180, 1/2

Erick rolled out of bed. He felt a bit tense, but he was relaxed and focused as his bare feet touched the cold, wood-slat floor. Rainbow white glows shone in through the window, the pastel, green, and light from Yggdrasil all blending in to form an almost iridescent shimmer. A nice wind would have been blowing through the window, too, if Erick had left it open, but he had shut himself off from the breeze as soon as he could, as soon as he had made his room last night. For the first time in weeks he had actual floors. And a roof! And actual walls! Camping out on Yggdrasil’s branches was fun for a while, and thanks to his Constitution the cold air wasn’t hard on him, but it was nice to have an actual room again.

The floor was brown wood. The walls were white drywall. The ceiling was vaulted with exposed beams and lots of little spots for Ophiel to roost in, which he did. Erick went to his private bathroom where the tile floor was comfortably colder than the floor in his room. A cast of [Sealed Privacy Ward] cut off this space from Tasar’s sight, who was in the main working room at the moment, and then Erick switched to his Other Self and began his extended morning ritual.

Ten minutes later, Erick [Cleanse]ed the toilet and dropped the Privacy, returning to Tasar’s various senses, but Erick doubted that the woman actually noticed him beyond a cursory glance every now and then. Fully relaxed and ready for a new day, Erick exited his private little tower and entered the main structure of [Fairy Stronghold].

Tasar was already hard at work.

Tasar had all of the third floor to herself, to use in her Fae Space experiments, and she had made good use of the space. The black-green woman had three floating pieces of chalk writing out math on three different sets of chalkboards, while she spoke math at those various chalks as she danced around inside her shadowy, glittering green Domain she had scattered over the room. She wasn’t really dancing, Erick admitted to himself, but she was blipping herself and about a dozen smaller objects between various clumps of shadow space in movements that were almost dance-like. Most of the objects were normal; a few wooden cubes, a metal sphere, a triangular pyramid with numbers on each side. Some were odd; a spinning top, a hundred-sided die, and a bowl of water.

None of those other objects had been there last night when Erick went to bed.

And Tasar was so engrossed with the numbers and her experiment that she didn’t say anything to Erick as Erick walked in; she was already mumbling out a steady stream of instructions to the floating chalk and had each of them taking down different notes. She had set a little blackberry summon on the wall outside his door and marked it out with a note, saying ‘To keep an eye on possible security issues while I work, pop when you want privacy.’ Erick had popped it, of course, before he did his business. That action had briefly alerted Tasar, but then she had gone right back to working on… whatever it was she was doing.

The math on the boards was beyond Erick, but he understood some of what Tasar was doing. Chalkboard one held normal Spatial Magic math. Chalkboard two held experimental notes from all the blipping Tasar was doing. Chalkboard one and two correlated rather heavily, but here and there Tasar had circled certain bits of math with great big circles, and those bits of math had been reproduced on the third set of chalkboards. Erick didn’t understand the math itself, but he understood that Tasar was figuring out how Fae Space differed from Normal Space.

He watched as Tasar blipped between two shadowy areas, and nothing changed, but then she blipped the hundred-sided die across the room and up onto a chair, and the bowl of water to where the die had been sitting on the floor. The die switched from showing a 27 on top, to show 72. The water inside the bowl transformed into a 100-sided die made of ice, resting in the bowl and showing a 27 on top.

Tasar already had a half-manic grin on her face, but now, she laughed loud, saying, “Oh my gods!” And then she went right back to blipping things around, working at a frantic pace, spouting off words like ‘arcanomatrix’ and ‘probability-shears’ and ‘reflective transformations’. Strings of numbers and letters and symbols poured out of her mouth, going in one of Erick’s ears and then out the other.

Erick thumbed toward the balcony, saying, “I’m going to take a swim.”

Tasar paused everything, staring at Erick with a manic expression, then she said, “Can you give me five minutes? Or leave an Ophiel in the room so that we can still see each other?”

Erick smiled, then said, “I will leave an Ophiel in the room.”

Ophiel hopped off of Erick’s shoulder and alighted on a perch by the window. He cooed in recognition of his new responsibility; to watch Tasar, and to make sure that she and Erick were never too far outside of communication.

Erick asked, “How close are you to figuring it out?”

Tasar’s whole expression went blank, as though she couldn’t understand the question. “I don’t understand the question.” And then she got a little mad. “This could take me decades.” She got a little more miffed. “The Artosian Transformation alone— Decades! The answer is decades.”

