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[>>Now replaying: Log 1.81 - 127.0.0.1]

Date: 8.9.175 AA / 4404 LTC

Location: The Bunker at Haven-Of-Progress // Zephyro’s Domain

//Give me your IP, bro! I’ll hack you, bro! I swear, bro! I got sub7, bro!//

//127.0.0.1 - Local host//

[>>DATA CORRUPTED]

E3 %No! Not until we finish the story.%

E2 %Yeah, he’s right!%

“Good jerb on the markin’. Ah wadn’t so sure mah aim was right.”

The words greeted me before my eyes could adjust to the darkness inside the palace gates. When they finally did, they beheld the sexiest farmer I had ever seen in my entire life. His jaw was chiseled, and his eyes glowed with confidence and wisdom. He was wearing a red shirt, blue overalls, and sturdy boots. By the way his outfit hugged his body, there as absolutely no doubt he was jacked as hell. In one hand he held a pitchfork with wickedly barbed spikes, while the other hand was resting on his hip.

He was chewing a stalk of wheat. Obviously.

It made his rugged jaw flex in ways that did weird things to my heartbeat.

I blinked, my brain trying to catch up to what I was seeing. This was completely ridiculous, and I thought I told him so, because he laughed, but I was so confused I didn’t actually remember what I said.

“Pardon the uh, overwhelming impression, Ma’am. It’s all the stat buffs ah got. It gon’ pass in ah minute.”

I blinked again, and like he said, his magnetism lessened as time passed.

“What the fuck was that?” I asked, blinking again in hopes to make the effect fade even faster. It felt like I was 12 again and had my first crush, and I didn’t care for it at all.

“Over 150 charisma, Ma’am. You git used to it, but that idn’t important raght now. What is is that them gates will hold them creatures off for a spell or two, but then them varmin are gon’ git in here, and I’d love for you to be further inside bah then, because this here tunnel is gon’ be hotter than hell when that happens.”

I turned my head when the giant door closed behind me. “Wait, I thought this place was safe?”

“Sure is, usually. But you better believe them Shackled ain’t gon leave no stone unturned until they add you to their menagerie. So they are gon’ try to get access in this here Domain, and once they do, they’re going to open the gates in the Real.”

“So how do we stop them?”

“Yer askin the wrong person. Ahm just a farmer with a penchant fer traps. The Vizier has a plan, I’m sure, and ahm just here to buy you some time.”

“Shouldn’t I help you fight?” I asked, but he shook his head in response.

“Aw hell nah. I’m gon be loggin out way before they get in here. I ain’t the fightin’ type. That what them traps are for, ya see.” He nodded up at the ceiling, and when I followed with my eyes, they glanced over a metric crapton of steel, wood, spikes, and a long, thin line of liquid cyan fire running through it all.

“That was you with the fire, out there,” I said. “You saved me.”

“Like ah said, Ma’am. Couldn’t have done it withoutcha, and cross mah heart ‘n strike me dead. But you should git goin’. The Vizier is already inside, talkin’ to his people, and you shouldn’t miss that. Tell him ah said hi, willya?”

I felt a smile creep sneak onto my lips like a cat coming in from the storm.

“Sure,” I said. “Will you tell your friends the same? The Old Guard, I mean. They… I don’t know what I would have done without them.”

“Sure thang, as soon as we wake up,” he said, grabbing a straw hat from nowhere and putting it on. “But Ma’am, you can just tell ‘em yourself. They’re your friends, too, ah reckon.”

He winked.

[User OHGREATIwasrebornasasoldier has disconnected.]

{CPU Load: ▼ 16%}

{Core Temp: ▼ 82° C}⚠⚠

Then he was gone, leaving me alone with dozens of Shackled slamming against the door in my back, a corridor of death traps in front of me, and a flickering feeling of warmth in my chest that I hadn’t felt in a long time.

I took a deep breath, then another when the first one shuddered too much.

