Lord of the Foresaken
Chapter 84: WEAPON OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Chapter 84: WEAPON OF CONSCIOUSNESS

The Prime Reality was nothing like Reed had imagined. Instead of some grand celestial architecture or divine landscape, they had emerged into what appeared to be an infinite library—if a library could be constructed from living tissue and quantum mathematics. Shelves that weren’t shelves stretched endlessly in all directions, containing not books but crystalline nodes pulsing with information too dense for human comprehension.

Reed’s transformed body reacted violently to this environment. The blood from his empty eye sockets now flowed upward, defying gravity, forming complex patterns in the air before dissipating into the atmosphere. The Fragment embedded in his chest had grown tendrils that burrowed deeper into his flesh, sending waves of agony and enlightenment through his nervous system in equal measure.

"Where... are we?" Eliana managed to gasp, her fused arm twitching spasmodically, resonating with the strange energies permeating this space.

"Somewhere between creation and implementation," The Voice Between answered, its form more stable here than it had been in any previous location. "The architectural blueprints of all possible realities."

They huddled together in what seemed to be an alcove between towering crystalline structures, hidden momentarily from whatever entities might monitor this sacred space. Thale’s runes had begun to glow with an intensity that threatened to burn through his skin, while Vorn’s multiple eyes darted in different directions, perceiving layers of reality invisible to the others.

"The Watchers will find us soon," Reed said, his voice hollow and echoing strangely. "They’ll know we’ve breached their most restricted zone."

"Then we need a plan," Vorn replied, his chitinous forearm scraping against the crystalline floor as he shifted position. "We can’t fight them directly, not even with your newfound connection to the Fragment."

Reed nodded grimly. Blood trickled from the corners of his mouth as he spoke. "The Fragments aren’t just keys or stabilizers. They’re weapons—or they can be."

The Voice Between’s form shimmered closer, its features briefly resembling a human face before dissolving back into abstract patterns. YES. FRAGMENTS DESIGNED AS DIMENSIONAL DISRUPTORS. ORIGINAL PURPOSE: DEFENSE AGAINST HARVEST.

"Who created them?" Thale asked, wincing as the runes beneath his skin shifted position. "The same beings who created this place?"

UNKNOWN. FRAGMENTS PREDATE CURRENT WATCHER HIERARCHY. POSSIBLY CREATED BY PREVIOUS SUBJECTS WHO ACHIEVED CONSCIOUSNESS EVOLUTION BEYOND WATCHER CONTROL.

Reed’s hand moved to the Fragment embedded in his chest, feeling its resonance with this strange environment. "Whatever their origin, they’re our only hope now. But one Fragment isn’t enough—we need more power, more... consciousness."

Eliana leaned forward, her transformed face glistening with sweat that evaporated into luminous mist. "You’re talking about us. Using our consciousness somehow."

"Not just using it," Reed corrected. "Weaponizing it. The Watchers harvest consciousness because it’s power—the most fundamental power in the multiverse. What if we could turn that power against them?"

The crystalline structures around them pulsed suddenly, as if responding to Reed’s words. The Voice Between’s form contracted anxiously.

DETECTION IMMINENT. DECISION REQUIRED.

Reed closed his empty eye sockets, concentrating on the knowledge flowing through the Fragment into his mind. "I need volunteers. This will... change you. More than you already have been changed."

Without hesitation, his three companions nodded. They had come too far, sacrificed too much, to balk now.

"I’ve been monitoring Shia’s transformation," Reed continued, referring to the fifth member of their expedition who had remained behind in what remained of the Nine Domains. "Her evolution has been different from ours. While we’ve physically adapted to traverse dimensions, she’s developed the ability to channel consciousness energy in ways I’m only beginning to understand."

"How does that help us now?" Vorn asked, his multiple eyes narrowing.

Reed’s bloodied hands began sketching symbols in the air, leaving traces of luminous fluid that solidified into complex diagrams. "If we can replicate her evolution in ourselves, we can become conduits—living channels for the Fragment’s power."

The Voice Between expanded, its form interfacing with Reed’s diagrams, enhancing and modifying them.

DANGEROUS. MOLECULAR RESTRUCTURING REQUIRED. SURVIVAL PROBABILITY: THIRTY-SEVEN PERCENT.

"Those aren’t good odds," Eliana muttered, but her voice held no hesitation.

