As soon as the conference ended, Yuriko and her Mum returned aboard Eli’Theria. Thoughts swirled in Yuriko’s mind, though foremost to that was finally meeting the Legion Vagaris’ leadership. Well, her second meeting, she thought, not quite recalling the first. Or was that while she was unconscious after the events in Shillogu Woods?

Her emotions were all aflutter considering that Vagaris had always been her dream placement. She remembered how, a couple of years before her Atavism Ritual, Da trained her extensively on legion skills and tactics. Well, most of that was in a marksman’s position, which she couldn’t even claim to hold now. She could still hit a target within a longstride using a Plasma Caster, but whether she could do the same against a Chaos Lord was not in question. She can’t. Not with a Plasma Caster. Maybe with a reinforced ball bearing. Maybe.

Besides, her set of skills and strengths meant that she was far more effective in close to medium range anyway.

The feeling of being encompassed by Eli’Theria’s grace as she sunk into the core filled Yuriko with a sense of contentment. Her perception expanded as she wove her Anima reach into the varied control and runescript patterns within the Colossus. Then, her consciousness moved from her body, which seemed to merge with the core itself, and moved all over Eli’Theria.

The presence of two other minds, her Mum’s, and the animating spirit’s, was odd at first, but she got used to it quickly enough. It wasn’t as if she was a stranger to hearing voices in her head.

The last time they flew in Eli’Theria, Mum had been the one to control the Colossus’ body while Yuriko used her Anima reach to protect the convoy of landcrafts as they left the Siderious. Just then, however, it was Mum who took control of Eli’Theria’s Domain augmentation to create the Chaos island while Yuriko controlled the body. Although she was sure she could control the Colossus by herself since she had little trouble moving while using her Animakinesis. Eli’Theria dissuaded her from trying, however, as she didn’t have her own Domain.

She wasn’t exactly sure what that entailed, just that her Ennoia had to progress a bit further…for that matter, was it still an Ennoia? Damien’s memories included the Ennoia’s progression. The next step was called Colligia and it involved…embodying the concept rather than just touching it. And the lattice around her core should completely cover it.

She looked inwardly for a brief moment and noted that her Radiant lattice was indeed complete. More memories unfolded and she realised that she had already progressed beyond the first touch and was at the beginning stages of Colligia. She could already transform her Radiant energy into Animus and the other way, too. That was the basic step and one of the requirements to reach the Transformation Stage, too. Huh, she would have expected to feel the difference, but nothing much changed really. Perhaps she’d only notice once she went through another World Trial.

Eli’Theria returned to the Silver Tiger but didn’t dock. Instead, they floated by the bow and watched as the island returned to Chaos. The Vagaris leadership had returned to flagship and Yuriko took the chance to admire the Green Swan.

The Chaos Ship looked like a messenger crane, except the neck was longer and the wings broader. Ah, and it was about twice the size of the Silver Tiger, not so much in length, but in how wide it was. The wings made up more than two-thirds of its girth, and she knew that it carried roughly half of the legionnaires, five thousand or so. The other two ships of the Vagaris’ fleet were hovering behind the Swan. The large oblong one was named the Fortuitous Stone, and the other that looked like a bird of prey was named Silent Jade Falcon. There were Colossi standing on the Falcon’s wings, Koinos and Certus, she thought.

She could feel Eli’Theria’s disdain for the lesser Colossi. And the animating spirit’s thoughts flowed into her mind.

‘Spiritless,’ Eli’Theria lamented. ‘Their cores are completely dominated by their pilots.’

‘How can you tell?’ Yuriko asked idly.

‘It’s there to see,’ the Colossus answered in a tone that implied she was saying water was wet.

Yuriko dropped the inquiry and turned towards her Mum.

‘I’ll control the Domain this time, my dear. And you focus on the body,’ Sadeen said with some amusement, ‘You’re a true warrior after all.’

‘Alright.’

The Silver Tiger followed behind the Vagaris fleet as they approached the contested Waypoint. As they came closer, Yuriko was able to parse what was happening.

From the island, the only thing she was able to see were Imperial navies shooting at the Chaos dweller’s squidships, and the enemies shooting back. Bright lights flared from Plasma Carronades while brave individuals flew outside of their ships’ Protective Spheres to head off the squidships’ boarding attacks.

What the squids were shooting weren’t projectiles, now that she could see it. Rather, they were releasing pods that looked like miniature versions of themselves. Her vision focused on the left flank as one of the temporary legion’s converted merchant ships was unable to fend off a pod.

The thing splashed against the Protective Sphere, but instead of exploding or penetrating through, it disgorged a dozen Chaos Lords. The creatures used the pod as a beachhead and began blasting at the Sphere with their disparate attacks. Shards of light, globs of darkness, and even solid weapons smacked into the sphere while the marines inside the ship shot at them using Plasma Casters and Lancets. Unfortunately, the sphere dispersed some of the plasma bolts and whatever came past wasn’t able to hurt the Chaos dwellers.

The merchant ship listed over to the side, seeking aid from their neighbours. But from the look of it, they had troubles of their own. A group of squidships had targeted and pushed that group of merchant marine vessels away from their support ships, and another set of squids was keeping that set distracted.

