Chapter 496 - Sofia is good at puzzles (Patreon)

Erredis thought the idea was funny so Bookie got himself a free meal after erasing a page with skeleton boars to make space, but he looked strangely disappointed when it was time to show Sofia his new page.

“I’m guessing we are not getting a lich summon anytime soon, are we?” Sofia asked the little skeleton as she grabbed the book he was presenting.

“We aren’t…” he confirmed, dejected.

“Well, let’s see what kind of skeletons Richard usually walks around in, then…” Sofia said as she opened the book to the last page. The drawing on the page showed a skeleton holding some kind of flask in one hand and a straight rod in the other. “Some kind of alchemist? It’s quite cheap, just 50 mana.” She summoned the skeleton, and he appeared as he was in the drawing, holding an empty flask and a thin metal rod. “What class is it?” she asked, as her [Identify] still didn’t work.

“Solar glassblower,” Saria read out loud.

“Nice, I could really use that one,” Alith remarked, “I’ve been trashing tons of glassware trying to work out the pill recipes.”

“You will need good quality sand,” Erredis noted, “and there are other things humans use like limestone but I’m not too sure they’re really useful for someone with a dedicated class.” The skeleton nodded along with what she said.

“It seems now is the time for me to give back what I borrowed,” Ihuarah said, starting to take off his necklace.

“You really don’t have to,” Sofia told him, “it’s not like sand is hard to find.”

“It is a small matter,” the shade said as he emptied the contents of the cursed sun-shaped necklace, which consisted of a small pile of mithril ingots and a bunch of yellow sand, “I no longer require that kind of assistance with a mana heart of my own, and I have already acquired another storage item,” he explained, pointing at one of the many small rings he was wearing. 

“Alright… I already had a bone field, I guess I can make a sand field… I’ll just hang it up with the skelems for now.”

Sofia grabbed the necklace from Ihuarah and started walking toward her ‘bone field’, she turned her head around while she walked, “Hoy, glassblower, use the sand on the ground and make something while I’m away.”

She slowly strolled all the way to the bone field, collected the bones and put the necklace around one of the Skelems’ neck.

A bit of silence.

Refreshing.

Alright, let’s get back to it. Fae time.

“Just do it, I tell you,” Erredis said with a shrug, “with me here you risk nothing.”

“Alright, Bookie.”

On Sofia’s command, Bookie’s book form opened in front of Sofia, showing the small drawing of the midenicite fairy skeleton and its previously unaffordable price that now felt super cheap.

Sofia ripped the page, and the mist gathered in front of her. Unlike all of the cheaper skeletons, the fae was slow to form, swads of mist swirling and coalescing together to form the small creature bone by bone in the air, starting by the legs.

Just like in the drawing, the fairy looked feral, about twenty centimeters tall, its neutral posture was more akin to a predator waiting to jump on its prey than a relaxed position like most other skeletons. Its bones were icy-blue just like the midenicite ingot the fae’s soul had once been imprisoned in. Its hands and feet had tiny but sharp claws, and its six wings’ bones looked like the vein structures of oblong dried leaves. Finally, the fairy’s tiny skull, the last bone to form, had two sharp canines like the Vampires, and two pointy horns looking a lot like Cinthia’s. 

“She’s really really mad!” Bookie warned.

Finally a faint blue light formed within the fairy’s eye sockets.

Sofia heard a loud bang. The fairy’s first action upon waking up had been to throw itself claws first toward Saria’s head, so fast that it had been hard to even see anything happen. But it had been caught by Erredis’ bare hand long before it could reach its target.

The fairy screeched and struggled to free itself from the Dragon’s grasp, without success.

“Caught a feisty one, it seems. Looks like it’s really mad at Saria,” Erredis observed as she firmly held the tiny screaming ball of rage.

“Did I slaughter fairies in a past life?” Saria asked, perplexed at the creature's hatred being directed at her specifically.

After a second of reflection, Sofia gave her hypothesis, “Because you’re the only human, maybe?”

“What are y-... Wait, I actually am. How’s this then?” Saria said, putting on her Dragon mask, the reward she got from the 99th floor of the ranking tower.

The screeching instantly stopped.

