Bel woke up and stretched, her mind churning through the lingering sensations of a fading dream. She had finally remembered – or dreamed that she remembered – her ritual. For a brief moment, she understood everything that she was supposed to do. The sensation didn’t last long after she woke up.
All that she could recall were snatches of memory, either dreamed or real, of the three terrifying women telling her to do stuff. Well, she mostly remembered Kjar talking while Dutcha kept her upright. Lempo just stared at her with ever-shifting eyes. Bel sighed.
At least it wasn’t a nightmare.
With a bit of lingering regret, Bel opened her eyes, brushed a couple of snakes away from her face, and looked around. She sighed again. She was on the other side of the Barrier, sure, but she was still lost in a cave. At least she was with her family rather than Nebamon’s cultists. She was, hopefully, beyond the reach of Technis’ people, but the Dark Ravager’s strange semi-humans would still be after them.
I never did figure out what they wanted with me.
Worst of all, she knew that her goddess mother and the other scary people from her ritual had wanted her to go through the Barrier, but she didn’t have a clue what they wanted her to do on the other side. If they had been trying to send her something in her dream, they hadn’t done a good job of it.
I wonder if choosing a patron will help?
She’d started to feel the beginning of a connection to something in her core as she’d absorbed more essence after the fight. Maybe choosing a patron would complete that connection.
Bel looked around. Beth was still fast asleep, although her rest didn’t look peaceful. Beth’s face twitched fretfully from whatever she saw in her dreams and the fingers of her remaining hand twitched rapidly, clutching at nothing. No matter how uncomfortable she looked, Bel knew that her sister needed to sleep so she moved quietly to avoid disturbing her.
A grumble from her stomach reminded Bel that they needed more than just rest. Things like food and water, and maybe a map. A plan would be nice, too.
She looked around for her brother and saw him sitting at the guard’s table. They’d pulled the two dead guards around the corner so the scene wasn’t too macabre and then James had volunteered to keep watch. Instead, he had fallen asleep with his chin resting on his fist.
Looks like he thought himself to sleep, she thought with a chuckle.
His eyes fluttered open at the sound. They slowly focused on her and his brow pinched in confusion. “What’s so funny?”
“You are,” she replied. “What are you doing?”
“Keeping watch,” he replied.
“No, James, you’re asleep.”
“No’m…”
He voice trailed off and a moment later his eyes were closed again. He started snoring.
Bel grinned. Her brother deserved his own sleep though, she wouldn’t begrudge him that.
She got up and stretched, and once again her stomach groaned. It felt like the opening to a yawning abyss, demanding immediate offerings to satisfy its furious hunger.
I haven’t eaten in…
Bel tried to remember when she’d last had food, but nothing came to mind. Some time with Nebamon’s group. And how long had she slept?
She looked around and her gaze settled upon the sacks stacked against the cavern wall.
The guards must have been eating something, right?
A quick search of the first few sacks turned up a large supply of cut and dried hay and some uncooked grain. Bel felt a growing fear that everyone outside of the Barrier would eat grass, but in one of the smaller sacks she turned up strips of dried meat, which immediately relieved her mounting worry. She happily began to gnaw on the tough food.
She kept looking, and eventually found a few large clay containers of water. She plunged a nearby ladle into one of them and drank greedily. She continued to search through the supplies, gorging herself until she felt ill.
I don’t regret it, she thought. Who knows when I’ll get a chance to eat like this again?
The rest of the supplies were mostly non-foodstuffs. Plenty of space was devoted to record-keeping, like the pile of reed pens and lumps clay to form into tablets. Most importantly though, Bel found a map.
At least, she thought it was a map. It wasn’t like she’d seen a lot of them, and this one had strange little drawings of people, birds, and beetles instead of proper writing. She put it on the table next to her brother so that he could take a look at it. His eyes twitched at the noise, but his head drooped down after only a few breaths.
