The trip to the Shrine was surprisingly uneventful, one or twice we had to stop because Misty thought she saw something ahead, but it ended up being nothing and we kept moving. As we approached the shrine again, I had the weird sense something was off proportions wise, but I shook my head and turned to Liora.
"You know what your job is, let's get to work."
Liora and I headed for the shrine where Liora saw the circle and got on her hands and knees as she started to mumble to herself, even reaching into an inner pocket on her cloak to pull out a notebook as if to cross examine what she was seeing. As she did, I heard what sounded like grunting noises, but as I stepped outside for a moment to see what could be making them, I saw Kaelen hanging with his legs dangling over the side of the shrine's roof as he made various sounds of effort as his legs kicked back and forth.
"Don't grunt mind me huff I can do this."
Kaelen said through his huffs and puffs. I slowly made my way back inside not sure what to think of Kaelen's attempt at a rooftop watch before figuring that's where I should not think about it.
"I know magic more than I do potions, but they must share some similarities of some kind, right?"
Liora asked as she scribbled a small image of the circle in her notebook as she bobbed her finger as if counting.
"I could assume so, but I don't ever see a magic circle in the potions I brew if that's what you're asking."
I replied crouching down next to her confused on what she was asking.
"Then let me ask you a question related to alchemy, if you have a potion that is used to protect someone by making an area around them, does that ever serve as the base of a bigger potion or is that all it does?"
I thought for a moment, thinking back to the barkskin potion and how its properties manifested, but none of the potions I knew had a bubble shield like effect to them.
"I don't know of any potions that do that, so I'm not sure, but generally when you're trying to improve a potion you use its lowest rank form and you expand on the recipe from there based on the potion. Why do you ask?"
"I ask because the magic circle here is extremely simple, its entire function is set in this inner ring here, the rest of this is designed to be a system that is used to recycle mana to make the shield last as long as possible, weirder still is its written incorrectly. This is clearly someone who knows what they are doing, but they messed up that part there."
Liora said as she stood and pointed at a small part of the magic circle to the right of the room. After a moment she got up and started to look around the room as if the answers were just in a random corner. I followed behind her and asked
"What do you mean written incorrectly, like it won't work how it's been made, or?"
"I mean the shield is inverted, barriers are written to expel things outward, this one expels them in the wrong direction, I would have assumed it was an amature mistake if not for the extra rings on the outside. Though this could have been someone attempting to copy a design they saw in a text and mixing up a glyph, but that would have made other parts sloppy or at least wonkey at best."
"So, what, is this a case of good work with a small mistake, or do you think it was intentional?"
Liora reached at a nearby floorboard that had partially fallen off and started to pull at it seemingly looking at something below it as she said.
"Thats what I'm trying to figure out now. These travelers' shrines used to always keep a logbook of who came, if we can figure out who made the circle then we can see if its amature work or someone who knew what they were doing."
I walked over and helped her pry at the floorboards and after a moment she grabbed her staff and used it as a pry bar to break the wood. Inside we found a ratty book covered in tree roots. Liora looked at it for a moment before she turned to me.
"Didn't you say one of your potions was firestarter, got any handy?"
I shook my head rummaging through my potions.
"I have 3 shadowmeld, 3 Vomit, 2 Drowsiness, 3 focused sense, 3 irritation, 3 vigilance, 5 healing, and 3 night vision."
Liora gave me a look like she was not impressed before saying
"Those all sound useful for different situations, any chance you have a saw in that bag of your?"
"I have some small clippers for herb harvesting, but I don't think they will work on those."
"Better than nothing, gimme."
As Liora took my small clippers and started to lean in to find an angle on the roots Kaelen yelped. We both quickly turned to see he had fallen the last few inches from where he had been trying to lower himself from the roof. He quickly composed himself, wiping off the dust before he walked in.
"Jax is coming this way, I can't see any ash spirits following him, but they may be behind him."
Both Liora and I turned to each other before heading outside. Jax was indeed running over, and after a minute he came skidding to a stop and took a moment to pant before he said.
"The ash spirits were doing something weird."
"Like how weird are we talking here?"
Liora asked as she crossed her arms after putting her notebook away and handing the clippers back to me.
"I don't know, weird alright. I saw them shooing a deer away before suddenly all ganging up on one tree and ripping it up. The tree started bleeding too."
I turned to Kaelen who shrugged at me, not sure what to think either as I heard Liora and Jax arguing about a tree bleeding and what he saw.
"You said they tried to attack you every time you all were seen, and now you're saying they were guiding animals away, are you changing your story now?"
Liora barked as I walked past the shrine. Kaelen followed next to me and started to walk with me as he asked.
"You have the face of someone with an idea, mind filling me in?"
"It's less of an idea and more of a hunch."
I said as I walked over to the tree that loomed inside the preserved area in the shrine. I scanned the ground for a moment before I picked up a sizable rock, and before Kaelen could stop me, I slammed it into the bark of the tree. The sound of slightly crunching wood seemed to have alerted Jax and Liora who stopped their arguing as they turned to me. From where the bark broke under the rock came a crimson liquid in a small trickle that looked exactly like blood. We all stared for a moment as I reached down and picked up the small chunk of bark I had broken off. I turned to the Jax as I asked.
