FURY

Unbound Book Four

NICOLI GONNELLA

Copyright © 2022 by Nicoli Gonnella

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

To my mom.

I told you I didn’t need those business courses in college.

CONTENTS

Newsletter

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

Chapter 70

Chapter 71

Chapter 72

Afterword

About Nicoli Gonnella

About Mountaindale Press

Mountaindale Press Titles

NEWSLETTER

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CHAPTER ONE

Fate rushes as a river. A raging torrent that cannot be stopped…save by the boulder that refuses to be moved.

-Lambent Rill, Naiad Augur of Estes'Muur

SEVENTEEN MONTHS AGO

Atop the Klaven Cliffs, the City of Neer stood tall, an edifice of gray-green stone and glowing sapphires. The slums of Neer, however, draped from the fractured cliffs like the castoff rags most of their inhabitants wore. Housing was ramshackle at best, and most of the area was tacked onto the Klaven Cliffs, an unwanted, rotting appendage. Complicated knots of rope and rusted chains held the platforms relatively secure, though the sharp winds off the Darkwine Sea often set entire neighborhoods swaying. Men and women of all Races clambered across the rope bridges and slatted walkways, laboring at their many tasks while Market Day merchants rolled slowly through the elevated streets, crying out their wares.

In the midst of all this, a woman with pale, flaxen hair and bright orange eyes was quickly saddling her mount. Beasts of burden were uncommon in the slums, but not entirely noteworthy, especially not an avum so ugly. The giant bird had a squashed face with a blunt, hooked beak and dark eyes. Its coloration was closer to mud than the sleek black or white of the noble mounts, and the docked fantail curled against its rear revealed the truth. This was a mutt, likely the unintentional brood of some noble breeder. The avum kept nibbling at the woman's skirts, searching for treats.

"Focus, Grouse," the woman said, her smooth skin and clean robes telling against the general grime of the area. They stood in the uneven space between tenements, before a weather-worn wooden hut, a long distance from the lamps and gutters of Amaranth. She had left those duties behind, along with much of her cover once the summoning had gone out. Now she hovered on the cusp of yet another journey. "We've a long way to go."

"Do you truly have to leave, Ana?"

Ana glanced up, and she beheld the crooked form of an elderly woman. She was draped in a thick woolen stole, despite the warmth of the autumn morning. "Avet's eye, Mauvim, not so loud."

The old woman didn't hear her, or at least pretended not to. "You'll take up a new Mask, then?"

Ana paused her fingers on the bridle of Grouse's kit. She cast her senses outward, letting her Perception bathe the area for a moment. No one was listening, and the wards she'd inscribed were still empowered. "If that is what I must do. The sabotage of the summoning will have diverted the Unbound. They'll be sent far and wide instead of to Amaranth. We must be there when they arrive."

"Unbound," scoffed Mauvim, her face crumpling in disgust. "That we have resorted to such tactics..." The woman shook herself, as if chasing off a line of thought. "I suppose it is better to have them in hand than give them to the Hierophant. She'll burn us all."

"She'll try," Ana promised, a light in her eyes. Mauvim smiled, and it was like the sun breaking from behind a cloud. Her ancient face was transformed into a map of joy.

"That is the fire I need to see in you, girl. The fire all Chanters need." She nodded again, which sent her jowls swinging. "The others are headed north and south, so where shall you go?"

"West, I've a position in Haarwatch's Guild that I've neglected for far too long. The Guild will have the resources I'll need. The East holds no welcome for me, anyway, and I would be foolish to tempt fate." Ana finished cinching a buckle on Grouse's kit and walked over to her. Mauvim was the closest thing she had to family, at least one that still lived. Yet the woman's smile faded into a thunderous frown. "What is it?"

"The West. The Song grows wild to the West, girl. It shall be dangerous."

"As it was," Ana said softly.

"As it ever shall be," Mauvim completed the ritual words. Their place was not to shy from the dangers of the Continent, not in this task or any other. "I am sad to see you run from this Mask, though. I've come to love your Ana. There is a Truth to it."

The orange-eyed woman smiled sadly and shrugged. "My Truth will carry with me, Mauvim. I shall be as I am needed, and in Haarwatch, this face shall not do."

A glimmering chime took the air, though none but they could hear it. Light and Mana shifted, so subtly and so quickly that to blink was to miss it entirely. Where once pale-haired, orange-eyed Ana stood, now there was an equally tall woman with ochre skin and sea-green hair that fell in waves beyond her shoulders.

"A Naiad? Interesting, girl. Interesting." Mauvim's eyes were bright as she beheld her. "What's your name?"

"Zara Cyrene," she gave a curtsy in her robes and smiled a sharp-toothed smile. "Back from an expedition, long overdue."

"Ah, an old Mask. Your Truth rides along. It makes my heart happy, girl."

Zara stooped down and hugged the old woman, careful not to bruise her ancient limbs. Endurance had never been Mauvim's point of focus. "I'll find them, Mauv. All of them. The Hierophant's council is scrambling since the sabotage. Not even they know where the Unbound will land."

"Harmony does," Mauvim pointed out. "They aren't blind to it, much as I wish they were. Have a care in the wilds."

"I will."

"You’d better," she warned. What she didn't say thrummed between them, the rapid-fire impressions of their Affinity stats speaking at a level far more comprehensive than mere speech.

Zara mounted Grouse and wheeled the big bird around. She didn't say goodbye. She didn't have to, as their Spirits communed with the Harmony around them, between them. She could feel old Mauvim's care, her worries, and beneath it all, the bedrock foundation of their order: faith.

In people. In her.

"Come, Grouse. We've a long way to go."

* * *

PRESENT DAY

Felix floated in the dark.

No.

Not floated. Suspended. Held.

Tentatively, his Mind quested outward, and he felt a smooth stretch of...something attached to him in all directions. Threads? It was too dark to see color, to see anything. No solid surface was within reach, no matter how he shifted.

Shifted.

He could move his arms and legs, completely freely. Still, he felt...constrained. Like a huge weight was pulling at him from every side, so balanced that it wasn't tearing him apart, yet also heavier than anything he'd ever experienced.

A chime sounded, both far away and up close, resolving as a blue window appeared before him.

You Have Gained 8 levels!

You—

The edges of it flickered and spat golden sparks. It degraded completely after only a second, unable to complete the notification.

What?

The darkness began to waver before him, and sounds akin to an orchestra falling down a set of stairs started to fill his ears. Golden light, streaked liberally by a blue radiance, stabbed into the dark and released pure, refined notes that shook his Mind, Spirit, and Body as one. It was excruciating. A pressure built inside of him, one that began to match the forces that yanked him outwards, until Felix could no longer tell the difference between his screaming and the cacophony of music.

Then, thankfully, someone stabbed him.

The chaos vanished as Felix was catapulted back to his Body, and he became aware of two figures whispering harshly nearby.

"Why'd you do that?" One of them hissed.

"He moved!"

"So you stabbed him? What if he woke up?" Hisser shot back. The air shifted around Felix as Hisser walked closer to his prone body.

"You think he'd wake up now? He fell through the roof!" Stabby said.

"And he's not dead, is he?" Hisser crept closer. Felix could practically feel him breathing on the back of his neck. "Where'd you even stab him? I don't see a—YUAHH!"

Felix grabbed Hisser's leading leg and yanked. The man's cloth pants ripped, and he was thrown at least ten feet. Felix spun to his feet and turned on Stabby, but the other had already reacted.

He ran.

Taking in his surroundings, Felix leaped after him. Stabby tried dodging around some sizable fallen masonry, but Felix merely somersaulted over it and hit the jerk with the heel of his boot. Stabby dropped bonelessly to the ground.

Felix flared his Perception, and fhis Mind began to chug along, clearing away some of the cobwebs that had built up. Around him was a large stone...basement, was the first word that came to mind. It was huge and dark, the only light coming from a set of torches these two had brought down with them, burning merrily near the center of the space. Big blocks of stone were scattered about, along with much smaller, broken pieces that had the look of bricks. Where they weren't ruined, alcoves dotted the walls, filled with small tables and a few unmarked vases.

Above them, a hole gaped open, revealing a pitch black sky.

Where the hell am I?

Felix reached down, grabbed Stabby by the collar of his dark jerkin, and started towing him back toward Hisser. He could sense the man was only just rolling painfully to his feet. A Human, just like Stabby. Without even activating his Eye, Felix could tell neither of them had advanced much further than Apprentice Tier, which would explain why they were so easy to beat. Yet, when he tried to use his Voracious Eye, he felt a sharp pain in his gut, just above his navel. Like a pulled muscle that was also on fire. The sensation spread outward toward his limbs, traveling along his channels.

Notifications flashed in the corner of his vision, but Felix suppressed them. He didn't have time for this.

"Who are you?" Hisser asked as he straightened to find Felix stepping into the circle of firelight. "We—we just found you like that! I swear on the blackest Night we didn't do nothin' to you."

"Where are we?" Felix growled, trying to ignore the building pressure in his core. Hisser blinked in surprise.

"You don't know—? I mean, o'course. We're in the Cathedral of the Pathless. In Haarwatch," Hisser licked his lips nervously. "In the vault."

Felix just stared at him, not saying anything.

"We didn't break in! The area had already collapsed, see! We just saw an, uh, an opportunity," Hisser said.

"We're in the basement of a cathedral?" Felix murmured and looked up again. From his newer angle, he could barely make out dark shapes looming above the hole, black against the far darker black. "Why's it so dark?"

"Where you been—?" Hisser said before he literally bit his lip and stopped himself. "Er, it’s been like this since the fight. Ya know? The big fight?"

"Fight?" Images flashed past Felix's inner eye, memories recalled in painful clarity. "The...dragon?"

"Yeh. Dragon an' the Fiend fought, and the Fiend won!" The man laughed nervously, still eyeing Felix and the nearby darkness. "Clouds rolled in then and ain't left since."

"How long?"

"Wha? How long what?"

"How long since the fight," Felix practically snarled through the pain. His Song of Absolution felt like it wasn't doing anything for the pain, and Felix had to blink rapidly to keep his focus on Hisser.

"Uh, that was around sundown, so eight or nine glasses?"

Felix felt a knot loosen in his chest. He hadn't been gone for long. An irrational part of him worried he'd been Rip Van Winkled by all the Essence he'd taken in, but thankfully not. A thought occurred to him, so suddenly he felt it like an electric jolt down his spine to accompany the fire in his blood. PIT!

Hisser flinched, but Felix was gone before the man so much as raised his arms to shield himself.

Felix felt their bond warm in his chest, not so much leading him as it was slowly revealing information about where Pit currently was; which was a relief, as he sensed stone and shadow in abundance. He found the tenku only a bit away, and realized why the two Humans hadn't found him: Pit's wings were pools of shadow in and of themselves, and Felix could catch only the barest amount of crimson on his pinion feathers.

"Pit," Felix whispered, sending a pulse of inquiry through their bond. "Pit? You okay?"

Pit grumbled a bit before letting out a series of sharp, gurgling noises. Felix felt a part of his stress fall away. He was snoring.

"Jesus, you had me worried," Felix breathed, before berating himself. He could have just checked Pit's Status. He found the small feather icon in his vision and toggled it.

The Chimera was hurt, but healing just fine. Felix hadn't had the presence of mind to keep track of Pit's Health during their latest struggle, but it seemed he hadn't been too terribly hurt before they'd converged. With the tenku residing in his Spirit or whatever, he suffered no damage at all; even if Felix had taken a giant lance of light to the arm and several tons of stone to the face.

Well, not to the face. Felix looked up at the gaping hole above. The memory is fuzzy, but I landed after eating the Ravager King. I just don't think I kept my feet.

Everything must have collapsed beneath him, somehow.

Someone moved in the dark.

Now I gotta take care of that. Felix growled.

He found Hisser twenty yards away, putting a crowbar to a set of thick, paneled doors. Felix felt something swirl in the air, a feeling he normally didn't experience without activating his Manasight. His eyes widened. "Don't touch that."

"Ah!" Hisser leaped back, crowbar clattering to the ground as he tried to flatten himself against the far wall. The way the man's eyes moved, Felix could tell he was even more blind in the dark than Felix was feeling. "I wasn't stealin' nothin'!"

Obvious lie, Felix furrowed his brow. What could you steal from a church? But the air thickened as Felix drew closer to the ornate door, so he took a risk.

Manasight.

Felix's vision bloomed with unspooled light. Vapor hung tight against the surfaces of stone and iron and gold, while the thick shadows breathed with a gray-black mist that undulated through the space. Orange sparks danced above the two torches, while the dim outlines of crimson and green-gold pulsed through both Hisser and his unconscious friend. The Mana practically thrummed with a vibrancy Felix hadn't experienced before, possessing a liveliness he couldn't explain. Despite the jagged ache in his core, it felt right and natural, as if he'd been willfully blind before.

Ah. All around the ornate door were layers of Mana constructs. From ten feet away, he could pick out where sigils had been carved into the stone and metal, and where the Mana flowed through them like tiny rivers of molten light. Wards. A lot of them.

"What are you trying—"

Before Felix could finish the sentence, Hisser jabbed the crowbar at his face. It didn't even hurt, and as the crowbar rebounded from Felix's face, and Hisser stared at him in growing fear, Felix struck once. The man flew back, directly into and through the warded doors.

Whoops.

The wards went off like fireworks in his Manasight. Squinting, Felix watched as several wards activated at once, each construct trying to ignite and drop a payload of a half-dozen nasty surprises for the would-be thief. Groaning, Felix stepped forward and thrust his arm into the chaotic assembly of discharging wards. You're mine.

Ravenous Tithe.

Ravenous Tithe (Epic)

Consume completely an object or creature which you have claimed and can physically touch. Uses Mana to power the conversion. Chance of gaining Skills and/or Memories from target if applicable.

The burning in his core intensified tenfold as he pulled Mana out of the air and into himself, while the pressure within him skyrocketed to all new heights. Yet, as the air was denuded of Mana constructs and power streamed into him, Felix’s core started to cool, and the force in his channels eased up the smallest amount. He felt...better.

"Uuugh," Hisser groaned from the floor, and Felix's attention retracted from his aching core. He stepped forward through the cleared air and found himself within a large room filled with rows and rows of tall shelves. He almost turned off his Manasight, as the fireworks from before were nothing compared to the radiance that absolutely dripped from the overstocked shelves. Vials, stones, statues, all manner of objects filled the room to bursting, and all of them gave off a dense concentration of Mana.

"By the Voice of Light, halt! What are you doing!" a voice shouted from behind, followed by the distinctive sound of discharging Mana.

Spinning, Felix batted the bolt of light out of the air with a bare hand, sending it smashing through several artifacts to his right. With his right hand, he formed it into a gasping claw.

Shadow Whip!

The burning returned, redoubling the pain. Smoky black vapor congealed in his grip before stuttering and bursting apart. Felix glared at his right hand as someone advanced on him, light Mana gathering between their hands.

"How dare you profane this house of faith! Thieves of the Night!" The man walked further forward while Felix fought against the pressure in his veins. His peripheral vision caught an aged face with a thick, gray beard and somewhat dusty, once-white robes. The details weren't too important to Felix at the moment. "Begone from here!"

Screw this, Felix panted, before reaching both hands onto the nearest shelf. Mine.

Ravenous Tithe!

CHAPTER TWO

The items on the shelf burst into brilliant vapor, their Essence torn free and streamed into Felix's open mouth. This, he realized, this is what is worth stealing in a church.

Power surged in him.

A storm lit within his belly, and a confusing flurry of notifications flickered in front of his eyes. With a fierce effort of Will, he muscled them down for later review. More importantly, the influx of Essence helped counteract the nightmarish pressure that had built up in his core. Fire Within told him a dangerously potent gathering of System energy pooled within him, blocked by his Will and the desire not to Tier up. The pain faded though as the two seemed to balance one another, System-granted and Felix-stolen, but the pressure didn't go away. He'd have to make choices before too long.

He was sick of not thinking things through, however. He wasn't going to Tier up again in the heat of the moment.

The priest shouted in outrage, but his voice was distant and slow. The strain in Felix’s core eased even further, and the rampant, static-inducing flickers of his notification icon slowed and settled.

He was finding a balance. But he needed more.

More.

Ravenous Tithe!

Felix swept his arms down the shelf, putting his body into the abundant aura of the relics. They pressed at his Manasight like a screaming crowd, smelling of laughter and joy, while the sound of choir bells danced along his tongue. Potent.

Goblets and statues and tiny glass enclosures filled with bones. All of it burst apart at his touch, turning entirely to glowing vapor filled with multitudinous lights. Gold predominated, but white and green and deepest blue were present as well. All of it rushed into him, inhaled in a moment, and he straightened with a sudden alacrity.

Felix turned toward the priest, who had stumbled backward in shock and horror. "What have you done!"

"People keep asking me that," Felix muttered. He narrowed his eyes at the priest and gestured around him. "Unless you want the rest of your hoard evaporated, I'd suggest you let me pass."

I can't use my Skills, apparently, unless I want to get hurt. I'll just have to rely on my stats, then.

The priest's eyes darted down at the would-be thief's prone form, then back up at Felix. Light still gathered on his liver-spotted hands, not dimming in the slightest, and Felix could see that Stabby had disappeared. Before he could even wonder where he'd gone, they all heard a terrified scream from overhead.

"No! NOOOEEUUUGHGH!"

Wet squelching and tearing sounded from above, and the scent of rotten, putrid blood coiled through Felix's sight. No. Not here, too.

Moments later, the Revenants crawled from above. Three skittered across the ceiling and walls while five more landed heavily upon the ground. They had their varied snouts in the air, tongues lolling with thick spittle as they lashed about.

"God damn it," Felix snarled, and took a gamble.

Sovereign of Flesh!

Sovereign of Flesh (Transcendent)

Flesh is as clay to you! Gain increasing control over your Body, increasing your Strength, Endurance, and Vitality when active. Requires Essence to function. Control and speed of transformation increases with each level, pain decreases moderately per level, and Health regeneration increases slightly per level. Amount of Essence required per transformation decreases minimally per level.

Immediately, Felix's skin began to shift and transform. Heavy scale plates formed across his chest and shoulders, midnight black in color, while finer growths appeared down his arms and legs. It was mostly hidden by his shirt, trousers, and boots, but his face and arms were easily visible. His skin burst and twisted, accommodating the breaking bones beneath the surface as the monster inside of him was unleashed, and his Body swelled with muscle. A discordant thrum of power surged through his veins, siphoning away a large portion of the Essence he'd just taken to fuel the Skill. A series of glowing cyan lines formed upon his chest, arms, and legs, shining even through his clothes, swirling atop his scales like convoluted knots.

Felix barely registered the priest's screams when he began to move.

All of them looked exactly as he'd recalled. Rust-colored scales covered most of their bodies, save for the pulsing veins of sickly yellow flesh that criss-crossed their arms and chests. Their faces were different from one to the next, ranging between canines, lizards, and worse. Yet all of them lacked eyes, and their fanged mouths took up nearly half of their faces.

A quick pivot and they hissed when they saw the priest. When they looked past him and noticed Felix, every single one of them let out a baying rattle-scream, as if their throats were filled with vibrating thorns. They recognized him. They knew him.

Part of him, at least.

Like hounds loosed for the hunt, they exploded into motion. Felix didn’t give them a chance.

They had barely shifted when Felix appeared, slashing his black talons into them. Limbs flew as his preternaturally sharp claws cut through enhanced scale, muscle, sinew, and bone in one swoop, and a dark, fetid ichor poured onto the rubble-strewn floor.

"REEEAARRCH!"

The thing screamed piteously, and he knew each Revenant was once a Human or a Dwarf or any number of poor innocents shoved into the Domain's corruption. But Felix had no mercy left in him. Not for them.

He ducked under the wounded creature's wild swipe, spinning around to slash at two others. Scales split without effort, and the stink of their blood tripled in less than a second. Screams cascaded through the room, but not for long. Felix pushed himself, moving through them like a ghost, and he tore them to pieces.

It was over in fifteen seconds. Their bodies piled upon the ground, meat and blood, some faintly twitching with the last memory of life.

Yet he wasn't done. Dropping to his haunches, he thrust his hands out, driving his talons into as many bodies at once as he could manage.

Ravenous Tithe!

The Revenants burst into dark, shimmering smoke that he inhaled in a single, powerful moment. Once more, and they were all gone.

The storm in his core quieted as he became flush with monster Essence, but it was more than that. Something else was pulled into his channels this time. It felt...complete, somehow. More than Essence, Felix had taken in something more essential and vital from them. Within his core, the cloud of Essence grew thicker and more complicated, while below the golden-blue radiance of System energy sparked and flared, stymied.

Between them both was his core flame, now a ring of roiling, almost liquid-seeming fire that spun around a dark void. Flickering near that ring were eight sparks of ruby-red energy, brighter by far than standard Essence, all spinning counter to his ring of blue-white flames. With a shock of recognition, Felix knew what they were.

Pieces of Maw, Felix swallowed audibly. Echoes of its power found in each of the Revenants. Now it's mine. Back where it belongs.

Felix stood up abruptly and felt a cold shiver down his spine. That last thought hadn't been his. Had it?

"St-stay back, monster!"

The priest stood between Felix and the open reliquary, as Felix now realized what the room was, and both of his hands were wreathed in halos of golden light. Felix considered the old man, noting the way his hands shook and how his nervous jaw clench sent small ripples through his loose jowls. Carefully, Felix raised his own hands and held them, palms out.

"I don't plan on attacking you, father," Felix started, but was interrupted by a bolt of light that shot out and bored through his palm. He snatched it back and hissed in pain.

"I'm no father of yours, creature," the man spat. "I know you, Fiend. You truly are a monster."

Felix snarled and bared his fangs, but held himself back. He had no reason to kill the bastard, though there was a part of him that very much wanted to...

The priest's Skill flared again, but before it could go off, Felix hurled himself forward. Bridging the gap between them in a single bound, he reached out and grabbed the man's flaring hand.

Ravenous Tithe.

The golden light burst into glowing vapor, and Felix breathed it in. It sank smoothly into his core. He looked down at the old man, and the priest flinched so hard he nearly fell on his ass.

"Don't ever do that again," he growled softly, trying not to lose his already frayed temper. Then he released the man's hand. The priest stumbled backward.

Somewhere in the dark, Felix sensed movement. He focused his Manasight and sifted through the dusty-brown of stone threaded with shimmering metallic inclusions, until he spotted the bright red and green-gold of blood and life Mana. There was another room attached to the one he was in. In fact, the door was cracked and several faces were peering out of it. A few wore the familiar white robes of this priest, while others had jackets and dresses on. It was far away and dark, but Felix was almost positive their clothes were expensive. Nobles. At least ten that I can sense.

It seemed they had holed up in the church during the troubles outside. He glanced back at the ichor smears on the ground. Troubles that were still ongoing, apparently.

"You're welcome for killing the Revenants," Felix said, before turning and walking away into the dark.

Convergence!

A flare of bright light filled the underground chamber, and Pit's unconscious form nestled back into his Spirit before he took a running leap straight up. With his enhanced Strength and Agility, it was easy to clear the fourteen-foot distance. He landed amid the tumble-down ruin of a cathedral; only three walls still stood, along with a number of cracked pillars and one extremely durable flying buttress.

It was still dark, but with his Manasight functioning, it wasn’t a hindrance. The night swirled with flows of black shadow Mana, dusty brown earth Mana, and white flows of air Mana. Along it all, however, was a pervasive sense of agitation. The tiniest touch of rage. Courtesy of the Revenants, he had no doubt.

The skies were cloudy and impenetrable, just as Hisser had said. Far-off, blue-white flashes of lightning Mana tore jagged scars though the clouds, but there was little light and less sound. It was a hypnotic display, one Felix would gladly have watched for hours were he not convinced more monsters could be nearby. Yet, despite his vigilance, he didn’t sense her, not even for a second.

“You’ve grown.”

Felix spun toward the voice, claws up. He let them sag when he saw who it was.

“Zara.”

“Felix. Or should I call you the Fiend right now?” The ochre-skinned Naiad smirked, showing off teeth nearly as sharp as his own.

“Please don’t do that,” Felix groaned. He hated that name. With a pained groan, he released his transformation, and his bones realigned with audible snaps and cracks. His muscles deflated and the scales sloughed away into luminous ash. He was left looking like a normal, if athletic human man with black hair and blue eyes, for all that they had once been a dark, muddy brown only a few short weeks ago. "I'd rather that name not get more popular than it already is."

"Too late," Zara laughed and picked her way toward him through the rubble. "It's the name on everyone's lips these days. You put on quite a show up there."

Felix grimaced, the fight against the Ravager King flashing through his mind. The power he'd taken...eaten...he clenched a fist.

Zara stepped up to him, only a few feet away, and regarded him. Her eyes flashed with an aquamarine glow, gone in less than a second. "You're hurt."

Felix waved her off. "I'm fine."

Zara pointed at his core, just above his navel. "No you're not. You're stuffed to bursting. What's happened?"

For a moment, Felix considered answering the question, but found himself suddenly suspicious. "Why're you here? I've been out for hours, apparently, and you're just now showing up?"

Zara arced an eyebrow at him. "This city is quite big, Felix Nevarre, and you are not my only concern. Other events have been plaguing Haarwatch, events that have been destroying this city, piece-by-piece."

Felix blushed, abashed. "Right. The Revenants." He rallied and refocused. "How are they here? I thought they had all died in the Domain."

"Some escaped as the Domain collapsed, but it was no more than a hundred or so, from what I sensed."

"Oh," Felix's shoulders sagged in relief. "That's manageable, at least."

Zara started walking, and Felix followed her. "I wish that were so. The population of these Revenants has exploded in the hours since their arrival. That first hundred turned to two, then three, and now there are nearly two thousand spread across this city, at my last estimate."

Felix choked and stopped walking. "Two thousand?"

He imagined the damage they could do, a mess of Tier II monsters imbued with the Maw's worst qualities. It was horrifying to think about. "What's happened to the people? Dusters and everyone else?"

Zara's face was grim in the dark. "Many have died. Far too many."

Holy shit. Felix's heart ached. Is this my fault? If I hadn't interfered with the ritual, would the Queens have eaten all of the Revenants?

A sleepy pulse of warmth shot through his chest, a formless, wordless comfort that settled his spinning Mind. Pit was right. Had they not interfered, it was likely the Ravager King would have killed them all. That thought sparked another, and Felix looked to Zara with urgency.

"Vess and Evie? The others? Did they all make it out?" Zara nodded, and Felix sighed so deeply he nearly lost control of his core. A quick, fierce struggle with his Fire Within mastered the volatile mixture of Essence and power, but it sent a wave of sweat across all of his skin at once. "Where are they?"

"Back at Calesca's warehouse, though that term may not be entirely accurate anymore," Zara said, but her eyebrows tilted in concern. "Felix, are you alright? Your Mana seems...tangled."

"I'm...fine."

Zara gasped. "You're holding back your Tier. Of course. How long?"

"Been a bit over nine hours, maybe," Felix grunted. "Glasses. Whatever."

"You should be fine for nearly a day, yet. Why do I see such pain in you?" Zara put a hand on Felix's shoulder.

"Monster Essence and...System energy doesn't mix well," Felix said, and revelation lit up Zara's face.

"That...explains much," she said. "I had wondered how becoming part Primordial would affect you."

Felix's eyes snapped up to Zara's, but the Naiad was patting her robes as if she'd forgotten something. "Ah, here it is." She pulled out a large, fresh fruit. "I figured, despite your meals below, you're probably hungry for actual food, yes?"

Felix eyed her, but took the fruit and ate it after quickly identifying it. Kelaan fruit. He hadn't had one since he'd left the Foglands.

"What do you know?" he asked.

"Well, that is quite a broad question," she admitted and started walking again. They were heading west, near as Felix could tell. Without the stars or familiar buildings to orient on, he was mostly guessing. "Regarding your situation, I know that you've had some unfortunate encounters with the Primordial in the Labyrinth."

"Unfortunate. That's a good way to put it," Felix snorted a laugh. He had spent so much time fearing that Zara would find out about his connection to the Maw, and she'd known all along. What was the point of hiding anything, anymore? "I killed it back then, sorta. Then I killed it for good in the Domain."

Zara was tapping her lips, watching him with her ice-blue eyes, far more vivid than his own. "No, you absorbed it. Which, strictly speaking, is impossible."

Felix felt his gut lurch, but he refused to give into the fear. "No. It's dead. The Mind of the Maw was destroyed when I ripped it from the Ravager King. It's gone for good."

"Perhaps," Zara admitted. "Perhaps not. I will say, however, the Primordial's power is still extant in this city. So in that sense, your Maw is still quite active."

The Revenants. Felix nodded, unable to muster the energy to object to the Maw being termed as "his."

"I have to admit, Zara. I figured you'd kill me if you found out I'd had a piece of the Maw riding inside me," Felix said.

"That is a completely reasonable fear," she agreed. "I would have, had things been different."

"Different?" Felix asked, ignoring the admission of his potential murder. "What are you talking about?"

"You conquered it, Felix. A task I would not have imagined attainable, yet here you are. Whole. Of sound Mind, Body, and Spirit," Zara shook her head. "It is remarkable. An achievement that only reaffirms my commitment to making you my apprentice."

Felix wasn't sure what to say to that, so the silence stretched as they navigated the ruined streets of Haarwatch. The city had been broken in many places, but there were still swaths of neighborhoods that seemed entirely untouched. Untouched, that is, save for darkened windows and smokeless chimneys. Everything Felix had seen had been abandoned.

"Where did everyone go?"

"There are several hidden redoubts around the city, though most are like the cathedral I found you in. Small with relatively limited access to food and water. It has been in flux all night, but a new balance is forming. There are three camps. The Guilders at the Wall, the Inquisitors in the Sunrise Quarter...and you."

"Me?" Felix asked, confused.

"Well, the Blue-Eyed Fiend, at least," Zara smirked at Felix's frown. "A third camp has gathered, and the vast majority are doing so under your name."

"What? Why?" Felix gaped. "How?"

"I think showing is better than telling, don't you?"

Felix clenched his jaw. Zara's smile could have cut glass.

CHAPTER THREE

Felix marveled as he flexed his hand. The hole that the priest had shot through it had healed completely. All it had cost him was stolen Essence. The other slices and bruises on his body healed just as fast, fading to simple scratches in minutes, though it depleted him just as quickly. The Revenants were more than happy to keep him topped off, however.

"SCREAAAAARGH!"

Felix leaned back from the Revenant's wild swipe before closing the distance and tearing out its throat. Black ichor sizzled against the stones, a stain that spread with every strike. After some difficulty, he'd manage to keep his transformation localized to his hands and forearms, which gave him claws and a hefty bonus to his defenses there. A final blow to the thing's skull, and it fell. Felix stood over it, his Body buzzing with stolen energy and craving more.

A gleeful cry came from one street over.

Felix looked to Zara, who stood some distance away with her arms folded into her black chorister robes. "I've got them," he told her, a touch of challenge in his voice.

Zara raised her eyebrow but didn't argue, instead watching him with her bright, curious eyes.

Ravenous Tithe!

A jagged spear of pain lanced through his gut as his Mana burst from his channels, but it soon dwindled as the four Revenants at his feet turned into dark smoke. Pain for strength.

Without another word, Felix took off, speeding down the nearby alley moments before the toothy beasts appeared.

Nine, he counted. They let out snarls of surprise as he bowled directly through them, tackling one musclebound abomination into the wall opposite. They hit hard enough to crack the stone edifice, and his heavy Body was more than enough to turn one into a meaty paste. The Revenants rallied and spun on him, but Felix was already up and hurling himself back at them.

Sovereign of Flesh!

Dark scales burst along his arm, and his upper body swelled, his full transformation activating. He hit them like a truck filled with knives, and in moments two more were twitching meat sacks on the cobbles. Still, the rest piled onto him, their slavering hunger hitting him almost as hard as their bodies did. It didn't take his Affinity to read exactly what they wanted.

"Come and...take it!" he shouted.

Barbed wings burst through the pile, neatly severing two more Revenants into four. The edges of his new appendages were as sharp as his talons, their mixture of bone and rigid feathers a unique and once-in-a-lifetime experience for the Revenants. Three stumbled back, the sudden transformation startling even to their tiny Minds. One, however, was not so smart and went in for the kill.

Felix drove his jaws into its descending neck, savaging it across its collarbone and trapezius muscle, before his left hand ripped its damn head off.

He stood up, and ichor poured from him like a waterfall, soaking his clothes and filling his nose with a nauseating, delectable bouquet.

Ravenous Tithe!

Forcibly turning to Essence was an explosive event, Felix had found. So, when the Revenants flinched as the corpses of their fellows sublimated, Felix had all the time in the world to rip them apart.

The last Revenant died while screaming, and another flare of his Mana and Will turned all evidence of them into dust.

"That was...enlightening, Felix," Zara said. "I didn't expect wings."

"They were a surprise to me too," Felix said. Feeling suddenly guilty, he wasn't sure what to do with his hands. With a gasp of pain, he reverted them back to human-seeming.

Zara tilted her head. "It hurts?"

"Not as bad as it used to," Felix said with a shrug. He eyed her a moment longer. "You don't seem particularly weirded out by my...Skills."

It was Zara's turn to shrug. "I've seen far stranger sights than a Body alteration Skill and a consumption Skill. Both courtesy of the Maw?"

Felix nodded, and almost by silent agreement, both of them started walking down the street again. "It's had a...formative effect on my development."

Zara laughed. "Remarkable."

It felt good, Felix realized, being open about everything. Zara was a Chanter, a Sorcerer, and who knew what else; she'd seen so much that even his strange and terrifying beginnings were old hat.

Still, he reminded himself. Don't get too comfortable. She doesn't know that I'm an Unbound, yet. He eyed her in his peripherals. How will you feel about that, Zara Cyrene?

He planned to tell her, just...not yet. Soon.

The journey through the city had so far been a smorgasbord of battle, with the center city being heavily overrun. The cathedral of the Pathless had been up on the hill itself, so they'd had to wade through bodies to get back out. Had Felix not been imbibing straight monster Essence every other breath, he would have fallen with exhaustion by the tenth block, but as it was, he felt jittery and strong, as if he'd been mainlining the blackest of coffee mixed with industrial-grade steroids.

And his appetite only seemed to be growing. The rush of Essence was unlike anything he'd experienced before, even considering the feel of a level up and System-tuned stat upgrades. His capacity had been stretched and tempered by the influx from the Ravager Queen and King, and now the space around his core felt cavernous. The thick, textured darkness had become a seemingly endless realm of shadow where his Skills revolved in a dance of vibrating light. And his core...

His core had been fundamentally changed.

Where before it had been a blue-white bonfire crackling with lightning (strange enough as that was), now as a consequence of surviving the devouring of the Maw and the Ravager King, it had become a tight ring of flame. Still blue-white in color and still coursing with electrical discharge, the fire had become less of a plasma and more of a liquid. It had condensed and, at the same time, expanded. Now a dark space lay in the center of the ring, an abyss that seemed darker than the night of his core space.

It was this abyss that ate his Essence.

A continuous stream was taken from the nebula of power that hovered above his core flame, a steady depletion of the power that kept his Sovereign of Flesh Skill active, and which, currently, kept his core balanced between Tiering up and maintaining consciousness. The pain of that balance still jabbed at him. The golden-blue radiance below rose and swirled against the blooming Essence nebula above, each clash marked by fissures of light and strokes of incandescent pain.

Each fight lost him more Essence than he gained, and his hungry core kept eating even when he left Sovereign of Flesh off. He hadn't a clue as to what it was doing with all of that potency, but he felt stronger than he ever had before. Devouring the Ravager King and absorbing his blood, muscle, and bones had somehow reinforced his own Body. Without System notifications, however, he could only guess as to what changes had been made.

A quiet coo thrummed across his bond, and Felix put a gentle hand to his chest. Keep resting, ‘lil man. I've got this.

Pit was clearly exhausted, likely from his own experiences with the Ravager King. After all, the Chimera had taken on his share of the beast's vigor, but he wasn't able to prop himself up with stolen Essence. Not yet, at least. They shared so much between each other, Felix couldn't imagine Pit would be unable to replicate the effect at some point. As their bond and the Etheric Concordance Skill grew, it was clear that their link would only deepen.

Felix shook himself as he navigated the rubble-strewn street. He was getting distracted. He'd peered into his core for another reason.

Atop the ring of liquid flame, a collection of ruby motes gathered. Echoes of the Maw, he called them, and he was growing a substantial collection of nearly thirty. Each devoured Revenant garnered him a new one, the spark detaching from the clouds of Essence all on its own. Drawn to orbit the event horizon of his abyssal hunger, dancing along the edge without ever falling in; they ran counter to the spin of the flames themselves.

He no longer worried the Maw was still around, somehow plotting against him like a mastermind. He felt a strange sort of dominion over the ruby motes, as if they were his, completely and utterly. Were the Maw still alive, a voice told him, he would never feel so certain. So in control, for the first time since arriving on the Continent.

Felix banished his Fire Within and focused on their walk. He had heard movement ahead, mingling with the rush of water. Consulting the mental map of the city he'd built up over the past few weeks (an easy task with his Keen Mind Trait), he realized he knew exactly where they were. The River Ianus was just up ahead.

And someone was fighting.

* * *

"Form up! Form up!"

A bald man with a small, neat mustache was twirling two shortswords as Felix and Zara rounded the corner. Each twirl deflected a powerful strike from a Revenant, drawing three of them into battle with himself as a small squad behind him struggled against another. There, a large woman with dark, green-purple skin let out a roar of challenge. The lone Revenant pivoted immediately toward her, clearly Taunted.

"Shields!" The bald man ordered, still parrying like a whirling dervish.

I know that guy. That's Yan! The man was part of Cal's crew, and one of those they had rescued from the Foglands. What was he doing out here?

A small Goblin woman hauled forward a thick wooden buckler, though it appeared huge in her arms. It was nearly as big as she was, and it thunked solidly as she planted it between herself and the Taunted Revenant. The tall Hobgoblin woman next to her had an easier time, but the Human lady beside her fumbled with her own heater-style shield. The Revenant hit the Orc hard, like they usually did, all furious claws and snapping, toothy jaws, but she held up remarkably well and deflected them to the sides.

"Heva! Fire, please!" The Orc lady growled through her clenched tusks. She was wearing armor, that mix of leather and steel most Guilders seemed to favor, but one good hit from the monsters would tear right through such protection. As it was, her shield was quickly shredding under its onslaught.

"Smoldering Lash!" The crimson-skinned woman announced, and awkwardly thrust her hand forward. A line of molten orange light formed in her grip, a whip that snapped out and across the Revenant's disgusting snout. "Haha! I got it!"

"My turn!" The Goblin squeaked, waving a sharpened iron rod. She scratched markings into the air before her, leaving trails of green-gold light that formed a series of sloppy sigils. The moment she finished, they wafted toward the Revenant almost glacially slow, no matter how much she prodded it. "Ugh, faster! Dumb magic!"

The Human woman, finally hefting her heater shield on her arm, stepped forward to help defend. Unfortunately, she immediately walked into the floating sigils, and her body seized up and fell over like a statue.

"Ahh! Dumb Human!"

The Revenant had nearly overwhelmed the Orc's guard, and now that it saw a juicy prize lying motionless on the ground, it went into a frenzy. It gripped the Hobgoblin's fiery whip and yanked on it, pulling her off balance and into the Orc defender. The Hobgoblin sent her stumbling, and the Revenant pounced.

Her shield shattered.

"SCREEEAACCGGH—!"

A clawed fist burst from the Revenant's open maw, and the thing paused for a startled, agonizing second. The Hobgoblin and Orc stared upward in confused panic, which dissolved into relief as the monster was hauled away from them. Yanked backward and tossed unceremoniously on the ground. Shaking his bloody hand, Felix stood tall behind it. He glanced at the four of them, checking for any obvious injuries.

"You're all good?"

The Hobgoblin's eyes had turned huge and she struggled to say anything, but the Orc just grunted. "Nothin' a good ale won't fix."

Felix grinned and helped them both to their feet. "Good. See to your friend."

Beside them, the Goblin was shaking the paralyzed woman frantically. "Get up, get up, get up!" By the time they looked back, Felix had already moved onto Yan's battle.

"On your right, Yan!" Felix shouted, before plowing into two of the Revenants. He took them down to the ground, letting gravity and his own weight force his claws deep into their chests. The creatures let out piteous shrieks and thrashed wildly at him, slicing up his shirt and trousers, but they weren't getting up.

He wasn't gonna let them.

"Mine."

Quailing before his grip, Felix ripped into the Revenant's scaly chests and gripped what amounted to their hearts. He tore them out.

Ravenous Tithe.

Both bodies turned to smoke, and the Essence spun around him as he stood and turned to face the group again. He breathed in the last of it as Yan finished off the final Revenant, easily decapitating the creature now that the odds were a little more even. Behind them, the others slowly brought the shaking Human to her feet. He almost smacked himself for using the Skill near so many others, though. Zara was one thing, but he'd rather keep his abilities under wraps from folks on the street. Luckily, everyone was entirely too preoccupied until it was all over.

"Felix?" Yan asked, blinking in surprise. He sheathed one of his swords to wipe a layer of blood from his face, staring incredulously. "We thought you were dead!"

"Alive and...well enough," Felix said with a smile. "What're you doing out here?"

"Patrols," Yan nodded at the four behind him. "We've had an excess of...volunteers. Cal's been tryin' to train them up."

Felix assessed the four women, wishing he could have used his Voracious Eye. He didn't want to risk the pain, though. "Untempered?"

"Mostly. The Orc, Cade, she was a caravan guard. She hit Apprentice yesterday." Yan finished cleaning his other sword and sheathed it. "C'mon, I'll introduce ya."

Keeping his frown to himself, Felix followed. Surreptitiously, he released his shifted form and let his hands go back to normal. As they approached, the Goblin and Hobgoblin were checking on the Human woman, while Cade inspected the tattered remnants of her buckler. She looked up at them and hurriedly straightened.

"Cade, everyone, this is Felix. Felix, this is Cade Ovanna," Yan said. "The little one is Merk Twinhandle, the Human is Stellis Jor, and the firebrand over here is Heva Keldatter."

"Nice to meet you all," Felix said.

"Ah, the same," she said, and her voice was deeper than he expected. Felix hadn't much interaction with Orcs, though; it was probably normal. "You saved my life. My heartfelt thanks." She bowed.

"Oh, uh, you're welcome. I'm sure you'd have done the same for me," Felix said hurriedly, hoping she'd stand up again, but the Orc remained in the bow for a full five seconds. Only then did she straighten. Felix turned to Yan. "I need to get to the warehouse. Are you headed back?"

"Hm? Oh yeah, we were on the return trip when these nasties ambushed us," Yan kicked a severed arm away from himself. "We shouldn't have come this far with so few of us, but the Revenants haven't been crossing the river in glasses."

"They are congregating near the city center, but they are multiplying somehow," Zara said, sending a surprised jolt through everyone except Felix.

"GAHH! Where'd you come from!?" The little Goblin screeched.

"Chorister?" The Hobgoblin asked, her eyes flickering between Felix and Zara. She seemed almost...in awe of him. He felt uncomfortable about that.

"You're...Zara?" Yan asked and gave her a level look. "Cal talked about you. She's been waitin'."

"Let's not keep her any longer then, yes?" The Chanter swept forward, and in the wake of her swirling black robes, they all followed. "We have much to discuss."

"Hmph," Yan grunted, and Felix offered him a half-shrug. "Glad you're alive, kid. Can't wait to tell Kelgan. He owes me two solid crowns."

Felix laughed, but his eyes tracked the remaining corpses. One-by-one, they had started to break down into greasy black smoke and drift away. He felt a pang in his core as he witnessed several ruby-red sparks flit off into the sky. He restrained himself. There'll be more where those came from. We've got time.

Except they didn't, he reminded himself. The true threat behind the Domain's collapse and their new monster infestation had been revealed to Felix and his friends, and it still loomed large in his mind. The Archon.

Felix quickened his steps.

The warehouse, and his friends, were close.

CHAPTER FOUR

They were mostly silent as they made their way through the winding streets of the Dust Quarter. The roads were damaged and the buildings dilapidated, but that was par for the course; aside from a few smashed windows, the Dust had largely escaped the fall of the Eyrie and subsequent chaos.

Still, the chance of running into more Revenants was high. Felix let his Perception swell outward, relying on his Manasight and high stats for any early warnings. He was hoping he'd get at least a few more before they reached the warehouses, but it seemed that Yan had been accurate. The Revenants were rare over here, at least for now.

"How many Revenants have you been seeing, Yan?" Felix asked.

"Too many. ‘Bout a hundred swarmed us when we were fightin' off the redcloaks yesterday, shortly before the Eyrie fell." Yan chuckled grimly. "It's funny. If it weren't for their attackin' us, we wouldn't have survived. Revenants fell on the Inquisition first."

Felix frowned as he remembered that, having viewed that event from within the liminal Void between Domain and the real world. Zara had told him a bit more about the redcloaks and their grab for power before the Domain fell. That had been their doing, too, at least in part. They had thrown prisoners into the Domain to destabilize it, though it was the Guild that messed the place up first.

A little Maw blood and a whole Domain goes insane. What'll happen if the Revenants start turning more people? Could it happen? The Domain proved it was a real threat, but the circumstances were unlikely to be reproduced there in the city. Or so he hoped.

Yet another good reason to eat them all. Kill them all. Felix corrected himself. Kill them all.

The volunteers were ahead of him by at least twenty feet and whispering, but with his Perception, it was impossible not to notice. Felix tried to give no indication he could hear them as they walked, instead focusing on their surroundings. Yet, as the urban terrain proved less and less dangerous, he had little to distract himself.

"You think we failed?" Heva was asking.

"Failed?" Merk the Goblin said with a confused grunt. She was having a time hauling that shield, but she wasn't giving up or asking for help at all. "We did good, far as I'm concerned."

"We looked like rank amateurs," Stellis whispered. Felix could practically hear her blush of embarrassment. "When I joined the patrols, I wanted to learn to fight, so I could keep my boys safe and fed. All I did here was get in the way."

"Ain't arguin' with you there," Merk agreed. "Ya better learn to watch where you're goin'. Can't say next time the spellform won't melt your leg off."

"Really?"

There was a bit of glum silence. "...No. Someday, though. Just need someone to teach me."

"He can," Heva said.

"He can what?" Merk asked.

"His fists shattered the Revenants. He barely broke a sweat." The Hobgoblin's voice was filled with a measure of reverence that made Felix supremely uncomfortable. "He probably knows how to use those sigils of yours, too."

"He's definitely strong for a Human," Stellis agreed. "But I put my money on the chorister with him. I've encountered her before, and her power is not to be taken lightly."

Felix silently agreed. Maybe he had great stats for his level, but he wasn't even Journeyman yet. He had a long way to go until Master Tier.

Thankfully, that seemed to move the conversation away from him and firmly onto Zara: who was she? What could she do? Why was she here? The questions were batted back and forth endlessly, and Felix took the time to assess Yan's team.

Apart from the Orc woman, Cade, the others were garbed in patchwork leather and scraps of metal, if they were lucky. The Human Stellis wore a dress and studded leather gambeson that hung down nearly to her knees. She was in her late twenties and had the doughy look of someone who had neither much Strength nor Endurance. It was remarkable that she'd volunteered for this dangerous job. Or perhaps it said more about Cal's desperation that she was being put into a combat position at her level. Her only weapon seemed to be a dagger at her hip.

The Hobgoblin, Heva, was older than Felix first noticed, with a collection of fine wrinkles around her eyes and mouth. Too old, perhaps, to be fighting at all? She wore a simple jacket and trousers, well-tailored but made from roughspun linen, but not a stitch of proper armor. She had a knife, same as Stellis, but clearly she had at least one fire-based Mana Skill.

Merk's age was impossible to gauge, as Felix simply didn't know enough about Goblins to say; but she seemed in her twenties, relatively speaking, and possessed of a manic sort of energy. She had used sigils during the fight; he'd have to ask her about that. Merk just had her own shirt and trousers in addition to the wooden buckler and scripter's stylus.

Cade herself was easily in her thirties, with a number of scars on her dark green skin, and her dark hair was done up in short, thin dreadlocks. As he'd noticed before, she wore the most full kit of the group, and even then it was subpar at best. The shield was useless, though she held onto the bits she could recover for some reason. Aside from that, Cade had a wide-bladed and curved saber on a hip, something that looked far better than whatever amounted to standard issue. On her back was a large bastard sword, dinged and dented.

They must really be hurting for supplies if they sent out a patrol like this. Felix chewed his cheek in thought. Yan was equipped well, but it was the same equipment Felix had seen on the man only days ago. He hadn't seen their Skills in play, but Felix could feel a swirl of Mana around Stellis, Merk, and Heva; they were clearly mages of some sort, or at least leaning in that direction. Cade certainly appeared martial, with the weapons and Taunt Skill, but appearances could be deceiving. A sizable amount of Mana swirled around her as well.

That was new, too. Felix had been able to perceive Mana for a while, but he'd never been able to sense it gathering around people. Except perhaps when Skills were activated, then the vapor would often condense enough for anyone to see it. A talented mage would be able to keep the vapor to a minimum; he'd never seen Atar release fire Mana vapor into the visible spectrum when he didn't need to, and the man slung spells all day. Regardless, his new sense of Mana was interesting. He'd have to ask Zara when he had a chance.

Faint noises a block ahead grabbed Felix's attention. He'd started moving forward before he realized the disappointing truth: there was no enemy ahead; they had only come to the camp. Felix let himself slow back down to a steady walk and ignored the questioning look Yan gave him.

The pressure inside him had been increasing with every step. Felix felt as if his eyes were vibrating. There was no sign of Revenants, and he couldn't break away from the rest to go hunting...He had to address his notifications. Normally, someone had a day to address their notifications before they'd go into effect automatically. In the case of Tiering up, that meant if he didn't have an Essence Draught prepared, he'd waste the Skill and simply gain a few stats instead of Tempering himself.

Yet, as they drew closer, Felix could feel an uneasiness in the air. He started to feel irritable and scared before he realized that the emotions weren't his own. But they hung in the air, thick like a bad perfume or a song that was too loud to understand the words.

The camp was visible a minute later as they rounded the nearest bend, and the first thing Felix could see was a large, makeshift wall made of packed dirt, blocks of broken stone, and panels of rusted, corrugated metal. It was maybe twice his height, but it looked like a stiff breeze might do it in. Their street narrowed as it approached, the sides filled in with rubble and sharp debris so there was only one angle to come up to the wall. Defenders dressed in ragged, patchwork armor walked the top of the wall, each of them at least armed with what looked like a good sword or spear. The uneasiness in the air redoubled as they drew closer, and Felix recognized it for what it was: he was feeling their emotions, broadcast on the hidden channel only those who had unlocked their Affinity stat could perceive. These people were tired and terrified and sick of being both.

"Hold! Identify yourselves!" came a shout from atop the wall. Clearly inexperienced defenders bunched up together and watched them with wide eyes. Yan grinned and lifted his hand.

"Trendle!" Yan shouted at a large man atop the wall. "Patrol returning!"

"Yan?" The portly man squinted at them. The sun jabbed through the crevices in the city, a buttery morning light that did more to blind than illuminate. Trendle's eyes widened when they met Felix's gaze. "Ho hey! Yan brought ‘em back! Get Cal down here! Tell her the Fiend has returned!"

A large hubbub began on the other side of the makeshift wall, and the gates were pulled open. Behind him, the others whispered furiously to each other.

Jesus Christ. Felix wished he had a hood or something to hide in. Pit, you think you could hop out here, and I'll hide in you? Pit snored on. Traitor.

The gates opened fully, and their small group proceeded through into a sizable but chaotic staging ground. The warehouse where he had trained was there, but fairly distant. The dirt wall encompassed two other large warehouses in the area as well, the space within easily the size of two or three football fields, if he had to guess. Most of the space had been street and overgrown, weedy lots. Now it was filled with makeshift housing, lean-tos, and ragged tents. People were absolutely everywhere, far more than he had expected, and just as he feared, the name of the Fiend started drawing a crowd.

"The Fiend..?"

"Where?"

"Is that him? The bald one?"

"That's Yan, the swordsman. It must be that boy..."

"The Fiend! He'll save us!"

"The Blue-Eyed Fiend!"

Quite apart from being called a boy (something he'd resolved to get used to, as Tempering had resulted in a far more youthful appearance), Felix chafed at the gathering crowd. But when he saw them, truly saw them, he bit back any complaints. There were so many, all packed into that relatively small space. All Races were present, from Orcs and Goblins to Humans, Dwarves, and even one or two Elves. Dirty and terrified, the emotions he'd been sensing on the way here finally crested over and hit him. Except now those emotions were joined by the bright, feeble thread of anticipation.

Of...hope?

"Hi," Felix said to them. They'd pushed close, but none got any closer than a dozen feet from him. He didn't know what else to do before so many eyes. "I'm here to, um, to help."

An almost visible, stuttering wave of energy swept through those closest to him, their moods lifting, and the songs in their hearts switching to a new tempo. It didn't reach everyone, but the change alone was startling.

Felix found Zara's eyes watching him, and a small smile played along her lips. He shrugged in response.

"Make way! Move it!"

"C'mon folks! She's got knives! So many knives!"

Through the crowd, Felix could see people getting pushed aside and jostled until they made way for three women. Cal was a little shorter than him with sandy blonde hair cut short and sensibly, all kitted out in studded leather armor and several impressive daggers. Behind her was Evie, one of his closest friends in this crazy world. She wasn't much taller than Cal, but was paler of skin and had longer hair tied back in a series of braids around the crown of her head. Beside her was Portia, another member of Cal's crew. A healer of sorts, if Felix remembered correctly (and he did), the woman immediately set about checking on Yan and the others.

While she was tall, easily as tall as Felix at five foot ten, Yan barely came up to her shoulder. "You idiot," she chastised. "You could've been killed. And then where would I be?"

"Bereft and inconsolable?"

"I'd be out running patrols, like you fools! So the next time a monster comes to eat you, run!" She slapped him with a spell, literally jolted into his body like a dart. Felix watched with Manasight as it spread through the man's channels and repaired him somehow. Despite the slap, Yan was grinning wildly.

"Felix! Still not dead, huh?" Evie came up and gave him a tight hug, apparently not caring that her spiked chain dug into his shoulder and chest. At such a pressure, it didn't even hurt, but it still cut a few more holes in his tunic. Evie noticed and grinned sheepishly. "Sorry. Didn't think."

Felix rolled his eyes, but couldn't stop his smile. He'd been worried Evie and the others had been hurt when the Domain fell. "No worries. Where's everyone else? Harn? Atar and Alister? Vess?"

"Ah, good enough. We made it back in one piece, more or less," Evie gave a sudden, impish smile. "Vess is gonna be mad you asked about her last, though."

"She's here?" Felix asked. The pressure in his core twisted, hard enough that Felix couldn't keep the grimace from his face.

"Off with the Hand." Evie rolled her green eyes and tucked her long, black hair behind her ear in annoyance. It had started to slip from those braids again. "Got here only two glasses ago and woke us both up. They've been locked up in the fancier warehouse ever since."

"There's a fancier one?"

"Enough chit chat," Cal barked and fixed Felix with a frown. "We got a lot to do. First of which is you explaining everything that's been goin' on." She nodded to the side, and Felix followed her gaze. "Zara."

"Cal."

"You're back as well?" the ex-treasure hunter asked.

"For now."

Cal grunted in response, something Felix thought she might have learned from Harn. It was definitely a Harn sound.

"Fiend!"

"Help us!"

"Let's get outta this madhouse," Cal said. "Now."

* * *

Heva watched the Fiend leave with the leadership at camp, and the crowd practically melted away from him. She read a familiar startled reverence in their eyes, but a few looked frustrated. Heva looked for her own in the crowd, but Mahria was likely back at the tent, taking care of little Bhed. They'd both be overjoyed she was back...and had her chit in hand.

"Can't believe that was him!" Merk was nearly vibrating with excitement. She mimed a series of jabs in the air. "Did you see how he killed those Revenants?"

"I did not realize he was this Fiend you all speak of," Cade murmured, her eyes thoughtful. "He's only Apprentice Tier?"

"Gotta be top end of Apprentice. Gotta be. Right, Heva?" Merk nudged the Hobgoblin.

"Hm? Oh, yes. I'd think so," Heva said, and paused, looking toward the door he'd disappeared into. "Do you think he was sent?"

"By who?" Merk asked, not stopping in her pantomimed fight.

"You mean god-sent," Stellis said in her quiet way. She was checking her gambeson for tears, but it seemed fine. "You believe the rumors, Heva? What the chorister of Vellus said?"

"I don't know what to believe," the Hobgoblin replied honestly. "But that man has saved my life three times now. It would be a fine thing if the rumors were true. If—it would be a fine thing."

Stellis agreed, following her gaze. Merk just shrugged, and Cade tilted her dark head.

"I was not raised on the gods of these lands, but he was as fierce as any gashak upon the plains," she patted the curved sword at her hip, the one Heva had never seen her wield. She had no doubt the Orc was good with it, but she wondered why that was. "If he fights with us, then that is to the good of us all."

"Come on," Stellis said with a smile. "We've earned a food chit, let's cash in and get back to our families, yeah?"

* * *

"All right, now that we're away from that circus, lay it out," Cal said, leading them to a series of familiar, rough-hewn wooden benches. She sat with a weary sigh. "Harn and this one gave me their accounting of the Domain, but I need to hear it all."

Felix gave Evie a look, and she shrugged. "Callie says I embellish too much."

Felix laughed, but it came out more strangled than usual. His gut clenched hard and he frowned. Zara narrowed her eyes.

"You've not much time, Felix," she said. He nodded and looked back to Cal.

"Can I get a raincheck on the debriefing?"

"What?"

"I need to take care of something first," Felix said.

Evie clapped him on the back. "Why didn't ya say so! Latrines are dug in the back, hard to miss ‘em," she grinned. "Just watch your step."

Rolling his eyes, Felix shrugged her off and turned to Cal and Zara. "I'm about to Tier up. Been holding it off all night."

"What, the whole way to Journeyman?"

"I don't—I don't think so, but it's a couple at least. I haven't checked," Felix said dryly.

"Noctis' tits, take the usual room. You just about ruined it before, so it's still empty and gutted." Cal grunted as she stood back up.

"I've got a few questions before I go, though," Felix winced as it felt like a spike was plunged into his side. He breathed through the savage sensation.

"Of course you do," Cal groaned and sat back down. "Can't it wait ‘til you're not exploding with System stress?"

"Doubt it," Felix panted. "I need Essences, anything you got. And I need advice."

Cal's expression sobered in an instant, and she only hesitated a moment before she nodded.

* * *

The room was warded by a double line of sigils, one he recognized from a book on basic sigaldry. It was deft work and showed a real competence for the craft, almost a perfect replica of the diagram that sat in his memory. It would suffice.

Felix walked into the center of the room and settled onto the ground. In the exact position he'd taken when he first attempted to sunder his Acrobatics Skill. Dark markings marred the floor, walls, and ceiling from the results of that particular course of action. That had been less than a week ago. He shook his head in disbelief, but another spear jabbed through his middle.

Time to start.

With shaking hands, Felix laid out a series of sealed jars. Each one was filled with a luminous liquid, almost phosphorescent. In his Manasight, vapor trembled and swirled around each jar, though not nearly as much as they had around the last set he'd taken. Cal had only a few Essences to hand, which should haven't surprised him as much as it did. Yet, the former treasure hunter had given all that she had to him, which was beyond generous.

Before him were eight jars, three Iron and four Bronze Essences, often used for ranking into Journeyman, and a single Silver Essence Draught. All of them were Common-ranked, somehow distilled from common metals by Guilder alchemists. The Essence Draughts were needed to Temper his Aspects, his Body, Mind, and Spirit. Three for each Aspect, he'd choose Essences from the alchemical draughts and push his advancement that much closer to Journeyman.

Felix knew he had a few Skills that had Tiered up during his recent battles, namely Fire Within, Etheric Concordance, and Ravenous Tithe. It was exceedingly likely there were more waiting for him in his notifications.

I've enough Essences for six. If it's more than that...then we'll have to see.

Cal and Harn had given him a lot of guidance on his Skills. They'd been surprised to find he'd had more Epic and Legendary Skills than before he'd entered the Domain and dumbfounded to see his Transcendent Skill. That had been fun. But they confirmed what he'd worried about before, that the rarity of the Skill affected the quality of the Aspect being Tempered. Generally speaking, that meant most folk went on to Temper the highest-rarity Skills they gained.

Of course, Felix was a special case. He not only had a variety of rarities, but a dumb amount of Skills. Most maintained fifteen or twenty Skills, nurturing them and ultimately focusing on only a few of them to the exclusion of all else. This, he was told, was to specialize and enhance their power. Felix was spread thin. Now, knowing more than ever before, he knew his course of action.

It was time to focus.

He opened his notifications.

You Have Gained 8 Levels!

You Are Now Level 42!

+16 to PER! +16 to VIT! +16 to END! +24 to INT! +32 to WIL! +32 to AGL! +40 to DEX!

You Have 61 Unused Stat Points!

Damn! Felix stared at the amount before his eyes, but was swept away by the crashing wave of colorless radiance, long held at bay.

Power crashed against his core, soaked utterly into his ring of flame. A long moment, then a wash of golden and blue-white fire spread outward in all directions. A tidal wave of potency, it surged against his revolving Skills, inundating them with power. One after another lit up in a blaze of glory.

One, two, three...Six, he counted. Six Skills burned brighter than the sun in his core space, filling it with an ethereal music that sawed at the edges of him. Lighting crackled around his core ring, and thick tongues of flame leaped higher than ever before.

Congratulations! You Have Reached Journeyman Tier with Fire Within!

You Gain:

+5 INE

+5 RES

+...

He wanted this one for his Spirit, without a doubt. Internal Mana control and greater access to his core space? No-brainer. Felix reached out to the first draught.

Multiple Essence Sources Detected During Formation!

Felix looked down at the row of untouched Essence Draughts in front of him in confusion.

What?

Choose An Essence Mote!

What?

CHAPTER FIVE

Pinging before his eyes in a series of alerts, Felix stared at nine (NINE!) Essences that he'd never seen before.

[Essence of Sage]

[Essence of Hearthstone Flame]

[Essence of the Celeritous Trek]

[Essence of Diamond Eyes]

[Essence of Sainted Bones]

[Essence of the Dustbringer]

[Essence of the Severed World]

[Essence of Knighted Steel]

[Essence of Primal Fury]

Voracious Eye!

Name: Essence of Sage

Type: Essence Mote

Lore: Essence Motes are rarely used treasures, harvested directly from prey and used to Temper one's Aspects. Used upon achievement of a Tier, they help to expel impurities and refine the vessel. This Essence is infused with the Spirit Essences of Sage.

Rarity: Uncommon

The others were the same, though the Aspect affected and Rarity all changed. Each notification glowed with power, informing Felix with a glance of their rarities. The first three were Uncommon Essences...and the rest were all Rare.

Did these come from the Ravager King? He'd eaten a Larval Ravager and taken a singular Essence from it back in the Domain, the Essence of the Primal Seed. But there are so many...

Beyond the notifications, Felix could see them swirling among his Essence cloud, and watched as one disappeared into the abyss in his core. In a flash of incandescent light, it was consumed entirely. The blue box for [Essence of Knighted Steel], a Body Essence, flickered and vanished from before him.

No! I could've used that!

The clock was ticking.

Felix could feel something about them, a nebulous sort of sensation that he couldn't pin down. Each Essence was composed of lesser Features, things that made up the Essence in some way. When selected, the Feature transferred to one's Aspect. If he took an Inferno Essence from a draught, then his Spirit would have some feature of an Inferno. He had been told it was only a minor, barely noticeable effect in Apprentice Tier. Each Tier thereafter, however, it grew more and more apparent. This was his foundation, the structure upon which his true strength was building. He Tempered very well in Apprentice, and he had to continue that trend.

Flipping through them, Felix fumbled at them with his Affinity. All of them thrummed with the barely heard vibrations of the Grand Harmony, but one felt deeper than all the rest. More resonant, he supposed.

Rare Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of Diamond Eyes]

As it sank into him, the feel of it was so opposed to the Ravagers that Felix knew it wasn't from the King. Like a bolt of lightning from the clear blue sky, he knew. The others must have come from the cathedral's vault.

Thanks, Pathless. You're a peach.

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose A Feature:

Jager - The Clearest, Finest State

Allotrope - The Multiplicity of States

Bort - A State of Accumulation

Focus Upon The Way Forward, Ascendant. Focus.

Shock hit him harder than the System energy that unspooled into his core and channels. Normally, there were no explanations during this process, yet now he was getting advice? In all the hubbub, Felix had forgotten about the bonuses his two Titles gave him, so perhaps the description was from them.

But there was only one thing that had called him ascendant before. Vellus, the not-quite-dead goddess. Still, he didn't have time to ponder what it might mean, just to work with it as best he could.

Jager was immediately tempting. Clearest, most fine state? How could that be beat? It sounded strong and focused. A leap to the end.

Yet Allotrope was about having multiple states. Though Felix didn't know what that meant, it sounded like it would give him versatility. The how, of course, was unknown. If nothing else, it felt like it might have complicated effects on his Temper.

Despite its silly name, Bort was compelling as well. Accumulation. Gathering. The grind to the top. Jager offered a path to the top, at least that's what it suggested. But did he accept the System’s definition of perfect and choose Jager, or did he devise his own by building from the ground up? Or should he expand his options in some way with Allotrope?

He had seconds to choose, as always. The "bonuses" from his Titles were hardly better than no information at all...but he chose. Felix selected what he believed would result in true strength. He only hoped he wouldn't regret it.

The way forward...

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The Essence Of [Bort]!

That...sounds super dumb.

Energy pulsed through him, crackling around his Fire Within Skill in a halo of electric fire. A not insignificant chunk of his stolen Essence vanished into that halo, sucked up like a sponge. A ribbon of blue-gold light shot out from his core ring and connected to the Skill as it raged. Felix felt the tingling pull of power, almost distracting him from the next notification.

Etheric Concordance is level 62!

Congratulations! You Have Reached Journeyman Tier with Etheric Concordance!

You Gain:

+15% AFI

+15% REI

+15% EVA

Felix gritted his teeth and let the Skill Tier up without Tempering it. He'd considered this, and it hurt to do it. But he felt like it was the right choice.

You Have Unlocked A New Feature!

Etheric Concordance (Legendary), Level 62!

You have deepened the connection between you and your Companion, forming a concordance that will have echoing consequences for you both. The grandest heights and crushing depths lie in store, though what shape the future holds is up to you both. All previous abilities of Companion Pact are retained.

Upon reaching level 25, you have gained the ability Convergence - Merge with your Companion for 1 minute x Skill level, gaining additive bonus to Harmonic Stats. Companion is released at end of effect.

Upon reaching level 50, you have gained the ability to share physical characteristics such as Sight, Smell, Touch, Hearing, Taste, or even discreet body parts. Sharing will last for 1 minute x Skill level and consume Mana to activate and maintain.

Sorry, bud. Our bond is powerful, but I need to chase down the strength we both need to survive. Perhaps next time, he could Temper with Etheric Concordance again, but for now, Felix was going to focus on directly enhancing his strengths and shoring up his weaknesses.

In his periphery, Felix sensed more Essences drifting toward his hungry core. He'd never make it if he had to wade through miscellaneous Skill ups; he needed to burn through those he needed to Temper. Taking inspiration from his wild experiments with sigaldry, Felix focused his Willpower and Alacrity, narrowing his Intent until he could visualize what he wanted.

Show me my Spirit Skills that have Tiered. He knew there were at least two more. Enough to fully Temper his Spirit.

The notifications before him shuddered, weirdly misaligned in his vision for the barest of seconds. Then a single, almost acquiescent chime.

Theurgist of the Rise is level 55!

Congratulations! You Have Reached Journeyman Tier with Theurgist of the Rise!

You Gain:

+5% INE

+5% AFI

...

Swallowing nervously, Felix grabbed at the one that burned brightly in his nebula. Cloudy power swirled around it like tiny rings, and as he seized the Essence it sent waves of intense energy into his everything. It hurt.

Rare Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of Primal Fury]

If the [Essence of Diamond Eyes] had felt serene, this felt jagged and raw, like the shaking extremis of adrenaline-fueled rage. There was no question where this Essence had come from.

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose A Feature:

Wroth - Ire Without End

Genesis - Origin of All

Dominion - Right to Rule

Wroth was...that had to be the anger inherent in the Profane Sigaldry, the messed-up magic script the Envoy and Archon used. It was clear that wroth was monopolizing this Essence. Felix could feel it jolting through him, sparks of fury that made his insides twist. It was not something he wanted as part of his Spirit, he was certain about that.

Genesis was the same Feature he'd used to Temper his Body, back when he'd eaten the Larval Ravager. Should he use it again? Would that be a good thing?

Dominion was clearly control. If he was to focus on the way forward, then what Felix needed above all else was control. He fought like a brawler, and only his powerful stats had carried him through many of his battles. If he'd had more control over all that, then perhaps he wouldn't find himself pressed against situation after situation, unable to escape the hardest choices.

And if that control was to be applied to his new, Legendary sigaldry Skill? There was no further debate needed.

He chose Dominion.

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The Essence Of [Dominion]!

Yet another chunk of his Essence cloud vanished as a second halo of thunderflame lit atop the Theurgist of the Rise Skill. A sucking emptiness opened up in Felix's gut, but it was swiftly replaced by the bloom of blue-gold System energy that radiated from his flickering ring, and another ribbon of light flared into life between it and the blazing Skill.

Two down...

Reign of Vellus is level 50!

Hell yes!

Congratulations! You Have Reached Journeyman Tier with Reign of Vellus!

You Gain:

+5% WIL

+5% RES

...

Felix was about to grab the Essence of Sage, the only other Spirit-based Essence, when he felt it. The Tempering of two Skills had sucked away much of his stockpile, and now the bright, concentrated ingots of swirling potency were easier than ever to detect. What had once been hidden among the cloudy nebula was plain as day, and a new Essence joined the others. It shimmered more than pulsed in his dwindling nebula, colorless yet also possessed of the faintest tinge of something. A color he'd never seen before and couldn't put to words. Perhaps he would have missed it, even in the quickly emptying core space, had he not just tempered his Fire Within; his senses felt raw and incredibly acute in that moment. He used his Voracious Eye, and thankfully felt no more twinges of pain.

Name: Essence of the Unseen Tide

Type: Essence Mote

Lore: Essence Motes are rarely used treasures, harvested directly from prey and used to Temper one's Aspects. Used upon achievement of a Tier, they help to expel impurities and refine the vessel. This Essence is infused with the variable Essences of the Unseen Tide.

Rarity: Transcendent

A Transcendent Essence, Felix boggled. And variable means...it can be used for any Aspect?

There was no question.

Transcendent Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of the Unseen Tide]

The indescribable color dropped into his ring of liquid fire...and nothing happened. As if he'd simply poured water on an intense heat, it was like it evaporated completely. Felix almost feared it wouldn't work.

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Whew, good.

Choose A Feature:

Veiled - The Draw of Silence

Gravity - The Pull of Significance

Surge - To Rise from Quiescence

Quiescent, to his knowledge, meant inert or passive. But rising above such a state was not worthless. Far from it, Felix's entire time in the Continent was being forced to rise above where he was, if for no other reason than he would die otherwise. He set that one aside.

The "Pull of Significance" felt like something, but Felix couldn't put a finger on it. What was "Significance"? Were they similar to the links and connections in sigaldry? He hadn't a clue.

The "Draw of Silence" and the word Veil suggested covert, sneaky stuff. That...really hadn't been his style so far, but he wasn't against the option.

What was the way forward, then? How could he build a better Spirit with these?

Felix ground his teeth. As helpful as these new descriptions were, they didn't go out of their way to be informative. It was as if the world were intentionally being obtuse, blocking information from reaching people. Like how society seemed to be organized by secret factions, and even simple things like standardized measurements of Strength or Vitality were not shared outside of them. It was enough to drive a dude insane.

Reign of Vellus was a staple of his fighting style, and it was linked somehow to Vellus herself. A literal goddess, dead or not. He had hoped that, by choosing a Transcendent Essence, he could bring it up to snuff; it was excellent for mobility and crowd control, but the Skill was dangerous to everyone, even himself.

The Skill operated on generating kinetic blasts or implosions. If the Feature was to affect his Skill, he could focus on Surge, increasing its power with a sudden rush? Or perhaps Veiled would quieten the ability somehow, let him cast it without all the lightning?

Gravity though...the pull of mass, of entire worlds. But it was also a profundity, a sense of magnitude and peril.

Yeah. Gravity it is.

Perhaps he didn't know the way forward, but he knew where he wished to go.

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The Essence Of [Gravity]!

Felix wasn't expecting much due to the Essence's quiet entrance, so he was nearly thrown onto his back as his core fire exploded with a cacophonous radiance. Leveraging himself back up from his elbows, Felix dipped his senses back below, utilizing his Fire Within. It was like a bomb had gone off.

Less a halo and more an aurora of crackling light surmounted his Reign of Vellus Skill. A ribbon of light, twice as thick as the others, was already wrapped firmly around his core ring, and the entire space sang with ethereal music. What's more, it was music that sounded nothing like the System and Grand Harmony. Nor did it sound like the discordant buzz of the Maw's old caterwauls. It felt...clean and pure, like a glacial stream. Like...What's that?

It was hard to notice at first, what with the light and sound and all, but as his Fire Within sharpened his focus, he could make it out in the brightness. The convoluted pattern of his Skill had literally doubled in size.

Whoa.

Felix could feel the vibrancy that was soaking into the Skill, and though he had no idea what it might lead to, he was suddenly excited to find out.

3 of 3 Spirit Essences Formed!

Tempering Has Begun!

Grinning despite the rising pain, Felix let out a joyous "whoop!" as the light inundated his senses.

* * *

The screaming kept going.

Evie swung her chain too high, accidentally wrapping it around one of the newly erected posts. A half-instant later, a sharp edge brushed against her neck.

"Don't get distracted, Aren," Callie hissed. She pulled the dagger back and sheathed it in one blindingly fast motion. "Distractions get you dead. Or smash your pelvis. Again."

Evie grimaced and rubbed her neck, though the blade hadn't even scratched her. She still hadn't fully recovered from having her pelvis nearly pulped by that Bishop of Hunger, but copious healing spells from Portia and a few choice potions had brought her to the cusp of recovery in a few short glasses. Still, Callie wasn't an Adept in Short Blades Mastery for nothing, and Evie never had a real chance against her. "How can you not be distracted? Felix's been in there hollerin' his head off for twenty minutes!"

She shuddered. Hitting Apprentice Tier had been painful and gross, not to mention she had to Temper her Body twice. But still, she hadn't made noises like that.

Callie only looked toward the other end of the warehouse, where the sound wards were trying and failing to keep the Unbound's screams sealed. Evie had seen her ask Vivienne to look at it, since Rory wasn't back yet, but the Bronze Rank couldn't see what was wrong with it. Or, to put it in her own words: "I see where the sound is escaping, but there's nothing wrong with the warding array. He's just...bypassing it, somehow."

Callie turned from the warded room to Zara, who was tracing a series of aquamarine sigils into the ground. She had created a complex, clearly arcane pattern of glowy lines, but Evie couldn't make heads or tails of them. When she'd asked, Zara had said something about "seeker nets" and "material filters" that made Evie's brain want to take a nap even now.

Zara's fingers didn't stop in their efforts, nor did she look up. She simply seemed to sense their gazes and said, "He'll be fine."

Evie let out a controlled breath. She wasn't entirely sure why she felt anxious. Felix certainly had fought weirder and stronger odds than a few ranked-up Skills, right?

"Or he won't," Zara continued. "This is his struggle alone."

Evie closed her eyes in annoyance. Damn mysterious chorister. She still found it hard to fully trust a priest of Avet, no matter how helpful she had been. He was the god of change, after all. For good or ill.

"Can't you at least fix the ward?" Callie asked her again. She'd asked her before, when Atar had checked, but the Naiad had been as busy then as she was now. Again, Zara didn't stop.

"No," she made a weird little flourish, and a spark of blue-green light flitted into the air. It dissipated in seconds. "He's using a Transcendent-ranked Essence. It'll only degrade the ward again. We can wait until he's finished."

"Wait, hold on," Evie said, at the same time Callie sputtered out a few choice curses.

"Burning Transcendent? Where'd he get that?"

"Perhaps it was something he ate," Zara said, and she smiled.

A grin for nightmares, Evie shuddered. Looks like a shark.

Felix's screams had changed in texture, but still they came, and Evie took a few calming breaths to focus. The breaths caught and stuck in her throat a moment before Evie forced it out. Was that what Journeyman Tier felt like? Would it feel that way for her, too?

A jab to her shoulder nearly sent her stumbling, and Callie clucked her tongue. "Your stance has gotten sloppy. We start again. Recall your chain, and get out your side dagger."

Evie stifled the groan that wanted to escape from her throat and did as she was told. Short Weapon Mastery was one of her worst Skills, and Callie knew it. Somehow, she felt Felix had gotten the easier task.

* * *

Felix wasn't sure when he stopped screaming, but he found himself lying on the cool stone floor of the warehouse, staring blankly at the warped and blackened ceiling. He blinked, and it felt like sand had crusted over his eyes.

"Ugh, gross," he rasped. A notification was blinking before him, and it took two tries to make his eyes focus on it.

Congratulations!

You Have Tempered Your Spirit!

You Have Formed: the Rising Sovereign Spirit

+20 WIL

+20 INT

+10 RES

+30 INE

+30 ALA

Hot damn, Felix gasped as System power flooded his veins. It felt far more powerful and somehow smoother than ever before, flowing into his core and then out into his channels in a single, lightning-quick moment. It was glorious, a fine recompense for the pain of Tempering in the first place. The sensation faded after several minutes, and Felix took a long moment to catch his breath.

Then he dove back in.

There were a few more notifications to get through, and he didn't have all day.

Get to work.

CHAPTER SIX

There were plenty of notifications from his recent battles, and when Felix let the floodgates loose, they poured in. A veritable storm of System energy flooded his core before being spun back out as golden flame.

Unfettered Volition is level 43!

Voracious Eye is level 43!

Meditation is level 46!

Mana Manipulation is level 37!

Shadow Whip is level 38!

Stone Shaping is level 40!

Wrack and Ruin is level 39!

Corrosive Strike is level 40!

Unarmed Mastery is level 40!

Dodge is level 44!

Exploration is level 35!

Dual Casting is level 32!

Oathbinding is level 21!

Influence of the Wisp is level 41!

Invocation is level 17!

So many Skills, Felix thought as the thrum of power coursed through his channels. He forgot, sometimes, how wide a net he had cast in that regard. He even had a couple that hit Apprentice Tier, a milestone that felt somewhat lackluster after all the rest. With a flex of his Will (no, my Intent), he truncated the presentation of Apprentice Tier ups. The System seemed amenable enough to changes like that, and the blue boxes merely flickered before reappearing.

Abyssal Skein is level 28!

Apprentice Tier!

You Gain: +10 to PER, EVA, FEL

Make an Entrance is level 37!

Apprentice Tier!

You Gain: +3 INE, MIG, ALA

There. Short and concise.

Without warning, there was a piercing pain in his core, like the tearing of a muscle that got progressively worse.

In7im1d4tion is level 12!

...

In71m1dat10n is level 24!

Agh! Broken Skill! Felix still had a number of those, but this was the only one that wasn't a weapons Skill of some kind. He supposed he had tried to intimidate the Envoy and Ravager King, in a way. It burned in the dark, dripping sparks of light like blood as it cut through the happy haze of leveling so many other Skills. I'll have to sunder this one soon. It's not even that useful...

Luckily, there was more to distract himself.

Ravenous Tithe is level 54!

Congratulations! You Have Reached Journeyman Tier in Ravenous Tithe!

You Gain:

+5% STR

+5% REI

+...

Felix considered his options and gripped an Essence with his Will, yanking it into his core ring of liquid flame. The sense of grim certainty that pulsed from it was a tidy match for his vast, hungry Skill.

Rare Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of Dustbringer]

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose a Feature:

Annul - The Way to Break

Vigor - The Way to Be

Conductor - The Way Between

Felix, gripped by the flow of his choices, let his Mind maneuver through the options. Annul, to break, to cancel, was tempting. His current Mind was the Godeater Mind, and that suggested breaking gods themselves. Seemed fitting if insanely ambitious.

Vigor was sort of the opposite, a word that meant life and vibrancy. Yet Felix had learned a law of magic in his studies, and it was that "like called to like." Would Tempering his Hunger with Vigor mean he'd draw in more benefits from what he devoured?

The last seemed the most arcane, yet it was compelling as all the rest. A conductor could transmit energy from one place to another, like a lightning rod. But it was also the word used for those who directed symphonies and orchestras. In a world where music itself was magic, that was almost too much to pass by… if it meant what he hoped.

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The [Essence Of Conductor]!

A blare of horns sounded around him as another wave of System energy stormed through his core. A halo of thunderfire around Ravenous Tithe, and the Skill became a bonfire within his internal solar system. Just as the ribbon of light connected to his core, quick on its predecessor's heels, his next notification appeared.

The Song of Absolution is level 55!

Congratulations! You Have Reached Journeyman Tier In The Song Of Absolution!

You Gain:

+10% EVA

+10% MIG

+...

Again, a moment of concentration to fix his Affinity upon the Essences arrayed within him. Some vibrated more strongly than others, and without even looking, just by feel, he chose.

Rare Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of Sainted Bones]

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose a Feature:

Martyr - Witness of Faith

Manes - Those That Remain

Glory - Acclaim of Faith

The idea of faith baked into his Body sent a ripple of cold distaste through Felix, and he braked hard on the two Features that mentioned it. He clearly stole these from the cathedral, and the last thing he wanted was some sort of religious tie to the Pathless who, by all accounts, seemed like a dick. Glory sounded all right otherwise, but Martyr? Felix let out a sharp laugh. No.

He chose Manes.

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The [Essence Of Manes]!

Again, a tremor pulsed through his body as the Essence descended into his core ring. Yet another halo of thunderflame surrounded The Song of Absolution, not nearly as bright as the one around Reign of Vellus, but equal to all the rest. The ribbon tether formed quicker than before, almost conjured wholesale in an instant, and a new sensation joined the rest. When Ravenous Tithe had connected to his core ring, it had felt like a jolt of caffeine except a million times more powerful. As his first Body Temper connected, it felt similar but perhaps more akin to adrenaline. Fluids and hormones flooded his system, and his very physical channels seemed to tremble in anticipation.

A wave of System empowered light blasted forth, inundating his pathways with nurturing radiance. When it had passed, Felix felt like he had been strengthened in some small way, while at the same time, his head reeled.

Yet he was not done.

Bastion of Will is level 53!

Congratulations! You Have Reached Journeyman Tier In Bastion Of Will!

You Gain:

+5% RES

+5% FEL

+...

Starting to get a bit dizzy from the constant pulses of growth-inducing power, Felix blindly groped for what he felt was his last Tempering Skill. He regretted taking all of this on. Was this how it was supposed to feel? Like ants were crawling through his skin, and his muscles felt like they were on fire?

He...he didn't feel well.

Rare Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of the Severed World]

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose a Feature:

Sever - Break The Ties That Bind

Empyrean - The Skies That Bind

Moon - Grip The Binds That Tie

Felix's mind felt muddled, buzzing though it was with what felt like limitless energy. It felt like he had all the energy and cognition of a five year old with ADHD and a serious sugar problem. The Features blurred before him, and thinking on them felt...pointless. He was making choices based on scraps of information that were little better than nothing at all! Why was this world so maddeningly dense?

Screw it, he thought, feeling certainty wash over him in equal measure with his vertigo. They won't show me the rules? I'll just tear them apart.

Sever!

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The [Essence Of Sever]!

The moment he absorbed the last Essence, the rest were torn from his grip. No longer held, they were sucked down into his spinning abyss, with only a brief flash of sizzling heat to indicate that they had been devoured. Yet the explosion of thunderflame that erupted around his Bastion of Will was wild, a conflagration that traced the razor's edge of a consequence Felix could not conceptualize, only feel. Ribbons of light flailed outward, one connecting to his core ring, but others reaching out to The Song of Absolution and Untempered Skills like his Manasight and Deep Mind. The latter were gossamer, nearly transparent connections, but firm just the same.

Vertigo hit him hard as colorless System energy poured in from the darkness around his core, and the space was transmuted to a flood plain of gold and azure light. As the light washed over his Tempered Skills, he felt a powerful kickback that yanked him out of his core space and into the physical world once more. His head was already spinning, but this sent him reeling. Felix hurled up a thin stream of bile as more notifications flashed at him.

Hidden Quest Completed!

Defeat the Corrupted Domain!

You have faced and defeated the forces that have sent the Haarwatch Domain into a death spiral.

Due to defeating a Larval Ravager, your rewards are increased!

Due to defeating the Envoy, your rewards are increased!

Due to defeating a Ravager Queen, your rewards are increased!

Due to defeating a Ravager King, your rewards are greatly increased!

You Gain:

+3 Levels

+New Title

+Silver Chest

You Have Gained 3 Levels!

You Are Now Level 45!

+6 to PER! +6 to VIT! +6 to END! +9 to INT! +12 to WIL! +12 to AGL! +15 to DEX!

You Have 82 Unused Stat Points!

New Title!

Primordial Slayer (Transcendent)

+50% All Stats - You have killed a Primordial, an ancient enemy of the gods themselves! You—

ERROR!

Primordial Still Detected!

ERROR!

Primordial Is Dead!

ERROR///!

-#(#-$(%!!!

ERROR!

Flashing white text and a flickering blue background consumed him.

* * *

"Wake up, Felix."

"Gugh?"

"Wake up and have your breakfast, Bumble."

Despite feeling like warmed-over crap, Felix's head snapped up at that word. Pushing his Perception, he tried to sweep the room as fast as possible. He sat at a wooden table in an extremely familiar room. A pale linen ran along the center of the table, its edges detailed with the delicate lace his mother loved. He was in his family's dining room, a place he hadn't seen in months, but which had haunted his dreams a time or two.

The reason for his nightmares sat quietly at the other end of the room.

"You," Felix said while making sure the exits were still where he remembered. The door to the street was down a level, hard to reach from there, but a sliding door was to his left and a large picture window was fifteen feet behind him. Down the hall, he could hear someone walking about; the floorboards were creaking. Was there someone else? "Why?"

He'd been pulled into a memory of his mother's home before; only last time, he had been battling the lying constructs the Maw had assembled. His interaction with this creature was not a great memory, though she had given him advice that proved fruitful, in the end.

The woman watched him over the rim of a teacup. Unlike last time, she actually faced him, though her form was draped with thick shadows. The room around them was bright with golden morning light, but none of it reached her form. She set down her cup, and the way her arm moved sent shivers down Felix's spine. Joints were not made to move like that. Not human joints, anyway.

"I needed to speak with you, Bumble," she said, and bile rose in his throat at the sound.

"Don't call me that. Not ever," Felix gripped the table before him and considered hurling the damn thing at the creature. Only his mother called him that. "I didn't agree to speak with any gods today, or whatever you are."

The thing that he was increasingly certain was the goddess Vellus laughed, and for a dizzying second, Felix saw a windswept crag before him. Then it was gone. The shadowy figure dabbed at her lips with a cloth napkin, the nice ones his mom kept in storage. “For guests,” she would say, though she never had guests over. It just made him more angry to see them being used.

"You are an ascendant on the Broken Path, Titlebearer. With our link, that affords me some options. What's more, you're a Fatebreaker, and now you've finally killed the Primordial that has been dogging your steps since your summoning. This is me congratulating you, Felix Nevarre."

Her voice was soft and smooth, like a gentle rain from lavender skies. Felix flared his Will, Alacrity, and Felicity, trying to keep it at bay. It offered a calming solace, and he needed his wits about him. "Stop that."

The sound stopped immediately, and he thought he saw a frown cross the thing's obscured face. "My apologies. I meant no harm."

"Don't mess with my head, then," Felix growled. "I'm not in a mood to deal with more cryptic beings. If this is a congratulations, then thanks. I appreciate it. Send me back."

Vellus made a confused noise and shifted in her chair. The movement of her body was oddly disjointed, and Felix had to look away. "I had forgotten how...discourteous the Unbound could be."

"I'm not gonna grovel, if that's what you're after." Felix finally did stand up, though he realized that Vellus still stared at him levelly though she was still seated. Like she had instantly grown taller.

"That is not—I have come to thank you. And to warn you." Her eyes fixed on him like two searing brands. "Your Dawnwalker Spirit was a light in the darkness, a way forward through the unknown. Your own guidepost into this wild world. Yet, as you navigated the darkness, you have grown your power against the heavy wheel of adversity. Your dominion has widened with every step, and those arrayed against you have failed to call you to heel. The pull of your existence is growing harder to miss, ascendant, and soon your enemies will have to acknowledge you. And your enemies are far more numerous than you can imagine."

Vellus paused and her head tilted at him. The sound of creaking floorboards grew louder.

"You're the one giving me tips on Tiering up?" Felix asked.

"I am. You activated the bloodgate in my ancient temple, and so we are connected by tenuous strings. Linked enough to give you what aid I can." The silhouette of the goddess sagged, as if a heavy weight dragged at her. Those floorboards groaned. "We do not have much more time. There is much you must hear. You have traveled beyond the First Gateway to the threshold of the Second. Before you lies a path that once held the promise of the divine...now it is no more than a weedy game trail, barely visible among the overgrown wilderness."

She twitched, and Felix was scalded by the impression of boiling rain the color of blood. "I can help bridge the gap, Felix Nevarre. But you must find the Temples of the Lost Gods, just as you have found mine. It is the only way."

Dark eyes, black on black, bored into his own. "But you must beware us. We are not your friends, or allies. We are gods, Felix Nevarre."

Steps, heavy and fast, rattled the whole house.

"We are not to be trusted."

* * *

"Gugh!"

Felix woke on the cold floor of his warded room. He'd sprawled out on his back, so it was the burned and stained ceiling that greeted him first. It was where the Maw's corrupted influence had been vented, back when it had tried to take him over the second time. Or was it the third time? A frustrated rage percolated in his chest as he thought of the apparent vision he'd just had.

More of the same. Another creature telling me what to do. Felix was sick of it. And the bit at the end? What the hell is that supposed to mean? 'I'm a spooky god, don't trust me, but also help me.' It's enough to make me an atheist again, despite the annoying evidence otherwise.

Felix leveraged himself onto an elbow and grunted as his sore abdominals fluttered weakly. His body felt like it had been wrung out and beaten while he was asleep, though when he checked with Fire Within, his core was calm and spinning.

A snorting huff to his left made him spin to his feet.

Unfettered Volition!

"Pit?"

Felix lowered his fists, already glowing with green, acidic vapor and blinked. Pit was curled up on the floor next to him. The tenku had come out of hiding at some point, yet still seemed to be resting. That, however, wasn't what surprised him.

Pit was flipping huge.

The tenku had grown into some sort of jumbo-sized horse. He had to be nine or ten feet long, and his folded-up wings were likely far bigger. His head alone was as long as Felix's torso and just as wide. He was laying down at the moment, but if he had stood up, he imagined he'd be at least a foot taller than before. What had happened?

Toggling open his notifications, he saw that nothing remained to be seen. All notifications had been reviewed, apparently. Still confused, he opened his notification history.

Whoa. He scrolled back a bit. That explains it.

Your Companion Has Gained 13 Levels!

Pit Is Now Level 42!

+26 to PER, +26 to VIT, +26 to END, +39 to INT, +52 to WIL, +52 to AGL, +65 to DEX

Pit's Bite is level 43!

Pit's Rake is level 41!

Pit's Cry is level 44!

Pit's Skulk is level 39!

Pit's Wingblade is level 48!

Pit's Flight is level 23!

Pit's Etheric Concordance is level 62!

Journeyman Tier!

He Gains: +15% AFI, REI, EVA

Pit's Frost Spear is level 51!

Journeyman Tier!

He Gains: +6 INT, WIL, PER

Pit's Poisonfire is level 25!

Apprentice Tier!

He Gains: +11 VIT, AGL, DEX

No wonder the Chimera had grown so much. As far as Felix could tell, his Companion's size was linked to his level, Vitality, and Endurance somehow. Whenever those would increase, he'd get a little boost. This time, however, he'd gotten the biggest boost yet.

I don't even know if he can get through the door like this, Felix marveled. Perhaps it would be easier to fly them both around now. Though I can fly myself, I suppose. Still, the thought of riding into battle on his flying Chimera was amazing. Or even just like, down the street.

Belatedly, a single blue box chimed as it opened before him.

ERROR RESOLVED!

Primordial Still Extant!

Title: Primordial Slayer Revoked!

New Title!

Cardinal (Minor) (Epic, Scaling)

You are reborn anew! Primordial Nym, you bear the legacy of the Unseen Tide. Ware the Path. +5% All Stats.

Felix felt another giddy rush as System energy infused him, pushing him closer and closer to that second threshold. He made a mental note to ask Zara about that later.

+1 Silver Chest Awarded!

A very real, very heavy chest materialized in front of Felix. It thumped onto the stone floor so hard it cracked the surface. Felix grinned. Like the Bronze Chest he'd received before, this chest was made entirely of smooth sheets of silver metal, molded into an eye-pleasingly curved chest with a hefty lock on the lid. As before, the moment Felix touched it, the lock dissolved, and the lid popped open.

Received:

Blade of the Fang

Inscribed Femur of the Envoy

(50) Scales of the Ravager Queen

Huh. Felix pulled out the materials, all of which were far too big to fit in such a small container, but somehow did. The blade was nearly eight feet long, the femur at least six, and the thick leather sack containing the scales was almost like a big, inflexible trash bag. The moment the trash bag of scales popped out, the silver chest winked out of existence.

"What am I supposed to do with this?" Felix eyed them and tapped his lips. The Blade was carved from a large, white tooth and consisted of a grip and the naked edge. No crossguard. It was detailed with numerous lines, dots, and other designs that weren't sigils, even though it was clearly enchanted. The Femur was also enchanted, but the inscriptions were inert, remnants from the Profane Sigaldry used by the Envoy during its short, cursed life. The trash bag of scales was exactly that. Fifty palm-sized scales of rusty red color, an inch and a half thick, and—whoa—razor-sharp along the edges.

A few ideas began to brew in his Mind, but there'd be time for that later.

Felix pulled up both of their Status sheets.

Name: Felix Nevarre

Level: 45

Race: Primordial Nym

Omen: Magician

Born Trait: Keen Mind

______

Health: 1841/1841

Stamina: 1446/1446

Mana: 2068/2068

______

STR: 252

PER: 277

VIT: 378

END: 280

INT: 392

WIL: 810

AGL: 270

DEX: 292

______

BODY

Resistances: The Song of Absolution (L), Level 55

Combat Skills: Axe Mastery (C), Level 5*; Blunt Weapon Mastery (C), Level 10*; Dodge (C), Level 44; Long Blade Mastery (C), Level 15*; Parry (C), Level 4*; Small Blade Mastery (C), Level 10; Staff Mastery (C), Level 7*; Thrown Weapons Mastery (C), Level 13; Unarmed Mastery (C), Level 40; Blind Fighting (R), Level 25; Corrosive Strike (R), Level 40

Physical Enhancements: Armored Skin (R), Level 49; Unfettered Volition (E), Level 43

MIND

Mental Enhancements: Deception (C), Level 22; Intimidation (C)*, Level 24; Make An Entrance (U), Level 37; Meditation (U), Level 46; Negotiation (U), Level 1; Bastion of Will (E), Level 53; Deep Mind (E), Level 45; Ravenous Tithe (E), Level 54

Information Skills: Tracking (C), Level 15; Exploration (U), Level 35; Herbalism (U), Level 17; Voracious Eye (E), Level 43

SPIRIT

Spiritual Enhancements: Dual Casting (U), Level 32; Mana Manipulation (U), Level 37; Manasight (U), Level 49; Manaship Pilot (R), Level 22; Etheric Concordance (L), Level 62; Sovereign of Flesh (T), Level 49; Unite the Lost (T), Level 1

Spells: Abyssal Skein (R), Level 28; Cloudstep (R), Level 14; Fire Within (R) Level 57; Influence of the Wisp (R), Level 41; Invocation (R), Level 17; Mantle of the Long Night (R), Level 33; Oathbinding (R), Level 21; Shadow Whip (R), Level 38; Stone Shaping (R), Level 40; Reign of Vellus (E), Level 50; Wrack And Ruin (E), Level 39; Arrow of Perdition (L), Level 13; Theurgist of the Rise (L), Level 55

______

Unused Stat Points: 82

Harmonic Stats

RES: 156

INE: 221

AFI: 135

REI: 140

EVA: 110

MIG: 84

ALA: 217

FEL: 84

_____________________________________

Name: Pit (Companion)

Level: 42

Race: Chimera - Tenku

______

Health: 1178/1178

Stamina: 685/685

Mana: 1150/1150

______

STR: 120

PER: 160

VIT: 235

END: 125

INT: 176

WIL: 212

AGL: 283

DEX: 258

______

Bite (C), Level 43

Rake (C), Level 41

Cry (R), Level 44

Skulk (C), Level 39

Etheric Concordance (L), Level 62

Wingblade (U), Level 48

Frost Spear (C), Level 51

Cold Resistance (C), Level 23

Poisonfire (R), Level 25

Flight (R), Level 23

______

Active Titles:

Survivor III

Butcher III

Unconquered

Face the Charge

Bulwark of the Innocent

Pactmaker

Work Horse

Blind Pugilist

Hero

Iron Will

Apprentice Magus

The Broken Path

Voidwalker

Indomitable

Unleash the Beast

Blessing of the Lost

Fatebreaker

The Shape of Fate II

Cardinal (Minor)

Pit's Harmonic Stats

RES: 31

INE: 63

AFI: 50

REI: 56

EVA: 72

MIG: 33

ALA: 58

FEL: 46

Aside from the fact that his Mana had been halved due to his changed core, Felix felt good. Both his and Pit’s Primary and Harmonic Stats were looking good. Exceptional, if he were being honest. Whether it was because he was Unbound or because the Maw fiddled with his fate the moment he arrived on the Continent, Felix had found opportunity after every struggle to grow stronger. He tried not to waste them. The Primary Stats were fairly straightforward, while the Harmonic Stats were more arcane, having to do with the Grand Harmony and some sort of unifying energy that bound the world together. The universe? Felix paused a moment, thinking of the vision that Vellus had pulled him into. His mother's house. Was the Grand Harmony part of Earth too? If it was, did that mean he could go back?

Did he even want to?

*SLAM SLAM SLAM*

The wards suddenly dropped, and someone started pounding on the door. "Quit messin' around in there! If you’re done yellin', let's go! Daylight's burnin'!"

Cal's voice was sharp, but even through the walls, but Felix could hear the concerned lilt of her inner rhythm. Shaking his head ruefully, he stood and stretched. A few moments later, he flung open the door, surprising Cal, Evie, and Portia who had crowded nearby. Felix blinked at them.

"I'm done," he said as he handed the assorted jars to Cal and Portia. The two of them juggled the eight Essence Draughts with little difficulty, but their looks were confused. "Didn't need them."

He walked out, rotating his left arm. It felt a little tight, and he could use a—he grinned as he spotted the obstacle course Rory had built a week ago. "Don't bother Pit. He's tired," he called back to them.

He was almost to the course when someone, Portia, he thought, screamed, "Siva's grace! He's huge!"

A tired, faintly annoyed warble like a truck horn met the words.

Felix grimaced. He probably should have warned them about that.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Within the sitting room of a four story manse near the Sunrise Gate, Eliza DuFont pondered the vicissitudes of life. A wine glass balanced on her fingers, half-full of her second favorite vintage, the best she could find in the manse's stores. She sighed deeply.

Only a few short weeks ago, the Elder of Acquisitions had ruled much atop the Spire, the highest portion of the Eyrie where the Elders parceled out their power. When the Master Inquisitor had turned the city upside down with his damned Order, she'd seen the way things were moving. Dark and dangerous days were coming for the Guild, and her time there had expired. She jumped ship.

Then a gods-damned dragon had burst from the Eyrie and laid waste not only to the Order's Manaship, the Stalwart, but also apparently killed the Master Inquisitor as well. Much of his leadership had been aboard as well, nearly all the Inquisitors. Now, reeling, she'd gathered what she could and had laid claim to a series of manors in the Sunrise Quarter.

"Ma'am?"

DuFont frowned. She'd never liked that appellation. The armored youth beside her put a hand to his waist and snarled. "You will address the Inquisitor by title, or you shall be removed, good sir."

"Ve-very well, Lady Inquisitor. I apologize for my uncouth address," the merchant bowed and scraped so low his shoulder length hair brushed the ground.

DuFont kept her smile to herself, but she was quite pleased with the young Initiate beside her. He'd cleaned up nicely since she'd found him bloody and raving in a ditch. He made a good guard dog, all things considered. Heel, boy.

"Your apology is noted, Mister—?" DuFont feigned ignorance of his name, a tool she'd used in many a negotiation. It bred a certain expectation in her listener; if she couldn't be bothered to Analyze him, how in the world will she care about what he says?

"Wezzle, Lady Inquisitor." The Human was short, only slightly taller than the average Dwarf, but he had a beard that could compete with the best of them. He wore a fine jacket threaded with gold and silver, and the Merchant's Guild emblem hung prominently below his cravat. His voice was deep, but it trembled at the edges, and his eyes were red-rimmed.

"Mister Wezzle. Now, explain why exactly you need to broach the safety of the barricades?" DuFont raised a manicured eyebrow at him, a daily labor that she'd hoped would disappear with her advancement to Adept. No such luck. "You and yours are safe here while my people fight back the monsters roaming our city's streets."

"Lady Inquisitor, I beg your pardon, but we have seen no such monsters. We hear the stories, and they sound terrible, but guards we have aplenty. As a representative of the Merchant's Guild, I am requesting that we be allowed to travel deeper into the city. Both for trade and for my people to check on their families, many of whom we have not seen in months despite being camped just outside the Sunrise Gate. Your predecessor kept us locked in the Verdant Pass for nearly a month, and now, when you finally let us in, we find much of the city has fallen. We must tend to our business, Lady Inquisitor. We must."

Eliza couldn't claim she was unmoved by the merchant's plea, not only because he had the backing of the Merchant's Guild behind him. They were not a force she could easily face, not even if she had the Inviolate Order of the Inquisition fully behind her, which was not the case. Despite that, the former Elder did not want to encourage any of the merchants to move farther into the city. With them in control, she commanded access to their resources, and as the city deteriorated, those resources would mean the reins of the city would be in her hands.

The right hands.

That said, the threat of the Revenants was not a lie; the creatures were slaughtering citizens by the hundreds. Her patrols could fight them off, but only if the beasts were outnumbered, and they seemed to be getting stronger as the glasses ticked on.

"Mister Wezzle, you do not see the monsters because my men are fighting them back. The rumors you have heard are both accurate and woefully incomplete. Death resides in the city of Haarwatch, Mister Wezzle. Until we can secure more of the Quarter, I must insist you stay within the barricades. My people will gladly buy your merchandise at a negotiated rate, so you need not fear a loss of profit."

Wezzle's face moved through several emotions so fast it was hard to track, but DuFont spotted worry, anger, and loathing before a mask of acceptance slid over it all. He bowed low once more. "I understand. I thank you, Lady Inquisitor, for receiving us. Who might we speak to regarding our wares?"

DuFont smiled kindly and a bit sadly, an expression she'd practiced countless times. It was designed to convey quiet, calming dismay that she could do nothing more, but greatly wished to do so. Backed by her Acting Skill, the effect it had on the merchant's entourage was visible. Each of them softened their stance, just slightly. It did not escape her notice that Wezzle, however, was unaffected.

"I wish I could do more, Mister Wezzle, and be assured that my men are hunting the streets and expanding our influence as we speak. Your wares will go a long way to ensuring they are fed and armed for those efforts." She nodded at Klark, who began ushering the assemblage out of the sitting room. "My man will see you to our officer. Until we meet again."

"Until then, Lady Inquisitor."

The door closed with a soft boom, Klark and the merchant gone. Blissful silence reigned.

"Getting rowdy again? Didn't you just tell them to stay put?"

Eliza jumped slightly, but schooled her face to impassivity as she turned to see Ilia manifest out of the darkness behind her chair. The Sworn grinned at her.

"Yet another merchant family. There were too many the Order had been blockading at the Sunrise Gate." DuFont ran a hand through her silky hair and sighed through her perfect, Tempered teeth. Having advanced to Adept meant her physical form was nearly perfect. "These will prove troublesome, however."

"You want me to make an example?"

DuFont looked askance at the Sworn. "Are you up for that?"

Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say, as Ilia bristled like a cat. "I could kill this entire damn camp if I wanted, Lady Inquisitor."

Eliza held her hands up in mock surrender. "I am only concerned for your well-being, Ilia. You suffered grievously at that Sorcerer's hands. I merely am worried that you are still feeling the ill-effects of her power."

The Sworn clucked her tongue and looked away, but she didn't reply. She was wearing the same dark leather armor and mask she always wore, but her hair was stringy, and her hands twitched slightly. The signs of her assault were still there, clear to Eliza's eyes at least.

"I'll have that witch's head on a pike," Ilia snarled. "One way or another."

"A worthy goal, indeed. But before the witch hunt, I'll need you to give the merchants a scare. Let them see what we're truly up against."

"Lead a group of the beasties in?" Ilia asked, and Eliza nodded. "How large?"

"Eight or nine, but make sure their levels aren't too high. I'd like our Acolytes to take the credit for their defeat."

"Sounds fun. I'll see it done." Ilia grinned, her own teeth almost perfect as well. She turned back toward the darkness in the rear of the room, hidden from the nearby windows. "Ah, before I forget. The Inquisitors are coming to speak with you, and they're spittin' mad."

"Hmm, I'm sure they are." DuFont sighed. She felt like she'd been doing that more and more. "Send them in."

The Sworn gave her a look like a cat asked to play fetch. "You know I'm not your maid, right?"

She vanished into the shadows.

Grumbling to herself, DuFont had little choice but to go and open the chamber door herself.

Just outside were the last remaining Inquisitors in Haarwatch. The rest had all died or gone missing, which was just another way to say dead. These three remained, the highest-ranked of their order, along with DuFont. A fourth had lived as well, but he'd died in the fighting the day prior.

"Inquisitors. How may I be of assistance?" she asked with a neutral face.

"We must speak, Inquisitor DuFont," said Clovis Heuthorn, an exceedingly tall man with graying temples and a drooping face. He made his way into the room without another word. The others followed him in a swirl of white-enameled armor and brilliantly red cloaks.

As the only thing she could have done was stomp her feet and demand they stop, she let them pass. The title change was still a bit jarring to Eliza, for all that she'd demanded its use from Wezzle. When she had joined forces with Katan, he'd given her the honorary title of Inquisitor, due to her previous status as an Elder at the Guild. The others used it and, because the Acolytes and Initiates listened to her, they gave her the bare minimum of respect.

Over the course of the last day, however, that had changed.

"It has come to our attention that you have stopped our people from seeking out and executing further heretics," Inquisitor Heuthorn started. "I would ask that you reverse your order. This city has been declared a hotbed of heresy by the late Master Inquisitor himself. It is of paramount importance that we continue our work as ordained."

Ah, straight to the point. A refreshing change. "Circumstances change, Inquisitor Heuthorn. We must adapt."

"You step upon our god-granted right to end the threat of heresy, Inquisitor." Inquisitor Rutger was stocky, blond, and square-jawed. He put so much venom into her honorary title, as if that alone could kill her. "What right do you claim to do this?"

"I claim no right, just the loyalty of these fine people. I served the citizens of Haarwatch well before joining the Order, and they come first." Eliza rubbed the bridge of her nose. "What's more, if we hold our position and encourage others to flock to us, then we will control this entire city before long. The Guild had Provisional Authority over this city, and it allowed us to do so much. Were we to attain such control, imagine how easy it would be to track down dissidents. Once we have steadied the foundations, your pogroms can continue apace."

"You speak of safety? Of serving the citizens of this city?" Initiate Heuthorn's glare was an impressive thing, amplified by the wrinkles on his face. "Heretics running free is how such abominations came to overwhelm Haarwatch. If we stand idly by while more still gather beneath us, then we've already lost."

"We cannot wait for System Authority to deem us worthy," Rutger snarled. "We have been blessed by the Pathless Himself, and the One Who Remains guides us. We need nothing from the System we have not already taken with our own hands."

"Foolish," DuFont said, a hint of a growl in her voice. Her hand dropped to her waist and the hilt that resided there. "This city is on edge. We need them to gather together. With us, not against us. If you keep on your path, then we won't have to worry about monsters at the barricades, we'll be overwhelmed by the people themselves."

"The wolf need not fear the rabbit," Heuthorn sneered.

"You've no Master Inquisitor, not anymore. No one to hide behind. There is at least one true Master Tier in this city, and she is against us. Do you want to call her attention to us before or after we have established ourselves and can fight back?" Eliza shook her head and pulled a few inches of her sword from its sheath. "Do you still have objections?"

Heuthorn, Rutger, and Daur all eyed her sword with no little bit of trepidation. The hooked blade was a powerful antique, sharp as a razor and covered in an arcane script. The sigils, strange as they were, were definitely enchanted. The only ability she'd discovered, however, was a disruption-type effect. For a brief, two-second interval, the powered sword would disrupt Mana Skills. The Inquisitors knew its power.

There used to be four of them, after all.

"Very well, Inquisitor DuFont," Heuthorn nodded curtly. "We shall follow your lead...for now."

The man left without another word, and the other two followed so close they almost trampled his cloak.

"Gods damned zealots," she muttered and resheathed her blade. Klark returned just moments later. "Send in the next ones, Initiate."

"As you wish, Lady Inquisitor."

* * *

"GRAAAAH!"

Mervin Cors flinched at the sound, but Piotr's callused hand gripped his shoulder. "Steady, lad. It's locked up."

Mervin nodded, but it was hard to turn off his ears.

Sentinel's Regard is level 24!

Ugh, I'd rather you didn't level at this particular moment. Mervin shuddered as he tried to block out the sounds coming out of the room they guarded. He was only partially successful, so he focused on his friends.

Piotr was still leading their Wall crew, all of them Tin Ranks, despite the fact that he was pretty old. Nearly thirty, if Mervin had to guess. Lars slumped against the far wall, his bow loose in his hand. The man was drunk, but then Mervin had never seen him without something in his system, so he'd be more surprised to find him sober. On the other side of the door they guarded, Garin completed their group, and he was half-asleep despite the shouting.

They'd all been up too long, having only caught a cat nap in the hours before dawn. The Wall was abuzz with activity, Guilders practically flooding the chambers and battlements. Eyrie fallen, they'd been left with nowhere else to go; the Wall became a sort of rallying point for what was left of the Guild.

And the help was none too late in coming. More and more waves of beasts had emerged from the Foglands. And now the city—

More screams came from behind the door they'd posted up against. Mervin saw Lars flinch and take another swig from his flask. Where the man had found booze was a mystery, the Guilders were rationing it out, after all. Despite it all, he wouldn't have said no to a sip. His damn nerves were shot.

The screams quietened again, and Mervin let out a pent-up breath.

Monsters had emerged from the Eyrie. From below it. People were saying the Domain, but though Mervin hadn't had a chance to enter Haarwatch's Domain, he hadn't even been told it had...things like that.

They'd been chosen to guard the—what was it?—operation room, Teine had called it. "Why" was beyond him, but they'd been set up for hours at this point.

But the longer it went on, the less Mervin was terrified of it all. The operation room wasn't warded against sound; Teine had not cared, apparently. And with his Perception and Uncommon-ranked Sentinel's Regard Skill, he was able to bridge the distance.

He could hear Elder Teine speaking, his Skill even gathered enough sound and sensation that he could almost see it all. Like seeing with his ears.

Something big and heavy twitched and jerked atop a table of some sort. Claws rapped against its surface, and a few creaking screeches cut through the general malaise of sound. He guessed sigils were in play somewhere in there, as he could hear the low hum of the magic, flaring with every twitchy movement.

Others were in there, but he had seen most of them enter originally, Bronze Guilders for the most part. They were arrayed around the table, watching. Learning.

The Elder was teaching.

"You see their enhanced musculature, how it twists?" Mervin could hear a clacking of shoes and something metallic and sharper. A cane, he realized.

"Ah," said a chorus of voices.

"It is likely how they are so strong, despite their levels. Easily Tier I creatures," Teine said, his cane clacking again. He was walking in circles?

"What of the reports of their growing strength?" someone asked.

"Yes, that's part of it. Their Bodies feed on the strength of their conquests." Cloth rustled. "Look at its face. It's all mouth, meant to devour. The Mana channels in its flesh are thorned and twisted in a way that is almost...anathema to us. Were a Human or Elf designed as such, they would not live long before dying a gruesome death."

"Why?"

"The channels feed into itself. There is no outlet," Teine let out a huff of breath. He sounded...admiring? "Efficient, but impossible for adaptation within non-monsters."

"So they grow stronger with each kill. Recirculating the Mana they eat?" a new voice said, high and sharp. Mervin thought she sounded familiar.

"Indeed. Much the same as we do, but more...holistically, it seems," Teine agreed.

"Then...will they continue to grow? Will they ever stop?" a new voice asked, this one thicker and deeper. He sounded afraid.

"Mmm, yes they will grow. And no, I don't believe they will stop." The Elder did not seem terribly concerned by that fact. "They are imbued with...a terrible hunger. You can feel it emanating from their aura."

Clack. Clack. Clack.

"I feel...rage," the sharp-voiced woman said.

"...And hate," said the thick male voice.

"Yes, yes. Intertwined with the hunger. Why do they feel such fury? The loss of their master?" Teine mused. His cane tapped the ground, insistently.

"The dragon?"

"Mmm. Perhaps. Or perhaps the creature that destroyed the dragon," Teine said. "Do they seek vengeance?"

"The Fiend..."

"Mmm."

There was the weak sound of thrashing and further screaming. "Sir, it is dying. Slowly, but its Health is declining."

"We've found its limits. Very well. We're done here, but not with the study. I need more. Find another, preferably one of a higher level."

"Yes, sir, Elder Teine."

The screams cut off.

Steps within the room grew louder for a moment before Mervin realized they were leaving. He straightened to attention as the Bronze Ranks filed out, followed at last by Teine himself, holding a set of bloody vials. His friends followed suit, with varying degrees of ease.

Mervin tried not to stare at the Elder. He'd been hobbled, his once preternaturally handsome face now marred by a tight web of scars along his left side. Something else twisted his right leg, and despite healing Skills, the Master Tier mage still needed that cane to walk.

Teine tapped a finger to his lips thoughtfully as he gazed at the lot of them. Without saying a word, he walked by and started up the stairs, perhaps headed to the top of the Wall. Mervin let out a soft breath of relief.

"You."

Mervin froze like a rabbit before a fox's hungry gaze. The Elder pinned him with his pale eyes and smiled. With the scarring, it was a lopsided thing that tugged the left side of his face unpleasantly.

"Ye-yes, sir?"

"The beast within will stir in minutes. Kill it for me. I have no further use of it at this time."

"Ah, yes, sir."

Teine nodded and left, even his hobbling walk more graceful and quick than Mervin could manage.

"Lucky you," Garin grumped, not unkindly.

"Ah, anyone want to help?" Mervin asked nervously. He certainly would rather share the experience, and the danger, with his friends.

"What, and steal from you?" Lars snorted. "Have fun!"

Piotr shook his head. "The Elder gave this to you alone. We'll follow, in case of any problems. We'll be ready to help." The other two groaned, but that made Mervin feel better.

He entered the room.

It matched his envisioned specifics very well. Sentinel's Regard was a strong Skill, it seemed. Inside the monster was strapped down to a metal table covered in sigils, though it was barely moving. Lethargic twitches and a twitching jaw was all the action it displayed. They must have knocked it out, somehow. Even if it were awake, the metallic bands across its limbs and chest held it firmly in place. It wasn't going anywhere.

If it could have, Mervin was sure it would have fled long ago.

The others gasped at it, though Mervin wasn't sure if that was because of surprise or disgust. It was nearly flayed. Its scales and skin opened up along its chest, its ribs and bones cracked and exposed. Mervin could see its lumpy, misshapen core pulsing weakly in its chest.

Swallowing and forcing himself to draw his blade, Mervin lined up his sword and struck.

The weapon glanced off the beast's internals, doing almost no damage. But weakened as it was, exposed as it was, he was able to do more than none. That was all that mattered.

What followed was an embarrassingly long time swinging at it. Eventually, however, enough damage accrued, and a triumphant notification filled his sight.

You Have Killed A Manawarped Revenant!

XP Earned!

Mervin gasped as he gained five levels in quick succession.

Congratulations!

You Have Leveled Up!

You Are Now Level 16!

You Have 15 Unused Stat Points!

Congratulations! You Have Earned A Title!

Giantslayer I (Uncommon)! Defeat an enemy at least 10 levels higher than yourself! +1 STR +1 AGL

Congratulations! You Have Earned A Title!

Giantslayer II (Uncommon) Defeat an enemy at least 10 levels higher and at least one-half stage higher than you. +2 STR, +2 AGL

The energy of the true god poured through him, a blinding light that raised him up on its majesty. Mervin came down, shaking and buzzing with power.

"Darkest Night, Elder Teine did you a favor," Piotr said with an unbelieving expression on his face. Mervin knew Piotr was only level twenty.

"I didn't know it was gonna be trussed up like a pig!" Lars complained. He was only level fifteen. "I coulda done that!"

Mervin couldn't help but nod, feeling his power swell within him. He felt...incredible.

The creature burst into dark smoke that flickered with...was that blood Mana? Something ruby red glinted in the usual smoke rot, and all of it whisked away through a high vent in the room. Back toward the city.

What could that mean?

"All right! Time to celebrate! Drinks on Piotr!" Garin said. Lars came around rapidly at that and cheered, and when Piotr nodded and grabbed Mervin's shoulders, the boy couldn't stop his smile.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Stone crunched beneath the Archon's golden foot, loose debris scattered across the warped passages deep in the earth. His step was sure and steady, the pace of a creature that did not feel fatigue nor pain, as tireless as the mountain he trod beneath. Beside him, twisted sigils filled with lightly pulsing yellow-red light illuminated the path. The same light shone off the Archon's gilded form, highlighting the aged gold of his metal armor in a way that he found quite pleasing.

An enjoyable, if minor side effect of the power they afford, he thought, the bright red flames of his eyes gliding over the inscribed markings on the walls. He could feel the power they siphoned from the lands above even here, at the edges of his Domain. He breathed it in deeply, the sound hollow as air rushed through the helmet that comprised his skull and face, down his gorget throat and into the cavernous cavalcade of etheric constructs within. The Archon did not have a true Body to enjoy the thrum of stolen power, instead he was cursed with this false form of ancient metal armor, but his Spirit and Mind were whole enough to relish its particular flavor.

It's all power. All a step on the path. Until I've enough to end this blasted shell and my own interminable imprisonment. The Archon let the air within him rumble into a growl before his etheric condenser stole what little Mana lived within it. He swirled the potency through his forged channels, letting it tingle against his armored form before it descended into the core that raged within. I'll drain the world dry for freedom.

His sigils might only pull infinitesimal pieces of Mana from the land around them, but with enough time and power, one could achieve almost anything.

He was betting on it.

For millennia, the Archon had been stranded in the dark. His Body had been useless, sundered and impaired, and his Spirit had slumbered in the deeps. Though his Mind was in pieces, something woke him, though he could not recall what, and he spent the next few centuries alternating between passive catatonia and unhinged madness.

That was when the Voice in the Dark arose.

Not the unknown sensation that woke him, but a kind one, if fearful and worried. It warned him, told him secrets. Little things, things that made no sense to his piecemeal Mind; but slowly he began to form a new Mind from the dregs and stumps that remained adhered to his Spirit. Slowly, agonizingly slowly, he was remade.

He woke as a construct, a metal man but somewhat in command of his own Will. More centuries passed as he relearned how to be alive, how to see, how to feel, how to hate.

The memories came slowly, but he pieced them together into a tattered tapestry. He named himself Archon, though he knew it was wrong. It was something, however, an anchor he could hold against the march of time.

A name he intended to shove down the throats of all who opposed him.

Up ahead, the corridor clearly narrowed. The twisted, warped halls, once made of leveled and planed stone perfectly and exactingly crafted, had long ago moved out of true. Earthquakes, etheric drift, even the simple erosion of time affected them all. The Geist, original builders of his prison, were true Artisans; yet even the greatest of works eventually turned to dust. The Geist had gone down such a path themselves, and now they, too, were gone. As Lost as their wretched forebears: the Nym.

The Archon stopped with a heavy, thudding stomp. Pitted stone beneath him cracked. He barked behind himself. "Number 55118, open the way."

"Yes, Master."

An umber-colored Arcid stepped forward from the group, a construct both similar and vastly different from the Archon. Unlike other Arcids, or even the ice-imbued Reforged, Number 55118 was of middling size; perhaps a shade taller than a Human or Elf, and like in proportion to the brutish mortals. Like all his creations, the Arcid's Body was composed of overlapping metal plates made of specially treated ore and etherically charged minerals. Number 55118 raised its hand, and the stone and dirt before them trembled.

"Stone Shaping," the Arcid intoned in an echoing, tinny voice.

Dusty-brown Mana swirled around its umber form, emanating from the crevices and joints between plates. From its helmeted head, twin fires blazed brighter, amber-colored lights that stabbed out into the dark corridor. The walls and floor melted and shifted, turning to a pliable mud before spreading and compacting. The shift spread, pushing further and further before them, until it reached a stone archway that its power could not affect. Vibrant, violet sparks flew as the Skill ran against the open door-frame and was kicked back. Number 55118 grunted in pain, but did not stop. More violet sparks erupted.

"Enough," the Archon demanded. "You waste yourself needlessly. This is not a structure you can best with your paltry magics."

55118 leaned onto its knees and panted with a tinny voice. "Yes...Master. It was foolish of me to push myself in such a way. Never again shall I—"

"Silence." At the Archon's command, the air itself congealed around the umber Arcid, freezing him in place. "Still your prattling. Watch and learn, for you will need to know this to return."

Without another word, the Archon strode past his frozen peon. The stone shaping had settled, and the corridor was now smooth and relatively even, with a ceiling high enough to fit his significant bulk. Despite himself, the Archon was impressed. 55118 had come a long way since he'd first been ejected from Forge, wrong in that special way all of his greatest creations had to be. Flawed, those he had dubbed his Twelve had each experienced a unique reaction to the Profane Sigaldry he employed. It had produced...quirks in them, and the golden construct found them quite useful. And, thanks in part to his siphon arrays, they were swiftly growing in power.

He made it to the archway without issue. It was an empty space, easily large enough to fit himself through, were he capable, or even one of his larger creations. Beyond was utter darkness.

The Archon lifted his hand, covered in tiny overlapping plates to form fingers of remarkable Dexterity, yet possessed of enough Strength to crush mortal or beast. Yet, despite such Strength, he could not place that hand upon the archway; he could not even step within two spans of the foul barrier. The damn curse he bore made sure of it.

"We have reached the edge of my Domain," he said, turning back toward the Arcids that followed him. "Here is where you shall return upon the completion of your Trial."

Three of the Twelve stood there, watching him with the awe of an ant looking upon a boot that had, at this time, deigned not to crush them. It would not do to have his creations think themselves too well-loved.

Familiarity breeds contempt, the Voice in the Dark whispered to him. It did not speak much anymore, but its advice was always worth heeding.

"This is as far as I can take you. This gate will expel you along the banks of the river the mortals call the Ianus. You have but to follow it to its source, and you shall find their city. When your tasks are done, return up the river and look for my sign."

Number 55389 bowed its lanky Body, the vivid green of its armor bright even in the half-lit darkness. "We will not fail you. Our Trial shall be the benchmark for all who come after."

The Archon's flames flared bright, and Number 55389 flinched. "See that it does. You will not fail. Or you will never return."

Suffocating images flashed through his Mind, still frames from horrors he wished he could leave behind. Darkness everlasting, pressing upon him, eroding all that he was or could be...

The memory faded, and the Archon found the two Arcids trembling on their knees before him. Only the frozen umber-toned construct was unaffected. With an angry jut of his hand, the Archon's calamitous aura dissipated. He waved at the dark archway, this time with a snarl that shook dust from the newly shaped hall. "When you reach the city, you are to find the Wurms I've sent ahead. The magics of the mortals' Wall is powerful; clearly an artifact from before their vile time, when true knowledge walked the Continent." The Archon shook his great head in disgust. "They do not deserve to own such a thing. The land shall breathe a sigh of relief at their ignoble deaths."

"It will be done, my Master," 55389 said, once again folding itself into a skeletal bow.

Pfah, he scoffed. To rely on tools such as these...if only I could step beyond these damn gates. But he could not, not until he had the key. It all depended on the damned key, the one he'd foolishly let slip from his grasp. With a crook of a finger, the air flows around 55118 disappeared, and the Arcid fell to its knees, gasping for air it no longer needed.

"Go, and do not fail me."

* * *

Felix surged through the Gauntlet, his Body relishing the activity after nearly two hours sitting still. Despite the fresh cuts and bruises littering his flesh, a visceral joy rose up within him. He was testing himself.

Finally.

Earlier, he'd been stopped just before entering the Gauntlet (the obstacle course "borrowed" from the Guild and built by Rory, a Silver Rank trainer). Cal and Harn had pummeled him with questions, though Zara hadn't seemed to be in a hurry. She had lounged in a crudely made wooden chair reading a book during much of it.

It was a debriefing. What had happened in the Domain since Harn left? What happened in the sky with the Ravager King? Felix had already decided he was done with secrets. He gave them all, Zara included, the full story. Everything.

Stunned silence greeted his words, the implications of his tangling with a Primordial directly too much to fathom all at once. To Felix’s great surprise, Zara had chosen that moment to step to him and give him a binding Oath. The Naiad had offered it without question or issue, only the stipulation that if she dared share his secrets, her Temper and level would be sundered, forfeit to the Oath. It had surprised Cal and Harn both, while downright unnerving Felix. The trust suggested in that small action was...staggering. The lady barely knew him. He wondered if it was some sort of Chanter magic she possessed, or a Skill. Did Sense Motive exist as a Skill in the Continent?

Writhing chains flailed at him, yanking Felix from memory to the now in the Gauntlet. He flared Unfettered Volition to push through them, ducking and spinning from the heavy links. Still, he was battered and sliced, rewarded for his inattention with shallow slashes across his shoulders and forearms. Felix growled in annoyance. His tunic had only just started properly mending itself, and already it was shredded again.

He paused at the next section, breathing heavily as his thoughts ran across recent events. Zara, like Harn, had not reacted how he'd expected after revealing his connection to the Unending Maw on the way to the camp. Now that he also admitted to being Unbound, he'd anticipated some sort of fear or loathing or...or anything but what she'd done. She merely nodded and smiled, as if something had finally made sense to her.

"I had wondered why you were so interested in their history," she had said. Felix had scratched his neck and shrugged.

Zara had laughed. "This is remarkable, Felix. I am quite glad you broke into my shop."

That had brought a grin to his face, and he'd found his misgivings about the strange Chanter fading. At least a little.

Cal, however, had reacted exactly as Felix had worried. There was a lot of yelling and accusations and being subjected to lengthy Analyzes and information-gathering Skills. Felix didn't fight it, and in fact deactivated the Amulet of Veiling he wore around his neck to prevent others from inspecting him. Despite Cal's exhausting examination (she'd even checked his teeth), the treasure hunter had been able to find nothing about him that was suspect. Nothing, that is, except his new Race.

"Primordial Nym," Cal had breathed. "What is that?"

"Something not seen for a very long time, I imagine," Zara had said. "I've not heard of it in any tome or history, and I've read much. I'll see if I can dig anything up."

"Thank you, Zara," Cal had said with a nod. "I hate being in the dark."

"Imagine how I feel," Felix had offered with a wry grin.

"Sounds strong, though," Harn had grunted. "Good. Just don't go eating the newcomers."

Felix had let out a surprised laugh at that. Humor, from Harn. "I'll try my best."

After that, it was their turn. Harn had revealed how they had all escaped from the Domain. Turns out, they had been cast out when the shell failed; a safety mechanism devised by the Guild, meant to disgorge their people from the Domain in the case of failure. The only downside was that they had been scattered about, along with more than a few Revenants.

That raised a new wrinkle, at least to Felix. Since they were ousted by the same safety protocol that expelled Harn, the Revenants, according to the System, were people. Typically, the System categorized Races and Types. Races were considered sapient and could gain Titles and take on System Quests, growing stronger as they went. Types, or monsters, were not considered sapient by the same System, unable to earn such perks and growing stronger only through violence or other, more arcane manners. Strangely, that included the Risi, a Type of Giantfolk that were at least as intelligent as a Human, had a developed culture, and even boasted a messed up religion. Why, then, did the System consider the Revenants different?

The answer, unsurprisingly, came from Zara.

"They're Manawarped Revenants," she had explained in that lecture voice she'd used on him before. "You said so yourself, Felix. These creatures were once Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Orcs. All kinds. The System must still recognize that part of their pitiful existence."

"So what does that mean, exactly?" Cal had asked. "Does it benefit them?"

"It means they will likely be able to gain Titles and complete System Quests, though based on their level of Intelligence, I am not terribly worried about that. Regardless, I recommend excising them as soon as possible. They are a...stain on the Grand Harmony that will only spread and grew more intractable as time passes."

Felix could attest to that, and rubbed at his chest, still staring at the next leg of the Gauntlet. The infinitesimal piece of the Maw they contained was rife with discordant power, strains of a chaotic song that was almost the antithesis of the System itself. If the Revenants gained Titles as fast as he did, then they were all in for a world of hurt. He had mentioned that, but the others had laughed it off.

"Were they Unbound and cursed by the attention of a powerful Primordial, we would do well to be worried," Zara said. "But they will be unlikely to accrue significant Titles in the short term. The long term, as I have said, is another story entirely."

That had brought up the subject he'd been waiting for. The Archon. Explaining who and what he was had been difficult, as Felix wasn't entirely sure. Neither were they, as it turned out.

"Sounds like a golem," Harn had said.

"A sentient golem? You see those a lot?" Cal asked archly. "Nah, this sounds like more Foglands fuckery. More ancient unknowns coming from the past to haunt us."

Zara had hummed a series of contemplative notes. "Little is known about the Nym, and the way this Archon reacted to you suggests a history. There is a connection there that I might delve...yet it also means he is thousands of years old. For a construct to be running that entire time—it boggles the mind."

Zara had immediately begun rifling through a pack at her side, one Felix later learned was chock full of books. Before he could peruse them himself, Harn had grabbed his attention.

"If the plan was to destabilize the city, then this Archon's mission was successful. Haarwatch is ass-up and reelin'. If I were him, now'd be the time to strike against us." Harn had pointed west, toward the Wall. "The Guilders've been sayin' the Foglands are spewin' out monsters, hordes of em. Solid bet it's him."

"Good point," Cal had said with a frown. "The Revenants seem like an afterthought though, right? His real play was the giant Ravager King?"

"That's what I figure," Felix had agreed. "The Envoy said as much, and the memory I'd stolen from him indicated he was building an army to take advantage of the chaos the Ravager King would cause. The Envoy had planned for an attack from both sides of the Wall."

"Classic pincer movement." Harn had grunted. "And in a city shook by infightin' and sudden monsters. Woulda worked, too."

That's what had Felix worried. It had been a good plan, all things considered, and who knew what else was up the golden golem's sleeves. The four of them batted around ideas, but mostly it came down to protecting the people they had in camp and trying to root out the Revenants as best they could. With their rate of population growth, the possibility of them overwhelming the city felt entirely too real.

All of which meant getting stronger was his number one priority. They'd asked only a few more questions before he'd been released to train his newly strengthened Skills, though Zara had asked that they speak in a few glasses. She wanted to get moving with Chanter training as soon as possible.

Felix refocused on the now, weaving as best he could through more of the lashing chains. Like a dozen Evie's all fighting in tandem. It was hard and frustrating.

He'd attempted the damn Gauntlet twice now, and had made it no farther than halfway before being pummeled into the ground. The second time, he'd barely made it ten feet in before the animated mannequins took out his legs. Thankfully, using his Mana Skills no longer sent pain ripping through his everything, as Unfettered Volition often made the difference between evasion and a brutal wounding.

However, all was not exactly right. His Aspects kept flaring in the strangest of ways. He'd commit to an action, but a vivid heat in his chest would lead him misjudging and putting too much Strength into a jump. He'd rocket too high and have to weather the abuse of the many violent obstacles. Or he'd cast Shadow Whip, but an unsteady pulsing in his Spirit sent the spell twitching away from him, fouling his aim.

Through the chains, Felix ducked under the rolling blades, a series of spinning sabers that varied their elevations based on his speed. He'd made it past them the first time, just barely, and he thought he had the pattern down.

Duck, dive, roll, jump! Duck, dodge left, spin, hop! It was a flurry of quick decisions and pinpoint movements that he was awed to be able to accomplish. His Dexterity combined with Unfettered Volition lent Felix a precision that he'd never—

HURK!

A burning surge of blue-white flashed across his awareness, and Felix fell forward. A blade, missed in his self-satisfaction, stabbed at where he had just stood. It came so close he felt the back of his tunic slice open, though his skin was untouched. He tried to recover with a series of frantic rolls, but the next couple of blades hit him square in the shoulder and lower back, sending him sprawling into the loose dirt.

A loud but short klaxon sounded from a nearby post.

Failure. Again.

What the hell was that? He berated himself as he crawled to the sidelines and exited the Gauntlet. It had felt like his Body was making moves for him. Without him. How is that possible? I'm over level 40, I figured this'd be a cake walk.

He was wrung out and sweating far more than he'd had in recent memory. The Gauntlet was no joke, and to beat it, he had to take this seriously. Something was going on inside him. Felix dove into his core, utilizing his Fire Within to explore the strange chaos within him.

Previously, his Fire Within unlocked his internal Mana control and allowed him to visualize his core. It was a step that Rory had claimed was fundamental to being able to advance, though he hadn't gone into too much detail. The culture of Haarwatch, and by extension, the Hierocracy, was steeped in taboos when it came to sharing information. A frustration to Felix in many ways, but not one he cared to waste time on at that moment. No, he'd rather focus on the details now being unveiled by his new and improved, Journeyman Tiered Fire Within.

The first thing that stood out was the sudden clarity of his visualization. While before he could visit his core space and feel the power rolling through the myriad pathways around his Body, it had always felt somewhat dreamlike. Unreal. Now, there was a granular edge to everything, as if it were just one step removed from actual, physical reality.

Felix watched as waves of blue-white, liquid flame coursed through his looping pathways of his Body like blood through his veins. The power never stopped, circulated by the spinning ring at the center of it all. Said ring, made up of the same thick, undulating blue-white flames was tethered to a number of Skills. Each Skill he had Tempered provided a ribbon of shimmering light that slowly wove around the ring like some sort of luminous maypole. As the Skills slowly revolved around his core ring, planets around a star, the ribbon tethers twisted just beneath it.

Why?

Felix watched a bit longer, but ultimately was unable to understand much else going on within him. His Fire Within had Tiered up, but the change was not so stark as he'd hoped. The Essence of Bort, after all, was all about accumulation. He'd have to practice further.

Still, it was a strange feeling, but not unfamiliar; he'd lived his entire life without knowing how his organs and circulatory system really worked; how was this any different? It wasn't that he didn't care, but he'd had enough over obsessing about everything he didn't immediately understand. He'd ask Zara after he got done with the Gauntlet.

It was as simple as that.

Having someone around who had soared to the heights of Master Tier definitely had its advantages. Not the least of which was the Chanter training he was to begin later that day. Until then, he was to use his time as he saw fit.

You could go out and help them around the camp, you know, a nagging voice inside him prodded. Guard the camp, maybe, or fight off any monsters out there? That wall was looking pretty rough, too...

Felix shook his head and dismissed his guilty conscience. The best way he could help everyone was to get a handle on his abilities. He'd been scraping by the skin of his teeth for far too long. The next time he faced real threats, he wanted to be ready. And that meant training until he could kick the Gauntlet's ass.

