“What the hell are these things!?” Benny yelped, leaping backwards to avoid the mad rush. As soon as their 'emissary' had fallen, a swarm of enemies had been launched through the the gate and begun pushing them back. Jartor was struck first, a closed fist meeting his midriff and sending him flying backwards, spitting blood. This was a primus, even one subdued by the conflicting forces of the astral, injured...

Vidarr and Octavian had sought to close the gap, doing well enough for themselves given the time to prepare for the attack, but there were just too many of them. Most of them more accurately looked like humans, but it was hard to say.

Their heads had been split in half, horizontally at the lips, replaced by plates of steel to occupy the space their eyes and faces should be. They were burly and well muscled, with steel nails or screws patterning their flesh at consistent intervals. Rivets lined their bottom jaws to screw their mouths shut, muting them beyond anything but a dull humming sound. Interspersing them were large reptilian humanoids of an even larger bulk, but far fewer in number and well capable of roaring. Followed by scrawny, pale, starved creatures that might have once been humanoid, but their faces were peeled of any flesh and they all had glowing cyan crystals sprouting from their eye sockets. They screamed the loudest, out of pain or rage or some battle cry, none could say for sure.

“Those are definitely monsters.” Tyr pointed at the reptilians. They had the bodies of burly humans, scaled skin, which would remind him of the kobolds if not for their crocodilian heads and the significantly larger size of them. “Lizardmen.” He guessed. Nothing that came from the portal seemed wholly alien to him, though they were in the truest sense of the word. All bipedal humanoids, capable of some measure of thought and wielding weapons – few of them wore armor. The lizardmen in particular chose to don girdles of plated discs and stout bracers, but that was all – leaving their heads and chest bare. The humans, he was almost sure of it based on their scent, were slaved to the machinery that had replaced most of their brain, their internals were so full of enchanted metal that he couldn't glean much from observing them at a distance. Anima constructs, not unlike Hastur's own, but significantly more stable. Still 'alive'.

“Not quite.” Samson shook his head, eyes full of recognition, still that steady eyed titan managing to avoid any injury throughout the struggle. A paragon of the capabilities of a strong, unawakened man, born in a world where he would be considered 'lesser'. “Certainly monsters, I suppose, but those are Nileids. They are common in the lands to the west of mine, and they are vicious opponents. I would advise you not to engage one directly, these are bigger than what I'm used to.” He grunted, feet sinking into the slushy ground of melted snow, ligaments popping at the force generated by the first of the half-headed humans to reach him. Eyes wide at the astonishing might of the creature. Easily enough to beat him in a test of strength, until Tiber pivoted around his flank gracefully to cut the dominant arm from the thing. Physically powerful, but not so consistent in their durability based on how the others were handling them.

A swarm of the things continued to pour out of the gate, as much in scope as the fogmen they'd seen before if not more so. And through the now armless man kicking at Solomon, he realized that they did not feel pain. No pain, no fear, no consideration for their own wellbeing. No eyes to see, and yet the plated feet of the thing managed to catch Samson in the gut with precision, throwing him backwards with a windless grunt.

Throughout it all, Hastur observed the confrontation with even greater interest. These were not men, but they had the bodies of humans not so different from a biological standpoint to those of his own world. They were slaves, but in both body and mind. Flesh automata, and yet they possessed a bevy of enchanted implants that saw to augmenting their strength and madness both. Each and every one of them had been a living thing once, and now they were a legion of peerless soldiers. All of the benefits given a living thing, far fewer of the detriments so common in thinking beings.

Tyr leaped upon the creatures back. Stabbing down with daggers held in a reverse grip, Fennic attacking from the front. From both sides, the creature was perforated with holes. Expertly placed arrows jutting from where its heart should be, and Tyr used his sight to target both that and the other organ on the creatures body. And yet...

“Die!” He screamed. Tyr had been confident, perhaps too confident. In terms of overall power, he'd stagnated in recent years, since none of the beasts created from pure mana were 'real'. He gained no power from the faceless ones or the fogmen, nor the darkbeasts.

Yet, he'd come so far. Come to a point where he was certain no man could match him in a test of strength without magical aid. Never once had he stopped pushing his body, until common facilities had ceased to bear fruit and he'd had to improvise. Every day was an exercise in pushing himself as far as he could go, and now... He still felt so weak.

He let his daggers return to his dimensional space and gripped the massive thing in his arms, just long enough to squeeze its torso. His elbows popped, biceps straining as he sought to crush it outright – but the resistance he faced was incredible. Like trying to crush the trunk of a tree. Even with its innards all pulverized, it still moved. Burning with life energy when it had no right to. His feet dragged furrows through the earth as it tried to push and and use its last remaining limbs, its legs, to attack something else. Pulling Tyr along like a child, unable to stop it from approaching the prone form of Samson. Girshan and Xavier both hammered away at its legs, but the armor it wore on its lower half was sturdier than it looked.

