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The dungeon was set, the memory on the other side of the gate would hold, with all 9s listed on the timer above the path. The path lay directly in the hallway of the grand cathedral that held the Censer, so there was some worry that one of the memories of people would accidentally walk through the gate and end up in the dungeon. But that didn’t happen. The people on the other side didn’t even notice the existence of the gate, and when they walked away from the Censer on a collision course with the gate, they simply walked through the space as though it did not exist.

Because it didn’t exist; not for them. For them, this dungeon, this modern time, was immaterial and false. They were made of Darkness and mana and memory, and a whole lot of Elemental Dream, too. But then again, all the Elements within the Dark’s reality were real. They were certainly more real than the Particles on this side of the gate.

Erick announced the next task, “Now we just have to figure out how to bring things from that side onto this side. We’ll start with some of the trinkets on the walls and all of that; try to figure out how to turn Elemental Stone into granite, which is mostly oxygen, but also silicon and aluminum and potassium and all of that junk. Now would be a good time to research the Grand Translation magic at the start of the Script, I think.”

Solomon opined, “Or you could just try some Wizardry. Maybe based on some [Physical Domain] Wizardry, to inject some physicality into it all.”

Erick nodded, saying, “That sounds like a good base understanding of it all; yes. Especially for the Censer itself. That thing looks like it might be pure Destruction… And adamantium. Whatever adamantium was made of back then, anyway. It certainly wasn’t osmium like it is now.”

Debby said, “Well maybe it was, actually. There was that theory you bandied about regarding the Goddess of Knowledge and how she had to have known what Particles were, if people were transubstantiating between the Old Cosmology and other Cosmologies all the time; Planars and such. They even sacrificed her in order to get at that knowledge, so she had the knowledge, at least there at the end.”

Erick considered that very valid point. And then he said, “Well yes. She was the source of the Grand Translation magic. Perhaps she knew lesser Translations, too… Or someone did. Or someone still does… Or maybe not anymore, because Knowledge was Sacrificed and no one codified Particles until I came along.

“As far as I know, people who come into Veird from elsewhere are codified in the Script, and the Registrars have Translation Magic to facilitate communication, but people aren’t transformed into other forms. I don’t believe that the Script has any innate Grand Translation magic anymore, so we have to figure this out ourselves. But we could just ask someone? Hard to know without asking someone...” Erick hummed. He continued, “Anyway. I made that pure-Benevolence scroll a few weeks ago. Maybe I can reverse the process. I might have to, actually, since I’m getting the feeling that that sort of magic was truly Sacrificed for the greater good of Veird.”

“You know…” Solomon said, “I kinda think that’s why it took so long for Particle Magic to be made.” As people looked to him for explanations, Solomon said, “We’ve already gone over it once, but perhaps there is no memetic threat. Perhaps the Sacrifice of Knowledge is truly what stopped advancements for so long.”

Debby frowned a little, saying, “No. There’s a memetic threat out there. I am sure of it.”

“Well yeah,” Solomon admitted. “I’m pretty sure there is, too, but there is value in pursuing less obvious answers to questions about the current state of the world. So let’s all keep an open mind.”

Erick could find no fault with that, and it looked like no one else could, either.

Poi moved on first, saying, “I can already tell you that no one knows how to properly Translate mana into particles, and that the Grand Translation magic that was used at the beginning of the Script is no longer a retrievable function of the Script, because that functionality was lost sometime between the Death of all Halves and the Rage Wars. A lot of stuff was lost back then.”

Erick said, “Oh. Well...”

Poi continued, “There have been a lot of attempts at regaining… Ah. Well that’s something obvious I didn’t think of. Maybe we do still have Grand Translation Magic in the Script after all.”

While Poi had spoken, Erick’s mind spun into a thousand directions, eventually distracting the sapphire scaled man. As others looked from Poi to Erick, they wondered what was up.

Erick simply said, “The Grand Translation is just an instantiation of possibility into solid form based on this reality. In the greatest sense, we already have examples of this happening in this very day, like how Familiars become real people, or how shadelings crawl out of the shadows. One day soon, maybe 3 months away, Ophiel is going to become a real soul and he will create a real body at that time.”

Ophiel flapped his wings on Erick’s shoulder, asking, “I will?”

“Yes you will,” Erick said, “Which leads me to believe that either the Script still has Grand Translation magics in it —highly likely; almost assuredly— or it’s easy for mana to create real things, when in a proper environment. So! Here’s what I want to do: Leave the Censer on that side for days or a week, or whatever, while we research Translation Magic. We might not have to search for long, though, because I am reasonably sure that I can make a Translation happen, even without knowing the exact way all the particles go together. All I have to do is guide the Script and Particles over into that side of reality, while also calling on the mana to support such a translation.” He said to Debby, “This would probably be that mag-9 Particle Magic we were talking about.” He said to everyone, “It would be a multiversal pull using the possibility provided by mana as a baseline resource and the underlying nature of the current visual and mana-soaked reality as a catalyst or sounding board toward getting the real thing.

“I think I could send out a pulse of power, probably using [Physical Domain] like Solomon suggests, into an item, in order to make that item recognize itself along the parameters of this universe. Like using a picture of a thing in order to make the thing.”

Erick felt he was touching upon some universal truth in that statement; perhaps quite literally.

The others were less convinced.

Poi gave a concerned-yet-hiding-it, “Okaaaay.”

Solomon said, “You’re considering that ‘particles’ are the ‘mana’ of this universe, and thus a translation is possible through the possibilities provided by a multiverse just on the other side of sight.”

“Yes!” Erick said, “You get it!”

Jane spoke up, “Now I’m not one to usually suggest this, but perhaps you should just talk to Rozeta about this. Or Quilatalap. Or any of the others. Use them as a sounding board before you go doing the same with reality itself.”

“Well yes,” Erick said, “I could do that. But not yet. We’re not really at that point.”

Solomon said, “And besides. All this shit is basically just [True Resurrection] magic, anyway, and you already know how to do that.”

Erick side-eyed him, saying, “It’s a lot more complicated than that.”

“Explain how,” Solomon said, challenging him.

“Those people beyond the gate can be Soul Magic’d over here, sure. But artifacts often do not have souls, and so using Soul Magic on them and expecting it to work would be like eating soup with a toothpick,” Erick said. “Souls are easy to build bodies around. Souls want to be inside bodies. Artifacts have complicated magical reinforcements that are completely disconnected from each other. You couldn’t build a car from a headlight. But you could build a car from a blueprint and metals and a bunch of actual work.”

Solomon said, “Aye, that’s a complication. But do you really think that these items don’t have souls? That Censer is probably even an artifact that makes its own mana; it certainly looks culturally significant to me.”

“… Point,” Erick said.

Debby spoke up, “Bodies are super complicated, but souls can build those all the time. This is a Healing Magic problem, isn’t it? Perhaps we do need a god’s help in this part.”

Erick thought. Solomon considered.

Candice was kinda checking out of the magic conversation, for she muttered, “I thought we had gotten past the most difficult part.”

Beth said, “This was never going to be easy.”

“I think it’s interesting,” Emily said, “But I’m not sure I can help right now.”

Jane tried to cut through the gordian knot, “Make the dungeon do the work.” She added, “Or really, Melemizargo.”

Erick instantly said, “The problem with that is that no one will accept such artifacts.”

“They’ll barely accept them anyway,” Solomon said, “The chances of them working as they’re supposed to work and being what we want them to be are higher if we get divine help, yes, but then we’re beholden to gods.”

“And that’s not good,” Debby said.

“Oh! I just thought—” Erick suggested, “What about working along an Elemental Dream axis in order to reach a targeted Reality and bring it to reality? Like summoning a fae through Fairy? Or an angel or demon through Angel or Demon?” He gestured to the land beyond the gate. “That is a Dream, after all.”

Before the conversation could tangle further, Poi spoke up, “Let’s circle back to your original statement: Let’s bring some trinkets from that side to this side and try to make them real before we go after the Censer.”

Beth was very ready to get past the talking stage of this ordeal, so she instantly said, “On it!” as she started walking fast toward the gate.

Erick shouted, “There are—! … Still people on that side. Hmm.”

Beth was already through the gate, up and over in the Dark Dream within a handful of moments.

What happened next was surprising in many different ways.

The Cathedral of Destruction was what the place was known as, according to the words coming from the priests and otherwise as they gave their speech, as they watched over the continued destruction of some sort of artifact, which filled the land with knee-height heavy black smoke. There were a lot of simple facts displayed there, as all of that happened. But one of them suddenly stood out to Erick, as more important than all the rest. Those people were speaking Ecks. That fact hadn’t quite registered to Erick, or the others, until now, for some reason.

The entire ceremony had been in Ecks.

Erick knew the language they were speaking on the other side. This ancient language was known.

How the fuck?

Which made it all the more terrifying, in an existential sort of way, when Beth stepped onto the floor of the Cathedral, ignoring the smoke layered across the ground, headed straight for a pew, where some loose papers were stored in a slot behind the pew ahead. Those prayer papers were an easy target; they looked mass-produced, and there were a hundred pews in the cathedral that held similar papers. They were a good base for a repeatable experiment. She grabbed those loose prayer sheets—

And a priest at the Censer called out, “Ma’am! Worship isn’t for another cycle! You shouldn’t be in here!”

Beth acted fast, “Sorry, sir!” She plucked the papers and was already on her way out, saying, “I didn’t mean to interrupt! Don’t mind me; leaving right now.”

“Ma’am!” The priest came down from the side of the Censer, saying, “You can’t take—” He stopped still. He stared, watching as Beth stepped into the air, walking up the stairs of the Gate. To him, what Beth was doing had to be some sort of blasphemy, or something, for her to be walking into the air, maybe; Erick wasn’t quite sure. Or maybe he could see the gate? Erick hoped the fuck not. Either way, the priest knew something was up. The priest roared, “GUARDS! Seize— What… Where did she go!”

Just like she had gone too fast for Erick to tell her otherwise, Beth was already through the gate and down the other side, gripping papers in her hands. She looked over her shoulder to see if anyone was following while she handed off the disintegrating papers to her father.

No one was following.

Erick took the papers in his aura and flicked a spell of Time into the air, making a bubble of Stopped time atop the ‘papers’. The papers stopped disintegrating. Mostly. But they were also just mana, and like all broken spellwork, they were trying to return to the manasphere. Erick left it there for now; it would keep for a moment while he dealt with the fallout of Beth’s theft.

The priest and his guards, and then a second priest who had been out of view, all started shouting about what they had just seen, or not seen. The priest rushed forward, down the aisle toward the gate, but he stopped halfway to where Beth had vanished.

The guards mercilessly advanced. The guard on the left was a woman with pointed ears and blood-red eyes, who had some sort of short staff in her hands. She swirled the smoke at her feet and the smoke swirled at her command, flowing forward like several tendrils, headed to the gate—

And passing right through, as though the gate was not there.

The second guard was a man with a halo of silver hovering around the back of his head, looking like a thin razor, or a sword made into a circle. He telekinetically took the razor into his hand as he rushed forward, passing through the gate-occupied space and then beyond. Erick heard the man call out ‘I don’t see them!’

“Fucking shit,” muttered the priest. “Were the parishioners followed? Was that a demon?”

