Aitken realized he had heard them and clapped us hands before his head, begging for mercy. Truth be told despite the two of them being nigh invisible on earth. Here just about everybody and their grandmas were born with strength it would normally take mortals centuries to attain.
Yeah the scalings were just that twisted. Aitken knew when to back down from some fights. Even if this were merely an avatar of an avatar of a god, Aitken was pretty sure he could kill them by simply sneezing the wrong was, this much was evident in the fact that him simply staring them down had left such irreparable stamps on their souls.
"Lord Jakari! I have a proposal to make" Aitken said, gaining looks of mortification from Larriu and a look of shock from Jakari though for different reasons.
'Ohh so I'm just the luggage carrier—' Larriu lamented to himself, shocking Jakari once again at the boldness of the mortal before him.
To be honest, it intrigued him, elated him even, he could feel his blood boiling with the urge to kill—
"What is your proposal? You understand what it entails right? You know what it means to ask a god for a deal, you must be ready to give something of equal important in return." Jakari said coming out of his revere. Speaking to the more reasonable and probably intelligent of the two.
"Of course" Aitken said stepping forward with a bow.
"I have news concerning the lost tribe of the Northern Heavens" Aitken said. He knew that would no doubt have gotten the god's attention.
"Do you refer to—" Jakari said after a bit.
"Yes, my Lord, I'm referring to the lost tribe of Binturus" Aitken said looking up with a smile even as blood dropped from his nostrils.
***
For a long, breathless moment, nothing moved.
Not the air.
Not the dust.
Not even the divine.
Jakari's expression didn't change—but the entire realm did.
Behind him, the walls of the chamber—once ethereal and ever-shifting—hardened like glass being flash-frozen. The ground beneath Aitken's feet fractured with glowing red veins, burning with silent fury.
Even the spiritual sea within Larriu stilled, his voice caught in his throat as he instinctively stepped closer to Aitken.
"You," Jakari said softly, almost as if speaking to himself, "dare speak that name in my presence?"
There was no theatrical thunder. No blinding light.
Just stillness.
Pure, bone-deep, soul-seizing stillness.
Aitken bowed his head again, this time not from fear—but respect. "Yes, my Lord. I understand the weight it carries. But I believe the information I have is worth the risk."
Jakari's mouth twitched. He turned away, pacing slowly, crushing ghostly grapes between his fingers, their juice running like molten light.
"The Binturus… were not a tribe," he said, voice lower now, colder. "They were a calamity. A scar in the heavens that refused to fade."
Larriu blinked. "Wait. I thought they were supposed to be the guardians of the North?"
Jakari paused.
Then laughed. Just once.
A sharp, humorless sound like metal cracking.
"They were supposed to be many things," he said. "Guardians. Judges. Saints. But they chose something else."
His gaze fell back on Aitken.
"They chose freedom."
The word dropped like a boulder.
Larriu muttered, "Sounds familiar."
Aitken shot him a look, but Jakari didn't seem offended this time. If anything, there was a flicker of recognition in his gaze. A slow narrowing of the eyes.
He stepped closer—too close. He looked down at Aitken not like a god over a mortal, but like a hunter inspecting prey that might just be dangerous.
"You've seen them?" he asked.
"No," Aitken said carefully. "But we've traced fragments. Movements. Whispers. Spiritual signatures older than any on record. And a symbol."
He opened his palm. With a soft glow, a sigil floated above his skin—complex, swirling with ancient law and inverted balance.
Jakari flinched.
Just barely. But he flinched.
"That symbol was buried," he said. "Erased from memory. Burned from stone. It does not exist."
Larriu leaned closer, squinting. "Pretty sure it just existed in his hand."
Jakari ignored the comment this time. He looked—truly looked—at Aitken now, not as a pest, but as a vessel. A thread in a loom he hadn't touched in ages.
"If the Binturus are stirring again," he said, voice heavier now, "then the pact is about to be broken."
Aitken felt his spine chill. "Pact?"
Jakari didn't answer. Instead, he turned his back.
"You're asking for more than you realize," he said. "You bring old wounds into a new war. And for that, you offer only... a rumor?"
"I offer proof soon," Aitken replied, standing straighter despite the blood running down his lips. "I just need your permission to go deeper into the fourth dimension."
That finally earned him silence.
Even Larriu's smirk faded.
"The fourth dimension is forbidden to mortals with no distinction," Jakari said. "It was sealed by the council."
"And I believe what remains of the Binturus tribe is hiding beyond it," Aitken pressed.
Jakari looked down at his hand, where he'd crushed the last grape. Then, slowly, with a sigh that seemed to shake the chamber's very light—
"Then I'll allow it," he said.
Aitken's eyes widened.
"But on one condition," Jakari added.
"What condition?" Aitken asked.
Jakari turned back to them, and in that moment, the full godhood behind the avatar shimmered through—stars bleeding behind his eyes, time folding around his fingertips.
"When you find them," he said, "you must kill them. All of them."
Aitken and for once Larriu nodded in acknowledgement and waited, they had definitely gotten him hooked now it was time to deel in the goods.
"What do you want?" Jakari asked.
This was the true reason behind their visit.
Noir—their god, Jakari's uncle—had been sealed. Not by an army. Not by a council.
But by one man.
Carpathia Lie.
The Traitor of the Heavens. The Shadow King. The man whose name was etched into every divine archive with a warning: Do not engage. Do not pursue.
Aitken and Larriu had no illusions about their strength. By themselves, they could never hope to unseal Noir—let alone survive what came after. Because Carpathia was not just strong. He was a Legend.
And Legends… were different.
They weren't born from struggle or forged in war like other heroes on earth.
They were warriors handed down by the Heavens themselves.
Living laws.
Walking punishments.
Weapons too dangerous to keep… yet too sacred to destroy.
All had once been the highest-ranking officers in heavens court. Wielders of truths so absolute, even the gods feared them. And when they fell—by rebellion, by betrayal, or by decree—they didn't die.
They were cast down.
Exiled to the lower worlds.
Marked as Fallen.
Not as disgrace.
But as warning.
Carpathia wasn't just one of them. He was the one the rest feared and respected above all.
And now… he stood between them and the revival of Death itself.
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Spiritual Energy (SE)
Spiritual Sea (SS)
Spiritual Signature (SST)
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