The Fusionist Book 3 -- Chapter 49

Chapter 49

A darkness that surpassed anything he’d seen before enveloped Larek’s perception, plunging him into an endless cold void. Expecting feel himself being completely ripped apart from the impact of that swirling mass of black and purple energy, similar to how he had seen the spells that Chinli had thrown at them fall apart, the Fusionist instead felt… nothing.

Am I dead? Is this what happens after someone dies?

He’d never really thought about if there was an afterlife before this, but now there wasn’t much that he could think about. He couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, and didn’t even know if he still had a body as he couldn’t sense or feel anything; his thoughts were the only thing that seemed real anymore. With only his consciousness that seemed to exist in this perpetual darkness, he began to wonder if this was it. Would he be stuck here for eternity? Is there something more than this? What will happen to everyone I left behind? My new friends? My fami—

A sudden brightness blinded him after the sensory deprivation of the dark void, followed by the feeling of wind rushing past his ears that he thought he should be able to hear, except for the fact that he was still deafened by the screams of the Warped Void Hunters. Regardless, the abrupt change in his circumstances caused Larek’s mind to lock up as he attempted to figure out what was happening.

It was the whipping cold air blasting across his face that finally seemed to restart his thinking processes. Opening his eyes against the incessant wind trying to rip his eyes out of his head, he discovered what was happening to him an instant before his half-mile drop into a lake slapped the side of his body as he fell into the water below him.

Pain reverberated throughout his entire frame as the force of his fall against the surface tension of the lake snapped smashed the left side of his face, snapped his left wrist, lower and upper arm (which was outstretched and hit the water first), broke his left leg in a few places, and cracked at least three of his ribs. He didn’t know this all at once, of course, because the shock of so much damage was of secondary importance compared the fact that he had inadvertently sucked in a lungful of water soon after passing through the surface.

Drowning and under at least 20 feet of water once his descent into the lake after his drop ended, Larek panicked and attempted to suck in even more water in an attempt to breathe – but that, of course, didn’t work out too well. With his body spasming from the abrupt lack of oxygen, the incredible damage his body had sustained finally hit him, and he knew he was going to die unless he did something about it.

Upon mentally activating his Healing Surge Fusion attached to his robe, he experienced the incredible pain of his body speeding up his normal Body Regeneration to fix everything that was broken; not even his Pain Immunity Skill could block it out. It was at this point that he felt every single broken or cracked bone in his body, and could even feel the way his face was reshaped in what had to have been incredibly damaged, to the point where he was surprised he was still conscious. If he hadn’t already been drowning, the agony of his healing would’ve done it anyway as his mouth involuntarily opened in a silent scream.

The healing took so long that his body had floated to the surface by the time it was all done, and he broke free of the water – only to find that his lungs were still filled with water. A lethargy borne of both his recent healing and the healing he had undergone after suffering from his explosive spells patterns weighed his limbs down and made it almost impossible for him to move, but he forced himself to swim for the shore of the lake approximately 50 feet away.  A few seconds of struggling through the water made him realize that he wasn’t going to make it; he felt himself slowing down and his face fell into the water again, the effort of keeping it above the surface too much for him.

No!  Keep moving!

Larek’s mental objection and order directed toward his body caused an explosion inside his chest that felt like it was shredding his insides, but it also seemed to give him a surge of strength that allowed him to keep going. Every stroke of his arms through the water was accompanied by a pulse of alternating strength and weakness, but it was just enough to get him through.

His vision was starting to become spotty by the time he dragged himself onto the rocky beach, uncaring of the rough stone under his hands and knees. He collapsed as roughly as he could on his front side, aiming for a rounded protruding rock, and the impact against his chest did exactly what he hoped would happen. The pressure on his chest was enough to force a little of the water up from his lungs, and once it started coming out he actively worked to cough the rest of it out. It felt like half the lake emerged from his lungs as he spent the next few minutes roughly expelling every trace of liquid inside of places it shouldn’t be, and while his breathing was still a bit bubbly, the fact that he could breathe at all was a miracle in his eyes.

Unfortunately, the effort in pulling himself out of the water, along with the panicked removal of the fluid in his lungs and the healing he had undergone to fix his broken bones, all combined to overwhelm his mind and body to the point where he passed out, oblivious to the world.

* * *

“Whadja thin got ‘em?”

“D’know. Coulda been justa bout anytang.”

“Don see no marks ‘o nothin. Musta drowed.”

“Betta fo us. Dat robe seems fency-like. An dat reeng shood brang in a preety gol’ or so. Chick dat bag fo’ anytang—”

The sound of strange voices, their accent funny to his mind, along with an incessant tugging at the straps of the pack on his back, roused Larek from unconsciousness.  A sudden jerk as one of the straps slid over his moving arm woke up him up fully, and he reacted without conscious thought.

