The strange sensation washes over me, Cane got him then, and I was able to absorb Flat Nose’s Spirit through my cattle.

Planner / Panic Spirit collected

Odd, half the spirit runes aren’t crossed out this time. When I originally killed the dog, I got the Herder spirit however the hunger part was almost redacted. I wonder what’s changed?

The Satyr rummages through the hunters' possessions, taking the entire belt of pouches and then equipping the quiver.

“Help me Seth, those screams will attract many creatures or men.” She glares at my plain remorse.

I sit up, shock taking over, the reality of killing settling on me. Piia slaps me hard across the face.

“Come now great Shepherd, store these.” She’s agitated with constant vigilance of the surrounding forest while cramming gear into her overflowing satchel and my hands.

I take the items and bend down to Knive’s body for more, I touch his shoulder and his Spirit passes to me. The sensation is less strange now or I’m not quite present enough to register it properly.

Predator / Confusion Spirit collected

Again with no redacted text. I should check the Chaos recruit manual for information on Spirits. I place my hand back onto Knive’s corpse and loot him.

Loot added to inventory:

Oakthorne bow

Small quiver

9x iron arrows

2x iron beartraps

Rabbit bait

Rope

4x hooks

2x snares

2x Dehorning knife

Suze (Eff. advanced Tetanus poisoning)

Skinning blade

Hatchet

Cleaver

Knives was a truly accurate nickname.

“Let us leave.” Piia takes Sofia’s hand and heads away from Hearthold.

“Cane!” I recall my hippo.

He charges through the bush, those short powerful legs allowing for surprising speed. Cane’s wide mouth appears, blood and gore splattered and dripping all over.

My stomach turns, Flat Nose led a harsh life and he threatened my party and possibly Piia’s tribe. But being crushed to death by those jaws and tusks is a gruesome way to go.

I look into Cane’s black eyes, he seems pleased with his accomplishments. That doesn’t make him an evil creature. I pat his head as if he needs reassurance and leave a bloody handprint. I turn my hand over and see a hazy reflection of myself in the crimson, he was only following orders.

“Hurry you two!” The Satyr calls to us.

I rush after my friend, the scene of cutting Knives in two and Cane charging after his prey is repeatedly playing out in my mind.

It is a dark day and this will be my life from now on, I need to accept it, it was us or them. The things they were going to do to my Satyrs, I can never let that happen. I have to recover from these events quickly and not overthink them, or they will weigh me down and slow me. I need to be stronger than the person that first arrived in Silva, I need to empower.

“Piia, wait up.”

She barely slows her pace and continues marching on.

“Seth we need more trees between us and Hearthold. Danger is biting at our scent.”

“I know, that’s actually what I wanted to talk about. I got some more Spirit back there and I need to empower. It will heal my hand a little and give me energy if anything follows.”

“So you can use your Chaos power. I saw the Daemon use that exact magic.” She snaps at me.

“So I can protect us.”

She rounds on me, anger evident on her face.

“Why did you not tell me? You are marked by both Chaos and Order. You kept it hidden from me.”

“I was worried you would think less of me, you would not trust me.”

“You are right, and keeping it a secret makes it worse.”

“I’m sorry Piia, I always meant to tell you.” I plead.

“Just empower if you must, I will continue on with Sofia.”

I stop and watch them disappear, guilt now also infecting my current emotional state.

It will only take five leaf falls and then I’ll catch up to them. I drop to my knees, touch the floor with my head and begin to beg for power.

“Okay almighty Order, please bless me with your immense presence and take these Spirits collected from the weak to empower me with, please.”

The light breeze that kisses my skin and is swirling through Mother’s light dies. An exciting rush of anticipation builds inside of me, recalling my previous empowerment, the feeling and sensations were incredible, maybe even addictive.

Cane stares back at me, the drips from his nostrils have frozen in flight. I look behind him into the forest where hundreds of falling leaves remain still in open space, it was a perpetual painting.

My smile falters as I glance around the forest, my eyes falling upon a daunting figure.

Suspended above me is a cosmic horror. Floating motionless off the ground, a two metre tall figure stares back at me with an eyeless face. Its head, a fleshy bucket-knight helmet, crowned with protruding spikes at the top with vertical grooves gouged down to its mouth. A warped shark smile leers at me, the wide corners wrap around to the back of its neck, filled with layers of hairlike teeth.

