Chapter 155, 1/2

Chapter 155, 1/2

How does one find a dragon, since their entire species is all about not being found? Erick already had a few ideas. He could put some lightwards up in the sky, calling out the Mirage Dragon, or maybe just the dragon that the Mirage Dragon was imitating. He could even go around from bar to bar, asking if anyone had seen any dragons. He could find some Dragon Essence monster and tie it up somewhere, and then he could advertise the location of the beast, and see who shows up; dragons hunted other dragons and dragon-aligned beings for their dragon essence, after all. He could even start Imaging for some dragon teeth, since he had certainly seen those up close (thank you, Melemizargo), and then when he found some, he would either have found a dragon, or he would have found some draconic relic in someone's collection. If he found a relic, he might be able to track the blood identifiers in those teeth, and then he could find out where a dragon had been, and then he could go from there.

There were many different ways to slice this apple.

Nirzir paled at every new suggestion as she politely shot them down, while everyone had lunch together, in the kitchen dining room.

Teressa seemed to be enjoying Erick’s suggestions, as she ate her lunch like she was watching a play, but even he had to admit that he wanted to get all of the normal ideas out of the way, first, before Nirzir spoke of her own dragon finding ideas.

“I’ve seen dragon teeth all around in collections here and there. Lingxing even has one above her desk in her office.” Erick said, “Find one dragon, find them all. Right?”

“Oh, for sure,” Teressa said, smirking.

Poi shot her a hard-edged glance.

Teressa continued, “I, for one, wish to be directly in the center of a dragon fight.”

“Your sarcasm is noted,” Erick said, smiling.

Nirzir was having a little trouble keeping up, though, and Erick’s latest suggestion had thrown her for a hard loop. Her voice turned slightly serious, “You can’t touch that tooth. That’s a cast off tooth from Rozeta herself. It won’t be used in any ritual.” Calmer, she added, “But your postulation that one dragon will lead to all dragons is very... baseless.”

“Well those are my starter ideas.” Erick asked, “How would you go about it?”

“Have you talked to the Dragon Stalkers yet?” she asked.

“Yes, and we’re not going that route. They want to kill every dragon, and that is the opposite of my current goals. I want to talk to them; to find out what the Mirage Dragon was doing when she attacked.” He added, “I am fully aware that I will likely need to kill a dragon, but that is the backup plan.”

“Ah. Okay. Then...” Nirzir readily said, “There are certain establishments all around the Highlands, in the smaller places between the border and the main cities, with word ‘Ar’Co’ in their names. They’re always apostrophed like the ‘Ar’ in ‘Ar’Kendrithyst’, too, for they reference something dead that was once magnificent. Do you know of these places?”

Erick readily said, “I do not. Go on.”

Teressa silently, eagerly listened to the stories of dragons in Nelboor.

Poi seemed mostly ambivalent.

Nirzir nodded, saying, “Almost all of these locations are low class establishments, but there is one set almost halfway between Eralis and Alaralti, on the other side of the river, named ‘Arcology’, that is very, very high class. I have been there three times for various celebrations.

“Arcology is filled with the most obsequious people you would ever meet, who will take you through a wonderful dinner, made with the best ingredients you can find in this entire world. They have world class Cooks and you might never get a better meal anywhere else. The lesser establishments are similar in nature, but I was warned to never go to one of those smaller places. Ever.” She paused. “Maybe the dragons are at the smaller ones? But I don’t know about that.” She continued, “There are a few rules to follow at Arcology upon pain of an instant [Teleport Other] from the establishment.

“You must never wander away from the part of the building you have been placed into. You must not interact with other guests. When you walk into the establishment they will greet you and ask you if you have ever been there before. If you give them any answer except their code phrase, you will get a normal meal.

“I have no idea what the correct answer would be, but I was always told to never deviate from ‘No, I have not been here before’.” Nirzir said, “When I asked why there were all these rules, I was told that dragons frequent the establishment. That’s about all I ever got out of my older brothers or anyone else that knows of the place; it was very tough to even get that out of them. I have no idea what the dragons do there, and my mana sense was useless the last time I was there; the place is absolutely filled with blocking spells.”

