The wagon rolled with rhythmic creaking that marked distance from Millstone Crossing in increments Jake tracked through enhanced senses. Four chosen Bovari sat in the back. Broadhorn practically vibrating with excitement. Stonehoof stoic. Dustmane quiet. And Jake processing everything that had just happened.
The Champions strode ahead of their chosen. Separate. Maintaining distance that spoke to hierarchy more absolute than any grid division.
I could have stopped this. Could have possessed the Priest. Taken his body. Used his authority to…
The thought died before it finished forming. Because the part of Jake's consciousness he called "his Fallen" shut it down with visceral rejection. Stolen conscience from a man who'd believed in heroism. Who'd died trying to save people.
I can't just kill everyone. That defeats the purpose. I’m supposed to be trying to help overthrow the Snake Lords. Not become them.
The logic was sound even if Jake hated it. He'd come here to find the Shadow Conclave. To complete the mission. Possessing the Priest might have solved immediate problems while destroying any chance of actual resistance contact.
So here he was. Conscripted. Heading toward caves that bred and breathed. Toward some Pantathian trials he didn't yet understand.
At least I'll get to see what the caves actually are. Maybe connect them to the pictograms. Figure out the Latin connection.
Rationalization. But it helped.
Broadhorn shifted his pace beside the wagon, looking between Dustmane and Stonehoof with expression that suggested he was about to establish hierarchy. They'd all grown up together in Millstone Crossing. Worked the same fields. Attended the same temple services. A town of barely two thousand Bovari meant everyone knew everyone.
"We should talk about how we handle the trials," Broadhorn said with practiced authority. "My father was Champion. I know what to expect. You two should follow my lead when we…"
"Not interested." Dustmane's voice was flat. She didn't even look at him.
Broadhorn blinked. "I'm trying to help. If we coordinate…"
"We're probably going to die." She finally met his eyes. "Most do. Your father's experience won't change that. Planning won't change that. So no, I'm not interested in following your lead."
Stonehoof nodded agreement. "The Champions told us. Three out of four don't survive the first trial. Why pretend we can strategize our way through? You pretend to know more than anyone else. Stop you’re childish tactics before you get us all killed before we even get to the blessed cavern."
Broadhorn's face went through interesting color changes. Embarrassment. Anger. Wounded pride. He turned toward Jake like he needed someone to blame.
"What are you grinning at, Thornback?"
Jake realized his expression had shifted. Amusement at Broadhorn's humiliation bleeding through before he could suppress it. "Nothing. Just enjoying the scenery."
"Of course you're amused. Your dull mind probably doesn't even understand what we're facing." Broadhorn's voice rose, playing to the audience of their childhood peers. "The plague took your memories. Made you weak. Cowardly. You hid when the Warmaster called us forward. Had to drag you from behind your mother like a calf."
Actually they didn't. I walked on my own. But sure, let's go with that narrative.
"Your point?" Jake kept his tone level.
"My point is you're a liability. Blessed or not. When the trials come, you'll die first because you don't even remember how to fight. How to survive. You're walking into caves that kill Champions with nothing but amnesia and fake piety."
Dustmane sighed. "Broadhorn, if we're all probably dying, can we at least do it quietly? Your posturing won't help any of us."
Stonehoof's silence spoke agreement. Neither of them were impressed by Broadhorn's attempt at leadership. Neither were buying his confidence.
The travelers fell silent. Broadhorn glowering at being shut down by everyone he'd grown up with. Jake watching the landscape pass. Stonehoof and Dustmane settling into the kind of resigned patience that came from accepting fate.
And in Jake's pocket, the crystal shard pulsed with increasing intensity.
It all had happened so fast. Jake recalled the moment arriving with mechanical inevitability.
Krove had stood in Millstone Crossing's central square, his scarred Centaur form casting long shadows in morning light. The young bulls lined up by age. Broadhorn at the front, chest puffed with aggressive confidence. Jake further back, trying to blend despite his size making that impossible.
