Chapter 43: Forty One – 041

Felix became aware of the sound of a single, low pitched chord. It sounded like hunger at the end of a long night, like cold held close by the dark, of teeth not used.

With an awful clarity, he became aware of his body: the pleasant fullness of his stomach, the delicious flavor of the meat the giant had eaten, and the terrible certainty that it wasn't pork.

URGK!

All at once, Felix fell forward and vomited. His hastily eaten meal dashed against the fire pit, easily filling up the carved ring. He hacked and coughed, his stomach and mind refusing to believe he was empty, muscles wringing him out like a dishrag. When he was able to sit straight, Felix found Pit sitting close to his back, gold eyes watching with concern.

"I'm a--ghlk, I'm ok," Felix insisted, wiping at his mouth. He knew he didn't really eat what the giant ate, but he found it impossible to convince his mind that two meals were separate. Even the thought of the greasy, charred haunches of meat made Felix's stomach turn, so he pushed down the thought. Or tried to. Having perfect recall wasn't always great.

Lessons of the Past is level 10!

Lessons of the Past is level 11!

That's something, at least. Felix leaned back carefully, resting his body against the tier seating behind him. The stone was hard and cold, but Pit nuzzled up against his shoulders like a fluffy body pillow. He smiled when he heard the distinct sound of cooing coming from the tenku.

Ok, I got a Memory that time. What did I learn?

Felix retrieved his battered notebook, fishing out an even worse grease pencil. It had snapped in half at some point. I'll have to see if I can borrow a spare from their big bag of supplies. He found a clear section of paper, drew a line of demarcation from the other packed notes, and started writing.

Labyrinth. Something inside it? Something about this "Mother."

Leader's name is Grimmar, who rules the Daughters of the "Circle," and controls the others.

Puppets = mind control? Explains the dead look in the patrolling giants' eyes this morning.

Prisoners being led by the "angry one."

Notes finished, Felix regarded the page. Technically speaking, the Nym didn't need to write any of this down, but it helped him organize his thoughts. Having perfect memory was well and good, but only if he knew how to think in the first place. Something his mother taught him a long time ago.

First step to doing right, is thinking right. Hey, Bumble?

Felix felt his breath hitch suddenly, his nose burning and throat aching. That...it was like hearing her voice. Why hadn't he thought of this before? His memory had a chance of perfect recall beyond thirty days, but he'd rarely used it, too preoccupied with the now. He tried again, thinking back on anything, summers and vacations, long evenings near the beach, anything. But it was all just noise, vague impressions of washed out scenes. Just like any other memory.

But still. Makes me feel a little less alone.

Felix smiled to himself, lightly stroking pit's crown. After a minute or two, he took a breath and centered himself. It was time for the last vial.

I wasn't able to learn any Skills from the giant's blood, but the Memory at least gave me more information on them. Maybe I can learn the Risi's language? He scratched out another note. I'll try that later.

Carefully, Felix picked up the last vial. This one, unlike the others, was simply cool to the touch. No ice or magical phenomena had formed around the glass. It was just blood, darker and thicker than it had been when he'd collected it. 

It's congealed, a little. Ugh. Maybe I can pass on this one...I mean what do I need from an assassin I beat up?

Felix smiled sourly at himself, unable to even speak that lie aloud. The assassin had wiped the floor with him. If he hadn't fought off the poison she had used, he would have died there on the roof. And if he hadn't put her on the backfoot somehow, Felix doubted she would have fled. She was capable and ruthless, attempting to kill him simply because she could.

Speaking of, what happened back there? What was it called? Right. "Essence of Inevitability." What the hell does that even mean? Felix tightened his grip on the vial and let his mind drift, recalling the experience within his own little world of torment.

"Rare Poison Detected During Formation!

Choose a Feature:

Inevitable

Deadening

Heart-Rending

Still dizzy from the lack of pain, Felix chose the first one, barely reading it.

Congratulations!

You have absorbed the essence of inevitability!"

He cut off the memory as pain started to mount. Felix opened his eyes, and they shone blue for a brief second before dimming to nothing.

Holy...that's a rush. Like reliving the moment. Felix could still recall the pain he had felt, just hours ago. It tingled at the edges of his nerves, the memory dangerously close to rehashing the agony. Shaking his head to clear it, Felix tried to make sense of it all.

Inevitability. He looked for a blue box to appear, hopefully one with helpful information. No such luck.

Essence.

Formation?

With a near soundless chime, a new screen appeared before him.

Formation:

Apprentice Stage

Essence(s)

Body

1 of 3

Inevitability

Mind

0 of 3

N/A

Spirit

0 of 3

N/A

Ok! Now we're getting somewhere!

