Where the Dead Things Bloom [Romantically Apocalyptic Systemfall Litrpg]

34: Tall tales and Revelations [III]


"No, it wasn't fair," Candace lowered her eyes. "Again, I'm sorry for hurting you, Alpha. I was very high after our Skinwalker fight and thought that we were playing a fun game at first."

She shuddered and let out a small sob, hugging me tighter.

"When I used the Speed Multiplier I got from the Superstore—" she began again.

"The red candy you ate to go faster," I nodded.

"Yes," she confirmed. "It did more than just speed me up physically. It accelerated my mental perception too, amplified my Binder Astral sight. And when I grabbed your wrists, something... happened."

"Something?" Nessy repeated. She looked like she wanted to pry the fox off me, but also didn't want to start fighting again.

"I scanned him," Candace said, looking at me with somewhat uncomfortable, absolute intensity. "Not just a regular Identify scan, but a deep Astral reading. And what I saw..." She paused. "Was so utterly profound that it paralyzed me into blind, confused shock."

"What did you see?" Nessy tilted her head.

"I saw an endless, liminal, Astral tree," Candace whispered, her gray, slightly glowing eyes seeming to look through me rather than at me. "An unyielding spirit with soul branches stretching across realities. It was... batshit terrifying and beautiful. I'd never seen anything like it. That's when I knew that… that Alec was special. Not special as in 'look it's a cute human with a rare Reconstitution skill' but special in terms of whatever he really is in the deep Astral."

Adelle looked confused. "You never mentioned this to me."

"Because I was scared," Candace admitted. "By the time I came back to the physical, stopped gazing at the infinite tree, Alec was already in the dumpster. And I realized I had just one option then—to bind myself to the Astral tree with the Dagaz rune, so that I would not lose sight of him, to spend all my mana just to rest under the whispers of those endless branches again."

The room fell silent again. I stared at Candace.

She knew things. She knew too many things. Was it all Binder magic? Pulling information about me from the Astral?

Kristi broke the tension with a comment. "That's... an interesting way to put it, fox. A tad over-the-top though. Alec does have something about him. Inner strength of sorts."

"Ha ha! The cosmic tree of life branches into the stars!" Adelle added, clearly assuming Candace was still playing along with her tale. "The loopy fox seeks the Astral fruit of destiny!"

Candace wasn't laughing nor smiling. She just kept staring at me with that same intense expression.

"You're joking, right?" Nessy asked.

"Noppers," She shook her head. "Alec is my Astral tree, the one I've been looking for since I stole infinity from the Superstore."

"Riiiiiight. Moooving on from the fox-bae's Astral evaluations," Adelle resumed. "I was feelin' hella pissed, drunk, shocked, impressed, bedazzled, peppered, zapped, n' soakin' wet! He beat me. He beat me by losing! I saw how Bark and Fluff were looking at me. I was done as Captain. Done, my status in shambles, on the edge of ruin. So I made the strategic decision to…"

"To throw me into a dumpster," I said.

Nessy growled.

"A terrible tactical error," Adelle revealed. "An attempt to bring you down when I knew I had already lost. At this point a human girl would probably wrestle her partner into submission and then go on one knee and offer the man who captured her heart a diamond collar ring and a bouquet of man-eating flowers."

"That's definitely not how human marriage proposals work," I said.

"I don't know and don't care how human marriage proposals work!" The cheetah waved me off.

"Did you assist in throwing him in the garbage, fox?" Kristi glared at Candace on my shoulder.

"No." Candace shook her silver mane. "I was still Astral gazing at the endless, liminal tree when I saw that Captain Adler was so impressed by his resilience that she… performed the most ancient pradavarian claiming ritual."

I poured water from one glass to another, not saying anything.

"She what…" Nessy choked.

"It wasn't just any claiming ritual," Adelle insisted. "It was the legendary Platinum Alpha Claiming! Reserved only for the most worthy of warriors! I bestowed upon him my personal scent mark—the highest honor a follower can give! A declaration of surrender to a new Captain!"

"What?" I let out.

"I shared my liquid mana!" Adelle continued undeterred. "Each drop invigorating and potent!"

"Huh," Nessy sniffed Adelle. "She's not lying."

"What." I turned to the husky girl. "Are you telling me that…"

"She saw you as her Alpha," Nessy nodded. "What she did was essentially… an ancient prad gesture of absolute submission. I mean, doing that in public is hella 'effed up. But… yes."

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"See, the dog gets it!" Addie declared with a feline grin. "Your mana went up after, right, tater?"

"I thought that was because of Candace's Dagaz thing," I huffed.

"Don't be ridiculous. Candy's loop thing can't transfer mana over great distances," Adelle shook her head. "I essentially completely soaked you in my mana. Candy's binding thing should have allowed your body to completely absorb and integrate it all."

"Yep, yep," Candace nodded from my shoulder.

"I see," I said. "Welp, this makes me feel marginally better. Only marginally though."

"So that's how we met," Candace concluded with a flourish, finally releasing me. "A classic love story, really. Boy meets girls, girls beat up boy, boy becomes girls' boss. Tale as old as time!"

"You know," Nessy let out. "I'm still mostly stuck on 'Hey there, pink tater.'"

"Not my best pickup line." Adelle admitted.

"Not your worst either," Candace added, relocating to the cheetah's side. "Remember that time with the lion girl in Iona? When you tried to impress her by saying you could fit her entire head in your mouth?"

