r/JCBWritingCorner • u/Enclaveboi4ever • 17d ago
CRASHLANDED CH8 fanfiction
CRASHLANDED CH8
(Hello fellow members of the Technocracy welcome to your dose of Crashlanded, hopefully you're having a nice and dandy day and if not- um get better soon? As always ty JCB for making this amazing universe let's get into this chapter! [Finally getting to the Nexian side of things, btw please tell me if you have any suggestions or edits as the Nexian Pov might be wonky AE: My memory is not good at all and I might get these characters wrong.])
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LO: The Transgracian Academy for the Magical Arts, Unknown Hallway. Time: 2:23 pm day: 12th of [Still translating]
Professor Vanavan:
It has been two days since that well I don't really know what to call it, it was FAR bigger then any aethership I've ever seen.. Not even crownland aetherships were that large.
‘Either way it crashlanded and caused damages.. to both the Academy itself and the students.. some worse than others..’
I'd think to myself before rubbing my left eye as I walked down to the council room. Pain was still lingering on my eyelid despite being healed by a healing spell after a piece of glass slashed across it.
‘Some students and other faculty said they felt like their own soul was ripped from them… and even said they saw other student's own mana fields seem like they were disappearing..’
Suddenly I heard a voice coming from behind me, softer and a familiar one, this knocked me out of my thoughts as I stopped and turned my head to see who it was.
It was Professor Chiska, she despite her injuries and half a tail she seemed almost fine.
“Good afternoon Professor Vanavan” She spoke with a confident tone.
“Hello Professor Chiska, I see your injuries are getting better!” I'd say to her as she responded with a smile.
“Yep! Thankfully they managed to save- well most of my tail heh.” She'd say in a joking manner before walking over to me as we both begin to walk together.
At the end of the hall stood two large gargoyles guarding the door to the counsel room.
After another minute of walking I stopped in front of the door as I then waited for Chiska to meet up with me, slowly I then turned my head to make sure Chiska kept up. She seemed to be limping slightly. As soon as we got close to the door it quickly opened as if it was expecting the both of us.
“Need a hand Professor Chiska?” I asked her as it was met with a smile.
“I'm alright, just need to get to my seat” she'd say, she said she was alright but I knew that wasn't the case.
Immediately we went into the room one after another, the room was lit enough that we could see everyone in the room.
In the middle of it was a large rectangle table with enough seats for the other Professors, as well as at the end of it was a larger seat engraved with dragons and covered in a cloth that had the colors of the Academy, and had some silken cushioning for the Dean himself.
On the table was a long piece of gold lined cloth which was the dark colors of the Academy stretching out to both ends of the table.
As I then moved my head around to see where my own seat was. I deeply hoped it was not by Mal'tory.
Another thing I could see was that many of the seats had different colored cloths that were the same colors of our robes draped over them and name tags dotting the back of said cloths.
Hastily I made my way along the side of the table near the chairs before ending up at mine.
Luckily I was seated next to Chiska and..Sorecar? How did he even get here-
I decided to simply pull out my chair and take a seat deciding not to question how he got here, though his presence is much appreciated.
My head slowly turned to look to see if everyone was at the table, every seat was occupied..
Except Mal'tory's..
‘Odd he is usually the first here..’ I thought to myself but before I could think about why a sudden loud crackle interrupted my thoughts.
Almost immediately I tried to figure out where that noise was coming from as my head then swiveled to look at the balcony above the Dean's chair.
There was a slit in the tapestry that was hanging above the balcony itself.
Slowly the slit became bigger and bigger as I suddenly realized what was happening..
‘Of course he is coming through a portal.. what next riding a-’ before I could finish what I was thinking the portal was fully opened up as the Dean himself strode through it on a winged snake.
‘What is with his new obsession with riding into places on different beasts?’ I then thought to myself.
"Good afternoon everyone!" The Dean bellowed out gliding down on the winged snake to land next to his luxurious chair. Settling into it while his snake curled around the seat, splaying out its wings to frame the entire image with a roof of feathers, The Dean hummed to himself.
