Chapter Seven

Savages and Pawns

“Thus, the Sight was dubbed Divination. As it is only the Right of those Divine to see Beyond. And none are so Divine as Her. Any paltry Attuned could Divine that which happened long ago. Mystrel could Divine that which has yet to happen; secrets Forbidden to any of mortalmake. None else but Her Chosen has Divination Forbidden. For too long now, We’ve pondered if She were a fallen God. Many say Her Chosen proves She too is of mortal coil. To accept that is to commit hypocrisy of heart, for She must be more. Though She preaches from no Divine Throne, nor is She mortal; something inbetween as a Demigod . . .”

(If Mystrel really had ‘Divination Forbidden’ that allowed her to see the future, it would heavily suggest that she ascended as a God rather than die an ambiguous death, as is the leading theory. Also, who the Abyl is ‘Her Chosen’? That title isn’t mentioned anywhere else in the codex, or in any of the histories I’ve learned. I know mother would never let me, but I do wish I could show this to a wizened scholar.)

-580, On the Providence of Mystrel

Eliot

Eliot stepped through a portal into his dorm room. Conveniently, Henry and Penelope were already there. They had their backs to him, Henry sitting at his desk and Penelope leaning on him, looking over his shoulder. As usual, even from behind it was obvious that Henry was extremely uncomfortable with Penelope so close to him. Penelope, being her usual self, had no idea she was invading his personal space. Social wrecks, the both of them. Eliot couldn’t help a snort of amusement.

They, on the other hand, jumped in shock and immediately launched spells at the intruder. Penelope conjured a bola of vines with razor sharp thorns; Henry flooded half the room with a blaze of flames. All too bemused, Eliot opened a hemisphere of portals in front of him to redirect everything. Surprisingly, Henry’s flames didn’t so much as scorch anything in the room. Penelope’s bola, however, had a lethal amount of torque to it. Even though he made it hit the ground, it continued spinning for a half a second after, leaving a large area of the floor scratched and riven.

“I was hoping for a warm welcome. I guess I got exactly what I wanted,” Eliot chuckled with a smirk. “Careful what you wish for and all that.”

“Eliot! You’re back,” Penelope exclaimed, immediately closing the distance for a quick hug. The second after, she pointed a finger in his face and said, “What the Abyl is wrong with you! Do you have a death wish or something? Why would you pick a fight with Master Camble of all people?”

“I didn’t know who he was at the time,” Eliot argued, rolling his eyes. Even if he did, he wouldn’t have done anything different. But if he said that he would never hear the end of it.

Henry walked up after and bumped forearms with him. “I’m glad you’ve returned. I hope you’ve been well.”

“Did you get a lot taller? Or is it just me?” Penelope noted dubiously.

Eliot frowned. “Did I?” He opened his chifferobe to look at himself in the mirror. “Hijo de la chingada, I am,” he cursed in dẽn. “By almost eight centimeters!” He looked at his collection of clothes in dismay. “I just bought all of these and now half of them won’t fit me. I haven’t even worn some things yet!” The clothes he was wearing under his robe had probably stretched out with him. He noticed they’d started to fray and rip in some places, but he’d hoped it was just because of the constant abuse he faced on a daily basis.

“You could alway resell, or better yet, donate,” Penelope posited. “Most guys would kill to be eight centimeters taller. It’s actually kind of concerning you grew that much in three months. What did Master Camble do to you, exactly?”

“I was gone for eight months,” Eliot sighed, flopping on his bed in defeat. “For you guys it was three, for me it was eight.”

Shock, consternation, then realization flickered on their faces as they followed his words to their logical conclusion. While time dilation wasn’t entirely unprecedented in known history, it was still mythical. Furthermore, the most anyone could slow time in the past was by incredibly small amounts, at least as far as anyone knew. A ratio of three months to eight was not only unbelievable but plain unfair. It was also something that should be kept an absolute secret. Though they wanted to, Henry and Penelope knew better than to ask.

“My point still stands, most people would be happy to be your height,” Penelope said after grabbing her bearings.

“I’m not most people,” Eliot grouched. “This bed isn’t even that big anymore,” he whined dramatically.

“Now that I think about it, if you lived through eight months, your birthday probably passed, right? How old are you now, nineteen, twenty?”

Eliot snorted. “Is that how old you think I am? Sorry to break it to you, but I’m, like, way younger than you guys.”

“How much is ‘way’?” Penelope asked tentatively.

“I turned seventeen two months ago.”

Henry and Penelope shifted into mild stupors.

Eventually, Penelope said, “That . . . makes so much sense. I . . . I think I should apologize. I’ve been judging you as an adult, but if I’m doing the math correctly you just turned sixteen four months before we first met. I’m sorry for being so harsh on you.”

“Yes, we’ve certainly taken your intelligence and maturity for granted,” Henry agreed. “It’s astounding that you could be considered our equals despite our nearly four year difference. And at such a pivotal age for development.”

“Ehh, don’t worry about it,” Eliot shrugged, “I appreciate it, actually. I hate being treated like a child and I’ve always felt like I was older than I actually am.” After a moment of silence, he jumped out of his bed and started to change into fresh clothes that fit him entirely too tight. “Anything interesting happen while I was gone?”

Henry and Penleope turned around and mulled his question for a moment. “Not really. The BrotherHood’s been quiet, no word from Captain Ofal, all anyone’s been talking about is you and Master Camble,” Penelope summarized.

After he was done and they all relaxed like usual, he asked, “No word at all? Thanks to us a bunch of Serpents were arrested and a large front was exposed! they got nothing from it?”

“Pretty much,” Penelope sighed in resignation, “Everyone in custody is too scared to talk. They don’t trust the Guard to keep them safe, and honestly, I don’t blame them. It’s a pretty open secret that there are plenty of serpents in the Guard.”

“Alright, sure, but Polly Ofal should have a mountain of suspicions about BrotherHood movement and fronts. Why can’t we investigate those?” Eliot questioned.

Henry shook his head. “In consideration of our dire circumstances in the previous operation, Captain Ofal thinks it best we take no further investigative action.”

“Like the whole thing wasn’t his fault,” Eliot scoffed, rolling his eyes.

“What about you? What exactly have you been doing the past eight months?” Penelope queried.

“Exercise, mostly. That and spending half the day getting utterly trounced by Master Camble in a ‘spar’,” he grumbled. “Other than conditioning, lectures, and meditation, I did make some advancements in my magic. For one, I restructured my mage armor. For two, I constructed a Manaemundas.”

Penelope furrowed her brows, “You can only do that after specialization.”

“Tell me about it,” Eliot chuckled, “I spent three months trying and failing, not knowing that very important fact, until out of nowhere Master Camble deigned to tell me I was wasting time. I suppose I can’t complain too much because right after he told me a way to do it without specialization.”

“I was under the impression Master Camble is mana ignorant,” Henry chimed in, confused.

“He is, or so he says,” Eliot shrugged, “Personally I think he’s something of a special case: it’s not as simple as sensitive or ignorant with him. The details I have no idea about; he refused to answer any questions. The most he told me is that he’s accumulated a large amount of magical knowledge just by existing around mages for so long.”

“Well, that does make some sense. No one knows exactly how old he is, but he should have been around before the Genocide of Ignorance. In all likelihood, he probably helped Karl Favesh with some of his discoveries,” Penelope reasoned.

“As underwhelming as the last three months have been on the outside, unfortunately I do have things to attend to, so I’ll probably be out for the rest of the day,” Eliot told them as he got up, ready to leave.

Penelope immediately jumped to stop him. “That’s not a good idea. People wanted you dead beforehand. Now that you’re Master Camble’s discipulus, there will be a very high price on your head. Not even the crown is happy about you anymore. I understand that the two months before were quiet and it sounds like I’m just a scaremonger, but I need you to believe that there are people out there with malicious machinations,” she told him solemnly.

Eliot simply flashed her a grin. “Don’t worry, I’ll portal away at the first sign of trouble. I’m really good at destabilizing space, remember?”

She stood looking up at him with her golden eyes for a few seconds before relenting, “Alright. Remember that the hit from Beelzebub is still out, so things are complicated. Just be careful. The world would be a far worse palace if you died.”

“I’m fully aware of how amazing I am, but thanks.” He opened a portal and waved to Henry. “I’ll be back, you have my word,” he promised before stepping through.

He exited at the top of a three story building in the Trade District. Overlooking the rushing rivers of people below him, he took a deep breath of contentment. Only in that moment was he able to explain the restless energy building in his chest. Lex Ruptor didn’t just increase his mana purity and soul stability, it honed his sensitivity as well. The world around him was so much clearer— not because he could see better but because his kinesthetic sensitivity advanced to the same level as his main five senses. He was a blind man seeing color for the first time, a once deaf child hearing music. He could feel the world around him for the first time. The turbulent air currents, the solidity of the brick underneath his feat, the unique spiritual imprints of every person below him. He could finally look into the crowd and differentiate between each and every person. Everyone felt extremely different, some overwhelming, some furtive; some wild, some contained.

He’d told Henry and Penlope a white lie. He didn’t have anything to do other than buy new clothes, which he could do in half an hour. He just needed to get out and feel the world for the first time. So, he did exactly that. What he could do in half an hour, he stretched out to five hours. He walked everywhere, visited places he knew he wasn’t going to buy from, procrastinated on every decision, talked at length to every vendor, bought so much more than he needed, and took every detour possible. He didn’t care about anything other than the moment, not the egregious amounts of money he was wasting, nor the looming threat of assassination.

So—five hours in, low on coin—it came at no surprise to him when he realized he was being followed. He recognized six different people that had been tailing him for close to twenty minutes. Considering his extraneous and spontaneous route, it was pretty much confirmed they were following him. The first question he asked himself was why hadn’t they attacked yet? The longer they followed him, the higher chance he noticed, so why wait for so long? Thankfully, that answer became clear when he turned a corner and felt six more people stationed on the rooftops either side of the street he planned to go down. Most likely, they wanted to attack him sooner but his nonsensical pathing threw them off.

Then, he had to ask himself another question: fight or flight? He could feel that the six would-be assassins on the rooftops were relatively powerful mages, possibly even specialized. He knew what he promised Henry and Penlope, of course. But they weren’t there. He could always tell them that he didn’t notice the assassins until they attacked. After that point he could say that he recognized how easy they were to thwart and decided taking care of them would be just as fast as running. Would they be easy, though?

The second he considered the question, he snorted in derision. Of course they would. They had no idea that his portals would work just fine in stabilized space. They had no idea that he managed to create the beginnings of a cultivation technique. And most importantly, they weren’t him. They were nobodies willing to kill for a few thousand gold coins split twelve ways. If the mages were any actual good, they could be making a lot more for a lot less.