Erick wisely decided to leave. “I’m going to get out of your hair now.”

And then he stepped away, out onto the open balcony.

With a quick dash and a large hop, Erick leaped over the railing, into the open air. As the [Fairy Stronghold] vanished behind him, Erick sailed through the air, guiding himself through the rushing flow with his hands stretched outward and a bit of laughter on his lips. This was such a fun way to wake! An Ophiel, different from the one Erick had left in the room, flew down beside him and latched onto his shoulder, twittering in joy at the fun dive through the open air.

Back in the room, Tasar stared at nothing for a little while, then she tried to regain her train of thought, going to her boards and reading over the math she had written down—

She jerked as she realized something.

And then she was back to blipping around her toys, and herself, with a renewed enthusiasm in her motions. She had rediscovered her flow, too.

Erick ditched his clothes seconds before touchdown in the lake, handing the cloth and the Crystal Star off to Ophiel as he softened the water ahead of himself with an application of sunform. He crashed through the bubbly surface of the lake. Cold water slammed him from all sides in a bracing grasp. Bubbles surrounded him… And he relaxed. With only a [Fairy Item] bracelet around his wrist, Erick swam under the waves for a little bit, gazing out under the water, staring at everything that was growing under his largest [Familiar].

Yggdrasil’s subway-sized white roots brought brightness to the depths, illuminating fishes and long grasses and things that looked almost like corals, but not. With all the light down here, there was no ‘deeper part’ of this ocean-deep lake. Everything was as bright as the Surface, and so there was a lot of space for plants to grow, and a lot of space for fish and crabs and other marine life to live. For a little while, Erick just swam under the surface, taking it all in, watching as schools of fish swam away at his approach. He could hold his breath for a long time, these days, and with a bit of sunform helping him to breathe, like how Jane’s shadowform helped her shadow spider to breathe, Erick could actually swim underwater forever, if he wanted.

It was nice.

Much nicer than swimming around elsewhere on Veird. Too many places had too many underwater monsters. There were supposedly some underwater civilizations out there, too, but Erick hadn’t heard much of them… from anyone, actually. Only Quilatalap had spoken of them before, back at his Armory Presentation. He lumped ‘islands and the underwaters’ together, into a single category, if Erick recalled correctly. ‘Stone Reef’ and ‘Deadtide’ got lumped in with Oceanside. Erick wasn’t quite sure where Stone Reef or Deadtide were actually located, or if both, or only one, were an ‘underwater’, or what that meant, exactly. Whichever or wherever they were, they likely had unique underwater magics to drive away or kill the largest monsters of this world.

Why hadn’t Erick ever heard about them, before, though?

Maybe Quilatalap had mentioned them only because they were massive and thus deserving of recognition for that fact alone. It was quite likely they were like the Fractured Citadels; lands to which no normal person ever went, full of necromancers, in the case of the Citadels, or perhaps full of…

Erick wasn’t sure what actually lived in the deepest parts of the ocean. It was probably scary, for sure. In that case, no one spoke of them in polite company because it was just worrying over something they couldn’t do anything about.

Eh! This world was massive. Erick had likely never heard much about the ‘underwaters’ because there were more than enough local problems to go around, so people didn’t worry about stuff outside of their local systems. A lot of Nelboor had been like that; Erick had basically scoured that land of all major threats that came to him through people asking for help, so he knew of much of Nelboor, but he certainly didn’t know much at all. Flying over a place and eradicating a threat did not equate with ‘knowing a place’, not when there were hidden lands everywhere out there. He had probably blipped over the airspace of an ‘underwater’, too, without knowing any better.

Meh!

Erick breached the surface of the lake and began paddling, lazily, and also for fun.

It was nice to have a working body. His body had been working a lot better ever since he got to Veird, and it was wonderful. He didn’t make note of this change all too often anymore, but sometimes, like this, he couldn’t help but think of all the years he had spent in physical pain for this reason or that reason, and now, those smaller pains were a thing of the past.

Briefly, he wondered how Rats was doing. Or rather, how Xendross Sands was doing; that was his real name, after all. Sands was an orphan name…

Were the orphans back at Spur doing okay? Hopefully, his bank account was still sending them money as he had set it up to do.

How was Spur doing?

How was Jane doing?

… Probably fine.

