Beastforged Bond

Pain laced through my chest. The Insignia acted up, but the power stored within did not obey me. It did whatever it wanted.

Blinded by the intense light Volix emitted, I couldn’t see anything. But the Elemental Phoenix could. Through him, relying on our firm bond, I saw all that happened and felt everything my Soulkin experienced.

Something about Volix’s emotions was wrong, but by the time I registered that, the Elemental Phoenix was already on the move.

Raffael smiled at me, at Volix, the insanity in his eyes even more intense than before.

Then I felt it rather than seeing it. Flames oozed out of Raffael’s broken World, and Volix’s flames reached out to claim them. If he had been an Emperor beast like he was before meeting me, the Elemental Phoenix would probably have been fine. Now, he was not.

But Volix did not care. He reached for the remains of the Solar Orb, enveloped the life within the fragments, and devoured them. The Magma Dragon’s flames fell victim to the sudden power Volix unleashed. They stood no chance. Nothing did as the Elemental Phoenix exchanged his lifesource for power.

Unaffected by the scene unfolding around him, Volix continued to consume the flames leaking from the broken World.

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Raffael tried to retract his World, but stopped when the Elemental Phoenix arrived before him. Their bodies collided, but they did not shatter. Instead, a nebulous sensation pressed hard on my chest.

At that moment, a…second bond came to be. It was not a soulshare and felt more like the bond I’d formed with the flame that appeared in my World days before I acquired the Elemental Phoenix.

The bond was temporary, yet Raffael did not think so.

He shouted something I could not comprehend. Instead, I felt it. The bond, the firm soulshare with the strongest of my Soulkins, ceased to be. Pain raced through my entire body. It flooded my whole being. Then came the sense of weakness. The loss. The realization.

The Elemental Phoenix forcefully severed our bond. That should not have been possible, yet it was exactly what happened.

Yanked back into my body, I stared at the brilliant flames high in the sky. Tears welled in my eyes, but they evaporated long before they could trickle down my cheeks.

“I don’t understand,” I gasped, even as Phoenix fire burned in my throat.

Pain meant nothing. Not even the cacophony of cracks echoing in my ears–the sound of a World falling apart–was enough to pull me back to my senses.

I could only stare at the scene unfolding above me, embracing the weakness and loss that came with the death of a Soulkin. It was just that my Soulkin was not yet dead. Not until the Elemental Phoenix exploded in flames that incinerated everything, including himself and the Ruler of Fire.

Myself…included.

[End of Volume 4]