"Does this tree look anything like the tree you saw the ash spirits go crazy over?"
Jax shook his head and said
"No, the tree looked like any other tree on the mountain aside from the fact that it started bleeding, the leaves are different on this one and the trunk is much more twisty and much wider."
A feeling like a shiver ran through my body as I looked to the top of the branches. I squinted as I focused on the wind around me. The breeze was calm and unmoving, but as I stared, I saw the branches twitch. The barrier that keeps things in, the fact that the ash spirits were trying to rid life in an area, and the fact that like this one tree another one was bleeding and was attacked with fervor by the ash spirits was no coincidence. I turned to the others, I could feel my face had gone pale, but a gut feeling told me that something was definatly wrong, and yet I felt like if I said it aloud it would come true. Taking a breath, I tried to calm myself down as the feeling only grew worse, we had to get out of here, but before I could start sprinting one of my grandfather's sayings rang in my head. Animals hunt those who run, those who walk away just happen to be on the same part of the mountain. I glanced at my pendent where Misty was resting and made sure she was there. As I turned I saw a moment of recognition flash on Kaelen and Lioras faces as they both seemed on edge looking at me, and a bit to my surprise, Jax didn't seem to see anything wrong, instead looking over the tree behind me as if he was trying to look for more details that made it different from the one he saw before.
"Well, for now let's head back and we can regroup and figure out how we can deal with the ash spirits."
I said as Liora and Kaelen nodded, not sure what had me so spooked, but knowing I was trying to get us out of there.
"I just said they were acting weird; they may not be-"
Jax started but was cut off by Kaelen who jumped in and said.
"If we can discuss that when we get back to the house in one piece, I'm starving."
As Kaelen spoke, I heard his voice spike for a moment. Liora and I froze, and I felt the ground shift slightly as if little snakes had slithered underneath us, coiled and waiting to strike. I looked at Kaelen who didn't seem to notice it, but by how Lioras face had paled as well it was clear that she felt it too. Jax looked at Kaelen then glanced down.
"Did you all just feel something weird?"
Jax asked, looking at me. I shook my head and said
"Nope, but its gonna get dark soon and we can't do anything if we can't see and I didn't bring a lantern. Let's rest for the night."
Looking at Jax he seemed to know something weird was happening, but not sure what to do he said.
"Alright, let's get going, I'll scout if any ash spirits are coming."
I fought the urge to go sprinting from the shrine as fast as I could. repeating my grandfathers saying over and over again in my head. So, despite the fact I wanted to go running, screaming that we were all in danger, I walked, one step at a time, my heart pounding expecting that at any moment I would feel a sharp pain in my back and then nothing. Left foot, right foot, left foot again, until we left the shrine and stepped onto the ashen area. I felt like I might collapse, as if I had been running for a day straight and only just barely gotten to the end, but Jax had said a living tree, meaning it was at the edge of the ash area, so we weren't safe yet. We continued on as Liora and Kaelen looked to me as if expecting an explanation as I didn't meet their eyes, the feeling decreasing, but still pounding along with my heart. Jax however didn't seem to get the hint, practically skipping along as he looked to everyone with a confused look.
"What's with everyone being so moppy suddenly, did you all not get to translate the magic circle, if so, why did we leave so soon, why do all of you look like you just walked out of an ice box, are any of you going to respond?"
Jax asked, circling us as he spoke.
"We discovered the circle, and we know we need to get back home and regroup."
I said, glancing back almost out of instinct, checking for movement from the shrine in the far distance now.
"Great, so what's the plan?"
Jax asked, bouncing over to me.
"For now, let's just get back home and make plans to eat dinner in town."
Kaelen said as we walked, finally stepping out of the ashen area. The feeling dimly thrummed in my chest, but subsided more and more with every step, only when we were a good 20ft away did I realize I was holding my breath, taking a minute to breathe again as we stopped.
"Let me guess, gut feeling something was wrong?"
Liora asked as we took a minute to find a place to sit.
"Y-yea, it was like we needed to get out of there, like something was there. My grandfather always said that you never run from a big animal, or you identify yourself as prey, so.... yea."
"So that's why everyone was being weird, good on you Aiden."
I blinked at Jax for a moment in suprise, I had expected to have been called paranoid or scared or something, so the complement had me realing for a moment.
"You're not mad?"
I asked looking around
"Aiden, dozens of adventuring groups have died because they didn't trust a gut feeling, you have grown up on this mountain for years, if anything, your gut feelings are one reason why you make a good guide for this quest, your knowladge of the mountains norms could have just saved us, and even if they didn't I would rather walk back again tommorrow and spend an extra day then risk getting killed because I wanted to be fast."
As the three of them got up and started towards the house and the minecart, talking about what to get for dinner with Jax giving recomendations a weird thought passed trough my head before I could stop it.
"I think I'm starting to like our little group."