“Understood.” They lifted Viola up, and followed me and Raffyr we walked into the streets.
The old man walked silently beside me, looking at the houses all around, with a somber expression on his face.
I raised an eyebrow. He doesn’t seem to have his usual curiosity.
But then again, now was not a time for curiosity, given he had just run from a place he’d called home for who knows how long.
I felt a certain connection to his emotions right now — to how both of them must have felt when they had to leave their faction. It was not that I knew what it felt like to leave a house, but I certainly knew what it was like to wander around aimlessly, with no single place to call a home.
“It isn’t an easy situation to be in,” Nyx said.
I felt bad about how I’d treated the old man, but it was a case of me versus him. Either I assured myself there was no trick here, or I paid the consequences by being fooled once again.
“It is fine, Diablo,” Nyx said. “You did the right thing.”
“Although,” Acnologia spoke. “I am not sure if it is a good idea to take Viola and Raffyr to the healing chambers right away.”
Really? Why? I asked.
“It might not be in our favor to have those two see the Eternal we are trying to keep a secret.”
Raffyr is indebted to us, and whether I doubt his alliance or not, I certainly do not doubt his integrity, I thought. That is why I did not doubt the truth in his words.
“If you’re confident, then I’m good,” Nyx said.
“Very well then,” Acnologia said. “The old man does strike me as a person with integrity as well.”
I saw the top of the dragon’s head peek out from a few buildings away, and I turned to Raffyr, a smile on my face, wondering how he would react when he saw the Dragon.
Needless to say, I was not let down.
“A DRAGON?” Raffyr exclaimed the moment we walked into the village square, with a voice loud enough for maybe half the people to have heard him.
I smiled once again. That was who Raffyr was. In the toughest of times, a simple thing like this could get him completely ecstatic and ignorant of the hardships he’d just faced.
“I’d hardly say seeing a Dragon in the middle of a village is a ‘simple’ thing,” Acnologia chuckled. The dragon took one glance at Raffyr, stood himself up, and moved to the other side of the square.
I looked back once just to make sure the knights carrying Viola were still behind us and then moved on, quickly coming up to my house. Freya stood right behind the doorway, an eager expression on her face.
“Zoran!” She stepped to me. “How did everything-”
She froze, and she looked at the people behind me. Her eyes shifted between Raffyr and then Viola, and confusion built up in her expression. I calmly walked past her, leading Raffyr and the Knights down the staircase and into the healing chambers.
Ijyela and Krof wore looks of confusion as well when they saw Raffyr and Viola come down the stairs behind me, but they asked no questions.
“Get her set up on one of the empty beds,” I told the knights and they gently placed Viola on the stone bed to the right of the Eternal.
I noticed Raffyr glance at the Eternal as well, but he quickly shifted his attention back to Viola. After all, she was the reason he was here in the first place.
Ijyela was fast at work, and had already set up a crystal chamber around Viola. She was on her screen now, sifting through options quickly.
“She’s completely healthy,” the elven witch said a few moments later. “She, however, seems to have suffered some kind of deep trauma. There are numerous scars all over her body. Her heart rate also implies she completely exhausted. The reason she’s unconscious is probably because her mind decided it was safer to shut her body down.”
“So, she’ll be fine soon?” Raffyr asked.
“She should be awake by the time the night turns to day,” Ijyela said.
“Thank goodness.” The old man looked at Viola, and his eyes teared up again.
“Zoran?” Freya grabbed my shoulder. “Can I have a word?”
I blinked. Eh?
“Looks like you’re in trouble,” Nyx chuckled.
“Zoran?” the elf asked.
“Yeah, sure,” I said, and then glanced at Ijyela. “I’ll be back in a bit.”
She and Krof nodded quietly, and I made my way back up the stairs, following Freya out. The two guards from before were still at the doorway and so I dismissed them.
“Okay.” I closed the door behind the guards. “What happened?”
“What do you mean what happened?” She walked up to the window and turned around to face me. “Raffyr and Viola. What are they doing here?”
“Ah,” I said. “I figured it was about this.”
“Of course it was about this!” she yelled.
“Nothing is going to happen,” I said.
“Nothing was supposed to happen the last time. And yet somehow you ended up on the other side of the battlefield against Viola.”
“That was different.”
She sighed. “Just why are those two here? Why did you let them in?”
“There’s a good reason for this,” I said.
“Oh, there better be.”
I sighed and then told her everything Raffyr told me — about how they’d been put on the spot regarding me and the Alliance, about how they’d finally taken a stance, and about how that very act had gotten them nearly killed.
At the end, Freya stood quietly, nodding her head irregularly. “That sounds rough.”
“It didn’t seem like they were trying to trick me in any way. Raffyr seemed very desperate to be honest.”
“I’m…sorry,” she said. “I might have reacted impulsively.”
“It’s fine,” I smiled. “You were just trying to take care of me. I understand.”
“So,” Freya nervously twirled a strand of hair behind her ear. “Do you think they…recognized me?”
“Are you worried they’re going to freak out?”
