Power Awakens
Chapter 36

Lazrael could feel the intense build up of power, the concentration of life energy in one point was unique across the planet. He could taste it and he wanted it. The creature that had this power was yet weak, he was still puny compared to Lazrael but it had the potential for rapid growth. It was obvious to those with the ability to see, that this creature was new to such power and was therefore vulnerable. Lazrael could feel the creature almost fumble to access the abundant life energy around him. Weak and inexperienced, He thought, could Lazrael accelerate his plans, is it possible to connect earlier than I thought, Lazrael quickly re-evaluated His plans, re-calculated probabilities at an incredible rate, yes, He thought, it was possible, but could he really move to the next stage of the cycle and bridge the gap between this planet and his brethren. As the creature that Lazrael now recognised as the Nexii, reached the peak of drawing his power, Lazrael drew on His vast reserves and manipulated the structured Majee that His host used and mixed in His own energies. Suddenly He struck, hard and fast, but much weaker than He calculated due to the huge distance between them. Still several thousand leagues away Lazrael was able to bridge the gap between them. He could feel the pressure of his brethren through the barrier between worlds, yes, this was the time to take the next step and gorge on the life essence of this pathetic world.

Jaac had clearly absorbed as much energy as he could. The life energy enhanced his already incredibly sensitive senses and he continued to reach out further and further to everything around him. He could sense the individual life signature of every molecule in the clearing, he could sense the light from the stars and how they impacted the planet even in daylight and he could sense other less pleasant sensations, other lifeforms, and something else, something incredibly vast. A palpable barrier of some form which felt like a complete anathema to life itself and behind it the pressure of millions of entities that all seemed to be focussing on him, what in the name of Baln was this barrier?

As his senses spread even further, he had an impression of other powerful beings becoming aware of him, some with an intensely evil feel, some with an overwhelming feeling of harmony, and one that was not behind the barrier but had the same feeling as the entities pressing against it in an almost physical sense. All this new awareness blossomed in between a single heartbeat and as Jaac became more attuned to them he was humbled at his position in the wider cosmos. Suddenly and seemingly from nowhere, Jaac was struck by the most intense pain that he had ever experienced, as something tried to rip his consciousness from him. Instinctively and unconsciously, Jaac instantly put up an impenetrable barrier between the entity and the unbearable pain that this it was causing as it tried to pull Jaac’s awareness towards the barrier.

The enormous and increasing pressure, which Jaac could sense on the barrier, was suddenly intensified beyond belief. Jaac could see with his minds an infinite variety of coruscating energy rippling across a range of spectrums but with a single clear focus on the physical plane here in the clearing. Jaac had automatically and again unconsciously, extended his metaphysical barrier across the whole clearing but he somehow knew that if his full awareness was dragged towards this pressure point, then the concentrated life energy he was holding would be enough to act as a conduit and rip apart reality, letting these entities into the world. If this happened everything he knew, loved and cherished, would surely die. Jaac knew, without understanding why, that the whole planet would eventually die if these creatures succeeded in entering this world. Anti-life, creatures of Chaos, Morfesuc, they were known by many names, all of them meant death.

Lazrael was forcing him closer and closer to the barrier, Jaac tried to resist but it was incredibly strong and the pressure and pain was almost unbearable. Jaac could feel that the entity attacking him was still distant, and he intuitively knew that if this creature was any closer then he would have already lost this battle. Jaac, resisted but it hurt, he had drawn as much life essence as he could without harming those around him but he needed more energy to resist this creature or all was lost. He frantically searched for more power, he shifted his metaphysical senses from one spectrum to another in his desperation for another energy source. Nothing was helping and he was ever so slowly losing control. He started to lose faith and began to convince himself that it was impossible, but he still didn’t give in. At the extreme of the energy spectrums he suddenly found it and blossomed with new energy. The barrier. It was the barrier itself that was a virtually infinite energy source, at least Jaac couldn’t sense any limits to it. If he attuned himself to it, to let an immeasurably small trickle of a trickle of a trickle through with a unidirectional filter, then that would be enough to beat this creature but not enough to let anymore through. Any more power would break the filter and act as a bridge for the Chaos entities and that would prove disastrous. Jaac once again did the impossible and started to concurrently release this new energy source onto the physical plane at the same time as releasing his own life energy. It was a very dangerous and desperate plan, but what choice did he have.

Lazrael sensed that he was losing the battle and He intensified the pull even further. Jaac once again felt his resistance starting to weaken. The pain intensified exponentially as he fought the creature of Chaos and soon Jaac knew he would not be able to function through the agony. Without further thought on the consequences, Jaac merged his majee with the barriers energy, it surged into him like a burst dam even though it was through the smallest of microscopic connections, a torrential influx of power. The increased energy simultaneously allowed Jaac to expel the Chaos creature from his awareness whilst generating what Jaac thought was a permanent block to this sort of attack in the future, how he had done this once again he didn’t know, it was instinctive and not conscious thought.

