Mystic Heart Odyssey

Part 7: Downtime

Chapter 7

Hunting with a new kind of weapon is hard enough. But with less-than-ideal sleep? Big oof!

-Llox

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Several sensations gradually coaxed Lykou awake the next morning. First, although the barrier Kuna had put up kept out most of the sun up until a certain point, it was just starting to peek down through the gap between it and the rock overhang. And although it didn’t reach his face directly, it was starting to light up the sleeping area in general. Second, a small breeze that passed through the gap Kuna had opened in the barrier wafted the smell of a fresh crackling campfire over to him. And finally, there was the pleasant sound of Kuna quietly humming to himself while he was working on something.

Lykou slowly, almost reluctantly opened his eyes. As tired as he still was, he had to admit it was a nice way to wake up. He paused for a moment to listen to his friend before finally forcing himself to sit up and stretch with a slight groan.

Kuna glanced back over at him through the gap in the barrier and smiled. “Morning, Kou. How’d the visit go?”

The konuul half-crawled out and over to a spot next to him at the firepit, squinting against the light slightly. Once he got comfortable, he fumbled around for his waterskin, then took a big sip before smiling groggily at the sereva. “Mmn, fine. I’ll… tell you about it after I wake up some,” he said, then yawned. He looked down at his waterskin for a moment, then leaned back and splashed some water in his face.

Kuna snorted in amusement. “That kind of morning, hmm?”

“You know what that whole… astral realm thing does to your sleep,” Lykou replied, rubbing his eyes a bit. After another quick stretch, he leaned over and grabbed his food bag, then dragged it over to dig through it. “Sounds like you’re in a good mood at least. Sleep well I take it?”

“Mhmm. Really well, actually,” Kuna said as he went back to work on the material in his lap. “Woke up a little early, even. The sunrise here is gorgeous, by the way. After I ate some breakfast, I did a little quick scouting nearby and managed to find something I could use to finish patching our clothes and stuff up.”

Lykou blinked a few times, then glanced over at the sereva’s lap, finally processing what it was he’d seen. “Oh. Hey, that’s fantastic,” he said, flicking his tail around a bit. “Glad you slept well, Ku.”

Kuna smiled and continued working as the konuul slowly ate his breakfast and gradually woke up. Once he finished stitching up his old poncho- it was good to have extra backups, after all- he settled on practicing his magic a little. First he played around with some of the plants that made up the barrier he’d set up, experimenting with different flower shapes and colors, vine thicknesses, etc. Then he eventually turned his focus back on himself and tried tweaking his fur color in certain patches. It was still a challenge, seeing as how his body resisted the changes more than plants, but he was getting better at it.

Eventually, once Lykou had finished his breakfast and splashed some more water in his face, he decided to fill Kuna in on his conversation with their Sylthean friends. “Well, Daisy and Lana are doing well. Making more friends, including Moyra and Faergus.”

“Oh, that’s good! I’m really happy for them,” Kuna replied. “Do they… y’know, know their whole thing? You know, with…”

“Daisy? Mhmm. They’re apparently trying to tone down the secrecy a little more, bit by bit.”

“Well that’s good. Er, I hope.”

“Yeah, they’re kinda going to need to,” Lykou said, his smile faltering for a moment. “Apparently, somehow, Kerr escaped and he’s even more of an evil bastard than we thought.”

“What?!” Kuna replied, pausing his stitching. “How?? He was… well, you know…”

“From the sound of it, he might have had some… demonic help,” Lykou continued. “They found some of the other prisoners dead. And… it looks like he was drinking their blood.”

“Fuck!” Kuna blurted out, rubbing his head. “That’s just great, another demonic duo roaming around… is that shit really so common??”

“Well, on the bright side I think they’ve got it handled. They don’t know where he is right now, but they’ve got all the drunas on alert and, well, this is Aelana and Daisy we’re talking aboiut. Pretty sure if anyone can handle demonic shit, it’s them, especially now that they’re trying to be more hands-on with some things,” Lykou said. “And I can’t imagine the other surviving bandits will want much to do with him now. So he’ll have a hard time putting together anything like the Order.”

Kuna shuddered. “I certainly hope so. Clovaria’s a nice place, with a lot of nice people. Last thing I’d want is for them to have that kind of thing take hold there.”

