Author's Notes. Greetings! Sorry for posting this a bit late. I had a huge argument with myself over whether or not I should post this first part of the chapter with Harold in it. At first I decided I would (which is why some of you may have remembered the one extra section to the chapter), but then I finally decided to remove it because it really lacked purpose aside from illustrating upon Harold's nature. I know that such a thing as this is important, but I'm not sure if I should do it now. I'll consider adding the section somewhere else, and if not, then I'll find another way to elaborate on who Harold is, and why he is fighting Blue.

But enough of that. I hope all of are doing well. My experiments with gummy bears have reverted back to gold fish. (Those exquisite, delectable golden crackers. I cannot stop eating them.) I probably won't go back to teleporting them though until I get a feel for the power I'm harnessing. You know, the whole "man was never meant to possess such knowledge" spiel you get from 90% of the sci-fi/apocalypse movies we have. Anyways, on to answering some reviews!

To SuperVegito33: Thank you! In all honesty, I may be good at fight scenes, but I am at my best when I'm writing about character development through tribulation. I can tell you the follow-up will be interesting. Probably. I hope.

To FocusedStream: Thanks! Like I said to SuperVegito33, those types of chapters are my "bread and butter" to borrow the colloquialism. I thoroughly enjoyed making the chapter. One of my best, aside from chapter 134.

To xCrysis-x: You, my friend, are one of my most engaging reviewers. I cannot tell you how happy I am when you lend me your time to tell me what you think. I can say that I do take whatever you say into consideration. (I definitely took what you said about the flashbacks delaying chapters into consideration, and I'll address the issue in the second set of author's notes.) Also, if I do have time (which I don't currently, thanks to real life stuff) I will definitely go out of my way to help you with writing and stuff if you want it. I owe it to you. And speaking of that, I do believe I owe you a specialized, exclusive rewrite for "Through A Glass Darkly" ending. It might take a while since I need inspiration and the time to write it, but as long as I don't randomly forget I will get it to you within the year.

Right! That's all for reviews! Now, I will say - particularly to SuperVegito33 and Vibrant Sound (really cool name, by the way) - that this chapter does NOT contain the Inquisitor/Catalyst Corps combat that everyone has been looking forward to. That particular battle scene was so long (because of the amount of detail and care I put into it) that this chapter would have surpassed 10k words. And so, for convenience (and for the longevity of the amount of pre-written chapters I have stored away) I decided to split it into two. I am really sorry, but I think it's best this way. You guys will get the Inquisitor/Catalyst Corps action that was promised within the year though. The wait isn't as long as it sounds, I promise.

Regardless, you do get some robust action today in this chapter! Enjoy!

Dimension: Skylock

Planet: Scorch

Specific Location: The outskirts of the Skyfort, Carrion.

Time: Five days after Summer and Lyric ventured into the Southern Jungle.

Blue stood observing the groups of demons slowly filing into the giant abandoned fortress. He looked as large groups milled outside, and took down mental notes on the flow of the traffic. He studied the ugly faces of the demons, watching for flickering signs of disdain or grudging respect; all in an effort to identify the leaders.

"This is going to be harder than I thought," murmured Sunflower as he looked at the scene through his scope. "It looks like they're setting up anti-infantry shields up outside the Skyfort. See there, just as the bridge feeds into the gateway?"

The Skyfort was set upon one of the largest island-like rises within the Broken Valleys. The fort was adjacent to another incredible large plateau, and the two raised islands were connected by a massive stone bridge. It was old naturally, but it was sturdy and grand, with large arcs and thick pillars holding it high in the air. The breadth of the bridge was also ample, allowing countless demons to cross it while carrying a giant shining shield-projector. The horde set it down carefully beneath the arching gateway of the Skyfort and began to tend to the pre-activation duties.

Sunflower shook his head. "That's an 'Umbrella-boom-boom-you-dead' shield. Doxia-made, of course. Second age I would think. Just before the first Amethyst-Emerald war. It's not the most technologically advanced, but it does its job properly. The only way to really shut the shield off is to destroy it, but thanks to the way it projects itself you can't really get to it unless you're within the shield-projection radius."

"I'm going in," murmured Dark, ripping his hatchet from its holster and snapping it into its ready position. "There are too many demons around for all three of us to get into the projection radius, but I can melt into the darkness and wait for everyone to go inside the Skyfort."

