And while Purple birthed the heavens, there were no bounds to its deceit. Craving authority over the pantheon and possessing the craft to execute its will, it was only in collective banishment that the color gods were free of its tyranny. So that no sentient would carry the mark of Purple. So that no sentient would look into the night sky and remember their shame.
– Valyra Twice, secondborn of the first Twice tyrant, Book of Twice
Chapter 14 – The Colors of Susie Q
The dull metal gave way to a radiant light that pulsed with each subsequent strike of Toki’s hammer. The air itself seemed to warp and shimmer around the chain. This metal takes mana so well. I won’t even need aeso – I can burn the manascript directly into the metal.
"This library is strange," murmured Edgar, his feathers ruffling in a silent breeze that stirred from nowhere.
"It’s beautiful, no?" Kristina replied, a note of awe threading her voice.
As Toki continued to work the enchantment, the decay that clung to the space continued to peel away in fragments, revealing the splendor that lay beneath—a grandeur that defied time and neglect. The chandelier above sparkled, casting a golden sheen over a world transformed. The sagging shelves straightened, proud and resolute once more.
"Is this us? Did we do it?" Toki marveled at the spectacle unfolding around them, while focusing on the chain.
The library answered their call to adventure with a symphony of arcane energy, swirling around them—a vortex of potential. And at the center of it all, Toki's hammer connected once again with the ever-brightening chain.
Toki worked the hammer with a resolute cadence, hammering each glyph in meter. Each strike sent a pulse of flame and mana deep into the core of the unknown metal’s links, its dull gray sheen catching fireflies of light that soon flourished into a steady glow. The chain was a compliant mana vessel, eagerly drinking in the energy without the need for engraved runes to guide its flow, though Toki still cast [Charge Sphere] now to keep the hammer’s momentum from disrupting the internal enchantment configuration.
Toki chose the path of internal enchantment at this juncture—a silent whisper of power rather than the screaming of etched sigils. I wonder what metal this is. My hammer is adamant. This is definitely NOT adamant. The decision to preserve the metal’s integrity was a testament to her understanding of her craft, an intimate finesse that would win her ancestors’ approval—if they had ever granted her such a courtesy. This metal is precious.
The library became a resonating chamber for Toki’s rhythmic pounding. The ambient torchlight flickered in tune, as if dancing to the music she orchestrated. The library itself served as the harmony. With it, Toki's labor took on an almost sacred quality. The scene was a fever dream ballroom, wrought with chiaroscuro contrasts: the white-haired artisan, her figure haloed by errant sparks and constellations and framed by the dancing torchlight and ethereal philharmonics.
As the enchantment began to form within the chain, Toki's breath slowed to match the steady cadence of her hammer. Beside her, Edgar extended a trembling hand. A silver river of mana leapt from his fingertips, mingling with Toki's own flame as they poured their combined intent into the manascript within the chain.
It was then that the specter of memory rose unbidden in Toki's mind, thrusting her back in time. Susie Q, her friend and rival, drove this enchantment. It was a memory of her. It was an enchantment in her name.
Susie's voice echoed through the corridors of Toki’s thoughts, a mocking tone that danced around the edges of concentration.
--
"Tokyo, darling, do you really believe in those children's tales?" Susie Q's tone had been honeyed with derision, her words a pointed barb aimed at Toki's fondness for the mythic.
"More than I believe in your chances of succeeding tonight," Toki had shot back, her retort as sharp as her hammer. But even as she spoke, her heart had indeed clung to the stories of old—the color gods who wove the fabric of existence with deft, unseen hands.
"Sculptors of reality! Painters of the void! You speak of them as though they might walk among us, Tokyo. That you walk among them."
"Perhaps they—," Toki had whispered, half to herself before being interrupted, her eyes lost in the flickering forge light.
"Perhaps they're just another set of chains," Susie Q had countered, her laughter a jarring note amidst the rhythm of the flames.
“Then why did you choose Red, she was—”
“Oh Toki, you know who else is Red? Mirriam Calapo, the designer of the first floating ship, Elderbass Corinthan, he who made hearthstone fire sing, Benny Cumberbatch, the inventor of the cheapest short-range teleportation to date! I will fit in among the legends. The scientists of the era.”
“But they believed in Red, they had—”
“Heh, you know nothing Toki.”
“You didn’t even let me—”
“What, finish complaining about me choosing Red? You should have, too. You would be perfect amongst the Red.”
"Among the pantheon, the Purple god was mysterious." Toki began, her voice a low thrum barely audible over the sonorous beat of Susie’s hammer, "Purple was a lonely deity shrouded in questions, but asked just as many in turn. I know you. Of all people! You. Relish the questions." As Toki’s voice took on a melodic quality, Susie stopped her enchanting and listened in earnest. She was always drawn to a story. It’s about the only time I can get a full thought out anymore.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
"Purple traversed the void firmament, or whatever existed in those before-times. Ever solitary. Its essence remained untouched by the trivial skirmishes of its kin. Red fueled the fire of war, and yellow, ever the steadfast ally, joined to claim power over the others."
Susie swung her hammer, the impact sending a shimmer through the air, as if the very fabric of reality quivered at the mention of the gods.
"Purple, cloaked in twilight, spun the heavens with delicate threads of nebulous dust. Ever the creator. Ever the grand illusionist. With quiet grace, it wove the tapestry of night, arranging the stars—and in their cradles of darkness, worlds were born. Stars came to exist."
"Yet! Despite its labors," she continued, her voice barely above a whisper fraught with reverence and sorrow, "the Purple god was the only one denied its own canvas in the skies it had imagined." Toki watched as Susie’s hammer fell into a steady cadence, a requiem for the uncelebrated architect of the cosmos. "Even the envious Green, with its verdant touch, sculpted realms alongside Blue's tranquil waters and tempestuous stars—but Purple... Purple remained an outcast, its contributions unseen in the sky."
