Chapter 107: Limb from Limb
Nara sank herself into the lake. She would not drown.
There was nothing left for her to do but bear the pain and wait, however long it took.
*****
“Elder Sister,” Hellis said, her voice mournful, “I’ve failed you. I’ve failed the harmony.”
Raina Bow lifted her sister to her feet who had collapsed onto her knees is solemn reflection.
“No, sister, you have not failed us.”
“I have, sister. The outworlder will not accede.”
“I expected this outcome, younger sister.”
“You expected my failure…?”
“Hellis, you have succeeded through much of your life. Any of your failures have been minor, inconsequential. It is why you are one of the exceptional. This failure is a failure you must suffer for your growth. Think past your failure. What is it you must do next? What else is at your disposal?”
Hellis sighed, straightening her shoulders, and searching through her mind for what she has been taught. All that she must know to complete her missions effectively for the harmony.
“We can call for the astral vessel. Is it warranted?”
“I believe it is. I have peeked within the aura of that outworlder, and she possesses what I believe very few have. She is a vessel for her own soul, connected to the astral. If The Advent can learn of this power, recreate it then we possess the key to what those intolerable Messengers are born with.”
“What key, sister?”
“The key to everlasting harmony.”
*****
Aliyah awoke.
She was within a lake of stars. Glowing orbs surrounded her, drifting in that sea of stars like aimless bioluminescent jellyfish. She peered within them, and realized they contained objects, some of which she recognized.
Was that Chrome’s grill? She idly wondered.
She was within a lake, but she did not drown. She looked towards the surface, light streaming through the otherworldly scene in tranquil rays. She swam upwards, gliding as easily as an elegant angel fish, and breached the surface. Towards the shore, she saw a reassuringly familiar lakeside pavilion.
She swam towards it. Her body glided effortlessly through the water, as if it held no resistance at all. When she pulled herself out of the lake, the water slipped away from her body entirely. She was completely dry when she stepped ashore.
A gliding silver robe waited for her at the pier’s edge.
“Sage? Where is this?” She said with wonder. The magical energies of this place was a shifting kaleidoscope that felt alien yet so familiar.
“I suspect you know, miss Sahar.”
“This is…Nara’s Astral Domain. She’s mentioned it before.”
“It is.”
“What is this place? I mean truly, what is it?”
Aliyah could feel Nara’s aura with such clarity it was as if she breathed it through her body and ran her fingers though it’s spiritual power. She felt its power; enormous. Something an iron ranker should not possess.
“Miss Sahar, the soul is not so easily defined by rank.”
“Are you reading my mind?”
“The laws of this place are determined by Nara, except for one universal law. I do so in the same way the goddess of Knowledge bypasses this inviolable rule; such is the power granted to me in this realm.”
“You’re talking about the sanctity of the soul.”
“Miss Sahar, you are dead. Nara has placed you within her inventory, which is a part of her Astral Domain—her soul. Her soul is not just her soul. It is intricately woven with the astral. The magic of this domain is hers to determine. As such, this is her world. Should you wish to embark on the journey to the realm of the Reaper, Nara cannot keep you here.” A sleeve gestured somewhere—perhaps, to the ‘edge’ of the domain, if such a place could have an edge.
“You mean…if I want to die, permanently.”
“You would embark to what lies behind the veil of life.”
“I don’t,” Aliyah said firmly. “There is still so much to see, so much to learn, so much to discover…I had thought I had to give that up…” Aliyah’s eyes welled with tears, and she held them back, tempering her relief and elation—It wouldn’t do. She wasn’t alive, yet. “I cannot describe how glad I feel that I do not.”
“Then, you will stay here as long as it takes for Nara to find someone to revive you. With a bout of good fortune, it will not take long.”
Sage guided her to the lakeside pavilion where a warm cup of tea and some snacks had been prepared for her beneath a gazebo. Thanatos lay at the gazebo’s edge, tail still and ears drooped. He perked up momentarily at Aliyah’s presence, his tail wagging a few times before he settled into his gloom again, a puddle of shadow within shadows. Chrome sat at the table, calmly enjoying his own cup of tea.