Blue nodded. "I agree," he said. "Wait until the shield is open and then take it out. But try to use a 'delicate touch.' Don't destroy it. Reboot it so that Sunflower and I can sneak in. Once we're all in we should climb to the top of the Skyfort so we can view the unfolding events of the assembly from above."

Dark chuckled humorlessly. "No one ever looks up."

Without another word Dark melted into the shadows, as if he had been made of wisps of darkness himself. The sun was almost done setting in the west ranges, shining dying light upon the hideously twisted rocks of Carrion, casting deranged shadows. Torch stands and small bonfires were being lit in a couple of locations as well (especially within the Skyfort) magnifying the eeriness. Fittingly enough, this only augmented Dark's ability to vanish into the void of the shadows.

Sunflower shuddered. "How have I been hanging out with that guy for almost a trillion years?"

"We were never a team," said Blue. "In fact, we weren't even a team when I took charge over the old Blue."

"I couldn't sworn you insisted on being called August for the first couple months you were in charge," sighed Sunflower, checking his sniper rifle. "You know, I liked you better then. You do realize that Blue never left right? He's basically integrated his psyche into yours. You're one in the same now, August."

Blue didn't say anything. There was nothing to say. Sunflower was right. There was a pause. Then Blue replied. "When Flaming Star and his team were looking for you, they said you had left messages expressing your regret for all the 'atrocities' that you had committed during the age of the Inquisitors. Why are you willing to kill again?"

Sunflower sat down as he thought. Picking his words carefully, he said: "I am who I was made to be. I don't remember a life before waking up from a coma with Grand Inquisitor Arcturus shoving a sniper rifle into my hands. This is who I am. Perhaps a little humanity will glimmer from my eyes now and then, but the Inquisition Initiative did its job too well. I'm not human anymore, am I? No… And neither are you."

Blue nodded. "I am not."

Blue's HUD flashed red and then distorted. Then it reverted to normal with internal diagnostics reading nothing unusual. The anomaly had lasted a millisecond, almost as if the system had hiccupped… Or snorted derisively.

Blue actually smacked the side of his helmet as if trying to knock it into submission. Sunflower stared blankly. That had never happened before. The Inquisitors were ready for any kind of hostile situation, but when it came to allies… They never knew how to deal with those types of anomalies.

"August… Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," murmured Blue, his tone tinged with annoyance. This had been happening for over a day now. His battle systems had been outperforming every piece of technology in existence, but it was also acting erratically, as if it had a mind of its own.

Suddenly Dark's voice came in through the comms. "The demons are stirring. I think something is happening."

Blue and Sunflower looked up from their hideout in unison. Where there had once been chaos, there was now order. All throughout the Skyfort the demons that had been milling, arguing, and brawling were now standing to attention as a small convoy beings made their way across the bridge. Blue's systems immediately pushed straight through the Phantom Device interference to give him a close-up visual of the convoy, going so far as to do facial match-ups between the members of the entourage and the demon faces drawn from the memories of the slain demon captain Caprum. In a second Blue's system had identified the face. Blue pointed. "There is the commander. Demon Istir. He's arrived."

Sunflower looked through his scope. After a pause he said, "He definitely is the one in command."

A second later Dark's voice came in through the comms again. "What's the plan?"

"We wait until the demons are assembled," said Blue, his mind working with the deadly efficiency of an Inquisitor. "When they are, Dark will force the shielding systems to reboot, bringing down the energy barriers long enough for Sunflower and I to make it through. Once we are regrouped we will move to the top of the fortress so that we may look down upon them –"

"… To see them like the insects they are," interjected Dark, his voice heavy with malicious foreboding.

Blue stopped talking for a moment. After the pause he said, "Be quiet, Dark. As I was saying: We will gain the high ground so it is easier to spot Istir. When we have identified them… We will proceed to kill every single demon but him."

Dark laughed. "There are over a thousand demons within that fortress. We will be outnumbered on an incredible scale… I love this plan beyond measure."

Dark went radio silent, disappearing into the void.

"… 'And then there are those special few, who don't feel truly alive unless the odds are stacked against them'." Sunflower murmured to himself, quoting an old and long-dead adversary.

Blue looked to Sunflower and nodded. "We were trained for this."

"Dark and I were, August. You're here because the universe needs one final hero," corrected Sunflower.

"Some hero you turned out to be."

