027

Erick woke under a blue sky; his weather ward faintly visible above.

Two shadows loomed ovehead. As Erick’s eyes regained their ability to focus, one of the shadows resolved into a grey feathered Krakina. The other became a sapphire bluescaled Poi. Poi reached down as Erick reached up, and lifted Erick to his feet. Poi helped Erick remain upright, before stepping away.

Krakina looked him over. “Error message?”

“Yes. Can’t use Mana Altering on [Lightning Aura]. I don’t want to try it with [Call Lightning].”

Krakina frowned. She squinted her eyes at Erick. “Truth?”

“I could try it again, but—”

“Try again!”

Poi said, “I must insist that you try again as well. This is very important.”

Erick looked at Poi. The sapphire dragonkin was as focused as Erick had ever seen him, even more so than when Erick was talking with Anhelia, the information broker of Spur’s Mage Guild. So Erick nodded.

He tried again.

Mana Altering: Bludgeoning

[Lightning Aura]

 

 

Poi held Erick upright.

When Erick’s senses returned, he said, “Error, again.”

Poi insisted, “Try something else. Alter to Fire.”

“Are you an idiot!” Krakina slapped Poi on the shoulder with her wingtips. She shouted, “We would all die!”

“We have to know. We’ll go back to the absorption [Ward]s we put up. Erick stays here.” He said to Erick, “Sit down, and try it with Alter to Fire. The Lightning Aura you made is enough for us to know. If you tried this with [Call Lightning] that much mana clashing against an Error would lay you out for days.”

Erick looked into Poi’s eyes, and realized Mana Altering failure was a big deal. Erick already suspected it would be, but seeing Poi’s face really brought home that truth. That truth made Erick happy.

Erick smiled. “If this doesn’t work, that means [Call Lightning] is impressive, but trivial to negate. The aura is easy to negate, too. Just throw a [Call Lightning] up first, and the rain will dissipate any building charge. It’s a perfect counter to itself.”

“… The bigger issue is if you cannot Mana Alter the magic,” Poi stressed.

Erick grinned. “You two want to go back to your [Ward]s now?”

Both of them hurried over to their [Ward]s.

Erick sat down on the ground and stared at the blue sky.

It’s like you answered a prayer I didn’t know I had, Rozeta.

Erick threaded his mana through his skills.

Mana Altering: Force to Fire.

[Lightning Aura]

 

 

Erick was already on the ground, so he didn’t fall. He knew what was coming, so he didn’t lose consciousness. In fact, he felt a surge of relief.

He called out, “Error message! Can’t alter to fire!”

“FUCK!” Krakina yelled, at the same time—

—Poi yelled, “YES!”

Erick laughed loud, saying, “You don’t like being my ‘bodyguard’, Poi?”

“Ah!” Poi cleared his throat. “Ah. Sorry, sir. That was not my intent.”

“It’s okay. I’m happy, too. But this is going to make a rain grow aura much more difficult!”

“IT’S IMPOSSIBLE, NOW! How would you even—” Krakina shouted, “FUCKING—”

Krakina continued to shout, transferring from Ecks into some unknown language. As she cursed the sky, Erick reviewed his backup plan to making [Growth Rain]. Maybe it would work, maybe not. Maybe it would lay him out for another three days, but he was going to try anyway.

He relaxed. Poi shushed Krakina in the background. Meditation filled Erick’s vision with shadows as ambient mana trickled into his body. He wasn’t full, but that was okay. He opened his mana, and began:

“A world of wheat, a land of green, a thousand different delicious beans.

“Peaceful rain to grow the land, kingdoms linked hand in hand.

“A world of wheat, a land of green, a thousand different delicious beans.

“Peaceful growth devoid of pain, bloom the land with [Miracle Rain].”

The sky shifted.

Erick collapsed backward as his mana drained to 2. Then it went to 1, then 0.

As consciousness left him, the pitter patter of tiny drops of rain filled his ears.

 

– – – –

 

Rozeta’s voice brought Erick back to reality.

… Or as close to reality as this place could be.

“Dear Relevant Entities of the Script, today we have before you a man who some would call Wizard, others Heretic, and still more would call Saint.”

Rozeta’s voice carried on the clouds all around them, but this was not the middle of the skies, and Rozeta was not a four mile long dragon. She was a woman made of white metal, maybe 6 feet tall, wearing a receptionist’s outfit; prim and proper.