Again.

CHAPTER NINE

"What do you mean, I am not allowed to train with Zara?" Vess demanded.

Darius Reed, Hand of the Duke and her personal minder, didn't bother to stop. He plodded onward toward their own training area Reed had secured hours before. "It is forbidden."

"You cannot be serious," Vess said. She hurried after him, careful to avoid the Untempered that wove in and out of the pathway. "My father would not turn down a chance at strength. And my mother clearly did not."

She may have been imagining it, but Vess thought she saw Darius' cheek twitch. An opening.

"Seek out Zara, then. She will tell you what she intends. But know this: no matter what your decision is, Hand, I will not be swayed." Vess planted her feet and ignored the butterflies in her stomach. "Not by you or my father."

Darius inclined his head at exactly the right angle to indicate acknowledgement without subservience. "I'll not have you put in harm’s way by some witch. I would speak with her and discover exactly what this training entails."

Without warning, the Hand pivoted and headed toward the main warehouse. Clamping down on the nervous trembling in her middle, Vess followed.

The impromptu courtyard teemed with Untempered citizens, a veritable sea of the displaced. Each of them bore a similar haggard expression, one that tore at her heart to see. These were people who had lost much in the span of a day, many of whom carried all that they owned on their backs. While the Hand moved through like a ship through a choppy sea, Vess lingered behind, offering small comforts to those she could see. A helping hand to stabilize a cart full of stone, a word of encouragement, even something as simple as a sympathetic smile worked their particular magic.

It helped, of course, that she had a Skill for it.

Diplomacy is level 32!

The Skill was meant for hashing out trade agreements and settling disputes, but she could make use of it here. It granted her bonuses to favorable interactions with allies, and a subsequent lesser bonus to interactions with those deemed her opposition. It was a Social Skill, or what many among the peerage referred to as a "soft Skill."

Soft Skills were in high demand as they were quite useful at high levels, but frowned upon as well; rare was the soft Skill that could turn the tide of a battle, after all. It was far from Mind control or anything like it, but such Skills leveraged the System in an unknown way, allowing her to present more favorably to others. Not to mention, it was far more useful the first time it was used on an individual than any subsequent uses, especially at its current level.

Still, Vess' passage through the crowd left a number of eased burdens and lingering smiles in her wake. She would consider that a success.

She made it through the main building's doors only a minute or two behind the Hand. Vess had heard it referred to as the Training Hall by the Untempered, and they weren't entirely wrong. The entire place was filled with sandy fighting pits, inscribed combat mannequins, and the impressive bulk of the Gauntlet. The fighting pits were unremarkable, simple sand between raised walls, and the mannequins were far less advanced than even the common Clay Golems the Eyrie once boasted in their elite training grounds. But the Gauntlet was something else entirely. According to Evie, the heavily enchanted construct had been "borrowed" from the Guild by a wayward trainer. The Dwarf had intended to return it...but then things had gone sideways.

An understatement, to be sure.

When Vess had towed Evie out of the Domain, things had been bleak. The city center had collapsed into a warren of treacherously shifting rubble and gutted facades. Finding a path through the carnage had been difficult, let alone navigating to the warehouse Evie had described in the few minutes she retained consciousness. Dozens of Revenants stood in their way, with only Vess' spear between them an annihilation. But she was her mother's daughter, and though she was not yet a Dragoon, she channeled their Spirit and resolve. Over the course of three hours, Vess had slaughtered her way across the city, relying on stealth where she could but never shrinking from required carnage.

Haarwatch appeared to be transformed into a wilderness of death and monstrosities. The living were few and far between, often only screams in the distance, too far to find let alone help. Vess had made the brutal but necessary decision to prioritize her own Health and that of her friend. She owed Evie much for lingering in the Domain so that Vess could land that strike against the Ravager King. Nevertheless, seeing the mass of refugees and their grim faces now made her heart clench in regret.

"Regret is the hallmark of the ruler, small one," her father once said. "The trick is figuring out how to ensure its cause cannot take root again."

Power. Levels and Skills and advancing through the Tiers were the answer to nearly all of the Continent's brutalities. Conquering the Domain had rewarded that in spades. She had gained ten entire levels from those final fights, and numerous Skill increases. She'd even netted herself a Title:

Against the Tide (Epic)!

You foolishly set yourself against the oncoming tide. Yet you have persevered! Or, at least you didn't die. +5% END, VIT

It was a little...condescending, which was odd. None of her previous Titles were ever worded as such, but who was she to gainsay the System? Especially when it gifted them such bountiful rewards. Percentage bonuses to Endurance and Vitality were among the greatest of gifts for anyone, mage or warrior. Health and Stamina were always needed, as to run out of one was to be either dead or soon-to-be dead.

Moreover, Vess had also managed to Temper her Body into Journeyman once they had reached camp. It had been both a remarkable and unexpected boon. To grow so fast impressed even Darius’ dour personality, though it was not outside the scope of his expectations, apparently. Vess wanted to be annoyed at the man’s limited reaction, but she could only be grateful that he had secured a selection of Essences months ago in preparation for any further advancements.

Body: Wings of Vitra

Mind: Risen Spear

Spirit: Everburn

The increase in power was not insignificant, and the effect upon her three Body Skills was astounding. She'd Tempered Spear of Tribulations (Legendary), Dragon's Descent (Rare), and Dragoon's Footwork (Epic). It had been a toss-up between Dragon's Descent and Pierce the Sky, but ultimately, Vess had wanted to end the battles she fought. End them decisively and with conviction. Her new Body was built upon the bones of her Pristine Might Body, adding explosive power to her limbs, specifically her legs. With her newly Tempered Body, her ability to leap and maneuver was greatly enhanced, the true hallmark of the Dragoons.

She'd been infused with a bottomless energy since then, while the Hand put her through her paces. They'd still be training now, had he not got wind of Zara's proposed Chanter lessons. Vess shook her head in annoyance, watching as Darius led both Cal and Zara away into another room while talking in that maddeningly slow manner of his; likely berating them for having the gall to teach the Heir of Pax'Vrell anything.

"Stupid man," she sighed, not for the first time. The Hand was strong, well into Adept Tier, and he frightened her on many levels. But Vess found being told what to do had grown thoroughly stale. It was a crutch she no longer needed; she just had to convince Darius...and her father.

Turning from that particularly impossible thought, Vess regarded the Gauntlet again. It was impressive, though not as advanced as some of the better-scripted equipment the Guild owned. Used to own, she corrected herself. It is all crushed in the rubble now.

Racing and dodging through the course now was a familiar figure in tattered tunic and trousers, crackling with hints of lightning. Felix flipped over a low beam, reorienting on a vertical surface for an instant before rebounding onto a taller beam that kept swinging toward the next section. He barely seemed to be breathing hard.

"Close your mouth, you're getting drool on the floor."

Vess yelped in surprise, turning to find Evie's face level with her own. And upside down. She looked up and saw the irrepressible girl was half-wrapped in a flowering vine that extended all the way up to the ceiling.

"Evie!" Vess admonished. "What are you doing?"

"Just watching a noble lady go all gooey for our friend," Evie jabbed back, her wide grin full of mischief. "C'mon. The view is better up here."

The little monster spun her body and climbed back up the vine fast, like a Mana Vole zipping along a tree. Torn between annoyance and amusement, Vess gathered herself and leaped. She rose rapidly, nearly passing Evie before grabbing hold of the vine and hauling herself up the rest of the way. Even still, Evie was sitting atop the thick wooden rafter well before Vess clambered up over the edge.

"That's a bit of a climb," Vess said, though she barely felt out of breath at all. Her Journeyman Body certainly helped. "Why are you up here?"

"I come up here a lot, especially when I need to think," Evie said, gesturing below toward the room Darius and Cal had entered. "Cal said I couldn't stick around and listen to Felix's debriefing. Said I 'needed my rest' and to 'stay out of trouble for once in my life.' Twin's teeth! It's like she doesn't even know me!"

Vess let out a soft, tinkling laugh. "I'm sure she knows exactly who she's dealing with; you think she can't sense you up here?"

"You didn't," Evie countered.

"I'm not a Perception-focused treasure hunter, either," Vess pointed out. "Did you get to hear what he said? Felix?"

"Oh yeah, most of it," Evie drummed her fingers along the four foot wide beam, idly kicking her legs below. "Nothing special, really. This is the show."

Vess turned and watched as Felix wove between whirling blades, his shirt taking the brunt of the damage as the edged weapons sliced at him. Pieces of his tunic flew free, and Vess blushed and looked away. "Ahem. Is this really what you've been doing?"

"Eh, more or less. I thought about trainin' but, honestly, I'm bone tired," Evie leaned back on her hands, still kicking her legs out into the thin air.

"I can understand that. How're you feeling?"

"Good enough, I suppose. Portia fussed with me about as much as Cal did, sticking me with all her contraptions and salves." Evie tapped her hip, hidden under her loose linen blouse and trousers. It was rare for Evie to forgo her leathers, but Vess supposed nearly losing her legs was one of those times. "They had to scrap my armor. A real shame. I'd just gotten it broken in."

"Do you have a new set?" Vess asked, her eyes drawn again down to Felix's lithe shape. "I might be able to get something of mine tailored—"

"Nah, we got a new pair of smiths here, apparently. The Coldfire Forge set up shop yesterday. I'm sure I can get somethin' from them." Evie shrugged. "Why're you here, anyway? I thought your Handyman was putting you through your paces." Evie waggled her eyebrows at her.

"Gross, Evie," Vess made a face. "No, he interrupted our training when he learned about Zara's Chanter training later today. Now he's off meeting with her and Cal."

"Talk about gross. Sounds like a room full of opinions I'd rather not hear." Evie conjured a dagger from somewhere and began digging at the beam. The divot she'd already created was quite deep. "What's your plan, Vess?"

"My plan?"

"Yeah, after all this. The Domain, Guild destroyed, city demolished, monsters run amok," Evie stabbed at the beam with each event listed. "Now we gotta, what, survive among the chaos?"

Vess watched her friend clench her jaw and take a deep, steadying breath. She wanted to answer, but the heiress had a feeling Evie wasn't exactly done.

"And what about my friends? You and Felix and Cal. What if the Revenants overrun us? I've heard the reports, ya know? There's thousands out there. No one knows why or how, 'cept us, kinda. And Atar and Alister are still hurt over in Portia's area!" Evie stabbed down hard into the wooden beam. The dagger sank more than halfway. "I just feel...I dunno. Helpless, maybe."

"I understand. I do." Vess sighed. "I look at the people out there and wonder, what more could we do? We are just two, and an entire city is falling. Had I my father's forces, we could make short work of it and turn things to right again...but I do not have soldiers and healers. We have us, you and me, Felix and Cal, Harn, and all the rest. Even Atar."

Evie snorted. Vess put a hand on her friend's shoulder.

"We are strong, but we can be stronger. Perhaps we can't save the whole city, but we've got plenty of people here, right now, who need our help. Why don't we get to it, then?"

Evie put her own hand over Vess' and gave a firm, single nod.

"I can do that."

Then she jumped off the beam.

* * *

Lumber came swinging at Felix, a polished red wood studded with low metal spikes. Much of the Gauntlet seemed designed to swing at a person, which Felix found pushed his Physical Stats to the limit.

A quick perusal of the sigils had granted him a fast and dirty understanding of its arrays. The surface level, at least. Despite Tempering his Theurgist of the Rise, Felix realized he had far from a complete picture. He could tell there was far more going on under layers of scripted workings that he simply couldn't comprehend. The level of detail was astounding, easily surpassing the workings of the Envoy in complexity if not power. The gist of it was that somehow the magical training course adapted to his movements and speed, piling on more and more pressure.

Which meant he had to move faster than it adapted.

Reign of Vellus!

Tempered, it was no longer a messy wave of power that he had to brute force into shape. It became almost surgical. Potent and intense in a way that was hard to describe, but each time it released, Felix felt a hard echo in his gut. Electricity was still a component, but it was less erratic, more purposeful.

A concentrated bolt of blue lightning roared from his outstretched hand, sending reverberations through his own core at the shock of it. The power hit the descending lumber and shattered it, sending the bottom half ricocheting out of the Gauntlet and into the metallic wall of the warehouse. It was glorious.

Except the top half was still coming.

"UFFHHK!" Felix took the hit to the gut and was launched out the opposite side of the Gauntlet. He hit the ground hard, but managed to turn his rapid descent into a series of energy-softening rolls. Dizzy and injured, he fetched back onto all fours nearly sixty feet away.

"Shit, ulp—" He clenched his guts, preventing a rush of bile from leaping from his throat. He was partially successful. "That didn't go as planned."

He laid down for a second, letting his muscles relax for just a little bit. The stone flooring beyond the training areas wasn't exactly comfortable, but everything hurt on him, so it didn't really make a difference.

The Song of Absolution is level 56!

That made sense.

New Quest!

That, however, was a surprise.

He sat up. It had been quite a while since he'd seen a new quest pop up, at least ones that weren't of the hidden variety.

ERROR...

Lost Race Detected...

Adjusting Quest...

Felix rolled his eyes and waited for the gut punch.

The Proving!

You have been tested in the fires of battle, Apprentice! Slowly, you are being forged into a pupil worthy of the Titles you bear. Can you prove you deserve it? Raise five spells, Rare or better, to Adept Tier. Show us what you’ve got.

Rewards: Title, Variable

Felix blinked at the wording. His System messages had varied between staid and amusing throughout his time on the Continent, and he'd never really figured out why. In the beginning he'd entertained the thought that someone was sending him these messages, some person controlling the System itself. But that seemed, if not impossible, extremely far fetched.

Probably some Grand Harmony nonsense, he mused before abandoning that line of thinking. It was pointless. Instead, he focused upon the quest itself.

Adept Tier, huh? That's not too bad. His last spell quest had been to get five spells to Apprentice Tier, netting him a Rare Title and unlocking two of his Harmonic Stats. Adept Tier was far away, but it was something to work toward.

Speaking of working toward, Felix still had a few open quests. He hadn't given either of them any thought in recent weeks. He pulled them up.

Active Quests

Home Sweet Home! 3 of 5 Threats Eliminated

Shrines of the Broken! 1 of 7 Shrines Found

The Proving! 0 of 5 Spells To Adept Tier

He hadn't gone over these with the others. Mostly because he wasn't sure how pertinent it was...and also because something told him to keep the Nym Temple a secret. Nothing more than a gut feeling, really.

He wanted to be honest and open with his friends. These past two months had proven that honesty was his best step forward...yet he hesitated. The Shrine Quest he'd likely share with Zara; she probably knew more about the locations of such places. Though, ironically, he was least interested in following that particular thread. With Vellus stepping into his dreams now to deliver cryptic and frankly terrifying warnings about the gods, Felix's theological interest had plummeted even further than before. Still, the Broken Path was a promising avenue toward strength, seeing as it contained the First Threshold.

Home Sweet Home, however, promised no such power. He planned to keep that in his back pocket, for now.

Home Sweet Home!

You have found a safe place in the wild Foglands, an ancient Temple long thought lost. You are charged with securing your ancestors' Temple from all threats. Be wary, young Nym for your trials have just begun.

3 of 5 Threats Eliminated

Reward: Title, Home, Variable

He'd made decent progress on that one, though Felix doubted he'd have a reason to head back into the Foglands. Why would he? He'd been after civilization, and it was East, not to the West. That way laid the Bitter Sea and monsters. And the Dread.

He didn't think he'd ever forget the Dread.

Then again, having a place to call his own, a safe place, that was increasingly appealing to him. Safe, that is, if he could rid himself of the Fogland's pests.

Home Sweet Home! 3 of 5 Threats Eliminated

Threats:

Seven Legged Orit

The Archon

The Risi

The Unending Maw

Unknown

Of the five "threats" he had to eliminate, the Archon was predominant, but there was space for more. Only one more, as to his surprise, the Maw was listed as one of the "threats," and it was crossed out from the list.

Not sure if I can find a better argument that it's truly gone, he thought, looking at the slashed out name. I did it. I really did it.

Ruby embers flashed in his Mind's eye, little particles that clung to his Spirit like magical barnacles. The Maw was gone, but its power remained in him and in the Revenants that were slowly flooding the city. A pang of Hunger rippled through him, emanating from the dark hollow in his core ring.

He wouldn't feel truly free until all the Revenants were gone, too.

Motion flitted against his Perception, and Felix felt rather than saw a vibrantly green rope drop from the ceiling several paces behind him. Vine, he corrected. One of Portia’s, I think.

A figure in flexible steel armor slid down nearly soundlessly, her landing nothing more than a faint tapping on the stone. A second figure, far quieter than the first, alighted next to her as if nearly weightless.

"Were you guys up in the rafters this whole time?" He asked without turning.

Evie laughed. "Damn!"

"I told you he would sense us," Vess chided her. The both of them walked around until they stood before Felix. "You owe me two stone."

"Yeah yeah," Evie said, plopping down into a cross-legged seated position. Her Agility and perhaps some sort of Skill made her every movement almost liquid-like. Evie didn't walk, she flowed. "Cal sent me away after you got done screamin' your head off. Said they 'had important things to discuss.' Like I'm not part of the team or somethin'."

"So you crept onto the ceiling and eavesdropped," Felix said.

"Well, yeah," Evie grinned. "Cal may be the boss, but she's not my mom. I go where I please, damn it."

Vess sat as well, and while her movements weren't as fluid as Evie's, it was somehow more graceful. As if everything she did was purposeful and intentional. No one could make Vessilia Dayne do a thing she did not set out to do. "I missed all of it. My minder has had me on a particularly short leash."

"The Hand, right?" Felix asked and got a tight nod in response. "I'll tell you the rest later, maybe when your minder isn't around."

Vess smiled. It was...distracting. Her teeth were as white as anyone who had Tempered into Apprentice Tier, but her skin seemed even smoother and more glowing than usual. Felix snapped his fingers. "Did you Temper your Body?"

Vess' smile brightened, if that were possible. "I did! You can tell?"

"Yeah, you're—I used my evolved Analyze," he lied, not entirely knowing why he was doing so. He looked at Evie and ignored her smirk. "I assume you didn't come down here just to talk about me getting my butt kicked by the Gauntlet. What's going on?"

"We, Vess and me, wanted to do somethin' for the camp. Since you don't have that Chanter trainin' ‘til later, I figured you'd want to help."

"Uh, I had planned on training until later this afternoon. I've got some kinks I need to iron out, and—"

"What, you want to get beat up by the Gauntlet again?" Evie asked, arching her brow. "You can practice your Mana Skills in camp. I'm sure there's plenty to accomplish if we put our minds to it. Flexibility training, Cal calls it. Using your Skills in nonstandard ways."

Felix tilted his head and stuck out his lip in thought. It wasn't a bad idea. Plus, he could help fix the wall and the courtyard, and maybe...

"Yeah, okay. I'm in."

Felix should have said yes sooner. Vess' dimpled smile was a pretty good reward.

CHAPTER TEN

Felix secured some replacement clothes, similar to the natural ivory and taupe color of Evie's own getup. Felix had asked her about her armor, but she'd just muttered something about it being ruined, and a new set was being made. Apparently, Rafny had made it back and was doing some work on new equipment for people.

I never did get back to them about armor, did I? Felix had wanted to get some armor since he got into town, but one thing or another kept it off the table for him. Now, with the unnatural armor provided by his Sovereign of Flesh, did he even bother? He figured he'd check, at the very least.

He'd left his Khellish tunic and trousers near Pit. The enchantments on them would use ambient Mana to repair them eventually.

Outside the warehouse, it was pushing toward midday. His Tempering and Gauntlet attempts had taken up more time than he had figured, yet Felix didn't feel a bit tired. Quite the opposite, as those occasional surges through his core kept jolting his nerves into high alert, as if he'd injected a bit of adrenaline each time. So, he tried to keep himself even-keeled as they walked out into the glaring summer day.

It was hot. Hotter by far than Felix had experienced on the Continent, comparable to some of the worst days in July back home. Regardless, people rushed to and fro outside, intent on their errands and tasks. It almost felt normal if he only ignored the looks of gaunt dismay and desperation everyone wore. A dangerous undercurrent thrummed through everything, a rapid tattoo of rising anxiety Felix sensed through his Affinity stat. He gasped.

"What? Felix, are you alright?"

"Yeah, I," Felix took a breath and tried to shrug off the sensation. It took him two more attempts before his attention shifted. "Yeah. I'm fine."

"You sure? Cuz you're sweating. Like a lot," Evie pointed out.

Felix didn't answer, just kept walking out into the broken cobbles of what was being called the courtyard. Central between the three main warehouses, this was the area protected the most by the trash wall that had been erected from stray debris. People were everywhere, many of them carrying bulging sacks that likely were all their worldly possessions, most with children of varying ages. Felix had recognized a few when he'd arrived, even more who rang a familiar bell of recognition in his Mind. His perfect recall matched their faces to ones he'd seen in the Dust, Wall, even the Crafters Quarter.

A long way to go during a monster attack, he thought, pairing a few faces to ones he'd seen reveling back the night of the clandestine chorister gathering. How'd they end up way over here?

The city of Haarwatch was divided into four Quarters. The northernmost was the Dust, home to those that labored in the nearby mines or on the Ianus River docks that snaked through the city. It was the poorest Quarter, but also the most heavily populated; citizens lived piled atop one another in towering, ramshackle tenements, and ill-repaired multi-generational homes.

To the west was the Wall Quarter, which was mostly weapon and armor shops, taverns, and the ubiquitous Wall, a magical construct made of mystical metal and heavily enchanted in some way. The south had the Crafters Quarter, where most of the skilled craftsmen in the city dwelled, your wainwrights and tailors and artists, as well as many merchants. Finally, the Sunrise Quarter was to the east, filled predominantly with minor nobility. When the Eyrie fell, it fell toward the Crafters and Wall Quarters, doing heavy damage to those parts of the city and likely killing more than the Revenants had.

So far.

Water was being hauled across the crooked cobbles and the sounds of disorganized shouts and cries came from all over. It was a mess of flesh and noise and heat and smell. Evie came up behind him and nudged his arm.

"So how'd you wanna help?" Evie asked. "I think there's lots that needs to be done, but I'm not keen on running errands for the smiths or anythin'."

"I figured we could run patrols or train people or, I dunno," Felix shook his head. "I'm not sure what the camp needs, other than more weapons, more fighters, and better walls."

"Then let's start there," Vess said. She gently tugged on both of their shoulders, and they were swept along behind her as people hurried to get out of the heiress' way. She gave off an aura of nobility, somehow, intangible and not at all like an aura of power. It was an aura of attitude. Vess was in charge, and apparently people started to recognize that.

She led them toward the debris mound that acted as their impromptu wall. "We need to flag down whoever is captain of the guard here."

"Cal's inside, so that means Bodie," Evie offered, already panning the area for the man. "There he is."

It was easy enough to find him, as he was often head and shoulders taller than most Humans and half again as wide. He stood atop one of the mounds and was speaking in low tones to a group of barely armored volunteers.

More Untempered folk, looking to fight, Felix mused. Why aren't they huddling in the camp where it's safer? He looked at the shoddy wall again. Relatively safer.

"Hey! Bodie!" Evie shouted, startling Felix and causing a crowd of people to turn and stare at her. "We need to talk to you!"

Evie looked back and met Felix and Vess' stares. "What? It's easier this way."

Bodie looked up and spotted them. He gave Evie a wide smile and jumped straight up into the air. Well, straight up wasn't quite right. It was more of an angle, and his parabolic arc had him land before them with a muffled thud.

Bodie was a big guy, easily six and a half feet tall, with short, curly hair and built like a wall. He wore the usual half-plate and leather armor Guilders preferred, a mishmash of styles more concerned with protection than looks. A huge mace hung at his hip, lightly enchanted according to Felix's Eye, but he bore no other weapons, aside from a small dagger across his chestplate. Felix had sparred against him once or twice, and his body still remembered some of the bruises.

Behind him, the dirt wall he'd leaped from half crumbled under the force of his jump. Bodie winced before brightening again.

"Evie! And your friends, too! Glad to see you all. Especially you, Felix," Bodie rumbled with a barely concealed laugh. "You won me quite a few crowns, coming back when you did."

"So I keep hearing. People were really betting on me living or dying?" Felix asked.

"Some maybe," Bodie laughed. "But mine was on when you'd come back." He clapped Felix on the back before grunting and grinning even harder. Felix had barely moved.

"Bodie, we wanna help around here. What've you got for us?" Evie asked.

The large warrior fingered his dark chin and lowered his voice. "I could always use more patrols. The Untempered here are enthusiastic but...let's say I only have so many skilled warriors to babysit them."

They all nodded. Felix had seen that first hand with Yan and his team. "I'm up for patrol duty, but...I was thinking I could do something for the camp."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Your wall—" Felix started, grasping for the words.

"It's shit," Evie said. "You just knocked it over by jumping too hard."

Vess smacked her shoulder, but Bodie only chuckled with a grim sort of humor. "It needs improving, that's the truth. Problem is, none of us are engineers, and the only one with a good shaping talent is some Untempered Dwarf lady. She can't use it more than a few seconds, let alone long enough to make anything proper."

Felix nodded slowly. "Well, I have Stone Shaping nearly to Journeyman. I think I could help with that."

"Can you make stone blocks?" Bodie asked, suddenly excited.

"Yeah, I think so. Never tried before, but I made a boat once. How hard could a few blocks be?" Felix said.

Bodie clapped his big hands together and grinned. "That's the best news I've had today. I'll clear the way and let you know where to start." He took off with another leap.

"See? Easy enough to help," Vess said with a smile.

"Why's he jumping around?" Felix asked. Evie snorted.

"Low Agility, high Strength. Bodie can't run for beans, but he's strong. Jumping's faster."

In a few short minutes, the area was cleared of patrolling guards. Unfortunately, that meant a whole lot of people had stopped what they were doing and were now watching them. Felix felt his skin crawl under their gazes, like there was an extra heat in the air entirely separate from the noonday sun.

"Just ignore ‘em," Evie muttered.

"Sure. They're not staring at you like you've grown an extra head, though."

"It's just overworked rumors," Evie said. "People're all in a tizzy over, uh, everythin'."

"She is right," Vess added. "Once they get used to you, the attention will fade."

"Yeah, just try not to do anythin' too flashy," Evie suggested.

Bodie walked over to them and gestured toward the packed earth of the wall. "You've got the floor, Felix. Do what you can, and my people can take it from there."

Felix nodded and took a steadying breath. The extra attention on him was a bit more unnerving than he had anticipated, but he tried to shrug it off as he flared his Manavision. Weaving threads of vibrating light burst into being all around him. The stone, the dirt, the people, the air itself; everything was Mana, everything was fed by it and gave it off in some measure. Zara called it the Grand Harmony, and she wasn't wrong, as a rousing chorus of infinite complexity unfurled the further he focused...but he pulled back. He wasn't here for that.

Refocusing, Felix stared down at the earthen mound they had constructed. It quivered with dusty-brown earth Mana, interspersed with smoky black shadow and tiny threads of green-gold life Mana denoting worms and insects. Below that, however, there were silver-gray flashes of metal Mana. A rough-hewn framework sat beneath the earthen mounds, likely giving them support and strength.

"Bodie, do you mind if I clear the debris?" Felix asked.

"Clear it?" Bodie nodded at his people, who made sure to get out of the way. They did so, but several gave nervous glances outside the walls, perhaps worried that something would attack. "How're you gonna do that?"

"Not sure. Let's find out together."

Making sure one last time that everyone was clear, Felix flared his old favorite.

Reign of Vellus!

Like before, the Mana for its use surged through his channels with such speed and potency that it felt like trails of fire tore through him. Unlike before, Felix flared his Will and attempted to alter the pattern of the Skill; he wanted to wipe out a large section instead of concentrating the strike. But the Skill fought back. Rippling vibrations shook his core, a kick almost like shooting a rifle, and the unchanged Skill manifested from his outstretched hand.

And consumed the earthen mound in blue light.

That same roar shook the air, and a ten-foot-wide section of the impromptu wall was hurled into the distance. Pulverized dirt and twisted hunks of metal launched at speed nearly forty feet, a few of the shards going so far as to stick into the sides of the nearest buildings.

Silence reigned.

"Ah, that was too much, I think," Felix managed through his suddenly dry mouth. The ground before him had been leveled almost completely. Felix thought he could see a few cobbles torn up, too. Whoops.

Before he could think about all of the people now staring at him, Felix dove back into his core and reached for his next spell. It was almost effortless, as he'd used Stone Shaping so much it felt as much a part of him as his arm or leg. Visualizing the Skill, pulling its elaborate pattern up out of his core, Felix sounded its length. Mana tightened and twisted, flowing through his channels with a now-familiar burning intensity.

Stone Shaping!

A six-foot-square section of the ground before the wall went jelly, turning into a thick sludge of competing earth tones. With a flare of his Will and Mana, streams of the sludge flowed up and out of the newly formed pit, congealing slowly into a roughly shaped block that jiggled with each additional layer. It was a relatively quick process, though far longer than a kinetic blast, and in only three minutes, a new giant block had formed. The composite matrix of cobbles, bedrock, and other varied stone beneath the road appeared quite sturdy, even if it was ugly as hell. Browns and dirty yellows and a few dark greens dotted the six-foot-square block, and if you focused, you could pick out where the stones got fused together by his Skill.

"Whew, ok. There's one," Felix panted. The Skill left him as out of breath as the Gauntlet, and Felix found himself wishing for a chair. "Gimme a second on the next."

More silence greeted his words, and when Felix looked around, he saw Bodie's flabbergasted face.

"I-I thought you were gonna make some bricks," he admitted. "This is...amazing."

Oh, dang, Felix froze. Bricks would've been way easier.

"Impressive, Felix," Vess said. "I have seen you make a few such things, but I, too, thought you were going to make bricks. Is this to make it easier for the camp? I admit it would have been challenging to lay and cure brickwork while being attacked by monsters. This will begin to protect us immediately." She nodded in appreciation.

"I thought I said 'don't be flashy,'" Evie said from his other side. "Now you got all your admirers aflutter."

Felix tried not to look, he really did, but that comment had him curious. He glanced to the sides and saw an increasing number of Untempered folk all watching him. Some had wide eyes and scared expressions, but most of them were smiling. Their emotions scratched at him, and though Felix denied his Affinity, he could still sense a surge of giddy relief that appeared to pass through them in a wave. He wondered if it was him or the wall that made them feel better.

"Felix. Can you do it again?" Bodie asked him as he walked back from the block. His face was serious and quite earnest. Felix smiled at the man and shrugged.

"It'll take a while, but sure. Let's do it."

* * *

Nearly three hours later, they'd finished the first stretch of wall. The composite stone was strong, though he doubted it would hold up long against a Revenant's claws. His own would probably shred it like paper.

Still. He'd easily placed two hundred blocks, each one fit snugly against each other. That had taken some doing, especially when the line of the wall curved. As he'd progressed, the blocks had become more and more regular and refined. The large chunks of composite materials had shrunk until they were simple specks in the overall makeup of the blocks, and Felix knew in his gut that such a thing made them stronger.

Stone Shaping is level 41!

Practice makes perfect, he mused, though he felt the tiniest flash of annoyance. All that and only a single level? He had a feeling moving through Journeyman Tier was going to be tough.

Collapsing onto a stool someone had gotten for him, Felix let his Meditation sooth him and steady his exhausted breathing. Even with his Stamina and Mana regeneration rates, the amount of work involved had him wrung out.

They had only managed to lay out the first line of stone blocks, completely replacing the earthen mound. It was not finished, but it allowed them to start on another project. A trench was being dug out, using the gouged pits Felix left after stealing the stone beneath the road. They were being expanded and filled with sharpened stakes. A small Dwarven woman had appeared an hour back and was helping them shape the stakes. She appeared to have a similar stone Skill, if not nearly as advanced as his. Evie and Vess had helped, too, using their Skills to break stone and widen the trench as best they could.

Other people soon joined in on the effort, breaking down the cobbled streets with hammers and picks and forming teams to haul the stone out. Felix had almost forgotten that many in the camp had mined for a living. They were fast and efficient, and soon the six-feet-tall wall had become twelve feet tall and fronted by a wide, slanting trench. Now, at least part of their camp was more easily defended.

At some point, Yan had come out with several stout casks and started passing around drinks. It was ale of some variety, rough and sour-smelling, for all that the workers downed it with relish. Felix passed in favor of several pints of water. He still had several lengths of wall to do yet, and wanted to keep a clear head for that and for whatever his Chanter training would entail. Zara still hadn't come and found him yet, so he figured she wasn't yet ready for him. She hadn't given a time, so much as a vague indication of 'later,' so Felix couldn't do anything except make himself useful.

Felix stood up and Eyed the wall.

Name: Wall of the Blue-Eyed Fiend

Type: Structure (Rough-Hewn)

Lore: Built almost solely by the magic of the Blue-Eyed Fiend, this is a wall meant to protect innocent life.

Ugh, he groaned. The goddamn wall was named after him. No, not me. My folk hero persona.

Honestly, it was flattering that so many looked up to him, but Felix couldn't escape the uncomfortable horror of it. Who was he to be idolized? He could barely save himself, most days. But there was nothing to do about it, so he rubbed his eyes and did some more thinking.

The wall could use some arrays worked into it, maybe defensive and offensive arrays to help protect people. The problem with that, however, was that Felix was still very much a beginner when it came to sigil knowledge. The ones he'd slapped together in the Domain were roughshod and temporary, but this would require more finesse and detail than he could manage. He had a few inklings of how he might have gone about it, but that was System-assisted knowledge; it was unfortunately not paired with a working understanding of sigaldry theory. In order to do it, Felix either needed a tutor or a mess load of books.

Maybe Zara has more on the subject. He'd read all that she'd had in her parlor, the parlor in the house that had been thoroughly demolished by the Inquisition. That made it two libraries she owned that Felix had messed up, if he included her bookstore in town. Maybe finding a tutor would be easier, he thought with a wince.

As he kept walking back toward the beginning of the wall section, Felix felt...something in the air. Ignoring the whispering spectators and the constant cross-stream of hustling folk, Felix felt his Perception snag on a rough sign posted above one of the smaller warehouses. Healer's Ward, the sign said.

"Have a lot of people been injured by the monster attacks?" he asked a nearby Goblin who had gathered a pile of wood and metal scrap to himself. He was leaning against one of the ale barrels and tilting his large head to look at the sky. The clouds had retreated in patches, revealing a deep, sapphire blue.

"Huh? Oh! Me? You're asking me?" The Goblin jolted and nearly fell over. "Um, ah, yes. People get hurt all the time, but the Healer's Ward is full-up of sick folks. You ah, you wanna buy some metal scrap? Smith’ll take it for a few stone, but I can’t carry it." He smacked his leg, which was splinted from the knee down.

"Sorry, no thanks. Sick with what?" Felix hadn't really heard of sickness being an issue in the Continent. Everyone had potions, and a Vitality stat, and magic for god's sake.

"I dunno. Somethin' about the monsters and how they're so dangerous, is all I know. It's been hittin' us Untempered more than others, seein' as we don't have any fancy constitutions."

Felix started walking toward it. "Thanks. I appreciate it."

"Anytime! Just uh, just remember ol Noggin when you go out fightin'! I could use some more scraps to sell!"

Felix didn't bother to answer. That something in the air was growing stronger the closer he drew to the makeshift hospital. It had been built up against one of the larger warehouses and was constructed in much the same way, with overlapping corrugated metal plates covering the walls and roof. Just outside the doors, there were two large Orcs in leather armor holding spears. They ignored him as he walked through the door.

Inside, it was relatively large, perhaps fifty feet wide by two hundred feet long. Improvised cots had been set up down the length of it, rows deep. Some were actual cots and others were wooden pallets or scavenged trestle tables; anything to keep patients lying flat and still. There had to be two hundred beds, and each one was full.

Light groans and whimpers filled the air, and that feeling Felix had sensed pulsed powerfully. His Affinity tried to pull the patients' emotional state from them, but he repressed it; Felix could imagine none of them were feeling great. Instead, he focused on the heat in the air, separate entirely from the baking summer warmth outside. It was intensely familiar, almost exactly like the air in the Domain.

Are the Revenants creating this?

All around him, people were lying wrapped in bandages and covered with red-irritated skin and weeping sores. Similar symptoms to what he'd seen before on Alister and Atar, but way worse. Felix stepped closer to the nearest patient. He could feel the corrosive Mana pouring off of them, like body heat turned up to eleven.

Not just the Revenants, then. Their victims are putting it out, too.

He didn't have to be a mathematician to know that was bad. Given the number of Revenants out there and the number of victims there likely were, it was only a matter of time before the whole city was inundated in this stuff.

"Hey, what are you doing?"

Felix looked up and saw a tall, blond woman with a pixie haircut and flowing green and white robes. A series of belts and sashes crossed her waist and torso, each filled with pouches and pockets. She hustled across the ward until they met eyes, and recognition flashed across her features.

"Oh," Portia said and slowed down to a walk, still heading toward him. "It's you."

"Sorry, hi. I don't know if we were ever really introduced. I'm Felix."

"I'm aware," she said as she crossed the distance and gestured for him to follow her. She led them toward a small office he'd missed as he walked in.

"Portia. I was...I was wondering if I could help, somehow."

"Help? I appreciate the sentiment, but I've plenty of help as it is." Felix followed, discovering a small wooden table for a desk and two rickety chairs. She sat with visible relief. "All we can do for these people is keep them clean, dry, and reapply my ointments and salves whenever I can."

Portia let out a frustrated sigh. "What I need is more yarrow and flitweed, or kelaat root and silverleaf. Anything to keep these people from the edge."

"You're short on supplies?" Felix asked.

"Strapped for them. The supply chain was bad enough when the Inquisition was blockading the Sunrise Gate, but now there's nothing." Portia ran her hands through her short hair and groaned. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be burdening someone else with this."

"Hey, no, I get it," Felix said. "This is bad. How do we get more supplies?"

"Short of hunting the ruins of the various markets around town, I don't know," Portia said. "Even if we could get them, it's just a stopgap. Harn told us how the Domain was affecting people, how it affected your friends. We just don't have any idea how to reverse it."

Felix straightened like he'd been prodded with a burning poker. "My friends?"

"Yes—you didn't know? I thought-" Portia stopped herself and cursed. "Of course not. I'm sorry. Atar V'as and Lord Alister Knacht have been my patients ever since Harn dragged them, unconscious, out of the Domain. They haven't woken since."

CHAPTER ELEVEN

"Here they are," Portia said.

She had led him to a pair of cots in the rear of the Healer's Ward. Both of the patients were heavily bandaged. Felix could make out their faces well enough, even if he didn't have his Voracious Eye to identify them.

"If you need me, I'll be making more salves," Portia said in parting, clearly intending to leave him to his...his whatever. Was it grief? Or guilt?

Felix could sense a large portion of the Maw in their forms, more than twice as much as any of the other patients. According to Portia, they were the only Tempered people who had been afflicted, and they were among the worst off. The Maw's influence was clearly twisting their flesh. Small patches of rust-red scales had formed where the rash once blighted their skin, and Atar's teeth were even turning a familiar shade of yellow-ivory. They even seemed sharper.

Vess found him there, leaning over their bodies, inspecting them with all of his senses. "We'd wondered where you went."

"No one told me," Felix said, though there was no anger in his tone. He hadn't been the best of friends with Atar, and he barely knew Alister, but they'd been through a lot together. That meant something, to him at least.

"It all happened so fast…" Vess paused, groping for the right words. "And I suppose it was easier to not mention it. To pretend, for a little bit, that it was not happening."

"This is widespread?"

Vess nodded. "Cal has not told us much, but I overheard the scouts. More and more survivors are being found like this. Not dead but...changing."

Felix frowned. Was this where the surge in Revenants was coming from? How they were making more? But it was happening so slowly, surely it couldn't be bolstering their numbers by that much. There was a piece they were missing. Yet that didn't change the fact that people were being changed, which was perhaps more horrifying to Felix than others. He'd only narrowly avoided that fate himself, directly at the hands of the Maw. Even still, he'd been transformed.

The remnants of the Maw—so much stronger in both mages—wouldn't stay out of his mind. It was like a nagging toothache he couldn't stop worrying at with his tongue. Each time Felix tried to physically inspect them, it drew him back.

Could I...?

There was only one way to find out.

Ravenous Tithe!

Vess gasped. Small streamers of rust-red vapor suddenly poured from both mages, pulled in a straight line directly into Felix's mouth. But they were only part of it; from the air around them, a multi-hued array of vapor manifested and swirled into him, like a radiant oil spill being sucked down a drain.

When it was over, Felix leaned forward onto his knees. Fresh sweat beaded on his brow. His breath came in small gasps that he couldn't quite control.

"What was that? Did you use your—"

"Yeah," Felix managed. He stood up, but the storm in his gut had grown a touch wild again. He hadn't meant to pull in the ambient Mana like that. The feeling stabilized after his greedy core sucked up much of the loose Mana he'd ingested. "I was trying to get the corruption out of them. I-I think I did."

"I think you have done more than that," Vess said with wonder on her face. "Look."

The groans around them had lessened. Carefully, Felix opened up his Affinity again. While the majority of the room was still afflicted with pain and fear, a few nearby had drifted off into a comfortable sleep. Not completely free of either, merely lessened enough for exhaustion to take hold.

Ravenous Tithe!

Felix tried to take more, whether from the patients around him or the mages. But nothing more was taken. He could still feel bits of it coiling within his friends, but it wasn't enough to latch onto, and the same went for the other patients. All of them hadn't reached the point where his Tithe could yank the corruption free.

But what if he leveled his Ravenous Tithe? Would that be enough? He'd already gone over the edge with his Bloodline changing and subsequently fully absorbing the Maw. He was a freaking Primordial now, whatever that meant. Could he make it worse by leveling his Maw-themed Skills?

Sovereign of Flesh, Voracious Eye, and Ravenous Tithe. Three Skills, each with an effect on his Body, Mind, and Spirit. He already had a feeling the motes of ruby power within his core were another source of strength, just waiting to be tapped. It wasn't a question now that he'd thought of it. If he could pull this dangerous affliction out of the air, then he'd do it.

Vess leaned over Atar and checked his neck where the skin had started to look healthy again. The scales had vanished, but a flaky rash had remained. She looked at Felix in surprise. "It reversed the process, Felix. Is it akin to taking their sickness?"

"Something like that. The corrosive Mana that's hurting them has no effect on me, not anymore. Apparently, I can pull it out of the air too, but only if it's concentrated enough." Felix gestured helplessly to the patients moaning all around them. "I can't do anything for them. Not yet."

Portia rushed out from her office. "What happened?" She put a hand into the air and swirled it, activating some sort of Skill. Visible Mana vapor coalesced around her limb, and she pulled it down to inspect it. "There's less foul Mana in the air. What did you do?"

She froze when Felix explained it was the effect of a Skill. The look she gave him was intense, and Felix wasn’t sure if she was going to shake him, kiss him, or both at once. A familiar refrain spilled from her lips.

"C—can you do it again?"

* * *

Felix moved through the room for the ninth time, but finally was able to pull nothing else from the air. He had been able to pull more from the air than the bodies, as the corrosive Mana mixed freely with the air, light, and miscellaneous other Mana around them. Adhering to one another, he took it all in. Even the normal ambient Mana was gone, and the world seemed almost inert to his Manasight.

With enough applications, I can drain an area dry. Good to know. He could use that to stop enchanted equipment from recharging, maybe. Or...or he could stop enemies from regenerating their Mana. He grinned. Yeah. That's useful.

A downside, apart from how long it would take to drain an area, was that it affected him, too. Primordial Essence lingered, and his Mana dropped with each activation. The nebula of Essence had returned, though much of it was directly Mana vapor which he absorbed back into his core with little effort. The vapor disappeared almost immediately into the abyss within his core ring, while the Essence cloud lingered on like a roiling storm. Essence, whatever it was, seemed somehow distinct from Mana.

More questions for Zara.

Felix took a breath as he completed his last circuit. "That's about all I can do here, Portia."

"Siva's grace," Portia was once again checking a collection of congealed Mana vapor around her arm, but there were only a few bare flickers of color. She had said it was a Common Skill called Mana Gauge used by many academics interested in the etheric arts. "The ambient Mana is just...gone. Where do you put it all? Why aren't you exploding from the pressure and combating elements?"

Felix ignored the spinning circle of hungry darkness in his core and gave Portia a half-smile and a shrug. "It's a good Skill."

"That's not really the point—"

"He is not at liberty to say, Portia," Vess interrupted smoothly, giving the agitated healer a brilliant smile. It was a smile he hadn't seen from her before, an easy kindness that simultaneously kept its hand on the hilt of a sword. "Let it lie at that."

Portia, either not registering Vess' expression or ignoring it, didn't stop. "You must understand, Felix. If we can replicate what you can do, teach your Skill, then we could help a lot of people."

"I can't teach this one," Felix said helplessly. "Even if I wanted to. But I'll make a point to come around here as often as I can and take care of the build-up."

Portia's face hardened and went a touch cold. "Very well. If that's all you can offer...I will gladly accept what you can do."

She turned and started inspecting her patients again, but swiftly moved to the far end of the ward. Felix sighed and gave Vess a grateful look.

"Thanks."

"You should stand up for yourself more," she said. "You let the others run roughshod over you too often."

"Hm," Felix said, noncommittally. He wasn't exactly in the mood to talk about his flaws. She wasn't wrong but..."If I can help, I should help."

"Not if helping drains you dry or exposes you to backlash," Vess said gently. She gave him a smile, and the devastating dimple returned. "As much as I can tell you hate it, you are a hero to many. A leader. And a leader cannot overextend themselves, or they risk everyone who follows them."

"I'm not a leader or a hero, Vess," Felix scrubbed his hands across his face. His callouses scratched at his skin painfully, but it was an honest sensation. "I just keep getting put in the middle of shit."

"Then take charge. Leaders choose where to go, whether that is into the 'shit' or away from it," Vess said. At some point, she had gotten closer than Felix realized. He could see the variations in the brown of her eyes, like gold shot through dark loam. Her breath was warm and oddly minty against his face. “They will follow you.”

"Follow…? Choices have consequences," Felix said softly, and a thrill of suppressed urges danced along his nerves. "I can’t—"

"Monster!"

"Run! Run!"

Unfettered Volition!

The screams came from outside, and along with it a surge of powerful confusion and anger. It originated in his chest, a burning heat across his Companion bond, almost shoving aside his emotions for Pit’s own. Cursing to himself, Felix activated his movement Skill. Bare thought surged into physical action, and Felix raced to the door of the ward, pausing only to assess the situation. Vess arrived only moments after him, her own figure blurred along the edges.

The courtyard was in chaos. Men and women scattered in all directions, but they were traveling away from the central warehouse and toward the walls, not the other way around. Had the Revenants gotten inside the camp?

"I'll take the high ground and call out targets," Vess nodded at the warehouse.

"I'm going in," Felix said.

Vess grinned. "I assumed so."

Grinning himself, Felix dashed forward, darting around the Untempered laborers that were fleeing the area. Moving at full speed, it appeared as if most people were moving in slow motion, his Agility and Perception working in tandem somehow to feed his Intelligence-strengthened brain information at a far faster rate. It was...extremely cool, if he were being honest.

Felix made it through the crowd and into the widened empty space in seconds, and instantly groaned. He knew why everyone was freaking out.

Pit had woken up.

The now-massive Tenku had apparently freaked out when he'd come out of his slumber, evidenced by the large, jagged hole torn in the side of the metal-sided warehouse. Now he spun in circles, surrounded by poorly armed guards that were shaking in their boots as they leveled spears at him. One of them hung onto a rope that they'd somehow gotten around Pit's wing, and a casual adjustment by Pit yanked the guard from his feet. Pit let out a piteous chirrup, but his enlarged chest distorted the sound into a threatening basso cough.

It was almost funny, were people not threatening his friend's life. Felix could feel his Companion's confusion and worry, but the moment he laid eyes on him, Pit became aware of Felix. He perked up, his triangular ears sticking straight up in excitement.

"Everyone, calm down," Felix shouted, and the guards all looked at him in surprise. One man fell down, surprised to see Felix standing so close by. "He means no harm."

"It's a bleedin' chimera!" One of them shouted back, and Felix noticed that none of the spears were lowered.

"He's a friend. Put down your weapons, or I will do it for you," Felix said, but this time a snarl escaped him. The man on the ground scooted back on all fours, leaving his spear in his haste to flee. The others traded glances with each other, but the spears didn't waver. They were all Untempered, his Eye told him, but Felix wasn't about to take chances with his friend's life.

Pit squawked out a worried greeting and tried to step toward him. One of the guards, a reedy looking boy with big, pointed ears and sharp cheekbones stabbed forward. As if it happened in slow motion, Felix watched as the spear head thrust outward and slid across Pit's feathered throat.

REIGN OF VELLUS!

Felix let the power pour through him but still had the presence of mind not to fire what amounted to a gun into a crowded room. He sounded the Skill's pattern backwards, and the power that left him grabbed at the spear—and everything attached to it—and pulled it toward him. A soundless wave of force spread behind Felix as one after the other, the spears were yanked to his side. Five iron spears clattered uselessly to either side of him, two of which still had guards sprawled next to them.

Felix ignored them all and walked calmly forward. The guards, Untempered and now without weapons, backed away and into the gathering crowd. "Don't touch my Companion. Got it?"

The crowd gasped, and low voices broke out among them. The guards nodded vigorously.

Distance crossed, he held out his hands just as Pit lowered his head and pressed against Felix's own. It was big enough now that it extended from Felix's forehead down to the middle of his chest. A deep rumble vibrated between them, and he stroked Pit's glossy feathers.

"Hey bud. You sleep well?"

Pit chirruped, and words flowed across their bond. I woke. Scared. Where were you?

"Handling some business out here. What's the last thing you remember?" Felix asked softly. Pit responded by huffing a big bellowing breath and sending a collection of sense-memories along their bond. Images of the Ravager King, of tearing through the liminal Void, of trying to help Felix devour the newborn Primordial. The memories were vivid, filled with sight and smell and sound; they took all of a second to relive, however.

Felix blinked his vision back and stared into Pit's much larger golden eyes. "Been through a lot, me and you. Now you've been through a whole building, too."

Pit glanced back at the hole he'd torn through the side of the main warehouse. A little bit of embarrassment filtered across to Felix. Sorry.

"Don't worry about it, bud," Felix frowned at the crowd that had gathered around them. Apparently, their fear had abated, because it was growing again. He spotted many familiar faces, including those who had helped him build the trench and wall, as well as the members of Yan's team.

"I'm only going to say this once," he said, raising his voice so that the entire courtyard could hear him. He heard his tone echo off nearby buildings, like he was on a megaphone. "This is Pit. He's a tenku. A Chimera. He's my friend and my Companion. If you attack him, you're attacking me. Don't."

A soft thud landed behind him, but Felix didn't stop glaring at the crowd. His Perception revealed it to be Vess well before she landed. "That was dramatic."

"Hm," Felix grunted, in a fair impersonation of Harn. "They might not have been able to hurt him, but I don't care. They attack Pit again, and I'll tear this place apart."

"It was not a criticism, Felix," Vess said, placing a hand on his shoulder. Felix hadn't realized how tense he was until her touch sent a wave of relaxation through his arm. It didn't feel like a Skill, just...her.

"Well, aren't you two cozy!" A whip crack voice cut through the crowd as it dispersed. Voices were raised, and the general hubbub of activity had resumed, even though it sounded a bit forced. Vess immediately took her hand off his shoulder as Evie came out of the crowd. She was sweating liberally despite the overcast skies, and she'd gotten a thin, fabric umbrella from somewhere to create some shade for herself. She noticed his gaze and twirled, chain clinking on her shoulder. "Like it? There's a crafter selling her stock down that way. Snagged one of the last ones."

"Interesting." As Evie twirled, Felix saw that the umbrella was painted with some sort of leggy bird catching a snake in flight.

"Interestin' isn't the word I'd choose for someone wasting their limited stipend on frivolity," Cal said in her sharp tone. She, too emerged from the thinning crowd. "Especially when she should be trainin' instead of running around camp."

Evie immediately wilted, and Cal turned her attention toward him and Vess. "My apologies for Pit, Felix. He woke up while we were busy, and the Tin Rank we had watching him...well, they wouldn't have been able to stop him, anyway."

Felix shrugged a single shoulder; he didn't feel angry anymore, just tired. Apparently, they were using the same rank designations as the Guild for the camp-goers. Untempered for the citizens, but anyone who joined up to patrol or fight were Tin Rank. "I should have stayed with him. But now at least people know not to attack him. Can you see to it that the word is spread among the camp? I was hiding Pit before, but I guess I can't avoid that now."

"I think it'll spread just fine on its own," Cal said, wryly. "A tame chimera? In Haarwatch? I expect the whole city'll know before the end of tomorrow."

"I see." Felix eyed his Companion, who ducked his head in shame. "Sorry about the warehouse. I'll see if we can't fix it somehow."

Cal waved him off. "Not the greatest of my concerns. I saw the wall. Impressive. I'll have to bother you to finish the job later."

"Later?"

Cal gave a nod to her left. A few ragged folk were being tended to by Portia. Their bodies were criss-crossed with bloody wounds, though none of them were near death. His Eye even flagged two of them as being Apprentice Tier. "A scouting party came back. We sent them out before dawn to meet up with some folk down at the mines. They were ambushed."

"More Revenants?" Evie asked.

Cal's lips thinned and she shook her head. "Inquisition," she said and put her hands on the hilts of her long knives. "You up for some combat, Felix?"

Hunger roared within him as his core sped up, pushing a flush of Mana through his channels. Felix grinned.

"Yeah. I think I am."

CHAPTER TWELVE

"The scouts reported that the civilians were trapped in the mines proper, along with the people our scouts were sent to collect," Cal said. The press of people had faded, but still a few of her crew surrounded the group to ward off any mundane eavesdroppers. Though, anyone with advanced stealth Skills and a high Perception could easily hear what they discussed, and Cal knew that. If this were truly sensitive information, they would have erected some actual wards.

"And the Inquisition is outside the mines? Just waiting for them to come out?" Felix asked.

"No. After they drove off and nearly killed my people, the bastards were collecting the raw ore and materials that the miners had put together. I'm told they arrived with avum-drawn wagons."

"They are hunting resources," Vess said with a nod. "I am sure the Order forces are drawn as thin as we are; they likely need the source of metal to repair their armaments and equip new fighters."

"I agree," Cal said. "They'll try to occupy the mine and keep the supply comin'. It's what we were gonna do, anyway."

"I've noticed we're running a bit threadbare," Felix said with a glance around him. Cal grunted.

"That's an understatement. We had resources aplenty for our small crew...but nothin' was in the books for nearly a thousand refugees. We've got some crafters to outfit folk, but we need that ore to produce anythin'."

Felix asked a few more questions, but the gist of it was simple. Get rid of the Inquisition and save the miners. When Evie asked if the miners would be captured already, Cal smirked.

"I doubt that. Rory's out there. It's why we knew about the miners in the first place."

Ah, that makes sense. Rory was a Guild trainer, and he'd helped all of them by sticking his neck out when the Guild had ostracized the group. More importantly—to him at least—Rory had helped Felix combine and evolve his first set of Skills, resulting in Unfettered Volition. "So he's keeping them safe for now. What sorta levels are we talking about?"

"Seven Acolytes, all in their twenties, led by two Initiates pushing into their forties. Not a huge problem, but the scouts are positive more will arrive soon, if not already."

"We'll move fast then," Felix said. He turned to Evie and Vess. "You both coming with me?"

"Blind gods, yes. I'm so burnin' bored," Evie said. Cal gave her a worried look, but the treasure hunter flattened it to neutrality. "I'll be fine, Callie. I'm all healed up, mostly."

"I shall keep an eye on her, ma'am," Vess promised. "She will be safe with us."

"Fine. But you watch yourself, girly. If you come back hurt, that'll be it for combat for a while. You understand?" Cal said. Evie nodded absently, already checking her gear. Luckily, she'd gotten that new suit of leather armor during the day, and it fit about as well as her last set. Cal looked at Felix again. "I need you to do two things: one, save the miners and root out the redcloaks. And two, secure as many resources as you can."

"Got it." Felix nodded. They had to get a move on; he wanted to rescue Rory before anything terrible happened.

"We can get a crew together fast, but I've got no mounts. It'd be a trek by foot. I can spare a few..." Cal began, but Felix stopped her.

"We can travel faster on our own, and you can't spare the skilled hands you have," Felix insisted. "I don't want to give those bastards a second longer than we have to. I owe Rory that much, at least."

"You'll be walking into a tough fight," Cal said.

"Nothing new. But I don't plan on fighting, not if we can help it," Felix said. "The four of us can handle it. Is it close?"

"Northern Blue Mines, shaft number fifteen. Evie should know the way. It's not terribly far, especially if you're mounted. You'll ride the chimera?" Cal asked.

"They'll ride Pit. I'll...manage," Felix said.

"Very well. But at least take one other with you. I can't spare my core team, but I know someone who can help."

Cal led the four of them across the courtyard and behind one of the main warehouses to a strange hut against the side. It was strange because it appeared as if a mossy residence in the woods had been transplanted wholesale onto the uneven cobbles of the Dust Quarter. The hut was barely six feet tall, covered in greenery, and dappled by sunlight that wasn't actually coming from the sun. Felix flared his Manasight, and the entire structure faded into flows of gold and purple vapor, packed tight against a rough, ramshackle lean-to.

Light and Augmentation Mana, Felix noted.

Cal stopped a few feet in front of the incongruous shack and shouted. "Thangle! Out here, if you please."

A series of crashes and bangs sounded from within the hut, along with a thin, reedy voice. "Be just one—AH!—no, several grains!"

The three of them exchanged looks behind Cal's back as the noises increased to an absolute cascade of heavy items being dropped from a height. Then, without warning, the door opened, and a small figure half-fell out. Barely four feet tall, he had a shock of white hair atop his head and a scraggly beard the same color, while between the two was a large, jutting nose, like an acute triangle affixed to his face. His lined face creased into an easy smile as he found his footing. "Hello again, Captain Boscal! How are you on this fine morning?"

"It's near evening, Thangle."

"Hm?" Owlish eyes peered up and blinked slowly. "So it is!"

Felix recognized the Gnome, though his green and purple robes were worse for wear, and his hair was lank and greasy. That infectious smile was hard to forget, whether or not you had perfect recall.

Voracious Eye.

Name: Thadeus Thangle

Race: Gnome

Level: 35

HP: 389/???

SP: 255/???

MP: 945/???

Lore: Gnomes are small, generally nimble, and are typically predisposed to the magical arts.

Strength: More Data Required

Weakness: More Data Required

"Hey there, Thangle. Glad to see you made it out alright," Felix said.

"Eh? Ah! My young savior!" Thangle exclaimed as he eyed Felix's larger frame. "I'm happy that such a force for justice still walks the city. Especially in these dangerous times."

The Gnome was bursting with energy and life, belying his bedraggled exterior. He'd already moved onto the others, shaking each of their hands in rapid succession.

"Thangle will provide support," Cal explained. "He's an Adept illusionist, a Skillset I'd recommend none of you underestimate."

"You a Guilder?" Evie asked with a grin.

"Nope! Not ever! They wouldn't want me, anyway. Too much of a free thinker, you know!" Thangle laughed, a sound too bright for the camp's atmosphere. "I am, however, the sole proprietor of the Fantabulous Magetorium of Delightful Miracles! Thadeus Thangle, at your service!"

At some point, the Gnome had pressed a pasteboard card into each of their hands. Felix recognized it as the same he'd received weeks ago, but had since lost. Now, at least, he could read it.

Thadeus Thangle

Owner/Founder

Fantabulous Magetorium of Delightful Miracles!

See reverse for festival rates!

Felix couldn't help the stupid smile on his face. He'd been meaning to find this guy again, if only to learn a bit more about magic. Illusions, huh? That could be useful.

"This is good, Cal. He'll be light enough." Felix nodded and put the card into his satchel.

"What?" Thangle asked, his smile never slipping as he looked between Cal and Felix.

"C'mon. We're leaving now." Felix didn't answer, instead marched away. Thangle was forced to scurry to keep up.

"I'll have Bodie and a team headed your way soon," Cal promised. "Just don't die in the meantime!"

"What?" Thangle repeated, though this time his smile looked more forced.

Felix looked at him and the women. "You three will ride Pit."

"The Chimera?" The Gnome asked, clearly nervous. The smile was falling apart now.

They five of them cut through the courtyard as easily as a ship through water. Men and women of all Races pulled back out of Felix's way, and he didn't miss how some of them were making repeated gestures in the air as he passed. It had the same vibe as someone crossing themselves. Like they were warding him off, maybe.

Ugh. Next time, I'm not leaving the warehouse without Abyssal Skein pulled up. At least with his Void-stealth Skill he'd avoid most of the attention.

The crowds thinned nearer the main warehouse, as most of the Haarwatchers were placed within the other two; they had both been predominantly broken up into small sleeping spaces for people. From what Felix had seen, they were running out of space quickly, and more arrived at their gates every day. But that wasn't his concern. Save people first, then worry about keeping them comfortable.

Around the back of the warehouse, it was blessedly quiet and open enough that Felix figured Pit could take off. Vess hopped easily atop Pit's back, taking a firm hold on his neck, before Evie grabbed hold of a startled Thangle and followed suit.

"Heyaaaaaahhhhh!"

The Gnome's shouts petered out as Pit ran and pulled himself up into the air. Felix could feel Pit's glee as he took to the air for the first time since awakening to his much larger size. The tenku let out a deep bugle of triumph into the air, and it was only Felix's warnings that kept him from attempting a series of aerial acrobatics. He wasn't entirely sure Thangle would be able to hang on during those.

Meanwhile, Felix focused on his own transportation.

Sovereign of Flesh!

The nebula of Essence within him dwindled by the slightest margin as Felix engaged his Skill. However, as opposed to covering his body with scales and growing sharp teeth and claws, Felix tried to replicate something he'd done only twice. He tried to grow wings.

"MMHHHHMMMM," Felix half-screamed, attempting to hold it in but failing. The feel of his back tearing and shifting was excruciating, far and above any pain he'd encountered before, and his Song of Absolution did nothing for it. Gouts of Essence vanished from within his core, feeding the ability as he fought to form the wings...but it failed. Sweating and bleeding, Felix fell to his hands and knees as he recovered.

What was the problem? It had worked before when they were in the Domain. Felix pushed away the pain as best he could and tried to think. What was different? Then it hit him. Before, Pit had been converged within him, a feature of their shared Skill, Etheric Concordance. Was convergence needed to use the wings again? The only other option he could figure was the new feature that allowed them to borrow senses or even body parts from one another. The part of him that held System-granted knowledge knew he could take Pit's wings...but that would leave his friend without them.

Grunting at the dwindling echoes of pain, Felix stood back up and started running. It was disappointing, but it would do for now.

* * *

Pit flew low, keeping near the rooftops as Felix ran close behind. Unfettered Volition and his own high scores in Agility, Endurance, and Strength allowed him to do so with little effort.

Pit, however, was quickly outpacing him in Agility. Felix sensed a smug satisfaction in the tenku that he could go faster than this.

Hold your horses, lil pig, Felix sent. Let's just stick together for now.

Pit sent back a snorting chirrup and flapped just a little ahead. Felix rolled his eyes.

They traversed the rooftops, most of which were warehouses in this part of the Dust. Evie knew the layout of the city and kept Pit pointed in the right direction. The mines were connected to the northern and southern parts of the city where the Dust and Crafters Quarters touched the mountains. The mountain rock provided the city's only defenses in either direction, the stone of it worked into sheer surfaces, with each mine entrance heavily warded against whatever beasties may wander in from the deeps.

While the run across rooftops would have normally thrilled Felix, he found his attention captured by something far more dire. Specks gathered in the blue sky, wheeling about in a suspiciously rigid manner that tickled his memory. Pausing between leaps, Felix focused his Eye upon them.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Rook

Type: Primordial Spawn

Level: 29

...

"Goddamn it," he muttered. Pit, the damn bone birds are back.

His Companion's head swiveled immediately, orienting on the information Felix provided. The feathers along his friend's crest and the fur of his tail all bristled in rage. Closer now, the Rooks were collections of bone, sinew, and scaled, skeletal flesh. Awkward in flight as they were vicious in battle, they didn't so much flap their wings as they shunted the air Mana around themselves to maneuver. Abruptly, the entire flock, seven strong, banked and headed in their direction. The Rooks had spotted them.

"What're those?" Thangle asked, his voice less worried and more excited. "I've never seen birds like that before."

"Oh no. They are here, too? What else escaped?" Vess asked, casting a worried glance at the rest of them.

"They're comin' in fast. How do we wanna do this?" Evie asked.

"Pit is champing at the bit. Let him take the lead, but keep him covered. They're low-level, but they can move fast." Felix said, and before the words finished leaving his mouth, Pit shot off.

It was not much of a fight.

Half of the flock abruptly froze in place as purple-white chains of ice lashed them together...and they began to fall. A barrage of air Mana Wingblades hit them long before they could crash, shattering their bodies into glistening red chunks. The other Rooks screeched in alarm, but their voices faded into confusion, and their wings flapped themselves into a tight, spiraling circle. Felix thought they were preparing some sort of attack, but no, they were just...spinning? A few more Wingblades, and those died as well.

The Rooks had been anemically leveled, which was a two-fold blessing. Aside from falling prey to Pit's relentless Wingblades, it meant they hadn't been killing tons of civilians and boosting their levels. When the last of them fell, Felix felt a slight pang in his gut. Finding them and eating their Essence would have been satisfying, but it wasn't worth his time at that point.

They had better things to do.

Pit returned with everyone and they traveled onward. The particular mine they were headed toward was fairly close, at least at the speeds they were traveling. They all made it there only ten minutes later, though only to the large industrial buildings on the outskirts of it. The mines proper were complicated areas where stone, metal, and other rare resources were extracted, sorted, smelted, and shipped off around the city. An operation like that required a lot of infrastructure, which is why a series of large, boxy buildings crowded the blocks near the mountain.

The five of them dropped low during the approach. Felix took a bit to recover his Stamina, which had gotten a large chunk taken out of it by Unfettered Volition, and tried to see if they could spot anything. However, all was quiet.

"They're probably closer to the shaft entrance. This far away, though, there's no tellin' how many might be stuffed in those buildings," Evie said.

"We'll need to get closer without being seen," Felix mused. "I've got a pretty good stealth Skill, but it's not even level 30 yet. I dunno if it'll get past the scrutiny of Journeyman Tier opponents. Same for Pit."

"Both Evie and I have Stealth, but neither has been extensively leveled," Vess agreed. She turned to the Gnome beside them, who was twisting his head between them, following their conversation. "Mister Thangle, do you have any Skills that might aid our endeavor?"

"Oh yes. Yes, indeed, I do." He grinned.

* * *

"The school of Illusion is one often ignored by those looking for more combative abilities, but my Mana Skills are quite useful in a number of arenas," Thangle explained. The spell he planned to cast was called Obfuscation which, much like the Chanter version baked into Felix's Amulet of Veiling—or even his Abyssal Skein to an extent—allowed for certain things within its purview to be ignored. Thangle explained it as a circle he could maintain around himself that would turn eyes and ears away. Not invisibility, as that was far beyond his Tier, but close.

"Sadly, my personal demesne isn't large enough to handle all of us. At least not for as long as we'd need it," he said, with a significant look at the horse-sized chimera. "I could hold a demesne of forty span for at most a handful of moments."

Felix and Pit merely traded a smirk before the tenku disappeared into motes of light.

"Siva's grace, I have never watched that happen before," Vess exclaimed. "I could see Pit dissolve into your Spirit. Does that not hurt?"

"Only a little," he admitted. Felix did feel a bit of a tug on his core, like he'd hung a weight from his insides, somehow, but it wasn't unbearable. Must be because you're getting so big.

Pit squawked at him, sending a flurry of impressions that made Felix a bit guilty. Yeah. I could have Tempered with Etheric Concordance, but you know why I didn't. Pit just sent a brief, annoyed trill before subsiding within him. Felix realized Thangle was watching him with wide eyes.

"Remarkable, Felix! Remarkable."

"Uh, thanks," Felix nodded ahead. "We've no time to waste. Let's move."

The approach was stressful but ultimately uneventful. The group each maintained their personal stealth Skills, aside from Thangle, who had to concentrate on holding his spellform. Felix could see it warp the air around them in his Manasight, a streaming bubble of purple-colored Mana vapor. Once he'd dropped into Abyssal Skein, however, the colors of the world inverted, and the bubble became basically invisible again. That wasn't ideal, but Felix never quite knew how the Void would interact with other things in the world, what academics called the Corporeal Realm.

Despite his concerns, they made it into the first of the buildings. The doors were unlocked, and several windows had been smashed, but they were completely empty. They kept a tight formation, Felix in front with the warriors to either side of him and the wizard in the back. The first building was a storefront of some sort that had been completely looted, and it was a straight shot through a narrow hallway and into a small, enclosed courtyard. A trickling fountain of iron had been cast into the shape of a grinning man's face; the water poured from his mouth in a steady stream.

Aside from the wind above, it was the loudest feature they'd encountered.

<Creepy,> Evie signed at them, and Felix had to agree.

They kept moving.

They were through another whole structure, this one seemingly designed as a smelter, when they heard a crash and raised voices.

"Hey hey hey! Strip them first!" The voice was full of that sort of self-confidence only government-sanctioned command could engender. "We need all the arms and armor we can get. So, I don't care if it's got a sword hole in the gut or not. We take it!"

"Maybe you strip ‘em, ya trumped up popinjay," someone griped, not loud, but not nearly quiet enough.

"What was that, Acolyte?"

There was a beat of silence as Felix's group crept closer to the nearest dusty window. As one, they peeked their heads up over the edge and beheld another, larger courtyard dominated by a series of six wagons and some sort of mechanical crane made of wood and rope. To the side of the area, about ten bodies were laid out on the ground, some of them wearing a combination of leather and plate armor accents.

Half the Acolytes were standing over the corpses, while the rest were loading the wagons. Even as Felix watched, a large, heavily laden crate was placed into the back of one of the wagons. The team of avum hitched to said wagon screeched in protest as the weight of it settled.

"Nothin'...sir," the surly voice said, and Felix saw the man surrounded by four other sweating Acolytes. All of them were standing over the bodies of Haarwatchers, some roughly manhandling their bloody and brutalized corpses.

"No, no, it sounds like you've got something to say, Acolyte," said the commander, an Initiate according to Felix's Eye. The man stepped up, well into the Acolyte's personal space. "Say. It."

"Thangle, how large can your demesne be?" Felix asked in a low tone, not daring to whisper. Inside of him, Pit was ready to leap out and tear into the bastards. Felix was just about ready to let him.

"Forty span, or so. Only for a few moments at most before it fails," Thangle began, but his face was pale and angry. "But long enough, I think."

"Good," Felix grunted and felt his friend's inner songs roar along with his own. "Time to make some noise, then."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

"Do you have a problem with your duty, Acolyte?" Initiate Tilwen asked as he stepped further into his subordinate's personal bubble. The idiot's cheek twitched as he attempted to master himself and failed; a scowl bloomed on the Acolyte's face.

"I ain't doin' your dirty work, Tilwen," the Acolyte fairly spat, his young face pinched in anger. "Why not lift your own arms, for once?"

There was a hiss of breath from around him, and the Acolyte spared his compatriots a glance. They'd all pulled away from him. Tilwen smiled. He always enjoyed an opportunity to reinforce obedience.

"What a grand idea."

The slap came from nowhere, as far as the Acolyte was concerned. It laid him low faster than he could blink, and Tilwen loomed over the young man with all the menace of an oncoming storm. The Acolyte slurred something through a mangled mouth while blood dribbled from his nose and lips.

"Do you not appreciate my help?" Tilwen asked, a mocking smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. Oh, how he loved to put the new recruits in their place. It was his duty to drive his subordinates toward Strength and Purity, by any means necessary. Tilwen leaned closer, putting his face inches from the young man's own. "Before you speak again, I would recommend you think very carefully on your answer."

The Acolyte flinched at the Initiate’s movement, but otherwise remained silent. The idiot boy's eyes rolled in his head, as if he couldn't manage to focus on Tilwen's movements.

Eyes of Affliction.

Status Condition: Dazed

Tch. Children. Too weak by far to be serving the Pathless. He straightened up and pushed the Acolyte with a single foot. The boy fell, limp. How worthless.

"I trust the rest of you are fine with my orders?" Tilwen's words were met with a series of vigorous nods and sudden bustling about the corpses. "Good. Strip them of everything and pile it in the wagons."

"What...what of the bodies, sir?"

Tilwen gestured to an unused corner of the courtyard. "Throw them in the corner. I'll have them burned later."

When Inquisitor DuFont had selected Tilwen to go on this assignment, he had been eager to prove himself to her. She had been elevated by the Master Inquisitor himself, after all, and her grip over the Order's forces was growing by the glass. Already the Acolytes and most of the Initiates had thrown in with her vision of their cause, while a stubborn few sided with Inquisitor Heuthorn and the old guard. But Tilwen could tell the way the wind was blowing, else he'd never have made it to Initiate so early in life.

Now he and the others had secured their first mine shaft for use by the Order. The resources they had acquired here would go a long way toward preparing his forces for further battle against the loathsome heretics that plagued Haarwatch. Only a city rife with corruption would see such monsters erupt onto its streets, and the Inquisitors had made it plain that dangerous meddling with forbidden powers led to this sorry state.

Barely made it here in one piece, Tilwen thought with a snort of derision. Were it not for his leadership and discipline, it was likely the entire mission would have failed. Yet now they'd succeeded, even going so far as to drive off those damned Guilder scouts. Bastards likely are reporting back to their masters at the Wall, but they'll return to find this mine a fortress of the Inviolate Order. A bastion of Light to defy the dingy darkness in this city.

Tilwen smiled and let the overcast light bathe his upturned face. The day had begun with strife, but it would end in absolute triumph. It—

Tilwen opened his eyes. The courtyard was unchanged, but something...something was different. His senses were trying to tell him something, but the Initiate couldn't quite put his finger on it. For all the banging of loading crates, it felt quiet.

"AH!"

Tilwen spun, chains of purple-white energy manifesting from the air. "Mage! Engage your movement Skills!"

Fleet of Foot!

Without waiting for his men, Tilwen took his own advice. A crackling set of chains missed him by less than a span, so close he could feel the deathly chill in his bones. Feet blurring, Tilwen even managed to dodge the appearance of four silver spears, and instead watched as they impacted his Acolytes.

Fleet of Foot is level 52!

Dodge is level 44!

Three of the four were horrifically impaled, the conjured metal punching through their armor as if it weren't there at all and hurling them backward. The fourth missed the still-prone form of the Acolyte he'd scolded, the lucky bastard. All three impacted victims fell onto their asses several spans away, pinned to the ground.

"Show yourself, cowards!" Tilwen screamed as loud as he could, though his voice sounded muted among the tall buildings. The others would surely hear them and come running in a few moments. "Face me with honor under the Light!"

As the remainder of his Acolytes hurried to aid their fallen comrades, something exploded out of one of the nearby buildings. A pale form erupted from a glass window and into the courtyard. It was a man with dark hair and simple linen clothing. Tilwen didn't hesitate.

Diurnal Reach!

Four bolts of shimmering, golden light coalesced in his grip and shot out with unerring precision. Diurnal Reach was one of the first light Mana Skills an Acolyte was taught, but Tilwen had practiced it for years, even going so far as to Temper with it at Apprentice Tier. The four bolts shrieked through the air, so high it escaped the range of his ears; the man stood, staring and raising a single hand at the Initiate as if dumbfounded.

Fool! Die by my hand, heretic!

Yet, when the bolts reached the man, they simply...vanished.

What?

Half-submerged in the tilted shadows, the man's eyes blazed like vivid sapphires. The man lowered his arm, and Tilwen swore a ripple of golden light shuddered down his throat before it disappeared from sight. As if...

As if he had eaten his Skill.

"F-fiend," the Initiate gasped. Then, louder to the rest of his men still recovering from the attack. "Fiend! Everyone! To arms!"

The explosion from behind caught Tilwen completely off guard. A surge of air Mana threw him off his feet and tore his Acolytes to bloody pieces. The Initiate tumbled forward, trying to keep his senses on the devastation behind him as well as the monster before him. The Fiend was gone, however.

Where are Nieves and Alton? Those explosions...Far too late, Tilwen had a stroke of realization, just as the sound came rushing back like water draining from his ears. Illusion magic. HUERK!

Tilwen gasped in pain and looked down to see a black-scaled arm sticking out of his chest. Baffled, he followed it up and up, until he saw the jagged-toothed grin of...of a monster.

"Mine," it snarled at him. Hate burned with azure light in its vile eyes.

Light flooded him, blessed and holy. The very core of his being swept through Tilwen's senses in a cascade of shimmering motes. It winked out, just as his Diurnal Reach before it, and there was darkness.

And then nothing at all.

* * *

You Have Killed Tilwen Goar, Initiate of the Inviolate Order!

XP Earned!

Felix stood above the Initiate, panting as if he'd just sprinted a damn mile. Power coursed through his channels, stolen Mana and Essence that deposited a storm of potency into his core. The temptation to eat the entire bastard was strong, something that Pit clearly felt was what the man deserved, but Felix held himself back. Perhaps he wouldn't have been able to before he'd Tempered the Skill, for even now it was like holding back the tide itself.

Ravenous Tithe is level 55!

Felix drained the man's Mana and left his body mostly alone. Bits of blood and flesh came along with the Mana, but he hadn't rendered the Initiate's entire body into smoke. He figured that, eventually, he'd have to take his Tithe without raising too many suspicions, so he might as well practice it now. He pulled his black-scaled arm from the rapidly cooling corpse and let his arm painfully revert back to normal flesh. With a grimace, Felix spat out a bunch of sharp fangs as his regular teeth regrew within his mouth.

Ugh. The worst. Pit chirruped in cheery agreement.

As the hot sensation of power poured through him, Felix looked around. They had scouted the immediate area before initiating their attack and had discovered no other teams within close proximity. Two buildings north, however, there seemed to be some activity, and judging by how the Initiate had yelled at the end, they were close enough to hear their shouts. Thankfully, we've got Thangle. The man's Obfuscation Skill had proven just the element they needed to shut them down.

"Black teeth, but that was brutal," the Gnome exclaimed as he hopped out of a nearby doorway. The others also filtered in from different vantages around the courtyard, with Evie alighting nearby like a ghost and Vess clomping hard to the dusty flagstones. "I can't believe you took them out before the demesne went down."

"Thanks go to Vess on that one," Felix grunted, flexing his hand as he focused on pressing all of his newly gained Mana down into his spinning core. Not the abyssal void at the center, but the bright outer edge. The stolen Mana burned away, bit-by-bit. "Those spears really did the trick."

"Indeed. But I did not detonate them," Vess said, anger thick in her voice. She stepped toward the remnants of the Acolytes, now mostly in chunks. "Evie was to incapacitate them, as we had planned."

"Yeah, I'm not sure how that happened," Evie added. "I couldn't even make my Bindings of the White Waste stick. It was like—"

"Like the Mana was in flux," Thangle whispered. He lifted his arm and gathered a collection of congealed light; Mana Gauge, just like Portia. Felix tilted his head just as Thangle looked over his shoulder, directly at him. "Something destabilized the Mana within my demesne, which sent the Mana Skills into decay."

Felix felt his guts go cold at the same time his core flashed with a final burst of blue-white fire.

Did Ravenous Tithe do that? When he'd eaten the Initiate's light bolt spell out of the air, he knew a lot of ambient Mana had come along for the ride. Does this mean I can mess up Mana Skills without even touching them?

You Have Finished Digesting Your Target's Mana!

You Have Gained A Memory!

Would You Like To Review It Now?

Y/N

Huh. The notification knocked his new thoughts on Ravenous Tithe right out of his head. He'd never been given a choice on viewing stolen Memories. It didn't change what he planned to do, but it would definitely be nice going forward.

"Folks, I'm gonna check a Memory here. I'll be out for...hopefully just a few minutes." Felix met Vess' and Evie's gaze and they nodded.

Yes.

As always, the world went grayscale while a ripple across reality flexed everything into strange dimensions. Within moments, the ripple intensified and fell inwards, sucked into a single point of darkness that became everything.

Off he went.

* * *

The darkness became the Void, spreading around him infinitely in all directions, but a simple and familiar act of Will shattered the black into a kaleidoscopic landscape. Hundreds, then thousands, then millions of Tilwen Goars spread out all around him. Each one was slightly different than the next, wearing different clothes or with wounds, though most of the largest changes were more distant. This was a visualization of the Initiate's life, of each Memory to which Felix now had access.

And he could only choose one.

Thankfully, the unique features of Ravenous Tithe allowed him to intuit impressions from each Memory as he glanced at them. Small pieces, things that could be misleading, but it was the only way forward. Felix focused on not freaking out as the Memories crowded up against him, letting his senses inspect the Initiate's most recent recollections.

There.

Felix reached out with his Will and Intent and grabbed hold of a Memory in full armor without smudge or stain on its brilliant red cloak. The moment he held it within his grasp, the space around him shattered again, and this time, the Memory expanded to become his entire vision.

He was Tilwen, standing among tall, dilapidated buildings. A gray cliff face loomed nearby, streaked liberally with earthy red, and a large opening before him was filled with darkness. The mineshaft.

Beside him were two other people, both Human, wearing the white-enameled plate armor favored by the Inquisition. What's more, they all carried a blade at their side, steel chased with gold, the symbol of an Initiate's authority in the Order.

"—ten more Acolytes with me," one of them was saying. He was a swarthy man with a short, dark, well-maintained goatee. Someone important, at least according to Tilwen's roiling emotions. "Inquisitor DuFont has sent two more Initiates with their own cohorts, but they're taking a sweep through the eastern Dust now. Trying to round up whoever they can for the mine."

"Good, then we'll have a fresh supply of workers," Tilwen said with a sense of satisfaction. "When will they arrive, sir?"

The other Initiate shrugged. "Soon enough, I suspect. These Untempered dullards can't stand up against even the weakest of our Acolytes."

"That's true. Only the Guild could stand up to us here, and well…" A low chuckle escaped Tilwen's lips. "They're preoccupied at the Wall. Soon, Inquisitor DuFont will control half of the city."

"As it must be," murmured the third of their group, an older man with a large, drooping mustache. "I only hope the Pathless can save the heretics from themselves before all is lost to these monsters."

Tilwen mentally sneered at the old man. His thoughts tumbled around the idea of killing him and making it look like an accident, even going so far as to eye a nearby pile of fallen masonry before dismissing the idea as premature. The fool's time will come soon enough, Tilwen thought.

Felix scowled from within him while Pit bristled at the casual cruelty in the bastard's thoughts; a veritable matryoshka doll of disgust. Given the example the jerk had already set, Felix felt he shouldn't be surprised, yet he was.

I'm really glad I killed this dude, Felix sent to Pit, who trilled in agreement.

In the near distance was a scuffling and fall as men and women in thick iron collars and chains fell to the ground. Shouting began, mostly by the Acolytes who were escorting these people across the space. Tilwen's thoughts touched on them a moment, eyeing the elision collars around their necks before dismissing the captured miners as far beneath his notice.

So, there are some Tempered among the miners captured, Felix observed. The collars were a cruel sort of restraint that cut off the Tempered from their core, made with twisted spikes on the interior that also drained a person's Mana and kept it artificially low. It left prisoners weakened and more easily captured if they ever managed to free themselves.

Around the miners and escorting Acolytes were more of the rank-and-file zealots. Redcloaks fluttered in the early afternoon light as they shifted corpses to the side, some of whom looked a lot like the corpses piled in their own courtyard. But Felix also noticed at least three corpses in white-enameled armor. A fight had happened here, and it hadn't gone perfectly for the Inquisition.

"What of the fighter? Have you seen him since they collapsed the mine section?"

The older Initiate answered. "No. He has stayed within the shaft, but we've lost two more to a scouting foray into the mine. He is strong and has a number of miners at his back. I would not underestimate his capabilities, not in a location such as this where we cannot bring to bear our numbers."

"Wise words," Tilwen said, while his insides twisted with loathing for the old man. The swarthy Initiate nodded as well.

"We will do well to listen to your experience, Garant. Let us secure the area and await reinforcements, then. Tilwen, if you would be so kind as to oversee the collection and return of our newfound resources?"

"As you will, Third Flame."

* * *

The Memory faded so quickly it was five seconds before Felix realized he'd been thrust back to his Body. He opened his eyes and found he'd been dragged into the shadow beside one of the laden wagons. More importantly, an eye the size of teacup blinked at him from inches away.

"AH!"

"SQUAAAWWW!"

The avum yanked its head back in alarm at his outburst, and the wagon began moving away from him. Felix leveraged himself to his feet as the frightened avum startled the rest of the team. "Whoa whoa! Shh shh!"

"Forged Calm," said a high voice, and a net of purple vapor swirled around the two avian heads, stilling their movement and making their large eyes half-close. Thangle emerged from the other side of the wagon to pat one of the avums' legs. "Easy boys, easy." Thangle looked up at Felix. "You're pretty good at scaring everybody, huh?"

Felix frowned and looked for the others. They had been near another cart, carefully loading what looked like...Ah.

They'd been putting the dead into one of the carts.

"That was loud. We gotta move. You finished with your…" Evie gestured vaguely at him. "...Memory thing?"

Felix smiled. "Yeah. I got some insight into our redcloak friends." He quickly recounted what he'd seen and felt during the Memory, noting the number and placement of the Inquisition. He even sketched out a general layout into the dusty soil that had drifted over the flagstones. Vess tapped her foot in thought as she listened.

"So we have two more Initiates, one of which is older and experienced, and the other is more powerful," Vess reiterated.

"And at least twelve more Acolytes."

"Third Flame, huh? That mean somethin'?" Evie asked.

"They're like lieutenants in traditional fighting forces," Thangle explained. "Like the Lady Dayne suggests, I imagine he will be stronger than this one was."

He gestured at a pile of dead redcloaks that had been shoved unceremoniously into the darkest corner of the yard.

"So, we take it slow and careful. Scout ahead again," Felix suggested.

Vess nodded. "Cautiously," she added. "If we cannot take them, then we must wait for reinforcements Cal is sending."

"And they'll get here before the Inquisition's do?" Felix asked. "I don't know how much time we have."

"We can't let them dictate the pace, though. Gotta be sensible. Rory's in that mine, sounds like, and he's more'n enough to handle a few Initiates," Evie said, but hesitated when Felix and Vess both looked at her in surprise. "What? I can't make sensible decisions?"

"Er, no, you're right," Felix said with an anxious smile. He'd rather rush in and get Rory out of there, along with the miners. No one should have to be put in chains like that. "Slow and steady."

"Don't forget. I've still got some tricks up my sleeve," Thangle added. "Maybe we can make their caution work against them."

The Gnome waggled his fingers, and several transparent shapes swirled into being above his hand. Evie laughed.

"Now that's an idea!" She slapped him on the shoulder. "I really like this guy!"

Vess' own smile was tight, and Felix could practically see the wheel turning as she came up with a plan. "That is ingenious, Thaddeus. Thank you."

"Oh. You're very welcome, Lady Dayne." Thangle blushed until he was more pink than white.

"Please, call me Vess." She dropped down into a crouch and pointed at the diagram Felix had drawn. "We can make this work. Here's how..."

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Felix watched the doorway Evie had disappeared into while idly tracing the outline he'd drawn. She had decided to scout ahead, despite their foreknowledge of the terrain, thanks to his Ravenous Tithe. Vess had agreed, and Felix deferred to their expertise; he had a decent grasp on where the redcloaks were, but more information couldn't hurt them. Felix trusted that Evie wouldn't get caught. Mostly, he was staring at the door because otherwise he'd have to answer Thangle's questions.

"What was it you did back there?" Thangle tried again. His voice was excited, rising to an inaudible squeak on the second word. "My demesne was fluctuating so rapidly I could barely keep it going for the few seconds we had it. I don't normally need to fight so with my Skills, I'll have you know!"

Felix hesitated before answering, running his thoughts across the enlarged pattern of his Ravenous Tithe Skill. It hung in the darkness of his core space, like a luminous planet among all of his other Skills, slightly larger and brighter than most. Its song was quiet, but insistent. Pervasive.

"I can...disable Mana Skills to a certain extent. But I think I affected the ambient Mana too much when I activated the Skill." Felix hedged around the truth, not quite lying, but he barely knew the Gnome. He looked at Vess. "I think that's what set off your spears."

Vess set her mouth into...not quite a frown, but it was stern. "Your...connection. To the monster in the Domain?"

Felix stilled and nodded, slowly. He couldn't quite parse her expression, and her inner rhythms felt...cautious.

"Evie told me earlier today. While you built the wall," she admitted.

"Oh," Felix managed. He wasn't keeping it a secret though, right? Not from the people who'd sworn a binding Oath to him, at least. Why was he worried? It was stupid. He shook his head. "I should have told you sooner myself."

"Perhaps," Vess said with a tilt of her head. She stood and conjured one of her spears from a brief burst of expended Mana. "The fluctuations. Can you make them happen on purpose?"

Felix looked from the spear to Vess' slight smile. There was that dimple again.

"I can try."

* * *

The buildings were quiet. Abandoned for the most part, the workers had clearly left in a hurry as the world turned to shit in a matter of hours. Evie could see evidence of crafts interrupted as she crept through the smelters, a series of large blast furnaces that had clearly slagged over with cooled metal half-poured from their...spigots? Spouts?

Iron-holes, Evie decided. She had only a passing familiarity with smithery, though Mags had always called it a failing one. Without warning, there was a sharp hitch in her breathing, an ache in her chest. Miss you every day, you big dummy.

It hurt a little less now to think of her sister, but it hadn't gone away. Keeping busy was the key, she had decided. Training had sustained her for a bit in the beginning, then the weirdness that Felix brought to the table had sent everything topsy-turvy.

Still, that it hurt less felt...wrong, somehow. Shouldn't she still be a weeping mess? Callie was clearly still fighting with it all, despite her stone face. Evie had heard her crying once or twice, late at night. It tore Evie up to see her like that.

There were a number of slashes in the stone and wooden floors, quick scrapes where talons had gripped for purchase. There were no bodies, but a few dark stains around her told their story. The Revenants had come here, too. More bodies to heap on the Guild's shoulders.

Because this was the Guild's fault, for all that some spooky monster might have done the actual killing; their Elders had set this all in motion when they had tried to lay claim to the Foglands. Every action since then, from cutting loose most of the survivors of that expedition to demoting Magda after she'd returned in a Night-cursed box, stripping her of all rank and honors and refusing to burn her atop the Spire...all of it boiled Evie's blood. She was damn pleased the Guild had fallen, and her only regret was that she hadn't been more directly involved.

Inquisitor DuFont though...can't be the same as the Elder DuFont, can it? How'd that rat bastard get into the Order? She was the only Elder Evie had heard about since emerging from the Domain. None of the others had popped their heads up, and she hoped they had gone down with the Eyrie.

Siva's will, Evie would never hear from those snakes again.

Now, however, they had this mess. A city had fallen apart as its people were slaughtered by the thousands. Monsters ran wild. What was the point in staying? Vess had claimed they should stay for the people, to help those who couldn't help themselves, but Evie found caring about random nobodies difficult. It was her friends she was concerned about. Why should they risk themselves? Why should she?

Someone shouted. Stern words and the clank of metal. Panic.

Redcloaks.

Evie crept up to the far window, listening intently. Extending her Perception she could clearly hear the jangle of buckles and mail, as well as the uneven breathing of folk about to get violent. She risked a peek over the sill.

Beyond was a workyard similar in dimensions to what Felix had described, perhaps two hundred span wide and twice that in length. It was filled with heavy carts and more of those loading cranes near her position, while farther away were a series of partitioned areas filled with varying amounts of lumpy rocks. Ore, she supposed. The most important detail, of course, was that the Inquisitors were scrambling. Beyond the partitions was a large, dark opening in the mountain and there, at the edge of that darkness, a half-dozen or so Acolytes were advancing.

They're going to attack the miners! Quick as she could while maintaining Stealth, Evie spun and loped back. They had redcloak killing to do.

And people to save, she supposed.

* * *

*SHAAAAAAA*

Thangle's Obfuscation failed, releasing a chaotic storm of wind Mana that blanketed Felix's sight. Luckily, the force of it had been mostly redirected elsewhere, as Felix wasn't looking to add a bunch of new wounds to his collection. The nature of Ravenous Tithe had forced him to step close to the Gnome's demesne in order to claim the ambient Mana trapped within. It had worked, as the conjured spear Vess had left within the circle had exploded just milliseconds after Felix ate up the ambient Mana, and only his quick reaction time allowed his hands to remain attached to his body.

"Blind gods," Thangle said softly. He stared at the flagstones where his demesne had been located, even going so far as to lean over and run his fingers along their ruined composition. The ground had been torn apart within the diameter of his Skill, perhaps a yard or so by Felix's estimation. The Gnome lifted a piece of stone that had been sheared into a jagged piece of shrapnel. "The restriction focuses the blast. My Skill works by trapping a bubble of ambient Mana within the confines of my demesne, and when you destabilized it, Lady Dayne's spear had nowhere else to go."

"A shaped charge," Felix muttered. Vague recollections of books read and movies watched danced across his memory, things like anti-tank rounds or landmines. The way Vess' spears exploded created a sphere of wild wind Mana sharp enough to put Pit's Wingblades to shame, and this... "Making something like this work in battle would be difficult."

"Making it concentrated like this, yes, you're right," Thangle nodded. "There are a number of problems, not the least of which is keeping track of my Obfuscation. Its entire purpose is to be unobtrusive!"

"What if it were made bigger? As before?" Vess suggested. She idly spun one of her spears before her, moving casually through the kata he had often seen her practice.

"Larger and the space would be harder to destabilize, I would assume. But! We can test!" Thangle's eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas.

A snort from nearby surprised him. Felix cursed and spun toward the sound, but only found Evie stepping through the same doorway from which she'd departed. "You'll get your fill of testin' in a minute. Found the rest of the redcloaks. They're assaulting the mines. Now."

Evie barely finished talking before she had turned around, while Vess and Felix weren't far behind.

"On-onward, then!" Thangle said nervously, though he ran just as hard as the rest of them. Felix grinned back at the Gnome. His Affinity touched on a song of anxious determination humming within the old man’s Spirit. Thangle clearly wasn't used to all this, but he hadn't put up a single word of protest. Felix respected that.

They raced through the abandoned industrial buildings, Evie deftly guiding them all. Stealth was a concern, but speed was more important. "There are twelve of the little idiots in the yard, but one of the fancy ones with a sword was nearby."

"Twelve Acolytes and one Initiate," Vess translated with a nod. She ducked low to avoid a beam of sunlight that speared through a nearby window as they passed. "That's not insurmountable, if we do this right."

"What about the mine? You said they were assaulting them?" Felix asked.

"Half a dozen Acolytes led by an older buffoon. A real graybeard."

"Something...changed," Thangle panted beside them, his smaller legs scurrying at twice the rate to keep pace with them. "You said...they were...gonna wait."

"Hm, I have to agree. Something must have happened," Vess agreed. Felix felt the Memory still there, just out of sight, but he could easily recall the assurance that the miners were out of their reach for now. They had partially collapsed the shaft and had killed the few who scouted down the path.

What could have happened to make the redcloaks assault a fortified position?

Quickly, they made it to the smelters, where two doors and five windows faced toward the inner yard and mine proper. Evie gestured outside, fingers flying in handsign that Felix was only able to partially deduce. He got the gist, though.

With a final look to one another, they split up, Felix and Thangle going through one doorway, while Evie and Vess went through another.

When I give the signal, Pit, unleash everything.

SCREEEAAAW!

* * *

Felix and Thangle, under cover of Abyssal Skein and Obfuscation, flitted across the far end of the yard. The cover was plentiful, chock-full with half-laden wagons, each taller than Felix. Still, cautious was the watchword of the day. No one ever got a second chance at a first sneak attack.

Moving into one side building after another, the two of them crept closer to the rearmost line of Acolytes. While a few had entered the mines, the rest were still out and about, most filling up the wagons with the unrefined ore. Nearest to them were two Acolytes only absently doing that task; mostly, they were watching the distant mine shaft.

"Damn dirty Dusters," one of the Acolytes muttered. "This shouldn't be such a hassle. Why won't they listen?"

"What'd you expect? This place is a stain on our nation, consorting with Sorcerers and heretics," the other said, spitting to the side in contempt. "I say burn them out of the mine. Who cares if some peasants get roasted?"

The man hurled his piece of ore backward without looking, missing by a mile. Felix had to quickly pull Thangle to the side to avoid the projectile, which clattered loudly to the flagstones. The illusionist looked up at Felix with a grateful expression and the Primordial Nym put a finger to his lips despite the Gnome's Obfuscation. He crept forward.

"Burn them out? But what about the stink?" The first one said in mock outrage. The second laughed.

"You're right! It'd ruin the metal!"

Sovereign of Flesh.

Discord sang through Felix's ears as his hands—and with an effort of Will, just his hands—shifted. Black scales and talons erupted from his fingertips, and he rushed forward. He was surprised at how easy it was to cut through their gorgets and spines, because with two quick blows, Felix tore their throats out and damn near decapitated them. Surprised or not, he caught their limp corpses and slowly let them down to the ground. Blood spurted and pooled in their ruined flesh, and Felix fought down a surge of bile.

You Killed An Acolyte Of the Inviolate Order (x2)!

XP Earned!

No time for mercy, he admonished himself as he shifted his hands back. They'd have none for you.

Glancing backward, Felix saw Thangle still frozen behind the wheel well of the previous wagon. The Gnome looked a bit green and was eyeing the two bodies with shock. Felix gestured at the old man; the fact that he could see him at all meant that he'd dropped his Obfuscation. Thangle startled, and his eyes went wide before he vanished from sight again. A moment or two later, Felix felt the tingle of the Gnome's spell washing over him, and Thangle came back into focus.

"You okay?" Felix asked.

"Ah, yes," Thangle managed. "I've just not...violent death is not unfamiliar, but..."

"No I get it," Felix said. "You ready to keep going?"

Thangle nodded once, determinedly. "Yes. We've miners to save, right? Onward."

* * *

While Evie could rely entirely upon her Stealth Skill, Vess' own abilities were lacking in that regard. Instead, she leaned heavily upon her Dragoon's Footwork. It was an advanced movement technique that allowed her to defy the Perceptions of those viewing her, typically by putting her where an opponent least suspected. It was not, however, ideally suited to stealth. So, when the Acolyte turned and spotted her, she did not even hesitate.

Spear of Tribulation!

Faster than an Untempered's arrow, a silver spear manifested and impaled the woman straight through her mouth and into the side of the wagon behind her. She hit with such force that the wagon tilted, rocking up off two of its wheels before falling back with an immense clatter of tumbling ore and creaking wood.

You Killed An Acolyte Of the Inviolate Order!

XP Earned!

Blackened Night! Vess cursed, flaring her Dragoon's Footwork as three more Acolytes shouted and rushed around the wagon's frame. They lifted their hands in unison, orange orbs of Mana forming in their palms.

A heavy, spiked chain shot out before all three of them, missing their faces by half a span before twisting impossibly and doubling back, this time beneath their outstretched arms.

"Wha—!"

The Acolytes had barely reacted when the chain bit into all of their arms at once. Skill-enhanced blades sparked against their armor, unable to penetrate on its own, but it did not have to: with a grunt from Evie, the chain suddenly weighed three times as much. The Acolytes' arms all dropped as the chain was yanked to the right, each of them now tangled among the others and stumbling.

Spear of Tribulation!

This time, the three spears took them all in the chest, and the Inquisition armor blunted the force enough that they only slightly wobbled the wagon when they hit it.

You Killed An Acolyte Of the Inviolate Order (x3)!

XP Earned!

"Do you think they missed that?" Vess asked, hopeful. Said hopes were dashed a second later as a horn sounded, and Evie smirked.

"Let's assume no."

Vess dismissed the spears before her, letting the four bodies drop unceremoniously to the ground. With a gesture, she re-conjured her full complement. Six silver spears manifested around her, floating on the air Mana that gave them shape, and a seventh coalesced in her hands. Evie laughed, not mad at all. Delighted, even.

"Let's go kick their asses."

"Indeed."

* * *

A horn sounded out of nowhere before Felix could advance much farther. He cursed. "We've been made. Can you get out of sight?"

"Consider me the wind," Thangle replied, and the little Gnome ran beneath the nearest wagon and vanished from Felix's Perception.

What a cool trick, he thought, not for the first time. Ahead of him, the remaining Acolytes rushed toward the other side of the yard. Clearly, Evie or Vess had tipped them off.

Unfettered Volition!

Leaping directly over a nine-feet-high wagon bed was easy, as was landing on the other side. Hell, he even overshot it, clearing more than fifteen feet with his jump. A Strength of 250 was no joke. What was slightly difficult were the four Acolytes he landed on top of; difficult in that Felix landed directly on their spears.

Sovereign of Flesh!

Twisting around one or two spears would have been easy, but four was more of a challenge. The thickening scales that bubbled out from his skin and muscle, however, took the brunt of their force and diverted most of it. The gunshot sound of snapping wood and screeching metal filled the air as Felix landed heavily in a crouch among the Acolytes. Most were sent sprawling by the force transferred through their spear hafts, while the rest stared at him in paralyzed fear.

Make An Entrance is level 38!

Reign of Vellus!

They were mostly just slightly out of reach, and Felix didn't have time to waste. A quick, reverse pulse of his kinetic spell sent brilliant blue lightning out of him in a ring, before the ring was yanked inward. All four Acolytes toppled into Felix's range, each of them lasting no more than seconds before his black talons ended them.

You Killed An Acolyte Of the Inviolate Order (x4)!

XP Earned!

"FIEND!"

The swarthy looking Initiate stood only ten yards away, atop a fully loaded wagon. Crashes and thuds sounded from nearby as his Acolytes faced off against Evie and Vess. Felix could only see a jumble of legs and flashes of metal through the large, spoked wagon wheels. A golden radiance hung around the Third Flame Initiate's entire body like a halo.

"You've picked the wrong place to show your face, you Ruinous beast! I'll end you, or my name isn't Salazar Korith Astandes!" With a ferocious cry, the Initiate launched himself at Felix.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Or he would have, had the man not stopped mid-stride with a sudden stricken look upon his face as purple Mana flared around his head. "What—No! No!" The man fell back, clearly terrified.

Movement to Felix's left revealed Thangle, now fully visible but hiding beneath another wagon; his face was red and a vein pulsed from his forehead. A group of miners were nearby, chained to the wagon and staring between the three of them with expressions that betrayed their fear. All of them were wearing elision collars.

With Thangle's help and beneath the miners' grim stares, Felix didn't waste another moment. He slashed out with his talons, but they merely gouged the surface of the Initiate's armor. The awful, jagged sound of it snapped the man awake.

"Huh—How did—FIEND!"

Corrosive Strike!

Felix's taloned fist burst alight with green acid and took the still confused Initiate fully in the chest. The man tumbled backward, but in moments, he had fetched back onto his armored feet.

"A cheap shot! Aided by...by illusions!" The swarthy man's face grew darker in his rage. "You should have killed me when your pet Gnome was in my head! Now you've only given me time to fight back!" Salazar crowed in triumph, despite his dented breastplate. "Echo of the Divine Shell!"

The aura of golden light that had clung to him coalesced around the man, forming into overlapping panels of conjured armor. Felix groaned; he had seen this Skill before, and it had proven to be a pain in the ass. Salazar's body lifted up off the ground as a plate-armored body formed completely around his own, simply scaled to one and a half times the size, so that it seemed like he was suspended within a huge translucent set of armor.

Great. Felix snarled, showing off the row of jagged fangs that had filled his mouth. Last he'd faced this Skill, he'd been a lot weaker. Let's see how fast I can break it this time.

Unfettered Volition!

Influence of the Wisp!

Corrosive Strike!

Hoping to hold him still, Felix bathed the Initiate in wispfire. The blue-white flames flickered brightly for a moment before they failed to catch, so unfortunately, the Initiate managed to evade his Corrosive Strike.

"Diurnal Reach!"

A volley of four hard light bolts shot out, but Felix snatched them from the air with a flaring of Ravenous Tithe, netting a chunk of ambient Mana with them. Before the Initiate's eyes stopped bugging out, Felix darted closer and landed a non-Skilled jab on his conjured armor.

A plate of shimmering Mana cracked under his blow and shattered completely beneath Felix's second one. Gasping in fear, Salazar shuffled backward, out of Felix's immediate reach. He turned around and ran, directly toward Thangle and the line of chained miners.

"No you don't," Felix snarled.

Reign of Vellus!

Lightning, almost like a tether, zapped forward and into the Initiate's back. Jolting with the impact and electricity, Felix hauled back and yanked the Initiate off his feet and back into range.

"Immolation Charge!" Salazar cried out, and his conjured armor was bathed in a deluge of flames. "First Charge!"

A wave of fire exploded outward, washing over Felix and several nearby wagons, setting all of them ablaze. Including the ones holding the miners and Thangle.

"No!"

Status Condition: Burning

Thanks! Felix growled at the System, slapping at his burning clothes before he dove past the Initiate and flared one of his rarely used Skills.

Mantle of the Long Night!

Purple-white Mana poured from Felix's channels, hitting the superheated air and turning instantly to a visible mist as an arctic chill began to rotate around him. Like an icy hurricane, Felix dumped his Mana into the spell, increasing its range and rotation until a dire wind spiraled around his form and hit the wagons. The orange and purple-white Mana clashed against one another, sparking in a way he'd never seen before, perhaps due to his increased capacity for Manasight. Regardless, the ice Mana chilled the wagons enough to stifle the fire Mana.

"Thangle!" Felix couldn't sense the Gnome under the wagon, so he immediately ran to the miners. They were chained to the far side, and several had nasty burns on their arms and legs. Six miners, men and women both and ranging between the common Races Felix had encountered, none of them were uninjured. The aura of his Mantle smothered the little flames that clung to their clothes, but Felix had to turn it off or else risk hurting them. They pulled away from him in alarm, but couldn't move much due to their manacles and chains.

"Don't worry, I'm here to help," Felix assured them, but it was a losing battle. His face was a mess of dark scales and sharp, alien angles, not to mention a mouthful of prominent fangs. Felix knew his eyes were burning, too, like tiny lanterns of blue light. He flexed his claws and saw them flinch, but it wasn't for them. A single slash sheared through their chains.

"Go, take cover! We've got this!" Felix wanted to smile reassuringly, but settled for an encouraging nod.

"Running away, Fiend?! Expected of a coward! A craven swine!" The Initiate was running toward them, great stomping steps shaking the earth and his phantasmal armor still wreathed in flame.

"Go!" Felix shouting one last time at the miners, before he turned toward the glowing idiot. "Bring it on, douchebag!"

Unfettered Volition!

Corrosive Strike!

Zipping forward faster than the Initiate could manage, Felix met the man well before he reached the wagons. Dipping beneath the man's horizontal slash, Felix stomped outward at his conjured legs. Salazar grunted in surprise as a series of golden Mana panels shattered, sending him stumbling to the side. Felix pivoted out of the way, pushing his Agility, reorienting on the idiot's back.

Corrosive Strike!

Corrosive Strike!

Corrosive Strike!

Three rapid-fire punches shattered another section of the redcloak's glowing armor and sent him sprawling onto the stones. The Initiate Divine Shell was falling apart, but still, Salazar grunted and slammed his hands to the earth. A voice like gravel tore at the air.

"Second Charge! Third Charge!"

Waves of flame flowed outward, but this time they were white-hot. They swept over Felix faster than he could blink; there was little else but to endure it. The Initiate flopped onto his back, panting and staring up in smug satisfaction. "Haha! Face the Light and burn, Sorcerer!"

Until the inferno simply...vanished.

Ravenous Tithe!

The fire swirled around Felix, unable to move past the powerful pressure he exerted upon its Mana. It rushed into him, like a damn reverse dragon, searing his mouth and throat as it went. Salazar looked at him with despair, his cheeks sunken and eyes dark.

"Is that it?" Felix asked with a rough voice, baring his teeth against the pain that screamed across his nerves. His clothes had all caught fire before he extinguished all the fire, and his Health had dropped by nearly a quarter. "My turn, then."

Felix gripped the man's conjured boots and heaved. With a screaming grunt, he lifted the Initiate bodily from the earth, rotated, and slammed the jerk face-first into the flagstones.

*KRAAKK!*

"Uoouugh," the Initiate moaned, writhing only slightly. From this vantage, Felix could see the golden panels that had been shattered on his back. "You-you'll never—never get away..."

"You see me running?"

"Diurnal Reach!"

Four more bolts of light shot from the Initiate's hand, but not at Felix. The man hadn't even lifted his arm for the shot. Instead, they were sent back toward the wagons, faster than Felix could move to intercept. Toward the miners.

"No!"

Arrow of Perdition!

Felix slammed his open hand down toward the Initiate's exposed back, and a crossbow bolt made of gold and blue light manifested in his grip. With a single, smooth motion, he stabbed its length down into the man's lower back. The bolt sank into the redcloak's flesh, lodging itself directly into his core. With a flash of radiant gold, the armor around the Initiate evaporated back into Mana vapor. Salazar screamed in true, gut-wrenching pain as his strongest Skill was damaged directly.

Arrow of Perdition is level 14!

"You! Fucking! Asshole!" Reaching down, Felix took hold of the edges of the Initiate's breastplate. Screaming in effort, he tore it up and off the man, his voice almost as loud as the tortured sound of bending steel. Inscribed enchantments sparked and sizzled, fighting the damage as he tore it open.

Salazar tried to roll away, even managed to draw the longsword at his hip and fumbled a seated swipe at Felix. It was fast enough that Felix couldn't dodge had he even wanted to, but Felix stayed on the man. The blade dug into Felix's shoulder, but the poorly leveraged swing was unable to penetrate past the thickened plates. Felix backhanded the sword out of the Initiate's grip.

"You're the follower of a god of light! Where's your mercy? Where's your compassion!?" Felix grasped him around the arm and neck. His anger felt raw and torn open, a wound he'd been ignoring for way too long. "All you want to do is take and kill! What the fuck is wrong with you people!"

A sudden movement Skill had the Initiate bucking against Felix’s grip. The Initiate limped into a roll, coming back to his feet with something resembling grace, even as his pauldron and sundered breastplate fell to the ground. Blood waterfalled down his face where Felix had broken him, but the hate expressed there was a bonfire. Raging. Unquenchable.

"You demonic cretin," Salazar spat. His eyes were bloodshot, but his gaze was level. "We seek Strength. Order. Above all, we seek Purity and Truth. Your lies of mercy fall on ears deaf to your influence! The Pathless preserves me against your selfish evil!"

"Shut!"

Corrosive Strike!

"Up!"

Corrosive Strike!

Felix screamed as each fist made contact. His entire fist broke through the man's chest with a sound like a meaty firecracker. Felix flexed his claws and tore his way out, shredding the Initiate's internal organs all the way down to the man's navel. His emotions were a riot of hate and disgust and rage, so much rage, more than he'd even felt before. He felt like his entire body was burning up, his scales itching fiercely, and his core spinning like a mad top of impossible flame.

You Killed Salazar Korith Astandes, an Initiate of the Inviolate Order!

XP Earned!

He wanted to rip and tear and rend and devour this stain of a human being. To do the same to all of them, hunt them all down and end their Order with tooth and claw. He could—

Peace.

He could taste the man's blood already, so close to his mouth. To his maw—

Peace, Felix! Brilliant light subsumed his vision, resolving into dark feathers that wrapped across his face and chest. A horse-sized head leaned onto his shoulder and gently pressed him back. Peace.

Pit's soothing trills washed against Felix, hitching his breath. He wanted to push past the dark pinions before him, but...he breathed. Once, twice. Still, his instincts told him to tear them all apart, like a warning.

"Forged Calm," Thangle's high pitched voice said from nearby.

Purple Mana swirled around Felix's face, and Thangle pushed down on his riled up emotions. Felix welcomed it, but even if he hadn't, he wasn't sure if he would have been able to muscle past Thangle's Skill. His emotions flatlined, dampened into a gray neutrality. Not quite apathy and a bit blander than contentment. Complacency.

Felix opened his eyes and saw Thangle standing nearby, his hand still outstretched. Sweat poured down the Gnome's face and into his beard.

"Thanks," Felix said. "I-I think I'm good, now."

"You sure? Because that was rather frightening," Thangle said as he peered at him. "You aren't feeling any more...bloody urges?"

Under Thangle's spell, Felix managed a smile and let his transformation fall away as he stood. Scales were reabsorbed by his body, and his fangs fell out of his mouth as they were replaced by his normal, flat teeth. Thangle blanched at the sight and took a single step away from the fangs as they turned to wisps of smoke upon the ground.

"I'll be fine, I think," he said as Pit's big head came to snuggle against his own. "Where're the others?"

* * *

"The effects will wear off in a bit, but until then you'll feel a bit," Thangle made a wobbling motion with the flat of his hand. "Odd."

Felix felt fine, really. His display showed the icon of a steady, winding river and claimed he was under the effects of Forged Calm for the next five minutes. It felt kinda nice, really. He hadn't realized how volatile his emotions had become, but now that it was flatlined for him, he could see the weirdness of it all. Pit walking at his side helped, too.

The others were close by, which was readily evidenced by the wreckage of the other half of the work yard. The flagstones had divots blown out of them, and the wood and stone buildings sported huge, serpentine gouges torn from them. Felix was surprised he hadn't noticed it all during his fight, but the tall wagons had blocked his line of sight and must have been muffling some of the sounds. Evie and Vess were both standing among eight surviving Acolytes, all of them unconscious on the ground and wrapped in manacles.

"You certainly made a lot of noise," Vess commented as Felix, Pit, and Thangle turned the corner. "Is the Initiate taken care of?"

"Yes," Felix said, his voice hitching slightly. "There are too many Acolytes here. Did we miscount?"

"Dunno. They must've arrived later with that guy," Evie jutted her chin toward what was left of a man with an Initiate's sword. He had been stabbed into the second story of a workshop, then parts of that story had been blown up. Felix spotted pieces of him here and there. "They put up a fight, but the Acolytes couldn't do much. Still, Vess didn't want us killin' a bunch of folks if we could help it, so…" She gestured to the tied-up Order members. They looked secure enough that they wouldn't be going anywhere, even if they were awake.

"We can try them for crimes against the city at a later date," Vess stated, her tone one that allowed no argument. "We shall jail them for now."

"Where, though?" Evie asked, exasperated, as if they'd already had this conversation.

Vess opened her mouth to answer when the air was split by the sound of muffled explosions and terrified screams. Felix whirled on the sound. It was coming from the mineshaft.

"Come," he ordered, before taking off like a shot.

The flagstones cracked beneath each step as his weight slammed into the earth, each stride hurling him forward faster and faster. Pit and Evie were close behind, while Vess and Thangle were no doubt on their way. He couldn't be concerned with waiting on them, and for once, this definitely wasn't an emotional response. Forged Calm was still in effect. It felt like simple logic, especially considering the narrow space of the mineshaft.

"Pit, stay out here or converge?" Felix asked, and received a disbelieving snort in response before the tenku disappeared into white light that jolted into Felix's chest. "Evie, we go in hard. Stop the redcloaks however we can, save the miners, and get Rory out. Good?"

"Sure. Kill the redcloaks, something, something, then done," Evie grinned, her legs whipping faster than his own. "My kinda plan!"

Sovereign of Flesh!

Pain bathed him as everything twisted and crunched within his body, but Felix didn't stop running. Unfettered Volition didn't even let him stumble as his skin blackened and swelled into matte-black scales. Sans boots, his feet were clawed, elongated ever so slightly, enough that his tread actually improved.

They hit the tunnel quickly. About ten feet tall and fifteen feet wide, it wasn't the smallest of fits, but neither of them would have a lot of room to maneuver. Despite the torches that were lit along the walls, they needed a second to adjust to the dimmer light. Even Manasight wasn't immune to the weakness of eyesight, at least not at their stage of advancement.

Which is perhaps why they didn't see the trap until they were nearly on top of it.

"Look out!" Felix cried out and threw himself up and over a section of stone that abruptly radiated brilliant orange mana vapor. A wall of fire erupted to fill the entire space like a curtain was drawn up from the floor. Evie dropped to all fours and increased her mass, slowing herself down considerably and stopping before she hit. Felix, on the other hand, burst straight through it.

And right into a wall of white-enameled steel.

"RRAAAAHH!" Acolytes shouted as they thrust toward Felix's tumbling form, a hedge of spears all gunning for his guts. Felix tucked his body tight and fired off Reign of Vellus.

Like a goddamn cannon going off, the Acolytes directly in front of him were smashed into red paste by the force of the Skill. Yet the reciprocating force launched Felix in the opposite direction. Back through the fire, again. The only difference was that this time, he was ready for it.

Ravenous Tithe!

The fire burned him for only a moment as he came into contact with the Mana, claimed it, and let it flow once more into his throat, scalding his insides for good measure as the Mana tore through his channels.

Evie ducked as Felix flew by again, swearing, but lashed out with her chain. "Bindings of the White Waste! Scorpion's Tail!"

Felix rolled to a stop some thirty feet back, and though he reclaimed his feet easily, it was annoying. Now he had to get back there. Except when he looked, he saw Evie fending off the spear-wielding Acolytes arrayed against her. Purple-white ice Mana filled the tunnel, binding a quarter of the combatants while the rest contended with the unpredictable length of her spiked chain.

The Acolytes were defending a split in the cavern. To the left was a well-lit path that angled downward, while to the right, the shaft had been overrun by rubble. Clearly, that was where the miners had sealed themselves in. But the rubble was shifted, and sparks of light kept erupted from a door-sized gap in the stones.

Angry shouts and pained screams emanated from that gap.

Felix flared his Unfettered Volition, blasting past Evie and releasing a spread-out version of Reign of Vellus. Strands of lightning burst outward in an arc, pushing back at the Acolytes as Felix's own momentum carried him forward. Some fell to the ground while others were steamrolled.

"Don't worry about it! I got this!" Evie snarked at his back.

Then he was through the rubble. Within, it was far darker; someone had extinguished the torches here. Felix pulsed his Manasight enough to pick out three dozen figures struggling in the darkness; all of them seemed to have glowing green eyes, a common vision Skill called Night Eye. Everyone had bunched in one spot where a single man in white armor and a red cloak fought them all to a standstill.

Without warning, the Initiate's long sword burst aflame, and nearly every single miner recoiled in pain.

They were the first to die.

Like a whirlwind, the old Initiate tore through his opponents. The flame on his sword sketched dazzling shapes in the near dark of the tunnel, brilliant feints and last-second parries. Pickaxes and hammers were turned aside, easy as breathing, only the Initiate’s intense stare and streaming mustache indicating he was putting in any effort at all.

What level is his Sword Mastery? Not even Harn moved with such deadly grace. Yet the thought didn't panic Felix, it merely made him curious. Let's find out.

Unfettered Volition!

Influence of the Wisp!

Stone Shaping!

Rushing forward as blue-white fire lined him, Felix bore down on the old man. Similar flames flickered around the Initiate as well, long enough that Felix felt the vestiges of furious satisfaction tingle at the edges of his Mind. At the same time, he dual-cast Stone Shaping as a precaution, yanking the section of stone beneath the Initiate's feet up in an effort to foul up his balance. Frozen in place, the shaping merely toppled the man to the side, where he would have hit the earth had Felix not been there to land an unarmed slash on him.

His talons struck sparks off the Initiate's immaculate armor, similar to the last one he'd fought. But before the old man could hit the ground, he'd somehow escaped the enthralling effect of Influence of the Wisp and swept his leg out. Pivoting seamlessly, the talented Initiate turned his fall into a spinning lunge and brought his newly flaming sword to bear against Felix.

It all happened too fast to stop his second blow; Felix had already committed. So when the sword came across his right arm, it sheared off one of his bone spikes and dug a bloody furrow in his dark scales. Felix twisted, too late, and was met with a simple palm strike at the center of his chest.

It hit him like a speeding truck.

Felix was thrown bodily back into the rubble half-clogging the tunnel. Rock exploded outward, tumbling down to pummel him as his body was partially lodged in the wall.

Status Condition: Forged Calm

Duration: 1 Second

The icon of a winding river flickered and disappeared, the effect of Thangle's spell gone at last, and Felix felt a sudden and terrifying welling of emotions. Horror, fear, rage, and hate burst fully formed into his chest, and coupled with the adrenaline and battle lust that had begun to dominate Felix's Mind. Not even Pit's calming ministrations from within his Spirit were enough.

Arm bloodied, spine probably bruised, Felix didn't think or plan. He rushed back in.

It wasn't the smartest thing he had done recently.

The old man wove through Felix's furious assault, impossible to hit while simultaneously landing his own slashes against Felix's thighs and shoulders and hip. The burning brand left clean, bloody wounds where it struck, and though nothing was worse than glancing, it infuriated Felix. The flood of emotion overwhelmed him as he unleashed his power on the Initiate before him.

Influence of the Wisp!

Arrow of Perdition!

Reign of Vellus!

Blue-white fire flickered to life again, but this time, the Initiate resisted the enthralling status condition and instead pressed the attack. The flaming sword hit Felix with the flat of the blade, knocking the conjured Arrow of Perdition out of his hand and rendering it into wasted Mana vapor as it vanished. The blast of kinetic lightning, however, connected.

The old man caught it on his sword and, with a twist, sent the spell hurtling into the ceiling.

What the fuck?

"Impressive abilities, for one so young," the greybeard said as he reset himself. "But you will find that age provides its own Temper. Now, come."

He described an elegant figure eight with his burning blade.

"Again."

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Felix tried to calm down, wrangling the nest of vipers that writhed in his chest. He tried to think calmly, to strategize. His Manasight flared, picking out details in the tunnel. The floors were relatively smooth, and the walls were coarse and pockmarked from excavated ore. Dusty brown and gray-black vapor swirled everywhere, threaded through with various metallic hues from the ores that studded the walls. It was like standing in a shimmering night sky. Before him, the miners crowded back, threads of green-gold life Mana coiled about with crimson blood Mana.

The old man, however, blazed like the sun.

Orange fire and golden light Mana vapor hurtled through his aura, suffusing the green-gold and crimson of his Body so much that the latter was barely visible. The sense of solidity and control Felix garnered from the man was astounding. In many ways, he reminded him of Zara. But he couldn't be a Master Tier combatant...could he?

Voracious Eye!

Name: Charl Hornsworth

Race: Human

Level: 52

HP: 2465/2465

SP: 2554/3014

MP: 922/1137

Strength: More Data Required

Weakness: More Data Required

Aside from Hornsworth's information, Felix's Voracious Eye snagged the man's advancement. He was only at the upper end of Journeyman, a far cry from the last few Initiates he'd fought, yet not nearly as Skilled as Felix had assumed. How was he kicking Felix's ass? The man was like fighting a river, if said river had a sword made of fire.

Hornsworth raised a bushy gray eyebrow at Felix and tapped his foot. Felix snarled and dove back in, pushing Unfettered Volition for all it was worth. Visceral frustration mounted with each missed strike, each dodged advance, mutating swiftly into a burning rage that burned at his Mind.

Peace! Trilled Pit from far away. Calm!

But it wasn't time for calm; it was time for action. Rolling beneath Hornsworth's horizontal sword sweep, Felix snapped a claw at the man's leg in the hopes of hamstringing the bastard. Yet the leg was gone before he connected, and his opposite boot caught Felix in the temple. The kick wasn't particularly hard, but it rang his bell, and Felix had to hurl himself ungainly to the side to avoid the Initiate's flaming follow-up.

Felix propelled himself into the wall about ten feet distant, cracking into it hard enough to make his own Health drop several dozen points. He looked back, stilling his head as if to encourage his vision to stop swimming, and saw that Hornsworth was once again standing still. Waiting.

What a jagoff. Felix grimaced. He got back to his feet slowly, watching the Initiate for any sudden movements. The man was impossible to predict. Then something caught the edge of his perception, and Felix suppressed a grin.

From the darkness, a spiked chain shot out at the old man. Snaking through the air like a living thing, it altered direction twice as it wove toward the Initiate, moving faster than most anyone in the tunnel could track.

Harnsworth slid through her attack without even looking at it, and when Evie's chain changed direction, he simply lifted his sword and deflected the chain into the ground. He had to look to do that, at least. Evie ran through the rubble, twirling her chain with renewed fervor. She seemed almost as pissed off as Felix felt.

Felix frowned and watched them, hoping to see some way past the man's impeccable defense and trying to bank the fury that was building up within him. Which is how he noticed that the miners were slowly beginning to lessen in number. At first he feared that they had somehow hurt them, but when he spotted two more of the Untempered workers vanishing into the darkness, he realized what was happening. Thangle was Obfuscating a few people at a time and getting them out.

The Gnome's a genius.

And he wasn't alone.

Evie ducked low as a silver spear shot over her head and straight into the Initiate; the projectile, unseen until the last moment, was barely avoided. A terrible screeching sound shredded the air as his breastplate and left pauldron were scored by the arcane missile, but he wasn't impaled. The spear instead slammed into the ground immediately behind the Initiate.

"Thangle!" Felix shouted and rushed the old man. As expected, the Initiate wove around Felix's lunge, turning the man's own kinetic energy against himself and hurling him through. But this time, Felix managed to grab hold of Hornsworth's fluttering red cloak. Yanking hard on that, he slowed himself down and pulled the Initiate off-balance. The man took two steps and re-centered himself easily while Felix fell heavily to the ground, which was not exactly the result he was hoping for; but it was good enough.

Vess' silver spear sat between the two of them, one prone and the other holding aloft a flaming sword. His mild voice belied the intensity of his gimlet eye. "Do you seek forgiveness, child?"

"Not really," Felix grunted. "Thangle! Now!"

An instant later, both the spear and Hornsworth vanished from Felix's senses, and he thrust his hand outward until he could feel the tingle of active magic. "Mine!"

Ravenous Tithe!

A tiny stream of Mana surged into Felix's channels, a chaotic mix of ambient earth, fire, and shadow. At the same time, the space before him imploded with the sound of a screaming gale, and the Initiate was thrown backwards.

Finally!

The old man's legs and right arm were torn up, the enameled metal scored so deep that, in some places, it was cut right through. Blood welled along his limbs, and Hornsworth gasped a series of pained breaths through his mustache. He looked up at Felix as the young man got to his feet.

"How did you—"

"Vess! Thangle! Again!"

Another spear tore from the darkness and plunged into the earth, yet before Thangle could cast his Obfuscation circle again, the Initiate leaped aside and ran. The old man vanished back out through the rubble in moments, his insane Agility blasting past all of their Perceptions.

Felix stood a moment longer, fists up, worried that he'd come back. When seconds turned to minutes, he figured it was safe enough. The wave of relief that spread through Felix at that moment was nearly enough to send him to his knees.

"Twins' teeth, that graybeard was spry," Evie said from the nearby darkness. "Did he put you through a wall?"

Felix grunted in annoyance and ignored the question. "Thangle, did you get everyone out?"

"Almost," the Gnome said, and Evie jumped about a foot into the air.

"AH, I hate that!"

"My apologies," Thangle half-bowed to the woman. "There are a few people still farther back that I couldn't reach without making myself far more conspicuous."

"All right, Vess? You good to lead the rest of the miners out? And find Rory!" Felix called out.

"It will be done," she replied from near the blocked-off entrance, and soon the heiress' voice called out for the miners to follow her.

"Awesome job with the evacuation, Thangle," Felix grinned. "I wish I'd thought of it."

"My pleasure," he replied, though his face betrayed his emotions. "I will admit being so close to danger is not...not a usual happenstance for me. I was happy to be of use."

"With illusions like those, I've got scads of ideas for ya," Evie said with a laugh. She clapped the Gnome on the back hard enough to stagger him, which only made her laugh more.

Felix's fight or flight response felt keyed up, and it was all he could do not to pace with the excess furious energy. His emotions still felt amped up, supercharged by just...everything. Forcing himself to breathe deep, he let his transformation Skill fade away. Being ready for a battle didn't help his nerves at all, and he could reactivate it quickly if needed. The pain of the transition helped clear his head, too.

Nothing like seared nerves to really find your center.

Felix turned toward the deeper darkness of the tunnel, where more dislodged stone was built up into small ramparts down its length. Something was moving back there.

"Felix?" asked a familiar voice, followed by a squat Dwarf limping along with the help of a willowy, middle-aged woman. Rory smiled despite the bloody ruin of his leg. "Took ye long enough, lad."

* * *

The first thing they did was free the miners.

Well, no. The actual first thing Felix did was curse loudly when he discovered that all eight of the captured Acolytes were missing. The chains had been melted. There was little wonder as to who was responsible.

Great. More recurring villains. Felix scrubbed his face with his hand. My life is a Saturday morning cartoon show.

Part of him—a dangerous, minor part—wanted to chase after the slippery Initiate and—he wasn't sure what. Something violent. The jerk had basically toyed with him, and it rankled. Still, helping the miners took precedence. Felix had to remind himself of that several times over the following half-hour as he helped free the miners and ensure the area was secure.

The first bit was easy enough. Felix sent Pit flying high into the sky, keeping an eye out for any approaching redcloaks or Revenants, while Evie spent some time flitting about the upper levels of the industrial facilities surrounding the mine. It was the second part that had proven...challenging.

Most of the miners wore manacles and chains, and those were easily broken. Common iron and steel was relatively simple to break, considering his Strength, though doing so without injuring the very squishy people wearing the manacles was quite the endeavor. He could have—perhaps—Ravenous Tithed the chains…but Felix’s control didn’t feel entirely up to that. He could have even used his claws, but he figured the prisoners were scared enough; he didn’t want to throw the “transforming demon” into their faces so soon.

Those wearing elision collars were far harder to free. Felix had encountered the artifacts right before he dove into the Domain and he was aware of their use. They cut off a person from their core, somehow, as well as drained their Mana to extremely low levels. He had no idea how they worked, not even what sort of Mana they were built out of, as they were blank to his Manasight. Empty spaces where the ambient Mana in the air just didn't go. The people wearing them, irrespective of gender, age, or level, all looked completely wiped.

Felix soon found out why. As he touched the collar, he felt a jolt of...not electricity or fire, though it felt deceptively like both. Instead it was numbness that sped up his arm before petering out near his shoulder. He'd found the key to the collars on Salazar's corpse, but Felix couldn't take them off without gripping them in some way. So, he gritted his teeth and did it anyway.

It was unpleasant. The numb sensation spread the longer he was in contact with the awful thing, and even in the five or six seconds it took him to unlock and remove the collar, the sensation was able to cover about three-quarters of his body. It felt like a weight on his core as well, though simply touching the metal didn't cut it off; he'd have to have the wretched thing on for that to happen. When he pulled the first collar off, he got a better look inside the thing. Where he'd been expecting smooth metal, Felix instead found twisted spikes flecked with red. The miner he'd taken it off of groaned in relief, and tiny droplets of blood welled up around his neck.

"Are you okay?" Felix asked, as the miner slouched so completely he was worried he'd lost consciousness. "Can you stand?"

A bone-weary nod from the miner put Felix at ease, and with help, the man was on his way. Felix moved down the line. Each of the freed miners were Skilled with wards, something they learned on the job, apparently. The Inquisitors had come upon them before they could enact the defenses that the mines usually employed. These wards were typically meant to deter monsters from the mines or mountains, but could, with a little tweaking, provide an extra oomph against others as well, or so the miners said. Not deadly, but certainly enough to take some of their fight out of them. The majority of the freed miners went off to work on that, though it seemed slow going.

Felix was unlocking the last of the elision collars when Rory found him again.

"Lad, let me introduce ye proper to my friend," Rory said as he hobbled up. Someone had found him a length of wood he was using as an impromptu cane. His leg was cleaned and bandaged up, the work of the woman at his side. "This is Aenea Ty'lel, former Bronze Rank Alchemist for the Guild and a damned good friend. Aenea, this is Felix Nevarre. A stray I helped train a bit."

"Just a bit," Felix agreed. He couldn't help returning Rory's crooked smile, though his own was awkward. The numbness from the last collar still shivered through him. He dropped the collar in his hand and shook it out, trying to return some feeling to it before taking Aenea's outstretched hand. It was slightly limp, but he could feel calluses on the pads of her fingers. "It's nice to meet you, Aenea."

"Nasty things, those collars," she said, looking down her nose at the pile of the spiked restraints. "It's pure barbarism to place such a device on anyone, criminal or not."

"They're not fun, I agree with you there. Even touching them makes me numb," Felix said, still wiggling his fingers. "I'd rather throw them into one of those smelters."

Aenea tilted her head slightly. "Interesting. You will not keep them? It's how enemy combatants are typically restrained."

"Ah, hmm, I see your point. I'll have to let Cal make the decision on them, I guess." Felix waved his hand as if to banish the topic. The collars were unnerving and not what he wanted to talk about. "Do you two need help? I'm just about done here—"

"Nay lad, nay. We are lookin' to head back to your camp, though," Rory said.

"Yeah, Cal mentioned that her scouts were to bring you back. You're more than welcome to join us on the return trip. Vess is telling me we'll have to take as many of the wagons as we can to supply the crafters, so there'll be plenty of places to sit."

"Good. Thank ye, Felix," Rory sat atop an upended barrel and sighed heavily. Seeing them both in the daylight now, fading though it was, Felix could tell that both of them were exhausted.

"How long has it been since you slept?" Felix asked.

"No more than four days," Aenea chimed in. "Alchemy waits on no one, sleep-deprived or not."

Four days isn't so bad, if you've the Endurance for it. Felix figured he'd be able to stay up for a week solid by this point, though he doubted he'd be of any use by that point.

"I went to visit Aenea a couple days ago. Social call," Rory grunted and shifted his bandaged leg. "The damn city went hairier than Yyero's backside while I was there, and we just managed to make it out of the Eyrie before it collapsed."

"Siva favored us. Favored you, Roridan."

Rory waved the words off. "Regardless, I was in the right place at the right time to save some folk. Most went off to the Wall, hopin' to link up with the rest of the Guild. Aenea and her team decided to come with me to yer camp."

"Team?" Felix asked, looking around. He'd thought they were all miners and laborers, but it had been dark and hectic in the tunnel. Rory gestured toward where Evie and some miners were loading a wagon. Six young women, each in multicolored smocks and dark aprons, were inspecting the contents of an opened crate nearby. The miners moved around them, clearly annoyed. "I see."

When he turned back, Rory gestured at Felix to come closer. He looked to Aenea, but the woman seemed to be studying something in the distance with peculiar intensity. Frowning, Felix bent low, and Rory spoke in a low voice.

"Keep it between ye an me. Crafters don't get loose from the Guild often, and usually it requires a lot more dismemberment. To have an Adept Alchemist and her six Apprentices? It's a windfall, lad." He grunted at Felix's still uncomprehending face. "I keep forgettin' how much ye don't know. Just keep it close, yeh?"

"Sure, Rory," Felix said. He understood that Alchemists were pivotal in creating Essence Draughts so that folks could Temper, but apparently that put a lot of value on their heads. "What do you mean, 'got loose?'"

"Hmph. I would have thought your people a little more knowledgeable, Roridan," Aenea sniffed. Felix looked up to see her staring down at the both of them. "The Guild lost their Charter. Any binding Oath sworn to them has been nullified."

That explained little to Felix, but he nodded as if it did. He could always get clarity from the others later. "I see."

Aenea snorted. "A poor liar as well as a sloppy commander. Tell me you didn't teach him to fight, Roridan."

"Excuse me?" Felix stood up and stared at the woman. "We just risked our lives to save you—"

"And did a piss poor job of it. Your technique is sloppy, and your teamwork is abominable. Perhaps, if you'd have worked together, you could have captured these men instead of murdering them," Aenea said, pointing at the corpses piled unceremoniously on one of the empty wagons. They were all draped in their own red capes.

That familiar rage swelled from within Felix's chest, though this time Pit didn't try and stop him at all. "Listen, lady, I don't know who you think you are, but—"

People! Incoming!

Pit's words dug at Felix's attention, pulling him up short. He realized he was only inches away from the Alchemist and let himself settle back on his heels. "We have company."

Rory got to his feet pretty quickly for a man with a bum leg. "Inquisitors?"

