NOVEL NEXT 164 (I) Descend [III]
Psychomancy will wound your heart, Uva.
There is no way to avoid the pain. The people often talk about ethics and rules regarding your skill, but so little about what it will inflict on you.
You are a person. Never forget that.
Even if you gain the ability to shape your own mind, there will still be places where you remain fragile. Because we perceive ourselves to be a certain way, and we imagine ourselves to hold to certain forms.
And I think that is what cuts us most deeply: The moment when our sense of self does not match the brutality of reality.
I was your age when I slew someone in the name of our Lady Arachnae.
Oh, do not look so envious. It is a black thing, ending another life. Watching the vampire's life dissolve behind her eyes left me shaken. Beyond the hate I held for her and her kind, she was still a person. And you will understand this better than I ever will. Because you will be looking into someone's personhood. You will be blessed and damned to truly know what it is like to step beyond your own flesh.
Our skills are not just weapons to use against our enemies. They can misshape us as well. So, before you do anything, understand the cost. And take care of your wounds. Take care to cleanse your injuries so that they do not fester. Take care to treat yourselves with honesty so that you are not brought down by your own lies.
Take care to shape yourself into who you wish to be.
That is most important. Shape yourself. This is something that must be done beforehand. Done with intent and focus. You cannot live thoughtlessly. Not like the rest of us. The power you have is too great, too invasive, and all acts you perform on another's mind will come with their own reactions.
They will chisel at your sense of self.
So, learn to be a good sculptor. Learn to think ahead. And understand that even the highest rewards come with their own perils. A setback could save your life, and an inappropriate evolution can become your peril.
Know yourself. Above everything and everyone, know yourself.
Because if you do not, you will die lost and afraid before the end.
-Sister Phure Mettabon to her daughter, Uva Mettabon
164 (I)
Descend [III]
Uva felt like a cauldron as the Starhawk's unfathomable power boiled within her. The divine mana that he channeled clashed with the colors of the Outside, mingling as they flowed free from her being and her many skills. Her threads of Psychomancy were lit with gradients of shifting color and resonating pulses of incandescent mana. What used to be translucent strings that inflicted supple and subtle wounds on minds became tangible cords. Cords that bled heat into reality. Cords that could be woven into a nest to serve as protection.
As such, when the Republic's forces suddenly descended from that colossal dimensional gate that manifested in the skies above Blackedge, Uva coated the spire of Starhawk's Perch with her newly-empowered Psychomancy and barred the intruders from entry, like a spideress sealing the entrance of her nest.
The manifestation of the dimensional gateway was a staggering display of power in and of itself. It was larger than the town itself, with its innermost ring more than capable of swallowing Blackedge.
Thousands of Pathbearers flowed out every passing second, and they descended in orderly formations, with the Cavalry soaring through the air, forming a defensive perimeter and monitoring the space. Then plunged the heavyset Vanguards, Pathbearers clad in adamantine armor and bearing massive shields or colossal weapons. They slammed down upon the town, avoiding the wounded citizens while making for the collapsed ruins. They began lifting massive pieces of debris and slabs of rubble off bodies, and the Geomancers among them began reconstructing the town of Blackedge as well.
Finally, there came the dedicated magi. The Republic fielded mixed-lore formations of magi bearing all elemental affinities. The voice called them Poly-Magi earlier, and Uva assumed they were a combined-magical skill force meant to be adaptable and overwhelming at the same time. They hovered just above the city in their varied formations and stood atop magical platforms with spiraling spell patterns quivering beneath their feet. The magi unleashed waves of Biomancy and Hydromancy, delivering rain and healing for those who needed it.
And after the brutality Blackedge had experienced at the hands of Vicar Sullain's Retribution Crusade, the survivors needed a great deal.
Among the Republic's forces were also Psychomancers. So many Psychomancers—more than Uva ever recalled seeing at once. Weave was a city-state, and a young one at that. Of the Five Faiths, Uva was under no illusion as to which was the weakest. But she didn't serve her Lady Arachnae because Weave was powerful. No, she did it because it was just, just in the face of overwhelming odds, and the only chance for Umbrals to escape the vile fates that awaited them.
In her time as Sister of the Order, Uva faced vampires, Dragon-Knights, Compact mercenaries and their hired demons, even Necrotechs in the field. They were treacherous adversaries, overwhelmingly powerful in their own specialized way. But the Republic was on a whole other level.
She had always known the surfacers were formidable adversaries. The stories passed down from the Abyssal War primed her with respect and wariness against the Pathbearers of Yellowstone. But she still had underestimated them—underestimated how many of them there were, underestimated the sheer variety of skills they possessed, and how powerful their skills were.
