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Fragments of Self
Elusive trust and sudden invasion

Elusive trust and sudden invasion

As I finish getting ready, I put my jacket on and an idea dawns on me, my power seems to be limited to my imagination, so what if I plant a flame to listen and watch what happens in my room while I'm gone?

I extend my right hand and open my palm, the fire spews from my knuckles and bends itself into my palm from the sides of my hand, and I form it in the shape of a human, before placing it down I check to see if the creature burns with my left, the heat emanated from it is low enough to feel soothing instead of intense and burning.

With that, I place the fire spy on top of a shelf behind the vase of a flower and I check to see if it works by making some hand gestures in front of it humming and clearing my throat, then I absorb the humanoid person through my right hand.

My mind replays the memories of the humanoid, seeing what I have done, myself making those hand gestures and the sounds, seems that my power indeed is limited to my imagination, no wonder why the void would want such a potent power... I wonder why I was given this power in the first place, with the amount of flexibility this power has, with the right user this should be catastrophic...

I shake my head, I have to go now and do what Jathorn asked of me before meeting up with Laven.

I begin walking towards the door after making another humanoid for safety and then leave, when I go down to the stairs, this time I don't use Jathorn's apparatus but my fire, I jump onto the stair's border and slide down as I use my right hand to make my feet into fire skates and make myself a fire tail to work with the balance, about midway down I lose my balance and fall off the border towards the left where only a gaping long hole awaits, with this new opportunity I use my power to make a solid and long flame staff that I then extend while holding it horizontally which stops my fall.

I use my hands to approach the stairs and hop on them, swiping the sweat off my forehead from the sudden possibly almost death encounter.

that was a bit risky but I have to know how to use my powers at their fullest potential, I'm more than sure that sooner or later something will come after me for them, especially now that I forgot how to use them properly.

I put my left hand over my face as I sigh, then I continue walking letting my left hand go at ease, shortly after I reach the bottom.

Seems I fell quite a bit if I were to think more while falling I would have hit the ground, nice save me.

I then walk out and look around, noticing Jathorn in the distance by the Upbringing fields. I walk down the same path I have yesterday, taking in the smell of food, I notice by a house that people were cooking outside by a campfire, it smells good. I take my eyes from them and continue down the path, without much time passing I arrive and shout to Jathorn as I approach him

"Jathorn!"

Jathorn turns towards me and cracks a smile

"There you are, I was just about to come after you, took you a while to get ready I suppose?"

before I could talk he interrupts me

"eh, it is natural, after all, you took your time to think about what you learned so far of this world. Now follow me, we have some defenses to strengthen and not much time, scouts have already spotted Vanta spots forming close to the light beacon and I fear an attack is imminent"

it feels like just 2 or 3 days have passed but in reality, from what Jathorn told me, more than a week has gone by, I suppose the void was getting ready for an attack ever since.

"I suppose the void is serious about getting their hands on me?"

Jathorn nods his head.

"Indeed, that's why I need you to reinforce our defenses, enough talking, let us not waste more time"

Jathorn begins walking through the trees behind the Upbringing fields, I follow him from behind into the orchard of vermilion trees, some of which host golden fruits. Jathorn must have noticed me for he draws my attention

"Here, catch!"

Jathorn throws me a golden apple from one of the Vermilion trees.

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"try them, my favorites from the Vermilion trees are a fruit similar to grapes, ill get some for you after we are done"

I take a bite from the golden apple, it has soft flesh, my teeth sink into the apple without much effort and the taste that encompasses my tongue is that of a regular apple but its potency increased to the maximum, it's almost like eating ambrosia, the taste is simply delicious!

Looking down at the bite in the apple I notice its exposed flesh, the color surprises me, it is much the same as that of the leaves on the trees... its Vermilion, no, Crimson-like blood color, and the juice from its flesh follows the same thematic, dripping down my left hand as if I were holding someone's heart, not to mention the white fibers within its vermilion flesh that make it look like raw steak, What a morbidly delicious fruit.

I continue following Jathorn as I eat the apple, somehow not disgusted by its morbid appearance of it. we soon walk out of the orchard to a wall with intricate details engraved into it

"We are here, Xavier, we will first replenish the outside and then the inside and no we can't go after the one inside first, we would have to do a detour to the other walls.

I suppose people kept asking about this often for him to go straight for that way on approaching this

"Alright, to the outside we shall go then, lead the way Jathorn"

Jathorn takes no time to respond and does as I said, he takes me to a part of the engraved wall that looks like a doorway with a hole in the middle. He places a sigil into the hole which makes the doorway open up.

"Etheral the way magic works, wouldn't you say, Xavier?"

