Nexus Awakened (An Isekai LitRPG Gender Bender Story)

707. Ready to Set Sail

Salvation was the gift that Frost’s Will could bestow upon people. It was different from how Frost needed to physically fight against a person’s inner turmoil to reinforce their Ego, as one ultimately needed to make that choice themselves.

Frost further questioned Deiman as they waited for the Hired Arm to finish up above. According to him, he didn’t arrive at an epiphany to manifest a Corrupted Persona. It should have been obvious to Frost considering the nature of Salvation, but it still came to her as a surprise.

I wonder if the White Rabbit is aware that an epiphany isn’t the only avenue to manifest this kind of power. And not just her, but also the Aberrations of Elysia as a whole might not know about this either. Nav. Lailah. What’s the chance that this is what Elysia wanted in the first place?

< Just like you, she seeks to save people by allowing them to tap into the spark of light within. Salvation is the only clue we have regarding Elysia’s intentions. The White Rabbit had a similar reason as to why she brought people into the Escape >

< But Lailah is pleased with your findings. The crystallization of the Ego through its reinforcement verses an epiphany that devours oneself whole through a psychological collapse >

< And still yet the ‘Self’ exists within both outcomes >

Deiman didn’t think she tried to make him Corrupt out of malice. He said Elysia seemed genuine enough despite her suggesting that he should leave Autumn to die. I’m curious why Elysia’s Will focuses so much on the… can I call it the Shadow?

< Unknown >

There was no way of understanding Elysia’s reasoning until they either spoke directly to her Will, or to Elysia herself. The former didn’t seem easy since one required to be close to Corrupting in the first place.

The last thing on their mind would be to interview a God of Cogntion.

The Ankou became fairly distraught at Frost’s level of knowledge regarding the Corruption. Elysia was a name they only knew through her Aberrations and nothing else. For a being that wanted nothing other than to become a Corrupted, they were awfully ignorant of the one person who could grant them their wish.

The talking head, like all Impuritas, spilled everything he knew.

This time, however, it was thanks to the mention of Beholder Umbra. Frost didn’t even need to torture him this time around, but she made it clear that she could inflict a pain beyond comprehension with only a gentle squeeze.

“I’m not sure if Beholder Umbra’s the one you should be worried about.” Frost stated as she charred Gustus’ cadaver. “This place is one of many, am I wrong?”

A compulsion to feed overcame her. She had all the food in the world stored within her Dimensional Storage, but with the number of slaves the Hired Arm was bringing to the Underflow, she figured that that deserved to eat something other than wheat gruel and half-baked bread.

She gave a subtle warning to Deiman and Autumn before she dined on Gustus, devouring him with unstoppable chomps.

“… Holy shit…” Autumn’s voice quivered. “You were never human in the first place. At all…”

“The thing in front of me says she’s the Head of the Nexus.” Deiman said. “And she was the voice that gave me this power.”

“I thought she was just an unusual Court Mage… Either I’m already dead and seeing things, or this world’s about to get messy if they knew this…” Autum’s stomach lurched as she cupped her mouth, yet for some reason she couldn’t bring herself to look away from Frost.

“Too late.” Frost said, wiping her lips with a thumb. “Brandar’s been exposed to a whole new flock of Healers that can take down guys like these on their own. Hard to believe that, huh? If I said that they could injure Moons too, then would you believe me?”

Autumn wished she could take Mae’s place and pass out. It would be easier to shrug this off as a fever dream.

“Moons…? You mean those deities of the Nexus that fight the Corrupted? Them? How do you...”

She knew that Frost had no reason to lie. Her power spoke for itself.

Frost patted her chest and grinned.

“Like Deiman said, you’re looking at the one who runs the Nexus. Like it or not; the three of you are caught up in this mess now.”

Frost toyed with the Ankou, flicking his face lightly as she brought close to hers.

“You said you wanted them alive, but you didn’t say why. Care to explain it to me?”

He trembled, for he knew that one bite was all it would take to end him for good.

“I’m not sure. But the Broken Thorn wanted Deiman and Autumn. As for the Maestro – The Maestro! How can you spare her when she’s an impurity!?”

“Mae is nothing like you.” Deiman spat with vitriol. “She… didn’t have to pull me along with her. She could have just abandoned me.”

Frost’s feathers rustled in response to both of their answers.

She was tempted to jolt Mae awake for questioning, but she figured that it wasn’t important right now. The Hired Arm was drawing close, and she still needed to consolidate as much information as possible from the Ankou.

The first thing that came to mind was of course the whereabouts of the Red Barron.

“Wherever he wants to be… He can replicate like us from any of the Hearts of the Hungry. With how close we are to releasing the horde, then he will be positioned at the Capital! Frontier! To become their savior!”

“Against the Sins of the Subcut? One Color isn’t going to achieve that outside of a dream.”

“He’s well-armed.” The Ankou spoke with a tone of warning.

“So am I.” She coldly stated.

There was no true confirmation of his whereabouts unfortunately, and it seemed like she had wasted time travelling to the north when she could have just waited in the mines. But hindsight was a disease, and she didn’t dwell on it.

Either way, things worked out in the end.

After further cleansing the bodies of the three, and investigating the colossal chains, she received a message back from Umbra.