Felix tilted his head, listening to Pit. With a heated glance at Aenea, he offered a smile to the Dwarf. "Friends."

* * *

Reinforcements had arrived.

Led by Kelgan and Yan, more than thirty Tin Rank volunteers had marched the distance between the camp and mines. It wasn't far, thankfully, which meant they had arrived before dark had settled on the city. Being nearly mid-summer, they had close to two more hours before night truly arrived and the danger from roaming Revenants multiplied.

"Killed a lotta the bastards. Good," Yan said by way of greeting Felix. "Our scouts reported more redcloaks nearby, but they scarpered. I assume you're the reason, hmm?"

Felix gripped the man's hand and Kelgan's. Unlike Yan, the spearman was tall and lanky with a full head of light brown hair and an even fuller beard. A no-nonsense spear of plain steel was in his grip, the handle well-worn. An actual weapon, as opposed to Vess' conjured ones.

Kelgan grinned at him. "Felix."

"Kelgan. Yeah, we had an Initiate get away. Must have met up with them and changed their plans." Felix shook his head. "Which is good, because this place is rough. You got anyone who can change wards? I'm about to have a look, but I'm not exactly an expert."

"Oh? You're in luck. We've got—" Kelgan began, but was cut off by a panicked shout.

"Where is she? Aenea!"

The Alchemist's stern face lightened considerably as a man with curly brown hair and a well-trimmed beard pushed through the other Tin Ranks. He was wearing a rough helm and leathers, but he moved as if he'd never worn the gear in his life.

"Hector!"

Hector rushed to Aenea and took her into his arms. "You're alive! Thank the gods!"

Kelgor leaned toward Felix with a smirk. "We've got him. Some sorta scriptie, wouldn't let us leave until we agreed to take him to his wife."

As annoyed at the Alchemist as he was, Felix found himself cooling off just a bit as the two of them embraced and put their foreheads together. He tried not to listen in, but his Perception was a curse at times. His ears clearly snagged on Hector's voice saying "the Fiend," followed by a startled look from Aenea. At Felix.

"Soo, was the trip here as uneventful for you as us?" Felix asked Yan.

"Eh, we saw two or three Revenants, but none that got close. Either they were scared or are getting smarter. I don't like either option, because I know they're not scared of us," Yan said, spitting to the side. "These Tin Ranks have about as much killing intent as a clutch of field mice."

Felix couldn't argue with that. Though they had volunteered for the trip and training, the three dozen men and women were looking around the workyard, clearly unnerved. It was obvious that most of them hadn't seen a dead body until very recently, especially when a few kept looking between the dead redcloaks and Felix.

Things fell into place quickly after that. The Tin Ranks started patrols of the area and generally helped the miners clean up and get the place going again. A lot of the volunteers were family members of the miners, so once some tearful reunions were complete, everyone was moving with a pep in their step that Felix hadn't seen since arriving at camp that morning.

Hector turned out to be a treasure trove of knowledge. He was a Bronze Rank Guilder, damn close to Silver, too, but only in a singular area: sigaldry. The wards the miners mentioned were harder to parse and alter than anyone had anticipated. Though Felix's sigil Skill was Legendary, it didn't help him brute force past the fundamentals he'd yet to learn. Hector made short work of it all.

"The central glyph is a combination of two or more sigils and acts as the core of any array. Secondary sigils will orbit this glyph, with tertiary sigils branching off from there. Each one, as you no doubt know, is a modifier on the original glyph." Hector was remarkably amenable to explaining his process to Felix once asked, though some of the finer points didn't make sense to him yet. He filed away the sigils and arrangement of the wards in his memory to study later. "Changing these allows us to at least provide a minimal barrier to any people who might try and approach the mine. At least, ones without a ward key."

"Fascinating," Felix said. The written form of magic was something that filled him with a sense of wonder, even after seeing it countless times in the past few weeks. "Could we erect something like this around the camp?"

"It would be expensive," Hector said. "Monster cores or someone acting as a Mana battery would be needed. Here, the mines' wards are designed to pull from the city-wide net of energy siphons. The old, scripted paths flow up the mountains to absorb as much ambient Mana as they can handle."

"Really?"

Hector nodded. "It's usually just enough to maintain the Wall and general defenses, but for some reason the Mana in the city is...strange. Caustic, almost."

Felix pursed his lips at that, but didn't comment. How was he supposed to reply? “Watch out, you might fall into a coma at some point, but we're not yet sure?” He couldn't see that going over well.

Using Stone Shaping, Felix raised a few more short walls to block off alleys between buildings and other access points. With Rory's guidance, they were able to turn the one way in and out into an easily defensible, certainly deadly path. They planned to keep operating the mine, after all. Yan and Kelgan were going to stay on for now along with the Tin Ranks, to provide protection as well as escorts for each shipment of ore that would go out. Their crafters would no longer be without material, iron at least.

Yan was parceling out food and drink as Felix and the others mounted up to ride back. Pit decided to walk on the ground with them, and it turned out, was strong enough to carry Felix in that manner. It was weird to get used to the tenku's loping gait, but his Dexterity was high enough, he'd manage.

Arrayed on the wagons were his friends as well as Rory, Aenea, and her husband. A few of the miners came with them, those who had family back at the camp, and those who weren't sure if their family had lived or died. The last group was particularly heartbreaking to listen to, as Felix's Affinity kept feeding him their emotional state, and it was best described as whiplash. Happy to be free of the redcloaks followed by fear that their wife or child or parents were gone.

More than that, it forcibly reminded him of his own family, gone farther than most. A world away, at least. Where were they now? Did they miss him? Felix hoped that they had found some sort of closure, because he was certain there was no way back to Earth. Not in this life.

Unbidden, their voices echoed in his Mind, imperfectly recollected sounds but vivid just the same. Damn magic brain, he cursed. If he'd been alone, maybe he'd have embraced it, looked to see where that rabbit hole led. But sitting atop a Chimera and padding through the abandoned ruin of a monster-filled city was neither the time nor the place.

"Let's get moving. I'd rather not be out here when it hits full dark," he said. "C'mon, Pit."

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Riding atop Pit, Felix found himself with time alone. The tenku could easily outpace the load-bearing avum, so the man took point and ranged at least half a block ahead. Their paired senses were a good early warning system. He needed time to think, away from people and especially that Alchemist.

The events at the mine had opened his eyes in more ways than one. Felix fingered the charred edge of his linen tunic; there was little of his sleeves left, and the front was half burned away by that fire wall trap. But, along his left side, there was a long gash. The skin below still had the pucker of a scar, a cut even his Essence-enhanced regeneration hadn't been able to heal yet. Hopefully, it'd finish healing soon.

That Initiate was so fast, he mused. But it hadn't just been Agility aiding the man; his Skill at Dodge or something like it must have been high. Not to mention his Long Sword Mastery Skill. It was like attacking the wind.

The encounter had gone a long way toward proving Harn's advice true: stats were no substitute for Skill. Felix had often coasted on his superior stats, which allowed him to ignore some of the level discrepancy of his opponents. Adding in the strong Apprentice Aspects he'd formed had only let him lean into his "style" of fighting. Rush and punch and use a spell if he could think of a clever option. He knew he couldn't fight this way forever, and their teamwork in the Domain had shown him how effective it was to have allies in the battle as well.

Reign of Vellus!

Noise shattered his shaky calm as the Skill swept out of his channels, lighting up the street with azure. Only the broken remains of a clay roof tile were scattered to the winds, one among many from the ill-kept buildings around them. Felix's outstretched hand crackled with remnant discharge, and his chest heaved. His Skill had not just blasted the tile, but the cobbles beneath it were obliterated as well. He'd made a two-foot diameter pothole deep enough to gut a car.

Just a roof tile, he chided himself. Get it together, dude. What if that had been some innocent bystander?

His emotions were...just a huge mess. Nearly an hour after his last fight, Felix's heart was still racing at the slightest noise. He felt waves of anger at the redcloaks and agony over the deaths he caused and over those he couldn't prevent. Hate boiled above it all, a simmering stew that jabbed at his self-control. He had to get a grip.

Is it the Maw? Is my dumb new Race influencing me? Felix would be an idiot not to consider them connected, but he was certain there was something more to this. He'd killed before, but today it felt...normal. Casual. And when he kept throwing himself at the Initiate, the thought of retreat hadn't once entered his mind. If Thangle and Vess hadn't used their Skills to help me drive him off, I might be dead now.

Ravenous Tithe had proven more useful than he anticipated. He'd been able to weaponize it, thanks to his friends, but they wouldn't always be there to set up such a combo attack. Frankly, he had to get a handle on all of his Maw-touched powers. Sovereign of Flesh had tons of potential, even aside from forming armor and claws or upping his Health and Stamina regeneration; but there was more to learn, more to practice and perfect.

It cost Essence to use, but as long as he had enemies, he'd have fuel, and if they ever ran out, he could always start eating the furniture again. Voracious Eye was the only Maw-influenced Skill that had yet to show potential beyond the obvious. However, an Analysis Skill that had no range limit and could ignore most Status-hiding Skills was extremely useful, regardless of other benefits.

After his fight against that Initiate, he needed to leverage all of the advantages he had. Not to mention, Ravenous Tithe could eat the traces of the Maw that were proliferating across the city. The stupid Alchemist was right. He was sloppy and poorly trained. He needed to be better—to be more—fast.

"What was that?" Evie asked as her wagon came closer. A miner was actually driving the team but she perched atop the bench like a captain aboard his ship. Her voice was eager. "Something attack?"

"No, nothing. Just—" Felix waved his hand. "Nothing."

Evie sat back with a disgruntled frown on her face. "Ugh. This is boooring." She shifted herself a couple times before returning to standing, unsuccessfully fiddling with the sword strapped to her back. "And this damned thing is driving me batty. Can't you hold it?"

Held on by a pilfered baldric was the ornamented longsword of the first Initiate they'd defeated. The corpses of the others had been looted before they'd left the mines, likely the result of the quick-thinking Initiate who had also freed all the Acolytes. It was stylized with a flame motif, as all such blades were, the holy symbol of the Pathless centered on the hilt itself. Felix had looked at the sword multiple times since they had found it, noting it was enchanted in some way to produce flame, but he'd refused to actually touch it. Was unable to, really. His Long Sword Mastery was still broken, along with most of the others he'd managed to learn. He wouldn't even be able to pick up the Initiate's sword without spasming.

"You know I can't. Not yet," Felix said. "Besides, I know less about swords than most. Why not use it yourself?"

"A sword? Pfah! It can't even bend! Swords can't compare to chains, Felix." Evie laughed. The miner beside her just stared in confusion. She gestured to the sword. "You want it? It'd probably be good to like, light a forge or something?"

"Oh auh, no, ma'am. No," the miner said and affixed his eyes forward. "Swords ain't for the likes a’ me."

"What? Any idiot can use a sword. I have it on good authority—mine—that its last owner was the biggest of butts."

"I ain't even Tempered, ma'am," the miner protested. His voice shook ever so slightly. "When the monsters came we...we hid. People died, and we hid. I know minin' and ore, and that's it."

"Could always change it up. The city's different now. We need more hands to fight back against the monsters. The Fiend here can't do it all alone," Evie said, gesturing at a frowning Felix.

"I could never, I ain't—"

"You sure got a lot of excuses though, huh?" Evie laughed. "Tell you what, when we get back to camp, you can ask Bodie or Harn to see if they'll train you up. They've got a good eye. They say you're good, then hey, you're good. If not, you go back to mining, and you can't say you never tried. Yeah?"

Felix watched, bemused, as Evie bullied the man into speaking with Bodie. Yet, despite his reluctance, Felix felt that same bright thread of hope weave through the man's Spirit. She keeps saying she's no good with people, but what was that?

Pit turned his head to look at Felix, fixing him with a large, liquid gold eye. Echoes of the aggression and hate that still roiled around Felix's Spirit made their way onto the Chimera, but he only returned a calming trill. He'd come a long way from his unthinking aggression when they'd first met, and that understanding spread between the two of them. There were little to no secrets between the Companions.

I think it's because you're so big. Too lazy to get mad. Pit blew a raspberry at him. How'd you even do that, mentally?

Pit just trilled a song-laden laugh back at him.

* * *

They made it to camp without further complications, despite the onset of nightfall. Felix couldn't put his finger on why, but not being attacked was more unnerving than an ambush. At least an ambush would have cut the tension. Instead, Felix rode Pit into camp more taut than a bowstring, and just as ready to snap. The loud noises of the makeshift gates being drawn open and the shouts of the Tin Rank guards all grated at his senses. When the crowds rushed at them, it was all Felix could do not to have Pit shove his way through everyone.

Which was unfair. The citizens in the camp were excited to see them return, but more importantly, dozens of families were related to those who worked the mines, and they all wanted good news. The miners with them all hopped down to the ground, including their new prospective Tin Rank, each rushed by tens of folk. The hubbub swelled as miners shouted out for missing family members as even more in the crowd called out for word on their loved ones.

It was chaos, and Felix couldn't stand it.

"ALRIGHT!" Felix's enhanced Endurance helped his voice ring out like he had a megaphone, so loud he almost startled himself. "These men and women have been through a lot! Let them settle in before you tear them apart!"

Silence hung over the crowd, and more than a few looked at him with worried expressions. Felix could feel his eyes shining again, something that was happening more and more. The quiet stretched as the miners pushed through the crowds, and, thankfully, Vess saved him.

"We have a list of all those found at the mine, alive or dead. It will be posted to the main board in a quarter glass!" Vess held a scroll above her head for emphasis, and the crowd, struck still from Felix’s outburst, began to reluctantly disperse.

"Very well done, Lady Dayne," Cal said. She emerged from the crowd like greased smoke, as if the press of people were little more than a beaded curtain to her. "A wise move to collect their names. I'll see that it gets posted."

Vess handed the scroll over to Cal with a smile. It was one of her politician smiles, just a bare showing of teeth and warmth in the eyes. "I thought it prudent to get a tally of who was working in the mine, especially considering their concerns for their families."

"Wow, Vess. I didn't know you'd done that," Felix said, still atop Pit. The tenku cooed in a complimentary way, though Felix wasn't sure if it translated. "That's...glad you're on the team."

Vess smiled again, but it was wider this time. It felt more natural. "I am sorry I failed to mention it. You were dealing with other issues at the time."

"Oh, uh, don't worry about it. But thanks."

"Get me off this damn chicken wagon!" Rory shouted from nearby, and the smirk that had crept across Cal's dumb face turned into a beaming grin.

"Is that you, Rory?" She moved to the wagon and helped the injured Dwarf to the ground. "Oof! You've gained some weight, old man!"

"Someone has to! Look at ye! Skin and bones!" Rory gathered the treasure hunter up in a tight hug. "I've missed ye, Callie. Been only a week, and it's felt like a lifetime."

"I know the feeling," Cal groaned through the Dwarf's crushing embrace. "Ah, you have guests. How rude of you not to introduce them."

Aenea and her husband had descended quietly behind Rory as they had conversed, though Cal clearly hadn't missed them. Felix was certain she was simply being polite. Aenea tilted her head slightly at Cal.

"Calesca."

"Aenea," Cal shot back. "You lookin' for work?"

"I'm looking for my family. That is it, for now. If you'll excuse me." The Alchemist didn't quite huff the words, but it was close.

Cal let her go, but Felix saw a shine in her eye that he hadn't spotted before. If she were a cartoon character, he had a feeling she'd have two big dollar signs in her pupils. "Rory, what a wonderful surprise."

"Ain't it just?" Rory grinned through his beard. "But you tread careful, Callie. That one is proud. She might be cut loose, but she won't work for just anybody."

Cal waved the Dwarf's concerns off. "I'll be a proper lady about it."

"What exactly is she? I wasn’t payin’ attention when she showed up." Evie watched as Cal and Rory drifted farther away into the crowd. She leaned against Pit's haunches and ate some sort of beige fruit noisily. "Another crafter?"

"Alchemist, Rory says." Felix shrugged. "None of my concern, really."

"Alchemist? As in, maker of Essence Draughts?" Evie spat out chunks of her fruit. It was bright orange inside, apparently. "Noctis wept, but that'd be a boon."

"You're not wrong," said another voice. Felix turned to find two female Dwarves walking their way, one fair and the other dark. "I'd be excited to see what she could do for my forge, were she willing."

"Rafny, Elle," Evie said, hacking up a small piece of orange fruit meat. "Figures you'd come rushin'."

"Like a harnoq to a fresh kill." Rafny grinned with too much teeth. She looked up at Felix. "'Lo there, Fiend. Mind coming down to mortal level?"

Felix raised an eyebrow and hopped off Pit's back. He landed a few feet from the smiths and sketched a small bow. "Better?"

"Much. Now, show me all the ore you brought us." Rafny rubbed her hands together, but her wife put her fingers on her bicep.

"Raf, don't be rude. We still owe this man a fitting for armor, do we not?" Elle's expression was one of warmth, despite the wear that was starting to show. Based on the amount of simple arms and armor he'd seen worn by the new Tin Ranks, they had been hard at work the past two days. "We had told you to wait for better materials, I do believe. Yes?"

Felix nodded. "You did. That was...well everything spiraled since then."

"That it did," Elle said, a little sadly, Felix thought. "You've brought us some excellent ore, though. Simple and common, but the quality is outstanding. Enough to make plenty of Apprentice Tier weapons and armor for our new guards."

"Couldn't find some orichalcum in that mine, huh?" Rafny asked, now peering into the back of one of the wagons. "Or some mithral or veridian?"

"Quiet, you," Elle said. "This iron will go a long way to helping everyone. But I think I have something we could make work for you, Felix Nevarre, if you'll let us."

"Oh, yeah, absolutely," Felix smiled. "I've been making do with, uh, nothing up until now."

"What about a weapon?" Rafny prodded, having obtained a chunk of ore and measuring it with her hand and eye. "I've never seen you with more than a belt dagger. Is that because of your Fiend powers?"

"My what? No. I never really learned how to use one," Felix said, flustered. "Had to make do with my fists."

"Uh-hm, uh-hm, and what happens if your enemy is outside your range?"

"Magic?"

Rafny fixed him with a glare. "Mana runs out eventually, yeah? Come see us tomorrow."

"He shall be busy tomorrow," another voice smoothly interrupted. Zara, wrapped in layered robes of orange and cream, appeared as if out of thin air. "If you'll forgive my intrusion, Rafny. Elle."

"Zara, of course. Send him to us when he's done, if it would please you." Elle flashed Felix and Zara a wide smile before leading her wife toward the wagons, where two dozen women were now swarming and cataloging the ore.

"I'll make it a priority, Adeptsmith."

"Wow, just everyone's interrupting everyone else, huh?" Evie said, crunching into her fruit again. "Kinda rude."

"Who was rude?" Vess asked as she entered. She stretched her arms above her head with a groan. Her finely made armor was showing some strain, but it still moved with her form as if it were made of cloth, rather than metal. "I assume it was Evie."

"Hey!"

"Children," Zara admonished before giving them each a once-over. She tutted her tongue. "I had planned to try and teach you some of what you desperately need to know before you turned in, but I can see the day has been...difficult."

"All of us?" Evie asked. "You teachin' me to sing?"

"If you wish, yes. You've touched on the Harmonics, you will be able to learn," Zara said. "Tomorrow. For now, all of you, go rest."

"What? I can go for days yet," Felix said with no little confusion. He hadn't felt properly tired since he woke up early that morning, and Pit echoed that sentiment.

"Did you fight?" Zara asked, looking him in the eyes. Hers were a bright blue, chips of chill ice.

"Yeah, we just—"

"Did you kill?" She pressed.

Felix hesitated, though he wasn't entirely sure why. "Yes."

Zara nodded as if everything made sense. "Then go rest. I don't want to see any of you for at least six hours."

Felix looked around for some support, but Cal just shrugged and continued issuing orders to the Tin Ranks around her. Evie slapped him on the back. "C'mon, tough guy. I'll show you to your room. We're all near each other."

Felix threw a confused glance at the Chorister, but Zara's expression was steel.

"Fine. Sleep, then."

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Their rooms were located on the relatively small second floor of the main warehouse. It only took up the back quarter of the building, as the rest were empty rafters supporting the roof. A set of long stairs, exposed to the air with only a thin railing for safety, so steep and narrow he had to converge with Pit to navigate them. Felix supposed OSHA regulations weren't really a thing on the Continent.

"This is you," Evie pointed out the second room from the stairs. "You get prime real estate. Probably because you're so scary."

She laughed as she said it, and even Vess joined in, which teased a relieved sigh from Felix. He could always count on his friends to give him a hard time. "All right, thanks. To both of you. The fight today was...I'm glad you were there."

"Ah, we got yer back, you glow-eyed idiot," Evie said, punching him on the shoulder hard enough to bruise. His Song of Absolution absorbed the pain while still letting him know it hurt a little. Resistances are weird.

"Where else would we be?" Vess asked. "I shall not see this team broken more than it already is; in time, I hope that Atar will make a full recovery as well."

"Me too," Felix said, grabbing the door latch. "I'll see you both in the morning."

"G'night."

"Sleep well."

The two of them walked further down the hall and Felix allowed himself a moment, just a second to watch them walk away. Even through armor, Vess' form was...sinuous. Stop it. She's like eight years younger than you, Temper-rejuvenated or not. He looked to be in his early twenties, but he'd been nearly thirty (and looked it) when he’d arrived on the Continent. Hitting Apprentice Tier had revitalized his entire Body. Yet his Perception betrayed him, focusing his hearing on their moving conversation.

"Where is my room? Darius tried to have us placed in a separate lodging. I refused, and Cal put her foot down. Said there was not enough space to, ahem, 'accommodate every idiot with a rank.'" Vess laughed lightly, like a set of resonant bells. "I do like her."

"She's a peach," Evie said dryly. "You're up near me. Though, I gotta apologize beforehand."

"Apologize?"

"Our rooms are way in the back, sandwiched between Harn and Yan. You cannot imagine how much both of them snore," Evie groused.

"I have never heard Harn snore," Vess said.

"That's cuz he usually sleeps with his helmet on in the field. It's got a sound blocker or somethin' on it. Believe me, it's bad."

What are you doing? Felix admonished himself, spooling his Perception back in. Eavesdropping wasn't something he wanted to make a habit, no matter how often he had to do it in the field. Eavesdropping on his friends was a magnitude worse. Grumbling to himself, he unlatched his door and walked in.

The room was small, to say the least. It barely had room for a bed and a thick, heavily locked chest at one end, and a thin path leading around both. There wasn't a chance Pit would fit in here, not the size he was now, and his convergence would last less than an hour at a time. A whine of sadness peeled through his chest, and Pit sent him a series of sense images, snatches of memory of both of them cuddled on cots and beds and on the bare floor of the Nymean Temple when they'd first met.

"Good memories, bud, but I'm not sure there's a bed out there that could fit us both," Felix said with regret. "I think you'll have to bed down near the training area. Okay?"

More whining happened, but Pit didn't fight back as they walked back down the narrow stairs, and they parted. With a flash of light, Pit soared out into the empty air above the training area, catching the attention of a few of Cal's original crew, speckled with a smattering of new faces.

Stupid Zara. With my Endurance, I could go for like, a week without sleep. At least a week, I bet. Felix trudged back up the stairs, into his room, and practically collapsed on the straw-filled mattress. Felix growled into the thick padding beneath him. This is such a waste of time. I need to train, not...fall asleep...

He was out before he finished the thought.

* * *

His sleep was fitful.

Dreams plagued him, filled with the images of men and women in white-enameled armor crawling on the ground. They were bleeding heavily from wounds on their neck and chests, but still they cried out. To him.

Felix ran from them, unable to bear their eyes and words. But he came into the city proper, where Revenants tore apart wagons and houses, places filled with fleeing survivors. They were ravenous and did not care if it was a man, woman, or child, only that it bled.

Horrified, Felix fled to the roofs of town. From there, he could see the sun setting over the sweep of mountains in the Foglands. But there, on the horizon, a giant made of gold and fire beckoned to him. A giant with fires for eyes and a helmet for a head, it grasped Felix in its enormous mitt and squeezed.

"Huuah!"

Felix gasped awake to blinding light. For a moment, he thought of that golden gauntlet rising up all around him, and his heart raced. But it was just sunlight. Small holes apparently perforated the ceiling, just enough to cast the slanting light of dawn on his face. He'd slept for the entire night, though his dreams hadn't made it particularly restful.

Felix rolled to the edge of the bed and considered his hands. Younger than they were months ago, they were still his. A few scars here and there from dumb accidents when he was a kid. Calluses along his palm, though his knuckles were strangely unblemished. He once punched a man straight through his armored chest, and there was no evidence of it on him.

Why did that make him feel uneasy?

High Endurance, high Vitality, and Sovereign of Flesh were all answers as to why such things were possible. And with training, even stranger feats were waiting for him. He hoped. They had to be.

Felix clapped his hands and stood up. "New day. Plenty to do."

He could focus on his fears when he wasn't so busy. Or never. Never was good, too.

The morning was relatively calm, in spite of everything in the city. Zara was doing something in her room, no one knew what, but it left Felix with some time before her lessons. He focused on helping with the rest of the wall, pushing his Stone Shaping further and further. His progress with that Skill had been growing rapidly since he had begun using it to build things. It made Felix wonder why that might be; the Irontooth Ape—Balfur—used it to rip up columns of solid stone, but he doubted they ever built anything. It wasn't the only shaping Skill he'd heard of, however, so variants must have existed. Regardless, by the time he had managed another length of wall, the Skill had leveled twice.

Stone Shaping is level 42!

Stone Shaping is level 43!

"That's fine work."

Felix was leaning against a pile of debris that had yet to be cleared, idly inspecting the smoother aggregate of his newest wall section. He'd been getting faster at composing and shifting the stone, and with the last level up, he felt his control notch up by just a touch. The stone was no longer a rough, ungainly mass of compressed stone and earth and felt more uniform throughout. He turned and saw Hector, Aenea's husband, with his hand to his chin in thought.

"Oh? Thanks. I'm trying to figure out how to make it stronger, though," Felix said, pointing to a section in front of them. "Gotta get the, uh, granules smaller. Not sure how to do that other than brute forcing it."

"I've no Stone Sense, nor am I even a mason, but this looks likely to stand up to an army," Hector said with a smile. "A small one."

"One without ladders, yeah," Felix laughed. He stood and stretched his lower back. He didn't get sore much anymore, but it never hurt to stay limber. "The stone comes from pits on the opposite sides, so at least there's a bit of a trench to deal with. If the Revenants come for us, we'll have a fighting chance."

"And the Inquisition?" Hector asked, his expression darkening. Felix had to remind himself that the man's wife had just been trapped and nearly killed by the redcloaks.

"I imagine the powerful among them could just jump over this." Felix nodded. "I know I could. But even building higher wouldn't solve that; too many Skills to account for, according to the others."

"Do you still wish for the wards you inquired about earlier?" Hector asked, his voice a touch rough.

"Absolutely. That would help solve some of those issues. But you said we'd need monster cores to power it. I don't know what our supply is like right now," Felix began, but the man cut him off.

"I've already spoken to Cal on that. She said she has what we need to set up a standard array, enough to ward away most enemies for a short period." Hector pointed at several spots on the wall. "Here and here we'd place the siphons and condenser glyphs. We'd leave it inert until we faced an attack, otherwise we're wasting power for no purpose."

"All right," Felix nodded. "Not that I'm complaining, but I thought you were skeptical about making it work before?"

"After speaking with my wife, I've—I've decided to make the attempt," Hector said with far more heat in his voice than before. "The things she told me they did, things they said." He growled something in another language Felix didn't recognize. "I'll see them burn before they touch my family again."

Felix patted the man on the back, earning him a surprised look. "My man. Just let Bodie know what you need, and we can get it done. I'd like to watch, too, if I could."

"Oh, certainly. For the Fiend, that is the least I can do."

Felix hesitated, trying not to grimace. "Just Felix is fine. I don't know why this Fiend nonsense started up."

Hector, easily in his mid-thirties, gave him an uncertain glance before nodding. "If that is what you prefer."

"It is," Felix said and rubbed his hands together. "Where should we start? I think—"

"Felix!"

He looked up and saw Evie standing on top of another pile of debris that was being cleared away. She was perched precariously on a stack of empty crates, like a bird. She pointed toward the main warehouse. "It's time!"

Damn. "I have to take care of this. If you don't mind, I'd like to look your work over later with you."

"It would be my pleasure," Hector said, bowing his head ever so slightly.

"Great. Thanks Hector." Felix trotted toward the main warehouse, excited despite the slight annoyance at not delving further into sigils with the Bronze Rank Inscriptionist. Then again, it was time to learn about Harmonics.

Magic. Real magic.

He was excited.

* * *

Zara had them all seated on a single bench stolen from the communal dining area, which they had to drag to a separate, closed room. Felix, Evie, and Vess spaced themselves evenly about, while Pit scooted behind them, jostling the bench with every step. Evie kept whispering things to Vess and laughing about something, giving Felix some uncomfortable flashbacks to high school, though he refused to abuse his Perception again.

It didn't matter what they were talking about.

Luckily, Zara did something along the edge of the wall, and it was distracting as hell. A series of brilliant, aquamarine sigils flashed across every surface, all at once, before subsiding to a vague gleam. Felix flexed his Manasight and saw the sluggish vapor of constructed Mana, though of a type he hadn't yet seen before.

Something to do with water...

"Good. Now that we are settled, let us begin," Zara proclaimed as she walked to the other end of the room. The benches had been pushed back against the wall, so there was as much open space as possible. Zara faced the three of them and considered them with a grave expression. "What I share with you now is not to be repeated to anyone not under Oath. Do you understand?"

Felix narrowed his eyes, but nodded, as did the others. With a few terse words, she extracted a binding Oath from all three of them. Manasight still going, Felix observed as the silver thread of the oath shimmered into existence and tied onto his Spirit. A faint weight settled onto his shoulders before fading from conscious awareness. Vess and Evie both squirmed a bit.

"As I've explained to Felix previously, this is all supposition at best, but it is believed that all of Creation originated from the sublime vibrations of the Grand Harmony. A Chanter uses those vibrations to change the shape of our world." She gestured, and from nowhere, a brightly plumed kingfisher alighted on her outstretched hand. "Keru, if you would demonstrate?"

"As you wish," the bird chirped, before taking wing. He flew in a tight spiral before her, faster and faster, until he vanished with a startling pop.

Felix leaned forward, eyes wide. In the place of the strange bird was now a series of concentric circles etched with a diaphanous light, dozens of them stacked within each other. Zara stepped forward and touched the outermost edge, and pushed.

The entire array began spinning, each circle rotating, flipping over and over like the most complex gyroscope he'd ever seen. Then Zara gestured again, and the circles replicated themselves twice over, until all three gyroscopes spun so hard they began to hum.

"These are the three Realms, as accepted by modern scholars," Zara pointed to each one in turn. "Corporeal. Cognitive. Ethereal. Each corresponds to one of the three Aspects: Body, Mind, and Spirit. This is not unintentional. When Grand Harmony begat the System, it is believed to have done so with Intent."

"Wait, wait, you're saying this big noise I keep hearing is alive? A god?" Evie asked, looking at the others for support. "Thinkin' music?"

"Of a sort. The Grand Harmony is the totality of Creation, Evie. What we ascribe as Intent may have been simply a result of unknowable interactions between forces so titanic they would shake this nation apart were we to name them. The Ancients may have known, those Lost, but modern thinkers are acting on hints and intimations at best." Zara spread her arms somewhat helplessly. "And the 'noise' you've been hearing sounds like chaos due to your lack of Affinity. Had you the requisite stat, you'd find it far more palatable."

"Palatable? It sounds like a goose honkin' half the time," Evie grumbled.

Vess tilted her head up, a question in her eyes. "How would one unlock the other Harmonic Stats, then?"

"Ah, a very good question. Felix, would you answer this?" Zara turned to him, as did the others.

Felix looked up from considering the three spinning orbs of circles and blinked. "Oh, I got mine from finished quests, or from Tempering Skills. Is that the only way?"

"A deed of import is required, though what that deed is can vary from person to person. The importance has more to do with its personal significance than System significance." Zara tapped her lips before baring her sharp, shark-like teeth. The way she said ‘significance’ felt important, somehow. "The Grand Harmony seeks rapport with your Aspects. That is how you have all gained what stats you have."

Zara returned her attention to the spinning orbs, and they each phased into one another, one pushing into the center while the outer two fully passed through it. A Venn diagram with a circle atop its center. "The Grand Harmony is in all things, but to perceive it properly, one must have unlocked Affinity. To truly harness it, one must have unlocked Intent."

"Yet I heard it way before I unlocked any Harmonic Stats. The moment I integrated into the System, it was there; that and the Maw's godawful droning," Felix said. He hadn't known it at the time, but now he couldn't escape it. He experienced that jarring dichotomy on a lesser scale with every breath; those motes of ruby light and his Maw-touched Skills all gave off echoes of discord, while his core was bathed in the System's harmonics. "Is that because I'm Unbound?"

"Intriguing. Perhaps influenced by your nature, or maybe the Primordial's unhealthy interest in you. The Unbound of the past were able to do things most were not; miracles, if the tales are to be believed." Zara shook her head ruefully. "We have no hard facts from those times, so I'll have to start with what I know, and we'll work from there, hm?"

Felix nodded while Zara shook her head ruefully. "And, for all this to make sense, one must know some context. The names and details of Harmonic Stats."

"Noctis wept, yes!" Evie groaned in relief before whispering to the others. "This is like listenin' to a seer. Dunno what's up and down anymore."

"Evie," Vess chided.

Zara wove her hands through the spinning construct, destabilizing it until it was an amorphous cloud around her fingers. With a deft hand, she shot it out once, twice, thrice, and each glob of power zipped in front of each of them. Pit craned his head over Felix's shoulder, jostling him.

"Okay bud, calm down," Felix scratched Pit's face, right between his eyes. Before them, the cloud of power had become a large aquamarine screen filled with pale, off-white letters.

Harmonic Stats

Resonance - Affects mental recovery. Confluence of Intelligence and Willpower.

Intent - Affects influence upon the Harmonics. Confluence of Willpower and Strength.

Affinity - Affects empathy and connection with the Harmonies. Confluence of Vitality and Perception.

Resilience - Affects physical recovery. Confluence of Endurance and Vitality.

Evasion - Affects physical defense. Confluence of Dexterity and Agility.

Might - Affects feats of the Body. Confluence of Strength and Endurance.

Alacrity - Affects feats of the Mind. Confluence of Intelligence and Agility.

Felicity - Affects mental defense. Confluence of Perception and Dexterity.

"As you can clearly see, each Harmonic Stat is a confluence of two of your Primary Stats. Moreover, each stat affects one or more of your Aspects." As Zara spoke, words on each screen flashed. "Your Physical Stats are Strength, Vitality, Endurance, Agility, and Dexterity. Mental Stats are Willpower, Intelligence, and Perception. And Spiritual Stats, well, all of the Harmonic Stats fall in that category."

"All Harmonic Stats involve the Spirit?" Vess asked, a bit incredulous. "That is heavily weighted toward a single Aspect. Why?"

They got another shark-toothed grin from the chorister. "A wonderful question, and for which I actually have something of an answer. The Spirit is multifaceted and, frankly, not entirely well-explored by modern scholars. What we do know is that it reflects the Ethereal Realm." She once more conjured those three globes, overlapping two of them like a Venn diagram. The third she held separate. "This Realm sits between, among, above, and below the Corporeal and Cognitive. A connective skein between all things, much like Harmonic Stats, it is a confluence of all things."

The third phantom orb settled over the two overlapping ones, centered on their point of connection. "Your Aspects are merely reflections of Creation at large played out upon the small scale of your forms."

"As above, so below," Vess said in an odd tone. Felix glanced at her, and she had the strangest expression.

"Exactly right. You are your mother's daughter," Zara said softly. Vess' expression was almost aggressively neutral. "The Grand Harmony is a pattern by which the entirety of Creation was made. As far as we can piece together, that is what the ancients believed, but it is an incomplete picture. For instance, can any of you tell me how this works?"

She hummed a note, steady and solid, then descended it several octaves until a ghostly, orange flame appeared above her hand. It happened so fast, Felix hadn't even seen her expel the Mana vapor to produce it. The longer he stared at it, however, the more he realized that there was almost no Mana vapor. It was simply...there.

Felix looked in shock at Zara, who was grinning at them all as her little song died. The ghostly flame vanished.

"What was that?" Evie asked. She had half-stood when the flame appeared, for all that she'd faced down an entire squad of fire-wielders just the other day. "That wasn't...something was wrong with that, right?"

"Perceptive. Yes, it was a bare-bones construct of the Chant. The tones I uttered were the framework for a spellform composed almost entirely of my Intent. Only a trickle of Mana was used, enough to fuel it, but the image you saw was provided entirely from my Intent."

"So you just willed it into being?" Felix asked.

"Yes and no. Intent is a framework, but Mana is the substance of it all. Mana is the confluence of all life, of all things, derived from the Ethereal Realm. It forms all things in the other Realms as well. It is the most direct and concrete example of the Grand Harmony. It also reinforces the System's vibrations, providing the meat and bones for everything to build upon."

Felix found himself nodding along. His Manasight had clued him into this early on; everything he saw was made of vaporous storms of power, Mana that he slowly began to perceive at varying states of solidity. There were very few places where he'd been unable to see Mana spooling in the air. But, even then, the physical objects around him were still composed of it. After all, if they weren't, he would have never been able to use Ravenous Tithe on them back at Zara's manor.

"Zara...you didn't mention any of this to me when we spoke before. What gives?" Felix asked. She had once claimed ignorance on a bunch of things that she was now answering fairly plainly.

"I was not entirely forthright with you, Felix. I could not be, not without an Oath. Not until you were all ready," Zara said, her tone apologetic. "Things are different now. Having passed through the belly of the beast and returned victorious, the lot of you have proven yourself remarkable. Changed. The consequences of your actions have echoed across your beings, and now you are all ready to learn what I have to teach."

Her shark-toothed grin between ochre lips was playful, yet still filled with a near-tangible danger. "Who's first?"

CHAPTER NINETEEN

FIVE DAYS LATER

Acid splashed outward in a fluid arc, and Felix damn near squawked in angry surprise. His chest felt like a swarm of angry bees were trying to escape him, and all he had to stop them was a net. His Intent wobbled, and Corrosive Strike lost all cohesion.

Still, the training dummy was only made of wood. It was blasted apart by his unarmed blow. The torso shattered into jagged chunks, splattered haphazardly with the remains of his conjured acid.

"You need to control it, Felix," Zara said, appearing at his elbow. She tapped his chest with a strong, ochre finger. "This is why I had you all rest that first night, why I've banned your Revenant hunts. Your emotions affect everything you do, even when you're not working with Harmonics. Too volatile, too unbalanced, it will spill out and deform your working. You need to center yourself."

Felix glanced down. Green acid dripped from the pieces of the training dummy, wood that was sizzling away rapidly under the power of his conjured acid.

"Your last confrontation was days ago," Zara stated. "Why are you still so angry, Felix?"

"I-I don't know," Felix said, and the admission was like a sour pit in his gut. Zara hummed contemplatively to herself.

"You need to find out why and to control those emotions. Focus, Felix. That is the only way forward."

Zara left him, moving onto Vess in the nearby sand pit. All three of them—four if he included Pit—were working on the fundamentals of what Zara taught them. Vess was doing better by far. She executed her kata, moving her spears in a series of dizzying patterns that was hard to focus on, and he couldn't sense her emotions spill over at all. Which was unfair, frankly. She had unlocked Resilience and Might previously, before they had even met, and after the Domain collapsed, she'd earned Felicity, Alacrity, and Evasion. All new to her, and she had yet to unlock Intent. Despite all of that, Vess' spear thrusts began to take on a ghostly shimmer.

Goddamn it, Felix groused. He was happy she was figuring it out, he supposed, but it was frustrating. Can't even hold my damn Skill together.

They had been trying to weave their Intent into their standard System Skills. Zara said it was the easiest way to get used to using the Chant, that by tying it to Skill use at first would help craft the pathways needed to proceed in the art. And she had emphasized 'art'; the Chant had no codified rules except those intuited by a Chanter. Apparently, the Grand Harmony changed—frequently.

"Think of it as an improvised, Master Tier concerto. Its beauty and power is in its spontaneity. One could repeat the same notes but never quite recapture the same Essence. Hmm?" Zara had explained.

By focusing on their Intent (even for those who had yet to unlock it), they had somehow bypassed the passive aid the System provided with regards to Skills. Previously, when Felix had used his Intent, it had been in a more abstract manner, conveying his wants for the movement of Essence and intangibles, rather than using it in place of his Skills. What Zara was teaching them was...it was several orders of magnitude more difficult.

Whereas before Felix could execute a Corrosive Strike in his sleep, now he had to consider the move from the ground up, start to finish; he had to shift his body, flex his muscles, and direct the Mana through his channels all at the same time. On a conscious level! Needless to say, Felix had been failing at it, almost as bad as Evie. Her nonstop curses reached him from across the warehouse as she fought with her spiked chain.

"C'mon you dirty, burnin'—no! Not that way!" Her voice was followed by the clink-clatter of her chain hitting the sand.

At least I'm not the only one. Pit's not doing much better, either. The tenku was attempting the same training as they were, but was having trouble the same as Felix. He took some comfort in that, but he still eyed Vess' capable moves with a bit of envy. With a grunt, he hooked the strap of a waterskin with his foot, tossed it up into his hands, and took a long swig. He wasn't exactly winded, just frazzled, like his concentration was slipping a bit. Zara had said that is one of the side effects of using the Chant. Mental conditioning was necessary, and those of weak mind would not find much use for the art.

He toggled his Harmonic Stats.

Harmonic Stats

RES: 156

INE: 221

AFI: 135

REI: 140

EVA: 110

MIG: 84

ALA: 217

FEL: 84

It wasn't enough to simply develop his Intent. Above all his other Harmonic Stats, that one was the highest—which only made his repeated failures more frustrating. No, Felix and the others all had to focus on attaining or developing their Affinity as well. His own was decent, but not in line with his Primary Stats or even top three of his Harmonic ones. Still, he had figured he could hear the Grand Harmony well enough.

He was wrong. Zara had made that painfully clear.

All Felix could hear were snippets, tiny sections of a greater symphony that was so alien, it made his ears bleed to perceive it. Literally. Zara had somehow opened a connection to a small portion of the Grand Harmony, and Felix had been blown back on his ass. Like a cartoon character in front of a giant subwoofer. Evie still wouldn't shut up about it.

Felix shook his head and considered the sectioned-off area before him. It was sand, as were most of the training pits the crew had installed in the main warehouse, and lining it was a thin, twelve-foot high wall of shaped stone. That, he had made. It was high enough to block most casual Skill discharges but not so high they couldn't hop over it if the need arose. After the fight with the Inquisitors, Felix hadn't felt comfortable dropping his guard, even there.

The wooden dummy he'd broken was slowly piecing itself back together as inscribed sigils flashed in the morning light. But it was too slow. The array detailed in the training dummy was a basic thing, no more efficient than the siphon array on Zara's lamps back at her manor. Former manor. Rubble-formerly-known-as-manor. The thing would take at least fifteen minutes to reconstitute, time Felix didn't want to waste. With a minor effort, he hopped over the wall and walked to the other side of the warehouse.

To the arena.

Over the past week, aside from getting a grip on Chanter magic, Felix had focused on his other Skills as well and practiced them in the larger arena that had been built up near the edge of the Gauntlet. Those fights had proven themselves as a powerful outlet for the passions that stirred his veins. Hitting someone with a big piece of metal or wood was cathartic in a way that he had never truly appreciated until Rory had goaded him into the arena. Getting beat up was a small price to pay for working out his frustrations.

"Back at it, Felix?" Trendle asked, his curled mustache almost twisting in glee. He gave the impression that he'd been simply passing through the area, but it was clear he had been waiting for this. Felix knew the crew couldn't bear to miss a chance to gamble. "I'll get the boys! They won't wanna miss another fight!"

The large man ran off, surprisingly speedy for a mage. Felix's mouth was a grim line. Trendle was support, much like Portia, focusing on Amplification magic to aid his allies. Felix had only seen its like once before, from Lilian in the Domain. Alister's cousin, the one who ran away along with Dabney, the earth mage.

Thoughts of the Domain soured Felix's mood further, so by the time he reached the arena, he was even more ready to work off some steam. Nodding at the man at the edge, Felix pushed open the side gate and strode into the sand-filled space. He had put a lot of effort into developing his broken Skills; there were only six left, and nearly all of them were weapons mastery Skills, so it was less a matter of how and more a matter of Endurance.

Breaking a Skill was like breaking a finger; everything he touched hurt him, though only in the specific sphere of influence described by the Skill. Simply holding a weapon would send pain through him, pain that Felix had to acclimatize to until it was simply background noise. Then the Skill would level, the pain would escalate, and he'd have to start that process all over again.

Felix crossed the arena, a wide sandy circle approximately forty feet in diameter, and up to a rack of weapons. All varieties of violent implements were here, each of them blunted and battered from many hours of use. They all had Beginner Tier siphon arrays etched into their hafts, but they rarely went unused for a long enough time to fully self-repair. Without hesitation, Felix grabbed a training long sword, feeling a current of electric pain spasm through the muscles and bones of his hand and forearm.

"Ungh," he grunted, but that was all. Sweat beaded at his temple, but the level of pain was manageable, even with his Long Blade Mastery on the cusp of Apprentice Tier. A shock of concern echoed through his chest, but Felix sent back a sense of well-being, feigned though it was. I'll be fine, Pit. The tenku warily settled back into his own training. Determination burning through him brighter than the pain, Felix spun and marched back into the center of the arena.

And he began to move.

Rory had taught him the basics of each martial Skill over the course of the week, keeping him busy whenever he wasn't driving himself into the ground with Zara's lessons. He'd fumbled his way through each of his broken Skills, notching up the agony with every improvement he wrestled from Beginner Tier. Luckily for him, relative to Apprentice or Journeyman, the Beginner Tier levels moved swiftly. The biggest hurdle was the last one: level 24 to 25. His Long Sword Mastery had been stuck there for two days now, it, along with Parry, lagging behind all the rest.

Axe M@st3ry is level 25!

Blunt W34p0n Ma57ery is level 25!

L0ng B//ade M4st3ry is level 24!

P#rry is level 24!

St&ff M4st3ry is level 25!

Intim1d4t/0n is level 25!

He was so close to being ready to combine them all.

While his broken Skills netted him nothing for hitting Apprentice Tier, it was a necessary step for what came next. However, due to Felix's dedication, a number of his non-broken Skills had improved as well, some even gaining the bonuses his broken Skills could not.

Small Blade Mastery is level 25!

Apprentice Tier!

You Gain: +3 DEX, AGL, STR

Thrown Weapon Mastery is level 25!

Apprentice Tier!

You Gain: +3 DEX, STR, PER

Unarmed Mastery is level 45!

Corrosive Strike is level 43!

Unfettered Volition is level 46!

Armored Skin is level 51!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain: +10 VIT, END, STR

Armored Skin had been difficult not to Temper into his new Body, but Felix resisted. It was a good Skill, one that had doubtlessly saved his life hundreds of times, but he had different plans this go-round. Better plans, he hoped.

As he swung the long blade around him, shifting through some of the basic stances Rory had attempted to drill into him, Felix considered the movements of his body. The difference in his Strength, Agility, and Dexterity were noticeable since this time the previous day. He had taken the plunge the night before and spent the massive backlog of unused stat points. Having 82 points in reserve felt good in some ways, but ultimately, it was doing him no good.

He hadn't been fast enough, and while more Agility might not have let him counter that old bastard, it would have helped. So Agility got its day and got another 32 points added to it, while Dexterity got 12, and the remaining points were split unevenly between Strength and Perception. Basically, he balanced himself out, which had been his stat allocation plan for a while now. At one point, he had briefly considered going for a more lopsided build—his Race and Omen certainly pushed him toward WIL and INT—but he'd found himself having to escape death too many times to put all his eggs in one basket.

Health: 1841/1925

Stamina: 1466/1542

Mana: 2068/2068

______

STR:    210

PER:    304

VIT:     395

END:    293

INT:     392

WIL:    810

AGL:     313

DEX:     315

When he had accepted those stats, it was an experience, to be sure. System energy and what he'd been calling Primordial energy clashed in the worst way, and he got pumped full of both. It was like eating bad takeout then drowning it in bad booze. Felix was smart for choosing to do it right before bed, because he was useless for a couple hours after.

Now, though, now he felt good. Better than good. Despite his failures with utilizing his Intent, there was a bounce in his step that he could only attribute to his stat increases. It almost let him ignore the pulse of knotted emotion that dug at his heart. Pushing his stats toward balance made his body feel like he'd gotten a tune-up; his joints felt smoother, his movements sharper and more precise. Felix had seen what an imbalanced build did and wasn't interested in the pitfalls.

For instance, Bodie was strong as hell but had garbage Agility and had to leap about if he really wanted to move quickly. Evie, on the other hand, had a fairly low Strength for her level but great Agility. She was speed focused, and most of her Skills and Titles were pointed in that direction. But she couldn't take a punch nearly as well as Vess, nor could she get much damage out of her chains without adding more velocity to the attack or cheating and increasing their mass with her Born Trait.

I still have no idea how that works. Felix pivoted on one foot, slashing perpendicular to the ground. He did it wrong, but he was close. He tried again. He'd asked Evie to explain it to him, but she had just shrugged and said 'dunno' and moved on. Par for the course for her.

"Felix! Again?" A voice to the side laughed, followed by the thump of heels hitting the sand. Felix finished his form and saw Rory striding over toward the weapons rack. "What'll it be this time? Ye wanna take more punishment from the axe or the hammer?"

A grin forced itself across Felix's face as his heart rate spiked. "Choose what you want. I'm here to finish the job, however that shakes out."

"Hah!" Rory barked a laugh before grabbing a long-handled warhammer from the rack. He hefted it onto his shoulder with an easy grace. "It'll shake out with me puttin' your head in the sand. Make no mistake."

"Fightin' words!" shouted Trendle. At some point the man had returned, and this time about fifteen others were with him. The crowd had grown with each passing day, and not all of them were Cal's crew. Most were Haarwatchers, the newly minted Tin Ranks, all coming to see the Fiend get trounced. "Make your bets, friends! Roarin' Rory or the Blue-Eyed Fiend! Who will win!"

Perhaps he could have pushed through these levels with his Memories, much as he advanced a few of his other Skills. But Essence fueled those exercises, and the only source of Essence was monster cores or running into the city to hunt down more Revenants. Monster cores were being used for enchantments and powering the new wards, so that resource was out. As far as Revenant hunting, with his emotions in disarray, Zara had instructed him to stick close, to try and let his volatility dissipate and even out. It still hadn't.

So instead, here he was to let Rory beat him up again.

Felix ignored the shouting and cheers and bowed to the Dwarf, who, other than a hundred years and forty levels on him, was barely half his height. That hadn't ever fooled Felix into thinking he'd be an easy opponent, though. Even before they'd started sparring, the former Guild trainer had forgotten more about armed combat than Felix would ever know. Rory bowed in turn, a delighted smile on his face.

"To battle, then."

Felix bared his teeth.

"Ah, wait, aren't ye forgetting something?" Rory slung his hammer into the ground, sending a spray of yellow grit into the air. He reached into a pouch at his waist and pulled out a length of black cloth.

Ugh. He had hoped Rory would forget. Felix walked forward and took the cloth from him, ignoring the man's wide grin. With a quick motion, Felix secured it over his eyes and tied it off. The Dwarf had insisted on using this ever since he found out about Felix's Blind Fighting Skill.

"Ain't no use in having a Skill that's under-leveled, Felix," he had said. Felix had, stupidly, agreed with him. The beatdowns that resulted were, to put it mildly, embarrassing. Felix walked back to his starting position, roughly. It was hard to be entirely sure.

"Now, we fight."

Cut off from sight completely and disallowed use of his Manasight on grounds of "bein' a sneaky cheat," Felix had let his Perception spool out from him. He'd gotten a little better at it over the past few days, but the added points to the stat made a noticeable difference. The world was a wash of textures, sounds, reflected heat, and wafting scents. Without sight, he had to focus, but that's where his Blind Fighting came in handy.

Blind Fighting is level 39!

Felix snapped his sword up into a high guard, deflecting a downward swing to the side as his Skill screamed at him. Using Blind Fighting wasn't like seeing at all, but instead felt like things burst into burning focus within a short distance from his body. Coupled with his upped Perception, Felix felt pretty good about his chances this time.

Then Rory got mean.

"Hammerfall!"

A series of strikes battered against Felix's defenses, so fast they felt simultaneous. He pivoted and swung his blade, angling it through Base Forms 1, 5, and 6. But it wasn't enough. A blow he couldn't sense swept his feet from the ground, and a second strike smashed into his thigh.

Sovereign of Flesh!

A spear of pain erupted along his legs as they snapped and transformed instants ahead of the warhammer. The blunt weapon crashed against the thickened scales of his semi-summoned battleform, only dropping his Health by thirty points instead of the hundred it would have dealt. The transformation hurt more than the hammer.

Unfettered Volition!

Felix pushed away, sliding himself across the sand in a spray of confusing vibrations. Friction caught up with him, and he rolled, coming to his feet and feeling thoroughly disoriented.

"I said no transformations, Felix!" Rory's voice was disapproving and dripping with threat.

"Ah, you said no full transformations," Felix said, sword at the ready. The Dwarf was a smudge of sound and smells to him, shifting ever so slightly back and forth. "That was just my legs."

"I thought you were a warrior, not a magistrate!" Rory shouted, advancing across the sand in a quick burst of speed. His hammer came up from below in a swing that was so telegraphed that he'd have to be truly blind to miss. Felix stepped back, letting the weapon pass harmlessly in front of him before moving into the Dwarf's guard and trapping the man's arm against his own leg.

"And I thought you were better than me," Felix said, at the same time slashing into the Dwarf's center mass. Metal on metal scraped his senses, and Rory grunted. Arm trapped between them, he lashed out with a headbutt, one that had laid Felix out before. But instead of hitting his solar plexus, the Dwarf hit nothing at all. Felix danced backward, sliding his feet through the sand.

"Ach, ye've got balls kid," Rory moved his hammer and touched his hand to his chest. At this distance, Felix could feel the faint heat given off by the man's open wound, small though it was. "But this ain't over yet."

The fight—apart from the cheers and jeers from the crowd—was as intense as any life or death battle Felix had fought in the Foglands. Rory held nothing back, not if it would help teach what he aimed for, and his lessons were almost always brutal. When it was over, though Felix had managed to get another hit in, his left arm was broken in two spots, and his body was bruised from head to toe.

"Match called in favor of Roarin' Rory!" Trendle's boisterous voice announced and was met with a collection of whoops and cries. To Felix, it was a wave of white noise that washed over him as he lay prone in the sand. He hadn't even taken off the blindfold yet.

He was far more interested in the notifications flashing before his eyes.

Blind Fighting is level 43!

The Song of Absolution is level 57!

Dodge is level 46!

L0ng Bl4d3 M@5tery is level 25!

Apprentice Tier!

You Gain: ERROR

P@rry is level 25!

Apprentice Tier!

You Gain: ERROR

He'd done it. Finally.

"That's a smile I recognize," Rory's gruff voice said from above. Felix tugged the cloth off his head and let his grin shine full force.

"I'm ready. The last of my weapon Skills hit Apprentice."

"Good. Maybe soon ye'll be a real challenge," Rory said with a laugh. "Now stand up. You're gettin' blood in the sand."

CHAPTER TWENTY

"What do you mean, you're unavailable? Developing your Intent is paramount, Felix. You cannot afford to be lax with the Chant."

They were in Felix's tiny closet of a room. Well, Felix was in the room while Zara stood in the doorway and Pit loomed behind her like a horse-sized bouncer. She patted his beak before staring back at Felix. For his part, he gave her an apologetic shrug as he grabbed a set of linen clothes that had seen better days. These will do.

"I know. It's not that. I've got to clear up my Skills. My first meeting with the Maw led to several of my Skills being broken. I've fixed a lot of them, but I still have a few left."

Zara shook her head. "Avet's eyes, broken? How could that happen? There's no record of this—" She stopped mid-sentence, registering Felix's confused stare. "Nevermind. Are they your Mana Skills?"

"No. Most of them are Body Skills, weapons masteries, and one Mind Skill." Felix flexed his hand, just imagining the jolts of pain whenever he used them.

"Body Skills?" Zara's tone was incredulous. "Why waste your time? You've proven yourself well capable without weapons of any kind. Your transformation Skill alone is terrifyingly effective. What need do you have for a sword?"

Felix opened his mouth then closed it. "It's more than that. I feel...I feel like I'm in pieces, somehow. I need to be whole."

Felix looked up again to see Zara regarding him levelly, her bright blue eyes curious. While his Affinity could sense nothing that the Naiad didn't wish to give away, she seemed genuinely concerned. "I see. How has your core developed? I think that may have a lot to do with these feelings."

"What?"

"Your core. You should be in the Actualization Stage at this point, yes?" Zara eyed him impatiently before realization dawned. "You're Unbound. You have no idea. Night." Zara held up a hand and placed it near Felix's body. "May I inspect your core?"

"Uh, sure."

Zara's ochre palm touched Felix's tunic, right above his belly button, and he felt a gentle pulse of aquamarine power sweep through him. It was like getting blasted by those air conditioners above the doors of a convenience store; chilly but benign. Felix observed Zara's face instead, watching as her expression changed rapidly from pinched concentration to surprise.

"You've already condensed into the Ring Stage? And—you have strands forming?" Zara shook her head ruefully. "I had expected accelerated developments, but this..."

"What are you talking about? What's the Actualization Stage and Ring Stage? The Maw once told me of the Visualization Stage, but not much else. Is that—are they a Tier thing?" Felix asked.

"No, it's—damnation. I should have told you of this already, but you were so capable. I had assumed—regardless. The core," Zara stepped back and gestured. A ghostly image appeared before them, a small glowing speck in a dark void. "All cores start the same. It is a mote of energy that sits in your center and radiates System energy throughout your Aspects. It is the interface between you and the System itself. This is the Mote Stage.

“When enough energy has passed through that speck of power, it will branch through your flesh, forming channels for the System's energy to better travel within. This is the Vein Stage and is quite important. Typically, this happens around level 15 to 20, as that's when most gain the requisite stats to jump start the process."

Felix thought back on his time in the Foglands around those levels. He recalled the burning sensation he'd continuously felt within him from the outset, whenever a Skill leveled or he'd earned more stat points. Was that his Mote Stage?

"Which stats?"

"Intelligence and Willpower are key, but Endurance and Vitality are also important to endure the process," Zara eyed him. "Most would need at least 15 in each to make the most of the Vein Stage. Do you recall this occurring?"

Felix thought back to the near death by hypothermia that had netted him his Fire Within Skill. It had all the earmarks of what she was talking about. The events then had edged out of his perfect thirty day recall, but he could remember well enough. "Yeah. My stats were in the twenties and thirties at that point."

"That’s—to be expected of an Unbound," Zara said. Her breathless interest in this conversation was a strange departure from her usual kind mystery. The image between them had become a body of pulsing veins, looping throughout the torso and spooling through each limb and even head. "Once your channels have formed, they take a while to settle. Once they do, the use and expulsion of Mana vapor becomes far easier. You have learned to open and close your Mana Gates, yes?"

He winced, remembering the rusty blockages that his Mana Gates had become, and the painful process of freeing them. He nodded.

"Good. Those are, of course, the key to both absorbing and releasing your Mana. This is also the part where your core could have become attuned to an element of Mana. Now, I cannot tell what element you have chosen, Felix." Zara looked at him. "Is it lightning? Or is it fire? I see your core has elements of both, but the texture of their sound is not like any elements I've encountered. What did you choose?"

"I uh, I didn't. Choose, that is." Felix again thought of the Maw, of the begrudging lessons in the Void. "I was informed that my core is undifferentiated, able to accept and exude any and all Mana types."

"Informed? By the Primordial?" He nodded, and Zara scoffed. "It could have lied to you, but the song of your core makes far more sense in light of that knowledge. No attunement, just...that explains the wide variety of your Mana Skills. It explains much." She paused, staring at the ghostly image beside her.

"Zara?" Felix asked. "What is after that stage?"

The Naiad blinked and smiled, her sharp teeth showing again. "Yes. Well, at that point, your core should have grown into its next stage, called the Visualization Stage. This is where you begin to conceptualize your power."

"Rory mentioned that to me," Felix nodded. "He said there were some who saw their cores as vaults in the earth or a forest of trees, or whatever."

"Precisely. Rory should know a bit about this, as it is key to an effective combatant. Once you've visualized your core, its form becomes affixed and rarely changes, but it allows you to benefit more rapidly from the influx of energies." This time the image changed to show a core that looked like a swirling ball of ocean water, except more...ephemeral than actual liquid. More energy poured in from the sides before being siphoned back out.

"From there, you must accumulate power from the ambient Mana all around you, pulling it into your core and expelling it from your channels through your Mana Gates. This is usually done passively, thanks to Mana regeneration, so the more you use your Mana, the faster you can cultivate this power. After that comes the Actualization Stage, where the visualization of your core becomes more concrete and nearly real. Someone at this stage should be able to mentally delve into their core and experience it as if they had physically entered the space." Zara let out an exasperated breath. "This is where I would have guessed you were, based on what you've told me of your capabilities. But you're a whole stage ahead."

With another gesture, the image once again changed. Now the water had vanished, instead forming into a replica of Felix's own core. It was a ring of thick, liquid-like fire that spun in the center of two dozen revolving Skills. It looked like nothing so much as a solar system diorama, with the hollow ring as a sort of sun and the Skills as humming planets.

"Your core space is...odd, and the visualization is lacking in some respects, but the sheer breadth of it is astonishing, Felix. And your core itself...how did you accomplish this?" she asked.

"Pit helped me," Felix admitted, meeting eyes with his Companion. Pit let out an excited chirrup. "When we fought the Ravager King, he helped me spin my core to manage the influx of monster Essence and Mana. After that, I lost half my Mana pool, then this all happened." He pointed at the ghostly image.

Zara pointed to the ring of blue-white flames crackling with lightning. "The Ring Stage, where your power condenses into a more potent form, will typically reduce your available Mana pool. But what you lose in available Mana you gain in might, as each Mana Skill now carries an extra boost. You've noticed that, yes?"

Felix nodded. He certainly had noticed his Skills were hitting harder than before.

"This is concerning, however. That you have broken Skills at this stage," Zara shifted the image of Felix's core, an impressive snapshot she'd somehow taken with whatever ability she'd used. It focused on a half-dozen Skills that shone with fitful lights. Up close, they resembled nothing as much as bundles of luminescent twine, many of which were cut and ripped apart.

"The Ring Stage of your core will introduce...complexity in combining Skills. The further along your advancement moves, the more set in stone your existence becomes. The greatest of us, those who reach beyond Grandmasters, are immutable and nearly ageless. But gaining new Skills? Altering their old ones? Nearly impossible."

"Nearly, though," Felix said, jumping on the word. "And I'm not on that level."

"No, you're not. But you are advancing rapidly and in ways that confound me. The Ring stage should not be reached until you're an Adept and have enough Mana and significance to force the transformation."

"Significance?"

"A consequence of power. The more you attain, the more...weight you have in the three Realms."

"So, the Ravager King helped me, then," Felix said, feeling a surge of grim satisfaction. "And I imagine the Larval Ravager and Queen Ravager didn't hurt."

"No, they certainly did not. Your manner of acquiring power is something I haven't seen before, but strength does not come without a cost. Beware of how you proceed, Felix. The path ahead of you is wild and untested." With that, Zara spun on her heel and left his room.

He sat there a while, thinking on things. Ultimately, however, he had already made up his mind. Zara's advice was well-meant, but Felix couldn't wait any longer. Now was the time. He was done messing around with broken Skills.

The next day, Felix was back in that warded room, again.

"Hopefully ye don't burn the walls down this time, eh?" Rory said, slapping the walls that still bore faint char marks. "What're you plannin' to do about monster cores? We're right short of them at the moment."

"Don't worry, just chalk the ritual. I've got the rest covered," Felix assured the man, while within his core, a stormy nebula of writhing, iridescent smoke raged. In preparation for this, and despite Zara's protests, Felix had gone hunting. Over forty Revenants had died before he'd felt he had enough to work with, and even then, Felix had killed another dozen. Just to be safe.

Rory eyed him but began to mark out the complex ritual circle around Felix. He had done this before, without the ritual circle, but it had been wildly inefficient. Tons and tons of the Larval Ravager's Essence had been lost, only the bare minimum actually utilized to strengthen and build an evolved Skill. It had still netted him a Legendary-ranked Skill, but what if he did it right?

Wearing his worn and torn spare clothes, Felix sat in the center of the circle and threw back a small vial of bright magenta liquid. It burned as it went down, diverting itself toward his core before rapidly spreading throughout his channels.

Oooh, that feels weird.

He'd grown in understanding since the first time, both through System-ingrained knowledge and observation. He knew now the cost of a backfiring ritual, especially one meant to combine Skills; it would be Mana intensive, nearly prohibitively so for most, and that's if it went well. If it took a turn, as his first such attempt did, someone could die. So, when Rory finished the circle and went to activate it, Felix stopped him. "No, I've got it. No need to waste your Mana on this."

"Lad, don't ye test me. This is dangerous. Ye could—"

"I know. I know, Rory. And thank you," Felix grated out, his voice rough with unexpressed concern. "This should go smoothly, but if it doesn't, you shouldn't be forced to pay a price."

"Daft boy," Rory groused. "I'm a teacher. This is what I do."

Without hesitating, Rory placed his hand on the edge of the ritual circle. "Begin."

* * *

It was....Painful wasn't quite the right word.

“Transcendentally awful” was more appropriate, if dramatic. Felix went through the process of breaking his Skills, bearing the agony of a piece of himself being savagely split apart. It was like ripping off his fingernails, just slower. And to music.

Axe Mastery, Blunt Weapon Mastery, Long Blade Mastery, all of his broken skills were torn apart and held together only by his Will. After a lot of thought, Felix chose Unarmed Mastery as the base for the new Skill he'd forge. There was a worry that he'd upset his Apprentice Tier Formation, but he couldn't imagine reforming all of his fighting Skills without his strongest one. He'd spoken at length with Rory about it, and the Dwarf had led both of them to their newest arrival: Aenea the Alchemist.

Some hard negotiations led to him getting an alchemical draught meant to aid in combining Skills while maintaining the construction of what Aenea called the "seed Skill." Felix almost wished he'd had one of them back in the Domain when he'd cannibalized his Poison Resistance Skill. Regardless of those benefits however, it wasn't a well-regarded creation, partly because its low-ranked materials provided little help in the way of the sundering and combining process. It was still an enormously painful experience that most could not handle. And partly because of its physical side-effects, which he was told in no uncertain terms were violently foul. Yet the low-ranked materials meant it was easy to produce in camp, so Felix had to hope his Endurance and Vitality could withstand the aftermath.

He didn't miss Aenea's smirk as he left her rooms, however. Which only made him want to use the draught all the more, if only to prove he was stronger than her dumb craft.

Childish, yes. Satisfying? Also yes.

Unlike the concoctions Rory had told him about previously, the draught's effect wasn't to help break apart his Skills. He still had to do that manually and endure the blistering torment. Instead, it made his broken Skills glow intermittently along their severed edges, where the patterns were disrupted. The glow was supposed to intensify as his other Skills neared, outlining the potential places where they could bind. Whereas previously, Felix had worked by sound and feeling alone, now he had something like training wheels. So, after a deep breath, he'd chosen his seed Skill and got started.

With the draught, it was far easier to sound their patterns—hearing the literal music of the Skills—and link the broken Skills together. Long Sword Mastery hooked into Small Blade Mastery, which intersected with Thrown Weapons Mastery and Axe Mastery. Staff and Blunt Weapon Mastery fused together easily, both of which used Parry as an intermediary to fuse to the Sword Skills. Blunt Weapon Mastery also had enough commonalities to link it to Unarmed Mastery, and the particular permutations of his hand-to-hand combat let Small Blade Mastery tag along easily enough.

The hardest to fuse was Intimidation, but Felix had no desire to lose a Skill when he could fold it into a new form of weapons combat; this is where the draught really proved itself. Fighting against the pain, strong despite the thrum of his Song of Absolution, Felix could barely see the flaring pattern of his new amalgamated Skill.

Cool magenta light sparked along six of its edges like a contrail of fireworks before shifting and focusing on a single, looping portion of the etched pattern. Felix thought he was seeing things at first, because the sparking was happening almost dead center in the pattern. How could he affix something there? It all made a ton more sense as Felix realized for the first time that his Skills weren't flat etchings.

They were 3D.

The join was along the edge of Unarmed Mastery in the very center, and Felix could sense, as if from the outside of himself, that the raw force of his unarmed attacks could inspire terror in those who watched him. That was his way in, and he used the sounding of them to be sure. The musicality of the vibrations matched, just as the visual did, and once his view had rotated, securing Intimidation to it was relatively painless… aside from the all the pain.

But then it was done.

Without the existential crises of a Primordial threat, it was all almost too easy. It was just him and the will to carry on. And Felix had plenty of Will.

But the thing about the process, about touching any of his Skills and sounding their patterns, was that the Grand Harmony was never far away. His Skills, as he perceived them, were visual representations of musical vibrations. Literal waveforms of light and sound that echoed with a unique and powerful melody. There were few other places that Felix felt as close to it as he did within his core space.

In stitching together so many of his Skills, it was a cacophony of reverberations that slowly resolved into a strident pattern. A song, more distinct than any person, and new. Felix felt the swell of chords lift him up, a wave that was cresting within the Skill he was holding together. Something was there, just at the edge of his Perception, twinging upon his Affinity like a half-heard whisper. So Felix reached for it.

For a moment, his Affinity snagged on an alien stretch of notes, a faint glimmer of sound so profound it felt like falling into a deep, dark pool. Chords like colossal footsteps shook him, while a million throats took up a call to glory. Music so wild it felt like his soul was trying to dance free of his body, and Felix's heartbeat was subsumed by the tempo of it all. It was...it was both sublime and utterly wretched.

It thundered through him.

In its wake, his Skills burst alight. Patterns that once only glimmered ignited into infernos as the rarefied vibrations filled his core space with golden-blue light. System energy. Without a single ounce of his Intent, a notification shook through him.

SYNERGY DETECTED!

The Skills Axe Mastery, Blunt Weapon Mastery, Long Blade Mastery, Parry, Small Blade Mastery, Staff Mastery, Thrown Weapon Mastery, And Intimidation Have Synergy With Unarmed Mastery!

Do You Wish To Evolve Them?

Warning! Evolution May Result In Death And Cannot Be Stopped Once Begun.

All Choices Have Consequences.

Continue? Y/N

The notification was hard to parse with the flare of power resonating through all three of his Aspects. The Essence within him rioted as golden-blue light surged into his core ring, but Felix directed it down into the flames as well, in an attempt to balance the influx. As he did so, tides of heated emotion wafted through him, hitching a ride along with the flood of power. There was nothing he could do about it, though, except endure.

Felix didn't need to read the notification, not really. He'd seen it before.

Continue! Yes!

Evolution In Process...

This had better work!

It felt like pushing lead through a hose. Felix's Body felt heavy, his Mind dulled, and his Spirit dimmed beneath the onslaught of savage energies. System power hit his core in wave after wave of illumination, cascading from all of his ignited Skills, while the Essence of fifty Revenants was siphoned into those congealing flames. Discordant, atonal humming gave a cruel counterpoint to the symphonic majesty of the System, and the Skill bucked beneath Felix's Will.

Another swell of matched powers hit him, again, and again. Each time, the evolving Skill was nearly rattled from Felix's grasp. Each time, he nearly lost it all, as if it was refusing to fuse together.

"The further along your advancement moves, the more set in stone your existence becomes." Zara's words echoed through his Mind as he held on. "Significance....A consequence of power. The more you attain, the more...weight you have in the three Realms."

Reign of Vellus!

The Skill responded instantly, hurtling from the far side of his core to besiege the stitched Skills with blue lightning. Kinetic force pressed them together, leveraging his Willpower from another angle. More importantly was the Tempered Feature affecting Reign of Vellus.

Gravity - The Pull of Significance

With every ounce of his Mana and Will, Felix held his resisting Skill together, even as his Essence slowly ran dry.

C'mon! You joined so easily! Fuse! Evolve!

A great distance away, Felix heard the sound of a single raindrop falling into a pool.

From nowhere, an irresistible fury welled up in his core, a film of blinding red that flash-soaked his entire core. His emotions, so carefully bottled up, overturned like a can of gasoline, igniting the fires all around him into an uncontrolled inferno. System power swept through him unchecked, and his nebula of Essence unspooled wildly into his core.

The Wild Song faded, the red only thickened, and all Felix could hear was screaming before his senses were inundated with sanguine radiance.

* * *

Felix woke on his own bed, fully nude, with a giant tenku on his chest.

"Ouuuufff, Pit!" He croaked. "Get off!"

With a confused warble, Pit shifted his immense weight to the side, which had the unfortunate consequence of tilting his straw-filled mattress. Felix's face mushed right back into the Chimera, this time getting a mouthful of feathers.

"Pthaw pthaw!" Felix spat out a unique mix of fur and down and pushed himself up. "What the heck?"

Sick. Hurt. I am helping. Pit's sending was infused with such a surety and warmth that Felix felt his anger melt away. You were angry. Mad. After ritual.

Felix only remembered snatches since he had chosen to evolve his Skills. Flashes of light and impressions of sound that didn't really make sense. He'd gotten so used to his perfect recall that it was disorienting. "What happened?"

Pit's grasp of language was increasing rapidly, but many things were beyond him. Instead, the tenku sent a series of sense images that showed Felix bursting from the small room in a fit of rage. He'd staggered around the warehouse, smashing through a set of water barrels and shoving...shoving Rory into a wall before Pit had tackled him to the ground. The images were hazier after that, but it was clear he'd been taken to his room.

I did all that? It had felt like watching a stranger with his face. Why? I don't—I don't remember doing that. Is Rory...I didn't hurt him, did I?

No. Images of the Dwarf back on his feet flitted through their bond. You were angry. Hurt. Sick.

That anger again. It had never affected him this much before, though. And worse still, his memory was affected, too, something that hadn’t happened to him since he’d gained his Born Trait. Was it because of the draught? Felix remembered a surge of fury clearly at the end of his ritual.

"The ritual!"

Felix hastily brought up his notifications...and sighed in relief.

"It worked."

New Skill!

Wild Threnody, Epic, Level 35!

You have embraced the Untamed Chords, and the Songs of War have come to call. Mana, the lifeblood of all, is yours to command, even unto death. Any weapon you hold, whether it is an axe or your fist, can be imbued with the Mana of your core. Scope of imbuement increases moderately per level, mastery of chosen weapons increases moderately per level, Mana cost decreases slightly per level.

Untamed Chords? Songs of War? Felix frowned. He'd lost ten levels of his Unarmed Mastery, but gained ten with everything else. All things considered, it was a rousing success. More importantly...

Formation:

Body: Seed of the Unchained Mountain (Apprentice)

Mind: Godeater (Apprentice)

Spirit: Rising Sovereign (Journeyman)

My Body is unchanged since the last time. Felix slid around the bulk of his Companion, clambering to his feet. The draught worked. It had somehow left his Body alone despite the fact that Unarmed Mastery technically no longer existed. It felt like his new combined Skill sat within his Body Formation like a stone in his throat, heavy and obvious. Slowly, so very slowly, the sensation faded...and his Body relaxed.

That's one thing solved, I guess. But I could have hurt someone because of that potion. Aenea has some explaining to do.

Felix had barely grabbed his clothes before a violent, painful gurgle ripped through his midsection. Swallowing, he reconsidered his options. He'd have time for Aenea in a little bit.

*GURGLE*

Maybe longer.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

"My work is not poison! How dare you!"

Aenea's voice pierced the morning and sent more than a few heads turning their way. Felix gritted his teeth and moved further from the door of the woman's new space. She'd been gifted some prime real estate along the second warehouse's northern side. Inside were bare counters and rough shelving units still being mounted to the walls. A number of her assistants were bustling around the space, setting jars and containers onto racks and ledges, dusting the space, and generally setting up for business. The woman had been elbow-deep in some unmarked crates, slowly pulling out a number of leaf-wrapped bundles, but now she had her arms akimbo and a righteous sneer.

"I didn't say poison," Felix growled. "I asked what—exactly—you put into that draught. Though, judging by your reaction, I'm certainly not less suspicious!"

"You mewling child, I've been distilling my concoctions since before you could string two words together! I told you there would be physical side effects. I told you that's why most people don't use that potion, but you had to go ahead and drink it! I'm not the one at fault here."

Felix fought off the urge to scream, but only just. This confrontation wasn't going as he'd wanted. True, he had been angry about everything, but after he spent too much time on the chamberpot, he had retreated to his Bastion of Will to think. Within the fortress of his Skill, perspective was a bit easier to manage, and he'd cooled off considerably. He'd come to Aenea's space in order to politely ask her some questions. It had devolved quickly from there.

"Look," Felix huffed a breath and tried to settle his thoughts. That caustic anger was bubbling over, but he steeled himself against it. "Just tell me what the side effects of the potion were supposed to be. Can you do that?"

"Can I—? In my sleep, Fiend," Aenea sneered. "As I told you before, that's an Elegiac Tonic, a draught of the Common rarity that allows insight into Skill interactions. It's made of simple, easily found materials that do not interact well with mortal constitutions. Side effects of imbibing it are fever, vivid dreams, and nether distress."

"Nether distress."

"Including but not limited to the runs, vomiting, excessive sweating, foul discharge, irri-"

"Okay, I get it," Felix said, feeling his face heat up. He'd had most of those, just not a fever. Most of it had run its course already, his Vitality proving enough to combat it. "Vivid dreams, how does that work?"

"In your sleep," Aenea snapped. "Taken too close to sleep, it will interact with the flow of your Mind and has been known to produce intense dreams. As I told you, it is a Common-ranked draught for a reason, just as no one ever really uses it. But you insisted."

"So nothing like losing consciousness or...or increased aggression?" Felix asked, more tentatively than he'd wanted.

"What? Of course not. The ingredients have no such effect, no matter their permutations. If you've experienced either symptom, it's not my work at fault," Aenea said. Her shock at his question felt genuine, and his newly sensitive Affinity confirmed it.

"You're positive? Nothing that could incite a rage or anything like that?" Felix pressed, staring at the woman's eyes as his Affinity raked her Spirit. "Nothing?"

Aenea stiffened as he leveraged his Affinity, her cold expression turning absolutely hostile. "No, you fool! And if you knew anything of alchemy, you'd know it yourself!"

"Then show me," Felix said.

"What?"

"It's clear you don't like me, for whatever reason. Show me your process, reassure me, and I'll get out of your hair." Felix spread his hands, palms up. "I'll never bother you again."

"You're a bruiser. There's no place for you in my workshop," Aenea sniffed with disdain before eyeing him critically. "Do you even have the Herbalism Skill?"

"Yup," Felix smiled in a way he hoped was pleasant but feared was more like baring his teeth. "Level 17."

Aenea laughed, unkindly. She started to unpack her crate once more. "Pathetic. You'll never learn anything with such a low informational Skill."

"I have an Epic-ranked identification Skill."

Aenea froze in place, one hand hovering above the box. Her face shifted through a few very amusing expressions before settling on guarded curiosity.

"Show me."

* * *

Two hours later, after accurately identifying all of the ingredients she had to hand, including some relatively rare ones, Felix secured a promise for Aenea to show him the process of making the Elegaic Tonic. She claimed they were out of some materials, but they'd have more the following day. She would send for him when it arrived.

Good enough for him. He'd seen more than enough to know the woman had plenty of poisons and strange roots in her possession. Voracious Eye had told him that he was right to be worried...but there was a growing certainty that he was going about this all wrong. He truly didn't think the tonic was the cause of his issues.

On the other hand, he had gained quite a few Skill levels.

Herbalism is level 18!

...

Herbalism is level 24!

Voracious Eye is level 44!

Not bad for two hours of work. Perhaps when she showed him the process, he might even learn some sort of alchemy-specific Skill, too. Brief, childish dreams of besting the Alchemist at her own gig flitted through Felix's head, but he dismissed them quickly. He learned fast, but specialization was a real force on the Continent. A generalist like him had no chance against someone steeped in their craft.

Which is why, right after the Alchemist’s, Felix headed directly for the smithy.

The married owners of the Coldfire Forge were busy at work, both of them toiling away at their workbenches while apprentices rushed about working the bellows, grinding, polishing, and all the other million tasks for which they were responsible. Most of it was a mad scramble that made little to no sense to Felix, but it was lively if overbearingly hot.

A hot forge in the middle of summer is probably a bad idea for most people. He had respectable resistances, but Felix could still sense the sweltering, moisture-sucking air that barely swirled in the shop. Weapons and armor of all sorts were being made at a furious pace, with stacks of short swords, pikes, and simple iron breastplates laid out along the large room. Every once in a while, a few teens wearing linen tabards would rush in, pick up a load of one and rush back out—carefully.

Felix had asked about it on previous visits. With the ore recovered from the mine now being regularly supplied to them, the Coldforges were cranking out sets to equip their influx of Tin Rank volunteers. All of the weapons and armor were Apprentice Tier rank, of Uncommon rarity, and would last longer than anything of lower quality. Both Rafny and Eldrunna had a number of Titles that helped them with production speed, quality, and even managing the temperature of the forge itself. Rafny was a Journeyman Weaponsmith, while her wife, Elle, was an Adept Armorsmith, the true talent in the family.

"There ya are! We almost had to hunt you down! Your armor and weapon are ready."

Felix waved slightly at Rafny, who was pointing to a table set opposite the Tin Rank equipment. There, nestled atop a collection of other weapons, was a set of half-plate made to his specifications. He idly wondered what metal they used. Felix had given them his bag of Scales, since he hadn’t a clue what to do with them, and it had led to a lot of soft exclamations and happy shouting. After getting them to take his measurements once again—due to gaining a significant amount of muscle across his chest and arms—they’d promised him results by the end of the week. Now that he could wield weapons again, he was eager to take them up on the offer.

One of the assistants led him to a changing room, which was more like a leaning pile of tetanus waiting to happen. With a curtain. Felix made do, however, and in short order, he had the armor on. It had been lightly enchanted to fasten itself once it was on him, another technique of Elle's. He just had to feed it some Mana, and all the ties and clasps secured themselves.

Mana Manipulation is level 38!

When Felix emerged from the back, he felt...different. More capable, somehow. The armor was heavily plated down both of his arms and chest, but left his midsection less protected with thinner, overlapping plates to increase flexibility. Dark, thick leather pants went from his hips to his mid-thigh, which was where the oversized greaves and knee protections took over. His fists were both covered in thick, durable-seeming gauntlets, and the whole thing gleamed silver. Aside from his bronze-coated boots that is, but those weren't part of the overall set.

"Oh, don't you look a sight!" Felix just about blushed as Evie emerged from the opposite end of the forge, decked out in her own set of leathers. She was clapping. "Bright and shiny as a crown!"

"Shut up," Felix grinned and gestured at her own armor. "You wearing a new set? Again?"

"The last set had problems in the weave," said a calm, kind voice. Elle stepped into view, redheaded and curvy and all of four-and-a-half feet tall. She was eyeing Evie like the girl was a prize mare. "You don't feel any binding, Ms. Aren? Pinching?"

"Naw, it's fine! Just like the last one was fine, really."

"It was not fine," Elle insisted, her voice friendly, but now there was heat present. "It would have failed most spectacularly, and knowing you, that would have been at the worst possible time."

"Hm, she's got your number, Evie," Felix said, unable to help his smile. Evie responded with a rude gesture that Felix had picked up from some of the rougher Goblin traders. Apparently, Evie hung with the same sort of people. "Elle, make sure you reinforce the hip area."

"Shut up," Evie laughed. "You get a weapon to go with your shiny new plate?"

Felix held up the belt and sheathed longsword in one hand while gripping a barbut-style helm under his other. "Wanna give it a test run?"

"Didn't know mind-reading was a Skill you had," Evie said with an eager grin. "Arena?"

"Uh-uh, here. You fight in the back." Rafny came up, wiping her hands on a dark cloth. "I need to see how that blade works out, and Elle can make any adjustments to your armor."

That worked for Felix, so he shrugged and followed the smiths through a narrow hallway and out of the sweltering forge. Outside, the sun was up and bright, but the sky remained overcast. They hadn't seen blue sky for a week, and the distant, sourceless thunder had continued. Yet it was still mid summer, and the cluttered scatter of industrial buildings in the Dust meant very little wind came through it. The back patch behind the rehomed Coldfire Forge was thin and weedy, despite obvious efforts to even it out. The summer sun and a steady stream of booted feet had baked it into a dusty, hardened expanse interrupted only by patches of wildflowers and a row of uneven stumps. Atop the stumps was a collection of rubble, makeshift targets to test out the smiths' weapons.

Felix gestured to his armor. “Did you use the Scales I gave you, Rafny?”

The Dwarven weaponsmith pushed a tired breath out of her nose. “No. Haven’t found the trick to using them yet.”

"Oh. Well, dang. I can’t do much with them otherwise, so take the time you need.” Felix Eyed the spiked length around Evie’s waist. “New chain?” It was more compact than her usual, though he realized he'd never given it too much thought before. There was no way she would have been able to haul that length of chain around forever, so of course it had been enchanted. "Enchanted for what? Durability and to somehow shrink?"

"Durability, yes. Same enchantment as my last one, actually, for all that I wanted a Journeyman weapon. Advancement ain't there yet, though. Raf said I'd barely be able to fight with it." Evie threw the smith a narrow side-eye. "But not shrinkin'."

"Ms. Aren's chains are enchanted to pull compact when not in use," Rafny explained. She and her wife were settling into low-slung wooden chairs, clearly waiting to watch their spar. "Keeps it small, but doesn't clutter up the metal with unnecessary sigaldry."

"Unnecessary? If a shrinking array were possible, wouldn't that be better?" Felix asked.

"Yes and no. If you could get one to work, it would be a benefit to Ms. Aren, I'm sure. But too much Mana interferes with the metal," Rafny said. Felix waited for more, but apparently that was all. He shrugged and gestured to the open area.

"After you, Ms. Aren."

"Uh huh, call me that again, and I'll beat you twice."

They moved into the yard, which was no more than twenty by forty feet. Space was at a premium, though efforts had been made to secure another warehouse. The Revenants hadn't attacked them in a few days, for all that they were growing thick in the city center, so they could afford it for now. Felix stretched himself, testing his range of motion. It all felt fine enough, but they'd have to see how it held up. He buckled on the sword belt and drew it.

The blade was simple, a cruciform-style hilt with a hand and a half pommel. The blade was wide, with a fuller down the center that Felix remembered was to reduce the weight, and was sharpened on either edge.

"Fancy pig sticker. Can you do anything with it?" Evie asked.

"Let's find out."

Their clash was abrupt, though Evie's chain hit Felix before he could reach striking distance. The preternaturally heavy chain hit him in the right pauldron and wrapped around to rap against his back as well. He barely felt it through the armor, his resistances ignoring the pain, but Felix saw his Health drop by a single percentage. The chain was gone again before he could react, and all he could do was close the distance.

Unfettered Volition!

Felix unleashed his Agility, tearing up the hardened dirt beneath his feet as he propelled himself toward Evie. He could hear creaking but didn't pay it any mind; battle had begun, and he only had eyes for his target.

"Whoa!" Evie shouted before throwing herself upward. She cleared over Felix with barely a moment to spare, but his Skill-enhanced reflexes meant she felt his iron grip on her ankle.

"Where're you going?" Felix growled. He hauled back on her, but her unnaturally light body suddenly became a lot heavier, and he misjudged his movement. Pulled askew, Felix could only watch as the woman twisted in mid-air and delivered two devastating kicks to his face and shoulder. "UNF!"

Felix slid to his hands and knees while Evie tucked into an agile tumble before coming back to her feet. He frowned. His armor was good and had protected him from most of the chain-fighter's attacks, but it felt...restrictive. Like it was holding him back. It had an impressive range of motion to it, he'd felt that when he had warmed up, but it wasn't enough.

Evie whipped her chain about herself, spinning it up and over her arm and foot before shooting it directly at his face. Felix lifted his arms to block it, to smash it out of the way, but it hit like a cannon; the crash of the heavy chain and his own counterforce shattered his vambraces.

Armored Skin is level 52!

Shit! Felix snapped his arms out and grabbed the length of chain. Immediately, he felt a force try and push at him, like the earth was trying to yank him into the ground. With a snarl, he shoved back, and Evie's head wrenched back as if he'd punched her. Then Felix pulled himself, jerking the chain with a single mighty motion and yanking Evie airborne.

Use your damn sword! He'd dropped the blade when he'd blocked her chain, so he scooped it up and brought it into a high guard. Evie, acrobat that she was, had already started flipping her body around to face him. Purple-white Mana formed in her free fist, forming slowly into a dagger of ice. She was ready.

Felix grinned.

Wild Threnody!

A tumultuous dirge poured from nothing all around them, and Felix’s core surged with Mana. Unattributed Mana surged through his channels, pumping into his right hand and out of his body. Guided by his Mana Manipulation and his new Skill, the thickening vapor soaked immediately into his blade, and it glowed a vibrant white.

"HUAH!"

"AH!"

Evie's ice met Felix's imbued sword and shattered, the Mana itself detonating somehow and hurling her lightened body back nearly the length of the yard. She landed in a sloppy roll and hit the low, metal wall with a clanking crash.

Wild Threnody is level 36!

"You okay, Evie?" Felix asked.

"Fine, fine," she grunted before getting to her feet. She seemed a little wobbly, but shook it off. "What was that?"

"New Skill. I can put Mana into my weapons now," Felix said with a wide, shit-eating smile.

"Gods damned...cheater," Evie hissed, stopping herself before she said too much. "How many Skills does that make? Fifty?"

"Actually I've been cleaning them up. Practically lightweight now," Felix said before tossing her chain back to her. It landed with a jangling thump on the earth. "You ready for more? Or you gonna call it quits?"

"You wish."

They began again.

Blows were traded back and forth, though Evie's build was well matched against Felix's slew of advantages. Hard to hit, hard to grapple, as long as Felix couldn't pin her down, she was almost impossible to fight against. For the fight, he'd refused to use his Mana Skills, at least directly, since that wouldn't test his armor and weapons. But that didn't mean they didn't get their chance to shine.

Wild Threnody!

He'd used Mana straight from his core previously to imbue the weapon, but after sensing the pathways of his magic, Felix had an idea. His Mana Skills occupied the same channels and used the Mana collected in his core, just the same as Wild Threnody. So why not combine them? This time he sent his Mana into Mantle of the Long Night, filtering his power through the lens of its arctic power before sending it looping through his pathways into his hand. Immediately, ice crusted over the blade and sent contrails of steam in its wake.

Wild Threnody is level 37!

Wild Threnody is level 38!

Felix slashed the blade across Evie's chain, knocking it aside and leaving a purple-white haze clinging to the metal. She raised an eyebrow before pirouetting and sending her chain flipping around her back before it hurtled toward Felix's midsection.

Shouting, Felix poured more power into his blade. Ice-cold Mana erupted from his hands and was greedily taken in by the long sword.

Wild Threnody is level 39!

Mantle of the Long Night is level 36!

The blade thickened with ice as purple-white Mana coated it, until the steel was no longer even visible. Spikes of jagged ice pushed outward at the hilt and along the back of the sword, adding weight to the weapon. Felix swung through several of his learned Forms, chasing after the ghostly afterimage of his opponent. She was a wraith, impossible to hit with his weapon Skill as underdeveloped as it was, but Felix was determined.

Yet, when he finally did connect, it was only because Evie's chain shot out to tangle up his blade. The length of her chain spun around his blade and hands, crushing his gauntlets and yanking the tip of his sword to the ground. Evie danced forward, feet light as a ghost, her ice dagger formed in her free hand. With a surge of Mana, Felix poured more into the weapon, enough that even Evie's chain began to frost over. With a scream, he lifted the blade up and slashed down with it. Evie dodged away, and when the blade hit the ground, it didn't just fall.

It exploded.

This time, even Felix was tossed away from the point of impact.

Armored Skin is level 53!

Bastion of Will is level 54!

Wild Threnody is level 40!

New Skill!

Heavy Armor Mastery, Common, Level 1!

Extensive practice wearing heavy armor has granted you better knowledge of the makeup and utilization of heavy armor. Bonus to defense increases slightly per Skill level. Stamina use reduces slightly per Skill level.

When the ringing in his ears cleared, Felix found himself flat on his back, ten feet away. A dark-haired Dwarf was leaning over him with a thunderous frown on her face.

"You broke my sword."

Felix lifted his hand and found the pommel of his new long sword still there...but half the guard and all of the blade was just gone.

"Sorry?"

Rafny clucked her tongue and helped him to his feet. "That's a new Skill? What's it do?"

"Imbues Mana into my weapons," Felix said, examining his body. His gauntlets were shredded, and his forearms were exposed and bleeding. The rest of him didn't look much better, either. "Guess I used too much."

"Used too much? You damn near blew a hole in my yard!" Rafny gesticulated at the practice yard. It was studded with patches of quickly fading ice, centered around shards of broken steel. "Hm, imbuing Mana, though. That's hard to work around. Gotta account for tolerances, not to mention all that Strength you're packing....How much Mana are you putting into my weapons?"

"It's too new, not sure yet. But my max limit with Mana? It's a lot. I'd need something that can really put up with the strain." Felix gathered that his power had stressed the weapon too much and that, coupled with the impact, had caused the explosion.

"We'd need better materials than we have, I'm sorry to say. If I could make use of those Scales…" Rafny trailed off, spitting to the side. "I’ll keep trying. Orichalcum or veridian would be good, but getting those out here is weeks at the best of times." She gave him a look. "These aren't the best of times."

"I'm aware," Felix said dryly. "Whatever you can do, I'd appreciate it."

"You better," Rafny grunted. "Go see Elle. She's got some ideas for a new set of armor since, well, this isn't going to work."

Felix had to agree, and as he started moving, the joints caught and ground. He'd bent some of the pieces, often just from the force of his own attacks. He stripped it off and carried it over to the armorsmith in a pile. Evie glanced at him as he did so, clapping him on the back in passing. Her own armor looked fresh as a daisy.

"Anytime you wanna go again, I'm free." Evie smirked. "That was a good fight. You're hard as hell to evade, Felix. You get any faster, and I'll actually have to break a sweat."

"Thanks," Felix said, deadpan. Evie only laughed and walked back through the shopfront.

"Hm, those for me?" Elle asked as Felix set the remains of his new armor at her feet.

"Sorry," Felix said, unaccountably embarrassed. He'd just gotten the new set and already..."This one couldn't keep up, I think."

"So it would seem. I do not believe steel is the right material for you, Felix. You are too strong and move too quickly for it." She grabbed at nothing in front of Felix, tightened her fist and threw it to the ground. A shaky image formed from heat haze and smoke, slowly steadying into a holographic image of Felix himself. With a faint furrowing of her brows, the duplicate changed into different sets of armor, individual pieces shifting and rearranging around his form. "You're strong enough for Heavy Armor, but perhaps not strong enough for orichalcum or veridian, not in a full set. They're ridiculously heavy. Hmm."

A young girl, perhaps seven years old, rushed out of the back door wearing one of those linen tabards. Her gaze, dark and intense, flitted across the yard until it found Felix. She swallowed, then walked with determination toward him. His Eye tagged her as Amaya Ty'lel, gifted in Willpower and Intelligence and already level three, despite her age.

A relative of the Alchemist?

"Um, hi? Can I help you?"

"Are you the Fiend?" Up close, the girl's expression seemed torn between terror and excitement. Practicing as Zara had requested, a quick check of her Spirit's rhythm confirmed the same vibrating emotions. Felix nodded without speaking, and the girl's eyes widened, her breath quickening. Those vibrations became a frenzy that only barely touched her face. "I have a message for you, from the Healer's Ward."

"Portia?" Felix asked, taking a folded note from her. It was sealed with a glob of green-gold wax and the impression of a tern in flight. Felix broke the seal, scattering hard bits of wax across the yard. "Sorry," he muttered to the smiths, and read.

Felix,

Come to the Ward immediately.

Your friends are awake.

~P

"Raf, I believe our time is done for now," Elle said. Her wife had just come over with a page of charcoal sketches.

Rafny rolled her eyes. "Tch, fine. You'll have to come back later to—"

*PING*

The sound was a trilling, high-pitched note that made Felix wince. But so did everyone else, even the little girl. A blue box, bordered in gold filigree appeared before him.

TERRITORY-WIDE QUEST ALERT!

A Growing Scourge!

A Nest has been found! Manawarped Revenants have invaded and nearly overtaken the city of Haarwatch! They pose a threat to all life within the Territory and potentially the entire Continent! Seek out and destroy the Nest, by whatever means necessary!

Rewards:

x1 Gold Chest

Territorial Authority

Felix barely finished reading it when the window disappeared with a descending note.

Quest Accepted!

He looked up and saw everyone staring ashen-faced into the middle distance. Slowly, Elle lifted her gaze to Felix's.

"Blind gods."

The back door slammed open behind him, and Felix spun, hands painfully shifting into talons. But it was Evie, and her eyes were manic.

"Felix! Now! Meeting!"

"Why? What's happening? What was that?" Felix asked, but Evie shushed him.

"Authority, Felix! Blood and ashes, didn't you read?! Territorial Authority!"

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Morning light was a strident gold that filtered through the mansion's large, south-facing windows. Aside from its central location and relative luxury, Eliza DuFont had chosen the place for its exposure to morning light. For two hours each morning, the rising sun streamed through the windows and illuminated her entire sitting room, where it glinted on the gold inlay of her polished ebony desk.

Eliza ran her gauntleted hands over the smooth surface, the touch enchantments allowing her to take a measure of relief from the cool wood. It was going to be another hot day. The mansion had a few enchanted fans that kept the air circulating, but her Acolytes were having trouble with most of them. They'd started malfunctioning. Something about shoddy scriptwork.

"—need to move," Inquisitor Rutger was saying. "The commoners in the Dust Quarter have claimed the mine already. One of the few where the wards haven't completely fallen into disrepair! We should gather the rest of our forces and march on it!"

"And what? Hold a position behind enemy lines? Because that is what they are, whatever you may consider them," DuFont said. "Those gathering under the Fiend's banner are not our allies, and we should expect considerable resistance. If what Initiate Hornsworth told us is accurate, they have at least a few capable combatants, one of which has an unknown Body transformation Skill. Four of their fighters tore through our Acolytes and three Initiates! Not only that, but I know for a fact that Harn Kastos is aiding them, among others."

Rutger quieted, though his cheeks were still splotched with red. Not all Guilders were famed, but the Onslaught was well known in this corner of the Hierocracy. "So we give up the mine? We need resources!"

"I didn't say we give up. We have to leverage our strengths," DuFont pointed to an expertly crafted map of the city and surrounding areas. One of many that Eliza kept stored away. "We control three other mines, though they're not protected by their wards. We dispatch Acolytes to defend the miners and draw what we can, funnel it to our smiths for repairs."

"We don't have enough miners," Inquisitor Daur said, while DuFont groaned inwardly. "None of the Sunrise Quarter are really fit for manual labor."

"Not to mention, the merchants are complaining that recent Revenant attacks have proven our men are unreliable," Inquisitor Rutger said. "They're demanding more Acolytes as guards."

A few days ago, a wave of Revenants had somehow penetrated their defenses, coming close but not quite close enough to killing some merchants. Now, the people who were so eager to strike out on their own found their priorities shifting and had started setting up shop in their designated areas. A deft handling of the situation, if I do say so myself. DuFont smiled inwardly, but presented a neutral face to her fellow Inquisitors. Acting was a fantastically useful Skill.

"Pissants," scowled Daur. "Without us, the beasts would have killed the entire quarter already."

"Regardless, we should redouble the guard around the more important civilians. Pull them from the westerly side of the quarter," DuFont said. "It's mostly servants and low crafters there. Grab any who aren't pulling their weight. They can serve better in the mines."

Inquisitor Heuthorn smiled, his face an accordion of wrinkles. His eyes, however, were like daggers. "A proper suggestion. I'm impressed, Eliza."

DuFont spread her gauntleted hands and smiled. "Why, thank you, Clovis." She emphasized his first name just a touch, just enough for him to notice. "I do try."

"But why not use the easier resources to hand?" Heuthorn continued. "We have our suspected heretics in hand. Use them in the mines as well. If the monsters take them, then so be it."

The others grumbled pleasantly in agreement, while Eliza fumed. Several of those "heretics" were her own people, those in her network who had followed her as she left the Guild. "As I've said before, taking men and women seemingly at random will cause an uproar. Your list names crafters, servants, minor nobles, even quite a few of the mercenaries at hand. Gutting them all would strike a blow to us from which we would not recover."

Heuthorn shook his head and smiled in a way that even his wrinkles looked condescending. "Eliza. You are unused to the way things are done. You have accomplished a great many things in these dire times, but we need to follow the tenets of our faith. Order, Strength, Purity. We—"

A trilling noise interrupted the man's pontificating, and four blue windows opened before each of them.

"What in the—?"

TERRITORY-WIDE QUEST ALERT!

"Trackless avert," Daur whispered as he read. The three older men all shared a look, each of them paler than the last. A sudden slamming on the table made Daur and Rutger jolt.

"Just as I predicted," Eliza said, her face serious and intent. "We take that Authority, and we take Haarwatch."

"This is more than the Guild ever had," Rutger mused in wonder. "That was merely Provisional Authority."

"We'll be able to oust the Sorcerers from the city, from the entire Territory," exclaimed Daur. "Our job, done. We could return home!" The longing in his voice was palpable.

Heuthorn held back, his eyes flicking across the alert rapidly before it disappeared by itself. He met Eliza's eyes with reluctance writ large across his face. "...Very well. We search for this Nest."

"Agreed!" Eliza bared her teeth, and the man's frown deepened. It wasn't a smile so much as the visage of a hungry predator, one that promised a grisly end for those who crossed her. "This is what we must do..."

* * *

Inquisitor Heuthorn was seething.

Rutger had become quite proficient at spotting the old man's moods, and it often had served him well. It was easy to see in his stance, his step, and in the way his aged face tightened across the eyes and chin. Acting when the elder Inquisitor was in a proper mood was an important aspect to Rutger's personal success. If the younger Inquisitor had normally encountered Heuthorn in such a mood, he would have made all efforts to avoid the man.

That was significantly harder to do, however, when said man was waiting in his rooms.

"Inquisitor Heuthorn," Rutger managed as he closed his door, though not before shooting a withering glance behind him. The Acolyte standing guard outside had not mentioned any visitors. She would pay for that lapse. "How may I be of service?"

"That woman will be the death of us," the Inquisitor hissed. Rutger didn't have to guess as to who he meant. "This is a new high of stupidity, even from her."

"The race for Authority? How so, sir?"

Heuthorn gave him his own version of a withering stare, and the hair on the back of Rutger’s neck stood up. An aura, barely leashed, brushed against his senses. His vision swam. "Even you are not so foolish, whatever you may pretend. This race is important, yes, and we must gain the Authority. But what if we fail?"

"Fail?" Rutger gasped, his vision steadying. "The city is broken. Who else has enough strength to oppose us?"

"The Guild still stands, though they're preoccupied by the Wall for now. This Quest will change that. And the Fiend," Heuthorn snarled the name. "He will no doubt pounce. Do not forget, reports have him defeating that Primordial in the sky."

Rutger paled but shook his head. "You don't truly believe that was a Primordial, do you sir? Whoever this Fiend is, there is no chance he would survive against—"

"I believe it was powerful, regardless of its pedigree. The Fiend must be dealt with, sooner rather than later. This will be easier with System Authority, but we do not have enough men." Heuthorn said. "I no longer care to play DuFont's childish games. Take those we've held in reserve. They must reach the Waystone in Setoria and request reinforcements."

Rutger's heart quickened, and a smile bloomed across his jowls. "At once, sir."

"Take this," Heuthorn said as he removed a golden amulet from his neck. It glinted in the morning light, depicting a white spire rising alone upon a field of crimson. "Ride swiftly. This is life or death, Inquisitor. Either we control this city, or it burns to the ground. There is no middle."

* * *

Screaming filled the air within the dim chambers. Nestled deep within the interior of the Wall, he was far from any patrols or proper Guilders. All those save his new guard were training or manning the battlements. Uldred Teine supposed they were fighting something or other, though he couldn’t be bothered to check. He had little interest in the monsters outside the Wall.

He was more concerned with the corruption within the city.

"Who made you?" Teine asked the small device in his hands. It was a small, solid rectangle, only slightly larger than his palm, made of a dark blue metal. Had it been only that, it would have been unremarkable, easily dismissed by anyone. But to those with the highly attuned senses of a Gold Rank, Master Tier mage, it was hard to miss the telltale hum of Mana held in abeyance. Teine flipped the device over and, for the thousandth time, sent his senses questing within its casing.

Manasight.

Mana spun out of his core, a collection of twisting gears and shimmering sigils, tearing up through his channels and into his eyes.

Magic came alive all around him. It had a taste, a smell, a texture that changed with every passing moment. But Teine did not revel in the sensations, but instead focused. Within the casing of the device were hundreds of miniscule inscriptions, each of them in a wild, unnatural script that had once burned his eyes to even perceive. Now, it merely sent shivers through his flesh, involuntary flinches from the dread Truth of it.

What is this language? This script? Teine had never seen its like, which would suggest it was new...but there were too many things lost to time for him to make that assumption. The script had weight, significance that things newly conceived could rarely claim. For all his research, all his dissection of the runes, he'd only parsed the bare minimum of their meanings. Something held him back. Something he was missing. "What made you?"

The man he'd taken this from had been maddened by the wounds he'd received in the Foglands. Wounds from some sort of dire beast in the Labyrinth beneath the ancient ruined city. It was an Elf by the name of Pen or Pell—it no longer mattered—they were long dead by that point. Teine rarely bothered with unimportant facts. The device gave off an energy, a crimson corruption that trailed it like a smokestack. His Manasight could perceive it, but thankfully he was one of the only possessors of such a Skill; lesser ranked Elemental Eyes and the like would not—could not—notice the delicate traceries of power.

So no other Elder noticed how many Guilders had been infected by this power.

Returning from the Foglands had marked many of them, and not for the better. In order to study them more, the High Elder had allowed Teine to secret them all away into the Domain, where he could pursue their treatment...and his own experiments.

The screams, which had drifted into hoarse, muted cries, began anew. Tch. The beast must have regenerated its vocal chords. Teine glanced over his shoulder at the monster, the Manawarped Revenant he'd strapped to his examination table. Much of its blood and viscera had been taken out, but still it lived, even thrashed weakly. Remarkable.

He ignored it for now. It wasn't going anywhere, after all.

The device. It was an impossible thing, flowing with the echoes of a discordant power he'd never before encountered. It was the start of all of his plans. All of his failures.

How was he to know that the corruption that stained the Guilders was of Primordial stock? Powerful, unpredictable, and vicious, Primordials were said to be the bane of life itself. They were exceedingly rare in the world, named enemies of the gods themselves. The only one he'd ever heard of had been spotted in the deep sea, thirty years ago. None who witnessed it survived long.

Teine leaned backward and groaned. With shaking hands, he took out a hardened leather case, flipped the top, and tossed back a glittering violet potion. It tasted of sour milk with a hint of raspberry in an attempt to hide the flavor. He truly wished Aenea had survived. That he had to live with an Apprentice Alchemist now, of all times, was a true tragedy.

Everything hurt on Teine, from his leg to his face. After the Night-cursed Primordial had ripped its way out of the Domain, he'd been buried under a city of rubble. His favored inscriptionists had died instantly, crushed to paste, while he had expended every ounce of Mana to keep himself breathing. Sixteen hours he had spent beneath the earth. He frowned, forcing the thoughts from his mind.

There are more things afoot than my injuries.

Primordial or not, Teine had found a remarkable power within the corruption. He'd used it in the Domain, experimenting with the flesh of those who were changing, piece-by-piece. Then he had left his experiments, driven back to the city for entirely too long. Something had changed within, something he hadn't accounted for, and an actual Primordial had emerged. The corruption that emanated from his device was the key to that power. He just had to unlock it.

He knew of the Harmonics, knew of the heresies that the church tried to keep covered up. The corruption was somehow counter to what the old religion called the Wild Song. It fascinated him in ways the magic music of cultists never had. Before him was a path to the pinnacle, one he had long searched for. Though it felt jagged, perhaps broken, glory was at the other end. Immortality.

Had he the fortitude to take the leap?

Silence filled his chambers. Teine looked up from his desk, noting the varied desks and tables, each filled with carefully penned notes and vials of bubbling liquids. It was cluttered but clean. Sterile, as he liked things. The Revenant had fallen completely silent.

Teine put down his device and lurched to his feet. Cane in hand, he hobbled over. Only a few steps away from his desk—and the device—a notification flickered into being before him.

Curious.

He read the alert and nodded. He'd been expecting this, ever since he'd heard the Charter had been torn up. The Guild only ever had Provisional Authority, while the Heirocracy gave them the power over the city. They'd never even been able to fully tap into the Wall's true defenses. That was biting them in the ass now, as the monsters kept throwing themselves at the city.

Those Wretches, strange giant otters, some sort of acid-spitting lizards. They didn't stop, and his people were getting exhausted. It wouldn't have mattered one way or another to him, but the constant fighting was depriving him of capable assistants. One could not do proper research without at least one assistant.

Closer now, Teine spotted the Revenant's head. It had no eyes, no nose, only a wide, fanged maw that glistened wetly. Yet its head was moving gently back and forth. Almost as if...

Teine's hand slammed into the creature's throat.

Purloined Vision.

His Skill flared through his center, pouring out of his mechanized core and into his jagged channels. Those hours beneath the earth had hurt his foundations worse than he had suspected, but it was more than enough for this.

A screen appeared before the Revenant. A blue notification screen, and it said something altogether different than Teine's.

TERRITORY-WIDE QUEST ALERT!

Protect the Nest!

The Nest is in danger! Your enemies search even now for the home of your people! They pose a threat to all life within the Nest! Seek out and destroy the threats, by whatever means necessary!

Rewards:

x1 Gold Chest

Territorial Authority

They can receive Quests?! Teine's eyes shot wide and the Revenant began thrashing with greater vigor than before. Dark fluid spilled from its open chest cavity as organs squirmed and pulled back together. The thing was trying all it could to escape. To...It can understand the System?

"Shh, shh, shh," Teine whispered, placing his unharmed hand atop the Revenant's scaled throat. He squeezed, hard. "None of that."

Air Mana discharged from his palm, a simple spell for simple, clean results. Drained as it was, very little blood spilled as its head detached from its body. He had no time to waste on this creature, not any longer.

He had a Nest to find.

* * *

"Read it to us."

Tipan could not scream. Something had reached into her chest and blocked it, a fist of ice that stoppered her lungs. Wurms, huge, segmented monstrosities undulated slowly through the earth around her, menacing her with their fire-bright mouths. Jaws like axe blades ate through the earth as water.

"Mortal," the tinny voice said again, and that pressure released. "Read it to us. Now."

"Te-territory wide Quest alert," she began, barely able to focus on the words for the immense, skeletal creature before her. It was tall, unnaturally so, covered in armor the shade of vomit, and fire burned from its face. She had seen others, two others, one normal height and the other impossible round. Both of them were covered in armor, burning from within like Avet's own. Fear beat so deeply in her chest, awful and bright, that Tipan didn't notice she had finished speaking until another chimed in.

"Authority," it said, and its bulbous, slate-gray body shifted against a stand of trees. They creaked beneath its immense weight, despite being thicker than four Tipans could encompass.

"Territorial Authority," hummed the skeletal one. Its face, so far from the earth, was hard to make out in the shadows of the deep forest. She'd been sent to scout out the monster horde and...and these things had found her. They'd cut into her so deep it felt as if she'd never stop hurting. Then the questions started. The only relief to be found was when the Quest alert appeared. Skeleton tapped its razor-sharp fingers against its bony thigh. "A Territory that stretches from the mountains..."

"...to the Sea," said the third creature. This one was approximately her size, but colored like deep, loamy soil. "Master needs to know."

"Master trusts us to act," Skeleton said. "We cannot leave until we have completed our mission."

"Very well, but it will be made clear that I did not choose this path," the smaller one said, petulantly. It looked at Tipan with its burning eyes. "We must take care of the Human."

Skeleton turned back to Tipan, but the grotto had started spinning. Everything felt strangely warm, like she was cozied up against a well-stocked stove. The heat moved, up her back and onto her head. Strange.

"It is already done."

Tipan's last thought was that the summer morning had grown unreasonably hot entirely too quickly, before a Wurm tore off her head.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

"Can you believe it?" Evie said as they burst from the smithy's door. "An entire Territory, all on the same Quest! Never seen it before!"

Felix and Evie raced across the courtyard. They had to weave through the crowd, many of whom were clumped in tight groups, each discussing the new Territory-wide Quest with varying amounts of dread. Snippets of their conversations drifted through his Perception.

"A Nest? How will we survive...?"

"...we have to fight them? All of ‘em?"

"No! No, they took your father, they'll not take you, too!"

Felix blanched, his own burgeoning excitement dying near instantly. Quests weren't exciting to normal people; normal people died on quests, especially quests involving a huge nest of monsters. Monsters that had just killed many of their friends and family.

The tension was palpable, roiling among Felix's already turbulent emotions. Felix fought the grimace off his face, focusing on maneuvering at speed through the crowd without hurting anyone. Simultaneously, he attempted to flare his Bastion of Will. He had to do something to reduce the pressure in his chest.

Yet his emotions did not calm.

What?

Felix came to a stop three quarters of the way to the warehouse, staring into the middle distance. Humans, Hobgoblins, Orcs, the crowd noticed him for the first time, but Felix wasn't paying attention any longer. His Bastion was one of the cornerstones of his life on the Continent, an Epic-ranked mental resistance Skill. It had protected him time and again from the Maw and its machinations, often proving to be the one thing between him and failure. But it was ineffectual at managing his new problem.

Because it's emotions? But those are mental, right? He was missing something obvious, he was sure. He could see the Bastion swirling with light in his core space, brighter than before, just as all his Skills had become. He was about to dive into it when something touched him.

Unfettered Voliti—!

Felix's fist was moving before he dropped out of his core space, the blind strike guided by his recent training. His ears, however, caught up to the motion in time to hear a single, choked off word.

"Don't!"

Felix pulled his punch, stopping only inches from a dark, green-skinned face. The man cowered next to him, a burly Orc with tusks bigger than Felix's pointer finger. He stepped back, fixing the Orc with eyes that he knew were glowing again. "I'm—Please don't touch me."

The Orc cracked open his eyes and nodded rapidly. An adam's apple as large as a baby's fist bobbed in his neck. "Sorry, sorry! I—We, we all just—"

"We need to know," said a woman, another Orc. She stepped from the crowd around them and gripped the still-trembling man's shoulder. "What is happening? What are you doing about this?"

Felix stared at her, unsure what to say. His Mind raced, composing then discarding a thousand phrases in seconds, all of them trite or fake. He took so long that the woman blinked and stepped back, her face guarded. She pulled her friend with her.

"I understand. We're sorry to have bothered you, Fiend," she said.

"We will win," Felix said, unwilling for her to walk away. The words came unbidden, unexamined.

The Orcs paused, glancing back at him. Felix's Perception caught dozens more around him, all craning their heads in their direction.

"I'll kill them all." The emotions around him rumbled, swirling in fluid arpeggios that did not feel calm or assured. It was a hurricane and Felix the eye, with fear spiking at his words even as it was followed by a smattering of…reassurance. The fear wasn’t gone, but it steadied into something like a calm wariness. "I promise."

Hope is all I have. The Orcs’ expressions were alarmed, but after a moment, the man's back straightened, as if a great burden had been shifted. A great many others around them did the same, and though it wasn't uniform or perfect, the air felt...steadier, somehow. It's all they have, too.

"Thank you," she whispered before pulling her friend back into the crowd.

* * *

They reached the warehouse along with everyone else. The interior was packed with folk, everyone from Harn to Aenea and her husband Hector. Among the crowd, Felix made eye contact with Vess shortly before catching sight of the dour Hand beside her. Darius Reed stared down his aquiline nose at Felix, his distaste only marred by his acute interest in what exactly Felix represented. Felix's Affinity could feel the man's Spirit tremble, awash in a strange melange of annoyance and curiosity. There was no fear there, unlike with many of the people outside. An Adept combatant had little to fear from Felix, especially one as reportedly capable as the Hand.

"Felix! Evie! You came back just in time," Vess smiled at the both of them as she made space. She actually shoved the Hand slightly to the side, though Felix could tell she had no real way of budging the man had he wanted to remain. Darius was even three or four inches taller than Felix, which made his glare a bit more intimidating as they sidled up. "Cal is starting."

Cal pushed her way through the crowd, carrying an armful of rolled up parchments. Maps? A couple of splintering tables had been shoved together, and Cal maneuvered to one side. "Someone clear off this damn table," she growled.

Trendle and Portia quickly scooped the remaining bowls and plates from breakfast, and Cal dumped her load of paper onto the table. With quick motions, she laid out several large maps, held down by pieces of broken masonry. Felix could see the city etched out in crude, faded lines, but it was clearly Haarwatch broken up piecemeal in each map. "You've all seen the alert. This is big. Doesn't get bigger. We got a chance to save this city, and we're gonna take it."

"Not gonna argue against ruling a Territory, neither," Harn chuckled. Several others did as well, all of them former Guilders. They had a glint in their eyes, a mixture of excitement and fear.

"Neither am I," Cal agreed. "We got a shot at Territorial Authority; that means we could take control of the city in a way no one's ever done. Not here."

"But how's it work?" Bodie asked, and he wasn't the only one. Several of the others joined in a vague chorus. "We get Authority, then what? I've only heard bigwigs back east have it."

"That is just it," Vess said with mounting excitement. "Most cities have Provisional Authority from the System. Not even my Father has true System Authority over his territory. With it, you can do so much."

Cal pointed at Vess and looked at everyone else. "Exactly. We would gain access to any supply caches, weapons, crafting—"

"Treasure," Trendle said, his eyes glazed.

"Defenses," grunted Harn, putting an elbow into the big man's ribs. Trendle let out a small noise of surprise and pain that puffed out his mustache. "We could control the Wall. Really control it."

"How would that change things?" Reed asked, his eyes sweeping the assembled. He, aside from Zara, had the highest advancement among them. Felix had seen many of them defer to the man out of respect or maybe fear. "That just alters the hand on the wheel, is that not so?"

"Wrong," Evie said, glaring at the man. "The Guild didn't have System Authority, not full-force. And now they've got none."

"Correct. The Guild only ever had Provisional Authority, granted by the Hierophant, much as any Duke is granted. They were the rulers of this city because of the nature of the post: a wall against the monsters of the Foglands," Zara explained. "But the Guild's Charter was torn apart by the Master Inquisitor. Their Authority has been dissolved." She nodded at Aenea, who frowned in thought.

"Right, and stop interruptin' me, all of you," Cal said with a tired sigh. "The point is, we take the Authority, we take the city. Oust the Revenants, the redcloaks, by Siva's grace, we could even push back those damn monster hordes at the Wall."

"Sounds...too perfect," Felix said slowly. "What's the catch?"

"The catch, boy, is that we'd have to wade through thousands of beasts to find the Nest, let alone destroy it," Reed smirked at him. "I doubt even you could manage that."

The animosity in the man's Spirit flared the moment he started talking, but Felix ignored it. He simply met the man's gaze, staring at him as the tempo of his internal rhythm started to stutter then tilt back toward caution. Felix felt the moment when the Hand remembered just who had taken a dragon out of the sky.

Darius Reed looked away first, snorting.

"Except...we all got the quest notification, yeah?" Evie asked and folks around the room nodded. "What are the chances that the Inquisition and Guilders got shafted on it?"

"Nonexistent," Zara interjected. "This was a territory-wide alert. Everyone in the territory received the quest, which, according to System records, means anyone in Haarwatch, these mountains, or the Foglands themselves would have been notified."

Felix immediately thought of the Archon. Is he a sapient Race, or is he a monster? Zara said monsters don't get quests. They might be fine on that front, but for how long?

"...that just means we have to stay ahead of them. System said there was a Nest, so that means a concentration of at least three thousand by Guild reckoning." Cal pointed at the center of the map, where the hill and a large, imposing tower was depicted. "City center is where we've been seeing them, so that's where we start."

"There's too many; how would we get through them all?" Bodie asked. "It'd be wading into a river of blood. We'd lose more Tin Ranks than we could train up."

"Meanwhile, the Guilders and Inquisition got equipment and recruits to spare," Trendle grumbled, making his curled mustache wiggle. "They'll get through ‘em far faster than we ever could."

"We need a better way to fight ‘em," Harn rumbled. He had taken off his armor again, but he looked far less tired than he had in a long while. "We get too close, and Bodie's right: we get swarmed."

"I may have an idea," Felix announced. Everyone turned back to him with expectant gazes. "But we may need to do a few trial runs."

When Felix explained his idea, several of the Guilders broke out into laughter, and Evie punched his shoulder with a grin. Harn literally chortled, full-throated and everything.

Make An Entrance is level 39!

Only Zara stayed quiet, though she let a thread of her Spirit touch Felix's Affinity to make it clear to him: she was not pleased.

* * *

"Your idea is foolhardy in the extreme, Felix," Zara said while baring her teeth. "You cannot fight the Revenants. Not as you are. You know this."

Felix stopped at the threshold, door open and courtyard abuzz outside. He didn't turn around, just considered the moving crowds, feeling the new emotions that were growing by the second. Cal's crew were out there, answering questions and letting them know they had it under control. Zara watched him with an eyebrow raised.

"You're going to do it anyway, though, aren't you?" she asked. "Just as before."

Felix didn't even answer. He just opened his Affinity completely in reply. Zara's eyes widened a moment before she snorted. "Ridiculous. You place the Untempered above your own well-being?"

"You can feel me," Felix said. "Yeah. Yeah I do. They can't defend themselves, not against Revenants. The Tin Ranks aren't much better. There is no choice here, Zara."

"No." Zara’s voice was grave, and for once she let loose the tight control she had over her own Affinity. A rush of emotions tumbled outward, irritation wrapped up in micro-emotions that passed him too fast to identify. But above all else, he felt regret within her; deep and dark as a river to the sea. It all tangled together, a song that spoke to him more completely than words. “We may not like the options, but there is always a choice.”

“Not for me,” he said, quietly. Firmly.

Zara considered him for several beats of his heart, her ice-blue eyes boring into his own. Felix felt stripped under her gaze, almost flayed to the bone. Finally, she let out a very unladylike grunt, and her Affinity buttoned itself up until not a speck of her Spirit could be heard. "Find a way to center yourself, at least. Practice those breathing exercises I showed you. Level Meditation. And, Avet's teeth, don't go eating everything you see."

The grim set of Felix's mouth eased, just a touch. "Thank you, Zara."

Zara frowned and walked away. "Thank me by not getting killed, Felix Nevarre." He had gone through the door when her voice floated back to him. "And don't miss your lessons!"

* * *

The Healer's Ward was quiet compared to the hubbub outside. Portia hadn't even returned. After sharing his letter with the others, Felix, Evie, and Vess had all made their way over.

"Where's your Hand?" Felix asked Vess with a pointed glance around.

Vess thinned her lips at the question. "I told him off. I cannot believe he spoke that way to you."

"What, the stuck-up thing or the 'you cannot comprehend the power it takes to kill' tripe?" Evie asked through a mouthful of bread. Where had she gotten bread?

"He is insufferable," Vess said as they passed Portia's empty office. "I cannot understand why my father would ever have saddled me with him."

"He's strong, though," Felix admitted. "I can't deny that having him out there is a good thing. We need all the help we can get in this."

Vess tilted her head at him, conceding the point.

"Psh, Revenants ain't nothin'. We've handled ‘em before, and we can do it again," Evie said, swallowing the last bit of her loaf. "I bet I can kill more Revenants than that ponced-up fop."

They passed rows of ill patients one-by-one, his friends' conversation not doing enough to keep his attention away. Men and women of all Races were wheezing and sweating, their skin reddening and scaling. The Primordial energy in the air was changing them, faster than Felix had realized. And the further back they went, the worse it got...until it didn't. The last three rows felt blessedly cool, like someone had invented then turned on an air conditioner. Felix glanced around, but there were no fans to account for the temperature change, though he noticed that many of the patients were breathing easier, and their skin had smoothed.

It worked better here. Why? It keeps coming back everywhere else. He'd stopped by three times now to consume the ambient Mana in the air of the Healer's Ward, each time leaving it calmer than before. But the energy in the air had always returned...just not here. Near the mages.

Sitting up on one bed, heads together, Alister and Atar were weak but clear-eyed. They leaned against each other, and though their breathing seemed labored, it was clear.

"Atar! Noble-boy! You're not dead!" Evie exclaimed. "Congratulations!"

"Evie," Atar croaked, his voice creaky from disuse. "You're...you, as always."

"Atar, Alister, how are you feeling?" Vess asked. She sat gingerly on the bed beside them, keeping her eyes on the pair. "Do you need food or water?"

"We're fine, Vess, thank you," Alister said. His voice was just as bad, if not worse than Atar's. His gaze lingered on Atar's, and Felix noticed him gingerly grip the other's bandaged hand. "It's been...bad. But I'm told we have you to thank, Felix?"

Felix shrugged, uncomfortable. "I have a useful Skill. I just wish it could have been more help to everyone else here." Though the weight of the Revenant’s influence in the ward was less now, it was still both extant and beyond the reach of his Skill.

"Your Ravenous Tithe, was it?" Atar asked, and Felix nodded. "A strange ability, but to be expected considering its...source."

"Damn useful, though," Evie said. "Listen, you see the Territory-Wide Quest? How soon before you two can fight?"

"They have been through quite a lot, Evie. I'll not have them fighting until I'm sure they're clear of the worst of it," Portia said, walking down the aisle. "Now, if you please, my patients need their rest." She gestured gently toward the exit.

Vess gave Atar a hug, and Evie almost punched Alister on the shoulder before she caught Portia's stern eye. Felix simply nodded, his own emotions in turmoil. His read on their Spirits was troubling; they were both fresher than before, but traces of Primordial energy clung to them. Like a stain. Something surged inside of him, an emotion he couldn't name, but Felix fought it back.

Bastion of Will is level 55!

"Felix? Can you make a pass through the ward again? I fear it's grown once more."

Breathing heavily from whatever that was, Felix nevertheless nodded. Portia half-opened her mouth, as if she wanted to say more, before turning around and walking back to her office. Evie and Vess, freed of the healer's attention, lingered and spoke more to the mages.

She still wants me to share how I do this. He shook his head. As if I'd willingly give anyone else these Skills.

Felix wasn't an idiot. The rampaging emotions he'd been experiencing were clearly from the Primordial energy he'd been using to advance himself. Essence, energy, whatever. I just know I have to find a way to stop this without… stopping.

Ravenous Tithe was the key to saving these people. He knew it.

Felix just had to save himself first.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

The three of them left shortly after Felix finished ingesting the Ward's ambient Mana. It had taken a few passes, but less than last time. He was getting better, if slowly.

Vess went back to the Hand, who was her primary trainer now that the Eyrie and its bevy of training resources were no more. Evie had mentioned something about looting those resources when they approached the city center, but Felix was doubtful anything worthwhile remained after a skyscraper's worth of stone fell atop it. Regardless, Evie had her own preparations to make, not the least of which was begging Cal to let her join the fight.

"She's gonna say no, I know it," Evie groused.

"Just...frame it properly. Tell her you'll be safe with us. I…" Vess suddenly sighed. "I assume Darius will join us."

Evie rolled her eyes. "Oh, yippee. I can barely restrain my joy."

"Good," Felix said, and the others turned to him in surprise. "We need the help. You're both excellent fighters, but I'm...more of a work in progress. I've got the stats, but the Skill levels..."

"You've killed monsters and assholes twice your advancement before, or more," Evie pointed out, poking him in the chest. Felix barely felt it. "What's with the humility?"

"Is it because of the Initiate?" Vess asked.

That rage flared up, coupled with genuine embarrassment, and heated Felix's cheeks. "No. Yes. Other things, too. I need to train properly. I have...I've survived on my stats and luck, and I can't do that anymore. I'm working to fix that. If having Darius on our side means we'll all live through this Quest? I'm for it, in a heartbeat."

He'd left them shortly after that to begin his own preparations. After running up to his room and retrieving a few items, he made a stop at the Coldfire Forge before collecting Pit and returning back to his favorite warded room in the main warehouse.

Pit, who had been sleeping in a rare sunny spot in the courtyard, was groggy and irritable but followed dutifully. The moment Felix entered the warded room, the tenku slumped down and went back to sleep.

"Big pig, now," Felix smiled.

Minutes later, Felix and Pit sat together in the warded room downstairs, his belongings strewn out before him. His bronze-capped boots were off, and his feet enjoyed a rare breath of fresh air. Not that the enchanted footwear ever smelled; the magic woven into their making kept them too clean for that. No, instead it was the feeling of relaxation inherent in the act, a key to the techniques Zara had taught him.

Breathe deep. Breathe even, he coached himself. Let the quiet flow through you.

There was a connection between mindset and outcome, one of the simplest of all links. As above, so below, Felix thought with a faint smile. He wiggled his toes.

Breathe.

Felix fell into his core space.

The darkness around him was thick, potent if pushed out further and further by the preponderance of light. His core ring gleamed like the sun, his Skills a set of jewel-bright worlds, each brimming with power and potential. He was here, however, for one Skill in particular.

Bastion of Will.

Ever since he'd encountered trouble with his emotions, a little voice in the back of his head had wanted to check on his Bastion. Inspect it. Tour the grounds. Yet Felix was afraid of what he may find within. He'd shied away from it.

His Bastion should have prevented his emotions from running amok. It had not.

As his Skill moved toward Felix, taking up more and more of his vision, his consciousness tipped forward. Wresting control back mid-fall, Felix plunged into his Bastion, a speck of a world of rolling green hills, a lush forest, and the flash of distant waves. Standing central in all of that was his Bastion proper, a squat, square fortress built of dark stone. In the center of the castle lay a huge expanse of grassy field, uninterrupted by much other than the huge, five-sided tower in the very center.

Well, that and the gargantuan hole in the earth.

"Oh my god," Felix whispered as he alighted upon the grass. The hole was jagged and raw, as if something had been forcibly removed, littering the field around him with great clods of dirt and uprooted grass. The Maw had once been imprisoned there, beneath his Bastion. Felix walked to the edge of the hole and peered within.

It was dark, darker than it had any right to be, but in the steady, unchanging sunlight of his Bastion, Felix could see that the hole was lined with more dark stone and glittering metal than he remembered. It was all shattered from the inside, as if something had broken out. The Maw was gone, Felix knew, and all of this likely happened during his final confrontation with the Ravager King, when he'd forcibly eaten the Maw's Mind. The process must have torn apart his Bastion as the Maw was finally—fully—consumed.

Something flashed crimson within the crater.

"What's—" Felix peered closer, and his eyes widened. The stone and dirt within the cavity were shot through with crimson veins, glittering like metal. They weren't malignant, yet they felt strong. The memory of starvation, blunted somehow. An edge of ferocity that felt like a caged animal, tempered by the patience of an eternal being.

It marked me. Again and again, in ways I'm constantly discovering. Felix almost groaned. How did this affect his Skill? He glanced around, casting about for something, anything else. He supposed—

From his lower vantage point, Felix could see that each and every wall glittered with pulsing veins of carmine metal. Unlike those in the hole, these felt aggressive. Hateful. They bore a malevolent presence that Felix was astounded he had not felt before; now that he was aware of them, it was impossible to ignore. With a thought, Felix was there, inches away from the nearest wall. He reached out a hand and ran it through the air, not quite touching its surface.

Sense impressions exploded across his Mind and Spirit; a jumbled mess of memories and emotions spiked into him. The point of view was alien, the thoughts strange and disjointed, like a home movie taken apart and edited back together randomly. More than anything, the violence and wild brutality had been layered onto his Bastion, baked into the stones themselves.

"How the hell am I supposed to fix this?"

* * *

Pit was dreaming.

It was a pleasant sort of dream. The kind where snacks were plentiful and easily stolen, where scratches were whenever he wanted them, and—most importantly—he was small again.

Pit missed being small.

Being large had its advantages. Chief among them was the ability to fly and fight enemies better. It let him carry his friends now, and that was nice. It was good, and the warmth he felt from his friends' Spirits was a proper reward. Still, Pit missed being able to hide beneath tables and fall asleep in the same bed as Felix. Now, they couldn't even share the same bedroom.

It made Pit...sad.

In his dream, he was tiny, practically the way he'd been when he found Felix. It was perfect for winding through tree roots and hiding among the brush. The undergrowth was covered in fog, as it always had been until he'd bonded with his strange Companion, but the trees above stretched high enough to escape the gloom. There, far up, his mother flew.

She was like him, russet and dark, wings and feathers and a great bushy tail. She had been huge, the biggest thing he'd ever seen, though in his dream, she was far larger than she ever had been in life. He knew that, but didn't care.

She was beautiful.

"Pit."

Pit spun toward the voice, lowering his body and spreading his tiny, baby wings. A hiss escaped his small beak, and he spotted his mother standing among the shadows and mists of a bulbous tree. His hiss ended in confusion as she moved forward, though the shadow never quite left.

"Pit, you must help us."

You are not mother, Pit shrieked. His voice was as tiny as his body. You are not welcome!

"Felix is not listening, Pit," the creature said, and its limbs writhed in the mist. Jerking motions animated each leg, yet it grew no closer. It was...wrong. "You must convince him. He must not...t(#0st—"

The figure flickered as if a cloud had passed over the sun. It twisted. It was in clear, terrible agony. For all that it was not, it felt like his mother. He ran to it.

Stop! Stop hurt! Pit lunged for the shadowy creature, unsure what he could do, but unable to stop himself.

Blood-red light split apart the world.

A mountain rose up before him, one so huge it blotted out the sky itself. Strange, impossible stars lit the sky as etches of light strobed their way across the horizon. The smell of ozone, of charred rock and wood and flesh filled his nose, closely accompanied by the copper-rich scent of flowing blood. Oceans of it.

A waterfall spilled down the mountain, and not only one, hundreds. Each the width of the Ianus, they thundered from on high, falling from a summit that bore the collected aggression of an unbelievable storm. Lightning lashed the peak, a place so far above him that he was less than an ant before it, yet so close he could taste the discharge on the air.

"ENOUGH!"

The mists returned, and the forest, and the sound of bugs and wind and smell of imminent rain. But it felt hollow now. A lie. At some point, Pit had even returned back to his original size. His NotMother stood in her darkness, a shadow of something once living, heaving a breath that made the forest around them tremble.

No, it did tremble. It shook, and the trees swayed.

"It has found me. You share his Titles, but it's not enough time!" The creature writhed more, now turned flat, like a leaf or page of a book. "Speak to him, Chimera. Beast of Harmony, Child of Guardians. You must protect him. It is coming. He must find the shrines, quickly. He is no longer the only one on the Path."

Pit tilted his head. You are hurt.

"I am far more than that, Wild One," the shadow said. Its eyes flashed with a brilliant, familiar blue. "Now run."

* * *

The Bastion was falling apart.

"No!" Felix strained his Willpower and Alacrity, trying with all his might to halt the collapse. He still didn't understand how it had happened. All he had done was try to rip out the hole the Maw had left when the entire fortress began to topple. "Back. Together!"

But the Bastion didn't respond, not as it had before. Only a few chunks of masonry were affected, sizable though they might have been. They shifted back, settling into place among the crumbling remains while the rest hit the grassy earth with the force of cannons. Each impact tore godawful wounds in the grounds, gaping holes filled with loam and traces of crimson metal. Waves of fury and fear and grief pummeled him with each exposed vein. It was terrifying, but Felix couldn't tell if that was his emotion or not. Crimson energy swirled all around the Bastion, clouds of vermilion streaked with bright spots of white-hot feeling. It crawled into him, through him. Felix couldn't help it.

He screamed.