“Purple was either a dreamer, Toki, or the grand puppeteer. Purple’s ambition knew no bounds. Who knows what really happened.”
“Heh.” Toki flashed a grin. “So, you do believe.” She laughed as Susie blushed and continued hammering.
Susie sighed, "Such was the fate of Purple," Susie’s final swing infused her manacast motor with life. "A creator without claim, a god without glory."
--
The mana flared brighter within the links of the chain, as if yearning for more of the memory. Toki paused, her muscles tensing.
The room seemed to hold its breath, and even the shadows leaned closer, drawn to the somber beauty of the intent. Edgar's silver manastream intertwined with Toki's, their combined force wrapping the chain in a cocoon of potential, as if to console the forsaken deity.
Toki's hammer fell into a rhythm that seemed to echo the sorrow of the stars themselves, each strike a silent ode to the outcast Purple god. The library's ancient volumes absorbed the sound, their leather spines shivering in the palpable aura of power.
It was then, amidst the thick air of enchantment and the musical laments for a deity scorned, that Edgar and Kristina, too, materialized within the confines of Toki's memory.
--
“Toki, Susie!” Edgar called out.
Their sudden appearance was like the gentle caress of a familiar breeze, controlling the atmosphere. Kristina, meanwhile, remained an enigma shrouded in shadow, her form indistinct yet somehow solidifying within the memory.
"Feathers!" Toki greeted.
"Is she talking about Purple again? Heh, I’m going with yellow. Yellow fits my bushido best." Edgar replied. “You’ll never convince me to go Purple.”
“How about you, Kristina? We all know Edgar’s a lost cause.” Susie chimed in.
“Hmmm, I haven’t thought about it much. I suppose I would pick black. Black suits me, it’s my color.”
As Toki’s gaze landed upon Kristina, a deep chill skittered down her spine, her skin prickling with the sudden recognition. There is no Black god. Grey. Grey calls upon the notes of black. Grey is the color you choose if you don’t believe. Grey is what you choose if your fate has drawn you into hatred towards the color gods. The comforting illusion shattered, yielding to the monstrous truth.
Kristina's body, massive and arachnid, became clear—she was the embodiment of creeping dread, eight eyes glinting with an otherworldly intelligence, eight legs straddling her hairy thorax.
“I’ll choose black.” Kristina confirmed.
Gods, Toki gasped, her heart thundering in her chest as if trying to escape the unsettling revelation. The warmth of the memory felt stolen away, replaced by an icy void as vast as space itself.
--
Her hammer hovered mid-air, paralyzed by the grotesque beauty and sheer horror of the creature that was Kristina—a big-ass spider in all its terrifying splendor.
For a moment, Toki's enchanting faltered, her muscles caught in a web of fear, yet also fascination. She could have killed us, and we wouldn’t have even realized. The illusion of the room, once alive with the rhythm of creation, now shattered into what it truly was. A dusty library from a long past age.
Drawing in a steadying breath, Toki anchored her resolve in the thrumming mana that coursed through her veins. The presence of the monstrous arachnid beside her was a disquieting shadow at the edge of her perception, but she would not let fear rule her. Not in this moment.
Fight or flight. Act natural. For real this time.
She raised the hammer once more. The final blow came down with a cacophony that reverberated through the cavernous library. Discordant even.
A radiant shimmer cascaded along the links as they drank deeply of her final offered mana. Light pooled and swirled within the metal. Each link became a microcosm of wonder, infused with the time before time she wove into the story. The chain glowed, pulsating with an inner life, as the enchantment crystallized under the group’s efforts.
The air itself seemed to hold its breath. As the glow stabilized into a steady luminescence, Toki felt the rush of accomplishment flood her senses.
[Tokyo Twice, Edgar Featherstone, and Kristina an Unbound Soul of the Mercy Queen of Spiders, have created a unique enchantment]
[So Susie Shall Bind Purple (Weapon / Class C / Mortal): Use a truth, untold or stolen, to bind another in the chains between time.]
[Enchantment is incomplete. An auxiliary enchantment may be required.]
She had succeeded; the chain now bore an internal enchantment potent enough to rival one of Oberon’s. I’ll have to think about this. How was this so potent? Such ad hoc crafting was possible? She snapped the thought away, fixing her attention back to the present. Kristina. The fuck is an Unbound Soul?
Amidst the torrent of elation, a creeping but visceral thread of anxiety twined around her heart. The horror of Kristina's form loomed. Toki's pulse hammered a frenetic rhythm, echoing the pounding of her hammer, as realization dawned on her with chilling clarity. We’re in deep elfshit.
There, mere paces away, reposed a creature of nightmares, its multitude of eyes reflecting the enchanted glow with an inscrutable sheen.
Kristina, the eight-legged monstrosity of chitin and silk, edged closer to Edgar with an unsettling movement. The spider's multifaceted eyes caught the dimming chandelier lights, glittering with a predatory sharpness that sent shivers skittering down Toki's now visible goosebumps. In that moment, she saw the creature not as a silent observer, but as a specter of doom for her feathered companion.
Toki swallowed the knot of trepidation that threatened to silence her spirit. With an act of will, she tethered her racing thoughts to the shimmering chain before her.
In this fraught situation, where hope contended with dread, the library—a mausoleum of knowledge and secrets—was now a silent witness to their standoff. Toki's gaze flickered between Edgar and the colossal arachnid, her mind racing with possibilities and plans, each more desperate than the last.
"Edgar!" Toki's voice shattered Edgar’s own high. "Mana, now! Infuse the chain!"
[Quest: Hunt! Defeat the spider queen!]