For a long time, Freya had been hiding her identity, disguising herself as a man and going by the alias ‘Frey’. She’d actually been involved with the Lumina Knights for quite some time, and had been Viola’s partner. She’d known Raffyr and Viola quite well back then, but those two knew nothing about all the secrets Freya had kept away from them.
I realized this was the first time Freya was meeting someone who had only known of her past alias.
“I…I honestly don’t know why I’m so nervous about this,” she said. “It just happened so suddenly. When I left the Lumina Knights faction I assumed I would never see Viola or Raffyr ever again. And yet here I am, standing face to face with them.”
It’s actually the second time you’re meeting Viola without your disguise, I thought but didn’t bring it up. If Freya had forgotten the first time she’d met Viola, I wasn’t going to be the one to remind her. It was not in the most pleasant of circumstances to say in the least.
“Hey, listen.” I grabbed her hand, and held it in my palms. “This is going to be fine, okay? Those two still believe a bit in me — a guy who’s been documented in the olden scrolls to basically be the worst kind of person there is. You’re someone they’ve known and loved for a long time. They’re not going to judge you for hiding your identity from them.”
“Mmm.” She looked at the floor.
“In fact, if anything they’re probably going to be more supportive of you. You deserve as much.”
“I know but—”
A flurry of footsteps shot up the staircase, and Ijyela’s hustling form emerged from the secret door in the floor. Freya jerked her hand away from mine. The elven witch looked at me, with her chest heaving. “Zoran, you need to come here,” she said. “Now.”
I froze, and then my chest thumped as I heard the next words out of her mouth.
“It’s the Eternal.”
***
CHAPTER FOUR
/> I rushed down the staircase, my heartbeat in rhythm with the sounds of my hasty steps. Ijyela and Freya were ahead of me, and looked just as worried as I was.
Okay, I was probably much worse.
The moment I walked into the healing chambers, I froze up at the sight before me. The Eternal lay sealed within the crystal casing, but her body writhed violently. Her hands and legs trashed about, smacking into the casing over and over.
Her face on the other hand was completely calm, as though she had no idea any of this was going on. It was almost as though her limbs were acting on their own.
“What the hell is she doing?” I asked as we crowded around her body.
“No idea,” Krof said. “Her vitals say she’s completely knocked out. This shouldn’t be happening.”
“It’s eerie.” Ijyela had concern written all over her face.
“Can we even do anything for her right now?” I asked.
Krof shook his head. “We had no leads, which is why we called you. We hoped Nyx or Acnologia would have some insight into this.”
“I’ve never seen something like that,” Nyx said. “And if I have, I’ve certainly forgotten about it.”
“I’m quite certain I’ve never seen such a thing either,” Acnologia said.
The noises of limbs banging crystal filled the chamber and each of us delved into our own set of thoughts. I quickly glanced at Raffyr, who — unlike the rest of us — wasn’t paying attention to the unconscious Eternal banging on her capsule. His eyes looked at Viola the whole time.
I frowned. Why is he avoiding this situation? He couldn’t have something to do with it, could he? I stared at him for a second more, and then brushed the thought away. I’m probably being too paranoid.
The man had already established very clearly that he cared a lot for Viola. Expecting him to shift his concentration away from her when she was still unconscious was probably not practical.
“Maybe I should grab my sedatives,” Ijyela said. “I have a collection of strong potions upstairs that could probably knock her out. That’s the only solution I can think of at the moment.”
“Wait, you keep them here?” I blinked. “At my place?”
The elf said nothing and walked up the stairs, out of my vision.
“There are a lot of things we store here, Diablo,” Krof smiled and headed up right after her.
Wow, okay, I thought, and turned away from their disappearing forms, wondering if I should be concerned that there were unknown things being stored at my house.
I glanced at the Eternal, and quickly noticed that her movements had become more vigorous. I placed my hand on the outside of the crystal casing, and felt the tremors pass through my fingers.
What are you doing? I wondered, as unease built inside me as well.
All of a sudden, the Eternal froze. Her eyes jerked open, but instead of pupils, a bright white light shone from within, sending rays into the chamber roof. She opened her mouth and a scorching scream exploded, sending shockwaves through every structure in the chamber. The lady thrashed about wildly — even more vigorous than before — and the tone of her screams turned more violent in an instant.
She’s in pain. My eyes widened. “We need to get her out!” I slid my sword out.
“Zoran, wait!” Freya yelled.
The crystal case shattered, like a pane of glass struck by a boulder. Transparent pieces of sharp, jagged edges showered all over us. The screams turned more high-pitched, and the walls of the chamber cracked, with fissures weaving their way through the structure.
The Eternal was no longer a dark-skinned lady in white robes, but one humanoid being of pure white light. My eyes widened. “What the hell?”
And that was an instant of time not spent well.
The Eternal’s screaming increased its pitch even more, and turned intense enough to cause the roof to destabilize, sending rocks and debris down to the floor. A bright sphere of light shot out of the lady, and the terrifying intensity struck my pupils, rendering me blind. I heard yells as I dropped to the floor, clutching my eyes in pain. I breathed heavy, keeping my eyelids shut, trying to put out the burning sensation raging within them.
