However long it had been here, it had only ever known one thing about itself.
Simply that it was.
Whatever purpose it once existed for had long since eroded to nothing.
It was, and still is, and does not know if it will continue to be so for only a day more or for millennia more. It is not particularly intelligent, nor is it alive in any sense of its knowledge of life. It can feel and think, but it does not possess a soul. It knows what those are, and in fact some of the few things it knows how to do is touch souls. It reaches out, with tendrils of itself, to touch souls near it, for no other reason than it can, and has almost nothing else to do. Almost, because it can do exactly one other thing.
If a soul is not inhabiting a body, it can grab them, pull them closer to itself. It does not know if this actually does anything else, but they disappear when they get too close to it. It can touch the souls of those alive, and draw in and make disappear the ones that are not. Perhaps there is some reason or function in this, but if there is it does not know them.
In the time it has existed, it has continued to do this. There are those that reside near itself, which it reaches out to with its tendrils, and holds onto, out of curiosity and loneliness. There are those that die near itself, which it takes close, thinking that maybe one of the times it does so that it will understand the purpose of this act. It did try once to let someone near without reaching out to them, and disliked it.
For whatever reason, those it does not reach to do not come back, or else do not stay long. Some of them used to come and go frequently, others used to stay and leave rarely, some never leave until death. Those that stay with it until death, it feels no need to pull into itself, it does not fully understand the languages and concepts used by those it touches, but it does understand that it should not make disappear those souls that stayed with it when it was lonely.
It did try once grasping a soul of a dead one, and holding it, refusing to take it to itself, and tried to refuse letting it go wherever those souls go when it does not take them, but found that the longer it held onto it, the harder it became to continue its grasp, and eventually, it slipped away from its tendrils and went away.
Since then, it developed rules for itself. Those that stay with it for over a day, it touches and holds onto. Those that it did not touch before, it will grasp when they die. A simple system, a binary one. Those it wishes to hold onto, and those it would take into itself.
Recently, though, at least recent for its concept and perception of time, things have become more challenging for this binary system. It began when something unique had happened. For the first time in its existence, a soul had been created within itself. An individual it was holding had, from its perspective, given another individual a soul. Soon after, the first individual left, and brought back with it another. This was hardly unusual, it had found that when one of its held individuals brought back another individual, either the one brought or both of them would soon be dead. In that sense, what followed was also unusual.
The one that had been given a soul killed the giver, and as per its system, it did not take the giver’s soul into itself. Also unusual, the one brought was left alive, and as per rules, reached out a tendril to hold her after she had proven to be staying around. Since then, more people have died near it than ever before. Whereas in its long life, it was abandoned and lonely, and only a few would die near it, maybe three or four for every dozen visitors, but now, in such a short timeframe, dozens of visitors have died, and none of them stayed.
Instead of some coming and staying, more souls have been created, six new ones, to be precise, and it seems to it that the Given and the Brought no longer possess their individual souls, but instead have a shared one, for when it touches one, it can feel both. Now, its tendrils can ‘feel’ more things. In a dozen more individuals, something growing that it thinks will become a soul eventually. It wants to touch them, to hold them now, but knows it cannot until they have truly become souls.
Something also now clings to the Given and the Brought, they sometimes come very close to it. This is not unusual in itself, sometimes the Brought would get so close that the Brought could touch it, if they could reach through a few inches of stone. Now it is different, it is not just it trying to touch and hold onto them, but the Given and the Brought seem to want to touch it as well.
For reasons it does not know, the idea of being touched in the same way it touches the souls of others instills fear within it. Seldom does it feel anything other than the way it is, so fear being felt within makes it think that maybe, just maybe, there is something it can do to defend itself. Maybe the Given wishes to kill it, like the Given killed the Giver? Or perhaps it is something else?
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In its fear, it tries to wrap its tendrils around itself, tries to lash out with them, to do something, anything, but then it stops. It feels its tendrils on the Given and the Brought, and understands something. They bear it no ill will, they are just curious, as it was once curious. It is ok with that, even though it knows what will happen to it. It feels its tendrils receding, and it feels what those it grasped to itself must have felt, and it knows that it will disappear, the same as those souls had. It had expected its tendrils to recede, for something else to happen other than this feeling of impending nothing.
