[There are 29 Wayfinders in Ironside]
[There are 27 Wayfinders in Ironside]
Including Arthur and himself, that was 25 unknown Wayfinders- two had apparently died just as the Lotus mentioned it. Did they die together? How? Most Wayfinders were probably similar to him at this stage, only just starting out. That might not be right either though.
His first mission assigned him a month, but because of Erebus, he only had less than a day. How long did everyone else have?
[All powers earned by Wayfinders in their first mission were brought back]
He was, in fact, behind.
A brief thought later and he had been returned to his makeshift bedroom with materials in hand. The normal flow of fear energy into his Nightmare Seed resumed. It seemed that, unlike his blood energy, the uses of fear energy weren't as intuitive. All he knew was simply a passive refinement at the moment.
Silas spent a few hours in the room slowly circulating his blood energy and allowing it to nourish his body. They had only arrived at the Lower City at dawn, so it was barely midday at the moment. He reckoned the kids had finally fallen asleep, so he stood up and went back downstairs.
The Director wasn’t present, the figure at the dinner table instead being the young Sergeant Glass. Silas smiled as the two had a quick hug. His injuries had, for the most part, healed in the short time he’s been gone.
“They gave you all a nice place huh? Damn.” Glass laughed as he sat back down. Silas noticed he was no longer wearing his guardsman uniform.. His weapons were still present, however. “The Old Man told me to crash with you guys while the barracks gets sorted out, is that alright?”
“Obviously not. You snore.” Silas chuckled, moving to make himself another cup of coffee. He heard a distinct crack as he shattered the mug’s handle with a start. Glass was still going on and on about how he doesn’t snore when he saw the faint shimmer of red light flowing across Silas’ skin.
The Sergeant stuttered as he walked forward and grabbed Silas’ bleeding palm. A fragment of the handle had embedded itself within his skin. “You- you’re an Empyrean now? Hah! Finally! Fuck! I told you!”
Rolling his eyes yet again, Silas yanked his hand from the man and slowly pulled the mug shard from his palm. This was a good reminder at least that his strength had in fact increased. He just hated the satisfaction it gave Glass.
“All it means is you can’t slack off, or I’ll catch up before you can say Deium Oil.”
“Why would I say Deium Oil?”
Good point. He’ll pretend it wasn’t by walking away. Glass persisted however, following him while repeating his question, again and again. He only grew silent when Silas approached the kids room. Puzzled, Glass poked at his shoulder. “Aren’t they asleep?”
“Exactly.” Silas exhaled, stepping through the door and into the first floor bedroom as quietly as possible. The room was long and narrow, just wide enough for a single bed. That being said, the room was long enough for five beds in all. A toy chest was placed between a couple of the beds while the walls were covered in paintings of battles he didn’t recognize.
Lumped together on all the beds, the kids were all fast asleep. His heart ached when he saw some of them twitch or roll, expressions of discomfort on their face. Under Glass’ confused gaze, he summoned the Nightmare Seed and silently sent it into Caisus’ chest.
Just like before, the boy’s veins slowly turned the same purple blue colour. Caisus’ expression quickly eased and Silas focused on using the Seed to refine the boy’s nightmare. A few minutes later he felt the Seed flash and it exited Caisus’ chest on its own.
It felt bloated, filled with an abundance of not just fear energy but something else. Silas sat down and quickly began refining the energies within, his innate talent washing over the seed and drastically speeding up the process even as it siphoned off some energy for itself.
Half an hour passed by when the energies had finally been fully refined and the Nightmare Seed grew slightly larger. Then, he directed it towards another child and it disappeared into their chest just the same.
Glass watched the whole time from the corner and Silas could feel the small sense of distrust he had towards the process even as he was preoccupied. Only when Glass saw that he was actually helping the kids sleep did he relax, a sense of shame overcoming him.
Silas didn’t blame him.
He had only refined five nightmares when kids started waking up and Silas was quickly overwhelmed by an insistence on playing with them. Glass had long disappeared, leaving him to fend for himself amidst the onslaught of children.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
When the Director walked in, he was greeted by the sight of Silas building a fort with the children out of their mattresses in the living room, using chairs, tables and other random pieces of furniture as supports. They had long expanded their small fort into the kitchen too.
The kids all laughed and screamed, speaking of an attack on the fort by an old monster. Silas laughed as he did his best to leave the fort without destroying it, making his way to the kitchen with the old man.
“They’re so energetic?” The Director raised a brow, watching as some of the kids revealed themselves to be ‘monsters’ on his side to attack the fort. “I’ve become a monster, it seems.”
“A powerful one, apparently.”
