OSOS 0x17

Conventus

D[ –.– ]B

On the observation deck of their newly founded Domain, Debug was trying to decipher the riddles her two look-alikes were spouting. First gaping at Editor in response to their baffling statement, then to Interrupt, the subject of such absurdity.

Busy elsewhen? Not where?

The Mara-Skill in question stood at the top of the observation deck’s steps, seemingly unfazed at being the subject of incredulity, or perhaps, unaware. With her attention now drawn to them, it slowly began to click for Debug that Interrupt’s odd manner of speaking ( or lack of manners as it were ) was really stemming from how they perceived time.

Thinking back to their last moments together in Mara’s domain, back when both were just mana constructs, orbiting around in tangential non-space. Interrupt’s construction was absurdly complex, folding within itself like some sort of ever-evolving tesseract, but now, in hindsight, Debug was realizing that what it was seeing was an entirely different way of building a skill. One built in a fourth dimension, though how, or why, were questions she’d have to table for the moment.

Pivoting back to the rest of the Editor’s casual mention that she was actually the real crux of all this time-fuckery, and not Interrupt– Who, in her opinion, seemed to be operating on a whole different perspective of time all together, so what did that mean for her?

Looking out from the observation deck to the ever-enlarging swirling mass of nothing, and the vision of Mara past it, Debug wondered what she could have possibly done to find herself in such a fucked up situation.

A ‘Divine Offense’; that was the term Editor had used, but once again Debug was lacking so much confidence she was beginning to truly understand why Mara always seemed like she was grasping at straws– She practically was.

If only I could just analyze this whole mess, maybe then I’d get some straight answers.

“Okay– So what the hell is a ‘Divine Offense’? Are you saying I offended a god? I’m pretty sure we’re all in agreement that they’re not real.”

Bursting into a fit of cackling, that was both unexpected as it was unsettling, Interrupt cut in to answer her question.

“Hahahahahahahahaha… Hypocrisy is such a good dish. They meant ‘divine’, as the adjective, not the noun; as if to say ‘beyond excellence’ or ‘unparalleled’– And ‘offense’ as to the disregard or insult of oneself, or one’s principles.”

As usual, anything that came out of Interrupt’s mouth was as confusing as it was intrusive, and once again Debug was left with more questions than answers.

“So I disregarded myself in an unparalleled way? What does that even mean?”

Smiling, Ed gestured back towards the door they’d entered from.

“Well, it would certainly be easier to show rather than tell– Fancy a stroll?”

Walking back up the steps to meet Debug half-way, the Editor laid a hand on her shoulder as they whispered in her ear before continuing up the steps.

“What do you think ‘Pinkie’ wanted?”

Debug whirled around, even more perplexed by the sudden question. It didn’t seem to have anything to do with what they were talking about, but it certainly snagged her bounding curiosity.

Pinkie? As in the pink-swarm from the space-ship? Do they know something I don’t?

Joining Interrupt at the top of the steps leading out of the room, Ed called back to Debug.

“Curious, isn’t it. You haven’t even thought about it, have you?”

As much as she didn’t want to admit it, she hadn’t. Not that they’d been given much time elsewise, but Debug had entirely glossed over what the pink-swarm could have been up to. It seemed, somehow, not even a full minute later, she’d been steered right into another mental block by the ‘duo ex machina’.

Shit. Maybe I am the case-study…

Stumbling after the other two, Debug rattled through what she could remember from the ‘flashback’ of Runic Recollections.

So, if both the pink-door and the pink-swarm were the same entity, then why did it bring Mara to the alien space-ship? The only other thing it did was– That rune… I didn’t think about it before but…

“Hangon– Did it create that ‘blood rune’ Mara keeps spawning out of?”

Interrupt cast a sly grin over their shoulder, seemingly eager to see Debug working it out on her own.

“Close~”

Close?...

“So… It didn’t create it? It… hijacked it?”

Not hearing a response from the other two, Debug looked up to find they were already walking into the hallway left of The Hub, leaving her to catch up, in more ways than one.

Shaking her head at finding herself thoroughly distracted by her own thoughts, which was a rather new development all things considered, Debug lightly jogged after the others to regroup as she tried to put the pieces together.

Okay, so it kidnapped Mara, but then poorly copied her? Why? What did it need her for, or a shitty clone for that matter, if it had the power to warp around like that? Why her? And why such a roundabout way? And why warp her to the fountain room when it could have just taken her to that blood-rune directly? Or even just take her to the forest in the first place, or a town for that manner? Unless however Mara got from that ship to the forest was something Pinkie couldn’t do…

Couldn’t?... Maybe wouldn’t. Maybe the point of the blood rune was a quantity thing.