“Yeah, thank goodness they’ve got pretty good protection there. Between Lana, Daisy, Moyra, Faergus, and the other drunas, plus the other town guards in general, I think they’ll be fine,” Lykou said, then hesitated for a moment. He sighed. “...and I guess technically Ink is still there too. Much as I despise her for what she’s put us through, I don’t imagine she’d sit by and let some demon gets its claws into Clovaria, especially given her, y’know… connection to Lana. And I guess technically Daisy, but-”

“Yeah mostly Lana, I know,” Kuna said with an amused smirk. “Daisy made it pretty clear.”

“Heh, hard to believe those two were ever a thing,” Lykou commented, then took another sip of water. “Although I can kind of understand why they’re trying to at least be friends now though.”

“Really?” Kuna asked, somewhat surprised. He certainly had no great love for Inkari either, but he knew the konuul definitely had an even bleaker opinion of her than he did. So the statement took him off guard.

“Yeah. I mean think about it- there aren’t many powerful, magical thousand-year-old people around. Friends are great but I imagine seeing them come and go through the generations must be hard, so it must get lonely,” Lykou explained. “Must kind of suck really, when you think about it.”

“Wow, yeah,” Kuna agreed, frowning. “Never really considered that.”

“Mm. But yeah, they’re doing alright overall,” Lykou said. “Was nice seeing them again. I caught them up on our adventures too, of course. The ursarans and that monster, the islands and our new friends there, the Kr- oh, shit!”

“Huh?” Kuna shot a worried look at the konuul as he suddenly bolted up and darted over to his main bag and started rummaging around in it. “What’s wrong?”

“Where is that damn- ah! There you are,” Lykou said as he pulled the small remaining vial of draught of the dead from his bag. He held it at arm’s length with a wary look, then looked around until he spotted Kuna’s bag. He didn’t even wait to ask before quickly rummaging through it for Kuna’s vial.

“Er, what are you doing with those?” Kuna asked, bewildered by the canid’s sudden frantic disposition.

Rather than answer right away, Lykou rushed over and tossed the vials forcefully down into the fire. Almost immediately, there was an explosion of foul-smelling, multi-colored smoke. A small shockwave also knocked him back onto his rear and bumped Kuna over as well. When they both sat up, they scrabbled back a bit further when they saw the cloud of smoke coalesce, briefly, into what looked like a laughing skull. They could swear they briefly heard the faint sound of some familiar cackling, though it soon gave way to the crackling of the fire as the plume gradually dissipated. Sizzling fluids gradually steamed off on the logs, giving little colorful sparks and occasionally shifting the flame’s color to pale greenish-blue until it all was finally gone.

Kuna stared at the fire for a moment, before suddenly shooting Lykou a confused glare. “What the fuck, Lykou??”

“Believe me, we probably do not want to know what would’ve happened to us if we took the last one of those,” Lykou said as he gradually calmed himself down. “That whole species swap thing was apparently almost definitely intentional and not an unavoidable side-effect. And we’re extremely lucky that’s all we had to go through.”

Kuna’s eyes widened. “O-oh?”

Lykou nodded. “We had a very… enlightening conversation about the Kryck, and Algrytha in particular,” he said as he dusted himself off, then crawled back over to his spot by the fire while Kuna did likewise next to him. “They were very familiar with both.”

“Really? Doesn’t sound good,” Kuna hazarded.

“To put it mildly,” Lykou said, then shuddered. “I don’t know what’s scarier, the fact that we very well could have ended up trapped in the Kryck, reliving one of its dark ‘stories’ for who knows how long… or that the person helping us was one of Sylthea’s greatest villains.”

“...what?” Kuna asked quietly, staring in disbelief at the konuul. “A-Algrytha…?”

“Dark Aggy, l-like she said. Apparently so twisted and evil she even scares Lana and Daisy,” Lykou said as he gripped the waterskin in his lap to ground himself a little. “Given what we heard before in all the confusion at the end, I think there’s a good chance she organized every bad thing that happened in that… ‘story’ we experienced, and that was probably one of the less nasty things she’s done.”

“...fuck,” Kuna said in a tiny voice, trembling slightly. “A-and we drank those potions…”

“Lana and Daisy said we’re probably okay now. Our goals just happened to temporarily align with hers, so other than messing with us a bit, she didn’t care what happened to us as long as she got what she was really after.”

Kuna gulped. “Which was…?”

“No idea. But, ironically, we probably don’t need to worry about it specifically because of the Kryck. She’s part of one of its stories, and it… keeps people,” Lykou said plainly. “And from the way they talked about it, Kryckwood is more than capable of holding onto her as long as it wants.”

