Corvis Eralith
Tessia's finger jabbed towards the yawning maw of a grotto ahead of us, a jagged tear in the hillside darkness.
"Corvis, let's go into that dungeon!" Her voice vibrated with the raw, infectious enthusiasm only she possessed, cutting through the low hum of the Barbarossa's core and the settling dust from our travel till here.
The entrance loomed, large enough to admit the crimson titan inside, swallowing the daylight just meters beyond its threshold. It felt less like an invitation and more like a dare issued by the earth itself.
"Sure," I replied, the word tasting pragmatic on my tongue. Pragmatism was my armor now, layered over the gnawing dread. The deeper we crept into this pre-war lull, the more precious—and fleeting—these opportunities became.
Soon, these dungeons wouldn't be challenges; they'd be Alacryan beachheads, spewing corrupted beasts and soldiers from the portals Agrona was doubtlessly waiting to activate throughout the Glades like malignant spores.
My mind flickered to the novel's grim tapestry. What changes have I truly wrought? I'd strengthened Dicathen, yes. Saved individuals. But the colossal, crushing weight of Agrona's ambition? The sheer, industrialized might of Alacrya?
I had barely scratched the paint. The scales remained grotesquely tipped. Empowering our side felt like shoring up sandcastles against an incoming tsunami. The stakes hadn't budged; they'd only grown more terrifyingly real.
The Barbarossa's heavy tread echoed unnervously loud as I guided it towards the grotto. The transition from sun-drenched hillside to shadowed stone was abrupt. Cool, damp air, thick with the scent of wet rock, ancient loam, and something faintly… wrong —metallic and sour—washed over the external sensors, translated through the Dark Visor as a subtle shift in the ambient light and mana spectrum.
The world narrowed to the tunnel ahead, illuminated only by the Barbarossa's piercing frontal lamps, cutting beams through the oppressive gloom.
"Corvis," Tessia's voice broke the focused silence, her earlier exuberance tempered by the sudden intimacy of the enclosed space. She shifted beside me, her shoulder pressing against mine in the cramped cockpit.
"I didn't ask… what kind of weapons does this giant actually have?" Her eyes, wide and reflecting the console's soft glow, scanned the controls, seeking the instruments of destruction.
"Two melee, for now," I answered, my gaze fixed ahead. "Mana Wreath—the hilt you see mounted at its waist. And Mana Stinger—the dagger-like projection on its dorsal spine." I gestured subtly with my chin towards the holographic schematics flickering on a secondary display.
Tessia leaned closer, peering at the schematics. "Wait… I don't see their blades," she pointed out, confusion knitting her brow. "How do they even work? Are they retracted?"
"The blade is the manifestation," I explained, a flicker of pride warming the pragmatic chill. "Pure, solidified mana drawn directly from the mana core substaining this whole thing. Forged on demand, a weapon of light and devastating force." I nudged the controls, urging the Barbarossa deeper. The passage widened slightly, but the sense of confinement, of being swallowed, intensified.
"Now, let's see what's down here."
A comfortable silence settled, filled only by the rhythmic thrum of the core and the crunch of armored feet on loose stone. Then Tessia's voice, softer now, hesitant, cut through it again.
"Corvis… how are your legs doing?" She didn't look at me, her gaze fixed on the rocky walls scrolling past outside the cockpit, but her concern was a tangible warmth in the cool air. "I see you still use the cane."
The question landed like a small stone dropped into a still pond. Ripples of phantom pain, the ever-present dull ache, seemed to resonate deeper for a moment. I flexed my fingers on the controls, the movement deliberate.
"I don't think I'll ever fully recover," I admitted, the words tasting like ash. It was a truth I wore daily, a physical reminder of my vulnerability, of the cost extracted from everything my body went through. In hindsight a small price for the power I was slowly gaining.
"When fighting… the augmentation compensates completely. I can move, strike, channel mana without it hindering me in combat. But everyday life…" I trailed off, the memory of the cane's rhythmic tap-tap-tap on castle floors, the subtle strain of walking unaided, the constant awareness of the weakness, flooding back.
