Deep in the Oscar Forest the trees towered an insurmountable height. What little semblance of a path was rough with bulky roots and fallen branches as the incline began to steepen into the Cathedra Mountains. A broken and buried stone path began to surface through the dirt, dotting the trail leading the way to moss covered, broken pillars and crumbled painted walls of long forgotten buildings now nothing more than planter boxes overgrown with life.
Further beyond, nestled between the towering precipice of the steep mountains, was the last structure that remained standing. It was far larger than the broken buildings they had passed. While still worn, cracked and covered in vines and moss, the orange and yellow painted stone that was chipped and cracked in what little dawn light peeked through the trees gave a warm feeling to the place. The decorative markings on the stonework that frames the massive archway leading inside almost seemed to tell a story leading to the sunny emblem on the keystone.
A large tunnel was lined with statues of stone dragons, some completely broken and others simply chipped and cracked leading to stone double doors with the same sun symbol carved into the center with an intricate design filling the rest of the space. Just inside was a large entry hall that was completely empty save a few mana lanterns sitting on the floor in various corners of the room and a couple in the center. A few small rooms with no doors were off to the left and right. On the far side, opposing the entrance was an archway leading to another sizable room, on the other side of which was a closed door not quite as extravagant as the entrance but still had an engraved pattern.
“Ah, home away from home!” Erik stretched as he walked inside.
“You have a home?” Aliya raised an eyebrow. The way he talked before made him seem more like the wandering thief, never settling in one place.
“Good point!” Erik laughed it off, waving his finger at her. It was really as she suspected. “I guess this kinda is home.”
“This place is pretty thick with Mana,” Ter noticed the little specks of light rising from the ground. It wasn’t often mana was so naturally present that it was visible.
“It’s literally coming out of the earth!” Bius shared his brother's surprise.
“This is where a couple Leylines intersect,” Aliya deduced as she looked over the structure of the room. “From the architecture I would hazard a guess that these ruins date all the way back to the Age of Darkness. Back then humans tended to build them on points connected to the Leylines. It was common practice after that but what’s more interesting is that they weren’t built with the assistance of Spirits.” She beamed as she filled with excitement and curiosity. She had always enjoyed exploring old ruins with her brothers, piecing together bits of history that only time knew. It had been a long time since she’d investigated some ruins she couldn’t help but smile. “There aren’t very many intact ruins left in the world that are as old as this!”
“Wow didn’t realize you were such a big nerd,” Kindle jested with a smirk as she sat on the remains of a broken pillar.
“Really? I thought that was obvious by now,” Aliya snickered as she leaned in the archway.
“You sure this place was built by humans? The ruins go pretty dang deep,” Erik looked at Aliya with an air of skepticism. “There’s a point where it stops because it’s sealed off by a giant door. No way to open it and bashing it in doesn’t do a thing. I’ve tried.”
“You would,” Aliya leered at him. “I bet to steal whatever’s down there!”
“You caught me!” Erik smiled, putting his hands up. “It was disappointing to find this place empty but it works as a place to lay low.”
“Weren’t you a pirate?” Kindle tilted her head at Aliya.
“Yeah, I was associated with thieves but I didn’t steal anything myself,” Aliya crossed her arms. “Besides back then we mostly fought The First Order. The amount of thievery that any of them did was mainly to mess with those jerks.”
“Is that why you don't like humans?” Erik narrowed his eyes at her quizzically.
“No, just you,” Aliya stated frankly.
“Why? What's not to like about me?” Erik shrugged with his playful smirk on his face.
“You're annoying, selfish and disloyal,” Aliya listed off, in a resentful tone, counting on her fingers. “There's something else too I have yet to put my finger on. I'll be sure to let you know if I do and you happen to still be around.”
“You are a rather blunt woman,” Erik flashed a charinged smile.
“Hope you don’t mind me asking, Aliya,” Kindle approached the topic cautiously knowing it would be touchy. “Were you with the Black Briar Pirates before The First Order enslaved the Spirits?”
“No,” Aliya’s expression darkened a bit, but she answered honestly. “I was enslaved and under mind control just like the rest of the Spirits in the world.”
“How’d you break free?” Kindle leaned forward rather curiously. She couldn’t recall much from that time. The entire time under the control of The First Order was a complete blank for her.
