Chapter 1800: Chapter 1800
At Jenkins's summons, the four-hoofed animal slowly pulled the carriage to the base of the building. Jenkins pointed a finger at the carriage seat, and a dense web of overlapping black lines materialized, quickly coalescing into a thick quilt that was immediately soaked by the rain.
"Wait over there," he instructed the horse. "Don't come near the building until I call for you."
He spoke with a clipped urgency, and the animal immediately pulled the carriage full of quilts back to the other side of the courtyard.
From the other carriage, Chocolate meowed pitifully at Jenkins from out in the rain. Jenkins moved a potted tulip from nearby, placing it beside the cat. He tapped the flowerpot, and the beautiful, golden-hued blossom immediately began to grow sideways. It was a bizarre sight; the once-symmetrical petals enlarged on one side and drooped, forming a canopy that sheltered both the cat and its bread and biscuits from the downpour.
Chocolate watched Jenkins turn and dash toward the building, glancing up at the burning third floor. Feeling a pang of loneliness, the cat lifted a paw and gently batted the petals above its head. It hated being separated from Jenkins.
Instead of scaling the outer wall, Jenkins rushed back into the building and took the stairs, heading for the third floor. Strangely, the first floor was deserted, and so was the second. He didn't pass a single person fleeing downstairs. The flames were only just licking at the second floor, leaving the staircase passable for the moment.
The path was simple enough—just follow the stairs. But as he rounded a landing, the temperature spiked dramatically. He saw that the entrance to the third-floor staircase was completely blocked by a haphazard barricade of furniture. Thick, black smoke billowed through the gaps, choking the stairwell between the second and third floors. Jenkins could already imagine the scene on the other side.
But that wasn't about to stop Jenkins. He took a step back, then threw his shoulder against the blockage. With a tremendous crash, he forced the barricade of cabinets, tables, and chairs aside.
The furniture was already burning, and the thick, black smoke sent him into a fit of coughing. Fires spread with terrifying speed. In the few minutes he'd been delayed, flames had begun to shoot out from the walls themselves. He wondered what on earth the place was built with.
Covering his mouth and nose, Jenkins charged into the third-floor corridor, keeping low to the ground. A Blessed Fire surged from within him, pushing back the mundane flames. He had only taken a few steps when he saw a group of people rushing toward him, led by two Gravediggers and protected by a shimmering, bubble-like barrier.
"In that room down there! The captain is in a standoff with that... thing! It forced us up here! We just managed to get out, but there are still others trapped!" ᴛʜɪs ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ɪs ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ʙʏ NovєlFіre.net
The younger of the two Gravediggers replied, his gaze flicking to the path Jenkins had just cleared behind him.
"Don't go that way. The fire has already spread to the second floor."
Jenkins pointed to the wall beside them.
"Break through this wall."
The older Gravedigger produced a talisman from his pocket. Waving everyone back, he gave it a light toss. The talisman slapped against the wall and detonated in a violent spray of bone shards, blasting a hole through to the outside. A gust of cool, rain-laced wind swept in, but it did little to quell the flames.
Jenkins moved to the hole and shouted down to the horse. The carriage laden with quilts immediately rolled into position below.
"You can jump straight down. It's a bit of a risk, but the fall won't kill you."
With the Gravediggers here, getting everyone down safely shouldn't be a problem.
"I'm going to help your captain," he told the two Gravediggers. "I'll leave the rest of the people on this floor to you."
After murmuring their thanks, they began to organize the survivors, helping them escape through the blasted hole in the wall.
Paying the people behind him no further mind, Jenkins plunged deeper into the burning hallway. The wind and rain gusting through the new opening were finally having an effect. Though the blaze was still fierce, he was able to forge a path forward. Other trapped survivors hurried past him, fleeing in the opposite direction, and the occasional sharp crack from the fire drew startled cries from the crowd.
Yet he saw no sign of the flower girls until he reached the very last room at the end of the hall. The moment his hand touched the searing doorknob, black smoke hissed from the cracks around the frame. He shoved, but the door refused to budge.
So he took a step back, got a running start, and threw his shoulder against it. The door seemed to dissolve like a phantom, and Jenkins, having put too much force into the charge, stumbled right through it. He shot into the room, nearly crashing into a huddle of flower girls crowded near the entrance.
Despite the inferno raging just outside, this room alone showed no trace of the flames. In fact, not only was it not on fire, but the indoor temperature was unnaturally cold.
At the far end of the room, Captain Rogges of the Gravediggers stood frozen, holding a short staff. He was locked in a tense standoff with a pool of writhing black sludge in front of a small, round table. The disgusting mud was steadily expanding, creeping away from the captain and spreading across the floor and up the walls. But the Gravedigger didn't dare move a muscle. Jenkins could see his back was soaked through with sweat.
"What's the situation now?"
As he spoke, he turned and tried the door again, but it remained stubbornly shut. A nearby flower girl, sobbing with fright, quickly explained that they were trapped because the door wouldn't open, and that the other gentleman in the room—she gestured toward the captain—hadn't moved in a long time.
"Captain Rogges, what's going on?"
Jenkins asked again, but the Gravedigger neither spoke nor moved. Finally, one of the bolder girls spoke up. She told Jenkins that she'd seen the man he was talking to in the courtyard earlier. After Jenkins left, the man had someone bring over more white mice, and then he started giving them injections.
Jenkins understood immediately. She meant he was injecting the mice with some kind of toxin. If they had simply repeated the procedure Jenkins had witnessed, there shouldn't have been a problem. Something the Gravediggers did afterward must have triggered this.
The girl continued, explaining that her group, along with most of the people from the first and second floors, had come up to the third floor on their own. After the sludge appeared in the courtyard, Captain Rogges had roared for everyone to run for their lives.
They were supposed to escape into the street, but just as Jenkins found himself unable to open the door to this room, they had been unable to open the main entrance to the building—the very same door Jenkins had found wide open upon his return.
So, everyone fled upward, floor by floor. But in the chaos, they were cornered on the third floor as the sludge began to seep up through the cracks in the floorboards. None of them dared to look directly at the horrifying substance, so the flower girls couldn't describe exactly how the fire had started, but they were certain it had broken out during the confrontation.