After an hour or so of preparation, their party set off. Towards a relaxing day, at least, that was the plan. Trillia rode on Tormash's shoulders, her brother's large frame easily able to carry her. A heavy double-bladed axe hung at his hip. Ba'Shoon had no apparent weapons. Amelia was walking next to them, a mallet of her own hanging at her hip.
The guards gave respectful bows as the troupe passed but otherwise said nothing. Trillia wore a little smile. Feeling happy to be out and exploring. Because of how dangerous times were, she wasn't allowed to leave the small town's perimeter alone. She peeked around the side of Tormash's head to speak with him.
"Think we'll see any cool creatures?"
Tormash offered a little grin in response.
"Maybe. We are closing in on winter soon. While snows don't fall on this side of the Shattered Plains, the cold weather still causes most animals to find long-term shelter."
Trillia absorbed all of the information happily. Amelia had pulled out a notebook and something to write with. She also wasn't allowed outside the perimeter alone. So it was a good experience for them both. It seemed as though Amelia wanted to take notes on herbs and plants. Trillia silently cursed herself for not bringing her own notebook to do the same. What a waste of experience.
They walked for a few hours. Stopping only once so that Ba'Shoon could cast a spell on Amelia to help with her Stamina regeneration. Tormash finally came to a halt, a grin once more finding it's way to his face. Setting Trillia down next to him and taking her hand, he motioned ahead.
"This is the place we'll have our picnic."
Trillia looked around. There were some tall trees, thin little green needles hung by the tens of thousands from heavy branches. The sun, now setting, broke through the trees and cast the area in a soft warm light. The ground seemed to slope upward and had been doing so for some time. Trillia held on tightly to Tormash's hand, following him up the steep incline. Amelia followed more slowly, careful with her footing. Ba'Shoon seemed to have the easiest time of it. She was following Amelia. A hand gently on the princess' back to ensure she didn't fall.
The trees began to thin out as they trudged along. When Trillia crested the ridge, she froze in place, her eyes wide, staring at the landscape that rolled out before them. Tormash had led them around to a cliff that sat a few miles away from the town. Trillia could see it in the distance. It looked tiny to her. Trillia strode to the edge of the cliff fearlessly. With every step, her smile widened. Tormash chuckled as he came to stand next to her.
"Feel a little taller now?"
The man looked down at her with a grin, she responded with one of her own and a silent nod. The trees rolled out around them, the cliff they were on seemed more like a large rock outcrop that jutted up and out of the forest around them. The rock was mostly flat where they stood, and Ba'Shoon was taking advantage of that. She dug through her bags of holding to pull out various food items and a large fur blanket for them to sit on.
Trillia and Amelia stood on the rock for some time, happy to enjoy the silence together. Amelia was the one to break it.
"It reminds me of the walls of the great labyrinth. Seeing the realm roll out before you. It reminds me of just how tiny we all really are."
Trillia took her hand, giving it a squeeze. She knew of the great labyrinth, it was what many minotaur's called their home city before it fell.
"I promise. One day you'll be able to stand on the walls again."
The words seemed right. Trillia knew making a promise was a big thing, so she didn't like to do it often. Not unless she was really sure she could keep it. But it seemed like the right thing to say in the moment. Looking at her friend, she expected the princess to have tears in her eyes. Instead, the opposite was true. There was a cold, hard determination in them.
"Yes. Yes, I will. When we do take back what is ours, I hope you will come and visit someday, Trillia. So you can see the view."
Trillia smirked, shaking her head.
"Don't be silly. We'll take it back together after all."
Amelia returned the little squeeze from earlier, a happy smile coming to her face. The two were pulled from their conversation by Tormash.
"Realm domination plans later. For now, come and eat."
The two certainly didn't have to be told to come and eat twice. They munched on some sliced smoked meat that was shoved between bread with some sort of sweet jam spread on the bread as well. It was very tasty. Trillia couldn't help but scoot a little closer to the edge, taking in the view once again. The sweet reverie was broken suddenly. Trillia dropped her sandwich and shot to her feet.