So, he sharpened his sensitivity and waited for them to make a move. A few steps away from the buildings the mages were stationed on, the world around him thunked into place. Suddenly, every bit of reality felt unyielding and tangible. Every step thereafter felt graceful and smooth, dependable and sure. It was obvious that they’d stabilized space to a higher degree than even the castle’s defenses. Once he took the final step, directly in between them, the mages stood up on the edge of the roofs and shot two each of three different spells at him. Whoever they were, they were desperate enough to disregard civilian casualties.

Closing in on him from either side, he had abnormally fast fireballs, waves of lightning charges, and the most concerning, large ballista bolts made of light. If Eliot really couldn’t use his portals, he would probably be screwed by the assassins’ opening alone. In reality, though, he opened six sets of portals simultaneously. The first portals directly in front of each projectile, the seconds directly behind the mages that cast them. Moving faster than any of them could react, the ballista bolts pierced straight through the stomachs of their mages. The grievous injuries also left them unable to mount a defense against the charges and fireballs that hit right after. The other four mages were able to launch themselves away without getting hit, but could do nothing to help their doomed allies.

Everyone around him naturally started to panic in light of the flashy spells and explosions. More than the six people pulling out weapons and running at him, Eliot felt concerned that a large amount of people in the crowd would still be injured or killed from trampling. To prevent that, he opened a series of portals throughout the street leading to the open fields just outside Everveil’s walls. Sure, it was the most inconvenient location, but if he sent them anywhere else in the overcrowded Metropolis he would just be spreading the damage further.

The six martials would have been a little annoying to deal with before his training with Master Camble, but now he couldn’t help sneering at their pitiful display. Normal martial combat is a simple thing decided by whoever has more men, more armor, or better geographical maneuvering. It isn’t until the echelons of Demigods, half-step-Demigods, and those on the cusp of the Mortal Limit that there is any doubt—or really anything interesting at all—involved. After his tortuous training with Master Camble, the six people before him looked absolutely pathetic. Eliot was more than confident that he could incapacitate all of them with his fists alone—that is if he had enough time and freedom of movement. The four mages still on the rooftops would undoubtedly rejoin the fight with a vengeance as soon as they regrouped.

He waited until they were all roughly three steps away from him to cast a spell to spray them all with highly pressurized, about to freeze, water. When the water hit them, not only was the pressure and cold enough to stop them in their tracks, it finished freezing on contact. In just a few moments, they were all taken out of the fight since large amounts of their bodies were covered in thick layers of ice. Before he could do anything else, however, the cement under his feet liquified. Already expecting something along those lines, Eliot instantly cast a water walking spell that hovered him just above the cement, saving him from being trapped when it resolidified a second later.

He reconfigured his focus and jumped through a portal onto one of the rooftops. The two mages turned to face him, but before they could cast anything, their own shadows lifted to shove them over the edge. One of the mages was just able to cast a spell to soften their fall, though not by much. They would still have fractures, or at the least, a severe ache for a few days. With that done, he portaled to the other rooftop, where the mages were already waiting for him. They fired off a volley of balls of hot and cold air currents. Eliot smirked at their stupidity and opened portals to send them right back. To his pleasant surprise, the mages had set up a hemispherical field of orange light that easily dispersed the winds on impact.

Then, with a resounding crack, large parts of the roof to his sides folded up to meet him. Completely caught off guard, he wasn’t able to think or cast a spell in the split second he had. The only thing he thought to do was duck his head and lift his arms. The slabs of brick slammed into him, making his mage armor flare to life in protest. Even as improved as it was, it could only last a second until the overwhelming pressure shattered it and pressed in on Eliot. He shrieked as the unyielding forces ground and shattered his bones, and attempted to fold his torso in half. Agony like he never felt before flooded his senses and drowned out all his thoughts but one: the inevitable surety that if he stayed where he was, the mages wouldn’t hesitate to finish him off. Through the tears and painful gasps, he commanded his mana to open a portal beneath his feet. He fell and landed hard in an alleyway a few streets away, crying out once more. Thankfully, it was unlikely they would hear him over the rumbling of the slabs falling back down.

In the alley with thick tears rolling down his face, he focused his mind on controlling his breathing, just like Master Camble taught him. Eventually, after a long time, though the pain didn’t nearly go away, it did subside enough for him to think clearly and assess his situation.

“Gods, that hurt! I can’t even remember the last time I cried,” he chuckled, though he knew that wasn’t true. He could remember it in vivid detail, he just very much didn’t want to. “Ugh, Penlope is going to be so mad and insistent and I’m going to have to be extra sincere to make up for it. Pinche Cabrónes, causing more trouble than they’re worth,” he complained.

He blinked the tears out of his eyes and looked down at himself. From his shoulder to his wrists, his arms lay unnaturally limp and dressed in all ranges of blacks, blues, and reds.

“OK, so no moving around for the rest of the fight. Magic is awesome, so I can work with that,” he whispered to himself.

Sure, he could—and any sane person would say that he should—cut his losses and leave with his life, but Eliot wasn’t about to lay down and take serious injury without getting something in return. At first, he wanted to take on the assassins to gauge how much Master Camble’s preliminary training had a practical effect on combat, and to have some fun. Now that he’d paid for his foolhardiness, he was going to get his retribution.

Eliot, without moving a muscle, opened a small portal high in the sky to get a bird’s eye view of his enemies. As expected, they were grouping up, taking care of their wounded, and it looked to him like they were discussing further action against him. If they were still considering going after him, he realized he was wrong about his first impression of them. They clearly weren’t just doing it for the gold, there was something greater on the line. As far as the mages’ magic abilities went, he knew everything he needed to know: namely the fact that their casting was nowhere near as fast as his. They needed to set up a trap and cast in advance to catch him, instead of casting on the fly.

So, as boring as it was, he fell back on his portals to single-handedly win the day. A few mental calculations later, all ten living assassins fell—or rather were sucked from difference in air pressure—into a large portal that opened instantly under their feet. Then, he immediately started covering the empty street in massive webs made of human-equivalent-sized strands. From their prospective falling point, he opened a series of portals that would have them fall through each section of the web, a portal at floor level taking them to the top of a different area. Nearly forty-three seconds later, the assassins fell from the sky, unconscious and shivering. They tore through the first section of webs like it wasn’t even there, then the third and fourth. Slowly, but surely, they ripped through every web until they were finally caught by the twelfth section.

Eliot had set up twenty sections to be safe, so half the web went unused. To clean it up he separated the twelfth section from the space around it with large portals, and lit the web on fire. The webs burnt to nothing. With that taken care of, he turned his attention to the tens of guardsmen making a perimeter around the street. After the fiasco with the Serpentine Brotherhood’s den, he’d made sure to study up on Guard protocols. Usually, it was standard for guards to maintain a perimeter around a fight when it was between high-level mages and above. He didn’t know whether to deride them for being incompetent or feel flattered that they considered him a high-level mage.

He cast a voice amplifying spell and announced, “Attention to any guardsmen, this is Eliot Reileus speaking. I was ambushed by a group of twelve individuals that wanted me dead, so much so that they ignored the safety of the common folk. To ensure their safety and prevent a stampede, I opened portals outside of Everveil’s walls. I have no doubt there will be a large procession of citizens wanting to get back in. The ten remaining assassins are bound and unconscious, I would appreciate it if you would arrest and hold them for me.”

After he was done, he gingerly rested his head against the well and sighed, “Now, for the worst part.” He closed his eyes and focused on his breathing. He maintained a meditative headspace for a time, then counted to five and opened a portal back to his dorm, specifically above his bed. Even landing on a softened surface, his breathing seized as a fresh wave of pain overtook his already haggard psyche.

Thank the gods, Penelope was there. Both she and Henry jumped to their feet. Penelope gathered her mana to perform a series of quick pulse scans on his most injured extremities. After a barked order, Henry was quick to do Eliot up in magically improvised splints and restraints. With assessment and preparations done, Penelope started the healing process. In total, the healing took just over twenty minutes and she was drenched in sweat, completely spent by the end of it.

Still, she only took a small breather before saying, “Damn the Abyss, Eliot, why do you do this?”

Eliot still felt sore all over, but he knew Penelope, even nascent, was still one of the best healers on the Two Continents. “How bad was it?” he asked.

“How bad was it?” she laughed ludicrously. “Your arms were shattered! You had fracturing everywhere! You’re lucky you’re not paralyzed or have blood pooling in your brain, you suicidal dimwit!” She turned away and took a deep breath. “I could only address the worst of it. Your body should be able to heal the rest, but only over a long time.”

“Exactly how long? Also, if it’s that bad, shouldn’t I go see another healer?” Eliot posited.

“No, you should not go see another healer. Most healing magic just isn’t as good as natural healing. If you were to get your arm cut off and regrown, it might feel like it’s good as new, but we only heal the bare minimum so that the body has something it can heal on its own,” Penelope explained.

“Ok, but how long?” he pressed.

“Until I damn say so!” she snapped. “If you get into another fight, or just intensive physical activity, your bones will rebreak and your blood vessels will repop. I can’t believe that’s what you’re asking about right now. You’re lucky you got here before you passed out. Clearly the Gods, Fates, and reality itself just can’t get enough of you.”

“What transpired to leave you in such a state?” Henry interrupted before she could go on.

Eliot smirked at the thought. “I got a little ahead of myself, underestimated my enemies. Before I knew it, the ground, or I guess roof, came up to flatten me. If I hadn’t restructured the mana in my mage armor, I probably would have died. In the end, I just portaled them up into the sky and caught them with some nifty webs.”

“Are we going to talk about this now or later? Either way, we will talk about this,” Penelope insisted.

Knowing exactly what she meant, Eliot sighed in exasperation. “We can get it over with now.”

“Why do you feel the need to lie?”

“Everyone lies. You lie about a lot, even Henry lies some,” he asserted, “It’s not necessarily a bad thing. Well used white lies help keep relationships healthy.”

Penelope shook her head furiously.“Lies have a place in small talk and setting boundaries. They don’t keep relationships healthy, they stop them from happening all together. And when lies in a relationship get exposed, they break it, Eliot.”

“That’s completely reliant on the prerequisite of the lies getting exposed. If I hadn’t messed up, you would have no idea I fought off assassins if I didn’t tell you. And it should be said that I would have told you both eventually, during an important discussion so it could slip right by and I could claim no harm no foul.”

“Why did you have to lie in the first place?” she asked. “If you were going to tell us eventually, why didn’t you just tell us in the first place? Why risk our trust at all?”

