“You're in some deep trouble boy.”

Who are you?

“I guess the most 'name' sounding thing you can call me is Gash. I am a wound that was personified. It's what I came into existence from, not what defines me as I am though.”

Um, okay.

“Things only get stranger as you climb the ladder. Enjoy your time here in the mortal planes. You may be the plaything of greater forces here but you're at least afforded protection that's not granted out there, not really anyway.”

Soooo, why am I in trouble?

“The long made short, you've got a broken piece of a worn out soul forged weapon lodged in your body. At your current strength you can't digest it with your void. Man have you tried though. You've tried so many times that it's become a part of you. That's the first problem.”

How many do I have?

“Depends on where you draw the line but let's just say that if you don't get to solving them then some of them are going to solve themselves. When that happens you're going to be a very sad person.”

How much time do I have and where do I get started?

“I like that. A 'Go get 'em' attitude is the best to work with... First big sad moment is about ten seconds away but that's real time. In here, the closer you get to center the more time you have but the harder it will be for you to leave. Let's leave it at about an hour before I reach a theoretical threshold where I become increasingly less certain by the second that I can get you out without your help.

“Even with the crappy understanding you have of your abilities, ten seconds gives you a good shot but you're in for an uphill battle to even save yourself... Let me give you a breakdown so you won't waste time thinking about things when you're trying to fix your problem. While I'm doing that, take a look at your theoretical inner construct or whatever you want to call it.”

This may waste valuable time but why are you in me and why are you helping?

“Without making things hard to understand, I'm the animus of Silent Mind, the spiritual counterpart to the physical part you can't digest. If you turn Asura you can. I obviously don't want you to become Asura and I don't think you want to either. Since you ate off all the hate and compulsion, I'm free to make decisions. I've decided to serve instead of being eaten. I could just let you go instead of holding you in here but you'd turn Asura, maybe even eat the souls of your friends or something before you were deported. I can't help out much with your problems because the only things I really know are the thoughts I've sealed at least a few times. It took a few days but I've gathered enough of you in here that you can do what you need to do. So, go fix your inner construct so I can release you.”

Wren looked at his inner construct. The bottom part of the octahedron had separated and grown to three times the size of the top, giving it the look of a tiny pyramid sitting on the flat part of a much larger one.

How can this happen? This is my theoretical model. I should... Logic was sealed away. My body and it's powers were being controlled by intuition and instinct. What was I doing to get this much growth added to me?

Parasite Eradication: x8 Dream Eater x1 Nightmare [Since primal state activation]

Total Rewards/Demerits:

x10 Dream Eaters- 1000 AP

x1 Nightmare- 1000 AP

Invader Cell Elimination- 500 AP or x1 Class/Profession Knowledge Set

Large scale destruction of friendly settlement- 500 AP demerits

x2 Participant casualties [possession negates demerit]

x2 Consumption of SYSTEM registered sentient souls [soul core release negates additional bounty] [self defense negates fugitive status]

Actions requested by operators and approved by Host: excessive force- 500 AP demerit per incident, 1000AP demerit total

I-I ate two people's souls!?

“Technically just their astral shells. It's a small blessing that your void space has acquired a taste for tainted sources or you may have done much worse. If it's any consolation, they attacked you after you ate the astral parasites in them first.”

Probably because they were scared out of their minds.

“Me being lodged in you was because the smiling man picked me up and drove me up underneath your chin. The shape shifting lady kicked me in crooked or I would have killed you. The shape shifting lady said something about a negotiation reward.”

Wait, what!? Then how did I get all primal and eat the possessions to begin with?

“It was a crossbow bolt that went through the upper rear of your skull, out through your right eye and you weren't. Your inner mind took the driver's wheel until they stabbed you with me. Like I said, if the shape shifting lady had kicked me in straight, I would have killed you. The last order of inner mind, that I was able to seal after being pooped back out of your void for about the 200th time, was to have void eat me. It was on loop after my effect sealed inner mind. By then all the damage had been done and your friend, Jaden I think it was, has been chasing after you for the last three days. When you encounter stuff that tries to kill you, he calls out people to help him keep you alive but whatever was letting you know where all the parasites are isn't picking up anymore or it stopped working.

“The point is you started growing restless and decided to go after something and now you're surrounded by a nest of drakes. Jaden and Little Gray, what an odd name, have noticed the drake in front and are preparing to face it but there are two more swooping in from behind. Your primal self has noticed but has no problem using them as bait to get the drakes in range. Well, you are inching closer to Little Gray so maybe you care a little. I can't really tell how much you care because I've seen you do all kinds of weird and contradictory stuff. All snarling at people one moment or licking their wounds closed the next... Now you know, so fix yourself.”