“Absolutely not,” came the voice of the razor-ring man, who was still out-of-frame, and whom Erick now recognized as an alvani; a human/angel man. Before the Old Demons had caused the Death of all Halves in order to make the demon/human incani, the only sort of hybrid of souls that used to be able to exist between those old powers were of the angel/human variety. Or other angelic flavors. Angel/elf was a common one, too. The razor-ring guard stepped back into view, demanding to know, “You felt the Dark and the mana pouring off of her, didn’t you? She was a Shade of the over-god.”

The elf woman instantly fired back, “Do not speak such blasphemy without proof. All she had was a strong manasoul and…” The woman angrily gestured to the space where Beth had vanished. “And some sort of hiding magics. Maybe she was a Wizard-in-training.” She said to the priest, “I don’t believe she was a demon.”

The alvani man said, “I felt a fraction of Vile from her, but there was so much…”

“Hard to say,” said the elf, completing the man’s thought.

The priest stared hard at the land in front of him, as people poked their heads into frame, far down the cathedral. The priest breathed, then said, “I think it was a demon.”

The alvani man shouted, “It wasn’t a demon! It was—”

Erick tuned them out, because Jane was talking.

Jane asked everyone, “Anyone else suddenly finding it fucking terrifying that we can understand them, but they’re speaking other languages? And that we didn’t even think about this with the others with that Purity fountain, who spoke some other language, too?”

Abigail, Beth, Candice, and Debby all tensed.

Emily, Poi, and Solomon, did not.

Poi said, “I’m already trying to understand what happened there. All I can tell right now is that Erick realized this half a minute ago, then I was next, and then Solomon, and now everyone else. There was a clarity of thought that was achieved, that had not been there before. I have no idea what it means.”

The priest and his two guards on the other side of the gate continued to argue about what they had seen. Nothing important had changed there.

Solomon gestured to the prayer sheets, frozen in time. “And those are legible. Wheatly. Come out now.”

Solomon’s staff flashed to fullness beside him, hovering gently, the white crystal at the top glowing softly, as the image of wheat fields held reflected on the silver surface. Words were also on that surface, carved deep and strong. Solomon was already reading the surface, and Erick was, too.

Solomon said, “Don’t see any words I recognize as words, except for the ones I put down myself; ‘Repent all sinners and be spared’.”

Erick didn’t see any words he recognized either, so he moved on to the sheet of paper. It was completely legible. He gestured at the paper, “That’s a prayer to Destruction Itself. No one will be saying those words out loud except me, maybe, in order to instantiate the Censer to this reality. And not right now.”

The argument beyond the gate was reaching a crescendo.

The priest shouted, “This is intolerable and unprofessional! Not only did you two see the anomaly but you let her go! I was the one who actually acted—”

Ring-man said, “And if you would have been calmer, she might have stuck around and we would have gotten answers.”

Smoke elf spoke, “Stop,” and the knee-high smoke rippled with her voice. The other two went silent, but not out of fear; but because they respected her. The smoke elf calmly said, “Might have simply been a fair folk. We can send a letter to Wizard Hewer, with our three accounts of what happened, and then we wait for him to show. In the meanwhile, we secure the area and increase the guards on the Censer, as we would do for any anomalous activity that happened around a Destruction.”

“Ughhh,” Erick and Solomon groaned at almost the same time.

Candice voiced, “That means that if we wait to steal it, it’s just going to get harder?”

“Probably,” Poi said.

“Would another Wizard even be real?” Jane asked.

“I wouldn’t risk it,” Poi said.

Solomon asked, “Chance speaking to them? Try to prevent them from doing anything drastic?”

Emily said, “Sounds to me like they have to actually call their Wizard. He can’t just appear like you can, dad. We might have a window of opportunity here that will close later.”

Emily was right, and everyone else knew it, too.

Erick thought for a moment.

He looked across a gulf of eternity and reality, from the present, to a memory of the deepest past that could be real under the right circumstances. There were many ways to create the ‘right circumstances’. There was that Name Finder artifact from Crystal Archmage Imara, from Greensoil. That red cube was good to use on people. Erick had used that small red cube upon the Riamites who wanted [Reincarnation]s. But before the Name Finder, there was the simple act of experiencing the Other and making it real through constant exposure. The Name Finder was a fast-ways to make that realization happen, but the normal method was the second one. From shadelings coming out of their fugue and realizing they were in a new body and life, to what was happening to Ophiel right now as his soul was gradually being made real…

The smoke elf’s words were grating to the priest and the ring-man’s sensibilities.

Their argument started up again.

Anyone watching the argument quickly found out that something like ‘a person appearing and then leaving without any traces’ did not happen in the Cathedral of Destruction. The smoke elf tried some old-school mana tracing, as one would use for anyone [Teleport]ing in the Old Cosmology, but her trace ended at the gate, and she had no idea what that meant. ‘It shouldn’t be possible!’ she said, more than once. All in all, they had very little methodology for dealing with what they were dealing with.

Some priest on the other side of the cathedral, watching all this happen with the others, had already calmly walked away, saying they would send the signal. No one seemed to be in a real rush, though.

There was time to talk about next steps.

Erick asked, “Beth? How was your mana sense on the other side? Cause mine ends about at the gate, or a little bit beyond.”

Everyone’s mana sense ended at the gate threshold.

Beth said, “It came back once I was through the gate, but it was wonky. Very short.”

All the other girls nodded at that. They had all experienced the land beyond the gate the other time, when it was focused on that Purity Fountain.

“Aura control?” Erick asked.

The girls all said variations of ‘not much’. Beth agreed that this situation here was like the situation before.

Jane said, “Control in the body was easy, but mostly I just attuned to the Dark as much as my slime form allowed, and tried to constrain the mana into my body.”

Candice said, “All that flesh-flaking was our mana destroying our impure body from within.”

“Expelling our particles, yeah,” Beth said. “It’s still the Dark over there.”

Erick nodded, and said, “Well let’s see if this works… and if it does, these people are probably going to awaken as real. So that’ll be fun.”

The group tensed, except for Poi—

As Erick stepped toward the gate and threaded his aura outward, forming a thin line of white glows. His aura reached the gate, and the strange surreality contained within. It was like dipping his toes into ice and knives, and not like either of those two things at all. ‘Pain’ was not the feeling here. More like Erick was touching something that was not meant to be touched.

His aura proceeded anyway, through the gate, flickering lightning—

“Something comes!” said the priest, rapidly backing up from the empty air, almost running back to the Censer. He stopped halfway there.

The warriors had other ideas. More violent ones. The smoke elf rolled smoked at Erick’s aura, disrupting his power all the way back to his side of the gate, while the ring-man’s angelic-powered ring whipped forward in some sort of attack. That ring vanished as it passed through the gate. And then the ring reappeared, slicing back through the space again, in the other direction, to return to the man’s hand.

The elf whispered, “An intangible [Gate].”

The ring man nodded, preparing himself for the worst.

Erick frowned. And then he manipulated his aura to form the words for ‘peace’, which would have been impossible because he didn’t know the words for ‘peace’ in whatever language they were speaking, but ‘peace’ was upon the prayer sheets that Beth had stolen. And so, Erick showed them ‘peace’, disregarding the fact that there was a large disconnect happening right here between how languages got in his head and how they had gotten on the other side, and how all of that worked.

… Mostly disregarding all of that.

The smoke elf almost attacked again, but her smoke pulled back at the last second when she saw the words ‘peace’.

She demanded, “You hear us?”

“… Uh.” Erick looked at the prayer song. “I can’t answer that question based on the information I have.” He looked to Poi.

Poi spoke, “I’m working on it.” His tendrils were through the gate. The people on the other side didn’t seem to sense them, either, which was some sort of miracle or something. “Okay. I’m getting it. What do you want to write?” Erick wanted to ask about how he was making his tendrils invisible, but— Poi answered, “I’m making them not able to see me, but they are on very high alert. I can’t reach the guys in the back, and they’re going to call in reinforcements soon. I'll give you 2 minutes.”

Erick told Poi, “Say ‘I can barely hear you. We’re in another realm.’ We’ll go from there.”

Poi supplied Erick with the words he was looking for, and Erick repeated those words in his aura display, just beyond the gate’s other side.

The warriors tensed as they read, turning solid in the face of an unknown threat—

Poi pulled back. “I got the full language. It’s called ‘Imperial’. They’re in the Endless Empire, in the Farundari Stretch of the Radiant Depths. Year 12,400 according to their calendar—”

“Why are you here? Who was that invader from before? That woman?” the smoke elf asked, her voice slightly louder than before.

Erick had a thought, Poi supplied his words before he even needed to ask, and Erick wrote out, “Your realm is dead. You have been subsumed by the Dark, as a memory. We’re here to rescue you and the Censer, but mostly the Censer. We are still working on how to do all of that, but those are our goals.”

Jane asked Poi, “Do they even have minds to read?”

Poi said, “I don’t know how it works either, Jane.”

Erick left the message there. The people on the other side instantly started debating amongst themselves.

There were suddenly other concerns for Erick, though.

Erick said to his family, “For some reason, as we talk with them, the barrier is getting thicker and deeper. But also thinner, paradoxically. There’s a bigger depth, but the thickness of punching through that depth is easier. Also: according to my All-Seeing Eye, their souls are brightening. I’m pretty sure I could [True Resurrection] all of them if they got close enough to the gate. So that’s one half of the translation problem solved but I still have no idea how to instantiate the Censer.”

“You’d have to [Reincarnation] both of them, too; not just [True Resurrection],” Solomon said. “Alvani cannot exist on this side. Elves are non-grata.”

Jane asked, “Are you really going to bring the people to life?”

Candice added, “They’re not real right now. We do not have to take on this security risk.”

Erick was starting to think Candice was the bloodthirsty one, but they all were like that. Candice just let it show more than the others, when she could.

“Yes we do have to take on this security risk,” Erick said, “Besides! Who else would know how the Censer functions best—”

The very second Erick announced his true intentions, something shifted in the very foundations of existence. The Dark surrounding the slime dungeon flexed. The black ocean roiled—

Fallopolis stepped out of the air, onto the grounds beside Erick’s family. The Shade of Civilization wore a masculine-cut black suit and she held her black kendrithyst crystal staff in her left hand. Her wild, curly white hair bobbed as she stepped forward heavily, her bright eyes happily shining white, as she said, “We are glad you are making the decision to rescue people from Dark Dreams, Erick. Please allow me to witness this event, and to help with the aftermath.”

The gate deepened as Fallopolis spoke.

A pathway became apparent.

On Erick’s side, nothing physically changed. Not really. But Erick’s aura control around the gate space got a whole lot easier, and a whole lot of shit simultaneously happened on the other side, for the elf and the alvani instantly backed up, taking hard stances. Erick wasn’t sure what they were seeing, for he wasn’t sure what he was seeing either.

Erick said to Fallopolis, “They’re going to Candlepoint if they—”

“Ho!” called the elf, “I hear you now!”

“We’re not going fucking anywhere!” roared the alvani.

The shadows of the past backed up, and started arguing again.

Erick put up a sound barrier, then asked Fallopolis, “Any idea how come we know the language?”

Fallopolis smiled a little, saying, “Tsk tsk, Erick. Making Wizardry and not fully understanding it? How ever will you cope with the mystery!”

“Don’t deflect,” Erick said, “This is serious. This is a memetic hazard. How do we know this language? How is Poi able to work Mind Magic on them at all?”

Fallopolis shaped right up, saying, “You separated this dungeon from the Script as much as you could, but the Script has some basic functionality with translations—”

“Well that’s one question answered,” Solomon said.

