The paper’s narrative was bafflingly incoherent, almost as if it were an obscure tapestry of inscrutable metaphors woven together. Even for a seasoned scholar like Morris, the text was impenetrably mysterious, and each repeated reading yielded no more understanding than the last but left him with an unsettling, ominous feeling.
He found himself wrestling with unanswered questions. Who were these forsaken rulers? What about this forsaken clan? And what could be the significance of these people amid the ashes and the oft-mentioned theme of “protection”?
Duncan squinted, his gaze sweeping over the faintly smeared ink on the moisture-damaged paper. Certain phrases seemed to spark a hint of recognition in his mind, but he was unable to weave them into any meaningful understanding. He had an inkling that the words were more than mere disjointed ramblings. These segments, bearing the semblance of religious scriptures, seemed to hint at some connection to their current epoch, the so-called “Deep Sea Era.”
Or perhaps, these words were remnants of a time preceding the Deep Sea Era.
“Could this be Crow’s penmanship?” Vanna abruptly looked up at Nemo, who was hovering nearby.
“Indeed, it’s his,” Nemo confirmed, bending over to verify the handwriting. He then added with assurance, “He had this peculiar habit of extending the final stroke at the end of each sentence. I’ve never seen anyone else do this.”
“What was his faith?” Vanna inquired, “Did he follow any spiritual doctrines beyond the Orthodox principles? I’m not necessarily implying heretical beliefs—he could have been involved in less mainstream groups, like clandestine societies or scholarly retreats.”
“He was a staunch worshiper of the god of death from his early years. Besides regular visits to Bartok’s church, I’ve never seen him associate with other congregations,” Nemo responded, reflecting on the question, “As for secret societies and academic retreats… it seems highly improbable. He lacked the intellect to be a part of such intellectual circles. He struggled for three years in remedial classes to barely scrape through public high school in the lower city. They wouldn’t have him even if he harbored a desire to join these intellectual retreats!”
“A fervent Orthodox believer with no exposure to spiritual guidance outside the true god’s faith… Now that’s intriguing,” Vanna commented, eyeing the paper in Morris’s hand and rubbing her chin in thought. “The prose style on this paper clearly exhibits influences of the classical city-state era or perhaps the even earlier dark age, reflecting a typical ‘holy book’ style. This is not something that an individual with a rudimentary high school education could have invented on a whim—and yet, Crow kept this paper close to him, indicating its importance to him.”
Throughout this discussion, Duncan remained silent, his mind teeming with thoughts. Then, an idea struck him, “So, this could be something he copied from another source.”
“Copied?” Nemo echoed, momentarily stunned before the realization dawned, “Are you suggesting that Crow might have stumbled upon a location, and the information in this paper… is essentially a ‘clue’ he had transcribed from that place?”
“Maybe he didn’t fully comprehend the significance of the text he was copying, but it was the most puzzling and compelling piece of information he encountered there,” Duncan conjectured, slowly nodding in agreement with his own hypothesis, “And, tragically, the very act of transcribing these enigmatic passages may have unwittingly brought him face-to-face with his own doom.”
“Accidentally stumbled upon a place…” Vanna murmured, gradually rising to her feet, her arms folded across her chest, musing aloud, “The place must have been alien to Crow, possibly with an otherworldly ambiance. Unable to swiftly discern his exact location, he rushed to document what he observed as potentially useful cues. Concurrently, it’s plausible that he was discovered and fatally attacked soon after the transcription, without having the chance to delve deeper into the surroundings. Otherwise, he would’ve had the opportunity to note down more specific details that could’ve painted a more vivid picture of the environment.”
With that, she cast a glance at the waterlogged corpse, her eyebrows knitting together in a furrow of concern.
“What kind of place had he ventured into? And how was his body returned here? A soaked body would’ve undoubtedly left a trail while being transported…”
Nemo lifted his gaze, scanning their surroundings.
In the arid sewer corridor, there were no discernible traces of a body having been dragged.
“Perhaps we should extend our search along the usual patrol route of Crow. He may have left behind clues before venturing into that unknown place,” suggested Morris, his gaze drifting towards the foreboding depths of the corridor, “Did he typically venture in this direction?”
“Yes,” Nemo affirmed with a nod. “This corridor leads to the Upper City, but there’s a stretch that suffers from erratic lighting, intermittently plunging into darkness. While temporary blackouts aren’t a significant concern, there is still the potential of encountering… less than pleasant entities. Hence, the need for regular patrols to promptly spot any emerging shadows.”
