Chapter Seventy One - 071I need a plan, I need a plan, he thought frantically. A good one for once.
Felix was still hidden as far as he knew, held from Grimmar and that terrible presence by no more than a few dozen feet of stone wall and thin air. There was nowhere else to hide: the hallway ended there and the chamber beyond was as wide open as a place could be, not to mention being lit up by what appeared to be a noontime sun.
If she's as powerful as I fear she is, I'm already exposed. My Stealth Skill is just barely in Apprentice Tier, and she...she's definitely not.
Felix's mind raced, looking at his Skills, at the terrain, at anything he could to survive this next deadly adventure. His mind felt somehow like an enormous greased wheel, spinning and spinning with greater speed and breadth than he'd experienced in his life; it felt similar to when he got his fist significant Intelligence bump. His Primary Stats hitting one hundred plus had amplified his physical and mental stats beyond what he'd ever experienced. He reviewed what he'd just seen in his perfect mental eye.
Grimmar prostrated on the floor, the woman standing before him...above him, even. He called her Mother. The Mother, he assumed. Which, all things considered, was the worst case scenario. Facing off against a deified mother of monsters was not even remotely in his wheelhouse, despite the fatal danger he continually faced with every passing moment on the Continent....
Maybe he should have expected this.
He returned to the mental image, viewing it from all angles. Grimmar was sweating and dirty, his armor scuffed and torn. Evidence of a rough passage through the Labyrinth? Or something else? The giant was also bleeding slightly, from the ears too, which Felix was pretty sure wasn't normal. He shied away from the woman, focusing instead on the massive pyramidal obelisk beyond her: the bronze spike. Curious just how far his perfect recall went, Felix attempted to use Analyze on the obelisk in his own mental image. Surprisingly, results came back.
Name: Essence Anchor
Type: Enchanted Structure
Lore: Used in Ages past to siphon, store, and transmit Mana across vast distances. Made of Crescian Bronze, the ancient Nym built them with the help of the Geist.
Exploration is level 25!
Congratulations! You have--
Felix cut the notification off and dismissed it. Shit. This is not the time. Shit.
There was a lurching sensation within him, like a jolt through the center of his belly. Concerned, he probed his core, visualizing by dint of his Fire Within Skill. Blue fire, shot with gold and crowned with crackling sparks, it remained largely the same. There was an...echo of that gnawing hunger, one that seemed to be growing louder. That that wasn't the sensation Felix felt, so instead he looked beyond all that, to his Skills. Patterns etched in light, they spun a slow dance around his core. He knew that they lit up and shimmered as he used his Skills, but now several flickered with ephemeral light. The greatest of them flared wildly, burning bright with a sense of exuberance to it. Felix knew instantly that this was his Exploration Skill.
This is what it looks like when a Skill is about to Tier? He regarded the flashing, pulsing lights. It's beautiful.
A few others shone nearly as bright, among them Analyze and...Companion Pact. In addition to Exploration they were his final two options to finally, fully Temper his Mind and Spirit.
But would even that be enough here?
Fire Within is level 33!
"Oh come now," said a bright and airy voice, half laughing. "Hiding is so childish."
Felix pulled from his core, his spine snapping strait as nerves and surprise got the best of him. Haltingly, he edged his head toward the corner and peeked an eye beyond. The woman was still standing in the same place, but now she stared right at him as she gently waved. Beckoning him closer.
"Come, Felix Nevarre," her voice was soft and sweet. "I promise I won't bite."
Shit. I don't have a choice, do I? Pit, stay back...and be ready to run.
A surge of stubborn anger washed through the pact, surprising Felix enough to forget his nerves for a moment. Pit rammed his head into Felix's leg, clearly refusing to stay behind.
Ok fine. We'll do this together.
Shuddering with adrenaline and fear, Felix and Pit took a hesitant step into the chamber. His booted foot clunked against the smooth flooring, which seemed to be made entirely of polished granite and inlaid with countless interconnected stars. Count the stars, he thought with a nervous laugh, pressing forward through air that felt thick with energies and a powerful swell of far off music. His Manasight still ran, though not as strongly as before, and the entire chamber was awash in a storm of ambient power. The closer he drew toward the two figures, the more he realized that much of the power was emanating from the Essence Anchor, so much so that the other two were almost washed out by the noise of it all. Almost, but not quite. A faint buzz rattled in the background, a hum running counterpoint to the Anchor's powerful draw.