"Slayer, don't remind me!" Adelle elbowed the fox. "She dared me to do it and I nearly dislocated my jaw!"

"Aight! Mana-infused wine time!" Candace proposed, snapping a wine bottle open and filling everyone's glasses. The Topaz high seemed to have worn off, leaving her less hyper and clingy and more relaxed. I wanted to figure out how to help her with her addiction but had no idea where to start.

Maybe Nessy could help? She seemed like the most level-headed prad in our quirky group.

"To not dying horribly!" Candace declared, raising her glass.

"To not dying horribly," we echoed, clinking our glasses together.

"Candace, what do you usually see in the deep Astral?" Nessy wondered, seemingly reading my thoughts and looking at the fox.

Candace sighed, putting down her now empty glass. "It's hard to explain. When I dive into the Astral, I see connections—loops and threads binding people, events, places. Like a cosmic spider web. But sometimes, when I touch certain nodes in that Underside web, I see... more. Too much."

"Like what?" I asked.

"Like..." she struggled for words. "Like alternate versions of reality, vastly different worlds featuring the same souls. Like possibilities that could have been or might still be. Like the truth behind the System." She shook her head. "But it's not meant for linear prad minds to comprehend. That's where Topaz helps—it slows, dimensionally expands my perception, makes the incomprehensible liminality just... confusing instead of mind-breaking."

"And what did you see when you touched Nessy?" Kristi asked.

Candace glanced between Nessy and me, her expression unreadable. "I saw... a connection. Something old and unbreakable. Something that's survived... more than it should have."

"Verrrry specific and helpful," Adelle snorted, reaching for the wine bottle and chugging it without a glass.

"It's the best I can do!" Candace protested, puffing up. "Try describing a color to someone who's never seen one before! Or explaining how a five-dimensional object casts a shadow in three-dimensional space!"

"Don't worry about it," I said. "We're all friends and we're just trying to understand."

Candace deflated slightly. "Sorry. It's just... frustrating. I know things are connected—the Astral tree, Dagaz, you, me, Addie, Nessy, the quest, the Magnetic Lynx, the Superstore, Manchester... but I can't see the whole picture yet. Just fragments."

"Maybe we're not supposed to see the whole picture yet," Nessy suggested quietly. "Cus that'd break our minds. Unmake who we are?"

"Maybe," Candace conceded. "Or maybe I'm just a junkie having hallucinations." She laughed, her smile not reaching her eyes.

"Either way," I said, steering the conversation back to safer ground, "we need a plan. For tomorrow's dungeon simulation, for classes, etc."

"Including the seventeen baby wyverns that now hate our guts," Adelle added cheerfully. "Don't forget those!"

"Thanks for the reminder," I said dryly.

"What we truly need… Is absolute trust between us," Candace said.

Kristi arched an eyebrow.

"For... our eventual, inevitable dive into Highway Sixty Nine," the fox added.

Kristi immediately lowered her eyes.

"Nu-huh, bird," Candace said. "No sadness! Look, I'm totally down. Who else is down?"

"Down?" I repeated.

"Down to be together no matter what," Candace said, putting her hand on the table, white paw pads up. "Until the end. Until we get strong enough as a delving team to kick the Magnetic Lynx's butt! Until we beat the Infinite Highway and save Ferguson!"

Adelle put her hand atop of Candace's. I reached out and put my hand atop of theirs. The ex-bikers smiled at me. Nessy's hand covered mine, her pink paw pads feeling warm and soft. Kristi's scaled, violet hand covered ours.

"All for one and one for all!" Candace yelled, gray eyes flashing across our faces. "No take backs! No letting go! From now and forever!"

We all nodded.

"BIND PACK!" Candace barked, putting her other hand atop of Kristi's. "Absolute Dagaz pact!"

A Dagaz rune flashed out of her hand, reaching itself and wrapping its loops around our hands.

Silver-violet light coursed through our touch, the magical energy running up our arms like electrical current. I felt a warm pulse through my chest as the magic connected us, binding our hands together in shimmering light. The sensation wasn't painful—more like the feeling of stepping into a warm bath after being out in the cold.

I breathed out as the light intensified, pulsing with each heartbeat.

Candace's eyes were glowing with an inner silver fire, her expression one of intense concentration. The rune between our joined hands spun faster, trailing fractal patterns of light that spiraled outward, wrapping around our wrists and forearms.

"In the name of Infinity Paradox Proxima," she intoned, her voice carrying an otherworldly echo, "I connect these souls in absolute trust. Five points of Dagaz, four prad souls entwined in love and trust focused on our human captain! Let no force tear asunder what has been joined here. Let nothing come between us!"

The magic surged, a final burst of light that was almost blinding. Then it collapsed inward, seeming to sink into our skin like water into sand. The glow faded, leaving us staring at our joined hands with various expressions of bewilderment and wonder.

"Ah, pretty," Addie commented. "Everyone gets even more shared XP now n' sheet? And we'll be able to voicecast each other?"

"Yeah," Candace yawned.

"What exactly did you just do?" Kristi asked.

"Maximum possible pack bond," Candace replied simply, looking very drained but immensely satisfied. "Not just your temporary claim or standard pack link. A true bond. Mega unbreakable. Till the end. Maybe, past the end? Like everyone agreed!"

Kristi opened her mouth and closed it.

"Welp, I'm gonna rest for a bit. That took all the mana outta me." Candace relocated to the couch, curling up into a silver ball in a white bathrobe.

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