Ch218-What’s In The Box

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Ch218-What’s In The Box

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An entire minute of dead silence had passed since Owl had said that they wanted him to help them defeat the new emperor.

A faint smile tugged at the edges of Owl’s mouth, as Hound continued staring at Sylver as if he expected him to lunge at them. Even if Hound didn’t think the man sitting in front of him was a threat, he still took his job seriously.

“So?” Owl asked.

Sylver placed his hands in his lap, as he leaned forward slightly.

“You’re a very fortunate man if all the people you dealt with agreed to help you kill an emperor without asking questions,” Sylver said, as the faint smile on Owl’s face turned into a full-blown polite grin.

“Does it matter? You already have the blood of two innocent men on your hands. What’s one more?” Owl asked as Sylver chuckled.

“Guilt? Is that your angle? Since I already killed 2 innocent men, if I stop now, their deaths will be meaningless? Wouldn’t telling me they died for a good cause work better? Tell me the current emperor is a demon wearing a man’s skin. That in his free time he rapes, tortures, that he’s a vicious animal, who hates the things I love, and loves the things I hate,” Sylver said with an almost bored tone of voice.

Oddly enough there wasn’t any change in Owl’s face or his soul.

Hound probably wouldn’t have heard a word Sylver had said, even if he wasn’t deaf. He was fixated on Sylver, the way a starving dog would be fixated on a giant slab of meat. His grey hair was tied in a firm ponytail, which made his face look sharper than it actually was.

“I don’t need to convince you, because I know what kind of person you are,” Owl answered.

Sylver rolled his eyes and could almost hear the muscles tighten in Hound’s neck.

“Sure you do,” Sylver said.

“You care deeply about the people you consider friends and are completely disinterested in the lives of those you don’t. I also know that you don’t have any alternatives when it comes to saving Fobur Plateforged,” Owl explained.

A sly smile gradually appeared on his face, as Sylver continued to blankly stare at him.

“Assuming that’s true, this is still the emperor we’re talking about. I’d like to know I’m not part of a suicide mission. Why do you want him dead?” Sylver asked.

“You’re overestimating your involvement… How about this, we’ll tell you everything we expect from you, and after that, you can decide whether or not you’re comfortable with it,” Owl said, as Sylver sat up, and winced as he felt one of the stitches on his spine pull at his skin.

“As long as you don’t say something like “now that we’ve told you our plan, you can either join us or die.” Can you promise me you’re not going to say that?” Sylver asked as Owl nodded.

“That’s not how we do things. If you choose not to help us, you will be allowed to leave unharmed, no questions asked. But then you will have to find and rescue Fobur without our assistance,” Owl explained with just a hint of a laugh in his voice, as Sylver scrunched up his face.

Sylver was pretending that Owl was talking about Edmund, as opposed to Fobur, because for whatever reason they seemed to think that Sylver was willing to die for this Plateforged fellow. Which was good, because that meant that their only bargaining chip was actually completely hollow.

Sylver had to play pretend with them because he wouldn’t win against Hound.

Difference in raw power aside, there was something about Hound that made Sylver’s gut twist into a knot. The last couple of times he’d had this feeling, he had been right to avoid fighting. And deeply regrated the rare times he’d ignored it.

Sylver wasn’t even sure if winning was on the table.

Sure, he couldn’t lose, but surviving and winning were not the same thing. If he knew what he was up against, maybe, Sylver would risk a confrontation with Hound, but as it stood, he had no choice but to resolve this kerfuffle without violence.

“Alright,” Sylver said, as Owl nodded at him.

“In a few hours, a man will cross the eastern border. He will be carrying a package. We want you to meet this man and swap a decoy package, with his. You will then hold onto that package until the grand auction is over,” Owl said.

“Are people going to try to steal that package from me?” Sylver asked as Owl made a so-so gesture with his giant spade-sized hand.

“If everything goes to plan, no. The package you will hold will be one of many. We hope that you will be overlooked and ignored, on account of being less, shall we say, prominent,” Owl explained, as Sylver just nodded at him.

