– Era of the Wastes, Cycle 219, Season of the Rising Sun, Day 34 –
Terry stared back into the cold vampiric eyes behind the window-like ground. He clenched his king spear tightly and took a deep breath. “Could be worse.”
How could it possibly be worse? A man is dying because of me. I can’t move in the shadow plane. I’ll have to return to the regular plane and that’s where they are waiting. Even if I can see from here to the other side, that doesn’t mean—
“Yeah, but I can see the other side, which limits their options,” stressed Terry to himself. “And I’m alive. If that was all they can do, then we’re at a stalemate.”
Except for the healer dying. For my healer dying because of me. What was his name? I barely spoke to him.
G…something.
Ga… Ge… Go… Ge… Georg. His name is Georg.
Terry exhaled slowly and then lifted his foot to step to the other side.
Let’s get this over with.
The instant Terry arrived in the regular plane, he unleashed his disruption field. Far below all the intense sensations from his unleashed mana touching the ground, there was a faint prickling in his mind.
“Amusing,” said the vampire flatly.
Terry could see his spell slicers and lower-density mana accumulate at a fixed range around himself. He recognized the effect as a spatial distortion that stretched space. He had seen a dungeon use it to protect its core. He had also experienced martialists using an artifact with similar effects against him.
Even though Terry knew it would fail, he still tried to burst his way through the stretched space. His damaged mana channels immediately protested his futile efforts. His oscillating mana would not help him here.
They have done their research.
Terry could only lament the fact that his enemies had plenty of time to gather information on his weaknesses while he himself didn’t even know whom to look into. They were facing him. He was facing a faceless army of invaders and traitors.
Well, not exactly faceless…
Terry glowered at the masked vampire who was lurking safely behind the spatial distortion, together with the other three and their captive.
They must have set this up while I was in the shadow plane. And they lured me into the shadow plane, so that I wouldn’t sense what was going on here.
Even though he wanted to cut their throats, Terry still felt a semblance of respect for their maneuvering. They had exploited his personality. They had nullified his strengths. They had utilized three traitors from different factions. Three folks that could not be any more different in background, bearing, or reputation.
“What do you want?” demanded Terry. He knew he was trapped. His inability to move in the shadow plane and the stretched space in the regular plane ensured that he couldn’t go anywhere.
So what?
Terry was already used to so much worse. He might be trapped, but unless they had a way to bypass his disruption domain and immovable objects, they couldn’t do anything to him.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t just him. Terry could not help but glance at the immobile channeler. His healer that had been inflicted with spirit poison. Georg was dying.
“The question is rather, what do you want?” The voice of the elven vampire was icy.
Mind games.
Terry snorted. “Well, how about you kill yourself and the traitors? Oh and if someone could bring me some chocolate and mana-imbued tea, that would be great.”
“The tea might be arranged.” The vampire’s tone did not change. “You don’t seem to take me seriously, but I am serious.” He tilted his head. “We only serve to fulfill people’s desires with simple favors in return.”
The city guard in the back harrumphed and glared at the vampire with loathing eyes.
“Please, man,” whimpered the hunter and scratched his hands bloody. “I’ve done my part, no? Please. They don’t have the stuff in the city anymore and I need it.”
Cold red eyes moved from Terry to the hunter and back. “You see, some people are not satisfied with mere pleasure, they crave ecstasy.” He retrieved a bottle from a storage item and held it out. “We offer to fulfill their desire.”
The hunter eagerly grabbed the bottle and drank it without hesitation. A slight haze flickered in his eyes and his twitchy hands finally rested while he exhaled blissfully.
Terry recognized the bottle’s mana signature and connected the different pieces of information. That bottle had contained the magic narcotic rumored to be from the Lich Kingdoms. It appeared that the rumors were true and that the Lich Kingdoms were now cutting off the supply to turn the screw on the city’s addicts.
“Is this how you force people to betray their own city?” growled Terry while pointing at the high hunter.
“We’re not forcing anyone,” returned the vampire without even the slightest hint of emotion. “We offer to fulfill people’s desires. They are free to choose.” He gestured at the hunter. “He wanted this. He’s a free man.”
