Chapter 277. Last Chance (Patreon)

[ make sure you read 276 first, which i released ~1 hr ago ]

In the end, the ascendant with Regret affinity chosen to accompany me is a willowy, square-jawed man named Red Griffith. The name sounds familiar, but my Beginning affinity fails to make the connection until we meet in person.

Our minds brush up against one another; he’s a Remorse practitioner, too. That’s when it clicks: I faced off against Red in the second round of the pageant. He’d transformed into a bear and a tortoise using the ring of flesh shift. He’s an ascendant protege like me, and a newer one if the white faction is confident that the black faction won’t recognize him.

“You sure look different,” he comments. I’m fully transformed using the ring of flesh shift and the dagger; Maria’s regalia lies upon me.

“I suppose I do, but that’s the point,” I say.

“Fair enough. Not sure why you need to look like an evil seraph, though; it’s a tad dramatic.”

Maria’s mental laughter choruses with Crystal’s. The fish saunters up to me and butts my leg with her head.

“You only just came back, only to leave again,” she says, her round eyes shining in the ambient light. Her dorsal fin droops. I sense the energy in her legs stutter in reaction to her emotions. “Come back soon.”

Fish can’t cry–they don't have tear ducts. But as a terrestrial organism, Crystal needed them, and I gave her tear ducts soon after the initial modification process when I removed her gills and reshaped her bone structure.

Tears bead against the waterproof fabric of my pants and drip down my leg.

My eyes and face feel warm and my chest tightens. “Shh,” I say, leaning down to wrap her in an embrace. I rub her side, the smooth scales feeling almost soft. They’re beautiful scales, a motley of color and shade, bright oranges, deep blacks, and blueish grays on pearly white. My hands migrate to her shoulders, where violet sinews fix themselves to otherwise-unoccupied sockets. Her leg is pleasantly cool and slick beneath my fingers.

I give her a last squeeze, then stand up.

“Are you ready?” Griffith asks, giving Crystal a peculiar look.

“Yeah.” I already said farewell to the others after they gave their approval.

We head for the welcome hangar. Just as I hold out my hand to carve a portal to Abyssinia, a voice stops me.

“Wait,” Karanos says. We’d said goodbye before, but it was a quick exchange with all the others who had helped me prepare–primarily Kuin, Farona, and Krath. “I can’t believe you were about to leave without seeking me out again.” He withdraws a familiar object from his void storage: the return beacon, a simple trigger that fits in his hand. “I would’ve had to chase after you.”

I blush. Wow, forgetting the return beacon would’ve been both hilarious and pathetic.

But to be honest, I’m surprised he’s just handing it to me, even though I know he has no other choice. As he drops it into my hands, I think about what would happen if I just... left.

As I struggle with my thoughts, Karanos’s expression is inscrutable. “I just wanted you to know that I believe in you,” he says. “You and Maria both.”

I blink. “Thanks.” Admittedly, his words feel hollow. Just a few days ago he suggested that I solidify my foundation for at least another year. Does he really think I’m ready, or is he just trying to offer encouragement?

“I try to see the good in people,” he continues, “which is a key reason why I joined the white faction. You saw a snapshot of my world, a place where practitioners ruled by right of might and dismissed those without affinities as defective. When I ascended, I was cynical, rebellious, and paranoid; I saw the worst in people because of what had happened to me, because of what I’d done to others. I threw myself into studying the underlying principles that govern planes, spending as much time away from others as I could.”

“Exploring the void,” I add.

“And in unstable places that few venture to–the edge of Eternity and the lost quadrant. But eventually, in the darkness of isolation, there was light–people. I’ve met good people in Eternity, Ian. People who have made me better.” He laughs. “Crazies like Suncloud, perhaps, but also more mild souls like Marina.”

“Suncloud made you better?”

He gives me a wry smile. “At some things more than others, yes. But my point, Ian,” he says, his face growing serious, “is that I don’t fucking want you to die before you have the chance to get better here.” He fixes his gaze to my crown of flames. “I don’t think Maria’s at the same level of risk, but the sentiment is the same.”

“I always heard that Eternity makes people worse,” I confess, thinking of Messeras’s words when I first arrived. They’ve stuck with me. Others like Karanos have seemed to implicitly agree with them. Even Crystal hasn’t denied their validity.

He bobs his head. “Sometimes you need to get worse to get better. Other times you only get worse.” He sighs. “I can’t accompany you on this journey without arousing suspicion, but when all of this is over, and you come back, I hope we can help each other get better. Not because of a mutual agreement, or any such nonsense, but because–” He pauses. “It seems that I only lose friends, these days. I’d like to count you and Maria among my dwindling number.”

I try to suppress the shock from showing on my face. I never expected Karanos to give such a heartfelt sendoff.

“There is a not-insignificant chance you never return,” Crystal reminds me. “Unless you contact him with the transmission artifact on your journey, these might be the last words he evers says to you. This is his last chance.”

I wonder, then, at the last words Karanos would have said to Ari. He never got that last chance–he had never expected the young ascendant’s death. And I wonder if regret over never getting the chance to say goodbye is what drives him to speak from the heart now, when he normally maintains a stoic demeanor only occasionally broken by moments of levity.

I draw my hand across my heart. “I’m going to return, Karanos.” I don’t make the statement into a promise. I can’t say that I will return for sure. “I’m still uncertain whether I can take Maria with me using the beacon. If I can’t...”

Don’t, Maria says. Bring me out.

I comply, divesting her of the dagger’s energy. I slump as she alights next to me.