Eliot scowled grumpily. He could tell that all the pain and weariness was making him be a lot more direct and callous than usual, but since he was still in a bad mood he didn’t really care. He would deal with the consequences later. “Because if I told you the truth immediately, you wouldn’t have accepted it. You would say, ‘Don’t go, you might die’. I would say, ‘I’m going anyways’. Then you would say, ‘I won’t heal you if you’re so insistent on dying’. Then I would say, ‘I don’t care, I can get my healing from someone else’. And we’d both be fuming about it for the rest of the day. Me because I think it’s awfully rude of you to try controlling my actions like that; you because you can’t understand why I’d risk my life on something so small and stupid,” he huffed in one large breath. “When obviously I don’t think it’s very small or stupid nor do I think my life is actually at any risk. I’m sick of you trying to tell me what to do when you don’t know me or what I’m capable of.” Immediately after, he turned his head to the side when he felt a grimace forming on his face so strong he couldn’t suppress it. He felt like a fucking four year old indulging in this garbage but he was just too negatively charged to regain control, and every word only riled him up more.

Seeing Eliot turn in his direction, Henry looked away and awkwardly readjusted himself. He did his best to try and pretend like he wasn’t there.

Penelope only spoke after a long moment of silence. “You’re partly right. And you’re partly wrong, as well,” she said softly. “I’m sorry for being so . . . smothering. It’s hard to . . .” She sighed before saying, “I’m sorry. I’ll try my best to stop. But you’re also wrong for assuming we wouldn’t accept it before giving us a chance to prove otherwise. I don’t need to understand why, if it’s that important to you, you know? I’d like to think that I’d support you regardless.”

Eliot took a deep breath, composed his face, and turned back to her. “I do my best not to lie, you do your best not to be a control freak. Sounds fair enough,” he nodded.

“Next time tell us honestly what you’re going to do, and maybe we’ll be there to help if you ever make another mistake,” Penlope told him with a small smile.

Eliot looked away again. “Thank you.” He wanted to say more, but he bit his tongue.

“You really are seventeen, aren’t you?” she laughed.

“What’s that supposed to mean,” he half-growled.

She just descended into full on laughter. Great, so he was going to have to deal with ageism again.

“It would be great if you wrote some sort of note I can show Master Camble to get out of training. And I’m not trying to rush into anything, but I would like to know when I can move around by myself, at least.”

She considered for a moment. “Give it three days until you move for anything unnecessary. As for Master Camble, it would be best if I could talk to him directly. Is he the type of person who wouldn’t deign to speak to a lowly mortal?”

Eliot snorted, “You wanna give Master Camble a talking to?”

“If at all possible, yes,” Penelope harrumphed with crossed arms. “I want to make sure he understands the severity of your injuries. It would be extremely untoward of me to tell him myself when he can resume your training, so I want to make sure he has all the details.”

Eliot mirthlessly chuckled. “He’d meet you, sure, but you’re in for a rude awakening if you think he’s going to give me even the bare minimum for rest and recuperation.”

“It may be untoward to tell him when he should resume his training. But what’s he going to do if I consensually kidnap you for a few days? He may be Master Camble but I’d like to see him weather the consequences of trespassing on holy ground and barging into the room of Gaia’s chosen. Afterall, I’m a fair maiden with lady things that should not be made public. He would be tarnishing my honor and dignity,” she dramatized with airy demure.

Eliot snorted into aching laughter; even Henry couldn’t help a bemused grin.

“Look, I appreciate it, but he may do just that, not caring of the consequences,” Eliot told her after catching his breath.

“I have other places I can take you, too, don’t worry about it,” Penelope assured him. After a second she said, “I don’t really have things to hide in my room. I’m hardly there for anything besides sleep.”

“Alright,” he agreed unwillingly, “Thank you.”

After casting the cleanse spell, she got off the floor and flopped on Henry’s bed. “Rest assured, if I do have to spirit you away I’ll be stealing your bed as payment. Henry’s will have to do for now,” she sighed, nesting under the furs and hugging his pillow.

Henry’s face reddened ever so slightly at the sight. Eliot shook his head in sympathy. It was looking more and more likely that those words would be left unsaid. Playing matchmaker was all fun and games when he didn’t really care about either person involved, not so much when it concerned his friends. He had to consistently remind himself that trying to meddle in that would have consequences he wasn’t willing to bear. Even if he did, his desired outcome may be more challenging than he was capable of. Penelope was naturally a little oblivious, but when it came to Henry it was to a painful degree. For the nth time he told himself that he’d let it play out naturally.

“I didn’t really care about the clothing,” he admitted a little late. “Well, I did, it just wasn’t the actual reason I needed to go out.”

“What was, then?” Penelope asked after sitting up and getting serious again.

“The manaemundas I made was, let’s say, more than I thought it would be. I haven't consciously measured my mana’s purity yet, but I know it’s probably near mucilaginous now. The main thing is I think I can feel mana signature now,” he explained.

Henry and Penelope’s eyes widened at his words.

“Only Archmages are supposed to be able to feel mana signature without assistance,” Penelope whispered in shock. Eventually, she smiled and shook her head in disbelief, “Is it too late to take back what I said about you being an unworthy successor?”

“I’ve an assessor if you’d like,” Henry chimed in, fishing the cerulean-black orb from his chest.

Eliot took the pearl with a thanks, immediately channeling an SUM into it. While he had rough estimations of his purity, he was still filled with anticipation as various shades of blue swirled within the pearl. Nearly a minute later, it settled on cobalt blue. In other words, lower-low mucilaginous.

Crowded around him, Henry and Penlope leapt for joy at the sight—literally in Penelope’s case. Eliot, though, felt the joy drain away like it was a tangible thing. Lower-low mucilaginous was the highest purity an average mage was likely to achieve after spending their entire life honing their magic. Eliot was able to reach the same height after a mere ten months.

Taking Henry and Penelope as examples, their natural mana purity maxed out at lower-low aqueous. They were lauded as well above average, and yet Eliot matched them two weeks after his initial awakening. It took years for a mage to meet the max of their natural purity, meaning he could make no progress in Lex Ruptor for years and his natural purity would get him to around lower-high Mucilaginous. With a purity like that only a few years into his tenure, he would have reached a level orders of magnitude higher than the average mage could ever dream of.

The problem was clear: his progress was just too fast. Even though the ranks of mana purity describe exponential increases, he was just beginning with Lex Ruptor. By the time he was even half way, he was going to eclipse tangible mana altogether. And that wasn’t factoring in the amount of mana he would gain.

“What, mucilaginous not good enough for you?” Penelope chided when she noticed his less than celebratory expression.

Eliot cracked a smile with a shake of his head. “No, it’s just not a surprise anymore. I kinda already knew where my purity was so this just feels like old news,” he lied.

So what if it was too fast? It was becoming more and more obvious that he couldn’t stay at his level of power for much longer. When he was done playing politics and sorted out anything that could distract him, he would have all the time in the world to invent new goals to work towards. For now, he would stay resolute in his path to progress as fast as he could. Only with power could he do the things he wanted. So power he would be.

“If you can feel mana signatures what do ours feel like?”Penelope asked, circling with her finger.

Eliot smirked. “It’s hard to put into words; it’s like trying to describe the color orange to someone who’s blind. But I’ll try. At first glance, Henry’s feels like a harmless shadow doing its best to be small and unnoticed. Upon closer inspection, within that shadow rages a fiery, tempest. A power ready to raze the world, kept contained and controlled. At the same time, like a sword that can cut through anything stowed in its sheethe, waiting for its wielder to need it. Maybe like a sword made of fire.” He mulled his words over unsatisfied. As much as he dug, there was a weird, clashing quality about it he couldn’t put in words.

Eliot shrugged it off and turned to face Penelope. “Yours feels like a flower bud. Your signature comes in layers wrapped around themselves, covering a core of vibrancy. The flower is just starting to bloom with something more, like a fruit of some kind growing from the core. Also, the flower is on a long, curly stem riddled with thorns.”

Henry pondered the words with a frown.

Penelope immediately complained, “Seriously? Henry gets to be a cool fire sword and I’m just a flower? Growing fruit, no less. That’s all I get?”

“I did mention thorns, didn’t I? Long, pointy ones that would get you through gloves. I thought you liked plants, anyway.”

“I do,” she sighed, “It’s just sometimes it feels like that’s all I am. I’m like a little girl obsessed with unicorns, except for me it’s plants. I’m more than Gaia’s chosen. Or I want to be, anyway.”

Eliot grinned brightly. “Is it so wrong to be so obsessed with something? Besides, from personal experience, you’re way more than just a plant girl. Honestly, life would be easier if you weren’t so darn complicated,” he snuck in a nugget of truth.

She grew a grin of her own. “Thanks. You know, now that I think about it, can you feel your own mana signature?”

“I can,” he nodded. “But it’s like trying to look at myself without a reflective surface. I can see a lot, sure, but there's also a lot I’ll never be able to see without assistance.

“If I had to describe it, my mana signature is like a storm, with me at its center. Ready to rage or clear at my whim. But, again, that’s only the amount of it that I can feel. Most likely, the full picture is something completely different.”

“That sounds pretty accurate already. I wonder if mana signature has something to do with personality. It seems pretty clear that it does, but I haven’t seen that mentioned in anything I’ve read,” Penelope pondered.

“Maybe it’s not necessarily the mana signature but the mana itself that takes after the personality of its person. Mages definitely feel way more, not only strong but more complex than non-sensitives. Maybe the more experienced the mage the more their mana reflects them. Maybe it has something to do with ego?” Eliot posited his train of thoughts.

“That sounds likely. I’ll see what I can dredge up on that front, but we’ll probably have to be satisfied with our own guesses.”

They talked for a while more, until Penelope had to leave for other things. Henry was quieter than usual, clearly something on his mind. But he still participated here and there. It was a nice reunion after having been gone for so long. They had known each other for less time than he’d been away, yet coming back felt like he picked up right where he left off.

He didn’t have much he could do being bed-locked and all, so he spent time reading his journal in its entirety for the first time. Suddenly, everything made sense. Not actually everything, but in a few hours he learned everything about magic that the author learned over the course of years. A large majority of that knowledge learned from books so old that they were written sometime near the Iceonian empire’s time period. While they certainly didn’t have any of the amazing upgrades they had during the Golden Age of Magic, there was no better source for the basics than when magic was first created. He didn’t fully realize until then that his journal probably held a wealth of restricted and coveted knowledge that was hard to get or downright impossible to get anywhere else. Whoever the author was, she was either extremely important or extremely lucky.

For one, he learned how healing and status spells worked. Normally, a spell couldn’t be cast directly on another person. Technically, it was possible to cast a spell infinitely close to someone, but the authora—or aura—rebuked spells within its purview. The closer to the person the spell was being cast, the more mana it would cost and the weaker effect it would produce. It also introduced post-casting time. Instead of just coming into effect the instant the runes were engraved into reality, it took time for those effects to manifest when in the authora—drastically increasing the closer to the person until the spell is negated outright.

However, there were some spells that could bypass those rules and play by their own. First off: healing wasn’t affected because, as an integral part of most healing spells, the spell’s effects remained as mana after the casting until the spell reached the area it was supposed to affect. Once the mana is already deep in the authora, it doesn’t seem to care. According to the journal, healing spells only got away with it because the spells technically culminated outside of the authora.

