Annabelle’s Bastion

From the upper branches, Anna could see the entire expanse of the deep lake, its calm waters betraying how dangerous it was. It could be anywhere beneath, waiting for her to appear.

“Good thing I don’t fear heights, huh?” Anna said, holding tightly onto the tree. “I told you this was a good tree.”

Towering above the landscape, their colossal trunks and vast canopies provided an ideal vantage point to observe the surroundings. Especially the one she found a few days ago! It was almost like her tree was artificially designed to serve as a watching point for the area.

Getting close to its top wasn’t too difficult, courtesy of her enhancements and connecting branches with the nearby trees at different heights.

“Now…” She scanned the surrounding trees once more, then sighed, shaking her head. “There really aren’t any, even up here.”

Whatever—whoever—used to live in the Titan Forest clearly knew the lake was dangerous; there weren’t any tree homes on any of the trees bordering the lake. She noticed it a few weeks ago, but now there wasn’t any doubt.

It was kind of depressing, actually.

Goblinfish must have once owned the lake with enough of them to make it dangerous for whatever race lived in the forest to reside around. Sadly, that was the past. Now, Anna could say some confidence that only one remained.

What could have possibly happened to the planet? There was still a chance the forest was just abandoned, but it seemed too expansive for that to be the case. A whole species… gone.

“It’s the same as me, isn’t it?” Anna said sadly. “We could be the only two lives left on the planet!”

But it was an unlikely conclusion. If there was one, there’d certainly be more. But even that small likelihood made the coming task all the more depressing. It felt like she was about to potentially kill an endangered species.

Yet her decision remained firm—she needed to test her ability, something she hadn’t had a chance to do since she awakened it. Well, she tried fish, but that didn’t work.

She still couldn’t see it in the lake, but it was definitely in there somewhere, waiting for something to catch its eye. Her prior observations told her it seemed to be completely still until it detected something to strike at. It was almost like a gargoyle, protecting the lake from intruders. But when it saw anything, it launched from that lake like a rocket.

They’d be perfect for a moat… if they could be trained.

“Well, here goes.”

Anna’s ring silently expanded over her forehead, her enhancements flowing through her body. She carefully descended the tree on the side opposite the lake, making as little noise as possible. Even one small misstep and it would find her within a second. It took a bit to reach the bottom, even with her enhancements.

Once her feet softly hit the ground, she fruitlessly checked again for movement in the otherwise still lake. She knew she wouldn’t be able to tell, but it was too terrifying!

She increased her enhancements, flooding her entire body with more strength. It was a reflexive thing now; will it to flow, and it would flow. That was something she mastered recently, no longer needing to activate it over a specific limb. She’d gotten to the point that it was a similar, if not better, effect than before.

“Seems… clear?” Anna nervously chuckled, shaking her head at her own words. “Not that it hasn’t been clear every other time.”

If the Goblinfish wanted to launch a sneak attack, it would go unnoticed. But Anna wasn’t foolish; the next step was to find a different spot from her previous ones. The Goblinfish could be lying in wait near her old locations.

Anna ran around the lake, scanning for a new, safer approach. She never approached from the same location twice and was methodical in remembering from where she had already emerged.

Once she found a good spot, she even ventured a bit farther—there was no such thing as being too careful!

It should—it would be the last time, too. She resolved to fight it for the lake if her plan for testing failed.

With a nervous swallow, she tightened her grip on the bottle and dashed towards the lake, ready to fill it as quickly as possible.

As she reached the water’s edge, Anna plunged the bottle into the lake in the same fashion she did whenever it was filling time. Everything precise and practiced.

Simultaneously, she pulled the poisoned fish from her storage right as she launched her other hand, deep and powerful enough to appear as though she was grabbing something directly from the lake.

It worked well, considering there were plenty of fish in the lake.

Her heart pounded, and her sweat poured, but her actions were smooth.

Those next ten seconds were easily the worst, longest of her life.

But she heard it, an almost unnoticeable sound. A deep, stuttering growl. If the place wasn’t so deathly quiet and she wasn’t carefully paying attention, she wouldn’t have even heard it.

She immediately whipped her hands out of the water and launched backward, her enhancements at maximum capacity to propel herself with maximum force.

Simultaneously, the Goblinfish emerged from the water like shooting from a geyser, its body aimed right where she stood. Before it even reached the peak of its launch, a sharp impact hit the ground where Anna just was. That was always its first move—it tried to impale her with some rocky spear!

In just a few seconds, it emerged from the water and launched a deadly-to-most attack!

But she came too far to make a mistake. With careful, well-practiced movement, she made it appear as though she stumbled while retreating, and the fish fell from her hand.

Anna glanced sadly at the fish, but in that same second, the Goblinfish was ready to land with its horrifyingly sharp claws.

“Damn it!” she shouted, fleeing into the trees to the sound of the Goblinfish’s snarls and quick, wet steps in hot pursuit.