“Then what?” Sylver asked.

“Then we will ask you to bring the package to a specific location,” Owl explained.

“That’s it?” Sylver asked with a tired sigh.

Great, they’re going to use this as blackmail to force me into doing other shit. Just what I needed.

“Regarding your part in helping us defeat the emperor, yes. As for rescuing Fobur Plateforged, that is a bit more complicated,” Owl said, as Sylver gestured for him to carry on. “The head of the Blue Tiger sect will be found dead in his room in a week or so. He will have killed himself out of grief, on account of the death of his last 2 remaining heirs, and-”

“I was told the Blue Tiger sect had more than 30 heirs?” Sylver interrupted.

“It used to, yes... After the head is found dead, a vigil will be held for him. High-ranking guards that defend the border, and defend the location where Fobur is held, will have no choice but to abandon their duties to see to the burial of their sect head. The ones that remain will all be low level, and inexperienced,” Owl explained.

“So, I will be able to just walk in, grab Fobur, and walk out?” Sylver asked as Owl nodded at him.

“That’s the idea, yes. There are 30 people who will be breaking in at the same time as you, so your only job will be to find Fobur,” Owl said.

What happens if I say no right now?

Either they leave me alone, or try to kill me… If I attack them first, I could probably get enough blood to track them… Then again, Owl can teleport, and Hound is faster and stronger than I am…

Do I lose anything if I agree to this? I’ll have to watch over a box containing a powerful weapon or something, but other than that? Faust can fight off the people coming after the box, so corpses for me, and XP for him.

I’d have to go through with the jailbreak, but I could just walk in, look around, walk out, and say I found Fobur dead. Or I could rescue him, I’ve got enough of his blood to track him.

Is there a way I could ask about the girl without letting them know why I want to find her?

Sylver placed his palm flat against where his stomach used to be and was almost surprised to find it perfectly relaxed.

“I have a few more questions,” Sylver said with a warm smile.

***

Green curtains, green curtains, Sylver repeated to himself over and over again, as he walked from one barrier-enclosed building to the next.

He was looking for an abandoned building, with dark green curtains. For whatever reason, even the “ghost town,” as Owl referred to it, still had perfectly functional barriers, that required Sylver to physically walk from one building to the next.

Spring was doing it too under the guise of his skinsuit, but even if Sylver could have multiple Springs, he only had the one skinsuit.

He made a mental note to create more when he had time.

“You’re going against the emperor, a man you yourself described to be “incredibly powerful,” because your stomach didn’t hurt when you considered it?” Ria asked as if Sylver’s answer was going to change just because this was the 4th time she was asking it.

“Once again, I am open to suggestions, and alternatives. From where I’m standing, in exchange for moving a box from one place to another, I have an excuse to be around the Bucklers,” Sylver silently tapped out, as Ria told him that this house didn’t have green curtains either.

He had initially tried to have her ride on Aleri, to find the curtains that way, but enough of the houses had roofs that stuck out that Ria couldn’t see the windows, so they had to find it the old-fashioned way.

“The healer elves?” Ria offered.

In her defense, although she questioned Sylver’s digestive-based decision-making 3 times already, she always had a new idea.

“I will obviously talk to Tarragon, but they wanted an answer right there and then, and I answered yes. If he knows something about the shield girl heir, good. But what if he doesn’t? Until we know for certain, we shouldn’t assume anything,” Sylver explained, as Ria went quiet again.

They walked past 10 buildings before she spoke again.

“Why don’t they remember you? Do you not find that suspicious?” Ria asked.

Sylver scratched his chin, as Spring informed him he hadn’t found the house with the green curtains.

“They might have traded their memories away. Or it might be part of a ruse unrelated to me. Or it’s part of their master plan to deceive me. Honestly Ria, stop trying to overthink everything. Sometimes weird shit happens, and it has nothing to do with you,” Sylver said, as he passed yet another house that lacked green curtains.