Erick thought, then said, “Sounds like a good way to be ambushed. I’ll do that if there are no other options.”

Nirzir looked a bit saddened by that, but she rapidly went to the next idea. “There’s a dragon known as Red! She had been shutting down the larger dragon fights in Eralis for a long time by eating the other dragons she finds. I have been told that if you are not a dragon, she will talk to you. Getting to Red is outside of my ability, but you should be able to do this. It’s a bit more difficult than meeting normal people though, of course, and you won’t actually meet Red, herself. There are other complications, too.

“Dragons have territories, you understand, and they secure their territories through strength. But it is by the simple act of having one territory marked as theirs, that makes other territories ‘not theirs’. This mental shift is enough for some of them to interact with others as long as such interaction is across established, polite boundaries. They still have to meet each other through the use of intermediaries, though. These meetings are always dangerous, because either side could be trying to move in on the other dragon’s land.

“And the very fact that the Mirage Dragon was active in this land without Red appearing means... Well. It could mean anything.

“The way I see it: There are two possibilities. The Mirage Dragon is either someone from outside Red’s territories, in which case Red would know more, as she is undoubtedly trying to find out what the interloper was doing. Or, the interloper dragon was just an illusion, and yet, even in that case, Red would want to know more, so she has probably sought out what was going on there.” Nirzir thought for a second, then added, “Or the Mirage Dragon is Red. Or... Well. There are a lot of possibilities there. Too many.”

“Hmm.” Erick said, “Meeting Red seems like a good idea.”

Poi said, “She won’t interact with you.”

Erick scrunched his eyebrows. “And you know this?”

“No.” Poi said, “But the Mind Mages do have standing orders not to interact with her, because she will not interact with us, and you’ll likely get the same treatment because you’re already marginally aligned with the Headmaster, and his territory is the entire world.”

“Do the Mind Mages know about this recent—” Erick paused. He said, “Ah. Sorry. I shouldn’t ask that.”

Poi smiled softly. “Thank you. The Mind Mages generally keep firm lines of obfuscation between ourselves and dragons, because the dragons are always after other dragons, and the Mind Mages are strictly uninvolved with that.”

Erick said, “Right. Well. If we end up seeing Red, maybe she won’t be an enemy.”

“Why would she be?” Nirzir asked. She added, “I mean. I know why. I hear what you’re saying: To be known to the Headmaster is to be automatic enemies with all the rest... But wouldn’t it be different for an archmage of your stature?” She glanced to Poi, then back to Erick, saying, “I didn’t know that about the Mind Mages, but Red will meet with almost anyone of high enough ranking.”

Erick said, “We’ll put her down as another option, but not one to actively pursue.”

Nirzir nodded. “Then I have one more option. We could go to Ooloraptoor and speak to the Warlord Tribes.” She explained, “The grass travelers are supposed to have a long history of dragons behind every major clan, with each of those dragons warring with other dragons through the tribes they control. I don’t know how true that is, but that is how they portray their fights, sometimes.”

“... Tell me more,” Erick said, suddenly concerned.

Was this the Path, shoving him toward Ooloraptoor?

Nirzir brightened. “Oh! Well. Their concept of war is where a lot of Nelboor gets the concept of polite war; a hundred warriors facing down a hundred warriors, and whoever is left gets the rights to whatever is being disputed. If Terror Peaks had won that initial clash— Well. Things would be very different. Eh. Well. If they had asked for something lesser, and if they had won, then they probably would have gotten the chelation treatment, or something. But they wanted our annihilation. If they had gone for a normal war, then maybe we could have avoided the... the rest of what happened.” Nirzir put away those bad thoughts, and turned upbeat again, “The grass travelers firmly adhere to the original Polite War. They field ten people on both sides and if anyone dies on either side, then the army that did the killing gives recompense to the harmed clan, which is usually a grand core per person killed. In almost all situations, that recompense is worth a lot more than whatever argument they’re disputing, so everyone tries to avoid total war.

“They’ve had large wars, though.

