The rock didn't splash when the fin returned. It didn't ripple. It simply ceased to be solid, allowing the creature to pass through as if the stone were a heavy mist.
Kael stood on a slab of granite, his boots sinking slightly into the surface. It felt like standing on a sleeping lung.
"Kael, get back!" Elric screamed from the ridge.
"Stay there," Kael ordered. His voice was calm. Too calm.
The Cylinder against his chest wasn't burning anymore. It was cold. A deep, void-like cold that numbed his skin and clarified his thoughts. He didn't see the Deep Waste as a chaotic mess of colors anymore. He saw... lines.
Faint, glowing lines of tension holding the world together.
...break them...
The ground erupted.
The creature didn't lunge at him; it lunged through him. Or it tried to. It burst from the rock directly beneath Kael's feet, jaws wide—a maw of spiraling, needle-like teeth that rotated independently.
Kael didn't jump. He didn't have to.
He saw the line of tension representing the rock's liquidity. And he snapped it.
Solid.
The command wasn't spoken. It was pushed through the artifact.
The rock, instant and absolute, remembered it was stone. It snapped shut around the creature's midsection with the sound of a mountain cracking.
The beast shrieked—a sound that wasn't audio, but a spike of pressure in the skull. It was trapped, half-in, half-out of the granite. Its translucent flesh pulsed, organs visible and frantic beneath the skin.
It snapped its jaws at Kael, inches from his boot.
Kael looked down at it. He felt no fear. He felt... curiosity.
"You swim in the land because the land forgets itself," Kael whispered. "Let me remind it."
He placed his hand on the creature's head. The scar on his palm flared with purple light.
...burn...
Kael channeled the Void. He didn't push fire into the beast; he pulled the life out. He felt the rush of vitality flood up his arm, intoxicating and sweet. The creature withered instantly, its flesh turning grey, then black, then crumbling into dust.
In seconds, there was nothing left but a fossilized impression in the rock and a pile of ash.
Kael stood up. The rush faded, leaving him hollowed out and shivering. The Cylinder purred, satisfied.
"Gods above," Elric whispered.
Kael turned. Elric had scrambled down the ridge. The old Knight wasn't looking at the dead monster. He was looking at Kael.
"What did you do?" Elric asked, his voice trembling.
"I survived," Kael said. He tried to sheathe his sword, but his hand was shaking so badly he missed the scabbard twice.
"That wasn't survival," Elric said. "That was sorcery. That was Ash-King magic."
"It worked," Kael snapped. "It's dead. We're alive. Do you want to argue ethics, or do you want to keep moving?"
Elric took a step back. "You enjoyed it."
Kael froze.
Did he?
The memory of the life-force flooding him, the feeling of absolute control over the geometry of the world... yes. He had loved it. It was better than food. Better than sleep.
"It doesn't matter," Kael said, turning away. "We have a long walk."
He started walking toward the Spire. He didn't look back to see if Elric was following. He knew he would. The old man had nowhere else to go.
But as Kael walked, he noticed something. The obsidian spikes bent away from him. The floating dust parted to give him a path.
The Deep Waste wasn't trying to kill him anymore.
It was bowing.