Kin of Jörmungandr

I don't find the ocean to be beautiful, as Ceph said, but the vast structures spanning the length of the coast certainly are. Unlike the nests near the Pit, these buildings are like a never ending wall bordering water riled up in a thunderous storm.

Great waves crash against the long chain of buildings, rattling the heavy board windows and drenching the balcony overhangs. The grainy rock of the structures appears like sand, hardened and stiff. It doesn't look overly strong, but apparently it holds even against the constant onslaught of the ocean.

From my vantage, flying high over the waters, I can see the land the nests are constructed upon. Or, cliffs. When the waves roll back — gathering for another powerful blow against these incredible feats of creation — the sheer edge of rock reveals itself. Each building is constructed on land just below the average water level, but as soon that land reaches out for the water itself, it dives to greater depths than the nests are tall.

I'd considered the first city — what Ceph calls her hives — to be impressive. And I still do. But this towering, artificial cliff spanning the full width of my sight surpasses even that. A true manifestation of what the minds of sapients can accomplish. A demonstration that coming here to learn is anything but wasteful.

"Orm!" Standing on one of the higher balconies, and wincing as the splash from a wave strikes her, Ceph waves for me.

Creating a hole, I appear right before her. My slender length wraps around the metal rail of the balcony and I raise my head to her level in question.

"Thanks for being patient," Ceph starts, leaning over the railing to my side. Her eyes cast over the endless wall. "You are a lot different than what most people we will see — both here and going forward — so its better I talk to them before properly introducing you."

"I do not mind," I say. "Patience is always necessary when dealing with small skittish critters."

Ceph gives me one of those blank stares she so often loves to employ before she turns her eyes back to the waves below. "Y'know, the water never used to be like this. I was hoping to show you the beauty of the calm sea as I remembered it… but apparently, ever since the Titan Alps fell, the storms have been constant and the sea-level has risen dramatically."

She gestures a tentacle to the long rows of balconies. "When I visited a few years ago, there wasn't a place along the wall that didn't have people sitting out over the ocean. The view was too good to enjoy." Ceph's voice quietens slightly, as if she's talking to herself. "But times change."

I nod, enjoying the action despite the sombre topic. "I can understand. Not all that long ago, I had a territory of my own. There was this rock I loved to lay on, where I could enjoy the warmth and find amusement in the play of the tiny creatures. That was all destroyed by a Titan."

Ceph gave me that look again. "On the Other Side, right?"

My head shakes, and I enjoy that just as much as a nod. "No. It was here. Below, but probably not that far away. The column you call Kalma's Pit was only a few rifts from my territory."

She has that look again, but at least this time I can see flickers of concern and fear break through. The way she looks down makes it all the more clear.

"Titans aren't common, if that's your concern." I try to console her. "I spent hundreds of what you call years down there as the strongest predator before I reached sapience. That was the first time I encountered such a terror."

My words don't seem to assuage her much. Her eyes hold the waves below as she speaks. "It's still shocking that there is an entire ecosystem under our feet. Especially one so thriving that it can cultivate one such as yourself. For all of recorded history, we've thought there was nothing but solid rock down there. It was only a few years ago that we learnt that the Titan Alps had paths beneath it. Well, before The Collapse."

Ceph twists her eyes back to me again. "Titans aren't completely alien to us. We have records of their sighting every few centuries. In fact, there was one that only the blind would have missed a few years back, when it surmounted the Alps." She gestures off to our left, but whatever she's indicating I cannot see.

Maybe I should do as Hirsh said, and try to figure out if I can decipher those ripples that are apparently light.

"I guess it's just a fear of all that happens around us that we cannot control. That we can't even know about. Particularly when it comes to the ongoing crisis; between the Alps collapsing, random fissures, rising tides, frequent earthquakes, and the wa—ah…" Ceph trails off as her eyes catch mine. "Sorry," she squeaks uncharacteristically. "We're here to show you what our races can do, not doomsay."

I unwrap myself from the rail as Ceph steps back to the thick framed door.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

"Come," she says. "Lets introduce you to those who call these cliffs home. At least those who didn't see you on our way in."

As I return through the core of the nest, I absently take in the odd assortment of objects within. It's like a narrow rainforest cave, yet instead of plants and animals, it has more of those seats of theirs, soft masses like furs, and moss covered walls. Well, the mossy walls aren't strange for a cavern. But the patterns they make certainly are.

Despite the strange scene — all clearly creations of the sapients — my mind lingers on Ceph's mention of disasters. It seems I am not the only one to have experienced my surroundings breaking around me. More than likely the earthquakes I have felt were the same as the ones felt up here. Or it could be the fall of the Titan Alps, which seemed to be the most devastating up here, by what Ceph says.

Not that I know exactly what the Titan Alps are to be certain.