“Quite.” With a grin, the old man set down his bag of various food items and got to work making dinner. Silas did his best to help as they discussed the situation of Ironside. He had apparently seen Old Isaac on his trip to the storehouse. The situation was grim. Few survivors had shown up in the few hours they’ve been there.
Hordes have slowly begun to create roadblocks on the streets leading out of the Lower City. People can still travel via rooftop or can get through by climbing through windows but any attempts to leave through the streets were met with conflict.
The intelligent mutants hadn’t been seen again and no attacks were actually made on the Lower City, but it did mean no more survivors could arrive safely. If anyone was left, they were holed up in their homes or somewhere relatively safe.
“Do they know who rang that bell? Saved our lives.” Silas asked as he diced a few pieces of beef for the stew. The few times he grazed his fingers, a flash of blood energy quickly closed the scratch.
“Not yet, but a few other survivors reported similar experiences in different parts of the city.” The Director shook his head, sighing. “Brave person though, that. Can’t imagine how difficult carrying a bell that size must be.”
“Especially how fast they must be moving with it. We only heard the bell once, so every time they rang it afterwards was rather far from us, no?”
Bribed by the stew, the orphans finally ceased their play time and lined up with their bowls for the meal. The two adults only took their share after the rest had gotten a more than lavish filing. Hours passed by, Silas sharing a drink with the old man until the kids finally wasted all the energy they had recuperated.
Bidding the Director good night, he stayed downstairs a little longer to refine a few more nightmares and get used to his blood energy. Only when his mind was exhausted did he head upstairs and go to bed himself.
When a whole day passed by without any events, Silas felt a little strange. The fog remained on every street, people requiring escorts by Empyreans to leave their assigned residences but most people simply remained indoors, making the outside feel lifeless.
Silas simply spent the day inside, entertaining the kids. More than a few of them wanted to see the Nightmare Seed so he was forced to repeatedly bring it out just to calm them down. Magic, they called it. Wasn’t entirely wrong.
Caisus though simply remained attached to him by the hip. Whenever Silas sat down, Caisus sat down next to him. When he got up, Caisus got up too. When he meditated in his room, Caisus meditated outside his door. He was reminded of the Director’s joke nickname for Caisus- Little Albrecht.
Nonetheless, Silas felt a distinct improvement in both his Nightmare Seed and his blood energy after just a day. His body quickly acclimated to the First Gate and the Seed was quickly growing with every refinement of a nightmare. It didn’t take him long to wonder if it was meant to be this fast.
[No. You are in a unique position as the sole Nightweaver]
“Why’s that?” Silas quickly finished refining the last nightmare of the night, meaning to head upstairs and circulate some blood energy to finish the night. He was slowly getting used to the Lotus intruding upon his thoughts.
[In a World of Nightweavers, there aren’t enough nightmares for everyone]
[Right now, you lack competition for both fear energy and nightmares]
The Lotus’ words made sense. In Erebus’ world, fear energy was probably diluted and split amongst all the Nightweavers present, whereas he was probably the only one in his world. He could consume it all with reckless abandon.
When two days had passed, his Nightmare Seed reached the Adolescent Stage and doubled in size, now looking more like an eerie crystal. It’s veins of energy pulsed with life and a bizarre feeling of spirituality. It almost felt like something was looking back at him. Was it? It was a split piece of his soul, after all.
He also began to refine his Second Gate, slowly wearing away at the white canine tooth with his blood energy and using it to batter the gate over and over again. This time the gate was in his right shoulder, creating a strange numbness every time he cultivated. Luckily, the book said this was normal.
The Second Gate finally opened on the third day, directly doubling his blood energy. Its current grew stronger as it flowed across his body, growing in strength with the increased space to flow. At the same time, Silas received a message saying two more Wayfinders died, bringing the count to 25.
Yet Silas didn’t like the relative peace and quiet. As the third day passed by and he found himself falling asleep yet again in this lively Villa, a gnawing feeling slowly ate away at his heart. The first half a day of the Darktide was life threatening. Mutants hiding in the fog to kill any and all they could. Some even had intelligence.
Yet, now, three days later..
Nothing.
If Silas hadn’t had a Nightmare Seed protecting his dreams, he’d bet ten silver it would only be nightmares coming to him in his sleep every night. Mutants flowing from alleys with nothing but wrath and gluttony in their eyes, their claws reaching for his heart with every chance they get.
As he fell asleep, thinking of how they’d tear him apart, he realised he didn’t need the nightmares in his sleep. He had a perfectly good one in reality.
When Silas woke up, the gnawing feeling in his chest was gone. It was as if everything in the world suddenly became right overnight. As it should be. He almost heaved a sigh of relief as he stood up and stretched, looking out the window with a smile. Then he heard the sound of iron scraping against cobblestone.