246, 2/2

It had been frantic.

And now, for the moment, it was over.

Erick sat down on a conjured chair, sighing in relief. Solomon joined him. The others were busy looking over everyone, as they slept in groups on white stone platforms above the slime dungeon main floor, out and away from the Gate. Both he and Solomon were fucking exhausted.

That had been a lot of magic, as quick as they could do it.

The Grand Hall was gone. They almost hadn’t been fast enough. Erick glanced over toward the Black Gate and the space beyond. What was once a hallway of Judgment was now a kaleidoscope of prismatic black, like it usually was.

“So that worked out?” Solomon asked, teasing sort of, but exhausted and not at the top of his game.

“I wanted to ask him to bring everyone he cared about into the room before we proceeded, hoping that he would believe me, but expecting that he would not. I was hoping it would take awhile between his realization of what was happening and the total collapse of that place. Time to talk and be cryptic, to allow for the saving of more people…”

Solomon finished Erick’s thought, “There was no way it was ever going to work out perfectly.” And then he added, “Let’s take solace in that it worked at all.”

Erick looked to the left, to where Avandrasolaro slept upon the ground.

The processes of summoning angels and demons were practically the same; involving Elemental Exalted or Vile which then got turned into proper Angelic and Demonic when interfaced with an actual sentient collection of that sort of person. They were almost elementals in that way. Summoning and controlling them was a lot more difficult than just [Conjure Force Elemental]… But not really.

But Avandrasolaro was a real person now; not just a conjured being made of Elemental Angel.

Erick had done that. He had taken Avandrasolaro and turned him into a real person, who was also an angel.

Avandrasolaro lay on his back, on a thin mattress. He was brown and muscular and bald, and a towel covered his dignity. His weapons were mostly lost in the transfer, but even now, Erick watched as his Angelic soul manifested those weapons in the air beside him. Just tiny daggers for now, but they would grow to fullness soon enough, especially with that much power inside that man. He didn’t appear to be a demigod anymore, but… Who knew what the future held.

That man was technically the only real angel on Veird, as far as Erick knew. Sure, the Converter Angel on the moon Celes could come back through a strong enough ritual to that effect, and she would also be a true angel on Veird, but that wasn’t likely to happen as far as Erick knew. That Converter Angel was on the moon, doing moon-side things, like talking to dead people and other stuff. Erick had never met that Converter Angel in as long as he had been at Candlepoint in the last 11 years, but he had heard of her now and again. Apparently, she was the Converter Angel; she had never been killed, like all the Breach Demons were eventually killed. She just went away until it was time to come back to exact revenge against the demons and their incani children.

Which had been a minor mindfuck, but enough sources corroborated it that Erick believed it.

Erick said, “I hope he can actually end the Forever War.”

“He’ll need to regain power,” Lorizal said, standing near the angel, staring down at Avandrasolaro like he was a certain kind of salvation. “The Church of Peace is ready to help that happen.” Lorizal looked up at Erick. “We hope House Benevolence will be there beside us as we work to end the Forever War.”

Erick shut that down, “Sorry, no. House Benevolence will not step into the Forever War; we are neutral. But Solomon here will be helping with that, as soon as we’re done here in this Sundering Search, and other such Dark investigations.”

Solomon bowed his head. He was still sitting, still tired.

Other people were working right now.

Guile sat near Avandrasolaro’s head, looking down at him, studying the angel. And then he looked up at a hovering shard of manifested Angelic. It was still growing, tiny motes of power continually gathering, crystallizing, as angels always did. Erick thought it might become a sword; he wasn’t sure. It certainly wasn’t going to become a mace.

Guile spoke up, “This summoning was unorthodox, but it seems to have worked out.” He looked to Erick. “You are a Strong Wizard, aren’t you.”

Erick nodded. “I’ve been told that; yes.”

Guile hummed and looked back to the shard of not-metal, hovering in front of him. “Everything you did with this summoning was wrong, but it still worked out. Or maybe I am the one who is wrong. Magic certainly doesn’t work like it used to work.”

Solomon asked, “What did he do wrong?”

Erick was interested, too.

Guile said, “Nothing, as far as I could see. The spellwork to open the way, the power displayed in that opening, the layering of intent, the pulling of purpose. Even the crafting of auric power afterward, in the frantic re-embodying of all these people… But something still feels wrong, and I cannot put my paw on it. I will inform you when I come to a theory.”

