Irwin's Journey 492: Stop asking questions

Irwin woke with a jolt, blinking as he blearily looked at the far wall of his and Scintilla's bedroom. 

What… was that? he thought, as his mind took a moment to fully wake.

He felt like someone had shaken him, but as he looked around, he saw nothing. Heard nothing either, for that matter. The memories of his otherself, which always kept an eye on him as he slept, told him that there wasn't anything in his room… at least, nothing visible. 

Removing the restraints on his soulforce senses, he spread them out. Scintilla's soulforce signature glowed beside him, while Ambraz's burned like a bonfire in the smithy below. Beyond that, the nearest others were Rinbus, Nimlarel, and their children in the restaurant next to the smithy. 

Something just woke me, but what? he thought.

'Kid, there's someone in the smithy,' Ambraz said, while a burst of surprise and worry flowed through their bond. 'He just appeared out of nowhere a moment ago. He's wearing a cloak, and… great, now he's looking up at me. Got some ugly red eyes…'

Irwin held back from jumping up out of the bed, instead very slowly getting up. His mind was quickly connecting dots, and he had a sneaking suspicion who was down in his smithy. The opening had been a week ago, and he and many others had searched every inch of the Blackglass Cavern, finding no trace of the man who had snuck inside. 

"Irwin…?" Scintilla muttered as her arm slid from his chest.

"There's someone in the smithy," he whispered as he grabbed his nearby pants and pulled it on.

Scintilla's eyes snapped open, and she sat up with a jerk. Leafbrand appeared in her hand as her eyes darted around.

'He's still not doing anything… Kid, I think he's waiting for you.'

'I'm coming down,' Irwin replied, before turning to Scintilla. "Calm down. Whoever it is, Ambraz says he's just sitting there and doing nothing."

Scintilla hesitated, then unsummoned Leafbrand as she climbed out of the bed. Normally Irwin would have taken the time to enjoy looking at her nearly naked body, now he just quickly tossed her her pants and tunic. 

They hastily got dressed, then headed to the door, Irwin in the front.

"I don't know who it is, but they took a bad time to introduce themselves," Scintilla muttered behind him. 

Irwin hummed in agreement as he walked down the stairs. As the sturdy wood creaked under his weight, he wondered if he should have used the soundwaves to head down.

What would it matter? Whoever it is, he already knows we are awake.

'You still can't sense him either?' he asked Ambraz.

'Nothing. It's like looking at a chunk of ore,' Ambraz said.

Irwin reached the smithy door and pushed it open. His eyes immediately locked onto a small figure sitting on the ground, legs folded, looking up at him. Two blood-red, slightly glowing eyes looked back at him from an emotionless, pale face.

"I come to talk," an icy voice said.

Irwin saw the glint of pointy, red teeth behind thin lips. 

"You are the one who burst through the Exit Portal a year ago and who arrived with the teleporters last week?" Irwin asked as he walked further into the smithy, stopping when he was ten feet from the figure. "Who are you, why are you here, and why did you hide until now?"

"To observe you," the figure said quietly. "And as to who I am? You may call me Umbral, and you are the Cardsmith Irwin, first of the Crathans, target of the Guidar, and one of Yilda's ilk."

Irwin's eyes narrowed as he sensed Scintilla move a step away from him. He knew she was wound tight and ready for combat. This Umbral had only answered one of his questions, but his last few words surprised Irwin.

That's the second time someone mentioned Yilda, he thought.

It wasn't the only thing that bothered him, though. What did this thing know about the Guidar, and that he was the first of the Crathans? Very few people actually knew either of those things, and even fewer here on Scour. 

"Why are you here?" he said. "And what do you know of the Guidar?"

"I am here to make a deal," the figure said, still sitting there calmly. "You have something I need, and I have something you need."

Irwin shared a quick glance with Scintilla, who was holding Leafbrand again. She raised an eyebrow and shrugged.