Her eyes darted to and fro. She had felt an immense wave of mana wash over them. But she couldn't see from where. Trillia felt Tormash's hands, one gently grasping her hand that somehow had her rapier in it, the other on her shoulder.
"It's the mana rift. This rock is a few miles from the camp in the direction of the mana rift. The rift itself is still a few hours away before we can actually see it. In the early days of discovery, we had to move camp several times. The mana discharge was just too extreme for some people. The camp is safe, and so are we."
Trillia tried to calm down. Shakily putting the rapier back in its sheath. She still felt on edge though something wasn't right about the mana. Trillia thought it felt the same as when she was angry and sad. When she wanted to scream and smash her fists into the ground. But it felt as if it was the realm itself crying out in futile anger.
Tormash squeezed her shoulder.
"The downside to having traces of divinity in us, from Mom."
Trillia looked at him in confusion.
"Mom has divinity in her because she is bound to a deity. Some of that carries over to us. Most mortals don't have divinity in them. Deities harvest divinity from our desires and wants. It's like mana to them, but much stronger. They can leave traces of divinity in mortals with pacts. That divinity will be passed down for generations. That divinity lets us feel and see things others may not."
Trillia looked back toward where Tormash said the mana rift was.
"It feels...so angry, Tormash. Like it's crying out for help."
Her voice was a whisper, fear and trepidation still evident on her face. Her brother offered an encouraging smile.
"I know. Mom and King Cordaos are trying to find a way to help it. But they need to be able to cross the mana rifts to see their old friends first. The waters aren't safe, and neither is flying high enough to get over the effects. The trip you made out with the others to collect herbs. They are trying to make a way to cross it safely."
Trillia took a deep, steadying breath, looking down at her mostly-eaten sandwich. She shrugged and picked it up, wiping the dust off and taking another bite. She and Tormash joined the others back at the blanket.
"I'd like to see the rift. Are we still going to it?"
Tormash nodded, looking at Amelia.
"Will you be ok? Seeing it again?"
Amelia nodded meekly.
"I should be ok. The rift here is quite small, and there is only one. Near God's Watch, it was... it was terrifying. The city only barely survived the claws that came down and ripped through the land. The first few weeks after were awful. Swarms of creatures tried to overrun the city and failed."
Trillia said nothing. No one did. Amelia hadn't talked a whole lot about the events at God's Watch. Now that she was, no one wanted to stop her from getting it all off her chest.
"Father manned the harbor with his royal guards. Mother manned the city walls facing the plains. I mostly watched from the windows high up in the central citadel. The mana density was..."
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
She trailed off, shuddering at the memory.
"When the blast came every hour, it felt like we were drowning in the mana itself. Father and I could feel the emotion coming from it. But it wasn't sad and angry like it is now. It was murderous, vengeful. Filled with hate and spite. We're all taught that the intent of a spell or skill has a serious impact on the mana used to form it."
Amelia looked at each of them now as she continued.
"The intent in the rifts was out of anger. Something wanted to destroy us all. Dad is bound to the same deity that Chieftain Amara is. Mom also met him. They both said he is a very clever deity and immensely powerful. But mostly, he was kind. The fact that he's sealed divinity from us all. I..."
She hesitated now, looking unsure of herself. Ba'Shoon put a hand on her knee.
"We won't judge your thoughts or ideals, Princess Amelia. Speak freely."
Amelia smiled at the woman. After a moment to collect herself, she continued.
"From everything I've been told by both my parents and Trillia's, I think it was for our protection. The debuff that is."
Confusion appeared on everyone's faces at that. Amelia continued.
"He had to know that limiting our ability to heal and use what we call holy mana would impact us severely, right? He had to know that the rifts were dangerous, yet still, the debuff remains. I think it's because something was trying to kill him. Or kill the realm itself."
Tormash's eyes darkened at that. The thought seemed to deeply trouble Trillia's brother. She was out of her depth and knew that. Trillia was happy to sit in silence and listen. Tormash spoke, his voice not betraying the emotions inside.
