The Grand Weave

When my body passed through and into the otherside of reality, it nearly caused me to throw up. It was like somebody had forcefully downloaded vertigo in my head. But as quick as it appeared, the feeling faded, and I was able to refocus my eyesight.

I didn't have time to get a detailed picture of the world, but I saw what looked like pulsating white flesh lining the skies. It was hard to get a clear picture as the creature that grabbed me was pulling me in fast.

A jolt of pain came through the connection, and I screamed.

Magnus! Fuck! LET ME GO!

I sank my claws into the tentacle and ripped them out—the long, fleshy things spasmed, smashing me against the ground. The impact knocked the breath out of my lungs, and my eyesight blurred, but I ignored the pain to do it again.

The tentacle started to loosen this time but maintained a firm grip around my waist. When it began to spasm again, I was slammed down, back first, into the spongy ground and then knocked into what felt like a large rock.

Come on! Let go!

I tried to repeat my attempt, only for a different kind of feeling to come through the connection. It was hot, like a volcano, ready to explode. Every thump was a war drum that pounded in my ears, and I felt its call. The beast locked away howled in madness, and my blood started to boil.

Strangely enough, it wasn't from Magnus but rather from Zharia. And I could feel her fury approaching like a flaming bullet.

"Master!"

The tentacle started to pull again and dragged me to my feet. Before my legs left the ground, an actual flaming missile came rocketing by. It impacted the albino appendage and erupted in a twister of golden flames.

The fire washed over me and bathed me in its embrace. But, the flames did not hurt; they never would. And inside the fit of seething anger that threatened to crawl out of my skin, I called to my spirit.

Mana flowed in my chest, and I let the floodgates open. It rushed and pushed and followed my will, sinking into the skill wisp inside my soul.

The flaming whirlwind that was Zharia's body bursts into motes of equally bright light. They sank into my chest and coated me in a shell of mana.

Together, entwined and ready, we changed. The demon of wrath broke its bars and threw its cage at the mental walls containing it. It was free, and it wanted blood.

The fire that erupted from the activation of my skill incinerated the nearby surroundings. The tentacle tried to squeeze down on my body, but the force of the eruption knocked it away. What was once bone white was now a blackened mess that scattered to the wind.

I howled and launched myself at the fallen limb. When I was close, I leaned down and sunk my claws into the convulsing flesh. And then, I ran. My feet carried me forward, closer to where I felt my other spirit fighting off a wave of pain to combat a foe much larger than himself.

I wasn't sure where or even what I was doing, but I let the carnage flow uninterrupted as I consumed mana like water from an endless well. My body was hot, so scathingly hot. The hand ripping five smoking and bloody lines into the massive tentacle left behind a trail of golden fire to burn the blood that spurted out.

Somewhere deep, the logical side that controlled rationality was trying its best to wrest control back from the beast. But it was futile. I needed to find the thing that caused my familiar pain. I needed to end it!

When I did find Magnus, I saw a monstrous clawed arm impact his back legs and send him flying. I roared and tore my arm away from the tentacle. Without thinking, I launched myself at the mass of slimy flesh and grabbed on.

The monster released a high-pitched trill that burst one of my ear drums. In retaliation, I channel mana down both arms and let two streams of golden flames explode out.

It caused the creature to thrash and twist, threatening to throw me off. I couldn't allow that; I wouldn't let it, so I opened wide and then bit down. My fangs punctured the salty skin, and the taste of putrid rot assaulted my mouth.

The smell and taste invaded my senses, and I wanted to barf. Instead of letting go, I bit down harder and let the feathers adorning my limbs light up.

Something called my name, and a scream assaulted my ears from behind me, but I ignored it all. There was nothing that would stop me.

I gripped tighter when its fists hammered my back. My claws punctured flesh, and I grabbed down as it tried to tear off my limb.

When it bit into my shoulder, I finally screamed. The serrated teeth sliced into my flesh, treating it as if it were paper, causing intense pain.

I tried to scream harder to block out the strange trill that vibrated my bones. It didn't care. It forced two clawed hands against my chest and pushed. My arms threatened to give, but I felt bone inside its body and curved my fingers around it.

Another trill, again. Angry, hurt. Another yank, another bone that cracked. More teeth joined the feast and forced my mouth open into another scream. I couldn't make a sound, blood filling my throat.

It pushed again, and my arm snapped, so I let go. It released its bite and tore a bloody chunk of flesh away as it trilled.

I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe. It hurt; everything hurt. My eyes glared through heavy lids as the multi-eyed eldritch spawn screeched in my face, bloody spittle and strips of flesh impacting my skin.

