B3 Chapter 382: Tales, pt. 1

Kaius stumbled forward into a clearing that looked identical to the one he had just left, alone once more.

If it wasn’t an exact clone, it was a close one. The grass was luscious, filled with fronds and seed pods; the scattering of pretty white flowers with yellow centers reached up to his mid thigh. It was a meadow, surrounded by a ring of dense trees and thickets that looked almost impossible to pass. Somehow, he knew that his meagre strength wouldn’t be enough to break through the brambles and brush, no matter how harmless they first appeared.

Yet despite the natural beauty that surrounded him — the shining sun above and the deep purple sky overhead — he barely paid it any mind. With that single step, connection had been restored to him, and it pulled him toward a mind familiar and loved.

Porkchop. His presence returned once more.

Kaius was already running, hurtling across grass that provided far more resistance than he was used to. He saw his brother quickly: a mountain of green, white, and black rising above the thick growth, charging toward him at top speed.

“Kaius. You’re here! You made it — and you didn’t fall to horrors beyond the pale!”

Kaius laughed, running faster instead of answering. When Porkchop was within a dozen strides, he launched into a tackle — slamming bodily into his brother’s chest. The blow wrenched his shoulder from its socket: a spike of pain in his mind that he ignored. Going down fighting, Porkchop reared up and tossed him across the grass.

They laughed — only to stand frozen as an unexpected voice called out to them.

“Kaius?! Porkchop?!”

Kaius jumped in shock, snapping toward the voice. It was oddly muted, despite how close it had come from — but he let the detail slip by as he focused on the speaker. Clean and refined, with that coastal metropolitan lilt he had grown fond of. Ianmus, dressed in pale robes, casting focus in hand. Tall and lithe, he tore across the field straight for them, his face beaming.

Kaius gaped at the man. In all of the forsaken hells, what was Ianmus doing here? Porkchop, he could understand; Porkchop made sense. Xenanra had told them herself that their bond created allowances that others wouldn’t have. Hells, they’d already run into each other once in the Trial of Animus. But for their half-elf mage to be here… that meant something had changed for this trial.

Porkchop was stunned for a moment, but he was less frozen by surprise.

“Mage boy, you made it!” he yelled, bounding towards the man.

“That I did,” Ianmus replied, laughing as Porkchop sent him stumbling back. “It was harder than every exam I’ve ever taken in my life put together — but I made it.”

Kaius could see the weariness in his friend’s face. The ordeal; the struggle he had endured. But also… he could sense that the mage had been reforged. He could feel the palpable weight that seemed to roll off him in waves — something he sensed from his brother as well, perhaps even more strongly thanks to their bond.

Using the sense of Truth and fundamental solidity of his own being that had come from embodying his aspects, he could feel something of the mage’s own renewal where it brushed up against the edges of his own Authority. There was a tension there — not quite a contest of strength, but an acknowledgement. Ianmus met his eyes, and Kaius knew the mage felt it too.

“It seems we have quite a bit to talk about,” Kaius said. He was eager for it. Ianmus had been a staunch ally and a close friend for nearly the entirety of their journey since leaving the Arboreal Sea. If he had been burdened by what he had triumphed over, then Kaius would hear it — and offer his support where he could. That was what a team was for; it was part of his duty and honour as a leader.

But if Ianmus was here, then someone else must be too. They had a fourth. Their ranger, Kenva — Where was she?

She must have heard them yell — they weren’t exactly quiet. Plus, with her Skill, he would have expected her to see them tussle and fight — or at least glimpsed them. The meadow was rolling, but the hills were shallow. More bumps a few strides higher than anything else.

Yet when Kaius looked around, he saw no sign of the ranger. Just grass and white flowers.

She must have succeeded! She was every bit as driven, as staunch and willful as the rest of them!

Porkchop felt his worry and met his eyes. He shook his head. “Do not count her out yet. There may be more we don’t understand. Perhaps she is simply further away — or perhaps there’s benefit to her taking this trial alone.”

Ianmus looked confused for a second, catching only half of their conversation—until he connected the dots.

“Kenva.”

Kaius gave his friend a nod. “Give me a moment. I’m going to check.”

Stepping back, Kaius flicked his attention inwards — feeling for his glyphs. They were there, waiting for him. His mana was locked away in inscriptions: the same ones he had prepared at the very end of his Trial of Animus. They were untouched, ready and waiting.

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He reached for Aelina, tapping into one of his many inscriptions of Expedient Shunt. The chained power within the runes burst free — glowing motes of once-bound arcane might erupted from the glyphs on his feet. A wave of force exploded beneath him, sending him skyward. The grass rustled, yet didn’t tear, and the dirt held firm beneath him as he burst into the sky.

Kaius barely registered it, far more focused on the simple resistance of the very air. It held him back, slowing his ascent. He cast twice more — rising nearly fifty strides into the air.

As he sailed to a slow peak, he whipped his head back and forth, leaning heavily on Truesight to absorb every detail of his surroundings.

The meadow they stood in was vast — larger than he expected — and surrounded by what seemed to be endless forest. It must have spanned at least a league across. Nor was it as flat as it had first appeared — there were scattered depressions throughout the terrain. Places in which things could hide.

For instance the figure he immediately spotted far to his left: a short ranger-girl with a pale blue complexion, stomping up an incline with a stern and focused expression, her eyes scanning the area.