The second biggest exceptions were status spells. Although it seems as if status spells directly targeted a person, the tangible effects were more of a consequence to their real target. Status spells, for lack of knowledge, seemed to target a person’s will. When a positive status is cast on someone, their will lets it take effect without fighting. When a negative status is cast on someone, a battle of ‘wills’ takes place. Except, sheer willpower doesn’t hold as much sway over the contest as the ‘magical prowess’ of the contestants. The stronger, more experienced mage usually won in the end, while willpower only mattered if the two mages were of a similar level. Proclivity in status spells, like Penelope had, made it incredibly easier to force and defend against statuses. The difference even a minor proclivity had in the battle of will and magic prowess was noted to be extreme. So Penelope’s major proclivity was probably going to be a much bigger deal when she finished maturing as a mage, and had more mana, practice, and spells at her disposal.

The final noteworthy exception were illusion spells. In the same vein as status spells, illusion spells targeted a person’s senses. While the advantages these spells had are great, they also came with plenty of downsides. Healing spells ranged from complex to mind boggling, status spells were similarly complex and costed astronomical amounts of mana compared to other spells. Illusions had it worst of all. To be just a good illusionist was Abysally difficult. Even the slightest of discrepancies in an illusion, if noticed, could be enough for the target to believe it was an illusion. Illusions affect a person as if they were real even if that person knows logically that it’s an illusion, as long as the person can’t find any mistakes or logical fallacies in the illusion itself. Unfortunately, most people just weren’t able to perfectly emulate every detail of reality without the smallest mistake. Especially when it had to be done in the language of runes and in the midst of battle. In modern day, for the regular mage, illusions were perceived as good for little more than novelty and pranks. Even if in reality they could prove very useful, if properly implemented.

Eliot also spent a large amount of his time reading all he could about divination. It caught his eye for more than a few reasons. He paid particular attention to it in the first place because it was labeled as one of the few schools of magic known in the modern age but that no one’s been able to really understand yet. Also because he knew that one of Penelope’s titles was the Holy Divineer. He figured that he could help her by understanding the difficulties in her expertise and maybe even solve a few of them. He was pleasantly surprised to find that his assumptions were a misunderstanding. Holy divination and ‘regular’ divination were two completely different things. Holy divination didn’t even have anything to do with magic. It also couldn't really be practiced or learned, it was gifted. Holy divination was the ability to receive information, visions, dreams, messages, and so on from celestials or gods. Seeing how distant the gods had been and how Penelope was the only mortal favored by a god in Everveil, that was probably why she was known as the Holy Divineer and not something along the lines of Gaia’s Divineer.

‘Regular’ divination—sometimes referred to as magical divination—was the practice of using spells for the sake of information and extrapolating upon that information to ‘divine’ important events and details of the past, present, and future. One of the main attractors of magic, in Eliot’s opinion, was the fact that magic relied on science, math, and the inner workings of reality to function. Divination was the same, except the separate field it drew on was the Spiritual Plane and the nature of mana. Which was the main reason why no one could fully revive it. While most functions of physical reality could be perfectly observed, the Spiritual Plane and mana were much harder to experiment with for a fathomless myriad of reasons. The main reasons being: to even be aware of mana and the Spiritual Plane’s existence, you needed to be mana sensitive, which was already a rare thing. Then, to be able to observe it with clarity, you needed to have strong sensitivity, which was exceedingly rare within mana sensitivity’s already established rarity.

For Eliot, every word more he read on divination, the more he fell in love with it. Just like engraving, the second he set his eyes on it, he knew it was meant for him. He’d eventually master everything, of course, but he knew he wanted divination to be one of the main attractions in his hat of tricks. Not to mention, he already had unfettered access to divination’s most low hanging fruit, especially now that he knew more about it. According to his journal, mana signature wasn’t as set in stone as everyone thought. He was spot on in thinking mana signature was mostly formed by outside influences; that part was obvious just from the fact that Henry’s was sharp and Penelope’s was blossoming. Regardless of how strong of an impact anything had on it, though, that was just the default. Mana was inherently malleable to no end. With enough practice, even the mana’s signature could be manipulated.

Eliot imagined that nugget of knowledge in particular wasn’t well known, if it wasn’t repressed entirely. As far as he knew, mana signature was basically the only form of identification and security built into magic. Their dorm rooms, for instance, were keyed to their mana signature, and it was touted to be absolute, ironclad security. It was highly likely Karl Favesh knew that wasn’t the case. It was also likely the boasting of its security was propaganda for the specific purpose of fooling everyone else into thinking so. That notwithstanding, it was said to be insurmountably difficult to perfectly replicate another mana signature, since there was so much volatile detail that went into it. It should also be said that there were varying levels of signature verification. Eliot would have thought it would be as simple as the reliable cleanse spell—one spell that perfectly got the job done—but apparently spells that read and recognize mana signature were hefty in mana cost and complex in structure. So, by knowing what those spells looked for, he would only have to worry about the section of signature any given spell cared about. On the other hand, mana signature was complex enough that it should be possible for a mage that knew what they were doing to create their own signature reading spell that cared about different parts. Meaning, unless he knew beforehand what that specific spell cared about, he would basically have to mimic the signature perfectly. Then, if a mage really knew what they were doing, they could set their own unique signature reading spell that cared about a unique signature that was different from their own. In that case, without knowing what that signature was or what the spell looked for, it would be impossible to exploit that set up.

All of that meaning it wasn’t as simple as he first thought. He had no doubt that divination would be everything he was hoping it would be.

Finally filling in all the gaps of his basic comprehensive knowledge, Eliot felt content facing his three days of motionlessness. The next morning, Penelope arrived bright and early to talk to Master Camble. Needless to say, she and Henry were stewing anxiously. They even took the initiative to dress nicer than usual. Henry looked plenty dapper in his white and gold vest and leggings he usually wore when he had to be social. Penelope wore a polka-dotted sundress of all things. They wore it all so well that, even knowing it was entirely unnecessary, they succeeded in making Eliot feel out of place and underdressed. Had he known they were going to dress up he would have spent some time putting together an illusion spell to wear over his casts, at least. He did his best to remind himself again and again that Master Camble wouldn’t bat an eye whether they were wearing rags or the finest silks in all the realm. But fancy clothes had power. More than just appearance for others, fancy clothes had power over personal perception. Eliot loved how he felt done up in eye-catching clothes. And he was getting a surprising amount of fomo from seeing his friends like that without him. Fomo definitely wasn’t something he’d ever felt before, so it was proving difficult to control.

Although they took forever and spent way too much time roleplaying, Penelope finally felt ready for the real deal an hour after showing up—an hour after he was supposed to be there for training too. She took a deep breath and nodded to Eliot. He surreptitiously rolled his eyes while casting a portal to Master Camble’s office.

Master Camble raised his brow at the sight, not even having the decency of looking caught off-guard. Naturally, Henry and Penelope bowed and did the whole respects to the master thing. Then, before Penelope could get a word in, as she was raising her head, Master Camble simply stepped through the portal and examined Eliot’s wounds with dull eyes. Apparently, even after an hour of preparation, not once did they think Master Camble would so casually enter their space.

Master Camble leaned back a minute later with a frown. “Just who did you allow to injure you so?” he hummed disapprovingly.

Eliot couldn’t help a snort. He was entirely too amused that Master Camble saw the situation similar to himself. Realistically, after conditioning with Master Camble and taking the first step of Lex Ruptor, he shouldn’t have lost to anyone that wasn’t semi-well-known and powerful. It was only because he didn’t give his opponents the respect they deserved that he got injured. “I don’t know just yet, but I have a good plan to find out as soon as I can move. Also, I would appreciate it if you let me handle it myself instead of stepping in,” he requested.

“You must have a suspicion, then.”

“Yeah, I don’t have any proof, but I’m pretty sure it was a hit ordered by a lesser Archmage,” he nodded. “I should be able to figure it out pretty fast once I start searching.”

Master Camble turned to Henry and Penlope—making them jump—and nodded his head. “Thank you, Lady Evergreen. I owe you the life of my foolish discipulus.”

Eliot rolled his eyes so hard his vision started to swim.

“N-no it wasn’t—I mean, it’s not like—” Penelope bumbled helplessly over her words, almost immediately turning beat red. She quickly decided to just shut up and nod back.

“When shall I expect him well?”

“He’ll be well enough to move in two days,” she confessed immediately. “But, in your benevolence and wisdom, I ask he be given a week to properly rest to eliminate the risk of further injury.”

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“Very well,” Master Camble decreed. He turned and walked back through the portal. Somehow, much to Eliot’s amazement, he closed the portal on his way, despite the fact that Eliot was still providing mana. The mana cost didn’t suddenly spike, either, like it would have done if he had forcibly stabilized space to a degree even Eliot’s proclivity couldn’t cope with. The portal just decided to close. Eliot couldn’t even begin to try and guess how. Demigodly bullshit was bullshit.

For various reasons, the monk left the trio in a daze that continued for minutes after he left.

“What the fuck?” Eliot bemoaned into the silence with a pout. “Enemies will just be able to close my portals in the future?”

Penelope and Henry stirred at his words, realizing Eliot wasn’t the one who closed the portal. Penelope took a second to gather her words before she accused, “He was nothing like you described. Were you purposefully setting me up for embarrassment?”

Eliot violently shrugged his shoulders. “Did he not act like I said he would?” he asked rhetorically, “He’s a self righteous, senile old man. He pretty much ignored you until you were important enough to care about.”

“You have no idea what self righteousness and entitlement looks like,” Penelope groused, “And even though he was aloof, Master Camble of all people has earned that much.”

“You only say that because you’ve been conditioned to accept more shit than you should,” Eliot dismissed.

Henry shook his head. “I’m forced to disagree,” he told him slowly.

Eliot gasped dramatically, “Et tu, Henry?” Then he sighed and acquiesced, “Fine, I admit that you’re right. There are a lot worse people out there and being his discipulus could have been a lot worse, but just because I have it better doesn’t mean I have it as good as it really should be.”

“I suppose that’s the best we’re going to get,” Penelope grumbled. “I see you’ve been reading up on your history. Caesarus is a weird place to start in Kirlandhil history. It also doesn’t have much of any practical use unless you’re a part of the ruling class.”

Eliot scoffed, “You see, that’s the difference between me and you. You study history to learn from it, I read it for enjoyment. Caesarus’ life plays out like a novel, and the sheer audacity of the man is just amazing to see unfold.”

“Of course. And here I was hoping you of all people wouldn’t dramatize and glorify a narcissistic megalomaniac, like everyone else does. You are still seventeen, I suppose,” she jabbed.

“I’m obviously not commending his actions,” Eliot snapped, “All I’m saying is now that it’s all done and happened, it’s interesting to read about. If someone like that was alive today, I’d be first in line to humble them.”