< Do not interfere with the chains. Ones of that size are best to be left alone until we send in specific personnel to decommission them. The existence of my chains, first and foremost, is to seal leaks from the Subderma layer. Should they disappear, then there will be nothing left to hold them back >

They’ll be broken either way. Is there nothing else we can do?

Nav relayed her words to Lailah, and then, Lailah spoke to Beholder Umbra.

< My Ark holds the key to your queries. Give it a moment to fall into place. What you see before you are merely inferior imitations. It still baffles me that it is possible. It is hard to call them counterfeits when they work so closely to ours to begin with >

It was always tiring listening to the Beholders due to their prose. She hoped Jury wouldn’t end up like them one day. With that in mind, she breathed a sigh of relief knowing that there was a countermeasure against these chains.

Although that was on a timer, as was everything in this operation.

An army of orphaned children, slaves and servants warily marched behind her, and the large Isolation Sphere swayed on her back as she carried it along.

Frost couldn’t leave them here all alone, so she needed to quickly form a plan.

Teleporting them all back to the Nexus is out of the question since I’ll be dragged along. I can’t open a portal to the Derma Layer either or they’ll be crushed into a paste…

She looked around, eventually finding a docked cargo ship.

Nav. Any idea how fast a ship can move in the river underneath the Bellum Empire?

“About as fast as you can run.”

Perfect!

“Hey, where does that cargo ship lead to?” Frost asked Deiman and Autumn.

“I think the Capital.” Deiman said. “Autumn?”

“Frontier. It’ll head straight to the heart of the Capital.” Autumn nodded.

“There will be major resistance ahead.” The Ankou warned, desperately trying to stay on Frost’s good side. “The Hungry, us, Syndicates – they frequent those waters.”

“Even better.” Frost hummed. “Then the Isolation Sphere will do all the work for us. Good work, other me.”

The Hired Arm saluted as many eyes roamed back and forth between them, convinced that they were either twins or blood related.

Finally, with everything set in place, Frost gathered their attention by raising the barrel of De Jure into the air.

“Alright. Everyone! I know you must be scared, and I know it’ll be hard to trust us – but we are here to help you! If freedom is what you desire, then board the ship with us!”

They seemed uneasy at the mention of boarding the ship. Ankou wasn’t the only one who was aware of the dangers ahead in the Underflow.

However, with nowhere else to go, and with no other hands to reach out to – one by one, people shuffled forward, leaving their fate into Frost’s hands. Deiman could see why he was so infatuated with Frost to begin with. It was so easy for her to move people’s hearts and offer them glimpses of hope when they needed it the most.

Deiman wanted to ask her why she even bothered trying to save them, but refrained and admired her from a distance.

* * *

Frost needed someone to steer the ship. As much as she would’ve loved to play out the fantasy of being a pirate, she’d rather leave the helm to more experienced hands.

Furthermore, she asked the slaves who could use magic and grouped them together, and further split them between those who could cast [Barrier] magic and offensive magic. As Frost as strong was, the Achilles heel was the ship itself.

Therefore, defending it was their highest priority.

They boarded the ship using a rickety boardwalk. It flexed and threatened to snap as a horde of people stepped barefoot across it, swarming onto the deck where various crates and materials were loaded. Within the ship were long chambers filled with cargo containing enough dry food to last a small town for months.

Children called the small raisins ‘treats’ and told Frost that they were given only one raisin when they did a good job. In response, she kicked open a crate, allowing a sea of raisins to spill past their ankles.

They didn’t know how to process this, and looked up at Frost with frightened eyes, expecting her to either burn or crush them beneath her feet.

Instead, she smiled and scooped a handful up and spilled it into one of their hands.

“Take as much as you want.”

The child’s eyes dazzled with stars as they smiled with childish glee.

The cargo wasn’t what interested her. According to Autumn, this one-hundred-meter-long ship was a warship.

And a smaller one too.

It boggled her mind trying to wrap her head around how such a large ship was considered small. This ship would have been preserved as a work of art on Earth, but here, it was but a cheap vessel.

The oceans of Elysia were dangerous. Such massive vessels were a necessity to brave it. Kilometer-long vessels, for example, were standard and required a crew the size of a small town to operate.

Those crews often lived permanently on their vessel.

Giant harpoon-launching cannons lined the sides of the ship. Piles of spare harpoons each weighing more than fifty kilograms each, with one major launcher at the very front of the ship capable of shooting one-hundred-kilogram harpoons.

Again, Frost had to tell herself that this was small.

Then again, she had seen what a high-tiered train looked like.

She couldn’t help but wonder what Caldera Industries’ seafaring equivalent to their Behemoths was.

“I think we’re going to need a bit more defense.” Frost muttered to herself near the captain’s helm where a sheep Demi-Human took the wheel. “There is no way that normal barriers are going to be able to stop a harpoon like that.”

“W… Wwwww what do you suggest?” The girl asked.

“Two things. We reinforce the ship, and we avoid getting hit if it comes down to it. We know there’s trouble ahead. But this is the best shot we have.”

Frost thanked Jury for her time-manipulation powers as she stared at the pale Isolation Sphere. It was anchored in the center of the ship, its immense weight causing the ship to sink slightly.

It took Frost one and a half days to reach Seer’s Town from the Adamantium Mines.

With Jury’s Isolation Sphere, it would only take her three and a half hours to reach the Capital.

But she first needed another source to confirm that the Red Barron was truly within the Capital.

Frost turned to her allies on the CognitO Transmitter.