It raised its leg, the dizzied man below prime for a stomping, the helmet-less skull all to easy a target. Tyr pulled with all his might, letting earth magic infuse his frame and link him to the ground below. Piles of dirt hardened to stone at his feet, and yet still – he could not stop it. The layers of rock shattering like clay as he continued to squeeze with all his might. “Samson!” He shouted, panicked for the first time in recent memory at the idea that the man might really die. His man, this... Brother of his, someone who'd shown him great faith and loyalty irrespective of his perceived failures. “Someone help!”

Girshan ceased his attempt to crush its left leg, dropping his hatchets and hauling at the limb. It merely slowed, just a bit, before continuing on, the juggernaut that it was. Hauling three men along with it, with a body covered in viscous black blood and every circulatory and respiratory organ cut to ribbons. Xavier's arm became a wicked gray scythe, chopping into its midriff until he reached the spine where he could go no further. It was like the bones of this thing were made of mithril... His allomancy wouldn't work on it, and he couldn't cut directly through them.

Tiber pulled at Samson's collar, dragging him away with all the force his significantly smaller body was capable of. The creature was strong, and incredibly durable, but it wasn't exactly fast. Samson was a large man, however, and in his armor it was like dragging an anvil across flagstones. Slowly, the creature was gaining on them.

Tyr huffed, shaking with the exertion, putting everything he had into this one single enemy, well aware that there were hundreds of these things. A deep gloom settled in his soul, saving Samson was of utmost importance, but after...? They were going to lose.

Jura slid around, rapidly padding over the ground, crouching with bow raised and arrow nocked in defense of the big man that Tyr seemed to care about so much. Slotting an arrow to her bowstring and pulling it taught, she cried out. “NIGHT LANCE!” The black-violet projectile sank into the creatures flesh with a resonating thud. It shuddered, what remained of its upper body writhing and shriveling until it was little more than a twitching mummy. Still alive, though, and that was a thing Tyr would never forget in all his days after. Stomping it flat until it no longer was, extending his arms and washing it with flames until very little was left.

Some component that was keeping it alive had dulled under the force of Jura's spell, some great vulnerability in their design.

“Weak to darkness magic!” Hastur shouted to the others, they were some distance away – but he was an archmage. As far as he was concerned, there wasn't a single mage on the entire continent that was stronger than he was, especially in that particular element. Hastur the bloody, they called him now, but he'd always been the black, darkness had always come easy to his line in particular. “The ones with the implants are incredibly weak to darkness magic!”

The others watched on as the 'sniveling coward' became a tyrant of the battlefield, lifting himself from the ground without an incantation and raining death down on the enemy. A swarm of black bolts coming down in a whistling hail. Tyr watched him, aghast. He was slaughtering hundreds every second. The reptilians were more resilient to it, but many of them perished as well. This was the true might of an archmage, something he had not properly appreciated in the past.

Jura joined him as best she could, as the only other member of their group capable of using darkness magic. One arrow at a time, she was magnificent, but even still only a drop in a well compared to what Octavian and Hastur were doing on the opposite side of things. Rafael, the other human adventurers, and Tyr's team matched them as best they could, leaving the others standing in place without much to do all of a sudden. A brief calm in the storm.

“Can't you help them?” Yana asked, staring at Tyr. For the first time since she'd known him, he was doing nothing, standing in place and frowning hard at the conflict raging before the portal. “I'm sorry, I don't mean to pry or tell you that you're not doing a great job. It's just--”

“I can't use darkness magic.” Tyr replied with a stony face. He'd managed to access all elements to some degree, and could use them readily as infusions to augment his physical capabilities, but darkness magic had eluded him, and continued to do so. He was too anxious to attempt to read of Altrimar to see if that would help, even if he'd still had the book that had 'mysteriously' disappeared from his dimensional ring. Of all the elements he could manifest, a wisp of dark magic was the best he could maintain. “See?”

He pointed at one of the rampaging, half headed men in their general vicinity. Extending his spellbreaker outward to weave a spell of life draining. His version, at least. What should've happened, for a level two spell, was a funnel construct of elemental darkness connecting him to the other living thing. Instead, what he got was just a thread. Barely perceptible to those who could sense mana, and not at all to those who couldn't. Only, this time, something about it was different. The creature froze, shuddering, dropping both axes from its hands despite no apparent injury. Something... Tyr couldn't put a word to it. It just clicked in his head. Like an egg being cracked with the gentle tapping of a spoon, he was unraveling the things mana core, albeit very slowly.

“A boy sworn to death. Valkyrja, exiled Hel. The literal concept of death. I'll never be death, I do not know death nor my soul the passing of time. I am immutable. She is death, it's not my power, it's hers.” Tyr mumbled with a furrowed brow – holding the creature in a state of silent agony while leaving the others confused and baffled at his strange outburst. “It's like life, these prime concepts that lord over living breathing things are too much to handle directly. It needs... A conduit, some measure of focus, but could I do it? No... Maybe? Not yet.” He shook his head. “I'm still... Imperfect. To see it as a weapon, it's not a weapon, it's a sacred connection, I've seen it in the song but only now do I understand. It's not about the song... Song magic was just a key, a way of understanding... Emotion? But why?”

