Prologue - 2,374 A.R (After the Ripple) - (4,394 A.D) - Distant Future
“Damn memory crystals!”
Personally, taking the time to destroy everything from glass to quartz to steel and graphite got old. Even after a few thousand years of crazy adventures and sporadic meditation, my temper still pushed restraint to the limit. The fifty-seventh attempt this week of trying to combine function, utility and beauty wore on my nerves as another delicate yet frustrating piece of work shattered in my hands.
An ornate chalice of mine found itself also broken to tiny bits as I drained the last of my drink and hurled it against the inner walls of my sanctum.
[This old hobby is a serious pain in the ass.] I grumbled internally, snarling at my own worst, wait, most annoying foe.
I’ve had to put this hobby down many times over the centuries due to one of two things, sheer frustration or intermittent apocalyptic events that would decide to rear their ugly heads just when I was making headway. The glinting splinters bounced off my magically hardened skin but a long curved shard quivered from where it stuck out the smooth top of my marble plated desk. I watched it shiver for a moment before going still.
“Asshole.”
Glaring at the ruins of my work, the jagged remnants of what would have been a shapely blue glass sculpture of the Yggdrasil, the World Tree, emerging from a fortified ziggurat, frustration forced me to pause and not pick up the rest of the broken pieces that scattered across the stained red oak floor. My poor humble home-grown furniture sported nasty glass porcupine quills from my latest failure. Thank all the living deities for magic. Cleanup is no longer a time consuming bitch. It’s also good to finally have servants again.
Illium, a former majordomo of a High-Dwarven clan, I can never remember which one, swept into the room like a whirlwind of grace and class, swiftly dispensing of the mess with brutal efficiency. His exceptional height for a dwarf, a little over five feet, spoke to his less than pure heritage. And his magic, well, that told a sordid tale of its own, of a runaway dwarven prince who enjoyed a soiree with a sky elf and did the dirty for a few hundred years in a forgotten corner of their own world.
I watched as little whorls of air magic gathered the dust and shards into his calloused hand while his other one casually held out my drink of choice. I did take the time to appreciate his attention to detail, the way he managed to clean while staying perfectly still in his sharp tuxedo. He maintained an oddly polite fascination with the trends of ancient Earth. And let’s face it, everyone looks good in a tux.
“Sire, if I may . . .” Illium began with his deep yet liquid voice as his almond eyes swept across the room. I barely caught his uniquely slender face vacillating between concerned watchfulness and exasperation before he schooled his features. “Dwelling on the past may not be the best use of your time. There are uncounted apprentices from my clan who would love to practice copying your memoirs.”
“Only because you jealous misers won’t part with the damn manufacturing secret!” I snorted but kept the false anger mostly out of my voice. I knew Illium’s sharp ears would catch it but I couldn’t help myself. Probably was a bastard from a dwarven doing the horizontal tango with an exiled elf. Someone without the proper training handling my overcharged memories? Laughable. Too many dangers involved with magic of this caliber.
Generic quartz crystals generally work well at first but sharply degrade after an indeterminate amount of time, or was it moderate use? It’s hard to tell with so many experiments going on. I do know that they’re better for magnification lenses for detailed sigil use. Crap. I need to keep better notes. Then again, what defines moderate use?
Conjured diamond used to be my go-to crafting material as carbon is super plentiful. It just needed to be properly ordered but the magically encapsulated thoughts would deteriorate in the energized matrix and become unusable to the point where they could potentially drive the normal viewer mad. Pumping the memory with more mana to keep it stable only increased the psychic blast yield. And to be fair, it’s not a common field of study to begin with.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Downloading copies of emotionally charged memories into an imperfect medium and then reviewing them is enough to turn a sane human into a vegetable if they’re not carefully guided. I mean, I did live through the end of the world. Er, one of the ends of one of the worlds?
My few empty yet artistic successes adorned the small but tasteful living room and I gazed at them with pride just to boost my confidence. They didn’t have memories implanted in them but they were still pretty to look at.