“Probably the anti-meme,” Solomon said, offhandedly.

Erick thought so, too. But to get back to the topic, “How would you have summoned people from the Dark?”

“A year of preparation. Tracking down every single piece of the person I could find. Cherished memories locked into items to use as bait. Finding a good spot in the Dark to plumb, and having to pass a Trial of the Dark to get a single opportunity— though I suppose you’ve done plenty of Trials already. And then there would be about an hour-long Calling. Maybe a week-long Calling in some cases.”

Erick asked, “I can understand most of that, but at the end of the day the final ritual shouldn’t take that long, should it? It’s just pulling someone from a different reality into this one. A simple translation from one harmonic reality to another. It’s a complicated Rift, but not much more than that. When you line up all the pieces, anyway.”

Solomon added, “The Dark used to be a lot larger, so I assume that would account for most of the change in Calling times.”

“That’s a good point,” Erick said. “Though I assume the Dark could help with that if they were so inclined.”

“Melemizargo and the Dark both seem very inclined these days,” Solomon said.

Guile frowned. He looked at the two of them. “What’s Rift Magic?”

Erick paused before he answered, because the nature of that question hit him rather solidly. He looked to Solomon, and Solomon returned the confused look.

Solomon asked Guile, “Do you not know Rift Magic? —Oh wait. Translation error?”

Guile waited.

Erick said, “It’s opening barriers between this world and side-dimensions. Other wavelengths of existence. Other frequencies— Ah…” That wasn’t helping. Those were all physics terms. Erick tried, “Other resonances? Like this world exists on a certain level, and all the other Elements exist on another level; separate from this main world yet still existent in their own world. Like Fairy is just on the other side of Springtime—” Guile seemed to understand that, so Erick finished with, “—and Rift Magic is weakening the walls and allowing that other dimension to spill through into this one.”

Guile nodded. “Rift Magic, yes. I recall Rift Magic now. And yes, this is sort of like Rift Magic.”

… He was deflecting. Why was he deflecting?

Solomon noticed, too. He said to Erick, “You’ve been working on that multiversal theory of magic.”

Ah. Yes. Erick explained, “All magic is basically all Rift Magic.”

Solomon continued, “I imagine that this sort of knowledge used to be rather widespread, actually. For how could there be advanced civilizations of magic users out there without knowing this? [Gate] is rather wide spread, and there were a lot of Wizards in the Old Cosmology making nodes in their chosen Elements to use as Gate Nodes.”

… Erick was suddenly not tired anymore.

“Fairy Moon knew what she was doing when she made me realize Benevolence,” Erick said. “You should know about this stuff, Guile. You should know very well about all of this.”

Guile looked a little lost.

“… I don’t think it’s a translation error, Erick,” Solomon said, as he looked around.

Moments ago, people had been listening to them, trying to decide what the Wizards were talking about, but now they were back to investigating the new arrivals and talking amongst themselves about what came next.

Guile, meanwhile, was narrowing his eyes at nothing in particular, his gaze darting back and forth just a little bit. At the mention of Fairy Moon, though, he focused hard.

Fairy Moon stepped to Erick’s side, looking around. She noticed Avandrasolaro and all the others right away, but she was mostly turning her face this way and that, as though she were seeing something that wasn’t there.

Panic began to rise within Erick, like a leviathan from the depths. He checked on his most precious things in the world.

The girls were all fine. There was Abigail, Beth, Candice, Emily, and Jane—

“You can see them now, can’t you!” Debby’s bracelet shifted on her arm as she yelled at them, “Tell me you can see them too! Please!”

“See wha—”

There was something red in the air.

Scattered, jagged cracks, floating like crimson snow—

– – – –

“Of course I know of Rift Magic,” Guile said. “This is clearly a different application of it than I would have done. Seems like you must be tapping into Fate Magic, too.”

Erick shrugged. And then he looked down at Avandrasolaro. “Want to wake the big guy up?”

Unanimous consent among all those involved soon had Poi unraveling the [Sleep] spell he had put on Avandrasolaro.

The angelic ruler of a trillion people and the founder of the legendary Bisection, opened his dark eyes. His still-regrowing weapon-shard wings began to grow much faster as a white-gold light shone from Avandrasolaro’s soul and eyes, and collected upon his weapons, crusting them over, before shattering to reveal full-sized swords and daggers and maces. In a flash his towel flipped away, leaving behind a kilt he had been wearing on the throne.

