As soon as the vines surged toward him, Kailu snapped his fingers. A sharp pulse rippled out, a burst of sonic energy shattered the incoming growths mid-air. Splinters of wood and fragments of vine sprayed outward.
Ian's eyes narrowed slightly. His voice was calm. "Let's test what more you can do."
Kailu looked straight at him, his expression unreadable. "Another one coming to die..."
He paused, head tilting. "Aren't you the one who killed this idiot before?"
"You're not Vulas," Ian said, cold and certain.
"Bravo," Kailu replied with a slight smirk. "Correct answer. Now die."
The floor beneath Ian trembled. Long, jagged spikes of cyan crystal erupted upward, striking out in sharp patterns like a trap blooming open. As one of Ian's Obryx blades made contact, the crystal detonated, a blast of compressed energy rippled outward, scattering the blade mid-flight and shaking the corridor.
Ian quickly braced to protect himself from the impact.
Then he turned his mind and a dense gel-like substance surged into place around the other crystals. It is Navarax, the material he had based his second mental lattice on.
Over the past few months, Ian had focused on identifying his weaknesses. Especially after the ambush by Vulas and Kolvar - the same one that led to Eryndor's semi-death. During that fight, Kolvar had easily bypassed Obryx-based shielding and reached Myrra. It made sense. Obryx, for all its durability, was just a hyper-dense material. It had no additional properties. It couldn't absorb energy. It couldn't dampen force.
That's what led to Navarax.
A dense, engineered gel substance designed to distort energy flow as it passed through, and absorb the resulting shockwaves and force.
Navarax spread over the crystals covering it. As the next cyan spike made contact the crystal flared with a flickering light, another compressed wave surging out, but it went nowhere. The impact sank into the gel and vanished.
Ian pressed down with his foot, cracking the ground as he shot forward at high speed toward Kailu.
Obryx blades launched. Vines followed, coiled in dense spirals. The terrain shifted, mud walls rose, closing in on Kailu.
He fired a sonic burst, shattering them. But even as the shockwave cleared, a layered wall of Obryx and Navarax covered from behind, and more blades and vines emerged from the other side. One sliced across Kailu's shoulder, leaving a shallow cut.
As Ian closed the distance, several large creatures burst forth, charging at him. In response, he instantly enclosed himself in a cube of Obryx, vines pushing outward to reduce the impact.
BOOM.
The creatures' attack smashed the cube into the ground, dust erupting around it. But Ian was unharmed inside. In the same breath, more vines erupted, now armed with heavy Obryx weapons like giant arms holding the weapons. They slashed through the attackers, tearing into them.
Ian's multiple consciousness threads took over, each controlling a separate set of constructs, coordinating in parallel while his main focus remained on Kailu.
Before Kailu could react, a thin vine, sharpened with Obryx along its edge shot straight toward his head. He dodged just in time.
Shhhk. "Aargh!"
It sliced through his ear. Blood ran down his neck. Kailu staggered, panting hard.
Then...
Crack.
He shattered a blood-red bead in his hand as the red dust spread over and was absorbed into his body.
A pulse spread.
A massive sonic blast exploded outward, dense and layered. Ian braced, but the wave hit like a hammer. The corridor buckled. He was thrown back, body skidding across the stone.
Kailu stood, chest heaving.
"You imbeciles," he spat, voice distorted from the sonic strain. "Just die already."
At that moment, Kolvar moved. Shadows wrapped around Ian's legs mid-recovery. A blade slashed cutting half through his palm cleanly. Blood splattered across the ground.
Ian winced, pain flashing across his face.
Before Kolvar could follow through, a white flash blurred across the field.
Taredd.
He struck Kolvar mid-lunge, blades of light spinning behind him. At the same time, one of the remaining creatures lunged. Taredd didn't dodge. He took the hit to the side, armor denting, but his blade punched through Kolvar's stomach, dragging blood.
Kolvar recoiled, shadows pulling him away.
Taredd stood between them, injured but holding his stance. Ian straightened behind him, blood still dripping from his hand.
They looked at each other. A silent nod.
Ian moved again.
His mind calculated trajectories, pressure offsets, recovery vectors. In a split second, vines reformed. His half-severed palm had already begun sealing, a new one forming as he moved.
Thick vines surged ahead, their surfaces armored with Obryx plating.
Kailu raised his palm and a sonic wave detonated outward. More cyan crystals erupted from the walls and ground covering. As they detonated, compressed energy waves hammered the corridor. Shocklines ripped through air.
As the blast thinned, sharpened Obryx spikes jutted out around Kailu, angled to shear through him. He leapt upward, but more vines were already waiting. They whipped out from every side, aiming to engulf him mid-air.
At the same time, Taredd blurred forward. Kolvar stepped in to intercept, shadows fanning out like a blade. But Taredd's strike burned through, a compressed arc of light slicing across Kolvar's side.
Kailu's eyes darted. The pressure was closing in.
He spread his arms wide.
Another sonic blast exploded from his body, larger and deeper, not focused but expanding outward in a violent ring. The structure around him cracked. The ceiling groaned.
And collapsed.
Chunks of stone and metal rained down toward him.
As Kailu raised an arm to shield himself, Ian appeared from the far side, standing atop a massive vine curling through the air. It carried him fast, hurtling directly toward Kailu with impossible momentum.
Kailu's pupils narrowed.
He wouldn't be able to dodge that.
So he fell, let the structure take him down.
But just before ground impact, Kailu's palm opened. A distortion blinked into existence, a vertical tear in space, humming low and sharp.