[Breathe in, breathe out. Nothing worth having comes easy. That’s what she said.] I chuckled at my own relaxed idiotic inner monologue. I can’t believe I can still picture Michael Scott clear as day even after a few thousand years.
Ignoring Illium’s subdued presence was easy. His deft control of magic allowed him to completely rearrange my tools to where I liked them to be and dust every corner without ruffling a curl on my head.
Snooty bastard. Incalculably valuable bastard. I still believe bastard is ‘technically’ correct. Double entendre for the win.
Idle thoughts almost seemed to take on a life of their own as I recalled one of my favorite shows. Pushing the Office to the back of my mind yet again, I refocused on my work with a sigh. Using my sorcery in ways that it wasn’t intended definitely kept me on my toes as lack of attention could make things randomly explode.
Oh, but my minor successes were beautiful. The leftmost crimson glass sculpture set into the wall was of my technically estranged wife. I actually didn’t make that one. It was my inspiration though. Still irritated me that I had to get it commissioned. One day though, I’d make my own version of it. Even now, the eerie red glow made her visage beautiful and terrifying, sort of how I pictured her next time I’d get to see her.
Still can’t believe I’ve got two thousand years to go.
That sad glass memory crystal contained my first few years worth of memory from when the world ended. Shit. What a wild ride that was. At least I repaired my relationship with the dwarves (thank you Illium) well enough to trade for that first working memory crystal. Greedy midgets wouldn’t show me how to make my own. Hence, my less than successful experiments based on my observations of an existing work.
Illium noted my misty eyes and again motioned towards the stein made from magically joined jade and bloodoak. “Sir, if you’re going to lose a day to memories then might I suggest starting just after the most painful events? Self guided therapy would not be a waste of an afternoon. Smoothing over one of your rages takes more time and money than I’d care to admit. But if it’s resolution you’re looking for then perhaps starting at the very beginning can help with the healing process. See what a younger Lord Benjamin went through and regain proper perspective.”
[Fuck self improvement.] I thought, snorting and taking a calm sip of gnomish ginger beer spiked with elven whiskey. Rebellious nostalgia made me reach forward and gently reach one finger to touch the base of the smooth glass where the inscribed year worked as the replay mechanism. A quick burst of controlled air turned the memory crystal around. The wash of memories from the wrong Era took me back.
[Crap! Wrong starting point!]
334 A.R (After the Ripple) - Not So Distant Future
“Glass!” I cursed, muttering to myself yet again. Time takes a toll on the human brain. No wonder Merlin and Flamel are batshit crazy. Are we truly meant to simply endure the long centuries? What? Are we made of stone?
My muttering continued as I picked splinters of heated glass from my hands. The wounds healed just as quick as I could remove the splinters.
“Freaking pain in my ass! Still can’t believe it took me three centuries to figure it out. Why glass? What is it about melted freaking sand that works? If ruby or sapphire just bonded to silver like I wanted then I wouldn’t have to be this damn careful. I can do ruby and sapphire . . . super easy to mess with the growing crystalline bonds before inputting the memories. Glass captures emotions, and that’s a good first step but what captures the pure data?!”
The process to magically combine charged silver and purified Saharan sand glass was more excruciating architecture instead of passionate Picasso.
My earth elemental assistant, Deg, simply shrugged his rugged clay shoulders. His ruby eyes seemed to sparkle as he laughed yet again another failure. The evil part of me considered smashing him for a change just to see how many times he could reconstitute himself from the Elemental plane before our contract would be considered ‘violated’.
I grumbled to myself. [One step forward, one and a half steps back . . . now where is that damn picoscope?]
Nobody really tells you how much of an utter pain in the ass it is to write your memoirs. Few people who have lived as long as I have ever even considered it though . . . screw it. I got this bright idea in my head to use magic to create my own version of a Jedi Holocron, a shaped crystal capable of perfectly storing memories and teachings for later but the process just wasn’t that simple.
— “Wait . . . too far forward . . . back it up some more . . . Illium is a well-paid asshole” —
A deft touch of Illium’s power from the real present pulled my aging mind back to the actual starting point of when the Earth met its first end.