Chapter 5: The Deep Below

The cloud sea was not a fluffy white blanket, as poets in Mumbai often described the monsoon sky. It was a turbulent, endless ocean of grey vapour that smelled of cold iron and ancient dampness.

They had been flying for three hours. The adrenaline of the escape had faded, replaced by the bone-deep chill of high altitude and the vibrating numbness produced by the Garuda’s wooden frame.

Arjun sat behind Kavya, his arms wrapped tightly around her waist, his face buried in the coarse wool of her shawl to escape the biting wind. He wasn't looking at the view. He was looking at the dashboard over her shoulder.

The crystal engine was pulsating with a worrying irregularity.

Fuel Efficiency: 32%

Mana Reservoir: CRITICAL (15% remaining)

Estimated Range: 40 km

"We’re burning too hot," Arjun yelled over the roar of the wind. "My hack on the lift-runes—it’s drawing power faster than the crystal can recharge from the ambient static."

"I told you not to hard-code it, Calculator!" Kavya shouted back, banking the bike around a massive, jagged spire of rock that jutted out of the mist like a blackened tooth. "We need to find a thermal updraft to glide on."

"I don't see thermal updrafts," Arjun snapped, his teeth chattering. "I see velocity vectors of wind shear that could snap this balsa-wood death trap in half."

He adjusted his glasses, which were miraculously still on his face, though fogged up. He squinted into the soup.

The world below Siddhanta was terrifying in its emptiness. Occasionally, other islands drifted past in the gloom—some small as houses, others large enough to hold small forests. Most were uninhabited, dark lumps of rock overgrown with purple, bioluminescent ivy that pulsed like exposed veins.

"What happens if we fall?" Arjun asked, looking down into the bottomless grey. "Is there a ground? A surface?"

Kavya hesitated before answering. "There is the Deep Below. The Ancients say it’s where the failed equations go to die. It’s endless pressure, darkness, and things that eat mana."

"Things?"

"Sky-krakens. Void-eels. Lawyers."

Arjun couldn't tell if she was joking about the last one.

"Nobody goes below the cloud line and comes back," Kavya added soberly. "That’s where the gravity goes wrong. It gets... heavy."

Arjun looked at the floating numbers in the air. The atmospheric density equation was indeed getting stranger the lower they went. The variable for 'mass' seemed to be multiplying itself randomly.

A memory leak in the gravity rendering, Arjun diagnosed grimly. If you fall down there, your own weight increases until you’re crushed.

The Garuda’s engine gave a sickening lurch. The red light on the dash fluttered and dimmed.

Whirrr-kchunk-hissss.

"Lost pressure in the primary manifold!" Kavya cursed, wrestling with the handlebars as the bike dipped sharply. "We need to set down. Now."

"Where? The nearest Province is fifty clicks east!"

"Not a Province," Kavya said, her eyes scanning the misty horizon. "A pit stop. Look for the red beacon."

Arjun squinted. Through a break in the clouds, he saw a faint, rhythmic crimson flash.

It was coming from a structure that looked less like an island and more like a celestial shipwreck. It was a massive conglomeration of rusted metal plates, broken ship hulls, and stone debris lashed together with thick chains and petrified vines. It hung precariously in the sky, rotating slowly.

"Rahu’s Tooth," Kavya said, nose-diving towards it. "The finest scum-hive in the mid-altitudes. Try not to look like a Highborn, Arjun. They charge double for arrogance and triple for clean clothes."

Arjun looked down at his hemp tunic, covered in soot, moss, and dried nervous sweat. "I don't think that will be a problem."

Landing on Rahu’s Tooth was an exercise in controlled panic. The "dock" was a rusted metal grating that vibrated violently as the Garuda’s wooden runners screeched across it. They came to a halt inches from a precipice that dropped off into infinity.

The engine gave one final, pathetic wheeze and died. The crystal went dark.

Silence returned, heavy and damp, broken only by the clanking of distant chains and the moan of the wind through the metal riggings.

They dismounted. Arjun’s legs were shaking so badly he had to lean against the cooling engine block.

"Welcome to the free skies," Kavya muttered, pulling her shawl over her head to obscure her face. "Keep your head down, let me do the talking."

The place smelled of ozone, burnt grease, and something sickly sweet, like rotting jasmine. It was a shantytown built of scrap metal. Makeshift stalls lined the grating, selling everything from salvaged engine parts to dubious-looking street food that glowed faintly green.

The people here were different from the Capital. No flowing silks or polished armour. They wore leather patched with metal plates, goggles covered in grime, and expressions of permanent suspicion.

Arjun’s "sight" was overwhelmed. The magic here was thick, oily, and corrupted. Every person walked around with a cloud of broken code trailing them—curses of bad luck, minor addictions, physical ailments rendered as looping errors.

They walked toward a large, circular hut made from the repurposed turbine of an ancient sky-ship. A neon sign—actual neon, buzzing with trapped lightning bugs—hung above the entrance, depicting a foaming tankard.

Inside, the air was thick with smoke from hookahs bubbling with strange, aromatic substances. Rough-looking men and beings with too many joints in their arms sat at tables made of cable spools, drinking from dented metal mugs.

Kavya walked straight to the bar. The bartender was a massive creature, perhaps human once, but now his skin was grey and cracked like dry mud. One of his eyes was replaced by a multifaceted ruby that whirred as it focused on them.

