Threads of the Soul

Turning away from the once resplendent view of a previously beautiful city, which was now wreathed in death and destruction, Seth focused on the task at hand. He had found their location, but if they were going to raid this place and put an end to these wretched beasts once and for all, then he needed to know exactly what they were going up against.

Going on half cocked would not only be incredibly moronic, but could easily get some, if not all, of them killed in the process.

Leaping from the gargoyle, Seth had little Geets latch onto the wall once again like a spider, digging his fingers into the mortar and creating hand holds. It might not have seemed like a difficult task, but even with Geets enhancements Seth still had to send trickles of mana into his puppet to help out in the process.

On their own, those trickles didn't mean much, but with every new handhold requiring its own little boost, it would quickly begin to take its toll on Seth's mana supply. Honestly it was quite irritating, in his opinion, that despite having a detailed interface of his stats, he still had no quantifiable measurement of his mana.

Seth simply had to go off the physical strain it left on him, hoping that he didn't over exert himself and end up face down on the floor passed out. Again. He would be lying if he said he hadn't gone over board when he first realised what his new muscles could do with a little magical help.

It would be even more useful if he could simply have the gargoyle under his control and have that chauffer Geets through the skies, or have him simply fly himself. But his powers had some strange restriction on such things.

He could make normal items float or he could make humanoid objects, like statues and figurines, walk. He couldn't do both. Perhaps if their original form was capable of flight, such as if he puppeteered a raven's corpse, but he had yet to test that theory.

The logic of it, he simply couldn't understand. He could make his clothes levitate in order to walk like a normal person, but he couldn't make them fly. Whether he was in them or not. Which was another thing he had tested after he realised how difficult sword surfing was going to be.

Perhaps it was simply restricted by his subconscious, or just how the threads had to position themselves across the objects. Truly he had no idea.

So, for now, he had to settle for being a wall crawling little menace as he carried out his spy mission.

Squeezing himself through an arrow slit window, Seth found solace in his mana expenditures in the form of a small, ledge like lip between the top of wall and the curved ceiling. He was sure there was no doubt some architectural purpose for it, as well as a proper name. But neither of those mattered, for now they just served as Geets personal walk way and would be named as such.

Using this new personal walk way, Seth sneaked and snuck his way throughout the bowels of the castle, keeping a low profile high above the heads of the stubby legged little Hemogoblins as they prowled throughout the castle, occasionally having to employ his wall crawling shenanigans from time to time until he found new ledges to creep along.

Trying to get an accurate count of these basic goblins was a frivolous effort, since they could easily spawn more. Not to mention, most of these were simple cannon fodder. What he was after was the properly powerful ones, the mages and Hobgoblins.

After only a ten minute cursory search, his total for the mages was reaching 20, while the Hobgoblins were just shy of double digits themselves. However that wasn't the worst of it, although he couldn't exactly confirm what it was, he briefly caught sight of something humanoid that towered over the Hobgoblins before it disappeared into a heavily guarded room.

He didn't need three guesses to know that thing, whatever it was, was most likely the leader of this band of crimson skinned misfits. They seemed to respect strength, after all, and that thing definitely looked strong enough.

However, from his brief glance at its figure he did notice one odd thing about this creature. While everything here, from the basic Hemogoblins to the strongest Hobs, had skin the colour of freshly spilled blood, for obvious reasons. This thing on the other hand, was emerald skinned. What that meant, Seth had no idea.

Perhaps it was a mutation, perhaps it was just an odd type of blood it spawned for. Or maybe it was just nothing. Maybe...

Regardless, there was no way for Seth to confirm what that thing was or even get in the room for a better look at it, so he turned his attention to another important room. The dungeon.

These things liked to capture and control animals, right? So what better place to keep them than the dungeon, it had all your cages primed and ready for you with no need to build your own. At least, that's what Seth thought.

But when he eventually reached said dungeon, after getting lost a few times and ultimately resorting to following a collared creature as it returned home, he was overwhelmed by the sheer eagerness of the Hemogoblins efforts to capture and enslave.

The existing cells were over run with countless beasts, to the point that they had to build their own crude cages in the same room. Some cells even contained a few humans, as well as things that used to be human before the Fall.

Troughs had been set out within the cells, filled with all manner of mystery meats, and Seth doubted that the Hemogoblins had given a single bit of care to make sure their their prisoner's didn't partake in the act of cannibalism. As if they would ever be so kind.

The few humans that did fill out the cages just didn't look right. They had twisted or bulging flesh, as if they had the most extreme cancer the world had ever seen. One of them had a single arm three times the size of his other one, with the arm covered in flesh that almost seemed like it was melting. Like he was nothing more than a flesh blob that was desperately trying, and failing, to retain his original shape.

If Seth couldn't see the intelligence, as well as the fear and utter despair, in this mans bloodshot eyes he would have thought he was just an aberration, like many of the others creatures. But instead, it was almost as if he was caught in between. As if the process was halted before it could complete whatever transformation it had in store for him.

Although, whether that was a good sign for this man, or a dreadful omen of the future, Seth could only wait until they rescued them to find out. A prospect he utterly hated to the deepest parts of his core.

Scampering his way to the other side of the dungeon like a little rat, Seth came across a thick wall separating him from the next room within the dungeon, most likely what used to be a torture chamber or just a solitary cell. In the middle of the wall was a set of heavy steel double door with half a dozen latches and padlocks on them, and a single sliding grate at eye level. Of course that was normal eye level, not his current eye level which was more like ankle level.

The sheer amount of security on this door was not a wonderful sign, but perhaps it was simply there to keep something out. If it was a torture chamber, then naturally they'd want to lock up the 'instruments' so that the prisoners couldn't get use them as weapons. Yes... that definitely had to be it.

However, even if it was just a heavily secured supply closet filled with nothing but toilet paper, there was no way that little Geets would be able to get through that door. Then again, he didn't need to.

Luckily for this little ankle biter, however, it seemed this dungeon had some actual rats once upon a time, before they mutated into horrific monstrosities. Crawling through the hole in the wall, which the previous rats had so kindly left from him, Seth took a peek inside this mysterious dungeon room.

It was only when he laid eyes on its current tenant, did Seth fully understand why this door was so heavily sealed shut and what the evil hands of fate had in store for them. Looking at the creature before him, as it slumbered within the depths of the cells shadows and filled the room with its rumbling and thrumming snores, Seth's heart sunk deep within his chest.

'God... why do you hate me so much? What did I ever do to you?'