Unbound

"Strength of Many!"

Bodie's arms and shoulders swelled, ballooning with muscle in a way that was almost obscene. His empowered mace crashed into the Ghoul's leading leg, and the thing's kneecap literally exploded into red paste. It tried to scream in pain, but Cal appeared at it's shoulder, and her blades tore it's scaled throat out. All that escaped was a harsh gurgle, and the monster fell dead to the ground.

Territorial Quest Alert!

You Have Gained Extra Contribution!

The revelation of Evie's proximity had spurred Cal forward, and she had braved the traps with a recklessness that was only matched by her skill. Catapulting herself from the falling corpse, Cal soared through the air and directly into the grasping arms of the second Ghoul. Felix was seconds from leaping into the fray himself, but the woman slipped between the brute's talons like a piece of soap. She shot upward and to the left, impacting the Ghoul's shoulder blades first and tore a jagged line across its impossibly muscled collarbone.

"She's got this," Harn said from his side, and Felix nodded though he remained worried. He had taken a bite out of the ambient Primordial Essence in the air, topping off his reserves for the umpteenth time that hour, but it barely halted the spawns' ability to rapidly reknit flesh. The only tactics they'd found was to surround and overwhelm the Ghouls, peppering them with enough attacks that they couldn't cope or use Essence directly and circumvent their regeneration.

Cal's blades moved at a speed even Felix's Perception found hard to track, blurring in and out of the Ghoul's throat so fast it looked like it had just decided to take off its own head. Cal flipped backward off its toppling corpse, and the Ghoul crashed to the ground just like it's friend.

Damn, Felix thought. Pit trilled in agreement.

"She is...She is a force, is she not?" Elder Regis said from his left. She and Elder Holt had mostly held back during their journey, so he didn't exactly know their capabilities. They still felt weakened, however, as before. Injured. "Perhaps she was closer to Gold than we assumed."

"Keep moving," Cal barked.

One final corner and they reached the end of the tunnel. A pointed trefoil archway let in a bright, almost neon red light. The thing was thirty feet across and double that in height, and the carmine light damn near blinded most of them. Cal swept the area, as did Atar and Harn, but none of them found traps in the last few yards. That was a relief to Felix.

The relief, he was sore to find, did not last.

The archway led into an absolutely massive chamber that was filled with that same red miasma, like smog. At a guess, it was probably five hundred feet in diameter, distinctly circular, with winding pathways down into lower levels. Three massive statues of a human-seeming man and two women loomed from within the banks of crimson fog. They were depicted in that interesting combination of armor and robes Felix had seen before, and their heads were surmounted by thin circlets that were covered in three pointed stars. Their arms reached out along the vaulted ceiling, until all three hands touched at the center.

Exploration is level 37!

Exploration is level 38!

"Is that a gemstone?" Harn asked, amazed. The thing held at the very center of the gargantuan stone hands was an immense, faceted stone. It looked a deep purple in the flood of red light.

Voracious Eye!

Name: Belais Crystal

Type: Mineral

Lore: Mana responsive mineral useful as a medium for enchantments.

"Crystal," Cal corrected, eyeing it. "Belais Crystal. Biggest damn one I've ever seen."

"Used for enchantments? So are these giant statues—" Felix started.

"Don't tempt fate, Felix," Cal said. "I'll not put anythin' past the Nym, but I draw the line at fightin' golems the size of the Eyrie tower."

"Are those Nymeans?" Vess asked in a low voice. "They look so—"

"So Human," the Hand said. His voice was level, but Felix sensed tremors of a haunting melody. Was it wonder? It flickered and shut down after only a moment, though.

Vess signed at Felix.

Felix managed, his stilted handsign even harder to do covertly.

"Yes, those are Nymeans. I've seen them before," Felix said, instead of answering Vess. Then he realized how he'd phrased it. "In ruins. Murals in the Foglands."

"Fascinating," Elder Regis said. "I'd like very much to hear about these ruins. We've long held an interest in that Lost Race," she continued with a sour look up at the looming statues. "Haarwatch was founded by them, after all."

"What?" Felix asked.

"Who do you think built the Wall?" Elder Holt asked him. "Who built all this?"

"And what was it used for?" Bodie asked. "Buried underground and filled with tunnels. What's the point?"

"Nym ruins don't make a lick of sense," Cal said. "Traps, always. Treasure? At times. Danger always, but not a lick of sense."