Blue looked around. Had someone spoken? That voice was not of Sunflower, and Dark had gone radio silent. But someone had definitely spoken to him over the helmet speakers. Either way that left one final option: He was finally crumbling into insanity. Blue sighed to himself. This had been expected. The old Blue had warned him of it. Inquisitors were made to kill without heart, so that the heartless had something to fear, but such immorality always came with a cost…

"They're moving inside," reported Sunflower, looking through his scope. "They're following Commander Istir. We're almost to stage two."

The masses of demons lingering about the Skyfort began to shift, like a quiet lake disturbed by a single pebble: Istir. The hordes moved as one, following their leader into the giant fortress silently. The lack of sound was absolute now, and it was worse than when there had been foul language and course laughter drowning the air. The very last demon to enter turned to the shield and tapped a quick sequence of patterns into the holographic terminal. A second later the air in a one-kilometer radius about the Skyfort rippled ever so slightly, denoting the fact that the particles had now been charged with the power to disintegrate any organic matter that passed by its invisible buttresses. The first installment of Blue's plan did not go all the way as indented though: The second the shield was active, at least a score of demon guards strolled outside to stand on the bridge. They stood there like pawns upon a chessboard, looking in all directions, alert and resilient. Demons were chaotic by nature, so the fear and respect that Istir must be capable of holding over the spawn of hell had to no doubt be sizeable. Then Blue saw it: A small figure as silent as a wraith, moving along the underside of the bridge, clinging to the rising pillars of stone. It was Dark, moving straight for the shield as if the demons on the bridge directly above were not an issue.

"I bet you an apple to an acorn that Dark sees those demons… And he couldn't care less," said Sunflower airily.

He was right. Dark saw the demons, but he had no intention of detouring. Slowly he leapt from clinging to the supporting pillars to the arching underside of the bridge. There were no handholds, so he punched himself some. Using sheer force he swung himself across the bottom of the massive structure spanning the two adjacent mesas. Finally he came to the end of one side of the bridge. Here he halted, his fists buried half a meter in the stone and iron as if it was soft Styrofoam. He waited and listened to the demons directly above him.

"Croad, why do we have to wait outside? The damn Istir is speaking! I heard he could charm the heart out of a female arch-demon… And then rip it out of her in the same move. He's the type of commander I'm going to be someday."

"Hah! You keep wishin' that, grunt," came the voice of another demon. "We ain't ever going to get out of this place like that unless you kill yourself at least a dozen Dimensional Travelers… And that ain't gonna happen cuz' the Dimensional Travelers are almost extinct now! Tough luck."

The demon Croad swore harshly, and then stomped away from his compatriots to stand at the edge of the bridge so that he could look down at the rotting expanses of the Broken Valleys. Little did he know that the only thing separating him from one of the most powerful being in the Multiverses was a couple meters of stone-and-iron flooring… And apparently that was not going to do much for him either. A second later Dark swung up deftly, flipping straight over Croad. As he passed over the demon's head, Dark snapped the grunt's neck with a prompt hand movement. Without even a gurgle the dead monster tumbled head-over-heels off the edge of the bridge. Dark melted into the shadows casted by the torch emplacements on the ridges of the bridge once more just as the bulk of the demons guarding the outside moved by him to group together.

"Where'd Croad go?" grumbled another demon.

"Who cares?" replied the first demon to laugh at Croad. "He's probably gone off to sulk. I tell you, though, he does have a point. I would give a barrel of grog to go inside to listen to Istir. Some say he was once the right-hand man of the Grand Devil himself. I could believe it. There is nothing scarier than Commander Istir."

"Wanna bet?"

The whole demon group turned to the new voice. It was very different. The tone was soft, but filled with more malice, hate, and loathing than even they had heard. It was as if death itself was talking, and they were demons; they knew death. The guards whirled to see one single being: Dark. Light flickered off of his ebony armor, giving it a blood-red glow. The eternal void shimmered in his visor, showing the demons that there was more to fear than they had ever known. Then Dark rushed them before the demons could even fumble with their weapons.

He hit them like the rushing winds of time, blowing them away as if they were all naught but grains of sand. With a single swing of his hatchet he decapitated five of them, sending their bodies flying across the bridge. Blood exploded from their bodies, staining the slabs of stone with messy splashes of crimson. The rest of the demons tried to run, but they were too late. Dark hurled his hatchet, bisecting the two farthest of his targets. He then grabbed two more and crushed their throats with his fists, hurling the corpses to knock another screaming from the bridge. Then he grabbed the closest living demon and hoisted him into the air. Before the horrified eyes of the surviving four demons, Dark tore the demon clean in two, ripping his spine free like a piece of string cheese. The blood gushed down upon Dark's head, but he welcomed it. The remaining demons didn't even fight. Silently they hurled themselves from the bridge, welcoming death.