Bel nodded. She was safe, for the moment, and properly fed. Now was her chance to trigger whatever had been waiting for her since she’d cleared the final threshold of her core. Bel prodded her brother and let him know of her plans; she got a bleary nod in return. Then she went to a comfortable rock in the corner, sat down, and put her back against the wall. She closed her eyes, reached for the new sensation that hovered around her core, and pulled.
The world around her exploded into color, and then went dark.
----------------------------------------
Bel found herself standing on a small circular area of smooth stone, surrounded by nothing. She prodded the area around the stone and her foot found no resistance. Just nothing. She quickly retreated from the edge.
The space looked familiar, although if it was from what she’d seen in the ritual she wasn’t going to be able to remember any of it. She idly fiddled with one of her snakes; the memories were still just as elusive as the wind.
“Hey, hello there!” exclaimed a cheerful voice.
Bel spun about, startled to see that she wasn’t alone. She discovered a thin pedestal to her side where before there had been nothing, and upon the pedestal was the creature who had spoken to her: a six-legged caterpillar with tiny wings. It spoke from a mouth at the end of a prehensile trunk half as long as its body.
Caterpillar was probably the wrong word, but Bel couldn’t think of anything else even close to the bizarre thing. I’ll just think of it as a caterwhatsit, she decided.
“Uh, hello,” she greeted it hesitantly.
“Welcome to your Path selection,” crooned the caterwhatsit, “I’ll be your guide! Call me Ishmael.”
“Oh, is that your name? Or is that what you are?”
The creature shrugged, a fluid roll that traveled down its body as each pair of leg shrugged in turn. “Who knows? Not me!”
Bel scrunched her face with worry and confusion. “Uh, what?”
“Oh, my apologies! I don’t have any memories. I’ll try to remember to mention that next time – or maybe not!”
“How are you supposed to help me if you don’t know anything?” Bel challenged Ishmael.
“I know plenty,” it responded confidently, its trunk held aloft in defiance.
Bel blinked back, confused, and the trunk dropped.
“Okay, well, I only know about Path advancement,” Ishmael admitted. “I don’t remember anything else.” Its trunk twisted through the air as it thought, tracing a sideways figure eight. “I think maybe I was banished here? Or maybe I’m paying off a debt? It’s a mystery.”
“I see,” Bel stated flatly. Ishmael was landing somewhere between cute and annoying, but the more she realized that her future depended upon it, the more annoyed she became.
“Why send help at all,” she muttered aloud, not really expecting an answer.
“Oh, that’s easy,” the little fuzzy creature responded quickly, “the options here are so overwhelming that sentient beings kept picking whichever deities were well known! That really upset some of the newer and quieter ones, who demanded an impartial assistant be involved.”
Ishmael pointed at itself with its long, flexible trunk. “And here I am! I don’t know a thing, so I’m probably impartial!”
“Oh. I guess that makes sense,” Bel agreed.
They stared at one another in silence until Bel asked, “so what’s next?”
“Well, first we should narrow… oh, it looks like you don’t have very many options. Typical for a gorgon, I suppose, since you’re all cursed. Let’s take a look!”
“Wait, what?”
Ishmael gestured with a wing and a large, wooden placard popped up next it its perch.
Bel stared into the darkness from whence it sprang, wondering what other stuff was out there. Her snakes flicked out their tongues suspiciously and Ishmael waved its trunk to get her attention.
“I get the feeling that you can read, right?”
Bel looked at the placard and nodded, too distracted by the writing to respond.
On the top part of the wooden message was a heading describing her current status and list of her current inscriptions.
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Threshold: 20
Strokes used: 17/40
Second stage.
Old Strokes/Threshold: 1 and 1/2 New Strokes/Threshold: 3
Unbound abilities, 4 of 42 strokes
Improved Lung Capacity. Improve the exchange of gases to and from your blood. Two strokes.
Sudden Coagulation. Cause blood to immediately coagulate. One stroke.
Toughen Coagulation. Toughen coagulated blood. One stroke.
Gorgon path abilities, 13 of 42 strokes
Glare. Channel your authority into your gaze, stunning any who dare maintain eye contact. Three strokes.