Felix's limbs crackled with blue lightning and flickering, golden fire. Fangs erupted from his maw, face breaking and reforming to fix his new, powerful jaws. His eyes burned, piercing azure light that seared the red clouds all around him.

Bastion of Will is level 54!

"NNnnnnG!" Felix threw himself forward, hands-first to the ground. He hit with a muffled thud that split the grass and dirt, releasing another stream of vaporous carmine light. "BACK! TOGETHER!"

Bastion of Will is level 53!

What?

It was coming apart, all around him. His Skill...Why?

SKEEAAAAAW!

CONVERGE!

Far above, a black speck shot through the once-blue sky. Storm clouds gathered upon it, fissured with lightning. Pit plummeted, a comet of black light that slammed into Felix's Spirit from orbit. The earth around them exploded. Earthen clods shot into the air, propelled by azure lightning and clouds of burning light. Felix's Harmonic Stats, bolstered by Pit's convergence, surged in response. "STOP!"

All around him, for dozens of feet, everything froze.

Pressure beset him on all sides, an all-encompassing sensation that threatened to tear him apart completely. He focused his fractious Intent, bearing down upon it with all the Willpower he could muster. His Bastion was breaking apart, infected by the Revenant's emotional stain. Felix couldn't remove it, couldn't even touch it, so that left only a single path: he had to filter it out.

Reign of Vellus!

Lightning shot out from him and into the earth and walls around him, focused beams of wrist-thick electricity. Felix grabbed at everything he could, be it falling walls, shattered tower, or the very earth itself.

Reign of Vellus!

Felix cast it all, over and over. He felt Dual Casting rank up again and again as his Mana drained at a prodigious rate. Far faster than even his regeneration could handle. Through sheer force of Will, Felix held on.

Bastion of Will is level 52!

God damn it! What else could he do? He'd only ever sundered Skills apart. Holding them together, healing them, he'd never—

Unfettered Volition, he remembered. Craning his neck, Felix could just see the decaying, pentagonal facade of his central tower. Emblazoned on that tower was the pattern for his movement Skill. He'd once somehow connected it to his Bastion; not a combination of evolution, but an...integration.

What if—what if he did more? But how?

From within his Spirit, Pit's own fury rose to match Felix's, and the tenku let out a powerful and lingering cry. It swept through the area around him, setting his lightning aquiver as it passed, vibrating the very air. The cry didn't end, but grew stronger as it spread, evoking reverberations from all around them. The clods of earth, the stone, even the traces of metal echoed the sound, catapulting its resonance ever further. The walls shook. The winds.

The sky itself.

Urged by a shared instinct he knew better than to question, Felix sent his Affinity coursing along those vibrations. Sweat poured from his brow, his core aching as Mana drained from him like a sieve, but his senses shot outward faster and faster. The sky, heavily clouded and rumbling with dark promise, rocked.

There!

REIGN OF VELLUS!

One last burst of magic exploded from him. Felix poured nearly all of his remaining energy into it, burning Mana and Essence and his waning mental strength into the blast. The lightning formed into a beam of blue-white radiance, surging into the sky. It pierced the dark-bellied clouds and split them apart. He tore a hole in the sky, revealing a familiar darkness studded with the glittering star patterns of his myriad Skills.

Affinity and Alacrity quested outward, no longer held at bay by the limits of his Bastion. Felix knew what he needed. He grabbed one, then two Skills from the ephemeral ether of his core, pulling them down, down through the sky and into his Bastion. Once the shimmering Skills crossed the barrier into his Bastion, they transformed. They became secondary suns in the sky, mountains of raging power that boiled the clouds from around them and set winds shrieking in tumultuous gales that uprooted trees beyond the broken walls. Though it was like gripping twin infernos, Felix did not quit. He hauled them down, down, into his Bastion until they were just feet from the tallest tip of his tower.

BASTION OF WILL!

The world around him let out a melodious hum, joining with the calamitous fury of emotion that sheared at the edges of his Mind. The Skill quivered beneath that combination of sound, a discordant tone that soothed Felix's mind but set his teeth on edge. This was his Bastion, his Skill, and it was his to control!

Meditation!

Deep Mind!

Felix sounded their patterns and the suns came alive, their former heat only a precursor to their new intensity. Normally passive Skills by their nature, that had never stopped Felix from tracing out their patterns. Meditation was to counterbalance the rage for regeneration of Body, Mind, and Spirit while his Deep Mind was to strengthen his Bastion's connection to his Mind. For that is what this place was; his Bastion was a safeguard, a fortress for his Mind and Spirit, a world sheltered from the terrors of the Continent.

And he'd be damned if he gave that up just for some jerk-ass Revenants.

"BACK!"

The lightning thundered around him, blooming outward into branches, each flicker of force connected to a piece of his Skill. Felix raised his trembling hands, now scaled and tipped with bleeding claws, and grabbed at the air beside him. Pit screeched in tandem, his own strength joined with Felix's.

"TOGETHER!"

With a mighty heave, he pulled his arms inward. An eruption of blue-white light and concussive sound shook everything. Felix's veins stood out like cables in his neck and arms, and he screamed through clenched fangs. His jaw popped, the force too much for it, and his teeth shattered, but still he pulled. The light of twin suns expanded until everything was awash in glorious golden radiance...

...then, it vanished.

Relative darkness followed, and the sudden cessation of resistance found Felix's arms limp as noodles. Ragged and panting, mouth bleeding and eyes burning with brilliant, sapphire light, Felix sat up.

Grass, dirt, entire fields that had been torn asunder and filled with crimson vapor had largely slithered back where they belonged. The process had been reversed, for the most part. The walls around him had reconstituted, but huge, glaring cracks crazed the surface. They shone with a fitful, vermilion radiance.

It had worked, but it was only a band-aid. He turned and beheld his pentagonal tower; still, he could see the pattern for Unfettered Volition etched into one side, and on two more were Meditation and Deep Mind. Both of them were linked now to his Bastion; connected but not combined or evolved. Like stars that rotated around each other.

Bastion of Will!

Felix ‘s heart settled and his mind calmed, while all around him a wind kicked up and the many, many cracks in the earth and stone all flared with bloody light. The metal that represented his new emotional flaw was not going anywhere, but at least this Bastion was working once again.

Bastion of Will is level 53!

Bastion of Will is level 54!

Bastion of Will is level 55!

Ah, excellent. Felix sagged with relief. He feared the Skill would break. Pit, you're a lifesaver.

I am a Beast of Harmony. Child of Guardians, his Companion said.

...What?

But Pit didn't reply, only huffed a tired breath and faded into sleep.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Later that day, Pit couldn't really confirm what he had meant just before he'd zonked out. The tenku seemed as confused as Felix was, although happy enough. Whatever had exhausted him had worn off, and he was back to his over-excitable self again. Felix moved on. He had an imbalanced Skill and an idea of how to fix it, so it was time for training.

Zara had given him some advice when he approached her with what he'd done already, linking Meditation and Deep Mind to his Bastion of Will. She nodded as if that made sense. When he admitted to the veins of extreme emotion that had infected the Skill, she had grown more concerned.

"Is this an effect of the Primordial?"

"I can't see anything else that would cause it," Felix said. "Each time I pull the red haze from the air around me, or when I devour a Revenant, the effect stirs. Grows stronger. It's reached a point where it's affecting my thinking, and I can't have it."

She said what he planned, what he'd already accomplished somehow, was done, but rarely. "The effects could be deleterious, but only if one mismatched the Skills. You have the benefit of your Affinity: if you can hear the commonalities between them, then they will link. The more commonalities, the less reduction in power. If they are common enough, you may even experience a brief surge in capability."

Armed with that knowledge, the next few days passed in a blur of activity. Everyone was in a hurry to go out and win the Quest, but many didn't even have armor or spears. Those who could went out and hunted the Revenants, typically the more capable Iron and Bronze Ranks among the crew, but there weren’t enough to assault a Nest. The sheer number of monsters would crush them to paste without levels, training, and equipment. So the Coldfires were hard at work, they and their apprentices stayed up for twenty-hour days, just to outfit everyone with basic arms and armor. The one advantage of the wait was that it offered Felix time to hone himself.

Meditation and Deep Mind took some doing, the first requiring him to keep his Skill active as long as possible or during heavy fighting. He'd long since been able to keep Meditation working during fights, but for things like the Ravagers, he had dropped it completely. When Felix had arrived on the Continent, he had been given a choice of Born Traits; he had chosen Keen Mind, which provided him with perfect recall for events up to thirty days prior.

Since then, he'd benefited greatly from his memory, but only recently he’d learned of a way to cheat the System, in a way. By burning Essence with his core, he was able to fuel his growth through repeated actions in memory. The more he diverged from true events, the greater the cost of Essence, but it was so very useful. It was also exhausting and extremely terrifying. The creatures that could challenge him now were among those beasts he'd never wish to see again.

Regardless, Felix bit the bullet, burned a healthy portion of Essence, and cast himself back into his memories of his worst fights. The bloodiest down-and-out scrapes he'd been in, the ones that still made him flinch to think about. He avoided revisiting the Dread, as powerful as it had been; it had too much in common with the Maw. He'd faced little that would threaten his mental defenses that wasn't Maw-related. He was left with only a single choice.

The Archon.

He'd reappeared in the humid garden deep in the Archon's Domain. Herbs, roots, fruits, and all manner of plant life flourished down there, but that sickly sweet scent of blood Mana filled the air to bursting. The details were foggy, as the memory was outside of his thirty-day limit, so it was more hazy collection of impressions than life-like recreation. He recalled that the plants around him were things like bellock and aram root, strange plants with stranger details he'd never really explored. Maybe Aenea would know more about them.

Then he saw the golden form of the Archon, flanked by his two gray-metal Arcids. Felix diverged from his memories, conjured an Arrow of Perdition, and charged the bastard. It went about as well as he expected. The Archon cleaned his clock, repeatedly. And when Felix was broken and bloody on the ground, as the memory and Essence dried up around him, the constructed jerk slammed his Mind with those eye-fires of his and sent him spiraling into darkness.

Felix was wrenched out of the memory so hard his head snapped against the concrete floor beneath him. With a snarl, he tried again. And again. Two entire days were lost to his reenactments, not to mention the time it took to harvest more Essence. But his efforts yielded fruit.

Meditation is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain: +5 WIL, RES, REI

Deep Mind is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain: 10% FEL, AFI, ALA

Reign of Vellus is level 54!

Unfettered Volition is level 48!

Wild Threnody is level 45!

Corrosive Strike is level 46!

Dodge is level 48!

Armored Skin is level 54!

Arrow of Perdition is level 22!

Dual Casting is level 37!

Abyssal Skein is level 30!

The Archon was tough, and he never managed to defeat the memory of him, but he proved to be a powerful motivator. The recollected hate in the construct’s eye-fires kept his Mind on target, despite the pain. They had to take care of the Quest so that they could be ready for him.

He ran out of Essence quickly on the first day. Revenants were getting rarer around them, gathering closer to the city center, so Felix had been forced to consume what was around him. There was little Essence to be found among inorganic matter, so he'd had to enter one of the abandoned, junk-filled warehouses nearby. There were many, the Dust Quarter clearly having seen better days. He'd eaten all of the scrap metal, rotting wood, and detritus that he could find, and only barely had enough to continue for a few hours. As a bonus, the warehouse was now empty, and he'd let Cal know. More refugees were diverted there for temporary housing.

So, on he went, clearing warehouse after warehouse, eating everything he could. He cleared so many, their camp could never secure them all. If nothing else, people were able to breathe again. After weeks of living on top of one another, Felix figured it would be a help. In fact, the mood in the camp had lightened considerably after the Quest, his little speech, and now more living space. It no longer felt like walking through the third act of a really sad movie. People had life in them once more, smiles, if for only a little while.

He had to do more.

With Pit's help, Felix fought with his Bastion and drew two more Skills to house themselves within it. It took more effort from both Felix and Pit, almost as much as it cost him to hold the Bastion together, but they finally connected them: Reign of Vellus...and Oathbinding. He had considered his other Skills, but these five seemed the most...appropriate to strengthening the Skill and himself.

Fire Within is level 60!

The Skills etched themselves, brilliant light erupting from the last two faces of his pentagonal tower. As they did, his Bastion shifted. Like a puzzle settling into place, chunks of landmass and stonework sealed themselves, more solid once again. The veins of red didn't disappear, but somehow merged with the landscape.

A towering cumulonimbus cloud, as massive as any he'd ever seen, manifested above his Bastion. Lightning crashed through it, lashing across the sky and down onto the guard towers in a constant, almost rhythmic fashion. Azure glow, traced by the faintest of gold, spread from those points of impact and through the walls. The dark stone became traced with those colors, as well as the marbled red of volatile emotions.

Atop the tower, a single, thin spire formed. Shimmering silver light gathered atop this needle and wobbled until tendrils of power began spinning outward, until with a sudden clap of silent thunder, a thousand silver threads shot in all directions. Lightning struck these lines and crawled across them briefly before fading.

Bastion of Will is level 56!

Bastion of Will is level 57!

Felix hurled himself into the sky, tentatively trusting his Bastion not to hurt him, and looked down at his creation below. His dark fortress sat amid a silver web like a squat spider. Lightning crashed all around him, but it had calmed, striking with an intermittent pulse at all four corners of his fortress.

Not...not bad. His imaginary body panted, still catching his breath after hurling around so much power. From this distance, I can barely see the red veins.

But his fortress was not the only thing that changed. Nearby, the forest beyond the walls had become gorged on power, growing wild and huge. Trees stretched taller than his walls, and mysterious winds shook their branches. Past that, to what Felix always thought of as south, the acidic sea swelled. Waves crashed, too far to hear, but big enough to see from miles away.

Time to go for broke.

Felix had considered his Skills as deeply as he could. He'd included Oathbinding for the reinforcement of its binding aspects. The accumulated connections to others and places and things was an anchor, he hoped. He'd chosen Reign of Vellus for much the same reason, except that Reign was Tempered with the Essence of Gravity. The Pull of Significance. It was another weight, and it latched onto his Bastion as if all of its pieces were being yanked inwards. He needed to hold it all together, because the next step was where things could get dicey.

He'd Tempered his Bastion with the Essence of Sever. He had been in a...weird place when he'd chosen his Temper in a fit of pique, but there was more there than rebellion against the annoyances of the System. Break The Ties That Bind, his Essence stated. His Bastion was a fortress, a citadel to protect his Mind and Spirit. But defenses weren't always passive.

Sometimes, you had to fight to protect.

Oathbinding!

The silver threads atop his tower illuminated with a steady, argent glow, onto which Felix focused his Affinity. Picked out among his false world were hundreds, thousands of connections; small strings that tied grass to soil, rock to wall, metallic veins to...nothing? The marbling that had infested his Bastion did not begin in the Skill itself. Instead, they trailed off into a darkness that was a hard right turn from his Skill.

Pit, if you will. Felix asked, and his Companion answered. A cry rang out, similar to what he had done before, and Felix followed its vibrations along the improbable path of his trespasser. Onward and out, Felix's senses emerged into the darkness of his core space, where the threads of crimson were far easier to spot, now that he was looking. They sped, straight as arrows, directly to his core.

Directly above his core, to be specific.

Echoes of the Maw. Shit. Felix groaned. Of course.

The ruby-red drops of Primordial energy floated above his core, legion even though many had clumped together and congealed into larger blobs. They spun quickly, but their power unspooled across his core like a cloud. He was practically infested with it all.

Bastion of Will!

An excruciating shearing sliced across Felix's Spirit and Mind. Even his Body trembled in the distance. The severed lines from his core into his Bastion whipped in the empty space, lashing about before retracting like injured tentacles to the array of ruby power.

Bastion of Will is level 58!

...

Bastion of Will is level 62!

"GGGAAAAAHAHH!"

He flared his Bastion in tandem with his Fire Within, and a wave of blue-white lightning rippled through his core space. Wherever the wave hit the red, the Primordial power recoiled and pulled back atop his core. Skills that were becoming enmeshed in the web of volatile emotions were cut free, suddenly shining brighter than ever before. Like the noon sun coming out from behind a cloud, Felix's core space was inundated with brilliance as each of his revolving Skills gleamed in the dark.

The cloud of vermilion dwindled away until it was a mere haze around the Echoes of the Maw.

And...stay...out...

* * *

Zara hummed to herself as Felix flopped backward. He was a sweaty mess after his extensive efforts in his core space. His Companion flashed out of his Spirit and nuzzled his face, eliciting groans of affectionate annoyance. The boy had utilized the tools at hand to imperfectly side-step the issue he was experiencing, but he'd failed to notice a critical development. Even now, Zara could sense it, brewing in his Aspects. The crimson motes.

What will you choose to do, Felix? Zara tapped her lips. How will you face it?

She wished she could tell him, warn him perhaps, but doing so would be putting her finger on the scale. The choices he made now would forge him into who he must become, and he alone had to contend with their consequences.

* * *

"Wait, so System Authority is irrefutable?" Felix asked. A day after his core diving, Felix and a small group of fighters had gotten clearance to approach the city center. Other groups were forming up at the same time, each heading in a slightly different direction to begin engaging the monsters. Armor and weapons were mostly available to everyone who volunteered, and squads had been formed among those eager to claim the Quest's rewards.

Felix felt good, less emotional, to be sure. A quick flare of Fire Within confirmed his Echoes of the Maw still had not moved, but nothing else had changed, either. The influence within his Bastion remained. Nothing he attempted had removed the red metal from his fortress and lands, but with his Mind calmer, he at least wasn't worried about going off the handle.

Today was a test, though. Could he devour more Revenants and keep the Echoes in check?

At the moment, they were all walking along the river Ianus, close to the edge of the "safe zone." The Revenants still hadn't made much headway across the river, but that was starting to change. Scouts had reported more activity on the far side, though few of the monsters risked the river. There were things in the river, Felix knew.

Goddamn eels.

"Yes and no," Vess explained. She looked at all of them as she spoke, including their entire squad in the conversation. "System Authority is nearly absolute. It doesn't give you the power of life or death of the citizens, necessarily, but you may alter defenses, access resources, even set terms on Duels. Once set, they cannot be broken. Like an Oathbinding."

"So everyone with Authority is ranked the same?" Evie asked. "If I get this thing, does that mean I can beat up your dad?"

Vess gave Evie a mock serious look before laughing. "No. Authority is not only ranked based on how much Territory you control, but you only have it within your Territory. If you traveled to someone else's Territory, even if they had Provisional Authority and you had the greater rank, you would be under their dominion."

"So no stormin’ the capitol and tweakin' the Hierophant's nose?" Evie frowned, and Vess shook her head with a smile. "Ugh. Then what use is it?"

A strangled chuckle came from behind them, and Felix let his Perception encompass the rest of them. Thangle was walking in the middle, stifling a shocked laugh, but he was flanked by a couple Tin Rank volunteers. They all looked just as startled at the subject of conversation, though Atar rolled his eyes in the far back. Felix supposed only some of them had gotten used to Evie's outbursts.

Felix had been instructed to make a squad of his own for testing his plan, but Cal had gone and made the announcement public. That meant most of the morning had been spent sifting through ambitious volunteers, trying to find someone to fit his team's fighting style. Frustrated, he'd just selected a few of the people he'd met before.

Cade and Sellis, Orc and Human women respectively, each bore martial weapons and heater shields in addition to their new Apprentice Tier armor. Merk and Heva, on the other hand, were mage types without any proper weapons, aside from a dagger at their waists. The mages were adorned in lighter leather armor, not quite as encompassing as Evie's, but more protection than Felix had. And heater shields of their own, of course. Atar simply wore his newly repaired armored robes, an expensive set the smiths couldn't replicate.

The Tin Ranks were still raw, having seen only a little more action since the last time Felix had seen them, but all of them had Revealed their Omens. Felix was still unclear on what Omens really meant, other than the vague and mostly useless "indicator of fate," but it meant extra stats at each level. He couldn't argue with that, and he brought them along to help them toward Apprentice Tier as quickly as possible. Aenea had even furnished their team with a collection of Iron Rank Essences, something she extracted from the ore, apparently. Felix had been too busy to have her teach him yet, though she also appeared to be avoiding him.

A problem for another time.

From above, a piercing cry echoed outward. Intent jolted through Felix, and he snapped his eyes forward, across the river.

"Burn me," Atar said at almost the same time. He pointed. "Here they come."

Roaming aimlessly through the burnt out and shattered husks of buildings, the sightless monsters perked up the same time Atar spoke. There had to be at least ten of them, and every single one pivoted and stared directly at them.

At Felix.

C'mon, beasties. Let's go.

A living avalanche of rust red and putrid yellow, they came, loping across the bridge at wild speeds. Bugling cries filled the air, and more poured from nearby side streets. Ten, fifteen, twenty more. A few even leaped directly into the river, taking the shorter path.

Felix could feel the others shift, his friends in anticipation and the newbies in fear. "Shields up! Arms out! Protect your neighbor, and you'll be fine," he shouted.

"Trust the Fiend!" Evie yelled.

Felix spared her a withering glance, but she just smirked and batted her eyes. "Well? Gonna fight or stand there, blue eyes?"

Sovereign of Flesh!

Unfettered Volition!

The sound of a dragon's roar shook the air as Vess unleashed her own Skill, and Felix rushed in.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

The Revenants rushed forward, and Felix unsheathed his club.

Name: Inscribed Femur of the Envoy

Type: Weapon (Enchanted)

Lore: Taken from the Body of a mad construct, this club is inscribed with the foul magic that had animated it. Due to a preponderance of Profane Sigaldry, it relies on Essence to function rather than Mana.

Durable VII - Profane Sigaldry has engendered an etheric durability in the bone.

Self-Repair X - Profane Sigaldry heals the bone like flesh, over time.

The bludgeoning weapon had shrunk shortly after receiving it, no more than twelve inches, too short to be a useful weapon. Rafny hadn't been able to do much more than wrap some leather around the narrower end of the blue, metallic bone. It had been beyond her Skill Tier. She couldn't even alter them in minor ways or budge the inscriptions on them, let alone tell that they didn't take Mana as a normal enchantment might. Felix didn't spare the time to explain. It didn't take Mana at all. It took Essence.

The monsters charged into view, and Felix fed out a measure of their own Essence into the club and swung. The femur shot out until it was over six feet in length and swept through an entire row of oncoming Revenants.

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

"HA!" Felix crowed. Every time they'd killed the Revenants, they gained a mysterious amount of contribution. He'd earned some already, but there wasn't a leader board or a little bar that filled up. "Focus fire on the ones I drop. Evie, Vess, handle the flanks. Thangle, protection for the Tin Ranks! Go!"

Arrow of Perdition!

Arrow of Perdition!

Felix slammed the bolts of blue-gold light into the nearest Revenants, right into their cores, and both of them stumbled to the ground, screaming. Something shatter within them, the piercing noise of tensioned wires suddenly cut off. His Mana dropped precipitously to less than a third of his maximum. Painful. He'd not used it since upgrading his core; the Arrows hit hard, but they ate up so much Mana.

Spears of silver and orbs of flame blasted the monsters to either side of Felix as he advanced, ducking beneath the swinging arm of another. Cutting off the flow of Essence to his club, it shrank quickly back down to a foot-long baton, which he used to brain the nearest Primordial spawn. The club was greedy though, and had eaten up a large chunk of his stored Essence, so Felix caught the near-dead Revenant and breathed in sharply.

Ravenous Tithe!

Ripped into greasy smoke and down Felix's gullet, the smog barely cleared when another three monsters were atop him.

Hmm, no. Felix frowned as he fended off their claws with his blue metal baton. I'll kill too many at this rate.

Ravenous Tithe!

This time, Felix focused on the air itself, claiming it. Ambient Mana and Primordial energy flowed into him like water, and the entire horde faltered. Confusion pulsed through them for a moment, and that was enough. Felix tore through those closest like a farmer reaping wheat. Others, he hamstrung with his claws and sent stumbling toward his group. They needed to learn to fight even more than he did, after all. Felix spared a glance back.

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Things were going to plan.

Vess was front and center, knocking back more of the Revenants than she killed, but her exploding projectiles weren't exactly surgical. Wild storms of air Mana burst and faded around him, shredding those monsters caught within. Atar's Sparkbolts kept on, hurled from the magical crown that hovered above his head. He was far more precise, but also considerably more potent than before. His power had grown since the Domain, despite his recent illness. He felt...different. More raw, maybe, but his fire had turned a bit more red than before.

Felix made a note to keep an eye on him, just in case.

The Tin Ranks were clustered near the back, with Evie and Thangle providing defense and support to them. Evie's chain lashed about, striking the swimming Revenants in the water, dunking them with the force of her augmented weapon. Thangle was...well, nowhere to be seen, but that was his thing. When several of the beasts climbed up the river wall, they were immediately struck by a purple haze and started lashing out against the empty air. As they'd discussed, the Tin Ranks rushed in to take them out.

"Rolling Boulder!" Stellis wielded her new mace with less grace and Strength than most, but a haze of dusty-brown vapor enveloped the flanged head as it hit hard enough to send a Revenant stumbling. She'd improved significantly since he'd last seen her fight, and Apprentice Tier weapons were no joke.

"Smoldering Lash!" A line of compressed fire Mana whipped outward, a small mirror to Evie's chain, and Heva wrapped it around the same Revenant's neck. The sizzling, even from this distance, was gruesome. The creature was knocked free of the purple Mana's illusion, but it had no time to scream or retaliate. A bright, green-gold sigil the size of a melon slammed into its chest and ripped open its skin with a similar, but different sort of sizzle.

"Got ‘em!" Merk shouted, thrusting her inscription stylus into the air in triumph.

A large sword flashed and lopped off the monster’s head in a single stroke, felling the beast. Cade growled. "Don't get cocky!"

More monsters came for them, but they were in good hands. Felix turned back to his enemies, just now regaining their feet. Time to earn some Contribution.

The fight went predictably after that. Felix mopped up those that came within reach, though Atar or Evie dispatched those that fled. Contribution went up, but still he had no idea how much, and he worried at their lack of progress. How far had the Inquisition gotten? Cal had scouts keeping an eye out, but there were only so many with the right Skills, and one of them was Cal herself. And she was busy running the camp.

All reports were that the redcloaks were steadily making their way inward, securing the Sunrise Quarter as they went. That couldn't possibly be good.

Felix briefly asked Zara why she didn't just...destroy them all and claim the Authority. She claimed she could not. Zara could kill the Revenants, but not without demolishing the city, and even then, credit for the kill wouldn't go to her. As a Chanter, she was apparently isolated from the System, to an extent. Authority could not rest on her shoulders, not System-given, anyway. Once, those who delved into the mysteries of the Grand Harmony were revered; but the Pathless changed all that, somehow. Now, they were all but excluded from the larger functions of the System, which included Authority.

Ultimately, that meant she was relegated to support. To teaching them her ways and strengthening their people. Otherwise, she risked her involvement fouling the Quest completely.

"Wait, so that means I won't be a problem? Or Vess and Evie?" Felix had asked.

"You're all too new to the Chant to have garnered enough significance to bar you from such things," Zara had said, waving away the concern. "Being Unbound also means you, in particular, are free of many restrictions. It's why your kind is so dangerous."

Dangerous. Felix reflected as the last of the Revenants fell beneath his club. He'd take whatever advantage he could. Life on the Continent wasn't easy and seemed to be getting harder.

"REEEEAAAAAARRRKKK!"

Case in point.

Across the bridge, a half-demolished building collapsed. From the rubble emerged a massive monster. It was easily twice the size of a normal Revenant, perhaps thirteen feet tall if it stood straight, though it was still built in the same vein. Two arms, two legs, both built like tree trunks.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Manawarped Ghoul

Type: Primordial Spawn

Level: 42

HP: 3045/3045

SP: 1818/1864

MP: 34876/0

Lore: An evolved version of a Manawarped Revenant, a Ghoul has supped upon the Primordial Essence and used it to advance itself.

Strength: Strength and Endurance are exceptionally high

Weakness: Low Perception

Territory Quest Alert!

Kill The Manawarped Ghoul For Extra Contribution!

"Oh damn," Felix said. The Ghoul turned and fixed its single, blue-green eye on them. It roared another challenge before it began to run, dropping to all fours for speed. The earth shook beneath its tread.

"Oh damn."

* * *

"Yah! Yah!"

"Can't you get them to go any faster, you stupid, useless whoreson!" Hartl cried, her lank hair whipping in the breeze. Gnokl spared her a withering glance, reins in hand as they fled for their lives.

"If you can get more out of these birds, feel free to try!" Gnokl shoved the reins into her hands and threw his own up. "They're gonna catch us, anyway! Oh, my beautiful face! Lost to the horrors of death!"

Behind them, thundering on their own avum, were six redcloak Acolytes. The one in the lead lifted their fist, and Gnokl threw himself down with a strangled yell. A bolt of light ripped through the edge of the wagon they drove, showering them with splinters. Hartl screamed, Gnokl screamed, even the avum screamed, but they trundled on. They'd missed.

Gnokl heard cursing from the Acolytes in pursuit. He lifted his head up and displayed a handsign so vile, no bright, Pathless thing would ever know—-Another quick dodge, and a second light bolt fractured the wood beside him.

All that glitters! Gnokl kept his head down and crept among his unconscious companions, most of whom he'd never be able to pick out of a crowded room. Almost all of them had spent their meager Mana to propel their wagon or fire potshots at the redcloaks; they all were breathing fast, eyes dazed but open. Awake, but not, with classic Mana overdraw. Damn weak core-havin' parasites! I coulda gotten out by now!

"It be okay, Gnokl," Lotr said in a dreamy voice. Her eyes were nearly as glazed as the rest, but she held on. "We make it."

Gnokl snorted and recoiled from her limp grasp. She always was dim. A faint frown crested her freckled Goblin face, but he didn't care. Lotr had spent the bulk of her power to save the others in the wagon. The non-Goblins. Traitor.

"Feh, what d'you know?" Gnokl climbed over the last of them, a few more Goblins, a Hobgoblin, and an Orc. Not many Humans made it out of the Drum Tank Inn when the bastards took it, not that it bothered the merchant.

Head low, Gnokl reached deep, peering into his core. It was a weak thing, feeble really, looking like a pile of crowns. It had once been more, but he'd bartered it all away, Skills and a weak Temper hurt him far more than Gnokl cared to think about. His Skills lay around the vault, dull coins on the ground. Instead, he looked at his reservoirs and noted he was half on Stamina, but there was maybe one last Skill's worth of Mana left.

Barely enough to rub together, he whined. In the past, when he'd dreamed of a vault that was filled to bursting with coins, he had never needed it so much as now. Gnokl ran his pointed tongue across his pointed teeth. Damn gods and damn Humans!

"Can't you magic us again!?" Gnokl snarled to the back, where a tiny Gnome lazed, smaller even than him. She had pale hair and pale, colorless eyes covered by thick glasses. A pair of dainty, nut-brown hands were shrouded in a brief, dim pulse of purple Mana...before it wafted away.

"I-I can't," the former cook gasped. "I used...too much. At least a...glass before I can do...anything."

"We'll be dead by then!"

"We're gonna die!" Hartl screamed. Gnokl spun around and beheld the road ahead; it swerved to the right abruptly, too sharp for their wagon to manage. He had barely a moment to register it when everything lurched sideways, and his stomach shot up to somewhere between his eyebrows.

Then total chaos.

He blacked out. Only for an instant. He woke to find himself twisted among the other passengers, and a series of Status Conditions floating in his vision. Despite the nasty knock on his head, he felt fine, if a bit...swimmy. He'd been shielded by the others' giant bodies. Gnokl gasped a thanks to his great god, the one that truly moved the world, and got his bearings. His ears were still ringing, so he wasn't sure if the redcloaks were surrounding them or not; he could only hear the pounding of his heart. Then he saw her.

Hartl.

She was just a few paces away, thrown clear of the wagon. Her harsh face looked softer for some reason, her thin hair more full. She didn't move. He could see no breath. "H-Hartl..." he choked out. But she didn't answer.

"No," the goblin whisper-screamed. His voice was scratchy and thick, and tears as big as copper stones dropped from his wide eyes. "She owed me money!"

"OH, DAMN!"

At a cacophony so great it shredded past his ringing ears, Gnokl grabbed Hartl's body just in time to avoid the collapse of a nearby hovel. He screamed, clutching her against him almost like a talisman against the madness that descended. There was a crackling report, a sharp boom of thunder, and Gnokl beheld a massive furrow in the street. A cloud of dust and debris that spiraled into the sky. A voice, almost sounding happy, shouted from inside the cloud.

Lightning exploded forward, a beam so focused and bright it rivaled the sun! He gasped and blinked, but it was too late, it had seared into Gnokl's vision.

"REEEAAARCCCH!"

A massive monster, easily twice the size of a Human, was yanked hard through the hovel ahead. Its limbs scrambled for purchase, but a blue light around its body did not relent. It was slammed down into the building's foundations.

"Stay! Down!"

Gnokl swung around, and saw a young...Human? It stepped out of the dust and flexed its terrifying, scaled arms. Its talons dripped with black blood that sizzled against the rocky street. It was almost familiar, this thing, but the talons....The Human looked at Gnokl and the others in the road, and the way it tilted its head made the Goblin think it was taking stock of even the redcloaks on their way.

"It's never just one thing," it muttered, before flashing a sharp grin at him. "Can you move? Or—" The rubble shifted. "Balls. Okay, just—just hold tight. I got this."

The Human set itself before bursting across the road, those cobbles that weren't already broken shattering beneath his feet. Gnokl stared in confusion and dismay. What is happening?

He cast his eyes about, back toward the wagon, and he could see the redcloaks coming around the bend. Lotr, was leaned up against the Gnome cook, barely conscious, but she smiled at him. She whispered, loud enough for him to hear.

"We make it."

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

The club came whipping upward, hissing with thick purple-white steam. It hit the Ghoul straight in the chest, cutting off its honking screech mid-syllable. Ice spread across its scaled underbelly, and frozen chunks of its scales cracked. The thing was almost lifted off its feet, and the force of the blow sent Felix knee deep into the rubble beneath him.

"GRAAAUHHK!"

Wild Threnody is level 46!

Ack!

The Ghoul's retaliating blow came only an instant behind Felix's desperate dodge. A fist the size of a manhole cover smashed into and through the ground floor, taking his already-compromised footing with it. His boots were enchanted to help with slick and rough terrain, but even they weren't quite a match for sinking into shifting debris.

Shadow Whip!

A thick tendril of blackened Mana shot outward from Felix's palm. It wrapped around the screeching head of the Ghoul. He yanked hard, reversing his fall and sending him rocketing upward. The Femur of the Envoy had shrunk down as he slackened the Essence stream. He pushed more out of his channels, tearing at them. Lightning surged along its expanding length.

"HUAH!" The six-feet-long club took the Ghoul in the chin, snapping its head up and driving it backward. Felix fell with it, riding its body down onto the rubble-strewn floor. Quickly, he tried to twist the club for a second strike, but the putrid mouth-breather got an arm up and slammed Felix, center mass.

"GRAAAAEEEEEE!" Its lipless maw screeched in warning and challenge. Felix stood up nearly thirty feet away and dusted off his body. Instinctively, his flesh had morphed into scales along his shoulders and spine, muting the impact. He could feel the Skill was so close to Tiering up, he was almost tempted to take a few more hits. But Felix had seen the people in the overturned wagon and heard the approach of more. He didn't have time to play around, and this Ghoul was more dangerous than he had expected. As he watched, the evolved Revenant sucked in great mouthfuls of breath that denuded the air of ambient Mana and that almost effervescent Primordial energy. Its wounds healed rapidly.

It's using the same technique as the Ravagers.

The same as him.

Shit.

Purple-white Mana vapor suddenly coalesced around the Ghoul's lower half, resolving into four ice-wrought chains that snaked from the ground. The Ghoul shattered them with a wild swing of its meaty, ape-like arm, but couldn't avoid the three silver spears that slammed into its shoulder and back. The Ghoul screamed in pain and rage, so loud that part of Felix echoed with its fury, but its cries turned to whimpering exclamation as the spears exploded. Wild whirlwinds of compressed air Mana blew chunks out of the Ghoul's flesh, enough to sever its arm entirely. The limb fell to the ground with a resounding crash.

Don't mess with Vess. Felix smiled, before he narrowed his eyes. The Ghoul was taking quick, panicked breaths, stripping the air once more. The arm didn't regrow, but the wound healed over. A second round of spears came at the abomination, but the big thing was smart. It was expecting the attack, and when they came close, it bashed them out of the way. The beast's Strength was so high, it drove them deep into a nearby building, where they exploded in a shower of debris and dust.

"Blood and ashes!" Vess' curse rang through the streets. A swirl of purple Mana vapor manifested around the Ghoul's face, but it merely breathed it in. Devouring the magic.

"That's not fair!" Thangle's voice was perhaps higher and more affronted than Vess'.

Then the fireballs arrived.

Technically they were Sparkbolts, a low-level Mana Skill most fire mages were taught, but Atar had grown. Six of them impacted the Ghoul's side nearly at the same time, and they burst into explosions five feet in diameter. The man rushed forward with an enraged gleam in his eye, hand outstretched as more Sparkbolts formed. Atop his head, his Crown of Ignis had flared brighter than ever, its three prongs blazing as it floated there.

Yeah, those're definitely more red. That was concerning. Yet, Felix's attention was drawn to the beast, who stumbled away from the fiery blasts. The burned and cracked scales on its side did not heal nearly as fast, despite its frantic panting.

Reign of Vellus!

Unfettered Volition!

"Atar! Keep it up!" Felix shouted as he raced up the side of a nearby building. The two Skills, linked closer than ever before in his Bastion, seemed to thrum in concert. The blast of blue force sent him just high enough to land gently atop the ledge. Huh. He took off down the roof, getting back into melee. "Pit! The wagon, if you please!"

A piercing screech came from the cloudy sky above. Warm confirmation washed across their bond. Felix re-sheathed the shrunken club at his waist and considered his options. The Ghoul was strong, but it was hurt. He'd been avoiding Zara's Chanter method of Skill activation, especially in the heat of combat, but as the Sparkbolts flew, he had a moment. All right, Zara. Let's do it your way.

Intent. Affinity. Guide and Listen. Felix let his senses delve into his core without actualizing himself there, instead grabbing hold of his Mana with his Intent and sending it spiraling along his channels. At the same time, Felix felt for the Skill's pattern, the unique vibrations that had been imprinted on his Spirit. Tediously, laboriously, he traced it out. Still running along the ledge, Felix strained and lifted his right arm.

"Reign of Vellus!"

A weak puff of blue light emitted from his hand, followed by a weak stutter of static electricity. Felix's breath whooshed out of him all at once. "Well, that's embarrassing."

The Ghoul, meanwhile, had climbed the building and was headed right for him. Just like all the other Revenants. He shouted out again. "Vess! If you please!"

From a street over, another spear hurtled at him, this one made of yellowed bone. Felix caught it out of the air, skipping slightly so it didn't slip from his grip. It was a tooth, nearly eight feet long, fashioned somehow into an ungainly and huge blade.

Name: Blade of the Fang

Type: Weapon (Enchanted)

Lore: Taken from the consumed flesh of the Ravager King, this is a trophy and weapon all in one. Profane Sigaldry has left its mark, but far deeper are the ties to the Primordials. It requires Essence to function.

Durable VII - Profane Sigaldry has engendered an etheric durability in the fang.

Self-Repair X - Profane Sigaldry heals the bone like flesh, over time.

Hungry Edge - Fueled by Essence, the edge is preternaturally sharp.

Felix spun the lance-like blade and grasped the four-foot-long handle.

"Round three."

* * *

Pit dropped from the sky.

The wind screamed in his tufted ears as the city below rushed to meet him. His wings were tucked, his head held in line with his spine, and his legs pulled up. Aided by memories of another, nearly forgotten life, among the fog-shrouded trees.

Flight is level 24!

Pit's wings opened with a snap and the thunderous roar of displaced winds. He landed on the cobbles, only slightly heavily. The overturned wagon was to his right. Two of the large land chickens were tangled in their leather leashes, bodies broken by the wagon's fall. Beyond that, a number of living creatures were huddled in the remains, one of which was suspiciously still. Pit poked his head over the edge of the wagon.

"AHHHHH!" Screamed a tiny, green Goblin. His nose was large and pointy, as were his ears, teeth, and chin. Greasy hair stuck wildly from his head, and he clutched another sleeping Goblin in his arms. "Chimera! A Night-damned monster!"

Pit let out a confused coo, but the Goblin simply screamed all the harder. Pit slowly blinked before taking stock of everyone else within. Three Goblins, four Hobgoblins, two Dwarves, a Gnome, and a single Human. There were others, but they had all died. Pit's coos turned softer, sadder. These creatures had died needlessly.

The approaching thunder of a fleet of land chickens tore around the nearest corner. Pit cut his crooning short and fixed them with a glare. Red-Whites. Pit hated them almost as much as his Companion did.

"Ho! A Chimera!"

"Monster in the city!"

"Open fire, men!" Cried the Red-White in the lead. His white armor hid his face, but the man's Spirit pulsed with fear and loathing. A rain of golden Mana followed, forcing Pit to lift a wing to block what he could. Their power stung, chipping away at his Health. But he couldn't move: those attacks would cut right through the wooden wagon and the people huddling within.

Frost Spear!

"AUGH!"

Six-foot spears of ice screamed toward the Red-Whites, first just three, but each spear broke into two smaller pieces. The foul Humans shouted in fear, only a few of them managing to erect small shields of golden light. Their big-chickens squawked in alarm, and before the barrage ended, Pit charged.

Poisonfire!

Ethereal, virulently green flame enveloped his entire body, propelling Pit faster along his ruinous rush. His new size was far more suited to this style of combat, and the Chimera took measured glee from the surprise on their faces. The Red-Whites didn't know what hit them.

It was Pit. And he hit them hard.

You Have Killed A Red-White (x3)!

XP Earned!

Poisonfire is level 27!

Three of the Red-Whites were down, unmoving on the ground along with their traitorous chickens. Three others had scattered from his charge and rounded their mounts amid Pit's slashing claws.

"Desist, monster! You cannot kill all who embrace the Trackless! We are as endless as the Sea itself!" One of them shouted, but his words felt hollow. Pit could almost taste the vibration of their Spirits; they feared death. They feared him. Pit let out a challenging shriek, and their chickens reared up in terror. Then something changed.

Their Spirits, mired with terror and a familiar stubborn refusal to flee, shifted. As one, the three of them turned tail and ran.

A massive thump shook the earth from behind, and Pit cut off his Poisonfire as he looked. Felix, covered in his scaled armor and dripping with black blood, stood atop the Ghoul's unmoving body. That huge fang rested on his shoulder, and the monster's severed neck pumped more thick, congealing effluvia. Felix met Pit's gaze and grinned, his mouth full of fearsome fangs. Pit felt a flash of reciprocal triumph and affection and let out a warbling cry.

We win.

* * *

Scared ‘em off, I guess, Felix thought, catching the flash of retreating red cloth. Why were they here, though?

"You all right, Pit?" The big tenku nodded, not bothering to mention the dozens of points of damage he had taken. Felix clucked his tongue. True, it wasn't much compared to his total, but still Felix's stomach soured. It was a clean anger, though. His anger. Damn redcloaks. You shoot my dog and run?

Only his concern for the people in the wagon kept him from chasing them down.

Forcing a stream of Essence into the Fang, Felix shoved it into the street, slicing through the cobbles like butter. When he stopped feeding it though, the blade stuck fast. It was too big to carry around everywhere, but it was a powerful weapon, especially against the Primordial spawn. It had cut through the Ghouls’ regeneration and powerful Vitality easily. Felix reviewed the notifications he'd been ignoring.

Wild Threnody is level 47!

Unfettered Volition is level 49!

Make an Entrance is level 42!

Bastion of Will is level 63!

Mana Manipulation is level 40!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Extra Contribution!

Excellent. Contribution only seems to stack for what I personally kill, though. Felix put a hand out toward the Ghoul's corpse and breathed it in.

Ravenous Tithe is level 56!

"Whoa." Felix reeled as a truckload of Essence poured into him, along with the usual Mana and a bit of the Ghoul's blood and flesh. He felt heavy, like he'd just eaten a huge meal. It wasn't uncomfortable, per se, but it was weird. A large, ruby drop formed above his ring core, larger than the rest by half. "How much Primordial Essence did that thing eat to become a Ghoul?"

More importantly, how many more were there?

The others arrived soon after, Evie and Atar leading the way while Vess and Thangle brought up the rear. The Tin Ranks' faces were pretty entertaining when they beheld the demolition of two and a half buildings, but Felix couldn't really enjoy it; he was lucky no one had been in the structures. This could have cost a lot of lives, had they fought somewhere populated. He needed to be better.

"Thangle, Evie, Vess, can you three please help whoever survived over here?" Felix pointed to the wagon Pit was still guarding. "I saw at least one living Goblin, but there are—" sense memories flickered from Pit. "—Three Goblins, four Hobgoblins, two Dwarves, a Gnome, and a single Human survivor. Huh. Thanks, Pit."

His Companion cooed in pleasure.

"Freaky beast magic," Evie said, just loud enough for Felix to hear it. He curled his lip, and she grinned cheekily. Vess and Thangle, however, simply rushed to their side. Concern was clear on their faces, and in rapid order, they had extracted everyone from the wreckage, even the poor dead avum, and turned the wagon back onto its wheels. Most of them were injured badly, though a few were just unconscious.

"Mana-starved," Thangle explained. He opened another Gnome's eye and stared at her pupils. "Used too much Mana, stores dropped too low."

Felix nodded in understanding. He'd encountered it a couple times. More interesting was that he recognized the Gnome, and a few of the others, all from the Drum Tank Inn where he'd spent most of his time in the city.

"Don't touch me or mine, Human!"

Felix looked over at one of the only conscious members, a Goblin named Gnokl. He'd once tried to do business with the man, back when Felix had thought the Domain was just some sort of dungeon. Things had gone south since then. The little green fellow was clutching another Goblin to his chest and refusing to move or to have his injuries checked.

"Vess!" Felix shouted by way of interruption. Both the woman and the enraged Goblin looked up. Felix pulled a hardened case from his satchel. "Here, give them my tonics. It should help take the edge off most of their injuries. Hey, Gnokl, do you remember me?"

"Remember you? All you tall things look the same, but I'd remember a monster if I met it before," Gnokl almost growled.

"We made a deal once, for monster meat from the Domain," Felix explained, ignoring the monster comment.

"Wanderer." Realization dawned on the Goblin's sharp-angled face. "You never came through on your end of the deal."

"Sorry to say, the monsters there weren't fit to eat, and the Domain's gone now," Felix gestured broadly to the city. "Most of ‘em are in the city now. The Revenants."

Gnokl blanched. "That's about my luck, summed up."

"Gnokl."

The Goblin looked back up at him, caution in his gaze.

"Can we see your friend?" Felix asked. "I promise we won't hurt her."

Gnokl gritted his teeth, but nodded and let Vess pull the other Goblin free. "Can't do much more to her, anyways."

Felix lifted an eyebrow. But she's not—

A shuddering gasp tore through the limp Goblin's frame, and Gnokl turned toward her in surprise. Vess pulled the tonic away from Hartl's lips and let her rest. "She's still hurt badly, we need to get back to camp," Vess said.

Felix nodded at her before turning back to the Goblin. "Gnokl, why were the redcloaks chasing you?"

Still gaping at his breathing friend, Gnokl took a moment before he answered. "Redcloaks caught us all at the Drum Tank. Said they had come to save us." Gnokl spat. "We were safe in the tavern. We had Jacinda and Ignatius, no mouthy monster was gonna breach those walls."

"They took people? Why?" Vess asked, appalled.

"Night if I know! They wanted folk and they weren't particularly keen on discussing the particulars. We barely escaped, stole a wagon. Redcloak bastards caught us quick, though." Gnokl rubbed at his arm and cautiously accepted Felix's last healing tonic. The little things healed only fifty or so Health a pop, but they were useful and cheap to make, according to Aenea. "Thanks."

"Don't worry about it. We'll have more questions, but let's get somewhere safe first." With a nod, Felix stood and walked toward Atar, who had been inspecting the wagon, but was now pushing at his Fang.

"Gonna have to do more push-ups before you can pull that thing out." Felix grinned. Atar gave him a flat look and tried, unsuccessfully, to yank it from the stone street. "You're not worthy."

"You're referencing something dumb again, aren't you," Atar deadpanned. Felix used all his Deception Skill to feign shock. It clearly wasn't enough, and Atar rolled his eyes.

"I'll let you look at the sword back at camp. I would have already, but you've been...preoccupied."

Atar rubbed at his neck, where red scales had once sprouted. "Hm."

"Is the wagon usable?" Felix asked, changing the subject.

"Wheel's ‘bout to fall off, and the team's dead," Atar gestured at the mangled bird corpses. "But the tack is more or less intact. Maybe Pit can pull it?"

"I'll see what I can do. Let's get these people moving."

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

After Thangle and Evie jury-rigged the wheels together, and Atar helped Felix attach Pit to the wagon, they were off. Pulling the ten-foot wagon filled with people wasn't much of a chore for the beefy Chimera, and Pit took to it quickly. Felix ran ahead, acting as a potential vanguard for any incoming monsters, but also as a magnet to hopefully pull them away from the relatively vulnerable group. Yet, they encountered no more Revenants, nor their nasty big brothers. A side effect of his Primordial magnetism, he supposed. They'd already attracted all that there was in the area.

Reaching the camp was a non-issue. Within a half-hour, they were through the gate and offloading their newest residents.

"Vivianne, they all need to see Portia," Vess explained, nabbing the field medic from the crowd. "We did what we could with tonics, but—"

"Ach, of course. Come come, it's right over here." The Dwarven woman led the small procession, flanked by Merk, Stellis, and Heva to the Healer's Ward. Those three needed almost as much attention as the rescued Dusters, but it wasn't anything a good night's rest wouldn't fix. Cade had been dismissed by Evie at some point, too. As far as Felix was concerned, he could go back out there immediately. He wanted to go and find the Nest, alone if he had to, and only the words of Harn and Cal and the others held him back. Cal’s voice resounded in his skull, as fresh as the day she’d spoken the words.

“A single man would be swallowed whole by the horde that constitutes a Nest, Unbound or no. Redcloaks might be outpacing us, but we aren’t going to win this by killin’ all of our people. We need an army, too, and the only way to do that is to train them up, fast as we can.”

An army. The closest he had to that was his team…but his team wasn't quite as keen for relentless battle. Evie got hauled off by Cal for something or other, Atar was entirely too tired to "go traipsing about the Dust without sleep," which only left Vess.

"Well," Felix started, undoing the straps and buckles that had secured Pit to the wagon. "If you're up for it, Vess, we could go back out? I've got energy to burn, and I don't want to let the redcloaks ahead of us, not to mention the Guild."

Vess smiled, flashing that dimple he'd come to enjoy. Purely platonically, he told himself. The Platonic Ideal of dimple. That was it. "Are you asking me to go fight monsters with you as the sun sets, Felix Nevarre?"

Felix glanced at the skyline, and indeed, it was beginning to turn a faint, but decidedly rosy hue. "I suppose I am. I could use the help out there. Those Ghouls are no joke, and, well," he hesitated. Somehow, she had gotten closer to him again. Her footwork was incredibly deceptive. "I-uh, can't carry this sword and fight at the same time, right?" He hefted his Fang and let out a weak laugh.

Felix's forced mirth was broken apart by the frown that passed over Vess' face, and he knew he'd said something very dumb. He knew it the moment it left his mouth, knew it by the way she’d sidled closer to him and how she slipped back now. He just didn't know how to walk it back. And before he could figure that out, the looming figure of Darius Reed, Hand of the Duke himself appeared out of the lengthening shadows. He was dressed in a fine suit of clothes, rich cloth woven with half a dozen protective enchantments. The odd synesthesia of Felix's Manasight could practically smell him at this point.

"Lady Dayne. It is good that you are back. We must continue your training," his dark green eyes raked over Felix with distaste. "Away from any...corrupting influences."

Vess, for her part, gave the Hand a withering look, but still she nodded. "Perhaps later, Felix."

And he was back to being alone.

"Good job, Felix. Great job." He'd never been this bad talking to people before coming to the Continent, let alone women. On the other hand, his last relationship hadn't ended on the best of terms. Felix shook his head, banishing the thought. These aren't productive thoughts.

He went to see Zara. Or tried to, at least.

After his weak attempts at utilizing his Intent in Skill manifestation, any success was great, and he wanted to speak to her about his newest...achievement. Sure, it was just an embarrassing fizzle of energy, but hey, he did it! Sorta! But Zara's quarters were locked, and she was nowhere Felix could sense or spot.

He was able to find Keru, her bright kingfisher Companion, who was perching in the highest rafters. It took some doing, but Felix made it up there without too much fuss and asked the puzzling creature to let Zara know he'd been looking for her.

The bright avian gave him a tiny shrug when he asked when she'd be back. "The Mistress moves in mysterious ways."

Unable to study or train in his usual ways, Felix almost accosted Rory for more sparring, but knew he was busy with their volunteers. Training regular folk from zero to “able to survive contact with giant mouth monsters” was a big task, even for him. He was too restless to sleep, and with his Endurance, he didn't have to, so he did what he'd been meaning to for days now.

Felix went to go see the Alchemist.

* * *

Tired as she was from the day's hunting, Vess was in far better repair than the newer recruits. Watching them stagger away from the wagon had let her feel like the Bronze Rank combatant she had become. It was always a surprise, seeing where she had been only a few short months ago. Like nothing else, it illustrated the depths of the trials her life had undergone. And those that loomed ahead.

Trials that she would crush, utterly.

However, she was tired. Her Stamina regeneration was good, but it still took time to recover completely. But when Felix asked in his adorably stilted way to go with him, she, well—she was a woman who knew her own mind. Of course she would go. Protecting the populace from the devastation of monsters was her calling after all, and she'd never turn down training. Going with Felix—alone—was just a...just an unexpected bonus.

And then he ruined it.

“A porter,” she scoffed.

Even still, Vess might have still gone. The lure of training was strong, and that Ghoul had been powerful for its level. Much like Felix himself. Yet the Hand had revealed himself, as he was annoyingly wont to do. Her actual training, which Darius was continuing, took precedence over a dangerous solo hunt. He was more than happy to remind her of that. Often.

"Your father would be appalled to see you risk yourself on a dangerous task. You are a lady of standing, Vessilia," Darius proclaimed. "It is not proper to be conversing with that creature."

Blood and ashes. Can you not leave it for a single day? "What have you against my friends, Reed? What vexes you so much that the vaunted Hand cannot gather the fortitude needed to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with commoners?"

"Commoners are fine; they are people the same as us. These refugees are worthy of your efforts. He is not." The man didn't even stop walking toward the warehouse he had claimed as their own. If he had his way, the man would have had her sleep and take her meals there, too, but Vess had put her foot down. "By focusing you upon his task, you have grown lax on your true training. You do not need foreign influences, not at this late stage. The Dragoons—and your father—would riot if your foundation was ruined. We will return to the circle, where you will practice your footwork and your kata. We have far to go until you are ready for the Ring Stage."

Vess swallowed the vitriol she wanted to spew. Arguments against the Hand were pointless at best and dangerous at worst. He was in charge of her wellbeing since her father, the Duke of Pax'Vrell, had learned of the botched, not-so-secret rescue attempt in the Foglands. More than that, she'd known the man since they were both little more than children, and he'd always been like this. Dismissive to those of lower station. Holding those with less power in a certain amount of contempt.

He was wrong in that contempt. He was wrong about her.

She felt at her core, her Elemental Eyes diving deep. Within her stood a mountain covered in snow, bathed in light of everlasting day, and caressed by the winds of a thousand distant places. She stepped within the temple built atop the peak, an edifice of diminutive towers and complex carvings that matched the etchings on her Spear of Tribulations. Lesser peaks surrounded her temple, those closest rising farthest above the carpet of clouds below. Each peak was a Skill, honed and built upon by blood, sweat, and tears. She'd only achieved Actualization recently, but the chill of the heights of her core space felt as real as anything she'd even experienced.

Ring Stage. I'm on the cusp of it, I know it.

She'd advanced fast in the short months she'd been in Haarwatch. Far more quickly than the Hand had expected. He'd almost been mad at her for her progress. The nerve of the man.

For now, there was little else to do but bear with the Hand's restrictions until her father released her from them. She was the Heir of the Duchy, and her role was set. But she could help those around her here and now. She would show the Hand, the world, how strong a Dayne could be.

* * *

While Pit was sent off to get himself food and rest, Felix spent time with Aenea. He had, apparently, proven more of an annoyance than anything else, however. The woman seemed determined not to teach him a thing, despite her nebulous promise. Technically, she had agreed to allow him to observe the process of making the Elegiac Tonic, but she never gave her word to teach him any of it. A twist of the knife that she reiterated to him three times.

So, instead, Felix turned his Mind and Born Trait to the task and had to infer everything he could.

Voracious Eye is level 46!

Felix watched, and the information she unwittingly revealed was slowly parsed by his Mind while his preternatural memory recorded it all. He mimicked her hand motions, much to her amusement, and with permission, even grabbed a few items and copied her methods.

Aenea didn't stop him.

The ingredients were extremely common, according to the Alchemist: Pale Lace, a weedy flower which apparently grew everywhere, even in dense, urban environments. Agatha's Curse, a thick, fibrous vine that was normally indigestible. And Delta Blossom or Null Bloom, different names for the same flower, blue with yellow variegation. Felix had seen them all before, scattered about the Foglands when he'd arrived, but he'd never had an Analyze Skill high enough to know they could be combined into anything. He ground up the Blooms and Pale Lace together, but soaked the vine in a solution of water and some sort of oil called Origin's Tears. Aenea didn't bother telling him how that was made, either, but he'd figure it out eventually. After the vine had soaked, he was to remove it, dry the vine, and break it apart with a mortar and pestle. Somehow, the oil kept the needed effects from washing or evaporating away with the water. Then he had to mix all three powdered herbals together with one part grain alcohol to four parts purified water.

Aenea let him copy her as she went through the motions, but after the second example, she switched to simple Health Tonics. Elegiac Tonics were useful only to the desperate (him). Health Tonics, on the other hand, were easy to make from simple materials, and they were in high demand. In the ten minutes he fumbled and checked his motions, and before he'd even made one concoction, she produced seventeen Health Tonics.

Despite Felix's Born Trait and impressive Mind Aspect, he still fumbled the dismount. Not once, not twice, but six entire times. Each failure simply widened the cheshire smile on Aenea's face and made Felix want to try all the harder. The trick ended up being the drying of the Agatha's Curse. He had to use fire Mana to draw the moisture out of it without disturbing the oily Tears. Once Felix realized that, on his ninth attempt, he got what he wanted.

Congratulations!

You Have Created An Elegiac Tonic!

New Skill!

Alchemy (Common), Level 1!

Beneath the eye of an Adept Alchemist, you have flourished, discovering the path toward alchemical enlightenment! Increases the efficacy, durability, duration, and potency of all alchemical creations by a minuscule amount per level.

Okay, not the most stellar of Skills. But still, could be useful. Felix grinned, more to himself than anything. "Thanks Aenea. That's all I needed."

"What?" She seemed confused, even a little angry. "You had me show you to make the tonic and that's it? You're not even going to bother to learn the Alchemy Skill? With an Epic-ranked Analyze Skill, you are wasting it on martial battles. Utterly wasting it."

"Oh, no," Felix waved his hand when he realized what her concern was. "I already learned Alchemy."

"What? When?"

"Just now."

"Just...now," Aenea scowled, glancing between him and his impromptu workstation. She lifted up the tonic he'd left there for her, and her eyes widened. "After two glasses, you simply...learned it?"

"Yes," Felix said, a smile threatening the edges of his mouth. He clamped down on it. Seeing her flustered may be mean, but it was kinda fun. "Is that not normal?"

"How?"

"Perfect memory," Felix tapped his temple. "Makes repeating things faster. Easier, in a way. But mostly it was because I saw how you used fire Mana to dry out your marinated vine. That little revelation netted me the Skill."

Aenea insisted that they keep going. By her own admission, she found Felix intriguing. A far cry from the derision and suspicion she'd been treating him with, but Felix wouldn't have stayed for any of those reasons. Her good opinion of him wasn't exactly high on his need-to-have list, but he had inadvertently found the craft itself fascinating. So many details, so many seemingly insignificant steps that combined into a greater whole. It reminded him of sigaldry in that way.

And he had nothing better to do.

This time, Aenea taught him to make a Health Tonic. It was more difficult than the last by far, but the materials were plentiful, easy to replace if he screwed it up. This time, Felix failed fourteen times before he finally got it right.

Alchemy is level 2!

"You've just gotten much more interesting, Fiend."

"Thank you?"

After that, he was put to work, mostly with the woman's Apprentices. Aenea was far too busy to actually teach him anything, but she had asked that he try and learn everything he could from her people. Felix went with the flow, and once Aenea left, learned that her Apprentices were all pretty cool. From a distance, he had assumed they were all Human and all female, but that clearly turned out to be wrong. He made a mental note to keep his Voracious Eye activated as often as possible.

Most of them were women and almost entirely Human, but there were two men in the group as well. Given how the Guild seemed to have a bit of a bias against non-Humans, Felix was even more surprised to see one of the men was an Elf. Said Apprentice approached him after his third hour. He was following another Apprentice around and watching her distill a Blindwart Salve, meant to cure basic aches and pains. It had become a favorite among the refugees, especially the older and infirm.

"You're different than I had assumed."

"Hm?" Felix had been copying the other Apprentice's preparations for the salve. He was grinding leaves with a mortar and pestle when he looked up. "Oh, hi. I'm Felix."

"I know. I am Vebranth," the Elf said. He had long, blond hair but it was tied back in a sensibly tight bun to keep it out of his face. Like the other Apprentices, he was wearing a set of well-stained, sturdy clothes covered by a thick apron.

"Nice to meet you, Vebranth," Felix smiled absently. He had to be careful to mash the leaves finely but not too finely, or else the consistency got messed up. He'd messed up the ratios several times by that point. Ugh, the precision is pretty annoying. "What're you talking about?"

"You're not as arrogant as I would have expected."

"Arrogant?" Felix was nonplussed. "Why would I be arrogant?"

"You are a warrior, aren't they all filled with pride?" The Elf raised a finely shaped eyebrow.

Did people pluck their eyebrows here, or did they just rely on Tempering themselves for beauty treatments? The thought rattled through Felix's Mind for a moment before passing, and he focused on the Elf's point.

"Okay, sure I guess. I'm not—" anything special, was what he meant to say, but that wasn't true, was it? Felix frowned at himself. "I try not to be a jerk, is all."

"Hm," Vebranth hummed, and it was a layered sound. Felix focused on it with his Affinity. It was a chime in the air that sent some wind Mana stirring.

"You're an air mage?" he asked.

Vebranth looked at him, startled. "How did you know?"

"Lucky guess," Felix lied offhand. "Also, you're brimming with air Mana."

Vebranth grimaced and turned aside. "Some might consider it rude to stare so at their cores."

Felix nearly kicked himself. "Oh, uh, sorry. It's hard not to notice these things, I guess. I'll make sure not to do it again."

"Hm." Vebranth smiled softly, perhaps a little viciously. "Just make sure you don't do that to Master Ty'nel."

Felix laughed. "Yeah, trust me. I don't need more reasons for her to hate me."

Vebranth turned out to be relatively helpful. The Elf showed him how to really get the most out of a mortar and pestle by rolling the pestle around the edges, utilizing more surface area. He also pointed out several flaws in his distillation process, things Felix had seen the other Apprentices do but didn't know enough to expect. The complexity of alchemy was a nightmare Felix wasn't sure he would have bothered to attempt, were it not for his Voracious Eye and Keen Mind Born Trait. As it was, he barely kept up with the other Apprentices.

By the time Felix left the Alchemist's, an entire eight-hour shift had passed, and he had made a smattering of Beginner-Tier Tonics and Salves. He even got to keep a few that he didn't screw up, which he planned to hand out to his Tin Ranks. They didn't do him any good, at least.

Alchemy is level 19!

Felix wasn't sure whether it was the guided learning from the Apprentices or the specialized equipment he got to use, but he had absolutely blazed through the Beginner Tier of the Skill. Typically, those leveled quickly anyway, but this felt very fast. That said, his Essence collection was bone-dry, thanks to his quick advancements and the odd darkness at his core’s center. The lack of it made his core ache fiercely.

Felix stepped out of the shop and stretched until his shoulders and spine popped. It was late, or perhaps too early, but he had to hunt something, and soon. Dawn was maybe two hours away, but aside from that ache, he felt energized. He was buoyed by his successes—few though they were. It felt good to create something, even if most of what he learned were salves for feet and joints. Something not...inherently violent. It was soothing.

He clapped his hands. Time to wake up the Tin Ranks and kill some monsters.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Ilia blinked, slowly, so as not to disrupt her Mask. Quite separate from the face she wore on missions, it was one of her most advanced Skills, something taught to her by the Matriarch of the Sworn and a few others. A volatile ability, not entirely tethered to the rules of the System in ways that confused her. That made it powerful, if unreliable. She had little choice for this mission.

Ilia had considered simply removing her dark face and walking bare before the enemy...but She had already seen her true features. Far and above all other violations of her Body and Mind, that had sent Ilia into a rage. The face of the Sworn were held sacrosanct, hidden once they reached their majority and never shown to another. Were the Sworn ever revealed, they needed only to dispose of their dark face and walk away. A stranger. But now...it was no armor, no camouflage—could not be—until that woman was dead at Ilia's feet.

Infiltrating the Drum Tank had proven as easy as breathing. For an expert such as Ilia, it was almost an insult. Ilia posed as a washerwoman, having barely survived a monstrous raid on her tenement. No survivors. The rubes ate it up. She dwelt within the inn for nearly four days before the redcloaks attacked, ingratiating herself with the hostess and people within. When the violence began, she had a wagon ready and waiting for them all. The hardest part of the ruse was convincing that idiotic Goblin to think it was his idea.

Now she clung to the rafters, her tattered but clean clothes wrapped around her limbs. While the rest of the refugees had been sent to the healer's, Ilia had slipped away. Adept-ranked Stealth was hard to counter in a group such as this, and the only one who might have spotted her was distracted by a pair of pretty eyes. Boys and their brains, they were easy to fool every time.

She had ghosted into their command center and, once her perch was achieved, had wrapped her form in shadow. Below her, warriors and mages wandered in and out, training and talking and laughing boisterously. Ilia had little clue why they were in such good spirits, but it gnawed at her. The pervading mood of the city was despair, and for good reason. Monsters were everywhere, and the safe spots were dwindling fast. This pathetic hive of good cheer was as much an abomination as the scaled beasts that stalked the streets.

Relatively quickly, important people began to gather. At first, some strapping warriors and a few potent mages, all of them pushing close around a set of tables that had been crudely joined. Atop the table were placed a series of overlapping maps. From her vantage, Ilia could read them easily, and she smiled. Marked down there were considerable notes that her employer would find engaging. Scout movements, notes on resources acquired, tactical information that should prove useful, were the Inquisition to exterminate these fools.

A warrior stepped from another door, dark of skin and massive in stature. Behind him was their slender leader, the treasure hunter Calesca Boscal. She gestured everyone closer just as the final arrivals appeared.

"Harn, Evie, excellent. We can begin," she said.

That flighty girl blinked and looked around. "Is Zara not here?"

"She had other engagements." Cal shrugged a single shoulder. "Took her out of camp."

"Is that safe?" Evie asked. "The Inquisition is trying to snatch people up."

Some outraged chatter began, but Cal slashed her hand, and silence returned. "You think some redcloak is gonna take a Master Tier? She'll be fine. We, however, need to hear more about what happened. Tell us about the redcloaks and these new refugees. Most importantly, did Felix's tactic work?"

Ilia narrowed her eyes and tucked herself further into the shadows. The witch had left; that was good news for her continued stealth. Just the same, it tore at the burning pit in her Spirit, the one she'd had ever since the Sorcerer had "gently" forced the Sworn away from her manor. Only her uncommon Will and a small fortune's worth of elixirs had brought Ilia back to anything resembling normalcy.

"—swarmed him, just him for the most part. He's like a magnet," the little Aren was saying. "Let us take most of them out with minimal danger, but we only encountered a group of around thirty. Dunno if it'll be good against a bigger amount."

"Ye'll have to continue to test," a Dwarf said, one Ilia recognized as Roarin' Rory, a Guild trainer. Curious. Why is he here and not at the Wall? "A good Taunt Skill can do the same as this. Had we an Adept-Tier Taunt Skill among us, we could handle hordes a hundred strong. For this plan to work, he needs—"

"We know, Rory," Aren said, exasperated. "But there's another issue, aside from the Inquisition. There's a new kinda monster. They're big, and they're strong."

"Tell us everything," Harn grunted.

Ilia leaned forward, ready to learn.

* * *

"Breathe in slowly, and let yer new Skill guide ya," Harn said. They had retreated from the tactics meeting to train, but the warrior had plopped down in the middle of the sandy arena. He'd glared at her until she'd done the same. Now he sat before Evie in a simple tunic and short pants of all things. It was wrong. The man was built for armor, and that was all. He...bulged in normal folk clothes, for all that he wasn't much taller than her. Even just sitting cross-legged on the sand, he felt like a boulder, or an anvil. "Let it pull ya into yer core then unfurl its strength, pouring yer attention through it." He held out a hand, and without hesitation, Evie took it. "Watch."

Together they fell. It felt like slipping into darkness, into a...blankness so complete it broke apart the meanings for light and shadow. Did that make sense? Evie would have gasped at it, had she the breath. But she was nothing. Thoughts, sensation alone, yet an iron grip held her tight and pulled her down.

Evie really wished she hadn't agreed to do this, but Callie and Harn had insisted it was the next step in building her strength. "Actualization Stage," they called it. She'd already sorta visualized her core, but her power had been brought so high and pushed far by the circumstances of the Domain. Not to mention the rewards for destroying a dangerous Domain filled with abominations.

Focus, Harn sent. His thoughts vibrated through the nothing here. Not sound but—-like his Intent. Somehow, she knew he was pointing at something, even though she couldn't see a lick.

Fine, she sent back. She focused.

Before her appeared a speck in the black, one that, without warning became everything around her. Evie fell to her knees—I have legs!—and looked up. All around her was a vaulted stone room, circular and rising hundreds of feet into the air. Tall, slitted windows opened up onto daylight outside, and around the rim were level after level of open balconies. The balconies and everything around her was packed full of armor and weapons of all varieties.

This...

She stood up, and peering over the racks of polearms, she could see the very center of the massive room. There was an impossibly huge anvil, easily the size of a house, so tall she couldn't see its top. It dominated the center and rang out with the regular crash and chime of a busy smithy.

What is this?

Welcome, Evie. Harn appeared beside her and gestured outward. He was still wearing those short pants. Welcome to my Armory.

This is your core? But you're not a smith! Evie didn't understand.

No, but I know the trade well enough. Your core is about the 'who' and the 'how.' Harn poked her in the chest. 'Who' you are, 'how' you plan ta grow, and 'who' you plan ta be.

Plan to—I'ma be Evie for as long as I can figure. She scrunched up her nose at the constantly ringing anvil. Can you shut that off?

That's my core, so no. You're just not listenin' enough. Harn grabbed her shoulders and spun her so she faced the anvil. Focus. What do you feel?

Feel? I feel everythin'! The ringing is stabbing my ears, the impact of the hammer is joltin' me, even the Mana is...Evie paused. Mana? What Mana? Yet she felt it, coursing along the hair with each strike of the anvil. A wave of power that was just a touch out of her range.

You feel it, huh? Harn grinned audibly. Evie didn't even need to turn around. Good. Now watch this.

Something shifted in the Armory. Where once it was simply a normal, if huge gallery of death, now it shimmered and pulsed with hidden light. Golden radiance, tinged slightly with blue, tore around the room. And in the center...Evie shielded her eyes. It was too bright, far too bright. It was the heart of a burning forge, brighter than any daylight, and the heat of its flash scalded her everything.

AHHHHHHHHH!"

Evie fell over. Her back thumped softly against the sand, and when she opened her eyes, all she saw were the distant rafters of the warehouse. The torchlight filled them with flickering shadows, but it was blessedly dim. She groaned.

"Haha, you'll be fine," Harn chuckled. Chuckled! He reached over and helped Evie to her feet. "That's Actualization. Bein' there. Seein' it, feelin' it. Think you got it?"

Evie yanked her hand away from Harn's calloused mitt. She grinned at his challenge.

"Anythin' you can do, I can do in spades, Harn Kastos."

"Show me," he grunted.

Evie activated her newly evolved Skill, Beyond The Pale, and with a bated breath she fell inward. It was a short fall, or seemed to be, nothing like the languorous drifting Harn had displayed. Within seconds, they splashed down.

Splashed? Evie looked at the ground, a sort of textureless black and brown that twitched beneath her eyes. Above it, rising all the way to her knees, was water, clear as glass and cold. The water spread everywhere in all directions.

Good. There's water. What else is here? Harn said. You've already visualized this, so you know. Just make it more.

Evie frowned and pushed, making her thoughts tighten. Lashing them down and forcing them together. Her core was this, she knew it. She could feel it, a burning cold at her center, a wild movement out of sight.

The sound of raindrops made her open her eyes.

They fell, fast and ferocious, the heavy drops that ripped autumnal leaves from trees and stripped branches bare. The knee-high water crashed all around her, the rain impacting so hard it sent splashes as high as her chest, soaking her in an instant.

Cold. Freezing cold.

A cloud loomed above, huge and mighty, a rainstorm to end all others. Silent lightning flickered through its purpled belly, and rain fell down as a wall of shadow. Below it all, a chain the size of most buildings writhed and snapped, weaving between the raindrops.

It's just like I imagined it, she said. Just a little...fuzzy.

Great, Harn clapped her on the back. Now. Do it better.

Evie gave him a look, one that Harn was likely used to; the look of a longsuffering student just utterly tired of his shit. He was, unfortunately, immune.

Evie rolled up her sleeves.

* * *

The hunt went well enough. Neither Evie nor Thangle had been available to join him, and Felix wasn't about to go bug Vess just before dawn. He still felt dumb about what he'd said, so the more distance from that debacle, the better. Fortunately, both Atar and the Tin Ranks were ready to go. Pit had mostly been sleeping anyway, his default setting ever since he'd grown into his big boy body. Felix imagined it took a lot of energy to keep the tenku moving.

They had ranged a bit more northerly this time, pushing a little closer to the Drum Tank. He'd been told that Jacinda and Ignatius had been taken, along with many others at the inn, and damn it, he wanted to know more. Atar had protested at first, but Felix wasn't exactly keen on hearing it. The fire mage was left the option to either go back alone or continue onward. Thankfully, he stayed.

They encountered several dozen Revenants, all of them zeroing in on Felix within seconds of sensing him. Felix made sure to lure them far enough away from the rest, with Pit strafing them with Frost Spears and Wingblades. Even so, stragglers took their chances against the relatively weaker Tin Ranks.

Cade made short work of many, her Apprentice Tier sword slicing off hands and heads with equal gusto. She was a born warrior, and she was the only one of them fully tempered into Apprentice. Strictly speaking, she was an Iron Rank, the way Guilders figured it, but she stuck with the rest. A mother hen with her chicks, almost.

Stellis was following in her footsteps, though she had embraced earth magic. Rocks erupted around her and tangled feet as she swung her heavy, flanged mace, or piled onto her weapon to increase its weight at a critical moment. Sort of like Evie's Trait, but it was relatively minor and over quickly.

Merk was a tiny dervish of scripting fury. The tiny Goblin was getting faster and faster at scrawling glyphs and sigils around her, typically drawing a circle whenever they stopped, flinging green-gold sigils in the general direction of monster groupings. The others had learned to stay out of their way as they inflicted a limited paralysis, but when it hit the Revenants, it caught perhaps three times out of ten. Though, when it did come through, everything piled onto the defenseless monster without mercy.

Heva, meanwhile, was enjoying tips and tricks from Atar. As a fellow fire mage—if a fledgling one—the guy had taken a liking to her. It was almost sweet, if wildly out of character.

"Yes, now release," Atar said. A whisper-thin thread of glowing orange Mana flicked outward and bisected a Revenant's knee. The creature let out a honking scream and fell to the ground before being silenced permanently by Cade.

"I did it!" Heva gasped, her matronly features lighting up in an equal mix of wonder and horror. "Dear, dark Noctis. I did that."

"Don't think too much on it. They're here to kill you," Atar stressed. "Kill them first."

"R-right. Of course."

Felix didn't like what this invasion had done to many of the people he'd seen, living their peaceful lives around the city. Sure, it wasn't always safe, but so many folks lived peaceful lives. Now they were either dead, cowering in fear that they soon would be, or they were fighting and killing to ensure they would never cower again.

Well, when you put it that way, brain, I don't think I mind as much. Felix sighed. Who was he to judge, when he'd done the same, just to survive? When he was likely to do worse in the coming days?

The Drum and Tankard Inn was a charred husk when they arrived. Felix felt his gut clench to see it, and the Echoes of the Maw trembled and vented their clouds of contaminated rage. A few pulses of his Bastion sent its influence reeling backward, but his own fury remained. The place was nothing more than a collection of charred matchsticks, and most of the once-busy market square was the same. Fire had gutted the Dust.

Pit landed next to Felix and nuzzled close, a similar sadness reverberating between the two of them. He'd spent time in this place, helping these people, talking to them. Living with them. Felix didn't see any bodies, but he was sure more than a few died in the struggle. Why were they like this?

Atar knelt by the ashes, some of them still glowing with heat. "This was man-made. There's fire Mana threaded throughout all these buildings. A normal fire would've dissipated by now."

"So the redcloaks burned the buildings down after they took all the people," Felix muttered, his voice too thick for his own liking. He swallowed. "Why? Why bother burning it down?"

"So they can't come back," Cade said with conviction. Her jaw clenched and tusks quivered as her Spirit roared. She was just as angry as he was, if not more so. "It is something done upon the grasslands. Burn their homes, so that they might never return. Then they are yours."

"Jesus."

"They needed our mine, right?" Atar pointed out. "Wasn't that because their mines were dangerous, or unsafe?"

"You're saying—" Heva started, though she stopped when Felix looked at her. He waved for her to continue. "—They're taking people to work in the mines?"

"They're taking people to die in the mines," Merk piped up. "The mines ain't just dangerous. The wards're down. They're lettin' in monsters."

In the distance, another gargantuan scream pierced the morning. Another Ghoul, and it was close. Felix was pretty sure he could take it, this time, but he looked at the others. All of them were getting tired. Their winding path had taken two hours so far, and it'd likely be the same to get back. If they ran into a Ghoul then, so be it, but he wasn't about to risk their lives for his own vanity.

Ravenous Tithe!

The lingering fire Mana pulled from the ruins, swirling into a near-visible coil of orange radiance before disappearing into his maw. All around them, the charcoal ruins collapsed into greasy smoke. The Tin Ranks stared, but Atar didn't bat an eye.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Felix and crew returned just as three other squads were heading out. Felix hesitated near the gates, watching as newly minted Tin Ranks and those with a bit more experience stood at attention. Those who had come here earliest, who were first to be thrust into the fire, they had come out as Tempered Apprentices. Iron Ranks in all but name, there were only three and each led a team of nineteen Tin Ranks.

"Keep to the southwest where we've seen new herds of monsters gatherin'. Don't go too far south or east. There's larger creatures out there, things called Ghouls," Karp was saying. The man's bald head shone in the light of the mid-morning sun. "They're strong. You see ‘em, don't even think of fightin'. Run fast." Murmurs spread through the recruits, but it was light. Karp grinned through his bushy red beard. "Alright. Ready? I don't care. Move out!"

The three squads all saluted. It was a mish-mash of styles and enthusiasm, but it got the point across. Karp started shouting orders to each of the Iron Ranks in the lead, and the squads filed out of the gates.

Felix stood there as they passed, and, to his surprise, the rest of his team hadn't left. They all spread out behind him, watching in the same manner. Bemused, he put it out of his mind. Instead, he focused on making eye contact with as many of the passing fighters as he could. His experiments with his...influence, he supposed, had yielded certain results. Felix nodded, once. A wash of stirred symphony spread through their Spirits, a tiny ripple in unsteady seas. Yet backs straightened and chins lifted as the squads passed.

It's something, he insisted to himself. He couldn't be out there, protecting everyone who fought. If his presence made them feel more confident? He could do that, gladly.

As the rest of the squads left, and his own Tin Ranks were dismissed, Atar caught Felix's eye. "It's strange, you know."

"What is?"

The two of them had started crossing the wide, busy courtyard. Folks of all ages were scurrying to and fro on various errands and tasks, or, in the case of a wild knot of screaming children, just enjoying the morning's relative coolness. The summers there were turning into real scorchers.

"How you act around all of them," Atar gestured vaguely at the crowd. "You actually seem like you know what you're doing."

Felix laughed. "I don't. Just trying my best, like everyone else."

"Mm."

The both of them tried looking for Zara again, but she was still gone.

"You seem upset," Atar noticed. "I won't lie, I do wish she told someone her whereabouts. I'm told she's quite talented with sigaldry, and I'd love to pick her Mind."

"I'm not upset, I'm worried," Felix clarified. "We're falling behind. We can't afford to let the Inquisition gain the Authority over Haarwatch."

Atar rolled his eyes. "They've got a small army, Felix. All we've got is a bunch of rough commoners that're barely beyond Tin Rank. We'll never keep up with their Contribution, even if you were out there all day and night. The only thing we can do is find the Nest, and Cal already has people searching."

Felix grunted. He knew Atar was right, he just didn't like all the waiting. Should Pit and I go back out there?

"Oh no, I know that look," Atar said.

"What look?"

"The one where you start suggesting increasingly dangerous and unlikely tasks, then we all almost die," Atar scowled. "No no, I'm still tender from the last one."

The blond fire mage looked around, his curled hair still well-coiffed despite hours in the field. "Let's...yes. Let's go see this Hector you've been telling me about. If I can't pick Zara's brain, then another Inscriptionist will do nicely."

"Hector? He's a good guy," Felix said, and Atar started guiding him in the direction of the wall. "But he's probably busy—"

"No way to know if we don't try!" Atar grinned.

"I suppose," Felix allowed. So off they went.

Construction of the wall had passed from Felix's hands a while back, one of the refugees with a similar Skill taking over for him. He'd heard they were doing very well, but it was slower going. Felix almost wanted to hop back in and finish the job, but it was good for grinding Skill levels for the Dwarven woman. He'd be a jerk if he just swooped in and took over.

Near the wall was a tent, purposefully temporary so that it could be relocated every couple of hours. It was fairly large, as tents went in Haarwatch, but it needed to be in order to hold a collection of splintering wooden tables, each utterly covered in scrolls and reams of parchment. Hector was there, bustling about a large stone with an inscription stylus in one hand and a hammer in the other. Surprisingly, there was another person there. too.

"Alister?" Atar said with a smile. "I thought you were still at the ward."

Lord Alister Knacht looked far different than when Felix had first met him. He still had the wavy, dark brown hair, but his face was covered in the rough scratch of a two-week-old beard. On a teen like Alister, that was still pretty patchy, though. His wide smile was guileless as they approached, but Felix didn't miss the dark circles and gaunt cheeks.

"Atar. And Felix," Alister raised a well-manicured eyebrow. "I would have thought the two of you would be hunting until evening."

Atar laughed. "Ah, too boring for me, plus this one got tired."

"How the mighty have fallen," Alister quipped, before he hobbled forward on a cane. The noble hadn't recovered nearly as well as Atar, it seemed. He gave Atar a tight embrace. "Glad to see you safe."

"I was never in trouble. Felix would barely let me kill a monster or two," Atar said, joy in his voice despite his words.

"I mean, maybe two," Felix admitted. The mages met eyes and shook their heads. "What's going on out here?" He looked between Alister and Hector. "Sigaldry lesson?"

"Of a sort," Hector acknowledged. He had hung back as they talked, but now he stepped forward and shook Felix's hand. "Your friend was giving me a hand and also telling me about the unique glyphs you saw in the Domain."

"Yes yes, the, what did you call it, Atar? Butcher's Sign?" Alister said, nudging the mage.

"Oh, hah, I did postulate that it might be called Butcher's Sign," Atar said with a blush. "But it has a name. Profane Sigaldry."

Felix had shared that with the fire mage a few days ago when the two of them were comparing notes on the singular language they had found in the Domain. Atar was such a sigil nut that it had been a good way to pass the time while he finished convalescence.

"Profane Sigaldry," Hector said, as if tasting the word. His mouth twisted. "I don't like it. And from the way Lord Knacht described it, I don't think I'd like to use it at all."

"It's not safe to use. I wouldn't try it," Felix warned. "We're all way better off using the sigils you got there."

"As you say," Hector nodded. "Did you come for questions? Or did you wish to help?"

"Help?" Atar asked. His arm had snaked around Alister's waist, holding him close and keeping the man propped up at the same time. "How can we help?"

Hector waved at the block of stone he was working on. "I'm trying to set up wards in several prime stones, then we're installing them into the wall. Once complete, it will allow us to apply a number of glyphs into an overall array, swapping out effects that are all keyed to the wall. It's a continuation of what we discussed the other day, Felix."

Felix nodded. He'd stopped by Hector's whenever he could, but with everything else going on, his schedule was getting more and more hectic. Hector had introduced him to the concept of a massive master array, one that could be modular and changed relatively easily. It was something Hector had developed himself, and Felix barely understood despite his Skill levels. "Is that all? Just more wall defenses?"

"How do you mean? I thought this was a priority?"

"Oh no, it is! It is. But I've been working with your wife," Felix said, and Hector grinned. He knew how she felt about the "Fiend" and found it very amusing. "And I noticed her Apprentices are making a lot of low-level tonics and tinctures. Things most folk can use easily, and that we can make quickly. Is there something we can make with sigaldry in the same vein?"

"No," Atar stated bluntly. "Sigaldry is for those with the knowledge to turn it to their ends, for those who are capable of strength. Most of those here are either Untempered or know next to nothing of the Etheric Arts. They can barely use their own Skills, limited as they are."

Alister tried to laugh but it turned into more of a wince. "He's...not wrong. Sigaldry is a difficult art to learn, as is the Mana Manipulation one needs to utilize its benefits."

"What about something that would work remotely?" Felix suggested. "Something that could explode, like a remote Sparkbolt?"

"Felix, we can't do that," Atar said.

"What? Why?" Grenades would be so useful, Felix thought. "They'd work wonders against the Revenants, especially with how they like to pack together."

"What I believe your friend means to say," Hector explained, "is that sigils can't work that way. Sigils lose effect the moment they are disconnected from their array or direct line of power. You'd need a power source to ride along with it. To do that, you'd need monster cores. And no one can afford to throw monster cores away by the hundreds just to maybe have enough power to take out a single beast."

Hm. That is tricky.

Everyone soon started working on the wall inscriptions. It was brute force work and tedious, needing to be accurate as well as strong enough to break the stone properly. Felix helped quite a bit, moving through one stone after another. He also volunteered to replace the stone in the wall. That, at least, wasn't too hard. He lifted the four-by-four-foot block with a simple conveyance of Shadow Whips and his own Strength. They wrapped around the top and around the sides, steadying it and evenly distributing the weight. Everyone was impressed, and Felix was quite proud. He'd learned it from an infomercial.

But, all the while, Felix's Mind didn't give up on the idea of making grenades. Or at least something that could be used to even the odds for so many weaker fighters. A force multiplier.

He knew connections drove the effects of any array, both the literal drawn connections between sigils and the more ethereal kind. So, wasn't there a way to keep the bomb connected to your core when you threw it? Set it off when it lands with a pulse of Mana, then terminate the connection?

He did some experiments. Felix carved the sigil for light on a palm-sized rock. When Felix pressed Mana into it, it flared with light. He threw it a few feet away, then released a cloud of Mana vapor from his channels, willing it to connect to the stone. Through some careful poking and prodding, Felix was able to corral his Mana vapor until it bathed the stone once more. The stone lit up.

Success!

Mana Manipulation is level 43!

Invocation is level 20!

But that was hard. Felix was sweating, and he had nearly a thousand points of Willpower. Still, it was proof of concept; he just had to make it easy enough for anyone to do it.

"Blighted Night!"

A muted boom sounded nearby, and Felix looked up from his experiment, letting the crackling cloud of his Mana fade away. Atar stepped away from a tiny plume of smoke, wringing his hand and dripping blood from a cut on his face. The smoke was coming from the new block they'd been inscribing, and with gentle fingers, Hector reached in and brought out an unevenly sized spherical gemstone. It was dull and lifeless, and cracks crazed its entire surface. It was a monster core.

"Another one ruined." Hector sighed. He placed the cracked monster core on a nearby table. "We're running low on these. I don't know how long we'll be able to maintain any sort of ward."

"My apologies; it was unresponsive to the array, so I tested it with Mana. I—" Atar began.

"No need. I should have warned you. These cores are nearly depleted. They were all Calesca could spare for our meager defenses. If these arrays activate, then we have perhaps thirty seconds of decent protection before we're left with just a stone wall." Hector sighed.

"Almost empty?" Felix perked up at the news. He stood and walked to the collection of small monster cores Hector had set aside. "I have just the thing for you, I think."

"What? You can't put Mana in them; I just broke them doing that," Atar said.

Felix ignored him and reached out for the nearest core, gripping it and guiding a flow of Essence from his core. Slowly, with far more care than he used with his two new weapons, Felix allowed a stream of Essence touch on the core. With an internal lurch, the Essence was yanked out of him, pulled into the core until the thing began to shimmer with captured light. Sagging slightly and rubbing at his wrist, Felix placed the core back on the table.

"What did you do?" Hector said, his eyes wide. He lifted the core and held up. It shined even brighter in the light. "This was nearly empty."

"I infused it with more Essence," Felix said. "Glad it worked. I can do it for the rest, if you like?"

"Essence? Ye-yes! Please!" Hector practically shoved the remaining cores at him. "As many as you can!"

Atar laughed, a touch bitterly. "Yet another thing you can do, Felix. When, exactly, will you stop surprising people?"

Felix just grinned at the mages and got to work.

The hours burned by as a new facet was added to his routine. Felix would hunt and gather Essence, then he'd come and infuse the cores in the wall. It was solid work and an additional task to take up the stretch of hours when his team needed rest. Hector had also plied him with questions about Essence and how he could transfer it from place to place. That, he’d had to gloss over, claiming some rare Skill had given him the talent. It wasn’t entirely a lie, at least.

Felix fought, he inscribed, and he concocted in Aenea's shop as well. Over the course of four days, they had proven Felix's strategy dozens of times over. No matter the concentration, the Revenants were drawn to him. Moths to a flame.

The Ghouls continued to appear and in greater numbers. Felix had only fought them one at a time, luckily, but that would likely change soon. Zara still hadn't returned, but everyone was frightened by their growth. The Revenants were already too much for most to handle alone, and more than one team had been lost when a Ghoul had stumbled across their path.

That hadn't sat well with Felix, but there was little he could do. He just trained all the harder, killed the Revenants faster, and tried everything he could to speed up their production of tonics, tinctures, and his own personal sigil project. He'd made significant progress, but had to push himself harder and harder each time.

Invocation is level 25!

Apprentice Tier!

+5 INT, WIL, INE

Mana Manipulation is level 45!

Theurgist of the Rise is level 57!

Tracking is level 19!

Voracious Eye is level 47!

Corrosive Strike is level 47!

Dodge is level 49!

Wild Threnody is level 49!

Dual Casting is level 44!

Abyssal Skein is level 35!

Cloudstep is level 24!

Influence of the Wisp is level 43!

Mantle of the Long Night is level 38!

Shadow Whip is level 39!

Stone Shaping is level 44!

Wrack and Ruin is level 42!

Arrow of Perdition is level 24!

Alchemy is level 27!

Apprentice Tier!

+3 INT, DEX, PER

Herbalism is level 29!

Apprentice Tier!

+3 INT, DEX, PER

No rest for the weary. Felix was tired. He'd driven himself to the edge over and over again against the Revenants and whatever Ghouls he could find. He was getting better with his weapons, but in his exhaustion, he'd returned to the brute style he'd favored most of his time on the Continent. His training sessions with Rory felt like they dissolved beneath the weight of Stamina and Mana loss.

But he had so much to do, and the clock kept ticking. It didn't matter that he couldn't see it, in fact that made it worse. How soon would the Inquisition take the Nest? How much farther had they to go? They had to be stopped, no matter what.

He forced himself to his feet.

Again.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Astride a river, the Arcids found that the trail of their Father's power vanished. They had questioned the locals quite vigorously, but they had all broken into pieces. A fragility they had enjoyed...until none were left to question. The mortal Races were truly too frail; it was remarkable any of them could live as long as they did.

The mountain the Wurm's tunnel had emerged from had contained a bounty of mortals, enough that their escorts had taken their fill before collapsing the shaft behind them. It was what they deserved for completing their Father's task...but they had overshot. Now the Arcids were left following the breadcrumbs of their Father's power, along with the new Territorial Quest, tracking it all to the source.

Vines covered the walls, what few remained standing, and most of the furniture was crushed to pulp. Bodies were stacked up like cordwood, a phrase the Arcids had only recently learned, but all found relatively delightful. A small, umber brown Arcid stepped through the rubble, kicking it idly. "Not here either. Have you read the trail correctly, Number 55389?"

From behind a cracked column, a wheezing Human suddenly scurried. A vine unwrapped from the wall and snapped at the portly thing. It grabbed his feet and hauled him into the air.

"Ahhh! No no no! I'll do whatever you like! Please!"

"I have not read the trail incorrectly, Number 55118. The trail simply seems to have been muddied by these Humans." With a dismissive wave, the skeletally thin Arcid slammed the man into a stone column. Unlike some of the others in the room, this Human was not Tempered, and the column was fine. The man, however, was not. "It is no fault of mine that their stink pervades the air here. The trail is clouded by their miasma."

"And the other," rumbled their companion. An Arcid entered, nearly as wide as the other was tall, his body rolling with its strange gait. "Can't you feel it? The pressure of it?"

"Primordial," Number 55118 said, softly. His umber-hued helmet turned upward, staring beyond the ceiling. "Apart from Father's magic, I can taste its presence."

"Aye," the acid-green Arcid agreed. "A thorn in my side. A burr in the bone."

"Discord."

The three of them stood there, unmoving as their Minds all reached out toward the presence that drifted from the sky. A behemoth like that should have destroyed this city and a thousand cities like it. It had been torn apart, but its Mark did not leave. It lingered in the sky, the clouds boiling in its place. Yet it also pulsed in the streets. Something, someone was carrying its Mark.

Nothing else made sense to them.

"Aha!" Number 55389 cried, hurling a false pillar to the side along with nearly a dozen bodies. 55390 wrinkled its forged visor at their disturbed scent, entirely too potent. They'd only been dead a few hours at best. 55389 lifted another latch, and a large section of the floor vanished into darkness. The stone dropped and formed a stepped path, from which vented an outpouring of their Father's power. "It is here!"

It was the trail, renewed. 55118 took a deep, excited breath. They were close.

"55390, widen the path."

"Yuh," the big Archid grunted. Its massive body moved toward the hole and began tearing up the stone. Soon they could continue. Their goal was just out of sight.

Father would be pleased.

* * *

Orange-eyed Ana walked the camp, nearly invisible beneath her ripped and charred rags. They felt as a second skin, comfortable in a way that was almost nostalgic. It had been over a year now since she'd worn this Mask, and it felt awkward at first, not being Zara…but with the face came memories of how to move, how to speak. How to be all that Ana had been. Barefoot, she carried her crooked iron rod and tended the lamps, turning them out for the morning.

The Inquisitor camp was far wilder than she had expected, knowing their unreasonable demands for order owed in part, no doubt, by the size of the area. The Inquisition had claimed much of the Sunrise Quarter, blocks and blocks they had to protect against the growing monstrous threat. Their forces, already hurt by the fall of their leader, had quite the job cut out for them. Knowing their usual process, the slapdash nature of it all felt wrong to Ana.

Clearly, DuFont is affecting things more than I anticipated.

The woman had risen to prominence since the fall of Katan, but to have placed her hand on the scale in such a way was surprising. How had she cowed the other Inquisitors, for instance? She saw the soldiers, kitted out and being honed for war, but they were barely making a dent in the Revenants that abutted their territory. It made little sense. The fool was waiting on something, but what? Unfortunately, despite her abilities, she could not easily suss it out.

So she walked.

The streets were filled with people, and while most were clean and well-kempt, an undercurrent of terror trickled through all their Spirits. It was far worse than her own camp, where refugees had fled for safety. Here, they were taken, stolen from the streets, if need be. Here there was no Blue-Eyed Fiend to calm the raging seas, something that had impressed her again and again. No, in the redcloaks' shadow, darkness bred further darkness.

"Keep it movin'!" Six citizens were led down the street, fitted with chains, and led toward a wagon destined for the mines. The man in the lead snarled, yanking on the chains and setting two of his slaves stumbling. "Here ya go, got six for ya."

The wagonmaster, another Acolyte with dirt on his face and a tangled beard, sneered. "That's two short of your quota, Tomas! Get it movin', or else you'll lose your cushy job 'ere and be on guard duty down at them mines, hm?"

Tomas snarled something, but accepted his pay and left his victims with the wagon.

Bastards. They were rounding up all of the commoners and forcing them to mine in their compromised sites. She had heard horror stories of monsters coming through, from the dark, places typically protected by the city wards. One of the eastern mines had just been annihilated when the whole thing collapsed beneath the onslaught of some sort of wurm. Killed two hundred souls. Ana clenched her fist, and her iron rod creaked.

"Hey, you!"

She ignored the voice, continuing onto her next lamp.

"Hey, I'm talkin' to you!" A calloused hand grabbed her by the shoulder and spun Ana around. A man with a short, pug-like nose and crooked teeth leered down at her. The same one who had led the chained Haarwatchers to the wagon. "Where're you goin' alone on a night like this?"

There was only the one man, and the street was rapidly emptying. Most of the folks around her were merchants or the like. They had no interest in helping her, lest they put their own necks on the block. She smiled at him, flashing a bright, even smile.

"Acolyte, huh? You alone?"

The redcloak smiled at her, his aggression turned to slimy charm. "You know it. Too strong for a team, little girl. Now how about you—"

"Where are the rest?"

"What?" Tomas stared at her, eyes dull and flat.

"Where are the rest of the Acolytes for this area? Every other neighborhood has three squads. This has just...you."

"I'm all it needs, baby," Tomas continued. "Everyone else ran off, outta this miserable city. But not me, I'm too strong. Gotta protect all of you from the monsters."

Tomas moved his hand up, drifting it closer to her waist, but Ana had had enough. Her hand snapped down and stopped his with implacable, iron strength.

"Wha—?"

"Where did they go?"

"Ah, yer—ah! Yer hurtin' me!"

"Where did they go?"

"Ou—out of the gates. To Setoria!"

"Avet's black teeth," Ana swore. "They've gone for reinforcements."

"Le-let go of me! You can't do—ah!—this to me!!"

Ana released the Acolyte, letting him crumple to the ground. This changed her approach. She should have expected it, but—

"Touch me, bitch?! I'll show you!"

The man swung a haymaker at Ana in a wild attempt at reestablishing his masculinity, but Ana hadn't the time. She raised her eyebrow and let a wave of aquamarine vapor billow outward. It caught the man by the fist and spread rapidly along his skin, twining among his muscle and bone. The brute was barely Tempered, or the spell would have taken far longer to affect him. He froze in place, his skin lit up from within by her light.

"How long have they been gone?"

Tomas' throat worked, and he found his mouth free to move. "Four days, a week, maybe. Please...don—don't do this to me..."

The aquamarine power flooded his mouth again, and he could no longer move it. He could breathe, but just barely. Ana had dealt with her share of cretins in her years, and this sorry excuse was cut of the same cloth. She leveled her iron rod, its tip sharpened to a deadly point and pressed into his neck until blood rolled down its length. Tomas' fear thrummed through his Spirit.

"Where is DuFont?"

* * *

Mervin didn't like being on the streets.

Admittedly, he was surrounded by Guilders with levels ranging into the twenties and thirties, and he was steps away from Elder Teine himself. Harm was not likely to touch Mervin or his teammates. It was ironic, he thought, that when Teine made them his personal guard, he was protecting them rather than the other way around. The clatter of glass down an alley had him snap in that direction, but it was only a damn daika. The idiotic chicken-lizard fell off a pile of garbage and scurried away.

"Calm yourself, young man," a smooth voice said. Mervin pulled his spear back up, and his spine felt like it locked into place. "We are in no danger."

The Elder looked like he was out on an evening stroll. While the sun was low in the sky and the evening air was cool, there were monsters in these streets, even if Mervin's Perception couldn't pick them out. They were systematically clearing the Wall Quarter at the moment, but the Revenants plagued them just as much as the rest of the city. The difference was the other Quarters didn't have the Wall to steal their attention.

A few Bronze Ranks were with them, along with some Iron and Tin Ranks; not many at all compared to the danger they had faced as they cleared the streets. The bulk of the Guild's forces were still needed to defend the Wall. Monsters assaulted it in waves, creatures that were slowly battering down its defenses. It had gotten so bad that the Elder had wanted to search sooner but couldn't risk leaving their post. Now, he'd changed his mind, for some reason.

Mervin worried that it wouldn't hold, but the others called him an idiot for being concerned. "It's lasted longer'n my grandpap's been alive, it'll last a few beasties," Garin had said.

Mervin just hoped they were right.

"Street is secure, sir," a Bronze Rank confirmed, and the Elder nodded absently. He was fiddling with that box again, the one his Sentinel's Regard kept telling him was extremely dangerous. Mervin wanted to edge away from it, but he was to stand guard. So guard he did.

"Very good," Elder Teine said in his smooth voice. It belied the gruesome scar that marred his face. He pointed ahead with his device. "There. The trail leads there."

Mervin looked. It was a pump house, one of the many that somehow helped the river from flooding the lower parts of the Quarter. Never claiming to be more than a simple village boy, Mervin had only the foggiest idea of how they worked. Magic, as far as he understood, was scripted pipes housed within a building larger than the farmhouse he grew up on. Though the Elder and thus Mervin did not move forward, the Tin and Iron Ranks did, a wave of them pushing toward the pump house to secure it.

They didn't survive.

The nearest wall of the pump house exploded outward, propelled by a concussive wave of force that made the air itself squeal. A massive thing rushed out, nearly twice the size of a Revenant, thirteen feet tall and hulking with muscle. Tin and Iron ranks were swept away with a single, brutish arm. Several were turned into a vile paste, splattered against nearby walls.

"Form up!" Piotr shouted. Lars raised his bow, arrow already shimmering with Mana. "Protect the Elder!"

A horde of Revenants boiled out of the torn edifice, following in the massive creature's lumbering wake. Suppressive fire rained down upon them, a sea of elemental bolts and physical arrows. Yet the abominations were not halted. They crashed against their front lines, bearing much of the front row to the ground. Mervin flinched and moved forward, but a hand halted him.

"Not our job," Garin grunted. Mervin restrained himself, reluctantly.

The Revenants tore into the lower ranks at first but cracked against the superior power of the Bronze Ranks. Mervin was able to thrust his long spear and deliver a few strikes to the pressing beasts, but his teammates had the real victories. Lars' arrows flashed out like summer rain, a deep blue Mana trailing each projectile, while Garin's halberd chewed vicious chunks from the abominations' necks and shoulders. Piotr's spear spun with deadly precision and far more Skill than Mervin could manage. Most of them had their Omens Revealed by the Pathless long ago, and despite the lesser gains, they were stronger than him in most ways.

Sentinel's Regard is level 25!

With a gasp, Mervin fumbled out a glowing vial. Teine had given them all a selection of Rare draughts, a most generous contribution, in the hopes that they would Temper.

Congratulations!

You Have Reached Apprentice Tier in Sentinel's Regard!

You Gain:

+3 PER

+3 INT

+...

Rare Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of the Hungry Survivor]

Choose A Feature:

Desperate

Relict

Craving

Which do I—? Mervin hadn't the time, and the words were unfamiliar. The Elder had not prepared him for this. He chose.

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The Essence Of Relict!

Mervin nearly screamed as the light of the true god filled him, and a terrible, burning sensation shuddered through his center and radiated outward. It was like paths of fire were being etched into his flesh, lines of agony that twisted wildly through his chest and toward his limbs.

"GRAAAAAAAAHHH!"

The massive creature—the Ghoul—howled in near tandem with Mervin, and it rushed their central formation. Whether it was drawn to his Tier Up or not, he didn't know. But onward it came. Mervin fumbled for his spear, dropped in the crush of it all, but his hands wouldn't work. They wouldn't—

There was a flash of silver and brilliant, achingly pure white. A torrent of wind Mana flooded the street, so much that Mervin's Sentinel's Regard couldn't keep track of it all. Dozens of discs of compressed air sliced in convoluted arcs, and dark ichor splattered out onto the road. A thud shook the earth as it fell, mewling but not quite dead.

"Secure it. I wish to study this larger strain," Teine instructed. His Bronze Ranks leaped forward with manacles and chains, each of them so heavily inscribed that they sparked with each shift. He walked over to Mervin and helped him to his feet. "You Tempered your Perception Skill? And you used my Essence Draught?"

Mervin nodded, not trusting his voice to speak. Elder Teine grinned, the boyish charm of it ruined by the tug of his scars.

"Excellent. Quite excellent." He turned to the rest of his team. "Guards, walk with me."

They went further into the pump house and saw the mangled remains of the inscribed construct and a jagged hole leading down into the depths beneath the city. Teine held the device over the hole, and it went wild, spitting frothing waves of corrosive light Mervin was increasingly certain his friends couldn't see.

"The way lies forward. Or, perhaps, down is more appropriate." Teine laughed in his throat. "Come. Destiny awaits."

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Breathe in. Focus.

Felix let his Perception seep inward, blanket his skin, his muscles, his blood and bones. He felt his heart stronger now than ever before in his life, an engine pumping relentlessly in his chest. He felt at the portion of his physical body that held his channels and core, a strangeness to his Body that nevertheless felt more natural than anything he'd known on Earth. But his Perception only went so deep; to sense the rest, he divested himself of his Body and flared his Affinity. He quested within his Spirit.

His core and channels were of the Body, but they also existed beyond that, above it, within the realm of the Spirit. The border between the two was distinct yet also muddled by ten thousand strands of commonality. Felix traced them, his Affinity plucking against every string, every tie and bond between Body and Spirit. Along those strings, into the core, his power waited. Spun upon a ring of thickened flames, it hummed in the pregnant darkness, a hollow star in his strange solar system. Felix systemically inspected his core, his Skills, their revolution around his false sun, the music they made as they vibrated at and among one another. All of it.

Intent. Affinity. Guide and Listen.

Felix didn't actualize himself within his core. He was told he didn't need to, that it would only slow him down. Instead, he used his Intent to seize his Mana and send it surging along his channels, shaping it all the while to the beat of his chosen Skill. It was like pushing molasses by blowing at it with a straw. Affinity extended, he sounded the Skill's pattern, agonizingly mimicking the unique vibrations imprinted within his core. The Mana along his looping pathways buzzed and transformed, its hue altered from a blue-white to a virulent green. He released.

An orb of darkened Mana shot forward, only to splash harmlessly against the wooden golem before him. The golem, for its part, rocked slightly back.

"Success!" Felix crowed. He pumped a fist into the air. "Take that, Pinocchio!"

It was weak and almost completely useless, but it had worked! Since his embarrassing flub against the Ghoul, it was also the first time he'd been able to manifest anything outside of his channels at all. This version of Wrack and Ruin wouldn't stop a charging mouse, but it was a step forward. And it was far easier without the Echoes of the Maw interfering. Still a pain in the ass, though.

"Open the gate! Open the gate!"

Felix's heard shouting from beyond the walls. His Perception had grown enough that it wasn't much of a chore, though he often kept it reigned in to prevent overstimulation. Shouts though, especially shouts like that, they cut right through the noise. This person was terrified.

Shouting for Pit, Felix sped toward the exit and whipped open the warehouse door. Beyond was the courtyard and hundreds of people milling about in a panic. Shouts were escalating as the sound of pitched battle bled into their camp.

"Open the gate!"

"Revenants approaching!" shouted a guard while lifting a large, heavily constructed bow. "Fire!"

A wave of arrows cut through the air like thunder, and now Felix could differentiate the squeals of the Primordial spawn. But apart from them, there were others.

Pit!

Swooping from above, the dark tenku snatched Felix from the cobbles and pumped his wings with a mighty heave. Wind buffeted the cobbles, strong enough to throw a few Untempered folk onto their asses, but Felix didn't spare the time to feel sorry. As they shot over the wall, he focused instead on the wave of rust-red scales that was descending on a group of fifty men and women. They were all of them ragged and bloody, an amalgam of desperation that had grown depressingly commonplace.

Drop me, bud!

They were nearly fifty feet up, but Pit didn't question the order, he simply opened his talons, and Felix plummeted to the earth.

Sovereign of Flesh!

Reign of Vellus!

A painful wave of transformed flesh subsumed his consciousness for the briefest of instances, clearing by the time a burst of crackling blue-white energy shot downward. A burst of kinetic energy, coupled with searing lightning, hit the leading edge of the Revenants like a tidal wave. Red-scaled flesh flipped ass over teakettle, though a few weren't able to immediately regain their feet. Just in time to witness Felix hit the cobbles like a meteor.

The Revenants hissed in hate and hunger, their Intent as clear to Felix as if they had shouted it.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Influence of the Wisp!

Blue-white wispfire flickered among dozens of the Revenants, freezing them in place as the Enthrall Status Condition caught them. More still were mowed down by the twinned orbs of sizzling acid, big brothers to the Skill-less attempt earlier. The acid magic ate through Revenant after Revenant, tearing limbs and boring holes through abdomens with little care. Still, the Revenants came at him, heedless in their fury, and Felix looked behind him.

The ragged group had made it to the gates of their camp, but they were entirely too close. The guards wouldn't open the gates with a horde so near. He had to change that.

"You want me? Come on!" Two identical whips of shadow formed, one in either hand, and he heaved to the left then to the right. Each swipe took several of the monsters off their feet and at least did a little damage.

Stone Shaping!

A wall of stone spikes shot up along the path of the whips, scattering their dark Mana and impaling another dozen abominations. Black ichor ran like water. Notifications for Contribution rolled in.

Only forty left. He glanced back at the gates, which were just now opening up. I can do this.

Ravenous Tithe!

The dead among the enemy exploded into greasy black smog, liberally streaked with a ruby luminescence. It hurtled toward Felix, but he was already moving.

The Revenants did not last long.

Shortly after, the gates opened once more to admit Felix and Pit. They were covered in black blood, and they were mussed from battle, but neither of them bore significant wounds. He'd kept the horde busy while the refugees had fled safely into camp, battling them close enough for the Tin Ranks to land their arrows and ranged Mana Skills. The Revenants didn't leave him, not once, practically glued to his side. Pit rained down Frost Spears and Wingblades, slicing them apart over and over.

"Ugh, heartburn," Felix muttered, rubbing at his chest. Pit cooed and nudged him with his giant head. "I'll be fine. Just more Maw power. Gotta cut it off."

Bastion of Will!

Around his core space, diaphanous strings of crimson power drifted like questing snakes. With a flex of his Skill, he severed their heads and sent them recoiling until they drifted harmlessly above his core. From above, the crackling nebula of Essence released another two ruby-red drops of glistening light; they swirled with the others in counterpoint to his spinning ring core.

Good enough, I suppose. It slithered through him, stabbing at his chest and limbs from the inside. Heartburn was a joke, because it was more like the ache of punished muscles pushed brutally beyond bearing. But was it an imminent injury, or did the ache promise more strength to come?

Did he trust that strength at all?

As the gates clattered shut behind him, Felix looked out at what he expected to be a gathering crowd. Instead, it was a ring of armored soldiers, spears leveled against the twenty-two refugees. For the first time, Felix got a good look at them, letting his Voracious Eye do its thing. Most of them were Humans, Untempered and heavily wounded, but one caught his attention; she was hanging nearly limp from a burly man's arms. Blood dripped from her lips and ears, black and red intermingling.

Name: Aslei Tunn

Level: 42

Race: Human

ERROR?@//

Corruption Detected.

It was the Chorister of Siva. Her silver robes were torn and bloody, stained black in some places. She was far worse than her escort, all of whom alternated between fear of the guards and concern for the chorister. "Please," she was panting. "Help us. We've found the Nest."

"What?" Cal demanded, striding through the crowd. "Where?"

"Please," Aslei gasped. More black blood poured from her nose and trickled down from her eyes. "They're all dying."

* * *

"She's packed to the brim with that Primordial Essence," Portia declared. They had moved the Chorister and her people into one of the smaller structures nearby. It had only four cramped rooms abutting the main area and was less than fourteen hundred square feet, but it sufficed. Her people were split up into two groups and were being watched. The Chorister, meanwhile, was laid out on a cot they'd salvaged from somewhere. Portia gestured helplessly to the woman's bloody nose, ears, and mouth. "You can see some scaling on her neck and hands, and her Night-cursed blood is turning black. That's more advanced than I've ever seen before."

"How'd it get this bad?" Evie asked. The whole crew was there, which made for more cramped space than normal. Atar, Evie, Vess, the Hand, Harn, Cal, Portia, even Aenea had been brought in. Everyone except Zara. "I thought it didn't hit those that're Tempered?"

"It doesn't affect you as much," Portia clarified. "Or need I remind you that your friend here was similarly affected?"

Evie waved her off. "My point is, she is way more'n me or Atar. Priest lady is Adept, at least."

"A valid point," Vess agreed. The Hand beside her shifted. Uncomfortably, Felix thought. "What could affect someone so strong?"

Felix knelt down until he was about eye-level with the unconscious woman's bleeding face. He could sense the power lingering around her, corroding her Mind and Spirit the same way it was eating through her Body. It...sang to him. "She took it in."

"What?" Cal asked. "What d'ya mean?"

"I don't know how, but there's more Essence roiling in her than I've seen in any of the Revenants. Either she did that to herself, or the Nest is so densely potent that it infected her." Felix shook his head and put his hand out, hovering it just above her chest. "She won't last long like this. I can feel it."

"So what? You're just gonna take that into you?" Harn growled. "That's dumb. Then you'll be dyin', kid. Cal, tell him that's dumb."

Cal was looking at Felix and her gaze didn't waver. "Aenea? Can you concoct something that'll save her?"

"I—I don't think so," she admitted. Her voice sounded a little sour. "Not in time. I've never seen this before, and the boy is right. She is dying."

"And with it, knowledge of the Nest." The Hand rolled his eyes. "How contrived."

"Excuse me?" Cal said.

"Don't you think it strange that none of her people know the Nest's location? That it's all in this one sick chorister? That she made it here, to the one place where her affliction might be cured?" The Hand looked at all of them and scoffed. "Don't tell me you're all so foolish."

"Pbbtthh," Evie elocuted.

"How...expected," the Hand drawled.

"Who cares?" Felix said. He put his hand out again, feeling the wafting warmth of Essence emanating from the chorister's chest. "I can save her. And I will."

Ravenous Tithe!

Like called to like, and Felix pulled at its Temper. The Conductor—The Way Between. He was the way, the rod for the levin bolts of crimson Essence to escape, to seek the greater pairing. Because, even when compared to the chorister, Felix's being was inundated with more Primordial Essence; it was part of him, and he claimed it.

The wind howled in the small room, air displaced so hard that the corrugated metal walls rattled violently. He could sense his allies' concern, the pungent tang of their anxiety, even the flare of distaste well on its way toward hate. But he didn't touch those, didn't steal them from the air. His Mind and Spirit were bent only upon Essence. He tore it from the chorister, from the air around them, from the pooling puddles of black ichor. It was his, alone.

Mine.

Ravenous Tithe is level 57!

Ravenous Tithe is level 58!

Red hot and screaming, the potency of the Essence seared Felix's channels as it invaded him. But his Hunger pulled at it all, draining everything he could from the woman in a torrent of bloody vapor. With a choking gasp, the chorister woke. And vomited a stream of foul blood right onto Felix's boots.

"Eugh."

Vess helped the woman into a sitting position as Aenea stepped forward with a set of odd metal and glass tools. Chuckling, Evie handed him an oily rag. "Thanks," Felix said wryly.

Whatever the Alchemist did, by the time Felix was done cleaning his boots, Aslei looked far more stable with a flush of color to her cheeks. She was fair of hair and eye, though in the gloomy confines, it was hard to tell exactly what color, and Felix didn't particularly care. As long as she's not foaming at the mouth or growing scales, we're good.

"Chorister Tunn," Vess began. "We need you to tell us about the Nest."

Aslei's face...shifted, somehow. It was gone in a flash, but Felix didn't imagine it. He could see it still in his perfect recall. It was as if something had quickly and violently moved beneath the surface of her face. Her confused expression melted into agonized despair, and her Spirit matched it.

"Where are my people?"

"The ones you arrived with are safe, but secured." Cal stepped forward and folded her arms. "Before we talk about them, though, we need to talk about the Nest. You said you know where it is. Tell us."

"I do, I do know where it is," the chorister breathed. She looked around herself, meeting the many eyes upon her. "Please, if I tell you, you must save them. They are dying. We all are."

"We cannot save anyone if we don't know their location," Cal growled. "Where. Is. The. Nest?"

"It was—it is beneath the primary pump station, near the base of the Eyrie. But you must understand! There are thousands of them, thousands! And more than the beasts. There are giant abominations and lean coursers. They are changing, quicker than we ever thought possible!" The chorister spat with every word, her gaunt face growing more severe by the word. "We tried! We tried to stop them! But the air is poison, and our blessings do nothing against it."

She touched her face and looked at the crimson blood that coated her fingers. Her eyes widened. "Why—why is it not blackened? Why am I not dead?"

Felix leaned forward and met the woman's gaze. She flinched back. He hadn't expected that. "What happened?"

"We couldn't stem the tide. The abominations found our redoubt, the faithful's last stronghold against the redcloaks and all that sought—" she stumbled over her words, and her tongue touched the corner of her mouth. Blood was there, and she winced. "They came for us. We were desperate. The Choristers they...we...all of us used them," she admitted. "Mighty shards of power, shed by the beast. So—so incredibly potent! If we could but pull in such strength..!"

"And it tore you apart," Vess whispered in horror.

Felix had heard stories of people ruining their foundations by absorbing monster cores, the impurities within them creating flaws and fissures in their Formations. That was the work of months and years, not days, and the attention of those in the room sharpened just that much more.

The chorister had the grace to look ashamed. "Yes. The other Choristers, they...they changed. The weaker of our people died. It was gruesome to behold."

"Changed how?" Portia asked, but her hand was already at her mouth. She'd seen more than most.

"They became foul creatures...less than Human but more than monsters," Aslei shuddered, and just for an instant, Felix saw it again. That...ripple across her features. "They are—I believe they can be saved."

Felix frowned. The woman's Spirit had quailed at those words, a tortured diminution that drifted into staccato bursts of...something. She was lying. To herself, or to us?

"What were they called?" Cal asked. "These shards?"

"Scales of the Ravager, though all other information was hidden from us." The chorister swallowed nervously.

Scales of the Ravager. Felix groaned. That asshole. Couldn't just disappear, could he?

"And ya...absorbed some of one?" Harn looked at her askance. "Haven't ya felt the corrosion in the air? What possibly could convince you to do somethin' like that?"

"You've not faced what lies beneath. You cannot claim you'd do differently." Aslei shuddered and wrapped her arms around her legs. "I took its power within me and...it broke me. My core is stained, I can feel it now. Whatever you did to me won't cure that." She looked back up, this time finding Felix's gaze. "But if you can find my friends, my family, perhaps you may bring them back from the brink."

Her hand snaked out to touch his own, but Felix recoiled. Something about her—

"We have to move. I know where she's talking, and it's a good two glass walk from here. Less if we hurry up," Cal clapped her hands and started barking out orders. "Harn, gather the teams, and tell Bodie to prep our defense forces. Atar, get the inscriptionists and fledgling mages. Evie, reach out to the Coldfires and let them know I'm looking for them, okay? Aenea—"

On it went, and Felix could feel the thrum of excitement as folks raced from the room. The Alchemist helped the injured chorister to her feet and plied her with a number of Healing Tonics. The Essence in his core roiled, unsettled or perhaps eager; Felix was unsure. What he was sure about, however, was that he didn't trust the chorister.

Voracious Eye.

Name: Aslei Tunn

Level: 47

Race: @>>#$

ERROR?@//

Corruption Cleansed!

ER$0R!!@

Anomaly Detected.

She was hiding something.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Tin Ranks hustled across the courtyard while their few Iron and Bronze Ranks shouted for formations and supplies. Pandemonium. Felix, joined with Pit, sped across the crowd with as much grace as he could muster. Last thing he wanted to do was crush some innocent civilian in his rush.

"Cal! Wait up!" Felix called out.

The slender rogue was walking with Harn, Vess, and the Hand. They all turned to him. "What is it, Felix? We gotta move."

"It's—" Felix's senses tracked the chorister, still held in their makeshift brig. "There's something wrong with the chorister. She doesn't feel right."

"Doesn't—What does that mean?" Cal asked.

"I Analyzed her, did you? There are errors popping up. Could be when she took in one of those Scales, it hurt her more than we thought," Felix said.

"But you cleansed her, no?" The Hand said, eyebrow raised. "You saved her already. How could she still be affected?"

Felix heaved an exasperated sigh. "I don't know, I just have a feeling. Something is going on."

"Felix, I sensed nothing. When I Analyzed her, she came up fine: name, level, and race, all listed." Cal shook her head. "But you're not one to make things up. We'll keep a tight guard around her, take her with us. Harn, can you see that it's done?"

"On it," the warrior grunted. He clapped Felix on the shoulder as he passed.

"I was planning to keep her people under guard while we're gone, anyway. I'm not trusting them alone in our camp," Cal explained. Felix felt a little of the tension in his chest ease up, and Cal departed, already shouting orders to passing fighters.

"I believe you, Felix, but I didn't sense anything, either. Not even with my Affinity," Vess said. She opened her mouth to say more, but the Hand groaned.

"Lady Dayne, we must move. We will not miss this chance at Authority."

Vess clucked her tongue but didn't argue. She gave Felix a brief, warm smile and put out her hand. "I'm getting ready, then we'll all go. Together."

Felix hesitated a moment, but he took her hand in his. "Together."

* * *

Evie had practically run to her quarters, reducing her own weight to fairly fly above the crowd. People generally didn't like getting their heads stepped on, but if you were light enough and fast enough, they didn't even notice until you'd already gone.

Cal had cornered her before she’d taken off, requesting that Evie stay behind to ensure that the camp was well-defended in their absence. Requesting, of course, is how Evie chose to remember it. The words may or may not have been framed as an order.

Not that she intended to listen, in either case.

In her room, she grabbed her bag, the one she'd packed for this exact eventuality. In it were a collection of Health Tonics, Mana Tonics, and two Stamina Potions she'd salvaged from a dead redcloak. Also it had a length of rope, a bedroll, some dried rations; the basics for adventuring. Mags had always told her to be prepared, take rations and extra weapons, and she'd never listened. After all, why prepare when you've got one weapon already, and a big sister looking out for you?

Evie slung the pack around her shoulders and cinched the clasps tight. Gotta look out for myself now. She swallowed that weird scratchy feeling in her throat and sniffed to clear her sinuses. Just normal prep stuff. Nothing to see here.

She grabbed a bandolier of daggers on her way out the door.

Evie was back down the stairs and outside the warehouse quicker than most folks got their armor on. Not her, she rarely took hers off. All she needed now was to find Vess, and—

What was that?

Evie swiveled her head, pushing her Perception outward into the crowd. She had noticed something, but where—there. A small figure dashed behind the Healer's Ward, clutching something. And they were flickering.

That's not normal. Evie followed after the figure, the ground disappearing rapidly beneath her enhanced Agility. Of course it isn't. Nothing's been normal since the Foglands.

She came upon the Healer's Ward without issue, even crept to the far edge without a sound. When she peeked around the corner, however, there was no one there.

"Huh," she breathed. No tracks marred the ground, nothing. Just an empty expanse filled with medical trash in carefully wrapped bundles, and beyond that the wall. Slowly, Evie moved her hand to the chain around her waist, but her Perception quivered before she could reach it. Breathless, she dove forward, narrowing avoiding a jagged blade of shadow that ripped from the wall.

"Who's there!?" Evie finally grasped her chain and unfurled it. It clanked outward and nearly hovered mid-air as she reduced its weight. The shadow blade widened until it resolved into the form of a small Human girl. She was barely taller than Evie herself, and slight, too, with long, auburn hair. She didn't recognize her at all. "Who're you?"

"You shouldn't have dodged," the girl said with a high voice. It was almost sweet, were it not for the raw violence in her eyes. "You're just making this harder, Aren."

There was no warning; the girl simply disappeared. Evie's senses strained to catch her, but still barely evaded the dark dagger that came for her throat. Instead, it cut a line of fire along her collarbone before being deflected by her armor. Evie spun away, chain already whirling, and wove a net of defensive steel around her body.

"Clever," the little girl said. "But not enough to face me, even like this!"

Again, the girl popped into range without warning, ducking under Evie's guard with contemptuous ease. A bare fist, cloaked in dark Mana vapor slammed into her gut. Evie let out a pained gasp before the force of it sent her enhanced weight hurling through the air. She slammed into the back of the Healer's Ward with a sound like thunder.

Or it should have been like thunder. Everything felt muffled and dim as Evie slid to the ground in a daze, a series of Status Conditions flickering in her vision. She could neither breathe nor pull power from her core. Instead, she fell to her side, a phantom burning tearing through her guts.

"Tch," the girl said with a flick of her long hair. "I don't have time for you. Next time, maybe try being a bit faster, hmm?"

Her body, for a moment, flickered like lightning. A blonde woman in black leather stood in her place before the flickering ceased, and the girl returned. A small frown crossed her face, and she checked something in her vision. Without another word, the false girl leaped over the wall and vanished.

Two desperate minutes of pained wheezing later, Evie gasped her first real breath and felt the frozen chain within her spin back to life.

"Noctis' tits," Evie panted. "You're not getting away that easy."

* * *

Felix checked his pack again. He had everything in order, he was pretty sure. Evie had instructed him on "adventure readiness" as she called it, and he'd taken it to heart. His Valerian Satchel had been packed with the essentials for days by that point, though that didn't stop him from adding one or two more things to it.

"More Revenants! Straight ahead!"

Felix glanced up from his pack, quickly counting the oncoming horde. Eighty....no, ten more coming from the alley. He shouted. "More to the southwest!"

Stone Shaping!

A wall ripped from the earth, sealing off the alley just as a wave of Revenants smashed into it. Pieces of masonry chipped off, and it shuddered, but it held.

"Pit! Guests on the other side of the wall! Greet ‘em!" Felix called out, and from above came a shriek of joyous challenge. A rain of Frost Spear came from the overcast sky, and the pained howls of the Revenants were accompanied by Pit's ferocious cries.

"Shield wall! First form!" At the front of the line, the Tin and Iron Ranks had pulled their shields, each of them falling back on training as Bodie screamed out orders. Bodie unveiled a massive, door-sized shield of thickened metal and slammed it into the earth just as the Revenants arrived. "Huaaaaarrrr!"

Foul spittle and gnashing teeth hit the steel shields, shoving some back. But the layers of Tin ranks held, bolstered by the rows behind them. Claws against steel squealed.

They won't last long like that. Felix focused his attention on them, noting the wave of Revenants that was now coming from the east as well. More of their people turned toward them, Kelgan and Yan among them.

A field of flickering flames followed by, paradoxically, a wall of jagged ice erupted before the shield wall. The Revenants howled as the magic tore at them, but too many were bearing them down, and the front line was pressed into them. But the Tin Ranks had started to pant as their Mana drained rapidly.

Stone Shaping!

Mana surged through Felix's channels, ripping from him in a wave that hurled itself into the cobbles ahead. The ground beneath the monsters turned to mud as his Mana forced it to lose cohesion, and dozens of Revenants lost their footing. They were crushed farther into the muck as those behind them did not stop their ravening charge. With a heave of his Will and shaped Intent, Felix dropped the thickened stone, pulling its gelatinous mass up and outward into a series of vicious spikes.

"HURUGAAAHAHHHH!"

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x27)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

"Felix!" Cal yelled. "Get your ass moving and do your job, bait!"

Felix spotted strands of golden-blue energy washing over a number of the Tin Ranks, each of them taking a portion of the kills that were cascading across Felix's vision. It barely tingled against his own core, the tiniest amounts of System power, not nearly enough to truly move him toward his next level. The Tin Ranks, however, started to shudder and shake; their level-ups were happening, and the System strain...He dismissed his notifications and leaped straight over the shield wall and into the crowd, his skin rippling and ripping as it transformed. A nightmare creature of dark scales and vivid, cyan markings landed among them, and Felix let loose a burst of power.

Reign of Vellus!

Soundless lightning exploded outward in a line, driving a slew of Revenants back and sundering those that took it head-on. The Primordial spawn all turned toward him, their mouths quivering with thickened slobber. They smelled him, and they howled again before rushing at him. His senses, however, told him worse was on the way. He shouted behind him.

"Bodie! More are coming from down the road! Hold tight!"

"Aye!"

Ravenous Tithe!

Felix pulled out his Femur of the Envoy and fed it a tiny portion of the Essence streaming into his core. The metallic club expanded, the inert sigils on it flaring with a strange, blue-yellow radiance. He started swinging just as reddish orbs of flame burst among the enemy.

More notifications of XP and Contribution. Felix ignored them as they flitted past his vision. Atar's fire was nearly as effective as his own Essence and Mana-imbued club, each explosion taking out a handful and burning more. Among them, silver spears landed with concussive force, reaping Revenant lives with every burst of air Mana. Even the Hand had stepped in, pulling a large, two-handed sword from his back and laying a dozen low with each swing. They were whirlwinds of death, but the monsters kept coming.

"Keep up, Fiend," the Hand said with a mirthless laugh, before he beheaded a row of oncoming spawn. "Or are you not worth the pedestal they place you on?"

Felix growled through his fangs, sensing the cold calculation bubbling in the man's Spirit. Still, he turned himself toward the fight and let loose a surge of kinetic force, bowling over the few abominations that threatened the advancing shield wall. He knew what the jerk was trying, but it didn't matter as long as these people were counting on him.

Only the fight mattered.

* * *

They drew ever closer to the pump station.

You Have Killed a Manawarped Revenant!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Felix slung his strange club over his shoulder with a groan. They'd been fighting for hours, ripping apart the monsters that came at them with such regularity that even his Stamina had begun to flag.

<All clear!> A scout signed from up ahead, and Felix breathed a sigh of relief before dropping his transformation. The pain helped clear his head.

All around him, the higher-ranked combatants relaxed their stances and collected themselves. The fighting had dragged on too long, leading many of their fighters to begin rotating in and out of the fray. Their saving grace was that Felix, as vanguard and bait, had turned the Revenant's heads and made it far easier for the rest to attack them.

He was a living Taunt Skill. His plan had worked.

That also meant, however, that he was covered in wounds. Relatively minor, thanks to his Sovereign of Flesh and constant source of Essence keeping him on the better end of healthy. A few of the scratches that were once jagged gashes finished sealing along his arms and face; the latter were particularly painful.

Ravenous Tithe!

A large swath of the street turned battlefield became awash in greasy black smoke. The others barely flinched, used to it by that point, as streamers of smoke moved against the wind and flowed immediately into Felix. His Essence hadn't been so full since he'd eaten the Ravager King, though he could tell he had plenty of...capacity left.

Influence of the Wisp is level 44!

Mantle of the Long Night is level 40!

Shadow Whip is level 41!

Stone Shaping is level 46!

Wrack and Ruin is level 44!

Dual Casting is level 46!

Blind Fighting is level 45!

Corrosive Strike is level 48!

He'd channeled most of his spells through his weapon, and the results were an impressive improvement in nearly all of them. The Femur of the Envoy, however, was starting to show some wear. Nothing a little Essence won't fix, I suppose. Though I wonder if there's a limit on the effectiveness of that repair enchantment.

<Ahead,> signed one of the scouts, and Felix oriented on them. <Ettivan Square>

The arcade directly before the pump station. They'd arrived.

Felix caught Cal's eye and started making his way toward her. The Tin Ranks, also well rotated to avoid exhaustion, were leaning heavily against their shields. He smiled and clapped a few of them on the shoulders as he passed, feeling their Spirits lighten just a tiny bit.

"We'll get through this," he whispered.

Dropping near silently from above, Pit swooped low and landed with considerably more grace than previously. He preened at Felix's attention and silent praise, before accepting head scratches from a nearby Vess. She was there, along with Atar, Harn, Bodie, Kelgan, and Cal. Portia worked her way across the street, applying her talents to the ranks.

"Where's Evie?" Felix asked Vess once he was in earshot, not trusting his voice above a low whisper.

Vess gave him a surprised look. "I thought she was with you."

Felix and Vess' eyes met, mirrors of concern, but Cal started talking. "I had Evie square things up at camp first before joining us,” she said, in a tone of voice that suggested that Evie better have listened. “The square is ahead, and the scouts are reporting that it's empty. Completely."

"What?" The Hand snorted. "They fear us so much?"

"Ambush," Harn grunted. "Gotta be. These things have been comin' thick and fast all day; ain't no reason for that to change now. Somethin's up."

"What is up is that they are running for their lives," the Hand declared. He shook his head. "Can you not feel their terror in the air? Their impotent rage? Why else would they flare so brightly with such emotions?"

"They don't—heurk—they don't fear us," Aslei announced. Blood flecked her lips as she looked directly at Felix. "They fear him."

Right. Felix didn't quite let himself frown, though his expression might have been termed stoic. She's still here.

The chorister wasn't looking good, and she hadn't started off in the best of ways. Her cheeks were more sunken than ever, and her eyes had dark circles and bloodshot whites. More than anything, she reminded him of the Maw, after he'd killed her the first time.

Funnily enough, that wasn't a comforting thought.

"Regardless, we can't find ‘em," Cal reiterated. She pointed to a map on the ground, and Felix could see their route marked out in splotches of ink. "We come in here, from the north, and we'll stick to the edges. The pump station is located here, just south of the fountain and right after the Bathor Road." She looked at all of them. "We move quick, we move quiet. I wanna get in that station without a peep if we can."

"Why not send scouts ahead? Why bother maneuvering this...armed force?" The Hand asked, his face serious. "Myself and perhaps two others could move ahead and secure the pump station before all of your people could even get to the fountain."

"Worth considerin'," Harn allowed, and despite Felix's dislike of the man, he agreed.

Cal put her hands on her hips and nodded. "Settled, then. We send Master Reed, Bodie, and...Felix. You'll head forward and secure the space."

"What? No, I meant—"

"I don't particularly care what you meant, Master Reed," Cal snapped, her voice still lower but sharpening. "But this is my crew and my responsibility. You either help us, or you're free to leave."

An incredulous smile spread across Vess' face as the Hand's jaw worked soundlessly before snapping closed. "Very well. We leave now." The man started striding away immediately.

"Well, this'll be fun," Felix said with a wry twist of his lips. "Bodie? Wanna go fight some monsters?"

"Always, Felix," the big man laughed, a little too loudly perhaps. "Glad to see you've upgraded to a proper weapon."

Felix grinned right back. Darius Reed might be a dick, but Bodie was good people. He could get through this, and worst-case scenario, they'd fight their way out.

Yet, he couldn't keep his eyes from wandering toward the chorister, who even now was staring holes in Felix's chest. He couldn't tell if she was hungry or just pissed off, but she didn't seem happy. Her Spirit, however, felt placid and calm. Too calm, he thought.

Felix took a breath and followed after the Hand.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

The Revenants were thick in the streets, nearly choking them with their furious onslaught. Guilders fought, side-by-side, doing butchers’ work as they progressed slowly up the thoroughfare. Blood flew, and the sizzle of arcane powers filled the air with the tangy scent of burned flesh.

It was disgusting.

Turned Blade!

Purple Mana vapor poured from Lilian Knecht's outstretched fingers and into the two Guilders ahead of her. Their flagging defenses rallied beneath her spell, and the talons of the Revenants were turned aside. With a roar, they charged forward, clearing further space. Lilian, meanwhile, barely suppressed her gag reflex as her Mana dropped to ten percent.

