Cederick still stood at the edge of Benjamins haven. The vibrations from Ozzy’s haven had long since restored to the emanations Cederick would recognize as those caused by combat inside. Yet not only did those inside himself continue, but they continued to increase. He currently felt as if he was being repeatedly punched in the gut yet somehow the momentum was pushing him forward. Closer and closer to the edge of the haven and directing him toward Ozzy’s. He tried to clamp down on his core and calm the vibrations but that only seemed to rile it up even further. He’d tried learning from Benjamin how to direct his growth and control his energy but had never been able to replicate what he taught his other pupils here. His core had a mind of its own. Drawing in energy constantly but never allowing him anything more than increased physical strength.

He eventually lost the battle of controlling his own body and found himself stepping into the void. As he arrived in Ozzy’s he was only partially surprised at what he found. He felt a connection he hadn’t in many years as he also saw a monstrosity lain out on the ground before Ozzy. No, not one, but two of them, and they weren’t moving, and appeared to be empty. They were husks, empty husks, both of them. The first a little smaller than the one that he had taken on with the mentor, and the other slightly larger. Yet that wasn’t all he felt. There were other connections nearby. There was a tiny little speck left of one of them sitting nearby with two pieces of shell surrounding it. There were two other connections. One surrounded Ozzy but he saw nothing there. The other was… within him, but strangely not residing in his core.

Something about that broke his mind more than seeing two of the seemingly unbeatable foes obliterated before him. He felt memories flooding through the barrier he had tried so desperately to build up all these years. Memories of experiments pushing boundaries that others didn't know existed. Memories of ethics and morals twisted into shapes that had him begging for release. None of them were intact enough to see clearly, but he could feel even now another connection that he’d been blocking as long as he’d been blocking the memories. Inside his own abdomen, inside his core was the last connection, though this one was much, much larger than the others. Unlike all the other times he’d pretended not to feel it, he could tell it was awake. Looking up and seeing and feeling the connection inside of Ozzy he was lost as to how or why he would have chosen this path for himself. “Wh.. wha..” he started finding himself unable to speak clearly with the vibration in his core continuing to ramp up "What did you do!”

———————————————————————

Ozzy turned to see Cederick standing not far behind him clutching at his stomach with a grimace on his face. Though as he looked at his face he realized he wasn’t just seeing his expression. Something he’d seen long ago but not realized finally stood out to him. The membrane that Cederick had covering his skin wasn’t recognized or mentioned by Vonder as a membrane, despite him being able to see Ozzy’s own. Yet it clearly was one. However now he could see the difference he wasn’t experienced enough at the time to see. He didn’t only see it either, there was now a connection he could feel between what he saw and the void membrane he’d just absorbed.

He could also now see beyond it and what lay beneath his skin was very wrong. In Vonder’s head he had seen a shining star with a concentrated strength stronger than his whole domain at the time. Inside of Cederick’s abdomen was something of the opposite. He technically couldn’t see anything at all there. Yet the vortex he’d seen around Cederick since he first truly looked at him was centered there. Though as he watched it didn’t remain still. The center of that storm was in turmoil. The focal point violently repositioning itself so fast that the energy flowing began to instead bunch up and reciprocate the vibration. There was also a connection there, at the center just as he could feel with the second skin Cederick wore. “What did I do?” Ozzy blurted out incredulously “What did you do?” he continued though he was already beginning to suspect what Cederick had done, or what had happened to him.

“NO!” Cederick screamed though with the pain in his voice the direction of his outburst seemed to only be partially aimed at Ozzy. “I did.. NOTHING to deserve… THIS!” Cederick choked out with long pauses yet extreme emphasis while gesturing at his stomach. Even as he did so he jerked and cringed while curling in on himself. It seemed any movement he made agitated his state worse than before. Cederick clamping down into a tight ball before suddenly jerking forward and coughing out a glob of blood which splattered onto the squares in front of him. After which the tension in his body released and Ozzy could see that the vibration in his abdomen had halted as well.

The energy vortex continued, yet the buildup of energy inside the boy didn’t begin to drain into his core. For a few moments Cederick panted as energy continued to collect into a tight ball inside of him. Strangely it didn’t dissipate, form any particles, or absorb into His clearly injured insides. As if whatever controlled this mass had no intention to allow Cederick to taste even a sprinkling of it. Cederick whipped his head up without warning and glared at Ozzy darkly. “You have no idea the things you’re playing with” he spat but almost immediately slumped back with tears welling up. “It’s never worth it…” he mumbled, then continued “Why can’t people leave things alone”.

