Chapter 259, 1/2

Chapter 259, 1/2

Erick flew for three days, mostly as lightning and moving a lot faster than he ever could as a dragon.

Over those three days, Erick had toyed with the idea that he was on an infinite treadmill again, but that was simply untrue. He had run tests with leaving giant ever-glowing lights in the sky, one half of them yellow, the other half black, pointing all the way back to where he had started, each of them connected by a strand of node network. That line of connected lights was still visible, even now, stretching far, far into the distance. From this angle it looked like a string of gold-ringed black eyes, and each eye lay directly behind the other.

Erick had needed to move off of that center-line to see the vast distances he had already crossed, but it was all still there every time he checked.

The Margleknot sky looked the same this entire time. The angle of the sights up there hadn’t changed, so either the sky was fake for every single person, or those other surfaces were, like, a solar system away, or more. But that would make the sky fake, for sure, because Erick saw stuff happening on other parts of the cosmology up there. Either way, the sky was not a good indicator of distance traveled.

The desert seemed never ending.

Until suddenly it wasn’t all the same thing over and over again... Somewhat.

There were rocks on the ground now.

Over there was a tiny oasis of wet sand and no visible water at all. Grasses still grew in that wet sand, though. It was a spot of green in an otherwise empty world.

... Which gave Erick an idea of how to end the monotony.

Erick molded resons into a [Terraforming] and threw the storm into the sky, attaching it to the node network and an [Undertow Star], molding it all together into a self-sustaining system of mana-siphoning worldly transformation.

Instantly the sky clouded over, the horizons turning dim and grey. The only lights came from the line of gold-rimmed light orbs and the node network behind Erick, and the sudden appearance of a tiny star of power that flooded the world with tendrils of shadow—

The star pulsed and Benevolent lightning scoured the sky, ripping across the empty heavens, splitting here and there as it chained off in every direction, adding clouds wherever it split as it stretched out into the vastness of the desert environment. The clouds gathered more lightning.

And then came the rain.

Erick flew as a dragon for a while instead of as lightning, enjoying the cool rain on his scales and the strike of lightning on the ground here and there. Every time the lightning struck damp soil it scattered in every direction, spreading green here and there. Sometimes that green glowed. Sometimes it just blew or washed away in the storm as minor lakes popped up here and there. Flash floods raced across the desert as shadowy tendrils cast down from the sky in every direction, touching upon the new life. That new life fed the mana demands of the many spells he had tied together; the [Terraforming], the [Undertow Star], and the node network and all the giant light orbs attached to that network.

The storm wouldn’t go forward anymore because Erick wasn’t putting down any more network in that direction, but it would go backward, back to where Erick had started the network about two days ago.

Maybe there was life hiding out down there, somewhere, but Erick hadn’t seen anything, and probably because of that time worm. If the only thing living out here was the time worm then fuck the time worm. It could drown, new life could spread, and that would be fine.

Lightning crashed, as if agreeing with that thought.

Erick grinned. It probably was agreeing with him.

Erick flew for a long while as a dragon, just enjoying the rain. He even stopped at what looked like a brand new lake to take a break and a drink and to feast on some mushrooms growing and glowing on a broken new-forest, near the lake’s edge. He didn’t like the red mushroom he tried, or the purple one, but the blue ones were fantastic. He copied a lot of those and then grilled them on some utility cooking spellwork.

With a belly full of blue mushrooms and water, both of which were completely superfluous to him since he was a True Wizard now, Erick flew faster once again.

He left the storm maybe 20 hours later. It was hard to keep track of time since this desert world was full-sun full-time, but Erick thought it might have been a day of flying, both as a dragon and as lightning, to escape the [Terraforming] storm. He enjoyed the sun on his scales for a few hours, and then he turned to lightning again and began flying faster.

Another two or maybe three days passed before the scattered rocks and tiny spikes of stone in the desert turned into more than that.

It happened all at once.

The horizon led off into the infinite distance...

.... and then the horizon got closer.

Beyond the density of atmosphere that existed here, Erick saw something that was not the end of the desert, but it was something similar.

Obsidian shards, like mountains-sized knives, stuck up from the sands, like teeth cutting tan flesh. Those daggers had a lot of space between each one, and they edged from horizon to horizon as far as Erick could see. But as he really looked, and as he flew closer, he saw that those obsidian shards were ever-so-slightly curved away from him. As though they were the start of an arc of black knives jutting up from the desert sands.

