B3 Chapter 343: Entrance, pt. 2

The weight, the power that pressed down on him from every angle, burning away at his inadequacies and threatening to shatter him at the slightest turns; he knew what it was. What it represented.

Her station. Her existence.

Kaius pressed himself low, prostrating as he pressed cold obsidian tight to his head. There was only one thing the unknown woman could be.

Another ascendant.

He heard his team do the same. Porkchop, he knew, had recognised what she was in the same instant that he had. The others had either followed their lead, or reached the same conclusion when they felt the simple supremacy that wafted off the woman in waves.

It would be hard not to — not when it shook him to his very core. It was oppressive, choking his control on his Resources — like all it would take is a little Will, and their very souls would gutter out.

“Oh please, stop that!” the ascendant sighed. Kaius stiffened at her displeasure.

“By the boundless, the newly integrated are so fearful. You—”

He felt something almost physical jab him in the chest, a prod that rolled through his entire body like a jolt of static.

“ —face me and speak. I abhor sycophantism at the best of times. I’m here to guide you through this challenge, not terrorise you.”

Gulping through his bone-dry mouth, Kaius forced himself to rise. It was only through force of will that he kept his back straight as he met the woman’s pure white eyes.

She raised one angular brow — as if daring him to speak.

“Apologies, ascendant—”

Kaius regretted his words the second they left his lips as the pressure surrounding him seemed to sharpen. A naked blade, angled directly at his throat that was primed to slaughter him where he kneeled.

The ascendant froze, the very air in the room growing cold. Kaius’s breath fogged as the sweat on his forehead froze. The naked blade drew closer, a strength beyond strength setting its grips on him.

He didn’t breathe, he didn’t move — even his very heart stilled as the blood in his veins thickened like treacle.

Time grew unmoored, the moment hanging for what could have been millennia. There was only the woman seated on the divan and a piercing gaze. Her eyes, as large as the moon fallen from the sky, peeled him apart from the skin — inspecting every grain of his being. It was a judgement, and an end.

Six black dots appeared in lunar fields, voids that promised to swallow him whole.

Kaius grabbed his knees as he felt himself become unmoored.

Her mouth opened, and the world moved to her demands. Space shook, and Kaius felt an unknowable Truth descend.

“Ascendant. You speak of something you by rights should not know. An aged and broken world like this, hanging by a stable thread to the initial stage is a rare thing, but not unheard of. For the foundation to be so thoroughly ruined, as this one was? Rarer still. For said world to progress to the next stage, so suddenly, with no proceeding cultural, technological, or magical development having occurred? Nigh unheard of. For the method of progress to be amongst the most uncommon?”

The ascendant paused, her nails gauging out the fine carvings of her divan as space cracked with equal ease. Kaius quavered.

“Nothing is impossible — but is it likely? No. And now I have two babes, standing before me with Heroic classes and the Kingslayer honour, speaking of Ascendants. Something does not add up. You will explain.”

Kaius’s eyes remained frozen, sucked into the endless depths of white and black. How could he speak in the face of such might? What could, or even should he say? He knew too little! Had they broken some taboo, or could the ascendant be an enemy of Ekum?

If he had stumbled into some dispute between gods, or broken some rule at another’s urging…what could he even say if the woman demanded their death, even for simple unknowing involvement in schemes beyond them?

The world went grey as cold terror overflowed within him, saturating every fibre of his being. He couldn’t even speak — the blade was too close, the weight of power a boot on his throat, choking off his voice.

“You are afraid.” It was a statement that cracked through the room with the force of a lightning strike.

As quick as it had appeared, the pressure that drowned him vanished, and the eyes larger than mountains vanished. Kaius flopped back gasping, hearing the dull thuds of his teammates collapsing behind him.

There was no outrage at their treatment — no scorn or anger within him. What could man hope to do in the presence of a god?

The ascendant seemed to frown with curiosity, her white eyes staring in a direction he couldn’t comprehend.

“Not of me — at last, not just. No, you haven’t just heard of my kind — you’ve met one. Who?” It was a demand, one he couldn’t fathom denying. She wasn’t finished. “ —and how? No one can break the integration locks, and the only ascendants allowed are designated guides and…the Watcher.”

She seemed to come to a realisation, kicking her legs off the side of the divan to dangle free as she sat up straight.

“Possible — even likely. After so much time, would it really be a surprise? So many are commanded to sacred duty as a punishment — what would one of those layabouts do after so many years?”

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The ascendant tilted her head. Somehow, despite her eyes being expanses of featureless white, Kaius felt her gaze on him. It was dispassionate, yet curious — like he was a strangely coloured insect who had stumbled across her path.