Kane raised his sword, preparing to unleash his Aspect. A familiar hum of power should have resonated in his soul, But there was nothing. He tried again, and again, but the power that was so uniquely his remained dormant, a lock he could not pick.
He stared at his weapon, his mind racing. His Aspect, his most potent tool, was gone.
Linia, seeing his frantic attempts, quickly spoke up. "Shit! I forgot to mention a crucial detail. You can't use your Aspect here in this maze. Don't worry, only the abilities become unusable. Your attributes and the nature of your Aspect are still there."
Kane's mouth fell open. "Then how the hell are you surviving here?" he demanded.
In response, Linia summoned her own sword—a pitch-black broadsword that seemed to drink the light around it. "By swordsmanship alone," she replied, her voice firm.
Accepting the grim reality, Kane immediately summoned Missy. "Looks like our first battle together happens now," he said, his voice a low growl of grim determination.
Missy materialized beside him, her head cocked to the side. She nodded, a silent acknowledgment, and took the sword from her mouth. Her Attributes and her Aspect Nature were not reliant on abilities, so she was not restricted in the same way.
Kane took a fighting stance, the rumbling sound growing louder from the hallway ahead. A black swarm of creatures poured into the corridor. Each was the size of his arm, with four spindly limbs tipped with razor-sharp claws. Their faces were nothing but a gaping maw of razor-sharp teeth, a terrifying void of pure hunger. Individually, they were weak, easily defeated. But as a single, massive swarm, they were a terrifying tide of flesh and claws.
Kane charged forward, his sword a blur of motion. He cut down the first wave, but more and more creatures swarmed around him, locking onto his presence. He quickly realized that simply attacking would be a futile effort; they would overwhelm him with sheer numbers.
He glanced at Missy. "On my signal," he shouted, his voice ringing with authority. "Attack them by possessing any one of the creatures!"
Missy nodded, her form a blur as she moved into position.
Kane then yelled at Linia, "We're splitting the crowd! Are you okay with it?"
"Yeah, I'm fine with it!" she shouted back, her voice tinged with a manic energy.
Kane veered from the path, sprinting toward a particular unexplored room whose door stood ajar. He had no idea what was inside, but splitting the swarm would give them a slight advantage. The creatures, driven by pure instinct, split their attention. A large portion of the swarm followed him into the dark doorway, a black, undulating tide of claws and teeth.
He entered a colossal room. The ceiling was held up by four massive, crumbling pillars, their surfaces cracked and worn. The floor was a chaotic landscape of uneven stone, with a sharp, rocky rise in one corner. Kane dashed toward the rise, his feet scrambling for purchase on the unstable ground. The swarm, in their mindless pursuit, followed him to the top of the jagged stone pile at a breakneck pace.
As they swarmed the rise, Kane gave the signal. "Missy, now!" he bellowed, pointing to the tail end of the swarm.
Missy vanished from sight. Suddenly, a creature at the back of the tide began acting erratically, attacking its own kind. The strange behavior rippled through the swarm. The creatures, driven by a simple, base intelligence, stopped their pursuit of Kane, confused by the sudden aggression from within their ranks. They began to fight among themselves, a chaotic storm of ripping claws and gnashing teeth.
'These creatures must be beasts or monsters,' Kane thought. 'Their intelligence is quite low.'
He telepathically contacted Missy. "Missy, how is your situation?"
"It's good," she replied in his mind. "I'm rapidly possessing others and fighting. Anything important?"
"I'm planning to destroy the pillars," Kane said, his gaze fixed on the nearest one. "Cover me."
Without a second thought, he leaped from the rise toward the nearest pillar, his sword, the Ultimate Defiance, already in his hands. He swung with all his might, the blade hitting the stone with a deafening CRACK. The sword stopped halfway through, lodged deep in the ancient stone. Kane held the hilt with both hands and used all his physical strength, his muscles screaming in protest, to force the blade forward.
The pillar groaned, a deep, unsettling sound, and then cracked. The roof above gave out, raining debris down on the creatures below. The collapsing ceiling killed most of them, burying them under a mountain of stone and dust. The few that escaped were cut down by Missy and Kane, who worked in tandem, a perfectly synchronized dance of death.
