Chapter Eleven: The Architect's Gambit

  “The Ritual?” The moment Mo Fei's fingers closed around the glaive, He realized the meaning of this. He had known the cost; previously, there had been countless times when he faced terror and wounds. His eyes alternated between his wound and then the Glaive. The pain was gone, but the wound wasn't.

  “I understand it.” Mo Fei said he got the meaning of the blood loss.

  The well was empty because it awaited the architect's first medium: intent made manifest. This should be filled with blood. It wasn't a sacrifice, a ritual, or perhaps it was a contract.

  Mo Fei did not hesitate. He turned the double-edged glaive in his hand… A tool for cutting both ways, for division and precision, and it placed its cruel, sharp point against the palm of his left hand.

  He looked once more at the empty well. It was not deep, but the hunger was clear. Ashe moved towards the well, a basin barely half a meter deep, and he stood there.

  “Yes… A contract,” he whispered, his voice the only sound in the humming, schematic void. “My blood is an efficient material for the well.” He figured it out, this wasn't the first time. He had done this before to escape World Two. Now the history repeated.

  He drove the glaive's point through his palm. And closed his eyes, inhaling a deep breath. Mo Fei stabbed his palm with the Glaive. His eyes trembled from the pain. In the past, it was an instant death, but now he had to face it for longer. He started feeling all the pain.

  The pain was sharp and profound. A deep grunt escaped Mo Fei’s mouth once again. He had to endure the pain just like he did in the “Ji Yu” Phenomenon. Crimson blood flows up against the ground from his side and now his palm. He did not cry out for help; it was his own choice. Why would he step back now? This was his chosen pain.

  Then he turned his hand over the well.

  The first drop fell.

  SPLASH

  Where his blood met the surface, it formed a temporary wave that faded as more blood fell, each drop adding a stroke to a fading, ephemeral design. The well fills more slowly for its depth.

  Mo Fei squeezed his fist, letting it flow more. A stream of crimson arced down. The ache in his side flared in sympathy, a second tributary feeding the same river of sacrifice. Mo Fei grunted, clenching his jaw tightly but it wasn't enough. Dizziness washed over him from the blood loss. Pain was temporary; it'd not stop him if it was just pain. His face now a mirror of exhaustion, well, taking more time than it should.

  This was different. Before, using a sliver of an Authority not his own had cost memories but also the pieces of who he was. This pain, this blood... It was a price he could understand. A material trade. The first rule of the Architect: “Everything has a measurable cost.”

  Outside the gate, his companion saw only part of it. They saw him stab his own hand. They saw his blood fall into the darkness of the well. They saw him stagger.

  Elara covered her mouth as she couldn't watch it. Grig took a step forward to stop Mo Fei, but Han held him back with a snake-like grip, his face pale with an understanding deeper than fear; he knew it was better not to interfere in a ritual of authorities. “Do not break and enter the circle forcefully,” Han breathed a hitching inhale. And pointed at the ground where a line had formed a barrier, “We can't enter and if we try that, I fear it'd not go well.” His face showed a warning. Grig stepped back hesitantly. He couldn't see his comrade almost falling. The same person he once didn't trust was now closer than the slaves that walked beside him.

  The last drop fell. The well was now a shallow pool of blood ripple. It did not look like blood anymore. It looked like a polished dark water, the hue of blood shifted to it.

  The glaive clattered from Mo Fei's treacherous fingers before it hit the floor. Mo Fei’s eyes were dizzy, his body trembling slightly from the blood loss, almost in a state of death.

  From the center of the well, a silver thread of pure light emerged and started floating in the blood. The silk was covered in sticky blood. Mo Fei’s blurry vision stared down as he moved his hand toward it.

  When his finger touched the ribbon, the navigator ribbon snapped, its thread tore apart and fell down. The moment it snapped, Mo Fei’s heart stopped beating, but when the ribbon bound to his wrist, his body stopped at mid from falling.

