Cal hurried through the afternoon crowds as he made his way back to Jakob's shop.
So much for slowing down, he thought, weaving through the throng. He’d just resolved to be more methodical, to stop rushing headlong into every new crisis. But some plans didn’t survive contact with reality. Especially when reality involved a friend chained in a lightless cell.
Tools! I need tools… hammer and chisel? Maybe a pickaxe?
He'd studied the chains during his earlier reconnaissance and they were heavy links, each one thick as his thumb, bolted to stone through an anchor sunk deep into the foundation wall.
A key would be ideal, but he had no idea who held it. He'd found nothing of the sort in Cillian's void ring, and the thought of searching Zarven's private quarters was a non-starter. A man like that would absolutely litter his personal space with lethal countermeasures.
That left brute force. But "brute force" in a basement connected to the same structure as the building above it presented a very specific problem.
Sound.
Percussive shock traveled through stone the way electricity coursed through copper. Every hammer blow on iron or chisel-strike against rock would send vibrations racing through the shared foundation, up through load-bearing walls, into floor joists and support beams. Anyone standing on the ground floor of the Verdant Phial would feel it as a low tremor beneath their feet. Anyone in the basement would hear it as clearly as if Cal were knocking on their door.
He didn't know who remained in the Phial. The assistants who ran the storefront seemed oblivious to their employer's extracurricular activities, simple wage-workers maintaining inventory and processing sales. But Zarven hadn't operated alone. Loric was still out there somewhere. And there might be others, deeper operatives who Cal had never seen, people who would know about the prison beneath the shop and might investigate unusual sounds emanating from it.
Not a risk I'm willing to take.
He paused in his rush as the thought of seeking help tempted him. Captain Hatch? With Zarven out of the picture, maybe he’d listen.
But listen to what? A wild story about a secret prison Cal had no proof of? How would I even explain how I know? He'd have to admit he'd used his [Spiritual Perception] to scan a private residence, a magical invasion of privacy that for all Cal knew was probably illegal. And even that wasn't the whole truth. It was his unique spatial mapping that had truly pinpointed Jakob's location. Revealing that ability, a power no one else seemed to possess, was a line he wouldn't cross.
He shook his head. In this world, the strong made their own justice.
So will I.
Turning off the main road and into a side street, he thought Jakob wouldn't mind him appropriating his tools for a rescue. Probably try to charge him for their use afterward. If he's still capable of charging anyone for anything…
Cal briefly recalled the memory of the broken man, but just as quickly pressed down his frustration and fear, refocusing on the operational challenge.
The noise problem. Solve the noise problem first, then worry about the rest.
He turned his thoughts to [Isolation Field]. The Spell was designed as a cleanroom barrier for alchemy, its primary function to create a hermetic bubble that blocked ambient Mana currents and physical contaminants. But he'd noticed something during his usage of it: when the field was active, external sounds became muffled. The field's positive air pressure, generated by the [Ventus]-[Cycle] pairing at its core, created an outward push that partially deflected incoming sound waves.
Partially: that's the key word. It muffles airborne sound, but structural vibration bypasses air entirely.
He needed more than a muffler: he needed a dead zone.
A narrow alley opened to his left, barely wide enough for a handcart, running between a shuttered cobbler's workshop and the stone foundation of a two-story warehouse. Cal turned into it without breaking stride, the ambient noise of the street dropping away as the close walls ate his footsteps. Halfway down, a rusted iron gutter jutted from the warehouse roof, its terminus positioned above a half-full rain barrel. Water collected at the lip of the pipe and fell steadily.
Drip... drip... drip...
Cal stopped beside the barrel. Perfect.
He extended his hand and cast [Isolation Field]. The Spell snapped into place without a hint of instability, the construct accepting his denser E-tier Mana as if it had been designed for it all along.
[Your proficiency with Isolation Field (E) has resolved to Novice]
The air blurred faintly as it covered the rain barrel and part of the adjacent wall.
Just as I suspected. The [Volatile] tag was simply a flag for recalibration. The ease of it was almost anticlimactic, confirming that a successful cast was all it took to prove his control.
I wonder if it will always be this straightforward, or if my Impartments are smoothing over a process that should be far more difficult. Maybe it'll get harder at higher tiers?