With pure glee, I spat the blood clogging my throat into its eyes. The creature reared its head back and raised me into the air.

Burn bitch!

I shoved my hand into its maw and grabbed at its slimy tongue. I let out the weakest laugh and forced mana into my palm in a fit of giggling madness.

The explosion blew out its brains, pale chunks mixing with burnt flesh while shards of broken teeth pelted the ground. There was a moment of silence, a brief lull in the drums of war that shook the world.

And then the clawed hand that kept me in the air loosened, and I dropped to the ground. I landed on my ass, and the motion caused me to spit up more blood.

Yet, my eyes ignored that splatter of pink that landed on the pool of black muck. Instead, I watched as the monster, now missing half of its head, began to stumble. Like a house of cards, it collapsed and smacked the ground with a wet schlthuunk.

My eyes stayed glued to its head. Where was once a face was now a meat fountain spurting up more of the rancid tar. And somehow, that sight of it all made me laugh.

My brain pounded as my anger grasped for thoughts to feed off of anything to keep the raging fire alive inside its chest. But I kept laughing, even as my ribs began to protest and creak.

The flames along my body flickered until they guttered out and went dormant. And the world lost its yellow tint now that the fire was gone. All that remained was an increasingly paling corpse that painted the ground black.

Footsteps came from my left, and there was a moment where I wanted to ignore the fact it was footsteps from a person and not the wet thumps of a monster. However, the rage was gone, and the walls were closing back in. The anger inside me tried to run, but it couldn't. The monster was dead; now, there was no reason to let it run wild.

"Are we Cyrus, or are we Wrath?" Sereza called out.

She sounded distant, like she was further back than what the footsteps suggested, and the oddity helped my brain calm down.

When I turned my head, I saw that she was several meters away and was holding something behind her back.

I turned away from her and continued to stare at the corpse. "Is that how we view it? Treat it like an alternate personality, separate from us?"

I heard her sigh in relief, and she approached. "Yes, actually. I'm sure a child of wrath has it worst, but generally, felkins divorce themselves from their instinctive self." She stopped about a meter away and tapped something on the ground. "Found something of yours."

I turned and saw her holding my spear. "Oh fuck. Didn't even realize I dropped it, thanks."

"No problem," she said. Then she frowned and looked around. "Uhm, where's the cub?"

My eyes widened, and I tried to stand up, only for my limbs to fail, and I fell onto my back. The black tar covering the ground stuck to my hair like glue, and I groaned.

Fucking bastard and its rotten blood.

"Magnus! Where are you? Are you okay?"

"Yes, Master. I'm here." Magnus responded.

I struggled to turn my head, but I managed and saw Magnus walking from behind a small mountain. His fur was back to normal, and I could see that he was unharmed.

It brought peace to my mind, and I relaxed as I let the ground sink in. Now that he was safe and my thoughts were back in control, I needed healing, or I'd die, and the entire fight would have been pointless.

I undid my transformation, even if I was reluctant to let its reinforcement go. The fire mana would have gotten in the way of Áine's skill.

Zharia appeared, and she flapped her wings to remain flying. "Master, we did it. Burned big, nasty monster."

"Sure did. Thanks for coming to my rescue."

Her feathers lit up in joy, and she landed on my chest. I tried to protest, knowing she didn't like getting her feathers dirty, but she lightly pecked me.

"No. Master is more important."

I simply thanked her and laid my head back. Mana, thankfully, was separated from my physical well-being, and I summoned Áine. She landed on my chest and placed her hands near the massive bite wound on my shoulder.

While she was doing this, Magnus reached the last few feet and joined in the cuddlefest, even with the blood coating everything. When I regained some strength in my arm, I reached up and placed a hand on his head, gently scratching behind his ears.

"Honestly, I'm a little jealous. That looks like an amazing way to spend time. Minus the injuries, of course," Sereza said.

I let out a weak chuckle. "Yeah, it is. Should totally try it sometime."

"Yeah, maybe if I had enough gold to buy a city. The fact that you have five summons is insane."

I tried to shrug, only for Áine to smack a tiny hand against my chest. I apologized profusely and focused back on Sereza. "So, how did you escape? And why the scream? Not that I'm judging you for it."

She frowned. "Acid melts flesh pretty easily. And I didn't scream. You were the only person doing that, and even that was more of a mad howl than anything else."

"Wait. I swear I heard screaming. If it wasn't you who wa-"

Magnus raised his head and jumped. "Oh, Master. I found someone."

"Magnus, what do you mean you found someone? Where are they, and why didn't you tell me sooner?"

He lowered his head and let out a weak mew. "Sorry, Master. I wanted to join you and the others."

