Everyone stared at Merrick for a few moments. Tristan was smug, he knew what he was doing, kind of. Helen and Tris looked on with confusion they had no idea what was happening. Shadow Fist and Elder River with shock. Tristan was not aware that his father knew Merrick.
“Son,” Elder River said hesitantly, “you’re alive.”
Tristan rolled his eyes. They had used a medical stasis artifact on the man. It was only due to a lack of knowledge that he hadn’t been brought back sooner. Tristan was ninety-nine percent sure that somewhere within the healing artifact stash of the head family was something to stop blood loss.
Couple that with a healing artifact and even with the tier difference, the injury should’ve been healable.
The only thing they couldn’t have known was that an essence reservoir could subsidize the body’s reliance on essence until the kern could supply it. Not that they could have known, the temple would’ve just had to have shared the knowledge on how to harvest them. They kept that secret as a religious funeral ritual for any elemental they came across. So, anyone with a proper education on forces and essence could have brought him back.
Tristan couldn’t blame them for the lack of education. He had a tier five alchemist and a tier fifteen soul tool teach him quite a bit that wasn’t available to the common man or even the elders. If the Caldera survived this war and defeated the Lord of the Underworld there would be a new golden age in the Caldera.
Merrick looked at his father uncertainly, “am I not supposed to be alive? And who are all these other people, none of them look like the healers that I’m aware of?”
“You were dead, “ Elder River said, “this young man brought you back. “
Tristan got a bad premonition.
Elder River continued, “He is a silver devil and apparently has necromantic powers.”
Tristan groaned.
Little Tris tugged at Shadow Fist’s arm, “Dad what is a neck romantic?“
Shadow Fist smiled, “it is somebody who can do special things with dead bodies.”
“I am not a necromancer, “ Tristan huffed, “ now can we get back to sealing up Shadow Fist’s kern?”
Merrick blinked several times, “Helen, you have a girl? I could swear you had a little boy.”
Shadow Fist looked uncertainly at Tristan. He wondered how his father would get around this one. Continuing the charade no longer had any value. The Temple’s influence was massively crippled, and the laws of the Caldera had little authority.
Shadow Fist shrugged noncommittally. Helen slapped him in the back of the head, “This is our second child, uh Tristan,” She pointed at her son, “That is our son,”
“Who is also called Tristan?” Merrick asked slowly, he looked Tristan up and down, “How long was I, uh… Where is Laura?”
Elder River grimaced, “Your wife is dead, she couldn’t handle losing you,” he looked over at Tristan. He set the Abyssal Chalice on the end table, “Do what you need to with the chalice, I need to talk with my son. Many old wounds will be fresh for him.”
Tristan nodded, “Take as much time as you need. I’ll be heading back to the Lake Caldera after this, if you have any messages for Elder Lake or Siren let me know before I leave.”
Elder River led his son out. Merrick looked to be in shock. Tristan couldn’t understand what he was going through, one day he was fighting mythical beasts to protect his home, the next he woke up to find out the people he fought for were dead. Just because he couldn’t understand it did not mean he didn’t pity the man.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“So what’s this about sealing my kern?” Shadow Fist asked. He sounded more inquisitive than fearful. His dark kern was not his most potent ability, his ability to motivate and win over the common man was. That made the River Caldera a surprisingly good place to dump him. Not many common men to win over.
Tristan shrugged, “You’re not important enough for me to deal with, but you’re also too important for me to let Blacklake’s people slice you up for info.”
Shadow Fist’s face paled a little. Evidently, he knew Blacklake. It should not have come as a surprise, they basically had the same job. Shadow Fist just did more with propaganda than murder while Blacklake was the opposite.
Tristan pushed aside the family drama. This soul tool should be bound to the one who possessed it, however it was designed to be used by six individuals. No five, the Grass Caldera was a recent addition within the last two decades. How could that be? Tristan had little knowledge of artifact design, to the point that he called true artifacts formed upon a person's death, reservoir imbued tools, and soul tools all artifacts. However, he was sure that artifacts were not designed to have multiple kerns interacting with them.
Not knowing what else to do, he decided to be a good silver devil and force some answers out of an old man. He walked over to Elder Plain and picked him up by his collar. The old man was so thin that his extra weight barely registered. Drawing his knife, Tristan sliced the helmet off the elder’s face.
Elder Plain spat out the piece of seat cushion, “I will have you skinned alive for this-“
Slap!