Returning to the task at hand, Cal stepped back three yards and cocked his head, well outside of the field's influence.
Silence. The dripping was gone.
He moved closer, stopping just outside the boundary and leaned in. The water continued to fall, and as he watched it hit the barrel's surface he thought he might have been able to hear the slightest part.
Cal drew his harvesting knife. He pressed his ear flat against the warehouse's stone foundation, just outside the field's boundary, and reached through the invisible barrier. He tapped the knife's pommel against the wall and the dull impact traveled through the stone, vibrating clearly against his ear as he confirmed his theory.
He needed to add a sound-killing component to the Spell's functionality.
Cal dismissed the active field and leaned against the opposite wall, arms crossed, thinking. The [Vox] rune presented itself as the obvious candidate. It governed sound waves, sonic pressure, and resonance. In theory, integrating it into the field's filtering system should allow the construct to specifically target and neutralize acoustic energy.
This alley is the perfect sandbox environment. Time for some QA!
His first approach seemed the most straightforward. He visualized the [Isolation Field] schematic and attempted to pair a [Vox] rune with each of the four [Gate] runes, essentially adding a sonic filter to the existing physical-matter filter on each side of the Spell. He just needed to adjust his Intent so that the gates let air and particulate out, while keeping sound trapped in.
He built the blueprint, fed Mana into the new construct, and pushed. The Spell destabilized almost immediately.
The runic structure wavered in the air, the added [Vox] runes distorting the clean lines of the [Gate] runes. The entire construct seemed to fight itself, the boundary layer stuttering unstably as he felt the Spell begin to fray.
Cal released the Mana before the construct completely failed, letting the Spell dissolve while a faint headache pulsed behind his eyes.
Maybe it's a logic problem? I can't tell the gate to allow air out, while simultaneously telling it to trap sound in. Not with my basic understanding and design, anyway.
He rubbed his temples, reconsidering his approach.
The [Gate] runes helped define what crossed the boundary… but the [Null] rune was another core element. It sat at the apex of the construct and dampened energy within the field's interior. Wild Mana, specifically, but its function was suppression. Cancellation.
What if I'm thinking about this wrong? Maybe I don't need to filter sound at the boundary, but I need to kill it at the source.
He rebuilt the schematic in his mind, rudimentarily attaching the [Vox] rune directly to the [Null] rune, and then drew the plan in the air with his Mana.
Igniting it, he felt the construct accept the design without resistance. The runes blazed. The Spell stabilized. Cal pushed it outward, anchoring the silent, two-yard sphere around the rain barrel once again.
[New Spell Gained: Soundless Isolation Field (E) - Novice]
[Your proficiency with Spell Modifying (E) has increased to Practiced]
Nice.
Cal drew his harvesting knife again and proceeded to test the wall. A distinct vibration traveled through the stone, drumming against his head.
But there was no sound.
He struck again, harder. A stronger tremor shook through the foundation, but it was a phantom impact completely disconnected from any noise. The effect made no sense and violated physics as he understood it. But it worked.
Magic is so cool…
Cal sheathed the knife and stepped through the field's boundary into absolute silence.
Every ambient sound vanished as if someone had pressed a cosmic mute button. The silence felt aggressive, a sensation so strange it disoriented him and made his balance waver for half a heartbeat. He snapped his fingers. Felt the motion, the contact of skin on skin. But he heard… nothing.
Maybe it's overkill. But after everything that's happened, I'm not taking any chances. This will work.
He grinned as he dismissed the field and sound rushed back in, the ambient noise suddenly loud and almost startling after the void. Then he quickly made his way back to Jakob's shop.
The back door was still locked, so Cal figured it was time for another test. He cast the [Soundless Isolation Field] over the door and the surrounding frame, set his stance, chambered his rear leg, and drove a [Front Kick] into the door just above the lock plate.
His foot punched back the iron mechanism without resistance, the bolt shearing clean from its housing. But the force didn't stop there. The door rocketed inward on its hinges, the frame around the lock splintering outward in a spray of wood fragments, and the slab slammed into a shelf unit behind it hard enough to send three clay pots shattering to the floor.