The Warmaster's eyes had swept the line. Not cruel. Not kind. Just evaluating livestock with practiced efficiency.
He'd pointed at Broadhorn without hesitation. "You."
Broadhorn's grin could have lit the village. This was what he'd wanted. What he'd been preparing for. The chance to find his father. To prove his worth. To become a Champion of the Golden Fields.
Krove had moved down the line. Pointed at another young bull. Stonehoof. Solid. Reliable. The kind who followed orders without question.
Then at Dustmane. The burliest female in their age group. She'd accepted selection with quiet dignity that suggested she'd expected this.
And finally, Krove's gaze had landed on Jake.
The Warmaster's expression had shifted. Just slightly. Recognition of something that made the decision complicated.
"The blessed one," Krove had said. Not a question. Just acknowledgment of Jake's reputation.
The Priest had pushed through the crowd. Desperation overriding protocol. "Warmaster, this one has already been chosen! For priesthood! It is my right as Elder to select my successor, and I have chosen Thornback to…"
"No." Krove's voice had carried finality that allowed no argument. "Only our Pantathian Masters can override the Choosing. And I see no Snake Lords here. Do you?"
The Priest's jaw worked in frustration. The Centaurs statement bordered on heresy but he was also correct. His physiological signals screaming frustration. Hope dying in real-time as a thread of resistance he'd found got severed.
"He goes," Krove had finished. Then turned away, dismissing the Priest's authority like it had never existed.
Dawngraze had pushed forward. Tears already streaming. She'd reached for Jake with trembling hands. Touched his face. His horns. Trying to memorize him before he was taken.
"Come home," she'd whispered. "Promise me. However long it takes. Come home."
Jake had nodded. His concentration focused on the constant drain of the crystal in his pocket. He allowed her to pull him into an embrace that felt like drowning and salvation simultaneously. Maternal love he'd stolen. Devotion based on lies. But real enough in that moment to make his chest ache.
Then Krove's team had been there. Separating them. Moving the chosen toward the wagons filled with supplies that waited at the square's edge.
And Jake had walked away from yet another pillar of stability he'd found. Away from Dawngraze's lullaby and the Priest's potential Conclave contact. Away from the mission that had brought him here.
Into conscription for Snake Lords he was supposed to be fighting.
Jake pulled himself back to the present. The memory still fresh. Still raw. Dawngraze's tears. The Priest's helpless frustration. The finality of Krove's decision.
The void suppression he'd been maintaining since Krove's arrival was draining. Not physically exhausting but requiring constant mental attention. Like holding a door closed against pressure that never stopped pushing. Jake could maintain it. Had been maintaining it for hours.
But days of travel? While trying to stay alert? While dealing with Broadhorn's antagonism and the Champions' presence?
There’s no way I can keep this up. The shard wants to respond to Krove's talisman. Wants to connect. And I can't suppress it indefinitely.
Options cycled through Jake's mind. Bury the shard? No, it seemed way too valuable to just abandon. Hide it somewhere in the wagon? Too risky if someone found it. Give it to William to carry? The zombie fly couldn't handle the weight.
Unless...
The thought arrived with parasitic logic that had become second nature. Jake consumed things. Integrated them. Made them part of himself. He'd done it with brains. With affinities. With magical structures.
Why not a crystal fragment?
Swallow it. Let my biology handle suppression instead of my consciousness.
The idea was insane. The shard was only the size of a finger, but it was jagged. Jake's parasitic nature had adapted to worse, he had integrated plenty of materials that shouldn't be possible to absorb.
And his Life affinity could smooth the process. Could protect tissue. Could begin integration that might solve the resonance problem permanently.
And if it comes down to it, I’ll just shit it out in a few days. I’ve done that enough times with only… mild side effects.
Jake waited until the others weren't watching. Broadhorn had turned away in sulking silence. Stonehoof stared at the horizon. Dustmane somehow seemed to walk and doze simultaneously.
He pulled the shard from his pocket. Held it in his palm. The crystal pulsed with stolen light. A small piece of whatever the pictogram Pantathian had taken from the shining cave.
