Erick smiled as he watched Quilatalap wear nothing but an apron as he cooked pancakes in the kitchen. The last several hours had been filled with talk, and activities, and all sorts of quiet words shared on pillows, and now they were here.
It felt like home again, even though this home was in a different part of the world, where neither of them could come or go freely, and nothing was the same—
The air flickered gold near the living room.
Erick’s Staff of Divine Absolution popped out of the air, to float exactly where it shouldn’t float.
Ophiel squeaked at the intrusion, saying, “The staff! The staff!”
Erick gestured to the staff, saying, “That’s what I was talking about. It moved with me. It almost greeted me at the door of my house in the Glittering Depths, but I left it behind. And then it was at the cloudcastle, and now it’s here.”
Quilatalap narrowed his eyes at the staff for a long moment, staring at it from several meters away. And then he relaxed, and went back to flipping pancakes, saying, “That’s a divine artifact that is locked to you, Erick. It was half-alive in the memory of the Glittering Depths, and then it became fully alive— Well. Not really ‘alive’ in the classical sense. Sentient, not sapient. Like a very young [Familiar].”
Erick sighed. “Okay. Well… We gotta talk about the memories in the dark again, Quilatalap.”
“It’s something I have tried to keep to a minimum, because that distracts from the learning possibilities of dungeons. People need to learn and grow, not ‘suddenly remember’ stuff that never happened to them.”
“So you don’t think those memories are real?”
“… The memories are real when they are viewed, but when a person recognizes themselves in the past, they seamlessly take in a part of them that is not-them and they grow and change because of that addition. This is something that exists outside of one’s control. The actual mechanism by which this realization is achieved is something like a [Soul Splice], but in a less horrific, souls-fighting-souls-for-dominance sort of way, and more of a ‘waking up’ sort of way.”
“… It seems like you’re fighting the obvious answer that it’s a [Reincarnation] of a more traditional sort; of realizing the memories of a past life.”
Quilatalap sighed a little, and then said, “Yup.”
“… Why?”
“Because you don’t want to talk about being Xoat, and about how in the old stories of the Old Cosmology it was often thought that perhaps Xoat came back now and then to help people in times of great need.” Quilatalap set the done pancakes to the side, and ladled more batter into the pan. “Are you willing to talk about that, now?”
Erick controlled his instinctual response to rebel. He tried a chuckle instead, and to gesture at the floating staff in the living room, as he said, “Hard to argue against that, I suppose—” He rapidly added, “I will argue against being Xoat, though.”
“Why? What’s so bad about it?”
“Because then none of my achievements will have meant anything; it will all have been because of Fate shit.”
Perhaps Erick had said that too strongly.
But Quilatalap rolled with it, saying, “Fate only sets the path; it does not walk that path for you. I am absolutely sure that for every individual great story that could possibly be attributed to Xoat, like this one in the Glittering Depths, that Xoat has also lived thousands of lives in complete obscurity.”
“I’d much prefer if ‘Xoat’ was just an idea and that people got their lives’ works misattributed to him or other godly powers all the time. I do not like the idea that the achievements of mortals are only possible through the interventions of gods or otherwise.”
“Gods are themselves the works of aggregate mortal achievements that eventually gain a spark of sapience and grow to full power, outside of their worshipers. This power then extends itself back to those worshipers in return, beginning a true positive feedback cycle based on those initial parameters.” Quilatalap said, “Gods are just powers of the masses manifest in holy confluence.” And then he asked, “Do you want eggs and bacon, too?”
“Eggs yes, bacon… yes.” Erick took a moment to think about the rest of Quilatalap’s words. “… And what about people misattributing things to this Xoat persona?”
Quilatalap didn’t speak for a moment. And then he went and got some eggs from the bottom shelf of cold storage while Erick watched…
The big green bastard was trying to distract him, wasn’t he.
Well it was working, Erick supposed, as he enjoyed the show.
And then Quilatalap was back to cooking, cracking eggs in bowls. He began, “It’s sort of like the Wizard conundrum. We know that Wizards are people who produce a lot more extra mana than others. This is due to them having more Dark in them than most. But outside of that fact…
“People produce mana based on various factors. Almost all of those factors lean in one direction or another. The first factor is how much of an effect that person has on society. The second factor is how much knowledge of self, of magic, and of power, that person has, outside of any outside influences. The second is an easy one to increase; go to school, play around with mana, etcetera. The first is much harder to increase, because, for example, you can only ever have one head chancellor of an arcanaeum, or one king of a nation, or one owner of a business. If that power is split, then so too is the mana generation that comes with that position of power.