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The long skinny neck connects to a gaunt torso of malnourished ribs. Instead of hips, the sunken abdomen connects with the tail of a large shark, two symmetrical fins stick downwards on the bend while the tails jut backwards.

Six long wings, in the shape of whale flippers, fan out from its protruding spinal column. The pale, sickly skin covering its body is tight and drawn as if vacuum sealed over a grotesque skeletal frame.

Putriding grey barnacles and moist coral are growing out of the skin, partially covering its right flank. Multiple arms stick out of the creature's torso, varying in length from double Livingston’s arm to a small boy's forearm. One particular arm is shielded by the rest and densely covered in coral.

The mass of bony limbs coil together like a spider crab suspended in the air. Each hand, a mismatch of scrawny fingers and thumbs, clasping unusual artefacts and trinkets. Only the depths of Hell and the imagination of pure madness can create a Reaver of souls like this.

What had I done differently from the last time? Did I accidentally summon a servant of Chaos or Omnia itself? Both Gods' empowerment rituals are so similar, I am sure I did the same steps as before.

“Man of Order, so resilient in the face of Chaos’s creatures. Offers of Spirit to the great one Spirit. The power of suns and the will to change cycles are your boon.” It sings to me in that same melody of angelic purity, the sweetest sound I had ever heard.

I close my eyes to escape the terror before me, concentrating on its radiant voice to help me escape from this nightmare. Was this hellish spawn what empowered me before? Just hidden from sight by magic, why do I see it now?

“Fierce warrior of Man, give Order the souls and empowerment will be yours.” Tears of terror stream from my eyes, how can something so hideous and dreadful, imbibe hope and joy at the same time?

“Take them.” I croak the words, wanting this whole ordeal to be over.

I reach internally and locate the Spirit, struggling to bring it forth.

“Focus, our champion of Order. Hold the offerings before you.” Its entrancing voice floats down to me like a lover's kiss in a dream.

I crack an eye, hoping the twisted abomination will have become the angel to match its voice. The limbs unfurl and expose the barnacle matted arm within. It draws towards me, revealing a sickening sight.

A small translucent dugong animal is clasped in the creature's long fingers, clenched by its head in an overhand grip like a trophy on display. The parasitic coral and barnacles weld the two creatures together and cover almost every inch of the dugong’s skin, leaving tiny gaps for its mouth and only one miserable eye.

Closing my eyes, I concentrate internally, blocking out the world around me and what floats close by. I repeat the words ‘Spirit’ over and over, clearing my thoughts of the horror bearing down on me with the tortured creature it holds prisoner.

I grasp the small energy source that dwindles deep within me, it pulsates with my awareness. Drawing it out feels like tensing a muscle you only just discovered, always present but never used.

Breathing heavily while concentrating on the process, a stressful workout and not a meditative joy, I strain until the energy finally vacates my body. I open my eyes in time to witness the final lights flowing into the small dugong's open mouth causing the patches of translucent skin to writhe with rainbow pulses. Iridal light ripples through the coral and barnacles, causing rapid growth along the horror’s long arm and across its torso. The dugong skin quickly dulls back to a faded translucent colour as the Spirit is drawn out by the parasitic crustaceans and embedded coral.

The Reaver withdraws the dugong back into its protected shield of curling limbs. The deep vertical grooves on its head constrict and quiver. Dry, thin lips pull back over crimson gums in a dreadful smile of ecstasy from tasting and relishing the essence of life itself.

“Delightful, quite the bounty you bring forth upon this day. Spirit from all manner of beings, with tides of emotions present in their deaths. Shades of their worth were with them till the end. A man with ideas, he always had a plan until death closed in and there was only panic.

The professional predator of Order, so confused at becoming the prey in his last breaths. And of course, a leader for Chaos, rage for its enemies and its own failure burned strong, until its blood stopped flowing.

Mighty Spirits sourced from divergent alignments. Tell me human, who tastes both sides of the coin, are you an Aspirant?” It questions while silently gliding closer with a twitch from its shark tail.

I recoil, stepping backwards with shaking legs, unable to tear my eyes from the leering grin of whale-hair teeth.

“The human mind is so easy to read when they wear their thoughts with expression and motion, I know what you see.” The entrancing beauty of its voice falters and morphs into a daunting hiss, the illusion dies with my hope of surviving.

My body screams for me to flee from an instinctive sense of impending doom. My limbs fail to respond, petrified in place from fear. It stops gliding a few metres from me, a shorter arm containing an empty golden goblet is extended out.

