My Wild Beast

Music Recommendation: Sacrisol by Ancestral Elephants

°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･

A powerful force slammed into Yoa, sending his arms and legs flailing as the air whooshed from his lungs. Symbols and images ran behind his closed eyelids, and a multitude of whispers, spoken in a language he couldn't speak, yet somehow understood, layered over one another. Each voice tried to rise above the others, wanting, no needing, Yoa to hear them. To hear their stories. To receive the knowledge of the island… and beyond.

Yoa could do nothing but lie there and accept his body's response. His muscles spasmed in wild bursts, his back arching, mouth parting wide as more information breathed into his lungs.

It was too much.

Too much to comprehend.

When will it stop?

Yoa did not know how long he lay upon the earth. The shaking left him slowly, like the rumbling of thunder passing from bone to bone. How many breaths had passed? Time had no meaning in this place.

But when warmth began to spear through his chest, he clung to it with everything he had, needing it to end. The whispers, and the power that had lain over him like a heavy hide, slowly fell away, easing from his chest. His breathing calmed, lungs filling with long, steady pulls of air.

The whispers remained but he managed to push them aside and concentrate on calming his body and mind. He remained in this state for… Well he didn't know. He just needed to ensure this peace remained while accepting all that Tayun had to plant in his head.

Pain hammered through Yoa's skull relentlessly as a fog cleared his mind and eyes. He blinked back with a wince, swallowing against the dryness in his throat and the hollow ache in his stomach. It was as if he hadn't eaten in a week. Slowly, he sat up, staring around wide-eyed with knowledge beyond anything he'd ever known wisping through his head, the voices hushed and kept at bay.

Not everything he was shown remained or the gods kept that part of his mind blocked

He winced again, and rubbed the side of his head and the whispering voice whose language he couldn't speak yet could understand calmed, and faded away. His head hurt with all that Tayun had told him. He'd had to accept it all, taking his time for each thread of wisdom and memory to slide in his mind, behind his eyes until he could understand it.

Now he could tell the entire ordeal had taken more than a day. The rumbling in his stomach, the weakness of his limbs and dizziness swaying his upper torso said it all. He turned his head to the side and discovered Vulcan still on the ground, staring up with a glazed over, blank expression.

Yoa crawled over to check on him, relieved to see the soft rise and fall of Vulcan's chest. Though his eyes were freakishly wide-open, it was clear Vulcan was still adrift in the water's dream.

"Do not wake him." Zahul croaked behind Yoa, almost making him jump out of his skin from how close he was.

Yoa froze and looked up at the phantom. He said nothing more as he gestured at the lightest tunnel among the three that split in different directions. Yoa nodded once at him, wondering if this was their final farewell.

"I passed?" Yoa asked, needing to hear it. Needing it all to settle in.

Zahul said nothing, but answered his next question before he could voice it, his skeletal hand resting on Yoa's shoulder. "Vulcan will remain like that until he discovers the key to his success."

Yoa frowned. He could feel his own weakened body, unaware of how many sunsets had burned across the sky before he'd risen. "And if he does not figure it out?"

Zahul stared at him. Though he only assumed the phantom guide did because his cloaked kept him hidden in shadows. Zahul said nothing else and gestured at that final tunnel again.

Yoa released his breath then walked through the tunnel that kept growing lighter and lighter until the whistling tune of birdsong echoed back to him and the brightness turned to white. Yoa raised his hand to shield his eyes from the blinding light, his eyes shut until the light dimmed and he was suddenly in the Sacred Lands again.

He turned around to see if Zahul followed but the path he'd been on was not there. Only the totems, the jungle and the rocky terrain that blocked Luna Lacus from these lands remained.

Was that it? Yoa wondered, staring around, waiting for Zahul to reappear and tell him what he needed to know. The whispers in his head reduced and his body no longer felt weak. In truth, he felt powerful, and he swore he was taller, broader and his hair longer like it had aged with him.

It wasn't possible to have remained in that cave, lost to Tayun's knowledge for so long. Was it? Yet, he couldn't question it.