Erick stood at the center of a blackened caldera, the edges of the dead volcano hundreds of feet away and scraping upward like daggers. Fluffy white clouds flowed through those obsidian daggers, cutting into the blackened space only to reform as a thin mist around Erick.

A hundred faceless people or more, of all kinds, were in that mist.

Some of them were the mist; half there, half elsewhere.

There were dragonkin and orcols, humans and incani, dragons and other, harder to describe species. A winged maybe-human. A black spot on the world like something was missing. A cube, slowly spinning on one corner. A gentle glowing star, bright silver, attached to nothing, just hovering in the mist. They all talked among themselves, but the words were too quiet to understand.

Four people stood out from the misty crowd.

To his left: A blue-skinned maybe-human woman, but tall like an orcol, 9 feet at least, with long hair billowing backward on some unseen breeze. She wore the torn sails of a ship as a dress that was only held on by the wind.

To his right: A muscular, darker skinned human woman, in a loose, gauze-like dress. She wasn’t obviously an orcol, no fangs or green skin, but she could have passed for one considering her perfect beauty and also 9-foot tall body.

And, of course, in front of him, the only one that looked like a wrought; Rozeta. She was pure white metal in the shape and size of a human woman. Gold glittered upon her skin, but as she moved that gold revealed itself as white.

The last person present was a man. He looked like a grandfather, or someone Erick’s age. He was human and human-sized, wearing black pants and a black tunic. He stood a dozen paces behind Erick.

Rozeta spoke above the murmur of the audience, “Allow me to introduce the primary complaints. We have Sininindi, Goddess of the Storm. She stands against the accused, denouncing him a Wizard and Heretic. We have Atunir, Goddess of Fertility and Field. She stands for the accused, claiming he is a Saint. We have Phagar, God of Death and Time. His is the final judgment.” She turned to Sininindi. “You may level your complaints now.”

Sininindi stepped forward. “This man has introduced a poison into our world. A poison that breaks down the very nature of our reality. It is our duty as tenders to this world to end this man and his daughter, and call upon all of our followers to purge this knowledge of Particle Magic from Veird.”

Atunir stepped forward. “Mana Altering seems to have failed with Erick’s [Lightning Aura]; These strong magics will never be truly devastating spells. [Call Lightning] and [Lightning Aura] destroy each other, and all Particle Magic is stopped by the proper [Ward]. We have solved all of the actual problems with Erick’s Particle Magic before they truly began. All of your complaints are theological, and therefore have no place in today’s judgment.”

“This man’s new spell will ruin your worship, Atunir. How can you not see that?”

“I plan on forcing this man to be my champion, and thus his newest spell is available only through me.”

Until then, Erick was holding his tongue because he didn’t feel like being a red stain on the black caldera. But what tumbled out of his mouth was not some great argument against what they were saying, but the very first thing that came to mind.

He shouted, “I will not be the champion of gods that allow the human and incani war to be incentivized with experience gains!”

Okay. Maybe staying on topic would have been a better idea. That was a weird complaint when it seemed his very life was on the line.

Atunir looked down at him. So did Sininindi.

Atunir ignored him. “He’s a bit ignorant, but that’s not a big deal. He works hard. He does what he can for the people around him. The rest will come with time.”

Sininindi turned to Rozeta. “And what happens when he causes another Sundering, without using magic at all? We’ve all seen his Deep Scan. We have all seen the videos of atomic bombs. He might not know how to make them, but others will figure it out.”

“Fusion and Fission are already part of the Sundering Ban.” Rozeta said, “Even if someone were to refine uranium and then do everything else right, it would still not cause a nuclear reaction.”

That riled Sininindi up. She yelled, “The fact that these forgotten magics have been revealed at all is a problem! We know, they’ll know! I won’t have my oceans ruined by an idiot wizard!”

“You worry for nothing.” Rozeta said, “Nuclear weaponry is impossible, as I have said.”

“She is right, Sininindi.” Phagar stepped forward. “I have checked all my sources. Atomic magic is still Banned.”

Sininindi breathed, and the air moved, smelling of salt. “Fine. Then I suppose I must believe you. But!” Sininindi accused, “He promised not to release new magic into the world, and most of us were okay with his existence after that. I thought everything would be fine. Now he has broken that promise. At the very least, this is cause for concern. I put forth that this concern is enough to end him right now. We should not suffer a wizard to live.”

