Music for today:
(Fancy link isn't working today)
https://youtu.be/_-2TXLiJ3UQ
Chapter 500: Echo
Mid Afternoon - Late Summer : Year 39 : Poseidon, Draconic Continent
-----
*Woooooooosh* The breeze was steady, cold, and damp as it curled over the edge of the caldera that afternoon—plunging a foggy mist into the basin before it was sucked down the channel like a titanic maw gasping for air.
But it was a lovely sight to see. After nearly a week of work, the channel to the city had been reopened, and the mountain could once again exchange its breath with Delphi's sky—half the channel sucking air in like a vacuum, and the other expunging it like it was poisonous.
"Hooooh..." -What a project this turned out to be...- Letting a heavy breath out as the fog ripped past me, sizzling as it brushed my scales, I coiled around to watch Hera flash cooling the final section of obsidian on the channel's lip opposite of me, over twenty kilometers away.
I almost wanted to laugh seeing how small she looked beside it, even in her full size form.
"Think the channel is big enough?"
Quickly pulling herself over the lip and slumping onto the mossy flat, she took several moments to breathe before glancing at me over her wing. "If this collapses again, you're cleaning it up on your own."
"Heh," I scoffed as the tension in my chest held back my laughter. "If this collapses, we'll have far bigger problems." Lowering my eyes into the channel, I looked at the glittering obsidian walls genuinely questioning if a collapse was even possible. -With all the titanium thread I wove into it, it'd be troublesome even for me to make it collapse.- And that was before it would be inevitably be strengthened by the ridiculous flow of mana from the ruins below.
But, Hera's worries weren't completely unwarranted.
Slowly turning to face the channel as well, Hera got a little more comfortable on her bed of moss before motioning down. "You don't think people building into the walls and carving through the obsidian will make it lose any integrity?"
Having extensively discussed what we wanted to do with Poseidon while we worked to clear the channel, Hera and I had come to quite a firm agreement. Poseidon wasn't going to just be our home, it was going to be the capital of the new Draconic Continent. The city would be rebuilt, and the island itself would once again become the center of draconic culture—of course becoming our home in the process.
However, while such ambitions meant the walls of the channel would inevitably be carved in or through, "No amount of structural integrity loss will matter so long as things are supported vertically."
Hera was quick to give a relieved, pleased nod. "Good. That means we can leave it to Reon."
I nodded promptly, smiling as Reon unknowingly shuddered in the cavern below. -He's really got his work cut out for him...-
From actually designing nearly the entire city, to needing to overlook and regulate just about everything around its construction, Reon was on track to needing a few disciples in order to have a moment of rest anytime soon.
However, if anything was made clear over the last week, it was that he was up for it.
Though, only when it came to the design and regulation. "He still needs a team."
Hera was quick to agree. "I already have some people in mind, but..." As things were, no one was allowed near here. "We need to do something about the burial aquifer."
I nodded with a whip of my tail as my expression fell dark. -Right...- It was a matter I had been putting off addressing while we worked on clearing the channel.
But just ignoring it wouldn't solve the problem. -We have to either learn more about it...- "Or bury it..." I mumbled beneath my breath.
Hera didn't need to hear me to know what I said though—pulling my eyes up to hers and holding it as if having a conversation without word before, "I'll trust your judgement."
My gaze thinned within hers—my tail stilling as my mind occupied with thought.
Truthfully.. no matter how much Hera trusted my judgement, I didn't trust it, myself. The burial aquifer was something we had to investigate, and yet I, the only one that seemed unaffected by the 'call', couldn't even touch the water without it breaking down the space mana reinforcing my body. -If I tried to dig down to it and the water collapsed in on me.. I'm really not confident I'd survive it.- The heavy metals weren't even the problem.
-But...- I really wasn't sure we had a choice. No realistic amount of mana or strength I could gain would make my body more resistant to breaking down, or any better at keeping the water and mana off me.
And waiting did nothing but delay the inevitable... With the mound of more pressing matters already approaching from the horizon.. I wasn't confident it would be worth the time. -We've already spent too much time here...-
"Haah..." But it's continued existence while knowing Hera would have to regularly come here on her own left.. something looming over me... -Delphi...- "~What do you think...~" My words slipped like a feeble whisper directed at someone I knew couldn't hear me. -If you were here.. what would you tell me...-
However, as my gaze fell down the channel, toward something far below the stony crust, molten mantle, and churning core.. a voice from another direction reached me.
"~I think we give it one last look.~" It was Hera, but this time with a tone that stirred something in the depths of my mind...
'Her' silhouette.
Delphi's...
"Hooh..." Forcing out one last breath, my eyes shut, hoping to suppress the infectious anxiety spreading through my chest before reopening with an unusual emptiness, and nodding. "Right..." Delphi's silence since my reincarnation had always sat at the back of my mind.. a looming storm I wasn't yet confident I could address.
But... -Maybe that's really her speaking...- Not the dragon, Hera.. but the goddess.
And I wasn't going to risk objecting if there was any chance that was the case.
"Let's.. give it one last look..."
-----
- Hera ??? ~
Following Vasilias down the maze of wide passageways leading to the burial aquifer, I was unusually tense. In the back of my mind, I told myself not to worry—no matter what happened, Vasilias was there to catch me.
But for some reason, my chest ached and my body tingled—each step welling doubt and worry I couldn't source... -What the hell is happening to me...-
Just moments ago, I spoke with such confidence it was unnatural.. like a voice separate from my own spoke through my maw.. and yet.. I couldn't object. I was anxious, yet resolute, as if worried, but sure that it was the right thing to do.