Toughened Integument: Gradually toughen your skin, scales, hair, and nails over time. Ten strokes.
Below that was a thick line carved into the wood, under which were listed what she presumed to be her Path options for her second core.
The Path of the Gorgon. Potency: 3.
Kjar’s Path of Judgement and Punishment. Potency: 3.
Dutcha’s Path of Disorder. Potency: 5.
Lempo’s Path of Upheaval. Potency: 7.
“So,” she said, gesturing to the placard, “what do these mean? And what did you mean when you said that I don’t have many options?”
The caterpillar leaned back on its hind legs, freeing up a pair to gesture at the writing. “Well,” it began, “this is generally where all the gods, goddess, and other stuff make their pitches. You know, become a follower, give up some essence, learn powerful abilities, pledge your soul into near-eternal servitude, that sort of stuff.”
Ishmael tapped itself with one of its free legs. “And that’s where I come in. I measure your compatibility with the different Paths on offer. The list comes from a combination of your rapport with a deity and the affinity of your existing abilities with their Path. With that done, I would present the best, oh, hundred or so options.”
Bel looked at her list.
“I know! It’s short, right?” the little creature enthused. “But gorgons pissed off the entire pantheon, you know? It’s a miracle that any of them even like you a little bit.”
“Uh… wait, what did the gorgons do?”
Ishmael spun its trunk in the air. “I forget!”
Bel grumbled deep in her throat, and her snakes hissed.
“Whoah, don’t bite the messenger, okay? You’ve got some great rapport with these three, so forget that other stuff!”
“Rapport?”
Ishmael nodded enthusiastically, its trunk flailing the air. “Yup! If you’re closer to a deity then you’ll have an easier time using their abilities! Basically, your strokes will be better at holding abilities from them because you’ll be able to tap into their divinity – just a little bit though!”
Bel looked at the numbers. Well, looks like being Lempo’s daughter is good for something. And that weird spirit lady too. Seems like Kjar isn’t quite as pleased with me – probably because I’m not punishing the wicked or something.
Ishmael continued nodding, it’s snout bobbing up and down out of sync with its body. “You’re only being tithed a tiny amount of essence for these Paths, too. These three must really like you!”
He squinted at her curiously and looked her up and down, his gaze lingering upon her snakes. “I guess they’re already connected to you!” Ishmael clapped two of its little legs. “How lucky!”
Bel looked back at the small creature and decided that he was cute after all. “Can you tell me about them? The three that are offering me these Paths?”
“What do you wanna know?”
Bel tugged on one of her snakes. “Well, what do Kjar and Lempo want from their followers?”
“Hm.” Ishmael rubbed his head with his trunk, lost in deep thought. Then his trunk popped into the air. “Nope! I’ve forgotten. Sorry!”
Bel snorted. “Fine, then can you explain more about the potency numbers? Are mine good?”
“Of course! When you walk a Path you specialize some of your strokes to better hold inscriptions that fit on that Path. Glare takes three strokes on your current Unbound Path, but on The Path of the Gorgon it would only take one stroke because your potency is 3. Three divided by three is one, get it?”
“Sure.” Bel nodded as she thought about it. “Wait, that’s really good! No wonder people get so much stronger when they pledge to a patron.”
“Yeah, probably! A potency of 7 is fantastic, I think! Lempo really likes you!”
Bel looked at her existing abilities. “What about my existing stuff? Would I have to give it up?”
Ishmael shook its little body, sending its mouth-trunk waving. “Nope, you’re forming a new core but your old one continues to grow. Think of it like a branch sticking out of the trunk of a tree. The tree’s height grows more slowly, but it doesn’t stop.”
The caterwhatsit’s trunk shot up. “Oh, and of course a bit of the extra energy that you gathered after reaching your current threshold will be used to form the new core, so it starts with ten strokes. From now on, when you gather essence a bit of the energy will go into your new core, so you’ll get a single aligned stroke in the new path per threshold, and the rest will be unaligned and will add to your existing core.”
