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Melemizargo floated in the water that was also air, amidst false suns that dotted the oceanic sky overhead, all the way to the top of this dungeon space. His wings and body were a shadowy expanse, creating a true abyss all around this level of the dungeon and everywhere below, while his eyes mirrored the bright spots of light up above. He smiled, and his fangs glowed white, as he said, “But first, let us take care of this little ritual you did for me. I am quite thankful for that, but more so for the notice that you’re back. Now that was truly kind of you.”

Erick stood in the roofless core room of dungeon six, directly in front of Melemizargo, like an ant standing before a man. Quilatalap stood at Erick’s side, wearing his ‘Vanya Silver’ [Polymorph] form, holding in his hands a rapidly-developing dungeon slime that would become the master of this place. That slime burbled as it was still developing and had no idea what it was right now, but Quilatalap was in complete, calm awe of this event happening in front of him. He was also a little weirded out, but only due to the words that had come out of Melemizargo’s mouth.

Erick was weirded out, too. They’d get to the discussion about how he had ‘fucked up an [Onward] and missed 11 years of his life’ soon enough. For now, Erick said, “Yes. This ritual.” He asked Quilatalap, “Anything in particular you want?”

Quilatalap’s eyes went wide as he stared at Erick in complete disbelief—

“Ah! You must have skipped over this: I can’t give out boons without regard to the Pantheon’s protocols, and I certainly can’t give out requested boons anymore. At least for a while. Every boon I give is logged with the Relevant Entities and is used to judge my sanity and cooperation ever since that Anarchy Wizard debacle… But enough about that embarrassment! Let me see here...”

Erick did remember that, but he didn’t feel like arguing with Melemizargo about anything at this moment in time.

Melemizargo gazed down at Quilatalap and the core, then he glanced around, his massive head swinging around in the airy water, spilling swirls of darkness as he moved. And then he turned back to Quilatalap. “How about a half million mana core to start, and I’ll link up the other cores in the area to this one— Ah. No.” He glanced to the air. “A notification that that is too much, and that Sininindi demands I do nothing at all, but that’s not going to happen. So this is what I’m going to do: I’ll make the core a 250,000 mana core, and you’ll have to link the Grand Dungeon together on your own, which you were already going to accomplish through a series of dungeon wars, if I envision that correctly. How were you planning on doing that? What’s your plan after this hostile takeover?”

Quilatalap calmly said, “If further violence proves to be necessary, and if I receive no help at all, then I will seal the dungeons from delvers and create undead which will gradually grow the mana capabilities of this dungeon. From there, I will have them flood out into the overworld on missions to capture the other nearby dungeons. If the response from Storm’s Edge is hyper-violence, calling in resources beyond their own, then I will have to flee, but if they give anything less than that, then I will be in control of the seven dungeons of this Pit in 2 months at the earliest, and 6 months at the latest. From there, it would be a year before I would open the dungeons to delvers.” He continued, “If violence is not necessary in order to get my way, then with the cooperation of Storm’s Edge, and after a week of remaking, the dungeons will open to allow delvers to continue delving. The first floor of the Water Dungeon and all the other Elemental dungeons will take me a week. In a month, the False Society will be active. In 6 months, the whole place should look rather presentable to any sort of inspection, from anyone, and this whole place will be back on track for proper growth.”

Melemizargo nodded. “Let’s bump that dungeon core starting bonus up to 350,000 mana.”

Darkness swirled into the dungeon core, then soaked into the inner facets of the smooth crystal. And then it grew. Three seconds. That was all it took for the core to triple in size, growing from the size of a human head, to the size of a human curled up in a fetal position. It pulsed with power, and the entire dungeon suddenly seemed more real in some unknowable way. It was a sensation akin to only knowing that there had been a buzzing sound all around after that buzzing sound went away.

Erick had felt that sensation before, in other dungeons, but it was always odd to feel when reality stabilized around oneself. Quilatalap’s dungeons were still far and away more stable than this place, but with Melemizargo’s empowerment, this dungeon was a lot better than what it had been.

Quilatalap dropped to one knee and bowed, saying, “Thank you.”

The Vanya-slime had enough wherewithal to bow with Quilatalap, though Erick might have been anthropomorphizing the little slime too early, for it flopped about quite erratically.

“My pleasure!” Melemizaro looked to Erick. “Let us take that talk now.”

Erick rapidly said, “I needed to speak to you about what comes after Yggdrasil’s release, too. We’re still not opening new worlds for 90 years, at least, to give everyone ample time to prepare.”

“Sure sure sure.” Melemizargo waved a wing, like half of the black world rising and then falling in the airy water, leaving behind a vast portal, large enough for the God of Magic to float through unimpeded. On the other side lay a mountain city vista and a blue sky, overlooking wild jungles as far as the eye could see. Melemizargo moved through the portal, taking all the shadows with him, saying, “Come on then!”

Erick rapidly asked Quilatalap, “Are you—”

“Are you fucking crazy— go through that portal now. I’ll be fine with this core! Love you.”

Erick smiled. “Love you too. I’ll be back soon.”

And then he centered himself, and followed Melemizargo to lands unknown.

- - - -

“Oh,” Erick said, looking down as he hovered in the sky. This wasn’t ‘lands unknown’. “This is Mount Ascendant.”

As the gargantuan portal winked shut behind him, Erick found himself in the air over the mountain that Melemizargo had claimed for his purposes years ago, over on Dungeon Island; the largest of the three major islands located southwest of the main continent of Glaquin. Most people called this place Mount Ascendant, though it had other names. ‘The New Ar’Kendrithyst’ was one of them, though that was a misnomer, and most people only called it that jokingly.

The mountain was one of those impossibly tall mountains that could only ever exist on Veird, where gravity was a suggestion, and not the rule. Recently, it had been a single, whole mountain, but then Melemizargo had split that mountain in twain with his own impossible forces. He had cracked the mountain from north west to the east, and then lifted up the southern piece, the larger ‘half’ of the mountain, by a few extra kilometers. Tens of dungeons lay within that dark crevasse, between the north and south parts of the mountain.

It sort of reminded Erick of a cake he had baked one time, that had cracked mostly across the middle.

The lower, northern part of the city, was a gently curving expanse of cultivated gardens that looked, to the untrained eye, like wild spaces; like an extension of the jungles of Quintlan all around the base of the mountain. This place held no wild oozes, though. This place was a rather nice location for anyone searching for any powerful or useful herbs, flowers, mushrooms, trees, and all other manner of forest flora. It was also home to several special dungeons filled with special fauna, located beyond black arches, half-hidden here and there. A lot of monsters that were very desirable for their Familiar Forms lived inside those special dungeons. Hunting one of those monsters was usually a Test of the Dark all on its own, but if you could get here, and if you could find those hidden dungeon entrances, then you could take that test.

The upper, southern half of the mountain was where civilization grew.

All over the cliffside, and then for a 20-ish kilometer-sized spread down the southern slope of the mountain, lay a ‘Dead City’, festooned with magnificent, airy architecture, with domes and spires and sky bridges and crystal towers, all growing tall upon the ridge, and everywhere else. It was almost completely uninhabited, though, except by the people who oversaw the six major Grand Dungeons located within the city, and within the crevasse down below. But you couldn’t just walk into that city, and go to those Grand Dungeons. That city itself was a test, for before anyone could challenge the dungeons therein and claim some truly grand prizes, they had to first evade and also kill the sentinels of that city, gathering keys to allow them passage past the absolute defenses located just in front of the dungeons themselves. If the tester lost those ‘hunter versus hunter’ battles then the sentinels would not kill the tester; they’d take an arm or a leg, and set down some curses inside those broken limbs that prevented restoration for a few days.

Erick glanced downward, and saw those sentinels floating around the city, far below. They resembled elementals made of white crystal, gold and silver, and flowing black magic. Some of those creatures looked up at him, up there in the sky. Some of those sentinels were even positioned by massive anti-castle cannons, waiting to shoot him down.

If it weren’t for Melemizargo flying down across the sky, his wings spread wide billowing, those sentinels would have shot Erick down already. But the God of Magic was here, guiding Erick into his new city, leading the way to a massive circular platform located in the top center of the city.

Erick followed, as an obvious guest.

Erick had been here a few times already and he had lots to do back at Storm’s Edge, so he didn’t want to spend too much time here, but he did need some answers.

He hadn’t really [Onward]ed himself through eleven years, did he?

Erick had a hard time believing that, and yet, Melemizargo would not lie, and he was rather sane these days.

So Erick checked on the blue boxes of the pair of magics he had made together, eleven years ago. The first was [Return].

- -

Return, instant, self, 10,000 mana + Variable

Rewind your time by at least 10 Script seconds.

- -

He used that thing perhaps more than he should, and a lot more recently than he had in a long time. Erick could do that spell even inside a dungeon, manually casting it, because he had needed to learn how to do that in order to save everyone more than once. There was the Anarchy Wizard, and then there was the Blue Wizard, and then there were all the assassinations over those early years. And those assassinations weren’t just against him, either. It used to be, every so often some person from House Benevolence would be assassinated out in the field, too, and Erick would reverse time if he could and then go save that person.

He hadn’t gotten a call to do that in a few years, though. If times were still like that, then he never would have gone on sabbatical; he never would have entertained the idea of releasing Yggdrasil from his soul early.

Erick knew how to cast [Return].

It was the other spell, the one that he almost never used, which Melemizargo claimed that Erick had cast wrong.

Perhaps… He had?

- -

Onward, instant, self, 1,000 mana + Variable

Speed through to the future by at least 100 Script seconds.

- -

The spell looked normal.

Whatever.

Erick would find out about all that soon enough. First thing was first, though. He recast his [Unbreakable Form]. And then he flew forward. As Erick descended upon the city, flying on Benevolent lightning, he gradually suspected that no one would be up ahead except for Melemizargo; this would be a private meeting.

