Chapter Text
When the Silver Eagles got the report of an ancient castle appearing in the forbidden realm, Nozel was intrigued. The location itself was interesting: close to where the original Royal City was believed to have been hundreds of years ago, although its exact location had been lost to time. That could mean that they would be exploring the place of his ancestors. Of course, it could just as likely be an old fortress castle, left to time and the elements, with nothing inside it. But the Department of Magic’s assignment team was being cautious. They chose the Silver Eagles for the recovery mission due to the castle’s location making it high risk. So Nozel put together a strong team, and led the expedition himself.
When he and his squad arrived before the dungeon, two things were abruptly clear. The first was that this building did not only contain powerful magic; it was powerfully magical. The very mana radiating from its walls was suffocating. While their arrival triggered no active magic phenomena, it didn’t need to; ancient power pressed upon them, deep and indomitable even in this passive state. The second thing about the structure was that it was extremely dilapidated: bricks crumbling to dust; plants rooted deep in the decaying walls, pushing aside brick and mortar; windows sprinkled with glass long ago reduced to dust, the wooden panes in which they once sat rotted to nothing. Walls slumped and rose, long ago heaved to unsteady angles. There were no right corners left anywhere on the three-story exterior. Much of the stone roof had collapsed into itself. What was not stone had long ago rotted away. There were no doubts in anyone’s minds that the lightest misplaced weight could bring this entire structure down on their heads.
But the Silver Eagles were nothing if they were not confident, so powerful mana and crumbling walls would not slow them down. Once they had gained all the possible information they could from the outside of the building, including a detailed interior map via their stone mage, they had a route plotted. It appeared that something within the dying castle was extremely powerful, and the path to it was direct, straight through the main room. There did not appear to be anything else of note within. They could stick close together, keep up their guard, get the artifact, and get out. Then, they would perform a controlled collapse. A simple mission. Nozel supposed they’d be done within an hour.
With their initial assessment complete, the Silver Eagles gathered outside the castle. Solid was practically vibrating with excitement on Nozel’s left side; dungeon crawls were his younger brother’s favorite kind of mission. Somehow his royal status and years in the magic knights had not robbed him of his childlike wonder for a treasure hunt. Nebra, easily amused by his excitement, wore a curious smile on Nozel’s other side. The four other members of his squad were no less eager, although they hid it better. He kept his tone careful and controlled, forcing professionalism upon them. “Our mission is to get the magic artifact within the building and leave. No one is to divert from the path. If there are other treasures within this building, we will recover them after it is brought down. I do not intend to trigger an uncontrolled collapse. Understood?”
His magic knights saluted. Nozel straightened and took the first careful step into the castle. His brother and sister fell in line behind him, and the other knights followed.
Even in its rotting state, there was no denying that this castle had once been beautiful. The large, open front room, now devoid of a roof, gave the impression that the heavens were opening up for them. Holes in the walls marked where several large, elegant doors must have led to the separate wings. A stone walkway stubbornly clung to the crumbling walls that made up the front room-- both a place of defense and casual observation. It was open, welcoming, and grand.
When the knights had filed inside, Nozel looked to Nebra. She nodded, and her grimoire flipped open. Eyes on the page, she lifted her hands. Magic gathered in her palms.
Mist Magic: Spider’s Unmasking Threads.
The room filled with a thin, light mist. Usually in a dungeon, this spell would form thick clouds along the floors and walls, pointing out exactly where boobytraps were hidden. But it didn’t do that here; instead, it hovered lazily in the magic-heavy air, except in one spot, where it gathered so thickly that it was hard to tell what laid beyond it. Nozel watched the mist spread with narrow eyes, and then he continued down their plotted path. His knights, fascinated and assuaged, followed confidently behind.
The mist marked the only remaining door in the room as a place of densest magic: a thick, metal door, darkened with age but not weakened. As they approached, it was clear that it was not the door that was attracting the mist; it was whatever was behind it. Nozel surrounded the door frame with mercury, allowing his magic to bear the weight of the unsteady stone, before he formed a key in the keyhole and pulled it open. The building heaved, and the door scraped defiantly against the uneven ground, but to Nozel’s relief, the building didn’t lean into his mercury. Slowly he withdrew it, and when the wall remained still, he and his knights let out a breath. He peered into the room.
Despite everything else about the castle having aged to dust, this room was so well-preserved that it hadn’t yet decayed past the stage of rot. An old wooden desk, taking up a majority of the room, stood on weak legs. Its surface bowed like the back of an old workhorse, and the bottoms of its drawers had rotted out, spilling their contents onto the floor. The metal quills of pens were all that remained. The smell of rotting glue flavored the air, wafting from the book shelf behind the desk. The books had ceased to be anything but decaying mush decades ago; those with leather covers were all that distinguished one book from another. A couple shelves had already collapsed, and the rest would not last much longer. A rug underfoot served no purpose but to stink up the room further. Its once bold colors were reduced to a putrid brown. There were no windows, but several empty candle holders still hung on the walls. One adorned the corner of the desk.