“That gun,” Aliya pointed to the gun on Erik’s hip, her expression still grave. “It's a rather special weapon called Regulus. It's Lost Continent Technology from the Age of Stars. It used to be in possession of Captain Thatch before it was gifted to my brother Zephyr. It fires compressed mana not quite as dense as a Rune but it sure can feel like it. A massive influx of mana can disrupt a tether bond as well as certain magic artes. After we were shot with it, it was easy for me and Zephyr to break free from the Druid that had enslaved us.”
“Did The Order really do all that?” Terbius looked shocked. Their sister never talked much about the past so it was rather surprising to hear.
“Yeah! You didn’t elaborate on that before!” Breyze pouted as she was writing more details down in her book.
“Can you blame her?” Pree chimed in her ear. “It was a dark time, no Spirit from that time period likes to talk about it.”
“Well I'm going to go steal some food from town!” Erik turned away, trying to change the grim subject. “I know for Spirits food is optional but you guys want anything.”
“Nothing from you!” Aliya glowered at him as she turned into the room that led further into the ruins.
“I’ll be fine,” Kindle leaned back against the wall. “Thank you, though.”
“Booze!” Terbius cheered, Kindle rolled her eyes at them.
“You boys got it!” Erik pointed at them excitedly, he looked over at Breyze who had settled in a corner and started writing in her book while Pree sat next to her on the floor.
“Don’t worry about us!” Pree noticed Erik looking their way. “Breyze still has a handful of goodies in her bag!”
“Suit yourselves!” Erik shrugged and left.
“Hey!” Aliya called out to the Spirits as soon as she heard the stone doors shut. She took a deep breath and smiled as she returned to the main hall everyone was in. “Would you all like to see something special? Now that he’s gone I feel more comfortable doing this.” Aliya snapped her fingers and the mana that was just floating upward in the air gathered and swirled, forming a circle that looked like a gateway somewhere entirely made of light.
“That’s the thing!” Breyze shot up and pointed with her quill. “You came out of that outside Gaylette!”
“It does last for a short bit after I dispel it so I guess you would have seen that, huh?” Aliya smiled as Breyze looked it over from every angle with vigorous curiosity. “The power I borrow from Lady Azurius is a bit more specific than her other Kinbound. It’s the ability to access the Leylines. I’m supposed to keep it a secret but I trust you guys.”
“Cool!” Terbius excitedly joined Breyze in looking it over from all angles.
“I see,” Kindle slowly walked over. “It makes sense you would know as much as you do about Aurora Runes and the Leylines. Your excuse at Blacksong seemed a little flimsy.”
“Well I actually learned about them from Volarius and Lios first,” Aliya shrugged. “So it wasn’t so much an excuse as a half truth.”
“So you are just going to toss the Aurora Rune in there or what?” Kindle eyed her and the bag curiously.
“What, you don’t want to see the Leylines?” Aliya smirked. “I wouldn’t have opened a portal this big.”
“I do!” Breyze dashed directly into the pool of mana.
“Ah! Breyze! Wait for me!” Pree jumped in after her.
“I’m in!” Terbius cheered following after.
“Not everyday you see the Leylines,” Kindle smiled as she entered, rather excited to see what it was like.
The bright light took a moment to adjust to. Once everyone did, the shimmering flow of mana was a stunning sight to see. It was as though they were looking at a sea of stars. They stood at the center of three pathways made of crystalized mana that shimmered with all the colors of mana blended together.
“Are the paths Aurora Runes?!” Kindle looked stunned. She didn’t know what to expect but the sight was amazing.
“Yeah,” Aliya smiled. She never got tired of seeing the Leylines. “Since literally everything here is mana it’s the only place Aurora Runes are stable even when they break. The pathways are always shifting and crashing into each other in the mana streams.” She stood at the edge of the Aurora Rune they were standing on and took the one in the bag out. She released it into the flow of mana and watched it drift off. “This looks like a crossing of three Leylines in fact, judging from the paths and the mana flow.” She stood back up and looked out in the endless river of light. “This is the very core of our world. Mysteria’s life starts and ends here…”
“This is where all Spirits come from…” Kindle paused and thought back to a time where she heard that Spirits came from overflows of mana from the Leylines.
“We all come from this place?” Breyze was snapped out of her enthrallment of the place. She looked between Kindle and Aliya.
“When humans die and they happen to be exposed to massive quantities of mana at the time of their death, that mana comes here,” Kindle recalled the story she was told by The Fire Celestial around the time she met her brothers, freshly born as a Spirit. “When an overflow of that mana collects and leaks out of the Leyline a Spirit is born. Isn’t that right, Aliya?”