Fallopolis continued, “But not on this level that you’re working. I’m pretty sure the gate is somehow inherently full of Translation Magic. I have no idea why you only recognized this until now. I thought that was the point; translating things. But magic does cross the 10% divide quite often if you’re 90% there.” She turned toward the gate, saying, “All magic is about communication, too, so I’m not exactly sure why you’re that surprised. You not recognizing that you were working Translation Magic is peculiar, though.”

Erick touched the Lidless eyes hanging around his neck, beside his All-Seeing Eye. “Not very effective, eh?”

Debby pulled the Bracelet of Memory from her pocket and snapped it around her wrist. She winced, her eyes darting around for a moment before she settled.

Candice had the Crown of Self hanging from a loop on her belt, but now she put it on her head. She said, “Havuhohpwt oijqwe pjpati oqu.”

Everyone looked at her.

“The area Translation Magic isn’t working for you anymore,” Fallopolis said, somehow simultaneously in Imperial, and Ecks, the two strings of sounds coming out of her mouth like she was a dubbed actor and the audio techs had forgotten to remove the original soundtrack.

Candice shrugged. This was fine.

Poi said to Erick, “They’re artifacts and we’re in the Dark, Erick. Their effect would only ever be minimal… Though I only realized there was a translation effect after you did. So— Ah. Later.”

The guys on the other side had stopped arguing, so Poi went silent with his point.

The elf spoke up, and Erick released the sound barrier, “Can you prove you are the Dark?”

“I’m not the Dark,” Erick said, and his voice reached them. “I’m just a Wizard, poking through the memories of the Dark, searching for things to salvage from a destroyed universe.”

As terror crept across the faces of the elf and alvani, the dungeon flexed again.

The pathways between Old and New widened, and like the brush of a thousand ephemeral silks, Erick felt a wind billow from the gate. Lightning flickered here and there, dancing in and out of the space, linking both sides together.

And suddenly the people on the other side looked through the gate, and saw Erick and his family. And also Fallopolis.

The elf surrounded herself with smoke—

But the alvani’s armor began to flake away. He yelped and leapt backward, crashing through wooden pews as he retreated, yelling, “It’s an attack!”

“It’s not an attack!” Erick called out, “Our realms are just incompatible. You’re in the Dark, like a shadeling.” He rapidly asked Fallopolis, “They know about shadelings, right?”

Fallopolis rapidly answered, “They’re powerful people and they know magic; they should.”

Debby whispered, “That alvani is bleeding now. A lot. Is that because of the stuff?”

She meant the switch from when the Old Demons broke the Script in order to make incani, and disallow alvani.

Fallopolis answered, “Extremely, yes. It takes an act of the Dark to keep alvani alive over here. Priestess was only able to remain together because of His actions, and only as a skeleton.”

The alvani guarded himself beside the Censer, a good forty meters away. Blood flowed freely from him, while an acolyte tried to heal him. The healing wasn’t working too well, though. The alvani cried out in pain, and the acolyte stopped, saying, ‘I don’t know! I don’t know! The gods— I don’t feel them anymore!’

Well, Erick thought, that would be because the gods you’re praying for don’t exist over there.

A double handful of people huddled behind the Censer, and near the alvani warrior, well past the edge of the mixing-of-realities effect, or whatever it was that was happening between this side and that side. The elf stayed closer, though. Elves weren’t removed from Veird by the Death of all Halves; they were removed from Veird because of systemic genocide against them.

The elf stood still, gauging what she was seeing. Erick’s mana senses now extended about that far, so she was probably sensing Erick just as much as he was sensing her. Her body was entirely made of mana, while her soul was thin, but growing stronger. A lot stronger, actually. She would soon meet the same fate as the alvani if Erick didn’t act soon, tho—

“What is wrong with your bodies?” the elf asked. “You’re made of nothings.”

Erick said, “We’re made of various forces that are present in this Cosmology, which are not present in your Cosmology.”

The priest, who huddled by the Censer with the alvani, called out, “Wizard Hewer is on his way! You better leave, or you face Destruction Itself!”

Fallopolis softly said, “I doubt it. The stabilized memory is only a cubic kilometer. Nothing will enter that space from the outside. If they come out on this side without being fully out of their fugue then you better be prepared for some raging shadelings, Erick. Or don’t let them come on this side too fast.”

Erick listened to Fallopolis, but he also watched the elf. Something very interesting was happening to her. As the woman listened to Fallopolis her soul magnified tenfold, that ephemeral thing that lay just below her skin and within the core of her body —for she was an accomplished mage, with a true core— turning from a mist to a thick cloud. By the time Fallopolis finished speaking, Erick now knew what he was looking at. He had seen the exact same thing happen to shadelings a thousand times, as they woke up from their shadow fugue.

Right on cue, the elf looked around, her eyes going wide as she blinked rapidly. And then she went hard, slowly stepping away from the gate as power flowed from her core to grab the smoke all around her, prayers falling from her lips, “What is this trickery—”

Fallopolis called out, “Girl! Take a look at your armor! Your skin. You’re in the Dark. You’re flaking away. As soon as you become fully cognizant, you will die if you retreat deeper in the Dark.”

The smoke elf paused, briefly eyeing her arms. And then she stopped and watched as a layer of silver armor flaked away from her gauntleted right arm like a scab floating away in the bath, revealing that her arms were already wounded with unfelt destruction pulling her apart.

“It’s a trick!” called the ring man. “Get away from there Shalia! Wizard Hewer is on his way!”

Fallopolis instantly said to Erick, “That’s not going to happen. That space is contained over there. Just as all their gods don’t exist over there, there is no Wizard Hewer capable of reaching that land.”

Shalia stilled. She stared at Erick, and then at Fallopolis, then back to Erick, calmly asking, “What is this?”

Erick said, “Your soul is developing far enough for you to see yourself and the world around you for what it is. With every passing moment, I can mana sense more of your world over there, and you can do the same for mine. No doubt you see that right under me is stone, but also nothing; the Dark is down there. It is the same on your side. I see about two meters of stone under your feet, and then it’s the Dark, roiling and shifting with memories and magic.” Erick said, “The light coming from those windows up there is false.” As Erick said those words, the cathedral darkened, the light of day fading beyond the windows. And now Darkness crept in, replacing the glass in the windows entirely. It spilled forth like slow tendrils. “And now your world is collapsing. Everything beyond what we have focused on is a memory. Despair if you wish, but know that there is hope. Come to this side and be reborn. And we want the Censer, too.”

Erick made sure they knew what he was really after. It might help to save them, or not. People were suspicious when you tried to help only them, but if you gave them a demand with that help, then they were more apt to believe your words, especially if you truly were after something else and only happened to meet them, in their time of need.

Shalia delayed, tensing—

The alvani man shouted, “He’s a demon, Shalia! Get away from him!”

Shalia stepped back and her silver armor suddenly frayed, blood spooling into the air, all becoming shadows.

A lot of questions occurred to Erick, as he watched the elf woman slowly disintegrate. Why was she falling apart, and not the ground, or the pews, or the walls or the ceiling? Why were the solid, dead things made of mana, surviving better than Shalia, with her soul? But the second he had that question, he answered himself. Shalia had a soul. The rest of the world over there did not… Maybe the Censer did? Erick wasn’t sure. The Censer seemed to be holding up fine—

Shalia’s right forearm broke into fragments of nothing, though her soul remained where it had been. That soul was the only thing holding her hand in position, though there was no flesh between it and the rest of her arm. Shalia stared at that fragmentation, her eyes hotly recognizing her mortality.

“I never meant for this transposition to cause pain or harm, but I can already see that’s where we’re headed.” Erick said. “Let me save you, Shalia. Let me pull you and all the others from this memory of the Dark.”

Shalia’s hand fell off. And then her knee began to disintegrate—

“Time’s up, Erick,” Solomon said, before he declared, “J, A, E, C; capture and rescue. D, B, stay and support.”

Jane, Abigail, Emily, and Candice all rushed forward, moving as an invasive unit. Beth and Debby went slightly slower. The girls moved at incredibly enhanced speeds, but Solomon’s aura moved faster. With lightning-rimmed light, Solomon sent power through the portal—

Erick briefly considered interrupting. He weighed the pros and cons of stopping this invasion, this violence. But Solomon was right. Erick understood what his brother was doing, so that he didn’t have to, so that he could remain the positive force, while Solomon did what was necessary. Erick was thankful for that, because he had been half a moment away from doing exactly what Solomon was doing.

—and Solomon’s power latched on to Shalia like a clutching fist of Benevolent Lightning. Solomon pulled, simultaneously crushing Shalia’s brief attempt at resistance and securing her soul within his lightning, for the woman disintegrated completely when she passed through the gate. All of the mana of her body vanished into the manasphere of the dungeon.

And then Solomon manually cast [True Resurrection], flashing Shalia back to life, into a physical body that was completely at home in this reality. He flashed a [Reincarnation] across her body next, taking several seconds to set her to rights, to take away her elvish body and give her a human one.

Fallopolis and Erick casually watched that happen.

And then Erick turned his full attentions back to the gate, to watch the girls' invasion.

People screamed. They tried fighting back.

The priest stood beside the Censer and called out words of power above the carved metal cauldron, but nothing happened. This distressed the priest almost as much as when Jane tackled the alvani warrior and tangled the disintegrating warrior up in webbing wrought from her hands. Jane threw the bundle of a person twenty meters, into Debby’s waiting power, who then handed it off to Solomon’s waiting aura, nearer the gate. Jane moved on to help Candice grab the priest behind the Censer. The four girls at the front moved fast, subduing and capturing, while the other two transported people out of the Darkening cathedral. Some got away, rushing forward into the Dark, unable to see the Dark ahead of them. Others shied away from the waterfalls of black coming out of the windows, only to fall into the girls’ webs.

Within two minutes there were 9 bundles of webs on this side of the gate, and Erick was resurrecting and reincarnating them right alongside Solomon.

By the time the girls came through with the last person, the land beyond was falling apart and all the rescued people had been made viable for life on this side of reality.

Some of them had been harder to bring back than others. The alvani warrior’s cocoon had completely collapsed by the time Beth shoved it through the gate; it held almost nothing, and only half of the man’s rapidly disintegrating soul. Erick had managed to bring that man back through some manually cast magics, transforming him into a normal human. Erick had needed to do that sort of transformation twice, for there had been another alvani within the Cathedral of Destruction aside from the ring warrior.

Before Erick knew it, all the girls except for one had come back through the gate.

“DEBBY!” Erick commanded, “Get your ass back here!”

Debby stared at the ceiling and at the Censer. She was wearing the Bracelet of Memory right now and she was seeing something on the other side that no one else could see. But at Erick’s voice, she obeyed. Debby raced through the gate, back into the slime dungeon.

The cathedral had been a land of white stone, filled with smoke from the Censer of Destruction. Now it was a land decayed by Dreams turning into Darkness. Stained glass windows had been replaced with portals to liquid black ooze that waterfalled into the cathedral like streams of absolute black honey that was also —somehow— alive and cloying.

The Censer remained untouched by all of that.

The timer above the gate remained at all 9s, but at Erick’s glance, the timer also showed all 0s. It rapidly showed 9s again, and then flickered in unknown symbols.