Melemizargo’s Throne was a 1,500-meter-wide white stone dais, and more technically, a smaller dais set upon the larger one, on the northern side, right against the edge of the cliff. If he wanted, he could stretch his head over the edge and look right down into the dark crack in the world below.

Melemizargo actually held ‘court’ from his position on that smaller dais sometimes, while everyone else stood, or rested, on the larger space, here in the heart of Ascendant city, among clear-crystal spires filled with shadows. The white stone was actually white crystal. The whole place, but mostly the clear crystal spires, reminded Erick of the clear crystals of Brightwater and of the Spire of the Shades back at Ar’Kendrithyst, back before the place had been broken, first from the events of Last Shadow’s Feast, and then finally and completely due to the events surrounding the Soul Slime. It wasn’t till a few years ago that Queen Anhelia had propped that Spire back into the sky and restored a lot of the white and clear crystal spires back into position, and turned that place into a living space. Erick had visited Ar’Kendrithyst for the opening ceremony of that reclaimed land, but he had not visited recently.

As Erick set down onto the white crystal dais, he thought about how he hadn’t visited this place in a long time, either. Had it been years already? Yes, it had been years.

Melemizargo settled down onto his own private dais upon the dais, and a convenient cloud moved gently in the air above to drown the place in shadows. He smiled in the deepening darkness of a bright day, and said, “Fallopolis is going to host this year’s Shadow’s Feast, and I have decided it will be here, at Ascendant Mountain. Will you be able to attend in a month?”

“I can try. I was planning on getting through the various requests I’ve made on behalf of Yggdrasil before truly relaxing. I would attempt to keep the promise I made to my son before I made a new one to you.”

Melemizargo smiled a little. “Good. I wasn’t ready for you to be back already, anyway; Fallopolis can keep her current venue and you do not have to attend. I wasn’t ready for you to be here right now, either, or else I would have provided some snacks and entertainment. Next year will be a much better festival. Hopefully when that seal is removed we’ll still have a next year, yes?”

Erick gave a nervous laugh. “I hope so, too.”

Melemizargo nodded. “I won’t keep you overlong for I know you’re busy doing whatever, which is normal for mortals at your age and at your position of power— But before you get back to all that!” Melemizargo leaned in. “We’re going to ensure that you know what you did wrong with that [Onward], and then you’re never going to do that again.”

Ah.

Melemizargo missed him.

Well, Erick had grown somewhat friendly with Melemizargo, too, over the years. There had been a lot less accidental murder or catastrophe when talking to the God of Magic these days, so he was easy to get along with, even though he was usually several buildings bigger than everyone else in the area. Which was fine, though somewhat awkward for most people not used to it.

But there were a few things Erick wasn’t sure about right now, that made all this rather questionable.

“Why do you think I went [Onward] for eleven years?”

Melemizargo eyed Erick, and lowered his head closer to the ground. “I am not insane, Erick. I know what I see.” He raised back up. “Never before on this lifeboat of a planet— I know what I saw, and I saw you, a few months after—” He paused. He said, “Tell me of the day you made [Onward] and the methodology you used.”

“… It was two months into the new year, after the Dungeon Exodus and the Teleport Exodus, and I wanted to get through some rather boring meetings with awful people faster than I was able to do so on my own, and I was facing down two solid months of Gate creation. So I took a break and worked on both [Return] and [Onward], the first to avoid the bad ends in those future meetings and all other future meetings, and the [Onward] to sort of ‘turn my mind off’ when facing months and months of routine runic creation.

“I had been toying with the functionality of both spells for a while, and while both spells are similar in creation, they are vastly different in their function. [Return] takes my conscious soul when I cast the spell and updates the me-of-however-long-ago, depending on mana spent, with the experiences of future-me, by melding my future self with my past self through my world-line. This is possible through mana’s general ability to ignore time, and, in my case, Benevolence’s easily-used Elemental-Time-adjacent properties.

“As for [Onward]...”

- - - -

Erick stood in his warehouse on Yggdrasil’s branches, staring at the job ahead of him.

He didn’t much care for what he was seeing. This was a task that needed to be done yesterday, and yet, he did not want to do this, at all.

The warehouse held a thousand thousand blocks of grey-black iron, ready to be transformed into intricate runework Gates, all while they were currently inside in the middle of a continuing, global emergency. You couldn’t just [Duplicate] a working Gate, though, or else Erick would have done that.

Runic webs required that magic be carved directly into them, and a copied gate did not copy over magic at all. There had been some experiments with [Duplicate]ing magical items long, long before Erick’s time, and Kirginatharp had all of that information with him, and he had shown Erick all of it. The long and short of it was that magic did not like to be copied, unless it copied itself, which the Propagation Ban stopped short. Shade Lapis had a suggestion, though it was one she didn’t believe Erick would take and it wasn’t one she was recommending, anyway.

Magic could be copied easily if one were to construct a living artifact to do this work. Such an artifact would include an undead arm capable of wielding a runic knife, a brain capable of doing a complex spellwork chore and not burning out from doing that chore, and senses enough to allow the arm to hold the knife and carve the runes.

Erick chose to ignore that ‘living artifact’ option.

He would have enlisted actual help, with real people, but that was a non-starter, as well. Stratagold and Tasar and Archmage’s Rest and Oceanside were all working overtime to get there, but Erick was the one with all the spellwork that went into these things. He couldn’t really offload half the job, either, because when you introduced multiple mages to a working, then you ran into the cooperative casting problem, and though [Renew] helped with that…

The tolerances for this job required that Erick do the work himself.

So instead, Erick focused on a different solution.

He had made [Return] about an hour ago, and it worked well.

Now, it was time for the other option. [Onward]; a spell framework that allowed the user to flash forward through a task, or for a set amount of time. The spell would allow Erick to get through work quickly, though time would still pass. If he did it well enough, then he could even use this magic inside a [Hasted Shelter], and that’s when [Onward] started to actually look like a good option.

Phagar had originally told Erick about both [Return] and [Onward] back at that first real lesson in Time Magic months ago, right before Erick had made [Hasted Shelter]. The God of the End and Time had told Erick that there were certain types of Time Magic that were easy, and others that were difficult, and some which were the realm of Wizards only.

Speeding up or slowing down localized time was easy enough. One just had to focus on Elemental Time in an area, and then drink deep in one way or the other; faster or slower. Elemental Time was already everywhere, after all, but by altering one's temporal rate of flow with that Time, time would alter accordingly.

Ophiel twittered in the air near Erick, humming an odd tune of guitar-string worry.

Erick smiled, saying, “Don’t worry, Ophiel. This is just me skipping forward. I won’t be going anywhere.”

Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye bounced in a worried-sort of way. “But you won’t be here.”

“I won’t be leaving long.” Erick said, “I doubt I’ll use this magic much at all, but it’s a part of the full set of Time Magics, and I need to have it, just to have it. I might be able to use it inside a [Hasted Shelter], too; Phagar was able to [Return] me inside the Feast Barrier that one time, on the day you were born. Normally Time Magic doesn’t play exactly well with each other, but it does work fine if you can work it well.”

“How does it work?” Yggdrasil asked.

Erick had Ophiels begin to hum in Elemental Time, as Erick explained, “[Onward] takes my consciousness and sort of ‘plucks me upward’ while my body and soul and everything else continues to operate normally. I’m here, but I also become unmoored in time, and when the spell ends, I come back to myself and a certain amount of time has passed without me really experiencing it. It’s more of a loosening of the soul and allowing the world to happen as it would, and less like actually trying to affect anything in a temporal sense. [Onward] is sort of like how you can walk through town from one normal location to another normal location in a routine-sort of way, and zone out while doing so.”

Yggdrasil asked, “Like when I’m sleepy, but still awake?”

Erick smiled. “Yes. Almost exactly like that. Your body is still growing and changing and working but you’re not really there. Now imagine if your body and your mind were there, and doing something, but you were not really there at all.”

“Subconscious?”

“Something like that. It’s a lot less complicated than [Return].” Erick said, “Because of the natural direction of the arrow of causality, [Return] costs about a hundred times more mana than [Onward]. Honestly, the ‘zoning out’ that [Onward] can cause is also easily achieved with certain drugs, or what have you.

“I’ve been warned that doing the magic that way is like putting yourself into a true fugue, instead of achieving the type of [Onward] where you can still work while casting the spell. So I won’t be doing it that way.

“A much better way to think of [Onward] is to think of it more as a ‘flow state’, in which all your goals become incredibly easy to achieve, and then suddenly they’re achieved.

“A third way to think of [Onward] is to imagine yourself at the point where you wish to end up, and then you cast the spell, and then you’re there.” Erick tuned Ophiel with his intentions as he spoke, and the little guy began to sing a happy song, and Erick felt as though a radio had come on and his favorite song was playing. He just needed to turn up the volume; he needed to actually cast the magic, and then the workday would pass him by. Before he did that, though, he said, “Please know that I’m still here, Yggdrasil, Ophiel. You can talk with me about whatever, but I do plan on doing this work right now. I’m just turning on the music and getting into the groove, okay?”

In a breezy sort of way, Yggdrasil sighed, saying, “Okay.”

And Erick turned up the volume.

A song that only he could hear played for him, and he began to move to the beat; shaping metals and carving them deep with his runic knife, time passing oh-so-quickly. One runic Gate was suddenly done, and then the next and the next; complete, complete, complete—

The music ended in a sudden record scratch.

Erick breathed deep as he came back to himself, halfway into the next Gate creation but having stopped at a good part to stop—

A blue box appeared.

- - 

Onward, instant, self, 1,000 mana + Variable

Speed through to the future by at least 100 Script seconds.

- -

“That was like, ten minutes?” Erick commented to Yggdrasil, “That wasn’t so bad, was it, Yggdrasil?”

