Mutnya had sacred symbols drawn all throughout the cavern walls and floors. Some glowed softly as I passed them, forcing me into a random, steady pace that had me shifting around in odd patterns to avoid touching them. I couldn't tell for certain what all of them meant - it appeared some sections were writing backwards, and then shifted halfway through.

It didn't help that the strange thing on the ceiling was watching me roam the cavern. I could hear a steady, constant shift in the air, like soft snores of a slumbering beast. I kept expecting the ground and walls to move with the eerie sounds, but they never did.

There were other hidden doorways scattered throughout the structure, but I didn't bother attempting to figure out how to open them. I didn't know what could be there, and with the nymphtan on her way back, I couldn't afford to get myself trapped between a lair of stone. Surely she had a safeguard in place for trespassers.

Wait a minute.

Curious, I backtracked to where I noticed one of the drawn, faint arcs that'd suggest there being a door. The writing flowed uninterrupted, here, and there was a single symbol of a withered flower to suggest that this would either lead to dry herbs or poisons. Then I walked a few paces down, where the writing appeared to be organized out of random. There were no symbols that stuck out to show where this would lead, if it were to lead somewhere at all.

Hmm.

"Well, there's the safeguards," I muttered to myself, turning in a circle to examine the rest of the cavern. I didn't need to figure out what led behind every door - I just needed to find where the nymphtan would have an altar built for Tanryn, who 'served' as the exiled god to her people.

The one that breathed and demanded evil like one would need air.

I craned my head back to study the ominous face of black, withered vines watching me. Then I closed my eyes, focusing on the voices that did not seem eager to quiet down anytime soon. Images of naked flesh exposed in harsh, brutal winds flashed before my eyes. I man struggling to scream as his skin was pelted in large, ugly boils, his veins matching the vines covering the cavern walls.

Oh, shit.

Suddenly, it was like I was looking down upon myself from above, like a bird's eye view. There was a girl dressed in rags, her long, red hair cascading down her back like a veil of blood. Her eyes were a deep, brilliant blue, as cold and blank as the stillness of a snowy dawn. Her bare, dirty feet dragged over smooth stone as she made her way to me. She held a box in one hand, something barely bagger than her palm.

And her attention was focused directly on me - my body.

"Have you come to pass the test once more?" Her voice echoed inside my head. My body remained still, frozen, caught in a place where time and timeless met. I couldn't move my mouth to speak, couldn't focus my thoughts to proper words for her to understand me.

"Oh, child," she cooed. The single part of me that understand what was going on struggled not to panic when she reached out a cold, clammy hand to rest against my cheek. I wasn't sure how I was able to feel the icy daggers digging into my skin when I was currently having an out of body experience. "You've brought upon more chaos than those who dedicate their entire lives to reign it."

The quick return to my senses came like a swift punch to the gut. I stumbled forward, gasping for air, arms protectively wrapped around my midsection. I even fell to my knees, both of which cried in protest when they slammed against the unforgiving stone.

Eyes watering, I forced myself to look around, searching for the girl holding the box. While I wasn't surprised to find her gone, a part of me was tempted to demand that she come back so that I could shove my sword down her throat.

With an abrupt cough, I shook the thought from my head. That one, I knew, didn't come from me or the things inside me. Her presence lingered for a moment longer. I faintly felt her cold, dead laugh brush against my ears . . . Until she was gone.

Struggling to harbor the fury threading to give way to fear, I rose unsteadily to my feet. I'm glad Orik didn't come here. The goddess of chaos would not have spared him so eagerly.

It should have been a warning to me, that she was willing to help me now, of all times. That what I had planned for Mutnya was not at all something that should be advised. Because as I looked around, there was a single, open doorway that wasn't there before on the other side of the stream. Did she bypass the hold Tanryn held over this place, or were they working together? And if they're working together, were they hoping to let the nymphtan have her way with me, or was it the other way around?

Maybe it didn't matter to them. Maybe they just wanted to watch a fight that would end in blood, regardless of the outcome. I'd never heard of two gods from different sects working together, however. Yet if I had to ponder which ones would, these would be it.

Grinding my teeth, I rested my hand on the hilt of my sword and began my way over to the sudden entrance, my footsteps quiet. I didn't bother looking up to see if the face was still watching me.

I did, however, rub the spot on my face that the girl had touched, wanted to wipe away the icy trails that still lingered on my skin.

The altar Mutnya had built for Tanryn wasn't like the ones man liked to build for their deities. If I hadn't spent the majority of my life dedicated to hunting these things down, I wouldn't have known that it was even an altar. The room itself might have once been open and spacious, but with the shelving carved right out of the stone and wide, oddly shaped tables scattered throughout, I might as well have been trying to walk through a maze.

Then there was the small pool of water at the back, with sticks and twigs loosely covering the surface. Judging from it's clear appearance, Mutnya hadn't even caught what she was going to sacrifice.

A cold, familiar feeling settled deep inside my gut at the thought. Fuck, I hated the thought of these blood-soaked rituals. Nothing but pain and horror for all parties involved. I took a breath, trying to put myself in the nymphtan's footsteps. By now, she knew her ward was long dead. She still went ahead and orchestrated an attack on Canden, one of the most secured cities in the known world that was reigned by no kingdom.

It could be said that she did this because she wanted to steal more years from our youth to add on to her own lifespan, which had been cut short the moment she went astray from her people's god.

Yet, the villages Orik and I had passed on the way here were untouched, and the smoke she had summoned and the horses she'd created - the woodland spirits she forced to her will - were all so incredibly unnecessary and wasteful for someone seeking to expand their time with the living. Sure, I knew she would wage an attack regardless, but the way she'd done it was unexpected.

She most likely paid more years of her own life than she'd gained from that whole mess.

So why? What was the point?

I sighed, shaking my head. I was trying to find reason inside a mind older than I could fathom, one that had had more than its fill of corruption and death ten times over.

Still, I couldn't shake the feeling that I was missing something important. Something major. As I walked around the room, examining the items and plants and limbs of things I'd rather not know, an idea came to mind. A very reckless, careless idea that contained a higher chance of death than not.

But it was an idea that would surely piss the Circle off if I did die. Otherwise, I'd get the chance to tell an exiled nymphian god where I thought he could shove his nose without too much of a consequence. I grinned, the first time I'd felt my lips curl in such a way in a long while. Perhaps it was the whispers singing in my ears that were prompting me to this decision, or maybe it was the madness of leading such a life that was finally getting to me.

Either way, I was going to piss someone off.

Several hours of painstaking planning later, I pressed my hand against one of the vines lining the walls behind the altar, the adrenaline coursing through my veins causing my breaths to come in low, shaking gasps that I struggled to control.

With a hand steadier than it should have been, I raised a small blade to scratch at one of many symbols drawn over the wall next to the vines, effectively breaking the spell.

~ 1572 Words ~

Another chapter of internal thoughts 😅 Golly, I promise it won't stay like this. I just felt it was important to explain this a bit before stuff goes down. I might edit it later, though, once I figure out how to navigate it all