"The cane does a perfect job. Keeps me grounded. Literally. I already need to use mana for my bodily functions, I am surprised only my ability ti walk is hindered."
"I see..." Tessia murmured. The simple phrase held volumes—a sister's sorrow, a flicker of helpless anger at what had been done to me, a fierce protectiveness. The sadness in her voice was a small knife twisting in my own gut. I hated being the source of that sadness.
"Don't worry, Tess," I said, forcing a lightness I didn't quite feel, nudging her shoulder gently with mine. "I'm not letting it define me. I'm already thinking… integrating it with my combat style." Her head snapped towards me, eyes wide, curiosity instantly overriding the sorrow. "Using it with my vibration mana arts. Making it part of the weapon, not just a crutch."
"Really?" Her voice regained its spark. "How? Show me!"
"Accaron," I explained, the name of the vibration spell feeling solid, reliable. "The way I channel vibrations through my hands… imagine focusing it through the cane. Using it like a conductor, a wand. Amplifying the effect, directing the frequency with pinpoint precision. Turning a support into a—"
The Barbarossa stopped. My explanation died mid-sentence. The passage ended abruptly at a colossal stone door, ancient and scarred, easily twenty meters tall.
It blocked the way forward, radiating an aura of profound age and… unnerving stillness. We hadn't encountered a single mana beast since entering. Not a rustle, not a growl, not the skitter of claws on stone. The silence wasn't peaceful; it was oppressive, thick with watchful malice. The air tasted stale, tainted with that faint metallic wrongness, stronger now.
Tessia peered through the Dark Visor, her earlier excitement replaced by wary tension. "Is this the entrance to the next level?" she whispered, as if afraid to disturb the tomb-like quiet. "It's… too quiet, Corvis. Nothing. Not even insects."
"Careful, Corvis," Romulos's voice slithered into my mind, devoid of its usual bored sarcasm, replaced by cold assessment. His spectral form coalesced, leaning against the doorframe only I could perceive, tracing the ancient carvings with a translucent finger. "This silence… it reeks of corruption. This might be more than a dungeon. This feels like a nest. A mutant's den. Or worse."
A chill that had nothing to do with the damp air traced my spine. Yeah. The conclusion was inescapable. The proximity to the Castle, the unnatural void of life, the sheer, intimidating scale of the door—it screamed preparation.
An Alacryan staging ground, seeded and corrupted, waiting for the signal to unleash its horrors. The Barbarossa could handle corrupted beasts, even a den of them. Its armor, its weapons, Sylvia's mana core—they were formidable. But the thought of such a festering wound so close to home, potentially spewing abominations onto the flank of our defenses when the war came… it couldn't be ignored.
"Tessia," I said, my voice low and serious, turning fully to face her in the cramped space. The console lights reflected in her wide, trusting eyes. "This dungeon… it's been corrupted. Tainted by Alacrya. This is exactly the kind of place they'll use—a hidden tumor, growing stronger, ready to burst when they invade. To flood our lands with twisted beasts bolstering their armies." The grim reality of the war we were going to face settled heavily between us.
Her face paled slightly, but her jaw set. The Princess, the Beast Will prodigy, surfaced, pushing aside the adventurous twin sister. "Do you want to clear it?" she asked, her voice steady, her gaze locked on mine. Complete trust. Unwavering.
"I do," I affirmed, the weight of the decision settling on my shoulders. "It needs to be done. But," I added quickly, the protective brother warring with the strategist, "if you don't feel secure, if you have any doubt, we turn back now. We alert the Council, send a Lance team."
She shook her head immediately, fiercely. "No. We can handle it. You can handle it. But… alert Grampa. Just… so someone knows." Practicality, learned from harsh lessons. "How do we activate the radio in this thing? The signal might be weak down here."
I reached up, detaching the heavy, square microphone unit mounted near the exit kf the cabin. "Already on it." I thumbed the activation rune, hearing the faint power-up whine. Static crackled immediately, thick with the interference of the dense stone and whatever ambient corruption pulsed beyond that door.
"Grampa," I spoke into the mic, my voice deliberately calm, cutting through the hiss. "You're probably going to hear this later, maybe garbled. Signal's weak inside of here. Tessia and I… we've found something. A dungeon, heavily corrupted. Mutant den, I see a strong mana signature. Approximately three hours east of the Castle."
