Chương 492: 492

Mark settled down onto the charred island. Fires raged and bodies burned, the mist coiling hard in the flow of heat and light. The Forgetting did not like fire at all. It was already coiling down onto the fire, erasing it, but if there was enough fire then the Forgetting didn't work that well. Several Dereks stood around, some holding the iron-dark wooden 'swords' that the goblins had been making, some collecting more swords. The weapons were more like daggers for Derek, but he collected them anyway.

The battle for the island was not over, at all. Mark had started fires in the goblin trees, he had killed weak and stupid newborns that had clearly spawned from monsters, and then he had turned into spiraling, slicing adamantium, cutting through everything nearby. Some of the goblins knew who he was, having been informed of him by previous generations. Those lesser goblins had roared at him in fear and anger, calling him 'Black King', throwing everything they had at him.

It had not been enough, because none of the major antagonists had stayed, at all. Those had fled the very first moment one of them —Mark was pretty sure it was BiggestBaddest, with his Hive Mind organizational capability— had sounded the major retreat alarm. The alarm had blared 'Everyone fight and we can win!', so it didn't sound like a retreat alarm, but every bright, shining soul in Mark's fragment of a divine mirror vision had spooked and ran while every dim goblin remained.

It was a retreat alarm for everyone except for the rank and file. One Derek smiled over at Mark, saying, "You got better at that!"" I had a lot of practice." Another Derek asked, "I thought you were gonna talk to them first?"" I am. The ones that mattered all left as soon as they saw me show up. Can you see BiggestBaddest out there?" A few different Dereks looked around. Ahead, on top of a 10 meter-wide tree trunk that Mark had cut through, that Derek pointed up to the fallen tree.

Further than that, another Derek stood at the only part of the big tree that wasn't burning, maybe 50 meters in the air. That Derek pointed across the island. A Derek near Mark said, "BiggestBaddest wishes to parlay."" Thanks, Derek." Mark hovered into the air, adding, "This'll be good for a laugh." Another Derek called out, "The guys back on shore are telling me to tell you how the goblins are liars!" Another Derek further down Mark's flight path called out, "Pick me up!"

Mark scooped that Derek onto a seat as he flew, saying, "Sorry. Should have brought you with me," and then he asked, "Who is saying that the goblins are all liars, exactly?" Derek grinned, saying, " 'Cause if it was Mabi then there would be some truth to it, like it was a general worry expressed with the goal of keeping you safe, right?"" Yeah. But if it was Amokai, then I would feel a different kind of way.""

It's actually Poura and also Kei," Derek said, pointing to a slightly different direction than the one Mark was flying in. Mark adjusted course, slowing down a little. Mark and Derek were talking, but they were also having a much deeper conversation with Union. Neither of them trusted many people here on the island, and it was going to be an ordeal to get through this in a positive way. Mark said, "The elder and the guardian, right? You said they were on opposite ends of the politics here, right?

Explain that whole thing." Derek explained, "To know about Poura and Kei and the whole Guardian versus Elder thing, you have to understand that there are only 3 Elders and 3 Guardians, and it's all a jumble of alliances and power grabs that would require a diagram to fully flesh out. I'm going to cut through all of that as best I can." The main Elders are Amokai Arona, Poura Rarei, and the youngest Elder, Urutu Rarei. They are generally not involved in the politics here.

They make sure the Fraying Edge remains protected. How they become Elders is through a rather serious vision quest that most never attempt, and that some people find themselves thrust into instead of taking the Tutorial." The Guardians are the Matriarch Greenspeaker Lani Arona who grows the cities, Patriarch Wavecrasher Kei Rarei who protects the cities, and Matriarch Wavespeaker Mabi Khava who has all the technology and Techies. They become Guardians through political action and control."

You impressed Poura back there by not accepting Amokai's ultimatum against you ever pursuing the book. If you had lied and said you'd never go after it again, then she would hate you. She respects power— Oh shit. That's another thing. A BIG thing, I couldn't tell you before you got here." The Language is action." Mark stopped flying forward. A lot of things made a lot more sense in that revelation. Not about the politics of the island; that didn't really matter to Mark.