Bel glanced at the line that said ‘New Strokes/Threshold: 3.’
“So I’ll get double the strokes I got previously? One aligned stroke and two unaligned?”
“Yup! It’s weird, right? Everything else triples – 20 for the first milestone, then another 60 for the next, 180 after that, blah blah. But your core only gains space at double the rate when you clear the milestones.”
Bel waved her hands to slow down her mystical guide. “Wait, I can change my Path later?”
Ishmael chortled. “Of course! Plenty of people go onto one Path, grab some nice stuff to fill up all of their aligned space, and then switch to another Path later when they can form a third core. The second core is really more like a fun side-journey before you start your serious Path.”
It shrugged and shook its head. “I mean, look, all of these deities tend to be a little unidirectional if you know what I mean. If you want to be able to manipulate both fire and water? You’ll probably need two Paths.”
“Oh.” Bel tilted her head. “Wait, Dutcha’s constellation seems to have all sorts of different things though.”
“Well, yeah. I mean, it’s called the Path of Disorder, right? Throw in the fact that she’s a spirit too and it isn’t surprising.”
Bel read the Path name again. “What’s special about spirits?”
Ishmael leaned back, looking like it was getting into a relaxing mood to tell a story.
“Imagine you go and fetch water from a well,” the little caterpillar began.
“You have a fun little walk, and you spill some of the water on the way back. That’s what happens when someone dips into the heart of Olympos to pull out some essence – there’s always a bit of spillage.”
“So what happens to it?” Bel asked, eager to learn something new.
“Well, sometimes it turns into something nice. Other times it becomes alive, gains sentience, and then it kind of does whatever it wants to. Dutcha is probably one of those.”
Ishael nodded to itself. “Powerful too, or at least powerful enough to get pulled off of Olympos and confined to the heavens where she’s stuck doing this patronage thing. I think that the gods left me with these memories so that I could warn you to avoid messing around with the natural balance between Olympos and the spirits. We don’t want them getting angry and running around blowing up the moons or something.”
“Blowing up the what?” Bel sputtered.
Ishmael tapped its head a few times. “Yeah, blowing up the moons. I can’t quite remember, but I feel like that’s a thing. You do have moons, right?”
“Yeah. Wait. Is Dutcha’s Path extra powerful?”
Ishmael squinted somehow, an interesting trick without any eyelids. “Well, powerful sure, extra powerful? I dunno. There’s some crazy abilities in there.”
“Can you tell me about them?” Bel asked hopefully.
“Nope,” Ishamel denied her, “I can just give you some general information. There’s some body transmutation stuff, matter transmutation, different ways to explode things, ways to steal essence faster, some weird ways to get around, a couple of things to interact with other spirits, and a whole lot of things that look dangerous to you and everyone around you.”
“What about the other Paths? What’s in them?”
“The Path of the Gorgon is your typical mythical being Path. Mostly body modification and strengthening, some special powers with your gaze.”
Ishmael barely paused before continuing.
“Kjar’s Path of Judgement and Punishment – a bit of a mouthful – is mostly judgement and punishment. Lots of fire, lots of hunting the hearts of the guilty, stuff like that.”
“Lempo’s Path of Upheaval is… holy pantheon, who allowed this stuff!” Ishmael gave Bel a strong side eye. “Well, if you take this one you’d better be careful. It starts off with your standard mutations, some abilities to ruin things, some ways to destroy souls, disintegrate stuff, put things back together the wrong way, and then moves up to bending reality and removing stuff from existence. Pretty heavy. Risks getting the attention of the gods, if you ask me.”
Bel’s eyes widened. It wasn’t okay for a mortal to do stuff like that, was it?
Ishmael whipped his trunk around in disapproval. “I’m gonna be honest, taking it is risky.”
“Why? Shouldn’t I just take Lempo’s since it has the highest potency?” she wondered.
