With each annual Prophecy from the Omen-well, come chosen Totem wielders to fulfill it. These are called Totem wielders, with their own collective specialities.
Those of the Omens of Order, like Timofey and Camille specialise in quelling conflicts and wars against armies with very little resources.
Those of the Omens of Bedlam like Ivanhoe and Esra have powers that grant wishes sung by generations of people.
Those of the Omens of Holdover Fire like Izel, Bright and Astrid reignite the wills of lost civilisations and complete failed tasks of those who have passed.
And as for those of the Omens of Night like Equinox and Locksley, for their prophecy to come to pass, the world might perhaps have to plunge down to its most dire state.
———
"When all seems lost, and the omniscient turn to the ignorant for help,
The sky weaps as the landscape is rend asunder,
The Earth mourns and cries to the heavens like rising thunder,
A creature will rise from the depths, sent from the heavens,
Yet at the prophecy, they cried, No! We did not ask for this, It must be a blunder!
But the mighty creature is not a foul beast!
Who is he, you wonder?
It is I, Chevreuse!!! Mwhahahahaha!!" A loud laugh echoed through the forest.
His booming voice soon quietened, as if swallowed by the gloomy darkness.
"Ahem!" Camille adjusted his tie before letting out a bored sigh and continuing along his slow journey. This was all he could do— walk. He didn't have any fancy tools or virtues that could carry him in the air to traverse the skies, nor creatures that would allow him to stand on their back as they would be made to crawl for his sake.
"Perhaps I should have asked that cannon-mouthed woman to let me ride on her serpent." He held his chin in thought. "Knowing her, that creature most likely can carry me through the air. Ugh, no matter! I can just use my wish for some reliable form of transport..."
He pressed the back of his palm on his open eye and spat, "...Or some way to put you useless freeloaders to use!"
Flinging his hand away in disgust, he added. "Hmm, but after today, I can finally upgrade to better options, and the new 'tenants' will just have to obey me! Mwahahahahaha!"
Camille would continue like this for the majority of his journey, talking to himself and laughing at one 'genius' idea he'd thought up or what he would soon accomplish.
To the people trailing at a safe distance behind him, this man was clearly obnoxious, and very full of himself.
"Who does he think he is?"
"I don't know, but maybe he'll tell us his name again. Don't think we all got it the first two hundred times."
The four of them couldn't even get to chuckle at the joke before the lone prophet shouted his name again as he went into a fit of laughter.
Hippolytus sighed. "Endure just for a while longer. We are nearly at the crimson beacon."
The four of them were in a shell, one that had no colour or substance, yet blocked sight and all senses from the outside world from peering in.
As Hippolytus spoke, the others could already feel that shell being taken down by the person who had cast it. But to their surprise, Camille still didn't show any reaction to the sudden whiff of spiritual essence in the air.
"This guy must have one lucky Virtue. I'm calling it, it's a power that lets him pick the safest path amongst roads!" One of the two women said.
The others chimed in as if with the intention of placing bets, saying,
"I think it's something that dulls the senses of people around him."
"You mean just spirits right? Cuz I swear I can smell his cologne from over here. Trust me guys, I've been at this for three years now, so my assumptions definitely hold more water."
"What do you say then? Tell us your guess, Hippolytus." She turned her head to Hippolytus as they walked, "Or maybe you have an actual clue as to why we haven't seen any spirits in the last few days. You were the one who convinced us to follow this person after all."
Hippolytus shrugged. "I can't scry any more than his strange relationship with spirits. But after monitoring what little fluctuations I can from his essence... he has another Virtue that has something to do with being beautiful... I think."
"Huh?!" The woman put her hand over her eyes and squinted, she couldn't sense a level of beauty worth being a Virtue from Chevreuse. Then again, they all could barely see in this dark.
This motley crew was in a very dense part of the crimson forest. The trees were pillars of their own, branches and leaves like canopies interlocking with each other, blocking out the view of the already pitch black sky. If it were not for the red vines pulsing beneath the earth, albeit faintly, no one would be able to see a thing.
It was especially hard to navigate through this deep in the forest, bacause they couldn't even see the pillar of crimson light. This is why they had found themselves walking amongst each other, following behind this strange prophet who laughed without a trace of fear in his voice.
"Say, Hippo. How can you scry in this place anyway? Doesn't that only work in places you've been taken too by your Totem?" The other man asked.
The definition of a prophet is one who perceives outcomes others cannot, and can read the world through prophecies. To look through one's Totem and gain knowledge of the world is what scrying is.
However, the usual prophet can only know about the omens they have foreseen, and peer into the veins of knowledge of worlds which their Totem had brought them to.
At least, this is how it should be.
Hippolytus turned his head around, his eyes like roughly grounded rubies glued within two circles, and a slight smirk on his face that expressed that he did not want to expose too much about himself. He had already shown these strangers to a front row seat of how his Totem worked, so his silence was understandable.
Camille placed his gloved hand on a particularly strange tree. It was strange because this tree had a red line trailing along its stem vertically, falling into the ground. Even stranger however was how the trailing red line shone eerily across the ground, flowing into three other trees, all aligned like the four cardinal points.
Hippolytus suddenly grimaced, blood welling up in his eyes. His surroundings appeared to shift and shake, making his stomach churn and leaving him dizzy.
The world seemed to be calling to him, yet the distortion in his eyes had to be settled if he was to have a chance at resisting the unexpected foe. Essence burst forth from his chest, an unseen shell shielding his and the others' bodies.
Camille turned around, humming in surprise. He couldn't move Hippolytus with his Virtue.
"What's going on?!" Tenoch, the other man in the group exclaimed. The entire forest was trembling, and soon essence began to flow out of the man they had been stalking, spiking out of him like heavy threads.
Camille squinted. If anything could resist his Virtue like Hippolytus' shield, it was most likely a Totem.
'If it was a typical barrier, that man would have been brought to me regardless.' He thought. But no matter. Camille had other options he could try.
Hippolytus pushed through the pain and dizziness, forcing his Totem to stay active. His essence reserve was already quite low, which was why he had desummoned it earlier.
Sansa clicked her tongue. "Now that I see him clearly, he does look beautiful."
"Isola! Tenoch! Watch her movements and don't let Sansa step out of thi—"
"I'm not going anywhere, Hippo! So just focus on keeping your shell up. Even I know I'd be in deep trouble if I get out of this thing." Sansa suddenly exploded into a cloud of pink glitter, her form reconstructing into a mermaid like creature. However, unlike a mermaid where their scales are only on the lower half of their bodies, Sansa's pink scales crawled up all the way to just beneath her neck.
She fell flat on the ground, then pushed herself up, her aquatic tail splitting apart into bare legs so she could stand. Her former tails had now become a skirt with long splits, and her upper body scales turned into a rib-length jacket.
The other two, Tenoch and Isola who could still see just fine, stared at her back in awe, Tenoch's eyes trailing down to the vibrant yellow skin on her lower back before snapping out of a daze and looking away.
"Ooo~ you look fantastic!" Isola squealed, rubbing the shoulder of Sansa's scaly jacket.
"Do you all understand that we're about to get beaten into vegetables right now?!" Hippolytus called on the three, taking a step backwards as Camille began to walk up to them.
"Relax." Sansa rolled her eyes. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes, opening them again as her entire demeanor changed drastically. Her face looked serene, her pink eyes like painted water swirling gently in circles, her lips curved into a warm smile.
Placing one hand on her chest, she stretched the other out to Camille and spoke, her words calming even Hippolytus's agitated mind,
"Were we to count the stars... Camille."