Rising Kite - A story from the world of HWFWM

Atop a mountain peak in western Hua-Xi, the mild winter day casting them in bright light, two adherents of the gods stood facing one another. They were both gold rank, powerful beyond the scope of what mortals could comprehend. Both were present at the behest of their gods, as important clergy like them were often the one to carry the will and word of their deity. And both wore masks, even if that was where the similarities ended.

One, priestess of Discord, wore fine robes of Hua-Xi make, shimmering silks and gossamer shawls surrounding her like a halo of opulence. Her mask was a blank, porcelain white, and her rich bismuth hair was kept in an elaborate hairstyle kept in place by a multitude of hairpins. The priestess of Justice was shorter and more slight of frame to the full, voluptuous figure of the other woman. Dressed in brass-colored armor which looked like metal behaving like supple leather, her mask was instead shaped like that of a somber, statuesque woman, a slight frown hinted at in the otherwise perfect features. A hood of the same malleable metal covered the rest of her features, but the symbol of Justice hung from her neck on full display.

As the chase between silver-rankers continued off in the distance, the glittering carp and its rider gaining on their quarry, the priestess of Discord spoke.

“Is this how you and yours would use your mandate? I would have assumed that there were more valuable ways for you to leverage the wiggle room my actions would have given you. It’s just a silver-ranker of what you all call a backwater country. There should be way more you could accomplish than this with such an opportunity.” Her tone was flippant and casual, twirling her long thin pipe in one hand as it trailed a small line of shimmering smoke in the air.

“The mandate of Justice is to uphold the law and balance. And a gold-ranker traveling here to strike down a silver which she would not have any way of knowing was even here is in clear violation. The abhorrence of the strong hunting down the weak is one accepted across the world.”

“Yet there are currently silvers striking down bronzes and iron down below. Where is the justice in that?” the priestess of Discord countered.

“And had you been here already, by happenstance or plan, our paths would not have crossed, adherent of Discord. The strong and the weak will always come to clash, no matter my goddess’ will. But as I said, there is a stark difference in how you arrived here. And if Discord found the boy’s continued existence abhorrent enough to risk sending you, it should be well worth it for us who oppose you to make sure that didn’t happen. We should even thank your master, because with Knowledge acting within her domain of knowing and informing and I acting fully within my rights to prevent transgressions such as these, our gods will even end up with some more free mandate to spend against you.”

The smile was clear in the voice of Justice’s priestess, and while it irked the woman in the porcelain mask, she knew better than to act upon such impulses. Because while she was skilled with her aura for a core-user, she would not be able to hold her own against another gold who had forged their path through martial prowess. But the fact that they weren’t already locked in battle meant that the other gold-ranker was sent to curtail and limit, not assassinate, as such action would trigger a cascade of violence neither side seemed to want at the moment. There was a reason for the careful balance between the gods and how they directed their followers, after all.

But Discord’s priestess did do something, as the trail of smoke from her pipe started billowing down to gather behind her, forming a seat on which she sat down to lounge with theatrically exaggerated comfort. “Well, as there is nothing I can do here then, I might as well get comfortable for an hour before I portal back. I would offer you a seat, but I would suspect that you would prefer to remain standing?”

The lack of response from the priestess of Justice was answer in and of itself, but the woman in the porcelain mask soon found herself keeping only part of her attention on the other gold-ranker, the rest spent on taking in as much detail as she could of the adventurers and the mana-draining nuisance in particular. His familiar had caught poor Shard in a sphere of restraining water which soon led to the priest being caught in a cage of force with only the other silver-ranker as company. What followed was a systematic beatdown where the priests' attempted struggles were only turned against him as the spells and attacks he attempted only led to more precious mana being burned from his spirit.

But there was one detail that the priestess of Discord found most interesting. Every once in a while, one of the man’s many arms would produce a weapon which almost seemed like it wanted to avoid the senses. Not enough to obfuscate it from her, but she did feel at least a hint of its effects. And it was a weapon she recognized.

