Chapter 54: Attuning
’Aegis, how’s our daily analysis of Devil’s micro-movements coming along?’ Zephyr asked just as they paused at the sound of a distant beast cry. Zephyr had made it a point to never evade beast territories he’d spotted traces of until it was glaring enough to be spotted by a regular person. He wanted Smiling Devil to know as little as he could about his capabilities.
Analysis of micro-movement patterns show variation within the normal and acceptable range. His injuries still seem to be real.’ Aegis replied promptly.
’Hmm... Alright. Please notify me whenever anything changes.’ Zephyr instructed.
After a few momentary pauses, they finally reached the entrance that led to their cave. Zephyr went through the regular motions of checking the surroundings, hiding the wheelchair, and resetting the little details he put in place to quickly tell if anyone had been around before hefting Smiling Devil onto his shoulder and starting the climb up through the dark network of cramped tunnels and crevices.
They arrived at their little haven some time later, with Zephyr dropping Smiling Devil down and settling himself in his own side of the cave. The constant thundering sound and mist of water from the fall gave him some sense of solace. This far into the cave, they could hear themselves talk fairly clearly, but they still had to speak louder than normal. The stray jets of water were also mostly at the mouth of the cave— only the mist reached them where they slept.
After settling into his side, he and Smiling Devil ate their evening meal consisting of a loaf of bread and some beef jerky— two portions for Zephyr due to his large appetite. The jerky didn’t particularly taste like beef, but he didn’t mind. It was meat, and it supplied the necessary nutrients.
This was their daily routine. Drab and monotonous. Only with some slight variation every now and then, but nothing exciting. And Zephyr was content with it... In his books, he’d had enough excitement to last him a few years— Tier 5s, 6s? A world dying before his eyes. Traveling through the dimensional void. Crashing into someone’s gateway link, and landing in a totally foreign world... Not a small rift world, but a real, fully developed world teeming with its own civilizations, history, and people. It was moments like these that the true depth of the whole experience sunk in. He was literally in another world, with no possibility of ever going back in sight. Smiling Devil had concluded that this was an unassimilated world. Yet to be discovered and conquered by any of the nations of their world. If true, this would mean the civilization here had not even started inter-dimensional travel, and both of them were fated to spend the rest of their lives here. But Zephyr wasn’t convinced. Some religions here had statues of people that looked like humans from their world, making him sure that this world had at some point in history, been visited by people from their world. Smiling Devil, while agreeing with Zephyr, thought it more likely that the visitors were people who somehow got stranded like them, and never returned home. He pointed to the fact that they were still being chased down by the backer of the merchant convoy as an obvious tell— the man who saw Zephyr was most likely still alive and had described how Zephyr had cast the Mana barrier spell to someone in the know.
The earlier stranded individuals must have started up families here with the natives, and unveiled a bloodline so different and powerful to this world. That was Smiling Devil’s theory. It seemed plausible, and he was committed to it.
That would explain the relentless pursuit. Someone was clearly pouring money into finding them, convinced they were onto something. Zephyr couldn’t make sense of it. Such decisive action with so little apparent information pointed to an individual who was either wildly delusional or exceptionally sharp— there was no in-between.