It wasn’t the usual quiet, the one wherein the beasts in the field held still when a predator prowled. No, it was sothing else, sothing a bit more…primordial.
It didn’t take Yuriko all that long to suss it out. She had experienced sothing like this before, and she knew that back in the Chaos Sea, the varied planes had a Will of their own. Why would she assu that interstitial space didn’t have sothing like that, too?
The feeling wasn’t identical to what she felt before, of course, but the similarities were there. More importantly, now that she sorta knew what was happening, she could gauge what it ant. And it wasn’t anything good.
The deafening silence was punctuated by hostility. To her and her companions? No, the hostility wasn’t quite directed at her. Scarlett was fidgeting though, and glancing around, nerves showing.
The clearing was barely big enough to lie down in, but there was a fallen log that crossed the center. She nudged it with her foot and found that it was stable enough to risk sitting on. Scarlett took a seat with a relieved sigh, despite the fact that the other girl barely walked up the side of the hill. Still, she was still recovering from her wounds and Yuriko surreptitiously examined the new flesh. Recovery didn’t leave scars as long as it was used throughout the healing process, so no worries there.
Yuriko catalogued her stolen—requisitioned—goods. She grabbed a dozen MREs from the soldiers, though each package looked different. About half of them looked like thin lunch boxes, each one about the sa size if not with the sa number of partitions. The other half were pouches of different sizes. They were labeled at least, and the Wojan variant was the sa as the one used in Astoria and Irvalla. There was another set of characters near the bottom of the label in Old Imperial: Manufactured for the Imperial Army.
The small pouches were actually side dishes for the main ones in the boxes, mostly dried fruit and nut mixtures. The lunch boxes had the labels: atloaf and mash, corned beef and bread, and pork and beans. The last one only had a single partition straight down the middle.
“Is that food?” Scarlett asked, her tummy grumbled loudly.
“Yeah,” Yuriko chuckled. “You still need to eat to fuel your Recovery.”
“But I already…” Gurgle!
Yuriko handed one of the trail mix pouches. “Snack on these. We’ll save the others for dinner.”
Wordlessly, Scarlett tore open the pouch and tilted it over her palm carefully. A smattering of shelled nuts and dried fruits landed on her palm. She eyed it dubiously then tossed them into her mouth, using her Animakinesis to make sure none of it missed. Yuriko eyed her friend’s aura and noted that much of the fractures had already healed, and more importantly, Scarlett’s reach had doubled from two inches to four. Her friend didn’t notice as she ate most of the trail mix, only thinking of offering so to Yuriko once the bag was near empty.
Yuriko gratefully accepted and tossed the mix into her mouth, chewing thoughtfully while she examined the flavours. Salty and sweet. Yet also…old.
She glanced at the label and noted the manufacturing date, but snorted in laughter when she realised that of course, the Irvallans didn’t use the Imperial Calendar. It took her a bit to rember the Astorian Calendar and the current year, 611, but it seed the Irvallans didn’t follow that either. She frowned as she tried to rember the calendar they used, and sighed.
No, she didn’t rember.
She hadn’t used her mory palace technique then. Without a fra of reference she didn’t know if 2005 was anywhere close to Astoria’s 611 or the Imperial 3004 After Founding.
Ehehehe, she didn’t even know what the Shangrians used as a point of reference, though it was a much longer string of numbers than one would expect but the last four numbers were 5054. That would an that the Eternal Tower residents were able to keep records that lasted for that long, right? An unimaginable number of years…
The majority of her focus was suddenly drawn towards the fliers. They were far enough away that it would take quite a while for a search party to suss Yuriko and Scarlett out, but only if their numbers were limited. From what Desire said, there were quite a lot of soldiers in the invasion force, and likely more to co. They were building an interplanar tunnel, after all.
Anyway, the flier had stilled for a few monts which gave her sunblade the chance to close in and strike. He managed to block with his arms and legs, and the powered armour was good enough that it didn’t buckle from the blow, and strangely, the Radiant energy she imparted into the attack didn’t consu the alloys, but instead, was shunted aside.
A burst of Radiant energy two inches from his position threw the fliers several dozen paces away, and well out of perception range. With a jolt, she realised that the tag she left on the male flier had been eroded away by the burst.
“Tsk.”
Yuriko focused and split apart the simulacrum of Fri’Avgi into seven thinner swords. She sent them towards the canopy and once they were under cover, she directed the blades towards where she felt Desire was. And, as if on cue, she felt her bound Chaos Lord’s ntal communication.
‘Master, they’re moving all of the prisoners, including myself.’
‘Moving prisons, or for sothing else?’
‘The latter, Master. I’m not sure what they intend. Ah, I see Brilliance and Speedrun…Master, they aren’t in good shape.’
‘You were unable to check on them earlier?’
‘No, they were too far away when they passed my cell. Speedrun has a broken arm, Brilliance has several bullet wounds, but they are well tended.’
‘You ntioned other prisoners?’
‘Yes, Master. Another seventeen individuals. I’m not sure if they’re all Altered, mundanes, or a mix.’
‘Very well. Escape if you can, rescue as many as you can safely.’
‘I believe it would be more productive to find out what they intend first, Master.’
‘Will you be safe?’
‘They’ve never seen before, Master. And when they interrogated earlier, I twisted their minds with my hymn.’
