The grand formation kept lighting up slowly, the symbols covering not only the ground, but the walls and the ceiling, the red light glowing ominously.

Velvet put a hand over her mouth, the palm against her chin, her mind working as she looked at the sigils. She wasn’t as much in a hurry as one would expect, since a formation of such size needed a lot of magic to activate.

Yet, she didn’t know much about formations, since they were of no use to her, making her be rather slow at deciphering it. Formations couldn’t be moved, and the powerful ones needed several mages to start working, which pushed their learning importance a bit towards the bottom of what Velvet had rushed to learn. What she knew was obtained from the formations she had seen in person, not in books.

Looking down at her feet, at the formation’s center, there was the same hexagonal black cylinder that was stuck on Dianthus’ chest, just that this time it was stuck on the ground.

You can skip the ‘needing lots of mages’ part by simply siphoning magic from Dianthus, hm. Yes, this part of the formation is like the one used to take Frenese’s blood.

It also was the one that Cardomos activated with his own magic, while the rest was being lit by the connection with the cylinder, using Dianthus’ as a battery, working like the formation that released Frenese’s seal did.

Keeping Dianthus away while taking his power, instead of putting him here seems deliberate. He could react while unconscious, breaking down the formation. Not that it matters now.

“Velvet.” Hyde said, interrupting her thoughts.

“Shut up and help me compare these sigils with the dream ones, my head it’s killing me.” If the formation was supposed to create a portal between the location of the Chained Man and the Death Realm in Cardomos’ pocket dimension, it needed to pass through the formation that surrounded it, the one Velvet had triggered once by saying Andras’ name.

In the past, she had broken down the dream formation in pieces, storing them in memory packets, where they remained closed off from her brain, so as to prevent corruption. Yet right now, she was opening those packets one by one, comparing them to the symbols on Cardomos’ formation, keeping the matching ones in her mind while locking once again the others.

Before repeating the same process with the next packet.

It wasn’t as difficult as it sounded. After all, knowledge mages were made for work like this, analyzing and breaking down information on small pieces, so as to build an understanding of the composition behind its existence.

They weren’t fighters; Velvet could never hope to compete on brute force or agility against the likes of Igern or Drifa, same way that they couldn’t match her on making and understanding the symbols and sigils that shaped charms and formations.

But, even so, the material Velvet was working with right now was rather volatile on the mind, even when she was making sure of only keeping the necessary stuff. Her blood temperature kept on rising slowly, almost boiling, matching with the increasing red lights.

A bead of sweat crawled down her face, sticking to her hair. She felt sick, almost feverish, but, with her time being limited, Velvet couldn’t exactly take a break.

At least Hyde was cooperating, filling some of the gaps on his own and sending them to Velvet. With his help, she was getting closer and closer to knowing the truth.

That part belongs to the portal that needs to fit Cardomos. She could enter simply by falling asleep, so the portal didn’t need to take her into consideration. Yet there’s another two parts, aside from the one siphoning Dianthus’ magic…

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One of those parts was even being activated before the portal, but wasn’t doing anything, just filling up with magic, connecting to the last part, which wasn’t active yet.

And yet, she understood what that last part did.

Velvet looked at Cardomos, who continued activating the formation, then at the sigils, how they lit up, moved and threaded between each other.

She had finally figured the reason behind her unease and distrust at his words.

“A minu-”

“You don’t need to lie.” She said, interrupting him… something she regretted when Cardomos momentarily glanced at her. Or in her general direction, to be more specific.

Well, Cardomos wasn’t lying per se, his plan was to go with the Chained Man and die there, but, like every single fucking mage Velvet had met, they told only a small part of the truth, hiding the rest so deeply that the spoken truth could be considered a lie.

The formation had a small ‘return’ portal included, not big enough to bring Cardomos back, which proved his decision to die there, but to return something.

Yes, something, not someone. The size was too small to bring something bigger than Velvet’s fist. And that’s why there was a part of the formation storing magic. It needed to activate the return portal even when Cardomos wasn’t there anymore.

Cardomos kept silent, and she saw him squinting slightly, to which she quickly added. “Not that I’m opposed to what you want to do, but I’d like to be told the truth. The whole truth.”

For Velvet, any information she could get about the dream was a boat she was riding into, even if it was just proving that bringing stuff from the dream was possible… as long as the stuff wasn’t the pitch black worms once again. But then, those didn’t need any portal to cross over.

“You’ve never seen Him in the flesh, right?” She used the same tone Cardomos did when speaking about the Chained Man. “Someone else told you about him.”

Since Cardomos didn’t deny the accusation, she continued.

“Honestly… this temple looks awful, nothing like an ex-Inquisitor would make to pray, and that statue… looks made by a five year old. If I was a god, I would feel insulted.” She looked to the sides, barely decorated. “This temple lacks first-hand devotion, among many other things.”

As if all the things used to represent the Chained Man were simply gotten from someone else. Someone not really into temples.

She whispered that last part, but the Goddess of Death chuckled nonetheless, covering her grin behind her fingers, even when her mouth was already covered by the veil. Cardomos didn’t find the comment as funny, though.

“Even if my devotion was born from gratitude towards a third party, I have followed my duties faithfully. I would discourage blaspheming against it.”

Why is mocking your beliefs the only thing that makes you react…?

“What I’m trying to say is, for who are you doing this? And for what end? You want to take something from Him, even when it will cost your life.” She let him understand that she knew what the formation was for, without saying it out loud.

… It was how mages spoke, after all. Too much behind the lines. Did they hope for the listener to unravel what they truly meant? Even so, if she wanted an Archmage to take her seriously, she would need to speak like a real mage, not a novice.

Cardomos took a deep breath, Velvet’s words showing some effect. He hadn’t stopped charging the formation for a second, even when its activation had slowed down at times.

“Flesh.” He finally said. “To devour is to become.”

“Flesh for whom?” She asked, eyes fixated on Cardomos, tracking even the smallest of his movements.

“The First Saintress of-” Once again, the name got mangled on Velvet’s mind, but this time, she found the culprit, it being the Corruption of Fate. Not that this was the best moment to confront its interference.

“And you are sure that His flesh would help her?” She didn’t ask for her name, not wanting to ask the same thing twice, losing Cardomos faith in her skills. It had taken her to almost boil all her blood just to prove her power, and she wasn’t going to mess it up now.

She would find that First Saintress if everything went fine. After all, flesh didn’t deliver itself.

“No. But if my life is the price for a chance to repay a debt written in blood, then I have no objections.”