Book 5 - Chapter 37 - Ithil, the Jewel of Commerce (Patreon)

Ranthia never managed to get any more sleep that night. The notification just felt as if it had seared itself into her mind. She didn’t feel guilty, or at least she didn’t think that she did. Nor was there any denial—not that denial would have made sense. It was just… Gods, she thought she had prepared herself. She knew that she’d live to see the announcement. Ever since Hwinthel made the wish, it had been inevitable.

Ranthia had awaited the death of the final shimagu for almost thirty-six years.

But she hadn’t expected it to come so soon. She had… hoped. She wasn’t even entirely sure what she had hoped for—just… for something to be different. For reality to be less cruel in a single instance!

Unfortunately, she possessed enough self-awareness to know that she bore some fraction of the responsibility. No, she didn’t believe that she had killed more shimagu than anyone else or anything like that, but she had fought them for a long time. And… honestly, there was a time that she herself wanted them destroyed, no matter how she tried to convince herself otherwise. The goal of breaking the shimagu to find peace only came after the [Mind Healer] helped her to let go of her pointless hatred.

She didn’t singlehandedly wipe out the shimagu. But she still killed a significant number of them. Enough people to populate a city, for certain. The only question was how large of a city. The number itself would only torture her, but inside the confines of her tent—far too similar to the one she’d sheltered within back at the Unbreakable Image, in retrospect—she found herself sorely tempted to use the System or [Immortal Armaments] to retrieve it.

Just before dawn Ranthia abandoned her thoughts and emotions. As if nothing was amiss, she emerged from her tent and lent a helping hand as the caravan woke up, broke down their camp, and broke their fast. A few mentioned the announcement, but most seemed to pay it no mind. Even the few that mentioned it seemed to dismiss it as they began their preparations.

The elves were decently efficient, but their mornings were glacial by her standards, and the sun was high in the sky by the time they resumed their journey. Had she been in a better mood, Ranthia might have been annoyed by that. Allegedly, the only reason the caravan was willing to take her on was because of her experience as a Ranger—swift preparations and early starts included. As such, she had expected to struggle to keep up with the elves, especially since most of the caravan out-leveled her. Instead, she was the first person to have her tent packed away by a significant margin!

Of course, the caravan made up for its slow start once it got moving. Ranthia mostly stuck to her ‘usual’ place to the left of the third wagon as she ran alongside it. The pace was a bit aggressive, but they had no space for passengers—if she wanted to accompany them, she needed to keep up. Ahead, three elves led the caravan on foot, serving both as scouts to confirm the road’s condition before the wagons arrived and as an initial deterrence for any monsters along their path. None of the caravan’s five defenders were assigned to the sides or back—the two that rested did so alongside the drivers—but Ranthia supposed they were moving fast enough that sudden attacks from any other direction were somewhat unlikely.

For lunch they stopped briefly to water the beasts and handle any midday duty swaps. While the majority of the elves were busy with that, Ranthia joined the (predominantly younger) group that hurried to pass food around—Ilan bread, pleasantly chilled water, and several strips of dried mango.

At least her lingering mood made it easy to ignore the flavor of the Ilan bread.

And that evening, just after sunset, the caravan once again came to a stop and formed a camp just the same as the first day—wagons on the inside with tents and campfires surrounding them. After Ranthia finished helping with dinner service, she once again retreated to the privacy of her tent, abandoned the false smile she’d kept on her face, and renewed her miserable thoughts until slumber finally came for her.

That night she dreamt that she was back fighting in the war. With the System counting down every time she took another life.

Shortly after they left their first stop on the journey to Ithil behind, the caravan encountered trouble in the form of a caster monster [Hippopotamus], level 849. It wasn’t native to the area, but it was still incredibly territorial and seemed to be quite determined to smash the caravan into pieces.

Until that moment, Ranthia had fully expected to join in the defense of the caravan—a lack of armor wouldn’t stop her from that.

But the five elves that were actually in charge of defense were good. Ranthia was no slouch, of course—gods, there was a decent chance she had more experience than any of the elves, no matter what their levels suggested. But the fivesome knew each other well enough that they didn’t need to shout orders or guidance to one another as they fought. They had enough trust and familiarity to seamlessly work as a cohesive whole.

