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It took Candlepoint 3 hours to mostly-evacuate. Well over half of the population had left by the time the sun had fully risen above the horizon. By the time the sun shone directly overhead, even more people had evacuated. Candlepoint was a ghost town of shadelings, former shadelings, and the scant few others who had decided to stay in the face of Erick’s declaration of Wizardry.

The evacuation had gone smoothly, which was something of a surprise to a lot of people, but Erick had been there to end all of the nonsense that could have started, and now the city was calming down.

A lot of people had no idea what to do with themselves because their jobs at various stores were gone, for the people who ran those stores and all their goods were also gone. A lot of people, mostly those who still worked in city hall, had way too much to do, for all the abandoned homes in the city were up for grabs, and a great deal of people wanted stuff that had been left behind. A lot of people filed multiple claims against singular houses, which was obviously a lie in some way for there was no way that ten different people all had prior claim on one of the nicest houses in the city. But it was what it was. Erick almost helped with housing then and there, making multiple mansions for the taking, but there weren’t any actual housing issues. Just plain greed. Now that the city was down to a population count of 5,547 (only about a thousand more people than there were shadelings and former shadelings) from a former high of 21,000, there were more than enough houses to go around.

Mephistopheles and Justine handled those problems as would any mayor and vice mayor. They shoved people around to fix the broken bureaucracy of Candlepoint to make things happen as best they could, while Guard Captain Slip oversaw the keeping of law and order.

The Mind Mages from Spur helped pull out truth from those willing to accept a Mind Mage arbiter, but those Mind Mages kept away from the bigger events. Like politics.

For this day was shaping up to be a true political shit storm.

Poi was handling a lot of that, though. He answered questions from those demanding answers, from the Viridian Throne, to the Wasteland Kingdoms, to the Pearl Kingdom. Treehome called, too. Every single person Erick had ever interacted with, who he had left on good terms with, called, and Poi answered. But he was only one man, and so he called in more Mind Mage help from the rest of the Mind Mages, and Erick [Gate]ed in people from several different places around the world to assist in that untangling of truth.

The Mind Mages weren’t playing political favorites (they told Erick multiple times), but if he wanted the truth of what was happening here to get out there (which he did), then they could certainly ensure that truth flew slightly faster than horrible lies.

Some people, somewhere, were surely going to think that Erick was setting up ritual magic to cause another Sundering, but the Mind Mages could do nothing about those responses; they could just tell people what they saw happening here, on the ground.

Kirginatharp and Stratagold had small words for Erick, mostly along the lines of ‘what the fuck’ and ‘good luck’ and ‘please respond with your true plans at your earliest convenience’. Not a minute after receiving those missives, Erick decided to have Poi respond with those plans. With regard to the evacuation of Candlepoint, Erick was simply telling it like it was, and letting people make their own informed decisions.

To Stratagold, Erick added, ‘The first of the public Gates should be open by tomorrow, or earlier, upon the locations discussed. Candlepoint is ready for trade!’

Candlepoint wasn’t exactly ready for trade, so this was something of a small lie. But it would be the truth soon enough (Erick hoped). The part about having Gates up and running by tomorrow was an enthusiastic and hopeful estimate, but it would be a lie if Erick wasn’t able to deliver, and so, Erick got to work on making a Gate. A real, proper Gate, within which he could set a [Gate].

But first, he needed a Gate workshop.

- - - -

Erick knew he needed a lot more time to play around with [Gate], to learn how the spell truly functioned long before he attempted to stick it into a runic construct. But there was little time to be had.

The world was watching.

And so, Erick got to work. Upon another branch of Yggdrasil, separate from the one holding his house and higher up in the tree, Erick set down long lines of platinum. From there he inscribed them with scratches of a Benevolent knife, and began casting [Fairy Stronghold] onto the runic web. With Kiri and Teressa watching, Erick had made for himself a workshop unlike any other…

But it did look sort of like Redflame’s workshop, which was intended.

Erick’s new domain of creation was an air hangar that stretched along the flattest 150 meters of Yggdrasil’s branch, and extended left and right all the way to the edges of that branch, about 70 meters. At twenty meters high, it had cost Erick a lot of mana to conjure for even empty space cost mana when it came to [Fairy Stronghold], but Erick had mana to spare and a lot of efficiency multipliers.

And now he had a workshop of mostly-unbreakable solid white floors, nice overhead lighting, lots of windows in every direction to let in the natural lighting of Yggdrasil, and an in-born security system of [Fairy Stronghold] that would keep out all prying eyes and let him work in peace. There would be no [Prismatic Ward] in this space, though, for it was much too large, and so Fairy Moon could probably pop in whenever she wanted…

Erick did not doubt that Fairy Moon could pop into his house, either, even though that space was covered by his own [Prismatic Ward], which he had recast, himself. The dense air around his house in Spur had vanished due to that, since he could only have one Solid Ward active at any one time, but—

Erick was distracting himself again.

What was the point of worrying over Fairy Moon? There was no point. Erick moved on.

By the time he reached this point the sun was already headed back toward the horizon, to set in the west, though it would still be a few hours before it got there. It was time to work, and work fast. Erick briefly cursed himself again for not playing around with [Gate] while he could.

But he was here now, and so there would inevitably be some playing before the real work could commence.

Erick stood upon the white floor of his new workshop, and said to Kiri, “I’ll explain as I work, but I gotta get the first ones out as soon as possible, so I don’t have a lot of time to properly teach right now. There will be more time later, though.”

“You already said that,” Kiri said, smirking. “Where can I help?”

“Right! This is next.” Erick gestured to the left, opening a [Gate] to Yggdrasil down in Stratagold. Large blocks of metal, each one a meter square and five meters long, began to flow through the portal, trundled along by Ophiels in sunform. The transition from the gravity of the Underworld to the gravity of the Surface had each block ‘flinch’ a fraction as it came through, but Ophiel compensated. Soon, three large rectangles of metal rested to the side. “We’ve got normal steel, rustless steel, and prismsteel. All wrought quality. I can get the first two easily enough by paying for them, but the third one needs to go as far as I can make it go.”

Kiri glanced around for a brief moment, looking at Teressa, before looking back to Erick. It was just Erick, Teressa, and Kiri, right now. Jane was over with Poi, providing backup to Poi as Poi oversaw the last of the evacuation.

Kiri sent Erick, ‘We all know you have [Duplicate]. Teressa, Poi, Jane, and I. No one else as far as I know.’

Erick winced.

But Teressa nodded, and silently stared at Erick, probably trying to decipher his wincing.

Erick said, ‘I guess you do. But. Let’s keep the lie going, okay?’

Kiri said, “Make the prismsteel go as far as possible. Sure.”

Erick turned back to his work, “Now I’m going to make an arch out of rustless steel first, in the hope that that will allow me to keep costs down. It’ll still rust, though, and so I hope to be able to make a [Condense Oxygen] or [Anti Oxygen] runic structure to preempt such an occurrence. To start…”

Erick continued to explain as he used a precise cast of [Metalshape] to cleave off a half meter length of rustless steel from the full bar. From there, and to prevent beading and weakness from using [Metalshape], Erick used [Incandescent Aura] to heat up the metal to bright red, stopping just before the point where all the baked-in mana evaporated out of the metal.

The next part was harder, for the proper way to do this would be to use great big machines to roll out the steel into proper bars, but Erick didn’t have that. Eventually he would have that sort of stuff, like they had at Enduring Forge, but for now he used his sunform to crush and stretch the steel.

Benevolent lightning crashed around the red-hot steel, sparking and flashing and crunching inward. Gradually, Erick turned the glowing metal into a long bar, around 50 meters in length. Erick hadn’t really measured anything, and he knew he had lost some steel due to the method of forging, but a 100x100x50 centimeter block of steel becoming a 10x10x5000-ish centimeter length of steel seemed like a good length to go for, and Erick was pretty good with eyeing proper measurements these days. These arches needed to be big enough for someone to drive through—

Not ‘arches’ actually.

Erick decided that square openings were better to make use of the full space provided by a single [Gate]. This meant a steel square around 12 meters on a side. Erick cut this down to 10 meters on a side, though, and used the extra material to square the corners, and provide some structural stability. It cut down on the overall usable space of the [Gate], but it was still ten meters to a side. Big enough.

… Large enough that it needed structural support beyond the small supports up at the corners.

Erick hummed as he gazed up at the 10x10 meter square of steel he had propped vertical in the workshop. The top sagged. The sides bowed. It needed more reinforcement. He was happy to reaffirm that a well-applied [Incandescent Aura] was more than enough to produce really strong welds, which was a plus, but this was not working. This Gate needed a lot more than this.

“This is the proper size, but… I don’t like it,” Erick said.

“Why?” Kiri asked.

“Sagging.”

Kiri looked at the square as best she could. “It’s barely sagging?”

“Well. Yes.” Erick said, “But it’s still sagging… And this isn’t gonna work! Gotta cut it down some.”

And so he did. Ten sagging meters to a side became five-point-five meters to a side, doubling the strength but nearly quartering the available [Gate] surface area. It was fine. Erick shoved the interior corner bracers to the very edge of the Gate, too, ensuring that there was a good five meters of clearance in the center. This, then, was stable.

Erick made a second one as easily as he did the first, though it still took him twenty minutes to do that.

When he had two nearly-identical blank Gates, he got out his adamantium knife, and—

Instantly realized he hadn’t done nearly enough experimentation with [Gate] yet to be sure of anything.

It was time to do that. And so, Erick opened up a [Gate] on one end of the warehouse, taking up a good ten meters of space, and leading to the other end of the warehouse. Erick saw himself through the endless warehouse, and smiled. He waved, but he ended up waving at his turned body, for this was almost like a hall of mirrors ‘infinity mirror’ thing, but it was not like that at all.

Kiri rapidly turned from one [Gate] to the other, trying to catch sight of her front, or something. Erick wasn’t exactly sure. Kiri said, “Okay. That’s weird.”

Wide-eyed, Teressa said, “I can sense myself though it.” She whispered, “Oh that’s so weird.”

Erick smiled as he opened up another set of [Gate]s to the left of the main floor; one ten meters up, one at waist-level, both of them horizontal and facing each other. He added some Shaped [Force Walls] around the [Gate]s, linking them together, and then grabbed a hunk of scrap metal and blipped it into the tube. The hunk of metal rapidly fell into the bottom [Gate]—

—And appeared out the top [Gate], to continue falling.

The ball bearing rapidly picked up speed, and soon the force of the air in the tunnel was enough to affect its fall, brushing it to the side. The ball bearing struck the [Force Wall]s Erick had put up and began skipping through the tunnel, striking the walls every so often as it hit terminal velocity. And it just kept going. The air in the tunnel began to fall through as well, though that happenstance was not nearly as easy to witness as the falling metal.

Erick pulled out another bit of metal from the rustless steel block and began shaping it into smaller Gates for more tests while his current [Gate] experiments ran. He had always closed whichever [Gate]s he had opened before, but now, he just let these ones run. His spell didn’t actually have any limitations on duration, though.

Half an hour later, Erick had an assortment of rustless steel Gates to enchant, ranging from a meter across, to a flimsy thing ten meters across, and he had decided that they would all be useless for this first [Gate]. He didn’t have time to test [Condense Oxygen] runic web structures right now, but these forms had helped him to understand what he needed out of a proper Gate design.

He also had an open [Gate] down below, deep in the waters of the lake, which had an exit point outside of the windows of his workshop. It was a ten-meter wide [Gate], so it wasn’t no small thing like the ball bearing tunnel he had set up inside the workshop.

Water poured out of that hole, a roaring torrent of rushing white that didn’t sound like much here at the top, but down below, where it crashed back into the lake a kilometer below, it was the sound of utter destruction. Of pulverizing. Of weight crashing down.

Teressa stood by the window nearest the waterfall [Gate], watching the water fall down.

And because Erick had no real work for her yet, Kiri had gone over to watch the waterfall, too.

Erick joined them.

Kiri glanced his way, then turned back to the waterfall. “It’s so weird. The water comes out of the hole in the world, and it keeps coming. This has passed all known limits of the [Gate] you can buy in the Script. I feel like it shouldn’t work like this.” She added, “But it obviously does work like this.”

“I thought weight limits mattered,” Teressa said. “But they don’t.”

“Well. It’s only water.” Erick said, “I am aware how much water weighs, but I have a net of Force surrounding the intake [Gate], filtering out all the actual life that could go through the intake. So this is just weight testing; not ‘transporting creatures testing’.”

“I almost want to try plunging through that intake [Gate]. Jane would certainly be up for that.” Teressa asked, “If you’re interested in sending people through?”

Erick perked up. “Oh! She would. Wouldn’t she?” He glanced through Ophiel. “Ah. Poi is still organizing the exodus and the initial chaos, and Jane is still with him. A waterfall ride might be fun, though.” He turned his attention back to the mostly-quiet start of the waterfall right outside his window, saying, “But, I’ve already sent thousands of people through the other [Gate]s I have set up outside Candlepoint, and none of those have broken with all the thousands of people going through. Thousands is not the same as millions, though, which is what I expect to happen someday. This weight was just another test that I needed to run, to see where my limitations lay.”

