Aethernea : Soulbound [Book 1]

Episode 125 - Aged Food

Previously:

While writing a letter to her fiance, Nelaira thinks about the events that led to her current predicament. She remembers how her squad of ten found a hidden entrance to a long staircase climbing through the mountain, first discovered by Zor Arite. There they find a green valley filled with wildlife and ruins of a village. They decide to take one day off to recuperate. Nelaira uses her day off to explore the ruins and finds a diary hidden inside a pillar. While picking herbs Luki finds a patch of land where a large quantity of ash is buried under the soil. He finds it suspicious but his comrades disagree.

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"Let's say that someone indeed buried the remains of a pyre here in the last 20 years. The question is, why would someone bother burying the ashes of a pyre?"

Episode 125 – Aged Food

Aurel Iphis sighed, deciding that the sooner they started playing along, the sooner they would finish with this ridiculous conversation. "The only reason why someone would bother to bury the ashes would be either to hide them or because it was a part of some sort of ritual."

"Or perhaps the ash was an eyesore?" The archeologist of the group grumbled.

"Right," Nelaira nodded. "Let's set the ritual aside for now. Why would someone want to hide the ashes?"

"To avoid leaving traces of their pyre? Perhaps what they did wasn't right and proper, and they didn't want others to find out about it?" Luki's eyes glistened.

The archeologist with a monocle rolled his eyes. "Or perhaps they just thought that it would be better for the environment to bury it."

Luki ignored him and continued adding more ideas to the mix. "Perhaps there was someone on their trail, and they wanted to wipe off all traces that they were there?"

"Any other ideas?" Nelaira glanced over the group, but this time no one spoke.

"Alright. So then, since the ashes were allegedly buried in the last 20 years, that would mean that either Zor's expedition buried it or there are survivors in the forbidden zone."

Luki nodded his head like a cluckling pecking rice.

Nelaira continued: "Personally, I think the pyre was used to burn the bodies of our fallen comrades. Zor's expedition did have causalities and carrying dead bodies around would be impractical."

Luki interrupted: "But weren't causalities caused by the Tainted? Since this place is untainted, the encountered Tainted would have attacked them before they reached this place. I doubt Zor Arite would carry tainted bodies up the mountain and risk infecting the remainder of his squad."

Silence descended onto the clearing.

"I still believe it the most likely that they had a celebration for finding this place and buried the ashes because they were unsightly." The archeologist broke the silence.

He was ignored once again.

"Perhaps they encountered the tainted on their way up and hid inside the passage through the mountain? The tainted comrades were in bad shape but not dead yet, so he had no choice but to carry them along, unaware that he was carrying them towards an untainted place?" The redhead offered.

"Tainted comrades are a liability, not only would they slow down the exploration but they would also potentially infect more people. Purge Rule 5, Tainted comrades are to voluntarily leave the squad and abort the mission." Luki rolled his eyes.

Nelaira gave Luki a strict look. "So, what you are suggesting is that either Zor's expedition did some kind of strange ash burying ritual, burned the evidence of something they shouldn't have done, or that there are survivors in the forbidden zone?"