“I saw someone, across the road.” Yuriko said as she returned to where the others were hiding. “Ah, and a bunch of skeletons in armour are fighting the Femorants. They’re winning, I think, since they’re pushing back the ants.”

“Skeletons?” Asami frowned. “From Uaran?”

“Yes, the same,” Yuriko said. “I’m not sure how they got here though.”

“Wait, you saw someone? Who?” Orrin asked.

“I don’t know. Someone who isn’t part of our group,” Yuriko answered.

“The Federation expedition?”

“Probably. But that means they’re also stuck here without a path to Synkrasia.”

“That’s their problem, isn’t it?” Asami snorted. “As for ours, do we have to cross the battle lines?”

“I don’t think so,” Yuriko muttered. “Orrin?”

The boy closed his eyes for a long moment then pointed. The direction was across the battle lines, but more towards where the ants were coming from than the skellies. “Circle around?” Orrin suggested.

“I’d rather not fight our way through and draw attention,” Yuriko sighed.

Decisions made, the three of them, along with the unconscious two, turned and followed the debris filled road. Every now and then, Yuriko would climb up the rubble and check. After ten minutes of walking, the only creatures in sight were the ants that were headed towards the clash. However, there were stragglers wandering around the place, enough that they had to move a bit farther away from the city center to avoid them.

A few hours later they had to backtrack. The center was now filled with Femorants. The ambient Chaos was denser too, by point one of an iarvesh, as far as Yuriko could tell. Even worse, once they went back a little bit, she saw that the skellies had moved the battlefront by several hundred paces closer.

“Maybe we should fly past them,” Yuriko muttered, frustration colouring her tone. It would be easy to punch through the lines, but she had a sneaking suspicion that doing so would cause all of them to chase after her and the others.

“How about there?” Orrin pointed at a hole near the pavement. “Sewers?”

Yuriko frowned. “Are they even big enough to walk in?”

She approached the hole and expanded her perception aura. Most of the area around the entrance was filled with debris too, but the lower parts of it had water flowing through. But a couple of paces down, the water had accumulated enough that it filled half of the sewer pipe. It was barely a couple of paces across, so she could stand there if she was in the middle, but that was where the water was at.

But, as far as she could feel, the other way wasn’t blocked. They’d backtrack again, and she wasn’t sure if they could actually bypass the battle line this way, but at least they would be out of easy sight.

“Let’s go,” she decided, and the three of them jumped down the entrance hole. There were indents in the stone at the side, which acted as a ladder, but there was little need for it. She didn’t stand in the middle, instead, she used her Anima to float while in a seated meditation pose. She oriented Faeril and the other Hollower horizontally, as if they were lying on a bed, and, after seeing Orrin and Asami’s pleading puppy dog eyes, she relented and carried them too.

It was slow going as the tunnels were narrow, and there were several parts that were blocked or constricted with rubble. At least it didn’t stink so much though, so there was that. They spent nearly half of the day backtracking and navigating through the maze, until eventually, they managed to make their way across the line, but only emerged about fifty paces from where she first saw the skellies fighting the ants. By that time, the reflection of the skies showed the Radiant Sun was merely a couple of hours away from dusk.

Still, they could travel a long way with the remaining time in the sun, but then again, daylight wasn’t a necessity when traveling this deep underground. The only reason she adhered to the daylight hours was the convenient illusion up in the ceiling.

She let the other two down to walk. Her Anima wasn’t strained at all, even carrying that much weight with just her kinesis. Still, there was a feeling of stiffness when she stretched her perception out too far. Nothing a good night’s sleep wouldn’t cure.

From here, she could see the cavern’s walls. It was still about a couple of longstrides away. An easy walk if the roads were clear, and an even easier flight if she dared take to the air. She could see dozens of tunnels peppering the walls too, and not all of them easily reachable from the cavern floor. She could see ledges and possible passages going around the wall, but not how to access them.

A light mist covered the lower portion of the city, and she could see a waterfall in the distance, roughly three or so longstrides from where they stood. The mist originated from that area.

As it were, they walked towards the wall for an hour, before stopping to look for shelter. They barely progressed five hundred paces through the rubble filled streets, and searching for a resting area where the invalids could lie down took them another hour. In the end, they took shelter by the shadow of a half collapsed wall that was surrounded on two other sides by rubble. Yuriko’s perception checked the rubble piles stability and she figured it would take concerted effort to collapse them.

They were in the midst of preparing dinner when Asami suddenly jerked.

“There’s someone there,” She hissed.

Yuriko gripped her Arclight Sword’s hilt but didn’t draw it yet. Her perception aura didn’t catch anyone’s presence, but Asami’s range was farther than hers anyway. “Did they notice you?”

Asami’s cheeks were pale. “Yes. Humans.”

“Oh.” Yuriko nodded. At least it wasn't the ants or the skellies. Not that Federation people weren’t much better either.

“Who’s there?” came the call, and Yuriko blinked. That had been in Verdanian, not Wojan.

“Here,” she answered, though her voice probably wouldn’t be too audible behind several mounds of stone, not to mention the walls. She walked out of their little cul-de-sac shelter, though she kept her coat away from her sword.

When she rounded the corner, her eyes met with a surprised Imperial. Obviously not one of her group. It was a youngish-looking man, though clad in a legionnaire’s uniform. Well, no, not a legionnaire’s. The insignia on the lapel indicated a marine. The legionnaire stared at her, slack-jawed, and it took a few moments, upon which four other marines revealed themselves, before the first recovered, though mainly from her realising that her Mien had been active, and she pulled it back.

