Chương 45: Chapter 44

"Where hope goes to die?" I repeated back to Griselda. The half-orc woman's well-defined jaw clenched at my words, and I wondered if she would lapse into silence again. The seconds stretched before she spoke as she continued to swing the handaxe in small cutting motions while I kicked my legs back and forth from my seated position.

"All Dungeons try to expand," Griselda finally said, the words forced out through gritted teeth.

"But none as aggressively as The Chittering Dark. It is a warren of tunnels with the only light coming from fungi glowing along some walls. Some of the tunnels have no light at all. Just darkness and the chittering of the giant insects that infest the dungeon. They're fearless, merciless, and they never stop coming.

"The Matriarchs collect a tithe of slaves from all the tribes regularly to keep pushing back against the hives of The Chittering Dark. They are sent in as fodder to try and keep the Dungeon from expanding any further."

"Wouldn't it be better to send in trained Adventurers?" I asked. Griselda shrugged, her broad shoulders displaying her strength as she hefted the latest piece of wood off of the workbench.

"Probably? But they don't allow Adventurers into the Dungeon. Probably wouldn't even let them onto the Plains."

"Why?"

"I don't know," Griselda admitted before shooting a glance at me as she set up the next piece of wood to work.

"You ask a lot of questions." I tried just smiling innocently. Griselda shook her head in response which could've meant anything, but she didn't tell me to buzz off.

"Did you not like living on the Plains?" I asked, relying on my childish innocence for asking uncomfortable questions. In truth, I just liked learning more about the world I lived in.

"The People are cruel to each other. They are worse to those who are not Orcs. I was treated badly and eventually the Matriarchs demanded I be given to them in tithe. I was sent into The Chittering Dark with the Dark Hand to die. I got separated from the group. Thought I would die there but I got lucky. The Dungeon was budding… creating Rifts. I managed to crawl into one such Rift before the branch closed and then escaped from the Rift. I found myself on the southern edge of the Ravi Plains.

Made my way west into Ajinar, starving and wounded. Martin found me. Nursed me back to health. Then we moved here to avoid the looks he got for loving an orc blood." I smiled innocently, noticing she was watching me for a reaction out of the corner of her eye.

"I'm glad you're here. I want to be as strong as you when I grow up!" She snorted, but I could see the small smile on her lips as she continued to work.

"What's the Dark Hand?"

"Male orcs who can cast spells. All orcs are tested by the Matriarchs — those with strong aether cores are taken. Girls become Matriarchs, boys become Dark Hand. They're the ones who actually hold back The Chittering Dark. The slaves sent in are just fodder to keep the Dark Hand safe. They are worse than the tribes. They hate everything that is not the Matriarchs. Cruelty is a game to them." The look on Griselda's face told me far more than her words had, and I finally decided I should give the poor woman a break.

"Thanks, Griselda! I'm going to do some more running!" I shouted, jumping down from my seat and returning to my exercises now that I had caught my breath. I practised sprinting back and forth, my legs pumping as I felt three sets of eyes following my progress. Martin might have been looking at Griselda, but the half-orc was definitely watching me along with my mother from the garden where she was weeding. As I ran, my thoughts invariably drifted towards Gramps and what he was doing in the mountains.

I knew I was worried about the old codger, and running wasn't distracting enough to keep him out of my thoughts. Instead, I turned to planning and considering what I would do for the next five days. Since Gramps was away for at least that long, there was no one to make tea for, which put a dent in my ability to keep working on the Path of Brewing. Grandma Lucille surprisingly didn't seem to like the drink, preferring mulled wine.

I could try my hand at brewing a few things on my own but I knew in reality it was more likely to be cooking than brewing. Magatha hadn't started teaching me anything in-depth about ingredients yet, or even how they interacted and why they worked. Of course, I could work on making a heap of alchemical base, but the repetitive nature of the task also meant I wouldn't progress as fast.

As annoying as it was to lose progress, I figured I would be better off dropping the Path of Brewing for the week and picking up the Path of Hatchets again. Especially if I could convince Griselda to teach me a little. She seemed to know how to use them and with a little instruction I felt like I could probably get the Path from the second to the fourth tier over the week. This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

After I had puffed myself out from sprinting a second time, I stopped in front of Griselda. Her uncertain glance told me she was expecting more personal questions.

"Can you teach me how to use an axe like you do?" I asked. Her surprise transformed into a gentle smile.

"Sure." The rest of the day was spent working on my hatchet skills with Griselda. I half-expected my mother to interrupt me for reading lessons, but instead, when the time came, all she did was bring me out a sandwich for lunch. Being as kind as she was, she also brought out lunch for Griselda and Martin.

