You know, there aren’t many Laws in the Web of Worlds. Rules? There’s plenty of those, but here’s the thing: rules were always meant to be broken, especially ones that aren’t with a capital R.
Laws on the other hand, the capital L kind, the type that must not and, usually, cannot be broken, are few and far between. Sometimes there are more, sometimes less, it depends on what Time you’re looking at the Web through and that old Spider’s mood.
One of the only Laws that always stays in place, no matter what, is this one: ‘Thou shan’t damage Memories’.
It is also, by far, the most broken Law in all of the multiverse. Hell, there’s a restaurant in an ever-changing location of the Web that serves you memories to eat: if that isn’t damaging, I don’t know what is. It has consequences, still. Or it will. Or it already had. Time is wonky around here.
What? ‘What consequences’, you’re asking? Why, of course, the complete annihilation of the multiverse as we know it. Don’t worry, it’s not all their fault. ‘Tis a process that’s been going on since Everything started. They’re only hastening it.
Anyways: there is but one other Law which is always in place in the Web and, for once, one that is respected, if only because it pertains to a single individual. The Law goes like this: ‘Time shall never touch this cursed, hallowed, place’. And she, respectful of the Spider’s wish, doesn’t even look here, just like the Observer.
That, as you can well imagine, has its own set of consequences, most notable of which being that individuals spending time in the Web do not age; second, and less notable of which is the fact that every single moment of Everything that ever happened, is happening and ever will happen, happens all at once, and never. A strange paradox, but a perfect one for Travelers and Wanderers such as I.
So let me ask you, dear readers: what is Time?
This… is an old question. One might even call it a Question, capital Q. Yes, I know, there’s lots of capital letters here, but what can we do? Chaos, from which Everything was born, was many things (all things, actually), but not imaginative. Or also anything, since he died the day he created Everything. But that’s semantics.
So, what is Time?
The simplest answer would be that she’s a woman, or a late teen, with a bubbly personality, a bright smile and a competitive streak, with the single biggest problem about her being that she’s a teensy itsy bitsy cantankerous. She’s been basically stalking for the last three centuries a dumbass who’s managed to become immortal by tricking her in some unknown way, reveling in every time he has had to suffer any sort of pain.
She’s also good friends with Death, maybe even more than her colleague, the Observer.
She exists in a plane of existence that appears as a foggy landscape of hills and mountains with an eternally setting sun, every few meters a clock appearing and taking on the form most fitting for the place it’s standing. ‘Tis a quiet idyllic place and, sometimes, when she meets someone she particularly likes, she lets them roam there for a while, before having Death take them to the other side.
One would be led to believe that she’s seen everything that there is to be seen, but that would be wrong, for that is the Observer’s job. It would be more correct to say that she’s heard it all, for her friend tells her all the stories he’s witnessed.
In short, Time is… a normal person. Time is everything we could ever wish her to be, the greatest gift ever given to humanity by Chaos, and we should thank her every day for the part of herself she’s given to us.
One last thing: betimes, Time blesses the creations of the people she’s learned to love the most.
Clockmakers.
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We showed you how Serafia and Gaius reacted to finding out their vault had been robbed and their security measures, which they’d thought of as proofed against all but the highest Level individuals with decades of experience behind their backs, broken through. For all they knew, it had actually been one of such individuals. They… took it extremely well, actually, for nothing of real importance had been lost for them.
What we didn’t tell you is what happened to Isse. Oh, sure, we showed you her and Siidi’s Level Ups, but what of it? Even Death herself sometimes cannot stop the System from giving its gifts.
Luckily, Death did not come to the city of Tedam.
Ê̶̦v̸̱͈̈é̴̺̍n̵̻͠ ̸̬͒l̴̩͈̑̐ư̸͉ċ̵͔̫͠k̴̖̠̕i̷̻̜̇̅ë̵͇̠͘r̵̝͊͐, Isse did not find anyone on her way out of the mansion.
But the way itself… it was strange.
It felt surreal, no, unreal, as if she was walking through a moonlit fog, a chilly wind caressing her hair as a voice whispered in her ear, asking a simple question: What is Real?
She didn’t know the answer, for this world had never been real before That One’s meddling and she wasn’t real and nothing was real, and since nothing was real then the guards passing by her weren’t real, and unreal things do not notice each other, and since the world was not real then the walls around her weren’t real, nor the earth over her head, nor the trees and that little pond she liked so much and the statues that had been set up to fire at anything that moved, friend or foe alike.
Nothing was real.
Until a song played in the back of her mind, a song so old it had been forgotten by all. A song not of this world nor of home, but what was home? Where was home? Home had been the colorful forest, the embrace of her soulmate in a silk hammock, the lessons of a grumpy old arachne and the laughter of an older sister with a crack in her soul. Home had been a house with a tree she’d climbed over and over again and jumped down from even after she’d broken her arm doing so, a school with friends that had cared for her and people she’d called friends but in the end had been nothing. Home had been a lot of things, but it wasn’t what it was now.