I took a breath, my eyes fixed on the colossal door. Tessia watched me, her expression resolute. "We're going in. Clearing it. Just… so you know." I released the transmit button, the static swallowing my final words. The message was sent, a tether thrown into the void.
The silence rushed back, deeper, heavier than before. The only sound was the frantic thud of my own heart, the hum of the core, and Tessia's steady breathing beside me. The enormity of the door felt like a physical pressure. Beyond it lay the unknown—horrors twisted by Vritra magic, the frontline of a war that hadn't officially begun, but had already poisoned our land.
My hand tightened on the main control lever. The cane leaned against my seat, a silent reminder of fragility. Tessia's trust was a shield and a weight.
"Ready?" I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
Tessia nodded, her knuckles white where she gripped the edge of her seat, her gaze fixed on the door with fierce determination. "Ready."
With a surge of will channeled through the controls, the Barbarossa's massive hands gripped the ancient stone. Runes flared along its arms, hydraulic systems whined with immense strain. With a grinding groan that echoed like the protest of the earth itself, the colossal door began to inch open, revealing only impenetrable darkness beyond. The stale, metallic stench flooded the sensors, thick and cloying. The true descent began. Not into a dungeon, but into the heart of the coming storm.
———
The Mana Stinger slid free with a hiss of contained energy, its shorter blade a stark, practical white against the suffocating gloom of the tunnel. As it ignited, pure mana blazing to life, it carved a jagged path of light through the darkness, pushing back shadows that felt less like absence and more like a physical, watchful presence. The illumination was cold, clinical, a surgeon's light in a tomb.
"Haven't you also installed some lighting artifacts along the frame?" Romulos's voice was a dry rasp in my mind, a spectral finger poking at my preparations. A silent nod was all the answer I gave him.
My thumb found the rune-engraved button on the control panel. With a soft thrum, four powerful beams snapped on, two flanking each armored shoulder of the Barbarossa. The tunnel was suddenly bathed in harsh, unforgiving light, every striation in the rock, every droplet of moisture clinging to the ceiling, thrown into stark relief. Illumination was solved, banished as a concern.
We pressed deeper into the cavern's throat, the only sounds the rhythmic clank-thud of the Barbarossa's steps and the low, constant hum of the mana core fueling it. The Dark Visor scanned relentlessly, painting the world in shifting hues of mana potential. Nothing.
Not a flicker of life, not the barest whisper of a corrupted beast's presence. It was profoundly, unnervingly empty. Like walking into a grand hall prepared for a feast, tables groaning under imagined weight, only to find dust, silence, and the chilling certainty that you were utterly, completely alone.
The emptiness wasn't peaceful; it was a vacuum, sucking at my resolve, amplifying the dread coiling cold in my gut.
"This is eerie," Tessia murmured beside me, her voice small in the vast, artificial brightness. Her unease mirrored my own, a shared tremor in the oppressive stillness. I could only grunt in agreement. This wasn't a normal dungeon, teeming with predictable threats.
And it certainly wasn't the Hearth. The hypothesis had flared briefly, a desperate attempt to categorize the unknown, and just as quickly died. We were adrift in pure, unsettling mystery.
"Let's be careful," I forced out, the words tasting like ash. "If we don't find anything… we just leave." The promise felt flimsy, a child's wish against the deepening wrongness of the place. Leaving meant carrying this unresolved dread back with us, a hidden rot too near to the Castle.
The jagged rock walls blurred into streaks of shadow as the colossal mutant lunged. A wave of putrid air, thick with the stench of corrupted mana and rotting flesh, slammed against the Barbarossa's sensors a heartbeat before impact.
"Corvis!" Tessia's shout was sharp, laced with adrenaline, but my hands were already moving.
The Mana Stinger, a sleek dagger of pure potential mounted on the dorsal spine, hummed to life. A searing beam of condensed violet energy lanced out, silent and brutal, impaling the charging horror mid-trajectory.