But distance only compounded my doubt. The closer we got to the aquifer, the more distant that confidence became...
Until we finally walked up to the aquifer's shoreline.. and all that was left was the quiver in my paw.
I was.. afraid. Not of death.. but of losing control...
Looking around the cavern, at the vines hanging from the ceiling, and grasses coating the shores of turquoise waters.. something was eating at me.
And Vasilias knew, even without me saying anything.
Coming to a pause in front of me, still some distance from the water, he sat down and motioned me to do the same.
From there, I couldn't hear the 'call' at all, yet for some reason my consciousness was already fighting something.. something seemingly within myself.
Though.. when Vasilias finally broke the silence, the fighting stopped, "Hera," And both sides of my mind sat to listen... "I want you to close off your senses, and focus on your mana, and divinity."
Feeling my quivering begin to settle, I nodded with a lingering uncertainty—lowering my snout, shutting my eyes, and detaching myself from my physical senses.
"~Just.. listen... Not for the ripples of water, or ambient churn of mana.. but for something.. deeper...~" He spoke slowly.. gently...
Caressing my attention toward.. a presence... *Woom* The moment I felt it, my whole body tensed.
-W..What.. is that...- Though faint, behind the wall of Vasilias's presence, I could see something.. hear it whirring... -Power...- An unfathomable mass.. trapped and squirming... Crying out for something...
"~Who.. are you..?~" I whispered.
But no voice replied...
"~Why.. are you crying..?"
No presence shifted...
Until, after merely observing in silence, something more physical moved... Tendrils of mana rising from the water—writhing across the ground—wrapping and coiling themselves around Vasilias's unmoving body almost possessively.
But he.. wasn't responding to it at all... -Am I.. imagining those things..?-
Remaining still, I watched as they coiled and winded around his body like entangling vines until nothing remained free from their grasp.. tilting my head as if to question why I was seeing them...
Until...
*SHRRRRKK* The instant I convinced myself it was all an illusion, the tendrils ripped Vasilias across the shore and without caring for his resistance, plunged him into the water. -V...- "VASILIAS?!"
I bolted forward with a scream—adrenaline soaking my body so deeply I thrashed, breaking through the force keeping me in place before diving after Vasilias reaching for me just below the water...
Until... *ripple* The moment my snout touched the water's surface, a sharp, tearing pain ripped through my body, and my eyes snapped open to find Vasilias's figure.. gone...
*Crack-fw-WOOOOOSH* Getting hurled by my tail, I was whipped around like a weight on a string before flying down the passage we entered and ricocheting the ceiling. *WHAAAAM*
My mind was blank—my senses still blurred with adrenaline—yet as I caught myself and looked up, found Vasilias standing over me with blood dripping from his mouth.. mine mixed with his own from where his teeth had sunk into my tail and one of my spines had pieced the roof of his mouth...
His eyes were empty and feral.. sharpened to the point of cutting the air...
If I so much as twitched, he wasn't going to just hold me back with his aura...
But.. I had to... *Woom* Feeling the presence from the water return, my eyes snapped into the cavern behind him, and to a far greater mass of tendrils.
Tendrils that weren't limited to my imagination as they were before. "V-VASILIAS!" I yelled as I scurried away—fracturing the floor as I desperately crawled down the passage—begging him to turn around. "W-WATCH OUT BEHIND YOU!"
But the instant he took his eyes off me, the tendrils.. stopped... -H..Huh..?- They.. faded... -Were those.. an illusion too..?-
The moment that doubt touched my mind though, one erupted from the ground beneath. *Shick*
Feeling a sharp pinch, a cold chill spread through me.. my chest tightened.. and with a drip of blood turning into a pour, I found a tendril pierced through my chest.. and reserve.
*Splat...* Blood drained from me like a waterfall—my senses blurred—my body washing with static as I lost balance and felt my consciousness waver.
My senses were.. moving away from my body... Sinking and expanding...
Until they completely detached themselves from my flesh.. and all that remained was.. an image...
As if my senses had blended with something far greater—larger—an image of the distant city, the caverns, and channels blended with a view of the aquifer.. the channel leading beneath the city, and the bubble at its end.
The bubble where the presence sat.. calling.. and crying...
And only then.. after my mind almost seemed to blend with it, did I hear a voice...
My own.. voice...
"~He must.. not.. dig...~" It was.. begging... "~He must.. not.. seek me...~"
It was desperate.. pitifully so...
And yet after its first cries.. it.. paused... "~Y..You...~"
Feeling it stir my chest, I felt its.. familiarity.
It.. recognized me... "~Another.. echo.. exists..?~" It sounded.. disbelieving... Distrusting...
But the moment it muttered those words, something deeper sirred within my being.. within my soul... -An.. echo..?-
It was like a memory.. distant and veiled with fog.. slowly gaining clarity...
Until the connection finally snapped. *KWOOOOOOOM*
My senses returned with a wave—instinct clashing with my consciousness as my eyes snapped open to find myself still sat beside the aquifer.. before Vasilias.. like nothing had happened. -That.. was all.. an illusion..?-
My chest wasn't pierced.. and Vasilias's maw wasn't dropping with a blend of our blood. -None of that... Happened..?-
Until finally, with a rapid churn of my stomach, I threw my head down and belched. "HUERK—"
Covering the ground with an emulsified blend of blood and flesh.
-----
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No next button?
NEXT ->
(You can read more of the rewrites on My Patreon!)
(In case Embedded Link doesn't work: https://www.patreon.com/TDOD )
-------------
Also, please feel free to check out our discord for all updates related to TDOD releases! https://discord.gg/Dv7G5bQD4v
All are welcome! Come and hang out!