Path of the Berserker

Blue Rose continued to give me the cold shoulder in the mess hall, but I couldn’t care. I had a major experiment to conduct and I needed a clear head to be prepared. After dinner, I headed down to the barrier to meet up with Chief Yora and Master Eiji.

In my head I went over all the things I wanted to accomplish.

I needed to first see the limit it would take for me to attract the attention of I’xol’ukz.

Then I needed to see if I could sense Kelsey again.

And finally, I needed to ingest just enough Dark Frenzy to become sick enough to warrant a private visit to the aetherite crystal. It would mean me dipping in and out of the Bloodmoon to limit my exposure and keeping a close eye on my spiritual surrounds while on the inside. The last thing I needed was to be ambushed by I’xol’ukz and me losing control and turning into a demon right in front of both of them.

The Bloodmoon was already cresting over the horizon by the time I reached the barrier.

Yora was waiting for me with Master Eiji.

“You just about made it on time,” Yora said, looking up at the night sky. “Are you prepared?”

I nodded and cycled my Frenzy to engage my [Soul Shield] technique.

We both stepped past the barrier’s edge and I sensed my [Soul Shield] flare in response to the Demonic Qi. Glancing over at Yora, I noticed her jawline tighten a little but nothing more. The landscape was barren, no demons at all.

But that didn’t mean they weren’t out there.

“We’ll give it a couple of hours,” Yora said. “If nothing abnormal appears we’ll know it’s safe to resume cultivation classes.”

I merely nodded again, focusing on the dark areas of my peripheral instead.

I lowered my [Soul Shield] technique and allowed the full effect of the Bloodmoon to take hold.

It was like taking a punch to the gut.

My Flame roared and shifted like being blown by a strong wind. As the edges of my vision began to darken, I dove into my [Spectral Body] and quickly traversed the spiritual landscape, seeking both Kelsey and I’xol’ukz.

After about ten minutes I had sensed neither.

I waited a bit longer and the pressure of the Bloodmoon began to truly weigh on my Flame. I was in the gains making zone now. On the edge of my limitations. This was where I had to balance increasing my endurance naturally and resisting the sudden pull that might send me over the deep end into full demon mode.

I waited until I felt my muscles begin to twitch before raising my [Soul Shield] again to give myself a breather. About that same time, I noticed the first eye-ridden tentacle appear in the corner of my vision.

He’s coming, I thought. Time to ditch.

“Are you alright?” Yora asked, glancing at me.

“Fine,” I said, quickly jumping back into my physical form. “I’ll take a quick break and return.”

I stepped back within the barrier, regaining my focus. But mostly I was biding time for I’xol’ukz’s presence to dissipate. I got back ten minutes later and repeated the process, going a bit further before quitting this time. I performed the same maneuver four or five times in a row, steadily building my resistance and tolerance while avoiding I’xol’ukz’s eye-ridden stare.

“Something’s coming,” Yora said, halfway through my sixth attempt. “Minor horde.”

Within my mind’s eye I snuck a peek at the outside world and sure enough there were screeches of demons being carried by the wind. It was bad timing, I hadn’t completed a full cycle yet, but I needed to poison myself before those monsters arrived. I had to speed the process up. Waiting for it to happen naturally was out of the question, which meant I had to do the next best thing—cultivate a sip of the Dark Frenzy directly.

Here goes, I thought and reversed my Flow of Frenzy, drawing in instead of pushing out.

I braced myself as the putrid energy pulsed through my meridians like razor blades. Instantly my Flame darkened, and I fought back the urge to shift into demon form as perverse thoughts invaded my mind.

Anger.

Malice.

Hate.

Rage.

I pushed back with my [Soul Shield] and took in a gasp of air as I returned fully to my senses.

“Iron Bull?” Yora said staring at me, brow furrowed. “What happened?”

I realized then that I must have cried out.

“Too much exposure,” I said, stumbling towards the barrier, putting on less of an act than I had anticipated needing to. The Dark Frenzy really had done a number on my Flame. It was still darkened when I got to Master Eiji for him to examine me.

“Looks like you already overdid it,” he said, staring at my Dantian. “Come on then. To the tower with you.”