As Kane cut down the last of the creatures, he heard the announcement echo in his mind:
[You have slain a Dormant Monster, Fallen Acolytes]
[You have slain a Dormant Monster, Fallen Acolytes]
....
After the battle, Kane and Missy returned, covered in creature blood and gore. They reached the place where they had left Linia and found her sitting on a pile of the dead creatures, completely covered in blood herself.
"So, how was it?" she asked, a wry smile on her face.
Kane stopped at a distance, a new respect for her etched in his features. "I was able to trap them and kill them. How was it on your end?"
She laughed, the sound echoing through the quiet hallway. "Nothing I couldn't handle. I'm a senior here, remember?"
Kane lowered his head. "I'm sorry. I should have helped you, but I couldn't think of a better solution." What he had done was a tactical baiting, a calculated risk that had put her in mortal danger.
Linia looked at him, her smile softening. "Peachy. It's okay. I would have done the same thing." She patted the spot next to her. "Get ready. We have an hour to rest."
Kane sat down, a respectful distance away, as per their agreement. After thirty minutes, he tried to get some sleep, but he heard giggling from Linia and Missy, who were sitting together in a different corner, their voices loud and clear.
'Seriously,' Kane thought. 'They are very loud.'
Missy, who had a mischievous glint in her red eyes, turned her head toward him. "So," she said, her voice echoing in his mind. "What does the lonely idiot have to say about our voices?"
"Seriously, you are violating my privacy, Missy," Kane said in a calm tone. "You have Linia. Leave me alone with my thoughts."
Linia laughed, an amused sound. "So, you'll only talk to women who are near you? Pervert."
"Actually," Missy chimed in, a wicked grin on her face. "He has a person he has a soft spot for."
Kane's gaze turned curious, wondering how Missy, a being he had just created, could know such a thing. Linia's eyes widened. "Seriously? Who is this guy in love with? What's she like?"
Missy's mouth curled into a smile, though the stitches in her mouth held it back. "It's a girl named Cassia. She's a blind blonde who's an oracle of sorts. You know what? When he first met her, he called her 'Miss Porcelain Beauty.'"
Linia's eyes widened, and a hearty, unrestrained laugh escaped her lips. "Seriously?! What a cringe dialogue! You've never spoken to a woman before, have you?"
Kane was mortified. He pointed a finger at Missy. "How do you know Cassie? You never met her!"
"When I was born, I got some fragments of your memories," Missy replied nonchalantly. "So I knew some things. I told her about this because it was funny."
Kane was embarrassed, his cheeks flushing. Linia's eyes sparkled with mischief. "So, Kane, is it? Is there really a history behind that name?"
Kane looked at her, intrigued. "Enlighten me."
Missy sat forward, her gaze fixed on Linia as if she were a child listening to her parents' love story.
Linia began. "Before the Nightmare Spell, there was a story well known to humanity. It went like this: There were two brothers, Cain and Abel, the firstborn of humanity. Cain was a farmer, and Abel was a shepherd. They offered their sacrifices to God, but God accepted Abel's offering and not Cain's. Cain became so angry that he killed Abel. God, who witnessed Cain's act, became enraged and cursed him."
"Which God was it?" Kane asked, his mind already piecing together the myth with the world he was in.
"I have no idea," Linia shrugged. "It was from the pre-Spell era, so there's no way of knowing."
Missy, who was listening intently, chimed in. "So, boss, if it wasn't Kane, what would your parents have named you?"
Kane thought for a moment, trying to recall what his parents had written in his diary. After a moment, a memory surfaced. He looked at Linia and Missy, a slight smile on his face.
"Actually, my parents had different names for me," he said. "It will be even weirder than my current name."
Linia's mouth curled up. "Do tell."
"If I was a boy," Kane said, "they intially planned to name me Azik Eggers. If I was a girl, they planned to name me Amanises."
Linia when heard the name,her eyes widened and face contorted with rage.