Finn could feel despair well in his chest as he watched her health continue to slide lower. She couldn’t die here. That would mean at least a forty-five-minute wait for her to respawn, they didn’t know where she would end up when she came back, and that tunnel they had just used was definitely a one-way trip inside the palace.
If she died, then their group would be down one member.
Come on, Julia, he recited in his head.
Kyyle exhaled more air into her lungs, pulling back…
And Julia suddenly sputtered, water pouring from her mouth and nose. Kyyle helped her lean onto her side, letting her cough and hack up a mixture of sand and water even as Finn breathed a sigh of relief. Only moments later, her health had begun to stabilize, and her breathing had become more even.
“I told you that tunnel was a death trap,” she muttered, her voice hoarse and her eyes meeting Finn’s for a moment.
“You did. You definitely did,” Finn said with a relieved laugh.
Julia’s gaze shot to Kyyle. “And… uh, thanks, I guess.”
“You’re welcome for saving your life,” he replied with a grin.
“Pretty sure I didn’t need the help,” she grunted, crossing her arms playfully. “And besides… couldn’t Abbad have just pushed some air into my lungs. Seems like you were looking for an excuse to kiss me.”
“Uh, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but you look sort of like a drowned rat at the moment,” Kyyle offered in reply, a faint blush creeping up his neck. “Not the most appealing look for you.”
Julia tried to take a swipe at him, but missed, still weak from her near-death experience and fully depleted stamina. “If I weren’t nearly dead, I’d kick your ass for that,” she grunted, slumping back onto the chaise in defeat.
“Rain check then?” Kyyle offered, his grin widening at her groan.
“Way, way too soon,” she muttered.
It took Julia a few minutes to fully recover, her health regeneration swiftly repairing the cuts and scrapes that marred her skin and the damage to her lungs. In the meantime, the group used the opportunity to dry their armor and gear – using Daniel’s flickering form to help push the moisture out of their equipment without being forced to cast a spell. The AI’s mana signature didn’t seem much greater than the lamps in the hallway, so it seemed safe to keep him around. Also, they needed to balance the risk of his presence against leaving a trail of sand and water behind them as they moved through the palace.
A short while later, the group was relatively dry and their equipment repacked. They hovered in the center of the sitting room, talking about the next step while preparing to leave.
“Okay, so we survived that part. Barely. But what now?” Kyyle asked, shooting a glance at Finn and Abbad.
“My guess is that we will find Bilel in the throne room. Finn observed mana coming from that origin point back at the northwestern gate,” Abbad said, pulling up a map of the palace with a swipe of his wrist. “That was the last place Finn saw him casting, and he wouldn’t relinquish that vantage point lightly,” he continued.
Finn nodded, and his gaze focused on the map. The group was currently sitting in the western wing of the palace. And the throne room was located in the center of the palace complex. It towered above the rest of the city, sitting almost flush with the southern wall. They were going to have a decent hike through the palace.
He tapped at the throne room’s location, and a yellow path wound through the complex, tracing a twisting route toward their destination.
“That looks like it’s going to take some time,” Kyyle said, staring at the map.
Julia nodded. “And there’s a big risk that we run into a bunch of guards or hounds,” she offered. “Bilel had to have stationed some sort of defenses here inside the palace. And it’s only going to take one alarm to put an end to this assassination attempt.”
Finn’s brow furrowed at that. “My sight gets fuzzy the farther out I try to reach, but I should be able to get a decent sense of what’s inside this wing of the palace,” he offered. The others nodded, and he approached the nearby wall, activating his Mana Sight and peeling back at the intervening layers of mana.
He didn’t see any guards or hounds lingering in the central hallway where they had entered, the corridor only broken by the telltale mana signature of the lamps. Finn shifted his attention, peeling back at the walls of the adjoining chambers… and then hesitated. Clusters of multi-colored light lingered in each room, the combination of energy appearing almost human. Yet the energy didn’t fluctuate nor move. It seemed to be entirely stationary.
