Path of Stars 14: Wild Spirits (Patreon)

The stars of the Chaos Wild passed by in a thousand colors as Sam and Sleset headed toward the origin of the aurora ore. Now and then, Sam dragged Sleset onto an astral thread to speed it up, much to the naga’s distaste, but they spent most of their time looking for encounters along the way, since the main reason for coming here was to gather experience.

Sam kept up his Wild Giant disguise and bandits attempted to ambush them twice more, but each of the groups was smaller than the first one. The battles had little to recommend them except that he earned half a dozen levels and some improvements to his Charisma, although he did pick up some assorted coins and gems. Nonetheless, the experience he gained was higher than the essence from the beasts they encountered, which made it a success.

For Sleset, apart from when they walked an astral thread, the journey was a dream come true as he accompanied his lord in battle. Nagas were an energetic race and often inclined to battle and magic, and for the first time, he felt like he had a clear sense of purpose. In his mind, even the Great Coiling Serpents were not as strong as an Astral Titan, and so he was fully content with his new situation.

Along the way, Sam spent a bit of time studying the enchantments on the ship he’d just acquired and made a few modifications. He also changed the overall structure of the ship, making it a bit more streamlined and altering some features to remind himself of Aster Fall.

He imprinted a tall, blue and white mountain on the sail and reshaped the prow to make the figurehead look like an ice drake. All along the hull, he refined the wood with crystal flame and astral energy to harden it, and then he reworked the enchantment with runes for astral ice to increase its defenses, which gave the wood a light blue sheen that rippled across the surface.

By the time he was done, the ship looked nothing like it had before. He gave it a satisfied nod and inscribed a name in blue-white symbols across the prow.

It read “The Ice Drake.”

He wasn’t too concerned about someone identifying the ship, but it was best if there were no questions. With that done, he shrank it back to the size of his palm and stored it away in his cloak. Even with the upgrades, the ship was slower than walking the threads and he didn’t want to scare off bandits with an expensive-looking transport.

As for the rest of the time as they traveled, he took the opportunity to study many of the new beast parts that he hadn’t used yet. He slowly worked on them, transforming them into small artifacts refined with runes and the elements.

Now and then, he crushed a particular material between his palms in a sphere of blinding light as he forcefully upgraded its quality with Elemental Smithing and vast quantities of essence, pushing it toward a higher tier before he worked on it.

Most of the items were scrolls and other single-use artifacts for attacking or defending, like beast talons that he enchanted to create a cutting blade when they were thrown. With his current strength, the energy infused into a single blade was enough to slice through a small meteor.

For each item, he did his best to infuse his latest understandings of the Void and the elements of the Chaos Wild, but for the most part, it was just practice. His class as an Astral Artificer was focused on creating enchanted artifacts and he wanted to make sure that he didn’t neglect it.

His Spell Forging ability and his professions had set him on the way to creating a unique class in the future, and it was this type of effort that would ensure he stayed on it. As for what he’d use these items on, he was sure he’d find a target soon enough.

One by one, the new artifacts stacked up inside his cloak and dimensional bracer in shining piles.

Time passed quickly and about four months later, the two of them arrived at the edge of the system where he had sensed the ore.

The center of the region was a bright viridian star that gleamed with a double core of blue and yellow, which somehow merged together to create the unique color. It looked like the two cores were in the process of fusing.

The region was on the edge of the Deep Wilds about fourteen days of travel on the astral threads away from the Borderlands. The chaos winds were strong and wide here, sweeping past with great force like an ocean tide.

On one side of the system, there was a vast river of stones spinning slowly through the Void, somewhat similar to the area where he’d built his hall, and that was where he sensed the location of the ore, as well as a combination of Wood and Ice energy. Ribbons of virescent light spun through the field of rocks, creating striking emerald rainbows that could be faintly seen.

It looked like the stones had absorbed the energy of the green star to create something unique.

Part of the way between the rocks and the star, there were two planets orbiting in the center of the system. One of them was a sphere of burning gas, but the other had continents and a subtle sense of Wood-aligned greenery, although it seemed undeveloped.

What made him freeze in surprise, however, was that in the space between the planets, there was a violent battle underway. A slim merchant ship was trying to escape from a wave of beasts, while two groups behind it were fighting. Streaks of elemental energy marred the darkness of the Void between them in a swirl of silver-green, yellow, and red.

