Tongue Of The Ancients

Sounds flooded Kies' head. The sounds themselves made no sense. It sounded like murmurs and rasp whispers, like ghosts trying to say something but couldn't. He didn't understand what the golem was trying to convey to him. But suddenly, as if he learned how to speak and understand ghosts, out of the blue the sounds and noises began to make sense to him and formulate words. These words then turned into sentences.

The voices stopped and the Ancient spoke again. 'Not all magic can be controlled. Some will break free from the restraints you impose on them. Centrolio is the magic language of the humans. Think about its purpose for existence. After you find the answer to that, you will understand the rest.

There was another pause from the golem before it spoke again. 'And as for this piece of the Stormcaller, if you can get rid of the poison, it is all yours.' With that said, the ground rumbled and sank into the ground. 'Now that I have given you what you want, I shall rest. Wake me once you have solved the poison that plagues this forest.' The world returned to stillness and the golem's presence was no more. Kies felt the Ancient's magic power, buried deep in the ground, dormant.

Kies spent a minute in order to gather together what the golem had told him. The magic language of the humans and its purpose. The bizarre voices he heard in his head. It was not the first time that he encountered it, but he clearly heard what they were saying to him. 'Set us free.' They chanted that eerie phrase over and over in his head. Who or what did they belong to, that was a mystery, but from their tone, they were angry at him... but for what?

Kies' walk back to the tree was met with many unhappy gazes. He spotted Nyana, distanced from the rest of the crowd. She had her arms crossed and when their eyes met, she shook her head. She had on not her uniform, but casual clothes and a bow messily slung over her shoulder with a quiver at her side. She motioned for him to follow her then turned to head back into the tree.

There were intense stares from the elves as Kies followed Nyana back into the tree. He followed the elf to a quiet room. A table-sized mushroom sat in the middle of the room and surrounding it were smaller chair-sized mushrooms. As if to match the theme, more fungi lined the walls and ceiling, acting as both decoration and lighting. The floor was soft like moss, but a closer look revealed the carpeting to be thousands of tiny mushrooms too.

It felt gross to be stepping on all of them but Nyana assured him that his shoes were fine. "The mushrooms may feel soft but they're some of the most durable things in this forest." The elf took a seat on one of the mushrooms and waited for Kies to do the same.

"Didn't I tell you to stay out of trouble?" The elf rubbed her eyes with her hand and let out a deep breath, obviously tired. "Anyway, I heard that you solved our problem," she continued, changing the topic. "I have to say, I didn't think you would manage it this fast. So let's put aside the fact that you gave everyone here the fright of their lives for now. Thank you for your service." She bowed her head respectfully, as a soldier would.

Kies kept silent, unsure how he should respond. He certainly did solve the elves' crisis like Nyana asked him to, but now what. The fragment was still with the golem and it gave him another task to do. If he wanted that fragment, he would have to get rid of the source of the poison.

Waiting for Kies to speak, Nyana sat there silently waiting. When she saw that Kies wasn't going to say anything, she spoke up. "So, I'm guessing you want a reward? I don't know what a being like you would want. And that crystal thing... Did you retrieve it from the golem?"

"No."

"No?"

"I need to do something for it first. I need to get rid of the poison plaguing this forest," Kies recited what the golem said to him.

Nyana nodded her head. "Looks like your work in this forest isn't done yet," she noted. "Those old bark-heads will tear their hair out when they hear this," she smirked.

The elf stood up. She rolled her shoulder to shift the bow away from her neck. "I can get you on the investigation team. They definitely won't be happy about this, but we always need more manpower. They can't say no to someone with firepower such as yours," she told Kies.

The elf took a step out the door but stopped herself and asked Kies first, "Is there anything you want as a reward? A weapon? Perhaps some armor, though I doubt it would fit your physique. Or maybe a magic amulet or tool? Actually, I think you have enough." The elf went down the list but couldn't seem to figure out something that Kies either didn't have or was of use to him. Defeated, she awaited his response,

There wasn't anything materialistic that Kies wanted but there were questions he wanted answers to. "I do want something. Can you tell me how the Centrolio interacts with magic?" he asked Nyana. The golem had told him something about finding the purpose of the language's existence and how it would help his magic. With all the books in this place, there surely was an answer buried somewhere here.

Nyana rapidly blinked a couple of times before raising her eyebrow and asking seriously, "That's all you want?" In utter disbelief by how simple of a thing Kies wanted, she was was questioning if that was really all.

"Yes," Kies said confidently.

"Okay... Well, I can't say we elves know much about the language as it was the humans that invented it. We sort of just went along with it. I'm pretty sure the humans have also forgotten the history of their language considering their lifespan and how long it has been, but I will tell you what I can." The elf scratched her head and mumbled to herself for a bit.

"Let's see... I honestly shouldn't be the person to ask this to, but Centrolio is used to bend magic to your will. In comparison, our language doesn't do that. The Elven language is pleading with the nature spirits to help us. The only time I use Centrolio is for combat since it is much faster and more reliable. Sometimes the nature spirits don't do our bidding. Not exactly what you want when you're in a life-and-death situation. It's akin to having disloyal subordinates," Nyana briefly explained.

Kies narrowed his eyes, intrigued by this. Was this what the golem was talking about? Was it trying to tell him to change the language in which he used magic? But what difference would that make when he didn't even use chants to use his magic? There was more to this than what he first thought.

"What other magic languages are there?" Kies asked, his curiosity suddenly sparked by this revelation.

Nyana looked to the side, trying to recall what magic languages existed. Off the top of her head, she listed, "There's old demonic and current demonic. There are also the two we just talked about. I don't think the dwarven language is one... The beastfolk don't have one either. The ocean dwellers, I believe their language has strong ties with magic. And the only other one I can think of is the tongue of the Ancients."

Kies' eyes widened. The Ancients. That was a magic language! How did he not consider that!? The pieces of the puzzle suddenly pieced themselves together. Kies shot up from his seat which prompted Nyana to look back at him.

"Is something wrong?" she asked in concern.

"Does the Ancient language sound something like this?" Kies replicated the sounds that he heard before. 'Set us free.' A chill went through the room and both of them reactively went for their weapons.

Gripping his sword, Kies looked around frantically. Nyana backed herself against a wall and had her bow drawn with an arrow nocked. "What did you just do!?" she asked, panicked.

"I don't know..."

Whatever Kies did, it wasn't something good. He sensed a presence in the room but he couldn't place where exactly it was. "I think I might have summoned something..."

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