Chương 228: More than one thing

Discordance, the sensation of concepts out of tune with one another, was usually something which Verses Sung Twice would find worth appreciating, perhaps even pondering during her contemplations along with her god. Be it conflict, strife and other disagreements, Verses would be all the more content to help sow the seeds of Discord in those fertile seedbeds. For the world to change, one needed contention. But ambivalence, especially her own, was still a piece of her god's purview with which she was still struggling.

On one hand, it had been long since Verses found her path pushed this way in direct combat against other foes of her rank, as she was normally part of the council's top agents in Heavenward, enough so that she was even sent out into the kingdom and beyond to oversee and lead their projects more closely.

Her path of veiled intent often let her mislead and overwhelm as she was shielded by conflicting impressions while her touch turned her foe's defenses into weapons for her to wield, and needing to really push herself was in a way exhilarating. But the fact she found the clashes of their running battle challenging, even as they outnumbered these adventurers - who had somehow pursued them into this trial - five to four if you counted the odd draconian, also meant that the possibility of defeat was quite real.

A lot more real than they had expected, going into this collaboration to help their potential allies. And it especially didn't help that her current foe was so assuredly annoying." Dissolve the patterns of power!" The chant of the young man with the glowing tattoos came just as Verses and Flutter - Sunless' blade wielding subordinate - both struck towards him almost simultaneously.

A shimmering ripple burst out in a sphere from the adventurer, and seemingly all at once the obscuring, confounding haze from Verses' discord essence was shredded. This wasn't just limited to a couple of Verses' active effects either, as Flutter seemed to stagger mid-step as some boon of speed and balance winked out.

The next moment, the two-pronged assault was stopped; the gravel beneath the man scattering to form a small crater as he stood firm while meeting Flutter's twin blades with his wide shield and slapping Verses' outstretched hand away with his ringed staff. The spectral arms he had sprouted conjured wave-edged blades that retaliated swiftly, and Verses had to use one of the powers of her echo essence to flash back to one of her earlier positions.

Flutter wasn't as lucky, apparently still unable to teleport as the counterattack left him with a decently deep wound in one shoulder where a thrust punched through armor.

"I recognize his style too…" Verses thought as she reconjured her haze and started a flanking maneuver while leaving Flutter taking the brunt of the onslaught of attacks which followed. It wasn't something she had seen herself, but rather had described to her, or read somewhere. Those musings were interrupted however, as Sunless appeared nearby in an inky swirl from a nearby shadow.

His chained sickle joined the onslaught of exchanged blows and parries even if it was soon shattered by some kind of dispelling defense of which this particular adventurer sported plenty.

"Did you finish her?" Verses asked as she used one of the quicker spells from her echo essence to cause the effect of one of Flutter's venomous strikes to reoccur, buying her companion some more time as the adventurer had to reposition to account for the new arrival.

"We are pressuring them already. With you, it should-""No." The reply was as unexpected as it was terse, and Verses could clearly sense the sting of defeat in the draconian who otherwise didn't look too worse for wear.

"Then go back and-" Verses began, but the draconian continued.

"I will retreat for now, and so should you. We should take stock and properly evaluate these interlopers." He spoke with an uncharacteristic seriousness which was as remarkable as it was unheard of during the time Verses had had the misfortune of knowing the man. Was Sunless Fang, one of Discord's silver-ranked elites in Hua-Xi… shaken?

They locked eyes for a short moment and Verses was just about to reprimand him as her spiritual senses, projected wide even as she fought, picked something up which caused her to quickly reassess Sunless' suggested course of action.

"Retreat," she said, spoken just loud enough for all of her silver-ranked companions to catch it even among the echoing din of battle. At first, it looked like one of the elf siblings chasing the celestine with the parasol was about to protest, but they all soon seemed to sense what Verses had; another group of silvers was approaching, and one aura at their front seemed to glow like a bonfire.

"Wall!" Walls of force sprang up to block the different tunnel exits, as the tattooed young man had apparently also sensed the incoming adventurer reinforcements and seen that the tables would soon turn. Frustrated, Verses countered with one of the more potent choices of her magical arsenal." Confound the connections, splinter the senses. Grand synesthesia!" To Verses, the zone of her spell looked like a crackling, shimmering haze as it spread out from her like a wave to cover the whole area and more.

