NOVEL NEXT 105 - Food Shortage
Div stumbled over his words, trying to find a way to appease Divilina. The Ascended Rank thought that he had left with her son, Rigomaros. It wasn't possible, Div hadn't set foot in Bavacium since the gathering two years prior.
En had. He had joined this year's delegation.
Now he wasn't sure how to clear the misunderstanding.
Divilina's serious gaze broke into a smile, then a chuckle. "I'm pulling your leg. Do you think I wouldn't know who my son is traveling with, Div?"
"My brother. I suppose," Div said.
"Yes, your brother. Interesting way to define your relationship. Although I guess this isn't completely wrong. But not entirely right, either."
"What do you mean?" Div asked. "Why would it be wrong?"
Divilina paused for a moment, scratching her chin.
"You were born from the same body, not the same mother," she said, slowly. "Saying that you're clones would be more accurate."
"We're more than just clones."
"Yes, you two did a wonderful job creating this skill. I'm looking forward to seeing you master it. But anyway, we need to talk about your request for shelter in Bavacium."
Lugsellos and Gennorina perked up, inching closer to the edge of their seats.
Divilina sighed, "We can welcome you in the village."
"Thank you," Lugsellos said.
"Don't thank me yet. We can welcome you, but I would recommend that you don't stay here."
Div, Lug, and Genno looked at each other in confusion before turning back to Divilina.
"The situation is dire," the elder continued. "The curse affecting those lands is forcing us to dig into our food stocks right when we should have been harvesting."
"Aside from Camboaci, I'm afraid the entire basin is in the same situation," Gennorina said.
Divilina nodded. "To varying degrees, yes. But we were thinking of abandoning Bavacium and gathering our forces in Camboaci. We will come back when the war concludes."
Div forced himself not to look at Gennorina. It was mostly for her that he was out there, he didn't want his friend to think he was blaming her for that.
Regardless, since they couldn't return to Camboaci with Suce, they would have to continue to the next village.
As if she had read his mind, Divilina added. "I believe we are not the only ones looking to put ourselves under the protection of the wall of trees. The surrounding settlements will too."
Thoughts raced in Div's mind. He needed to come up with a solution. Their options were dwindling. Going back north wasn't a good idea, east was barred for obvious reasons. That left them either continuing south until a village accepted them, or head west.
To Kheironites, everything away from the southern coast was known as the Wildlands. They didn't make the distinction. The Lien River basin, the eastern range, all the way north until the White Sea. All that was west of the Lien River was no exception.
There lay a forest, seemingly endless, teeming with beasts and legends. Human communities lived there, mostly isolated. Without a river to connect them to the wider world, even Kheironite explorers had little contact with them.
"Div?" Lugsellos asked, well aware that he had let his mind drift away.
"Sorry, I was considering our next move."
"I do have a suggestion for you," Divilina said. "Would you like to hear it?"
"Please," Lugsellos said.
"Considering the way we are being attacked, there are three places that can counter the curse. Three strongholds we'll have to rely on if we want to emerge victorious. The first is Camboaci, protected by the wall of trees' spirit. The second Kheiron, where the Leios clan's sun magic and the vast sea should be enough to feed the population. The last, to a lesser extent, is Trabine."
"Trabine?" Div blinked. He remembered the name, it was Ilmara and Seriun's hometown. The girl's echo magic had caught his attention back then.
"After so many years of gathering attuned Uepi feathers, they have developed a mastery in magical formations unmatched in the region," Divilina explained. "I believe they will have a solution."
"Trabine it is, then," Lugsellos said. "Div is banned from Kheiron, and Genno from Camboaci."
"En went to Kheiron," Gennorina argued. "I don't know how it's going for him, but maybe…"
"No," Div said, shaking his head. "Let En do his thing, we'll go to Trabine."
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It wasn't that Div didn't want to see En, but he wasn't ready to visit Kheiron again. Danger aside, all three of them wanted to make themselves useful in the war.
Gennorina's bond with Suce, the earth spirit, gave her the power to have an impact.
Lugsellos' skill had already proven its use before evolving.
As for Div, he wasn't sure, but he felt that his rot magic had the potential to counter the lifeforce drain.
"Reaching Trabine will take a few weeks," Divilina said. "We can't spare many rations for you, I'm afraid."
Div nodded. They didn't have enough to travel this far, but they would have to manage on their own. Somehow.
Before long, they were back on their boat, sailing down the Lien River.
It was empty, lifeless, bleak.
During their first night after leaving Bavacium, Theaphilia contacted Gennorina. Nobody was happy about their decision to continue to Trabine as they would soon be out of range from her skill.
But there was no choice. Even Genno's parents recognized that, without food, Bavacium wouldn't stand long.
On the third day, they crossed paths with a flotilla. Dozens of boats going up the river, toward Camboaci.