“Alright… So, do you actively decide not to worry about it, or is it natural?” Ria asked.

“You get used to it. Or rather, you don’t have a choice when you have to multitask thousands of things. Worry about the things you can control and forget about the things can’t. The moons don’t look right to me Ria. Something is off about them, but I don’t know what. Can I do something about the moons looking weird? No. So I’m not going to waste my time thinking about it,” Sylver explained, as he leaned in through the barrier, and told Spring to come back.

“Weird how?” Ria asked, as Sylver rolled his eyes and started spreading his mana out to search the house.

“Weird as in, there’s something off about them. I can’t be any more specific than that, the vast majority of my magic doesn’t require knowing the positions of the moons. I would go as far as to say it might be my imagination,” Sylver said, as he used [Fog Form] to enter the house, materialized on the second floor.

His shadow extended towards the pile of rubble and very gently pushed the bits of oddly heavy wood out of the way. Bit by bit, Sylver uncovered the package he was meant to carry to the eastern border.

It looked like the kind of thing a bard would use to carry a delicate lute, except it was maybe three times as big. Sylver had to guess that it was meant to contain a Warhammer, battle-ax, or a large spear, or maybe some sort of rectangular shield.

As he used his [Deadly Darkness] shadow to stand the package up, he placed his hand on his face and massaged the area above his eyes.

“They’ve got a 4th-tier mage working for them, fan-fucking-tastic…” Sylver said to no one in particular.

His shadow placed the package upright against the wall. It was rectangular, about the size of a door, but a bit smaller, and thicker. It was covered in a very cheap-looking black leather, with scratched-up and rusty metal edges.

There was a very distinct piece of blank fabric wrapped around it as if it was a gift. The middle bit that would have been a bow instead had a wax-like seal, that was a very peculiar shade of red.

Sylver crouched down and moved his face towards the wax seal until his nose was almost touching it.

“Is this bad?” Ria asked, as Sylver reached out with his hand, and tapped the tip of his finger against the outer rim of the wax seal.

“Assuming the decoy is identical to the real thing, they’ve got some really serious shit locked up in here,” Sylver said, as a tendril of [Necrotic Mutilation] extended out of his chest and began to wrap itself around the package.

As Sylver stood back up, the package floated into the air and followed him as he began to walk down what remained of the stairs. It was only now that he noticed that the weight distribution inside the thing was off.

He spun it around while he walked, and it didn’t feel like any sword or shield that he knew of. Stranger still, the way the weight was spread out almost felt familiar. A thin layer of lead inside the package prevented him from peaking inside.

The seal was fake, but Sylver was worried there was a trap inside, that would let the man he was swapping packages with know he couldn’t be trusted.

Sylver hid the large rectangular box floating above his head using an illusion, and while it wasn’t completely invisible, it was transparent enough that the few people out in the street this early in the morning didn’t notice it or pretended not to notice.

***

Sylver arrived at the eastern gate with time to spare.

Now that he was aware of this “Ki bubble” business, he was on guard for it. But the interaction between these Ki bubbles, and the primal energy Sylver was able to feel, was too faint for him to figure out where one bubble ended, and the next started.

The only thing he could sort of feel was when someone near him was inside one of these bubbles. Even then, it wasn’t perfect.

Because if it was perfect, he would have noticed the fact that the transparent box leaning against the wall next to him, had been replaced. He had been watching it since the moment he had the thing in his possession, and even then, someone had swapped the box out without him noticing.

The only reason he even noticed the package was different, was because he leaned down to scratch his knee, and accidentally touched the real 4th tier seal with his elbow.

And while he was worried about the fact that someone had so easily bypassed his net of [Necrotic Mutilation], as he had explained to Ria, there was nothing he could do about it, so he wasn’t going to worry about it.

It was bright enough outside now that the lamps had all been turned off, and people were gradually waking up to go to work. Sylver had been watching the eastern gate like a hawk, but either the person who had swapped the packages was already inside the city by the time Sylver got here or the group of guards guarding the entrance had failed at their jobs.