But she knew that to her foes, the world would be madness as their senses scrambled and their bodies might start behaving oddly to their commands. It was a potent power, but limited in that suffering damage would clear it from a person. But it should buy them enough time.

"To retreat. To plan. And to see how to best bring the ambitions of these intruders collapsing in on upon themselves," she thought as she and Flutter unleashed potent spells and attacks which started cracking through the closest barrier.

"Now I just need to collect that useless orb. And perhaps whip our near useless allies into shape." The world, and all impressions it tried to impose upon his senses, was madness. Kite found himself stumbling as his body temporarily mixed up his intentions while the world just sparked and shone in a jumbled mess before his eyes while his ears seemed to somehow attempt - and fail - to hear the flickering lights and the sensation of gravel beneath his feet.

As such, gathering the mental focus for a spell was agonisingly hard, as well as focusing his aura on anything in particular. Kite did feel the feedback of one of his barriers breaking, and had just about gathered his wits enough to start casting Ripple of Cancellation again in the hopes of alleviating the effect when someone else got to it in his stead." Iniquity's bane!"

A bright light erupted from some point which Kite's beleaguered eyes attempted - and once again failed - to interpret akin to physical touch, but any such befuddlement of his senses was soon purged like cobwebs before a firestorm. Will, Laevyeth in hand, descended into the open space as whatever potent illusion they had been subjected to was dispersed.

"Fear the might of my Heavenly Shaft, evildoers! With both mine and my Lady's hand upon it, there is no escape, nor is there any chance of your victory!" the spearman called, his and Laevyeth's aura seeming to mingle together in righteous determination.

"What he said!" Dragonfly added, giving Kite a quick once-over but after seeing that he was mostly fine she turned her attention to the still incoming waves of enemy drones that were scattered before her like slag violently expelled from atop molten steel. Kite was just about to properly take in the state of his companions, both of his group and the new arrivals, when the final lost sheep returned to the metaphorical fold.

"Why are you just standing here? We should be pursuing them!" River called with a distinct edge to her voice as she came sprinting out from a side passage.

"I can still feel them! We can overtake-""No." Kite's answer apparently surprised her enough to stop briefly, locking eyes with him.

"What?" she asked, voice flat and low, almost bordering on hostile.

"No, River," Kite continued.

"Look around you. Or, better yet, use that terrifying spirit of yours."

"So? You're weak, but so are they. We should-""River, we just fought through an ambush that could have ended spectacularly bad had we not had reinforcements on the way. And while our companions here are better off, I can feel that they have pushed hard to get here."

"But-""No, River," Kite repeated again, voice gaining a bit of an edge.

"We need to consolidate. And learn from this. And-" Kite was interrupted as River's aura suddenly reached out and spiked his in a sudden thrust of spiritual force. Even with his improved aura defenses, it took him unaware enough that the brief but intense impact of their spirits was soon followed by a similarly brief and intense sense of unease; like a suppression condensed into a second of discomfort.

To anyone looking at the acolyte of Pain, it might have seemed like she was as neutral and unbothered as usual, but to one like Kite who had spent some extended time around the woman, there were small signs of the truth. A slight twitch, a different kind of stiffness to her jaws, the curling of fingers into something more akin to claws. At that moment, Dancer of the Broken River was furious.

Even so, Kite had trained beneath Ardent Horizon Seeker, and even though their sessions had been few and far between, the next attempted aura spike was met with a spirit more tempered and unyielding. River's pure power still made Kite's defenses shudder, but this time they held as he also let a bit of Ardent's most recent teachings of the void color his mental imagery; part of the aura attack simply being withered away before even reaching his true self.

"Wh-" Will began from somewhere behind Kite, already making subtle moments of preparing to intervene as he - along with any other essence-user with a lick of aura sense in the near vicinity - had sense what River had done. But he had barely started his project when one of Fantina's tentacles reached out and gently but firmly pressed against his chest in an obvious urging for him to wait.

"Are you quite done?" Kite asked River while mentally thanking Fantina for her intervention.

"How can I be done when they still live?"

"Let me rephrase, then. Are you quite done acting like a child?" The faint edge in Kite's voice was still there, even if something more hard and unyielding had joined it, and it seemed enough for even River to back down. If only a fraction.

"Even with Wander's scouting, we are deeper inside the Labyrinth than ever before," he continued.

