There are hundreds of ruins within the curse that blankets the well known Hewn City, the place rumored to house shade monstrosities beyond what is normally seen, and, while this mostly hogwash, the rumor holds some validity. There are secrets here, to be had, to be found.
To those who find it, the Sanctum - which once housed a society of Shade Hunters: The Uga Sect - holds one of the largest hoards of information on the shade in this realm... or rather, it would, had it not all been more or less ruined by inky shade slime in an event best left unspoken, an event that lent incredible, irrefutable proof to the rumor of shade beings within the Hewn City bounds.
-
The entrance to this decrepit "almost-tomb" is hard to find, being half buried by rubble, and is housed in one of the darkest portions of the Hewn City's curse, and difficult to spot. The Sanctum, surprisingly enough, is wholly underground. Of course, if you'd ask any surviving member of the scraps of the Uga Sect, the reasoning is solid. The sect was fond of taking children as "orphans", and raising them as hunters, among other uncouth and quite frankly disturbing practices. The verdict is clear and agreed upon by any survivor met: the Uga Sect is best left dead and dissolved.
-
Within the ruins of the Sanctum, you will find walls stained black, old tapestries and stories long lost, whose tales remain whole only within the mouths of former members. There is a distinct absence of magical influence, long since been drained away - perhaps, this may make you sick, woozy and with a pounding headache, but you'll get used to it. This is, after all, a sort of "ground zero" - the side effects of complete and total magical disconnect may vary.
Desecrated, ashen skeletons litter the rooms, some clearly taken in their sleep, others, in a fight. They tell their own story of a catastrophic event, and the more evident trail, if followed, ignores the ruined libraries, and leads right to a vast room on the deepest reaching floor of the Sanctum, the only room with slight traces of magic energy. Sealing magic. Inactive magic.
The ground here is ruptured, the staircase leading up to some sort of balcony in need of great repair, and water fills the fissures in the earth, tainted, and best not to drink.
The remaining stone - for once not covered in solid black slime, only slight (watered-down) stains - hosts pieces of a long destroyed circle, a massive rune carving that is too far gone to piece back together. What can be gathered is that this place, this room, was the epicenter of the catastrophe that left nothing behind.
-
You may wish to return one of the libraries, and scavenge knowledge of the Shade and how best to beat it, to seal it, but rest assured, what you'd find almost isn't worth it. What pages that survived are faded, and most are illegible - there are more skeletons, more remains and more stories in how they lie, and the air is thick with dust and ash, the paper remains easily disturbed into the air. There are, however, a few intact tomes and accounts that may just be untouched, and there are many weapons who enchantments need only be charged with the right sort of magic... Shade hunting weapons, assuming the best haven't already been plundered by past explorers, or returning sect members. What's left is likely lesser in quality, but, there may be something. Somewhere.
-
Wrapped in slowly decomposing canvas, hidden in the walls, under the floor, within a bed... You might just find a series of journals - whose magic signature flares to life at your touch - but this is only if you look in the most secret and hidden of places, and while these divulge nothing of what occurred, they give insights into the daily lives of many of the dead, the woes of apprentices sick of learning, the escapades and pranks of seniors and soon-to-be-graduateds, and the cavorting of some of the more experienced and battle-weary grads, including their fears that death drew near with every passing day they hunted - which yes, it very much did, as evidence shows - as well as their fevered quest to experience life to its fullest, as full as it actually could be, within the sect. This is as close as you can get to those no longer living, and it is as close as you can get to knowing more.
If you find such journals, you may just figure out what Shade Demon wreaked such havoc, and you may even read the tale of how they captured it. You might even have the smarts to figure out what is near obvious with these clues - that it escaped, and brought its captors down.
But, this is, after all, a massive if. Most of the journals able to be found and read contain the most meaningless and trivial of material... well, unless you enjoy that sort of thing, that is. Reading into private and personal lives while surrounded by their bones and ashes. They won't judge if that's the case - they're simply too dead to give a rip.
2087
dailybridgerton
gracieabrams
pixelskylines
areudirty
germansingergirl