With their first foray to the border a failure, the trio considered their options, heading back down the path at a leisurely pace.
Kael lamented, "Maybe we should've stayed for the fight between Alex and the centurion?"
Gus shook his head. "You know that would've been a terrible idea. And we didn't know about the tokens at the time."
Kael's head tilted back, leaving him looking up into the temporarily-cleared skies, the three of them having decided on getting some sun after the latest fiasco. "Well our alternatives seem to be heading to a citadel and hoping we can scrounge up a ridiculous sum of gold, somehow, or finding another centurion and impressing them with our 'valor,' somehow."
Shaela cracked her first smile since they had reached the border, though it quickly went away as she continued fiddling with something in her pocket. She had barely stopped since the border guards explained the concept of centurion tokens to them.
She spoke up. "It's not as bad as you guys think." They looked to her. "Kael is an Aspect, so he'll be able to get through somehow," she gave a cheeky smirk to go alongside the word. "Either by some non-asshole guards letting him through, or by bypassing the barrier entirely, which they seemed to think was possible for an Aspect." Shaela turned to Kael, questioningly.
He shrugged. "It might be. I was able to manipulate the weather on the other side of it a bit, though not super well. Dunno how I'd get through the border, though. Maybe through some wacky conceptual stuff? I haven't focused too much on the emotional side of my Aspect in a while. Gus seemed to think it was a waste of time." Kael then turned to Gus.
Gus began, "It certainly seemed to be. You hadn't made much progress on it after months. Meanwhile something like your needle droplets can change the course of a fight, or take out an animal from range for Shaela to pick up. Way more practical to focus on something where there's concrete progress and we know there'll be results."
Shaela headed off the argument before it could get going, "Well maybe it's something we can explore while we try to find another token."
Gus ran his hand through his hair. "Sure-"
Kael spoke over him, "Hold up. Did you say another token?"
Shaela took a deep breath and nodded, pulling out a large coin from her back pocket. It shone a deep green, behind dark red decals and borders around the rim. One one side was a helmet, similar to the one held by the centurion they met earlier, with a slight flare over the back of the neck and an open face. The other side displayed a clawed hand covered in scales, likely representing the Dragon of Battle himself.
Gus closed his eyes and pinched his nose. "And of course you have one. You're a real pack rat, Shae, you know that? Where did you even find that?"
Kael, meanwhile, just stared at it.
Shae began timidly explaining, "Aether gave it to me..."
Gus gave a deep sigh. "Okay, that's fair. It still would've been nice to know before we ended up staring down two border guards and an impenetrable wall."
"I didn't know what it was until they explained it! Aether just told me to hold onto it. He gave it to me a year ago and never mentioned it again until just before we left, when he double checked that I still had it, which, of course, I did."
Kael chimed in, "But how'd Aether get ahold of one?"
She shrugged as she twirled the coin. "He probably just beat up a centurion until they gave it to him."
Thinking back to the fight they had earlier, and the centurion riding the wyvern, Kael's image of a centurion clashed with how he remembered Aether... and then he nodded slowly. "Yeah, probably."
Gus brought them back to the topic at hand. "So we have a token, and we have an Aspect. Could we not have just gone through?"
"The barrier didn't seem to stop me when I touched it. I could still feel it, a bit, but I could also feel the token flaring up as I did. I doubt it works for more than one person, and I dunno if we want to risk getting separated by the barrier if one of us crosses with it." Shaela countered.
"Still though, you two could've gone ahead - could still go ahead. I could head back to the nearest citadel and get a job, or maybe-"
"Dumb." Shaela gave a thumbs down. "Idiot." The token disappeared into her pocketspace, to make room for a second thumbs down. "Moronic idea. Worse than Kael's idea of playing with the wyvern." Shaela closed her eyes in rememberance, while Kael shook his head decisively in the background.
Kael picked up where she left off, ignoring the last jab. "Obviously we're not gonna split up like that. We'll just have to find another token, or save up 100 gold. How much do we have, Shaela?"
"8 gold, 73 silver."
Kael rubbed his hands together. "Alright, alright. Not too bad. Make a bunch of money, or impress a centurion..." He transitioned into pinching his chin as he looked into the distance, before his eyes caught on something on the horizon.