There was some sort of magic on them.

Erick got closer and stopped a few kilometers from the encirclement, and it was an encirclement, for sure. It had to be ten thousand kilometers wide according to Erick’s guesstimations. He could only see part of the circle. He couldn’t even see the end of the grey sky pillar that pointed at one of Wraithborne Tower’s Layer 1 cities, but he was pretty sure it was in there. Somewhere. Probably in the very center of the obsidian dagger ‘wall’.

This was his destination, for sure. Erick checked his Lightning Path and saw that the Lightning was pointed in this direction, specifically to here, too, but only briefly. The real way forward lay beyond...

Over there...

Illusions, perhaps? Erick narrowed his eyes and tried to pierce whatever illusions might be laying on the other side—

He couldn’t see clearly, but he saw some sort of illusion magic encapsulating all of the land on the other side. It was still desert over there, but there were... buildings? Spellworks?

Oh.

Guardians on a wall, looking at Erick in the sky, wondering what the heck he was doing.

Erick spoke in draconic, which was his usual language these days, “Hello! I’m Erick Flatt, Wizard of Benevolence, and I’m coming into the Wraithborne Tower’s hideout. Make way, or I will make way. You have a minute to comply.”

He floated there.

A voice called out from the ‘wall’, “You can’t enter from here! The worm is too close and you are too large. Please fly around to the other side!”

Erick transformed back into a person, the transformative clothes that Lionshard had given him transforming with him, turning from jewelry on a horn to a nice white and black suit. Erick felt a little constrained by his human form, but that was normal. Being as a dragon for so long always had a few side effects, and the instinctive, disruptive feeling of ‘I don’t want to be this small’ was one of them.

Erick’s voice remained large. “This better?”

“... Yes! Please come through here, and fast!”

One of the illusions between two obsidian knives faded exposing a land that looked pretty fucking miserable. At first glance Erick saw soldiers that were dead, in the literal sense; they were bones and armor and dried flesh. There were a bunch of mostly-dead soldiers, too, in the sense that they were skin and bones and severely malnourished. The mages controlling the undead looked dirty and unwashed, with pit stains and worse in their white underclothes, while their over clothes were purple fabrics that they used to hide all the rest. Men, women, bug people, some person made of paper who might have been an elementassi of Elemental Book, goblinkind; there were all types beyond the wall, in what appeared to be a forward settlement on that side of the obsidian knife wall.

And for every person, there were at least two undead.

The largest of the undead were flesh golems 50 meters tall, both of them looking like sexless men, hanging out on both sides of the obsidian knife entryway, gazing at Erick with full-black eyes that seemed almost malevolent in their gaze. Not Malevolent, though; or at least not that Erick could see.

The entrance had only been open for a bare second.

Erick zapped right on through to stand near the person whom Erick suspected of being the speaker, seeing as how he was in a central position on a wall-like bulwark-building, but he was obviously not in charge of this entire land. He was simply too... unclean, really.

Erick started with, “Hello.”

The man in a purple robe bowed fast then he shouted to the side, “Close the Wall!”

The two flesh golems tapped the 100-meter-tall obsidian knives and sound rang out. A flickering mirage echoed into the space between the knives, and the desert beyond turned indistinct. Erick couldn’t see anything beyond maybe 50 kilometers. He had lost sight of his storm days ago, anyway.

He wondered if these people knew about the storm out there? They looked like they could use some water.

The purple man turned to Erick and did a proper, formal bow, going all the way down to his knees, pressing his head against the ground. “This one greets the honorable Ascended Flatt. How may the Wraithborne Tower be of service?”

“You all look rather miserable. Rise, please. Need any help with anything?” Erick thumbed back toward the way he came, saying, “I left a large perpetual storm about 4 days back that way. Barring shenanigans by the worm— and you do mean the time worm, right? When you spoke of the worm. Anyway. Barring shenanigans then that part of the desert is going to be full of water and life for a long time coming. And that’s just some of what I can do, so let me help you in some big way, and then you can point me toward the exit to layer 0.”

The man focused as Erick spoke, his eyes still cast downward as he thought fast.

And then he rose, as Erick had commanded, and said, “Water four days from here is a boon that cannot be overstated. We appreciate this generosity. The Endless and its time worm does not abide by such water creation, so we will send out skeletons to grab and return whatever water they can carry and hope that some is left by the time they can get that done.”

