Chapter 1615: Unclear paths
[...and I’m going to be honest, I didn’t know Chaos could be absorbed in such a fashion,] Blazejudicator reported to his fellow kaijin, [but I am now a little disturbed.]
[How so?] Screamira asked.
[Probably because of the smell,] Corpse Doll answered. [It was bad. Like, worst than a rotting corpse bad. And I should know.]
[Mmmm. I don’t think it was the smell that was the problem,] Porcelain Doll added. [I think it was because of the quality of the Desires.]
[Yeah! The desires were all...murky. Not like the desires that Caretaker condenses. These were all...messy.]
<=It’s because those were passionate desires. Not something that comes from the soul. Well, not a core part of the soul,=> Logos and Pathos explained.
[What does that mean?] Hurricroak asked.
<Oh, I got this. You know how sometimes you get a random-ass craving for a food item, but then after eating it, you immediately regret doing so? >
[Yeah...]
= The desires locked in those spilled bodily fluids are similar. They contain desires that are as ephemeral as craving a triple-decker cheeseburger with extra bacon. It sounds like a good idea at the time, but it usually comes twinged with regret further down the line. These kinds of desires are very common but never seem to come directly from the inner reaches of the soul...save for a few individuals. =
<Those guys tend to condense fairly powerful cores, due to their societal desires getting mixed with these messy primal ones. >
[Hmmm.]
Taking everything that they knew so far about Ferroxa and Hulna, the kaijin could only determine that these two main secrets were that they figured out how to cultivate like a kaijin...sort of.
The [Sacred Flame], whatever portion they had managed to take in, had apparently started to reward them for following certain innate tendencies that they already followed in the first place.
Ferroxa was a veteran hardass who demanded proper protocol from his troops, regardless of their mercenary status, and seemed to get empowered whenever he had to exact discipline on the rowdy mercenaries.
That or whenever he committed acts of extreme violence against them, this was still being investigated by the members of Mysticlassic.
Hulna, on the other hand, was a man who preached peace and love yet somehow learned how to tap into the most primal form of the latter and...well...feed off of it like some kind of low-class incubus.
Either way, as far as the kaijin could tell, they were both still possible traitors for the exact reason: personal cultivation power.
If Ferroxa was the traitor, his motivation for assassinating the previous Hearth Tender was to simply keep the war going.
The longer the war, the more chances he had to exact disciplinary violence and reap the weird rewards that came from it. Of course, it ran the very real risk of the war going on for so long that Ferroxa and his acolytes would have no one to preach to other than corpses or have no more bodies to bury except themselves.
Hulna’s motivation was somewhat similar but with a weirder payoff and an alternative "win con."
If the war kept going, he could keep hosting his "gatherings of peace and love" and be able to continue gathering the errant desires of people just trying to live in the moment and not think about their impending doom.
If he could figure out how to end the war the way he wanted, i.e., somehow get the Emperor of the Erupting Dawn Empire to agree to a peace marriage alliance, then he could sneak his way into that man’s imperial harem and feed off of the sexual desires that would surely be generated in such a situation.
Granted, this was speculation on just Blazejudicator’s part, as the Doll Twins were still trying to wrap their heads around the idea of feeding off of such errant and weak desires.
[So what do we do now? Keep stalking these guys until they do something obvious?] Razorstella asked.
[We could just take them both out and be done with it,] Screamira suggested. [It’d be quick too. No need to worry about whether or not we made the right call.]
[I really don’t think the Ringmaster would order something like that,] Springerdermain pointed out.
’He is right about that,’ Zhen Liu finally chimed in. ’For the time being, maintain a close eye on Hulna and Ferroxa while Logos and Pathos make their determinations on who is the more likely suspect. They’ll give the final verdict once y’all collect enough evidence.’
[Fair enough.]
[Do they at least have a preliminary guess?]
...Well? Do they?...
<Well...this is a conundrum. Usually, I could tell right away who was a duplicitous bastard with just a single look at their faces. Unfortunately, from what I can sense, they’re both hiding something beyond their apparent ability to tap into [Chaos], but I can’t tell what,> Pathos grumbled. <Are they secretly lovers? Exs? I got nothing!>
=To be fair, we expect this sort of thing to occur, which is why we have the kaijin tailing them in the first place. Give them time, and we’ll probably have a final answer in the next three days. Maybe four. =
<I know that, but...what if they’re red herrings? Wild geese? Fucking snipes?>
=Ah, you’re wondering if it’s possible that Serena is playing us for the fool so that she can possibly steal ownership of us? That she might’ve set these two up as obvious bait to draw crucial kaijin power to locations other than where it’s actually needed? =
<Yeah...fuck, I think our current Lord is rubbing off on me a little as well. >
=That doubt is why we have zakos tailing her.=
<Right...>
...Speaking of zakos and Serena...
"Hmmm."
"..."
Understanding that trust was a two-way street, Serena didn’t mind having what were essentially monstrous time bombs on her person, especially when they took on the form of some surprisingly fashionable beads made of precious metals.
However, that didn’t stop her from trying to get a better look at her so-called "assurance".
Which is why, after she had finished her morning rituals as the First Hearth Tender, Serena retreated to her office and began to study the zako marbles in greater detail.
"Interesting...very interesting."
In her mind, they were very similar to aether puppets but had some details that made it very clear that they were anything but.
The first thing she noticed, on a physical level, was that these zako marbles were perfectly smooth and symmetrical...but not in a manufactured way.
Making metal marbles and beads wasn’t an unusual practice; many blacksmiths and craftsmen first learned to make such baubles, but they always had imperfections or at least carried signs of polishing techniques.
These zako marbles appeared as if they manifested into reality as being perfectly spherical, as if the universe had deemed their existence to be as such from the very beginning of reality.
The second thing she noticed, on a spiritual level, was that these marbles weren’t inert like regular aether puppets when they were inactive.
Aether puppets, when not in use, were no different from normal puppets. They essentially sat there and did nothing and released no aura or aether that would suggest otherwise.
These zako marbles, however, constantly released and absorbed energy like they were living beings. Then again, Zhen Liu did say that they technically were living things that could learn and grow given enough time.
"I wonder..."
From her desk, Serena pulled out several low-tiered aether medicines and aether beast crystals that she had acquired from her time before becoming the First Hearth Tender.
She had wanted to donate these items but had never gotten around to it given how busy her life had become.
But now, she had another purpose to these items.
"Now, I don’t think these guys have any mouths, so...maybe I just—oh!"
Serena’s initial plan to see what would happen if she "fed" the aether materials to the zako marbles was to use her aether to try and break them down into energy that could then be absorbed by the marbles themselves.
However, that turned out to be an unnecessary step.
The moment Serena placed the items on the table next to the marbles, one of the gold ones immediately rolled over towards them and plopped itself atop a crystal that had once belonged to a first-tiered aether beast known as an Icicle Frog.
The golden zako marble sat on the crystal for a few moments before the latter had disintegrated into particles of energy and was promptly absorbed. Immediately afterwards, snowflake-like patterns began to appear on the surface of the gold zako marble and Serena could make out the vague shape of a frog’s head mixed in as well.
"How peculiar..."
After making this comment, the other zako marbles began to move towards the remaining items on the desk and repeat the process.
By the end of it, the once-blank zako marbles began to take on more...unique patterns.
’No wonder the Kaijin Lord is spoken with such caution in the records...’