“But that second situation is thrown into chaos when you get someone who has an oversized effect on society that doesn’t rely on known power structures.
“The person who invented the mana miner.
“The person who writes a really good book.
“The person who changes how banking works in a world.
“The person who invents a new magic.
“All of those people have larger-than-average mana productions. This can be a self-reinforcing system, like with the creation of a god, but different. This can be a self-reinforcing system that creates a Wizard.
“Wizards are Creation and Paradox and Destruction all at once, until they choose to focus. But maybe Wizards are just normal people, who have been changed by circumstance and possibility, into being more than they were before.
“Perhaps all Wizards become Wizards based on future actions, which are only possible because they’re already a Wizard to start with. Which is a Paradox, for sure. It’s very hard to tell where the line actually starts with a Wizard, for they are self-creating systems of power unto themselves.
“And once you get into that sort of thing…
“Mana likes mana. It likes to be made. It likes to be used. And it never goes away. It only changes form. It goes from one universe to another, planting seeds of future growth and opportunity and possibility. For mana is possibility, first and foremost. Mana is the infinite quantized into a smaller infinity that shows itself as Fire or Water or Twosday, or Springtime, or Benevolence, or Book, or me, or you, or whoever, but only because it is impossible for us to view the whole at any one time.
“So it is very possible that Xoat-sightings are misattributions only because the people who are Xoat only become Xoat in the creation of themselves, in that image of infinite generation of possibility. For what is the image of Xoat, but as ‘the enabler of More’? Not much more than that, really. This does not mean that you are Xoat, Erick. Not exactly, for it is more complicated than that. But you’re also not, not Xoat, either.”
Erick sat back in his chair, and thought.
And then he decided he didn’t want to think about that right now, because what was the point? He didn’t think he was Xoat, and that’s all that really mattered to him. Other people could think what they wanted.
And then Quilatalap added, “I would like to know why you have a problem with accepting that you are not just your own power, though. Why do you think it is some sort of weakness to have been aided by the realized spirit of Xoat, or however it happened? You have a history of helping others and accepting help in return. If you accept that the mana is Xoat, then what does it matter that Xoat wants to help you? What’s wrong with accepting that the mana itself loves you, and wants to help you along in your quest for more goodness?”
After hearing that viewpoint, Erick knew he would have needed to lie down for a while if he wasn’t already sitting.
As it was, Erick wasn’t able to form a coherent counterargument against Quilatalap. All he could really do was marvel at how much thought Quilatalap had been putting into all those words he had just spilled out here in their living room, while both of them were nude and one of them was making breakfast, and Ophiel played with some building blocks in the living room, which mostly consisted of building small towers and then knocking them over and hopping on top of the destruction, and then remaking the small towers all over again… Erick was distracting himself again.
“… Okay. Well...” Erick said, after a minute of quiet, filled with the small sounds of sizzling bacon and frying eggs and tumbling blocks. “When you put it like that, I suppose I don’t have a problem with it. I just don’t want to be labeled as some savior figure. I was only able to do everything I did because of a modicum of personal power, and a whole lot of cooperation from everyone else… Including the mana.” Erick said, “Thank you, Quilatalap… I missed you. I missed you a lot.”
Quilatalap smiled brightly, his lower fangs showing as his dark eyes glinted. “I missed you, too.” He set bacon onto plates, along with eggs and stacks of pancakes—
And then he got a large pie out of a cupboard and broke the Preservation seal on it, adding the scent of freshly baked purpleberry pie to the air. Ophiel started chirping instantly as the smell filled the room, and then Ophiel hopped up off the ground with the blocks, to hop onto the back of the nearby couch.
His many eyes focused on that pie. “PIE!” Ophiel chirped loudly. “Purple pie!”
Quilatalap said, “I was just waiting for you to show. It’s all yours, Ophiel.”
Quilatalap managed to set the pie onto the far side of the dining room table right before Ophiel dug in, getting just as much purple pie goo all over his feathers as he got everywhere else.
And then Quilatalap brought Erick his plate and set it in front of him and Erick put his hand on Quilatalap’s, and stood up, meeting the big guy halfway for a kiss. He was warm, and he smelled of good food, and he was an excellent kisser.
“I love you, Quilatalap,” Erick said closely. “And Ophiel does, too.”
Quilatalap almost giggled, as he said, “I love you, too.” He set down his plate and happily said, “So what’s going on with those mana crystals! Tell me everything again, from the top. How was it all different from what we already did with mana crystals?”
