Chapter Three Hundred And Fifty Nine - 359Felix rushed to the shoreline, skipping over rocks and trees, all of them overturned, broken apart, and festooned with the gory remains of Jadorak. He was everywhere, and he would have thought it pretty gross if he'd have paid it any mind. Instead, Felix landed atop a thirty-foot tall stone split unevenly down the middle. He scanned the choppy surface of Haestus Lake, searching for his friends.
"C'mon," he muttered. "Pit? Can you?"
A flash of light heralded Pit's emergence from Felix's Spirit, and the tenku soared off into the air above the lake. Felix's eyes could pick out details hundreds of yards away, but all he saw was whole lot of nothing. Water and torn up seaweed. Pit, however, cries out almost immediately.
There!
Pit pointed a clawed paw at a place further down the shoreline, and with a stone-shattering leap Felix was able to see it too. His friends and their Naga escorts were making landfall.
Adamant Discord!
Lightning burst around him, and Felix took off through the sky, quickly overtaking Pit. The tenku huffed in annoyance and flapped his wings harder, manipulating the air Mana around himself as best as he could. Still, Felix tore past him and landed in a shower of pebbles and outflung muck, just outside the hastily formed perimeter of Legionnaires. Muted shouts rang out, far too late, had Felix been a hostile force.
"Shut up! It's the Autarch," Darius shouted, his voice pitched quietly but just as imposing as if he'd shouted at the top of his lungs. "Felix. You're a sight. Is the other one dead?"
"Yeah," he said, frowning at his dishevelled Garment. He focused, and the material restored itself into a blue-grey tunic and dark black pants. "He didn't give me much choice."
Pit landed, and set a huge spray of swampy water in all directions. The Legionnaires cried out, the Sunken Ward had faded and now they were soaked to their skin. Felix shook his head. "Did we lose anyone?"
"No, thank the gods," Zara said, stomping her way toward them. "Our escorts were more than capable of outpacing them once we'd blunted their claws."
"Good." Felix walked past them both, finding the pale green form of Le'lani and mottled brown of Garox. The Naga were still in the water, though their heads all reached at least twenty feet high. Garox was contemplating the rolling waters.
"Jadorak perished, yes?" the Spirit Naga asked.
"He did. I tried to stop him, but"
Garox nodded in grim acceptance. He was a...driven warrior. The Fathom have pushed many of our young ones battle-mad, and Jadorak was no exception. His end was only ever to come in violence.
Felix frowned at the snake-man, at his placid Spirit in the face of his people's deaths. "What of the others? I'm told most of them got away."
"Yes. But they cannot go far, not before I find them. I promise you, Returned God, they shall pay for this affront." This time Garox's Spirit flared bright and acidic, a song of wild dissonance and frantically plucked notes. "The others will be brought to you, so that you may pass your judgement."
"No! No," Felix said with a cough. "I'll leave that in the capable...coils of the Deepking."
"As you wish, my Lord." Garox bowed so low his upper, humanoid body ran almost parallel with the ground. "If you head further south, you shall find the town of Bogfeld. It is the nearest to this lake and to the southern Stormeater Peaks."
"Stormeater, huh?"
"I do not know where it is you are going, my Lord. Nor am I questioning it. But," and here Garox looked truly upset, his face matching the unease humming across his Spirit. "the dry lands beyond breed death. Fire and dust are all that lives within. A god does not need my warnings, but still, on behalf of my people: tread carefully."
"Oh, uh, sure," Felix said, unnerved by the Spirit Naga's intensity. "I appreciate it."
"We shall guard your Temple with our lives, and the room within," Garox promised. "None shall enter the sealed chamber while we still breathe."
"Right," Felix said. What better way to keep the Shadowgate safe? "I'll be back as soon as I'm able."
"It is as it must be." Garox bowed low again, pressing his smooth, scaled forehead into the dirt. Then, with a soft, sighing rustle he slipped back into the water. In moments, all the Naga were gone.
"Giant snakes," Felix muttered to himself. He turned back to his team. "What's next?"