In an instant, the sounds around me shut down, and all sensations in my body disappeared. I slowly opened my eyes, the stinging sensation within them dying down quickly, and what I saw was no longer the scene from before, but an expanse of pure darkness.
I blinked. What the heck?
“I have no clue what happened,” Nyx said. “But it seems like your consciousness was brought back to your Spirit Space.”
“But why the hell did that happen?” I asked. My Spirit Space was a segment of my consciousness that I obtained because of my special ability — Spirit King. I was able to host spirits in my Spirit Space, hence the name. Nyx lived exclusively in my mind, and Acnologia to a certain extent was able to speak to me from afar because of my Spirit Space as well.
“It is odd, Eternal,” Acnologia said. “Such a transfer should not happen of its own accord.”
“Unless there’s something that forced Zoran to come in here,” the spirit said.
“That doesn’t sound good,” I muttered.
“No, it does not.”
“I need to get back out there.” I looked at the darkness around me. It was comforting to be in such a place after being half-blinded by sharp light. But it was time for me to leave. I put my hand into the air, focusing on the energy around me and shaping it to my will.
In seconds the darkness shattered, just like the crystal from before. The black peeled away, making way for…more black.
Huh? I frowned.
DING!
A prompt screen popped up before me.
Congratulations! The Familiar Storage System has been unlocked. You can now carry the physical forms of your familiars using the Ga’em.
DING!
Familiar Storage has been activated. ‘Acnologia, the Shadow Dragon’, has been retained within the familiar storage system. You cannot store any more familiars.
I looked around me and realized the Dragon was not here. “What the heck is going on?”
“I am just as confused,” Acnologia said.
“Where are you right now?”
“It looks like I’m in your Spirit Space but I can tell that is not the case.”
“And your physical form?”
“Can’t sense it anymore.” He sounded tense. “It appears my entire existence is within whatever this space is right now.”
“Wow, he actually did get stored in this weird system,” Nyx said.
“Have you heard about such a system before?” I asked. “I wasn’t aware familiars could be stored like this.”
“I had no idea either. I didn’t even think it was possible.”
We’re going to have to pick this up again some other time. I turned to the situation before me. I was still in darkness but I could feel that this was at an actual location. I was in a physical place this time, and not my Spirit Space. I looked right into the black and activated my Night Vision skill.
I made out the fuzzy image of a wall to my right and to my left, and saw a darker black ahead of me. An underground tunnel? I wondered.
My breathing was the only sound that accompanied me, with the surrounding air empty of any voices — both friend and foe.
What did that Eternal do to me? I muttered as I walked through what seemed to be a long corridor. Small rocks and pebbles scuttled across the surface as I kicked them, making my way further down.
“I can’t sense any other presences coming from around here,” Nyx said. “But then again, my orientation is completely screwed up right now. I wouldn’t be surprised if I was blatantly wrong.”
That’s very comforting to hear, I sighed, glancing around me, but still saw just walls and darkness. My hand hovered over Dawnbreaker’s sheath, ready to pull the blade out.
Something usually did.
“Where is everyone else?” Nyx asked.
“No clue,” I said. “Maybe they weren’t brought here like we were.”
“Where is here anyway?”
“I’m as confused as you are.”
A wall emerged ahead of me, fading in through the darkness. I blinked at the sight. If this path was blocked off, where was I supposed to go?
“I sense an oddity from that wall,” Acnologia said. “Perhaps it is worth looking into.”
I nodded and walked closer to the surface. I sensed nothing at first glance, but I trusted the Dragon’s intuition. I placed my hand on the wall, and tried to see if I sensed anything odd within it. To my surprise there was absolutely nothing. It was a plain old sheet of stone. No more and no less.
However, I didn’t give up. I focused harder, shifting my concentration not to the wall itself but to what was behind it. Surges of energy pulsated on the other side, however the source of this said energy I did not know.
“That’s very odd,” Nyx said. “I’ve never seen an energy signature like this before.”
“Tell me about it.” I put my sword back in its sheath. I took a step back and exhaled while keeping my eyes trained on the wall.
Nyx, can you give me just the arm cover from my armor? I asked.
“Sure,” the spirit said. A stream of lights emerged into the air and collected around my arm, forming a shadow-black piece of armor that covered my fist and a part of my fore-arm.
I flexed my fingers, and then took another look at the wall. I stepped forward and punched it, smashing my fist into its surface. A thundering boom rattled the tunnel, and the wall before me shook. It stood still for just a moment, and the very next, fissures of all lengths and angles plagued it. It took merely two seconds after my punch for the wall to crumple completely.
Take the armor back, I said, and the arm cover dissolved into a stream of light once again, floating into the air and disappearing into the darkness.
DING!
Congratulations! You have advanced a ‘Hand combat’ special move:
The Eternal: A Boxed Set (World of Ga'em Book 6) Page 52