He was going to ally with Mabi and the Khava faction, even though this new information painted them as the weakest of all 3. None of the elders were Khava, and that was a big mark against them. But Tulo Khava was at Dawncoast, making weapons for everyone and ensuring the place had resources and whatnot, and that mattered a lot more to Mark than whatever politics and gains could be had in this land that seemed to purposefully cut itself off from everyone else. But the Language being action… Now that was big.

Waterpeople was a magical language of positioning and sculptures and flows. Silent. Not actually spoken by anyone at all. Words did not matter when it came to monsters or danger, after all. Only action mattered. Mark asked, "All of the sculptures of warriors and scary faces and stuff underneath the water… Oh. It's underwater because it controls the flow of waters— OHHH. Yeah. Okay. That makes sense. It's only a language underwater."" Close. It's a language that works in the manasphere," Derek said, "But yeah.

You got it. What you need to understand is all the talking that people do here? That talk back there in that courthouse? That was them being scared and the world being how it is, where spoken language has taken over most places and we call such places 'civilized'. But the Picory are chiefly warriors and people of action. They go out and they hunt and kill monsters all the time, and they even decide their whole status in society through fighting.

The goblins encroaching on them has been really tough for them, forcing them to reevaluate a lot." All of that is just background." Elders Poura and Uru t u are Rarei, like that Guardian Wavecrasher K e i Rarei; they're the main warriors of the Picory." Amokai Arona and Greenspeaker Lani Arona are the housemakers; More skilled in the Language and able to make the watertrees that they all live on, but less prestigious by far. They're called Wavespeakers, too."

Amokai going out there to meet you on the beach was an insult to him and a power move by Poura, who demanded he go, and who is trying to raise Uru t u right, by making him fall out of hero-worship of you." Mark hovered in the misty sky, thinking. After a moment he said, "So Poura and Kei are telling me to beware of the goblin lies because… they're meddlers and trying to make inroads with me for various reasons."

Derek nodded, adding, "And that's not even touching that conversation that the Guardians had in the courthouse about Ocean Shaper."" Oh gods, that was a mess and a half…" Mark flew forward, the rotor overhead casting streamers of mist down across Mark and Derek. Mark had a lot of questions, but the one he asked was, "How honest was that threat of them going to Dominant and fighting for him?"" Not sure.

There's a whole eldritch-and-the-trees-thing happening here, and there's that iceberg gate we found in Endless Daihoon, too, and all the Picory's main cities are in half-submerged trees with glowing underbellies."" Glowing underbellies?"" Oh yeah. It's real pretty, too." Mark nodded a little. Conversation ended, because ahead lay a clearing in the mist with a low boulder in the middle, torches burning around the edges, and Derek standing down there with a goblin on the other side. They were talking with each other.

Mark asked, "What's he saying?"" He's trying to work me over, to make us leave. Threatened a return to Aluatha if you engage more than this, and if you hand out any Powers to the Picory." Mark nodded while he spun a line of his body far away, connecting it to his main body by just his astral self, allowing him both to appear vulnerable and able to run far away if they should activate, like, a void bomb, or something like that.

Mark doubted that specific threat would come to fruition, but prepping for worst case scenarios was always a good idea." Make an entrance, Mark," Derek said, dismissing his body and leaving Mark alone in the sky. And then Mark pulled in the rotor, making a few blades and aiming his feet at the side of the boulder, angling the wind just enough to keep on target. He felt BiggestBaddest's worried vector as he came in hot. A few goblins in the woods suddenly freaked out and raced away, abandoning their posts.

Mark amplified their fear by thrumming a Union of Anarchy and Civilization into their gathering, breaking their cohesion, and then hammering into that break with a Union of Glory and Fear. Nimbus'd with a white halo and shifted to full black by the expectation of a coming fight and the mist in the air, Mark weighed several tons. He landed with all of that weight, barely bending his legs, right to the side of the boulder, across from BiggestBaddest. The ground cracked, but held.