Penelope flashed him a shit eating grin and chirped, “Good.”

And that was why he never told anyone anything. Cabrónes, todos.

Satisfied, Penelope hunched over and tore her dress off. Because of course she would. Unsurprisingly, underneath she had on the usual tubular bodice and glossy leather leggings. She almost gave Henry a heart attack, the poor guy.

“Speaking of assholes that need to be dethroned, I have an idea on how we can continue our crusade on the BrotherHood,” Eliot shared.

“I know that you know that we will refuse any of your insane plans until you’re in fighting shape,” Penelope told him with crossed arms.

“Agreed,” Henry supported.

“The first part of it doesn’t involve any fighting or even moving around. Just hear me out,” Eliot pleaded.

“We’ll listen, but no promises.”

“Thank you,” he emphasized with thespian flair. “Now. You know how when we talked to those scales they said they’d always receive instructions in some compromising location, like under a loved one’s pillow, right?” He specifically waited until they both nodded before he continued. “The intention behind that is the message that the Serpentine BrotherHood can be anywhere at any time. But, if you think about the logistics and just plain efficiency of something like that, there’s just no way they always have a blade hand-deliver those instructions. In fact, I’d wager they almost never have someone physically deliver those instructions. Why go through all the effort if there’s an alternative?”

“So they use magic. I could have told you that,” Penelope interrupted. “Something like that would be trivial for any decent mage. The scale is daunting, but that’s to be expected from an organization as large as the Serpentine BrotherHood.”

Henry, though, seemed to catch on. With widened eyes, he mumbled, “You mustn’t be intending divination?”

Penelope recoiled as if struck. “Since when did you learn how to do that?” she demanded.

“ . . . Last night,” Eliot admitted.

“You’re telling me that you went from knowing nothing about divination to knowing how to recognize and trace a spell that was cast in the far past, in a single night?”

“Well . . . yeah, basically,” he answered slowly.

Penelope sat on Henry’s bed and held her face in her hands. “Why do I even try? You wouldn't have to move to move a muscle, either. You can connect two points in space from anywhere in the world.”

“Know what I can’t do? Heal myself when I’m on the brink of death. Even if I knew some healing spells, they would never be as good as yours.”

“I guess you’re right,” she sighed. Lifting her head, she asked, “What do you need us to do?”

“Mostly reconnaissance. Even with my portals, it would be better for you two to scope things out. Plus, depending on just how much information this reveals, we might stumble upon an actually important location. I have no doubt the facade and politics keeping the place disguised will be ironclad,” Eliot explained his reasonsings.

They nodded, then crowded around his bed to see him work his magic. Apparently they wanted to do it then and there. Somehow they both forgot that they didn’t know where any scales lived. They didn’t even ask the ones they helped disappear. That was nothing Eliot couldn’t fix with a little divination, though.

His journal didn’t just stop at mana signatures, that was nothing but the beginning for divination. In modern times, most learned mages regarded mana signature as the lowest level divination related magics. While it was true that mana signature was the starting point to divination, it wasn’t technically a part of divination itself—at least it didn’t used to be. Mana signature was stressed as the starting point of divination because it was a prerequisite to being able to use divination spells in the first place. Most every divination spell followed the same order of operations: once cast, the spell would do something to the spiritual plane that elicited a ‘response’. According to his journal, that ‘response’ was known as akashic feedback. And in order to perceive that feedback in the first place, a mage needed to at least be able to feel mana signature, since it too was technically a form of akashic feedback. So, according to his journal, mana signature was nothing but an indicator that a mage had enough sensitivity to perceive divination’s akashic feedback.

In Eliot’s understanding, he likened the process to flashing a light on something. The light would hit an object and bounce off of it, which gave information to the eyes on how that object looked like. Of course, he was only aware that was how light worked because he read Karl Favesh’s book on everything light. It was easy to see how someone with no notion of something like that would find divination difficult to understand.

In their specific case, all he needed to do to find a suitable target was search through residential areas. As a novice, if he tried using a divination spell anywhere near some place like the academy, he would just get a wall of indecipherable stimuli that would overwhelm his senses. The living areas of the common folk, however, would be next to empty when it came to magical activity. With enough trial and error, Eliot was guaranteed to find what they were looking for.

Henry and Penelope were fairly disappointed when he told them how long it would take—they were raring to go right that instant—and they left to get some late breakfast from the mess hall soon after. Apparently watching a novice divineer painstakingly search through a massive area wasn’t very exciting. Eliot was forced to agree. The search took so long that he started to doubt if he was doing it right. Hours, and a good quarter of his mana storm, later, his spell finally returned something.

In truth, his descriptions of their mana storms were almost entirely embellished. Again, it was like trying to describe the color orange to someone who was blind. The only things he didn’t make up were their personal qualities. Penelope’s felt vibrant, beatific, and fresh, like all the qualia of an expansive forest. Henry’s was a threat ready to be acted upon at any moment because, whether he knew it yet or not, he was a skilled warrior ready for anything. It had those qualities first and foremost because mana signature wasn’t technically divination. It was adjacent, but ultimately different.

When Eliot’s spell returned akashic feedback, he was met with a consistent and regularly repeating stimulus. Like a beat repeated over and over. He knew that within that stimulus was everything he could ever want to know about the spell, its casting, and its caster. Unfortunately, he had no idea what to look for or how to understand what anything meant once he found it. All he did know was where the spell was and that it was still in progress.

His entire body flinched when it happened, so Henry and Penelope were already up at the ready. In lue of explanation, he opened a small portal from the middle of their dorm to high in the sky above a neighborhood of houses, then he cast an illusion spell to magnify the image to ten times its size.

“There it is!” Penelope exclaimed, pointing to an animated letter flying through the sky.

They watched the letter nosedive over a specific home in wonder, still shocked that the divination worked in the first place. Eliot quickly dismissed the first portal and opened an extra small portal in each room of the house, magnified twelve times. The letter flew in through an open window, pressed up against the wall to remain unseen, flashed up to the second story, slipped under a door into a bedroom with six small beds, and nestled under the closest pillow. Eliot dismissed the rest of the portals and magnified the image of the room, then shared a thrilled look with his friends.

Penelope took a few seconds to focus on a long spell, closing her eyes and fixing her hands together as if in prayer. A hyaline, hemispherical white forcefield flicked to life over the three of them when she was done. Before the night previous, he would have had next to no idea what the forcefield was or what it did. Now, he knew it was a sonic barrier that would block sound from escaping so they wouldn’t be heard talking through his portals.

“Can you find where it was cast from?” she asked him hopefully.

He nodded his head and jumped to do just that. Thankfully, tracing a spell wasn’t something he had to dissect from the akashic feedback, it was a different spell altogether. Just like all things divination, Eliot found the tracing spell unendingly interesting. Its main complexity was its targeting. Spells that required a target needed something definitive. For a spell like fireball, its ‘target’ was where the fireball was produced. The duplication spell ‘targeted’ anything within a specified range. The tracing spell needed to target the spell it was trying to trace. To accomplish that, the first rune string of the tracing spell was a modified version of the recognition spell he used to find the animation spell in the first place. Instead of just blindly pinging an area—which was how the author of his book took to describing the process—to decipher its akashic feedback like the original, the rune string was specified to ‘ping’ the last area and object of the spell’s effect and target. In this case it was the letter under the pillow. And instead of giving him the same akashic feedback he already knew, it fed that information to the rest of the spell, which somehow used it to trace where it was cast.

Eliot assumed it would be similar—simpler even—to the akashic feedback of the recognition spell. So he was caught completely off guard when his entire being was wrapped up in the feedback and yanked into a spiraling rollercoaster of a journey. Flashing lights, roaring sounds, prickling and boiling and brushing sensations, sour and sweet and savory tastes, burning cedar and rotting eggs. A chaotic mash of all sorts of stimulus bombarded his senses. And above them all, he could feel the spell’s consistent repetition, growing stronger and stronger as the seconds went by. Until finally, for an instance, it overshadowed everything else.

He slammed back into his body breathing heavily and sweating profusely. Penelope was in the midst of casting a spell while Henry did everything he could to hold him down.

“What happened?” he huffed.

“You started to seize! I thought you were having an aneurysm for a second,” Penelope sighed. “What did you do?”

“I casted the tracing spell,” he chuckled, getting a handle on his heartbeat with slow breaths.

“What kind of spell does that to its caster?” she grouched.

“Well, this one, evidently.”

Back in his body and calming down, Eliot wasn’t about to be deterred by something as minor as that. Clearly the spell did exactly what it was supposed to. It just gave more than he expected. If it was overwhelming and chaotic, all that meant was he didn’t understand everything the spell was trying to tell him. That being said, the spell was more of an overachiever than he could have asked for. Even though he had no idea how to make sense of anything he just experienced, the physical location of the spell’s casting was burned into his mind nonetheless.

“Are we to take this as the spell’s failure?” Henry asked slowly when Eliot fell silent.

He shook his head with a toothy grin. “Nah, I know exactly where it was cast from. And if we’re lucky the caster is still there.”

He was hesitant to open a portal immediately at its location, though. As he first noticed with his professor, sufficiently experienced mages had sensitivity honed to the point that they could feel spells cast in their vicinity. To make matters worse, the spell was cast from a prominent Mage’s Guild location. For all he knew, the entire administrative ladder of the location was in cahoots with the Serpents. Even if they weren’t, the building would undoubtedly have spatial defenses, and when they were breached there would probably be some kind of alarm sounded.

Were any of those actual problems, though?

He opened three portals. The first connected the middle of their dorm to a diagonal portal that peered down on an area of flat grassland outside of Everveil. On that area of grassland he cast an illusion spell that would reflect images exactly like a mirror. Then, he opened a second portal positioned diagonally across from the first portal so that anything looking through it would have its view reflected from the illusion and see their dorm room. That connected to high in the sky above the Mage’s guild, where his final portal shared its view looking in on the room the spell was cast in from a corner. Four spells and a second later, Eliot’s set up gave them indirect line of sight to the room. To finish things off, he used another illusion to magnify the image and prepared a portal spell just in case things went south.

The trio were greeted to a dim room with an interesting contraption built into the center of its floor. It looked to be an esoteric diagram outlined and hollowed into golden metal, connected to a faucet that provided it with water to rush through its shape. A mage in a blue and orange robe kneeled at its edge, taking deep breaths with closed eyes.

They waited in tense silence for a few moments, but nothing happened. The mage didn’t notice them; no alarms seemed to be triggered. Eliot was almost disappointed.

“He must have just finished,” Penelope mused, “I should have known it would be this simple sooner. That’s a ritual set up that basically copies a spell and casts it en masse. If you have enough mana, time, and resources, you could cast a spell thousands if not tens of thousands of times. But, as you can imagine, it takes a lot of mana. Standard protocol says it should be powered by at least two wizened mages, or something like five average specialized mages. The fact that he can power it himself and that he chose to do it himself is telling.”

