Chapter 14 part 1

When additional training in the Forbidden Zone was announced, everyone was skeptical, however, the prospect of leaving the Yagn-Sho for a moment was tempting, so everyone decided to go.

Galaspiael returned and immediately boasted to Kalena what progress he had made in deciphering the dynamite recipe. In the letter he sent, he asked for performing a "small" experiment, through which the girl destroyed a major part of the secret room in which he kept his belongings.

"Oh for the Great Ancestors, what a horrible smell!" He exclaimed, going inside to see the results of her work. "It's impossible to breathe here"

"We try to ventilate this room every day and it's better than earlier. I tried to be careful, I promise! I followed your instructions strictly, there can be no mistake. I wanted to help."

Galaspiael sat on the floor with resignation.

"I had to mix something up. Maybe it's about proportions? No, I probably misread the name of some ingredient. Couldn't you write and warn?!" He shouted, venting his irritation.

"You told me not to write back under any circumstances," she reminded him. "Because the risk of someone intercepting the message is negligible, but it still exists, remember?"

"Did I say something like that?" Galaspiael rubbed his face and nodded. "Yes, I remember. Anyway, never mind. Get ready, you have a busy day ahead. I must ask you for a favor once again. I want you to look for the water nephrite in the Forbidden Zone."

"What? Are you sure?"

"Absolutely," the prince threw the notes he brought to the table and looked at them briefly. He chose one card and then quickly ripped it. "Have you ever heard this name?"

"Yes... in this fairy tale book you gave me. I didn't think such a thing exists.'

"According to our brothers from Madegald, it does. I also thought that this "water nephrite" must be some form of metaphor. Finally, I began to think that the whole recipe is written in a code that only a few can understand. By the way, it's amazing that you managed to remember such a small detail. If you made several copies of the same book, you could even sell the original, everything would still be in your head."

"Sell books?" Kalena remembered the self-proclaimed Searchers he had once shown her. "Who's going to buy them?"

"Rich Sekanian merchants often have their bookcases. Their daughters and girls from noble families treat decorated and elegantly written books as an ornament."

"They don't read? What are they doing then?"

"Most of them can read, although educated women are feared in Sekania. That's why they hide that fact."

They both went out into the corridor, and Galaspiael locked the door. He grabbed the door handle and checked whether it was impossible to get inside by force.

"It's an interesting country," Kalena said after a moment of silence. "Why an educated woman causes fear but a man not?

"You know, I've always wondered. I also think it's an interesting country. We should go there someday."

*

In the Forbidden Zone, young Scribes were primarily to practice agility and perceptiveness. The training was a field game in which they could get points for finding and delivering something to a certain place as soon as possible. Everyone had been instructed exactly what to look for. Almost everyone had to focus on herbs, only Nemina had to find the spring and draw water from it.

This day was special because the students for the first time could bring weapons with them. It was not their own yet, because they were to receive it after the official exam, but the mere fact of having shen with themselves caused a sense of pride.

On all maps, students saw the Forbidden Zone was marked as an area completely covered with dense forest. However, in reality, the forest was only the surface. It surrounded the heart of this place - the ruins of the capital of the former empire. Although the seekers took a lot of things from there, you could still find something, if you only knew how to search.

First, everyone helped set up the camp in a clearing. There was a small lake in the middle of it, but Rikken forbade the students to swim in it after Mizar tried to throw Zarkin into the water.

Galaspiael took Kalena aside and discreetly handed her a small box.

"I won't blame you if you don't find anything. I'm going to look myself, but on the other side of the valley, but to be honest, I don't think we'll find anything. It's said that water nephrite was in common use here before the war, but chances are small that the Searchers left anything. The most important is for you to complete the task and return safely. Good luck, little one."

"I'll do my best to find what you asked for," Kalena bowed in a typical manner in which students bowed to their masters, and then joined the group gathered around Master Rikken.

"Listen!" he began. "You got a weapon, you will soon start cutting your fingers with it, so we need a lot of Teneurin leaves. Four people are looking for them. I advise you to divide it into groups so that we don't have to stay here for several weeks and look for each other." He took a short break. "Remember, we're guests here. If you see somewhere a path too decent to be considered trodden by animals, don't try to follow it. When somebody collects everything on their list, they can come back. Oh and I don't accept stories about some other students stealing from you. You have to watch and care for your treasures."

"And we don't have to play clean?" Seth asked quietly. Zarkin turned to him contemptuously and snorted angrily.

"Nobody will play clean against you in a real fight," he murmured.

"Only this is not a fight," Kalena interjected, "it's just a game."

"Field lessons are an obligatory stage of training. According to you, the final exam would not be important, because it'll last for only a few hours?" Zarkin nodded at Mei and turned ostentatiously. "Good luck! You'll need a lot of it with this attitude."

No one had ever guessed that the girl Zarkin had taken with him was his slave, and he wasn't going to brag about it.

"Hold it!" he commanded, handing Mei his set. "Let's see if you can be useful. Only idiots walk in a group, it is better to act alone."

"But ..." Mei began quietly. "We are together. I will help. So how is it 'alone'?"

"Because you're not a student, that's why you don't matter".

Mei looked at him as if she wanted to say something wouldn't like, but in the end, she stifled it.

"I understand. I will try not to disappoint your expectations, my lord. But I have to warn you, I run very slowly and I can't hide or fight."

"And what about it? Zarkin pulled Mei a few steps further when he saw Jin-Si walking toward them. "You will concentrate on searching and I will defend you. If Mizar would want to steal, it's logical that he'll attack me."

"Because the searching it's your job, right? He will think that you are watching over what you found."

"Exactly," the boy grew serious. "Just don't think you'll be able to escape. I keep an eye on you!"