The room darkened a fraction and then brightened back up, as Yggdrasil flickered unsure colors outside the windows. “… It worked?”

Ophiel twittered unsure guitar strings, for he was also confused. Did the magic even happen?

“Yes, it worked.” Erick showed Yggdrasil and Ophiel the blue box. Ophiel didn’t get anything out of that, not really, but Yggdrasil did. The big guy’s floating white eye nodded a little. Erick said, “Now this time, I want you to talk to me, okay? I’m still here, so talk to me about anything at all.”

“… Okay?”

Erick cast the spell again.

A minute into his next Gate, Yggdrasil asked, “Is the spell active?”

“Yes, it is, Yggdrasil.”

“But you’re talking to me?”

“Please don’t treat this as me skipping out on you. Please treat this as me dealing with work, and then coming back to you and everyone else after the day is through. But just like when I’m at work, you’re able to give me a call anytime you want. Okay?” Erick replied cheerfully, as he finished the last line on a runic carve.

“… Really?”

Erick said, “Really. You can always talk to me, no matter what’s going on in my working life, or whatever.”

“I already knew that,” Yggdrasil said, perhaps defensively.

Erick grinned a little. Before he moved onto the next part of this Gate, he asked, “Tell me about your day? How was the fishing at Treehome?”

Yggdrasil was unsure at first, and then he began talking about scarlet kings and green lads and bright, bright golden darters, and about how he was moving around the river in order to make better habitats for all of them.

“I’m really glad you’re helping all those scarlet kings to grow up well and plentiful, Yggdrasil,” Erick said, as he continued to work on his Gates. [Onward] ended, and then he recast it, and said, “They’re such good fish.”

Excitedly, Yggdrasil said, “I found good one for you! He’s old and big! Ready to eat!”

Erick chuckled as he imagined the treat waiting for him after this Gate-making marathon, and Yggdrasil talked about anything and everything. Only one of his newest children was talking right now, but Ophiel was listening a lot.

Finally, when Erick was comfortable with [Onward], Erick told Yggdrasil that he needed to put up another [Hasted Shelter] and truly work to make these Gates happen faster. Yggdrasil suggested a [Hasted Shelter] large enough to house him, so he could continue to talk with his father, and Erick let him do that.

And so, Yggdrasil put a giant [Hasted Shelter] around all of himself at Candlepoint, including all of Erick’s warehouses, and he continued to talk with his dad for the next 24 hours, while Erick [Onward]ed through his Gate making.

At the end of that, Yggdrasil decided he hated having a part of himself inside the [Hasted Shelter], but that he really liked talking with Erick.

- - - -

“And I loved the whole experience,” Erick said, “I was there for the whole thing, but I was able to put myself into an [Onward] and get right into that flow state. I never really used the spell outside of those specific situations, though.”

And that was the full story, as far as Erick knew. Making those two spells had been about the only break Erick had had in that first year after the Teleport Exodus, and even then, that ‘break’ had been in order to allow him to work better; him and House Benevolence. He abused [Hasted Shelter] way too much… All the time, really. But especially back there in the beginning when everything was changing and people were dying the world over due to any number of factors.

Lack of food was a big one.

The Underworld did a lot better than the Surface, for the Underworld hadn’t had [Teleport] for a long time, but even then, the Underworld got shipping through the Surface, so it was a complete mess all the world over.

Erick added, “I have used and continue to use [Return] when the situation calls for it, but I never really had a use for [Onward] outside of making the grunt work go faster. Like, theoretically, I can see how I might have wanted to [Onward] through paperwork and many of the bureaucratic meetings I have had over the years that never really meant anything aside from giving people face by being there with them...” And then he frowned at Melemizargo, saying, “I’ve spoken with you tens of times since I made that magic and you never said anything about this before. That time with the Anarchy Wizard and quite a lot of talking afterward, and then there was the time you actually came to the Feast, in person that one year; we all talked then, too.”

Melemizargo listened the whole time Erick spoke, and then at the end, he said, “There were, and continue to be, many different discrete factors working in concert with each other in order to produce what happened there, with you traveling [Onward] to the current day. I’m not sure when, exactly, you came out of your fugue, except that you only really came back when you sang that spellwork there in that dungeon, but it likely started when Yggdrasil asked to be freed.

“Now I know what you’re thinking, and yes, you did sing to the mana a few times before now, so how do I explain that? We’ll get to that.

“When you created Benevolence, you Established many different things. A bit of how some of your spells work. A bit of how your [Familiar]s function. Etcetera. I suspect, based on how this whole situation with how you and I and Veird has gone, that, from the very beginning, you probably did a little bit of Establishment and other assorted magics to get to this point, and that includes [Onward].

“To explain: Back in that first year and then the second year after that 'Last Shadow's Feast', the effect was minimal. I couldn’t even tell until now what you had done back then, when you hadn’t actually done anything at all, except for here, in the ‘distant future’.

“Of course there are likely countless realities where you failed and none of this growth happened at all. But here we are, in this reality, so I can only say that this one is the real one and all the other ones are imaginary.

“Moving on:

“And now we come to this Time Magic, when you actually learned Time Magic and then tried to make some more yourself. The first few tries were normal. [Hasted Shelter] or what have you. But then you tried for the higher tier Time Magics.

“The Script smoothed over both [Return] and [Onward]. It’s possible that you even flubbed [Return], though, and you shoved yourself all the way back to the beginning of your time on Veird; in the mana. No way to really know about that, because if you did, then you flubbed the consciousness transfer part of that magic. Maybe only your subconscious went into the past, and that directed all of your actions to this current future? I doubt this is the case, though. It was unnoticeable back then.

“The effects of [Onward] were similarly unnoticeable until now. I couldn’t even tell that you had flubbed up [Onward] until today. Here is how:

“The first evidence is that Benevolence is an Element with properties of Time, with the major duty to prevent disaster from now until forever. I believe you have always been Benevolence, but that you became your true self when you became Benevolence Itself, and that true self also went backward and forward through time, in order to nudge and poke events into the best possible order so that it would come into being. Backwards-capability is not within Benevolence’s currently established powers, but you are a Paradox Wizard, and those get all over the place.

“The second piece of evidence is that you’re not a Full Wizard yet. While you have been able to make spells like [True Resurrection], and all your various other smaller spellwork in the years since you cast [Onward], you haven’t been able to take that final step into Wizardry. This is because you weren’t fully here all this time.

“There are a few smaller bits of evidence here and there.

“And the last bit of evidence is this: I know. This little song you sang there in that dungeon was real, Erick. It had something to it that was not present in all the other songs you have sung over the years.

“Plus: Paradox Wizards always miscast something, somewhere in their history, and you were well overdue for a miscast.

“This [Onward] was your miscast. Perhaps because you didn’t know how to cast it properly because of the many, many nuances to Time Magic which weren’t explained to you because you’ve never needed them explained before, and you’ve never had formal study, or maybe you miscast [Onward] because you wanted to skip the last eleven years. I can’t really blame you for that last one.” Melemizargo said, “Personally, it was very frustrating dealing with you and your bureaucratic mindset. Yes, you were consolidating power and whatnot and that’s perfectly reasonable. But looking back on it, you were always asking me to ‘cut to the chase’ and saying that you couldn’t stay because you ‘needed to go do this-and-that’; running off and going back to work for two days every day. And you’re even having a real emotional response right now! See? You wouldn’t have had this before. This is you. You’re back. Welcome back from your fugue.”

Erick’s heart felt tight. His skin seemed dry and wet at the same time. His breath came out slowly and evenly only due to the many lessons he learned on the job as the Apparent King; to never show weakness—

“I remember everything perfectly, though,” Erick said, “There are no gaps.”

“It was a low-level [Onward] and you have a high Intelligence, and you were ‘in the flow’, as you say. If you had cast Mind Magic to get into the flow then the Mind Mages would have noticed it moments before I noticed it, but you did not touch that spellframe. Perhaps that is where the actual fault lay in your spellwork; you tried to include Mind Magic, when you have no capability with Mind Magic at all.” Melemizargo added, “Wizardry is dangerous, Erick, but when you screwed up, the whole world got eleven years of prosperity and stability, because, I think, you might have been ‘inside the mana’, as you say, and helping yourself and everyone else without even knowing it.

“You might have ‘pulled yourself out of yourself’ just enough to be everywhere your Benevolence was, which is something Creation Wizards usually learn how to do, but which you might have Paradoxed your way into, at least a little bit.

“And your failure was just what we needed, really, after I introduced the Dungeon Cores and demanded the Teleport Exodus. I’d give you a boon for that wonderful feat of near-Establishment magic, but as I have already said I’m not doing any real boons these days.” Melemizargo waved a wing dismissively. “Politics and all that.”

“But I was there,” Erick complained, disbelieving everything he was hearing.

“90% there. Maybe 40% during the boring parts.” Melemizargo hummed a little. “Maybe less— Oh!” He looked to the side. “Ah? Now what is she doing here?”

A portal to Springtime opened, all green and pink and white and whirling.

A little person stepped out of that [Gate] into Fairy. She was dressed in brightest jewels of every color imaginable, layered onto her like they were some sort of armored-business-suit-dress. Erick knew this one well, and he was glad to see her, though her timing was suspect. Her name was Gnowmi, and she was already smiling at seeing Erick. And then she saw Melemizargo, did a double take, and then gave a courtly bow to the God of Magic.

Melemizargo dipped his head.

Erick was surprised to see Gnowmi, but it was not an unwelcome surprise.

