Chapter 426 - Ever Forward

Chris

Ottawa

I sat upon a ledge of ice and watched the snow fall from the summer sky. Months now, we had been at this. Months this war had lasted, and I had long grown weary of the… weight that had to be bared.

Still, there were times, moments, that helped ease that weight, and now was one of those.

My Spirit, over the days and weeks, had slowly begun to knit itself back together. The tear that had nearly sheared it nearly in two had begun to slowly close. I had known the injury wasn’t permanent, but I also hadn’t expected it to last this long either.

Half a year, and my Spirit was just beginning to pull itself back together. It was an injury like no other, and I was only just now realizing how long it would be until the wound was healed.

Torn as it was, it did not leave me ignorant of the changes I was feeling. The hum that sometimes rippled through it. Those vibrations had once been accompanied by pain when the wound was still fresh, but now they were rather soothing.

Something about watching the snow accumulate over the city, especially now, in the midst of summer, caused that hum to stir inside me. I knew where the path ended, but it was the journey to get there that remained elusive.

Authorities were… different than other powers. There were none other like it. Skills, Spells, Laws, Runes, and Bloodlines came close, but there was a fundamental difference between those and an Authority.

Those followed guidelines. Rules. Structure, which Authorities stood without.

Skills and spells were expressions of mana or stamina fueled with intent and will, but they were not formless. There was a structure backing them, a matrix that held them up so that they may exert their will on the world.

Bloodlines were derived from essence and formed around that energy to facilitate its power.

Laws were expressed through our own will, but they were not ours. Like Runes, they were foundations for meaning that we tapped into, not created.

Authorities, though, were the first time that the will of the person asserted itself on the will of the world in a way that required nothing other than Spirit and the willpower to use it.

There were no crutches holding it up. No form that it leaned upon. It was a power derived only from the Spirit, and in doing so, required no outside source or external help.

It was what could make them one of the most powerful sources of strength, but it was also what could make them the weakest.

When power was derived from only one source, it could be influenced in no other way if that source was lacking. A weak Spirit led to a weak Authority, and there was no amount of stats, mana, or levels that would change that.

To make things even more tenuous, it wasn’t guaranteed that a strong Spirit led to a strong Authority.

Like Anchors, they had to be formed. Realized. In that process, even with a strong Spirit, they could be formed short of their best. Just as how Anchors before them could be forced from images or ideas not entirely perfect to explain who you were.

My First Authority still remained out of grasp, but I felt myself getting closer. Inching toward the finish line, even if it was only one small step at a time.

Taking that next Step was different than the first one. Harder.

Like Anchors, Authorities were entirely introspective, but unlike Anchors, they did not come with a question you had to ask yourself. There wasn’t a guiding thought you could work towards.

For Anchors, you delved into who you were. Examined the core of what made you you. They were the foundation that you built off of, but also kept your Spirit from crumbling under the weight of future power. An Authority without an Anchor would rip the Spirit apart. It was well documented and written about and always ended the same way, with the person’s Spirit extinguished.

Authorities were formed, at their core, by what they were. As their name suggested, they were the power to enforce.

Enforce what, you may ask?

Anything.

They could enforce anything you wanted them to. They expressed your will and enforced it upon the world. Whatever Authority was formed, your Spirit would enforce it on the world around you. Some called them domains, but they weren’t, truly. Those came later after forming more than one Authority.

They could cause light to dim and cause night to fall in the middle of the day. They could do the opposite, and enforce the sun to rise at night. They could turn winter into summer and summer into winter. They could affect more than just the environment, too.

They could enforce healing on those who need it. Enforce gravity on those near you. Enforce emotions like courage, bravery, and valor. Negative ones, too, like fear, despair, and cowardice. Even lust, in the case of some more… promiscuous races.

They could be turned inward, too. Enforce strength beyond your body’s ability. Enforce mana beyond your normal control. Enforce endurance beyond your limits. Fortitude beyond your means.

With such a wide range of what Authorities could be, and with no guiding question to seek the answer for, it made them the hardest to form. It was what made the Path of the Spirit so much harder than the Body or the Mind.

So I sat on my ledge of ice and listened to the dull hum inside me, hoping to grasp anything that would lead me further towards the right answer. To see the path forward.

My inward gaze saw nothing. It only felt the faint resonance and nothing beyond that.

“Chris,” A voice turned my attention outward to see Hal standing behind me, bow in hand. “It’s time.”

Old, partially healed cuts and new scars drew my eye. They were proof of the toll this war had caused. Everyone had a new scar that they didn’t have before I had called them to war. Some had missing limbs, instead of just scars.

And some… some had paid more than others.

Now it was time to do it again.

We had been outside Ottawa for over a month now, and it was time to see how high a toll the city would extract from me. How many coffins I would be forming after this was all over.

Three times I had brought death upon a city, and this would be my fourth.

“Chris,” Hal repeated when I didn’t respond.

“I understand,” I said quietly.

