Chapter 24 – The Great Blot and the Silent Forge
[Location: The Spire of Scribes – Capital City of Eins]
It started with a drip.
In the Hall of Records, where thousands of blind monks scribbled the history of the kingdom onto endless scrolls, a single drop of ink fell from a page.
Then another.
Then a stream.
High Scribe Morel stopped his quill. He touched the parchment. It was wet.
Not with fresh ink. But with old ink that was turning back into liquid.
"What is happening?" he whispered.
Suddenly, a scream tore through the library.
A scribe three rows down clawed at his scroll. The names he had written names of the soldiers sent to the Weeping Pass were screaming.
Not metaphorically. The paper vibrated with the high-pitched shriek of dying souls.
Then, the names simply... melted.
Five hundred names. Soldiers of the Brute. Mages of the Light. Executioners of Judgement.
They dissolved into black puddles that dripped off the tables and pooled on the marble floor.
The door to the Hall burst open.
The room went instantly cold. The scribes fell to their faces, foreheads touching the stone.
King Lazarus entered.
He did not look like a warrior. He looked like a scholar made of gold and glass.
His robes were woven from pages of ancient texts. His skin was flawless, glowing with a soft, inner light. A halo of floating runes circled his head, shifting constantly.
He walked to the nearest table. He looked at the black puddle of melted names.
"Silence," Lazarus said.
His voice wasn't loud, but it resonated in the teeth of every man in the room. It was the voice of absolute definition.
He dipped a finger into the black sludge.
"They were not defeated," Lazarus murmured, rubbing the dead ink between his fingers. "They were... unwritten."
"My Lord," High Scribe Morel trembled, not daring to look up. "Is it... the Nameless One?"
Lazarus stared at the black stain on his finger.
"He is tearing pages out of my book," the King whispered.
The calmness in his voice was more terrifying than rage. "He does not play by the rules of the Story. He creates a Void where my Ink cannot stick."
Lazarus wiped his hand on the Scribe's robe.
"Burn this scroll. Burn every record of the Weeping Pass expedition. These men did not die. They never existed."
"My... My Lord?"
"If the people know that Silence can defeat the Word, the kingdom falls,
" Lazarus declared. "Erase the event. Quarantine the North. Tell the House of Myth that the Weeping Pass is now a 'Fiction' a place that no longer appears on maps."
He turned to leave, his halo spinning faster, turning a violent red.
"And summon the House of Shadows. If the Nameless Boy wants to play with the dark... let us send him the dark that bites back."
[Location: The Silent Hold – House of Barbarian Territory]
While the King erased history, Uzo was busy forging the future.
The cavern was busy. The bodies of the Coalition soldiers had been stripped. Piles of armor, staves, and swords lay near the fire pit.
Ronnie stood over a table covered in small, silver coins she had taken from the dead Arbiters.
"Judgement Tokens," she explained, flipping one to Uzo. "They use these to bypass checkpoints. We can use them to move freely once we leave the mountains."
But Uzo was looking at the weapons.
Specifically, a Mage's staff made of enchanted weirwood.
"They can't use these," Kaelen grunted, standing beside Uzo. The Void Knight was now back to his human form, though his skin retained a faint, grayish hue. "Magic burns our hands."
"I know," Uzo said. "But we don't need the magic."
He picked up the staff.
He placed his hand on the wood. The Wax Seal in his chest hummed.
"Nullify."
The Unword flowed into the staff.
It didn't break it. It sucked the 'color' out of it.
The glowing red gem at the tip turned a dull, matte gray. The polished wood turned black and hard as iron.
Uzo tossed the staff to Kaelen.
"Try it."
Kaelen caught it. He swung it against a rock.
CRACK.
The rock shattered. The staff didn't even vibrate.
"It feels... dead," Kaelen said, impressed. "Heavy. Quiet."
"Dead Iron," Uzo named it. "It won't cast fireballs. But if a mage tries to block it with a shield, that staff will eat the shield and smash the mage."
Ronnie walked over, picking up a dagger Uzo had treated. The metal was dull, absorbing the light.
"Anti-magic weapons," she mused. "That's... expensive. In the Black Market, a single dagger like this would cost a castle."
"We have hundreds," Uzo said, looking at the pile.
He turned to the gathered Barbarians. They were watching him with reverence.
"We need to organize," Uzo announced.
He pointed to Kaelen.
"Kaelen is the first Void Knight. He carries the full weight of the Silence."
He pointed to the woman who had fought bare-handed a warrior named Vara.
"Vara, step forward."
She knelt.
Uzo touched her forehead. He didn't give her the full transformation it drained him too much. He gave her a fraction.
Her blue war paint turned black. Her footsteps became soundless.
"You are Hushed," Uzo declared. "You and your squad will be the scouts. You will move unseen. You are the shadow that precedes the storm."
He looked at the rest of the horde.
"The rest of you are the Mutes. Your armor will be Dead Iron. Your skin will reject minor spells."
Uzo raised his fist.
"King Lazarus erases names. We erase power. This mountain is no longer just a cave. It is the Silent Hold."
A roar went up from the Barbarians. But true to their nature, it wasn't a vocal cheer.
It was the rhythmic slamming of Dead Iron weapons against the stone floor.
THUD. THUD. THUD.
The sound was deep, heavy, and terrifyingly disciplined.
Ronnie stood beside Uzo, watching the army take shape.
"You realize what you've done?" she whispered. "You haven't just built a base. You've started a religion."
Uzo looked at the Lexicon in his hand. The pages were shifting, new names appearing in gray ink.
Kaelen... Vara... The Silent Legion...
"Not a religion," Uzo corrected. "A Resistance."
He looked North, toward the exit of the pass.
"The base is secure. The army is armed. Now... we go to the House of Myth. We find out who I really am."