“Karanos,” she begins politely, “in the event that I can’t accompany Ian, I’m expecting you to come and fetch me from the competition grounds. It’s a long way back to Voidkeep and I won’t be able to keep the route straight.” She looks at me and raises an eyebrow. “Not all of us can cheat with a Beginning affinity.”

He nods. “I will come.”

“Me too,” Crystal says, giving Karanos a pleading look. Mixed with her still-red eyes from crying, she looks heart-wrenchingly pitiful.

He scoffs and turns away, rubbing at his neck. “With that all being said–farewell.”

Damn it, Karanos–making me feel all emotional. Especially when we have a random observer. Poor Red Griffith has walked himself out of the hangar; I sense his vital signature just beyond the walls.

I honestly don’t know what to say to him, but I know I need to say–or do–something. The years with Ash have added distance between us, perhaps distance that only I feel. Despite that, I can’t help but be moved by his sentiments.

Maria gives me a knowing look. Sometimes, words are unnecessary, she says, stepping forward to give Karanos a hug. The man stiffens. Don’t leave me here alone.

I step robotically forward and wrap my arms around them. Crystal joins in as best she can, jumping up on her back legs and pawing at us like a bear hugging a tree.

When Karanos and Crystal leave, Red Griffith comes back, his hands tucked into his trouser pockets. “You’re a strange bunch if I’ve ever seen one,” he says. “A baby ancient, a pseudo-ascendant lich, a sapient walking fish, and then we get to the most normal one, the Void Seeker himself.”

“You haven’t even met the most important member of our group,” Maria says, her lips curling with unvoiced laughter. “He couldn’t make it, unfortunately.”

“What’s his name?”

I chuckle softly. We’ve been together long enough that I don’t need to read her mind to know what she’s thinking. “Jimmy.”

—

The first few days of the journey, the planes are mostly empty of people, with a few exceptions. But as we approach the closest confluence point, the main checkpoint before reaching the competition grounds, the density of populated planes increases drastically. More often than not, planes will be full of souls. When disembodied souls pass near, the six embers of my crown rotate more rapidly to the point that they almost buzz with excitement.

We’ve been making good time, so I tell Griffith that I want to take a reprieve for a few hours to experiment with the souls.

The six souls that I fed to the crown back when I was with Ash only provided enough fuel for a day of soul sight. After that, the singular large, gray ember that had sunk into my head broke apart, turning back into six flames.

The plane we’re on now reminds me vaguely of Shurvan, the city that we once visited to utilize its planar crane. It has towering buildings and an eccentric populace who fly everywhere in sleek wingsuits.

But the plane must be under the control of a Light practitioner, for the most noteworthy thing about this plane are the all-present projections. People don’t look like they’re all wearing nearly identical, neutrally colored wingsuits. Visually, they appear as all kinds of different avatars. It’s an extraordinary display of either advanced technology or Light affinity.

Ascendants can bend the rules of planes, Maria says. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that people born within this plane can all naturally control an avatar that obscures their true body. I can see the appeal–natural beauty and physical genetics become largely irrelevant when you look like who you wish to be, rather than who you are.

If Maria’s right, the natives’ ability to control Light projections reminds me of how the denizens of Vracoola’s Domain wield Life energy in a limited capacity without being true practitioners.

Throughout our journey, one part of me has argued that letting my transformation falter won’t do anything, since it’s not like the black faction is already tracking my movements. First, why would they even know to do so? Second, I’m confident that I would have noticed any lurking ascendants by now. But the other half of me screams that I can never be sure, and so I’ve cleaved to caution and maintained my apparently frightening appearance for the entire trip.

I smile as I walk on the street. In this place, my fantastical appearance is odd, but not shocking. It’s one of the main reasons why I wanted to stop here–people don’t gape or flinch when they look at me. Instead they mentally mock me trying too hard picking out such a dramatic appearance. Believe me, I know–all their minds are unguarded.

I experiment with bringing disembodied souls up into the crown, confirming that the embers change color to match the soul that they’ve respectively absorbed. When all six embers are full of soul, they combine like before, forming a striking gray flame that sinks into my head.

Suddenly the world changes. The crush of bodies–illusory shells over people’s white vital silhouettes–simultaneously crack. Different colored ooze appears over the vital silhouettes, representing the colors of their souls.

“Red,” I say, gesturing to the ascendant to come over. We’re like visual polar opposites when standing together. He’s dressed in trousers and an oatmeal colored sweater, while I’m, well. Me.

An immortal of shadow and flame, Maria says, lord of beginnings and ends, death and fire.

I give her a mental eye roll. You’re sounding like Crystal. I recognize Maria’s attempt at levity, even if it fails to fully distract my mind from the request I’m about to make.

“Yes, Suitangi?”

I facepalm. We’ve tried to come up with an alternate name to use when I reach the competition grounds. None of the older ascendants back at Voidkeep had good ideas, so we’ve fielded different options while traveling. Suitangi is an attempt more terrible than most.

“That’s literally my first name backwards,” I grumble. “Anyway, I need your help. I think it’ll be good practice for when we reach the competition grounds and need to run scenarios together.”

He catches on to what I’m going to ask for. “You want to run an experiment now, in scenarios?”

I nod, my expression serious. “Then I want you to share the memories of the experience with me when the scenario ends. I’ll process them easier with my Remorse and Beginning affinity.”

“What are you planning to do?”

“Enter a scenario and you’ll see.”

[ thanks for reading! ]