“Well shit. Good that you got that race change, Sof,” Alith commented. 

I can’t help but feel like this will be an issue later…

The fairy’s skull turned to Sofia, and it pronounced a few unintelligible words. Sofia looked at Erredis but she shook her head, “No clue what she’s saying, sorry. Doesn’t even sound close to any language I know.”

“Ihuarah?” Sofia asked.

“That is peculiar,” the shade said, “That certainly is not the Fey dialect that I happen to have some basics in.”

“Bookie, any insight?”

“Uh… She’s a bit less mad now? I think.”

“Do you understand me?” Erredis asked in Draconic, which Sofia took a second to translate in her head, but the Fae did not seem to understand at all.

“She’s very scared!” Bookie interjected.

Erredis smiled, “So she at least knows to fear the superior species. Not as brainless as she looks.” 

“Saying this while you have bunny ears and a small puffy tail is tremendously funny,” Dopple snarked from Alith’s chest.

“Oh, you’re awake for once?” Alith reacted, looking down at her sentient piece of clothing.

“Is the temple safe?” Dopple said next, completely ignoring Alith, “That’s what she said.”

“Wait, you understood that?!” Alith continued, shocked to discover a hidden talent of her annoying shirt.

“Of course I do! What kind of rag do you take me for?!”

“What temple?” Sofia said to Dopple, and Dopple proceeded to translate it into the weird dialect of the Fairy.

“Now she’s a bit relieved but also worried!” Bookie told everyone, continuing to provide a live-feed of the Fairy’s emotions. 

The Fairy answered Dopple and Dopple translated back for the group, “The planar gate temple I was guarding!”

Planar gate temple… 

Wait, wait ,wait… Planar gate?

Without a word, Sofia activated the Autumn movement of [Sixth melody], the cursed music helping her organize her thoughts easier.

A scenario rapidly assembled in her head, starting from one simple memory, the image of a giant fissure opening in the sky, a planar gate the Alphageid used to invade Veliadren.

Current year, 3215.

Around the year 1700, Zangdar is built on the foundation of a gigantic midenicite vein created by the corrupting influence of the half-dead fairy whose soul was not disappearing somehow.

Zhǎng Lú found the remains of the fairy along with the midenicite tablets in the ruins of an underground civilisation deep beneath Zangdar. He brought them to Richard and Alkorm, as evidenced by the fact that Richard knew about the tablets and Alkorm helped forge the ingot.

The original description of the tablets…

Mr.Scribe was quick to find the very old [Identify] logs for Sofia. She now knew that these were provided by the High-Scribe DATABASE.

[???] : This set of carvings detains great secrets and possibilities.

Level : 500. Grade : Forgotten.

Not just carvings. Even beyond their link to the Deep, doesn’t this description imply that they have some kind of special use?

Then the fairy mentions a planar gate. Meanwhile, the device keeping this place floating in the margin and that brought it here in the first place…

Sofia still remembered the words from Zhǎng Lú’s letter. The plane-crossing device.

But it’s clearly a modern device using recent ritual magic and Avian-style runes, and it’s not been turned to midenicite. So it is not the planar gate, but a copy? Perhaps made in part thanks to the knowledge found in the tablets?

And here comes the major discrepancy.

When we asked Jen about the Phageid, she said that the invasions occurred around every five hundred years, with us still having about forty years before the next one. The second one thus was around five hundred years ago, while the first one would be five hundred years before that, the one I got to witness during my first trial.  

That would put the next and third attack around the year 3250, the second attack around the year 2750, and the first attack around 2250.

Meanwhile, Zhang lu was stuck in Zangdar for what sounds like a few years after the attack and his letter was dated from 1758.

Zangdar fell to a Phageid attack… Around the year 1750.

But back then, there was supposedly no sign of a large-scale attack anywhere else.

There’s no fucking way, right? Right?

And… And there was a tablet depicting the Deep, so the planar gate being able to reach the Deep is not the most far-fetched conclusion.

The rift the Alphageid came from…

It was spewing a strange red light.

“Sofia? Sofia, you’re still here?” Saria asked, while everyone worriedly looked at Sofia.

“I- I think I need to sit down…