Stepping into the ruins, Artemis drew the silver blade from its sheathe and whipped his gaze from side to side, trying to identify where the scream had come from. He ran past the crumbling verandas of stone brick and wood, underneath an iron-barred gate that had been torn clean from its setting, thrown to the side to rust with age.
There was a large clearing in the center of the ruins, several staircases bordering the clearing which led up to the verandas that had already sunken down towards the ground. There were several doorways bordering these walkways which led to rooms jutting outwards, expanding the ruins even further.
Where could that cry have come from?
Although he was not keen to get himself into danger again so soon, barely having recovered himself, the thought of that woman he had seen when he had encountered the crumbling abyss resurfaced in his mind.
What if she too had appeared in the Cradle of Ash, and was in danger in these ruins?
He slowly approached the scene in the center of the room, cautious of his surroundings, checking around him a few more times before finally gazing down.
Faint aqueous moonlight pierced the haze of fog and cast the wooden ruins in its reverence. It served to exemplify the ancient scene set before him.
He did not know until that moment that a skeleton could look so horrified. How jaws could remain forever agape as if centered around the horrific pain they had experienced before their passing. He was doubly unknowing of how that could leave such a horrible mood wafting in the air. Simply stepping foot inside made him feel a bit uneasy. Although, that could have just been the threats that might have been lurking in the shadows, watching him as he took cautious steps.
And more than that, there was only one physical body lying in the pools of ash that gathered in the center of the ruins. The rest whose horrible faces he studied were casts of soot on the stone-brick walls, those who had cast them now missing.
This lone skeleton was not of a usual hue, bones charred black by the terrible bite of flames, perhaps even the same flames that burnt high within the Ivory Tree. It was missing its left arm, its bony face vacant and placated.
Fellow brother in... arms... missing arms...
A faint, cruel smile curled up his lips. What was humour at the expense of someone who was dead, as long as it uplifted the living?
Determining that he was safe in the moment, or at least not an immediate target, he returned his focus to the skeleton.
He touched his left eye, which had already dried over with crimson blood. Back when he had first instinctively activated [Eyes of Discernment], he hadn't really been able to feel anything but pain, so it was very hard to... well, discern the feeling of using it.
But now that he had adamantly watched the crimson serpents, he had gathered a certain sense of how the Daemon's essence was distributed when these 'abilities' were used. When [Enhanced Regeneration] had been used, he had felt that vile malfeasance spread throughout him, but also that sense of the unknown that plagued his mind. It was illuminating, terrifying, and filled him with curiosity.
Which is exactly what he felt as the crimson serpents rushed towards his hollow socket, filling it with that terrible feeling as he looked down at the one-armed skeleton.
Just by willing them to move, they followed his command as simple as if he were moving his fingers. And sensing his intentions, [Eyes of Discernment] was activated.
The crimson-coloured runes painted themselves in front of them, and Artemis dutifully ran his eyes over the lines of text as they gradually appeared, speaking them in that foul tone underneath his breath. The air crackled and sizzled as if it was on fire, but a terrible chill ran through his bones.
[If Ash was the end of suffering, Soot was its portrait. How cruel was the life where Eocyro tried to save his own people, just to return them to the cycle of madness and despair?
Even though he had been hunted by the Onyx-armoured Lord, he was filled with rage and insolence. He wished to prove that humanity could defy those Strangers from another world. So he bound the armour with Soot.
Thereby, when the Lord inside the armour died, it became a vessel tethered to the land, with the hopes that if the Lord ever found himself a Spirit, he would never leave this Hell they had created.]
Artemis stared at the body in reverence, his expression placid but with eyes abound with curiosity.
Was this the skeleton that once belonged to the figure named Eocyro?
This person had already been mentioned to him once before, when he had first used [Eyes of Discernment] to discern the nature of the Ivory Tree. However, at that time, it had mentioned that Eocyro had tried to set the Ivory Tree afire, and that the entire ordeal had killed off the people closest to him.
Was this what it was speaking about?
Whatever he had done to set that tree alight, had it also led to the death of his comrades in these ruins, as well as created the Cradle of Ash?
There was one issue with this thought process, however.
Why was it that the soot marks on the walls were of skeletons, and not of corpses?
It was the duty of the Captain of the House Guard to cremate the bodies of fallen soldiers. There was not often matters that brought about violence, rendering his Guard fallen. But they did often die of age, and Artemis took that duty upon himself to make sure they were properly honored.
This left him with the distinct knowledge that it took several hours to burn a body down to its bones. And that was just in the cases where they used a furnace. In an open-air fire like this one, the ruins should have burnt to the ground before the bodies were mostly burnt away, and even then, there should have been most of the skeletons left. The ruins shouldn't have even been here, much less the soot stains, the fire should have burnt itself out long past that, and there should be a multitude of skeletons surrounding Eocyro's.
So there were two main inconsistencies with this scene.
Why were the marks of skeletons, and not men, and where were those skeletons now?
Artemis cursed underneath his breath, unable to find a suitable answer. This curiosity was plagueing him. Although, he supposed it didn't matter.
He was here to hunt, and not to study...
Artemis perked his head up, his remaining eye filling with a dark trepidation as he raised his blade.
The scream sounded out again.
However, this time, it was more reserved and suppressed. It sounded less like a cry for help... and more just like... crying itself.
Artemis abandoned Eocyro's sleleton, heading towards the stairs, the direction the shout had come from. He could finally ascertain its origin. In the farthest doorway of the ruins, which remained slightly ajar despite the section of building it was attached to having caved in, there was now a faint and muffled sobbing emanating from within.
Once he reached this door, he wrapped his fingers tighter around the hilt of his blade. Reaching out his other hand slowly... he paused. His face paled. Because he reached nothing out at all.
Right... I only have one hand now.
A humoured smile curled up his lips.
How silly of me.
I really hope there isn't some ghost or some really crazy monster past this door.
He raised his foot high into the air, and after sucking in a deep breath, kicked it open so hard that the rusted hinges snapped, and the rusted wood caved in on itself.
However, despite his exuberant entrance, he still seemed privy to politeness. In a soft tone of voice, he whispered, "are there any ghosts in here?"
There was the silhouette of a young woman enshrouded in a mixture of shadows casts by the moonlight gleaming onto the ruins, and the haze that fell from the layer of fog in the sky.
She stared back at him with bright eyes, a calm expression plastered on her face.
Narrowing his eyes, he was barely able to perceive her frail form.
Portions of her hair were as black as the night, while others were as vibrant and raw as fire, crimson in hue.
All parts of her were pale, a bit scrawny and blanketed in dirt and ash. She resembled a little mouse that had crawled out of the grass to scavenge.
His eyebrows flew up. This was indeed the girl he had chased after to try and save from that strange creeping abyss.
But there was something odd about her...
...in the fact that there was nothing odd about her at all.
She wasn't wounded in any obvious fashion.
There didn't seem to be any monsters nearby.
So why had she screamed?