“It has been some time, Chrome.”
“Aliyah,” he greeted flatly.
The familiar looked calm, but Aliyah sensed he was furious.
“What has made you so upset, Chrome?”
Chrome looked up at her, eyes sharp. “All of it, obviously.” And went back to brooding, although brooding was too mild a word for his brightness of emotion.
“If I have died,” Aliyah said, doing the best to parse her memories and the situation, “How have I ended up here, in Nara’s Astral Domain? She shouldn’t be able to access her inventory under ability suppression. Ceram had just…killed me.” The admission made her shiver. “Is Nara alright?”
It was a silly question to ask, but Aliyah didn’t know how else to voice her concern. Aliyah had died, and Nara must have managed to lift the suppression long enough to take Aliyah’s body into her Astral Domain. That, however, didn’t mean Nara was okay or safe. The thought of a despairing Nara, having exhausted all her energy to take Aliyah’s body, at Ceram’s mercy made Aliyah feel nauseous.
Chrome’s grip shattered his cup. It fixed itself, spilled tea floating it reverse to fill his cup once again. He threw it into the lake, where the shards of broken ceramic plunked beneath the surface in a melodic splash.
Aliyah hadn’t blinked, yet a new cup sat on the table as if it had never left. Chrome’s loss of composure shocked her; the familiar was always unflappable and arrogant. He seethed at the cup, his gaze such that he wanted to use telekinetic powers he didn’t have to crush the cup, but the cup did not acquiesce its physical integrity to his intangible anger.
Sage chuckled.
“She’s messing with me?” Chrome said. “She is messing with me when she isn’t even here?”
“Chrome,” Sage said in a chiding tone, “If you could refrain from taking your anger out on the dishware. They haven’t done anything wrong.”
“You want to know what happened?” he said, turning his attention from his vengeance against ceramics back to Aliyah’s inquiry.
“I have a feeling Nara won’t tell me later,” Aliyah said, “If you’re this angry, what actions she took to preserve my body was harmful to her in some way.
Chrome sighed, an edge taken off his anger. He looked out to the lake. “No, I was the one to tell her to rescue you. She hasn’t been harmed beyond what you’ve seen. But if you wish to ask, ask her.”
Aliyah blinked, surprised. “What do you mean?”
“This is her soul. She is always aware of what happens inside, on a subconscious level. Appeal to her.”
Aliyah blinked. It felt odd that she’d need to appeal to her friend when there was no physical form to direct her appeal to. She was constantly aware that this was her soul—she felt it, ever present, on everything she extended her aura to touch.
All it took was a questioning push of aura, and a physical form of Nara appeared before Aliyah, manifesting to respond to Aliyah’s need of a representation of herself. She barely had to appeal at all—Nara had always acquiesced quickly to her friends.
“Nara?” She said, surprised to see her teammate before her, looking calm and well put together.
“Hello, Aliyah,” she greeted.
“What is this? A doppelganger? Is it…an illusion?” Aliyah asked, unable to hold her curiosity.
“It’s an avatar,” Chrome said, answering for Nara, “It is Nara, but it is not Nara.”
“Is but isn’t? Chrome, could you explain more precisely?”
“Is magic really the realm where precision is possible?” Nara said.
Aliyah rolled her eyes at Nara’s usual inaccurate representation of magic, “It is as much of a ‘science’ as the ‘science’ of your world. There are rules and explanations.”
“What Chrome means is that this is a representation of me, but isn’t me,” Nara said. “If you saw me and my avatar side-by-side in this realm, you’d be able to feel the difference, if I let you.”
“If you let me?”
“It’s my realm so it’s all me. It’s going to all feel like me, unless I let other people sense the difference. My real body has something that these avatars don’t have.”
“What is that?”
“The ability to exist in reality. I can do almost anything here, the god of a Minecraft world, but I can’t translate code into mass, magic into reality. An illusion is a functionally similar representation.”
She could make certain objects real, but her mind and capabilities were quite limited. She had managed water, and could manage simplistic magical manifestations, like spirit coins.