‘Gnowmi’ had popped out of creation when Rozeta relaxed the Bands of Intent of Elemental Fairy around five years ago. Fairy Moon had brought Gnowmi, along with the nine other recently revived fairy, out to a grand Presentation Gala, where everyone who was anyone visited, which ended up being a lot of people from the Fairy-side of reality, and also Erick. Events then happened, and Gnowmi had picked the name ‘do you know me?’, and then asked for it to be translated into some other language she did not know. After a small talk, Erick supplied her with a shortened name, in English. It was only after he was done naming Gnowmi, and seven other of the nine newest (oldest) fairies to be reborn on Veird, that he realized that he had named her ‘gnome’.

That particular naming had given Gnowmi a whole slew of expectations, from being an inventor and creator, to being very, very fast. In Erick’s opinion Gnowmi ended up a rather awesome person, and she loved her name, so there was no issue there. All of the new fae loved their English names, and even Fairy Moon was happy they were happy.

Gnowmi was the only fairy that Erick really interacted with these days, though, and then only once or twice every few months.

“Gnowmi?” Erick asked, unsure of her arrival into this particular meeting, though it was still nice to see her. “Does the Fairy Court have a request, or is this a social visit?”

Gnowmi stepped a single step onto the white stone, and out of the Springtime [Gate]. She seemed to be about business today. With a high voice, she exclaimed to Melemizargo, “Greetings, Melemizargo, God of Magic. I apologize for my impertinence for interrupting your talk. Please forgive.”

Melemizargo nodded a little bit. “It is of no trouble at all.”

Gnowmi gave a small bow again, and then she turned to Erick. “House Benevolence has contacted me to get into contact with you. There is something big happening, and you are needed.”

An icicle to the heart; that’s what those words were.

Melemizargo furrowed his brows then glanced to the air— “Ahh… Someone is trying to contact you. Ahh. I hoped to have some time... Well I will cut this short, since you’re going to come back here anyway. A few final things: I’m not removing my part of the seal until the others have removed theirs; that was the stated agreement and I’m sticking to it. We can talk more about Time Magic when you come back. You’re rather skilled with [Return], so there’s likely no problem there, but I suggest you don’t do [Onward] without the Script assisting you, for you might find yourself suddenly standing ten or twenty years down the timeline.”

Gnowmi’s eyes flickered in bright concern as she heard what Melemizargo said, and then she put together a lot of her own facts of the last several years. She rapidly believed that Melemizargo must have been mistaken, and so she turned her attention back to Erick.

Erick decided that the timeline-thing was a lot to handle right now, and that he did not need to be handling that at this very moment. Especially with something happening at House Benevolence that required them to ask Gnowmi to come get him. So Erick said to Melemizargo, “Good to see you, then, Melemizargo. See you later.”

Melemizargo smiled a little, and nodded.

Erick asked Gnowmi, “Will you be coming with me?” as he opened a white-lightning [Gate] to his throne room in the House—

As Erick looked on the other side, saw the gathering over there, he rapidly decided that he probably didn’t have time to spend with Gnowmi at all, talking about odd Fae Magic, or whatever. He was still thankful for her help in developing [Fairy Banishing] and a few smaller fairy spells, but he had only really given her record players and calculators and light bulbs in return.

And Gnowmi had already decided that she was needed elsewhere, anyway. “Farewell, Erick. We’ll get to work on more inventions eventually!”

Erick suddenly remembered Ezekiel.

He needed to introduce Gnowmi to Ezekiel, or perhaps his repro, Ezekiel, was already in contact with Gnowmi? Maybe not, though, if Gnowmi was asking about more inventions. Maybe Ezekiel just didn’t want to cloud the connections to Erick’s life?

“I have someone to introduce you to later, Gnowmi.” Erick simply said, “I’ll tell you something fun the next time I can. You’ll like it, I’m sure.”

Gnowmi smiled brightly. Then bowed and stepped backward into a suddenly-swallowing [Gate] to Springtime, and then she was gone.

Erick said to Melemizargo, “Farewell!”

Melemizargo nodded serenely.

And Erick stepped through the [Gate]—

- - -

—into a shouting match that had only stopped because of his presence. Or perhaps everyone here had seen Melemizargo on the other side of the hole in the world and that brought them up short, too. Probably a bit of both. With a mental switch, Erick shut the [Gate] behind him, popped out his horns, became the ‘Apparent King’, and studied the scene in his throne room for a leveling-glare moment.

Kiri wore a nice dress, and all of her was well put-together, with her [Familiar] Sunny loosely curled up around her neck like a boa. She was not doing well, though. Her emerald-scale face was haggard, and her shoulders were tense in an abnormal way. Not many people would have noticed that except for Erick and other people closer to her, but the room was full of ‘other people closer to her’, so a lot of people noticed.

Teressa stood near Aisha, the Overseer of Magic, the large orcol woman and the petite human-shaped celesteel wrought forming something of a bloc amongst the gathering.

Poi stood between Teressa and Kiri, but not directly between them, looking worried, but not overly worried. That was good. That meant that whatever this was had to be solvable. Not quite solvable on their own, though, or else they never would have sent Gnowmi after him.

And then there was Burhendurur. The incani-shaped Overseer of Enforcement had gone google-eyed when he saw Erick, as though he was embarrassed that they needed to call Erick in at all.

Volaro, the orcol-shaped Overseer of Law, and Raingorl, the Overseer of Wellbeing and the Chancellor of Candlepoint Arcanaeum, were both missing. That was rather normal for a ‘not everyone needs to be concerned about this’ sort of emergency. Mox, the Overseer of the Exterior, was also missing, though, so whatever this was… Well maybe Mox just hadn’t gotten here yet. A few other Overseers were missing, though, which was completely normal for them to be absent. The Overseer of Trade. The Overseer of the Council. The Overseer of Gate Expansion, who was a man by the name of Vixo and who had been Kiri’s secretary prior to his promotion. None of them were in attendance either…

One missing person should not be missing, though. Zolan, the Castellan of House Benevolence. A quick mana sensing found the man. He was downstairs dealing with—

Ophiel alighted on Erick’s shoulder, cooing in happiness as he said, “Welcome back, Father!”

Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye appeared before him, bright and iridescent white. “Thank you, Father, for doing what you are doing. I have seen it and I know it has been tough. Something came up though, as you can tell from the gathering here. That is why I asked Gnowmi to get you.”

“Ah. You called her. That’s fine.” Erick stood a bit taller. He nodded. “That’s one mystery solved, then. From what I’m seeing here, that decision to involve the fae was a controversial one?”

“It was.” Yggdrasil said, “I made the call, though.”

Burhendurur sighed a little; he would not scowl, but he was close.

Erick said, “Burhendurur; you are of the opinion that I did not need to be called?”

“The prognostication is several months out,” Burhendurur said, “We have a firm grip on the House and on the land and on the world. There are no disasters that go unnoticed, and we have noticed this one early enough to get all the way in front of it. Your presence is appreciated, but not needed at this time.”

Not a Wizard-level disaster, then. Something smaller. Something that was prognosticated. By whom? Erick would usually ping Aisha for a prognostication about something bad, but—

Erick saw Poi glance at Teressa.

So Erick looked to Teressa. “Summarize what you have seen.”

Teressa easily said, “I have Seen a problem down at Storm’s Edge—”

Erick flicked some runic workings in the wall, enacting some dormant spellwork that was layered into the throne room and was only now active. The bright sky beyond the glass dome turned suddenly black, and the only light in the room came from the wardlights set up all around the perimeter of the room, near the reliefs of trees that was the wall. It was a Privacy working, and it was rather perfect, except in specific ways to allow Yggdrasil and Ophiel and Sunny to operate without issue. No one outside this room would know what was happening in this room.

There used to be days when activating that spellwork would suddenly drop some hidden people out of the air, and onto the floor, or that a dozen [Scry]-eyes would pop. No [Scry]-eyes popped this time, though, and no unseen people fell out of the air.

Most everyone in the throne room had a reaction to the Privacy going up which was somewhere between relief and a solidification of worries. Everyone in that room knew what Erick had been up to, generally, in that ‘he’s down at Storm’s Edge’, but only Poi had any specifics at all. Yggdrasil obviously knew what Erick had been up to, too, for he knew about Soltic and Vanya, and he had some rather good long-range [Scry] spellwork, courtesy of Erick’s efforts with that magic years ago.

Teressa probably knew more than the others due to her prognostication abilities, which was probably partially responsible for the altercation that Erick had walked into. Mostly, this altercation was due to some people wanting to keep Erick out of it, and others wanting to draw him back in. Erick didn’t care about that altercation, though, but if something had caused Yggdrasil to act on his own like he did, then this was a big deal.

So Erick simply said, “Please continue, Teressa. Leave nothing out. Bring me up to speed on whatever happened, and then we’ll solve whatever happened.”

The tension in the room began to lessen, though Burhendurur was still embarrassed that House Benevolence couldn’t function without Erick—

A knock came at the door.

Erick checked who it was, and then he canceled the Privacy and let Zolan into the throne room. As soon as the pale-purple incani man walked into the room, Erick shut the door and activated the Privacy again.

Zolan did a double-take upon seeing Erick, and then he chuckled, and said, “You’re supposed to be on vacation.”

“Events ever conspire against me,” Erick said, and then he nodded to Teressa.

Teressa resumed, “Around noon, three hours ago, Archmage Wiloza Tidewalker enacted the Prognostication Clause of our Gate Treaty, asking about some people who approached the Regency looking to alter the dungeon system. Since we’ve been hands-off with Storm’s Edge, and especially since you were down there, I did that prognostication myself. Apparently, Wiloza investigated Soltic and Vanya for the past day, and she found dead end after dead end. She brought that paperwork with her, and I read it. She was rightfully worried based on what I read.