Ranthia knew what it took to earn those bonds. She had formed them with her fathers, and she had come close to that level with Ranger Team 6. But she had never pulled it off since then, perhaps aside from what she had with Avyna. Maybe, given enough time, she could get there with Anthelleon and Neyvern—assuming they even chose to keep hunting after their son grew enough to be left alone for an evening here and there. But they weren’t there yet.

And Ranthia wasn’t about to throw herself into a fight where she’d just get in the way. She kept herself ready, just in case the situation turned, but it never did. The elven defenders successfully held the creature off until the caravan was clear, then they disengaged and the journey continued.

They even left the beast alive—though if it failed to relocate, someone else would eventually need to purge it.

Ranthia’s birthday passed unnoticed. She had managed to entirely forget about it, until she checked her sheet after [Soups & Stews] finally merged with [Home Cooking] to create [Campfire Cuisine]. Sure, she still had the shimagu’s fate dampening her mood, but turning one hundred and twenty just… didn’t feel very important.

For the first time, she felt as if she could understand why Avyna didn’t care about her own birthdays.

With an eternity to come, what did any single year even matter?

And with that thought rattling around in her skull, Ranthia turned her attention back to the skewers she was grilling. For the past several days whenever they made camp, she took some time to forage, looking for ingredients that felt at least somewhat familiar. She had a craving for a familiar comfort food, but she was still in an elven forest. Also, there wasn’t any bamboo in the area, which forced her to use metal spikes, but they were as close to the Reman-style skewers as she could make. Unfortunately, she wasn’t able to add anything quite like the taste of silphium—she’d never found a comparable herb outside of Remus’ borders.

She considered herself to be a pretty good cook, even without her Skills, but trying to make a familiar food from mostly unfamiliar ingredients was overly ambitious. She nearly spat the first bite back out. The seasonings tasted nothing like the familiar herbs she’d sought, the flavors of the ingredients were too sweet, and the sauce came out too bitter even for her tastes. Yet somehow, despite all its failings, the more she ate, the more the skewer somehow reminded her of the home that she had abandoned.

They weren’t good, but they were exactly what she needed.

[*ding!* You have unlocked the General Skill [A Taste of Remus]!]

[A Taste of Remus]: No matter how far you travel and what you experience, sometimes nothing can offer greater satisfaction than a taste of what you left behind. Increased cooking prowess per level when preparing and cooking meals in the familiar style of the Remus you knew or while using ingredients native to that area. -579 Mana Regen Rate while preparing food with this Skill active.

It wasn’t the grilling Skill that she’d been fishing for, but she didn’t hesitate to accept it.

The farming operation they visited was no idle hobby or small-scale thing, unlike most of the elven farms Ranthia had seen. It was a massive undertaking that required hundreds of Skilled workers. In a matter of hours crops were seeded, grown, harvested, and the remaining plant material was Decayed and added to the fertilizer that was imbued into the soil. And with that, the cycle began anew. The sheer volume that the farm produced demanded heavy traffic in and out of the area, as caravan after caravan entered, offloaded supplies that the farm required, and took on carefully stored produce and grain.

Ranthia hadn’t really appreciated most of the sights she’d seen as they travelled—moving on from her surly mood was oddly difficult, since just forgetting that an entire species had been wiped out felt almost as abominable as the act itself was. But the farm still managed to rouse her. She had seen similar operations in Remus, sure, but the elven farm was far superior in every possible way. The harvests came faster, the efficiency was unparalleled, and their crops were beautiful. Tomatoes larger than any that she had ever seen. Pristine potatoes, unmarred by rot or infestation. Grains so golden that they shined beneath the sun.

It was enough to make her hungry—not that they had time to worry about meals while [Laborers] rushed to prepare the wagons. Every moment they lingered was a delay for the next caravan. The farm was technically named Al-Salanas, but everyone just called it “the farm that never sleeps.” And given how eternally busy it was, the name felt incredibly apt. With every harvest, farmers changed out as the field moved on to the next crop in the rotation.

Proof that even the notoriously idle elves could be incredibly proactive when enough of them were gathered for an important enough task.