For training, Griselda would pause between her preparing all the wood for construction to show me how to hold the small hatchet or set my feet and then leave me to practice, only occasionally calling out suggestions. While her tutelage was only minor, I could see the steps climbing in my Path of Hatchets and calculated at the rate I was going, I would achieve my goal of making it to the fourth tier before Gramps returned. That evening, everyone gathered in the common room to eat dinner.

Kaylee was there, sitting next to Etta with Grandma Lucille on the other side of her. Martin and Griselda instead sat by the fire as they ate, chairs pulled close together, and I got to witness the gentle intimacy of the two as they spoke in hushed voices and made subtle contact as they brushed skin against skin. Mother sat next to me as we enjoyed our food, and as always, I relished the comfort of her presence.

After dinner, Lucille entertained Etta and I by letting us get out our wooden swords, which we then used to fight against threads of wool that the old woman controlled. The thin twine had moved like snakes slithering through the air, trying to wrap around our feet and swords while Etta and I laughed as we tried to dodge the threads and get back to the table for our honey drop dessert. We only managed to succeed after Lucille ran out of aether, which happened within twenty minutes.

I was pretty sure that meant Lucille had a Minor Aether Core just like me. When everyone was getting ready for bed, I had expected Etta to share a room with her mother and grandmother. Instead, she had asked if she could sleep in my room with me. Saying 'no' had been on the tip of my tongue right up until my mother shot me a look that told me to agree. That was how I found myself doing pushups on the floor of my bedroom while Etta sat on top of the wooden trunk that housed my clothes, staring out the window.

I didn't think she was going to say anything at first, especially after she didn't comment about me doing another workout before sleep. For me, the pain and weariness in my muscles was entirely offset by seeing my Path of Body Strengthening going up. There were even a couple of steps in my Path of Balance from doing planks.

"I wish he didn't have to go," Etta whispered. I looked up, a sheen of sweat over my forehead and arms that chilled me in the night air. Wiping myself down with a towel, I sat on the floor and took a drink from the wooden mug of water I kept in my room every night.

"He's doing it for you," I said softly. Etta's eyes slid away from the window and the view of the Horndales it provided, her gaze settling on me as she pulled her knees up to her chin.

"Is he? He didn't tell me why he was going." I sighed, debating how much to reveal. On one hand, I could say nothing or something simple, and nip our little chat in the bud. But, seeing Etta worrying about her father mirrored the fears in my own heart about Gramps. What would I do if he never came home? The thought was enough to make my stomach tense up in worry, a hint of nausea following. Of course, telling her might make her worry more.

In the end though, I would have preferred to know, and so I granted her the same consideration.

"He went to get you the heart of a storm eagle so that Magatha can perform a ritual to help you unlock the Storm Affinity to fill your open slot." Even in the darkness I could see Etta tense up.

"You're not supposed to know about that. Mummy and Daddy said I shouldn't tell anyone. Ever!" The last word was hissed, as though she was struggling to keep her voice down.

"I snuck up to the door and listened when your dad talked about it with Gramps. I won't tell anyone though."

"You promise?" she asked. I smiled, my white teeth shining in the darkness.

"I promise."

"Good. I won't tell anyone either," she whispered back.

"Tell anyone what?" I asked quietly, a thread of worry worming its way up through my stomach.

"That you've unlocked your Status as well," Etta answered, looking back out the window.

"I haven't…" I started to say.

"It's why you're always working so hard, isn't it? And the games you used to make up for us. Dad thinks they're all Cornelius's ideas. But I know you come up with most of them. So does Grandma Lucille, but she never tells my parents anything." I sat as still as a statue in the darkness, realising that I hadn't been particularly careful around Etta because I had thought of her as a silly, little six year old. But she had no doubt unlocked at least one or two mental Paths.

Probably one for language now that I thought about it. She had even told me that her mother said she was smart. Thinking about our reading and writing lessons, she wasn't that far behind me. I'd been blinded by her size and now I was paying the price for it. Or was this an opportunity? Would it be so bad to have a friend who knew? In the end, I was just making the best of a bad situation.

"Alright. We'll keep each other's secrets," I whispered.

"Do you think my Dad is coming home?" Etta asked in a quavering voice.

"Your dad is the best swordsman and earth mage I know, and Gramps is really strong. They'll definitely come home." When my Path of Deception didn't tick up, I knew I believed the words I had spoken. If only my heart would listen to my head's logic, then I wouldn't have felt so worried as I went to sleep.