"And had we pursued, we would outpace her. Which would mean that we would be rushing on blindly in the pursuit of an unknown force and whatever other dangers this place has in store for us. If there was one thing that Gauntlet taught me, it was that it is those situations that get people killed. Sometimes it is necessary, or cannot be avoided. But this is not one of them, River.

So center yourself, help Wander keep watch and ponder what ramifications aura-spiking any of your companions like that ever again could lead to. I won't say that you are better than this, but from how you have survived so far I would have at least expected you to be smarter." While the silence of that moment couldn't by any means be called a complete one, given the sounds of Wander and Soul tearing into those enemy drones that remained, it somehow still managed to feel deafening.

River's features became an even more impassive mask as she turned and left.

"Will you-" Kite began, but Wander replied even before he could finish.

"Already on it. Even though I don't think it's needed~."

"How so?"

"Well, River is pretty fast in most situations. But the way she's moving, it's more of a 'I'm a brooding avenger seeking solitude' kind of fast rather than the 'Woe befalls my prey as I am about to fall upon them' kind~." This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

"I see. Thank you."

"You're welcome. And, Kite~?"

"Yes, Wander?"

"That was actually pretty badass~." As Verses Sung Twice saw her officiator orb hovering silently where she had told it to remain, she had to admit to a slight twinge of relief.

"At least one thing went as intended," she thought to herself as she once again fell in beside her companions who were also running, gliding or otherwise traversing the Labyrinth in various states of bedragglement. Speaking aloud, she called: "Keep your eyes out for those rats. They're the same as those outside. Probably a swarm-user." At any other time, Verses knew that Sunless would have thrown some barbed jibe back at her for that, probably about her being skittish of vermin now.

But the draconian was nowhere to be seen, and besides she knew that he had sensed them too back outside and hadn't protested her call that it was time to bolt for their objective once they had been discovered.

"But still, so many of them? We need our so-called allies to do their part here. It seems Mistress Porcelain Mask was right about this mission after all."

"Over here~!" Kite and the others could easily follow the small chain of waving rats as Wander led them back throughout the crevasses. Their base camp by their ruler would indeed be the eventual destination, but there was something else to investigate first.

"See~?" Kite recognized the place where they had initially encountered the ambushers as one crevasse that had been made significantly wider by Little Crow's opening explosion. And just below the imagined epicenter of the blast rested a pile of quintessence, topped by an awakening stone that looked like hazy smoke gradually being brought into order by some unseen force.

"Huh," was all Kite could get out at the sight of the treasure, kneeling in front of it.

"A reward, trial-taker!" the officiator orb trumpeted from behind him as it apparently sensed his surprise.

"Yours for defeating an enemy commander!"

"Wait, we get rewarded for that?" Dragonfly asked, joining the others and looking at the condensed - and quite valuable - pieces of magic.

"Well, of course," the orb replied.

"The Queen of Jade and Sky was - and is - ever generous, rewarding the brave who seek tempering in her trials. This is a test of applying one's path as part of a greater whole, no? Not everyone has the means to demolish front lines. Many paths will be able to find their place under such circumstances, at least as long as they are correctly brought to bear!"

"That sure is a nice touch," Little Crow noted appreciatively.

"How do we keep track of the loot?"

"Let us bring it back and leave it with Braid. Assuming everything works out, there will be time for dividing any spoils we cannot immediately use afterwards," Kite replied, stashing the treasures in one of his dimensional pouches. The group, now gathered in full, joined him as they began trekking back towards their camp.

And seeing his opportunity, Kite took the chance for some proper evaluation after they had passed through their own line of drones that was now claiming ground against their blue-tinted counterparts.

"So, we have had a chance encounter with our enemies. It is time to share what we've learned. Would everyone please share any observations they made of each of them; powers, tricks, skills, equipment? It does not matter, as long as it is of use. Little Crow, could you begin?"

"Certainly, Junior Brother. Of the five assailants, I tangled the most with the elf with the illusions. She was very skilled with those too, as I could barely keep up at times. Her essences are hard to tell too, as there are several of the more illusory ones that could make sense. She did fight with a lot of touch-based spells included in her attacks though."

"She at least had the discord essence, although not the divine one," River added tersely, having eventually rejoined the others even though the acolyte of Pain kept mostly to the outer edges of the group.

"I've met their type before."

