My Servant System

Chapter 1238: Chapter 1237: 'Navigation'



"Gods be damned..."

We were on our second stop in nearly eight hours, the constant traveling getting to us only because we were on high alert the entire way, our senses strained to nearly their breaking point as we listened, looked and smelt for anything that might be coming to attack us.

Then there were the four who had to alternate between lugging the carriage around, which was still a mammoth of a task even in it's heavily enchanted state that made it lighter than it was supposed to be and therefore requiring less power to move.

The two Demonesses, the Demon Wolf and the Jackalkin all took turns hauling it during these hours, and while they were more than capable of hauling it over the somewhat rough terrain that Lilith constantly flattened out for them they were still being asked to walk dozens of miles with far more weight then they were accustomed to.

Thankfully the herbs that I was in charge of diffusing throughout the air kept the monsters away from us completely, and I had managed to find a fascinating way to dilute the liquid in the herb to just enough of a degree that maintained its monster repellant but gained a lot more usable time.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

Weaker effect but for longer meant that some monsters got a little too close for true comfort but it meant that we were safer for far longer, and that was invaluable in the Labyrinthian, at least to me.

"y'know... I never thought some of these muscles could hurt like this..."

Rolling out her joints and stretching, Jahi stumbled away from the carriage and refused to look back at it as she began to get her body back into working order, resulting in a cacophony of cracks and pops that I knew had to feel like heaven as she stopped right beside me.

I continued to hold my incense lamp thing that Lady Fenyras had given me while pushing the smoke out into the area around us even as Jahi shuffled to stand behind me so that she could rest her head on mine, much to the others mild annoyance.

Draka gave us a look that was filled with yearning for something similar - obviously with someone else - before she forced herself to turn towards Lilith to ask "You said we were heading in the 'right direction', but I thought that knowing where you were going was impossible in the Labyrinthian? It shuffles around at random, after all."

Humming to herself and nodding back at the Dragonkin, Lilith waved her hand loosely at the land behind us that we had just walked over as she said "That's correct, no one can know exactly where you can go thanks to everything shuffling around. But that's the thing... everything is being *shuffled* around, not recreated, not randomized... but shuffled."

That got all of our attention yet again, and the older Demoness smiled as she saw all the lights flash brilliantly above our heads, with Jahi being the one to ask "So while you cannot know where you will end up, you CAN know the area that you're in?! And you can also still navigate using that knowledge?!"

"Correct~! I haven't full explored nor will I ever managed to do so even if I lived for another millennia or two, but I have seen enough of this place to grasp that fun little nugget of information. The Labyrinthian is shuffled just out of sight, all the time, but everything is still the same. It's one big puzzle, and while the pieces move around you, your piece remains the same. So heading in a single direction still works, but getting disoriented is extremely easy."

Sensing the immediate question that would follow that statement, she just held up her other hand and flashed a ring at us, acting like that would answer it preemptively at first only to nod and say "I have a way to navigate since there's a super powerful and specific Ritual Circle carved into the entrance we were just at. So all I need to do is head opposite of that to go towards the center of the Labyrinthian, which is- ah, getting ahead of myself~!"

She stopped and grinned at us as she lowered her hand, and while we were all very much contemplating a way to beat it out of her she just returned to her humming and spun back around, giving us the time we needed to recuperate.

"So there's a way to navigate the Labyrinthian... Is navigation even the right word? You don't even know where we are, right?"

"Where we are? No, I never found a desert comprised of quartz in my travels, but I can tell you that we are heading in the right direction. Directly behind me is the path that leads back to the entrance, but the only problem is figuring out how to safely return. Sometimes the puzzle pieces you find yourself on are very unfriendly and extremely anti life."

We all looked around at the murky white rocks that jutted out of the ground around us, the grains of ground down quartz cushioning our feet while the mineral itself caught the sunlight and trapped its heat down here, cooking the air fiercely.

Draka and I were keen to get out of here as soon as we could, but it wasn't the worst area to be in since there was a constant breeze, though considering it was blowing against us and traveling back the way we came, it only felt like the Labyrinthian was breathing around us... What made that theory all the more believable was the fact that the breeze came in intervals with varied strength, and each time it whipped up a gale the quartz sand would become a weapon used against us as it lacerated our skin easily, though a barrier of our own wind protected us from the worst of it.

But the moment that wind kicked up into a fierce storm the scent of our protective herb was diminished, and as we were taking a moment to rest yet another front crashed down on us, sweeping over the quartz around us immediately and howling through the air as we were buffeted by clouds of dazzling white; sharp, deadly clouds of white...