"The air feels like fire," Atar hissed. "Can't you all feel it? Why aren't you more worried? Can't you sense what's below us?"

That thick miasma of red vapor was visible to all of them, apparently, as they couldn't see the bottom of the chamber either. But Felix felt Revenants closer than ever, their collective connecting tugging at him with an almost physical pressure. As they watched, the shifting miasma parted enough to make out a massive, writhing creature far below. Around it were hundreds of oval objects that seemed Human-sized. They watched as it discharged several more of them.

"That's disgusting," Cal whispered in clear horror. "Eggs."

"How many're down there?" Harn asked with annoyance. "I can't see anythin' with this fog."

It was way too far for any of their Perceptions to clear either. They'd have to send a scout or...or Felix could have to try something. It was risky, but so was sending Cal ahead all alone.

Felix put his hand out into the coil vapor, thicker than ever before, and sent his Will and Intent coursing along it's connected parts.

Mine. But not all of you. Just. You.

Ravenous Tithe!

A storm of Essence and Mana thundered through his channels, but as before, he fed it directly into his endless abyss at the center of his core ring. It took all of the Essence and Mana without complaint, only the soreness of his channels witnesses to its passage. The blob of crimson liquid above his core seemed just a touch bigger.

"Look!" Bodie murmured. "The fog is shifting!"

The lot of them craned their heads carefully over the edge of the narrow platform to peer below again, Felix included. The red miasma had indeed thinned, though it still clung heavily around the edges of the chamber. The writhing thing was almost exactly what Felix feared.

Name: Larval Broodmother

Type: Primordial-Spawn

Level: 23

HP: 8473/8473

SP: 233/286

MP: 0/0

Lore: A new creation, like the Ghoul these are a mutation as a result of power and Primordial Essence mixing without restraint. Beware.

Strength: Strength of the Horde. Its children are its strength.

Weakness: Mobility. It cannot move from its current position.

The thing seemed weaker than the usual Revenant, but it's Health was insane. Felix shared what he knew, but he was sure only Cal was listening. At that exact moment, several of the darker colored eggs ripped apart and released goo-covered Revenants, fully grown and screaming. Those newborns stumbled and ran into the waiting arms of an entire horde.

Someone gasped. Thousands of Revenants filled the chamber's floor in addition to being studded with dozens of Ghouls.

"If that's not the Nest, I don't know what is," Bodie said. "Nasty."

"And deadly," Vess contributed. "I do not know if it is wise to assault this force."

"What? We turn back?" Cal said, glaring at the heiress. "When we're this close?"

Felix considered his satchel and the grenades within. "What if we—"

"Authority doesn't help us if we're dead," Atar said through a groan. He was cradling his arms as if they had been injured. "Can't you feel that heat? None of us will last long in here, not with this amount of Primordial Essence in the air."

Felix tried again. "I have—"

"Felix where is Evie?" Cal asked, her eyes flashing.

Felix frowned, but felt along his connection to his friend. He could feel her advancing on their position rapidly, but she didn't feel directly below them. Not yet. "She's close. Lower than us too...I think. It's hard to tell."

"If Evie is down there, then so am I," Cal spat. "I'm not losing her."

"Foolish. You'd throw our lives away for one child?" Reed hissed back at her. "You—"

"I've got bombs!" Felix half-shouted, then clenched his jaw, afraid that the sound carried. Everyone turned to look at him in varying degrees of surprise and consternation. He reached into his satchel and pulled out a handful of palm-sized stones. Each one was heavily inscribed. "I've got bombs."

"What's the Tier?" Cal asked, her eyes flicking between the bombs and Felix's own. "How much damage can they cause?"

"Uh, Tier? I'm not entirely sure. I've only tested a few of the smaller ones, but they made a sizable dent in the cobble streets," Felix said. He eyed the stone around the ceiling. "That crystal is surrounded by granite, hard but I think I can break it apart."

"And drop it on the Broodmother," Vess said, glancing over the edge again. "The Quest never said we had to kill all of the Revenants, did it?"

"No," Cal said slowly. "It just says 'seek out and destroy the Nest.' That—Blind gods, that could work."

"It's central to the room," Reed said, glancing up at the crystal. "It'd take some angling to actually hit your target. Can you manage that?"

Felix met the man's eyes and nodded. He was sure. "I've got a few ways to make it happen, yeah."

