Un-Chain

The black ink spread rapidly throughout the crystal and tendrils of it broke through the crystal. They moved sporadically, all aimed towards his direction. Uteu cursed, he was only able to move his upper body. While he had done his best to dodge, he wasn't able to dodge many.

Every tendril that landed a hit on him caused him to hiss, it left a burning feeling behind, but otherwise he didn't find it painful enough to let go of Uti's hand.

Seemingly realizing that it couldn't do lasting damage to Uteu, the tendrils re-entered the crystal, returning to it'd black ink form. The ink within the crystal quickly shot for the body that was holding himself to the tower, disintegrating it.

Losing his footing, Uteu was forced to let go of Uti's hand in fear of hurting her. The black tendrils shot back out of the crystal with fiercer attacks the moment he let go. Uteu had to shift lower onto the crystal tower to find any stable footing and to avoid them. The tendrils did not follow him on the way down. It seemed satisfied with just getting him away from the main crystal.

Finding himself next to Judith, he looked up and observed how the tendrils appeared to be protecting Uti or at the very least, keeping outsiders away from her. It destroyed any bodies around the center crystal including the ones that had pushed her upwards.

Once it was done with it's job, the tendrils folded into itself before fluttering outwards like feathery black wings, wrapping itself around Uti. He could no longer see her from his position.

Uteu cursed under his breath and bent down to check on Judith. Surly enough as he had thought, she was only knocked out. He took a breath and felt for his chains. His and Judith's was completely snapped, no trace of it could be found. His and Grello's was shrouded and he couldn't get close to it without feeling numb. Turning to the only chain he had access to, he called upon Harvet's abilities.

Feeling the familiar red energy wrap around him, Uteu let out a breath of relief. Whatever this tower was, it continued to damper his connection to Grello, but no longer affected the one to Harvet. Using her strength as his own, he felt his muscles strain as he worked at the crystal to pull Judith free.

Just as he pulled her free, he heard what he thought were voices. Looking further down, he saw Harvet and Harkal fighting somewhere below the tower and surrounding them were numerous other people.

Had the Guild and Association arrived already?

Uteu gave the tower a glance, it wasn't exactly subtle, they were most likely all drawn here.

As soon as those other people got over whatever shock they had over seeing such a tower, they resumed their attacks on each other. Magic and weapons clashed with one another with ferociousness.

Uteu was just about to call out to Harvet when the main crystal once again gave a pulse. The wings covering Uti fluttered for a moment, but would not move away from covering her from view. Looking back down, a lot of people seemed confused and a lot of attacks were suddenly a lot weaker than before.

Uteu had to wonder if the tower was also causing interference for them.

Perhaps they had a few Chains and Links down there?

Whatever it was, it seemed to have caught Harkal's attention as he suddenly broke away from Harvet and shot upwards towards the main crystal.

Uteu had to put Judith back down to intercept the man. He lashed out a leg to kick Harkal away. He didn't want this man anywhere near his sister.

Harkal snorted and waved his hand, blowing Uteu a bit off course. Flipping over to land onto the tower. Uteu used it to shoot back towards Harkal's direction.

"Annoying."

Was what he heard the other say before a wall of wind suddenly bore down upon Uteu. It knocked the air out of him and sent him spiraling down straight towards the bottom of the tower.

He was just barely able to recover and land on his feet. He could hear a few surprised gasps and yells around him but he didn't pay them any mind. Desperately s.u.c.k.i.n.g air into his lungs, he snapped his head upwards, he observed Harkal who was fighting off the tendrils that lashed out from all around the main crystal. Harkal appeared to be struggling against them. The wings hardly moved from Uti, letting the other tendrils attack Harkal alone.

Looking around the tower, Uteu plotted out the best paths he could take to get back up. Just when he was about to take action, Harvet landed next to him with Judith in her arms.

She looked fairly haggard and out of breath as well.

"I'm sorry I couldn't stop him..." She started to say.

Uteu pat her shoulder, interrupting her words and gave her a short smile.

"Thanks for holding him back as long as you could."

Glancing at Judith he also said, "You shouldn't have let her in, our connection was snapped. I'm not sure if we can form another connection again."

Harvet seemed taken aback by this and looked down at Judith with a guilty look in her eyes.

"Uti is in there." Uteu said as he pointed upwards at the crystal Harkal was still trying to get near.

Harvet followed his finger and s.u.c.k.e.d in a breath of air.

"I need you to take Judith away from here.... Wait, actually..." He bent in close to her ear and whispered his orders.

Harvet nodded to his words seriously and then took off, she even managed to knock out a Guild member that was fairly close to them on her way.

Uteu was worried. He didn't know what the hell this tower was and it's affects on Uti. On top of that, he had no clue as to where the resentment had all gone off to. Such strong resentment... there's no way it could have just disappeared into thin air.

Glancing back up, he was glad that the tendrils were still fighting back against Harkal.

Uteu braced himself and then leaped up onto an outcrop of crystal. He was alarmed when it wasn't only his set of feet that clinked against the crystal.

He followed the sound and frowned at the set of familiar boots against the crystal. Following it upwards, his eyes landed on Welton's smug face. Uteu grimaced. He didn't want to deal with this guy right now.