Unbound

Chapter Four Hundred And Ninety Seven – 497

"Everyone can see him?" Felix asked, surprised.

"Yeah," Beef grunted. He was being supported by two Naga, shoulders seemingly repaired but still in clear pain. "He kinda looks like you. Sorta."

"Nymean," Vess said with an awed whisper. The Spears behind her tilted back, away from the white-robed figure. "How?"

"A detail that concerns me as well," Isla remarked, before arching an eyebrow. "You still have not answered my question, spirit. Are you Nymean?"

"I am of the Nym, yes," the dark-skinned phantom said, though he did not address Isla directly. His strange eyes bored into Felix's instead. "How...how long have I slept, Unbound?"

"If I had to guess...it's been something like several Ages?"

The phantom's head rocked back like Felix had punched him, and he reached out to press his long-fingered hand against the restored bark of the Spirit Tree. "So long. From the looks your allies are giving me, I fear the answer, but I must ask this as well: how fares the Empire?"

Pit let out a trilling cry, no longer in his puppy form. "Bad news, there."

"A Chimera. I am honored," the phantom bowed to Pit as the tenku ambled forward. "Please explain this 'bad news.'"

"Uh." Pit gave Felix a look, clearly unsure how to proceed.

"That's a long conversation, and I need to make sure of something. Hold on," Felix said. He stepped closer to the Abundance Anima and laid a hand upon its trunk. Life Mana thrummed beneath his fingertips like rivers of rolling timpanis and bright, crashing cymbals. Felix pressed deeper, flaring his Affinity. Blue-white lightning crackled from his shoulders and a rush of sublime music assaulted his ears as Adamant Discord and Skein of Fate were both activated. Yet Felix felt nothing more than the Tree itself. The connection to the Fathom was no longer immediately present. "Whew. Okay, good."

"What was the purpose of that?" Vess asked, cautiously sidling up to Felix. She hadn't banished her Spears, and still watched the phantom like he would vanish at any moment. "Are you alright?"

"Just peachy. I had to eat the ooze infecting the Spirit Tree, and that left me open to the ooze's connection to the Fathom." Felix gestured vaguely into the distance. "I did it before, and the damn thing notices every time. If I hadn't burned it up to restore the Tree, then we'd be facing down the monster boss already."

"So it knows we are here?" Isla asked, her voice sharp.

"No. Well, sorta. I've gotten its attention enough that I'm sure the Fathom knows about me, but its never been able to pinpoint my location." Felix tapped right below his sternum. "The connection in me is gone as well. What little I didn't use up, I devoured."

"Devoured," said the Nym, tilting his head. Combined with his all-blue stare, it came across as alien and a little unnerving. "That is the province of beasts and monsters. Unbound, what Race did you choose upon arrival?"

"Oh." Felix scratched his jaw. "That's a complicated answer."

"Were you not guided to a suitable choice?" the phantom asked. Felix could hear the man speak, the rustle of his robes and where his hands rubbed nervously against his thighs...but the Nym's feet made no sound upon the ground, or bend a single frond below. "An Augur should have consulted the Omens during your reception. What did they say?"

Felix laughed. It was easier to do now, across the gulf of months. That would have been nice. But no. No Augur. No answers at all really.

What fools would summon the Unbound and not follow the Path of Arrival? Who performed the summoning?

"Someone you wouldnt know, Id wager. Listen, all this is great to learn and all, but were pressed for time. What is your deal? Wait, no. Whats your name, first?

I was once called Paxus, Chanter of the Green Wilds and Companion to the Abundance Anima." The Nym's voice deepened, ever so slightly, as if he were used to giving his full title as part of a ceremony.

"Chanter?" Isla asked. Her voice, by contrast, slipped higher and filled with an uncharacteristic excitement. "You are a Nymean Chanter? Of the Grand Harmony?"

"A facet of it, yes. Specialization is the heartsblood of potency, after all. Harmony itself asks for it, and for all pieces to work together as one." Paxus frowned. "This too should have been explained upon your initialization into the Harmonys pattern."

"Right." Felix would rather avoid having to rehash his unorthodox arrival to the Continent. If not for brevity's sake, than for Paxus'; the man's Spirit was all but unguarded and Felix could hear it shaking like a leaf in autumn. He was more affected by their revelations than he let on. "The facet you're talking about is the Green Wilds, right? What is that exactly?"

"The Green Wilds? They are the verses of the great song that brings life from death and death to life. All things that grow must also perish, in order to fuel more growth. The green wilds are a cycle that never ends but will always flourish once more."

"I have a skill called the Aria of the Green Wilds. Is that related?"

"Ah yes. I had thought I detected some resonance within your Spirit. Following the path of the green wilds is a popular choice among us, even among the unbound. Or so I have heard."

"Right. That Path." Felix cleared his throat. "You mentioned being a Companion. To the Spirit Tree?"

"Of course. Not all of us are found worthy of a Chimera's attention, after all." Paxus once again bowed to Pit, who took the opportunity to preen under the attention.

Isla strode forward, right up to Paxus and stared up at him. She was over a foot shorter than Felix, let alone the taller Nym, but still her gaze was steel. "Answer swiftly. We haven't the time to waste. What is this place? What is its purpose, and how was it perverted by this strange ooze?"

Paxus' frowned, but he did not back down from the small blonde woman. "You stand within my Companion, the Abundance Anima, spread round the floor of this sea after the Convocation of the Sundered determined it must be studied."

