Chapter 18: A New Grimoire

Arwyn hauled up the ladder, the rungs creaking under his grip, rust flaking where Santina's whipsword had carved her mark. The clang hit again. Steel on stone, sharp and close that rattled the metal. Nathaniel climbed below, his voice still looping in Arwyn's head:

"Something's still moving."

The diary thumped hard in his pack, clawing to break free, and his katana bumped his thigh with every step.

He hit the top, boots scraping damp stone as he swung over the edge into the Spire's mid-tier guts. Air slammed him. Thick, electric, Passion Energy crackling wild against his scar like a live wire. The chamber sprawled wide and ugly. There were cracked pillars that jutted up like broken fangs, bases slick with ink pools that shimmered red under the Spire's pulse. 

Ink veins snaked the walls, pulsing slow, alive, and the floor was a mess. Shattered stone, burnt sketch scraps, a faint buzz humming under it all like something waited to pounce.

Nathaniel dropped beside him as his boots squelched. "Kid," he muttered, voice low and tight, "that's no bounty trash." 

His eyes locked on the rubble, the center of the room. The dust still swirled from a fresh-collapsed pillar. A glint caught there, faint violet sheen glowing through the grit. Arwyn's scar flared even more. With hesitation, he stepped forward, kicking debris aside. 

Leather-bound, edges singed, the thing pulsed under his fingers as he snatched it up. A book. A grimoire.

"Hey," Nathaniel breathed, then narrowed his eyes. "That's… shit, that's Daverno's."

Arwyn brushed ink-dust off the cover, squinting in the red haze. A spiral rune, Terra Incognita script, not Delacroix, etched deep. And the title? Arcane Codex. He flipped it open, and its ink shifted like it was alive. Words forming, fading, sketching themselves as he watched.

His scar buzzed hotter, itching under the glove, and Nathaniel's jaw went tight, a crack in his usual cocky mask. "You know kid, he was my apprentice," he said, voice rough. "back when I fought here in Incognita. Weak bastard, barely 500 poules. He couldn't even sketch a straight line. When I got yanked to Earth, I figured he'd faded into nothing. But well, guess I was wrong."

Arwyn's gut twisted, eyes darting over the shifting ink. "This isn't any diary," he muttered, flipping pages fast. Scribbles, runes, notes in a shaky hand that steadied as it went. "He wrote this after you bailed?"

Nathaniel nodded, and Arwyn smirked, scar pulsing. "He was strong enough to leave this?"

"Stronger than me, maybe," Nathaniel shot back, dry as hell. "After I got turned Earth-side, I never heard from him ever since. Told him to hide his name though."

Arwyn's fingers tightened on the leather. It wasn't just a manual. It had secrets, stuff the Delacroix Diary never coughed up. Arcane Sketching, it said. Part of the Dream Sketching system, but twisted differently. 

His Manifestor gig conjured nets, bars, daggers, stuff you could touch. Arcane Sketching? Pure energy, Passion bent raw. Arcane people drew symbols to summon elemental energy in forms such as balls or beams.

Daverno's notes spilled it. He'd sucked as Nathaniel's apprentice, too shaky to keep up, but after the blue-haired bastard vanished, he'd grinded. 50,000 poules, with no status whatsoever. Arwyn couldn't swap styles. Manifestor Sketching was in his blood, but this grimoire was a cheat code anyway.

"Efficiency," he muttered, eyes locked on a page. "Says here you stretch Passion Energy. You channel it sharp so that you waste less. My nets? Sloppy at 100 poules. It could drop to 70 with this." His scar hummed, syncing with it like it agreed. Nathaniel raised an eyebrow, the rings glinting as he leaned in.

"Daverno always was a nerd," he said, smirking faint. "Keep reading, kid. He's got more."

So Arwyn flipped fast, ink shifting under his glare. There was a chapter about Erasures.

"Passion leaks feed them, cracks amplify them," Daverno scrawled. Arwyn glanced back at Nathaniel, whose gaze was entirely on the book. He had a smirk tugged at his face, and a proud one at that.

"Keep going," Nathaniel said, voice flat.

More, and about Sketch Binding.

