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Chapter 14.1: The Beholder

Witches pursued beauty. It was their god, so much to the point that they would defy actual gods for the sake of it — but when the first witch arrived in Amatoria and confronted its goddess for the first time, she called her “smokin’ hot.” The goddess did not know what she was on about; anyway, from there started the witches’ reverence for the goddess, making her their idol and standard for every kind of beauty imaginable.

Millennia passed, however, and some dared ask: did she truly define the limits? Some didn’t think so.

In a bid of defiance, they made elixirs for youth, but though they could exceed Enthusia’s aesthetic, they could not match her charisma. Thinking wisdom and aesthetic made charisma, they made elixirs of wisdom, yet they could not match her power — and when they made an elixir for that, they could not match her wit.

The wiser of them asked, “Should we be doing this?” but Enthusia gave them the go-ahead, so it was all fine.

Development accelerated. Every decade, a spectacular new elixir came out, and they held a beauty contest against the heavens, proving each time they still could not match her. Even as they thought to unify all theories of beauty and create a super-elixir, scores of such theories were proposed, and the witches ended up dividing themselves according to whichever they thought was the better one.

The situation worsened. Enthusia seemed almost unreachable — almost as if there were as many theories of beauty as there were people.

Nevertheless, the witches’ pursuit never stopped. For them, reaching for beauty was the whole reason for their existence, pushing them to build a tower to the stars just because they were pretty, to dig mines until the center of the world for ever rarer gems, to delve into dark jungles for vibrant, poisoned dyes — and for one daring young witch, to trespass unto heaven itself.

***

Nightshade never understood the people of the [down_realm]. She was looking for something skirting the edges of the fighting grounds of an arena, but even with the light of a moon and stars above, she could hardly find anything in the night.

This place had long been abandoned. Grass grew from cracks in the hundred-meter diameter fighting circle, and sections of the carved stone bleachers were pulverized. Newcomers would’ve spawned into an on-going battle here, fought ’til they died, and prospecting clans would get into a bidding war with each other to recruit the guy even before they’d respawned — all while the audience whooped and gambled on the outcome. Personally, she wouldn’t be able to keep up with that sort of rollercoaster.

A giant statue of Enthusia spectated from the side. This realm’s people regarded more as a game master than a goddess, and so they gave her the best spot. It towered over everything else, its arms raised to the cold sky, showing Nightshade the [down_realm]’s broken moon — and how beautiful even a place like this could be under the right sky. Without the statue, she would never have thought a place such as this could be so serene.

But she wasn’t just here to sight-see. There was a pink glow at the foot of the statue, and she raced to get to it.

She sprinted and slid to a stop, taking a wooden trowel against the cement surface. Wood against cement? In Nightshade’s hands, cement loses. She was careful to work around the stalk of a plant that had grown underground, its stalk having bored its way through solid concrete just to get a little bit of sun and fresh air.

As she dug deeper, the pink glow grew brighter. So close! She dug and dug, and when the first bit of light shone out through a crack in the subsoil, she thrust her hand into the ground like a villain about to rip out the earth’s heart.

“Proof!” she cheered aloud. She yanked, and she could see the tuber’s skin. “I’ve got proof! Proof!” She pulled, and with a great heave, finally got it out.

She fell on her back, screaming “Heck yeeaah!” her voice bouncing off the arena’s seats and back at her from all around.

She kicked up and got to her feet. Just like the statue, she raised her arms and presented a glowing potato to the moon. Bits of dirt came falling on her face; she had to spit them out, but what did she care? She’d gotten proof: that just like magic, beauty coursed through all of life in Amatoria. With this, I’ll finally show the Tower —

The weather turned bleak, rain pouring from zero to a hundred. Lightning strikes set the whole arena aglow in neon white-blue.

She groaned. “Enthusia damn it,” she muttered. A little bit of rain wouldn’t kill her — her hat was wide-brimmed and waterproof — and if she went around, she was sure she’d find shelter somewhere. The problem was the way back: it’d be bogged down in mud, and there could be any amount of landslides and lahar flows that would sweep her or her roads away. It was better to wait it out in this sturdy place and maneuver around the settled damage.

It annoyed her that it was all artificial, too! Depending on the stakes of the [down_realm]’s latest clan battles, the month’s weather controller might even dial up the average “crap” level; the higher the stakes were, the crappier the weather got, the more fired up the locals became — and the longer she had to stay.

