The commotion died instantly, and the Hun’Kui looked around in apparent confusion, as Hector had left only their heads uncovered.
The young Rainlords that they’d been bothering all looked toward him at once, and Hector wasn’t sure what their expressions meant. Had he made a mistake? Maybe he shouldn’t have interfered. It wasn’t like the Rainlords needed--
An unfamiliar sound rang out--a heavy, piping noise that simultaneously carried a whip’s crack with it.
Pain came knifing through Hector’s chest.
The street erupted into shrieks as the crowd around the Rainlords scattered, and Hector saw several more clusters of Hun’Kui letting everyone flee around them. One was aiming at him with a long, two-handed rifle of some strange kind. Tendrils of blue smoke--or something like it--swirled up from both the tip of its barrel and the back of its apparent loading chamber.
This time, it was the Rainlords’ turn to react. Everyone bolted away from Hector, and within as much time as it took for him to turn his head, the Hun’Kui were nearly all subdued--many by crystal or metal, some by threat of a blade or gun, and the last lingering few by a hand or foot pressing them into the dirt.
Hector, however, was more concerned with the gaping hole in his chest, and thus, his suit. And despite already having the vigor required to walk in this cumbersome thing, Garovel had not been numbing his pain. And so, he felt every bit of that searing air as it rushed in and scorched his flesh, exploding up through his punctured lung and burning his throat, mouth, and nose with every breath.
His body wanted to panic, of course, but he knew it wouldn’t last long. He knew Garovel’s help was imminent, and indeed, it soon arrived. All pain flew away from him as quickly as it had arrived.
But when he turned to look at Garovel, he saw that the reaper had a gaping wound, too.
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every day at noon PST by ~400 words.
Tuesday, January 3, 2017
Monday, January 2, 2017
Page 1252
((The Monday Triple: page 3 of 3))
‘Okay, but how does the funneling actually work?’ said Hector. ‘I mean, where does the heat go?’
‘Oh, the heat is transferred into a “cooler,” which is an area where someone--likely a servant or team of servants--is working around the clock to maintain a low temperature. It would be a very tightly-controlled environment. They used to just be caves that had been lined with loads of heat shielding materials, but they might be different now. I’m curious to see one, but I don’t know if we’ll get the opportunity. We didn’t come down here for a tour, after all.’
‘Hmm. But, uh... so these servants who are keeping that place cold... uh... are they not in the city itself? Or...?’
‘Well, they could be, I suppose, but they’re probably not. The idea behind heat funneling was to construct a vast network that could cool many cities, without ever making it so that any one city was entirely reliant upon any one cooler--the logic being that, if, for whatever reason, a cooler failed, then the other coolers in the network would be able to pick up the slack.’
‘Smart.’
‘Before funneling was invented, it was just as you said. Very powerful servants would create “safe zones,” and everywhere else was pretty much off limits.’
That made Hector want to ask what happened so long ago to make people migrate all the way down here in the first place, but someone bumped into him before he could formulate the question.
A loud group of Hun’Kui were crowding around a young Rainlord on his right, and even though Hector couldn’t tell what they were saying, their intentions seemed apparent enough from the way they were pushing into the comparatively small entourage of Rainlords.
The body language, the shouting, the unprovoked aggression--Hector had seen this plenty of times before in Atreya. Without even thinking, he flicked his wrist and encased every single one of them in iron.
‘Okay, but how does the funneling actually work?’ said Hector. ‘I mean, where does the heat go?’
‘Oh, the heat is transferred into a “cooler,” which is an area where someone--likely a servant or team of servants--is working around the clock to maintain a low temperature. It would be a very tightly-controlled environment. They used to just be caves that had been lined with loads of heat shielding materials, but they might be different now. I’m curious to see one, but I don’t know if we’ll get the opportunity. We didn’t come down here for a tour, after all.’
‘Hmm. But, uh... so these servants who are keeping that place cold... uh... are they not in the city itself? Or...?’
‘Well, they could be, I suppose, but they’re probably not. The idea behind heat funneling was to construct a vast network that could cool many cities, without ever making it so that any one city was entirely reliant upon any one cooler--the logic being that, if, for whatever reason, a cooler failed, then the other coolers in the network would be able to pick up the slack.’
‘Smart.’
‘Before funneling was invented, it was just as you said. Very powerful servants would create “safe zones,” and everywhere else was pretty much off limits.’