Erick knew what he needed to do, so he did it. He splashed his [Physical Domain] through the gate, bringing a Particle understanding to the other side, as he glanced at the [Stop]ed prayer sheets hanging beside him. In a flashing moment, Erick condensed what appeared to be an hour-long sermon into a quick, powerful poem,

“In cauldron’s embrace, destruction is grace

“Power and mercy, enveloping space

“Guided through pure faith, smokey aftermath

“With steadfast resolve, walk this righteous path.”

Erick’s words became an echo that vibrated along a corridor created by his power, aimed directly through the gate. Blackness splashed away from that corridor, and white light latched on to the Censer like a 10-meter wide tunnel bored through reality, to envelop the 7 meter wide artifact of power. The stone underneath the Censer fractured and broke. But the Censer remained, hovering.

All the cathedral fell to Darkness.

And the Censer flowed outward, toward Erick, to pass through the gate, its curled, white weave darkening, flashing solid as material appeared from Elsewhere, turning mana into real metal. Into black adamantium. The white stone under the Censer was unimportant, not a real part of the artifact, so that stone simply vanished, like spellwork breaking, mana returning to the manasphere.

Erick took hold of the Censer with his aura, holding up the artifact with his power, as he guided it to the side, to sit alone upon the rim of the dungeon. Erick let go of the artifact.

It sat there, black as adamantium—

And Erick felt a weakness creep into his very being. He had run another marathon, apparently, though he only felt it when it was over. He breathed hard, relaxing a little. After a moment, he stood tall. He turned around to the sleeping forms of the rescued people.

All of them were humans, resting under conjured blankets and atop conjured beds. All of them were probably not in the bodies they wanted to be in, but they were alive, and real, and somewhat comfortable, and that was what mattered. For now.

Erick informed the girls, since they might not know, “We’re not bringing back elves. It might cause Aloethag to abandon the orcols, and for the orcols to rage.”

Jane said, “We know.”

“But is that even really possible?” Emily asked, unconvinced.

Fallopolis answered, “Your father speaks of the eternal threat of elves returning, which is why everyone kills elves wherever they are found.” Fallopolis gestured to Shalia and the other elf that had been a part of the rescue; a man of red hair and red eyes. “You should kill both of them and sunder their souls if you wish to keep this threat from becoming as real as they have become. It is the only way to be sure.”

Erick seriously asked, “Is an elven soul too much?”

“Hard to say, Erick.” Fallopolis said, “I am merely giving you my professional suggestion, gifted in an attempt to preserve the stability of this world that you have built.”

“… Fuck.” Erick decided, “I’ll chance it.” He glanced toward the gate, and the riotous black colors of the land beyond. The timer above the gate was gone, having hit all 0s and then blinked away, and now the cathedral was gone, too. Erick hadn’t paid much attention to the final memories of that place, as they fell apart into nothing and Darkness. But now, Dream-like scenery once again flowed. “That’s enough for today.” He said to Fallopolis, “They’re all coming with me back to Candlepoint to the Wake Up House. I’ve got the resources there to bring them up to date, and so I’m going to do that.”

Fallopolis bowed a fraction, saying, “Then it will be as you say, Wizard Flatt.”

Poi interrupted, “We need to talk about all that just happened, but before that, we need the priest awake. We need him talking about the Censer in case there’s some unknown danger about having it just be here. Even if he doesn’t answer, he will mentally answer, and I will know if we’re in some sort of immediate danger.”

Erick turned to the priest on the floor, then said, “Understood. Wake him up.”

Poi flickered with a few new tendrils of thought and tickled the mind of the priest, undoing the [Sleep] he had done earlier. Because of their recent Rule changes regarding the Script, Poi didn’t have access to mana from the Script, but since he was connected to the dungeon, as a dungeon master, he had access to dungeon mana. That was more than enough for him to cast all his magic he needed to cast.

Everyone else had cores that contained the mana that they naturally produced, based on the sizes of those cores. There was minimal Script interference in this place, but they were still connected to the Script; the Script still stole their natural mana regeneration. Therefore, waking these people now probably wasn’t too much of a danger.

They should have 0 mana, or near enough to 0 mana.

As the priest woke up, Erick saw him reach for the part of himself that could contain and control mana, but instead of grabbing for a source of power within his soul and body, all he touched upon was intangible nothing.

A certain sort of tension escaped Erick in that moment.

The capture of the Censer and its people was nearly done, and nothing had gone too wrong.

The man panicked as he looked around and saw the sleeping forms of his friends and coworkers, or however it was for their working relationships. He saw Poi, a dragonkin of an odd sort. He saw Erick, Solomon, and the girls, and was afraid. And then he saw Fallopolis, and hope kindled in his heart.

“Dearest Shade of Darkness! I beseech you for salvation in this Trial of the Dark!” He was on his knees, angled toward Fallopolis, as he said, “Tell me true if what I see before me is real, or a demonic threat. Tell me the nature of my Trial.”

Fallopolis tried not to grin at being instantly thought of so positively. Something like that didn’t happen all that often. Possibly never, considering how Shades had been received on Veird for more than 1400 years. Fallopolis easily adopted her elderly-grandmother persona as she kindly, softly, told the man, “Your Trial is just beginning, but take heart, all the demons as you know of them have been dead for a long, long time.” She gave the floor to Erick, saying, “And this man is perhaps the greatest Wizard you will ever meet. A true source of good, this one.”

Erick didn’t wait for the man to fully process that. He said, “You’ve been rescued from the Dreams of the Dark, and given a new life here on this lifeboat of a planet known as Veird. We’ll get to what all of that means later, but for now—” Erick gestured at the black cauldron that was the Censer of Destruction. The priest stared at it for a hard moment, uncomprehending, then he realized what he was looking at. “—I believe I have successfully stolen the Censer of Destruction from that memory. It doesn’t look as it once looked, and the reasons for that are beyond the scope of this conversation. But, even now, looking upon it with my mana sense, I can tell my theft worked. Never mind the color; it’s still adamantium. Is there a danger with the Censer that I need to know before I hand it over to the local gods?”

The man collected himself fast… And then his eyes flickered to Fallopolis, and then the girls, and then Solomon, before landing on the Censer and then up to Erick. His face turned harsh. He spat, “You’re no Wizard! And that’s no Shade! You’re an impostor and this is all some sort of Fae trick—”

Poi knocked him out, tendrils of thought invading the guy’s mind while other tendrils turned solid enough to gently lower the priest back to his bedroll. “The Censer needs to burn something or else it burns the world around it. It appears to be burning the manasphere right now, though, so I suspect it’s fine for transport into other hands.”

Erick asked, “It only burns what’s left inside of it for a while, right?”

“Yes; confirmed as much as I can confirm.” Poi said, “It’s just about the best, controlled Destruction sort of artifact out there. Or at least it’s the one the Dark and the Well were willing to show us.” Poi said, “I’ll meet you at the Wake Up House, Erick.”

Erick nodded, and then said, “So? Preliminary plans? What are you girls going to do?”

There was time again to relax a little, but Erick wouldn’t feel truly secure until he got this thing into proper hands, and then had some proper downtime afterward.

Plans were set, people decided to go or stay, and while that was happening, Erick delivered the Censer to Rozeta, who waited above the dungeon, looking happy in her white wrought form. She was not the only happy wrought in the forest clearing.

Tasar the Summoner, the green-black human-woman-shaped wrought archmage, who had accompanied Kiri on her Worldly Path for the first half of it, and who was Erick’s friend, also stood ready to take the Censer. She smiled as she touched the black artifact, saying, “Congratulations on the Paradoxing, Erick. We have thousands of old things that are too dangerous to attempt to destroy ourselves. This… This will do a lot. It will free up a lot of resources, mostly in the form of guards ever-guarding locations or things.”

Erick smiled a little. “Glad to help.”

He almost mentioned Tasar’s lack of [Familiar], saying that now maybe she’d have time to actually commit to one. But that would be tactless, and she was probably on the Worldly Path right now, so she wouldn’t want to make a [Familiar] before she was done with that; a [Reincarnation] to Benevolence and assistance with making her first Gate Node would erase any [Familiar] she had brewing.

Rozeta chuckled a little, stepping forward, saying, “Congratulations, Erick. And thank you. It was a question whether you could do it or not, but of course you could.”

Erick felt a certain tension unwind a little bit more.

“It was kinda iffy here and there, but it worked out, and we’ll be working out the kinks soon enough. If you have specific items you wish collected, we might be able to find them, but we’ve only had luck locating big events, or important items. This particular artifact had nine tag-alongs, so that’s a complication I didn’t foresee happening, and which we’re dealing with. I’m taking them to the Wake Up House as soon as we’re done here.”

Tasar simply nodded.

Rozeta said, “I’m sure you’ll do right by them. But anyway! You should find the Enchanter’s Guile, if you can, like Atunir suggested. It is perhaps one of the best ones you can take right now, for it will allow you easier Wizardry.”

“Sure.” Erick nodded. And then he moved on, “I do have a question about language and how come we were all able to understand Imperial before we knew we were actually speaking Imperial.”

Rozeta paused, her brow furrowing. “Ah…” She thought. She relaxed, and said, “Your Wizardry with the Gate is a Wizardry of communication. So I would guess the language-understanding-capability was simply an emergent action of your Wizardry, and the Dark… I see you had questions about the Grand Translation, too?”

“I did.”

“That magic still exists, but not nearly as strong as it once was… And that’s about all I can say on that in such an unsecured location.”

Erick smiled a little. “That’s sort of what Fallopolis said already, but it’s good to hear it from another source.”

After a few smaller comments back and forth, Rozeta opened some [Gate]s of her own, to guide Tasar and the Censer along to where the artifact of Elemental Destruction needed to be.

When Erick came back into the dungeon, it was to see Poi have some quiet, angry words with Debby about taking the Bracelet into the Dark. She was lucky that it retained functionality even in its brief foray past the gate. The Bracelet was off her wrist right now and sitting on the kitchen table with the other Mind Magic artifacts.

Erick said, “I just want to know why you paused coming back home, Debby; why you lingered that long past the gate.”

Debby looked admonished, as she said, “I don’t know what happened. I took off the Bracelet already and my memory fragmented, as it always does. This time seemed worse.”

Poi said, “I don’t think you should wear the Bracelet anymore, Debby. It is an extremely strong Mind Magic artifact, with unknown side effects.”

Debby almost argued with him. But she did not. She simply said, “Okay.” Then she looked to Erick, asking, “We going to the Wake Up House, now?”

“Do you want to come? I thought only Emily was coming with me?” Erick looked around. “… But she’s back at the hotel in the city?”

The only people in the house right now were Erick, Solomon, Poi, and Debby. Jane and Abigail were out with the sleeping people, watching over them where Erick had left them, talking to Fallopolis about what had happened with the infiltration and all that. Beth, Candice, and Emily were all back in the city, going over plans for the next operation.

… Well they were all moving faster than Erick was comfortable with. What ever happened to taking a break after a big win?

This was a big win, right?

Solomon said, “Emily is going through some oddness right now. I think the next time she actually talks to any of us in a big way she’s going to be male.”

Debby gasped a little. “Oh my gods. She is?” She corrected herself, “He is?”

Solomon looked sheepish for a moment as both Poi and Erick Looked at him. And then Solomon blurted out, “How have you not noticed yet, Debby? And it’s ‘she’ until otherwise said.”

“… I have been figuring out my own shit,” Debby said. And then she strongly added, “Anyway! I want to see the Wake Up House and be there when all these people wake up. Emily said that she wanted to stick around here; she told me to tell you that.”

