Chapter 174: Thurk
"This would work." Zephyr nodded, scrutinizing a prime location of the plateau.
It was the best spot for him to build his Troglodyte home. An open space, nestled between one of the cracks in the plateau’s lee side.
It was a deep crack, just wide enough to allow someone of his size to walk through without touching both sides.
Zephyr could dig into the hard-earthen walls at that depth, opening up a cave and creating a place he could call his home.
It offered sufficient privacy, such that anyone who was passing by wouldn’t even know there was an abode cut into the cliff-face.
He started on it immediately, willing the earth to bend to his intent. His mana node went into action, executing his intention with the use of earth magic.
He softened the packed earth gradually, careful not to overdo it. The walls crumbled in thin layers, peeling away like dried clay as his mana node worked in small pulses.
Zephyr stopped every few minutes to let the vibrations die down before continuing. He wasn’t about to risk a cave-in on himself, nor draw unnecessary attention with too much noise.
Aegis created an overlay within his HUD, warning whenever the structural balance was close to tipping. Zephyr reinforced those weak spots immediately, compacting the loose soil until it hardened back into stone. "Never thought I’d become a stone-mason..." he muttered, wiping sweat from his brow.
He needed to be careful, not just because of the fear of a cave-in, but also because of the monster lair a few miles away.
He didn’t want a repeat of the ’eye-opening experience’ of the previous night, so he tried to keep the tremors to a minimum.
With Aegis’ advice, he didn’t dig straight in. Instead, he angled the tunnel downward right from the entry, sloping it further down so that anyone walking past the crack wouldn’t see the black hole of a cave, but rather, a slightly recessed rock structure... Unless they deliberately stepped into the crack.
He continued downward for a few feet before leveling and carving out the main chamber.
Once he had carved enough depth for the chamber, he reinforced the ceiling with even further compacted stone, using his exquisite spell-processing capabilities to compact the earth and fire it till it was very solid, basically creating the rebars that supported the structure.
After that was done, Zephyr now had a decently spacious room that he could call his own.
It was bare and very featureless, but it was sufficient for his needs.
The next thing now was ventilation, minor chambers, and secret paths outwards.
It was common sense to have more than one exit for emergency purposes.
Zephyr had Aegis chart out three separate escape channels branching out from the back of his chamber. Each one curved toward a different exit point.
One sloped upward, deeper into the plateau, and opened up somewhere close to the flat top. Zephyr hid the exit below one of the large rocks lying around at the top. It blended with the surroundings naturally and didn’t draw any unwarranted attention.
He created another tunnel, this time going a longer distance. The longest he had built so far, at around six hundred yards (550m).
It opened up not too far from the fruit bearing trees that made this place a food source, providing him with a private, direct channel to get food.
He ensured the exit was well covered with slabs of earth, loose rocks, and dry brush, checking and rechecking the disguise until even he struggled to spot the exit.
The last exit he created was one he made simply for emergency purposes.
It branched out into a dozen pathways like a maze, each leading to dead ends except for a single one which only he knew led out a side of the plateau.
All the three exit tunnels were interspersed with minor obstacles, unnecessarily winding paths at various points, full-on blockages that only Zephyr knew his way around.
This was to prevent his exit points from becoming entry points for anyone who might discover them despite their camouflages.
At this point, Zephyr had been working non-stop for more than half the day.
At least he was spared from the brunt of the desert heat this deep down.
The hardened soil still conducted heat, but it wasn’t as terrible as being directly underneath the dry desert sun.
In fact the heat this deep down affected the meagre trapped moisture in the soil, condensing it slightly in the air.
Zephyr took advantage of this, carving out channels along the walls and floor, designing them to funnel the stray condensation and air moisture toward a cistern he dug into the corner. It wasn’t much now — just a shallow basin — but with his water magic to draw condensation faster, it would become a reliable storage for the water he needed.
After doing all this, and also adding narrow vents to the surface disguised as a natural crack, angled to allow air circulation without letting much light through, he moved on to add finishing touches.
Alcoves inside the walls to serve as shelves and wall storages, all with varying levels of deepness based on their use.