Home wasn’t the workshop, home wasn’t Albert or this city. These were just places. She lived here and ate here and read here and worked and learned, but it wasn’t home.
The song stopped for a moment, and it was enough for that sense of unreality to take over again, but it didn’t last long as another song started playing.
This time, though, it wasn’t a violin, but a piano.
And the song felt like home.
It felt like all she had lost, and then it felt like all someone else had lost. Tears streamed down her face as she walked purposefully, aimlessly, around the streets of Tedam, and Siidi cried with her, for the song spoke of the Silken Palaces and her sisters of blood and battle. It spoke of the great libraries and the bars and the cheer and the alcohol and the love. It spoke of the spiderlings running around and playing, laughing, of the knowledge that, as long as they were growing and for a few years after their puberty, they would live happily, for their sisters and unknown mothers would protect them from harm and the knowledge of what could harm them.
The song was in a language she didn’t know from a country of her world, but she knew it spoke of a cradle and a woman waiting patiently for a man to come back from a war and sit by her side, to look upon their child and love them together.
And then the song asked her a single question: Would you take me with you?
Isse and Siidi, one and the same and two souls, laughed and cried, a shrill chittering sound that sent shivers down people’s spines and made them look in the dark corners of their rooms, and they, she, as one, answered: Yes.
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They woke up back in their hammock, in their room over Albert’s workshop.
Said Albert was currently sitting on a chair by the open door, glaring at them with a smile.
They shook their head, and they became two shes anew.
Isse looked at Albert, feeling both groggy and full of energy.
“Mornin’,” she mumbled under her breath, her mouth feeling dry, her tongue too large. She was thirsty.
“Good morning to you too. You succeeded in your exam, if barely.”
She raised an eyebrow questioningly, and the action felt much more difficult than it should: “Did you riffle through my Bag of Holding? You know it’s bad manners looking into a lady’s bag. You never know what will find you.”
She decided she’d put some kind of venomous snake or spider in there if he’d actually done that, just to make the point clear, only to then remember that living things didn’t survive inside bags of holding since they were compressed together with the rest of the stuff inside.
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“Nothing like that dear. I’m a gentleman after all. I simply have a Skill from my [Spymaster] days: [Underling: Mission Report].
She grunted and fell back face first into her pillow, willing her body to start working as it should instead of feeling like someone had added weights all over it.
When that didn’t work they both groaned.
Then Isse realized Siidi was groaning too.
Do you feel like shit too?
I feel like I drunk fifteen glasses of beer without eating a crumb of bread.
They both groaned.
“Yes, I’m told that’s usually what it feels like. To bond with a Relic, that is.”
That was more or less when everything that had happened last night from the moment they’d walked into that third room with the vault came back to them.
They froze in place, their eyes opening wide as the sight of frozen flowers calling at them filled their memories, the sensations overwhelming them.
“Calm down. Deep breaths. I said deep breaths Isse.”
But she wasn’t breathing. She couldn’t. The memory was beautiful and haunting and -
Albert slapped her.
She bit him.
“Argh! Cow dung!” he shouted. And still he didn’t curse.
Nonetheless, it had been enough, and now she was looking down at him with wide eyes and a little smile on her lips. His blood tasted sweet.
He glared up at her: “I’m not going to lose our bet because of a little bite. Now, would you mind showing me what you so foolishly grabbed from that mansion?”
Isse stared at him for a moment longer, the taste of blood still lingering in her mouth, then she took a deep, calming breath, and reached inside her bag of holding, taking out the violin’s case.
Plonking it down on her hammock, she opened the two latches and lifted the lid, turning it around to show Albert the contents. A single violin. It didn’t look like anything special: rather, it looked worn, used and scratched in a few places, the wood clearly well traveled. The strings though looked almost new and, when she looked down, seeing the bow, she noticed that it, too, looked completely new. One could go as far as saying that it looked unused.
“Do you know what Relic this is? For the matter, is it normal for Relics to, like, kidnap people?”
Albert observed the simple instrument, cocking his head to the side, uncertainty appearing in his eyes, before he shook his head: “I’ve never heard of a Relic taking on the form of a violin. For that matter, I also never heard of Relics, as you said, ‘kidnapping’ people, but I did hear tales of how they sometimes choose the person worthy of using them, so I guess that’s what happened: you were chosen.”
Isse sighed, then fell face first into her pillow again, groaning, then groaning louder as her shoulders cramped up.
“What is this, some kind of shitty novel about chosen ones and the like? Will I now get an animal companion to accompany me and my group of chosen friends on adventures to save the world? ‘Cause I haven’t been in the mood for saving anyone after the fire.”
This, dear Isse, is not, in fact, a novel. I believe we passed that point over 50000 words ago. These are books, and I’d like you not to - oh, wait, is this thing still on?