“And so, I did the prognostication. The exact wording of that reading is this: ‘Have them make the dungeon into a shelter. Devote the majority of the inner lands into a truly defensible location. Somewhere that all of Storm’s Edge can shelter inside, for there is a storm coming and it is not of Sinininidi’s make at all.’ And then came the big part: ‘The Grand Dungeon of Storm’s Edge must hold all of the life of the Archipelago, and more besides. It will be The Lighthouse, The Castle That Withstands All, The Vault In The Ground Under The Roots Of The World Tree, The Protected Cove, and more, and you, Wiloza Tidecaller, must make that happen. Through the Death that is yet to come, there will be life, or there will be nothing at all for you and yours when lightning lashes Storm’s Edge.’ And that was the full prophecy.

“The current timeline has this happening is between 6 to 9 months from now. The exact nature of the ‘storm not of Sininindi’s make’ is unknown.

“And now we’re here.”

Erick took a moment to think.

And then he said, “Here’s what we’re going to do. House Benevolence will make an overture to the Regency offering assistance. It will not be an offer, though. If necessary, it will be an action from us onto them, through the proper channels of the Gate Treaty, but it will be a unilateral action, if necessary. I would prefer to work alongside them, though. Inform them not to touch the dungeons until I have a chance to inspect them myself. I will be arriving in an hour, but until then, I will move an Ophiel into position around those dungeons as soon as possible, and if they should touch those dungeons, then I will be arriving earlier than declared.

“That hour is to allow me to talk to Sininindi and to get approval for visiting. If, however, she does not approve my visit, then I will be visiting anyway, and things might get diplomatically problematic.

“None of you are to speak of the truth of Soltic or Vanya at all. We will maintain that secrecy.

“And I will be solving this problem, personally.” This was actually really good, now that Erick had spoken the suddenly-made plan aloud. The prognostication was worrisome, but in the perfect case scenario, Erick could go down there, ensure that Quilatalap got his Grand Dungeon and that the city of Storm’s Edge supported Vanya’s work. And then Storm’s Edge and the Archipelago would be set to weather the coming storm, whatever that might be. Erick said, “And that’s the plan. As for the eventual prophecy, we’ve got time. Since the prophecy only speaks of the Archipelago it might not be a large event that would actually cause worry. Might be a Wizard, though, so Destiny will need to be contacted, soon. For now, we solve the problem in front of us. Zolan, begin the missives. Teressa or Aisha; one of you is coming with me to Storm’s Edge, alongside Poi. Everyone else is to maintain their work here. I will be talking individually with some of you soon enough.”

Erick canceled the Privacy surrounding the throne room. The glass dome brightened as darkness retreated, and soon, they were all standing under natural sunlight again.

People began moving, once again under the auspices of the Apparent King.

- - - -

Erick stood with Kiri in a side room under Privacy. He still wore his black-horn crown, and he would be wearing that for the foreseeable future. His voice was that of the king, but it was still filled with Erick’s normal compassion, “Kiri. Are you doing well as the Gatemaster?”

Kiri knew this was coming, and she was prepared with a quick, “The adjustment has been difficult, but I know I can do this.”

“I know you can do this. I am not worried about the job or about your capabilities.” Erick said, “I am worried you aren’t getting enough sleep.”

Kiri suddenly gave a small, nervous chuckle. “I can handle the job just fine, Erick. It’s the fact that you could sweep away problems with a single word that’s giving me issues. Usually when I run into problematic issues, I’ve been able to tell those problems that I could get you involved if those problems wanted you involved. Usually, those problems would then stop being problems. That only ever happened rarely, but now... Things are different. I was trying not to do that. Because I was trying to keep you out of it, it’s barely been two weeks and I might have fucked up a situation in the northern lands, near Vindin.”

“What happened, and how can I solve this issue?”

Kiri explained.

Erick went out and removed a local lord from power and placed him into jail.

The guy was stealing from the Gate Network and also preventing people from moving freely. Erick dealt with the fallout from that removal, too, by talking to the mayor of Vindin, who claimed to have no idea what was happening with the local lord. Erick let the mayor have his lie.

Both the probably-temporarily-imprisoned lord and the mayor of Vindin were testing what they could get away with, which did not bode well, but it was also something that everyone did, everywhere, all the time. Erick had solved the problem at the top level, so now, House Benevolence would reorganize the Local Area Gate Network and solve whatever issues might have appeared at the lower levels. That would take them time, but the new Overseer of Gate Expansion was on that task, right away.

Erick gave one last bit of advice to Kiri, “Don’t refer to people as ‘problems’. It’s bad form. I know I’ve done it a few times, but I wince every time I do.”

Kiri gave a nervous chuckle, then said, “Right. Whoops.”

Erick moved on.

- - - -

Burhendurur was next.

“But all I have is some paperwork regarding some long-standing cases I need you to sign off on, and then I have some new hires I want you to meet. It’ll be a quick, five minute thing, but I would like a Shelter for that meeting.”

“I’ll go over the paperwork and you put those people all in the same room. I’ll Haste us all.”

“Thank you, my King.” Burhendurur grinned a little. “I never thought I would miss that spell so much, but it truly does make the kingdom run a lot smoother.”

Erick chuckled. “I’m surprised you’ve never tried for Time Magic, what with Death and Time and all that being under Phagar’s purview.”

“The only ones I know of who aren’t in the upper echelons of the Church of Phagar who are allowed to touch Time Magic are you and Quilatalap. Many suspect the God of Time and the End judges the actions of Death dragons and various sapient undead a lot harsher than otherwise, and he’s already a harsh judge.” Burhendurur continued, “Anyway, the paperwork…”

Erick signed off on a pile of 89 different cases, only two of which he actually needed to look over, since they were incidents involving the Benevolence dragons. All the rest were things that Burhendurur put out there for Erick to see that the kingdom was running fine.

As for the Benevolence dragon cases, one was an incident of a dragon eating someone’s cow without paying for it, and another was a dragon burning down a barn, with the people inside, and then torturing the people with fire for several hours. They were both exonerated of their wrongdoing.

It turned out the first guy had paid for the cow, and the seller only claimed no-payment when he found out how rich the dragon was. There was some sort of hate going on there that Erick didn’t bother to check into too deeply.

The second guy was exonerated when the Mind Mages got involved with the case, because the barn was filled with putrescent slugs. No one could see those nasty, green things, as they ate away people from the inside out and incubated inside their hosts. It was like they were a ‘natural’ intervention. The dragon had burned the people and also healed them, while also keeping the people fully sedated so they didn’t feel anything. But he also couldn’t see the slugs at all, so his cleaning operation failed, and the slugs were still there, so his Benevolence triggered him to burn the patients again, which failed again, and this went on for a while. The dragon was a doctor, too, who was completely blindsided as to why he was doing what he was doing, only knowing that he had to keep going into the ‘operation’ over and over again, while his nurses and otherwise had no idea why he was burning those poor people he was ‘treating’. He was very sorry for his actions, but everyone was very hurt over that whole thing.

Erick decided to send some letters to the aggrieved parties in the putrescent slug case. Maybe that would calm them all down. He'll probably have to help the doctor dragon get a job somewhere far away from where he was previously employed, though, and that was fine.

After writing that letter, Erick went to go see the people Burhendurur wanted him to see. It was a quick meeting, though it did take an hour inside a [Hasted Shelter]. By the time he Erick left, he left behind a bunch of happy new security people, who Erick felt good for having at House Benevolence.

- - - -

Goldie, the former Shade of Assassination, was now the Shade of House Benevolence. She was also a bit of a bookworm, who usually hid out in the library, reading books, when she wasn’t out on assignment. Erick chose to visit that library to check up on everything that went bump in the night.

Erick rounded the corner of the Privacy-laden library, and spotted Goldie laying back in her recliner, reading a good book, half a second before she spotted him.

And then she spotted him, her bright white glowing eyes going wide. The Shade’s ever-present, black slab of a sword, floated at her side like a languid cat, but at Goldie's noticing of Erick, that sword suddenly came to life for the briefest of moments. It relaxed almost just as fast, but Goldie did not. She leapt out of her chair and landed in front of Erick, already down on one knee.

“Sir!” she said.

“At ease.”

Goldie rose from the ground, smiling. “Are you back?”

“Not really. Are you subject to interventions? They’re like Silences, but simpler. Temporary, I think. Anti-memes. First time I heard of them was about 2 weeks ago, so I assume they’re rare.” He added, “Not that rare in practice, though, with putrescent slugs and other mental monsters.”

Goldie frowned a little; worried. “What is the source of the Anti-meme?”

“Rozeta, Sininindi, the Script.”

“I’m immune to those. All of those sorts of things, actually.”

“Good. I thought as much. Everbless is Gold Taker. Does that make sense to you?”

“… I have no idea who ‘Gold Taker’ is, but I assume it’s an… Alter of Everbless?”

“Exactly.” Erick said, “I’m going down to Storm’s Edge, and I need you with me, yet hidden. Bring along a few elites that are the best about keeping secrets and not being seen. The priority is not being seen, and especially not being seen by Everbless or Gold Taker, which is a tentacle-like [Familiar] that can be either kilometers big, or small as Ophiel—”

Ophiel said, “I be bigger one day!”

“Yes you will, Ophiel. You did very well hiding yourself as well as you did down there.”

“I did!”

“Yes you did.” Erick turned back toward Goldie. “Gold Taker is usually ethereal and invisible and intangible, yet he has had little to no apparent formal training in that regard, or no impetus to get better, for he’s been invisible in that sort of way for the last few years. Ophiel knows how to do all that much better than Gold Taker / Everbless. Even so, I am sure that if you are not careful, he can see you anywhere inside Storm’s Edge or the surrounding lands. Trying to hide from him will be like trying to hide from Yggdrasil; near impossible, but I trust you can do that. We leave in 20 minutes.”

“Heard and understood!”

