Chapter 18 Zakanchivat

Chapter 18

The Zeppelin trip took a day to fully complete, the blue sky was exchanged for complete darkness and the sun has not been seen again for 2 hours.

Boom! boom!

With a crew member banging on the door, we began to rise from our slumber.

"Coming, coming!"

Trying to shake off the dizziness I have upstairs and obviously the wolf of a few pounds, I start moving towards the white wooden door.

Outside this one waiting for me was a man in his 70's in a tuxedo and Monocle, all on him shouting, important man here.

"I'm the captain of this ship, Sebastian, and I'm here to warn you that your stop is near."

Hearing that I move my head towards the window of the room, there is only darkness, even in my dizzy state I can tell it didn't look like he was lowering the ship.

"It doesn't look like we're preparing for a landing, I don't doubt your competence in piloting."

Still a little dubious about his words, I walk over to Sif's body still sleeping on the bed.

"It seems you haven't fully read the ticket, there are no proper ports around these parts, so the landing will be in a bit of a wilder mode."

As Sebastian spoke behind my back, I start to tap Sif with my foot, while picking up my gear from the ring.

"When you say savage, what do you mean?"

"Well, our mages on board teleport you to below our current coordinates due to the fast travel speed, you may end up a little further away than desired, but nothing really bad."

As our conversation comes to an end, Sif starts to wake up and begins her stretches, I want to know the way that creature does to not get drunk.

"Umm, master that matters a little inaccuracy, the next real stop go figure out where that is."

Letting out a soft sigh that doesn't seem to come from that wolf-like creature, Sif begins to speak with a bit of reason in her words.

"Since you put it that way, it doesn't seem like a very bad idea to use this mode of landing."

"Well, if you've already decided, you can follow me there's no time to waste at this point."

With everything settled we move out of the room, at that we move down some corridors until we reach an open room with nothing in it, in the center of the smooth floor is a circle of multiple black runes and next to it is a mage.

"Stand in the center of the circle, when you are ready give the signal and we send you straight down."

"You know right, we don't know when or where we are?

Sif, seriously you should tell him to his face, anyway before I forget I'll ask him about it.

"It may be a random question, but you won't have a map about the zone of eternal darkness, of course I'll pay for it."

"Here it's free, by the way we already arrived over the chosen area."

After saying that and throwing me a map from his ring, he sends a head signal to the wizard and the wizard starts chanting his skills.

<locate><anchor><transport>.

Dizziness and yes even more than mammoth horn wine, at that my sight changes radically, colors intertwine, sounds mingle and the feel of the ground against my feet is the only thing that gives me security.

"Master, are you ok, hey come on it's no big deal."

With Sif's words my vision begins to settle in the vicinity, it's all dark, dry and leafless trees adorn the landscape of a gloomy aspect and the distant noise of some types of beasts can be heard through the air.

"Sif, do you manage to see anything in this darkness?"

"Sure master, I have built in night vision, ha ha ha ha I am far superior to humans."

I can see I need to trust Sif completely, oh this will be a long journey to get to the city of Zakanchivat.

"Come to think of it, Sif, every time you analyze a map of my system, does it show up for you too?"

"Yes, the map of the roads from perk to fort louis, plus the road to dunsk are all filed."

With my eyes already used to the darkness of the area, I manage to see at most about 2 or 3 meters around, there is a river stretching out of my vision and everything else is trees without a leaf.

"I trust you Sif I can't see beyond 10 feet I mean nothing."

"Come on master, if you can't trust me, who are you going to trust."

Already on top of Sif I stick against her body as much as I can, I don't want to eat a branch by mistake while she runs, with everything ready we start moving downstream.

I kept my body glued to her fur at all times, of course I always check our location on the map, after about 4 hours where there is nothing but darkness, howling and wind whispering, we reached the vicinity of the city of Zakanchivat.

It was spectacular the torches on the wall of about 15 meters, they illuminated everything near them in the 6 towers that are scattered along the wall, in their highest points there are triangular gems that throw small particles into the air giving a complete illumination over the city.

"It's beautiful master, a pity it's all so... crumbling."

Yes, just by getting a little closer to the walls you manage to see large clusters of cracks, lack of equipment like cannons and even the soldiers on top of this one are poorly equipped.

"Stop, stop! State your name and why you are coming this way."

From the gates of the city, an already elderly man in his 50's, ill-equipped and with a serious malnutrition problem comes out.

"I'm a class C adventurer, I'm here for good... I'm an adventurer."

Why is he looking at me like a weirdo, come on adventurers go and die almost anywhere.

"I haven't seen one of your kind in many years and these last few days 2 have appeared this is strange, almost no one is interested in these lands of death."

That's strange, come on the lands of eternal night are a bit strange and chaotic, but they still occupy a ⅓ of the territories left by the former Muscovite empire, even so there are only 3 cities, Zakanchivat, Polovina and nachalo.

No outside Kingdom has tried to absorb any of these three cities, there are too many problems here from starvation due to lack of sun, rampant beasts and more, I guess that's why there is not much interest in exploring these lands.

"Nothing personal, but as you know better to be informed than not, I have seen that there are only ill equipped and older soldiers on the ramparts, I can't think they would withstand the silver moon horde."

Throwing a few glances towards the ramparts, he extended a hand towards me, come on you always have to pay.

"As you may know there are three cities in the dark zone, the current lord of Zakanchivat took some of the 15 year olds to the city of Polovina as tribute, the regular army is holding back the families and citizens."

Wait what? I know there are three cities in this region, but there has never been one stronger than the other otherwise they would have been unified by now.

"I understand and thank you for the information, even so I couldn't help but notice that the surrounding darkness doesn't affect you."

"Oh, you're talking about the shadowy spider eyes, they're a type of potion that work permanently in the dark zone, you can buy them at the magic store in town."

With the conversation now finished, I turn back to Sif and we move towards the city of Zakanchivat.