Chapter 263: The Colony’s Leaders

Immediately after Aelric’s cold and utterly bleak statement, a sudden chill swept through the temple like an icy hand slipping beneath a door. It crept beneath collars and along exposed skin, raising goosebumps across their bodies.

Beyond that sensation came the sound of beating wings. They were faint at first, resembling distant clothes flapping in a storm, but grew louder, drawing nearer until even Sylveris, whose senses had not been enhanced by cultivation, could hear the flutter reverberating through the stone corridors.

The young girl tightened her grip around her ivory fangs, the two weapons suddenly seeming like the only lifeline she could cling to.

Her silver eyes clouded with fear, and despite the garment of boldness she tried to don, it was clear she could barely suppress the instinct to drop everything and flee.

She swallowed loudly, the sound particularly jarring and embarrassingly conspicuous in the temple’s stillness but she didn’t care as she asked, "What is that?"

One might have expected Aelric to show courtesy and reassure her like a kindly older brother.

Instead, with a coldness that would have made winter seem hospitable, he replied without even glancing in her direction,

"That, Sylveris... that is the sound of death."

Unfortunately, his answer was no balm for her fear. Rather than soothing her, it fed the panic gathering inside her like a spark dropped into dry tinder.

Sylveris edged closer to her sister, and the shadows around Aureleah’s cloak curled thinly around her, as though she sought solace—or at least the illusion of protection—in their familiar darkness.

Predicaments like this made Sylveris wish she were already an Awakener, or better still, an Etheryean. Yet she remained unawakened and would stay that way until fortune favoured her with a natural awakening at fifteen.

If she failed to awaken then, there would be no Ascension Altar in the Nether Lands to assist her.

The possibility of remaining powerless for the rest of her life was a bleak prospect, made considerably worse by the fact that the Nether Lands seemed determined to remind her how fragile an ordinary human could be.

Since even the other awakened exiles are still struggling to survive, there was no doubt that it would be harder, almost downright impossible, for her to survive within this purgatory as an unawakened.

Meanwhile, the wingbeats became a thunderous rustle, their strokes stirring the air beyond the temple and sweeping through the crimson foliage like a gale through a field of dry reeds.

Dust sifted from the surviving sections of the ceiling, while tiny fragments of mortar pattered onto the flagstones. The lesser Ratchyrs began to retreat, clicking in agitated bursts as they pressed themselves against the ruined walls.

Their movements were no longer the disorganized skittering of scavengers disturbed during a meal. They withdrew with eerie discipline, clearing a path for whatever approached.

Aelric’s expression soured and as though remembering an information he forgot previously, "I should have known," he muttered.

His remark was so unhelpfully detached from the immediate danger that Aureleah turned towards him, her eyes narrowing as she asked. "Known what?"

"I should have known," he repeated, as though she had failed to appreciate a particularly obvious observation.

"Ratchyr colonies resemble wolf packs in one respect: they have leaders who supervise and direct the others. But while a wolf pack generally has one alpha, an average Ratchyr colony has at least three or four leaders. Also, these leaders are usually one or two ranks above the rest of the colony."

For a heartbeat, nobody spoke. Then the implications detonated in their imagination.

"And you only care to tell us this now?" Caelestra demanded. Her voice rang through the chamber, sharp enough to make several lesser Ratchyrs flinch. "Why?"

She looked ready to invoice Aelric for every second of their remaining lives, with interest compounded hourly.

Indignation sharpened her features, as though he had personally insulted her intelligence, endangered her investments, and then had the audacity to offer no compensation.

Unfortunately, before Aelric could even dignify her with an answer, three silhouettes emerged from the darkness.

The first landed upon a fractured pillar, its broad wings unfurling before folding against its sides. It was nearly twice the size of an ordinary Ratchyr, with a barrel-shaped body covered in coarse, charcoal-grey fur.

Dark ridges ran from its neck to the base of its tail, and hooked claws gouged the stone as it settled. Its elongated snout twitched, exposing two curved incisors stained black at their roots.

The second descended behind it, striking the floor with a heavy thump that sent chips of stone skittering across the tiles. Its hide was darker, almost the colour of old ash, and sparse patches of fur revealed thick, leathery skin beneath.

Its ears rotated independently, measuring the chamber through sound, while the thin membranes of its wings stretched between elongated forelimbs like torn sails. A pale scar crossed its snout, splitting the fur above one nostril.

The third did not immediately approach. Rather, like a bat, it clung upside down to the archway, its claws embedded in crumbling masonry.

Compared with the others, it was leaner, but its shoulders bulged with dense muscle, and its incisors curved far beyond its lower jaw.

Furthermore, a dim, murky aura wavered around its body, so subtle that it might have been mistaken for heat rising from sun-baked stone—if the temple had seen sunlight in centuries.

They were certainly Ratchyrs, but no longer creatures that could be dismissed as oversized vermin. Nether gathered densely around them, pressing against the group’s senses like the weight of deep, murky water.

If Aelric was correct, these creatures were not Rank One Netherytes. They were either Rank Two Ratchyrs or, though the possibility seemed infinitesimal, Rank Three Netherytes.

The repulsive aura they radiated alone told the group everything necessary; so doubting Aelric would have been an exercise in spectacularly poor judgement.

The newcomers surveyed the intruders like sovereigns inspecting trespassers on their land. Their tiny eyes were poorly suited to the scarlet gloom, though they appeared somewhat more receptive to visual stimuli than the lesser members of their colony.

Even so, they relied on clicks and calls to map their surroundings, the returning echoes locating each human with unsettling precision.

One leader lowered its head towards Regaleon. In the next instant, golden eyes met crimson ones.

Every muscle in Regaleon’s body coiled. An overwhelming urge to flee surged through him, primitive and absolute, urging him to abandon dignity, comrades, and whatever remained of his good sense.

He forced the terror down through sheer willpower, held his ground, and stared back at the Ratchyr. His pulse hammered against his ribs, but he refused to let his gaze waver. Leadership and knighthood, he was discovering, often meant standing still while every instinct screamed at him to run.

The scarred leader turned its snout towards Vaelorin, whose fiery staff was already wreathed in flames. The failed Pyromancer had evidently abandoned his earlier intention of avoiding further provocation.

Facing three creatures of such rank left little room for peaceful alternatives; there was a predator’s gulf between caution and surrender, and Vaelorin had no intention of offering his throat.

Still, the flames around his staff flickered as he tightened his grip, betraying a tension he would never have admitted aloud.

The third leader listened to the group as a whole, its ears rotating in different directions as though weighing which of them would make the easiest meal by echolocation alone.

For a brief moment, neither side moved, and they simply remained, observing one another like two enemy commanders measuring the battlefield before committing their forces...