The sereva arched a brow. “You make it sound-”

“Like it’s alive, I know. Apparently it kind of is, in a way. Supposedly there’s some kind of ‘spirit of the Kryck’ behind it all, but not actually connected to the spirit world.”

“F-fuck. That… just m-makes everything we w-went through even s-scarier,” Kuna said, hugging himself as he processed it all.

“No kidding,” Lykou said, scooting over to wrap an arm around the sereva. “So glad we got out of there… at least we don’t have to worry about it now.”

“Thank fuck for that,” Kuna said, leaning against him. “So… talk about anything else?”

“Well… I did mention this place. All the statues and stuff,” Lykou replied. “Lana said it sounded very vaguely familiar and she was going to do some, er… ‘research’ about it when she got a chance.”

“Research?” Kuna asked curiously.

“Yeah, apparently she’s got a collection of scrolls of her own. I guess the whole ‘writing’ thing is common for Syltheans,” Lykou said. “She says she wants to start teaching it to people in Clovaria some time.”

“Huh. That’s interesting. Shame we didn’t get to see it while we were there,” Kuna said.

“She did say she’d be happy to teach us or offer advice for developing our own if we’re interested,” Lykou replied, then shrugged. “I kind of like the idea at least, but might want to save it for after we get back to Lakefire.”

“Sure,” Kuna agreed, then grinned. “Hey, you and I could even make our own secret writing that only we understand. Y’know, for fun.”

Lykou beamed at him. “That does sound kind of fun.”

Kuna thought for a moment, then narrowed his eyes and prodded the konuul playfully. “Sooo… how’d your inner voice embarrass you? Don’t tell me it didn’t, because I won’t believe you.”

The konuul immediately blushed and looked away with a bashful look. “N-nothing really bad,” he lied. “Y-you wouldn’t-”

“Kooou,” Kuna wheedled him, grinning. “Don’t make me tie you down with some vines.”

Lykou groaned a bit and frantically tried to think of something to say that wouldn’t give it all away. Unfortunately, he couldn’t think of any good lies on the spot, so he settled for the one embarrassing truth that wouldn’t immediately give away everything. “Welll… they uh… kind of… know about o-our… y’know. Thing. Yesterday.”

“Thi-” Kuna started to ask with a confused expression, then stopped when it dawned on him. He blushed furiously as well and covered his mouth. “W-wait, you… you mean..???”

“Yeahhhh,” Lykou said with a sheepish, flustered smile, unable to meet his eye. “I-I promise it was very much n-not something I intended to tell, but, welll… y-you know how things h-happen in there…”

“Fffuck,” Kuna said with an embarrassed, flustered look. “How’d that even come up??”

“I… guess it just happened to be on my mind w-when they showed up,” Lykou lied. “And you know. Try not to think about something and suddenly it’s all you can think about.”

“Good grief,” Kuna groaned, rolling his eyes up. He then smirked and nudged the konuul in the side. “Not fair. Even in your dreamscape, I still end up getting second-hand embarrassment.” They both giggled a little, still blushing. After a moment, Kuna’s smile faded and he shot the konuul a worried look. “S-so why was it still on your mind? …f-feeling awkward? Having s-second thoughts? Cus w-we don’t have t-”

“No! Nonono,” Lykou quickly assured him. “Not at all. Uh. Y-you aren’t either, right?”

“Nono, I-I’m fine,” Kuna replied. He then smiled bashfully again. “Honestly I… think that might’ve been part of why I slept so well last night…”

Lykou smiled back, folding his ears down. “G-good… cus I r-really enjoyed that…”

“M-me too,” Kuna agreed. They both smiled at each other for a minute, getting lost in each other’s eyes and their own feelings, before realizing what they were doing and quickly looking away again. “Ehehe, s-so… right. S-supply day…”

“Yeah! Yeah, I um. I should get ready to start hunting,” Lykou said, then looked over at his axe thoughtfully. “Never really hunted with an axe before… should be interesting…”

“You sure you’re up to that?” Kuna asked. “Being tired and all?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Lykou said as he got up and went to grab the axe. Once he picked it up, he yawned and blinked a few times, then shot the sereva a sheepish look. “Hopefully. Only one way to find out.”

“Okay, second question,” Kuna continued, eyeing the axe warily. “Should you even still use that thing? Given where we got it and all…”

Lykou looked down at the axe in his hands thoughtfully. “...well, it wasn’t from Alg- Dark Aggy, at least.”

