Return of the Runebound Professor-Chapter 808: A simple ask

Wind sliced by Noah’s hair and stung his eyes. He squinted at the map clutched in his hands before him, trying to make it out through the whips of fog lashing him as he passed through the low-hanging clouds.

I can’t read this damned thing for shit.

It probably didn’t help that he was moving so fast that he could barely even keep his eyes open. Reading while flying was probably a somewhat inadvisable activity. But it had been so long since Noah had gotten his hands on a flying sword that the idea of slowing down just to do something as pointless as read a map felt like a huge waste.

I’m headed in roughly the right direction, after all. At least I think I am. Never exactly been trained at reading maps. But it feels like the right way. The vibes are right. I can feel it.

Noah squinted at the map again. It was little more than a flapping, cracking flag in the wind. The wind was probably going to tear it apart at this rate. Suppressing a sigh, Noah rolled the map back up and shoved it into the back of his pants.

He squinted down at the ground. Even as fast as he was moving, it seemed to crawl by from this high up in the air. His spot among the clouds granted him a pretty good vantage point to check out his surroundings.

Sharp hills bordering on mountains dotted the landscape below like the rolling waves of a stormy sea. Swathes of purple-leafed trees grew along them in thick patches of forest, illuminated by the wide gaze of the overhead moon.

It was beautiful.

It also looked absolutely nothing like anything he’d seen on the map. There had been a lot of bits with mountains, but that was like saying that there was a lot of air in the area. Air was everywhere. Mountains were everywhere.

I hate maps. I should have asked for a guide.

Noah scrunched his nose. He brought the flying sword lower, keeping a fair bit of distance between himself and the peaks of the mountains. The last thing he wanted to do was end his no-death streak by running headfirst into the side of a protruding rock.

His flying sword responded to his desires nearly perfectly. There was little delay or resistance in its movements. It felt like an extension of him, a perfect merger between his will and the runes within the metal.

The sword was ideal. It probably would have gone for hundreds of gold back in Arbitage. There was no doubt that the craftsmanship that had gone into it was sublime. This was an artifact level piece of equipment, something that a family would treasure through generations.

Noah hated it.

The damn thing had no personality. Compared to his original sword, this one had no will or presence at all. It was just a tool.

A very, very good tool.

I can’t wait to complain to Moxie about how boring this thing is. I’ve been flying around for like three and a half days now, and I still haven’t seen shit. How damn big is Obsidia? There should have been like four towns in the direction I was heading. I’m pretty sure I should have passed at least two of them by now.

Hm. Perhaps I’m lost.

Noah squinted through the mountain peaks and into the horizon. There wasn’t much of anything waiting for him there. It was still far too dark to make out more than a vague shadow in the distance. The night still had many long hours left in it.

And then, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted something. A patch of large, oddly square stones protruding from the side of a low mountain in a valley. He was going so fast that he shot right past the strange formation. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

Noah leaned back slightly. The sword instantly responded to his movements, and he cycled back around to get a better look at the side of the mountain. It took him a few seconds to re-locate the patch of rocks.

His eyes widened slightly. Then a grin spread across his lips. They weren’t rocks at all. Protruding from the side of the dark mountain were houses. The homes looked like they’d been carved right from the side of the mountain itself, but they were unmistakably houses.

Their square walls had windows and doors — though there wasn’t a single light or other sign of life anywhere in sight. Then again, it was the middle of the night. It would have been a bit odd if the town were all awake at this hour.

I’d have expected maybe one or two torches or something, but this is good enough for me. People means directions. At the very least they can show me where the hell I am on my damn map.

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Noah directed the flying sword straight for the town. It wasn’t a particularly large one — there couldn’t have been more than a few hundred people living within the tight clump of square houses at most, but all he really needed was one person that vaguely knew where they were.

He flew down targeting a small square in the center of town that had the fewest amount of thing she could potentially run into. The caution was pointless. He landed easily in the very center with nothing more than the faint clink of the sword touching down against the stone.

Man, it’s almost too easy. Where’s the fun in that?

Noah scooped the sword off the ground and slid it into the sheathe at his side that Far-sed had been kind enough to provide along with the weapon. Then he glanced around. His arrival hadn’t garnered any attention.