Aliyah steepled her fingers, thoughtful, but remembered what her original query had been.
“I see you’re trying to distract me,” Aliyah said humorously. She appreciated seeing her friend so animated, even if it wasn’t representative of her real status.
“Am I?” said Nara slyly. “I’m just being a helpful guide of limbo and answering your questions.”
“What’s happening to you, outside of this place? What happened after I died?”
Nara’s lips pulled back into a frown.
“Nara,” Aliyah said, “What happened? You know no matter what you do, what I see, it’s not going to change how I feel about you.”
“Isn’t it fine to keep these memories to myself?” Nara said, her tone shifting into something more guarded. “We all have unpleasant memories we don’t want others to know about.”
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
“Nara, it can’t possibly be worse than what I’ve already seen.”
She grunted her unwilling acknowledgement of Aliyah’s point. She didn’t really have anything more to be ashamed or vulnerable of, in front of Aliyah.
The location shifted, and Aliyah was transported to a dark auditorium room. The seats were plush and reclining, made of a material similar to Erras’ leather, yet different—evidently, of an animal that did not exist of Erras. There was a large, flat white flexible screen that covered the far wall. Soft ground lighting lit up the walkway between the seats and the gradual stepped incline. She recognized the style of the room from what the Advent used in their facility, although the mechanism differed, as well as the lighting. For what purpose was it darkened? Did the projections not work if there was too much ambient light?
Nara and Aliyah were seated next to each other towards the back of the room, facing the theater screen.
“Darkening the room improves the quality of the viewing experience in a movie theater,” Nara said, answering Aliyah’s unvoiced question.
“What is a movie theater?” Aliyah supposed she knew what a theater was. “What’s a movie?”
“It’s about to start,” Nara said, not answer the question or giving Aliyah the knowledge directly, “I’ll give you some commentary along the way. Hope you don’t mind when people talk through.”
“You can’t just show me your memories directly?”
“I could,” Nara acknowledged, “But that’s invasive.”
“I don’t mind.”
“It’s still fresh to me, Aliyah, I mind.”
Aliyah reached over to squeeze her shoulder, and Nara’s stiff expression relaxed into something that could almost be called a smile.
*****
After five days, Lawrence and Amara had devised a ritual to detect astral spaces. In its initial iteration, the range was greatly limited, hundreds of feet at best, and almost no better than manual perception, although it at least was more thorough. The Adventure and Magic Societies dispatched adventurer and ritualist pairs, prioritizing suspect locations, then expanding block by block in a heuristic search pattern.
Sezan Aciano had arrived in Sanshi. As he dashed through the landscape expanding his aura to search, he confirmed what they already knew: the abducted researchers were within an astral space.
Another two days passed before Amara and Lawrence expanded the effectiveness of the array, increasing the range. It was not enough.
The Advent possessed efficient modes of transportation that did not require portals, same as Earth. They ran on magic power rather than fossil fuels and were similarly optimized for long distance travel in short periods. Moreover, thanks to magic, they possessed capabilities such as VTOL. Which meant, the search radius needed to be further expanded.
Another day, and the detection range of the ritual was expanded again. Beyond this point, Amara and Lawrence’s improvements to the ritual slowed.
At long last, after half a month, a sealed astral space was discovered. The Adventure Society had discovered a few other astral spaces in that time, but none of them were sealed. Sezan Aciano inspected each space and found nothing of note.
“This is the last one,” Zinnia said. “How long will it take for you to break the seal?”
“Not long,” Amara said.
With a quick and dirty yet surprisingly thorough suite of detection and test rituals (Amara’s own homebrew of analytic rituals), she narrowed down the locking mechanism of the seal. It wasn’t based off the magic theory of this world, but all magic had common roots.
“It’s an honor to see her work,” Lawrence said with awe. “She’s working with a ritual magic of an entirely different world and mastering it as she goes.”
“You spend a few hundred years with ritual magic, and you’ll reach this level,” Amara said.
“You’re a few hundred years old, Amara?” Zinnia commented with a curiosity not entirely innocent. “I didn’t know that.”