- - - -

Erick stepped into the True Interfaith Church, still located where Erick had begun construction and where the gods had finished that construction 12 years ago. It was all flying buttresses and stained glass and a whole bunch of white eternal stonewood, but also black outlines on the whole place, and the marble-like floor was a checkerboard. Church was not in session right now, so getting inside and where he needed to go was easy enough, though Erick had to stop when he saw Head Priestess Justine Erholme. He didn’t really want to stop and say hello, for he was in a time crunch, but Justine stood in front of the Hall of Gods, Erick’s destination, and he couldn’t really walk around her or push her out of the way.

Justine was an all-white Underworld-born incani, with bright red eyes, who was glad to see that Erick wasn’t barging past her ‘blockade’; she was a rather small woman, after all, and the Hall of the Gods was several meters wide.

“Hello, Justine. I would ask to get around you to go talk to a goddess, but I suspect you already knew that.”

“Hello, my king,” Justine said, “I’ll be happy to let you pass, but first, the goddess you wish to visit has expressed to me that she does not desire a visit with you right now, for news of this latest prognostication is spreading fast and she is dealing with the debris of it all. You have your bargain, and she trusts you to fulfill it as well as you can.”

Erick gave a diplomatic smile, and said to Justine, as well as to the air, for Sininindi was surely listening right now (along with a bunch of other people in the church, who were sitting and praying in silence, and down the Hall of Gods, where a bunch of people were moving through, unimpeded by well-meaning high priestesses), “You can tell her that we’re going to have words about a certain thing that she knows about, after I solve this new minor crisis and fulfill the terms of our bargain. We can talk about all that later, but I do need to see her, to decide how to make this next part happen.”

“… That is acceptable,” Justine said, as she stepped to the side.

“Thank you.” Erick adopted a nicer mien. “It’s good to see you, Justine. Everything going well here? Anything I need to take care of?”

Justine spoke casually. “Everything is going great, as far as I know. Not sure what you got going on with this latest event, but we’re good here, Wizard Flatt.”

Erick smiled in a normal sort of way. “Good to hear.”

And then he walked down the hallway.

- - - -

The world was a dark ocean with a surface tens of meters below Erick’s floating body. Waves broke and swelled everywhere, creating valleys and mountains out of salt water, as a storm raged overhead. Lightning crashed everywhere, briefly illuminating grey and black clouds, heavy with rain.

And then the lightning illuminated the Goddess Sininindi. A wave crashed upon her like she was a rock in the waves. Water splashed everywhere but the Goddess of Storm and Sea remained unmoved.

The water and wind did not touch Erick.

“Hello, Erick,” the Storm Goddess said, with a hint of natural thunder in her voice.

“Hello, Sininindi,” Erick said, like a completely normal human. “I will be going to Storm’s Edge now, to solve this developing issue in the safest and quickest way I can. Are there any nuances you desire from my involvement?”

Lightning flashed across the sky. Waves crashed all around.

Sininindi took a moment. She was subtly angry, but she was controlled, too.

And then she said, “By all rights, you and I should be better allies than we are, but I am terrified of you and of any new Sunderings, and anyone who controls lightning outside of my church. Even after you became Benevolence…” She moved on. “Everbless is old enough and this is a large enough of a possible disaster that the time for distance is over, if you wish it to be over. I would have you as an absentee uncle figure, though, and only if Everbless desires this.”

So they were going to have this conversation right now.

Erick said, “The intervention.”

“It remains.”

“When are you planning on removing it?”

“I will never remove the intervention. Gold Taker will forever be disconnected from Everbless, until a time of his choosing, which he has already chosen to do with ‘Vanya’. This intervention will afford Everbless to have a persona that he can adopt to get away from the eye of the storm of being a World Tree. When he wishes, he can adopt another avatar, and that one can be his public persona.”

“He needs to be held accountable on a larger scale than a personal one for his actions as Gold Taker, so that he will know that killing people is wrong, even if it is done in a dungeon.”

“And who holds you accountable, Erick? No one. Everbless will be like you, and woe betide all who get in my son’s way.”

“I have all the world holding me accountable, Sininindi. I also have over half a century of learning how to be a good person—”

“And before you were given a hand up you were a shit person. Allow my son time to be a shit if he wants to be a shit.”

“… All I’m saying is that you are floating dangerous ideas out there, Sininindi. I didn’t gain power until long after I grew up. People who grow up with unfettered power often grow up dangerous.”

“We are dangerous entities, all of us. And I am his mother; I will not crush my son in any way whatsoever. So you tell him what he has done wrong. Maybe he’ll listen to his ‘eccentric Wizard uncle’ if you speak well enough, and teach him well enough, in the few interactions you will have from now on.” Sininindi frowned a little bit, as she said, “I am extending more trust than I am comfortable with, so do not endanger my people or my son.”

“… I will solve this current problem, ensure that the problem remains solved, and then I will be opening a channel of communication between Everbless and Treehome, so that he and the arbors and Yggdrasil can all communicate with each other in a more direct manner. It was good for Yggdrasil, and it will be good for Everbless.”

Sininindi seemed momentarily surprised. And then she seemed ashamed. “Thank you, Erick. I am sure Everbless will love it.”

“Will you remove the intervention from all the arbors?”

Lightning flashed in the distance. No one cared about that.

Sininindi said, “The intervention is a weak thing, and though it is powerful now, it will break if Everbless removes too much of it from the world, and once it is removed from a person, they’re immune to reinfection. He knows this, and now you know this, too. Let the intervention stand while he is a child, please, Erick. He is learning how to be a person in as normal a way as one like him can learn; don’t take that away from him.”

A moment passed in quiet thought.

Erick suspected that he and Sininindi probably would have been closer if he had handled that first interaction with Sininindi’s priests better, years and years ago when he was giving those talks on Particle Magic in the Mage’s Guildhouse of Spur. Storm Priestess Tiza Nindi was the name of the head priest at the time. She was still the head priest, if Erick recalled correctly, and he did.

“I will be telling Everbless to remove the intervention from people he wishes to be friends with.”

Sininindi gave a little nod, slow and measured.

Erick departed.

- - - -

Erick stood inside his Gate Space, checking everything out while he still had a small bit of time. The Regency had been warned that he was coming, and everything was going fine at the dungeons right now, according to a rapid check with Ophiel. All delving had stopped at the Pit, though, and some battlements had been set up around dungeon 6.

From what Erick gathered through Ophiel...

The people of the Dungeon Guild were being told that they were preparing for a dungeon break.

Barda and Nero were wanted for questioning.

House Maryol was under the control of the Regency’s rapid response teams.

And Archmage Wiloza Tidewalker was standing inside stone battlements overlooking over the Pit, and furiously casting even more castlework, lining the entire Pit like she was preparing for something horrific to come out of all those black holes in the world. Or maybe she was preparing for something to assault the Pits from the outside. Hard to tell right now. She was probably playing that option close to the chest; able to switch her angles of attack and defense either outward or inward as needed.

Everyone was in a panic out there, at Storm’s Edge. But here in the Gate Space...

A calm breeze brushed against Erick, as he gazed upward into the sky.

The sky looked alright. The whole gate space looked fine, actually; it had grown a lot from what it had been eleven years ago, though. Back then it was a land of white stone hexagons, suspended in a vast white sky, with Yggdrasil floating off in the distance. A small fountain had burbled up from the center of that land, flickering with flame at the top while also flowing water up into the air, and then outward, across the hexagon land, into the air again but sideways, and then over to Yggdrasil, connecting Yggdrasil to this gate space by way of floating water. Back then Yggdrasil had looked like a very large tree growing from a floating lake, off in the near distance.

It was the same sort of look these days, but the scale was a lot different. A lot more.

Yggdrasil was fifty kilometers tall and twice that wide. He did not cover the sky at all, though, for he was far, far away from the fountain. At least a hundred kilometers away, for he always looked the same sort of height he always had, but distance and size played grand tricks on anyone’s sight inside this land.

The platform itself was now fifty kilometers wide at the smallest parts and dotted with wild, green spaces amongst the hexagonal ground. Certain parts of the platform even extended out of sight, out past a lightning-filled horizon like stone bridges among the power lines. If one walked across those stone bridges, if they braved the lightning and the dense illuminated fog, they would eventually end up at the other gate spaces that Erick had made, all around Veird.

The fountain that existed in the center of this platform, and to a smaller extent, on every platform inside every one of Erick’s gate spaces, was no longer the small thing of the previous decade. It was now an overflowing lake, a good half a kilometer wide. The bottom of the fountain was a black abyss, while the top held a floating bonfire the size of a house, shaped like the curled-up rune of [Renew]. That rushing lake overflowed directly into several rivers, all of which flowed through deep channels, out to the edge, to form a moat around the main platform. That moat then flowed through the sky, to connect to Yggdrasil in the far, far distance.

If one hopped in that river, or in any river on any platform, and if they managed to keep floating and not fall out of the benevolent sky, they would eventually float to this central platform, and then to Yggdrasil.

Anyone taking such a trip would need to be mindful of the lightning, though.

Tangles of lightning held all around, like white lines of power, never thundering, but always making themselves known, especially with those few black tangles here and there. In those places the lightning did not flow freely like it should.

There weren’t a lot of those tangles these days. Most of them were rather more grey, than black, and those that did exist were generally good things.

Over there was the induction of a boy into Candlepoint university, and the subsequent creation of computers on Veird. Another tangle held the same eventuality but a good 60 more years in the future, so whatever was happening there was not too set in stone… Or set ‘in the sky’, as some people were saying these days. Erick kept his eyes on that particular tangle sometimes. Most days he ignored everything he saw, though, because it was all so ‘up in the air’, which was another multi-meaning saying that was spreading amongst the people of House Benevolence. None of these things were absolutes. All of these futures were possibilities, deeper than most. The only ones that were truly visible as ‘this will happen now’ were the ones that were closest to the edge of the platform...

Erick looked around, trying to find the tangle that was for Storm’s Edge…

He found it.