Dark stood alone and listened. Silence. Not a single demon in the area was living, and no alarms had been raised. Silence. Like death. Dark needed this.

Slowly the shadowy Inquisitor picked up his hatchet from where it lay buried in the back of one of the demons and snapped it shut, strapping his weapon to his thigh. He then walked slowly and deliberately to the shield projector. Gauntlets stained in blood, he activated the holographic terminal. There was a passcode, but Dark typed in the Amethyst override. That was the one downside of using Doxia-made technology. There was always a secret override, only known by the Rerenhaw Council and the Inquisitors. Dark then proceeded to force a reboot to run security diagnostics. As the shield began a ten-second countdown Dark contacted Blue. "Shields going down in seven seconds. Stage two has begun. You have thirteen seconds."

Dark didn't even move as the shield shut down. He just stood there like a monument to all that was evil… Listening to the silence.

A kilometer away, Blue and Sunflower leapt down from the rubble of an ancient stone tower that they had been using as cover. They then leapt from the mesa that the ruin was perched upon and dashed toward the Skyfort, their eyes expertly fixed on the nigh-invisible shimmering of the shield. Then the shimmering stopped. Blue and Sunflower barreled past the border. Without breaking their stride, the two Inquisitors leapt high into the air in unison, easily rising a hundred meters into the air as they slammed into the side of the natural table that held the Skyfort. Their fists and feet dug into the sheer cliff-face, and they began to climb like the wind. In less than a minute they were at the top where they were joined by Dark.

"You should be called 'Red' now," commented Sunflower dryly as he looked over the red splotches that stained Dark's armor.

"That would only make sense two-thirds of the time though," replied Dark with the closest thing he could get to humor. It wasn't funny.

"We need to get to top of the Skyfort," said Blue briskly, his eyes scouring the heights of the ruined fortress. He paused. Something had moved in one of the many skeleton rooms that littered the gutted towers and decaying minarets. Blue didn't disregard the movement in the least.

"I saw something move up there," said Blue, pointing with the glimmering point of the all-powerful wrist blade. "We are going to avoid that area until we can confirm the location of Istir and have decided upon the best course of action."

"What do you mean by 'course of action'?" snarled Dark. "I thought you said 'kill them all.' That's what I intend to do, anyway."

"We might, we might not, depending," said Blue, his voice never once relinquishing the emotions locked deep within him. "Let's go."

The Inquisitors rushed the nearest wall of the Skyfort. With mighty leaps the trio latched onto the cobbled sides of one of the many crumbling bulwarks and began to climb as the very last ray of light from the setting sun sizzled into nothing and the true night enveloped the land. The three Inquisitors just kept on climbing, unhampered by the lack of light. Like creatures of the Black, the spirits of judgement rose higher and higher, until they reached one of the many minaret peaks. There they just hung, looking down upon a very worrying scene: Over a thousand demons, all armed to the teeth, gathered like grains of sand upon a beach. Torches lined the open-roofed interior of the Skyfort, illuminating the tawdry finery and decrepit weapons of the sea of monsters below. Not a single word was spoken down there. All was silent as each and every demon looked to Istir. He was speaking to them in a soft voice, hypnotizing them with honey and venom. Blue's systems altered him that they could hone in on the voice, but Blue declined the utility. He had no interest in the words of the demon. They meant nothing to him.

"They're all bunched together," breathed Sunflower. "And they are all heavily armed. I even see some charged projectile and laser weapons. There's a thousand of them too."

"Look," murmured Dark, his voice soft, almost meek. He was always the quietest and most soft-spoken before a massive, intensive battle. The literal embodiment of the calm before the storm. "Blue, look: the commander is standing upon a raised platform, and there are two exits behind him. We will need to prevent him from escaping through either of those ways."

There was a full minute of silence as Blue thought. Finally, he spoke. "Sunflower, do you have any portable bubble-shields? One of the hard-light ones, not one of the flesh-rending ones."

Sunflower tapped his utility belts. A small spiked disk with a greenish center popped out into his hand. "I do."

Blue nodded. "Hurl it at Istir's feet when I give the word. Dark, take out your rocket launcher. When I say 'go' I want you to shoot at everything. Set the missiles to 'explosive' mode. Destroy it all. Leave nothing standing. We will bring this whole fortress down on top of their heads, but Istir will be safe from the onslaught… Safe for us to interrogate."