"Well, given that, she is a competent duelist if not a team fighter. None of them except those two elves really were," Little Crow noted.

"I would count her among the most dangerous of the enemies we encountered here though." Kite nodded at this, sharing the assessment after having suffered through some of her powers himself.

"The elf pair felt like they were some of the ones most used to cooperation," he noted, taking over.

"Reasonably coordinated, but they still gave off the feeling of competing against one another. Both were well rounded though, and felt like classic warriors of the Hua-Xi styles with an earth and stone-user along with an armament conjurer. I wouldn't have thought them amiss as part of some of the more prestigious sects." While it was only a likeness made in passing, as he put it into words the thought struck Kite as more plausible then he had at first assumed. And that was quite a troubling one.

But as he mulled it over, Fantina picked up the evaluation.

"Fortunate for Glint and I, the other two - the sword-wielder and the floating leonid - felt almost as at odds with one another as us. They got in each others' way quite a lot, which let us hold on and for me to cleanse the toxins of one of them. But while it pains me to admit it, they would probably have won out in the end anyway had we not had the rest of you in support.

My many years with only brief moments of practice made themselves painfully known," the blonde woman said, trying and at least somewhat succeeding to hide her chagrin.

"But they were highly mobile strikers though, and I'd recommend watching out for the leonid should we face her again, as she tried to throw me into the storm above with her wind powers." Most in the group looked up at the ripping gales above at that, imagining how such a trip might feel and in what state one would be when - or if - one came back down.

"So -," Kite said, dispelling the unpleasant thoughts of being torn to shreds, "- we have a diverse group, definitely hostile who seem quite competent but lacking much practice or will to work more closely together."

"More or less," Little Crow agreed, the others who had been present nodding in agreement.

"Then, River, how was your target? Your bout was a little more secluded than ours, after all," Kite asked the priestess who was brooding in her own corner of the group.

"Decent. Slippery. A skirmisher not unlike myself," eventually came the answer.

"But in the end, his spirit was lacking as he ran as soon as I shattered his confidence. It should be noted though that he had some kind of power which made it hard for me to pin him down and left him able to shift through the shadows even when I thought I had him." They spent a few more minutes recounting details, Dragonfly and the others coming with the occasional question of their own. But eventually, Kite thought it time to broach another topic quite related to the first.

"And what about us?" he asked, tone once again turning serious.

"What could, or should, we have done differently?"

"We won, did we not?" River shot back.

"We will be ready the next time, and then they will be ours."

"If my time with Gauntlet has told me anything, it is to never underestimate essence-users with some proper time to prepare. And while that goes for us as well, I've been taught that it is always best to assume that our foes are doing the same thing we are; learning. So I repeat myself; what could we have done better?"

"Apart from timing certain spells and attacks better?" Little Crow asked, at least trying to take the question seriously.

"I would say things went well, given the circumstances. But that is obviously not what you are getting at."

"Indeed," Kite confirmed.

"And you are not wrong, Little Crow. Things went well, especially given the circumstances. Your initiation and the timing thereof was good, and I believe that my barriers were as well. We managed some of our practiced coordinated moves at the beginning, but after that? Things devolved quickly from there, leaving us as islands to fend mostly for ourselves even though we did switch things up a bit. Or would you disagree, Wander? You did get a different perspective on most of it, after all."

"Nah, you're right~," the rat on his shoulder agreed.

"Do you want me to gather myself and help more the next time~?"

"Only if we're being pressured for longer, or can't rely on reinforcements. We need your scouting most of all unless things have really started falling apart," Kite said, before turning his attention back towards the whole group.

"I know we are no comprehensive unit like the teams of inner members of Gauntlet. I've seen them fight together at times, and it's like they can read each others' minds. But even with the temporary outer teams, we usually manage to stay a bit more coherent when the proverbial fire rises."

"Any suggestions then, Annoying one?" River asked, clearly skeptical of Kite's line of reasoning.

"Well, time and experience. But there is some more advice I have based on my training too. We can go over that more once we get back. Still, I believe that we can at least confirm that our foes are most likely the agents of Discord we are looking for, even if I have seen no trace of the so-called Builder cult."

"Just leave it to me, Kite. I'll sniff them out eventually~," Wander replied, making a show of sniffing the air, whiskers dancing as each rat in sight did the same.