BiggestBaddest, the goblin that had infested the minds of all the humans back at Goblinhome, who had ridden them around like they were puppets, locking them in their own minds all the while, was probably riding the mind of the goblin in front of Mark right now, too. Even if BiggestBaddest wasn't a singular person, they still acted the part.

Mark most remembered how BiggestBaddest had occupied the minds of the 'news casters' on Goblinhome news, pretending to be two different people and letting Quark into their network just to sell that illusion, and to also attack back in ways that Quark was no longer vulnerable. But they didn't think Quark had been vulnerable to such attacks back then, either. BiggestBaddest faltered backward, just a fraction, fear driving into him and making him wince under Mark's Glorious light.

Almost all of the goblins in the woods had a much stronger reaction, some screaming and running, others merely running. Mark was glad the fucker was fearful. He should be. BiggestBaddest remained a short little green shit, nude and with heavy fangs in his awful mouth. He composed himself, his fangs shrinking a fraction, his mouth closing, and then he said, "We— Welcome to Vaka, Mark Careed.

As I was telling your associate, if you remain, and if you help them, then we're coming after Aluatha on the side of Dominant.""

You really are a piece of shit, but you already know that so there's no point in telling you except for my own satisfaction, which I have now achieved," Mark got on with it, saying, "So hear this: They threatened me with the same thing if I don't help them, so if it's a choice between killing the goblins forever or letting you take control of the Edge—" Mark still had no idea what that was, exactly, but he had Thoughts that were probably close to correct.

"—then I'm going to pick the first option and truly purge your kind from this world. OR! You could leave Vaka alone." OR —And here's a big one— you could leave Vaka alone AND tell me how Dominant could control you in the face of a Worlds' War, and I can help you negate that, if I feel like it, and then you can just fuck off away from everyone until we have to kill you all anyway."

BiggestBaddest instantly said, "If we move into Vaka, if we displace the people there, then we can be Forgotten by the rest of the world. If we're Forgotten we can escape Dominant when he comes for us first, and then everyone else. That is the only way for you to be rid of us, for if you actually could kill us then you would have done so already."

"… Well fuck, that's a pretty good reason. So. If I believed you… What would you do with the Edge?" BiggestBaddest's vector —which could have been faked, just like his outward emotions on his face could have been faked— was one of total surprise. Like he had found himself in a place he never expected to land, and that place was full of bounty. With a cautious tone, he started, "We would remain here and be Forgotten by the rest of humanity. Nothing more, nothing less. Just like how it was in Goblinhome."

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere." That's not what I asked. I asked what you would do with the Edge." BiggestBaddest narrowed his eyes just a fraction, sensing weakness. He lifted his head quite a bit in order to stare down his nose at Mark, saying, "You have no idea what the Edge even is, do you."" Here's your chance for some goodwill! Tell me the absolute truth about the 'Fraying Edge' and we'll see where we go from there."

BiggestBaddest's eyebrows went up, his ears went down, and then he narrowed his eyes at Mark, and said, "It's the Edge of the Systems, taken from its actual physical location and then folded in on itself many times over, turned into mist, and kept Forgotten and small. It's part of the Great Eye of Arakino. Nothing from out there can cross the Edge of the System and invade this world without first breaking open the edge.

We would see the Edge kept safe from everyone, because if the Edge were to ever open then everyone would die, including us if we lived here, so it is to our benefit to keep it fully intact. We don't need humans here. Take them away and leave us the land." Mark nodded a little, believing… some of that. He asked, "And what about the frozen iceberg gates and all that mist in Endless Daihoon?"" Iceberg mist and frozen gates seem like they're related, but I don't know exactly how it all works."

BiggestBaddest added, "Nothing about the Edge makes physical sense and it doesn't have to. It just needs people living there in obscurity, keeping the obscurity going, which is something we can and will be doing, for our own benefit. And since you can't get rid of us, ever, no matter what you do, then you should stand aside and let us devour this land. If you want, we'll even allow you to grab all the humans and take them with you." Mark said, "Leave this island. Pull back.

