“Let me start by saying you weren’t the only one affected by this shit,” Glaustro began. “What Crewe did was… let’s say, dangerous, for anyone less powerful than an archdemon or demonic noble. The only reason he could do it at all was the weakening of the bindings placed on us by the World Will.”
I wanted to interject there, quite badly, but I kept my mouth shut. It helped that shame had begun eating me from the inside out, which made it difficult to find my voice at all.
“When he leaned on his Sin, he sent the jinn into a collapse and plenty of our troops into a frenzy. Really, you’re lucky you survived. Dying in that state would have been even more risky than what happened to you already.”
“I understand he was pissed, and that the jinn presented more of a challenge than he expected, but I still have no clue what he was thinking when he did that,” Bronwynn snapped, eyes alight with anger.
Whereas Glaustro just looked tired and forlorn, Bronwynn seemed caught between anxiety for me and Mia and enough anger that, should Crewe have been in the vicinity, the pink-skinned demon might have just started swinging.
The odd state I was in meant I was taking a while to process everything, but something finally clicked.
My eyes snapped over to Mia. “Are you…?”
I trailed off, because really, what was I supposed to say? ‘Okay’? ‘Good’? None of us fit those particular adjectives at the moment.
All of my memories somehow felt both shockingly clear and like I had to dredge them up from some great depth, so while I couldn’t guarantee I was right, the cat girl did not look all that great. She seemed tired, frazzled, and unusually twitchy. As I watched, her eyes took on a faraway look and almost glowed briefly with some infernal light, but then she snapped back to awareness quickly.
Unless I was missing way more memories and details than I thought, that just didn’t seem like the stoic cat lady I knew.
“I am dealing with it.” Mia’s voice had a jagged edge caused by something beyond anger, but she made a visible effort to smooth out her features into the shape of the woman I remembered. She was only partially successful.
“I’m — I mean —” I wanted to offer support and reassurances, but I faltered. That same darkness that was now permanently part of me threatened to surge up, and while I could bottle it up well enough to get by, the continual leak of self-loathing left me feeling useless and exhausted.
In the end, I looked away, too full of shame to follow through. “What else happened? You said some demons were affected, too?”
“Plenty,” Glaustro hurried to continue, no doubt literally tasting both my and Mia’s emotions. “They weren’t as impacted as you two, obviously, and there’s no permanent damage done, but… yes. We won the battle, in case you were wondering. Still, considering how bold the jinn were, it’s probably no surprise to hear we weren’t the only city struck by their retaliation.”
I didn’t really care in the face of my rapidly surfacing depression, but focusing on Glaustro’s voice did help distract me a little. “Did we at least beat them back?”
“Mixed results, I’m afraid. We killed plenty of their leaders, along with some of their strongest locals on Lagyel. But we still only won about sixty, maybe seventy percent of the battles fought that day. Both sides are scrambling to make up for the losses.”
“That’s how we managed to get leave so easily,” Bronwynn piped up, now pressed against a wall with arms crossed over his chest. One leg was angrily bouncing, like he was barely restraining an urge to pace. “There’s a ton of demons due to resurrect that will be pulled back into Lagyel. We’re even getting the rest of our unit members who were killed by the golem. We can easily hitch a ride back with them.”
I nodded, then frowned. “But… with how badly this went, won’t the general have something to say about Crewe’s failures? I mean, this can’t have been an ideal course for an invasion.”
To my surprise, Glaustro just shrugged. “He’s not doing as badly as he could have been. The jinn might not be a civilization quite on par with ours, but they’re up there. And accounting for the golems you uncovered ahead of time…”
He trailed off, but I got the subtext, making me frown harder. It had felt good to focus my resentment on someone.
In fact, the more I gave way to my rising anger, the easier it was to think. I could feel the tendrils of darkness trying to squirm back into my mind, but they failed to take root. While this was all kinds of ironic, I welcomed it.
Anything was better than that all-consuming darkness.