Teressa paused, realizing that Erick was already on the case. “Huh. Yeah.”

Kiri postulated, “Maybe you’re only limited by someone actively breaking the [Gate]?”

“Maybe. I do need to ask around about how normal [Gate] functions, to see where my own [Gate] differs.” Erick scrunched his eyebrows together as he glanced around his workshop, saying, “Maybe these questions I’m testing have already been answered.”

He knew the broad strokes already, but these little nuances were piling up. They made him feel as though he hadn’t done nearly enough research into this whole thing.

Kiri shook her head. “I researched as much as I could while you were gone and all of these tests have already been answered by explorations of the Script-granted [Gate], but I’ve got nothing on self-made [Gate]s.”

Erick smiled brightly. “You did!”

“Don’t get too excited, now.” Kiri gestured to the ball bearing tunnel. “That should have cut out after maybe ten cycles.” She gestured to the very large [Gate] open at both ends of the warehouse. “That is way too large. The size of a normal [Gate], cast as large as it could be, is about 5 or 7 meters in diameter.” She gestured to the waterfall outside the window. “And that breaks everything I assumed I knew about [Gate]. Not to mention the ones you already have open at Candlepoint right now. People are still moving through those, too, and those don’t seem to be stressed at all; I’ve been watching.”

… And now Erick was a bit worried.

Perhaps the limitations on the Script [Gate] were to prevent a finite resource from running out?

He quickly opened a new [Gate] into Benevolence. A white lightning hole in reality led to a land of similar lightning… But it looked fine? Same size as before? A bit bigger, actually. Everything was slightly larger, in fact. Glancing inside, Erick noted that the stone fountain in the center of the land was about twice the size it had been last time he had looked, and the Yggdrasil inside the space was about 20 meters tall now; Yggdrasil had doubled in size. He was growing just fine.

And the space was naturally growing, too.

Kiri looked over Erick’s shoulder, asking, “Is that the [Gate Space]?”

“Yup!” Erick stepped away from the portal, closing it as he said, “That appears normal, so it’s not like I’m ‘draining’ some resource to keep these other portals open.” He looked outside again, and then back to his warehouse. He shut off the waterfall and the [Gate]s at the end of the building, but he left the ball bearing tunnel going. He refreshed the [Force Wall]s around that experiment, saying, “Keeping that one. As for making these Gates…” Erick shrugged. “Maybe all I need is some way to be alerted when a [Gate] actually breaks, and needs to be recast? Maybe I don’t need to care about the duration enhancing power of runes?”

Which made a lot of sense, actually.

Teressa offered, “Like what we saw with the Twisted Vision? It came back after being disturbed.”

Erick nodded, his thoughts already having gone that way. “I didn’t think it was that simple, but maybe it is? So how can blank metal do that…” Erick fell silent in thought.

And Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye, which had been watching all this time, began bouncing up and down in front of him.

Erick smiled. He and Yggdrasil had already had this small discussion before, but Erick hadn’t found a way to correctly inform Yggdrasil that what he wanted was not actually what he wanted at all. Perhaps today might be different? Erick tried, “I know you want to help, but I don’t want to make you into a teleportation service for everyone who asks. You don’t want to do that, either. It might be fun for a while, but long term, this is not a solution, not when there might eventually be thousands upon thousands of call requests every second, 24 hours a day, all year long.”

Yggdrasil paused his bouncing. Yeah. That didn’t seem like fun.

And then he resumed bouncing, and his voice came through the ground of the warehouse, “I still want to help. Use a branch!”

Before Erick could say anything else, a sudden branching spike of glowing wood erupted from the floor ten meters in front of Erick. Yggdrasil’s egress rapidly grew, and then twisted, forming right angles, becoming a 5x5 meter-thick square of white wood; the same shape as the Gates Erick had been making. Smaller branches curled up and out from the upper part of the main square, followed by flaming green leaves bursting out of those twigs, forming a scattered canopy with a faint rainbow crown glowing on top.

Erick lightly smiled.

Ah. This was going to be difficult, then? Or maybe Erick could use this, anyway. He had been wanting to experiment with wood from Yggdrasil, anyway, and now was as good a time as any.

Kiri and Teressa both stared at the floor, though. Both of them rapidly reassessed the danger of living on Yggdrasil, and then rapidly came to the conclusion that they were probably still safe.

“That’s wonderful, Yggdrasil.” Erick said, “I’ll see what I can do with it, but it might not look like this when I am done. I might need you to help in a different way, okay?”

“Okay!” Yggdrasil said, “I’ll help whatever!”

Erick reached over and touched the wooden square near where it still connected with the branch sticking out of the floor. “Can you break it here, Yggdrasil?”

“Yes!”

The white glows of Yggdrasil retreated from the square branch to end exactly where Erick pointed, and then, with a flicker of light, the branch snapped off right there. Erick supported the square with his sunform before it could fall more than a few centimeters. It didn’t weigh much; maybe only a few hundred kilos.

… And now he had a 5x5 meter square of meter-thick, rather light wood. Yggdrasil had pulled his light from the wood, though. It was still bright white wood with brilliant green leaves, but the crown of rainbows was gone, the wood was simply white without any light, and the leaves were no longer on emerald fire.

Erick pondered.

Strangely enough, Erick’s first instinct was to see if he could have Yggdrasil reflexively open up a [Gate]. Perhaps... Like how a doctor tested the reflexes of a knee by tapping the knee with a rubber mallet, perhaps knocking on a Gate made of Yggdrasil could open a [Gate] without active participation on Yggdrasil’s part.

Erick said, “I don’t want to hurt you by working on this bit of wood. Can you still feel this square now that it’s separated, Yggdrasil?”

“Nope!”

There went that idea. Of course it wouldn’t be as simple as having someone physically knock on a Gate and Yggdrasil reflexively opening the portal. Perhaps, though…

Erick had no intrinsic idea of where the [Gate]s were once he cast them, much like how he had no feeling for where all his currently-running spellwork still existed, across the globe. And yet, Erick was still connected, intrinsically, to all the magic he had running out there. He could still cancel every spellwork he had ever cast, just by willing all that magic to collapse.

Was it possible to train some sort of magic sense? In order to know when a particular magic that should be running, was not running anymore?

Perhaps Yggdrasil could gain that sort of sense, and if a [Gate] collapses, he could recast that [Gate].

Erick asked, “Can you tell where the [Gate]s I opened are?”

With a bit of wariness in his voice, Yggdrasil said, “… No?”

Erick smiled, and said, “I can’t tell where I put them either, so don’t worry about not being able to either, okay? I might need to work on a Magic Sense, or something like that, but I have never even heard of this sort of magic, so… I’m not sure.”

Kiri shrugged. She had never heard of a ‘Magic Sense’ either.

“Okay,” Yggdrasil said, a bit sadder. And then he excitedly tried, “But I can feel Benevolence everywhere! I can feel that! Flows like sticky air! I get spiderweb feelings.”

Erick was surprised, and happy.

But he was also suddenly, horrifically terrified of Yggdrasil getting spider feelings of any sort. How did he even know that phrase? Were there talking spiders inside a Yggdrasil somewhere, that Erick didn’t know about? Some spiders out there talked, after all—

Wait.

The Big Guy had likely heard Jane talking, or something.

Erick asked, “Has Jane ever visited you as a spider, and talked about being a spider? What it feels like to be a spider.”

“I got spiders at Holorulo! They talk sometimes.”

Terror.

Erick strangled that emotion away, feeling strange both for the power of that particular emotion, and for how it had caught him completely off guard. He let that go.

“… Okay.” That was a thing to be investigated, for sure. Erick asked, “How long have they been there? Are they in your canopy?”

“Long time. Swimming spiders. Root dwellers, fishy-catchers.”

“… Okay.” For now, Erick said, “Okay. Well. I’ll talk to them another day. For now, since you can feel Benevolence, that’s wonderful. That gives me an idea.”

Erick set down the square of Yggdrasil wood and used a concentrated blade of his sunform to trim off one of the smaller branches on the top. It was like cutting stone with a buzzsaw. He barely cut the white wood even with applying all his force. So instead of doing more of that, he used a very small cast of [Eternal Stonestreeshape] to turn that bit of white wood into a solid cylinder about a meter long, and ten centimeters thick. Another Shaping turned the wood into a tuning fork with the ‘tines’ actually being the rune for [Renew].

It held no power, for it was not an enchanted item, but maybe Yggdrasil could ‘feel’ it anyway?

… This was probably not going to work, and that was fine.

Erick held the ‘tuning fork’ in his right hand and zapped it with his [Pristine Benevolence]. Iridescent white lightning soaked into the ‘runic’ working to dance back and forth between the closest point where the tines almost touched, at the top. Erick asked, “Can you feel that, Yggdrasil?”

“… Yes.”

Erick was impressed.

Yggdrasil had lied, and not about something small like ‘being tired’.

“It’s okay if you can’t feel it, Yggdrasil.” Erick said, “I won’t be mad at all.”

With a deeply worried tone, Yggdrasil exclaimed, “I can’t feel it! Is something wrong with me?”

Erick smiled calmly, and said, “Nothing is wrong, Yggdrasil. But now that you have told the truth, I can put together some more advanced thoughts, and make some more advanced designs. Telling the truth is important when it comes to magic, no matter who you will make mad by telling the truth.”

With a questioning tone, Yggdrasil asked, “People ask if you’re a Wizard and I still say no?”

“Just don’t tell anyone about me, Yggdrasil. No need to lie, or tell the truth. Just don’t tell them about me when they ask.”

“Okay!” Yggdrasil happily said, “This is easier!”

Erick smiled.

And then he had another idea. The basic idea of a piece of Yggdrasil, soaked in Benevolence and then chiming off power, probably still had merit, if Yggdrasil could indeed feel all the Benevolence around him with ‘spiderweb feelings’. Perhaps the problem was one of scale? Or maybe strength of signal?

Erick asked, “Can you feel me, Yggdrasil? When I walk around?”

“Yes!” Yggdrasil said, “I know where you are, always. Very comfortable. Better that you live here now.”

“I like living here, too.”

Erick turned his attentions inward.

… He felt like he should be able to have such ‘spiderweb feelings’ as Yggdrasil. But he did not. Maybe he needed to actually experiment more with Benevolence to understand it better? The answer to that question came as soon as Erick had that thought: yes, you fool. You need to experiment more with Benevolence.

Erick had too many fun and interesting new toys and not enough time in the day—

And, he needed to get on with Time Magic, too! With Phagar!

— to learn about all of them, and what they could do.

Well. He was here and experimenting. So he focused again on the thought of ‘spiderweb feelings’.

And he got nothing.

“What do I feel like to you?” Erick asked.

“Like a river flowing. I feel you brush against me. I know where the river starts.”

Even though Erick wasn’t currently releasing Benevolen—

Wait. He was currently releasing Elemental Benevolence out into the world. His [Pristine Benevolence] and his [Lodestar]. Erick turned off his sunform.

He asked, “Do you still feel me?”

Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye squinted at Erick. “Yes. But not like before. Something changed?” Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye stared at him. “What happened?”

Erick turned his sunform back on.

“There you are!” Yggdrasil said, “I feel you lots. You are here, father!”

Okay. So. Actively casting Benevolence caused his mana to flow away and he was fully sensible to Yggdrasil. Made sense. Mana that got used was often tainted with the magic that it was used for. In Erick’s case, his constantly-active sunform was doing exactly that. But since he was a Wizard, and all his mana was usually his own, unlike the vast majority of most people on Veird, would other constant magic allow Yggdrasil to sense him, even if it wasn’t Benevolence-based? His own mana was all Benevolence mana after his recent transformation, after all; that was his particular ‘flavor’ of personal mana.

There was the slight nuance that Yggdrasil could always feel where Erick was, anyway, but that might not be completely relevant to this sort of discussion.

Erick cut his sunform and turned on his [Physical Domain] aura, but kept it small and close by. “Can you sense this, Yggdrasil?”

“… Nooo? … Yes? No. Maybe. No— Yes.” Yggdrasil spoke solidly, “Yes. You are there. I see you.”

Seemed inconclusively affirmative of Erick’s hypothesis.

Oh! Erick had another idea; another way to get an automagic [Gate] system set up.

Erick asked Kiri, “Do you know if [Scry] can be used to call the sight of a particular person, or entity?”

Kiri and Teressa both had been standing to the side, watching and listening while Erick worked. Now, though, Teressa had absolutely no answer so she glanced down at Kiri, and Kiri blinked at the unexpected question.

“Uh…” Kiri said, “Not that I am aware of—” She realized something and instantly said, “You can call the Sight of a god by calling their name. Other than that; no idea.”