Even now, she suspected some of the clout-to-cloud lightning in the sky were actually two sect grandmasters going at it. Well, it was their house. There wasn’t really anything she could do about it.

Just as she started thinking of starting a garden to pass the time, however, a bolt of lightning struck the statue in front of her. In hindsight, it shouldn’t have been a surprise that the [down_realm]’s denizens would have intentionally designed Enthusia’s statues to have raised arms, having them act like lightning rods. Knowing them, they would’ve found seeing their game master’s statue shoot real lightning out of her hands pretty darn cool.

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At such a close distance, the world turned pure white. Only for a split second did she even hear ringing in her ears; the ringing stopped, but the pain continued, and she only felt the rest of the explosion reverberate in her chest.

Despite all that had happened, she knew she was still alive. She could feel her heartbeat, and although she couldn’t hear, she could see … but, what’s this, was she going to be blind and seeing all-white for the rest of her life?

No matter how much time passed, it was just all-white. The thrumming pain in her eyes had settled already, and yet, she still just saw a vast expanse of white. Having died once before, it wasn’t hard for her to think: Oh, gee, did I die for realsies?

When she turned and met eyes with a woman in pajamas, though, her theory wavered. The woman was wrapped up in blankets like a burrito, leaving only her glasses and hands visible. She was behind a rectangular table, one hand on a laptop and another holding up a tea cup — all the while wide-eyed as she stared at the sudden visitor.

“Who” — the woman paused. She set the cup down. “Who’re you?”

“Am” — the witch paused — “Am I dead?”

The woman shrugged. “I dunno? I’d tell you if you’d tell me your name, though.”

“Oh — huh, is that how it works?”

“I-I could try? This is a first for me, though.”

Nightshade found this all very strange. There was something about the woman; plain as she might seem, there was a beauty hidden somewhere in that burrito. Her specialized beauty-detection magic wasn’t picking anything up, however. Maybe she was just assuming things.

Well, whatever. The woman was chill. Whatever was going on, it’d all turn out a’ight. “Oh, well, the name’s Nightshade.”

“Sure, thanks.” The woman turned her attention to the screen, and its reflection flickered in her eyes. A moment of keyboard tapping later, and she squinted with a confused look, turning towards the witch once more. “Somehow, you’re alive.”

“Somehow? Hey, that doesn’t sound very good!” She flailed her arms in complaint — spreading around bits of dirt. She paused, raised her right hand, and there, hanging from it, was still the glowing potato. “Oh shoot, I made a mess. Sorry about that!” She fidgeted left and right. “Where’s the broom? Darn, I — um” —

“Dun’ worry about it,” the woman said. Nightshade faced her again, and she was surprised to find an extra chair before the table. It hadn’t been there before.

The woman took out a paper bag from under the desk, whipping it open and raising it up for Nightshade to get. “Sit down and tell me about it. Oh, call me” — she thought for a moment — “Entry. Like ‘data entry,’ right?”

***

With the potato in the bag, Nightshade sat down and recounted the chain of events that had led her to this place. Entry nodded along with everything.

“I see.” She began to type on the laptop. “Issue ninety-nine eight thirty-two: [down_realm] authorized statue objects will reverse summon nearby users when struck by lightning.” She frowned and sighed, looking up and leaning back on her chair. In her burrito form, however, it just seemed like a pillow flopping backwards. “There’s not enough data to figure out the actual trigger conditions.”

“Hey, where am I, anyway?” Nightshade asked.

“Huh? Oh, this is the System Domain.” She patted the top edge of the laptop’s screen. “This is the System. I borrowed it from a friend.”

Nightshade shot to her feet, slamming her palms on the desk. “No?!”

Everyone knew what it was. There was no one who hadn’t touched its screens. Yet here she was, observing the very machinery that made Amatoria’s Three Realms march to its beat. Ever watched a heart surgery video and seen the little thing spasm around? The fragility of it, the invasion of biological privacy — it felt like that.

The two held gazes. Entry didn’t blink.

Nightshade leaned forward with a severe look. “T-then this is basically Enthusia’s Domain!” She almost threw herself over the desk. “So I’m dead!” She gasped. “So you’re” —

Entry pulled back. “Hey, now, I just work here.” She gently pushed Nightshade away by her shoulders. “And if the System says you’re not dead, you’re not dead.”