Solomon nodded. “Next time she’s around you and only you, expect a talk, Erick.”

“Heard and Understood. I’ll be sure to make that sort of situation happen a few times.” Erick took a moment to just stand around, enjoying the win. Then Erick moved on, “Let’s get going.”

- - - -

In a white stone, circular cathedral, kilometers wide and draped in light, there sat a woven cauldron of black metal right in the center, upon a dais that was a series of daises. Black smoke roiled out from the holes in the censer, to form a low carpet of black shadows and smog that rolled down from the daises like water from a fountain.

Kromolok, the Head Inquisitor of the Church of Rozeta, stood beside that cauldron, that ‘Censer of Destruction’. The man was shaped like a white incani, but he was made of metal, of aluminum, or rather, what they called ‘holyite’. Black smoke curled around his legs as it flowed away, down into the cathedral, where it settled upon the white stone floor. As far as Kromolok understood, inside the original Cathedral of Destruction, acolytes and otherwise would ritually clean the cathedral every day, and especially after every burning.

A node network with some [Cleanse]s did the cleaning these days, but those spells weren’t active right now. The ritual of the destruction was important to the functioning of the Censer, and part of that ritual was to let the world be blackened by the passing of great magics, to leave a mark, to let the world know that something powerful had existed, and now it was gone.

Or at least that’s what the copies of prayer sheets Erick had sent along with Tasar had said.

Kromolok was fine with ritual, though.

Here, in this new Cathedral of Destruction, located near the Orrery of Rozeta, in the Splinter Mountains of Nergal, this Censer of Destruction would cleanse the world of a great many ancient evils. The first one was already burning away, vanishing before Kromolok’s eyes, in a way that had been impossible before.

The Mirror of Evil had been a simple hand mirror made of black adamantium. It had been an artifact of profound reflection, creating evil versions of whoever beheld themselves within its depths. There had been many such artifacts that had the same effects as this one, but this one had also been completely impossible to destroy.

And yet, there it was, floating in the center of the Censer’s concentrating weave, flaking away, the grandness of the simple, powerful artifact, wearing away a great evil, Destruction erasing it from existence, and gaining power from that erasing. The Ash and Gloom released by the Censer was little more than a magical nuance of that destruction; an honoring of the magic that had come before. The object wasn’t actually being turned into anything else at all.

Or at least that’s what Kromolok understood of what was happening here.

Simple burning or shattering or any sort of other destructive methods, when used against all of the items that Kromolok would be feeding to this Censer, would simply cause many of those items to move, to save themselves, to kill everyone around them, or whatever other horrors they felt like creating in order to prevent their destruction, or to make sure everyone knew they had been destroyed and to make them sorry about that fact. The things destined for this pit were Wizard artifacts, or even more dangerous things crafted by a person’s final Death Curse, or the sacrifice of others. All of the items Kromolok planned to feed to the Censer were different, but in many ways, they were the same.

A veritable train of artifacts would be arriving in the coming days and weeks, each one guarded and secured by countless magics, each one of them a danger to the world around them.

Kromolok’s smile widened as the Evil Mirror suddenly cracked, a line appearing upon the black surface, as it hovered there in the Censer of Destruction. It was breaking, but the Evil Mirror fought against that breaking, as it always did. It cried out, black adamantium forming faces and arms and reaching claws and beating wings, trying to fly away, to escape. But Destruction flared harder. The Censer vibrated deeper. And the Mirror cracked more and more. There was no escape.

Kromolok watched the whole thing.

He watched as an artifact rescued from the Dark did what none of the wrought or any of the archmages for the last 580 years had been able to do; disintegrate this damned Mirror to nothing, and make sure it stayed that way. One time, this damned Mirror had seemed to break when Archmage Riivo, of Archmage’s Rest, had tried a novel spell against it, but the Mirror had just abandoned its adamantium form at the time and [Teleport]ed all of its magical effects and existence into a plain mirror a thousand kilometers away, whereupon that new mirror had transformed into adamantium. And then, it had continued to destroy and kill using evil copies of people.

This Evil Mirror was not the only item that was capable of doing that.

A lot of the most evil sorts of artifacts were actually more like bombs, with no real good way to dispose of them at all.

But this Censer… This changed a lot.

“It works well,” Rozeta said, as she stepped out of the ether, to stand next to Kromolok.

“It does,” Kromolok said, “We can close tens of Forgotten Campaigns, for good.”

“The Love Arrow. The Contract Machine. The Balanced Ledger.” Rozeta was happy as she said, “The Pirate’s Coin. All of it can leave, and never return.”

Kromolok smiled, joking, “Whatever will our Forgotten Guards do with all their free time?”

“Figure out whatever anti-memetic magic is happening around this Sundering search, and then find out how to combat it.”

Komolok’s good mood soured. Back to business that fast, eh? Kromolok pivoted, as he always did. “We haven’t noticed any anti-memes, but to hear the circumstances surrounding the Sundering Search from Poi and Erick does give us pause. We’re not sure what to do except to support their search.”

Rozeta said, “I know. Which is why we’re expanding operations.”

Kromolok did not like the sound of that, because she wasn’t angling toward sending wrought to Erick, to help him with the search, directly. She had already vetoed all of that sort of action, for Erick was to do as Erick was to do, and the Geodes were to simply prepare for the coming storm; the Prophesied Storm. But now we were expanding operations? Because Erick’s search was proving fruitful?

… Of course things were changing now that Erick’s search was proving fruitful. Until now, every suggestion of ‘targets to find in the Dark’ and every talk of the gods and Relevant Entities had been merely talk. Nothing real. Nothing actionable.

“The first thing to do is send some of your people to the Wake Up House, to speak with the people Erick took from the Cathedral of Destruction. I want this Censer running at peak efficiency, and those people would be the best to do that. The second thing—” Rozeta gestured to the side. “—Is to attack this Sundering search from other angles.”

Twin disturbances stepped through the smoke. They resolved into legs, and then into a pale pink and green dress, with a white corset. Fairy Moon, looking like a pastel human girl of no more than 20, stood before Kromolok and Rozeta, as though she was an equal to either of them. Technically, she was. She was the Queen of the Fae. Maybe even above them, though that was blasphemy, and not quite true either.

And besides that, Fairy Moon had also been… mostly a good neighbor since the Dragon Exodus.

Perhaps surprisingly, she had become an even better neighbor after Rozeta relaxed the Script, and released 10 of her cousins from containment. Nowadays, a Fairy Moon sighting was rare, and almost always in the accompaniment of one of those cousins, for she was spending almost all her time with them, and not bothering anyone else. Kromolok was very glad that that particular prognostication about letting loose 10 more fae had turned out to be true.

Rozeta said, “Hello, Fairy Moon. Welcome.”

Kromolok was diplomatic, as he said, “Greetings, Fairy Moon.”

“Greetings and greatness, Razing Rozeta and Killer Kromolok.”

Kromolok did not frown, but it was a close thing.

Rozeta was completely unbothered.

Fairy Moon continued, “This Sundering Search requires a revision of vision and a venturing into other ocular states of self. I invite and implore the Inquisition to come calling upon Ar’Cosmos and our creation of a Sundering Search separate and similar to Erick’s entries into the Deeper Dark. But outward and onward, rather than inward and invasive.” She glanced down at the Censer’s insides as the Evil Mirror finished burning up, and the final floating bits of black metal melted into smoke and nothing. And then Fairy Moon took out a ring of gold and magic. She tossed it into the Censer, where it instantly started burning in a way that didn’t involve fire or flame at all. She nodded. Then she said to Kromolok and Rozeta, “Erick is ensconced in the Dreaming Dark for the foreseeable future. He has his ways. We will have ours. We must secure a speculative soaring above the Script. We must contact the council of Other Fae, who live in this New Cosmology.”

A lot of things had happened rather fast right there. Kromolok ignored the ring; it was dying in Destruction, and did not need his due diligence. Kromolok did notice the Fae Magic that had maybe unintentionally ensorcelled the area. After he scattered that Fae Magic, he actually looked at the ring. It was dying. It was fine. The Censer worked as advertised.

And then Kromolok focused on how Fairy Moon was speaking of Other Fae. New Cosmology fairies were a myth as far as he knew. If they were real, then Kromolok should have seen them before now, but he had not. So: a myth.

Rozeta instantly said, “Go ahead and contact them if you wish, but I will not help you with that. I have tried already, and aside from planars we have had no contact with the outside Cosmology, and those contacts have been one-way trips to here, as far as I have always known. As for what we agreed—”

Fairy Moon did not like Rozeta’s words. Before she could move on, the Queen of the Fae instantly turned almost childish, “We cannot be companionless in this cosmology! We are anything but singular in this space!” She accused, “You just killed and canceled them when they craned their consciousness into this cavernous cave, you cynics of conjuring!”

Rozeta glared, saying, “The Script accepts all magic, Fairy Moon; we did not ‘cancel’ anyone. Even if one of them did fall here, I would know, and they would be transformed to fit the land, and we would deal with the aftermath at that point in time. If they were True Fae then they might have been captured by the Script, but I doubt that, and I am almost 100% positive that I would have recognized that action if it had happened. But it hasn’t.

“There have been no New Cosmology fae here on Veird, or anywhere else, as far as I know.

“The simple fact is that mana moves as mana moves, this universe is BIG, and neither you nor I understand how mana moves in this universe quite yet. But we’re getting there. Now will you agree to the agreements I thought we already made before I invited you to come here and see the Censer? To see Erick’s accomplishments?” Rozeta gestured to the Censer, “An opportunity you used to destroy a ring, I might add, which you were not invited to do.”

Fairy Moon broke in small ways. She softly said, “We must prepare for and pamper them as the primest guests when they do deign to grace this languished land.” She stared at Rozeta and Kromolok, saying, “I need to know that you understand this Truest Truth.”

Rozeta was not convinced.

Kromolok wasn’t convinced, either.

Fairy Moon saw that she wasn’t winning any hearts today, but her message had been given. After a moment of dread, she moved on, “If there is an anti-meme about the Sundering Source, then it might be visible when vantage is taken from atop Fairy. I invite the Inquisition to do a full Anti-Meme investigation within Furthest Fairy. Perhaps, through cooperation with our cooperative creations, we might uncover the ultimate reason why my Daughter’s Decree of Creation collapsed so completely.”

Kromolok did not appreciate any of that; that notion that a fae made the Old Cosmology. Rozeta seemed particularly angry, too, at the fae’s assertion that the entire Old Cosmology was just a painting of the Dark with a spot of Light that was Xoat. Fairy Moon seemed to always be talking about that these days, but only when people in power were listening. Kromolok felt that perhaps the Old Fae was making up for lost time.

As for an Anti-Meme investigation?…

Kromolok said, “I accept your invitation on my Inquisition’s own terms.”

Fairy Moon nodded, then she stepped away, vanishing into Springtime, her voice carrying with her, “You can find your own way to our lovely lands. See you soon.”

And now it was just Kromolok and Rozeta, standing beside the Censer.

Fairy Moon’s gold ring was still ‘burning’ in the center of the multi-meter wide black cauldron.

“What is that ring, anyway?” Kromolok asked.

“I’ve no idea. Probably a wedding ring. Lotta magic. Nothing more than that…” Rozeta paused as she stared at the golden ring. “No souls. Hard to see, though; that’s the real Censer of Destruction.”

“Could it be the ring she used to wed the men she married and then killed?” Kromolok asked, “Like she’s Destroying that part of her life?”

