54 Lake of Flowers (2)

At the sight of such boulders, abruptly, I turn back to Obrecht. "…This is", I trail off.

"Mm, I though it sounded familiar when Krael said he found a field of flowers surrounded by five enormous stones. Then I remembered you told me about those five giant boulders, right? This could have easily been where the lake was before the water seeped down or dried up. But that's just my guess."

I contemplate as I walk to the nearest stone, my hand tracing the moss.

The boulders were large and a third of each seemed to be buried deep into the ground, unmoving. But the inside that supposedly faced the lake was a bit concaved, if not slightly hollow.

"…Thanks, Obrecht."

I think I needed this kind of closure. Maybe everything I've seen and experienced during my ceremony was just a dream—something made up, or a memory someone had left behind. But it's gone now.

Shifting backwards, my hand falls from the stone, my nails scraping a few moss away from the stone. My actions were somewhat miniscule but it is enough to pause my actions. In the sea of visions, the scribbled white line of the boulder had an inkling of a blue wisp.

Was I imagining it? With me wanting to see anything, it could have been possible that my mind made it up, but…isn't it better to be sure?

I walk over cautiously. Obrecht catches the change in my composure and walks nearer to me to see what happened. Slowly, I remove the moss with one hand, as the other hand shifts the mask to the side of my face. The boulder looks the same no matter how much you study it, but whenever I close my eyes, I can see a wisp of life inside it.

"What is it", Obrecht questions as he watches me go from stone to stone to scrape off the moss.

Uncovering each stone made them all look the same—a blue wisp trapped inside a ton of white immovable rock. A crazy idea forms inside my head. Quietly, I back up into the middle of the field, the shadows beneath my feet condensing into a darker degree until they materialize into five gigantic thick vines poised to aim at the five boulders.

Not the least bit daunted, Obrecht walks over, his hands raised and clutching the back of his head in a lazy but interested manner. But I am not fooled by his appearance—a split second is all he needs to get into a proper fighting stance. Upon entering the small concentrated center of my domain, a few naughty vines immediately cling unto him until half of his body could no longer be seen. I almost roll my eyes behind my mask.

At this point are you guys still considered as my shadow vines or his?

Dissatisfied, I click my tongue, before I turn my attention back to the boulders. In a blink of an eye, I strike five points at the same time, resulting in a loud noise that even made the few birds squawk away in retreat. The vines dissipate downwards to the ground, leaving behind the boulders that are denser than they look to be. I wait for a few seconds, but nothing happens.

Checking one of the stone boulders, I find that the blue wisp is gone.

Did I make the wrong decision after all?

I thought removing the outer layer of the rock would free the blue wisp, maybe show a hidden item in each of the rocks that could perhaps lead us to more clues, but it resulted into nothing. Just more rock, albeit crumpled. Now, all the boulders had round embedded holes like something drilled half-way.

I sweat a little upon thinking that Aovialutre might be a little mad at me destroying the gate of her house, and quite possible, unleashing the 'attack dog' in anger. Thinking that way, I am a little relieved that those flashes of dreams are unreal.

"…We should—"

"Videre, Obrecht—!"

"Look out—!"

""Centipedes!""

Panicked voices ring out unto the whole field, immediately dispelling the tranquil feeling they gave off earlier. While shouting, Vera was dragged by Krael into the field. It was akin to a cold drum of water pouring over me. Obrecht dashes to defends Krael and Vera from an oncoming attack from a giant centipede that was as wide as Obrecht's arm span.

The problem isn't that it is large, but that it had comrades. Very soon, a few more of various large sizes came forth from the direction of our camp.

What could have led to this? Why didn't I perceive them?

Unsheathing my blades, I condense my shadow domain into the middle of the field, the upstart of my power whirling dust into a spiral that surrounded the five boulders, with me at the eye of the 'storm'. Obrecht successfully intercedes an attack by one centipede, allowing Vera to run to where I stand, meanwhile Krael stays back to help Obrecht, accurately throwing a knife and hitting a centipede in the eye. The wounded creature writhes, and thrashes in anger; its howl terrifying as it calls on more and more centipedes to come rush out to surround us, some sprouting from the ground.

Witnessing their emergence from the earth, I realize the wrong I did. Burying the organs and blood in the soil—it must have been how they tracked us faster! And my shadow—I never tried expanding my shadow down to the soil, I even doubt the possibility—but—there is always a first after realizing a mistake.

Angry at myself for making the wrong decision and not disposing of it at the stream, I wield my shadow to create a thousand sharp outwardly protruding javelin-looking vines to defend ourselves. Wary of the ground, I force my shadow to seep down to create more spikes below, uprooting the field of flowers into a dreadful field of devastation, yet nobody had the time to lament the loss of its beauty.

"Obrecht", I shout when I see a centipede's antennae hit him hard enough to launch him backwards.

Vera immediately releases a few arrows at the centipede that is about to devour Krael, but the hard armored back of the centipede was too hard for a wooden make-shift arrow that was only meant for practice. I hear her shout Krael's name, slowly, pensively, until I zone it all out until all I could hear is static.

Everything immediately slows down, but my heart is beating so unbelievably fast.

A shadow launches just in time to ease the impact of Obrecht's back hitting a boulder, and another to strike the centipede in front of Krael, impaling its mouth to the head upward in a gruesome death.

The ground trembles, but I hardly notice it, what with my entire being focused solely in keeping my friends alive. Like instinct, I follow blindly this intuition that tells me to release my control—consequences be damned!

If my control was thread, I might've heard that audible snap as it broke.

Everything and everywhere darkens as I pant hard. My mask falls, revealing my face as rune after rune start appearing down my neck to my shoulders to the back of my fingertips, a dark wisp emitting from the very pore of my skin.

A hot feeling on my forehead further divides my focus, letting the darkness of shadow wild and free to mercilessly devour every centipede in sight until none of them are able to move, and then impaling them with a thousand shadow spikes that were harder than their body armor.

Even when they were all dead, the spikes never stopped until their bodies were left in tattered pieces.

The scene looks so gore and bloody, that it seemed so hard to believe that those shadow spikes were once baby vines that used to compete for Obrecht's attention like shy children a few days ago. Seeing them now, aren't they a bit like hidden monsters?

Then…does that make me a monster inside after all?

Trembling, I fall backwards, barely aware of Vera's scream beside me.

Blurred outlines of Krael's stumped expression, and Obrecht's worried face flashes by, as all of a sudden, the ground devours me and Vera, not even a strand of hair left behind. With no energy left, I succumb to oblivion's calling.