“A hundred years ago there was a large debate among the grass travelers over the integration of Ooloraptoor into an actual nation state. Every so often this debate happens, and we’re in the middle of one of those times, but we’re still a long way off. Years, perhaps. Back then they got to the final stages of integration, with different compacts floating around, and battles being fought over those compacts.

“For three years, they had polite war, with small scale battles of ten people versus ten people, and occasionally with a hundred versus a hundred. They were actually in the middle of making a hierarchy; of putting together their people into some final form that would then go on to make a true centralized government. There were still a lot of people against the whole idea, though. They fought to knock down those who chose to integrate. Thus, the two sides of the final battle. Integrator, versus traveler.

“The path to integration came to a head with a thousand people versus a thousand people, and it started off as any normal war would, with people being injured to lost limb and heart stab, and then being taken off the field. But someone killed someone, and then, instead of stopping and reorganizing the field, and the offender being taken off the field, the killing cascaded. Soon, it was seven hundred integrators against a hundred travelers.

“And then a single traveler cast vast, dark magics, instantly killing most of the integrators. Several integrators survived, though. One of them turned into a dragon; brilliant blue. That blue dragon proceeded to assault the other side. Soon, more dragons appeared. The official records state that, in the end, there were seven dragons in the battle.

“It was, perhaps, one of the largest dragon fights to ever occur.” Nirzir sat back, saying, “And now we’re in talks for integration again. So. You know. That story is on peoples’ minds. We think that the guy who started the killing was a Shade, though, so it might not happen that way this time.” She added, “Since you killed all of them and Blessed the rest into becoming better people.”

That was a lot to think about.

Erick arrived at a decision rather fast. “Looks like we’re going to Ooloraptoor.”

Teressa smirked, saying, “That guy you saved and the face stealers were already pointing us in that direction.”

Nirzir looked puzzled.

Erick explained, “A week ago I rescued a grass traveler by the name of Amasar of Clan Pale Cow when he [Teleport]ed into a destroyed city near Alaralti. He was dying from blood loss. He had confronted some face stealers who had taken the Forms of some ambassadors from Alaralti. I thought I had untangled that knot by providing some Imaging services to help them counter-hunt the face stealers among the grass travelers. Of the hundreds I did help to counter-hunt several days ago, the grass travelers only gave me 9 people to search for; Amasar’s patriarch, Niyazo, contributed the most names. He accepted my services and found some more face stealers among his people. But, you know, there are obviously more of those types lurking around that place, for sure.” Erick shrugged. “And now I know there are dragons there, too. All the more reason to go for a visit. I’ll probably drop in unannounced on Amasar and Niyazo and go from there.”

“Oh.” Nirzir said, “Then... Is that how the Worldly Path works?”

“It’s certainly not going how I expected it to go.” Erick said, “This started as a vacation, with a bit of an academic pursuit of [Gate] on the side. Everything else has just... sort of happened.”

Teressa smiled. “You haven’t backed down from helping the people who fall into your Path, though.”

“I have, though. I miss a lot of people I could be helping.”

Teressa had a sudden look of disbelief on her face. So did Nirzir. Poi understood, though.

Erick said, “I see a lot with Ophiel. I could send him out right now and find a hundred different problems I could solve. I could dedicate my entire life to doing just that; to helping those homeless on the streets, to feeding the world, to solving crimes faster than most guards are capable of working... But it would never be enough. I would end up killing myself to take on that much work, for there’s always something more to be done, and there’s always big stuff that needs to get done, too. So I help with the big stuff, and hopefully that is enough.”

Teressa sternly said, “You do more than enough, Boss. You do a lot. A lot of good, for a lot of people, but people got to look out for themselves, too.”

“Well... Yeah. I guess. But it’s still hard to see the good I could be doing, and yet I am not. I could never do enough.”

Poi said, “You do more than enough, Erick.”

Erick gave a sad grin, saying, “I suppose you would know what it’s like.”

“No. I don’t. I may be able to walk through a marketplace and know the problems people have, but you can do the same thing on the scale of a hundred marketplaces, and you’re allowed to act on what you see. I cannot act on anything I see, unless someone is in direct physical peril, and maybe not even then.” Poi said, “But even so, maybe some advice I was given a long time ago might help you: There are limits to giving of oneself to the world, and you are so far past your own limits that you don’t even know where you last left them.”

