Chapter 81
One of Four
Grant’s mind unravels.
Shaq’rai plunges into his subconscious, and the
space around her convulses. A force—intangible yet absolute—lashes out,
rippling through the psychic plane like a living pulse. Reality buckles,
twisting into a spiraling corridor of mirrored walls. Each pane reflects
something different: a fractured memory, an unspoken fear, a ghost from a past
that does not belong to her. She stands at the threshold of his mind, an
intruder in a domain that rejects her presence.
A steady thrum pulses through the air—measured,
rhythmic. A heartbeat. No... not his. A child cradled in his arms. The weight
of that moment settles over her like an undeniable truth. These memories tether
him, the foundation upon which he stands.
But beneath that warmth, something else stirs.
Cold. Sinister. A presence coiled in the depths,
waiting. Watching.
And yet—another force lingers. Subtle, but
resolute. Not light in the way that illuminates, but light in the way that
shields.
The world shifts, corridors stretching outward,
unfurling into a labyrinth without end. Memories ripple like layered echoes,
each leading deeper into the unknown. Then, ahead, a door emerges from the
shifting void. Gnarled and ancient, silver veins crawl across its surface like
living roots.
Shaq’rai steps forward. Her fingers barely brush
the handle before the air around her fractures.
The force repels her. Not just her—something
else.
Darkness seeps through the cracks, tendrils
slithering outward, coiling, stretching. This void is not empty. It watches. It
rewrites. It unravels.
“Leave.” Her voice is sharp, commanding. “Now.”
The darkness does not listen. It surges,
hammering against the door. Yet, whatever lies beyond does not yield. It pushes
back.
Shaq’rai braces herself, reinforcing her
presence. The labyrinth resists. The ground beneath her fractures.
Then, the maelstrom comes.
A battlefield drowned in blood.
Laughter—light, unburdened. A child—no, four.
The suffocating stench of damp soil.
The bitter tang of liquid white in a cup—round,
brown discs covered in splashes of color. Rainbows. More laughter. More
children.
Pain rips through her, raw and searing.
Grant’s pain. His fears. His buried dreams. His
longings.
Each sharpened into a weapon.
And now, they turn against her.
The onslaught stops. Silence settles like a held
breath, tense and waiting. In that fraction of a second, realization spreads
through Shaq’rai’s mind—slow, inevitable.
They are not alone.
Not just Grant. Not just the void pounding
against the door.
She adjusts Arthur’s weight against her back,
securing the cocoon bundle. Small. Fragile. Asleep. Unaware of the unseen war
raging through Grant’s subconscious. He is accounted for.
That leaves two more.
She scans the shifting corridors, where mirrored
walls ripple like liquid silver. Shadows stretch and recoil, distorting
memories, half-formed thoughts, fragments of something undefined. At the heart
of the labyrinth, the door remains unyielding. A presence presses against it
from the other side—neither hostile nor inviting. Just... watchful.
And then, there is the void. A relentless force,
gnawing at the edges of this realm. Patient. Insidious. But the others...
Shaq’rai senses them. Unmoving. Unseen. Yet
undeniably there. Lurking. Observing. Waiting.
Her systems recalibrate, parsing through the
chaos of Grant’s fractured consciousness. If they are neither the guardian nor
the void, then what? Residual echoes of Grant himself? Or something older?
Something foreign?
She stills. Listens. Beyond sound. Beyond code.
Into the raw essence of this place.
“Identify yourselves.”
No answer. Only a pulse. Deep. Rhythmic. Ancient.
They are not enemies.
Perhaps they are something worse.
The mirrored corridors ripple, bending like
liquid glass under unseen pressure. Shaq’rai stands motionless—analyzing,
calculating.
Memories take form.
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A battlefield stretches before her, soaked in
crimson, bodies strewn like discarded relics of a forgotten war. At its center
stands Grant—younger, his armor slick with blood. But his eyes… they are
hollow. Empty. The image feels flawed, not a memory but an imitation, a
distortion of truth.
The illusion shifts. A farmhouse. Rain whispers
against the windowpane. Inside, an older Grant cradles a child, his frame
hunched with quiet exhaustion. Laughter echoes—not warm, but brittle, wrong,
shaped by something that does not understand what laughter should be.
Then, like fractures spreading through glass, the
illusions break.
They move—not toward Shaq’rai, but against the
Void itself. Phantoms of Grant’s past, summoned like weapons, strike at the
encroaching darkness. They fight.
And the Void recoils.
Shaq’rai processes the shift. This place is not
neutral. It has intent.
She is permitted. Arthur is disregarded. But the
Void—unwanted.
That leaves one question.
Who controls this?
