Captain Hyrmine felt her soulcards shudder as a wave of soulforce rippled out. The Atriguul's barriers were rippling like a pond during a hailstorm. On one side, the shape of the giant stood, holding something that was causing a screaming sound. It had to be an instrument, though she'd never seen one that looked like a piece of sharp metal. The sound was like a mix of one of the soulbirds she'd seen at a wandering circus and a scream of anger and rage. There was a song there, though the barrier was blocking most of the sound. Still, the way her soulcards kept resonating gave her an inclination of what it would sound like to others outside the shield.

  "Captain, the shields are draining our soulforce reservoir! If we don't-"

  Hyrmine glared at one of the shieldmenders, the only carded who were able to boost, regenerate, and control the way the shield worked. The lack of any serpent markers showed he was tribeless, and she held back a curse. Had it been one of the warriors of her tribe, she'd not have to explain anything.

  "Drain the soulforce from anything you need. Just keep these shields up!" she shouted. "Do I need to explain what will happen if the shield doesn't block that soulforce and sound explosion? Keep them up even if you blow out the runes!"

  The man paled even more, which was impressive as he'd been close to the color of paper already. Still, he turned to his job, and Hyrmine glared back up at the giant.

  Hyrmine knew she was letting her worry and anger overtake her common sense, but one look at what was happening beyond the shield should tell anyone they needed those shields.

  Who are you? she thought, watching the giant dodge a tentacle. The attack was slower than before, and she saw that some of the eyes on the Oculithar were partially closed. Beyond that, it was hard to see anything, as the soulforce that she could barely see in the best of situations had become like a storm of teal, purple, gold, and fire, raging only just beyond.

  "Xouzel, prepare another attack," she roared. "As soon as that attack stops, shield-blink and hit it with everything you have!"

  There was no response, but she sensed the faint presence of a dozen shadewalkers near the edge of the barrier.

  The shield all around them shivered in its entirety, and Hyrmine flexed her own soulcards. She knew that, as the captain, she shouldn't attack, but she found it hard to hold back her ingrained reflexes.

  If I need to, I'll help them, she thought, wishing she could see what was happening beyond their own precarious situation.

  --

  Irwin grinned as he felt the Oculithar's soulforce shudder. The song he was playing could barely be called that. Instead, he was just flinging his fingers across the snares to generate the constant shocking of soulforce resonance, but it was working. As his soulstrum guitar howled, the movements of the two Oculithars slowed steadily.

  Dodging was effortless now, but there was one problem.

  He couldn't go full power.

  As he dodged one of the slow tentacles, he glanced at the people protected by the Portal Guardian's shield. It had been a brilliant, stable barrier before he started. Now, it was rippling and unstable, and he actually had to hold back a lot after his first strum.

  If he wanted to actually start damaging the Oculithar, he had to go all out, but if he did that, their shield would drop.

  Perhaps I can start destroying some eyes, he thought as he ran forward, occasionally zipping across the soundwaves that were everywhere around him. The tentacles wrapped around the shield were only as wide as he was, making running across them difficult, but he did manage to reach the first eye. Without looking, he stomped his heel down on the face-sized milky disk.

  His foot bounced back with surprising force, causing him to almost lose his balance. Taking a step back, he inadvertently strummed his fingers with a bit more force. The soulforce strings hummed up a notch. To the side, the shield rippled like it had been struck by a giant fist, while one of the tentacles that had been moving towards him flailed sideways, slamming into the other Oculithar.

  Okay, let's try that again.

  Irwin stepped to the eye and split his focus slightly, a small part of him pulling on his first soulcard. Flame rippled around his foot as he stomped on the eye again. This time, he was prepared; the bounce barely caused an issue, and he left a slightly blackened indent. A high-pitched screech came from the center mass of the Oculithar.

  Another three stomps finally had the desired effect as he felt something pop below his foot. A spray of pale white ichor sprayed out while the Oculithar's screech grew to ear-rattling levels.

  Irwin released his hold on his soulforce senses, quickly checking the Oculithar. All around him, the soulforce resonance appeared with a vengeance, colors, sounds, and impressions surrounding him like a storm that wanted to devour him whole. He pushed through, focusing solely on the beast below. The previously stable soulforce within the demonic beast was a cracking mess.

  As a headache popped up from the barrage, Irwin quickly suppressed his soulforce senses and ran to the next eye. It might take a while, but as long as the Portal Guardian could-

  The tentacles below him released the shield as the Oculithar pushed itself away. His feet pulled out from under him, Irwin toppled down, and he instinctively flung himself through the soundwaves, appearing atop the shield. The Oculithar was flailing slightly but speeding up as it moved away from them, already three ship's lengths away.

