Chương 202: Preparation for Disaster

Slipping out of the belly of the beast was not nearly as simple as getting in. Cultists ran past the half flesh-stripped bears by the dozen. Many Fleshsmiths gathered to defend the bridge, but there were still a substantial number that remained to oversee the sacrifices and prepare them for the upcoming ritual. All of which, seemed unperturbed by the assault on their Island. Were they not concerned that something was off?

Nyxala was happy with the outcome, as it meant the ritual wouldn't be delayed, but the lack of suspicion seemed odd. Was it simply expected in the prelude to such a massive ritual? That the unbidden entities within Coral would come rushing in upon sensing the extensive preparations? This much localised intent… of course they would expect interference. And that was without whatever the other cults might attempt. Nyxala doubted the Bodytwisters and Omen Artisans were the only ones that wanted to halt this ritual.

Even the Scriptures — the Fleshsmiths' temporary allies — would be unlikely to be happy with a competitor gaining power. The cultists here were simply confident in their defence. The bridges would hold. At least long enough for the ritual to reach conclusion. Through the slit in her bodybag, she peeked through the bear's ribs at the sacrifices they passed. Most had already been prepared. She caught the burning red ring of a ritual circle arcing around a Fleshsmith and the young man he carved away at.

The victim's body flinched beneath the knife, yet there were no screams. His jaw was noticeably absent. In its place was a viscera-woven plate of steel that clamped around his neck. The Fleshsmith cut into his chest. Her hand was ablaze in an ethereal blue haze that flowed down her arm and embedded itself through the wound. Around them, the ritual responded.

A dull, darker hue spilled from the rest of the sacrifice's body, cycling into the ritual before shifting to an intense red that seemed to pulse with each additional cut. The wounds sealed behind each brushstroke of the blade. Runes left in the skin carried a subtle tinge of blue that left Nyxala sickened just looking. Her cage was moved on before she could see the end of the ritual. But she soon found her answer. Dozens more sacrifices had already completed their priming.

These people — ranging from children stolen away from the wards to former cultists that pissed off the wrong person — were all awake and aware. Some struggled, fighting their fleshforged bindings to no avail. Many more seemed broken. They knew their death was at hand, and that no amount of resistance would change that. But in each one, layers upon layers of ethereal runes marred their skin.

The Fleshsmiths had carved away skin and continued to heal them until the scars left ugly valleys which were then filled with liquid metal. That metal scorched the skin as it flowed into a distorted pentagram wrapping the body. Even then, they weren't given the relief of the boiling steel cooling into a hard frame. The sickening energy permeating their runes flowed into the steel, eternally keeping it liquid, and bound to their skin.

Nyxala breathed in deep the smell of barbeque, involuntarily licking what remained of her lips. … she really needed to address how quickly she'd changed her tune about human meat. This obsession was concerning. But… later. For now, she really needed to slip away. Preferably without being noticed. Unfortunately, it was impossible to leap through the ribs the same way she'd come in — no way to gather enough of an O̅s̫stho̲th-boost — so she had only two options. The first; shatter the ribs of this beast and escape.

It would be loud, and she wasn't entirely sure she could break through the bone unstrengthened as she currently was. And it would almost certainly reveal herself. The only benefit she could see was that it offered a lesser immediate risk. Her second option meant waiting. Slipping away after the bear's chest was cracked open. But this might be even more risky than the first option. The cultists had rushed them through without checking, but that hardly meant they were in the clear of more onomasticians.

Or soulsingers with some form of soul-sight. A third and fourth evo amongst unevolved? It would raise questions. And there was also the threat of being restrained. Waiting for an escape gave the Fleshsmiths time to give them the same fleshforged chains as the rest of the unfortunate sacrifices. Neither choice was clean, so she opted for the more enjoyable of the two. Pushy snuck out and poked Lysyra as Nyxala wrapped her mouth around the side of a rib. She tried to bite, but her teeth only sunk in so far. Oh, well.

