Briggs definitely wasn’t letting them do that gravewater clouds trick, which gave him all the daylight to finish up some of the stuff he wanted to do. At night the Undead Hunters popped assorted undead in great numbers and with equally great enthusiasm, powering up the stuff that was built during the day.
Briggs also wasn’t trying to claim ground, although he was clearing a lot of extradimensional tombs and lairs carved out of this ancient Death Zone, much to the annoyance and deaths of the undead using such places as hidey-holes and loot caches. A little extra pay hurt no one...
Still, the killings weren’t anything that troubled the undead at all, having four thousand years-worth of souls to draw on. What was being thrown at the Undead Hunters to keep them busy didn’t really rate for the moment... and Briggs was careful to keep it that way, having no desire to undercut the Undead Emperor in the middle of such a fine distraction.
Which didn’t mean he wasn’t going to act as soon as he deemed it prudent to do so!
“Maybe two hours of work and they are done. Then just need to power up the last of it, and we’re good to drop a Pyramid on it. Confirm this is the last active Dark Conduit on the planet?” Briggs asked me, just to be sure.
“Yes. I can also confirm that one of the Netherlords is already standing by and holding this thing open. He’s aware of what you are putting into place above, but there’s no way you can close it with Him sitting there keeping the Conduit opening.”
“Damn, I thought I felt something watching the lads. Well, too bad for the bastard that he’s wrong.” Briggs clicked his tongue once, his pale violet eyes cold and clear. “Nice Fate-reading. Or was it just calculation?”
“Mostly calculation. I don’t want to timesight against Netherlords, although I was able to eliminate a lot of scenarios that were extremely unlikely to happen as we acted. They just aren’t going to risk their last remaining easy way onto Terra. I think it’s Yama, the Patron of the First Emperor there. Pretty sure he’s been drawing off other servants so that the Chinese aren’t at a disadvantage against the Egyptians in this fight.”
“As long as we can Heavens Weep tonight, I’m sure He’ll be very happy with everything,” Briggs snorted. “All the other surprises in place?”
“The Emperors are very curious to watch it all happen,” I confirmed.
“Then give them a nice show. How’s Infinite Sands set on Egypt?”
“He’s watching them get rid of their Dark Mana and Nirvanan Light users very closely, and in no uncertain terms He’s let them know that if they don’t, He’s going to bury them in sand and chase them away because they stink... and that they stink to all the Emperors, so going somewhere else isn’t going to save them.
“The Crystalheart Compounds are very full. On the flip side, we’re learning a whole lot about proper methodology of purging Stars of Dark and Light Mana, particularly when working together. Give us another year or so, and we can start optimizing the whole process as an art unto itself.”
“That’ll be useful, although being able to pick your Elements is going to be much more important in reducing the number of Dark Element users in the future,” he nodded in approval.
“Aye, but they have to make it to a Spellhouse to do that.” Which generally wasn’t an issue, as everywhere we opened them up, people would travel hundreds of miles to Awaken their kids, find out what Elements they’d be best at, and thus exert some choice about their future, instead of enduring the random-ass Awakenings that only the wealthy were able to avoid before.
“More Spellhouses will not be a bad thing,” Briggs agreed. “Especially if the Broom Closet goes public, and really throws the governments of the world on their ear.”
“You know perfectly well that as low-key as we can keep it is best for that. The mouth-breathers will promptly panic and whip up hysteria about a country that can be anywhere and everywhere it wants to be, not respecting national borders.”
“They can go take a flying leap. As soon as ‘territory of a High Emperor’ is uttered, they’re all meaningless lip-flappers,” Briggs grunted.
Which was utterly true. If they wanted to keep a High Emperor out, they’d best be a High Emperor themselves!
The fact we were training the most skilled mages in the world was no surprise anymore, while the existing powers and Families concentrated on the people with powerful Talents or from wealthy Families with unique skills and close-held knowledge that we were rapidly deciphering. The utter collapse of the Mage Association and the plundering of its records and archives was helping with that on a broader basis, not that Sama hadn’t been doing the same for years.
They got people with magical Talents, and we got the people who were smart, driven, and committed. Guess who was going to have a bigger influence on the world as a whole? What did their Talents mean to Wizardry?
After their showing during The Great Flood, being able to access whatever magic was needed at the time it was needed without needing a particular Element, the Typeless Element was on the rise, threatening the previous balances of power. Wizards squaring off against Talented mages was also a thing, and in civilian jobs, artificers and alchemists did much better than rote mages, especially in technomagic.
It gave the smart people and those who were willing to work, regardless of background, better chances in life and society than ever before, a fact not appreciated by many established Bloodlines that were no longer important. After all, we went looking for smart people from wherever, we didn’t care about a magical Bloodline or inherited Talent at all.
Were profiting by it greatly, too.
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“I’m going to go review what’s been done and then get set up for the Weeping and the Sealing,” I told Briggs, who nodded shortly.
“Ah, for a video of this when it all goes down,” he murmured with a half-smile.
“Markview and paste it if we can!” I agreed cheerfully, and went off to be a huge pain in the neck to the Netherlords.
------
The key for this attack was not to place the Seal over the Conduit. It was to place it on top of the entire Death Zone, sacrifice all the active undead to it with the Vivic Holy Water from The Heavens Weep, use that to temporarily crash the Veil and Seal the Conduit, then get a Pyramid up during the time it was Sealed.