I smiled inwardly as the next part of my plan unfolded, but my curiosity got the better of me and I hesitated to see just what kind of demons would show up. As the screams drew closer the familiar shapes of humanoids emerged from the darkness.

Chief Yora immediately flew into the air, distancing herself from the horde as it slammed against the barrier. She held herself aloft with a whisper of radian Qi, the form enveloping her like a sheer silk robe. I peered into the writhing mass, looking for signs of the alien demons from before, but this seemed all in all like a normal swarm.

Demons born of the humans who once inhabited this world.

“I see no anomalies,” Yora said as she touched down beside us. “A good sign. The President must have cleared them all out.”

“Which means it’s safe for the rest of the team to get back in the water again, right?”

She looked at me oddly. “What water?”

I chuckled. “Sorry. A Terran expression. Has to do with sharks and the ocean.”

That only got a more confused stare.

“Whatever the case, yes,” she said. “We will resume training tomorrow night. But as for you. Looks like you’ll need some healing first.”

“We’re on our way,” Master Eiji said. “See you in the morning, Chief Instructor.”

* * *

Anticipation built in my gut as Master Eiji and I made our way back to the prison and started the long climb of stairs towards the crystal chamber at the top of the roof. But as excited as I was, my soul was still poisoned for real and I had no idea if the crystal could cleanse me the same way as Venja. Be that as it may, I was honestly more eager to discover what those voices were that I’d heard before, than to merely cure myself.

“I’ll give you a good hour,” Eiji said as he unlocked the door. “Remember to cultivate deeply. The crystal will cleanse your spirit of the Demonic Qi.”

“Thanks, Master Eiji,” I said as he closed the door behind me.

I waited another painful five minutes to ensure he was gone, cultivating steadily as I did so.

The harmonics of the crystal did indeed resonate with my soul, but for true cleansing I needed direct contact. The thing I’d been dying to do for days.

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“Here goes,” I said, faintly hearing the muffled voices within the humming of the crystal as I outstretched my hand.

I finally put my palm on the glowing crystal and my vision shrank to a pinprick as the entire world disappeared.

* * *

In the void of darkness, It waited.

The Husk had appeared but briefly.

A new aperture opened and then closed.

Yet nothing, did It sense now.

Had It been mistaken?

Perhaps.

The remnants of the Cursed Flame were widespread across the cosmos—foul effigies to the great betrayer of the One True Flame.

But a husk was rare.

A husk conjured wrath as well as defiance.

The expansion of space within the primal realms was too vast to scour for it.

It would wait until the Husk would traverse the realms again.

Then, would it reveal itself to It and then It would know with certainty where it lay.

For now, the lesser Husk held more opportunity.

Its location was clear and with Its champion would It destroy the foul remnant completely.

* * *

I found myself in darkness, like the inner workings of my spiritual realm.

I engaged my [Spectral Body] immediately, assuming my blue-hued form. I summoned my [Spectral Weapons] as well, just in case, feeling the grip of my Axe and Glaive form in my spiritual hands.

A yellow glow appeared before me and in a brilliant flash of radiance a hovering figure emerged. It appeared to be female, a naked form with flowing golden hair. Her body was made of the same glowing skin. As soon as she appeared a deep sorrow resonated within my soul and I could see her angelic face was marred with a look of sadness or despair.

Her golden eyes widened when she focused on me however and I sensed a sudden hope spring from within her.

“The Frenzied Flame,” she said, the words forming more in my mind than being heard. “Arth thou here to avenge us now?”

I wasn’t even sure if she was speaking Yee, or English or if it even mattered, but what I was sure of was that she spoke in multiple voices. It was like listening to an auditorium of a hundred people all speaking at once.

“I’m a follower of the Frenzied Flame,” I said, resting a hand on my chest. “My name is Max. Who are you? What are you even?”

“We are the few of those who used to be,” she said in her reverberating multivocal voice. “A remnant of what once was whole.”

“Do you have a name?” I asked.

“Our name is Fhae I’ung but we are now but a remnant of the whole. Our memories are few and scattered. Pray thee Frenzied Flame, art thou now come to avenge us?”

