It was early evening by the time the party climbed out of the cave. The sun felt like the embrace of an old friend, the gentle breeze brought their first breaths of fresh air in hours, and the beautiful meadow was a welcome relief from the dark and depressing cave. Titus was the first to collapse into a seat on the ground, his armor clanking as he let his weight fall. Iris promptly followed, and Victoria shrugged and joined them in their rest. Autumn was about to join as well, before seeming to change her mind and run off into the grass to forage.
"We should really head back to the lodge," Eli said, "we don't know what else might be in this forest at night."
"Not a chance," Titus said, "we've earned this rest."
"Yep," Iris agreed, stretched out across the ground with her hands behind her head.
Eli sighed, but took a seat on the ground with them. He couldn't argue that a break was long overdue.
"Hey Iris, can I get my pack out of your bag?" Victoria asked.
"Go for it," Iris said without opening her eyes, "Abby, be nice."
The drawstring sack untied itself from Iris's belt and loosened itself open. A single tentacle rose out of the void, stretched out and plopped down on the ground. Abby shifted her weight onto the tentacle and hoisted the bag up above it, arcing over and plopping onto the ground about a foot closer to Victoria. She watched with amusement as the bag repeated the process several more times until it arrived beside her, where the tentacle positioned the bag upright before withdrawing back into the void.
"Do I just reach in?"
"Yep," Iris said, "think about grabbing hold of the item you want, and then just pull it out."
Victoria hesitantly stuck her hand into the void, frowning at the strange sensation of nothingness. After a moment, she pulled out her hand with a firm grasp on the strap of her backpack. As she continued pulling, the opening of the bag stretched impossibly wide to accommodate the large pack she was withdrawing from it. When the pack was free of the void, she placed it on the ground in front of her and smiled at the bottomless bag.
"Thanks, Abby."
Faint harmonious tones emanated from the void, and then the tentacle slithered out and began the arduous process of returning to Iris. Victoria opened a pouch on her backpack and withdrew her adventure journal, which she cracked open to her character sheet.
VICTORIA LOREMERE
Champion Rank, Level 30
Experience Points: 458 / 56,620
Progress to next level: 0.80%
Recent Accomplishments:
Absorbed Thread of Souls and ascended to Champion Tier.
You have gained a new ability.
An evolution of Special Ability: Mist Form is available.
You have accepted evolution of Special Ability: Mist Form. Special Ability: Mist Form has evolved into Special Ability: Spectral Form
New Special Ability: Spectral form:
Transform into an incorporeal spectral form. This form has the innate abilities of specters, but these abilities must be discovered by the user.
New Ability: Soul Cage
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Source : Thread of Power (Souls)
Cooldown : N/A
Mana cost : High
Description :
You have formed a soul cage within your spirit. Absorb souls, soul fragments, or soul-like entities via direct physical or incorporeal contact to store them within your soul cage. Powerful souls may resist this ability. Stored souls can be converted to mana, used to supercharge other abilities, or deposited into appropriate soul repositories.
Current soul count: 78
Maximum soul capacity: 100
Victoria stared at the description of the Soul Cage ability. It confirmed what she had feared, she hadn't just cut off the Living Soil’s power source by absorbing the thread, but had also absorbed some or all of the lost souls that it was using as fuel. After absorbing the thread she had known intuitively that she could cure the curse on Iris, and this description confirmed how she had done it; by absorbing the ghosts attacking her soul.
She could feel them now, the soul cage came with a sensation of its own not unlike a her well of mana, it was something she could simply feel and understand by focusing on it. The souls were dormant, but not yet stripped of their individuality, and she suspected that if she pried deeper it would be possible to identify each of the souls and fragments of who they were when they were alive. That was something she very much had no interest in doing.
"So," Autumn said, starting Victoria as she plopped down beside her and held out a handful of berries, "tell us about your new powers."
Victoria silently took a berry and popped it into her mouth, chewing it slowly to stall for time. Iris sat upright and propped herself up on her elbows, clearly eagerly awaiting her response. Titus and Eli were looking her direction too. She sighed.
"It was a Thread of Souls," she said flatly.
Autumn blinked, while Titus and Eli exchanged a concerned look.
"Is that bad?" Iris asked.
"Not necessarily," Victoria answered, "it depends on what powers I get. So far, nothing awful, but I'm not sure I like the direction it looks to be heading."
"The Thread of Souls can be extremely powerful in the right pairing," Titus said, "it's high on my list of preferences, actually. When combined with my Thread of Life it would likely give me at least one powerful true resurrection ability."
"But when combined with other threads," Eli added, "it can be-- dark."
Victoria nodded with a grim expression, "a Thread of Souls with a Thread of Arcane, for example, usually results in necromancy abilities."
"Whoa, does that mean you're a necromancer now?" Autumn asked.
"I am not a necromancer!" Victoria snapped, "I will never be a necromancer!"
Autumn scooted away from her with a fearful expression.
Victoria's angry snarl cracked and faded to a regretful frown, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to yell. My first thread was the Thread of Dreams, that can go a lot of ways when combined with a Thread of Souls. Necromancy abilities--" she faltered, then looked away with shame, "they're not completely off the table."
"Hey, if you get them that's not your fault," Eli said, "worst case scenario, you just don't use them, right?"
"Yeah," Victoria said quietly.
Autumn looked down at the berries in her hand, then at the awkward and solemn expressions of her friends. She shot to her feet, forcefully handed the berries to Titus, and spoke in an overly excited voice.
"How about a meal?" she asked with a smile and hands on her hips.
Even Victoria perked up at the suggestion, and Autumn nodded in acknowledgement, "alright, Iris, start pulling cookware out of your bag. I need a flat pan, a grilling rack, and the entire spice rack. Oh, and all the fish we have..."
Autumn continued listing off cookware and ingredients to Iris while she cleared a space in the grass to make a fire. She made a point to keep talking whenever no one else was, so no one had a chance to dwell on bad thoughts in silence. It wasn't long before she was giving an entire impromptu cooking lesson to her captive audience, but judging by the look on Victoria's face, it was a welcome distraction.
After heating a full meal, the party packed up and started off back to the lodge. Their heavy stomachs resulted in a slow pace, but the long days of summer provided the time they needed to make it back before dark. The grounds were exactly as they had left them, except the pile of dirt and corpse parts left behind by the golem had spent the day baking in the sun. A foul stench of decay now filled in the grounds and permeated the buildings, causing the party to cover their noses when they drew close to the grounds.
"On second thought," Eli said, "maybe we should camp in the wilderness."
"Ugh," Autumn groaned, "why do nice things never last?"
"Look at the bright side," Eli slapped Autumn on the back, "we can use our new tent for the first time."
A short while later, when the sun was dipping below the trees, the party was setting up camp in one of the fields of stumps east of the lodge.
"That's weird," Eli said as he observed Iris pulling the tent bundled pieces from the bag, "I could have sworn it came better packed than this,"
As the party was still full from their meal only a few hours before, Autumn instead prepared desert. She made a tart sauce from foraged berries and spread it across buttered and grilled sweet bread before topping it off with some whole berries and a few spices that paired well with sweets. Throughout the evening, they avoided conversation about the quest or the Victoria's new powers. Iris eventually caught on to Autumn's attempts to keep morale high, and joined in to provide improvised sound effects when Autumn began telling stories from her early adventuring days.