  So much for slowly whittling it down, Irwin thought. He looked around to take stock of the rest of the situation.

  The Nocturna was flying away from the smaller Oculithar, which was chasing it with red, glowing eyes. Intermittent beams of red energy pulsed from its eyes, harmlessly striking the shadowy shield, while Coal's dark shadowclones flickered around the Oculithar. Like Irwin, they were constantly attacking the eyes, many of which had been turned into hole-riddled, bleeding messes.

  Far away, closer to the city, a cloud of energy vapor hung while the hundreds of ships kept blasting at whatever was inside. There was no sight of the Bigbelly, but Irwin sensed Ambraz's presence in the cloud, and he seemed unbothered by whatever was happening.

  A blur from the side made Irwin dash sideways, reappearing to see the other of the two Oculithar pulling one of its tentacles back.

  He was about to rush to it when something below drew his attention. He was stunned to see Captain Hyrmine hover just below him, her face fuzzy through the shield. Her lips were moving as she shouted at him, and he stopped his fingers from striking the strings.

  The sudden silence was shocking, but Hyrmine's next shout came through much clearer.

  "Get the other one. We've got this!"

  Irwin didn't bother asking if she was sure, but turned to the fleeing Oculithar. Ichor was still leaking from its busted eye, but it seemed to ignore it as it sped up to the city.

  Why is it going there? Irwin thought as he unsummoned his soulstrum guitar and dashed after it.

  Reappearing in mid-air, he frowned. The Oculithar was heading in roughly the same direction as the small had gone too. His initial thought had been that they were going for the people in the city to consume their soulforce, perhaps. Now, he wasn't so sure.

  Are they heading for the exit portal?

  It would make sense. Most stories said that the giant Oculithar were prone to hovering around the exit portals and portal corridors. They were even able to exist in the space the corridors inhabited.

  He zipped forward twice more, reaching the Oculithar and landing on its main body, between the eyes, which were plastered haphazardly on its front. The tentacles were angled back as if they were pushing it on, but as soon as Irwin appeared, it slowed down as two tendrils flashed forward.

  Irwin's soulstrum guitar appeared instantly, and without having to worry about the nearby ship, he struck it as hard as he could. Part of him worried about the people in the nearby city, but he knew that if the Oculithar reached it, things would be far worse.

  The incoming tentacles almost looked drunk as they flailed sideways, one hitting nothing but air, the other actually crashing into the main body, nearly hitting the Oculithar's own eyes. The Oculithar showed no reaction to its own tentacle slamming into it. Instead, it shuddered and flailed around, occasionally letting out a torturous cry as if the sound was causing it intense pain.

  Irwin ignored them, increasing the power of the soulstrum guitar's strings as much as he could. Even without his enhanced soulforce senses, he could feel the monster's soulforce begin to crumble below him.

  Seconds turned to minutes as the Oculithar seemed incapable of acting, and his tension subsided.

  I wish this would work against the bigger ones, he thought.

  He was pondering whether he should stop and try some other approaches, so he could practice things, when the Oculithar's eyes began glowing with an unearthly pale white light. The tips of its tentacles began curling inward while its soulforce began fluctuating. The pulses went from slow to faster than Irwin could count within the span of a few moments.

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  Irwin hesitated. What was it doing? Was it some ability it had held back, or was it-

  A sense of danger flooded him, and Irwin didn't hesitate. He jumped into the soundwaves, following them away. He appeared a few hundred yards away, only to be buffeted by an explosion of soulforce that picked him up and shoved him forward. His body spun around frantically, a soulforce-induced force hurtling him off-course.

  Irwin struggled, trying to dash into the soundwaves, but whatever was pushing him was blocking his ability, and he felt his soulcards resonate oddly - almost as if in pain. The world kept spinning, and he only caught flashes of his surroundings, but they were enough. He was being pushed toward the barrier.

  Soulstrum guitar!

  Irwin's hands clenched around his guitar, which hadn't been unsummoned by whatever the Oculithar had done. His connection to it felt faint, but it was there, and the strings were still humming with power. Trying to ignore his spinning body, he struck the snares.

  Sound and soulforce blasted away from him, and for a moment, he sensed resistance - something was wrapped around him, yanking him away. Then, whatever it was shattered. Irwin instantly sensed his soulcards screaming a warning.

  Irwin triggered his movement ability, dashing back across the soundwaves. As he reappeared, no longer spinning but now falling down, he felt his skin crawl.

  A few hundred feet from him was the barrier of this section of the portal gallery, and behind, innumerable malice-filled eyes were staring at him. The nearest was as large as the Bigbelly, and as it watched him, Irwin saw a primal recognition. The enormous Oculithar saw him and… recognized something.