The Hand smirked. "Good. Then get on up, Fiend. Save us the trouble of having to fight an entire Domain's worth of monsters."

"Revenants will rush us the moment he's noticed," Harn pointed out. "Be ready."

Shadow Whip!

Shadow Whip!

Shadow unspooled from Felix's hands and he rolled his shoulders. He could climb the curving ceiling, Tarzan style. Though an easier way would be to...

He checked on his Spirit, and on Pit still curled up in pain.

...No, Shadow Whip it is.

Screams sounded from below. Human screams.

"Twin's teeth, what is that?" Cal hissed. "Are there people—?"

Explosions of fire and golden light Mana splashed across the horde, the angle suggesting it came from outside the chamber but on the same level. The miasma had partially restored itself, so it was hard to tell, but the howls of Revenants suggested an attack.

"That's Inquisition magic," Harn said. "They've come too."

"Good! An excellent distraction!" Elder Holt said with a vicious sort of satisfaction. "Let the monsters chew on white armor for a while."

Felix's Affinity twisted as the Revenants became further enraged. But among them, he felt the thickening silver thread of his friend. His stomach dropped. "Evie's down there! With the Inquisition!"

Cal's wide amber eyes met his own, and Felix saw a naked terror in them. He didn't need to hear her Spirit; he knew Cal well enough to guess what would happen next.

"Are you sure?!" Vess asked. "I don't have the range to hit anything from this height!"

"I do, but I'll run out of Mana well before I actually make a difference here," Atar protested.

"We have to get closer. Now!" Cal ordered, and checked her long daggers at her side. She had a brace of throwing daggers across her chest and down each leg as well.

"What? That's suicide!" Atar said.

"Come with me, or stay up here, your choice mage! Same goes for all of you! I can't make you come with me, but if my....if Evie's down there, then that's where I gotta be." Cal turned to the sloping path down. It followed the curve of the chamber, terminating somewhere in the middle of the mess below.

Harn readied his axes and Bodie hefted his mace and shield. There was no question in their stances as they followed.

"Calesca," Elder Regis called out and Cal half turned tower her. The Elder's hands swirled with a deep wash of black and grey Mana vapor and six dark hounds emerged from those swirls, each one the size of a Great Dane. Elder Holt stepped forward and inscribed a series of electric blue sigils in the air, too fast for Felix to catch more than symbols for force and wall. The sigils fused together into a glyph then zipped toward the shadow hounds, each complicated inscription striking their foreheads and sinking in. "I'll lead the charge, if you don't mind."

"After you," Cal said with a grim smile.

The shadow hounds ghosted past them, now limned by a crackling blue light. They made no other sounds as they raced down the spiraling path.

"Felix, get a move on. Else I won't save any fer you," Harn said.

"I am going too," Vess stated. Her spears hovered around her, along with Felix's Blade of the Fang. "Whether you like it or not," she said to the Hand.

"I can't protect you down there, Vessilia," Reed protested. More explosions and furious screaming sounded. The rattle of armor was almost overwhelmed by the caterwaul of monstrous howls.

"I don't need your defense, Darius. I need your blade at the front," Vess' eyes flashed dangerously. "But if that is all you understand, then know I am going to be in the thick of it, and I may die. Protect me or face failure, Hand of the Duke."

"...Fine," he growled. "At least if I'm dead your father can't kill me."

Felix grinned at the relief on Vess' face. She was more worried than she let on. He was too. For her, for all of them.

"Vess," he started, but his words dried up in his throat. She turned to him. "Save Evie, yeah?"

It happened fast, but the spearwoman suddenly had her arms around Felix. She hugged him tightly. She felt like steel armor and leather padding, and all he could smell was the blood and gristle they'd waded through to get there. But...it was nice. He hadn't been hugged in a long time.

"Be careful, Felix. I forbid you to die."

Felix offered her a lopsided smile as they came apart. "I'll try my best."

"Ahem."

The both of them disentangled their arms, and she blessed him with one of her dimpled smiles before hefting her spears and trotting off. The Hand watched Felix a beat longer, and for once his Spirit was as closed off as his expression. Then he too disappeared down the path.

"Right," Felix re-summoned his Shadow Whips and swung them at the ceiling above him. With a leap he was able to reach a higher point and the ends of it attaching to the textured ceiling. Swinging a bit, he took a breath, and pushed off the wall and out into the open air.

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