‘I see, do as you want, but keep in contact. Ah, Scarlett’s mostly recovered.’
‘Hmmm, maybe we should have left her back ho?’
‘She’d never forgive .’
‘Better that than dead. Or worse, a hindrance.’
‘Dee…’
‘Apologies, Master, I overstepped.’
‘No, it’s alright.’
‘I understand wanting to cultivate her potential, Master…’
‘It’s not just that.’
‘Then please enlighten .’
‘When we return from this adventure.’
‘Yes, Master.’
The connection shrunk and only her sense of where Dee was remained. Yuriko idly opened a snack pouch and nibbled on so nuts and dried fruits, then handed most of the bag to Scarlett once the other girl finished hers.
Wordlessly, the two of them continued their trek. After a few minutes of the smaller woman stumbling on roots, bushes, and twigs, Yuriko asked, “Would you rather I carry you?”
Scarlett’s cheeks reddened, but the reality of the situation was that they were moving at a crawl, not to ntion making a lot of noise, rather than making good progress. The sunblades were halfway between their position and Dee’s, and she was sure it would only take another five or so minutes to make contact. Probably less before the seven swords were spotted.
Did she mind that the camp would be alerted? She was sure the fliers already did so, and there would likely be patrols and search parties. Then again, would they even discern what she wanted? They had been fighting the Unfettered a while back, and she supposed those murderous fiends already fled. Though if they did, why would their abandoned hospital space still be there?
The silence of the Interstitial Space, and the hostility didn’t feel directed at her, but a more general antipathy, so perhaps the Unfettered was still making trouble. If the Irvallans kidnapped nineteen people, then what was Astoria Republic’s response? Did they even know? How competent was the governnt really? What more if the abductees were all Altered? Would the politicians care?
Yuriko humd in thought. They probably would, if only for the fact that so Altered had aligned themselves with the Protectorate.
Then again, what would her grandfather think after three days of her disappearance? Would he command his minions to search for her or would he be too preoccupied with his anti-RuiNation fight? With another click of her tongue, she pushed down Lilibeth’s lingering attachnts and proceeded to carry Scarlett with her Anima. At the sa ti, she spread the seven sunblades out at an angle, and by the ti they reached the camp, they should provide a suitable distraction.
That was probably the best way to handle it, yeah, only…she had to devote seven strands of consciousness to surveil the swords, which sowhat ran counter to their purpose as Manifested weapons.
She left a set of instructions and debated whether she should allow the sunblades to signal her when they encounter an enemy. Hmmm, since their use now was beyond the purpose she initially set them too, they wouldn’t be able to adapt to new circumstances too easily, unless she set them to attack whatever they encountered. She couldn’t inadvertently hurt the ones she ca to rescue. With ideas set, she released the links and focused on her incarnation body and Scarlett.
They moved at an even pace, and an hour later, Desire contacted her again.
‘Master, we’re being brought into a weird construct. I can understand so of the runescript lines…and the underlying energy flows…the dinsional layer is morphing…’
There was more than a touch of worry in Dee’s ntal voice.
‘Can you disrupt it?’
‘Not without catastrophic consequences.’
‘What do you an?’ Surely, whatever they were doing couldn’t have been far along right? If they were just bringing the Astorian…natives? Oh.
‘The process had already begun, and disrupting it will cause the dinsional leylines to go haywire. The backflow might erupt into the pri material…or it could cause so other effect. What I’m sure of is that anyone in the vicinity won’t have a good ti.’
So whatever they were plotting was already well on its way to completion. Yuriko huffed, then blinked as she took stock. Did she really care? As long as it didn’t kill everyone in Astoria by the ritual’s completion…
No, she should care.
She could feel the remnants of Lilibeth’s psyche protest at Yuriko’s callousness. Oi, she wasn’t callous! Astorians weren’t her people, and it wasn’t as if everyone’s innocent. Besides…
‘What will the ritual completion effect?’
‘Nothing deadly, I think. It’s an accelerant to their earlier works.’
‘The bridge building?’
‘I think so.’
‘So, instead of taking Seasons to complete…?’
‘It could be done by day’s end. At the earliest, I think.’
‘And no way to stop it safely?’
‘Not anything I can think of?’
‘Will you and the others be hard?’
‘I don’t know. But I think my presence would be disruptive. And possibly have negative consequences.’
‘Then escape before you’re drawn in.’
‘What about the others?’
“We’re already on the way. Rendezvous with us and we’ll proceed after.’
‘Yes, Master.’
Yuriko felt the connection narrow and wished good fortune to Desire, not that she really needed it. By now the Chaos Lord would have finished restoring her Chaos reserves, and she drastically outclassed everyone in the plane. Ancestors, Desire’s current power was higher than the incarnation body, though practically, a Paragon Ancient was still more potent.
“We should hurry,” Yuriko said.
“Trouble?” Scarlett shook her head ruefully. “What am I saying? There’s always sothing wrong happening.”
“Well, yes. Hostages were moved to a ritual chamber. Dee can’t disrupt it without things going a lot worse.”
“Perhaps you should leave behind and go ahead?” Scarlett bit her lower lip nervously.
“No,” Yuriko imdiately replied. “I’m not leaving you behind.”
“Alright…” But Scarlett’s face remained doubtful and more than a little bit guilty.
It also didn’t help that Yuriko felt several creatures enter her perception range.
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