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The stairs are without form or feature and, wherever the Painted Guardians with their macuahuitl are, they're nowhere near enough for you to grab one of their hand weapons.

"Mexihcatl!" It's Stralchus. He has both rifles. He tosses you yours and looks alarmed when you swing it around, testing its balance as a club. These Amantiou rifles are tough as nails and perfect for caving in skulls.

Then Stralchus looks down at the boiling-blood nightmare in the plaza below and howls as if mortally wounded.

The Painted Guardians finally appear from chambers below yours. They charge Keimia, racing to be the first to reach her. But suddenly a mass of shadows detaches from the far end of the plaza. You know those monsters: feathered apes! They've blackened their feathers with soot! Or, you suspect, someone has helped the creatures hide themselves with that trick. They slam into the Guardians, unnoticed until it's too late. The stories of the Guardians' tattoos are true—claws and crude bone clubs slide off their skin without effect. But the apes are cunning and no human can match their strength. Ignoring the Guardians' blows, they start to pick them up and rip them limb from limb. In seconds, half are dead, and the rest are surrounded by furious apes and flying, blinding soot.

Keimia laughs as she directs the apes. As the silver light shines down on them, you realize they are all united in purpose: the feathered apes serve Keimia, and Keimia serves the False Icon.

Amid the chaos, you spot rolled-up sheaves of bark covered in unfamiliar designs. Those are diagrams needed to repair the Specular! A clawed foot kicks them, and they teeter at the edge of a precipice on the far side of the fighting from your location.

Vecla, already down below, hops toward them but nearly gets trampled. She flees, desperately trying to avoid stomping feet. As the Painted Guardians fall, their morale breaking, you peer through the soot and see one still fighting, his white robes torn to reveal new tattoos: Therko, the young administrator.

Stralchus spots the diagrams, too, and advances down the steps, rifle first, followed by Keimia's warriors, who at least show no signs of misplaced loyalties. The controllers follow.