"Lilian! Are you alright?" Dabney asked, his hands quick to take her weight off her feet. She jerked her arm out of his grip.

"Do not touch me, oaf," she snapped. He tried to use those big puppy dog eyes of his again, but it wouldn't work. Not again. "Focus on maintaining the barrier."

"I am," Dabney said, a shade of outrage creeping into his tone. How dare he grow angry at me!

Lilian huffed her breath and turned away, activating Meditation to help her push her Mana back to full. She had gotten the hang of using it in combat, but it was far from truly effective yet.

Meditation is level 15!

Hmph. It was about time for it to level. She'd have it to Apprentice Tier in no time. Six weeks to learn a new Skill and gain fifteen levels in it? She would have been considered a prodigy among her family.

Family. She felt her stomach drop. She still hadn't found them, neither her mother or father. The Eyrie had fallen and—she turned away from those thoughts. Refused to acknowledge such impossible facts.

Lilian looked about, counting the Guilders around her. They'd only lost a handful on the journey through the Wall Quarter, reducing their number to just under thirty. Their success was heavily predicated upon the Silver Rank in their midst, along with the front-line Bronze Ranks. She and Dabney were among the handful of Iron Ranks present, while the bulk of their expeditionary force were Tin. Elder Teine had them sent out that morning, but it had been an glasses-long slog through ever-thickening monstrosities to even reach the edge of the city center. She glanced behind, where the slowly decomposing forms of the Revenants littered their path, arcing down the hill and back toward the red-gold glitter of the Wall.

Will this be enough, Teine? Will you release us from your Oaths? The others in the group may have come willingly, but Lilian had only wished to hide upon the Wall. After her experiences in the Domain, she hadn't wanted to face the Revenants again. Yet, when Teine had come to her, he had pressed upon her an Oath in such a way that disobeying him was a distant, foreign thought. It burned to even consider it, and that terrified her almost as much as what became of her former teammates in the Domain.

Burn you and all the Elders. I'll get your Authority if it means cutting my ties. No longer did she care what her family thought or how her rank in the Guild would elevate her; now it was survival, pure and simple.

"Iron Rank! Press ahead with your wall! Chevron formation!" The Silver Rank, Onai shouted at Dabney. The boy saluted—like an idiot—and put his core to work. Dusty, brown Mana coalesced in his grip and the dun-colored stone wall shifted into an angular 'V' shape before pushing ahead. Onai, along with several other Bronze Rank fighters, put their arms against it and pushed, lurching them all into a steady run as the Revenants lashed and gnashed their rotten teeth at them all. It forcefully reminded Lilian of the Domain.

You're free. You're not there any longer. Lilian's hands trembled as her Mana ticked high enough to cast again. You're safe.

She disregarded the fact that the Tin Ranks were ragged, and that even the Bronze Ranks were quaffing tonics and potions to keep themselves afloat. They would make it through, find the Nest, and return in glory to the Elder. And she would have her reward.

"Commander Onai!"

An agile blur flitted into their moving bulwark, resolving into a nimble Bronze scout who easily shifted to keep pace. Onai turned her thick face and jutted her heavy jaw at the scout. "Report."

"Ettivan Square in one mile! And it's empty."

"These are the last abominations?" Someone murmured, and the scout's words were met with exhausted jubilation.

"Enough! Kill these few, and we'll move ahead. Take it slow and steady!" Onai shouted at them all, and her smile was an ugly, eager thing. "Then we take that Nest."

* * *

The three of them made their way across the square. It was desolate in a way that made Felix's skin crawl. His sharp eyes and nose spotted blood smears and the gristle of gnawed-on bone, but the perpetrators were absent. The stink of fury and broiling hate, that aura he'd come to associate with the Ravager and its spawn was thick as anywhere else. And growing thicker.

The arcade was elevated, stepped into the city side as everything else. City center had proven to be a network of stairs and landings, albeit ones large enough to hold several city blocks. The higher they moved, the closer to the ruins of the Guild tower they came. In the gaps between mansions, Felix could see out over the city and some of the Dust and Wall Quarters where it wasn't blocked by buildings or statuary. The Dust looked as it always did, stone blue and clay red roofs bright in the afternoon sunlight, almost as if all was right in the world.

The Wall Quarter, what little could be seen from the square, was devastated by the fall of the Eyrie. The Wall itself was a reddish-gold strip in the distance, atop which faint flashes could be seen. Discharges of Mana. They were fighting again or had never stopped. Reports kept saying the Wall was being attacked at all hours of the day and night.

A wide fountain, carved with frolicking children along the base, dominated the space. Centered upon that, still gushing a flow of water, was the statue of an armored warrior of impossible dimensions; he held a winged monstrosity aloft, spitted on a spear that rained down a spray of water below. Ettivan, he presumed.

Within him, Pit growled.

Yeah, that's definitely a Chimera. Didn't look like a enku, but it was perhaps a...fanciful version of a harnoq, one of those cat-snake monsters he kept hearing about. Wonder if the artwork will be better now that the illusory fog is gone. Maybe I could use Stone Shaping to make a statue of you.

Pit cooed at that, mollified.

Bodie moved behind Felix, his massive mace unsheathed and ready for violence. "Step careful. I feel eyes upon my Body...something watches us."

The Hand snorted, his own greatsword slung carelessly along his back, and his walking was light and easy. "Superstitious nonsense. I've a Skill for such things, and it's detecting nothing but trace elements of monsters we've already dispatched. Come. We've a station to secure."

"I've a Skill too, Hand," Bodie began, but the jerk was already on his way. His Adept Tempered Body was far faster than theirs, especially Bodie, who had to struggle to keep his hulking mass moving at speed. "Felix, do you feel anything?"

Felix nodded. "Revenant spawns were here. Maybe still are, but it doesn't track. They usually charge us if given the chance."

"Charge you," Bodie corrected. "They sure don't like you, huh?"

"The feeling is mutual," Felix grimaced.

Despite their unease, nothing happened as they reached and passed the fountain. Beyond it, perhaps another forty yards away, was the pump station. Nestled among the huge mansion-like buildings around it, a Continent version of mega-businesses, Felix assumed, the station looked relatively small. Still, it was four stories tall and nearly three hundred feet wide. The steps approaching it were steep, reaching up to the second floor, and the edifice of the station was carved into intricate designs of mighty warriors fighting against pitiful monsters. Monsters that looked like more bad renditions of Chimeras.

Pit growled again at the brutal carvings, but it was laced with heartache. Felix hadn’t the right words for his friend, settling on sending a wordless warmth across their bond.

"Hm, monsters did a number on the doors. This could be trouble," the Hand muttered. In the silence, it was easy to hear him, at least for Felix. The doors at the top of the steps were huge and hung askew. From the look of the damage, it was far more likely it was something breaking out rather than in. He put a foot on the first step and looked back at Felix and Bodie making their way across the cobbles. "What are you waiting for? We've a station to clear."

The Hand started walking up the steps, and Felix immediately felt a shift in the air. The roil of crimson fury tweaked, ever so slightly, like someone stepping on creaky floorboards. A thrill of fear sparked down his limbs.

"Reed! Stop!"

"Hey! You bastards!" A high voice shattered the peace seconds after Felix. "Where do you think you're going?!"

A group of Bronze Rank Guilders hustled down a side street, weapons drawn and Mana Skills flickering at their fingertips. Their leader was a brutish-looking lady with a lantern jaw and biceps bigger than Felix's head. Felix Eyed her quickly and felt his gut drop: Onai Storr, Silver Rank, nearly at Adept Tier, according to his Eye. He looked up at the Hand and the looming pump station and forced a weak smile.

"Uh, we're having water issues. Gonna check the main line," Felix said lamely. "You too?"

"Don't believe him," said a voice. A familiar one. Felix craned his neck, but couldn't see anyone until the lead Guilders parted. Behind them was a slight woman with pale blonde hair and a twist to her lips. Lilian Knecht, Alister's cousin. "He's full of lies."

"Oh," Felix forced a smile. "Hi Lilian. Glad to see you survived." Felix used his peripherals to eye the distance to the pump station. "How's things?"

"Things were just fine before you mucked it all up, Felix Nevarre," Lilian hissed. She waved at the city around them. "Until you did this. Where is my cousin?"

"He's...fine, and that's not fair. I didn't knock down the tower. This was Teine's doing, and the Inquisition only made it worse," Felix said, and several of the Guilders shifted their weapons. The Guilders were looking at him with much more heat than before. "I tried to stop this."

"And you failed, for all your supposed 'power’," another voice said from above. Felix looked up and spotted Dabney DeLane, earth mage and second-hand man to the tiny girl before him. Felix Eyed the man, but both he and Lilian had only gained a handful of levels and were no closer to their next Tempering.

"Why are all of you talking and not fighting?" Onai growled.

"This, Commander Onai, is the vaunted Blue-Eyed Fiend," Lilian announced, and laced through her voice was a purple Mana vapor. It was...amplifying something. He could see it sink into those around her, including the commander. Murmurs moved through the Guilders, and both Bodie and the Hand shifted their weight. Things were gonna go bad soon, he knew it.

"We do not wish to fight," the Hand said. "We wish only to end the threat these creatures pose. Do you truly not desire the same?"

"What we desire is none of your concern," the Silver Rank, Commander Onai, said again with deceptive calm. Felix could hear the woman's heartbeat and Spirit, and both were raging for violence. All of the Guilders were on the edge of it, ready for things to begin.

"Listen, why don't we take it out together? Help is appreciated. Just," Felix looked around. "Just be careful. Monsters are close, and we don't know what will wake them."

"You think us afraid of these beasts?" The Silver Rank shouted, her rage clearly boiling over. "We've waded through the blood of hundreds to get here, and a few more won't stop me from claiming that Gold Chest."

Like a magic incantation, mention of the Quest reward sent Spirits spiralling higher and the scales tipping further toward conflict. But the noise did something else as well. Beneath his feet, Felix felt...movement. He looked at Bodie and the Hand, and they nodded. They felt it, too.

God damn it.

"Fine," Felix said, throwing his hands up. "You win. We'll just walk away, and you can have all the—all the glory, or whatever you want. It's right through there." He gestured at the pump station doors.

"What we want is the loot, kid," their Commander said to him, though she spared a quick, greedy glance at the unhinged doors. "Now, I don't know if this Iron Rank is spittin' shit or not, but if you're the Fiend, I ain't trustin' you at my back. She's right about one thing: the Fiend got us into this mess. You're comin' with me."

The brute force of the Silver Rank's aura manifested and pressed down on Felix. It was like she was leveraging emotion and something else; a weight to her presence that he couldn't quantify. Felix had felt auras like it before, many far worse. Onai's lacked some teeth in comparison to the Ravager King.

"Truly? You are attempting this?" The Hand asked, but the pressure against their senses only redoubled as Onai sneered at them.

"Try and stop me, fancy boy."

Reed slashed his bare hand into the air, and it was as if a sharpened blade sliced at the aura. The Silver Rank's pressure vanished instantly, and she stumbled backward, her nose bloody. The Hand smiled, wide and bright, and a quiver of fear rattled through Felix’s Spirit.

Holy shit. That was just his hand. Felix watched the Guilders as if in slow motion, his own Perception coupled with his Intelligence overclocking his system for a brief burst. Is that why he's called that? That's dumb—

An absolute wave of stone and ice and fire swept toward the three of them as nearly thirty Guilders unleashed their Skills all at once.

"Everlasting Bulwark!"

A wave of dust and fine powder broke free from the cobbles, launching upward to form a thickened sheet of sand. Ice and flame hit it, burning parts of it away, but it was replenished almost immediately. Felix blinked, and Bodie laughed. "Don't make me wait all day, Felix! Go and kick some ass so I can drop this thing!"

Felix grinned.

Sovereign of Flesh!

His smile shattered as his human teeth were replaced by jagged fangs while his bones and skin crawled and snapped. Felix threw himself up and over the Everlasting Bulwark, easily leaping the fifteen-foot wall and met three Guilders with the same idea.

Reign of Vellus!

Reign of Vellus!

Dual cast bolts of kinetic force and lightning slammed forward with all the subtlety of a thunderstorm on a cloudless day. The two Guilders, Bronze Ranks both, were catapulted backward, and Felix landed amid a literal firestorm.

Onai, the Silver Rank, had recovered from her brief lapse and had charged straight at Reed, her massive sword bearing down upon his blade. Each swing sent shudders through the air and ground and scattered the half-hearted Mana Skills that aimed for the pair, among them Sparkbolts.

Meanwhile, red flames bloomed outward all around Felix, and more were on their way. The two hundred men and women he'd arrived with charged across the square, each bearing a heavy metal shield and absolutely brimming with Skills that sparked and dazzled his Manasight. Felix laughed and swiped out with his talons, catching another Bronze Rank across his armor and hurling him to the side. Their faces twisted in horror at the sight of his dark scales and odd, cyan markings, even through his simple clothing.

"Up the steps! Now!" Lilian shouted, and the majority of the Guilders obeyed, scattering from Felix's claws. "Dabney!"

A rock the size and density of a cannonball blasted Felix in the chest and drove him directly into the ground.

"HUAGH!"

The cobbles shattered beneath Felix, and something cracked inside his chest. Blood flooded his mouth, but it only stained his teeth, his Transcendent Skill already busy replenishing his Health at the expense of his Essence store. Three more boulders fell from on high, but this time Felix dodged out of the way, and peered up at the source. Dabney had his hand outstretched and a Mana potion tipped up to his lips.

"Not so tough now, are you?!" Dabney moved his hands strangely, and a glowing sigil appeared. Felix blinked. It meant “slide.” "This is for the Domain!"

"I didn't do anything to you!"

An explosion of dusty brown Mana ripped from Dabney's channels before it was sucked up into the very building he stood atop. Simultaneously, the building itself began to tremble, and great fissures burst apart its edifice.

"Avalanche!"

Great.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

The earth rumbled.

It spoke to them, buzzing shapes across their Minds that took the chaos and shaped it. One after another lifted their heads, their mouths drooling and bodies lethargic after their great meal. The gnawed-on bones of it were beneath them, edible bedding for them to laze upon.

One grunted, pulling its lips back and baring its prodigious fangs. Blackened gums and yellowed teeth stuck out from its smooth, scaled head, and opened wide. It breathed. Those around it breathed as well.

They could not speak, not any longer. There was a time that once it had been possible, when they were more. Memories of people, of things beyond their immediate needs, all of it flashed through their limited Minds. But it was momentary lightning, there and gone as their Minds were stunted by an eroding voice in their blood, the one with teeth and howling heat.

Prey! Meat! Rend the flesh and crush the bone!

Take it!

Take it all!

It was not a voice they could resist.

They did not want to.

The rumbling increased, and now the telltale sounds of screams joined the vibrations. Below the earth, the Revenants stood. They could not see, but they could sense. They could hear and taste the delicious waft of Mana and lifeblood. That tang of potency.

They could taste him.

* * *

"Quickly! Quickly!"

Lilian led the Tin Ranks and Iron Ranks up the marble steps, taking charge of them while they were still confused and scared. Scared of the creature that had just dispatched two Bronze Rank combatants with a single spell. Each of them moved quickly and fluidly, all of them having at least one Physical Enhancement Skill. Coupled with her Augmentation magic, most of them made it away from...whatever the hell Felix had become.

His skin had boiled over with scales and spikes, his hands claws. He'd become more monster than man, and Lilian was terrified. She tried and failed to smother the pang of guilt she felt at leaving Dabney to fight him. Strong as the boy was, he wasn't a match for that.

The doors loomed ahead, broken and hanging askew, but close.

"Faster! Inside!" Lilian bade the Guilders inside, lingering at the door to look back at the battlefield. Felix was suddenly felled by a boulder shot by Dabney, which sent a thrill through her. But in the distance, an absolutely immense shield wall of warriors charged in their direction. There had to be at least six hundred coming for them. "Blighted Night," she gasped. "It's an army." They were doomed. The Bronze Ranks were caught up against the massive beast with the mace, while Commander Onai fought against that unknown Silver Rank that—

That is the Hand of Duke Dayne!

More than the oncoming shield wall, that made her flee. If the Commander wanted to fight the blasted Hand, then she was more than welcome to die. House Knecht would not be caught attacking a Duke's sworn man. She escaped through the broken doors.

"You, fix this door," Lilian ordered a younger girl with dark brown hair coiled into braids. After a moment where the noble thought she would refuse, the Tin Rank reluctantly saluted and started putting her pathetic Skill to use. Who ever thought Wood Shaping would ever be useful? She felt a laugh, somewhat hysterical, bubble up from her belly. We're going to die.

She slapped herself, once. The Tin Ranks did not look at her, though two of the six Iron Ranks did. She was beyond caring what they thought.

No! You'll pull through this! They don't get to take everything away from you! Lilian practically growled at herself, and she pointed at three Tin Ranks who were huddling near one of the strange pipe things coming from the ground. "You three, scout the room. I want to know what we're facing in here."

"A—aye, ma'am."

The room was well lit, with large rectangular windows set high in the walls to either side. Sunlight streamed from above, more than enough to cut through most shadows. Her team was clustered near the center, aside from the three moving in slow loops around the circumference. The wide, open area was filled with a series of complicated pipes, each a pitted brass and etched with more than a few sigils. Lilian drifted closer. The sigils added their own glow to the mix of illumination, and there were a few that seemed damaged. Scratched straight through, she thought, running her fingers over a ruined inscription. The glow was fitful on some, while others were completely dark.

The air smelled of dust and must. But there was an undercurrent of something thicker, muskier perhaps, along with the distinct, coppery tang of blood. At one point, Revenants must have passed through, but it seemed utterly empty now.

"Ma'am? I—I found an issue."

Lilian's frayed nerves threatened to unravel from the carefully worded comment, but she bolstered herself. Night, but I wish my magic worked on myself. To the Tin Rank, she gestured imperiously. "Show me."

Lilian followed the Tin Rank's pointing finger toward the far corner, where the shadows pooled. Disturbed rock and dark, fetid earth had been spilled across the floor, a feature she had somehow overlooked. Pebbles clattered louder, more purposeful this time, accompanied by eager, panting breaths.

"Pathless protect us," Lilian hissed.

Teeth came from the darkness. Hungry, hungry teeth.

* * *

"Avalanche!"

The building, already fissured by Dabney's spell, practically detonated. Chunks of masonry and dusty debris careened down at him as the entire side of the building detached in a wave.

Reign of Vellus!

Unfettered Volition!

A concussive blast of lightning tore from Felix's channels, burning him as much as the chest wound drove needles into his lungs. The slabs of brick and stone were obliterated, but it wasn't enough to stop the sheer mass of it all. Columns and shattered bas reliefs collapsed on him, and Felix had to dance his way through the onrush of stone, punching away what he couldn't dodge as he experienced demolition up close and personal. Then he nearly slapped his forehead in exasperation.

Stone Shaping!

From above, Dabney laughed. "Fall! Fall before me! I might not be a monster, but not even you can—ULK!"

A red blossom of flame snatched the earth mage from the roof, losing concentration just as the cascade of masonry turned to liquid muck mid-air and split to either side. Felix spun, following the Sparkbolt back to its source. The shield wall had gotten far closer, and behind them, Atar waved.

"Always wanted to do that!"

Felix bared his fangs and sent the Mana-infused stone down onto the ground with a wet splortch. Still burning Unfettered Volition, he sent his body rushing across the uneven terrain toward the fallen mage. Dabney had landed relatively safely, his Apprentice Tier Body proving more than resilient enough to survive the fall.

"Stoneshot!" A string of boulders shot toward Felix again, but he dodged out of the way. Dabney scrambled backward, crab walking through the debris as his Mana poured from his channels in a poorly shaped cloud. "Wall—!"

"Enough!" Felix hissed, crossed the distance faster than the man could cast. He batted his hands away and grabbed at the earth Mana vapor.

Ravenous Tithe!

The dusty brown vapor as well as a stream of multicolored ambient Mana was sucked into Felix's core. Dabney looked poleaxed, and his arms fell weakly to either side as he stared. "Kill me then, Fiend. Just like you killed my friend."

"What? Alister's alive, you idiot," Felix snapped and got to see the look of flummoxed surprise on Dabney's face before he cold-cocked him. The earth mage fell limp, alive but unconscious and probably badly concussed. "Not gonna kill you either, jerk."

It was a lot easier to live through head trauma on the Continent. He'd be fine.

Within, Pit crowed with satisfaction regardless.

Felix gathered himself and looked around. The Hand fought the Guilder Commander across the square. They matched one another blow for blow, and each strike was enough to send tremors through the earth. Their blades were a blur of flashing steel accompanied by occasional discharges of Mana Skills that Felix couldn't parse or even track. Felix had to admit, the jerk was strong. And fast. He seemed to utilize a series of footsteps that was similar to Vess' own. As much as he didn't want to admit it, Felix knew he'd be in the way if he interfered.

The shield wall was another story. His camp's forces had entered the fray, though they were mostly Tin and Iron Ranks behind those shields. Arrows, physical as well as projectiles of ice and fire were launched from that relative safety, but their Skills did little to affect the Bronze Ranks and less than nothing to the Silver Rank.

They're still super intimidating. But aren't there more than usual? Ah. Thangle, Felix surmised. Now that he was looking for it, Felix's Manasight picked out the dense swirl of purple vapor around several rows of suspiciously nondescript warriors. Illusions. So cool.

Though they were mosquito bites on a rhino, the massed attacks of the shield wall was having an effect on the Bronze Ranks. Held at bay by the prowess of Bodie and his enormous mace, they were hard-pressed to both defend and take advantage of the single man opposing them.

"You gonna stand there, kid? Or you gonna fight?" Bodie laughed, whirling his mace in a devastating arc and catching a Bronze Guilder across the thigh. Bone snapped with the force of a gunshot.

Whirling daggers of stone and ice rained down on the man, drawing lines of blood along his arms and face. The Guilders weren't pulling their punches, either. For his part, Bodie's mace burst alight with a strange Mana vapor. Felix hadn't seen many of the man's Skills, as he usually simply used his Strength and Bludgeoning Weapon Mastery to dominate his fights. The warrior swung his mace and from the ground emerged a cloud. The sediment in the cobbles moved to his command, forming and hardening around his mace until it was five times larger.

Bodie grinned. "Now this is a real weapon, Felix!"

Felix couldn't argue as Bodie blasted aside a Guilder's sword and kicked the woman straight through a nearby wall. He moved to join the fight. The Hand had the Silver Rank matched, so Felix might as well help clean up the rest.

"HAUAURRRRRRRRRRR!"

A single piercing, guttural howl split the air, and soon it was a dozen. Then more. From his right, the pump station's doors ripped entirely off their hinges, carried away on a tide of rust-red scales and slavering maws. A veritable horde ran down the steps of the station and charged heedlessly against the nearby Guilders.

"Revenants! Shift! Third formation!" Cal shouted. "Move!"

The shield wall reoriented and focused fire on the new threat. A few arrows sank into scaled flesh, but the rest clattered harmlessly off their armored backs. There was only so much even Apprentice Tier weaponry could manage.

"Pit! Go!" Felix shouted, and in a flash of light, the tenku manifested, soaring rapidly toward the horde. "Atar! Vess! Evie! I'm going in!"

The sound of crimson explosions and silver whirlwinds were enough answer to his words. Felix started running, "Right behind you, Bodie!"

The man had smoothly pivoted from Bronze Rank fighters to monsters, but the Bronze were trying to take advantage. Felix dashed forward, releasing a pulse of Reign of Vellus and hurling some of the Bronze Guilders away. Others, far faster on the uptake, anchored themselves by drawing ice or earth up and around them into thick armor.

Earth and ice Mana users all seem to be tanks of some sort, Felix thought as he ducked beneath a Guilder blade. He came back to his feet on the other end, pulsing Stone Shaping to tear the armor from the earth mages with a surge of effort. Affecting them so closely to their skin was difficult, a contest of Wills, but Felix didn't have a peer in that regard. Not in this battle.

Bereft of armor, Felix's blows knocked Guilder after Guider aside, each one thrown from their feet by his strikes. Then he was through, sprinting now headlong for the Revenant horde.

"GRUK GRUK GRUAAAAAAAAHHH!"

Ripping through the wall as much as the door, the biggest Ghoul he'd ever seen rampaged down the pump station's steps. Marble crushed beneath its tread, and so did Revenants, their pathetic cries unheeded as they were pancaked. It's head was absolutely massive, at least three feet, and all jaw and tooth and lolling tongue. The thick scales of its back, chest, and shoulders hunched its posture even further than other specimens as it ran, gorilla-like, into the battle.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Manawarped Ghoul.

Type: Primordial Spawn

Level: 55

HP: 3874/3874

SP: 2421/2430

MP: 67487/0

Lore: An evolved version of a Manawarped Revenant, a Ghoul has supped upon the Primordial Essence and used it to advance itself.

Strength: Strength and Endurance are exceptionally high

Weakness: Low Perception

Holy...that's a big boy.

The Revenants had reached the shield wall at that point, and the crackling sound of ice and fire shredded the air, along with the screeching squeal of claws on steel. Leaving Bodie behind, Felix threw himself into the horde, yanking stone-shaped spikes up among them for good measure. Howls of pain met his landing, and they oriented on him immediately.

"Hello again!"

Mantle of the Long Night!

The temperature dropped precipitously around him as arctic winds spun into a miniature hurricane. Hoarfrost formed along the ground and the monsters’ limbs, some of the weaker ones stumbling as their joints slowed and stiffened. Essence streamed from him into his weapon, and Felix smashed through them with a wide swing.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x8)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Pit shrieked from above, using Cry, and swaths of the abominations froze in fear, ripe targets for the Frost Spears that followed. Explosions of red flame and silver wind littered the battlefield, and behind him, a surge of beige-brown vapor heralded Bodie's Skills activating. Even the Guilders were forced into the fight, distracted from their murderous intent at last. Yet the Revenants didn't stop. They poured from the pump station, even around the Ghoul. If they didn't stop, then they would fill the entire square and flank their shield wall.

Felix laid about himself with his Shadow Whip, buying him some space, and considered their options. They had to reach the pump station, but their forward momentum had been all but halted. The Ghoul, arms swinging, had reached the line and was trading blows with Harn. The Onslaught was keeping it occupied, but both its reach and fury surpassed the warrior's, and he wouldn't last much longer.

Influence of the Wisp!

A swath of Primordial spawn froze before him, all of them Enthralled by the Skill and afflicted with burning wisplight. Felix ran through them. He couldn't let himself get distracted by the small fries. They needed to move, now.

"Vess!"

Even after his stupid open-mouth-insert-foot comment, she had forgiven him and agreed to carry his new blade with her. A sharp, buzzing noise sliced through the air as his Blade of the Fang hurtled toward him at insane speeds. Felix leaped up, just grabbing the end of the handle, but was yanked bodily toward the Ghoul as the Blade did not stop. It streaked toward the ground on its arcing flight, and Felix was only just able to tuck his body into a roll and smash through a cluster of drooling Revenants.

Well, he thought, a little dazed by the landing. Maybe she didn't entirely forgive me.

"GRUAAAAAAAAHHH!"

Unfettered Volition!

Wild Threnody!

Lightning crackled along his Blade as Felix hefted it and ran at the Ghoul, packing it to the brim with his Mana and Essence. Distracted by Harn and the peppering of a handful of inconsequential Skills, the Ghoul nevertheless immediately noticed as Felix drew closer. Its blind head swiveled, and its massive mouth stretched wide in anticipation.

"Don't forget me, ya big bastard!" Harn shouted, and silver fire manifested along his twin axes. With a mighty roar, he cleaved the Ghoul's leg off at the knee.

The Ghoul twisted and fell, but it almost didn't care; instead, it reached its massive claws for Felix, who was rushing to meet it.

"Eat me!" Felix shouted, mid-leap and brought his massive Fang down on the abomination's bulbous skull. Blue-white Mana detonated, releasing a lightning strike as thick as Felix. The Ghoul's mouth slammed shut as its skull was forced into the earth so hard its teeth splintered, and the cobbles deformed beneath them.

The Blade sank deep into its skull, and the monster's Health dropped to zero.

You Have Killed A Manawarped Ghoul!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Extra Contribution!

"Hah, hah," Felix panted, before twisting his blade, once.

Ravenous Tithe.

All of the Ghoul vanished into smoke, though instead of being predominantly black, it was filled with a crimson luminescence. It had contained even more Primordial Essence than the last one.

"Harn! We need to move!" Felix shouted as soon as the smoke had disappeared into him.

"Yeah, we know, kid!" Harn turned and shouted to the rest. "We move! Double time! Don't stop ‘til we hit the pump station!" Harn turned back to Felix. "Lead on, Fiend."

Felix grinned. "I've got a better idea."

* * *

This fop is too strong, Onai thought with incredulity. How'd the other side get someone so strong?

Onai was against the wall. The fop was even talented with his greatsword, almost as good as her. Her people had scattered, and when the Revenants had emerged, and that illusory army had marched, they'd been splintered even more. Many were nearby but feared close proximity to their errant blows. Even while fighting the fop, she'd killed her share of the scaly monsters, though it hadn't even put a dent in their numbers.

"You give up yet, Guild trash?" the fop said, smiling. He wasn't even sweating!

"Heh, you'd like that, huh? Just roll over for ya? That's how by-blows like you happen, after all!" Onai spat out a mouthful of blood. When had she started bleeding? The fop tilted his head away, but at least he'd stopped smiling. "That hit a sore spot, bastard?"

"I'd make you eat your words, Silver, had I the time," he said, and quicker than she could track, his sword was replaced on his back. "Lucky for you, I have better places to be."

He has the stones to run! Onai raged despite her relief, yet both were brought up short at the sight of a black-scaled abomination bolting in her direction, followed by a wave of the normal, rust-red Revenants. Her senses could tell the creature wasn't even Journeyman Tier, which she appreciated. It would be perfect to vent her frustrations on. "Guilders! To me! We push against these monsters and claim what's ours!"

A rousing cheer met her words as nearby Bronze Ranks found their way to her side. Onai sneered, her confidence restoring rapidly until their gazes, and she turned again toward the blackened abomination...

...which had vanished.

Instead, rising behind him like a land-borne storm, the full might of the Revenant horde fell upon them, one and all.

"Night-cursed nobles," Onai managed, before they were engulfed in a flurry of tooth and claw.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

Pulling himself away from the Revenants was almost physically painful. There was a part of Felix that only felt alive when he was in the midst of a bloody battle, and a not inconsequential portion of his core space that ached to eat as much Primordial Essence as he could manage. Yet his Will was not to be denied. His Bastion severed the ever-increasing Echoes from within, burning and straining but still working. Felix raced up the pump station steps.

I'm in control, he insisted. Pit cooed in fierce agreement.

Abyssal Skein is level 36!

Felix slipped into the pump station just behind the last of the Tin Ranks. They had rushed across the battlefield after he'd explained his plan to Harn, driving through the horde as it followed after Felix with rabid abandon. He almost would’ve felt bad for the Guilders, had they not tried to kill him. The Bronzes and Silver Rank would get out just fine.

With his Bastion reinforced, and his Willpower flared, he only felt a little guilty for Dabney, too.

"Burnin' Revenants took the damn doors," Atar gasped. He was red-faced and sweating, his limbs all but shaking as he recovered against a large curved pipe. "Why'd I follow you people? If those things turn around, we're dead faster than a fish in the Dry."

"I don't know any shaping spells, do you?" An Iron Rank scowled, her chest heaving just as much. "How long will they stay—occupied?"

"Long enough," Harn said, stepping into view. "Get to Cal. We need ta find the Nest quick. I'll—"

Stone Shaping!

A wave of mud-like stone spread from the floor, up the sides of the empty portal and all the way to the top. A web of metallic inclusions filled the mud-brown muck, enough to anchor across the entire archway. Altering the vibrations of the pattern as he sounded it, Felix ripped stone and metal from the foundation below them and put them all to work. With a grunt, he poured a final dose of Mana through the spell and cut it off.

"Twin's teeth!" The Iron Rank stumbled backward from the newly formed door. Wall, really, as it had neither hinges nor handles, but was nearly seamlessly fused to the lintel and frame. "How—"

"Felix," Harn sighed.

Abyssal Skein sloughed from his skin, the touch of the Void leaving him feeling oily and in need of a bath. He'd asked what the effect looked like, and apparently it was as if Felix was bleeding into existence when his Skein dropped. The Iron Rank blanched and saluted, as did a slew of others nearby.

Make An Entrance is level 43!

"Don't—Okay," Felix half-heartedly saluted them all, fist to chest. "Uh, at ease."

"Felix, will this hold?" Atar asked, already running his hands over the stone wall he'd made. "Those things cut through stone like parchment."

The door suddenly shook, claws screeching against it from the other side. Perhaps the Revenants had gotten a whiff of Felix again, but the door held up.

"That Envoy turned out useful, for all the trouble it's caused us. By tweaking the song of my Skill, I was able to pull some metal from the foundations into the matrix of the stone. It should hold off the Revenants, at least a little." Felix grimaced. "A Ghoul is another thing entirely."

"Best we can hope for," Harn grunted. "C'mon. We need ta move."

Felix was led into the large open chamber of the pump station. It looked remarkably like a water pump station back home, with pipes and everything. The pipes were seamless rather than held together with bolted flanges and stuff, and sigils were inscribed into literally everything, but otherwise it felt eerily familiar.

"This place runs the whole city?" Felix asked. Harn shrugged.

"Don't think so. There're a lotta places like this around town, mostly movin' and cleanin' the water supply from the Ianus," the man supplied. "Tainted supply might not hurt us too bad, but Untempered's can't live without clean water."

Felix hadn't made it a habit to go to such places back home, but he recalled doing a field trip in grade school to the water treatment facility. What he hadn't recalled from that trip was the magnitude of blood and viscera spread out across the entire floor.

"Did any of the Guilders survive?" Felix asked.

"We don't know, but there're tracks, like things were pulled back into the tunnel," Harn said.

"Tunnel?"

"Back here."

They moved to the far end where Cal, Vess, and Darius Reed stood near a massive, gaping hole in the corner wall and floor. Chunks of rock and dirt were scattered all over, and smears of blood liberally coated the area. Heavy claw marks, the kind made from a big-ass Ghoul marred the stone. Among them were smaller tracks and signs of many somethings being dragged deeper.

Of them all, the Hand caught his eye first. The Adept combatant merely gave Felix a once-over, looking at the dark scales that he'd not yet dismissed. Visceral displeasure spiked through the man's Spirit.

"Have you seen her?" Cal grabbed Felix's shoulder while he was preoccupied, and she gripped it with considerable strength. He almost winced.

"What?" Felix looked between her and Vess, both of them spattered with blood. "Seen who?"

Vess chewed at her lip, and her dark brown eyes were soft. "Evie is missing."

* * *

Evie had followed the not-little-girl's trail, though it had been difficult. Only a very judicious—one might say sagacious—use of her newly unlocked Affinity attribute let her keep up. There was a tenuous connection between Evie and the not-girl, one she didn't understand. Still, it allowed her to sense the bare whisper of her movements, like a half-heard song in a crowded tavern.

Eventually, that song led her to the redcloak encampment—for all that "camp" was not the right word. The Inquisition had taken over the whole quarter, and it looked like a proper city, as if the troubles of recent weeks had barely touched its expensive walls. She had watched as the not-girl flitted into the depths of the enemy, a damnable spy. But when her form once again flickered and faded, revealing a blonde woman with dark armor and a black mask, then she truly cursed. "Not a spy. A Night-cursed Sworn."

The Sworn, if her Affinity wasn't wrong. It pulsed like a ringing bell at her understanding, and Evie knew the truth of it. It was the woman that kidnapped Vess back in the Foglands.

She's gonna tell them about the Nest. I've gotta—She had peered around the sprawling encampment—I need to find out more.

Cal had always kept Evie from the big scout missions, even now, when she'd clearly proven her mettle. She'd fought a burnin' Domain Core! She was damn near Journeyman! Cal would say to hang back, report what she knew, be safe.

Evie had crept into the camp, instead.

It had been bustling, filled with merchants and messengers running up and down the causeways. Everyone had looked a bit haggard, too, but those were the times. No one was sleeping well, not now. She had followed the lingering traces of the Sworn, moving far more cautiously now than before, until Evie discovered a large, four-storied mansion that had been utterly packed with redcloak guards.

The Sworn had gone in there, not through the doors or even windows. Their connection strengthened the longer she lingered on and paid attention to it. She had watched that mansion for a fraction of a glass, feeling her Affinity flex and retract, like a muscle she had ignored all her life. Without warning, the muscle spasmed and flailed, and redcloaks began boiling out of the mansion like ants. And Evie knew exactly what had kicked their hive. House? Warren?

Regardless, they were going after the Nest, and Evie...she had to do something.

"Faster, lads! We've heretics to catch, and a city to save!" An Initiate cried out from the lead, his voice just loud enough to reach every one of the Acolytes following him. A Skill, Evie didn’t doubt, and a worthless one at that.

A shouting Skill? What for? Use handsign like an adult, Evie griped. She pulled her stolen cloak closer around her shoulders.

The lot of them were hustling through the muck of a sewer tunnel, row by orderly row despite the foul sludge that filled the passage and stained their pristine armor. Evie had secured a red cloak and helm for her disguise, but her armor was still leather beneath it all. She ran in the middle, hidden in their midst as they raced along.

The redcloaks had somehow cleared a path through the sewers and into the city center, maintaining it with their fervor for all things shit, killing any beasties that might have wandered into their midst. It was where the zealots had disappeared to, she soon realized, spending the days practically paving a road toward the Nest.

So now, cloaked and helmeted, she ran through the guts of the city. At first, they were one large force, nearly six hundred strong, but after a while had split into three groups. Evie had tried to stick with the central group, the one where the Inquisitors and the Sworn were, but damn if she didn't get stuck with one of the flanks.

Evie had spent some time in the sewers. The tunnels pushing up at an incline meant one thing: they were going to the city center, likely to the same place her friends were headed.

Gotta slow them down.

She just didn't know how yet.

* * *

"Since when?" Felix asked in alarm. His Perception had already snaked outward, pushing beyond the newly reinforced doors. All he could sense was chaos and rage out there. "She's out there? Alone?"

"No," Harn said, walking up and shaking his frog-mouth helmet. "Two Iron Ranks say they saw her runnin’ out of camp when we left, just not in our direction.”

“I told her to remain behind,” Cal said through gritted teeth. “Of course, she wouldn’t listen.”

“She ran away?” Atar asked, surprised.

"Evie doesn't run from a fight," Vess said, turning on Cal. "But she would not have stayed."

"It can’t matter now," Cal said. She was stoic, but Felix could hear her Spirit tremble with unease. "Whether she stayed or went wandering, we can't wait for her, either. Those Revenants won't be held off for long, and we've got a Nest to find. Chorister, you said your people were down here?"

Felix quieted the unease in his Spirit as Aslei stepped forward. She'd been surrounded by Bronze Rank guards the entire time and had barely made a peep during their battle. Neither had she contributed, yet she was coated in a sheen of sweat, and her Spirit stank of fear. She stared into the open pit and trembled.

"Yes. We slipped through the doors here—" she gestured to the hole. "The doors that used to be here."

"All right, we move then people," Harn shouted. "Quick-like! Now!"

The team reassembled and went down. Cal, Harn, Bodie, the Hand, and most of the high-ranking combatants took the lead while the chorister followed closely behind. Bronze, Iron, and Tin Ranks came after, moving in relative silence down the inclined path. Felix could only pick out bits and pieces of what Aslei was saying at the front of the column, but she was clearly giving directions.

"Vess, Atar, I really don't trust the chorister," Felix reiterated for perhaps the tenth time. "This all feels weird."

"Which part?" Atar asked. "When we were attacked by an army of monsters, or when we descended into the earth to look for their Nest and save some illegally worshipping yokels?" He laughed, clearly out of breath even with the relatively light exercise. "None of this is normal, Felix."

"Even so," Felix maintained. "Keep an eye on her, and an eye on these choristers when we see them. If they tried absorbing these remnant pieces of the Ravager, it cannot end well."

They descended. Felix, Vess, and Atar took the rear. Partially for protection, but mostly because Felix could close it up behind them. His channels were starting to ache, sort of like burning muscles, but he had more than enough Mana for the task.

Soon enough, the tunnel was sealed up behind them, though he made sure to keep it from being airtight. Felix didn't know where they were going, but it was unlikely it would be well ventilated. He kept the spell going for as long as he could.

"Where could she be?" Vess asked. Her spears hovered horizontally beside her, along with Felix's Blade of the Fang, and she juggled them worriedly on currents of wind Mana.

"I haven't the foggiest," Atar said with a shrug. "She's accomplished at finding trouble, though. And you're adept at making it." Atar made two fists and crashed them together with a smirk. "We'll see her soon, I wager."

"Ha ha," Felix deadpanned.

"What of our connection?" Vess asked, and when Felix only furrowed his brow, she explained. "Affinity. You have proven that we can use Affinity to sense the connections between us. I have seen mere glimpses, but you claim more. Can you not check?"

"I can try," Felix said, chewing at his cheek. He'd followed the path of Oath strings from within a Domain before, how hard could it be?

He tilted his attention, similar to expanding his Perception, except now he moved both inward and outward at the same time. There was a moment of resistance where the world itself felt...reluctant. But then he pushed past that, and Felix felt the dense knot of multicolored threads that wound around his three Aspects. The silver chords were Oaths, sworn to him, and he could see those extend to Vess and Atar, terminating at their own chests. He located the one he felt connected to Evie, and it stretched outward but...downward as well?

"She's not near," Felix could feel that much. "She's also not above ground? Or—is there someplace lower in elevation than us?"

"Most of the city," Atar said. "We're up pretty high into the tiered mountain of Haarwatch."

"This feels...different. And closer than something else would be," Felix said, his eyes still closed. A warm hand gripped his forearm, keeping him steady and guiding him down the path. Silver threads wrapped around that hand, mingling with other colors he didn't recognize. Blue and green and white.

He lost focus and opened his eyes. Vess took her hand back with a soft smile.

"She's close? Siva's grace," she breathed in relief.

"Lower, but closer? Then she's in the sewers? By herself?" Atar groused. "Why's she always make things more difficult?"

"It is a talent of hers," Vess said with a smile. "If she is down here, then she will meet up with us. We can question her when that time comes. Let us move, however. We have tarried too long."

They agreed, and Felix continued to work his Stone Shaping until he'd nearly worn out his Mana entirely. By then, they had a plug of stone blocking the path upward, one that would take even a Ghoul at least an hour to tear through. It also had the unfortunate side effect of blocking the only way out they knew of…but as long as Felix was around, he could break it down again, given enough time. Atar and Vess watched his back as Felix simply walked and recovered, but it was unnecessary. The tunnel was devoid of both threats and danger, aside from the uneven terrain.

Eventually, however, the tunnel cut across a wide set of stairs. Here, the chorister had them turn, using the steps to more rapidly descend. The light, which had steadily been increasing the farther they went, kicked up a couple notches. Instead of a uniform grayness, now the steps and rough-hewn walls were picked out with a warm, yellow light. Handsign came back along the line; they were close.

<Close to me,> Felix signed for his friends. <Be prepared, anything.>

<Confirmed,> Vess gestured at him before flashing him a smile. <Your handsign is terrible.>

Atar didn't do anything except roll his eyes and nod.

Soon enough, the column slowed, and they filtered carefully out into a larger chamber. It was easily a couple hundred feet in diameter, a massive chamber that was as much natural cavern as it was a carved hideaway. Pipes poked out from the walls, covered in a series of glowing inscriptions before arching down into the ground again. His understanding translated the gist of them, which had a lot to do with sealing the pipes together. The inscriptions were like fittings, each piece of pipe was held against another with magic. Felix even spotted the tiny, numerous siphon arrays on the nearest collection of pipes.

Cutting across the vast chamber was a crevasse and a sturdy-looking bridge spanning it. The sound of rushing water echoed from far below, and it was clear where the Ianus ended at this point of its journey. As the ranks spread out, Felix was able to pull himself closer to Cal and the rest in order to figure out their next move.

"—they are on the other side of the chamber," Aslei was explaining in a low voice. "We—we've only to cross the bridge and take the rightmost tunnel to the end." She let out a harsh, phlegmy cough.

"What's this place for?" Cal asked, peering around in cautious annoyance. "It doesn't have the stink of the Revenants."

"Access to the water below. Pipes go through the rock and into the gorge. There's a deep pool down there that the Ianus feeds," Bodie said from the side. Harn and others stared at him a moment in bewildered silence. "What? I read!"

"We're wasting time." Cal raised her hands and made a series of quick gestures. <Move. Rapid. Over bridge.>

They moved.

Felix lingered as they crossed the chasm. Though the bridge creaked, it felt sturdy and overbuilt, each beam made of solid wood nearly four feet thick, with tall struts at steady intervals. It looked like something he'd see on Earth, built to withstand the elements and, more likely, monsters. The claw marks across its thick floor beams were evidence of that.

Quiet as they all tried to be, there were still so many of them. The simple sound of their boots on the stone and wood was huge, echoing down into the crevasse and around the cavern. Felix winced at the noise, but if the monsters hadn't come to meet them yet, it was likely they weren't there at all. That didn't stop Cal from sending out a series of scouts, however.

Atop the bridge, Felix could see into the gorge better than before. Bodie had been correct about the pipes. They slid out of the cliffs like metal snakes, and there were a series of stairs carved into the side of the crevasse that switched their way down into the darkness. A distance that made Felix a little dizzy to consider.

"How far do you think that is?" Felix asked, but no one answered. He looked up to see Atar walking as dead center on the bridge as possible. "You okay?"

"Hm? I'm fine," Atar said, not stopping even once. Felix had to jog slightly to catch up. "I just would rather not be on this death trap any longer than I have to be."

"Atar, are you afraid of heights?" Felix asked with a smile. "That's a surprise."

"I'm not afraid of heights," Atar said through his teeth. "I'm afraid of rickety bridges and deadly falls. There is a distinct difference."

"The entire crew crossed the bridge. If it were going to break, it would have done so when Bodie crossed, no?" Vess asked.

"...You may have a point," Atar conceded.

"Yeah," Felix grimaced. "A bridge is likely the least of our worries."

Almost on cue, screams began echoing from the tunnels ahead. Atar groaned.

"Why? Why did I come with you?"

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

The screaming escalated, accompanied by the sickening tang of Primordial fury. The chorister was already moving, running full tilt for one of the nearby tunnels. Felix's senses shifted into high alert, and he didn't wait.

Sovereign of Flesh!

Unfettered Volition!

Felix hurled himself over the ranks and landed with a graceless lurch amid the leadership. "I'm going!" he shouted in passing, moving too fast to stop. The Chorister of Siva was ahead of the column, which is why she made it into the tunnel before him, but Felix was right behind her, as were the woman's Bronze Rank guards. Felix knew them by name, thanks to his Voracious Eye, but hadn't spoken to many. But, as the screams increased in volume, they didn't need to speak. All of them just ran.

Aslei's burst of speed was, frankly, insane. The woman was walking wounded in a way Felix had rarely seen from someone with so many advancements under her belt. Yet still, she zipped ahead of all of them down the winding tunnel. Her Spirit was filled with a terrible panic.

Felix wasn't about to let that woman out of his sight, because there was something else in the air. He flared his Manasight as he ran, spotting thick clouds of crimson miasma boiling through the tunnel. He tasted desperation and...anticipation. Cal shouted behind them, and the muffled sound of jangling harnesses and chainmail filled the tunnel. They were following.

The path was only big enough for three people abreast with some room to spare for maneuvering. The ground, whipping beneath his legs, was covered in drag marks and blood. The same claw marks he saw on the bridge were everywhere. Soon the tunnel opened up into a larger antechamber with a massive stone door. It was clearly once hidden, rough and uneven on the outside, but what caught Felix's eye was that it had been broken open completely by something very big. The Ghoul, he assumed.

The screaming had petered off, but it was replaced by the strangled howl of a familiar enemy. Felix didn't stop at the doors and rushed through, forcing his Perception to its limits to catch what might be ahead. The room opened up into an ornately carved chamber lined with weird, triangular pillars that paraded down the length of it. They held up an arched ceiling laid with triangular tiles he could just make out in the gloom. There were no windows, not so far beneath the earth.

Exploration is level 36!

Instead, Felix saw by the light of a hazy, red glow. Even without Manasight active, it was clear, the Primordial miasma was thicker than ever, a carmine illumination that only highlighted the blood that smeared the room. Bodies were scattered about, or rather, pieces of them. In the center of the room, already grabbing at a weakly struggling Aslei, were ten Revenants.

"Hey! Over here!" Felix shouted.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Twin cannonballs of dark acid formed and shot off through the air, tearing through three of the monsters in quick succession. A wild, wordless howl followed, and the remaining seven charged Felix heedlessly.

"Pit?"

"Screeeaah!"

A flash of light filled the dim room, and the monsters were faced with an enormous tenku. They didn't stop running, but three of them pivoted cleanly to attack the Chimera while the rest kept on toward Felix. The battle was quick and painless; Felix had faced too many of their kind to even break a sweat on only four of them.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x4)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Pit's foes died only seconds after Felix's own, their bodies riddled with slashes and jagged spears of ice. By that point, the Bronze guards had caught up and rushed into the room. Carefully, they surrounded the chorister; as much to protect her as to guard her. The woman was barely standing, having suffered a few grievous wounds across her chest. She coughed up blood that looked more black than red.

"Sa-save them," she whispered and gestured across the room.

Felix looked up. Along the far wall was a wide open darkness, a tunnel that led into mystery. A massive, round thing was lodged in the ground before it. The object was twice the size of a man and rust-red in color, and it practically breathed out red vapor.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Scale of the Ravager King

Type: Artifact

Lore: Fallen from the Body of the Ravager King, this piece of his flesh is packed with Primordial Essence.

Felix snarled and was about to race for it, when the entire room shook.

"Did—what was that?" Atar said, looking up nervously. Dust rained down from above, and the ground shook again.

"Shh! You hear that?" Cal said.

Stilted cries and stifled moans were on the air. Portia and Cal rushed to the side, but Felix already knew what they'd find. He felt an emotional turbulence like a bonfire he couldn't see, but the heat of it burned at him.

Just beyond the nearest pillars, dozens of men and women of all Races were laid out. Blood streaked the ground, but many moved, if sluggishly. All of them were hurt, their wounds filled with blackened blood while their skin was scaling over.

"Felix!" Portia cried out. "Help them!"

"You cannot!"

All of them looked up as two people in bloodstained robes disengaged from the pile of bodies. They hobbled to their feet, gruesomely wounded, but their aura of authority was almost palpable.

"Elders?" Harn shouted, readying his axes. The sound of weapons being drawn was louder than the occasional tremors that shook the room.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Olivia Regis, Elder of the Protector's Guild

Name: Holt, Elder of the Protector's Guild

He couldn't see much of their information, due to artifacts or level difference, but he could sense their advancement. They were both in the Master Tier...then they weren't. Elder Holt coughed and spat up blood, while Elder Regis supported him. They both looked seriously hurt, and their advancement was perhaps mid-Adept level at best.

Something had hurt both of them. Badly.

"You mustn't touch them!" Regis begged. "Their sickness is infectious! It will worm its way into your core and tear—tear you apart!"

"Please," Holt said.

No one put down their weapons. None of them trusted the Guild, not anymore.

The room shook again, and the Elders both flinched. Regis looked up and around as if something were going to pounce on her, and Holt grimaced in pain.

"Did you try'n absorb the Scale, too?" Harn asked. Felix could see silver Mana gathered around the axe heads, but they didn't ignite.

"No! It's a death sentence to take in that power," Regis said, and her hands were shaking. "We warned them all, but they wouldn't listen. None of them." She gestured to the side, where the majority of the injured people leaned against the walls and moaned. Among them, Felix could pick out a familiar style of robes in blue and red, and several pairs of dark sandals.

"Are those choristers? Aslei?" Cal turned to the Chorister of Siva, who was glaring daggers at the Elders. She nodded weakly at Cal's words.

Felix had heard enough. The people around him were writhing in near-silent pain, though their Spirits were loud enough to shatter eardrums. Desperate agony was being torn at by the red-hot violence of the Primordial miasma. He shoved his hands outward, feeling the heat lick against his palms and wrists.

Ravenous Tithe!

It was a lot, plus the ambience in the air. It made his head spin, and he was forced to clamp down on the Echoes. It only drove them together, and the dark abyss in the center of his ring core pulled in the drained Essence even faster. His head cleared as the Essence drained away, the sudden urge to run and jump and fight dissipating like morning fog.

The victims breathed easier, and the darkness was gone from their blood. Scales were turned to ribbons of light and smoke that he inhaled.

"How'd they get like this? Did they take the scale on, too?" Cal asked, looking toward the Elders.

Felix shook his head. They'd been bad, but this was like the people in the healer's ward, just super accelerated. "Maybe some of them. But it's the concentration of the miasma here that's the problem. The Primordial's power seems amplified this close to the Nest. And...that Scale isn't helping."

"It is pumping out more of it, I can almost feel it," Vess said. She closed her eyes, and Felix could tell she was reaching out with her senses. She hissed and recoiled. "Foul."

"How'd you get here? With choristers, no less," Cal asked the Elders. They were leaning against one another, and both looked like wrung-out dishrags.

"When the tower fell, we were in the hands of the Inquisition," Elder Holt grated out. His voice was like gravel rolling over sandpaper. "We fought free and ran, but not without a cost. The Choristry...they found us. Took us in despite everything. Been hiding down here ever since."

"And this?" Felix asked, pointed at the Scale. "Why the hell is this thing here?"

"They found it, scavenging in the tunnels beyond. Brought it here," Elder Regis said with a shudder. "We didn't know what it was at first, other than some sort of monster body part. But it should have decayed weeks ago. That alone was enough to keep us interested."

"Couldn't you feel this? The foul heat?" Vess asked, aghast. "Why would you want this near you?"

"Desperation," Holt said. "Us and the choristers. The monsters haven't stopped attacking us since we arrived. This Scale...it pushed them away. Drove off the small beasts and gave us much-needed peace."

"It wasn't until later that they tried to absorb it, like a monster core," Regis added.

Felix looked at the slowly awakening choristers, and over at Aslei, who was being treated by Portia. The woman was shuddering beneath Portia's magic, clenching her teeth so hard that blood was dribbling from her lips. Pit lingered near the woman, his tufted ears laid flat against his skull and suspicion in his big, golden eyes.

"D-don't trust them," a whisper told him. At his feet, a chorister in dark, blood-red robes trembled weakly. The Chorister of Vellus he’d seen at the assembly before all this began. "The sky is screaming, Blue-Eyed Fiend. And-and the earth is trembling."

The room shook again, more than before. What was that?

"What are you talking about? What's shaking the ground?" Felix asked.

"Pride," the chorister laughed breathlessly. "A Blight runs beneath us. And a stamp in the sky, in you." Without warning, her hand snapped to his sleeve, gripping it with more strength than Felix would have expected. "The Blood Moon is coming, Fiend. Find them all."

"Blood—Find what?"

The chorister's eyes met Felix's, and despite his Perception and Manasight, he couldn't make out their color. "You know." Her hand dropped from his sleeve and she slumped backward, eyes drifting away.

"I know? Explain, please," Felix asked, but the chorister wouldn't meet his gaze or say anything. "Shit."

Right. Almost forgot Choristers of Vellus go insane, Felix huffed as he leaned away from the woman. Near to him, Atar leaned against one of those triangular columns and wiped sweat from his brow. He was looking more and more pale. "Are you okay, dude?"

"I'm—No. I'm not. The heat in here burns me, worse than the scorching sands of my home," he practically panted. "It feels...It's like being back in the Domain."

Felix clenched his jaw. Atar was likely more sensitive to the feeling than others, but he could see sweat beading on the skin of all the Tin Ranks and quite a few of the Iron Ranks, too. They didn't have much time.

"I have to take care of that," Felix said loudly, pointing at the Scale. Cal and the Elders pivoted to him, and he saw Regis flinch at the sight of his scales and bright blue eyes. Holt's look was far more calculating. "Everyone's gonna start feeling its effects soon."

"Do it," Cal ordered. "Harn, help him."

"What? No, you cannot," Regis protested. "I don't know what the boy did before, but if he tries it against the Scale, he'll shatter his foundation or—or worse—"

"He'll be fine," Cal insisted, but even her eyes looked worried. Felix didn't have time to reassure her.

"Harn, let's go."

"Aye." Harn and Felix started at the Scale, but the room shook again, and more dust tumbled from above. A few tiles, triangular, fell from the ceiling and pinged onto the ground. The area was scattered with them. Felix picked it up. It was a triangle, but etched on its surface were tiny, nearly invisible sigils that Felix couldn't quite parse. And in the center was a three-pointed star.

"You gotta be kidding me," Felix muttered and held up the star for Harn to see. That was a Nym star, only found in structures the Nym has made. "Is this a Nymean ruin?"

The ground trembled again, then again, faster than before. Again and again.

"He's returning," Elder Regis moaned. "I didn't think—there's nothing left here for him!"

"Who?" Cal shouted, and, behind her, Bodie mobilized the Ranks, getting them into defensive positions. "Who's coming?"

"The Chorister of Yyero," giggled the Chorister of Vellus. Her giggle became a full-throated laugh that was as mad as Felix remembered her to be. "Careful careful careful! The Pride of Blight returns!"

From the darkness emerged a hulking form, a creature nearly as big as a Ghoul and only tangentially Human. Felix recalled the chorister and recognized his facial features...somewhat; the rest of him was warped and ballooned outward by the muscle and glistening scales that coated his malformed Body. Two tree-trunk legs thumped into the room, barely covered by the brown robe of his order, and a pair of thick, muscled arms leaned onto the ground. A second, thinner pair of arms extended from beneath the larger, their skeletal fingers tipped with vicious talons. The creature sniffed the air and flashed teeth far too large for a human's mouth.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Pride of Blight

Type: Primordial-Spawn

Level: 62

—$(#

ERROR!

For the first time in a while, Felix's Eye couldn't see the details of a Primordial-Spawn. But the specifics didn't matter, not even the man's—creature's—level. More important was the advancement Felix had felt...which was pushing damn close to Master Tier. The red miasma began to swirl in the air, thickening into a hurricane of shimmering power.

"High Adept," Reed called out. The ring of steel was sharp in the silence, and the Hand walked forward through the company. "Do not take this thing lightly."

"I'll keep that in mind," Harn grunted, and his axes burst into silver flame.

Behind them sounded a keening roar. The hurricane of miasma struck from above, smashing into their people and scattering them in all directions as it poured onto a single person. The Chorister of Siva buckled and warped, her flesh ripping as something scaled and toothy tore from her pale skin. The miasma poured into the rents in her skin, healing it as she grew to the same impossible dimensions as the Blight before them.

"I fucking knew it," Felix growled.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

Name: Deceit of Misfortune

Type: Primordial-Spawn

Level: 61

—$(#

ERROR!

The same error plagued his Voracious Eye with Aslei as with the other. She grew, the thing inside her tearing free until little was left of the poor chorister. It fixed Felix with a sneer as its teeth were replaced with crooked fangs.

"You knew, yet did nothing! A fool in the end, Felix Nevarre!"

Deceit of Misfortune—what a name—raised its Human-adjacent head and let loose a sharp, ululating cry. Everyone winced, but Felix and Vess both felt its call surge with Intent. Their eyes met as it blistered the air and raced into the darkness.

<Not good,> she signed at him.

She wasn't wrong.

Like the strumming of a guitar the size of a city, a low, basso thrum shivered through the darkness, and an answering howl returned. Felix could sense them: Revenants racing down the tunnel, at least fifty and rising, and behind them ran several enormous Ghouls.

It's a goddamn trap.

"Monsters! Incoming!" Felix shouted, but barely got the words out when the chorister backhanded him across the room.

"HOUUUGH!"

Felix smashed through two triangular pillars, each impact a blinding flash of pain. It cut through his Song of Absolution like it wasn't even there.

"Felix!" Vess called out, but all he perceived were flashing lights and an atonal ringing in his head. The ground beneath him shook as the malformed beasts clashed with his allies. "Pit!"

Felix rolled to his feet to his Companion's piercing screech. The hate was clear, burning bright in their bond, and he struck chorister with a flurry of Frost Spears and Wingblades. The spells splashed against her scaled hide, nothing but colored lights for all they affected her. With contemptible ease, she plucked him from the air and snarled.

"Begone, rat! AAAGH!" Within her enlarged grip, Pit's entire body ignited with a virulent green flame. "AAGH!" The abomination’s limbs lit up with a blackened-green light before it hurled Pit down, faster than Felix could track, and the tenku's body smashed into the floor so hard it rippled the tiles for yards around it.

"NO!" Felix choked. Something in his chest cracked, and the greatest agony he'd ever felt lacerated his nerves with a sharp, unending fire. "PIT!"

The monster chuckled darkly, her not-quite-Human visage marred by a ruinous maw and sneering disdain. "Praise me, Felix. Your attachment is a pathetic sickness." Her thickened foot lifted, now a claw of rust red and putrid yellow flesh. " I shall cure it!"

* * *

While the Fiend fumbled against the other, Darius Reed focused upon the Pride of Blight. Clearly the stronger of the two, the abomination was, at first glance, beyond even his Skills. He shoved that idea out of his Mind.

No. He flourished his greatsword. I will cross that divide upon the edge of my blade.

"Mine!" The Pride of Blight stomped forward, its claws already grasping for a distracted Felix. Reed hewed his heavy, doubled-edged greatsword across its ten-inch long talons. Sparks flew, and the Blight was brought up short. The Hand whirled his greatsword and smiled at the abomination.

"I'll take the first dance, I think."

"RRRUUUAUGGH!"

The Blight's fury was considerable, and it shook Reed’s core with its strength. A common tactic among the stronger monsters on the Continent; they would leverage their innate ferocity against even stronger foes, sometimes besting them. But Reed was no child from a backwater like Haarwatch. He was an officer of Pax'Vrell's military, one handpicked by the Duke himself and invested with authority far above the station he was born into. The Duke promoted those who knew the value of work, and Darius Reed's position was only below the Duke's.

The Blight's one-two swipe was titanic, and they blasted apart the flooring and walls where they hit, but Reed dodged its attacks with ease.

Steps of the Drake!

A variation on the Duke's family style, Reed flitted within the Blight's guard while its hands tried to pummel the empty earth. "You're a thousand years too early to catch me with that, monster!" His blade flashed with dark blue Mana, and a shower of blows deflected its massive arm. Yet its hide remained unharmed. Reed marveled at its Vitality; the touch of a Primordial had truly driven it beyond Humanity.

"Feh!" The Blight gurgled. Unlike the other chorister, this one seemed further along its path of dark power. The teeth in its warping face flexed unpleasantly. "Die!"

Vile crimson clouds gathered within its claws, and it drove forward.

* * *

"Pit!" Felix's shout grabbed Vess' attention. The monster he faced was letting loose a series of discordant whines, things she didn't understand in the least. But when it hurled Pit to the ground and went to stomp him, its intent was clear.

Vess' seven silver spears reached the monster just as it lifted its powerful leg, and she wasted no time in detonating them. Air Mana raged against the abomination's flesh, unable to penetrate its scales. But that was never their purpose.

Dragoon's Footwork!

Blurring across the battlefield, Vess managed to reach the former Chorister of Siva only moments after her spears exploded. She spun as she arrived, using her momentum to slam Felix's massive bone sword into the back of the beast's knee. With a surprised howl, the creature stumbled to its side.

"Pit! Run!" Vess screamed, but that was all she managed before a clawed foot snapped outward.

Vess tried to dodge, but it was too fast. The blow caught her body at an angle. The world spun wildly for a brief, nauseating moment before she hit something hard enough that her leg snapped.

"MMMMF!"

She muffled her pained gasp and forced herself to keep rolling. She'd hit one of the triangular pillars and spun again, this time nearer the giant glowing scale. Waves of heat boiled off the thing and nearly made her lose her breakfast, but worse than that was the howling that came from beyond. The dark, gaping tunnel behind the scale took that moment to burst alive with a rampaging horde of Revenants.

They were all in a lot of trouble.

* * *

The pain of his bond was excruciating, and Felix felt suddenly lost in the haze of emotions and reverberating sensations between him and his Companion. Thankfully, the detonating wind blasts shook Felix back to his senses.

"Pit! Run!"

Vess had somehow toppled it, but the thing's clawed foot booted her away. She flew fast and hit a pillar hard, though her Body wasn't durable enough to break through. She broke instead.

"Vess!" Felix shouted, but she didn't answer. He turned back to the piece of shit that did it and found Pit taking flight from his crater. Pit, are you okay?

Pained assurance flitted across their bond, but it hurt, like driving splinters into his eyes. The both of them hissed, and Pit's flight faltered. Felix shoved his hand out. Converge!

Light flashed, and Pit vanished, moments before a thin, spike-filled tail tore through his position. Felix's Spirit lurched with the addition, an ache he couldn't reach. But better protected within than out there. Better for both of them.

"Foolish child," hissed the chorister.

Felix's HUD blinked at him.

Status Condition: Spirit Damage (Minor)

Spirit Damage: -10% Efficacy of Spirit Aspect

What?

"You hitched your cart to a beast," Misfortune continued with a dark chuckle. "Few know the limitations of a Companion, but I do. Hurt the beast, cripple the mage."

Felix's memory flashed back to that day, months ago, when he'd chosen to bond Pit.

A Choice Is Made.

All Choices Have Consequences.

Bear Your Burdens Well, Lost One.

"I don't need my Spirit to kill you," Felix started to say, but the monster was already charging. "Shit!"

Unfettered Volition!

Dodge is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+3 AGL

+3 DEX

+3 PER

Felix moved fast, but still he was barely ahead of the Primordial Spawn. He slammed into the nearby wall, splintering it with his impact before rebounding sideways and just behind his target. It's tail lashed again, but Felix grabbed the thing instead. The spikes barely dented his sculpted armor, but the momentum of the whipcord appendage hurled him free, his grip foiled.

Felix landed twenty feet away, skidding on the bloodstained ground, just in time for the wave of Revenants pour from behind the Scale.

"Shield wall! Form up! Protect the injured!" Cal's voice was amazingly loud, strident, and clear over the sound of two behemoths roaring at Felix and the others. The Hand and Harn faced the Pride of Blight, while Felix was handling Misfortune all by his lonesome.

The Revenants hit the shield wall as he watched, and the chorister cackled. Sheets of ice and fire sprang up around the shields, and buzzing Sparkbolts hit with unerring precision. Then the Ghouls started emerging, and the fight was truly on.

"Your people are doomed!" the twisted chorister shouted.

"Quiet, you!"

Bodie appeared behind the beast and swung his massive, enhanced hammer into the chorister's left flank. It cracked like a gunshot, and it let out a high-pitched yelp of pain. Felix grinned and bolted for Vess. She was in the midst of that horde, and she was hurt.

But he had to get past the beast first, and evading its clutches proved impossible. Each attempt had the creature recover and nearly skewer him with her bone tail, or smash him through another set of pillars. Feinting to the right just as Bodie crashed into its body and staggered the chorister, Felix almost made it. But the thing was getting stronger somehow, and it shrugged off the strongman's attack. The wound from his mace healed before their eyes, the red miasma thickening against its scales until the gashes disappeared. Even its advancement felt greater than before, like it was just on the cusp of Master Tier.

No, we can beat her. I just—Felix paused as more and more miasma swirled around the chorister. Both of them, actually, the Blight regenerating his wounds just as quickly. I just have to get close enough.

Felix unsheathed the Femur of the Envoy and fed it some of his dwindling Essence. He still had Sovereign of Flesh, active and it ate Essence quicker than almost anything else. Even more now, as the Spirit Damage he'd suffered reduced the efficacy of the Skill. But as the metallic Femur grew, he only focused on moving.

Unfettered Volition!

Wild Threnody!

The distance was eaten up in moments, and Felix shoved his Mana through the swinging length of metal. Lightning crackled, discharging into a bolt of azure force when the club crashed into Misfortune's heavy shoulder. A quick follow-up with Influence of the Wisp only grazed her with blue-white wispfire, and her hide fought off the sizzling effects of his Wrack and Ruin. Even with Bodie assisting, he couldn’t seem to hurt her much at all.

"Your magic is useless!" The chorister crowed. She spun, backhanding Bodie from his feet and using her tail to drive spikes toward Felix's chest. It missed and she growled in frustration. "Stay still!"

Felix ducked her tail, braced his feet, and swung again.

Arrow of Perdition!

Flashing the effect through his weapon Skill, the blue-gold power was both easier and more difficult to produce. Above anything, it felt weird, shoving a metaphysical, conjured arrow through the end of a club. Yet he hit true. There was a flash of blue-gold radiance as the bludgeoning weapon made contact with the Desire of Misfortune's abdomen. Directly above her core.

She stumbled with a pained, surprised groan.

"Wh-what?" The abomination didn't lose any Health, but its inhuman face stretched into an awful expression of mounting pain. He couldn't tell what Skill it had suddenly lost access to, but it didn't matter. "How?"

Felix didn't bother answering. He was close enough now. He flitted forward, putting away his bone club and slamming his talon outward, just piercing the weaker flesh of its belly.

Ravenous Tithe!

Like called to like, as ever before. The red miasma from the air surged into him, a waterfall of potency that was nearly overwhelming. Essence filled him, along with the chorister's rage and shock, but he didn't stop.

Ravenous Tithe!

Again and again, Felix took chunks of the beast. Each time, he drew more. Blood and viscera, scale and sinew, all of its stolen power he in turn stole away. It hurt him, the amount, but he'd eaten Queens and Kings. One corrupted priest was nothing.

"R-release me!" She cried, her bulk deflated by his unstoppable hunger. "You—you must!" The chorister was little more than skin and bones, though still impossibly stretched by the corrosive power of the Primordial. A cadaver pushed to extreme limits, barely recognizable as Human let alone Aslei the chorister.

A large part wanted to keep feeding until there was nothing left. Until she'd been wiped clean entirely. Yet, a portion of his weakened Spirit, instinct maybe, felt the rarefied vibrations within the chorister's quaking soul. He could feel the woman, imprisoned within herself. Screaming, Body lost, Mind overwhelmed, Spirit entrapped. Still there, despite it all, still Human.

A Skill within his core space shimmered alight with a compelling song he'd never before heard. That part of him, one he did not yet fully understand, reached.

"The Ruin is not the End," Felix whispered. "Unite the Lost."

Unite the Lost!

Blessing of the Lost Title Detected...

Affects enhanced!

A massive chunk of his stolen Essence, nearly all of what he'd just acquired, was torn from his channels by the arcane forces of his Skill. A storm of Mana thundered through him as well, as his spinning core flung itself into higher gear and discharged wild lightning across his Spirit. The Essence, imbued with streamers of Mana, was turned to flesh and blood and sinew.

With a thunderclap, both of their bodies were hurled apart. Felix rolled, nearly completely disoriented, and was sent plowing through the unsuspecting bodies of four Revenants. His reinforced Body was less hurt by that than by the screaming discharge of power that had his insides reeling in aching horror.

My god, he gasped. Revenants howled all around him, but he paid them little attention. What was that?

Unite the Lost is level 2!

...

Unite the Lost is level 8!

Felix slashed outward, his talon ripping across Achilles tendons and hamstrings with equal measure. Revenants screeched in pain, and a few even collapsed, their legs no longer working correctly. It gave him enough room to stand back up and take stock.

To take in the fact that the Desire of Misfortune was gone.

Aslei Tunn, Chorister of Siva, instead stood in its place. The woman's expression was one of utter and complete shock, before she collapsed completely.

New Title!

Save the Lost (Legendary)!

You have saved a victim of a Primordial's influence, in defiance of Fate itself! Bold of you! +10% AFI, FEL, and INT!

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

You Have Defeated Deceit of Misfortune!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

Save the Lost? Felix spared his notification a single glance, though his vision wavered with pain. It...cured her?

He hadn't had a chance to try out the other racial Skill he'd gained upon becoming a Primordial Nym. Or rather, he'd been too worried about how vague its description was and put it off. So many other things were vying for his attention all the time...

Like, for instance, the Ghouls stomping through the darkness ahead of him.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

The orbs of dark green Mana tore through the Revenants to either side of Felix, but when they reached the nearest Ghoul, neither penetrated its thickened hide. It barely sizzled against them.

Status Condition: Spirit Damage

"Ugh, shut up," Felix groaned, slashing his left hand claws to create some space. His damage was affected by his new Status Condition, at least with his Spirit Skills. With his right hand, he went to feed Essence into his club...and promptly spasmed, catching a Revenant's talon to his abdomen as he doubled over.

Corrosive Strike!

Acid wreathed Felix's left claw, swiping upward in a blind strike that gutted the beast. It fell backward, screeching in pain.

Even my Sovereign of Flesh is weaker. Felix ran a hand over the deep gouge in the scales protecting his belly. The Revenant had nearly torn through them. And he was running almost completely empty on Essence. The pain that stabbed at him was his core, greedily sucking at the emptiness where usually the cloudy nebula of power lived. One way to fix that.

Ravenous Tithe!

Death was rampant all around him. Felix was responsible for some, but not the lion’s share of it. His Tithe required him to claim it if he was to absorb the power, and slowly, Felix had come to learn that it was merely a matter of Will. The Essence that burned from the smoking corpses of dead enemies contained pieces of Primordial, of the Maw. As far as the Hunger inside of Felix was concerned, that was his. No one else's.

Mine!

Glowing crimson vapor rushed toward him, filled with dark smoke like striations in a stone. Even the sky was not immune, as he pulled the cloying Mana radiation from the Scale toward him on a ceaseless tide.

The storm was reignited with him, though parts of it were being eaten up by his core ring again. Felix ignored that, focusing instead upon releasing a stream of that Essence into his weapon. The club grew, the Profane Sigils on its length burning with a crimson and blue luminescence.

"Much better," Felix grunted, shoving it forward like a lance. The heavy weapon crashed into another Revenant leaping for him, checking the movement before sweeping sideways to collide into the rows that had surrounded him. "Back! Off!"

The ground trembled. Felix’s Blind Fighting Skill gleamed and he twisted aside, but not fast enough. A fist the size of a small boulder hit his face and shoulder, all at once, and he was slammed into the tiled floor. Stone shattered, and Revenants were tossed aside as his Body plowed a shallow furrow into the chamber floor.

"Eat!" The Pride of Blight bellowed. The once-chorister loomed out of the dust and smoke like a twisted, tooth-filled tumor, its arms grown even heavier than before. Mouths had opened along its arms, tiny, gasping monsters with writhing tongues. Neither the Hand or any other of Felix’s allies were anywhere to be seen.

"Ugh," Felix said, rising to his feet. He coughed up dust and dirt that had shoveled into his mouth. "Why are Primordials so gross? Or—or is that a Maw thing?"

The Pride of Blight screamed and charged.

Ravenous Tithe!

More of the room's ambient Essence and Mana siphoned into Felix, but the Blight wasn't slowed in the slightest. Felix yelped and dove beneath the thing's fist, coming up under the arm to deliver a caustic blow.

Corrosive Strike!

Felix's armored fist hit the former-chorister's elbow joint, easily as thick as his torso. On someone regular, it might have actually been useful. Instead, Felix felt his hand slip into one of the many teeth-lined maws on the abomination's body. The acid gushed from the mouth, and the damn thing bit at him and ripped straight through the scales on his hand.

"FUCK!"

"Got you," the thing chuckled. The Blight flexed, and suddenly Felix was airborne again.

Felix fumbled at his waist, grabbing at his Femur of the Envoy with his left hand. He yanked it free and streamed Essence into his club again. The thin, metallic bone became a battering ram, hitting the Blight's elbow with all the force of his Strength.

It did nothing.

Then lightning struck.

"GRUUUUAUAAAHhH!" The monster cried out, pain clear in its voice. The mouths all over its deformed body all screamed at once, and Felix slipped free of its nasty teeth. He landed in a crouch and cradled his arm against his chest. Other than his many other injuries, he was unharmed. Somehow, impossibly, the lightning didn't even touch him.

A second, then a third lightning bolt coursed out of nothing to strike the Blight. The High Adept abomination was seizing, all but frozen in place by the immense currents shaking through its flesh.

To Felix's utter confusion and delight, Elder Holt stood nearby, his hands outstretched. Bright, blue-white Mana crackled around him like a halo of volts, and his graying beard swayed in a violent gale.

"We got ya, kid," Holt groaned, his body flexing beneath the strain of his spell.

We?

A second strike, this one of shimmering grey-black Mana, stabbed from beneath the creature. A jagged jaw of shadows ripped from the earth and tore into the convulsing thing. Great gobbets of flesh stripped away from its legs, and the Blight stumbled to a knee.

"If you're going to make a move," shouted Elder Regis, her face covered in sweat. "Do it now!"

He knew just what to use. Felix thrust his hand into the air. "Vess! Sword me!" A moment passed, but nothing happened. Just him with his hand raised like an idiot.

Where...? Vess!

Felix spun, frantically casting about for her, but he couldn't see anything. "Vess!"

She didn't answer.

He turned back to the Elders. "Hold on!"

"Sure!" Holt gritted through his perfect teeth. "Take your sweet-ass time!"

Felix exploded from his position, tiles shattered with each step as he plowed through the Revenants gathered around where he had seen Vess. Revenants died by the truckload, but there were always more.

Reign of Vellus!

A flex of his Will pushed his evolved spell back into the 360-degree attack it had once been. Coupled with the damage to his Spirit, the lack of focus reduced the power even as it sent a spike of agony through Felix’s core. Felix suppressed his screams of pain and fired off two quick castings anyway, momentarily clearing the area. But still, he couldn't find his friend through the chaos.

"YAAH!"

Vess leaped backward from behind a triangular pillar, just ahead of a Ghoul's inept but powerful claws. Her spears, re-conjured, maneuvered around her body like five independent tails. Each one was a barbed stinger, packed with Mana and deadly. The spear in her hands was a blur as well, and she used it to clear the ground—explosively—of Revenants before she landed.

"Vess!"

She pivoted, barely ahead of the Ghoul's smashing counterattack. Her left leg was broken and unable to take her weight, though she was agile enough to evade the claws of the Revenant horde. The true problem was the Ghouls, five of them, smashing their brute force against the shield wall. Just as Vess retreated over it, her pursuing Ghoul followed.

It plowed into the shield wall with little more than a hitch in its step.

Stone Shaping!

The distance interfered, well over a hundred feet at this point. A line of hollow earth erupted from the shield wall, but the beasts tore through it without pausing. That's when Cal flitted outward, attacking in a blur of dagger strikes. She pulped the leading Ghoul’s neck and shoulders with her blades, but the flesh was knitting back together faster than she could do damage. She cursed and leaped aside just as the darkened orbs of Atar's Sparkbolt struck the creature with crimson blooms of fire. That, at least, ate into the beast quicker than it could repair itself. Combined with the precise and somewhat frantic strikes of Cal’s Skills, the Ghoul finally died. Cal rode the corpse of the Ghoul to the ground before speeding through the crowd toward the next one Harn was facing with sixteen of their fighters. People were dying, fast; there simply weren’t enough strong combatants on the field to keep all of the monsters at bay.

"Felix!" With a ragged cry, Vess hurled one of the objects floating at her back. It rocketed toward him, and Felix snatched it out of the air with a practiced jump and grab, adjusting his grip on his Blade of the Fang as he landed. The Revenants that had been closing in on him ran all the harder, panting for his blood.

Wild Threnody!

Essence as well as Arctic power thrummed through his Blade as Felix spun in a wide circle, arms extended. Hoarfrost coated the Blade and trailed through the air, leaving jagged, flash-frozen wounds in its wake. Arms, legs, and chests were severed by its preternaturally sharp edge.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x12!)

XP Gained!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Thunder filled the chamber again, accompanied this time by a groaning bellow from the Blight. Felix raced back toward the monolithic monstrosity, Blade of the Fang held out to the side like a toothy spear. Unfettered Volition raged, giving him the oomph needed to push through the shifting horde.

The Blight finally wrenched free of the Elders' spells, sending both of them crashing to the ground, spent. Out of the smoking bodies, the Hand emerged, running full tilt toward the abomination.

"Focus on me!" The Hand shouted, leveling his blade at the Blight. He looked bloody and tired, but his face was lit up with a mad grin. Felix felt the man release some sort of Taunting ability, and every Revenant within ten yards suddenly reoriented on him. "I've got it, Fiend! Go elsewhere!"

But the Blight's own attention didn't waver; it had eyes only for Felix.

"MINE! RUAAUGH!"

Mouths gnashing, it pounded the ground, obliterating it into jagged shards that its scales ignored. Felix crouched low, Fang to his side, and poured all he could of his twin resources. Essence and Mana burned through his channels, both at the same time crowding each other and tearing at his pathways, but he brute forced it through. The Fang crusted over with ice, growing frosted crystals and spikes along the length of it as more and more Mana flowed outward.

Mana Manipulation is level 46!

C'mon, closer...

The Blight ripped through ranks of Revenants and the burning arcs of Harn's silver axes. The man had dispatched those Ghouls nearby with deadly brutality, but the Blight shrugged off his attack with no effort. The shadows beneath it boiled, releasing spikes and dark hands that grasped...yet these, too, the creature eradicated with its relentless stampede.

Closer...

Unfettered Volition!

Reign of Vellus!

Felix exploded from the ground, Reign of Vellus shot backward at an angle to provide him with lift. He'd attempted this before, but never with the Tempered Skill. He went fast, and only his Unfettered Volition allowed him to maintain his form.

Felix swung his Blade, low to high, as he flashed toward the Blight. He felt the weapon catch, the resistance of flesh, before a massive fist came down from the sky.

Reign of Vellus!

Kinetic force blasted him aside just as the Blight swung, narrowly missing the strike. He reoriented mid-air—thanks to his Unfettered Volition—and landed feet-first on a column before launching himself back at it. Ice had formed along a section of the monster's arm, right where he'd hit. He struck again, this time on the other arm, but the ice barely formed at all.

Barely broke its skin that time. Essence burned through his Fang, but it wasn't enough. He needed more. Landing atop the next column, Felix shot off another Reign of Vellus and reversed course again.

Ravenous Tithe!

Flying through the air, Felix drew in all he could from the cyclone of carmine power in that chamber. It thundered into him like a hurricane and rampaged through his core. He shook, a leaf in the wind, but still he flew true. Sword extended. A Wild Threnody on his lips.

Wild Threnody!

Arrow of Perdition!

The ice of his blade sheared off, dissolved into purple-white vapor as new Mana took its place. Golden-azure light, so thick it was like liquid, sparked off his Fang.

"Felix! Prey!" The Blight screamed, its once-human face twisted into a mocking replica of fangs and eerily mortal eyes. "Mine!" It lifted its arm to deflect his blow once again.

"Shut up!" Felix shouted and cast.

Reign of Vellus!

Felix's body dropped, propelled downward by his kinetic spell. The Blight recoiled, the lightning discharge harmless but surprising.

"I'm!"

Reign of Vellus!

"Not!"

Again, he pushed backward, but this time his Fang was extended like a lance.

"Prey!"

The Fang hit the beast in the gut with the sound of a thunderclap taken to eleven. Felix’s eardrums burst as golden-azure light bubbled and sparked from his weapon, now sunk to the grip in the Blight's abdomen. The creature howled with every mouth it had, and Felix something wilted within it.

But he wasn't taking chances. He wrenched open the wound and shoved a taloned hand into it.

Ravenous Tithe!

Mana and Essence poured into him, desiccating the flesh around the wound as if in time-lapse, and Felix simply fed it back into his sword. It cut deeper. Onward the power came, so much that Felix had to grit his teeth against the pain the two resources generated, traveling through his channels at once.

"No!"

The Blight screamed and swung a pendulous fist at Felix, missing him but forcing him to release his Blade. A second swipe knocked the weapon free, and the malformed creature stumbled away. Its gut was ruined by necrosis, and black veins spiderwebbed up its chest and down its thick legs. It stared at Felix with its all-too Human eyes.

Then it ran.

"Motherf—!" Felix grunted, but a heavy hand on his shoulder stopped his pursuit. Angry, he found Harn at the other end.

"Finish the job here. Then we hunt it down. Yeah?"

Felix wrestled with himself just a moment before clamping down his Willpower. He nodded. "Yeah. Finish the job."

The Revenants were still swarming, hundreds of them, but they were more manageable now that the two choristers were taken care of; the shield wall proved effective against the rank and file Primordial-Spawn, while the heavy hitters took down the Ghouls in three-on-one slugfests.

"We've got the beasts," the Hand said, wiping his brow with a dark cloth. "But...we can't do anything about that." He pointed at the Scale of the Ravager King. "You can."

"Admitting I'm useful, Reed?" Felix asked, too tired to even smile.

"You're a one-trick avum, Fiend," the Hand spat. "So go. Perform."

The man was gone before Felix could even form a response, but something in him wanted to chase him down punch some respect into his stupid face. The Hand. He only needed one, right? It’d be so easy to grab his Fang and just—No. What? Felix put a hand to his head, suddenly a little dizzy. His core felt hot, like a wildfire. Stop it, stupid Maw pieces! That’s not me!

Felix shook himself, clamping down harder with his Bastion of Will until the violent, hateful bonfire dwindled to smoldering embers. Who cared what Darius Reed thinks about me? And he isn’t wrong.

He bolted toward the Scale. Flitting above the heads of the Revenants, he was able to easily evade their clumsy attacks and landed among the twenty foot radius around the Scale. It was clear there, utterly devoid of Revenants as if they refused to go closer. Or couldn't.

It didn't matter. Felix placed his hands against the Scale. Its heat was like an open furnace times a thousand, but not actual heat. It rekindled those embers at his center, flaring in delicious counterpoint like two parts of a jagged, dissonant scream. It burned along his Spirit, perhaps even more acutely now that Pit was hurt. His poor tenku quailed within him.

C'mon bud. Just a little more. Stick with me.

Pit let out a single, steady, solid chirrup of assent.

Ravenous Tithe!

* * *

Vess nursed her leg by using her floating spears as crutches. It worked well enough to fight off Revenants, mindless beasts that they were. Their hunger made them predictable, and their relatively lower stats—compared to her, anyway—were not a true threat. At least, aside from their razor-sharp claws.

No, the true threat, aside from the mutated choristers, were the Ghouls. It took at least ten Bronze Ranks to handle one of the behemoths, and they kept coming from the darkness. Men and women died, slashed apart to simply buy more time for the stronger party members to reach their fights. Several Ghouls had been felled, but eight still held the field. Then it changed. Cal, Atar, and herself had just dispatched another when the room grew monstrously hot.

"Felix," Atar groaned beneath the weight of that heat. His face had gone ruddy and beaded with sweat. "He's doing something. I know it."

Elemental Eye!

The Mana in the room was suddenly visible to Vess, though limited. Swirls of power arced off those still fighting, as well as some of the natural features close by; but it was all of it dominated by the monstrously oppressive cloud of crimson power that hung above. Her first thought was that it was a storm building to a devastating thunderbolt, but as she watched, the storm receded. It did not calm or reduce itself, but it simply...fled.

An aura of vibrant, multi-hued light burst from the far end of the room. Well beyond the Revenants, it was near the mouth of the tunnel. At the Scale.

Felix. Be careful.

* * *

The Scale screamed within him. Or maybe that was Pit, or himself even. Felix couldn't tell any longer. Ravenous Tithe pulled an immense amount of power from the Scale. The thing was made of Primordial Essence, and each mouthful was a crumbling chunk of the Scale itself, sublimated and inhaled.

It was so much, but it didn't even scratch the sides of his capacity. Forged by his encounters with the Ravager King, Felix was in pain, but it wasn't going to kill him. He was certain of that, and so was Pit. Essence poured from his channels, a constant influx. It gathered above his core as it always did, a cloudy nebula above the sparkling solar system of his core space. And, as always, the abyss within the center of his ring core took its due.

Only this time, it was not stopping.

It was like a tornado, funneling down into the hungry emptiness within him, pieces of the Scale vanishing just as fast as they appeared. All but the Echoes of the Maw, those ruby red drops fell to the side and collected atop his core. Slowly, yet far faster than he had expected, the Scale of the Ravager King vanished entirely.

That was…distressingly easy.

Fire Within guided Felix's eyes to his core, where the scattered Echoes of the Maw coalesced into a larger whole. An amorphous blob of crimson liquid, still spinning above his ring of liquid fire, exuded a new weight to it that he could not fully describe. The larger, congealed whole trailed specks and spatters like a comet's trail as it turns in counterpoint to his core.

A thrum of discordant power pushed into his core space. Or rather it tried to: Felix flared his Bastion and severed its influence before it got very far.

Things...settled. The Essence nebula above his little solar system crackled with unreleased potential, and his Skills harmonized into a brilliant, shining song. Each vibration worked on the whole, acting as counterpoints to one another.

It was beautiful.

Then it was over, and Felix gasped a breath of true air. He looked around himself, only to find scores of Revenants running...away. They streamed back into the dark tunnel, fleeing the chamber far faster than they had arrived. Even the Ghouls were fleeing. Their Spirit, usually so hateful and visceral, conveyed only a sense of terror.

Yet when Felix looked around, all he saw was the ragged remains of their fighting force.

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

"Huh."

CHAPTER FORTY

The enemy fled. It was the first time Felix had ever seen them do something so tactical, but at that moment, he didn't care.

Pit!

Felix dove into his core space to find the curled-up form of his Companion, floating near the top of his core, just above the nebula of swirling Essence. His wings were wrapped about his own body, along with his bushy, russet tail. He was breathing, but waves of pain fed through their bond.

Are you okay, lil buddy? A hoarse chirrup came through. Felix could feel a strain on both of their Spirits, though Pit's Body had also taken quite the hit. Just rest up, Pit.

Felix came back to his senses and inspected the others. There were, surprisingly, very few casualties. The shield wall had done its job and protected the worst of the Revenant's onslaught, with only the Ghouls reaping lives as they emerged. Still. Felix heard Harn mention the names of the dead, and he couldn't help but imagine each and every one of their faces. His memory felt like a curse, at times.

Soon enough, Cal had pulled the leadership into talking strategy.

"It was a blighted trap," Yan snapped. He pointed at the Chorister of Siva, still crumpled in a heap. Her flesh was wasted, and her advancement seemed heavily damaged, but she was alive. Bodie and Kelgan stood above her, both of their weapons to hand. "She led us here to die."

"No, she led me here," Felix interrupted. "They were looking to take me. Eat me. It's what they want, from the Revenants to whatever exactly the choristers had turned into. So let's give them what they want."

"What?" Vess asked, alarmed.

"Sounds fine to me," Reed shrugged, earning himself a new glare from the heiress. "What? We scared them off for now, but they'll come back. And it didn't look like there was an end to them, either."

"The Nest is close, that is sure," Cal agreed. She swiped her hand at Felix and Reed, cutting off their conversation. "But I'm not sending people out to die, Felix."

"There were at least a hundred Revenants that fled," Harn growled. "I heard more in the dark, and I can't believe there ain't more Ghouls below, either."

"The Essence is drained from this place, but it's not gone. It's wafting up from below," Felix confirmed. "There are more of these Scales, I'm sure of it. And that means more monsters feeding off of them. It's likely how they've been multiplying. Growing stronger."

"What, exactly, is this Essence?" Kelgan asked. He looked to Cal and Harn. "You've never said."

"It's the stained touch of ancient beasts," a woman's voice interrupted. Elder Regis walked toward their huddle, her steps steadier than before. "It will rip away everything that makes you you. Replaces it with a twisted, new version slaved to its bestial nature."

"What?" Yan asked. "That was a lotta words for not tellin' me anythin'."

"It's the cast-off detritus of a Primordial," Elder Holt clarified. "A strong one, to have continued affecting the world so long after its death."

Felix winced and glanced at Harn. The man shrugged as if to say, “it was gonna come out sooner or later.”

"A Primordial?!" Kelgan gaped. "A bleedin' Night-cursed Primordial? Why aren't we all dead?"

"Dead? Why aren't we all slaverin' beasts?" Yan hissed. None of them shouted, attempting to keep their voices from their people. "Wait—is that what the Revenants are? Primordial-touched?"

"Yes," Cal confirmed, and not a few of them sucked in a worried breath. "The Revenants are Primordial Spawn, as are the Ghouls, and whatever the choristers had been transformed into. All of them have their origins in the ruptured Domain, and that is what we're trying to stop here." She looked at all of them. "Not just a monster incursion, not just a test for Authority. We aim to eradicate the source of the corruption in our midst and take back our home."

"And how do we do that? Primordials are—they are considered high-priority raze and ruin targets," the Hand said. "Standard policy is to destroy anyone who has had contact with the Primordial or its spawn, and leave no structures or resources for it to propagate." He looked at all of them, lingering on Felix with cold, hard eyes. "How could you have not told us this sooner? You have endangered us all."

"Because you are not in danger, Hand," Cal snapped. "None of us are. Do you feel that heat against your skin? Scales on your flesh? No? You have only one person to thank for that, and he's our key to winnin’ this."

"How?" The Hand asked, turning to Felix.

Felix flushed at her words, though he couldn't deny them. When everyone looked at him, he cleared his throat uncomfortably. "A Skill. I can pull all but the smallest traces of the Primordial out of people and the air. Maybe more, once I push its level higher. But you saw it in action: I removed the Scale of the Ravager from play and stopped Aslei from killing us. I can keep you safe, from the Essence at least."

"It is impossible," Elder Regis said. Her face, slightly rounded with graying temples, was haggard. "To take that Scale inside of you—"

"It works, that's all that matters," Cal interrupted. "He's fine, and because of that, we have a fightin’ chance. Are you still willing to help us, Reed?"

The Hand looked at Vess who, Felix realized with a start, was looking at him. Reed frowned at that, but nodded. "I've come this far."

"And you two?" Harn grunted at the two Elders. Regis and Holt both looked like they'd been run over by a car, but there was a fierce light in their eyes. "What d'you plan to do?"

"We..." Regis looked at Holt, who nodded. "If you would have us, we wish to aid you."

"Why should we trust them, again?" Yan said with a sour twist to his mouth. "They're the ones who caused this mess."

"We were kept in the dark regarding Teine's experiments," Holt spat. "Fairbanks and Latvere knew, and they paid with their lives."

"My husband as well," Regis said, and her voice was steady despite her watery eyes. "But the two of us knew nothing of the Domain. We only wish to right these wrongs that have been done to this city. Please. Let us help."

Harn traded glances with Cal, but Felix felt the sincerity in both of the Elders' Spirits. He was tempted to believe them, but after Aslei, he was beginning to believe there were ways to fake that emotional resonance.

"You will come with us, but you are not to act without our orders, understand?" Cal's voice brooked no argument, and the Elders gave none.

"We understand."

Things went faster after that.

The impromptu council quickly made a decision to establish a base here in the Nymean chamber and began to fortify the area. The choristers had started the process, but with their people and a number of Tin and Iron Ranks staying behind, they would be able to make it properly defensive. If nothing else, it gave them someplace secure to fall back to if things went south further on. Considering the dangers of a Nymean ruin, that was a concern to Felix.

He mentioned his worry and handed Cal one of the fallen ceiling tiles. "See the stars? It's Nymean."

"Siva's Grace, that's some luck," she laughed. "Can't say we didn't need it."

"I thought you'd be more...concerned," Felix said. Her reaction confused him a bit. "Magda told me that Nymean ruins were pretty hated."

"That's true enough. The traps we've seen would kill most below Bronze, and that's in a two-star ruin." Cal grinned. "But the chances the Revenants know how to disarm traps is wonderfully low. Could be the Nym did much of our job for us."

"Ah," Felix said. If the Revenants were wandering these halls before the choristers ever came down, then chances are they tripped just about every trap there was.

"And it also means our endgame just got a bit easier," Cal added, but she refused to elaborate. "And it changes how we go forward."

The decision was made to leave the majority of their forces behind and only bring an elite strike force further into the tunnels. That meant Felix, Vess, Atar, Harn, Cal, Bodie, and the Hand were all moving ahead, while Portia, Yan, and Kelgan stayed behind to keep the lower ranks safe. Portia wasn't going anywhere, regardless: she had too much work to do on the survivors.

Apart from the followers of the old gods, there were a number of Guilders who had been dragged down there. All of them were in bad shape, and not a few had died. Surprisingly, Felix saw Lilian among them. She was torn up and unconscious, but her Health seemed stable.

"Are you here to help or to be in my way, Felix?"

Portia had come up on Felix as he stared at the row of unconscious survivors. "What's wrong with them?"

"Heavy blood loss, concussions, and a number of other minor maladies. They could use a good cleansing, if you're up for it," she suggested. Felix didn't argue, but placed his hands into the air above Lilian.

Ravenous Tithe!

Another swirl of ambient Mana and Essence poured into him, filling his stores and swirling down into his hungry core. Felix could still sense a good amount of red lingering around the patients, but it was the best he could do for now.

"Portia, do you know anything about Spiritual injuries?" he asked.

"Some," she admitted. The pixie-haired woman gave him a searching look. "What's wrong?"

"My Companion got hurt by that monster," Felix gestured vaguely toward the guarded chorister. "And now both of our Spirits have been damaged in some way."

"Ah."

"How do I fix it?"

"I'm not entirely sure. I've only ever heard of Companions in old texts, and even then, it's not a popular subject. Research on how they work is thin, to my knowledge," Portia said.

"What? Why? They're so useful," Felix said. Without Pit, he would have died multiple times over in the Foglands or even in Haarwatch.

"Because few would trust another creature enough to share their Spirit. You split your potency the moment you form that pact. The risks are too great, and the few passages I've read on the Skill warned me away from it." Portia shook her head. "It shouldn't surprise me that you learned such a rare Skill, let alone enacted it with a Chimera of all things."

"What risks?" Felix asked, but he had an idea.

Portia cast a wave of life Mana over another patient, easing their breathing and shoring up their slowly recovering Health. "If your Companion dies, all of your Aspects will suffer. Not just Spirit. And it's even worse if you Temper with such a Skill."

Yeah. Figured that was coming. Felix snorted to himself. You and me, Pit. In it together.

Portia moved down the line, sending pulses of green-gold life Mana down and into each unconscious survivor. A flush of Health returned to many of their faces, and his Manasight spotted the vaporous power sinking into their cores before vanishing from his senses.

"Wait," Felix said, drumming his fingers on his leg. He had an idea. "Can you hit me with one of those spells?"

"It's only a minor healing meant for stabilizing the injured," Portia explained. "It will do nothing for a damaged Spirit. You would need a far more potent Mana Skill for that."

"Yeah, no, that's okay. Just hit me with it."

"Fine," she raised her left hand and gestured. "Healing Wave."

Just as before, an undulating wave of green-gold life Mana poured from Portia's outstretched hand. The moment it hit Felix's skin, it sank into him. It tried to diffuse across his body, but Felix didn't let it. He pulled at the Mana vapor and yanked it into his core. The green-gold mist hit the nebula atop his spinning ring and immediately began to mix.

Life Mana heals injuries, but with Sovereign of Flesh, I can use Essence to heal my own. Felix grabbed at the life Mana with his Will, pulling it through the storming cloud of Primordial Essence. So what if I mix them?

Distantly, Felix heard Portia's startled gasp as his flesh erupted in armored scales, but he ignored it. Grabbing handfuls of life Mana and Essence, Felix fed both into his Transcendent Skill. A burst of cooling sensation suddenly flooded his core and channels, moving along them like a refreshing breeze.

More importantly, Pit perked up. The tenku's attention drifted toward him, and Felix could feel the power cut through the pain just a little.

Felix blinked back to his physical body and found Portia staring at him in fascination. "More, if you please."

The healer startled, a flush creeping up her neck, and nodded rapidly. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, I think it's working."

Another wave of life Mana followed the last, and Felix tried again. Little by little, Pit improved, until finally they got a result from the System.

Status Condition: Spirit Damage

Spirit Damage reduced from 10% to 9%

Progress.

* * *

"Report. How is our progress?" DuFont barked.

Klark, running beside her, spoke up. He was barely breathing hard beneath his heavy armor. Eliza meanwhile was sweating atop her palanquin, and the Acolytes carrying her made for a bumpy ride. "We are moving quickly and should reach the city center within the next few minutes. Our scouts have reported some more Revenants ahead, though not nearly as many as previously."

"Very good. Let's keep up the pace."

"As you wish, Lady Inquisitor."

Split up into three groups, the Inquisition raced through the sewer system. Revenants came against them, but it was a pittance compared to the surface. Which was strange—usually there were more of the beasts beneath the streets than atop them. The creatures were distracted though, many of them on the move in the same direction as her own people.

"It's the boy," Ilia said, and DuFont stifled her urge to jump. The woman took sick delight in surprising her, Eliza was sure.

"What?"

"Felix Nevarre. The Revenants seem to hate him even more than the Inquisition," Ilia said. She glanced at the Inquisitors running just behind them. Only Daur and Rutger were with her as Heuthorn had insisted on staying with the camp—for purposes she found suspect, but couldn't gainsay. She'd allowed it, if only because there were enough loyal members of her team still up there that a mutiny was nearly impossible. That, and her other preparations.

"Ah yes, the Blue-Eyed Fiend." DuFont snorted. "Truly, you are fixed on this child."

"When I met him, he was a strange boy who survived a heavy dose of my Inevitable poison. Not only survived, he Tempered with it, on the fly," Ilia hissed. Her voice was nearly inaudible, some Sworn Skill, but Eliza could tell the woman wanted to shout. "The next time I witnessed his prowess, he was killing a dragon above this city. So yes, I find myself fixed on the rapidly strengthening combatant who has definite reason to want me dead."

Ilia huffed several heated breaths, and DuFont tilted her head in a shallow nod.

"I concede the point," Eliza graciously offered. "But if you are right, then this is good news."

"Good news?"

"The Revenants will lead us right to Felix and his people," DuFont said. She snapped her fingers, and Klark hurried closer to her.

"Yes, Lady Inquisitor?"

"Pass the word. Tell the others to follow the Revenants. Do not engage unless threatened." DuFont offered Klark a smile. "Our time is at hand."

The young Initiate swelled with pride, and Eliza could almost see the flow of his golden Mana quicken with excitement. "At once, my lady!"

"Pawns," Ilia muttered.

"As useful as any, Sworn," Eliza sniped back before increasing her pace. She could sense movement ahead and the increasingly familiar heat of the Revenants' presence. Just as reported. "Ready yourself. We need to move quickly."

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

How come no one ever said scout work was so burnin' boring?

Evie had been marching along with her "torch" for what felt like glasses, unable to leave her rigid position in the formation. It was a light jog, usually, nothing she couldn't handle. Their Endurance was almost impressive, doing it in full plate and all. Almost. They had strength enough to talk among themselves, too. Their conversations weren't exactly enlightening, but Evie learned a collection of new, Pathless-flavored curses. That was something, at least.

Combat, however, was a distant memory by that point, and it left her hands itching. They ran into Revenants often, but it was always up toward the front, far enough that she hadn't seen a lick of action yet.

Bet the others are in the heat of it right now. Evie pouted. Jerks.

But it had been her decision to chase after the spy, her decision to tag along with the dumb redcloaks. Evie couldn't blame anyone but herself, not that she didn't try.

Without warning, the Acolytes around her started running. One bumped her from behind, the one that breathed almost exclusively from his mouth. "Watch it!"

The man grunted but didn't say anything back. All of them seemed intently focused on the run.

What's going on? The increase in speed was, again, not really an issue for her unless they kept it up for another glass. Her Endurance was likely the lowest of her stats. She was more of a sprinter, after all.

"Keep on them, men! Shields out! Spears at the ready!" Nearly as one, the redcloaks took down their shields and held them close to their body. Evie was left running in her stolen cloak and helmet, nonplussed. Ahead she could hear the growling howls of Revenants, but there wasn't any sign of Skill discharge or even the sounds of fighting. They were...chasing the monsters?

Why?

No answer was forthcoming, but the chaos of their fast pace was soon evident. Not every redcloak had great Endurance, and a number of them fell behind. They tried to do it orderly-like, but the narrow sewers prevented a lot of their standard maneuvers. Taking the cue, Evie did the same and pivoted out of line to drop back. No one even glanced her way, though Mouth-Breather did grumble something.

Near the back was where the supplies were, rolling along inside a sturdy but narrow covered wagon. Evie had wanted to take a peek since they started their march. So while everyone else jostled into position, she dropped farther back, letting them overtake her before dropping into a roll beneath the wagon's girth and flaring her Stealth Skill. The wagon kept going, easily clearing her small body and allowing her to pop up behind it.

Stealth is level 47!

Grinning to herself, Evie jogged behind the speeding transport before hopping aboard. It was such a rough ride that the driver wouldn't notice her extra weight, but for good measure, she reduced it by a third.

Stealth is level 48!

Inside the canvas-covered wagon was a collection of crates and barrels, cleanly and clearly labeled. Evie's eyes lit up. She had wondered what exactly they were transporting, as most Apprentice Tier combatants could do without food and water for a goodly amount of time. And she was right; it wasn't rations or even spare weapons.

Potions. Heaps of ‘em.

Crate after crate rattled with the sound of Mana-reinforced glass. According to the labels, these weren't Tonics. They were full-fledged Healing and Stamina Potions, along with a lesser number of Mana Potions. Evie practically drooled beneath her dumb redcloak helmet.

Then her Perception snagged on something, and she peered between the stacks. There were another set of boxes, perhaps a stride in length and half that in width. All of them were stamped with a stylized flame. Evie's eyes widened, and her grin turned absolutely jubilant.

Oh, Siva's Grace, yes. This is what I need.

Shouts and screams echoed down the tunnel, far louder than before. With quick, sure movements, Evie grabbed one of the smaller boxes and hid it beneath her cloak. The shouting and howls grew louder.

Revenants. A lot of them.

With a graceful tumble, Evie slunk off the back of the wagon and back among the winded Acolytes. Ready to fight some monsters and ruin some redcloak plans.

This scout stuff is easy!

* * *

"Mervin, dear boy, come and look at this," Elder Teine said.

Mervin glanced at the others and ducked his head, hustling toward the Elder's position. Of the sewers beneath Haarwatch, this section was strangely clean. Mervin hadn't even known they existed, let alone that they were so big. They had walked what felt like leagues beneath the city, up and down twisting tunnels and forgotten, slimed-over stairwells. Each step brought them against more monsters than he'd ever seen this side of the Wall. The Bronze Ranks and what remained of their Tin and Iron Ranks had managed to beat them back once again. Now they were resting at an odd, hexagonal intersection filled with carvings.

"Do you know what these are, Mervin?" the Elder asked.

"Sigils, sir," he replied, smothering his irritation. He may have been a farm boy, but he wasn't an idiot. His father's homestead had plenty of inscribed equipment on it, though Mervin hadn't been allowed to touch it. Teine had done much for him, however. Getting mad was unacceptable.

"Not just sigils. These," Teine said with a gesture at a few fitfully glowing markings. "These are unknown sigils."

Mervin glanced at where the Elder was pointing and immediately looked away. An indescribable ache stabbed at his Mind while his Skill, Sentinel's Regard, practically screamed at him.

"Are you all right, my boy?" A warm hand set on his shoulder. "Tell me what you're feeling."

Mervin's eyes were watering, and his senses were reeling. All the while, a klaxon sounded in his head. Sentinel's Regard was an Uncommon Skill, primarily focused on identifying and responding to threats to his life and safety. It was only into Apprentice Tier, but it was Mervin's best Skill. He focused on the piercing feeling and tried to describe it. "It-it feels like an off-key squealing, sir. Right between my eyes."

"Fascinating. Off-key, you say," Teine murmured. He gestured to a Bronze Rank nearby, and they jotted something down on their scroll. "Tell me more as we walk."

"O-of course, sir."

The painful sensation disappeared after a short while, so long as Mervin avoided any other glowing sigils. Even still, they practically vibrated at the edge of his Perception. Teine grilled him for details on what he looked at, how soon he felt something, the location of the pain even now, and so on. Mervin answered as best he could until the Elder was finished.

"Hm, and how is your Temper coming, Mervin?" the Elder asked.

"Oh, I am proud to say I'm only a single Skill away from Apprentice Tier, sir!" For this, Mervin had all the enthusiasm in the world. The Elder had lavished Mervin and his friends with Essence Draughts; each of them had been given rare draughts the Elder had made himself. The four of them were all nearly Iron Rank, with only Piotr having crossed that threshold. "Thank you again for your generosity, sir."

Teine waved a hand, as if thousands of crowns in draughts was nothing. "The least I could do for such faithful guardians. You've all grown in strength quite fast, and that is worth its weight in gold. Keep doing as you are, and I'll consider my investment paid in full."

The Elder's smile was easy and kind, despite the scarring that tugged it astray. Mervin didn't fully understand the man, but his willingness to provide for his team had cemented the Elder as a superior worthy of praise.

"As I understand it, you have yourself a Perception-heavy build, yes?" Teine asked, and Mervin nodded, a little embarrassed. "I can sense you're ill at ease. Don't be! Perception is quite useful to those like us."

"Like us, sir?"

"Of course! Those who wish to see the Truth, not have it hidden away behind layers of fog and mystery." Teine grinned conspiratorially at Mervin. "When I was your age, I had earned quite a few Titles that pushed my Perception above the norm. Took quite some getting used to, though I imagine I don't have to tell you that, hmm?"

Mervin let a small smile come through. "No sir."

Teine clapped his hands. "Good. So! Tell me what you've noticed since coming to rest at this intersection. No," he said, stopping Mervin from looking around again. "What you remember, not what you notice now. Report, now."

"Yes, sir." Mervin saluted but hesitated. It was the stern look in the Elder's eye that forced the next words out of his mouth. "The intersection is clean, far cleaner than other places we've traveled. The markings—sigils—that you're inspecting are all over, on the floor, walls, and ceiling. Only a third are glowing, which I assume means they're being powered by a failing source."

"Hmm, hmm," Teine tapped his lips thoughtfully. "Anything else?"

"Oh, ah, no sir. Just that the sigils seem stronger toward the western tunnel."

Teine's eyes lit up. "Very good, Mervin. I am impressed." Mervin practically glowed at the praise, but the Elder wasn't done. "But you're quite wrong about the power source."

"What do you mean, sir?"

"It's not failing at all," Teine said, and gestured again to the strange, painful sigils. Mervin tried to glance at them all quickly, but that same squealing pain reappeared between his eyes. Still, he managed to see them at least.

The intersection was half-filled with empowered sigils.

"It-it's getting...stronger?"

"Yes, it does seem so," Teine said with what could only be a smile on his lips. Mervin stared, wondering how the man could be so calm. So...happy. "We're nearing the center. It won't be long now before we find the source of this fascinating array. I, for one, am quite excited."

Mervin couldn't say the same.

* * *

Reign of Vellus!

A blast of kinetic lightning exploded three of the seven approaching Revenants, turning them into bloody paste. The other four were merely tickled by the weakened spell and didn't so much as pause in their charge.

"Field of Flame!"

An arc of fire hit them as they ran. Immediately, they were engulfed by the spell, yellow-orange but deepening toward crimson as it ate their scaled flesh.

"Pillars of Strength!"

Stone burst from the tiled floor, shattering them as rounded pillars of rock impacted the remaining Revenants.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x7)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

"Getting tired?" Bodie rumbled, then nudged Felix companionably. The man was strong enough that the nudge would have rocked a boulder, but Felix forgot to let it budge him. "Oof! I forget how heavy you are!"

"Oh, sorry," Felix said absently, staring at the burning remains of the Revenants. "I'm more distracted than tired."

"Distracted is a good way to get dead," Atar groaned, massaging his lower back. "What's goin' on with you? Is it your pet?"

"Hmm," Felix grunted. He'd gotten his Spirit Damage down to 7%, but even with Portia's aid, it hadn't dropped any lower. Not in the time they had available. "Companion, dick."

Atar threw his arms up in the air. "As you say. Just keep your head about you, Felix. It's not just monsters we're worried about, not anymore."

Felix was frustrated, but it wasn't at Atar—at least not completely. He'd let Pit out into the world a few times since they had headed out from the previous chamber, but each time, the tenku had keened in pain. Nothing was wrong with him physically, as all of his wounds had regenerated long ago. Instead, it was the same issue as before: Spirit Damage. Only, Pit's Spirit was weaker than Felix's. So now the Chimera was sleeping it off while Converged, and Felix was scrambling to fix it.

His spells were weaker with the damage, but truly he simply hated seeing his friend in pain.

"HA! Got it!" Cal said from behind them, and Felix turned to see the treasure hunter on her knees next to the wall. She had a series of thin rods in her hands, industrial-sized lockpicks basically, and slipped them smoothly from nearly invisible grooves in the wall and floor. "Trick was to simultaneously trip them both. Holds the damn things in stasis." She snorted and swiped at something only she could see. "Even got a damn Skill level out of it. Been a while since those went up."

She looked up at the three of them.

"Any problems with the horde?"

Bodie laughed. "Not a one. Who are you asking?" He clapped Atar on the back, and the fire mage sprawled onto the ground. "Oh! Sorry, young Atar!"

"Hrmm—watch your burnin' Strength, oaf," Atar mumbled into the floor before slowly pushing himself up. Felix wasn't sure if Bodie had enough Perception to hear it, but he helped the mage to his feet quickly regardless.

"Calm down, he didn't mean any harm," Felix cautioned. Bodie's Spirit remained calm, if a shade confused. Its rhythm was a collection of timpanies against a rising glissando of flutes.

"If yer done playin' around, we've gotta move again," Harn grunted.

Cal's assumption that the Revenants would have discharged most of the Nym's traps proved to be a little optimistic. The hallway from the chorister's chamber had been fairly straightforward but was still rife with hidden dangers, many made more dangerous by the smoking corpses of Revenants scattered down its length. Four times now one or more of them had nearly been skewered by a fast-moving blade or a dropping triangular column of stone.

Once, a cloud of bright green fog had filled a six-foot-long section of the hall. The fog had utterly melted a Revenant corpse in seconds. Harn had to seal his armor completely with his weird Born Trait and slip through, though even his armor pitted and hissed. A few seconds of bashing later, and the fog dissipated, revealing Harn with his silver axe half-buried in a sigil the size of his torso. There had been no sign of the sigil before he'd destroyed it.

Moving as a smaller group had been a wise move, and not only because of the traps. They had been forced to combat isolated pockets of Revenants as well; creatures that had been left behind or walled off by discharging obstacles as the horde had fled. They were, for the most part, easy pickings. Free experience, even if they barely pushed Felix toward his next level. But it was slow going, and Felix chafed at the delay.

His senses were screaming to him that the Revenants were closing in; more and more of the miasma had started permeating the air. The Primordial Essence shuddered above, visibly disturbed every few minutes, and noticed only by Felix. His Manasight could spot it easily, but none of them save Vess and the Hand had anything similar. Theirs was called Elemental Eye, and it seemed to feed them limited Mana information, but required a large amount of Mana and concentration to operate.

Barely better than normal eyesight, Felix mused. He was a bit spoiled with his Manasight, and leveled nearly to Journeyman, it afforded him plenty more information. It was synesthesia-inducing though, often mixing his senses with the ambient Mana he sensed all around him. How the steel Mana in a blade could smell like desperation was beyond him, but it was interesting information all the same. That, he thought, looking up at the roiling clouds of Primordial Essence. That smells like hate and hunger, and it feels like a thousand spikes in my skin. And it's getting stronger.

They moved ahead, navigating the hallway at a snail's pace. Cal found and disarmed most of the traps, especially those that were mostly mechanical in nature. The more arcane ones were either found by trial and error, or Atar sniffed them out. His Skill with sigaldry was growing rapidly, and he managed to find a number of buried glyphs in the walls and floor.

Every dozen feet, more Revenants had to be dealt with, and Felix took his frustrations out on them. He murdered them all and tithed their bodies, replenishing the stores of Essence that his hungry core kept devouring. The speed at which his core was emptying his Essence nebula was alarming, so Felix made sure to replenish it as often as possible.

Each time he did, his sense of the Primordial Essence waxed brighter. Felix had noticed it happening weeks prior, but here, where the Essence was gathering and truly potent, he felt it like a thousand threads all pulling at him. It was so much like his Affinity stat, that which connected him to the world at large. Felix let himself slip into the sideways vision that let him perceive the silver strings of his Oathbindings. They did not pull at him so much as wrapped around his body like a shroud before stretching off toward his friends. Vess. Harn. Cal. He even felt Evie, though she was farther away and...

...Evie was close and getting closer. Below them, coming in from the east rapidly, along with so many other people. Headed toward—

He could also feel other connections looming ahead. Too many. Red on top of red, strings of corrupted miasma and Essence, wound tight around his soul and just as real as any Oathbinding. They pulled him in all directions, all at once; it was a sensation he found horrifyingly familiar. Of being trussed up in the dark, feeling the world itself pull at every part of him until he sat weightless and motionless between it all.

With a ragged gasp, Felix tore himself from the vision. He loosed his Bastion, capturing the sensation of connection within his central-most tower. Locked away just below the silver spire at the very top. Cut off, the overwhelming sensation of unidirectional pressure disappeared almost entirely.

Bastion of Will is level 64!

"Evie," Felix managed. Cal turned to him so fast he could have sworn she had been walking backwards. "Evie is ahead."

"What? Where?"

Felix swallowed and blinked away the image of glowing strings from his eyes. "The Nest is ahead, or else there's an army of Primordial Spawn just waiting for us for no particular reason. And Evie's headed straight for it."

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

"Strength of Many!"

Bodie's arms and shoulders swelled, ballooning with muscle in a way that was almost obscene. His empowered mace crashed into the Ghoul's leading leg, and the thing's kneecap literally exploded into red paste. It tried to scream in pain, but Cal appeared at its shoulder, and her blades tore its scaled throat out. All that escaped was a harsh gurgle, and the monster fell dead to the ground.

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Extra Contribution!

The revelation of Evie's proximity had spurred Cal forward, and she had braved the traps with a recklessness that was only matched by her skill. Catapulting herself from the falling corpse, Cal soared through the air and directly into the grasping arms of the second Ghoul. Felix was seconds from leaping into the fray himself, but the woman slipped between the brute's talons like a piece of soap. She shot upward and to the left, impacting the Ghoul's shoulder blades first and tore a jagged line across its impossibly muscled collarbone.

"She's got this," Harn said from his side, and Felix nodded, though he remained worried. He had taken a bite out of the ambient Primordial Essence in the air, topping off his reserves for the umpteenth time that hour, but it barely halted the spawns' ability to rapidly reknit flesh. The only tactic they'd found was to surround and overwhelm the Ghouls, peppering them with enough attacks that they couldn't cope or use Essence directly and circumvent their regeneration.

Cal's blades moved at a speed even Felix's Perception found hard to track, blurring in and out of the Ghoul's throat so fast it looked like it had just decided to take off its own head. Cal flipped backward off its toppling corpse, and the Ghoul crashed to the ground just like its friend.

Damn, Felix thought. Pit trilled in agreement. It may have only been the coup de grace after countless strikes, but it was still impressive.

"She is...She is a force, is she not?" Elder Regis said from his left. She and Elder Holt had mostly held back during their journey, so he didn't exactly know their capabilities. They still felt weakened, however, as before. Injured. "Perhaps she was closer to Gold than we assumed."

"Damn right," Harn said.

"Keep moving," Cal barked.

One final corner, and they reached the end of the tunnel. A pointed trefoil archway let in a bright, almost neon red light. The thing was thirty feet across and double that in height, and the carmine light damn near blinded most of them. Cal swept the area, as did Atar and Harn, but none of them found traps in the last few yards. That was a relief to Felix.

The relief, he was sore to find, did not last.

The archway led into an absolutely massive chamber that was filled with that same red miasma, like smog. At a guess, it was probably five hundred feet in diameter, distinctly circular, with winding pathways down into lower levels. Three massive statues of a human-seeming man and two women loomed from within the banks of crimson fog. They were depicted in that interesting combination of armor and robes Felix had seen before, and their heads were surmounted by thin circlets that were covered in three-pointed stars. Their arms reached out along the vaulted ceiling, until all three hands touched at the center.

Exploration is level 37!

Exploration is level 38!

"Is that a gemstone?" Harn asked, amazed. The thing held at the very center of the gargantuan stone hands was an immense, faceted stone. It looked a deep purple in the flood of red light.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Belais Crystal

Type: Mineral

Lore: Mana-responsive mineral useful as a medium for enchantments.

"Crystal," Cal corrected, eyeing it. "Belais Crystal. Biggest damn one I've ever seen."

"Used for enchantments? So are these giant statues—" Felix started.

"Don't tempt fate, Felix," Cal said. "I'll not put anythin' past the Nym, but I draw the line at fightin' golems the size of the Eyrie tower."

"Are those Nymeans?" Vess asked in a low voice. "They look so—"

"So Human," the Hand said. His voice was level, but Felix sensed tremors of a haunting melody. Was it wonder? It flickered and shut down after only a moment, though.

<Ethereal, is what I was going to say,> Vess signed at Felix. <They look like...gods.>

<I don't know. Nym mysterious,> Felix managed, his stilted handsign even harder to do covertly. He’d gotten better at understanding the vocabulary, at least.

<Like you?>

"Yes, those are Nymeans. I've seen them before," Felix said, instead of answering Vess. Then he realized how he'd phrased it. "In ruins. Murals in the Foglands."

"Fascinating," Elder Regis said. "I'd like very much to hear about these ruins. We've long held an interest in that Lost Race," she continued with a sour look up at the looming statues. "Haarwatch was founded by them, after all."

"What?" Felix asked.

"Who do you think built the Wall?" Elder Holt asked him. "Who built all this?"

"And what was it used for?" Bodie asked. "Buried underground and filled with tunnels. What's the point?"

"Nym ruins don't make a lick of sense," Cal said. "Treasure? At times. Danger always, but not a lick of sense."

"The air feels like fire," Atar hissed. "Can't you all feel it? Why aren't you more worried? Can't you sense what's below us?"

That thick miasma of red vapor was visible to all of them, apparently, as they couldn't see the bottom of the chamber, either. But Felix felt Revenants closer than ever, their collective connection tugging at him with an almost physical pressure. As they watched, the shifting miasma parted enough to make out a massive, writhing creature far below. Around it were hundreds of oval objects that seemed Human-sized. They watched as it discharged several more of them.

"That's disgusting," Cal whispered in clear horror. "Eggs."

"How many're down there?" Harn asked with annoyance. "I can't see anythin' with this fog."

It was way too far for any of their Perceptions to clear, either. They'd have to send a scout or...or Felix could have to try something. It was risky, but so was sending Cal ahead all alone.

Felix put his hand out into the coil vapor, thicker than ever before, and sent his Will and Intent coursing along its connected parts.

Mine. But not all of you. Just. You.

Ravenous Tithe!

A storm of Essence and Mana thundered through his channels, but as before, he fed it directly into his endless abyss at the center of his core ring. It took all of the Essence and Mana without complaint, only the soreness of his channels witnesses to its passage. The blob of crimson liquid above his core seemed just a touch bigger.

"Look!" Bodie murmured. "The fog is shifting!"

The lot of them craned their heads carefully over the edge of the narrow platform to peer below again, Felix included. The red miasma had indeed thinned, though it still clung heavily around the edges of the chamber. The writhing thing was almost exactly what Felix feared.

Name: Larval Broodmother

Type: Primordial-Spawn

Level: 23

HP: 8473/8473

SP: 233/286

MP: 0/0

Lore: A new creation, like the Ghoul, these are a mutation as a result of power and Primordial Essence mixing without restraint. Beware.

Strength: Strength of the Horde. Its children are its strength.

Weakness: Mobility. It cannot move from its current position.

Somehow Felix knew the Broodmother’s Strength and Weakness, though all other creatures he was forced to fight and learn about. Was it because he’d killed so many Revenants? The thing was clearly weaker than the usual Primordial-Spawn, but its Health was insane. Felix shared what he knew, but he was sure only Cal was listening. At that exact moment, several of the darker-colored eggs ripped apart and released goo-covered Revenants, fully grown and screaming. Voracious Eye still active, Felix saw the Broodmother’s level rise to 24.

Those newborns stumbled and ran into the waiting arms of an entire horde. Someone gasped. Thousands of Revenants filled the chamber's floor, a living carpet of rusty red scales and putrescent yellow flesh. Worse, studding the vast crowd were dozens of Ghouls.

Felix thought that some of them looked up. At him.

"If that's not the Nest, I don't know what is," Bodie said. "Nasty."

"And deadly," Vess contributed. "I do not know if it is wise to assault this force."

"What? We turn back?" Cal said, glaring at the heiress. "When we're this close?"

Felix considered his satchel and the grenades within. "What if we—"

"Authority doesn't help us if we're dead," Atar said through a groan. He was cradling his arms as if they had been injured. "Can't you feel that heat? None of us will last long in here, not with this amount of Primordial Essence in the air."

Felix tried again. "I have—"

"Felix where is Evie?" Cal asked, her eyes flashing.

Felix frowned, but felt along his connection to his friend. He could feel her advancing on their position rapidly, but she didn't feel directly below them. Not yet. "She's close. Lower than us too...I think. It's hard to tell."

"If Evie is down there, then so am I," Cal spat. "I'm not losing her."

"Foolish. You'd throw our lives away for one child?" Reed hissed back at her. "You—"

"I've got bombs!" Felix half-shouted, then clenched his jaw, afraid that the sound carried. Everyone turned to look at him in varying degrees of surprise and consternation. He reached into his satchel and pulled out a handful of palm-sized stones. Each one was heavily inscribed. "I've got bombs."

"What's the Tier?" Cal asked, her eyes flicking between the bombs and Felix's gaze. "How much damage can they cause?"

"Uh, Tier? I'm not entirely sure. I've only tested a few of the smaller ones, but they made a sizable dent in the cobble streets," Felix said. He Eyed the stone around the ceiling. "That crystal is surrounded by granite, hard, but I think I can break it apart."

"And drop it on the Broodmother," Vess said, glancing over the edge again. "The Quest never said we had to kill all of the Revenants, did it?"

"No," Cal said slowly. "It just says 'seek out and destroy the Nest.' Like a Domain, destroy the core and destroy the Nest. I’d bet my life the Nest’s core is in the Broodmother. That—Blind gods, that could work."

"It's central to the room," Reed said, glancing up at the crystal. "It'd take some angling to actually hit your target. Can you manage that?"

Felix met the man's eyes and nodded. He was sure. "I've got a few ways to make it happen, yeah."

The Hand smirked. "Good. Then get on up, Fiend. Save us the trouble of having to fight an entire Domain's worth of monsters."

"Revenants will rush us the moment he's noticed," Harn pointed out. "Be ready."

Shadow Whip!

Shadow Whip!

Shadow unspooled from Felix's hands, and he rolled his shoulders. He could climb the curving ceiling, Tarzan style. Though an easier way would be to summon wings from Pit. But can he handle that?

He checked on his Spirit. On Pit, who was still curled up and whimpering in pain.

...No. Shadow Whip it is.

Screams sounded from below. Human screams.

"Twin's teeth, what is that?" Cal hissed. "Are there people—?"

Explosions of fire and golden light Mana splashed across the horde, the angle suggesting it came from outside the chamber but on the same level. The miasma had partially restored itself, so it was hard to tell, but the howls of Revenants suggested an attack.

"That's Inquisition magic," Harn said. "They've come, too."

"Good! An excellent distraction!" Elder Holt said with a vicious sort of satisfaction. "Let the monsters chew on white armor for a while."

Felix's Affinity twisted as the Revenants became further enraged. But among them, he felt the thickening silver thread of his friend. His stomach dropped. "Evie's down there!”

Cal's wide amber eyes met his own, and Felix saw a naked terror in them. He didn't need to hear her Spirit; he knew Cal well enough to guess what would happen next.

"Are you sure?!" Vess asked. "I don't have the range to hit anything from this height!"

"I do, but I'll run out of Mana well before I actually make a difference here," Atar protested.

"We have to get closer. Now!" Cal ordered, and checked her long daggers at her side. She had a brace of throwing daggers across her chest and down each leg as well.

"What? That's suicide!" Atar said.

"Come with me, or stay up here, your choice, mage! Same goes for all of you! I can't make you come with me, but if my....if Evie's down there, then that's where I gotta be." Cal turned to the sloping path down. It followed the curve of the chamber, terminating somewhere in the middle of the mess below.

Harn readied his axes, and Bodie hefted his mace and shield. There was no question in their stances as they followed.

"Calesca," Elder Regis called out, and Cal half turned to her. The Elder's hands swirled with a deep wash of black and gray Mana vapor and six dark hounds emerged from those swirls, each one the size of a Great Dane. Elder Holt stepped forward and inscribed a series of electric blue sigils in the air, too fast for Felix to catch more than symbols for force and wall. The sigils fused together into a glyph then zipped toward the shadow hounds, each complicated inscription striking their foreheads and sinking in. "I'll lead the charge, if you don't mind."

"After you," Cal said with a grim smile.

The shadow hounds ghosted past them, now limned by a crackling blue light. They made no other sounds as they raced down the spiraling path.

"Felix, get a move on. Else I won't save any for you," Harn said.

"I am going, too," Vess stated. Her spears hovered around her, along with Felix's Blade of the Fang. "Whether you like it or not," she said to the Hand.

"I can't protect you down there, Vessilia," Reed protested. More explosions and furious screaming sounded. The rattle of armor was almost overwhelmed by the caterwaul of monstrous howls.

"I don't need your defense, Darius. I need your blade at the front," Vess' eyes flashed dangerously. "But if that is all you understand, then know I am going to be in the thick of it, and I may die. Protect me or face failure, Hand of the Duke."

"...Fine," he growled. "At least, if I'm dead, your father can't kill me."

Felix grinned at the relief on Vess' face. She was more worried than she let on. He was, too. For her, for all of them.

"Vess," he started, but his words dried up in his throat. She turned to him. "Save Evie, yeah?"

It happened fast, but the spearwoman suddenly had her arms around Felix. She hugged him tightly. She felt like steel armor and leather padding, and all he could smell was the blood and gristle they'd waded through to get there. But...it was nice. He hadn't been hugged in a long time.

"Be careful, Felix. I forbid you to die."

Felix offered her a lopsided smile as they came apart. "I'll try my best."

"Ahem."

The both of them disentangled their arms, and she blessed him with one of her dimpled smiles before hefting her spears and trotting off. The Hand watched Felix a beat longer, then he, too disappeared down the path.

"Right." Felix re-summoned his Shadow Whips and swung them at the ceiling above him. With a leap, he was able to reach a higher point, and the ends of it attached to the textured ceiling. Swinging a bit, he took a breath and pushed off the wall and out into the open air.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

It was chaos.

Evie rolled beneath the lumbering swing of an Acolyte at the same time she scooted away from the flashing claws of a Revenant. She had hoped to see some action, bored as she was, but this was proving to be entirely too much.

The leaders of her hunting party had followed a pack of Revenants as they had loped off into the distance, just barely able to keep up with the beasts. Soon enough, they had led them to another open tunnel, where the Primordial Spawn had stopped.

Their lines had clashed almost immediately upon entering the wide causeway. It was nearly sixty paces across, more a road than sewer tunnel, though it certainly smelled like one. Offal and waste clogged the air, competing with the burning crimson sensation of that invisible Essence. She hadn't felt it so strongly since she had left the Domain, and that was likely because the causeway had been filled with Primordial Spawn.

Acolytes had moved quickly, forming orderly ranks and hefting their polearms. The leading Initiates unveiled their enchanted fire blades and had ordered an immediate charge. Caught up, Evie had little else to do but go with the flow.

She quickly regretted it.

Should have stayed in the back! Evie rolled over the corpse of an Acolyte and pulled and threw the dead man's side blade in one smooth motion. It flew true between two struggling redcloaks and right into the craw of a screaming Revenant, not killing it but doing heavy damage.

Thrown Weapon Mastery is level 31!

Cal would be so proud.

"Supply line!" An Initiate shouted from ahead, and Evie spun. She caught the wagon being pulled forward by heavily armored avum, but the redcloaks had a time getting the damn birds to come closer to the horde. Evie felt a powerful urge to raid that wagon again and get out of there. "Acolytes! Run for potions! We need healing!"

"Healing? We need the incendiaries!"

The Revenants pressed closer, and the front line of Acolytes started to bend inward. The press of the monsters was too great. Evie knew they couldn't last long.

"Inquisitors!" Came another shout from beside her, and Evie pivoted again so she could look. "On the left!"

Across the huge, arched tunnel was another entrance, perpendicular to their position. A flurry of orange Mana vapor bloomed from the tunnel, and three Inquisitors in full battle regalia came in like a firestorm. Literally. A tornado of flames ripped into the assembled Revenants, catching them from the flanks and hurling their charred bodies in every direction. Something slammed the ground, and six blazing lines of fire raced through the horde, searing scaled flesh with impossibly hot death. Behind those lines came a woman in white armor, her head held high and without a full helmet, as if she were marching into a party.

"DuFont," Evie snarled.

The former Guild Elder thrust her hand casually forward, and her golden gauntlets flared with yellow light. Another line of flame exploded a section of the Revenants, leaving nothing more than chunks and bone. Yet the explosion also cleared the way for the charge of an enraged Ghoul. It bellowed in challenge, and, for a moment, Evie reveled in the idea of the woman getting trounced.

DuFont met the thing head on, dodging its massive punch and snapping the beast's elbow. The crunch was so loud she heard it clearly above the battle. A circle of yellow sigils surrounded her gauntlets before discharging into a weird, blurry flare-up. The Ghoul's elbow caved in, and its skin baked and ripped apart, but she didn’t see any fire.

DuFont's got heat magic? Piss and blood, Evie cursed as she dodged between Revenant claws. Heat magic was notoriously hard to combat, and mostly invisible to boot. Where's Felix when you need him? Or even Pit. I could do for some cold magic to ruin her day.

"GRUAAAAWWWUGH!"

While she was distracted, a Ghoul slammed through their lines just ahead. Evie tried to backpedal, but Acolytes with halberds blocked the way. No Initiates were anywhere close, and the line of battle had pushed ahead. She was safe, but not for long. The idiots behind her were shaking in their boots.

Where'd it go? The wagon she'd looted had thundered forward, pulled closer to the fighting by a mad charge of terrified avum. It plunged into the Revenant lines and was soon swarmed by the fighting. Evie could only barely make out its covered top before the press of white armor and rust-red scales took her attention. Blind gods! Okay! I can't do anything here; these morons are doomed. Time to go!

The Ghoul tore a hole in their defensive line. Halberds stabbed at it, but at best, they simply got stuck as the creature's flesh regenerated around them. They weren't doing enough damage to it. What they did accomplish, however, was to send it into a powerful rage. The thing's maw, taking up most of its head, spat thick spittle as it roared and swung its ape-like forearms with shattering results.

Blighted amateurs! Disgusted, Evie reached down and snatched another short blade from a dead redcloak and looked behind her. A handful of the white-armored zealots were shaking in their boots, staring at the thing. Stupid monster is in the way. If I'm getting outta here, I need bodies.

"Listen up! We're gonna charge that Ghoul, now," she shouted in her best leader voice and tucked her stolen red cloak around her armor. A few of the men and women behind her still stared into the roiling chaos of battle. She snapped her fingers in their faces. "Hey! Follow me! You'll be fine! Probably! Arms up, double time! Let's go!"

Evie took off at a jog, reducing her mass to save on Stamina and slipped between the thrashing edges of the redcloaks. Behind her, she could hear the Acolytes start moving, their discipline and lack of leadership driving them forward. Just as she had hoped.

"We're taking down the Ghoul!" Evie held the short sword to the side, only knowing the very basics of its use and determined not to let it trip her up. "It heals fast! Distract it! I'll take it from there!"

As they drew close, several other Acolytes were hurled across Evie's path, but she leaped nimbly over their flying corpses. She didn't even slow down, though a few of the ravaged bodies hit her followers. Not gonna be the last thing they get hit with.

The Ghoul loomed ahead, still howling into the crowd of frightened redcloaks. As she drew closer, Evie marveled at just how big it was—far bigger than the Ghouls she'd faced up above. It had been the one to hurl those corpses at them, and it wasn't done. More wide, sweeping swings of its fists sent recloaks flying in all directions. Pikes and halberds and spears all stuck in the abominations' flesh and spells of fire, and light crashed against its natural armor like waves on a beach.