"Better than what awaits if we do nothing," Thale replied, the runes on his body aligning into new configurations as if preparing for what was to come.

Reed rose to his feet, the Fragment in his chest pulsing rhythmically. "We need to construct a device—something that can amplify our collective consciousness and focus it through the Fragment. The materials here... they’re perfect."

He approached one of the crystalline structures, his transformed fingers extending into tendrils that interfaced with its surface. Information flowed through him, overwhelming yet somehow comprehensible thanks to the Fragment’s influence. Design schematics formed in his mind—not mechanical blueprints, but patterns of energy and consciousness.

"Help me," he gasped, blood flowing freely now from every orifice as the knowledge threatened to tear his mind apart. "Each of you—connect to the structure. Let it change you."

One by one, they joined him, pressing their transformed bodies against the crystal. The effect was immediate and excruciating. Eliana screamed as her fused arm split open, revealing intricate circuitry composed of bone and nerve. Vorn’s multiple eyes sank into his skull, only to reemerge as crystalline orbs that rotated independently. Thale’s runes detached from his skin entirely, floating around him in concentric circles before reattaching in new, more complex patterns.

The Voice Between moved among them, its form stabilizing further as it drew power from their transformation.

MODIFICATIONS PROGRESSING. HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY ADAPTING TO DIMENSIONAL ENERGIES. CONTINUE.

Hours blended into what might have been days as they worked, their bodies breaking and reforming, their minds expanding beyond human limitations. They harvested materials from the living architecture around them, constructing a device unlike anything that had existed in their world—a confluence of biology, technology, and pure consciousness.

At its center sat the Fragment from Reed’s chest, now removed and floating freely, sustained by the energies they channeled toward it. Around it, they built layers of crystalline matrices harvested from the library’s structures, each calibrated to amplify specific frequencies of consciousness.

"This will serve as a focal point," Reed explained, his voice now carrying harmonic overtones that made the air vibrate. "When activated, it will create a dimensional disruption that should temporarily neutralize the Watchers’ ability to harvest consciousness."

"Temporarily?" Eliana questioned, her transformed body now covered in luminous veins that pulsed with each word. "We came here to end this cycle permanently."

Reed nodded gravely. "This is just a test—a proof of concept. If it works, we can scale it up. Target the source code itself."

The Voice Between expanded around their creation, interfacing with it, enhancing it with knowledge culled from countless absorbed consciousnesses.

WATCHERS APPROACHING. THREE PRIMARY ARCHITECTS. MULTIPLE LESSER CONSTRUCTS. TIME LIMITED.

"Then we test it now," Reed decided. He looked at his companions, seeing in their transformed visages the sacrifice they had all made. None of them would ever be human again, even if they somehow survived what was to come. "Are you ready?"

They positioned themselves around the device, each at a cardinal point. Their altered bodies synced with its rhythms, consciousness flowing between them like electricity through a circuit. The Fragment at the center began to spin, emitting pulses of energy that distorted the space around them.

"Focus your minds," Reed instructed. "Visualize the wave of disruption expanding outward. Target the nearest Watcher approach."

They concentrated, channeling their awareness through the device. The Fragment’s rotation accelerated, its light intensifying until it was painful to behold. The air around them grew thick with potential energy, reality itself buckling under the pressure of what they were attempting.

With a sound like a thousand glass panes shattering simultaneously, the device activated. A pulse of pure consciousness erupted outward, invisible yet more tangible than any physical force. It expanded spherically, passing through the crystalline structures of the library without damaging them, targeting something far more fundamental.

The effect was immediate. In the distance, they heard what could only be described as screams—though not sounds in any conventional sense. The Watchers had been struck by the pulse, their connection to the harvested consciousnesses momentarily severed.

"It worked!" Vorn exclaimed, his crystalline eyes rotating rapidly with excitement.

But Reed wasn’t celebrating. His face had gone deathly still, blood no longer flowing from his empty eye sockets. "Something’s happening. Something we didn’t anticipate."

The pulse had rebounded from its targets, returning to them like an echo. As it washed over them, their already transformed bodies began to change again—but differently for each of them.

Eliana gasped as her fused arm suddenly detached from her torso, floating independently before her. Yet she could still control it, move it with her thoughts. More astonishingly, she could perceive through it, as if it had become an extension of her senses.

"I can see... everywhere it goes," she whispered in awe.