  The character 肆 (4) appeared, but now there were no other numbers. In their place, a new symbol seared itself into the silk, glowing with the same moonlight silver as the ritual's light. It was not a number anymore. It was a word. A title. The first sigil of his path:

  ‘壹睹’ (The First Witnesser / The Apprentice's Eye)

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  “The… Witnesser?” Mo Fei’s thoughts stopped as his eyes finally closed up; he couldn't keep standing anymore. A heavy risk had paid off. Afterall “Mo Fei” was a ‘Human’ that stepped into the path of divinity.

  The blood well started to burn. Evaporated it. It had been dry for a few decades.

  ‘The ritual has ended.’

  With a groaning steam, the lines disappeared, and as it did, three of them rushed inside the chamber, their faces etched with fear and worry. Grig started shaking Mo Fei’s face, hoping to wake him up. Han’s eyes locked in Mo Fei’s palm, and his side, the blood had stopped or could have… Ended? Elara’s trembling hands hold Mo Fei’s. She checked the veins; he was alive but unconscious. The ritual had extremely exhausted him.

  “He's lost too much blood, we are in a temple, we need to move?” Elara cried out in urgency of the situation, but where to go?

  “Trasia… is not further from here, but if we go this path, we will reach the palace of ‘Dream Weaver’ and in this situation, if we go there…” Grig paused in mid-sentence, but they understood what he meant. He was right, yet they had to move.

  Jian Yue, the observer, stood over the roof of a house in ‘Trasia’, his expression filled with apprehension of the possibilities.

  “The execution of the elders is stopped. And once the Overseer finds out this… They have to move.” He felt that one of the chosen ones was in this world, as his pages showed it through messages.

  He mumbled. “He had chosen the ‘Architect’ Authority?” It was a shocking thing to him, though he waited. He didn't want to interfere right now when he went through the execution chamber to stop the execution of the elders.

  “The elders are safe, but the Overseer will go after me or the chosen one,” he huffed a low, soft breath.

  “I told them this would happen. How am I supposed to find the chosen ones, but I think I have to damn well know that if I don't, the Overseer will kill them.” His voice came out as a harsh truth.

  “Damm it! Apparently I neglected to bring the necessary items for the ritual from the previous world…The rules of ascension are intricate, as returning to the previous world is impossible without further progression… Tch.” His hand reached out for the hilt of his blade, and he waited with a flicker of hope in his eyes that this year at least someone would make it out alive.

  “I can't intervene directly yet… Not without drawing Dream Weaver's full gaze, they have to reach the safehouse first.” He raised his hand, and the paper dissolved in space.

  Back to them, a paper flapped in the air and fell on them. Han’s hand grabbed it, a message written there.

  “The Dreamer knows when you wake. Flee. To the south, once you reach the palace, move to the left near a house whose shape is rectangular; outside is a light blue flower that blooms, eight of them. Reach there.”

  Han recited those words, each of them carefully, and he understood that someone was helping them, but he couldn't understand why.

  Han folded the note, his face grim. "We gotta move. Now. Grig, carry him. Elara, watch the rear. The path is toward the south exit. We have to find the house with eight light blue flowers."

  As Grig lifted Mo Fei’s unconscious form with surprising gentleness, a low, melodic chime echoed in the temple, a sound like distant, beautiful bells. The golden light at the entrance to the chamber dimmed, as if someone had entered through that, then it curdled, thickening like honey going bad. And then a scent, a sweet smell fills the air around them reaching their nose.

  Han’s blood ran cold from the clarity of the situation. He knew that scent in still air, the smell of lavender and nectar of the most fragrant flower, a sign of nobility as a ‘Slave’, he knew better, a normal guard couldn't afford. It was the perfume of the Dream-Weaver’s honorable court.

  "Someone is searching us, and it is a Noble, perhaps a ‘Royal Guard’," Han whispered. “Run.”

  The moment Han said ‘Run,’ two of them got ready. Grig, carrying Mo Fei on his back, held him tight, his eyes lay on the ‘Glaive’, his hand quickly moved to lift it, but came back quicker from the burn.

  “Argh!! It's hot!” He roared quickly, putting his hand on his mouth to muffle it. Elara took off her muffler and wrapped it around the Glaive. It was still burning hot but bearable. And she held Glaive and gave Grig a look to start running.

