The Guardian gods-Chapter 746

During that time of year, the queen would once again enter the forest, but she would not go alone. Women from across the kingdom, nobles and commoners alike, would join her in the now-domesticated woodland. Together, they hunted the creatures that lived within it, some still dangerous, others tamed but untamed enough to test skill and courage.

When the hunt concluded, the women would return to the city bearing their catches.

There, they were welcomed by the men of the kingdom, dressed in traditional cultural attire. The men received the spoils of the hunt from the women's hands, skinned the beasts, and prepared meals from their flesh. Those meals were then served to the women, honoring them as providers, protectors, and participants in the kingdom's survival.

The ritual carried layered meaning. It reminded the people of the queen's near loss. It honored the king's wrath and restraint and it reaffirmed the balance between strength, care, and devotion that defined Osita's rule.

From this tradition emerged a single week each year, a time when the security of the Osita Kingdom reached its absolute peak. Patrols doubled, magical defenses were fully awakened, and every possible threat was watched with relentless vigilance. The event meant too much to the people to ever be allowed to fail.

Over the years, it grew in scale and significance, passed from generation to generation not merely as a celebration, but as a lesson.

A reminder that the kingdom stood not on crowns or laws alone, but on a fragile truth: as long as the queen lived and was cherished, the king would protect the world itself.

And for one sacred week each year, the entire Osita Kingdom existed for that purpose alone.

In time, even noble women began to take part in the hunt. What had once been a tradition rooted in fear and devotion evolved into an event of prestige and reverence. Delegations from neighboring kingdoms journeyed to Osita during this season, their noblewomen seeking the honor of joining the queen in the domesticated forest. To hunt alongside Queen Amina was no longer merely a test of skill, it was a statement of respect, courage, and political goodwill.

It was for this very event that Mei and her team had come.

Their goal had always been this week.

Their goal this time was the hunt itself. Considerable risks had already been taken to acquire the present they carried, one prepared specifically for Osita and its people. It was not something meant to be revealed openly, nor something that required attention in this moment. For now, it simply needed to remain where it was.

Mei glanced toward the place where the chained box was meant to be.

She could neither see it nor sense it. To anyone else, there was nothing there at all. Yet Mei did not doubt its presence. She had been the one to cast the spell upon the box, and because of that, a connection remained. It was faint, yet certain, strong enough that she knew, without question, that the box still existed exactly where it should.

If she wished, she could open it. The spell recognized her intent, and that bond had not weakened with time. For now, she let it remain sealed, its contents undisturbed, as the hunt and the festival continued around her.

Mei shuddered, unable to stop herself from imagining the horror that would unfold if she were to open the box. The thought alone made her breath hitch. She did not need to see what lay inside to know the devastation it could bring. That single possibility was enough to draw her back into memory, to the steps they had taken to acquire what the box now held.

After Mei and her team made their swift exit from the Omadi Kingdom, they did not follow the main group returning to the southern continent. Instead, they quietly broke away. Their mission had not yet ended. There was another purpose they had to fulfill, one that had never been spoken of openly.

When they stopped, a map was laid out before them.

Upon it, a single route had been clearly marked. It led not toward safety or civilization, but toward a place all nations feared, a place deliberately left untouched. Even the strongest kingdoms had agreed, without treaty or discussion, to keep their distance from it.

The destination was the Crystallized Mountain.

It had appeared suddenly, rising during the Night of the Untold, as though the world itself had been pierced and frozen in that moment. The upper echelons of power knew how the mountain had come to be and more importantly, what it signified. That knowledge alone was enough to ensure silence and caution.

Measures had been taken to mark the region as forbidden. Borders were drawn, patrol routes altered, and records sealed. Yet beyond these precautions, little more could be done. The mountain's very existence rendered further security meaningless. Attempts to control or contain it had already proven futile.

Anything that drew too close risked corruption. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Living beings, artifacts, even spells were said to twist under its influence, reshaped into pawns of the dark gods that lingered beyond mortal understanding. Proximity alone was enough to invite that fate. For this reason, both kingdoms declared the region off-limits, allowing only a handful of individuals to ever approach and even then, only briefly.

It was into this place that Mei and her team had gone.

There was still security in place around the region, but it was limited in both scope and effectiveness. The most that could be done was to establish checkpoints and borders at a safe distance, keeping civilians and wanderers away. Anything more aggressive proved pointless.

Mei and her team's first destination had been the mountain itself.

Their objective was simple in wording, yet dangerous in execution: obtain a crystal shard no larger than a fist from the Crystallized Mountain and leave within a strictly limited time. Any longer spent within its influence risked exposure to the whispers, the murmurs and half-formed words of the dark gods said to emanate from the mountain. Those who lingered too long did not return as they had entered.

Passing the borders posed little difficulty.

The guards stationed there were third-tier soldiers, competent but unremarkable. This was to be expected. Higher-tier warriors had no desire to waste their time standing watch over a place no one was meant to enter in the first place. Their role was not to stop determined intruders, but to discourage the careless and the ignorant.

Mei still remembered the moment she and her team crossed beyond it.

If the magical scans around the Osita Kingdom had given her the sensation of countless unseen eyes observing her, this was something far worse. The instant they passed the border, it felt as though they had stepped into a different layer of reality. The land itself remained unchanged, same ground, same sky, same air yet everything felt wrong.

The silence pressed in unnaturally.

From the corner of her vision, Mei could have sworn she saw something dark pass between the crystal outcroppings. It was never clear enough to define, never present long enough to confront. The others felt it too. None of them spoke, yet their tightened expressions betrayed shared unease.

They seem to have entered a place that existed beside the world, not within it.

At times, a voice would whisper so close to their ears that Mei could almost feel breath against her skin. The nearer they drew to the mountain, the stranger it became. The whispers grew clearer, forming fragments of words that lingered just long enough to be understood before dissolving again. The dark shapes that passed at the edge of their vision became more defined, more compact, so close it felt as though they were a thin breath away from reaching out and touching them.

Or being touched in return.

Their strength and more importantly, the discipline of their minds was the only reason they continued forward. Each step required deliberate effort. They had to convince themselves that what they were seeing was not real, that the sensations pressing in on them were nothing more than the mountain's influence trying to take hold. To hesitate was to listen, and to listen was to fall.

Then, as if it had been waiting for them, they saw it.

A crystallized shard, no larger than a fist, rested against the mountain's surface. There was no struggle, no resistance, no hesitation. Mei and her team moved at once. The moment their hands closed around the crystal, they turned and retreated with everything they had.

What followed remained unclear even in memory.

They did not remember the path they took, nor the distance they covered. All they knew was that they escaped. When they later tried to recall the retreat, each of them found the same unsettling absence. The dark shapes, the whispers, the oppressive presence, all of it vanished the instant the crystal was taken.

It was as though the shard itself had shielded them.

As though it had guided them out.