"I think we might have a problem," I say. The ache in my chest is only growing, and with it, there's a distinct sense of dread. I'm not sure if the dread is coming from or from the Void, which has very much decided to start paying attention to current circumstances and is now emanating a distinct feeling of hunger.
Ikaara stops. When she speaks, her voice is strange. "It is difficult to navigate the currents, especially with two passengers," she says to ; the words are distorted by a stray rush of dense Firmant moving past us, and I have to blink several tis to get rid of the afterimage imprinted onto my retinas.
Briefly, I consider turning off Tetrachromacy but no. I'm trying to learn. I need to know what Ikaara is doing here, in case I need to do it on my own. Right now, I have barely a clue.
"The Interface is reacting to the slipstream," I say with a slight grunt. Ikaara observes , six eyes blinking alternately, and I feel her gaze like she's looking through my skin.
"The slipstreams are usually only navigated by us morphlings," Ikaara says, her voice faintly distracted. There's a small undercurrent of worry there, though. "We have never brought an Interface user in here before... But it should not be reacting to your Firmant regardless."
"You better not have tricked us," Ahkelios says, folding his arms.
Ikaara shakes her head, then presses one hand solemnly to the upper left corner of her chest. "I would not," she says.
She doesn't seem to be lying, though I don't have much attention to spare right now. The ache in my chest is growing, and the Interface pulls itself up in front of .
[ Warning: Temporal overload detected. ]
Clarity slams into . It's not the Interface that's reacting to the slipstream not exactly. It's whatever part of the interface is tied to the loop.
"It's temporal Firmant," I manage to say, gritting my teeth through the growing pain in my chest.
Ikaara's eyes widen. "You have temporal"
She doesn't get to finish.
Firmant erupts out of my chest, leaving folded over and coughing, a sudden, searing pain flashing into every particle of my lungs. I collapse, letting go of Ikaara and Rotar, and I recognize almost imdiately that that is a mistake, because the current of Firmant surrounding catches in its grip, and I realize, abruptly, exactly how much Ikaara was doing to keep us stable.
The current of Firmant around lashes about wildly in thousands of violent tendrils, at speeds so great that Quicken Mind doesn't help even slightly. I reach for the Accelerator, hoping to boost it further, but even with the increased speed of mind I can barely perceive a difference.
How was Ikaara holding all of this back? It looks impossible to . Firmant moves around like a chaotic storm, and I'm sent tumbling along with it, down what I'm sure is a very, very wrong path.
All while temporal Firmant continues to writhe around , interacting with the slipstream's Firmant and sohow as best as I can tell being amplified. The chaos of the slipstream rges with the Interface's temporal Firmant, and while the Interface itself doesn't appear to be in any danger of running out, it doesn't really matter. The real and present danger is that that chaotic temporal Firmant is throwing around like a rag doll.
Worse than that, it's gathering. Tetrachromacy lets see what looks like sparks and flashes of magenta lightning, which as far as I can gather is lightning made out of ti. My head aches from trying to process and understand.
Hopefully Ikaara and Rotar will be fine. I need to focus on surviving this especially since whatever's going on has sothing to do with ti.
I don't know if I'll loop correctly if I die here.
Think. Ikaara was doing sothing to navigate the slipstream. I don't have access to the sa Firmant she does, and I don't know how to produce it. She changed into this form because it had a better way to sense Firmant, and I do have that to my advantage.
Quicken Mind doesn't help. Accelerator doesn't appear to help, either. Processing speed won't help out here. Ikaara's deanor is calm, relaxed; whatever she's doing, she's not relying on split-second reactions to make it work, but it does require her focus.
Crystallized Barrier. I try it, just in case it can protect from the Firmant all around , but it nearly instantly shatters as it manifests. I grit my teeth.
I'm not close to death. I don't want to use Second Wind yet.
My various speed skills won't help here; I don't have anywhere to go. I try Color Drain, but it steals only a fragnt of the Firmant's energy before it fails and collapses. There's too much here for to drain.
There is the Void. The Inspiration seems attentive. It's lurking within , waiting for to call on it. It hasn't tried to take over, and it doesn't seem hungry.
Verdant Armor fails. I don't even want to try either of my temporal skills. Ahkelios appears to have dissipated at so point in the stream of Firmant, though I feel the bond with him still secured within that, at least, is a small comfort.
What else can I do? What was Ikaara doing?
She needed to sense the Firmant. I can sense Firmant. What are we doing differently?
All-Seeing Eye.
The purpose of the Eye is ostensibly to help see connections. It lets combine skills because it lets see the ways in which two skills can fit together, because the two things are otherwise a chaotic ss.
Just like the slipstream.
As soon as I use the Eye, I see it. It's hard to notice, in the chaotic array of Firmant, but there is in fact a path that's relatively clear it's just a path that's constantly moving and shifting. The Eye lets predict where the path will open next, to so extent...
