About halfway through his flight over the camp, Felix spotted movement. One of the awnings next to the building in the center was lifted revealing some kind of device surrounded by a group of Devoured. Before Felix could decide whether he wanted to get a closer look, the device glowed slightly then released a loud booming noise accompanied by a massive stream of pink gas firing directly towards his light. The stream missed him by a dozen or so meters but, being a gas, it spread out quickly. Felix accelerated to keep himself ahead of it but the Devoured compensated for that by firing the gas far ahead of the light in the hopes that it would fly into it. Unfortunately, they ended up firing it directly on and around Felix himself.

As soon as the edge of the gas cloud touched his robes, Felix heard a sound that resembled an odd combination of a fire burning and something sizzling in a hot pan. The gas quickly spread around him and filled his nose with the smell of burning pepper. Felix accelerated as fast as he could out of the gas but it was too late, it had spread itself completely around him. It burned at his exposed skin forcing him to close his eyes and slowly wormed it's way beneath his robes. It was like cutting onions but taken to the extreme. With his eyes shut, Felix flew using his memory alone and shot himself in a random direction with the only thought to get far away as fast as possible so he could recover.

After just a few seconds of flying, the gas had eaten though most of the upper layers of skin on his face. He was pretty sure blood would start seeping through his skin if he didn't get rid of it soon so Felix mentally checked his map and launched himself towards the center of the kingdom. He didn't bother checking his health because he knew it would only stress him further and wouldn't provide any useful information he didn't already have. He either made it to the lake or he didn't, knowing how fast his health was declining wouldn't change that fact. As he got closer, Felix knew he had to lower himself close to the ground so he didn't attract the attention of the flying Devoured around the castle. Unfortunately, with his eyes in the process of burning, Felix had no idea how high up he was from the ground.

Felix had dropped his Mana Shield earlier, mostly out of shock, so he recreated it and placed it in front of him as he flew. He made the shield as big as he could and lowered it a few meters below and in front of him. Finally, he slowly descended waiting for his shield to start hitting things. As soon as it did, he would rise back up a little bit. While Felix thought it was a solid idea in theory, he didn't actually check his map again so he didn't descend fast enough. The first thing the shield hit was a large solid object followed shortly by Felix himself as he had lost concentration. The impact was enough to daze him which dissipated his force spells and caused him to plummet downwards.

Felix caught himself with Feather Fall but allowed himself to fall when he checked his map. The solid object he had hit was the cliff face around the castle which placed him right above the lake. After a few agonizing moments of Felix's everything being eaten by an unknown substance, Felix dropped the Feather Fall spell and allowed himself to fall into the water. He knew it wasn't safe to blindly jump into water incase there were rocks near the surface, but at the moment he didn't care. He decided that a fall probably wouldn't kill him and it was the fastest way to get into the water.

Luckily the water was plenty deep where he landed and he immediately flailed about trying to get as much of the acidic compound washed off of him as possible. He quickly cast a force spell behind him to push himself away from the water he had just soiled and into fresher waters. It took him a little while to get it all off and even then he wasn't sure it was all gone as he still felt like his skin was burning all over. He swam to the surface and opened his eyes but he couldn't see anything. At first he thought he was blind but then he realized there was no light down here so he fired off a Light spell above him. Then he realized he really was blind, but took comfort in the belief that it should be temporary.

Felix held his breath and began meditating in the water in hopes that it was safer than meditating on land while blind. It took Felix almost an hour to fully regenerate his health and finally be rid of the burning sensation plaguing every crevice of his body. Once he was ready, he ascended back to the surface of the lake and opened his eyes along with casting a quick Light spell and sighed in relief as his dull surroundings became clear to him once more.

Only partially fueled by rage, Felix prepared himself to assault the encampment. He flew back towards the encampment and lowered himself to the ground stealthily creeping towards it for the last few kilometers. His plan was to do what he had done before and take out the guards on rotation then punch holes in the wall. Except this time, he would take out the walls entirely then lay siege to the contents. Luckily anything of particular value, including the seal if it was in there, would easily survive.

Felix chose his targets and waited for them to be right in the middle of their route then grabbed their attention. As he expected, they immediately chased him away from the camp. The shield bearer lifted his shield and slowly approached with the two spearmen on either side. Felix pulled out his axe and took one step towards them then stopped as he heard the sound of a horn bellow out from behind the shield bearer. As soon as the sound was released, the trio ran backwards.

What in the hell…

Felix chased after them and almost reached them before he spotted a group of five Devoured on his left. Quickly looking around, Felix saw Devoured a few hundred meters to his right and a couple a hundred meters behind him as well.

Son of a…

Felix turned to the Devoured closest to him, the ones on his left and used a force spell to hold them mostly still while he ripped through them with the axe. He didn't have time to finish off the wriggling remains of their corpses so instead he leapt over them and ran. Felix ran a few hundred meters and spotted more Devoured pouring out of every nook and cranny around him, some of them well equipped, others not at all.

He continued to push through every passage with the least number of Devoured but soon enough he found himself surrounded by Devoured. These ones all wore uniform equipment that was similar in quality to the guards around the camp. Felix tried to push through the closest ones but found that these ones refused to engage with him and instead backed off and poked him with the tips of their spears.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

As soon as he leapt at a group of them, they would scatter in different directions, making it impossible to kill more than one of them at once without spells. Even with force spells grouping them together, the number of Devoured around Felix just kept growing as he couldn't kill them fast enough. Felix refused to give up though and continued to chew through the Devoured as fast as he could. Whether by chance or some greater scheme, Felix ended up pushing through the buildings towards the flat, open area surrounding the encampment. Looking around, Felix saw Devoured in every direction closing in on him. They weren't actually attacking him though, instead they seemed to be more focused on keeping him from running away.