But it's hunched. Protecting its belly. To the Acolytes behind her, she shouted, "Shoot at its abdomen! Core shots! Use your light thing!"

"Diurnal Reach?" One of them asked, breathlessly.

"That, too! Fire!"

It spoke to their stress and fear that the redcloaks didn’t hesitate. A volley of bright, golden bolts shot from behind Evie, causing her to yelp. It was way more than she expected. Glancing back, she saw that a whole damn company was following behind her, just as a second volley of bright bolts shot out.

"GREEEAAAAAAAAAKKK!" The Ghoul screeched in obvious pain, hunching farther as more than a few of the barrage hit its weaker underbelly.

Now! Evie grabbed the bottle from within her cloak and hurled it. It flew straight and true, thanks to her Dexterity, passing between the nasty thing's teeth. A muffled explosion sent the Ghoul rocking backward, and a wash of flames poured from its half-closed mouth. It let out a choking scream and stumbled.

Manawarped Ghoul is Dazed!

"Fire again!" Evie yelled. She could see the wagon, just beyond the Ghoul. She could make it.

"Diurnal Reach!" A hundred voices rattled off the same spell, and the field became engulfed in a golden radiance.

Evie ran forward, whipped her cloak back from her legs, and dropped into a slide. The hard leather plates on her thighs and knee scraped across the even tiles, and her Agility did the rest. She zipped through the Ghoul's legs like a shot.

Yeah! She had made it through. The wagon was only a dozen strides away, and the Revenants were pushed back. She'd done it.

Then something slammed into her back, hurling Evie from her knees and into the thinning pike line ahead. Pain hit, like fire in the veins. Frantically, she reduced her weight and twisted her body, able to evade most of the spears, but not the shield wall. She hit hard.

Ough. That's-that's gonna bruise.

"GAAAARRRRUUUEEEEKKK!"

The Ghoul charged for her, regardless of the hail of light bolts that drilled through its flesh. It knew who had hurt it and was smart enough to know about revenge.

Great, she thought, rolling drunkenly to her feet. Her bell felt well rung. Burnin' redcloaks can't even distract one Ghoul.

Her chain dropped from her shoulder, unspooling onto the ground with a resounding thud.

"I'm done playin', then."

* * *

"My god, it's a massacre," Piotr whispered.

Mervin swallowed sour bile and tried to force his stomach to quit heaving. It wasn't particularly effective, though he had little left in his guts to empty. He'd wasted much of it in the twisty tunnels they'd just escaped. Their group was much reduced by the sickening traps that were everywhere. Once they had crossed the secret entrance in the sewers, the one Teine had found, it was as if Avet himself was putting his vile finger on their spines. Men and women died to clouds of acid, hidden blades, and crushing pitfalls. Once, they faced a field of lightning so strong he could still smell the char one of the Bronze Ranks had become.

Mervin shuddered. What laid before them was even worse than what they had just endured.

Over the thick, ornately carved railing, a thick, red fog drifted in massive clouds. Apart from the huge statues and winding pathways down, all that drew their attention was the flash and burn of Mana Skills and weapons below. Thousands of Revenants clawed and roared, so far down that simply looking made Mervin a little dizzy.

They were hard to see through the fog, but a group of people, only a few, were facing off against the horde. Power swirled around them so strongly that his Sentinel's Regard flared hot, a sure sign of extreme danger. Revenants fell before them like wheat before the scythe, a clutch of shadowy beings taking point.

"They're tearing them apart," Lars marveled. "Whoever they are, they're at least Adept Tier."

"Won't last long," Garin muttered and gestured at what was clearly the Nest. "Against that? Not even our Elder would survive with so little support."

"Look! Sir!" A Bronze Rank pointed over the edge. "Are those Inquisitors?"

A wash of golden flame came from a tunnel they could just barely see, and new swathes of Revenants perished in an instant. More flashes of light and the distant clang of weaponry drifted from below.

"Ah, so all the players have arrived," Elder Teine said. His voice was a little tight, and maybe he leaned a little heavily on his cane, but he was in good spirits. He glanced below at the white-armored figures just barely peeking into the central chamber. "I do hope they brought more than that."

Only moments after he said it, more armored soldiers poured in from side passages, cutting into the frenzied throng. They met plenty of opposition, however. Ghouls were demolishing everything in their way, and there were hundreds of them.

"Pathless forfend," Mervin whispered to himself. "What have we walked into?" He looked up from the killing fields and panned the gargantuan chamber. It felt bigger than anything he'd ever seen in his life, save the mountains themselves. Huge statues were carved with incredible detail up the sides, and in the center there—wait. What is that?

A flurry of shapes swarmed the ceiling, hidden before by the crevices and their own bony appearance. They had wings of bone and ropy tendons and were very familiar, however: Rooks. A weak, flying variety of the Revenant creatures. But something else was up there, something with two long, strange arms.

"Sir?" Another Bronze Rank said, pointing up. "Sir, what is that?"

Mervin focuses his Sentinel's Regard. The whole of the room was a wash of danger that he couldn't even begin to parse, but as he focused his Perception on the figure, he felt his Regard tilt wildly. Mervin's vision went white as a keening sound tore through his Skill, and his knees almost gave out in terror. If a Revenant was a mad beast, and those Ghouls were death walking, then that thing on the ceiling was something else entirely.

A blast of blue-white lightning sent two dozen Rooks falling from the sky, and Mervin gasped in sudden recognition.

It's him. Felix. The Blue-Eyed Fiend.

"Siva, you have graced me with your light," Elder Teine murmured in smug satisfaction. "The Fiend has joined the battle! Now things are getting interesting!"

* * *

Hanging from the ceiling was more screaming in terror than Felix had anticipated, and his expectations hadn't been very high.

"AHH!"

Swinging wildly on his Shadow Whip was a visceral experience, more so when being attacked by a hundred flying murder birds that had somehow hidden among the rocky crags. They had burst to violent action the moment he’d drawn close, clawing and pecking with abandon.

"Get away!"

Reign of Vellus!

A blast of lightning and kinetic force demolished a chunk of the nasty things, but it felt like there were always more to take their place. Twisting his body to avoid several dive-bombing him, Felix flared his Unfettered Volition and shot out a new Shadow Whip. He couldn't keep his movement Skill running all the time, or else he'd run out of Mana trying to handle so many spells at once. If he were on the ground, that wouldn't be much of an issue, as his regeneration was insanely fast by this point.

A lot harder to manage Mana when it's the only thing keeping me from falling to my death. Felix’s sweat poured down his back, trickling beneath his shirt, before it was wicked away by the wind of his passage. He swung low then back up toward the ceiling again, just barely brushing it with his head before throwing his other Shadow Whip forward. The ends of the Whips could expand and grasp things, a trick he'd learned a long time ago. Lucky for him, the Nym had left the ceiling filled with natural textures and crags; it was easy to find purchase, swing-to-swing.

Reign of Vellus!

Another blast of Mana shot out, frying yet more Rooks that were beginning to try Felix's patience. They weren't a true threat to him, but they were a distraction. And he had enough of those.

Evie. Vess. He looked down, searching for them in the morass of violence below him. A thrill of dizziness and fear crackled through his instincts, but Felix muscled it down with a nudge of Willpower. He couldn't afford to be afraid of heights, even if it was extremely reasonable in this particular situation. They'll make it. They have to.

One final swing got him to the huge, purple crystal, and Felix had to make a quick decision.

Sovereign of Flesh!

His skin erupted in scales and plates while his fingers burst into black talons. Shunting a portion of his Essence into them, they pierced the granite around the giant crystal while his enchanted boots found easy purchase against its lightly textured side. Felix wedged himself in the gap between the ceiling and the stone, surprised that there was such a large space at all. The whole thing was far bigger than he had estimated. From the tunnel, it had looked to be the size of a two-story house, but up close, Felix realized that it was more than five times that size.

Holy shit. Pit, you seeing this?

Within, his Companion shifted and chirruped tiredly. Felix felt that the tenku was stronger, but their Spirit Damage remained.

Focus. Felix snapped his attention back to the expanse of purple crystal before him. Reaching into his bag, he freed one of the many rudimentary grenades he had created. They were little more than rocks that he'd heavily Inscribed with force and fire sigils, along with an array connecting them all into a greater whole. Pure simplicity. Once they were fed enough Mana, they'd explode and hopefully tear holes big enough to knock this thing out of the ceiling. Felix regarded the crystal and the small stone in his claws.

Gonna need to use all of them, I think. He had exactly twenty-four, as the twenty-fifth one had been used to test this batch. Not much more could fit into his satchel. It was enchanted for self-repair, not infinite space, unfortunately. He reached out and notched the granite with his talons, creating a narrow groove he could wedge his grenade into. With a little push, it fit well enough. As long as it doesn't fall out.

Screams echoed from below, terribly distant but nonetheless galvanizing. He had to hurry.

There. Twenty-three to go.

The only warning Felix had was a rush of vibration, but his senses screamed at him. He shoved off of the ceiling and out into the open air, just as a huge bolt of bright green Mana hit the crystal. And his grenade.

Shit!

The world exploded.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

Vess' heart roared in her ears.

Those last few strides, just before their relatively tiny force hit the encroaching horde, Vess was viscerally reminded of their fight through the Domain keep. The fear and scent of burning blood was the same, even the glimmer of metallic Mana from Harn's steady axes. Though Vess held her spears at the ready, though she trained all her life for combat, she could not help the chill that crawled along her spine. Racing up the path toward them, the horde was as implacable and as furious as a thunderstorm.

But this was not the Domain.

Their force hit the horde, and the storm broke before them. Sounds too loud to parse, howls and clashing blades all transformed into a thunder that swept the abominations away. Backed by allies who were all High Journeyman or Adepts, it was a massacre of Primordial flesh.

At their head, Shadow Hounds ripped the Revenants to grisly pieces, their incorporeal bodies slipping through attacks just as the lightning sigils fried those nearby. The Elders might not be Master Tier any longer, but they were still Adepts and strong. Elder Regis not only controlled the hounds but also hurled clouds of shadow that screamed across the battlefield. All monsters caught within boiled alive. Elder Holt, meanwhile, was hurling fields of lightning that raced from Revenant to Revenant, searing out their eyeballs and leaving only charred ruin behind.

Cal was a ghost, flitting between enemies so fast it was impossible to track her. Even with her upgrades to Perception and her Elemental Eye, Vess was hard-pressed to even see what Cal was doing, but the abominations fell before her just as quickly as the Elders.

Bodie and Harn were two peas in a pod, wrecking balls that tore into the bodies massed before them. Corpses were flung, split into pieces, or pulped into toothy messes, themselves becoming projectiles the horde had to evade. Atar followed behind them, his head once more surmounted by his Crown of Ignis, and Sparkbolts flying from his fingers. Six or seven of them spun in a tight, protective circle around the mage, and any Revenant that encountered it screamed in agony as their scales and muscle and fats were melted. He had truly grown in strength since the Domain. Vess would have been impressed were she not faced with a thousand opponents at once.

"Down!"

Vess ducked just before a blade as wide as her body whipped above her. The six-span blade caught the face of a charging Ghoul, shearing its jaw from its repulsive face. Vess activated her Dragoon's Footwork and evaded the gigantic body that collapsed before them, two of her spears already fending off three other Primordial-Spawn.

"You let that get entirely too close, Darius!" Vess shouted.

The Hand spun in a dizzying arc and decapitated several Revenants before discharging a blast of wind that ripped the feet out from thirty more. He grunted but managed an annoying smile. "Hard to protect you in a pitched battle, Lady Dayne."

"Do better," Vess growled before leaping.

Pierce the Sky!

Dragon's Descent!

Vess rocketed upward, her Born Trait and Skills propelling her to immense heights, before she and all of her spears came down with calamitous force. Right onto the prone Revenants.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x7)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Pierce the Sky!

Spear of Tribulations!

An explosion of air Mana obliterated those monsters she had not killed outright, until the field before them was a whirlwind of blood and dark meat.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x34)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

"Indeed," the Hand remarked, using his own air Mana Skills to keep the effluvia from his armor. He pointed to some Revenants struggling to their feet. "You missed a few."

Vess scowled, but turned back to the fight. Just in time to see a bloom of flame in the distance, and, above the approaching multitudes, a figure leaping through the air.

Attached by a chain.

"Evie!" Vess shouted.

From nowhere, Cal appeared beside the heiress. Her eyes tracked Vess' own, and she snarled. "We go!"

"Cal! Hold to—! Noctis' tits!" Harn cursed, coming up beside them. Bodie and the rest weren't far behind. "C'mon! We're plowing our way through!"

"This is foolish," Darius muttered, looking upward. "If that boy drops that crystal on us, I'll be hard-pressed to save any of us, let alone you. We should turn back."

But Vess was already running. Her friend was in danger, and that was all that mattered.

* * *

Stone fell all around Felix as he plummeted from the sky. Two more green bolts of Mana sizzled past him, but he fell faster than they had anticipated, and they all flew too high. Felix had a moment to marvel at the large chunks of rock that fell with him, and his eyes picked up on the eight-foot-wide hole in the stone ceiling.

It worked!

Shadow Whip!

The congealing length of shadow snapped outward, but it was too short. Felix couldn't reach the ceiling or the walls. He tried dual casting it, but he fell too fast.

Reign of Vellus!

A blast of lightning and kinetic force shot downward, arresting his fall for an all-too-brief moment. But there was only air around him, nothing solid to push against, and he was entirely too heavy for air to be enough. The same was true when he tried his anemically leveled Cloudstep. The Mana scattered the moment his speeding body hit it, dispersing in a crackling cloud.

Shit shit shit shit! Pit! Wake up!

Emerald-colored bolts rained all around him, now joined by blue and yellow and orange Mana. The ground rushed upwards faster and faster, the ant-sized horde below growing at an alarming rate. Unless Felix wanted to test himself against terminal velocity, he only had one choice left.

Pit! I need to do this, bud!

Dimly, within the recesses of his Spirit, his Companion gave a short, consenting chirp.

God, I hope this doesn't hurt you! Felix thrust his arms out to the side.

Ravenous Tithe!

Crimson vapor streamed into him, clearing the air around him for hundreds of feet as Essence and Mana raged within. His core began to digest it immediately, but Felix had other plans.

Sovereign of Flesh!

The scales around his body thickened and darkened, while Essence burned through him to fuel it. The ground surged upward, only a hundred feet away.

Etheric Concordance!

Pit shrieked in terrible, crushing pain.

Without warning, Felix's shirt tore from his body, rent asunder by the emergence of two massive wings. It was only his third time using them, but his Body knew what to do. Spread wide, the wings caught the air around him and slowed his descent rapidly until Felix arced his body and flapped. The Revenants below howled in recognition and fury as Felix banked hard, swooping past their flailing claws and back up, into the air.

"Holy shiiiiiit!" Felix screamed, fear and exhilaration warring for dominance. His wings were easily twenty feet wide, tip to tip, bat-like but half-covered in ebon and crimson feathers, all threaded through with a glowing cyan. He pumped his wings and rose, shot powerfully into the recovering miasma like a deranged bird.

Blasts of rich, green light ripped through the miasma, hunting him.

Who the hell is attacking me? Felix banked again, flapping harder to get back up to the crystal. But he was foiled, forced to dive and twist to evade the barrage of Mana attacks. He ate those he could, Ravenous Tithe ripping the Mana from their Skill-borne shell, but they were too much for him to eat wholesale. Whoever it is, they're powerful.

Taking a risk, Felix plunged through a thicker cloud of Primordial Essence and emerged into clearer air. Below yet hundreds of feet in the distance, he could see a row of armored men and women atop a landing almost identical to his. Even from this distance, his eyes had no trouble seeing the medallions they wore, even before his Voracious Eye identified them all.

Guilders, I should've figured. And, Felix swooped below another green scythe of energy. And that's Elder Teine. Shit.

Close after Teine's shot, a new bombardment of spells ripped from their ranks. Those blue, yellow, and orange bursts of Mana flew fast and true, so many that he couldn't avoid them all. Felix winced at the first hit, but they were far weaker than the green spells; they splashed against his transformed skin, barely able to penetrate enough to tick his Health down more than a few points.

That bastard is Master Tier though, why—Felix blinked. Why does he feel weaker? What happened to all of the Elders?

Among the Guilders, Felix sensed a thread, this one blue and green-gold, extending powerfully toward one of the figures below. Information grabbed by his Voracious Eye came to Mind as he wove around the attacks, categorized and flipped through in rapid time.

Mervin, Felix realized. The kid from the woods.

The kid was one of the few not attacking, and maybe that was because he didn't have a ranged weapon, but something told Felix that wasn't it. Felix couldn't sense anything from their Spirits, not from so far away. Yet, when he tried, he gets flashes of something from the boy: fear and unease prime among them, along with concern for Felix.

And through that thread, like distant echoes, he heard the sound of Teine's voice. "I want him alive! Do not damage his core!"

Great. That's not ominous. Felix banked hard and swept back into the thicker clouds of Essence. The Essence felt warm and comforting against his scales, his Body repairing itself under its influence. Felix took another chunk for his stores and to keep his transformation going, before flapping hard for the crystal once again.

"He's...eating the mists! How!?" There was a pregnant pause, before he shouted again. "What are you doing? FIRE!"

Teine's words echoed in Felix's head, transmitted along his connection to Mervin. As annoying as it was, Felix didn't want to be surprised, he kept his senses—and the connection—open. He was safe enough, tucked behind the crystal's bulk. Their Mana bolts hit the crystal and sank into it harmlessly.

Sheltered, he fumbled out his grenades and placed them as quickly as he could. No longer forced to wedge himself to the stone, Felix put all twenty-three grenades along the far side of the crystal. The primary issue, however, was that the near-constant barrage prevented him from placing grenades evenly around the entire thing. When he set them off, it would be lopsided.

I just hope it's enough. Felix glanced down, far, far below, and saw the approach of the Inquisition through the chamber as well as his own team's smaller assault. C'mon. Get Evie and get outta there.

* * *

"Inquisitor!"

"What!" DuFont didn't bother turning, driving her gauntleted fist into another Ghoul's face before activating the enchantments on them. Blistering heat bored through the creature's weakened skull until it burst beneath her Strength.

You Have Killed A Manawarped Ghoul!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Extra Contribution!

"Ma'am, the Guilders are here!" Klark shouted, his burning blade fending off several of the lesser beasts nearby. "They're firing off their Skills!"

That did grab Eliza's attention. She twisted until she had a clear view up through the burning fog. It was enough to see a multicolored light show streaming across the top of the chamber, perhaps hundreds of spans away. The bolts weren't firing at them, which was a relief, but instead they were being sent...up.

DuFont gasped.

There was something with massive wings flying near the ceiling, but what truly set her eyes gleaming was the absolutely gargantuan Belais Crystal it hovered around. With that much crystal, she could buy a small kingdom. She could—Eliza shook her head and dismissed the thoughts. She hadn't the time for greed, though a part of her quailed at the thought of leaving it behind.

"They're not attacking us, and that's all that matters at the moment," DuFont shouted back at Klark. The boy was a useful aide, but he worried entirely too much. "Focus on the fight. We need to push forward, toward that!" Eliza gestured to the squirming mass of the Broodmother, still churning out eggs amid the chaos. "We kill that, we claim the Nest! New marching orders! We push for the Broodmother!"

That Authority will be mine!

* * *

Dervish!

Evie's chain whirled around her body, blowing her cloak back in a wind of cold steel. The spiked chain met the claws of the onrushing Ghoul and batted them aside before wrapping tight around its leading arm.

"You shoulda kept fighting the redcloaks!" Evie shouted, before spinning and applying her leverage. The weight of the stone beneath their feet flowed through her and into her weapon, becoming three times as heavy. The Ghoul was caught off-balance and fell atop its own tangled limb.

Bindings of the White Waste!

Four more chains, these made of purple-white Mana, shot from the ground and into the Ghoul's prone flesh. The creature bellowed in pain.

"Stay down!" Evie hissed and blurred forward. She flipped over the Ghoul's struggling form, landing on its back. She stabbed downward with the short sword still in her off hand, but the tip skittered off the beast's armored hide. "UGH! Ghouls are the worst!"

Scorpion's Tail!

Beneath her, the Ghoul let out a wail of pain as her Skill reshaped the spikes on her chain into longer, jagged blades. It wasn't a Skill she made much use of, but she liked it a lot.

Scorpion's Tail is level 44!

Not bad, not bad. Evie grinned.

Then, abruptly, the world was inverted.

"GRAAAHHHH!"

Exploding upward, the Ghoul surged with immense Strength and hurled Evie straight into the air.

"AHH BLIGHT!" Evie hollered. She was thrown up and behind the Ghoul, but her mad ascension was cut short by the very chain that she still clung to; more importantly, it still clung to the Ghoul. For a brief, strange moment, she hovered in midair.

Then she stole back the weight from her chain, put it into herself, and pulled.

Scorpion's Tail!

The Ghoul screamed in pain as the elongated blades dug further into its flesh, and when the chain began ripping up its belly and shoulders, it went mad with agony.

*KRUUNCH!*

Evie hit the stone tiles and shattered them, yanking on her chain. Before her, the Ghoul spun, pulled around by the jagged weapon lodged across its torso and forearm. "I told you," Evie panted, blood dribbling down her lips. "You don't want to fight me."

Dervish.

Evie hauled back at the same time, her heavy body too much for the Ghoul's weakened flesh. The chain went wild, writhing in her grip like a living thing, and the beast's belly was sundered completely.

You Have Killed A Manawarped Ghoul!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Extra Contribution!

Huffing an unsteady breath, Evie let her chain just lay on the ground for a moment. Behind her, people stirred, and the battle raged only strides away. But here, in that moment, Evie needed a break.

"Good job, Acolyte," someone said to her as they clapped her on the shoulder. Evie started and found herself looking into the features of an older Initiate, one she recognized. The one who had given Felix so much trouble. "A little...unorthodox. Where'd you get the chain? And why aren't you in your regulation kit?"

"Er uh," Evie managed, approximating a Harn-like grunt. "It broke."

"What? How—"

Another Initiate was screaming. "Harnsworth! The Inquisitors are pushing ahead! We have to move, now!"

"Very well," the old man muttered. He turned back to Evie, but found her gone. "Where did—?"

"Harnsworth!!"

"Argh," he cursed, before turning to the Acolytes milling around him. "Forward march! Into the breach! We go to save the city!"

A ragged cheer met the Initiate's words, but Evie didn't stop to hear any more. She was already slinking through the ranks and nursing her shoulder. The Ghoul had wrenched it good.

Stealth is level 49!

So close to Journeyman, she hissed. At least she'd have something to show for this fool's errand. The line of redcloaks moved past her rapidly, leaving only the wounded and a few guards administering supplies. The wagon, battered and featuring two extremely keyed-up avum, was only a dozen strides away. Folks with white sashes passed out red vials among those not already dead, and Evie licked her lips.

Maybe more than something.

Keeping her head down, she made it all the way to the wagon without anyone saying a thing. Silently, she swung up into the driver's seat and grabbed the reins.

"H-hey! What are you doing?" Someone shouted.

"Sabotage!" Evie shouted back and snapped the reins. "HIYAHH!"

The avum squawked in terror and bolted, hauling Evie and the entire supply wagon straight into the front lines.

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

The screams below were rising louder and louder below, Tempered lungs proving their worth as the Inquisition cut a bloody swath through the horde. But the Revenants weren't holding back either. Teine watched in rapt fascination as the beasts rallied with all the fury of a hive protecting their queen.

Teine looked at the Broodmother, his Analyze enough to tell him its name and level, but its Type was tantalizingly out of reach. Just as all the others. He had his suspicions, but until proven, they were only guesses. The writhing abomination belched out another dozen eggs as he watched, its immense form made up of curling tentacles, studded with fleshy nodules and glistening with ichor. It was simply...

"Beautiful," he murmured.

"Sir?"

Teine looked at his guard. The boy was wracked with terror, but still he stood fast. Mervin knew his place, and with the incentive of Essence Draughts, he'd become far more enthusiastic toward their work. So what if those draughts were developed with Revenant parts? Even if the boy knew, he'd have jumped at the chance to advance. Everyone always did.

"Elder! The Inquisition is pressing forward!" LeQuin said, pointing below. "The Inquisitors have taken the field!"

Teine panned over the horde toward the furious battle being waged along one side of the massive chamber. Even had the Eyrie still stood, the place could have held all of the Guilders within it and still had room for an opposing force. Teine gathered what he needed from a glance, his powerful Mind and Intelligence sorting and processing it all.

"Ten thousand Revenants, give or take a score, versus what seems to be two thousand redcloaks. Most of them Acolytes," Teine mused, more or less to himself. He spoke loud enough to be heard, though, as he was their leader. One must always demonstrate dominance on the battlefield, else your underlings will begin to get...ideas. "With the Inquisitors joining the fray, however, they'll likely penetrate the horde in short order. We cannot have that."

The Tin and Iron Ranks—those who survived—were still firing at the Fiend. Their pathetic Sparkbolts and Ice Arrows shot out with regular bursts, cutting through the crimson fog but unlikely to hit anything. The Fiend wouldn't be taken down by them, and Teine hadn't the energy to spare for the creature, not yet.

"Keep the Fiend occupied! Distracted, hm? Under no circumstances is he to engage the monsters!" Teine made eye contact with the fledgling mages, getting nods from every one of them. "The last thing we need is another win in the Revenants’ column."

Teine regarded his "guard," though he had no need of their protection. The older one, Piotr was looking a touch peaky. He'd have to keep an eye on that one; he'd been the first to complete his Tempering with the Revenant draughts. Mervin, swiftly becoming his favorite, was watching the mage's Mana bolts sail into the sky. He seemed nervous. "Mervin, come here, please."

As the nascent Apprentice Tier approached, Teine took a moment to take out his etheric device. The small, inscrutable box had been practically humming ever since they'd entered the Nymean ruin proper, and Teine's Manasight could pick out the red-yellow energy radiating from within. The crimson haze it released was indistinguishable from the fog around them, a fact that tugged at his scarred cheek.

"Something funny, sir?" Mervin asked. Teine looked up to see the young man step forward and rest his spear against the smooth tiles.

"Ah, no no," Teine waved a hand dismissively, but didn't miss how Mervin scratched at his forearms. Interesting. "Simply reflecting on the majesty of our surroundings.”

“They are...something, sir.”

“Indeed. In fact I think—“ Teine stopped suddenly, running his hands near the railing once again. Teine gasped. He laughed, then coughed and clutched at his cane. "They're wrong..."

"What was that, sir?"

"The sigaldry led us here, but I thought it vanished the moment we came into contact with the true weight of this creature's aura," Teine gestured at the Broodmother. It squelched titanically, releasing more eggs. "They didn't vanish, however!" He ran his finger along a groove in the stonework, and his touch briefly ignited a rune that glowed a vicious yellow-red. It faded quickly. "They're hidden. Protected. Come!"

“Protected how?” Mervin asked, before belatedly offering, “Sir.”

Teine barely noticed. He was following the nigh-invisible markings along the banister. They swirled in complicated flourishes that made little sense to him, despite his time with the strange, alien language. "The array is inverted, pulling its frequencies inward to hide them. But it's also...blind gods! That's it!"

Sudden revelation hit him like a thunderbolt. The language itself was inverted! It was twisted against itself! That was why it contained so many inconsistencies, so many incomprehensible gaps.

Teine snapped his fingers, and while his Body wasn't the most powerful, the sound made the Tin Ranks flinch.

"Bronze Ranks, follow me. We're to find the source. We do that, and we find the true Nest."

Onward, he smiled through his scar. To destiny.

* * *

"WATCH OUT!"

Evie held on tight as the team of avum charged through the battlefield. The wagon jostled behind her, kicking up over each corpse she trampled but not slowing a bit. That was partly due to the redcloaks that chased them, hurling bolts of light all the while. The already-terrified birds were mad with fear; nothing could stop their frenzied charge.

Except maybe a wall of Acolytes and Revenants.

"Supplies! Coming through! Make a hole!" Evie screamed, her Apprentice Tier body forcing the air from her lungs in a booming voice. It barely rose above the chaos of the battlefield, however.

"AHH!" Evie slapped her hands to the bench below her and willed all the mass she could shift into the wagon. It wasn't much, but she didn't have time or the ability to reach the ground. She hit the redcloaks hard only moments later, and for a desperate instant, Evie feared she wouldn't make it. Then the sheer weight of the supply wagon hurled the lot of them forward, white-armored warriors thrown into the thrashing claws of the Revenants, and she was through.

"NOCTIS WEPT!" Evie shouted, half elated, half terrified, as the wagon's inertia could not be stopped. They plowed through rank after rank of Revenants, grinding everything below the massive wheels of the supply wagon. Kill notifications streamed across her vision, redcloak and Revenant alike.

Behind her, the battle line fell into disarray as the section around Evie's entry collapsed. Revenants streamed into the breach, and the Inquisition's unrelenting advance buckled. Shouted orders resounded, and the bolts of light Mana only increased. Several even came close enough to glance off her leather armor.

Just gotta get close enough to the other supply wagon, blow this up, then vanish into the crowd. Evie panted as sweat poured down her forehead. Easy as breathin'. Evie slapped her own face, letting the pain center her. Okay! Time to cause some real havoc!

Scorpion's Tail!

Dervish!

With her left hand, Evie unspooled her chain and whipped it outward, describing a lightning-fast arc of bladed fury. Revenants were shredded and knocked back by the ridiculous length of chain, enough that the avum could force their way ahead. With her other hand, she fished out the few remaining potions she'd stolen and hurled them ahead of her. Explosions bigger than her wagon bloomed where the incendiary potions fell, each one setting four or five Revenants alight and utterly wrecking their charge.

It was chaos.

Behind her, the light bolts began to fade as the howls of enraged Revenants grew stronger. They had bigger worries than her. Ahead, she could make out the second group of Inquisitors that emerged from a sideways tunnel. They were advancing through the horde as well, but were ignoring anything but the enemy, not even bothering to assist the floundering team she'd left behind.

Callous zealots. Evie cursed, ignoring the fact that she was the reason they were being suddenly overwhelmed. She snapped the reins with her free hand, never stopping her deadly weave of bladed chain.

The terrain quickly grew inexplicably uneven, and in a few places, Evie spotted greenery and vines growing along the tiled floor. The wagon rocked hard as it crested each corpse and protuberance in their way. But the sheer terror in the avum and momentum of the payload meant they kept racing ahead. The constant crashing from behind her meant more than a few crates overturned. An herbal tang competed with the scent of blood and that musky, fetid heat.

Not much time, she thought, bashing her way clear of the horde. She'd only gotten so far by dint of her heavy wagon and the fact that none of the many Ghouls was near her. Not gonna fight one of those again, not anytime soon. She could see the other supply train now, sitting in the rear of the advancing group of redcloaks. She was close. Evie snapped the reins again and shouted at the birds. "Just a little farther, friends!"

"Diurnal Sunder!"

Evie's world turned white, and her ears were filled with a roar far louder than the Revenants. She couldn't see anything, but everything tipped. She kicked off the seat, flaring her Agility and Dexterity as the wagon rolled beneath her. She spun, arching her back as she rotated her feet back underneath her and, once she'd flipped, pulled all the weight from her chain back into her Body.

She dropped from the air, landing in a crouch atop the wagon as it skidded to a stop. It had careened through the monsters around her, sending more Contribution and XP her way as they were ground to pungent paste. The area behind her, however, was emptying rapidly of Revenants; they had turned and begun running in the same direction Evie had been heading. Her eyes widened.

A tiny army had followed her. Led by that Harnsworth guy. His armor was untouched by the blood and burns that adorned all the rest. He looked right at her.

"You're no Acolyte," he murmured, not so much angry as disappointed, as if she were a child stealing sweets. "But even heathens know that stealing is a sin."

"So's bein' an old rat bastard, but I'm not slingin' names, am I?" Evie shot back. She adjusted her grip on her chain and let her hands move ever so slightly.

The old man tutted, his beard quivering. "You're not one of mine, but I'll teach you this lesson regardless." He unsheathed his sword, which ignited with a burst of orange fire Mana.

"Bring it on, graybeard," Evie grinned.

* * *

"Follow the explosions!" Cal shouted. Their team cut through the Revenants with a single-minded purpose, rejecting widespread slaughter in favor of surgical precision. Revenants and even the odd Ghoul stood no chance, but they all kept their Stamina and Mana expenditure as low as they could. If either fell, it wouldn't matter how much Health they had left, they'd be dead.

Another explosion of fire ahead, and Cal adjusted her heading. The terrain was strange, slowly overgrown with vines and roots the farther they traveled into the enormous chamber, but it was of little concern to Cal. Slipping between Revenants like the wind, the malformed creatures stumbled over the exposed vegetation as if offering themselves up on a platter. Her daggers licked outward, each as long as her forearm and taking arms, legs, even heads, whatever presented itself along her path.

The horde was thinning, at least around them. Her team had torn through the edges of the battle before plunging in, but each of them was a powerhouse compared to the average Revenant. Even Atar and the Dayne girl held their own. The creatures seemed to be fleeing from them, or perhaps shifting closer toward the Broodmother in some sort of protective formation. All it meant to Cal was that it made her task that much easier.

Ahead, something impacted the ground, and the Revenants about sixty strides ahead tumbled into the air, thrown by some large object. Cal looked up, pushing her Perception, but Felix hadn't dropped that giant crystal. What was—?

Fatal Flurry!

The last of the Revenants blocking her view fell, their spines and throats severed instantly. Cal flowed into the gap they left, Vess, Atar, and the Hand close behind.

"Is that—is that a wagon?" Atar panted. The Crown atop his head flickered and faded, and Cal noted his eyes shimmered bright crimson for a moment before returning to their natural hue.

"Supplies," Cal said, nodding at the characters along the side. Redcloaks were good at being orderly, at least. "But why is it here? The redcloak line is further up."

A slight figure landed atop the wagon, trailing a bladed chain that almost floated in the air. Cal’s chest clenched and released at the sight, only to have her senses blaze warning when a man in white armor led a battalion of Inquisition closer and shouted at Evie. Beside her, Vess sucked in a breath.

"Him," she pointed at the older Initiate. "The one in the lead. He fought Felix to a standstill."

"Oh really?" the Hand said, eagerness in his voice. "And only Journeyman? How fascinating."

"Good, then you can take him out, Reed," Cal barked. "The rest, we need a distraction."

"I...have an idea," Atar said.

* * *

"My Lady! We've spotted another force from the upper levels!"

"Report, Klark," DuFont demanded. She shoved a hand forward and let loose a torrent of heat Mana, burning through the Revenants before her. They died before they could even scream. "How many?"

"Only eight, but they recognize the Guilder known as Onslaught among them," the boy said breathlessly. His own sword was out, burning with the Order's flame and cutting into the horde that never stopped coming. "They're cutting a path to our rear guard, as if they're trying to flank us."

"Harn Kastos and Calesca Boscal," DuFont scoffed. "They finally arrived. But only eight? Was one of them a young man with blue eyes?"

"No ma'am, the only younger male was blonde. A fire mage."

"Damn." Eliza dragged her other hand through the air and let her own brand of flame pour out of her gauntlets. It baked the root-covered tiles before her, igniting many of the Revenants pressuring her men. "Then where is that bastard? Pass the word. We're too close to the Broodmother now. We'll not be taken off course by the Fiend's entourage!"

"What of the rear guard?" Klark asked.

"They stand at least three hundred strong," DuFont snapped. "Do you think they'll fall to eight fighters?"

"No, ma'am."

DuFont and the two other Inquisitors had pushed their troops forward as quickly as possible, forming a path lined with their shields and bodies. Acolytes were falling by the dozen, but there were plenty to spare. The Initiates more than made up for the loss of meat shields, taking up the fight against the Revenants and Ghouls. DuFont had spared some of her precious Mana to push back the horde, but it was an impossible task. She had to take the Nest first—she had to; before that need, all else was meaningless.

Then they were there. The base of the Broodmother and its field of noxious eggs.

Eliza paced ahead, joining Inquisitors Daur and Rutger at the head of the procession. She took the lead, eyeing the both of them, almost hoping they would challenge her right to be there. They simply looked away, though Rutger looked quite bitter. DuFont let a smile slip across her face.

"Come, men. Time to take the Authority we deserve."

That I deserve, she amended.

Without warning, a strange hornblast cut through the air, and only steps ahead, an aquamarine wall of light rose up over the eggs and Broodmother. It shimmered in the crimson light, almost painful in contrast.

"No!" DuFont screamed. She unsheathed the hooked blade at her side, the one she'd claimed from the Foglands expedition. She struck at the shield rapidly, but the enchantment on the blade did nothing to the shield.

"That is a Master Tier shield," Daur gaped.

"The Sorceress is here!" Rutger hissed.

"Indeed she is," a voice said.

DuFont spun toward the sound, sword and gauntlets up and ready. A woman with pale blond hair and a crooked iron rod leaned casually against one of the man-sized eggs.

"Nice to see you again, Eliza," the woman said and aquamarine light rippled down her arms. "I've been meaning to have a chat with you."

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

Felix balanced himself between the crystal and the granite shelf, wings folded and his legs holding him in place easily. It was an awkward fit, made more so by the fact that having wings was still entirely too new, but it allowed him to both rest and stay free of the Guilders' relentless attacks. The Mana bolts had stopped coming so furiously, instead appearing in tight bursts every couple seconds. They grew more precise every time he ventured beyond the crystal, though the strange rock absorbed their Mana whenever their shots strayed too close.

No wonder it's so good for enchantment, Felix breathlessly mused. Flying took a lot out of his Stamina, and he hadn't even learned a Skill for it yet. This thing sucks up Mana like a sponge.

Frankly, he was worried that, if he placed them too close, his grenades’ Mana would get soaked into the crystal. To circumvent it, he'd tried to wedge the inscribed stones in place without having them touch the crystal itself then Stone Shaped some connecting sigils between them all. This section of the ceiling had some seriously thick vines growing across it, which, aside from providing useful handholds, made securing the grenades relatively simple. Hopefully, it would be enough to prevent absorption.

Invocation is level 33!

Stone Shaping is level 47!

Theurgist of the Rise is level 58!

Felix looked down, scanning the ground once again. His Voracious Eye, having no distance limit, was extremely useful when the Essence fog wasn't too thick. Unfortunately, the fog kept regrowing, even after he ate it. He could make out plenty of Revenants and Ghouls, but his friends were harder to spot. As were any further Scales of the Ravager King. Felix felt a powerful urge to find and consume the rest of them; an urge that was entirely his own, as upset as that made him. He knew they were below, the clear source of all the Essence pumped into the air, but there was so much they were practically invisible.

What wasn't so hard to spot were the white-armored forms of the Inquisition, and Felix could see hundreds, maybe thousands of them pushing through the horde. They were making a beeline straight toward the Broodmother.

Shit. They were going to destroy the Nest. He had to move.

Felix quested outward with his Perception and Affinity. Where was the Elder? He hadn't seen a single of the vibrant green spells in a few minutes, but was the man just waiting?

His Affinity tingled, the connection between him and Mervin discovered once more. He repeated that same, odd twist of mental gymnastics, and distant, muffled sounds appeared in his ears. Voices whispering to one another.

"Don't worry, kid. We're with the strongest Guilders alive, yeah?"

"Cuz all the rest are dead."

"Shut it, Garin. Elder Teine's with us; he's given us Essences an' all, why would he let us die after spendin' so much?"

Someone coughed. "Lars is right. Stick to his side, and we'll be right as rain."

"I suppose," Mervin said, his voice far louder than the rest. "I just don't fancy goin' toe-to-toe with whatever a Broodmother is."

They've gone down as well. Felix pulled back from the connection and looked down. The Mana bolts still flashed regularly, so not all of the Guilders had left, but the stronger ones had for sure. Okay. Okay. Time to make this work.

Without warning, Felix's Affinity flared again, and an entirely new set of sights and sounds filtered into him. It wasn't so much a gentle vibration as a hard shove into his face, as if someone wanted him to listen.

Clutching to the vines around him, Felix was upended into someone else.

* * *

Felix's vision resolved into a static-filled haze before two rapid blinks smoothed away the imperfections. With a start, he realized he was only twenty feet away from three extremely angry looking Inquisitors.

And one of them had a very familiar sword.

Hey, he tried to say, but the word merely echoed through his Mind. Instead, another voice spoke.

"Nice to see you again, Eliza. I've been meaning to have a chat with you."

Felix didn't recognize the voice and he couldn't see the face, but it only took a moment's thought to realize he was inside of someone else; someone he knew well enough to be pulled almost entirely within their senses.

Zara?

The woman with the hooked sword—his hooked sword—peered at them. "You speak like you know me, but I do not recognize you at all. Who are you, Sorcerer, aside from a Master Tier threat?"

The woman—Elder DuFont, Felix realized—said the last part more as a warning to her compatriots. The two other Inquisitors traded wary looks. Both of them were older, wrinklier men with powerful builds and thick armor that belied their considerable Temper. They were not the sort to be scared lightly.

"A foe you do not want to face, Inquisitor," Zara said. "I come to give you a warning and to hear your Choice."

DuFont gripped Felix’s sword tighter, angling its curved tip across her body defensively. The more slender of the two Inquisitors visibly bristled at Zara's words. "You presume to warn us, heathen?"

Zara's gaze did not move from DuFont's face, which had gone from pale to a deep flush.

"You'll not stop us, Master Tier or not," the former Elder stated, drawing herself up. The sword was still held in a middle guard position. "I hold the advantages here. You may kill us, but the Inquisition will claim this city, one way or another."

Felix felt Zara tilt her head, a strange sensation for him. "Is that why you sent for reinforcements, Eliza? Do you truly want power so greatly that you'd burn all of Haarwatch for it?"

They sent for reinforcements? Felix thought, aghast. When? From where?

Viewing as he was, Felix's senses didn't work properly. Instead he relied on Zara's observations, and the Naiad easily spotted the blaring alarm in the woman's Spirit. So, too, did she sense the sudden unease within the other two Inquisitors.

Oh. Ohhh. She didn't know.

"I have come to witness your Choice," Zara said again, and her eyes flicked toward a wall of aquamarine light that filled the space. Beyond it, Felix could see the immense, writhing form of the Broodmother. She'd walled it off. "What lies beyond this wall is not the power you think."

DuFont pointed her stolen blade at Zara and snarled. "You'll not dissuade me from my path with your lies, Sorcerer. Either step out of my way or face the consequences."

"Consequences," Zara mused. Her tone was light, but Felix could feel anger and a...weighty sadness. "Yes. The price always comes, sooner or later. Very well." She panned her gaze across the three of them, their expressions all ranging between fatalistic fury and fearful contempt. She snorted. "Your Choice has been Witnessed."

* * *

The connection abruptly disappeared, and Felix whiplashed back into the stone outcropping. A brief, flaring cry called out through his Affinity, a song that clearly originated from Zara's Spirit. Felix focused his addled Mind on it, and a string of something—Intent?—flowed into words.

"They seek to destroy the Broodmother. I cannot delay them longer than this, or else risk the Quest. Do what you must, Felix."

“Then help me!” His own words fell flat as the crimson fog parted below him, and Felix could see the aquamarine globe that surrounded the disgusting Broodmother...and the white specks of the Inquisition furiously beating against it. The seething throng of Primordial Spawn threw themselves at the double lines of white, viciously threshing them, but the Inquisition held. Barely.

The aquamarine dome, the largest object below him, shuddered as DuFont and the Inquisitors attacked it. He was running out of time.

He fell.

Ten feet below, he snapped out his wings with a groan of relief. Holding them so close to his body for an extended period had been uncomfortable at best. Felix soared, and within him, Pit trilled gleefully despite the pain. The tenku always felt best when flying.

It's time, bud. I don't know how this is gonna go, so brace yourself. Felix felt Pit stiffen within his Spirit, their mingled senses tensing against the task ahead. Here we go.

Felix dipped and spun, flying back up to the ceiling only twenty or so feet away. He was still close enough to the massive crystal that the Guilders shouldn't have a clear shot, but far enough that he could set off his grenades without worry.

He hoped.

Closing his eyes, Felix let a thick tendril of Mana vapor breath from his channels. Like fogged breath on a wintry morning, it poured forth, except his Will held its shape together. Pit let out a small whistle of pain, but the tenku did not ask to stop. Certainty washed through their bond, and Felix continued.

The tendril of crackling steam snaked across the vine-coated ceiling until it touched the first of his grenades. The stone came alive, primed but not detonating yet, just as he'd hoped. They functioned by Intent as much as sigaldry, another reason why mass-producing them wouldn't really be effective yet. Few could match his Intent, let alone when paired with Pit's. The sigils he'd inscribed in a semicircle around the crystal lit up with animating Mana, draining his extended vapor as each grenade lit up in turn. Felix gritted his teeth and forced more Mana along his channels, pouring himself into the connection until the last of the small artifacts were primed.

Invocation is level 34!

...

Invocation is level 37!

Theurgist of the Rise is level 59!

Mana Manipulation is level 47!

Mana Manipulation is level 48!

Felix and Pit both gasped a desperate breath when it was finished, but their Will held strong. A single thread of Mana extended between him and the array he'd improvised. He had done it. They had done it.

Felix let his Voracious Eye roam below, identifying Acolytes and Revenants. The temporary shield was flickering wildly now, likely under great amounts of stress from DuFont. He couldn't see any of his friends or allies. It was time.

Here goes nothing, Pit.

* * *

Atar's plan was mad. It was foolish and foolhardy, one of the worst he'd ever devised.

It was, in his own words, “a Felix special.”

Hah! Atar looked up, trying to find the Unbound above them. The cavernous roof was almost entirely obfuscated by the swirling mists. His mood sobered at the thought of a giant rock falling on all of them. They had to move with alacrity.

Evie, impetuous imp that she was, had already engaged the dangerous Initiate. And she was losing.

As the group raced into position, she fought desperately against the Initiate. The man was lightning on two feet, the quicker by far. So much so that he seemed to be toying with her.

Hold it together, Evie! He ran through the plan in his mind once more, but couldn't keep his eyes off the fight. His Perception was excellent enough that he could see their exchange clearly despite the mist and distance. Run! Don't fight!

Evie ducked beneath a sword swipe, but couldn't dodge the man's knee. She tried to block it with her right forearm. The metal-shod appendage drove her own arm up and into her chest, lifting her bodily into a counter thrust from the man's weapon.

A Sparkbolt hit the Initiate's legs, and the man skittered backward. He looked up, almost as surprised as Atar felt. His hand was extended and everything.

"Thought we were supposed to be stealthy, Atar?" Vess shouted, glee in her voice.

"Don't care! Kick their teeth in!" Cal screamed, before blurring forward. The Hand was right behind her.

"Bodie!" Atar shouted.

"On it, little man!" Bodie's easygoing voice came to them, the only one to have peeled off in another direction.

Though she landed awkwardly, Evie immediately pressed the advantage, spinning her chain in a deadly dance that the Initiate immediately fended off.

Idiot, Atar groused.

"Open fire!" the Initiate shouted, seeing the figures racing toward them. Atar liked to think there was panic in his voice. There was certainly panic in the fire mage as several hundred Acolytes opened up into a blinding volley of light-aspected Mana bolts.

"Ah!" Atar threw up a wave of fire, his Field of Flame turned on a separate axis, and a large amount of the golden bolts were consumed.

"Our turn!" Vess shouted, and her spears screamed through the air.

* * *

Bodie slid to a stop, his eyes taking in the sorry state of the redcloak's supply wagon. The two avum were tangled in their harnesses and half-broken traces, reduced to chirping in wide-eyed fear and pain. "Shh shh, I'll save you." With a single tug, Bodie tore apart offending straps and freed them. "Run along, sweeties."

Once the giant birds scurried free, Bodie reached down to the overturned wagon. "Strength of Many!" His already-impeccable frame filled with muscle, his Stamina and Mana dropping by a quarter as his Strength and Endurance jumped by thirty percent. In a single movement, Bodie lifted the entire thing.

And he threw it.

* * *

Crown of Ignis!

Atar's Crown manifested above his head, the outward sign of his mastery of the fire element. Potency flooded his channels as his core redoubled in size and ferocity. The power of it sang to him, crooning all that he could do, but Atar knew better than to listen. He followed the plan.

Atar had noticed the glyphs painted on several crates that had spilled out of the broken wagon. It may have been a reckless scheme, but it was their best chance.

Sparkbolt!

Harn, Vess, and the two Elders were already facing down the collective fire of the Inquisition, freeing up Cal and the Hand to face the Initiate. They fired back, waves of metal, air, shadow, and lightning Mana hitting the small army with deadly force. But even they paused for a second to see the wagon tumble above their heads and into the midst of the redcloaks.

It rolled in the air, almost frozen in time. Its contents began to spill from its rent sides, but it was too late.

Just before it hit the redcloaks, Atar's Sparkbolt reached it.

The wagon exploded with such force that Atar—easily a hundred strides away—was thrown off his feet. The redcloaks did not fare as well.

Death and destruction enveloped the company, the kinetic force of the explosion sent undamaged vials and bottles hurling in all directions. Health, Mana, and Stamina potions scattered and broke open, and Incendiary potions bloomed in brilliant flame. They ripped up the tiles and heavy roots just as easily as they tore through squad after squad of Acolytes. A final bolt of lightning even blasted those few remaining on their feet.

A Fulmination Potion?! Atar marveled, climbing back to his feet. They pulled out all the stops here.

The Initiate was also thrown from his feet, but he was already in a bad way. The Hand hovered over the man, greatsword still sheathed, his bare hands dripping with the other's blood. Evie rushed up from behind him, chain whirling.

"Step away, Hand! He's mine!"

Cal grabbed her from behind, arresting her left arm. "Leave it! We don't have time—!"

Another explosion rocked the cavern, and Atar looked around in confusion. Several massive boulders easily as big as an avum slammed into the ground all around them, crushing Revenants and redcloaks alike.

"Look!" Vess pointed up, and they could just barely see a winged form flying above, before it was assaulted by a rainbow of Mana bolts. "Felix!"

"We have to run! Now!" Cal barked, before taking off. With a terrified look up, Atar followed.

Don't you dare drop that crystal on me!

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

Rock dust and pulped vegetation blasted outward. The sound was deafening so close, and Felix watched as large, horse-sized hunks of stone fell silently into the fog below. Yet before the debris cleared, he could feel his eardrums healing. Sound returned with a strange sort of pop, and Felix looked up to see the crystal...still there.

"Shit."

The Belais Crystal was hanging at an angle, half-attached to the rocky cavern roof by strands of straining purple mineral. They looked like roots, and they were deep in the stone. Felix retracted his talons and dropped from his perch, extending his wings and shooting toward the dangling crystal. But the mages below weren't idle. A veritable storm of Mana bolts launched at him, filling the air. The crystal, now out of alignment, meant he was somewhat in their line of sight. Despite the distance, the barrage was so thick he couldn't avoid them all, even with Unfettered Volition. He took a few hits to the chest and shoulders, knocking him off course.

Reign of Vellus!

He didn't fire at the mages below—he didn't even know if the spell would reach that far—but instead at the stone above the crystal. The lightning bolt of kinetic Mana slammed forward and was immediately absorbed by the crystal. It hadn't even budged.

We'll have to do it the old-fashioned way! Felix dove through another volley of arrows, orbs, and sizzling Mana bolts, only taking a few hits to his wide wings. Pit shrieked in anger and encouragement. They banked hard to the left and spun, barrel-rolling over the bright flames of a Mana-wrought bola before he made it. His boots hit the uneven top of the Belais Crystal, but despite its precarious grip, it didn't even quiver beneath Felix's significant bulk.

More Mana bolts hit the area, but the crystal cleanly absorbed most of them. Felix ignored them and scrambled up the sloped mineral, which was jagged and precarious, like the exposed roots of a tree. The ceiling was pitted and blown out where his grenades had been, but Felix was surprised to see that directly above the crystal there were a series of large glyphs. Felix's eyes raked over them, though they were rendered mostly illegible by the removal of the crystal and explosions.

He reached the edge, where the thing nearly met the stone, and placed his claws against it. Below, Felix could sense a wild battle; the fight before was vicious, but this was furious abandon. And in the midst of it all, he could see Cal, Harn, Evie...and Vess.

They're running to the right. This angle, Felix adjusted the placement of his hands and feet. I can make this work. They'll be fine.

They had to be.

Ravenous Tithe!

Taking a huge chunk of Essence from the air around him, Felix flared Sovereign of Flesh. Muscle and scales redoubled along his limbs, refreshed and bulked by the excess of Essence to burn. His scales darkened even further, pushing beyond black and towards a boundless sable, and his talons dug deep into the granite overhead.

He pushed. Up against the granite and down, onto the crystal. He pushed with everything he had.

The granite creaked, a protest so loud it drowned out the noise all around him.

Push! Pit cried out, flooding him with surety and faith. Conviction.

He pushed.

* * *

When the explosion came, Eliza flinched. The successive impacts were less surprising, but no less dire. Dozens of her men were slaughtered by falling debris. Their deaths were meaningless, except that they weakened her resistance against the ravenous Revenants. She cast her Perception into the sky, trying to pierce the thick crimson fog, but it was useless; she sensed nothing until the stones had come within a hundred feet.

She returned her attention to the shield. It was at the breaking point. Her crooked sword was tearing it apart, piece by small piece. The ancient weapon was practically vibrating in her hand, and though its secrets were locked away, its ability to destabilize Mana was hers to command.

"Once we're through, destroy the appendages. The Broodmother doesn't appear mobile, so hit it from a distance until it cannot muster a defense," she ordered the other Inquisitors.

"That Sorcerer is among us still!" hissed Rutger. "We're fools if we focus on another enemy!"

"We'll die if we do not!" countered Daur.

Eliza struck a sweeping, overhanded blow on the aquamarine shield. The Crescian Bronze soaked up the Mana like a dry sponge. Then, like a piece of crockery, the shield shattered.

"Hah!" she cried out and half turned to the Inquisitors. "We fight the Broodmother! That's an order! Get the Acolytes up here to lay on their—"

A louder explosion tore the mists above them asunder, as if a giant had simply wafted away the fog. Far above, DuFont's Perception picked out the purple mass of Belais Crystal. Was it glowing before? Her eyes widened, and she hurled herself forward, screaming all the while.

"Move! Take out the beast, now!"

* * *

Felix sank his hands into the stone ceiling, the granite creaking around his palms as he strained with every ounce of Strength he had, boosted by every Skill he possessed.

C'mon! FALL!

There was a resounding crack, almost as loud as the grenades, and the stone above him cratered into pieces, and his feet launched the crystal down.

Down.

Down.

+1 STR!

Yes! Felix laughed, holding on now only with his talons. The crystal fell at an angle. Below, the aquamarine shield flickered out completely. It was going to work!

"NOO!" a terrible voice boomed. A figure half as large as the crystal itself burst sideways from the Essence fog: the Pride of Blight. Its hulking body, a mess of muscle and scales, smashed directly into the falling stone. It clung there, its Strength and mass alone enough to divert the crystal's fall into the horde.

Right toward his friends.

Felix didn't stop to consider anything, he simply pulled his wings tight to his body, flipping until his feet pressed hard against the stone above him.

Reign of Vellus!

Reign of Vellus!

He leaped at the same time as he dual-casted his favorite spell, and Felix launched like a shot. A bolt of lightning streaking down from the heavens. The ceiling shattered behind him.

You absolute piece of—!

The creature was too heavy, and it was moving too fast.

He wasn't going to make it.

No! Cloudstep!

Felix kicked off of the temporary platforms. They were obliterated by each aerial stomp, useless for an ascent, but he was going down. This time, the density of his Seed of the Unchained Mountain Body was a boon.

Cloudstep!

Cloudstep!

Cloudstep is level 25!

Apprentice Tier!

+10 AGL, END, DEX

Cloudstep!

Felix hit the Belais Crystal like a comet, his powerful Body and Sovereign of Flesh just barely enough to keep him from splattering against it. Sound boomed around Felix, and within that shuddering impact, he could feel the basso howl of the Blight. Then he lost everything as they tumbled, freewheeling wildly in the air.

With a sound ten thousand times louder than his grenades, they hit the ground.

* * *

Teine was nearly thrown from the path as the entire cavern shook. A terrible whining filled his ears until his Body punched through the Dazed Status Condition.

"What in Avet's black teeth was that!?" Piotr shouted, still stumbling.

Mervin, ever watchful, pointed out into the sea of violence, where a plume of dark smoke and bright red mist spewed upward into the air. Teine leaned on his cane and watched the smoke—dust, it appeared—clot the air. He looked up.

The crystal was gone.

What is that fool playing at? A commotion sounded from close by, but the Elder was too engrossed in his speculation. He dropped it?

"Sir!"

Without even bothering to look, Teine snapped his good arm outward and caught the Revenant by the throat. Its claws cut at his elbow and bicep, but it barely even scratched his enchanted robes.

Purloined Vision.

The mechanical whirr of his core was nearly audible as rich, green Mana was forced through his channels. He hissed inwardly at the pain, but it was over momentarily. A blue screen appeared before the creature, rotating and revealing its secrets to Teine.

TERRITORY-WIDE QUEST ALERT!

Protect the Nest!

The Enemy has arrived! Defend the Broodmother!

Defeat and Devour the Primordial Heir!

Rewards:

x1 Gold Chest

Territorial Authority

The Quest updated.

Teine froze, and his Mind whirled through a thousand rapid permutations. From his spies, he knew the monsters wanted the Fiend; were drawn to him, in fact. The Revenants gained strength from that which they consumed, but...Primordial. Of course.

They were in far more danger than he had assumed.

Wind Blade.

An errant pulse of Will sent the Revenant's head tumbling off, and Teine dropped it over the side of the path before it even had a chance to bleed on him. Teine eyed his bodyguards, noting how flushed they appeared, and Piotr's coughing fits. They weren't feverish like the rest of the Guilders around him, no shakes. He pondered. Were they immune to the Primordial's influence now?

And what was the reason for the array? He lifted the device at his hip, inspecting the corrosive red Mana that steamed from it, sparked with a deeper yellow. Holding it, Teine was far better able to track the snaking, hidden lines of the array around him. His eyes tracked them along the path, until it hit...

"Blind gods," he breathed. He could see it.

"We stop this array! Now! Whatever the cost!" He pointed at his Guilders and had them pull close as he erected a shield of vital green Mana. "Follow behind me!"

* * *

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x343)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

You Have Killed Manawarped Ghouls (x42)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Extra Contribution!

You Have Gained A Level!

You Are Now Level 46!

+2 to PER! +2 to VIT! +2 to END! +3 to INT! +4 to WIL! +4 to AGL! +5 to DEX!

You Have 7 Unused Stat Points!

Felix pushed himself up on shaking arms. He felt like he'd been pancaked by a Mack truck, and his hand bones were only just snapping back into place, shooting flashes of pain up his forearms. The burgeoning thrum of System power flooding his core helped combat the pain, replacing it with a soft Harmony that shook his bones.

He was atop the crystal still, but all around him was darkness. He looked up, but felt his spine shift painfully at the movement. His Sovereign of Flesh was working hard, putting his pieces back together, but it was a hungry beast. He'd used up almost all of his Essence store healing what it could. He needed more.

Ravenous—!

A claw the size of a dinner plate caught Felix in the chest, flinging him off the crystal and into the darkness...which resolved quickly into a crumbled stone crevasse wall.

"UGH!" Felix hit the wall hard enough that stars flashed in his vision. But above him, he could see crimson light. He was in a crater, one made by their impact.

"Death!" bellowed a familiar voice, and Felix saw the Pride of Blight leap atop the crystal. The thing was massive, fifteen feet tall were it not hunching, and strapped with so much muscle it looked ready to pop.

"You first," Felix snarled.

Reign of Vellus!

Felix ripped apart the earth behind him and sent his Body rocketing upward just as the monster dove for him again. He skipped over the bastard's back, hopping into the air and spinning back toward the mutated chorister.

Shadow Whip!

Reign of Vellus!

Felix fired off another blast, this time directly into the Pride of Blight’s wide back. Lightning coursed through the creature's flesh, and kinetic force caved in its shoulder blade. It reared back, screaming just in time for Felix's Shadow Whip to catch it around the head.

"HUUUAAAAAH!" Shot backward by the counterforce of his Skill, Felix pulled hard on the Whip. The creature, off-balance by rearing up, fell backward and slammed head first into the jagged edge of the crystal. Felix slid to a stop on the far side of the crater, hand still holding his Whip taut.

Voracious Eye told him it wasn't over, though.

Unfettered Volition!

Felix yanked hard on the Shadow Whip, letting its elasticity pull him along as he jumped. Felix zipped up and over the crystal, freeing the Femur of the Envoy from his hip. He fed a stream of Essence into the weapon and swung down with all the Strength he had.

Wild Threnody!

Corrosive Strike!

Virulent green Mana bubbled along the weapon and smashed into the Blight's enormous chest. The metallic club had expanded to nearly six feet, and the weight of its blow was enough to savage the earth around them.

The Blight only grunted before shoving it away.

"Damn it," Felix hissed.

The Pride of Blight was High Adept, but Felix had hoped he'd have finished him with that one. The creature wasn't doing well, at least. Its jaw hung oddly, and its back and chest were crushed and torn, and multiple old wounds had split and rotted further. It was practically weeping ichor that dripped upon the crystal.

None of that stopped the beast from leaping onto Felix and driving both of them up and through the earth behind him. Stone shattered against their bodies as they fought, tooth and claw against each other, Felix's Strength and Vitality nearly a match for the Blight's. With a devastating eruption, they emerged back into the blood-light of the Essence fog, casually crushing Revenants with their passage.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x3)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Their emergence knocked both of them loose, and Felix landed twenty yards away, flaring his Unfettered Volition to keep his feet. His Sovereign of Flesh burned at the dregs of his Essence, which stopped his wounds from bleeding out at the very least. But the Revenants were eager for his blood, and they set upon him immediately. Felix had to unleash a ring of kinetic force around himself, sending the Revenants reeling before following up with a spinning club that ended them all for good.

You Have Killed Manawarped Revenants (x12)!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Contribution!

Ravenous Tithe!

Essence and a little Mana streamed back into his core, reigniting his Transcendent Skill and setting his skin to itch-crawling as it healed. Fifty feet away, the Blight also got back to its feet. Its arm was dangling, dislocated in their fight, and a number of rents in its abdomen showed where Felix's talons had found purchase.

"C'mon then," Felix hissed. One of his fangs was loose, but he didn't care. "I'm not done with you yet!"

Abruptly, a horrible, discordant wail filled the air. It was coming from the Broodmother, clearly seen from this angle, several football fields away. Its oozing tentacles wriggled and flexed, somehow producing the dissonant corruption of the Grand Harmony. Felix felt his core recoil, but he'd heard its like before. It wouldn't stop him.

Then the ground around him shook violently, throwing redcloaks and Revenants alike to their knees. Massive Scales of the Ravager King—each easily ten feet tall—emerged from the earth, shattering the smooth tile and tangled roots around them. Bloody Essence streamed from the Scales, like smoke stacks venting into the atmosphere.

Felix looked back at the Blight, and saw that its arm had rejoined its socket, and its jaw snapped back into place. It was healing.

Two could play at that game, though.

Ravenous Tithe!

Felix reached out and claimed the lion's share of the nearest Scale. He stole it, breathing its power into him and letting it burn through his channels and into the space above his core. Whatever he couldn't fit, he funneled it into the abyss at the center of his ring. A space of clear air surrounded Felix, startling after getting used to the crimson haze, and the Blight's injuries stopped healing so fast.

"I didn't say you could heal," Felix admonished, resisting the urge to pant. He felt like someone had cut open his veins and shoved hot coals into them. Thousands of Primordial Spawn had turned toward their battle, and hundreds more were racing toward him. He could feel their want—their need—to devour him. But he focused on the Blight. He had to, or else it'd kill him far faster.

Then he saw it. Just a flash, but it was a tonic in Felix's veins.

The Blight screamed through its regenerated maw, and little was left of the chorister's human face. Only a single Human eye peeked above its fanged mouth. It was strong. Stronger than Felix, all things told. But when it charged at him, Felix only felt anticipation.

After all, he wasn't alone.

"Wind's Embrace!"

"Fulmination!"

"Sparkbolt!"

"Lines of Shadow!"

Elemental Mana surged at the Blight, lightning striking first and spinning the creature around. A nigh-invisible blade of wind from the Hand sliced through its left arm, almost severing it completely at the bicep. The Blight screamed, but its face was suddenly netted by thick, spinning strands of darkness, just in time for a crimson fireball to knock it prone.

In seconds, it was back on its feet, tearing through the shadow bindings with its ebon claws. But then the others got close.

"Fatal Flurry!"

"Raze!"

"Strength of Many!"

"Dervish!"

"Spear of Tribulation!"

Sepia daggers cut into the monster's legs and thighs, while Bodie rushed forward with a mace the size of a sedan, knocking the Blight back to its knees. Twin blazing axes followed suit, cutting at its remaining arm and leaving shallow gashes in its flesh, while a bladed chain and silver spear danced out before it. The latter attacks did little to hurt the creature's Tempered flesh, but Evie and Vess proved an effective distraction.

"Steps of the Drake!"

The Hand appeared from nowhere and avoided the enraged swings of its deadly right arm. A Revenant that got too close was torn apart by its force, spraying the crowd around them with thick ichor. On its backswing, the Hand caught its forearm with the blade of his greatsword.

"Couldn't even drop a rock right?" The Hand complained, barely deflecting the High Adept monstrosity. Its swing diverted into the tiled ground, ripping a trench into the roots and stone.

"Eat me," Felix growled, flipping over several Revenants that were still charging him. He broke more of them with his club before re-sheathing it and rushing the Blight. It snapped at him, but the Hand peppered it with more arcs of slicing wind Mana, giving Felix just the opening he needed.

Unite the Lost!

The Skill within him surged and pulsed, a wild song rising inside of him like a wave before crashing out of his channels. Except, as it struck the Blight, the gorgeous harmonies fouled and turned, breaking apart into atonal notes and jagged vibrations.

It failed.

What? Why? An overwhelming sense of the Blight’s corruption washed against Felix, smell and taste combining into a visceral gut punch. He’s too far gone?

The Blight reached over its shoulder with a lightning-quick motion, suffering deep gashes into its chest, all to grab Felix and hurl him away. Felix tumbled through the air before smashing headlong into more of the crowding Revenants.

“Fiend!” the Hand cried out. “Get back up!”

“I’m—ugh—working on it!” He kicked outward, breaking through the knees of another Revenant before he could regain his feet. Ichor was dripping into his hair and eyes, hot and foul. From the shit situation though, an idea bloomed. "Hand! Just get it to scream at you."

The Hand grunted, taking another blow against the flat of his blade. He was deflecting them expertly, but even his Adept Body clearly felt pressured by the Blight's attack. Even with all of them there, Felix wasn't certain they could destroy it. Not with thousands of Revenants closing in on them.

"Vess!" Felix shouted. The woman spun, easily leaping above a sea of Revenants, and sent his Blade of the Fang flying toward him. Felix caught it.

"Kill the burning thing!" she shouted.

Felix grinned and felt his Wild Threnody surge. From his core, Felix sent dual streams of Mana and Essence through his channels. Filtered through Reign of Vellus, the Mana surged with lightning and force, while the Essence tore lines of fire through his Body. The Blade lit up, a mixture of red-yellow and crackling, blue-white lightning, until it was more light than fang. Felix all but emptied himself into the weapon.

The Hand spun, driving his massive sword into the beast's side, causing it to bellow in pain.

Felix let loose, launching the blade with all of the Strength and Dexterity he could muster. It accelerated from his grip, a blur of lightning, and kicked out by a secondary discharge of Reign of Vellus. It hit the Blight, dead in its gaping maw.

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

Wild Threnody is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+5% RES, MIG, FEL

Lightning consumed the Blight, tearing from its throat and lighting up the former chorister's insides. His friends leaped away, bowling through the encroaching horde while smaller, foot-thick bolts of electricity arced outward, lighting up the Revenants nearby.

You Have Killed The Pride Of Blight!

XP Earned!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

The Blight collapsed to the ground, a lump of charred meat and blackened scales. A flicker of other kill notifications came in, Revenants dying by the dozen, but it was all Felix could do to keep standing. His core was rioting, a blue-white flame that was barely flickering. His Essence had dropped precariously as well, and the pain of their upset balance burned through his gut.

Pit let out a worried squawk, but they weren't the only ones in pain.

The two Scales that had emerged were pumping out that dire vapor while he fought, and now their production seemed to kick up a notch. Towers of crimson fog poured from them, more like volcanoes than smokestacks, and people had started to succumb. Felix saw Acolytes fall to their knees, clutching their chests and throats as the corruption turned the air to soup.

No no no. Felix spun, terrified.

Atar had already fallen, grimacing even in unconsciousness, and both Evie and Vess were close behind. Bodie and Harn, Cal and the Elders, all of them stumbled to their knees. Felix's Tempered eyes could pick out scales forming even on their advanced Bodies.

"Vessilia!" The Hand shouted, appearing at her side in a blur of wind that barely stirred the thickening air. "What is happening? Fiend! Do something!"

Ravenous Tithe!

Huge chunks of the miasma were pulled into Felix, thundering through his channels and into his core. But it wasn't enough. It was like air: there was always more to fill the gap.

The Shadow Hounds, which until then had been fighting off a sizable pack of the Revenants, flickered and died with ghastly howls. The Revenants let loose their own cries, but it was one of triumph and bloodlust. Mouths eager for the slaughter.

The horde charged.

"Reed! Take them all! Get them out of here!" Felix said.

Even the Hand seemed a bit woozy, but he held his ground. "By myself, fool? What'll you be doing?"

"Something stupid, probably."

Reed paused just long enough to give Felix a begrudging nod. Then he conjured some sort of spinning vortex of air Mana; the thing twisted on itself, shaping into some sort of concave disc, and the Adept grabbed Vess and the others in rapid succession. All of them were tossed onto the disc.

"Keep them off my back, Fiend," the Hand demanded. "I can't carry them all and fight off an army!"

"Don't worry," Felix grunted, watching his Mana regenerate as the horde closed in. "They're here for me."

The Broodmother screeched again, and whatever primal magnetism Felix held over the Revenants redoubled. The monsters were tearing each other apart to get to him. The nearest Scale was to his right, and those Primordial Spawn that weren't headed directly for him were swarming around it. Even as he watched, a Revenant screamed in pain and pleasure as its body tore itself apart...and rebuilt into something larger and more vicious.

That's how the Ghouls are being made. Felix ran forward, flaring his Unfettered Volition in spurts. His Mana was still recovering from his last burst. All this Essence, concentrated. It's forcing them to grow. To mutate. He spun aside, dodging several swipes toward his chest and thighs while lashing out with his own claws. Just like the choristers.

Ravenous Tithe!

More Essence streamed from around him, accompanied by a relative trickle of ambient Mana. His core throbbed with imbalance, but there was little he could do while his Mana still hadn't recovered. He zipped through the charred remains of the Blight, retrieved his Blade of the Fang, and unsheathed his Femur of the Envoy. Well, one thing.

A torrent of Essence poured from him and into his weapons, and Felix swung them about like a wrecking ball. His Strength, Endurance, and Agility combined with the preternatural durability of the weapons to devastate those Revenants near him. They were all, at best, six or seven levels below him, and Felix's stats were well beyond the norm. Flesh ripped and bones snapped beneath his onslaught, teeth and claws and thick, pungent ichor sprayed in gruesome fountains with every swing. Felix was death incarnate to the Revenants.

Experience and Contribution streamed across his vision, but the enemy never stopped. Out of the swirling mists, more and more gnashing teeth came howling, all of them piling over one another without care or concern for survival. Felix could sense it in their stunted Spirits: rage, hate, and an all-consuming need to devour him.

Influence of the Wisp!

His Mana had recovered, enough for a few castings. Blue-white fire limned the bodies of dozens of Revenants, each of them freezing in place as their scales and flesh and fats were turned into fuel for his Skill. Dropping his shoulder, Felix rammed through them.

The Scale! It was close, maybe fifty more feet. He could feel the infernal heat of it.

Influence of the Wisp!

The next group froze as well, and Felix wasted no time killing them. Instead, he gathered more of his Mana and, ignoring the riot of pain that clenched his core, he sent it surging out of his channels.

Stone Shaping!

Ahead of him, the overgrown floor buckled and rippled into a sludge forty feet in diameter. Revenants and three newly minted Ghouls stumbled and sank to their hips and knees, respectively, before Felix dropped the Skill. The stone solidified, trapping them for at least the moment.

Unimpeded, Felix jumped. He cleared the sunken grasp of the Ghouls and landed, Fang-first, onto the side of the massive Scale. The Blade sank into the ten-foot-tall ovoid, but only a few inches. Felix could feel the Essence he fed into the Blade pushing back at the Essence burning within the Scale. With a mild grunt, he lifted himself atop it, confident the Essence running through would handle his weight. Revenants and Ghouls began to rip themselves up from the shaped stone, several of them growing bulkier as they struggled.

Felix swallowed, mouth dry in the utter heat pouring off the Scale. He easily recalled the feelings the last Scale had put him through, the pressure and pain. Yet, from that height, Felix could see the Hand retreating, his friends trailing behind on a floating gurney. Bad for you, and it's killing them. Don't hesitate.

Ravenous Tithe!

Felix and Pit screamed, their voices unified in agony as a hurricane of Primordial Essence screamed into his channels. The corrosive power was far more concentrated than the last one, and it burned him from within, a sanguine flame that did not stop, could not stop. The Scale beneath him ripped itself apart, sublimated into luminescent vapor that thundered into Felix, and even when his Blade fell away, he remained, floating, held up by nothing but a storm of power.

The Spawn screamed all around him, the Ghouls and Revenants alike clawing at their flesh, digging into their own chests. Only part of him noticed them at all, and soon even that part was subsumed by the tumult within.

Essence poured from his channels, a raging, ceaseless influx. It gathered above his core as it did before, a cloudy nebula above the sparkling solar system of his core space. Again, thankfully, the abyss within the center of his ring core tore the lion's share from him, consuming all that it possibly could. Felix became a conduit for the Essence, and it didn't care that his skin began to tear, and his eyes burned a brilliant, blinding sapphire, or that his fangs lengthened and sharpened. The blackened armor across his body thickened, heavier scales growing atop the old along his back and shoulders, while the bone spikes at his elbows and knees curved, darkening from a yellow-white to a slick ebon.

Then it was over. He fell.

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Significant Contribution!

Song of Absolution is level 58!

Song of Absolution is level 59!

Song of Absolution is level 60!

Notifications of Contribution continued, ceaselessly, and Felix banished them. His core shrieked at him, recoiling from the font of Primordial Essence in a crescendo of noiseless sound. But Felix stood from his crouch, blinking past the pain, and saw a killing field. Hundreds of Revenants and Ghouls were laid out around him, dead. They were barely recognizable and looked like they had been wrung dry of everything, all moisture and mass torn away from them. Stolen.

Holy shit. Pit let out a whistling whimper. Buddy, you okay? Felix asked. Pit trilled weakly, pained but managing.

How had he stolen from the Revenants? He hadn't targeted them. Ravenous Tithe had never forcefully drained something he wasn't actively claiming. It was part of its description, even. So how—?

Links, he realized. Connections. The part of the Maw that resided in the Scale resided in them as well. Somehow the Scale amplified my Skill, and the link between them and the Maw was enough to do the rest.

Felix looked up and saw that more Revenants were coming, but the other Scale was close. Nearer the Broodmother than Felix, but close enough.

Unfettered Volition!

* * *

Teine skidded to a stop at the crater's edge. Lightning coursed across the battlefield, followed by golden swarms of offensive projectiles and the bitter howling of mad beasts. Teine ignored it all, instead staring down at the center of the ruptured floor. The Belais Crystal shimmered purple in the red haze, though the fog was thinner here than elsewhere. The Fiend had accomplished something.

But he cannot defeat them all, Teine thought as he slid down the jagged edge of the man-made chasm. If this array activates, none of us stand a chance.

"Everyone! Pour your Mana into this crystal!"

"Sir?" Mervin asked, but Teine only gestured violently at the misshapen mineral deposit before them.

"Wind Blade!" A ripple of air Mana tore from his channels, hitting the crystal and sinking into it without a whisper of sound. The purple glowed a little bit brighter. "Fire whatever spells you have! I want this glowing like the sun!"

His people asked no further questions, just unleashed a barrage of Mana Skills on the crystal. It soaked up everything that came its way, the perfect receptacle for Mana. Teine regretted the choice he was being forced to make.

Regardless, he stepped closer to it and pulled a golden inscription stylus from his pouch. With a sure, deft hand, he began to inscribe sigils upon the stone's glossy surface as fast as possible.

* * *

"Kill it!" DuFont screamed, bringing her hooked blade down upon another slick tentacle. They had been attacking at range, but the Broodmother had not been content to let them bombard it in peace, the wretched thing. Ghouls and Revenants had also rushed them, but not as many as Eliza had feared. They seemed preoccupied with whoever had caused that explosion.

Both Daur and Rutger were beside her, flanked by Initiates and Acolytes, all of them firing their light bolts into the mass of fang and flesh. The Broodmother had writhed beneath the onslaught, parts of it blackening and curling as fast as it healed itself. Then something had changed, and now their hits were accumulating.

"Keep it up! The creature cannot withstand forever!" DuFont defended against another two appendages that swung from the main mass. Explosions of heat dessicated the limbs before they reached her, but it was the hooked blade in her hand that severed them. It was an invaluable weapon, doing far more damage than the Inquisitor's fiery blades, despite their heavy enchantments. She bisected another tentacle, releasing a foul wave of ichor that she boiled to steam with her heat Mana.

The Broodmother let out an ear-splitting bellow, high and low notes mixing into a buzzing cacophony that even DuFont's Body struggled to defend against. Hundreds of her Acolytes fell to their knees and were immediately cut down by Revenants and Ghouls. There was an almighty squelch, and the egg factory shifted; the creature’s body was trying to tear itself from the ground, reaching for something out in the battlefield.

"It's moving!" Rutger hollered. "Focus fire!"

Another volley of light hit the beast, and it screamed again. Yet more Acolytes and Initiates were stunned, but DuFont would not be diverted. They were close. It was almost dead!

"Don't stop! Die if you must, but don't stop!"

* * *

Ebon scales a blur, Felix cut through the Revenants; hot knife meet butter. His Fang and Femur spun in a wild dance of death that plowed through their resistance, but mostly he simply avoided them where he could. The Ghouls nearer the second Scale were far more stable, having had more uninterrupted time to develop. Felix skirted them as much as he was able to; they didn't matter, not if he was right.

The Broodmother screamed in a poor imitation of the Maw's discordant rage, energy surging through the horde just as white-armored figures stumbled to their knees. Felix didn't bother to help them; they were too far away, and the Inquisition had too much blood on their hands already. Let them reap the blood they had already sown.

Still, the boosting effect of the Broodmother had given the Ghouls nearest the Scale a leg up on speed. He was forced to expend more Mana to divert them, trapping them with Stone Shaping and Shadow Whips, burning them with Influence of the Wisp. They were not defeated, but Felix was able to slip through. He reached the second Scale.

Ravenous Tithe!

The surface of the Scale was molten, and Felix could practically feel his Song of Absolution gaining potency as it fought off the heat and pain. His sturdy, scaled flesh began to sizzle. But as the Scale dissolved and turned to luminous steam, the Essence echoed within him with each passing second.

Crimson cords that tied the ruby blob atop his ring of flames reached out into the world and tied together the Primordial Spawn as well. Not just here, but everywhere. Through the dark tunnels and above, in the first chamber where the Iron and Tin Ranks faced off against a renewed assault, and above that, in the streets of Haarwatch. Felix could feel them, like a phantom limb, just as he experienced their rage and hate as his own.

Felix grasped along those connections, drawing them in as much as he drew in the Scale, and power flooded him. He choked on it. It burned him, threatening to hollow him out with every passing second, but still he pulled.

Yet it wasn't enough. They were too far, too spread out. The Ravager King had been so close, the Maw's Essence that animated him, readily available to Felix's Hunger. It wasn't enough.

Ravenous Tithe is level 59!

...

Ravenous Tithe is level 64!

Song of Absolution is level 61!

Song of Absolution is level 62!

Fire Within is level 61!

...

Fire Within is level 63!

Pit pulled alongside him, devouring more and more of the soup of Essence, Mana, and ineffable potency Ravenous Tithe consumed. Pain tingled between them, as strong as the exhaustion that hung heavily over their heads.

Etheric Concordance is level 63!

Thanks...bud...

The Scale was gone, eaten entirely, and Felix crouched on the vine-strewn ground as he tried to settle it all in his veins. Together, Pit and Felix both hissed out one breath after another, muscling down the Essence that wanted to disgorge itself at any moment. That hungry cyclone in his core, however, slowly eroded that feeling of fullness. It'd dissipate eventually...he just wished he knew where all the Essence was going.

Pit trilled in sudden alarm, and Felix snapped his weary head up, fearing an attack. Instead, what he found was the mummified corpse of a Ghoul only inches away. Around him, hundreds of dessicated Primordial Spawn had fallen, drained of the corruption that animated them. Felix checked and dismissed the notifications for Experience and Contribution that flickered through his vision, noting the increase in several of his Skills, too.

Another discordant screech ripped from the Broodmother, but Felix barely felt it. He rose to his feet and picked up his discarded weapons. Bone and Blade, he turned to the beast, still protected by thousands of Primordial Spawn. He could sense another, final Scale, but not its location. The Scales were clearly providing the power for the Revenants, and if he cut them off, then he'd take care of the Nest.

He just—

"Well, how interesting," a voice buzzed. It was the sound of a hammer on an empty steel tube. "So you are the Fiend."

Felix spun, and Pit quailed within him. Striding from the thinning haze were three armored forms, unknown to him, yet unmistakable.

"Arcids," he snarled.

CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

"So you recognize our majesty?" said the Arcid at the front. It was a small thing, comparatively, barely bigger than a normal Human and colored like mud. Felix's Manasight picked out currents of dusty brown circulating around the creature, concentrated around its hands and skull.

Earth Mana. It's got a spell ready.

"I recognized your stench, yeah," Felix said.

All three of the Arcids stiffened, and their Spirits blazed with a restrained anger.

"You are one to talk, Fiend," said another, its voice more melodious than Mud. It was far taller and thinner, too, like a stretched skeleton made of bright green metal. A sense of green-gold and brown Mana fluttered around its feet. "You stink of the vile, vicious power in this Nest. You're no different than the beasts you've killed."

Life Mana? Or...growth, related maybe. Nature. Felix Eyed the three of them. They were all nearly level fifty, and all of them were beyond Journeyman. Were they all Risi before, as well? Like the Envoy?

"Did the Archon send you?" Felix asked, buying time. He could sense more of the Revenants closing in, maddened by the Broodmother's wrath. "How'd you get past the Wall?"

"Pfah!" the last of the three Arcids scoffed. Its voice was deeper than the rest, matching its immense, spherical body. It was a gun-metal gray and looked like an enormous ball of overlapping plates, its arms and legs little better than short stumps. "The supposed ingenuity of the mortal Races is nothing before us."

"Nor the might of our Father," Mud continued. "Though, you should know...I sense our Father's touch upon you." The umber-hued Arcid's eye flames flashed. "That should not be."

"You are tainted by the vicious filth of this place," Skeleton said, waving overly long fingers in the direction of the Broodmother. "Mixing such with our Father's blessed touch is...profane."

"Profane," Felix snorted. The sound stoked the ire in the Arcids' Spirits, and they took several steps closer. Felix eyed the distance between them, only thirty feet, and threw his senses out toward the horde. It was closing in, faster now. "That's rich, coming from the Archon. The Envoy tried singing his praises, too." Felix felt Essence and Mana surge in his veins in time with his own rising fury. "It didn't end well for him."

"You are an insect. You could never kill the Envoy—!" The Orb rocked forward, but Skeleton held out a thin, green hand.

"Do not be foolish, 55390. Look at what’s in his hands," it's robotic voice admonished, staring pointedly at Felix's weapons.

Orb growled, like the sound of an engine misfiring, but the thin Arcid still restrained him. "We have better methods than brute force."

"Ah," Ball said, the word deep and sonorous in its cavernous chest. It twitched in a slow laugh. "Huh huh, of course."

Felix gripped his Blade and Femur tightly, letting his power coil within him. His Will lingered around the etched patterns of his Skills, ready for his moment. But first he needed information. "Why are you here?"

"You think we'd allow you to claim Authority over us? Over our home? Pfah!" Mud sneered as much as its immobile metal face allowed. "None of you are worthy."

They were too calm, too collected. The Envoy was insane, but it only made mistakes when it was worked up. Would the same be true for these twisted creations? Felix lifted his Blade and bone. "And the Archon is? Last I saw, he was cowering in his hole." Felix smiled, baring his fangs. "Crying over his pet wurm."

"You—!"

"Enough! He has transgressed, all of them have," Skeleton intoned. Felix didn't like the sound of its (her?) voice, though it sounded eerily familiar. "Just like the abominations, he has hints of our Father within him. That will not do." She—definitely a she—flicked her over long fingers. "Activate the array."

Wait, what?

Those collections of dusty-brown and green-gold Mana surged down, into the ground, and it suddenly shimmered into a blinding brilliance. Light as fetid as a marshy sunset flushed the chamber as sigils crawled across the floor, illuminating the mesh of vines that covered everything.

No—the array is the vines! Felix flinched before he started running. Oh no.

* * *

Mervin's Skill was screaming at him. Wading into the battle was not safe, but once Mervin had chosen to take that course of action, his Sentinel's Regard had quietened regarding the combative hordes of monsters and Inquisitors. Even when Teine had led them into the crater and had begun inscribing the massive crystal, it had remained practically silent. That had changed.

Mervin spun, looking up at the lip of the crater, but he saw no Revenants or Ghouls coming to slay them. But he did see a wave of brilliant yellow-red light begin to shine from the roots that overlapped the crater's edge. The light flowed along the roots—vines?—that clung to the side of the shattered stone.

When had they grown down here? Mervin shook himself. The thought was idiotic. "Sir!"

"Not now!" Teine snarled, his hands moving furiously. Somehow the Elder was inscribing two separate arrays with each of his hands. The man had covered half the glowing facets of the crystal in a cramped script that flickered with a deep green light. "I'm nearly finished!"

"Sir! The roots! They're glowing!" Mervin repeated.

Teine stopped what he was doing and looked. Had Mervin not seen it, he would never believe that Elder Teine could look so lost, terrified, and hopelessly in love.

"Blind gods," Teine gasped. "The grandeur of it!"

Then the screaming started as the ground burned, and the very sight of the twisting, growing sigils were ice picks to Mervin's brain. Teine himself shouted as that small device of his tore itself apart and dumped a massive amount of crimson smoke directly on the ground. The sigils sucked it up like they were parched earth and it was water.

"No! Not that!" Teine pleaded, hurling his own Mana at the roots. Chunks of the glowing pattern faded, only to be replaced in moments as the pulpy matter regrew. "Run!"

Mervin looked quickly between the roots and the Elder, then at his team. They were all staring in alarm as the Bronze Ranks around them ran for their lives. "Sir!"

"You, too, boy! Before it's too late!" Teine shoved him, none too gently, and Mervin nearly collided with the side of the crater. He and his team started running, tripping over the glowing roots in their haste. Lars grabbed Mervin by the arm, hauling him after them.

He glanced back. Teine crouched over the glowing crystal, inscribing furiously. Mervin's Perception could easily pick up his muttering over the rising whine all around them.

"...you cannot do this...it's mine!"

Mervin ran.

* * *

Darius Reed sprinted up the incline, his booted feet barely inconvenienced by the vines or the slick rivulets of dark ichor that coated them. Behind him, the makeshift gurney of air sped, barely able to match his Adept-ranked Agility. He didn't stop to look or even pause to send his senses spiraling back down the path. When the knotted vines began glowing, he only ran faster.

The heiress moaned atop his whirling platform, struggling to stand and, if he knew her, to get back into the fight. Darius pressed her down with another flow of air. He had one job, and that was to ensure the survival of Vessilia Dayne.

Whether she liked it or not.

* * *

Ana paused atop the banister, peering nervously down into the cavernous chamber. Below, the yellow-red light of the Profane Sigaldry lit the bloodstained space, and a pressure descended on her that felt wholly alien and entirely...evil.

The looming faces of the Nym stared at her, as if in judgment, and Ana grimaced back before stripping her Mask. Light and Mana shifted, so subtly and so quickly that to blink was to miss it entirely, until Zara stood in her place. "I cannot interfere, or else the Quest will fail. Or else his Path will stray." She looked to the statues, their regal faces impassive as the stone of which they were made. "It is at the cusp, now. It is up to him and him alone."

Zara looked back down, following back to the source of the rapidly spreading array. When compared to the mangled and cobbled-together existences flanking him, he stood out like a fire in the night.

"Prove yourself, Unbound," she whispered. "You must."

* * *

The Broodmother, split into bloody strips and squalling in pain, convulsed. Her shrieks sent fissures of discordant pain through DuFont’s ears, still alive but in agony. DuFont was thrown back from the pulpy remains of a flailing limb, only then noticing as the Nest around her was lit by a net of yellow-red illumination.

"An array..." Daur gasped. "Hundreds of them! All linked together!"

The yellow-red crawled rapidly up the walls, until it was even coating the far distant ceiling. They were trapped entirely by it. Pain pierced DuFont’s eyes, as if something were rummaging around inside her brain. She gasped as the yellow-red light swelled.

"What is this?"

* * *

Felix ran. Each step—fueled by panic and Strength—shattered the ground in small, concentric circles. His Agility sent him tearing ahead so fast the sheer air pressure ripped his enchanted shirt and pants. His boots tore up the vines with every crashing step, but they regrew, glowing all the while.

The array caught up with Felix before he made it more than sixty feet.

The greedy threads of the sigils activated beneath him, a sudden, irresistible weight on his entire body. A sharp, acrid scent proliferated, followed closely by the atonal whine of some immense thing just beyond his perception. In a flash of terrible syncopation, he felt the chitinous creatures that scraped along the bottom of that horrid place. The one he'd plunged into when he first entered the Archon's Domain.

Let go, Felix...

Let us innnnnnnnn—

But then it was gone, and Felix fell to his knees. The ground burned, scorching his trousers, and the pressure threatened to crush him to the earth. Something sank into him, less like fingers and more like the raking claws of an uncaring giant; within his core, his very soul, something was taken.

In his Manasight, everything around him was yellow-red, a vapor so thick it felt almost solid. Yet from within him, his Fire Within detected a similar radiance that was yanked from his channels. It was agony similar to the ravages Essence took upon his pathways, and it just kept going. It felt like his soul was vomiting up every bad decision he'd ever made in his life. It burned and stabbed at his core, splashing from Felix before soaking into the array beneath his knees.

Like...calls to like, Felix managed. Profane Mana...how'd it get...inside me?

But then he saw it, as more was seized and ripped free. The yellow-red Mana had somehow dwelled among the Primordial Essence, masked by the crimson corruption so thoroughly he had never sensed it. His Manasight, now fully cognizant, felt only hate and spite and an unbridled fury as it scoured his channels and spat out into the world.

That fury, he panted before another wave of fouled Mana spewed from his skin. It wasn't...it wasn't the Essence at all.

It was the Archon.

The arrays dimmed beneath him. Felix collapsed. He'd fought so long against the pull of it that his muscles seized the moment it disappeared. His Health, Stamina, and Mana had all taken a big hit; none were above half. Felix flared his Meditation and focused on recovery. Essence burned, enough that he was going to have to take another bite before long.

“Ah, quite a lot,” rumbled the Sphere. Its voice shook the space between Felix’s bones even from a distance. “As expected of our great progenitor.”

"Our Father-Master has seeded this realm with all the tools we need to complete our Trial," Skeleton intoned. "It is only on us to make proper use of them!"

Felix turned back to them and saw a curious thing: the three Arcids, so different in dimensions, standing before a floating, shifting polyhedral of familiar energy. Yellow-red Profane energy, stolen from him and—he looked around—stolen from all around him. From sixty feet away, he could feel a coiled malice within it. Carefully, Felix leveraged himself back to his feet.

"The Fiend lives!" Mud announced. He almost sounded impressed, before he noticed something else. "As do the abominations...That is unexpected."

Around them, Felix could sense the amassed Revenants and Ghouls recovering. Their Spirits felt confused and angry, but the flavor of the emotion was strangely muted. Toothless, almost.

"Something else animates them," Skeleton hissed. "Something ancient."

"Irrelevant," Sphere boomed. The massive Arcid rolled forward until their stubby arm rested atop the shifting shape of energy. "They will not survive the next."

His resource pools slowly ticked back up, and Felix felt better than before. Clearer. More calm. Pit chirruped curiously, but Felix hadn't the time. He squared himself against the Arcids, ready for violence.

"Oho! The Fiend has changed his mind! No longer the prey!" Mud laughed, a little too boisterously. "He wishes to play the predator!" With a curt gesture, a tiny portion of the gathered power zipped into the three of them. Their metallic bodies were limned with a fiery light, almost blindingly so, and Felix gasped. To his Voracious Eye, they rose from High Journeyman to High Adept in a span of seconds.

Below them, the array relit, but this time it formed a series of four interconnected script circles. Where they overlapped was where the Profane energy hovered.

"They are all prey, baring their false fangs," Skeleton said, her thin hand joining Sphere and Mud's above the energy. Power hummed in the air.

Felix charged.

Unfettered Volition!

Reign of Vellus!

Before his kinetic lightning could reach them, the energy surged into the array. A cascading wave of violent, angry, hateful power flooded the earth, sweeping over and through Felix like a relentless tide. His charge was stymied, his body lifted and thrown backward. He hit the front ranks of charging Revenants and tumbled through them as they were all tossed by hurricane-force winds. A mad collection of scales, claws, and white-enameled armor all pitched into one another.

"Authority is wasted on you mortals," the three Arcids shrieked in unison. The three of them raised their other hand up, pointing at the Broodmother. Power diverted from the array at their feet. "None of you deserve such power!"

Another surge built, a wave so powerful that Felix could feel its screaming edge.

"We shall remove the temptation."

CHAPTER FIFTY

Influence of the Wisp!

Reign of Vellus!

The lashing claws around him froze, most of them Enthralled by his Skill as Felix exploded back toward the Arcids. He burst through the Revenants and redcloaks, Blade and bone slashing his way forward.

Before he even reached the edge of the madness, a massive beam of Profane energy ripped across the sky. It punched through the miasma and crossed the entire cavern almost instantly. Felix emerged from his violent cocoon in time to see the Broodmother, already hurt, get hit center mass.

The creature boiled, instantly sublimating into noxious steam before exploding outright.

Felix gawked, his weapons faltering. Yet, before he could do more than pan back to the Arcids, the array pulsed once more and released another wave of invisible force. This time, however, it passed him by without touching a hair on his head, but his Affinity and Perception howled as they were wrenched from his Body. His sense of self vanished, and instead Felix rode that tsunami of profane energy, experiencing the deep defenses within the earth that broke before its onrush. Shadows and steel, masonry and enchanted stone, none of it was enough to stop the wave. It swept up and out, through the earth and jumbled, hidden passages deep beneath, through the sewers, then up onto the streets of Haarwatch.

Into a city besieged.

Revenants bellowed in a hungry frenzy as they ripped through homes and businesses, maddened by the death of the Broodmother. He swept by them, pushing ever onward, ceaseless. Until he hit a shining mass at the edges of his floundering Perception, equal parts red and gold and humming with a staid potency.

The Wall.

Screams and shouts of a different sort dominated the air here, and they reverberated through the magic. Monsters crashed against the Wall, barely held back by the enchantments and the Guilder's own desperate efforts. Only Tin and Iron Ranks were left to fill the defensive construct, Skills weak. The monsters shrugged off their attacks and kept coming. Some tried to climb the Wall, but the enchantments on it blasted them off. The Guilders thrummed with anxiety and fear, but it was dimmed by the protections of the orichalcum Wall.

Then the tidal wave of Profane energy found its way in. Like a sledgehammer hitting a bell, the Wall rang with a tone bent from true. Violet arcs of Mana fire tore through the interior of the structure, frying those unlucky enough to be within. The Wall's shine died as the sigils along its length burned out.

The Guilders panicked.

The loping monsters attacked again, and this time, their climb was not countered. The monsters swarmed the Walls.

The shrieking cry of a bird caught his ear, a warning in its tone. Pit?

"HUAUH!" The air left Felix’s lungs as something hit him hard. He was driven into the ground, shattering the roots and tiles and nearly losing grip on his weapons. Above him, the cylindrical fist of the Sphere pulled back while its tepid Spirit swirled in satisfaction.

Status Condition: Concussion (Mild)

"Fool! Do not abandon the ritual!" Skeleton shouted. She sounded far away.

"The ritual can hold itself." Sphere hummed happily, hate in their movements. "Father will praise me if we remove you from the board." The big magic cyborg pulled back its stubby fist.

Pit cried out again. Felix blinked up at the bastard and flared Sovereign of Flesh. Essence burned through him, ripping his channels even further, but he didn't stop.

Reign of Vellus!

Aimed below his feet, the counterforce sent him out of the way of the Sphere's immense blow. He tumbled backward, flexing Unfettered Volition and his Dexterity to regain his feet. He rolled several times before his enchanted boots found purchase.

"Come, Fiend! I wish to test your vaunted Strength!" The Sphere hummed again, far more aggressively. Felix crouched and did the only smart thing.

He ran.

"Halt! Return and face me!"

The Quest isn't over, he thought, flicking through his notifications. That strike killed the Broodmother, but it didn't end the Quest. Something else is up there—

The howls of Revenants and Ghouls finally reached Felix, and he looked up to see thousands of them all racing toward him. Their Spirits were consumed by blood vengeance. For once, it wasn't directed at him, but at the Arcids.

And, above the horde, atop the rise in terrain where the mangled Broodmother lay, was the biggest goddamn Scale he'd seen yet.

There it is! The last chance he had was to claim Authority before the Arcids turned the whole city into a slaughterhouse.

Reign of Vellus!

Reign of Vellus!

Dual cast, the kinetic blast sent Felix flying above the horde as it approached, and he unfurled his borrowed wings. He soared into the air, nimbly twisting from a Ghoul's grasp. He kept using Reign of Vellus, despite his Spirit's injury and the state of his channels. They were raw and weeping. He didn't stop. Everything went into speed, every ounce of his Will and Endurance. He assigned his free points into Agility.

All the while, he heard the cruel laughter of the Sphere as it crushed the horde to paste.

He reached the Broodmother's corpse and made a beeline for the Scale. A mass of redcloaks had bunched around the beast's corpse, and three tall figures were approaching the Scale on foot.

"Stop!"

The redcloaks opened fire. Bolts of intense light seared across his body, forcing him to tuck his wings and drop. He landed with a crash, tearing up flesh and stone beneath him. Only the enchantment on his boots let him keep his feet, so slick was the earth. The Inquisitors spun, turned on him with massive blades of flame.

"Fiend," DuFont hissed. She hefted his hooked blade in her hand, the bronze metal pristine despite the ichor that covered everything else. "You're younger than I expected."

Behind him, the giant Orb had started giving chase. The Sphere had tucked its limbs in and rolled through the Revenants and Inquisition like a steamroller. Bodies and bones and claws burst into sprays of ichor and Human blood, but the monster didn't stop.

"You can't touch it. It's...it's concentrated Essence. Corrupted. The same stuff in the air that's burning at you." Felix nodded at the red patches on the elderly Inquisitors. They scowled at him, not moving their weapons. "It will kill you."

"Unlikely, boy," Daur said. "We are Tempered with the greatest of Bodies known to our Empire. We'll not fall to paltry tricks and monster spawn."

"They're Primordials," Felix blurted, and all three of the Inquisitors froze as if they'd spotted a deadly viper in their midst. "Nascent, but Primordials just the same."

"Impossible," Rutger scoffed, but the quiver in his jowls and Spirit betrayed his unease. "No Primordial has been seen outside the Seas in a thousand years. You lie."

"My Analyze calls them Manawarped, but their Type is hidden," DuFont said, flicking her eyes across the battlefield then Felix. The amulet around his neck heated up. He'd almost forgotten about its veiling enchantment. "And it calls you Human...but that's not right either, is it Felix Nevarre?"

"I'm as Human as they come, DuFont." Felix bared his teeth, grown into sharp fangs by his Skill. "But we're running out of time. The Arcids are coming, and they've already disabled the Wall with their ritual. You have to let me take the last Scale; only my Skill can remove the threat."

"How convenient!" Rutger lunged forward, his sword describing a flawless arc.

Reign of Vellus!

A blast of kinetic lightning threw the sword wide, and Felix booted the man in the chest. The Inquisitor was tough, however. His boasting of a strong Body wasn't all air; he was thrown by the kick, but he never lost his feet or weapon. Then Daur was on him, swinging for his head.

Felix brought his too-long Blade up, deflecting the blow. The shock of it vibrated through his arms and into his chest, and his Health dropped by ten percent. "Listen to me!"

"And hand you the Authority over this Territory?" DuFont laughed, and her sword came back up. "You think us fools?"

"That Wall is pure orichalcum!" Daur screamed, weaving his long blade around Felix's own. "It isn't falling to some overgrown golems!" He thrust, shoving Felix's weapon aside and opening the Nym up for the kill. "And we will not fall to you!"

Felix's other hand came around, the club rapidly expanding as he brought it across the old zealot's neck and shoulder. Daur was committed to the attack and tried to turn into the strike, but was too slow. The Femur hit him with a sound that reminded him of a car crash, steel bending beneath the metal club like softened clay.

"You can't!" Felix shouted, rolling then jumping above a twisting attack from Rutger. A Cloudstep reoriented his movement, so he ping-ponged behind the whirling Inquisitor. "Don't touch it—!"

DuFont was running up the slick incline, only yards away from the looming Scale.

Shadow Whip!

Influence of the Wisp!

Enthrall failed.

The blue-white wispfire died before it touched the woman, snuffed by her white-enameled armor. But his whip caught her by the leg, yanking her back until she planted face-first in the ichor slurry that was once the Broodmother.

"Stop, you idiot! I'm trying to save your life!" Felix shouted, planting his Blade into the earth to deflect the whirling strike from Rutger. The force of the old man's blow shattered the stone platform they stood on, and all of them stumbled forward.

The Shadow Whip tighten, and Felix hauled back, dragging the inconsequential weight of the ex-Elder back through the muck. She shouted through the grime coating her face. "Imbeciles! Do something!"

The Inquisitors brandished their flaming swords, chopping at Felix, who had to dive out of the way. Their swords whistled through the air, propelled by Adept-level Strength, and severed his Shadow Whip.

"Got you," one crowed.

Felix threw an acid orb at his face.

"Ah!"

The man's helmet saved him from most of the acid, though Felix didn't care. He cast another Shadow Whip, catching DuFont's arm and twisting her around in a neat pirouette. She splatted back into the vile muck.

"Stay down!" Felix shouted and advanced, angling his Blade so it didn't drag on the ground. But the old men cut him off.

"You'll not get past us, Fiend," Daur promised. Golden Mana gathered in his core, visible to Felix's Manasight. "We are protected. Echo of the Divine Shell!"

Not this again...

Golden plates of light Mana formed around both of the Inquisitors' bodies, lifting them off the ground and encasing them in elaborate armor. They were transparent, golden mechs; better by far than the others Felix had faced. Yet still, the armor was made of magic.

And Felix had grown hungry.

Sheathing his club, Felix flared Unfettered Volition and ducked under Rutger's guard. The old man seemed surprised that Felix didn't hesitate. He grabbed the front plate of Rutger's light Mana armor and drove his Essence-fueled talons into it. Cracks spiderwebbed across the surface, and Rutger screamed as Felix pulled the man closer.

"Ravenous Tithe."

For a brief moment, their Wills butted against one another, but the old man could not match Felix. His chest plate, the largest front portion of the armor, dissolved into colored light that Felix breathed in.

"Impossible!"

Perception screaming, Felix leaped backward just as Daur brought his burning sword down before his ally. The blade cut clean through the stone.

Ravenous Tithe!

Felix cast his free hand outward, grazing the edges of Daur's conjured armor, but it was enough. Streams of golden energy surged into his channels, stabbing at his Body, Mind, and Spirit in equal measure. Pit bristled, but his cry helped Felix focus more than anything. The blade had missed him, but they had succeeded in making him lose his Shadow Whip. Again. Beyond the two Inquisitors, Felix could see DuFont get back to her feet.

"Keep him busy!" she shouted. "This is mine!"

Daur growled as if fighting with the sword before yanking it up from the groove it had carved. While once it had been aflame, now it was as dull as any normal steel. Interesting. Despite his frustrated grunts, the enchanted sword seemed burned out.

Felix's weren't.

He poured his Mana and Essence through his two chosen weapons, sword and club, Blade and Bone. They crackled, glowing but containing the magic that filled them to the brim. Golden-blue energies began to drip from both of the weapons, and both of his resources rapidly dwindled.

"Get out of my way," Felix said.

"Never, child of Night. You stand against the Indomitable Order, and we will not let abominations take hold of our people," Rutger proudly proclaimed.

"They'd be better off dead than under your Authority," Daur added.

Felix surged forward, not bothering to speak, all of his Strength and Agility pushed into the movement. He swung low with the Blade and high with the Femur, pushing into the Fourth Form of Long Blade Mastery Rory had drilled into him. Their blades hit and stopped dead.

"Our...enchantments," Rutger said through gritted teeth. Apparently, the blades had boosted their Strength before.

"Seems like they burned out." Felix grinned, showing off his mouthful of fangs. He poured more of his Mana, filtering it through his Skill and into the weapons. They glowed brighter and brighter as the Inquisitors tried to leverage their Strength against Felix. "Your turn."

Felix dropped the Form, letting the sudden release stagger his opponents, and stepped back. With six-foot-long weapons, his reach was ridiculous. The Inquisitors stumbled, and Felix performed two simultaneous thrusts.

Straight through their golden chests.

Their armor immediately shattered into motes of golden light, which Felix swept into his core. The Blade pierced Rutger through the abdomen, and so did the Femur, though the latter was far more brutal.

They fell.

You Killed Inquisitor Slavis Rutger!

XP Earned!

You Killed Inquisitor Ellis Daur!

XP Earned!

"You're next, DuFont!" Felix shouted, but his way was blocked by another figure. A familiar one.

"Me first," Ilia the Sworn said. "Been looking forward to a rematch."

* * *

"There!" Teine screamed, his channels burning, blood shreds. But the sigiladry was completed. He slammed his scarred hand down upon it and forced the last dregs of his Mana into the array, cackling all the while.

Fury and hate! So powerful! So useful! I see it now! They wouldn't take this revelation from him. This unique energy was his!

The flux of power before him threw his Spirit into disarray, and his Mind just barely kept up. Yellow-red energy mixed with the Mana in the crystal and the purple glow had turned into a swirling nexus of howling power. He muscled the madness down, just long enough to press his Will against the spellform he had crafted.

"Let it be done!"

* * *

Dodge is level 51!

Unfettered Volition is level 50!

Journeyman Tier—!

He cut off the notifications, holding it at bay. God damn tier-ups in battle.

"You could've stepped in at any time," Felix panted. He'd dodged the assassin's furious dagger work, but he had to put everything he had into it. She blurred toward him again, and this time her daggers scraped harmlessly off the heavy scales on his chest. Sparks flew.

"Maybe," Ilia grinned, winded herself. Sweat beaded on her upper lip. "Maybe they deserved it."

The Sworn never stopped. She was strong and agile, but her Endurance was less than Felix's. But she didn't need to stop Felix for long, just until DuFont was done.

"She'll die if she tries to destroy that Scale," Felix warned, actively looking for a way past the woman.

Ilia shrugged and gestured sharply. Five throwing blades appeared in her hand. "So what?" She whipped them at him at speeds closing in on supersonic. Felix burned Unfettered Volition, shifting himself out of their path by the barest of margins before charging himself. He needed to get in melee range.

"So fast! You've grown much, Felix!" Ilia laughed, but her smile was off. "Too much! Show me how!"

Cloudstep!

Felix stepped to the side, landing atop an angled platform before springing off of it. He completed a dizzying arc around the assassin, but the Sworn met him midair. She, of course, had her own Cloudstep to use.

"How did you learn this!?" She demanded and jammed a short blade into his gut, its length steaming with dark vapor.

While his scales had protected from slashing attacks, with all the Strength and Skills the Journeyman Tiered assassin had, it was simple enough to penetrate his defenses. He dropped his Blade. The ball was in her court...except that, by stabbing him, she had put herself into his melee range.

He grabbed her as they fell, neither of their Cloudstep strong enough to hold their combined weight. He didn't grab her skin or muscles, but her armor.

Ravenous Tithe!

The black metal and leather resisted his Strength, but not his hunger. He ate the enchantments within the garment before ripping it completely asunder.

"I learned it from watching you," Felix said. And he punched her right in her unprotected chest. Ilia was hurled backward, and her Health dropped sharply, but she was still alive. That didn't matter, not to him. Not now.

DuFont had nearly reached the Scale.

From behind them, a purple light mushroomed up from the battlefield, staggering them both. Ilia, gasping for breath, releasing a sound of utter terror. Felix, however, couldn't spare it a thought.

Unfettered Volition!

Reign of Vellus!

Felix rocketed past Ilia, boosted by his unflinching Willpower, powerful Agility, and a brilliant burst of kinetic lightning. His club ripped from his hand he reached out his talons, screaming all the while.

So close! Ravenous Tithe!

Before he reached it, he heard the metallic clash of bronze hitting stone.

"Mine," DuFont hissed.

Then a blinding purple light consumed them all.

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

Bastion of Will!

Sovereign of Flesh!

Felix was thrown hard against the burning surface of the Scale, though the sensation soon paled before the onrushing violet light. It seared against his exposed limbs, just as terrible as the rush of corrosive Essence which had stripped his already weeping channels. Something else rioted within the light, a piece of the Archon fused with the explosion; one last wave of that damn array to finish them all off, maybe. Felix tried reinforcing his Mind and Body against it, but he could feel—if not see—the light breaking them down faster than he could regenerate. He could barely think. It was—He—

Ravenous Tithe!

This time, he widened his scope. The Scale, the ambient Essence miasma, the flash of power, opening his mouth wide and letting all of it pour into him. He'd experienced trying to breathe in a hurricane, the impossible misery of it, and eating the Maw from the Ravager King had felt like wrestling a firestorm.

This was like taking a bite out of the apocalypse.

His Body, Mind, and Spirit were washed by the torrent of unleashed Mana and Essence, buoyed on winds that sought nothing but to destroy him wholesale. It was madness incarnate. He screamed, and Pit chimed in chorus with him.

Status Condition: Spirit Damage Increased From 5% To 12%

Status Condition: Mind Damage Increased By 5%

Status Condition: Body Damage Increased By 5%

Spin it! Pit shrieked. Must! Spin!

Together they tried to do as they had with the Ravager King, moving the power through Felix's abused channels and spinning his ring core with greater and greater haste. Pit's channels were far more hale than his own, but being converged meant only a fraction of the power cycled through the Chimera. With the strain on his channels, it took everything Felix had to keep Ravenous Tithe activated. His core open to the unending blast wave, Pit struggled to help push the power along their converged channels.

Felix could sense shifts within his core, but he hadn't the attention to spare. The violet power thundered across him. Each passing second stretched into infinity, a violent cacophony of noise and light. Deep, earth-shaking vibrations filled the blinding light, Harmonics that called to destruction and devastation. And the Archon's own Profane energy, twisting that music into something worse.

Status Condition: Spirit Damage Increased From 12% To 17%

Status Condition: Mind Damage Increased From 5% To 10%

Status Condition: Body Damage Increased From 5% To 10%

Ravenous Tithe!

The ruby form above his spinning core flexed and trembled, and the Maw's inert instincts prodded him, telling him what he could use and what needed to be vented. Spin and pull, burn and expel; it was a pattern so familiar it had begun to happen without his knowledge. The abyssal vortex within his ring core devoured what it could, but even its unending hunger was not enough.

Notes of discordant fury shook through him, a burring twang that marred the explosion's subtle Harmonics. And then it was gone, and a relative darkness took the vast chamber.

TERRITORY-WIDE QUEST ALERT!

Congratulations!

The Nest Has Been Destroyed! The Threat Of Their Influence Has Ended!

Territory Contribution Is Being Calculated...

Territorial Authority Has Been Granted!

Congratulations: Eliza DuFont!

No!

Due to—

Felix couldn't focus through the pain, the horror of it. And the rumbling did not stop. Blearily, Felix saw that—somehow—he was rushing toward the ceiling. Somehow—wait—! The enormous, granite face of his Nymean ancestor was falling. The entire chamber was falling apart.

"Stone...shaping...!" With a final push of his Mana, the ground turned to putty beneath him. Felix was sucked beneath the surface just as the colossal statue hit.

Into darkness.

* * *

Pain and pressure.

Felix's constant companions, they had become his world. He couldn't remember the impact of the stone above, or even where his physical Body was; he was simply floating, hovering above the deep darkness within his core.

Pit coiled around him, wings outspread, trembling while Felix clutched at the tenku. Whatever had happened, the both of them had manifested within the darkness of his solar system. Celestial lights illuminated them, from both his planetary Skills and the blue-white sun of his core, highlighted by a steady strobe of lightning prominences.

Power spun through him. Mana and Essence and flickering shapes of yellow-red, all of it swirling through his veins like a deadly magic cocktail. A vortex of that wild mix spun above his head, ceaselessly devoured by the black on black abyss within his core. Still, Felix could hardly breathe. His Aspects felt compressed, and for a moment, he feared he was being crushed to death by whatever stones were now certainly crushing his physical Body.

But no, he could see his Health. It was steady, if low. Yet the pressure continued, both pushing and pulling on him. And immense, terrifying pain that was hard to describe. Like his everything was being peeled, layer by layer.

He needed to cut it off, something to break its hold. He—he needed to sever it.

Bastion of Will!

The pain swiftly retreated before the Essence of Sever that he'd Tempered into his Skill. Nearly all sensation fled, banished as Felix floated in the pregnant darkness of his core space. Even the light of his Skills and the flickering fire of his core ring were muted...until they disappeared, too.

But the pressure remained.

It pulled at him, from all directions at once. A familiar, irresistible tug at his Mind, Body, and Spirit that suspended him. It was the same as when he'd first awoken in the Pathless' cathedral.

"Pit? Can you feel this, too?" he asked, but there was no answer.

Pit was gone.

"PIT!"

Felix's voice, which he shouted with all his might, was without echo. Muffled as if he were in a room draped in thick cloth. All of this was terribly familiar, even the surge of fear that tingled in his belly. As before, his Mind quested outward, and Felix felt a smooth stretch of bonds attached to him. Pulling at him in all directions. He knew more now, and though he couldn't see the bonds, he knew what they felt like.

Threads. A million, a billion strings of connection. They felt smooth, but that was only because they were each so tiny it was hard to separate them. They constrained him, though he could move his invisible limbs in the dark. But he was immobile, fixed at this point by the weight of them.

Felix tried to flex, to twist, but the threads would not shift. A weight greater than he'd ever experienced pulled at him, and he'd just had a sculpture the size of a mansion dropped on him. The only saving grace was that it was pulling him so evenly that Felix felt...balanced. As if no one thread were stronger than the others.

"What is this?" Felix tried to navigate toward his Bastion, to the small world he'd made of the mental Skill. But he remained, strung up in the dark.

"So you have found it."

Felix gasped in surprise. Below—ahead?—of him, a figure resolved out of the dark. She was little more than a silhouette, but it was one he recognized. The proliferation of joints in her limbs was a dead giveaway.

"The deepest part of you, unveiled," Vellus said, turning her featureless head as if appraising the space. "An endless darkness put upon by eternal, untiring forces. How...bleak."

"Why—how are you here?" Felix asked.

"Our connection grows tenuous the longer you refuse to seek the Shrines, Felix Nevarre. I had given up hope on reaching you, especially after your Companion refused me," Vellus said, twitching unpleasantly. Everything about her felt disjointed and raw. She hurt to look at, but Felix couldn't even blink. "But here, deep within your core, here, our connections thrive."

Pit? Felix queried, but still there was no answer. "Where am I?"

"When you cut yourself off from sensations with your Bastion, it did more than sever them. You unmoored yourself—temporarily, of course. Without your Perception, without even your core to ground you, your Self drifted into this place. An expression of that which animates you, of what moves your very soul."

Darkness that reminded him of the Void and eternal bondage to things he didn't understand. That was…not a great sign; he would have hoped for a happier scene. But Vellus gave him the clues he needed. If Bastion got him here, then it would get him out. Bracing himself for the pain, he deactivated his Bastion.

And nothing happened.

What the hell? "How do I get out? The redcloaks have Authority!" That fact burned, for all the effort he'd put into it. Only to fail. "My—people are in danger!"

"The forces acting on you are beyond your understanding, Felix Nevarre. Even deactivating the Skill that led you here is not enough to escape the gravity of significance that binds you." Vellus twitched, and suddenly she was closer. "I can help you fix it, however."

This sounds familiar. Felix scowled at the goddess. "For what price?"

"What is freedom, true freedom, not worth?" Vellus replied. Evasively, Felix thought, but everything about her was so alien it was hard to tell. "I will say that your plight is not your only concern. Your city is being overrun, its defenders dying by the dozen. And your friends are in dire trouble.

"I know that! That's why I need to get out of here!" Felix said. He was fighting to stay calm before the goddess' hedging. "They could be dying right now, for all I know."

"I can show you."

Despite himself, that got his attention. Felix felt his stomach twist. He knew the goddess was manipulating him; everyone else had, after all. Everyone except his friends.

"Show me," he hissed.

Vellus reached her too long arm out, sideways, and plucked something. A shimmer of light rippled down a thread in two directions, toward him and off into the distance. His Affinity sang in tones so complex he couldn't follow. The light raced toward Felix, and then it all merged. He saw.

He saw a darkness gathering in the Foglands, thick and viscous as the fog that had once dominated it. The forest and mountains beyond the Walls pulsed, shaking with the approach of something terrible. Dark clouds raced across a sky that had been overcast ever since the Ravager King fell. The clouds thickened, purpling above the city, pregnant with a tempest Felix knew was almost upon them.

A golden figure shone in the darkness, and around his towering form were a legion of monsters. Blue-armored hands coated in living ice ripped through the earth. They were free. Golden gauntlets followed, an elaborate armor built in an ancient Age.

A moon rose above it all, soaked in blood.

Felix fell, falling backward off the Wall, yanked through the city by Vellus' hand. He saw white-armored zealots swarming like disturbed ants, weapons shining and voices raised in a fanatical chorus. They fell upon stone-shaped walls around a series of warehouses. His walls.

Felix gasped, but the vision did not stop.

Redcloaks perished under the weapons of their Tin and Iron Ranks, but it wasn't enough. Their few Bronze Ranks made a dent in the tide of Acolytes, enough to make the Inquisition hesitate beyond the walls. Men, women, and children were gathered up and moved away, back into the fortified warehouses. He saw Thangle weaving elaborate illusions around the civilians, his Obfuscation at work. Hector was frantically inscribing the walls, hoping to repair them, maybe, while Aenea was passing out tonics and potions as fast as she and her apprentices could manage.

But then she appeared, holding his hooked sword aloft. A red-gold aura surmounted her head, not quite a halo so much as a crown. There was the sound of rumbling stone and the titanic clatter of something being released. From the clouds overhead came a rain of light upon the encampment. It scoured the earth, burning through leather, metal, and stone.

Nothing survived.

Felix jerked back to himself, his Affinity reeled back like a snapped line. He couldn't move, but he shivered in horror all the same.

"Is—is that happening now?" he demanded. If he could have, he would have grabbed the goddess' gangly body and shaken her. "Did that really happen?!"

"No. It is, however, a near certainty." Vellus tilted her shadowy head at Felix, curious. "Have you not seen the Quest notice?"

"That DuFont won?" Felix heaved a series of heavy breaths. His heart wouldn't stop racing. "Yeah, I saw."

"Not that. This." Vellus waved a hand, and a blue box appeared before him. It was the same as before, except at the very bottom.

Due To Conflicting Levels Of Contribution, Challengers Have Been Chosen!

Each named individual can Challenge the holder of Authority. If they are defeated, the Authority falls to the Challenger!

All Challengers have three days to Challenge for Authority. After that time period lapses, no further Challengers are allowed.

Named Challengers:

Uldred Teine

Calesca Boscal

Felix Nevarre

Holy— "Is this...I can Challenge DuFont?" Felix bared his flat, human teeth. "Good."

"You will never reach her, Felix Nevarre. The dregs of her army are still mighty against a lone attacker, and the defenses she can now summon will dwarf any such efforts. Even by the Fiend."

Felix looked at her. Her voice sounded..."What are you saying?"

"You have one chance to take it, to save your city and those you care for," Vellus said, flickering closer still. She was...larger than Felix had anticipated, and he realized he wasn't sure how far away the goddess truly was. "You only have to make the Choice."

"What choice?

"We are connected, Felix Nevarre. Through the Choices you've already made, time and again. The Titles you bear, the Skills you've earned." The goddess drifted slowly closer, twitching all the while. Felix held back a gasp. She was no closer than before, but she loomed, a shadow taller than most buildings. "You only need to strengthen the Harmonic connection between us, thicken the ties that bind our causes to the Grand Harmony itself. A Choice will bind us both and allow me to send you pieces of my power."

An Oath, he translated. Swallowing, Felix looked up at her shrouded face. "What do you get out of this?"

"An emissary. A true servant to complete the tasks I've left undone for millennia." Something like lightning flickered in her incomprehensible form, and Felix briefly tasted a coppery tang in his mouth. "This world has been too long without the gods. It cannot last, not now."

Felix hesitated. He remembered all too well the Chorister of Vellus, and further back, the Sage of Vellus. Both driven insane by their connection to the goddess. "I've seen your emissaries. Your followers all end up crazy."

"Weakness. They are unable to retain the truth. The Grand Harmony shattered them, either all at once or in piecemeal. They were barely Chanters, but they were not Lost, or Unbound. You are all three, an existence I could not have predicted." Vellus rumbled, and this time Felix swore he could see a bleak, crimson mountain. Lightning assaulted its peak. "You are my Chosen, ascendant. You alone shall receive my Boon."

That lightning, so familiar, coiled around Vellus' gargantuan form. The goddess flickered and twitched, growing closer and closer, while the blasted terrain he glimpsed within her did as well. She was a mountain of shadow, pressing against Felix with all the weight that implied. He panted, unable to maintain his gaze on that terrible place.

"Please." Vellus' voice was soft, whispered into the dark with a vulnerability that twisted Felix's heart. Something had broken this creature, god or not.

"I," Felix said, gathering his thoughts. Things swirled strangely, so close to the oddness of the goddess' being. "I think—" he swallowed, pushing past the pressure that she exuded. "I think that I—"

Distantly, Felix felt a wrenching sensation, and he gasped. The goddess' pressure redoubled.

"Felix? What is your Choice?"

His thoughts felt murky, as constrained as his body. He was—what was she asking?

"Your Choice! Do you wish to save your friends? Do you wish to save everyone?" Vellus' voice was thunder, destruction from on high that sparked Felix's primal brain.

"Yes," he croaked, unsure why he was trembling. "I will save them."

Hidden among the pressure, Felix felt cords tighten upon his soul. It was jarring compared to the immense but neutral pull in all directions. Intrusive in a way that Felix found familiar, and memories of the Maw dissolving into his Body flickered across his vision.

The strings of connection between them began to burn, blood and lightning crawling their lengths.

"No no no," Felix blinked, his eyes bulging. He pushed back the fog that clung to his senses. Felix tried to reject them, but the cords only tightened further. A vast presence pressed against him, slithering through his channels, into his core. A feeling that reminded him viscerally of the Maw. "Not you, too."

"You have Chosen, ascendant," Vellus crackled. She had expanded into his entire vision, so that crimson mountain within her was nearly life-sized. "And I cannot let you waste it."

Felix screamed as azure lightning coursed through him. His screams seized in his chest, gripped by a hand bigger than entire cities. His head was forced forward to peer into the darkness of Vellus' form.

"Behold. My prison, Felix Nevarre. Wrought for me upon my breaking, so very long ago." The mountain loomed, and a mist of bloody rain sprayed into the null space around him. It joined the lightning in tormenting his battered form. "Only the connection of those paltry few brave enough to embrace the truth—the unfettered reality of their world—only they have seen this. My choristers went mad when it took me, and even my Sages and Paragons were lost to its evil predations."

The shadow that was the world moved, leaning down until its face was mere feet from his. Felix could see nothing but curdling darkness, punched through by an endless storm of blood and lightning. "I am sorry for this, Ascendant. You would not listen, and we have not the time. I have no other Choice. The others race against me, and our greatest failure returns."

The goddess' breath tasted of copper and burnt ozone. Blood and storm.

"I need you, Unbound. Few are they who can withstand the Ruin."

Her grip upon his soul tightened further, but Felix's screams were swallowed whole.

CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

Vellus gripped him, body and soul. The goddess had engulfed Felix's vision in all directions, and the mountain the size of a planet dragged at him. An endless storm within her thundered closer and closer, its lightning shattering stones the size of continents. Those clouds churned with magenta, disgorging torrents of sanguine rain in driving, razor sheets. Lightning and blood channeled through Felix, and he sensed them bypassing his core. They soaked his Aspects directly.

"The Maw has left its hungry Mark on you. As Unbound, you are receptive to all Mana, no matter its place on the spectrum, but you seem intrinsically tied to mine. You could say you ate your way into my influence." Vellus' voice was all-encompassing, more than sound. It shook his soul. "The Unbound are beyond our reach unless they give us permission. Unless they Choose us. The others have taken their bounties, other ascendants have taken their Boons. The world races toward its doom, and the gods merely watch. But I can save it. I will."

Familiar lightning and sanguine tides swept through Felix, soaking him in their energies as the crimson mountain became his entire world.

"That wasn't a choice, Vellus," Felix gasped. The pressure redoubled—as if he were getting sucked into the mountain's gravity—and the charged Mana surged through him. "It was...coercion! You're...no better than the Maw!" he shouted. He threw his Will against Vellus' in an attempt to push her back, but it was like trying to whistle into a hurricane. All he did was run out of breath. "At least it...was honest...about being a monster!"

"I am trying to save this world, Felix! Just as before! Just as always!" Vellus snarled, and Felix was hit by bloody storms and jagged blue lightning. A creature was lashed to the mountain's peak—a speck in his vision but growing—bound by chains bigger than entire cities. It thrashed, strangely jointed limbs twitching every which way. "That wretched Primordial was a stain upon the Continent! It was nothing like me!" The creature howled, and his strained Affinity could hear it. The strident thrum of fear.

She's afraid, but not of me. Of the Primordials. Felix flinched back, much as he could. He was missing so much context in what she said, but that was clear. How can I—?

"You've no clue, Felix Nevarre. The Primordials would have ended us all. You cannot—cannot imagine the devastation..." The null space quivered around him, briefly disrupting the goddess' presence. She flickered like a ghost before solidifying again. That distant creature spasmed, and the chains rattled like thunder. "We would have done anything—have done anything to survive. And now...and now it is no longer enough. Worse threatens us all, Divine and mortal alike, and none of you will listen!"

The closer Felix drew to that wretched mountain, the more convinced he was that he'd not survive. Not as himself, at any rate. Whatever was strapped to that peak—and Felix was almost completely certain it was Vellus herself—he would be changed. He needed to delay, to do something, anything. His Mind scrambled while his Body and Spirit fought to resist her awful kinetic pull.

"What—" he gasped. "What threatens us?"

Yet she did not answer. Instead, Vellus' madness turned palpable, though it was likely only a taste of what her choristers and Sages went through. It burned and swirled, the edges of it falling to pieces only to be reconstructed into shapes that defied description. The crimson world loomed closer.

"Without me, you will die," Vellus rumbled, and her voice had become thunder and the rattle of chains. "I have Seen it. Even fully empowered, that Cardinal Beast could not have saved you."

Cardinal—? The Primordial, saving me? Felix gritted his teeth against the currents of the goddess' insanity. Are we...talking about the same Maw?

The flow of the goddess’ power increased the closer that mountain came—Vellus' moon, he realized. It felt different than what the Maw attempted, time and again, but no less a violation. He hadn't allowed this; he wouldn't allow it.

Yet he couldn't do anything. He couldn't even shift from his relentless descent.

Desperate, Felix grabbed at his invisible core. His Skills, his stats, anything he could reach. He knew it was all there, just out of sight, but where? His stats were the first he tried, but his Strength, Vitality, and Endurance were useless, as were his Dexterity and Agility when he couldn't even move. His Intelligence and Perception weren't bringing him anything, and his Willpower had already failed against the goddess'.

What did I expect...from a deity? Felix panted his breaths, his body still feeling oh so physical here in this place. It was like the Void, but not. The darkness wasn't black, just nothing, an absence of anything except him and the chaos shadow of Vellus. But if...they don't work, then what about...the Harmonics?

Resonance and Resilience were there, toiling away in the background as he focused on them. They fought against the destruction of his flesh from the firestorm that still raged and from the crushing depths they had fallen into only moments before. Moments? Time had stopped even making sense within the influence of Vellus' being. He could have been there for minutes or days, it all felt the same.

Evasion and Might both felt slippery, unable to gain traction; feats of the Body and physical defense both seemed moot at that point. Intent was...nothing. Felix's focus was scrambled each time he gathered it, cast aside by the storm winds that buffeted him. He had a feeling it would remain nothing until he could break through, back to his core space.

It came down to three, then: Alacrity, Felicity, and Affinity. Feats of the Mind, mental defense, and connection to the Harmonies.

"HUUUAAAGH!" Felix seized as bolts as thick as his waist flashed across his Body, so bright, they left afterimages even in his strengthened eyes. The electricity, charged with a kinetic kick, wormed into him like a serpent. A serpent covered in jagged thorns. "AAAAGGGH!"

"You mustn't struggle, Felix Nevarre. You mustn't!" Vellus' voice thundered, more chains and lightning. The blood storm swirled. "This is the only way! You cannot face what they plan alone!"

Felix's fall accelerated, heat igniting against his face and limbs like a meteor entering the atmosphere. Felix struggled, focusing on his Harmonic stats. This wasn't really happening, at least not on the physical level. So...so it was mental.

Focus! Push past it! He had to reach his core again. A feat of the Mind. He flared his Alacrity, one of his highest stats, and the null space quivered. His Bastion cut off all sensation, and he'd Tempered it into his Mind Aspect; could his Mind overcome his Mind? FOCUS!

Screaming in pain and straining against the invisible bonds that held him, Felix hurled his Mind against his own barriers. And, for the briefest of instants, the null space opened.

Light, blue and red and yellow, shone upon him like a break in the clouds. Felix shoved his Mind through the breach, relying on his Felicity to gird himself. The stat was low, not even 80 points, and the meager protection it offered was a paper wall before a wildfire. It would have to be enough.

Searing pain assaulted him, Mind and soul, as he squeezed his consciousness back up into his core space. His Felicity shunted a portion of the pain, the damage, but nowhere near all of it. But the tiniest piece of him pushed through, and his Affinity let him connect to his core, to the gathering of connections inherent in his core space. To Pit.

Pit!

Pit screeched in fear and fury, their bond shining momentarily in the dark. A blazing connection, thick with black, blue, crimson, and gold light flickered to life. A thread that was a steel I-beam of light emerging from Felix's chest, up and out of the null space around him.

He could feel the tenku move, as if falling from a great height.

What're you—? But Felix didn't have time to ask questions, the sensation was gone just as he felt Pit dive into the maelstrom of power above his core.

+10 FEL!

+5 AFI!

+9 ALA!

Etheric Concordance is level 64!

He felt his soul tear, wrenched nearly free of its moorings...dragged toward that nightmare vista. He had opened up the smallest points of access to his core space, and the tumult of energies flooded his consciousness again. The pain redoubled, quintupled, a blinding agony that threatened his tenuous grip. Felix gripped at his Skill, the only one he could think to help.

Reign of Vellus!

The null space stripped the Skill, and no lightning nor kinetic blast answered his call. He couldn't use his Skills! He—Felix focused. He had trained this. He could feel it, his core, so he could connect to it. His Affinity thrummed, reaching, seeking...and he felt it. The shining etching within his core space. He gripped it and turned his Intent inward, all of his concentration on the idea of it, the process. Something answered his Will, but it wasn't a surge of lightning. Instead, he felt a welling of a dense force pulsing through him. Words rode along his Affinity, coming unbidden to his mind.

The Pull of Significance.

Felix slowed, the fire against his flesh dimming. He still fell, the crimson moon below him still swelled, but it was less. The storm, however, only raged all the more. The opening to his core space had...widened.

"What are you doing!" Vellus thundered. "You dare use my own Skill against me?"

Felix felt the grip on his soul shift, as if the goddess were reaching for something else, before it tightened on another portion of him. He braced for another painful wrenching sensation, but it never came. His soul slipped from her grip, and the titanic fumbling he felt was accompanied by a pained hiss.

"What foul work is this? You've Tempered...with a Primordial Essence Mote?"

Essence of the Unseen Tide. The Maw's Essence Mote.

Choices have consequences! That's what the System says. I may have been coerced into this, but I also choose my Tempered Essences. Felix bared his teeth as lightning made his muscles seize. His stomach boiled. He was terrified, but more than that, he was furious. Vellus has no clue what she's up against.

He wasn't Felix the Nym, or even just Felix the Unbound. He was a fucking Primordial.

I...I just gotta finish the job.

Through the gap to his core space, Felix flexed two other Skills. Ravenous Tithe and Fire Within rang out in the solar array around his core, and that maelstrom of devoured energy intensified. It thickened, the clouds turning to a dense swirling liquid that flashed red and blue and yellow. The Skills were stripped as they neared his null space, their effect not quite reaching him.

A State of Accumulation!

The Way Forward!

The Essences of Bort and Conductor combined spun a bridge of luminous power that speared from Felix's core down, down into the null space. A bolt of liquid lightning.

"What—? No!" Vellus cried. Chains boomed as they shifted, and ten thousand unnatural joints cracked and twisted. Reaching.

Felix embraced his lightning, and the power inundated his restrained form. A heat grew within him, terrifyingly strong, Vellus' horror growing along with it. The ruby-red pieces above his core collected faster and faster, torn from the liquid vortex at a speed far faster than Felix had ever seen. What he'd called Echoes of the Maw flitted out and hit him like tiny detonations, chunk after chunk of shining crimson congealing together. Building something.

"What have you done?!" Chains rattled and slithered, shattering stone and diverting the course of crimson rivers. "It will be your end!"

The ruby formation had been growing all this time, unnerving Felix. He couldn't keep the terror from riling his Spirit, caught between the divine mountain and whatever fresh nightmare the Primordial's last gift had in store. Vellus' madness thundered, quaking his entire Body with her rage, but she moved as if in slow motion. She couldn't stop him. Pit trumpeted, and Felix felt a single word across their bond.

Brace!

Contained within that maelstrom above, the last piece of Maw flitted out and hit him. Immediately, an expanding ripple of Primordial potency blasted outwards. It hit and passed through every one of his Skills, and Felix felt his everything shudder with the impact. Then it reversed course, collapsing or perhaps imploding, rushing through his Skills and core space in a blink.

WARNING!

SEVERE DEVIATIONS DETECTED!

SKILLS MAY BE AFFECTED!

ASPECTS W!## $0—

BE W4R#$!—!

Out of the implosion, a glistening ring of thick, viscous liquid formed above the blue-white fire of his core, spinning in counterpoint.

"You've...No, no! You cannot—!"

"Already did," Felix screamed back. He felt like he was gonna throw up. "Jerk!"

Vigor flooded him in a constant stream. The new ring began to spin faster than before, and Felix willed his original to match it. The abyss within it howled, a sound it had never made before, as the two cores created a greater suction than ever before. The Essence, Mana, Profane energy, all of it was devoured.

ERROR!

CRITICAL ERROR!

CALCULATING NEW—!

ER%0R!

What remained was a steady, incomprehensibly intense pull that somehow acted as a counterforce to the all-encompassing draw of the threads around him. Including the goddess'. Felix shifted in the null space for the first time since he'd arrived. He gasped, reveling in the sudden freedom just as that heat crescendoed into a fierce, clawing corrosion he knew all too well.

"No! What you're doing is madness!" Vellus' voice was rage turned to agonized terror. He was no longer moving toward the mountain, but it trembled as if it would reach for him. "You tread upon a forbidden Path! Do not do this!"

Pit cried out, fear and iron resolve mingled in his sense-projection. Doubt filtered through Felix, but he was more than sick of others choosing what he should do. He threw his Will behind his Companion's, and the suction of his abyss multiplied. His Affinity spread, wider and wider, until it felt like Felix held the entire city in his Mind and Spirit. He could sense it all, every single mote of Essence that floated above or clung to raving Revenants. All of it.

Mine, he said. Not a statement. A command.

As above, so below. It was drawn into him, breathed into his flesh through channels worn so bloody they were little more than suggestions. Essence filled every inch of his core, a storm of amorphous energy that galvanized each and every one of his Skills. Those Skills blazed anew, shimmering strangely since the Primordial ring's formation. Everything—all of it—swelled and ignited, an illumination that was all the colors of the spectrum.

What...what is this?

It felt like nothing ever had. There was no pain or pleasure, it was simply a profound sense of strength. Of resilience. Those threads that constrained him moved freely, still connected, still pulling at him with the weight of worlds, but...changed.

Race Upgraded!

Your Aspects Have Been Permanently Altered!

You—!

Turbulence cut off the System as the mountain that was a moon hurled a thunderstorm at him. Lighting struck into the null space, while gale winds and piercing blood rain stabbed into him. Felix cried out, his Body torn, bleeding, and burned.

—Have A—

"You cannot do this! You doom us all!" Vellus thundered. More of the goddess' power heaved itself toward Felix, enough that he doubted he'd survive its impact. He tried to flee, to will himself up and out of the null space through the gap he'd opened. The moment he attempted it, Vellus' aura thickened with eddies of insanity, enough to send Felix stumbling. "We must save them!"

—Title Change!

Cardinal (Major) (Legendary, Scaling)!

Primordial Nym! You Have Embraced the Legacy of the Unseen Tide! Your Power Grows, and the Path Before You Trembles! +15% to All Stats.

The power that had been swirling among his core speared downward once more, guided by a swooping tenku, and struck Felix in the chest. His nerves seized, and his muscles clenched as they expanded, but more than anything, Felix's Mind felt raw. He...expanded in ways he wasn't sure how to explain, while a raw and dangerous potency came alive within him.

"You've corrupted yourself, Felix Nevarre. Become a beast of vile and wretched instinct! The Primordials have Lost so much, it is not a Path to tread!"

"Enough!" Felix shouted. His Affinity and Intent, strained already, made a final appearance. "I Choose this! Not you!"

Ravenous Tithe!

Felix reached out toward Vellus' oncoming storm of blood and thunder, seeking to claim it. The goddess resisted, pushing back against his Will like the force of nature she was...but Felix wasn't so easily budged. Not any longer. For an instant—a brief, unbelievable second—Felix held his ground.

And he devoured.

The feel of a living storm tore through his channels, though it all felt muted, and perhaps that made the difference. He'd taken a bite out of the stormfront, but the rest of it followed swiftly after, already cutting into him. Felix didn't think, he acted on his training: he took the tiniest shred of the goddess' stolen power and fed it to his core.

Everything...stopped.

In the null space, sound vanished. Wind, rain, lightning, all of it disappeared. A titanic, pained gasp shook him, but then even that was gone.

"An-anathema!" Vellus said in an agonized whisper. Felix couldn't see her, but she sounded close enough to touch. "You have no idea what you have done, Felix Nevarre. Beware."

The grip upon his soul vanished utterly and completely, like popping a soap bubble.

Vellus was gone.

The null space retreated, and his core reasserted itself around Felix. He floated, bathed in multi-colored light that wavered as his Skills revolved around his two spinning core rings. Ribbons of near-blinding light extended from his blue-white core to his Tempered Skills, and as he watched, a series of ruby-red tendrils reached outward, as if questing for Skills of their own.

Without warning, Pit barrelled into Felix, wrapping his forelimbs around his Companion with a fierce joy. It radiated between them like a light of its own, warm and golden, and...

...and it wasn't coming from them.

They both looked up. In the distance, a massive wave of iridescent energy was racing toward his core. From all directions. A tsunami of System energy; and he was chock full of Primordial Essence, its antithesis.

"Oh, what the hell," he complained. "More?"

CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

Felix had no time for anything except to brace himself. The multicolored wave impacted his core space and was met with violence. The System's power struck the build-up of Primordial energy like a hammer meeting an anvil, and Felix was iron between.

Buzzing Dissonance met angelic Harmony, and a light show of Essence and Mana burst all around him. He was in the center of an explosion, and each conflagration sent mounting agony stampeding through his Aspects. Body, Mind, Spirit all quaked and tumbled from the collision, so hard that Felix was nearly tossed out of his own core space. But, tooth and talon, he held on. His Willpower was—my god—over a thousand points, and only by flaring it did he retain his consciousness in the mad cacophony.

The wave rode up onto an invisible wall around his core space. It roared, building and building, neither stopping nor relenting. The wall flashed a deep, dark crimson while a million different lights glimmered from the liquid light. Each time it flashed, the wall—and Felix—quivered.

His universe shook.

Powerful tremors as the undifferentiated Mana flashed, and the dome of Essence crackled back. Beasts of two masters, they raged against one another in all directions. Buzzing interrupted a frenetic song, atonal notes undercutting the melodic majesty of the Grand Harmony.

Felix and Pit, joined together, weathered the pain and disorientation that subsumed them. They cast out their Affinities and Perceptions, each looking for a way out. With crystal certainty, Felix knew that if the clash continued, it would kill them both.

The dome of dark power splintered further.

The Maw existed for thousands of years! And other Primordials, too, according to Harn. Felix pushed his Mind, collecting and tossing aside recollections and ideas as fast as he could come up with them. How did they exist—UGH!—without being destroyed by the System?

A wave of light and crippling nausea assaulted him in unison. Pit squawked, as if surprised. Before both of them, a stream of blue boxes appeared, one after the other. His notifications, suppressed near the end of his fight, opened without his permission. Felix couldn't stop them.

Ravenous Tithe is level 70!

Deep Mind is level 56

Meditation is level 54

Bastion of Will is level 68

Cloudstep is level 28!

Fire Within is level 65!

Stone Shaping is level 49!

Armored Skin is level 61!

Song of Absolution is level 65!

Negotiation is level 15!

Exploration is level 44!

Arrow of Perdition is level 31!

Apprentice Tier!

+10% STR, VIT, DEX

Oathbinding is level 34!

Apprentice Tier!

+5 to INT, VIT, END

Felix screamed through clenched teeth as his Aspects trembled; Body, Mind, or Spirit attuned to each of his Skills. Each notification that charged through his consciousness was a white-hot bar of agony as a ray of fluid light streamed inward. It struck his blue-white core and ricocheted up into the newly formed Primordial core before boomeranging back out. This time, it was colored gold, blue, and a deep, dark crimson that was nearly black. It rushed outward, in seventeen flows, each one spearing one of his leveling Skills. The patterns of light, etched into his core space, flared with new power; each grew into tumultuous orbs of incandescent light.

Slower, the notifications still kept coming. As the next arrived before him, Felix felt his Mind and Spirit quiver in unison. Before he could question it, the blue box pealed in triumph.

Voracious Eye is level 48!

...

Voracious Eye is level 51!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+5% PER

+5% AFI

+...

Multiple Essence Sources Detected During Formation!

Choose An Essence Mote!

This again!

Literally dozens of Essence Motes appeared before him. They clung to the rim of his Primordial ring, shimmering but somehow prevented from being devoured by the hungry abyss below. Felix's Eye picked out [Essence of the Sun], two [Essence of the Stalwart Faith], even [Essence of Hearthstone Flame], the last an Essence Mote he'd garnered before. They clearly belonged to the Inquisitors he'd defeated; had he stolen the Essences they'd used to Temper themselves?

More light speared into his dark cosmos, each finding their way into his twin rings. More power washed in and out, spitting against the Primordial Essence in the air. Felix bit down his scream. He had to move faster. He scanned his Eye over the Essence Motes, noting their rarities more than anything else. The ones taken from the Inquisitors were either Rare or Uncommon, not worth considering. With a flex of his Will, he cast them both into the depths of his abyss.

*RUMBLE*

His cosmos shook with tiny tremors, almost imperceptible compared to the clash of Essence and Mana on the outside. But something felt different.

Felix shook his head.

[Essence of Rectification] and [Essence of Captive Struggle] were both cast aside, their Epic rarities paling before their source. Both pulsed with yellow-red power, the Archon's energies coursing through them. Felix hurled them fast into the abyss, unwilling to even toy with their consideration.

*RUMBLE*

Essences from Revenants and Ghouls flitted past his Perception, all frantically discarded into the darkness as none were greater than Rare. They made up the majority of the Essences clinging to his core, but four others waited, shimmering brighter than all the rest.

[Essence of Pride's Fall]

[Essence of the Unyielding Genesis]

[Essence of Devastation]

[Essence of the Evensong]

All of them were Legendary. The first came from the Pride of Blight, while the second came from the Broodmother. The third was sourced from the Seeds of the Ravager King, while the last...the last came from the Belois Crystal itself.

What?

*RUMBLE*

The Essences shuddered before his abyss, but Felix gripped them with his Will and held them up. His notifications flashed and shook, and the pain mounted into a spike that was driving between his temples. Felix gritted his teeth and fought down another scream. With trembling hands, he chose.

Legendary Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of Pride's Fall]

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose A Feature:

Collapse - Come to Nothing

Cascade - Plunge Into the Deep

Honor - Fidelity Unto Death

Felix grunted in surprise. He had rejected Vellus, so he hadn't expected the helpful hints to continue. He immediately discarded Collapse and Honor, however. He had no interest in tying his Mind to "nothing" nor to a nebulous fidelity. Fidelity to what?

No, there was only one choice.

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The Essence Of [Cascade]!

The etched pattern of Voracious Eye lit up in brilliant flame, brighter by far than any of his other, untempered Skills. The energy stored up in his core surged outward, gold, blue, and dark crimson crackling as a ribbon of light formed between the Skill and his lower blue-white core. Its revolution stopped, arrested by the swelling illumination.

3 of 3 Mind Essences Formed!

Tempering Has Begun!

His Mind wobbled, vibrating with the advent of his Tempering, but his notifications didn't slow down at all. Felix braced himself as his vision went white and the cracks around his core space deepened. He couldn't stop. He knew it deep in his bones. If he stopped, it would all fall apart. So he endured, because he had no other choice.

His Mind screamed as it was impacted by several notifications in quick succession.

Manasight is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+5 INT, WIL, PER

Dual Casting is level 47!

...

Dual Casting is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+5 WIL, DEX, INT

Mana Manipulation is level 49!

Mana Manipulation is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+5 INT, INE, RES

Unfettered Volition is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+5% STR

+5% AGL

+...

On the last, his Mind quieted, and his Body resonated, Unfettered Volition pushing into the fore. Still blinded by the vibrancy of his Tempering Mind, Felix used his Affinity to choose another of the Essence Motes. He plucked it free and claimed it with his Will and Intent. The core space trilled with light and sound he couldn't see and barely heard.

Legendary Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of the Evensong]

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose A Feature:

Crepuscule - Proclaim! The Dusk

Nox - Revel! The Dark

Aurora - Hark! The Dawn

The Essence permeated his being, half-sinking into his Body Aspect even as he considered his choice. This was the Essence taken from the crystal, but more than that, it held hints of fire and earth and a golden-blue radiance he found desperately familiar yet could not place. He flickered through his options, Dusk, Dark, and Dawn. Zara had spoken to him at length about Essences and how they functioned.

They took concepts of their whole and broke them into parts, allowing one to Temper with the idea of them. How that worked was beyond him, but he knew he had enough of darkness. Dusk was a dying of light. He did not want his Body to be weighted with darkness and death, even as concepts.

He chose.

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The Essence Of [Aurora]!

The Essence sank completely into his Body Aspect, and Felix couldn't restrain a gasp. He knew, now that it began soaking into his Body, where the Essence had truly been sourced. It may have been stored in the crystal, but it had nothing to do with it.

It was an Essence of the Nym.

Unfettered Volition doubled in size, glowing with that same internal light as another ribbon of power connected his core to it. His Affinity shuddered as the vibrations within his Mind increased—it was getting harder and harder to parse the chaos around him.

Felix's Body once again shook, vibrating along with the advent of his Body's final Skill. He seized the [Essence of the Unyielding Genesis], but something else seized him. His Affinity strained to make sense of it, filtering out the war of sound all around him. Something...there was a single Skill notification left. He could hear it.

It called to Felix, resonating with the Primordial Essence that eddied all around him. Echoes of it shook his Spirit and Mind, both already Tempered. But it also sent powerful oscillations through his Body. The Essence in his grip shivered and fell, consumed by the abyss.

Felix knew. A tempest whirled in his Mind, but he knew.

Some Skills were used by more than one Aspect.

His opportunity to Temper Wild Threnody passed, and the Skill hummed with renewed power as it merely Tiered up. Felix groped for the final Essence and clutched it to himself.

Sovereign of Flesh is level 50!

...

Sovereign of Flesh is level 52!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+15% STR

+15% END

+...

The Essence Mote in Felix's grip sublimated away, its vapor attempting to pierce into his Spirit Aspect. His Tempered Spirit rejected it, sending it reeling and a fissure of pain through Felix. He could sense the Primordial energy around his crater, letting in that much more colorless System power and propelling the Essence Mote onward. It pivoted toward his Mind, but Felix mustered all the Will and Intent he could spare, and pushed.

Toward his Body.

Legendary Essence Detected During Formation!

[Essence of Devastation]

Broken Path and Fatebreaker Titles Found! Journeyman Tier Bonus Added!

Calculating Effects...

Choose A Feature:

Raze - Ashes Behind You

Havoc - Tumult Within

Calamity - Upheaval Before You

Guided by his Affinity, he saw terrible connections to both Raze and Havoc. His world was one of strife, destruction, and chaos. But that wasn't what he wanted. Devastation? No. I want change!

Congratulations!

You Have Absorbed The Essence Of [Calamity]!

3 of 3 Body Essences Formed!

Tempering Has Begun!

Warning!

You Are Tempering Two Journeyman Aspects At Once!

Influx Of Power Doubled!

Warning!

Chance of Death High!

You Are Not Permitted—

ERROR!

You Are NoT—

ERR0R!

Felix felt at the connections that swarmed around him, all the thousands of threads connecting him to countless others. They pulled at him, a titanic weight upon each strand, and he gathered them up. His Skills flared in a coruscating light show, invisible to him save for his Affinity, and Pit's wings wrapped around him in unspoken, eternal support.

Felix pushed.

You—

—Have Made Your Choice!

All Choices Have Consequences.

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

Blind and deafened, Felix spun his cores. Pit did the same, screeching under the same burden. The protective dome his Essence had erected was torn asunder, and his core was flooded with System energy. They were buffeted by forces neither of them could fully perceive or explain, colorless light and a deep, vital darkness clashing within their shared Spirit. All of it funneled into their cores, sparking the spinning rings into vibrant flames.

Faster! Felix shouted, pushing his cores with all of his might. Pit didn't reply, but his own core pulled and burned as well.

The Essence and System Mana inundated them, too much to handle as his Body and Mind Tempered. Deep instincts guided both of them, just as with the Ravager King, and Felix absorbed what he could use and discarded the rest. Essence and Mana were drawn into the abyss between his cores, unable to resist its attraction once discarded. What remained, Felix and Pit absorbed into their skin and bones, eyes, and ears. Tendons, teeth, muscles. They feasted.

But there was too much. Even with Pit sharing the terrible pressure, more and more kept coming. His core space strained at the volume, its limits pushed for the first time since the Ravager King had perished. Felix felt things tear and break, just as others healed and renewed. It was like he was being destroyed and reborn, all at once.

Aspects Have Been Permanently Altered!

Divine and Primordial Strains Detected!

Permeation Imminent!

A spark fell through the maelstrom, so bright it pierced Felix's blinded senses. It roiled, smelling of an oncoming storm, tasted of violence and hope, of growth and death all at once. It dropped down, down, and Felix could sense its Intent. It was aiming for his Primordial core.

No.

Blind save for his Affinity, Felix grasped at the falling spark. It evaded, slipping through his fumbling grip, but his Willpower and Alacrity had grown far beyond what they once were. His core space was a place of Spirit and of the Mind. It was his.

He speared the spark with his Will, arresting its fall just moments before impact. The spark writhed, its Intent a living thing that sang out in a haunting dirge. A dark, forlorn song sent despairing ripples through his Affinity. Surprised, Felix recoiled from the spark, and it fell once more. But its trajectory had become misaligned, for instead of hitting his core, it was greedily eaten by the hungry abyss.

Divine Spark Consumed!

What?

All but senseless, Felix and Pit both nevertheless felt the shockwave that ripped through everything around them. Songs turned sharp and bitter, put upon an edge that drove them into higher frequencies, and the thrumming fury of the Primordial Essence was thrashed into a molten rage. Pit squawked in alarm, his body ripped from Felix's grip.

PIT!

But his Companion had vanished into the storm that swept through him. All was chaos and confusion, senses upended, and his Affinity filled with the discordant sound of ten thousand orchestras all playing different songs. Wild, wrathful noises mixed with a willowy concerto, undercut by the fierce notes of brass and wind. Dissonance and Harmony mixed, and Felix felt it tearing at everything he was, had been, or could be.

And still, the notifications did not stop.

Hidden Quest Complete!

Reject The Divine!

You're a bold one, ascendant! You've fought back the predation of both the Primordial and Divine! Your Will is incomparable! But was your Choice the Path of the Magician or the Path of the Fool?

Reward:

+Omen Key

+1—

—ELS—&@$F!//

Curse Detected!

He read but could not understand. The message washed through him as an unimaginable pain crashed into his soul. Those strings had returned, and their strength was beyond anything he'd ever felt.

New Title!

Spurned By Gods (Legendary)!

Just as you have rejected them, you have been repudiated by the Divine! +100% Damage Taken From All Enemies, -100% Damage Dealt To All Enemies.

"AUUGH!" The pressure tightened, cutting into him with crackling bonds. He couldn't see, or hear, or breathe. "GET! OFF! ME!"

You Cannot Hope To—

ERROR!

There was a slackening in the bonds around him, as if whoever was doing it had become distracted. Felix panted through the pain as his Affinity sensed his core light up around him in sprays of gold, blue, and deep Primordial crimson. No...that's not Essence. It hadn't the cloudy diffusion of what he drew out with Ravenous Tithe, nor the compacted glisten like what composed his Primordial ring.

It rose from the abyss between his cores, sprouting upward like a small series of roots. Each branching piece sang with a confusing, eldritch harmony. His Affinity sensed a bloody liquid, so deep it was nearly black, and it crackled with the rage of storms.

Divine Spark Detected!

Curse Cannot Be Levied Against Other Divinities!

Title Removed!

"Wait—?" The pain vanished as if it had never existed. Felix would have crumpled to the ground had he been physically standing at all.

New Title!

Thief of Fate (Divine)!

You have stolen a piece of Divinity from the Bloodstorm itself! Though Lost, her power sang with the appropriated Harmonies of Creation itself. That song is now yours.

"A piece...of divinity?" Felix couldn't spare the energy to think. His Mind and Body swirled, still forming, still raging. "What's that...make me, then?"

New Title!

The notification blasted across him, shaking all of his core space as if it were a mortal blow. Felix screamed, but the storm around him swallowed the sound.

Tyrant of Choice (Mythic)!

You have severed the lines of causality between you and another, denying even the gods their due! Spectacular! You are rising, Ascendant! You can no longer be bound by Oaths unless you Choose to be.

Power thrummed through him, that new, strange mix of System and Primordial energy. It built up onto his Aspects and stats like a thick honey before sinking into them, as rain into drought plagued earth. Primordial Essence, paired with System Harmonics. Dissonance and Harmony. Two sides of the same coin. The two sounds built up within the maelstrom, and lightning coursed through the blackened skies of his core space. He was struck.

Felix fell.

* * *

Congratulations!

You Have Tempered Your Mind!

You Have Formed: the Fatebreaker Mind

+50 PER

+40 FEL

+10 RES

+30 ALA

+40 WIL

Congratulations!

You Have Tempered Your Body!

You Have Formed: the Calamitous Dawn Body!

+20 EVA

+20 MIG

+30 END

+30 VIT

+30 STR

New Title!

Against Catastrophe (Epic!)

You have escaped death by dint of ability and Skill! Your quick thinking sank you into the earth, and your potency extended your life! What new feats await you, ascendant? +20% AGL, DEX, PER

The blinding white light had gone. Felix blinked, but the darkness around him was absolute. As sensation slowly returned to him, and he felt the grit of stone beneath his back and atop his arms, he realized he was no longer within his core. The dark was the dim, dusty sort of the Corporeal Realm.

He gasped a sudden breath as power rushed through him, reinforcing his Mind and Body. His stats blossomed as his new Formation settled, and Felix could feel himself break through into Journeyman. His senses strengthened again, his limbs quickening as well, and the darkness no longer felt as cloying. He smelled rich earth, the acrid tang of burned vegetation, and the implacable weight of stone.

The last vestiges of symphonic chords thrummed through Felix's core and extremities. The feeling was a golden warmth from within, touched at the edges with wild, shifting patterns he couldn't parse. Felix blinked again and tried to activate his Manasight. It flared up, but it was as if the world around him was dead. Cords of fitful Mana flickered into sight, nearly dead neon tubes of drained power. The dusty brown and smoky black he expected to see was a faint wisp along the ground. Yet, the contours of that fitful power was enough to perceive his situation fully.

He was trapped. His left arm and leg firmly wedged beneath boulders, while Pit was squeezed beside him, somehow spat out of his Spirit.

Massive stones boxed them into an opening so small he was amazed they hadn't been crushed altogether. The melted shapes above him told him that he'd managed to Stone Shape them into this hole, which meant he'd likely be able to shape his way out. Furtive hands patted at his side, feeling for his Companion. Beneath his fur and feathers his flesh was warm, and Felix could sense the steady flow of Mana through him. It was a relief, and it showed how disoriented he felt as he could have just checked his friend's Status.

Focus, he chastised himself. The vibrations he'd felt within his core had died down, though he could feel thunder echoing faintly through his senses. The boulder's weight on him was a distant thing, and he regarded it almost clinically. Then the surge of internal music ended, swept away into whatever recess the System hid itself. The pain hit him a second later.

"MMMF!" Felix stifled his shout as his vision dimmed, the return of sensation nearly too much for him.

The Song of Absolution is level 66!

Felix panted, but the pain muted just a touch more, and he could think. He could remove his arm and leg easily enough with Stone Shaping, but he had no space for them in their shared crevasse. Not with Pit in the way. Moreover, the liquification of the rock could mean the entire space collapsed. First things first, then.

Convergence!

A blinding flash of light vanished his Companion. There was a slight stab of pain through Felix's abdomen, but it was hardly noticeable after everything else. Felix waited a moment, gritting his teeth against the sensation of stone grinding his muscles and bones to dust. He checked his Spirit, tentatively flaring his Fire Within to see his core. He felt Pit there, stored safely, while all around him, brilliant towers of light spun and rotated.

Felix pulled away before he got lost in the dizzying dance of it all. Later, he promised himself. He took three deep breaths, his strengthened Body all but devouring the air in the tiny stone cave. He cast.

Stone Shaping!

The stone all around him turned to liquid, while at the same time, Felix created a rising column beneath himself, ramming his body straight up. His Will flared, and the stone above him softened and shifted aside, only inches from his face. Tons of rock melted before him, and in less than a minute, he broke through the surface.

Felix released his breath and rolled to the side, letting go of Stone Shaping at the same time he brought two orbs of dark acid to his hands. Crouching, he panned the cavernous chamber with his Perception. His heart hammered in his chest, powerful but slow and steady despite the fear that gnawed at him. An unfounded fear, it turned out.

Where is everyone? Felix stood with a wince.

The chamber where the Nest was once located was unrecognizable. The floor had buckled and erupted in places, while the walls and ceiling had come tumbling down. Great mounds of sheared boulders and smaller stone led upward, and the still-recognizable features of the Nymean statuary were cracked and scattered throughout. More importantly, it was as desolate as a tomb.

Not a single body remained, alive or dead. Felix couldn't even perceive discarded arms or armor. All of it had been consumed by the earth...or—

A wave of Essence pulled from all corners of the city, drawn through the earth and into his hidden nook.

Or perhaps he'd disposed of them. It didn't matter much, either way. What did matter was getting back.

Evie, Vess, everyone, Felix worried at his lip. The vision Vellus had shown him, was it truly the future? Or had it already happened? I have to get out of here.

Felix took a step and felt his left leg buckle under the weight. His left arm and leg were bruised and battered, and several deep lacerations oozed a thick blood that looked entirely too dark in the dim cavern. The rest of him was remarkably hale, considering his injuries even before his accidental entombment. Even so, he couldn't rush off, not like that.

All that Essence likely fueled Sovereign of Flesh and healed me, he mused, dropping into a sitting position. He leaned back against a slanted stone bigger than an entire house. Not to mention Tiering up completely. Bracing, Felix flared Sovereign of Flesh again.

A vicious pain tore through him as his skin, muscle, and bones were forcibly transformed. It hurt worse every time, but the sensation faded away quickly enough. He felt his Health Regeneration amplify, and he focused on Pit.

The tenku floated within his Spirit, but had roused during Felix's ascent through the earth. Tentatively, Felix sent to him. You okay, bud? A groggy nod came back, followed by a weary chirp. You want me to let you out? A second, positive chirrup. He released Convergence, and Pit's horse-sized body materialized out of smoke and light.

"Squaaa!" Pit cried, pushing his giant head into Felix's face. He accepted the forceful nuzzle as he summoned Pit's notifications.

Pit Has Gained 10 Levels!

Pit Is Now Level 52!

He Gains:

+20 to PER, +20 to VIT, +20 to END, +30 to INT, +40 to WIL, +40 to AGL, +50 to DEX!

A wave of visible energy coursed through the tenku, and Pit let out a chirp that became an exultant shriek. Muscle built upon his frame as Felix's already-depleted stores of Essence fueled the transformation, and Mana thrummed through his outspread wings. Despite his pain, Felix couldn't help but smile.

You Have Gained A Level!

You Are Now Level 47!

You Gain:

+2 to PER! +2 to VIT! +2 to END! +3 to INT! +4 to WIL! +4 to AGL! +5 to DEX!

You Have 7 Unused Stat Points!

Felix's smile soured a bit at that. Damn XP penalty.

He pulled up the Chimera's Status.

Name: Pit (Companion)

Level: 52

Race: Chimera - Tenku

______

Health: 1541/1541

Stamina: 927/927

Mana: 1642/1642

______

STR: 140

PER: 296

VIT: 308

END: 171

INT: 285

WIL: 300

AGL: 534

DEX: 514

______

Bite (C), Level 43

Rake (C), Level 41

Cry (R), Level 44

Skulk (C), Level 39

Etheric Concordance (L), Level 64

Wingblade (U), Level 48

Frost Spear (C), Level 51

Cold Resistance (C), Level 23

Poisonfire (R), Level 27

Flight (R), Level 24

______

Active Titles:

Survivor III

Butcher III

Unconquered

Face the Charge

Bulwark of the Innocent

Pactmaker

Work Horse

Blind Pugilist

Hero

Iron Will

Apprentice Magus

The Broken Path

Voidwalker

Indomitable

Unleash the Beast

Blessing of the Lost

Fatebreaker

The Shape of Fate II

Frostbane

Architect of the Rise

Cardinal (Major)

Save The Lost

Thief of Fate

Tyrant of Choice

Against Catastrophe

Pit's Harmonic Stats

RES: 35

INE: 72

AFI: 73

REI: 68

EVA: 85

MIG: 38

ALA: 67

FEL: 61

Pit had grown sturdier and sturdier. Good, Felix thought. He'll need it.

He brought up his own Status next.

Name: Felix Nevarre

Level: 47

Race: Primordial Nym

Omen: Magician

Born Trait: Keen Mind

______

Health: 3400/3400

Stamina: 3074/3074

Mana: 3057/3057

______

STR: 928

PER: 802

VIT: 690

END: 538

INT: 624

WIL: 1182

AGL: 604

DEX: 715

______

BODY - Calamitous Dawn

Resistances: The Song of Absolution (L), Level 66

Combat Skills: Dodge (C), Level 51; Heavy Armor Mastery (C), Level 1; Blind Fighting (R), Level 45; Corrosive Strike (R), Level 48; Wild Threnody (E), Level 50

Physical Enhancements: Armored Skin (R), Level 61; Unfettered Volition (E), Level 50

MIND - Fatebreaker

Mental Enhancements: Deception (C), Level 22; Make An Entrance (U), Level 43; Meditation (U), Level 54; Negotiation (U), Level 15; Bastion of Will (E), Level 68; Deep Mind (E), Level 56; Ravenous Tithe (E), Level 70

Information Skills: Alchemy (C), Level 27; Tracking (C), Level 19; Exploration (U), Level 44; Herbalism (U), Level 29; Voracious Eye (E), Level 51

SPIRIT - Rising Sovereign

Spiritual Enhancements: Dual Casting (U), Level 50; Mana Manipulation (U), Level 50; Manasight (U), Level 50; Manaship Pilot (R), Level 22; Etheric Concordance (L), Level 64; Sovereign of Flesh (T), Level 52; Unite the Lost (T), Level 8

Spells: Abyssal Skein (R), Level 36; Cloudstep (R), Level 28; Fire Within (R) Level 65; Influence of the Wisp (R), Level 44; Invocation (R), Level 37; Mantle of the Long Night (R), Level 40; Oathbinding (R), Level 34; Shadow Whip (R), Level 41; Stone Shaping (R), Level 49; Reign of Vellus (E), Level 54; Wrack And Ruin (E), Level 44; Arrow of Perdition (L), Level 31; Theurgist of the Rise (L), Level 59

______

Unused Stat Points: 7

Harmonic Stats

RES: 220

INE: 280

AFI: 344

REI: 208

EVA: 180

MIG: 143

ALA: 355

FEL: 282

Still a Primordial Nym, huh? Felix mused, wincing as his arm throbbed. He could feel the muscle beneath the scales squirm as it healed. I thought that would've changed.

A fuzzy image of a dark crimson tree branch flashed before his Mind's eye, rising out of the dark depths between his two, opposed cores. Even thinking of it sent a fissure of pain through his core, chest, and brain.

What the hell is it?

Without warning, a new set of pains assaulted Felix. At first, he thought they were aftershocks of his Health Regeneration, amplified by Sovereign of the Flesh, but then they spread. Beyond his injured left side, pushing into the muscles of his chest and neck. Powerful vibrations made his entire body clench and tighten; he could practically hear his bones grinding against themselves. Blue and gold flashed across his vision, along with a deeper, darker crimson as a rising chord vibrated within his soul.

It felt familiar, but he couldn't place the memory. He—

His heart thundered, audible beyond his flesh as his Strength and Vitality proved their mettle, less a beating and more thrumming along inside him, pushing his blood through his body that he felt change with every passing second. His skin hardened further than before, his muscles tightened, his bones burned as blood poured through them like magma. A strange song surged through him, a triumphant melody intermingling with wild, discordant notes. Order and chaos.

He couldn't help it. He screamed.

Congratulations!

You Have Achieved The Second Threshold!

All Primary Stats Exceed 500!

Title Updated!

The Broken Path (Epic)!

You step ever further along a path toward power. You tread a way meant only for Divinities, Primordials, and the mad. Step lightly, for Ruin awaits. +10% Journeyman Tier Bonus (Body, Mind, Spirit), +20% Adept Tier Bonus (Body, Mind, Spirit)

Requires: All Primary Stats Exceed 500, Level Below 100, Lost Race (Primordial Nym)

The flurry of sensation stopped abruptly, and Felix fell to his knees like a puppet with his strings cut. Oh, Felix managed, his mind drifting on the breeze. This again.

With a sudden snap, the fog evaporated, and the dissonant melody vanished. Felix gasped a ragged breath and pushed to his feet. Sovereign of Flesh had deactivated, but that didn't matter. His Body felt strong as hell, far more than ever before. His movements were clean and simple, his breathing easy, and his thoughts felt clear. Like a veil had fallen away from his thinking, and even his Perception felt more precise and capable. As when he'd hit the First Threshold, it felt as if his Primary Stats were joined together in a more perfect union, greater than the sum of their parts.

"Holy damn," Felix whispered, meeting Pit's wide golden eyes. He could feel anxiety and a willingness to do violence from the Chimera, emotions that Felix reciprocated. He looked up at the rubble above. “You strong enough to fly?”

Pit shook his head.

“Right. We’re climbing then.” Securing his Femur at his waist, and awkwardly swinging his Blade of the Fang on his back, they started picking their way up the rubble.

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

Congratulations!

You Have Been Granted Territorial Authority!

Gold Chest Not Available Until Challenges Are Complete.

Authority Accessed.

Welcome, Lady Eliza DuFont.

What Song Do You Wish To Sing?

Eliza had opened the notifications at least twenty times since it had appeared. She toyed with the translucent panel before her, still giddy she had access. Its meaning was relatively clear, but she did not understand the significance of the last line. What Song?

List of Options:

Song of Peace

Song of Trade

Song of—

Alright, I get it. She dismissed the interface entirely. She was intrigued, elated even, but would have plenty of time to plan after she received her aide's report.

DuFont strode among the halls of her appropriated mansion, flanked by a bare-bones guard of Acolytes. They all snapped to stiff attention as she passed, which gratified her, though she did not miss the whispers that followed her passage. The journey up from the depths had been rough, bloody, and painful—but it had not been without fruit.

A twinge of pain shot up her left shoulder, and a tingling iteration flowed down into what she knew was empty air, but which felt so very real. As if her arm were still there. DuFont suppressed a groan as the pain grew too heavy with each beat of her heart.

Pain Resistance is level 8!

Learned a new Skill, at least, she huffed, too angry to be pleased. If that bastard hadn't stopped her, she could have claimed the Nest and been out of there before...before the explosion. Her people, the few who survived, later told her it was a Guilder that set it off. And that only shortly after, giant metal golems appeared to activate that yellow-red array they still hadn't identified. None of the survivors had their Analyze at high enough levels to even get their Type, and the crater had hidden the offending Guilder from view. Bah. And now I have Challengers to worry about before I can get the Gold Chest rewards. Not only Teine and his Guilders but Boscal and her pet.

The Fiend.

She spat onto the polished hardwood and ground her muddy boots into the carpet as she stomped past. She still wore her white-enameled Inquisitor armor, its protection far superior to anything she'd owned before, even after being pummeled by half a mountain. Her left gauntlet was lost, and the precious set was useless unless paired. She'd cast the right aside soon after arriving in camp.

"At least I still have you," she crooned, patting the crooked sword at her hip. Her cloak was ragged and her skin covered in scrapes and bruises despite her Adept Tier Endurance and Vitality. It had truly been a close thing, only the mysterious Crescian Bronze blade allowing her to survive the onslaught of magic. It had dulled the edge of the explosion, while she had hid behind the bulk of that blasted Scale. "You, my army, and unmatched Authority."

A door loomed ahead, and DuFont marched through it without pause. Inside, Klark was busy organizing his desk and a number of missives bound in colored ribbons. He came to a smart salute as Eliza passed him.

"Lady Inquisitor," Klark said by way of greeting. "Are you—?"

"I'm fine, Klark," she said. The few healers remaining to her had bathed her wound in tinctures and covered it in unguents so sharp they could knock a man out. It ached terribly, but that only served to fuel her fury. "We've been back a few hours. What do we know?"

Klark reset his feet and folded his arms behind his back. "Much of the assembled Order was lost in the Nest; only two hundred remain from the operation."

"Successful operation, Klark," DuFont pointed out, and didn't miss the Initiate's quick glance at her lost arm. "Remember that. What of our troops here? How many remain, and did they do as I ordered?"

"Yes, Lady Inquisitor. The Acolytes and Initiates you stationed here pulled all high-value assets into our core camp, and the external streets have been barricaded and trapped. A thousand remain, while the rest, ah, it appears that the rest...fled."

Klark's flinched as DuFont whirled on him, and her Skills could read the fear on him. "What? What did Heuthorn do while we were away?!"

"What must be done!"

The double doors burst open, propelled by the kick of two Initiate boots. DuFont pivoted toward the noise, reaching down for the blade at her—Damnit! She switched and moved her right arm, drawing the blade. Into the room marched a rank of Initiates, their swords drawn and packed with Mana, while behind them was the tall, gray form of the man himself.

"Clovis," DuFont hissed. "What is the meaning of this?"

Inquisitor Heuthorn sneered at her, while fifteen Initiates spread outward to cut off any hopes of egress for DuFont and her aide. "We are balancing the scales, Eliza. As the last ranking member of the Order in the city, I am declaring summary judgment upon you."

"Judgment?" DuFont's blood pounded in her ears, and her knuckles went white on her sword. She lifted it, leveling it at the old Inquisitor's face. "You dare?"

"I do more than that, child," Heuthorn snapped. "You led thousands of our Order to die, against my well-documented wishes. You are no longer fit to be the leader of our mission."

"Fool! I am the only choice! I have claimed Territorial Authority! The first in this damn country's history!" The Initiates' swords were unwavering as they glowered at her through their helms. "We are victorious because of my leadership!"

"You have returned with a prize you do not deserve, Guilder. I have dispatched word to the Inviolate Order by way of Setoria so that the Grandmaster may come here herself and take up the mantle of Authority." Heuthorn flicked a speck of imaginary dust from his pauldron, and DuFont felt her stomach drop. "Until then, you shall relinquish control...to me."

The Grandmaster, she thought, panicking for the first time. If she—she'll ruin everything!

Heuthorn smiled, his facade of kindly elder burned away by the sheer hate in his gaze. "Do the right thing, Eliza. You cannot hope to win. Not anymore."

DuFont swallowed and glanced at Klark, who was standing at her side with his own sword held at the ready. "Whatever you choose to do, Lady Inquisitor. I'm at your side," he said.

Bloody Pathless and his burning, idiotic servants! DuFont flourished her Crescian blade and focused.

Authority Accessed.

Welcome, Lady Eliza DuFont.

What Song Do You Wish To Sing?

The Song of War.

"I choose victory," she snarled as her hand moved of its own accord. The sword stabbed the air and summoned a complex array from nothing.

"Attack! Do not spare her!" Heuthorn shouted. "Diurnal Barrage!"

A tight volley of light and fire Mana came at Eliza, but it was stopped wholesale by the glimmering array she had somehow summoned. With a flick of her sword, the array ignited into a blazing inferno, and an overpowering force crashed against her enemies. The Initiates were bowled over, swords torn from hands, while the Inquisitor barely kept his feet.

"What have you done!" Heuthorn howled. "This—this is Sorcery!"

"No," DuFont grinned, marveling at the power that thrummed through her channels. It spread into her core, as light and powerful as a springtime gale. "This is true Authority, and you are no longer welcome in my Territory."

Select Targets For Expulsion From Territory?

"Yes." Eliza DuFont bared her teeth as the unrelenting force—the Song—dropped Heuthorn to his knees. His armor creaked as if a giant were slowly crushing him, and blood dribbled from the man's horrified eyes and ears. "And one more thing."

It was time to take her city back.

* * *

"Pathless' blessed light," one of the mages gasped. He would have fallen to his knees were it not for Lars' strong grip.

"On your feet. We got movin' to do," the archer muttered.

Mervin couldn't help but sympathize. They had escaped the calamity below the earth—with less than ten of them, all told—only to find new, ungodly threats ready to kill them all. New monsters ran amok in Haarwatch. Just a few at first, but the numbers steadily grew as the Guilders flitted from house to house in an attempt to reach the Wall again. Surely, the defenders would have answers.

What they found was a massacre.

The Wall had been overrun, and parts of it were on fire. Blazing, violet flares of clearly magical fire lit large swaths of the structure, and according to Piotr, the red-gold glow of it had dimmed for the first time ever.

"Here! Survivors!" Someone on the Wall was shouting down at them. Mervin let loose his Perception and pinpointed them immediately, four stories up and leaning out of one of the Wall's many hidden windows. "More monsters on the way! Run! Get up here!"

His team didn't have to be told twice. Mervin and his crew sped for the access stairs, taking two or three at a time. The higher up they got, however, the more Mervin grew concerned. He could hear screaming from the other side of the Wall, monstrous ones as well as what sounded like Guilders. The interior shone with the same weak, red-gold light as the outside.

"What is going on? How'd this happen?" Piotr asked, his voice rasping. The man had been in rough shape ever since something had killed all the Revenants. They'd encountered quite a few of the desiccated corpses on their blind flight from the sewers, and he looked much the same. He'd lost muscle mass and fat, but he stubbornly refused to rest.

"Blind gods, man! What happened to you?" a Tin Rank exclaimed, but her Iron Rank superior stepped in.

"Wall failed, at least partially. Monsters are surging from the Foglands faster than we can put them down, and without the Wall's protections—"

"They're bleedin' climbin'!"

The Tin Rank was pointing out of the other side of the ancient, orichalcum artifact, where several one-way windows let them view the approach. What looked like thousands of low-leveled, white-furred monkeys had swarmed out, each roughly the size of a Human. And behind them came skittering creatures with iridescent green-blue carapace.

"Those're Wretches," Garin exclaimed, his eyes nearly bugging from his head. "They're back!"

"How? We never see two monster groups intermingle like this," Piotr rasped, speaking over the Iron Rank. Slowly, their group had gathered the other Guilders closer to them, as if desperate for new information. All of them quivered with fear and uncertainty.

"Where's Elder Teine?" the Iron Rank asked.

"Gone," a Tin Rank mage responded. She was white as a sheet.

Gasps ran through the Guilders, but Mervin paid them no attention. Instead, he focused on the warning that was screaming through his head. Sentinel's Regard squealed, a hot sensation between his brows.

"Something bad is coming," Mervin said. "The earth...it's shaking."

Sentinel's Regard is level 34!

The Wall shuddered. Then the sound of an immense impact struck the side of the Wall, and Guilders screamed. Violet fire surged down the narrow hallways, but an Iron Rank mage raised a shield of hardened air, diverting the flames. The red-gold shine within the Wall flickered and died, plunging them all into semi-darkness.

"What happened!?"

"The sigils are inert! The Wall is down!"

A blue box appeared before their eyes as that high-pitched noise continued through Mervin's ears.

Warning!

All Defenses Are Being Deactivated And Rerouted!

"No," Mervin gasped.

Beyond the treeline, the insectoid Wretches let out piercing, distorted screeches. The monkeys and insects charged as one.

* * *

All Defenses Deactivated And Rerouted.

Heuthorn was curled on the ground, immobile but conscious, and he gasped like a dying fish. "What...what have you...done..?"

"What I must," Eliza said with a grin. She held it, despite the fact that her Authority somehow let her hear what was happening at the Wall. Desperate screams echoed impossibly across the distance of Haarwatch for her ears alone, but she pushed them aside. She focused on what she had to do.

No one could Challenge her Authority if they were too busy fighting another monster horde. She stripped the Wall of its damaged protections and rerouted the Mana to her, the Authority providing a basic understanding of the vast, hidden systems beneath the city. It was astounding.

The mansion began to rumble.

Mana Reserves Have Been Rerouted Completely.

Sing the Song of Siege. She had been flicking through her options while the Inquisitor had writhed along the floor. She had a growing grasp of it now.

Song of Siege, Activating.

All around the Sunrise Quarter, the lines that traced out its well-tended walls began to tremble. She could sense that the few Acolytes nearby ran in alarm as something massive lifted from beneath the earth. Masonry and wrought iron crumbled and fell, the walls raised up higher than ever before falling into clouds of dusty debris. In their place, new shimmering walls of smooth, red-gold metal formed a single, solid barrier. No doors or windows or even defensive parapets existed along its length. It was smooth, steep, and charged with all the deadly defenses DuFont could access.

The Sunrise Quarter was cut off entirely from the rest of the city, from mountain to mountain. Eliza laughed so hard she cried.

"Lady Inquisitor?" Klark asked, carefully.

Eliza dabbed at her eyes, but the mirth kept spilling out. "I'm fine, Klark. Truly, for the first time." She stepped forward, maintaining eye contact with a feebly struggling Heuthorn and all his precious lackeys.

"You cannot...kill me...you cannot...imprison me," the old Inquisitor gasped, barely holding onto consciousness. "The Order would...fall upon you...The hammer...of justice."

"The wolf need not fear the rabbit," DuFont said to him and relished the fear in the old man's eyes as her sword cut off his head.

"I've found my destiny," she whispered. She turned to Klark, who had turned a bit pale. "Dispose of them. All of them."

* * *

"They do our work for us, brothers!" cried the venomous green Arcid, her skeletal neck turned to the skies. Violet fires had erupted along the western edge, and the sounds of battle rode the breeze. She was hunched over in pain atop the stepped hills of the city center. Her metallic flesh was battered and charred, but she was whole.

The rounded one, also charred, laughed. Its voice rattled as if something had come loose in its chest. "Our Father's Marked beasts have come, finally. The Blood Moon is nigh! Number 55118! Let loose the signal!"

The umber-hued Arcid grunted and lifted unmarred his arms. His eye-fires were bright and merry as a bolt of yellow-red, inverted Mana shot into the sky above them.

A thunderclap shook the air as the power pushed at the ever-present cloud cover, making spacing for a single, gargantuan sigil. Yellow-red power sparked and scalded the air, tracing out the convoluted and eye-searing form that anyone within leagues would be able to see clearly.

Distantly, a noise began. It faded, then began again. And again. A dark cloud roiled to the west, low and racing for the mortal city. The skeletal Arcid laughed and threw its arms wide.

"Let it begin!"

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

Status Condition: Spirit Damage Decreased From 27% To 17%

Status Condition: Mind Damage Decreased From 20% To 10%

Status Condition: Body Damage Decreased From 20% To 10%

Felix's Aspects made their discomfort known as he climbed. It hurt his concentration, sent occasional tremors through his muscles, and made something deep in his chest ache fiercely. He had hoped reaching Journeyman and the Second Threshold would knock them out, but all three of his Aspects still felt strained. It was like each had been stretched, beaten, and bloodied; for all that his Second Threshold had refreshed him, he had a ways to go. All Felix could do was push himself forward.

"You feeling it too, Pit?" He asked, and the tenku curled tighter in his Spirit. Despite that, he let out a warbling chirrup.

Yes. Cautious weariness thrummed through the tenku's voice, though it was brighter than before. Feeling better.

That was encouraging. Felix still felt as if he could fight, but doubts remained. DuFont had the Authority now. He knew that she could do all sorts of things with it, though not even Vess had known exactly what she'd be able to do.

Am I really gonna run her down and defeat her? Felix scrubbed his face with the heel of his hand. No. You'll go to your friends, get back up, and do this smart. I'm not a hero, even if I have the Title.

He kept climbing.

The footing was treacherous, and his boots were mangled and destroyed by the cave-in. They had finally given up the ghost, as not even their impressive enchantments could survive several tons of stone grinding them to paste. Felix had still managed to hang onto his weapons, though and, surprisingly, his satchel. All three were strapped to his back, knocking into him with every movement, but were barely a concern, save the Fang's length. He had to maneuver that around as he rapidly climbed.

Felix had shifted his bare feet, the soles covered with thickened scales and toes tipped with talons. It was a little upsetting to see his skin and bones deform, but his traction improved. His Body felt so fluid and effortless that he was moving almost on autopilot as he climbed farther up the cliff. Felix's Strength had grown ridiculously, along with the rest of his Primary Stats, and he doubted he'd really even need Stone Shaping to do what he planned. His talons ripped right through the stone with little effort.

And promptly set off an avalanche of rock, one he barely evaded.

Stone Shaping might be a better idea.

He made it to the top of the cliff in minutes. Here, buried under ten thousand tons of stone, was the path that had led them into the chamber originally. It should be just a straight shot through the walls and back on his way.

Stone Shaping!

The rock melted before his Skill, turning into a muddy gelatin before shifting aside to let Felix through. However, the rock around the tunnel he'd used didn't liquefy at all. It remained stubbornly solid. Felix attempted to sound out its unique characteristics, as he'd done in the Domain with metal-laced stone, but it evaded his senses. It was a blocked path, and now that he knew to look for it, Felix could sense a number of "dead spots" in the stone walls. All places he'd not be able to Stone Shape his way through.

"Damn it," Felix groaned before looking up. "We'll have to make our own path, Pit." The tenku chirped tiredly at him from within his Spirit before laying down again. "Sure. Take a load off. I got this."

Stone Shaping!

* * *

Forcing Mana through his channels and into the pattern of Stone Shaping took barely any effort from him now, and for the last twenty minutes, he'd drifted into a state of mindless toil. He'd traveled hundreds of feet by his own reckoning, having to zigzag around sections he couldn't affect and slanting the tunnel just enough to keep moving at a speedy walk. Felix would have rather run to the surface, but his Skill wasn't able to keep up with his Body.

A final burst of effort shaped an opening in a particularly thick slab of rock, and Felix sighed in relief as daylight poured into the hole.

"Finally," Felix breathed, clambering up and out of the hole. He was atop a tiered landing, somewhere between city center and...yes. He was facing the Dust Quarter.

It was raining. A soft, steady downpour that barely cooled the summer air, but dark clouds were moving in from the west. Felix had thought of the daylight as bright, but really it was nearing dusk and the heavier than usual cloud cover dimmed the already overcast sun. In the distance, Felix could barely make out the cluster of buildings that made up his camp. He saw no columns of smoke, and he didn't hear any clashes, but there were a number of tall buildings that obstructed a clearer view. He tried stepping forward to see more, and it said something about his exhausted Mind that he didn't even notice the corpses at first.

What happened here? Scattered across the steps were thirty or forty dead bodies. All of them were shriveled, as if something had sucked all the moisture from their flesh.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Manawarped Human

Name: Manawarped Dwarf

Name: Manawarped Elf

Name: Manawarped Human

Name: Manawarped Orc

Name: Manawarped Goblin

The list went on, all of them listed with the same moniker. Felix realized they were Revenants. Though their faces had regained eye sockets and noses, he could see the vestiges of mangled fangs in their unhinged mouths.

It's like...all the Primordial juice was leeched out of them. Felix swallowed. By me.

Thunder sounded. The rain pattered harder onto the streets, almost loud enough to drown out the sound of approaching footsteps. Perception already extended, Felix spun and sent an orb of dark acid flying.

Wrack and Ruin!

The acid orb flew from his grip, a wrecking ball of corrosion, and took a monkey straight in the face. It let out a short, sharp gurgle before falling.

You Have Defeated An Unknown Monster!

XP Earned!

A monkey? The thing was covered in matted white fur and had iron bangles around its wrists and ankles. It was almost as tall as him. Giant monkeys?

Name: Ghostfire Simian

Type: Beast

Level: 42

Lore: Born in the deep forests of the Foglands, these bipedal creatures are intelligent tool users and fiercely territorial. They retain an instinctive grasp of fire Mana and considerable Strength.

Strength: More Data Required

Weakness: More Data Required

A second and then a third white-furred monkey came at Felix, more, all of them up and over the sides of nearby buildings and through windows.

Swarm, huh? Felix flexed his hands and readied his Skill, waiting until they'd grouped together more. They seem weak.

Reign of Vellus!

Mana surged in his core, sounding the Skill's pattern and...nothing. Electricity crackled in Felix's grip, but the Skill would not respond.

What?

Then the monkeys were on him, swinging oversized fists and iron bangles at his head and legs, simultaneously. Felix dodged their blows, barely paying attention to the fight. He was worrying at his core.

Why won't it work? More Mana was shoved through his channels again, but the Skill remained unresponsive. It wasn't inert or broken, simply unresponsive. Did—did Vellus do this?

The thought pissed him off more than he expected, and a deep flash of anger boiled in his gut. With a contemptuous swipe, he decapitated a Ghostfire Simian, not even bothering to shift into his battleform.

You Have Defeated A Ghostfire Simian!

XP Earned!

"You wanna fight? FINE!" Felix roared, just as two dozen more poured from the buildings around him. Fire burned in their hands, and primal shrieks filled the evening air. "No Skills necessary!"

Felix dove into the fray just as waves of fire engulfed his position.

* * *

*TRING*

The sound pulled Felix back to himself.

He stood atop a savaged corpse, its white fur matted with blood, and its head pulped into the cobblestones. He had...he had been punching it for the last ten seconds. Felix pulled back and blinked. All around him, the tiered stairwell was soaked with the blood of Ghostfire Simians, their corpses plentiful enough that he barely noticed the desiccated corpses of the Revenants.

Felix swallowed, working spit back into his throat. His Perception could pick up no more of the giant monkeys, and he let himself relax against the carved stone railing. He swiped aside a message of his kills, and focused on the new notification that had appeared.

Quest Restored!

"Quest?" Felix asked, before he felt his heartbeat quicken with realization. "The Hidden Quest?" He hadn't received the rewards from it due to Vellus' parting curse, and Felix was mighty curious as to what had been going on. But the Quest hadn't shown up in his Quest List at all; he'd checked.

Another blue window replaced the first.

Reject The Divine!

You're a bold one, ascendant! You've fought back the predation of both the Primordial and Divine! Your Will is incomparable! But was your Choice the Path of the Magician or the Path of the Fool?

Reward:

+Omen Key

+1 Primordial Essence Node (Transcendent)

+1 Divine Essence Node (Divine)

Three items were suddenly in his bloody hands, so swiftly he nearly dropped them. Two were palm-sized orbs of wispy light, yet both weighed more than some boulders he'd managed. Felix's arms quivered under the strain of them, despite his massive Strength. The third item was a large, faceted key made of transparent glass that was immediately smudged by monkey blood. No, he decided. It's made of gemstone. This is an Omen Key...? And what are Essence Nodes? He hefted them in his hands and focused.

Voracious Eye!

Felix's eyes literally tingled as his Tempered Skill surged with a newfound strength. The palm-sized orbs of diaphanous light flickered before three blue boxes appeared in his vision, each one bounded by gold and a dark, dark crimson.

Name: Omen Key

Type: Path (Enhancement)

Lore: Omens are our destinies unveiled, hints at futures yet to come and strength yet to unlock. Not all attain their destiny, but all meet their Chosen Fate. This is the Key to your Path. Walk boldly or not at all.

Name: Primordial Essence Node (Transcendent)

Type: Essence Node

Lore: Essence Nodes are a stage more concentrated than Motes, the natural result of the concentration of Significance. They are used to advance one's core. The Node before you is the concentrated Significance gathered and condensed by a powerful Primordial. It contains the power of the Unseen Tide.

Compatibility: 98%

Name: Divine Essence Node (Transcendent)

Type: Essence Node

Lore: Essence Nodes are a stage more concentrated than Motes, the natural result of the concentration of Significance. They are used to advance one's core. The Node before you is the concentrated Significance gathered and condensed by a Divinity. It contains the power of the Bloodstorm.

Compatibility: 94%

Felix looked out into the city as the rain increased in ferocity. Distances were becoming obscured as thick sheets pummeled the quarters, and the sky rumbled with more and more unseen lightning. Felix was soaked, but he didn't care. The coolness felt good on his overheating skin, and the blood and dust that covered him was slowly being washed away. He considered his new acquisitions.

The Omen Key was some sort of upgrade, unlocking his Omen's "Path." Whatever that might be. Though outside of the bounds of his perfect recall, Felix could vividly remember his arrival on the Continent. When he'd been initialized into the System, it had assigned him a Race and Omen in short order. Errors had cropped up as the Maw had fiddled about, attempting to give him the Omen of the Fool. Instead, he had received the Omen of the Magician. The description of the Hidden Quest even mentioned both of those as potential Paths.

His Affinity hummed as he considered the faceted gemstone key, turning it about in his transformed hands. The thing was weighty, though nothing compared to the density of the two Essence Nodes. Felix listened to the Key, searching the connections tugging away at his soul. They Key resonated with him, its muted hum echoed somewhere within, but its purpose was still cloudy.

Felix tucked it away. It might make him stronger, or it would be a distraction that ate up more of his precious time. He had no clue how long he'd been buried, and the visions Vellus had shown him could very well happen at any time. What's more, the Wall was already being overwhelmed and monsters were surely within the city.

He gripped the Essence Nodes tightly.

Do You Wish To Absorb A Primordial Essence Node?

Do You Wish To Absorb A Divine Essence Node?

Y/N

Felix wavered, feeling out the Nodes with his Affinity and more mundane senses. They were heavy, yet paradoxically put no pressure on his palms, despite the quake in his arms. The layers of wispy light, flashing with various swirling colors was hypnotic and felt potent. There was a part of him that shook as he regarded them, much like with the Omen Key. His Affinity traced out vibrations that sang through invisible, nigh-intangible cords linking Felix to the two Nodes.

What d'ya think, Pit? Felix asked, for the Chimera was just as interested. He could feel him testing the connection, same as him.

Dangerous, he chirped, but a shining curiosity burning brighter than fear. But strong.

Yeah. That's what I was thinking. Taking a deep breath, Felix cast himself down, back into his core space.

He slipped between crackling clouds of Essence, each threaded with veins of multi-hued color and flashing with barely restrained lightning. Swooping below, he caught sight of his cores, ruby red and blue white. One above, one below and oriented to face upward while they spun in opposite directions. The force of their turning was tremendous, filling the stormy space with a constant, thunderous rumble. Blue-white lightning arced occasionally between the two cores, briefly connecting them like two tesla coils going off.

Felix's Skills surrounded him, bright and shining against the thick, almost liquid dark. They still spun, rotating and revolving around the "sun" that was his opposed cores. Nothing seemed damaged by the meeting of opposed Harmony and Dissonance, much to his surprise. His Skills looked brighter, even those that hadn't been Tempered, as if they were burning something other than Mana. Glancing at the Essence that packed his core, Felix wondered if they were.

Ribbons of light extended from his blue-white core, his normal one, connected to each of his Tempered Skills. Those ribbons had twisted just beneath the blue-white core, braiding together all this time, but something fought against it. The woven ribbons were barely crossed, and shimmering veils of light pulsed their lengths with every revolution of his Skills and core. His Primordial core, on the other hand, was not connected to anything.

At the center of it all, however, was the black hole. What he'd come to refer to as his abyss. His Hunger. It felt sated now, but would that change soon? Felix had no clue. It was a bridge he'd have to cross when he came to it.

More unnerving than the black hole in the center of his core was the impossible tree branch that had grown out of its center. Defying the rules of physics because—apparently—magic trumped all, its vein-like structure originating in the primal darkness below and extending in fragile strands that were chased by pale bolts of electricity. His Hunger was still insistently pulling at everything, it was merely no longer going wild. A storm was above him, but it was nothing compared to the maelstrom he'd seen only hours earlier.

What are you? Felix wondered, Eyeing the growth for any sort of hints. His Skill, however, disappointed him.

Name: ???

Type: ???

Lore: ???

Of course. He snorted, but then he felt it. The thread of resonance he'd followed down into his core space originally, streaming from the Essence Nodes in his physical grip. His Affinity perceived them, weaving through the storm of Essence above him, pulsing with a hauntingly familiar cadence. Surprisingly, he heard an answering thrum. From his cores.

Both of them.

Felix narrowed his eyes as both his Primordial and normal cores resonated sympathetically with the Essence Nodes. It wasn't exactly a surprise; both the items' descriptions had said they were used to advance one's core. What did surprise him was that his normal core was chiming in tune with the Essence Node of the Primordial, and his Primordial core was syncing with the Divine Node.

What? Why would that make sense? Felix scratched his neck, weary despite refreshed stats and resource pools. What happened to the rule of “like calls to like?”

The humming only increased the longer it went on, until the thickened air had started to quiver. His Skills flared as they passed, each calling out with their unique vibrations, while those that were Tempered chimed the loudest.

Do You Wish To Absorb A Primordial Essence Node?

Do You Wish To Absorb A Divine Essence Node?

Y/N

A deep conviction spread throughout his Mind as the Nodes pulsed. This...he could toss them aside and use his own incredible new stats to fight against DuFont and the monsters he'd glimpsed. Take the Nodes' risk out of the equation.

But am I strong enough to fight her? He worried. The former Elder had gained the Territory's Authority, and from everything he'd heard about Authority, that made her more than formidable. Even if he saved his friends, he couldn't escape her reach. DuFont had a sort of control over the entire Territory, which was the city, the mountains, and the Foglands.

Pit? Should we take the risk?

A jumble of emotions flooded their bond, images and scents and sounds all squished together. Felix saw their friends, Vess and Evie and Atar and all the rest, coupled with the scent of rain and a warm, comforting musk. The scent shifted to a bitter fume, and their friends were cut down, torn to bloody shreds as thoroughly as the monkeys Felix had destroyed. Yearning and comfort disrupted by danger and fear. And at the end, he saw DuFont raising that sword—his sword—and striking the Scale moments before Felix could touch it. A deep, heated anger coiled in the Chimera, and Felix felt it echoed in himself. His people were in danger, and DuFont had to pay.

We fight, came the tenku's words. Always.

Yeah, bud. Felix braced himself. Yeah we do.

Warning!

Consuming A Divine Or Primordial Essence Node Is Highly Dangerous!

Extreme Risk Of Fatal Injury!

Do You Wish To Continue?

Y/N

Yes.

A dissonant hum filled Felix's ears, tuneless yet containing several chords that pleased him. It rose in volume and bombast, infusing him with a sudden, primal urge to move. To do. It spiraled through him, yanked Felix's attention into his core space as both Essence Nodes were sucked into his channels. The Nodes traced lines of fire through his pathways, looping along with every powerful beat of Felix's heart.

Within his core space, the maelstrom of Essence and Mana had restarted, spinning above his stacked rings like the eye of a hurricane. Into this maelstrom, Felix watched the Nodes burst, rocketing downward through the eye of the storm accompanied by bolts of incandescent lightning. The first impacted his ruby-red Primordial core, while the second skirted the hungry abyss and struck his blue-white ring of flame.

And the music went wild.

Energy—Essence and Mana both—twisted together in the maelstrom and surged down into his cores. What wasn't siphoned off by his Hunger was pulled into the ribbons of light extending from his normal core. It was immediately spun outward and into his Tempered Skills. Blooms of vibrant, vital energy flowed down those ribbons, pouring into his Skills and filling his core space with the sound of nine distinct chords.

It was breathtaking.

Status Condition: Spirit Damage Decreased From 17% To 0%

Status Condition: Mind Damage Decreased From 10% To 0%

Status Condition: Body Damage Decreased From 10% To 0%

The energy built up and spread, the rush not stopping, and his fractured Aspects began to feel better. There was nothing Felix could point to and see it heal, but the discordant melody sank into his Body, Mind, and Spirit. It was like a hot drink on a cold day, and the cool side of a pillow on a hot night. It was both comfort and relief, a surcease of pain and a surfeit of life.

Felix gasped.

Aspects Have Been Permanently Altered!

Alterations Complete!

Aspects Have Integrated Primordial And Divine Qualities!

Whoa.

His Aspects shone in his mind's eye. When he had reached the Second Threshold, he had felt as if a veil had been lifted from him, but now he was truly unburdened. His Body unknotted and stood tall while his Mind and Spirit stretched outward, expanding.

At the heart of his core, visualized in his Mind’s eye, he saw dark red veins spread up and outward, rising further and further. The veins had thickened, but their tops had split, subdividing into smaller and smaller branch-like sections until it resembled a crimson tree. That discordant melody only grew stronger, thrumming through his core space as a storm of sound.

Error Resolved!

Race Has Fully Updated!

CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

Influence of Primordial and Divine Essence Nodes Detected!

Calculating...

First Threshold Exceeded!

Calculating...

Second Threshold Exceeded!

Calculating...

Required Harmonic Threshold Exceeded!

Calculating...

Felix shook and fell to a knee. His Blade and Femur fell from his hip and back, almost forgotten in his spate of violence and new, System-induced evolution. He let them be, his muscles spasming too hard to even make the attempt to pick them up. He gritted his teeth against a rising pain and pleasure that reminded him of the internal war when he'd Tiered up. An all encompassing pressure impelled parts of himself—parts he couldn't identify—to move and shift, and suddenly they did. Without warning, the composition of Felix Nevarre changed, irrevocably.

New Race!

Primordial of the Unseen Tide (Lesser)*: The Union deepened and strengthened, the cadence has burst into wild melody. Will Unyielding, Soul of Fire turned to Unending Song. +4 to WIL, INT, DEX, and END per level. +10 Bonus Stats per level. -25% XP Gain.

Energy pulsed through his core and channels, a spreading warmth that soothed as much as it agitated. As if adrenaline were being pumped into his heart, he felt charged with a manic vigor that threatened to send him sprinting into the distance. Yet part of him was also sinking deep into a smooth and soft lethargy from which he feared he'd never wake.

Primordial? Felix's thoughts raced in lazy circles. What happened to being Divine? Felix half-laughed to himself. He felt giddy and content, as if all of the "good" hormones in his brain got dumped at the same time as the manic and depressive ones. He fought off the confusing euphoria with a flex of his Will, Alacrity, and finally his Felicity, determined to keep his head. What does the asterisk mean?

*Base Race: Nym.

Ah. So he was still a Nym, technically. Did that mean the Maw was once another Race as well? Or had it simply jumped from body to body in the ancient past? He shook himself and got back to his feet. Not worth thinking about.

Having mastered himself, Felix reached for his weapons and strapped them down. He tried to not let his Race change shake him, no matter that it literally did just that. It was just another thing. He was still Felix. Still himself, such as that was. He—

He could feel threads.

They were fuzzy and unclear, but his Affinity twinged at their presence. Distant swirls that were maddeningly close; thousands, upon thousands of connections wrapping around his Spirit. They were dimmer in the real world than in that null space beyond his core, but they were most definitely present.

Felix licked his lips, his eyes fixed on the middle distance as the rain soaked him to the bone. Those connections trembled, all of them at once as something shivered toward him. He could hear it, a series of rising chords that crescendoed just as a blue box appeared.

New Title!

Tyros of the Unseen Tide (Primordial)

You have begun to sense the totality of That Which Binds All.

+25% To Perceiving The Unseen Tide

Prerequisites: Cardinal (Major) Title, Race: Primordial

Those connections tugged at Felix with an increased fervor. It was coming from all directions, as before, but stronger than ever. Nearly as powerful as he had felt in the null space. It felt like a natural force, like the world itself was anchored to him or that he was a keystone in an archway that held up all things. It was vast and incomprehensible, and now he had a name for it.

The Unseen Tide, huh? Felix felt at the threads with his Affinity, his only stat that could sound their ephemeral shape. That's the same as the Essence Mote I took to Temper Reign of Vellus. He flexed his hands while that invisible weight dragged at him, his brain caught up trying to make sense of the juxtaposition. I Tempered with the Essence of Gravity.

He looked at his Skill, still shining brighter than all the others, tethered to his blue-white core with a ribbon of multicolored light. The Essence of Gravity had enlarged the Skill, enhancing it in ways that had been superior to his other Tempered Skills. What was once a weak push had, through evolution, training, and Tempering become a mighty bolt of lightning capable of breaking buildings and Journeyman bones. It was one of his favorites, and now it would no longer respond.

Reign of Vellus!

The Mana gathered and circulated, but the Skill did not hum or change in the slightest. Even marshaling his Intent and working it manually did little more than make the Skill brighten in his core space. It was as if he'd been locked out.

Vellus. It was clear the goddess had a hand in it. After all, the Skill bore her name for some reason. Felix glanced at his cores again and the convoluted shape emerging from between them. Like a set of roots growing the wrong way. Did that have anything to do with it?

Those dark red veins pulsed, and Felix felt a brief and staggering pressure mount between his eyes.

Cores Have Integrated Primordial And Divine Qualities!

Around his lower core, blue-white fire and lightning burst outward in an expanding corona of light. Felix threw up an arm for protection, but the light slipped past his defenses in a spreading ring of blue-white flame. Crackling thunder followed its path, the sound just as powerful as the fire itself as they both seemed to scour him from head to toe.

That same melodic dissonance that had been dominating his core space flared in strength. Above, the ruby-red core finished absorbing the Divine Essence Node and shifted its coloration closer to a burnished gold, albeit on chased by a glimmer of crimson. It, too, let out a peal of noise, though to Felix's ringing ears, it sounded like the primal roar of some mighty beast with lungs the size of a mountain.

Essence Nodes Absorbed!

Due To Accumulated Significance, You Have Developed (2) Named Cores!

+ [Cardinal Beast Core]!

+ [Thunderflame Core]!

The two cores spun counter to one another, blue-white and burnished gold lightning arcing between them as that dark shape grew every higher through their centers. Essence and Mana screamed above, pulled into the vacuum created by his core's rotations; all of it fed into that thickening, bloody pattern.

What—Felix braced himself against the rising light of his Named Cores, fighting to remain close to them. What is happening?

Spinning faster and faster, the crimson-gold of his Cardinal Beast Core spun out ribbons of its own light. Each flew unerring into the darkness of his core space, and each latched onto one of his Skills. The exact same Skills he had Tempered for Journeyman.

Felix felt a brief surge of strength as each of his Skills took in whatever that power was; each Skill felt...more, somehow. Even Reign of Vellus, though it remained distant. Yet they didn't gain a level, there was no bright flare up of gold and blue or expansion. Instead, it was as if they had gained...weight. Depth. Their rotations and elliptical revolutions around his cores slowed to a glacial pace.

Beneath the two cores, a small length of woven ribbons snapped together joining both sets of nine into a tiny column. The nine ribbons twisted around while the cores spun and the Skills revolved. Movement did not stop, and somehow each revolution packed more and more tighter together but barely extended the length. It was like ribbons around a Maypole, but each spin drew the ribbons so close they seemed to mesh into one another.

The next core stage, he realized. Zara had told him of the others, and informed him of what he should expect after the Ring Stage. Weaving Stage, when my Tempered Skills join in on the fun.

Zara neglected to mention what exactly it did...and he doubted even she would expect him to suddenly have two cores.

Thoughts of Zara led him to consider the rain once again. He was absolutely soaked, and Felix realized he was feeling cold. Not a chill from the weather, but a lack of heat against his skin and eyes. Something he'd been unconsciously feeling all this time. He looked down at the withered corpses, half-buried beneath the smoking remnants of the monkeys.

The cloying heat of the Maw’s lingering influence was gone from the air around him. There was just him and the power he had claimed and turned to his advantage. The chill in the air felt...good.

Yet, in that gap in his Perception where once he could feel Revenants and Ghouls running amok, now Felix could sense something else far less intimately. Sounds in the rain, breathing and the padding of paws against wood and stone. More monsters were coming.

I don't have time for this!

The beasts emerged, but Felix and Pit had already rejoined, and wings sprouted from his broad back. They were huge and majestic, fully covered in black, cyan, and red feathers. A single pump of them sent Felix rocketing into the storm-laden sky and sent the racing Simians sprawling from the sheer wind pressure. Ghostly white balls of flame were lobbed in his direction, but they didn't make it halfway to him before they were doused by the torrential downpour.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Dual-cast orbs of acid dropped from his accelerating form. They were pumped full of so much Mana they were easily both the size of wagons, and they wobbled as they fell, barely holding together. The Ghostfire Simians barely had a chance to scream before each one splashed down among them. Intensely effective acid exploded in all directions, hitting nearly the entire mob of beasts. Those near the center of the impact were melted completely, while the others lost muscle, skin, bones, even entire limbs to the hungry acid.

Felix didn't wait to hear their screams or parse the kill notifications he received. He flew on, north, dodging lightning bolts as they crashed laterally across the clouds. Pit, ever watchful, cried out warnings when the lightning came a little too close for comfort, but none hit them.

He flew on, letting his connections draw him onward. Visibility was extremely limited, even from on high, as the rain continued unabated. Gale-force winds pushed at them, but Felix was heavy enough and strong enough to fight back against it, though it ate at his concentration. He could feel his friends somewhere ahead and far below, but not exactly. Evie, Harn, Cal, and Vess...all of them were there. He could also sense a dense collection of threads that were pulsing in an odd pattern. One that was in tune with his new Cardinal Beast Core. He didn't know what to make of that.

As he drew closer, the clarity of his Affinity increased. A rapid rhythm vibrated along his Oath threads.

Fear. Anger. Exhaustion.

The sensations floated toward Felix, hitting him as he descended from the storm. His friends were worried, and they were fighting for their lives. He dropped lower, and through the rain, he saw the encampment.

The walls were besieged, just as Vellus had shown him...but it wasn't the Inquisition at all.

Monsters.

Felix could see Ghostfire Simians, hundreds of them, assaulting the walls he had made. Guilders were atop the battlements, letting loose with Apprentice Tier bows or brightly glowing Mana Skills. Monkeys died by the dozen, but there always seemed to be more, and behind them were the bus-sized carapaces of a familiar insect.

Wretches! Felix fumed. How'd they all get in the city? What happened to the Wall?!

Then Felix saw him. A massive figure in gray metal, more ball than humanoid. It raised its stubby fist and gestured imperiously at the struggling defenders. What it said was lost to the storm, but from behind the Arcid came seventeen humanoids, each of them around ten feet tall. They wore mechanized armor made of blue, ice-encrusted plates. Reforged, his Voracious Eye claimed, each of them between level 60 and 65.

The giants! Felix snarled, and Pit echoed his fury. By unspoken agreement, they dove, hurtling toward the earth and the bastard Arcid. So great was his focus that he missed the three Reforged that leaped from nearby rooftops, tackling him and bringing all of them down among the rabble of Wretches and Simians. The monsters erupted in fountains of ichor and blood, the weight of the four of them too much to withstand.

Pit! Go!

A flash of light accompanied Felix's mental shout, and the horse-sized tenku manifested just before the reaching arms of a Reforged. The armored creature flew back with a surprised scream, its face no more than a sheet of molded ice above a lower jaw filled with flat, even teeth. Felix rolled to his feet, the other two Reforged rounding on him amid the charnel path they had made. Without a word, they charged again, stomping their armored boots and grasping at Felix's limbs.

"You thought to ambush me, Fiend!?" A hollow, rattling voice shouted from nearby. The Sphere laughed. "I'm surprised you survived below, but you'll do no further harm here! We've come for Challengers! So do us a favor and perish!"

The Reforged reached for Felix, but he threw himself forward with a stomp. Flitting through the grip of one, he landed feet-first on the chest of the other. The force of his impact sent the Reforged sprawling, and the two of them tore through another three Simians before they crashed into the cobblestones below.

"RAAA!" the Reforged screamed, reaching for Felix's face.

"No," Felix snapped. He seized the monster's arms at the wrists and held them. No matter how the creature strained, it could barely move them. "I. Will. Not!"

With a roar, Felix hauled back and ripped the abomination's arms off.

"RAAAAAAHH!!"

With two heavy throws, the arms fell to the ground. The ice around them shattered, and Felix turned toward the Arcid, visible above the rush of monsters.

"Oh blessed Father," the Sphere whispered, and even through the rage, Felix could hear the terror.

Good. It was time they learned to fear us. Felix reached down and ripped the Reforged's throat out, his hands unharmed by their brutal cold.

To fear me.

CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

Thangle rushed up the ladder in the rain, fast enough that the entire thing wobbled precariously. He weighed little, but the Gnome was frantic; the people in the camp were dying by the dozen, engulfed in white fire that the defenders were not stopping. He couldn't—he wouldn't—let it continue, and after guiding the Untempered into the fortified warehouses, he rushed to the wall. He was an Illusionist, but he was an Augmenter first and foremost. He couldn't kill swaths of enemies, but he could support the defenders.

He just couldn't do it from the ground.

Thangle gritted his teeth, muscling down his fear. Cool, violet Mana flowed in and out of his channels, circulating as if ready for battle, spurred by the unpredictable, folding geometry of his spinning core. A sudden crash echoed through the earth, making the ladder jump beneath him. Thangle lost grip and was flung into the air.

"AHH!"

A hand nearly the size of his face caught him, and Thangle looked up at the bristling mustache of Trendle. "Aye, don't kill yourself, Thangle," he said, rough but kindly. He hauled the tiny Gnome up onto the wall as the ladder fell to the cobbles below.

"I assure you, I was not planning on it," Thangle managed, catching his breath. The screams were so much louder atop the wall.

"Good. Don't want to rob them of the chance," Trendle rumbled. Beyond the battlements, entirely too close, monsters filled the street. White-furred monkeys screamed and raged at them, driven onward by the hulking and distant form of some sort of steel golem. Hundreds of the Ghostfire Simians were funneling down the three interconnecting streets, and only the barriers and debris they'd built up and installed on the roads had slowed them down. That and the enchantments on their Fiend-built wall were the only reason they were all still alive.

More of that spectral fire flew up at the battlements, and Thangle’s guts clenched. A hue and cry rose, many of the Tin Ranks shouting out in unison. Sigils shone a vivid blue-white beneath their feet, and a series of transparent shields emerged from the wall. The shields extended up and over the combatants, blocking many of the fireballs, but they were patchwork at best. Thangle watched in horror as a number slipped through and detonated.

Screams tore across the wall as bodies were incinerated, and the white-furred monkeys made huge, bounding leaps up and onto the sparking shields. Their own fire limned their bodies, but their eyes were black and soulless, without fear or pain. Thangle saw it all as if he were detached from his own body, unable to think, unable to act.

He saw Heva, the Hobgoblin grandmother, wielding her fiery thread in frantic, defensive loops. He saw the Goblin, Merk, standing next to her, furiously scribing lime-green sigils into the air. Cade and Stellis were there, too, swinging their huge weapons, pushing back a few of the Ghostfire Simians. But not enough. More were coming; they were flooding through the streets despite their chokepoint. The camp couldn't hold.

Arrows imbued with green-gold life Mana exploded above the battlements, raining shards of imbued wood down on the charging line of monsters. Simians reared back in pain, their spectral flames no protection against whatever Skill had attacked them.

"Rally!" the red-beared Karp screamed. The sound swept across the wall like an alarm, fueled by his Mana and likely Stamina. Thangle’s Mind abruptly realigned with his Body, just in time to see a fading notification.

Status Condition: Crisis of Faith removed!

Avet's blackened teeth! Thangle fumed. "You don't touch my head, monsters!" he screamed, and his Mana twisted through the folded geometries within his core. He lifted his small hands and thrust them forward. "Forged Calm!"

Purple vapor poured from his hands, spilling out over the edge of the battlements and out into the fight. Thangle leveraged his Willpower and Intelligence, pushing more Mana than usual into the working. Within a forty-foot radius, target after target fell under his influence, their primal snarls fading to indifferent slumps. The rain hissed in the relative quiet, sizzling against the flames.

"Good man!" Trendle cried out. "Fire at will!"

Thangle's concentration was barely broken by the shots that rang out, Sparkbolts and Ice Arrows as well as physical projectiles rained onto the vicious beasts. Melee fighters like Cade and Stellis carved the defenseless monkeys apart, aiming for exposed necks and eyes, anything that wasn't protected by their thick pelt and fiery magic. Apprentice Tier weapons proved their mettle, as the beasts died by the score, each one a small ping on his notifications list, a tiny bit of experience that trickled into his core with each assisted kill.

No more than thirty seconds later, Thangle fell gasping to the ground, as he lost the Will to hold it.

"That's good enough. Thank ye," said a voice nearby, and Thangle looked up to see the Dwarven trainer move past him. Trendle smiled through his huge mustache and put his hands out along the wall's sigils.

"Second Wind!"

A rush of yellow energy surged along the battlements and those defending it. Thangle even felt his own meager reserves of Stamina refresh.

"Ah, thank ye, too, Trendle," Rory said with a grin. "I'll put it to good use."

"I'm sure you will, sir," Trendle replied, flexing his wide, rounded shoulders. "I—"

"Blind gods, what is that?" Rory asked, in such concern that Thangle couldn't help but look up. He was short, even for a Gnome, but it was hard to miss the sight of Ghostfire Simians being launched in the air by a figure.

"I can see them! It's the Hand! Cal is with them!" Trendle shouted in joy, but Thangle only felt a terrible sorrow clench at him.

Trapped in one of the side streets, the Hand trudged along with several bedraggled people Thangle recognized as friends and leaders. He spotted Evie, Vess, and that mage, Atar, all laid out on some floating bed, while the rest sent Skills careening around themselves.

"They're trapped," Rory growled, pointing. "They came up from the sewers and got cut off. We need to help!"

They were fighting a desperate battle. Dozens of enemies fell before them, split apart or riven with lightning and shadow. But illusions taught him how to see true, and there was no hiding how worn they looked, as if every one of them had been sent through that damn Gauntlet with a blindfold on: wrung out of their last drop of Stamina and likely Mana, too.

The Hand was a blur, but he took as many hits as he delivered. He was wearing out. Even a tiny stream can bore through a mountain, given enough time, and the Hand was a monolith ripe to fall.

Yet they were in no better position. The monsters, previously hurt by Thangle's control Skill, were now reassembling as more monkeys pushed down the avenues. Giant armored insects joined the fray, ones that were nearly as tall as the wall itself. They'd only ever managed to push it up a score span, and they were in reach of the monsters' scythe-like claws.

Wretches, he recognized, feeling his hopes gutter out in his chest. All of them over level forty. We're doomed.

An almighty crash sounded just beyond the obstructed roads. It was loud enough that it briefly drowned out the sound of fighting, distracting enough that everyone, monster included, seemed to pause and look...

Then a winged shape burst in a flash of white light, tackling into a distant, ice-blue figure and ripping them into the sky.

"It's the Chimera!" someone shouted.

"The tenku!"

"...Fiend!"

"The Fiend!"

A powerful cheer tore from the battlements as a forest of stone spikes impaled a fifty-span swath of enemies, killing every single one instantly. Thangle couldn't help his own heart from racing in terror and hope.

Felix!

* * *

Felix dropped Stone Shaping and ignored the kill notifications. The monsters around him were nothing, not even the Reforged, tough as they were.

He only had eyes for the Arcid.

"You fool! You've come to your death!" Sphere bellowed, his arms and legs grasping at the ice-armored Reforged around him. "Kill the pathetic Challenger!"

Several of the Reforged charged at Felix, along with a slew of monkeys. Felix flared Unfettered Volition and his movements, already so smooth and clear, became greased lightning. There was no space between thought and action, no lag or latency. His Mind burned, and his Body was the flame. Momentum built within him, and Felix was a train of inertia plowing through the Ghostfire Simians, his talons and sheer mass tearing through their weak bodies in showers of gore. Then the Reforged loomed ahead.

Sovereign of Flesh!

His flesh broke and reformed into sleek, black scales traced by glowing cyan lines. He dropped into a slide down through the approaching Reforged's legs and simultaneously swiped both talons out. Resistance met his Essence-fed claws, but the ice, metal, and flesh parted before him like paper. The Reforged fell.

Felix popped back to his feet, barely slowed, Unfettered Volition raging. He met the charge of another ice warrior, head-on.

Upheaval Before You!

The Essence of Calamity raged through his core as Sovereign of Flesh flared, and Felix's hands exploded in size. His talons elongated, and the bone spurs along the back of his hands speared outward, shearing through the Risi-turned-zombie-golem.

Sovereign of Flesh is level 53!

Two more dead.

More Ghostfire Simians tried to get in his way, but Felix activated his Mantle of the Long Night, and the arctic blast of the Skill snuffed the fires from their fur. They fled before him but did not live long enough to take more than a few steps. Felix charged through their flash-frozen corpses, shattering those that brushed against his Body.

Mantle of the Long Night is level 41!

Mantle of the Long Night is level 42!

The Arcid drew itself up just beyond its screen of Reforged bodyguards. "You-you cannot hope to win, Fiend! I—"

"Shut up!"

The Sphere looked in alarm at the Shadow Whip that suddenly latched on to its stubby arm. Yanking hard, Felix flew through the last thirty feet, his talons outstretched. The Sphere hurled itself away, rolling through its allies before crashing through a nearby building. Yet Felix's Shadow Whip was still lodged in its tucked arms, and he came along for the ride.

They smashed through buildings like a wrecking ball and Felix pulled himself ever closer, shrugging off masonry as he smashed side to side.

"You are worthless! I do not know how you survived, but it shall not be for long!" The Sphere screamed as it rolled, its deep voice rattling within it. Felix slammed through wall after wall, pushing his feet against brick or stone slab and being hauled through them time after time. "I will break you!"

"Get in line!" Felix snarled, spotting what he needed. He kicked off a crumbling wall and swung himself to the side, holding tight to his Shadow Whip. His feet hit a steel beam lodged in the earth, and he braced, hauling as hard as he could on the line. Muscles bulged and veins stood in violent relief along Felix's biceps and shoulders. The Sphere slowed.

"RUAAAAAAAAGH!" With a burst of manic Strength, he pulled the Sphere to the side, sending the Arcid rolling like a wrecking ball through his horde. "Is this the best your father can do? Huh?" Felix shouted, so angry and hurt that he wasn't entirely sure of what he was saying. "You can't—!"

Felix's words died as he saw the encampment, its walls—his walls—were being overrun by iridescent Wretches he had not thought to see again. An abrupt lurch and pivot by the Arcid had his Shadow Whip snap, and Felix was sent sprawling as his own Strength fought against him. He hit the rubble hard, sending bricks and debris scattering in a wave that killed a few Simians.

Sphere stood up, rolling from the blood-strewn remains of its horde. So many were dead in their battle, and the Reforged had been left behind in their mad dash. Only the Wretches were nearby, and all of them were focused on taking down the encampment before them. He could see it limping toward Felix, its gun-metal gray armor cracked and dented along its left side.

"You...pathetic worm," it hissed, and it was the sound of a steam engine venting. "Do you have any idea...what the Father will do...to this insignificant town? This den of mortal failings?" The Sphere shoved its massive hand into a pile of mangled corpses and lifted a jagged piece of corrugated metal. It hefted the hunk of material. "He plans to elevate it! Free you all from your short, inconsequential destinies! To seize the throat of this Continent and force it to submit to his majesty!"

Felix pushed out of the rubble, watching the Arcid draw closer but also unable to peel his Perception from the Wretches assaulting his camp. They met stiff resistance atop the wall, but their scythe-like blades were savage. Explosions of vibrant energy and plumes of rock dust filled the air as the inscribed wards groaned under the attacks.

"You should worship him as a new god, yet you all fight! Why?" The Sphere kept advancing, its eye-fires bright with a fanaticism he'd seen one too many times on the Continent. "You are all prey struggling under the providence of predators in fine robes and refined language!”

The Arcid didn't wait for a response, instead rushing at Felix with its jagged spear of iron upraised. Felix felt the connections around him blaze in sudden sympathy, but he ignored it and ran. His Body shattered the rubble still around him, and the rusted iron spear screamed through the air just inches from his back.

Shadow Whip!

Shadow Whip!

The shadow Mana snagged onto another beam, and Felix hauled himself to first one side, then the other, dancing between the savage strikes of the Sphere's spear.

“You are lambs meant for slaughter! Why do you care what hand holds the blade?!"

Wrack and Ruin!

An oversized ball of green acid ate away at the descending spear, devouring a chunk of its momentum as Felix punched the weapon out of the Arcid's astonished grip.

"What blade?" Felix asked, grabbing the Sphere's leg and letting his talons sink into its armor. The Arcid let out a wail of pain, too distracted to fight against the second punch Felix laid onto its round gut. It hit like a gong, and the Sphere crashed into the earth.

"All of you talk the same way, zealots and gods and ancient hellbeasts. I'm sick of it." Felix let his core spin faster and faster, pushing at it as the stacked cores sparked against one another. The Essence within him had thinned slightly, and the pit at the center of it all ached. "People. Aren't. Prey!"

Each word was punctuated by another blow, unaltered by any Skill or technique. Simply rage and fear turned into violence. The Sphere's armor dented and cracked with each hit, until the sound of distressed metal was replaced by the solid thunks of an axe on wood as its bulk collapsed.

"No, what—what are you? What ancient Will animates you, creature?" The Sphere gasped and tried to escape Felix's grasp, but it was broken beyond remedy. It was only able to drag itself several feet at a time, too slow. "You aren't—Analyze makes no sense. You can't be..."

"I've found it doesn't much matter what my Status says," Felix whispered, and a wave of inexorable hunger swelled inside of him. "I'm me and always will be."

He drove his clawed fist down into the Arcid's chest, watching the bastard's eye-fires flare in pain and surprise.

"Your dad is next," he hissed. "Ravenous Tithe!"

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

The Arcid screamed in unwilling rage, but Felix didn't care. Felix's Will was iron, and the Arcid broke itself against him. Mana and Essence tore from the Sphere, its Body and Mind and Spirit all draining into Felix's bottomless Hunger.

"You...Those are...mine," it rasped.

"No." Before its eyes flickered out, Felix met their gaze and twisted his arm deeper into its chest. "They're mine."

The world around them, the battle that raged, all of it faded to gray and rippled away. Felix didn't hesitate, he knew how it worked now, and he'd grown better at it. Gray became black Void before, with a single piercing note the Void shattered into the coiling Memories of the Arcid.

A universe of Arcids exploded in that Memory space, an eternally spreading centipede of spherical golems. Among them all were vibrations, strains he had never before heard. But Felix knew what it meant. It all suddenly made perfect sense. Connections. It's all Connections.

Felix knew what he needed to find.

He shaped his Will, his Intent, flexing his Affinity to hear the telltale shimmers of resonating connection. It was the loudest strand, for obvious reasons. However twisted the relationship, what could be greater than the connection between parent and child?

Felix seized it and swallowed the rest whole.

You Have Taken A Memory From Arcid Number 55390!

View Memory Now?

Y/Y

Yes.

The Memory swept him away.

* * *

Rory pulled back his sword, the wet heat of the Simian following its blade as its body collapsed. Now that the furry bastard was out of his sight, he could see the trail of devastation Felix had left on the battlefield. The monsters were in disarray, and he had just taken down their massive leader. Rory grinned through his bloodied beard.

The next second, however, a wave of red-gold energy thrummed through the ground. It shone from beneath the cobbles, passing by the monsters without singeing a strand of fur, yet when it hit their wall, the sigils around Rory flared into a blinding radiance. Even his Endurance couldn't handle the light, and wiggling afterimages dominated his vision for a precious few seconds. He couldn't see anything, but he hadn't Tempered some third-class Mind. Based off their positions seconds ago, Rory lashed outward in a flurry of offense that caught furred flesh with axe and blade. Kill notifications flickered past him, but he dismissed them out of hand.

"Hector! What's happening?" Rory screamed, his vision clearing enough to make out the Inscriptionist. The man was hunched behind a redoubt, frantically inscribing new sigils along the battlements. Rory could make out the man's face, and it was drawn and haggard.

"Th-the wards! All of them! All of them!" He practically howled the last, shoving his stylus forward as glyphs and sigils formed beneath him with unerring tenacity. "Mana is draining out of the arrays! Something is draining them all! It's sabotage!"

The translucent bulwarks around the battlements flickered and faded as the last of the Mana drained away, leaving the sigils dull and inert. Rory's senses flared in panic, and he dove for his friend. "Get down!"

A string of spectral fireballs detonated atop the wall, and the Dwarf was thrown bodily from them as if he'd been hit by a giant's backhand. In a moment outside time, Rory briefly saw the other defenders tossed from the wall, and Hector hung limply in his grip.

Don't die on me, lad! Siva's Blessing!

Pink light welled beneath his fingers and sank into the Inscriptionist, just as the two of them hit the ground hard.

"UNF!"

Rory landed on his back, hoping to cushion the more fragile Hector. He ended up squashed between his armor, the ground, and Hector's full-grown Human weight. He wheezed a breath, his Body more than enough to put up with the punishment, but it did nothing for the pain. Above, a swarm of Lesser Wretches buzzed up and over the neutered walls, their wings easily carrying them into the emptied courtyard.

"Blind gods, this day doesn't quit, does it?" Rory rolled Hector off of him and reached for his weapons. He had lost the shortsword he'd been using on the battlements, but he was practically bristling with options. A handaxe and another shortsword found their way into his hands. Thunder crashed far above. "Ye picked the wrong camp, beasties."

Charge of the Undermount!

Earth Mana welled beneath Rory's feet as he ran, each step propelled farther as the ground strengthened him. The nearest Wretch turned toward him, but the Dwarf was on it before it could bring its claws to bear. Three entire legs sheared off at the joint before it engaged him, and Rory's casual toss of a throwing dagger blew a span-sized hole in its armored abdomen. Mana and Stamina surged in his Body, his veins and channels chugging with a fiery cocktail of adrenaline and a potent, Weaving Stage core.

You Have Killed A Lesser Wretch!

XP Earned!

One down. Rory huffed and looked at the field. Too many to go.

More Wretches came over the walls as he watched, more than he could handle alone. Pockets of resistance were forming, but the fighters were scattered and injured from their various falls. People were dying right in front of him, and Rory couldn't help them. It about drove him mad.

*KRRAAUUSH!*

A section of the wall exploded inward, raining shrapnel on them all. Rory dove behind his recent kill, but his Health dropped twenty points from the needle-sharp chunks of stone. A huge Wretch waded through the gap, rocks still falling from its huge scythe claws. One of the Greater Wretches. Behind it, a flood of Ghostfire Simians rushed in, streaming beneath its dagger-like feet.

We can't hold. Not here. Rory swept his eyes around the field, rushing to Hector's side and leveraging the unconscious man to his feet. We have to—

The monkeys and bugs all but ignored the defenders, heading directly to the reinforced warehouses and healing ward. Where the sick still remained, the ones hurt by the emerging Primordial energy. They'd never stood up again, despite the energy disappearing from the city. They were defenseless!

No! Damn it!

Scintillating Spanner!

He ran, the axe in his hand welling up with a flux of Mana vapor. It began to shake so hard he could barely hold it. Rory cut down another Lesser Wretch but kept running. As the vapor began spewing outward, he hurled his axe. The weapon arced outward and exploded in a bright white light laced with greens and blues. It hit the Simians hard, knocking many of them off their feet, but he couldn't stop them all.

He couldn't stop them all.

* * *

Felix was in the Archon's Domain, and somehow he knew this Memory was from months ago. He recognized the tilted halls and smoldering heat, though not the room he resided within. It was a vast chamber, fueled by waterfalls of vivid magma and studded with elaborate black metal machines.

Lava forges, he suddenly knew, having pulled the word from the Memory itself. Screaming Frost Giants were all around him, hauled upright on black iron hooks and chains by twisted amalgamations of that very same black iron and belching furnaces. Crude Arcid precursors, clearly created to build better versions of themselves.

With the Risi as the base.

A faint thread of sympathy pulsed in Felix, but he ignored it. They shared a lingering connection for his part in their demise, but he didn't regret his actions. Grimmar and his ilk were monsters, through and through.

Stronger by far, however, was the Maw's connection to them. It was gone, but he'd somehow taken over parts of whatever the Maw had been, and to the Risi, the Maw was a god. The Risi he passed seemed to look right at him, but they didn't see Felix. Not really.

"Mother...Mother please..."

The whispers continued, unabated. Pleas for mercy, for salvation. Hissed warnings of what they knew, what they dared to hear. Felix heard it all, pouring through him and leaving foul trails behind. The Archon, what it planned, what it was doing. The Risi were being torn apart, and he'd already seen the result.

Arcids and the Reforged. Despite their contentious history, despite his desire to feel nothing, that sympathy roused in him again. Damn it.

At the far end of the chamber, a fifty-foot-tall door opened with a mighty boom. Fear coursed through all those around him as a towering figure in golden armor stomped into the chamber. He was speaking to a much smaller Arcid who carried a clipboard, of all things.

"Yes, Master," it marked something on its clipboard. "That is what I have seen. The Blood Moon comes apace; we have but to infuse them with the necessary tinctures as the reforging commences. Your garden has all we need. I—"

"Silence."

Felix froze just as the Arcid, for the Archon's huge, golden finger stabbed out. It pointed directly at him, and the golden giant's face—helmet though it was—contorted in revulsion.

"YOU—!" As if called, Wurms of all types unspooled from the walls and ceiling, slipping seamlessly from the rock. "How is this possible? You died! You could not have survived the Primordial!"

Felix swallowed and backed away. This Memory wasn't behaving like the others he'd taken, where he was a passive viewer. Felix didn't like it, not a bit. He reached out, trying to wake himself. He'd gotten what he needed.

"No, this is Nymean magic. Treacherous!" The Archon howled, and his eye-fires blazed like Roman candles.

The Memory trembled as the golden giant focused on Felix, the hazy edges of it refining until he could barely tell it wasn't real. The Archon lit up with yellow-red vapor, focused in swirling orbs atop his elbows and palms.

Uh oh.

* * *

Darius stumbled, overextending his greatsword as the latest of his wind slashes ripped another clutch of monsters asunder. The damn monkeys kept pushing, trying to reach his charges, but he wouldn't let it happen. He was a protector, the Chosen Hand of the Duke of Pax'Vrell! He would not fail.

Reed! Take them all! Get them out of here!

"I told you, Fiend," Darius grunted, blocking a blast of spectral fire with swirling wind Mana. "I can't carry them all and fight off an army!" He brought his greatsword around again in a looping strike, bisecting four more Simians. "But I will bleedin' try!"

His charges had spent themselves after waking, with only the rare bolt of lightning or jaws of shadow from the winded Elders. It was up to him.

Closer! Closer!

The monsters were thinning. He would make it.

I will make it!

* * *

"Stop running!" the Archon screamed.

Felix let out a spate of nervous laughter and kept trying to end the Memory. C'mon! What is going on? He couldn't feel the edges of it. It was seamless, like someone had bricked over the exit.

"RRUAUUUAAAGH!"

Felix kept out of the range of the golden giant but had to keep pushing himself to dodge the Archon's blasts of burning energy. Wurms wove from above and below, slipping and out of the walls and floor while their four-way jaws chomped at the edges of his clothes.

"I'm not really here for this!" Felix back-pedaled, dodging for all he was worth. He felt with his Affinity, hoping for something, and touched upon the connections to the Risi again. They thrummed, but it wasn't a way out. But there was a thick connection connected to his chest, one that pulsed with warmth and constant energy.

Pit! Felix reached across it while ducking behind one of the chamber's lava forges.

"You will not escape me a second time, Nym!" the Archon raged. "I will have your head for what your people did!"

"I don't know what you're talking about!" Felix shouted back, though he had no idea if the Memory could hear him. It certainly acted like it couldn't. A single swipe of the Archon's oversized gauntlet demolished one of the lava forges, and Felix fell into a backward roll, popping back to his feet fast enough to dive out of the way of another energy blast. Stupid!

...Felix?

Pit! Thank god, Felix kicked off the wall and flipped over another incoming beam, using Shadow Whip to yank himself in another direction while in midair. I'm stuck! I—

Felix felt something other than Pit riding adjacent to their bond. A bundle of new connections, ones he could only barely feel, except Pit was amplifying them in some way. It felt like...fifty of them. The number was firm in his Mind and Spirit, fifty burning spots in camp...In the—Really? The monsters had made it into the camp!

They were in danger.

PIT! Save them! His Companion was already wheeling through the sky, diving down and readying an array of Mana Skills.

Another violent blast of red-streaked yellow energy speared outward, carving a deep, jagged line in the obsidian walls around them. Felix stayed ahead of it, but not all of it. He had to use Ravenous Tithe to take the edge off, but still the spell took him hard in the chest. He was thrown back, spun into the air and onto his side. The ground shattered beneath his weight.

Yet he stood up fast, his tattered clothes not even singed. It isn't real! he reminded himself. His Mind bored down, grabbing at the edges of the Memory. Felix burned his Perception and Affinity, pushing them as much as he could, like opening his eyes wide in the darkest of rooms. There!

The flow of connections through Pit and those fifty others, he felt it, the space where it ended. Felix seized it and pulled with everything he had. Don't engage! Escape!

The edges of the Memory faded, turning foggy. He had it.

"No! Not again!" The Archon stomped forward, its steps shaking the entire room. Magma shot from the cracks, spurted upward in tiny, molten fountains. "Never again!"

Felix reached, and he felt the threads of the Unseen Tides tremble with his effort. OUT!

The Memory shattered around him, turning to fragments of light.

He sprawled forward, smashing his face into something wet and cold. Felix panted, gathering himself. Beneath his hands, he felt the crushed and jagged edges of the dead Arcid, and the rain still came down in a deluge.

You Have Gained A Level!

You Are Now Level 48!

You Gain:

+2 to PER! +2 to VIT! +4 to END! +5 to INT! +6 to WIL! +4 to AGL! +7 to DEX!

You Have 17 Unspent Stat Points!

System energy fluttered through him, bouncing off his dual, stacked cores. It washed against the rest of him in a wave of sparking light, more different than before. There was no pleasure or pain. It just felt...right.

The camp! he reminded himself. He could feel those connections moving, roused by something that felt like fear and...What is that?

* * *

Rory blinked blood from his eyes as he cut down another three monkeys. The blade twisted, nearly wrenched from his grasp, and his positioning was pulled from true. He expected a claw to the face for his brief bout of inattention, but nothing came. Instead, he witnessed the monkeys before him being impaled by giant icicles that rained from the sky.

"SKREEEEAAH!"

A dark shape swooped out of the torrential downpour, the beat of its wings almost louder than its cry. More Frost Spears followed, spitting dozens of the Ghostfire Simians, whose spectral flames did nothing to blunt their terrifying chill.

The lad's Companion, Rory grunted as took a breath. He must not be far away, then.

Rain scattered in all directions as the Chimera dropped from the sky at wild speeds, Pit's dark body suddenly covered in a green flame. He slammed into the side of a Lesser Wretch, tackling it onto its back and savaging the underbelly.

It's focusing on the monsters at the lead, nearest the Untempereds, he realized.

"Hah! Ye got a mighty beast, lad. Suppose I can't slack off meself." Rory dropped the ruined blade he carried and pulled a double-headed axe from his back. He swung, decapitating another monkey and moving to support the tenku. The least I can do.

Another cry came from the Chimera, and this one sent Rory stumbling. It twisted through his ears and shook him, physically shook him to hear it, and he wasn't the only one. The monsters flinched as well at the noise: a glorious swelling of chords and a sawtoothed, atonal burr. It vibrated the very air.

To Rory's immense surprise, as the sound ended, he heard people emerge from the Healer's Ward. The door slammed open and dozens of patients stepped out on shaky legs, each of them in nothing but robes and bandages. Broken chair legs, eating utensils, and the jagged remnants of their cots were gripped in trembling hands. Pit took to the air, describing a tight circle above them. It was as if the tenku gave the patients a sudden second breath of life. As one, they raised their crude weapons and screamed.

It was a release of such helpless rage and pain that Rory would have stumbled to his knees had the Chimera's cry not already put him there. The Ghostfire Simians were likewise stupefied, enough that they barely reacted before the patients were on them. They went down, but they were Untempered. Miraculous as their recovery was, they would die before long.

The Greater Wretch screeched and chittered in response to the challenge, and it surged forward, only to be met by the diving, on-fire, shape of Pit. Thick, table-sized mandibles snapped at the flying Chimera, but Pit was too fast. Wingblades and Frost spears pummeled the creature, but its carapace was too tough. It lashed out with a claw and smashed the tenku from the air, hurling him into the ground.

The thing is nearly impervious. Rory groaned, still supporting Hector's unconscious weight. The man was spattered with blood, but it was the ichor of monsters, not his own. More are coming. Monkeys and bugs, we'll be overrun. They aren't trained for this. None of them were.

Then a lone wind blade sailed through the blackened corpse smoke and hit the Greater Wretch on the ass. The thing stumbled from the strike, and it pivoted its wedge-shaped head back toward the opening in the wall. Limping, his greatsword the only thing holding him up, the Hand shouted in challenge. Beside him, two dark-robed Elders—much to Rory's surprise—stumbled out of the heavy rain. Bolts of lightning and jagged jaws of solidified shadow spread outward, decimating the weaker enemies before them.

"This...is the last army I fight...today," huffed the Hand, and the monsters burst forward, all of them redirected by the Greater Wretches’ shrieks. Toward the larger threat.

Rory grinned.This old Body's still got some juice left. He ran, double-headed axe held in a high guard as he rushed the Greater Wretch. From his flank, he watched in awe as Pit rallied, appearing ahead of the patients and leading the Untempered in a charge. Frost Spears started it off, clattering off the giant monster's carapace as easily as the rain around it, but it split the beast's attention.

"Take out its legs!" he shouted to the Untempered patients, and to his surprise, they actually listened. The fifty-odd men and women bum rushed the Greater Wretch's legs, hacking away at them. "Bring it down!"

Across the way, the Hand took on the teaming Ghostfire Simians and Lesser Wretches. His blades of wind Mana kept them distant or killed them outright. But the man was exhausted, Rory could see that, even amid his own struggles.

"SKEEEAA!" Pit cried out, and a powerful flap of the tenku's wings sent a number of Untempered folk flying backward. The area before the Greater Wretch, empty now, rumbled and liquified before reshaping into a massive twenty-stride spike of stone aimed at its heart. But the creature was too smart. It reared back, deftly avoiding the angled spike.

It could do nothing for the man that fell from the sky. Felix hit it, feet-first, and drove its armored abdomen directly onto the deadly spike in a single, ichor-spewing movement.

You Have Killed A Greater Wretch!

XP Earned!

"Took ye long enough, lad!" Rory shouted at him. The boy turned and fixed him with a glowing, sapphire stare before making a sharp, expansive gesture.

A wave of blue-white flame swept outward, passing by Rory's people harmlessly, but clinging to every single monster in sight. They froze beneath the eldritch flame, locked into place as they began to burn alive. Kill notifications swirled through Rory's vision, all those foes he’d wounded now dead, so many he couldn't keep track of them.

Felix didn't smile as he hopped off the back of his kill, his face uncovered by the black scales that covered the rest of him, from his exposed chest to his bare feet. Rory thought he spotted claws there, too.

"Been a weird day," Felix said.

CHAPTER SIXTY

"Reed!"

Felix shouted and rushed across the battlefield, catching the big man by the shoulders before he hit the ground. He looked like shit, and his eyes were barely open.

"Fiend," he rasped, but fell unconscious without anything further.

Felix set the big man down but wasn't quite fast enough to catch his friends. Cal, Harn, Evie, Vess, Bodie, and the two Elders all collapsed with the absence of the Hand's magic wind-gurney. His Eye assured Felix that they all lived, but every single one had bottomed out their Stamina and Mana.

"Rory! Do we have any healers? Potions?" Felix shouted, his Tempered voice sending a few nearby soldiers reeling. He didn't care. Almost a hundred feet distant, Rory mutely pointed to the Healer's Ward, and Felix nodded. "Pit, let's get them out of here."

He carefully balanced all of them atop Pit's back, and they trotted across the brutalized courtyard to the Healer's Ward. Luckily, the structure had avoided too much damage, aside from a few holes melted through the ceiling. Men and women of all Races were nearby, finishing off the Ghostfire Simians and Lesser Wretches with a collection of scavenged implements. They were dressed in simple linen gowns, and quite a few had bandages wound around them.

"The sick, recently made whole," Rory said, coming up to help him take his unconscious friends down. "We'd thought they'd been permanently harmed by the Primordial, even before all the heat in the air vanished."

Felix felt a shiver move through him, like a chord struck in another room. A Gnome and a Goblin looked up, meeting his gaze and nodding. Felix could feel...gratitude and frustration in their Spirits. It was surprisingly strong, and the threads between them...all of them led to him. The former patients got back to work, dispatching the weakly struggling monkeys and bugs.

It took only a minute or two to get all of his friends onto cots and grab one of Portia's Untempered aides to keep watch over them. They brought out a few Health, Mana, and Stamina tonics, enough to address the obvious problem, though the aide mentioned the possibility of Status Conditions plaguing them.

"Do what you can," Felix said, clapping them gently on the shoulder.

He joined Rory and Pit back outside, both of whom were in the process of ferrying more of the injured to the healer's tent. Rory had shanghaied the former patients, and together they had formed an efficient battalion of surveyors. Surviving fighters were found and carried back. Not for the first time, Felix realized his abilities extended to destruction and death but little in the way of utility.

You're fast, though. Move it. Felix took off, locating survivors with his Eye and lifting them as gently as possible after Stone Shaping any rocky debris from their person. He had to be careful not to jostle anyone too hard; his Strength was insane compared to their Vitality and Endurance, and he doubted they'd survive being whiplashed in his arms.

Regardless, they cleared the courtyard of the injured, moving them into the Ward or the adjacent warehouses. The Untempered folk who had fled into the fortified structures had begun to peek out, and more than once, Felix thought he heard a cheer that was quickly stifled. He was glad for that. Felix looked out at the destroyed wall and savaged courtyard. The number of survivors was less than fifty percent, and though the rain continued unabated, it hadn't yet been able to wash away all the blood.

The Archon. DuFont. I'm coming for both of you, he silently promised.

* * *

The storm raged above, and the rain had begun to blow sideways, but it did not stop Felix. It had only been thirty minutes since the battle had ended, and now everyone was stashed inside away from the elements. Felix couldn't rest—didn't need to, far as he could tell—and they weren't safe. Which meant he was standing atop the broken walls and considered the mutilated masonry. Felix channeled a significant portion of his Mana into his Skill, letting the song of the Skill vibrate throughout his core.

Felix reached out with an open hand. "Stone Shaping," he commanded. The rock around the sundered wall melted into a gooey morass, flexing like gelatin. Felix slowly closed his fist and brought it upward sharply. Like a reversed wave, the liquid stone flowed up onto the wall, filling in cracks and breaks like several tons of cement.

Felix saw it, how his Intent held the spell together, supported by his Willpower, while his Affinity sounded the music behind it all. His ability had expanded more than he understood. He shaped the edge, molding the battlements to match the rest of the wall, before releasing the Skill. The transition from goo to solid stone was nearly instantaneous.

Stone Shaping is level 50!

Journeyman Tier!

You Gain:

+10 INT

+10 DEX

+10 END

"Impressive, Felix," said a familiar voice.

Felix moved before he considered that familiarity, only the jarring flat of a blade stopping his transformed talons from ripping out Zara's throat. She looked surprised, but not as much as Felix.

"You," he managed, drawing his hand back. The sword hadn't left a mark on him. "Where have you been?"

Felix left it unsaid that the attack might not have happened had she remained behind, though it was a close thing. His Mind reminded him of the purple barrier around the Broodmother and likely a dozen ways the Chanter had quietly helped them from the background. But he didn't want to consider rationality, not when so many people were dead.

Zara's face softened, and what might have been regret reflected in her ice-blue eyes. She pushed a rain-soaked hood back, exposing her sea-green hair. "I tried, Felix. Had I known that this would happen, maybe I—No, I cannot lie. I would have followed your expedition. It was—is—too important to leave to chance."

"We didn't win!" Felix reminded her. "Now, the worst possible person has Authority over us!"

"And we have two Challengers," Zara added gently.

"One of whom is recovering inside, also nearly a victim in all this," Felix pointed out. "I...I'm just tired. Can you heal? We have a lot of injured people here, defenders and the sheltered citizens, too."

"Not particularly well, but I brought the next best thing," Zara said and gestured into the foggy rain. Night had fallen, and apart from flashes of distant lightning, the streets were pitch black to normal eyes. Felix's Manasight could pick it all out easily, however. His breath caught in his chest. "I was not idle in my return, Felix."

Out of the dark marched columns of shield-bearing Tin, Iron, and Bronze rank combatants, wet and bedraggled, but very much alive. At their head was a blonde with a pixie cut and a staff of crooked wood, along with dozens of familiar faces. They started cheering as the wall and Felix came into sight.

"It's something," he allowed.

* * *

Along with Zara came reports on the monsters that had invaded. The Wall had gone dark, its protections stripped, and the beasts were swarming up and over it. The bigger monsters were still trapped outside, but it was only a matter of time.

"We could hear the thing quake from miles away," Portia confirmed. She was sweating, and exhaustion and anxiety warred over her Spirit, but she kept moving from patient to patient. Green-gold light swelled under her hands, her and Rory moving down the line. "They're trying to break a hole in it."

"More monsters are coming," Zara said in a quiet voice that nevertheless carried to everyone present. "It’s a ceaseless torrent from the Foglands. Something is riling them up and pointing them in our direction. With the Wall defenseless, it will only get worse from now on."

"That's what happened here," Hector said, taking another tonic from his wife Aenea. His head was bandaged, and his face was raw with scratches, but he was moving again. No small amount of responsibility for that was with Aenea, who had been brewing tonics and potions as fast as she could manage. "Someone drained my arrays, too. I had thought it an inside job, but—"

"It's DuFont," Felix asserted. Rory had mentioned the red-gold light shimmering through the wall before it failed. “She’s using her Authority to expose the city and anyone who could Challenge her."

"Authority can do that?" Yan said as he handed Portia a full wineskin. The grateful healer took a deep swig. "Just open up the gates and screw us over?"

"Worse than that," said a high voice. Keru, Zara's brightly colored kingfisher fluttered through one of the dripping holes in the ceiling. He landed atop Zara's shoulder and shook himself vigorously. Zara let out a small tut of annoyance. "There’s an orichalcum wall built along the Sunrise Quarter limits."

"Did—did that bird just talk?" Kelgan said with wide eyes.

"No," Keru said.

"DuFont is planning to only defend her piece of the city?" Vivianne said, disbelieving. Her short, red locks were frizzy from the humidity. "I know she's an ass, but would she sacrifice most of a city to keep power?"

"Seems like it." Harn grunted as he sat up. Cal was up only moments later.

"Harn, Cal," Felix said with a relieved smile. "Have a nice nap?"

"Could've been more quiet," he groused before pushing himself cautiously to his feet. He was still in his strange armor, even now. "So when do we take the fight to her?"

"Wait, wait," Felix held out his hands, partially to stop Harn from marching into the dark and partly to get everyone's attention. "There's more."

He explained the Archon, who he was, his responsibility for their current crises, almost all of it. He'd done so for the core of the group, but not anyone else. It had been a quirk of his Oath with them; they couldn't share this info because a lot of it sidled up against his secrets. The people around them were many, including the robed Untempered who had stuck by to help treat the injured. Felix didn't care who knew, not about this. Not anymore.

"So this Archon is...working with DuFont?" Yan said, scratching his bald head. "I'm confused."

"No, he is a separate agent," Keru explained, flitting over to Yan's vambrace. "An old threat in the Foglands."

"Seriously, is no one concerned about the talking bird?" Kelgan muttered, more to himself by that point.

"So he's made his move?" Cal asked. She gingerly stretched her limbs and winced at some accumulated soreness. "How many Arcids were there?"

"Three. Two now," Felix said. "They're tough, and so are their elite troops. Reforged, they're called, big warriors in ice armor."

"So not just a monster horde, but a monster horde around giant ice golems?" Evie rubbed her temples and helped Vess sit up as well. "I just woke up, but I'd like to go back to sleep now, please."

"The Archon is driving this attack," Zara confirmed. "But DuFont is allowing it. We have to destroy her first before we can address the bigger threat."

"Assault her how, exactly?" Vivianne asked, and Yan nodded in agreement. "She's holed up behind, apparently, some serious defenses."

"We can—" Zara started, but Felix interrupted.

"What is the Blood Moon?" he asked.

"Vellus' moon?" Vess said, confusion visible on her face. She stood up and conjured one of her silver spears to lean against. "It is Lost, yes? Not seen in an Age at least."

"Why?" Zara asked, her bright eyes boring into his own.

For a brief moment, he was tempted to tell Zara about Vellus and her...offer. But that was a conversation he didn't want to have in front of so many others. He forged on with what he meant to say.

"Because apparently it's coming again, and the Archon is planning around it. Something big." Felix shook his head. "I don't know the details, only that he built the Arcids and the Reforged for battle. I—" Something struck him. "That's right. The plants."

"What?" Harn asked.

"The Archon, in his Domain, he had herbs growing in this garden. They mentioned it, in the Memory. All of the plants were something to do with..." He thought a moment, his feet pacing down the aisle of the Healer's Ward. The events were beyond his Keen Mind Trait's limit, but his powerful Mind pulled the information with only a little effort. "Dark Murmurs, as well as the Blood Moon. Things that enhanced their effect. Does anyone know what they'd do?"

Aenea looked up from tending her husband. "Dark Murmurs? Did you see Aram Leaf? Ceskin Gourds?"

"Yeah, I remember seeing those. A lot of others, too, like Bellock," Felix confirmed. "Blossoms that emitted small puffs of fire, moss covered in thorns, red, tear-shaped fruit. The whole place smelled like blood, honestly."

"A symptom of producing too many alchemical herbs with a concentrated purpose," Aenea said. "A purpose that seems entirely dedicated to the Dark Murmurs, though..."

"What? What do you know, Aenea?" Cal asked.

"Dark Murmurs is a rare Status Condition afflicting an Aspect directly. It infiltrates the Body and breaks it down. It is not easy to counter, but it is also a hard effect to produce. What you're saying, Felix, is that this enemy has gathered huge stores of it? That is worrying and indicates he plans to use it offensively."

"A poison that breaks down Bodies? How is that fair?" Evie complained.

"Offensively? How?"

"That's the thing, it is extremely hard to cultivate the required reagents and even more difficult to weaponize it. More confusing is the presence of Bellock, which disrupts Dark Murmurs. Why would they grow that as well?"

"An antidote for their people?" Alister suggested.

"The Archon doesn't care about his people, so long as he gets what he wants," Felix said with certainty. "It has to be something else."

"I'll think on it," Aenea promised.

"Think quick. We haven't much time. We have to take this fight to DuFont," he continued. "The Arcids are already searching for Teine, and they came here for me and you, Cal."

"They're after the Authority," she guessed.

"No, they can't take it. They're monsters, right? They just don't think we deserve it." Felix gestured back outside, still pacing. "This horde? Like Zara said, it's just the beginning." Felix explained. "We have to stop the Arcids before they kill DuFont."

"If they killed DuFont before the Challenge period was over, wouldn't the Authority flow to you or whoever else had the most Contribution?" Atar asked, looking up from his quiet conversation with Alister. "Why don't we let them?"

"No," Vess said. "DuFont dies before she's Challenged, and it is lost, all of it. If Felix or Cal can Challenge her before they kill her, then maybe. At least, according to the annals my father had me read."

"So it's a race to kill an Inquisitor," Harn grunted, his scarred face widening in a smile. "I'm in for that."

"If all she can do to us so far is drop our defenses, then she's limited in what she can do," Felix guessed, and Zara nodded. "She's lacking either capability, control, or knowledge to use her Authority. That means we have a chance here, but taking on her stronghold is gonna be tough."

"We’ll break into smaller groups," Cal stated. They'd all rested as much as they could amid all the preparations. The command group was clustered around her water-stained maps of the city, laid out in the warded room where Felix had once Tempered himself. "It’ll be more dangerous, but we’ll be faster and harder to spot."

Harn pointed at the map. "Our team will go down the center, the most obvious path between our camp and DuFont’s. The others will flank. Here and here.”

"What if we run into the metal assholes?" Evie asked, raising her hand. Yan nodded, and Kelgan pointed at her. Keru had sat atop his head at some point. "I didn't catch Big Boy's level, but he gave you trouble, didn't he Felix?"

Felix nodded. "If we run into them, I can—"

Cal shook her head. "Maybe there's only two Arcids left, like you said, Felix. That might feel tempting no matter their personal strength, but they’ll likely be surrounded by these Reforged. And every single one of them is a tough customer. We'll fare better if we don’t engage any of them."

Felix only grunted at that. If things went his way, none of the Arcids would survive.

"The gates aren't manned, at least not well," Keru chirped. Pit pawed at the kingfisher, causing him to flit about to avoid the tenku's playful bats. "They might be strong, but there weren't any redcloaks nearby. Mana flow looked weak, too. Might be the best place to attack."

"Likely what DuFont is thinkin', too." Harn pointed out. "She's wily."

“But what if it’s not just us?” Vess suggested. She pointed at the map, drawing everyone's eye.

"Has a bit of poetry to it, considering what she's done," Cal allowed. "Reckless, though."

"Wait, that's it?" Evie asked. She looked at everyone assembled around the city map. "We just smash through the gates with a bunch of monsters on our heels?"

"We have to assume DuFont knows how to use at least some of her Authority," Cal said. "She knocked out the city's defenses, after all."

"So, we get in through the gate Keru found," Felix tapped the map of the Sunrise Quarter. "After that, well, then we're gonna have to improvise."

"We just have to be intelligent about it all," Vess said, grinding the butt of her spear into the stones. “It is our luck that we have two things DuFont wants and fears in equal measure: challengers. We simply have to…entice her properly.”

Cal and Felix traded grim smiles. He looked around at everyone, meeting their gaze before nodding.

"Let's go knock on her door."

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

"Now is the time," the Archon rumbled.

Dark, almost-black energy flooded a gate before him. It was the twin of the one he'd sent his other Arcids through, only far larger. The Archon considered it, still troubled by the sensation of something touching his Mind a few minutes ago. It had felt...familiar, and he did not know why. Only that it filled him with wrath and the urge to crush everything before him.

The golden giant thrust a massive hand forward, and yellow-red striations of power peeled out of his channels and roared against the flickering gate. He hadn't the Mana to open the way previously, but times were changing. The gate filled with brilliant, carmine light and cascading chords.

"The Blood Moon. It fuels the exit. It lacks the strength to shatter my chains. But you..." the Archon laughed and regarded the hulking form behind him, one that was many times his own large size. It stomped from the dark, its breath a bellows that kicked stone dust into the air.

"You shall pass. And I shall guide you."

* * *

The Dust was dark. The quarter didn't have many functioning lanterns at the best of times, and now the streets were as empty of light as they were of life.

Unless you count monsters, Felix groused.

His group—composed of himself, Vess, Evie, Cal, Harn, and Atar—navigated the back alleys, carefully avoiding the prowling Wretches and Simians where they could, and swiftly ending them where they could not. Felix took point, but Cal and Vess were not far behind him. Evie and Atar sat in the middle while Harn took the rear. Felix had his Perception extended to its limits, but it was taking in far too much information. He was getting better at narrowing it down, but for now, only a city block or so swam through his senses, and not all at once. The rain was a constant distraction, as were the occasional roars and shouts in the far distance—sadly, not everyone had evacuated the Dust Quarter.

The Ghostfire Simians were exceptionally silent, their padded feet and hands making only whispers of sound against the wet cobbles. But they couldn't hide their Spirit, not from Felix. He gestured behind him, signing for them to stop as they approached a blind corner.

Stone Shaping!

You Have Killed Ghostfire Simians (x4)!

XP Earned!

Felix waved the others forward, and around the corner were four corpses. Each one was impaled by spikes of stone shaped from the masonry. Felix reached out and claimed them.

Ravenous Tithe!

Another Stone Shaping, and the spikes melted back into the walls.

<Forward.>

<That's some control you got there>, Evie signed.

Felix shrugged. They prowled forward, out of the alley and away from the fading remnants of monster Essence. The next street over was shrouded in shadow and curtains of rain, which made sneaking behind another group of Ghostfire Simians easy, even for their group.

<Maybe I should get a cavern dropped on me. Improve my foundation a bit.>

Felix rolled his eyes, but he could see the smile on his friend's face. It was true, his control and capacity had increased dramatically since hitting Journeyman Tier. He could practically feel the ribbons of light weaving beneath his cores; a sturdy column of vibrant light that spread through him in waves.

<Gonna save some for us?>

Felix smirked and gestured ahead. Evie gave an elaborate bow that ended with her chain zipping out through the air and punching straight through the monkey's skull.

Influence of the Wisp!

Blue-white fire ignited around the three humanoid monkeys, freezing them in place. Evie rushed forward, Cal and Vess close behind. The moment the others were close enough, Felix dropped the Skill.

<You know, fire is more my thing,> Atar signed. He was looking healthier than ever, even despite his blonde curls hanging limp in the rain. He flexed his hands around his sharp metal staff, nervously.

<Prove it. Soon,> Felix signed back. He heard a faint chime along his Affinity and looked at the three women. All of them swiped a notification out of their vision. <Few more blocks.>

Further down, they encountered their first real threat. An ice-armored Reforged crouched among a Lesser Wretch and six Ghostfire Simians. Its body was moving strangely, but their angle of approach blocked most of the scene. Felix's Manasight picked them out from the dark and rain, but even normal sight would have spotted the Reforged. They glowed with a faint, purple-white luminescence. The Mana poured off them like steam in the cold rain.

<What is it doing?> Vess asked. Evie signed back to all of them.

<It's...eating.>

Felix shifted his position and made out the dark smears staining its hands and arms. The thing turned its craggy, inhuman face and sniffed. Blood coated the ice armor around its mouth and forehead. It dove back down, chomping away.

Blood. It's eating somebody.

Let me fight, Pit sent to him from inside his Spirit.

No. You stick with me for now. You know the plan. Felix lifted his hand. I’ve got this.

Influence of the Wisp!

Stone Shaping!

A wave of blue-white fire inundated the courtyard, washing up and over the Simians and Wretch, but leaving the Reforged untouched. Following nearly instantaneously, eight thick spears of stone stabbed up from the ground, each one four feet long.

You Have Killed Ghostfire Simians (x6)!

XP Earned!

You Have Killed A Lesser Wretch!

XP Earned!

Unfettered Volition!

The Reforged blocked the stone shaped spear from hitting its chest with an arm and bashed it apart with a simple backhand. A snarl rippled through its chest and the Reforged turned...only to find Felix flying through the air, fist-first.

Corrosive Strike!

Wild Threnody!

Felix's fist, sparking with a corrosive aura, smashed through the Reforged. Shards of ice exploded around it as its face was driven back, only to feel the needy tendrils of shadow Mana grab its exposed flesh.

Shadow Whip!

Its body was brought savagely back into collision with Felix's acid-fueled punch. This time, its entire face caved in.

You Have Killed A Reforged!

XP Earned!

"AH!" Another Reforged stepped from the darkness, hidden from sight by the crumbling ruin of a building. Felix didn't hesitate, but threw himself forward as the Reforged screamed out a challenge. Distantly, Felix could hear the stomp of approaching footsteps.

"Felix—!"

"He's getting too far ahead!"

You Have Killed A Reforged!

XP Earned!

The next one fell to his transformed claws, its chest unable to withstand their Essence-fueled sharpness. His friends were yelling, but his ears were too busy ringing. Felix had quite enough with these bastards, and he was more than ready to vent his frustrations. A wave of shaped spikes took out the knees of a contingent of loping Simians, stabbing at them sideways from the walls.

Purple-white Mana vapor accumulated ahead of him, lighting up the streets as footsteps shook the ground. A chittering call joined the booming steps, and the spectral light of the Ghostfire Simians soon joined them. Felix ran, heedless. He could feel chain, spear, dagger, and axe laying about themselves behind him, but he wasn't concerned. His friends could handle themselves.

He had monsters to slay.

* * *

"Lafei! What's that?" Keryk pointed with his oversized chin, too lazy to even lift a finger.

Lafei checked the sword at her side and adjusted the tilt of her enchanted helmet. Inquisitor DuFont had raised both of them to Initiates, despite their age and lack of battlefield achievements. She was dedicated to proving herself worthy of the responsibility and authority placed upon her shoulders. Keryk, meanwhile, slouched harder despite his expensive armor and flame-forged sword. So it was with little enthusiasm that she responded to her partner's exclamation.

"What are you—?" But then she saw it. A collection of purple-white lights converging on their position, and soon, beyond the relentless sound of rain, the cacophony of monstrous footsteps. "Monsters! A horde has breached the city!"

Lafei reached for the bell pull to alert the Inquisition, but froze mere finger-lengths from the cord. Pain assaulted her with a terrible, hideous touch as blue-white fire sprung about her entire person.

Status Condition: Enthralled!

I-I can't move! She screamed internally, the flames burning her exposed skin. Her Health began to steadily drop. Keryk!

But in her peripheral vision, she could see that he, too, was affected. No!

Below, just beyond the red-gold glow of their wall, a man had run out into the open. He was moving incredibly fast, but what struck Lafei the most in that moment was the brilliant, deep sapphire blue of his eyes. He was looking right at them, and his own body was limned in an identical flame.

It's him! The ground all but quaked around her. The Fiend!

Behind him, racing as if the Pathless himself were after them, five others followed the Fiend. All of them shimmered with a motley collection of Mana vapors, while behind them the purple-white luminescence increased many fold. Monsters, creatures from the dark imaginings of the Continent raced out of the stormy night, howling for blood.

Had she been able to move, Lafei would have fallen back in fear.

The Fiend hit their gate like a Human catastrophe, the boom enough to wake the dead. He and all of his cronies caved in the reinforced doors, sending them careening into the inner bailey erected by Inquisitor DuFont just that evening. A shiver of red-gold went through the entire structure, and despite her pain, Lafei felt a twisted pleasure. Soon the defenses would activate and—

—and nothing happened.

What? Why? Lafei quailed. Inquisitor! Save us!

The grotesque horde hit their gate only moments later, a tide of ice-borne horrors and insectoid abominations. Lafei screamed, and not until she heard Keryk shouting alongside her did she realize the truth. The Enthrall had faded along with the fiery torment. Hands numbed by scalding pain, Lafei reached for the cord and rang the alarm bell.

"Breach! En-enemy has breached the gate!" she shouted, her voice hoarse already. She rang the enchanted bell for all she was worth, ignoring the truth as an icy monstrosity impacted the guard tower and threw her from her feet.

It was too late.

CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

Monkeys, insects, and ice warriors followed Felix like a streaming banner. They had broken open the Inquisition's gate by leveraging every single one of their best Skills, from Atar's newly evolved Imbued Sparkbolt to Harn's Raze. Even then, it had taken every ounce of Strength Felix had to throw them open. The monsters followed, screaming for their blood. They had entered an inner pocket of the defensive structure, but the red-gold light of enchanted metal only reflected off of the wall behind them. Ahead it was a relatively low structure of simple stone.

"Keep them off our backs!" Cal commanded. "Everyone! Scale that rampart!"

Stone Shaping!

Felix was getting better and better at forming spikes from the earth, and with his senses enveloping the small area, it was easy to claim the cut stone ground as his own. The boost of his Intelligence hardened the stone all the faster, while the speed at which the monsters were running sent them swiftly toward their end. Kill notifications and experience flickered across his vision, but they felt like drops in a bucket the size of a lake.

"Stop them!"

Shouts from above came just before a flurry of arrows, and Diurnal Reach’s light bolts pelted their party. Not just them, though, but the monsters as well. Spectral fireballs sizzled through the air, exploding sections of their battlements as the Simians retaliated. Felix and his team simply tried to survive.

It was chaos.

Within five seconds, however, Felix, Evie, and Cal reached the opposite end of the inner bailey. Shadow Whip, Fluid Shift, and skilled chain use sped their ascent up the wall, and Felix had the wild thought that his plan might actually work.

Then the stones beneath them were ripped asunder, and all three of them were sent careening back to the ground. Felix landed atop a Lesser Wretch, knocking the creature's legs out from under it and snapping its thorax in two; the creature shrieked in mindless agony as he blinked back at the rampart he'd been nearly atop.

It had been demolished and replaced with a gleaming, red-gold metal expanse. Whorls of vibrant vapor still swirled among its summoned length, which had completely boxed his team in. Felix glanced back, and through the gore, he could see the gate behind them slowly dissolving. The wall had moved around them, and this time, there was no gate at all.

DuFont...

Ahead, the walls continued to grow thicker and more robust. Brief, scripted constructs flashed upward and outward moments before the metal surged from the earth. Mansions and delicate landscapes in the Sunrise Quarter were shattered and scattered as DuFont's Authority manifested itself. Monsters raged, momentarily pushed back by the blaze of the conjured defenses, but the ice-armored Reforged pressed onward.

They were trapped.

Atar groaned. "I swear, Felix, if I die here, I'm going to kill you.”

Unlike the three in the lead, Atar, Vess, and Harn were relatively unscathed by the emergence of the new bulwark. Atar spun twenty Imbued Sparkbolts around him in a whirling defensive array, pushing back the monsters that drifted too close. The problem was, they were all coming too close, and in a matter of minutes, they'd be overrun.

"Calesca Boscal and Felix Nevarre," said a jovial voice from above. Felix looked up to see Eliza DuFont standing atop the reconfigured defenses. "Here I was thinking I would have to hunt both of you down! How kind of you to deliver yourselves to me."

An Imbued Sparkbolt flew through the air, fast enough that it whistled, but it ruptured well before it could reach the Inquisitor. Felix’s Manasight watched the defensive constructs interfere with the spell's Mana.

"Tsk tsk, we are having a dialogue, little boy," Dufont said in a faux cheerfulness while she glared at Atar. "Dear me, Atar V'as? You cost the Guild quite the pretty penny when your Master sent you north. A pity you have fallen in with such ruffians; I will lament your wasted potential. Fire on the beasts."

Diurnal Reach continued, unabated, but it fell upon the monsters and Reforged that had funnelled into the area. They halted their advance, roaring at the onslaught.

"You talk too much," Evie said, twirling her chain. "Is it because you're scared behind that big wall?"

"No one will mourn you, Aren. Too worthless to succeed without your sister, you'll fall only months after she died to save you. Pathetic." DuFont spat in disgust.

"What's pathetic is what you're doing to this city, Eliza," Cal snarled. "You brought down the Wall, letting death into the city so you could, what? Rule over the dust that remained? How desperate for power are you?"

"Quiet, treasure hunter!" DuFont screamed, the veins in her neck bulging. "You'll not lecture me on power! Or did you not flee into the Foglands for scraps of dominion?" She suddenly laughed, shaking her head ruefully. "Ah, but you got me worked up! I had wanted to thank your little pet."

Felix shared a glance with Cal before returning his eyes to the armored ex-Elder. The woman was staring at him now, yellow Mana vapor curling from her arm. She had lost the other one, he noted.

"If it weren't for you, the Master Inquisitor would still live, and I'd be pressed beneath his thumb. So truly, from the bottom of my heart, thank you," DuFont said, etching the shallowest of bows. "And as proof of my gratitude, I offer you a final battle worthy of your short but bold legend, Mr. Blue-Eyed Fiend."

Behind them, among the monster horde, two metallic creatures stomped out of the slackening rain. Behind them came more of the Reforged, their purple-white glow unmistakable in the dark. The bolts of light Mana ceased with a barked command. Three hundred of them towered in the night, while the two Arcids stalked forward with murder all but etched into their Spirits. Felix felt their eye-fires on him like red-hot coals.

"You—you are working together?" Vess exclaimed, glaring daggers at DuFont. "When I thought you could not stoop any lower—!"

"These creatures and I will have our reckoning. I simply told them where to expect you. It was obvious, after all, so save your speeches, heiress! Do that, and I'll tell your father that you fought bravely until the end," she said with a sneer. "Now, fight nice!"

You piece of shit...

DuFont disappeared from the battlements just as the two Arcids strode forward. The Reforged and common monsters split before them, and someone dangled in Skeleton's grip. Felix blinked, almost not trusting his Eye. Elder Teine hung limp in her hands, his body mangled beyond recognition but somehow still alive.

"We have come to end this farce," the tall Arcid shouted, her voice tinny in the dwindling storm. "This city is to be claimed by the Archon. Those who oppose us will be broken upon our Father's will!" She threw Teine's twitching body ahead of her, and he rolled several times before coming to an oozing halt. "That one has had his foundation shattered, his Tempering scattered to the winds for daring to disrupt our grand array!"

"Twins’ teeth!" Cal sucked in a breath. Felix could feel all his friends tensing themselves and readying their weapons. The Arcids didn't care. Skeleton and Mud stood proudly among their army and laughed.

"Yet his incendiary failed! Behold!"

At her expansive gesture, the clouds above the city flexed and shifted. Lightning jumped across the thinning gaps, and for the first time in weeks, Felix could see the night sky above the city. No moons greeted him, nor any stars at all. Just a single massive, blood-red orb like a lidless eye.

"The Blood Moon," Vess whispered. "You were right."

Carmine light bathed them all, but the ice-armored Reforged suddenly convulsed. Each of them fell to the ground on hands and knees as the red light seemed to eat away at the purple-white Mana vapor that surrounded them. Screams resounded through their ranks, so loud and powerful that the Wretches and Simians all cowered in fear.

"What's happening?" Harn growled.

"Is their Mana changing?" Atar asked.

