When Last Night Didn't End

11.2

Vestone bled below me like a carpet of grass. The wind was cold when it drove my hair off my face—as expected for a mountainous region such as the Southern Tower. I was told this part of Solarlume was controlled by warring tribes, each with their own civilization and territories. Vestone, the town I was visiting, was the only neutral ground. A trading post, if you please.

The summoned beast I was riding, a phoenix-like creature minus the scalding flames, cawed and began to dive. The pit in my stomach grew to nauseating levels as the bird punched through the faint sheet of white clouds and zeroed in towards the spread of gray against the sea of green.

I just had enough time to notice a small river curve around Vestone before the wind began roaring in my ears as our descent became faster. My arms wrapped around the creature's neck, my legs straddling its flank clenching, as I held on to avoid getting blown back into the sky. As quickly as it began, the bird's talons scraped against the town's cobblestones, stopping its flight with mighty flaps of its wings. Dust and debris swirled as the air generated by the movement stirred them into a cloud.

As I dismounted, whispers rose from the witness of the spectacle who had begun to gather around the summoned beast. I faced the beast and ducked my head—a sign of thanks for its service. Then, using the ability I borrowed from Nazran, I called off the summoning. The bird gave one last caw, which would have awakened the entire town and more had I not withdrawn the magic sustaining its presence as fast as I did.

I blew a breath and gave the people a small wave. Unlike the standard tunic-and-trousers combo the people from the other Towers wore, the fashion in Vestone was a mixture of colors, styles, and material. The most common garments were thick coats either lined with pelt or padded with wool from the inside. I tucked my hands into the pockets of my dull khaki coat, feeling out of place in this world of bursting colors.

Metals clanged against each other and sparks flew in the air as I passed by an alley reserved for some sort of smithing businesses. Some carts bearing produce and other biodegradable goods disappeared into the earliest corner, no doubt going to the alley designated for them. I passed other people by, each carrying baskets over their heads filled with the randomest things like vegetables, patched sacks, or the occasional daggers and knives.

It's possible I just walked inside the biggest supermarket in Solarlume.

Where were the locksmiths in this part of town? I pursed my lips, scanning the line of shops with their awnings propped up. Most of them dealt with swords and other weapons, their hammers eliciting thin and thick clangs from their work.

If I remember correctly, Goran was a master locksmith found in Vestone. His work was purportedly so great the neighboring Towers and the Central Empire often called him to make their vaults and their personal storages.

But he's more than a crafty smith. He was also a reputable magic-user. He's not an adventurer, but rumor has it he could very well be one if he chose to. Not only that, he had applied his locksmithing to the world of magic and was responsible for the creation of the Tanzhi Keys.

Getting these keys became one of the game's limited events and was loosely based on the concept of summoning. Using the keys would let one who wasn't a summoning spiria call forth pre-designed creatures from the netherside, usually in the form of legendary beasts found in mythology and literature. I remember participating in it and only got to the end of the first tier keys because I had to study for finals.

But the one I was really here for was the Key of Goran. Rumor has it Goran created it from a shard of a mind of a Divine and that he traded one important part of his life to obtain it. Then, he fashioned a key out of it, and it became known as his final creation. The Key became a legend among the adventurers as everyone wanted a share of the Divines' knowledge, but to me, it was just another magical item I needed to find Hye-jin.

I shouldn't ever forget that.

I reached the end of the smithing alley. The one running perpendicular to it featured rows upon rows of bundled up textile. Just the explosion of colors made me turn away from it. Too much. Better to ask someone, then.

"Excuse me," I approached the first people who passed me by on their way to take a left or a right at the end of the present road. "Do you know where Goran is?"

The lady, who wore a tight turban around her head and let her intricately-braided midnight purple hair fall over her shoulder, beamed in recognition of the name. "Oh, the locksmith?" she said, her words showing me straight rows of pearly whites. Due to the colder climates in the Southern Tower, a reddish sheen colored her cheeks like she was slapped or put on too much blush. "He's down there."

I turned to the vague direction she was pointing at. So, I turn left here? "Follow that cart," she instructed, gesturing towards a cart with a strange pot of plants with droopy lines of leaves swinging from it nailed against its door. "It will turn right around three bird calls, then you'll see a man with a pipe on his hand by a fountain. He'd get up by the time the cart passes by and he'll go to the street where Goran's shop is. Just follow him."

I blinked. That's it?

"Thank you," I ducked my head in a brief bow at the lady who shuffled her companion, another lady dressed in the same way but just with rounder eyes and taller stature, back into their way. As soon as their frames joined the haze of heads and clothes down the opposite direction, I blew a breath, bracing my hips with my hands. Those directions didn't make a tad of sense. But it'd do.

So, I went on my way and caught up to the designated cart as fast as my legs could carry me. The roads, shops, and people mixed and mashed in my periphery as the cold air faded from my skin and sweat started forming at the base of my neck. I should just watch until it turns right. What did the lady say? Three bird calls? What in the Divine's Foot was that?

The cart did turn right, dropping me straight into an alley that gave way into an expansive town center. In the middle of some sort of a rotund sat a man with a pipe. He was clad in a patterned green and blue garb with feathers stuck behind his ear and hanging down his chest in some sort of necklace. His head snapped up from his pipe when the cart I was following passed by the huge arcs peppering the end of each alley that spilled into the center of town. Then, he stood up and started jogging to an alley to my northwest. Shit. That's too far. I'd lose him when I was this far-off.

I clenched my jaw and dropped into a stance. Pumping my legs, I burst forward, the thuds of my soles against the stones pounding in my temples. My breaths came in huge puffs as I kept my eyes on the back of the man's back and the columns of smoke flitting off the bowl of his pipe. He didn't appear to notice me following him, but that didn't mean he was taking it easy either.

By the time he disappeared inside a tent made of patched dried leaves, I knew I was in the alley leading to Goran. I whirled around, my chest heaving as it tried to catch up all the breaths it lost in my little run. My eyes swept past a litter of tents propped over a field of wheat-like blades of grass. Gold and white colored my horizon. Which one of these was Goran's?

"You from the Central Empire?" a gnarly voice zipped from my side.