Unbound

Status Condition: Spirit Damage 27% > 17%

Status Condition: Mind Damage 20% > 10%

Status Condition: Body Damage 20% > 10%

Felix's Aspects made their discomfort known as he climbed. It hurt his concentration, send 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 further 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 it's 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 zig zag 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 open a particularly thick slab of rock, and Felix sighed in relief as bright 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 a instinctual grasp of fire Mana and considerable Strength.

Strength: Swarm tactics

Weakness: Extreme cold

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, it's 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 in 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 he still felt tugging away at his soul. They Key resonated with him, it's 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 tight.

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. 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 originated in the primal darkness below and extended 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, that made her more than formidable. It made assaulting her almost impossible. 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 squashed 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 17% > 0%

Status Condition: Mind Damage 10% > 0%

Status Condition: Body Damage 10% > 0%

The energy built up and spread, the rush not stopping, and his fractures Aspects began to feel better. There was nothing Felix could point to and see it heal, but he felt as the discordant melody sunk 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 shined 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 center of his core, he sensed the dark red veins spread up and outward, rising further still from the center of his cores. The veins had thickened, but their tops had split, subdividing into smaller and smaller branch-like sections. That discordant melody only grew stronger, thrumming through his core space as a storm of sound.

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