From Moving Crates to Killing Gods-Chapter 19: Ward

The telepathic voice hit like a sledgehammer to my brain, sending me staggering back into Kira. My ears rang with silence while my mind thundered with words that hadn’t been spoken aloud. I pressed my palms against my temples, as if I could physically push the intrusion out of my skull.

Around me, the others reacted with similar panic, Coco nearly dropping his precious canteen, Phinyx doubling over, and Mira, her face a mask of cold fury, summoning her blade of concentrated light.

"Welcome to the party!" the voice boomed again, this time slightly softer but no less disorienting. It wasn’t sound, it was a thought, bypassing my ears and dumping directly into my consciousness like water poured into an already full glass.

"Stop!" Mira commanded, raising her light blade toward the floating entity with the distinctive eyebrow like protrusions. "Whatever you’re doing, stop it now."

The creature, Brow, pulsed with gentle blue light, its tendrils undulating in what might have been confusion or amusement. I couldn’t tell. Reading the emotional state of a floating jellyfish was somewhat outside my skillset.

Rolen stepped forward, placing himself between Mira’s blade and Brow. His hands were raised, not in surrender but in a calming gesture, like a handler soothing spooked farm animals.

"He’s just a passive mob." Rolen explained, his voice steadier than I would have expected. "His species communicates this way, it’s not an attack."

"It feels like an attack." I muttered, still rubbing my temples where a dull ache persisted. "My brain wasn’t designed for guests."

Rolen turned toward Brow, his expression softening into something like reverence. "They’re not used to telepathic communication. Can you... adjust? Maybe a bit gentler?"

The creature bobbed closer, its tendrils sweeping in a graceful arc. I braced myself for another mental assault, but what came next was different, a gentle touch rather than a battering ram.

"Welcome to the party that has lasted a century!" the thought unfurled in my mind, almost conversational now, though the volume was still a bit excessive.

"A century?" Kira echoed, her eyes widening. "You’ve been here for a hundred years?"

The creature pulsed, its blue glow briefly intensifying.

"Indeed, young one. I have witnessed the passing of many seasons from this sanctuary."

Phinyx let out a nervous laugh, his hands making small, circular gestures that I’d come to recognize as his attempt to generate ’calming vibes’.

"That’s a vibe even I can’t match." he said, his voice cracking slightly. "A hundred year party sounds exhausting."

"How is that possible?" Petra asked, her voice barely above a whisper. "Nothing survives out here that long. The Corruptors—"

"They can’t reach us here" Brow interrupted, his thoughts pulsing with what felt like pride. "The ward protects. The ward endures. And we dance."

I followed the creature’s subtle movement, my eyes drawn to the center of the vast chamber for the first time. There, nestled among a cluster of Bloops, sat a small cube no larger than my hand. It emitted a steady green glow that looked hauntingly familiar, the same sickly hue that illuminated Argent’s barrier, the same color that had beckoned us as a trap when we first entered the wasteland.

The light bled from it in a soft haze, staining the air and covering most of the room’s interior in its warm, familiar tint.

"The Ward?" I asked, stepping forward cautiously. "That’s what you call it?"

Brow drifted toward the cube, his tendrils curling around it protectively without actually touching its surface. "Come. See. Understand."

We approached slowly, our formation unconsciously tightening as we moved deeper into the chamber. The floor beneath our feet was surprisingly clean compared to the debris strewn tunnels, almost as if it had been maintained.

As we neared the cube, I felt a faint resistance in the air, like pushing through a curtain of static. Then it broke, and we were fully inside the green hue it emitted. The change was instant. The oppressive, watching silence of the ruins vanished, replaced by a low, familiar hum and a sudden, shocking sense of containment. It felt like stepping indoors. It felt, in its dim, failing way, like Argent. Like home. The relief was so physical my knees nearly buckled.

"I was once a young Bloop, drifting through the ruins, hiding from the Hunters." Brow said while moving his white brows.

Images accompanied the words, flashes of terror, of hiding in narrow crevices while shadowy distortions passed by, of watching other Bloops being consumed by those same entities. The memories weren’t mine, but they felt immediate, visceral, as if I were experiencing them alongside Brow.

"Then I found this place." the thought continued. "Or it found me. I was fleeing a Hunter when I passed through what seemed like a curtain of cold fire. The Hunter pursued, but then he stopped outside the green hue. Unable to reach me."

"The Ward." Mira said, her voice hushed with realization. She’d lowered her light blade but hadn’t dismissed it entirely. "It produces a small barrier."

I approached the cube, examining it carefully. It looked ancient, its edges worn smooth, its surface etched with symbols similar to those we’d seen on the walls. But despite its age, it hummed with power, a subtle vibration I could feel more than hear.

"This is Citadel tech." I said, the realization striking me like a physical blow. "The same energy signature as the barrier. The same... everything."

Mira stepped in beside me, her face unreadable but her eyes alight with something I recognized. Hunger not for food, but for knowledge.

"Seems like a copy of Argent’s core." she murmured, her voice low and certain. "A smaller copy. It makes sense they’d try to set a barrier here." She studied the flickering cube, her head tilting. "But it’s nothing like Argent’s core. This seems... weaker."

"But how does it work?" I asked, crouching down to peer at the cube’s faintly flickering surface. "Everything we’ve seen out here is forgotten. Dead and barren. Everything else out here has been reclaimed by time. Buildings crumbling, machines silent, power sources dead. So how is this still functioning after all this time?"

"It fades." Brow observed, a deep sadness coloring the thought. "The light retreats a little more with each passing season. Soon, the party will end."