Kalon Bloodborn's POV
The air within my private quarters was heavy. My room, moments ago a place of rest, was now a mess. Scraps of parchment covered every surface, weighed down by books. Outside, the twilight bled through the narrow window, casting long shadows across the stone floor.
I stood by the desk, my hands resting on the edge of a map of the great ruins, but my focus was entirely on Damon. He was pacing the length of the room, his boots striking the floor with an agitated thud. He looked like a man caught in a snare. Something he had walked into willingly but was now desperate to escape.
"No. I don't have access to the storage room," Damon said for the third time, his voice rising in pure frustration. He stopped mid-stride, turning to face me with his forearms crossed tightly. "Kalon, listen to yourself. We are deliberating over how to gain access to a storage room, just so we can take away the storage ring of a fallen raider."
My plan seemed simple. Soon, Damon and I would be made to made to go to the Great Ruins. A land once home to the now fallen Asura race. Now it was filled with demons and wraiths. Two zones divided it. The inner and outer ring. The latter being for young Celestials to train and the former only access by strong celestials that had been given the position of raider.
One specific raider had fallen to a fully transformed demon, a wraith. That raider was Dregol, an Aeolian, and he was the one I had chosen to get a storage ring from.
These rings are treasured items that come from the Terra Castle. It is said that that are made with the guardian's special ability over chaos magic and houses great space within it and the capacity to house bodies, something mere pouches could not do. Each ring was given to a high ranked celestial and can only be accessed with their mana signature.
To make use of Dregol's ring, I need his mana signature. And to mimic it I needed to study the source of his mana, his heart.
"Do you not understand? Raiders get one in their entire life. To even suggest that I, a scholar with a future, should conspire to steal one from a fallen raider's belongings..."
I leaned back against the desk, my expression remaining cold. "But you know the guards assigned there, Damon. You've worked alongside them. You are called a genius. They all respect you. I just need you to distract them for a few minutes while I do what l must. I only seek to ensure the survival of our kind."
Damon let out a sharp, cynical laugh, running a frantic hand through his wavy hair. "Our survival? Or your obsession? This plan is simple for you because you've already abandoned your conscience! You want me to obtain the storage ring of a raider. So he died before help could arrive. But he doesn't deserves to be stolen from, he deserves to be honored."
Like many other fallen celestials, Dregol was kept in the bier rooms. His body prepared to be sent back to the floating mountains of Aeolia.
We celestials believe the body must wither away to join the ambient mana. It is our final peace. Every body taken out of the bier room was to undergo that sacred ritual. I had not forgotten.
"I have forgotten nothing," I replied, my voice dropping to a low tone. "The bier rooms are for the dead. I am focused on the living. Don't you want to know why? Don't you want to know how an entire race like the Asuras could be wiped out, leaving only these nightmares behind?"
Damon's pacing became more erratic. "Of course I want to know! But not like this. Kalon, I've seen how much you've changed. Every time I visit this room, you look like a different person. You're becoming... different and now you're asking me to help you desecrate a sacred ritual. To cut into him, to take a portion of his heart... it's immoral. It's distasteful. It's wrong!"
"Is it?" I countered, stepping toward him until we were barely a foot apart. "How do you think our ancestors mastered healing magic, Damon? Do you think they just looked at scrolls and prayed? No. They practiced on each other. They pushed the limits of the flesh to see where it broke and how it mended. That knowledge, the very magic you use to heal your peers, was it not built on the scornful acts of the past? Why should finding the truth about spirit energy be any different? Why is Dregol's heart more sacred than the lives of the raiders who will fall tomorrow?"
Lord Cian has introduced you to the high-ranking elders. You are well known now.
"Because he is a comrade!" Damon shouted, his voice cracking. "You're talking about sacrificing your sanity for something we're unsure of! What if you get caught? You've finally gained the Patriarch's favor. You have everything to lose, and yet you're willing to throw it all away for a piece of flesh?"
I stared into his eyes, watching the conflict play out in his gaze. He was rebuking me, but he was also rebuking himself for even listening. He saw the path I was willing to walk. One where moral boundaries were mere constructs to be adjusted for convenience, and he was terrified that I was dragging him down with me.
"If I may, master," Proteus interjected from the corner.
My chronicler was huddled on a small stool, his body shaking. Bane, my Soul Reaper, had grown immensely over the years, now seven-foot-long. He was currently coiled around Proteus, using the drunt's small frame as a perch. The beast's head drifted past Proteus's ear, his tongue flickering out to taste the air.
Proteus looked like he was about to faint.
"I... I believe the master is right. The missing storage ring would likely be overlooked. A mistake in their jotting. And the Aeolians? Surely they would be happy in the end if Dregol's heart was put to a use that might save the rest of their kind from the Wraiths."
Damon glared at Proteus, then back at me. "You've even got your pet and your scribe convinced. Is this what the Patriarch's favor does? It makes you think you're above the laws of the Oracle? Kalon, if you walk this path, where does it stop? What will you ask of me next? A living heart? A soul?"
"I am asking for a chance to save Enora," I said, my voice sharp. "In two years, we will be deployed to the Great Ruins. We will face those demons and might even come across a wraith if we're unlucky. Within those demons once lived life, Damon. If I can understand the spirit energy that drives them, I can save them. I can save us. To achieve that, I am willing to be inconvenienced. I am willing to be seen as evil if it means the truth is found. Dregol's death was a tragedy, but his sacrifice can bring a miracle."
Damon's shoulders slumped. He looked exhausted, the weight of my reasoning pressing down on him. He looked at the map of the Great Ruins, at the sketches of the different wraiths, and finally at me. I could see the moment his resistance shattered. I doubted he yielded because he thought I was right, but because he couldn't let me walk this path alone.
'Damon is my friend. I must make sure not to inconvenience anymore'
"You're playing with my mind, Kalon," he whispered, his voice laced with defeat. "You make the horrific sound like a necessity. You praise the fallen just so you can use them."
"Because they deserve to be used for a higher purpose," I replied. "Damon, the storage rings have greater capacity than the common pouch. They can harbor bodies. Something our regular pouches cannot. We need it for the deployment. We need to bring back samples of the demons we slay. If you help me now, we enter those ruins as masters of our fate, not victims of it."
Damon let out a long, shuddering breath. He uncrossed his arms and stepped back. His face filled with resignation. "Half an hour. I will go to the western block. I'll gather the guards under the pretense of discussing the new runes. They'll follow me because they know I have the Patriarch's ear. But Kalon... if you aren't out by the time I finish my distraction, I'm leaving. I won't lose my future for one that wishes to be a thief."
"You could make it an hour," I said, a dark sense of victory in my mind.
Damon turned toward the door, his silhouette framed by the fading light. "I hope this truth is worth its price, Kalon. Because I don't think we can turn back after tonight."
He stepped out into the hallway, his footsteps heavy and hesitant. I stood in the center of the room, the silence rushing back in to fill the space his shouting had occupied. I looked at Bane, who was watching me with unblinking, red eyes. The wyrm could feel my pulse. A slow rhythm of a someone who had already crossed the line.
"Proteus, prepare the jars," I commanded, grabbing my pouch.
"Already done, master," Proteus answered, finally untangling himself from the wyrm's coils.
I began to walk out of the room. I didn't feel the guilt Damon felt. I didn't feel the evil he described. Only clarity.
I stepped out of my quarters. The seed of deceit would be sown, and now, I was going to harvest the first of its bitter, necessary fruits.
Dregol was waiting in the bier room, and through his poisoned flesh, I would find the key to the world's salvation. No matter the cost.