“Free?” scoffed Terry. He could not help but recall his experience in the dungeon again. The clash between his immediate feelings and the person he wanted to become. “The urges you call desire, it looks like he is a slave to them. You call that freedom?”
“To be free is to fulfill your own desires,” said the vampire flatly. “To claim differently is pointless sophistry.”
“That’s all swell, but I’d like to be paid now,” interjected the Guildhead. “Even though he spoiled everything up to the fourth scenario, I delivered. He’s even alive and still kicking. I would think that deserves a bonus, but I know who I’m talking to.”
“Here is the payment you desire,” said the vampire and tossed a storage ring to the woman.
The Guildhead inspected the contents and grinned. “You always pay the best. Pleasure doing business. If you have more things you need done in the city, send me a message. You know my rates.” With those words, she stepped into the shadows and left.
“You may not like the choices some folks make, but it’s their choice.” The vampire addressed Terry. “We’re not forcing them. They are free.”
The city guard snorted again with derision.
“Free to be your slaves?” challenged Terry. He did not know what the point behind this conversation was.
“Free to be themselves,” corrected the vampire. “Whoever that might be.” The elf leaned closer. “You’re not the first to find true freedom daunting. For those like you, we can offer to show the shackles you yearn to impose on yourself. To take them off, or to replace them. Whatever you desire.” He gestured at the immobilized healer. “Do you desire to save this man’s life?”
“Yes,” replied Terry instantly.
“If that is truly your desire, then I can offer that to you,” said the vampire. “In exchange, you will open your mind for me to place a geas.”
“Piss off,” growled Terry.
“Then I take it you don’t truly desire to save this man’s life?” challenged the vampire. “Are your desires this shallow? Or are we haggling about the price? To show how much this man’s life is worth to you?”
“I won’t open my mind to anyone or anything,” hissed Terry. “No matter what.”
“Then I have another offer,” said the vampire. “Before the count arrives, you’ll slip something into the food of the man they call the Whisperer.”
“Go die, you little shitstain,” hissed Terry with a scowl. “I’m not doing any of that.”
“Then it appears that you have lied,” said the vampire. “You claimed that you desire to save this man’s life, but you act to the contrary.” The elven man shrugged. “It is not for me to judge people’s desires, but I find it distasteful if someone denies who they truly are.” He tilted his head. “You want this man dead? That can be arranged, too.”
“What? No!” Terry stepped forward only to find the familiar sensation of stepping into stretched space.
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“Finish him,” ordered the vampire with a look to the city guard.
“Why don’t you do it yourself?” The city guard barked back.
“Because I have you,” retorted the vampire mercilessly. “Do I need to remind you that your daughter and your son-in-law are living in our territory now? They remain alive because of your use to us. If you desire them to live their lives, kill him.”
“No!” shouted Terry.
“Sorry, Guardian,” sighed the city guard and drew his blade. “But I have no choice.” He drew his blade across Georg’s throat before piercing it through the bottom of the man’s skull and into his brain. “A choice between my family and him isn’t really a choice.”
Terry stared incredulously at the cold-blooded murder.
“That is a man who truly desires to preserve a life he cherishes.” The vampire gestured at the city guard while looking at Terry. “A man that isn’t just deceiving himself and others. A man that acts according to what he claims to desire. A man that chooses to do whatever is necessary.”
Terry saw the life fade out of Georg’s eyes and focused on his breathing to remain calm. The man had only come because he was assigned as Terry’s healer.
His name was Georg.
“You can go now.” The vampire informed the hunter and city guard. “I’ll contact you when I need anything else.” He returned his gaze to Terry and he gestured at the corpse of the channeler. “That death is your responsibility.”
“I wasn’t the one who killed him,” hissed Terry.
“No, but you’re the one who refused to save him,” retorted the vampire.
Terry focused on his breathing and growled. “I don’t care what you have to say. I won’t do whatever it is you want from me. After this spatial distortion wears off, I’m coming for you.”
“I won’t go anywhere,” said the vampire. “I don’t have to talk, but I will listen to whatever you have to say. When you are ready to admit your desires and act accordingly, I will be here to greet the true you.” He leaned in closer. “I’ve found that a few days of isolation without food or water can be very enlightening.” He tilted his head while looking emotionlessly at Terry. “Put a nice meal in front of a person after that and they shed their self-delusions and stop denying their undeniable desires.”