Dimension: Skylock

Planet: Scorch

Specific Location: The Skyfort, Carrion

Time: Five days after Lyric and Summer ventured into the Southern Jungle.

"This was soooooooooooooooo bad of an idea. I mean, I cannot even begin to elaborate upon the terribleness of this idea. If there was an idea that was worse than this one, it would implode and bring the end of the Tri-Multiverse as we know it," hissed Batusi, looking through a large hole in the stone-slab floor; the only thing that separated their hiding spot high in the air and the open-roof hall below brimming with blood-thirsty demons. The Catalyst Corps had taken refuge in an old fire-gutted bedroom suspended like an empty and broken cage scores of meters in the air in an eviscerated tower attached to a bulwark. The tower itself was listing slightly, allowing a good top-down view of the going-ons below via multiple cannonball holes.

"Okay, Batusi, okay," grumbled Tenebris. "I get it. This was a bad idea. But hey: In my defense, it looked pretty abandoned when we got here."

"We should have vacated the place the moment that scouting party went through here," commented Anima, joining Batusi at the hole. "We should have known this was a rally."

"A rally?" snorted Xavier, who had not been listening to the conversation for the past half-hour and had immediately taken their words out of context. "Like for animal rights? Are they here to support the extinction of the mosquito? I heard that those poor, innocent little creatures are hunted and hated in Earth Prime… I even heard that they're killed for no purpose except for being a tad bit annoying! Poor critters!"

"Xavier, shut up," said Tenebris, joining Anima and Batusi. "Anima, you said this was a rally. What makes you think so?"

Anima nodded sagely and pointed to several locations that his keen eyes had spotted at a glance. "There's a platform with a demon at the front. I can't hear what he is saying, but notice how the demons below shift like a wave whenever there is a pause. The demon at the head is definitely the leader, a commander or something, and he is talking about something really important. See how he constantly pauses for effect? And see how the viewers are clinging to his every word? That demon is a really good speaker. He's starting to get them really riled up."

"You know what gets me really riled up?" interjected Xavier. "Marshmallows. The damn things are just so… Squishy. The Grand Devil couldn't have concocted a more diabolical vessel for evil."

Tenebris glared at Xavier. "Xavier. Shut up."

He turned back and said, "Right. Anima. We're running out of time here. What do you suggest-?"

"Everyone be quiet." It was Xavier again. But now his voice was tense.

In a second the rest of the Catalyst Corps was on the alert. Despite the fact that Xavier spouted tall tales and nonsense most of the time, whenever his voice went tense everyone went on high alert. Tenebris turned around slowly and looked to Xavier worriedly.

"What is it?"

Xavier put a finger to his lips and then cupped his other hand about an ear, indicating that they should listen. They did, and then they heard it: Demonic voices, coming their way up the old rickety staircase that wound about the tower like a disembodied spine.

"Why we got to make sure the damn place is secure? We know this place is!" That was one demon.

"We're going to be on high alert until the Watcher is sure that there were no survivors of that crash." That was two. There were two demons coming their way.

The first demon thought about what the second had said for a moment and then said: "Are they dead?"

"Hell no! Didn't you hear? Captain Caprum, Taskmaster Blord, and Taskmaster Nistor were found dead not far from here! I was there with a hunter party earlier. You shoulda' seen it: Caprum's head was crushed to bits. And poor demon Kahon… He had been torn apart. His guts were everywhere… In fact his intestines had been used to choke Targis to death! I tell ya, we're in trouble. Those were the survivors of the crash no doubt, and they are true warriors. The Watcher is going to need to bring in arch-demons when he hears of what happened to Caprum."

Batusi looked to Tenebris with a face twisted in horror. "Someone disemboweled a demon so he could choke his companion to death with his intestines? Who would do such a thing?!"

Tenebris's face was grim. Demons were their enemies, but a death like that was too terrible to comprehend. Whoever had done this was probably a greater threat than the demons outside. Tenebris immediately began to debate the validity of this last conclusion as the two demons stopped directly outside the termite-eaten door that housed him and his team. Nothing but a couple of centimeters off rotting wood separated them from being discovered. Xavier slowly stepped away from where he had been pressing his ear to the door and drew his shotguns, readying them. The two demons leaned against the door as they continued to talk.

"Damn," breathed the first demon to have spoken. "That's evil… And we're the epitome of evil! The survivors of the crash must have hearts blacker than the Grand Devil himself, and that's saying something."

