Chapter 7
Upper Nroi Temple, old goods distribution yard.
Cycle 6002.646.05.25W
Overall Neodigs stay at Adenga so far had been pleasant. But more and more he got the feeling, that things were only going smoothly because he was an outsider. He suspected today was going to be interesting, because the administrator had asked him to get his hair trimmed the night before. He now only had coarse stubble on his head and was dressed in temple clothes.
There was a knock on his door very early in the morning. Since he was used to early morning work, he got up quickly enough. He found the administrator there waiting with an enthusiastic and mischievous smile. With him were two very modern, heavy looking metal traveling cases. He told Neodig to put any essentials in the smaller case that strapped onto a person’s chest. Then everything else fitted easily in the large rolling case.
Enjoying his mysterious plan, the administrator asked Neodig if he could not speak till he was on a transport away from the mountain. He was given a face mask and asked to flick up the deep hood of the cloak he was wearing. Puzzled he followed these instructions. To make things more bizarre, a temple apprentice dressed identically to him, came into the room when beckoned.
The apprentice was silent as well. There was a similar case strapped to his chest and a larger rolling case like Neodig had been given, rolled along side him. He asked the two to walk in a small circle around the room. Happy with this, the administrator then asked them to follow him.
As if this wasn’t strange enough they soon got to another courtyard with four more similarly dressed apprentices. It wasn’t until this group had also walked in circles and then done other awkward marching like maneuvers that Neodig realised he was being shuffled in with decoys. He quickly understood why the administrator was enjoying this so much.
They were instructed to do one last continuous circle till another more bored looking temple official waved them out. One by one, in as irregular fashion as the official could manage they exited to assemble in a final line. They then walked down several ramps. There group trip finished as they rode a juddery mechanical elevator down to a courtyard and storage area. They had been lined up like those ready to be executed and the administrator welcomed them to the old distribution yard. Things suddenly felt tense.
The administrator had paused for effect, then Neodig remember about what he had heard, as he politely asked people to let him hear what was really going on around the place. One of the apprentices would be riding the rubbish shoot of death. As the apprentice next to him started shaking violently, he felt he had safely identified today’s victim.
As the silence dragged out he struggled to recall what he had heard the previous day. Originally the apprentice that had whispered about this, had said that this chute had quickly shot goods down to the mainland. Riding to work at the platform halfway down had been an exciting job. But the chute had been neglected and closed after too many accidents.
It was occasionally used as a rubbish chute and after heavy rains, any apprentices with serious misconduct might be sent down there. They were told if they survived they would be rewarded as the heavens had favoured them to open up the chute again. If they died in the process, it was a clear indication that they had been dealt with according to the evil in their heart.
Before the suspense faded, the administrator said to let this to be a lesson to anyone that though those of a spirit of sloth would be tolerated around here. If they accumulated too much debt to the temple, then they could be the next to ride the chute. In some ways the speech didn’t make sense. Neodig was left to assume that it must be a well known tradition of apprentices to spy on these proceedings.
Neodig could start to guess at what the apprentice had been trying to explain to him. The weaker and less disciplined could rack up the temples equivalent of debt. This system was being allowed to flourish so that they had forced volunteers for jobs like this. Who knows how corrupt this place really was.
With that the administrator asked the apprentices to take their positions. Two quickly walked to waiting vendors heading off in opposite directions along the mountain track. This was a safe job if you had the strength and stamina to complete it. There were also people waiting on elevators for the boys that could not handle the carting job. Apparently it could be very mixed for how these boys lived turned out in the villages down the mountain.
Despite looking similarly skinny to the remaining apprentices disguised for the event, Neodig could have handled one of the waiting goods carting jobs. Instead, unsure what possessed him, he wandered towards the chute and subtly nudged the shaking victim off trajectory. Greeted by the bored official, he was told to put his big case in the rear sled and sit in the front.
He assessed the quickly thrown together sleds, they were solidly made, but little care had been put into crafting them. From this you could again guess, that the expected odds for completing this trip down the chute alive were not high. He put the large case in the back and settled in the front as calmly as he could. Then got a confused look as he gave the thumbs up to the waiting official.
As the odd gesture was ignored, the official went back to looking bored. He pushed the sled down the slope and it quickly picked up momentum, disappearing into the darkness of the chute. The official wandered towards the hidden crowd and declared that the price had been paid. He didn’t notice the slightly worried demeanor of the administrator though.
At first the sled trip was more gross than terrifying. After initially picking up speed the sled ploughed in a pool of foul refuse water. But somehow the sleds strangle design meant it kept moving, even after splashing through the sludge. It would have been a nice luxury to worry about the the light coating of foul sludge, but the sleds picked up speed.
In this dark acrid smelling place, fresh air would have been great. Instead the speed increased more and Neodig was thrown around turns faster and more violently. The ride became sickeningly disorientating.
The chute was a mess compared to when it had been designed and built. There were times when the sleds would hit ruble and bounce sometimes grating skin off Neodig as he stabilised the sled with contact to the wall or sometimes was just shot up and grinded him against the ceiling of the chute. Soon the inevitable happened and rubble flipped the sled, ejecting Neodig to grind his way down the chute.