"I don't know who or what you are," Irwin said slowly. "You just show up in the middle of the night at my house, after coming to Blackglass and hiding. I think it might be best if you tell me why, and what you want from me."

"I want you to unchain me."

Irwin felt his mind jolt, staring at the figure. He was a Chained like the Accenti? Did that mean the Guidar had found Scour? If so, why weren't they beyond the Exit Portal?

"Before I help you with anything, I think it's best you answer some of my questions," he said slowly. "Why should I believe anything you say?"

Umbral stared at him, still as emotionless as before. "Those questions you asked are of little consequence, and I can tell you everything you want if you unchain me. This includes everything I know about the Guidar, which is more than you can learn from anyone else."

Irwin felt a wave of excitement, though he knew he had no guarantee the man wasn't just lying. Besides, he had been dodging nearly all of the other questions he'd asked.

"That sounds great," he said, crossing his arms. "And if you are truly a slave of the Guidar's, I-"

A flicker of emotion appeared in the red eyes, and Irwin felt a tiny waver in the surrounding ambient soulforce before everything returned to the stillness of before.

"I am not a slave," Umbral said, his voice as emotionless as before, almost as if nothing had just happened.

"All Chained are slaves," Ambraz snapped from above. "Now, if you want help, how about you answer the kid's questions?"

Umbral looked up at Ambraz for a few moments before turning his attention back to Irwin. 

"Being chained means I can't answer many questions, and what is allowing us to converse will drain rapidly if you force me to," he said, a slight annoyance in his voice. "Unchaining me is in both our best interests."

Irwin frowned. He hadn't thought about it like that, but perhaps the reason Umbral wasn't answering it was because of the chains? 

'Didn't the Accenti have these limits when we first met them?' he asked Ambraz as he tried to recall.

'Yes, but if you want to unchain this guy, you may have to bring him into your soulscape,' Ambraz said. 

Irwin stared at the silent figure, realizing Ambraz was right.

"If I have to unchain you, I need to be able to sense the chains first," he said. "I don't know how you are hiding yourself from me, but if you want any help, you will need to stop that."

A shift happened in the surrounding soulforce, and suddenly, he sensed the being sitting in the smithy, and he took a slight step back. The power that was tied up within the being before him was immense, easily that of a four or five-soulcarded, but he instantly knew he held no cards. He was a soulskilled, but one he'd never felt before, with a resonance that was so complex he could barely grasp, like thousands of instruments playing an interwoven song.

Ambraz hissed from above. "What are you?"

"Something old," Umbral said. "Now, can you unchain me?"

Irwin shook himself, focusing on the being's soulforce signature. It took him only a few moments to feel the chains, horrid, dissonant 'gray' chains of foreign soulforce that were woven throughout Umbral's soulforce like spiderwebs. The difference between what he'd seen before, with the few Accenti whom he had unchained long ago, was immense. As he let his senses flow across them, the memories of the Accenti Elder whom he'd unchained returned.

The man had been called Douki, and as someone equivalent to a heartcard, his chains had been far stronger than the others. Irwin vividly recalled how unchaining him had made Guidar appear as if he were trying to stop him.

But even Elder Douki's chains had been nothing compared to these.

'Kid… are you sensing this?' 

Irwin didn't bother answering the rhetorical question. Instead, he wondered just how much pain being bound this tightly must cause. He was about to ask Umbral how he was even able to act when he sensed something else. Faint, like a mist that flowed along the chains. 

'Something is keeping those chains at bay,' he said, trying to understand what he was feeling.

'It's like a layer of soulforce… a third type. It's blocking part of the chain's dissonance.'

Irwin let his senses examine the chains for a few more moments before pulling them back. He had come to one conclusion, and it suddenly explained why the man before was so reluctant to speak. 

'Whatever it is, it's fading and weakening rapidly. If it is completely gone…'

'Kid, if you can't remove those chains before that happens, you need to subdue him,' Ambraz said.

