WARNING!
A Cardinal Beast Approaches!
The gods were blasted back.
Vess stood cradling her left arm, staring at Felix in awestruck horror. Where he had been bound was now a pillar of liquid smoke, cast from a purple so dark it was nearly black and limned with flres of red-gold and blue-white. She could still see Felix within it, his head thrown back as his Core Manifestation tore out of every one of his Mana Gates at once. The column of smoke grew, billowing outward and upward until it dwarfed the Divine Vessels around him.
The Twins' heads shook behind their rift, a strange protomouth stretching wide across its inhuman features. Rage poured forth like a furious concerto, so hard and heavy that Vess' Affinity buckled beneath the weight of it—but not before she felt something else.
Fear.
Kill The Abomination!
The Divine surged forward, Noctis, Yyero, and a flickering Vellus leaping for Felix's gathering power. Godly might crashed upon him in waves, throwing Vess back against a statue that cracked beneath her weight. Icy shadow, rotting clouds, and a cascade of bloody lightning collided with the Beast. She straightened, back aching, just in time to glimpse a pair of familiar blue eyes meeting hers before Felix vanished completely.
Felix…
White flashed in her peripherals and her Perception flared. Vess twisted, wings driving downward to thrust her away—but not fast enough. An alabaster staff crashed into her trailing leg, met by a surge of red-gold scales that formed around Vess’ calf. They shattered instantly, but the sunburst staff was deflected into the gold-inscribed floor.
Vess spun, Spears manifesting around herself and launching in the same fluid moment. Ocalla deflected them all, the weapons exploding harmlessly dozens of feet away.
"Impressive.” She licked her lips. Her smooth, ageless face creased into a wild grin. "But not enough."
Felix's view of Vess vanished as the gods assaulted the Beast.
Felix sat within its gargantuan body and screamed. Red-gold fire poured from his lips and blue-white lightning sparked from his fingertips, catching within the purple-black shape of the Beast. A familiar potency was there among the Chalice's power. Bloody and raw, it flowed from the depths of the cup where it had been stored. Mana, Essence, and significance enough to run riot through Felix's core.
You Have Digested Your Target.
The Dread Is No More.
You Have Gained A Memory!
Absorbing The Skull Fragment Of Veridaan!
Progress 15% > 64%
Ssev was gone, and in his place, a wild strength ran through Felix's veins—one that felt unlike any monstrosity he'd consumed before, save one. The memory of that beast uncoiled through him like a serpent. The Ravager King. The twisted Primordial Spawn that had inherited a large mass of the Maw's power.
No wonder the fragment was absorbed by so much. He regarded his sparking hands, talons extended like curved blades from each fingertip. He sat within the Beast, surrounded on all sides by Divine Vessels looking to murder him. Yet as he acclimated to the pain of the Chalice inside of him, a piece of him could only marvel at the Core Manifestation around him.
In addition to the Beast's highly defined hands and forearms, things that Felix had developed during the earliest stages of his Core Manifestation, a crude head had formed. It was more detailed than previously, bearing a defined jaw, fangs, and the beginnings of cheekbones. The eyes, however, were the true advantage. Felix could see now. Like windows into the outside world, he was surrounded by transparent panels in every direction. He twisted his Body, held fast in the Manifestation's center, but rotating to look at the savage destruction closing in on him.
The gods were trying to kill him.
You Will Not Rise Again, Cardinal!
The Twins’ voices chased after Felix as he and the gods fell off of En’cridhe’s side and through the air, trading blows like rabid animals. Though the Twins did not join them,Yyero, Noctis, and Vellus had all focused on him at once, their varied powers tearing at the purple-black smokestuff that formed the Beast.
You Cannot Stop Us, the Beast rumbled through Felix's lips. Adamant Discord!
Lightning blasted upward, arresting their fall as the Beast seized their connection to the sky.
What the hell?