“As safe a guess as any.”

- - - -

The Wake Up House had a bunch of different names, but all of them were accepted, just like the people themselves were accepted. It also wasn’t just one location. The main location was about 1500 kilometers directly north of Candlepoint, while there were also major offices directly inside Candlepoint. It was to the main offices by the mountains where Erick brought his newest reincarnated people.

The main building was almost literally a palatial estate, just south of snow capped mountains that reached up to the sky. The recently-tamed Not-Crystal forest sprawled out in every direction, trees and grasses and otherwise growing upon land that had once been desert as far as the eye could see, except for those mountains, where massive stoneworks had been erected to separate the desert from the mountains. If one rose high in the sky, to overlook the trees that dotted the land, they could even see that stonework endeavor, where the mountains had been made into cliffs, to drop straight down into a sea of sand, filled with crystal mimics.

But now the mimics were gone, corralled to a different thousand kilometer ring encircling Ar’Kendrithyst.

Now, the Crystal Forest was much more forest, and filled with settlements here and there.

The Wake Up House was perhaps the largest of those settlements in this area. There was the main estate, which was like a halfway house, a college campus, and a cosmopolitan village all in one. A lot of people, after they went through here, opted to make a go of it somewhere close by. The Crystal Forest was absolutely prime real estate, and it was all free for the taking. Mostly. Erick had secured around a 500 kilometer diameter space south of the mountains for the Wake Up House.

People needed some nice, calm space in order to come to terms with their new bodies, after all.

Erick arrived through a ring of lightning directly into the receiving courtyard of the main house.

Poi was already there, waiting for him and for Debby, and for all the people flying through on Erick’s power. If Poi hadn’t been there to get things started, Erick was sure that the two doctors on call would have been reading books and waiting for something to happen. Three nurses standing to the side would have been in the same position, and probably playing cards, as they often did. They would have acted fast, though, if something came through. Which it had.

This was a style of care that Erick had stolen from Oceanside, along with some of Oceanside’s own emergency staff, because Oceanside was no longer the center for emergency care that it had once been; not with [Teleport] made impossible for the last eleven years. The emergency team here was well versed in working odd hours and with Erick’s presence, though, because Erick worked directly with a lot of them. With little direction necessary except for a basic command of ‘They’re code red, so armored rooms’, the team got to work, and soon, others came out of the house, taking in Erick’s nine new arrivals. Within minutes, the new people were set up in waking rooms.

Armored ones.

[True Resurrection] would not have rid them of soul-imbued magic, but [Reincarnation] certainly did. Even so, Erick didn’t want to take chances. That desire to not take chances was obvious to all, and soon, the director was there to greet him. But the time was somewhere around 7 pm.

“Shouldn’t you be off having dinner with your new wife, Magnin?” Erick said, smiling a little as he teased the director, as the two of them walked down the hallway, just inside the Red Wing.

Magnin was a young human demi in appearance, with very faint violet features to mark him as touched by incani blood. He looked similar to Zolan, but still different. He was actually a contemporary of Zolan’s, for he was around 135 years old. Unlike Erick’s Castellan of House Benevolence, who was an eternal bachelor it seemed, Magnin had gotten married several months ago. It had been a beautiful wedding.

Magnin smiled as he said, “Soon as Poi came around, Araleel put the roast under [Ward] and went to check the defenses around here to make sure they’re fully active.” And then he got down to business. “You haven’t called for a code red in a while.”

The Red Wing was just like all the other wings of the Wake Up House, but its [Ward]s and defenses were a lot more strict than other locations. Even if the people Erick had taken from the Dark could cast magic, most of it should be shut down… Hopefully.

Erick explained his concern, “I took these people from the Dark, like taking shadelings out of their fugue state prematurely. They were going to die otherwise. If they were who they were in their previous lives, I have no doubt that they could have stopped me. They were guarding something very, very precious…

“They’re probably good people, but they’ve been through a lot. Events like this will likely happen again, Magnin. This time was unexpected…” Erick stopped at the door to the first room. Shalia, the former smoke elf, rested on a soft bed with soft pillows, inside a rather nice room with soft chairs, and with a big window that gave a nice view of the outside world. All of it was cleverly made of rather damned strong materials, and a lot of it was secured to the floor. “But I probably should have expected this. It’ll happen again.”

“We’ll take care of them, Erick; you leave that to us.”

Erick smiled. “I know you will. I trust you.” Erick breathed in. He gestured back the way they came. “Let’s have an overview meeting, Magnin.” And then he nodded to Poi, saying, “You can start waking them up.”

Poi flicked power outward and his [Sleep] spells dissolved… Or rather, the [Sleep] spells cast by Poi’s other [Hive Mind]ed self started to dissolve. At that thought, Poi gave Erick a Look. Right, right; okay. They were the same person.

Poi nodded.

Erick said to Magnin, “They’re probably going to try and accrete right away, which might monsterize them. That’s the main reason for the code red.”

Magnin paused. “… They don’t know that that is a bad idea? Untrained accretion?”

“They’re very trained, Magnin, but trained under a very different set of rules. Anyway, let’s talk about the Wake Up House, starting with the most recent returners.” Erick asked, “How are things?”

In the hallway, guards and otherwise were on the case.

Magnin began, “Rather normal. The people from Riam are starting to get along with others, but that’s rather normal considering the directions of their [Reincarnation]s, though we are having yet another upsurge in worshiping of you, which I am having some difficulty dismantling. I might need to ask the Xoatists to step in and convince the Riamites to leave to seek their fortunes elsewhere.”

Erick didn’t cringe nearly as much as he usually did when talking of worship and Xoatism. “Approved. Whatever you need to do.”

Magnin noticed Erick’s change in demeanor, and let it pass unmentioned. “On that note, we have around 740 people asking for different [Reincarnation]s.”

“Oh. Okay. That many? Sure—” Erick had a sudden thought. “Are any of them from the recent groups? From Storm’s Edge and the Glittering Depths, I mean. Not from last week’s [Reincarnation] day.”

Magnin took a half second to gather his thoughts, then he said, “There have been a few from those groups. Which people in particular are you worried about?”

Erick was already using Ophiel to scope out the records office. A few things stood out to him, but since those records were purposefully kept vague, Magnin would be the one to ask about all that. So that’s what Erick did. “The Artillery Archmage from Riam; Terrance Nightenflit. If any of the Aroidos decided to stick around, or if they’re back. Oozy Stormcaller, also from Storm’s Edge.”

They stopped at a common room and sat down.

Magnin began, “As an overview, Terrance is doing well, but he’s having a lot of difficulty with mana in this New Cosmology. I believe he wants a stronger body than the one he requested; he’s among the ones requesting a different [Reincarnation]. There are a few Aroidos around here but none of them are on the re-[Reincarnation] list unless that changed recently.” And then Magnin paused, and tried to deliver some bad information in a calm way, “Oozy does not want a new [Reincarnation]. He is having trouble interacting with people, though.”

“Ah. Yes. I figured he would,” Erick said, feeling slightly nervous himself. “That [Reincarnation] didn’t go how I expected it to go. Has he filled out new paperwork? I don’t see it in the records office.”

“He wants to talk to you directly. I don’t believe he wants a new body.”

Erick nodded. “What else is happening?”

Magnin spoke for a while.

And Erick ironed out many small issues here and there, all across the land, as the 9 rescues from the Cathedral of Destruction woke up in the Red Wing. Some of them panicked. Some of them relaxed, and prayed to gods. Some of them stared at screens, amazed that they were in a land with a manaminer.

Two people tried to accrete.

Erick had to cut short his talks with Magnin to deal with those suddenly-monsterized people, as they took in the mana all around them. That situation got out of hand rather fast, with a whole lot of yelling up and down the Red Wing, and a bunch of nurses and doctors and guards having to go back through the whole group of new arrivals, to inform them once again that it was bad to accrete outside of proper methodology.

Erick didn’t get involved too much with all that; not yet, anyway.

Because suddenly he had appointments with various Relevant Entities about stuff they wanted rescued from the Dark. It seemed that Erick’s small foray out of the Dark, and the proof of his capability to bring out items from the past into this reality, had knocked loose about a hundred bee nests, and all of them needed attention.

He’d get to the 9 rescues from the Dark tomorrow. They could use a day or so of rest to come to grips with their new lives, and the Script.

- - - -

Erick sat in a nice sort of meeting room, but not too nice. The chairs were functional and appropriate to the people who were showing up, in order, but they were all a secure sort of functional. There was no gilding on these chairs, tables, and walls. This was by choice. The impression Erick was giving by these choices was that he was a working man, doing working man’s work. There was a time and place for ostentation, to display power and wealth, but now was not that time.

Zolan, the Castellan of House Benevolence, walked back into the room. He shut the doors behind him.

“Okay. So. That went well.”

Erick laughed. “Tiktik was on his best behavior today.”

“Hmm. Yeah.” Zolan looked the stone floor over, making a show of looking for the great divots that Tiktik had carved into the eternal stonewood. “Can’t even tell he was in here.”

Erick chuckled. “There’s not much to expect out of the God of the Wild’s avatars, except that they will be wild.”

“Sorry for abandoning you halfway through.”

“Not a problem, Zolan. It’s not your responsibility to keep me safe, but I thank you for your time spent in these conversations anyway, for your knowledge of all these people and events.”

Zolan smiled softly. “Will you actually be able to get the Life Seed for Fangorl?”

“Doubtful, but I can try.” Erick said, “There’s nothing wrong with trying for ancient artifacts. Every single one makes Veird more robust; stronger.” Erick moved on, “So next?”

“That would be Lynkari, of the demons.”

“… Ah.”

Erick had gone through 17 of these appointments so far. Most of them had been from paladins of various gods coming to Erick to deliver the words of those gods, or other Relevant Entities. Not every god was a major power like Koyabez or Rozeta, able to manifest a body on demand. The lesser gods, like Fangorl of the Wilds, or even Sumtir, the God of Righteous War, sent paladins. All of them wanted something from him, or rather, from the Old Cosmology. Some of them wanted something to make them more powerful, like in Fangorl’s case, or they wanted something that they had lost, and which Erick agreed to look for, like with Sumtir asking for the Shield of Faith, which was a defensive artifact of war.

And now, before Erick knew it, it was time for the final few meetings of the day. The more dangerous ones. Or at least Erick assumed they would be the more dangerous ones.

The Demons, of Hell.

And then the Angels, of Celes.

There had been a whole argument over who was going to be able to talk to Erick first, but then Erick suggested a coin toss and the demons won the coin toss, but not before both sides tried to interfere in the fate of that toss. Erick was rather sure that the envoy from the Angels had been trying to use actual Fate Magic to influence the toss, too, but then she bled from the nose instead, the Script shutting her down. Erick ignored that extreme breach of propriety, for the demons had tried to do something similar but with very subtle Particle Magic. Erick shut that attempt down himself.

In the end, the demons probably won the toss, and Erick left it like that.

“Is Lynkari sending an envoy again?” Erick asked, “Or do I need to actually go summon her?”

“Different envoys for both the angels and the demons; those first ones fell out of favor when their tricks were exposed.” Zolan said, “The demon envoy is at the Wall, at Centerpoint, awaiting your [Gate].” And then Zolan walked to the wall, to stand to the side for the meeting.