“That blade… That belonged to Bliss,” she thought with certainty. It was she who had commissioned it for that useless little brother of hers, after all. While she didn’t care much for the death of the much younger sibling per se, this young silver-ranker now carrying it was an important piece of evidence. “Was he present when Bliss died? Did he know before the Descending Star sect fell? Or was Bliss discovered during his failure?” she thought, adding this new information to her growing understanding. But one thing was clear; that young man now carrying Bliss’ blade meant that he was an even greater danger to their cause, and might even have been for a while.

“We will have to make sure that you and whatever little notions you have gotten into your head are drowned in conflict, little silver,” she thought, her mask hiding a slight, cold smile. Shard didn’t know overly much of their grand schemes, but if - or rather when, as things stood - the adventure society found more proof of their meddling, she had no doubt that the little annoying silver-ranker’s actions here would cause more to come sniffing at their different projects. While it would be ever so satisfying to break him herself, Justice’s intervention was a clear signal that she would have to be very circumspect about it. “Oh, if there was only a nation of overly prideful warriors which we have already been cultivating for over a century,” Discord’s priestess thought sarcastically, her cold smile turning wicked. Indeed, finding mortal instruments to nudge the way of this silver-ranker and whatever else would come knocking shouldn’t be too much trouble.

Her path of action clear, the woman with the porcelain mask sat back in her seat of shimmering smoke. Waiting. And watching.

The suspected priest of Discord attempted to block Kite’s descending staff with a forearm bracer, and that final would-be defense spelled the end of his struggles. The Veiled One’s Decree appeared in one of Kite’s spectral hands and he thrust the obfuscated blade forward. In one smooth motion, it pierced through the other silver-ranker’s chest, but no blood flowed as Cleave the Spirit ensured that it was only the man’s final dregs of mana which ran dry. Kite did note the final flash of panic that went through the man as his fate was sealed, and didn’t hesitate to snap a suppression collar around his neck as he slumped down to the floor of the force cage.

“Now we’ll see if you can eventually shed any light on the situation,” he noted, anticipation bubbling inside him. Ever since discovering the priest of Discord at the fall of the Descending Star sect, the potential threat of more of them was looming in Kite’s mind; an indistinct shadow just out of reach. Dropping onto Glint’s waiting back as he dispelled the cage of force that had been their impromptu arena in the sky, Kite laid out the unconscious man in front of him as his familiar turned back towards the mountain with the cabal’s hideout. They entered through the hole in the wall which they had come, stepping over the downed bronze-ranker who had attempted to bar their way and went back towards the hall where the team of the task group had made their entrance.

From the only sporadic sounds echoing up the tunnels, things were dying down, but Kite still met more than a few fleeing lower-rankers who soon ended up as part of the growing row of bound up, unconscious bodies towed behind him and Glint.

“Kite! How did it go?” Amica called as soon as he entered the wreck that had once been the common area, apparently having sensed him first. She flew over to alleviate his burden, picking up the unconscious cultists through her telekinesis. “Ryker, Gray Sky and Christine have gone off to clean out the place and find what hiding spots that they can.”

“Then we’ll leave them to it, but I will need to speak with all of you when they return. This one-” Kite said, gesturing to the unconscious man with the presumed aura mask, “-will need to be delivered to the adventure society. I have some people who I trust and I would like to go there first, if possible. While I can’t tell you much right now, this man might be a lead in an important investigation I intend to take a more active role in. But said destination is a bit of a trek, so I can’t just demand it of the rest of you. Heavens, things would be easier if we could just make people go through a portal.”

Kite settled into helping the remaining team members clear up what they could of the small battlefield, now that the once placid cultist hideout was thoroughly destroyed. Given the number of dead among their foes, it was a grim task even though Amica once more did the leonid’s share of the work in creating disturbingly neat stacks of the slain. Meanwhile, Kite’s ever-hungry vortices kept those alive and collared empty of mana and unconscious. After a while, he fell into meditation as the wait dragged on, the serenity only broken when Ryker and the others returned.

