Chapter 5, cont.

Horoz raced back into the colosseum via the overhangs, the point which he determined to have the lowest anti-spell barriers. It was still a rough climb, but years of running from everything had honed his acrobatic aptitude, and he made it to the top without complaint. The arena-wide mud splatter from two days ago was a faint memory only to him and the staff, particularly that bumbling Grade 1 cleaner who couldn't even move a light sweeping of dust without the aid of a broom.

He snorted in contempt to think of that time. It seemed ludicrous to hire a team of low-grade workers to do the work that a single mid-grade could do working alone. No—a mid-grade would be too competent to do the work and, therefore, wouldn't want to do it. Everyone strives to do more than what is possible, and settling for less is unacceptable.

The logic was airtight. Incompetents did the lowly work because they couldn't achieve more than that. He imagined a furious head of staff coming in and whipping the sorry lot of them for not being able to do better... It was barbaric that they hadn't created a spell to do the cleaning for them. If they paid him enough, Horoz would do it in no time at all.

After solving this mystery.

Horoz_CZ

Kohout put down a cushion of air to lighten his descent, then dissipated it—wouldn't want to leave his signature for someone else to track. He examined the arena for clues leading to the kingdom, which seemed to be easier than it was. He already knew the answer—where was the question? Surely it would still be around for stragglers who wanted to catch up, wouldn't it?

Possibly not. This was supposed to be a team effort, after all. There might not be a way in for latecomers. That would be problematic—Kohout wasn't excited about the idea of joining the Brigade, especially after skipping the first day of tour. There must have been something he overlooked as an atmospheric-focus.

Kohout_TR

But there was nothing left in the arena that wouldn't still be there after the journey was ended, he could perceive. It must have been a message given to the participants, possibly a task to perform. He didn't have enough of a grasp of Base-IS to even conceptualize turning back time to see what it was—all he knew was it was something a little like Base-DK but not.

Hydd didn't know. Did that idiot from before know? Pecore or something like that. Anyone higher up the chain wouldn't tell him. Maybe he should track down Pecore and ask... no, dead end that way, if he was thrown by a low-grade mud splatter even if it was on an enormous scale.

Horoz was getting annoyed. He would follow the path anyway and find out what he could. Failure is always an option, he realized, even if it wasn't a preferable one, and if he couldn't solve a mystery without outside help from a ragtag band of brigands on holiday, he wouldn't make a good detective.

The climb back up to the overhangs was nearly as steep as from the outside curving in, but he managed to do it without having to shift again—not that he couldn't shift, but he avoided doing it as a matter of pride in being able to do as much as possible in his starting base. He descended the exterior wall of the colosseum with somewhat more difficulty than before but still managed it while evading detection. Only the concave slopes gave him significant trouble enough to cheat.

Second face was looming. Did he bother to spy on those two again? While luck was on his side for the first encounter, Horoz didn't feel like tempting fate without good reason. Casually, he meandered across the grounds, touching quickly on the spots where he had seen the Brigade pass through. The tower gates lining the second-face borders were undisturbed save one—that must be where they broke through. How were the defences now?

Horoz_PL

Though Kogut wasn't fond of this form, she would blend into the shadows and might have an easier time wheedling her way out of trouble in the event of capture than Horoz would. She sidled along the wall, listening closely for guards approaching. There was one at the top of the gate starting to doze off from boredom, but all other activity was from workers making repairs to the barriers—it seemed like the coast was clear, but she didn't want to shift back to gain additional perception to make sure. She decided to cast a spell to bypass shifting:

CTRL-ALT-DEL > Processes

There were a few basic monitoring spells on the tower, mostly low-level stuff easy for a skilled cracker to deflect. The majority of their processing power was going toward defragmenting the damage and backing up the network. Their firewall wasn't even armed. Good news for Kogut.

She slipped through under cloak of darkness, tiptoeing through the gate and pulling herself through the gaps in the portcullis with a twinge of difficulty—she would have to watch her figure. As she reached the far end of the corridor—

403 FORBIDDEN

You do not have permission to access this site.

Maledictions! She must have missed one of the layers of protection on the tower! Still, it was a weak barrier—it might be possible to crack it with sheer force...

"You! Stop!"

The guards were closing in—she didn't have time.

Kogut_DE

In a flash, Hahn was through the gate, rocketing down the third face and out of sight of the tower in less than a min. This was bad—now he was on their radar. It would take learning a new base to get back off it completely. What could he learn in such a short time, though?

So this was third face, then... He paused in the crepuscular light of third face, yet rising from the direction of the second. It was like travelling back in time several hours. More drastically than that, the gravitational shift disoriented him at first—he couldn't fathom doing this often, and certainly not so often as the members of the Brigade would be doing if they returned for the lodging battles every day.

Speaking of, where would they be now? They shouldn't be more than a day's journey away, even at a normal person's rate of travel. He couldn't see any particular sign of passage, however, and jogging to the nearest towns revealed even less. He would have to ask someone.

"Excuse me," Hahn asked the nearest townsperson, but she seemed to be in a hurry.

"I'm so sorry," she apologized, dashing away. "Emergency!"

Odd, he thought, trying another.

"Make way! Coming through!"

The next person raced past as though running from a fire. He glanced back in the direction they were running from but saw nothing of note. Was it worth following them?

Hahn_TR

Though he didn't expect this to tie into the Brigade directly, Horoz decided that information on something unrelated was better than no related information, and perhaps the townspeople would be able to help him if he helped them. Following at a leisurely pace, he watched as practically the entire suburb poured out onto the streets, forming a gigantic mob. What could possibly draw the attention of so many from as diverse a people as this?

The crowd seemed to converge on an amphitheatre at the edge of town, where a number of tawny citizens had gathered. He noticed on the spot that they were all Base-IT. A chill ran down his spine as he noticed ALL the citizens were Base-IT to various degrees.

No, this couldn't be the IT crowd. They wouldn't just allow a Base-TR to stumble upon their private meetings, would they? To be certain, he decided to shift again.

Horoz_IT

Gallo worked his way into the mob, emulating some of the others' mannerisms so not to draw attention to himself. He could barely make out the activity in the amphitheatre as one of the speakers took the stage.

"It is a sad day," he crooned, as though writing a love song from a dirge. "Our dear leader Rana has passed from this plane, leaving us without a guide. It is tradition that we now summon a new leader to bring us into the future."

A burst of cheer erupted from the mob, which Gallo mimicked in astonishment. These cries sounded more excited than mournful...

"The ceremonial rites will commence—each of us will place our greatest wish into the offering bowl, that our new leader will receive them and learn of what is to come."

For a ceremony, it was short. The crowd proceeded single-file to the auditorium, where each person approached the bowl and appeared to pray. It seemed innocent enough that he could get away with faking this as well...

As his turn came, Gallo imitated the person before him with rigid accuracy. In his mind, though, where his predecessors had dreams, Gallo had questions, and his prayer consisted of, "Is this stupid thing done yet?"

There was a burst from within the amphitheatre, and for a moment Gallo was afraid his cover was blown. That would be ridiculous, though—these were an earth-focused people, not psychic...

...were they?