Sylver didn’t have any misconceptions regarding the current limitations of his abilities but having something he was actively looking after stolen right from under his nose, was embarrassing in a way that was difficult to put into words.

Thankfully, Sylver had gotten somewhat accustomed to failure and wasn’t even that upset.

Speed and Ki weren’t his specialties, so there was nothing wrong with someone running circles around him, without him even noticing.

Magic was his specialty.

Like that poorly put together barely functional piece of shit 4th tier seal.

But as much as Sylver enjoyed the thought of cracking it open, just to prove he could, he had enough sense to swallow his pride for the moment.

He twirled the large door-shaped box above his head as he walked towards Faust’s sect, as Ria quietly sat in the back of his robe. Since she spent the vast majority of her time back there, he had taken the time to weave a pocket of sorts for her, so she was comfortable.

The two guards outside of Faust’s gates nodded at him, as they swung the doors open, and allowed Sylver inside.

Sylver didn’t bother using the stairs, and simply jumped, and landed on the roof of the main building. Spring opened the hatch for him, and as Sylver descended down into his workshop, he realized the large box he was carrying wasn’t going to fit.

Sylver gestured at the square hatch, and pulled his hand towards himself, as the flat rectangular box tore through the small square hole. The shattered tile pieces fell down and smashed into even smaller pieces as they collided with the metal ladder, and hard wooden floor.

Sylver just looked at the pile of rubble he had created and forced himself to calm down.

“I take it, it didn’t go well?” Faust asked.

Sylver turned towards the man and saw that he was holding a ridiculously large bottle. It was as long as one of Sylver’s legs, and just as thick.

“How many hoops have I been made to jump through at this point?” Sylver asked, as he gestured towards the package he had been given, and made it float over to him, so he could sit down on it.

“Let’s see… Two?” Faust guessed, as he used his thumb to flick the cork out, and produced two large mugs seemingly out of nowhere.

“It was a rhetorical question. But no, my trip to the ice place alone is at least a couple of hundreds hoops worth of jumping. And now I’ve got this thing,” Sylver said, as he rapped the door-shaped box with his knuckle.

“On the bright side-”

Faust stopped mid-sentence as both he and Sylver turned their heads towards the box Sylver was sitting on, as they heard the box make a sound.

Sylver stood up, and pressed his ear up to the box, as he knocked three times on it.

He heard something knock back three times in response.

Is this Aurick, or the shield heir girl?

Or someone else?

It’s about big enough for a small human to fit, or a very thin dwarf…

"What’s in there?” Faust asked, as Sylver very very gently placed the box down, and ran his fingers along the edges of it.

The way Owl had spoken about it, he had been certain there wouldn’t be anything alive inside. Owl didn’t say a word when Sylver asked if it was alright to bury it to hide it.

Then again, if they have someone capable of crafting a 4th tier seal, a couple of life-supporting spells wouldn’t be that difficult in comparison.

Sylver pressed his ear up to the box again.

“One knock for yes, two knocks for no. Can you hear me?” Sylver asked.

He heard a single knock, yes.

“Can you talk?” Sylver asked.

Two knocks, no.

“…” Sylver’s voice caught in his throat, as he tried to figure out how to approach this.

If this is Aurick, I need to pretend to be on their side, so Owl, Hound, and presumably Lion, don’t try to kill me. But why would they bring Aurick here in a box?

On the other hand, if this is the shield heir girl, I need to get her on my side, so she cooperates and I can sterilize her. What can I ask that would-

“What’s your name!” Faust shouted at the box.

Sylver, Ria, and Spring, all turned to stare at the wise cultivator, who had enough power to take over an entire sect in a week.

“Is everything alright with you?” Sylver asked with a gentle voice.

Sylver felt physical pain in his stomach, as it took Faust too long to realize the problem with the question he had just asked.

