Chương 30: Chapter 28: Uncovering Discoveries

Two cars drove towards them, likely having met back up after Squeaky pressed the button. At the front, Aaron could see the general staring out, eyes landing on him briefly before flickering about to all the monsters, and the nosferians comforting those monsters. Amelia had to be pulled back by a few of the other soldiers, lest she try and jump off to meet with him. Still, he smiled and waved, shouting "Hey Gary! Hey Amelia!" Amelia was a bit tied up, but Gary waved with a smile.

A hundred feet away, they came to a stop and the general disembarked, staring at him for several long seconds, brow slowly scrunching as he did.

"Are you in control?" he finally asked, and Aaron nodded.

"Yea, I took back over… I think about forty five minutes ago." He frowned, turning to Squeaky, and his voice suddenly took on a strange cadence- likely the same Celina told him he had as well.

"Safe?" Squeaky nodded, "Safe." The man then glanced behind Aaron to see the other humans and nosferians.

"What about them, who are they, and what are the nosferians doing?" Julio gave a quick wave, and Aaron said "I actually had to break out to help them, my Primary was about to turn them into monsters so… y'know. I just kind of met them here. As for the nosferians, we just found out that those corrupted are still conscious, if trapped.

I'm breaking them out one-by-one, but it consumes some of my energy to do so, and sends out a huge beacon to things in the area that there's something here, so we've decided to be careful about it. The nosferians are comforting their trapped brethren until I can release them." The longer Aaron spoke, the more… pained the man looked.

"... How?" he eventually asked, "How did you get out? We tried… everything. For so long, we've tried getting through to a single one of the monsters, and we've never been able to. No sign the other person was still in there." Aaron looked at him sympathetically, suddenly understanding the man's behavior now. They hadn't thought it was possible for Aaron to be alive, or for them to help; they'd assumed it was just a trap to lure Amelia and his other friends in and kill them, no chance of anything else.

They might've been using some magic of their own to scan Aaron's ability to see what kind of monster he was, and prepare accordingly.

"I'll give you as detailed a recount as I can later, but the summary is, uh, I reached like… absolute understanding of myself with the help of the System giving me a similarly made Primary, then created magical energy. I suppose it worked especially well for me, because my energy is focused specifically on never giving up, and I had to win to be who I am?"

The man gave him a flat stare, and Aaron shrugged, "I'll walk you through it man but I'm not shouting for the next half hour, and I still have to start with freeing the victims as soon as I can devise a way to suppress the burst." He nodded, "Yes, I can see we have much to talk about, starting with introductions. I am Commander Paxton, leader of the nearby Root base, and I suppose I am talking to Aaron?" He nodded, "Yea, that's me."

He nodded, "Allow me to get my head analyst to verify that you aren't Gone, then we can work together to figure out a way to move forward."

'Gone?' he wondered, but figured he would ask later. * The head analyst scanned him several times with an ability, and Aaron could even feel it hum through the air, though it didn't seem to use the same energy as a Primary, it was something more innate to the Underworld. When everything was sorted, Paxton finally gave Amelia and Gary permission to come see him, meaning Aaron was once more wrapped in a hug.

"How did you even survive getting chased by the Mushki?" Amelia eventually asked, holding him at arms length to inspect him for wounds, finding none. Paxton, in particular, also seemed quite interested in the question, though he didn't say so.

"A lot happened, I'm definitely going to have to start at the beginning or nothing's going to make sense."

"It's good to see you again, boy,' Gary said, relief on his face.

"We haven't gotten a single moment to speak since getting pulled down here, but I'm glad you haven't taken it… too badly." Aaron smiled at his previous landlord's concern. Gary had always been a nice old man, even before his family passed. A man on the shorter side, he was somewhat thin and severely wrinkled, with wispy white hair that he truthfully should've shaved a while ago.

He was even the one to help Aaron navigate the paperwork required to get the proper subsidies, not charging him a dime and letting Aaron stay in the apartment until everything went through and Aaron actually could pay him. Aaron nodded, "It's a relief to see you're still kicking too. I haven't even gotten the chance to pay you back for how much you've helped me."

"Bah," Gary waved him off, "Nothing to pay back, I wanted to do all that on my own." It warmed Aaron's heart that there was at least one person in the world who'd been sympathetic. He and Gary had rarely ever talked, but that was mostly Aaron's fault for shutting him out all the time. Gary had always taken the effort to try reaching out gently, Aaron just continuously rejected the offers.

Amelia, Gary, and Paxton weren't the only ones trying to muscle their way towards him and take up his time though; there were a few others from his convoy that he recognized, but didn't know the names of, plus Squeaky getting slightly impatient about freeing the nosferians, and the team of analysts chomping at the bit to hear of how he resisted his Primary's influence, and even Julio, Celina, and Freddy were yet to fully be introduced to everyone.

Once he had his brief reunion with Amelia and Gary, Paxton tried stepping in but he held out his hand, saying "There's a lot of questions everyone has, but we need to get started on freeing people. There'll be down time while I recover my energy, so let's prioritize them first. How do you want to go about this? You know your tools better than me." The man seemed conflicted for a half-second, but eventually nodded, "You're right, my apologies, it is simply such a shocking revelation.