In the seconds that Nozel had before Nebra’s mist flooded the room, he took in, in their entirety, the two other things that there were left to see. The first sat in the middle of the desk, its base pressed into the soft, rotting wood. Sitting atop the broad brass base was a crystal ball. It looked untouched by time, and it was not hard to see that that was due to its powerful magic aura. Nozel thought that he saw the clear crystal orb’s insides shifting before Nebra’s mist surrounded it, but it was hard to tell for sure. The second thing to note in the room was the crumbled, disintegrating form of a skeleton, its head having long ago fallen from its spine. Seated in the chair pulled into the desk, it was nearly reduced to dust. Its decomposition, however, had slowed near its hands, which laid on either side of the crystal ball, blackened and leathered.
Nozel took advantage of the narrow doorway and shifted his stance to keep his siblings from crossing the threshold of the room. “Nebra, dispel.”
Tilting her head in a transparent attempt to catch a glimpse of the room, she did as she was told. The mist dissipated, and the skeleton and the crystal ball appeared through the fog once again.
Solid, peering over his brother’s shoulder, let out a low whistle. “Cliche.”
Nozel rolled his eyes. He lifted his hand, motioning the others back. It was clear that whatever this thing was, it would have a powerful hold on whoever got too close. He did not intend to take any chances. Luckily, they had come prepared. “Solid, the chest.”
Solid pulled from his satchel a bulky wooden box. The black velvet interior radiated powerful magic; the lock was made of the strongest metal that the Clover Kingdom could craft. This device was designed to hold magic artifacts. It wasn’t like this was the first time that magic knights had discovered an item that could have a sway on a mage, and their caution was a lesson written in blood. Solid set it down by the door of the room and backed up. The other magic knights shadowed his movement.
Mercury pooled around Nozel’s feet and snaked into the room. He could feel the magic power radiating off of this object, rattling the molecules of his mercury. He was glad for his caution. But it struck him, as his magic surrounded the crystal ball with care, that it wasn’t buffeting his magic away; it was drawing it in. Softly, like a siren’s song.
He didn’t let his urgency break his concentration. The object came away from the rotting desk with a moist pop, and he drew it out of the room with care. It seemed to love his magic; his mercury followed the shifting and swirling within the sphere like it was dancing with it, and Nozel found it difficult to still his own magic. Through the extension of his magic, the object felt like a warm embrace; a familiar friend. He’d never encountered anything that felt this way.
It wasn’t until the artifact passed through the threshold of the room that he realized the walls were crumbling.
Nebra’s cry made his head shoot up. The Silver Eagles were backpedaling, hovering near the center of the room where the crumbling walls couldn’t yet reach them. Magic shields came to life as the east wall of the castle collapsed, and the north followed like a row of dominoes. Stones and brick ricocheted into the air, and the castle roared a mighty death rattle. Nebra cupped her hands around her mouth and made her voice rise above the cacophony. “Nozel! Come on!”
Stone fell around the metal doorway. Nozel leapt out of the way and darted for the wooden chest, the crystal ball still cocooned in his mercury by his shoulder. “I’m right behind you. Get out!”
Trusting their captain’s judgement, the magic knights darted for the exit. Thick dust blotted out the light as the collapsing walls disintegrated to dust. A tower connected to the east wall fell across the main room, cutting off Nozel from the knights. The ground shook as the stones scattered across the floor, and the entrance started to crumble. Those of the knights with strong defensive spells hung back, shielding their comrades from the falling debris as everyone stumbled out of the doorway. They ran until they were free of the thick dust, and when the air cleared they collected, wiping muddy tears from their faces and coughing until the grit didn’t constrict their lungs.
Through the dust, the castle kept falling. Each tower fell into the main room, throwing up more dirt until finally the entire structure was obscured in stony smog. The earth rumbled like the quaking was coming from beneath, and Nebra, along with several other knights were thrown to their knees. Solid stared, thick, clear tears keeping his vision unmuddled, as the obscured castle finally finished its descent to the ground.
The castle grew still all at once. There was no rumble of pebbles settling. No crackle or thumping as stones lost their purchase. Just sudden, damning, silence.
Solid spoke first, his voice cracking from the dust caking his throat. “Where is he?”
Nebra lifted her head, blinking dirty tears off her long lashes. “Nozel?” When no one answered her, she climbed to her feet. Her voice grew to a discordant boom. “Nozel!?”
Behind them, the Silver Eagles stared in helpless confusion.
She grit her teeth and pressed her curled fingers to her lip, voice cutting as she whirled on them. “Where is he!?”
Still, the four faces staring back at her offered nothing.
“Nozel!” Solid’s scream thundered through the trees, louder, bolder, and more afraid than Nebra’s could ever be. “ Nozel!”