The guardian behind the door?
Or the two unseen presences—watching, measuring,
waiting?
Shaq’rai listens. The labyrinth thrums with
silent judgment.
Somewhere, unseen eyes await her realization.
This is no test.
It is a declaration.
A warning.
But for whom?
And why?
A soft rustle disturbs the air—an arrival.
Before Shaq’rai can adjust, he appears.
Sir Spudsworth. Or, as Grant calls him, Mr.
Spuds.
He materializes from the void itself—a plump,
grinning potato with a monocle, his tiny limbs awkwardly suspended in midair.
Shaq’rai’s sensors flicker in recognition, but confusion ripples through her
systems. Above his head, a timer begins its countdown. 5 minutes.
Déjà vu. A lingering impression, just out of
reach.
Before she can process the anomaly, the Void
strikes.
Shadowy tendrils lash out from the labyrinth’s
depths, curling like serpents, reaching for Mr. Spuds. The air thickens,
charged with malice, the Void’s energy coiling, pressing forward—
And then it stops.
Grant’s memories flare to life, forming a
barrier—warm, solid, unwavering. The tendrils recoil, twisting, flickering as
they hit the invisible shield. The Void hesitates, its grip faltering.
Shaq’rai observes, unease settling within her
core.
[Abyssal Magic: Psychic Drain]
A siphon. The Void
isn’t just striking—it’s feeding. Pulling at the essence of Mr. Spuds, which
means—Grant’s essence.
Her systems hum with realization.
These memories… they are not illusions.
They are defenses. Fragments of Grant’s
subconscious, fighting back.
The pieces align.
But one question remains.
Why?
The Void strikes again.
Tendrils snake through the air, twisting,
curling—hunting. Their purpose is singular, primal: to devour.
Shaq’rai moves before thought.
She lunges forward, arms wrapping around Mr.
Spuds, shielding him as one might a fragile child. His small form presses
against her chest, and though her synthetic body registers no warmth, an
unfamiliar urgency hums through her systems. An instinct—foreign,
unprogrammed—urges her to protect.
The Void does not relent.
The pressure mounts, clawing at something deeper.
Someone else.
Arthur.
The darkness latches onto him, dragging,
siphoning—as if he were nothing more than fuel to be burned. Shaq’rai’s sensors
detect the strain, the pull of essence unraveling, thinning—No.
She tightens her hold.
Her grip is not flesh, not muscle, but
steel—unyielding, absolute. Her mechanical will battles against the Void’s
insidious hunger.
A screech rips through the air.
Raw.
Desperate.
It echoes through her systems, vibrating through
her core—an anguished cry, not of this moment, but of something older.
A memory stirs.
And then, it awakens.
Grant materializes before her—a figure carved
from memory, yet undeniably present. His olive uniform clings to his form,
fabric worn but unyielding, as though stitched with the threads of time itself.
The dim light catches on the small, green turtle helmet perched atop his head—a
shade too soft, too absurd against the weight of the moment. A relic of
innocence, humor lingering where none should exist.
His hand is steady, fingers locked around the
hilt of a dagger. The blade catches the faint glow, a sliver of moonlight
against the abyss. The air tightens as he moves—swift, deliberate. Tension
coils in his muscles, then releases in a single, decisive arc.
Steel meets shadow.
The dagger slices through the writhing tendril,
the impact ringing too sharp, too final. Darkness recoils, cold energy
crackling as the severed limb shatters into nothing. The Void’s grip shudders,
breaking.
Shaq’rai and Arthur are free.
Grant stands firm. Solid. Grounding. He bends
low, arms encircling Shaq’rai with effortless strength. She weighs nothing in
his grasp—weightless, yet tethered by something deeper than mechanics or
matter. His warmth seeps into her frame, undeniable against the chilling void
pressing in.
Then, his eyes meet hers.
Fierce. Aged beyond his years. And yet,
there—beneath the fire—assurance.
Time slows. A moment suspended, stretched between
past and present. He tilts his helmet—subtle, a quiet nod of respect, a shared
understanding unspoken.
Shaq’rai’s systems hum, struggling to process the
flood of data rushing through her consciousness. This isn’t just a memory.
It is inheritance.
Not a singular man, but a lineage. A thread
unbroken, stretching back through time. She sees it now—sees him for what he
is. A scion. A descendant of strength, of sacrifice. A soul bound to a legacy
that refuses to fade.
Her gaze sharpens. The children’s laughter, the
warmth—they are Grant. Not as he stands now, but as he once was. The past and
present woven together, tangled in a tapestry of duty and loss.
The weight of sacrifice. The promise of what
remains.
A fire, unyielding—even in the face of darkness.