To Felix's Eye, little changed, except that their Health and Stamina suddenly skyrocketed, shifting from around nine hundred to over three thousand. More than that, their physical forms swelled under that bloody light, while their ice armor cracked and expanded to cover them.

"Our Master knew! In his immeasurable wisdom, he foresaw your petty resistance!" The umber-colored Arcid had started talking, apparently having climbed atop some rubble to be seen over his horde. "The Blood Moon is ours! Its potent magics seethe in our veins, a gift stolen from the Blind Gods themselves!"

No, Felix realized. He isn't standing on rubble. The Arcid he called Mud had doubled in size and stood nearly as tall as Skeleton, though she had grown in her own ways. Burrs and blades jutted from their elaborate armor plating, just as it did from the enlarged Reforged. Mud was the smallest of them, but the average Reforged were all fifteen to twenty feet tall. They towered over their own horde, and Felix’s palms begin to sweat.

"Improvise, huh?" Evie said, panic threading through her voice.

"We are invincible, Fiend! Our empowered warriors will lay waste to this city and all of the mortals within it!" Mud thrust his enlarged hand forward, and the earth rumbled beneath their feet. "Attack!"

The Wretches and Ghostfire Simians screeched in terror-fueled aggression, their Spirits stretched and trembling to Felix's senses, before they stampeded forward.

"Evie, Cal, Harn! Now!" Felix shouted, drawing his Femur and Blade of the Fang. They sang in his grip, a subtle sound Felix had never heard before, and he complied by feeding them both Essence. "Go!"

Evie hesitated, but Cal and Harn didn't wait. The big man's metal fingers grabbed Evie's shoulder, and the three of them raced toward the wall. Toward DuFont.

"Atar!" Felix shouted over the screams of the onrushing horde. The fire mage looked at him before raising his hand to the sky and sending an Imbued Sparkbolt racing upward. Fifty feet in the air, it exploded.

Stone Shaping!

Influence of the Wisp!

Felix's channels burned as Mana poured from him in a torrent. Ten-foot bulwarks of stone ripped from the ground ahead of them, the sides forming jagged spikes facing the monsters. Monkeys and insects slammed into it without stopping, while a ripple of blue-white fire enveloped nearly a hundred of the common monsters, many of whom were then trampled to death by their allies.

"Field of Flames!" Atar shouted, sending a stream of almost liquid fire arcing over the walls Felix had just built. Screams filled the night as the monsters collided and died among the spikes and flames, but then the first of the Reforged reached his barrier.

And shattered right through it.

"UNGH!" Felix grunted. He felt his wall shatter like a physical blow, one that would have broken something only hours previous. More Reforged came through the gap, their immense shoulders chipping the barrier wider and wider. Their ice armor was now accompanied by deep panes of crimson, as if blood had been frozen to coat their grotesquely muscled forms.

Felix shook the pain off and nodded at Vess, but she was already moving.

"Wyrmling's Call!"

A ghostly dragon's head formed around Vess's as the Skill activated, and a piercing roar cut through the monstrous noise. Even the Reforged were dazed for a brief instant before they resumed their charge with a new, rabid intensity.

"I Taunted it!" Vess shouted. Her Skill had an equal chance to induce a Taunt or Fear Status Condition on those within range, and which was entirely out of Vess' control. He grinned, and Vess smiled right back, her dimple showing. "Atar! Again!"

"Got it!"

Another two Imbued Sparkbolts shot up, bursting simultaneously in the dark sky.

Unfettered Volition!

Felix raced out, crossing the thirty feet to the nearest Reforged and swinging down with both his club and sword. No strike Skills or magic. The enhanced abomination didn't even try to dodge. The weapons caught it across the chest—

—and smashed it back into the ground.

The Reforged fell, chest armor shattered by Felix's club while his Blade cut deep into the meat of its abdomen and back out through the bastard's groin. He whipped the Blade up and around, severing the creature's arm at the wrist as it reached for him, before plunging the weapon straight into its heart.

You Have Killed A Reforged!

XP Earned!

Without pause, another Reforged lunged at him, then another. He twisted around their attacks, but they were a lot faster now. He got blindsided and smashed to the side, sending both of his weapons flying from his grip. The Reforged that hit him followed after, while the rest were still affected by Vess' Taunt.

C'mon, Felix thought. He searched the sky. C'mon!

The Reforged warrior that came after him was nearly twenty five feet tall, an equal for his old pal Grimmar. Felix flexed his hands, letting Sovereign of Flesh thicken his dark scales. The Reforged howled, its voice muffled by the jagged helm of ice around its head, and it bounded forward like an animal.

Shadow Whip!

Shadow Whip!

Dual cast, the black whips shot outward and snagged his weapons. With a sharp pitch, Felix brought both of them smashing inward in an arc. The Blade hit first, stabbing straight through the Reforged's neck before the Femur smashed into its expanded deltoid. The force of the second strike catapulted his Blade the rest of the way through its neck, tearing its throat out completely.

You Have Killed A Reforged!

XP Earned!

Orange explosions shook him from his notification, swiftly followed by a rush of intensely hot air. Felix ran toward the source, yanking his weapons back to his hands. The Reforged had reached Atar and Vess, and more were on the way. He had to fight them off, to give their plan a chance. He—there!

Above the battlefield, a pale purple star blinked into existence.

"Where did—?!" Felix heard Mud exclaim, but the rest was swallowed by the utter firestorm of Sparkbolts, Ice Arrows, Acid Drops, and Shadow Jaws that razed their forces. Mud screeched, like tortured metal. "Ambush at the rear! Attack!"

"HUUUUAAAAAAAAAAAAR!" screamed a thousand voices in unison, as, from beyond the smashed gates, hundreds of warriors raced toward the monsters' flank. They appeared as if from nothing, but Felix could see the telltale quivers in the air. Thangle's Obfuscation had worked!

The shield wall raced ahead, the Iron Ranks supported by Bodie, Yan, Kelgan, even Portia and Alister. Thangle himself thundered just behind them all, atop an avum armored for battle. His small fists stabbed into the air as the purple star above the battlefield exploded into streamers of violet vapor.

"Forced Calm!"

The Ghostfire Simians and Lesser Wretches stumbled and fell as lethargy inundated their senses, their counter charge stymied for a brief second. Their senses returned almost instantly, but by then they were engulfed in ice, flames, and shadow.

* * *

"No!" 55118 screamed, and that bastard boy laughed. Ahead, the Fiend bowled through the Reforged, his Father's perfect creations! The cursed creature's weapons were blurs of death and dismemberment, each strike fueled by such incredible power. He started forward, but a hand held him back.

"He taunts you, 55118," his sister hissed. A series of vines had grown up around her arms as life Mana surged underfoot. "Do not be tricked!"

"They are killing our troops!" 55118 roared, and the Mana beneath the earth responded. "I'll end this now!"

The Arcid's hate flared, and he shook off the restraining hand of his peer. 55118 ran at Felix, his feet pounding the earth so much it began to heave beneath him. He shouted to his troops, his voice a deep, resonating cry. "Kill them! Kill them all!"

CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

Aenea gasped as the Blood Moon's light shone upon the battlefield. The Reforged had grown to twice their size, while the monsters had gone almost insane with bloodlust. Their shield wall was barely holding up, despite the Bronze Rank support.

The little...Felix was right, she thought, almost numb. Vellus' moon returned. How? More than that, her Skill, Medicinal Query spotted a wave of Status Conditions spreading among the enemy:

Status Condition: Dark Murmurs (Modified)

Aenea clenched her jaw. Pushing her abilities further, she could taste a reaction in the air around the Reforged. It was sour and fetid, but wound around something sickly sweet. It smelled of rot and gangrene, but throbbed with vitality nonetheless. It makes no sense!

"Below!" Bodie shouted from ahead, just before one of the ice-armored Reforged fell to the earth. Bodie's magically enhanced mace was stuck fast in its skull. The man crashed behind it, his over-muscled frame hitting earth with as much grace as the dead monster. He gripped his mace and yanked it free, sending out a fountain of blue-black blood. "Sorry about that!"

"Please, I've seen far worse," the Alchemist said. Instead, she knelt by the Reforged's ruined face and took out one of her specialty blades. Small enough to do delicate surgery, it was still only barely sharp enough to cut its Tempered flesh. Fishing a vial from her bandolier, she quickly dropped the chunk of flesh into a pale yellow liquid and capped it. Even before she shook it, the thin yellow fluid tinged a vibrant green and thickened in the tube. "What is—"

The entire vial shattered, spewing a thickened substance that was closer to a solid than liquid. Aenea stepped back from it, wicking it from her skin and clothes with her Repellent Corium Skill. It wasn't effective against weapons or Mana bolts of any sort, but blood and fluids couldn't penetrate. And luckily they didn't, as the thickened substance hit the stone and began to grow onto the cobbles. Tiny veins extended and stretched, grasping onto the cracks and crevices.

"What in the world is that?" Portia asked, pausing between Life Bolts to look over. The illusionist was next to her, quaffing the Alchemist's store of potions.

"An abomination," Aenea hissed. She took a second vial from her bandolier and poured it over the growing lump. Thick, potent acid sizzled as it ate away at the thing.

"These...creatures were infected with a modified version of the Dark Murmurs. Their Bodies should have broken down into mush by this point," Aenea did some rapid calculations in her head. "The Blood Moon was a catalyst."

"What does that mean?" Thangle gasped, finishing another Mana Potion. He limbered up his fingers, cycling his Mana through his channels.

"It means we're all in trouble."

* * *

"FIEND!"

Felix spun, just in time to take a series of stone pillars to the gut and chest. His Manasight had flared, his Blindfighting screaming, but the battlefield was so chaotic, he hadn't noticed until it was too late. Felix took the hits and rolled with them, letting his Body and Unfettered Volition move him. He flipped before skidding to a jittery stop on all fours.

"You dare tarnish my Father's glory?!" Mud ran at him, his enlarged steps shaking the earth like tiny, localized earthquakes. "I will destroy you! Utterly!"

Stone Shaping!

Felix sent his Mana speeding into the earth, intending to trip the enraged Arcid but gaped in surprise. His Mana was ripped entirely from his control, the dusty-brown shade turned yellow-red and twisted. Felix yelped and threw himself to the side, flying nearly fifteen feet as a jagged spike of stone erupted right where he had been.

Holy—! Felix landed easily on his feet and stared at the spike of stone then at the Arcid. He took my Stone Shaping away from me?!

The ground bucked beneath him, and Felix jumped straight up. More spikes burst upward, chasing him.

Shadow Whip!

A tendril snapped outward, snagging onto the ice armor of a passing Reforged. Felix hauled on it and swung around, twisting his body to avoid the sudden rain of rocky projectiles. More than a few hit, dropping his Health by ten or twenty points each time.

Shit! Wrack and Ruin!

Influence of the Wisp!

As a wave of blue-white wisp fire washed outward, Felix pumped his huge stores of Mana into a single, overlarge casting of his acidic spell. The dark green orb grew ten times the size it normally did, but he held its shape steady. With a grunt of effort, Felix hurled it forward as he rotated around the Enthralled Reforged, intercepting the next barrage of projectiles. The acid ate up all of the stone, but detonated in a spectacular splash against a newly erected monolith the Arcid raised.

Enthrall Failed!

Mud hadn't even stopped.

Felix let go of his whip and tumbled to the ground, letting his momentum and Strength carry him forward into a ground-eating run. Mud followed, keeping his distance and twisting the earth to attack him with spikes, columns, or even opening sudden, treacherous holes.

He's better with earth Mana than I am, Felix realized. Whatever was boosting his physique was also enhancing his power. Felix cast his Perception outward, noting that his people were getting closer as they cut through the Arcid's monstrous minions, but they still struggled with the Reforged. Felix sent a pulse of Stone Shaping outward, intending to trip up more of the Reforged for his people, but a wave of yellowed earth Mana hit and diffused it. Felix cursed.

Mud laughed. "No no! You face me!"

Felix couldn't afford to hurl his acid any which way, not with his people closing in, and he'd lost Reign of Vellus. Influence of the Wisp was useless, as it relied on weak mental defenses to stick, and Mud had a solid Mind, apparently, though it was nothing compared to their new Bodies. The Blood Moon and whatever they had done with Dark Murmurs had pushed them beyond their limits. His Voracious Eye could sense that easily.

The Arcid wasn't giving him many options. He had to get in close. Felix grinned and spat out his human teeth as fangs grew in their place.

"You want to fight?" Felix shouted back. "Let's fight!"

Unfettered Volition!

Monoliths erupted ahead of and beside Felix, but he wove between them, too fast for their manifestations to block his advance. He caught a glimpse of fear in the Arcid's eye-fires, potent enough to shiver his Spirit.

"Anointed Barrow!"

In a flash, a series of boulders folded up from the earth, before crashing down onto Felix in tandem. He didn't even have a chance to dodge.

"Hah!" Mud cried out before pushing his Mana into the ground. "You'll not escape me! You...what?"

The stone pile detonated.

Mud fell backward, his metallic frame pelted with boulders as Felix emerged from below. Sovereign of Flesh sang within him, so bright and so loud that even the Arcid flinched in dim understanding. Massive plates of hardened scales covered Felix's form, across his arms and shoulders and chest, like a suit of armor made of nightmares.

Short spikes of thick, white bone stuck from his elbows and knees, while tiny spurs dotted his forearms and shins. Topping it all off, glossy, black scales crested up over his jaw and nose, forming a maw of vicious teeth and a half-mask marked only with whorls of glowing, ethereal cyan.

"Escape?" Felix asked, and he didn't shout. He didn't have to, as Mud sat staring in undisguised horror. "No. No escape."

Felix charged, shattering the stones beneath his clawed feet. The Archid ran.

He tried to.

Stones flowed from the earth, intercepting Felix's path, but the Primordial smashed through them. No Skill, no technique, just pure, unadulterated Strength, Endurance, and Vitality. He emerged in time to grab hold of the Arcid's trailing foot, and his claws tightened on the metal appendage, sinking deep.

"YEEAAAGGG!" Mud cried, falling to his chest. But he didn't stop there, and the ground parted for him like water. It surprised Felix enough that Mud twisted from his grip, but Felix dove right in after him.

"No you don't!"

Felix tackled the Arcid, landing on the monster's spine. Metal groaned, stressed beyond its temper while Mud continued to holler. "No no no no! Get off of me, you treacherous, useless thing!" They fell through the liquid earth like stones into a pond.

Arrow of Perdition!

Felix's hand surged with golden-blue light, and he cocked it back as he aimed for the Arcid's core. But Mud twisted at the last second, and the blow only skittered along his side. A terrible gash was ripped open in the metal, spilling a deep, poisonous-looking blood.

Earth Mana swelled, and Felix had just enough time to realize what was happening before it did. The stone where his upper body was moving suddenly solidified, trapping him as Mud fell away.

Shit!

The Arcid all but vanished to Felix's senses, as he was quickly frozen in place. He couldn't move in the slightest. Felix flexed his biceps and shoulders, straining to twist and buck before stopping himself.

Ravenous Tithe!

Just as he felt the rock dissolve, it was overwhelmed by the onrushing sound of an earthquake, and a fist the size of his chest hit him square in the face.

Rock shattered in all directions. Felix felt it turn to powder against his back, each deposit of stone bludgeoning him as it shattered against his scale armor. He burst from the earth in a spectacular geyser of stone chips and dirt clods, and the grinning visage of Mud was right below him, propelled upward on a massive pillar. The Arcid caught Felix by the arm and swung him down, right into the uneven surface of the pillar.

Felix's Health dropped down to sixty percent, and blood spewed out into his maw-mask.

Sovereign of Flesh!

As the Arcid lifted him again in a tight arc, Felix ragdolled until his body hung parallel to Mud's forearm. His shoulders and back were savaged, but he felt the itching tingle of healing as the Skill activated. He gripped the Arcid's arm, sinking his talons into the metal and flesh beneath. Mud howled in pain.

"Why won't you die!?" he screamed.

Felix clung tighter, even as the Arcid's entire arm slammed into another stone pillar. The two of them were several stories above the rest of the battle. His vision was getting black around the edges in spite of his enhanced regeneration. On the third slam, Felix punched his free hand into the pillar's many crevices. Mud pulled back but was stopped short by Felix's stretched body.

Mud yanked harder, his brown metal groaning with the strain. "Hunfh! W-what good do you think this will do? You only delay the inevitable!"

Ravenous Tithe!

With the barest of contests of Wills, the pillar erupted into dusty-brown smoke, and Mud was suddenly off balance. He let go of Felix and fell, howling.

Shadow Whip!

Felix latched onto Mud and hauled himself closer as they plummeted thirty feet. Talons sliced into his armor, and Mud's panicked yells became agonized. "Wha—the earth is mine to control! How?"

Felix didn't answer, only sank his talons deeper into his chest.

Ravenous Tithe!

Ravenous Tithe!

Ravenous Tithe!

Mud's screams tore through the night before they hit the ground with a resounding crash. A cloud of dust rolled away from them, but the steady rain quickly dispersed it, leaving only a man surrounded by a rising fog of crackling lights.

"No! You can't—!" Mud howled weakly. "My Master's dream—!"

"I don’t give a fuck," Felix spat and stomped his clawed foot into the bastard's chest.

The light in its helmet flickered and guttered out.

You Have Killed Arcid Number 55118!

XP Earned!

"You're damn right it was earned," Felix muttered.

* * *

Scorpion's Tail!

"On the right!" Evie shouted, bending her chain around Harn's bulky armor. The weapon snaked around him and struck the approaching Acolytes. The spikes sank deep into them, a sort of visceral vibration through the chain, and tore back out. They dropped.

You Have Killed An Unknown Acolytes (x2)!

XP Earned!

"The rabble feels endless," Harn growled.

"It's not. They can't have many left, and these are just the dregs," Cal replied, flitting through her own gaggle of enemies. The redcloaks fell shortly after, arteries opened so far they were nearly decapitated. "That bitch is throwing children at us to avoid a fight."

Evie frowned. They had scaled the wall, negotiating its defenses, but it had been underwhelming. She had expected more resistance from the barrier, as the one at the edge of the city was almost impassable. "She likely needs to keep her attention on it," Callie had mused with a grin. "Wonder if she knows?"

When DuFont had run, she'd weakened her own defenses. But it was clear the ex-Elder wasn't keen on meeting them face-to-face. All Callie had to do was get close enough and declare her Challenge, according to Zara, and their Duel for Authority would initiate. The woman was doing everything she could to avoid that. The Inquisitors kept coming, putting themselves between their blades and DuFont's retreating backside, but they were all Acolytes. New recruits. She'd been trying not to kill them, but they had such a fervor in their eyes that it had taken the choice away from her. Either she killed them, or she let them kill her.

They wove between buildings in the Sunrise Quarter, encountering barricaded alleys and cleverly trapped streets filled with spike-lined pits and heavy canvas tarpaulins that broke their line of sight. Evie was annoyed by how much she respected the effort put into the defenses and simply fed that respect into the flame of her hatred.

They advanced, Cal nimbly disarming traps as they moved. Her Skills were tailor made for such things, but it did slow them. Instead, the difficulty was in avoiding the waves of white-enameled armor that came to them to die. They weren’t successful at that, and Evie felt her Stamina drop lower and lower with every redcloak she killed. She wasn't recovering enough to get through all of them and was forced to drink the Stamina Potion she'd been allocated. DuFont was trying to wear them down with pebbles until they were too exhausted to keep fighting. She clearly didn't know them very well.

But she certainly knows how to hide, Evie thought with a gasp. She plugged up the last of her potion, having only downed half of it. There was no sign of DuFont, not to her.

"I think we lost her—" Evie started, only to have Harn immediately tackle her out of the way. A blast of distorted air ripped through her former position, so hot and powerful that it charred the bottom of her boots. "Harn!"

The man had taken the full brunt of the blast, and he stood stock still, his armor glowing a molten orange. Evie stared in dread. He had been broiled inside his own armor.

Analyze!

Evie shot out the Skill without thinking. The Skill was rebuffed by the amulets Zara had given them, claiming they were an edge they could use. Any edge in battle was good, but Evie felt despair climb her guts when Harn didn't move. Was...was he—?

"I always told him he'd die in that armor!" A high-pitched voice echoed around them.

Evie's scalp tingled with heat, and it had nothing to do with the Inquisitor's magic. She fumed. She leaped to her feet, finding Callie already pivoting in a slow circle.

"Where do you hide, Eliza?" Callie asked. "Too afraid of a little Challenge?"

Another high, mocking laugh. "Do I look like a fool? I'll not be risking my neck for pride, Calesca."

The voice bounced oddly, and Evie guessed it was a Skill redirecting the noise. There was no telling where DuFont was hiding, not without Harn's senses. The blunt man had a gift for finding his opponents in battle.

"Even if I fail, Eliza, Felix will come next," Callie warned. "He'll tear down your Wall." DuFont scoffed, but when she remained silent, Callie kept going. "Don't believe me? Fine. Say he fails. The monsters won't. You think this is a simple attack? Are you blind?"

"Watch your tone, Boscal!" DuFont threatened.

"There's forces at work that you've no idea about!" Callie yelled, her eyes sharp on their surroundings. "A creature intent on conquering this city, and you've nearly handed it to them!"

"This is my city!" DuFont screamed, and Evie caught it. The way the sound moved, it vibrated like her chain had earlier. Like...like how her own Spirit trembled with anger.

Is this...my Affinity?

Evie let herself fall back behind the glowing statue of Harn.

"You know nothing of what I have done for this city! What must be done, still!" DuFont's voice was louder now, though still it shifted and bounced randomly. Still, Evie could almost trace it. "I will eject the abominations from my city the moment I have dealt with all of you."

There.

Scorpion's Tail!

Her chain flowed and curved, speeding from her grip like a living thing while the spikes along its length lengthened into hooked blades.

"URK!"

She felt it hit and twisted it. Sudden resistance met her grip, hauling back on the weapon and nearly yanking it from her grasp. A terrible groaning sound echoed from behind her, and heat billowed. Evie whipped her head to see Harn's nigh-molten fist grabbing onto the end of her chain. The once-silver armor was orange and yellow, putting out so much heat the air warped around him.

"G-got you," he grunted.

He heaved backward, and someone screamed bloody murder. DuFont, her body encased in white-enameled armor and tangled by Evie's chain, blasted through the barricades, shattering them into smithereens.

CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

Vines whipped past Vess, growing at a pace she could barely match. Her feet blurred between the sundered streets and torn up stones, while floating spears danced at her back. She slipped into the pattern of Dragoon's Footwork as her main spear wove defensively, knocking aside attack after attack. Man-sized thorns burst from the lashing vines, each seeking to stab, rend, and kill.

"Keep her away from the shield wall!" Vess shouted. Atar didn't reply, but a stream of fire abruptly inundated the far end of their battle, cutting the immense Arcid from their fighters. The Arcid reeled back—the one Felix unimaginatively named Skeleton—taking large strides from the crimson flames.

"Why do you mortals insist on surviving? Can you not see the peace we offer?" Skeleton hissed and wove pulses of green-gold Mana into the earth again. "Simply give up! Our Master is an oncoming storm, unstoppable and unrelenting!"

Lightning lashed from up above, and the rain that had once abated began to pour down again. Vess' eyes flashed, Elemental Eye flexing. It was dramatic and more than coincidence; three of the Reforged had their hands raised up, pulsing streamers of crackling multi-hued Mana extending into the sky.

Elemental Eye is level 51!

Dragoon's Footwork is level 55!

Vess kicked off a riven stone, activating her Born Trait and leaping far above the battlefield. Her Strength had increased considerably when she'd hit Journeyman in truth, and so had her Agility. A deadly vine ripped up at her, but she thrust her floating spears forward. They hit the vine's hardened flesh and slowed her momentum enough that her feet found purchase atop it.

Wall Run!

Slowed but not stopped, Vess ran atop the swirling, thorny vines. The Arcid threw its skeletal hands about, its power following, but the heiress leaped and slid between the weaving attacks. It couldn't hit her, not as long as she had Stamina to burn.

And that was a problem.

Work faster, Atar!

Wyrmling's Call!

Vess' face and shoulders were wreathed in the spectral seeming of a roaring dragon, though the sound was entirely real and frankly hurt her throat. An invisible wave of effect followed her call, breaking uselessly against the Skeleton but pricking the ears of the monsters beyond the flames. It called to them like the sweetest of songs, one she could sense was plucking at something her Affinity could only barely make out. The monsters turned and ran directly into the raging fire.

You Have Killed A Ghostfire Simian (x4)!

XP Earned!

You Have Killed A Lesser Wretch (x2)!

XP Earned!

AFI +2!

Vess grinned but had to drop low to avoid another swooping growth of deadly vegetation. Her Affinity was improving, clearly, but she still had no control over whether Wyrmling's Call taunted or frightened her enemies. It was a frustrating Skill, for all that she Tempered with it.

That thought was knocked entirely from her skull as a thin, green hand emerged from the writhing tangle. It struck her sideways along her shoulder and neck, barely slowed by the defensive explosions of her silver spears. Vess hit yet more vines, tangling her with offshoots that wound around her spears and limbs.

"You'll not stop us! You are weak!" The Arcid's leering face followed its hand, slipping through its own vines like a fish through water. It loomed over Vess as thorns closed in. "Your life is mine."

"Grand Impetus!"

An almost-solid beam of blue Mana slammed into the Arcid, throwing the enormous construct back into its tangled growths.

"Pillars of the Domineering Sentinel!"

All around Vess, the ground exploded upward, thrust up by columns of kinetic Mana. Skeleton's hold was torn asunder, her vines and plants shredded as a platform of stone and dirt sailed upward with Vess still on it.

Pierce the Sky!

Spear of Tribulations!

Vess ascended just as the pillars of Mana winked out, soaring into the downpour as if she'd grown wings. Air Mana swirled, condensing into silver spears that swam around her body like a flock of deadly birds. She rotated her hips, keeping her eyes on the ground as she reoriented in the dark. Her Elemental Eye could barely make out the shape of the looming creature.

Dragon's Descent!

Vess fell like a comet, propelled by air Mana and spiraling gouts of orange fire. The Arcid had less than a second to react, throwing up an arm in defense.

All seven of Vess' spears hit at the same time, though only five sank deep into the Skeleton's metallic flesh. The others buried themselves among the greenery. The creature screamed in rage and no little pain, from what vibrated across its Spirit.

"About time!" Atar complained, he threw the new arrival a beaming smile.

"I had to...run...through your fire," Alister panted as he patted out a burning patch on his robes. "Thanks for that."

Atar had the grace to look sheepish.

"Focus, Atar!" Vess yelled, stabbing down with two more spears. They struck true, but the Arcid was getting back up regardless.

"Burning ashes! On it!" Atar cursed before throwing fire back down at his feet. His Imbued Sparkbolts cut into the uneven flagstones and cobbles, marking out charred sigils.

Vess dodged out of the way of Skeleton's wild swipe, but it was close enough to draw a line of sparks from her armor. The force of the glancing blow sent her spinning, and Vess nearly lost her footing before her Skill saved her. Still, the Arcid got the space it needed to regain its feet.

"Nothing you plan will stop us. No array or force of arm," Skeleton panted. "We have seen the Path forward, and we will take it!"

A muffled boom echoed out from close by, startling them both. Dust rose but was beat back down by the rain, and Vess blinked in surprise.

"Tell that to your brother," Vess said. Felix stood atop the other Arcid, drenched in blood and practically steaming with visible Mana.

"NO!" the Archid bellowed, then she lit up brighter than the sun itself.

Vess stumbled back, shielding her eyes as a green-gold radiance poured off of Skeleton and reached outward like a many-armed beast. Tendrils of her visible Mana hit and infused the vines that lay thick along the battlefield, and suddenly it was chaos. Vines quintupled in size and grew upward at a pace that Vess couldn't even follow. Every single piece of vegetation tore itself up from the earth at the same moment, and all of them hurtled toward the Arcid.

"Blighted Night!" Vess exclaimed, weaving between the walls of plant matter. Thorns and roots clipped her, shaving dozens of points from her Health as her Stamina struggled to replenish itself. "What is—?"

The vines, which Vess had assumed would soon turn against them, instead rapidly grew underneath the Arcid's feet. A platform of vegetation formed beneath Skeleton, and without warning, she was launched straight up into the air.

No. Not straight up, Vess realized. At an angle.

Directly toward the Inquisition's wall.

"Gods and fools, Atar!" Vess shouted in frustration and jabbed her finger at the array he was building. "Will that work anymore?"

"Not if she's not inside it!" Atar shot back before pulling at his coiffed hair.

The platform, and the veritable tree that grew underneath it, hit the wall like a careening Manaship. Defensive formations sparked and stuttered, the creature's vines assaulting it in too many places at once. The sigil constructs exploded into coruscating fireworks.

It's headed for DuFont, Vess realized. "It's going to kill DuFont! We have to stop it!"

If the Authority died with her, it was gone.

* * *

Mervin crawled to his knees and managed not to vomit. Everything hurt, but he still had both of his legs.

He couldn't say the same for everyone else.

Outside the enchanted glass window, from atop the Wall, an ocean of trees stretched out ahead of Mervin. In the daytime, it was one of his favorite sights, but now, beneath that wretched crimson moon, it loomed like the thing of nightmares. Monsters had poured from that thicket only minutes before, overrunning their post with a single-minded ferocity. That ferocity was what saved them, though plenty among their number died. The monsters hadn't lingered but streamed inward as if intent on reaping as many innocent lives as possible.

"At least it's all over," Lars whispered. He, too, retained his limbs, but his bow had seen better days. The others were close, nursing their wounds. "We live."

A sudden scream tore through the night. It was stronger and more resonant than anything they'd heard so far. In the distance, the trees of the Foglands began to sway harder in the rainstorm. Mervin traded looks with his friends, all of whom looked as terrified as he felt.

"What in the world is that?" Mervin hissed.

"It is death, come for us," a new voice murmured. Mervin yelped and stared at the woman who had somehow appeared next to him.

"Who are you?" he managed, his racing adrenaline enough to level his shortsword at the woman—Naiad, he noted. "You cannot be here! It's dangerous—!"

"Concerned?" The Naiad grinned, and Mervin saw bright white teeth. They were as serrated as a beast's. "That is to your credit, but I doubt I'll be able to avoid that."

She pointed back into the Foglands. Mervin tracked her gesture, and his eyes widened as the sound suddenly reached them. Tearing through the forest—literally ripping trees from their places in some cases—was an immense, metallic thing. It looked like a man had been draped in steel before being stretched and ballooned across the chest and shoulders, expanded until it was almost taller than the Wall itself. Steam or smoke poured from huge vents in its shoulders and neck, while its face was built like an Inquisitor but on a grander and equally cruder scale. Lights burned in the darkness of the helm, two bonfires that cut through the dark and rain as it fixed on its destination.

It was coming straight for them.

"By the Pathless' eternal mercy!" Mervin gasped. His danger sense blared with a belated, terrified warning.

"We're doomed!" someone else cried out, though he wasn't sure who.

A hand gripped his shoulder, and the boy looked down to see delicate ochre fingers flexing on his battered pauldron. The woman smiled grimly, if kindly.

"Run, Mervin Cors. I may not be able to end this Quest, but I can prove my worth here," she said.

"Quest?" he asked. "What quest? The one for Authority?"

"Run," she repeated, before sigils of brilliant aquamarine began to appear around her. Each was the size of a dinner plate, and flashed into being in mere moments. "You will not survive this collision."

Sentinel's Regard went wild inside of him as he saw those sigils, and he swiftly turned to his friends and fellow Guilders. "Everyone who can, run! Carry the rest!"

Mervin stooped to scoop up his injured friend Piotr, but only made it as far as the adjoining hallway before the stomping, cataclysmic feet of the approaching monstrosity reached the clearing between Wall and forest. They weren't going to make it.

"To the battlements!" Mervin shouted, and behind him the others moved to obey.

They burst out of the top of the Wall through doors and passages just as the massive metal giant hit the barrier. A hammer of smoking, imbued ore struck against the unpowered strength of orichalcum.

It was no contest.

The wall immediately ripped asunder.

Screams filled Mervin's ears as they kept running, even as the ground beneath their feet trembled and collapsed, bucked and twisted. Aquamarine flashes and snaking lines of sigaldry cut across the orichalcum, possessed of such potency that Mervin couldn't even understand them, except that they were strong and attempting to reinforce the metal. The monstrous giant hit the wall again and again. The sigaldry and Wall fought back, groaning in almighty protest, and a massive array ignited in the air. More lines of dense magic began inscribing themselves across the night, flaring as if bracing themselves.

Mervin's friends cried out.

"Don't look!" he cautioned, his Regard squealing in warning. "Don't—Just run!"

Then the Wall fell out from beneath them, and darkness swallowed them all.

* * *

"Felix!"

Felix's head snapped up from the cooling corpse of the Arcid to see the battle raging hard all around him. He blinked, then saw her.

"The Arcid!" Vess shouted, pointing. "It's after DuFont!"

He spun and caught sight of an immense, jack-and-the-beanstalk style plant that slammed headlong into DuFont's new wall. His Manasight picked out elaborate defensive measures that set the glowing length of bulwark on fire in the night. Vines blackened and died, but more kept coming. The strength of the life Mana that powered its conjuration was nothing to sneeze at, even more powerful than Mud had proven with earth. The Skeleton Arcid stood atop the beanstalk, stretching its spindly arms outward.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Dual cast orbs of sizzling corrosion manifested and sped through the air almost as fast as he could think on the Skill. He spammed it, hurling orb after destructive orb at the Arcid. Thorny growths grew to intercept them, but each one ate through the creature's defenses. Yet for all of that, Felix knew it wouldn't be enough.

"Help the rest of them!" Felix called out, but shouldn't have bothered. Vess, Atar, and Alister had turned back to the Reforged and monster horde and were cutting through their numbers with savage grace.

"Hmm," Felix managed before refocusing.

Stone Shaping!

The jagged and sundered earth beneath them heaved upward, forming into a platform of his own that sent Felix rocketing into the sky. He sailed upward and unsheathed his Femur, his Blade already awkwardly in hand. Fighting with them both was a challenge, but he needed all the advantages he could get. He shoved more Essence into their lengths while lightning flashed above them in near-constant strobes, and in the distance, he thought he heard the sound of calamitous thunder.

Felix threw himself off his pillar as it reached its zenith, letting his Strength and Agility prove their worth as he soared through the air, weapons-first, at the Arcid.

Round two.

Fight.

CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

Vess steadied Atar and Alister both with a hand, as the streets tilted and sank. The stone beneath her feet drained away, and when Vess turned, she saw why. A collection of hexagonal pillars shot upward after the Arcid's own wild growth, Felix atop it.

Fight for us, Felix. Vess turned her attention forward again, giving her friends a boost as they all ran back to the horde of monsters. We will take care of things here.

"Atar! Spread the fire ahead! Alister, can you give us a lift?" Vess shouted.

Flames surged by way of confirmation, and on their next step, three pillars of translucent blue Mana sent them flying upward. They were launched over the field of flames stymieing so many monsters, the wind rushing in their ears as a roar edged with a faint chiming. Atar screamed, and Alister laughed.

Spear of Tribulations!

Conjured once again, six of them uplifted her two friends, slowing their fall. Vess, however, came down like the Hand of the Twin's Immutable Justice.

Dragon's Descent!

Vess hit among a grouping of Ghostfire Simians, crushing two beneath her boots while the impact damaged dozens more in a crater twenty feet wide. The Tempered Skill boosted her Endurance and Strength enough that landing was never an issue, not for her, at least.

Dragoon's Footwork!

Vess lashed out, her spear a scalpel. Each thrust was a kill, each turn was just enough motion to evade counterattacks and set up her own. In seconds, her landing area was clear.

Atar and Alister landed shortly after, their Skills unleashing a torrent of fire and force. Attuned to fire the Simians might be, but Atar's own was a magnitude more destructive. More hungry. It seemed to eat away at anything it touched, while Alister's attacks were punishing blows their hide did not do much to mitigate.

"Cut a path to the shield wall!" Vess ordered above the din of battle. "Atar, use your flames to cut the monsters off, if we can. They need time to flee!"

"On it," Atar panted, finishing off another Mana Potion. He only had a few left, but Vess didn't tell him to slow down. There was a glint in the man's eye; his failure with the Arcid stung. "Flank and burn. They won't live through the night."

"I'll lead the way," Alister said. He brandished his new rapier, fully enchanted by Hector and the Coldfires. "Just don't kill yourself."

Atar and Alister embraced for a quick moment while Vess tried to ignore the pangs in her own Spirit. Felix and Evie were both risking their lives up there, beyond the Inquisition's defenses. She hardened her heart and let her Dragoon's Footsteps flow through her Body and Mind. Monsters ran at them, spectral flames coating the monkeys and the Wretches in equal measure. A path between them appeared to her.

Silver spears floated around her, and Vess advanced.

"Our people won't last long before they run!" Vess said between steps, ducking beneath a stream of white flame. She pivoted and spun to the side as a Lesser Wretch buzzed forward. Two of her spears detonated against its carapace and sent it reeling backward, the storm of air Mana enough to rip it in two. "Stay close!"

They pushed their way through, each step a contest of stats and Skills, pitting their greater abilities against sheer numbers. The beasts seemed to be moving in an uncanny concert with one another, something that was slowly overcoming their allies. An endless tide of unthinking beasts was one thing, but if they had the simplest of tactics at hand, it would prove deadly. And it was.

Through the press of bodies, Vess saw members of their camp fall to claw and scythe, fire, and paralytic bite. She pushed all the harder, throwing herself into harm's way and screaming out Taunts to draw the enemy away from their lines. The horde came at her, their eyes entirely too intelligent for her liking. Her spears gathered, and the three of them thrust through the monsters before letting their Skills explode outward.

"Field of Flames!"

"Pillars of the Domineering Sentinel!"

"Seven Tribulations!"

Fire, force, and air Mana consumed their center in a whirlwind of power and death. But still, the monsters charged. Surrounded, the faint chime Vess had heard increased as they penetrated the horde, until it was all but subsuming her senses. It felt like sickness and rot, a line that tugged at her core despite her resistance. Vess flared her Elemental Eye and her Affinity, pushing both to their limits between strikes.

Elemental Eye is level 52!

A sickening glyph blazed in her vision, branded onto the abdomen of every enemy. Vess gasped in recognition. "They're Marked!"

"What? Which ones?" Alister panted. His rapier was a blur of parries and thrusts.

"All of them!" Vess responded in disbelief. From what she understood, a Mark created a Spiritual link between the beast and the Skill user. It allowed direct control, as well as a host of unknown applications. But what sort of abomination could handle all of them?

"We have to cut it off, somehow!" Atar added. Imbued Sparkbolts whirled around him like a cyclone of flames, scorching any that came too close.

"Abdomen and chest! Aim for them with a Spirit-based Skill, and you'll sever the connection!" Vess advised as she pressed deeper. At least, I hope so. There was little literature in breaking a Mark from a beast, so rare was the ability to inflict them. They couldn't afford the horde to think.

Dragoon's Footwork!

Spear of Tribulations!

They would just have to kill them all.

* * *

Unfettered Volition!

Abyssal Skein!

Felix vanished into the blackened smoke and bright Mana vapor, the Void crawling over his flesh like a living thing as a spear of hardened vine thrust out of the miasma, missing him by inches.

Cloudstep!

Cloudstep!

Cloudstep!

Felix spammed Cloudstep, creating tiny, crackling footholds in midair. Each step revealed his presence but allowed him to reorient his trajectory around the forest of vines that thrust upward at him. Felix spun, extending his clawed hand out and digging deep into the side of a vine—still cloaked, he fell while attached, spiraling all the way down through the thickening smog.

Cloudstep is level 29!

...

Cloudstep is level 33!

He emerged into chaos as hundreds of redcloaks fired their light bolts at the Arcid that stood tall atop her bulwark. Felix kicked off the vine, clearing it just as Skeleton realized where he was; thorns bigger than him erupted from the vine he'd just vacated.

"FIEND!" the Arcid howled. "You will die!"

He didn't reply, relying on his Abyssal Skein, and sure enough, the Arcid's eye-fires did not track him as he fell. The moment he touched down on the battlements, however, Felix hit the metal hard enough to dent it and send a wave of sparks into the sky. Vines immediately raced for him, all but ignoring the redcloaks and their attacks.

Felix burned Unfettered Volition for all he was worth, dodging aside from the rising tangle of vegetation and still pushing himself forward. If fighting Mud had taught him anything, it was that he had to get close in these fights. The Arcids would not be taken down by his paltry magic.

Unfettered Volition is level 51!

...

Unfettered Volition is level 55!

Tooth and claw, his instincts urged. Instincts of the Primordial that he had become. Bring down your prey and sup on their lifeblood.

Felix embraced the beast within, pushing himself farther and faster. Diving and twisting among the unfocused attack of the Arcid, he ran atop undulating vines and kicked across patches of thorns that crushed an entire squad of redcloaks. Abyssal Skein flared, harder and harder to maintain, but Felix pressed onward. He sped up the crest of a massive vine and threw himself higher than ever. He soared through the air above a field of light and flame as the Inquisition brought all they had left to bear. Toward the screaming, enraged Skeleton Arcid that was covered in a shield of woven vines.

Felix pushed his Mana through his channels and out into his weapons. Golden-blue vapor clung to his bone and Blade, each crackling with liquid-seeming lightning. Abyssal Skein flickered and dropped, unable to hold out any longer.

Arrow of Perdition is level 32!

...

Arrow of Perdition is level 34!

Wild Threnody is level 51!

Felix brought both weapons down as he dropped, slicing through the woven shield like it was paper. He met the Arcid's hand as she tried to slap him away, and Felix felt the thrill of her fear.

*KRAKOOOM!*

Like a bomb went off, the interior of the vine dome exploded outward in a tsunami of golden-azure light. The Arcid was thrown backward, nearly off the wall itself. Felix, however, hit the ground hard enough to send up a series of volatile eruptions from the bulwark. The material bulged and flexed under the force of his landing, and he slowly rose to his feet, bone and Blade held aloft.

"We end this now, Arcid!" Felix shouted. He cast his Perception into the Sunrise Quarter where his friends had chased DuFont. I don't have time for you anymore.

Make An Entrance is level 44!

Make An Entrance is level 45!

The notification surprised Felix, and he blinked as it appeared in a swirl of System-born harmony.

Due To Your Increasing Expertise, Make An Entrance has Evolved!

Make An Entrance (Uncommon) has become Manifestation of the Coronach (Epic)!

Level Has Been Maintained!

New Skill!

Manifestation of the Coronach (Epic), level 45!

You are more than what you have done. You are all the things people whisper in the light...and in the dark. Harness the lamentations of your enemies and the exultation of your allies. Has a chance of inflicting an instance of Rallying Cry on allies or A Crisis of Faith on enemies. Chance increases with level, effect of Rallying Cry and A Crisis of Faith increase with Tier.

Rallying Cry - Double Regenerations For All Allies In Range for 45 Seconds, Reduce Chance Of Frightened Status By 50%

A Crisis of Faith - Reduce Willpower by 50% For All Enemies In Range

Felix grinned, then outright laughed. Apparently the System had a very loose definition of what "allies" meant because suddenly the redcloaks facing the Arcid were inundated with a sourceless light. Their Spirits swelled with an influx of System energy, a rousing chorus to his ears.

Enemy of my enemy, huh?

The Arcid slowly regained its feet, its emotions surging wildly. Rage and pain and hate and fear chased each other in frenzied circles. Its parrying arm had been blasted into little more than scrap metal. There was no talking, no clever jibes or hateful threats. Skeleton screeched in primal fury, and green-gold Mana erupted from every part of her artificial body. The beanstalk she'd ridden spread, sprouting violently in all directions.

"DIURNAL REACH!"

A chorus of unified voices screamed to the heavens as Felix's vision was inundated with golden-hued Mana. Light bolts streamed overhead, enough to banish the night entirely, and though they were individually weak, there were thousands of them.

Unfettered Volition!

Wild Threnody!

Felix's scaled body lit up with vibrant cyan light, the whorls upon his flesh igniting as he blurred forward. If nothing else, his new mask protected him from the winds his moving so fast had created. It was a short distance, no more than forty feet, allowing him to go all-out on his Agility. Time seemed to slow as he raced forward. Light streamed, liquid as the radiance along both of his weapons, Arrow of Perdition channeled once again. Sounds stretched strangely; the Arcid's howls turned into high-pitched shrieks while the redcloaks became an army of basso-lunged beasts.

Then he was there, meeting the downward blow of Skeleton with his two massive weapons. Before, the sound had resembled a bomb going off, but Felix realized he had no idea what he was talking about. Their collision now dwarfed that by an order of magnitude, green-gold Mana meeting golden-blue until everything simply became light.

One moment, Felix was swinging his Fang and Femur, and the next he was twenty feet away, half-buried in the metal and stone of DuFont's conjured bulwark. His hands were empty, but his weapons were near enough to hand, if partially buried. Felix's Health blinked at him, down now to less than half, while his Stamina and Mana were likewise blunted. But that was nothing compared to what was around him.

The wall was devastated, its enchanted light gone out completely while a savaged hole the size of the mansions nearby was torn through it from the top down. There were no redcloaks to be seen, only the bent and broken form of the Arcid at the edge of the collapse. Felix stood, and though he ached, he was whole.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Two oversized orbs of acid shot outward at the Arcid, and both hit a hidden nest of vines. Felix grimaced beneath his helm and hurled as many as he could.

Wrack and Ruin is level 45!

Felix spent his Mana as fast as it regenerated, sending a veritable tide of acid orbs at the prone construct. Tendril after tendril of greenery intercepted his attacks, until the last one. The ball of acid hit the Arcid straight in its chest, and Skeleton screamed.

"Finally," Felix panted. He sped toward her, weapons upraised, dodging the wholly expected sneak attack of vines. His Blade cut through them with contemptuous ease, then Felix was there, kicking the Arcid in the chest. Skeleton fell backward even farther, spitting up a dark ichor. She fixed him with a baleful eye.

"Do...your worst, Fiend," she said, and fear rippled across her Spirit.

"You don't deserve my pity," Felix grated out. He was getting tired. "But for what has been done to you, you have it anyway." He lifted his two melee weapons, remnants of her "Father's" own work.

"We...do not want your pity," Skeleton coughed. Sudden triumph seared across her Spirit. "For we will win. Berserk Blood!"

Felix quickly tore out her throat, but was too slow to stop the words. He shouldn't have let her talk!

A pulse of power flitted outward along a barely visible connection, one that stretched between the Arcid and the horde below. He tasted the power as it passed beyond his reach, and his stomach dropped. It tasted of blood and hate.

It tasted of Vellus and the Archon both.

The bellowing screams of monsters abruptly filled the air, each of their voices deepening and rattling with an awful, deadly promise. Then his own people began to cry out.

Oh no.

CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

"Seven Tribulations!"

A storm of air Mana threw the Ghostfire Simians back, shredding through ten of them. Yet the ones behind them simply clawed their way forward, into the bursting spears and suffering lacerations that cut them to the bone. They did not stop.

You Have Killed A Ghostfire Simian (x11)!

XP Earned!

They have gone insane. Vess stepped frantically, pushing her Agility to its limits as the monsters came at her without regard for their own safety. Their eyes were wide and glowed faintly with the same blood-red illumination as the moon above. A Status Condition?

"Vessilia!" Atar cried out, moments before Imbued Sparkbolts burst to either side of her. It was enough of a warning, letting her flip backward and out of the line of fire. "They're enraged!"

"So I see!" Vess leaped up and over a Lesser Wretch that took a swipe at her, flipping just over its iridescent carapace. Her remaining two spears stabbed down and pierced it with a violent report.

You Have Killed A Lesser Wretch!

XP Earned!

"The Mark! It's burning up!" Vess' Elemental Eye spotted the Marks along the monster’s various torsos, and each one pulsed with a sickening yellow-red illumination. She could almost hear a discordant squeal in the distance, but no, that was only the maddened roars of over a thousand insane beasts. "Whoever is controlling them just cut them loose!"

"And pissed them off!" Alister added, using his own Grand Impetus to shove himself out of the way of a soaring white fireball, rolling along the foul ground. The bolt of force had the added effect of dispersing the explosion entirely. He stumbled to his feet. "Oh, that worked nicely!"

"We're close! Get to the shield wall before the signal!" Vess said, leaping far above the assembled horde.

Pierce the Sky!

The rain and darkness limited visibility, but Vess could still see a mass of ravenous monsters, all of them burning with that same sickly light. The Archon's light. Beyond the limits of her Perception, it was a sea of yellow-red embers looking to crash against them all.

"Lass! This way!"

The voice broke through the roars and screeches of the monsters; a tone she recognized. "Rory!"

The Dwarf's double-headed axe cut through the few monsters ahead of them before he beckoned with his free hand. Vess landed, her spears skewering still more enemies as Atar and Alister caught up. They were ushered beyond the shield wall while the horde slammed against the flickering flames and ice the Tin and Iron Ranks conjured.

"We've been waitin' for ye!" Rory shouted while shouldering his axe. "Thaddeus! How goes it?"

Thangle was atop a pile of masonry, weaving together strands of wisping violet energy. His face was screwed up in concentration, his white beard all but quivering. "Almost...finished..."

"Roridan, we cannot last much longer," Aenea said. "I am nearly out of Mana Potions, and the Gnome is at the end of his ability." She approached from Thangle's side, and her bandolier was almost empty of vials. She stabbed a hand at the monsters assaulting their shield wall. "And they're all under a new Status Condition. Berserk Blood."

"It is transmitting along their Spirit Mark," Vess added, and the Alchemist's nostrils flared.

"Someone is controlling all of them?" she whispered. Horror trembled her Spirit before an impressive Will steadied it. "I'd say that is impossible, but we are well out of my depth here."

"I've almost got them...connected. Hold them off...give me...I need more time," Thangle gasped, his fingers flicking ceaselessly. Whatever he was doing, it was more complex than Vess understood. She was no mage.

A chorus of bellowing cries shook out as nearly a hundred ice-armored Reforged charged their line. They towered over the others and even trampled many of the monsters underfoot in their rampage. All of them bore a Mark atop their chest, burning like the sun.

"Bodie!" Vess shouted, and the big man bounded in their direction. He was covered in offal, but his mace was strangely clean. "Carry Thangle! We retreat!"

"Aye, Lady Dayne. Sound the retreat!" Bodie hollered, his Tempered voice louder than the thunder above them. "Fall back!" With a single, fluid motion, he lifted the almost catatonic Gnome onto his shoulder. Thangle kept weaving his spell form, thankfully uninterrupted.

"Those abominations will hit our lines before they can disengage." Aenea pointed out to Vess. "We can't leave them to die."

"We won't," Vess assured her, before quaffing a Mana Potion. Her last. "We'll give you all enough time to breathe. Make the most of it."

"You heard the Lady," Atar said, a crown of flames manifesting above his head. The fire mage's entire aura suffused with flames and streaming orange Mana. "Let's give them some time."

Rory laughed, a touch bitterly, as Yan, Kelgan, and others converged on their spot. Spells and Skills manifested around them in a fireworks display of Mana vapor as the shield wall sagged and fell back. "Aye. Let's."

Grant me your grace, Lady Siva. Spears conjured around her and began to rotate.

With a cataclysmic bellow, the Reforged burst through.

* * *

"Pit! Go!"

A flash of white light, and the tenku manifested outside of Felix, wings already spread in flight. Pit let out a shrill scream before climbing farther into the air.

Support them! And remember the plan! Felix sent, receiving a frantic affirmation in return. It would have to do. As much as Felix wanted to turn back and fight the Reforged, he had another role. If everything went to plan, then...

Felix ran across the battlements and through the charred remains of redcloaks, leaping easily from the bulwark and onto the roof of a mansion. The Sunrise Quarter was littered with the things, all four or five-story monstrosities occupied by merchants and nobles. Empty now, or so Felix hoped, as he crashed into their roofs and tore apart their shingles and eaves. Each leap sent more destruction splintering behind him, but he couldn't stop. He refused to stop.

Screams ahead.

A trail of destruction lay before Felix, an easy one to follow. Patches of flames and ice lingered among smoldering, ruined landscapes. The fortunes of more than one minor noble were likely dashed by desperate battle. Interspersed were pools of glowing...Is that metal?

The screams continued, though they changed in timbre and pitch. Grunts and Skill names filled the air, followed by the report of stone or wood meeting a devastating end. Felix found them fighting in the open courtyard of a six-story mansion. The fountain that once decorated the center was ruined, melted to slag, while the water in the basin had become a rising cloud of steam.

Eliza DuFont was the one screaming, and as Felix landed atop the mansion's roof, he saw her duck and dodge beneath a flurry of attacks. She kept portico pillars between her and his friends at all time, weaving around them in a dizzying pattern. Harn followed after, moving far slower than normal. His armor was glowing, and some of it had even started to melt across his body. Though stilted, Harn's every swing contained a mighty power that severed entire columns with a single strike. He was driving the ex-Elder into a corner, and Felix was glad to see it. Evie and Cal were both right behind him, weapons at the ready.

Felix only had a brief moment of warning before a blast of heat Mana sent all of them running. Harn withstood the brunt of it, unable to deflect or dodge in time, and his armor reignited in a bloom of molten metal. The sheer pain of it drew a ragged scream from the stoic warrior. Almost simultaneously, a pulse of strange music swept through the air. Felix couldn't quite place it, except that it felt familiar. The song crescendoed, and without warning Evie, and Harn both collapsed to their knees, fresh screams torn from their throats.

What the hell? Felix felt the song push at him, but he ignored it. Instead, he leaped down from his perch, pulling at his core for the lightning he knew resided there. Yet his channels choked on the action, and Reign of Vellus refused to ignite. Frustrated, he conjured a Shadow Whip and swung it as hard as he could as he landed. His descent had been so rapid that it took the ex-Elder completely by surprise, and the whip bludgeoned her hard.

"AA—!"

DuFont barely had time to scream as she was driven straight through the mansion's wooden walls. The song cut off immediately. Cal, who also seemed fine, leaped into the mansion after her.

"Go get her, Cal," Felix said.

"What took you so long?" Evie panted while she regained her feet. Up close, Felix could see cuts all over her face, hands, and neck. Aside from that, her face was haggard with whatever DuFont had been doing.

"Evie...What was—Are you okay?" he asked.

"Quit it, I'm fine." She shook herself before eyeing Harn. The man creaked in their direction, his armor glowing in places but slowly reforming. "How hurt are you?"

"The Arcids?" Harn demanded hoarsely, ignoring the question.

"Dead, both of them," Felix said. He handed both of them his last Health Potions, which they slugged back without hesitation.

"The Legion?" Evie asked.

"I don't like that name," Felix began but was interrupted by a blast of yellow Mana vapor. It dry roasted the mansion's entire first floor, and flames soon followed. Cal was thrown backward, out of the house, but she reoriented midair and landed in a skidding crouch.

"That didn't go well, I assume," Evie said. She blinked at the inferno before them. The heat was intense, so hot it was charring the stonework.

"You killed them, Fiend?" DuFont's voice crooned from the conflagration. She stepped through the flames as if impervious, though her red cloak had all but burned away. Wooden struts and beams around her popped in mini explosions as the heat redoubled. "Good. Less for me to clean up afterward."

Evie threw her chain only moments before Cal hurled daggers, and Felix sent two orbs of acid flying at her.

Rerouting Mana Reserves.

What? Felix shivered at the voice he heard, its warm tones at odds with the eerie premonition he experienced. Then another phrase, uttered with the same cheerful disregard.

Song of Siege, Activating.

A glowing, narrow orichalcum wall rose from the earth, blocking both his acid and Evie's chain. Cal's daggers ricocheted and clattered to either side of it. The wall was just big enough to hide DuFont entirely from view.

"You've no idea the power this Authority grants me!" Dufont raged. The wall shifted, speeding toward them faster than even Felix could perceive it. It slammed into him, and all he could do was put his shoulders down and take the hit. The impact drove him back into and through the half-melted fountain. Evie and Cal were thrown from their feet as Felix plowed deep into the flagstones, only barely able to bring it to a trembling halt.

"It is nothing like the Guild’s paltry power! I could tear all of this city to pieces and turn you into quivering wrecks with a single note of a symphony of might!" DuFont kept shouting, but with the structure so close, he couldn't see her. Evie and Cal climbed to their feet behind him, though. He met Cal's eye, and she nodded and signed at him.

Got it, he mouthed. "Then why don't you," Felix grunted. "You've had Authority for less than a day, and this city is a warzone! Why not stop the monsters?"

"And let you band together and take this from me? I've tried too long to rise to greater places, Felix. This is my right! And you will never, ever take it away from me!"

"Switch Reversal!" Cal shouted. The blades she’d thrown lifted from the ground back toward Cal with lightning speed. Except DuFont was in the way. She gasped in obvious pain, and the wall slackened against Felix's Strength, though he didn't realize it until he'd nearly pushed it over. He could see DuFont clearly now, from her charred armor to the hanging sleeve that had once held her left arm. She writhed on the ground, two-foot-long blades sunk hilt-deep in her shoulder and back.

"Now that you're holding still," Cal said, removing two new daggers from her belt and stepping around the dimming orichalcum wall. She met Felix's eyes, and he nodded in agreement. "I Challenge you, Eliza DuFont."

A rapid melody played at the edge of Felix's hearing, and lightning crashed above them, loud enough to shake the earth.

"I have come to claim your Authority."

* * *

Authority Contested!

Reminder! You May Not Use Your Authority Directly On Any Challengers!

Light swelled in DuFont's vision, even as blackness edged her sight. The blades Boscal had ambushed her with had sunk deep in her shoulder and back, piercing most of what she needed to live. Eliza knew it, with a clear, cold certainty.

She was going to die.

Challenge Issued!

Challenge Automatically Accepted!

Terms: Surrender or Death!

You Have Chosen The Path Of Kings, Now You Must Defend Your Reign.

Walk Onward, Ascendant.

Ascendant?

Then Cal was on her, fast and furious and entirely too skilled. Too fast. DuFont had to throw herself wildly back to her feet, and even then, she just barely evaded the treasure hunter's Skills. Eliza's heat magic blunted the edges of Boscal's attacks, forcing the woman to withdraw as her power swept outward in small bursts. But it wasn't enough.

Insistent strains of music called to her as she fought for her life, and DuFont refused to accept its siren song. It was the greatest and most terrifying of Authority's Songs. To Sing it, she would put her entire foundation at risk. Her Temper would suffer; she could even lose entire Tiers. All of this she knew intrinsically. In her bones.

I...I can't...!

It would risk everything she had built. Yet Boscal was not toying with her; she fully intended to kill her. Eliza managed to parry the woman's dizzying display of dagger work with her own hooked blade, even canceling a Skill or two the woman tried to send her way.

Strike after strike, they came too fast for Eliza to track. Her Skills were great, but her Body was not her greatest Aspect. She stumbled beyond the edge of the courtyard, the blades already within her grinding against everything vital.

"Lady DuFont!" a familiar voice screamed, and Eliza grabbed at the white-armored figure in anguish. He grunted in surprise as her superior Strength dragged him close.

"Fatal Flurry!"

Seven attacks blurred forward from Boscal's refined Body, and Klark served his last, most honorable purpose. He jerked in her arms as the blades carved him apart.

I'll—I'll remember you, boy. Eliza gasped and fell away from his corpse.

Authority! Sing the Song of Fury!

Authority Accessed.

CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

Mana filled the night with the sounds of screaming. Bestial roars and unintelligible gibbering were met with inchoate shouts and shrieking cries. Skills clashed as crimson blood and dark ichor was spilled in equal measure.

The shield wall disengaged from the horde, but it was not clean. With only a handful of those at Bronze Rank or above, there were too many points of contact to cover them all. Ice warriors, monkeys, and bugs all hit their lines and trampled dozens if not more of their warriors. Vess could only clench her teeth and attack. There was nothing she could do.

Just follow the plan!

Jagged chunks of earth and sand swept upward, slicing through the legs of a line of rabid monkeys. Vess took the opportunity to leap backward, dispatching another of her spears to explode their ranks. "Full retreat!"

Her people shouted in recognition, and a piercing command sent a streamer of crimson flame to light up the night. The monsters didn't flinch as they marched through it, but at least a few of them succumbed to the inferno.

Vess, meanwhile, ran for all she was worth. She caught up with the Tin and Iron Ranks quickly, spinning her five remaining spears to deflect the spray of spectral flames that chased them. They were running out of time. Thangle had to be ready, now.

Sweat dripped down the heiress' face, but she ignored it. A flex of her Will sent her spears outward, stabbing into the overturned streets as banner-less flagpoles. Atar and Alister hustled beyond the edge of her range, the last of their people to pull back. Columns of blue force and flowers of carmine flame flowed behind them, yet still the Reforged charged after.

Seven heartbeats, Vess thought, eyeing the horde with growing panic. That is all we can give you, Illusionist.

Will you make it work?

* * *

The giant, monstrous Arcid tore through the weakened Wall like paper, stumbling powerfully into the Wall Quarter. Its feet smashed inns and taverns in equal measure, and its immense girth put holes in the streets themselves.

Zara's aquamarine power had flooded outward, marking its metal flesh with sigils the size of houses. They weren’t enough. Metal eroded beneath the waves of her power, scooped away as if by the inevitable coursing of the seasons, yet it regrew. The creature's impossible Body was an engine of furious discordance, a sonata of spite.

"You will not escape me!" Zara spat and rode the line of her power across the sky. Light flared behind her in ribbons, and she lifted her hands high above her head. Swirling orbs of aquamarine script manifested above each fist to the peal of twelve bells the size of a man. "Seizure of the Solemn Vow!"

The orbs unfurled into writhing cages, flying from her hands to impact the gargantuan Arcid. The tendrils of script slipped around the construct before igniting with green-blue flames as they snapped into a rigid formation. The creature stopped.

"I have you," Zara hissed from the air around it. Her spell had grabbed it, but her hands trembled. "You'll go no further, abomination!"

The Arcid turned its helmeted head slowly to regard the Master Tier mage. Noxious fumes emanated from the creature not unlike the black smoke of monster dissipation. But this was an acrid pollutant that smelled of an arrhythmic tattoo, beating against the insides of Zara's temples. Its eye-fires met her own, and the effect redoubled until she was barely holding onto the containment spell. Her Analyze flared.

Name: Apollyon

Type: Archonic Construct

Level: 73

...

A titanic caterwaul sounded from Apollyon's chest and raced up the hollow thing's throat. The cacophonous shriek met her harmonic spellform and burned through it. Zara lurched backward, concentration destroyed as her Skill unraveled before her. By the time she recovered, Apollyon had already begun to move.

With quickening steps, it stomped into Haarwatch, strands of her spellform still sticking to it like glowing tethers. It demolished everything in its path, and Zara stifled a frustrated scream. It was headed for the battle.

For Felix.

* * *

Activating the Song of Fury.

It was all the warning Felix received before an outburst of oppressive yellow Mana discharged from DuFont. It was the same Mana Skill she'd been tossing around before, but amplified a hundred-fold. Cal shouted something.

Stone Shaping!

Reaching deep, Felix pulled up a wall of ten feet of conglomerated rock between them and the Inquisitor. The wave of heat Mana struck the wall with the force of a bomb, and the stone splintered a half second before it exploded.

Stone Shaping is level 51!

....

Stone Shaping is level 54!

Wall after wall, Felix threw his arms up in rapid success as the blooming heat refused to be denied. He pitted his Intelligence and Will against the force of it, but it was not enough.

"What is this!?" Felix screamed.

"I don't know!" Cal said. "Evie! Harn! Get her out of here!"

"No! I'm not leaving you!" Evie shouted back. Her chain whipped about in the volcanic winds, barely restrained by her gloved hand.

"Harn!" Cal screamed as Felix erected another wall of stone. The warrior grabbed Evie, his armor having cooled enough. Evie screamed, but Harn hauled back and stumbled into a plodding run.

What is the Song of Fury? Felix strained to hold his wall together. Beyond the curved expanse of it, he could sense the entire mansion ahead of them igniting. Smoke choked the sky, pressing ash into the storm clouds. Even the rain was gone, evaporated as it hit the expanding bubble of heat.

Felix could hear it, the Song. And by the look on Cal's face, so could she. "What is it?" she asked, but Felix shook his head. It sounded like a melding of harmonics that felt far less like the System and more...Primordial.

"It's her Authority! She's done something," Felix grunted as the wall cracked. His Mana drained out of him like a sieve as more liquid stone flowed to fill the breaks. "I can't Analyze her from here, but this is way stronger than I thought she'd be!"

"She's boosting herself!" Cal said. Her eyes glowed with smoky shadow and deep sienna. "We need to stop her, now! Can you draw her in?"

"Okay! Yeah!" Felix said, juggling his options. "I'll open the way!"

With a surge of Will, the stone beneath their feet parted into a dark passage. Felix quested ahead, boring through the top layers of the city streets with his growing magic.

Stone Shaping is level 55!

Cal dashed forward, while Felix desperately tried to hang on and weaken the nova burst of heat.

Ravenous Tithe!

Yellow Mana surged into his channels, scorching him before being deposited into the spinning center of his cores. The abyss ate it up, but it was like reverse acid reflux with every bite he took. And it barely lessened the punch of it all.

Mantle of the Long Night!

Purple-white Mana surged from his burning pathways, soothing them before frosting them entirely. A maelstrom of arctic winds manifested around Felix with himself as the eye of the storm, and each iota of frozen Mana turned to visible steam upon meeting DuFont's heat. Felix pushed back against it, shoving his Will and Mana at the Skill until the air itself began to shriek.

Mantle of the Long Night!

Clouds billowed outward, ice turned to water turned to steam. Felix screamed, and the Skill pushed out farther and farther.

Mantle of the Long Night is level 43!

The heat lessened, just a touch. Hopefully enough.

Stone Shaping!

Felix couldn't see it, but his Perception was strong enough to open the other side of the tunnel he was building. He felt Cal race through it at almost the same time the jarring Song increased its fervent tempo. DuFont laughed, and her voice reverberated in the night.

"You stop here, Boscal."

Felix punched his shaped wall forward, moving it through the earth. Cal dashed about, harried by blows that boomed in the air. Pieces of the mansion collapsed, wood and embers pouring outward, but Felix's wall cut it all off as it shaped into a sharp V formation before he cut open the very center.

DuFont stood tall, hugely so, as if she'd grown, and Cal flitted about her with her usual deadly grace. Blades flashed and shimmered with black and sepia Mana vapor, but DuFont shifted, too fast for Felix to track. Cal took an uppercut to the shoulder, flipping her up into the air.

"Cal!" Felix sent a Shadow Whip out, catching his friend. The whip latched onto the back of her armor, and he yanked, pulling her out of the way of a savage follow-up from DuFont.

Wrack and Ruin!

The orb of acid was tight and relatively small, but it hit the ex-Elder like a cannon. Except, Dufont barely moved from it. She grinned at Felix as he caught Cal's limp body. Her smile was wide and white and feral.

The Song blared, higher and faster. Felix winced under its relentless tempo, and Cal bled all over him. The heat had only grown, as if DuFont's Skill levels had skyrocketed.

Everything ignited.

* * *

Harn all but dragged Evie away from the mansion. The heat died just beyond its perimeter, but the untiring warrior didn't stop or weaken his grasp. Evie stumbled after him, trying and failing to oppose his Strength. She was no match, no matter the mass she brought to bear.

"Stop! I won't leave them again, Harn! Not again!"

Behind them, now a block distant, the mansion exploded into a swirling inferno.

"Callie!"

A series of sharp screeches met Evie's ears, and Harn fell flat onto his face. Evie was yanked from her feet, still in the man's iron grip, six throwing blades embedded in Harn's weakened armor. "Harn?"

"Be more concerned with yourself, girlie," a voice said. Evie looked up and beheld a figure dissolving from the waving shadows around them.

"Sworn," Evie cursed. "If you've killed him, you will follow after."

"I'm shaking, honestly," Ilia said. The inferno behind them flared up and illuminated the woman's face. Scars puckered and broke the woman's once-beautiful face, and half her head was shorn entirely of hair. "But it's past time you lot paid for what you've put me through. I'd rather start with that prissy noble bitch, but you'll do just fine."

Shadows swirled, and the Sworn vanished just as Evie pulled her wrist free of Harn's grasp.

"Come and fight, girlie."

* * *

Cal blinked up at Felix, who was crouched low over her. Her eyesight swam, and it was dark. His black mask had been smashed, and only a few rogue fangs clung to his jawline. The rest of him looked charred and smudged with soot, only rags of his clothing left atop his armored scales.

"Wake up, Cal! I don't think I can fight her on my own!" Felix strained, and Cal could see two different spells at work. Stone was formed atop of them while swirls of deadly cold eddied around their forms. The cold took the bite out of the heat that even now was melting its way through the boy's stonework. Her Mind felt sluggish, idly cataloging useless details. "Whatever she's doing is not permanent, but—UGH!—but it's strong!"

"She knocked me aside like I was nothing," she whispered. It was coming back to her now. "My blades couldn't even pierce her skin." Cal struggled up into a seated position. Felix's neck was corded and strained, looking like cables more than tendons. "This...is more than a boost. She's advanced, somehow."

Cal felt at the blood that flowed freely down her side. Her Health was dropping rapidly, and her Stamina was only a touch above half.

"She's Master Tier."

* * *

"Seven Tribulations!"

Pierce the Sky!

Pierce the Sky is level 57!

Grace is level 51!

Six.

Vess sailed above them all again, exploding her picket of spears. She timed it well. Wretches stumbled and fell, their bellies blown out, killing far more than a single explosion of air Mana could accomplish alone. Ghostfire Simians were trampled and torn apart by their own allies' blood frenzy.

But still they charged.

Rankers died by handfuls as spectral flames burst among their backs, while ice-bound weaponry cleaved entire lines apart. Their forces were fully routed, and though Bronze Ranks tried to maintain order, it was a pell-mell dash into any streets that would get them away from the ravening horde.

Five.

Alister lifted a stumbling Atar, thrusting backward with his rapier to send both of them forward on bursts of kinetic Mana. Rory sent burning handaxes out into the crowd, each one exploding into a tiny inferno. Karp shot arrow after arrow, each one shattering into a dozen shards and raining jagged death on the enemy.

Four.

Aenea threw glass vials, each concoction a colorful mist that boiled blood and liquified flesh. Her husband etched sigils in mid-air, forming temporary shields of hardened air as they ran. Ghostfire splashed against them, eating them apart.

Three.

Ahead, the Iron and Tin Ranks fled as fast as they could, led by the bounding form of Bodie. The giant of a man held Thangle over his shoulder, cradled as carefully as any baby.

Two.

Thangle's hands moved ceaselessly, and as Vess began to fall, she could see the tendrils of his gift spread out among the street's shadows. Portia's life Mana surged into the street, raising tanglefoot grass that snagged a few more of the beasts, but was powerless against the Reforged.

The ice warriors could not be stopped.

One.

* * *

The streets were awash with aquamarine sigils. Each glyph took up entire market squares, the thoroughfares merely lines in a vast and complex array. Zara hovered atop it, frantically placing the last marking upon the earth as Apollyon raced toward her.

The armored behemoth blurred with every step, moving faster and faster now that her earlier spellform had finally faded, until its sheer momentum was impossible to deny. A discordant bellow, low to high, shattered windows for blocks and sent deep fissures into masonry. Zara's wards flared and burst around her, unable to cope with its impossible cry.

"Poor creature. What has the Archon made of you?" Zara shouted, her remaining power gathering in the streets. Luminescent streamers of green-blue vapor filled the air in a sinuous dance. She began to Chant, a harmonious chorus singing along with her spellform.

The abomination raged but did not halt. Its eye-fires burned like fallen stars. Dissonance hung about its shoulders like a cape of darkness, and in the shadows, far distant, something golden shimmered. Something twisted.

The Archon laughed.

CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

The stone covering above them was ripped away, and Felix desperately backpedaled, dragging Cal along with him.

"Hah! Yes! Now you flee!" DuFont crowed from above him. Her hand had ripped the last of his stone protection away, but it wasn't a Human hand. Stone and metal had flowed and congealed into an oversized limb that grafted to the chestplate of her Inquisitor armor. It was crude and jagged, but the strength it exuded was terrifying. DuFont pulverized the bits of shaped stone in her grip, letting the dust whip away in a wild breeze. "Now you fear."

"In my defense, I've been terrified this whole time," Felix said with a cautious look at her new limb. Cal grunted and tried to find her feet. "New arm?"

"To replace the one you cost me," DuFont snarled and pointed at him. The metal and stone arm only had two fingers and a thumb, but it looked plenty deadly. She stepped closer, slowly. "Do you know how it feels, Fiend? To lose a piece of yourself?"

Felix backed up, Cal's weak legs barely helping. The Song that hovered around DuFont grew in volume. The woman had not only grown a new arm, she had grown, period. She was a foot taller than Felix and broader across the shoulders than she had any right to be, yet aside from battle damage, the Inquisitor armor still fit neatly across her body. Cal's blades were still jammed into her torso, but the exposed flesh around them had hardened to a crazy extent. It was like someone had turned her Temper up to eleven, and he suspected it had something to do with the Song of Fury.

"I've never lost an arm, but you've taken enough from me. From everyone in this city," Felix said, maintaining distance while still holding Cal to her feet. Each jolting movement spilled more of her blood onto the ground. The trail they were leaving boiled. "It has to stop."

"Taken from this city? You dare to speak on such things?" DuFont laughed, a bitter note atop the frenetic concerto of her Song. Swelling strings and staccato notes rang out behind every shift of her body. “I know what you are, Felix, and what you claim to be! Nym and Primordial, intertwined! You brought this calamity to our doorstep yourself!”

She lunged for them.

Unfettered Volition!

Felix burned his Agility, Dexterity, and Strength with all the effort he could muster. Still, he caught the edge of DuFont's metal fist, and it was enough to send him sprawling backward. Felix fell, cupping his body so that Cal could fall on him as well, and instead only managed to spin into a tangled ball of limbs and unpleasantly hard armor.

"The power of true Authority is nothing like the neutered mastery the Guild commanded," she continued as Felix stood again. Her right arm, the Human one, lifted up a sword of gleaming bronze. His sword. "I’m no longer beholden to the limits of their vision. I alone saw what the Foglands promised, and I alone set out the operation to claim it. When it failed, only my actions saved the Guild from dire repercussions. Yet it failed originally because of their weakness!”

The hooked sword dropped, slicing neatly through an orb of acid Felix had flung. The acid broke apart into a bisected stream of Mana vapor. “Just as Teine’s experiments failed. All of them, worthless. If they had but listened to my counsel, taken heed of my concerns and caution, the Guild would still rule, and our Wall would still stand.”

“That’s rich, coming from you.” Felix cast about, looking for something to use against the woman. The mansion was on fire around them, the wood all burning and the stone not far after it. The heat was intense, her power multiplied as the Song of Fury pushed her beyond Adept and into the realm of Master. She couldn’t use her Authority directly against him—he’d seen those messages—but she was merely augmenting herself. It was her own amplified Aspects and Skills that were the threat. "You basically tore down that Wall to build your own."

"Yes, to protect those who were worthy of protection. Nymean or not, I have heard of your exploits, your little speeches to the paltry few who worship the ground you walk on. You are a boy with a boy's knowledge and aspirations! You know nothing of true power and what it takes to keep it." DuFont's arms spread wide. "I hold true, System-born Authority. It doesn't even matter if the Hierophant herself comes for me; they would do anything to retain the sovereignty I now possess. Once you two are dead, nothing can halt my advance.

"So embrace it, Fiend. Accept your end."

The Song of Fury rose to a shrill crescendo as they ranged across the blasted mansion. It battered at Felix as he danced behind burning pillars and charred staircases, but he could tell she wasn't using it on him. The Song was what had advanced her; his enhanced Affinity was working against him, able to pick out the dire weft of its melody. It made it easy to tell where DuFont was, but she had abandoned subtlety in favor of pure, overwhelming force.

"Leave me," Cal hissed, but Felix ignored her. He ran through what remained of some sort of parlor, though all of it was aflame. His resistance Skill slowly ticked upward the longer they lingered, but he wasn't—there. At the end of the parlor was a huge, floor-to-ceiling window.

Stone Shaping!

Short spikes emerged from the uneven flooring just as DuFont came barreling through the parlor wall. She laughed, her face bloody and burned. Her eyes were wild and glowing with a deep, golden light.

"Hey!" Felix rasped through the smoke in his lungs. "I’ve been meaning to mention this—but that’s my sword."

DuFont's smile only grew wider, and points of yellow and gold Mana formed above her shoulders, elbows, and hands. Flickering shapes appeared in the mass of Mana, each one a different Skill. All of them artificially potent. She was burning herself up, Felix could feel it.

"I want it back," he said.

"Then come and take it, boy!" DuFont's Skills filled the burning mansion with a cataclysmic light.

Stone Shaping!

Felix's spikes erupted from the floor.

* * *

Ilia feinted right, but Evie swung wide. Her chain bent and slid, moving after the Sworn with unnatural precision. Ilia cursed and dissolved back into shadow stuff.

Evie sent two Ice Spikes into the dark, but they only shattered against the buildings around them. "Quit playing around, Sworn. We've a score to settle!"

"You couldn't beat me while I wore the Mask of a child," Ilia's voice replied. It sounded distorted and spread out. Evie couldn't trace it. "What hope do you have of besting me now?"

Evie hissed out in pain as something cut her cheek hard enough to draw blood. She spun from the attack, stepping on her chain and passing it around herself in a belated defense. Ilia laughed.

"Ah, that was too easy. Just imagine if that were poisoned, hmm?" the Sworn laughed again as Evie's face paled. "Don't worry, Aren. I wouldn't waste my work on you. I could end you with my eyes closed. My poison is reserved for that Zara and your pal, Felix." Ilia appeared again, composing herself from the stuff of shadows, but Evie leaped away. "Stop running, and let me kill you!"

Evie did not oblige, and instead kept weaving that defensive net of whirling chain around her. Blades of shadow swept from every angle, but she'd Tempered Dervish, and it was paying off.

Ilia sighed like an annoyed elder sister. That grated on Evie. "The sooner you fall, the sooner I can move onto the rest of them."

"First Vess and now Felix? You got a thing for my friends?" Evie said, letting her chain dance along the street. It wrapped around a tilted lamppost, and she hauled back on it, using the leverage to accelerate her impressive Agility.

"Aw, poor little Aren. You can make new friends," Ilia crooned as claws of shadow emerged from around her; they met Evie's chain and sparks flew. "Not like they're family, or anything."

"You bitch," Evie hissed. "Bindings of the White Waste!"

Purple-white chains shot from the ground, but they found no purchase on the Sworn. Ilia danced backward and lobbed three blades.

"Dervish! Ice Spike!"

Evie's chain undulated like a snake, the curve of its length rippling just long enough to block the thrown weapons. At the same time, a foot-long icicle manifested in her palm. She threw it.

The Sworn knocked it out of the air with her side blade. "Is that all you got, Aren? Are you glad your sister didn't live to see you fail so badly?"

Evie fought back the shriek in her soul, twisting aside as another dagger hurtled for her heart.

* * *

The spikes hit the window an instant before Felix did. Both of them rocketed through the glass just ahead of an absolutely gargantuan explosion of heat, fire, and shafts of near-physical light. Several of those still managed to score burning lines into his legs and back despite it all.

She has lasers?!

He had to trust in his Journeyman Body to protect him from the reinforced glass while he did his best to shield Cal from the impact. They both fell hard enough to shatter the cobbles of the street two stories below.

"HRNG," Felix managed. He'd landed on his back, his density and the speed of their descent enough to drive him two feet into the road. Cal wasn't in his arms, though. "C-Cal!"

"Get up you idiot," the treasure hunter said quietly, extending an arm into his shallow crater. Felix took it and leveraged himself up with his legs and other arm. Still, Cal grunted in surprised pain and no wonder; he'd grown heavier yet again.

"You okay?" Felix asked.

"No," she said with a shaky smirk, and Felix noticed her face was very pale. His Eye couldn't break through their Veiling Amulets they each had donned, but he imagined her Health was pushing close to the twenty-five percent mark. "But we gotta finish this. One way or another."

"My sentiment exactly!" DuFont screamed from above, so much closer than Felix anticipated. He tried to react, but she fell onto them with a preternatural speed, her massive, ill-formed fist landing on his side.

Felix had no time to even scream before he was slammed downward into the earth. So hard was his impact that he immediately lost track of Cal. His vision was inundated with pain and the relentless hammering of a jagged fist of metal and stone. The first blow didn’t break his skin, but the fourth did. Dufont jackhammered into him, pummeling him deeper into the flagstones with every strike.

Felix gasped for breath, too overwhelmed by DuFont's offensive. Cal was...she was gone. He couldn't feel her. Everything, in fact, had gone numb. Even the despair that crawled up from his core and into his chest. His Affinity spasmed, flaring along his Oathbindings and—and more. He—

* * *

—Vess ran. The monsters were at her heels while everyone died around her. She took a wild, shaky breath to—

* * *

—dodge out of the way of her blade, but not the kick that followed. The Sworn moved too unpredictably, and Evie was covered in weeping gashes already. How much longer could she last? What—

* * *

—is this?!" Zara screamed, her own emotions clearer than any before them. A terrible, nascent violence swelled beneath her senses as Apollyon plowed onward, relentless. Unstoppable.

* * *

All at once, Felix felt it all. Numbness became a torrent of despair and fear that echoed its way across his friends and allies. Visions flickered in and out between the manic blows of DuFont's powerful new body, of Vess and Evie, Thangle and Atar and Alister. Impressions and emotions hummed across their connections.

All of it a song.

A song that reminded Felix of the people in camp on that first day. The fear and hopelessness that streaked their Spirits and faces. What could he do against that? Against any of it? Why was he fighting so hard?

Unbidden, a warmth blossomed in his chest. The feel of feathers and fur and a warm pressure at his side. Three words echoed across their bond.

Safe. Home. Protect.

Other connections answered in kind. Cords of silver that thrummed with a fire that burned to heal and save. To protect those they cared about. Cal and Evie, Harn and Vess, Atar and Alister. But more. So many more. All the faces and names he’d memorized and tucked away, the Coldfire smiths, the Alchemist and her little family, the grandmothers and grandfathers and orphaned children. Connections swelling into the thousands crowded his Mind and Spirit. They pulled at him, a weight far greater than he’d ever known. It felt lighter than a feather.

And in a rush, he knew.

The Unseen Tide.

His Primordial core, the [Cardinal Beast Core], spun with a grand, shrieking dissonance. Only tempered by the [Thunderflame Core] swelling with a sublime and overpowering harmony. The veins growing from the abyss between them sparked with vivid, colorless lightning.

"I can feel you!" the creature above him screamed. "I can hear the strange music you sing! Stop it!"

Felix had survived endless beatings, the predation of an insane Primordial, and a Goddess just as mad. He had grown stronger, time and again, by surviving the threats against him. Not winning. Persisting.

For a long time, he felt he was running. Running from shit jobs and failed relationships. Running for his life from monsters and pirates, running to civilization, running from the Inquisition and the Guild. Now though, he knew he was running toward something. Battle called to him, in a way nothing ever had. He and his Companion reveled in it.

Felix knew his purpose, in that moment. He had been searching all this time for the reason why he was brought to the Continent. This was why. He was here to fight. To protect.

And gods help whoever stood in his way.

Whispers of song spoke to him. Preserve, they said. Protect. Unite. He activated his Skill.

Unite the Lost!

From within Felix, a wave of Mana, Essence, and something deeper and darker swept outward. Not across physical space but traveling down the ephemeral web of connection he could see so clearly. DuFont hissed in sudden, confused pain.

"Stop it!"

* * *

A wave of Mana swept from the dark, so potent that Vess gasped. A winged shape dropped a rain of deadly Frost Spears on the enemy, driving them back for a bare instant. It wove among a complicated web of violet stars, screeching in defiance. With a sudden surge, the last of the purple stars manifested, and somewhere ahead, a Gnome crowed in triumph.

"Let it be done!"

The tendrils pulsed, once, as Mana drained from the elaborate spellform and along their lengths. Swift as an arrow, a thousand tiny tubes lit up with a spark of power...power that hit a thousand simultaneous stones hidden in the city streets all around them. Grenades planted along thoroughfares, at corners and the shallow ditches of blind alleys.

Sigils ignited.

Behind Vess, the night turned to day with the wild roar of cataclysm.

* * *

Apollyon stumbled as the array finally caught, and strands of victorious energy entangled the etheric abomination's immense legs. Sigils the size of houses burned their way into its shiny, metal hide.

"You go no farther!" Zara shouted, and the beast bellowed back just as a firestorm lit up the night. Miles ahead, triumph echoed through her Affinity.

* * *

Dervish (U) Has Evolved Into Reap the Maelstrom (E)!

Skill Level Is Retained!

Reap the Maelstrom (Epic), Level 54!

You have become the center of your own storm. An inexorable force of nature, your relentless momentum brings dark currents to bear on your enemies. Skill level moderately increases accuracy and damage, greatly increases weight and the amount of Mana packed into your chain.

A surge of Mana jolted into Evie's core. It flowed through her channels like fire and lightning, cycling into her core and back out again in an instant. The chain in her hand, so desperately describing a defensive loop against the Sworn, somehow sped up. The wild power skyrocketed as Evie bent and looped the chain around her shoulder, hip, and leg, each rotation adding the rush of deep blue Mana to its strikes.

Ilia's strikes were thrown off balance. Evie's chain wrapped twice around her forearm and pulled hard. Yet the Sworn was strong and fast, stronger than Evie, for certain, and she pushed back. Evie stumbled forward, her Strength unequal to the task.

But then, Evie had never really devoted much to Strength.

Evie ducked into Ilia's guard, pulling herself closer to the assassin's body before lashing outward. Ilia gasped as a line of fire opened up along her cheek, before laughing. The Sworn closed her grip on the chain-wielder, immobilizing her without any difficulty at all.

"All of that, for a simple scratch?"

"Yeah," Evie breathed and dropped the blade she held. Ilia's eyes widened as she saw it. It was her blade, one she kept in a hidden sheath along her upper arm. A sheath that was now empty. The Sworn’s face went numb as Evie smirked. "Poison's a nasty thing, ain't it?"

A look of horror crossed Ilia's expression before she fell limply to the ground.

"Don't mess with my friends."

* * *

Unite the Lost!

Mana and Essence swirled within him, a vortex of liquid power around his opposed cores. The pattern of Unite the Lost flared with brilliant, incandescent music as it turned inward. Between the two cores, the vein-like growth hummed and burst alight.

Divine Spark Detected!

Primordial Spark Detected!

Something shifted. Tectonics slipped across fault lines. Discordant Harmony swelled, exploding and expanding as an etching of light twisted and turned. A Skill shrieked as threads snapped and realigned, while his cores hummed and vibrated in sympathetic distress.

"Stop! Stop! Stop!" DuFont was screaming. Her malformed fist came down upon him like a wrecking ball. Madness was in her eyes.

A storm ignited within Felix, one that had been growing for a while. Thunder and fire and lightning discharged in a great, almighty burst outward. DuFont was hurled back, her towering form thrown clear of Felix's battered flesh.

Within him, before him, a powerful chorus sang.

Reign of Vellus (Epic) has evolved into Adamant Discord (Transcendent)!

Skill Level Is Retained!

Adamant Discord (Transcendent), Level 54!

You have reclaimed power once Lost to the turning of Ages. The Pull of Significance accumulates with every step. Greatly increased power, control, and precision with each Skill level.

CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

DuFont was thrown back by a column of energy that stabbed the sky like a brilliant spear. Her armor and Tempered skin melted before its onslaught, and unimaginable pain wracked her for the first time since the Song of Fury had begun. A swelling of Sorcerous music surged within the boy, something that sounded entirely too similar to her Authority.

Primordial Spark Detected!

Divine Spark Detected!

The Primordial Spark she knew about—the Authority had told her as much. But the spark of the Divine? How? DuFont braced herself against the blue-white light of the Fiend's discharging Skill and Analyzed him. She could tell he was no more than Journeyman, but his power...how was he so strong? Her Analyze told her nothing but impossibilities. Lies of weakness. Had she not enacted the Song of Fury, DuFont feared she would be no match for him.

A gold-bordered notification blipped into her vision, and Eliza stifled a gasp.

Warning! Unbound Detected Within City Limits!

Recommend Immediate Evacuation Of The City.

Unbound? Impossible. That little shit—

The song crested, swelling to greater heights, and Felix struggled to his feet. She had split him open like a log—the armor on his chest and shoulders revealing bright blood beneath—but now his flesh shuddered and twitched as it healed over. The boy's eyes glowed that uncanny, piercing blue while similarly colored Mana vapor poured from his mouth like steam. He clawed forward. Up. Out of the crater she had created.

Her own Song of Fury was wearing thin; it would not last much longer. The Song boosted all three of her Aspects and pushed her into Master Tier but...against an Unbound...She had to end it. Fast.

No wonder he had proven so hard to kill, and how he had accomplished the impossibilities that had been laid at his feet. Before her was a monster far worse than anything the Foglands could produce.

It was a demon.

* * *

Sovereign of Flesh!

Felix stood on shaking legs, his body broken but healing. He stared at his clawed hands, at the black scales that thickened and crawled over him. But it wasn't his transformation that he saw, it was a legion of threads he could feel touching every inch of his body. They were more than simple connections, however. They were lines of influence weighted with a daunting potency.

Adamant Discord!

His new Skill flared, and blue-white Mana flashed all around him. Lines of it shot in all directions, a spiderweb of power that sent a swath of the street itself heaving. The ground buckled and cracked, while a recoil of pain assaulted his Mind, Spirit, and Body in equal measure. The worst migraine, cramp, and panic attack he'd ever experienced, and it lasted all of a second. Felix blinked it away, his Temper and Skills shrugging most of the effect off.

Felix no longer felt the uneven surges of Reign of Vellus. That Skill—and whatever affiliation with the goddess—was gone. He couldn't look into his core space, but all he felt now was a vast sense of connection.

Unity.

He felt the shift in the air as DuFont came for him, and not only because her heat Mana filled the street with an unbearable warmth. He felt the pull of her, distinct from the air and the earth and the flames. He dodged aside, and her mangled arm of stone and steel crashed into the cobbles.

Dodge is level 52!

"Stand still!" she snarled. She was charred from his attack, and her arm had been broken down until it was more framework than bulk. "Your time here is done, Unbound!"

Felix started as the word came out of her mouth, enough that he took a spear of golden Mana right to the chest. Felix flew back, his wounds reopened and scorched for extra measure. He gasped in pain before his Song of Absolution kicked in.

"You seem surprised, Unbound. Did you think your secret would remain hidden?" DuFont's arm reformed, drawing in chunks of masonry from around her. A hulking limb formed atop her joint, studded with jagged protrusions that would shred anything it touched. In her right, she whirled her stolen Crescian Blade. "I know, and soon, so will everyone else. The Authority has told me to destroy you. Even if you survive today, Felix, the Church of the Pathless will hunt you down for the rest of your miserable life!"

Heat Mana pooled along her new arm, her Spirit as boosted as her Body. Even at a distance, Felix’s scales blistered. She came at him, faster than he could track, but Felix threw himself aside anyway. The threads shifted with him. He felt them so clearly, it was almost as if they were...pulling him.

Adamant Discord!

Felix’s Mana spooled out of him again, but this time it followed lines in the direction of his dodge. Like a fish on a line, he was yanked into the distance, and just in time. The building behind Felix collapsed in a detonation of brick and mortar, not once but twice as DuFont entered and exited the structure. An aura of heat and light baked the air, distorting it as the stone around her boiled.

There was no more talking. The ten-feet-tall Inquisitor screamed and sprinted at him, her boosted Body simply eating up the distance. Felix pulled on those threads once more, whipping to the side just out of reach of each explosive swing. The arm impacted the ground, the buildings around them, and each time, a flameless blast of power left molten stone and charred rings in her wake.

Adamant Discord is level 55!

Dodge is level 53!

With each flare, the threads of connection between him and everything around him tightened. He pushed and pulled on them with his Willpower and Strength, ping-ponging himself around in flashes of blue-white lightning. It strained all of his Aspects, each wrenching change in direction, but he gritted his teeth against it. Felix was ahead of DuFont, and that was all that mattered.

Another hit from that arm of hers...He didn't finish the thought. His Health had fallen below half again. Sovereign of Flesh and Meditate were working overtime, but the sheer presence of DuFont's aura was siphoning Health from him at a steady rate.

Sovereign of Flesh is level 54!

Sovereign of Flesh is level 55!

Wrack and Ruin!

As he sent himself up and over a nearby roof, Felix sent an orb of acid down at the maddened Inquisitor, and she didn't even bother dodging it. It hit her shoulder and sizzled, doing minor damage, but she wasn't even slowed.

"You cannot defeat me, Felix! Your poorly planned attack failed," DuFont sneered as she leaped atop the roof. It creaked ominously under their combined weight. "Your friends are dead or dying. They've all abandoned you. Even the Authority has rejected you! You lost, Unbound."

Felix hunched, dizzy with pain and an omnipresent ache. His core burned bright, but his channels were raw and bloody. "You're...an idiot, DuFont."

Felix felt the rigid threads all around him, strong enough to break stone but not hindering his movement in the slightest. It was like...gravity. A force that bound everything together, a shimmering connection between all the others that spooled from the top of his Bastion of Will. It was what he felt back in that null space when he was immobile. The Unseen Tides.

"Oh," Eliza chuckled. She strode forward, armored feet smashing through the clay roofing tiles. "Please enlighten me, wise one."

It wasn't people, like Oathbindings, or the nebulous emotional connections he'd formed.

The Pull of Significance. Unseen Tides. The threads that bind me to...everything.

Even his enemies.

"You got too close."

Adamant Discord!

* * *

"Harn!" Evie lifted him up, propping him onto her shoulder; she had to shift his mass into herself just to lift him. He was hot to the touch, but no longer molten, thank the gods. "You can't be dead. Wake up!"

The blades in his back had been formed of shadow Mana, and once the Sworn had gone down, they had dissolved. Which was just as well, because Evie didn't have the stomach to start yanking blades out of her friends. She banged on his chest, but the metal was so dense it barely made a sound. "Wake up!"

"Gods, yer loud," he complained. His voice slurred, but suddenly his weight lessened as he found his feet. "What happened? Where's the Sworn?"

Evie laughed, but cut it short. It was too close to a sob. She pointed to the ground not twenty paces away. "Where she belongs."

Harn grunted and took off his helmet. It came off with a click and hiss, like air was escaping his kit—underneath, his face was bruised and bloody. "She dead?"

"Just about." Evie hadn't been pressed to check. "I woulda run her through, but you were over here looking so pathetic and dead yourself, so..."

"Yeah, yeah," Harn said. "Where's Cal? Felix—?"

An explosion of blue-white lightning enveloped a rooftop down the block. Evie winced and shut her eyes, but not in time to avoid the searing afterimage of it. Booming detonations followed soon after as three more mansions in a row collapsed into ruin.

"Nevermind." Harn grunted and took a step forward, but nearly fell over when his leg didn't move right. "Damn legs. You've got my weight shifted?"

"Oh, sorry," Evie said, wiping her eyes. The afterimage had done a number on them, and now she was crying. She sniffed. Stupid lightning. "I'll drop it."

"No, no. I've got a better idea," Harn said with a bloody grin.

* * *

Cal woke to the sound of thunder and the taste of strawberries.

She blinked awake, finding Evie above her and feeding her a Health Potion. No. She gasped as it went to work. A Greater Health Potion. The rare concoction practically swarmed with Mana as it plunged into her system, knitting her flesh closed and restoring her lost blood and bruised organs.

"How?" she croaked. Evie smiled, and her eyes filled with tears.

"Ah, we just mugged some lady for them," she said. Cal saw Harn—looking more beat-up than she'd seen in some time—standing with a black leather bandolier and satchel across his shoulder. Evie helped her to her feet. "Listen, we have a plan."

* * *

Felix stood atop the building, shivering under the aftereffects of his Skill. He'd thrown DuFont off the damn roof and through two—no, three—nearby homes. His Aspects screamed at him, but he'd done it.

Adamant Discord is amazing. He felt the flex and weft of things around him, as if his Perception were enhanced in a fifty-foot radius around himself. He had limped to the edge of the roof to see if DuFont would get up from that hit. He was disappointed.

The Inquisitor stumbled from the wreckage, bloody and really, really mad. Her arm had swollen again until it looked like it belonged to some steroid-loving rock golem. "FELIX! This ends now!"

"Sounds good to me," he muttered to himself. Louder, he said, "Then come and end it!"

DuFont screamed like a woman possessed. Her eyes lit up, blazing with golden light like she was a jack-o-lantern, and she exploded from the street below. Felix threw himself back, flaring both Unfettered Volition and Adamant Discord to move fast enough.

The roof beneath him shattered into a million pieces, set off by a sudden eruption of heat Mana, as well as DuFont's giant body rocketing upward.

Adamant Discord!

Felix panicked and pulled upward; the rigid threads hauled him into the sky.

DuFont, impossibly, followed after.

Twin blooms of fire and heat formed beneath her enhanced Body, while tendrils of half-formed Mana writhed around her Spirit. She accelerated, and the tendrils snapped outward just enough to grab Felix's ankle.

"You're not running away!"

DuFont spun and hurled Felix back to the earth, so hard and fast he couldn't compensate. Felix hit the roof of another mansion and smashed straight through it. And the floor beneath. And the one after that. He landed amid a tiled kitchen, filled with pots and pans and the largest cauldron he'd ever seen. Felix wheezed a breath, but his Manasight flared as yellow Mana suddenly suffused everything around him.

Adamant Discord!

Felix barreled sideways through wall after wall, his scaled shoulders leading the way. Each hit shaved off more Health from his dwindling pool, but it was better than the alternative. He burst out onto the street, rolling away on the cobbles only seconds before the entire building erupted in flames.

The heat was unbearable, and Felix flinched to his feet. The air wavered and wobbled, the brightness of the fire enough to make him doubt his vision. Something moved at the far end of the alley, but his attention was torn away as DuFont landed before him. The stones began to slag beneath her tread as Felix cautiously retreated. He was in a dead-end street, but walls weren't enough to stop him.

The Song of Fury built to a frenetic and terrifying crescendo.

Eliza DuFont stood before him, dominating the space. Tendrils of half-formed Mana lashed about her, ready to grab and tear him down. Heat Mana surged, and the cobbles beneath his claws turned to molten stone, singeing his scales and pushing him back against the thick wall behind him. That, too, began to heat up, yellow Mana infusing its length in an instant. "Have you ever been burned, Unbound? I'm told it's not pleasant, but it gets the job done."

"Fire is...not really my thing," Felix managed. The air was too hot to breathe now.

Mantle of the Long Night!

Arctic wind billowed out from him in waves of purple-white Mana, but the yellow vapor in the air made no room for it. The spell was crushed beneath the weight of DuFont's Spirit, greater than Felix's, despite his advancement. Felix cried out as his Spirit recoiled under the onslaught.

"No more talking, no more running. It is time to die, Felix Nevarre." She swung down her left arm in a brutal open-hand strike, so fast it tore at the air.

*KRAAAAKKOOOM!*

Unfettered Volition!

Felix got his arms up, and the rocky limb slammed him into the earth. The ground around them shattered for yards in all directions, and a wave of molten stone sloshed upward. Felix fell to his knee, barely stopping the Inquisitor's unnatural power.

"No! DIE!" DuFont screamed, her mouth agape and spittle flying. She pressed harder, and Felix screamed. His knee, his entire leg, sank into the molten cobbles. "The Authority is MINE!"

"No," Felix rasped. He felt the contact between himself and everything. Her fist, his shoulder, the ground. It was all connected. With a trembling groan, he pushed.

"I just—"

Metal creaked and stolen masonry cracked as DuFont's arm was forced back, back, back. She screamed without words.

"—want to...remind you—"

He let Essence surge into his hands and sank his talons into the forged limb. He flared his Strength all the harder and lifted his quaking knee out of the superheated cobbles.

"—I never Challenged you!"

Felix screamed the last as he put everything he had into a final burst of Strength. DuFont howled in fury as Felix tore her arm completely off. She stumbled, off-balance for a brief, fateful second.

"But I did."

Cal leaped atop DuFont's oversized back and drove two wicked daggers directly into her eyes.

CHAPTER SEVENTY

The Inquisitor howled in pain, and those Mana tendrils atop her aura flailed. Cal took a hit hard enough from them that it sent her flying into and through a second story wall nearby.

"Cal!" Evie cried out, but Felix couldn't see her.

DuFont stumbled, reeling from the blades in her face and the arm Felix still held. The Song that had buoyed her all this time faltered, a hitch in its beat. Felix dropped the arm and tore the Femur of the Envoy from his hip. His Blade of the Fang had been lost somewhere along the way, but this would do. He tilted the club sideways and flooded it with Essence and lunged. Felix's leg, half-melted, gave out the moment he put his weight on it.

Adamant Discord!

Lightning flared, and thunder boomed as the immutable threads of gravity launched him forward anyway. He slammed into DuFont, club braced, and pushed.

Adamant Discord!

Off-balance and wavering, DuFont still would not move easily. Felix poured his Mana and Essence into the Skill, flaring it with every ounce of his Aspects and stats. Yellow Mana bloomed, slamming into the buildings and street until the wood burst alight, and the stone went red hot. Felix screamed.

Adamant Discord!

They became an incandescent bolt of dueling Mana, blue and yellow surging against one another until the alley walls shattered around them. They took off like a shot, Felix pushing with his club, and DuFont bellowing down the narrow gullet of the alley.

"Reap the Maelstrom!"

"Raze!"

Deep blue and silver Mana sliced through the night, discharging into the dark. Lashing chain slashed at her legs, while twin axes buried themselves in DuFont's back. Armor sundered and flesh split before Evie and Harn's Skills, but Felix didn't stop his own Skill. No matter the pain.

“My axes!” Harn shouted.

Adamant Discord!

Both of them ripped past his allies, across the thoroughfare, and through the wrought iron gate of another merchant's mansion. Felix hauled back, angling them higher, but they were moving faster and faster. DuFont rolled, her immense body attempting to blindly twist Felix from atop her.

"You're not escaping!" Felix snarled.

One wall, two, they plowed up a set of hardwood stairs and through the second story masonry. They skipped over a rooftop, shattering three chimneys in the process, before careening into some sort of squat tower. And right through it. DuFont let out a strangled scream as they emerged and struck the Femur from Felix's grip. A bolt of lightning discharged in all directions, and Felix was thrown backward, the club spinning into the night. Then both of them fell.

"You-you've blinded me!" DuFont choked out. Felix's curved sword was still in her grip as they fell through the rainy dark. "Burning ashes! I'll kill you!"

Shadow Whip!

A cord of shadow caught the Inquisitor, and Felix tugged, hauling himself onto her back just as yellow, gold, and a black Mana vapor coiled about her form. Felix grabbed the woman's gorget and clawed at her face. His own hooked sword met his claws, parrying a blow meant for the knives that still protruded from DuFont's eyes.

"Ascension of the Morning Star!"

Felix was inundated with a column of black and golden vapor that sparked into a massive, glowing blade above them. It dropped like an executioner's promise.

Adamant Discord!

Lightning burst alight and sent Felix rocketing downward at an angle, still gripping tightly to DuFont's armor. She wailed in defiance, and the massive conjured sword hit the earth. An explosion of shadow, light, and heat Mana expanded outward, ripping apart mansions and parks and tiny, immaculate gardens. They were driven all the harder downward, into and through the roof of a massive mansion.

"UNF!"

Felix's Health was dropping too fast for Sovereign of Flesh to keep up. He tried to put the Inquisitor between him and the constant impacts, but the woman fought against him, twisting in his grip and swinging blindly at him. They bulldozed through a parquet floor at an angle, out of one wing and into another. One house soon became two, then three, then four, a half dozen houses filled with masonry and woodwork, wrought iron and molded bronze.

Armored Skin is level 62!

...

Armored Skin is level 69!

Sovereign of Flesh is level 56!

Still the Song of Fury sang unabated within her, despite the raking strikes and savage collisions. The blinded DuFont held onto him in turn, slamming into him with the butt of his hooked blade.

"That!"

*CRASH!*

"Is!"

*SLAM!*

"Mine!"

Adamant Discord!

Adamant Discord is level 57!

Rows of demolished blocks flowed in their wake. Lightning cocooned DuFont's ten-foot frame as they emerged from a first story portico, smashing through no less than four columns on the way out. Felix gasped. They had come back, full-circle, to the bulwark DuFont had raised. It still glowed a faint red-gold, the orichalcum of its composition thrumming with System energy. His Skill dragged them toward it at breakneck speed.

"KEH! You want this? Take it!" DuFront grabbed Felix, driving the hooked sword against his back. Felix's talons slipped as some effect of the blade sapped the spells wrapped around him. She trapped his chest against her own. "Authority! Sing the Song of Seige!"

Activating the Song of Siege.

Ahead, the wall surged with light. Felix could feel it, far stronger than the Song of Fury within the Inquisitor as dormant defenses came online.

"You don't deserve Authority, Unbound! It won't have you!" Around DuFont, her yellow heat Mana pulsed and flowed. It combated his own Skill and covered them with a cloying layer of intense warmth. "I'd rather die than let Haarwatch fall to someone else!"

“I don’t want it!”

“Liar!” Her spell flared, and the heat Mana packed in around them. Felix's eyes bulged as they streaked toward the bulwark. Her Spirit was powerful, even with the dregs of her enhancement still running, even with two eyes blinded. Felix didn't bother with his Mantle of the Long Night; he couldn't compete with her Authority-enhanced Spirit before, let alone now.

Adamant Discord!

He heaved upwards on the threads, putting everything he had left into the action. With a lurching boom, they pivoted and shot straight up into the air.

Into the storm.

"DuFont!" Felix screamed into her face. "I Challenge you!"

Challenge Issued!

Challenge Automatically Accepted!

Terms: Surrender or Death!

You Have Chosen The Path Of Revolt!

Claim Your Place, Ascendant!

"I knew it! But you can’t take it!" DuFont twisted and kicked. Her knee caught the edge of his hip, and Felix's tenuous grip slipped completely. They split apart, both of them still ascending.

Felix rolled, his body still wreathed in lightning. Both of them had almost hit the cloud cover, and the rain had become all but impenetrable. DuFont was slowing but still rising, and her form glowed with a yellow radiance like the sun.

"This is mine by right! No demon from beyond the Void will claim it!" she screamed, and a sphere of blinding luminescence formed atop her hands.

Adamant Discord!

Lightning crackled around Felix's fists, and he flew toward the Inquisitor. Two axes ripped free of her back, stuck there all this time, and spun through the dark on tendrils of blue-white lightning.

DuFont howled, and her entire body became a pyre of yellow Mana vapor. "The Void can have you back!"

Two silver axes slapped into his palms, carried by his new Skill, and Felix flooded them with his power.

Wild Threnody!

Arrow of Perdition!

"Fall of Nova!" she cried.

Yellow light enveloped them both.

* * *

Cal limped from the wreckage just in time to see the sky explode. Yellow Mana turned the night to day and burned the clouds themselves. A cataclysmic gale hit the streets below only seconds later, and the air became a squall of lumber, tile, and fractured stone.

"Harn! Evie!" She couldn't see anything in the whirlwind. "Are you—"

"We're here! Alive!"

"Fer now!"

Cal sagged against the quivering frame of the upper story. Above, the raging inferno of heat Mana filled the sky, all but clearing it of the storm, so hot that the puddles she could see on the streets below began to visibly evaporate.

Felix. Did it work...?

* * *

The Song of Absolution is level 68!

...

The Song of Absolution is level 70!

Armored Skin is level 70!

...

Armored Skin is level 72!

Sovereign of Flesh is level 57!

...

Sovereign of Flesh is level 60!

Wild Threnody is level 52!

...

Wild Threnody is level 56!

Arrow of Perdition is level 35!

...

Arrow of Perdition is level 39!

Mana Manipulation is level 51!

Adamant Discord is level 58!

Felix hung in the naked sky, wreathed in lightning, held aloft on invisible tethers. Behind him, the Blood Moon shone a vivid crimson, and all around were the vast swath of stars in a world without any real light pollution. Thousands of feet below, the flash and flare of active magic danced with the steady flow of ambient Mana. It was peaceful this high up, like a calming breath between screams.

He twitched. Energies—System and otherwise—surged and flickered across and through him, varied in their influence and provenance. Skill-ups filed across his sight, notifications he saw and accepted without much thought or concern. He'd almost died, again, and on the Continent, that meant growth. At the end of them all were several trilling blue boxes that filled his ears and vision.

You Have Killed Eliza DuFont!

XP Earned!

Felix panted, his skin shredded and scales stripped. Blood dribbled down his chest and arms, baked black all along his front. In one hand, he held the melted haft of a silver axe, and in the other, a bronze weapon, hooked and bowed more like another axe than blade. The Crescian Blade. His sword.

Authority Has Changed Hands!

Felix's tired eyes looked up, eyeing the other body among the stars. It twisted in lazy circles, suspended just as he was, though it was straining his Aspects to hold it. DuFont's Body was charred and desiccated, still glowing with remnant heat and the trailing wisps of Mana vapor. She was dead. Finally.

Congratulations!

You Have Been Granted Territorial Authority!

Do You Accept?

Y/N

Yes, he thought, wearily. Why not?

Accessing Authority—

ERROR.

Shit.

Unbound Detected.

Primordial Detected.

Authority Restricted!

Limits Engaged!

Felix all but screamed as an incomprehensibly vast hand clamped down upon him. His Aspects were squeezed and crushed, constrained by that immense grasp.

Aspects Outside Safe Parameters.

Core Stage Beyond Tier Limits.

Primary Stats Far Beyond Tier Limits.

Contacting Regional Authority...

...Regional Authority Unavailable.

Binding Limits To Target.

Felix shook, his breath pressed from him so all he could manage was a harsh wheeze. The melted remnants of Harn's axe fell from his trembling fingers, and his Skill failed him. Lightning cut out, dropping DuFont's mangled body into the dark city, thousands of feet below. Felix remained, held aloft by something else.

Ribbons of inexorable light wound around him, almost too fast to perceive, yet languid in motion. Golden-blue light surged along their length, Mana that hummed with the strident march of the Grand Harmony. Each layer crushed his Aspects just a touch more, splitting skin and muscle, bone and tendon. His Spirit and Mind felt stripped bare, naked under the touch of the System's Authority.

His Bastion quivered.

Bastion of Will is level 69!

Deep Mind is level 57!

Get off of me!

Felix's Willpower surged beneath the winding constriction, hammering at it. The ribbons didn't so much as tremble beneath his onslaught. He raged and stretched himself, pushing with everything he possibly could.

You Are Bound By Oath Of Authority.

You Cannot—

ERROR.

GET. OFF. OF. ME!

Title: Tyrant of Choice Active!

Oath Unbound!

You Have Made Your Choice!

Authority Rejected!

All at once, the restriction fled Felix, and the golden-blue System lights vanished completely. Felix gasped, part in relief and part in agony.

Territorial Authority Seeking Nearest Challenger!

Felix fell from the sky, his form flickering with brilliant blue-white lightning. Take it, Cal. His Will hardened, though he shuddered as the threads pulled him along. I don't need it. I just need...a little rest.

A basso roar shook the night, from entirely too close.

Okay. Just...one more thing, then. He angled his descent, turning into the wind, and lit up the night.

CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE

Cal gasped and stumbled as a sudden, almost acidic power swept across her senses.

Authority Has Changed Hands!

Congratulations!

You Have Been Granted Territorial Authority!

Do You Accept?

Y/N

Yes. Cal had barely accepted when a thunderous roar encompassed both her Mind and Spirit.

Accessing Authority!

Please Stand By!

She gritted her teeth and bent forward, ignoring the exclamations of the people around her. System energy slammed into her, far different than the feel of Tempering or gaining levels, burning through her channels like lava and acid and bitterest cold.

Then it was done.

Authority Accessed.

Welcome, Lady Calesca Boscal.

What Song Do You Wish To Sing?

He did it. Cal looked up, past her worried men and into the sky. Noctis wept, Mags. He did it.

* * *

When the explosions settled, the edge of the Dust Quarter was ruined. Vess surveyed uneven mountains of rubble that filled the space of two city blocks.

Blind gods, Felix. What have you created? Those grenades of his had done such immense damage. And all it had taken was a mage with raw power and Mana Manipulation. Dangerous and difficult to set off, but Thangle had done it.

But Vess cut off her musings on the future and instead scanned the section of debris before her. Of the few monsters she could spy, all of them were dead. The trap had worked, desperate though it was—only a few of the strongest Reforged still moved, and none too quickly. Forty or so of them had lurched from the rubble, their ice armor broken and busted from the collapse of the world around them.

The others gave them no mercy. Whittled down, the Reforged were manageable. Rory, Yan, Kelgan, and several others isolated one or two of them and brought their massive pools of Health down to nothing. Bodie—freed of his role as Thangle transport—had even waded into the fray, meeting the ice warriors' blows head-on. The Reforged were strong, and the Berserk Blood Status Condition pushed them beyond the edge of their already impressive Endurance; yet they were not invincible, especially without the support of their massive, monstrous army.

Then the earth began to shake.

"Shield wall! Western front!" someone shouted. The Tin and Iron Ranks that had been recovering got to their feet and put up their shields once again. "Reinforce!"

A shimmering wall of multicolored vapor manifested as each combatant poured their meager supply of Mana out around their shields. Purple-white, orange, and smatterings of silver flowed and spun before their readied shields, each of them planted securely in the earth. A surprisingly difficult task, given that the ground shook beneath them all.

"What is it?" Vess yelled out to Rory. The Dwarf shook his head.

"Can't be certain! But it's big—"

Ahead, perhaps five hundred strides out, the industrial facade of a tannery exploded into a shattered cascade of stone and wood. From within, an Arcid of colossal proportions charged, each step simply eating the distance. Pieces of its metal flesh were melted and broken, and huge, aquamarine tethers were dangling from its limbs, but it showed no hesitation as it plowed through the few remaining structures in a straight line.

"Atar! Now'd be a good time to drop those sigils again!" Alister said. He, along with some of their more long-range combatants had hung back from the Reforged fight.

"Burn me. I'm on it!" Atar raced out, his hands already summoning spinning points of flame. Shapes scorched themselves into the earth as he passed, lines of an array they hadn't been able to use on the Skeleton Arcid. "Oveh!"

A Dwarven woman, her hair bundled up into a no-nonsense bun, didn't reply but flung her arms out. A wave of dusty brown vapor sped along the ground, sinking into and shaping the glyphs along the edges of Atar's scorch marks. Hector ran behind her, a pile of glimmering monster cores in his satchel. He met Vess' gaze and shouted.

"Go! We need time!"

Vess nodded. "Karp! Portia! On me! Those of you not holding the shield wall, fire everything you have!"

Pierce the Skies!

The heiress shot into the sky, an arrow at the moons. Her Born Trait activated, sending her farther and faster than any normal Human should go, and with the dregs of her Mana Vess summoned her last seven spears. The monster—Apollyon, her Analyze said—did not stop, not even when a barrage of elemental Mana bolts hit it dead on. Green-gold life Mana and golden light arrows hit harder, but were no more effective. The creature was twice the size of any building in sight, and had the Vitality to match.

Dragon's Descent!

"Seven Tribulations!" Vess dropped from the sky, her silver spears preceding her. They detonated with all the force of a Journeyman combatant, and hunks of metal tore from Apollyon's mangled frame. Clouds of dust billowed outward, but Vess dove right in, spear-first.

Vess twisted her body, pushing her Agility hard as her Perception twinged upon impact. Her spear found no purchase. She leaped and kicked off a jagged surface, but wasn't fast enough. A massive hand swung into the thick dust cloud, catching her side and throwing her to the ground.

"AUFH!" she groaned from the bottom of her ten-foot-wide crater. Vess rolled from her back, gasping for breath. Her Health had dropped to less than fifteen percent from that one hit. "Bl-blood and ash-ashes."

Yet the creature didn't bother to finish her off. Its footsteps slammed onward toward their impromptu army. A rain of Frost Spears shattered against its armor as Pit strafed across the sky. The force of his magic dented a few of Apollyon's plates, but left its Health untouched.

Pierce the Skies!

Vess went airborne again, rising until she was level with Apollyon once more. She and only a single spear left and precious little Mana. She kicked off a building as she went, reorienting herself and sending her ascension in pursuit of the colossal Arcid.

"Do not ignore me!" she hurled at its back along with her spear. The creature paused to look at her, just long enough to take the silver weapon to its helmeted face. The detonation of air Mana made it flinch backward, and Vess grinned.

Without warning, the creature pivoted and put its entire shoulder into a retaliatory blow.

Dragon's Descent!

Vess attempted to reorient, dropping at an angle, but Apollyon was too fast. Its descending fist came at her without mercy or hope to dodge it. However, the blow she feared came instead from the side: a bandaged hand shoved her away while a second brought a massive blade to bear.

She tumbled to the earth once again, skidding into a wild roll before pivoting to her feet. Above her, a ringing roar filled the air, accompanied by the groaning sound of metal stressed beyond its breaking point. Apollyon's fist had impacted the wide blade of someone else.

"Darius!"

She couldn't even make out the Hand's expression before the force of the monster's blow sent him smashing into and through a nearby building. He hit so hard the entire structure collapsed after him.

"No!"

The Chimera's lithe form followed after her father's Hand, diving into the wreckage. She ached to follow, but a surge of fiery Mana stole her attention.

"Vess! Get out of there!" Alister cried. "It's ready!"

"Set it off!" she gasped in a rage, and the road blazed with light. Orange fire Mana surged beneath her feet, connective sigaldry thrumming between her boots. The street below them ignited in a vast array of interconnecting symbols. "Burn it down!"

Spears of orange flame stabbed through Apollyon's arms and legs and chest, each coming from a different direction. The colossus strained, caught overextended and off-balance, but was held fast. Vess would have cheered had she not seen its metal flesh begin to absorb the heat.

"Back! Everyone back!" she tried to warn, but Apollyon shattered the restraining array moments later. It lurched, pitching wildly toward a shield wall that would not survive a single stride of its boot. She had nothing left, no Mana, and astonishingly small amounts of Stamina and Health. She—

The sky exploded.

Yellow heat Mana flooded the entirety of the sky, tendrils of vapor that burned away the clouds. Rain evaporated, the heat so intense it scoured the rooftops. Everything stopped as their attention turned upward, monster and mortal alike. The sky was dominated once more by a sea of stars and the carmine, lidless eye of the Blood Moon. Then a gale drove all of them to their knees or worse as debris blasted in all directions. Vess braced herself against the squall, but others were not so fortunate, and some members of the smaller Races were flung into the air.

Apollyon paused for but a moment. Its faltering steps pushed onward, only a hair's breadth away from the shield wall itself. Without warning, a series of aquamarine discs formed in the sky, each littered with dense sigaldry…before a lightning bolt blasted down through it, chased by the crashing sound of thunder.

No. Not lightning.

Felix—moving so fast she only saw the blue-white power of his dive. The discs—arrays—flared with power, somehow speeding him even further. Green-blue light trailed him like lambent water, pushed into radiance by his own thunderous descent. He hit Apollyon square in the chest, and beneath that onslaught, its entire frame crumpled.

Apollyon fell, and the small, Human shape of her friend rode its body down.

It hit the earth with its own thunder, and everything jumped beneath them. Atop of it stood Felix, surmounted by flickers of blue-white, gold, and dark crimson energies.

"Felix!" someone said.

"The Fiend!"

* * *

Manifestation of the Coronach is level 46!

Now Active - Status Condition: Rallying Cry!

"Cal! You got it?" Felix shouted, looking back along the street. A figure, far down the block atop the gold-red bulwark, raised their hands. Crackling energies wreathed her, enough for him to recognize Cal and two other figures beside her.

Cal bellowed into the night. "None of you are allowed here!"

The streets around them lit up. What remained of the street lanterns flickered to a bright yellow radiance. The monsters that survived trembled, suddenly stricken by a weakness none of the mortals felt. Apollyon, still struggling to stand, fell prone once more.

Felix could hear that strange, terrible music, near twin to the concerto that hummed in his core space. It wreathed the monsters all around him and was especially potent on the beast beneath him. Felix leaned forward and forced his fist into Apollyon's chest. Metal groaned as his Essence-fueled claws bypassed its armor.

"I know you're in there, Archon," Felix hissed, twisting his talons. He felt the edges of a large, lumpy core and gripped it. A tingling sensation surged up his arm, like pins and needles but involving more fire.

"NYM!"

The shout was immense, greater than ever, and a wave of yellow-red vapor swirled out of Apollyon's injuries. Felix took a single, careful step back, releasing the core. But he didn't flee.

He was done with that.

"You live...no, you thrive," the Archon observed. Felix felt his skin crawl at the thought of the golden giant's eye-fires on him. "Feeding on these insects' emotions and hope...Typical. It will not save you."

"I'm pretty sure," Felix worked some spit into his mouth. "I'm pretty sure this makes me three for three, Archie."

A well of hate and fury rose from Apollyon's twitching, fragmented body. It resonated in the yellow-red Mana cloud, a quivering. Then it suddenly smoothed out, unnaturally so; like a pond going glassy still.

"Why do you bother with them, Nym? Mortals cannot halt me, not forever. I am ageless and unrelenting," the Archon said with a reasoning tone. "Ah, but there are no Nym to aid you any longer, are there?" Its voice turned smug and satisfied. "You are alone."

"No," someone said from the side, Vess stepped from the rubble. "He is not alone."

"Aye, ye face all of us, ye smokey bastard," Rory added.

Voices large and small joined in, all of them shouting. The threads between Felix and those around him swelled into thick, braided cords of connection, and he could not help but feel his skin prickle.

"How sweet," the Archon crooned, before violence flooded his Spirit. "But ultimately meaningless. Today is not the end, Felix Nevarre, last Nymean of a dead empire. It is but an opening salvo in a game far too advanced for you to even underst—"

"Game on, then," Felix interrupted. "Cal!"

That discordant harmony swelled around them, pressing inward on the Mana vapor. The voice of the Archon crackled and stretched, straining.

"Haarwatch rejects you, Archie," Felix said. "Bye."

With a screech, the cloudy projection of the Archon was crushed from existence.

A ragged cheer sounded from his people, and Felix gave them a shaky smile. He was beat.

"Felix!" Vess shouted to him, but he held up a hand, begging for a moment. He knelt. Beneath him, Apollyon sagged in abrupt exhaustion. Felix's Voracious Eye confirmed its Mana was utterly spent, and its Stamina was draining fast as it fought against whatever Cal was doing. Its connection to the Archon was clearly cut, and Felix knelt down again to grab at its core. He was hungry.

Ravenous Ti—

Felix felt something tremble in the core. It was faint, more like an echo than anything else, but he...What is that?

It felt cold and alone. Lost.

Lost.

Felix groaned, feeling the tug of his Affinity and a swell of Intent. But he surrendered to it, as he had previously. The Skill was a mystery to him, but it felt important. It felt necessary.

Unite the Lost.

Essence and Mana poured from him, the majority of what he'd taken that night, and into Apollyon's giant frame. Metal shrieked and fell away, corroding in strips and crumbling apart. Ichor swirled and boiled, evaporating so fast Felix almost doubted it had existed. From within, something else began to take shape, until the metal shell beneath him collapsed completely.

Unfettered Volition!

Felix kept his feet, riding down the rotting panels of metal as a figure was born from the corpse of the old. It was much smaller, but still at least twenty feet tall. A Risi, a Frost Giant, stumbled out from below, naked and terrified.

A gasp of alarm swept through those watching, but Felix held up his hand to stay their attacks. The Risi's Spirit quaked with terror and bewilderment; it turned and ran. Back along the path of ruin it had made. Back, he assumed, to the Foglands.

Zara dropped to the ground, limping and bloody. "What have you done?" she asked, her voice colored in equal measure by concern and trepidation.

Felix regarded her calmly. "Thanks for the assist with those arrays."

She ignored his comment as he had her own. "You're letting it go? What if it rejoins the Archon? Can’t you feel its terror and anger?"

Felix regarded the vanishing creature, feeling its Spirit. There was confusion and anger, but nothing like retribution in its troubled Aspect. "I don't think it will. And I'm...I'm tired of killing things right now." Notifications flashed in the corner of his vision, not yet addressed. "And I have a feeling tonight is far from over."

"No," she agreed. "We have a lot yet to do."

CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO

Felix stood atop Haarwatch's once-mighty Wall as dawn broke. It was sunken and pitted in spots, the red-gold metal having lost its luster. He looked down at the massive rent that split the wall almost in two, where Apollyon had forced its way through. Felix had tracked that creature's progress through the city, and the...renewed Frost Giant had indeed run right back into the Foglands.

Those dark forests were bathed in the shadow of the mountains, without a stitch of fog but impenetrable just the same. Felix turned away from them and considered the city.

Golden sunlight skimmed the tops of a thousand thousand roofs, the skies above a vibrant orange, unburdened by clouds. The heavy cover that had sat atop the city for weeks was gone, and the fugitive glimmer of stars and fading moons still clung to the brightening sky. The Blood Moon was the most prominent, larger by far than the others, as if it had drawn closer to them, somehow.

Felix shook his head. The Berserk Blood condition had run its course, those affected having simply fallen to pieces afterward. The enhancement, however, remained. The few surviving creatures had Bodies that were greater than previously, juiced up on magical moon steroids. They had done what they could to eradicate all the monsters within the city, but it was an ongoing process once the monkeys and bugs scattered. It had only been four days since that fateful battle, but it felt like a lifetime.

With Portia and Aenea's help, the leadership had swiftly constructed an area for triage and treatment. Portia and the poorly named Fiend's Legion—those patients who had miraculously recovered during the camp's assault—they moved across the battlefield and administered what aid they could, whether tonics or Skills. The Alchemist, in turn, had transported the majority of her equipment to the border between the Dust and Sunrise; she whipped up what she could with the resources they had to hand. Luckily, with the Sunrise Quarter so close, they had a rich source of supplies.

The Inquisition—those who survived—had all fled the city entirely. Felix had considered chasing after them, but they weren't worth the effort. According to Zara, the news of their activities—of the Primordial, the Authority, all of it—was already out. In a few weeks’ time, the Inquisition would reach the nearest city beyond the mountains, and soon after that, word would reach the head of their order.

The goal now was to make sure they were prepared for what followed.

The merchants, nobles, and families of all stripes had seemed relieved to learn the redcloaks had fled. Cautious cheering had met the news that DuFont had been defeated by a Challenger, though many were concerned that it was a Guilder who once again held Authority. Some loudly proclaimed Haarwatch's time of troubles over, which had made Felix laugh. So far, it was going well. Felix didn't know what to expect from the nobility. His experiences with them were mixed, at best.

The core of the Sunrise Quarter had escaped the destruction visited on the rest of the city, and the people were healthy and well-fed, if a little wan. When Aenea had burst into their temporary shops and demanded reagents for tonics, salves, and potions, they were less than pleased. But the woman paid for what she could, and commandeered the rest; there were people in trouble. The merchants cried foul at the rough treatment, but Felix found it hard to sympathize with them.

The reagents were put to use, instead of gathering dust in their storehouses. Profit could wait for another day.

It was good they stocked up on all they did, as they'd found more survivors than expected, and not just from their assaults. Many had been gathered by the Inquisition into the Sunrise Quarter, but more still had holed up within the Crafters and Dust Quarters, stashed in basements and root cellars, malnourished and terrified of the monsters that had prowled the streets. It took some convincing to get them out, and their efforts were ongoing, but Haarwatch was coming back to life. The city had survived.

Now the question was what to do with it all.

"I still think you shoulda taken the Authority, Felix," Evie said, kicking her heels over the edge of the Wall.

"I thought you would be happy to see Cal given such power," Vess asked. She was crouched nearby, along with Atar and Alister, inspecting the burned-out sigils along the inner edge of the battlements. Hector and a few others were down the way, further into the Wall's guts. "The Authority is better placed in her hands than Teine's."

"Hm," Alister said, not disagreeing. "How is Teine? Has he woken up?"

"Not yet," Atar answered and stood up. The fire mage wiped his hands on a greasy rag. "Portia doesn't have much hope, either. Whatever those Arcids did, it ruined his foundations."

Felix winced. "What about the Wall? Can we fix it?"

"Not without some serious work," Atar said. "I'll leave the real diagnosis to Hector, but at the very least, the sigaldry has to be reshaped."

"Not to mention the orichalcum needed to patch the holes," Alister pointed out.

"Can't Callie just," Evie wiggled her fingers.

"She is still figuring out the limits to her Authority, but DuFont sapped too many of the city's resources. We are running on empty," Vess said. "That's why we are here."

Below them, lined against the rent in the Wall, fifty Tin Rank fighters were in a loose shield formation. It was crude and wouldn't stop anything truly strong from the Foglands, but it was all they could manage right now. Felix rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"The Fiend's Legion will keep us safe, eh?" Evie said, a grin stretching her mouth. "I feel better already."

Atar and Vess all but laughed, though Alister had the grace to hide his amusement. They all knew how he felt about the "Legion." They were the patients from their camp's Healer's Ward, and during the previous night's battle, each and every one of them had both survived and revealed their Omens. It was impressive and a little scary. Each of them looked at Felix like he was...something more.

He wasn't a fan.

"At least they're useful, and with the minor threats coming out of the Foglands, they should rack up enough experience to get more dangerous quickly," Felix said, pushing aside his unease. "As long as the threats stay minor."

* * *

The sun rose higher, bathing endless blue skies with the warmth of high summer. Felix basked in it, closing his eyes as it warmed his skin. He still stood on the Wall, but the others had fled to various projects and training, though Hector still toiled somewhere below. Felix had been helping him, trying to keep his mind busy and away from the thoughts that tugged at him.

He opened his eyes and looked west, away from the ascending sun and toward the Foglands. It had gone quiet the last few days, as if it were simply a boring forest from Earth. But Felix could feel a presence out among the dark branches and hidden ravines, a mingling of threads that twinged ominously in his senses. The Archon was out there, too close for comfort.

Felix touched the weapons at his waist, seeking them for comfort. Well, one was at his waist, and the other was leaned against the parapet beside him. Both the Femur of the Envoy and the Blade of the Fang had been recovered from the rubble, both untouched by the tons of wood and stone that had buried them.

If only my clothes were so durable. He was wearing a new set of clothes again. New boots, too. They were all without enchantments, destined to be torn apart, but it was fine enough for now. The tailor who had made his Khellish garments had turned up alive, so Felix was hopeful the man would be able to make him some new ones.

Distractions. Felix chided himself, just as the sound of feet on metal echoed up a nearby staircase.

"I had thought to find you here," Zara said.

"Yeah, well, people don't like to come so close to the Foglands, now that this thing is ripped open," Felix shrugged. "And the crowds are getting to be a bit much."

"The price of fame," Zara said with a smile. Felix let out a very Harn-like grunt. "Do you believe the Archon is defeated?"

Felix laughed. "No. I barely know the thing, but from what I've seen, he's not the type to give up. We bloodied his lip here, but we barely survived."

"He wants to escape his Domain," Zara said. "We both know that such a thing is possible. If he were to burst the bounds of it, he'd be set free. From what I felt when he inhabited Apollyon, he is not something we want to face directly. Not yet, at least."

"We aren't ready," Felix agreed. He leaned against the crenelation. Already more soft light suffused the metal, though it was hard to tell in the daylight. "We barely survived this time, and who knows what other crap he has planned. Scary magic, if I had to guess."

"Indeed. We should grab any weapon that comes to us then, yes?" Zara smiled, and out of the corner of his eye, Felix could see her pull something from her hip. "You left this in camp. It is quite the complement to your growing arsenal. I was surprised to see you had discarded it."

She held out a hooked blade made of bronze. It had a simple cross guard and a wire-wrapped hilt capped with an oblong pommel. His sword. His first sword.

“I didn’t discard it. Just misplaced it.” Felix eyed it a moment before taking it in hand again. The moment he did, he heard a trilling chord, and the corner of his vision began flashing furiously.

Zara tilted her head, as if hearing something. "Did you just receive a System notification?"

Without answering, Felix toggled the blinking icon.

Hidden Quest Completed!

Inheritor of the Key!

You've proven yourself worthy in a trial by combat with a Master Tier existence! The Key is yours by Right and Might! Seek out the Temples to discover its true purpose and unlock its power.

Rewards:

+1 Level!

+Title!

New Title!

Inheritor (Unique) (Evolving)!

You are the master of the Nymean Key! Evolve this Title by seeking out Nymean Temples!

You Have Gained A Level!

You Are Now Level 49!

You Gain:

+2 to PER! +2 to VIT! +4 to END! +5 to INT! +6 to WIL! +4 to AGL! +7 to DEX!

You Have 27 Unspent Stat Points!

Inheritor?

"Do you know what this sword is, Zara? What it does?" Felix asked, muscling down the rise of System energy in his core. It was becoming easier with single levels.

"I saw DuFont use it to unravel spells cast upon her, and it is made of an exceedingly rare metal. It has enchantments that are hidden from me, which I assure you is not a common occurrence, and it came from the Foglands." Zara spread her hands, palms up. "Did I miss anything?"

Felix nodded, holding the sword aloft. It felt good in his hand, and the longer he held it, the more his Wild Threnody pulsed inside his core, as if pushing him to use it. To fight...and more.

"It's a key," he said. He twisted the Crescian Blade in his hand, tilting it back and forth in the mid-morning light. "It opens a door into a Nymean Temple deep in the Foglands."

"Truly?" Zara said, curiosity dancing in her eyes. "And what is within that Temple?"

Hidden Quest Discovered!

The Door Of The Lidless Eye!

Seek out the Temple you once took refuge within, Ascendant. Dire secrets dwell within, waiting for the Inheritor. It is your duty to prevent the darkness from escaping into the light. Do not tarry, for the Archon is close, and the darkness is closer.

"What else?" Felix said, whipping the sword down and sheathing it opposite his club. "Scary magic."

AFTERWORD

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ABOUT NICOLI GONNELLA

Nicoli Gonnella spent his formative years atop a mountain, breathing deep of the world energy and expelling impurities from his soul. Also he went to school and stuff. He always wrote but now he's abandoned everything to do it full time. Readers give him strength, spirit bomb style, and there's no telling how strong he will become. This isn't even his final form.

He lives with his wife, two kids, and a corgi named Cornelius.

Connect with Nicoli Gonnella:

NicoliGonnella.com

Discord.gg/sqQvJQhY8F

Patreon.com/Necariin

RoyalRoad.com/fiction/30321/Unbound

Facebook.com/Nicoli-Gonnella-Author-347428719693359

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ABOUT MOUNTAINDALE PRESS

Dakota and Danielle Krout, a husband and wife team, strive to create as well as publish excellent fantasy and science fiction novels. Self-publishing The Divine Dungeon: Dungeon Born in 2016 transformed their careers from Dakota’s military and programming background and Danielle’s Ph.D. in pharmacology to President and CEO, respectively, of a small press. Their goal is to share their success with other authors and provide captivating fiction to readers with the purpose of solidifying Mountaindale Press as the place ‘Where Fantasy Transforms Reality.’

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MOUNTAINDALE PRESS TITLES

GameLit and LitRPG

The Completionist Chronicles,

The Divine Dungeon,

Full Murderhobo, and

Year of the Sword by Dakota Krout

Arcana Unlocked by Gregory Blackburn

A Touch of Power by Jay Boyce

Red Mage and

Farming Livia by Xander Boyce

Space Seasons by Dawn Chapman

Ether Collapse and

Ether Flows by Ryan DeBruyn

Dr. Druid by Maxwell Farmer

Bloodgames by Christian J. Gilliland

Unbound by Nicoli Gonnella

Threads of Fate by Michael Head

Lion’s Lineage by Rohan Hublikar and Dakota Krout

Wolfman Warlock by James Hunter and Dakota Krout

Axe Druid,

Mephisto’s Magic Online, and

High Table Hijinks by Christopher Johns

Skeleton in Space by Andries Louws

Dragon Core Chronicles by Lars Machmüller

Chronicles of Ethan by John L. Monk

Pixel Dust and

Necrotic Apocalypse by David Petrie

Viceroy’s Pride by Cale Plamann

Henchman by Carl Stubblefield

Artorian’s Archives by Dennis Vanderkerken and Dakota Krout

Vaudevillain by Alex Wolf

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