Over a hundred Psychomancers were assailing her now, each a Hero or a High Master. Weave, comparatively, couldn't possibly come close to even matching a tenth of that in totality. The Yellowstone Republic mustered them in a casual instant.
Yet there was something else that Uva found herself awed by. It was the fact that even as more than a hundred Psychomancers of differing skill evolutions were working in tandem, shaping massive spells that swirled like transparent spheres above the town of Blackedge, they couldn't push through Uva's protections. They still had no chance to overpower her defenses. And that was thanks to the Starhawk pouring his power into her. His mana was further tempered by the influence of the Outside, and anyone who reached too deeply suffered madness and mana strain alike.
Puppeteer of the Formless Strings 141 > 142
And it was then that Uva learned the true distance between a mere Pathbearer and a god.
Uva thought herself formidable at Heroic-Tier. Such a threshold of power was something that she'd only indulged in private fantasies all her life, thinking it to be only achievable in the far-distant future, or if the System intervened on her behalf. The latter happened in the form of Shiv, and now she faced adversaries beyond her reckoning; foes that should have killed her time and time again.
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But she didn't die. She prevailed, and the System awarded her for surviving its attempted murders. Yet, there was no chance that she could survive the Starhawk's wrath. Not if he decided to inflict his violence upon her.
He was the sun, great and terrible in its glare, and she wasn't even an ember. She was but cold ash.
The Republic Psychomancers pulled and struck at her dense weave of mana strands, and they couldn't budge her at all.
She was an impenetrable wall of iron, and they weren't even waves. They were moisture in the air, clinging as condensation to her, and nothing more. She had anticipated a struggle against them, a battle. But now she simply did as the Starhawk requested. She moved Blackedge toward the chasm, preparing its descent into the Abyss, for that was the main purpose of their bargain: To deliver Blackedge, and Starhawk's Perch in particular, into the embrace of the Great One and ensure the Starhawk's scheme came to fruition.
The town was wounded, and Uva wasn't nearly as versed with the Starhawk's power as Roland was. Furthermore, she was a far weaker Pathbearer compared to the currently crippled Town Lord. As such, Blackedge floated slowly, awkwardly, dragged along by a few errant strands grasping at the air.
But still it flew, and it hovered mainly because of the Starhawk's divine might. Oddly, it also let out an emission of ever-changing colors. And from those colors, faint sounds followed, whispers of beings lurking just beyond the veil, close by, yet impossibly far…
"Refrain from touching my being again," the Starhawk commanded. There was a tone of severity in his voice, and Uva looked behind her to find the ethereal form of the Ascendant towering over her.
"Pardon?" she said, trying to keep her nervousness in check. She reached for her power, yet realized that it was pointless. Again, she wasn't even an ember. She was less than ash.
"Not you," the Starhawk replied, his tone softening. "The thing within you. The thing you have so unwisely decided to grant residence within your soul."
A twinge of annoyance thrummed through Uva. "You say that like any of this was ever my choice. The circumstances between me and the Dreamtaker resemble our current arrangement more than you might think. It was this or certain death."
The Ascendant didn't take offense; instead, he fell quiet. And what came from him thereafter surprised Uva. "I apologize," the Starhawk said, his voice somber. "I am frustrated. And I feel powerless. The Dreamtaker intends to take advantage of my fragile state and expand her influence. I refuse to allow that."
That certainly wasn't what she'd expected the god to say. She didn't even expect him to apologize, much less admit to emotional fragility. Such things were beneath powerful Pathbearers, and deities even more so. Yet, the Starhawk didn't act like a god. No, he was more akin to a man. A man with far too much weight on his shoulders. Weight, she was beginning to feel in his stead.
He reminded her of her Lady.
"I have faced many enemies for the Republic," the Starhawk began. "Most can be slain conventionally. Most can be understood. The Outside is different. Their presence leaves me uneasy. And with you being a Seeker, my worry only grows."
"I cannot say I blame you. The eldritch is… volatile in the best cases and treacherous for most minds to behold," Uva said. As soon as she finished speaking, she felt a shudder of power pulse out from her eyes. The Dreamtaker's attention was seeping out, and the colors drifting free from Uva's mind reached out toward the Starhawk's face as if to caress him. Uva restrained the colors, drawing them back into her eye, and she felt something almost approximating annoyance resound from the Dreamtaker.
"I merely want to observe," the Dreamtaker muttered from inside her.
Your observation might come with actual harm, Uva shot back mentally.
The Starhawk inclined his head ever so slightly. "I thank you for your consideration, Sister. I suspect I am not so different from you right now. Both of us are bound by bargains we did not wish to make. If only I was less of a blind fool, I could have seen the threat coming, and this wouldn't have been necessary."