Cal stood with his foot still extended, staring at the devastation.
Whoopsies...
He canceled the silence field and grabbed the swinging door before it could rebound further. It hung crooked on one hinge. Cal wrestled it back into the doorway and checked the alley for witnesses, finding none.
He found a discarded supply crate leaning against the adjacent wall, dragged it over, and wedged it against its exterior, jamming the broken panel into something resembling a closed position. It looked terrible. But from the street, to a casual observer, it appeared shut.
Cal looked around. The back room was a mess. Crates were overturned and goods were scattered; the evidence of whatever violence Narbok had conducted when they'd taken Jakob. Cal navigated through it with a quick [Light Orb] and soon found the tools he needed. He selected a heavy pickaxe with a fire-hardened ash handle, a short-handled mallet with a steel head, and a cold chisel with a blade thick enough to bite into iron. He tucked the chisel and mallet into his belt, gripped the pickaxe in his left hand, and moved to the center of the room.
He leaned the pickaxe against his leg, then raised his hands as he pulled Mana from his core. He cast the [Portal] Spell as quickly as he could, almost losing it towards the end. Then he tried something new that he desperately hoped would work: he willed the room in his mind he'd only seen through his spiritual senses towards the magical construct.
The air split. Holy mackerel, it worked!
Through the aperture, there was only darkness. Cold, fetid air billowed outward, carrying the smell of blood and human waste.
Cal hurriedly downed a Mana potion and stepped through, pulling his [Light Orb] through the door in space.
The room was small, just as his beam had shown. Bare stone walls, slick with condensation. A flagstone floor stained with things he didn't want to examine too closely.
And against the far wall hung Jakob.
Cal's stride faltered. The man was barely recognizable. The wiry salesman looked like a skeleton draped in skin, his once pristine clothing soiled and too loose. His head hung forward, chin against his chest, hair a matted tangle that obscured his face. His wrists were locked in iron manacles affixed with chain that was welded to iron plates bolted into the stone above. The chains were just short enough to prevent him from lowering his arms below shoulder height.
He crossed the room in four strides, pickaxe in hand. Up close, the stench was worse. Jakob breathed in shallow, irregular rasps that barely moved him.
But he was breathing.
"I don't know if you can hear me, Jakob, but I'm going to get you out of here. Just hold on a little bit longer," Cal whispered.
Standing over him, Cal raised his hand and cast [Soundless Isolation Field] so it encapsulated Jakob, the chains, and the section of wall where two plates were embedded with four anchoring bolts.
Then he hefted the mallet and chisel and got to work.
The first blow landed on the welded hook of the plate securing Jakob's left wrist chain. The silent impact traveled up Cal's arms, the chisel failing to bite into the hard metal.
Three more strikes resulted in a similar outcome. He managed to lightly score the metal, but the iron held.
Cal switched targets, attacking the stone around the anchors instead of the metal itself. The mallet rang soundlessly against the chisel, and chips of grey rock sprayed outward in a mute cascade. Progress, but slow. Too slow. His Mana was draining to maintain the portal, and every second here was a second someone could walk in.
He set them aside and grabbed the pickaxe. Cal widened his stance, lined up the pointed end with the masonry surrounding the first iron anchor, and swung.
A sliver of grey foundation stone the size of his thumbnail flew free. He adjusted his angle, brought it down again, and a larger fragment broke loose, exposing a quarter inch more of the iron plate's seated edge.
There we go! Now we're getting somewhere.
He fell into a rhythm. Each strike launched mute shards skittering across the flagstone floor, and with every one the iron anchor's hold on the wall grew more tenuous. After a dozen strokes, a notification popped up.
[New Skill Gained: Mining (E) - Novice]
Cal paused mid-swing, the pickaxe hovering at the apex of its arc.
Mining? I'm conducting a prison break on a secret dungeon beneath an alchemist's shop, and the System decided this qualifies as vocational training?
He shook his head and kept swinging. Somewhere in the vast architecture of Vox, his efforts at stone removal had crossed whatever threshold constituted "repeatable proficiency in a task." He supposed it didn't care about context.
Recognize away, you magnificent celestial bureaucracy.