“Uh...?” Yana cocked an eyebrow at him as he felt into a wild muttering, crouching down low with his hands on his knees.

“Tyr, what are--?” Tiber had seen his mental state devolve before, and this was a lot like that. Tyr who would stare at pictures of men for hours, pasted to his wall. Silently glaring at those images. Until exhaustion overtook him, the same men that had 'killed' his mother. Signe who had barely spoke to nor seemed to recognize Tiber, and if she had, she'd said very little. Tiber knew her son better than most, and he had the same look in his eye. Like... Like he was looking at this poor creature as if it were an insect and he the entomologist. Something to be picked apart and studied, that cold and calculative part of himself, a monstrous aspect of his underlying personality.

“Die.” Tyr said softly. The darkness magic coming as a thread from his hand burst forth into a black hand, clawed and all, but it wasn't enough to satisfy him. Eventually, the creature did wither and cease in movement, but it didn't feel quite right to him. “I see.”

“You see...? See what?” Girshan was crouched, ready to at least attempt to intercept anything else coming for them, but that had been strange to say the least. He'd gone through a great deal of preponderance regarding Tyr's underlying personality traits and found them mostly artificial. And sometimes, the man would say the strangest things with no elaboration whatsoever, making him even more mysterious.

“I don't want it to die.” Tyr frowned, deep in thought. “I need to want it to die, down to my deepest parts to use this power. But I can't. That's why my magic is so weak, it lacks intent, I don't understand it's purpose – nor my own... Without conviction, I cannot properly wield the shard given to me, it is not a thing earned. I need to earn it, to really feel it, but that kind of conviction is inhuman. I am still too human.”

“Still too human...?” Girshan's confusion rose a measure of ten, especially considering that Tyr had very obviously just killed that creature. Tyr was many things, but he was not weak – among humans he was more than competent if not for a lack of creativity. Even then, that's not something he could be blamed for. His ability to heal and remain nigh immortal at a fundamental level far superseded the faults in his technique, but it was also a detriment to his learning process. At the same time, it was also the inverse. You couldn't learn if you were dead, but you also could not progress properly if there was no struggle. Tyr was dead to honest fear, the rush of adrenaline and mad dash for survival had started to become a concept he couldn't truly understand, and that was a weakness. “What difference does it make stomping it, putting an axe to its head, or smashing it apart? Don't tell me you've suddenly developed some kind of sympathy, and for these things. They are slaves, not capable of thought, shells of consciousness forced to exist beyond what nature has intended. We are doing them a mercy, Tyr. Believe me.”

Tyr was similarly lost, his voice wispy and droning. “I think... I've killed, you know? A lot of things, and a lot of people. But I never needed them to die. I wanted them to die, for my own benefit. Away from me, separated, I didn't care about them or their place on the world, only motivated by petty desire. I am a bad person, Girshan, a demon in the flesh. I thought there were no bad people – but if there are, I'd have to be one. All of my motivations have been so selfish. Death is not malicious, it's not evil, it's a sacred part of life, something too pure for my current self to touch at. Entropy is natural, something sacred and universal. All turns to dust, one day. I can use light magic because I am full of vain desire, but I cannot use the dark freely for the same reason. I don't want anything to die because it should be dead, I want it to die because... Well – I want it to die, I am confused as to how I should articulate this. Death is not selfish, but creation is.”

“I guess it's time for another schizo rant in the middle of a battlefield, then?” Girshan frowned. Tyr was staring down at the withered husk of the beast with a heartbroken expression, facing whatever perceived failure and fault in his character he'd been forced to confront. Yet, still, he ensured that it was dead. Dead enough to remain that way, burning it to ash. These creatures were incredibly resistant to most magic, and force, but they burnt all the same when given his ministrations. “I don't get it, and if I don't understand it, I can't help you.”

“I don't either, it's a voice in my head. There's a voice there whispering to me but I can barely hear it, but I'm so close... I'm just not worthy yet.” Tyr looked back at his teacher and one of his many mentors he'd had throughout the years. Perhaps even a companion or friend, he wasn't sure. “I'm not sure if I really want to hear it.” He didn't remain frozen in place for long, sprinting off into the mess of things and leaving the others behind. “But I think I need to. I want to know who I am!”

It was a lesson. The skillbooks he'd consumed and yet failed to understand. He understood the one, but could never truly make use of its underlying concepts. Tyr had never needed anything to happen. He just wanted, the ultimate selfishness that predicated all mortal existence. He couldn't change that, he couldn't need something to die. But he could want hard enough to emulate it. He could want to have a thing and see it done, and that would have to be enough. Drawing his cleaver in the right hand and a hatchet in the left, hoping to find it soon.

If he could reach that peak presented to him, perhaps those questions filling his mind could finally be answered. For now, it was enough, a goal.

Who am I? What am I?

What is my purpose?