It is Ceph's final comment — the one about doomsaying — that concerns me the most. I'd been told, by Titan and Beyond alike, that the warped tunnels would collapse. Considering I'm no longer in spatially twisted air, I thought that meant I was free and safe of the eventual collapse. Whether it's the Other Side, or this surface, it should be safe. Yet that isn't the case.

If the people of this surface know of the day the barrier shall break, did they also hear the voice of the Beyond? At least on some subtle level. Or did they discern this from the growing disasters alone?

"Did the Beyond speak to you, too?" I ask as we move out of the nest and into a narrow tunnel — or hall.

"The Beyond?" She eyes me warily. "This isn't another Other Side, is it?"

"No." I respond immediately. Then I actually think about it. "Well, in a way. It is a voice from outside our realm. It is the gifter of sapience. I thought your young might have experienced its touch."

Again, she gives me that difficult to decipher look, and I swear I hear her mumble something along the lines of 'insane Titan' and 'following me', but I have no idea what she might mean, so I let it slide… even if the 'insane' part sounded a little insulting for some reason.

"I'm no psychologist… or philosopher, so I can't say for certain if we're born sapient or it just comes about as we grow, but I can say for certain that we do not hear voices… other than our own thoughts."

Oh? I thought that even if the Beyond turned out not to be a the giver of sapience, then sapience itself opened a gate to it. None of them have heard its voice? Not ever? Then how did they learn to speak the same as I?

"The Beyond warned me of the total destruction of the Warped Tunnels. That might also extend to the surface." As I speak, Ceph freezes in the doorway to the outside, where one of those fascinating metal boxes awaits with a Dohrni. Like a small train. I quickly notice Ceph's rapt attention, and it urges me to continue. "I believe it will occur when the Beyond breaches the barrier between realms. It intends to eliminate the Titans. A battle between beings like that would easily create a second Other Side."

Rather disappointing that all that these sapients have created will be reduced to gravel. I wish it didn't have to be. But the inevitable is inevitable. The Titans had no reason to lie, nor did the Beyond. And if either of their word wasn't enough for me, the view through the fabric tear revealed all I needed to know. Our thread is fragile.

There is no saving it, so all I can do is work towards the task given to me. If I kill the Titans before the Beyond arrives along with beings from the other, infinitely stronger threads, then I will be given the only thing I need.

I slide past the still motionless Ceph, and approach the metal box. Surprisingly, the Dohrni welcomes me with a bow, and opens the door for me. I slither inside, once more indulging in curiosity.

❖❖❖

A battle between Titans and beings of equivalent standing?

Ceph was gobsmacked. Such a thing had to be impossible. All through recorded history, there had been plenty of instances where Titans appeared, but never did they fight. They were impossibly massive creatures, natural disasters wherever they walked, but never intentionally so. She wanted to disregard Orm's fortelling as fantasy. Considering the snake only moments ago admitted to hearing voices, she really should have. But something stuck out to her.

The Beyond, its prophesied Armageddon, and the barrier between realms.

Rumours had been circulating even before she'd descended the darkness to find the snake. And now that she'd returned, Ceph had made sure she was up to date with news. Particularly focused on the war, but also on chatter.

She already knew Remus and his team left a while back for Riparia in order to stop or delay the Armageddon everyone knew was coming. What she, and almost nobody else knew, was what was the cause. If the Mercenary Order or the governments of the pact nations knew, they kept it hush from the populous.

But that didn't stop people talking. Initially, most thought it was the Titans. There were very few through Meja that didn't hear that wailing shriek from across the Alps. Ceph had been too busy losing her friends and teammates at the time, but apparently that explosion of wind that knocked Telum into the Nightfall Shroud was a very distinct bird cry that was heard a thousand kilometres away.

That theory only lasted until stranger, more concerning stories came from beyond the immediate scope of the pact nations. A beam of light in the south that shifted the skies between sunny, dark, stormy, and apocalyptic from one heartbeat to the next. The northern ocean turning blacker than they night sky, and growing unnaturally still. Even through the war, they'd heard talk of one of the Henosis Empire's rear cities disappearing from existence.

And if none of those were enough, there was not a single person who hadn't noticed the Crimson Moon's eerie red glow remained eternally now, rather than the brief midnight window it once once held. Even through the constant blanket of ash near what remained of the Alps, its glow remained.

Essentially, the threat they faced was not something of this world. If Orm's Beyond was real… so were its words. Armageddon was not just a fear, but the truth. And the snake Ceph had to look after just had to be connected to it.

Her eyes swivelled after the serpent, who was now winding itself in and out of the seat cushions inside the car enough times that she didn't know how it didn't tie itself in knots.

Was the pressure of being the only answer to an unwinnable war not enough?

She wished her team was still with her.