Chapter 113: Interludes Alpha

The last of the monsters were dying on the Irunian front. A few figures in liquid metal armor were still out there, cutting down those that remained. All of them were exhausted and many were weakened, so it was the perfect opportunity to target one of the isolated warriors.

Instead Anaelina stood alone and stared toward the central wasteland. She'd never particularly cared about their "Frontier" or their silly ideas about monster incursions. When they'd all started making noise about how dangerous this one was supposed to be, she'd rolled her eyes and just looked for opportunities to absorb their strange powers.

Then the battle had begun and everything had changed.

Even a nation away, Anaelina had felt the powers that had dwarfed her own. The Irunians, always with their dull eyes to the ground, mostly hadn't realized. But her senses had always been clear, attuned to all the powers she'd eaten, and she'd felt a battle that shook everything she knew about the world. The horde of monsters, which was indeed worse than anything she'd ever encountered, was paltry by comparison.

"It's the witch!" An Irunian saw her and called to the others. Exhausted as they were, the warriors of Irun banded together and began to advance on her.

"You know what?" Anaelina said. "Fuck this."

"You can't escape!"

Fuck Deadwaste and its muddy little nations. Fuck that boy and his inexplicable monstrous powers. Fuck the wasteland that could apparently spawn world-destroying hordes of monsters.

Anaelina was going back to Rosemount. She leapt over the heads of the Irunians trying to capture her and didn't even kill any of them on her way out.

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On an ordinary day, the Brightwind Pagoda would be a place of deep reverence. The greatest of cultivators might visit and all others would line up for the hope of receiving the slightest of suggestions. It was said that a single word from the Zae sect was worth an entire manual from another. When anyone in the land stared up towards its lofty peaks, they saw not just the building but the authority of those who controlled the realm.

It was not an ordinary day. The grand patriarch Zae Clen Ban sat on his jade throne, the relic that had been handed down for generations. Everyone in his court shuffled nervously, from the lowest servants to the sect officials to all fourteen of his wives.

Those with little spiritual awareness understood only that their patriarch was angry. Those who had advanced in their cultivation knew that something terrible had happened the previous day. Those with the deepest understanding had quietly slipped away before court began.

"Patriarch Zae Clen Ban, we have finished our survey." The first of the scholars kowtowed with his head to the marble floor. "If it pleases you, we can tell you what we have learned of the incident in Deadwaste."

"Yes, tell me about this racket." Zae Clen Ban was a nobly-built man, but that day he slouched in his seat, his head propped up on one hand.

"There appears to have been another outpouring of the usual vermin that infect that benighted continent. Usually we would never trouble the patriarch with such a small matter. But, as you wisely observed, an exceedingly powerful cultivator was involved in the battle-"

"Who?" The patriarch ground out the word and the court winced. "Deadwaste has no cultivators worthy of the name."

"The incident must have attracted the attention of an unknown sect, patriarch. The battle also included a great outpouring of mana and chakra, the likes of which have never been se-"

A rope of qi wrapped itself around the scholar's chest, then slithered up to his neck. As it squeezed, the entire court shuddered at the patriarch's wrath. Only once the scholar's head was a purple mass and his body twisted beyond recognition was the corpse released.

"Do not insult me with these feeble stories." Zae Clen Ban scowled over the company of scholars. "The limits of Deadwaste are well-known to all. Are you children? I require a proper explanation for what we observed."

The scholars were silent for some time, many withdrawing the scrolls they held. Eventually the patriarch leaned forward, his wrath growing again. Some quailed, but the oldest of the scholars stepped forward, lowered his head to the floor, and spoke.

"Our studies have suggested that the barbarians have come into possession of one of the Great Insanities, patriarch. When their own cultivators could not deal with the monster threat, they unleashed it. As with all the Insanities, the resulting power surpassed our expectations."

"A more likely explanation." Patriarch Zae Clen Ban sat back, appeased, and folded his arms over his stomach. "And what have you discovered about this Insanity that came into their possession?"

"I fear we have failed to uncover more, patriarch. But it is known that the barbarians of Deadwaste have many relics of older civilizations. They may have stumbled across a new, unknown Insanity."

"Hmph. Well, at least one of you is worth something. Have none of you anything else for me?"

The scholars shuffled nervously, as the idea that the outpouring of energy had been caused by an artifact had never even been considered. Several immediately began planning how they might fake results that would support the new accepted hypothesis. But it was a younger scholar who stepped forward with a different observation.

