Unbound

Chapter One Hundred and Eighty Two – 182

"Do you have a problem with your duty, Acolyte?" Initiate Tilwen asked as he stepped further into his subordinate's personal bubble. He could see the twitch in the idiot's cheek as he attempted to master himself and failed; a scowl bloomed on the Acolyte's face.

"I ain't doin' your dirty work, Tilwen," the Acolyte fairly spat, his young face pinched in anger. "Why not lift your own arms for once?"

There was a hiss of breath from around him, and the Acolyte spared his compatriots a glance. They'd all pulled away from him. Tilwen smiled. He always enjoyed an opportunity to reinforce obedience.

"What a grand idea."

The slap came from nowhere, as far as the Acolyte was concerned. It laid him low faster than he could blink, and Tilwen loomed over the young man with all the menace of an oncoming storm. The Acolyte slurred something through a mangled mouth while blood dribbled from his nose and lips.

"Do you not appreciate my help?" Tilwen asked, a mocking smiling tugging at the corners of his mouth. Oh how he loved to put the new recruits in their place. It was his duty to drive his subordinates toward Strength and Purity, by any means necessary. Tilwen leaned closer, putting his face inches from the young man's own. "Before you speak again, I would recommend you think very carefully on your answer."

The Acolyte flinched at the Initiates movement, but otherwise remained silent. The idiot boy's eyes rolled in his head, as if he couldn't manage to focus on Tilwen's movements.

Eyes of Affliction.

Status Condition: Dazed

Tch. Children. Too weak by far to be serving the Pathless. He straightened up and pushed the Acolyte with a single foot. The boy fell, limp. How worthless.

"I trust the rest of you are fine with my orders?" Tilwen's words were met with a series of vigorous nods and sudden bustling about the corpses. "Good. Strip them of everything and pile it in the wagons."

"What...what of the bodies, sir?"

Tilwen gestured to an unused corner of the courtyard. "Throw them in the corner. I'll have them burned later."

When Inquisitor DuFont had selected Tilwen to go on this assignment, he had been eager to prove himself to her. She had been elevated by the Master Inquisitor himself after all, and her grip over the Order's forces was growing by the hour. Already the Acolytes and most other Initiates had thrown in with her vision of their cause, while a stubborn few sided with Inquisitor Heuthorn and the old guard. But Tilwen could tell the way the wind was blowing, else he'd never have made it to Initiate so early in life.

Now he and the others had secured their first mine shaft for use by the Order. The resources they had acquired here would go a long way toward preparing his forces for further battle against the loathsome heretics that plagued Haarwatch. Only a city rife with corruption would see such monsters erupt onto its streets, and the Inquisitors had made it plain that dangerous meddling with forbidden powers led to this sorry state.

Barely made it here in one piece, Tilwen thought with a snort of derision. Were it not for his leadership and discipline, it was likely the entire mission would have failed. Yet now they'd succeeded, even going so far as to drive off those damned Guilder scouts. Bastards likely are reporting back to their masters at the Wall, but they'll return to find this mine a fortress of the Inviolate Order. A bastion of Light among the dingy darkness in this city.

Tilwen smiled and let the overcast light bathe his upturned face. The day had begun with strife, but it would end in absolute triumph. It--

Tilwen opened his eyes. The courtyard was unchanged, but something...something was different. His senses were trying to tell him something, but the Initiate couldn't quite put his finger on it. For all the banging of loading crates, it felt quiet.

"AH!"

Tilwen spun, hearing and seeing chains of purple-white energy manifest from the air. "Mage! Engage your movement Skills!"

Fleet of Foot!

Without waiting for his men, Tilwen took his own advice. A crackling set of chains missed him by less than a span, so close he could feel the deathly chill in his bones. Feet blurring, Tilwen even managed to dodge the appearance of four silver spears, and instead watched as they impacted his Acolytes.

Fleet of Foot is level 52!

Dodge is level 44!

Three of the four were horrifically impaled, the clearly conjured metal punching through their armor as if it wasn't there at all and hurled them backward. The fourth missed the still-prone form of the Acolyte he'd scolded, the lucky bastard. All three impacted victims fell onto their asses several spans away, pinned to the ground.

"Show yourself, cowards!" Tilwen screamed as loud as he could, though his voice sounded muted among the tall buildings. The others would surely hear them and come running in a few moments. "Face me with honor under the Light!"