Terry scoffed quietly while holding the vampire’s gaze. It appeared the vampire’s research on him was lacking. Even ignoring that his mana foundation would allow him to go more than ‘a few days’ without physical nourishment, he did not really worry about a lack of food or water.
His storage items were filled to the brim with food supplies thanks to his dungeon-induced hoarding habit that had been exacerbated by his experiences in the Elusive Fog of Frost and the martialists’ isolated pocket realm. He had stocked up just before the attack on the city, because he had thought he was going to leave for Arcana along the scenic route.
As for the threat of isolation in itself?
Don’t make me laugh.
Terry snorted with derision. He had survived a dungeon full of ghouls in Tiv. A damned prison cell for blood sports in Thanatos. A double-cursed dungeon tomb infested with martialists in the Union.
The Lich Kingdoms wanted to threaten him with taking a break under a beautiful blue sky?
Laughable.
Terry rolled his eyes and clicked his tongue. He looked around and spread his mana and followed it closely with mana sight. He spread it into the sky and ground to test the limits of the stretching space. To his immense chagrin, the vampire had been thorough and had covered all different directions around Terry.
Terry tentatively tried to summon a divine hammer beyond the reach of the stretched space, but unsurprisingly, he failed. Even if failure came as no surprise, he could not help but look unsatisfied.
Terry’s mind raced and while he was exploring his options, he activated his soulsight to discover that the vampire in front of him was either soulless or had a means to hide his soul. “You are soulless?”
“I thought you don’t care about what I have to say?” The snarky remark was delivered in an entirely emotionless tone. “You’ve changed your mind faster than expected.”
“I take that as a yes,” said Terry and rolled his eyes. The vampire was getting under his skin, but he also felt like fishing for information.
“Those like me benefit from being soulless,” said the vampire. “If I had arrived first, you would not have been able to disturb our plans. Your soulsight was unexpected and unfortunate. An unfortunate prolonging of suffering. Avoiding soulsight is just one of the benefits of being soulless. It also allows us to be more effective when using some of the means at our disposal.”
Terry detected a purple magic move from the vampire to himself and realized what was going on. “You’re trying to infect me with karmic rot?”
“Do you desire me not to do so?” The vampire tilted his head. “You know the terms.”
If he isn’t worried about catching soulrot himself, because he’s soulless, then why should I worry? Can’t he see that I’m soulless? The other vampire claimed I was lying, but….
Terry felt the itch to fish for more information again. “Even if you want to infect me, I don’t think you can.”
“Because of your peculiar soul?” questioned the elven vampire. “I have to admit, I haven’t seen anything like it before, but I’ve also never seen the karmic rot fail to infect a soul of folks.”
Terry made a mental note to figure out what was going on with his soul. He still did not believe that Rafael had been lying to him about being soulless in Thanatos. Not that the ambitious martialist was above lying, but there had been no reason for the sticky-fingered felan to lie about that.
Terry decided to surround himself with a narrow disruption field and place layers of divine barriers and immovable ice against the soul magic just in case.
When Terry pulled on the more distant mana he had spread earlier, he felt a barely perceptible prickling in his mind again. A faint feeling that was rolling underneath the more prevalent sensations from his closer mana touch field.
That’s… my mana.
Terry hurriedly avoided the vampire’s gaze and covered his mouth with his hand in order to hide his honest face.
He was sure.
On their way here, Terry had maintained his usual mana detection bubble. He had not bothered to reclaim all mana when they had switched into the shadow plane, because his mana pool had already been full at that point – thanks to his regeneration outpacing the natural decay of his dumped mana.
Terry closed his eyes and concentrated.
That mana was his.
It was beyond the stretched space, but it was his nonetheless. He could reach it. His general mana control exceeded his control of the divine hammer inscription by far and in contrast to the inscription, Terry didn’t need the mana to cross the stretched space, because it was already on the other side.
That mana might have started to decay a bit, but it was still his. Terry clawed at it while stretching his mana control to its limits and claiming all that he had left behind. He tried harvesting additional mana at a distance, but failed again. Claiming mana that was still partially naturalized by him felt worlds easier than harvesting free mana from scratch in this manner.