Yet, it is not afraid, and in its final moments, it experiences something akin to a moment of clarity and understanding. For the very first time, and indeed its last time, it has purpose, and knows it has had one all along, for this moment it is-
By consuming a dungeon’s Core, you have earned the title Core Eater
Due to the effects of your Worldheart title and Pactbound pact, both you and your bondmate Sera Eranda Eclir Luvil have gained the Curse Eater magical effect, the Worldheart blessing, and the Soul Tendrils active skill.
Vey stares at the notification he’d gotten the moment he and Sera touched the rock that was the source of those mana tendrils- soul tendrils, he corrects himself as he interprets the connection between ‘consuming’ and ‘gained’.
“Vey… What was that? What are these?” Sera’s voice is full of fear and confusion, and Vey turns to see what she means.
He spots it immediately, or at least, he’s not sure what else she could be referring to. He’d casted [Arcane Sight] for her as well, so that they could both see the same things, which is why Sera is pointing at the space in his chest, at the ball of magical energy that looks almost identical to the way that thing, the dungeon’s Core, had. Vey also sees one in Sera’s chest, where her heart ought to be, and the word Worldheart takes on a very, very different meaning.
“How exactly did touching it count as consuming… read the stuff we gained, maybe it has answers.” Vey offers his solution, but just as he begins reading the first line of Soul Tendrils, he hears a mental ‘ping’ noise, like a bell being struck, and turns. “Nevermind, the alarm at the cavern was tripped, we’ve got visitors. We need to move!”
--
Sera absently reads the entirety of each of the three things she gained from… whatever they just did as she jogs to her room while Vey heads up the stairs to the upper level before her. One of the three has worrying implications, one sounds very useful, one she’s not quite sure how to use at all, but none of that matters right now.
She grabs her longsword, hesitates for a moment when she spots three chips in the blade, and grabs a different sword instead. It’s almost identical, but is in better condition and doesn’t have the neat little design on the crossguard, but it will do for now. She also mentally prepares herself for a fight. She wasn’t expecting the alarms to be tripped, much less at night, but she supposes that they did also attack those soldiers at night because Sera thought they wouldn’t expect it, so it makes sense.
She starts up the stairs as fast as she can, and as she reaches the halfway point, she starts to hear it. Screaming. Not people screaming, but something else screaming, Vey’s skulls, no doubt, and by the gods do they make a lot of noise. She’s nowhere near them yet, but just being on the same floor as them she can hear them at the volume of a conversation going on a few feet in front of her.
Eventually, she opts to use her new [Protection from Energy] spell on herself, using it to grant her protection from Sonic damage, on the assumption that even if the screaming isn’t going to cause her any damage, she’d like to keep her hearing.
By the time she reaches Vey and Dragon squad, the Skrats are returning from the barracks room, and Vey looks and nods at her before leaning down to the small undead. While Vey… converses, somehow, with the Skrats, Sera opts to do the same with Dragon squad.
“Where’s Sheo squad?”
“Outside, gathering wood, as you ordered.” Woi responds, without saluting, though Sera can definitely tell he wanted to.
“Vey, I’m going to call Sheo squad in! Ter, Jyu, with me.” Sera points to the blue and red skeletons after informing Vey of her decision. She doesn’t get a response back from either Vey or the pair of melee fighters, but Vey not objecting and the two falling in line behind her are good enough for that.
She makes her way down the hall to the entry door, lets the pair each take one door while she waits in the middle for a clear path to exit the dungeon. She does her best to assure herself that Vey’s planning is sound, and that they’ve got at least half an hour or more before any invaders will be close enough to them to have to fight, but she’s still worried about Sheo squad enough to immediately yell out for them to return, without anything they’re carrying.
--
Soul Tendrils (Active)
The user can extend Soul Tendrils out from themself, the maximum number of tendrils is equal to the user’s hit die. These tendrils are invisible without magical detection, and have very limited effect on the physical world. Instead, these tendrils enable certain functionalities of other skills and effects.
Curse Eater (Magical Effect)
The user can consume the souls of others by absorbing them via Soul Tendrils. Consuming souls completely refills the user’s MP and restores 20% of their HP. This ability has a three hour cooldown, which doubles for each use within a week of a previous use.
Worldheart (Blessing)
This blessing amplifies the progress towards levels and evolutions(henceforth called Experience) of the holder. The holder can also share the amplified amount with others via Soul Tendrils. The amount of Experience shared is equal to what the holder would have received as a bonus.