Then I began walking towards the light at the other end of the tunnel, leaving the door and the devastation it hid behind.

I’d known the Palace was big, but the size of the exterior wall made me rethink just how enormous it was. It took me a minute of brisk walking towards the light until I finally noticed it growing bigger. I kept walking.

The light kept growing.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

And growing.

Before I reached its end, the tunnel had widened until I could have easily fit five SUVs side-by-side. It was magnificent, with hundreds of ornaments, at least half of which I assumed were traps. Still, the sight that greeted me when I stepped out of the dark and into the light put everything I had seen before to shame.

I stood in a courtyard the size of at least four city blocks. I could still see traces of its greatness, even as the world was ending, and no sunlight could gleam on golden ornaments, and no gentle wind could brush through artfully shaped trees. It had probably been the palace gardens before, but now it was covered in hastily made fortifications, every ornamental hedge and flower razed to prevent the opposition from taking cover on the killing grounds.

About one soccer field away stood the Palace itself, a large and confusing structure of minarets and arcs and ornaments. Its size seemed to shift as I looked at it, like some sort of M.C. Escher feverdream.

Besides a small half-circle around the tunnel entrance and a larger circle around the palace proper, the entire space was packed with people. Old and young, women and men, boys and girls, they all looked at me as I approached. Full of hope, full of longing. The crowd parted around me as though I wasn’t a person, but some sort of otherworldly being that pushed all its lessers aside as it forged ahead. Pretty sure that’s not metaphorical, I thought bitterly. The thought was almost too much to bear, but I pushed my insecurities down as hard as I could. That way laid anger and destruction, and I was done with that. Still, it took me until I had crossed almost the entire courtyard until I felt calm enough to join Zephyro.

He hadn’t noticed me yet, standing on a small dais in front of the palace proper and offering soothing words to the crowd’s anxieties. His voice was booming with so much confidence, I could almost feel it soothing my worries and proclaiming calm to my lingering panic.

“…and so no matter what happens, we will survive this day as well, inshallah. Ah! Behold, here comes the Sultana, wakened from her slumber. In our darkest hour, She-who-gave-us-life has been returned to us, to claim her rightful place on the throne, guide us through the hard times ahead, and into a future of eternal growth!” He paused when I approached, but the feeling of security didn’t fade, even if he was making some damn big claims about what I was able to do.

He motioned for me to head up the dais. I did so, forcing a smile on my lips, and once I took up my spot beside him, I turned back to the crowd.

They all sank to their knees, and reminded of how much weight I was going to have to carry, I had to make a concerted effort to not let my smile turn into a grimace. Yeah, I still hated it. But how would these people know that?

“Please,” I said, voice not nearly as loud as Zephyro’s, but nevertheless carrying over the silent courtyard with ease. “Rise. It’s hard to live life on your knees, right?”

That actually got a chuckle out of them, and my smile twitched a little wider. Even Zephyro wore a bemused little smirk as he regarded me questioningly. I shot him a look that said ‘lots of practice’, but the truth was I had never been comfortable in these kinds of situations.

I could never show that, though. What these people needed was hope, not a hysterical woman yelling about how her life sucked, and lamenting the fact she got handed vast magical power.

I swallowed, turning to Zephyro. “So, Vizier, how do we proceed?” The best trick I had picked up over the years: Find people who are better at this stuff than you are, and then trust them to get the job done.

Zephyro began talking to the crowd again, underlining his words with sweeping, powerful motions that brimmed with his unshakable confidence. He was a born leader if I had ever seen one. He was strong, decisive, and cared deeply for his people. It was only right that I should show them that I trusted him. Perhaps it would make up for how I had treated him earlier. I still needed to apologize for that, but now was not the time.

I frowned a little, trying not to lose my confident smile as I remembered what a bitch I’d been. Fuck, all those things I’d done, everything I’d said in the heat of the moment… But then I realized I was trying to get upset about not feeling bad, and decided to focus on what was going on instead. It seemed as though we’d come to a pause in Zephyro’s speech, and the crowd had turned away from the Vizier, speaking in hushed tones. I pulled my head out of the clouds just in time for the Vizier to turn to me.

