Stumbling Up: A Loser's Guide to Progression - Chapter 41: Soulbound and Sinking

We started moving again, this time much slower.

I eyed Richard on his perch. This time, he avoided my look, not because he was ashamed of us, but because he didn't want to answer any questions about his relationship with Rhi. Instead, he sat, indignant head forward, tentacles stretched out as though he were leading us himself to Rhi. What a poser.

With the pace slowed, my health and stamina bars had recovered. I could breathe. I could think.

The ring gifted to me by Rhi's sister sat heavy on my hand. I tugged at it, but it stubbornly refused to move.

"I think it's stuck," I said out loud, tugging at the gold band.

Tandy, who hadn't left my side, frowned, grabbing my hand. She gave a few gentle tugs.

"[Detect Weave]," she murmured, gripping my wrist tightly, now entirely in control of my hand, holding it up in the air. "Cole, I think you're going to regret putting this on your ring finger."

"How so? I just slipped it on in the middle of the fight."

"It's soul bound, isn't it?" Tandy still held my hand up as she examined the ring.

Was it? I scrolled back through my notifications. Sure enough, [Blessings of the Waters] was soulbound.

"Looks like it," I said, staring at the [Error] messages in the description.

"Well, now you have an excuse for your inability to get a girlfriend," Leo chimed in, chuckling.

It was on my left ring finger, right where a promise ring would go. Was I engaged to a blue-haired undead mummy?

I imagined a possessive ghost haunting any potential match.

I was never going to find a girlfriend.

"You can't make this stuff up," I said dejectedly, as Tandy gave the ring a couple of tugs.

With our pace slowed, I'd finally been able to pick up my head and look around. The water level had doubled in this area of the swamp, and we walked in a corridor with six-foot-tall walls. The deeper water had gotten clearer, and I could see through it. My assumption about an ancient graveyard had been mostly correct. It appeared as though we were walking through a ruined metropolis.

Half walls stood crumbled or flattened, the only impression a vague footprint of a foundation. We passed a 'town square' with an ornate fountain made of marble with three bronze horse heads held high. The sides of the road, the dirt surrounding the fountain, and the floors of the collapsed buildings had all been repurposed for a darker reason.

Gravestones sat in neat lines along the road, surrounding the fountain, and even in the middle of the building’s foundations. Some of the markers had script, some were ornate, but a horrifying majority were simply blank, with just a year of death noted.

"Does anyone know what happened in the fifth age 743?" I'd taken the village classes, all youth did, but history had always been a weak point. Who cared what happened before? We lived in the present.

I was beginning to see the shortsightedness of my youthful philosophy.

"I think the fifth age ended in 750?" Tandy said. She was always the bookworm of our group. She blamed her grandmother's intolerance of imperfection, but I think she just liked school. "So whatever happened here was probably a precursor to the rise of the Ursine Wall. I know our classes didn't cover this, I would have remembered an ancient city on the doorstep to Woodsten."

I agreed, even my inattentive teenage brain would have held onto an ancient burial in our backyard like a dog with a bone.

I watched as a water viper followed us. The venomous snake was swimming across the top of the water, its tongue whipping as it tasted the air.

"They probably didn't want to tell you for fear you'd go investigate," Meredeath said, her head turning towards us. "How about you, Richard? You obviously know Rhi, do you know the history of the place before she took up residence?"

We all focused on Richard, as his tentacles drooped.

This was once known as the Niyatgra, which roughly translates as Blessed Waters.

"Like my ring?" I asked, confused. The fifth age ended over six hundred years ago. Were Rhi Voss and Lael, her sister, really that old?

Yes, like your ring. Rhi and Lael were the ruling sisters of the city before it fell.

"How is she still alive?"

"How did you know her?" I blurted over Meredeath's question.

Richard's skin was almost dry. His head downcast, tentacles retracted.

The snake that had been tracking us made its move, jumping from the water straight at Leo’s face. One of the guards moved smoothly, chopping the viper in two midair. The warrior knelt quickly as the head of the snake bit ineffectually at its fleshless hand and stabbed through the head of the snake.

I was suddenly glad I hadn’t tried to take on these ancient warriors.

Richard carried on as though my heart thumping in my chest was overdramatic.

It's a long story, but it comes down to [Immortality]. Rhi is a [Lich], which you probably could have guessed.

"What's a lich?" I asked, unfamiliar with the term. Meredeath turned to look at me, almost tripping.

"How do you not know what a [Lich] is? Even I know what a [Lich] is and..." she trailed off, glancing at our silent sentinels, worried they might be listening. We'd agreed to keep her otherworldly background a secret. No good could come from Rhi understanding that little quirk about her before she was ready.

The world has forgotten so much. Richard's mental voice sounded so tired. I almost felt for the little slug. A [Lich] is a class, and Rhi is above a [Sage] in mastery. One of the specializations available to [Liches] is [Necromancy], as you can see, she has this specialization. [Lich] is also a path to [Immortality].

A memory triggered. The slime-covered book in the Library of Alta and On Immortality and Death by Magus Reaver. Lich was one of the classifications that contained the skill [Immortality]. I had no idea it was wrapped up in the walking dead that surrounded us.

