Aether Engineering

Chapter 60

Maston Academy

The Town of Maston in the Candis East District

Terris was in position over the mound, twin blades in hand. Thanks to the detailed information in their books, they knew exactly how the gestoud would be buried. Kate signaled her readiness and was followed close behind by both Seth and Tullis.

Terris gathered himself up, leaping onto the top of the mound. Terris’ blade flashed in the remaining sunlight. With a roar of pain, the gestoud revealed itself, blood coming from where Terris had cut through one of its most powerful weapons, the tubelike organs that directed its sound blasts.

Terris tried to stay on the beast’s back to cut off the other tubelike organ, but the monstrous frog was too strong. Terris was sent skyward, launched by the beast’s strength. Before he even hit the ground, the gestoud had swiveled around. The organ on its back pulsed, launching a sonic attack towards its enemy.

Kate evoked pure mana around Terris’ head, defending him against the blast. The defense held and a moment later, Terris hit the ground, throwing his weapons to the side to avoid impaling himself.

Kate pulled out her spear, the same one Myles had used back in Hydrabridge. She moved forward in a charge, but she was too slow. The gestoud launched itself with its powerful legs, soaring over her head. Kate immediately moved into the iron turtle, evoking mana around her ears.

She was just in time. A wall of sound blasted over her, tearing her pure mana apart. The wall was followed by another, then another. As she started to panic, her pure mana depleting, the gestoud was finally forced away by a fireball blasting into its side.

Its attention swung to Seth who had used their other spear construct to singe the beast’s hide. It roared its defiance, moving its remaining sound organ to line up a shot. It was too slow though. Tullis had caught up, swiping at it with shorter weapon. The thick dagger cut through easily, destroying the gestoud’s ability to launch sound attacks.

The gestoud ignored Tullis who hastily moved out of the way as the frog charged towards Seth, fangs ready. Seth managed to snake step to the side, avoiding the charge, but he was struck by the desperate creature at the last minute, launched from a kick delivered through its long hind legs.

Seth rolled through the mud, grasping at his back. Kate grimaced. He had been commuting quite a lot of pure mana, so she guessed that he would be fine, but he had still been hit hard.

Kate rushed forward again, activating her spear mid-sprint. A fireball shot out, hitting the gestoud squarely in the side of the head, its skin drying out as it crackled with flames. It was gone before Kate got close enough to deliver a killing blow with her spear though. Kate growled with frustration. She needed to move faster.

Tullis was well-positioned and managed to waylay it before it could sink its fangs into the stunned Seth. Tullis dodged its strikes, keeping it at bay with an impressive defense using his two weapons. Terris joined his brother, landing a few shallow strikes to the gestoud’s hind legs.

The beast tried to turn, but the sudden pain from its hind legs and the ligaments that Terris had torn through kept it from reacting. As Kate closed the distance, Terris clambered on top of its back from behind with a series of agile bounds. It made to swat him, but that just opened it up to an attack from Tullis. He dashed in, sliding through the mud underneath the thing’s neck and slicing up. A fountain of blood came from its neck at the same time Kate finally reached it, plunging her spear deep into the gestoud’s chest. It went still

After they had checked on Seth who seemed to be mostly ok, just shaken up, they got to work on extracting the monster’s core. It took them more time to do than Kate had hoped. As it turned out, the gestoud’s core was further back than they had realized. By the time Kate managed to pull the core out, night had fallen.

The group wasn’t concerned about getting the core back to Granite in time. After all, the man they knew was much more interested in the job getting done right than he was in how fast it was done.

As they made their way back, Kate found herself walking next to Terris. “Hey.” She said tentatively.

“Hey.” Terris replied in a mumble. It seemed that much of what he said came out that way.

“You did great out there. I was amazed at how you were able to dash up on that thing’s back like that.” Kate meant the praise. She was the fastest among her dormmates, but not even she would have been able to pull that off so quickly.

Terris seemed to get some measure of confidence from Kate’s word, straightening up just a little. When he spoke again, it wasn’t so much a mumble. “Tullis and I have always been quick. I’m pretty sure that’s why we were scouted for this.” Terris gestured around them. “We were given a lot of training though too. From the moment we arrived, we’ve been run through all kinds of obstacle courses. Our combat instructor is determined to make sure we can fight on any terrain. He pushes us crazy hard.”

Kate grinned. “I can relate. We’re constantly…”

Kate was interrupted by Tullis. “Look guys. I think someone’s approaching us.”

Kate frowned. It seemed odd that anyone would try to approach them out here. None of the other student’s should have been this far out. Sure enough though, the figure of a man could be seen in the distance, slowly walking towards them.

“Everyone, run!”

