The construct of the teleportation spell unraveled in an instant. Although it had taken a monumental effort to re-work the spell, it was altogether a simple construct, so there was no real indicator that it had worked or failed. Gio’s heart was pounding.

It didn’t work! I’m screwed! Hold on… something isn’t right.

He curiously watched the man with glowing eyes. He was mouthing something, but no words came out. It didn’t seem like Marcus was looking at Gio, almost like he was looking straight through him. Gio waved a hand in front of his face, getting no response.

A silver mote faded into existence, causing a slight distortion effect in the air around it that played oddly with the ambient light. Gio shifted his focus toward it with rapt attention.

Gio nearly leaped out of his skin as he felt a tap on his shoulder. “AAAH!” he screamed.

He spun around, coming face to face with his reflection.

“Hey there,” Rio said.

Gio gasped.

“It worked!” Gio yelled.

“Yep. Welcome to the flip-side.” Rio responded, pointing to the hastily constructed targeting circle beneath Gio’s feet.

Gio jumped forward, hugging Rio. Rio awkwardly returned the hug.

“This feels… a lot like hugging myself.” Gio deadpanned.

“Yeah, not the comforting sensation you get when hugging another person,” Rio replied, equally as flat.

“Cool, so we never speak of this again.” Gio said.

Gio dropped the hug, looking around at the mirror dimension. It looked…mostly identical to the real world, with a few very notable exceptions. In certain places, where there weren’t any reflective surfaces, there were places that looked gray, almost like the color had been drained out of them. Gio looked out at a section of glass panels in the alleyway beyond, where two reflective surfaces pointed towards each other and caused a cascade of shimmering, mind-bending spaces where motes of mirror mana seemed to congregate. Through the semi-reflected surface, Gio could see out into the real world, while also seeing into the warped space beyond. It hurt to look at.

Space seemed to follow the light in the mirror dimension. One of the golden pillars present in Hart’s Casino lit up the mirror dimension like a beacon, coating the world around it in a yellow filter. The curved surface of the pillar caused the brickwork of the ground around it to bend outward and stretch off into the distance until the reflection was interrupted by another object. Through the pillar, The real world could be seen crystal clear and unwarped, albeit through a yellow filter.

“Whoa.” Gio said.

“Yeah. I have a lot to show you about this place. Before we get to that, we need to talk about what just happened- also we’re both bleeding from the leg and the adrenaline hasn’t worn off yet.” Rio replied.

They both looked down to see the [Reflective Shard] that Rio had fired into Gio’s thigh to jolt him out of Marcus’ mind control and sever the bindings on his wrist. Rio had a matching wound, and a matching shard stuck in the opposite leg.

“Trippy. So, the injury reflected to you, even though you weren’t bound like I was?” Gio asked.

“Yeah, that was bizarre to watch. From my angle, the mercenary lady ripped a bit of a shirt off of thin air, which caused my shirt to be ripped a second later. Then, she bound your wrists, but I wasn’t standing there- so I just kind of… stepped out of it? I don’t think our powers play well with cause and effect. I felt it when I shot you in the leg, though.” Rio replied.

“When we were practicing in the mirror room, you didn’t get injured when I did… but we haven’t really had a lot of chances to observe this particular effect since,” Gio noted.

The other man standing before them stepped forward with surprising speed, phasing through Gio. Gio felt the texture of his shirt and smelled the metallic tang of crusted blood on his face as Marcus phased through him. Strangely enough, Gio saw straight through the man once he had passed far enough through, like looking through a foggy grey glass sculpture. Gio was relieved that he didn’t end up seeing the inside of the man’s body.

“Okay eww, that’s uncomfortable” Gio exclaimed, jumping backwards.

“Yeah, you gotta watch out for that. Sometimes when we’re in the cafeteria, I get burned when someone’s reflection passes through me while carrying hot food… it’s weird. Like I said, cause and effect is wobbly here. The floor is solid enough most of the time… until it isn’t. I have to focus a tiny bit of my mana to touch stuff reliably… but it’s still best to be wary of the reflections of things that are usually dangerous. I’ve never not been burned by the reflection of fire, for example. There’s also the warping. Be very, very careful of the warping.” Rio cautioned.