"There's still some perishables in the main storage unit," the one and only Ascended Rank elder of the flotilla told them. "We couldn't take them with us. Help yourself, better you than the mountaineers."
On the fourth, they stopped at the village that had just been abandoned.
Saying it was eerie was not enough to describe how the streets of the empty village felt.
Closer in style to Bavacium than Camboaci, it was a lot smaller. Maybe a hundred homes clustered near a cracked stone pier, a few gardens outlined in woven reed fences. Having seen its inhabitants fleeing upriver just a day prior, there was no mystery as to why the village was empty.
And yet, the way it stood—silent, intact, suspended—was profoundly unsettling.
A bucket of water sat half-spilled on a doorstep, the puddle still damp. Laundry hung stiff on the lines, flapping gently in the cold breeze. A knife was stuck halfway through a loaf of bread on a wooden counter, its crust hardened but untouched by mold. In one home, a child's game was laid out on the floor—colorful beads arranged in a spiral.
No signs of violence. No signs of haste, either. Just the quiet echo of people who had no choice but to leave things behind.
The northern wind pushed through the narrow alleys, rattling open shutters and lifting dust. One door creaked back and forth, slapping softly against the frame. Lugsellos caught it with a grimace and wedged a piece of wood under the hinge.
"Feels like they're all just… out in the fields," he said, voice low.
"I know," Div said.
Genno didn't speak. She stood still, gazing down a street littered with signs of life interrupted. A cooking pot still rested over cooled coals.
Even the animals were gone. Not a single chicken, no dogs barking from behind a fence. Just the wind, and the faint creaking of the river docks.
"Let's find the food the elder mentioned," Div said. "Then we can decide if we want to spend the night here or not."
As instructed, the storage unit was still filled with fruits, vegetables, and unpreserved meat. In the region, hunts were typically dried or salted, but both processes took time. Time the villagers didn't have.
Div inspected the food. "At least, the curse killed most of the rotlife, it will take a while for those to rot."
It gave him an idea.
"With your permission," he said. "I'd like to work on a new spell. I think it's a good opportunity to create a preservation spell."
"I don't mind," Gennorina said. "With all this food, we can even spend a few days here. There's too much for us to take, and I'd like to search for a nice rock for Suce."
"I agree too," Lugsellos said. "We've been on the move for a while now, we can take a break. That said, I suggest you experiment on some random plant before you cast your spell on our food."
"Ugh, right," Div said, kicking himself for not thinking of that sooner.
Before they could each work toward their goals, they decided to find a house to settle in. A few doors were locked, and out of respect, they wouldn't break in. But most were open. Either there was a lot of trust in this village, or the locals figured locking their doors was pointless if everyone left.
They picked a house midway between the storage unit, the river, and the forest. A coincidence, it was the first they found with three beds.
"We should get our packs and hide the boat," Lugsellos said.
Div, Gennorina, and he were on the same page. They hadn't seen any so far, but mountaineer scouts roamed the area, draining the life out of the land.
A smart strategy. Most settlements couldn't survive the lack of food. If they wanted to conquer the Lienien people, besieging only Camboaci and Trabine instead of every single village would save them a lot of time.
Unless the concentration of Ascended Ranks in both places increased to the point where the assault was too costly…
Div didn't know. He wasn't an experienced strategist. He was barely a warrior.
He shook his head. There was no point worrying about things that were out of his control. For now, all he could do was survive and get stronger.
Once they reached Trabine, he would take orders from people more qualified than he was. Hopefully, that would be enough to thwart the mountaineer lord's plans.
Or, maybe, that lord would succeed in his attempt at transcendence and leave them alone. Unlikely, but Div allowed himself to dream.
Once they had brought all their belongings to the house, the three of them carried their boat ashore and hid it under a bunch of branches. It should be enough to fool inattentive scouts. If someone was determined to scour the village, they couldn't hide their presence anyway.
It was a few hours past noon that Div sat down in front of a dozen dead flowers he had found in a garden. It was time to create his second spell, and he already had a good idea of what he wanted.
Truthfully, the lifeforce drain curse was helping him immensely. It was like using a crutch. Since the rotlife in the dead plants was already mostly inactive, suppressing what was left would require a lot less effort on his part.
Still, magic was never simple. Killing the leftover rotlife would slow down decay, but it wouldn't be enough to completely stop it. Dead matter attracted rotlife like a light in the dark. It wouldn't be long before more found their way to the plant.
No, he needed something more complex than that.
Thankfully, his experience working with cheese at the farm was birthing multiple ideas in his head.
To think he had rejected rot magic at first…
He giggled, mocking his previous self for his short-sightedness.
Rot was in his blood, the heart beating in his chest. Now that he was actively engaging with it, he could see why his bloodline was such.
He enjoyed it too much.
Just as Div focused on the first flower, pulling rot-attuned mana to shape his spell, a sharp crack echoed from the forest.