Cold and suffocating—the darkness smothered him when Ewan came to, a bit dazed. The crushing pressure and the roaring silence jolted him awake. Water gushed into him, bloating his stomach. His ribs creaked, his eyes burned, and his throat ached as he flailed his limbs to no avail. This wasn’t the space crack anymore, he was drowning. His Pa taught him many things, he learned a lot from his teachers, but swimming wasn’t one of them.
Ewan clenched his fists and stopped moving, drifting down, the pressure crushing him with each inch. He wasn’t a Kyron, he didn’t need the Kyron’s way of survival—he pushed down with Ryvia and propelled up, the stress alleviating as he rose up.
Faster.
He thrusted hard and rocketed towards the surface, leaving a trail of stream behind. There was no light at the end, it was all murky with the water turbulent up ahead. Ewan broke out from the top and emerged into a raging storm, the deluge of rain and squall slapping him. He gasped, lungfuls of air stuffing his chest, and choked. The towering waves thrashed him, shoving him back in. He pushed back and came out again, panting.
He looked around, rocking with the waves. Beyond the darkness, there was no end. Water was everywhere, it met the interminable horizon with no land in sight.
Where was he? Ewan gaped; his heaves hitched. This river had no banks, how wide was it? Its depth almost crushed him; this wasn’t what he read. Rivers weren’t like this. Was it…an ocean? He licked his lips and tasted the water, it was salty—too salty—and left a fishy taste at the back of his throat. Ewan retched and vomited the water he’d ingested. After emptying his stomach contents and gaining his breath back, the realization hammered him.
Nana!
They’d separated the moment they fell into the space crack. Did she come here too? Did she drown? His heart thumped. No, no, she was strong, he made her strong, she wouldn’t die like that. He lunged back into the water and propelled down with Ryvia, faster than he came up. His emotions howled that she was alive, his logic disputed she wasn’t, she couldn’t be. Even he barely survived.
The pressure squashed him again, and the weight spiked as he shot down. He enveloped himself in Ryvia, pushed away, and countered the pressure before moving down again.
He searched and searched but couldn’t find any trace. She wasn’t here, she was never here, the signs said, or a lack thereof. His search pattern was random, but he didn’t miss anything, not even a tremble in the water. If she was alive, he would save her; if she was dead... No, she wasn’t dead, she wasn’t... His determination eventually took him to the sandy bottom, the depths of the unending ocean. The absolute lack of light here troubled even his evolved eyes; it glowed an emerald shade as Ewan strained them.
If she came out here with him, she couldn’t have drifted that far. The currents crawled down here; they couldn’t have taken her away. He looked for her inside a reasonable radius, then extended to an unreasonable range when he couldn’t find her. Bit by bit, his logic adjusted. The lack of any trace was obvious, she never came out with him. She should’ve arrived somewhere else. He must contact her in the hub, else his restless heart would never settle down.
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He propelled back up again but stopped when his Ryvia shifted the sand at the bottom. It exposed a circle of rocks surrounding an egg. Ewan checked the wheel of his ‘Luck Roulette’, the skill was still in effect. So, this was a forced lucky encounter. He had no time for this though, and he couldn’t carry it away either—it would become a burden during the backlash. At most, he would come back to it after confirming Nana’s status and finding solid ground again.
The skill dinged in his mind, and a sense of dread enveloped him. The first part of the ‘Luck Roulette’—the good part—was over, and now he had to survive the backlash. He stabilized where he was and pushed his Ryvia out. Luck was random, he couldn’t read it. The threat it would bring could come from anywhere.
The favorable part had only affected the position of the space cracks and presented him with this egg. The backlash from that shouldn’t be too bad, he hoped.
Come, I’m ready.
A school of fish rushed out from under the loose sand and assaulted him, barging inside his Ryvia sphere. Their teeth, or bladed fangs rather, shredded his skin on the first round.
Fuck!
It was only skin wounds, but he bled all over and his ripped clothes hung loose.
Blood Rein!
He cast and used the blood he shed. The school of fanged fishes u-turned at a distance and came at him again, his blood and flesh dangling from their mouths. He aimed at them, and the blob of blood extended out into needled branches, and soon a barbed shrub stood in front of him. The fishes didn’t stop and barreled into the thorny branches. The blood needles stood firm and tore apart the incoming school, turning the area wine-red. The taste of iron overtook the saltiness of the ocean for a moment but soon reverted to the fishy taste again.
That can't be all…
When he finished the thought, a tentacle reached from a distance smacked Ewan down into the sand.
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Status: Injured
Step-0 [6th Awakening]
Name: Ewan Ayres
Species: Human
Vitality: 1.7
Spirit: 12.9
Anima: [Fire – 12.9 | Ice – 12.9 | Blood – 0.0]
Astylinds: 4 [Potential: 0]
Rolling Cat [Toast]: Step-0 [6th Awakening]
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Fire Monkey [Orange]: Step-0 [Level-6] [Grade-B]
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Imp [Frost]: Step-0 [Level-6] [Grade-B]
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Blood Lotus [Iris]: Step-0 [Level-6] [Grade-C]
Equipment: Common Clothes; Yurn [Neck Gaiter].
Storage: Journal; Elementalist—The Path of Anima [Subtype-Book]; Spellbook; Bloodlust [Spell]; Transmute [Spell]; Anima-Crystals; Obsidian Dagger; Hub-Connector; Ingredients.
Novas: 491
Crelith: 4984