Since nothing was happening, Eliot happily set up more portals utilizing different angles of his mirror illusion to get a better look at their unsub. Once he memorized as much of the man’s face as he could—along with the ritual setup, of course—he closed his portals and dismissed his illusions.

“Anyone know who that guy is?” he asked while getting started on a sketch.

He used to be of the mind that, in a world with magic, muscles had next to no practical purpose beyond appearances. Now that he was fit and in shape he knew the true benefits of muscles were their massive improvements to quality of life. He would have thought having muscles wouldn’t affect something like drawing in any way whatsoever, but now he knew with properly trained muscle came much more finesse and control. Thanks to all that and his experience in engraving, he became an excellent artist basically as a byproduct.

“No, but . . .” Penelope alluded, casting a look at Henry.

“He bore the robes of a Crown mage,” Henry muttered darkly, looking away with a scowl.

Eliot bit his lip in concentration as he hunched over his drawing. “I have no idea how most of the stuff here works, so you’re going to have to explain it to me as if I was a foreigner that didn’t live here,” he reminded them. Because he basically was.

“Fine,” Penelope groaned. “Roughly, there are four types of mages in Everveil. There are Guild mages which are self explanatory, House mages which serve either a noble house or a specific noble, Crown mages which directly serve the Crown, and independant mages who don’t have exclusive allegiance to any one party.

Sighing, she continued, “Practically, it’s a lot more complicated. To become an official mage of any kind, you either need to be powerful, talented, or extremely good at what you do. Most mages in Everiveil are independent mages that practically do have definite allegiance with one party, but aren’t good enough to be given the promotion. The excessive requirements are especially true for official Crown mages because they literally report to the Crown first and foremost. There are different types and in practice there is a buffer in the chain of command, but the amount of political and sovereign authority any one Crown mage has is a force to be reckoned with.”

“And this guy is really a plant that works for the BrotherHood. Meaning their reach extends a lot farther than we thought,” Eliot realized what they already had.

“Yeah,” Penelope confirmed frustratedly.

“The way I see it, this doesn’t change too much. It just gives us more reason why we need to destroy them.”

“Indeed,” Henry seconded with fervor.

“And done!” Eliot announced cheerily. He copied his sketch onto four pieces and passed them to his friends.

“Mmh,” Penelope hummed dramatically.

Eliot crossed his arms defiantly. “Got something to say?”

“Me? Oh nothing,” she mocked a laugh. “Just, I don’t get a very developed sense of depth in this piece, you know?” She motioned to their innocent friend minding his own business. “Henry thinks so too, he’s just too nice to say it.”

Henry opened his mouth to say something but couldn’t seem to find the words.

“Tell you what? When you can draw a rough sketch of a face you saw for just over thirty-four seconds with a ‘developed sense of depth’, I’ll be delighted to learn at your feet. But until then, less critique and more admiration, yeah?” Eliot groused.

“Very well, I suppose the budding mage needs his fragile ego intact to make anything of himself,” Penelope delivered with an upturned nose.

Eliot rolled his eyes but couldn’t help chuckling at her inane comments. “Anyways, I don’t mean to call you out, Penel, but if that mass casting ritual was a thing that existed this whole time and it’s well known, why wasn’t that our first thought?”

She shook her head with a scratchy huff. “You’d be right to. I was stupid for not immediately suspecting it. But . . . it’s not supposed to be well known. The knowledge of how to use it, make it, and the physical constructions themselves, are all the property of the Mage’s Guild. No one outside the Mage’s Guild, even a Crown mage, should have access to it without extraordinary circumstances.”

“Then, do you think the BrotherHood has plants high up in Crown mages and Guild mages?” Eliot asked.

“After that, I have no doubt they have their fingers in every pie on the sill,” she agreed, “But I don’t think that’s the case here. If the Grand Magus or a Magus of that district were in on it, why not just have them use the ritual? I’ll tell you why: every use of something as important as that ritual would have to be documented and known by a lot of important people in the Guild. I think if someone at the Guild is in on this, their part would be to look the other way while the Crown mage did things on his own.”

“I think you’re right. That makes the most sense and explains why we didn’t activate any alarms: they were already disabled.”

“How shall we proceed?” Henry asked eventually.

“For now, we keep living our lives. You two try and find out anything you can about this guy. I’ll keep my eyes on this to see if it’s the same person using the same method in the future.”

They nodded resolutely. The more they dug into the Serpentine BrotherHood, the more fuel they found to keep their conviction burning higher than before.

Eliot's last two days of bed rest passed uneventfully. He woke up early the next morning and portaled to the top of their dorm tower. He floated above its peak with the fly spell, taking in the sprawling metropolitan view basking in the early sunrise. His eyes filled with marvel; his chest filled with thrill. He wondered just what was happening to make the sun those yellows and reds; what was happening to make the sky pink, purple, and blue. He wondered just what his eyes were doing to make the beautiful landscape appear before him. Whether it was the sun, sky, wind, or his own breathing, he knew there was an unfathomable explanation to everything occurring all around him every second of his life. And one day, he would know it all. One day, he would stand among his chaotic reality and know everything it was.

His time of playing games and messing around was over, whether he liked it or not. His foretold reckoning was finally starting. As much as he wanted to, he couldn’t just refuse and carry on with his life. That’s why he needed power, because that’s all power was, really. The ability to say no to what others wanted for you, and to what others wanted for themselves. He was sick and tired of doing what others told him. He was sick and tired of limiting himself for the sake of others. He was sick and tired of playing by other peoples’ idiotic rules.

He took a deep breath, then portaled back to his dorm. It was time he knew magic.

From that morning onward, Eliot set himself a rigorous schedule. From sunrise to twelve in the afternoon, he memorized the shape and function of every rune and spell he could get his hands on. Afterwards, he observed the BrotherHood’s daily transmission and practiced divination for six hours. He spent the last six hours of his day on engraving for practice, money, and personally useful items. He was so committed that he compromised his sacrosanct eight hours of sleep for a measly six. Afterall, who was he to question the wisdom of an ancient Demigod in Master Camble? If six was all he needed, six would have to do.

After the first few days of it, Penelope stopped visiting for more than an hour a day. Without Eliot’s input, she was really just spending an hour in their silent company. It was more difficult than he thought it would be to basically ignore her, but he knew it was probably for the best of them both. Penelope was chronically stressed and overworked. Hopefully, with the time she wasn’t spending with them, she could spend on . . . whatever it is she had to do all day. He still had no idea what it was keeping her so sleep deprived and busy, but he imagined it was something along the lines of ‘sacred duties’ only she could perform.

Henry, on the other hand, took the change in stride. They didn’t talk so much as they matched each other’s vibe to feel effortlessly comfortable in the other’s presence. He decided to join in on the rigorous study and practice. He read when Eliot did and trained his sword when Eliot focused on his preferred specialties. It proved to be incredibly beneficial to both of them. Especially since they traded books from Karl Favesh’s personal library and the royal anathema, which was a privilege literally no one else alive had access to.

A week flashed by like it was no time at all. The next morning, Penelope barged in and demanded their attention by snatching the books right out of their hands.

“You do know I could have you drawn and quartered by order of the crown for stealing precious secrets of the state, right?” Eliot drawled with a roll of his eyes.

“It’s a good thing you’re not stupid enough to do that over something so petty,” she scoffed; though she gave the titles a curious glance. “I finally got word from my informants about the Crown mage, or did you forget about all that?”

“What’d you find?”

She sighed. “It’s not as simple as we first thought. According to my sources, there is no Crown mage with that face. And that makes a lot of sense in hindsight,” she admitted. Manipulation of appearance wasn’t exactly easy, but it was by no means impossible.

“Well, I don’t think we can afford to be that cut and dry about things. How sure are you that your informants are right?” Eliot questioned.

“Pretty damn sure,” Penlope insisted. After a second, she begrudgingly added, “But I suppose I can’t be completely certain.”

“Regardless of appearance, the man must be a Crown mage. For his robe bore the marks of authenticity,” Henry contributed.

“All twelve of them,” Eliot agreed, having just learned that from a book he probably wasn’t supposed to have access to. “And if the guy couldn’t be bothered hiding his robe, why would he go through the effort of hiding his face? That just doesn’t make sense to me. There could be a more sinister explanation for it, but we need to rule out the most likely scenario first.”

“You say that, but I have no other source of information to draw from. What can we do that we haven’t done already?” Penelope pointed out.

“I . . . may know of a method,” Henry said slowly. “I’ve pondered if perhaps it would prove ultimately harmful.”

Eliot raised his brow curiously.

Henry took a breath. “I have no doubt my sister is capable of confirmation, if I were to beseech her.”

Penelope cringed ever so slightly at his words.

“What’s so wrong with messaging your sister?” Eliot queried, his interest peaked. “I get the feeling it’s not as simple as worrying for her safety.”

“My sister . . .” Henry trailed off and looked at the ground.

“Can be a very difficult person,” Penelope finished.

“In what way?”

“She’s capricious personified, and when she does set her mind on something she’s more stubborn than a mother oviuus protecting its calves.”

Eliot shrugged. “I don’t see the problem here.”

“They also . . . aren’t on the best of terms, you know?”

Eliot snorted. Avoiding social confrontation? Typical of Henry. Unless his sister really hated his guts, he doubted it was that bad.

“Trust me, I have plenty experience handling ‘difficult people’,” he emphasized with bunny ears. “If it becomes a problem I can help write the response—only if you agree to it, though,” he assured Henry.

He raised his head after a second of hesitation, and nodded. “Very well. You have my trust.” He grabbed the already written and packaged parcel from his desk drawer. With a deep breath, he casted a sending spell, spurring it to fly off into the sky from their window.

Now that he was more studied on the topic, Eliot knew exactly what kind of spell Henry used, and why he was spot on when he mentally labeled the BrotherHood’s spell an animate spell rather than a sending one. Henry used a standard sending spell, with the main function being to ‘push’ an item in a straight line a certain distance and elevation away. Other than some basic protections against things like moisture, the only other function of the spell was its minor obstacle-maneuvering. If the letter hit something in its way, the spell would lock it into a diagonal position relative to the obstacle. That way, the simple, one-directional ‘pushing’ of the spell would make it slip off of and out of the way of the obstacle.

The BrotherHood’s spell, on the other hand, had the letter take complex, surreptitious maneuvers during transit that were necessarily unique to each and every letter’s surroundings. Similarly, the end point relied on the letter finding a specified location and depositing itself in a specific place within that location that was necessarily unique to that location. Considering just the facets of the spell that he could observe from the outside, there was just no way that could be called a sending spell anymore. It couldn’t be just any regular animate spell, either. Even Archmages with proclivities in animating spells would find it a decent challenge to match the level of the spell the BrotherHood used. That all made perfect sense, though, considering the spell was pivotal to their operation, and they used it everyday. It also wasn’t very flashy so it was easy to disregard as nothing too special.

