Chapter 592: Facing the Abyss Again

With the battle against the Deepclaw over, Kai found himself strangely off balance. It was the next morning, somehow, and the incursion had been officially started for over a day. His mind was constantly seeing the Deepclaw under the ground or trying to come up with more strategies even though the fight was over.

And it was over: he could feel the new essence within him. Simple but immensely powerful. He'd have to do something with it... once he had the presence of mind to use it properly.

Fortunately, his disorientation wasn't harming anything, because for the first time since the start of the incursion, he wasn't urgently needed. What he needed to do most now was to recover so that he could be useful, and they needed to wait for a teleporter anyway. Sheiri was handling the details, and he was more grateful for that than for the role she'd played buying him time.

Despite all his distractions, Kai had shifted back to the combination of essences he'd planned for the incursion. If things did go wrong, he'd be prepared.

Even though he had yet to get the overall picture of the incursion, he felt reasonably positive. The elites he'd spoken to seemed to imply that they had come through relatively well, for the first day. Now they needed to deal with the surviving monsters, both individual strong ones and hordes. His sense for the timing of the incursion was distorted because he'd started so much earlier than normal, fighting with the elites at the Frontier instead of only seeing the horde that reached Monskon City, long after the true start.

When he felt Gunjin arrive, first he checked for the Deepclaw teleporting, then ignored it... then realized that he was ignoring the person he was waiting for.

"What's the situation?" Kai asked, leaping to his feet.

"Take it easy," Gunjin told him. "You took a nation-destroyer out on your own, so don't push yourself."

"So long as I'm not fighting, I'm recovering. What's the current situation?"

"We can lay it out for you." Sheiri stepped up beside him in order to create her liquid metal map of the continent, but otherwise it seemed like she intended to support what Gunjin said. They had apparently talked about her proposal to go to the center before teleporting over, and that interested him as soon as he checked up on everyone.

"This incursion has seen average numbers of hordes, but unusual activity among stronger monsters." As Gunjin spoke, the liquid metal map shifted to show representations of the monsters spreading out from the center across the Frontier. "We've seen higher numbers of strong ones, especially city destroyers, but there have been a total of three nation destroyers. That would normally be an apocalyptic result, the type that only appear as disasters in the records."

Those three appeared as skulls on the map, in the south, east, and northwest. Based on the location, Kai recognized the southern one as the Deepclaw, which he'd taken out. That left two others, threatening Irun and potentially the border between the Elemental Nations and Krysal.

"Omilaena took out the one in Irun," Gunjin explained. "She's in recovery now and stated that she intends to catch up with you for some reason. Your experiment at the abyss will have to come first due to limited resources."

"And what about the last one?" Kai asked.

"We took it on conventionally with a group of elites. Thanks to you three handling such large areas, and the Elemental Nations border being in good shape, we had more elites than usual. Three taken out of action due to heavy wounds, but no actual losses."

"So... does that mean we've eliminated the biggest threats? The incursion is actually going well?"

"It would be premature to declare victory, especially because of the holes in the wall." Gunjin grimaced and gestured to Sheiri, who made multiple points of the Frontier wall collapse. "As expected, our repaired walls weren't nearly as durable as the originals. The only one to survive was the Goralian wall that was only damaged, but all the others had new holes blown in the repaired sections."

"The Irunian one is the most bitter loss," Sheiri put in. "Your wife went to great effort to stop the nation-destroyer from hitting the wall, but it only protected it for a few hours. While she was fighting it, normal monsters eventually took down the wall anyway."

"Though with considerable losses. Irun is under control... the same cannot be said for Krysal. With three holes, the monsters are forming three massive hordes. As we recover and regroup, that will be our primary focus. We can't let the Krysali disaster spill over into Goralia, and the Elemental Nations can only send so much support."

As he looked over the map, Kai knew that was an oversimplification. With so much area and so many monsters, there would be almost endless problems remaining. The behemoth he had fought last time, which could have destroyed Monskon City, would barely have rated on a continent-wide map like this.

