Chapter Twenty - 020Felix stood in the darkness, chewing his lip.
He'd encountered this flaw with his Keen Mind Trait before. His head was like a computer with a huge amount of memory, but his RAM was limited. Keeping track of all those memories had started to feel exhausting, and this was the result. He had "forgotten" that the cavern was sealed behind Balfur.
"Ok," Felix reasoned. "Not the worst outcome. I just have to figure out how to drill through solid stone." He reached out and touched the rough surface of the cave wall. He could find no opening or flaw in the rock. "Right. Easy."
Then he heard it.
Skittering.
The sound of small stones clattering against bigger ones, but softer, as if a rock slide was attempting to be stealthy. It was all around him now, moving quickly in the darkness. Felix put his back to the wall, Pit sidling up to his right. It was pitch black, and the movement echoed in the cavern. Felix felt his pulse jump, adrenaline pumping into his limbs and ready to run or fight.
Wafts of brownish-black smoke drifted all around, and it took Felix a moment to realize what he was seeing. There was no light, so it wasn't smoke. It was Mana. Flexing his Manasight, Felix suddenly saw a dense cloud of Mana all around him. Deep shades of brown covered it all, but grey-black smog choked the brown tones of earthen Mana, something he could only recognize as shadow.
But within the clouds, he could just barely discern shifting movement. Bundles of black and brown twitching and flowing from one spot to another, the clack of their limbs following them.
Manasight is level 12!
Manasight is level 13!
Rockstrikes. They surrounded him. He could suddenly sense their shadowy tendrils lashing angrily in the air, even as they focused on him with their beady eyes. They were here for vengeance, he could feel it in their seething silence. It was so strong, it felt like the earth itself was shaking.
Wait. Oh, that sucks so much.
The earth was shaking. The ambient Mana began to swirl, like a breeze in heavy smoke, churning it wildly. The Rockstrikes shifted and several began to run away, their panic as palpable as their rage.
Then the ground split open, and the earth itself engulfed them all.
Felix tumbled down, falling without sight and the cacophonous sound of an entire mountain crashing down. Thunder and darkness, his fear was electricity in his veins, even as his stomach lifted into his chest and his unseeing eyes burned with the rush of air. When he impacted the ground it was almost a relief.
Almost.
Hitting the ground felt like a jolt of lightning, a shearing pain that splintered across his nerves. Agony was a red fire across his shoulder and chest, his vision black except for a few glowing status icons.
Status Condition: Broken Ribs (Major)
Status Condition: Dislocated Shoulder (Minor)
Status Condition: Shock (Severe)
"F-fuck," he groaned. It hurt to breathe, and his vision was hazy with brown and grey smudges atop the inky void of his surroundings. Thinking was hard, his mind stuttering under the pain. He forced through a single thought, however, and activated Meditation.
You Have Entered Into The Domain Of Another.
Beware!
It Approaches!
The darkness deepened as Felix felt his mind recede, reflexively pulling away from the ruin of his body. Everything faded.
Time lost meaning. Minutes, hours, days? Felix had no idea. A sense of red hot ruin coursed through him, pulsing like a second heartbeat. A slithering giant passed him, arcs of jagged light piercing the darkness, dancing across his wounds like knives of fire.
Suddenly thunder crashed, carmine light galvanizing the sky as the nothingness all around him swelled into a roaring sea. His mind was abruptly afloat on a raft of blue light, tossed in a turbulent sea that threatened to engulf him at any moment. Beasts roamed these waters, twisting shapes beneath the acidic water, limbs thrashing and coiling. Serpentine bodies rolled beneath him, their dorsal fins raking against his raft, tearing holes and flooding his feet with dark water that burned his flesh. Terror gripped him harder than his pain, his mind filled with the image of vast jaws and innumerable teeth.
Somehow, Felix understood that if he didn't repair his mind he would fall, never to rise.
Felix stiffened his Will, forcing the raft to repair itself. Gouges from innumerable claws filled in with a shimmering blue light, the gouges shining brighter than the rest of the raft. He wasn't sure how he knew to do that; it was like flexing a muscle he hadn't known he possessed.