"There is one other thing, patriarch." He swallowed as he lifted the scroll containing his notes. "After the energies generated by the Insanity faded, there was a surge of natural qi. Nowhere near as substantial, of course. However, given its unusual nature... we believe it may have been your wayward daughter Zae Zin Nim."

All at once the court went still. Multiple corpses had been created over the mere mention of the patriarch's absent daughter, and several officials began making an exit. Those who knew the patriarch well examined his visage and held their breath.

Patriarch Zae Clen Ban chuckled, and the court nervously laughed with him. "So she has overcome her tribulation, has she? Then we should send someone after her. It is past time that she rejoined our family."

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An eternity away, two figures stepped onto an empty gray plane. Even with their power shrouded, their arrival distorted the world and sent shivers through reality.

On one side, an enormous man with blue skin stretched taut over his bulk bent the ground. The gray plane beneath him twisted like muscle fibers, straining as if they might explode at any moment. His bare chest was covered in blood, but none of it was his. Even as he stood, the blood slipped away as if it couldn't remain on him.

Opposite the hulking man, an impossibly beautiful woman hovered several feet in the air. The world beneath her began to flow in gentle waves that lapped up into the air, as if reality itself bent to the flow of power within her. She carried her power ready as she met eyes with the man, but chose not to act.

"Savage Emperor," she said quietly, with an almost imperceptible incline of her head.

"Final Maiden." The beast of a man greeted her and then folded his arms over his chest. "You wouldn't have agreed to meet if you got it."

"Did you?"

"I should have. Got there first, but Thrice the Fool pushed me away."

"I'm not sure any of us were truly close to victory," the Final Maiden said. She closed her eyes as if in sorrow. "Who could have imagined that such an anomaly would show up so abruptly?"

"Not me." The Savage Emperor stomped his foot, devastating part of the horizon. "What is even going on over there? How does some random continent get a P3?"

"A forgotten experiment? Security through obscurity? Who can say?"

"I was hoping you could. What's even the point of meeting?"

"I had hoped we might make a temporary alliance, but I can see you're not in the mood." The Final Maiden shook her head slowly. "If anything like that occurs in the future, we need to be more cautious. Koleiman the Magnificent nearly slipped past all of us. Had fate twisted slightly differently, he might have secured the anomaly."

"Bah, Koleiman is a cosmic toy-maker." The Savage Emperor unfolded his arms and rolled his shoulders, creating an avalanche of muscle. "What I want to know is if it will happen again. Are there other hidden abysses? Is that one going to change again?"

"I do not know. One of the stagnant powers may have some knowledge of that place, so I intend to make inquiries."

"You want to take over that little continent? Just in case?"

"No, that would likely be a waste of our time. And I don't trust you to do any more than exchange information."

"You shouldn't." The Savage Emperor bared his teeth and then turned away. "Alright, then. Chalk it up to Detriton having another mystery. I'll see you next war, and maybe we'll settle things then." He didn't wait for an answer, instead executing an enormous leap that made him vanish into the sky.

The Final Maiden remained a while longer, watching the gray landscape be captured by her flowing power. Eventually she stepped through a crystal-clear portal and vanished, leaving the emptiness to ripple for a while longer before returning to stillness.

When it did, the slightest disturbance remained. A man all in gray emerged from the twisted space where he had been eavesdropping. He considered it mildly interesting that enemies such as the Final Maiden and Savage Emperor could meet civilly, but it was ultimately just another turn in the powers of the cosmos. Without a thought, the man dissolved into the emptiness.

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The prisoner hung from crystalline chains. More than everything that had been done to him, it was the way his arms were forced overhead and pulled taut that hurt. Torture and cruel experiments stopped, but his arms ached constantly, no matter how long he waited.

When he first arrived he'd strained against his chains, trying to move himself and reach some method of escape. His personal crystal sat in a cage on the opposite side of the room: all of his cultivation glittering out of reach. When trying to summon it had grown too painful, he'd struggled to reach the table beside him. One of the chemicals or strange devices there might have helped him, if only he could reach.

Now he simply hung limp, defeated. The worst of it all had been the power yesterday: horrifying levels of energy had raged from the Frontier. In his prison, he had no idea whether or not Krysal had survived the incursion or how many of the city states had been destroyed. Then again, if his captor's city was the one destroyed, that might be for the best.