Instead, he found himself strolling through the Sacred Lands, almost by instinct. It took him a while to adjust to his height and the weight of his body, but he tuned it out as energy thrummed along the earth, guiding his steps down an unused path. His body moved like it had walked these lands a hundred times before, though in truth, it had not.

Instinctively, Yoa pressed his palm into a rock and stepped back, waiting as the rock rolled to the side, revealing a hidden tunnel. Without a second thought, he stepped inside, the glimmer of light behind him stretching his shadow onwards until darkness fell over him once more as the earth rumbled to the rock rolling back into place.

No more than a breath passed from Yoa's lips before two glowing silver footprints appeared ahead of him. They began to run straight for him, its steps silent. Yoa froze at the sight of a Starlight spirit flickering into life before him.

A young woman's voice giggled, echoing along the tunnel as she reached for him. "Yoa!" It giggled, and his shoulders relaxed.

He allowed the spirit to take his hands in hers. She began to move, twirling around, completely at ease with him, her long hair swaying to the movement and her strange outfit flowing around her.

There was something utterly compelling about this spirit like he wanted to bask in her light and warmth for eternity. He didn't question as she began leading him along the dark cave. A smile formed at his lips, the warmth spreading along his chest, making him feel light, lighter than he'd ever felt before.

The spirit's laughter was infectious and he couldn't help but chuckle, watching the entity lead him in the dark. His gaze fell back to their connecting hands, her arm stretched back. Worms glowed like stars above them, dragging his attention away from the starlight spirit momentarily to the vastness of this underground tunnel.

Yoa looked back at the spirit and blinked back at the bright, yet cosy room he found himself in. There wasn't much to it besides the grand view at the other end beyond a small waterfall and a pool. The starlight spirit released his hand and skipped ahead, twirled around before tiptoing along the top of the pool, looking over her shoulder at him as the sun set behind it.

He stepped closer, feeling compelled to get closer.

He could hardly see it now as her image distorted and flickered in the soft wind. As the sun dipped behind the ocean and the sky became a mirage of purple, pinks and oranges before it darkened, and the skies became navy. The spirit looked back to the ocean then leapt from the balcony, her arms outstretched like wings and scattered into starlight.

Yoa raised his hand to the blinding light. His heartbeat echoed like distant drums, fading into a void as a trance-like state took him deeper. His breath slowed as a hush fell over him. Golden thread weaved through the light, forming vague shapes and movements like mist curling through water.

Once the light dimmed, his hand lowered, the golden tendrils dissolving into nothing. The world around him had changed. He was no longer standing at the edge of a pool facing the sea.

The jungle was gone. Any warmth from the sun now felt distant, proving to him how far away he was from home. Questions rose in his mind about the sudden change, but they froze on his tongue the moment he saw the woman standing ahead of him.

He could only see her from behind. Her hair, a pale brown with a golden sheen, was long and wavy, falling just past her shoulder blades. She leaned against a balcony, gazing up at a towering structure aglow with many fires—no not fires, but strange glowing lights stacked in rows, flickering at all levels like stars trapped in stone.

He forced his attention to this strange world, blinking up at the towering shapes. They were like trees, but entirely wrong. Cold. Unfeeling. He sensed nothing from the towering stone. It was magnificent but lifeless.

Whatever this place was, it was a forest that had lost its spirit. All the colour seemed to have bled out into greys, black and whites. The air reeked of smoke, the heat was strange clinging to his skin unnaturally, and there was something here that clogged his senses, his pores and weighed heavily on his soul.

Below, strange beasts roared, trapped in metallic skins, honking and growling as they lined up along a path, almost at a standstill. If he was trapped like so, he too, would be crying out in rage.

Were they dangerous? Yoa glanced back at the women who seemed to shimmer in this ghastly world. It was almost like an invisible golden glow outlined her body. She was not alarmed by these beasts.

She looked fragile, tiny, yet strength lay beneath her skin, like a shield. There was something about her that entranced him. She felt familiar.

One foot stepped in front of the other before he realised what he was doing.

Something about her pulled at his spirit—a deep ache he didn't understand.