Virgil, Balliol, and Sarra didn’t have to ride the whirlwind to return to the Rose’s Thorn. The Waypoint dissolved on its own. It started from the edges though only Virgil could see it. The barrier between the place and the Chaos beyond slowly dissolved.

The Chaos streams outside forced their way inside and as they touched the winds, the air, they simply unravelled. Virgil keenly observed the process. His visual acuity was enough that he could see it happen from a longstride away, though not the finer details, not without spending Animus to further enhance his sight anyway. But the chance of watching a Waypoint unravel because of Chaos degradation was quite valuable.

It was a chance to see how the underpinning laws of the world worked. After all, it was hard to see how something worked while it was still intact.

Virgil pulled Animus out of his core and channelled it into his Facet. He stared straight at where the edge of the Chaos stream intruded into the Waypoint. He watched as little motes of something, dust, he thought, unravelled and turned into even smaller particles that he could only discern from the light it gave out. His eyes tracked one particular particle as it flitted about.

When it came into contact with the larger particles of the waypoint, that bigger one gave out a bit of light and then split off into similarly smaller particles. It set off a chain reaction, with every mote that turned to Chaos, even more were created to degrade everything else around it. In a few seconds, the small holes in the barrier had widened to huge gaps and the Chaos outside poured in. In less than a minute, only the central island was left intact.

Balliol and Sarra were also staring intently, the other man was practically drooling, though he noticed that Balliol alternated his gaze between the dissolving Waypoint and the Chaos seed in his hand. Virgil could see Amiri and Craig observing from the Ocean Skiffer’s airlock.

When there was barely enough room for the three of them to stand, Sarra spread out her Field. A block of pink-veined marble appeared underneath their feet. The Chaos particles clumped together under Sarra’s Will and changed to form the block. From there, they floated over to the Rose’s Thorn’s airlock and stepped into the skiffer.

“Looks like someone had an adventure,” Amiri snorted with laughter, pointing at Virgil’s coat, stained with vomit.

“It’s what happens when someone’s hasty,” Balliol snarked.

Virgil flushed, ignored his sniggering teammates, and headed to the lavatory to wash his clothes. He’d lost count of how many times he’d been grateful and appreciative of the fact that forceweave didn’t stain and was essentially waterproof. Still, the stench of vomit clung to his skin, so he drew about a bit of his Animus into his palm and gave it the Intent to draw away anything that wasn’t forceweave. He had to be careful not to touch the ball to his skin or hair otherwise it’d get sucked into it. Not pleasant and definitely painful. He rubbed it across his coat, and the tiny flecks that still clung to it were siphoned off.

Feeling a tiny bit better, he walked out of the lavatory and grabbed a canteen of water, guzzling it down to wash away the sour taste lingering in his mouth. He felt the Skiffer start to move so he made his way to the bridge.

Sarra sat on the pilot’s chair while Craig and Amiri supplied extra Animus. Balliol leaned casually against the bulkhead.

“Oh, you’re here,” he greeted. “We have to discuss the Chaos seed.”

Virgil nodded grimly. The Chaos seed was either a blessing or a curse. The Ennoia inside of it could either help them advance to Knight-Captain or, for Virgil and Sarra, to Knight-Commander. On the other hand, it could destroy their Facets and Heritage patterns. Of course, that was only if they brought the seed into their Anima.

A less dangerous course was simply to study the seed and incorporate what they learned to adjust and strengthen their Heritage patterns or create new ones. Most Heritages were complete by the time the successor reached Knight. That included the Davar Heritage and the reason Virgil was able to advance to Knight-Captain was that he managed to add to and modify it.

While it didn’t mean that any successor of the Davar Heritage could easily make it to Knight-Captain, it meant that the Heritage was strengthened as a whole, allowing the Facets derived from it to become better than what the previous generations had.

“I hope none of you will want to take the risk,” Virgil said firmly.

“No,” Balliol immediately said. “It is foolish to do it here. Care must also be taken when studying it or it might degrade.”

“Right,” Amiri huffed. “You’re more likely the winner here, Ballsy; it has the wrong property for me. Though I think the others can still find it suitable.”

“Ballsy?” he sputtered. “How dare you!”

“What, wasn’t that your handle back in Agminis?”

“No, Chaos burn you!”

“Hie hie. Fine, sorry.”

“Anyway,” Virgil interrupted, “I believe we can all use this time to study what we can from the seed. When we return to Rumiga we’re faced with another choice.”

“Unless there's a pressing need to use it, we should offer it to the Empire,” Sarra cut in.

“Right, so we just hand it over?” Balliol muttered.

“Unless you want to absorb it,” Sarra said, “then you’d have to pay us our share of it in gold.”

“How much is something like this worth anyway?” Craig asked.

“At least a jade mark.”

“What! Fallen Sun, that’s years of a Knight’s stipend!”

“Then I suggest you don’t absorb it without dire need,” Sarra said with a slight smile.

“Either way,” Virgil sighed, “Let’s set up a study rotation. That’s also the only way we can tell if the Ennoia inside is suitable for absorption.”

“Fine,” Balliol groused. “I’ll go first if nobody minds.”

“That’s four hours and forty-eight minutes a session,” Amiri said.

Virgil had to spend a few moments to check the calculation before he agreed. “So, it’s Balliol, me, Sarra, Craig, then Amiri?”

“That’s fine.”

“Well, off with you, Balliol. Good luck.”

“Right.” He marched to the bunk room and shut the door. Virgil followed and nearly got his nose smashed in.

“Watch it!” he yelled as he pushed the door open.

“What, oh, sorry.”

Shaking his head, he climbed into a bunk and slept, letting his exhaustion pull him down into his dreams.