Felix poked at the words Body, Mind, and Spirit. But nothing happened. Apprentice Stage, at least, he thought he could make sense of now. He had reached Apprentice Tier in Poison Resistance while that gnarly concoction was inside his body. So he...took something from it? Absorbed it? Why?

Moreover, he had chosen "inevitability" instead of a super cool one like "heart-rending?"

But what did that mean?

Felix probed the Essence column and finally, finally, something happened.

You have absorbed the essence of inevitability!

Continue to temper yourself and reap the rewards!

Huh. Temper myself? He rubbed his eyes, feeling a headache coming on. Those guilders need to get back soon. I've got so many questions.

Tempering sounded like strengthening to Felix, and he wasn't against that idea. This has to be a common thing, right? The how was a bit of a mystery, though it clearly had something to do with reaching Apprentice Tier. He nodded to himself. He'd ask the Tin Ranks about it when he went back downstairs.

In fact, Felix was convinced he'd taken the wrong route with them. The Tin Ranks especially were very accepting of him and his particular circumstances. Despite Magda's suspicions (and Harn's to a lesser extent), Felix figured it was time to be honest.

I'll explain what I can. They don't seem to have an issue with my Race, after all, despite all my worry at having a "Lost Race." They must have Analyzed me by now.

Feeling that decision firm up in his mind, Felix lifted the vial which had warmed slightly in his grip. Though the blood was still disgustingly chunky. Taking a deep breath, Felix uncorked the vial and tipped it back.

"OUGH GAWD," he coughed. "That's ughk! That's horrendous."

He expected it to be coppery, after all he'd bitten his own lip before. He had even expected lumpy sour curdles. But he hadn't expected it to be cloyingly sweet!

"Oh damn! Oh fuck! That's -erup- bad," Felix's pushed down his gorge, forcing himself to swallow the chunky mess even as the taste of it invaded his entire mouth. Several thumps on his chest and it passed, leaving him with what felt like a slime trail of salty sweetness.

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Deep breath. Any moment now and your core will burn it all up. Deeeep breath.

But nothing happened.

"Well...shit." Felix felt at his chest and core, prodding. "Does it not work on humans? That's a waste. Pit, it's time to--"

Felix turned around but there was no one there.

There was nothing there.

Blackness, pure and complete filled his vision. Not a speck of Mana swirled or shined, not a soul moved. Felix looked down at his hands and he could clearly see himself, fully lit by a sourceless light.

This is terrifying. His words swept around him, jangling like out of tune bells as the not-air shivered. But his chest didn't rise, his breath didn't move. Definitely not a fan of this.

What the hell is going on?

The discordant chime of his words shook the darkness, the void...thinning, somehow. Felix reached out a hand, attempted to grasp the shadows but there was nothing there. No substance at all around him. Or below him. Felix had a dizzying moment as he regarded the endless dark beneath him, a negative space so absolute it was like standing on a featureless black painting that was at turns flat and terrifyingly 3D.

AHH!

More atonal noise, more shivers in the world around him. Felix fought down his panic, applying his mind instead. 

Move.

The nothing shuddered, but less. Like a taut tarp in a gentle wind.

Move!

A wobbling, as if the darkness was balanced on the edge of something else. Felix channeled all of his fear and adrenaline into a single shout, pouring all of it out of him.

MOVE!

With a soundless explosion the void shattered into ten trillion pieces, each one rotating and oscillating into a cascading spray of people upon a white background. The people flickered outward, shot forward as if shot from cannons. Behind them trailed imprints of themselves, footprints that were their entire past, crawling forward at lightning speed like a billion caterpillars shuffling into infinity.

It was, in a phrase, trippy as balls.

Felix held his head, his eyes ready to explode from his skull. He looked up, and the figures extend up too; and down, and behind him. Felix stood in an epicenter while infinite permutations of people spread like fractal map of armored women.

Wait. Armored...Felix sees their faces, noting their darkened leathers and brace of blades. These are all the same woman. The assassin!

Holy shit what was in that blood?

In some iterations the woman was wearing no armor or mask, just simple clothes or heavy jackets. Sometimes she was even dressed in elaborate finery. But mostly it was the mask and armor, over and over.

A single person in an infinite span of moments, the thought struck him over the head as he watched the assassin unfold endlessly into the white void. She reached in all directions, echoing across his mind like a ringing chime. It was a sublime chord, plucked and shuddering as she spiraled away from him in a dance that was pure chaos. All movement without meaning.

Then, without warning, a terrible discord shuddered through the music, a defect in the crystalline tones that spread like cracks across the person's spiraling self. The cracks mazed the void, spreading like broken ice, shearing with inevitable finality.

Blindly, Felix thrust his mind forward, moving somewhere, anywhere he could. Anything to escape.

He touched one of the infinite moments and flinched as time splintered like a shattering stained glass window. It enveloped him even as it fell in on itself.

And he was gone.

