understand, nor did Cataloger immediately translate. A powerful scent, a mixture of ink and dust, struck Nick, and he had to fight off a sneeze as it entered his nostrils.
Sitting atop that pile, like a dragon over her hoard, was a small woman with a black ponytail, wide round spectacles, and what looked like a knee-length jacket wrapped in a belt, only the red fabric more resembled the softness of a robe. She looked up from the book in her lap, blinked twice, and then waved excitedly.
“Hi, I’m Violette!”