"Say, for instance, by stopping a forest fire!" He pointed toward a broad plume of smoke in the distance, shouting "Let's go!" And dashed into the woods in the plume's direction, as he began re-gathering the clouds above them in preparation, without waiting for Shaela or Gus to respond.
Gus called after him, "Kael!" He began to follow regardless, alongside Shaela. As they struggled to catch up, he spoke more conversationally to the girl beside him, "He gets way too excited sometimes. Wasn't this near where one of the paths branched off?"
"Maybe, yeah. Still, I'd say this is better than fighting a wyvern," Shaela replied as they ran after him.
Gus smiled. "Yeah, I guess so."
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As Kael closed in on the smoke, with Gus and Shaela shortly behind him, he emerged into a clearing, discovering that it wasn't, in fact, a forest fire at all, but the burning of a small town.
While the rain coalesced above the still burning rubble and half-collapsed buildings, he frantically analyzed the situation, trying to sense any movement in the streets.
Gus and Shaela came up behind him, neither prepared for something like this.
Kael felt them arrive through the rain, resuming his run once he found a survivor. "Gus, Shaela, look for anyone still alive in the buildings! I can only feel one person standing outside!"
Taking in the situation at a glance, Gus replied as he struggled to keep up with Kael's burst of energy. "We will! But Kael, be careful! We don't know who's responsible, or if they're still here!"
Whether Kael heard him as he entered the streets, Gus wasn't sure. Either way, he made an executive decision. "Shae, I'm gonna make sure Kael doesn't get himself killed. You're more suited to uncovering people from the rubble anyway. My skin would just get burned in the fire."
She agreed. "Alright, stay safe. I'll try to make my way to you guys as I search." Gus nodded, and they both ran.
Meanwhile, Kael closed in on the only other person still moving in the streets, while his rain poured down on the surrounding buildings, dampening and extinguishing the fires, one by one.
He turned a corner and spotted the woman he had sensed, standing in the middle of the road in a black vest and pants, with long hair of the same color trailing behind her.
She turned to him. "Oh? A survivor?" She pinched her chin as she spoke to herself. "No, I doubt one would come running to me so energetically."
She spoke up for Kael to hear, waving in his direction. "Hello there, young man. I'd highly recommend leaving. It isn't safe here."
"I can see that. Are you responsible for this?"
She raised a brow. "Yes? Why, did you know someone here? My condolences, if so. They were barely alive by the time I arrived to finish them off."
"You- How can you speak as if this is normal? How could you do this?" He couldn't help but imagine the same befalling his own home - his mother one of the corpses left strewn on the ground after being burned to death.
She shook her head. "They had to die. There-"
Kael's hand swung out. "This whole town!? I can feel dead kids here! There's no way this could be justified."
She raised her brow at the 'feel' comment, but pursed her lips. "Leaving them would've made things worse."
Kael was taken aback at the response. "You... You're a monster!" He pointed an accusing finger her way, while he prepared to accelerate droplets from the clouds all around her.
The woman willingly endured his self-righteous tirade, but lost her patience at being called a monster, her jaw clenching. "Tch. Fine, fine." She waved her hands in concession. "If I'm the villain, I'm the villain. Been itching for a good fight anyway."
She pinched her chin as she muttered to herself once again. "What would Drazil say in this situation? Something about..." Kael couldn't hear her over the sound of the rain, the dying flames, and his own heartbeat pounding in his ears, losing patience with the way she seemed to talk to herself. "Oh yeah..." She nodded, confident in her conclusion.
She looked up at Kael and called out as she ran a hand through her hair. "What can I say, kid?" She gave a mean smirk and a shrug. "Small fry live to die."
A half dozen needles fell on her position from above, encircling her as they closed in at a slight angle. She merely raised her right hand above her head, palm up, and from it released a conical blast of steam, forceful and hot enough that it stalled out and burned away all the droplets above her, including the lethal ones amidst the rain.
She resumed speaking once the 'woosh' of the blast faded from their ears. "The rain, huh? It did seem to come on pretty quick." She began walking toward him. "That how you felt out all the corpses?"
When another lethally fast droplet came at her from a shallow angle, slipping between two buildings, she merely raised a palm to the side, and let loose a second blast of steam, finishing off the two structures.
