Chapter 1175 (2/2)
Lady Iellaya shared a glance with Randidly after Lord Miln followed his protege. Unable to restrain herself, she cleared her throat lightly as she reached for the fog of energy. “Does this perhaps mean that Lord Miln’s fascination with your body… extends beyond the professional sense?”
“Keep your eyes on the prize,” Randidly said with amusement. Then he tilted his head toward the energy. “Besides, what makes you so sure that he can’t hear what we are saying right now? Or are you fine if Lord Miln hears your joke.”
Lady Iellaya felt a flash of panic as she remembered the presence of the grinning Cail Tweocs, but mastered it quickly enough. In front of Randidly’s eyes, she simply shrugged. “That’s the way things currently stand between us. It makes this invasion that's about to happen all the more interesting, no?”
Randidly’s mouth twisted and he gave Lady Iellaya a slow nod that was laden with hidden meaning; it seemed that he was ready to finally deliver on his promises. From his expression, he intended to do it here. Lady Iellaya’s heartbeat quickened. Inside the Nether Prince…?
Then he reached for the energy and then disappeared. Lady Iellaya quickly followed. Although she teased him, both understood that the Nether King’s looming assault was extremely dangerous. They would need all the power they could get. Without the boost that Lady Iellaya hoped to leverage from her new Class, it would be difficult to perform heroically enough to earn a promotion from this battle.
Hell, Lady Iellaya didn’t even know if her strength would be enough to survive the experience of facing a Nether King as it was. Even Lord Miln seemed profoundly mortal in comparison to the dark mass of energy that was slowly tumbling down to crush their bases. That was how feared an existence the Nether King was. Lady Iellaya had never even met anyone in the Nexus who boasted about meeting a Nether King and living.
It seemed most poor souls that faced a Nether King died.
Obviously the forces of Aether had the Xyrt Brigade, but they were far beyond the experience of most people. And the Xyrt Brigade hadn’t yet shown itself on the frontlines. Although they were technically relying on Lord Miln to report the problem...
After touching the energy, there was a moment of wrenching weightlessness and then Lady Iellaya followed the others into that strange world of energy. Everything was blended watercolor and then slowly everything came spinning back into focus. As Lady Iellaya steadied herself, she looked around and saw that she was standing next to Randidly on a dirt path that led up a hill in front of them. Tallgrass rustled invitingly on both sides of the path as the wind whispered around them.
Lord Miln and his protege were already striding forward, ascending toward the summit of the hill that seemed to be the central location of this place. To Lady Iellaya’s shock, she could clearly tell as she watched them that even Lord Miln was struggling to walk forward. They had just started up the slope, but their speed had slowed to a crawl. As she narrowed her eyes, it was possible for Lady Iellaya to make out thick waves of pressure that were radiating outward from the summit. When she glanced at Randidly again, she found him studying a small sign at the head of the dirt path.
The path branched, and the sign above that branching pointed in both directions: the long path and the short path. Lord Miln’s duo had taken the short path on the right.
“...thanks for this opportunity, by the way. I doubt Lord Miln would have let me in otherwise. And it seems clear that this is every individual for themselves,” Lady Iellaya pursed her lips as she looked after Lord Miln. “Didn’t even bother to give us information from his investigations.”
Randidly grinned at Lady Iellaya. “You’ve done a lot for me. It’s the least I could do. And also… I figured that this would be our best chance to make you your new Class. I believe… well, getting either the time or the distraction sufficient to allow it to happen would be difficult otherwise. This is our shot.”
“The same thought occurred to me. So now…” Lady Iellaya looked at the sign, then up at the two figures clearly struggling on the short path.
“...from what I understand, Nether Princes generally contain either a powerful memory or emotion.” Lady Iellaya said lightly drew her finger across the sign. The wood appeared completely mundane. “So often times individuals find themselves present in a battle, or another sort of scenario with high tension. Generally, death is involved. And that scenario will play on repeat, allowing the people who travel within to experience it several times and incorporate some of the lessons or emotions therein to their own images. But this… it appears like it is the other big type of Nether Princes: philosophical ones.
“Sometimes a being faced a choice that so obsessed the maker that it will persist beyond their death. No matter which option they ultimately chose, they were consumed by regret. It haunted them and became a persistent metaphysical dichotomy. Their continued obsession will linger and warp the world… and in the end, it’s a relatively simple choice. Just one that did not bring about the desired result for the original chooser.” Lady Iellaya gestured elaborately at the sign. While the right path led up the hill, it appeared the left path led down into a gully beside it. “So Mister Ghosthound… when it comes down to it, will you pick the long or the short path?”
Randidly Ghosthound glanced upward. “How about the path where we don’t have to bother with those two.”
“Long path it is,” Lady Iellaya said, barely able to contain her cheer toward the thought of obtaining a new Class. Together, the two of them followed the dirt path down into the gully, across a stream, and then into a crack in the exposed rock of the hill. Within the crack was a dimly lit tunnel, which possessed a low enough roof that even Lady Iellaya had to hunch over slightly to proceed.
But after a short while, they saw light and hurried forward. After the short time within the tunnel, the air tasted clean and fresh to Lady Iellaya’s tongue. Her feathers flexed in pleasure. Yet when they looked around, they found another dirt path in front of them, leading up to a hill. A larger hill, but a hill nonetheless.
As the approached the hill, they came to another sign at a branch in the path: the longer path or the shorter path.
“How long do you think it goes?” Lady Iellaya asked.
Randidly chuckled. “Depends on which path we take. Not that it really matters. Let’s take another long choice, and then make it to the next branching point… and there let me finally pay you back for protecting my images while I was away. I’m ready to make you a new Class.”