Erick frowned; knowing Poi was right, and yet still feeling some kinda difficult way whenever he saw someone in trouble.

Erick said, “I suppose I shouldn’t discount the ability for others to do well by themselves, either.”

Teressa said, “Exactly!”

Nirzir had watched the discussion with rapt, quiet attention.

After lunch was over, Erick allowed Nirzir to have her pick of the extra rooms, to set herself up, and then he decided to take a nap so that he could ignore whatever conversation Poi needed to have with the young girl.

Hours later, Erick awoke to the smells of burned something.

Nirzir was desperately trying to make dinner. By herself.

She had the rice in the steamer but there wasn’t any water under the basket.

The fillets of fish had been mangled beyond belief.

The frying oil was barely hot enough to fry—

And now there’s a fire. And! The girl was crying. Nirzir had been crying a little this whole time, but now came the waterworks.

Erick rapidly got out of bed to go help her.

Teressa, who had stopped practicing with her aura to watch the show from three rooms over, sent to him, ‘It’s just food! Let her burn it! And then let her eat it.’

‘I may not recognize all of my limits, but one of them is little girls crying over failed dinner preparation.’

Teressa laughed; her boisterous voice carried through the house.

- - - -

“... Thank you.” Nirzir said, her face red as she joined Erick in his library, after dinner. “For helping... With everything.”

Dinner had been well-seasoned and seared pork chops, buttered vegetables, bone broth soup (which was much better than it sounded), and rice, along with an assortment of sauces. It had taken two hours for Nirzir to make the meal, with much of that time spent restarting, and with Erick helping her the whole way. To Nirzir’s credit, she powered through; she might have cried a bit but she got it done. Erick even offered to take over for her twice, but Nirzir assured him that him ‘taking over’ was not an option for her. She had to do this. Erick had said that everyone cooked, and so, Nirzir would cook.

Erick had offered to let her try something simpler, but that was a non-starter of an idea, too. No; Nirzir wanted a good dinner, and she was going to make it happen.

And after a fashion, it had.

“You’re welcome,” Erick said, looking up from his book. “Learning how to cook takes time and patience and recipes.” He smiled, and joked, “Just like how they say you’re supposed to learn magic.”

Nirzir asked, “I don’t understand why you cook for yourself, though? Other people are much better at it. You could hire a world class Cook if you wanted.” She added, “I mean... There are wait lists to get good Cooks, so I can understand that.”

“... Wait lists?”

“Oh yes. A good Cook is hard to find! I can’t imagine that you wouldn’t get your pick of Cooks... though.” Nirzir eyed Erick and frowned a little. She sat down in the seat across from him, saying, “You have no idea what I mean when I say that, do you?”

Erick smirked. He closed his book, saying, “Not really.”

“Cooks? In the guilds? The Cooking Guilds?”

“What? Oh my gods!” Erick laughed. “There are cooking guilds?”

“Of course there are cooking guilds! You don’t know— Oh! They’re big on this side of the world. Maybe not so much over in Glaquin? I don’t know about that.” Nirzir said, “I do know that if you don’t get in good with them, then you might never get a decent Cook in your life! My family has a branch family of Cooks and I might be lucky enough to hire one of their 8 stars once I become an actual archmage, but even that is not for certain. My brothers have joked at committing an inter-family polite war when the next 10 star Cook comes out of Eralis...” Her voice trailed off, then turned serious, “We don’t think it’s a joke anymore.”

Erick’s eyes went wide as he gave a nervous chuckle. “Oh my gods.”

“Oh! Uh. No one will die...” She softly said, “Probably.”

“Ah. Well...” Erick asked, “So I take it these cooks are rated like Adventuring Guild threats?”

“Oh yes. I think the two guilds originated together, but only the Cooking Guilds survived Nelboor. There’s all sorts of different specific Cooking Guilds, too.” Nirzir said, “If you know where to look, you’ll see their Cooks everywhere. There’s a 9 star in the Void Temple. We have a 10 star at the palace; Neri Fei. She’s been with us for thirty years. The Headmaster collects as many 10 stars as he can get, but he’s at the bottom of the waiting list right now. Void Song is next in line, and we’ve been waiting for a decade. Neri Fei is fantastic, but she’s looking to retire. I never tried cooking before tonight—” Her eyes went wide. She looked away.