Terry took a deep breath. He knew he wasn’t a good liar, so if he wanted to avoid having his plan show on his face, he better distract himself. He sat down cross-legged and looked through his storage items.
He placed several metal rods on the ground in order to imprint them. For most of his time, this was the extent of his contribution to the city’s defense preparation anyway. It hardly mattered if he would create his wands in the Flower House or here with the creep.
Except, here I’m not getting healed because I let my healer die in front of me.
Terry ignored his intrusive thoughts and ostensibly focused on his imprinting while covertly moving his reclaimed mana around to scout for the mana signatures of his allies.
He just needed one reliable messenger to contact Edmund, Akemi, or Thiago. They might be on the defensive, but against a single creepy vampire, the city had enough forces it could muster. If they managed to catch the vampire alive, then perhaps they could gather some valuable intel?
However, if I show my remote finger runes to the wrong person, I risk them taking precautions. I must not be found out by another traitor working for the Lich Kingdoms.
He took a deep breath.
I’ll figure it out.
He glowered coldly at the red vampiric eyes watching him. I’ll make you regret this. Today, you’ve trapped the wrong mage. I’ll show you and I’ll shove those poisoned offers right back into your throat.
***
“He sure walked right into that,” muttered a canan in crimson uniform.
“Even we didn’t know that the city guard had been turned,” grumbled Ruby. The dwarven woman was furrowing her brow and making coded notes in a pocket notebook. “That one is dangerous. Edmund knows better than to put an addict or opportunist mercenary into vital positions of command, but he wouldn’t see a betrayal of that man coming. We might have to consider exposing the city guard, but first we’ll wait and see.”
“Should we help the Whetstone Arcanian?” asked an elven soldier from Ruby’s squad. “After the infiltrators spin their story for the Guardian’s absence, the city will probably be flailing.”
“Yeah, ‘the Guardian’ has become the mascot of the city’s defense,” snorted an older human soldier.
“I think he has earned that position, don’t you?” Ruby chortled.
“With reckless actions and foul gambles,” snorted the human soldier. “I don’t believe he’s an operative for a second.”
“If he’s not as skilled as had been suspected, then it puts a different light on his recklessness as well, no?” challenged Ruby. “Calculated risk taking, even if I don’t fully understand the calculation.”
“Maybe he’s just bad at math,” quipped an elven soldier.
“Same puzzle as before.” Ruby shrugged. “If he’s acting, then he’s damned good at it. If he’s an operative here to inspire coordinated push-back against the Lich Kingdoms, then I have to give it to him.”
Ruby smirked slightly. “A single person forcing a stop to an undead horde. A man working tirelessly to protect the city that had conspired against him. Unflinchingly breaking into undead armies and persevering despite already looking like death himself. A stranger to the region that pulls all people together.”
Ruby laughed. “A human member of a traditionalist dwarven whanau wielding the divine hammer and following in the elven footsteps of the Valkyrie to push back the Lich Kingdoms.” She clicked her tongue. “Even Thanatos couldn’t write better propaganda for either Arcana or the Guardians.”
Ruby put away her coded notebook and shrugged. “Doesn’t make our job any easier. Just because a story sounds too good to be organic and authentic, doesn’t mean it is artificially crafted.” She looked over her squad. “We still have to sieve through the bullshit to get an accurate picture of the Whetstone Arcanian.”
Ruby looked towards her elven subordinate. “No, we won’t interfere just yet. We might be helping them to push back the Lich Kingdoms, but that doesn’t mean we’re on the same side. This is an opportunity to observe how Whetstone deals with it.”
The elven soldier from Thanatos nodded.
“Did we get any new information on the others looking for the Whetstone Arcanian?” asked Ruby.
“Even though we have planted false leads, they’re still closing in steadily. For now, they are tied down on the east side of the Union though,” replied the second dwarven woman in crimson uniform. “Reports are still conflicting. Dozens of individuals in some reports. More than fifty in the most recent report in which the punishment hall of a martial sect has been crushed completely. The most concerning point remains that they manage to bypass all detection before taking action.”
“That and the fact that they seem to have a nose for sniffing out false leads,” mumbled Ruby pensively.
***
Terry had been patiently biding his time for nearly two days when his honest face failed to hide his smirk any longer…
***