Felix gaped at the lightning that flickered through his shadowstuff containment. Since when could the Beast use his Skills?The gods followed as they rose, but it was a cautious pursuit. Their fervor dimmed as blue-white lightning played across the stormy skies, tethered to the Beast’s scaled fists. It was Noctis that broke their silence.
Kill It! Shadowflay!
Lashes of darkness sliced into the Beast, stripping the purple-black from its haunches and back. Yyero followed, an explosion of vile ichor tearing across the Manifestation’s chest, and Vellus rained bloody bolts from the sky.
Your Stolen Might Means Nothing Here!
The Beast wasn’t daunted in the slightest. Its maw stretched wide, crooked fangs glowing blue-white while his tongue and throat flared like a red-gold furnace. The Beast lunged, sinking its teeth into Noctis’ shadowy leg.
Empyrean Embrace!
Shadowflesh gave way to fangs both physical and ethereal, and Noctis cried out in a high pitched wail as a chunk of her thigh was torn free.
I Deny You! The Twins burst free of the Deadlands, thrusting their closed fist forward into the air. God-flesh was ripped from between the Beast's jaws, drawn toward the Twins' clenched fist. It absorbed instantly into the conjoined god, expanding their presence instantly. Heel, Beast!
Blue-white light overcame Felix and his Beast as a bright cascade of lightning sent them hurtling back into the sky. They slammed into the barrier, back cracking on impact, while steel lines of connection held him a few seconds longer before fading.
What the hell? That was Adamant Discord…
Lingering lightning skittered across his Manifestation, leaving trails of char across its smoky flesh. Pain drew a roar from the Beast, but it only barely touched Felix. The Manifestation was a buffer, like a living suit of armor, and it did its job.
Warning!
Your Health Has Dropped Below 50%!
Barely.
The notification faded as his regeneration kicked in, but that was when the new pain settled across his Aspects.
Significance damage again, while the other gods can only dent my Health.
And they certainly did. The Divine followed him to the barrier like hounds on a hunt. Yyero clung to him like the diseases he so loved, his tall, angular form half-fluid as pestilence and fetid auras tried to drown Felix. Noctis flickered through the sky, traveling through shadows cast by her minions as they swarmed their location. She trailed fog and frost, a diabolical cold that made his Manifestation’s unformed body congeal into sluggish billows of ill-formed Intent.
Vellus crashed into them, her lightning tearing the Manifestation apart, which in turn drew more and more Essence and Mana from Felix's cores. The Bloodstorms swirled, joining the fight as cyclones spun around their battle there in the center of the city.
The shield still stood, keeping Felix from fleeing too far, but the Beast wasn't interested in hit-and-run tactics. It ripped and tore at the gods, savaging them with fists studded with spikes and scales. The Divine were pummeled back, again and again, but each time they returned, their forms unharmed and undaunted. Their attacks hurt, but they weren't going to kill the Beast unless the Twins attacked him faster…and the conjoined god seemed reluctant to leave their rift.
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The Beast attacked, snapping its jaws over Yyero's grotesque head. Empyrean Embrace thrummed through Felix, sounding from the depths of his ringing core space, only to be thwarted instantly. Lightning hit them, their mouthful torn free and yanked down once again to the Twins.
Warning!
Your Health Has Dropped Below 25%!
Felix cursed. "Stop trying to eat them!”
We Cannot Help Our Nature, Scion!
We Feed Because We Must, Or Else Our Harmony Dissolves To Dissonance!
“We need their power to maintain the Core Manifestation?"
The Beast didn't answer. It only raged.
The three Divine defended, barely turning aside the rapid pugilism of the once-Cardinal. Though they were still chained, their rifts to the Deadlands shrunk, and En’cridhe's amplifying effect dimmed, their Divinity could not be denied. They were as immovable and eternal as mountains…unless he devoured them. The Twins wouldn’t allow that, though.