“So, what now?” I groused. “We go back to hunting down golems and grinding away at the jinn while constantly traipsing through sandstorms?”
“Not quite. Crewe’s done with his slow approach. Everyone knows he usually likes to drag things out. The more fear and associated emotions he can squeeze out of a world, the better for him, but he’s well and truly pissed this time.” Glaustro sounded almost amused. “He’s organized a full-on hunt for the jinn, their golems, and their cities. No holds barred, no expenses spared.”
“Why does he even want us back, then? Are the losses that heavy? I was under the impression that getting people on-world wasn’t cheap, and that we were doing better in the losses department than the jinn.”
“Because he’s not taking any chances, as I mentioned. Besides, we have no way of knowing how heavily fortified the jinn capital will be once we find it. With close to a thousand years to set up, plus all the wishes they could have squeezed out of the populace in that timeframe, they’ll be a real threat. The more soldiers he has on hand to throw at the issue, the better. We’ll be there to guarantee his victory.”
Stolen novel; please report.
I nodded glumly, unsure what to say or do other than finally tackle the topic I was least looking forward to.
“And… me?”
There were several seconds of silence.
“You… you shut down, kid,” Bronwynn said quietly. “We were scared. Considering how close to ascension you are, we thought the Abyss might have subsumed you fully. You were barely reacting to anything. Just staring off into nothing without even moving an inch. You would do whatever Glaustro ordered you to, but literally nothing else. You started showing some signs of life when we entered Passion, but even that wasn’t a guarantee you’d wake up.”
I shuddered, having absolutely no memories of what he was describing. All I could recall when I dared inch closer to that time in my memory was the swamp of misery, rooted in and overflowing with my own self-hatred.
“I’m guessing I handed over the soul when ordered?” I asked, refusing to give into the urge to wrap my arms around myself.
Glaustro paused, then nodded. “Yes, you did.”
To be honest, I didn’t care all that much about the soul being gone. If anything, I wanted it as far away from me as possible.
Most of the damage I had suffered, physical and emotional, was the result of Crewe’s outburst. But part of it had to do with that soul. Whatever it did to me as it passed through had pushed me over the proverbial edge, even more surely than the attacks of my fellow soldiers.
I could still remember the agony, the howling of the soul as it fought to wrench itself free. That, even in my mired mind, was a memory accessible easily enough.
“Hayden!”
I jolted, looking around in confusion. I was met with three equally concerned faces, and Glaustro had his hands on my shoulders. I couldn’t remember when he had put them there.
“What’s wrong?”
“You drifted off. Again.” Glaustro sounded equally frustrated and angry, but I wasn’t sure if the latter emotion was aimed at me.
I assumed it was.
“Oh… sorry.” I curled up a little tighter, finding that I had pulled my knees up to my chest and wound my arms around my legs at some point.
“Don’t apologize,” Glaustro started off angrily, then quickly tamped down the emotion. “Let’s just make the most of this moment while you’re lucid, okay? Come on, follow me.”
The demon stepped back and motioned for me to stand up. For a moment, I had to wonder if I could. Thankfully, I found my legs were functional enough when I tried to put my weight on them. In fact, considering what a wreck I was on the inside, my physical body was remarkably compliant.
“What are we doing?”
“What we’re doing is the Archmage advancement ritual. I’m almost finished putting it all together. We were going to try and force you to go through with it, even in the state you were in. This is much less risky, and it should help a little.”
“A little?”
The room they had rented for me wasn’t particularly large. We crossed to the door quickly, and I stared at the hallway outside like I had never seen anything like it before.
Funnily enough, it was the familiarity that threw me off. The hallway reminded me so much of other Apple Infernal establishments I’d visited that, for a brief moment, I couldn’t tell when and where I was. Berlis? Lagyel? My memories swirled and pooled together into one unintelligible mess.