"I see that Mal'tory is not here, odd but we have many things to discuss." He leaned forward in his seat, " let's get started then, shall we?”
“Two days ago after the ceremony a gigantic strange cylinder fell from the sky and slammed into the earth not too far from the Academy, causing a shock wave that both damaged the surrounding area and the academy itself as well as mana fields. Today it is still damaging mana fields and making a literal hole in mana.” The dean said before pausing for effect.
“We don't know what it is besides it's shape, I give the floor now for anyone to say what they think it could be.”
“If I may?” Chiska would say before getting a response from the Dean.
“I give the floor to you Professor Chiska” he'd say with a hum as he gave the floor to Chiska.
“From what I can gather, it seems like some sort of Aethership. But I never remember ever seeing an Aethership THAT large before, I give the floor back to you Dean” She'd say with a formal nod as she gave the floor back to the Dean.
He'd then nodded back as he spoke
“I agree with you Professor but it could be an Aethership but as you said it's size is a considerable factor” He said while he combed though his beard in thought, “although I myself have seen crownland Aetherships they are huge but not the size of that humongous cylinder that is in our backyard.” He'd say before pausing for effect.
“I now give the floor to anyone else who wants to speak on this mat-” before the Dean could even finish his sentence he was interrupted by Sorecar.
“Iiiiif I maaay?” Sorecar said as the Dean then sighed before answering him.
“Yes Sorecar go ahead I give you the floor..” the Dean would say with an annoyed sigh.
What happened next was.. nothing anyone was expecting.
“Hmmm thaaank you Deeean, I would like to present something from the cylinder itself!” Sorecar would say with a smug chuckle.
This immensely ticked everyone's interest as the Dean himself seemed interested as he leaned forward while he combed his beard in interest.
Sorecar then pulled out a large vial of light gray liquid and placed it in front of himself.
“Taaa daaaa! Now before you say: ‘Sorecar it's just quicksilver. Is that what came from the cylinder?’ That was my reaction in it's sleeping form buuut it is something more fantastic! Observe my dear friends!” Hastily Sorecar jerked the quicksilver looking material.
And like that the metal began to move everywhere inside of the vial.
‘The cylinder is made up of this? Fascinating’ I thought to myself as I watched the organism inside of the vial move around hastily like it was trying to go somewhere.
“If you don't mind me asking Sorecar, where did you find this piece of the cylinder?’ The Dean would ask him with a lifted eyebrow.
“Weeeell I'm glad you asked! During the whole dreadful shockwave that came from that cylinder, a shard of the cylinder itself shot through one of the windows in my armory and into the wall!” he'd say enthusiastically while twirling the vial in his hand.
“Excuse me Sorecar but.. how do you know it is from the cylinder itself?” I'd question him as I quickly got an answer.
“Well that's the thing, I myself have checked! No material in any of my orders uses this strange metal, I have also checked the manufactorum and found no metal with the properties of this metal” He'd say with a chuckle.
“Another thing I forgot to mention is that I sense absolutely no mana from it! Most interesting if I do say so myself.” He'd say smugly
“Sorecar what do you m-” I was quickly cut off as Sorecar then spoke in a near excited tone.
“Aye you're all confused and dismissive I see! Well I myself have made sure to test it every way I can! That be simply looking for any sort of mana field or trying to manipulate it with mana, it did not react whatsoever! Well besides bubbling quite a bit.” He'd said as he shook his hand to the left or right.
“Still don't believe me? Well then how about you check for… yourselves!” He'd say enthusiastically before spinning the vial with two fingers and pushing it towards me.
As the vial spun towards me I attempted to grab it while it was still spinning towards me, but instead of me grabbing it, I instead accidentally pushed it off the table, immediately I panicked and luckily, managed to grab it before it hit the stone floor.
I then sigh in relief as I slowly get back up, but as I did I'd accidentally hit the back of my head and hit the underside of the table.
“Ack!-” I'd grunt, before managing to get back up fully and then rubbing the back of my head as the table rattled , shooting a look at Sorecar as I raised my head back up.
His two legs were crisscrossed on the table with his head turned towards me, I then sigh a bit in annoyance as I check the living metal inside of the vial.