Erick smiled, saying, “Water is important then. I’ll consider making a storm here. Moving on: Who is actually in charge here? What is this place anyway? I came to this part of the Wall for whatever reason, and you look marginally in charge, but I don’t want to put you under any more pressure because I am sure that maybe Morbion will come down and interrogate everyone who speaks with me.”

The man tried not to show fear as he said, “We have been informed of possible actions happening around us because of your esteemed personage. If you wish to speak to someone in charge then please continue on to the main city, which is in the center under the big grey pillar, and go to the largest building with the biggest dome. It is there that Chancellor Eldawae holds his court. Welcome to Da’luwe.”

“And a fine welcome it is.” Erick gestured toward the grand city in the far, far distance. “That’s Da’luwe, then?” He gestured downward to the empty land between here and there, and then down even more, to the jumble of buildings and hovels on this side of the obsidian wall. Everything rotted and fields looked weak and terrible. Women and men tried to use magics to eke out tiny fruits from a meager orchard that was not getting nearly enough water. No one seemed to be getting enough of anything. “So what does that make this blighted land? A subsidiary? A torture? A relegation? Are your soul shackles chafing you, mister man in purple?”

Erick watched him, but he also mana sensed every single other person in the closest 500 meters. He counted 376 people, and maybe 1200 undead. The undead were harder to count because some of them looked composed of multiple bodies. Maybe 21 people were actively listening to this conversation. Every single undead was listening, though.

The man in purple’s body betrayed his hope even as his words came out, “We’re doing fine here. Your worry is appreciated, Ascended Flatt.”

Erick got to the point. “How much is your debt?”

“7,300 res—” The man stilled. His soul twisted just a little, and then relaxed. “My debt is my own, Ascended Flatt.”

“... Hmm!” And then Erick handed him a reson jewel worth 7,500 resons. “Yours.”

The man touched it—

... Erick wondered, with the Demons being real again, was slavery back on the table on Veird? Yggdrasil hadn’t spoken of that back when he had talked about what was going on back home, but the demons, even if they were incani, had a habit of doing the slavery-thing.

But in that case...

Entering into an Elemental Vile and Demon slave contract was the only way for an incani to die and end up with the house they signed up with, instead of randomly placed somewhere else on Hell, as like, a dretch or worm; the lowest lifeforms of demonkin.

And that was largely true. Demon slave contracts weren’t all that bad, in a technical sense. The new ‘slave’ became a member of a demon house upon death, and sure, there was conscripted grunt work, but they were treated more like little brothers or sisters, and not really like slaves at all. The Old Demons were all dead, and all that was left on Hell was generational family houses built by incani, and upon centuries of dead grandmas, cousins, brothers, fathers, etcetera.

The soul shackled slavery on display here in Da’luwe was not like incani slavery at all.

As Erick flew through the sky, looking at the ground below and at the people, wraiths and ghosts and other incorporeal flying undead began to lift up from the edges of houses here and there, all of them looking almost invisible against the rest of the world. They were the aerial defense force, of course. Some of them took to the sky to follow Erick. Some floated up in front of him, directly in his path, their eyes full of hate and their bodies turning partially real as they prepared to strike. But then their eyes would flash a different color, going from invisible to barely green, or yellow, or orange, or purple. Purple happened a lot. And then, when that happened, the undead would disperse, or move to the side, or ignore Erick.

Erick assumed that the ghosts were all on simple commands to kill anyone in the sky, and that it took work to make them not attack the people in the air, which was why Erick was the only one in the air right now... At all, it seemed. Everywhere Erick looked, nothing was in the sky at all, except for him.

Erick floated toward the largest, central buildings, which held upon a low mountain in the center of the city, looking like an Evil-Vatican-meets-Parthenon sort of place, and mostly grey with black accents. It was a land made of domes and spires and tall silver trees, sitting behind a high wall that separated it from the high-class parts of the main city of Da’luwe.

Some scary-looking undead, including what appeared to be a few ghost-alien-dragons, briefly appeared underneath as Erick crested the wall separating the central castle from the rest of the kingdom. But then those ghosts went back to total invisibility, soaking back into the wall and the land. Their eyes didn’t flicker in that redirection. They didn’t need to hear commands; they were likely intelligent ghosts.

Everything in the castle land was light grey stone with black accents, and it looked positively evil.

Still, it looked kinda nice.