"Blue-Haired Mentor, Nathaniel's his name, though society calls him the Fortissimum. I can't blame them, the man was a trillion-poule monster, bound sketches like threads. Using those threads, he can either bind sketches into one single piece, or separate them into pieces. I've seen him separate stuff once, and man was it gory."

Arwyn's jaw dropped. "You weren't kidding?" 

He shrugged, grin gone with confirmation, no explanation. He didn't know why he'd got nerfed either. Nathaniel just knew he himself had been a god once, and that god shaped Daverno.

Arwyn's chest tightened. "Trillion poules," he muttered, half to himself. "And you're stuck at 10,000 now? That's… damn tough."

The Spire trembled hard, sudden, and cracks split wider, ink veins pulsing fast. Arwyn's scar flared, Codex thumping like the Diary beside it. Nathaniel's rings sparked, blue threads flickering, ready but held.

"Daverno hid this here," Arwyn muttered, eyes darting. "Why?"

Nathaniel, still silent, turned and walked back to the ladder that they'd just climbed on. He finally spoke, with a voice softer than Arwyn would ever hear him. "Runar's spire was a good place for preservation and secrecy. Told him to hide it here, and well, it's here."

Arwyn checked the table of contents. It had ink shifting, chapters glowing faint. Erasures, Arcane tricks, Sketch Binding, TI history… No Phoenix Quill.

His heart sank, a cold pit in his gut, till Nathaniel's hand clapped his back, firm but light. "Quill's something only the Delacroix would know," he said, voice steady. "We'll find it ourselves, kid."

Arwyn snorted, shoving the Codex into his pack beside the Diary. "Yeah, great—another dead end." His scar buzzed. 6,300 steady, itching under the glove, but the grimoire's weight felt right, heavy with promise. He flipped his sketchbook open, pencil scratching fast to test out if this 'efficiency' really worked.

Another apple, small, tight. 50 poules burned, but sharper, brighter, no flicker. Daverno's trick clicked. There was less waste, and more punch. The orb flared violet, lighting the chamber's mess. Rubble, ink pools, a spiral stair winding up into shadow.

"Nice," Nathaniel muttered, smiling again. "Efficiency's kicking in. Daverno would be smug as hell."

Arwyn threw and caught the apple with a steady posture. One hand in his pocket, and one holding the apple. His shoe repeatedly clacked against the floor, echoing through the Spire. "So, what's next?"

Nathaniel kept his smile, but now a bit serious, as though the air shifted as Arwyn asked the question. "We go back."

He expected something more than a grimoire he can't even utilize to its maximum potential. Maybe gold, or an enchanted bracelet that could increase his Passion Energy significantly. But… nope. Just a grimoire.

"What? Just this shit?" He pointed at the book with his middle finger, fucking him off and pointing at the same time. "After all those Erasures and that god-awful sewers, we get a book that I CAN'T EVEN USE."

"You'll get it soon, if we get out of here alive." Nathaniel glanced at the far-upper corner of the hall. "That's why."

And Arwyn looked the same way.

Cameras.

Nathaniel sighed, knowing that guards will inevitably come. "They never installed cameras the last time I went here before. I bet there were some at the sewers as well." He continued strolling down the way they'd just entranced earlier. "When the guards come, we surrender. And…" 

He looked back, and Arwyn's scar pulsed brighter as he held the book, staring blankly at the camera. "Oy! Can't you hide your scar for god's sake?!"

But his voice trailed off as Arwyn stayed, then a thud, from a jump most likely.

His mind swirled around the idea of panic. He didn't know what to do, though he most definitely didn't want to get locked up in a place where everything seemed worthless, where people didn't give a single damn about anyone, anywhere, anytime.

He snapped back a moment after, and Nathaniel was gone. He ran away without him, without even a message or anything. Was this perhaps a test, or did he really just… poof out of there?

"Nate?" Arwyn tried calling him, but to no avail. He called again with a shout, but it was the same result. "NATE?!" He was too tired to yell, and so his voice was hoarse.

Arwyn fled the Spire, and jumped–didn't climb down, but jumped down onto the sewers. It was colder and quieter, now that he was alone.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck! Where the hell is he!?"