“Who are you?” she asked, which jolted the lot of them from their stupor.

“Ah, er, we’re…from the Empire’s temp legion, marines assigned to Her Majesty’s Ship, The Shattered Spear,” the first one said. “Senan Arkas, at your service.”

Yuriko smiled. “Yuriko Davar from Faron’s Crossing. You say you’re from the legion? How did you arrive here?”

“We’re part of an infiltration group to assist with reopening the Chaos Channel, except we got caught by the Chaos Lords’ defences. We escaped by diving deeper into the sea close to the plane, and entered through an underground channel a few days ago.” Senan explained happily. “You’re from Faron’s Crossing? That’s a town in western Rumiga, isn’t it? Ah! How did you and…” he nodded towards the direction of the camp “come down here? How deep under are we, anyway?” He muttered. Senan’s bright green eyes darted up towards the broken skies, and he brushed strands of his red hair off his forehead.

“Oi!” One of the others, a dark-haired woman who looked twice Yuriko’s age, protested, “What proof do we have that she’s from the Empire?” She prodded Senan in the back, “Don’t let her pretty face make you a fool!” She hissed in a low tone, but Yuriko heard it anyway.

She pulled her identification card from her safe pouch, which was tucked under her shirt, discreetly using her kinesis. She reached into her coat with her actual hand and pulled it out. Senan touched his finger into the imprint and nodded when the resonance was positive. Then, he took a closer look at the card, and his eyes widened and he gasped, “Knight!”

The others gasped in surprise, glancing from the card to Yuriko’s face, before each of them bowed.

One of the others, a middle-aged man with brown hair and eyes, and ebony skin, muttered, “Davar? Like the marine captains and the Runeer?”

“Riley, Aidan, and Layla Davar?” Yuriko asked quickly.

“Oh, yes. From the Sullen Striker. You’re from the same house?” the cautious woman asked.

“My cousins and aunt.” Yuriko answered with a smile, then she frowned. “Are they with you?”

The five marine legionnaires exchanged glances, then Senan looked over towards the skelly-ant battlefront. “Yes, I believe we should bring you back to home base.”

“Great!” Yuriko cheered. She missed Riley and the other two, and considering the last time she saw them was just before she left Ulmira more than a Season ago… “Is your camp within the city?”

Seran shook his head. “No, ma’am. We’re a scout unit. We passed through several tunnels before we arrived here in this cavern. There’s another similar cavern not far from here, although the ceiling there is in much better condition.”

“I see.” Yuriko shook her head. “We’ve been separated from our larger group and passed through a Chaos lake occupied by Red Femorants. There’s a Knight-Commander level combatant there, the queen. Our base camp is in another city similar to this. I wonder if your camp is in the same one?” That would have been serendipitous, but there was an easy way to check. “Anyway, come into our camp first. It’s late after all.”

“Ma’am,” Senan laughed, “we would be delighted to. Although we left our camp only a few hours ago.”

“That’s good to hear.” Yuriko beckoned and they followed into the cul-de-sac, which had suddenly become much crowded with five additional bodies.

Asami had been listening in, so she wasn’t surprised. The marines looked at Orrin and his antennae, hands twitching at the sight before Yuriko placated them, “He got exposed.”

“Apologies.”

They stared at Faeril’s obviously foreign features and frowned, “Who are they? And what happened to them?” the woman asked.

“Friends,” Yuriko said. “We rescued them from the Femorant nest.”

“Thank you for sharing shelter with us,” Senan said formally.

“You are welcome to our fire, and our food,” Yuriko returned, “though it's only water and ration bar porridge.”

“Ah! Allow us to share our spice blends!” Senan insisted. Each of the marine legionnaires pulled out a spice packet from their satchels, though Yuriko noted that they were mostly identically labelled pouches.

They happily shared the spices and added them into the pot, which would need about ten or so minutes to fully blend. In the meantime, the marines, Yuriko, Orrin, and Asami chatted.

Amanda Sevier, the dark-haired woman, regaled them with their daring escape from the Chaos dwellers, and of how many of them died just to bring the beacon to the city.

“The beacon will allow a tether to reform between Witton Hold, Delovine, and Rumiga, which will allow the fleet and the legions to bypass the Chaos dwellers’ blockade. As soon as we bring this to the surface and to the Chaos Channel, then this will end.” Amanda explained, “And the full might of the Empire will fall upon those savages.”

Yuriko and Asami exchanged glances, “Will a Knight Imperius come?”

“Huh, no, I don’t think so. A Knight Imperius’ time is far more precious than a frontier plane, I think,” Amanda said.

“Then, I’m afraid the legions wouldn’t be able to triumph so easily,” Yuriko said grimly, “The power behind this war is a Chaos Duke, and he’s already managed to get his claws into the plane. That’s the reason we’re down here. We have to protect the planar core, and through the city of Synkrasia, go through a portal to take a weapon that can match a Chaos Duke.”

“Truly? But, why are you all still here instead of Synkrasia?” Senan asked.

“Because the path has been blocked. But surely, you and the others could easily find a way up?”

“That’s the thing. We’ve spent the last week searching, and none of the tunnels ever lead to the surface.”

“Eh? But we just came down here a week ago!”

As if to mock her words, the earth trembled and the ceiling illusion flickered as boulders rained down into the ruined city.