It was a grey tangle, about forty meters away from the edge of the platform. It was rather a lot less defined than most tangles out there, but it was the closest one to ‘now’.

All Erick could really see, though, was that something was happening at Storm’s Edge, and that situation would be developing over the course of a few months, give or take half a year. Sometimes Erick hated that he couldn’t read the sky as well as other people could. Teressa and Aisha, in particular, saw way more inside Benevolence than he did all the time.

Perhaps he could ask Rozeta or Melemizargo about that phenomenon again, now that he ‘was here’? Maybe they would give a different answer, or maybe he could have a different solution to his lack of capability.

The last time he had asked either of them for a better explanation as to why Teressa could read the sky better than he could, both Rozeta and Melemizargo had spoken about how Erick was the source and other people were the boats, so while he could direct the river wherever he wanted, a lot of it simply went outside of his control once he spent that mana. So of course other people could read the waters better than he could. It was the same phenomenon all Wizards experienced to a degree, with Creation Wizards —and certain Wizards like Erick— experiencing this phenomenon most of all.

Benevolence was Erick, and Erick was Benevolence, but Benevolence itself was rather autonomous when not consciously directed, or after Erick created it from his soul. That’s how that Element was able to do what it did, up there in the sky, showing off potential futures. If Erick had to control it to make it do all that it did, then he would have found the whole thing impossible. Indeed, if he did have control over it, then it wouldn’t have been able to operate like it was supposed to operate.

And so, Erick looked to the sky one last time, checking to see that there weren’t any upcoming disasters except this one down in the archipelago.

Annnnnd… Nope.

Of course, Erick got the feeling that he was missing something big, because there were Silences in the Script, and there were anti-memes, and there were mental monsters out there that fucked with the mind, and then there were fairies, too. Someone was hiding something from his Benevolence and his Sight, for sure. But then again, Erick had always known that there had been things hidden from him. That fact rarely came up, though.

That fact was the main reason he wanted to become a Full Wizard, though. Once he achieved that, then no one could influence him through magic, without his permission, ever again.

- - - -

Zolan delivered a litany of news, “The Regency, through its Regent Augustive Glorious Tidewalker, is politely demanding that you forgo your trip to Storm’s Edge. They have tried to assure us that they have the situation in control. This is a lie. Burhendurur’s elites have already moved into the land, and they’re reporting back a number of untoward events. Archmage Wiloza Tidecaller, a Slime Mage, is acting semi-autonomously, and Shaping the land around the Pit into something else. We’re unsure of her ultimate goals right now, but reports indicate she wants to make the land defensible. She started doing that when Lord Aroido Tidecaller came out of the dungeon carrying a bunch of wildlife he prized, and they had a private conversation. After depositing his wildlife into dungeon 1, in the center of the dungeon space, Lord Aroido ordered the normal dungeons to move their entrances, and all the other dungeon entrances have moved out of the pit, leaving only dungeon 6 there. Dungeon six is still closed to outsiders.

“That’s it for actual action.

“There’s a lot of talking happening in the halls of power down there, as they’re still deciding on their ultimate actions. All of the Regency is currently in emergency meetings with the Storm Priests, their trading guilds, the guard, the Sailors, and a few others from nearby in the Archipelago.” Zolan finished with, “Wizard Destiny got the letter detailing the current events. She wishes to speak with you about —and I quote— ‘Whatever the fuck this is’. She wants to become involved whenever it’s a good time for her to become involved.”

Erick said, “Send Destiny a letter with the details today, and tomorrow I’ll get her with a [Gate].

“Get some people into those meetings with the Regency and everyone else.

“I’ll be taking a meeting with the Regent, privately. No more than 3 important people. Make that happen.

“And then I’m going to the pit, to see all this disaster for myself.” Erick looked over to Poi, who nodded at the glance. “And Poi will be coming with me. No Teressa or Aisha?”

Poi said, “They’re staring at the sky right now, trying to pin down exactly what Teressa saw. Results are inconclusive.”

“That’s fine.” Erick looked to Zolan.

Zolan had tendrils of thoughts coming off of his head, but none of them were in-depth conversations with others, for he had already anticipated Erick’s answers and had prepared accordingly; he just needed final confirmation in order to— Zolan winced a little, and then began speaking, “I’ll get the letter done and sent within the hour. Mox is attempting to send people to those meetings now that she has your permission; they’re already nearby. The Regent is prepared for you; you can appear at the front of the castle in ten minutes at the earliest. They ask you to not approach the Pit without escorts.”

“All acceptable. Then I’m leaving now.” Erick looked to Poi. “One detour, first.”

Erick opened a [Gate] back to his gate space, inside Benevolence, and walked through.

Poi followed.

Erick shut the [Gate] behind them.

- - - -

Erick said, “No time to really process what’s happening, so was I here, or not? These last eleven-ish years?”

Poi said, “I think Melemizargo thinks you weren’t here, and he’s not a liar so there’s surely something to that declaration, but I’m pretty sure you were here. If there was a difference, I could not tell the difference.”

Erick breathed out a little, feeling better already. “So I didn’t skip out on my kids, on the kingdom?”

“I would say you were here, Erick. The gods can say what they want to say, though.”

Erick nodded, and then he went on to easier topics. “This intervention?”

“Standard anti-meme put forth by the Script. Now that you’re immune to it, I can talk about it, but it wasn’t affecting anything at the House, or otherwise. And yes, there are other anti-memes out there. Usually it's we Mind Mages enacting those sorts of things, in order to erase some dangerous magical working from the public consciousness. Forgotten Campaigns and all that.”

“I did not expect to encounter one down in Storm’s Edge. I hope Everbless turns out okay. He seemed like a good kid. Hopefully he isn’t freaking out down there right now, with all the sudden changes.” And then Erick asked a big question, “Do I need to come back to the House, to be in charge of everything?”

“You want me to say ‘yes’, but I can honestly say ‘no’. We’re adjusting, but we’ll be fine. Besides, you have an obligation to Yggdrasil.”

“Is Kiri really doing okay, though? I’m worried about her.”

Poi smiled at the rapid series of questions and concerns, and at how deeply Erick cared. “Kiri is adjusting the most of any of us, but she’s doing fine, too.”

“Okay. Good.” Erick breathed deep, then he said, “Let’s get through this disaster, and then I’m off to help Atunir, or something.”

Poi nodded serenely.

The Apparent King adjusted his clothes a little, checked himself over with some mana sense, and then he was ready. Black horns like a crown. Impeccable suit/robe; white and black and a touch of silver. Poi was dressed for deployment into a political zone, too.

He opened the [Gate] to Storm’s Edge.

- - - -

Erick Flatt, Wizard of Benevolence and Apparent King, stepped down onto the blue-stone road that wound into Regency Castle. The castle itself loomed ahead. From this angle, it was a rather normal-looking collection of white stone buildings and bright blue roofs, and with enough architectural flourishes to mark it as a truly important place. It looked the same as it did the last time Erick was here; when Soltic and Vanya had accompanied Jarod and Glariol into the castle, to give their presentation to Lord Aroido. The guards lining the blue road were different, though.

Guards stood at attention on both sides of the pathway, all of them wearing their dress armor or uniforms.

The place was set up for the arrival of the Apparent King.

The fountains burbled wonderfully. The grass and flowers had been manicured one last, rushed-yet-perfect time. The windows and the walls were cleaned recently.

And a trumpeter announced Erick’s arrival with a rapid blast of sound.

A good forty knights and other assorted important people stood at rapid attention, lining both sides of the road leading into the castle. Down the blue road, standing in the massive archway leading inside, waited Regent Augustive Glorious Tidewalker, Archmage Wiloza Tidewalker, and off to the side, Lord Aroido Tidewalker.

Augustive and Aroido possessed similar features; a normal height for a man, black hair with a bit of grey in it, though Augustive had a lot more grey, and similar builds. They were older men who still clung to power, and it showed. More so in Augustive’s position at the center of the arrangement though, and since he had a gold-coin shoulder cape to go along with his grey suit. That shoulder cape was the mark of his office of Regent, passed down from the former Last King of the Archipelago some few hundred years ago to the Tidewalker family. The Tidewalkers were the regents until the Stormcaller family returned, but those last, hidden family members had been killed by Shades before they could retake the throne. And now, the Regency held power.

Archmage Wiloza was an elderly woman, maybe 85, with grey hair done up in a bun, and tanned skin. She looked wiry, and rather perturbed at finally seeing Erick in the flesh. A lot of people here shared that sort of look as they gazed upon Erick. Erick had once made vague promises to never come here unless it was absolutely needed, and now, the need was here, and everyone was on edge.

Where was Head Priestess Tiza Nindi, though? Erick supposed he did specify 3 people, at most, but he still expected Tiza to ignore that command and come anyway. A quick check with Ophiel showed that Tiza was at the Blue Church, currently arguing with Sailor Asmus, who was giving just as good as he got. Erick decided not to pay attention to that anymore.

A bunch of thoughts and concerns flitted through Erick’s mind as he strode forward, down the blue road, to stand before the Regent and his people. The soldiers on both sides of the road barely breathed, holding their tension in their lungs and shoulders and in their legs. Some people peeked out from windows high up in the castle; worry writ large on their faces.

What was the Wizard going to do?

What indignity were they going to suffer?

Would the Wizard stay long—

Regent Augustive began to speak before Erick got all the way to a proper speaking distance. “The Regency greets you and welcomes you to Storm’s Edge, Wizard Flatt. We would ask your intentions in this unprompted visit.”

Erick stood before Augustive, and said, “I heard a great calamity was either coming or already here, and I came to ensure the best possible outcome for all. How would you like to proceed, Regent Augustive?”