We'll talk more tomorrow at the next island over." It was said like a suggestion. Both of them knew it was a command. BiggestBaddest stared at Mark for a long moment, thinking, likely talking to many other people in all the other places he existed. Gods, Mark fucking hated this plague upon the world. Goblins were themselves a plague, but BiggestBaddest himself? A secondary, almost-worse kinda plague— BiggestBaddest bowed and stepped backward, saying, "We're leaving. The assault resumes tomorrow night."

He stood, stared into Mark's eyes, and said, "Wongod wishes to speak with you at dawn, at the Lightning Spires of Metrovakara, down on the northern coast of D'Australia. If you can remove the curse upon him, which is what Dominant would trigger to cause us to go to war against anyone he pointed us at, then Wongod will pledge the might of the goblin tribe against Dominant. We would expect to be allowed full control over Vaka after such a war."

You would do well not to trust us, but you should trust that Wongod despises Dominant more than you or Aluatha ever could." He maligned us first, Black King." That last statement was not from BiggestBaddest; it was from Wongod, watching from wherever he was watching. And then BiggestBaddest gripped his own throat and ripped it out. He did not struggle, or gasp, or do anything at all besides stand there, watching Mark, bleeding out. He faltered a fraction, one arm drooping, eyes turning foggy.

From one pulsing heartbeat to the next the goblin that housed the mind of BiggestBaddest collapsed to the ground, dead. A hundred other such incidents took place all across the nearby forest. Even more goblins simply ran, terrified, knowing that they had been given up. Derek asked, "We're clearing out the other goblins?" Mark said, "Yes."

A secondary massacre occurred as Mark became a blender of adamantium slicing through the world as though it was all soft foam, eyes and a fragment of a divine mirror illuminating every hiding goblin in the dark just as well as a Union of Good and Bad. D'New Britain was a large island, but this wasn't that main island. It was one of the smaller islands past the southwestern tip. It was still more than Mark cared to clear out, though. The Picory could use their Ocean Shapers to clear out the rest, later.

For now, thousands of tiny monsters died, though some escaped to the waves. They did not escape far. Glowing waters, illuminated like it was daytime, churned with fish and monsters and cutting waters, cutting goblins down to chewable bits that were rapidly swallowed by colorful fish. Guardian of the Picory and Patriarch of the Rarei, Kei Rarei, stood on a swell of phosphorescent water above the illuminated water.

A few other 'wavecrashers' flanked him, also standing upon their own phosphorescent swells of daytime water. Two of Kei's flankers had tattoos like him; relations by family, probably. The remaining woman had tattoos of vines and flowers, so not related to Kei at all. Mark stepped out onto the water, pushing droplets of adamantium down into the illuminated seafloor 10 meters down. He killed the light where he touched, where his astral body displaced the collection of magic in the waters that illuminated it all.

Made him look like he stood on darkness. Mark would have preferred to see down into the depths like the wavecrashers… Oh. The water underneath the wavecrashers was like Kabberjaw in the daytime. Probably not a coincidence. Derek had mentioned something like that, actually… and it was quite pretty. Mark pointed at the glowing water, saying, "That's sort of like daytime at Kabberjaw. Did you see the documentary me and my friends brought back from Endless Daihoon?

Kabberjaw was the giant skeleton of the former Dragon King, where the day and night cycle involved sunlight that pierced an impossible 50 kilometers of water, right down to the volcanic bedrock of that layer. Clearer than glass. Really neat. Makes you wonder about historical connections between that place and the 'sunlight water' thing you have going on right now. Can you tell me about those historical connections?" Something like shame flowed from the vined woman and the older of the males accompanying Kei.

The younger man was curious. Kei spoke like a warrior politician, saying, "Connecting with waves is a ceremony of power that we do not share with outsiders, but perhaps our Speakers back at Crash would be able to tell you more. I'm here to pick you up, at your man's request." Kei glanced behind Mark, toward Derek on the shore, then he asked Mark, "Unless the goblins are not clear yet?"" They're as clear as anyone can make them, but you're going to have to use Ocean Shaper extensively to clear out the rest."