"Something tried to kill the realm? I guess, I guess that makes sense. I remember the cataclysm. It felt as if great claws reached from the skies to tear the place apart. Some spell took effect. There were four orbs of light in the sky. It was the last thing I remember. I awoke hours later with the debuff. Mother told me that most of the camp had no mana when they woke up. Some even reported scanning others with more advanced versions of the skill and finding that the people they scanned had negative mana values."
They all listened intently. Ba'Shoon spoke next.
"I was...in the human cities on the other side of the great verdant forest. Many people died outright when the cataclysm happened. Humans are often at a much lower level and do not take great fluctuations in mana well. I crossed a mana rift to get to the Shattered Plains. It took days for me to recover enough to utilize mana again after the jump."
The conversation hung heavy in the air, silencing the little picnic. They ate a while longer before Tormash began packing things up.
"Let's go visit the rift, I guess. This way, Trillia can see it up close."
They were on the way shortly after. Tormash had been accurate. The trip had been a few more hours. Nighttime had fully settled on them. Trillia was grateful for the moon as she hadn't gotten the racial skill for seeing in the dark yet. Once they came clear of the trees, however, it hardly mattered.
The ground sloped down and away. With the high vantage point, Trillia could see the giant split in the world a thousand or more feet away. The sides of the rift wall glowed bright purples and blues. Tormash held up a hand to stop anyone from going further. Motioning to the ground. Trillia could see a clear line in the ground that perfectly mirrored the edges of the ravine ahead. As if the ground and plants were being changed by the constant outbursts of mana. Tormash took a seat before he began speaking.
"If we get any closer, we will start gaining mana. Much like when you consume too many mana recovery items, you will be afflicted with [Mana Sickness]. The closer we get, the faster your mana overfills. Right now, it takes a capacity of a few thousand mana to get close enough to the Rift to see down into it. It's mostly been mages, wizards, shamans, and other classes that have skills granting them a higher than average mana capacity that have explored near it."
Trillia was curious, of course, to go and see down into the ravine. But she had learned a lot about the mana sickness her brother spoke of during her training with Amelia. The debuff was not to be underestimated. It was a well-documented debuff that had several stages to it. The last was terminal mana sickness. At that stage, it took immense amounts of healing and willpower to keep the person alive for even a few hours. That had been the cause of death for most scouts and others who tried to make the jump across and back. One jump, you'd probably survive. Only her mother and Cordaos had survived a return jump.
Movement caught her eye. Reaching out her hand, she tapped Tormash on the shoulder lightly. The large warrior sitting next to her - but still quite a bit taller - looked to where she was pointing. Immediately his tome was in his hands, flipping to a new page as he began to write.
The movement was from a creature neither had ever seen before. It must have been huge. It was walking along the edge of the mana rift, seemingly unaffected by the debuff Trillia had just been worrying over. But even from this distance, it still looked like it would stand taller than Tormash.
Its skin was pulled tight over the corded muscle of a predator. Six legs, ending in what seemed - from this distance, to be large claws. The interesting part about the claws wasn't their size but the fact they glowed with the same colors and tones as the mana rift itself did. A white mane ran from the creature's canine-like head straight to the tip of its tail. The tail itself looked more like a large club. The creature had no problems lifting the heavy bone club that its tail ended in. It almost looked like it used it to balance itself as it moved.
Four eyes rested on the face. Two closer together near the front, two further back on the sides. Trillia couldn't tell from so far away, but it also appeared a fifth eye rested directly on top of its head turned long ways. The creature stopped in its tracks, nose turned to the air. Trillia, Ba'Shoon, and Amelia froze in place. Tormash continued writing in his tome, and the creature lazily turned its head towards them.
Trillia's brain screamed at her to run. A quick glance at Amelia and Ba'Shoon told her the others thought the same. Not Tormash. Tormash sat there writing and recording everything he saw. The creature slowly plodded towards them. The way it moved gave Trillia a headache now that it was closer as if it wasn't quite where she thought it should be. As it came closer and closer, it began looming further and further above them. Her guess had been on point. The thing was monstrous.
It sat on its four hind legs, sliding its two front paws out before plopping its head down on them. Now only forty feet away, it stared at the tiny insignificant little orcs with curiosity. Trillia couldn't help herself. The thought came, and her skill activated.