“I don’t want Yggdrasil to be a constant porter, but reflexes can be trained...” Erick paused. “The wording in the roots of the Twin Trees that held the [Gate] into the Twisted Vision was not Ecks, at all. It wasn’t any language I have ever seen. It was, in fact, just a way to designate that space as a place for the Twisted Vision to attach.” He paused. “… But that [Gate] was there to make an entrance into the Gate Space of Ar’Cosmos. What I want is point-to-point [Gate]s, and to bypass my own Gate Space completely.”

Okay. So.

If Erick continued along this line of inquiry, he could probably create a reflexive opening into the [Gate Space] of his [Gate]. This was not what he wanted, actually.

There was so much nuance to making a Gate; so much more than Erick had originally thought, way back when he was working with Tenebrae to understand that entrance to Ar’Cosmos, back before Erick knew it was an entrance to Fairy, to the land of the dragons.

And yet…

“I’m probably overthinking this.” Erick tried the first idea that came to mind; he tried to make a key. So he grabbed his adamantium knife and began carving into the runic tuning fork, slicing english words into steel-strength, balsa-weight wood. In two minutes he was 95% done. He looked it over, and it was good enough. And then he looked to Kiri and Teressa, sending, ‘You didn’t see this next part.’

They both nodded, mostly seriously, but Kiri had a small lilt to her lips; a tiny smile.

Erick added, ‘I mean it. This is a politically dangerous spell that might tank relations with Stratagold if they found out.’

Kiri lost her smile at that. Teressa just nodded, looking the same as she had before Erick added that next part. Teressa had known that Erick’s warning was real, and not just paranoia talking. It was probably ridiculous to still think of [Duplicate] as something to be kept hidden, especially since all the other stuff Erick was no longer hiding, but [Duplicate] was a political mess of a spell.

Erick [Duplicate]d the key.

And now, with two keys, he carved a few more English words at the bottom of the keys. For the original, he carved it with ‘to my other twin, beta’ and on the copy, he carved ‘to my other twin, alpha’.

This was good, for now.

Probably wasn’t going to work for any number of reasons, but this was just a test, after all, and the mana bridged many, many gaps. Some gaps were too wide to bridge, though.

Erick turned his attention to the large square of white wood, sitting on the ground in front of him. With quick Shaping, Erick tucked the branches into the square, and plucked off the leaves, smoothing out all the rough growth left by Yggdrasil. Then split the whole thing like he was cutting a bagel. Two halves separated left and right, and with a bit more Shaping, those two halves both gained enough stabilization to stand on their own, five meters away from each other.

Another Shaping opened up two keyholes for the keys, both at head height on the sides of the gate. There were many different placements possible for those keys, but this one felt right for now.

Standing between both Gates, Erick took both keys, put them in the holes, and took aim with both hands. Benevolence lightning shocked out of both hands and struck the keys, soaking into their runic inscriptions. The key with the runes Erick had actually carved began to glow brightly, those runes soaking up power, turning brighter white than the white wood of the key. The second key, the one which Erick had not directly carved, but which gained the majority of its runes through [Duplicate], looked a lot different. Only the final runes at the end of the key, deep in the hole, had gained any real brightness to them.

… And nothing happened.

Erick turned the keys a bit. He shimmied them back and forth. He felt a bit like a fool, but that was fine.

Because this particular form of this experiment was a failure.

Erick smiled brightly, saying, “Ah! I’m glad that didn’t work.” Erick left the keys to the side, and gazed upon the Gates, instead. For a long moment he thought.

And then he glanced over at the still-tumbling ball bearing tunnel. He had another set of thoughts, that were probably more correct than all the rest, and then turned back to the squares of eternal stonewood.

“I suppose… All I really have to do is ensure that the location where I cast the [Gate] is secure. That someone can’t poke at it with an antirhine knife. Eternal stonewood is very good at ensuring that no one can mess with it, for you have to have the special Shaping spell to get anywhere with it… But, Songli has that spell, actually. Perhaps I should make something that even the clans of Songli don’t know how to Shape?”

Silence stretched as Erick thought.

Yes. He would have to make some unique material and a Shaping spell to go along with that material.

But that could come later.

Kiri decided she had a very important question, so she interrupted Erick’s thoughts and asked, “Why is antirhine bad for [Gate]s?”

“Oh! Right; you don’t know. Uh.” Erick said, “When you touch the actual [Gate] of a [Gate] with antirhine the [Gate] explodes with magnitude 5 power… And I should probably test that, too.”

Kiri went, “Oh.”

Teressa gave a small, sudden, and ragged sigh. At that moment, Teressa’s sigh reminded Erick of Poi’s various sighs over the last year and a half.

Erick ignored it. “First I need to find some antirhine, though. Shouldn’t be that hard.”

It wasn’t that hard at all.

Erick had an Ophiel zip up to the lands north of Treehome, to search for the antirhine missile that had been shot at Syllea that one time when she was Raging and her brother, the Cultist Omaz, was attacking Treehome. That missile was exactly where Erick had left it; tucked into the crook of a tree about a kilometer from the ground, in the deep dark of the middle layer where all the trees were like gargantuan pillars, spaced far apart.

Ophiel opened a [Gate] from those dark woods to the surface of the lake, about a kilometer below his new workshop.

From there, Erick had Ophiel grab onto the back of the missile, where the thing had been enchanted for flight and direction and had no lead to it at all, and he dipped the lead head of the missile into the center of the [Gate].

The head of the missile came through the center of the [Gate] without issue. Lead could go through a [Gate]! Good to know! And then, Erick had Ophiel gradually move the lead-headed missile toward the lightning ring; toward the edge of the porta—

The ring popped like a soap bubble breaking, or a balloon experiencing explosive decompression. It shattered away from the embankments imposed, and let loose sparks of lightning everywhere.

Erick was not impressed.

The ‘explosion’ —and Erick was hesitant to call it that— was little more than a single second of exposure to Benevolent Lightning. This exposure had some side effects, of course, but it was nothing destructive.

In the Forest of Glaquin, a large, multitudinous spread of glowing flowers and mushrooms now grew up and down the side of the tree near where Erick had opened the [Gate]. Down below his workshop, at this end of the [Gate], a noticeable splash of greenery now floated upon the waters. They appeared to be water hyacinths, or something similar; floating, bulbous, lily-like plants, with small purple flowers.

Kiri’s Sunny floated by in the air near the water hyacinths, near another Ophiel that Erick was using to inspect the experiment. She came back to herself, saying, “That doesn’t look mag-5— Well. I mean… It could be? [Grow] is a deceptively high magnitude spell, too.”

And here now was yet another thing Erick needed to investigate! How could he have forgotten?

Too much on his mind, he supposed.

“I still don’t understand ‘magnitude’.” Erick asked, “Is it really the depth of change a spell has on its surroundings? Seems an inadequate explanation.”

Kiri shrugged. “I’ve had it explained tens of different ways and each explanation was basically what you said, but with only small differences. Apparently real Mind Mages can tell the magnitude of a spell by looking, though, so I assume that the amount of ‘mind’ that you put into a spell is really what makes the magnitude.”

Now that was a good avenue of inquiry. Maybe Poi wouldn’t be cagey this time. Erick said, “I’ll talk to Poi and have him look at a [Gate] explosion when I get a chance. Need to find some more antirhine, but that shouldn’t be too hard. Songli was going to be my backup source— Ah! Speaking of. I should make that spell too, while I have a chance—” He paused. “Later, actually.” Erick told Kiri, “I want to teach you how to make a real chelation molecule tomorrow, so don’t let me forget that. I already gave that magic to the Mind Mages, but you should have it too, long as there’s not a war, or something.”

Kiri stood straight. She nodded.

Erick went back to the problem of making a [Gate]—

“Oh.” Erick had a sudden, possibly-true thought. “I could ask Redflame the direct answer to this, but perhaps all the [Gate]s out there are cast one at a time; each a purposeful and unique working. Maybe there is no enchanting for automagical [Gate] creation; there is only protecting the [Gate]s that one purposefully casts…” He frowned. “That seems like a cop out.”

Perhaps Erick could look into standardized magic item creation, like what Kirginatharp taught at Oceanside. Wouldn’t that be funny! The solution to [Gate] would lie in the enchanting that Erick could not do with any reliability, and which he thought was bad practices.

The problem was that runic workings best allowed for pointed, close range targeted, or otherwise ‘set’ actions. Spatial Magic, the moving of items from one area to another envisioned area, required someone actually envisioning the area on the other side.

Solving the [Teleport] problem to allow people to blip back and forth a lot using runic devices, was an achievement of magic that Tasar and Riivo and Archmage’s Rest had invented a few centuries ago. The teleport stations.

… Okay. So.

Erick probably just needed to work with other learned people in order to solve these problems which had already been solved. Making an automagical [Gate] seemed very doable, just not by him. Not right now.

“But for now...” Erick looked over the squares of white wood, and said, “Leave the automagic for another day. I just need to make them truly immobile and invulnerable, cast the [Gate] into the wood, and prevent interference and disruption. I can manually cast [Gate] for a while.”

It wasn’t how Erick thought that he would be making Gates.

He envisioned portals, yes, and then someone knocking on a portal or empowering it somehow, in order for it to be connected to another designated portal in another place. He thought he would be making twin Gates where either of the Gates could be ‘called’, or whatever, and then the [Gate] would open between the two. And maybe there would be a key system to be able to turn it off and on as necessary, or to dial specific ‘Over Gate’s, or something…

And an Undertow effect, as well, tied into some runic working inside the [Gate], to allow everyone who stepped through to be able to pay the cost of their own transportation. Erick had thought that the Undertow Effect had been a big part of his Worldly Path, and it had been, but not in the way he originally imagined. Erick had baked that magic into his [Gate Space].

And moving people and goods didn’t actually cost Erick anything.

Erick had been speaking all of this aloud a bit, so Kiri could listen and learn.

Kiri asked, “Can you move your [Gate]s after casting them? Would the enactment of a [Gate] lock the Gate midair?”

“A nuanced question that I do not have the answer to. I was going to use Force Magic to emplace them. But maybe I don’t need to do that?” Erick frowned. “I could simply make something that [Gate] can attach to?”

… Erick went over to the squares of white wood that stood vertical on the workshop floor. He first Shaped both of the would-be Gates to normal, plain squares, and turned some of the cast-off wood into temporary holders to keep the squares vertical. With that done, Erick lightstepped to stand at the center top of the left wood square. With his rune knife in one hand, Erick precisely carved the symbol for [Renew] at the top of that would-be Gate. Under that symbol, and a bit smaller, Erick smiled a little as he carved the words, ‘Welcome all who wish to wander’.

He repeated the act on the second [Gate].

With a sunform grip, Erick hovered both Gates a meter above the floor, his lightning flickering upon both halves of what once was whole, soaking into the wood. Power glittered in the runic grooves he had carved, dancing within Erick’s simple message of welcome.

Yggdrasil’s separated wood remained bright white after being separated from him, but the actual glows that pulsed within the living summon had faded after that separation. And yet now, those glows came back. Small, at first, then brighter as Erick pumped pure Benevolence into the wood.

And then Erick cast [Gate] upon them both.

Lightning flashed inside the pair of Gates, and then settled down, to hide beneath glowing white wood, while the interior spaces became portals on both sides of Erick. He saw himself again, down an endless corridor. It wasn’t actually like a mirror tunnel at all. Erick turned left, and every single similar Erick also turned left, because that’s what was happening; there was no mirroring here, just some views from different angles.

Erick smiled.

With a bit of trepidation, Erick released some of his sunform grip on the Gates, hoping that they could float—

The Gates slipped down as Erick let them move, their weight not at all supportable by the [Gate] inside. Those [Gate]s inside instantly flickered and died. Erick ensured that the Gates landed without falling over, once again securing them to their temporary supports at their bases.

He had learned a few things in that exchange.

Weight was apparently a problem. [Gate]s could not support the Gates they inhabited. But at least the [Gate] was very much attached to the Gate, and in the moving of the Gate, the [Gate] broke. This was good progress! Good information.

“Have you read anything about [Gate]s being able to be moved after they’re cast, Kiri?”

Kiri answered, “[Gate]s can’t be moved after they’re cast.”

Erick considered the Class Ability, Gatemaster. Perhaps that one would let him make [Gate]s that could move? That Ability read ‘Double the effective range of your gate space. Minor improvements to everything gate related’. Did ‘minor improvements’ mean mobile [Gate]s? Perhaps Erick did actually need that Class Ability.

Erick had a think.

Perhaps, this was fine? As is?

[Gate]s that popped when moved might actually be preferable to [Gate]s that remained intact, for mobile [Gate]s could lead to some unforeseen consequences, like someone dumping one half of the [Gate] underwater and making a flood come out the other side. That would be bad.

And yet… Slight movements with [Gate]s would occur all the time, mostly by accident, but especially if someone moved the land around the [Gate]s. So the Gates Erick made needed to be super stable?

Erick could do ‘stable’. People have been making things stable and unmovable ever since the invention of Force Magic, way back at the start of the Script, and Erick was no exception.