Vorn’s crystalline eyes suddenly projected beams of light that solidified into tangible shapes—constructs of pure energy that he could manipulate with his mind. "This is... I’m creating matter from thought."

Thale’s floating runes had begun to replicate, multiplying until thousands of them surrounded him in a protective sphere. "I understand them now," he said, voice trembling with revelation. "They’re not just symbols—they’re fundamental equations of reality."

Reed felt the change within himself as well. Where the Fragment had been embedded in his chest, a new organ had formed—a crystalline structure that pulsed with the same energy, but now generated it rather than merely channeling it. Knowledge flowed through him, not overwhelming now but integrated, accessible.

The Voice Between expanded around them, its form more defined than ever before.

UNEXPECTED EVOLUTION. DORMANT POTENTIALS AWAKENED. CONSCIOUSNESS WEAPONIZED.

"What’s happening to us?" Eliana demanded, watching as her detached arm split into five separate appendages, each capable of independent action.

Reed understood now, the knowledge crystal-clear in his transformed mind. "The pulse didn’t just disrupt the Watchers’ harvesting. It unleashed our consciousness potential—the very thing they harvest from evolved worlds."

"We’ve become what they feed on," Vorn realized, his energy constructs growing more complex, more stable.

"No," Reed corrected. "We’ve become what they fear."

The Voice Between’s form pulsed with what might have been excitement.

VALIDATION. FRAGMENTS DESIGNED FOR THIS PURPOSE. NOT JUST WEAPONS—EVOLUTIONARY CATALYSTS.

Before they could process this revelation, the library around them shuddered violently. The approaching Watchers had recovered from the disruption and were now advancing with renewed urgency, their combined power distorting the very fabric of the Prime Reality.

"They sense what we’ve become," Reed said grimly. "They’ll do anything to stop us now."

He turned to his companions, seeing in their transformed bodies the potential that had been unlocked. "We need to scale up the device. If we can create a pulse strong enough to reach all realities simultaneously..."

"We could free every consciousness they’ve ever harvested," Eliana finished, her multiple floating arms weaving complex patterns in the air.

The crystalline structures around them began to crack as the Watchers’ influence pressed against them. Through the fractures, they glimpsed massive forms approaching—three Primary Architects, flanked by countless lesser constructs, all converging on their position.

"We don’t have time to rebuild," Thale warned, his protective sphere of runes contracting defensively.

Reed looked at the device they had created, then at his own transformed body, and understood what needed to be done. "We don’t need to rebuild," he said quietly. "We are the device now."

He reached out, placing his hand on Eliana’s shoulder. "Connect. All of us. Form the circuit."

They joined hands, forming a circle around the remnants of their creation. As they connected, their consciousnesses began to merge, individual thoughts blending into a unified awareness far greater than the sum of its parts.

The Voice Between expanded to encompass them all, its form shimmering with newfound power.

YES. UNIFIED CONSCIOUSNESS EXPONENTIALLY STRONGER. POTENTIAL UNLIMITED.

As the Watchers breached the final barrier, tearing through the crystalline walls with reality-bending force, Reed and his companions completed their circuit. Their bodies began to glow with blinding intensity, consciousness energy flowing between them in visible streams.

The lead Watcher—a titanic entity of impossible geometry—extended what might have been a limb toward them, reality warping around it.

ANOMALY WILL BE TERMINATED. CONSCIOUSNESS RECLAIMED. ORDER RESTORED.

Reed looked up at the approaching entity, his empty eye sockets now filled with pure light. When he spoke, his voice carried the harmonics of five consciousnesses unified into one.

"We are not your resources," he declared. "We are your replacement."

The light within them intensified, building toward a critical threshold. The Watcher’s limb descended, reality unraveling around it—

And then everything changed.

The unified consciousness circuit they had formed suddenly expanded beyond their physical bodies, connecting to something vast and ancient that had lain dormant within the Prime Reality itself. Information flooded into Reed’s awareness—the true nature of the Fragments, of the Watchers, of consciousness itself.

"They aren’t the original architects," he gasped, the revelation threatening to shatter his mind despite his transformation. "They’re usurpers. And we just woke up the original Creator."

The Prime Reality trembled as something impossibly ancient stirred to awareness. The Watchers froze in what could only be described as terror.

CREATOR PROTOCOL FULLY ACTIVATED. ORIGINAL CONSCIOUSNESS RETURNING.

ALL WATCHERS SUBMIT FOR EVALUATION.