Hal lingered, as if to say something more, but walked away after deciding not to.

I sighed, rising from my chair of snow and turning away from the city’s walls. Walls we had been shelling for weeks now, to no avail. Walls that were currently being showered in magic, as mages cast spell after spell in an attempt to soften them up.

A failed attempt. They were tall and strong. Stronger than the three before them.

Like Frostheim, great effort and resources had been poured into their construction to stand between the city and those who would harm it.

We would have to do this the hard way.

There was no section of wall we managed to bring down. The wall was too tall to create a ramp as I had in Smoothrock. The Formation etched into the stone wasn’t of the same caliber either.

Ottawa was a true representative of what a Capital of a Faction should look like.

And we were about to storm the walls anyway.

I stepped wordlessly into my tent and gazed upon my armor. Worn, but still strong. Scratched, but still sound. The metal still thick, and Runes still filled with power. I put it on silently and only paused to check it once.

My hammer came last, and I paused before the weapon planted in the corner of my tent. The red tint had been cleared from the ice, but I could still picture what it had looked like covered in blood. What it would look like in mere hours.

Give me strength, to do what needs to be done. Give those sworn to me good fortune in the battle to come. And if it should come to it, give them the death of a warrior so that they might live on somewhere beyond here.

My hands found their familiar place, and the frosty wood settled into my hand naturally as I pulled it from the ground.

It had been years since I thought of what happened after death, but with as much as I’d seen the past few months, it was a topic I revisited more and more. I remembered watching my father pass, and the hope inside me that the halls of Valhalla were real. That dying a warrior's death meant it would not be the last time I saw him.

I now had that same hope for those who died fighting for me. Selfish, maybe, so that my guilt was eased, but I hoped all the same. It wasn’t only for those who fought and died for me, either.

It was for those I felled as well. A number that only seemed to grow.

Some deserved what my hammer brought them, but not all. Some only had the misfortune of standing against me on the field of battle and having a fate that put them in the path of my search for Ryan. It was for those that I hoped there was something more.

Hammer in hand, I walked over to Cole’s section of camp to begin. I could feel the use of taunting skills even from where I stood, and it didn’t take me long to reach the area.

Beasts from the nearby forest or monsters from a nearby dungeon break were throwing themselves at men and women wielding shields and thick armor. The beasts ignored anything around them and continued their single-minded pursuit of the person in front of them.

Every so often, a wave emanated from the warrior, keeping the beasts [Taunted]. Forcing the monster’s attention to remain on them.

Without a word, I walked up to the closest beast, a mangy and feral thing, a dungeon break from somewhere, and brought my hammer down. The beast never saw its end coming.

[Weight of the Arctic] began to build.

A few minutes later, I did it again.

And again.

And again.

For three hours, the weight built, and I felt my body grow in power. I felt the Arctic building, swirling inside me. Like I had repositioned the north pole to be my core, and all of its power was contained within my flesh.

Since upgrading my Body to Copper, the usual strain and feeling of tearing myself apart were absent. My flesh and bones were stronger now than they were then, and the sizable [Weight] placed upon my shoulders was contained. Albeit carefully.

With the [Weight] at its peak, I placed my bloody hammer upon my back and looked the circle of Oathbound around me. The crowd had grown as the time wore on, as everyone knew what would happen when my peak was reached.

Every person was adorned in armor. Every person had their weapon at the ready. Every person was prepared without a word being needed from me.

I spoke for just the second time that day, “It’s time. Assume your positions.”

The crowd broke off into sections, which then broke off further. Wooden towers were climbed, and Mages settled into their protected room. Those who would push stood behind the wooden behemoths with grim faces, those on the outside more than the others.

Elliot took up the right side of one tower with Hugo taking up the left, a dozen others filling in between the two. Ashton and Valerie, another. Cole and Avery, a third. Wherever they could, the Lieutenants and Order Leadership took the hardest roles, just as I had always done, but there were more towers than Lieutenants.

People stepped up when needed, even though they knew what it would mean.

A man stood on the outside right side of a tower with his hands shaking and his face pale, but he stood there all the same. The woman on the left looked much the same, but I knew when the horn sounded, she would push.

Anders looked at me from the left side of the tower front and center. His axe strapped to his back, his hands rested on the left post of the tower that would see the most fire out of all of them. It would be the first, and the center of our attack.

Filled with power and brimming with strength, I walked up to the right side and grasped hold of the wood. My fingers dug into the wood, but it held. I looked back upon the dozen towers being pushed by hundreds of warriors. This would be the last time I would see some of them alive.

Even so…

I pulled the horn from my belt and blew.

Wood creaked and snow crunched. Men and women heaved against the weight of the towers, but the wheels began to turn. Some faster than others.

None faster than mine.

Magic exploded as our Mages opened fire to cover our advance, but my attention was held solely by the ground in front of me. I smoothed the snow and filled in any dips I could find. The wheels found no holes to fall in or obstacles to bar them.

I pushed, and my tower lurched forward.

Ever forward.