Technically there were ways to move Force after it had been emplaced, just as there were ways to move lightwards after being cast and locked to a location. That branch of magic was actually a constantly evolving competition between placers and movers, with the Shades and Cultists being the foremost authority on moving magic after it had been placed, and everyone else trying (and mostly failing) to make magic that could not be moved after being cast.

The Shades and Cultists of Melemizargo were the only ones open about taking down the magic of others, though.

Normal thieves and normal security mages in much of the world had long ago adopted those same sorts of magics, and on a much less life-and-death battlefield. Sometimes, the ‘battlefield’ was even inside research labs, with well documented and researched papers on the topic being published by the Arcanaeum Consortium every few years.

The methods used to move emplaced magic varied between Spatial Magics (the most prevalent and powerful by far) and pure manifestations of power, which mutated and moved emplaced spellwork (if it didn’t break that spellwork in that moving). Erick had seen many instances of the second occurrence, back when he was helping repair Songli from the Extreme Light bombs of Terror Peaks. In many locations, wardlights and other spellwork had been moved away from the epicenter of those blasts. This caused lightwards (if they had survived) and lightposts to be out of sync with each other.

Lightwards would be hanging out midair, a meter away from where they had been cast.

Erick had experienced this sort of movement of magic even more so, back when he watched Tasar blip objects around through her Spatial Domain, and when she taught him how to cast [Teleport Magic].

Now [Teleport Magic] could very much be used to move around a [Gate]…

The point to all these thoughts, Erick conceded, was that there was only so much he could do to prevent messing with his Gates.

Spatial Magic moved everything around at the command of the caster.

Pure power moved the very manasphere.

Erick could actually protect against Spatial Magic, though, by putting a [Spatial Denial] runic web into the Gate… And wasn’t that hilarious! He could Deny Spatial Magic, but his [Gate]s could still work normally—

Would that actually work, though? Erick thought it should work, but he hadn’t actually tried that particular experiment yet. So that’s what he did. With a quick cast, Erick filled half of the warehouse with [Spatial Denial], and then he cast a [Gate] inside—

And the [Gate] appeared. Both sides of the [Gate], too; the intake appeared in front of Erick, and the exit appeared to the right, exactly as Erick wished them to appear. [Gate] worked inside of a [Spatial Denial]!

Erick laughed.

And then he canceled that [Spatial Denial] and tried [Teleport Magic] upon one of the [Gate]s, aiming to move it one meter up into the air.

The [Gate] moved as commanded.

… A bit concerning, but that was fine.

Kiri’s eyes went wide. “Was that first one what I thought it was? A Denial with a [Gate] inside?”

“Yup!” Erick chuckled.

“And the second one was [Teleport Magic]?

“And the second one was [Teleport Magic]!”

“… Ignoring the security concerns of the second one for a moment.” Kiri asked, “Is [Gate] not actually Spatial Magic?”

“[Gate] is Spatial Magic.” Erick nodded. “But whereas normal Spatial Magic is all about choosing the place where an object/space exists, based upon imposing magical shenanigans onto that object/space’s Reality in the past, which has repercussions on the present, which is all we are actually able to affect…” Erick thought how best to summarize, and said, “[Gate] is shenanigans regarding the location of a Reality that is actually normal reality but of a different reality, which in effect links two different places in this reality together.”

Kiri looked at Erick. “… Okay.” And then she asked, “And all your Spatial Denial does is work on this reality, I take it?”

“Exactly right!” Erick smiled brightly, saying, “And of course the [Spatial Denial] I made only works on Spatial Magic cast in this reality; I wasn’t even aware that I needed to Deny other realities when I made that one… And now that I’m thinking of it, I don’t want to deny other realities, anyway.”

Erick felt a calm descend upon him as he gazed out at the mess he had made, for he knew exactly how to incorporate everything he had learned into making a proper Gate. It would be version 1, of course. Later versions would come and they would be better. But now Erick had a plan. Now, he knew exactly what he needed to do.

“Okay. This will be easier than I thought— I mean. Okay. I’m sure many different people are going to break these things many times and I’m going to need to remake them a dozen times till I get a version that is actually, mostly secure. But that will come later.”

And so, Erick ignored the rustless steel he had strung into squares, for that would come later. For now, he grabbed some of the platinum and hammered it into the same sort of shape as the rustless squares. Then, he took his knife and he started carving a rather simple runic web. This one included [Envelop Item], a spell Erick had rarely used, but which was perfect for encasing a working in Force, along with [Undertow’s Edge], the [Force Wall] version of Undertow which would create a continually-strengthening Force, based on the mana it Drained. [Spatial Denial] came next, along with [Renew] in order to make everything play nice with each other, and possibly make the Undertow spell support all the other spells inside the Gate. Erick placed a bunch of limiting runes and lines which would hopefully limit the ranges of the imbued spells. In the end, the Undertow should only extend into a roughly ten meter space around the actual Gate.

If this version didn’t work, then Erick would try again with the same style, but with perhaps some different structuring inscriptions. Theoretically, everything should play nice with each other and work how he told it to work, for runic webs were good like that, but this was all new magic. Erick had experience to draw upon, but not much experience. Not as much as an actual Runic Master.

Darabella would probably know exactly how to do this. Tasar and Riivo would, too. Erick could only put his best guess forward.

Erick made two runic webs, each as close to exactly the same as he could manage, and then he took those runic webs and Shaped Yggdrasil’s donated wood around them, forming a solid cover that could not be Shaped, and which would provide line-of-sight protection against Shaping of the metal inside. When he was done, he was left with two very similar squares of wood, both with a 5x5 meter square of open space inside, and around 7 meters wide. This last Shaping had ruined the runes Erick had placed on the Gates, of course, so he reinscribed those; a large circular [Renew] rune at the top center of the square, and the English words ‘Welcome all who wish to wander’ inscribed below.

With a sunform grip, Erick hoisted the Gates into the air, and kept them a good ten meters away from everyone else, and himself. With a twist of lightning threaded through a hole in the sides of both Gates, Erick touched upon the runic web inside.

The next version might be able to take in his Benevolent Lightning and start casting the runic spells inside all on their own. But that would make it very difficult for Erick to cancel the [Undertow’s Edge] if this experiment went wrong, for if he didn’t actually cast that spell himself, then he had no inherent canceling capability on that spell.

This way was safer.

Erick cast that first, most dangerous of spells upon the runic web inside one Gate, and then inside the other Gate. One right after the other, something stirred within the Gates, like a leviathan prowling through kendrithyst crystals. The Gates shook, vibrating a bit, and then they settled.

… He hadn’t even considered that they could have exploded, but perhaps he should have.

Gradually, Erick watched as [Undertow’s Edge] took hold of the air around the white wood, like an abyss shining behind a moon.

That abyss didn’t extend very far at all, only reaching about seven meters out from each Gate. Didn’t even reach the ground! Therefore it wasn’t anywhere near able to soak in Yggdrasil’s power. Erick smiled. Then he had two Ophiel float over and stand directly on top of the Gates.

The very second that Ophiel reached the abyss, that abyss began to soak him up. Ophiel had a lot of mana, but [Undertow’s Edge]’s Drain worked at a rate of twice Erick’s Willpower every second; around 450 mana per second.

Power thrummed into the Gates—

Suddenly, the Gates seemed to come awake with light and the abyss behind both white squares began to deepen. The Undertow soaked in mana and the runic web spread it out, [Renew] evening out everything, ensuring all the adjoining magic got as much power as it could handle. Force enveloped both Gates, and then deepened.

Into this power, into the primed, glowing wood of Yggdrasil, Erick cast [Gate].

A portal appeared, linking both Gates.

Just. Instantly. Appeared. No Benevolence escaped the glowing wood. No flowers or sparking lightning spread out. No mushrooms grew. The [Gate] held strong, the lightning ring hidden inside the glowing eternal stonewood, while the power inside the runic web began to seal everything under an [Envelop Item]. Erick let go with his own sunform, and the Gates did not fall. The [Undertow’s Edge] held both midair, and unmovable, while a spreading [Spatial Denial] would prevent the structure from ever being moved by easily acquired Spatial Magics—

“Ah.” Erick realized a weakness. “It’s actually weak to [Force Weaver].” He glanced through Ophiel to find Jane— “Oh good! Poi is done, too.” Erick rapidly opened a [Gate] directly from the warehouse to the kitchen at their house, where Poi and Jane were starting to make dinner. “Hey you two! Come see what I made! Won’t take long. I need to see if you can move this thing with [Force Weaver], Jane.”

Jane paused her washing of the potatoes.

Poi had been pulling fish out of the cold storage, but he put it back, then turned to Erick, paused, then said, “That’s tricky.”

Jane glanced over. “What?”

“Come see!” Erick said, “Come on come on come on.”

Jane dropped the potato, exclaiming, “Okay okay okay! It’s already so late, though. Dinner is going to be late, too.”

Jane and Poi joined Erick, Teressa, and Kiri in the warehouse.

Ahead of them floated two [Gate]s, inside their Gate-containers.

Erick gestured to both of them, saying, “[Force Weaver]. See if you can move them. You’ll experience a 450 mana per second Drain if you get too close, but that shouldn’t be too much of a problem.”

Jane moved in, paused as she entered the Drain range of the right Gate, and then she lifted her hand.

The Gate moved up, and the [Gate] therein popped like so much scattered magic. And then Jane let go. The Gate stabilized in the air, but now it was crooked, hovering at an angle and with streamers of white Force coming off of the glowing wood, hovering in the air like a scattered splash of glowing milk. That splash of milk continued to glow, and deepen the Abyss all around, for it was still the [Undertow’s Edge] and [Envelop Item], though they were now mangled together.

Jane’s [Force Weaver] was a hard counter to this spellwork.

Erick frowned. “I expected that, and yet, I did not.”

Jane stepped away from the Gates, getting out of the range of the Drain. “Was that supposed to happen?”

“It is a weakness I need to account for.” Erick tilted his head as he looked at the tilted Gate. “I need to include a [Force Denial]. Now that… That might be tricky, and especially since the Gate itself is constantly casting Force Magic itself.”

Kiri flinched. “That’s tricky.” With a bit of sarcasm, she added, “Might as well make a Void Song.”

“Force Magic is also hard to Deny; this is true.” Erick said, “Maybe I need to make a full-spectrum Denial, anyway. Something even more inclusive than [Prismatic Lullaby].”

“Or you could limit the Force spells to the inside of the Gate?” Jane offered. “I need Line of Sight to Weaver.”

“Wouldn’t work.” Erick said, “The Drain out here is still a part of the Force—” He paused. “Can you Weaver this Drain, by only touching the Abyss?”

Jane turned back to the tilted Gate. She wasn’t sure if she could.

She stepped forward once and reached out to the Drain hovering in the air. And then she ripped sideways. The Gate spun clockwise, rapidly turning almost a complete circle, splashing milky white Force outward from the entire structure. That floating Force held in the air like so much splashed paint. Some of it broke into broken mana. Most of it just stayed there, frozen in time, floating.

“Ah.” Jane said, “The Force spell is all over the place.”

“Yes.” Erick frowned. “If I put a theoretical [Deny Everything] outside of the effect of the Drain— Oh. I’m overthinking this again. I have a Domain already. I need to put my [Lodestar] into this thing— Well. [Domain of Light].” Erick looked up that spell, to see if it had changed—

It had.

- -

Domain of Benevolent Light, instant, super long range, 5000 mana

Harken unto your own Truth of Benevolence. Let no one diminish your brilliance.

Undispellable. Uncorruptible.

Lasts 1 hour. Effects last longer.

- -

He should still be able to put that into a runic web.

“Like. Duh,” Erick said to himself. “Yes. It needs a Domain in there. I really should have considered that earlier. That solves so many small issues.”

Kiri smiled. Teressa watched.

Jane and Poi went back to making dinner.

The sun had set hours ago, and Erick made Gate Version Two.

Jane came back, well before dinner was ready, and tested the strength of Erick’s new Domain-enhanced Gate. Jane put everything she could into her [Force Weaver], and yet, she could not Weave. Success! Or at least as much ‘success’ as could be had under the Script, where there was always some way to counter other magic.

Erick breathed deep, then exhaled. This was good.

Twin Gates hung in the air before him, both of them looking like squares of pure light, hovering above a land of light, yet hints abyss clung to the edges like a dark shadow. That shadow created darker lands to the left and right of the gate, forming a sort of tunnel that led to the hole in the world in the white wood.

Erick had constrained the [Undertow’s Edge] effect to the space around the actual entrance, so that people moving through the space wouldn’t actually have all of their resources stripped from them. Keeping the [Gate] stable was still important, though, so Erick made sure to carve some instructions to the side of each Gate, to make the people in both locations aware that while the space leading to the [Gate] was clear of the Drain, if they wanted the Gate to remain stable, then they needed to donate at least 3,000 mana per day to the Drain. More was fine. Less was not fine.

Technically, the Gate only needed 2880 mana per day, but a bit of extra leeway seemed good.

The backside had the full Drain guarding it, and thus it would drain about a thousand mana per second from anyone who was not defending themselves properly, or [Defend]ing themselves, in the case of most people.