*

"This place gives me creeps!" after a short walk, Seth regained his good mood again. "You know, the Searchers' guild is operating in Madegald. They think that treasures from Kagolanian Forbidden Zone have special value. If you'll find something, you can go and sell it there. You'll get a fortune.

They kept walking and their peers' voices grew quieter until they stopped hearing them at all.

At first, Jin-Si hanged around Kete and Li, but when she came across Kalena and Seth, she decided to join them.

No one was in a hurry to complete the task and return to the camp. The new unknown place tempted with its mystery. All groups sooner or later took a break and left the main route.

"What are you suppose to collect?" Jin-si asked when Kalena kneeled on the ground for several minutes, carefully selecting white leaves growing in the lowest layer of litter.

"This is one of the ingredients for paper pulp. Galaspiael promised to show me how to prepare our paper."

"I'd like to know what the Scribes add to make their paper so indestructible," Seth responded. "Some time ago I fell into the water by accident. My notes got wet but after drying it was impossible to recognize that something had happened. My master hast found about it so far. He took a card from his box that he hadn't even looked at before. "Oh Gods, why do I picked something so hard?! I'll never complete this task. Is there such a thing as a blood lily at all?

"Yes," Jin-Si replied sleepily. "It's a common weed, growing in wet places. This flower is neither fragrant nor useful in any way."

"It is not the flowers that are the most valuable, but the leaves." Kalena thought about her days as a slave. "I can make blood lily soup."

As she said that, something strange happened. The strong wing rose and almost blew them off the ground. They could barely stand on their feet. The strangest thing, however, was that the top of the trees remained still, even though young Scribes felt a huge mass of air rushing.

The unusual phenomenon stopped after a few seconds and became silent again. Then they began to feel something even more peculiar.

"I feel-" Jin-Si got up and pulled a few leaves from her hair. "I don't know. I don't like this! I have the impression that we shouldn't be here. Let's go!"

"I can feel it too," Kalena clenched her fists. "It's unpleasant. We should leave this place!"

"What? Why? Stop!" Seth protested when he saw the girls are about to walk away into the forest. "What happened to you? Let's focus on the search, and try not to lose your mind."

"But I feel this place is dangerous. What if somebody attacks us?" Jin-Si began looking around nervously.

"Oh gods, and even if so, then what? We are Scribes. Finally, all these fight lessons will be useful for something."

His words didn't sound convincing, but in the end, curiosity and willingness to complete the task won over fear. They moved forward, and after a while, the strange feeling of disturbance has left them.

After a while, they found themselves in a place where the trees no longer grew so densely. Here and there sun rays illuminated large tracts of land. At one point they noticed that they were on a paved path.

"Who walks on this? Animals or people?" Seth's eyes lit up with an unhealthy glow. "We should investigate this!"

"Definitely it was people," Kalena answered and stepped forward. "Probably the Searchers."

"For sure!" Jin-Si nodded. "That makes sense. Who else could have walked here?"

"Monsters who reside in the Zone?" Seth took out his am-shen and turned one blade several times. "I'd like to meet one and find out what it is."

Kalena stepped forward and stared at the boy.

"At the end of this road should be the heart of the Forbidden Zone. The most dangerous place. An abandoned capital."

"Shall we go there?" He asked, glancing at her.

"I don't think so," she murmured, "but maybe we'll be okay"

"Are you both crazy?" Jin-Si interrupted "Why do you think we call this place the 'Forbidden Zone'?"

"The point is, we don't know why," Seth responded fiercely. "Nobody knows. In Madegald, I've heard about five different legends about this place. What if half of what is being told about it is all lies? Maybe we are unnecessarily afraid?"

"If there was something to discover here, someone wiser would do it long ago." Jin-si argued, "If anyone finds out that you've been there..."

"Nobody will know unless you tell someone," Seth interrupted her firmly. - After all, the masters take us here themselves. They had to take into account that a student would go too far and eventually discover the ruins. That means basic training is enough to defend yourself here. We're from the Scribes' Association, who would threaten us? We'll have something to talk about when we get back home."

"All in all, you're right," Jin-Si admitted, "but Lin probably won't believe me."

They moved on. Gradually, the forest began to thin, and they found themselves in the area covered with only low plants. The abandoned city was in a valley. Kalena saw the remains of the watchtower. It was built in an ideal place, everyone who entered the city from that side was already visible from a distance.

Seth bravely stepped forward and they entered the city in absolute silence. Kalena noticed huge halls in the walls of the first houses they came across. The grass a lied lid from an old chest, probably destroyed by people who plundered the city. They went through what might once have been the equivalent of a wall protecting the outer city circle.

"In Madegald, people say the evil ruler gave the soldiers a new, dangerous weapon that got out of hand," said Seth when Jin-Si touched his arm. "And here it is told that the emperor released the mysterious beasts that revolted. So what's the truth?"

"I guess we'll never know." The conspiracy destroyed everything that was related to the battle that took place here," Kalena murmured. "There are no chronicles or books, only legends."

"In Madegald we have our libraries and books," he replied, "but I don't know anyone who had ever been there. The door is sealed, and behind them, the corridors were filled with liquid metal. But this knowledge is still there and if the Scribes found the way, they could recover it."

Kalena did not manage to answer him, because suddenly they lost control of their bodies, and before them appeared a tall figure dressed in long trailing robes, reminiscent of the clothing they saw in the engravings in the historical books.

It was more of a ghost than a man. They all had the impression that this character reminds them of someone. He lifted them above the ground and looked at each one in the eyes, then walked around and tilted his head. Long black hair fell over his shoulder.

A hand emerged from under the folds of silk. Pale hand, with unnaturally long fingers. He made some gestures.

And then the deep darkness approached them.