As the remainder of his Acolytes hurried to aid their fallen comrades, something exploded out of one of the nearby buildings. A pale form erupted from a glass window and into the courtyard. It was a man, with dark hair and simple linen clothing. Tilwen didn't hesitate.

Diurnal Reach!

Four bolts of shimmering, golden light coalesced in his grip and shot out with unerring precision. Diurnal Reach was one of the first light Mana Skills an Acolyte was taught, but Tilwen had practiced it for years, even going so far as to Temper with it at Apprentice Tier. The four bolts shrieked through the air, so high it escaped the range of his ears; the man stood, staring and raising a single hand at the Initiate as if dumbfounded.

Fool! Die by my hand, heretic!

Yet when the bolts reached the man, they simply...vanished.

What?

Half submerged in the tilted shadows, the man's eyes blazed like vivid sapphires. The man lowered his arm, and Tilwen swore he could see a ripple of golden light shudder down his throat before it disappeared from sight. As if...

As if he had eaten his Skill.

"F-fiend," the Initiate gasped. Then, louder to the rest of his men still recovering from the attack. "Fiend! Everyone! To arms!"

The explosion from behind caught Tilwen completely off guard. A surge of air Mana threw him off his feet and tore his Acolytes to bloody pieces. The Initiate tumbled forward, trying to keep his senses on the devastation behind him as well as the monster before him. The Fiend was gone however.

Where are Nieves and Alton? Those explosions...Far too late, Tilwen had a stroke of realization, just as the sound came rushing back like water draining from his ears. Illusion magic. HUERK!

Tilwen gasped in pain and looked down to see a black-scaled arm sticking out of his chest. Baffled, he followed it up and up, until he saw the jagged toothed grin of...of a monster.

"Mine," it snarled at him. Hate burned with azure light in its vile eyes.

Light flooded him, blessed and holy. The very core of his being swept through Tilwen's senses in a cascade of shimmering motes. It winked out, just as his Diurnal Reach before it, and there was darkness.

And then nothing at all.

You Have Killed Tilwen Goar, Initiate of the Inviolate Order!

XP Earned!

Felix stood above the Initiate, panting as if he'd just sprinted a damn mile. Power coursed through his channels, stolen Mana and Essence that deposited a storm of potency into his core. The temptation to eat the entire bastard was strong, something that Pit clearly felt was what the man deserved, but Felix held himself back. Perhaps he wouldn't have been able to before he'd Tempered the Skill, for even now it was like holding back the tide itself.

Ravenous Tithe is level 55!

Felix drained the man's Mana and left his body mostly alone. Bits of blood and flesh came along with the Mana, but he hadn't rendered the Initiate's entire body into smoke. He figured that, eventually, he'd have to take his Tithe without raising too many suspicions, so he might as well practice it now. He pulled his black-scaled arm from the rapidly cooling corpse and let his arm painfully revert back to normal flesh. With a grimace, Felix spat out a bunch of sharp fangs as his regular teeth regrew within his mouth.

Ugh. The worst. Pit chirruped in cheery agreement.

As the hot sensation of power poured through him, Felix looked around. They had scouted the immediate area before initiating their attack and had discovered no other teams within close proximity. Two buildings north, however, there seemed to be some activity and judging by how the Initiate had yelled at the end, they were close enough to hear their shouts. Thankfully, we've got Thangle. The man's Obfuscation Skill had proven just the element they needed to shut them down.

"Black teeth but that was brutal," said Gnome exclaimed as he hopped out of a nearby doorway. The others also filtered in from different vantages around the courtyard, with Evie alighting nearby like a ghost and Vess clomping hard to the dusty flagstones. "I can't believe you took them out before the demesne went down."

"Thanks go to Vess on that one," Felix grunted, flexing his hand as he focused on pressing all of his newly gained Mana down into his spinning core. Not the abyssal void at the center, but the bright outer edge. The stolen Mana burned away, bit by bit. "Those spears really did the trick."

"Indeed. Save that I did not intend to detonate them," Vess said with some heat. She stepped toward the remnants of the Acolytes, now mostly in chunks. "Evie was to incapacitate them, as we had planned."