It vaporized with a sickening hiss, leaving only acrid smoke and a shower of molten stone where its chest had been. Outside the reinforced cockpit, the Dark Visor exploded with flaring mana signatures—dozens, scores, pulsing like infected stars in the oppressive gloom, converging on our position.
"Guess we found them," Romulos drawled, his spectral form materializing near the console, utterly unperturbed as if observing a mildly interesting street performance. His casualness was a stark counterpoint to the primal fear tightening my throat. Tessia's knuckles were white where she gripped the seat.
More shapes detached from the darkness. Minotaur-like, yes, but stripped of any mythic nobility. Hulking masses of muscle grafted onto distorted bone, covered in coarse, patchy fur slick with ichor. Their heads were slabs of bone, sprouting six jagged horns like broken spears. Eyes, when they had them, burned with mindless, corrupted hunger. Nothing human remained.
Only rage, twisted and amplified.
One behemoth charged, a living battering ram, horns lowered. The Barbarossa's exoskeleton segments whined, translating my instinct into fluid, terrifying speed. My prosthetic hand—an extension of my will within the machine—shot out. Crimson fingers, reinforced with spellforms and steel, closed like a vice around the thickest horn, arresting its momentum with a bone-jarring crunch.
Simultaneously, the other arm brought the Mana Stinger down in a brutal arc. White light flared, cleaving through mutated hide and bone. The creature simply… ceased. Annihilated. Not slain. Unmade. The raw power of it, channeled through the machine, sent a familiar, chilling thrill down my spine, quickly tempered by the sheer wrongness of the foe.
"You are scarily good with piloting this," Tessia breathed, her voice a mix of awe and apprehension. She watched the carnage unfold through the visor, the Barbarossa moving with lethal grace amidst the hulking brutes—parrying a claw swipe, crushing a skull underfoot, another Stinger blast reducing a mutant to ash.
Each movement felt less like operating a machine, more like becoming the machine. A terrifying symbiosis.
"Yeah," I grunted, focusing, using the Barbarossa's momentum to grab another mutant by its distended leg and hurl it bodily into two others charging from the flank. The impact echoed like boulders colliding.
"But if I didn't have the mana core Grey gifted me…" The thought hung, heavy with gratitude and unspoken debt. This relentless expenditure, this raw power projection… Sylvia's mana core was the furnace that made it possible. Without it, the Barbarossa would be a slow, mana-starved coffin.
"…it would have much less capacity." My movements felt fluid, almost instinctive, like the exoform was an extension of my own damaged body, granting strength where my own legs failed. I leaned the massive torso into the throw, a grotesque parody of a baseball pitch.
"Baseball?" Romulos scoffed, phasing through the holographic display. "Now you are even imagining fictional sports? Truly, the depths of your cultural contamination astound me."
I ignored him, rolling the Barbarossa's shoulders—a gesture mirrored perfectly by the machine—and pressed forward, carving a path through the seething mass of corruption towards the deeper, denser mana signature pulsing like a diseased heart. The mutant leader's den. Each step crushed stone and bone. Each Stinger blast scoured the darkness with purifying, violent light.
Tessia's voice cut through the rhythmic thrum of the core and the guttural roars. "I heard Grampa say you were working with Professor Gideon to make more of this. He called them Beast Corps." A pause. Her next words were quieter, laced with genuine concern that pierced the battle-focus. "Aren't you worried they can get out of hand?"
I froze. Not physically—the Barbarossa kept moving, crushing a smaller beast underfoot—but internally. Her point struck like a physical blow, resonating with a fear I hadn't fully articulated. It wasn't Alacrya seizing them; they lacked our native beasts, the Vritra having purged their continent long ago.
The Council. The nobles. Men like Rahdeas. The memory of the novel's dwarven lords, turning the Beast Corps for their own gain against their people, was a cold splash of dread. These machines, forged to protect Dicathen, could become the instruments of its internal destruction, wielded by those hungry for power, fueled by fear or greed. The very weapons meant as shields could become the swords at our own throats.
"That's what the Council is for..." I finally replied, the words tasting like ash in my mouth. The justification felt flimsy, a fragile dam against a rising tide of doubt. "Avoiding our weapons meant to protect our continent turning against us."