Chapter 59: Encounters in Darmkael

There was one unexpected positive from the unusual start to the loop: Houdon was impressed by Suria and so rushed through all of the paperwork, getting her set up for the next term. She doubted that she could replicate these exact circumstances in future loops, and it would become tedious to do so, but she was glad to skip most of the necessary tasks. All she needed to do now was choose her classes and confirm her room with Xuhriha.

Well, and deal with the other loopers who had been waiting for her.

One thing she had missed in all her other plans was meeting with Jeilin, and she had to hope that he wouldn't leave so quickly, or might even have reconsidered. But as she headed out to Darmkael, she was first intercepted by Wynchard.

"I know you have your own business," he told her, "but there's something that might be relevant to you. We're not going to be relaxing this time, and it might change things."

"Who is 'we'?" Suria asked, without slowing her walk.

"Everyone, most likely, but I specifically wanted to let you know about myself and the Endelythans. We're going to be investigating in Darmkael and might stir up some criminal elements. Hopefully they'd never come back to campus, but we can't be sure."

That explained why he was still following her as she headed out of campus. As they cut through the streets, Suria considered what he was saying and decided that she couldn't afford to ignore their plans. Even if they were irrelevant to her, she needed a better understanding of so much around her.

"Alright," Suria said, "tell me what you have in mind."

"Because the cycle has been extended, we began to notice new patterns." As they walked, Wynchard cast some sort of privacy spell that shadowed their movements. "Local criminal organizations beginning to move larger shipments. Dark forces entering the city. We didn't want to poke the nest last time, but now that we know what's coming, we can investigate events before they happen."

"What does this have to do with the Endelythan faction? I thought they didn't cooperate."

"They've spent most of their time working with a group called the Blank Hand. Have you heard of them?"

"Not at all."

"Well, they're the largest criminal organization in Darmkael. I trust you can look up more on your own." Wynchard's eyes flicked around them as if he expected the gang to manifest right there. "In the previous loop, I noticed that for the first time we had Glyphbreaker agents appearing in the city. They may even have murdered a local mage, though I'll need to go back on the date of the murder this loop to confirm."

"I see." Suria frowned as she considered. "You keep telling me two unrelated things without connecting them. How are they related?"

"I'm convinced that the Blank Hand is bringing in equipment for the Glyphbreakers. It looked like some serious weapons - I mean anti-magic mage-killing devices. So far that's just a hunch, but this loop we're going to investigate and find out if they're linked."

"That makes sense. Are you telling me all this because you want my help?"

"Just a warning for now, but maybe in the future we'll need your abilities." Wynchard sighed and shoved his hands in his pockets. "Getting involved with the Blank Hand has led to plenty of injuries, and I'd like to recover from those instead of sacrificing a cycle."

"I'll heal anyone I can, but it's worth a favor."

"Completely fair. And I have one more warning for you: the necromancer might get stirred up again by all this. They were surprisingly quiet in the previous loop, possibly because they realized that something had shifted. But in the past, we detected them because they were doing something with bodies the Blank Hand killed. Don't ask me what, as I couldn't get close enough."

"Thank you for the warning, then." Suria stopped and turned to Wynchard. "I appreciate that you have your own goals, but am I going to have a problem with you or Adwyrma trying to force your way into Convocation Hall again?"

Wynchard looked away as if guilty. "No one wants a repeat of that loop. There could be secrets I need in Convocation Hall, but I promise you, I'll speak to you first. When I argued with Adwyrma, she said she'd contact you. So just be ready."

That was yet another warning for her to file away. Suria thanked him again and then they went their separate ways into the city. It seemed like Wynchard was doubling back to the leyline docks, which made sense since they had seemed like an area with a lot of crime.

As she walked, Suria realized that she wasn't nearly so anxious moving through Darmkael anymore. Truthfully, she still didn't know it as intimately as she should, since she had spent so many of her loops staying on campus, or even inside her room. But events had forced her into the city often enough that she didn't feel completely disoriented anymore and she'd gained a sense for the different districts.