“Amica told me that you went off to fetch a suspected priority target,” his teacher and team leader called as he drew closer. “I take it that is him?” Ryker finished, nodding to the lone silver-ranker among their still living foes.

“It is, and there is a bit of a complication moving forward. To tell you the full story, we would have to find a sanctum of Knowledge, but what I can say is that we need to get him to one of the local branches, preferably one in Gilded to the north or Bastion to the east.”

“Which means no portal,” Ryker said, apparently deciding to take Kite’s vague explanations in stride. Kite was actually a bit touched by the trust the man showed in his lack of questioning the need for such a detour. “Had this been a more coordinated contract rather than whatever happened to land us here, we would probably have support teams present to take care of that. But as things are, we’ll have to improvise. We can’t just bring all of the remnants,” the stern man said, gesturing to the stacks of fallen cultists,” but do you think you could transport us and the priority one with your vessel?”

“It will be cramped, but doable,” Kite confirmed. “But I know that this is a bit beyond the call of what the contract entailed, so I don’t-”

“Oh, relax Kite. We’re here now, so we might as well see things through,” Christine said, the blonde elf walking up to lean casually against the side of their stiff team leader. “Besides, we rarely get to actually see much of the places we’re visiting. So you’ll even get the chance to show us around!”

Either the rest of the team agreed or no one dared to voice any other opinion, so Kite bowed again to each of them in turn. “Once more, I am in your debt.”

“Which you can begin paying off when we get to a temple of Knowledge,” Ryker said in response. “If what you’re referring to is the reason for disturbingly well-supplied cabals such as this, then I at least want to know the full story.”

“Of course, teacher,” Kite agreed quickly. While knowing more about the potential conspiracy might be dangerous, the fact remained that elites from a task group such as Gauntlet were probably some of those least endangered by such knowledge. Facing the adherents of the shunned gods was every-day work for them, after all. If one could ever call facing down murderous, civilization-threatening congregations of cultists normal, that is.

“My life… is pretty awesome,” Dragonfly over Sun’s Reflection thought as she spun through the pack of wood elementals, reveling in how normal it felt to take on a pack of civilization-threatening monsters these days. Each spin of her axe propelled her forward into the next, with her animated, conjured greataxe spinning its own deadly circle around her in the opposite direction. The growing pack of hostile, living trees had become an unexpected bother for some of the farming communities north of Orchard as the mild winter led to them already preparing the fields and orchards for spring, and the contract to take out the weaker silver-ranked pests felt tailor-made for Dragonfly. She knew it would be easy though, almost too easy as her powers of flame and her weapon of choice made her the bane of the plant monsters.

But today wasn’t about pushing herself though. No, today was more about getting to show off a bit.

“How you have grown, little Dragonfly,” Force of Raging Torrent said with a wistful smile once Dragonfly had finished tearing through the monsters and absorbed the remaining flames from both their remnants and the trees around them. “Reaching silver as such at young age too. It does make a master proud.”

“I’m really doing my best, master Force,” Dragonfly replied while absolutely glowing under the praise of her long-time teacher and adoptive parent. “And besides, you would have been silver way earlier if you hadn’t slowed down to train me. No one would have batted an eye if you chose to pass me onto one of the church of Fertility’s orphanages.”

As she spoke, she sat down next to the older woman and accepted a big chunk of dried, spicy meat. While she bit down on the salty goodness, Force replied:

“After seeing you, all torn up but defiant? No, Dragonfly. You know I haven’t regretted my decision. As I’ve said to you many times, our lives can be long, and it is up to oneself on how to spend them. And no matter what, there will always be ebb and flow; times of consolidation and times of pushing. To reach the heavens, you need a proper foundation of both spirit, path and fist. Or axe, in your case,” she clarified even though it was a saying Dragonfly had heard many times before.

“Still, know that I am ever grateful,” Dragonfly said, leaning into the older woman where she sat at her side. They remained silent for a while, enjoying the feeling of chilly winds and the clear winter day, a sensation which would be rather unpleasant before silver-ranked bodies.