"And you know her?" Tandy repeated my question, not wanting it to be dropped.

We dated for a while.

Meredeath gagged, weakly speaking, “Maybe someone else can carry Richard for a while.”

No one volunteered. How did a slug and a presumably undead human date? I had to shut down that line of thinking before it went too far.

I could just picture… nope, not going to do it.

Richard ignored our collective horror.

And then I was her prisoner for a decade. Let's just say my presence isn't going to help your cause.

Richard fell silent, and his words had a finality that prevented any of us from asking more questions.

Had Richard been around for the fall of Niyatgra?

The path sank lower as we walked, and now the water surrounding us rose to fifteen feet. It was as though the swamp had given way to a real lake.

We're getting close. This was the reflecting lake in front of the palace.

Looking around, the ruins had given way to what looked like an actual lake bottom. Long strands of lily pad roots dangled while toothy fish zipped in and out of the tangle. Strands of seaweed reached towards the sun.

A four-foot-long predator with a long snout full of teeth deftly weaved through the weeds. I found myself grateful we hadn't tried to complete our original plan by slogging through here ourselves.

"What was the tidemaw’s home?" Leo asked. My confusion must have been evident as he coughed and added to his question, "If it's deeper here because of the reflecting lake, and the tidemaw sat three times deeper into the ground, it had to be sitting in something, right?"

My eyes swiveled to Richard. It was a decent question.

The tidemaw wasn't always that big. It was a pet of Lael's, and when she came home to fight the war, it rested here.

It probably grew bigger in the ensuing 500 years. How long did tidemaws live?

I think it ended up in the old marble quarry. Although I'm not intimately familiar with tidemaw biology, it's possible the beast could burrow out its own nest with magic.

We'd hit the middle of the lake, towering walls of water extending twenty-five feet above us. If Rhi wanted us dead, this would be an easy way to kill us. My hand rose to touch my gills, thinking of it. I might have a slight survival advantage, but the vindictive wildlife would make a snack of me.

"What do you think our chances are of leaving this place alive?" Tandy asked, as we finally passed the halfway point.

Very low.

Most days, I just wished Richard would shut up.

No one argued with him. I pissed me off even more when he was probably right.

With each step, we were gaining elevation. The undead seemed lighter, as though they were relieved to be home.

As we neared the shore of the lake and unimpressive expanse of more swamp sat before us. It proved a mirage, as the air began shimmering.

The illusion of wilderness dropped to reveal an unseen wonder. A palace’s spires rose out of the wilderness. Nothing in my rough-hewn experience of the [Outpost] of Woodsten prepared me for the scale and magnificence. It made Woodsten look like an outhouse.

White columns extended, holding up a dome of shimmering marble. The building extended to the right and left, towering over the swamp. Gold accents sat highlighting reliefs of great heroes and heroines fighting monsters and traveling the world. A boggy lawn of waist-high reeds floated between us and a swath of grey steps that led to a huge doorless entrance.

"Hush," the giant skeleton lord spoke in a deep voice. His head turned to us, and at once, I realized he was no longer an animated puppet but an independent sentient being. "We must tread carefully. [Corruption] has infiltrated Niyatgra, and not all who tread the palace grounds are friends."

For telling us to be quiet, the warrior was awfully wordy. The skeletons around us all watched the waist high reeds as though expecting an attack at any moment.

As we stepped forward, I pulled [Guardian's Promise] off my hip. We stepped out of the lake bed onto waterlogged ground. The magic that had provided us a path to the palace dissipated, water rushing to fill the last trace of our journey.

I looked out across the swamp, the water lilies and reeds, and bog trees dominated the landscape, leaving only hints of half-fallen walls and ancient headstones to hint at the once-thriving city below.

We took another step forward, and my attention returned to the chore at hand. The reedy grass mat bobbed under our feet as we spread out trying to distribute our weight. Each step forward rippled the woven reeds. It reminded me of a fly caught in a spider’s web.

Leo was having a tough time keeping his feet. His weighty frame was at a distinct disadvantage when floating across the reeds. He stepped heavily, trying to catch himself, only to have his foot break through the reeds, sinking to just above his knee.

Swearing loudly, Leo tried pulling himself out of the bog but only succeeded in busting his other foot through. He had a reeded mat wrapped around him like a giant diaper.

Leo mocked me for my ring placement, and now he was getting swallowed by swamp diapers. Cosmic payback is quick sometimes.

Flailing, my giant friend looked about to throw a temper tantrum.

"A little help here?" he grunted, trying to pull himself up on the quickly disintegrating weeds around him.

A howl went up in the distance, it was long and mournful. Several howls and barks joined the call.

Ter Lance swore.

"You've done it now. The water hounds are going to be on us. They were the first to fall to corruption. Prepare for battle." The squad of soldiers snapped into formation, weapons pointed down at the reeds themselves.

I knelt next to Leo, helping him scramble back on top of the mat. I had the sickening impression we were going to need his singing axe momentarily.

Meredeath must have agreed as she joined me. We shared a tight smile as Leo continued to struggle.