I felt like I screamed at a child. It was horrible, and if I weren't afraid of Áine threatening to stop healing, I would have scooped the cub into a big hug.

"Hey, hey. I'm sorry. You are fine. Thank you for thinking about me. But seriously, where is this person, and how did you find them?"

The feeling of guilt disappeared, replaced by happy excitement. "Over there, hiding behind the rock. She said she was too scared. I found her when I killed the monster."

I groaned at the lack of details and the numerous questions he was leaving me with. But I had to warn Sereza first in case something was about to happen. "Sereza." She raised an eyebrow, and I lowered my voice to a whisper. "Over there behind the rock. Magnus said he found someone, a woman, apparently. Be careful."

She nodded and casually stood up. I wanted to ask her what she was going to do, but then my jaw fell open as her body broke apart into a cloud of green smoke.

For a second, it looked like she teleported, nightcrawler-style, but then the cloud began to float away slowly. The Sereza-cloud crested over the rock and out of sight. I waited for something crazy to go down, but there was nothing.

My jaw was still open, and when Magnus accidentally splashed some of the black tar into my mouth, I began coughing up a storm. I struggled to control the force but managed to keep Zharia and Áine from being knocked off my chest.

When I looked back up, I found Sereza walking with a dagger pressed against a person's throat. She was a short, human woman with dirty blonde hair. Her clothes were covered by dirt-stained leather armour.

From the looks of it, she had a rough couple of days. Several patches of her armour were missing, while the rest were beaten and filled with holes. The fingers on her right hand were missing from the glove, and her left pant leg was gone, exposing cut-up, dirty skin.

She had fear in her eyes and was walking with both hands held in the air while Sereza's tail wrapped around her shoulder, ready to pierce into her neck.

When she approached, she saw me lying on the ground and paused. I expected confusion or incredulity but was met with fear. The panicked expression made me blink, and her eyes grew wider.

"No, stop, please. Don't make me go near him," she begged as Sereza pressed her dagger closer to her skin.

"And why not?" Sereza asked, her voice cold.

She stuttered and dug in her feet. Eventually, she kept glancing at the dagger and tail pressed against her neck and decided to answer. "You saw what he did to that thing. He's as much a monster as the monster itself."

Sereza didn't have time to answer as Zharia rushed at her. She tried to run away, forcing Sereza to grab her with her other hand.

Zharia flew up to her face, with her feathers beginning to blaze. "Don't speak about him that way! Dumb lady!"

"Uh, uhm, uh." She was a mess. Surprised at the sudden appearance of an angry phoenix yelling at her and with the realization of the danger she was in.

I sighed and called Zharia back. It took some coaxing, but she listened and landed on my chest. Her feathers flared while she bore holes in the woman's direction.

"Hey, whatever your problem is, cut it out. If what my familiar tells me is true, he saved your life. So stop being an asshat and insulting me," I shouted.

She eventually calmed down, and Sereza removed her blade but remained close by. That was good since there was no way we could trust her. Especially not in the creepy land made of pulsing tentacle flesh.

"Sorry. Uh, my name is Pena. And thank you for saving me from that monster. It's just that I saw the end of your fight, and you fight like a madman. It was kind of scary, sorry."

I waved her off. "Whatever, what's done is done. But I have a serious question."

"Oh, uhm, sure, go ahead."

"Where are we, and why were you with a monster?"

"Well, I'm not sure where we are, and to answer the second part, it's slightly complicated."

Sereza raised her dagger and growled. "Explain."

"Sorry, sorry! To begin with, I want to say I had no choice in the matter. When the monsters abducted my team, they dragged us all in here. I don't know what happened to them or where we are, but that's it, I swear."

I shared a look with Sereza, who narrowed her eyes. The story left a dozen questions for barely answering half of one. I nodded, and Sereza let her skill flare, and the blades started to glow a hazy green.

The woman started to panic. "I promise that's the truth! I don't know where everyone else was taken. There was no time to think as they ripped us out of the building and took us here."

"Where was the monster taking you then? Why aren't you dead?"

"Probably because it wanted to bring me to the center. I saw it take a few of us away and inject us with those... things."

"What things? Be more descriptive," Sereza prodded.

The woman shuddered and had to take a minute to calm herself. She slowly raised a finger and pointed to the right. Only fleshy protrusions were blocking her way, so I assumed she meant something beyond our area, where we couldn't see.

"I think the cult is sacrificing the people the monsters bring back."

And then the woman started to cry, and Sereza lowered her blade. It was a full-blown, ugly meltdown that made me feel slightly bad for interrogating her when she was probably still in shock.

I looked to where the corpse of the monster lay, dead on the ground.

I'm fucking tired of these rifts.