As I moved on my paved blight roads, I could already feel the air’s energy thinning.
When I arrived at the scene of the crime, I had to take a breath before I passed through the threshold. The mood in the temple was grim. Violala and Old Oak stood by the map, which had lost its luster. In the center, on a floor that no longer gleamed with captured starlight, our Kami stood. Nightshade shuffled in behind me.
The left head clacked its beak around as I entered. “So the proverbial traitor returns! To think, you would lay such a careful trap in the heart of our demesne! Your necrosis origins compelled you, I’m guessing? You foul-”
“To hear fowl from you is rich,” Old Oak chuckled at its own joke. “But there is no purpose in your harshness toward the Chimera Cores.”
The eyes on the left head bulged. Its gaze wheeled around the temple. “How delightful it must be, eh? To gloat of our misfortune. Old Oak Grasps Upward, were you involved in this plot as well? Did you receive your shard of power by our grace and then connive with necrotic spawn to witness our slow death, while you persist out of spite? But what a pathetic figure you cut, a shambling, forsaken-”
“Peace,” The right head of the three-headed duck said.
But if anything, that just incensed the left head further. “I will not quiet my voice. I have been warning you! At every turn, you have chosen to embrace these foreign liabilities, inviting them deeper within our circle of trust. Despite their nature, despite their corrupting touch, despite their every action hammering an outlook of pollution and decay into the heart of our land…
“Imagine my surprise, when my prophecies now come to pass and my accuracy only tastes like ashes in my mouth. Our plots to ascend to Tier II Kami matter not at all when we waste away without the protective film of our Mantles. Our people will weaken, even while the fat leeches of the Chimera Cores will escape without a care. Are you pleased?!”
They are afraid, I realized. Which only made the wild condemnation worse. My Innate Mana Attunement was almost poisonously precise, here in the heart of the Kami’s power. Because the lack of energy in the air hit home how serious a development this was. I felt the first few bubbles of frustration rising in my gut.
“Chosen Tallum can use his oils to preserve our seeds,” The right head said in a small voice. “We can-”
“Ours is an existence of momentum,” The central head finally spoke. Its words were heavy, heavier even the left head’s accusatory diatribe. “Our growth here is stalled, yet we have invested much in expanding our connection to the land. We have given everything, pouring the life energy into the sky. If we do not recover our Mantles within the day… that energy will still be released. But randomly. To whatever being lay claims to it. To the grasping claws of the other Kamis in the area. Their armies will surge in power… it will not take long for them to expand and slaughter us.
“Now is not a time for attribution of responsibility. That will come later. For now… in the name of survival, we will unite. We must.”
I pictured foreign animals, snakes and rabbits and dragonflies and swallows, an uncountable horde of wetland critter mass, sweeping toward us in every direction. My construction would be obliterated. My plans for an expanded Sanctuary neighborhood leveled. The crayfish, the squirrels, and the newly invited geckos… slaughtered.
“How can we?” Now the left head hissed. “A portion of our alliance is the very blighted cabal which precipitated this catastrophe.”
“They are just as harmed as we are.” The right head snapped back. “Do you think other Kami’s will view them with the temperance with which we have? They would not be so foolish to discard our protection-”
“This is… such bullshit,” I breathed out the words, almost unaware I was speaking. I felt my interstitial flesh quivering. My frustration had surged out from my core. I raised my gaze, feeling incendiary. My veins were molten and aching; I was tired of just standing here and taking this. “You, left head, are a short-sighted bully. Is it easy? To do nothing, observing and sniping at the ones who are doing your work for you? Are you proud of yourself?”
“How rich. The blightspawn seems to think its opinion matters,” The left head sneered. “Do you think your little pinch of power counts for anything? Our protection keeps you alive, dissuades the predators that itch to swallow you whole. If I bully, it is an ire you have earned several times over; if not for the necrotic taint already seeping into the Mantle of the mudfields, which we graciously purged at great personal cost, do you think we would have been forced into hibernation? This land barely avoids being drowned in the undead by relying upon us.”