"Thank you, Wander. Now, as I said, let's get back and see what we can put into practice on short notice. Some unity to balance out the discordance our foes hope to sow." As Verses and the others returned to their base, they found Jin waiting for them outside the cultists' fortified ritual site.

"Well?" Verses inwardly gritted her teeth at the man's cocked eyebrow as he took in their somewhat disheveled state even though their silver-ranked bodies and essence powers had done away with any actual injuries.

"We found the interference. One that, given what you and your cult claimed beforehand, should be impossible. Nine of them, Jin! Nine other silvers, and one of them seems to be that cursed rat swarm which found us in the first place on the outside. How is this possible?!" The last question came out as a snarl as Verses lost some of her composure, even though she quickly reigned it in during the silence that followed.

"While the great Builder shows us much, it is still up to us - his servants - to handle the minutiae and the unexpected," he eventually replied.

"Weren't your people brought in specifically to provide support for just this kind of situation? Are you not up to the task?"

"As if you and yours could fight outnumbered nine to six," Verses countered.

"They don't have a ritual site to protect either. So you better start pulling your weight, cultist, or this undertaking might just as well be over." At this, Jin met her eyes in another moment of silence, his gaze seeming cold and detached in a decidedly alien way even though none of his exterior gave away the metal and glass which Verses had previously glimpsed beneath.

"If we do, the ritual will be delayed. Significantly. Our brethren need the beacon to begin deploying the ritual to craft the dimensional tunnel."

"And if you don't, there might not be any ritual left."

"Surely you could hold them off? A few of you might perish, but what does that matter in the grand scheme of things?"

"Do you seriously believe we would do that just for you and your ritual? You delude yourself, cultist." Jin fell silent again, but it was only for a brief moment before shaking his head.

"While expected, it only stands to show that you and your kind lacks the dedication needed to make a difference in the grand scheme of things. Why my superiors found this undertaking worth it is still beyond me. But unlike you, I also know which cog I am in the grand machinery of the Builder. So I suppose it cannot be helped. Aki, Kura and I will pull away from the ritual for a time. Moro can handle it alone, as he is graced by the Builder with enough knowledge and the right gifts for the task."

"Good," Verses replied tersely.

"That at least evens the odds. We should head back out soon too keep up the pressure and-""An act in haste will only make waste," Jin said, interrupting.

"You far underestimate us if you think that a mere warrior on the battlefield will be the greatest impact we can make. Aki. Kura. Start capturing some of our so-called drones. And you, our esteemed allies, should help them."

"Why? What would that accomplish?" Jin seemed unperturbed by the hint of defiance in Verses' voice as he took command, and just gave her another one of those inscrutable looks through cold eyes.

"The Builder gifts his followers with superior forms, priestess. While they were intended to be saved for our operations here after the mission was completed, it cannot be helped. It is time we shared some of his bounties with our hapless soldiers." Kite joined Fantina where she was overseeing Little Crow and River in the open space next to their ruler, clashing with Soul to get a better feel for some intended joint maneuvers they had come up with earlier.

It was only light practice trying to somewhat find proof of concept before they would soon head out again, armed with more knowledge of their foe and a bit more confidence. But as the healer of the group Fantina still insisted on keeping watch as they sparred. The two stood in silence for a short while before the older woman eventually sighed.

"I can feel that you want to ask, Kite. Best just to get it out of your system." Kite started slightly at her words, slight chagrin coloring his voice as he did as he was prodded.

"I was just wondering… The tentacle essence is quite rare…"

"It is indeed. And an excellent choice for my power set, don't you think? I was most fortunate that my church chose to sponsor me with it."

"Of course, of course," Kite said diplomatically.

"And do you know how practical it is with all those extra arms when managing a brood as big as ours? The things children can come up with…" Fantina continued, patiently.

"Surely, supremely useful."

"But apparently, it only requires a few artists here and there with peculiar tastes for people to get ideas. And after that, most adults will somehow assume that it is a sex thing. Especially since I'm a priestess of Fertility."

"So… It's not?" Silence reigned for a short while before Kite saw Fantina's mouth quirk upwards into a mysterious smile as she replied, eyes glimmering:"Well, such a concept can surely be more than one thing, no?" At that moment, Kite had no idea whether the priestess was joking or not. Nor if he should start viewing Jarvan as a much braver man than he had previously thought.