Here goes nothing.
Jake's jaw distended. Life affinity threaded through his throat, preparing tissue. Lubricating passage. Making the impossible merely difficult.
He placed the shard in his mouth. Felt it press against the back of his throat. Too large. Too sharp. Every biological instinct screamed this was wrong.
Jake swallowed anyway.
The shard moved down his esophagus with resistance that should have torn tissue. But Life affinity worked ahead of it. Reinforcing. Healing. Smoothing passage that biology never intended.
It settled in his stomach with a weight that felt wrong and right simultaneously.
And the void suppression... stopped being necessary.
The shard's resonance disappeared immediately. Not suppressed. Gone. Like his body was shielding it. Integrating it. Making it part of himself in ways that went beyond simple containment.
Jake felt his parasitic biology respond. The connection with his host allowing Life affinity to examine the foreign object. Beginning the process of integration that had worked on brains and magical structures.
But this was different.
The shard wasn't just being consumed. It was being incorporated without Jakes guidance. And as Jake's biology began breaking it down, he felt a fundamental shift.
The structures.
Stolen story; please report.
Every affinity Jake possessed existed as microscopic architecture woven through his cells. Stolen patterns from consumed creatures. Integrated frameworks that let him channel concepts beyond normal physiology. Void from Jonas. Stone from Thornback's racial biology. Life from the swamp. Cold, vacuum and Shadowed Step from fusion. The amplification aura that he had learned from the gremlin Chief.
They were delicate. Fragile. Each structure was like houses built from cards. Functional but unstable. Requiring constant attention to maintain.
The shard changed that.
As his stomach acids began dissolving crystalline matrix, energy flooded through Jake's cellular structure. Not destructive. Reinforcing. The card-house frameworks that held his affinities suddenly gained mass. Density. Permanence.
Steel replacing paper.
Stone replacing straw.
The structures in his cells transformed. Became solid. Became real in ways they'd never been before. Fire affinity that had been tentative threads became woven cables. Stone that had been loose patterns became geometric precision. Every stolen concept Jake possessed suddenly locked into place with permanence that felt almost frightening.
Oh fuck. This is gonna…
Pain hit.
Not physical. Not exactly. But overwhelming sensation of his entire cellular structure rewriting itself simultaneously. Every cell adjusting. Every structure reinforcing. Biology adapting to incorporate the fragment into fundamental architecture.
Jake's vision blurred. His borrowed legs buckled. The world tilted sideways as consciousness tried to process changes happening too fast to track.
He felt himself fall. Heard voices. Distant. Concerned maybe. Or amused.
Then darkness pulled him down into depths where awareness couldn't follow.
- - -
Jake woke to the rhythmic creaking of the wagon and Broadhorn's laughter.
"Look! The blessed one stirs! I was beginning to think we'd lost him before we even reached the holy cavern!"
Jake's eyes opened. He was lying in the wagon bed. Supplies stacked around him. The canvas cover providing shade from afternoon sun.
And outside, visible through the wagon's open back, everyone was walking.
Stonehoof and Dustmane striding with easy grace. The single Arieti keeping pace despite the journey's length. Even Broadhorn, who'd been trying to work his way ahead of the chosen to be more connected to the Chapmions, now walked alongside with the others.
The wagon was for supplies. For equipment. Not for able-bodied taurs who could cover miles without strain. Jake realized that he had been unconscious. Had collapsed. Had been loaded into the wagon like cargo while everyone else continued on.
The looks they gave him were worse than the laughter.
Disappointment. Contempt. Pity.
Dustmane's expression was particularly cutting. Silent judgment that said everything about what she thought of Jake's stamina.
Jake tried to sit up. His body felt... different. Stronger somehow. The structures in his cells hummed with solidity they'd lacked before. But that didn't change the humiliation of waking up in a wagon while everyone else traveled under their own power.
"I may have been overestimating Thornback's chances of survival," Broadhorn announced loudly enough for the entire group to hear. "The bull will possibly die before he even enters the holy cavern. Collapse from exhaustion on the journey itself!"