Erick smiled, and began talking. “For starters, I could actually make a crystal inside the Glittering Depths without all the Domain work that we needed to do on Veird, so that’s a big deal. I think if I dropped down the mana density of the air to 0, to start, I could even make pure crystal, but I haven’t bothered with that in that dungeon because being in a 0 mana environment is not pleasant. But anyway, What you do is you go inside a mana chamber and spill mana into them, whereupon they…”
Breakfast was great. Erick and Quilatalap spoke of crystals, and that was also great.
Being home with Quilatalap was the best of all.
- - - -
Erick stood with Quilatalap upon an open land of bare rock and scattered grasses that extended out for a hundred kilometers in every direction. There was no sky; there was only darkness far, far overhead, that was also somehow light, illuminating the ground everywhere. In six directions, equidistant from each other and on the black horizon, lay colored light. White on one side, grey on the opposite, while the horizons between grey and white held magenta and red to the left, with yellow and cyan to the right; the Six Primary Elements. This land was to become the main floor where the False Society would exist, while those lights were to become the portals to the other elemental dungeons.
It was not the main floor yet.
Erick was still impressed. “This is a heck of a lot of space so far, Quilatalap.”
Quilatalap smiled softly. “It’s not impressive at all, but thank you.”
“It’s only been twenty days since you started. This is plenty impressive!”
“Vanya and I managed to get the monster habitats stabilized and square out the space for the rest of it, but there’ve been complications.”
Erick almost wanted to ask after ‘Vanya’, the dungeon master slime who had become Quilatalap’s copy, who was the actual dungeon master of this place. But just like all the other dungeon master slimes Quilatalap had made, and who all shied away from Erick practically on instinct, Erick did not pursue that line of questioning.
Instead, all he said was, “How can I help?”
“I need you to talk to Everbless and convince him to stop trying to break into the dungeon.”
Erick winced. “Okay. I’ll do that. How bad is it?”
“He regularly gets into the first floor because he has to ‘escort the dangerous monsters down’, according to him, which was tolerable but not ideal, and very much not what he is supposed to be doing, since he’s supposed to be zero-contact with the dungeon right now.” Quilatalap said, “Not ideal, but not what he was told to do. I could deal. But in the past two days he’s been trying to get to the control chamber, to the core.”
Erick frowned. “I’ll talk to him.”
“Tell him that he will be forcefully evicted if he should try anything like that again.”
“I will.”
Quilatalap said, “I’d also like your cooperation to open portals between other nearby dungeons, so that when it comes time to weather the storm people can come in from other dungeons instead of needing to come to Storm’s Edge first. That’s only if the Gate Network goes down, of course, but a secondary way for people to get here is always a good idea.”
“Okay, sure.” Erick thought for a moment. “So that’s how you want to do it, eh? Purposefully open up this place to other dungeon incursions? What do you want, exactly?”
“Just let the nearby nations with dungeons know that I can open safe spaces for them, and leave them with options to connect in an emergency. It’s minimally invasive and easily possible.”
“You know… I never really knew that was a thing that you could do. We barely talked about it when Kiri went through from the Freelands to Grand Benevolence, but the Glittering Depths apparently has people coming in through the golden fields all the time.”
“Dungeon hopping is rare. Doesn’t normally happen at all… Or at least in my dungeons it doesn’t. There’s not even an accepted name for the phenomenon, though the fairies would call it ‘stepping off the path’, I believe.” Quilatalap said, “And Kiri only transposed between dungeons 3 months ago. I’ve been pressed to figure out exactly what happened there, but I only really have a guess, because that sort of movement through the Dark is not normal at all.”
“I guess it has only been 3 months.” Erick asked, “What did you find out about dungeon hopping? How easy is it for people to move between dungeons?”
Quilatalap began, “People don’t move through the Dark because the Dark is death for all living things.
“But since the advent of the dungeons, with all these places now settled and realized in these depths...
“In a very large, relaxed dungeon, it is easier for people to transport between them, especially if there are many, many safe spots inside those dungeons, like with the Freelands and their open lands, and with the Glittering Depths’s golden fields.” Quilatalap said, “None of my dungeons have any safe spots except for the entrance and a few other locations, so by their nature, they’re rather secure. It was weird for me when Kiri popped into Grand Benevolence, but that was more due to the Dark acting on its own, and not due to any leaks in security on my end.” Quilatalap said, “I’m rather sure I can make those inner portals happen on purpose, though… At least for nearby locations, like dungeons on the other islands of Archipelago Nergal.” He gazed out across the empty world. “It might even happen without my input, because a lot of this land will be open, safe space. I doubt I could turn this place into a hub of inter-dungeon transport like the Gate District, for that would be only at the Dark’s pleasure… But I imagine that if the Storm Prophecy should come to pass that places like this one might get flooded with people from other dungeons… Lotta weird things could happen when that happens.” Quilatalap pointed to the side. “Like that.”