Erick’s own Constitution, combined with [Unbreakable Form] for 500 absolute damage mitigation after all other defenses were taken into account, was enough to fully protect him from the Drain, apparently, which was a pleasant surprise to discover. This fact let him explore the backside of his [Gate] without issue…

Which was something he should have done before now, too.

Erick looked through the front of his left Gate, and saw the warehouse which lay in front of the right Gate. From there, he stepped left, into the Abyssal Drain, and went around back. The space on the opposite side of the [Gate] was little more than thick, white mist. Like touching near-solid fog. Erick stuck his hand into the fog and felt nothing particular about that mist at all. It wasn’t cloying, or wet, or warm or cold. It just was.

Back when Erick was working with Tenebrae, at the Twin Trees which held the [Gate] that led into the Twisted Vision of Ar’Cosmos, when Erick had touched the backside of that [Gate] it had disturbed the portal, breaking it apart. Once disturbed, that portal came back after a little while, without issue. Other peculiarities with that particular [Gate] allowed Erick to stand on the backside and look through the portal-space, to see the forest in front without issue, while anyone from the front side hadn’t been able to see Erick at all.

Here, in his warehouse, staring at the backside, Erick only saw a land of white fog.

What was going on here?

He probably could have experimented on this part a bit more stringently until now, but he just hadn’t thought of it. And now, here he was. So.

Erick sent an Ophiel into that fog.

Ophiel fluttered forward, into the thick mist, vanishing from sight almost instantly. One meter in. Two meters in. Four meters—

Like light unfurling in front of the [Gate], Ophiel appeared, ribbons of mist and gentle lightning flickering away from him, to fall back into the [Gate] behind and vanish like figments, to disappear into the portal.

Odd!

Erick tested it again.

And again, the same thing happened. After going a certain distance into the fog, that fog vanished from Ophiel’s form, pulling away, revealing that Ophiel had actually just been moving through a separate layer of reality, briefly, until enough distance was gained and Ophiel just popped back into this reality.

Kiri had a good suggestion. “It might not be distance based? It could be time based? Or saturation based?”

Erick had Ophiel flutter inside the backside of the portal, and just hover there, in the light. He didn’t go further in at all. Five seconds passed. Ten seconds passed. Twelve—

Fractured glows broke away from a heretofore invisible, intangible, unknowable Ophiel, hovering just on the other side of the [Gate]. Those glows washed away, falling back into the glowing square of the Gate like so much disturbed magic.

“I’m guessing saturation, though I will have to run more tests to be sure.” Erick said, “But it’s time for dinner, and then I have some meetings to take with Candlepoint. I told them I would meet them after sunset, but it’s way past sunset. I also need to… I’m not sure. Consider making a Gate that is open on both sides, and that you can go through both sides? A double Gate. Remove all possibility of someone going in the back.”

There was a lot of experimenting left to do! Too much, in too little time. For instance, Erick needed to know what happened when you shoved an antirhine knife into the backside of a [Gate]. Did it pop the [Gate] violently? Eliciting greenery from everything nearby? Or did something stranger happen?

While Erick wanted to get right on those important experiments because magic was fun! But there were a few facts holding him back from fully committing. First, he knew he’d be learning about how to work [Gate] for months, if not years. Added to that, there was the Class Ability Gatemaster to consider. What sort of ‘minor improvements all around’ could be lurking inside that Ability? Probably a lot! Enough that Erick wanted to know how to work [Gate] before he got that Ability, at the very least.

Mostly, though, the vagaries of Erick’s life demanded satisfactory answers to questions they had yet to ask, and that Erick would not know were questions until they showed up and tried to punch him in the face.

Or some other sort of attack.

Probably antirhine knives in the dark, or something. Or missiles. Probably missiles.

On the bright side, he wouldn’t have to go looking for antirhine if his assassins brought it to him.

“But that can come later.” Erick declared, “It’s time for dinner.”

- - - -

Dinner was great, for Poi and Jane had cooked well, but dinner was also a tactical level discussion of what had happened today, both in Candlepoint, and in Erick’s workshop.

There were around 4,850 people in Candlepoint. 1,100 shadelings, now known as originals. 2,950 former shadelings, now known as returners. And 800 people who had chosen to stay. There wasn’t any particularly dominant race among those who were staying. The minotaurs had all chosen to stay.

The major players of Candlepoint were the same people who had been there months ago.

Mephistopheles, the red incani shadeling mayor. The other actual-shadelings in town were fiercely loyal to him, and he appeared fiercely loyal to Erick, which was either a problem or a boon.

Justine Erholme, the white incani priestess of Koyabez. She was the only representative of a god other than Melemizargo in town, and she had quite a flock among the returners. Not so much among the still-shadelings.

Ava Jadescale, the snake shifter sewermaster. She had already cleared out the slums under the city, and all those people were now above ground and moving into homes abandoned by those who left.

Valok Greentalon was still a shadeling, and still working well as the master farmer of Candlepoint’s farms. He and his people provided much of the food that fed Candlepoint.

Daetroi Ooragh, the cattle rancher father of Apogough Ooragh. Apogough had been the only survivor of the Farmer’s Council back when the Farms still existed at Spur. His father, the cattle rancher, had not survived, and had suffered a fate similar to Valok. Daetroi was the other half of Candlepoint’s food solution. He raised cows on the southern coast of the lake, south of Candlepoint. He was expanding into other meat markets, but had nearly been shoved out of those markets by the other people. Now that all those other people had left, Daetroi had a lot of extra product on hand, and barely any way to control it all.

Zaraanka Checharin. Human woman, but still a shadeling, Zaraanka was the current matron of the Pink Houses, and she had opened gambling dens alongside her brothels. She had been bringing in a lot of money for the town. She had also opened up healer huts, and had been trying to prepare the town for branch offices of the Adventurer's and Mage’s and Wayfarer’s Guilds. If it weren’t for Candlepoint’s odd nature as a Melemizargo plot, then those three guilds would likely have already moved into town, but because of Candlepoint’s nature, those Guilds had not moved in yet, at all. Zaraanka had lots of irons in the fire, though, so the cold feet of the Guilds were not a large problem right now. Zaraanka was the social butterfly and one of the major captains of industry of Candlepoint.

Almost all of her fledgling industries had been broken by Erick’s announcement of Wizardry.

And then there was Slip, Captain of the Guard. The captain remained a shadeling of black skin, black horns, no hair, and with the brightest white eyes of any comparable people. Everyone thought he was a Shade, but no one spoke that thought aloud, or at least not in his presence. The Guard of Candlepoint was perhaps the only institution which remained strong and secure in the wake of Erick’s Wizardly declaration, with all of the Guard’s instructions dutifully followed. Even before Erick’s announcement, the guard easily caught any criminals who made their criminality known. Mostly, those criminals were exiled. Very few cases demanded execution.

Erick said, “I’ll be checking up on that, though.” He frowned. “I hope he isn’t actually a Shade, but… From what I’ve seen out there today, he seems happy with and good at his job, and yet he’s also fine with just fishing all the time.”

Poi said, “His suspected status as a Shade is what makes others see him as a true threat.”

“Could he be brightening his eyes on purpose?” Teressa asked.

“Theoretically, yes,” Poi said.

Erick had a question about that, but he knew it was a long shot to get an answer about this particular question, since it would put Poi in an ethically dubious position with regard to Mind Mage protocols. Erick asked anyway, “Does Slip have a mind presence? Or whatever you call it? Thought slime?”

“I can answer this one, Erick. Yes, he does, but that doesn’t mean anything. He could be faking his mind-presence. Shades are capable of this.”

Everyone at the dinner table was surprised both by Poi’s answer, and by his elaboration.

Erick moved on, saying, “I discovered a few things about [Gate] I wish to impart. To begin…”

He had to stretch to make his [Gate] reach more than 50 meters across, and 100 meters seemed to be the maximum size. The most common, and easily castable size, was around 3 meters in diameter. If he were just ‘pointing and willing a [Gate] into being’ and literally nothing else about it, 3 meters diameter is how big it would be. Erick always stretched the [Gate] a bit bigger, though, for Teressa, so she didn’t have to touch the lightning ring.

Touching the ring was like touching a fog of fake lightning. The ring looked and acted like lightning, but it was also soft like light. Touching those discharges would cause plants to grow upon any clothing caught in the effect, but the Benevolent Lightning would not cause growth upon bare skin.

The [Gate] opened from a spark and spread outward in a flashing instant.

It closed the same way, but in reverse.

If one looked very, very closely, at the front side of a [Gate], they could see a faint lightning fog, but only near the ring itself; like smoke on water, and the ‘water’ being the flat plane of the [Gate]. Mostly, though, the view from the front side of a [Gate] was perfectly clear.

When the ring closed on anything, it caused a reality recombination, which was Erick’s tentative explanation for what he was seeing—

“Wait wait. I don’t understand that at all.” Jane said, “You’re telling me it doesn’t snap something in half when it’s caught in the middle? I mean. You already said that with Sitnakov’s arm and the kidnapping, but I want to see this in action.”

Erick smiled at Jane’s enthusiasm, and then he cast two small [Gate]s atop the dinner table, about half a meter in diameter and a meter apart. Both were parallel with each other, with their backs facing each other. Erick [Conjure Weapon]d a white staff, and stuck it through the portal. His hand remained outside of the effect, but the staff was now halfway through.

And then he canceled the portal.

Silent lightning crashed inward, slamming onto the staff. Just beyond Erick’s hand, the staff gained a ring of lightning. On the other side of the table, the part that had been poked through, also gained a similar ring of lightning. The now-floating staff poking out of the exit, continued to hover there for a brief moment.

Two things happened at the same time. Lightning flashed up the upper half of Erick’s staff, vanishing it from sight. That same lightning zipped up the staff where Erick held it. As that lightning-light fully flowed down the staff, it vanished, revealing the staff to the world, unharmed.

“What is happening here is something similar to what happens when one goes through the backside of the [Gate],” Erick said. “I imagine there is a way to put some sort of spellwork into this sort of intrusion, onto the staff itself, or onto one’s own body, in order to keep the [Gate] open. Whenever Sitnakov decides to show up I’ll ask him how he did that.”

Jane narrowed her eyes at the staff. She was trying to figure out how she might accomplish the same thing as Sitnakov. “Do that again. With the staff. Again.”

Erick smiled, happy for Jane’s enthusiasm even if it wasn’t for the magic of it all; she was more interested in vulnerability testing. And that was fine. Erick was happy to share this with her.

Eventually, he got back to the other facts he had figured out about [Gate], like how he had no passenger or weight limit, and how [Gate]s could not be moved after cast. He stressed there was likely a lot more to discover in the coming months, but he tried to tell them all the nuances which he had seen so far.

And then dinner was over, and it was time to meet with the representatives of Candlepoint.

- - - -

The sun had set long ago, vanishing beyond a glowing Yggdrasil on the horizon. The city of Candlepoint was not that dark, though. Starlight, wardlights all around, and the moons above provided ample lighting, but there was still lots of room for shadows all around.

And then there was lightning. Bright, flashing brilliance, banishing the night.

That lightning crashed open, forming a portal, linking the eternal light of Yggdrasil with Candlepoint. Erick stepped out of that portal to stand upon the top of black stone stairs. Poi and Teressa flanked him. The three of them all wore white conjured armor. Teressa and Poi had adjusted their own mana color as necessary, but that was not necessary for Erick. His color was already white, though it was a bit more iridescent these days, if one looked close enough.

Ahead, Guard Captain Slip and several other members of Candlepoint’s Guard flanked the wide open double doors of city hall. Slip was dressed in immaculate black armor, along with the rest of his people.

There was an obvious dichotomy there, in the colors of their clothes. Such an arrangement of cloth and color might be a thing in the coming years, if Erick saw fit to enforce such an arrangement, but perhaps something less combative was in order. Something less black versus white. With a simple recast of [Conjure Armor], Erick changed his armor from full white, to white with black trim.

Slip gave a tiny grin, showing off his white teeth beyond the full black of his lips, and his skin. And then he steeled himself. It was time for a bit of ceremony. It was easy enough to see that they had prepared some stuff for him; that was why he had chosen to come in this way, and to allow this ceremony to happen. If the ceremony proved to be unwelcome then Erick would dispense with it, but he doubted it would get too out of hand.

Slip took one step forward and smashed his gauntleted hand against his chest, announcing, “Archmage Wizard Erick Flatt, Fire of the Age! Savior of Light. Welcome to Candlepoint. Welcome home. We hope you approve of your new lands.”

Ernest. Strong. Hopeful. And yet Slip was testing Erick in a way he thought necessary to test.

There was an audience for this event, after all. City hall had been cleared of every single person except for a few, and all those cleared-out people (and more besides) all stood at the base of the stairs, outside of close range, watching. Some prayed. Some worried. Some schemed. There were at least a thousand people by Erick’s count, and about half of them shadelings; almost 50% of all of the shadelings left in Candlepoint. The rest were probably returners. A few of them were spies from other lands, or something along those lines.