Two stops before Ithil, they visited the hanging city, Jyndell. The name had conjured bleak expectations—Remus had been horrifically fond of varyingly creative public executions for those deemed too dangerous, too egregious, or too worthless to be sold into slavery. And so, Ranthia had dreaded the visit to Jyndell, expecting a city littered with corpses dangling from the ropes or chains that bound them until they succumbed.

Thank Xaoc, she was wrong.

From the moment the city came into view, it proved her expectations to be naïve. The epithet was far more literal than what her mind could have ever conjured. Above a massive, flooded crater—a sea that was given the High Elvish word for ‘Perilous’ or ‘Warning that must not be forgotten’ as its name—a city roughly the size of Ariminum hung in the open air. Thick metal support beams anchored deep into the walls of the crater and disappeared into the sea, supporting the solid stone foundation upon which the city was built.

The city itself was laid out like a bowl, highest on the outermost rings with the innermost zone built directly on the foundation. It was far more densely crowded than the City of Arts, though its inhabitants paid the caravan little heed as it made its way to the storehouses to swap out goods.

And once again, as with every other city and town they had visited, Ranthia never saw a single non-elf before they departed.

Jyndell was a large city by Reman standards, but Ranthia wasn’t in Remus. She knew from her first visit that the city could never hope to hold a candle to the caravan’s final destination—well, Ranthia’s final destination; the caravan would move on without her.

Ithil, the jewel of commerce. One of the three largest cities within the Tympestshard Council’s domain.

Even from a great distance, its crystalline towers loomed over the horizon. The city was bright enough that few stars were visible in the sky during their final night before they arrived, and their campsite was illuminated mostly by the glow of the still-distant towers, drowning out even their own fires.

She hadn’t appreciated Ithil during her first visit, but even with her thoughts haunted by the shimagu… it was hard not to be impressed.

Entry into the city was easy enough. A few of the guards, wearing uniforms of practical spring steel armor clad in crystalline plates, gave her some side-eye, but she was with the caravan and was waved through with the rest.

The glittering streets were wide and easy to traverse, even with the caravan. Most of the architecture in the city came in the form of the towers—each different in ways both subtle and pronounced—but there were also a few smaller buildings built in their shadows where there was available space. Absent any better ideas, Ranthia accompanied the caravan until it finally stopped next to a comparatively drab tower made of crystals in autumnal hues.

“Ranthia, ” Ardyn hadn’t spoken to her since she first joined with the caravan—and even then, he just grunted and told her to keep up. He was dressed in the usual white and brown oversized coat he favored, with his arms tucked inside of the sleeves.

“<Did you need a hand with anything before I take off?>” Ranthia made her offer in High Elvish with a polite smile.

“<Mm, no, not as much. This is for you.>” His colorfully painted fingernails—each an iridescent rainbow of slightly different shades—emerged from one of his sleeves, with a silver rectangle delicately clasped between two nails.

The design wasn’t quite like anything she had ever seen. A flat square area was in the center, where a thumbprint that seemed to have been made with actual blood (somehow) permanently adhered to its surface. Surrounding the square were intricate carved designs similar to those on the caravan’s wagons—crops and other fresh foods, attractively gathered into vibrant displays.

“<Thank you.>” Ranthia gave the expected words as she accepted the trinket. She knew better than to try to refuse gifts from elves, and she had done everything that she reasonably could to help out. Well-earned gratitude was always appreciated! Still, she had no idea what the thing was, though she tried to signal her confusion through an expression of wide-eyed curiosity instead of asking.

“” The man’s colorful fingertip traced the High Elvish characters for gratitude in the air, before his hand once again disappeared into its cavernous sleeve. “<If you’re ever after some honest work or have need to travel with another of our caravans, show them that sigil. They’ll know that you have my approval.>”

And the moment he was done speaking, he turned around and walked away, completely ignoring both Ranthia’s gratitude and the farewell that she offered.

With a second unasked for token of esteem from an elf weighing down one of the pouches of her belt, Ranthia explored Ithil somewhat aimlessly. She had a name—Algaras—and a business—Rykellos’ Armory—but she had no idea where either might be found. Ithil was just too damned massive and dense.

At every intersection was a small area with benches and a noticeboard that held varyingly useful information. The most useful bit was an explanation of how meals worked in Ithil—namely, the small stalls set up along the road had free food all day long. The containers and utensils that came with the food were conjured, and an Aura that somehow covered the entire city made any conjured material that was set on the ground decay rapidly.

