Bacon Macleod
patreon
B3 Chapter 366: Warm Haze, pt. 2
🕑 Added 2025-08-05 21:30:02 +0000 UTCThere were many things that Kaius thought of asking the ascendant who accompanied him on his forest walk.
The obvious answer was anything and everything she would share about his next trial. It was also what he was least inclined towards — it could wait until he was actually ready to move on.
Nor was he particularly interested in finding out more of how his last trial had functioned. Xenanra had already delved deeply into it. Any further, and it would likely delve into theory that was far enough beyond him he would find it incomprehensible. Besides, she’d already used caged and controlled terms when explaining it — just like she had done every other time she had brushed up against a topic she could only partially explain. It stood to reason that an indepth dissertation into the specifics of Ascendant-tier time manipulation fell under that bracket.
It was enough to know that it had stood at the root of his strange experience, and that it was used more widely in the Crucible in general as well.
Still — there were other things he had in his mind. What had caused him to abandon training skills when he otherwise had a perfect opportunity? He’d eventually just completely ignored everything that had no direct relevance to his trials. Beyond that, why had the progress he’d made on the rest of his abilities slowed and eventually stalled so quickly?
That wasn’t the only thing. Even if he knew Mentis on a deeper and more instinctive level than before, he still wanted a gods’ damned Ascendant’s perspective if he could get it — especially with regards to the budding interconnectedness he could feel between his two ignited aspects. He knew from earlier discussions that this process of embodiment didn’t actually change anything about how aspects functioned — just increased his awareness and understanding of what already existed. That meant that they had already worked in unison.
Mulling it over, he decided to start from what was ultimately of the least importance.
“My skills. Their growth stagnated really quickly, and utterly stalled far before they should have. What happened there? Also, why did I lose all interest in training them like I did early in the trial, and why did I ignore over half of my class Skills?”
It was the last point that bothered him the most. Just thinking of the way he brushed off the thought of working on his blade skills left him uncomfortable. It was utterly foreign, completely unlike him.
He’d been stuck in a bloody fucking endless loop! He literally had all the time in the world to work on them — and he hadn’t?! He should have hammered away at every single one of them, right up until they hit the point of utterly stalling out — no matter how repetitive it may have been, or how long it would have taken without proper challenges to test his use.
It was all just so…incomprehensible.
Frowning at the thought, Kaius took a long drink from his glass — draining the thing dry. It refilled the moment he pulled it from his lips. He had no idea how he’d managed to miss that, either.
Xenanra continued to bob along beside him, smiling at a bat-like creature that flitted from flower to flower overhead — a proboscis-like tongue spearing deep into floral throats.
“It was a form of balance.”
“A form of balance?” Kaius asked, brow furrowed questioningly.
“Balance.” Xenanra nodded. “Every challenger's trial is different — sometimes subtly, other times drastically. Even if someone had a looping obstacle course like you faced, their traps might have had subtle tells and signs — something designed for an Aspect close to your own, but more focused on awareness and prediction rather than memory and learning. Others might have something more radical in their divergence. An academic exam. A hunt for a great beast of greater wiles. The need to ferret out a single liar in a room of thousands. Even things on a grander scale, to divert the course of a nation's history over decades of effort.”
She spun, giving him a close look.
“If those who experienced extended trials like your own were able to use that twist of fate to train endlessly, you would have a distinct advantage over those who only had minutes or hours. The scales must be even — all participants can achieve the same rewards, given the same effort and performance.”
Kaius supposed that it made sense: if the trials were focused on Aspects, and were designed to be fair — even if he was unused to the idea of the System being so even handed in its dealings — there would have had to be limitations.
“But then why let me train some of my skills?”
“Because everyone uses their Skills to pass a trial — they are part of you. The use and practice of anything actually relevant to your trial was fine. You only lost interest when you started to train purely for its own sake, rather than to improve your next run, or when your gains started to approach the limit of what could be achieved without infinite attempts. For context, those with exceptionally short trials — or ones that wouldn’t stress their Skills in any meaningful way — receive a boost.”
That he could accept — and it matched up with what he experienced within the loops. Vos, Eirnith, Vyrthane, Mercurial Reversal, his mana skills — all of them. He’d only worked on them knowing that they would help him push further, survive traps, and in the case of Mercurial Reversal, navigate projectile-heavy obstacles.
“...I suppose that’s fair.”
Xenanra quirked an eyebrow at him. “I’m surprised you’re not upset about the underhandedness of it all.