What is that? he wondered to himself.
He shifted his attention to the lone doorway leading out of the sitting room where they were holed up. The adjoining room was a dead end. However, he noticed the same strange cluster of energy lingering inside.
“There’s something in that side room,” Finn said, dropping his voice to a whisper. Although, he suspected that if they were going to alert whatever was inside, they would have done so already. “I have no idea what’s in there, but I see the same energy signature riddling the rooms all along this hallway.”
“That’s just a small bathing room adjoining this sitting area,” Abbad offered, waving at the map. “What could Bilel have possibly stored inside…?”
There was only one way to answer that question.
Julia immediately pulled her lance from her belt and raised her shield as she moved toward one door, motioning for Malik to take the other side of the doorway – the fighter’s gleaming swords already held firmly in hand. The rest of the group took up a central position in the sitting room, Brock’s rocky form hovering in front of the mages protectively.
At Julia’s gesture, the pair opened the door and rushed inside.
Only to stop short.
“What the fuck?” Julia muttered, her lance drooping. Even Malik drew in a sharp breath as he observed what lingered in that small side room.
The mages moved forward as they realized there was no immediate threat, and Finn could soon see what had caught Julia and Malik’s attention, his mouth dropping open. A man hung suspended along the wall of the room. He was nearly naked – only a dirty loincloth covering his waist. His limbs were emaciated, as though he hadn’t eaten in weeks, the bones protruding through his pale flesh and his muscle having long ago atrophied.
“This…. What is this?” Kyyle spoke aloud, his voice echoing in the silent room.
Crystalline spears had been embedded in the man’s skin, and caked blood and inflamed skin encircled the lances. Yet the skin appeared to be partially healed, almost as though the crystal had been inserted some time ago. And each spear was connected to a thin, translucent thread that ran up into the ceiling. Those cords held the man suspended in the air, his limbs too frail to break free. As Finn observed the crystals with his Mana Sight active, the answer came to him immediately.
“Bilel is draining his mana,” he said, his voice hoarse as he took in the horror hanging in front of him. “Those spears are embedded in his Najima. The threads wind up into the ceiling and run along conduits sandwiched between this floor and the next.”
The wiring reminded Finn of the Forge in many ways. Although, a close examination of the crystalline threads indicated that they weren’t that same neurogem material. The wiring was a pale imitation that more closely matched the simple material that Kalisha used in her mechanids. Finn could only assume Bilel had stolen that tech from the merchants to build this… monstrosity.
His gaze shifted upward, now observing the multi-colored mana that flowed out of each room and up into the conduits along the ceiling, flowing eastward toward Bilel’s throne room. It seemed that they had been right. It was safe to assume that those rivers of mana were flowing straight toward the demon.
“We have to get him down… save him,” Julia said, moving forward.
Finn immediately put a hand on her arm to stop her. “We can’t,” he muttered. “His health is likely too
low, and those spears are embedded close to natural arteries. We saw how the purge is administered. It takes multiple healers to keep someone alive during the procedure. If you disconnect him, he’ll likely just bleed out.”
Julia’s lips pinched into a grim line, but she made no move to unhook the man.
“Those other clusters of energy must be other mages… more prisoners like this one,” Finn continued, now understanding the energy he had seen flowing down the hallway. “Most of these rooms are filled with these people.”
“But why?” Kyyle asked, shaking his head. “If Bilel was already purging the mages, why not just absorb the resulting crystals?”
Finn was rubbing at his temple, his thoughts racing. “That’s not efficient,” he said slowly. At Kyyle’s questioning glance, he continued. “Think about it. With the purge, Bilel could, at best, collect the mage’s total mana pool. And only then if he had a crystal large enough to contain that much mana. It’s much more likely that he’s losing some of that mana each time. And those gems could be more useful in other applications – such as the weapons and equipment created by the merchants, for example.”