Reflecting on the stories of the Apocalypse thousands of years ago, Jaac knew that he had come very close to bringing another far worse apocalypse to the planet of Cromus, and that the very essence of life on the planet had been in the balance. He swore to himself to be better prepared to protect himself and to use his power wisely, as he now also knew there were more players in this dangerous game than even Nuthay realised. Now he had to release this energy into something physical and quickly or he would burn up and that wasn’t going to help the planet one bit. Jaac focussed on the pan of water on the boulder in an attempt to heat the water as instructed.

Lazrael had lost a battle but He was pleased. He had felt the power of the Nexii and he now knew that he was enough to continue his cycle. The attempt at bridging the barrier from this distance had always had a low probability of success, but He was had gained a large amount of intelligence by the attempt. The Nexii had touched Chaos for the first time and Lazrael needed to encourage a greater connection, so that the next time he could wrench the conduit from him and allow his brethren into the world. He had weighed his enemy and had found him wanting.

Nuthay, a few moments earlier, had felt Jaac spreading out his senses, even though they were twenty paces away he could feel Jaac expanding further. Nuthay was not surprised that Jaac could spread his senses further than twenty paces, Nuthay himself could reach fifty paces, and he knew that the Senior Masters of Majee could exceed this. He had heard of a senior sorcerer in Naj who could reach out to seventy paces distant, although he was not sure he believed it. The amount of extra power that would give would be phenomenal. He was waiting for Jaac to unleash the energy he had obviously been gathering, but it seemed to be taking longer than expected. Seconds ticked by and Nuthay saw Jaac grimacing as if in pain. Just as Nuthay had decided to walk over to Jaac to check on him, an enormous river of white-hot flame shot out of the palms of Jaac’s hands and towards the pan on the flattened boulder. The heat from this flame was extremely intense and Nuthay threw up a protective barrier around himself and his two companions, already knowing that it was not enough, he was not nearly powerful enough to protect everybody from this level of heat.

The ferocity of the blast of Logain’s Fire lasted a further twenty seconds. When Nuthay could finally look past the intense light he was shocked to his core. Jaac had not just heated up the water, he had destroyed the clearing. He had managed to generate so much heat that the boulder the pan was sitting on had disappeared into a glowing molten slag, the rock behind it had an enormous molten hole bored into it as far as he could see with drops of lava still dripping from the top of the bore glowing with the furnace like heat. The hole was at least a hundred paces long but a portion of it had collapsed in on itself further down, blocking any further visibility of the depth of the molten slag hole. The trees on either side of the clearing were now stumps of blackened chars of wood, and the whole general area pulsed with an intense heat which was only just starting to cool.

Nuthay had provided a protective shield around himself, Tem and Osakee, and wondered how he still lived. He realised that although it was the strongest shield he could have put up, it just wasn’t strong enough to protect him. It had been Tem who instinctively put up an impenetrable shield. Tem’s use of defensive Majee was almost as far off the scale as Jaac’s and it was this miracle that had saved them. Looking behind him Nuthay noticed that all the trees behind him were also blackened stumps. They were very lucky to be alive.

Jaac just stood there dumbfounded. He had not meant that to happen. He had somehow erected a heat shield the moment he realized that the Logain’s Fire was too strong. As he had put his all into it, it was just too late to call it back. The only saving grace was that it was not too focused, Jaac had made it fairly wide beam so as to gently warm up the water. If that had been focused, Jaac wasn’t sure what would have happened and how far it would have extended. His head pounded from the struggle that he had just gone through and he felt intensely sick. Jaac decided he should keep what happened to himself as he wanted to understand what had transpired in his own time and he felt anyone else’s input at this point would confuse rather than help.

Nuthay wandered over with his heat shield still in place noticing that Tem still had his in place too.

Nuthay was in shock “… I am….I just cannot believe the power… your first true Logain’s Fire…I never knew….I have never heard of anything like it…. well …… well now…. I think that was a resounding success, I wouldn’t like to see what happens when you use the prime power to dampen and cool everything down. You might just cause another ice age. How….where….how far did you reach to gain this much energy Jaac, this much power, I hope you only took a little from each life-force?”

“I only took tiny amounts Nuthay, as you taught me. I tried to reach as far as I could but I couldn’t quite reach all the way back to Mank, I could sense it but I couldn’t reach it. I seem to be able to reach further and further the more I practice,” responded Jaac weakly, still distracted.

“If I hadn’t seen that for myself Jaac, I would just not believe a word you were saying. Mank is nearly six leagues back, it is impossible for anyone to reach that far, I thought it impossible for anyone to reach further than seventy paces, you have an incredible amount of power Jaac, absolutely incredible, it is immeasurably more than Zeetek ever had and he was the most powerful sorcerer of the age. Use it wisely Jaac, use it well, you look exhausted and a little pale, we need to get you back to the keep.”

On the journey back nobody spoke.