He shrugged, not quite understanding her perspective. Rotten roots, she was a bloody god. It seemed a little pointless to fret about. No one would catch him swearing revenge against a storm or avalanche. As far as he cared, it was an uncomfortable truth — but not one worth fretting about. Especially not when it was for explainable reasons.
“I don’t exactly like it — but I can see the reasoning, and it wasn’t like it negatively impacted me. Just limited the benefits.”
As they continued to walk, the thin game trail they followed through the forest started to curve down as they reached a slope. The grasses thickened until he could barely see the ground through their dense purple and green carpet, and the trees thinned to reveal slivers of a sky painted in violet and gold hues from the setting sun.
A few minutes later, they reached a ridge — and a break in the treeline. Kaius stopped suddenly, transfixed by a slice of crystal blue that cut across the forest below him. A lake, glistening in the sunlight like a sapphire. It was huge, larger than any body of water he’d ever seen before. It stretched all the way to the horizon, curving out of sight however many hundreds of leagues in the distance.
Kaius grinned — It made him wonder what it would be like to see the ocean. Even if he knew academically that it was large enough to surround Vaastivar on all sides — including the unmapped portions to the north and south — it was still hard to fathom that much water.
He’d have to see it some day — and maybe, on that day, it would overshadow what lay before him now. But a maybe didn’t detract from the beauty in front of him.
“What a view.” Kaius muttered, rooted in place as he stared.
A heart beat later, the centre of the lake rippled, before bulging upwards. A titanic beast, large as a keep breached the surface — throwing up waves that must have been thrice his height as it landed.
He barely caught a glimpse of it for a moment or two, but with Truesight he saw it in perfect clarity — it looked like an otter, though one that was far more sleek and aquatic with a streamlined body and flippers that would never be able to support it on land. Coloured a murky blue that verged on black, it vanished completely as it sank back beneath the surface of the waters.
“It is,” Xenanra replied softly, staring out over the water. “A Srollo — I used to watch them for hours as a girl. They’re not the most active in summer — the warm waters lull them to a quiet relaxation where they will rest without breathing for weeks at a time. The frigid storms of winter are when they become truly lively.”
Kaius enjoyed the tidbit — even compared to what he had seen in the Depths, the creature was the largest living thing he’d ever seen. It gave the beast a certain regality that left him fascinated.
Unfortunately, as much as he might have wished, the creature did not return. He sighed — there were more important matters to attend to, no matter how much he would have loved to indulge in a little naturalism.
“What of Mentis?” Kaius asked as he continued to watch. “I expected it to feel different from the Authority of Corporus, but it was far more internally focused than I anticipated.”
“That is simply its nature. While Corporus is how you act and impart your will upon the world, Mentis is what drives that. It is your mentality, decision making, and how you process your surroundings. It’s rather inwards facing.”
Crouching low, Kaius took a seat in the grass. “And the way they are melding? I swear that they are blending together, impacting each other's effects. It was like The Struggler’s Madness was making my body remember even when my mind struggled, and The Veteran’s Edge was highlighting exactly what I needed to practice to improve my movements and control.”
Xenanra turned, looking at him with a cocked brow.
“Do you draw your sword without your mind willing it? Can you think without your body sustaining and supporting your mind? It is a linked system — a triumvirate. I told you not to forget that.”
Kaius scratched his head and gave the ascendant a smile. That was true — but he hadn’t expected it to be quite so visceral.
“There is more to it of course,” Xenanra continued, turning back to the far off water. “But it is something that will only become clear when you have completed the triad by seizing Animus. It will be easier to talk about then, and all the more important for how it will affect later trials in this Crucible.”
He nodded, feeling his stomach knot in anticipation. Animus. Finally. He’d been waiting so long, and it would be his first challenge that he attempted without already having ignited his Aspect. That had to change things — and he couldn’t wait to find out how.
Besides, another finished trial meant being another step closer to being reunited with his friends. The very thought of them made his heart ache as he felt their absence all the stronger with the removal of his earlier haze.
Xenanra grinned at him. “So. You’re ready to hear what’s next, then?”
Comments
Joshua Little
Thanks for the chapter.
sarvashaktimaan
I feel a lot like everything that has been said in the last 2 chapters was already self apparent and thus pointless... but maybe my enjoyment is being ruined by genre savyness. Doesn't help that I am not vibing with the sudden calm without the gang to quip, which is probably mostly me.