But that was why he had put so much work into building up the Frontier nations. He and the elites needed to focus on the biggest problems and trust that the others could save themselves. It sounded like, despite the surprises and damaged walls, the first day had been a success: they had blunted the hordes and spread them out.

"How likely are more monsters to emerge?" Kai asked. "Major threats, I mean."

"That varies year by year," Gunjin said, glancing toward the center instinctively. "Minor monsters are still crawling out of the pit, and we need our resources elsewhere. Normally, we would expect a few more city destroyers that we have to deal with in the aftermath. But it could get worse if people throw more energy at the center, as you intend to do."

"I know there's a risk, but I've been waiting: I think this is the time to take that risk. You yourself said we can't win with the status quo, and part of overcoming that means understanding what we're facing. This might be the only time we can learn more about the incursions."

Gunjin raised his hands as if in surrender. "I was only stating the risk, not arguing. We intend to go as soon as everyone is ready."

That didn't take long - apparently they were only waiting for another elite to arrive and Gunjin to recover. He didn't intend to get anywhere near the abyss, so he was handing them off to another teleporter. While they waited, Kai considered his monstrous essence again, wondering if any of his skills would be relevant.

It was possible that they'd trigger a response and he'd have to fight something like the Starvation Wraith again. Just in case, Kai returned Famished World to his soul. He thought they needed to take the risk, but if it did cause problems, he'd take care of them himself.

Hopefully. Though Behemoth's Heart made normal movement comfortable, his deep reserves had absolutely not been replenished.

The other elite to join them proved to be Plinkesa - he hadn't seen the lamia in a long time. She slithered closer, greeting Sheiri with a wave, and focused on him. "Hey there, Kai! I wish I could have seen your fight, but I was busy with the other nation destroyer."

"Sounds like you had a hard time too," Kai said. "You have anything like this on Rosemount?"

"No, not at all. Everyone thinks Deadwaste is weak, but the monsters that come out at the incursion... they're pretty bad. It's strange, because I'd say it feels like the incursion weakens everything else. Those are just my impressions, though, and Gunjin thinks I'm mistaken."

It turned out that Plinkesa had her own curiosities about the pit, so she had volunteered to join his little trip to the center. Sheiri was sticking around, which meant it was the three of them plus the teleporter, a quiet Windborn woman who was speaking with Gunjin. Once they were done, she swept them all up in a wave of mana-rich wind and they arrived in the center.

Immediately Kai felt the hunger surging within him, stronger than it had been since the battle of the gods last incursion. The abyss felt active in a way he couldn't explain. Just another reason they needed to go investigate, as far as he was concerned. There were monsters crawling out, but in far lower numbers, so Kai consumed them with Legion Bite as he walked forward.

"Last time I was here, people looking into the pit died," he explained as they walked.

"So you're telling us 'hey, go look'?" Plinkesa said with a chuckle.

"Those were untrained civilians, so I'm just telling you to be cautious. When I looked in, I couldn't see anything. Whatever was going on, one of those strange alien beings thought it was interesting enough to investigate, so I think it's worth our time."

They had walked closer to the edge now, drawing more attention from the monsters. Sheiri lashed out with her whip occasionally, and Plinkesa could toss monsters with a flip of her tail, but none of them really needed to act against monsters like these. Taking action was just a good way to relieve tension as they approached the unknown.

When they reached the edge of the pit, Kai moved ahead of the others and looked down. Once more, he saw nothing but the gaping emptiness falling into darkness. Even though he'd explored deep into it, the circle of darkness remained a disturbing mystery to him... enough. Kai used a Tyrant's Claw to clear away all the nearby monsters and gestured to the others.

"Alright, take a look."

Sheiri and Plinkesa moved forward, looked down... and began to scream.