As much as he hated it, Irwin knew his friend was right.  Still, even without knowing who Umbral really was, he felt sympathy for him as he imagined how it must feel. Just examining the chains was already causing his own soulforce to act up, and he couldn't imagine what it must be like to have them actually weaving throughout his own soulforce.

I wonder what his soulscape must look like.

"Well?"

Irwin sighed as he focused on the red eyes, still emotionless and calm. He hesitated for only a moment before making up his mind. 

"I will try to unchain you, but your chains are worse than any I have ever seen," he said. "Also, you will need to move into my soulscape for this to have any chance."

The red eyes narrowed ever so slightly. "Is that required?"

"If you want me to break those chains, it is the only way," Irwin said honestly.

"What if he is trying to trick you?" Scintilla asked, finally breaking her silence. "We don't know him, we don't even know what species he's from!"

Irwin nodded slowly, watching to see how the man would react.

"I am not trying to trick anyone," Umbral said calmly. "Besides, from what I can sense, anyone who moves into your lover's soulscape will likely be under his control. This is why I would prefer another solution."

He can sense that?

"There is none," Irwin said, though he did agree with the other. He could technically attempt it without, but he was pretty sure it would fail horribly and make things worse.

'If you move him in, it will likely cost you a great deal of soulforce,' Ambraz said. 'From what I can feel, he has a great deal condensed within his soulskill.'

"Time is running short. Do we have a deal?" Umbral asked.

Irwin glanced at Scintilla, seeing her uncertainty.

'Kid, just do it. He is right on one count, as strong as he feels, inside your soulscape, he will be helpless, and with as many mental resistances you have, there's nothing he could do by himself. If"

Irwin sighed.

"Fine. I'm going to pull you into my soulscape, don't resist."

"Be careful," Scintilla whispered.

Umbral rose to his feet, surprising Irwin with how small he was. Something about his presence made him seem bigger. He stretched out his senses, then wrapped Umbral in his soulforce and pulled him into his soulscape. For a moment, it felt like his soulforce just evaporated, far more than even when he moved Ambraz into it. When it stopped, over half his soulforce was gone, but Umbral stood on one of the empty shelves in his smithy, his giant self staring down at him.

"I did not expect a building," Umbral said, looking around the walls with such intensity that Irwin wondered if he could see through them with his red eyes. He didn't show any reaction to Irwin's immense size, but as he looked around, his eyes widened minutely. "Nor did I expect a soulscape of this immensity. It explains a lot about your behaviour."

Irwin frowned at that, but Umbral didn't give him time to think about it.

"I think you should hurry. I can feel myself slipping."

Irwin's frown deepened, but now that Umbral was in his soulscape, he could feel even more clearly how horrid the chains were, while he could feel the thin layer that was between them, dissipating. 

"I'm going to start," he said, focusing on the being before him. 

Umbral merely sank to the ground, wrapping his legs and putting his thin hands on his knees.

Irwin created a thick barrier around the seated man before focusing on the chains. Like those of Accenti Elder, they were thick and constantly vibrating with a counter resonance to Umbral's own. But unlike those of the elder, Umbral's chains reminded him of the veins that ran through a body, branching out and binding even tiny parts. 

This is going to take a while, he thought, focusing on the largest branch in the center and wrapping it densely in his own soulforce.

--

Umbral ignored the pain and pressure that was building in his mind, while a soft cracking sound seemed to emanate from within his own soulscape. 

Instead, he focused on the being before him. From this close, he could more clearly understand why the Guidar's scanners had thought they had found an Amnathair. The pressure resembled what he had felt from the few artifacts of the ancient titans that had interacted with many eons ago. There was a difference, however. It was weaker, that was one, but the soulforce resonance was different. 

Crathans must be related to them somehow, he pondered as he felt the invasiveness of someone moving within his soulforce. It vibrated even into his soulscape, and it was a lot like the last time something like this had happened. When the chains had been placed on him. Even now, he recalled vividly the pain, the sense of losing his freedom. 