“Still, it’s from Kryckwood,” the sereva noted. “Who knows if its cursed or something?”

“Hmm, good point,” Lykou said. “Although I’d hope Zyn would have picked up on something like that. And anyway, nothing bad’s come from it yet.”

Kuna looked anxious. “Just… be careful, alright?”

“I will, don’t worry. First sign of trouble, I’ll come back here,” Lykou assured him.

*****

Lykou cursed as another potential quarry got away. He’d been hunting for a few hours, but every time he started to close in on his target, he’d inevitably give himself away at the last moment by slipping or loudly stepping on a branch or twig he hadn’t noticed before. The lack of sleep wasn’t helping matters. And neither was the change in tactics. He’d gotten so used to hunting with a spear, which gave him a bit more range, even if the crude ones he made himself were often not well suited to being thrown.

If only I still had that spear with the pelenock tooth, he thought to himself. I’m sure that one could’ve worked pretty well thrown…

After a few moments, an idea occurred to him. He looked over the axe in his hands and considered its weight distribution carefully. It was much bigger than the kind of hand-axe that some Ashers used for sport or self-defense against the ursarans, but it felt surprisingly well-balanced, and seemed to have gotten even moreso as he’d been carrying it. He figured he might as well experiment with it. With the extra weight, he figured it might even be more effective at killing, as long as he aimed it right. The smaller ones would only wound unless they hit a particularly vital spot, but the large axe in his hands might cut deeper if it hit its target, to say nothing of its latent magical nature.

So, after creeping around the woods some more, he eventually caught sight of something that vaguely resembled a boar, albeit with a long tail that split down the back and a strange beak-like mouth. He slowly approached until he felt like he was within range. After taking a slow, calming breath, he shifted the axe into one hand and hauled back, then hurled it towards the creature’s side with all his might.

Unfortunately, the axe landed just short of its target, burying itself in the ground. The impact spooked the creature and sent it running, making a strange warbling sound of distress as it ran. Various smaller creatures in the trees scattered in a small burst of panicked motion in response.

Lykou sighed. Clearly, his aim needed work. He trudged over to the axe and plucked it out of the ground. Surprisingly, despite having gotten wedged pretty deep, it slid out easily once his hand touched it. He looked it over in his hands and contemplated things for a minute, then searched his surroundings. “Right… I need practice,” he mumbled to himself. He searched for a short time, until he finally found a fallen tree laying across the forest floor. He circled around until he found a clear path to it at a distance he felt comfortable throwing the axe, then started taking practice throws.

Throwing and retrieving the axe over and over certainly didn’t help his fatigue any. Nonetheless, he found himself actually enjoying it after the first few minutes. Ever time he flung the axe, it felt more natural, and the loud, definite ‘thunk’ sound when it buried itself in the tree’s trunk was oddly satisfying. And despite the wood being largely rot-free and still in tough shape, the cuts went deep.

Finally, when he started to get slightly winded from the aggressive practice, he decided to take a break and head down to the river to cool off. When he reached the shore, he waded into it and topped off his waterskin, then took a big sip. After cooling off for a few minutes, he flopped down onto a large rock on the side of the river, relaxing in the sun as some nearby rapids kicked a pleasant mist up over him.

While he rested, he took some time to look over the axe and contemplate it. As many times as he’d tried the whole ‘attuning’ thing, he still wasn’t sure he was doing it right. And while the axe definitely felt more comfortable in his hands, he’d yet to unlock any of its magical abilities. His hands traced over the fancy patterns and symbols on the side of the blade, wondering what they might mean. As he did, he realized he could feel… something. It was faint and he couldn’t be sure it wasn’t just his imagination, but it was almost like a faint tug when his hand passed over the handle from time to time. And there did seem to be a vague connection forming that he couldn’t quite describe. “I hope that means I’m doing this right…” he murmured to himself. “Would be nice to be able to do that whole ‘cutting from a distance’ thing Elzhan did.”

When he grew tired of contemplating the axe, he set it aside and just looked at the forest around him. The statues were scattered all around, not just near the trail. Some were even standing in the water, in defiance against the erosion of time and the river’s flow. They were definitely the work of skilled craftspeople. He couldn’t help but wonder who made them, and what they were like. To have left so many works of art laying around without any other structures seemed odd to him.