It was weird, but it was something of a relief to know that she wouldn’t need to find specific sites for meal services.

Frustratingly though, there weren’t any maps or other guides for navigating the city posted.

She needed to ask for directions. In a homogenous city of elves, where she stood out so much that she was already drawing displeased scowls.

“Yeah… What can go wrong?” Ranthia subvocalized her grumbling before she set out.

The first four elves that Ranthia approached snubbed her openly, with one of them calling her a “monster” under his breath as he walked away. After that, she switched to High Elvish, in an effort to prove that she wasn’t an outsider.

And in doing so, she became a spectacle.

“<How adorable! It thinks it’s people.>” A man with an extremely punchable face didn’t even try to keep his voice quiet while he addressed the woman hanging off his arm. His voice was practically oozing contemptuous amusement too, just in case the words themselves weren’t enough.

“<Whoever owns it should keep it on a leash.>” The woman nodded her eager agreement with her partner’s words.

“<You do realize I already proved that I can hear you, right? Insulting my intelligence doesn’t really have the same zing when you prove yourself to be an idiot in the process.>” Ranthia snarked.

“<Ugh, it’s rude.>” Mr. Punchable complained, before he turned away.

“<You were the ones that started treating me like an animal! For Xaoc’s sake, all I did was ask for directions!>” Ranthia spat after them, flashing her smallest finger at their backs.

She really missed Remus sometimes. Using her middle finger still felt far more natural, but in the Tympestshard Council, she had to communicate her displeasure elven-style.

Frustratingly, they weren’t even the first pair to react poorly to her efforts to use High Elvish. The first woman had just stared at her, wide-eyed, until Ranthia gave up and walked away. Sure, none of them had been quite as rude as those two were, but she was rapidly losing her patience with the situation.

Asking two questions shouldn’t be so difficult!

And just because Ranthia really needed more headaches, she was extremely aware that guards were slowly gathering in the vicinity. They were pointedly not looking her way—as if that in and of itself wasn’t incredibly suspicious—but even as she moved on, searching for a less hostile elf, they were there. With another one or two arriving with every minute that passed.

Inanity aside, they were doing a decent job of securing the area. Even when Ranthia moved, they had guards ‘idly’ gathered by every possible escape route, with others seeded through crowds to control them if they needed to. She had enough Legion experience to appreciate the efficiency and thought, even if she hated being treated as if she was some dangerous beast that might attack someone.

Honestly, she didn’t punch the last elf, so she was pretty sure she would keep her temper in check, no matter how much the xenophobic jerks taxed her patience!

The levels of the guards varied dramatically. The highest group—those securing potential escape routes—tended to be just north of the level 1536 class up. Roughly two thirds of the group were cycling elves, putting them within spitting range of her own levels. And the remainder were younger elves, almost all of which at least possessed their third class. Which left three elves too young and inexperienced for that accomplishment—two boys around level 400, and the young woman with the lock of hair sticking out of her helmet at level 317.

Which was why Ranthia wasn’t even slightly surprised when, shortly after she vanished, the youngest guard approached her wearing casual clothing.

“<Hi, hello there. Pretty weather you’re having.>” The girl gave a valiant effort at High Elvish while she pretended to walk past Ranthia.

Ranthia glanced up at the heavily overcast grey skies, trying not to smirk openly.

“<Quite.>” She offered instead with what one of her [Divine Eyes] confirmed was a winsome smile. The other watched the nearest pack of guards, wary of any signs of an ambush. She didn’t expect the guards to attack her, but she had no intention of finding out just how much they hated unescorted outsiders.

“<May I ask the entity that is you what…>” The girl trailed off, frustrated.

“Creation’s fine, if that’s easier.” Ranthia decided to throw the kid a bone. Sure, visually she was an adult—yet another timeless immortal—but her mannerisms and level made her inexperience rather obvious.

“Oh, thank the creators.” The brunette whispered, sweeping her fingers through her curly brown hair as she tried to recompose herself before she offered a too-bright smile Ranthia’s way. “Um, yes, I was just wondering what brought a ‘hoomin’ like yourself way out here.”