Mara has definitely died countless times, so that would mean it wants her alive, regardless of her own opinions. So… What for? Why drag a girl from the twenty-one-hundreds to the end of the universe, only for her to end up in a world of magic? And where do I fit in? I was just a skill, and now, like a room forgotten in the back of my mind, there are all these memories of Earth, a childhood and a career that feels both mine and not.

Pinkie could have picked anyone, anywhere, anytime, so why Mara, why ‘us’? Why ‘here’, for whatever that counts for at this point, and what for? Did it have a purpose? It must have– Pure chaos isn’t a line of reasoning I can follow, so if its intent was to plant Mara in a world of magic and fantasy, with infinite lives, what for? What antagonist could a time-hopping space-warping light-swarm have that it would need such roundabout methods?...

The Editor was waiting for Debug as she bounded into the hall on the ‘west’ side of the complex, Interrupt already half-way down the hall to their right, heading ‘north’. She wasn’t sure how she knew who was who, perhaps it was intuition, or something to do with an underlying connection they all shared, but it was far beside the hot button issues of the moment because the Editor wasn’t waiting for her, but rather bracing themselves against the wall as they cradled their abdomen.

Dropping curiosities for concerns of the moment, Debug immediately went to the Editor’s side, trying to discern what had transpired in the few seconds they’d lost sight of each other.

“Are you alright!? What happened? Where’s Interrupt going?”

Her questions came out like a suddenly bristling brook, to which the Editor half-grimaced as they tried to summarize the need-to-know before their window closed.

“Like you, we too have our own Domains– Though certainly not as… complex as yours. Through them, we’re buying you two time, and hopefully a bit more than that. Now, what’s happening to me is… well, accounted for but certainly not preferable. She’s a bit more upset than we’d anticipated and my labyrinth isn’t much of a maze if she continues to obliterate the walls.”

‘She’? ‘You two’? ‘Accounted for’?? ‘Labrinth’???

Once again Debug felt very out of the loop, or rather, thrown for a loop, but right now was clearly not the time to be blindsided by another tangent. However the undying urge for answers was hard to quell, and so her intent to offer aid found itself clouded with her own questions.

“Can I do anything? Who’s ‘she’ and ‘you two’? And what do you mean ‘account for’?”

Shaking their head at the futility of trying to stem her curiosity, Ed pointed towards the door Interrupt had just reached.

“In that room you’ll find all the answers you need. As for me? If you could give me a hand getting there, I have a feeling this– Ow. –Is only going to get worse.”

As they were pointing, the Editor’s knee snapped backwards, dislocating in an eye-wincing instant, causing them to flinch, deeply inhale, and then fully exhale before finishing their sentence.

Mildly disgusted at the sudden sight of a joint well out of alignment, Debug tried to divert her gaze as she wondered how they weren’t screaming their head off.

“Oh– Try not to worry about what happens to me, it’s not going to be pretty I’m sure. Mind giving me a hand though?”

Grimacing through their suddenly gelatinous knee, it was clear to both that Editor was going to have a hard time walking down the rest of the hallway unaided.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

Sliding an arm underneath their Mara-look-alike, Debug began to waddle the pair of them towards the room Interrupt had just entered as her mind tried to place all the pieces of her current situation into some sort of puzzle board that made sense.

It was pretty clear that she was part of something bigger, both Interrupt and Editor had shown up with their own agendas, and were both actively challenging and changing her world-view. Not even an hour ago she was an it, and now not only did she look like Mara, she was pretty sure she was Mara– At least arguably so, and that raised a whole feast of its own problems, but she only had time for one fire at a time. Clearly someone had a problem with them, but why or how was–

Debug nearly stumbled as the neurons connected in her newly-acquired gray-matter. There was every chance, nay, a good chance that their mystery antagonist was also Pinkie’s.

Wide-eyed at the thought, Debug looked to Ed, the question written all over their face, but they had to ask regardless.

“Are we working with the pink-swarm?”

Trying to smile through their discomfort, the Editor nodded towards the room they weren’t too much further from.

“See that room ahead? It’s the only one I didn’t make myself, Interrupt was actually the one to put it together.”

Unsure of what they were getting at, Debug glanced to the door, barrier and bastion to the truth behind all these perplexing statements.

“Put it together? What’s that supposed to mean?”

Raising their eyebrows, the Editor almost whispered their reply, as if to avoid being overheard in the empty hall.

“That room? That’s the Daemon Foundry.”

-| –.– |-

As the lights in the alien space-ship flickered above her head, Mara looked back down to the terminal at her side, and wasn’t pleased with what she saw. Many of the readings on the graph still visible on the display had just plummeted straight to the bottom, and the others were now skewing erratically.

“Well. I suppose there goes my ticket to the isekai cruise-ship, but… Apotheca, huh?”