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Gio nodded along. The pair began bandaging their wounds. Gio noted with fascination as the summoned shards both disintegrated at Rio’s touch. Gio looked over to the mutant rats, still standing in formation behind the man.

“Do you think they can see us? I mean… we’re both here, right? So there’s nothing to… reflect.” Gio asked.

He paused, looking around, and then at his hands.

“Damn, we didn’t just fade out of existence did we?!” Gio yelled.

Rio chuckled.

“Not how that works. With one of my clones stationed in the mirror room, I can go to other places without you being there. You’re the real version, so I imagine that you’re not under any restrictions here at all. If it works the same way for you as it does for me then people can see us if they’re looking through a reflective surface… at the correct angle. So we’d have to be careful here because this room has a surprising amount of reflective surfaces, including the-” Rio started.

Rio was cut off as the pair went speechless. They both felt the echo of mana coursing through them.

A rainbow of colors erupted from the silver platter at Gio’s feet, illuminating the face of the man, who had spun around sometime in the past few seconds. The pair watched as he fell to his knees, and the gruesome sight of his nose regrowing in real-time.

“What was that?” Gio asked, bewildered.

“I think that might have been a… consequence of my actions.” Rio sheepishly answered.

The man began cackling, and though they couldn’t hear him, it was evident by his manic facial expression that he was probably very loud. Summoning balls of nearly transparent multicolored energy in both hands, he began sprinting down the road, throwing projectiles randomly. One orb turned a large section of wall into water, and another turned neon blue mid-flight and erupted into dangerous-looking black metal spikes upon contact with a passing rat.

“And what exactly does that mean?” Gio asked, dumbfounded.

“I needed to break you out of his trance… but you couldn’t see me. I couldn’t affect the real world without you… so I had to use a skill that I didn’t want to use. Here… read this. I’ll try to leave out all of the stupid uppercase letters and random characters.” Rio said.

Rio handed over a piece of notebook paper, writing out the description of a skill with [Scrivener’s Charm].

[Din’s Invocation] - You may ask a boon of your Aspect, and receive two in kind. One shall be a blessing of your choosing. The other shall be a random yet equivalent gift or challenge of their design. Effects shall become more dramatic with subsequent uses. Use wisely. THIS IS AN ASPECT SKILL. (Number of Invocations completed: 1)

Gio sharply inhaled and winced reading the skill. Rio grimaced, handing him another piece of paper.

“That’s not all. This is what Chaos gave me.” Rio said.

[Reflection’s Reach - Vergence] - When in the presence of your medium, you may affect the material plane by borrowing some of his mana, and vice versa. Subject to reality dampening.

“That… is insanely powerful. Vice versa- so I can do the same thing? If whatever just happened is the “equivalent” of this boon… yikes. What’s reality dampening?” Gio asked.

“No clue…wait, you’re not mad?” Rio asked.

“I thought we were past this. Rio, you saved my life… our life? It’s whatever. We deal with the consequences together. I’m sure whatever it was we just witnessed is probably going to blow up in our faces in a very dramatic fashion later, but for now I just want to go back to my dorm and get yelled at by my friends after a long nap.” Gio said.

“Alright… I think when we’re back somewhere safer, we need to fully go over our statuses… together. We need to stop flying blind with all this. I should have told you about the invocation earlier, but I didn’t want to worry you. No more surprises.”

Gio nodded.

Rio paused for a moment. He walked over to a dimly lit corner out of range of any mirror, where Gio struggled to see anything through the gray fog.

“With that being said, I think it’s time for us to bid adieu to Hart’s Casino.” Rio said.

He beckoned Gio closer. Gio walked forward and gasped as he watched the walls fade away, looking out into a sea of tiny stars.

Gio turned to his reflection.

“I think that sounds lovely. By the way, it is so, SO weird to be talking out loud to you right now.” Gio replied.

“I know!” Rio replied.