There is a temporal storm still gathering above , made of stolen temporal Firmant. I don't want to find out what's going to happen if I get struck by a bolt of ti.
Warpstep.
As soon as I see an opening with the Eye, I teleport into it, sparing only a second to look for the next one. The constantly shifting nature of the Firmant maze makes it difficult, like staring into static and trying to see a picture within that static, but I just barely manage it.
Warpstep.
It's painful. My chest still aches, and the Firmant in my body has gone haywire, no doubt as a result of whatever strange reaction there was between the slipstream and the temporal nature of the loop. It occurs to that this may be what Gheraa was talking about when the Integrator ntioned temporal banding; he'd ntioned it made it difficult for him to visit.
Warpstep.
I stagger. There's blood on my hands, though I don't rember when it got there. It doesn't look like my blood. There is a phantom hole through the right side of my abdon, and I observe this with a detached, clinical efficiency.
I am still surrounded by chaotic Firmant. The temporal storm continues to gather.
Warpstep.
There's an exit coming up. I think I'm missing an arm, but I don't know when that happened, either. I don't bother using Second Wind, because it's back a mont later.
It's... temporal banding? The knowledge doesn't seem like it's mine. I'm experiencing monts from my future, or maybe my past. The temporal storm continues to gather.
Warpstep.
I'm at an exit.
A bolt of temporal Firmant flashes towards .
Accelerator. Flashstep.
I exit the slipstream and land on desolate, broken rock, tumbling and rolling several tis over before coming to a stop. There aren't any signs of trees around , but then there's no sign of any life, either. There's just... an empty nothing.
Good news: The sky still looks like Hestia's sky.
Bad news: The ti of day is different.
My Firmant is exhausted, but I call on Temporal Fragnt one last ti, bringing up Ahkelios' miniature form to join in what is, as far as I can tell, a barren desert.
"Any idea where we are?" I ask. My voice is hoarse.
"I think you should be more worried about when we are." This is the first ti I've heard Ahkelios speak with such grim worry in his voice. "Check the Interface."
That was my next step, anyway.
[ You have defeated a chanical Remnant (Rank D)! 32 Strength credits. 51 Durability credits. 69 Speed credits. 27 Reflex credits. 20 Firmant credits. ]
A lot of which are my rewards for my actions, rewarded because I ostensibly defeated a chanical Remnant. I still don't know why the system is reporting these, except that it likely has sothing to do with the automaton I threw into the Fracture.
And then... many more ssages. So many more ssages. I don't even get credits for them.
[ You have defeated a chanical Remnant (Rank D)! ]
A ton of these ssages.
[ You have defeated a chanical Remnant (Rank C)! ]
Less of these.
[ You have defeated a chanical Remnant (Rank B)! ]
The rank, I notice, is slowly increasing.
[ You have defeated a chanical Remnant (Rank A)! ]
Only one of those.
My eyes drift to the Tiline Tracker on the interface. It reads:
92:17:23
Ninety-two days, seventeen hours, twenty-three seconds. I've been displaced in ti. A quick check of the Earth 'chat' shows no changes, so the temporal changes are likely local, limited to Hestia. I've pretty much already established that, but considering what happened, I figure it's better to be safe.
None of this feels quite real to yet. I'm going through the motions. Adapting to being dumped into the Trial? Sure, I can do that. I was forced to do that. But this...
At least now I know, I suppose. I've learned so crucial information. I keep going through the motions. The map is very, very zood out when I check I'm on another continent on Hestia entirely. The markers for the Cliffside Crows is gone.
"Ethan," Ahkelios says, sounding worried. No, scared? He sounds scared.
There's a rumble in the earth, and a very, very familiar sense of Firmant overwhelmingly powerful and growing by the second.
That can't be right, I think. I'm nowhere near the Fracture. It's on another continent. But it feels like the Fracture, like that blast that was sent up into the sky.
I notice, for the first ti, that the shape of the continent the Fracture is on is different. Half of it is missing.
There's a bright light on the horizon growing by the second. I take a second to parse what it is, and what's probably happening. I glance at the Interface's map once more and see a crack, spreading through the map, racing directly for .
Fuck.
The ground cracks and splits beneath , and I am swallowed by Firmant.
[ You have died. ]
[ You have unlocked a new feature: Doomsday Tracker. This Interface feature will track all events that may affect the ti at which Anomaly 006 occurs. ]
[ You have unlocked the knowledge database of Anomaly 006, kept by other Trialgoers. ]
[ For encountering an Anomaly, you have been awarded 50 Firmant credits. ]
[ Warning: New anomalies detected in loop. ]
When I wake up, it's with the blade of a mantis arm descending on my head.
END BOOK 1
Reviews
All reviews (0)