Looking towards the encampment, Felix though about running into it because it would likely be better than where he was now but quickly decided against it. The draw bridge was lowered and with synchronized steps, an endless stream of Devoured in full sets of armor with various weapons poured out.

He thought about flying out of the area but there were already multiple streams of pink gas pouring out above and in every direction around him. Before he had only come into contact with the dissipate edges of the cloud, if he flew out, he would have to fly through a thick concentration of the stuff. Right as Felix began preparing wind spells to keep the gas away, he spotted a Devoured wearing a collared shirt and an apron riding a muscular dinosaur ride out of the encampment. The reason he dropped the wind spells though, was that he could finally sense another seal coming from the Devoured, or the mount, he wasn't exactly sure.

The Devoured around him moved into formation as the mounted Devoured approached, arranging themselves into an isometric grid of pointy spears in every direction around him. They split themselves and raised their spears to allow the mounted Devoured through as they rode up to Felix, stopping just a few dozen meters in front of him.

"Finally. So you're the rodent that's been harassing my troops. Were you working alone? Who sent you? Are you simply the scouting party preparing for a larger attack?"

Felix, dumbfounded, didn't speak for almost a minute before responding incredulously, "You can speak?"

"What a stupid question, I'm doing so right now, aren't I? Of course I can speak," They shook their head "why wouldn't I be able to? I am Atheldem, Second General of the Kroterran army and head of the special implements legion. Surrender to me now and I will kill you before extracting information."

There are just so damn many of these stupid things. I could probably get away but how the hell do I get the stupid seal? This General has an actual army that he seems to be able to control and I can't really use spells to kill them. Using the axe, I'd sooner kill myself than make any tangible progress.

Felix planned on just leaving and coming back with an actual plan now that he had a better idea of the camps forces. He held hope in the back of his mind though that either he or Grim would come up with something, unfortunately both Grim and his own mind were completely silent. Before he could start preparing his escape, his right hand began vibrating. Looking down, the axe he held started to show tiny hairline cracks all along it's head. He wouldn't have noticed them at all if they weren't glowing. Luckily it seemed the glow was faint enough that the Devoured hadn't quite noticed it yet. Felix felt a nudge from the axe in a similar manner to how Nova might get his attention.

What the hell.

Looks like the axe is ready to bond.

Do I just offer it a soul seed?

Yep. Exactly the same way you did with me. It may or may not offer one in return, usually not with items. Remember the Kryptos Repository?

Yeah. This one just seems… different for some reason.

Reaching into his soul, Felix quickly grabbed a piece and offered it to the axe through his hand. The axe immediately sucked it in and the cracks along it's head began spreading. Looking around, Felix started preparing force spells to get himself out of here. Even though it had been less than a second since the General had given his generous offer, Felix could see them getting antsy.

Suddenly, the axe exploded, it's black encrusted surface and metal blade having been completely replaced by an ethereal blue material in the exact same shape. The shaft followed suit leaving behind just a small portion still wrapped in leather. The entire thing gave off a faint blue glow and tiny tendrils of pitch black shadow poured out of the blade and into the air above it.

The general scoffed and the surrounding Devoured closed in on Felix. He prepared his flight spell and hoisted the axe ready to cut himself an opening but instead almost threw the axe over his own head. The ridiculous weight he was so used to with the axe was completely gone, now it was lighter than he would have expected something of it's size to be.

That is a very welcome change. I guess it won't do as much damage now though.

Felix readjusted the axe and leapt forwards into the Devoured in front of him. As he swung, the axe felt like it grew in weight adding force to his strike and effectively ripping through the Devoured in front of him.

Nevermind.

It took him a few strikes to get used to it and it definitely made the axe more usable. He was no longer gnawing away at his own health just to swing it. He also found, through incessant prompting from the axe, that he could will the weight to increase when he needed it to, which could make it as heavy as it used to be, and more.

While the axe bonding with him had improved how quickly, and safely, he could slaughter the Devoured, Felix knew it wasn't nearly enough. He was ripping through their ranks just fast enough to keep a small empty space around him, but nothing more. If it weren't for the piles of corpses in his wake, he would assume he wasn't making any progress at all. Once again though, the axe nudged him, this time pulling on his mana. It couldn't actually pull the mana out of Felix without his permission, but it was definitely making it's desire known. Felix accepted and shoved as much mana as he could into the axe then continued to cleave his way through the Devoured.

Hearing a sound that scared him, Felix spun around and saw a man made entirely of shadow standing a few meters behind him, between him and the Devoured's front lines. The man held an identical blue ethereal great axe except his was slightly translucent. A Devoured rushed at Felix from the left so he quickly dispatched it with a flick of the axe and the shadow man in front of him perfectly mirrored his movements.

Holy shit…

Felix spun around, swinging the axe through the Devoured behind him, peering over his shoulder to watch the shadow man perfectly replicate his movements. The shadow man ended up mostly missing, just barely scratching a couple of the Devoured behind him. The axe pulled on Felix's mana again and this time he excitedly provided. Swinging his head around, Felix spotted another shadow man, just like the first, standing a few meters away. He tried providing more mana and although the axe accepted the mana, no more shadow men appeared around him.

I can work with this…

Felix turned back to the Devoured in front of him and took a step forwards while spinning the axe around himself. He figured this was the most likely to be able to hit the most Devoured, for all three of them at once. Felix continued to push into the Devoured army, more to get the shadow men in range than himself as the Devoured seemed to be backing away from them. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .