“Keiran, it’s time to stop.”

I ignored Querit and started preparing the reagents for the next experiment.

“Keiran! Please.”

Force magic chopped the herb into thin slices, then did a second pass to dice them into cubes.

“Keiran…” Querit reached out to grab my shoulder.

I shrugged him off and turned an angry glare on the golem. “I don’t have time to stop right now.”

“It’s been a month. I haven’t seen you sleep. You cannot tell me that the quality of your work hasn’t suffered.”

“I’m not going to argue with you about this. You know how important it is,” I said.

“I agree. It’s important. I will stay here and keep things running while you sleep, but please, please, go find your bed.”

I’d burned through the reagents I’d gotten from Shel’s new village faster than I’d wanted, but Hyago had come through for me and now had no less than five of his druids working in shifts to keep up with me. Each batch was a bit smaller than the last, but it was enough to keep pushing forward. We’d find the answer sooner or later, but only if we kept looking.

“Why are you so obsessed with this experiment?” Querit asked, not for the first time. “We have other sources of mysteel. It might take us a few extra years, but you weren’t in such a rush before.”

“You damn well know why,” I said, jerking myself free of Querit’s hand.

Six weeks ago, the gestalt had contacted me to let me know that something had appeared on Yulitar. It wasn’t much, just a single, solitary tower peeking out of the ground, but there was only one person capable of making it. And if Ammun had built it, that meant there was a reason. Maybe that reason was just that he was getting a spot of revenge by making us panic, but I couldn’t assume there wasn’t any greater purpose.

And if that was the case, then we needed to get things resolved down here before he showed back up. My mysteel generators were running full tilt inside the tower’s foundations, starving it of mana and producing the all-important metal at the same time. It wasn’t as fast as taking a metaphorical sledgehammer to it and breaking it to pieces, but it did have the upside of probably not killing everyone living inside it. They’d have plenty of time to realize the mana was gone, that it wasn’t coming back, and that there was no reason to stay.

I hoped.

“This isn’t the way to do it. You’re not thinking right. What happens if that lich shows up tomorrow and you’re in this state?”

“This is all I can do to prepare,” I said.

“Well…”

“Well, what?”

“Have you looked at the valley’s mana levels in the last few days?” Querit asked.

I frowned. “No… Why would…” My eyes popped wide open as I realized what he was saying. “We hit our threshold?”

“As far as I can tell, yes.”

“Even with all the mana we’ve been burning?”

“See for yourself,” Querit said. “And then go get some sleep. You’re going to need to be in good shape.”

When I’d advanced my core to stage seven, I’d planned on quickly taking the next step to stage eight. That plan hadn’t worked out for a very simple reason. I didn’t have enough mana. Stage seven involved creating an astral body double that existed inside the Astral Realm, essentially multiplying my capabilities and allowing me to easily handle heavy mana.

Stage eight was the forging of the mage’s shadow, which was essentially the creation of two more astral bodies, except one of them existed in this world. The shadow was connected to me, but could operate independently and couldn’t be truly destroyed. And the amount of mana needed to create it depended entirely on how powerful the stage seven mage was.

I was significantly more powerful than I’d been the last time I’d reached stage seven, and not just because I’d taken advantage of the opportunity to build my mana core perfectly. Something about my reincarnation had caused my core to exceed even my most optimistic expectations as far back as stage two, and that advantage had only been growing each time I advanced.

In short, I’d underestimated the amount of mana I’d needed significantly, so much so that it had taken over six months for my demesne, itself practically a mana dynamo with a fragment of moon core buried beneath a petrified forest of living stone, to make what I needed. In all fairness, I spent my mana quite readily these days and probably could have shaved a month or two off the buildup if I’d tried.

Advancing to stage eight would be a significant advantage if it came to another fight with Ammun. I would have done it months ago if I could have. If everything was ready now, then Querit was right. I needed to take a break from my attempts to integrate mysteel into the plant monster’s biometal processing and prepare myself to weave my new shadow.

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“Fine. You win,” I said. “I’m going to get something to eat, then hibernate for a few days. When I come out of it, I’ll be busy for a week or so.”

“Thank you,” Querit said, clearly exasperated. “Go, I’ll finish this up.”

“Okay, but first, let me just—”

“Keiran!”

“Alright! Alright. I’m going.”

* * *

As much as it pained me to admit it, once I got my mind off working, the past month hit me like a herd of stampeding horses. Human bodies weren’t meant to withstand what I’d been putting mine through, and I’d stretched it beyond my limits with a dozen invocations running every second of every day. I’d accomplished a lot in that time, but unfortunately, not the one thing I’d been trying to do.

Now that I’d stopped, the only thing I wanted was to sleep – the bed was optional. Food wasn’t, however. Once I went down, I wasn’t getting back up until my stomach made me. If I didn’t eat first, that’d be in less than a day, and I needed way more time than that. So I shoveled raw vegetables into my mouth, rounded them out with a few pieces of fruit, detoured to the bathroom, then teleported myself the twenty feet to my bed.

I didn’t even remember releasing the invocations keeping me conscious.

* * *

Coming out of a hibernation was a strange feeling. On the one hand, I felt amazing after even just a few days of sleep. On the other, I was in desperate need of a trip to the bathroom and something to drink. A shower wouldn’t go amiss either.

While I was doing that, I used my connection to the valley’s genius loci, the very aspect of my mana core that formed my demesne, to get caught up on what I’d missed. For the most part, things were unchanged. The trees were still stone. The artificial mana resonance point we’d forged still hung in the air over a shelf of bare rock on the south side. The wards were functioning, and the collection of mysteel pillars that formed the backbone of my defense network were intact and ready to be used.

In the labs, Querit was hard at work overseeing the experiments we’d designed, and our test subject was as alive and well as it had ever been. The golem noticed my divination sweep over him and paused in his work to look up at the source of the spell. “Six days,” he said.

My eyebrows shot up. That was a hell of a hibernation cycle, even for an archmage. No doubt, my mana had worked to keep me from dying of dehydration, however inefficiently it might have done the job. It certainly explained a few things about my trip to the bathroom after waking up, not in the least among them the ripeness of my smell.

Now that my head was fully clear, I could admit that Querit had been right. I’d been flailing at a problem to no effect. I cringed just thinking about how bad some of my ideas had been toward the end. It was incredibly obvious how those experiments would turn out, and I should have seen that without the need to waste resources.

I got the feeling Querit was going to be insufferable about this, probably holding it over my head every time I went without sleep for any extended period of time. He was always just a little bit smug about his golem body being able to function indefinitely. The joke was on him, though. I was ready to move up to stage eight.

Stage nine was going to be more of a problem, but I’d done it before. I could do it again. I just didn’t know how yet. Things were different this time around, but I’d adapt. It was really more of a question of how long it would take me.

And then I could resume the search for the mythical stage ten: true immortality. I had thousands of years left to figure it out, too. And if I failed again, well, there was always the reincarnation method. Admittedly, with the planet being down a moon and the world core itself broken, I was going to have to revise my methods, but I could figure that out if I devoted some time to it after I got everything else fixed on this busted up planet.

Once I was presentable and nourished again, I teleported to the resonance point. It wasn’t strictly necessary to do this here, but I figured it would be easier if the local mana flows were more tightly leashed. There’d be less interference that way.

Perhaps sensing my intentions, or just knowing me well enough to know I’d be impatient to get on with it as soon as possible, Querit was already there. “Before you get started, I’ve got a few things to update you on,” he said.

“Anything dire?”

“No. Hyago dropped off another shipment. He was concerned at the rate we’re going through the ingredients, but I assured him we’d be slowing down for a few weeks at least as something else had come up that required your attention. As I understand it, this will give his team a chance to do… something… I’m afraid I didn’t quite follow all the technical terms, but I understood it as rejuvenating the soil between crop cycles.”

I nodded along. “What else?”

“Grandfather showed up to talk to you three days ago. It seems everything is going smoothly at Eyrie Peak, but he wants you there to do one final check with him before he starts some long trip he’s planning. I didn’t get the details, but there’s no rush to get that done right now.

“Finally, your father has been trying to reach you via your scrying mirror all week. When he was unable to, he contacted me instead. I assured him that you’re alright, just in the middle of something.”

“What did he need?” I asked, my mind already conjuring all sorts of trouble that could beset the town.

“Shel showed up in New Alkerist. I’ve been told that she was quite insistent that she speak with you, but of course, no one could produce you. Your father said it wasn’t an emergency.”

“All of that in just a few days, huh? How’s the progress coming on our experiments?”

“Slowly. I’ve ruled out a few more catalysts and redesigned the acclimation process four times. All I’ve managed to do was cross out a few more potential combinations.”

“I’ve got a few new ideas to try,” I said. “Just kind of came to me when I woke up.”

“Imagine that.”

“Yes… Imagine that.” I gave him a flat look. “Okay, let’s talk about the base liquid. We’ve tried using acids to help dissolve the mysteel, but that was never going to work. On other metals, sure, but mysteel just won’t melt. It’s hard enough to reshape it, let alone dissolve it. We need to powder it, instead.”

“How would you go about powdering mysteel?” Querit asked, clearly bewildered.

“I’ve got a few ideas for you to try out while I’m busy. To start, a mysteel grinder combined with a transmutation spell to soften metal. I’ve already figured out how to recalibrate the spell from brass to mysteel. I think it will work better than any other type of metal transmutation.”

I finished giving Querit my ideas for the next round of experiments, then he left to prepare them. I took a breath, then opened myself to my demesne again. I would need all of the mana it could give me over the next few days.

Exhaling, I closed my eyes and plucked at the first thread of mana.