“Human.” Ranthia gently corrected the girl’s pronunciation. “And I live in the City of Arts. The Lodge’s owner and the Maestro of Conducting, Elsynthene, recommended I come here to commission a new suit of armor. My old suit got a bit smashed up after my last hunt, you see.”

Okay, Elsynthene hadn’t actually had any useful advice, but name-dropping the Maestro presumably had more weight than Myntheria did.

And given the interesting reactions she was watching on more than a few guards, she found herself sorely tempted to produce the little figurine that showed she had the favor of their beloved Unchanging Council. Eh, it would probably invite more trouble than it was worth.

But hey, while she had the ear of someone that had to listen to her…

“I don’t suppose you could tell me where Rykellos Armorers or a craftsman named Algaras can be found? I’ve been trying to ask for directions without much luck.” Ranthia allowed her smile to turn a bit toothy.

Sometimes to succeed, she just needed to surprise a few people and get a few directions. Mercifully for them both, a more experienced guard took over once Ranthia gained a small measure of trust—the kid’s rambling directions were more than a bit hard to follow.

Seriously, in what world was that tower pink? If not for how painfully perfect elves were physically, she might think the young woman had some issue with her ability to see colors!

Rykellos Armorers had fourteen floors of a tower near Ithil’s center, but Ranthia only planned to visit them if Algaras failed to pan out. His workshop was technically outside of the city, not that Ithil’s outer reaches were anything like the slums and isolated compounds that Remus’ cities were surrounded by. The streets were still made using the same crystalline material, the area was still clean, and the guard that was openly shadowing Ranthia still followed her. The only differences between Ithil and its surroundings were that the towers stopped and at least some of the Auras stopped affecting her.

Algaras’ workshop wasn’t what she was expecting though. It was a long, thin building of a single story—visually more akin to a storage facility than any workshop she had ever seen. A sign hung above the door with a (surprisingly simplistic) rendition of a hammer engraved upon it. The brown door itself housed three more signs and notices hanging from nails pounded into the painted wood: a sign that proclaimed the business to be open, another that proclaimed it to be closed, and what seemed to be a noise complaint that the owner had left to rot.

“Right. Eccentric indeed.” Ranthia acknowledged the contradictory signs and knocked.

There was no answer. Of course there was no answer. Why would anything be easy?

The door wasn’t locked, but a chain did bar it from opening too much.

“Hello? Algaras, are you in?” Ranthia tried projecting her voice into the workshop. If that didn’t work she fully intended to use her [Divine Eyes in the Void] to peek, but she preferred to cling to manners while she could.

That and she’d already seen enough unwanted sights to fill an immortal lifetime.

“Do you have what I would need?” After a moment, a masculine voice returned her call from somewhere within.

“Yes?” Ranthia hesitantly replied, not entirely certain she was interpreting his question correctly.

“Good! Good good good good!” The door seemingly flung itself open with sudden force, followed a moment later by an elf wearing a heavily stained coat that was presumably once white. His ibex-style horns barely stood out amongst the… corona of wild blond hair that stood out from his head in every direction, wildly unkempt and seemingly unbothered by mundane concerns like gravity. And much like her own, his amber eyes were set in pitch-black sclera.

[Artisan – Void] level 3001, [Artisan – Acid] level 2642, [Artisan – Inferno] level 2000.

The elf offered a less-than-sane smile her way, revealing more than a few missing teeth in the process, before his cheery mood suddenly vanished.

“Were you followed?” He asked seriously.

“Yes.” Ranthia chose honesty.

But before she could jerk her thumb at the very obvious guard that was studiously pretending to examine a barren flowerpot, the elf that she hoped was Algaras seized her by the shoulders.

“Splintering shimmerwoods! This means we’re down to Plan C!” The man projected both volume and spittle directly into her face, before he—quite literally—tossed her into his workshop and slammed the door shut.

As Ranthia bled her momentum and landed on her feet, she calmly assessed the situation. She was mostly certain that she had the location that the guardsman provided. Which meant that either Myntheria had dramatically undersold the experience that was Algaras by merely calling him “eccentric,” or that the guards had lied so they could knowingly throw her into some greater problem.

Gods and goddesses, she hoped it was just that the craftsman she sought was delightfully unhinged!