Progress was steady. The first anchor began to give after twenty-odd strikes, the iron plate rocking perceptibly as its stone housing crumbled. At this rate, he'd have both plates free in a few more minutes. Manageable, as long as no one—
He felt it through his [Spiritual Perception].
A presence. Above him and to the north, somewhere on the ground floor of the Verdant Phial, an aura shifted from the storefront toward the rear of the building. High E-tier. One of the primary apprentices, most likely. Cal held his swing and tracked the aura as it drifted past a storeroom and toward the back staircase.
No. Keep walking. Go to the privy. Go home for the evening. Go anywhere else.
The aura descended. One step, then another, moving down the basement stairs.
Cal's fingers tightened on the wood handle. If this person was just fetching stock from the upper basement, they'd turn around and go back up. If they had business deeper...
I can't bank on that. I need to be done before they reach this level.
A few minutes was no longer an option. The person had cleared the first flight and was moving across the upper basement floor, browsing or collecting. Heading south. Heading toward the second stairwell that led to the lower levels.
Time to find out if Aurelian's pill was worth the hype!
Cal reached inward and [Crimson Overdrive] ignited through his channels, the high-velocity current of Stamina flooding his system in a continuous loop. Power surged through his arms, core, and legs, the enhancement roiling into its pattern of barely-contained violence.
The sting came immediately. An acid bite along his pathways, spiritual friction grinding against walls still not strong enough to support it.
He swung the pickaxe.
The pointed end bit into the rock beside the first anchor with devastating force, the E-tier strength amplified and turning the blow into something closer to a small detonation. Stone shattered in a silent spray, a crater forming around the anchor's base. Cal wrenched the pick free and struck again, widening the hole, undermining the iron plate's grip on the wall.
Three more strikes. The first anchor dislodged entirely, a half-foot spike of iron pulling free from the crumbling stone.
Above and behind him, the aura reached the second stairwell. It paused at the top.
Don't come down. Don't come down.
It didn't listen.
Cal rushed to the second anchor. The stone exploded outward, and it shifted on the first blow. His body was learning the optimal angle and force distribution through [Savant of the Body], refining each repetition into something more devastating than the last. Two more and the second anchor tore free.
[Your proficiency with Mining (E) has increased to Practiced]
The presence was halfway down the second flight now, moving at that maddeningly casual pace.
Third anchor. Cal buried the pick so deep that stone fragments ricocheted off Jakob's legs. He twisted, levered, drove the point in again at a steeper angle. The anchor groaned loose.
The aura hit the bottom of the second stairwell.
Fourth anchor. Cal lashed out with everything [Crimson Overdrive] could give him, the pickaxe cleaving through stone with an impact that jarred his shoulders and sent cracks spiderwebbing across the wall. Somewhere behind the current of Stamina, the System tracked the erosion damage ticking upward, and he felt the notifications stack at the edge of his awareness.
He ignored it and kept going.
The left plate broke away as the last anchor was removed, its attached chain dropping with it from the wall. Jakob's right arm fell limply to his side.
The aura was on his level now, closing the distance with every step.
Cal moved to the right side. Arms aching, channels flaring, he swung away.
Four anchors to go. He gave each one everything he had, abandoning finesse for raw demolition. First anchor, three blows. Second anchor, three blows.
Ten yards away the person slowed and reached for something on the wall. An inscription, maybe?
Third anchor. Two blows. The iron bolts slid clear of the weakened masonry.
Fourth anchor. Cal reared back and slammed the pick down with a two-handed overhead strike that shattered the ash handle. The foundation stone split, and the final iron spike lurched, held by a last lip of rock.
Five yards.
Cal dropped the pickaxe, grabbed the exposed iron with both fists, and pulled. The anchor ripped out, and the plate dropped. Jakob's body collapsed forward, his emaciated frame folding toward the floor. Cal dropped the broken shaft and caught him, one arm hooking beneath his chest, the other bracing his head.
Jakob weighed nothing. Less than nothing.
Cal saw the person in his mind's eye raise what looked like a key to the doorway just outside the room.
He killed [Crimson Overdrive], the abrupt absence of power leaving him hollowed and aching. Ignoring the insistent throb in his channels, he bent and scooped the chains and plates - along with Jakob's limp form - into a princess carry then dropped the sound dampening field as he triggered a [Dash] through the still open portal. The world blurred for an instant as he launched himself across the cell and through the floating hole.