“Let’s proceed then. The sooner we explore, the higher our chances of uncovering clues,” Duncan agreed, “If there is indeed something that emerged from there, we can confront it simultaneously.”
No one protested as the team momentarily left Crow’s body behind, readying themselves to delve deeper into the sewer corridor. Before moving past the young man’s lifeless form, Nemo and Old Ghost simultaneously bowed their heads in a silent act of respect.
“Hold tight here. We’ll return for you,” Nemo promised.
Old Ghost stooped down, produced a triangular amulet from his belongings, and tucked it onto Crow’s chest, “Stay put, lad.”
Duncan watched the scene in silence, patiently waiting for Nemo and Old Ghost to finish their solemn farewells before leading the group onward.
“We’ll inform Captain Tyrian about the incident here when we return,” Vanna declared abruptly on their journey, “This young man’s death will not be without purpose.”
“Thank you,” Nemo murmured, his voice barely a whisper, the heavy weight of grief and loss coloring his words, “That lad… didn’t achieve anything particularly extraordinary in his lifetime, but being remembered by Captain Tyrian and Captain Duncan is perhaps an honor he wouldn’t have anticipated.”
“Did he have a family?” Morris asked, his voice soft as he broke the heavy silence that hung in the air.
“A family? He lost them long ago. He was brought up in an orphanage, and during his adolescent years, he left that place to become my apprentice,” Nemo replied, shaking his head. “The head of the orphanage told me they found the boy abandoned in a trash bin on a city street corner. When they discovered him, he was so small… barely the length of a crow from head to tail…”
“Discarded child,” Old Ghost murmured, anger tinged in his voice, “When the queen was still in power, she would never allow such atrocities to happen. Abandoning infants would mean imprisonment! Now, people have stooped so low as to throw their own children into garbage bins… The lad was fortunate; when he was first handed over to us from the orphanage, he was terribly frail, like a skeletal monkey. I was always anxious he wouldn’t make it through the winter, but he did… he survived… ”
The old man abruptly cut himself off, as if choked by his own words, then shook his head with a downtrodden expression, “In the end, he didn’t make it.”
The group was shrouded in a thick cloud of melancholy, and even Alice, who typically took longer to pick up on emotions, could sense the heavy aura. Puzzled, she glanced around the group, finally approaching Old Ghost hesitantly, seemingly wanting to offer solace, “Don’t… feel sad.”
Old Ghost raised his head to look at Alice, adorned in a wig and veil, and after a moment of hesitation, he sniffled, “Your Majesty, you need to take action against this…”
Alice looked at the elderly man before her with a sense of helplessness. But soon, the discomfort of the situation was broken as the group suddenly halted.
The corridor ahead was engulfed in dim light, with two faulty gas lamps embedded in the walls. Their feeble illumination was barely sufficient to fend off the darkness further down the passage. Vanna surveyed the boundary where light and dark clashed, her face adopting a serious expression.
“There… there’s a body,” She said, her voice barely more than a whisper.
A rather slight figure lay inert by the gutter lining the corridor. The dim and flickering gas lamps, their luminescence muffled by poor ventilation, shed a soft light on a well-known blue, sturdy coat.
As the group drew closer to the fallen body and the face came into view, Duncan felt no shock – it was Crow.
However, unlike Duncan and the others who had prepared themselves for this, Nemo and Old Ghost reacted with disbelief and a hint of terror upon seeing the familiar face.
“Crow?!” Nemo’s voice quivered as he stared down at the body on the ground, his instinctual reaction was to recoil, “How… how can this be…”
“It’s a forgery,” Duncan stated calmly, cutting through Nemo’s distraught outcry. From his initial inspection, he was certain that the body before them was an imitation created by the mysterious element. This conclusion was supported by the traces of a black viscous substance beginning to seep around this “corpse,” indicating the commencement of a decomposition process.
There seemed to be a range of endurance among these counterfeits. Despite all being shaped by the primal element, some could endure in the city for up to two weeks, while others would start decomposing upon reaching the cemetery. This specific “forgery” appeared to be decomposing at an even more accelerated pace – the time from Crow’s disappearance to the current moment was a mere matter of hours.
Duncan quickly started piecing together the puzzle, using the clues they had gathered so far.
If Crow had indeed stumbled into an unfamiliar and potentially perilous place—like the den of the so-called Annihilators—and had copied down the cryptic “holy text” while there, then the creation of his duplicate would have also originated in that same place.
Now, this replica lay in a location that Crow frequented on his patrols.
They were definitely on the correct path and perhaps closing in on the original creation spot of this forgery!
