Ch. 2.29 | A Perilous Errand
PoV: Sanya
Bright and early, Sanya and Mai entered the guild hall.
Sanya had not gotten a wink of sleep last night, staying up to work on spells. She moved with a slightly slouched posture. She felt her eyes bloodshot and aching. A headache pulsed, threatening to get worse.
Sanya had also learned that each eldritch limb functioned like its own staff. All she had to do was figure out how to cast from multiple at once, if that was even possible. Perhaps she could cast different spells from each?
Unfortunately, her mortal mind could not multi-task manually putting spells together, and she only had one mouth with which to cast spells verbally.
Perhaps she could verbally cast a spell with her staff while manually working on another with an arm?
At Mai's urging, Sanya had also learned more defensive spells. A stronger physical barrier than [Primordial Crust]. Another that could repel some magical spells. A third that would attack nearby foes and collide with projectiles, magic or physical.
All of which had been from Celestial Summoning.
If only Zahira had learned another magic or if everyone found the Spatial defensive spells, if they existed.
There was not a single one in Mai's Fleshweaving grimoire. The magic seemed to just make the user take the attacks and heal themselves later. Or branch out into another magic with defensive spells.
So far, it seemed like the upper bound of magic types or professions seemed to be two. Aisha was a special case. Thus, a conclusion could be reached that Necrotic magic was extremely strong, if the mage could take the magic attunements of sacrifices.
Sanya glanced around.
“She's not in,” Rusul said from the counter. He immediately understood who Sanya was looking for. Perceptive. And was Sanya really that predictable?
“Ah,” Sanya said. “Thanks.”
“Breakfast?” Rusul asked.
Sanya's stomach rumbled like the traitor that it was. Hmph. She may or may not have eaten at all during the night . . . that she had been awake for in its entirety.
There was something she wanted to check on before the day really started. Eating breakfast would just make Sanya take longer. An anxiety rippled through her, with shakes and a twisted stomach. Yet, she was also anticipatory in a positive way.
“Sure, when I get back. It should not be long,” Sanya turned towards Mai after suggesting Rusul start or prepare breakfast now. Although it was ready now, knowing the chefs. “Mai.”
“Y-yeah?” Mai dragged on the end of the word.
“I'm going to teleport to Speleothem to pick up the ‘fits.”
“What!” Panic flashed across Mai's face. Apparently picking up clothes was akin to the world ending—it was because of Sanya teleporting, of course.
Teleporting would no longer be an issue, she thought, at least.
“I'll be okay,” Sanya whispered.
“B-but.”
“Trust me.”
Mai sighed, then nodded. Glad that she would agree so early. She had to have some trust for Sanya. How irresponsible did Mai think Sanya was for her own well-being?
“Okay,” Mai said.
“[Pocket Repository],” Sanya grabbed her staff. Having a staff was kind of important for casting spells, being necessary and everything—as far as everyone knew. “[Globetrot Anchor - Interior Speleothem].”
Sanya vanished from the guild hall. She got deconstructed . . . reconstructed . . . the usual.
And so Sanya arrived in—oh. No.
Mai should not have trusted Sanya.
Sanya emerged not into a prosperous city in a massive cavern, but an empty void of black in every direction. As if all the llumifruits and other lights has gone out, and any semblance of night vision was not enough to see.
There was an absence of both cold and heat, or of solid ground beneath her. Yet she could walk around perfectly fine.
“Heliux spare me,” Sanya breathed, irritated. Breathing, somehow, in an absence of air. And, only irritated, of course. She knew what this place was. She knew what these things were. They would not scare her. Perhaps that was stupid. These were beings from beyond the world that could sow its destruction.
Slam. Slam. Slam.
Sanya looked up, expression flat, like just was but another pointless shenanigan done by a little kid or something.
“You better not break through or I'm going to pound you into dust,” Sanya threatened, crossing her arms.
Not that the thing could speak Tempest. Could it? Hmm . . .
She tapped her foot against the, well, she would say “ground”, but, there wasn't any, soooo—
Her foot stopped.
Sanya twitched her muscles. Nothing moved. It was like her commands did not make it to her body. As if her mind was cut off.
She tried again, really tried. Had she suddenly gotten paralyzed? That would certainly be inconvenient.
While she warred with herself to move her own body, the nothingness above cracked like breaking glass.
Then Sanya doubled over as a wave of unbearable pain washed over her. Her body shook as a thousand spears gutted her. Her limbs went limp as a fire consumed her, as if she was on her own pyre, corpse being offered to Heliux.
She felt herself shattering like a broken egg. The shell smashed so that the insides could drip on out, yolk and all.
Her limbs writhed like snakes, attached to her torso. No—her limbs had changed into something else, like the rest of her form. She was no longer human. Gray and ephemeral but real. As real as an eldritch being could be, on this plane, an entity that slipped off the human mind like ice. There were no words to describe the shape or make of her body. She just . . . was. She was a thing, and that thing had pieces of a body.
Incomprehensible to her mortal mind, she moved. Up and up, reaching towards the breaking seam at the edge of the world.
