Seeking Direction

Agreements made still didn’t solve things for the current problem that we faced. An unknown demon existed out there tormenting the townspeople. And I tried to think as little I could for now about the fact that this was beyond us.

But I had some matters to settle first. I grabbed my pack and pulled out the potion kit. And with the tools in hand I pulled up the recipe menu. ‘Just think about what I want. A potion to remove a demon’s curse.’ I figured specifics were important, in a world of magic I guess there was more than one type and flavor curse.

And nearly immediately, the recipe appeared to me like they said it would. Unfortunately, there were four ingredients, none of which I had ever heard of. Which I expected, but it was proof that I could undo it. It just might be a very long term quest of mine. But I could still check. “Eri, wanted to ask you something.”

“Yes?”

“Ever heard of Elega Root, T’Yurin Pedals, Great Benor Heart or Talisilum?”

“Never, what are they?”

“The ingredients to make a potion that would reverse the curse.”

“You can do that?!”

“Not right now. I can check with the Markets, but I’m guessing these are very exotic materials. It’s not a death sentence, but it may be a while before we can cure them. You’ll have to promise me that if anything happens to me, you find the other heroes and see that they can finish this.”

She knocked me on the head looking cross. “We’re doing it together, remember. You don’t die.”

It wasn’t so hard as it hurt, but it did knock me back a touch. “I’m not planning on it, just being realistic. You know, if something happens.”

“You’re asking the impossible.”

“Eri…”

“If you’re dead, that means I’m already dead.”

I sighed. “I guess I can’t argue with that logic.” She really was stubborn about things. But that wasn’t a bad thing. “Very well, moving on to the next subject. If we’re going to be dealing with a demon, I need better potions for us.” I went through the recipes again trying to see if I could imagine something that was a step or two above what I had.

The queries I made populated my recipe list with far more items. They were at least well organized and I could change the sorting. I had a feeling that the list would be getting unreasonably long in time. Some of the materials I did have, but others were unknown to me. Once more I’d need to check with the Markets or a local business. Normally I wouldn’t consider buying materials, but if we went after this demon I wasn’t going to be able to wait.

But even with my preparation out of the way, we still didn’t have a clue where to find this demon. The piece of bark only confirmed their existence. They could be inside the town or far beyond. I didn’t know how they operated or the power they possessed. “Eri, is there someone that can help us track the demon down?”

“We can go see the Scryer. They can locate things if you have something directly connected with it.”

“Couldn’t we have found Miss Welinna with the Scryer then?”

“If we had a piece of her or something that was intimately tied to her. My understanding is if the connection is too weak, they can’t find anything or it’ll be less accurate.”

“Then wouldn’t that mean we wouldn’t be able to get much for the demon. This is someone they cursed.”

“We’d at least get a direction. Which would be more than we have right now.” That certainly would be an aid. We were running around blind at the moment. I guess it wouldn’t be as easy as I hoped. Not sure I could handle finding the demon immediately. So this probably worked out in our favor.

With things settled, we departed the room finally. I didn’t realize how much time had passed for us. It was well into mid morning. We were distracted. But a path was set even if it had darkness to follow. It still scared me what we were attempting to do. I think the only thing keeping my feet walking was the commitment of Eri’Sol. If she wasn’t here I would have run away from all of this. It was out of my depth, yet maybe we could achieve something.

The first visit would be to the Scryer that Eri’Sol mentioned. Knowing the direction meant we’d be able to make some plans. Though it reminded me I needed a map of the area at minimum if we weren’t getting much more than a finger pointing in the way to go.

Not surprisingly, the Scryer was located a short distance from the Markets, the clock tower rising above the building in the back. It just had a simple sign with some tiny windows, but otherwise didn’t look very remarkable from the others. The interior though looked like pure chaos. Countless collected items lay around on shelves and the floor. The walls weren’t even visible with how thick they were with items or plants hanging. It looked almost like a jungle of objects. Were they a hoarder?

“Excuse me?” I looked around to see if they were around. The door wasn’t locked, but I couldn’t see anyone else. In fact, there wasn’t even a table. Did we need to go further back?

“Eh? Someone there?” I heard a voice, but I couldn’t place it. Glancing at Eri’Sol, she just shrugged as uncertain as me.

“Yes, where are you? We were wanting to use your services.”

I still tried to find another room, but it was hard navigating everything. There was a pile or a collapsed rockslide of crates, stones and plants. “Yes, yes! Over here! If you could spot me a hand!” A hand? What the hell happened? But then I finally found where the voice was coming from.

It was beneath the rockslide! “Eri, give me a hand!” We frantically cast things aside to dig out whoever got trapped underneath. I didn’t know how they managed to become trapped under their own things, but it had to be crushing.

Once free we were all sweating a little and before us was a mousey tall man that looked about my age with short wild green hair that brightly sparkled into blue tips. There was a little bit of a deathly look in his eyes like he hadn’t slept in ages, but the glowing magic hair provided quite the contrast.

He dusted himself off from his long robes that were torn up a little. “Thank you kindly. Thought I might just have died that time. Ma always says I’m going to be the death of myself, didn’t know she was being so serious.” He laughed sheepishly while glancing around at the room. They clapped twice as suddenly a table appeared from nothing.

I hadn’t really seen much in the way of actual magic yet from the world. Making a table just pop into existence as mundane as it was, felt truly magical. “Did I hear correctly that you needed my help?” I gave him an affirming nod. “Great! Always happy to find lost things for people. Take a seat.”

The Scryer pointed at the floor and I thought he expected us to sit there, but like with the table two wood high back chairs rose out of nothing. We took up the chairs and I handed over the piece of bark. It was the only thing we had to tie to the demon.

“This has a strange energy to it. There’s a chaos woven through it.”

“Will it be enough for you?”

“Of course! I may not get you exactly the location, but I can narrow it down for you.” After that he went silent bringing up his hands over the bark. A purple circular array expanded across the table. Numerous symbols and even what looked like scenes fit inside different circles of the array. It had a complex presentation, but was the only sign that he worked.

After a long silence, he snapped his eyes sharply to me. That deathly fatigue on him looked to have turned him nearly a rotting corpse. “What you seek is seeped in hatred and anger, centuries of resentment magnified to overflow. It’s the very darkness.”

I didn’t need more ominous messages to make me scared. “I expected as much. But did you find it?”

“Yes, though it is strange. The direction doesn’t make a lot of sense. I’m feeling that it is coming from the town, from beneath it.”