Grand Saint Alloy

Conni led them to the entrance of a mine, it was a long walk, especially on crutches. The caldera that held the six clans was over one hundred miles across, so there was enough space for the fifty thousand people residing here. The tunnels, however, extended like a human-sized ant hill. Not even the elders were sure how far it went below ground.

There were sandstone buildings surrounding the entrance, which looked like they were only built to be sturdy and nothing else. They had no windows and the door was made of thick wood. When it was shut, the only light would be coming from under the door. Through one of the open doors, Tristan could see rows of bunks lining each wall. It looked like their sleeping conditions would be less than comfortable.

Only one house stood apart from these drab buildings. It was a brick structure with a patio wrapping around the exterior. It had windows with floral curtains keeping out the warm midday sun. The roof was slate as opposed to the thatch of the other buildings and it had a chimney that was pumping out black smoke. Tristan assumed that this was Conni’s home.

Many of the miners, especially the ones who weren’t criminals were permitted to go home to sleep. Most only did this on weekends, as the trip to and from the Forest Caldera took about an hour by foot. It would take even longer for Tristan, even after he healed, as he could not exert himself too much with only a single lung. He looked glumly at the ugly brown structure that would most likely be his new home.

“So, this place sucks,” Luke said.

It was said loud enough for everyone to hear, however no one disagreed with him. Some of the older men gave the two youngest miners pitying looks. However, they would get used to it just like everyone else had.

Conni nodded at Luke, “Well said, young man. This place does suck. The pay sucks, the air sucks, the work sucks, however, I am a simple man and cannot tolerate bad food. Those who work hard, and by that I mean get results, will eat at my table in addition to the soup and bread that you would normally get.”

Tristan raised his hand, and when Conni nodded to him he said, “What about those of us who don’t know how to use our kern yet?”

“Normally,” Connis said, “I wouldn’t care. I need you to handle pick axes and shovels, not light things on fire or breathe underwater. However I need to figure out how to use you as a compass, so we will find a way to train you.”

Tristan almost gave a sigh of relief, but Conni continued, “If I can’t, you will be swinging a pick ax like everyone else.”

Normally, the newly sifted would be trained to use their kern by their parents. Normally a newly sifted would not be sent to the mine, so there were no people around to teach Tristan. Even if someone wanted to, no one else had the same kern as him, making it difficult to teach. There weren’t even any manuscripts for such a weak kern in the entire caldera.

“Alright everyone, “ Conni said, “Let’s get the tour underway.”

He proceeded to walk around the base camp to show them the different facilities. Aside from a small tool shed right beside the cave entrance and the raised platform to dump minerals into wagons for transport everything was actually inside the cave. Conni led them about two hundred feet inside and just as the light was dimming, they entered a cavern.

It was huge by Tristan’s standards, but then again the largest building he had ever been inside was a grain silo. This cave was slightly larger than a grain silo that had been tipped over, for one simple reason. It was square, not round. Along one wall were tools, some of which gave off the faint glow of artifacts. Tristan could see several shovels that looked like they had earth affinity and what looked like a wind affinity saw. All were most likely of tier one.

Along the other wall were wheelbarrows and above them was a large map of the tunnels drawn in chalk on the wall. Most of it looked like scribbles to Tristan, but he supposed that the map was invaluable to people working down here. Some areas were marked off with a red X and others with a yellow X.

Conni stood under the map with his hands on his hips, “Alright, the tools of the trade are fairly self-explanatory, you all know how to use a shovel, right?” Everyone nodded, so he turned and pointed towards the map, “This is your best friend. Memorize it. To start with simply count the turns you make so you can find your way back. If you have illumination follow the chalk marks back to the entrance,”

Generations of chalk marks had made it relatively easy to get back to the entrance. Hundreds of arrows would point in a single direction, as many claustrophobic people made absolutely sure that they had a way out. The mosaic of arrows was actually quite beautiful, as many untrusting people put down their own variant to get back.

“Now there are two big rules, never do anything without a piece of wind affinity equipment or someone with an air kern. There are veins of gas down here, you need to make sure that you have clean air,” Conni made eye contact with several people, including Luke, so Tristan assumed these people to be the troublemakers, “Second, Never go anywhere alone. This sounds like common sense, but we have people die for this very reason every year. This will stop you from doing stupid things like going down one of the unstable tunnels or opening up an ore pocket alone.”

Tristan assumed the red X represented unstable tunnels, but he was unsure how you would even go about opening up an ore pocket. Was it like a box? Tristan had assumed that it was like a mass of metal in the ground that they would eat into like a swarm of metal-eating termites.

“The red X’s represent unknown tunnels that we did not make and have not explored, the yellow X’s represent unstable tunnels or ones that are otherwise unsafe,” Conni trembled slightly, “If I ever catch any of you going down a red tunnel, I will execute you.”

Everyone took a step back from the man. Conni had not looked threatening before, but now that Tristan thought about it, he had no idea how powerful his kern was. For all the new miners knew, Conni could be a tier three with an earth affinity. Underground, he could execute anyone he wanted.

“You may think that this is an overreaction, well it's not. Remember this Caldera is sitting on top of an ancient civilization, presumed to have been wiped out by mythical beasts,” Conni had a dark expression, “What do you think happened to their kerns upon their sudden and untimely death?”

Tristan realized with horror what he meant. If someone with a tier one or higher kern died without emptying their kern there would be a potential elemental produced. This elemental would be a self-sustaining force of nature at the same tier as the person it was born from, and it would have a single-minded focus on the biggest desire of a person upon death. This was not necessarily an evil thing, but it was almost always harmful. As an example, if a father with a flame kern died, wishing he had spent more time with his children a flame elemental could be born that wanted to do exactly that. Only, flame and children don’t mix, and the elemental could not understand it was harming the child.

Most people condensed their essence into an artifact before death to avoid this possibility. But what if there was a sudden and violent end to an entire civilization? Not all the people would spawn elementals, but enough would, and most of them would be violent.

There was just one question Tristan had to ask, “Conni?” The mine foreman nodded for him to continue, “What is the average tier of the elementals?”

Conni gave the group a predatory look, “At least there is someone smart here. The average seems to be around tier four.”

There was a shocked intake of breath. Tier four was the highest the warrior caste was capable of reaching and that was rare. The water kern prodigy might have been able to reach tier six and become the first hero since the founder, but a tier four would be a minimum of five times stronger than someone with a tier zero kern. Most of the people here would die if one showed up.

“The lowest we have ever seen down here, not from a miner, was a tier three,” Conni said, “The highest was estimated to be at tier seven.”