The wave of magic that swept over Serenity filled him with far too many sensations. The first was that he was surrounded by food, but far too much of it and it was all mushed together to make an unappetizing mess. It was cloyingly sweet, eye-wateringly sour, overwhelmingly bitter, burnt, and incredibly salty, all at the same time. All in all, it was the most unpleasant thing Serenity could ever remember tasting.

The terrible taste was immediately followed by a wash of heat, cold, and pressure, all at the same time. That didn’t count the blindingly bright darkness or the ear-shattering silence; Serenity knew his senses were lying to him.

The only thing that was consistent was that he always smelled/tasted/felt a demon. It wasn’t a minor demon, either. At first, he thought it was the demon who destroyed the mana crystal; it smelled like an Obsession Demon and Serenity could believe that the demon who kept complaining about having its darkness taken away was obsessed with darkness.

The more he smelled it, however, the less he thought that was where the smell came from. The darkness-obsessed demon had seemed incomplete in a way this demon smell didn’t. More than that, the mana that accompanied the smell tasted different from the demon he’d fought. There was a hint of darkness about it, but it wasn’t physical darkness; it was more the darkness of secrets hidden and plots within plots.

Serenity vastly preferred physical darkness.

All he could think was that the mana crystal had been either created or refilled by a demon of secrets. They might not be the demon’s obsession, he couldn’t tell that, but they were definitely the method the demon preferred.

Along with the darkness was a hint of fire. It wasn’t quite the same as the Night Fire, but it was similar enough to worry Serenity. If you took the Night Fire and hid it for a very long time, shifting the Affinities just a little, it might taste like what he tasted now. That implied that the demon who destroyed the mana crystal was somehow associated with either the god of the Night Fire or perhaps a demon that used the god’s power.

All Serenity could do for the moment was sit and think; the only other option was panic and panic generally didn’t help. If he could have run, he would have, but he couldn’t even tell he was there anymore. There was a good chance he wasn’t, at least not physically. Without a shield or something else to take the explosion for him, the only thing protecting him was his body, Resistances, and any Skills that specifically applied. The only thing that told him he wasn’t gone was that he was still thinking and feeling, even if his senses were all messed up.

Serenity’s first guess was that he was a ghost. Well, technically he was more likely to be a phantasm, but the technicalities weren’t important; that was still a ghost as far as English was concerned. It would explain why he was still “alive” despite an explosion that ought to have destroyed his body in a sleet of mana: he wasn’t. It would also explain why he couldn’t feel anything and probably why all of his senses were messed up.

He’d never been incorporeal before. Both Vengeance and the Final Reaper had always had a body. Returning to life would be a real pain; while every method Serenity knew required restoring a body, they all assumed he had hands. He’d never tried to work without them. Working using a telekinesis spell sounded like a pain in the ass.

On second thought, that wasn’t entirely true. His Sovereign of Potential form wasn’t corporeal. It wasn’t undead, either. So perhaps he wasn’t a phantasm?

Maybe even if he was a phantasm for the moment he could shift back to one of his normal forms? It was worth a try.

Serenity couldn’t tell if the intense mana he tasted/smelled/saw/felt was really there or if he was more sensitive to it than normal because of whatever happened in the mana explosion. He tried to reach out for A’Atla’s screens to see what it said, but they didn’t come to him.

There were several possible reasons for that. Maybe A’Atla couldn’t recognize him. That wasn’t hopeful. It was equally possible that the mana was scrambling everything or that it had wiped out A’Atla’s ability to sense or project anything to this area.

Yeah, he was going with one of those last two. They were better options and they really were likely.

Serenity reached out to Aide but didn’t hear anything back. That was another point towards something having happened to his body; Aide could override Serenity’s senses, at least to an extent. Even if his senses were haywire, Aide ought to be able to get through. For that matter, Aide ought to have tried to do something about Serneity’s messed-up senses if he could. The fact that he hadn’t meant Aide couldn’t.

Calling up his Status worked. Serenity glanced at the first few lines.

Name: Serenity

Species: Chimera

Base Form: Essence Dragon (Wyrmling)

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Core: Unique

Progression: 88%

Tier: 8

Features: 6/11

True

Crystal

Link

Death

Origin

Holy (Dungeons)

Path: Dungeon Deity

Level: 100

Tier: 5

There was nothing new there. He hadn’t expected anything, but it was still a bit of a relief. At least the Voice hadn’t recognized a species change yet. Admittedly, that could be delayed, but if Serenity could recognize that something was odd, so could the Voice. This gave him hope that nothing had changed.