I really don't know what to do though.

“I don't know either!...Well, what does your structure look like? Maybe two heads will be better than one. Most of a head and the animus of a weapon, at least.”

Wren explained what his structure looked like before and what it looked like to him at that moment.

“Could you just...shove the smaller one into the bigger one? All the crazy is bigger but the smaller, not crazy you, would be center and in control right?”

That might work for a lot of structures but mine is encompassed in the concept of a theoretical perfect sphere. It would be alright if... if it were a tetra hedron. Creative and destructive impulses have both a logical and intuitive reason for existing. Another way of seeing logic and intuition that's balanced with emotion is the the physically minded thoughts of survival with the spiritually minded thoughts of enlightenment. At least, it's the way I want to see them...

I can see it like this. If all that I am is divided into thought, feeling and action that either serve me in physical or spiritual continuance and growth, then I have two tetrahedrons.

One side of each the small and large pyramids were consumed by the remaining until Wren was left with a small and large tetrahedron.

Whichever it is meant to serve it still serves the other. The spiritual journey of a lifetime ends at death. You have to start over with just the bits and pieces that might give you a head start in another life but not much else, I guess. A life that completely ignores the spiritual, even if it's just perceived as emotional health, is almost impossible to live. You'll kill/fuck over the wrong person or yourself and then that's it. So both sides naturally overlap. Even if one side is stronger than the other the smaller side still fully supports the other so it has no place to refuse.

As the smaller sunk in and seated itself within the larger tetrahedron, even though it was only a theoretical thought form, Wren noticed from one planar view the downward looked solid and the smaller ephemeral and from a different planar view the opposite was true.

Hehe, kinda looks like the tri-force. If they were both even though, it would look like a...merkabah.

“Not sure exactly what you did but it will only stop you from going Asura for about a couple hours. Not sure but I'm going off the feeling of stable, rather that immediate, evolution.”

So you're saying I have around two hours to figure out a way to equal out what eight tick men, a demon horse and two human souls gave me?

“Your terminology is way off but yeah. I'd say, just give it up or give it away but if your current self would listen that well we wouldn't have needed to do this in the first place. The thing is, you actually need to. You're bloated. That's what's triggering the evolution to begin with.”

Primal self won't give it up or give it away...Bet he would if he was getting it back better... I think I got it... I just hope Little Gray can forgive me by the time I'm done.

“What are you...oh. Okay, It's the best we got I guess. Just to warn you before I let you go, you're not going to be able to order your Id around like you normally do. There is no suppression. The you I'm talking to right now, is going to be like a rudder on a ship going full speed. Try to steer too hard and you might snap under the pressure, then its all Asura from there. Keep it simple.”

You mean like, save mate then breed, simple?

“That sounds on par... No big rush but I'm getting to that hypothetical limit soon.”

Alright...Carve it in...Save mate then breed...

“At least you worked the crossbow bolt out otherwise it would be like getting ra... never mind. If this works and you don't end up eating me, I guess we'll talk again then.

The lights came on but everything was dyed in red, the red of rage fueled adrenaline. Through the red a thought pulsed.

Fight, kill, eat...Save mate then breed...Mate? Mates! Mates in danger! Where is safe? Middle big black is safe... Get mates to middle big black.

Wren sped into motion towards Little Gray who was closer.

“Back!” Wren managed to push through the red haze.

Grimalkin and Jaden looked behind them at the same time. Grimalkin froze for a moment as Wren hurdled towards him with concern in his face. It was the first emotion he showed since they started chasing after him days ago. They could tell he was still in there somewhere when they saw him pull something dark and ominous out of Glaucous before licking the big man's cheek before going on a black something pulling frenzy. They weren't so sure until that moment.

Wren had ripped up almost the entirety of Seaside as the smaller black blotches tried to get away from him. Once he was done with that, he relentlessly tore after the ones that had escaped. That continued for almost two days before the bolt finally fell out and he healed the remaining damage. He stopped and blinked around a bit. He even started channeling some healing into Grimalkin and Jaden through licks to all their various cuts. They thought the worst was over until he finished all his licking and sniffing around the two, Then he just looked agitated for a bit, not letting either of them get too close before darting out into the woods...

Grimalkin faded from view as Jaden sent him back in the realm.

Jaden said to the confused Wren in a panic, “He's safe! Now come to me!” Wren needed no other spurring to change course to Jaden as the three drakes closed in.