The town was actually built at a steeper angle than he’d expected. Noah had to lean pretty hard forward just to stay upright. It was certainly an odd sensation. He wouldn’t have described it as anywhere near comfortable.

Who builds a town on such a steep slope? Whoever surveyed this area and decided it was the perfect place to live might need to be fired.

Not a single person had emerged to greet him. Evidently, his landing had been quite stealthy. A small part of him felt proud about that. Unfortunately, that also meant he had absolutely no idea where he was meant to go from here.

None of the buildings were marked as a tavern. For that matter, none of them seemed very welcoming. The doors were all unadorned — and they were all closed. It didn’t look like this place got visitors very often.

Couldn’t imagine why.

Noah scratched the back of his neck. He didn’t really want to just wake some poor bugger up, but he also had no desire to stand around like a slanted scarecrow until the sun rose again.

There was always the option of picking a house and knocking on the door. But that felt a bit rude, given the time of night.

Seconds ticked by.

Noah cleared his throat.

The seconds turned to minutes. He coughed again, louder this time, but nobody emerged to check on the strange noise. Noah was midway through coughing a third time in hopes of waking somebody up when a horrible thought struck him.

What if nobody lives here? Could it be abandoned?

Noah glanced around. There was only one way to find out for sure. It wasn’t exactly very polite, but he was out of patience. He approached one of the buildings. His domain spooled out — but, to Noah’s surprise, it met resistance.

The walls of the buildings were imbued. And not just with any magic, but with something that blocked his senses from squeezing past. Or, at the very least, he couldn’t squeeze past without breaking anything.

Somebody doesn’t want others to know if they’re home, huh?

Whelp. I tried.

Noah knocked on the door.

He waited a second. There was always the chance someone was undressed. He didn’t want to hassle them too much. But if there were runes like that on the house, then there was probably someone living inside it.

Probably.

He knocked again, louder this time.

“Hello?” Noah called. “Sorry about the timing, but I’m a bit lost. I could use—”

The door flew open.

A haggard man stared out at Noah with wide, glassy eyes. His face was covered with a bushy white and black beard that clearly hadn’t seen a comb since the dark ages. For a second, the two of them stared at each other. Disbelief crossed over the scraggly man’s face.

“What are you doing? Are you an idiot?” he hissed.

“Depends who you ask,” Noah said. “I just need—”

“Are you trying to get us both killed?” the man exclaimed in a harsh whisper. He grabbed Noah by the front of his torn shirt and yanking him into the building. “What manner of fool would come — here at this hour?”

“Look, I’m sorry for bothering you so late in the night. I’ll pay for your time, but—”

“No, you fool,” the man whispered, fear and anger flashing in his eyes. “Do you have a death wish? Be quiet! You’re going to draw its attention!”

Noah blinked.

Huh?

“Whose attention?” Noah whispered, dropping his voice to a whisper. “I didn’t see…”

A crunch cut his sentence off.

The ragged man’s face paled. He took a step back, raising his gaze up to the flat ceiling above them.

Another crack rang through the air. Fractures appeared in the ceiling, racing along its edges so fast that they encircled the roof within instants.

Noah drew on his Runes.

Then, with a loud crunch, the ceiling jerked. A huge black claw the color of the night itself wedged itself into the gap and started to peel the stone up like the lid of a tin can. The claw was easily the size of a horse.

“Save me, Mother Renewal,” the man whispered, taking a step back, eyes wide as saucers. “Save me.”

Noah raised an arm.

Concentrated Singularity’s power pumped through him. There was a whoompf as the gravity in the room abruptly magnified just below the ceiling. The ceiling slammed back down into its proper place with a loud crash, forcing the claw back out. Debris and dust rained down from the damaged stone above Noah’s head.

A second ticked by.

“Well,” Noah said, brushing his hands together. “That was weird.”

The other man stared at him with wild, terrified eyes.

A loud crunch cut through the air. Noah and the other man stared up as the ceiling vanished from above them, torn away and sent spinning into the night sky like a frisbee.

The sky vanished as a shimmering dark-purple hide appeared above them. It was so close that the only other thing Noah could make out about the monster was the massive yellow eye that filled where the roof had once been, unmistakable hunger burning within it.

“Man, I just wanted some directions,” Noah said with a sigh. “Was that too much to ask for?”