“But all of his goals are peaceful, Sininindi.” Atunir said, “The lightning spell was a fluke, triggering deep magics that have laid dormant for millennia and that none of us thought existed anymore. The lightning might have attached to him, but we can limit the spread of the rest of this Particle Magic. We could even put [Call Lightning] behind other gates. Like worship of you, if I get—”

A very quick, pronounced ‘NO’ reverberated around the misty caldera.

“I would accept only my worshipers having access to—”

A much louder ‘NO’ echoed across the land.

Sininindi huffed, but then schooled her emotions flat.

Phagar, God of Death and Time, said, “Don’t forget that talk about telomeres and the end of aging. I’m as fair as the next guy, but that would not be fair to those to come. I will not allow immortality back onto Veird.”

Erick was starting to feel very non-concerned with everything happening around him. Why was he even here? They didn’t seem to be including him in this conversation. This was as good a moment as any to interrupt.

Erick spoke to the audience, “You could expand into the rest of your solar system. New worshipers on new ground and all that.”

Every god, goddess, demon, angel, and dragon in the audience stared at him.

Well that was a weird reaction.

“You all… have a solar system?” Erick asked, incredulous. “Right?”

Sininindi declared, “Wizard.”

“Wizard,” Phagar agreed. “And also a Saint, if misguided.”

“My Saint.” Atunir looked down upon him, saying, “Or I walk away and you’re on your own.”

The air tensed.

Erick said, “How about an alternative to all of that.”

Gods and otherwise began to grumble, but Rozeta stepped forward. “What do you have in mind?”

Erick began, “I’d like you to stop dragging me out for shit like this—”

Sininindi stormed, “Then stop adding spells to the Script!”

A round of assents were followed by demands to ‘shut up!’.

Erick continued, “Do you all really not want better lives for your followers? To stay stagnant in this world? What’s wrong with knowing how things work and then using those facts to make magic easier? Granted, I’m probably going too fast with all of this, and [Call Lightning] was way too much, but what’s wrong with some good magic?”

As the audience began to complain, Rozeta spoke, silencing all discontent, “Nothing is wrong with any of that.” Rozeta gestured to everyone in attendance. “We are all simply scared that the Script is changing. Besides the individual variation at tier 2 and higher, the Script has been the same for the last 1241 years, which was the last time someone added a basic spell. And that was after everyone already thought the Script was completed 23 years prior. Obviously, we were all wrong.”

Sininindi asked, “Why not block all Particle Magic? We do not need these complications.”

The crowd grumbled various forms of ‘yes’ and ‘maybe we should’.

Rozeta’s voice rose above them all, “Everyone needs to understand this, because it seems we have forgotten!” Rozeta spoke to the silent gathering, “The Script is a guide and barrier, and mana is a raging ocean. Particle Magic is a vulnerability, a crack in that barrier, and I am not comfortable with this vulnerability remaining. We have two options: We either control this new magic with new barriers and new guides, or we watch it tear the Script apart. Even if we were to wage a Forgotten Campaign against Particle Magic, that will not change the fact that this vulnerability is too deep to add another ban to the Foundations. This problem is fundamental. It is not going away just if civilization forgets.”

Sininindi, Atunir, Phagar, and the rest held silent.

Eventually, Phagar asked, “Do the Sundering Bans still hold?”

“Yes.” Rozeta said, “The Foundations hold strong. For now. Which is why we are here to decide on what to do with Particle Magic, and what to do with Erick Flatt. This is bigger than a fight between gods.”

The silver star in the mists stepped forward, resolving into a pale, lithe human man with small incani horns. The new person wore very little in the way of clothing. Erick felt a spike of nostalgia for his own former 22 year old body.

Rozeta said, “We recognize Koyabez, God of Peace, the Silver Star.”

Erick liked the guy even more, now.

Koyabez spoke, “There’s no danger of this being another Sundering because, while powerful, Particle Magic does not come close to a [Reality Warp], or [Apocalypse]. It only feels big because it follows natural grooves in reality. Particle Magic is, in fact, a self solving problem, if we allow it to be. We’ve already seen what happened when Erick tried to use his [Lightning Aura] on his own [Call Lightning]. One spell killed the other. We can simply alter the Script so that this functionality occurs in all situations of Particle Magic, and thus it will become just another school of magic, like the Shaping spells, or Force spells, or Mental magic.