Laughter rippled through the chosen. Not cruel exactly. But not kind either. Just the amusement of people watching someone fail to meet basic expectations.
Jake climbed out of the wagon. His legs felt steady despite the unconsciousness. The shard's integration had strengthened him. Made his cellular structures solid in ways that should have been impossible.
But none of that mattered to the others. They just saw someone who'd passed out. Who'd needed to be carried. Who couldn't even handle the journey to the trials.
Hoofsteps approached. Heavy. Measured. Krove's scarred form appeared at the wagon's side. The Warmaster looked down at Jake with expression that mixed assessment and disappointment.
"Perhaps I should have allowed you into the simple life of the priesthood," Krove said. His voice carried no malice. Just statement of fact. "The caverns require more than a sharp mind, which I just learned is something you do not have. They also require endurance you may not possess."
Then he turned and strode forward. Rejoining the other Champions at the column's head. Leaving Jake standing beside the supply wagon with humiliation burning hotter than any affinity he possessed.
The chosen resumed their march. Four-legged grace covering ground at pace that would have exhausted human bipeds. But natural for taurs built for exactly this kind of travel.
And Jake walked with them. Trying to ignore the looks. The whispers. The judgment of people who didn't understand that he'd just integrated the holy cavern fragment into his own cellular structure.
Who only saw weakness where transformation had occurred.
When Jake came out of his stupor, the Arieti town appeared on the horizon. Jake recognized the pattern immediately. Same geometric precision. Same perfect roads extending in cardinal directions. Same template copied and pasted with unlimited resources.
But as they got closer, differences emerged.
The buildings were constructed from woven materials rather than stone. Reeds and dried grass formed walls that looked temporary but had stood for generations. The architecture emphasized airflow. Ventilation. The kind of design that suggested the Arieti valued different priorities than the Bovari.
And everywhere, absolutely everywhere, were sheep.
Thousands of them. Grazing in fields that extended beyond sight. Their wool thick and valuable. The primary resource this town contributed to the grid's efficiency.
Jake spotted the first Arieti shepherd and had to suppress a laugh.
Ram-taur. Quadruped lower body with powerful legs. Curling horns that marked him as male. Quasi-human face showing the same engineered intelligence as the Bovari. Standing among his flock of sheep with a shepherd's crook, guiding them toward water.
Are you fucking serious right now? Sheep people. Farming sheep. It's like if humans bred slightly dumber humans for hamburgers!
Jake watched another Arieti, female this time, shearing one of her flock. The sheep stood placidly while the ram-woman worked with practiced efficiency. Removing wool. Bundling it. Moving to the next animal with care that suggested genuine affection.
And her own hide was completely smooth. Groomed meticulously. Not a single tuft of wool on her body despite being covered in it from the shearing.
They distinguish themselves. Make sure everyone knows THEY'RE not livestock. THEY'RE the smart ones.
The absurdity was peak comedy. Jake felt the grin pulling at his borrowed face. This was the kind of cosmic joke that would have killed on Earth. The setup was perfect. The execution flawless. Someone had engineered an entire species to farm their own relatives and…
He watched the male shepherd kneel beside one of his sheep. Stroke its wool gently. Speak to it in soft tones that carried across the field.
"There now, sweet one. This water will help you grow strong. Your fleece will be magnificent this season."
Genuine affection. Pride even. The kind of care a farmer showed prized livestock.
The sheep bleated. Nuzzled against the Arieti's hand.
And the ram-taur smiled. Returned the affection with pat that suggested relationship. Bond. The uncomplicated love between caretaker and animal.
Jake's grin faded.
Wait. He really doesn't see it. Doesn't make the connection at all.
Jake scanned the town with enhanced senses. Watched dozens of interactions. Arieti shepherds among their flocks. Speaking to them. Caring for them. Treating them like beloved pets that also happened to produce valuable resources.
But nowhere. Not in a single interaction. Not in any expression or gesture or tone. Nowhere did Jake detect recognition.