After a while, he sighed and got back up. Much as he enjoyed the short respite and would have loved to continue relaxing there, contemplating the valley’s mysteries, he knew he needed to get more meat for the journey. And sitting around wasn’t going to get him any more supplies. Luckily, as he was wading back to shore, he spotted some of the large, colorful birds he saw earlier clustered around another spot further down the river. While they certainly looked different, they were about the same size as the turkeys back around Lakefire, and he imagined they might taste similar. With that thought in mind, his mouth began to water and he started working out a way to creep up on them.

It was slow going, of course. He didn’t want to spook them, so he approached slowly and carefully. He circled around and searched until he found one that was slightly separated from the rest. After finding the best position to strike from, he steeled himself and prepared to throw the axe. And then… crunch.

He immediately swore when the bird’s head jerked up at the sound of his foot cracking a small, dry branch under it. As it turned to bolt off, he quickly threw the axe. It came frustratingly close to hitting his target, but ended up burying itself in the side of a tree instead as the bird fled, dropping a few feathers behind it as it went. The others all noticed the commotion and escaped as well.

“DAMMIT!” he swore, then grumbled and trudged over to retrieve the weapon. “I was so damn close!” With a sigh, he started considering calling the hunt off for the day. He didn’t want to have to delay their travel another day, but he was clearly not in the best shape to be hunting. “Fuck it… I’ve got enough for tonight. I’m sure Ku won’t mind staying another day,” he said, defeated, then started trudging back towards the camp.

After hiking for a while, however, he spotted movement among some stones at the base of a small cliff on the side of a hill. There was some kind of moderately-sized creature lounging there, in an open patch not covered by the forest canopy, presumably basking in the sun. He grinned as he realized the ridge would give him a perfect vantage point to strike from. So, being careful about where he stepped, he slowly crept around the patch of rocks and dirt the creature was lounging in, then started ascending the hill from the far side. When he reached the top, he peeked over and looked around until he saw the creature dozing in the middle of a circular cluster of stones, on top of a pile of various forest debris.

He took a moment to focus and steady his nerves. Once he felt ready, he hauled back with the axe, and threw it. Being able to target from above definitely helped his aim. What he wasn’t counting on, however, was another creature stepping in the way. Suddenly, as the axe left his hand, things seemed to move in slow motion as he suddenly became aware of another animal stepping between him and his target- a smaller version of the thing he’d been aiming at. In fact, there were several of them, all bumbling around the larger one.

It was a mother and her babies. A sudden regret coursed through him as the axe flew through the air. He knew nature could be cruel, but he’d always made an effort to not be a part of that cruelty. He definitely didn’t want to kill a baby or leave a bunch of orphans. But the weapon was on its way and he could only watch in the strange, slow-motion view he suddenly had of the world as it prepared to end the young creature’s life prematurely.

Only it didn’t. Suddenly, as his hand was still outstretched from the throw, he felt a slight tug that paired with his desire to spare the young animal. And the axe slowed to a halt in mid-air, then reversed course. The next thing Lykou knew, it landed back in his hand, jerking his arm backwards a bit. The creatures down below let out a startled and confused cacophony of sounds as they tried to make sense of the sudden appearance-then-disappearance of the strange object that’d just rapidly gotten all too close for comfort.

Lykou quickly retreated from the edge until he was out of earshot of the creatures, then looked at the axe in bewilderment. “Did… did that really just happen?” he asked aloud, staring at the axe in his hands with wide eyes. Slowly, a grin crossed his muzzle as he looked it over. He got up after a moment and looked around, then tossed the axe again experimentally at a nearby tree. As soon as the axe left his hand, he tried mentally tugging on it. Unfortunately, it didn’t stop the axe from burying itself in the wood. Grumbling, he retrieved it and tried again. Once more, a solid impact cracked off a section of the tree’s bark.

He sighed. Must have been a fluke, he thought to himself. But just as he was about to give up, he felt a strange sensation pass through him. It felt almost like when the galdra spoke to him, only fainter and even vaguer. But it left a single impression on him: one more time.

He arched a brow and stared at the axe thoughtfully. Was it his imagination, or had it tried to communicate with him? Still, he decided to give it one more shot. After taking a deep breath, he whipped the axe around and threw it again, sideways this time. He felt a tug and mentally tried pulling it back. And this time, it worked. The axe slowed its traversal and spun in the air for a moment, before flying back into his hand. He grinned and tried it again. And again, the weapon returned. There was a very faint glimmer along the handle as it rested in his hands afterwards.

Giddy with the discovery, he practiced for a while. Every couple of attempts failed, but his successes gradually became more consistent. “Well… at least something good came from today,” he mused aloud, grinning at the weapon in his hand.