Eliot put his hand on Henry's shoulder and cracked a grin. “In other matters, I’ve put together a few experiments to try and figure out the portals in a ball fiasco,” he told them. “You didn’t forget, did you?”

By the way they stirred at his words, they had in fact forgotten. At least, they forgot Eliot was still hunting for explanations. He portaled them all into a practice room, which is to say a bare, reinforced room for practice and experimentation of volatile magic. Once there, he opened a smaller portal that led to the inside of a metal box Eliot buried a few days prior, some kilometers into the forest. He grabbed two magically laminated pieces of parchment, then handed them to his friends. Their eyes widened when they realized what he’d written on them.

“As I’m sure you’ve figured out, you’re holding the only written copies of the portal spell—don’t let go of them because the second you take your fingers off they’ll disintegrate,” Eliot explained quickly “Yes, it’s that simple. No, I don’t know exactly how it all works. I do have my suspicions, but they’ll remain suspicions for a very long time.”

“A-are you sure about this?” Penelope asked him in shock. “You know there’s no undoing this, right? If you’re wrong about being the only one able to cast it . . .”

“Then I have absolutely no regrets sharing it with you two,” he answered cheerily. “There’re just too many mysteries I’ll never be able to figure out if I don’t take the risk. I thought for sure I was the only one able to cast it since Karl Favesh did this whole golden light thing he never explained, but evidently Henry was able to use it somehow. And I need to know why.”

“I give my word: your trust is not misplaced,” Henry vowed solemnly.

“Thank you, princeling, I appreciate it. To start off, I want you both to try casting it, starting with Penel, if you would,” Eliot asked with a flourish of his hand.

Penelope’s bright eyes drank in the spell with awe, studying the slopes and flourishes of its runes. She closed her eyes, lowered her head, and put her hands together as if in prayer. Her mana flowed from three different points on her body and wove into the spell’s runes. The spell shone majestic, flickering gray, pulsing with power. The measured streams of her mana widened to deluge the spell, cresting in brilliance. Then, nothing happened. Penelope cracked an eye open with a frown. She fed the runes a small sea of mana, to no avail.

“What’s wrong?”

Eventually, she reeled in her mana with a thoughtful crease of her brows. “I can’t cast it. It’s as if it was a random assortment of runes, not a real spell.”

Eliot smirked. “Isn’t that interesting? Henry, you try please.”

Henry took a breath and rested his hand on the hilt of his sword. His mana followed the same routine. It shone all bright and splendid, and did absolutely nothing else.

“The same?”

“The same,” he nodded.

Eliot inclined his head knowingly. “Yeah, that’s about what I suspected. It’s nice to rest assured in the fact that I’m the only one that can cast it, but that doesn’t answer our question. Which means the experiment isn’t over.”

He fished an engraved silver ring from the same box and handed it to Henry. “That is a ring engraved with runes to open a set of portals just one meter away from each other. For our intents and purposes, it should be the same as the one you used against the serpents.”

Henry repeated his focusing ritual, only with his ringed hand extended. The mana’s light pierced through the ring as if it were hollow, bathing them in brilliant silver light. Eliot’s heart skipped a beat when the light flashed to nothing and two portals swirled into existence in front of Henry.

Eliot shook his fists together like an excited little girl. Jumping in place, he squealed, “It worked! It worked! It worked! Yes!”

Henry chuckled shakily, stunned in disbelief. He inched his hand forward through the portal, lighting up with a smile when he saw it exit from the second portal.

“That’s amazing!” Penelope exclaimed.

“Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!” Eliot interrupted with a point of his finger. “Now you try.”

Henry let the portals close and passed the ring. Penelope powered it without slipping it on her finger. Sure enough, a set of portals opened in front of her.

“It works for anyone! It works for anyone! It works for anyone!” Eliot put his hand on his chest and took a quick breath to calm himself. “Now, the question is why? Why the engraved ring but not the spell itself?”

“I . . . think I might know,” Penelope admitted slowly. “I’m fairly sure it has to do with Authority.”

A pleasurable chill raced down Eliot’s spine. “Woah, wait a second. Why did that sound . . . I don’t even know how to describe it but you all heard that, right?” he questioned. Henry nodded, still gobsmacked by everything happening in quick succession.

“Authority!” he tried, “How come it doesn’t sound like that when I say it?”

Penelope let the portals close, leaning into a hand on her hip. “Probably because you don’t understand it yet.”

“How do you know it, then?”

“Gaia. Authority is a pivotal concept to understand for Demigods and those on their level. So, to prepare me, he gifted me a sort of subconscious understanding of it.”

“So, can you explain it or not?” Eliot pressed her.

“I can try,” she shot back with attitude, “But don’t blame me if I don’t do a good job.”

“Authority is the overseer of reality. Whenever us meddlesome humans create a contradiction in reality’s rules, Authority decides the final outcome. It’s also directly responsible for proclivities. A proclivity in essence is nothing more than the Authority to cast a certain type of spells easier and with more oomph.

“I think what’s happening is that Karl Favesh gave you the Authority to cast the portal spell with that ‘golden light thing’ you mentioned. When we tried to cast it, we didn’t have the Authority. But because you were the one to engrave the spell into the ring, we were able to ‘borrow’ your Authority when casting it from the ring.”

“That’s so cool!” Eliot gushed. “But does that mean people will be able to effectively steal my authority if they get their hands on a portal spell I engraved?”

Penelope shook her head. “I don’t think so, no. Authority is smart. If you don't want someone to use your portals, then it shouldn’t work for that someone. I think.”

“In that case, I, Eliot Reileus, very much don’t want Penelope Evergreen to be able to cast the portal spell right now!” he announced grandiosely. When she gave him nothing but a blank look, he added, “Please?”

She chucked, rolling her eyes, and did what he wanted. Much to their amazement, the spell failed to cast from the ring.

“Authority, you smart cookie you! We’re going to have so much fun together!” he shrilled. He could almost imagine reality giving him a cheeky wink in response. He put his finger up and once again dialed down his emotions. “But! That still doesn’t answer our second question. Why is it that the portal spells somehow compromised on shorter portals rather than explode like they really should have when Henry didn’t have enough mana to fuel them?”

“That I still don’t know,” Penelope shrugged.

“Then there’s only one way to find out! Henry, if you would, cast the spell with only half of its necessary mana.”

Henry moved to take the ring, but Penelope pulled it away with an exasperated scoff. “You’re insane if you think I’m letting Henry blow his hand off. You don’t have to do this just because Eliot asked,” she admonished.

Henry shook his head. “I must. Not simply to fulfill his whims. I’d be unable to carry on if I refused, regardless of its peril. I must know of myself.”

She gazed at him with sympathetic eyes, but eventually acquiesced. “Alright, but we’re going to do this as safe as we possibly can.”

Fifteen minutes later, they were standing near one of the walls, shielded by various barriers with Henry sticking his hand in a collection of over ten more barriers of various effects. Only then did they finally get the go ahead from Penelope. Eliot watched with a toothy grin—Penelope a worried pout—as Henry focused on his mana manipulation. At exactly half the mana needed to fuel the full spell, he cut off his supply and willed it to gain weight and engrave upon reality. Penelope heaved a sigh, Eliot whooped a cheer, seeing a set of portals swirl open exactly half a meter from each other.

“Exactly what is implicated by this?” Henry asked after a moment of silence.

“If I’m not wrong—and I don’t think I am—this is your second proclivity at work,” Eliot told him while slapping his back.

Penelope jolted at his mention. “You know, I think you’re right. That would explain everything perfectly. Henry, I think you have an entropy proclivity. If we consider that it’s probably a specific mutation from your father’s major offensive proclivity, there’s just no way it’s not a major proclivity itself, as well.”

Henry’s face scrunched together. “I must confess I haven’t any idea of what entropy might be.”

“Entropy is . . . it’s . . . I don’t even fully understand it myself, this is too hard to explain. Eliot, you do it.”

“Gladly,” he accepted brightly. “Put simply, Entropy describes the behavior of ambient and uncontrolled mana. It’s actually a concept that mages have been studying since all the way back during the Iceonion Empire. We call it entropy just because that’s the name Karl Favesh coined, and he’s really the only person to put out anything in depth on the topic in recent times. The general mechanics of it are way too esoteric for me to explain right now, so I’ll give you a small presentation and I’ll give you all the books I’ve read on it later.”

Eliot dropped to the ground by crossing his legs, and conjured four sticks of physical darkness from his shadow. He motioned Henry to do the same across from him as he set up the visual aid. He placed the first two vertically in front of him with a large horizontal space separating them. He adjusted them slightly so they were equidistant from him and Henry.

“I need you to really try and go with me here, alright? This might sound like it has nothing to do with anything, but it does, I promise,” Eliot prefaced.

“Of course,” Henry nodded.

“Ok. Imagine the space between these two sticks is the amount of mana it takes to cast the portal spell engraved into that ring.”

Starting from the stick on the right, since it was Henry’s left, he filled the horizontal distance between the sticks with his mana.

“A normal casting of the spell requires that there be enough mana to reach the second stick. There can be more, but there can’t be less, otherwise there just isn’t enough to fuel the effects of the spell.”

He lowered the amount of mana to just a few centimeters away from the left stick. His pesky unspecialized mana kept dissipating, but he had to work with what he had.

“Even if there isn’t enough, though, the mana supplied is still there and it just needs to do something with itself. So it goes to the next best thing.”

He placed the third stick to the right of the leftmost stick, closer to his side than Henry’s.

“It blows up. Violently. It couldn’t quite reach the amount needed for the specified spell, but it needed to do something with itself so it blows up and fuels that explosion instead of the intended spell. That’s just the easiest thing for it to do in that situation. But, when it comes to you, things are different.”

He placed the last stick the same distance away from the leftmost stick, but closer to Henry's side than his own.

“When it comes to you, the mana goes out of its way to not go with the easier option of blowing up and compromises by casting the spell, just not at the same magnitude. Even though you’re probably not consciously thinking, ‘don’t blow me up,’ you would still much rather not blow up. And with your entropy proclivity, you’re able to influence the mana to do, not just what you don’t want, but exactly what you do want, which is cast the spell.

“That being said, that’s just the short and sweet of this specific example. There’s still so much to it, and honestly I’m jealous at the potential you have with it. Once you get some understanding and practice under your belt, you’re going to be able to do so much cool stuff with it. I’d go as far as to say it’s like having a special, advanced version of mana manipulation only you have,” Eliot elucidated.

“Why is it that ambient mana does not continuously explode, then?” Henry queried.