As Wren grappled Jaden to the ground, he fought off the strange tug of otherness his mind could not process, that was actually Jaden trying to send them to his realm. Instead, void power wrapped them both as they appeared in Wren's middle void realm. The scene that greeted them was a small oasis; a pond around fifty feet in diameter that was wreathed in reeds, a thick carpet of grass dotted with various other greenery and a small stream that meandered off into the wasteland around them. It was all encased in a glassy sheen dome of water vapor and lit with a white dwarf like orb suspended an indeterminate distance above them, crowned with constellations of sparkling lights decorating the expanse of black beyond.

Wren once told Jaden that the void realm evoked a feeling of tragic endings and uncertain beginnings in the same breath. After seeing it, Jaden could understand but he did not have long to contemplate such things before he realized that his crazed heart-brother was now exhibiting a much different kind of frantic behavior. As a person who was far more attuned with the primal than he'd like, Jaden had no trouble identifying this new urge that had overtaken Wren.

***

Wren could tell that this mate was tired, much more tired than the other. He would have chosen that other one if he could but his need was too great. He was too full to search for another when there was already a mate here to receive the nourishment of his kills. In a deep place he felt a small sadness that this breeding would not make young but he would still revel in his reward. Plentiful feeding followed by mating, this was right.

Wren was delighted when he saw that his mate was removing his shell to breed even though his mate was so tired. This mate was tired but very ready. Wren could smell his mate's excitement and see it as well. He also saw the challenge. Neither had claimed the other yet. This was a mating fight. This was also right but he needed to win. He was so full, if he did not give then he would... he did not know but some thing bad would happen.

If Wren lost it was bad but this was not bad. Adrenaline from fighting still sung in his veins. He nose flared wide to smell his mate's excitement He could sense the mate named Jaden's confusion but acceptance of this ritual of dominance. Something inside of Jaden understood and was just as thrilled. Something inside of him reached out to the Jaden mate. It pleaded Jaden to accept, to warn his mate of the need. He didn't like that. He didn't want to beg he wanted to win!

Wren shook his head as if to dislodge the weak inner him. He growled at the Jaden mate making his own appeal of fair dominance to the part of Jaden mate that understood. He huffed of survival and howled of pleasure. He growled of pain and sighed of the ending of all things. All of Jaden mate understood. Wren howled pleasure at the inner weakness' loss of appeal, at it's despair. It growled in small pain at it's inner voice's lack of belief. Did the inner weakness not know how strong he was? Then he would show it.

Wren breathed in the song of air to invigorate his life rivers. To the beat of his chest drum, he bid the water song to make his life water surge... Jaden mate flung him over on to his back... As he hit the ground he bid the silent hum of the earth song to fortify his frame before rolling to the side to avoid Jaden mate's pinning. He lunged to playfully nip at Jaden mate's haunches, leaving a light ring of red moon for his effort. He coughed a low huff of happiness as Jaden mate yelped.

Jaden mate had his legs. He played helplessness while he wiggled and squirmed. He silently reached for the fire song that lied in the burning pit of his excitement, slipping out from under his winded mate... With all four songs running through him he was tireless without end.

A part knew this wasn't truly fair. Jaden mate ran without the songs. He could feel his mate's body burning pain, the hard meat trembled with weakness. He would allow his mate's challenge but he didn't have to play fair. Was it fair that Jaden mate was born bigger to hold more hard meat? No.

He slithered around to Jaden mate's back and pushed his mate's arms out even as he pushed the legs out with his heels. He added his weight to the drop to knock the air out of his mate. He leaned down and gently but firmly clamped his teeth on the back of Jaden mate's neck. Jaden shivered.

“I'm not done yet!” Jaden said. A small hint of a whine came out that he could not contain from the burning muscles and aching tiredness made worse from having the breath knocked out of his lungs earlier.

The small trace of weakness that his mate revealed made Wren's chest tighten even as his fire song flared. He felt Jaden mate try to call on the water song. His silly mate, Here, the water song only listened to others when he wanted it to. He let Jaden call it to them before he stole it and doused them both to clean away the blood and dirt. The ending and eating dark took away the rest leaving them clean of all but the faint trace of scent that immediately started seeping back out. He could have held back his body water if he wanted to but Jaden mate liked his scent. He could tell from the wider eye black every time Jaden mate smelled it. He liked Jaden mate's smell too. Underneath the man smell was glacier springs and crushed evergreen needles.

Jaden used the last of his strength to turn over on to his back while Wren had loosened his hold to clean them. He looked at Wren shocked as he said, “You can steal the water control from me?”

With some difficulty Wren said, “Here, all song is my song. I'll share how you can hear but first I give.”