Sylver did his best not to show it in his body language, but apparently, Faust could tell Sylver was looking at him while asking himself “this is my ally?”

“I’m a bit under the influence,” Faust admitted, and Sylver chose to believe him.

He very quietly stood up from the box, and with a guiding hand on Faust’s shoulder, walked him towards the corner, away from the box.

“Do you have a technique to peek inside that thing?” Sylver whispered at the possibly drunk cultivator.

“No,” Faust said.

Why did I bother asking?

“I could make a hole and-”

“You can’t. I mean, you can, but it will kill whoever is inside,” Sylver interrupted before Ria even had a chance to finish her sentence.

Wait, I’m overthinking this. If it’s not the girl, does it matter who it is? Even if Nameless/Aurick is in there, so what?

Should I just ask if she has a birthmark on her shoulder?

Then what? Sterilize her, and tell Tarragon I will kill his whole team if anyone so much as thinks about healing her?

What if the current emperor is aware of the prophecy, and once Owl tells him they have the girl, he will come looking for her?

Sylver looked up at Faust and furrowed his eyebrows as he considered the wisdom of his idea.

“I need you to bring 10 people to the roof,” Sylver said, as Faust nodded and disappeared into thin air.

Sylver reconsidered his idea once more, and when he couldn’t think of a better alternative at this exact moment, used [Fog Form] to get to the roof.

There was something almost sinister about the way the Faust’s people stood.

It was the middle of the day, and yet that somehow made the 10 men dressed in black with white skull masks look all the more intimidating.

“Could all of you please think the word “Chrysanthemum,” while picturing this girl in your head,” Sylver said, as he gestured towards the 10 men, and created a life-sized illusion of Chrys.

Almost immediately Sylver felt a pressure in his chest that nearly made him gasp. No more than 5 seconds passed, before an impossibly pissed-off and terrified sparrow landed on his shoulder. Sylver swiped his hand towards the illusion and dispersed it.

“That will be all, thank you,” Sylver said to the group. Similar to Faust, they disappeared without a word.

Sylver held the tiny bird in front of his face.

“I’m sorry, it was urgent,” Sylver said to the tiny bird with a single glowing left eye.

Sylver shifted his vision just in time to see a black raven land on the top of his head.

“Please. Never. Do. That. Again,” the raven said.

“I promise I won’t. There’s a box downstairs, and a person is inside of it. I need you to tell me who’s inside,” Sylver said, the raven and the sparrow turned their head towards the location of the box, as if they could see it through the thick wooden floor.

As the sparrow flew off Sylver’s hand and disappeared through the torn open hatch, the raven jumped down to replace it.

“Can. Not. See. Inside. Box,” the Chrys raven said, as the glow in its eye sputtered for a second before it became consistent again.

“Right… Thank you for trying,” Sylver said, as the light in the raven’s left eye flickered, and then disappeared.

The bird was beyond confused as it remained where it was and stared at Sylver. He grabbed it with his other hand, carefully placed it down on the floor, and walked away from it.

“Now what?” Faust asked as Sylver ran his fingers through his hair.

“I don’t know. I didn’t expect for her to react so fast, I thought I had at least half an hour…” Sylver said.

“If you open the box, can you put it back to how you found it?” Faust asked as Sylver made a face.

“I can, the seal has all the components I need, but I would have to spend at least 50 hours channeling mana into it. And to be completely honest with you, I’m not entirely certain my mana channels will be able to handle that,” Sylver explained, as Faust nodded.

“So, the answer is no,” Faust said, with a smug tone that Sylver didn’t need right now.

“Why can’t you just ask her about the birthmark?” Ria asked.

“Because then she will think we’re only interested in her because of her birthmark,” Sylver said.

“But we are only interested in her because of the birthmark?” Ria asked.

“Yes, but then she will associate us with the same people who kidnapped her. She won’t trust us, and she’ll think us releasing her is a trick,” Sylver explained.

“Alright, but do we need her to trust us? We don’t need her to do anything, all we want is to stop her from doing something,” Faust said.