This wasn’t a big attack spell like we’d done in Egypt, and which all the Interlopers were curious to see take effect, fireworks, fireworks, rah-rah-rah. No, no, The Heavens Weep came in completely separately, an Imperial-Grade spell taking over the brooding clouds at night time as the fringes of the Death Zone were alive with massed combat and a lot of spells going off.
The Netherlord below didn’t even notice what was happening, too caught up in all the small conflicts taking place as massed rushes of undead hammered this way and that, trying to get through the surrounding Undead Hunters. Instead, they were running into flanking attacks and fusillades with prescient skill and imagination, as if the Undead were doing as Briggs directed, no matter how stealthy and randomized they thought they were being.
How the energy was transforming above the battlefield was not nearly as important, as they were looking down at the sigils we were supposed to be powering up for some big combat spell that was going to be ultimately useless here.
Then the clouds opened up, and Burning rain came shining down.
The Undead screamed and died as Holy and Vivic fires did their thing, dissolving, falling apart into sludge and muck, their captured souls Burned finally free and returning to the Land and not slavery. Vivus danced and swirled and the skies glowed and shimmered under the electrum waters like it was day.
And THEN the huge Pattern lit up, a Seal of monstrous proportions, fed by a million undead and hundreds of thousands of mages, including all the Chinese who wanted to be part of this, all brought out for this one job. A crapton of Seven-Element Mana poured into the thing.
The Veil crashed down and locked harder than any place on the planet, right on top of that Conduit. It wouldn’t last too long, especially when the Netherlord promptly started slamming against it in shock, but then, it didn’t have to.
I came down to the center of the Seal and grabbed the rock from tombs and graves, their markers and the stories they once held now crumbling to sand, reforming it pure and white from vivic saturation to make a ghostly white Pyramid perfectly attuned to this place, the Conduit beneath it, and I began making me a new Ghost Pyramid to lock this place up forever.
White sand became Blocks, only ten-footers, didn’t need more with the quality level and resonance they already possessed. I was basically making massive crystals out of sand at this point, slamming them together as quickly and smoothly as I could, even as the Veil trembled about me with increasingly powerful pressure coming from the other side.
Every tier that formed pulsed and pushed back against that pressure, easing the load on the mages pumping against it, and on the worldwide network of Pyramids that were also taking some of the pressure.
I’m sure the Lords of Light were very happy to see this, making ready to make a move of their own the second it was completed and take possession of the planet once we’d locked the Netherlords away, reinforcing what we’d done against them to the limit so that the Netherlords would never break through and they could leisurely claim their prize.
Indeed, they hastened right to the edge of the Netherworld immediately upon seeing this, making sure no other Netherlords raced to reinforce the one doing the blocking!
Which is about when the rumblings started on the Italian Peninsula...
-------
Infinite Sands was primarily an Earth-user, but He knew Fire plenty well. Reaching down into the mantle and bringing up rivers of lava was not difficult for Him, the only hassle being making it subtle and not setting off all the seismographs.
Cue Old Mountain Emperor, reaching out from his mountain lair and making the earth bounce and crack and fall away here, there, and everywhere around those cities. With the ground shifting, harbors rising, farmlands falling, floods rumbling every which way, pits opening up and crevasses gaping open, only to slam back together as they couldn’t breach the city’s Wards, there was no way Infinite Sands’ far more dangerous machinations were being noticed, especially with all the attention being focused on the breathlessly pivotal moment I was bringing into being.
It would take me less than two minutes to build the last three levels. The Manasphere was humming the timing along with me, and Infinite Sands surged with power.
Heads turned from beyond the Aether at the sudden expenditure of High Imperial Mana, and a LOT of it. Equal to The Great Flood, if not more! It raced across and under the Mediterranean, through the flows of lava, and it rose.
The Lords of Light finally realized what was going on, but it was too late for them to do anything about it, abruptly busy in return as the incensed Netherlords made sure they couldn’t retreat fast enough to respond.
Powered by millions of tons of blazing lava, the Black Pyramids I’d built miles underneath all the Chosen cities of Italy blew through to the surface in cataclysmic volcanic eruptions, punching through and destroying all the Wards of the cities as the shattered parts of them sank into a seething caldera of molten stone.
The souls of the slain Chosen went into the Black Pyramids and punched up into the Light Conduits set above each and every one of those cities, Burning as they did so, giving the Pyramids perfect resonance.
Even the Netherlord trying to force his way into the Ancient Capital paused to survey the utter destruction of the eleven Italian cities, the conscripting of their souls, and the blocking of the Conduits of the Lords of Light.
Briggs pressed a button.
Above the city of Rome, converging ripples Sang together and met at the Conduit above the city.
Down in the Netherworld, the Conduits attached to every single Egyptian Pyramid exploded from within, and then the demiplanes inside collapsed and were sucked away, destroying and shattering the Conduits in a massive resonating pulse of solidity that spread across the world, and just so happened to arrive at Rome at exactly the right moment.
With a shattering like all the glass windows being broken ever, the last Conduit of the Light was cut free and exploded, leaving sparkling particles of Light to fall down over the aghast city below as their direct uplink to Ihovah was destroyed.
Out in an undeveloped area of the Broom Closet, millions of tons of rubble were deposited into a growing mountain as the remains of those demiplanes were unceremoniously dumped there. The Great Pyramid there, scores of levels high and still being built up slowly and surely, thrummed as the essence of billions of enslaved souls flowed into it and out again, reinforcing the dimensional barriers around my Demesne and solidifying them multiple times over.