A circular vortex of swirling noise and static bent the air around him. The falling debris slowed unnaturally as Kailu's body was pulled inward. His body twisted into the distortion, swallowed piece by piece.
Seeing this, Kolvar exploded into shadow. His form scattered in a violent blur, vanishing into the corners of the broken hall. With Kailu gone, there was no reason to stay.
Silence returned.
Only wreckage remained. Ian stood still, scanning the collapsing chamber. His eyes narrowed as he activated Mindbloom, searching the last point of the wormhole distortion, but there was nothing. Kailu had vanished cleanly.
Taredd stepped back, steadying his breathing. He looked at Ian, but said nothing.
All around, the structure groaned. Support pillars had split down the center. Cracks raced along the walls. A tremor passed beneath their feet.
Without wasting time, Ian, Taredd, and Vaelsh moved upward through the broken gaps. The others were already gathered where Ian had left them earlier.
But before anyone could rest, the chamber above began collapsing. Dust and fragments rained down. They pushed forward, navigating quickly to find stable ground.
After some time navigating upward through the damaged upper corridors, the emergency beacon signal triggered, a rescue team made it through one of the cleared routes. Med-tech drones floated in first, scanning vitals. Reinforced units followed.
Minutes later, they were outside.
The shattered ruins of the lower facility were behind them, smoke still trailing from collapsed openings. Ian stood among the group, still carrying Amo, who now blinked lazily in the daylight. Outside, Wiokz was already there, waiting. It looked like he'd never been caught in the collapse.
Taredd and Vaelsh approached Ian together. Vaelsh spoke first.
"You didn't have to come down there," he said. "Thanks."
Ian gave a short nod.
Taredd stood silently for a moment, his gaze fixed on the scorched ground. "Those men… You knew them," he said, not as a question.
Ian replied, "Yes." He briefly recounted what had happened before, how he was attacked, and how the one who was supposed to be dead was not only alive, but far more dangerous now.
Vaelsh turned to Taredd. "Uncle, do you have any idea who they were?"
Taredd's eyes narrowed. "Shouldn't I be asking you that? You're the one who made a deal with them."
Vaelsh looked away. He didn't answer. It was clear he hadn't expected things to turn out like this.
Taredd kept his eyes on him. "We'll talk about this later."
He turned to Ian and gave a short nod. "Thanks. I'll take it from here. I have a rough idea who they might be."
Ian said nothing more.
Wiokz, seeing Ian back safe, ran toward him.
"Ian! Ian, are you okay?"
"Yeah," Ian said. "I'm fine."
Wiokz let out a breath, visibly relieved. "You scared me," he said. "I didn't know what happened. One moment you were here, and the next..." He shook his head, voice quieter now. "I'm just glad you're alright."
He glanced past Ian, spotted the infant, and gently took Amo into his arms. "And… thanks. For keeping him safe."
Ian didn't respond, but the look in his eyes said enough.
Later, back at Wiokz's home, the group had finally settled.
Ian lay quietly in one of the side rooms, resting. His body was mostly healed, but his mind hadn't settled. He stared at the ceiling in silence, thoughts locked on Kailu… and the shadow that escaped.
On the other side, deep in an empty underground space -
drip… drip…
The sound of liquid hitting stone echoed through the hollow chamber.
"Seems like this one's useless."
"Should we take it back?"
cough… cough…
Kailu stirred. The voices were distant, muffled, overlapping. He opened his eyes slowly. Everything was dim, the air stale. His body ached.
"Who… who's speaking…" he muttered, trying to rise. His limbs were heavy, his vision still blurred.
"Looks like this idiot woke up."
Kailu forced himself to sit up, head turning. "Show yourself! Who's speaking!"
No one answered directly. The voices continued, talking as if he wasn't there.
"We shouldn't have handed him control in the first place."
"He failed."
"He wasted the opportunity."
Kailu's breathing turned frantic. "SHOW YOURSELF!"
Finally, a sharper voice responded. "Stop shouting."
In the next instant, Kailu's surroundings changed. The underground chamber faded. He now stood in a wide, empty expanse filled with shifting colors, deep violet, pale gold, sharp streaks of crimson. He looked down at his hands, a greyish teal color. His form was different. His true form. A Drethir.
Yes, Kailu was one of the Drethir, species who once tried to challenge the Concord, only to be wiped out. His consciousness had survived, bound to an artifact hidden and somehow ended deep within Hilchester Gorge. That's where Kolvar found him. It was him who guided Kolvar, showed him the path in return for a physical body.
He blinked and saw someone standing in front of him. Kailu recognized the face immediately. It was his, or rather, the face of the physical body he had been occupying all this time. Vulas.
Kailu's throat tightened. "You… where is this?"
Vulas looked calm. "Didn't you want to see us? Now we're here."
Kailu blinked again. What was empty moments ago now teemed with blurry silhouettes, shifting, indistinct, whispering.
Seeing this, Kailu froze. No matter how imperious he had once been, he understood instantly, he was the prey here.
He staggered back, trying to find space. "Who are you…"
The voices didn't stop.
"See? I told you he was an idiot."
"We shouldn't have allowed this from the beginning."
"I thought he might lead us to the source."
"This is what happens when you rely on a broken vessel."
The murmurs overlapped, coming from all sides.
Kailu spun, but couldn't focus on any one of them.
Vulas stepped forward. "You've occupied my body long enough. It's time you to return it."
His hand rose. He placed his palm firmly on Kailu's head.
Kailu screamed, thrashing as the space distorted, his form splitting into fragments, scattering into the shifting air like dust.
In the dim underground space, Vulas opened his eyes. Still breathing and alive but now carrying everything of Kailu.