I hope this won't take too long, he thought as he felt his orders begin to assert themselves with every passing moment. The little of what Terlo had done that remained was all that was keeping him from attacking the one trying to help him. Worse, he knew that if that happened, there was a chance that he could truly harm Irwin. The size of a soulscape barely mattered, and unless his was warded against mental intrusions, it would be against him. 

Hurry. I can't meet my ancestors if I harm the one trying to unchain me, he thought, closing his eyes and trying to keep his mind as still as possible.

Time flowed by, and eventually, one of the central chains binding him had been completely wrapped within the Cardsmith's soulforce. Umbral didn't understand what the use of it was, as there was no way to move it away or break it, as far as he knew. Whatever it was, the pressure on him had increased to the point that he knew there were only minutes left.

Perhaps I should end myself, he thought, looking at his hands. If he fought Irwin now, even if he won, he would be lost within Chaos Space after the barriers broke down. A death sentence to even him.

"Prepare yourself," Irwin grunted, shattering the silence that had reigned in the room for close to an hour.

Umbral frowned, wondering what was happening, when a vibration moved through his soulforce. It clearly originated from the wrapped chain, and as the resonance increased, he felt the pain from his soulscape grow. 

 What is he doing?

Umbral's fingers clenched around his knees as he began breathing more slowly, trying to block the pain. 

It helped for only a moment, then the sound of something cracking came from all around him. It was deafening and caused the pain to double, but none of that mattered. All that mattered was the crackliness appearing across multiple of the shackles of the chain. 

With the crack, the building pressure weakened slightly. Enough to buy Umbral more time.

"I'm going to use more force," the smith whispered. "It will hurt, but there's no other option. Try not to resist."

"Pain is nothing. Do it," Umbral said, unable to keep his hope from his voice.

His words had barely left him when Umbral felt his willpower suddenly stretched thin as the resonance that had been coming from the Cardsmith's soulforce exploded outward, shaking his very vibration. The chain it had been wrapped around, shattered apart, and as it did, a tiny sense of freedom was buried under a pain Umbral had rarely experienced. Only when he'd been bound the first time and tried to break free had he experienced anything similar.

Still, as his mind turned fuzzy and his vision red, he remained where he was, keeping a tight lock on his own abilities. 

The pain faded after a few minutes, but by then, he felt the other's soulforce had begun wrapping around another of the central chains. With it, the pain began building again. Cracks had appeared within the walls of his own soulscape, and he knew that if this continued for long, there was a chance of it shattering. If that happened, he would be dead… 

Had this been any other situation, Umbral knew he'd have fought to the death to prevent what he was feeling. But this was no other situation, and buried deep below the layers of pain pulsing from a single hope grew steadily with the pain.

Freedom and vengeance.

--

Irwin groaned as he took a step back, staring at the shivering figure seated before him. One more chain, the final central one, remained, and he'd already wrapped it completely. But would Umbral even survive? He sensed how weak the other's soulforce had become, and he hesitated. Not just because of what might happen to Umbral, but also because of the other thing that could happen.

'I've reached the last one,' he said. 'Are you ready?' 

'Did your soulforce refill enough?' Ambraz responded immediately.

'Enough to pull you in, but you will both have to stay here for a bit,' Irwin responded.

It was quiet for a moment, and Irwin heard Ambraz and Scintilla talk. Both of his selves were in his soulscape now, and only a sliver remained in his body. Just enough to hear if something bad happened.

'Alright, get me in.'

Irwin focused on his bond and pulled him, causing the Ganvil to appear in the air beside him.

"Let's move out of here," Ambraz grunted. "Also, did you relocate all the cards and other things in the vault?"

"I did," Irwin said, part of him focusing on the room he'd made deep below the foothills of his first filled district. All of his cards and other things were there, safe in case the worst happened.

He moved himself, Umbral's unresponsive body, and Ambraz out of the house and to the side of his soullake. If he had to guard himself against the Guidar, this would be the best place. 