"You practically scream out your intent from a mile away, kid. Do better if you want to make this interesting."
She hopped in place as she smirked, bringing a hand down to her side, so at the apex of her jump, her palm faced backward and slightly down as she unleashed another blast, propelling her forward toward Kael.
Kael scrambled back around the corner, realizing there was little reason for him to even stay in sight of the lady as he ran. Looking down the street he was now on, he saw Gus midway down the avenue, approaching him at a jog.
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Kael's eyes widened in panic, and he swung his arm forward repeatedly in a wave for Gus to turn around. "Other way! Go! Go! Go!"
Gus had planned to catch up to Kael before turning and joining him in his new run, but Kael's pursuer apparently decided she didn't need to take the streets to make a turn, coming flying through the corner building, and shattering it in the process. The planks and stones that made it up didn't just fall down, though. The pieces that touched her directly all flew off at high speeds, becoming deadly shrapnel sent off in every direction.
A few bits nicked Kael, scratching his back and arms while a larger piece smacked his shoulder, sending him spinning to the ground. Gus had activated his facet as soon as he saw the explosion, his skin hardening into bark and resisting the impacts until he reached Kael, crouching over him as he got up, his left arm limp.
"Another one? You're with the boy then. What can you do?"
"Come and find out, miss wrecking ball." Gus helped Kael up while keeping his eye on their opponent.
Her eyes narrowed at his comment, not appreciating the insinuation. "You know, I think I like the other kid better." She leaned down and placed a palm on the ground.
Kael heaved for breath, not quite able to straighten up just yet. "Gus, we've gotta go." He sent down more needles from above, without looking, but she casually raised her free hand and let loose a blast before she smiled at them.
The ground began shaking under their feet, with the lady at the epicenter. Both boys lost their footing as larger and larger waves seemed to emerge from her position, until they couldn't even remain on their hands and knees, tumbling across the ground like ragdolls.
While they groaned in recovery, the woman stood up and hopped again, which Kael felt happen, causing his eyes to shoot open. "Move!"
She released a blast.
In the air flying toward them once again, she sent out another blast, this time above herself, propelling her down faster than gravity could carry her, directly toward Gus' position on the ground. He barely rolled to the side in time before impact, though the wind was knocked out of him as he bounced away.
"Really not helping your case, lady." Gus coughed out.
She approached Gus' prone form as she shook her head, baring her teeth in something that could only pass for a grin amongst residents of the Dome. "That was the wrong thing to say, brat."
Kael sent down two more lethally fast drops, one from each side of her. She merely leaned out of the way of one and sent a narrow blast to dissipate the other, then swung an arm in Kael's direction a few meters away.
"Not now." She sent a moderately powerful blast at Kael, knocking him to the other side of the street, where he tried to get his bearings as he endured the pain of the steam burns.
"As for you," she lifted Gus by his shirt, hoisting him into the air before repositioning her hand flat on his torso to hold him up. She gave him a beatific smile. "Enjoy this." The front of Gus' torso caught fire before he shot off into the distance, propelled like the rubble from the building she crashed through, though Gus seemed to be going farther - probably several streets away, and not toward Shaela.
While his primary senses barely recovered, and overwhelmed by the heat covering his body, Kael focused on the rain. He knew where Shaela was: still to the south and running in their direction, she had likely heard the noise and felt the distant vibrations from where she had been searching. Kael needed her to help Gus, though, and not run into this crazy lady while she was still feeling violent.
He pinged Shaela's head with a forceful drop. Not enough to particularly hurt, but enough to get her attention. Knowing she'd naturally look up, he waited a moment, then did the same to her right shoulder, causing her to turn east. He cleared the path ahead of her of any rain, and continued guiding her in this manner toward Gus, who was currently down for the count.
In person, once he calmed enough to focus on himself again, Kael endeavored to ignore every sensation besides the cooling feeling of the rain on his skin. With every drop, he imagined it washing away the pain, and returning him to a healthy temperature. Thankfully, the mental exercise worked, and he recovered enough to stand.
The woman had given a content sigh after sending Gus away, in no rush to move on from the feeling. She waited patiently for Kael's next move, curious to see what he'd do now.
Knowing she was giving him time, Kael intensified the rain between them to blur his image, for all the good it'd do, as he limped his way into the nearest building. Through his rain he could feel most of the back half of the structure had collapsed, and by now the fires were largely put out, meaning he'd have options once he was inside.
