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Chapter 814 - What comes next?
🕑 Added 2024-02-10 13:00:07 +0000 UTCAfter crossing the doorway, Hera and her Team continued moving, passing through another 2 doorways before stopping. Their next destination was 20 rooms away from the Glimmering Graveyard. That wasn't where the closest Alliance-controlled city was located, but it was a place the leaders of the species trusted to be secure. Only then would they give the lab materials to someone who would, on their turn, bring said materials to one of the hidden intelligence places the Alliance had. However, the Empress knew that there was a good chance things wouldn't work like that.
That plan considered only that they had the materials, not that they had, somehow, saved the Spirit and given it a voice. Hera wasn't feeling great about it. She didn't regret having Vulcan join her titled blades, but the ramifications were starting to worry her. So far, not many people know about her legacy. Sure, they could have some idea she was a one-woman army, but the details were still a secret. Considering what was going on and how much the Alliance already knew about the experiments, it wasn't a stretch to think that some scientists would be involved with the spies, and there lies the problem. Telling people who studied spirits that she had a legacy capable of turning the elemental creature into something closer to a person would make them go wild.
Maybe she could lie and say that all of this was due to a skill she got from the MAZE or an item, but it would be a hard sell. Anyone who started to look into this a bit more would realize that her story was iffy, and that could result in any information they got from Vulcan being questioned. That would go against the whole point, and the longer they waited, the more people would suffer.
She mentioned her worry to the rest of the team, but unfortunately, no one had any idea about the best way to go about it. One way or another, more people would start getting to know about her legacy, and trying to hide that information might just make it more tantalizing.
Hera wasn't the only one who was struggling with something. Although the issues were wildly different. Neria and Vash kept their heads down and spoke very little during the last three days. The team was now eight rooms away from the Glimmering Graveyard. They were sitting in a wide-open field with a massive brown mountain to their side. It was the kind that simply started and went up into the sky and not the ones that had a steady incline. If there were more, this place would feel like a canyon, but here, it was just like looking at a gigantic wall. The room was called the 'Valley of Morning Dew' because every morning, it didn't matter where or how well protected you were. You would become a bit damp. Not wet, not drenched, just damp. Out of the blue. As if the mana inside the room created that dew that covered everything. They didn't have any intention of experiencing that, not because some of the team wasn't curious, but because they would leave the room before nightfall.
It was lunchtime, and they were on the ground, eating some stew with monsters they hunted here. It was a nice change of pace after the last few days where they only had power bars to fill their bellies. They also already could use their tablets, which allowed for them to watch something while traveling. Yet, Vash and Neria were both not really paying attention. When a fight was about to happen, or they had to do something, the two would work like normal, but any time the team could rest, the triton and the harpy would just stare at a random thing with a somber expression.
Everyone noticed that, and they had talked a bit about what was going on, but never at length. Escaping the Glimmering Graveyard and making sure they didn't leave behind any tracks took precedence over anything. But today was different. They were more relaxed, and after crossing to the next room, the next doorway was less than 500 meters away.
Knowing that today they had time and could waste some of it talking, Hera sent a message to Skyler. They had decided to be the ones to talk with Neria and Vash. Flint wasn't exactly the nurturing and sentimental type. His advice would be mostly, 'Just suck it up.' While Roan was too used to killing. His previous job included dealing with roaming bandits near the large cities of the beastmen, and the first time he killed someone, he was just 16.
Skyler noticed the text and nodded to the Empress, walking over to the cart where Vash was eating and staring into the horizon. At the same time, Hera refilled her bowl with the stew and moved closer to Neria.
"Hey, do you want more?" Hera asked with a smile, offering her hand to pick the triton's bowl.
Neria looked down. She still had more than half of the stew to eat, but she wasn't particularly hungry, "No thanks. It's tasty, but I just don't feel like eating."
With a nod, Hera sat by her side, "I understand you are not doing so hot. Well, I mean, you are, but I mean in a different way."
Neria blinked, the weird phrase seemingly able to bring her out of her stupor, "What?"
Hera stared back at the triton, "C'mon. You can't be wearing that and not know you are hot. Even if you are not doing hot, you still are hot, and there is nothing you can do about it."
"I never pegged you for liking the depressed type," Neria chuckled.
Hera let out a genuine sigh, "It's been a while since I was pegged in any way," she flushed a bit, realizing what she just said, "Sorry, that just… came out. Let's go back to you. I can see that you are going through some stuff. Do you want to talk about it?"
Neria paused, also caught off guard by the Ophidianite's initial remark, but she quickly went back to her serious expression. "Would talking about it change anything?"
"Yes."
"What?"
"It will help you."