Nyxala settled in to wait for her saliva to melt through the rib-bone. Try as she might to keep the acid contained in her mouth, the sound of sizzling rang loud in her ears. Though, it wasn't the hissing that gave her away. Nyxala eyed the Fleshsmith trekking only a few metres to the side. Her nose twitched with a grimace.

"What is that-" The woman's eyes met Nyxala's. They froze. An instant later, those eyes also met the sharp tips of a pair of rapiers. She slumped, but Nyxala's tentacles held the Fleshsmith upright and dragging along the side of the beast in an attempt to delay the inevitable. It had been surprisingly easy to slip those weapons out from her chest. That was going to be useful.

Nyxala bought herself a full extra second to melt through the bone before the Fleshsmiths trailing behind noticed the woman's odd posture and let out exclamations of alarm. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. With the time for subtlety over, Nyxala pulled her jaw back and snapped her pincers down on the narrow section of bone. Her support gave away, and Nyxala fell out. Once her feet touched the ground, she didn't wait to rebound sideways.

Her chest opened, shredding through her robe until each rib-tooth stretched as wide as they would open. She swallowed the Fleshsmith before the woman could crumple. The two behind her quickly became four. Soon enough, they would call more. That was fine, so long as they couldn't communicate exactly what was attacking. Nyxala's chest opened, and the gem floating in the dark void bore its weight down on the cultists. Even she was surprised at how rapidly her eye consumed their lips and tongues.

Even if they were only third evolution… this was almost too easy. Despite the success, Nyxala didn't stop. It wouldn't take more than a second or two for the higher creeds to interfere. She needed to give them something to assume. Instead of chasing down the cultists that were now scrambling away in fear of the near instantaneous loss of their soft flesh, Nyxala leapt up on top of the bear. The towering beast acted lifeless. It acknowledged neither its broken rib, nor her sudden appearance upon its back.

She wasted no time cutting away the array of spikes interfering with its brain. Unlike the bone of the beast itself, the musculature-wrapped steel was fragile. Well, relatively. The ever so slight boost she'd gained from her escape had strengthened her claws enough to snip through a pike with a single heavy clamp of her altered fingers. One after the other, the oversized nails were severed. With each, life visibly returned to the bear. When she shattered the last, the fragile control that bound it was gone.

The beast roared. Instantly, the fleshforged frame clinging to its back snapped under the pressure of the massive bear's thrumming muscles. The enraged beast immediately charged the nearest Fleshsmith. That was — unfortunately for them — the four with scraped out tongues. With the cacophony, there were more eyes turning their way. Before the beast could reach the cultists and unleash its previously suppressed rage, Nyxala reached into her chest and yanked out her sceptre.

The dark shroud encased her before her enemies could blink. As much as she'd intentionally freed the bear, she couldn't let it take her prey. They had seen her escape, and now she couldn't allow their souls to flee. Nyxala pushed off. Her wings throwing her forward faster then the towering beast could compete. It snapped at her, but she found it all to easy to twist out of the way of that powerful set of jaws. She crashed into the first, almost swallowing him whole.

Annoyingly, he got stuck in her teeth, and she needed to chew a few times to fit the man near double her size into her chest void. The two besides her felt their legs taken out from under them, and dragged away by her tentacles. She paid no mind to the painful crack of their heads hitting the floor. Right before the bear charged through them, Nyxala kicked the last. Without her boots, the kick was dampened, and the cultists was only knocked far enough away to get his legs crushed, rather than his head. Look at me.

Saving Fleshsmiths. Never would I have thought I'd see the day. Nyxala flinched. Cuddly dropped one of the cultists. The woman had, in her desperation to be free, repeatedly stabbed the poor tentacle. Nyxala's response was vicious. She made sure the woman was mulch in her jaw before she properly swallowed. The last two died much quicker, and she even tossed a few legs to the bear as a reward. Not that the beast seemed to like her any more for it. Apparently it's thoughts were of the same as Nyxala's.