Eliot chuckled. “That’s because every type of mana has a ‘resting state’ where it’s perfectly fine just being in that state forever. Technically, ambient mana isn’t in its prime resting state since it wants to join with so many things, but that’s too much for right now. The prime resting state of refined mana is moving around in a mage’s mana storm. When mana is put towards casting a spell, it’s in basically the highest state of activity it can be in. It may seem contrary to reason, but performing the functions of a spell, or blowing up when it can’t do that, are the best ways for that mana to go back to resting. Even if it can’t get back to its prime resting state, it will do everything it can to get to a state that’s more relaxed than the state it’s currently in.

“That’s also why refined, unspecialized mana immediately starts to join back with the ambient mana surrounding it once it gets out of the mana storm. Even though the prime resting state of refined mana is in a mana storm, by becoming less pure and breaking away from the mage’s control it can achieve an even more relaxed state. Which is basically the same thing that’s happening when it explodes during a spell casting.”

“I see,” Henry hummed deep in thought. Eventually, he smiled at them and said, “Thank you, both. I haven’t any delusions that I’d be capable of uncovering my proclivities without your assistance. Thank you, truly.”

Penelope put a hand on his shoulder and smiled down at him. “Of course, Henry. We’re your friends, it’s what we’re here for. We help make each other better.”

“Yeah, exactly,” Eliot shrugged, disapparating the shadow sticks. “Who else is brave and skilled enough to stand by my side, felling serpents?”

Henry did that specific nose-exhale that meant he felt all warm and fuzzy inside. “I’ve much reading to be done. I must admit a decent grasp on entropy remains elusive yet.”

“Don’t feel pressured to try and figure it out as fast as possible. It’s a complicated thing with complicated explanations. Most likely, using it will be a skill you’ll have to continue refining your entire life,” Eliot told him.

Henry nodded, a burning ambition alive in his eyes. Eliot nursed a hefty ambition of his own. The things he learned in their experiment would change everything. If all went according to plan, everyone would be able to use portals to enhance their daily lives. And he was going to make a fortune off of it.

The second they got back to their dorm—after giving Henry his books on entropy—he portaled nearly a thousand kilometers north of Everveil, to the Veiled Forest. The forest was so named because of the fog, smog, and bog that perpetuated its floor, as well as from the long, overbearing branches of its poinciana trees. It was unfortunate the trees were all leafless from the cold weather, he’d heard a lot about their beautiful reds. When he first read about them, he planned to take his mother to see them, and get her opinion on how they compared to the Procudean Kingdom’s cherry blossoms. Unfortunately, it seemed he would have to wait a few extra months for them to bloom.

After some time searching and scaring off a talon of raptors with fanciful illusions, he finally found a clearing suitable for his experiment. With a wicked grin, he opened a portal that connected two hundred meters below the ground to two meters above the ground. Thanks to his expanding rune library, he figured out how to change the orientation of his portals. The one underground was parallel to the ground while the one above was perpendicular. His entire body tensed up in preparation as his hands covered his ears. A snapping screech of stone resounded throughout the forest and a puff of stone fell from one side of the portal. His shoulders drooped and his smile faltered when nothing else more rapturous happened.

“What? Did I get simple physics wrong?” he wondered aloud as he walked closer to the portal in front of him.

He walked in a circle around the portal, studying both sides. The first side, corresponding to the side of the underground portal facing up, showed nothing but untouched, unbothered stone. The second side, corresponding to the side of the underground portal facing down, showed stone with webs of cracks and shards, some of which spilled out of the portal and sprinkled the dirt.

The second side was entirely expected. It had all the weight of two hundred kilometers of earth on top of it. Suddenly having that lifted at instantaneous speeds would leave it in the exact state he observed it in.

The first side was the glaring problem. The portal underground was parallel to the surface, with the first side facing upwards. Meaning, from the perspective of the one hundred ninety one centimeter by two hundred kilometer cylinder of earth, there was nothing but empty space underneath it. It really should shoot out from the portal above ground with all the speed and anger of a cannonball—more probably. Objectively speaking, it was a good thing for him, a very good thing for him, but he couldn’t understand why things were working the way they were. He should be able to shoot massive cylinders of earth on command, damnit!

Getting an idea, he dropped to the ground in a meditative posture. He focused all his attention on his mana storm, figuring out how much the per-second-cost was and how much it cost him initially. He stood up with the beginning of a scowl when nothing was amiss. It all costed the same as normal.

“That just doesn’t make sense!” he whined to the dead trees.

The pull of gravity should be more than enough to overcome the friction and connections of the surrounding earth. Maybe if the portal were closer to the surface, the roots of the trees and foliage would reinforce the ground enough to keep it up. But there was just no way the weight of two hundred kilometers could be held up by any of the forces acting on it. At least the ones he knew about. It was entirely possible there was another big player he either forgot or simply didn’t know about.

Eliot let the first portals close and opened a second one a little ways away. No difference. He spent hours portalling around the forest and repeating the experiment, to no avail. Eventually, he tried it outside the forest, and got the same result. He got so fed up in the end that he portaled thousands more kilometers to the northern edge of the Feral Continent. On the other side of a mountain range, he stood on the precipice of a rugged cliff face, overlooking rocky ocean waters below and looking up to an endless blue horizon. After the hours he’d spent pouring over books on its ecosystem, animals, and views, Eliot had hoped his first visit to the ocean would be more special—maybe a shared experience with Cel and his family. Though he had to admit, the view was more beatific and awesome than he could have hoped for.

Taking a deep breath of the salty brine, he realized, “I need a view capture of this. And a painting. Mom and Dad would love it if I painted this for them.”

After opening a portal thousands of kilometers to get a canvas for his view capture, he focused back on his main objective. Using portals that connected the surface of the ground to the top side of a portal in the air, he walked out over the edge until he was above the ocean proper. Leaning over his portal platform to look at the water below, he started his experiment.

In his ground experiments, he learned regardless of the distance he opened a portal underground, the earth didn’t fall through. It only ever fell through if he tampered with it by manually cracking pieces. Even then, only the smaller chunks fell through while the main piece remained floating. The only time he ever got earth to fall through was when he first made a large cavity, closed the portal, then opened it in the same place. For some reason, the earth only caved in after the portal was gone. Then, if he opened a portal in the same place, only the shattered bits fell through while anything unaffected by the cave-in while the portal was gone remained floating. Similarly, a much larger cave-in would occur after closing the portal again.

Above the ocean, he opened a portal perpendicular to the surface in the sky near him and a parallel portal two hundred kilometers below the surface. Water immediately spewed from both sides of the sky portal with a rushing vengeance.

“Thank you! That’s what I’ve been trying to do this whole time!” he groused with thrown hands, his voice entirely overpowered by the water. “It’s also not what I was expecting,” he mused.

He had a whole host of tests and different setups he was planning on trying, but looking at the water bursting from his portal he realized he already knew the answer. He crossed his legs and fell into a meditative posture with a sigh. He let the portals close and the water stop before he spoke, “Karl Favesh idiot-proofed the portal spell.”

Just like the fly spell, Karl Favesh built in certain restrictions he deemed important enough to prevent accidental major injury or loss of life. In reality, he already knew that. Penelope told him a while ago that he really should have died when portalling half way across the world. He didn’t because the portal spell somehow resolved the life threatening issues with unobservable background magic, always there, always watching out. In reality, he had his suspicions the first test run, he just hoped he was wrong.

As much as he wanted to be mad that he wasn’t able to do whatever he wanted with the portals and that yet another person was trying to stop him from having the freedom to kill himself in an idiotic and spectacular fashion, he had to be thankful to Karl Favesh. Not only did he save him from a living Abyss of boredom, the idiot-proofing did save his life when he made a mortal mistake he didn’t know he was making. He wanted the freedom to launch face first into a suicidal situation, yes, but he wanted to know he was going into a suicidal situation beforehand. So while it did limit some of his freedom, it gave him just as much freedom as it took away, if not more.

Not being able to shoot massive cylinders of earth at people was lame, sure, but his plans—and working with underground portals in general—were going to be so much easier because of it. The automatic resolution of velocities, inertia, direction, and everything else with long distance portals hardly even had a downside.

Also, the implication of it supported one of Eliot’s more important hunches: his meeting with Karl Favesh’s spirit was not an accident. No spirit was as clear and crisp as that one. No spirit remembered exactly what it needed and no other useless information. No spirit wandered so far away from the place it was disjoined from its body. No spirit with the regret of never having found a worthy successor just happened upon the next generation’s magical genius. No spirit just had a written and wax-sealed letter of recommendation at the ready.

Why would Karl Favesh—a powerful Demigod and Archmage—impose integral restrictions on the portal spell? Since he clearly knew how to resolve the problems with other magic, why would he compromise on versatility to build those solutions into the portal spell itself? Clearly Karl Favesh knew he would need all of that preparation done. Eliot didn’t know enough about the mysterious circumstances of his death to say for certain, but it seemed to him that Karl Favesh knew he would die. Of course that begged all sorts of follow up questions, like why Karl Favesh didn’t seek him out sooner, but he was sure there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for everything that he would come to learn sooner or later.

Focusing his attention back on the present, Eliot stood up with renewed vigor. There was another potentially suicidal thing he always wanted to try with his portals, and kept putting off to use in a perilous situation against a much stronger enemy. Eliot formed the runes of the portal spell with his mana, setting the distance as ten thousand kilometers straight up. As expected, it failed to cast. Not like the way Penelope described it, though. The spell drank mana and gained weight, ready to bring reality to its knees for him. But right before the spell was ready to cast, it somehow refused to accept anymore mana. As if the spell itself knew what he was doing was insane and refused to be complicit.

Eliot sighed through his nose with a rueful smile. “Thought so.” Recollecting as much mana as he could into his mana storm, he put his hands behind his head and leaned back. “Still. Do I really need to be able to open portals to space? Just a few months ago, I got soul damage from portaling six and a half thousand kilometers, now I just traveled over seven thousand without making a dent in my mana storm. Abyss, I could open a hundred, thousand kilometer portals and be just dandy. I have so much mana now I could drown someone in it.” He lowered his hands and cocked his head at the thought. “What does happen when you throw just straight up mana at someone? Someone has to have tried that.”

After a second of silence, he realized what he was doing and laughed. “Just a few hours away from people and I’m already talking to myself. Some habits really are hard to break. I wonder what that says about me. Probably a lot. Whatever, it doesn’t matter. Well, it does, but . . . whatever, shut up, I’m wasting time!”

He shook his head and portaled back to his dorm. Henry and Penelope leaned over his bed looking at the view capture he chucked back through a portal before walking out above the ocean.

“Where’d this come from?” Penelope asked him.

Eliot’s mind immediately jumped to fabricate a lie, then froze midway. There was no reason to lie. He could go wherever he wanted whenever he wanted and do whatever he wanted. “I portaled to the ocean for some experiments, and the view was so beautiful I figured I would view-capture it and hang it somewhere. Any recommendations?”

He grinned with bemusement for the next thirty minutes as his friends put way too much effort into hanging it in the best place.