He heard her footsteps on the stairs and growled into his gag. The horrible bitch was coming back.

Omilaena strolled into the room wearing an elegant dress that was slit up the sides, almost to her hip. That look was ruined by her blue hair in a messy bun and the goggles hanging around her neck. The prisoner gnashed his teeth at the woman who had taken over his city. If only he'd gotten the drop on her...

"Terribly sorry to leave you here," Omilaena said with a smile as she undid his gag, "but the incursion happened yesterday. Did you feel it? Quite remarkable. If you want Krysal to survive in the future, I hope you'll be cooperative today."

"I'll kill you, you bitch!" He tried to spit in her face, but his tongue was dry and swollen.

"Oh, that's right, I started experimenting on you already. Given the scope of the incident, it slipped my mind." Her smile vanished and her eyes passed over the stitches she'd made in his stomach. There was the terror he remembered: Omilaena had arrived in his city like any other traveler, then taken over with clinical ruthlessness.

The prisoner started to shout at her again, but at that moment she used a fingernail to slice open the stitches in his stomach. He groaned and twisted in pain as she took a syringe from the table beside her and injected him with a bright blue liquid. There was a new surge of power, yet it felt like his stomach was eating itself alive.

"Those forces were more powerful than anything I've ever seen," Omilaena said to him absentmindedly as she measured two of her infernal potions. "Far beyond anyone on Rosemount, I'm confident in that. Some of them used chakra more potent than I've ever felt. Most likely I can't even adequately measure their strength, so I'm going to have to accelerate my experiments."

"Why... why are you...?"

"I don't think it was caused by the Frontier elites. Their understanding is shockingly advanced in some ways, but they aren't fundamentally so overwhelming. No, the scale of power rises much higher than we knew, just like I'd feared. Maybe you can help me figure out some of it."

Walking across the room, Omilaena opened the box containing his crystal and poured a green liquid over it. The prisoner screamed out in pain as he felt the cultivation within him twist. It was as if the power in his veins was crystallizing, stabbing out through his body. When he could feel anything except pain he stared in horror, wondering how such a thing could be possible.

"See, you and your crystal are still connected." Omilaena put one hand on her rounded hip in a motion that had once seduced him, but now she was merely looking at him like a pinned insect. "It's similar to the dantians they always go on about in Cloudspire, yet there's a distinction... tell me if you feel anything strange, will you?"

Before she could torture him further, a servant nervously shuffled into the room. Omilaena turned toward the woman with a scowl and the servant nearly fled.

"What is it?"

"There are refugees approaching Krysal," the aide said quietly. "Mostly from Goralia. Many of the other cities are rejecting them. I know you want to focus on your experiments, mistress, but you need to issue some sort of command if you want to keep them out."

"No, let them in!" Omilaena turned to the aide with a sinister smile. "We weathered the incursion just fine, so say we're being generous. Offer a little food from the vault to refugees, and jobs to capable travelers. I need more raw materials."

"Mistress? Are you sure?"

"The trade will be good for us, if we can capitalize on everyone the other cities are rejecting. Just focus on making it all go smoothly and I'll handle the rest."

The servant bowed and retreated up the stairs. As soon as she was gone, Omilaena seemed to forget about her, just as she forgot about ruling her city every time it wasn't convenient. She turned back to the prisoner and thought for a moment before she pulled her goggles up over her face.

"Now, where were we?"

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A fisherman limped along the shore of a lethal ocean, looking for mussels. It wasn't a safe place to live or fish, but then again his life hadn't gone great. He'd take what he could get, deadly water or no. Besides, he'd gotten used to the taste of the mussels here. All he had to do was step over the sharp crystals in the sand and kill an occasional monster with the anchor he carried over his shoulder.

Some sort of energy echoed in the distance, distracting the fisherman. Worse than he'd felt before, probably some of those great powers fighting. The fisherman didn't know much about all of that, but he knew that waves of chakra always made his bad knee act up. Whatever had just happened, there had been a lot of chakra.

"You say something?" the man's wife yelled from her place. He turned back to wave at her.

"Naw, just some battle, I think."

"It gonna kill us?"

"Suppose not. It was probably nothing."

"Then find those mussels, will you? I need to throw 'em in the stew soon."

The fisherman nodded and went back to his work. Whatever great battle had just taken place, the world went on, there were fish to catch, and he was getting hungry for dinner.