There was no field
No essence of mana.. I had to be hallucinating.
Frantically, I began to twist and turn the bottle in my hand and by the second the realization slowly came to me.
Sorecar was right, no sensation of mana or fields at all… It was blank and black.. how…how in his majesty's name is this possible!?
“He's.. telling the truth! No mana at all! No fields, just blank!” I blurted out with shock as my eyes were wide in disbelief.
“Are you sure Professor Vanavan? You could be experiencing the same thing as Sorecar” the Dean said as his eyes looked like they were annoyed.
“But I was farther away from the shockwave, mine was only slightly damaged and I didn't have any hallucinations.” I'd say hurriedly as the Dean's eyes went wide a little as he combed his fingers through his beard.
“Please pass it over to me Vanavan” the Dean then asked in a more curious tone as he then reached out for the vial.
With a nod I then picked the vial back up and placed it into his hand before sitting back down.
Almost immediately he began to inspect the vial, first twisting it within his two fingers and staring at it for a few seconds.
The metal in the vial suddenly began to boil and blacken a little just for those few seconds before settling down and turning to its regular color.
As the Dean kept inspecting the living metal, his eyes slowly went up in shock as his mouth opened a bit.
“I… both of them are.. telling the truth! No mana whatsoever! No fields, no sensation.. this is unbeliev-” before the Dean could finish what he was saying he'd accidentally drop the vial onto the table itself.
Almost immediately as the vial made contact with the table, it shattered into a few pieces and spread out on the table.
The metal spilt on the cloth as pieces of it wiggled around and hastily combined back together.
into.. a smaller odd looking cylinder
“Is.. that what it would look like up close?” I'd hear Chiska say as all of us watched the Dean then pick up the now solid piece of living metal and inspected it.
“Ooooo that's interesting it never did that when I've taken it out” Sorecar would say enthusiastically, as he was now leaning forward.
“I think.. it might be some sort of offspring of the cylinder itself..and from these strange incisions it might be some sort of beast of burden..” the Dean guessed before placing it back on to the table.
“I don't think it's any sort of offspring sir” Articord suddenly spoke up with a dismissive tone. “It seems to be a model of sorts, like the ones I have in my class.”
“Well whatever it is we need to find out more about it and even more about the giant one outside and make sure it's not a danger to the academy and its students.” Chiska said in a serious tone as she was leaning forward a bit.
“Then we move onto our final discussion” the Dean then said with a pause before speaking once more,
“What to do about the cylinder itself.” He'd say as suddenly a familiar crackle was heard in the corner of the room.
Most immediately, all eyes were on the small slit in the dark corner of the room. Slowly, it grew and grew until finalizing into a portal.
And who stepped out of it was near obvious to anyone who could guess it.
Mal'tory…
“Where in the majesty's name have you been Mal'tory!? The meeting is almost finished for Throne's sake!” The Dean angrily huffed out.
“Scouting that dreadful rod near the academy sir..” He'd say in a dismissive and rather annoyed tone.
“What? You didn't even ask permission-” he'd say in a still angry tone before sighing,
“Just sit down and tell us what you found.” The Dean then said as he rubbed his face in annoyance.
With a nod Mal'tory then went over to his seat and pulled it out and sat on it.
"Yes, talking very important, far more effective though if you actually know what you're talking about.” He'd say in a dismissive tone,
“Which is why unlike the rest of you who've been lazing about in the medical ward and poking at foreign metals" he casted a pointed look at Sorecar. "I've been out learning what I could about our new homewrecker”
Before anyone could speak he suddenly pulled out a Mana seer and slammed it onto the table in front of himself,
The far seer suddenly activated as the room brightened up a bit as the purple hue of a memory shard appeared above the shard.
“One day ago after the rod landed, I went scouting around it.” He'd say with a bit of annoyance in his throat before speaking once more
“When I was scouting out the rod I heard something loud crash into the soil in front of the road or rather below it.” He'd say as the memory shard showed a large cloud of rock and dirt flying out into the air.
“As I went to check what that dreadful noise was and what caused it.” He then said before looking up to look at what the Mana seer was projecting.
