TS6 - Chapter 1

The first thing Thorn noticed when he stepped out of the spatial tunnel was just how thick the ambient mana was. It pressed in from all sides, and he imagined that had he not been carrying an endless source of mana in his heart, it would have filled his body, granting him an explosive increase in strength. From Mina's gasp, it seemed his estimation was right.

They had appeared on a large rock, surrounded by gigantic trees that stretched hundreds of feet into the air. Everywhere they looked, the endless battlefield bloomed with life. Immediately, Mina sat down, doing her best to stabilize the surging mana rushing into her body. Akira, on the other hand, didn't seem to be affected at all, and sat on Thorn's shoulder, taking in the sights around them with glittering eyes.

Recognizing that it was going to take Mina some time to stabilize herself, Thorn began to do an assessment. His body had changed drastically after advancing his bloodline to the Starforger stage. The biggest shift had been in unlocking Unified Force, a mixture of four sorts of energy that he could weave together, increasing their power explosively. If his fight against Numamir was anything to go off of, the power Thorn's body now contained was terrifying. Even now, he could feel a sort of fragility in the world around him, as if his body was simply waiting to break through the limits that the world normally imposed.

Eve had rebuilt his stat sheet once again, trying to keep track of the various changes that had been made. The largest had been abandoning the number system he was using to track his stats, and instead settling into a simple low, medium, high, and very high categorization. Though it was sort of depressing to go from numbers, especially high numbers, to simply recording his stat as low, Thorn felt that it made sense.

**STATUS**

Name: Thorn, Master of the Void

Race: Titan - Starforger [Nebula]

Destiny Points: 19

Unified Force: Low

Martial Rank: Low

Magical Rank: Low

Divine Rank: Low

Tier: 10

Abilities: 7

[Divine Star Heart (Nebula): Your heart has merged with the heart of a lower world and been transformed into a divine vessel, granting you an endless supply of mana and divine energy that is immune to corruption. So long as you are not destroyed, you will never run out of either power. Furthermore, by feeding United Force into the Divine Star Heart, it can be upgraded to the next level.]

[Echoing Will: Your spirit has become an extension of your will in the world, granting you the ability to examine, understand, and shape the world directly. Your voice is particularly suited to apply your will to other people.]

[Master of the Great Forge: You may call and use the Great Forge, no matter what world you are in. You have unlocked the Star Map and Constellation Library.]

[Martial Master: Your training and combat experience has allowed you to pick up and master almost any martial weapon or combat form in a short amount of time. You have learned to unite your mind and body with the weapon you wield, fusing them into a single, holistic force, drastically increasing your effectiveness in combat. Weapons currently mastered - Halberd.]

[Mental Mastery: Your training and study has allowed you to develop near perfect recall and the ability to think quickly. This has been bolstered by an absolute affinity to the arcane element. Spells no longer hide any secrets from you. Your mind has grown powerful enough to shrug off any external influences making you immune to both fear and illusions.]

[Protector of the Endless Worlds: Your bonded god beast, Hati, has fully realized his guardian aspect, granting you the powers he possesses. Your fate as a Titan has influenced his decision and cemented his path of growth.]

[Unified Force: Your strength, mana, divinity, and mental sense have been forged into a single unified force that can perfectly express your will. Your new power has the advantages and abilities of each of the four types of power, and can mimic the shape of each of them.]

As he looked over the sheet that popped up in front of him, Thorn couldn't help but feel a trickle of excitement. While having high numbers or stats on his sheet was cool, what Thorn really loved was the process of getting there, of improving, and continuing to climb. Eve must have taken that into account when she established the new system.

Expanding his abilities, Thorn looked through each, one at a time. According to what his grandfather had been saying, Thorn no longer needed to focus his attention on growing his magic or his divinity. Instead, there were two aspects he needed to work on, his mental energy and the physical force his body could produce. Feeling a slight disturbance behind him, Thorn turned and saw Mina getting to her feet, her face pale.