"You can bet your flea-ridden hide on that, mate. Come on. Let's get this over with. Up to the peak we go."

The two demons pulled away from leaning on the door to walk away. The Catalyst Corps breathed a collective sigh of relief. Then the door swung open and the demons walked in.

"Let's just check in here just… In… Case…" The second demon to have talked initially slowly came to a halt and stared open-mouthed at the Catalyst Corps, huddled in the room. In a flash he reached for a revolver charged with demonic energy just as Xavier did the same with his shotgun. The demon drew his first. He pointed it at Xavier's face, who then slowly lowered his own weapons.

"Well, well, well... What do we have here?" The demon snarled, his face twisting in anger. He turned to the first demon. "Duton, go get the guards. I think we found the crash survivors."

Duton nodded. "Right Horth."

As Duton dashed downstairs, Horth stared at the Catalyst Corps with steely eyes. "I saw what you did to Kahon and Targis," he spat. "I remember. An' now I'm gonna do the same thing to you… You know what?"

Horth never finished his sentence, for his voice was suddenly drowned out by the sound of a massive explosion that tore through the entirety of the Skyfort. The very stones in the wall shuddered and cracked into splinters as a shockwave scattered a good section of the old relic of a fortress to the wind. The explosion was followed by another, then another, then another. Red and orange plumes of fire rose into the air to mingle with the screams and cries of dismayed demons. Horth stumbled backward, firing his revolver into the roof. That was the last thing he ever did. A second later Xavier pulled out his shotguns again and filled Horth's chest with the metallic spatter, sending the demon shooting through the rickety door. He tumbled past the safety-rail-less staircase and into the dark cool night air where he fell the sixty meters to his death. Another explosion shook the fortress. The tower that had acted as a refuge for the Catalyst Corps swayed… And then started to fall in on itself.

"What do we do now?!" shouted Batusi. "Not only is our cover blown, but we're about to fall straight into the claws of a sea of demons below!"

Tenebris paused a second too long, and so Xavier leapt in. He smiled wildly, his pointed hat askew. "Hasta la vista, babies."

He hurled himself through a newly-opened hole in the fast-crumbling tower wall, falling into the midst of the screaming demons below, his shotgun firing wildly.

Anima facepalmed. "Goddamnit Xavier!"

Author's Notes. Yes. "Goddamnit Xavier!" That needs to be a T-shirt. It really does. It needs to happen. Now to address an issue: The flashbacks. As I illustrated in the previous chapter, I had outlined that I had begun to prepare to release two sets of flashback mini-stories in "A Mending Soul." However, as xCrysis-x pointed out in his review, it would most probably end up adding unnecessary stress not only to myself, but also to the storyline segments not involved in mini-stories (namely the Catalyst Corps/Inquisitor arc and the Doxia/Rerenhaw arc). In addition to that these flashbacks could lead to extensive delays of other chapters. He's right. It would. At this time I have 10k words for "Into the Storm" and 25k words for "Shadowchess." That's a lot. Like, a lot a lot.

In all honesty, I don't have a clue as to what I'm going to do next. If you have any suggestions, then please do let me know in a review or a PM. You see, if I cut them, then my storyline is off balance, as the Summer/Lyric is already coming to a close, and I'm not sure what I must add to have it's storyline segment length match the lengths of the Catalyst Corps/Inquisitor arc and the Starlight/Harvest Snowfall arc. If I don't cut them, then I'll be spending waaaayyyyy too much time on these mini-stories. I could also just squish a bunch of the mini-story chapters I have into really, really long chapters (we're talking 10k to 15k word chapters) but that would take away from the quality of the feedback I get, among other things. Finally, I could also just take these mini-story flashbacks and just make them their own stories that run in tandem to "A Mending Soul", but that would lead back to the first issue with cutting these flashbacks that I described, and also it wouldn't get as much coverage, as they would only be associated with my main story.

Hmmmmmm... I'm going to have to think about this one for a long, long time. I don't know if I'll be able to post on my regular schedule for a bit. Please forgive me, but you guys know how this works. Eh, enough of this rambling. Right, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter! As always, I aim to please. If you enjoyed this chapter, don't forget to drop a review! Like I've said many times over, reviews are the lifeblood of a story! If you leave a review... Well, I'm not going to teleport you anything, but I will order you guys some invisible beats headphones (overpriced manifestations of pure marketing as they are). But hey, they do look nice!