I nod and follow Jathorn out of the boundaries of the wall, we then walk for a while where we reach a sort of tower engraving in the outer wall where Jathorn stops

"This is where you come in, Xavier. See that tower engravement? it represents the Light Beacons protection and at the same time acts as a magical protection barrier powered by people who hold powers much like yours for you see, Xavier, you are not the only one whit such powers, you are one of many Light beacons across the world. We have lost the white beacon dreamer, Harko, and so we will need you to reinforce this barrier for us due to their disappearance."

Huh? But I haven't seen a hand like mine from Harko... and what does he mean by other Ligh Beacons? am I a leader or something similar to another beacon? then what am I doing here? if I am of high importance to another beacon why am I not there?

"others like me? other light beacons? just what role are those with similar power to mine to these beacons? shouldn't I be at the blue beacon?"

Jathorn shakes his head

"You think too much, Xavier, I have told you this a few times already and I will not repeat myself, some questions I cannot answer for you. Dare you to attempt to force me and I will suppress you"

Is that a threat from who I'm supposed to trust?

"A threat? Why do you keep this information to yourself and then threaten me with suppression if I don't do as you say? Don't you see how your words leak trust?"

Jathorn closes his eyes and sighs as his expression cuts from normal to annoyed

"Listen, Xavier, I know it's hard for you to believe me when I'm not telling you what you want to know but it is either I tell you that, and the void gets access to every bit of knowledge you have owned in the past or you shut your fucking mouth and help."

I raise my eyebrow

"What are you insinuating?"

Jathorn puts his right hand over his right eye in annoyance

"The more you know of your past and the more you know of who you used to be, the more the void will be able to learn. How you may ask? Simple. Think of your memory fragments like well-guarded safes with a lot of locks on them, now every time you learn something about the past imagine a lock falling off. That's how the void knows soo much."

So the void fragmented my mind to learn how to get an upper hand against the light beacons.... if what he is saying is true then me learning about my powers must've been the reason why the void is already on its way here?

"So you're telling me that learning what I used to know makes the void smarter?"

Jathorn nods as he puts his hand back at ease

"Indeed, that is exactly what the void wants, for you see, more often than not people begin to tell those under fragmentation about their past and the void quickly gains access to valuable information. Essentially it incapacitates a person and gains knowledge fast, this leaves them a perfect window to strike back with usually a high threat target, such as yourself, removed."

Jathorn points to that tower engravement on the wall

"Now do as I have instructed, what I've told you already weakened the strength of a memory fragment. This time think of fueling a core that once activated turns into a shield that can connect to other cores"

I nod to him closing my eyes and thinking of a round-shaped core with pertusions on the side allowing connection from other cores, with its main purpose of being activated as a shield that once connected to the others, turns into a full bubble both upwards and downwards.

The fire from my right hand sews a hexagonal-shaped core in my hand unlike my imagination, weird, at least it still has the protrusions from the sides.

Jathorn casually picks up the hexagonal core and places it within the towers gaping hole which then begins to resemble the Light Beacon.

Jathorn then attempts to punch the wall which forms a shield

"Good, this will do, well done"

Jathorn continues moving alongside the wall, the exterior of the Light Beacons walls is much darker even though it's day outside, it's as if there is a fog of darkness cast upon the land, it does look like the Light Beacon is making this darkness less potent to the point of allowing sight outside of the beacon though.

"Curious how darkness still prevails in this world, wouldn't you say Xavier?"

Before responding to his question, I notice a pure dark spot among the trees outside the beacons walls

"Jathorn! Look there!"

I point my hand toward what looks to be a vanta spot

"Is that what I think it is Jathorn?"

Jathorn runs as soon as he notices the Vanta spot

"Run! We have to set up these defenses pronto!"

I follow Jathorn running in the same direction

"Xavier! Make seven more cores and throw four of them over the wall!"

"Got it!"

without much time to think I do as he says, making four cores and throwing them over the wall.

Jathorn jumps on the wall leaving behind a red dust trail.

"Continue running in that direction until you find the next tower engravement! ill be with you soon! I need to instruct people to hurry with the cores!"

I continue running using my fire to enhance my speed, making myself fire wings so that every flap creates combustions that boost my speed.

More of those Vanta spots spread amongst the forest, slower than me but just about fast enough that if I stop they would pass me and the defenses, so I keep flying with my wings as fast as I could.

Soon in the midst of the race against the void, another one of those towers pops into view, I make a core that homes into that slot and throw it, thankfully the homing ability works and it slots itself, connecting with the other core Jathorn planted before me.

Jathorn pops into view as he jumps off the wall

"Good job! 2 more left! I have instructed others to wait for my signal on the last internal defense core so we are good to go!"

I nod my head and continue my flying around the walls, Jathorn keeps up by running leaving behind a cloud of red dust with every step. Today seems like it will cut from a work day to a battle, this will get messy.