It took a half hour to get everyone dried, organized and sorted out before they took off at a quick march. More of a trot, really, something that Harn and Darius agreed that the majority of the company would be able to maintain for several hours. For the leadership, it was nothing, and Felix it felt like he was walking when he should be running. A half-dozen times had him pushing harder and harder, with only the cautionary words of Vess or Zara to remind him to slow down.
It was difficult. His dreams of the Minotaur Unbound were etched in his brain, and the sense that the other man was riding the ragged edge remained strong in Felix's Mind. Every delay or break or conversation with snake kings meant they were one step closer to losing the guy, or so it felt.
Essence helped distract him. Processing the consumed pieces of the Sunken Ward took more time than Felix cared to admitsifting through the power for its unique pattern was a challenge while jogging. Eventually, however, he was able to isolate it from the rest of the devoured Essence, which he sent streaming down to his eternally hungry abyss. The pattern, however, he pressed down into the gleaming, spinning rings of his cores.
New Skill!
Sunken Ward (Rare), Level 1!
A warding designed to protect a target from the hostile environment of the deepest of waters. Duration increases per level, Mana cost decreases per level, number of targets increases per level.
Useful, he mused, taking the marshy path at a steady clip. I'll need to find the time to level this one. Not really sure how often I'll get to use it in the desert, though.
Felix briefly considered leveling it by diving into one of the many pools of swampy water in the surrounding terrain, but the crust of algae and fetid stench put him right off that idea. Sure, maybe the ward would protect him from all that, but at such a low level did he want to risk it? He'd grown far too used to being clean in the last half year, there was little chance of Felix returning to his earliest grimiest days on the Continent. Indeed, just marching through the Ghreldan Hills was proving to be gross enough. The Hills were forested and wet, the very definition of a swamp between the humps of the hills themselves. Paths existed, but they were narrow things stretched between long-standing pools of slimed trees and mossed-over stones the size of pickup trucks. More than once, Felix had heard folks call it the "boglands," which was admittedly pretty funny.
After the second hour at march, Zara approached him, her steps as steady and sure as any among their party. Felix was surprised in part because he couldn't sense that fragility that had dominated her person in recent days. She seemed to have rallied and healed since her arrival in the Foglands, which was for the better.
"Zara."
"Felix."
They ran on a bit longer, both of their Perceptions sweeping the wet, wooded terrain for evidence of threat or civilization. Eventually, Felix cleared his throat. "You said we Unbound were summoned. Right?"
"...Yes," she answered, her voice lingering as if unsure of where he was going with his question. "The Hierophant in Amaranth performed the ritual summoning."
"How was it done?"
She raised an eyebrow. "You plan to bring more Unbound into the Continent?"
"What? No. I'm just trying to get a sense of things. Were there requirements for the ritual? Most I've seen now needed a bunch of monster cores as fuel, but I would think a summoning from across the...galaxy? Universe? I assume it would take a lot more power."
"It would, and did." Zara looked up at the sky, contemplating the darkening clouds. Rain was on the way. "It is one of the reasons why the ritual was discarded in Ages past. The cost was too much for any mortal to bear."
"Any...mortal? So you're saying"
"The Hierophant tapped into her patron god's divine power in order to fuel the ritual," Zara shook her head. "It is not an option for the rest of us. Only the Pathless remains of the divine pantheon, and he does not grace any but his chosen with power."
"Divine power," Felix muttered. He huffed a breath through his nose. "It keeps coming back to the gods. How'd you stop it then? You said you disrupted the ritual."
"I did not. My...colleague did. Another Chanter spent his life to stop the final portion of the array."
Felix glanced at the Naiad from the corner of his eye. Her face was drawn and her Spirit quiet, but he saw sadness in cast of her eyes and tilt of her head. It wasn't his Affinity or anything supernatural, just a feeling. "He was a friend?"
"He was," she said, and this time yes her eyes were a touch brighter than normal. "But he knew what he was doing. The summoning wasn't stopped, just diverted so that the Hierophant couldn't get their hands on you all."
"Because you need us," Felix said quietly. "For the Ruin."