“Yeah, you seem to know your stuff,” Aliya smiled.
“Hanging around The Fire Celestial you learn a lot,” Kindle chuckled. “He and I found Terbius when they were born, they were a special case so Igneous told me quite a bit about how it all worked.”
“The twin thing, right?” Aliya asked, watching them run around testing the fact the Aurora Runes don’t explode violently with Breyze, the three of them just tossing various pieces into each other along the path. “Can’t say I’ve come across twin Spirits.”
“Technically they are the same Spirit. Their strength was unstable. Igneous used this pair of gauntlets as their tether,” She held up her hands, flashing the golden gauntlets that shimmered amidst the bright light of the mana. “It basically divided one Spirit into two identical ones. I kept an eye on them after that in case anything went wrong but here they are, breaking dangerous Runes.” Kindle sighed with a faintly amused smile on her face.
“As long as it’s inside here. Outside might level the mountain on us,” Aliya snickered. She glanced at the gauntlets again, rather curious. Not just any tether could hold an unstable spirit for so long. The thought about the condition of her own tether came to mind. “I noticed the craftsmanship is pretty nice. Are they a Masterwork?”
“Oh, yeah, I thought they were pretty nice too, there’s definitely an Earth Rune melted into the metal. I wish I knew who made them,” Kindle looked the gauntlets over with admiration. “Igneous had them just lying around the shrine, he's such a weapon hoarder.”
“More like a combat nut…” Aliya rolled her eyes knowing exactly how much he enjoyed a fight.
“You're not wrong,” Kindle smirked coyly until it registered that Aliya knew him as well. “Wait, you know him too? How many Celestials have you met?!”
“Seven in total,” Aliya replied after taking a second to think about it. “The Four Elemental Celestials and three others, rather obscure to the current age.” She placed her hands on her hips and continued to talk about it like it was a regular occurrence. “I wouldn't say I'm particularly close with any with the exception of Volarius and Lady Azurius. After a while of traveling with Volarius, it wasn't long after that I became Lady Azurius’s Kinbound.”
“Just how many Celestials exist anyway?” Breyze had gotten her fill of experimenting with the Aurora Runes and had been quietly listening to their conversation for a bit taking notes again. She always thought there were only four, they were all she ever heard about.
“That is something no Spirit truly knows,” Pree answered her this time. “Except for maybe The Primordial Celestial herself!”
“The one that created this world,” Aliya trailed off thinking about her and the connection to the leylines, something she’d been looking into for a long time. “I've yet to meet her in person but I know a few who have. They say that her true body is Mysteria itself but she has a humanoid form that wanders the land.”
“Find any evidence of that down here?” Kindle raised an eyebrow at Aliya.
“Inconclusive,” Aliya shrugged with a defeated smirk. Years searching them she felt no closer to unraveling the mysteries contained within. “I'm sure if I did Lady Azurius would probably want me to keep quiet about it. There are some secrets of the Leylines best kept just that.”
“That just makes me want to know more!” Breyze whined, wanting her to go on.
“Same!” Kindle and Terbius chimed in unison.
“Maybe I'll tell you guys more later,” Aliya laughed at their eager curiosity. “At least what I can.” Aliya tilted her head back as she stretched with a yawn when she noticed something peculiar above them. A perfectly refined cube was suspended, unmoving, even amidst the ever shifting Aurora Runes. A strange sight, as everything always moves, even the platform they stood on was slowly drifting. It looked quite out of place, she wanted to look into it but wasn’t certain if it was one of the kept secrets so thought it best to not draw attention to it.
“You know, I'm getting kind of tired.” She snapped her fingers and a portal to the ruins appeared again, quickly stepping through before her curiosity took over, “Let's get back to the ruins before the slimy thief gets back.”
“Really? I feel way better after being in there,” Kindle felt extremely rejuvenated after stepping out of the Leylines. All the exhaustion after expending so much mana over the course of the night was gone.
“Yeah me too,” Terbius chimed in.
“Not surprising, we literally just took a mana bath,” Aliya smirked, glad the trip not only was enlightening but made them feel better. “The mana of the Leylines replenished you guys, but I just expended what was replenished for me in opening the gateway to and from.” Aliya walked towards one of the side rooms after everyone was out of the Leylines and in the ruins. “Mana is literally pouring out of the walls so a quick nap in this place and I’ll be fine in no time!”