As soon as he was through the doorway and had broken line of sight, he sped up drastically, having overplayed how limited his mobility was. As he turned and ran into the next building over, through gaping holes in the walls, he heard her let loose another blast, probably launching herself toward the building he initially entered - which was confirmed a moment later when she came through the wall, once again sending out a blast of shrapnel in the process, though this time there was no one (alive) to suffer for it.
Kael continued preparing another volley of rapid droplets, planning out a sequence that would hopefully break through her defenses.
Still, he really wanted her to slow down. Maybe he could weaken her blasts if he made the rain colder? And more intense. Sheets of water on her head; force her to continually shoot those blasts above her head if she wanted to stay dry. Wet and heavy and cold and dark. Fall on her.
The rain above them seemed to change in quality - not becoming physically colder, but each drop now carrying some extra, esoteric effect.
When the first of the new droplets hit her, she realized something had changed. "Dampening, huh?" The woman looked up. As the rain touched her, she felt herself minutely slowing down, and knew her blasts would also be somewhat weakened despite the physical properties of the rain remaining largely the same.
In response, she stood in place and momentarily flexed. As she did, she began to emit steam across her whole body, evaporating any water directly on her person, and thus blurring her position both in Kael's sight, and in his sense of the rain.
Kael continued running from building to building, clicking his tongue at this new defense she implemented, though he was more confident in his assessment of her abilities, now. It seemed like she could infuse energy into the things she touched directly, whether through heat or motion, and maybe other forms as well. "Not insurmountable..." he mused. The way she was detecting his droplets, though, was still a mystery.
While Shaela finally arrived at Gus and began attending to his injuries, Kael began his largest volley yet. The woman had continued blasting herself through buildings after implementing her latest defense, seemingly searching for Kael.
He waited until she had landed to direct the first lethal drop, heading almost straight down onto her head. He began sending the others before she had even responded.
Easily sensing the first needle coming, she raised her right hand above her once again, blasting it away, though before she completed the motion she was forced to raise her left behind her to stop a second droplet. The third drop came from her left side while the first blast was still going off. With both arms occupied she had to jerk her hips forward to avoid it, putting her into the path of the fourth.
She barely noticed it in time to kick her foot up into its path, releasing a blast directly from her sole for the first time in the fight. The fifth and sixth droplets were already closing in, one from the right and one from the left, respectively. The fifth was taken care of by her right elbow, her arm not able to come down in time for the usual palm strike.
Her second blast had also completed by this point, allowing her enough time to flip her left palm forward, facing it into the side of the sixth droplet's path, intercepting it with a perpendicular blast that pushed her body into a spin. She barely had time to jerk her head to the side to avoid the seventh, which had come from directly above her once again. Unable to easily stop her twist, she was vulnerable to the next three droplets descending on her position, except by bringing up her right palm and unleashing a blast straight up that negated the force of her spin, while dissipating the three drops.
The eleventh drop, however, she didn't notice until it had already closed in on her head - too close for most of her usual forms of attack, she attempted to evade, jerking her head once again, though it skimmed her forehead, and stole several strands of hair in the process.
Steam immediately exploded all across her body, and by the time the rain filled that space in once again, none of it touched her.
A shell? Thought Kael. Nothing could get close to her, now. It all evaporated inches away from her body - if it even got that close through the heat - forming a vague outline of her shape within the wider sphere of steam that distorted Kael's senses.
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Within the sphere, Lilith sighed at how close the boy got to dealing her a real injury. "Not just motion, the rain dampens perception as well, now?"
She flew upward to get a clearer view of the remaining town, carrying herself by imparting kinetic energy into the air directly touching her skin. The same air formed a solid suit of protection to prevent any further mishaps.
Looking down on the town, much of what hadn't been destroyed by the flames was now flattened by her actions during the battle, though only around the central avenues. "Hmm, there was a third as well." She ignored them, turning her focus back to the rain boy.
Her experience with her fledgeling authority allowed her to sense any opposing authority being used against her, so long as it related to energy. The boy's rapid acceleration of raindrops was close enough to give her some awareness of their location as they approached, though even that awareness was affected by his tapping into one of his authority's concepts... He's almost certainly an Aspect. Something to do with weather? Storm is still alive, last I checked, and he didn't utilize wind or lightning, so maybe Clouds, or Rain? Something more directly related to water is also possible. Now to find the boy...