He halted on the dirty floor of the stockroom, careful not to jostle his burden, and immediately flexed his will. The silver-edged rip in space zipped shut.
Through the last vanishing sliver of the gateway, a sound rang through the returning ambience of the shop.
Click.
A door latch turning in the now-empty cell.
Phew, that was too close!
Cal breathed out a long sigh as he adjusted his grip on Jakob, then moved toward the narrow staircase at the rear of the stockroom, the one that he knew led up to the small apartment above the shop.
The stairs were steep and tight, built for one person carrying little-to-nothing. Cal took them sideways, keeping Jakob's head from striking the center pole, his own shoulders scraping the wall as they wound up. At the top was a landing and an unlocked wooden door.
The apartment was a single room. Sparse and clean. There was a twin sized bed against one wall, neatly made with a wool blanket folded at the foot. A small writing desk beneath the room's only window, with the shutters currently closed. On the desk stood a stack of leather-bound ledgers in a rigid tower beside an empty dinner plate, a folded cloth napkin, and a tin cup. A wardrobe sat in the corner, and a woven rug with a faded pattern covered the floor.
A room of a man who owned very little but took great care of what he had.
Cal lowered Jakob gently onto the bed, supporting his neck until the pillow took the weight. The man's head lolled sideways, eyes closed, his breathing still that labored rasp. The manacles remained around his wrists, the broken anchors and chains trailing across the sheets. Cal would need to deal with those later. Removing them without tools designed for the purpose risked further damaging the already-ravaged skin beneath. His gaze dropped to the filthy stumps where Jakob's fingers used to be.
He felt a lump in his throat.
Straightening, he rolled his shoulders to work out the tension. His Mana sat at roughly a quarter capacity even with the potion; the [Portal] and the modified field having eaten through a significant portion of his reserves. He closed his eyes and breathed, slipping briefly into [Meditation] to get his pool to a more comfortable level.
When his core felt full enough, Cal raised his left hand and pushed Mana into the simple silver band on his ring finger. Selara's ring responded, and he reached into the pocket dimension with his thoughts to materialize a waterskin in his hand.
Magic is so... so cool, he thought again, briefly admiring the advanced magic.
He knelt at the bedside, uncorked the waterskin, and carefully tilted Jakob's head, bringing the opening to his cracked lips. Jakob swallowed instinctively. Cal let a thin stream pour, pausing between each mouthful to avoid choking him, then pulling back when the reflexive gulping grew irregular.
Enough for now. Too much at once could kill him as surely as too little.
He set the waterskin on the desk beside the ledgers and looked down at the man before him. Jakob looked gaunt, his cheekbones prominent and angular, but the faint color the water brought to his lips was a good sign. A small one.
He'll need real food soon, Cal thought. Broth, to start. Something his system won't reject.
Cal pulled the wool blanket from the foot of the bed and draped it over Jakob's motionless form, tucking the edges beneath his shoulders as if he were tucking in one of his own children.
He stepped back and let himself feel it. The full significane of what he'd just done, and what still remained to be done. He'd used magic and the power of his body to break his friend out of a prison he had been left to rot in. Was there anyone who even cared anymore? Now that Zarven was dead?
Who knows? Maybe Loric will show up again; maybe he won't. At the end of the day it doesn't matter. I had the power to save my friend and I did it, and I'll never let anyone threaten and abuse my friends again.
Cal turned back to Jakob. The man was alive, if barely. He needed water, food, and time. Not to mention a healing potion or five. And somehow Cal had to figure out how to remove his manacles.
But first, he had to make it through the night. Cal would make sure he did.
AUTHOR'S NOTE:
Hey everyone, thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed the chapter and the start of Book 3. I'm getting through these first few chapters even slower than I expected... this volume feels like it will be the chonkiest one yet, and we're just getting started. There's a lot I want to do.
Sorry I've been so MIA. There's too much going on with my day job and other commitments, and I have very little bandwidth at the moment. I'm hoping that in a few weeks things will normalize a bit more.
Have a great weekend!
Jon