Both of them were already looking at the golden staff that suddenly appeared, floating to the side, as though it was there this whole time. Erick had left it at the cottage, but here it was…
Floating.
“Hmmm, yeah,” Erick muttered.
Ophiel fluffed up on Erick’s shoulder, exclaiming, “The staff is back!”
It floated there, just glittering.
And then a few green buds rose from the ground where it almost touched.
Quilatalap easily said, “And that brings up another question. I could try for a portal between here and the Glittering Depths? You could come and go from here to there as you want?”
“… I want to say yes, Quilatalap, because I miss you. But I don’t want Greendale up in here.”
Quilatalap grinned. “I’ll be fine, if you’re worried about that. But I understand. I won’t try for that.”
Erick felt a small melancholy—
And then Erick told the staff, “Please stop spreading wheat right now.”
The green buds had managed to turn into a small patch of golden wheat, growing to a meter and a half tall in moments, before Erick’s request had slowed, and then stopped the spread of grain. The staff just hovered there now, not doing anything at all.
Erick asked Quilatalap, “A portal between these Grand Dungeons would be weird for those other dungeon masters, too, right? I’m still not out as Erick over there… It’s actually been really nice to just be myself, though Kinder already believes that I’m going to cause some huge mess.”
“You probably will, so I can’t blame the guy for feeling that way.”
Erick rolled his eyes.
Quilatalap smiled. “And yes, it would cause Kinder and whoever else to notice this place.”
“Better not do it, then.” Erick added, “I’ll work on getting the other dungeons to… Do what? Weaken their walls against this place? What have you decided to call this place, anyway?”
“All you really have to do is tell them that it might happen, and they won’t have control over it, so they shouldn’t freak out when it happens. They might be able to cause it to happen, though, if they know how to work their dungeon core properly.” Quilatalap said, “And I’ve decided to call this place The Storm Cellar.”
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“Sounds good. Are you going to put in an Endless Delve?”
“Those things are too random by far…” Quilatalap looked out across the world of his dungeon. “… But I could? … They’re good for making resources.”
“Are you going to do any sort of Second Script?”
“Nope. Don’t really like those things anyway. All magic is the same, and the Script already does a pretty decent job of it all. I’m going to let that in here as it already is.”
Erick nodded. And then he stepped forward. “So what sorts of buildings?”
Quilatalap walked with him, saying, “Standard city on the Surface. Grid-based… Also your staff is following us.”
Behind them, the staff floated across the ground, following behind Erick at a normal following distance. Ophiel clutched on Erick’s shoulder, watching the staff as it floated toward them.
The staff left a small trail of lush grass where it passed.
Erick glanced backward. And then he brushed the staff with his aura, raising it up into the air a bit. Instead of floating higher so as not to spread green, the staff hopped to his side and then stopped spreading green where it floated.
Ophiel twittered in very soft, unsure guitar sounds as he stared at the not-gold staff, only a half meter away.
The staff behaved.
Erick turned his attention back to Quilatalap, who walked at his other side. “I guess I have another [Familiar] for now.”
Ophiel perked up. “Another?!”
And then he fluffed up and fluttered into the air, over to the staff. With twenty eyes and one great big eye in the center, Ophiel stared at the staff from all angles. And then he sat on the gem on the top.
The staff glowed brighter, briefly, and then it didn’t care anymore. Ophiel fluffed up, spreading his wings, and the staff briefly bobbed, before it regained equilibrium and control.
And then Ophiel leaned to the side…
The staff leaned with Ophiel’s weight—
The staff rapidly spun, throwing Ophiel into the air, and Ophiel giggled and chirped at the toss before flying back around to land back on the top of the staff, which had righted itself. Ophiel landed once again and held on tight.
… And then Ophiel leaned to the side.
The staff spun, and this time Ophiel clung on for dear life, giggling wildly as though he was on a carnival ride, and then he spread his wings and angled upward, ensuring that wind cut downward like he was a ceiling fan on reverse.