"Ready?" Ambraz asked.

Irwin nodded, moving both his selves into a single body. With a shiver, he triggered his Surging Growth ability. He'd done so only a few times in his soulscape, mostly because it drained him greatly. Still, he was happy he had at least done so, because as his body rapidly grew, it took all his concentration to keep his soulforce wrapped around the final chain. With the growth of his body, the barrier around his soulscape rushed outward at breakneck speed, while the sectinos of his soulscape grew to match. The most stunning was the change to his third soulcard's volcano, which now dwarfed what it had been before. 

I wonder if it will ever be this big without using Surging Growth, he thought, before focusing on the figure that now rested in his hand.

"Do you think he will even survive?" he asked softly.

"He should," Ambraz grunted from his shoulder, having grown to his own biggest size. "Though there's a chance you will need to repair his soulskill. I can feel it crack and shiver, so I think it's best we start now."

Irwin hesitated for a moment as he felt how soulforce was flowing from the Ancestral Copperion into his massively expanded soulscape. The lake looked tiny now, like a pond nestled in the elbow of two towering hills. He waited for a few seconds, then focused on the final chain. 

He resonated his soulforce and quickly felt his headache grow worse, but he ignored it. Any pain he felt was likely nothing compared to what Umbral was.

Seconds passed, turning to minutes as more and more cracks rippled across the final large chain. When Irwin reached the final point, he slowed for a moment, staring at the incredibly distant barrier around his soulscape. Would a Guidar appear again? The last time that had happened, he'd been far weaker, but he had also removed far weaker chains. 

No way back now, he thought, causing a final resonance.

With cracks that echoed from the distant mountains, the final chain cracked and, like a chain reaction, the resonance rippled across the innumerable tiny chains that connected to it.

"His soulscape is cracking! Get ready to keep it in one piece," Ambraz snapped.

Irwin reached out with his soulforce, wrapping it around Umbral. He couldn't reach into his soulscape, but he didn't have to. He sensed the soulforce resonance, now dangerously unstable, and began bolstering it, resonating his own soulcards as much like those as he could. For a few moments, it was enough, then the tiny differences caused more harm than help.

"Soulstrum guitar," Ambraz said.

Irwin already had it in his hands before the Ganvil was finished. His fingertips quickly pulled the strings, and he used his thousands of hours of practice to rapidly reproduce the completed soulforce resonance as he'd sensed it before he became. At the same time, he created a cocoon of soulforce around Umbral, allowing the sound of the Soulstrum Guitar to guide it. 

Again, time flowed without his conscious notice, and he had no idea how long he'd been struggling to keep the man's soulscape from shattering when Ambraz spoke up again.

"The final small chains are breaking, get ready!"

Irwin continued playing, looking up just as a sound like glass shattering came from the tiny body before him. The sound was louder than it had any right to be, but as it happened, flickers of silver shot out of the body. They moved so fast he barely saw they were parts of the chain, and he reacted instinctively, creating a barrier around them. 

He fully expected that to be enough, but nearly all of the links turned a dull gray while three suddenly burst with brilliant light, and the horrid dissonance burst out like a wave of sound. They penetrated his barrier with a plop, leaving behind the other links that had begun dissolving. Irwin created another barrier, but the links blurred around, while he felt the soulforce press them from all sides. It almost felt like his soulscape was trying to evict them, and they were using the pressure to move at a speed he couldn't keep track of.

Before he could call out, he felt Ambraz disappear and reappear in their paths, three barriers appearing. Two held, but like before, the links inside dulled while the third turned into a tiny thing of such wrongness that Irwin felt his soulscape shove at it. Before he could even try to prevent it, the link slammed through his barrier, leaving behind a slowly expanding ripple that faded with moments.

"What just happened?" he shouted, trying to juggle both playing his soulstrum guitar, resonating the cocoon of soulforce, and holding the barrier with the dull, slowly dissolving links. "How can anything just move through my soulscape without me being able to stop it?