They didn't see themselves in the sheep. Didn't acknowledge the shared biology. The curling horns. The quadruped bodies. The fact that "sheep" and "ram-people" were obviously related species separated only by intelligence and engineering.
It wasn't that they chose to ignore it. They genuinely. Actually. Truly didn't perceive the connection.
Oh. Oh this isn't funny. This is...
Jake watched an elderly Arieti grandmother teaching a young ram-child how to properly shear. The lesson was gentle. Patient. Explaining the importance of the work. How the sheep depended on them. How their care ensured the flock's wellbeing.
"We are their guardians," the grandmother said. "The Snake Lords blessed us with wisdom so we might tend those without it. It is our sacred duty."
The child nodded. Absorbed the lesson. Looked at the sheep with the same affectionate detachment his grandmother showed.
No horror. No recognition. No moment of "wait, aren't we kind of the same?"
Just acceptance. Complete. Total. Unquestioning.
This is designed. Engineered blindness. The Pantathians didn't just create them. They made them unable to see their own exploitation.
The realization settled in Jake's gut like cold stone. The Bovari at least didn't tend cattle. Millstone Crossing grew wheat. They never had to confront the fact that they were engineered cow-people existing alongside regular cows.
But the Arieti? They lived with this reality daily. Intimately. Touched their own biology every time they sheared a sheep. Heard their own sounds in the bleating. Saw their own forms in the flocks.
And registered none of it. Because the tyranny ran deeper than physical control. Deeper than economic systems or military might.
The grid had erased their ability to perceive the horror. Had engineered cognition itself to prevent recognition.
That's not slavery. That's... that's something worse. That's making slaves who can't even conceive of freedom. Who look at their chains and see sacred duty.
Jake felt his borrowed stomach turn. The comedy had curdled into something deeply wrong. Something that made the perfect roads and geometric towns and systematic efficiency feel like manifestations of evil so complete it infected thought itself.
An Arieti shepherd passed close to the wagon. Young male. Strong. Guiding a flock with confident authority. He noticed Jake watching and nodded respectfully.
"Blessed traveler! The Snake Lords' grace upon your journey!"
Then he returned attention to his sheep. Speaking to them in soft tones. Caring for them with devotion that never questioned. Never wondered. Never saw.
And Jake had to look away. Had to break eye contact before the shepherd noticed something in his expression.
Because the really uncomfortable question was forming. The one Jake didn't want to acknowledge.
Am I the same? Do I see my own horror? Or am I just as blind?
He was a parasite. Wearing Thornback's skin. Having consumed the bull's brain and stolen his life and now pretending to be him while his mother sang lullabies to a corpse.
Did Jake recognize that as monstrous? Or had he normalized it so completely he couldn't perceive the exploitation anymore?
I see it. I know what I am. That's different.
But was it? The Arieti probably thought they saw clearly too. Thought their perception was accurate. Thought their relationship with the sheep was natural and right and blessed by divine authority.
What if Jake was just as deluded? Just as engineered to ignore his own parasitic nature? What if Hope's curse had done to him what the Pantathians did to the Arieti?
Made a monster who couldn't see itself in the mirror.
No. Different. I KNOW I'm a parasite. I admit it. That's not the same as…
Jake cut the thought off. Because following it led to places he didn't want to go. Questions without answers. Mirrors reflecting truths he'd been avoiding since Earth.
The wagon rolled into the town's center. Same serpentine temple. Same geometric perfection. Just different materials and different specialty.
And everywhere, the sheep grazed while their caretakers tended them with love and devotion and complete cognitive blindness.
Grid horror. The tyranny so deep it didn't need physical chains.
It just erased the ability to see you were wearing them.
Krove dismounted with practiced efficiency. His team followed. The local Arieti gathered with the same resigned acceptance Jake had seen in Millstone Crossing. They knew what the Choosing meant. Had prepared their young rams for this moment.
The festivities were identical. The selection process was identical. The priest of this town had said the same words, and even Krove’s evaluation was identical. Pointed. He chose six Arieti without hesitation or explanation.