Let's start with failsafes, you said that each release caused a pulse of energy, so we might need a way to cart them all quickly…" * They quickly went over all possibilities, and Paxton was most worried about space and how they'd all move, so he used his ability to create large platforms of wire mesh, each of which attached to the two cars, that would drag behind when necessary.

Apparently, he did have the native equivalent of a Primary, allowing him to freely create a steely material that could be as porous as a wire fence or solid as a sieve, though never a perfectly flat material. Aaron watched curiously as the man's arms flung about, lines of metal sticking to the cars like…

'Web, it's like a metallic web,' He dreaded the idea of Paxton losing control, because he could already see what kind of creature would form. When there were baskets for the twisted people, they set the second part of Paxton's ideas into motion: suppressing the outwards wave.

"So, first things first. We call the things that allow you to use supernatural abilities 'Imprints,' and there are three tiers to them. Tier one means it either consumes energy or doesn't use any at all, oftentimes drawing from the Underworld itself. My head analyst here, David, has one such Imprint; his takes advantage of the natural shape of the Underworld, siphoning the natural energies from it.

"Yours is tier two, an Imprint that produces energy on its own, oftentimes in response to duress, intense stress, or specific emotions. Most who have these learn to control their emotions, that way they may call upon them at a moment's notice."

'Not at all how mine works, but good to know. Likely another byproduct of it being tailored to me.'

"And what of the last one?" Aaron asked, thinking about the Mushki. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

"Tier three? They rarely happen. When a person and an Imprint act exactly the same, either because one twists the other or they were coincidentally fit, there's a strange… resonance between them, one that makes them greater than the sum of their parts. Even someone who has been "Corrupted" as this new System thing calls it does not end up as a tier three, likely because the person inside still does not agree with their Imprint.

The end result is a perfect merger, nigh unstoppable outside of, hm, unique circumstance."

'Ah, that's what the Mushki got? Wait, doesn't that mean the System CAN perfectly recreate the canvas of a person's soul, because it did that for the Mushki? What the hell…'

"Why the look?" Paxton asked, and Aaron just shook his head.

"You'll understand when I tell the story. Anyways, tier ones siphon energy, tier twos create it, so I'm guessing David will use his Imprint as hard as he can to take as much of the runoff as possible?"

"Correct." Eyeing Julio and the others, he could see their hopeful looks.

"Do you think he'd be down to give a crash-course to three others?" Following his gaze, Paxton grinned, "You and the other newest arrivals have been an absolute blessing, all coming with something, all with so much potential. What are we working with?"

"It's called a Spark of Warping, ring a bell?" He shook his head, "No, but no Imprint ever does. The fact that all three have the same Imprint at all is unusual, because the Underworld has the tendency to enjoy… not being consistent. Even when an Imprint breaks apart- which happens sometimes- the pieces mutate into something unique. All rules in the Underworld have their exception though, remember that; when someone says 'The Underworld works by…' the words 'Generally speaking' are implied."

He hummed thoughtfully, "Good to know."

"Back to your new friends, have you mapped their Imprints yet?"

"Sadly not, we haven't even gotten them to work a single time…" He went into detail of everything he speculated about, including how Sensitivity works and how he believed the Spark of Warping took advantage of the Underglass, explaining how he based it on his memories of the brief time he was corrupted but still in control and how he bent the Underworld to his whims. The team of what looked to be scientists listened intently, and Paxton even moreso.

When he'd finished his retelling, Paxton nodded, saying "I think I can agree with that reasoning. We hadn't used the term Sensitivity until the System came down, but everything it is saying has made sense so far. To have tier one Imprints use Sensitivity and tier two focus more on Resistance, categorizing their proficiency under completely different metrics… hmm, perhaps tier three takes more advantage of Weight? There is no way to say for sure, we do not even fully understand what Weight is.

"But your friends would benefit greatly from attempting to use their Imprints under David's watchful eye and the rare chance to experience an excess of energy that will gladly bend to their wills. It's usually quite difficult to contend with a person's Imprint directly, but I think this will be easier for them." So, they brought forth the first nosferian, David, Julio, Celina, and Freddy sticking close, readying themselves to drain away as much as they could.

Aaron brought the mind into focus, soothing the nosferian one last time, relying on Corruption to comfort them, and mentally unraveling the spell containing them. He was not completely sidelined this time either- he actively participated. Now that he knew what to look for, he knew that Mycelaric Expanse was a tier 1 Imprint, and it actively consumed energy.

The fragment of his power within the nosferian unraveled, but he didn't take it directly from the source as, if he overdrew, he would kill the nosferian, depriving it of the lifesaving body reconstruction it needed. Instead, he'd taken the seeds that Squeaky collected on the way here, scattering them about in a circle behind the tier 1 users. As the pulse rang out, he tapped into the starving nodes, feeding them a trickle of his energy, yes, but not ordering them to show him anything, he ordered them to grow.