Here and there, explosions of other colors broke through the clouds of energy, turning the entire area into a chaotic swathe of power.

One side of the battle was made up of dozens of beasts and three humanoid monsters that were leading them. They were in the majority and were pressing hard to surround the other side. The beasts were enormous shadowy grey lizards with yellow eyes and claws, and pale white pythons that had crystalline fangs and a silver-red dusting across their scales.

Here and there, explosive streaks of power slashed through the void as they struck at their opponents.

The three leaders of the force were two burly humanoid men who had stony red scales down their arms and three eyes, as well as a slender, bald woman with a pair of bright crimson eyes and long claws. What astonished Sam was that from each of them, he could sense a heavy presence of essence.

Foreign essence that was intimately familiar to him.

If anyone knew what that was, he did. It was the entire reason he’d lost his head on Aster Fall and had to come to the Path.

Outsiders.

Sam’s eyes narrowed as a wave of rage surged through his veins and the Void slowed, locking the Outsiders’ presence into his mind. He felt an instant demand to crush them and scatter their souls across the dark and he had to struggle to push it back enough that he could think.

He didn’t know how they’d come here through the Nexus or if they’d somehow escaped the Seal, but seeing them here brought everything he was doing into crystal focus.

Void beasts and bandits were one thing, but with everything he knew about the dangers of Outsiders and their desire to consume the essence in the Void, there was no way he would allow them to exist here.

How they were here and how long they had been in this galaxy were questions he’d answer later. He didn’t know if the Will of the Path knew about these Outsiders or if they had somehow escaped its detection, but now that they were in front of him, it was his problem.

Before he let himself get swept up by the demand to destroy them, he turned to their opponents to see who they were fighting. The merchant ship was still fleeing the battle, but the beasts were mostly ignoring it and it looked like it was just trying to get out of the way, so he focused on the third party, the ones the Outsiders were trying to surround.

Their opponents were an old man and a younger woman, as well as a group of a dozen metallic golems. At first glance, the man and woman seemed to have an extraordinary relationship, since he was putting his life on the line to protect her. The old man had metallic silver hair tied behind his head and he was wearing a set of plated armor that was half broken. The breastplate was there, but the pauldron had been torn away from one shoulder and claw marks had left the side twisted and gouged.

He was bleeding heavily from his wounds, but the blood was a vibrant green instead of red. He had the remains of a shield in his left hand and a strange spear with a curved blade in the other. His back was partly turned toward Sam as he faced off against his enemies. It looked like he was on his last legs.

If he had been alone, there was no way he would have held out against the dozens of beasts, but the golems were fighting with him, creating a line of defense that was slowly being pushed back.

Each of the golems was twice the size of the man and they were armed with massive spears and shields that looked like they were made from the same virescent aurora ore that Sam had come here to find. They were either local to this system or they had come here specifically to collect it.

The golems took the brunt of the attack and prevented the beasts from breaking through, but even with their help, the old man was being driven back. Even with their help, he was fighting three times as many enemies. Wide swathes of silver-green energy cut out from his spear as he used it to block the beasts’ approach, preventing them from getting past him to reach the woman.

In the background, the three Outsiders were standing with another dozen beasts, apparently waiting for the right moment to strike. Instead of focusing on the battle, however, their attention was locked on the woman. Their eyes never left her.

As Sam followed their gaze and looked more closely at her, the Void slowed for the second time as a shock shuddered through his mind. His breath stopped as astral energy flared outward from him and froze the Void into a field of ice crystals for two hundred feet.

Her features were refined with high cheekbones and she had brilliant emerald eyes with a vertical pupil. Blue-silver hair cascaded down her back like liquid metal until it touched her hips. She was as slender as a reed, but a sense of elegance radiated from her that was set off by the flowing dress and cloak that hugged her curves. Long sleeves draped from her wrists in sweeping lines, framing a delicate, hourglass figure.

“Asenya?” He couldn’t stop himself from saying the name that sprang onto his lips as he saw her face.

The memory of the emerald-eyed World Forger who had created his first class floated in his memory, her blue-tinged silver hair so long that it touched the floor and pooled there like liquid silver in that strange space the World Core created for evolutions.

No, she wasn’t Asenya.

That was obvious on his second glance. Asenya had looked young and her behavior had been playful, but there was a core of steel to her, even in the early memory that she’d left behind, long before the war for the Nexus.