"I'm sorry," she said, "for slowing us down."

Thorn could hear the edge her voice contained, and knew that she was still furious and scared. And he couldn't blame her. Her husband had been grabbed from under their noses, and though they had managed to kill four of the god beasts who had captured him, the most powerful, Numamir, had teleported away, using some sort of red token.

While Mina was getting used to the thick mana of the endless battlefield, Thorn had been scanning the area, and realized that they were only two miles from the doorway where they had entered Urmag'Tal's puzzle. Unfortunately, there was no sign of Numamir, and Thorn had a sneaking suspicion that the token that the god beast had used likely hadn't taken Numamir and Corvo to the endless battlefield.

"Eve, are you able to track Corvo's location?"

The air shimmered as a cloud of black nanites coalesced into Eve's form.

"Not precisely, but I can get a general direction. The distance is considerable, and because the mana is so dense in this world, I'm having to reconstruct some of my calculations. It'll take me a while to work through all of it again."

There was no one around the doorway to Urmag'Tal's puzzle, so Thorn, Mina, and Akira set out in the direction that Eve had indicated, making their plan as they moved. It was clear from the hard set of her jaw just how worried Mina was, and after they had gone about a mile, Eve flew over to land on Mina's shoulder.

"Corvo's okay," she said, patting Mina's ear. "I'm monitoring him through his E.V.E., and his vital signs are all good."

"Will you let me know if that changes?" Mina asked.

"Yes, I will."

"Thank you. It's good to know that he's not being harmed."

"Speaking of which," Thorn said, "I've been puzzling over why the god beast would want to capture him, and I think I have an idea."

"Don't they hate avatars?" Mina asked.

"On the surface, yes, but I think it's more complicated than that." Taking a moment to organize his thoughts, Thorn continued to lead the way through the tall trees. Between his titan steps and Mina's ice wings, they were moving incredibly quickly, forcing them to converse through their E.V.E.

"From what I understand, the history of the god beasts is a tricky one. They were created to protect the endless worlds by assisting humans in controlling various aspects of them. So, for example, the Moon Wolves, which naturally have the darkness and hunter aspects, allowed humans to improve their control of those aspects faster. Combining the natural ability of a god beast to manifest an aspect with the human's domain meant both could get more powerful faster, a sort of coordinated acceleration of growth, all so that they could fight the unmaking."

As he spoke, Thorn sent images of the vision he had seen with Lyssa, the former elemental empress of water. Even though it was a second hand memory, Mina and Akira could both feel the danger exuded by the crystalline monsters swarming from the portal. This was the enemy they were supposed to fight.

"Physical force, or even magic, barely worked against the unmaking. Instead, what is effective is the use of domains, and beyond that, aspects of the world. From what I understand, in order to create an army that could stand against the unmaking, potentially, once and for all, my grandfather formed the god beasts."

"So what happened?" Mina asked.

"Dragons. Dragons happened. Apparently, the dragons instigated the god beasts, convincing them that the avatars were a means to control them rather than empower them, and so, the most powerful god beasts turned on their avatars, hiding their betrayal with the help of the dragons. They set an ambush and slaughtered their avatars, each targeting another god beast’s avatar since they couldn’t kill their own avatars directly. This allowed them to free themselves from the avatar contracts while maintaining their aspects. However, what they found after they had broken the so-called chains was despair.

“The stronger a god beast gets, the more in line with their aspect they become. But the more in line with the aspect they become, the less will of their own they have. Instead, their will is subsumed by the sheer weight of the endless worlds. You might think of each aspect as a law that governs some portion of the world. Each law has its own weight, requiring strength of will to control it. These god beasts, who broke free, found themselves trapped by a different sort of chain. A chain that they could not overcome, no matter how strong they got."

"It sounds like getting stronger was actually the problem," Mina said. "I can't imagine just how strong the pressure to conform would be if it was me up against the will of the endless worlds."

