Circe gasped in horror as she felt her mind shatter into a thousand pieces, the process was painless and made the atrocity happening to her psyche feel magnified because nothing was distracting her from noticing her mind tearing itself apart.
Without owning a Territory her mind was lost, there was nothing to anchor her consciousness because her Soul kept elevating without a shell to contain it. If this continued her consciousness would dissipate to the universe and might take millions perhaps even billions of years before the fragmented portion of her immortal psyche merged.
This was the reason why a Divine Spark was essential to becoming a god because it housed the Immortal Soul of the god. Nothing else could contain an Immortal Soul, except you were a Mage with your Magus Tower, but that was just another variation of a Divine Spark or for a Demon, Infernal Spark.
She screamed soundless cries to the vast nothingness as her mind stretched until she feared she was about to be lost forever.
It was then that she felt it…
Like a cold fork repeatedly driven into her eyes and stirring her brain. It was a cold beacon that felt old, rotten, and awfully familiar.
Without any volition, her spirit embraced that cold, a thousand portions of her mind pushing it deep into her soul. Beggars could not be choosers, without this beacon she was lost, any amount of pain and violation was better than to feel your mind stretched till it shatters, and with a loud shriek that held all the horrors in her heart, Circe woke up.
She found herself kneeling in front of a bridge made of ice. An intense storm was blowing all around her, painting the area with a nightmarish shade of chaos. The wind blew her hair across her face and with a frown, she tied the hair behind her with a bonnet made from ice.
"This is tricky… she is still too weak. My Will would shatter the fragile balance here, hold on for a while longer Circe, the pain would not last for long. I can only do this much. I know you cannot hear me, but hold on."
Circe examined across the bridge and she saw a castle made from ice and bone. Was this the Divine Kingdom of Boreas? This was not how she had imagined it, she expected something greater than this.
She heard a crack that was loud enough it cut through the tumultuous sounds of the storm and she turned around only to see the ground behind her was cracking to pieces and falling to oblivion.
Her mouth opened wide in shock as behind her was nothing but a yawning darkness that seemed to be reaching across for her soul and it was already so close to her without her being aware of it.
Circe pulled herself to her feet and began hurrying to the bridge before she stopped her movement, she was feeling an intense sense of apprehension in her soul as if crossing this bridge was like delivering herself into the mouth of a hungry beast.
She was torn with indecision and another louder crack ensued behind her, figuring out that the darkness was a known threat against an unknown force ahead, she made her choice and Circe stepped onto the bridge, as the ground she stood upon a moment before fell into darkness.
"Rowan…" She whispered fiercely, "What is this? This is not a Divine Kingdom!"
Only silence answered her and the bridge began making a harsh sound of metal being twisted in a gigantic fist as the darkness began to creep forward, devouring the bridge along the way.
Placing her panic aside, Circe raced across the bridge and noticed that the darkness was beginning to creep faster as if it was hunting her.
Thankfully the bridge was not too long, barely a hundred feet and she made it across in less than three seconds gaining precious time away from the darkness, about to step forward, she was immediately slammed by a wall of air and ice that nearly threw her into the darkness that had devoured more than ninety percent of the bridge.
With a scream of desperation and anger, she drew on powers she did not yet understand and the storm subsided as its fury was channeled into her body, the power hurt but it was a familiar pain, making her laugh despite the anguish of calling upon it.
Her blue hair lit up as it transformed into thin lightning bolts, and her feet left the ground carried by winds that swirled around her like a tornado.
Acknowledging that this storm was her power, and the darkness was something else, she drew the storm inside her and everything stilled as the storm ended, it was as if time had stopped but that was a lie as the darkness had finished devouring the bridge and was now coming closer to the castle.
Unexpectedly the darkness exploded forward with a loud shriek that startled Circe and she hurled herself towards the castle, hoping it would be able to withstand the darkness, every instinct in her body was telling her that this darkness was the end of life, touching it would kill her, both in body and soul.
Her forward momentum was arrested as her body slammed into the unyielding door and her mind went blank for a brief moment with pain and desperation. The door was locked.
'Pull yourself together!!" She screams internally, channeling all the power of the storm that she had taken and placing it on both palms. Her hands lit up like a star as a dreadful power erupted from it.
With a loud bang, she blasted her way through the door and pushed herself inside the castle with the last of her energy, the darkness barely missed her by a slight margin, and she could not help but grin when she heard the shrieks of anger from that darkness.
Turning around she saw that the darkness had stopped at the edge of the door and as she observed it, the darkness went silent, and Circe had a feeling that it was waiting. She could feel a chill as she somehow knew that this darkness was aware and it was hungry.
An abrupt pain erupted from her left leg and she looked down and saw she did not entirely escape the hold of the darkness for her left foot below the ankle was simply gone. The stump was as clean as a snapshot and she was not bleeding.