Neodig didn’t know how long he had passed out for. As he came to, it took a while to realise that this foul smelling claustrophobic place, was the chute. He struggled back up in this thankfully well drained section and eventually bumped into the upturned sled. He couldn’t find the large case though.
Painfully he dragged his mangled and generously scraped body up the chute further till it was too steep to proceed. He had lost his main pack in the metal protective rolling travel case. With nothing else to do except for give into despair, he crawled back down the chute. With the energy he had left he flipped the sled and got it moving.
The only problem was that he had dragged and scooted it head first. Once he picked up momentum there was no room to flip himself for fear of grating against the roof at the slightest bump during this process. So having done all he could do with the energy he had, he again passed out, riding the sled into the darkness.
Pain, everything hurt. Neodig tried to get up, but everything hurt.
Darkness surrounded him.
He had passed out again. But bizarrely awakening again, the pain was less intense. He could breathe a little. But now everything hurt. This time he tried to roll onto his side more cautiously. His body wasn’t very creative. It screamed about the pain. Weirdly it looked like he was in some sort of temple. He saw some water and cautiously drank it.
The water seemed okay. He drank more. With pain threatening to overwhelm him again he rolled away from the water and was dragged into darkness again.
He woke up again, everything hurt. He took several breathes and found he could focus better now. Small shafts of light pierced the darkness and illuminating a temple artistically carved into the rocks. There were beautiful archways that would have made a mysteriously inspiring place.
Now-days the effect was lessened as caved in areas were sprinkled generously around the cavern. Also there was an unpleasant, unnatural havyness to the place. At the far end of the opening was what looked like a crypt. Bizarrely an out of place gargoyle sat on the stone coffin, clutching a jewelled dagger that was stuck in the lid.
This time he drank water and sat up. He could breathe okay as long as they were slow steady breathes. Unfortunately this didn’t look like the bottom of the shaft. He had a look around and it looked like he had crashed through a makeshift wall. The worrying thing was that there was still another shaft going down.
An eerie voice echoed through the chamber. It said that it would hate for him to get to hopeful, so it would let him know that he had only made it a third of the way down the mountains sled shaft. He looked to find the source of the voice. It wasn’t the news he wanted to hear.
Unable to find the voice he asked if he could manage the rest of the journey. The voices sad laughter echoed through the chamber. It said he might make it, but they were still looking for him. It could feel them scanning the island, over and over. It wasn’t as frequent as first, but they would find him and deal to him if he ever made it out.
He rested for a bit and thought. He had forgotten that his family’s enemies would still be after him. He asked the voice that if he assumed he could make it out, how could he avoid detection.
This clearly intrigued the voice.
It though for a bit and said if he almost cut his soul off and survived, that would do the trick.
Groggy he double checked that he was talking about scans of search magic. Was the voice sure it wasn’t his friends looking for him?
The voice spoke sadly, as if to an incompetent child.
It let Neodig know that this sort of magic only came from those of empty hearts. If he had friends that felt like they would devour anything to end a never ending hunger, then it could be them.
Neodig thought for a bit more. If what the voice said was true it definitely didn’t sound like it was friends looking for him. Exhausted from the small exchange he slept.
He woke up again and it was dark. The voice noticed he was awake and excitedly greeted Neodig. It said it had an idea about avoiding detection.
Neodig didn’t like how excited the voice was about this. He cautiously asked the voice about how this could be done.
The voice still excited, simply explained that almost completely severing ones soul, would do the trick nicely.
Neodig was confused. He said that it didn’t sound like a good idea even if it worked.
The voice thought and agreed. Regardless it told him about a group of warriors that cut the chains between their bodies and their souls. Those that survived, were able to fight off a great darkness, but in the end they never improved the land or had a real legacy.
Neodig was wondering what he had done for his existence to have turned out this way.
Still, talking to the voice seemed to be helping in recovering and thinking about a way out of the situation. So he humoured the voice further. He asked the voice if it thought it was such a bad idea, why did it had even mentioned it.
Now the voice sounded frustrated. Irritated that Neodig couldn’t learn fro the example. So it told another story;
Once there was a fruit tree that a vain one hated. It smashed a branch of the tree and though that it was past repair. With it’s wrath satisfied, the vain one left. Luckily the orchardess didn’t follow proper procedure and could listen to the spirits. She strapped the branch back in place and even though the branch was only hanging by a thread, it grew back into place. The orchard grew even more because of this love and success.
Neodig still had to admit he didn’t understand where the voice was coming from. He asked how the story related to the situation that he was in.
Clearly enjoying the conversation the voice replied that the story represented the conditions for those of vanity to abandon their attacks and the situations for restoration. It claimed to be a demon in the gargoyle on the stone coffin. It said that in exchange for severing part of his soul it would like Neodig to release him from this realm.
Neodig had heard about sacrifices to clear cursed areas. But he didn’t buy the spirit’s demon spiel. Neodig thought for a long time
The spirit was annoyed that it was being ignored.
Drowsy Neodig asked what the spirits name was.
There was silence for a while.
Then it announced that it was known as Bubu.
Tired Neodig thanked Bubu for his time and said he would get back to him after some more sleep. With that Neodig quickly drifted off into a deep sleep again.
Wehl 2024
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