"Fuel," Kavya said, slapping a small pouch of coins onto the zinc counter. "Standard crystal charge. And clean water."

The bartender, whose name was apparently Gogra judging by the tattoo on his forearm, picked up the pouch. He weighed it, his ruby eye spinning.

"Inflation," Gogra grunted. His voice sounded like grinding gears. "This buys you half a charge. And the water is extra."

"Half a charge won't get us past the Thunderhead Reefs," Kavya argued, her posture tense. "Last week this was enough for a full tank."

"Last week there wasn't a City-wide lockdown," Gogra sneered, leaning over the bar. He smelled of engine coolant and stale beer. "Sky-ports are closed. Enforcers are swarming the trade routes. High risk, high price, little tinkerer."

Kavya bristled. Arjun saw her hand drift toward the hidden dagger at her belt.

If she fights him, we lose, Arjun calculated. His mass is triple hers. His reaction time variable is boosted by a cheap stimulant spell.

Arjun stepped forward, placing a hand on Kavya’s shoulder. "Wait."

Gogra’s ruby eye swiveled to Arjun. "And who is this? He smells like fresh soap and fear. A runaway scribe from the Spire?"

The bar went quiet. Several heads turned toward them. Being a Highborn sympathizer out here was a good way to get thrown over the edge.

Arjun adjusted his glasses. He looked at the bartender. Not at his face, but at the massive, intricate brass tap he was using to pour a foaming purple liquid.

The tap was dripping. A slow, rhythmic drip-drip-drip onto the floor.

"Your flow regulator is misaligned," Arjun said quietly.

Gogra frowned. "What?"

"The tap," Arjun pointed. "You’re losing inventory. The pressure valve equation has a rounding error on the shut-off sequence."

Gogra looked down at the tap. It dripped again.

Arjun focused. The golden numbers of the tap’s enchantment floated in the smoky air.

Valve_State: CLOSED (98%)

Leak_Rate: 0.02 Liters/Minute

"I can fix it," Arjun said. "For a full charge and the water."

Gogra stared at him, then burst into a barking laughter that shook his jowls. "You? A skinny surface-dweller fix a Dwarven pressure-tap? You’d blow your hand off, boy."

"Let me try," Arjun said, his voice steady despite the thumping of his heart. "If I fail, you keep the coin and we leave."

Gogra stopped laughing. The ruby eye whirred, zooming in on Arjun. The greed equation floating above his head spiked. The leak was costing him money.

"You break it, you buy the whole bar," Gogra growled. He stepped back, gesturing to the tap with a massive, grey hand.

Arjun approached the bar. The patrons leaned in, watching with mild interest, expecting a spectacular failure.

Arjun didn't touch the brass. He held his hands over it, palms down, like a pianist preparing to play.

He closed his eyes and entered the code. It was old, clumsy magic, hammered into the metal with brute force rather than elegance.

Find the variable for the seal.

There. Torque \= 50.

Increase Torque to 100. Add a locking condition.

Arjun twitched his fingers.

Click.

The sound was small, sharp, and decisive. The dripping stopped instantly.

Arjun opened his eyes. He looked at Gogra.

The bartender stared at the tap. He grabbed the handle and yanked it open; the purple liquid roared out. He let go; it snapped shut. Not a single drop escaped.

The silence in the bar was different now. It wasn't dismissive. It was assessing.

Gogra looked at Arjun, his ruby eye clicking thoughtfully. He reached under the bar and pulled out a large, glowing blue fuel crystal and two sealed canteens of water. He slammed them onto the counter.

"Full charge," Gogra grunted. He slid the coin pouch back to Kavya. "On the house. For the entertainment."

Kavya grabbed the supplies, her eyes wide. She looked at Arjun as if he had just grown a second head.

"Let’s go," Arjun muttered, feeling the exhaustion returning. Using the "sight" was like sprinting while doing calculus.

They turned to leave.

"Hold up," a voice called out from a dark corner booth.

A figure stood up. It was clad in tattered grey robes, its face obscured by a hood. It walked toward them, tossing something onto a table in the center of the room.

It was a small, crystalline sphere—a news projector.

The sphere hummed to life, projecting a three-dimensional illusion into the smoky air. It was a rotating image of two faces.

One was a sketch of Kavya. The other was a terrifyingly accurate portrait of Arjun, glasses and all.

A disembodied, authoritative voice boomed from the sphere.

"By decree of the High Council. Wanted for heresy, destruction of sacred property, and high treason against reality itself. These entities are armed with Forbidden Logic and are considered unstable."

The projection shifted to show the face of the Seeker—the woman in the white mask.

"Any citizen providing aid will be Zeroed. The reward for their capture is ten thousand Gold Suns and automatic Citizenship in the Upper Wards."

The projection faded.

Every pair of eyes in the bar turned toward Arjun and Kavya. The sound of chairs scraping against the metal floor filled the room. Hands dropped to sword hilts and wand holsters.

Gogra leaned over the bar, his ruby eye glowing brightly.

"Ten thousand Suns," Gogra mused, his voice like gravel in a mixer. "That buys a lot of pressure taps."

Arjun looked at Kavya. She was already gripping her dagger.

"Run?" Arjun suggested weakly.

"Run," Kavya confirmed.

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***