Erick landed by a wide fountain in a large, central square, right in front of the gigantic domed building. This seemed like a good place for him to start, and his Lightning Path agreed with him.

Living people and a few liches, for sure, had been walking around down here, going from here to there, but they all scattered when it was apparent that Erick was coming down into this courtyard.

Erick faced the large domed building, and wondered at its closed doors. They were each tens of meters tall and wrought with imagery of city building, which was pretty good in Erick’s opinion. City building was a lot better of a theme than most undead liked to—

Huge, black, ghostly skeletal arms reached out of the air and gripped the doors. The metal doors groaned under the weight of themselves, and the skeletal arms pulled harder, opening them wide. The skeletal arms pulled the doors open all the way, and then faded back into the stone. The hall beyond looked like a grand central stage surrounded on all sides by low seating—

Horns trumpeted a clarion call of power from inside the building.

And then a man stood upon that central stage. He walked out of the large building, toward Erick. He was obviously a lich, wearing thin black robes that showed grey skin and a sexless body. Black bones poked through here and there. All of it had to be an affectation pointed one way or another, and Erick wasn’t sure what the goal of his affectations were, exactly. He was elven and about as tall as Erick, which was around 3 meters due to his own dragon stuff. Erick assumed this was Chancellor Eldawae.

It was probably Chancellor Eldawae.

Erick stepped forward, meeting the man halfway, in the sun.

The man stepped out of the meeting chambers, his eyes filled with silver light, as he regarded Erick. He gave a tiny, partial bow, saying, “Greetings, Ascended Erick Flatt of Earth and Veird and the new Father of Margleknot. I am Chancellor Eldawae. What brings you to our humble respite in the Endless? A way back to Layer 0, perhaps?” He pointed in the distance, toward a dim grey pillar on the horizon, to Erick’s right. “That is the correct path to the nearest portal to Layer 1, but that is not the full story. Go there, and then follow the next four pillars and you will make it to the way out of this land. It takes an ascended about a year to get to that first stop if you’re moving fast, but not too fast. If you move at the full speed of action you will get there in a minute, but about 14 or 15 years will have passed here in this land. The entire trip to Layer 1 is something that might take a person either 10 minutes and 75 years, or 6 years of simply moving fast.

“Or.

“I have a better option.

“Kill the time worm and we can see about funding the creation of a portal here, in Da’luwe. Falling to Layer 1 is easy. Leaving Layer 1 is only usually possible through walking, or dying. But we can make a portal under certain circumstances, for 1 person at a time. The only reason we don’t have one is because it’s expensive to maintain the wards, and every time the worm tests them we’re set back that much more.”

Chancellor Eldawae stopped talking.

That was all rather simple, then.

Erick said, “I want to install more Benevolence towers in your land to bring more bounty to your land, and to allow for a freer populace. I’ll see about killing the time worm afterward.”

Chancellor Eldawae had no response, except to stand there like a posed corpse, regarding Erick.

Erick remained silent.

Eventually, Eldawae asked, “Your purpose in those Benevolence towers?”

“My goal is the eradication of Evil from the Wraithborne Tower which would result in the eradication of a lot of subsidiary evils in the rest of Margleknot. I would desire for slavery as you know it to end as well. I do this because everything can be made better. The best way forward to a better tomorrow is only to kill what needs to be killed and then save all the rest, including the truly great evils. As long as people wish to be better, then I want to help those people be better.

“Take, for instance, the body you’re wearing. Is that for show, or because that’s what your magics allow for? If it’s for show, then that’s fine. If your body is that way because that’s the best option you have available —and I see that many undead around here are similarly corpse-like— then know that Benevolence can make for truly proper bodies. My boyfriend is an archlich and he put some Benevolence into his bodies a while ago, thus allowing for a much wider array of emotions and cohesion and power.

“A lot more power.

“And speaking of power, and going back to the towers I want to put up: you’re low on resources here, or something, and you need more resources. I have absolutely no idea why you have a water shortage at all, for instance. The tower I have already built is something I put up in 5 hours and will last forever, unless it is messed with. I’m sure I could do better if I had your cooperation in that.” Erick said, “In a more sinister way, I am helping how I can and proving that Benevolence can do what you cannot for whatever reasons, and extremely easily as well. That is how I can prove my power and the weakness of your current society.”

Some of that was bluster. Hard to say what parts, exactly.

Chancellor Eldawae was silent again, thinking.

