Chapter 41: Touch then Fall

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"K'Chain Che'Malle." 

The voice of the Steel Magistrate echoed in his mind.

"What?" Astolfo asked, somewhat bewildered.

In the dimly lit corner, he dozed off leaning against a fully deceased giant raven. The half-human-sized black monster lay on its side, its wings over a man's length, torn from the bones. This creature was almost identical to the giant ravens of the Moon's Spawn, its arrow-like beak stained with blood, resembling wet rust. Its pitch-black feathers drooped, and its two jet-black pearl-like eyes had lost their luster.

It was naturally impossible for a giant raven that fed on magic to truly appear here; the corpse was merely an empty shell filled with dead spirits, perhaps because the owner of the house had once visited the city of Cast beneath the Moon's Spawn.

Astolfo woke up drowsily, nearly falling back asleep on the giant raven.

He instinctively touched his thigh and then his forehead—it was cold metallic armor.

It's my light armor, not women's clothes, Astolfo thought. I've awakened from the dream, not drowned in the sea within it.

He struggled to push up the bloodstained visor. Through the gaps in the armor, he could see his long hair tied into a single braid tucked inside the back armor. Astolfo yawned, and he saw the Magistrate holding his long spear in one hand, rhythmically tapping the shaft with the other, the notes crisp, reminding him of the sound of wind chimes turning in the wind on a rainy night.

Although he was sleeping, Astolfo hadn't removed his full-body light armor.

He wasn't so careless as to sleep without armor in an unknown place.

"What's the name of this spear?" the Magistrate asked, planting the spear into the ground.

The Magistrate stood in the corridor like a towering boulder, casting a shadow that could block anyone, just as in the past.

“I’ve named it ‘Algaria,’ Sir Taxar,” Astolfo replied, struggling to sit up, his expression unusually serious at this moment, “I just happened to find it on the ground, and I’ve heard it might be Algaria’s own spear. I planned to return it, but then I found out the knight had died in battle two years ago, and his sister Angelica had disappeared. So, I named it Algaria in his honor, and I’ve been borrowing it ever since.”

"Two years ago... the conflict between the Vamar Duchy of the North Lether Continent and the Gray Elf tribe?"

"Yes."

"Ha! Barbaric fur-wearing race." Taxar told him, "As for your 'picking up' and 'borrowing'... forget it, I have no intention of questioning your past. Do you know anything about the ancient race K'ChainChe'Malle?"

Astolfo thought hard for a moment: "Those large lizards that have a social structure similar to ants?" he said, "I saw them mentioned in a Dark Elf's notes translated by Scholar Annys at the Calvin Library."

"Yes, that's the scientific name, but archaeologists usually call them ant monsters," Taxar told him, "There are those who would offhandedly refer to them as ‘intelligent lizards’—a term that lacks formality, wouldn’t you agree? I consider it rather informal. Notably, the ant monsters are chronicled as one of the earliest sapient races to assert dominion over our world. Their expertise in the arcane arts of gravity was beyond extraordinary. Yet, despite their formidable abilities, they met their demise in the conflicts with the elves. But it is worth pondering that during their time of extinction, humanity had not yet emerged, rendering their fate disconnected from our own lineage.”

"Hmm... now that you mentioned this—" Astolfo instinctively wanted to scratch his hair, but his fingers hit the cold helmet.

"Your spear, upon contact, causes one to lose balance with remarkable ease. Surely, such a device is the work of the ant monsters’ cleverness."

A wave of profound disappointment surged within him, “What? So it wasn’t the awakening of my sealed power?”

"There lies no concealed force within you; of this, I can assure with utmost certainty."

“No, no, no! At this moment, one should proclaim—‘The enigmatic power sealed within you eludes my sight, yet it must be a formidable force capable of altering history.’ Then, as a prophet would, utter a few cryptic verses to foretell—”

Taxar ignored him, channeling his spirit into the Algaria spear, then lifted it. The Magistrate casually touched Astolfo's shoulder with the spear tip.

A strange magical force entered Astolfo's body.

"Eh eh eh eh eh eh??"

From Astolfo's perspective, after a breath, the world suddenly flipped upside down. He was now hanging head down from the floor—or rather, it seemed like the ceiling to him. He was startled and exclaimed, realizing in shock that he had lost the sensation of his feet on solid ground—the ground had lost gravity, and a pulling force had emerged from above—he began to fall, but in the opposite direction of normal gravity towards the ceiling.

Then, Taxar caught Astolfo, who was falling upwards, with one hand—by his foot armor.

"Astolfo, the youngest child of Charles V, a wanderer across three continents, the owner of Algaria."

"Is this to declare my destiny as a hero? But I'm not mentally prepared to shoulder the mantle of a savior... Wait, no, how do you know I'm Charles V's son?"

"Hmm? Savior?" Taxar told Astolfo, "You should read fewer knight novels, young knight."

His metal cross-adorned face hung upside down in Astolfo's view, "There's no such profession as a savior in Lether, and I don't know any prophecy. I'm just trying to recite a few titles that don't sound too embarrassing for you. As for Charles V's offspring—that's semi-public information among the church's upper echelons, and with the ascension of Charles VI, it has shed its veil of secrecy, thus detailed explanations are unnecessary."

Taxar observed him through some unknown sense, his voice a steady chill in Astolfo’s mind, devoid of emphasis, “Impetuosity is your frailty, young knight, born not of reason but passion. Yet, I grasp this may be unalterable. Heed my words: we Magistrates are bound by venerable tenets. Your aid in the dungeon obliges my return of favor. I shall endeavor to bind this lance to your soul, granting you its companionship in the realm of dreams, ensuring you do not face death in solitude. Moreover, I shall impart some techniques for its mastery, that you may wield it with precision, rather than recklessly poking at the enemy's legs, lest my peers deem me a mentor of folly.”

Astolfo blinked, a bit curious, "Are you familiar with Algaria?"

“I am not familiar with the person you mention, however, this spear bears a connection to the ancient Warren of the ant monsters. Their remnants, too, are under the Church’s scholarly observation.”

"But... isn't it impossible to connect to the Warren's power here?"

“Challenging, yet not unattainable; nothing is absolute,”  Taxar shook his head. “The feats beyond the reach of the common man do not bind those who have transcended mortality.”

The Magistrate tapped Astolfo's armor with the spear tip again.

The pulling force changed once more, this time turning forty-five degrees. The world tilted, and he fell onto the left wall, luckily close to it. In his view—Taxar stood sideways on the wall—though it looked more like his feet were fixed to it. 

"Brother Brunord is dead, Sir Taxar," a knight approached them and calmly informed the Magistrate.

Astolfo turned to look, and Taxar fell silent for a moment. The arrival of this news had a chilling effect.

"Ha! To perish even within one’s dreams,” Astolfo heard him muttering in his mind, then the Magistrate paused. A voice directly from the air rose in the corridor like a large bell, “Pray, tell me the cause of death?”

"Total dehydration into a mummified corpse, all blood vanished without a trace."

Taxar released Astolfo from the altered gravity, signaling the knight to lead the way, and the two followed his footsteps towards the other side of the corridor.

"By the way, Sir Taxar," Astolfo suddenly told him, "I have uncovered the location of Miss Jeanne and the others."

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