I should still be able to get in without the ‘Nexus’–

Switching back to the first screen on the terminal, full of sliders, dials, and fields, Mara skimmed it over once more. If she could assume some basic interface-design ideas, then the bottom or top buttons should at least trigger something, however it was the rest of the screen that gave her pause.

Even if I don’t know what any of this means…

Poking a few of the options without much of an idea towards what she was doing, Mara paused, then scrolled back up to the top of the list and started maxing everything out and toggling everything she could ‘on’. She wasn’t exactly thrilled with not knowing, but maxing everything seemed a little more interesting than just rolling the dice.

With her ‘choices’ made, and a finger hovering over the large button beneath all the other options, Mara hesitated as another quake rumbled through the ship and the entire room lurched down about a meter in one sudden jerk.

–Oh fuck.

As she grasped the sides of the terminal to ground her feet, Mara felt a new rumbling growing from beneath her bare soles. Beneath her, the ship had finally breached the event-horizon, and whatever was driving the craft was clearly suffering with one foot in and one foot out, causing such tremendous vibrations it would likely rip the ship apart before it could fully plunge within.

Realizing her time was now measured in a matter of seconds, Mara slammed her fist down on the bottom of the screen, and a surge of power bolted up and around the three-story ring. Far from quiet, the surge of energy quickly ramped up to skin-tingling frequency just before unleashing its torrent as an eruption of neon-purple sand that quickly flooded the inside of the ring.

Apotheca…

For a moment, the sight of neon-purple tore her from the impending chaos, and all that Mara had in her mind was awe. Just imagining the science and technology that went into making something like this boggled her mind. Sure, full-dive had existed in her world for the last decade or so, but, if she understood the Nexus right, this had a ‘player count’ that dwarfed even the best virtual-mmos, and the potential for even greater adventures– Though, at a cost.

Seeing the ring’s surface solidify into a crystal-smooth surface of ultra-violet, Mara felt her hesitations firmly grab hold of her feet like cinder blocks. She had no idea what she was about to throw herself into, but she was well aware of the price. However, it seemed at this point her ‘life’ was a rapidly devaluing currency, and she needed to spend it wisely. It was either a portal to an artificial world, or inevitable obliteration.

It doesn’t take a genius to see this isn’t much of a choice, but maybe it’s an opportunity.

She wasn’t exactly sure how Apotheca was supposed to survive falling into a black-hole, or how it worked, but considering she could at least turn it on, she had some hope she wasn’t going to be at a complete loss once she entered– And maybe, just maybe, knowing her world was artificial would be a real game changer.

Releasing her grip from the edge of the terminal, Mara tried to instruct her legs to move, but found them near-numb under the constant tremors quaking her bones like meat-tenderizers. However, something like a bit of physical discomfort wasn’t going to stop her. Seizing every scrap of adrenaline she had left in her fight-or-flight response, Mara put one foot in front of the other as the rumbling grew ever louder like a carnivorous dinosaur pounding ever closer.

Step by step, Mara inched her way closer, as the rumbling escalated exponentially until the quakes became lurches and solid footing became a thing of the past. With a sudden lurch, Mara felt the floor leap up from beneath her, then plunge back down, effectively tossing her into the air before crashing her back down onto all fours, just shy of the ramp in the center of the ring.

Looking up, Mara caught the last moment before the flickering lights above completely gave out, and the only source of light in the room was the skin-tinting blacklight of Apotheca. Realizing her time was nearly up, Mara cursed under her breath as she willed every bit of strength into her limbs and scrambled forward in a desperate push to make it to the neon portal before it was all for naught.

“Don’t you fucking dare– I’m so close–”

However, her time was up. She wasn’t even half-way up the ramp when the grav drives failed, and the rapidly disintegrating ship was snatched into the abyss with all the force it’d been resisting for millenias innumerable. Its entire existence, and all its contents, were dashed in an instant, shattered and smeared across the pitch-black horizon.

{ √Δ }

At the heart of Uallach, a wooden carriage was just finding rest in front of the largest castle, as several knights ran out from various alcoves to assemble in front of it. From within, a burly giant of a man stepped out in a single motion, a king in both stature and presentation.

In front of him were the Scarlet Guard, the personal knights of the crown, and despite appearances, several had been accompanying him the entire trip. However, as he looked upon the assembled entourage, his visage soured as the one he sought was nowhere to be found.

“Where’s Polymese?”

The question wasn’t directed to any particular knight, so its words cut all present equally. However, the one nearest swallowed his hesitations and stepped forward to convey the message he’d been left with.

“He’s attending an unexpected visitor in his office, and gravely apologizes that he is unable to greet your arrival personally, though he extends an invite for you to join him in his office.”

