Kael brushed some dust from his shoulder and walked over to a body to retrieve the card.
The cold felt more present mixed with the familiar smell of blood.
Serene Moon devotees lay scattered across the temple, giving some colour to the otherwise bland interior.
He kicked one aside and made his way outside.
Against someone with Kael's experience there wasn't much difference between the devotees and lambs when it came to the slaughtering. The distinction existed only in how they looked beforehand.
The woman he had spoken to earlier came running toward him and collapsed at his feet.
"I've warned everyone." She panted. "Please. You must help us."
Kael bent down and grabbed her robe.
Then without a word he tossed her straight up dozens of meters.
Swishh.
Another streak of dark blue came through the air. Her soft flesh held no resistance, and with a wet clench she exploded into a cloud of red.
"Is that it...?"
From what he could tell whatever had attacked him earlier didn't seem to target ground level. Either that, or it was so far away it couldn't see them through the treeline yet.
Yvette walked out of the mist, wiping black blood from her face with her sleeve.
"They're coming."
She said it coldly, flicking intestines from her arm.
Just as the words left her mouth a crimson net of wires the size of a house appeared behind her.
Twang. Thwang.
Like a massive instrument being struck, metallic rings rang out as Pale Ones crashed into her mote. Limbs and viscera rained over them, turning Kael's snow white hair black in an instant.
"We're dead." She murmured, glancing over her shoulder.
At those word, the white wall the Pale Ones carried with them finally reached them.
Yvette disappeared from his view and him from hers.
Screams erupted all around as Pale Ones launched themselves at him.
"I..." He grabbed a skull and crushed it. "...need a mote for crowds."
The more that came the more corpses surrounded him. They threw themselves at him only to forget him a moment later, sinking their teeth into each other instead.
He drew a sharp arc cutting three in half before launching himself upward. The moment he landed on the temple ruins he flicked his arm up.
The blue came immediately, ripping his arm clean off.
He watched it to regenerate calmly before crouching low.
Beneath him the beasts clawed and screamed, desperate to reach him. They piled higher and higher until they began building a ladder from their own bodies. Kael refused to acknowledge them, eyes fixed on the treeline.
"Where are you…"
Then his eyes locked onto something.
Barely visible at the speed it was moving.
Treetop after treetop shifted violently to the side as it leapt from one to the next.
Another streak of blue shot out, forcing Kael to twist. He watched it whistle past him, carving a furrow through the air as it continued deeper into the forest.
His eyes snapped back at a loud crack tearing through the air.
The creature launched itself at him, arms reaching, hands closing around his shoulder. The momentum carried them through trees and rocks alike until they came to a stop.
It was disgustingly hideous. And disgustingly familiar.
"Ugly bastard."
Kael wrapped his hand around its throat and began carrying it into the air.
This was neither a beast nor a Pale One. It was a Dreadborne that had gotten its hands on a mote capable of producing glacial ice, that it tossed around like a weapon.
"Look how you've grown." Kael said as it clawed and bit at him.
Its arms alone were his lenght, and with every rancid movement its greasy black hair swayed and struggled to cling to its face. What gave it away was the unnaturally long fingers. This was the same type of Dreadborne he had killed only days after leaving Farkath, years ago. This specific one was much more mature, but the same none the less.
By the time they had climbed high enough that nothing could reach them Kael's clothes were torn beyond recognition. It had clawed at soft flesh and vitals with everything it had. But no matter what it tried it couldn't land anything the Primordial Eye couldn't regenerate.
"Shame I don't have my knife on me."
He grabbed its arm and pulled. The moment the first tore loose he tossed it downward and reached for the other. Its eyes widened as the second dropped. Sharp cracks rang out as it snapped its jaws at Kael.
He coiled his arm back and drove it forward. Straight through the leathery skin and spine. The chest was so thick his hand barely managed to come out from the back.
A gut-wrenching scream echoed as he released it, watching with cold eyes as it sunk into the ocean of beasts.
Pale Ones leapt into the air to get to it first.
He walked down until the drool running down their lips became visible. He truly had never seen so many.
Just as he started to wonder how many Dreadborne there could be per wave, a low rumble sounded.
'Above?'
His gaze found only clouds.
"Below?"
One of the Pale Ones suddenly shuddered and began clattering its teeth like something rabid. Then it started clawing at its own face. It gouged out its eyes first, then started digging into its own mouth. Fingers disappearing past the second knuckle.
Then another started doing the same.
It didn't take long before the sea of white turned black as Pale Ones clawed away at themselves.
Kael felt his hand begin to shake. Unable to resist whatever it was he joined them. Pain screamed through his body as he repeatedly clawed out his own eyes. Again and again. The sensation of his fingers finding the socket refused to numb.
His eyes regenerated three times before the Primordial Eye adjusted to the attack and closed it off.
He walked upward, rubbing his eyes until focus returned.
The air had filled with the foul smell of the Pale Ones, that was nothing like humans. It was older and stung in the nose.
Just as Kael snapped open his eyes something came down on him. It was too vast. Too fast. It didn't even give him a chance to process what it was before a flash of light hit and the world blurred sideways.
One moment everything was ice cold and in the next, it was burning hot. The screaming became distant. The howling wind became nothing. And for a moment it was as though none of it had ever happened.
Kael reached upward toward light breaking a surface and found rock. He hauled himself up, coughing mouthfuls of spring water onto the stone.
He clenched his jaw against the pain and the heat both. 'White Lotus Spring?'
Before he could find his footing it came down on him again. The water engulfed him. So did the pain. He crashed against the spring floor and cracks spidered outward from the impact.
Then another crack.
Then freefall.
The water from the spring instantly followed Kael into the darkness of the Depths below, pouring after him in a roaring curtain.
He crashed into a shallow creek, water exploding outward from the impact.
He lay still for a moment, listening to the water settle around him.
Then he turned his head.
Yvette had come down a few steps away. She was upright, almost peaceful, impaled through the chest on a branch that had caught her on the way down. Her hair drifted in slow, unhurried waves in the current. Her hands were drenched in bright crimson, fingers still curled, and blood filled holes where her eyes should have been.
Squelch. Squelch. Squelch.
Pale Ones rained down into the creek around Kael one after another, screaming and twitching, until the shallow water turned dark.
Kael rose, shook the numbness from his hand, stomped the head of a Pale One flat, glanced upward, and broke into a sprint.
He had to move. The ones that had fallen had crippled themselves, but the Pale Ones were an endless wave. Fresh ones would follow. It was only a matter of time.
And they were loud. So, so loud.
He jumped a ravine and vaulted a rock and settled against it.
More Pale Ones had started raining down from the spring above, livelier than the ones before them. And the pained screaming had turned into a plangent sonata.