“Do keep in mind, she’s part of an ancient bloodline, so there’s a less than zero chance that she isn’t a normal human girl. Once the box is open, who’s to say she won’t run away, and we’re unable to stop her?” Sylver asked as he waited for his tired mind to come up with a solution.

“So, what do we do?” Faust asked.

Sylver gave himself a solid minute to think through his options.

“If she is the girl I’m looking for, those 4 don’t matter… I’ll just take her back to Arda, and have Lola watch over her… If she’s not, then Owl will know I’m not on his side, and I might not find the real girl in time… Technically, as long as the emperor is killed, the girl doesn’t matter… The question is, assuming they’re using these boxes to transport the girl, would they give her to me?” Sylver asked.

“They gave her to you because they consider you to be weak, compared to everyone else, right?” Ria asked.

“That’s what they implied, yes…” Sylver said as Faust looked at him with a very unpleasant look of pity in his eyes.

“I mean… There are people who are well above level 500 here, compared to them you’re not exactly… Not to mention the locals don’t consider mages to be…” Faust’s voice trailed off, as Sylver just stared at him.

“That’s a fair point… Except they’re not local. Or I don’t think they are…” Sylver said.

“Why are you in such a rush to decide now?” Ria asked. “Sleep on it, and-”

“Because now that she knows we know she’s in there, the longer we wait, the greater the chance she decides we’re enemies, and tries to run away. She’ll pretend to be on our side, and then-”

“I think you’re overestimating her. If her family was hiding from the emperor, that means it’s very likely she isn’t even aware of what’s going on. I’ve seen it before, it’s why three-quarters of the greatest warrior always come from nameless villages,” Faust offered.

“We could ask the dragon,” Spring chimed in, and Sylver glared at the shade.

“That’s a last resort,” Sylver said with a tone that left no room for argument.

“Can’t you open the box a little, look inside, and close it back up?” Faust asked as Sylver shook his head.

“No. It’s a binary seal, either it works, and the box is closed, or it doesn’t, and the box can be opened,” Sylver explained.

“And making a hole is out because it will kill whoever is inside…” Ria added.

“Why don’t we kill her? A dead person can’t get pregnant, no offense,” Faust said.

Sylver considered the question. And was unpleasantly surprised that Ria barely reacted.

“If we kill her, that means we’ll have to wait for the emperor to die. But if we kill her, we won’t get help from Owl and the others, and I’m not sure how long it will take for me to get strong enough to kill the emperor… I would prefer to keep her alive until I was certain that using the emperor’s sword to free the dragon is impossible,” Sylver explained.

In all the images the dragon showed Sylver, the sword was always stabbed into a living girl’s and boy’s chest, not their corpses. That, and Sylver was familiar enough with bloodline magic to know it very rarely survived the death of the blood’s owner.

“Can I trust those 4 to underestimate me enough to leave something so valuable with me?” Sylver asked the 3 people/creatures, around him.

All 3 of them looked beyond uncomfortable, but Faust was the first to break the silence.

“If I… Wait, can’t you just trace the magic the seal is made out of, to find the other boxes? Assuming this isn’t the real one?” Faust said as Sylver did a quick estimate. A 4th tier seal would have more than enough mana for tracking.

“That would work if we assumed they had 1 mage create all the seals for them…” Sylver said.

There was also a chance that this was a trap. A test to see if they could trust Sylver, or not.

“We could spend all day arguing hypotheticals,” Sylver concluded.

“We could flip a coin?” Faust offered.

Once again, Sylver, Ria, and Spring stared at the cultivator. Sylver pulled a single gold coin out of his [Bound Bones] storage into his hand and looked at it.

He closed his hand into a fist and made the coin disappear after a moment.

“No, no coins, I know what I’m going to do,” Sylver said.

NEXT CHAPTER 

(AN: I could probably publish a whole book with how many chapters I wrote, that I then deleted and rewrote from scratch.)