The exhausted horse suddenly rears, forehooves clawing at the air. The reins wrench against Grachus’s crystal-marked palm as a dull pulse travels through the exposed wall channel.
Clean stone shivers without breaking. Grey dust trickles from the seam in thin threads, pattering onto the road while the horse screams and fights the restraint.
The Rider
That sound. Listen. Three dull beats, then a pause. It matches the warning stones beneath the eastern watchtower.
Hadrin presses his ear near the breach but keeps his bare hand away. The pulse fades, then returns beneath the stone, answering the crystal in Grachus’s palm.
Hadrin
No settling wall makes a pattern. The corruption is responding through him, or calling to whatever remains inside.
The Rider steadies the horse from the side, eyes fixed on the widening dust line. Behind them, villagers fall silent around their buckets and tools.
Hadrin
Hold where you are, Grachus. I must learn whether this channel is dying, or whether your hand has become its new anchor.
✓ Quest Accepted
Determine whether the corruption can influence the village's defenses
“Hold my hand closer to the wall and see if it reacts. Do not touch the wall.”
SUCCESS (Great Perception, rolled +2)
Grachus raises his crystal-marked hand toward the breach, stopping just short of the stone. The gap between palm and wall fills with cold, pale dust.
The exposed channel answers at once. Three dull pulses travel through the wall, then a fourth tremor lingers beneath Grachus's hovering hand.
Grachus
The wall responds more strongly when my hand is near it.
Hadrin
There. Do you feel it? The channel is not merely carrying the corruption. It recognizes you.
Grey grit gathers along the broken seam without crossing the open air. It rises in thin threads toward Grachus's palm, stopping at the crystal's edge.
The Rider
Then pull away! If it knows him, it may be calling the army through the stones.
Hadrin
No. Let him hold steady. The pattern has changed, and for the first time, the wall is showing us where the buried channel leads.
“Follow the wall with it reacting to my hand, find out where the buried channel is.”
SUCCESS (Great Perception, rolled -2)
Grachus moves his crystal-marked hand along the breached wall without touching it. The grey threads follow, pulsing through stone in three measured beats, then fading.
He tracks the response past the repaired seam, across two buttresses, and down toward the eastern watchtower. Beneath the road, the buried channel turns sharply underground.
Hadrin
There. The channel runs beneath the road and descends toward the tower. It was laid to connect the wall to those warning stones.
At the tower's base, a faint grey line becomes visible between the foundation stones. It ends at a sealed, iron-banded block hidden beneath old lime.
The Rider
Then the tower is part of the signal. If that buried line reaches it, the army may already know we are here.
The discovery costs precious time. While Grachus follows the fading pulses, the distant horns multiply, and the precise depth of the channel remains hidden beneath the foundation.
Hadrin
We know where it leads, but not what waits below. Break that block, and we may expose the source or wake it fully.
✓ Quest Accepted
Expose what lies beneath the eastern watchtower
− Scene Quest Removed
Determine whether the corruption can influence the village's defenses
“Break open the box striking it with my sword using my abilities.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Strength, rolled +0)
Grachus plants his feet before the iron-banded block and raises his longsword. The buried channel answers with three dull pulses beneath the tower stones.
He brings the blade down with a Stone-Warded Strike. Steel shears through the old lime and splits the iron bands, opening the block in a burst of grey dust.
Hadrin
You opened it. Do not reach inside yet. Let the dust settle.
Inside lies a narrow stone cavity, its walls veined with pale grit. A black glass disc rests at the bottom, beating faintly in time with the buried channel.
The Rider
That is the signal heart. If it speaks to the watchtower, break it before the army hears another call.
The exhausted horse shies from the tower as the disc sends one heavy pulse through the stones. Dust spills into the road, and the exposed chamber waits beneath Grachus's blade.
Quest Complete
Expose what lies beneath the eastern watchtower