Tristan sighed, “You are under a terrible misconception. You will die today if you don’t cooperate, you are responsible for the deaths of nearly twenty thousand people,” Tristan slapped the man as he tried to speak, “I don’t care if it hasn’t been proven in the nonexistent wartime courts. Before you think the information you have is valuable, remember Elder River will be back in here within the next few hours and he can tell me what you know.”
Shadow Fist nodded approvingly. That more than anything else made Tristan consider that he might be going a little too far. Had power gotten to his head? He was treating violence as his first option. Elder Plain certainly deserved it, but Tristan was not looking to get justice, he simply wanted to waste less time.
Conni was right. He was prone to selfishness and anger. He was fine with working with Hadrid, and that man was the criminal overlord of the Caldera, so he could not even hold the moral high ground over Elder River. Of course, he would not tell the now pale Elder Plain these thoughts. Frosty and Dusty had followed their lord out and he was now alone in a room surrounded by a silver devil and his family.
Tristan smiled, it was fake, his enjoyment of suppressing the man had faded, “Tell me, how does the Abyssal Chalice function?”
Elder Plain flinched, but he answered, “It is simple, any of the grand ancestor's descendants can use it. Fill it with essence and he will be able to answer.”
Tristan frowned, “How does that pertain to the current dilemma of sealing away Shadow Fist’s kern?”
“The essence is not used, only stored in a different area. That is why we have the sifting, the grand ancestor takes some essence and can tell us your kern and potential,” Elder Plain was nearly in tears. It seemed that the threats were having an effect, “The reason why we need three or more Elders is the essence won’t be released until more is put into the chalice than it can hold. Though only a descendant of the grand ancestor can complete the process and release the essence.”
Tristan tried to wrap his mind around that. The soul tool was like a bucket, but it stored essence instead of water, the grand ancestor would only awaken when one of his descendants topped the bucket up. Vulcan had said soul tools all eventually went insane, they were immortal beings with a very specific purpose. Eventually, that purpose would pass away or be completed, the grand ancestor had dodged insanity with a type of sleep state.
Being woken up a few times a year would stop his mind from decaying at a noticeable pace. Once his line died out, he would just never wake up, becoming nothing more than a super sturdy cup that could be summoned and dismissed. As to how he could do this, Tristan could think of a few forces. Encroachment was the one he wanted Siren to get as it was all about moving things around without passing through the intervening space. Emptiness, it would be able to store a person's kern, though it contradicted the image of a full cup.
He thought back to his experience. The black spear looked exactly like Siren’s cohesion. There was a very real damage that it inflicted, but it was nothing like what a spear would inflict. He had coughed up blood but had no hole poked in his chest. Mentally he ran through the list of forces he had memorized in the book that would cause that effect.
He had nothing else to read, so he had read each of the three books dozens of times. The biology one was boring, so he hadn’t done much with it, but ‘Collecting and Transferring Essence’ and ‘Natural Forces’ were fascinating so he read them many times. For educational purposes, of course, it wasn’t because he wanted to make a glowing lightning sword that would destroy his enemies.
Parasitism or possession were the only two forces that came to mind. Neither sounded nice. Both would allow the grand ancestor to take things, especially from a defenseless tier zero child. Vulcan had shown the ability to shut down Tristan’s essence before. Eve had described it like a god had entered the room for a moment, while the grand ancestor was weaker than that, he would still match the Lord of the Underworld. Within a vision, this soul tool had ripped a piece of Tristan out, he was not sure how to feel about that. The zealots in the temple would have killed him otherwise, but it still sucked.
It also explained why the lung hadn’t truly healed until he received a force that could literally replace body parts. He turned to his father, he had a force, but if anything it would make the chalice more effective. The last thing a person should do is inject a parasite full of consumption.
“Alright, start pushing essence in,” Tristan told his father. The cup was empty right now and would be able to store all of Shadow Fist’s essence. Once Elder River returned, he would take the chalice with him and pass it off to Siren or someone else he could trust. He did not want Shadow Fist to think he could just kill Elder River, take the chalice, and take over the River Caldera.
Shadow Fist sighed, before placing his forearm up to the chalice. Once the cup was halfway full of essence, he shuddered and stepped back. He looked like he wanted to vomit.
“Good, now to make you harmless,” Tristan said.
“What, I’m already harmless.” Shadow Fist complained.
Tristan nodded, “Yes, for a person with a tier four physique. Those hand restraints would be weighing you down more if you had lost it.”
Shadow Fist went home that day with his ankles restrained as well. He complained the whole way.