The staff went sailing up into the sky, with Ophiel giggling all the while—
And then the staff vanished from under Ophiel to reappear directly at Erick’s side, leaving Ophiel up there, still spinning for a little bit, until he realized he had lost his fun ride. The staff nestled closer to Erick, seeming in unsure distress, so Erick put his hand on it. The staff calmed right away and stopped floating, falling fully under Erick’s power, as Ophiel came back to ground level, to land on Erick’s other shoulder, for Erick had sent a gentle nudge at Ophiel not to play around with the staff so much.
“I still don’t understand it fully, Ophiel,” Erick said, as Ophiel hopped across Erick’s back, to get closer to the staff. He wasn’t about to hop onto it again because Erick had told him not to, but he was certainly going to investigate, because he could. “Look all you want, but don’t touch it again, unless it wants to.”
Erick wasn’t sure what the staff wanted, though. When it was separated from him Erick couldn’t feel it at all, but now that his hand was wrapped around that not-gold surface, it felt, a little bit, like a natural extension of his aura. Like his aura was active inside the staff, even though Erick wasn’t concentrating any power in the staff at all right now. It was an odd sort of ‘extension’ that was almost like a [Familiar]. But more solid.
Quilatalap said, “You went into a dungeon dedicated to Field and Fertility and you came out with another kid.”
Erick almost wanted to laugh at that, but instead he gripped the staff, trying to feel it out. It felt more like an extension of himself than a [Familiar], now that he was holding it, but then Erick let go, and the staff floated there, feeling like nothing at all. To his mana sense it seemed like some highly magical thing, but not much more than that. It certainly didn’t have a soul. It had a few golden glows, though, like how Erick’s Crystal Star used to have.
Ophiel and Yggdrasil both had ephemeral souls in their manifested bodies these days.
This thing had nothing at all.
“… A very new [Familiar]?” Erick guessed. “I’m not even sure how I got it.”
Quilatalap said, “Maybe simply a sentient artifact attuned to Atunir. One a bit more willing to be near you than the Crystal Star… It manifested oddly, though. The [Witness] for the upgraded version is one thing, but this form and function is a whole different beast, blipping from Grand Dungeon to the Surface, and then down into another would-be Grand Dungeon a quarter of a world away. Did you do any Wizardry down there?”
“Nothing I can think of… I am unsure if I even used my own mana for the [Witness]… But I suppose I did, didn’t I? Not like I had a [Witness] metamond.” Erick said, “The mana cost was negligible, anyway.”
Quilatalap nodded and thought as they walked.
The staff floated beside Erick. Ophiel almost hopped on it again, but Erick shook his head, and Ophiel twittered and stayed on his shoulder.
Quilatalap said, “From what I have heard, and according to what you have told me, the Glittering Depths is an incredibly restrictive Second Script dungeon. You could still cast some internal magics with your core mana, though, and Clarice Icewind had to use Wizardry to make her [True Sight] function outside of a manasphere —Which is a good idea; you should follow her suggestion.”
Erick nodded.
Quilatalap continued, “But she had to use Wizardry to do that, and she probably had to use her own mana. You probably used a confluence of your own mana and dungeon mana to [Witness] that history… Did you use a lot of your own mana to do anything else inside the dungeon?”
Erick almost facepalmed. Instead, he sighed. “I did a manual [Return] when I thought I had fucked up and people had seen the real me. Or at least the dungeon masters had. After I had already done it I realized that they could probably already see me as a dragon, so it didn’t matter.”
Quilatalap raised his eyebrows a little. “10,000 mana would qualify as a lot.”
“It was more like 27,000 and there was a tearing sensation.”
“Then there’s your answer. You held in your hand the recreation of a primary artifact of a memory inside the Dark— or at least it was attuned to you and nearby?— and then you used Time Magic around that artifact. Combined with what the Staff was already primed to do, and the fact you’re a Paradox Wizard, then that’s the full answer.”
Erick looked at the staff. It floated serenely. “… That’s the real staff?”
“Is the recreation of a painting the original painting? No. But it’s close. Think of it more like an NPC turned real.” Quilatalap added, “Clarice probably helped to make the staff fully manifest, though, since she is a Fae Dragon by her own admission, and you were listening to her when the staff fully became what it currently is.”
Erick had some rapid, mixed feelings about that. “… I don’t think she did anything except talk about her experiences… She didn’t do anything?”
“We’re in the Dark, where magic and possibility are sacred, easy things to achieve, especially when dragons and Wizards and gods and deep history are involved.” Quilatalap added, “You’re practically a walking ritual, too, so you were probably 80% of the cause of the staff, but you went into a Fae dragon’s house and ate her food, and she was already heavily invested in her own historical resonance with that dungeon. Even with all your defenses against that sort of influence, Clarice was probably 10% of the cause of that staff, at least. Atunir could have organized the whole thing, too, but most of the time people have to ask for gods to interfere in their lives, and Atunir sticks to the God Pact formed after the Sundering, just like all the rest.”