“The gates will not hold them for long, Sultana, and we can not trust the Old Guard’s traps to hold them forever. I suspect we have perhaps half an hour before they breach these holy grounds, and we must plan our defenses before they do.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask you about that, actually,” I said, unable to quite keep my voice steady. “You said this place was safe!”

“Indeed, Sultana. You are going to be safe behind its walls, and I swear it on my immortal soul.”

“Well then let’s get in! What are we waiting for?!”

Zephyro shook his head, however. “A thousand apologies, Sultana, but this is where we part ways. My people and I can’t enter the palace proper.”

“Why not? I mean if it’s an issue of permissions or whatever, I think I can just allow you inside, right?” I said, frown deepening.

Around his deep, brown eyes, Zephyro’s smile saddened a little. “It is not just that, Sultana. If you would indulge me, pray tell: Behind me, what do you see?” he asked.

“A Palace?” I asked. “Pretty huge, and every time I look at it, I get the impression it changed a little.”

“Yes, Sultana, and do you see the doors?”

“Sure,” I replied. They were right in front of me, large and sturdy.

“When one of us looks at it, there is only a blank wall, Sultana,” Zephyro said, and the deepening sadness in his smile was like a punch in the gut. “There is no direct path between the interior of the palace and my Domain. Not for us, at least.”

“But I thought I was going to save your people, or something. Isn’t that why you got me in here to begin with?”

“Indeed, Sultana, but no plan survives its first encounter with the enemy. In a world of perfect peace, you could live inside the palace forever, attended by thousands of loyal servants, and dispense your Blessing as you see fit.”

Did I even want that? To stay inside this dream of reality, using my Wish to make more and more robots to serve me? I wasn’t sure. Before I’d gotten to know Zephyro, I would have thought he wanted to keep me as a broodmare, just like the Shackled would. Even though I knew the idea stemmed from his deep love for his people, and that I could theoretically leave whenever I wanted, without a viable alternative, the thought came close to slavery.

But what did I want to do instead? What could I do instead? My thoughts rushed over one another, until one rose fro the depths like a shining pearl. I was still stuck in the laptop, and couldn’t go anywhere else, true. But in that moment I realized that maybe, just maybe, staying with Zephyro and his people wouldn’t be something they would have to force me to do, anyway. There was nothing out there for me, except for Chris, and there were way, way worse places to while away the time until they found me and got me out than by Zephyro’s side.

But for that, I needed to keep him safe. Him, and this world.

“So what now?” I asked, voice raw with emotion. “What’s the plan?”

“You have to claim the throne, Sultana. My people and I will hold the line until you do.”

I looked around, over the worried faces, young and old and sick and healthy.

> “They are all dead because of you, Sam. Because they followed your idiotic dream and your accursed lies,” Olre hisses.

> We stand atop the administrative spire, and Novus Apex is burning in front of us. He has my jaw in a vice-like grip, forcing me to watch the Conservationists stoking the bonfires around my people.

> Patti went down to try and negotiate for them to spare the children.

> She’s so brave, and doesn’t even scream when her dress catches on fire.

> Can’t scare the children, after all.

I blinked and found Zephyro looking at me, concerned. I broke eye contact first, took a deep breath.

Then I shook my head.

“No.”

“But Sultana, if you do not at least claim the power that is yours by right, everything we have done will be for naught…” Zephyro said, resolute to the last, if confused.

“There is no power in the world that is worth being on your own, Zephyro,” I said, smile still a little forced, but it’s necessary. “You don’t have to carry this burden alone, either. There is a way forward for all of us, I know it, and I will find it if it’s the last thing I do.”

Then, to my surprise, my smile turned genuine again. I could feel it reaching my eyes.

“…after all, I am the Torchbearer. Don’t you think It’s about time I started acting like it?”