“You did say before though that something still felt missing,” Force noted. “Even though I could clearly see both your body and aura veritably singing as you fought the elementals. My fiery, passionate Dragonfly at work.”

“Sure, I think I got the flow-part figured out. When I fight monsters, literally what I swore to do that day, things are great. But it is in the lull between contracts that something feels missing. We always need to rest and there are other parts of my life where I feel like I’m floundering. The guild does help, as there are always things to be done. And having Kite around is nice too. I suppose that I’m still seeking something more than that though. Something that is mine.”

“The path to the heavens isn’t built in a day, Dragonfly, and neither is a life. I know that you hate it when I counsel patience, yet I find myself doing that yet again.”

“I know. I actually know,” Dragonfly said with a sigh.

“But I do have one piece of advice, if you’d like it,” Force said, continuing as she felt Dragonfly nod where she leaned into her side. “Don’t be afraid to search for inspiration in others. Your place in life doesn’t have to spring up from inside you alone. See how people take on life and listen to their stories. Try things out and live through new experiences. Don’t strive for something unique for uniqueness sake, but for that which you find resonates with you. With lives like ours, you’ll probably face plenty of times such as these to find or re-adjust what is meaningful to you.”

As Force finished, there was silence once more, but as the younger woman was clearly thinking things through, Force gave her some time.

“Thanks, master,” Dragonfly eventually said, sitting up straight and looking up towards the sun in the sky above them. “I suppose that I’ll just have to continue living and find all those things. It’s just frustrating to once again have to practice patience. Still, I am very grateful. And thank you for sending me the message earlier. I would have hated to have missed saying goodbye before you left the country.”

“And thank you, Dragonfly, for taking the time to meet with your sentimental old master. When leaving for new horizons, it is easy to get a clearer picture of all you walk away from.”

“Please come back to visit, though?”

“Of course. But who knows? Maybe it will be you that will come and find me first out there somewhere in the wider world, full of opportunity.”

“Oh I hope so,” Dragonfly said, smiling. “But it will probably still be a while. I did hint at important things happening here at home, and I wouldn’t miss them for the world. Hopefully we can really start getting into things when Kite gets back.”

“It should be just around those cliff peaks,” Ara said to where Peak sat beside her at the back of her flying turtle familiar. The rest of the support teams were spread out on two more flying mounts as they flew low over the mountains of western Hua-Xi. Ara did not have the full picture, but branch director Temren had been most clear in their need for discretion, even arranging for portaling them out while under the cover stories of going on different contracts. All to support some wild cards who came in and started risking a proper ruckus.

“We should be ready to dive straight into combat,” Peak said from beside her, his sharp features eager. “The branch director doesn't pay us so well for nothing. We might even show up those task groupers.”

“Focus on the job first and glory second,” Ara reminded her companion with a friendly nudge. “I know you’re a local too, but don’t let pride get to your head.”

“I promise I’ll behave,” Peak said with a roll of his eyes. “But maybe just one duel if there is time?”

“Peak, If you-” Ara began, but fell silent as they crested another mountain peak and saw what could only be part of a cliff face blown wide open. Taking in the destruction and distinct lack of active combat, the support teams still approached with all the stealth they could. Peak disappeared from her side, the stealth specialist entering early to scout things out. The rest of the teams waited a tense two minutes as agreed, but when Peak didn’t signal them, they descended and started fanning out to secure the area. This proved unnecessary, however.

“The defensive formations are down,” one of the team members called from the side.

“No movement or auras here.”

“Here either.”

“And nothing further into the complex,” Peak said when he appeared at Ara’s side.

“That would have surprised me. Just look at all those corpses,” Ara said, indicating the stacks which none of the team had yet to go near. But even from afar, they could see plenty of signs of undead and other horrors scattered among them, making it obvious that this hadn’t just been some well-meaning little hidden congregation of hermits. “No sign of the task group?”