“We would proceed first with telling the Wizard that he is on foreign soil at the moment, and that though we are allies, he has little power over our internal matters. Secondly, we do welcome your assistance, but only in the ways that we wish for your assistance to occur. To discuss the coming order of events, please join us in the meeting hall, where we have prepared a briefing of events and some light appetizers, for what is happening right now is well under control. If, when we are done with the briefing, that you decide there is further need for your assistance, we would discuss that. But as of right now, all that needs to be done is being done, and you’ve never been here before, Wizard Flatt.” Regent Augustive smiled diplomatically, saying, “So let the Regency treat you to our bounty.”

“I accept.” And then more friendly, “I heard you have some good fishing here.”

A polite chuckle. “Some of the best in the world!”

After the act out front, Erick followed Augustive into the castle, down the hallway, talking of nothing of much importance at all, such as the state of the ocean and the weather, which was under control. People were watching, after all.

Erick saw no sign of Everbless.

- - - -

The meeting hall was a rather normal affair of one grand table in the center, some paper shapers and similar sorts standing off to the side who were waiting for their turn to speak or to hand out papers, if necessary. There was also a nice, multi-window view of Storm’s Edge, spread out below, across the mountainside and all the way down to the harbor.

Aroido shut the doors to the meeting hall and flicked a switch on the wall, connecting a latent Privacy spellwork to the node network, and enveloping the room in a modicum of security. It wasn’t perfect, but it was the latest, publicly available model of Privacy runework, available for purchase by governments, through House Benevolence. The windows occluded, turning messy, like someone had dragged a hand through a painting of the world outside, but it was just a Privacy filling up the windows, and also running through the walls.

Erick spoke first. “Augustive. The prophecy is a true one. Storm’s Edge is facing some sort of danger, and the dungeons must be made into something to contain and protect the people of this land. I will be assisting here in some deep capacity to ensure that happens, but I will also be combating whatever this disaster is, however it should appear. I would like for my assistance here at this end of solving this prophecy to be minimally disruptive for your people, but it will happen, and the treaties we have between our two powers will ensure that whatever we decide here will remain in place going forward, even after I deal with whatever storms are coming.” Erick said, “Also, Sininindi has finally given me leave to visit Everbless, so I am going to be doing that occasionally from now on.”

Hitting them with so much stuff that they couldn’t properly form a response was a tried and true tactic.

Mostly, everyone from the Regency bristled, unsure where to begin. Archmage Wiloza had an idea of where to begin, but it was not her place to speak first, though Erick saw her visibly holding herself back from breaking that protocol. Lord Aroido seemed relaxed, but he was anything but relaxed…

Ah. He was ready to face his death.

Did he think that Erick was going to erase him, his brothers, and the dungeons? Probably.

Augustive bristled, too, but he formed a response fast enough. “You’d have to go to Everbless himself if you would wish to speak with him. As for this recent disaster, we greatly dislike the entire idea of putting a shelter into a dungeon, and especially since a cultist has just taken over dungeon 6! Now you and your lot might be fine with cultists walking around and doing whatever, but even you would balk at one of them taking over the infrastructure of one of your dungeons, and then turning it into whatever she wanted! She is probably the cause of the coming disaster, we are sure of it, and so, if there is anything at all that you can do for us, we ask you to eradicate Vanya Silver and Soltic Cross from dungeon 6, before we begin to entertain the idea of turning the dungeons into a shelter. Maybe, if this Vanya and Soltic were Ended, then your Benevolent Sky would clear, and there would be no need for your interference in our business.”

“… I know some of this event already, so I was under the impression that Vanya and Soltic were here on Sininindi’s orders. What makes you think that their inclusion is a bad idea?”

Aroido was surprised at that response; at the fact that Erick knew that information at all. But then he realized that of course the Wizard would know about that.

Wiloza seemed a little vindicated that Erick was willing to let Vanya and Soltic live, or maybe she was vindicated for another reason.

Augustive said, “Sininindi tests us with storms and hardship sometimes, and this must be one of those times. Perhaps her true goal is the utter destruction of the dungeons, and then to have them remade into something else. Who can say; certainly not me, and certainly not you. All your Benevolent Sky can tell us is that something bad is happening.”

“… I would hear your briefing, if you would tell it. Perhaps I will hear something I did not know before now.”

Augustive gestured to the table, to a chair for Erick, while Aroido went to the front of the room and Wiloza went to her own chair. And then, with the help of the other people in the room, Aroido rapidly began his presentation, dishing out paperwork and speaking of the history of the dungeons and how they had been trying to make them better for the past several years, but it was only in the last few years where the constant dungeon breaks stopped. This was due to some techniques worked out between the Regency and some other people that Erick would be meeting later. Dungeon breaks still happened these days, though, for Sininindi was constantly sending dungeon masters in to remake the dungeons into something better.

It was one way to look at the situation, for sure.

An incorrect way, some would say.

There was no mention of the Maryols, or of the Storm Priests, or of the Dungeon Guild, or of the fact that the dungeons were still breaking, even now, with their ‘new techniques’, and that the dungeons were barely functional right now. There was no explanation of why the dungeon breaks kept happening, actually, or how Everbless had been the only ‘solution’ to the dungeon breaks that actually worked. There was no word at all about Aroido’s potential mismanagement of the situation, or how the Regency’s primary use for the dungeons —as a monster lure and kill box— was not how the dungeons were supposed to be used, and therefore, that was their major reason for breaking all this time.

Aroido was painting all of Storm’s Edge in a very good light, and he was also trying to save his own life, no doubt. When he was about 80% through with his propaganda-filled talk, and since he didn’t seem to be getting to any of the real information—

“I’m going to stop you there,” Erick said, “Sininindi wants the dungeons better. She invited a pair of accomplished, if secretive masters to come here, and they’re probably immortal through any number of means so of course they’re secretive. They gave you a decent presentation, according to your own words. Why not let them do what they want to do down there?”

Aroido went silent.

Regent Augustive simply said, “They are unlawfully enacting their will upon this land, and that is all I really need to know in order to condemn them. Again, I would ask for your assistance in removing them from our dungeons, if anything at all, and then we can talk about creating a proper dungeon in accordance with the prophecy received today.”

Erick pretended to consider that option, then he said, “What caused this happening over there at the Pit? What caused Vanya and Soltic to lock you out?”

Aroido looked to Augustive.

Augustive nodded.

Aroido began, “I took Miss Silver and Mister Cross into dungeon 6 in order to show them around, for everyone was eager for the dungeons to get made, for Miss Silver’s presentation on her ideas was phenomenal. So I did the tour. Halfway through they turned on me, killing me. Luckily I respawned before they could take over the place, and the dungeon master managed to get me some of my prized fish out of there before they forced the dungeon master to detach from that dungeon, and then leave. Gold Taker is recuperating from— He’s the dungeon master; Gold Taker. He’s an octopus archmage, and he’s recuperating from the ordeal right now. He cannot be with us at this moment.”

Augustive winced, and tried not to show it, when Gold Taker was mentioned.

Wiloza wanted to speak, but she knew not to.

“… Okay. Now that is something I did not know.” Erick stood from his chair. “I’ve heard enough. I’m going to go knock on the dungeon entrance now and get their side of the story. With any luck, I can resolve this in an hour or two.”

Augustive stood, with Archmage Wiloza following a second behind. Augustive gestured at the other Tidewalkers in the room as he spoke, “Archmage Wiloza has already cordoned off the area with her vast Stone magics, and her plan is to continue to do that in preparation for the eventual dungeon shelter that your House has suggested we construct. She is our person who does all of that exterior dungeon work. Lord Aroido is our main contact for the interior of the dungeons, and he knows everything about them. Please accept Aroido’s assistance in going inside the dungeon, for though Miss Vanya Silver has expressed that she has a great deal of knowledge with dungeons, we doubt she could have remade it into anything truly dangerous in the last three hours, for even the fastest repro she could have created would still be floundering around for another 9 hours, at least. She hasn’t even managed to move the dungeon entrance, so how good could she be! So now is the time to [Strike]. Aroido can assist you with that.”

Aside from the fact that Vanya wasn’t moving the entrance as a part of the deals she worked out with Aroido in those last minutes of interaction...

Erick actually considered the offer of Aroido’s assistance for a moment. “… Sure. I’ll take his assistance.”

Aroido looked both pleased and terrified.

Augustive had dropped the use of his royal ‘we’ when he got upset, but now he once again spoke as a king, “We are sure that with his knowledgeable guidance, you will see the crimes of Miss Silver and Mister Cross for what they are, and that even your vaunted benevolence will see that some problems need permanent solutions.”

Aroido continued to look both pleased and terrified, for he was expecting Augustive to say that.

Erick said no more. He opened a [Gate] directly to the Pit, and walked through.

Poi rapidly followed.

Wiloza and Aroido took a moment, but they followed fast enough, while Regent Augustive remained behind.

Erick shut the [Gate] behind them.

- - - -

Erick once again stood on the ledge of the Pit, but in his normal body, and with different people standing all around him. Poi at his left, Archmage Wiloza and Lord Aroido on the right. The situation was completely different from that first time that he was here, and the ledge of the Pit was different, too. Before, it had been a cliff, with a carved, bare-stone valley down below, with holes in the world where the dungeons lay, and Everbless in the sky directing mana in his Gold Taker form.

Erick noted a distinct lack of Everbless that entire meeting they had just come, and his ‘nephew’ was absent from the sky above the Pit, as well—

“They’re going to kill me, Wizard!” Aroido exclaimed, “I and my brothers are the former dungeon masters of the dungeon and the Regency is going to kill me and all my brothers if you don’t save me!”

Wiloza said, “I hate how you’re doing this, but they will kill him and all the other Aroidos to simplify the problem now that you’re here and telling us we all fucked up.”

Erick nodded. “Thank you for coming clean about all that. I’m sure I can still work with the Regency, though, and you’re all going to be safe afterward, as well.”