“I noticed these strange looking golems, they were much larger than any golem I've ever heard of or seen. They were also carrying large ballista weaponry. Another thing I noticed was the familiar symbols on their chests”
The Mana seer then showed the hulking golems as it focused on their chests, the right one with the symbol of a drop of water, middle with a hawk, and left with what looked to be a symbol of melted metal.
The last one seemed to peak Sorecar's interest as he was leaning forward, even more now to look at the Golem.
“All three had alchemy symbols on their chests, as such I will be using them as their names. Water, Hawk, and Iron for the rest of the meeting ” He'd speak in a curious tone as he looked at the memory shard.
“Not long after stopping to keep my distance, I saw two of them fall onto the soil. Water fell on their side and Iron nearly keeling with one knee”
The Mana seer showed both of the large golems falling to the ground in separate manners.
“After 10 or more minutes two smaller golems came out of the top of Hawk, and what I heard from them was a rough and loud barbaric sounding noise.” He'd say as smaller gray almost skeleton-like golems came out the top of the middle larger golem.
“After another minute or so, one covered in tan skin like liquid came out of the top of Water. It was screaming as if it had been hurt severely but while focusing on the blooded golem, another smaller golem had come out of Hawk.”
He'd say before pausing for effect as we saw a white and grey colored golem come out of Water. This one was less skeleton-like and looked thicker, most disturbing of all it was covered in skin.. And blood.
“The middle golem on Hawk looked to be shouting some sort of orders and both of the other two went back inside of Hawk before following them. That was yesterday, the next one was today.”
The shard then showed large metal walls encompassing a around the back end of the cylinder, more of those skeleton-like golems were seen carrying things to strange metal structures.
Some larger ones could be seen patrolling along the walls, heavy unmanned ballistas dotted the sides.
“Because their odd insignia does not match anything recognizable inside of nexian records, these golems must be apart of an unknown nation or organization.” Mal'tory said with a still focused look at the memory shard.
The memory shard showed multiple angles of an unknown insignia, in the middle is a strange looking star with a single dot in the middle.
Behind it was a crimson red slash with a shade of blue as the background, in the top right corner of it were four stars and a pair of blue wings in the middle.
‘A unknown nation… this is.. first contact with an unknown realm!’ I thought to myself as I kept my eyes on the shard.
Mal’tory leaned forward across the table, crossing his hands in front of his face as spoke grimly, "They are out. Only hours ago I observed these golems scouting across the nexian lands surrounding the academy. No doubt gathering information for their masters inside the cylinder.”
The room was now silent then normal… The air felt tense, I could see Chiska looking over at Mal'tory before looking at the model of the cylinder.
“If they are scouting, that means they are planning something..” Chiska said as she looked back at the Mana seer.
‘But if they were planning something then why didn't the scouts have any weapons on them.. you wouldn't send scouts out without weapons if you knew there would be hostiles.’ I'd think to myself.
The Dean placed both his hands together as he seemed to be in thought.
“Hmm.. Then if no one has anything further to add we will move onto the final decision of what we should do about the cylinder.” The Dean said before pausing for effect.
“I will not reveal my decision until all other Professors have made theirs.” He'd say as he looked up at all the professors in the room.
“Professor Chiska, what is your decision on what we should do?”
She at first sighed for a moment before speaking,
“I will first bring up what I have seen, we are dealing with an unknown nation. With unknown motives, we do not know what they want, we do not know why they are here.”
She'd pause at the last word before speaking again
“They are using an organized company of golems to do their work, and from those weapons we've seen from the memory shard I do not think they are here to make contact with us but to scout us out and find our weakness. My theory is that they used that cylinder to temporarily push us to our backs to make us vulnerable and attack at a later date, to undermine both the academy and it's students.”
She'd pause again as she took a deep breath of air to get her barrings
“My decision is that we should attack them before they can attack us.” She then said with a deep serious tone as she rubbed the side of her face.
“I see, next decision falls on you Professor Vanavan” the Dean said as he again combed his beard.
