Master of the Loop

Chapter 145

It Stood Hidden

Trek through the snow was fairly easy, but it was the night that made it difficult. Still, Sylas persisted, belting his boots into the snow and imprinting the path from the castle southward. The lonesome moon in the sky reflected his own being, as for the first time in a while, he was alone. A rugged, leather backpack hung over his shoulder, packed with essentials--more so than usual since he didn’t have Asha to rain supplies from the blue sky--and a sword strapped to the belt.

The night was as calm as he remembered nights being--it was when the noise died out and nature took a hold of reality. However, he didn't stop to relish it or admire it. He was mission-bound, single-minded in his pursuit. And while the fields and the forests and the mountains and even the slightly dimmed stars behind the graying clouds were all beautiful, they didn't matter to him.

What did, however, was whether he’d find the men responsible for most, if not all of the castle’s ills, west of the village. He’d have to make sure not to approach the village, however, as he didn’t know how far out the man within could see and he didn’t want to draw his attention. As such, he’d be rounding the open fields around the village through the forest, moving directly from there into the western mountains and moving south from there.

Though he didn’t have a perfect route in mind, largely because he wasn’t familiar with the terrain there past the very surface-level depiction of it on what was a fairly unreliable map, the rough one was more than enough.

Ever so often, he'd pause, knee-deep in snow, to reorient himself properly; navigating the world without a phone, he'd long since learned, was remarkably difficult--but, over what felt like eons by this point, he had the time to adjust and adapt. This was the case with most other things; toilets were outhouses, toilet paper rugged leaves of a tree, 'freshwater' marginally brown, hearths centralized to the few, if any, important rooms while the rest of the castle was forced to wrap itself into layers of blankets, and the list went on.

He was in luck, perchance, due to the nature of loops; most of the time he was too busy trying to figure out the next clue, the next thing he would do to pay attention to the 'little' things. He almost instinctively accepted that taking a dump out in the open in the blisteringly cold wind was just... normal. After all, before all of that, he had been repeatedly murdered in far more gnarly ways that made transitioning into outdoor bathroom visitations seem like a proper vacation.

Peppered among the occasional stop he made to re-examine his position were the brief moments of reminiscence before resolve kicked back in and he pushed forward through the snow. The night, thus, turned into a day, but he didn't stop besides to eat for a brief few moments. Because of this, his pace was much quicker than before. Even still, he wasn't a machine--despite the seemingly inexhaustible bodily stamina, his mind still tired and waned and required rest.

Still, some week into his journey, he’d encountered the familiar sight of the frozen river cutting through the landscape on its journey west to east--it drained off into the ocean somewhere far away, and judging by its width, it similarly originated elsewhere far away. The very familiar forest sprawled on its other end, covering the entirety of the horizon, while sky-decked mountains framed it on both ends.

After a brief rest, he crossed the river and continued through the woods--there was no point yet in entering the mountains since they were likely beyond inhospitable and hard to traverse even for him. And though the forest at night was exceptionally eerie as he was alone, in truth... there was little, if anything, there.

Days passed as his journey southward continued. He rested infrequently and in short bursts, sleeping only ever three-four days for a few hours, but, worryingly enough, he was actually running out of supplies. In part, it was due to the fact that he’d simply severely underestimated how much he’d need due to the fact that Asha covered that portion for their journey, and in part because he was forced to eat and drink more since he expended more energy.

As such, he began to veer off from the 'road' and look for anything edible while melting snow in the empty gourds and using it as drinking water. Most of what he came across as edible were merely some roots buried in the ground and occasionally a patch of mushrooms that, he discovered, were all very, very poisonous. Luckily, he could still eat them as his body was equally good at processing that poison without many aches.

Though it wasn't a long-term solution, he wagered he was around halfway through the forest by now, and that it wouldn't be much longer until he'd leave for the mountains where, possibly, he could find some wildlife--mostly hibernating in the caves and such, he suspected.

He had difficulty gauging just how far along the journey he was, however, since he never bothered with landmarks before as it was irrelevant. In the end, somewhat frustrated, he belted westward and into the mountains, hoping that a vantage point would offer him the answers.

Arriving at the base of the mountain, he took a deep breath; scaling it would be... difficult. There was no ‘path’ that he could walk up through, at least not past the first couple of hundreds of feet. The mountain was full of jagged rocks and protrusions with seemingly occasional patches of ‘road’ in-between. Forget climbing equipment--he didn’t even have gloves for protection.

Hoping it would change further south, he continued walking along the mountain’s edge for a few days longer until a faint cleavage-like view between the mountains offered him a sight of something that floored it--it was another ‘mountain’ beyond the current stretch, deeper into the ring, but it was... more of a spire. Rather than the ordinary, pyramid-like structure, it was platformed into craggy extrusions, all framing a central, statuesque rock.

It was flat along the edges and rose straight vertically like a propped-up building, only thinning out at an angle toward the sky-bound summit. To the side, he saw the cascading platforms that looked like stairs for giants bleeding into what looked like the ‘above surface’ world in and of itself, with bridges connecting various mountains and valleys.

Furthermore, it was much, much, much taller than everything around it--and, more shockingly, despite being all that much taller, he was unable to see it from anywhere else but that singular opening between the two mountains. That is, while he should have seen the ‘tower’ looming over the surrounding area... he didn’t.

“They’re there, ain’t they?” he mumbled into the wind, sighing. Serendipity, luck, coincidence--a million tiny machinations played part in him discovering this as, otherwise, he would have been a blind man since he suspected that there was more to it all than just the basic illusion of hiding.

He settled down on top of a nearby tree with a decent view of the ‘structure’, electing to observe it for a while to see if he’d notice anything else that was strange. He sat so for a few days, only ever noticing minor things--occasional flashes of light that passed as quickly as they arrived, though could still be explained as simply as it being lightning. Once or twice, he also felt as though the mountain began to ‘vibrate’ for a moment--the movement was minuscule and, for all he knew, it was just his eyes and mind playing a trick on him.

Since long-distance observation yielded no results, and since his supplies were on their last leg, Sylas eyed a nearby mountain that appeared the easiest to climb of the bunch. He’d still have to use a lot of basic, arm-climbing without any equipment, not to mention that the mountains appeared to be covered in a sheet of ice which likely made them extremely slippery. He hoped, in the end, his body heat would melt the ice quickly enough so that he would be able to latch onto the rugged rock beneath.

Looking at the steep climb, he began to mentally map out several potential routes toward his first destination--a slight protrusion that he would be able to use as a rest point. It was some six hundred feet up by the quickest estimate and had several additional take-off points for the further climb.

Blowing hot air into his hands and stretching for a moment, he hung the backpack over his shoulders with what few supplies he had left and began the climb. The first hundred feet or so was mostly just walking up a steep, snow-ridden, uncleaned ‘path’. Though difficult and taxing, it was not all that different than just walking through the snow. After, however, the steep ‘path’ was intercepted by sudden, vertical cliffs that he had to scale without an alternate route.

Latching onto the first rock, he felt the frost tingle his fingers for a moment before his own blood began to boil, melting the ice beneath his hand. The whole ordeal took 2-3 seconds which, though not a lot by any means, was in reality far, far, far too long. Two-three seconds was enough for him to lose the grip and fall off. Frowning, he could only pray; after all, though he could regulate his body heat to a certain extent, most of it was actually automated by his instincts. The climb would be long and harrowing, and a single mistake would likely result in death--even for him. But it was a climb he had to take. There were answers beyond that he was desperately seeking, and a threat of death was far from enough to deter him.