Their weakness to the Beast’s attacks made sense. They’re losing their buffs to manifest here in the Corporeal…but why isn’t that affecting the Twins?
Felix was pretty sure he knew. It glowed, blue-white, within a massive, conjoined fist. The reason the Twins could affect Bonds and use Adamant Discord, and the source of their strange potency.
The last piece of Siva’s core.
The Blood Beast Was Right, the Beast roared, its voice only for him. Bonds Give You Strength. The Unseen Tide Calls To All, But Only the Scion May Truly Command It!
Felix floated within the inky dark, his center a conduit for titanic powers that raged beyond his control. His Mind raced, a Bond between him and the core in the hands of the Twins. It was not Enmity, nor Fellowship. He could feel it. Hatred was hot and sour, and Fellowship was a warmth that drained even as it fulfilled. This was something else…the name of it rose from within him, unbidden.
The Bond of Kinship.
Part of Veridaan’s power, it echoed within Felix. A reverberation that touched the deepest part of him, where the Divine Tree joined with his Ten Pillars, and his dual cores ground out Dissonance and Harmony above the endless abyss.
It was there, in his heart.
The Bonds, Scion! Claim Them!
Felix reached out, Adamant Discord surging within him to the sound, following the flow of his Affinity. His core space rang in unison, his Skills igniting, all at once singing an arcane, lilting melody.
A beam as thick as En’cridhe itself stretched down to the rifts far below, and the metallic blue Divine that hunched within. It pulsed, dragging at the Twins, and with every ounce of his Will, Felix hauled back. The Twins yelped, a sound he'd never heard a Divine make, and they were pulled forward, their head and shoulders yanked through the rift and into the Corporeal Realm.
Siblings! the Twins cried, clutching at the core remnant in their fist as it was dragged upward, their arms trembling. Help Us!
Felix pulled back, and the Beast joined him, a manifested arm flexing as lightning sparked between their two points. The Twins were dragged forward, hips free of the rift…until Noctis, Yyero, and Vellus piled upon their kin. The advance stopped.
Harry His Followers! Noctis commanded. Force Them To Draw Upon Their Bond Of Fellowship! Vellus! Drain His Power!
The sparking scrap of Divinity pulled away from the others, lifting her ill-formed face to the heavens. Crimson lightning spat into the sky and outside the barrier, the Bloodstorm roused into a frenzy.
Stormwinds and sheets of bloody lightning crashed into Felix’s fleet like a tidal wave. The godslaves surged, attacking his people with a renewed ferocity. Though he still hauled back with all his Will, a distant awareness intruded on Felix’s single-minded effort. His people were being hurt. They were dying.
Felix clenched his teeth. Take what you need!
The Bonds of Fellowship thrummed within him, drawing his gaze. Blue-white eyes burned across thousands of survivors, lending each of them newfound Strength and Will. Red-gold scales enhanced their Endurance and Vitality, turning aside attacks that would have killed them before. Skills sang from their cores, bursting from their myriad limbs with a newfound potency.
Empowered by pieces of the Fiend.
Godslaves died. Yet despite all of that, his people were being overwhelmed.
Crown of Elysium Detected!
Set Effect 1 - Vital Aegis - Activated!
Vital Aegis - Empower the Bonds of flesh. You have become a living conduit of protection for all that follow under your banner. For a limited time, you may choose to take on the wounds of those within the same Territory as yourself, suffering the consequences that directly impact their Bodies in their place.
The severing of connections ceased. Wounds that would have ended lives and bypassed their boosted defenses were transferred across their thickening Bonds back to Felix himself. A thousand attacks struck him all at once, blasting against his reinforced flesh so quickly and so tremendously that for a moment his breath was driven from him.
Yet, it made little difference. Most godslaves couldn’t touch him, and those that could dent his scales were nullified by his ridiculous regeneration. Mortal blows to his people became a soft wave of impacts that Felix drove from his awareness. Vital Aegis thrummed within him, emanating from the Chalice in his chest. The power was like drinking the sun, and it poured through his core space, across those innumerable connections, as if he were radiating light itself.