Neria scoffed, "Yeah, sure."
"Seriously. I have a friend who is a really great therapist, and he explained to me why talking about things helps. When we are thinking, it doesn't always follow a logic. It's not like we are writing a journal. Our thoughts jump, loop, go back and forth, change to something completely different, and use smells, colors, or senses to convey something to us. That's why we think faster than we speak. Our minds don't limit themselves to just language; they use all kinds of inputs to make us understand what we think as quickly as possible. And I'm not even talking about people who have ADHD. In those cases, it's all that while a monkey is playing the piano and a fish doing the macarena, and both are making a presentation about the life cycle of a fruit fly."
Neria frowned, "That was… oddly specific."
"I had some weird dreams in the Cinderspire Citadel. But the point is, while that is super helpful when we are fighting or doing something, we need to think fast. If we have a problem and start to overthink, all those feelings and sensations get in the way. So, talking about it helps us organize the ideas we have. It helps us make sense of what we are going through since we have to explain it to someone else. Maybe you'll already know everything you say, and there will be nothing new. But usually, there will be something, even if it's something small, that will help you understand what is going on a bit better."
"Do I have to?" Neria looked Hera in the eye, her face clearly showing discomfort.
"No, you don't. If you don't want to, that's okay."
"Thanks. If I want to talk, I'll let you know," Neria ate a bit more of the stew while Hera was by her side, doing the same. After around two minutes of silence, the triton spoke up, "Was that your first?"
"The first time I killed someone?" Hera glanced over, getting a nod in reply. She looked to her stew once again and told the story, "No. The first time was in Dzviery during the centaur attack. There was an elf, his name was Vulmer Keller. He was affected by the madness spell, skill, or whatever it was that the centaur did. He came at me. I tried to fight him off, but he didn't stop. In the end, he walked into my glaive. I didn't swing, just held it there, and he just… ran at it."
"That's… awful. And it wasn't your fault. I mean, so many people died in that attack," Neria was now looking at her with wide eyes.
"I know. Thanks. But I spiraled a bit after that. I spent a couple of months exclusively running dungeons here. I had to fight people. Humans, in that case. I was angry at everything, upset for acting like that, and I almost let Lurize go. My first blade was the only one that came from a previous legacy holder. Yet, in a fit of anger, I wanted to get rid of him just because he was getting a bit weaker than the others. I didn't even have a replacement."
"How did you get past that?"
"Therapy, a lot of it. It helped me understand that it wasn't my fault, and even if it was. This was the MAZE. Things like that can happen, and we all know that. Two, my anger wasn't just about killing him but for being too weak and too indecisive to knock him out before it came to that. And three, that I really hated when people forced others to suffer. That one is a bit of a given, but it really does strike a nerve. That man was the second person I killed. Well, if we are counting real people. There were a few I had to kill inside a weird vision thing, and at the time, I did believe they were actual people," Hera noticed Neria's confused expression and just chuckled, "It's a long story. I'll tell you later. Either way, in my mind, it was simple. He was helping humans torture people. If we let them live, more people would get hurt, and their blood would be in my hands. After I saw what they did with Silah, and she died in my hands because of those experiments, I decided to stop caring about killing. It's not easy, and I don't want to go on a murder spree. But… if I start to feel guilty, I remember what those people did with Silah and how much the prisoners suffered. Using anger to not feel bad about that may be a crutch, but It's one that I intend to keep using."
Neria nodded, "I get that. Crutches help when we need them. Just be careful not to become dependent on them. Also… Did you say a friend of yours is your therapist?"
"Yeah."
"You know that's not a good idea, right?"
"Well… It's complicated. Basically, this friend is a giant turtle that lives on the MAZE. I can give you a referral, but getting there is very tricky. If we are in my private room, I can call him, but the rule is that I can only do that if everyone with me also knows him."
"Your therapist is a giant turtle? Hera, what the hell?"
Before the Empress could answer that question, Roan jumped to his feet, "We have a problem!" he turned his tablet to the rest of the group. There was an S.O.S. message from a team that was in the same room as they were. It seemed like they were delivering supplies but were attacked. There was no mention of who attacked them, but only one type of creature was aggressive in this room. They were called Myradions, bipedal jackals with elongated limbs and green hair. It was rare to see them, but they were always in groups when they attacked. This was a weaker room for Hera and the others. Monsters here were at most level 24, but if the people asking for help were around the same level, they were in trouble.
"Let's move!" Flint yelled as everyone jumped in the cart, and Nimbus took his griffon form to carry it again.
"What if this is a trap?" Skyler asked.
"Then we make sure no one else falls for it," the dwarf replied as the carriage picked up speed.