"Yeah, I'm not sure how that happened," Evie added. "I couldn't even make my Bindings of the White Waste stick. It was like--"

"Like the Mana was in flux," Thangle whispered. He lifted his arm and gathered a collection of congealed light; Mana Gauge, just like Portia. Felix tilted his head just as Thangle looked over his shoulder, directly at him. "Something destabilized the Mana within my demesne, which sent the Mana Skills into decay."

Felix felt his guts go cold at the same time his core flashed with a final burst of blue-white fire.

Did Ravenous Tithe do that? When he'd eaten the Initiate's light bolt spell out of the air, he knew a lot of ambient Mana had come along for the ride. Does this mean I can mess up Mana Skills without even touching them?

You Have Finished Digesting Your Target's Mana!

You Have Gained A Memory!

View?

Y/N

Huh. The notification knocked his new thoughts on Ravenous Tithe right out of his head. He'd never been given a choice on viewing stolen Memories. It didn't change what he planned to do, but it would definitely be nice going forward.

"Folks, I'm gonna check a Memory here. I'll be out for...hopefully just a few minutes." Felix met Vess' and Evei's gaze and they nodded.

Yes.

As always happened, the world went grayscale while a ripple across reality flexed everything into strange dimensions. Within moments, the ripple intensified and fell inwards, sucked into a single point of darkness that became everything.

Off he went.

The darkness became the Void, spreading around him infinitely in all directions, but a simple and familiar act of Will shattered the black into a kaleidoscopic landscape. Hundreds, then thousands, then millions of Tilwen Goars spread out all around him. Each one slightly different than the next, wearing different clothes or with wounds, though most of the largest changes were more distant. This was a visualization of the Initiate's life, of each Memory to which Felix now had access.

And he could only choose one.

Thankfully, the unique features of Ravenous Tithe allowed him to intuit impressions from each Memory as he glanced at them. Small pieces, things that could be misleading, but it was the only way forward. Felix focused on not freaking out as the Memories crowded up against him, letting his senses inspect the Initiate's most recent recollections.

There.

Felix reached out with his Will and Intent and grabbed hold of a Memory in full armor without smudge or stain on its brilliant red cloak. The moment he held it within his grasp, the space around him shattered again, and this time the Memory expanded to become his entire vision.

He was Tilwen, standing among tall dilapidated buildings. A grey cliff-face loomed nearby, streaked liberally with earthy red, and he could see a large opening that was filled with darkness. The mine shaft.

Beside him were two other people, both Human, wearing the white-enameled plate armor favored by the Inquisition. What's more, they all carried a blade at their side, steel chased with gold, the symbol of an Initiate's authority in the Order.

"--ten more Acolytes with me," one of them was saying. He was a swarthy man with a short, dark, well-maintained goatee. Someone important, at least according to Tilwen's roiling emotions. "Inquisitor DuFont has sent two more Initiates with their own cohorts, but they're taking a sweep through the eastern Dust now. Trying to round up whoever they can for the mine."

"Good, then we'll have a fresh supply of workers," Tilwen said with a sense of satisfaction. "When will they arrive, sir?"

The other Initiate shrugged. "Soon enough I suspect. These Untempered dullards can't stand up against even the weakest of our Acolytes."

"That's true. Only the Guild could stand up to us here, and well," a low chuckle escaped Tilwen's lips. "They're preoccupied at the Wall. Soon, Inquisitor DuFont will control half of the city."

"As it must be," murmured the third of their group, an older man with a large, drooping mustache. "The Pathless send that we can save these heretics from themselves before all is lost to these monsters."

Tilwen mentally sneered at the old man. Felix watched his thoughts tumble around the idea of killing him and making it look like an accident, even going so far as to eye a nearby pile of fallen masonry before dismissing the idea as premature. The fool's time will come soon enough, Tilwen thought.

Felix scowled from within him while Pit bristled at the casual cruelty in the bastard's thoughts. They were a matryoshka doll of disgust. Given the example he'd already set, Felix felt he shouldn't be surprised, yet he was.

I'm really glad I killed this dude, Felix sent to Pit who trilled in agreement.

In the near distance there was a scuffling and fall as men and women in thick iron collars and chains fell to the ground. Shouting began, mostly by the Acolytes that were escorting these people across the space. Tilwen's thoughts touched on them a moment, eyeing the elision collars around their necks before dismissing the captured miners as far beneath his notice.