Luckily, she didn’t have to run far; the Goblinfish would not enter the forest. She went a bit deeper, keeping her enhancements up as she went around as quickly as possible. There was another tree she had marked, and she scurried up to its highest branches.

“Damn, scary!” She shouted between deep breaths, holding onto the tree and carefully watching the Goblinfish through the small opening between the branches.

It was an almost perfect repeat of every other time she entered the lake—even the fish; she had attempted multiple times before to catch one. Those attempts… weren’t always purposeful, but they helped make it real.

The Goblinfish was still there.

It stayed outside the lake for a few minutes, walking around the vicinity like a guard. It saw the fish—it even looked at it. But it seemed to care more about making sure the area was clear.

“Does it usually take this long to go back?” Anna whispered, her heart betraying her anxiety.

A few tense minutes passed before the Goblinfish finally turned its attention back to the fish. Anna’s chest tightened, afraid it might not take it. Each step made her more nervous. There was always a chance it wasn’t that stupid.

What if it failed? Would she actually be able to fight such an animalistic creature? No rhyme or reason behind it, just slashing claws and piercing bites aimed anywhere it could land.

“Come on, come on…” she repeated, her fist tightening against the tree.

The Goblinfish finally moved, giving the fish a single, sharp poke into its eye. Its finger pierced the fish, but Anna hadn’t put any in its head since she observed it didn’t usually eat that part.

“Come on… co— what?”

It grabbed the fish below its head and held it into the air like it won a trophy by stealing it from her! Its growl was audible from her perch as it pumped its arm up and down.

“What the hell?”

Anna expected it to poke it once, then maul it!

She chuckled, the sight seeming like a child playing with a toy. Was it doing that just in case she could see it?

“It’s kind of cute.”

Finally, without further bravado, the Goblinfish shoved half the fish into its mouth and ripped it apart like a tough steak. It didn’t even chew as it swallowed the thing. Of course, it was familiar—its usual meal.

“Yes!” she shouted.

Before turning back toward the river, it looked where Anna ran off with what she swore was a look of victory.

Or maybe she was that lonely.

It wasn’t even a few seconds later that the Goblinfish reacted to the poison.

Anna didn’t expect it to eat half the fish in one go, but that pretty much made him consume at least three berries worth of the poison.

First, he froze perfectly still, with his dark green eyes staring almost vacantly toward the forest. It didn’t scream, didn’t stumble, and didn’t try to run—it just froze like a statue without even a twitch in its muscles.

Seeing that made Anna’s heart tighter, but she carefully descended the tree.

“The poor thing.”

Despite how hideous it is, with its big, fish-like head, shark-like tail, and jagged teeth, Anna couldn’t help but look at it fondly.

She gave it another minute before descending the tree.

Thankfully, it didn’t appear to be dead. Its slightly enlarged stomach went up and down slowly and with difficulty, but his eyes followed her as she entered.

One of its four fingers, with its half-inch long claws, twitched at her presence.

Did it know it had been tricked? Was it capable of those kinds of realizations? It had definitely eaten the berries before; she tested it by throwing a few at the lake and watching it avoid them last week.

Anna stopped directly before it; if it wasn’t paralyzed, it could easily kill her. Just one pierce from those claws—one bite from those jagged teeth.

“I’m sorry, buddy,” Anna said softly. She almost patted its head but resisted the urge. Seeing it now, it was just a shocked creature at her mercy. “I’ve… known about my Apex Sigil for a while now but haven’t had the opportunity to test it. If you didn’t show up, I may have never made any progress.” She shook her head and sighed. “Who knows? Maybe this will allow me to better understand you and your people.”

The Apex Sigil, an ability engraved onto her very being, and something Anna started feeling the presence of the moment she awoke after Eclipse knocked her out. She knew how to use it and had a basic understanding of how it worked, but she had no subjects to experiment with.

To activate the Apex Sigil was as easy as breathing; it was part of her, like a limb.

A low, brief growl escaped from the Goblinfish’s mouth as if responding to Anna’s laments.

“Sorry,” Anna said as she anxiously activated her long-awaited ability for the first time.

A deep, resonant hum filled her ears as mana surges flooded her body, starting from the depths of her bones and expanding outward in a single, powerful wave. Her muscles felt momentarily weak, accompanied by a soft, indistinct whispering sound.

Then, it felt like her entire body had disappeared—she had become formless, surrounded by an eerie silence.

The surroundings became a black void, the only source of light being the bright, ethereal azure glow from the Goblinfish’s direction. It flickered and flowed like a barely lit flame. Weak but grabable.

She wanted to stay and stare at it, but an urge hit her, one overwhelming. She needed that target—something to hold onto. It felt like she was a soul existing outside a body, and she needed to find one.

With the Goblinfish’s azure light as her destination, Anna’s vision went dark for a few seconds.

The next moment, her vision lightened. Her view of the world decreased to around 3 and a half feet, became slightly fuzzy, and she felt a host of different sensations. Her skin felt like it needed to be put in water; she craved the feeling of submersion.

However, she… couldn’t move.

“Oh my god,”  Her own voice echoed in her head.