Erick waited, but he was not idle. He gauged the reactions of every single person watching this exchange, from up in the nearby towers, to on the wall and preparing to strike Erick down with spellwork if the word was given, to inside the lecture rooms to the side, to those who mana sensed this conversation from inside hidden bunkers inside walls here and there. The soldiers among those here were all waiting for the signal to go, or to stand down, but the courtiers and sycophants and clerks and nobles all watched with a bit more worry, or hope, or absolute disdain.

Most everyone here wanted Eldawae to end Erick right here and now.

The smarter people knew that Eldawae would not have such an easy time doing to Erick what he had undoubtedly done to so many others in order to keep himself in power.

Eldawae was a smart person.

And so, Erick waited.

Eldawae relaxed a fraction and regarded Erick with dismissive silver eyes as he spoke in a pleasant tone, “I find it insulting that you think my body is not an acceptable form. Sex is highly overrated, Wizard Flatt.”

Erick grinned. “I completely agree. But then there’s food, and warmth, and a whole bunch of physical things that are nice to have.”

“You may enact your towers. The limits of Da’luwe are from the tops of the Wall to the top of that central tower behind my grand meeting chambers. Your current tower is below this measure, so that is fine. Do not build higher than that, or the worm will see. Do not dig any deeper than that height below the surface of the sands, either. To be safe, simply do not go below 25 meters.

“We don’t have a lot of water or many other resources so we have to import a lot of it from side realities using resons. Everything runs on resons here, and everything is imported.

“Da’luwe is a penal colony, so please do not go freeing people from the crimes they have committed. These crimes include murder, rape, arson, warmongering, failure to pay, genocide, treason, drug trafficking, terrorism, fraud, grand assault, impersonation, and many others.”

Erick easily asked, “Are you a penal colony looking to hold people, or to rehabilitate them?”

“To hold until death. Rehabilitation is not what people get sent to Da'luwe for, but that does still happen from time to time.”

“What about all the people in the city who aren’t undead? Who are just living lives of ease? Or the people by the Wall? Are they all Contract soul-shackle slaves, too?”

“The people who are living in luxury in Da’luwe are either those who are born to those who are imprisoned here, or visitors from outside who find themselves stranded here in the Endless, who come to us like you came to us. Those who were born here, if they choose to stay past the age of majority, are the majority of those in the city. Everyone who lives here contributes all of their power to powering Da'luwe, though, and that includes those who are not prisoners. Excess power goes to paying off debts, if people have them. Most people do not have debts; they have sentences for offenses committed. Many people stay shackled past their payments in order to support others.” Eldawae said, “Those who have minor offenses, but which are still major in the eyes of the Tower, get to keep their bodies and intellect upon arriving here, if they work a job like ‘wall guard’. Those who do major offenses become undead shackled to the city until their debt is considered paid, and then they are allowed to die and join the Waiting Room waiting line.”

... Well that was a lot.

If some of it was true...

Erick decided he still didn’t like their system.

After a moment more of thinking, Erick asked, “How does one kill the time worm? Is it just the one?”

“There is only ever one time worm in existence at any point in time, and the only way to kill it is with extreme power, surrounding the entire beast and obliterating it down to the last iota of existence. Soul magic works well. It only ever stays dead for about a hundred years, though. Don’t worry about trying to stop it for longer than that.”

“Is it truly mindless? Unable to be soul shackled?”

“No, and no. It’s a very intelligent beast, but it wants to eat and eat, and that’s all it is good for. Killing it will open up Da'luwe to likely fighting a surface war in the near future against any number of unknown actors and a few known enemies out there, but there’s always more of those than anyone can count. That war will happen in 70 years if we’re lucky, 90 if we’re more lucky, or 30 if we’re unlucky.” Eldawae said, “Those who crash against our obsidian knives, seeking to take our bounty, often find themselves prisoners, though.” He shrugged. “It’s usually a wash.”

“... I’m going to go out and make some resources for you all, and then I’ll go take care of the time worm problem. Talk to you later.”

“Please keep your fight away from the city. Far, far away.” Eldawae stepped back. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Ascended Flatt.”

“You as well, Chancellor Eldawae. I’ll be back.”

“I look forward to properly welcoming you to Da'luwe next time.”

Erick flew up and out of the city, to the outskirts.

32-ish hours later, and after having created eight more resource towers all in a rather organized circle surrounding the main city, Erick flew out and away from the obsidian wall, back the way he had come.

Toward the lands that held the time worm.