Nightshade paused. “Oh.” She pulled away. “You’re right.” She sat down. “That’s” — she scratched her cheek — “yep.” She lightened up. “I mean — yay, I’m alive!”

She clapped and patted herself on the back — but to her horror, Entry sighed, taking out a pencil from under her blanket-hood and pointed at her. “Alright, listen. Temple statues can only summon dead people.”

Nightshade wasn’t a genius, but sometimes her brain cells would fire in just the right way to give her the right idea — not that it would lead to the right conclusion.

“I gotta be dead before I can be re-summoned, right?” She took in a deep breath and stood up. “If anyone’s gotta do it, it’s gotta be me.”

Entry raised an eyebrow. “Whut?”

Nightshade looked away, pain dressed over her face like a lime had been squashed against it. “If I have to die, I can’t make you do it!… But don’t worry, amiga.”

She summoned a wand to her hand and pointed it at her neck. The life in her eyes went out like a candle; a chill swept the room; she spoke with no compassion: “It’ll be over soon.”

“Whoa, there, Sicario. I was about to say, I can just reconfigure things on my end, so don’t worry.”

“Oh?” Nightshade sat down like nothing happened. “So you’re just going to let me go? Just like that?”

“That’s what I’m saying.” Entry typed a few things into the laptop. “What a weird bug you’ve discovered. Now I just gotta figure out if it’s a freak numerical accident or a replicable edge case. If it’s replicable, it can be exploited.” She fixed her glasses. “Goodness me, I hate hate hate exploits.”

Nightshade looked on with some pity. She couldn’t imagine what it was like working directly under Enthusia. The poor gal seemed dedicated and happy with her job in her own way, but to be pushed to the brink of being overworked? To the brink of chewing on a pencil as stress relief? That wasn’t right — not by principle, and not in Amatoria!

She stood up once more. “I’ve only got one question.”

Entry kept her eyes glued to the screen. “Wuzzit?”

She hardened her expression. “Is this your Hobby?”

“Yuh. Why?”

That settles it. “Is there anything I can do? What do you need?”

The pencil in Entry’s mouth fell onto her desk. “You… Are you sure?”

Nightshade harrumphed. “Don’t underestimate the Witch of Taterity!”

She was a witch with a title. Deeply unpopular, underrated, and undervalued by the sophisticated cosmeticians of the Tower, there was one thing they acknowledged of her: her tenacity. Where others would wince at the idea of visiting the [down_realm] — a dry and dusty place that would no doubt disrupt the delicate balance of one’s skin moisture barrier — this woman was totally fine with making a two-month trek through destroyed mountain passes, deserts, and flooded valleys, all for the sake of proving there was beauty in all things.

But her title wasn’t one of pride; it was a bad joke. Only witches with witch marks — a little tattoo just under the eye — were ever given titles. They were fearsome and independent, just like Nightshade, but because she touted the heresy of “inherent beauty,” they looked at her strength and labeled it an inferiority complex. To them, she was just this noisy thing whose words could sway no one.

If no one else took that title seriously, then she would. The Witch of Taterity only needed to test her own resilience against herself and no one else. For this purpose, whatever challenge Entry might spring on her, she’d take it without a single moment of self-doubt.

Entry propped her hands up and leaned forwards. Shadows fell on her weary eyes. “Bug Tester of the Week. You’ll be right in the middle of every single permutation of test conditions imaginable. If I tell you to stand on one leg and cook spaghetti while insulting the statue, you’ll do it. If I tell you to die for a moment, you’ll do it, too.”

Nightshade gulped. The intensity in Entry’s eyes didn’t disappear, even as moments passed.

“This isn’t just my Hobby. It’s also my job. I don’t strictly need your help to get it done,” Entry continued. “Even knowing this, are you sure?”

Nightshade could just leave. There was nothing in it for her, and it would even delay her departure from the [down_realm] by a week — the [down_realm], where she understood none of its inhabitants, where the setting was too gritty for her taste, and the soil was too dead for any kind of decent garden to be made.

Even so, a glowing pink potato grew in such a place. A pink potato proved that beauty also existed in hardship, and by Nightshade’s account, she had never experienced the kind of hardship that Entry offered her right now. To her, this was just another kind of beauty being dangled in front of her face.

“Miss Entry,” Nightshade said, “why would you tease me with a good time?”