  Tentacles so wide they wouldn't fit in many of the portal gallery sections he'd visited, wrapped around the barrier.

  Irwin swallowed as he saw the soulforce storm beyond the barrier, blown away by a wave of a red-tinted, pitch-black pulse of soulforce unlike any he'd seen. His soulcards tensed, then almost seemed to withdraw within themselves, and only his heartcard pulsed with what felt like defiance.

  Irwin only noticed he'd reached the ragged, rocky ground below when it appeared in his peripheral vision. Then he struck it, his knees buckling slightly and his feet stinging. He barely noticed as he stared in horrified awe at what was happening beyond the barrier.

  The tentacles were tightening, and the blue lightning that had appeared when they had just arrived was nothing compared to the tree-sized bolts that rippled across the barrier now.

  Irwin held his breath, almost expecting it to shatter. But as seconds passed, the barrier held, and after what felt like an eternity, the tentacles withdrew, the enormous eyes slowly backing up. When the last one finally vanished into the storm, Irwin swallowed, shivering.

  As dangerous as the small ones had been, they were like a breeze on a summer day compared to the thing that lay beyond the barrier.

  The others!

  Irwin turned around, looking back at the city. Everything was quiet, and he saw The Nocturna fly towards him. A distant little hill behind it quivered every so often while tiny shapes dashed across it, showing that Coal's shadowy selves were finishing up. The fleet of hundreds of ships, including the Bigbelly, now hovered near the Portal Guardian.

  "How long was I standing here?" Irwin whispered.

  "I'd say close to fifteen minutes," a voice croaked.

  Irwin jolted and turned around to see Greldo look at the barrier. He was about to snap at his friend not to scare him when he saw how pale Greldo was, his hand shaking softly.

  "How long were you standing here?" Irwin asked.

  "Halfway through," Greldo muttered. "I was coming to help you, but as soon as I was here, my soulcards just… stopped doing as I want them to. Only Coal was still listening, and from what he told me, his own abilities were acting up. That… thing… forced me out of the shadowrealm. It felt like I was some unruly child, and it was just with its presence. What- Irwin, how are we supposed to fight something like that?"

  Irwin swallowed as he looked beyond the barrier.

  "I don't think we are… at least not yet," he said.

  "I thought we were doing great, killing those smaller Oculithar with little effort," Greldo said, turning to Irwin. "Those were nothing compared to that. Not even a comparison!"

  "I know," Irwin said before another horrible thing occurred to him. "Were there cracks in the barrier again?"

  "No," Greldo said. "And if there were, no more small ones came through."

  "Good, let's head back then," Irwin said.

  Greldo nodded, but he didn't make any move to leave yet.

  "How did you blow that other one up?"

  Irwin only now realized the reason he'd been blown to this side of the portal gallery section.

  "The young Oculithar have really weak soulforce stability," he said. "I overloaded it."

  "I take it you can't do that with the big one?"

  Irwin didn't even answer, and after a few moments, Greldo sniffed and shrugged.

  "Right. Well, let's head back. I'm pretty sure you are going to be talking with important people for the next day."

  Irwin grimaced at the idea, then glanced at the barrier.

  "Better than being near that thing," he said.

  --

  Tiny.

  Tiny.

  Tiny, but….

  No true thoughts passed through the entity as it moved back into the chaos, only emotions and instincts.

  Familiar?

  Yes…

  Dangerous?

  No… But- a powerful, ancient memory of others surged through the entity.

  Furious hatred bubbled up for a moment before fading as fast as it came.

  The condensed essence had stopped it from getting to the tiny familiar sense. It had been able to pierce the essence, but its weak offshoots had been unable to reach the cause and destabilize it.

  As the entity moved further, the chaotic memories tried to bundle together and form coherent thoughts. An instinctive thing to do. Long ago, it had been able to do it… but now-

  Knowledge without thought and barely any self. The storm's constant attacks were like pinpricks on its skin. Its memories told it that long ago they had been painful, but that was so long ago that the memory didn't matter.

  Memories, instincts. Pain. Hunger.

  Little more mattered to the entity as it flowed away, some of its eyes never leaving the brightly burning essence. Inside was the entrance. The pathway to… what?

  Rage flowed through its entire being, and when it left, it took the faint desire for coherence with it.

  The entity hovered there, sensing hundreds of smaller ones moving around. Hunting. Attacking. Each other and the tiny things that had begun to appear recently.

  A flicker of consciousness emerged from within the ancient, muddled lethargy of hate and pain. Like millions of branches suddenly blowing one way in the wind, a mind pulsed for a single moment-

  It approaches.