The name sounded familiar for some reason, like I’d heard it before but I couldn’t quite place where at the moment. But I had a bigger question to ponder about.

“Avenge you? What happened to you? And are you the crystal? Or are you trapped inside the crystal?”

“We are the few of those who used to be, a remnant of what once was whole. Our memories are few and scattered. Pray thee Frenzied Flame, art thou now come to avenge us?”

I paused, wondering if I had heard her right.

“Yes, I understand that. But what do you think I’m here to avenge you for?”

“Our memories are few and scattered. We are the few of those who used to be, a remnant of what once was whole. Pray thee Frenzied Flame, art thou now come to avenge us?”

This certainly wasn’t like having a conversation with Venja.

It was almost like who or whatever I was talking to, wasn’t quite real.

A shadow or copy perhaps.

I tried a different question. “Where do you come from?”

“Our memories are few and scattered. We are the few of those who used to be, a remnant of what once was whole. Pray thee Frenzied Flame, art thou now come to avenge us?”

I stood back, studying the radian glowing woman some more.

She was beautiful, but nondescript.

Nothing significant at all.

Like an amalgam of every beautiful woman my imagination could conjure.

Whatever this was, she knew the Flame. Knew instantly what I was and referred to me as the Flame rather than myself. The same way I’xol’ukz did. Did this make her some kind of spiritual being like it was?

“Do you know I’xol’ukz?” I asked.

“Our memories are few and scattered. We are the few of those who used to be, a remnant of what once was whole. Pray thee Frenzied Flame, art thou now come to avenge us?”

I was batting zero for three.

It was like communicating with a broken computer system or something.

The interface was there but there was no data to back it up.

A shell perhaps.

But I couldn’t deny what I was feeling coming from her either.

The pain and sorrow.

Maybe I was asking the wrong questions.

I had to try a different take.

Cycling my Frenzy, I engaged a more subtle technique than blunt questions.

“You seem like more than one person to me,” I said, approaching her slowly. “And I know you can’t remember much, but I think I can sense [Everyone’s Sorrow] coming from within you.”

At the mention of the technique, the woman let out a surprised gasp.

Instantly a pulse of energy radiated from her and as it crashed into me, visions of horrors filled my mind. There was nothing I could make out clearly. It was like watching a collage of a million points of view all at once.

But in each there was a common theme.

Death…

Thousands upon thousands of deaths.

I cried out as I simultaneously experienced each one, my mind screaming.

Flashes of the Bloodmoon appearing in the night sky, the sun becoming the raging cosmic eye of a Cursed Star.

People from some age and place I didn’t recognize fleeing in panic.

People being torn apart by monsters and demons as terror filled their hearts.

I felt it all.

The helplessness.

The cruelty.

The suffering.

And then from somewhere deeper a new sense emerged.

One of sadness and despair, but also of violation and injustice.

A sense that what was happening should not be so.

A new power then appeared from within the madness and chaos.

A power influenced by the fiery darkness falling from the stars and the pain and sorrow coming from below.

It sympathized, taking on a new form.

From the hate and chaos of the Cursed Stars it emerged.

A brilliant Frenzied Flame that gave strength to the suffering with a single thought.

A single gift.

~Defiance~

The world exploded into bright yellow flames as I emerged from the vision with a gasp, still finding myself within the spiritual realm. My head was spinning, the remnants of what I had experienced evaporating like a dream.

I had perhaps glimpsed far more than I could comprehend.

“No!” I said, trying to force my mind to not close. To force myself to remember. “I will not choose to unsee what I have seen!”

I engaged my [Soul Shield] technique, not knowing what else to do and with the sound of a striking tuning fork, my thoughts instantly cleared. I felt the Struggler within me collapse to his knees and weep with the thousands of new memories from [Everyone’s Sorrow] imposed upon his soul. I saw the flashes of insight from the cosmic story I had witnessed rattling inside my mind.

I could still barely make sense of it now.

But at least it was still there.

A half-finished puzzle yearning to be completed.

The golden hued woman was hovering over me still.