“… Should I be angry at Clarice? I don’t feel like I should be.”
“I think you should be angry if Clarice chooses to give Fyuri her true name; not for this staff thing.”
“True Names were never a problem over at the Freelands.”
“You figuring out one of your past lives was named ‘Ashes’ isn’t really a problem for you, either, right?”
“Ah. So you’re going with that interpretation, eh?”
Quilatalap smirked. “Look, Erick. I find it incredibly attractive how powerful you are, and you know it, so there.”
“Haaaa…” Erick moved on, “Should I burst in and solve this demonic murders case? In any other place I would have solved it already.”
“If you want to do good… When was the last time you checked in with the guardhouses in the Crystal Forest, and offered your help?”
“Been about four months now. Crime isn’t much of a problem that necessitates my intervention in the Crystal Forest, but it’s still nice to be able to wipe away problems that easily.” Erick added, “I want to do the same for the Greensoil Republic, but they’re a neighboring nation. Still though, it feels like I should be solving that from a top-down approach instead of this bumbling ‘not involving myself’ that I seem to be headed toward.”
“Greensoil has made their stance rather clear on your involvement in their security affairs… Aren’t you going to be having that Odaari meeting in a few days, anyway? Talk to them about it then.” Quilatalap moved on, “But for now! Can you make a starter city out of this land? [Terraforming], too, please.”
“Of course. What sort of architecture and style?”
Quilatalap held up his hands and projected light into a small model, saying, “New Highlands style, grid streets like in Candlepoint, with some riverbeds and…”
They spoke for a while, and walked beside each other for longer than that. When Erick knew the final shape of Quilatalap’s desired city, Erick pulsed with a [Cityshape], sending power out to every corner of the land like a rolling storm of white light and subtle lightning. White stone structures pulled up from the ground, and the ground dipped down everywhere else, only to rise again in some areas to form streets while deepening in others to form waterways and lakes. Towers crested into the sky, and then unfurled with balconies and holes for windows, as blocky structures peaked into roofs, and then expelled rock from every place that would become windows. Some of that expelled rock formed more buildings. Most went back into the ground.
The first Shaping was crude, base work.
Next, Erick unleashed an aura of stone control, fine-tuning what was out there into something that was actually livable. Minor cracks in the working healed over. A building that was slightly tilted got tilted the other direction, to stand straight up. The lakes and rivers got sorted.
The final working was a cast of [Terraforming], over what would become the area’s largest lake.
Rain fell heavily from a black sky, into a deep trough in the ground, where water slipped into sand and into mud, and greenery began to spread. That spell was permanent so it would stay like that forever, and eventually overtake this land with greenery. This was what Quilatalap wanted. Since it was such a major spell with permanent power, Quilatalap would eventually be able to gain control of that magic and make it a part of the dungeon itself.
Quilatalap could have cast the dungeon core version of [Terraforming] from the dungeon control panels, but having Erick do this saved him a great deal of upkeep expenses. And Erick’s magic was the real deal; dungeons just had imperfect copies of that spell that weren’t actually Permanent. With Erick having created the city, too, that was a bunch of time and effort saved on Quilatalap’s part, as well.
When Erick was done, he cast his gaze through Ophiel, high above, checked his work, and then came back to himself, saying, “It all looks good, and you have a minor field of golden grains back where we first came from. They soaked up the rain even though it didn’t rain there. Seems to have stopped at short fences that I didn’t put up there, either, so I don’t think you’ll get overgrown anytime soon.”
Quilatalap looked back where they had come from. And then he looked at the not-gold staff floating beside Erick. He frowned a little, but more in unsure concern, than in anger. “I suppose… That’s a good thing.” He lost his frown. “Perhaps Atunir isn’t as mad at me as she usually is?”
Erick smiled at that. “Maybe!” And then Erick thought about that for more than a moment, and realized that that made him incredibly happy for a rather good reason. Erick went to Quilatalap and gave him a big hug, saying, “That’s great news, actually!”
Quilatalap chuckled as he hugged Erick back. And then he whispered, “So that building over there looks like it could use some warming up.”
Erick laughed.
Hours later, Erick exited the Storm Cellar and made a brief show of public approval of the dungeon, with Quilatalap’s Vanya dungeon master slime clone bowing to him, while Quilatalap himself took the shape of Soltic, and also bowed. Erick’s formal approval was good for optics, for whoever was watching out there with [Long Range Scry]s, or [Witness]es. The Regency was certainly looking.