Mark made himself a surfboard/paddleboard of hollow adamantium, pulling his astral body upward from the ocean floor. Light flowed into the space that Mark had left behind, leaving Mark to stand upon what Darkness remained.

"So how does this travel thing work? More teleportation?

'Cause you guys sure got here fast." Kei looked a little miffed that Mark had guessed it, but he simply said, "We're a bit more… limited than the power of the Elders, but yes. I'll move us, now." Kei squared up, standing solid on the glimmering, glowing water, the phosphorescent glow doubling, turning a radiant teal, while the illuminated waters pulled upward. And then Kei Called, "Haaa!"

The world gonged, crashing through the edge of the illuminated waters, scaring away the fish and monsters eating the goblin meat down below. And then the gong vibration came back like an echo in reverse, sound vibrating upon itself— The waters blinked. The waters glowed. And now a cove made of branches and boughs and illuminated waters down below materialized all around them, leaving Mark on his black paddleboard, floating beside Kei and his 3 other wavecrashers.

The 'shore' up ahead was mostly a single underwater branch, with some docks and boats on those docks. It was night, though, so even while the waters were illuminated as though it was day, the fishing village past the coast-sized branch was sleeping. Not even any guards on night watch. Mark supposed there was no reason for guards on night watch; not in this place.

He looked down through the illuminated waters around the giant, half-sunken tree, and though there were fish aplenty and corals and lots of giant statues down there, all in warrior and evasive poses, there were no monsters. Mark didn't get to see much of it down there, but Quark did, so Mark would review the footage later if he got a chance. For now, for this one moment, Mark swore he saw some fish flowing around those giant statues, as if guided by unseen currents.

Perhaps there were very real currents down there, caused by the statues themselves? Perhaps. Kinda reminded Mark of Nobody Important's Buddha-esque statues that he kept around his Category 7 kaiju-body, hiding himself from the world and also directing and modulating his constant outpouring of power and powerful slimes. Yet another mystery to ponder.

Kei flowed forward, gripping Mark's paddleboard with him on it with a casual direction of phosphorescence, pulling them both to shore, as he said, "We have a guest house for you back at Crash. Once we're on the Crash, the tree, we can Travel there." Mark nodded a little.

"Sounds good, but I won't be sleeping. Do you guys have a historian? Or are you all just trying to understand what your parents Forgot?" Kei's flankers thought Mark was disrespecting him. Kei had thought Mark was disrespecting him, too, at first. Now, he just frowned and landed them on the shore with a swell of water, saying, "We have secrets that you will Forget once you leave, so there is no point in telling you."

"… Perhaps. So tell me anyway. Or at least tell me this: Did you all plant those statues down there in the illuminated waters? Or were they here when Crash crashed onto Daihoon?" Mark glanced down at the waters, saying, "I see no crust on any of them, though there is coral growing down there, so they're obviously self-cleaning—"" I will not answer these questions," Kei said, though he didn't sound angry. Just tired.

"Now you can either sleep here on the ground or back at Crash, with food and comforts." Mark went along with Kei and his cohort… hmm… his 'cohort of 3 people'. Hmm. Mark left that alone, too. The guy didn't feel like he had a soulhouse, and he didn't look like it to Mark's fragment of a divine mirror, but he acted in a 4 person group which was a standard sized group but also a standard 'cohort' size, like Mark's current Cohort maximum size. Maybe '3' was as large as it got under normal circumstances?

But Mark was only at Level One. Maybe Level Two did something else? Maybe Level Three did something else, too, besides add more Cohort size. Wongod obviously had a soulhouse with a cohort size in the 250 range, which was the theorized size of the actual, whole goblin tribe. Most goblins were fragments of the whole.

Mark's mind was filled with questions, each of them bouncing off of each other and making more questions, as they walked to a darker spot, beyond the illuminated waters and beyond the shore, behind the buildings and under the thick, dark canopy of the tree. The mist was thick here. Kei took 5 minutes to gather the mists all around them, while Kei's cohort helped, each of them shifting stances and then gesturing toward each other, gathering the Forgetting around them in a slow, deliberate dance.