“Only the marks of combat. One wall was blown out from the inside a bit into the northern tunnel with one dead bronze-ranker left in front of what used to be the door.”

Ara sighed, but wasn’t really surprised. “Well, I suppose we just went from support to cleanup, then.” Her words elicited a series of sighs and groans from the others, and Ara flared her aura a bit to stifle the complaints. “We get paid either way, so get to it. Branch director Temren will want our report as soon as possible. And I don’t think I need to reiterate her wish for discretion. When we’re done here, there better be no sign of this place even having existed at all. Let the directors handle the rest.”

Jarvan LanCaire, director of the adventure society branch in Gilded had assumed that the winter day would be a boring one. His schedule for the day involved a lot of paperwork in regards to approving the latest batch of members that had come from the entrance tests the day before, a meeting with a representative from the Victorious Sunset sect to discuss how to move forward in regards to their agreements in the assignment of contracts, lunch with his wife, handling a matter of complaints by a local merchant family in regards to why their child wasn’t allowed to join the Autumn Wanderer’s guild, a staff meeting of the local functionaries and making an appearance at the retirement party of one of the elder scribes who had worked for the adventure society all his life.

However, it did turn out that having a local adventurer boy turned silver-ranker show up out of nowhere with a team of seven more silvers in tow while wishing to use the holding cells of the Gilded branch to store a number of cultists, one of them another silver-ranker and possibly a priest of Discord, did make the day quite a lot more exciting.

“Well, it’s not every day we get to clean the dust from one of the silver holding cells,” Jarvan said as he sat down in one of the chairs. While the one in his office was a lot more comfortable, he had to agree with Kite that taking the ensuing meeting directly to the temple of Knowledge and its inner domain was wise.

The adventurers from the task group were a mixed bunch, but from what they showed in their auras, a skilled bunch at that. Especially the leonid woman raised Jarvan’s hackles with her aura promising withering death to all who broke her creed. Having been married to a priestess for over two decades now, he knew a member of the clergy when he saw one, even if she didn’t ostensibly wear any symbols to indicate her faith.

“Something in the aura, I suppose,” he thought, turning back to Kite. “And I assume that we chose this location so that we could clue in your new friends as to why one particular of you prisoners might be of interest?”

“As they have come all this way, I would say that they deserve to know,” Kite agreed.

“If it is of any help to the esteemed adventurers, my Lady Knowledge has no interjections,” an iron-ranked local acolyte of the goddess supplied from where she was trying very hard to remain unnoticed in her corner, unused to the company of so many silver-rankers in one place.

“Thank you, acolyte. You conveying the words of the venerable goddess is most appreciated,” Kite said, his smile causing her to shrink down into her robes to hide her blush before he turned back to his companions. “That said, I believe it is time I told you of what we have discovered here and why we deem it proper to investigate further. While it all began with what seemed like local politics, I believe that you will understand my concern when we tell you the full story.”

And so, Kite told them about the war with the Fallen sect and the subsequent troubles with the Descending Star sect and the odd spiritual affliction which the church of the Healer had been hard at work stamping out these last few years. And finally, of the priest of Discord which he and Dancer on the Broken River had discovered, and their suspicions of some larger scheme at work.

“Ugh, did I say that I hate Discord’s clergy,” Christine groaned in exasperation as Kite finished his telling.

“You haven’t even fought them,” Mtanga pointed out from where he sat next to her.

“No, and I still hate them. So sneaky and cunning. This does sound just like them though,” the blonde elf noted.

“While Discord is heinous, Gray Sky still disapproves that you even considered working alongside a follower of Pain,” the runic said with a deep frown. “Had Gray Sky chosen, both would have been left as shattered gravel in my wake.”

“You know as well as we do that contracts, especially incidents like that, can get messy,” Ryker retorted, once more surprising Kite as he came to his defense, continuing to silence any further complaints from the rigid runic. “Should things be as you fear, it sounds like you do indeed have a complicated mess on your hands. Discord’s followers tend to root themselves deeply when possible.”