  The air thickened in tension as the fragrance of perfume came closer.

  Grig heaved Mo Fei’s unconscious form over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry, the young man's blood soaking into Grig’s tunic. “South!” Grig barked, and they broke into a sprint, abandoning the Forsaken Chamber of the Gods.

  The temple was no longer a place of contemplation. It had begun to show the signs that a force unknown to them was here to hunt them down.

  Elara, at the rear, glanced back. The golden light from the entrance started to form again. The person had entered; whoever it was, they were indeed walking patiently, perhaps not taking the risk of throwing off their elegance.

  condensed, tall, graceful, and utterly wrong. It didn't run, it just walked.

  “Run faster!” she cried out in urgency.

  Han led, his eyes scanning the branching passages. The temple was a wheel; they walked along trying to find an exit. The note said south. In a place without sun, finding direction was also a gamble.

  They burst from a secondary archway, and there was the exit. A vicious wind, sharp with ice, slapped their faces. Below and ahead lay the city… not a town of slaves, but the true, alive capital. The smell of woodsmoke rose from a thousand chimneys, now clearer than before.

  The exit opened in the palace... Their destination and their doom.

  Between them lay a vast, terraced descent: the Oracle's Stair, a grand, ceremonial staircase of a hundred flights, now largely unused and choked with frozen weeds. It was the most direct path…a killing field.

  “We can't go down that,” Han gasped, pointing to the stairs. “We'll get seen.”

  “The note said the house is near the palace,” Grig said, shifting Mo Fei's weight. “We have to enter the palace to escape.”

  “Should we… Split up?” Elara stated a desperate suggestion.

  “No,” Han said, his mind working like a prey that was trying to find a way to escape. “We will get caught one by one or worse get beaten to the death, which will be easier when we are split. Follow me.”

  He didn't take the stairs. There he found a street, ice running down to a lower service road. It was suicide to jump there if they slipped. It was also perfect from the main approaches because this was isolated with no yapping coming out of any guards.

  "Down there," Han ordered.

  Elara paled as she had thought what if she fell, but for the love of the game, yes, she had to. Grig grimaced but nodded. Grig went first, descending cautiously, jumping, using his immense strength to lower himself and his precious cargo with agonizing slowness. Chunks of ice broke and made a clattering noise. He almost slipped, his breath hitched, but his soul came back when he didn't fall.

  Elara followed Grig, her fingers numb. Han came last, Grig supporting them if they slipped.

  “It has our scent!” Han hissed. “Move!” Han’s eyes were looking around. He looked at the sun and then finally left as he pointed towards it to move there.

  They ran through a ‘Trasia’ never meant for ‘slaves’. They saw a clean surface, covered market stalls shuttered against the cold. They were fugitives who had dared to defy the ‘Overseer’. Grig was carrying the bloody, unconscious young man as they walked.

  They ducked into doorways as patrols passed. The city was on a subtle alert; the guards' eyes were sharp, looking for any kind of disturbance.

  They then entered, outside the palace, looking for the house. Just at that moment, at the main entrance of the plaza, a squad of four city guards stumbled upon them. Their eyes froze and had a flabbergasted look, seeing the bloody, ragged group of slaves. One was carried like a corpse, and the other three were covered in dust.

  “FUGITIVES!?” All four of those guards had the same confused look with the same thought.

  For a heartbeat, there was an awkward silence, broken only by the wind everyone stared at each other.

  Then

  The lead guard’s hand went to his sword hilt. His eyes narrowed, moving from Grig's massive, threatening form to Han's wary stance, to Elara's terrified face, and finally to the unconscious Mo Fei.

  “You there!” the guard boomed, his voice echoed in the silence between the walls. "State your business! This is a restricted alley!" They were looking right at Grig, at Mo Fei's blood-soaked clothes, at the obvious, desperate wrongness of them.

  The chase was over in a way; they had lost the game of tag. They had been seen. The fragile sanctuary of the safehouse was probably just paces away, and utterly out of reach.

  The honeyed scent on the wind above them deepened, curling with satisfaction. The mundane trap had closed. The dream-trap was about to spring.