The Tenth Entry

For the first time in a very long time, I fell asleep in the flickering shadows of the fireplace. Mira stayed by my side, sitting in the chair next to me, until I no longer noticed her there.

I woke to a dark room, some light peaking in through the shades. The air was cold and stiff, not a single flickering flame or smoking pile of debris – instead only the remains of charred wood. Suddenly, a wave of voices crashed against my mind, flashes of flesh and metal churned with cybernetics burned into my consciousness. The wailing of the Obelisk brought me up out of the chair and thudding upon the wood floor on my knees, my hands clawing at the floorboards. I could no longer tell if it was the Obelisk that was reliant on me, or if I was reliant on it - or even something else entirely. This symbiosis was quickly becoming another question. I, however, was running out of time.

After managing to calm myself down I noticed just beside my right hand - a note. I concluded it must have fallen from the table when I did and picked it up. It was unaddressed and unsealed, so I opened the parcel.

It read simply: “I have gone to finish what my father started, Mira. P.S. Asking to live may have been too much after all.”

Standing, I placed the note back on the table and walked to the door. As I descended the creaking stairs, a pool of blood entered my vision and at the bottom of the stairs - a body. In the foyer of the mansion lay Halgrim slumped against the wall leading into the dining room. His face was pale, a stab wound had been plunged through his chest cavity. He bled out, if the shock had not killed him first, and died slowly. The blood was dry in some spots which indicated Halgrim was bleeding for some time, and the initial stab wound was at least an hour ago. Mira was the only one who could have done this.

I left Halgrim where he lie and departed the last silent home of Kanav - wandering the road east.

A violet glittering horizon peaked over the charred woods, pulsating vibrantly against the grey sky above. I wondered then when had the world become so ugly. Mud crusted on my armored boots and the air heavy as I entered the black forest. In the darkness of the forest, the violet glow slowly began to descend to below the tree line illuminating the warped branches and leaves. I trapsed along the dirt below, working deeper and deeper into the forest. The trees were withered and drained of anything they had to offer. A forest of corpses.

The silence of Kanav had never bothered me, but in that forest the silence buried even my own breathing.

The glow became its brightest crawling over the wall of bushes and thorns, and I pushed through the bramble and into the open area.

The violet rays were intense, but I was able to see clearly through it. No wandering corpses were to be seen, nor the lake. The grass had been reduced to dirt and the lake to mud. There were indications of a battle, several holes had been made in the ground from either above or from below it. At the center of the violet ray was the creature, evolving.  It had assumed a plant like appearance, like a jagged violet flower, yet churned like it was incapable of the form.

At the center of the creature was Mira being absorbed and integrated. As I approached, her eyes opened, their dim violet now a clear crystal glow. She desperately struggled and tried to scream – yet her vocal cords must have been integrated as she did not emit sound. Her body was slowly being transformed, her skin grey and green and pulsing violet. Yet, she struggled and struggled. I watched.

The voices returned, whispering: “Harvest.” In unison, they repeated. “Harvest.”

Mira seeming to either grow tired, or realize the futility in her struggle, stopped moving. She slid slowly back into the creature until her head rested against its flesh, there it wrapped her in a green gloss and there she silently stayed. Swallowed whole by the wretched and unfathomable gullet of nature.

The Failed creature would soon become a Newborn, the lowest of the Reverent. Reality had begun to slip, the violet tentacles of the Newborn becoming ultraviolet and translucent. Its birth would be violent, and catastrophic. The ground surrounding the Newborn liquified, becoming a state of reality and unreality. The sky warped into shades of purple and pink, the ultraviolet rays piercing outwards and filling the entirety of the world.

“Living was asking for too much…” I heard myself say. The voices continued whispering their hymn, a prayer for what seemed to be their salvation.

Until another voice I had never heard silenced the rest: “Harvest, for all will be mine.”

My armor flared red, and I grasped outwards. Collapsing the entirety of unreality on the Newborn, it tried to screech with newfound pain – the ultraviolet rays condensed into a single point at the center of its being. In less than a millisecond I was upon it and plunged my right hand through Mira’s absorbed chest – retrieving the soul.

I was standing on the ground next, and all that remained were ashes that rained from the sky. The Newborn was destroyed, and nothing remained of it. The Newborn’s soul still glowed an ultraviolet luminescence, and in its depth was a fragment of what I was searching for. I suspected that it was not the creature that had contained it, but Mira. Nothing was left of her. Crushing the wreathing soul, I absorbed the Newborn’s power and replenished some of my own. No vision was given, nor were there memories from a Newborn soul.

I breathed for a moment, unsure of what to do next.

I turned, and a rift greeted me. I entered the rift, and the same large pulsating room came into view – the rift closing behind me.

The Failed dropped from the ceiling, frantically looking at my being – searching for the bounty it had been promised.

“Where is it?” It hissed.

I said nothing and ripped the creature down telekinetically from its hanging cocoon, then ripped it apart piece by piece. The soul eventually showed itself from what was left, and I took it.

I floated for some time in deep space after that. I destroyed everything that was left of the ship graveyard, ensuring it remained dead. Until eventually a shuttle from the Obelisk found me, and I was once again sitting in the meditative chamber – the soul in my metal grasp.

“Aberus.” I called.

“You called, My Lord?” Came a voice from the shadows.

Aberus bowed and knelt before me.

“When did I start being capable of seeing the memories of souls I absorbed?” I asked.

“When you first started on this quest, My Lord.” Aberus answered concisely.

“I see.”

Aberus appeared hesitant at first, but asked: “The girl, Mira, was she the one who held a fragment?”

“Yes.” I answered.

There was silence, silence in the ship, and silence in my mind.

“Will that be all, My Lord?” Aberus asked.

“Yes, Aberus.” I responded.

Aberus again bowed and stepped back, disappearing into the shadows of the chamber.

The soul wreathed slightly, and I grasped hard upon it, it shattered, and I felt a dry cold wash over me.

“Seer.” A distant voice whispered in my mind, and a world appeared alongside it.

The vision ended, and the shuttle soundlessly moved to the next destination.