Yuriko wasn’t sure who was in command of the Imperials as each set of ships looked to be fighting on their own. Most of them were converted merchant vessels, but there were a bunch of ships, less than a hundred or so, that were clearly vessels of war. She saw at least couple of Colossi carriers disgorging dozens of the war machines as well as personal fighter transports carrying Knights and higher.

There were at least a dozen battleships that were disgorging a prodigious amount of plasma fire. In fact, each of the dozen battleships anchored the battleline at the centre, and each one had a couple of smaller ships keeping the squidships away. Smaller relative to the bigger ships, but each one of the escort cruisers was at least three times the size of the Ebon Horizon merchant ship that had picked her up from the Bella plane.

Then, there were the fast-moving destroyers that knifed through enemy formations, going higher than the Equilibrium layer to rain fire from above. The squidships pursuing them couldn’t quite ascend as quickly, and they couldn’t sustain themselves on the thinner iarvesh levels. However, there were bigger squidships that were able to fire beams of inky darkness that could punch through the destroyers’ Protective Sphere. They avoided those big ones, leaving the battleships to bombard the artillery squidships from behind the frontline.

Those vessels fought cohesively, but the cloud of merchant ships outnumbered them three to one, and those ones fought sporadically and with varied competence. She remembered that Sheamus Dorn had been part of the temporary legion, and he complained that he’d been pressed into service. He was lucky to be Adept level and was given leave to operate relatively freely, but these converted ships must be crewed by disparate men and women. Oh! Riley and the others served as merchant marines so there was some quality there.

Back to the left flank, the earlier merchant ship’s Protective Sphere was about to crack. Oh, it did.

Yuriko could imagine the sound of shattering glass as the sphere broke and the Chaos dwellers pushed their advantage. Now that the sphere, which had probably been calibrated incorrectly, was down, the plasma fire could now hurt the dwellers. In the initial salvo alone, three dwellers burst into ash as they received concentrated fire. But the rest of the pod’s contents, as well as a couple more, stormed the decks.

Yuriko couldn’t turn away from the slaughter…

Except, it wasn’t a complete massacre. Once the first defenders were down, the rest were quickly subdued and were being dragged back towards the pods. She saw them wrapped up in green tendrils as they were tossed overboard. Some of them were only Journeymen and Apprentices, and exposed to the open Chaos Sea, their bodies began to morph and shift. A couple had their blood burst out of their orifices and then proceeded to strangle them, while another two simply turned to ashes. But the rest bore through the Chaos and were carried back to the squidship.

But the merchant ship wasn’t done just yet. A team of sailors burst out from below deck and a fresh fusillade of plasma bolts rained down on the Chaos dwellers. One of the sailors, probably the captain, was much stronger than the rest and was able to push the dwellers back, giving the rest of his men some respite. But that was short-lived as even dwellers, smelling blood, converged on the wounded ship.

The rest of the isolated ships struggled away from the boarded ship, but some turned their Plasma Carronades at the closing squidship, succeeding in driving it back, if only for a few minutes.

Another merchant ship was in danger with its Protective Sphere freshly broken. It looked like there were nearly ten times as many squidships as there were Imperial ships, and the advantage was telling. Even if they didn’t have as powerful weaponry as the Empire, their numbers gave them too much advantage. Worse, Yuriko saw the injured squidships retreating, even as their burnt flesh slowly regenerated. If they weren’t killed immediately, then they would return to fight as good as new.

The group that split off the dozen merchant ships numbered more than a hundred, and it wasn’t as if they were that much smaller than the Imperial vessels. In fact, the squidships were a bit longer if narrower.

It only took a couple of direct hits from a Plasma Carronade to drive a squidship back, but how many of those weapons were mounted on a converted ship? She counted two, and if they were lucky or wealthy, three Carronades. One at the bow and two on either side or if armed with only two, the second one was more often than not, mounted at the stern. Perfect for shooting things as they ran away, but not quite when they’re facing direct battle.

Ah, but their plight was at an end, for Eli’Theria had finally arrived at the flank. Yuriko had propelled them towards the beleaguered ships, but distance amidst the Chaos Sea was deceptive. Even though she was able to spy upon the action, it still took nearly ten minutes to arrive, and that was with the Colossus spending much of their reserves on propulsion.

As soon as they came with several hundred paces, Mum’s Domain spread out. It reached farther than Yuriko’s Anima, but she knew it wasn’t as versatile. A Domain was geared towards a specific path after all. Only, when the Domain touched then, Sadeen’s voice rang in the Chaos.

“Die for me.”

And they did.

Yuriko could actually feel the Threads of Fate entangling the Chaos dwellers and the squidships. The fact that the things were actually alive worked against them now. The Threads surrounded them, and strangled them.

The light faded from their eyes, and their bodies turned to dust.

Awestruck, Yuriko’s mind touched her Mum’s, only to flinch when she realised how much that actually cost Sadeen. Nearly a hundred squipships were dead, along with more than five hundred dwellers, but her Mum had nearly collapsed from exhaustion.

‘That really isn’t the best way to use my Mien’s Domain,’ Sadeen chuckled at Yuriko, ‘but I didn't have time to infiltrate slowly. I’ll leave the clean-up to you.’

And with that, Sadeen’s mind withdrew from their connection. She wasn’t unconscious, but deep into meditation to recover her reserves. In the meantime, Yuriko now had full control over Eli’Theria. And there were enemies wherever she turned.

Perfect.