“And that is what we hope to uncover more of,” Kite agreed. “As long as the plan is still underway?”

The question was directed at Jarvan, who nodded in response. “It is, but as you know, this is something we local branches need to start uncovering by ourselves. While I assume that there are plenty within the larger adventure society who’d like to come down with the hammer on this country, the fact remains that we are an organization of volunteers whose purpose isn’t to start smacking countries around.”

“Even if we would like to, at times,” Ryker added.

“Even if we would like to,” Jarvan agreed. “And even then, Hua-Xi would come surprisingly far down on the list. As you’re part of Gauntlet, you know that there are plenty of worse places in the world, hiding Discord priests or not.”

“What will we do with the prisoner then, director Jarvan?” Kite asked, bringing the conversation back to his original line of inquiry. “Do you have what you need to extract what he knows here?”

“We do,” Jarvan began, but Kite could sense the ‘but’ in the pause that followed. “Still, this is something which I will have to clear with Anasta Temren in Heavenward. She has left it mostly up to us to start probing the smaller cities here in the more rural parts of the country. But with you bringing Gauntlet here like this, she’ll no doubt want to get involved. And while we may have our differences, Anasta is good at her job. There is a reason that she had managed to keep her seat as the director in Hua-Xi’s capital, after all. And her facilities and resources are a lot better too. I intend to contact her as soon as this meeting is over.”

“I… see,” Kite said, and Jarvan obviously didn’t miss his hesitation.

“I see that you’ve met her,” the director said with a chuckle. “Did she give you trouble?”

“No, not per se. But she seemed rather… skeptical of me, both in how suitable a local like me would be for joining the task group and how I conducted myself in general. Are you sure she will take this seriously?” Kite asked, putting his worries into words.

“That’s definitely Anasta for you. She’s way better at politics than me, which means that she is a lot better at using people to get the results she needs. She would have to, in order to wrangle the sects and the courts of the capital,” Jarvan explained. “But don’t worry Kite. She will assist in this. She’ll probably grumble a bit, but that doesn’t mean any less assistance.”

“But what will we do in the meantime?” Emilio said as he broke into the conversation. “Anything we can scout out in the meantime? Because I don’t think any of us just want to sit around while the administrators work things out. No offense, director.”

“We-” Ryker began as Jarvan only chuckled at the elf’s words,”- will return to port Singhni. Our portal courier will only wait for so long, and our contract is over. We located and eliminated the threat, and have now even delivered prisoners to a local branch. This means that Gauntlets’ work is over.”

“Besides, we do still need to write up your final evaluations and have sir Darnos decide on the matter of your memberships,” Christine added. “I mean, I think you all passed with flying colors, but that isn’t only up to us. But Ryker is right in that this is something for the locals to keep handling. And Kite too, I suppose, when you get back. Unless some local power requests that Gauntlet come here on a contract, this will be out of our hands.”

While he looked quite disappointed at her words, Emilio still nodded at the end.

“Unfortunately, the odds of the king or one of the sects doing that is rather low,” Jarvan noted with some dissatisfaction. “Still, if we can find enough evidence we might be able to either change that or gain access to some funds from the continental council to add some contracts of our own. But mister Lansar here is right in that you’d do best to just continue on for now. There will probably be a few weeks before we have gotten everything we could from you captive.” Noting the continued look of concern on Kite’s face, he added; “But don’t worry, Kite. I mean to give you plenty of work on this matter going forward. Braid and Wander among others are already investigating every lead and whisper we have gotten hold of so far. And who knows, it might even make your stay with the task group feel like a nice and exotic vacation.”

Rising from his seat, Jarvan nodded to each member of the team. “If there is nothing else, I believe that I have just gotten an excellent reason to clear much of my schedule for today with the exception of a very nice retirement party. Please convey my thanks to your supervisors. While it was a bit out of the ordinary, your quick action might prove to have given us just what we needed.”

Only when he was halfway out the door did Jarvan stop and call back; “Oh, and don’t forget your portal courier. She seemed to be the type to wander off.”