5—Harpies

Walking away from the bookshelf Merel head for the door ignoring the dust laden bed.

Opening the door a cold breeze flows past him sending shivers down his spine.

Striding unperturbed, through the cold air, he finds most of the rooms are stripped bare of their contents.

'Whoever ransacked this place they took everything they could carry in their hands.'

Thinking this to himself he's disturbed by a loud sound.

Squak! Squak! Squak!

A cacophony of bird like screeches resound throughout the hallway originating somewhere above him.

'That was too loud and unsettling to be your average bird.'

Merel stops after seeing the stairs at the end of the hallway that likely lead to the roof and possible source of that sound.

Merel silently summons out his inscriptor into his hands to prepare for possible danger taking inspiration from the witchers and their tried and true advice that you should always be prepared.

Standing still he raises his inscriptor remembering the tomes advice and creates an image of identification in his mind it was difficult at first but he settled on an image of passport. Holding the image in mind he begins tracing the word 'identify' in the air.

With palpable resistance on the inscriptor he strengthens his mental image of the rune by imagining examples of random items being identified with their name and some information about it appearing in the air.

The feeling of dragging the pen through tar became more of a sensation of honey after doing so.

Making mental notes on how to do inscriptions in the future Merel finally finishes the rune opening his eyes he keeps the image of identification in his mind to stop the rune now floating in the air from fading.

'The tome didn't mention how to put this on my palm but I guess it may come down to common sense...'

Thinking this Merel raised his arm and pushed his palm into the rune.

The glowing rune shakes after he touches it before being pulled into his palm.

Looking at his palm Merel can now see the word 'Identify' imprinted on the inside of his palm.

"Now one more rune left to make.'

Merel had decided to make one more rune he thought of placing a 'silent' rune on his feet so whatever had made that sound couldn't hear him as he treaded towards it.

Closing his eyes once more he tries to invision the meaning using the method of imagining the rune in action to capture the meaning.

Only after ten minutes of hard concentration did he finally accomplish his task of inscribing the 'silent' rune. Who knew it was so hard to invision silence?

Placing his foot on the rune it inscribed itself on Merel's foot.

Giving his strained mind a break he began working on the other the second time was slightly faster than the first.

After making both his feet silent Merel made his way towards the steps. The runes paid off as the wood didn't let out a single creak. Finally seeing some light coming from above along with the already cold air growing warmer from the sunlight. Merel felt as if he was stepping out of a cold cellar into a warm spring day.

The freakish bird like sounds grew louder, the sound of many wings flapping becoming audible over the din.

Seeing as he had been climbing the stairs for a while now Merel concluded he must be in some sort of watchtower.

Merel, cautious of the possible numbers of what he was about to bump into, slows down his walking speed turning into a more of a sneaking pace bringing his body lower to the ground reducing how visible he is.

Coming to a stop at a door with a hole in it. Merel looked through the hole to study what was on the other side only to stumble backwards shrinking backwards and pinching his nose.

'What on earth is that smell... this is a lot worse than my old apartment... is there a dead body up here?'

Merel remarks inwardly.

Bracing the overwhelming stench of rot and what can only be described as excrement Merel brings himself back to the hole to actually see this time.

'Harpies!?'

Emaciated humanoids with greyish dead looking skin that is stretched over the showing bones like a canvas large wings with dull hues of green black and brown feathers.

Hideous faces with the largest feature being their mouths shaped like a beak, bony hands set with sharp claws along with large feet that look more like a bird's talons.

Thinking back to his extensive experience with the game he remembers harpies made nests in high places, stayed in groups up to twenty and defended their nests fiercely.

Looking at how many were around he counted nine.

___________________________________________

A/N: If you enjoy this chapter or the novel in general leave feedback or a comment. 801 words without this Author's note.