That made Hector want to ask what happened so long ago to make people migrate all the way down here in the first place, but someone bumped into him before he could formulate the question.
A loud group of Hun’Kui were crowding around a young Rainlord on his right, and even though Hector couldn’t tell what they were saying, their intentions seemed apparent enough from the way they were pushing into the comparatively small entourage of Rainlords.
The body language, the shouting, the unprovoked aggression--Hector had seen this plenty of times before in Atreya. Without even thinking, he flicked his wrist and encased every single one of them in iron.
Page 1251
((The Monday Triple: page 2 of 3))
‘Funnels?’ Hector vaguely recalled one of the reapers mentioning such a thing when he’d first learned of the Undercrust’s existence.
‘It’s an absolutely ancient technique. Perhaps the oldest method, even.’
He still wasn’t quite sure he understood. ‘Oldest method of what, exactly?’
‘Of creating survivable conditions here. Of colonization, that is.’
Hector blinked.
‘The invention of heat funneling--down here? Historically speaking, it’s on par with the invention of agriculture. Its importance and influence to civilization here can’t really be overstated.’
‘Wow, uh. Okay. How does it work?’
‘It’s pretty simple. Have you ever heard the phrase “heat rises?”’
‘Sure.’
‘Well, that’s a lie.’
‘What?’
‘Or at least, it’s not the whole truth. Really, heat just flows from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration. From hot to cold. Until both areas are the same temperature. It’s part of nature’s eternal pursuit of equilibrium. We only think of heat as “rising” because heat affects the density of matter, and matter with a low density will generally get pushed up by matter with a high density. That’s why a rock sinks in water, and oil rises above it. But anyway, the point is, heat often gets conflated with the rising movement created by changes in density, even though heat itself is not prone to any particular direction.’
‘...I feel like I should’ve known this, already.’
‘Eh, you probably did, on some level. It’s fairly intuitive. And if not, well. That’s why I’m here, right? Don’t be too hard on yourself.’
‘You’re not gonna call me stupid again?’
‘Oh, yeah. You’re stupid.’
‘Ugh.’
‘Thanks for reminding me.’
‘Happy to help.’
‘Anyway, what was I talking about?’
‘Uh. Heat funneling?’
‘Right, right. So, ah, okay. Everything I just explained is an important part of how these cities down here maintain relatively safe temperatures. It’s hard for me to tell, since I can’t actually feel temperature, myself, but at a guess, I’d say that the streets of Babbadelo here are hovering around four or five hundred degrees.’
‘Funnels?’ Hector vaguely recalled one of the reapers mentioning such a thing when he’d first learned of the Undercrust’s existence.
‘It’s an absolutely ancient technique. Perhaps the oldest method, even.’
He still wasn’t quite sure he understood. ‘Oldest method of what, exactly?’
‘Of creating survivable conditions here. Of colonization, that is.’
Hector blinked.
‘The invention of heat funneling--down here? Historically speaking, it’s on par with the invention of agriculture. Its importance and influence to civilization here can’t really be overstated.’
‘Wow, uh. Okay. How does it work?’
‘It’s pretty simple. Have you ever heard the phrase “heat rises?”’
‘Sure.’
‘Well, that’s a lie.’
‘What?’
‘Or at least, it’s not the whole truth. Really, heat just flows from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration. From hot to cold. Until both areas are the same temperature. It’s part of nature’s eternal pursuit of equilibrium. We only think of heat as “rising” because heat affects the density of matter, and matter with a low density will generally get pushed up by matter with a high density. That’s why a rock sinks in water, and oil rises above it. But anyway, the point is, heat often gets conflated with the rising movement created by changes in density, even though heat itself is not prone to any particular direction.’
‘...I feel like I should’ve known this, already.’
‘Eh, you probably did, on some level. It’s fairly intuitive. And if not, well. That’s why I’m here, right? Don’t be too hard on yourself.’
‘You’re not gonna call me stupid again?’
‘Oh, yeah. You’re stupid.’
‘Ugh.’
‘Thanks for reminding me.’
‘Happy to help.’
‘Anyway, what was I talking about?’
‘Uh. Heat funneling?’
‘Right, right. So, ah, okay. Everything I just explained is an important part of how these cities down here maintain relatively safe temperatures. It’s hard for me to tell, since I can’t actually feel temperature, myself, but at a guess, I’d say that the streets of Babbadelo here are hovering around four or five hundred degrees.’
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