Huh.
At some point, she had summoned the eldritch hands.
She felt them attached to her form.
Whatever on Heliux’s forsaken hellscape her form even was right now.
If she had a heart in this body, it would be pounding like a dozen drums. Her lungs would have sucked out all the air beneath the tempest.
Why would eldritch entities have organs mirroring a human? After all, they were from different worlds, developed completely separately from one another, and needed their own things and senses to survive.
What was she doing? . . . This wasn't her. Like something else was controlling her movements.
Oh.
Oh no.
She reached towards the barrier and tried to tear it apart with all her magical and physical might.
Limbs smashed at the cracks. Other limbs tried to grasp any parting of the barrier, to try and widen any gap.
A flurry of spells assaulted it. The barrier defended itself from two sides, the outworld, and reality.
Then, the being from beyond shrieked.
Sanya shrieked back.
Unlike last time, she actually understood every single thing behind the shrieks. Sanya would use “words” here, but that wasn't correct.
It's futile. The barrier is not weak enough. The leylines are not stretched thin. More gateways must be opened still. It was a good effort though. We're so close to our next morsel. The thing from beyond communicated.
Okay. The rest will be opened, scout, and we will consume this highest treat with our kin. This most devoted infiltrator-herald will finish the task. Sanya communicated back.
Then go. Congratulations on taking control of your host for this world. It took you long enough.
C-control? Fear surged through Sanya, desperation consumed her.
Like heck it would control her!
So, uhhh, how would Sanya wrestle her control back from this parasite? Ummm . . .
Was she doomed?
The entity crawled away from the crack, or whatever word could describe how it moved. “Moved” was probably the most accurate.
Anyway, Sanya had gotten control over this thing before. She could do it again. After all, her mind was still here, so she was still alive, or something. She would not let herself be some idle passenger while she went insane without her agency or anything—
Okay. Calm. Deep breaths. Not that she could breathe.
Sanya pushed her awareness out, trying to feel the creature that she was. She did not understand how this worked or why she could do it, but she did.
She reached around with her mind, looking without eyes, touching without skin. She—
—uhhh, emerged into Speleothem. Right in front of the inn she had gone to a few days ago. The creature finally seemed to finish the Globetrot Anchor. Unfortunately, Sanya had not anticipated the . . . change.
Well . . .
She . . . she crushed the space around her with her size and limbs, causing the front of the inn to collapse into a pile of stones. A loud rumbling boomed through the cavern as the building fell apart. One wall gone meant the rest of the structure was not nearly as strong, and then a floor fell . . . then the roof. What was left were just three walls and then the rest of the structure carved into the rocks.
No! No no no no no!
She felt the stone and dust against her gray, ethereal limbs. She writhed and moved, making her way towards the entrance of the large cavern. Or in her case, the exit. She would have to go up and up, and far. Through the streets and paths and up the stairs, ramp . . . or just climb, probably. Then through the tunnels and out into the . . . where was it going, anyway? Why did it not just teleport there? Was it aimless? Just going to . . . sow a path of destruction just because?
People screamed and shouted.
Moving through the street, her limbs tore up stone and walls. The tiny mortals in front of her ran in freight.
Would it be okay to snack on a few? Sanya wondered how they would taste. They would be but a drop amongst a much larger meal. This world was so big, and so full of life. There was a lot to consume, but Sanya would maybe like to do so before the rest got here and she would have to share.
Wait.
Why was Sanya thinking about these things? Would this not be saved for the other consciousness with her? The . . . the eldritch parasite?
Sanya pushed around for it. It . . . uh . . . it wasn't there? . . . No. That wasn't right.
Some magic attacks flung at her from staves. Aeolian and Thermal. Some Temporal mages tried to get close.
Sanya's limbs slapped and threw them away. Temporal mages crashed into walls or against floors. Passing out or turning into bloody pulp and smears.
No! No. Stop. This couldn't be happening. Argh!
Predictably, the Aeolian and Thermal spells did nothing against her.
Oh. The world really was doomed.
Hah . . . of course no mortal world would ever pose a threat against the eldritch. They were timeless beings of countless worlds, all consumed for power and sustenance.
She drained any plants she came across. Low-hung strings of llumifruits from buildings died out as she passed by. Corpses turned into a quickly-disintegrating gray as she subsumed their life force.
Oh. She had been looking without, she should be looking within her own mind in order to find it.
Panicking, searching the recesses of her mind for anything at all, she found something deep within. Something that glowed to Sanya like a shining treasure in the darkest depths.
Memory. Within it were hundreds of spells that Sanya had never seen or heard of before. All their incomprehensible forms. All their shortcuts and verbal casting cues.
Eldritch magic.
Sanya searched around it. There, she found all sorts of primal instincts and will surrounding the eldritch. She found the parts of her mind draining life force.
Then she found the part of her mind making her move, which could control and understand all the movements of her body.
She threw her consciousness against it with all her might, wrapping around it, squeezing it like a constricting snake.
Her consciousness was but a tiny dot in a vast ocean.
And she realized that she would never be able to take it over.