Ozzy was torn. There was the empathy he felt for the boy, which made him want to console him and try to understand his viewpoint. The other half was annoyed, pissed even, at the cryptic way everyone chose to communicate. Granted he’d only technically met two people, but indirectly Benjamin and those that lived with him had refused to even talk with him based on some still unknown cause. Vonder had come across like a stuck up self declared high class with far too much self importance to explain anything without something to trade for it. He had felt like Cederick wasn’t like that, but even he had only revealed most of what Ozzy learned from him indirectly. Leaving Ozzy to have to brute force his way through understanding everything on his own. As he thought through it the pissed side of him was taking over.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

“What did I do?” He said again, this time sarcastically. Entirely done with the ‘holier than thou’ attitude being thrown at him, “I’ve been surviving on my own in the middle of literal nowhere! Trying to find food, make my own shelter, and improve my living situation as best I can” He paused and let his thoughts catch up to his mouth “I’ve had to trial and error my way through understanding entirely new aspects of existence nearly every day. On top of that I’ve had a giant rat, a wild boar, you, and some void creature show up uninvited!” During his tirade Cederick had initially just stared at him unimpressed, but as he spoke he started shaking his head and expressing just how much he disagreed. Yet he let him finish before retorting.

“Living on your own for a few weeks? Getting to play around with magic, and shaping a haven into your own private little world? Uninvited guests?” He scoffed “These are your excuses?”. He shook his head again and Turned around. Ozzy wondered if he would just leave, but he turned back again with a sneer on his face. “I lived in a pitch black darker than anything I’ve ever seen before, ate raw demon babies, and was alone for months before I eventually found even an empty haven with light! When I did finally find other people they attacked me, and chased me off!” As he said the last sentence he paused and Ozzy watched as he froze before shaking his head violently. “I … kept… “ Cederick started again haltingly “trying to find people, but… “. As he spoke he jerked intermittently side to side as if avoiding looking at something. Though his head kept drifting back to the same angle. “They were ALL terrible” He dejectedly blurted out “some, took… far too long to realize” Each pause was accompanied with his head twitching and sometimes his eyes scrunching shut.

Ozzy wasn’t liking the way he was becoming more and more agitated and created a suit around himself and another in front of Cederick. His breath was coming in pants now and he looked back up to Ozzy in a glare “I was subjected to things your nightmares couldn’t compare to” he shuddered momentarily “From the hands of people just surviving” Adding in air quotes he also stepped forward “I guess I’ll just have to do a little surviving of my own!” With the warning Ozzy was able to get another suit out and have the two in front grab Cederick as he tried to shoot forward. They weren’t able to stop him but combined with Ozzy moving himself out of the way he was able to avoid ending up like one of the rats he’d seen him obliterate.

Cederick looked down at himself and around the vicinity. The way he failed to focus on anything indicating he was not able to see what was holding him back. Tugging at his arms a bit he Looked back up and smiled dismissively. “Benjamin told me about your tricks” he said before jerking his arms forcibly to the side, “but it’s not going to keep me from stopping you”. The movement pulled his hands from the suit's grip but didn’t damage them in any way, and they quickly grabbed his arms again.

“Stop me from what?!?” Ozzy replied exasperated, “I’m not doing anything”. Cederick’s face twisted in rage at his words.

“Not. Doing. Anything?” His words were measured and punctuated with steps closer. Each of which Ozzy mirrored with his own steps away. “I’ve been told that before,” he said while stopping to look off in the distance. His face again scrunching up though there was no return of the heavy vibrations. Instead Ozzy could see something happening inside Cederick’s head. A hazy shadow was swirling about as he lifted his hands to hold his head. Though as he concentrated the shadow was crushed into a point and held. There was something like scar tissue built up around the spot it had been pushed to and it seemed to grow and be torn down repeatedly before settling down. Cederick opened his eyes slowly and glared at Ozzy once more. “I don’t need to explain myself to you” He announced before again jumping at Ozzy.

Between his own suit and those restraining Cederick he was again able to barely avoid the boy's swipes, stabs and kicks. As this time he wasn’t stopping to examine the resistance he was feeling. Instead going all out trying to end whatever threat he felt Ozzy presented. While Ozzy’s body was flipped, somersaulted, and contorted into artful shapes by the suit he’d instructed to dodge for him he took the sparse seconds he had to do what he always did and improve his odds of survival. Cederick had obviously left out something from his past. From his new understanding of the membrane surrounding the boy, and the way his vortex behaved, there was clearly a voidling involved here. Likely crammed into his reservoir or whatever it actually was. The shadow in the boy’s mind was concerning though. Ozzy’s own experience suggested it could be there was a part of the voidling that had avoided being locked into the reservoir and instead escaped into his mind.

He was bent backward into a pose he was more used to seeing Neo perform when he decided his next course of action. Cederick was clearly being thrown off by discussing whatever issue he had, and Ozzy needed to set him off as much as he could. As he was pulled back into view of Cederick's face he took a chance with his assumptions “They experimented on you”. The reaction was immediate and violent, both internally and externally. Cederick rocketed forward to shut him up, and in his head Ozzy could see the shadow break free once again and rampage through Cederick's mind. “NOOOO!” was all Cederick got out as his eyes rolled into his head.