By the time night fell, he already had a place he could call his home. A place he had built with his efforts alone.
He guzzled down a whole liter of water from a basic jug he had made from fired earth, glazed carefully with more intense flames to create a smooth, non-porous interior that could hold water stably.
He was famished from the day’s work and craving for food, but he still did a quick run by Aegis just to reconfirm the stability of all the structures he had built.
All structures are stable, host. The risk of any collapse is very minimal. Even under a strong storm like the previous day’s, the structure would still hold.
Zephyr let out a long sigh of relief. "Nice... I’ve got my home base now..."
He stared into the dim chamber, admiring his handiwork.
His stomach growled in protest, urging him to get some food.
"Yeah, yeah... let’s go get some food." Zephyr chuckled, starting down the tunnel leading to the fruit trees.
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Thurk was discontent.
He was discontent with his role in the nest. He was discontent with his name. Discontent with his... body.
An ever present feeling of wrongness that had started just a few days before.
The funny thing was, he couldn’t remember the days past these few days. Everything beyond that simply felt like a distant memory.
Like a dream that he once vividly knew the details of, but was now foggy and unclear for some reason.
He vaguely remembered bliss... and emptiness. But now...
He gripped his spear tighter, walking behind his other two colleagues as they argued over something he didn’t care to know about.
He was sure that what he was feeling was lost to the two. They didn’t share the same discontent he felt at every waking moment, fully taken up by their roles like it was all they were made for.
He frowned slightly, thinking about how in a few days, he could be right next to them, also arguing about the useless thing they were, fully ignorant.
He could already feel it happening.
Slowly but surely, even the already vague traces of memory he had were fading away.
The feeling of discontent and wrongness was also reducing as the days went by.
...No. He couldn’t let it happen.
He refused to forget. He needed to do something to prevent himself from forgetting...
But forgetting what...? He paused, feeling a rising surge of anger and discontent again.
It felt like he had a memory just playing at the edge of his mind, but no matter how hard he tried, it always slipped away.
THUD
His mind was jarred back to reality as one of his colleagues fell just a few steps in front of him. Dead.
What happened?!
The second colleague also stared at the fallen body of their comrade blankly before shrieking out in their weird, garbled language — another point of discontent for Thurk.
He understood very clearly, because he was also one of them. His colleague was furious.
The figure of the person who the furious shriek was directed at suddenly came into his view. A tall, black haired creature who towered above them, his height quadrupling theirs.
The creature walked straight towards them, observing them curiously, uncaring of the charging figure of his second colleague headed his way.
He raised a hand and flicked a finger at the charging figure, and immediately, Thurk saw a blur streak towards his colleague’s leg, halting his charge instantly.
His colleague stumbled to the ground, shrieking in pain as his blue blood poured out of a gaping hole visible through both sides of his thigh.
He had been incapacitated cleanly without as much as a twitch of the eye by the tall creature.
The creature squatted down beside his colleague who was thrashing on the ground, and muttered a few words that touched on something deep in the recess of Thurk’s mind.
After observing for a moment, the creature ended his colleague’s life cleanly, before slowly looking straight at Thurk.
Thurk’s heart pounded in his chest as he saw the gaze. It was neither predatory nor dangerous in any way, but it had a deadly calm to it that made him shiver even more than anything would’ve.
The creature raised a finger.
Thurk knew what was coming, and what he was supposed to do now.
He was supposed to charge, supposed to shriek loudly, attack the creature...
But he didn’t.
He realized he wanted death... wanted the relief that came with it...
For a second, it looked like the black haired creature paused, and an understanding flickered in his eyes.
He raised his hand slightly, changing the trajectory of his attack.
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Zephyr watched the wind bullet — a new spell he had created — streak through the air and pierce through the stout monster’s head cleanly, ending its life in one shot.
"...What just happened?" He frowned slightly.
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A/N: This Chapter’s special thanks goes to Abayomi_Atoyegbe. Thank you for the Golden Tickets!
Also, thank you to everyone who drop power stones regularly. I really appreciate!