"Legends?" Athelei asked when he heard a phrase he had once heard before, "Which legends and how do they go?"
Irene's eyes were still sparkling as she gazed into the distance where the sound monster was singing its song.
"...Irene?" Athelei prodded.
"Shh!" Irene hissed before stepping closer to the sound monster.
Athelei watched curiously as the lady, whose waist-long golden hair was swaying with the fierce vibrations, closed her eyes and began humming a familiar tune. Sadly though, her voice was not really made for singing despite being pleasant to the ears.
'It seems like Irene isn't the type to sing a lot,' Athelei's nonexistent eye twitched. He had heard Sir Xiu singing to Aria once, and the man's voice was as soothing as mythical sirens.
The sound monster, on the other hand, did not seem to mind. The waves it was once angrily propelling towards Irene suddenly shifted in nature. It no longer seemed hostile and had begun to gently caress her as if it was happy. Athelei noticed this previously subtle characteristic and curiously cut off his connection to Irene.
The woman didn't seem to realise a thing and that gave Athelei a few ideas. She continued humming in a duet with the sound monster. To the observing Athelei, it was like he was listening to a skilled teacher and a new student performing together.
A beautiful hymn and slightly off-toned hums echoed throughout the dungeon for a good few minutes. When they were done, the stone tablet shone in red light and released an orb of energy. It floated around the tablet and Irene pounced like a hungry cat.
She took in the energy and instantly sat down on the cold dungeon floor.
Athelei watched as a pair of infant wings manifested on her back and began glowing in a reddish hue. The warm colours slowly turned golden as time went by and as sweat dripped down Irene's skin.
Athelei's eyes shimmered, 'She found out how to grow her wings! Absorbing foreign energy sources does make sense... It's similar to what she had done to advance, and it isn't as sketchy as consuming a consciousness.'
Athelei floated around Irene as a thin grey fog, thinking to himself, 'In the first place, her wings aren't made up of the fog of someone's consciousness, now that I can observe them again... Irene is a special kind of person, isn't she? Pure golden Will and [Avaricious] luck should bolster that claim...'
After half an hour, Irene finished absorbing the orb of red energy. She let out a long, satisfied breath as she felt that her wings had grown by about one foot.
"Can you answer my questions now?" A voice whispered in her ear, making her jump.
"Whoa!" Irene exclaimed, and her heart stopped for a split second inside her chest, "You shocked me, Angel. Yeah... the legends..."
Irene paused, before comfortably settling down and gesturing Athelei to do the same. "It's pretty complicated, so I'll start with this dungeon we're in."
She made a vague gesture at the old room around her and started,
"We're very, and I mean very, deep underground right now. I travelled west from Aren and arrived at the plains near Zi village, searching for relics and special items. From there I ventured off the paths as any Adventurer would. I killed a few beasts here and there and even spotted a mutated one. Its meat seemed tasty so I decided to cook it over a fire. Doing so, attracted a weird worm monster that I had never seen before.
It gobbled up my food and then left before I could kill it. Not that I think I could, since it was as large as a house and as long as a street. I could barely even wound it.
Anyways, the worm had left behind loose soil as it escaped. I tried digging in anger but I fell into an ancient stone corridor instead. It was winding yet so incredibly empty. I went through about a thousand rooms as well as several staircases, all deeper than the last... Until I made it here."
When Irene reached this point, she looked towards Athelei, whose fog body had appeared in front of her, sitting like a kid listening to their parents tell a story.
'Cute,' Irene thought before continuing, "Normally, human ruins like the one in Aren city don't go this deep. There had been no records at all of humans going this deep into the earth. Even before the monster surge, our abilities to build structures that could bear the weight while somehow keeping it livable for humans are still a ways off.
But we found texts and weird items that dated back even further than humanity's recorded histories from these deep ruins. No one could understand them, and no one could figure out what they meant or did until the people back then discovered a dictionary inside the stomach of an underground beast."
"...A dictionary?" Athelei felt even more intrigued, "Seeing as it was in the belly of the beast, it couldn't have been too old, right?"
Irene nodded, "Exactly. If it was too old, it wouldn't have survived inside the guts of a beast, nor could it have emerged nearly unscathed. It looked relatively new and seemed to be built for the specific purpose of translating human languages into that mysterious language... But that was a few hundred years ago. Now, this language had been passed down simply because of how mysterious it is. A lot of humans who had learned the language back then were fond of using it for secretive deals.