“I don’t understand,” Malik said, shaking his head as he stared at the suspended mage.
“Okay, let’s say he collects 1,000 mana each time he administers the purge,” Finn continued. “But what if the typical mage has a regeneration rate much higher than that? Let’s say 30 mana/second for a novice. That’s 1,800 mana per minute. 108,000 per hour…”
“Or almost 2.6 million per day per mage,” Kyyle muttered, his eyes widening. “This process can’t be perfectly efficient either, but your point still stands. Bilel would be able to collect far more mana this way than simply administering the purge.”
Finn nodded, a weight settling in his stomach. Even the neurogem material had a conduction limit, and Bilel would need to be casting continuously to use up the mana that was flowing through those conduits. The demon likely didn’t have crystals large enough to store the overflow – or at least Finn hadn’t seen them with his sight. The demon also couldn’t absorb the mana every waking moment. So, there was still waste in this system.
That thought was the only way Finn was able to push back at the despair that was beginning to coil in his stomach. They may have just made a colossal mistake. This entire gambit had been based on the assumption that Bilel’s mana pool was finite, and he was relying primarily on the power of the relic. How the hell could they reasonably expect to fight a creature with a mana pool in the millions… or billions?
Even worse, Finn was pretty certain he knew where Bilel had gotten the idea for this farming method. In many ways, this approach was similar to what the Forge had been doing… or the gods themselves. But Bilel had taken it much further, taking 100% instead of only shaving off a modest 10%. And he hadn’t been content to only steal from the gods’ share. He had started draining the mana right from the source.
He had basically turned these mages into rechargeable mana batteries.
As this realization struck him, the enslaved man’s eyes fluttered open, and the group jumped. His gaze was distant, almost mad. His pupils were dilating rapidly, the man clearly having trouble focusing on them. Swallowing hard, he managed to croak out a few words, “Kill… me… please.”
Julia shook her head. “What the actual hell. Who… what kind of creature could do this? We have to at least put him out of his misery.”
Yet Finn still hesitated.
“What are you waiting for?” Julia demanded.
He met her eyes evenly. “I want to help him as much as you do, but we have to think about the larger goal here. If we kill this man, what about the dozens or hundreds of others hidden within the palace? Are we going to kill them too? And how long will that take? Each death will reduce the flow of mana. And Bilel will likely notice that his mana supply has begun to dwindle long before we finish killing the mages.”
Julia’s eyes widened slightly, but her mouth was pressed tight, unable to muster a rebuttal. A similarly grim expression lingered across the faces of the rest of the group.
Finn shook his head. “No. We can help these people – or at least allow them to move on. But we can’t do that yet. These conduits all have to flow to one place. So, our best bet is to find that hub and destroy it before we confront Bilel. Then he won’t have time to react. That won’t help us with whatever mana he has stored, but it will at least cut off the tap.”
Kyyle was nodding as he began to speak, “And Bilel is having to burn a lot of mana to keep everything running. The wards along the palace walls, that protective shield of air mana hovering above the palace itself, directing the hounds, assisting them in their skirmishes throughout the city… I’m betting it’s taking him a LOT of mana to maintain everything. If we cut his flow of mana for even a few seconds, that may leave him weakened.”
“Except for the staff,” Finn murmured.
“Except for the staff,” Kyyle echoed, meeting Finn’s eyes. “But we’ve already reduced the hounds’ numbers substantially, and we have to hope that Aerys is able to take out even more. At this point, we just have to have faith.”
“He can’t get away with this,” Julia growled, her eyes flashing angrily.
The man suspended in front of them had already lost consciousness, his form slumping back against the crystalline wires. Finn knew that this scene was playing out dozens of times across the palace – possibly hundreds of mages imprisoned and drained – committed to a fate far worse than simple death. An endless, pain-filled purgatory.