Erick, Solomon, Guile, and Lorizal stood near him. Everyone else had retreated.

Avandrasolaro sat up, giving a glance to the sleeping forms of all the other people who had been inside the Judgment Day hall. And then he looked at Erick, Solomon, Guile, and Lorizal. He got to his feet, and then he bent the knee, bowing toward them, saying, “A rescue from Dark Death is a priceless boon, and to give the same to my family and friends is too generous. Give me your greatest command and I will see it done, whether it takes me ten thousand years or more.”

Erick was thankful that this whole thing was going so well. Avandrasolaro was swift on the uptake, and willing to do what it took to save his people first, and then himself. He had been the last one through the Black Gate, and Erick respected that a great deal. For those reasons and for all the stuff he had seen during the day of Judgment, Erick didn’t foresee any problems with agreeing to this sort of arrangement the Angel was proposing.

Erick said, “End the Forever War through as peaceful and prosperous of means as you can.”

Avandrasolaro went stock-still. He thawed as he spoke, “I will… have to make an assessment on this request before I can agree to such a thing, but the basic idea has merit and I am interested in working toward that goal.”

“Most of the work has already been done,” Erick said, “Over 1400 years ago, the Old Demons screwed up and erased alvani from existence, while making their own forceful union of demon and human viable as a species called incani. Over the next hundred years, the incani murdered all the Old Demons to the very last and took over as the rulers of Elemental Vile, but instead of peace, the Forever War continues between Angels and the New Demons to this day. It spills down to mortal descendants in the phenomenon known as the Quiet War.” Erick gestured to Lorizal, “Lorizal Ex is one of those descendants of demons, but she is not involved in the war. She is a priestess of Koyabez, of Peace, and has been dedicated to the end of all wars for most of her life.

“And there’s so much more than that going on.

“But please, rise,” Erick said, “I would speak with you about a lot, and I’m sure you have lots of questions, too.”

Avandrasolaro rose steady on his feet, a light frown upon his face, filled with concern and unsaid questions. He did not speak, though. He waited. He observed Lorizal deeply, and then he moved to Erick and Solomon, and finally Guile. Surprise lit upon his face when he realized Guile was actually Guile, but he said nothing. He waited.

Erick said, “… Anyway. There’s no great rush to go out crusading or anything like that. We’re in a period of peace right now. But the Forever War could start up again once we’re expanding out to new worlds, and we don’t want that to happen. We wish for an end to the cycle of violence, and that is why we brought you back from the Dark. We want peace and prosperity for all.” Erick gestured to Solomon, saying, “This is my brother. We’re of comparable actual power, though I have a lot more political power in this world, but we’re practically the same person anyway. He wants to work with you to end the Forever War. Do you have any major questions, before we get to the actual questions of what all is truly going on here?”

Avandrasolaro asked, “Am I to be your lapcat for eternity? Or a partner? Or have you summoned me as Ruler of the Bisection?”

“I absolutely do not mind if you become a partner, or even something of a ruler once again.” Erick gestured to his people, still sleeping on conjured mattresses and under conjured blankets all across stone platforms. There were 167 of them. “Your people are here and they’re free to make their own decisions and become rulers, too, if they’re able. They’re all human for right now, because that’s simply how we had to make it work, but I can change them into better bodies soon enough.

“All that is likely going to happen in the next few days, weeks, or months, is that you and your people will become more secure in yourselves over at some property of mine, known as the Wake Up House. I have been bringing people back to life or giving them new lives for a while now, and that’s where almost all of those people spend some time after that event.”

Avandrasolaro took a moment, then he asked, “Who are you?”

“Ah. Sorry. I’m Erick Flatt, Wizard of Benevolence, of House Benevolence, Apparent King, and some might call me one of the most powerful persons on this planet… And a lot of those words mean very little to you, which is to be expected.”

Avandrasolaro said, “No. I am asking, who are you, to pull us all out of the Dark like this.”

Erick wasn’t quite sure how to answer that—

Solomon said, “The living treaty between all the various antagonistic forces of this world, to ensure that we all learn how to get along until such time as he can pass that power onto others, and the means by which we will all get going into new worlds, after the Sundering destroyed the Old Cosmology 1451 years ago. You died 180,000 years ago, by the way, but the Dark has been holding onto you for a long time.”