After Erick was done with that, he spoke to Regent Augustive for a short while, and explained away his near full-day inside the dungeon as exploring all that it had to offer. Agustive had been very worried about that; he had been about to send in the guard. But Erick assured him that everything was good.
Later, in a quieter part of the world, near Everbless and while using Privacy magics to keep away all [Scry]ing eyes, Erick had a talk with Everbless.
It went about as well as most talks with undisciplined children usually went.
- - - -
Erick spent the next few days completely ignoring everything else in his immediate life, from Clarice to ‘Ashes’ to the Staff, for he needed to prepare for a Wizarding ritual of [True Sight]. Normally, such a preparation wouldn’t have taken him long at all, but he had a certain expectation for what he wanted the end result to be, and this one would probably be difficult. He wanted to be able to gaze across the universe, where there was no mana, and yet see through all mana-illusions.
Even if there weren’t any out there, Erick was preparing for a future filled with space ships, so it made sense to get over this hurdle now, before it became an actual problem later.
And he had never even played around with a 0% mana atmosphere.
So that is what Erick did. Inside his house in the Glittering Depths, Erick turned the mana density down to 0, freaked the fuck out in a very unintentional way as his body wanted to explode but not really explode at all, and then he went back up to 50% manasphere density.
He played around with that for a while.
And eventually, he felt… Not comfortable. He would never be comfortable in a 0% manasphere environment. Erick was a Wizard and a dragon; a highly magical creature, by his very nature. With an empty core he felt like he was missing every part of his body. His brain felt sluggish. His blood felt thick and weighty. His arms and legs felt near-useless and he got tired way too fast.
But he could deal with it.
He got around to seeing Clarice once, to make sure nothing odd was happening with her yet. She was still a hermit, and still coming to terms with everything that he and she had spoken about. She hadn’t done anything at all. Perhaps she had become even more withdrawn, for Erick had not gone inside her house and Clarice had not offered him an invite. This was not ideal.
But Clarice said that she was dealing with everything and it was taking her time, which was fine. Erick told her the same.
As long as Clarice wasn’t telling Rebecca her real name, then everything was fine.
It took Erick three more days of item creation for the Iron Bandits and understanding of mana crystals and otherwise, and a bit more planning here and there with his ‘Ultimate True Sight’ wizardry, for Erick to understand exactly what he wanted to do.
And then it was time.
- - - -
Erick stood in the mana chamber in his rooms in Glittering Depths. The world was dry of mana; dead as true void. The mana chamber was darker than black.
That darkness seemed dimmer than it should be. The mana chamber was cold.
Erick was cold.
His little [Meditation] amulet was working, glowing yellow deep under the layers of his shirt, where no light escaped. Erick was using [Meditation] to see into the manasphere, while purposefully not spilling anything into the chamber. The mana chamber remained empty of all mana. And because it was empty, when Erick looked out, he saw nothing at all. No figments in the manasphere. No fake things at all.
Just…
Black.
Pure, and yet also empty.
But that wasn’t true at all. Erick was inside a dungeon. He was inside the Dark.
Erick pressed his hand over the [Meditation] amulet under his shirt.
This Wizardry would not be something that enchanted him; that changed him at all. But it would be something that would truly change the [Meditation] amulet. If the staff could be changed, and be let out into the world at large, then why not a little amulet, too?
Erick stared out at the pure black of the chamber.
He spoke,
“A plight we sight in endless night
“A scare we stare at, dark beware
“A truth, uncouth, uncovered sleuth
“Light bright, we see truth; all that’s right
“Flare breaks the night; these eyes of glare
“Forsooth, I dare, the brightest Truth.
“Let’s see what’s right; a brightest Sight!”
There was no mana in the chamber. There was no mana in Erick’s core.
But the Dark was there.
Something slipped and twisted inside Erick as some connection rearranged, as Erick spoke, his voice separating from himself and doubling. Out came one single mana from elsewhere, flowing out of Erick’s mouth like a spark of hope.
Everything else happened fast.
The amulet was suddenly not under Erick’s shirt anymore. It floated in the middle of the manaless chamber, like a tiny yellow sun surrounded by silver, almost blackish metiron, its chain snaking around the sun in lazy, zero-gravity twists.
And then the yellow turned white, prismatic. The grasping hands of the amulet’s metal flowed onto the white orb, like molten metal, and then winked open.