Kai stared for a moment, helpless: whatever was happening to them felt disturbing to his senses, as if they were being assaulted on a soul-deep level. They didn't melt immediately like the civilians he had seen before, but he knew they were dying. Had he just brought two elites to pointless deaths?

No, he couldn't allow it: acting on monstrous instincts, Kai unleashed Famished World around himself, trying to seize control of the area. As his power wrapped around the elites, he pulled them back from the edge of the abyss. They all staggered away and the tainted distortion of the world seemed to quiver and fade.

Thankfully the two were both alive, though Sheiri was gasping on her knees and Plinkesa coiled herself limply. When they had the strength, they moved further away from the edge.

"That was... a threat I've never felt before." Sheiri clutched the front of her robes, gripping her heart. "Like I was being... unmade. I've been here so many times, it's never... it was like it was radiating death... no, anti-life..."

"I think there's something down there." Plinkesa glared toward the pit suspiciously. "It's not chakra, qi, or mana... it felt a lot more like a monster. But not an actual monster. I don't even know how to say it..."

"Wait, you felt something?" Kai asked. "Something deeper?"

"I'm surprised you didn't. Aren't you attuned to monsters?"

"I don't... wait here and keep the others off. Let me look again."

When he shifted to the edge, uncertain despite everything, Kai still saw only an empty pit. Other than an intensified distortion of the world, he didn't sense any of the anti-life that Sheiri had spoken about. Then again, given his monstrous nature, that was to be expected. It wasn't crazy to think that there was some sort of monstrous power causing the incursion that threatened others but wouldn't harm him.

Instead he crouched and tried to seek lower, following what Plinkesa had said. His first instinct was to seek out monsters, by smell or by hunger, which turned up nothing. Well, if the effect was based on the soul, it might be more subtle... Kai tried to set aside all preconceived notions and just seek for anything...

Then he felt it: a throbbing core of nothingness.

The intensity of it, hidden until that moment, took his breath away. It reminded him of the fleshy core that he'd eaten deep within the pit, which was somehow tied to the monsters. He couldn't explain how he drew that connection, it just felt similar, except this one was a spiritual entity. Even if he flew all the way down, he didn't think there would be anything he could grasp. Kai considered going down anyway, in case he could end the incursion by destroying it, and decided that wasn't worth the risk when the incursion was already threatening so many.

After they didn't uncover anything else, they retreated from the pit. Few other monsters were incited to attack, so the experiment seemed to have been harmless, even if they didn't get results. As they retreated, wiping out the new monsters, the others seemed a little disappointed.

Kai wasn't so dissatisfied. It seemed obvious that there was a power here, something that emerged during incursions. Maybe it took seven years to build up and spilled over in an incursion, or maybe it was just connected to whatever third phenomenon caused the monster hordes. But it seemed likely to him that the power manifested at different strengths every incursion, following Gunjin's patterns.

And so, seven years ago, it had manifested so intensely that it drew the attention of beings from incomprehensibly far away. They had been fighting over who would seize that power, and when the incursion ended, they had no more reason to fight.

He didn't have proof, yet Kai felt certain he was on the right track. For the first time he had something like an answer about the event that had broken his world.

Of course, it only lead to more questions. Why was there an abyss here and why did such things exist in the first place? He could theorize that the smaller pit on Rosemount was the same "technology" and that it wasn't large enough to cause devastating incursions or draw outside attention. But who would create such things? This incursion obviously wasn't worth their attention, but would all those greater powers return if there was another intense one?

"We'll keep an eye on it from a distance," Plinkesa told him. "We need to do that anyway, in case other big monsters come through. But I'll also pay attention to... whatever it was. Maybe we can learn something after all."

"I don't regret the experiment," Sheiri said, "but we can't take more time away. The Frontier nations need our help. Are you good to fight, Kai?"

"Not quite," he said, and he began to smile as his mind shifted back to the broader war. "But I have an idea."

(Cognosticon here. Amazon delayed too much for me to post on Wednesday, but things [should be] approved now. I'll do the audiobook announcement on Saturday.)