Before the Storm

Chapter 19: To Chase... A Survivor

After the events in the Nether that shook both the Knights and the Felden army to the core, they deliberate what it is they are to do now that they have no lead on the mysterious entity that took on an entire realm and won

And then Senn mentions something that may yet get them back on the trail of the killer, although why he had taken until now to mention it is beyond most

Author's note: hehe so I was going for a 'tired' look for Senn in this drawing. kinda overdid it and instead he looks more like he's just so effing done with life XD

it's a mood, honestly

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Senn couldn't sleep. Hubris was restless. Grim was irritable. Onyx was infuriated. Grek was blank. Kiyoshi wouldn't stop thinking and Alec wouldn't stop pacing. Masani looked as though she couldn't have cared less, despite now being aware of the ever-changing tide beneath them, and despite not being required even for a check-up, Rika remained in the vicinity, curiosity piqued and engaged, although nothing was to be said for a long time.

They had prepared for – as Tygren had put it – a storm. They had spent these last many weeks gathering information and allies in order to take on the Voltaris tyrant and his Netheran army before he could locate and retrieve the hidden Prime Songs. They had their whole mindset fixed on taking him on with no mercy – just as Aurelius had requested all those years ago – and they were more determined than ever to ensure that Tygren could play no move against them in defense nor attack; and yet there they sat with no moves left to play, themselves, and no opponent to face.

Tygren was dead. Whoever had attacked the Nether as Senn had described during his escape had seen to it before they ever could, and it would seem that this new person was twice as potent as Tygren could ever pertain to be, hellbent on causing far more destruction than he ever could; yet this unknown person – this unknown entity – had not a trace behind them. No trail, no existence. It was as though they were fighting a... ghost...

As they sat together, none saying a word, none breathing a sound but despair and confusion, they couldn't help but ponder that something was amiss – that a blight was growing right beneath their noses, and they simply couldn't see it. There had to be something more than what they had to their disposal. There had to be something more to what they had found than another race to protect the Prime Songs from twisted hands and darkened souls. Someone knew about them before Tygren. Someone knew that Tygren would be after them. Someone knew that Tygren would be successful in his endeavour to bring the storm, and so they saw to it that he wouldn't; but even if that were the case, they had taken the Mobillium Prime that Tygren had stolen from Crown Peak – they didn't leave it. If they were so sated on defeating Tygren to prevent him from acquiring the other Prime Songs, then killing him was all that they needed to do.

Yet they killed him and took the Prime Song.

The Knights were sure that they wouldn't have done that had they not needed the Prime Song for themselves. And if it were to come to pass the thought that they were protecting the Prime Songs, why had they run? Why had they remained concealed to the eyes of the Knights, who would have the same objective? None of them had need for the Prime Songs, and that was why they were out of their way, trying to stop faltering minds from succumbing to tainted tunes; so, if this new unknown person – this unknown entity – were also out of their way to protect them, why did they hide? What was so dark inside them that they could not ally with the very team with the same objective?

It brought more questions than answers, and it made the Knights' heads spin uncontrollably, spiralling from one thought to the next, question after question, dead end after dead end. At the heart of their thoughts laid the only mindset that they all shared: that they knew not where to go from here.

For Senn and Hubris, they were questioning whether or not to believe Pythus' dying words as he spewed sights of Voltaris red that was not of Tygren. They couldn't decide, and between them, they struggled to find something – anything ­– that didn't somehow link back to the descriptions of the Felden guards of a Deathsinger look-alike, or the fact that it was the Deathsinger's very effects that were stolen. They wanted it to remain a coincidence. They didn't want to think about what would come of a confrontation with a man who had died in righteousness and honour – a death as valiant as his rite. Where would his mind be, especially after reigniting his search for the Prime Songs? And what were his thought processes in reigniting that endeavour? What if he had no mind, and he was just a shell, destined to live out his undead days repeating the very same endeavour that had cost him his life in the first place?