The shout was Reah’s voice, and she suddenly appeared before them. By the time Kate had deciphered her words it was too late. She felt a sudden sharp distinct, blazing pain, the pain of a neck being snapped. It wasn’t Kate’s neck, but the pain was just as bad. A moment later, Kate fell to her knees, dragged down by a sensation she had only felt once before.

A cacophony of images poured across Kate’s mind. A woman in the mask of a rabbit, a smiling father, throwing a ball with a twin brother. The memories were being pushed by something, something indescribably horrible. A twisted darkness pushed itself into Kate’s mind, bringing with it a cold that seemed to freeze her into place.

This was a feeling that Kate knew. The worst feeling, she had ever known, worse than any injury that had come into her mother’s clinic, worse than anything she had felt since. It was all consuming, and it didn’t let her go. She tried to block it off with the techniques Reah had shown her, but it was useless. A wave of darkness tore through her, crashing into her mind, relentlessly scattering the existence of a human, disintegrating it. She didn’t come to until the process had finished, until every last trace of that human was wiped away, obliterated.

The first thing that Kate saw was Terris. Where right before he had been standing next to her talking, now he was face down in the mud. His neck wasn’t just broken, it was shattered. It hung loosely from his torso, jaggedly curving in the wrong direction.

Kate couldn’t do anything. All she could do was rock back and forth, holding her knees and shuddering there in the mud. She didn’t have the sense to run or even the sense to look around her. For all she knew, she would feel that horrible sensation again, this time for herself.

A long time seemed to pass by before Kate felt any change. Eventually, a pair of arms wrapped around her from behind. Reah’s voice whispered in her ear calmingly. “Its ok Kate. Its over. You’re safe.”

Kate slowly came to, eventually climbing back to her feet. Her aether well was completely drained. Kate had a vague memory of evoking all of her mana, surrounding herself in a shell, trying to protect herself.

Reah helped her to her feet. An older man stood by Tullis who was sobbing uncontrollably, unable to look away from his brother’s body. Seth was left to carry Terris as they made their way slowly back to Maston.

Seth was remarkably gentle, carrying Terris with great care. His face was filled with a complex look of intense rage, sadness, and regret.

Kate supposed her own expression simply looked dead. She had no emotion to give right now. She felt that she was utterly spent. She didn’t even dare to think. She wanted to avoid the memory of what she had been through.

…

Silas was on his way back to the dorm after having dinner with Mercy when he heard a commotion. He listened carefully, gathering that it was coming from the entrance to the academy.

As part of his training, Silas had been told to pay attention to things like this. Mr. Habe had said that whenever emotions ran high, significant changes happened.

Myles and Mercy pushed their way through a small crowd to see…Kate, Seth, Reah, and a boy that Silas didn’t recognize being steered by an older man, maybe a teacher. In his arms, Seth carried a body.

Silas felt his heart start beating faster, worry coming over him. “That’s Kate. What’s wrong with her?”

Beside him, Mercy shook her head. “I don’t know.”

Kate looked horrible. She was shaking too bad to even stand up on her own. Reah was having to half-carry her. Silas made a decision, pushing his way forward to give Kate another shoulder to lean against.

“Are you alright?” He whispered into her ear. “Hurt anywhere?”

Kate didn’t respond, just shivering.

Silas flinched back as a man landed on the pathway having leaped over the gathering crowd. The man had an air of undeniable authority to him coupled with a distinct strength. “Move along!” The man shouted, and the crowd dispersed, unwilling to disobey him.

As the crowd of students walked off, Silas heard a handful of whispers. From them, he gathered the term unbreakable general, and his heart jumped into his throat. The unbreakable general had been the man who had led the province’s armies to victory against impossible odds in the railway war. He was said to be the strongest arcaner in the entire province, a man who had reached the very peak of human strength.

“Let’s get this taken care of shall we.”

…

By the time Myles and Jane got back to the dorm, things had settled down. Kate was in her room with Reah who had yet to leave her side. Seth had been waiting for the pair to get back, not wanting to give a full recounting of events more than once.

Myles felt sick as her heard the story. It was so sudden, so indiscriminate. Some random person had just walked up, killed Terris from a distance and ran away? There was no sense to it.

Reah walked out of Kate’s room, gesturing for them to call down. “Kate had a hard time of it because of her higher connection. She felt Terris as he was dying.”

Myles closed his eyes. He couldn’t imagine what that might feel like.

Later that night, Reah pulled Myles and Jane to the side. “I wanted you to know that we figured out who did this.”

Myles paused. “Why wouldn’t you tell the others then?”

Reah shook her head. “I can’t, or rather they wouldn’t be able to understand.”

Jane took in a choking breath. “The organization?”

Reah nodded. “It was one man in particular, someone who you met.”

Myles had a feeling he knew where this was going. He felt like he could hear that inhuman voice again. He had claimed that he would have killed them. Myles hadn’t realized just how serious the man had been.

“It was the enforcer, Ivory Force.”