  -the consciousness vanished, the single thought echoing through the chaotic, cavernous mind before disappearing.

  The entity flowed back, not noticing the hundreds of smaller ones that had stopped moving, fully focused on it, or the ripple that moved outward through the ambient soulforce.

  --

  "You think you can just come here, draw that monster's attention back on us, and just act as if nothing happened?"

  Irwin cocked his head sideways as he looked at the Granitian before him. He was still not sure exactly what was happening. He'd just suddenly been stormed at by the man, who started angrily shouting at him. What wasn't helping was his surprise that the Granitian's obsidian black eyes actually looked down on him, as the man had to be at least a foot taller than he was. It was something he'd not encountered in a while, and that made him wonder exactly how large Granitians could become.

  The man's eyes narrowed as if he expected Irwin to do something.

  "Answer me!"

  Irwin ignored him and looked around, noticing that the other people who had been waiting for their arrival were staring at the Granitian with looks that ranged from sadness to annoyance, and none moved to stop him.

  The deep sadness he saw in the eyes of a female Granitian was probably the only reason he was still calm.

  Something moved for his head, and he instinctively reached out and grabbed the towering Granitian's hand.

  "I demand-"

  Irwin squeezed, his patience suddenly gone. He felt the rocky skin crack between his fingers, and he quickly released a little pressure. Still, what was left was enough to cut off the man mid-sentence.

  With eyes bulging, the Granitian man slowly sank to his knees, one hand clasped over Irwin's, trying in vain to free his other arm. Irwin knew he should probably be angry at being so suddenly attacked, but he was both weary and confused. Besides, compared to the enormous Oculithar's presence, the raging man seemed mostly harmless.

  "What's going on?" he asked, looking at Captain Hyrmine, who stood beside him, glowering at the Granitian. "And who is this?"

  "This is shipwright Aarth, one of the three best carded ship crafters on Urlar and probably in the entire Langost branch," Captain Hyrmine said.

  She seemed to want to say something else, hesitated, and sighed.

  "I know this looks horrible, but can you please not hurt him? Ever since his son died during the first Oculithar attack, he's…"

  "Let. Go."

  Irwin turned at the Granitian, who had managed to force himself back to his feet. His face was warped in anger and pain, and Irwin sighed.

  "If I let go, how about you stop talking and walk away?" he said. "I have no idea why you are angry with me, but I have nothing to do with those Oculithar."

  The Granitian gnashed his slate-like teeth before grounding out, "I'll leave."

  Irwin sighed and let him go, ready to grab him again, but the man only glared at him before turning around and thundering away. The other people who had shown up made sure to keep out of his way. The female Granitian grimaced at Irwin, then mouthed something he was pretty sure was 'thank you' before turning and running after the towering man.

  Some drifted closer, seemingly wanting to talk with them, but Irwin waved them off as he turned to Hyrmine. He raised an eyebrow.

  "I'm sorry about that," Captain Hyrmine said. "The first Oculithar that showed up came a day after one of the merchants, and rumors began circulating that they drew it here because it was chasing them. Aarth… well, I think he needed someone to blame for his son's death. He is tribeless, and very few people are capable of handling him when he gets angry."

  Irwin sighed, shaking his head. He recalled how he'd felt when he feared something had happened to his own son, Glow. He couldn't rightfully say how he'd have reacted if the roles had been reversed.

  Still, that didn't mean he was just going to let the man rage and cause issues.

  "Well, try and make sure that he leaves my people and me alone," he said. "I'll try and be as calm as I can, but if he attacks some of my crew, I can't promise things will go as gently as just now."

  "I'll make sure to have someone keep an eye on him," Hyrmine said.

  Irwin nodded, sensing Ambraz's presence close in. Turning around, he saw the Bigbelly approach the docks beside The Artriguul, which he'd found out was the name of the Portal Guardian class ship. Greldo and the Nocturna weren't anywhere in sight yet, but he didn't worry that Greldo could take care of himself.

  He might be checking for cards, he thought, recalling their short conversation after the enormous Oculithar had left.

  "I'll be heading to the Bigbelly," he said. "Please tell the people I need to talk to that I'll be ready for them in a few hours. I need to look after my own people first."

  "Of course," Captain Hyrmine said.

  Irwin nodded and turned. He heard someone shout something at him, but he ignored it, instead using those soundwaves to shoot towards the Bigbelly.

  Common = Quartz, Uncommon = Amethyst, Rare = Topaz, Very Rare = Emerald, Epic = Ruby, Legendary = Diamond, Mythical = Ammolite