Even without opening his eyes, his fist lashed out and smacked the questing hand away, and he felt and heard a dull *crack* as his fist met soft flesh.

“AAAAHHHH! He ali’! Bro’ me ‘and, e di’!”

The accent seemed to get thicker to the point where Larek couldn’t even understand it; or it could’ve been that it was screamed out rather than spoken regularly. Forcing himself to turn over, he finally got a look at those who were talking – though only their backside, as the pair of short figures dressed in what looked like multicolored rags were hightailing it away from the prone Fusionist.

Larek tried to call out to them to apologize for hurting one of them, because it had been an accident stemming from a misunderstanding, as they obviously thought he was dead, but his voice only came out as a croak. It felt dry and raw, which only got worse as he hacked up yet another mouthful of water coming from his lungs.  Groaning as he got to his hands and knees, he forced himself to cough for another few minutes to get as much of the liquid out of his body. By the time he was done, his throat was extremely raw, but he thought he finally got rid of the rest and was able to breathe easier.

He nearly healed himself with his Fusion, but held off for the moment. A debilitating weakness weighed on his body to the point where he wasn’t sure if he would even be able to get up and walk, and he didn’t want to make it any worse.

After a few more minutes of recovering from his coughing fit, Larek finally stood up on wobbly legs that stabilized after a moment, before looking around. Based on the angle of the sun and how much his robe had dried, he figured he had been unconscious for a few hours, and while the sleep helped to recover his strength a little bit, what he really needed was something to eat.

Moving off of the rock beach was a challenge, as he nearly fell over the uneven rocks multiple times, but his Agility stat seemed to help him stay upright – even if he wasn’t graceful about it. Surrounding the lake behind him, which he saw was ovoid-shaped and stretched about 1,000 feet from one end to the other at its widest point, was a band of trees that blocked out any view of anything farther away. That was just fine with Larek, as he collapsed next to one of the odd-looking trees, which were all much shorter than he was used to seeing at about 25 feet tall. Their leaves were also huge, larger than both of his hands put together, and their branches were thin and springy, and he wondered how they bore the weight of multiple leaves.

He let that curiosity fade away as he sat down, before feeling something at his waist.

Bestie! You’re still here!

Larek felt under his robe for the axe, pulling it out and laying it over his lap in case some monster attacked him – not that he had the strength to swing it at the moment. Still, it made him smile seeing that his best friend seemed to have survived everything he had gone through; it was his faithful companion and was sturdy enough to get him through just about anything.

After that, he struggled to get the pack off his back and swing it around so that he could access it. Untying the straps, he immediately saw that it had been waterlogged from his dip in the lake, and some water even leaked out as he pulled the opening up further. Over the next half-hour, he pulled out all the supplies that had been stored in the pack, finding that most of the food that had been in there was essentially ruined, though he put aside some jerked meats and hardtack that was surprisingly still fine thanks to an expert job with a sort of waxed linen wrapping. When he found any food that was still edible, he consumed it immediately without thought to saving it for later in case he was unable to find more. His rationale was that he needed sustenance nowto replace what the healing had consumed from his body, and it would surely be easier to find food once he could get up and moving.

In the end, he ate every single thing in his pack that hadn’t been ruined, which equated to a basic meal at the Academy. He could tell that he needed a lot more than that in order to fully recover, but he had a feeling when it finally digested he would at least be able to move around and fight with his axe if necessary.

Unfortunately, he had lost his staff all the way back near the Aperture when the Gergasi had landed, and he hadn’t been able to grab it to take with him when Chinli took him away. He would have to recreate another one to use—except that he couldn’t right now. His Pattern Cohesion, despite being full, was raw and ragged throughout his entire body from the strain he had put it through with directing his spell patterns to overload and explode. Closing his eyes and internally evaluating his current condition, he realized that it was even worse than he thought. He had a feeling that if he were to try and do anything with his Pattern Cohesion in the next few… days? Weeks, perhaps? Regardless, it was bad enough that he might kill himself if he tried to utilize his own Pattern Cohesion for anything, even the simplest of Fusions. It was worse than anything he’d felt before, and he was honestly surprised that he actually hadn’t died from the damage.

Thinking about the Aperture and his missing staff inevitably led to thoughts of the events that led him to his current situation. First, he thought about his friends and how the Gergasi said something about erasing their memories of Larek and of herself, which he hadn’t taken the time to fully consider before now. He had made a deal with Chinli to spare their lives and that had seemed the most important to him at the time, but if he did find his way back to them, would they even recognize him? Would they even care to get to know him, a stranger, again?