Wren started rubbing and sniffing Jaden. Both scents together was good too. After he claimed Jaden mate he wanted others to smell his scent on his mate so they would know who Jaden belonged to. Jaden mate was still not done playing as he made a grab and locked onto Wren. He didn't care. They both knew who was going to win now. Jaden mate just wanted to know he gave all he had. He wanted to rub and sniff himself on Wren too. That was good. If others saw him first they would know Jaden mate was his without having to see. They rolled around, rubbed scent and nipped at each other until there was little real strength left in Jaden mate's hard meat.

A whimper rose from Jaden's throat as he said, “This isn't over, you cheat!”

Wren grinned widely as he choked out, “Next time maybe you give but this time I do!” He lunged in and locked his jaws on Jaden's throat, growling out a warning that play was over.

As much as Jaden didn't want to submit, he didn't have a choice. His inner self had made peace already, he just had to join it. Things were still good now but if he denied a direct call for submission like this one, things would not be as pleasant after the third round. He tilted his chin up and and let a full whine escape him, burning with shame at it. There was a lilt of faint growling at the end that promised another fight once he was recovered. That was fine with Wren. A mate with fight made the reward better.

As he was about to claim his prize, the inner voice whispered secrets to make the mate enjoy breeding more. He didn't understand most of it but one thing made perfect sense, even to Primal Wren. Dry would hurt, both of them.

Wren turned Jaden on to his stomach then pulled him up to his knees as Jaden folded his arms to protect his face as he rested his head on the ground. Jaden prepared to bite his arm when Wren entered him but he was shocked nearly to collapse when he felt something soft warm an wet slide between his cheeks. It took a second pass and the soft wet object working it way into him that he realized it was Wren's tongue.

He was glad when he felt Wren's knees framing his own. The sensation was so unreal that it would have made him fall flat again, which would have possibly hurt him as he felt himself grow ridged again, even through the thrumming fatigue of his body.

There was a faint earthiness to his mate's sweat here but he'd cleared out the night soil with the ending and eating black so it was just a richer and slightly more pungent flavor that was still all his mate's smell. He could also smell the return of his mate's excitement which made him push deeper and lap more roughly as his mate was enjoying the experience. He felt a small gratefulness for having the inner voice that knew such secrets of mate happiness. He could feel the tight ring start to loosen and let him work the wetness in. The inner voice showed him a hollow stone that held thicker wet for his breeding stick. It needed no such thing. It made it's own thicker wet. Wren reached down to work some of the thick wet along himself till his excitement gave him plenty.

Wren nipped the red circle moon gently once more before laying his mate back down into the grass. He didn't want his fingers to be the first to claim his mate as the inner voice wanted but he could work some more thick wet from himself into his mate's split as it felt good to do so.

Wren tried hard to put the welling feeling inside himself into words since Jaden mate wasn't connected to him strongly enough to see the inside pictures but he finally managed. “You watched my flank. You are a good mate.”

Patience at and end, Wren reached between them and pushed his breeding stick on to the the twitching ring. From some some other part of himself, Wren got the idea to push on his mate's back to make the air leave again and in that moment of lower loosening he drove in. Jaden mate's choking cough of a cry made him wait a moment before he lay himself along the broad back of his mate and cling to him as he worked from soft, shallow thrusts to longer and rougher ones.

He couldn't reach the crook of Jaden mate's neck so he put his breeding bite on Jaden's shoulder blade as he drove himself into his mate, leveling out into deep but short and rapid strokes. The last lingering of pain faded from Jaden and was replaced by a strangely deep stimulation that was unknown to him but satisfying. Wren could feel this as the sharing fog cleared.

Wren let joy howl into Jaden at their closeness. There was no smugness or crowing of a victor, only a deep care that was not tender at all but strong and true. This was no mate for pups this was his battle mate. He would protect and raise Wren's young if he should die as Wren would protect and raise his should he. They could share pleasure when the bitches were whelping and they would keep each other strong with play fights. Despite his grudging submission, Jaden was touched at the meanings given to him and when the first wave of spirit hit him he gave way to sensation and released his shame into the ground under him.

Jaden shuddered in hyper sensitivity as Wren returned to harder, harsher thrusts with intermittent grinding. Wren shot spurt after spurt of raw spirit into his mate as if what was fucking the bigger man was not Wren's body but his very soul. As every thick wave of primal spirit scoured and tempered Jaden's soul it carried with it the secrets of hearing and calling the world. The mostly silent and barely awakened part of Jaden shook itself to alertness to hear and see. As the whirls over Jaden's body began brightening to the cold and unforgiving silver fire of cleansing, Wren unloaded all that Jaden could bear and just a little more. He shuddered and bucked into his mate as he gave all he had to give of his body into his mate's clenching and spasming heat in harmony of union with himself and with this other living extension of him, even if that unity was only for a second. Finally the beast could sleep content. It had killed that which had offended it. It had ate to fullness and beyond. Then it had bred a newly claimed mate. All was well as he fell asleep still on and inside Jaden who had lost consciousness after his last volley had been shot to join the previous on the ground...

