Guan Ah Dan was blind, deaf and disorientated. Even his previous actions were a blur to him. Had he always been like this? Was there such a thing as a start to this oblivion or would it simply wash him away like a pebble in the sea? No more strength than a moth in a hurricane. No, even as he was thinking there was no end to this feeling, Dan began to feel himself going numb.

Numb was better than destroyed. Dan rested in the dull, quiet numbness for a while. He was certain that he was supposed to be doing something important, he remembered that much. Something serious and life-threatening. No surprise, then, that he was already dead. No, that wasn’t right either.

“There, there. Allow me.” Saccharine and velvet all at once, Kumiho’s voice blanketed the other noises and feelings. As quickly as the overwhelming noise and chaos had come on, it vanished. Dan could finally open his eyes. He did so and found himself somewhere he didn’t recognise. He was having trouble remembering where he was supposed to be but he was fairly sure that he was right to be surprised at the opulence around him.

“Where am I?” He asked, looking around in wonder, the previous moments distress all but forgotten. He could see that he was in a windowless room. Despite that, Dan could hear a calm evening outside, a burbling river accentuated with birdsong. Within the room, Dan’s eyes did not know where to focus. Draped around the room were gorgeous curtains and tapestries, the patterns upon them telling all manner of story. Fantastically soft looking cushions cluttered the floor and it was all Dan could do not to fall into them. He knew, somehow, that it wasn’t the time to rest.

“I’m glad you like it. You should. After all, it’s your room.” Dan wasn’t sure about that. He was fairly confident that he had never been in here before. Her smooth voice purring, Kumiho stepped from behind a curtain. She was clad in battle regalia, a fierceness to her form which Dan had never seen on it before. Her skin was a creamy pearlescent, though that could only be seen on her face. Everything else was covered in armour. A ferocious white leather and fur ensemble, a sharp dagger glinting at her side.

“What do you mean?” Dan asked, not actually expecting an answer from the cryptic Kumiho. To his surprise, she gestured for him to sit. He did so, feeling slightly awkward as she remained standing. Instead of looking at Dan, Kumiho seemed to be watching something. She looked into a distance that Dan couldn’t see, eyes darting around in response to some unknown threat.

“This is where I stay, in the back of your mind.” She spoke calmly, though she gave off the impression of a snarling animal. “I am protecting you here.”

“Protecting me from what?” Dan was grateful for the assistance. Maybe if he knew what they were fighting, he could lessen the load. The vaguest of memories seemed to be coming back to him, a feeling of overwhelming pressure. It seemed likely to be this feeling that Kumiho was guarding him from.

“The pieces are crashing together, little Seed. The wielders battle in earnest.” Dan was right to expect puzzling answers, it seemed. “So much consequence is flowing through us now that it would be impossible not to hear them.” Talk of a battle made more memories come to the fore of Dan’s mind. He, Fa Lian and Shade were close to something important. A claxon had exploded in his head, sending him hurtling through the darkness until Kumiho saved him.

“The soul relics. The spear.”

“Yes, the spear is close, in the hands of one without the requirements. Everything will change when you loft the spear. Our contract is close to its end.” Dan felt sad at that but the dreamlike quality of the space had started to melt away. The cushions started to vanish until the only one left was his seat. The tapestries fell from the ceiling and disappeared. Quickly, Kumiho and Dan were the only sights to see, afloat in a void. Kumiho looked him in the eye, her pupil a predator’s line.

She took Dan’s chin in her armour-clad fingers, holding him with her index and thumb. “The closer we get to our prize the more I remember. I remember the sky coming apart and how we fled the destruction. Devastation I saw in your dreams. She waits, the empty goddess, because she had already given up. You aren’t the type to stop, though. It is why I picked you up in that dingy corner of the labyrinth.”

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Dan knew what Kumiho saw in his dreams. A world torn asunder by a celestial cataclysm. A vision, once thought a nightmare, which Dan had avoided as much as possible. A dozen screaming fragments of divine power, their meteoric descent not hindered by the atmosphere, or the crust of the planet they punched through. A petal of divinity fell into a teacup. A beautiful woman drinks it and dies.

“You called me Seed. Why?” Dan’s question was almost rhetorical but he still had to ask it. Dan almost fell over as Kumiho pushed her face forward, a huge smile spearing across her face.

“Portion of a fragment. An unknown variable to their game. The fragments fell and forgot themselves, the pieces of the empty goddess, which you call soul relics. Now they call out to be joined again. It is why the pieces below fight, yearning to collect themselves once more.”