After considering it for a while, he realized that it might be for the best for everyone that they forgot about him – at least temporarily. Just knowing him had put all of them in extreme danger, and now they would be able to learn at Silverledge Academy and Fort Ironwall without having to look over their shoulders every few seconds. On a more personal, selfish note, their distance and ignorance of him would hopefully dispel whatever he had inadvertently influenced them with. When the time came to meet them again, preferably when he got a handle on his Dominion Magic, he could interact with them – and especially Nedira – without worry that he made them like… or love him.

But that all stemmed on whether he could even live long enough to see them again. With no sign of Chinli swooping down and capturing him again, despite him being in one place for a while, he was hopeful that he had escaped her clutches. The first question that burned in his mind about that whole situation was, “Why isn’t she coming after me?” – of which stemmed a number of other questions.

Was she killed by those Warped Void Hunters? He didn’t think so, based on what he saw there at the end of their fight.

Does she think I’m dead? That was a distinct possibility, given he was hit by one of those orbs of whirling energy that seemed to destroy everything they touched.

How am I still alive? Again, that went back to those orbs of whirling energy hitting him, but he had no explanation for why he hadn’t been torn apart.

But the most important question of all was: Where am I? He didn’t remember seeing any lakes along the ground where Chinli and the Hunters had been fighting, so he could only conclude that he wasn’t within a mile or two of that area. When he added in the strange accent of the would-be scavengers that he had scared away, he could only conclude that he was somewhere else in the Kingdom he was unfamiliar with. It was even possible that he wasn’t even in the Kingdom anymore; if that was the case, then he needed to find out where he actually was so he could get back as soon as possible.

That thought made him pause for a moment, as he considered his motivation toward returning. If what he suspected might be true, then the people who knew him the most at the Academy were either dead or had their memories wiped of his existence. The Gergasi, Chinli, quite possibly thought he was dead after being impacted by that destructive energy orb created by the Hunters. That meant that, as far as he could tell, no one had knowledge of his whereabouts or even where he should be. In other words, he was free to do what he wanted, just like he wanted all along.

So, why was he immediately wanting to return? Initially, it was because of family and friends.  Now that he wasn’t constrained to the Academy, he could surreptitiously visit his family to ensure they were safe with all the craziness of the Scissions and Apertures going on. After that, he would consider visiting Silverledge Academy and Fort Ironwall to connect with his friends again, determine if they were safe, and to see if Nedira would have the same feelings about him that she did before.

But there was another reason to go to Fort Ironwall, and that was to unlock his access to Stama and learn about fighting and Battle Arts – two subjects where he was sorely lacking in knowledge. After that, well, he supposed it depended on his future plans looked like with the SIC, because he would have an obligation to join them because of all the instruction they had provided him in both the Academy’s he’d attended and the Fort he hoped to attend. It wasn’t that he particularly wanted to join the SIC, given what he felt about the entire process and his lack of wanting to save the world as Dean Lorraine wanted, but he had to do something.

He'd seen the damage that Scissions could cause, and now with the new Apertures that were likely opening up everywhere throughout the Kingdom, the threat to everyone was only increasing. Even though he hoped to find his family and friends safe, if people like himself didn’t step up to defend the Kingdom from the threats that the monsters posed to them, then they were all doomed. Especially considering that the so-called “Great Ones” were of no help.

From what little he knew of the Gergasi, who were powerful enough to combat the monsters, he was fairly certain that they unable to leave their Enclave for long because the Corruption of Aetheric Force coming from the world they were connected to was attracted to them. Twice now, he had seen a Scission open almost on top of the two that he had personally seen, and he was convinced that it wasn’t a coincidence. If that happened every time they left their Enclave, then it was no wonder why they were rarely ever seen outside – and therefore would be of limited help against the Apertures.

Shaking his head to clear it, Larek repacked his bag, which now consisted of about a dozen steel bracelets that he had planned on adding Fusions to at some point, 8 platinum coins, 30 gold coins, and his transfer letter signed by the Dean and Vice General from Copperleaf and Pinevalley which miraculously wasn’t ruined by water, and then began to stand up to leave… toward somewhere. The only direction he could think of to head was where he had seen the two rag-wearing scavengers scamper off to, as it was possible there was a town or city nearby. From there, he would be able to determine where he was in relation to the Kingdom, and to formulate a plan going forward.

Before he fully got up, an insistent reminder in the back of his mind prodded at him. Notifications? What for?

When he looked at them, he dropped back down on his backside, temporarily overcome by information that flooded into his mind.