“This again,” My squirrel hands curled into claws. My energy sonar thrummed, animated into a buzzing haze by fury. “This bullshit. Just because we were created by a necromancer, that does not define who we are. We three siblings are more than the arrays that animate us. So don’t you fucking dare throw every little bit of necrotic energy in our faces, as though we deserve every associated sin.”
For several seconds I simply glared at left head, ready and almost delighted to have a shouting match with the Kami. But the silence kept stretching. Even through my fury, I felt a strange unease as the eyes of all three heads looked at me.
“Oh, you dumb leech,” Glee transformed the left head’s disposition; I had never seen such a joyous duck before in my life. “Have we not informed you, delivered the truth from our own beaks unto you? Well, let me repeat it-”
“Peace,” The central head spoke with a voice that buzzed with life energy. Left head’s beak snapped shut underneath its force of will. To and Fro the River Wanders might soon lose its gathered power, but it had not lost it yet.
The central head looked at me, even as the anger fell away and just left confusion. “I do not believe further discussion will be profitable. We will retire and attempt to conserve as much energy as we can. Let me assure you, Chosen Tallum, the threat is very real. In twenty-three and a half hours, all we have managed to create here will be lost.”
To my surprise, it did not request my help in retrieving the Mantles. It simply examined me. When it opened its beak, all it said was. “Remember, every choice creates ripples. You cannot escape them.”
Then the Kami vanished.
My heart felt filled with mud. My shoulders rose and fell, as I alternated between confusion, aftershocks from my earlier rage, and finally a horrible frustration that had fully shattered the leisure of my second life.
“Brother,” Nightshade touched my shoulder with a snakehead. “Do not take this to heart.”
“I just…” I reached up and rubbed my head for a bit. Hard not to take it to heart, when the left head spewed bile upon me that was a thousand variations of ‘this is your fault’. And then the central head kept making ambiguous remarks about ripples. “How did this happen?”
“Whoever the thief was, its methodology is actually quite intriguing,” Old Oak rubbed his teddy bear hands together and pointed to the area in front of the map. As before, the former Kami seemed surprisingly cheery. “Look. Somehow, the thief was able to affix your Array to a small stretch of ground. Although the edges show a bit of wear, the raw demonstration of manipulation-”
I tuned out the rest of the Old Oak's words, but followed his excited pointings. One of the tortoiseshell tiles really had been pried out of the ground. The surging life energy had dimmed somewhat in the temple, so the mundane origins of the floor tiles were more obvious; no longer did the shell pieces glimmer like stars. But as I looked at the missing tile, my mood soured.
“So they are a walking isolation array now,” I growled.
“Tallum!”
Sage bound through the doorway, literally a breath of glittering and fresh air. She landed lightly beside me and wrapped me up immediately with serpent tails; I wondered why my siblings kept trying to comfort me with snake body parts. “Brother, I have heard your woe writ in the sky! I conferred with destiny and discovered that our labors are not yet done! But do not let the relentless negativity of existence drag you down. Minor trifles buzz around the great like flies. Yet we rise above.”
“Sage is correct, Chosen Tallum.” Violala clicked her mandibles. “The time limit is sharp, yet we will track down this foe with time to spare. They could not have fled far.”
“But with the isolation fields,” I glanced over at the missing tile. Their energy traces would be completely screened.
“It will work out,” Sage announced.
“How?” Nightshade asked, genuinely puzzled. I also appreciated his direct nature, because I didn’t want to loose any more of the negativity I felt circulating through me.
“Nightshade, that’s the sort of question a peasant asks,” Sage sighed. “For us? It will work out. If something blocks our path, you will shatter it. If some trickers foe attempts to outmaneuver us, I will catch and castrate them. If an enemy wishes to boast of its minor prestidigitation, Tallum will bury them in a sea of clay. Who can stop us? It’s that simple.”
“Your optimism is a credit to your character,” Old Oak nodded in approval.
Sage shrugged. “Pessimism will try to convince you that uncertainty implies the possibility of a negative result. Just because we don’t know what could stop us means its conceivable that some conspiracy could do it. Yet isn’t that nonsense? If we can’t even imagine a concrete possibility of failure, how could it exist?”