As long as he was checking with people, there was one more person he really should check with. She probably couldn’t fix anything or even tell him what was going on, but it would still be good to hear her mindvoice. He really hoped she answered. :Rissa?:

:Serenity! Oh thank goodness, you’re alive.: Unlike the last time, this time Rissa sounded relieved. :How badly are you hurt? Blaze says he can’t get to you but he’s really worried. He’s refused to leave the closest spot he can get to. He’s still healing people after the earthquake but we have to bring them to him.:

That was … wait, earthquake? They were on an island that wasn’t connected to anything! :From the explosion?:

:Was that what happened?: Rissa didn’t let Serenity say more when she continued. :The whole island shook; a lot of the people that were exploring in old buildings had stuff fall on them. Fortunately, the worst damage was to the big excavation and everyone had already evacuated there because of the lightning. It’s not that far from the new spire. The harbors were beat up a bit by some waves, but by the time it reached the ships it was just a swell. There aren’t even any tsunami warnings. I’ve been listening to everyone talk about it and it sounds like there are some people pretty confused about that. Samantha’s muttering about A’Atla having a damping system and…:

Yeah, Rissa was definitely worried. The more he listened, however, the more worried Serenity got. He didn’t think it had taken all that long from when the demon crushed the mana crystal to when he reached out to Rissa. He’d have guessed it at five or maybe ten minutes, depending on how long he spent confused by the sensory inputs. There was no way everything Rissa was talking about could have happened in five or ten minutes. :How long was I out?:

Rissa said a couple more words then stopped as Serenity’s question registered. There was a brief quiet, then she admitted how long it had been. :More than four hours. That’s why Blaze has refused to leave; he said that he wasn’t about to abandon you when you might stagger out of the mana storm at any moment.:

Mana storm? No wonder his senses were all messed up; they were trying to give him information on something that didn’t follow the rules of the physical world. Maybe he was actually fine and just suffering from the mana storm.

Serenity couldn’t make himself actually believe that. It was wishful thinking and didn’t explain why he couldn’t reach Aide.

Serenity decided he couldn’t just wait here. He’d prefer to walk out of here, but if he was in the middle of a mana storm, that might not be possible. Could he even move, though?

:So what happened?: Rissa’s question led to a long discussion where Serenity told her about his entire day from when the sphere was finished up to the current moment. While he talked, he tried to see if he could move around the way he did in his Sovereign form, but that attempt fell apart when he realized he couldn’t tell if he was moving or not.

Rissa was happy with his choice of “Demonic Dungeon Lord.” If anything, she was happier than he was. While she hadn’t seen Lex’s grandfather the way Serenity had, she seemed happy with the idea that he’d be taking on some characteristics of his heritage. Serenity wasn’t certain if it was specifically the heritage or if it was the fact that the form lost the “wrath” designator. She concentrated on the heritage, while Serenity was far happier about the lack of the word wrath.

Before they could get into the long discussion about how people from Earth actually could handle the dungeon, at least most of its floors, Serenity decided he needed to try something. He needed to figure out how to get out of the mana storm.

:I’m going to try to shift,: Serenity informed Rissa. :I don’t want to wait any longer; this is really unpleasant and I don’t think I’m actually getting anywhere when I try to move.:

:Can’t you just wait for it to end?: Rissa didn’t sound at all confident.

:You said it’s been over four hours. Is it any smaller?: Serenity should have asked that earlier, but he was afraid he knew the answer. Mana storms were rare, but when they happened they could take weeks to die down. In a nexus, it could be even longer. Serenity didn’t want to think about what that meant for Earth’s ley line network.

Come to think of it, he hadn’t heard from Gaia yet, had he? He could vaguely feel her presence, so A’Atla wasn’t cut off again, but she hadn’t said anything.

:No,: Rissa admitted. :It’s not growing any bigger, but it’s not any smaller as far as we can tell. It’s hard to tell exactly where the edge is; we’re staying entirely out of the affected areas unless we’re checking on it. Blaze doesn’t like it when anyone goes into the mana storm.:

Serenity chuckled. Well, he tried to chuckle; it wasn’t really the same when he couldn’t feel his throat or hear the sound. :He’s the one that told you what it is, isn’t he?:

Rissa sent a long, wordless sigh. :Fine, try. While you’re in the storm, I can’t See anything about you so I can’t give you any advice you don’t already know.:

That was a surprise. Serenity knew that mana storms played havoc with spellforms and even many Skills but he’d never realized they’d block something like Rissa’s foresight. They were rare enough that he’d never seen the need to do anything other than avoid them.

:That’s why you’re worried,: Serenity realized. :You couldn’t tell what was happening to me or even if I’d come out of this.:

There was a long pause before Rissa sent a grudging :Yes:.