Erick saw a princess from the Wastelands and her two guards standing in the far back. He only noticed the woman was a princess by the thin band of gold around her head, and the heraldry she shared with her two guards. There were other important people here to notice as well, but if Erick stood here thinking about all of them he’d never get anywhere.

He saw no threats though, and the crowd was mostly silent save for a few whispers, so Erick continued.

“If I don’t approve of what you have done, then I will make of these lands what I must.” Erick gestured forward, “Guard Captain Slip. Lead the way.”

As Erick had guessed, his answer had been the proper answer for almost everyone in attendance. Without giving away that Slip was inordinately pleased to hear Erick speak like that, Slip struck his chest again, bowed, backed up, and turned toward the open doors. He led the way.

Erick followed.

As the guards of Candlepoint moved to stand guard across the top of the stairs, to prevent the crowd from following, people in the crowd began whispering, ‘Welcome, Archmage!’ or ‘Blessings upon the Fire of the Age.’ or in even smaller words, ‘Wizard.’

Erick and his people passed into the building, and the doors closed behind them, sealing away the sounds of the world outside.

City Hall was different. It had the same black stone walls and floor and ceiling as before. The same large, white crystal lights for sconces and overhead illumination. The same crystal runners down the sides of the main walkway, giving off the same levels of illumination.

But now the hallway had a white carpet laid down the center, and the back end of the hallway had been changed; Shaped into something new. Instead of a desk where people could direct visitors, it was empty, and the wall beyond had been transformed into an archway with a large set of double doors. Those doors were wide open. And that was their destination.

Slip led them into a room that had not been there before now.

A throne room.

Spacious. Pillars to the sides. White cloth hung like decorative, blank banners here and there.

A dais of black stone further in, with a white throne sitting upon that dais.

To the left and right of the walkway stood the heads of Candlepoint. Mephistopheles, Ava, Valok on the left. Zaaranka and Justine on the right, and then Slip, too, who joined them on that side. At a glance, Erick suspected this specific split of people could have been decided in any number of ways, but Erick’s first instinct was that the room had been split based on actual infrastructure on one side, and influence over population on the other side.

Erick did not take the throne. Instead, he stood there, on the carpet, and asked, “So this split is based on infrastructure concerns and population concerns? Or what?”

Mephistopheles, who had been standing just a bit forward, now stepped fully forward, but he did not block Erick’s path to the throne nor did he step onto the carpet. He said, “Greetings, Archmage Flatt. Yes; this split is based upon control of infrastructure and influence of persons. If there is a different way you wish to organize your lands, then we will of course abide.”

Erick looked past Mephistopheles, to the throne.

Here now, was a fear.

The calamity of all of Erick’s previous choices was upon him. All his power and purpose, aligned to this action here, now. Today. Tonight. This night, near midnight.

A split.

A direction that needed to be chosen, and chosen well. A path diverging, but only briefly.

If Erick sat on that chair then things would continue as they had been set up to continue. Erick would be a king. He would have absolute power over these lands, and people. He could organize everything, any way he wished. When war inevitably came, he could respond with his own power, and with the power of his people.

‘His people!’

And not just Poi, and Kiri, and Teressa, and Jane. All of these people. All of Candlepoint. That fact would put them at risk. They were already at risk, but until now that risk had been ambiguous. They were shadelings and a few more, and they were shunned by all the rest of the world, but Erick’s presence and power had forestalled the hammer that hung over this city, ready to fall at a moment’s notice. Now, Erick’s presence and power were like a lodestone to the threats out there, and yet, he could withstand that [Strike], if he prepared. His people could withstand that [Strike].

… If Erick did not sit in that chair, though, then there would be confusion, and then some other system of governance would arise out of that confusion. There would be a return to what had been happening already, but it would be messier, and disorganized. Weak.

And war would still come, only Erick would not be meshed in with the current workings of Candlepoint, and it would be disastrous. A lot more people would die.

It was possible that a lot of people were going to die anyway.

There was no real choice here, when all things were considered—

Well.

No.

The choice was the same as it always was.

To remain part of the world.

Or to run and hide.

Erick breathed deeply, then made the same choice he had made a thousand times before. He would not be a hermit. He would not run. He would not hide. He was a part of the world, and by his actions, he would make the world a better place for all. If these people wanted to enshrine Erick as a true power, as a king, then…

He could do that.

He strode past the now-lesser powers of Candlepoint, toward the dais, to his throne.

Small intakes of breath. Squared shoulders. Stern faces. Some truly happy faces. Some worried faces. All emotion kept locked up as tight as it could be, but Erick could still see those emotions.

Erick stepped up the short black stairs that composed the throne’s dais. And then he was there. He had arrived.

The throne was white and solid and fit for a king of no-nonsense strength. No cushion. Not even a comfortable divot for the butt, or a back that allowed any sort of leaning and relaxing. A throne wasn’t meant to be a place of rest, but Erick wasn’t going to be sitting here for any length of time without some sort of comfort.

Perhaps something small? Yes. Something small. Something that respected the gesture these people were giving him, and yet announced to all that this was his spot, now.

With a quick cast of [Fairy Item], which doubled as a way to detect if anyone else was using Fae Magic in the area and to disrupt any other active Fae Magic, Erick conjured a thin cushion for the butt, and then he sat down upon that cushion, upon his throne.

Poi and Teressa watched Erick take his throne, and they were both strangely happy. It took Erick half a second to understand that Poi and Teressa’s happiness had surprised even them, for though they could see what was coming, now that it was actually here…

It was surprisingly good.

Poi and Teressa both trusted Erick with their lives, and now they knew that Erick was actually willing to take up that responsibility in a serious way. Nothing would ever be the same, but ‘nothing would ever be the same’ had happened several times before already. Now that they were here, everything that had come before made perfect sense. Both of them had signed on to be an archmage’s guards, but they had adjusted with the times, and the tribulations. And now they were here, right beside Erick.

Poi and Teressa stood to Erick’s left and right, on the ground outside of the throne’s dais.

Erick looked to the people of Candlepoint.

The six representatives of Candlepoint met Erick’s eyes with their own.

Mephistopheles was beyond thrilled, his glowing white eyes seeming brighter by the second. Slip and Justine were happy for the possibilities that this event finally represented, but they were a bit more reserved than Mephistopheles; they had specific goals they wanted, and not just the goal of security. Zaraanka was well practiced in not showing her worries, but Erick could tell that she was worried about everything that was to come, and she was also worried about Erick shutting down her Pink Houses, or some other such ‘restrictive nonsense’ that only existed inside the Wizard’s head. Ava was both resigned and relieved in equal measure; maybe she could finally get the beautiful life she always wanted now that power had come to town.

And Valok was angry. Erick wondered why, but before they got to that—

“So.” Erick began, “This is odd. I never meant to take this place of power among you. I meant to be an assistant to help you help yourselves. And you did. You did great things while I wasn’t here. You kept the city growing, Mephistopheles, despite the collars upon your power. You kept the faith and the proper path, Justine, despite the many tribulations of this land. You kept them safe, Slip, even though you were collared just as much as anyone. You secured the sewers, Ava, the part of the city that is always capable of being the most dangerous, even though no one respected your laws. You healed people, and brought about the starts of the various Guilds, Zaraanka, even though none of those Guilds saw fit to come here and truly establish themselves. You maintained the food supply for the city, Valok, even though the economy here is in shambles and I have suddenly made it a lot worse.

“None of you have been honored for your work as much as you should be honored, and I am sorry for the dishonor I have caused by announcing myself to the world.

“I intend to help fix all these problems encountered prior to my arrival, or created by my own actions, or the actions of others. Candlepoint will be a metropolis. I have created the first of the Gates which I plan to plant in the ground to the north of Candlepoint, right after this meeting. That Gate will connect those lands north of Candlepoint to the lands near Stratagold’s embassy. From there, trade will flow. Slow, at first, but as people see that I am neither to be trifled with, or that much of a danger, I suspect trade will flow faster.” Erick said, “I have secured alliances with the wrought of Stratagold, and Kirginatharp at Oceanside, and the dragons of Ar’Cosmos, all of whom know about me already. I have secured alliances with various gods, including Rozeta, Koyabez, Phagar, Atunir, and, though I am hesitant to say so, I believe I am doing what Melemizargo wants, too.

“I believe Candlepoint will grow strong and prosperous, but there are no doubt some physical problems and other similarly solvable issues which will prevent such prosperity. Therefore, I will endeavor to solve these problems for you.” Erick said, “I expect physical problems will be easy enough to solve quickly, such as housing and external security. Political and organizational problems I will leave to you, until they actually need to be brought to my attention. Such attention will probably result in massive changes that might not be what you want them to be. As for my own personal wants, I will be creating House Benevolence, to oversee the lands already staked out north of the lake, where the Gates will go. House Benevolence will be working with the city of Candlepoint, in what I expect to be a king-mayor-elites sort of relationship, with Mephistopheles remaining mayor, and the rest of you becoming elites, or whatever sort of monikers you desire. I do not wish for nobility to form here in Candlepoint, but if that is what it takes to make this work, then I will do that.

“Now that all of that has been said...” Erick asked, “How can I first help Candlepoint be all that it can be?”

The movers and shakers of Candlepoint listened to Erick, and felt several emotions most keenly.

Mephistopheles was vindication personified. Justine held hope like a beacon within her heart for all to see, and feel. Ava relaxed; everything would be alright. Slip was ready to go fishing, knowing that everything would work out fine here on land. Zaraanka had been worried, but she was ready to move on with her fears, and to make the most of a rapidly improving situation.

Mephistopheles stepped forward, saying, “Za—”

“This is cowshit, Erick!" Valok exclaimed. “I do not want to be involved in another war.” The other five elites of Candlepoint stepped backward, and Valok was briefly alone. Valok briefly looked to his compatriots for support, but he found none. He ignored the others and stepped onto the white carpet, to stand directly facing Erick. With a calm, yet furious sort of tone, he spoke, “I do not want a war.”

“With any luck and a bit of foresight,” Erick said, “Any soldiery visited upon this land will be met with utter annihilation. I expect assassination attempts long before I expect—”

“Assassinations then! Label it whatever you want!” Valok said, “The last war you brought to my house ended up with me murdered and turned into a shadeling! They almost killed Delia! My daughter has finally started talking normally with me again, and now you come back into my life with this shit! I’ll be lucky if I’m not killed by tomorrow, and my daughter has to suffer through all that all over again.”

Emotions poured out of Valok like pus from a wound. The man almost started crying but he held it together. His anger was too unfocused to allow crying, for he was also sad, and worried, and a whole host of lesser feelings.

Erick offered him an out.

“I have made the spell [Reincarnation].” Erick offered, “You wish to leave this land behind? To step away from the war, and what is to come? You can. I can offer the same to your daughter. New faces. New race, if you want. Such an offer will set your level back to 0. It would have the same effect on your daughter. I can help you two to regain level 20 or higher through killing crystal mimics, to help set you on a path of your own choosing. I can set you down anywhere in the world. There will be no way for anyone else to know who you were. To track who you were before. I will not openly offer this power to any who ask, but to you, I offer this, freely and without reservation or attachments.” Erick said, “For if you accept, you will be out of this life forever.”

Valok had been too stunned by the offer to speak yes or no, so Erick had explained what such an offer would entail, and now, with Erick’s explanation over, Valok still had no answer. Erick kept his own countenance even and unworried, but inside, he was breaking up over all the ways that he had failed Valok already. Erick probably wouldn’t offer this option to most people, but Valok was still a shadeling, and Erick needed to do right by him.

Valok’s milky white gaze glanced left and right, looking for answers and finding none. Poi and Teressa met his gaze, but his own people would not. And then Valok looked to the ground. He stepped back, saying, “No. Not… Not that. Not yet.”

Into the deep silence of the room, and to get over what had just happened as fast as possible, Erick asked, “Then is there anything else that is most pressing?”

Mephistopheles squared his shoulders then stepped forward, but not onto the white carpet. “Zaraanka wishes to ask about the possibilities of getting a few major Guilds to bring offices here. Specifically, Adventurer’s, Mage’s, and Wayfarer’s.”

“… Is there no physical need right now? Housing? Walls? Stuff like that?” Erick said, “I understand the need for the guilds, but…” His voice trailed off.

Mephistopheles happily announced, “We are a physically sound city, King Flatt, and as stability returns, then all physical needs will be seen to in the order in which circumstances require. I dare say it will be quite easier for us to manage with fewer people, too, and if Stratagold works out, then we will have lost nothing too important.”

Erick winced a bit when Mephistopheles said ‘King’, but he let that go.

Mephistopheles continued, “But the presence of the guilds will bring a legitimacy to this land that is unlike most other forms of legitimacy. We need that legitimacy, more than anything else right now.”

“Very well. I’ll work on that first, then. When I install the first Gate to Stratagold, I will have words at their embassy down there. Or something. I’ll see what I can get done.”

Except for Valok, there was a great deal of relief all around. Zaraanka was most relieved of all.

