Threads of the Soul

Chapter 492 - 492: Slow and Steady, does not always win

The three men sat within their thrones at tips of the triangle, meditating deeply on the philasophical questions of life that had plagued humanity as a whole for their entire existence.It was not easy, cementing your place in the universe, but after everything they had been through it was starting to take shape.

Slowly but surely, they were absorbing the souls from around them. Every second a soul would disappear from the crowd and be absorbed into the cube, which would turn them into a stream of energy that it then fed into the three men.

But that was the issue. Even if one per second felt like good progress, in the face of quadrillions of souls it was barely anything.

To put it into perspective, if they continued like this for 10,000 years, then they would only still have made it into the billions. It would take close to 100,000 years - One Hundred Thousand! - to reach the trillions. 3.51 Trillion, to be exact.

As a member of a species that only lived to 100 years, or 120 if they were lucky, Seth and his other selves were unfortunately just a few years shy of such a timeline being possible. But even if they could live that long, it wasn't as if they had the time to sit around and live it out like this.

Yet that was all they could do.

As time went on, their pace picked up and started to snowball. One soul per second became two, then five and then ten. The thing holding them back at the moment was strangely one of their own.

Scar squirmed in his chair, fighting demons within his head as he struggled to answer the question that he had been wondering since the day he was 'born' from Seth. Who was he supposed to be, if his place had been taken by another?

His face scrunched up, the superficial scars shown on his face began to peel themselves open and ooze blood, before he suddenly disappeared from the room.

Even if he wasn't present, the box still kept the tether of soul energy connected to him. After all, they weren't physically present here in the first place. It was one with them now, and this was not something that they could escape from.

***

"Captain, are you okay? The crew is wondering what happened with you..."

Cynthia gently wrapped on the door of the captains quarters and waited for a response. Her slime body was formed so that she was wearing what she called a 'traditional' pirate outfit, with the wide hat and a sleeveless coat that hung down to her knees.

It was only traditional in the movies, but that didn't bother Cynthia. She even had an eye patch on, which was fine because she didn't actually need eyes to see. She didn't actually have any, she just made it look like she did.

In the same way that she had formed her clothing, she had also made it stand out by turning the slime clothing black. Changing colour was always something she had been able to do, she just never did. When she was weaker it was too difficult and when she was stronger, it served no purpose other than this. She could have replicated her old body, but she kinda liked being blue now.

Behind her, the crew had gathered and were waiting not so patiently for an answer. Over the course of their adventures on the high seas, Scar and his Merry band aboard the Queen Anne's Redemption had picked up a few strays.

Some people they saved didn't want to be thrown back to the cruel world, and others had heard of his crew through fast spreading rumours and had sought them out to join.

In total, they had gained fifteen new crew members, all of whom had been fashioned appropriate piraty clothing from whatever means they could find, and all of them swore complete loyalty to their captain.

So when he had collapsed in pain in the middle of a fight against a pod of highly intelligent Dolphins that climbed aboard, they all became seriously worried.

Cynthia glanced nervously at the crew, before dissolving her body and sliding underneath the crack in the door. It was better not to open the door, just in case.

When she reformed on the other side, she found Captain Scar facing away from her. His head bowed as he leaned against the wall, letting her see herself in the mirror he had just been staring into.

"Captain... is everything alright? Listen, if there is anything going on, you know you can talk to me Silver, I'm always going to-"

"Don't... Don't call me that. " Scar quickly interrupted, his voice dripping with anger yet having a slight quiver to it.

Cynthia moved closer and gently placed a hand on his shoulder.

"O-okay...I won't... But you have to help me understand. Everyone is...they're worried about you."

Scar began to laugh at her words, a cold and heartless laugh that was completely devoid of any joy.

"Worried... about me?" He muttered between his laughter, slowly turning to face Cynthia.

"They don't even know me... Who the hell am I Cynthia? WHO AM I?!"

Cynthia recoiled in horror at the sight of Scar's face, as it could barely be called such a thing. Wicked and horrific wounds covered nearly every inch of his face and his mouth was twisted into a permanent snarl as it looked like he had tried to carve it up from the inside out.

The only familiar part of his face that remained was his bright silver eyes against the blackness of his sclera. Yet all she could see in those eyes was pain and confusion.

Scar dropped to his knees, running his hands through his hair before bringing them down over his face in shame, muttering softly and endlessly that 'The flesh never forgets'. Cynthia stared at him for a few moments, before slowly moving over to him and wrapping her arms around his body a few times as she pulled him into a warm and squishy hug. Like he was hugging a marshmallow.

"You are my friend. No matter what happens to you, or who you think you are. I always know that inside, you are my friend. My Captain. That is all that matters to me."

Scar's muttering slowly shifted to a gentle and silent weeping, as deep in his soul in the room with his other selves, a million faces disappeared from the crowd in a single moment.