The familiar glow washed over them, and was immediately sucked down. While not all of it could be contained, Aaron succeeded in lightening the load on those around the nosferian, though he found that none of it was returned to him. His efforts were not alone though, as the four tier 1 users concentrated as well, doing their best to expend and bend the energy. David, obviously took in a large chunk, a neon lime green glow spreading out and curling about in the air, as if grasping for anything around it.

Contrary to his expectations, Julio and the others also managed to get it on the first try, though much more weakly. He watched three pillars of underglass spike upwards, a small portion of the energy siphoned away. The combined efforts of everyone involved managed to suppress the resulting explosion from a beacon to a blip- enough that it would still be heard as the pop of a firecracker, but not a mortar shell going off mid-air.

They collectively relaxed, and Celina letting out a squeal jumping happily at having finally succeeded in tapping into her ability, though Aaron's eyes were instead locked on the ring of sprouts pushing up through the underglass.

'Ohho hoo, what do we have here?' he thought to himself, feeling a very faint glow from them in Mycelaric Expanse. When he tried tapping into them, he found that it took barely anything to maintain, and again, it seemed that he'd just discovered yet another feature his Primary had hidden from him. Because, from these morally just to use sprouts, he detected that they were generating their own energy. Not enough to offset their cost, yet, but enough that he could easily see it growing into something more.

Looking suspiciously at Onward Evermore, he suspected it was waiting for him to move away from this area before commanding each of the seeds to grow, then start generating its own energy to overtake him.

'How many hidden plots does this thing have? Well, two less now without the trapped people AND that I know to watch for the seeds.' Their celebration was cut short as the nosferian broke free from its planty prison, and each of them jumped forward to help it free, comforting it where they could. With so many surrounding it, the nosferian was visibly more relaxed, leaning into the human comforts, and soon enough Squeaky's as well.

'Two down, twenty six to go.' With the ring of sprouts, he even found that they had a perfect staging ground for every subsequent release, * POV: The remains of the cannibal camp. He hadn't expected much; he'd known the likelihood of the mushki tearing through his men were not only high, but almost guaranteed. If only… it had been the mushki, he could have said his men went down facing an impossible beast. But the rotting corpses and cleaned supplies said otherwise.

"Jav, timekeeper, how long has it been?" he asked calmly, and his new second-in-command responded immediately.

"T-two and a half days since we left, sir." Jav… they'd been blessed with a new Imprint, but at the cost of his entire band? Was it worth it?

'It will have to be.' A specialized scryer, that was what his Imprint was. Capable of sensing the noteworthy events of the Underworld, he could easily spot the drop spots, starbursts of forming Imprints, and significant emanations. They'd used it to great effect, leading the mushki to large clusters, finding worthy distractions that divided its attention for a minute or two, before it grew bored and continued chasing them. Only when they found another mushki were they able to get away, but even then…

The one chasing them at the start was not normal, far too powerful, far too inexhaustible. This was not his first purge, and he was damn sure it wouldn't be his last. He'd outrun mushki before- the trick was to run for at least four hours. This one? It'd chased them for almost sixteen. And then, when they ran into a proper challenger for it? He shivered. He'd never heard a mushki scream in pain before, but the squealing like a stuck pig… it just… wasn't fit for such a predator. Wasn't right.

He scoped out from atop his tank, seeing signs of both a mushki and a raid.

"At least I know they were ripped apart by the damn mushki," he mumbled. {They actually weren't}, a voice suddenly said, and he barely stopped himself from flinching at Nothing's declaration. Glancing behind him, he saw that all of his men had heard it too. Suppressing the urge to click his tongue, he knew he'd have to act on this or look like a pussy.

"What do you mean?" {Your men were slaughtered, then the Mushki came and tormented the members they abandoned. Once it chased them, one of theirs had an Imprint capable of distracting it long enough for everyone to get away. Aside from two unlucky souls, every last person was either spared or later rescued.} He grit his teeth, calming himself before responding.

"And why are you telling me this?" {Call it a vested interest in confrontation.} He grunted, "You want me to hunt them down?" {Most of them are in the safety of the Tick's waiting hands, but there is one in particular, one with quite the Imprint that was separated from the others, one that has yet to make it back to camp, and you might be able to pull from his guarding transport if you move fast enough.}"So to kill just one guy? The one that led the Mushki away?" No response.

He sighed, Nothing had told him all Nothing would tell him. At a nudge of his thoughts, his tank-shaped vehicle moved over to what had once been the distillery. Waving his hand, the underglass peeled back to reveal an untouched payload of dozens of gas tanks, food, and resources. Enough to restart his band. He doubted it would last, not for what he had planned.

"Men. Load up the tank, every bit of gas goes in, understood?" His men's eyes widened, realizing what he was planning. His Imprint let him do things with metal that would normally be impossible, and Roving Fortress was his greatest creation. Utilizing four different memorabilia to keep it running as well as a constant infusion of his own energy, it was capable of bursting through walls at a moments notice in resting mode. But this would not be a peaceful expedition.

He didn't doubt they'd use most of the gas they'd stockpiled, but if he was going to reach this person before they could make it to safety… Waving his hand, layers of plating were folded and rearranged, the clicking of pointed legs touching the ground for the first time in months as he activated battlemode for his mechanized construct. It was time to hunt, and this prey he would relish devouring.