Ilia squatted on the ledge, wearing the shadows around her like a familiar cloak. Below her, human prisoners toiled between the frosted colonnades. Giantfolk stood watch, not closely, but certainly not far away enough for any of them to attempt escape.

The prisoners were too smart to try that again, though she could hope.

Certainly would cut into the drudgery of this assignment, she thought, rolling her shoulders and flexing her leg muscles, trying to stay limber in the cold. At first Ilia had been intrigued by this spot of monster on human slavery, but it had grown tiresome quickly.

If I hadn't gotten separated from my quarry, I'd have better things to do. Ilia rolled her eyes. They're headed here though. Sooner or later they'll show up.

The prisoners were mostly human, and were largely pathetic and weepy. Broken, by all accounts. Barely a hundred of them left, too. Ilia had been listening to them whisper among themselves, everything from curses at the gods to stillborn attempts at good humor. These men and women were desperate, the bare remnants of a grand expedition into the Foglands. Something that hadn't been tried in a hundred years.

It would have been audacious if it had succeeded.

Now it was blackmail fuel, because no matter what Ilia was hired to do, she knew Elder DuFont would pay good money for this never to come to light.

To have wasted so many resources on an expedition this size...and to have not one person return with anything? An absolute scandal.

Did the Elder think I wouldn't find out? Ilia scoffed. 

She jumped across the ledges, using Cloudstep to tap off a platform made of air when the footing disappeared.

Interestingly, there was a leader among the prisoners. A woman with honey colored hair, cropped short and wearing light drakeskin armor. She was fresher than most, even still had some fire in her eyes. Most of the others were barely above livestock at this point. 

Ilia watched as the woman ordered around the few who would listen. With many surruptitious glances back at the giantfolk, she went about teaching them how to fight, detailing how to survive in the laybrinth below.

Poor fools. You'll all be dead by dawn. Ilia had no doubts that whatever these behemoths were after was deadly; after all, if it was easy, they'd send their own folk in.

Unable to Analyze in this blasted fog, she could still feel the power contained in the giants. Especially what emanated from the bronze dome near the sink hole. Whatever dwelt in there was terrifying.

A dark crack sheared across a nearby pillar, though Illia did not look at it. She continued watching below, noting the prisoners' ragged clothing and lack of shoes. When the second crack spread across the ground below, she did not notice either.

When the third and forth cracks branched across the sky, Felix looked up.

Pulled from the assassin's body, Felix felt a powerful vertigo that destroyed his sense of balance. He tipped and fell from their perch, landing on the heavy snow with a muffled THUD. But it didn't hurt. Felix felt nothing, even as the memory around him began to splinter into a thousand pieces.

Felix saw the prisoners look at him in fear, their faces only half finished from this angle, a hodgepodge of misaligned features that gaped in terror at him. Horror mounted in his chest, but his screams wouldn't come.

He had no voice.

And then the world was rent asunder.

Vvim was old.

Far older than they had any right to be. And they were bored.

They were old enough to remember this place as it was, before the end. They remembered when Shelim was strong and beautiful, a jewel in the crown of the greatest kingdom ever known. The valley had been lush then, filled to the brim with life and laughter, so much that the mountains rang with it.

But that was long ago.

Before the Ruin, before the great work was finished. Before the curse.

They once had family, even after the Ruin. Now, Vvim only had the shadows of the past for company, and their memory dimmed with every passing year.

Vvim let out a sigh that was as dusty as the room around them. They rarely breathed anymore, just as they rarely ate. Why bother? When it all turns to ash in their mouth, it was better just to remember food.

Then, against all odds, something happened.

A tingle of discharged Mana surged across Vvim's desk, lighting a decrepit crystalline deposit set inside the surface. With a palsied hand, they pushed the inches thick layer of dust away and peered at the deposit. It glimmered blue, gold, then surprisingly, green-gold.

"It...cannot...be," Vvim wheezed, breath again pumping their withered bellows. He had felt a few Humans enter the tower some time ago, but he had withdrawn his attention when his senses detected nothing remarkable about them. But that had changed.

They were using sorcery.

Not magic. No pitiful rote Skills and Spells. True, honest sorcery. Now that he was aware of them, Vvim could feel the harmonics subtly shift the air itself. They raised a hand and manipulated the resonance, feeling the texture of the working.

It felt...discordant. Wrong. Not like a song half sung, but like a snapped string or punctured drum. It felt like an ending.

Vvim smiled, his skin creaking as their fur stretched. Small fissures appeared on their cheeks and chin, though no blood came forth. Their teeth showed, sharp and white.

Vvim felt their heart stir in their chest, a weakened, shriveled thing that caused their ears to practically roar as fluid pumped through their veins.

They were ancient. Far older than they had a right to be. And they were happy.

After millennia, death had come.

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