The four-hour nap came and went quickly and Virgil roused from his slumber feeling as if he’d been run over by a troop transporter. He moaned as he sat up.

“Quiet, you!” Balliol hissed. Virgil stared at him numbly. “I was this close to an epiphany, rotter!”

“Huh,” Virgil yawned, “why’re you so testy?”

“Shaddap!”

“Fine, fine.” Virgil staggered out of the bunk and ducked into the lavatory, splashing his face with cold water to wash the sleep away. He headed straight to the bridge and found the others in a stupor.

“How much further do we have to go?”

“About a week, I think,” Sarra said after looking at some of the dials. “Could be more.”

“What’s with Balliol? He snapped at me as soon as I woke up.”

“Oh, ignore him,” Amiri chuckled. “He’d been screaming about an epiphany for the last two hours now.”

“Huh, well, he only has a few minutes left for his turn.” Virgil yawned. When the time came to switch, he went back into the bunk room and found Balliol smacking his head on the wall.

“Why? Why? Why?” Thud. Thud. thud.

The Chaos seed was on the side table, so Virgil shrugged and swiped it. He sat in a meditative pose with the seed cradled on his palms, took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and extracted Animus from his core.

He struggled to keep it clear of any Intent as he pulled it out into his body and from there, he exuded it around the seed. A few seconds later, he retracted it back into his Anima. He felt a little bit of his Intent, the desire for knowledge, seeping into the strands. He couldn’t let it taint the seed.

He focused on the Animus he retracted. Aside from the little bit of Intent he inadvertently put in there, there was another part of it that had taken on the properties of the seed. That little bit was a tiny stain compared to his Intent but that was the key he needed to open the door of knowledge.

His focus didn’t waver as the stain shifted and slowly dissipated in a matter of moments. But it was enough.

“As I expected, it was Wind,” he muttered. “Well, good to get confirmation.”

He cleansed his Animus of Intent, a process that took him a minute to do. He couldn’t just return it directly to his core or it would taint the rest of his reserve with its Intent. Then, it’d probably take hours for his core to regain its neutrality. He could also just dissipate the Animus, but if he did that, he’d run out.

Once it was relatively clean, leaving just a tiny speck that he couldn’t get rid of, he returned it to his core and drew out a fresh strand. The speck would clear out in a minute or so and if it was too little, wouldn’t affect the rest of his reserve.

He coated the seed with the new strand, waited for it to imprint in his Animus, watching out for his own Intent, and pulled back just before it hit the critical amount. It was slow and painful going, often giving him little in return. But bit by bit, he gained a deeper understanding of the seed Ennoia. It wasn’t just the wind of course. He identified the Ideal of Momentum and Inertia. But he felt there was more there. Deeper.

What were the laws this seed used to create a stable pocket of reality that was strong enough to resist the Chaos streams? If he knew, his own Field would grow stronger. If he knew, he would be able to strengthen his Anima again for the first time in two decades.

He kept at it eagerly, feverishly. Until he felt a hand clasping his shoulder. He opened his eyes and saw Sarra standing in front of him. A check with his Facet told him that four hours and forty-eight minutes had passed since he took the seed. With a sigh, he gave it to her.

“Thank you,” Sarra said as she limped on to a bunk. Balliol was snoring fitfully on his upper bunk.

Virgil headed to the lavatory to splash water on his face again. Then he headed to the bridge to take his turn supplying the Skiffer with Animus.

Time passed in a blur of changing shifts, meditation with the seed, and sleep. Perhaps it was because they were in that Eye’s territory that they didn’t encounter anything else for the next couple of days or so. Travelling in the Chaos Sea was both simple and complex. It was simple to return to a place that they were familiar with, such as the plane of Rumiga, or even Delovine. One simply had to keep the destination in mind, and all roads, so to speak, eventually led there.

Travelling to a place that none of the people involved knew of was an entirely different monster. Random thoughts could easily lead them astray or to somewhere that was far too dangerous and deadly. Explorers had to take a single solid step at a time, moving from one Waypoint to another, ready to backtrack should the next one turn out to be lethal.

Travelling outside of Waypoints, such as what they were doing now, was deadly without a craft. Like the Fysalli with the wind Chaos seed, the streams and currents would erode their minds, if not their bodies. Worse, it could erode their Anima and when that happened, they would eventually weaken until they lost all power to protect themselves, much less travel. But the same principle applied.

As long as they knew where they wanted to go, they’d get there. It was only a matter of time. Well, of course, they could run across something dangerous on the way back but as long as they got through it, it would be fine.

With the Rose’s Thorn, they technically knew where they were going but until they actually set foot on the wild plane, they wouldn’t be able to get there without the Ocean Skiffer. Once they did, just one of them could lead an entire Legion to the location. That was one of the reasons why they’d accepted the Whisperer’s deal: for the chance to claim new territory for the Empire. They might even be allowed to name it. Virgil fancied living on the Davar plane with his children. Maybe Sadeen would deign to join him, too.

The skiffer shook and trembled, throwing him out of his daydreams. He blinked and looked out of the forward viewport. The Chaos streams washed directly against the skiffer, and the bow bucked against pressure. In the distance, he could see the Chaos smashing against a planar barrier and reflecting back.

“Ancestors! We’ve finally arrived!” Amiri yelled.

“Rotting Chaos lord,” Balliol grunted, “this place is too far from Rumiga!”

It had taken them three weeks, three rotting weeks to get here. Their supplies had almost run out. Not the ration bars of course, but the salt and spices that made it palatable.

“Call the other two,” Virgil commanded. “Only Chaos knows what we’ll find here.”