Erick did some searching with Ophiel upon the Wall that separated and delineated the Crystal Forest from the Wastelands. Both of those areas used to be filled with dangers and poisons of different kinds, with desert on the east and toxic marshes on the west. But now, there was farmland on the west, and the east held forests from there, all the way to Candlepoint and beyond. The Wall itself looked a lot less war-torn and spartan than it used to look, too. Now there was greenery and nicety.

Erick found the envoy standing upon the grey Wall, at Centerpoint, in the center of a presentation space that was almost a pedestal fit for a dragon. The archmage stood there, having just gotten up from her chair, her aides telling her that it was time for the meeting. Erick knew her, and he was glad to see she was doing well enough, though it was odd to see her tagged for this sort of thing.

Peatrice Shallowhammer was an incani Stone Archmage, wearing purple and gold, the colors of the Magisters of the Wasteland’s Magisterium. She spotted Ophiel, and did a bow that looked pained. She wasn’t an old woman, but she was certainly not a young woman, either. Maybe she would be asking for a [Reincarnation] today? The option was open for her; Erick had already explained long before now. She had always forgone that option.

Erick opened the [Gate] in front of her. The other end opened in the doorway to his plain office at House Benevolence.

“Hello, Peatrice,” Erick said, welcoming her into the space.

Peatrice took another slightly-strained bow, then she straightened and walked into the room. She bowed again, and then lifted, saying, “Greetings, Wizard Flatt.”

Erick closed the [Gate] and filled the room with a [Hasted Shelter]. They’d have plenty of time to talk, now. “Please have a seat, Peatrice, and tell me what ails you before we get to this artifact search.”

Peatrice tensed a fraction, but she was well-practiced in not showing her true feelings so Erick only understood 40% of what was wrong with her. She was having physical trouble. Soul trouble, too, by the look of it, though souls were, by their very nature, gaseous and 80% undefinable, so all Erick could really see were a series of old fixes constructed in order to bridge and heal old curses. They were wounds from the Converter Angel, over a decade ago. She had mostly healed herself, well before Lapis was involved in that issue. She had refused all other assistance since then…

Before Peatrice had the chance to say that nothing was wrong, as she usually did—

Erick flatly said, “Your old wounds are acting up.”

Peatrice took a moment to sit down in her provided chair. She sighed a little, and then said, “They are acting up, and it’s nothing to be concerned about. I’m here today to discuss ancient artifacts, and I would much prefer to go over those.”

“… Fine.” Erick set aside his desire to help Peatrice individually, to focus on the greater good. “What artifacts are you interested in? Keep in mind that only the largest artifacts are possible, as in stuff that changed the course of worlds, or stuff that left such a deep mana impression that they were used for literal millennia. And, so you know, we’ll only have one chance to get one item.”

Back in the dungeon, Solomon had done a test, trying to get the gate to link with the Cathedral of Destruction again. It had failed, producing a connection to disordered dreams. Erick hadn’t tried himself, but he would when he got back.

It was better to tell people that this wasn’t a sure thing.

Peatrice sat tall, saying, “We are aware of the limitations and warnings. With that in mind, and knowing that you have rescued people from the Dark, we are less interested in artifacts, and more interested in people, since that seems more of a sure thing considering what we have heard. In particular, there is an ancient Angel who once tried to work with the Old Demons to end the Forever War in a stretch of the Old Cosmology known as the Bisection. His name is Avandrasolaro. We believe he died due to carelessness in his old age, though he lived to around 30,000 before an assassination attempt took him. The Bisection survived another 500 years past his death, but it fractured and created a whole new front to the Forever War, maybe 180,000 years ago. The numbers are not exact; they are practically apocryphal.”

Erick had been inclined to say ‘no’ and to stop Peatrice the very second she said ‘person’, but he listened instead. Something like joy flowed through his body as he heard her request. Tempering his hope, Erick said, “A request like this will require confirmation from various Relevant Entities, but you already know that if this pans out, then I’ll try to rescue Avandrasolaro. How do you see that working out for you?”

“Hopefully, he will be able to provide a bridge between the Demons and the Angels to break the Forever War. Honestly, this war already should have been broken when all the Old Demons died in the Incani Uprising against them, but that took us a hundred years, and we were forced to commit atrocities against the Angels while we were still slaves to the Old Demons. Because of that, the Angels continued their aggression against us.” Peatrice added, “The Old Demons certainly wished for that sort of hatred to continue, so they certainly didn’t help matters with how they treated us. Their death throes are still felt to this day. But maybe, with Avandrasolaro’s help, and with his well-known disposition against the Forever War… We can bridge the gap between what could be, and what is.”

“I’m surprised this is the formal request of the Demons, Peatrice. I’m very happy. But I’m also surprised.”

Peatrice nodded. “We have a few more requests that are more in line with what you might expect; poisoned chalices, and such. But I felt like presenting the best option first.”

Erick smiled a little. Now that was more like it. “Go ahead.”

“If you will pardon the formality that is required to deal properly on behalf of my ancestors, and their distaste of the Angels— Ah hem,” Peatrice cleared her throat, and took on an air of pretend imperiousness, saying, “To begin with, let me remind you, if you will allow, that you reformed the Shades through the destruction of their worst members. Nothing was achievable against them without the murder of Bulgan, and Tania Webwalker, and all the other malcontents. We ask for the same sort of power to use against the Angels, eliminate the worst of them, in the hopes that we might achieve a similar sort of peace and cooperation. The first object that might help us achieve this is the Vile Needle…”

Peatrice gave her presentation, as she was required to do in order to fulfill the parameters of her Demon Contract. When she passed, she would likely become a high-ranking demon, and Erick would be seeing a lot more of her in this specific sort of way. But for now, she was merely incani, and thus she was ‘low on the totem pole’ of demonic existence.

Which was why Erick didn’t blow up at her for her unreasonable requests; she was just a speaker right now. The Demons all knew that he would at least hear them out, too, and so they exploited that about him, forcing him to hear their propaganda.

It was whatever.

They got a chance to air their greatest grievances, and Erick got to know a little bit about the lay of the land between Angel and Demon and their Veirdly counterparts.

Eventually, Peatrice got to the end of her requests, and Erick got to the end of his denials of those requests.

Erick asked, “The request for Avandrasolaro… Was that from one of the Houses of Hell, or from you?”

Peatrice said, “From the House of Blood-on-Hell. They’re trying to woo you into a Contract, of course, as all of them are, but they’re falling on hard times right now. If you should succeed with the rescue of Avandrasolaro then Blood-on-Hell will either be devoured by its contemporaries or rise to new heights to rival Demon King Dinnamoth. Hopefully they can thread that lake of intrigue and fire, but we don’t actually know until it happens.” She added, “They expended almost all their political capital to get you that target, too, so they’re hoping this gambit elevates their House into extreme levels of power. But since I am not allied with their house, and am actually in House Dinnamoth, I feel socially compelled to tell you that Blood-on-Hell used to be a very big proponent of the Quiet War, until you took office and made their normal operations unworkable.”

“Well… Who hasn’t been a big part of the Quiet War?” Erick asked, rhetorically. “I’m all about second chances, anyway.”

Peatrice nodded. “Which is what Blood-on-Hell is counting on.”

The meeting was basically over, so Erick tried one last time, “Are you sure you don’t want to take a [Reincarnation]? I can clean up all of those soul wounds from the Converter Angel, and all of the fixes you implemented to solve those wounds.”

Peatrice stood, saying, “Thank you, but no thank you, Wizard Flatt. I plan on living forever when I die, so that I may help my descendants for generations upon generations to come, alongside my ancestors who would do the same.”

Erick did not stand. He just dismissed the bubble of Time all around the room, saying, “Zolan will assist you with final words. It was good to see you again, Peatrice.”

“And you as well, Wizard Flatt.”

Zolan led the way out of the door, saying, “This way please, Archmage Peatrice.”

After a good ten minutes of some final paperworks between Zolan and Peatrice, Erick opened another [Gate] and Peatrice went home.

Zolan came back inside, asking, “Will you actually go after that angel?”

“A very large possibility, Zolan. I’ll need to do some digging, of course, to prove that story. I’ve never heard of Avandrasolaro, and it sounds like a dragon name to me, but I’m sure Koyabez would know more.” Erick said, “But moving on.”

Zolan nodded. “The envoy of the Angels is Kalimo Brighthand. I don’t think you’ve met him.”

“I have not.”

“You won’t like him.”

“… That doesn’t bode well.”

Kalimo turned out to be a Classed Paladin of the Holy Host of Angels, who lived in Greensoil as an Inquisitor in the northern provinces. Zolan had been right. Erick did not like the man. He was self-righteous, damning all demons with every other sentence out of his mouth, and halfway toward demanding concessions out of Erick due to the actions of ‘Ashes’ a month ago, in the Glittering Depths.

“It doesn't matter if he was your dragon,” Kalimo said, “He was a demon plant, just like all the rest of them. But you didn’t know, so it was forgivable at the time. You will rectify these transgressions, though.”

Erick maintained dignity in the face of Kalimo’s unreasonable demands.

Kalimo occasionally touched upon various artifacts of power here and there, but he seemed to be ‘negging’ Erick about it every time he spoke of this or that, adding, “But you wouldn’t give that to us anyway, because you’re a spineless ruler, bowing to demons whenever they send their slaves at you.”

“Okay,” Erick said, and that was all he said.

Kalimo got red in the face, and got even more angry.

… It was kinda entertaining, actually. That was why Erick allowed it to go on for so long. The man spoke of actual injustices done by the demons, of course, like the Daydropper and the almost-Breach-Demon, and various murders here and there. The man was clearly passionate about his hatred.

When Kalimo finished, Erick almost wanted to tell him that he wasn’t getting anything at all.

But instead, Erick said, “I wish the Angels and Demons would stop feuding. Do you think that is possible in this lifetime?”

“Absolutely not! Never! Not until they all die.” Kalimo said, “They embrace Vile sources of power, and that stuff is poison to all people. That is the base problem we have with them, and they will never forgo that power, and so, like how you killed the Shades to make the world a better place, we must kill the Demons, and then all the incani, too. The Script must be remade!”

Erick sighed a little. “Elemental Vile is just another Element, like the Angel’s own Exalted.”

“They are nothing alike!”

Kalimo wasn’t going to listen to reason, because of course he wasn’t. Those types never did. So Erick played the part of a polite king who was a part of Polite Society, like all good kings, and closed out the conversation with the Paladin as early as he could. Erick eventually managed to send Kalimo on his way, back to Tower Town; back to Kiri’s home town.

And then Erick said to Zolan, “Please find out what the fuck that was all about. That man was intentionally trying to set me off the whole time he was here.”

“I have a few theories, from Greensoil trying to publicly shame you via non-cooperation to any of their requests, to the Angels deciding to pull out from this endeavor when the Demons got first Bolt at you.” Zolan said, “I’ll have better answers for you soon.”

“Thank you.”

And that was it for the day.

Erick had to go talk to Kiri though, to get her opinion on Kalimo.

“Oh my gods, Erick,” Kiri said, while her couatl [Familiar] Sunny flickered in colors upon Kiri’s neck, to mirror her mirth. “You actually managed to have a talk with one of those Inquisitors from Tower Town?” Kiri laughed. “They won’t even talk to me! Especially now.”

“I’ve never spoken with them before now.” Erick said, “It was not a very productive conversation.”

“I bet not!”

Erick smiled. “So how are things going at the House? With the Gate Network?”