It was like their code, and it's still present today albeit with a few differences. That's how I'm able to read the ancient versions now. It took me a few months of study but, man, I did it."
A flash of pride appeared on Irene's face when she said that, but she quickly returned to her storyteller mode right after.
"Anyways, to those secretive people back then, this special language was called Acivis. Or, when elongated, Ancient Civilisation. It was basically them believing that some ancient people were the creators of this dead language.
They would sometimes joke around, saying that if you used the Acivis language too much, you would summon demons from hell. The joke was a bit famous since someone had speculated that the people who used Acivis still existed somewhere in secret and thus were even capable of making some kind of dictionary in the first place.
Though not many people truly believed the thing about the demons, quite a few said they really did summon horned demonic beings.
One case was about a group of friends who had been speaking the language for fun as they celebrated. Because of their booze though, they lost control and began saying a variety of things.
They said prayers and chants, sang hymns and songs, and even made poetry.
Then, at some point, without them knowing, a demon really did appear. It was sitting beside them at the table, even.
Whatever happened after that wasn't shared. And since there was more than one case of people who claimed they summon demons being revealed as liars, it made it hard to pinpoint the truth.
...But some historians and treasure hunters have had guesses of what happened to all those who truly witnessed demons. They only found out after going through hundreds of the same claims and they felt it was the truth: All those who saw a demon had died.
They either died because of the demon going on a rampage..."
Irene's voice trailed off as she put on a grim expression,
"Or they were kidnapped by Father Time and forced to age until they were dust on the floor."
Irene was half expecting Athelei to remain unfazed despite her playful attempts to scare him, but she really saw the angel-looking figure in front of her stiffen up.
'Primary Warden of Oxhor...' Athelei remembered, 'The constellation called the Grasp of Time... Coincidence? I think not. Especially since I've heard a single phrase come from the mouths of two people who are a long ways apart.'
"And these legends are real..." Athelei inadvertently muttered out loud, sounding a bit jarred from the revelation. At least in Irene's eyes.
In actuality, it was Athelei's excitement getting to him, and Irene realised this when she heard his next words,
"So these demons or whoever made the Acivis language should currently be alive right now? And they're living somewhere? Perhaps underground? Should we try digging and see?" Athelei asked a barrage of questions, making Irene cough slightly.
"I don't know about actively looking for them," She said slowly, "After all, if what I've heard is all real, then all of these demons should be scary existences. Not to mention that being called Father Time.
The stories I know claimed that the bodies of those who aged had weird marks on them as they decomposed. It looked like they were wrapped up in rope and strangled as they dissipated.
I may be strong, but I know that I'm not all-powerful. Dealing with weird legends is risky because it is hard to assess how risky a situation is."
Irene then sighed as she stood up, "Perhaps if I become even stronger, I could try digging for those so-called demons and I'll bring you along, Angel."
Athelei chuckled when he heard this, "Hearing all this, I agree that power is the first thing you'll need indeed."
He then glanced at the stone tablet which contained Oxhor's Requiem, "I have one last question: What was that red ball of light you absorbed?"
Irene heard the question and belatedly realised something. It showed on her face as she said, "...It should have been some kind of key or mark."
"Something that could only be activated when special circumstances are met? In this case, it was you learning the song? And you just ate it? What happens if it doesn't get triggered again?" Athelei teased.
"Yeah," Irene scratched her cheek, "I'm going to have to wait for the stone tablet to recharge before I can figure out what it really does. The sound monster could be resummoned, so I should be able to trigger it a third time."
Athelei laughed playfully, "Are you sure? You might eat it all up in the instant you fulfil the conditions."
"Ahem!" Irene coughed, "That was a one-time thing. It was for my wings! My intuition is telling me that eating the same energies won't work more than once. I need a new and unique energy source, so I really won't eat it a second time!"
"Haha, I guess we wait, and until then," Athelei still bore his playful tone, as he created a chessboard out of his fog-body. "Interested in a game? I've only recently learned the rules, so please go easy on me."
"Oh, I'm about average at this game." Irene smiled and sat down, "I won't mind a couple to pass the time."