I blinked. I genuinely had no idea what to say to that. Yet very quickly, my negativity surged through my veins, curling up into my brain. I could practically feel the stress multiplying through me. But… if they have the isolation array, how will we track them? They might not have been able to go far, but-
“Tallum,” Nightshade said. He spoke, but most of his communication was jelly vibration.
‘I have your back, brother. I will smash your impediments.’
I laughed and sighed, both noises passing through me simultaneously. I looked again at the missing tortoise shell tile. My two siblings had descended from storied and glorious pasts, but that didn’t overturn my lifetime of disappointing experiences. Many my own fault, yes, but also many were just… mismatches between expectation and reality. This felt like reader comments, all over again. I worked and worked and worked, yet-
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My gaze wandered… until it locked onto a spot a short distance away. A white dust covered the ground. I blinked several times. The Kami hadn’t mourned its loss, but I hadn’t simply made a single isolation array. I had made two and the contents of the second were also gone.
For the first time, the tide of self-doubt parted. I learned this lesson in Old Oaks domain, didn’t I? Even if I cannot see the solution from the outside, just worrying about it accomplishes nothing. I need to look. I examine my surroundings to assemble the tools to affect the future. And just by looking-
“Okay, let’s track down our thief,” I said, staring at the blight dust left on the ground, right outside the location where the second isolate array sat. Because not only had our thief taken the Mantles, but also the Corrupted River Opal. With the entirety of its prize, the thief had skulked away. But while the necrotic energy wouldn’t leak out…
The world sensed the presence of corrupted energy that suffused the Isolation Array. For whatever reason, blight would be conjured nearby.
“Ah,” Sage sighed. “That’s the confident Tallum we know and love. To think, the day began with escorting common geckos, but will end in an execution!”
“Old Oak,” My jelly began to hum, even as I tried to discount Sage’s weird comments. “Can you remain here? Although the Mantles are gone-”
“Yes, I will keep this place free of further interference,” The teddy bear’s lip curled. “Actually, this reminds me-”
“Violala, come with us. Depending on the foe, your short-term agility will likely be an asset. We should leave as soon as possible.” My mind raced ahead. For a split second, I cut off my vision and focused on my energy sonar. If anything, the depletion of energy made my task more difficult. But my focused senses were able to pick out little bits of blight that had formed on the ground, specks of complete energy neutrality that would lead us right to the culprit. “Let’s move.”
Your Skill (Earned) Innate Mana Attunement has grown to Level 19.
We marched out of the temple into the mud field. I nodded to Mimi’s grave then paused again. Innate Mana Attunement interrogated the surroundings… mostly, I had to ignore all the blight I had purposefully created. The roads were giant lanes of nullity, where no energy existed. I felt a pang of panic; if the culprit had been smart enough to use the roads to escape, my newfound method would crumble.
I took a breath. I forced my mind to calm. I examined the area-- and sensed the bits of blight in the reeds, creating a trail that led South. The trail was thin, because of how quickly the thief had moved, but it would be enough.
“This way,” I announced. I took a step forward.
Your Skill (Earned) Detection has grown to Level 25(+30).
You stupid Skill, I get it, you want to prove you are useful too, I shook my head. Sure, sure, you are great-
I paused.
What if Detection… had actually been great this whole time?
Your Skill (Earned) Monster’s Wisdom has grown to Level 25(+36).
My countenance turned stony. With Innate Mana Attunement, I combed through the surroundings in more detail. I didn’t let a single stretch of mud or cluster of reeds pass without examination. And, sure enough, there was a small oval space into which no energy flowed, between the reeds. A perfect bubble of isolation.
I didn’t think. I conjured a bolt of clay.
Due to your actions, Launch Clay Proficiency +5.
“Gah!” A small tortoise fell out of the reed cluster, landing on its broad and flat back. It rolled back and forth for a second, unable to regain its balance. A reed sash across its thin chest bulged; my eyes narrowed as I felt the energy in the area stirring.
“Violala. Get it,” I said. Violala’s wings buzzed. My eyes blazed; this fool must have been stalking us this whole time, and poor Detection had been doing its best to warn me-
A split second later, I realized our foe wasn’t a tortoise, it just simply wore a small piece of shell as a backpack. It wriggled its way out of the bit of isolation array it carried, the sash across its chest jiggling as it straightened. I recognized the infuriating form of the gecko princess. “Hey, wait! Can’t we talk-”
Violala materialized before the gecko and chopped with a serrated foreleg. The gecko yelped but moved with noticeable dexterity. It waved a paw at the ground and mud shimmered. A half-dome shield wove itself into existence quickly enough to deflect the slash.
