The Oracle Paths

[If I were you, I wouldn't prolong this out too long.] Xi reminded him tactfully, his unfocused eyes and absent demeanor a clear sign he was spacing out.

Of course, he wasn't. Jake was just pondering how to extract the two clowns from the belly of the Titan. If possible, he'd prefer the cephalopod to just regurgitate them, and everyone could go their separate ways without hard feelings.

If that option failed, then he'd have to force it, and if even that proved impossible, slicing open its belly would be the next step. No doubt this marine behemoth wouldn't take kindly to that.

Still, he owed it to at least give it a equitable shot. Undeterred, Jake closed the several-hundred-meter gap between the giant monster and the river behind it with a swift stride and, slowly looking up, he confronted it with steadfast composure,

"Do you understand what I'm saying?"

The enormous cephalopod, whose skin and sucker colors constantly changed, blending with the trees it was uprooting and the almost translucent rock of the bank, momentarily ceased its attempt to crawl back to the water. Then, with an unbearable slow heaviness, it turned its focus onto the tiny gnat addressing it.

To the gigantic sea monster, known as the River's Bane Titan by the natives of the Lustra Plains, that's indeed what Jake and all other humans were in its eyes: microbes. And if they were a bit bigger and plumper, food.

Unlike other Titanic Beasts and Abyssal Revenants Jake had heard of or encountered up to now, this Titan obeyed nothing and no one, posing a threat even to other Titans. This was, in fact, the norm, with Titans and Revenants collaborating with humans being the minority.

This was all the more true as without these human-allied Titans and Revenants, their societies would have long since collapsed. This was less true for the Radiant Conclave, which had the powerful Celestial at the helm and four other Saints to stand up to these monsters, but an undeniable truth regarding the Duskwight Lands.

Before the rise of the Soulmancer King, they were indeed just a myriad of tribes constantly warring among themselves over meager resources. As soon as a tribe grew enough to establish a nation or kingdom prosperous and stable enough to federate its neighbors, it would then become ripe food for all the wandering souls and sentient beasts tyrannically dominating their territory.

It happened so systematically and periodically that no Underworld Barbarians still believed in the hypothesis of simple bad luck. To survive, they had to intentionally limit their own expansion. The incessant wars were therefore not only due to the simple greed of these tribes but also their most honorable and legitimate means of regulating their populations.

The rise of the Soulmancer King had put an end to this decadent stagnation they were mired in, which explained the unanimous reverence the natives of the Duskwight Lands had for him.

Returning to the cephalopod towering before Jake, this River's Bane, was by far the most famous of these calamities ravaging the Lustra Plains. The fact that this 'kraken' had dominated the higher reaches of the Lumyst River made it a real thorn in the side of both the Radiant Conclave and other beasts wishing to approach the river to bathe or drink.

Jake didn't know it, but the Radiant Conclave had long forbidden its citizens from approaching the Heaven Cascade and the higher reaches of the Lumyst River without authorization. Not to monopolize access to the purest Lumyst Water, although that was one of the unspoken reasons, but for their own safety.

Even when the Celestial journeyed to the Underworld Cascade, with Featherfall by his side and under the watchful boughs of Anthace, caution was paramount. Drawing from the fathomless depths required a constant vigilance, for a moment's distraction could lead to being ensnared and dragged down into the murky abyss.

So close to the Heaven Cascade, the ensuing Lumyst baptism would undoubtedly kill him. There were horrors in these waters that even the most powerful Lifemancer of Twyluxia couldn't take lightly.

And this kraken was one of them… As Jake still awaited a reaction from the river monster, the cephalopod suddenly moved.

With a slow, deliberate motion, the kraken suddenly reared up, its gargantuan tentacles lifting off the ground, casting long, ominous shadows across the landscape. Each tentacle, a monstrous entity in its own right, was lined with rows of pulsating suckers, capable of crushing metal and bone alike.

As it rose, Jake got a clear view of its head, a nightmare-inducing fusion of an octopus and something far more ancient and malevolent. Its maw, a gaping abyss ringed with razor-sharp teeth, dripped with a viscous, dark liquid, as if salivating at the prospect of the impending battle, or rather the next meal.

The kraken's eyes, now level with Jake's, bore into him with an intelligence that was both alien and unnerving. They were dark pools of enmity, fixating on him with chilling intensity. In that moment, Jake felt as if he were not just being seen, but thoroughly examined by a being whose existence defied the laws of nature.

Despite its monstrous form, there was an undeniable majesty in the way the kraken held itself. It stood as a conqueror, a titan displaced from its aquatic realm, yet unyielding in its might. The air crackled with the tension of the imminent clash, a silent standoff between man and monster, each assessing the other.

Jake, standing resolute in the face of this primordial adversary, knew right away that negotiations had failed.

'This monster can't be talked with…' Jake sighed wearily. 'Then a fight it is.'

Either way, a glance into the creature's acid-filled stomach reminded him mercilessly that he didn't have much time left. Crunch and Lord Phoenix had finally begun to dissolve, their muscles and skeletons fizzing like an effervescent tablet in the hostile liquid. Seeing them grit their teeth, curled up against each other to better endure their pain, even Jake found himself feeling a twinge of sympathy for the two troublemakers.

"These two idiots..." Jake muttered, shaking his head in exasperation. But then, in an instant, his demeanor shifted dramatically.

The fight wasn't supposed to happen so soon... In a blink, Jake's previously subdued but untamed spiritual pressure exploded around him, now fierce and lethal, marking a drastic change from the calm before the storm. It was combined with his overwhelming and unified Lumyst Aura, now very near to completion.

The release of his aura detonated with the obliterating majesty of a nuclear bomb of at least a megaton, affecting everything within a three-kilometer radius. The enormous kraken was hit full force by the psychic blast, stunned silly, but that was just the beginning.

Understanding that the Titans of the Lustra Plains had insane physiques and lifeforces, but comparatively weak minds, Jake had to take advantage of that to end the fight quickly.

It wasn't just an isolated omnidirectional blast but an uncontrolled release of spiritual energy. Unaccustomed to controlling such a wild quantity of Spirit Power at the same time, it took Jake a short millisecond to channel such a release, but when he did, the radiant spiritual pressure disappeared completely, descending like a celestial vise on the kraken.

"Sorry, but I don't have time for a fair fight." Jake spat, his two palms raised in front of him aiming at the shrieking cephalopod. "SOUL CRUSH"

His right fist clenched and under the command of his True Will, a significant chunk of his Soul Power was drained from his body, merging with the dense spiritual energy with multiple attributes crushing the enemy Titan's spirit.

The kraken let out a harrowing howl in response, and immediately after, its huge malicious and hateful eyes became glassy, the aquatic monster clearly losing consciousness. Jake knew, however, that as weak-minded as the monster was compared to the quality of its body, its Spirit Body was no less titanic. It would take a lot more than that to wipe its soul, although it would undoubtedly take months or years to recover.

Despite this, less than a second later, dark circles filled the bags under Jake's eyes, and he soon turned pale. His Lumyst Aura began to flicker like a candle about to be blown out by the wind, and he knew he couldn't maintain his Soul Crush indefinitely. His mind recovered quickly, which was his major asset, but not to the point of maintaining a True Will-based Spell of this magnitude.

Focused on his task, Jake ignored the stream of sapphire blood reminiscent of liquid lightning flowing from his nose and finally clenched his left fist.