Not able to do much with light yet, she began humming, casting out the sound waves further than they'd normally be able to travel, especially in this rain. She then waited for them to bounce back to her, where she could sense the vibrations hitting her skin. With this form of echolocation, she mapped out the interior of most of the town, finding the boy continuing to move between structures, remaining out of her direct line of sight.
She smirked, finding his attempts cute. She then remembered how he damaged her hair, and demoted him back to 'amusing brat' status. Even if he gave her a nice little spar, her leniency could only go so far.
She began descending, directly toward him, sending him into a mild panic. As he sent more of those annoying raindrops, she merely shifted her entire body side to side, not letting any get within several feet of her, to demonstrate the futility and just how much she had been holding back against him.
She landed on the roof of his current building, and decided to mess with him a bit more. Laying her hand on the wooden boards, she concentrated, stretching her authority a bit to generate this effect.
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Kael looked up in dread, sensing how the monster had paused on his roof, and was now causing the structure to subtly ripple in the rain. The wooden roof parted for her, rather than being smashed through as she had done every other surface today, while the support beams of the structure sprouted branches that shot out around Kael, forming a cage that he couldn't immediately break out of.
As she descended through the new hole in the roof, Kael exclaimed at the new growths surrounding him, "Wha- how is that imparting energy."
She smirked, both at his deduction and his incredulity. "You'll find that even facets can tap into concepts, kid. Growth isn't too far from energy, and wood is a useful medium."
As the woman landed, she crossed her arms in thought and began tapping her foot. After making him sweat for a few moments, she nodded to herself. "Yep, that was pretty good, kid. Really got the blood pumping."
He stared at her, in anger and disbelief that she was still treating all this as a game.
She pulled something from her pocket and tossed it his way. "You'll be an army-killer in a few years, once you've developed your authority more. Come see me when the Polemos rolls around. We'll have a real party, then."
The item landed at his feet, though he didn't bother looking at it yet. Before she could leave - and before he could reconsider - he called out, "What about all these people, then? Was all this just fun for you?"
She scratched the back of her head. "Oh, yeah. Right. There was a plague, real nasty. Probably someone's facet, if not some Aspect like Pestilence, or Decay." Kael blinked, processing the new information and reviewing their interactions thus far.
"But... couldn't these people have been helped? Couldn't you do something? Energize their immune systems, or whatever?"
She shook her head sadly at that. "A good thought, but no. Not when dealing with such a directed enemy authority, in their own domain."
She continued crushing his hopes with realism. "We flat out don't have the resources for this particular issue, except in the citadels, and bringing these people there is a mess waiting to happen, while dragging any competent purifier or healer out here isn't a realistic possibility either, without a half-dozen centurions getting together, or Battle himself coming out. And that's not gonna happen for a random town. Hell, citadels could get knocked down before either of those things happen, especially considering the Polemos is coming up in just a few years, which'll be a great big reset for most of the Dome."
Kael scrunched his brow at that, having heard the term 'Polemos' before, but he was too busy processing the rest of the information and calming down from his - apparently misplaced - anger, to think more about it right now.
She stretched her arms above her head. "Anyway, you three should probably be fine. It was pretty much burned out by the time you got here, and the rain'll clear the air in case anything's left over, though I doubt there is. What was your name, by the way?"
Kael felt drained about this whole situation, nothing good seemed to have come out of this. "Kael."
"Well Kael, I'm Lilith. Like I said, come back around these parts in a few years. I'm sure you'll put up a better fight, then. See ya." She gave a final wave as she turned away, and leaped through the front wall of the building, shattering it as she flew away.
He slumped to the ground, taking shaky breaths as he checked on Gus and Shaela, who seemed to be relatively okay. Gus was breathing, and conscious, so Kael cleared the rain around the pair and in a path leading to his position, sure they'd eventually come by.
He looked down at the object Lilith left behind, picking it up to observe it up close. The empty face of a centurion's helmet stared back at him from the coin's surface.
He covered his eyes with his arm, rain running down his face.
"Fucking centurions."