Violala hissed and jittered sideways around the shield, but let out a loud ‘oomph’ as she rushed around with such speed she smashed herself against an angled stake that had appeared right where she was moving. Both materials glistened with the geometric patterns of the gecko people and fractured upon impact, but they had served their purpose.
“So, about our negotiation-”
“Got you,” Sage crooned.
She drifted down through the air, her tails stretching out to create a cage directly above the gecko. The gecko princess looked up and gulped.
Sage’s tails umbrella’d out to completely screen the gecko. I saw the muscles of her limbs clench… but then stop. Sage let out a curse. She pulled back her tails, revealing a full dome of the pretty and fragile camay material. She made a fist with a serpent tail and cracked it open. But in that same moment, the gecko slithered out of the soft mud a short distance away. She had discarded the isolation array backpack, but still had the sash with the Mantles.
The gecko princess opened her mouth again but seemed to think better of it right before she spoke. Instead, she turned with preternatural quickness and fled. My follow-up clay bolt shot through the space her head had just vacated.
Your Skill (Earned) Unnatural Adrenaline Rush has grown to Level 10.
Your Skill (Earned) Minor Realm Step has grown to Level 18.
As the world slowed, I unleashed the full force of Mana to impact with the thrust of my overwhelming beaver thighs. In the area around the gecko princess, there was a slight thickening of the ambient energy; apparently, some small amount of the connection was maintained to the pilfered Mantles.
So as I stepped, I created those small Mana tears around me and dove, deeper and deeper, right into a rising presence of energy. I felt like a kid, rushing headlong from the shore into the ocean shallows, splashing and sizzling and ripping-
Uh, ripping?
Due to your actions, you have attempted to learn the Skill (Earned) Mana Tear. Warning, no Skill (Earned) Slots available.
A Notable Achievement: For such a blithe attitude about the Skill Limit, +15 Max Mana.
Luckily, the physical journey between my launch point and destination proceeded slowly as I was still under the effect of Unnatural Adrenaline Rush. Mana splashed out around me in waves as I impacted the denser energy and forced it aside. Small sparks of burning Mana flew were spat sideways.
I felt excitement at the strange Skill, a repeated frustration from not being able to learn it, and finally a cold apathy for the System’s rude notifications.
Then I smashed into a group of reeds and I forced those thoughts from my mind, in favor of pursuit.
“I will tear you to pieces!” Sage bellowed. Even as I dashed forward, bullrushing through the reeds, Sage skipped through the air above me at an even faster speed. Nightshade slithered behind, losing a bit in speed compared to Sage and I. We burst through the plants onto one of the areas I had cleared for roads. The gecko princess skittered forward, her tail flicking back and forth, heading North and East.
I felt a sinking feeling in my chest-- if we kept heading in this direction…
Sage growled as she landed next to me. “I will savor your misery… Three Tailed Reaping.”
Mud slapped my side as Sage erupted forward. The Gecko Princess let out a hiss and twisted sideways at the last second, displaying that same incredible speed. But despite that-
“You violent thug. You can’t just attack!” The Gecko Princess squawked, hurrying forward. But her severed tail tumbled through the air.
Sage chuckled and plucked the bleeding body part out of the air. “Like you cannot steal things? Worry not, cretin, I will carve life lessons into your scales, so at least you know remorse before oblivion takes you.”
In a horrible display of body horror, Sage absorbed the Gecko Princess’s tail right in front of the victim and grinned. The gecko's tail was minute, about a third of the size of all of Sage’s other tails, but it still made the Gecko Princess shudder before she skittered further away.
Sage! Grandstanding like this is villain nonsense! I screamed inwardly, even as I bound to catch up. If the Gecko Princess makes it only a little further-
We reached the end of the mud stretch I had cleared for a blight road; we stood at the edge of the spiderling web zone. And just to the side of that, a group of thirty geckos stood around, already creating the basis of a clay structure.