It helped that she was no longer as defenseless as she had been when she first arrived. Yes, criminal organizations had mages too, and if the Blank Hand was really so important, they probably had strong ones. But between her shields and combat spells, she no longer needed to be afraid of random men in dark alleys. If she could master her soul talisman, she couldn't even be disarmed.

Or, thinking about it a different way, she'd already faced much worse from the thrones.

Soon enough she made it to the apartments where Dsjaho-an had once begun the loops. It hadn't been so long, despite the number of events that had been packed into the time so far, yet she discovered that Jeilin was waiting impatiently. There was no body.

"Sorry, there were complications," Suria said. "Do we need to set up a system to meet?"

"I could leave the key somewhere hidden," Jeilin suggested, "if it won't be long until you come get it. But for now it doesn't matter. My ferry doesn't leave for a few hours and I haven't found a better one yet."

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on NovelPhoenix.

"Then you're still convinced that you have to leave."

"Even more so, now that the cycle has been extended." Jeilin sighed and gave her a weary smile. "There's a lot to learn there. Darkmoon may be more powerful, but the National Glyphic Institute is the single largest university dedicated to magic in the world. There are so many students, it's mad, you really should see it."

"You are not selling me on this," Suria said, drawing a chuckle. "I don't know how to ask... are things in Junn as politically volatile as they are here?"

"I'll have a better answer for you after more loops down there, but if anything, it's worse. There are factions who want to keep the revolution going, purging their enemies, and there are also reactionary factions who want to put the aristocracy back in power. Have you met any of them? We have a few exiles here, and they'd retake control if they could."

"I think I met some." Suria thought back to the angry arguments in Professor Rhamsolk's class, and the professor himself had been taking defiant stances on the same issue.

"Anything else? I should get going."

"I guess I have one more question... this necromancer Wynchard keeps talking about... does anyone else ever hear about them?"

Jeilin laughed sharply, the way he did when he was taken off guard. "You're thinking hes imagining things? No, no, I've seen evidence. Several times when a looper died, someone used necromantic spells to take their remains."

"To revive them?"

"Possibly, or to try to derive information. The oldest necromantic art is said to be speaking to the dead, after all. There was also one time that Dsjaho-an and I were buying supplies and we ran into an animated corpse, one that had never existed in a previous cycle. But that's all I know."

"Thanks, Jeilin." Suria realized that she was just trying to think of topics to keep him, so she smiled sadly and lowered her head. "I'll see you next time."

"Right, next time." Then he was off, and in hours he'd be riding along a leyline to the other side of the world.

Once on her own, Suria picked up her supplies and money from the apartment and headed back into the city. It was good to have confirmation that Wynchard wasn't paranoid about the necromancer, even if it meant one more thing she needed to be worried about. Hopefully none of these complications would get in the way of everything she was trying on campus.

Next she needed to head down to the mercantile district to pick up silphium, plus she wanted to buy the runebook that had worked out so well for her before. Perhaps in this loop she could learn how to use it properly. If she could manage to get her hands on a thaumeter, she could find out just how much difference all the different methods made.

"Hello, stranger." Xuhriha appeared beside her, sashaying in her pink dress, but she looked a little more muted than usual. "You were right about the timing, by the way. Just a little after you hunched over in pain, the loop reset."

"Thanks for checking," Suria said. "I'm going to buy more silphium now, because the mixture obviously needs to be more concentrated. If I can enroll in Alchemy classes this loop, I should be able to make lethal concentrations without too much trouble. I can make one for you too, if you want."

"I appreciate that." Xuhriha kept her hands behind her back, staring at the sky instead of where they were walking. "So... are we still rooming together this time?"

"That's what we agreed, wasn't it?"

"I know that's what we said, but it seemed like you were doing a lot of things with people outside the loop this time."