That's not enough. Felix looked up at the oncoming waves, each reaching higher than a two-story house. He focused, shaping his Will in a way that felt both alien and utterly familiar. Blue light crackled as a hull rose up around him, a shape only vaguely boat-like, angled to cut through the dark waters all around him. Waves crashed over him, a deluge of fire and acidic lightning that made his nerves scream in agony. Trembling, Felix raised his arm, pushing his Will up and over him in a rough wedge.
The waters crashed all around him, and he was tossed into the air only to be slammed immediately back onto the deck. Felix gritted his teeth and held on.
Felix knew he wasn't here on this deadly ocean. Somehow he was also underground, pinned beneath tons of rock and choking on darkness. He knew. Yet it did not matter. The world raged all around him, his Will a thin shell against the red lightning and corrosive waves. He tried to focus, to snap himself awake or something. But his mind ran in circles, thoughts chasing each other as all of his agonies this past week filtered through him, carried on the acrid gales.
Acid burns, slashed flesh, bludgeoning, sharp teeth on weak skin. Memories of pain, of torment, they piled against him and threatened to capsize his vessel. He fell to his knees, then onto all fours. Felix was tossed by the unending strength of the sea, and the crimson thunder shook his azure sanctuary. Whispers rose from the water all around, their voices soft and sweet as they offered surcease to his torment.
Just let go, they sang, their voices as smooth and cold as silk. You have done enough. It is over.
Felix's Will felt strained and brittle, little more than a wisp of fog against a hurricane. He ached, his body broken and his mind starved for familiar voices, familiar places. Their voices were a song had never heard, but yearned for just the same. Your home is waiting, wanderer. We will take you there. You need only let go and let us in. Their voices twanged with a note of needful, hungry ruin.
"..cannot give up..."
This voice was different. It was harsh, but warm. A face surfaced in his eyes, a smirking mouth and nondescript face from a dream, one that he couldn't quite remember. Except the eyes. Blue-green eyes like leaves against a summer sky.
"You have so much more to do, Felix...
"...others are counting on you..."
There was an ache in his chest, one quite separate from the ocean of pain that surrounded him. This was already there, something he'd been nursing ever since he had saved Pit. It hurt, throbbing like the memory of a sunburn, but inside his chest. Inside his soul, maybe.
Deep in that hurt, Felix could feel a thread of emotion; one that he identified as not his own. He could feel a stubborn, foolish anger. Anger that burned bright enough to risk attacking an Irontooth Ape, anger that would attack anything and everything that threatened him.
Because he knew his Companion would be there for him.
Companion Pact is level 8!
Let us in, wanderer!
Felix's eyes snapped open. "No," he stood up, shaky as a newborn colt. "Never." Their voices felt like teeth on his neck, like a discordant note in an orchestra. He knew, deep in his bones, that to let go would be to fall forever. Felix had made a promise to himself; he would survive, he would persevere despite all of the odds against him.
The voices howled, enraged at him. Memories of pain, escalating and unending, cascaded through his mind. Felix braced himself, drawing on his Willpower as never before. He may not be strong enough, or vital enough, or fast enough, but he was a tower of will. He reforged the ship around him, draining the water that had begun to accumulate, making the hull thicker and stronger. Azure light gleamed in the dark sea, and he felt the creatures below retreat.
He was iron, his body unfeeling and cold. Unbreakable. He would survive this.
The water dropped all around him, bottoming out as a wave approached. Felix braced himself, his Will wrapping tight around himself. The wave was a tsunami, a mountain of dark water that crackled with red lightning. Twisted shapes coiled within it, each the size of jetliners.
Felix punched forward, his small ship suddenly accelerating across the water. If all this was a function of his mind, then he would make it his own. He forged the ship into a battering ram, slick and aerodynamic. He rocketed toward the wave, hull barely touching the sea even as it climbed up the face of it.
As he neared the crest, Felix grinned.