“Oh, Frenzied Flame,” she said while reaching down to me, her voices the ones of all those who had been slain. “Will thou now avenge us?”

I didn’t know how to respond.

I lacked the conviction and strength to say yes.

Even though I felt I needed to.

But I wasn’t the Flame.

Merely a follower.

“I’m sorry,” I said as honestly as I could with [Struggler’s Resolve]. “I just don’t know how.”

Her face saddened, but then like she hadn’t even acknowledged what I’d said, she merely repeated her words again. “Oh, Frenzied Flame, will thou now avenge us?”

I was about to try and answer her again when a sound emerged from the real world.

I quickly withdrew from the spiritual realm, just in time to pull away from the crystal and drop down into lotus position, right as Master Eiji entered the room. He looked surprised to see me, like he had forgotten I was in there or something.

“I didn’t think I’d find you awake,” he said, helping me up from the ground. “Looks like you could use some sleep now though. Those eyes of yours look more bloodshot than ever.”

“Yeah,” I said, mumbling my words. “Guess I got a bit more exposed than I realized.”

Master Eiji adjusted his glasses as he examined my Dantian. “Seems like the crystal did the trick though. No trace of Demonic Qi.”

I checked and confirmed the same within my Flame.

Not only was it back to normal, but it seemed even larger and brighter than before.

Filled with new truth and insights into the unknown.

Had I just achieved another breakthrough? I wondered.

Perhaps. I wouldn’t be able to test for sure until I faced the Bloodmoon again.

But I’d had enough of dabbling in the cosmic realm for one night.

As I followed Master Eiji back down the stairs, something else was nagging at me though. Something small yet something that couldn’t be just trivial. Her name. I recognized it somehow. Heard it recently, but I wasn’t sure where. I could still barely remember it myself. Just a phonetic sound.

“Master Eiji,” I said, taking a chance. “Have you ever heard the name… Fay..yung, I think it is?”

“You mean Fhae I’ung?”

My eyes widened instantly at the recognition. “Yeah, that’s it. Where have I heard that name before?”

Master Eiji chuckled. “The assembly perhaps? It’s the next planet on rotation.”

“Planet?”

“Yes,” he said. “It’s the name of the planet set for our next deployment.”

I briefly recalled it now, the president mentioning the name. But that caused only new thoughts to stir within my mind.

“How did it get its name?” I asked.

“Eh?”

“The planet, did we name it that, or was that the planet’s name already before it was attacked by the Cursed Stars?”

“We do not know the original names of those worlds or their inhabitants,” Master Eiji said. “But the great Imperial Marshal, Wi Chu Lou, is said to have heard the whispers of those names from the aetherite crystals we recovered from the planets they were on. He supposedly named all the Hell Worlds imprisoned under the Cursed Stars that way.”

Wi Chu Lou, I thought. The same guy who drew all the pictures.

“Did our crystal come from Fhae I’ung?”

“Why?” Eiji asked. “Is that the name it whispered to you?”

I froze dead in my tracks.

I’d said too much.

Master Eiji then broke into a laugh. “I’m only teasing, boy. Come on and get some sleep now. Clearly, you’ve had a long day.”

“Yeah,” I said relieved. “It really has been a long day.”

* * *

As I said goodnight to Master Eiji and finally retired to my room, my mind was spinning. A deep unsettlement now lay at the core of my soul. I’d felt the injustice of millions, yet I couldn’t help them at all. My own struggles seemed selfish in comparison, but I couldn’t deny I cared more about them than the nameless millions I had just seen slain.

Perhaps it was the limitations of my human spirit, or my human nature in general.

But with it came thoughts of Blue Rose as well.

I had prioritized my advancement to get home to marry Fia over thinking about slowing my advancement to keep pace with her. Maybe that was just how it was. How things had to be. Maybe it was naïve to even think that I could be everything and save everyone and do everything all at the same time.

I had to choose.

And I had chosen.

I had chosen Fia and the people I loved.

But I had to admit.

With the knowledge I had now.

Those choices weren’t feeling very good at the moment.

I pushed it all away with a sigh and then turned in my cot to try and get some sleep.

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