Mephistopheles smiled, saying, “Then now, we would ask what you would like to do with Candlepoint? Do you have any visions for the future? Some direction for which we can align?”

Ah?

Well.

Okay?

That was fast.

Apparently they didn’t need him for much? And they wanted to know what he wanted? Erick supposed this was fine. Expected, really, now that Erick had a chance to think about it. Of course they wanted to know what he wanted out of all this.

“Have any of you been to Songli?” Erick asked, “How do you all feel about widespread Denials? Was what you experienced today good, or bad?”

Looks of confusion passed around.

Justine was the first to speak up, “Stone Denial is useful. I would appreciate that one cast on a general basis.”

Ava rapidly objected, “Perhaps Denials cast upon specific buildings will be useful. I still need to be able to work the land and I cannot do that with your Stone Denial soaking into everything, King Flatt; no offense meant.”

“I don’t take offense at this at all. In fact, I am very happy that you are pushing back on my thoughts, and molding them to something more useful for all. I am not a tyrant, and I don’t wish to be. To that end:” Erick smiled, and then he reached forward and conjured a [Fairy Item] table directly onto the white carpet, before his dais. Six smaller casts created six chairs. The table and seats were a match to the stone table they had in the meeting room upstairs. “Let us have a discussion of magical improvements to Candlepoint, for I have high hopes to make this city both the most magically advanced land on this planet, and the most educated. Therefore, magic will eventually be rampant. Prismatic Denials might be necessary to maintain a sustained peace. But first, emplaced Denials and the capability to cast them without needing to know that magic yourself, is one of my first magics I wish to spread wide. I plan to do this through rune work and [Renew]. Please sit.”

Mephistopheles was the first to take his chair, barely missing a beat between Erick’s request, and accepting that request as though it were a command. Ava, Justine, Valok, Slip, and Zaraanka, took their chairs.

And the discussion began.

… ‘Discussion’. Mostly, Erick spoke, and ‘his elites’ objected or offered advice in some ways, and Erick adjusted his ideas. It was still ‘discussion’ enough to be called that, though.

Maybe it was more like an interactive lecture.

They spoke for little more than an hour, with Mephistopheles speaking second most, Justine offering words here and there, and Ava following up in fourth place. Valok wasn’t comfortable talking at all. Slip was reactive, speaking on security when the topic came up, but not offering much beyond ‘the guard can handle all normal problems, and this is how we do that’. To Erick, it seemed that Candlepoint’s Guard ran the same as any Guard anywhere else in the world, which was a bit surprising, but great to discover.

Zaraanka wanted to talk a great deal, and Erick felt that she would talk a great deal eventually, but not right now. Not while she was still figuring Erick out. She was freaked out about the Wizard thing, and had little idea how to handle that. Zaraanka did speak up when Erick asked over her dealings with the guilds, though, and she was receptive to a compliment about getting healer huts up and running.

“Thank you…” Zaraanka had no idea how to address him, so her voice just trailed off. She realized something, and said, “Your shadow kaleidoscope has been… It’s been one of the few ways to heal us shadelings. Properly. I mean.”

“I’m glad it has helped, Zaraanka. I don’t have that spell yet myself, so I will have to figure out how to make that spell and produce more of them. That sort of magic will become a part of what I eventually want to teach here, but those secrets of light will be a long time coming.” With a light, friendly tone, Erick said, “Including the requests for the Guilds, so far you’re the only one to offer me actual work.”

Zaraanka’s eyes went wide as the vaguely-pink woman’s face paled almost to white, as though she was facing her own execution. “I did not mean to presume upon your—”

Erick shook his head, and Zaraanka stopped. “You seem to know a lot of what needs to be done, and which I can do to get those things done. I approve.”

With a tight look, Zaraanka nodded quickly and quietly. She did not speak again for the rest of the meeting. Erick was not happy about being this feared, but he was used to it by now.

Eventually, the meeting ended. Everyone stood from their various chairs, while Erick had an Ophiel cast a [Prismatic Ward] upon the throne. No one could sit there aside from him.

Erick simply dismissed the conjured table and chairs, though.

And then he put an Ophiel on the throne, and had the little guy puff up a bit. Erick turned to… His people? Yes, these were his people now.

Erick turned to his people, and said, “If you have an emergency of any kind, feel free to tell Ophiel here, and I will hear it. Otherwise, there is lots to be done, and we need to all get back to it. I will be placing the first Gate and welcoming Stratagold to the Surface in the next hour. From there, with any luck, I will be able to build upon the paperwork Zaraanka has already lodged with the Mage Guild in order to gain a Mage Bank in town as soon as possible.”

Mephistopheles bowed, saying, “We welcome the benevolence of your reign, majesty.”

Mephistopheles had been trying out several different variations on title for Erick this whole meeting, and Erick had not liked any of them. Mephistopheles caught on to this, but he kept trying to find something that fit. ‘Majesty’ was about as inoffensive as he had managed.

He had tried calling Erick ‘Wizard’ once. Perhaps Erick’s instinctual grunt of displeasure had been too much; he probably wouldn’t be using that word again around Erick.

The others bowed as well, following Mephistopheles’s lead, saying, “Majesty.”

Erick stood there for a moment, taking it all in, then he left through a portal of lightning. Poi and Teressa followed close behind. Ophiel remained upon the throne, sized to a child, and yet empowered with a double cast of [Unbreakable Form] and a thorny, floating silver shield at his side.

Erick pulled his Sight from that room, though Ophiel remained in attendance.

Let them discuss whatever they wanted to discuss without him.

He had other worries right now.

- - - -

Yggdrasil glowed upon the southern horizon, upon the darkness of the lake. The coast was quiet. The dober dogs slept in a warm pile in their stone houses upon that coast, having eaten their fill of many rats and other small animals also trying to make their homes in that new, green land. To the north of that, lay the wall that ringed all of the lake. It was a massive stone wall; a solid construction ten meters tall and about that wide at the top, while being slightly wider at the bottom, to provide stability. Nothing could actually climb up either side, which was by design. No one wanted crystal mimics to invade the lakeside. It actually went about twice as deep into the ground as it showed above ground, too, to prevent tunneling.

Here, though, just north of that area on the wall, there was no crystal forest, or crystal mimics.

Kiri stood beside Erick on that should-have-been desert land, while Poi, Teressa, and Jane stood a bit apart. For fifteen kilometers in every direction, the sand had been transformed carefully and purposefully into a flat space of solid, interlocking stone blocks, upon a foundation of gravel and sand. Even further toward the north lay another wall, similar to the one that encircled the lake.

Erick happily said, “It’s impressive, Kiri. I like the blocks, too. Around four meters cubed and hourglass shaped. They should hold up rather well for a long time to come.”

“It’s the same sort of flooring that they use for martial tournaments and basic foundations.” Kiri said, “Of course you’d want to remove the bricks and build proper foundations if you’re going to make anything taller than two floors, but I dug down five meters deep all across this land, shoring up the sands to something solid. There were a lot of surprises down there.”

“People? Or just animals?”

“Animals and monsters. Lots of different types. Mostly shadowolves.” Kiri waved a hand toward the land and continued with her explanation, “There are sand holes and drainages placed here and there, so this place won’t fill up with rain water, but there are no proper drainage systems. I didn’t make a sewer. There will be some undermining if it remains like this for a long time, but a sewer system will need to be made anyway, and that will have to be the permanent solution to water drainage concerns. This is what you wanted?”

Erick smiled brightly. “Yes. It is.”

Kiri smiled, too, giving a soft, relieved chuckle. “Good. I’m glad.”

Erick nodded and opened up a very large [Gate] in the air before them. Ophiels came through upon wings of lightning, carrying a large square of white wood.

- - - -

Far, far away, deep, deep below the Surface of Veird, in a cavern that was as bright as daytime and near to Stratagold, another [Gate] opened. Another Gate passed through that lightning portal, carried by Ophiels, to come to rest upon a beach that was no longer a beach at all. That sandy land had also been transformed into a wide, stone surface. Almost no one was there.

There were two wrought guards on duty by the tunnel that led to the embassy, of course. One was a young copper human, all bright shining orange. The other was a grey iron incani man. They saw the Gate coming and the copper boy ran off, while the other just stood strong, watching as Ophiel moved the large wooden Gate around as Erick desired.

Ophiels centered upon the wide stone area, opposite of the tunnel, in the designated spot already discussed. And then they [Stoneshape]d a portion of that floor into a divot. Erick slotted the Gate into the ground, making the bottom, inner lip of the Gate end up a decimeter below the surface level of the stone square. A few more Shapings carved out some space on the open side of the Gate, and secured the Gate into the ground. It would not move without a lot more Shaping, but there would be magic Denying such Shaping soon enough.

By the time he finished with placements, other wrought began to show.

Geode Guardian Tasar. King Alfonin. Archmage Riivo.

They waited; concerned, hopeful, and a little angry.

Anger was a normal reaction to big stuff happening without warning, so Erick did not blame them for that. Oh well. It was better to seek forgiveness than permission, and anyway, they had already discussed much of what a permanent [Gate] would look like between both lands. Still, though, it was better to unruffle feathers while they were ruffled.

Ophiel floated forward with a letter. Riivo took the letter, read it, handed it off to the other two, and the three of them lost some of their concern and anger. Erick had explained everything about how this particular Gate would work, so hopefully whatever they wanted to talk to him about was not all of that, though he would no doubt be discussing what he had already written down, anyway.

It was time to get this show on the road! Ophiel linked a tendril of light to the runic web inside the Gate, and Erick personally cast [Undertow’s Edge] through his [Familiar]. Ophiels settled down into the Abysses around the Gate to provide some starter mana.

And then Erick cast [Gate].

- - - -

Upon the lands north of Candlepoint’s Lake, lightning flashed.

The [Gate] opened. The light of Yggdrasil’s Underworld cavern split the darkness of the night all around. On one side was the Surface, on the other was Stratagold.

But before that diplomacy could happen, an Ophiel appeared on Erick’s side with a very large rustless steel plate, large enough to completely fit in the five meter width of the [Gate], which is exactly what he did. That plate went into the [Gate] and slipped into the grooves carved on both sides, forming a solid steel bridge between here and there.

There was no way to easily move the Gate now.

Denials of all sorts occupied the area around the Gate. Ophiel had had to use his Benevolence sunform in order to move that metal through those Denials, and it had not been easy.

Other people could surely break whatever Erick put down today, but those people were few and far between; Domain holders, mostly. He knew that those sorts of shenanigans would happen, someday, but these Gates weren’t that hard to make. It was the magic inside them that was hard to duplicate, and that stuff was all Erick.

The wooden Gates glowed a brilliant white, while Abyssal Undertows held to the space behind both of them. Erick had opted to change out the ‘corridor of shadows’ effect that he had first created. Now, it almost looked like the Gates were set into a barely-visible wall of shadows that stretched up and out for twenty meters in every direction.

Erick looked through the [Gate], now that everything seemed to be working as intended.

Erick saw the wrought, and the wrought saw him.

Erick stepped forward, to stand atop the edge of the steel platform that straddled both sides of the Gate, saying, “Welcome to the Surface, Stratagold.”

King Alfonin stepped forward, to stand on the part of the steel platform that rested in his lands. “We accept your welcome, and welcome you to Stratagold in turn.” A bit more seriously, and quieter, “Though I question your open declaration of Wizardry.”

Alfonin had known what Erick was going to do, but this was a bit of a ceremony anyway.

“I’ve never been good at lying, so I’m not about to start now.” Erick put on a smile, saying, “Not here, not at this most momentous of changes.”

King Alfonin stood tall, and reserved. “Very well. Then that is how it will be.”

“Would you care to come through? Check out the place?” Erick offered, “I don’t have any structures set up on this side yet, so perhaps I can come through to that side and we can talk there? Also: Have you seen Sitnakov? I keep waiting for him to show up—”

The air flickered about a hundred meters behind Erick, on the edge of the prismatic Denial, and then that black wind resolved into a person. Sitnakov walked this way, holding his head high. He could have walked closer while using active magic, for his Domain could easily break the Domain Erick had cast into the Gate, but he had chosen not to. He had chosen to be royalty, it seemed. Which was fitting. The Second Prince was a near perfect physical match for his father on the other side of the [Gate].

“—I spoke too soon.” Erick turned back to King Alfonin. “Still not sure what’s actually going to happen with Sitnakov, though.”

King Alfonin glanced past Erick, then turned back to the Wizard, saying, “He’s to set up a waystation on that side of the [Gate], and to see to some troops positioned on that side, in whatever lands you designate as officially belonging to Stratagold. As to that subject: this cavern on this side is still yours, but we ask you to officially relinquish this beach and this side of the Gate to us.”

“Done and done. That beach is now officially your property, once again. The rest of the cavern remains mine. Now as for gate fees: As we agreed? For now, a 50/50 tax split based on rates already discussed. In addition, I will charge 1 gold per person crossing, either coming or going, to be paid to me; and you do not get that money.”