"That's exactly right," Thorn said, nodding. "The avatars weren't chains in the first place. They were a sort of compass to keep the god beasts as themselves, helping them know which way was up. When they lost that, they simply became unmoored, and were absorbed by the endless worlds. If my guess is correct, then this is why they're capturing avatars. To try and find some way to rebind themselves. To somehow stop their steady march into oblivion."

"Well, they should have picked somebody besides Corvo," Mina said, anger blazing in her eyes.

Soon, Thorn, Mina, and Akira came to the edge of the forest. They paused for a moment, staring out over the long expanse of rolling hills that continually increased in height until they transformed into tall, jagged mountains. Having seen the endless battlefield from the outside, Thorn knew just how big it was. It stretched for over a million miles from side to side and was close to twice as long. This massive, flat plain contained every conceivable type of environment. So far, they hadn't run into any other people or even seen many animals, though the subtle sounds of insects were plentiful. Glancing down at the E.V.E. on their wrist, Mina frowned.

"Any word on how far we're going to have to travel to catch up with them?"

A holographic image of E.V.E. appeared above Mina's E.V.E., shaking her head.

"No, it'll likely take me at least a week, but my guess is we're going to have to go all the way to the Council of Gods headquarters, or at least close."

"Let's hope we don't actually have to break into the Council of Gods to rescue him," Thorn said. "Otherwise, I imagine we're going to end up causing a lot of trouble."

Swallowing her frustration, Mina nodded.

"If we ever want to get there. Akira, do you mind giving Mina a ride?" Thorn asked.

Jumping down from his shoulder, Akira shook her body, expanding in size until she towered over both of them. Mina hopped up onto her back as Thorn took a step forward, beginning his transformation into a Moon Wolf. This was the first time he had transformed since sensing Hati's change from the aspect of the night to the protector aspect, and he found that the shift had manifested itself in his appearance. Rather than looking like a pure moon wolf, Thorn's fur had lightened, gaining a faint silver sheen. Every time he moved, glimmers of silver light formed faint moons around him that shifted and swirled as if they were shields revolving around his body.

Both his attack and his defense had clearly risen at the cost of some of the shadow manipulation abilities inherent to most moon wolves. His speed hadn't dropped a bit, and as he and Akira began to run, Thorn found it easier than ever to integrate his titan step martial arts into his wolf form. The distance seemed to shrink under his feet, allowing him to step from the top of one hill to the next. To his surprise, Akira was hardly any slower, appearing only a pace behind him as he charged forward. Because of the soul bond he shared with Akira, any time Thorn's strength grew, so too did hers. Furthermore, she seemed to be able to absorb some of the aspects that he carried, allowing her power to increase just as explosively as his.

For close to four hours, they continued to run, covering half the distance to the mountains which had appeared on the horizon. They had just reached the top of the particularly tall hill when Thorn sensed the first creatures they had run into since arriving in the endless battlefields. There was a small herd of some sort of half bull, half boar creature, contentedly munching grass and chewing on rocks. Each of the creatures was a dozen feet tall and close to twenty feet long, with pig-like snouts and wide horns that extended from their heads. There were fifteen of them, and they seemed to be grazing without a care in the world.

Just as Thorn was going to ask Mina if she was interested in hunting one to prepare for dinner, they heard a loud shriek, and all of the boar bulls began to gather together, looking into the sky with vigilance. From high above the cloud, a streak of brilliant green fell towards the earth, moving so fast it arrived above the boar's heads within a second. Thorn only got one look at it before it struck a massive bird that looked like a condor, with three legs ending in sharp talons that grasped at the bull boar below. Four giant wings extended from its body, pumping the air to slow its incredible momentum as it got ready to lift off after grabbing one of the animals. As alert as they were, the boar had no chance, and a moment later one of them was lifted into the air, squealing as massive claws dug into its back. With heavy flaps of its wings, the bird rose towards the sky, letting out a clear cry of triumph.