Erick’s heart beat hard as a thousand terrible scenarios raced through his mind.

Instead of panicking, though, he calmly asked, “What is it?”

With a completely normal, happy tone of voice, Nirzir continued, “I was just remembering a conversation— Did you know that Matriarch Lingxing is a 7 star cook? Not a classed Cook, so she can’t go higher than that, but I was just remembering... that. I don’t think it’s a secret? She really likes food and that’s not a secret at all.” She paused. She asserted, “It’s not a secret.”

Oh.

Nothing was happening.

This was just a normal talk.

Erick relaxed.

Nirzir glanced at the book in Erick’s hands, asking, “Reading about the grass travelers?”

“Somewhat.” Mostly, he was thinking about a spell that would be useful against entire armies without actually hurting them. Erick held up the thin book. “I got it with Ophiel while you were cooking.”

Nirzir smiled a little. “I know a little bit about that, if you are interested—” She dropped her hopeful expression, as though remembering something else. She rapidly continued, “But I will let you get back to your reading.” She stood up, saying, “Thank you again for helping with dinner. It was most informative.”

“... Anytime.”

Erick looked up to Nirzir, and the girl blushed.

And then she turned tail and tried to rush out of there as fast as—

Erick said, “I’ll be making one more spell before I’m ready to leave Songli behind. It’ll happen around midnight, or a bit later. Do you want me to wake you up for that?”

Stuck halfway through the doorway, Nirzir turned, and brightly said, “Yes!”

And then she rushed away, down the hallway, toward her room.

Erick chuckled a little, thinking it cute that Nirzir had a crush on him. That was unexpected! That was probably what Poi talked to her about, too. Ha!

He went back to reading.

“Yes! I am.” Nirzir cheerfully said, “It is nice to meet you, Miss Flatt.”

“No no.” Jane said, “We’re not doing honorifics if we’re in the same party. ‘Jane’ is fine, Nirzir.”

“Oh! Yes. Of course.” Nirzir tipped her head a fraction. “Jane.”

Well now! Wasn’t that a pleasant surprise! He wasn’t the only one surprised, though. Teressa was eyeing Jane like she didn’t know her, while Poi was... Well Poi was unflappable, apparently.

“Who is Keziro?” Erick asked.

Jane said, “A Reformist who wants the peasantry to go out and kill monsters and support their own lives here on the Highlands. I’ve crossed paths with him twice now, and both times it has been him saying good things about me in front of other troops.”

Nirzir nodded. “That is my brother, for sure. He is a big proponent for certain reforms like the one Jane has mentioned. He wishes that everyone would take their child out to the Tribulations after Matriculation and help them to kill a monster and shoot up to at least level 30, to better be productive members of Songli.” Nirzir added, “The detractors for that stance bring up the fact that no amount of levels or Stats would save a person who doesn’t know how to fight, and that commoners are not allowed to learn the arts of war outside of a Clan, so what’s the point of levels.”

Jane gave a half nod.

Erick could tell that Jane wasn’t happy with Nirzir being here, but she was willing to tolerate it. Erick decided to switch the subject, saying, “I decided on the next step of the Path. We’re going to head toward Ooloraptoor to speak to the grass travelers about dragons.”

“Still got four days left in your obligation?” Jane asked.

“Three days, now, but there’s still time to hunt monsters and make magic.” Erick said, “I’m going to go out and make one more spell tonight. Want to come?”

“Yup; I’ll come.”

- - - -

The night sky held three crescent moons that gave off thin glows of white, silver, and pink. Their light barely reached the surface. The stars, though...

The stars were a glittering brilliance upon the void. A trillion billion pinpricks of light. Not a single cloud marred their shine. Not a single light on the horizon, or anywhere else, polluted that sky.