Briefly, Erick saw a second eye appear out of the dark, but the second eye faded, and all that was left was the [Meditation] amulet, surrounded by eyelids. It looked kinda like Erick’s own eyes when he was a dragon; pure white and surrounded by black…
Even the metiron had been transformed into black metiron.
Erick held out his hand, and the new artifact lowered into Erick’s palm. It was no bigger than before, perhaps only four centimeters across, but the whole thing looked like a dark talisman of Melemizargo, and it radiated power.
Erick opened the mana chamber, and said, “Dungeon. Increase mana density to 50%”
Rapidly his house began to refill with mana and Erick breathed easier as breathing became literally easier. His connection to the Script began to refill Erick’s core reserves, and Erick relaxed.
The staff waited for Erick, just outside the chamber.
“The [Identify] I used on you didn’t do anything except return the same wordage as before,” Erick said to the staff.
Since it was a [Familiar], Erick had decided to start treating it like a [Familiar], which meant talking to it. The Staff of Divine Absolution didn’t seem to care about Erick’s non-commanding words, but it had taken Ophiel a long time to start to respond to small talk too, so Erick wasn’t worried about that.
Erick held up his new necklace, and wondered, “But what do you [Identify] as?”
Erick used his ring on the thing.
All-Seeing Eye, attuned greater artifact, 500/500
Beware of staring too deep into the Dark, for the Dark stares back.
Erick smiled at that, knowing that he had done it right, and also that he’d hopped up another 450 points on the Decoration board. He was probably at 4650 right now, and that news was probably getting around very fast.
He put the necklace on—
Erick stood on nothing in the middle of the Dark, while the horizon was a dim white line of fire and everything else was black.
And then the abyss below opened up, in the shape of a bright, bright white eye—
Erick said, “Oh. Hello Melemizargo.”
The universe chuckled good-naturedly, and then the eye closed.
Gradually, the house came back all around Erick. But if he looked down, he would see Melemizargo… Actually, if he looked in any direction at all he would see Melemizargo. But that was just a tuning problem.
Erick focused to a lighter touch, and the amulet responded—
Suddenly, Erick was firmly in his little cottage in the Glittering Depths. The floor was there. The walls and ceiling were there. Everything was as it should be to mortal eyes.
Erick nodded. “Good.”
And now it was time to get back. The hearing for Denutha Odaari’s grand treason was starting in several hours, and Erick needed to go back to Odaali to speak to Cyril and Yetta about all that, before it happened. He was involved in that case now.
Chances were rather great the Viridian Throne would offer to execute Odaari before they offered a trial for the crime of the Daydropper, and Erick needed to be sure that it went to a trial, not an execution. That’s what the city of Odaali, the king of Odaali, and the Champion of Atunir all wanted, after all.
Atunir just wanted the case over, one way or another.
Erick left his staff in his cottage as he took to the roads, and began running back to delver square. He said hello to a few people, and as he did, the All-Seeing Eye showed him everything about those people, easily cutting through all mana sense blockers and other obscuring devices…
Erick slowed down when he got into town…
There were hidden markers on streets here and there, showing the way to places that Erick did not know of before now. That was the way to the portal to the command center of the dungeon. Over there was a hidden stairwell to… some place.
Hmm.
There was a lot of hidden shit down here, eh?
Erick managed to make it to the tower that led to the first floor before someone managed to spot him and shout out a congratulations on reaching higher on the Decoration board. Erick smiled and thanked the guy, as he went up the tower.
In a minute, he was back on the first floor.
He got out of the dungeon. The sun shone brightly. The spider at the top of the dungeon keep, with its arms spread across and around the entire space, looked at Erick a little as he walked underneath, which was normal for that spider these days.
His various metirons were already ironcrystal.
Except for his newest one. That All-Seeing Eye hung around Erick’s neck, under his clothes, and remained a bright white eye surrounded by black scales. That was probably why Erick saw and mana sensed the inquisitors of Greendale standing all around the ironcrystal courtyard long before anyone else. They were waiting for him, according to their focused gazes and readied spells, but no one else could see them at all. Erick spotted [Invisibility] and [Intangible] and other, more esoteric spellwork that had some deep flavors of Fae or Mystical, or Air or Light. Not a single person in the courtyard saw any of them at all.
They had pulled out all the stops to greet Ashes today.
Erick would have liked to believe that he would have seen all of them on his own, but there was one man standing on the far side of the courtyard that wore flowing green robes, and that man was certainly one of the Viridian King’s personal assassins. That guy’s spellwork was world-class, for sure.
Erick stepped out of the castle.
He stood ready.
He waited for them to make the first move.