A day and a night slipped away in a blur.
Ethan raced endlessly across the massive grid that stretched before him like a boundless board ga, his Shatterstar ch flickering from one sector to another at full throttle. The speed was astonishing, yet no matter how many squares he crossed—three hundred and more in all—he still couldn’t find a way out.
"Damn it, I give up! Let out already!"
His frustration boiled over. That entire day and night had been a descent into madness. The longer he ran, the more he realized the truth: this wasn’t a static field. Every fifteen minutes, without warning, the squares shifted. Anyone caught in the wrong place when the ti expired was displaced, dropped at random sowhere else on the grid.
Ethan’s calculations only deepened the despair. It took six minutes to cross a single square, which ant that no matter how fast he pushed the Shatterstar, escaping ca down to sheer luck. If fortune favored him, he might be shunted to the outer edge and break free. But what then? What about Blackie and the others?
Uncle Jed had never ntioned this shifting pattern. If it had existed before, even a War God like Jed couldn’t have outrun it, unless he had known so hidden thod. Perhaps Jed had once studied the pattern of the shifts, moving deliberately square by square, waiting for displacent to carry him forward. But such knowledge would require complete mastery over the timing of the array—sothing Ethan had no hope of achieving. He knew next to nothing about arrays, let alone ones of this scale.
More troubling still, he wondered whether Hurricane City’s arrival here had sohow triggered the chanism, awakening a dormant construct. Fortunately, it appeared to be a trapping field rather than an offensive one. If the two were combined, Blackie and the others wouldn’t have survived the first night.
At last, exhausted and out of options, Ethan stopped, resigning himself to wait until the board shifted beneath him again.
"Brother..." A soft, lilting voice brushed across his mind.
"What is it, Yaya?" he asked, recognizing the spirit of the Tree of Life.
"Beastie says he can help you!"
Ethan’s head snapped up. His voice sharpened with sudden hope. "You’re telling this now?!"
"Beastie is shy... he only just ca to ," Yaya said gently.
Ethan could only sigh. The three spirits in his Mindscape were so different. Yaya was tender and kind, like a younger sister. Luna was her opposite, hot-blooded and brash. And Beastie—timid to the point of absurdity—seed the least dependable of the three.
"Alright, Beastie, tell ," Ethan said, focusing inward. "How do we get out of here?"
"Master," ca the boyish, hesitant voice, "you just need to summon my true form."
"That’s it?" Ethan asked, skeptical.
"Yes! Beastie rembers now. This place is controlled by the Mark of Oblivion. It belongs to the old turtle, the only living Beast Spirit of the Dead Sea."
Ethan frowned. "Beast Spirit? An old turtle? And why would the Mark of Oblivion even work out here? Aren’t the City Lord Seals supposed to be bound to their cities?"
Beastie stamred, unable to answer, clearly tugging at fragnted mories.
"Forget it," Ethan said after a mont. "We’ll figure it out later." With a thought, he summoned the Sigil of the Wild Legion, its ancient mark burning into being before him. "Alright, what now?"
"Head southeast. Beastie will guide you."
It wasn’t much of a plan, but it was the only one he had. Ethan steered Shatterstar into motion.
"Now go northwest... now due south..."
On and on it went, every boundary crossed followed by another course correction.
Two hours later, Ethan’s patience frayed. "Beastie, are you sure you’re not just leading in circles?"
"Yes, yes, Master!" Beastie urged. "They’re close now! Hurry, south!"
"They? Who the hell is ’they’?"
"The other City Lord Seals!"
Ethan blinked, then swore under his breath. All this ti he thought Beastie was guiding him to the exit, when in reality the spirit had been steering them toward the other seals. Still, if that was the way out... he didn’t have a choice.
"Fine. Keep going."
They pressed on, square after square, until Beastie cried out. "Master, we’re here! As long as you claim the Mark of Oblivion, you can escape!"
Ethan slowed Shatterstar and felt it imdiately: a pressure in the distance, heavy and suffocating. It wasn’t a sound at first, but a stench—the reek of blood. Not the cold, clean scent of the Blood King, but sothing rotten, like blood left to fester in the sun. Even in this frozen wasteland, the stench carried heat.
Stealth mode engaged, Ethan pushed Shatterstar forward, its energy engine humming low, the roar of its higher thrusters carefully muted. He crept closer, every sense sharpened.
Then he saw it: a column of crimson light tearing upward into the sky, and within it, a deep, ragged roar, the cry of sothing in tornt.
"No... Master, they’re hurting the Beast Spirit’s true form!" Beastie’s voice was thick with panic.
"The turtle shell? That’s the Beast Spirit?"
"Yes! I rember now!" Beastie exclaid. "Each of these squares, each little sector you’ve been running through—they’re the scales on the Beast Spirit’s back. That’s why we couldn’t see the light until now. Master, please, you have to help it!"
Ethan’s jaw tightened. "Shatterstar, charge the main cannon. Blast that light to pieces!"
[Beep... Main cannon system preparing...]
"No! Master’s toy is too strong. You’ll hurt the Beast Spirit!" Beastie’s voice cracked, frantic.
[Beep... Please set the charge energy limit...]
"Damn it," Ethan muttered. "If I can’t use the cannon, what am I supposed to do, march straight in and pick a fight? That’s a Voidbreaker-rank enemy in there."
[Beep... Please set the charge energy limit...]
"Fine. Cancel the cannon. Switch to full scan."
The Shatterstar humd, sensors reaching outward. Ethan glanced inward, and saw Yaya and Beastie watching him, pleading. He clenched his fists.
[Scan complete... Total corrupted forces: 4,876,569. Detected: 1 Voidbreaker-rank, 3 Saint-rank, 3,748 War God-rank, remainder low rank. Total uncorrupted forces: 2,846,966. Detected: 1 Saint-rank, remainder low rank.]
Ethan read the numbers and exhaled slowly. Almost three million innocents trapped inside. If he had fired the cannon, he would have wiped them all out in a single blast.
"Looks like I’ll have to go in there myself," he muttered. Then his eyes narrowed. Among the uncorrupted, only one Saint-rank presence. A strange certainty took root in his chest.
Uncle Jed.
It had to be him.
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