“Puppet!” The Gecko King said happily when he noticed our arrival.
The Gecko Queen frowned. “Look at the state of you! When will you learn the proper bearing of a lady?”
“MOM! We don’t have time for that! They are trying to kill me.” The Gecko Princess made it the last short distance to her fellow geckos. Panting, she moved next to her parents, spun around, and then pointed at us. “Ha! Now what, you fools! My armies will fight you to the death-”
Even though I felt tense, I felt the humming vibration from my siblings’ jelly. We all settled our resolve. To save the whole of the Kami’s domain, we would slaughter our new gecko allies.
“We surrender,” The Gecko King shook his head, sorrowfully. I blinked; almost amusingly, the Gecko Princess did the same as her father rounded on her. “Did you steal again? What have we told you about stealing?”
“She must be punished. Obviously, we would appreciate if her life is spared,” The Gecko Queen sniffed, even as most of the geckos in the area flowed to either side, creating a cleared path directly to the Gecko Princess. “But we understand if that is difficult. This fool girl must learn responsibility somehow. And clearly her father is too soft-hearted to do it.”
“Tallum, why don’t you do the honors,” Sage said beside me. I didn’t even have time to answer. Sage just lifted me, armored spine and tail meaning nothing to her high Stats, spun me around, and then flung me forward.
Your Skill (Earned) Unnatural Adrenaline Rush has grown to Level 11.
I had several stretched moments to consider my approach as I flew forward. I saw the Gecko Queen reaching forward and tugging the Gecko King aside, so he was out of the line of fire. I saw Gecko Princess staring at her parents, unable to believe the betrayal. Only belatedly did she seem to notice the threat, pivoting to look at me right as I arrived.
Unfortunately, I also had enough time for my empathy to stir. But an iron certainty rose in me. The Gecko Princess probably has had a… difficult life, with these parents. But that doesn’t mean she should be given a pass for trying to fuck up everything we’ve built here.
Perhaps inspired by the beaver I had fought most recently, or because Sage simply threw me so fast I couldn’t do much else, I curled into a ball and smashed directly into the Gecko Princess.
Your Skill (Species) Interstitial Body Structure has grown to Level 32.
Your Skill (Earned) Body Manipulation has grown to Level 25(+24).
Your Skill (Species) Interstitial Body Structure has grown to Level 33.
The Gecko Princess crumpled, smashed into the mud by the impact. Her sash burst, sending a glistening drop of water, a singular reed, and an obsidian leaf fluttering into the air. The corrupted river opal flew the farthest, tumbling over the half-built foundations of the geckos' home and sticking into the mud.
I staggered to my feet. First, I looked down at the Gecko Princess; I had clearly fractured one of her forelegs and probably did something similar to her ribs. She twitched on the ground, releasing a wheezing groan, tugging again on my empathy. For the moment, her life didn’t matter much. I studied the ground, scurrying back and forth to pick up all the pilfered Mantles.
I felt a vast sense of relief as I parted my flesh and set the Mantles inside of myself. A half hour ago, I was clogged with stress. Yet so quickly-
As I raised my gaze, I stilled. A grotesque monster had crawled out of the reeds on the far end of the clearing. Its body was that of an inflated tadpole, but half-formed legs twisted out of its slimy flesh, ending in stubby little fingers. Yet the most important fact was that its eyes blazed with necrotic energy.
A necrotic energy signature… that my instincts recognized.
Necretized Amphibian Zero Lvl 22
The half-grown toad who had seeded the undead plague, who had unleashed a horde upon the wetlands, who had weakened us enough that the stupid Gecko Princess could sneak in and cripple our Kami, gave me a long look. As though it felt the same kinship between us.
Your Skill (Earned) Innate Mana Attunement has grown to Level 20.
How… is that possible? I blinked several times. That necrotic energy… it’s mine?
A tongue shot forward and impacted the Corrupted River Opal. While I struggled to understand what my senses were telling me, the Amphibian Zero swallowed the prize. Its mouth unhinged and it gulped. Its body stretched to accommodate the stone, like a python with half a horse in its belly.
It’s flesh began to bubble.