This woman was truly young, perhaps twenty or so if she’d been human, although it was hard to tell since her race could be long-lived. Her features were a little softer than the World Forger's and more innocent, but there was a graceful arch to her cheekbones that gave her a sense of authority and that same spark of mischief in her eyes.

There was no denying the resemblance. He didn’t know what race she was from, but it had to be the same as Asenya’s. A sudden desire to meet her flashed through his mind, as well as a thousand questions. Perhaps she had the answers he needed about how to repair the Seal and where Asenya had gone.

At the moment, however, the woman’s expression was pale and her lips were pressed together as she shouted something at the older man. Her hands were curled into fists as emerald-silver mana flared around her in brilliant streams that extended to the golems, but it had no obvious effect.

He’d never been able to read Asenya’s magic, but he could sense the energy in this woman was a strange blend of Wood and Stone, as well as more aura than he’d have expected, marking that she was one of the rare classes who could manipulate it.

More than that, she had a slight sense of essence about her, like a passive trait that was barely detectable. When he glanced at the older man, he could sense it in him as well, but he wasn’t able to identify it. It almost felt like the essence from the beasts in the Chaos Wild, but it was a bit different. When he analyzed them, the result was surprising.

Wild Spirit. Verdant Priestess-Spiritweaver. Level 311.

Wild Spirit. Knight Guardian-Defender of the Glade. Level 362.

There was no name or other information that came with the analysis, making it clear that they were not fully part of the Path.

They weren't Outsiders and they also weren’t Primordial. The sense of essence was too weak for that. Of the races he’d seen so far in the Borderlands, they were the only ones he'd seen like this. They either had some blend of the energies, or perhaps their race was one that bridged the divide between essence and experience. It left him puzzled, even as he had to decide what to do.

In front of them, the beasts were pushing forward as they slowly enclosed the golems on both flanks. Once that happened, it wouldn’t take long for them to cut down the old man. Then the woman would follow.

If he wanted her to live through the next few minutes and tell him how she was connected to Asenya, he was going to have to save her. That went for the old man as well, since he could hardly let him die in front of her.

Thoughts spun through his mind like lightning as he assessed the level of their enemies. The three humanoid Outsiders were first as their information sprang into his mind.

Crimson Soul Wraith. Outsider. Level 390.

Bloodstone Giant. Outsider. Level 371.

Bloodstone Giant. Outsider. Level 360.

They clearly registered as Outsiders according to the Path, so he had no second thoughts about dealing with them. The only problem was that they were much more powerful than he’d hoped, and somehow they had also taken on human forms.

“Demons,” he muttered under his breath as he put them together with the legends of Outsiders who looked like people. They didn’t have horns, but the rest of it fit, including the sharp danger they presented.

Demons were a higher-grade existence than the average monstrous Outsider. None of their type had been seen on Aster Fall in ages and he had no idea how they had appeared here.

The woman was actually some type of wraith and the two men were giants. A trace of their origins was visible in their forms, particularly in the woman’s red eyes and long fingernails and the men’s muscular shoulders that were layered with red stone skin, but for the most part, their origins were concealed.

The beasts with them were between Levels 300-310, but their numbers and speed were causing trouble. If they’d had time, the Wild Spirits should have been able to deal with all of the beasts, especially with the help of the golems, which were also around Level 300, but they’d clearly been pushed onto the defensive, probably by something those three Outsider demons had done.

“Prepare for battle and follow me!” Without hesitating any longer, he issued orders to Sleset as he began to run forward. “We’re going to rescue the Wild Spirits.”

He’d come here for the ore, but as soon as he saw the woman, his goals had changed. Space compressed below his feet as he pulled out a dozen artifacts and scrolls. He tossed them into the air where he grabbed them with his aura and kept them close.

Runic bracers flashed into existence in a spiral of crystal flame, compressing around his arms as he prepared spells and stored them away.

He’d gained some levels over the last months, but he was only up to 218 now and it left him at a disadvantage against those Outsiders. He might be able to fight against a giant with the help of his artifacts, but two at once was pushing it.

The leader was a different problem.

He could tell from the strength of her aura that the Crimson Soul Wraith was much more dangerous than the other two. Fighting her would probably be as hard as a Void Lizard and she was likely to have powerful abilities or artifacts of her own to call on. Still, there was nothing to do about it.

He wasn’t going to let this lead about Asenya get away.