He could feel his own anger flare in the face of what Bilel had done. These people might not be entirely real – might not have flesh-and-blood bodies back in the real world – but Finn had spent enough time in this world to understand that they weren’t merely programs. His eyes flitted to Daniel. To Malik. To Abbad. These people – his companions – they weren’t just ones and zeros on a server to him.
They couldn’t be, not if he was to bring Rachael back successfully.
Mana rippled through his body, searing and burning through his veins until his eyes glowed an ominous dark red. Those flaming eyes met his daughter’s. “Trust me. He won’t get away with this. We’re going to finish the fight we started – once and for all.”
Chapter 46 - Check
The group hovered beside an intersection, their backs pressed along the nearby wall. They were currently standing on the upper levels of the central palace complex – closing in on Bilel’s throne room. Finn peered through the wall but saw no movement or telltale sign of energy in the adjoining hallway. According to the map that floated beside him, this hall led directly to the throne room – a final staircase leading up to a familiar pair of broad wooden doors. Even now, Finn had to repress a shudder as he witnessed that doorway in his sight.
The last time they had been here, it hadn’t ended well.
His gaze shifted to the floor where a current of multi-colored energy flowed along the crystalline conduits embedded in the stone. As they had followed those magical tributaries, the current had widened, growing brighter as more branching streams of energy fed into the flow. Now it was a brightly glowing river leading them straight to the throne room.
Although, Finn’s brow furrowed as he tried to peel back the layers of mana wrapped around that chamber. The room didn’t appear to be warded – or at least he didn’t see any telltale, glowing patterns or symbols that would denote active enchantments. There was simply so much ambient mana flowing into the room that he couldn’t make out any details of what lingered inside. The effect was eerily reminiscent of the interference he had encountered back in the Forge.
If Bilel was inside that room, then he was throwing around quite a bit of mana.
“Clear,” Finn whispered, but he made no move to pull away from the wall. His lips pinched into a grim expression, his thoughts swirling.
“This doesn’t feel right,” Julia muttered softly, glancing around the corner. “Where the hell is everybody? Bilel co
uldn’t have converted every single guard.”
“Unless he thought they were more useful as hounds,” Kyyle offered tentatively.
Julia arched an eyebrow. “Okay, so then he left no guards around his throne room? We should at least have run across a few hellhounds.”
Abbad shook his head. “It’s possible that the hounds can’t be trusted with this much mana flowing through the walls,” he suggested. “Most likely, they are more difficult to control around ambient sources of energy. That could also explain why they were grouped in the outer courtyards.”
The librarian glanced at Finn, their eyes meeting briefly, and Finn cocked his head in response, mulling on that thought. Abbad’s explanation made sense to a degree. And it assumed that Bilel’s control over the hounds was fragile, which was possibly good news for Aerys and the rest of their army of guildsmen and Khamsin. If they were able to distract the demon for even a few moments, that could give the rest of the army an edge.
However, there was also another possible answer.
Bilel might be strong enough now that he simply didn’t need guards.
Finn didn’t exactly love that explanation, but he wasn’t quite sure what the hell he could do about it – not at this point. They had long passed the point of no return.
He shook his head to ward off those anxious thoughts, his gaze snapping back into focus. “It doesn’t matter. We have to keep moving forward. The entrance to the throne room is at the end of the hall, and the main conduit flows straight toward that point.”
Finn’s attention shifted to Kyyle. “We’re going to need to disable the conduit before we breach the room. We’re not dealing with the neurogem material, so it should be enough just to obstruct the connection.”
His fingers wrapped around a dark metal orb, pulling it from his bag. “If you make me a hole, I can block off the flow of mana. Then you can seal the stone so that no one interferes with the conduit after we make it inside the throne room.”
Kyyle nodded, and Finn glanced at Daniel. “Can you give us a highlight? Make sure to cover the full width of the conduit. With this much energy flowing through that channel, even a trickle is going to be a problem.”
Awaken Online: Inferno (Tarot #3) Page 53