The night sky of Veird was something that Erick still found wonderful, even knowing that there were monsters prowling everywhere around him in that darkness. The fact that he could actually see the stars probably had something to do with that minor joy.

When people get older their eyesight starts to go, and in some ways, Erick never experienced that passing of youth; he never needed glasses, after all. But in some ways...

Night after night, year after year, the human eye becomes more and more incapable of seeing the brilliance that exists above them. Erick was not immune to this phenomenon. Regaining his night sight after gaining the Blessing of Rozeta’s Recovery was a similar experience, he was sure, to when someone who needed glasses gained those glasses; they spoke of seeing individual leaves on trees once again. When Erick ‘gained his own glasses’, he saw the night sky in its partial brilliance. But now, with Perception, that phenomenon had come to Erick again, and he saw the night sky in all its glory.

He was probably seeing better now than he had when he was a child.

Well.

Yeah.

For sure, that was true.

Anyway. The night was cold, but not chilly. The air was calm, and unwavering. The monsters were out there, but they were far away. And the stars... The stars were wonderful.

Erick focused. Tonight was the perfect night to commune with the mana, to speak of Void, to whisper of Starlight, to discuss the laying low of all those who dare to threaten.

Yes.

There it is; the correct mindset.

All around Erick, Ophiels began to swarm over each other in an unorganized tumble, but then Erick enforced a pattern, sending Ophiels outward, one by one, to form a circle around him, to dance among the starlight, atop the short grasses of the plains. Each one of them took up a piece of magic and played its music into the night sky.

He linked magics together.

Magics he had Remade, and understood. Magics he had created whole cloth. Magics of the uncertain made certain, and magics of power. Magics he had bought, and did not truly understand except for how they spoke to him. The mana spoke now, to him, through the magic; all one had to do was communicate back.

And so, Erick spoke,

“A Forceful Wall is broken; sundered

“An Undertow drags deep the plundered

“But a Ward will know of friend or foe

“While a Denial spell will say a ‘No’

“A harsh bright dawns upon these depths

“Casting down, it intercepts

“Those who would deny my right

“See now this [Rift of Undertow Light]!”

Erick’s voice deepened as he spoke; the magic taking hold and strengthening itself, imprinting its power upon Erick’s soul, and upon the world.

The sky seemed to deepen in turn.

The stars sparkled. And then they began to wink out. The moons vanished all at once. The night sky was such a deep blue that it looked black, but it wasn’t until actual blackness began to spread that one could tell the difference. Now, as darkness swept the sky, Erick could see.

Like ink, it spread.

And then, came the light.

A single, brilliant star, exploded into being in the center of the spell, illuminating everything and nothing all at once. The star cascaded black ink through the manasphere, like a continuous detonation. It hurt to look at, for the star was set beyond the darkness, and yet it was a part of the darkness itself.

Erick watched the star cascade for a little while, sending out tiny bits of disrupting Extreme Light, no doubt. At that thought, Erick’s calculating mind came back to him. The rift was about three hundred meters up there. The true stars and the moons had reappeared beyond his spellwork, though looking upon the spell, the central star was surrounded by a good twenty meters of deep, deep shadows, with tendrils of shadows that reached out up to a hundred meters away—

No. That wasn’t right. Some of those tendrils reached all the way to the ground, with one of them only twenty meters away from where Erick stood. Some of those tendrils reached far, far into the distance.

The spell had a range of kilometers. That was unintended, but Erick was thankful. He had thought he would need to Shape this spell to make it bigger. Maybe he wouldn’t need to—

A blue box appeared.

Undertow Star, instant, super long range, 4500 mana

Summon the Undertow Star! All are the same; all are different.

You may designate allies and enemies at will. All others are still subject to the star’s power.

Allies are excluded from the star’s wrath unless they get too close.

Drain 2x WIL Health and 2x WIL Mana per second from every target in a super large area of effect. Effect is stronger in the depths. Distant targets might not understand that they are being drained. Prevent all non-allied spatial travel within the star’s sight. Gradually erode any non-allied spellwork within the area of effect. The star will defend itself and allies with extreme light and against encroachment with worse.

Lasts 24 hours.