Three males, none tried to introduce themselves. Yet each trying to project confidence that their physiological signals betrayed as performance.
Three females that seemed to accept selection with dignity that suggested they'd also expected this result.
Families said goodbye. Mothers hummed lullabies that sounded different from Dawngraze's but carried the same desperate hope. Fathers gave advice about courage and survival. Siblings clung with the knowledge that most wouldn't return.
And through it all, the sheep grazed. Oblivious to the conscription happening among their caretakers. Just animals doing what animals do while people who shared their biology prepared for trials that would kill most of them.
Jake filed the observation away with everything else he was learning. The grid's scale. The species hierarchies. The Latin naming that connected Earth to this nightmare world.
Arieti. From Aries. Ram. Just like Bovari from Bovine. Verrin from Verres. Every species named in a dead Earth language.
How? Why? What's the connection?
No answers. Just more questions.
The Arieti joined the wagon. Ten chosen now instead of four. They introduced themselves quietly. Formed small groups. Began the tentative bonding that came from shared fate.
Except Jake. He stayed at the wagon's edge. Watching. Processing. Maintaining the paranoid distance that had kept him alive since Earth.
William circled overhead. The zombie fly tracked through void sense rather than sight. Upgraded. Improved. Scout that nobody else could detect now that the scent-masking was integrated.
At least I have plenty of advantages that nobody knows about.
The wagon pulled away from the Arieti town. Heading toward the next collection point. Toward more chosen. Toward the caves that waited with trials Jake didn't understand.
And in his stomach, the crystal shard settled. Integrating. Becoming part of him in ways that might matter later.
Or might kill him. Hard to say with parasitic biology that treated everything as potential fuel.
- - -
Krove called the wagon to halt as evening approached. Time for rest. For the Champions to set camp while the chosen stayed with the wagon like livestock being transported.
The team moved with synchronized efficiency. Tents erected. Fire started. Perimeter established. The kind of routine that came from years working together in environments where mistakes meant death.
Jake watched them through enhanced senses. Read their physiological signals. Detected the subtle wrongness that had been nagging at him since Millstone Crossing.
The Champions were agitated. Not anxious. Not afraid. Just... missing something. Like addicts between fixes. Trying to maintain normalcy while craving what they'd been separated from.
Their conversations during setup confirmed it.
"Three more days," the female Centaur said. Her voice carried longing that should have been inappropriate for discussing combat trials. "Feels longer each time."
"The emptiness is worse." One of the Bovari Champions rubbed his chest like something hurt there. "Can you feel it? Like she's calling even from this distance?"
"Always calling." The Verrin's voice held reverence. "Always waiting. It's why we come back. Why we always come back."
They spoke of the caves like lovers. Like something precious they'd been separated from against their will. Missing trials that had scarred them. That had killed countless others. That represented horrors Jake couldn't yet comprehend.
They're addicted. Whatever the caves do, it's parasitic. Makes them dependent. Turns Champions into junkies craving their next descent.
The realization was disturbing and illuminating in equal measure. These weren't just soldiers following orders. They were victims of something that rewrote their brain chemistry. Made them worship their own exploitation.
Just like the Arieti tending sheep without recognition. Just like the Bovari praising Snake Lords who harvested them. The grid's tyranny infected everything. Turned resistance into impossibility through engineering so deep it became biology.
Jake settled beside the wagon for the night. Let the others form their tentative bonds. Let Broadhorn glower and Dustmane maintain her emotional distance and the Arieti whisper among themselves.
And felt the crystal shard pulse in his stomach. Integrating. Becoming part of him.
Whatever consequences that carried, he'd deal with them when they emerged.
For now, he just needed to survive the journey. Make it to the caves. Figure out what they were. Find the connection to the pictograms and the Latin names and the Shadow Conclave that had to exist somewhere in this nightmare grid.
One problem at a time. Don't think about Dawngraze. Don't think about the Priest. Don't think about the mission getting further away.
Just survive. That's what parasites do.
- - -
END CHAPTER 60