“And I’m connected to them, too?” This was why he was debilitated by the power of the soul relics, while his allies weren’t.

“Connected, but not bound to her. The spear is the start. Use it to break the cycle. You promised, even if you don’t remember it.” For a moment, Kumiho’s intensity dropped and she smiled mischievously, the playful smirk falling onto her face. “I don’t think you have much of a choice any more, either way. Good luck, Guan Ah Dan. I’ll be with you all the way.”

With that, Dan felt his presence in the dream fading. Even as he drifted out of that space, he began to hear the sounds of battle around him. Kumiho vanished, leaving Dan in only darkness. Sensation came back quickly however. He tasted iron in his mouth, blood from a cut cheek. He felt a cold stone underneath him. He could hear Fa Lian shouting. It almost brought a smile to his face.

With a groan of exhaustion, Dan pushed himself to his feet.

Flashes of energy rippled around him. Dan saw them through his eyelids and with his mana. His ambient energy filled the large room he found himself in. He expected this was the room behind the phoenix door. When the other two had described combat in the places they first fell into, Dan had expected to find more as they journeyed down.

Fa Lian was in combat with three vaguely humanoid figures, though they could apparently become one being. When she hit, the body moved like liquid before rejoining any of the three bodies. Shade tangled with two himself, his sword doing nothing but slowing them down. Dan noticed that every attack he struck on the enemy in front of him was mirrored in the other, though it made no difference.

Whatever battle the other two had seen in their rooms, it had suited them. For some reason, the tower was challenging them. Either Yo Shen was testing himself against those who entered or the spear was testing their abilities. Whatever the case, this was not Shade or Fa Lian’s room. It was Dan’s, and he knew exactly what he needed to do.

Actually doing it was the challenge. Every bone in Dan’s body felt like it had been shaken to dust, he was fairly certain his brain was bleeding and his eyes wouldn’t focus properly no matter what he did. His mana channels felt empty. He had defended his body subconsciously and burned everything he had gathered from his allies. He was alive but given the choice, he would at least consider slipping away, rather than deal with the pain in his core and his muscles.

Instead of letting darkness take him, Dan stood. It was wobbly and uncertain, like the first steps of a foal, but he managed it. He did not even have the energy within himself to speak, so he couldn’t ask Fa Lian to move out of the way. He just hoped that she wouldn’t hit him out of instinct as he approached. Doing his best to pick up speed, Dan threw himself on top of one of Fa Lian’s opponents.

The liquid felt warm like blood under his touch, with the consistency of something close to rubber. Without wasting any time, like taking the deepest of breaths, Dan absorbed the creature.

Whatever it pretended to be or was shaped like, mana was mana. Dan had been learning that lesson consistently, over and over again. As though he were stealing the lifeblood of something else, Dan felt himself rejuvenate. He felt his muscles relax, his mana channels began to swim with power again. Fa Lian was shocked but did not stop defending him as he finished off the first of the creatures.

Stopping just short of wiping his lips, Dan stood up feeling much more refreshed. “Sorry about that, I think the chaos below knocked me out.” Fa Lian didn’t need to know more than that, nor any questions to ask. She simply nodded and separated one of her two enemies still standing.

Dan performed the same mana syphoning technique. When done with an ally or given freely, the process was jarring. The mana felt as though it leapt from their open hand into Dan’s waiting arms. This time, it felt like sucking a thick cream through a straw. Each pull on the energy made the combatant below weaker, less substantial. When he was done, there was nothing left of these mana-made creatures.

“Do you want this one or do you want to help Shade?” Within moments, Dan had gone from dead on his feet and useless to full of mana and confidence. He could see, for a moment, his own growth and it frightened him.

“You help Shade, I’ll keep this one busy.” She kicked her opponent’s liquid form, connecting with the central mass and sending it flying down the room before it splattered against a wall. It lost all form for a moment, simply a splash of dark blue that quickly reformed into a person. Dan turned away and dove in to help Shade.

He finished the enemies in short order, feeling bloated and powerful with the mana dancing around inside. Neither Shade nor Fa Lian questioned him on his blackout, which he was grateful for. Dan didn’t know what to say about it. He had decided that he believed Kumiho, that he was connected to the soul relics but telling that to others would make him sound crazy.

After all, how do you tell people you think you’re part god without sounding arrogant?