For every 10 resources drained, the spell will last 20 more minutes, gain 3 more points of [Dispel] protection, and be able to erode enemy spellwork with WIL extreme light damage.

It was a pretty big box! It was a pretty good spell, too.

Erick looked to his party.

Teressa stared up at the [Undertow Star], her eyes rolled back in her head a bit; no doubt trying [Witness] the spell as it was created up above, or... Hmm.

Perhaps she was mana sensing at a distance, to understand what the heck the tendrils of shadows were doing to the manasphere. Now that Erick wasn’t making the magic, he noticed a large oddity.

Normally, the mana around here flowed from north to south.

But now... Mana floated up, toward the [Undertow Star], like the spell was a hole in the manasphere, only to flow out once again, through all the shadow tendrils all around. The star wasn’t actually absorbing the ambient mana... But it certainly looked odd. Spells didn’t normally do that.

Jane looked up at the working, then down to her father. She seemed concerned, in that ‘are you hurting yourself again?’ sort of way.

Poi was worried, too, but for some other reason. Probably because of the noise.

The [Undertow Star] hummed into the world, with a constant, low grade sound. It was almost like when Erick had made Ophiel, but distinctly different; less otherworldly, for sure, but still supernatural. It wasn’t an unpleasant sound, but then again Erick liked Ophiel’s original sound just fine, too. In fact, [Undertow Star] sounded sort of like the air conditioner turning on, but distant, and barely audible. A very quiet AC. Erick always loved that sound because it made falling asleep back on Earth a lot easier. He had been missing that sound, now that he thought about it.

And now he had that sound back? Well wasn’t that interesting. Erick had made this spell so that he would feel safer falling asleep, after all. [Undertow Star] would prevent people from blipping into his sleeping space, lock down everyone who wasn’t admitted, and suck away all their resources, while also making itself rather [Dispel] resistant, too! Domains were likely still a problem, but if Erick ever added a Domain to some future version of this spell, then he could kill that particular weakness, too.

Magic was pretty awesome like that.

Nirzir’s reaction was not subdued at all. Her voice was filled with glee as she shouted for joy, “That’s amazing!” She asked, “What is it?”

Teressa softly said, “I got no idea what it’s supposed to do, either.”

Erick smiled. He almost spoke of his new [Luminosity] spell, but he decided not to.

That was probably the paranoia talking, but whatever!

Poi knew! That was enough, for now.

Erick didn’t hand out the blue box, yet, for there were parts of it that were concerning, so he first explained, “I put a lot of different spells into this working in order to produce a guardian for when we’re all camped out. It does quite a few things—”

“Where’s the box, dad?” Jane asked. She had caught on rather quickly that he was hedging his new spell.

Nirzir asked, “Can I see the box, too—”

A tendril of shadows rapidly moved across the intervening space between Erick and Nirzir, and the rest of his party, racing off toward the west. Everyone looked up, and watched as several thin tendrils, each multiple hundreds of meters long, joined together in the far distance, touching down upon something.

Erick sent an Ophiel a kilometer over to investigate.

“Ah,” he said, watching through Ophiel’s eyes with half of his focus. “It’s a pack of red dogs, or something. Not sure if they’re different from what we have over in the Crystal Forest, or not.”

The red dogs were each half as large as a cow, with massive teeth and fur that looked as sharp as needles. The [Undertow Star]’s tendrils reached for them, and caught them. The dogs panicked a bit, growling and trying to chomp at the shadows with their large teeth. Teeth met nothing, and soon, the dogs stopped caring about the spellwork touching them. [Undertow Star] had no obvious effects, unless you were paying attention to your resources, after all, and monsters were still monsters, even if they were zeroed out on both Health and Mana.

Erick said, “They’re headed this way.”

“Red dogs? Are you sure they’re not wolves?” Nirzir asked, “Do they have four eyes?”

“Oh. Well.” Erick looked again, then said, “No. Two eyes, and something that looks like eye spots just above their real eyes.”

“Oh!” Nirzir’s face flushed with light embarrassment. “Uh. Yes. They’re still called four-eyed wolves. They are expert nighttime hunters. They’re attracted to magic.” Nirzir said, “I’ve been told they’re harmless, but they are monsters. Best kill them.”