Grunting, the king pulled at the ever-itchy fur lining the collar of his royal cape, and pushed past the knight to march up the marble steps of his childhood home, Castle Uallach.

“An unexpected visitor, huh? Not many people could get Polymese to clear his schedule, leaves one to wonder who they might be…”

Pushing through the great doors of his home without the assistance of the posted knights, the king strode past his entourage of waiting aids and advisors with equal apathy. Striding quickly through the halls, the only destination he had any interest in was the office of his right-hand.

Whoever their ‘guest’ was, they were either very important, or brought even graver news. The thought that it could be both fueled the briskness of his pace as he deftly navigated the winding complex of his castle that spoke to his centuries of residence within.

It took him less than five minutes to find himself planted outside the reinforced door of his lead advisor’s office, but his hand paused before knocking as the murmur of voices pervaded from within. Two of which, he recognized. One his advisor Polymese, the other, Merlin’s former pupil Mads. The third was… familiar, but he couldn’t place the voice off-hand. It was like a ten year old with a twenty-year smoking problem.

*Thunk-Thunk*

With the rasp of his knuckles upon the door, the king heard all conversation within cease, and the slight scraping of a chair as someone likely stood up to answer his call.

As the door swung open, the ginger-maned lion of a king saw Mads standing on the other side, and behind her, a pepper-haired Polymese sat behind his desk with his usual poker-face. However, as the ever-overdessed Madison stepped aside, an old face peeking around the edge of her chair caught the king’s eye.

“Thelma! How’s the frontier been treating you?”

Raising her eyebrows in a look of exasperation, the gnome let herself fall back into her chair, and called out to him without directly addressing him.

“Oh I think you know. Merlin sends his regards.”

The king paused, a hand still propping open the door as he registered what she’d said.

“Merlin?”

Looking around, the grim looks said enough, but Madison’s silent nod was the real nail in the coffin. Blowing half a curse out under his breath, the king walked over to Polymese’s liquor cabinet and reached to the back, grabbing an unopened bottle with a gold topper.

“Alright– Fill me in. I presume you’ve all seen his notes? He met me on the way here– I wasn’t thrilled with what he had, but tell me what we know.”

Taking Mads’ seat, the king uncorked the liquor bottle and looked around the room, waiting for someone to speak up before he would drink, a silent threat to speak before he grew impatient. Thankfully, at his proffering, Thelma leaned forward on the edge of her, comparatively, oversized chair, with her elbows on her knees, and summarized what she’d told the others so far.

“Seven hours ago, Merlin showed up on my doorstep– Told me to leave, and then headed into the forest by himself, declining my offer to accompany him. I packed up within the hour, and I barely made it out of my house before there was an explosion that rippled the very ground for dozens of kilometers outside the eastern edge of The Lost Wilds.”

Polymese, sensing his input would allay concerns of the crown, jumped in.

“–I’ve already tasked several squadrons with search and rescue. Thankfully the frontier is still sparsely populated, so casualties should be low, but we’re worried about long-term effects for our projected settlement goals; we will likely have to adjust our estimates.”

Fishing two heavy pieces of parchment from a stack of similarly weighty documents, Polymese handed the pair of wax-sealed royal orders to the king.

“I had these officiated in your absence– The first mandates all available Magisters of Merlin’s Court to proceed to the frontier and assess and entrench the situation. The second is an allowance to The Adventurer’s Guild to post bounties for any of our ongoing needs, the first of which is scouting requests.”

Looking over one, then the other, the king grunted and finally downed a very large swig of ‘his’ bottle as he tossed the parchments back to the desk.

“Euych– There’s a reason I don’t drink much more than mead. Anyways, once again I find you more adept than I at administration. Any issues with the lords?”

“Other than a message from the Lord of Fàire raising concerns over the reverberations they felt on the western coast, this ‘event’ has not yet had the chance to manifest as any macro social or economic concerns– As of yet.”

“Alright. Then… do we know for sure if Merlin is… gone?”

The hesitancy to even word the question was written all over the king’s face, even as he quickly tried to hide it behind the now half-empty bottle.

Taking the moment to approach his side, Mads laid a withered hand of boney-white skin upon his shoulder in an effort to comfort her king.

“His tower is gone sir, and not a single sage of either the Arcane Court or those privy in the guild have been able to scry, message, or foresee him. It appears he has left us for evermore, but we must hold course.”

Downing the remainder of his liquor, the king slumped forward, heavy with the thoughts of days that would no longer be, torn with the ever-growing worries brought by the weight the crown he bore.

Sighing with remorse as he looked over the now empty bottle, patterned with pyramids of glass and a label he couldn’t read, the king tried to pry his course from the chaos of the moment, as someone in charge of a kingdom should.

“...Okay. So what do we know about this ‘ship’?”