"Ah." Suria slowed down and caught the other woman's arm in order to press her hand. "Last loop was wonderful, and I'm sure this one won't be the last time we room together. We may need to experiment, but-"

"Okay!" Xuhriha beamed as if this simple reassurance had completely wiped the concern from her mind. She gripped Suria's arm back and used it to tug her forward again. "So what are you up to with the others? I saw you running around with Maut-mai and Kiznua."

"I just want to see what happens if they're set on a different path. It seems like Maut-mai is most likely to go to the Water Society if nothing interferes, and I don't think that's good for her."

"Yup, she turns into a real bitch!"

"Kiznua was reasonably skilled in our healing classes last loop; she just falls apart under pressure. I think part of the problem is that, early in the cycle, she tries to clear the weevils and fails. This time she didn't even face them, so maybe she'll be more confident."

"Got it." Xuhriha tapped her cheek a few times as she walked. "Well, it can't hurt to try."

Their conversation had taken them to the mercantile district, and it wouldn't be long until they reached Bub's Bobs. Unlike all previous loops, there was suddenly a rumbling and shouts from around the street. Just ahead, in front of the crooked old shop, Suria saw a growing cloud of smoke. She would have been puzzled if she hadn't remembered the disrupted flagstones and what Bub had said on previous cycles.

Because she was looking carefully, she spotted someone sprinting out with mana cloaked around them, making their body blur into the environment. They seemed to be carrying a spatial box of some sort... no, there was no time for that, she needed to stop them.

Suria tried casting a force spell first, but to her surprise it seemed to melt away when it reached the target. She knew there was such a thing as anti-magic fields or magic resistance from some textbooks; she just hadn't encountered them in real life yet. That complicated things, and if she had been on her own, the thief likely would have disappeared into the crowd.

Xuhriha cast just after she did, producing a wall of blue fire in the path of the thief. They nearly stumbled into it and pivoted with surprising agility, kicking off the ground and darting toward a nearby alley.

Lowering her hand, Suria cast a shield at shin level and the thief didn't notice until too late, tripping over it and tumbling. The shroud of mana was disrupted, though it only revealed a cloak that hid their features, and the box bounced across the street.

They pursued, both casting another spell, and that was all the time they had. Xuhriha used her last spell to try to wrap the thief in ropes of mana, but they twisted out of them again, while Suria instead targeted the box with a gripping force spell. The thief realized that it was lost and abandoned it in an instant - once they were into the crowds with their mana shroud activated, there was no chance of catching them.

"Well!" Xuhriha put her hands on her hips. "Guess there are a few new things I need to look up."

"Let's go see what they stole." Suria moved forward while lifting the box to eye level. It had been damaged in the fall, but not enough to break it open. Now that it wasn't shrouded, she could see that it was a heavy crate with some sort of magical seal across it.

"I'd love to steal this," Xuhriha said, "but I assume we're taking it back to Zebub?"

"Yes."

"Not even a little peek?"

"No."

They headed back to the store, which had gained a crowd of onlookers due to the confusion. Bub himself was outside, fretting over all the damage done to the flagstones outside his shop. When he saw them, however, he beamed in relief and ushered them in.

"I thought my goods were gone," he said, "only for two young heroes to appear! I can't thank you enough."

"Of course," Suria said, placing the box onto his counter. "But what is it?"

"Oh, that's no secret." Bub pulled out a knife covered in glyphs and ran it along the side, undoing a seal. When he pulled off the top of the crate, he revealed that it was filled with carefully nested blue-white spheres - more than it should have been able to carry thanks to the spatial magic. "This is meteoric steel. It's used in all kinds of magic, from constructions to alchemy. Cost a heavy bit of oss, so I'm grateful you recovered it."

"Who would want to steal that?" Xuhriha asked.

"Can't say for sure, but they must have known about the shipment, because they targeted the steel." Bub replaced the lid and smiled at them. "I'm afraid I can't offer you two ladies very much, but if you ever want to buy anything at Bub's Bobs, I promise I'll give you a discount."

"Well," Suria said, "as it happens we're looking for a few things..."