Erick had already seen that they were monsters; they had cores in their chests.

Poi ignored the discussion over monsters, and spoke about the spell Erick had made. “You can’t cast this spell in a city, Erick. It doesn’t matter if you can make it not affect anyone.”

Erick hadn’t given out the box yet, but Poi had already read what Erick had read, for sure.

“You have a good point, Poi, but I can already think of a few ways that this spell would be perfect for inside a city, if it was Shaped properly, anyway. It doesn’t do any actual damage— But I can see that you are probably correct.” Erick shrugged. “It’ll be good for when we’re out under the stars, and wary of our surroundings. These tendrils seem to automatically find everyone around! Isn’t that something! Just think of the applications.” Erick prevented further discussion on the topic, for now, saying, “Now watch. I’m going to designate those wolves as ‘enemies’.”

Jane, Teressa, and Nirzir, all cast a spell to see in the distance. Poi did not; he remained on watch.

Erick designated the wolves as enemies.

High above, the [Undertow Star] radiated a baleful light. The tendrils of shadow surrounding the wolves began to rotate and pull, becoming hungry, ethereal twisters. The wolves instantly resumed growling and chomping at the darkness, their fangs flashing in the night. But when that did nothing, the forward wolf made a decision and howled into the night air, then charged forward, toward the thing attacking it. Running toward the star in the sky. The pack followed.

The wolves had no hope of ever assaulting the spell hanging so high in the air, and yet, still, they rushed toward the thing that was hurting them. Well. Not ‘hurting’ them. There was no actual damage taking place. The wolves were likely out of Health, though.

[Undertow Star] didn’t kill! Point proven.

So Erick finished the monsters off with the quick squiggle of a [Luminous Beam].

Erick came back to himself, just in time to see the light of his spell upon the horizon.

The others came back soon enough.

Erick handed out the spell, saying, “This’ll be good if I have to fight an army. Or a dragon. It can shut them down without injury.”

As Teressa and Jane read the spell, their eyes went a little wide. Nirzir got a wonderful, crazy grin on her face. Poi didn’t bother to read the blue box.

Jane got a weird, worried look, as she asked, “When did you learn [Teleport Lock]?”

“I didn’t.” Erick smiled. “I doubt this prevention is absolute, because the denial you’re seeing is the [Spatial Denial] I made a while ago, and that is certainly not absolute.”

Jane jerked, then relaxed, and said, “Oh.”

Teressa tentatively asked, “What would happen if it absorbed a million mana, or something like that? Surely there has to be a limit... Right?”

“Probably.” Erick said, “The Propagation Ban is certainly a thing that exists.”

“This is amazing!” Nirzir’s eyes were wide as she shook the blue box for [Undertow Star] in her hand. She looked to Erick, saying, “If this spell was under the control of Void Song then we could extend our peace and prosperity far beyond the Void Wall. We can reach all the way to our borders!”

“[Undertow Star] is not ‘Particle Mage Only’, though I did use some of those tricks in there.” Erick said, “You might be able to figure it out through your own methodology.”

Nirzir stood straight, and nodded.

Erick warned, “And you can handle the headache of bringing about a new world order through the single failure point of a single spell, when you do.”

Nirzir stood a bit less straight, and nodded again, a bit less sure this time.

Teressa furrowed her brows at the young girl, but since she was a good meter and a half taller than Nirzir, Nirzir didn’t even notice. Teressa didn’t like that the Void Song was the Songli solution to the problem of everyone having magic; she preferred for everyone to get stronger so that everyone could fight when needed.

Jane actually said the words aloud, though, “I think that too many people already have it too safe inside the cities.”

Nirzir softly said, “Safety is not a bad word. Everyone should be able to live their lives free of monsters.”

“It’s a nice thought, for sure!” Erick said, ending that discussion. He flicked his intent at the [Undertow Star], canceling the spell. The star burst into a nebula of dark light, taking the tendrils with it in a cascade of return to the mana. “But for now, we go back to Holorulo. We’re leaving the city in 3 days.”

Nirzir mumbled, “Right.”