… Erick hadn’t contacted them in a few days, so it was time to do that. Soon. Not this second. Later, for sure.

Erick turned up the speed, slapping his arms in a whirling motion, his Strength and Dexterity pushing him far, far beyond the best any Olympic athlete back home could ever hope to achieve. As he swam faster and faster, joy burbled in his stomach and came rumbling out as laughter. Water got in his mouth and he coughed, instantly losing his rhythm. He just laughed a bit more at that.

With a gesture, Erick both conjured a [Fairy Item] pool ring and hoisted himself on top of the not-plastic floaty; it was bright pink and just kinda fun. And then he sat there under Yggdrasil’s rainbow, green, and white light for a while, feeling a small, comfortable breeze brush along the lake’s surface. And he was still nude. So with another cast, Erick summoned a pair of board shorts onto his body because it just seemed rude to call people while nude. Another bit of magic sent out a telepathic call through Yggdrasil, across the world, to Poi.

‘Hello, Erick,’ Poi answered almost instantly. ‘I hear strange things are happening down there.’

‘Oh yeah?’ Erick smiled. ‘What strange things are you hearing?’

‘A meeting with Melemizargo, for starters.’

Erick’s grin widened. ‘He’s always in the shadows, Poi. He just decided to come out for a little while because I think I figured out [Gate]! Ha ha!’

‘Congratulations. And I’m glad you finally called.’ Poi said, ‘If you wish to be part of a world-spanning organization to control or at least not allow anyone else to control the [Gate]s, then I suggest we start planning out such an organization now. For starters, we need more personnel. A dedicated secretary for your finances, or perhaps a team for your finances, is absolutely necessary, but there are a bunch of other positions that also need filling. Guard. City defense for Candlepoint. Etcetera. But also, you need to think about what will happen when you’re revealed as a Wizard, because your assets in Mage Bank will be frozen at the very least and I’m pretty sure that some sort of war will happen.’

Erick did not expect the call to go in this direction. But as Erick’s initial feeling of paranoia and worry built, it was then crushed by a larger, overwhelming fact that Poi was thinking and planning for the future. A wave of quiet joy rushed up from deep in Erick’s heart and buoyed him into pleasant feelings of deep friendship, and hope.

And then he got down to business. ‘Do you think Silverite will turn against me?’

‘I cannot speak to the minds of others…’ Poi sent, ‘But what is public knowledge is that Silverite has a deep respect for Koyabez, and if you maintain your current standing with the gods then she will not interfere one way or the other. A lot of world leaders will be like that. The two notable exceptions are the Wasteland Kingdoms and Greensoil Republic, because they’re the major incani and human nations of the world, and they will see your ascension to Wizardry as a direct threat, for by your actions you have already screwed over both demonic and angelic plans for the world. The orcols of Treehome are a wildcard. I have no idea what the wrought will do, but I need to stay out of that, anyway. The Inquisition has come for the Mind Mages in the past and we only survived because of our Code. We don’t keep the Code because of them, but I won’t pretend that our strict adherence to morality and lines did not benefit us long before the Inquisition got hold of Mind Magic.’

Erick thought, then sent, ‘I’ll be dealing with the angels and demons at Oceanside after this Bright Tea and inquiry deal, so I might be able to wrangle a better peace from the Wasteland and the Republic than the one we have now.’ He asked, ‘Would you like to go there with me? Or are you needed at Spur?’

‘I’m needed here. I doubt any of us will be able to rejoin you on your Path.’ Poi sent, ‘Nirzir would likely want to, but she and her cohorts are too busy with… the event happening here. You probably shouldn’t take her, anyway. I hear the fae are now involved?’

‘A lot has happened, Poi. So last I called…’

He spoke with Poi for a good thirty minutes. It was a nice conversation. Erick missed Poi, and he sent as much, to which Poi reciprocated, but he also spoke of how it was nice not to be so close to Fate Magic. It was easy to tell when he was on the Path, for the problems steadily got larger. Now, the problems varied per day, with long stretches of nothing to do and with great strides made toward… Something that he wasn’t willing to share.

There was one thing Poi was willing to share, though. ‘With the power Spur has managed to amass thanks to you and the power Kiri has managed to inherit, we’re actually in a holding pattern because now politics have gotten involved, and people from all over the world are coming in to hunt the larger— Uh. We’ve got a lot of guests in Spur, and— Oh hey. You want to talk to Jane, now?’