Uva studied the Starhawk for a moment and realized what he was trying to do. He was attempting to establish a bridge between them, a common point. If he was doing it consciously or unconsciously, she couldn't say, but once more her guard was up, and she wondered if the Ascendant was trying to manipulate her.
"It is not your fault, my Lord," Roland forced out through clenched teeth. He was sitting not far away from Uva. His personal chair was once a magnificent thing carved from the finest wood that would have cost a fortune down in the Abyss. Now it was barely more than splinters, and that it was holding together at all was a testament to its quality.
By his side, one of his surviving Biomancers continued treating him while Rose held his hand and snarled at him, demanding that he stay focused on her, lest he fall unconscious. She cursed at him every time he slipped close toward unwilling slumber.
"The failing is mine." Roland coughed through his words. Uva tasted the shame and sorrow radiating from the Town Lord. Now that he had been brought back for a while, his thoughts kept drifting to the people outside, the people he felt he had abandoned, the people he felt he had led to their slaughter. Blackedge was a fortress town, but ultimately still a town. It was a tripwire more than it was a bulwark against the Abyss, and an attack of this scale had not been anticipated, with the treaties between the Abyss and the Republic still standing.
Before the war was over, the matter was supposed to be settled. Yet here they were, repeating old mistakes, renewing old conflicts. But things were more complicated than that. There were so many hidden agendas and hidden forces going around that Uva couldn't fully tell who she was fighting anymore. The Ascendants weren't a unified faction, and the Starhawk was determined to escape from them.
"The fault is not yours," the Starhawk said to his champion, lowering his head. "The fault is mine. I should have seen this coming. I should have kept a closer eye on Kathereine. I knew this was not beyond her or Stormhalt. Yet I was too obsessed, too focused on the grand vision that I let the details slip by."
"Enough," Valor said, cutting both the Starhawk and Roland off with a scoff of annoyance. "You are not children. There are consequences for every choice we make. I know of regret, but this is not the time to indulge. Face your mistakes and continue. Learn but do not be ashamed."
"How can I avoid shame?" Roland asked. He gritted his teeth as he shuffled in his seat. "How can I, when so many of my people are—"
"No." Rose shook her head as Roland tried to stand. She held him down, planting a firm hand against his chest. "Knock it the fuck off," Rose growled. "If I see you strain yourself one more time, I'm going to choke you out myself."
Roland blinked, and Uva shared that response. She wasn't sure if he'd heard his wife's words accurately, but then something impossible happened. The Town Lord laughed. Uva didn't think he was capable of such emotion, with the sheer amount of misery radiating from him.
"Choke me out," Roland gasped. "Yes, I suppose you are my Rose. I suppose I am not dreaming. Who else would threaten me so sweetly…"
Rose smirked and lightly flicked him on the chin. Roland winced in pain. She whispered a muttered apology to him, but then flicked him again.
"Lady Van Erren," the Biomancer protested, eyes wide. "Please, Master Arrow is—"
"I know how he is," she snapped, cutting the Biomancer off through clenched teeth. A snarl escaped from the woman. "I know my husband. You don't need to explain this to me. I've patched him more times than I can count on the battlefield, and right now, this is what he needs." She poked him on the forehead, and Roland let out a slight gasp of incredulity. "A little bit more agitation, a little bit of frustration, and someone to smack him over the head every time he gets close to blacking out." She leaned in toward Roland. "You are not allowed to die when I just got back, Roland. Otherwise, I'm going to reach into whatever hell you plunged into, and I'm going to raise the worst fit you will ever experience in this life and all the lives to come."
Roland lifted a shaking hand, and he rested it on his wife's extended arm. "I missed you," Roland choked out. "I missed you so much, across so many years, I've dreamed. I've dreamed..." And then he began to sag once more, and Rose did as she promised. She slapped him across the face, using the warmth of her palm to lead him back into the waking world.
Uva drew her attention away from the two after that. It felt like she was intruding on something private, something at once barely publicly appropriate, yet also too intimate for her to intrude on.
Something commanded her focus just then. Another hammer of Psychomantic force crashed against Uva's external wards, and it was followed by a thin beam of Dynamancy. The second bounced off Uva's dense strands as easily as the first did. Once more, she was reminded of her power. Of the power I borrowed, she reminded herself.
"Ignore them," the Starhawk reminded her once more, "simply focus. We are almost…" The Ascendant trailed off, and a sudden surge of pressure hammered down on Uva from above. Her awareness screamed, and her instincts went haywire. She felt terrified for some reason, and she didn't know why.
Unwillingly, unwittingly, her head turned upward, and she stared through the ceiling, a ceiling that was thoroughly cracked, leaking divine mana. Through that ceiling, she saw them. Twelve divine presences, far above Blackedge. The other Ascendants and their Avatars were there.