Alfonin said, “Agreed. As previously agreed, we will be conducting this business on your side.”

Erick nodded. “It should be easier for you, too. This side has a lot more space and the Denials I put up extend for a hundred meters in all directions. They only extend ten meters on your side, but on this side, people will have to come in from much further away in order to enter and transfer to Stratagold. Much easier to catch any people who might try running through.”

“We will have ways to deal with such an occurrence, but I am glad to hear of these Denials. That makes it much easier for us.”

Erick nodded, then moved on to business that had not been discussed before. “We have no Mage Bank here, though, so moving such monies around might be difficult. I plan on including the Wayfarer’s and Adventurer’s Guild here as soon as I can, as a supplement ‘last mile’ part of the Network, and as a matter of course, respectively, but Mage Bank needs to happen sooner than those other two. Can you make that happen?”

Alfonin looked at Erick, and offered, “We have Geode Bank. Would you care to switch banks?”

A deeply political question, actually.

The vast majority of Veird switched to Mage Bank over Geode Bank many, many centuries ago, because when the wrought did not like you, they could shut off your money at any point in time. Thus, the Mage Guild opened up their own banking system in order to get away from that oversight, and now Mage Bank was the largest banking system on the Surface, while much of the Underworld actually ran on both systems, though Mage Bank was still prevalent down there, as well. From what he knew, Erick had a rough guess that Mage Bank controlled 85% of banking on the Surface, with smaller banking chains open here and there, and roughly 60% of banking in the Underworld, not counting intra-Geode commerce. Geode Bank oversaw 99% of intra-Geode banking, and 40% of Underworld banking outside of the Geodes.

But if Erick accepted Geode Bank up here, at Candlepoint, at the center of the Gate Network…

A lot could change.

Erick wanted to keep most people happy, but he also wanted to keep most things the same. As much as possible, anyway.

“I will accept both.” Erick said, “I want to make this a land for everyone, so I might as well accept both. If you can get Mage Bank here, then I will accept Geode Bank as well. There is lots of land up here on the Surface, after all. Just gotta turn some of the desert back into livable land.”

“But through which one will you accept payment?”

Alfonin was glad to see that Erick was willing to host Geode Bank up here, for he wanted Erick to accept Geode Bank. He wanted control over the money that flowed through here, if he could get it. Erick expected nothing less from a king; to [Strike] when the iron was hot was a necessary skill in this sort of governance.

Mage Bank would eventually be very annoyed that they decided to hold off on accepting Zaraanka’s proposal, for waiting this long. But Erick wasn’t going to subject himself to that much Geode control.

“I have an account at Mage Bank, so I will accept money through them, here for this part of the Gate Network. Everything through Surface Gates will go through Mage Bank.” Erick said, “When I establish more Gates in the Underworld, then I will accept that money under Geode Bank, though the discussions surrounding that arrangement will need to come at a later time.”

Alfonin eyed Erick. “… Not as disruptive as you could be.”

“I’m trying.” Erick gestured behind him. “Care to pick out some— Ah. Hello.”

Sitnakov had been walking this way the whole time, but now he was three meters away, and so he stopped his approach. He nodded to his father, who nodded back, and then he turned slightly to face Erick. He gave a head nod, that was almost like a minor bow. “Archmage Flatt.”

Erick returned the gesture. “Prince Sitnakov.”

“In addition to my normal duties, I’m to be a knight for you for a while, wherever you will have me.”

Erick relaxed a little, then said, “I expect to be putting out paperwork soon, for people to come to me with monster kill requests. Would you be interested in that? Or in something more stable at a single location, like here on this land? I still need to build my House, but that shouldn’t take more than several hours. After which, I can grant you a room there. Or on Yggdrasil?”

Erick was throwing everything out there to see what stuck. He didn’t want to make Sitnakov unwelcome, but he honestly did not know what to do with the guy.

“I will be helping Stratagold to create our embassy here, and I will be comfortable with lodgings there, but I would prefer to be near you when you are out and about. Perhaps, in time, I will move into this House of yours, if you move in there as well, but I will not be moving into Yggdrasil. If you continue to room in Yggdrasil then I will remain out here.” Sitnakov continued, “Plainly: I will be a guard. Not to Crit the [Strike] too hard, but now that you are a publicly declared Wizard I’d prefer to have you in my Sights, for I am tasked with your safety… As much as anyone can be tasked with the safety of a Wizard. I fully expect an assassination attempt in the next day or three, at the very least, and I want to be there to prevent it.”

“… Okay.” The thought of assassinations so soon threw Erick for a loop. Of course he was worried and prepared, but to have other people preparing for such an event was vindication for Erick’s paranoia, and that was an uncomfortable feeling. What assassination attempt would this next one even be? His… Fifth? Assassination attempt? No? Erick said, “You know, I’m not even sure how many assassination attempts I have weathered now. Does war count as an attempt?”

“Yes.” Alfonin spoke from across the [Gate], “Assassination attempts in war count, unless you are on the battlefield yourself.” And without any preamble or further preparation, King Alfonin stepped through to Erick’s side of the [Gate]. “You’re in good hands with my son, Archmage Flatt. I look forward to this partnership.”

Erick looked up at the very tall black metal orcol, and at his son, and said, “I look forward to this, too.” He gestured toward the lands ahead. “Anywhere you want.” He pointed to a central space. “I believe I will put my House there. It will likely end up as a minor mountain, like what you would see in Songli.”

“Acceptable.” Alfonin gestured for Tasar and Riivo to come forward; they were both still on the other side of the [Gate]. Now, though, they strode forward at their king’s command, stepping out of the light of the cavern, and into the dark of the night. Alfonin turned outward, to view the darkened land. He narrowed his eyes, and then he asked Erick, “Could I get some light? And some ideas of what you envision for this land.”

“Of course.” Erick sent Ophiels flying high to cast wide scale wardlights, bringing the sun back to the stony land. Then he started adding lightsculptures, beginning with the shell of what would one day become House Benevolence; right now it was just a very large holographic blob of light. Illusionary Gates showed what this place might look like in the future, while streets and fences demarcated the land into lots. It had taken Erick less than a minute to do all of that. Then he said, “All of this is subject to change, of course.”

Tasar and Riivo looked across the land, impressed at the speed of Erick’s conjuring. Sitnakov tried not to be impressed. Alfonin succeeded in not being impressed. For everyone else, such a conjuring was old hat.

Alfonin walked forward, judging the land and considering what would come next. “It doesn’t look like you have a city planner, but you at least have a competent stone mage to make this flooring.”

“My apprentice, Kiri Flamecrash, constructed the stonework.” Erick gestured to Kiri. “I’m very lucky to have her.”

Kiri went rigid and still, and then she bowed deeply. To the sides, Jane smiled a little at Kiri’s reaction, while Teressa and Poi stood resolute, and yet relaxed.

Alfonin nodded at the young girl, then continued forward. “Would you accept a city planner? Or do you wish to do this [Cityshape]ing yourself?”

“If you’ve got suggestions, I’ve got ears.” Erick said, “I assume that you’ve been at this city-thing for a lot longer than most anyone out there.”

Alfonin smiled a little, and said, “I have been at this city-thing for a long while, but I have support structures as well. I’ll have some of them contact you, if you wish?”

“I’ll take that help. What’s the going rate for a city planner?”

“I have one very insistent architect who demands I offer you his services, and who is willing to drop his usual price to free for the honor of working on the Gate Network Hub.” Alfonin said, “I would suggest you pay them a fair price of 2.5 million gold, though, and give him your apprentice for the heavy lifting. O’Lark is a difficult man to work with, but he is very, very good at his calling. He built the White Palace of Eternal Light. He’ll build you something similarly unforgettable here, if you’ll have him.”

“I’ll take him.”

“O’Lark will be thrilled.” Alfonin smiled a little, then said, “He’ll be the one finalizing our outpost…” Alfonin looked around, and said, “And I’ll let him decide where to put it. Probably over there?” He gestured to the left, then he turned to Erick. “This looks good, Archmage Flatt. We look forward to working with you. It was good meeting you again, but I must be off. I’m sure you’re busy as well.”

Erick stood straight, and said, “I am. It was good to see you again, too.”

Alfonin was trying to play off his deep interest in everything that was happening here as nonchalance, and Erick was happy to play along with that deception. But Erick made no mistake. King Alfonin was thrilled for this happening, and what was to come. Riivo and Tasar were of a similar mind.

And that boded well.

The King of Stratagold thus took his leave, with Tasar and Riivo following close behind. While the king vanished when he got back on the other side of the [Gate], Tasar and Riivo bowed to Erick, and then vanished as well.

A few soldiers then came through from Stratagold to Candlepoint, bowing deferentially, both to Erick, and to Sitnakov.

Sitnakov said, “We’ll be setting up the temporary base, if that’s alright with you.”

“It is.” Erick said, “If you need assistance with anything, don’t hesitate to send a message through to Poi, or to me. I don’t have a secretary yet to deal with the vast increase in messages and contacts that I expect to field soon, but I’m working on that. You can also flag down Ophiel. I’ll keep one of him fluttering around here from now on.”

Ophiel chirped from Erick’s shoulder.

And then Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye bounced, and then another iridescent eye appeared hovering beside the first. He wanted to be included.

Erick gestured to the second eye, saying, “Or you can flag down Yggdrasil.”

Sitnakov nodded to Erick, then to Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye, and then he got to work with several other wrought, building a temporary base northwest of the Gate.

They parted ways.

- - - -

Once again safe in his [Fairy Stronghold], and with his people around him, Erick smiled brightly, saying, “That went really well!”

“Well done, King Erick,” Poi said, smiling.

Erick scowled. This was really happening.

“Seeing Sitnakov was weird. He looked just like in the stories.” Teressa said, “And King Stratagold looked the same, too.”

“The King of Stratagold knows me now!” Kiri happily said.

“That’s so weird, Kiri,” Jane said.

“What? Why?” Kiri said, “It’s important to know important people.”

“I know that. It’s still weird.” Jane said to everyone, “It’s all so weird. I expected more fights, and then for… I don’t know. For something to happen. And then for dad to solve those fights… Which would put us right back here in this same situation. And apparently there will be actual assassins soon, but we’ll get them, I’m sure.” Jane looked to her father. “And then the world would still change as my father demands.”

For a short moment, there was silence.

‘Demand’ was a big word there, Erick wanted to say.

He wasn’t demanding anything. He was trying to appease all sides and prevent war, to navigate the various troubles coming his way, because his original ‘demand’, if you wanted to call it that, was that the world should be better tomorrow than it was today. That people should have easier lives, more opportunity, and less hardship.

That was a perfectly reasonable ‘demand’.

Mostly, Erick was making this demand of himself. He wanted to help people, and he was going to help the entire world. The dragons were getting a new world, parallel to this one. It wasn’t a cure for the Curse, but it was close enough to a cure for now. Particle Magic was continuing to spread. That stuff was continuing to cause problems the world over, mostly in the form of toxic byproducts and accidental deaths, but maybe Elemental Illusion or Mystical would hold the secrets to less of those side effects, and then people would begin to learn what this world was actually made out of, instead of the Elemental learning carried over from the Old Cosmology. And learning was good. Monsters were getting beaten back, and the world was opening to habitation. The Forest of Glaquin was the safest it had been in a thousand years. Erick would continue to support that direction of change for as long as he was able.

He would raise kingdoms out of the sand himself, if he had to, for the growth of civilization was the growth of opportunity for all, and the surest way to weather any storm was with a neighborhood at your back.

And [Renew] was coming out soon.

All things that Erick was doing in order to make the world a better place.

It was, therefore, perfectly reasonable to demand that people not assault him, and securing a base of power in order to secure that basic right… Seemed reasonable. Erick was not going to be a hermit. And since he wasn’t going to be a hermit, that meant he automatically chose the other option, which was to participate in society.

For all his life, Erick had been working systems of people and government to ensure good outcomes for the lowest common denominator, but now, he had the option to be the system.

Or at least the base upon which all the rest was built.

From there, Erick could create all the good things he wished to create. If people wanted to flock to him to participate in that bettering, then he would ensure those people were treated well, and had good options in their lives.

And so, here now was another responsibility to get right.

A responsibility to his daughter, who never asked for her father to be this way.

Erick said, “It’s an adjustment. I’m not sure if I like being in a kingly position, but… You weren’t there for the meeting with Candlepoint, Jane, but if I didn’t accept this, then there would be a great lot of confusion. I don’t want confusion. No one wants confusion. Everyone wants stability, and I want stability, too. Such stability will come with sweeping changes to how the world works, yes, but the main thing is the creation of stability. Which is a bit of a paradox, I admit, but that’s fine.” He breathed deeply, and said, “So if my acceptance of a crown is what it takes to make this world a better place, then I’ll be a king for a while.”

“Apparently,” Jane said, giving him an unsure look.

Teressa nodded, saying, “The Apparent King.”

Erick looked to the large woman. “Really?”

Teressa shrugged, saying, “If you don’t pick a name they’ll pick one for you.”