So there are some Tempered among the miners captured, Felix observed. The collars were a cruel sort of restraint that cut off the Tempered from their core, made with twisted spikes on the interior that also drained a person's Mana and kept it artificially low. It left prisoners weakened and more easily captured if they ever managed to free themselves.

Around the miners and escorting Acolytes were more of the rank and file zealots. Redcloaks fluttered in the early afternoon light as they shifted corpses to the side, some of whom looked a lot like the corpses piled in their own courtyard. But Felix also noticed at least three corpses in white-enameled armor. A fight had happened here, and it hadn't gone perfectly for the Inquisition.

"What of the fighter? Have you seen him since they collapsed the mine section?"

The older Initiate answered. "No. He has stayed within the shaft, but we've lost two more to a scouting foray into the mine. He is strong, and has a number of miners at his back. I would not underestimate his capabilities, not in a location such as this where we cannot bring to bear our numbers."

"Wise words," Tilwen said, while his insides twisted with loathing for the old man. The swarthy Initiate nodded as well.

"We will do well to listen to your experience, Garant. Let us secure the area and await reinforcements, then. Tilwen, if you would be so kind as to oversee the collection and return of our newfound resources?"

"As you will, Third Flame."

The Memory faded so quickly it was five seconds before Felix realized he'd been thrust back to his Body. He opened his eyes and found he'd been dragged into the shadow beside one of the laden wagons. More importantly, an eye the size of teacup blinked at him from inches away.

"AH!"

"SQUAAAWWW!"

The avum yanked its head back in alarm at his outburst, and the wagon began moving away from him. Felix leveraged himself to his feet as the frightened avum startled the rest of the team. "Whoa whoa! Shh shh!"

"Forged Calm," said a high voice, and a net of purple vapor swirled around the two avian heads, stilling their movement and making their large eyes half-close. Thangle emerged from the other side of the wagon to pat one of the avums' legs. "Easy boys, easy."

Thangle looked up at Felix. "You're pretty good at scaring everybody, huh?"

Felix frowned and looked for the others. They had been near another cart, carefully loading what looked like...Ah.

They'd been putting the dead into one of the carts.

"You finished with your," Evie gestured vaguely at him. "Memory thing?"

Felix smiled. "Yeah. I got some insight into our redcloak friends." He recounted what he'd seen and felt during the Memory, noting the number and placement of the Inquisition. He even sketched out a general layout into the dusty soil that had drifted over the flagstones. Vess tapped her foot in thought as she listened.

"So we have two more Initiates, one of which is older and experienced and the other is more powerful," Vess reiterated.

"And at least twelve more Acolytes."

"Third Flame, huh? That mean somethin'?" Evie asked.

"They're like lieutenants in traditional fighting forces," Thangle explained. "Like the Lady Dayne suggests, I imagine he will be stronger than this one was."

He gestured at a pile of dead redcloaks that had been shoved unceremoniously into the darkest corner of the yard.

"So we take it slow and careful. Scout ahead again," Felix suggested, and Vess nodded.

"Cautiously," she added. "If we cannot take them, then we must wait for reinforcements that Cal is sending."

"And they'll get here before the Inquisition's own?" Felix asked. "I don't know how much time we have."

"We can't let them dictate the pace though. Gotta be sensible. Rory's in that mine, sounds like, and he's more'n enough to handle a few Initiates," Evie said, but hesitated when Felix and Vess both looked at her in surprise. "What? I can't make sensible decisions?"

"Er, no, you're right," Felix said with an anxious smile. He'd rather rush in an get Rory out of there, along with the miners. No one should have to be put in chains like that. "Slow and steady."

"Don't forget. I've still got some tricks up my sleeve," Thangle added. "Maybe we can make their caution work against them."

The Gnome waggled his fingers and several transparent shapes swirled into being above his hand. Evie laughed.

"Now that's an idea!" She slapped him on the shoulder. "I really like this guy!"

Vess' own smile was tight, and Felix could practically see the wheel turning as she came up with a plan. "That is ingenious, Thaddeus. Thank you."

"Oh. You're very welcome, Lady Dayne." Thangle blushed until he was more pink than white.

"Please, call me Vess." She dropped down into a crouch and pointed at the diagram Felix had drawn. "We can make this work. Here's how..."