“I’m still young.” Amara paused and looked at the group. “Forget I said that.”
Zinnia Helianthae looked at her with very suspicious and narrowed eyes.
*****
The team that entered the astral space was Amara, Zinnia, Laius, and Redell. Sezan stayed outside in case he was needed, guarding the singular iron ranker they took along, Lawrence, who, if he could’ve melted into a puddle under the exclusive protection of a diamond ranker, would’ve done so and then evaporate like ice in Atisalhaya. Chelsea, who was also competent in ritual magic, stayed outside as well.
Sezan glanced at Chelsea.
“You’re not a gold ranker,” he said accusatorily. “Neither are those others.”
“No, we’re not.”
And that was that.
Lawrence’s mind rapidly processed this new information. If she was not gold rank, she was…His mind processed the information too quickly and Lawrence’s mind decided the best course of action was to pass out to stop thinking entirely.
“Oh,” Sezan said, catching the young man, who now draped over his arm limp noodled. “Whoops.”
If Lawrence had known that’d cause a diamond ranker to catch his swooning figure instead, he may have chosen a different course of action. Like remaining awake to deal with the stresses of reality.
Chelsea shrugged, “It’s not like Knowledge didn’t know already.”
“Why didn’t his goddess tell him?”
“Same as you. Same as us,” Chelsea admitted, a smile cracking from its tight line. “We like to have a little fun.”
*****
Nara would have been cathartically smug to know the moment Amara entered the astral space Raina knew she and all the other Adventists inside were dead.
Amara did not hide. The aura of an enraged diamond ranker burst from the astral space aperture, careful enough not to kill the normal and iron rankers inside from its sheer power, but clearly communicating its wrath.
“Is that Sezan Aciano?! How did he find us?”
An alarm was blaring within the facility. Upon the forceful release of the astral space seal, a message had been sent to the other side of the portal. There was nothing more she or the other Adventists inside the facility could do. She knew it was futile but ordered an evacuation in the remaining few seconds of life she had. Whether any made it through the portal to the other side depended on how much the diamond ranker cared to kill every Adventist in the facility. The ethics of killing lower rankers for diamond rankers varied from sparing no thoughts towards collateral damage to targeting only the important high rankers. She hoped it was the latter.
Little did Riana know the information she so coveted from Nara had been their very downfall. She turned to run towards the portal, but she was not faster than a diamond ranker. As the only gold ranker in the facility, she knew even if they let all the others go, she would be the only one to never escape. Even with the distance between them, diamond rankers were supersonic, on top of all the speed increasing and time manipulation powers Amara possessed within her Lightning Essence. Even if Raina had specialized in speed, she still wouldn’t have been able to outrun the literally lightning-fast Amara.
The diamond ranker looked like the avatar of lightning…and was clearly not a man (and therefore not Sezan Aciano). Her dark skin crackled with lightning; fractal patterns traced with gold lightning across her skin. Her leather and metal-accented armor was gold and black, as sleek as it was intimidating, crackling audibly like a thunderstorm coursed through its seams. An array of glowing translucent golden hands fanned out at her back, the arms of Buddha if Buddha had decided mercy was no longer an option. Each individual hand flexed and formed fists, each capable of independent action with the mental capabilities of a diamond ranker.
Raina looked like a deer caught in the headlights of an SUV so tall they inadvertently ran over children. She looked to her sides, only to see that shadows were restraining other Adventists with no chance to escape.
Amara extended a single fist towards Raina, “Do you desire the honor of death by battle or the shame of surrender? I would enjoy tearing you limb from limb. However brief it may be.”
Laius spoke, “Alive, Amara. Chelsea said so.” He was leaning against a wall casually, wreathed in garments of darkness.
Raina hadn’t noticed the second diamond ranker at all until he made a noise.
Amara groaned, “Can I still tear her limb from limb?”
“Alive.”
“That’s a yes!” Amara said brightly. A gold ranker would survive being torn limb from limb. “I’ll try to make this last as long as possible. If you want to make this fun, at least try to fight back.”