He walked until he came to the edge of an inlaid circle, one that surrounded the Essence Anchor, Grimmar, and the woman.
"You're here, and none too soon. I see you have grown stronger indeed since last we spoke." The woman's eyes twinkled at the last, and a spark of recognition flared within Felix. He knew that voice. Those eyes. Blue-green, summer leaves atop a pond. A yearning ran through him, sudden and complete, and the hunger in his belly fully woke. Its growl matched pitch with that hum in the air until the two resonated unpleasantly, his inner ear buzzing with a terrible and distracting dissonance. A far cry from the orchestral thrum of the Anchor only feet away.
"You," he gasped, fighting off what he knew to be an unnatural attraction. "I know you. You're..."
"The woman of your dreams? Naturally," she smiled, her face framed by a cascade of straight black hair, and it was like a second sun emerged from the clouds. Vertigo spun Felix's world for a moment, before his walls settled again.
Bastion of Will is level 39!
Deep Mind is level 26!
"How?" Felix's mind raced, connections appearing and disappearing. "My dreams. My...you've been speaking to me since the waterfall."
"Well before that, Felix," she said, her pale dress billowing in a breeze he could not feel. It was a diluted yellow. "You just couldn't hear me properly."
A low growl emanated from Felix's left. Grimmar, still bowed low to the ground so that his head touched the cool stone, turned and locked eyes with him. A thrill of fear raced across Felix's nerves, but he was quickly reaching a saturation point. Even the giant's toothy grimace was becoming old hat, gross as it was.
"Oh come now, Grimmar," she chided, a pale hand bopping him atop his blue head. A sound like a gunshot echoed through the room, Grimmar's face smashing into the ground hard enough to shake it. "Don't be childish. You're both in line to be my Champion."
Felix licked his lips nervously. That love tap would have broken his bones. What the fuck have I gotten into?
Grimmar lifted his face, swollen and burst along his left cheek and jaw, and gasped. "Him, Mother? He is a disgusting Human...how could he be worthy of you?"
"Human?" She laughed, another bright cheery thing that danced around the chamber. Blond locks fluttered on the same intangible breeze that shifted her dress. "No no, dear Grimmy. He is not Human at all. Are you, dear?
Felix's eyes darted between the two of them, one grimacing in anger and suspicion, another smiling beatifically. He could feel the flare of alarm in his chest, and he felt Pit press tighter against the back of his legs, his own head on a swivel.
"No, I'm not," he admitted.
"See? He's Nymean," she nodded.
Grimmar's eyes nearly bulged from their sockets, and a vein snaked down his forehead. His cheek and jaw were healing quickly, but the sudden strain sent blue blood pouring from the wound, and the giant began to visibly shake. A long moment passed where Felix was positive the Risi was going to attack him, but the giant mastered himself, though not without consequence. Felix saw blood dripping from his nose and ears.
"You stayed your bloodlust. That is good." The woman, whoever and whatever she was, patted the giant on the shoulder. "It would displease me were you to fight in my presence."
"Who are you?" Felix asked.
"She is the Mother, you fool," snarled Grimmar, the heat not yet banished from his tone. At a look from the woman he leveraged himself up and onto his knees. "The beginning and the end of all life upon this wretched plane of mud and blood."
The woman made a tutting sound. "Grimmar is a bit...blinded by religious devotion. For which I give you full credit, dear," she directed at the giant, who blushed beneath the scowl he offered Felix. "I am Lhel. Or I once was, before...all this." She waved a delicate hand around her, indicating not just the vaulted chamber, but somehow all that lay beyond.
"Lhel," Felix repeated, hearing a soft musicality in the name. "Why are you here, in this...whatever this is? It looks like a palace, or a temple, but those don't usually have giant blood beasts guarding the doors."
"How...astute of you, Felix." Lhel sighed prettily, her dress flouncing. "Yes, I am a prisoner here. Trapped these long Ages by my vile enemies."
"Enemies?" Felix asked, eyeing the walls around him. They were at least a hundred feet in any direction.
"Why the Geist, of course. You must have seen their statues and paintings they had erected all over Shelim. Vain little cretins," she muttered.