[Psionic Behemoth - ?? - ???]
The creature's ears twitched a bit, lifting its head and turning it slightly to the side.
A Psionic Behemoth has scanned your mind. You are stunned for 15 seconds.
General Skill: [Adamant Resolve] Level 0 -> Level 2
Tormash set his book down ever so slowly. Reaching into his bag and pulling out a large hunk of smoked meat. Her brother was obviously unaffected by the creature's stunning ability. Or it hadn't scanned him. Tormash stood and slowly moved towards the creature, the hunk of meat in an outstretched hand.
Trillia still had seven seconds left. She wanted to cry out in terror when the creature seemed to simply teleport forward. It had done so the instant both of Tormash's feet were within the line he had pointed out earlier. On all six legs, with its head slightly down to sniff the meat, it was still three times Tormash's height. Trillia didn't know why her brother wasn't afraid. The obvious answer was that he was a complete lunatic. That had to be it.
After a few seconds of sniffing, the creature opened its mouth, enveloping the meat and Tormash's hand. The eye atop its head glowed more brightly for a moment. Tormash slowly pulled his hand, absent the meat, out of the creature's mouth. Once his hand was clear, the creature chewed and swallowed the tiny morsel of food.
Then, Tormash did something Trillia hadn't seen him do to anyone or anything except their mother. He knelt in front of the creature, eyes cast down to the ground. The creature moved its snout forward, touching the tip of its nose on Tormash's forehead before it turned just as lazily as it had approached initially, and walked back toward the mana rift. Tormash knelt for a few more seconds after it turned before moving back to the safety of the outer line.
The status stun had ended. But the sheer insanity of the events left Trillia unable to move or speak. She and the others found themselves holding their breath when the creature was so close to Tormash. Tormash being the lunatic that he was, picked his book back up and began writing once more. Trillia had never seen him smile so widely. Ba'Shoon spoke, a soft harsh whisper as if she didn't want to alert the creature and make it spin back on them.
"What were you thinking?! I know you have a connection with monsters, but that was reckless, Tormash, even for you."
Tormash looked at her oddly before he looked back toward the creature. By now, the thing had resumed it's plodding next to the mana rift.
"Ba'Shoon. That behemoth was over level one thousand. If it wanted us to be dead. We would be dead. It was curious about us, so I obliged."
The woman seemed to look at him as if he was even more daft. Trillia's eyes were fixed on the creature. Over level one thousand? How on Alirast did Tormash even know that.
"Could you see its level?"
The curious girl had to ask, though she didn't look at her brother. Instead, she continued watching the creature.
"It told me. Plus, I've never seen three question marks before. Everything else has always only had two. Even Mom and Cordaos only have two, and both of them are above level seven-fifty."
All three girls looked at him now.
"It could speak?"
Trillia whispered, agreeing with Ba'Shoon now in not wanting to anger it. Tormash looked around at all of them and just laughed, shaking his head.
"Yes, it could speak. At least it could telepathically communicate. But when dealing with such creatures, it doesn't use words as we do. I've met other creatures like that one, not nearly as powerful, but creatures that communicate with their minds. They communicate in concepts, emotions, and intent. Since those things are much harder to misinterpret or lie about. It thanked us for the food and gave me a warning that some sort of serpent was seen in these parts. We shouldn't dally long since the serpent hunts near the edges of the mana rift's influence when the moon is highest."
As if on cue, he gathered his belongings and motioned for them to follow. All but Trillia did. She stole another few seconds of staring at the creature. Who had now turned its head to them. It almost looked as if the creature nodded. Trillia bowed slightly before running to catch up to Tormash.
"Its skill was very scary, but it didn't stun me for as long as Mom's aura did."
Before anyone could answer the question hidden within that statement, Tormash spoke up.
"We can talk about it over dinner. Let's set up camp an hour or so away from the border. The serpent shouldn't be a problem that far away. No other life is anywhere near this area right now. I think that Behemoth spooked everything off. I don't know for sure, but I think it's trying to starve that serpent so it can catch it."