*Sounds of tape being wound back*
Albert couldn’t contain a chuckle: “I believe your life would turn into that kind of story only if you chose to. Relics don’t guide people, they’re not that kind of… thing. You can make your choices, and if they’ll align with the Relic’s past in some way you’ll be rewarded with Skills and knowledge. That’s how it works.”
She looked down at the instrument in her hands, her fingers having moved in a position that would make playing a Pizzicato easy.
She’d never played a violin her whole life.
“I’ve never -”
“I can tell. You’re holding it wrong.”
Oh, so the natural-feeling position had been wrong. Of course!
“I know someone who owes me a favor who’d be able to teach you. Interested?”
“Will it cut down on my free time?”
“Yes. You’ll still be required to learn about clockworking with me. I didn’t tell you to pick up a Relic from a noblewoman’s house. It was all your choice. Which means training yourself into using it will be on you. It’s your responsibility now, so you’ll have to bring it on walkies and change its strings or whatever in Airm magical violins need to do.”
Isse turned her head around, eyes narrowed, and mumbled: “Tyrant.”
“What was that?”
“Nothing,” she shot back, her voice higher pitched than she’d wanted. A moment later she chuckled, unable to contain herself.
Albert smiled and, out of the blue, his hand shot up to her hammock and, gently, laid itself on her head, combing back her hair.
“You did well, Isse. I’m proud of you. Don’t think about the Relic, I was joking. You did what you could, and then some.”
And then, without saying anything more, he turned around hastily and walked out. She couldn’t see it, but his cheeks were slightly red, his eyes a bit teary.
As for Isse? She stared towards the now closed door with wide eyes, her mind all jumbled up as a single memory was dredged up from the loam of the gray mass that was steadily becoming smaller and smaller.
Makira patted her head, combing back her chestnut hair with slick, long, fingers as she hummed in approval. She’d just won her first game of Queen of the Tree and couldn’t keep the smile off her face as Catgirl and Anda stood by her sides, the former smiling cheerfully while the latter pouted slightly, but still clung close to her.
“You did well, spiderling. I’m proud of you.”
Makira had always been like that: showering them with compliments, even for the, apparently, simplest things. That was why she was so beloved among all of her sisters and the spiderlings.
That was why her sacrifice at the end had been all the more bitter.
I miss them, she whispered in the back of her mind as she hugged her pillow close to her chest, muscles be damned, and buried her face in what was left, letting warm tears stain the white surface.
I do too, was all Siidi said. No comforting words, there was no need for them, for words couldn’t contain the depths of their loss. But she still felt a phantom sensation of being hugged.
It was all she needed.
She began falling asleep again, ready to meet her soul half in her Mind Castle and spend some time together.
As for the Violin? It sat there, in her hand, and as her eyes closed, the strings began to vibrate, playing a gentle song, a lullaby from a place that wasn’t home.
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When next she woke up it was to something hanging from a long bit of spider silk near her bed, her opening, foggy, eyes looking right at it.
At first she frowned, thinking it was just a bit of her web that was meant to keep her hammock in the air having detached from the ceiling.
Then her vision focused and she finally saw what it was: a clock.
A pocket watch, to be precise.
Its case was made of silver, or some other whitish metal, and from what she could see there was a single, big, snowflake carved on the side facing her, overly detailed and beautiful.
With a (luckily no longer aching) hand she reached out for it, half expecting her hand to pass through the beautiful object, but instead she was met by cold metal. Much colder than she had expected.
Slowly, gently, she tugged on the hanging bit, noticing only then that it was actually an albert, the chain meant to connect the watch to the user’s clothes. It, too, was made of silver.
She turned it around and stopped right in her tracks.
For, carved into the back of the casing, was a very simple symbol: a spider, divided in two by a wiggly line.
How the hell - she began asking, only for Siidi to interrupt her.
You meant to say Airm, right? Also, it’s Albert we’re talking about. He is a [Spymaster], so finding out about this isn’t even a surprise.
Do you think we should confirm it?
Silence was her only answer for a while, until she sighed: Yes, we should. However much I hate the idea, we should. He’s gained the right to know this much at least.
Nodding, she got up, cradling the precious gift in her hands.
Skittering down the hallway, she entered the kitchen-dining room and saw that, for once, Albert was neither cooking nor working. He was reading one of her books.
“In the end I managed to convince you,” she said with a smile.
He looked up at her over the edge of the book, eyes calm and relaxed for once.
“Yes, well, you were right. These are quite entertaining.”
She looked down at the title of the book and her smile only grew bigger as she noticed it was ‘The Mind [Detective] ‘
“You’re gonna have to tell me what you think about it.”
“I most definitely shall.”
Before he could go back to his book she handed him the clock, smiling: “Thank you.”
Then she showed him the side with the carving of the spider, a delicate finger tracing the line that cut it in half.
“Her name is Siidi,” she said almost in a whisper.
Hiiiiii!
“She says ‘Hi’.”
He looked up from the book again, eyeing the clock, then her, and finally smiling. A genuine smile.
“Hello, Siidi. It’s a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance.”