There was no sound this time, no Call, which also meant something, but Mark wasn't sure what. And then the mists furled and unfurled, and the 5 of them once again stood on the outskirts of Crash. Kei looked visibly drained. All of them looked drained. Mark Unioned with Good and Bad, fixing them up, as he said, "That's really amazing. Is it a localized teleportation network that anyone of the blood can use, if they focus long enough?

I assume that you only did a full 4 person group to make it go faster, but can 1 person do it all on their own? Non-Elder, of course. I already know that the Elders can do it on their own." Kei's cohort was more impressed than angry this time; They still remained silent. Kei frowned a little, and then he walked toward the woven vine staircase leading up to the tilted city of Crash, saying, "This way, traveler." Mark walked with them, silent for a moment.

And then Mark asked, "Did you all decide who would be getting the Ocean Shapers?"" The decisions on Ocean Shaper have been made," Kei said, looking at the two men and one woman who had come with them.

"Wavecrashers Angel Rarei and Jaxen Blue as well as Wavespeaker Yuda Arona will receive the strength to shift the oceans themselves. Clan Khava will receive mostly all of the mental Powers. None of the other such powers are necessary, and we would not want to gain these Powers of True Brawny or Telekinesis only for them to find better users outside this place." There are further details, but I would not want to commandeer your attentions on this matter.

Guardian Lani and Guardian Mabi would rather hammer that out themselves. All I care about is the clearance of the goblins and the security of our people, and Ocean Shaper does all of that." Kei stopped on the tilted street, under ancient skyscrapers, and sincerely said, "Thank you for coming here and clearing away the goblin threat from our shores, Mark Careed." The two men and the single woman with Kei all bowed toward Mark, speaking in unison, "Thank you, traveler." Mark grinned a little.

"Glad to help." And then he continued walking and tried to start up a conversation, asking, "So? Really? No True Brawny or Telekinesis?" Kei seemed a lot less worried and angry than he had back in the initial meeting with the other two guardians of the Picory, or even back there, when they were so close to goblin lines. With an instructive voice like a father's, Patriarch Kei Rarei said, "We take what we need and leave the rest for others, for to be greedy is to invite death."" Ah.

Is that philosophy due to how the Forgetting kills people if you use it too much?" Kei kinda didn't like that much directness, but he allowed for it as they walked toward the center of Crash, down illuminated, tilted silver streets, saying, "Calling the Blessing something as crude as 'the Forgetting' does tend to anger the Blessing, but not nearly as much as overuse. There will be repercussions for you visiting us so deeply and no one can say what, exactly, those repercussions will be.""

I thought as much, but I came anyway." Mark asked, "So how much of me do you think people are forgetting?"" I was told that Guardian Mabi visited Aluatha directly, but no one there knew she was a Guardian of our people. They treated her as a secondary person, at the same level as her brother Ropapo, and it was only due to her firmness that allowed her to rise to the level of Guardian that allowed her to speak to anyone at Aluatha of any true power at all." Kei waved a dismissive hand.

"People have likely forgotten you even now, but when you return then the fog will lift in small ways and then all at once. Such a reveal will result in violence, but you are capable of great violence and protection, so I doubt it will be a large issue. Do not be near people you care about when you reveal yourself." Mark had a lot of sudden ideas. With curiosity, he asked, "What if I wanted to keep myself small and quiet? Could I go out and do some things that need doing, and not be seen at all?"

Kei shook his head, dismissing the question as he said, "I would advise against this unless you have a great depth of other magics to assist in the Blessing. You aren't even one of the Picory. It won't recognize you more than it needs to recognize you in order to try and kill you for using it at all."" Hmm." Mark moved on, asking, "Your people wouldn't want to move on to Aluatha, would you?" Kei glared—" It's a serious question," Mark added, not-quite-glaring back.

"All of Citadel Freyala and many other nations anywhere near Okuana are evacuating. If there's any time to avoid dangerous locations, it is now, if this is a dangerous location."" Vaka is our home and it is not dangerous. Not to us," Kei said, solidly.

"We're not leaving our home."" Okay. Good to know."