“Well, you could.” Ishmael rubbed its chin with its trunk. “It’s powerful in the long-term, but you need to survive in the short term. I dunno where you’re staying on Olympos, but some Paths attract the wrong sort of attention from the local ascendant candidates.”
Bel waited for Ishmael to elaborate, but he wasn’t forthcoming. “The who?” she eventually prompted.
The guide shrugged. “I can’t remember. Sounds like people who want to walk their Paths far enough to ascend.”
Bel sighed. “So which of these is most powerful in the short-term then? And will I be able to switch from any of them to any other one after clearing sixty more thresholds?”
“You can always switch, unless you’ve lost someone’s favor. Which one is most powerful depends upon your circumstances though.”
Bel rolled her eyes. I need one of those… What does James call them? Strategy guides?
“So,” she said aloud, “Kjar’s is out, I think. I don’t want to be able to sniff out the last time someone told a lie or something impractical like that, and she doesn’t like me as much as Dutcha and Lempo.”
She looked over the gorgon option again. “The gorgon thing is probably reliable, right? Or are gorgons hunted down for something? Our snakes aren’t some weird delicacy, right?”
Gods, I hope that isn’t what Nebamon wanted from me, she thought with a shudder.
Ishmael waved its feet helplessly. “Can’t remember. Sorry.”
“Right.” She could always get more gorgon stuff with her unbound strokes. Dutcha and Lempo both offered so much potential gain with their high potency, but were they even safe to use? And were they even practical? Would she just be waiting around forever for something good to show up?
“Hey Ishmael, will I always get one Path aligned stroke forever?”
The caterpillar shook one of its legs in the negative. “Nope, those double when you move to the next Path too.”
Bel felt out for the constellations near her core and looked at the abilities that she could see with her 23 free strokes. The farthest thing on Lempo’s Path was an ability that would rapidly bulk up her muscles, eventually leading to them consuming her from the inside out and withering to nothing. She could see why overusing the abilities had been fatal for Ventas.
On Dutcha’s constellation, just within reach, was an ability that would turn something into fire. That was what she felt the ability would do, but she remembered Ventas warning her that fire abilities were more for show than effect. She wished that she could see a demonstration to see if this one was safe to use. Prior to that ability was something to temporarily morph her body in a small way. Those were both potentially useful, and with a potency of five they would only take four or five strokes so she assumed that she would be able to try them out quickly.
She mumbled to herself as she thought things over. “So, should I go for a high risk, high reward and take Lempo’s Path now? Or go with Dutcha’s Path because I can see the beginnings of some possibly useful abilities?”
Her snakes twined through the air, flicking their tongues in the breezeless emptiness. “Or am I being greedy? Should I just take the safe route and go with the gorgon Path?”
Bel shook her head, discarding that wimpy idea. Beth was missing an arm, and she and her brother weren’t much for fighting. She needed to get more powerful quickly if she wanted to keep them safe.
Lempo’s Path certainly had power, but… Bel only had to think of what had happened to Ventas. He was someone who had followed Lempo’s Path for years and his abilities were still too much for him to handle. The options that she had seen so far were about mutations and a weak disintegration that Ventas used for cleaning. If she tried to use Lempo’s powers and made a mistake who knew what would happen to her – maybe she would become goop. The thought of her flesh melting away from her bones made her shudder.
Bel chewed on her lower lip as she stressed about the decision. Ishmael implied that Dutcha was powerful – blowing up a moon seemed like a big deal – but did she want to follow the Path of some crazy spirit of disorder? Bel nervously pulled at one of her snakes as it tried to wriggle away.
Well, what’s the worst that can happen? At least my abilities should be surprising.
“I’ll take Dutcha’s Path, Ishmael.”
“You sure?”
Bel nodded. “I’m sure.”
“Okay! Don’t forget that this’ll connect you even more strongly to the spirit, but it won’t remove the influences of the other two. In fact, you’ll probably feel an even stronger influence from them upon your mental state!”
“What?”
Ishmael waved several of its little legs. “Good luck!”