*****
With his diamond rank senses, Redell easily located Nara, as well as the rest of the captives around the compound. His senses encompassed the entire astral space, which was on the small side. He found Nara within a lake, sunk to the bottom like a statue lost to time. With no need to breathe, no bubbles drifted upwards as a normal indication of life, but Redell could sense her soul and lifeforce, battered as they were. One of Laius’ shadow clones dashed into the lake, retrieving Nara, and handing her to Redell. Redell narrowed his eyes: Laius hadn’t wanted his fur to get wet.
With his diagnostic perception, he detected the infestation that ate away at her flesh, releasing toxic afflictions that inflicted both pain and hallucinations. The suppression shackles on her wrists healed her and kept her alive through the infestation of a silver ranked magic beast swarm, and the fire elemental energy regulated the maximum population of the infestation so that it’d never grow to surpass the healing power of the shackles and kill her.
“Holy light of purgation, cleanse the flesh,” he chanted.
The power of a diamond rank healer fully cleansed Nara of her afflictions. It hadn’t removed the beetles, but all the afflictions affecting her. The ability also temporarily prevented more afflictions from accruing. She roused from her delirium; gaze unfocused at Redell.
“Another hallucination?” She murmured wearily. “This one has been done before.”
But the damage had been done to her psyche. Nara had spent over two weeks in delirium. Her ability to distinguish reality was thoroughly destroyed and needed time to recover. It would not be solved by just cleansing her of her afflictions. She did not know what to trust. Even as the afflictions fell away from her, so many other dreams had felt that real.
“We’ll sort you out, Nara,” he soothed. His aura, Inspiration, was inherently restorative and invigorating. Some color gradually returned to her pale and exhausted pallor. “Laius, gather the other captives.”
Redell removed an orb from his dimensional pocket, one similar to Chelsea’s skimmer, likely her creation as well. It unfurled into a long capsule, and Redell placed Nara within it. It was shaped like a long transparent pill encircled by a wreath of branches and a bed of leaves. It was an autonomous floating vehicle that Chelsea had designed for him to carry patients, boasting extremely high defenses, passive healing, cleansing, and pain dampening properties. He could expand the capsule to transport more patients or use one of his many others. For him, it was the best artifact he could have, aside from his magical instruments.
Jiro and the other researchers emerged into the hall, totaling 12. After they had seen Tyler and Aliyah die, 6 more chose to leave through the portal. Jiro was somewhat surprised that so many had stayed. Some had similar reasons to him; leaving their families was no different than death. Others had been inspired—Inspired to bear the risk of death.
“Are there any other injured?” Redell asked. “I am Redell Gainer, high priest of the church of the Healer.” He could diagnose them by eyesight, but it was best to ask before. He introduced himself to settle nerves and establish trust with the captives.
Jiro shook his head, “There’s just…her.”
They descended the spire in a sky ship the size of a small pleasure craft. It skimmed over the forest and slowly headed towards the entrance of the astral array. Amara landed on the deck of the ship with a thump, shaking the flying vessel.
“Be gentle, Amara,” Redell admonished. “Not everything is as sturdy as you are.”
“Chelsea made it so it’s fine,” she said.
“Chelsea doesn’t like it when you’re needlessly rough with her crafts,” Redell sighed. “And we have patients aboard.”
She stared at the capsule containing Nara.
She tossed what was left of Raina Bow onto the deck of the ship. Her limbs had been torn off, leaving her but a charred torso-only mannequin. She was alive; Merely separating the limbs from the body was not enough to kill a gold ranker. Not even decapitation would kill a gold ranker—they needed to be ripped to pieces. With her head and torso together, she had more than enough mass to stay alive.
The charred body made the rest of the former captive researchers flinch. They couldn’t recognize the mannequin torso as Raina, if not for the fact she spoke.
Raina stared up at the sky of the astral array. She could see even if her eyes had been burned through. It was one of the last vulnerabilities of an essence users’ body. Even at silver rank, most could manage to perceive without working eyeballs, although their competency suffered.
“Why would a diamond ranker interfere? This miniscule of an operation shouldn’t necessitate your movement.”