"I don't know! We need to figure that out later, for now, let me take over," Ambraz said as he reappeared beside Irwin, two barriers with him. Irwin felt another wrap around his, and as soon as the glimmering barrier was complete, he let go of his own.

"Okay, I guess we pissed someone off," Ambraz said.

Irwin looked at the barrier, thinking he meant whatever had just tried to flee, when a dull boom echoed from high above. His head snapped up, and he saw a silvery figure like the one that had appeared long ago when he had broken the elder's chains. It was slowly pulling back his hand. Its features were faint and smeared out, but it was clear it was frowning, its mouth a tight line. Behind it was a small silvery pool, with a tiny door hovering above it. The insides of the door looked almost exactly like a portal.

A second boom came as it struck the barrier, but except for the sound, little else happened. Still, Irwin swallowed. If he had not used his growth skill, that single strike would likely have damaged his soulscapes wall. Now? The dissonance it was clearly trying to create was like a tiny stone against the immense strength of his barrier.

"It's much stronger than the previous one, but nothing compared to the increase in your defense," Ambraz said slowly. "It's a good thing it's fading already."

Irwin merely nodded, watching as the tiny figure-

It's not tiny. It's just far away, and I'm the size of a giant tree right now…

He shivered at his own thoughts, then watched as the immense silvery being slowly faded before turning and slipping into the door. 

"The other one didn't do that," he hissed, wishing he could move closer but knowing he needed to keep the balance.

"It also didn't talk," Ambraz said just as the silvery pool was pulled into the tiny portal-like doorway. Then a swirl of raw soulforce exploded from it, and it was gone.

Irwin opened his mouth, then closed it. He turned his gaze on Umbral.

"Let's hope he knows as much as we think, because we need every advantage we can get."

--

Mozarath stood behind Jieldinis, quietly observing her to make sure he could act when she wanted something. She had a tendency to overindulge in her experiments, and it was up to him to make sure she took proper breaks.

His eyes moved across the walls for a moment, looking at the used bodies. All were dead now, their hands cut off as was her custom, while she worked on the last one. 

I will need to see if more captives have been found, he pondered.

They had been back to her main base for hundreds of years now, most of which she'd been busy with her experiments or expanding her personal army. A long time,  but to a Guidar, even one with a broken mind like him, even a thousand years was a small span of time. 

"Alright, I fear this experiment is a dead end," Jieldinis said, stepping away from the twitching body. Both of its hands had been locked to the sides of the table, the cardslots now empty and ripped apart. "Mozarath, clean up after me. I'll be expecting you tonight."

Mozarath moved forward smoothly, bowing as he passed her.

"Yes, Misstress," he said.

He saw a flicker of disappointment in her eyes, something he had seen many times. The part of him that wasn't completely cracked understood she expected something else from him. Sadly, the rest of him had no idea what. He wished he could do what she wanted… he would always do what she wanted.

As he thought, he heard the door close behind him, and he raised his hands and started using his abilities, the ones she had gifted him, to clean up the blood from the ground, the tables, and the implements. 

It wouldn't take too long, but he would make sure it was done immaculately, because-

Mozarath froze mid-motion, his eyes burning with a bright silvery light. It lasted for only a moment, then it vanished, and as it did, the dullness in his eyes faded. Not completely, but compared to what it had been before, they looked almost as sharp as a knife.

Mozarath's hands lowered as he looked around, a small frown appearing on his face.

"So… One of them was finally employed and killed," he whispered, a tiny smirk growing on his face. "Now, let's see what has happened and how long has passed. Then we can see how to go about getting those other ten-" he cocked his head. "No. Not ten. I'm too complete for that. Nine? Eight… less? Wait."

He shook his head, eyes narrowing with fury. "How long was I even gone!? Why am I talking out loud… what?"

Ignoring the blood, he moved to the table and sat down, closing his eyes.