"Sea? Thought this was a lake," Beef muttered.

Felix nodded. "I was right then. It's a research facility."

"Researching what, exactly?" Vess asked.

"The Breach."

Felix's Mind scrambled for a moment upon hearing the word, as if someone had sent ten thousand volts coursing through his spine. A darkness spread outward, a great abyss of water and shadow that raged with invisible currents...and a face that drove unthinking terror into his limbs. Doors of stone slammed shut, massive gates that cut the image away from his Mind, sealing it within a tomb of glassy blue rock. Felix blinked, suddenly staring at his own hands. Both were crackling with blue-white lightning and crimson-gold flame, and the ground at his feet was charred to ash.

Title: The Call Of Defiance Is Active!

+25% Willpower When Contested By A Foe Of Divine Or Greater Advancement!

Bastion of Will is level 92!

"Felix, it's okay," Pit cooed at him. His big head pressed down into Felix's hands, and the song of his Skills cut out. "Focus on me."

He looked up, swallowing to clear the bile from his throat. "Whatwhat did I do?"

Isla stared at him as if he were someone she had never seen. An animal, perhaps. Beef, Hallow, and the War Nagas had all fled back about twenty feet; well outside of the ring of charred earth. Vess stepped forward, just a hair behind Pit. "You screamed something and hit the ground. Felix...Felix what did you see in that Memory?"

Felix licked his lips and met Vess' gaze. It was soft, but her brow was taut with worry. "Something awful. It...it lives in the Breach" he tensed, feeling his thoughts stutter, but this time he was prepared. "There's a hole in the world, and my Mind keeps skipping back to it."

"The Creature," Paxus said. He remained nearby, his white robes untouched by the devastation Felix had wrought. "You have seen it?"

"Only in a Memory I took from your Tree...or from the ooze, maybe." Felix stood up with Vess' help, and he did not push her away. "I saw the Abundance Anima spread wide, all over the bottom of this lake, connected by huge roots to other Trees. All of them surround this...hole in the center. Inside it...inside it is something I can't describe."

"You have seen it, then. All of the magi who worked within my Companion were tasked with viewing the Creature at least once. It slumbered for a great many centuries; an entire Age, we think. The facility, the array we grew, all of it was an effort to contain it within the Breach." Paxus ran a hand over the thick root of his Companion Tree. "Together our efforts were enough, and the magi were allowed to focus on exploring the unique flora and fauna within the trenches."

"Breach," rumbled Toa'ut. The War Naga had remained silent all this time, his brooding profile watching without expression. Now, however, Felix heard the quiver of alarm in him. "The Breach is where the Fathom resides."

"The center of Khasma," Lavix said, her voice almost as deep. "The stronghold of its spawn."

"Are you suggesting the Fathom is this Creature they're talking about?" Isla asked.

"I do not know. Only that Khasma's center is where we are headed, and if this Creature is there it will prove troublesome." Toa'ut's brow furrowed more than usual. "Deadly, perhaps."

Felix had finally mastered himself, flaring his Bastion to greater heights as he cut off the intrusive thoughts. "They're separate. I've felt the Fathom's influence, and it was nothing like this. The Creature or whatever, it triggered my Call of Defiance Title."

"I thought that only occurs when you are contested by a Divinity?" Vess asked. Isla and Paxus both gasped, sounding nothing alike yet united in their surprise.

"Divinity or greater, according to the Title." Felix looked around, meeting his team's gazes and nodded. "Yeah. That's what we seem to be up against."

The Nym studied Felix, his open Spirit vibrating with surprise, delight, and a constant measure of fear. The fear hadn't subsided, not since the guy had put together Felix's identity. "You would face the Creature, Unbound?"

Aiming for nonchalance, Felix shrugged. "If I have to. I'd rather not, though, so anything you can tell me would be golden."

Paxus straightened his spine, and his braided hair swung in time with his sudden bow. "As you wish, Unbound. What do you wish to know?"

"Let's start from the top. Is the Abundance Anima here and all over the lake bed? They're all one organism?"

"Correct. My Companion agreed to securing the Breach in return for her cuttings to be planted all over the Empire. Her root systems have been grown intentionally to form a seal over the Breach, one that was fueled by the Spirit Tree's power. It was, we thought, impregnable."

"And how did you come to be in this...form?" Isla asked, gesturing to his immaterial body.

Paxus pressed an arm through a bright pink blossom, not even shaking the dew from its new-grown petals. "The how remains a touch hazy...but I recall the why of it." The corners of his mouth tightened into the shadow of a grimace. "One of the Abundance's Trees fell to the Creature's corruption. That ooze of which you speak, the substance that clogged this very chamber, it bored into the seal and created a flaw. That is the only thing that would have caused the cascade of failures we saw that day. I...We gave ourselves to the seal, to keep the Creature below." Paxus touched the tip of his tongue to his teeth, his expression cycling between so many emotions Felix found them hard to track. "My Body was sacrificed. My Mind and Spirit live on within my Companion's Trees. When you revived her, you revived me as well. From the depths of my heartsong, thank you Lord Unbound."

"You're welcome." Felix looked up at the spreading branches of the Tree. "I assume the other Trees are still corrupted, then?"

"Indeed. We are connected, but the sensation is muddled and sour. I can feel more of those Wickerjak monstrosities prowling the root tunnels, filled with foul light."

"Wait wait," Felix said, holding up a hand. "What root tunnels?"

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