“You’re a gold ranker kidnapping iron and normal rankers. You have the audacity to pull rank? There is no one more shameful and lowly here than you.”
Raina could only bitterly admit the diamond ranker had a point.
“But why?” Raina repeated.
Amara sat down on the skimmer; legs spread wide like a monarch sitting on a throne. She ran her fingers over the wood of seat what her beloved had crafted.
“I’ll assume you did the bare minimum of investigating your targets.” She pointed to Nara, asleep within the capsule, “What did you find out about her? Anything that gave you pause?”
It gave Raina pause as she recalled Nisei’s warnings.
“She is teammates with Encio Aciano, grandson of Sezan Aciano,” she said. “But you are not Sezan Aciano.”
“Continue.”
“Are you his acquaintance?”
“As much as any of us diamond rankers know each other. There’s only so many of us and we occasionally meet. What else?”
“She…” Raina had a perfect memory thanks to her gold rank, and recalled the second warning she had dismissed, “…shares some relation with Amara Edea. They are not blood related but uses her last name.”
Amara directed her voice so that only Raina could hear it, an easy trick that even a gold ranker could accomplish.
“I had thought a gold ranker’s last name would have been enough. There are always a few errant researchers that have the idiotic idea of abducting outworlders and experimenting on them. We already know about their biology. They otherwise aren’t any different from a monster manifestation besides their soul. Yet, some think that they’ll somehow find something new with a new experimental subject. It’s folly. Devoid of any semblance of reasoning or good experimentation.”
Amara herself was a researcher and inventor. Those that thought they could cut corners with a rare experimental subject didn’t understand the essence of research, an essence that Earth and Erras shared: experiments and research needed repeatability. What could anyone gain by choosing the rarest of experimental subjects? There were those that believed rarity would make up for inadequacy. Amara detested their obvious lack in mental faculties, but knew they existed. Her last name should have been enough to dissuade those with ill-advised ideas.
“And I had thought,” Amara continued, irritable, “That the Aciano boy’s association would have been more than enough. You are arrogant, Adventist. You saw not one but two tails of a dragon and stepped on them, only to be surprised when they turned to unleash their wrath?”
She was Amara Edea, Raina realized. She would soon realize that she was wrong on two fronts, Sezan Aciano had come to help at his grandson’s behest.
If only Lina hadn’t interfered, Raina thought. She had been so close to stepping through that portal. Nara’s fingertips had nearly brushed the surface, and she had been so close, so infuriatingly close, to crossing that boundary. Then, she and all the others inside the facility would be gone, and Raina wouldn’t be lying here, miserable and in pain, reduced to a limbless torso at the mercy of a wrathful diamond ranker.
“If only we broke her,” Raina said. “I wouldn’t be here.”
“You seem to have the wrong idea about my student,” Amara said. “You can’t break her without destroying her. She is simultaneously very fragile and very strong—like a diamond. I’m sure you’ve read her aura, so you know what I’m referring to.”
“The soul torture.”
“In a choice between enslavement and death, she will choose death. Twice now, she has been offered that choice but with no option of death. What is her choice then? Enslavement? She will never choose enslavement. The denial of that choice is woven into the very fabric of her being, the sole value her soul holds unshakable at its core.”
Raina was silent. If the diamond ranker was right, even if she had gone through the portal, they’d run into continual resistance. And once the shackles preserving her life had been removed…
“What did she do?” Raina asked, who despite her limbless predicament, was transfixed by the story.
“She annihilated herself. The fact that she exists at all, by her own claim, was ‘a whim of the astral’.”
Essence users were bosom friends with chance and fortune. Their abilities, while they had some influence over the outcome, were random, and they had grown their abilities with those irreversible selections. Their abilities were whims of the cosmos.
“To force a soul to the brink of annihilation for the second time,” Amara snarled. “How very harmonious.”
*****
The ship passed through the astral space aperture, rejoining on the other side with Chelsea and Sezan. Redell glanced at Lawrence who had passed out and was laid on the ground.
“What happened to him, and do I have to heal him?”