Chapter 1567 (1/2)

As the desperate figures of Raymund and DiOrtho hurried from the valley, Vualla crouched on one of the overhanging peaks and watched their rapid departure. A smile danced across her lips as she checked the time; they had managed to convince the princess and depart in only nineteen minutes. They still had plenty of time to open up some distance between them.

Vualla flicked a pebble off the cliff and watched it bound down the rock face to the ground below. Seemed like it truly was a matter of motivation, after all.

The sound of skin against rock drew Vualla’s gaze to the left, but quickly she allowed herself to relax; honestly, there were no opponents in this world that truly threatened her. It was just instinct from the Xyrt Brigade training that kept her suspicious. That and her constant knowledge that Randidly was out there in the Nexus, fighting for his life...

A sudden movement sent a few more bits of stone tumbling down into the valley below. Helen scampered herself up around the rock face with the ease of a mountain goat and settled next to Vualla. “You seem to enjoy babysitting. I’m surprised.”

“You know? It’s honestly… not as bad as I thought,” Vualla readily admitted to the other woman. “I can see why Randidly always spends so much time trying with his subordinates. I can definitely feel how… fulfilling this is. And watching them… it’s somewhat inspiring, you know? As though individual differences each generates its own advantages. It encourages a different sort of strength in me. It’s… fascinating.”

“Enjoy it, please.” Helen nodded. Then her expression twisted toward an uneasy look at the sky. “Because based on Randidly’s last message…”

Vualla gritted her teeth with such force that his jaw began to tremble. Randidly had said that he had decided to train in the deepest portion of the Web as he prepared for their escape, but how could she not sense that the process was much more difficult than she let on? He was stuck after he had brought her here to relative safety.

Still, her own memories of that dense Nether and horrifying natural phenomenon pulling from below told her in no uncertain terms that she would be of no use to him. Despite how much it pained her, she could only remain in his Alpha Cosmos for the moment. Her immensely powerful image was completely useless against this type of foe.

Every individual had their own advantages.

Perhaps sensing her mood, Helen clapped Vualla on the shoulder. “Don’t let it bother you that much. He has things only he can do… and we have things that we can do as well. Come on; I want to introduce you to a few very emotional individuals.”

Vualla raised an eyebrow. “Who?”

“The King and Queen of the Shelley Kingdom,” Helen replied with a sly smile. “Did you think that you were just going to be working as a vigilante? You are going to be hired as a tracking and pursuit expert. In order to make those two absolutely miserable… you’ll have the entire force of a kingdom behind you.”

Vualla grinned.

*****

Congratulations! Your Skill Nether Sensation (L) has grown to Level 335!

Randidly floated on his back, staring upward and watching with no little envy as the vibrant emotions the Stillborn Phoenix released could swim upward and escape these depths. The vivid pink strands flew upward in spirals, savoring their relative positioning. As a weight counterpoint, Randidly and his sour mood were stuck down here.

Plus, he enjoyed looking upward because he had sunk so deeply in the shaft that the darkness above matched the darkness below. There was a curious duality to the experience, like laying upon a mirror. It was entirely impossible, without the steady movement of emotions, to know from which direction he had come.

He paused now because he needed a slight break; the passage of days had been… unusually difficult, for a Randidly who had been training for long, lonely stretches since the beginning of his System tenure.

Not that he didn’t benefit greatly from his training down here; Randidly enjoyed the restrictions placed upon him here, too. It was quite simple to release a pulse of an image and draw one or two Nether Beasts to investigate, which usually resulted in powerful enough impacts that more Nether Beasts were drawn upward. In between attempts at discovering how to Engrave for his own Nether Cores, Randidly cleared his mind with manic melees that set his heart pounding.

The Nether Beasts still weren’t truly a threat to him, but they were stronger than the small-fries he had lured upward previously. In addition, more and more drifted upward as he slaughtered them, meaning he didn’t worry about depleting their population. And although Randidly suspected there was no meaning to what he was doing, after he finished studying the fading cores of the slaughtered Nether Beasts, he dropped those cores and allowed them to return to the significance below.

Yet he continued to be perturbed. Randidly had to admit to himself that this wasn’t a matter of boredom; there was plenty to do here, with threats of multiple varieties surrounding him. But the act of constantly shaping and reforging the emotions present in his images, straining against the draw of the significance below, and the withdrawal from the Soulbond connection added up. More than had ever been true in the past, ominous black clouds hovered at the edges of Randidly Ghosthound’s psyche.

So Randidly took long breaks from his normal training routine to steady himself by studying the surroundings. Sometimes, he wondered if the Nether Beasts were a side effect of the power plant working below.

Yet his emotional state wasn’t the only difficulty plaguing him. Despite the fact that Randidly was (probably) steadily earning Skill Levels with his fights against the Nether Beasts, he continued to struggle with the Engraving for a Nether Core. Architecture of the Primordial Ways was extremely sophisticated, but…

Randidly looked at the nearby bone wall. The air down here was especially thick and murky, which led to the illusion that the spine was widening the deeper he went. But either way, as he glanced around, he could see failed attempts at capturing the significance of Yggdrasil curling around into the darkness. His technique was getting more advanced with every stroke. He was trying complex, new patterns. Yet…

Pursing his lips, Randidly looked back upward. The midnight-blue darkness held no answers, although it continued to broadcast a variety of confusing information up from the depths. A tumbling claw from a slain Nether Beast drifted close enough to him that Randidly batted it away in annoyance. But as he did so, he paused.

Something had occurred to him, finally. If he could speak, he would have said aloud, “It doesn’t matter that Yggdrasil was my first image. What matters… is why I chose that shape as my first image.”