“Oh… you know… Pretty good.” Kiri took a moment to decide something, and then she said, “I could use your help with this one thing…”

Erick spent three hours solving a small pile of international and Underworld-to-Surface problems.

And then he went back home, to the Cloud Castle to have dinner with the family; with Teressa, her husband, Poi, his sister Rizala, her husband, and also Debby, who he brought back from the Wake Up House to meet everyone. Kiri and Debby had some quiet conversations outside of Erick’s direct oversight, because it was rude to spy all the time. The whole evening was a little awkward with Debby, but Poi had already explained everything quite well.

Halfway through dinner, Rizala was fully on board with the copies of Jane and Erick, and asked, “Well why not invite all of them over?”

Erick smiled and did just that.

Soon, Solomon, Jane, Abigail, Beth, Candice, and Emily, were all at the House. The house was not full at all, but it was about halfway there.

And Erick loved it, a whole lot.

6 daughters!

A ‘brother’!

All of his family he managed to find on Veird.

It was wonderful.

- - - -

Erick walked down the hall of the Red Wing at the Wake Up House. The sun was halfway toward noon, light slanting down from the upper windows, casting shadows into the cool air. Everything was calm. Last night had been a hell of a time for most of these new residents of Veird, but sleep and good food had done a lot to calm the lot of them. Talking helped. Erick had temporarily installed a communications system between the rooms, inside the rooms and linked to each other and to the node network of the house. It was just some basic magic, hooked into effective-permanency effects, but knowing that their friends were alive had done a lot of good for them.

… Of course, not all of their friends had survived. In fact… Most of their worlds were gone. All that was left for these nine people were each other, and the Censer which Erick had stolen.

Magnin had explained their predicaments to them a few times already, at Erick’s behest. But now, Erick was here. He would be talking to them, in order. Starting with Shalia Moonglow, the former smoke elf. She was their commander when the actual commander wasn’t present. Erick didn’t know a whole lot more besides that, though; they could only overhear so much, because the people knew they were being spied upon.

Erick went to Shalia’s door and knocked. “Greetings, Shalia Moonglow.”

Shalia was inside whispering to the speaker spellwork, but some of her mana sense must have returned, because she saw Erick coming when he was about 10 meters away. She was on the other side of the door, three meters away watching it, by the time Erick came by. She saw him through the window of the door. She stared with dark eyes. “Hello, Wizard Flatt. Are we to be kept in detainment for much longer?”

Erick unlocked the door and opened it, saying, “I would prefer not to. We got your Censer up and running, by the way. I hear that we’ve rid Veird of a few hundred incredibly dangerous artifacts since yesterday.”

Down the hall, five people were pressed against their windows, watching, while the other three were listening to their speaker boxes, which broadcast Erick’s voice from Shalia’s room to all the others.

Shalia was unsure how to take this news.

But the priest down the way started yelling, “You idiots! You don’t even know what you’re doing! You might end up releasing something!”

Erick made a decision that he didn’t have to talk to all of them individually. He flicked his aura at the guy’s door down the way, opening it up. “Would you be interested in making sure we’re doing it right?”

The priest, who was named Gorgi, did not step out of his room. He stared at the open door like it was a mouth to hell, as he shouted, “The Dark take you for what you did to us!”

Erick unlatched every single door. Some people stepped out. Some remained inside.

Erick spoke, “You’ve all been dealt an incredibly difficult fate. You were dead, and now you are not. But from your perspectives, you were alive, and we stole you from your homes. I’m sorry for that. I’m also sorry for all of your bodies, for we had to act fast in order to get them made, to prevent you from passing on into the mana. None of you would have gone to the gods you wished to go to, for many of those gods are dead. The God of Destruction simply does not exist anymore; he wasn’t allowed onto Veird during the Sundering for fear of what he might do. From my understanding with some talks with some gods in the last 12 hours, the God of Destruction was reveling in the death of all worlds anyway.

“Aloeth no longer exists,” Erick said to Shalia, and the other elf, a man by the name of Jiloatho. “Aloethag is the Goddess of Beauty and Brutality, and she is goddess to the orcols these days, and elves are murdered on sight for fear of Aloethag reverting. You two have probably been contacted by her already. But know this: you will not become elves under my hand, for I will not invite that sort of split into this world.

“All alvani do not exist anymore, and the normal Gods of the Angels are gone. About 25 years post Sundering, the Old Demons killed all the halves that managed to make it here, and changed the Script so that the children of Angels and humans no longer happen. Now, only Demons and humans produce offspring. Those would be the incani you have heard about. Those incani overthrew the Old Demons long ago. Now it’s just incani-as-Demons versus humans-as-Angels in the Forever War, which is something that still exists —much to most everyone's chagrin— for reasons of continued atrocities on both sides.

“But that’s all history. Important history that you should know, but not too important for you right now.

“I implore you all to do some soul searching while you are here at the Wake Up House.” Erick added, “But before we get to that, I know only one of you actually filled out your [Reincarnation] paperwork, while the rest of you tore it up in anger, thinking you were defying me.

“Know now that I want to let you go and for you to do your own lives as soon as possible. If you want a new body, you can leave messages with the director, or his staff. To a certain extent, you are owed what you want, for it is not an easy thing to be transported to a new world, and to leave everything behind.

“Believe me, I know what that is like.”

A moment passed.

A woman began crying, a man held back sobs.

Erick said, “The Red Wing of the Wake Up House is open to you now. With time, and proving yourself as not a danger, you will be allowed to leave this area, and take up more normal residencies. Now. Gorolik? Would you like to have that [Reincarnation] now?”

A man standing by his door, the Gorolik in question, froze in complete fear.

Erick said, “I can hit every single one of those targets, if that is what you wish. Or, you can write out some new paperwork and we’ll do that new version later.”

“… I’ll write some other paperwork.”

Erick would have a private conversation with him about all that at a later date. There was nothing too untoward about his requests, but they were all made in clear defiance of what a normal person would want, based on normal societal conventions. But maybe he really did want to be an Old Dragonkin with wings and two sets of arms and a bunch of stuff going on down below. He had been a human, though, before he came through the gate in the dungeon. A simple human. Erick always asked people twice and sometimes three times if they desired switches far beyond their original bodies, and Erick had suspected that Gorolik had filled his paperwork with defiance.

It was good to see that Erick’s suspicions had been correct.

Most people when they got bodies like that and they actually wore them around for a little while rapidly decided that they did not like being that different from other people.

Erick said, “Then that is fine. Talk to you all later. Good day.”

Erick vanished through a [Gate], rapidly closing it behind him. The staff would watch over those 9 people now; Erick had done enough for them for today. It was time to visit other people.

- - - -

Oozy Stormcaller was the former king of Storm’s Edge before he had been transformed into an ooze by a Shade and then locked away in the castle’s dungeon for a few centuries. It wasn’t till a few decades ago that Oozy had been rescued by the people who had become his family, and taken to Seafoam Manor and raised as a person again. Sometimes blood oozes developed sentience if they lived long enough, and Oozy had regained some of his original sentience, but he was no longer the king of Storm’s Edge at all. His family was gone now, too.

He seemed to be adjusting… Somewhat well.

Oozy was painting a picture in all-red pigments under an apple tree, trying to capture the scenery of the plains and scattered forest ahead, under the bright sun above. But in all red. It was weird.

It was fine.

Erick stepped down onto the hill near him while he was cleaning his brush. “Greetings, Oozy.”

Oozy startled. Which was why Erick waited till he was cleaning his brush. And then Oozy looked upon Erick and smiled wide. He got up and stood, his eyes yellow rimmed in red, like two suns with dark spots in the center, while his hair was bright red and short. He had freckles now, and he was still rather skinny, but in a healthy sort of way. He seemed happier than the last time Erick had seen him, and in all of Goldie’s investigations of the man he had been no more or less than a normal person.

No secret trysts with evil powers. No known affiliations or outreaches to any sorts of organizations. Nothing. He mostly painted and lived a small life. There was, quite frankly, a lot of friction between him and many other people, but he had been an ooze for centuries, so of course interactions would be weird.

Oozy seemed to be okay as he called out, “Wizard Flatt! Hello again!”

Erick returned the smile, asking, “How are you, Oozy? I heard you wanted to talk to me directly? Also that you’ve been having trouble getting along with others.” A bit stronger, Erick said, “I heard you assaulted a man, and his brother.”

Oozy had been excited, and then he got less excited. “Ahh… Well. Yes. Those guys were… I’m not sure what came over me. I think they said something bad about Storm’s Edge, or the others that came through from there, and… I honestly forgot most of that night.”

“Well they’re alive, and you won’t do it again, will you?”

“I didn’t want to fight them… It… sort of happened.”

“That’s what all the others have said, too, and I believe you.”

Oozy relaxed. And then he frowned a little, “I think I do not get along with normal people. I keep… I tried to eat a slice of cake with the side of my face once weeks ago and a man at the cafeteria… It became a harsh sort of joke among them.”

“I’m sorry that happened to you, Oozy.” Erick asked, “Is that what you wanted to talk to me about? About your difficulty fitting in?”

Oozy made himself stand strong, and then he said, “I think… I can’t stay here any longer. It has been fantastic. But I want to go on a pilgrimage. Around the world, to find myself.”

Well… There was nothing wrong with that. Most people left the Wake Up House after some months of getting used to their new bodies. The staff made sure that the people were comfortable with their bodies before they left, so that they didn’t have regrets later when they were beyond Erick’s easy help. But some people left the area after only a few days, completely forgoing the standard body-adjustment period. That was their prerogative, though; Erick wouldn’t hold people against their will unless he needed to.

“That’s fine, but for you, I must give you a warning.” Erick said, “Once you leave here and get back into the world, I can’t protect you anymore. You’re on your own out there, Oozy. Sink or swim.”

Oozy seemed to beam with hope, as he said, “Thank you, Wizard Flatt.”

Erick nodded. “Where do you think you’ll go?”

“Well… I’ve been having dreams of storms. It was my namesake… Stormcaller.” Oozy held up a hand and red sparks gathered in his palm. “I want to see what that means. I want to see what connection I have to Sininindi— Or rather, what connection I used to have, and if there’s anything there anymore.” He dropped his hand. “I feel very storm-tossed, Wizard Flatt. I have lost my sea legs. I want to be better. Maybe actually gain some levels, or something. I want to find my footing.”

Red lightning in hand, eh?

Erick felt a little weird in that moment, but only because he was hyper-sensitized to Lightning Magics right now. They were searching for the Sundering, after all. But sometimes Lightning Magics were just Lightning Magics. Some other times, though, Lightning Magics had divine sources, and Sininindi was directly watching over Oozy, for he was the last of the Stormcallers.

So it didn’t surprise Erick at all to see what he saw next.

High above the land, a spark of gold lightning scattered from one lonely cloud to another, while a breeze rushed across the Crystal Forest, the sound of shaking leaves seeming almost like rain, drowning out the sound of the lightning. It hadn’t been a big bolt, nor had it been a big wind.

Erick and Ophiel were perhaps the only people who noticed the lightning and who knew what it meant, for it occurred behind Oozy, and Oozy did not have any of the sensing abilities that Erick enjoyed.

Erick made a decision. He said, “I wish you luck in finding yourself, Oozy. You’ll get the same graduating care package as anyone else, so be sure to collect that before you leave.”

Oozy smiled brightly. “I will! Thank you for everything, Wizard Flatt!”

“You’re welcome, Oozy. I’m glad I could help.”