Wren slightly stirred when he felt himself being rolled to the side then on his back and sudden coolness around his junk but was still too sleepy to care...

In what could have been 15 minutes or five hours, he woke up to the sensation of his legs being braced up. A face burying itself in his ass had him coming to wakefulness with the quickness of an epinephrine injection. As he was trying to crab walk backwards on his elbows he was drug right back as a thick tongue violated his pucker.

“Wha- What the fu..Jaden!? What are you do-” Wren couldn't keep up speech as Jaden sent a lick right up his perineum to the underside of his sack.

“That's one hell of a wake-up call bu-” Wren was once again interrupted mid-thought but it had nothing to do with Jaden's tongue touching a place Wren didn't even mess with anymore with the lazy convenience of void power at his beck and call. It was the in rush of pre-sleep events that had Wren's mental gears grinding.

By the time that Wren had digested the crazy that had him just shy of sanity breaking mortification, Jaden had a death clamp on Wrens legs, positioned for a one shot kill.

Wren tried to reach out to restore some calmness to this situation but words and psychic messages weren't faster than the sure thrust of Jaden's hips. Before the twinge of searing pain from his sphincter being gauged out so brutally could even fully be processed by his brain, a cool silver fire raged across and purified his mindscape of all else as it coalesced into whirls that took up his vision and seared into his being. A ball of condensed spirit essence tightly packed to near bursting within Jaden unfurled with the fury of a lashing whip and the stark suddenness of a lightening strike.

Three separate events individually intense enough to cause trauma happened at once. Wren's eyes rolled back in his head as his bladder lost control and he pissed all over himself. Still the maddened Jaden continued to take his merciless due as spirit intoxication so keen it bordered on sickness robbed Wren of all reason yet again. He lost himself over and over again within Jaden's cold silver fire until it finally dimmed. Vague flashes of begging for more and shameless LE abuse trickled in to create haunting memories for another day as a laughing but nearly crying Jaden finally coaxed Wren back into his realm and into the surprised arms of Grimalkin before sorely hobbling away.

Wren, with a new target and goal began plying his loving torture on his new victim, infusing vast amounts of raw spirit into Grimalkin before reversing the tables and giving the power drunk young man his first taste of being the dagger to a lover's sheath.

***

Once his little kitten had been worn to a ghost, Wren stumbled to the grove like a zombie. Liita and Bress, seeing his odd behavior tried to stop him at the circle's edge before he managed out a weary statement that he was here to share with his bonded. Bress nodded but Liita wasn't quite convinced. The light infused spectral transport that dumped her into the pond, startling Sable and Jhessa, removed the need for further convincing as Wren slumped against tree Lilly and gave her the last fistful of raw spirit through her roots before taking a small coma. This kindness was returned, upon his waking, with a golden peach which had a mysterious natural formation of the words 'bite me' on it. So he did. It was the most delicious, mercifully lust inducing free and tame, condensed spirit he ever had.

Discovered: Tier IV unknown Embodiment [closest match, The Chariot]- Adaptive variable essence consumption based on user actions (Minimum EE or comparative equivalent 0.33% PPM, maximum 33%)

Advisement: Evolutionary catalyst resulting in -error- (restricted by request of A/I/C Hosts) Estimated growth potential-Superior

Discovered: Micro-Elemental Physical Enhancement- A multiple application enhancement Buff

Lost: Teir IV Embodiment Eremita

How can it possibly unknown? I mean sure, I see the chariot up there but surely someone's done it before.

Additional information request denied... requires Director clearance...clearance granted for ten seconds.

Merkaba belongs to human exclusive spiritual evolutionary path embodiments Tier V Metatron and Tier V Adam Kadmon. Other lower growth potential paths possible. Both paths are traditionally associated exclusively with the Celestial Host. As a participant that contains non-quantifiable evolutionary potential and superior growth potential, Wren may be subjected to a variety of discriminatory behavior and predation. This is made more acute by the possession of a superior variant that remains unaligned.

Note: Lost or protected information evolutionary paths exist involving merkaba. All that is allowed to be shared about such paths belongs to the perfect symmetry paths that are under information protection of The Balance Keeper's Alliance and require membership to access.

Well, fuck me with a lacquered bus.