“Only an Aspirant can achieve what you have. Quell your terror oh feeble man and taste the liquor you sought and earned.”

The nostril grooves quiver again and a large chimney coral on its right shoulder withers and dies to powder, only a fraction of the new growth. Another pulse from the dying coral flows along the bulging veins of the goblet wielding arm, it fills with a mouthful of shimmering ultraviolet Liquid. “Drink the nectar of Gods and be rewarded with their power.” It hisses like a howling wind in my ear.

Frozen like the statues of Pompeii, I remain motionless, not even breathing. The only sign of life remaining in my body is a trickle of piss running down my leg.

The Reaver reaches around the back of my head, it grips my hair and yanks my head back, forcing me to look into its dreadful face. Dry fingers squeeze my jaw open as it pours the chalice’s contents down my throat.

Like breathing air, the liquid flows down and into me like weighted frictionless vapour. Electric energy shoots through my system, the fatigue of battle and trauma washes away with it. My cut palm radiates heat as the flesh nits together and heals faster than a Sana healing salve. My vision sharpens as runes appear in my peripheral vision.

Empowerment:

Order’s Predator

Ability unlocked: Cattle Senses

Chao’s Rage

Ability unlocked: Enraging Mist

Improved abilities:

Tame Lesser Cattle 3/10

Searing Blade 4/10

Attributes increased:

Ordo ranked up:

Ordo 0/10 (Ash)

Neuo - 3/5

Chao - 3/5

The Reaver lets go as it begins floating away, I shake my head causing the runes to vanish.

“Hold fast the truth of our nature, your kind are allowed this reveal. Keep it quiet or oblivion will be a peace you will beg for, and be denied. Do you understand this?” It unfurls every arm and spreads its flipper wings to an immense size to intimidate, completely unnecessary in my state.

I look down in submission. “I understand.” I manage to whimper out of trembling lips.

“Obedience is essential for ascent, collect more Spirit and speak the words.”

I flinch as coarse leather rubs my hand, I pull back and find Cane sniffing up at me. I hear the forest choir and breeze through the trees, the rustle of leaves and songs of birds.

The Reaver's voice still cuts through the beauty of my surroundings, leaving me shaken and smelling of piss. Enraged Guardians and warring Daemons are children's stories compared to this creature that lingers in the unseen.

Still kneeling on the ground, I lay down and curl into a ball to cry. I shut my eyes as the tears stream out, unable to block out the image of the Reaver in my mind. Its grotesque form of true monstrosity will leave me traumatised and dealing with night terrors for the rest of my depressing life.

I cry to myself for what feels like aeons, while Cane rubs against me in his best attempt at comforting, it helps some.

It called me an Aspirant, and said I taste from both sides of the coin. Even with the clarity and energy pumping through me, I couldn’t think straight, the Reaver’s face was all I saw. I have to leave this terrible, tainted section of Silva, I stand up ready to embark. I bend down and hug my hippo's giant head.

“Thanks for being here for me Cane.”

Turning in the direction that Piia left, I take off in a sprint. The Elixir left a cocaine high in my blood that wasn’t quenched from the self pity sobbing, but needed to be sweated out in a long distance chase through the forest.

I wipe the tears from my eyes as I check our connected magical rings, adjusting my course where appropriate. Bypassing small cliff faces that Cane’s powerful chode legs couldn’t climb, added time to the journey. Thick roots and hidden boulders made an assault course for my invigorated body to traverse, the speed made me smile and temporarily forget the Reaver.

We only stop for water leaves, my sharpened eyes helping me see the tail-tail square lights of Esca hidden amongst the bark. That Elixir is the Ambrosia of the Gods. I felt modified, augmented or enhanced.

My eyes and ears were slight improvements, however my sense of smell was vastly greater. Generally speaking, humans have poor smell receptors compared to other animals, we rely mainly on sight and sound.

I could smell the creature muk underneath the ferns, distinguish the scents of separate tree species and even the musky smoke odour of Pyhera living inside an ancient log.

A weak gust blows towards me, carrying a heavy familiar smell. I leap over a log and collide with a swinging branch midair, hitting the moist undergrowth with a winding thud. As I try to stand, several sharp points push against my chest. The bear poncho protects my skin as the spears are slowly pressed with force.

“Stop!”

I look for enemies amongst the ferns, the Guardian hood slides off my head, revealing a camouflaged group surrounding me.

“It's the Shepherd.”