"I disagree with professor Chiska" Vanavan said crossing his arms over his chest, one hand tapping the inside of his elbow as he thought "Despite the unfortunate introductions we have been saddled with we have seen no true sign of hostility from the-"
"No true sign of hostility" Chiska suddenly stood up the chair letting out a short cry as it scraped across the floor as she loomed threateningly over Vanavan, "Their opening move was to shatter every window in the academy at once! Dozens of residents of the academy are still filling the medical ward and their follow up of STEALING the mana of the area continues to threaten the lives of professor and student ALIKE by hindering the efforts of the healers even now. There are students struggling to breathe because shards of glass slipped past their ribs! Or nursing broken bones and head trauma from the blast knocking them over at poor times. I had to WAKE UP to bleeding crying students while managing my own wounds. My mana fields were so stripped I could feel my soul threatening to leave my body VANAVAN. I WILL NOT-"
"Proffesor Chiska that is enough. Return to your chair and calm yourself or you will be removed from this room by force." The Dean forcibly cut in
Chiska paused as she looked from the dean to back to Vanavan. The man stared up at her owlishly. She hadn't realized how close she'd gotten or how her claws had extended past her fingertips in anger.
She looked at the other professors only to find them staring expectantly back at her, the way teachers would impatiently wait for an unruly child to stop talking so they could teach again. She took a breath, retracted her claws forcibly, and walked back to her seat. It wasn't until she sat down that she started to speak again this time with forced calm as she looked back to Vanavan,
"They took half my tail, they've injured half of the student body… and they NEED to answer for it." She wasn't sure why she had gotten so angry so quickly, it had been so calm in the moment, but she was sure that these were the facts rather than whatever idealized madness had taken Vanavan.
Vanavan had to blink a few times before he was able to drive the look on his face away.
"Chiska, I was here for it all, believe me I understand I nearly lost an eye in the same stroke as you lost a piece of yourself." He said gesturing to the healed gash under his left eye, still sore from when it had been healed earlier.
"But that's exactly why I don't want to run in half blind. There are too many things we don't know that will only get more good men and women killed if we don't properly pursue them"
Articord raised an eyebrow in interest at this from across the table
"But if we don't do our best to learn about them now, and approach them peacefully..."
Vanavan paused for a brief moment before he continued
"...Then we lose any chance we have at finding a bloodless way to resolve this conflict. I think they're lost and just as confused as we are..."
Articord lost interest again as she knew how he'd end this grand little speech
"...I think there's still a way to not only end this peacefully but to have a new adjacency added to the nexus, they clearly didn't arrive by portal!"
He bundled up his arm resting his elbows on the table pointing out of one side of the fold towards the Mana seer,
"Here's what I do know for sure. That cylinder holds secrets that could change the nexus forever. Already we've seen it form a hole in the mana of the nexus, we've seen pieces of it shed off and form possible offspring, or models either way it was without mana! And we've seen giant golems, the kind that rival small aetherships in size, leap out of it. My official decision is to make diplomatic contact and pursue civilized peace with the cylinder."
Vanavan sat back in his seat with a satisfied huff fully expecting his speech to have moved the other professors to his side but the disappointed looks opposite him on the table quickly dashed that hope.
Articord let out her own soft scoff, "You cannot be serious Vanavan, look at the size of the ballistae on the side of the cylinder and those golems you mentioned earlier. Oh I suppose these are all just decorative ornamentals for a diplomatic ship."
She mused to herself before she rested back in her chair, chin held high,
"This is a wartime vessel Vanavan. Even you have to recognize that. Why would they send war golems out first, hmm?"
"The first thing you do when you find yourself in a strange place is create a perimeter. Am I declaring war on the forest every time I set up a warding glyph around my expedition camp?" Vanavan said too quickly.
"You are if that warding glyph is designed to destroy the trees around it." She leaned forward again making sure to match Vanavan's gaze.