Someone put their hand on my shoulder. I jumped, realizing I had paused in the middle of the hallway. My eyes found Mia’s concerned golden orbs, and I tried not to wince visibly at the worry I saw in them.
Glaustro cleared his throat. “Yes, at least a little. The advancement should strengthen your mind, so you’ll be able to deal with your… current issues… better.”
I mumbled out some kind of answer, barely able to force myself to trust the claim. It seemed so utterly incomprehensible. I couldn’t imagine feeling better, not when there was an abyss, lowercase this time, waiting to consume me inside of my own mind.
“Your next advancement will be a big one, so there’s a good chance that things work out the way we hope. And with you lucid, well, as I said, you have a higher chance of success. Mia will still be there to help you along, though.”
I didn’t say anything, but the look I sent the cat girl’s way was apparently enough.
“I’m ready to try and advance, too,” she confessed.
Her words sparked the first emotion strong enough to startle me out of my misery.
“But… how?” I stammered. “I was ahead of you. A couple days isn’t enough to catch up! And you stopped asking me for extra mana crystals a while ago.”
“I helped her purchase some,” Bronwynn admitted with a wry smile. “And she was, ironically, much more focused on her mage training than you were. You were fiddling with spells, sure, and then chasing your ascension, but she was altogether more dedicated to growing her mana.”
The ongoing shock wasn’t strong enough to fight back the wave of self-admonishment that followed Bronwynn’s declaration. He wasn’t blaming me for anything, but it was hard not to argue that I could have tried harder. I could have pushed myself to absorb more mana crystals on the move, despite the constant sandstorms.
Did I even have enough mana to make the attempt to become an Archmage? Had I ruined everything with my stupidity? Would I get stonewalled here and ruin all of Glaustro’s prep because I was a hair away from accumulating as much mana as I needed?
My emotions must have shown on my face, because Mia’s claws bit into my skin uncomfortably, and Bronwynn’s face fell.
“Hayden, I—”
“We should get a move on,” Glaustro cut in, and I was more than a little thankful for his interruption.
I couldn’t take an apology. Not right that second.
The room we entered shortly thereafter looked very different from the one I had woken up in. It was much larger, for one. More importantly, all the furniture had been shoved against the walls. Even the extremely plush, comfortable carpet was rolled up and removed so it wouldn’t get in the way.
This left the center of the floor dominated by a mana matrix unlike anything I had ever seen before. It was composed of far too many runes and sigils for me to make out individual marks. They all blended into each other, creating a distinct symbol that looked like it was coming off the floor, stretching into multiple dimensions instead of accepting its confinement to 2D.
I got a mild headache just looking at the thing.
The lines also shimmered and refracted light in a way that brought gems to mind. When I probed the matrix with my mana, I realized I was looking at extremely potent reagents that had been ground down, mixed with powdered mana crystals, and bonded together into a nearly perfect whole.
Everything about the matrix screamed ‘sophisticated and expensive’, which immediately sent me into a spiral of guilt and doubt. How could I possibly deserve something like this?
I hesitated, but Glaustro pushed me forward roughly, forcing my foot to land within the matrix’s confines.
“Do not freeze up now. Not when we finally got you here on your own power,” Glaustro warned, eyes narrowed and dangerous. He looked ready to clobber me over the head if I tried to complain.
“I… don’t know what to do,” I admitted, looking over the room one more time as if instructions would jump out at me from behind one of the mishandled pieces of furniture.
“Maybe not, but Mia does, and she’ll be able to get you started. All you need to do is sit down and focus inwards. I want you to view your mana core and soul as in-depth as you can. You’ll be making changes to both, so we’ll give you a bit of time to get into a proper meditative state. I’m warning you though, if you start to spiral, we will have issues.”
I gave a wan smile, then proceeded to comply. I tucked my feet under me, not quite in the classic ‘meditation pose’, but close to it.
Then, with more than a little trepidation, I dove deep into my metaphysical insides so I might finally step into the realm of Archmages.