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“We have come a long way since the Sundering. Many of us who were there are no longer here. Many of us who are here were never there. We aren’t here today to fight, but to ensure the survival and solidity of the Script. I feel that the only one true worry of this gathering is in the mind of various Relevant Entities, and their various agendas.”

Mists swirled, and no one said anything.

Sininindi broke the silence, “I have a problem with how easy it is for him to make new magic.”

There was a round of assents across the caldera.

She added, “Even if I accept that he’s pioneering Particle Magic, why is the magic he’s making so incredibly good? That Ice Mage in Spur is barely doing better than the equivalent Force spells. His experience is more normal.”

Rozeta said, “I could point to that meeting with Melemizargo, or the fact that Erick created a new school of magic, or that he thinks of magic very differently than the rest of us, but honestly? I do not know. As far as we’ve been able to work out, he and his daughter came to Veird through some quirk of reality. A tunnel that opened and is now as though it never existed, exactly how it is for most of those like him. There was no rhyme or reason to their arrival; they had no patron pulling them here.

“Atunir might have been closest to the truth. Erick might be ‘loved by the lightning’. That particular magic has roots in the collective mind of Veird as old as the Fey, may they rest in peace, and the Old Magic still blooms here and there in strange Classes or alternatively tiered spells.”

Her words hung on the air. The gathered crowd spoke among themselves.

Sininindi exclaimed, “That’s the answer! Lock the magic behind a new Class. Particle Mage. He hasn’t gotten to level 50, but that’s a formality. I’m willing to lay down my sword for this compromise.”

Atunir yelled, “No! [Miracle Rain] will be a spell for all of my people! I won’t see it locked behind some pitiful generalist Class!”

“Atunir. We’re not doing this dance with you, when we wouldn’t entertain the idea with Sininindi.” Rozeta said, “I’ve already gotten a 73% approval for Sininindi’s suggestion. … 85%. 91%.”

“Do I get a say in any of this?” Erick spoke, “I don’t want this to keep happening every time I make a new spell.”

Phagar stepped around Erick. He asked, “Why are you making new magic? Are the options not enough for you? Until your arrival, I always felt we were rather thorough in growing the Script to its full potential. Your [Call Lightning] is mostly already there; under the name [Nature’s Fury]. I know it wasn’t what you were going for, but there’s no need to reinvent the wheel.”

No one spoke among the crowd. All eyes were on Erick.

“… I arrived on Veird and saw the Script, and thought it nice, but not how I wanted to experience magic. I like the mystical, and I have a problem with such organized arcana.” Erick pointed all around him. “I have a problem with this too. This almost-courtroom setting. It’s all too formal, organized. There’s not enough magic in your magic, though I gather that was what you were going for.” Erick added, “But for what it’s worth, I’m glad that you’ve banned atomic magic.”

Some yelled at him, some smiled. Most held neutral faces.

Phagar chuckled. “Fair answer.” He said to Rozeta. “Make him a new Class. Restrict [Call Lightning] and this growth rain spell behind that prerequisite. And don’t call it [Miracle Rain], for Reality’s sake. No non-divine source is getting any abilities labeled ‘Miracle’.”

Now that Phagar was talking, something bugged Erick about what the God of Death and Time had said much earlier. Something about immortality.

Erick asked, “Aren’t wrought and dragons immortal?”

Phagar laughed. “And don’t I hate it! But you aren’t making anyone else immortal, young man.” He smiled, he frowned. He tilted his head. “I changed my mind. I doubt you’re going to be able to do it with one of those little rhymes, but if you can make someone immortal, I will allow its application in one instance, if only so Rozeta can squash that quirk of the Script.”

Rozeta asked, “Are you sure about that, Phagar?”

The God of Death nodded. “I am.” He added, “It’ll be ageless immortality, though. Not complete immortality. No reviving from a single drop of blood or any of that horrid nonsense.”

Erick thought about watching Jane grow old and instantly changed his mind on immortality.

Erick asked, “What if I just wanted to reverse aging?”

Phagar smiled. “That’s already in the Script. Go look for it.” He looked all around. “Unless there are any objections, we’re done here.”