37 The Bone Fort and Rune Experimentation

Kasdeya couldn't help but rub her eyes and look again, but the fort was still there. It might've been a slight exaggeration to call it a fort as it only included a very large fence made entirely out of bone and rock and most likely some buildings inside, though she couldn't see anything over the fence, but just the sheer amount of bones needed to build this thing would've required a massacre, and then the amount of time and effort to construct this with the primitive technology available would've been even more immense.

"We have arrived." Stated the brute in its deep and menacing voice.

"Umm, I thought you had a task for me to complete, what am I supposed to do here?" Asked Kasdeya, already not liking what the answer would be.

"You are to break into the bone fort."

Kasdeya was beginning to think about pretending to break in and then run while she couldn't be seen but the next words gave her a pause.

"There is a powerful relic inside that allows the lesser bone weaver to conjure this many bones, I want it."

After hearing the word 'relic', Kasdeya immediately thought of the technomancer core and its amazing benefits, most of which she hadn't used yet, and started formulating a plan.

'So far, relics seem to be quite beneficial, and I'm guessing that, from the wording of that sentence, the owner of this fort, the bone weaver, created the bones with mana, and whatever this relic is must boost one's mana. How else could it have 'allowed' something to cast more spells?'

"So am I to go in alone?" Asked Kasdeya, needing more information in order to formulate a decent plan.

"Yes, you are sufficiently strong after all, then, if you succeed, I will meet you outside the fort when you escape. And, if you fail, then you would have exhausted some of the defences and then I can come in behind you and take the relic by force."

'This creature is either very dumb, or very confident in my failure as there's absolutely nothing stopping me from running after I've taken the relic.'

"Ok then, well I guess there's no point delaying so I'll head off." Kasdeya stated as she started walking towards the bone fort.

As she walked, she paid close attention to anything that might be regarded as defences. She figured that something this large probably wouldn't be too easy to approach, after all, why else would the brute not just do it by itself?

However, despite her assumptions, there seemed to be no obstacles between her and the wall.

Arriving before the wall, she looked closer at it and discovered that the bones, that were used to create it, seemed to be fused together in some spots so it keeps its rigid shape and, in other parts, the bones were structured around large rocks.

'From the looks of this, I'd say that this 'bone weaver' conjured the bones in this particular way and shape and whenever a rock was in the way it just fused the bones around it. Kind of creepy though to see a massive wall made out of fused bone, even if I do know that it was conjured with magic. The first thing I should be considering though, is how to get inside without being found, I could climb over but then I might be seen so I'd rather check my other options first.'

Kasdeya inspected the bone closely and tried to apply some pressure to it in order to test its integrity but, unfortunately for her, it wasn't just for show. The wall did its job well as she couldn't easily break it or squeeze through it.

'It would be nice if I could melt down the material without causing any excessive noise, but the heat that would require would be excessive, plus I don't even know if bones will melt or burn.'

Kasdeya started walking the perimeter of the wall, looking for some sort of entrance while she continued to ponder her options.

'I guess I could try finding other solutions with my runes, like blowing up the wall. But I still haven't figured out what caused the rune to explode, plus there'd be no sneaking in if I managed that. I guess I can do some quick research though while looking for the entrance.'

Taking out a fire rune, she inspected it closely while walking around the perimeter.

The rune wasn't that complicated, consisting of a simple, strange symbol.

'There really isn't anything to research with this rune as it's just that simple. Maybe I can try a more direct route of activating it.'

Kasdeya channelled mana into the rune and lightly chucked it away from her as it burst into flames, and then quickly died out. She then went and picked up the slightly charred bone and inspected it to see the rune was still fine and the bone wasn't too badly damaged, however she was disappointed as it didn't explode.

'I really have no idea what I'm doing here so I guess I'll just try to up the amount of mana in the rune till something happens.'

Kasdeya poured a bit more into the rune and chucked it away again so she didn't burn herself, however, there was still no explosion.

'Come on, I really don't want to use too much mana here since I technically have a job I need to do.'

Picking up the bone again Kasdeya charged it with even more mana as she chucked it at the ground with a bit more force, with still nothing happening.

Picking up the bone again in frustration, Kasdeya charged it with mana again and hurled it at the bone wall near her while applying a bit more strength than she meant to. But to her surprise, when the bone came into contact with the solid surface of the wall, it shattered with an explosion.

'IT WORKED! I TOTALLY KNEW THAT WOULD HAPPEN! YES! So, the rune had to break for the explosion to occur? Why? I guess I'll try one more time to make sure this is the case before I jump the gun. But I will need to make some more fiery bones soon as I'm starting to run out.'

Repeating her previous steps, Kasdeya hurled the bone and watched it shatter as a larger, but still relatively small, explosion occurred again.

'I'm gonna have so much fun with this.'