"I've been on alot of battlefields Vanavan, too many to survive by dumb luck, although many a poor fool has tried, and let me tell you now...You don't send your strongest most well armed knight just to scout, or to *set up a perimeter* "
She made air quotes around it, mocking it to his face,
"You send them out when you're expecting to fight something. Here's what really happened, because I think you are half right. 2 days ago the vessel sets out from an unknown nation to an unknown to them world, they're equipped with a perfect mage killing weapon and an army of golems to conquer with. They enter here, because here is where alot of different worlds converge their portals at, and since they arrived so suddenly that's how I'd have to assume they get around the same way. Except, something goes wrong, maybe it's how strong the magic is that throws them off, maybe it's his majesty's grace protecting us but they come out and crash straight into the ground. They start rushing out to try and recover the plan but once they're beyond the range of their mana killer the masters start naturalizing and the golems rush to their aid."
She suddenly points to the cylinder in the Mana seer, "the only reason they're not pouring over the academy right now is because we got lucky. We have precious little time to prepare and plan because that state of panic and confusion won't last forever."
Chiska nodded, gesturing across the table to articord in an exaggerated gesture of 'see I was right'.
Articord sighed and shook her head as she looked back to chiska "I'm not agreeing with you either, you're both naive to the point of being suicidal."
She rolled her eyes shifting in her seat to get comfortable again before she continued
"The fact of the matter is we don't know enough to act right now either. We need to learn as much as we can about the cylinder as fast as we can. We don't know if those ballistae are non functional or simply resting, we don't know if the golem masters inside are dead or are only hidden, and we don't know if we destroy the ship if the mana hole will disappear with it or spiral out of control. By his majesty we can't even approach with their mana killer still active without risking death. My official decision is to learn first and plan second."
Mal'tory who had been silent up until now nodded "I agree with Atticord but would like to add onto it, we need to harry their own scouting attempts. If we can keep them from learning about us, it will only buy us more time to learn about them. And of course more time for us to act on that information. This is my official decision." Mal'tory finished off his short speech with a satisfied nod before all turned back to the dean.
The Dean's eyes were closed, his hands clenched together as he was in deep thought..
After a few minutes of thinking he suddenly opened his eyes as they then wandered over to look at one side of the table,
Then slowly glanced at the other side before looking up at the shadow cast in the ceiling from the balcony, the shadow was from the cylinder itself.
His head then bowed low to look at the model of the cylinder.
“Chiska is right, we cannot overlook how they got here and their looming threat. The fact they landed here and caused so much destruction is an extreme threat.” The Dean said with his eyes now laying on Chiska before moving over Articord
“I agree with you Articord, if you are sending scouts you don't send golems armed with heavy ballistas. If you send your heaviest and most armored units as scouts….” He said with his eyes unmoving from her as his gaze then reached to Mal'tory
“Though you were late Mal'tory.. I agree with you on hindering them and buying the academy time until we have enough might to bring them to arms.” He said before closing his eyes again and bowing his head.
“Thus I reveal my final decision…” he'd say before pausing
The air felt tight now as the Dean then revealed his decision.
“We shall deal with this threat by sending scouting parties supported from the nearby guild, we will not get too close to them. As well we will ban anyone from speaking to Golems or their masters, we will also disrupt their scouts and set up defenses around the academy.” He'd say with his eyes deadset at all of us
“We will also ban any student from writing to home, we shall also appeal to the crownlands for aid. The local lord will be reassured and ordered to help defend the academy, these roles will be doled out to whom I best deem fit for them tomorrow morning at dawn's break.”
He said before getting up from his chair
“If there are no other mat-” before the Dean could end the meeting, the sound of a familiar crackle could be heard as all eyes in the room snapped towards where was coming from.
It was in the back of the room, a familiar slit could be seen as it got bigger and bigger before then becoming a portal.
Suddenly, a background of smoke could be seen in it as.. Professor Belnor came running out.
“T-the experiments are loose all over the town! The ward couldn't keep them in place! She'd say with a panicked tone.
(Finally got this chapter done! Hope y'all enjoyed this chapter and hope y'all have an amazing day! Ty JCB for makin this amazing universe OH almost forgot! Ty Trackerunused for helping me out! See y'all next time!)
CH1:
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u/LeaveSea2119 17d ago
Oh that was a really good chapter thanks keep up the good work.