The Beast howled, the Bloodstorm concentrating upon them in a hammer of crimson light. It slammed them down toward the outbuildings of the palace, but a laugh echoed from the almost-cardinal as it arrested their fall. This Cannot Stop Us. None Of You Can. Adamant Discord!
The Beast rose up, blue-white lightning combating crimson as they blasted into the sky, taking on the gods. Together, Felix and the Beast hauled upon the Bond of Kinship. The Twins were yanked off their feet, pulled nearly halfway through the rift once more before Noctis, Yyero, and Vellus could leverage their own Wills.
They loomed large, their powers swirling, blood mingling with shadow and sizzling with rot as their powers twined together.
Already You Fail,
the Beast gloated and Felix pulled them closer along the Bond of Kinship.Their physical forms had thinned as their power reached the limits of what they could touch. Yyero started, staring down at himself. We Waste Away!
Noctis turned her empty face to the tower top. Hierophant! Sunder The Chains!
Ocalla was nowhere to be seen. Still, the Ouranic Bindings above creaked, trembling with flashes of searing, prismatic light. The links were breaking.
Lightning burned across the Beast, tangling deep within to invade the center where Felix was cradled. He bared his teeth. His people were in terrible danger, the gods were moments from being freed…and the Beast thundered through his soul.
That Core Is Ours! The Beast howled in sympathetic wrath. Devour The Thieves Of Ages! Devour The Gods! We Must Be Whole Again!
The chains groaned.
The once-Cardinal pulled all the harder, eager to fight no matter the consequences—and a piece of Felix quailed. It pushed back at him. A voice that echoed so deep that Felix couldn't tell where it came from.
This isn't you!
He shoved the voice away, but it came back, its connection to him too strong to ignore, even among the thrum of Chalice-borne enchantment.
That thing isn’t you! It has no plan or thoughts! It’s all instincts. Urges.
Above them, the chains shook, the melted links beginning to spread—nearly ready to snap. The Divine's power surged by the smallest of margins as they reached into reserves they did not possess only moments before.
You need a plan, Felix, please.
It wasn't a voice within him, Felix realized. It was Pit, speaking to him through their Bond. With great effort, he released his hold on the Bond of Kinship. The Twins and other gods and the rest of the Divine fell back, the steel line gone slack. They tumbled, half of them falling back into the rifts and crashing like giant trees in the dust of the Deadlands.
They rose swiftly back to their feet, strange angles and unkempt flesh reknitting as they strode through the rifts once more.
He Weakens, Yyero purred.
He Is Up To Something.
Vellus crackled. Kill Him!
Listen to me, Beast! Listen and we win! Felix, nestled within the manifested form of the hulking Beast, reached out, and for once the Cardinal followed him.
The gods flowed forward, halos of their Divine power igniting about their ill-wrought Vessels. Death, writ large behind their unstoppable, riotous strikes.
Adamant Discord.
Lightning burned from Felix, acting like nothing else before. The world itself was their Bond. Felix could touch it all—an ocean at his very fingertips. Lightning in his hands. All connections. All Bonds.
Mine.
He sought out the chains, the golden bindings of Ouranic Law, and layered on his power. He gestured, and the brilliant blue-white eyes within his palms seared into the chains, the links reforged with blinding lightning, Bonds strengthening as it tumbled out of Felix's control.
Empire Detected!
Nymean Authority Detected!
Authority Recognized, Inheritor!
Ouranic Binding Reinforced!
In a sweeping gesture, the eye in his left hand blasted at the Divine, throwing them back into the rifts. They screeched, their powers pulled away from their control by Ouranic Law itself as they temporarily tumbled out of the Corporeal. With a crackling snap, the rifts vanished.
The Divine with them.
Felix and the Beast roared in triumph.