It hated having its prey stolen. A hundred tiny slabs of metal slammed into the bear's side with enough power she felt the thump through her own chest. It barely seemed to damage the beast's untarnished upper hide. Twisting to the offender, the giant bear forgot her. It was a fifth evolution. And there were more rushing in from every direction. Nyxala took one last glance at the young sacrifices being tossed around in the released bear's ribcage before she slunk away.

More than a few eyes turned to her bright light shrouded in swirling dark, but there was nothing she could do about that. Nothing they could do about her either. Hopefully they wouldn't question her too much, and focus on putting down the beast that had eaten five of their cultists. Wait… five cultists, plus two sacrifices. Considering they wanted the sacrifices alive, she felt no need to attempt to help them herself. The Fleshsmiths wouldn't let them die in the crossfire. Probably.

There were a lot of sacrifices here… but there was also some time before the ritual began, if their incomplete preparations were anything to go off. Even if following through with her new ideology wasn't entirely possible, she could at least look into making an attempt. The architecture of the Island was not particularly hospitable. Everywhere she looked, the tendon-linked metalworks were dedicated to the support of ritual lines that spiderwebbed everywhere.

Nyxala relied on her edge sight to slip down a tube that looked like it was intended to siphon blood. She had to rely on her tentacles to orient herself around the protruding razorblades that tried to mince her as she fell. Nyxala landed. Crimson liquid splashed outwards, and she found herself knee deep. Glancing around, she discovered she'd fallen into a pool that likely spread through the entire bottom levels of the Island. Though the corruption certainly made it look endless.

Yog leapt from her neck almost too excited. As the strange existence sent its control through all that blood and began moving it around to its whims, Nyxala noticed that the blood was only the upper, thin layer to cover a sea of flesh. She rolled her eyes. Fleshsmiths were the same as ever. At least it wasn't molten this time. If she was to guess, they probably had a reservoir of molten steel in the upper levels.

"You know, it would have been much easier if you'd just been a little patient." Nyxala turned to find Lysyra cringing down at her feet. She didn't even bother to hide her vindicated amusement. Finally, someone else had to feel the slimy sensation she always had to deal with.

"Now they know something has probably slipped inside," Lysyra continued.

"Would waiting have resulted any differently?" Nyxala raised a brow.

"I'm a little less inconspicuous than you, in case you haven't noticed." Lysyra shook her head, dismissing the question. Obviously, she knew Nyxala was right.

"Still, we could have learnt more about how they've set up this ritual."

"You're not going to fill the Island with your replicas?" Nyxala was surprised. That was how the girl approached almost every issue. She scowled.

"Z͐a̟͠n̖͐di̥s͈t̝̾h̃̔́ has pure soul-sight. If I'm wandering around and happen across him, he'll notice me."

"So it's just this one of you?" Nyxala asked, surprised.

"What? No. Z͐a̟͠n̖͐di̥s͈t̝̾h̃̔́ will be near the core. So long as I keep them on the outer rim, I'll be fine," she said.

"Probably. I do have a few hundred reflections running around, so it's not impossible I won't trigger something. Still, I'm being careful. Fortunately, one of my names allows me to control how much my soul is present, so none but the most sensitive soulsinger traps will trigger."

"Right. Well, let's hope they aren't so suspicious of the strange circumstances of a bound beast going out of control." Nyxala sunk to her knees, ignoring the way the blood coiled around her and sunk deep into her clothes.

"It would be nice if we can keep this space for ourselves, without any Fleshsmith coming down to investigate." Lysyra looked disgusted, and was likely on the verge of vanishing entirely. Fortunately, Nyxala's closing of her eyes made the girl too curious to leave.

"What are you doing?"

"After chewing through the last cultist, I decided to check my name. I have an evolution ready."

"Already?" her voice was tinged with exasperation.

"Already," Nyxala said with a grin. She let herself slip into Pink.