Erick had been smiling this whole time, for this was nice, and, ‘Yes! I do want to speak to Jane. It was nice talking, Poi. See you when I see you, and hopefully not with a war at my back! Send everyone my love.’

‘Teressa, Kiri, and Nirzir all want to talk to you, too.’

‘Yes!’ Erick sent, ‘Hand me off to Jane first, please.’

The connection shifted.

Jane’s voice came through loud and clear, ‘Hey, dad! So you let Rozeta put a kill spell in you, eh?’

Erick froze. The disapproval in Jane’s voice was loud and clear, but he had only recognized it after the fact. Erick thawed fast enough, sending, ‘It’s more complicated than that. In exchange, she helped me sort my species from question-mark-human to something else.’

‘… Uh.’ Jane’s voice turned from worried to inquisitive, ‘Uh? What? I guess that’s good? What are you now? No wait… Why?’

‘I have a few defensive abilities now that I didn’t have before, that’s why.’ Erick added, ‘And I needed the change because it was going to happen sooner or later, so I got some help. I have Perfected Body now, too, so that’s gre—’

‘Bahaa!’ Jane laughed. ‘It’s pretty great, isn’t it!’

Erick smiled. ‘Yeah. It is. But I found out that it doesn’t help against long term usage of Blood Magic, so I was going to steal your idea for a Blood Magic [Personal Ward], but that won’t work.’

‘Ah? Damn… I guess I should abandon that idea. I wasn’t getting far with it, anyway.’

Erick dove right in, saying, ‘I did learn of [Steadfast Ward]s, though. They provide absolute damage reduction that works after everything else, including [Defend] or a body’s natural hardness. Made one of those for 250 absolute defense—’

Jane’s excited voice barged in, ‘You can do what!’

Erick smiled, sending, ‘[Steadfast Ward]s are the [Personal Ward]s that wrought use all the time. With it active, I’m immune to all damage under 1000 points. But there’s a problem with that, as I’m sure you can already guess.’

‘… Oh… Yeah.’ Jane sent, ‘Oh. I see. The large hits get through. No. That’s not good enough… Damn.’

‘There’s apparently something called a [Gloom Ward] that makes a person ignore a percentage of the damage they take. I’ve thought about that, if to just get another 5% out of my [Personal Ward]. There’s also an [Illusion Ward] which makes anything less than ‘Unerring’ or too large to not hit, not hit.’ Erick added, ‘That one is annoying to live with, though, and makes it hard to be precise with your own attacks. I think the best possible [Personal Ward] will have to be one that allows your normal defenses to reduce the damage you take, but I haven’t figured that one out yet. I’ll let you know when I do.’

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

‘Eh. It’s fine.’ Jane sent, ‘I’ll figure it out. I’m glad you looked out for me, but… Eh— Tell me more about the Underworld, and the wrought Geodes. What’s happening down there besides solving [Gate], or whatever— Actually. What’s up with [Gate]?’

Erick had a lot to say about all of those topics, so he started right in, sending, ‘So you know of the fae, yeah?’

Jane gave a tentative and unsure, ‘Oh shit?’

Erick began laying it all out there, from top to bottom, from Ar’Cosmos and the Houses of Fae, Carnage, and Death, to what it might mean to be a planar, to how ‘Fae Space’ was apparently its own thing, and how ‘the Flowery Murderess’ was apparently one of possibly two remaining true fae living on Veird, inside the Twisted Vision that they never got to explore in the Forest of Glaquin.

‘… And you’re sure you didn’t enter into any agreements?’ Jane asked again, for the fifth time, but in a different way than before.

‘I did not.’ Erick sent, ‘Don’t you let her get to you, either, okay?’

‘Of course not!’ Jane sounded almost offended, but she pulled that back, sending, ‘And don’t you let her get to you, either. I can’t recall what fae she could be, exactly, but I’m pretty sure this persona she’s adopted as the Letter Killer isn’t real beyond the fact that it’s useful for her to pretend that it is real. She’ll shed it like a snake skin the second it benefits her to do so.’

‘I think you’re discounting the depth of true reality inherent in Fae Magic, Jane.’ Erick sent, ‘The Letter Killer is probably a real person to her, in this moment, and in this reality of Veird.’

‘Okay. Yeah. I probably am.’ Jane sent, ‘Say… When you get back from Stratagold and your inquiry, will you teach me some of this fae stuff?’

Overflowing joy!