Avandrasolaro went stock still again, even the soft movements of his wing weapons freezing in place. Except for his eyes. His eyes focused on Erick.

“… This is a lot to take in,” the angel said, not fully grasping all that Erick had explained.

“Completely understandable,” Erick said. “So how about we get you and your people into some better accommodations and I set you up to learn all about what is happening here on your own time?” Erick lifted his hand and all the sleeping people rose into the air, all across the nearby space, as the Apparent King took a step into the air himself, light spilling out below his feet. “We have to leave the dungeon first in order to do that, so if you would please follow me.”

A flash of light swept out of Erick as he laid a ten-meter wide staircase of solid Benevolence in the air, like an illuminated path leading from the Black Gate area, up to the exit of the dungeon in the center of the dungeon, high in the sky. It was wide enough for every single person in the group to walk, but it would take a few minutes to walk because the exit was five kilometers away.

It was a good distance. It would allow for many, many questions to spill out of Avandrasolaro.

To get that tide of questions moving, Guile sidled up to him, saying, “Welcome back, Avandrasolaro. They brought me back a few days ago.”

Erick stepped up the path and the sleeping people followed, floating in the air beside the way out.

After a moment Avandrasolaro followed too, concern still etched deep on his face. But he saw his people were fine, and no one was making any moves on him, and Guile seemed to be a familiar face. He said to the small fox, walking at his side, “Are you ready to admit you were wrong to try and eat my wife? Do you apologize for everything that happened after that?”

Guile frowned, his tails going stiff… And then he relaxed. In a small, yet sincere way, he said, “I am sorry I tried to eat your wife.”

“Then we are settled,” Avandrasolaro said, with strength. And then, softer, he smiled, and said, “It is good to see you again, old friend. It seems you have a habit of turning up in my life at the strangest times.”

“You have no idea how strange.”

Avandrasolaro looked across the dungeon space, at the Dark, and at the slimes playing in the waters, and at the iridescent black beyond the Black Gate, saying, “I’ve seen strange things before.”

Guile chirped, laughing as foxes did, then he said, “They call where we were the Old Cosmology, Avandrasolaro. This is the New Cosmology, as in an entirely new universe, because the old one was destroyed in a grand Sundering. The entire thing. Gone.”

“… I don’t believe you.”

“It is rather unbelievable,” Guile said, nodding.

Avandrasolaro looked around again. “… But what I do believe… Is that trust is better than distrust in initial meetings between non-antagonistic forces, and even sometimes among antagonists.” He looked to Erick. “If you give me a reason to distrust you then it will be a lot harder to work with you going forward.”

The threat was implied.

Erick said, “I would expect nothing less. In the following days, I will be proving myself as a cooperative resource for you to call upon when needed.” Erick paused his walk, as he realized something else needed to be said. He turned. He looked at Avandrasolaro. The angel suddenly stopped on the stairs in response to Erick. Everyone stopped. Erick took a moment, then said, “I’m very sorry we couldn’t grab everyone you knew and loved. All I could reach was you, and the people in that room. We spent hours looking at you, but we had no good indication of when it was proper to interrupt, or how anything truly worked on that Judgment Day. Guile provided some information, but you’re little more than a memory of a brighter past to those of us living in this world right now. I had hoped to be able to tell you to gather everyone you loved… I’m very sorry, Avandrasolaro. I did what I could. I am not asking for your forgiveness right now, but I hope that one day you might give that forgiveness.”

Avandrasolaro was tense as Erick spoke. He was not used to his new, physical body, either. He noticed his own tension and seemed appalled at himself for a moment, but then Erick said what he had said, and brain chemicals and physiological responses took hold in a way that was clearly uncomfortable for the big man. A few tears fell, shimmering white-gold as they traced tracks down brown skin. Avandrasolaro spoke through his pain, “I was dead, and now I live again, instead of being a would-be-forgotten memory. I thank you for doing this for me and for all the people you managed to save. It is more than anyone could have asked for.”

He seemed sincere.

It was as much as Erick could hope for.

Erick said, “I’m still sorry we couldn’t save more.” Erick turned, and began walking up the stairs again. “Got any questions?”

Avandrasolaro and the whole contingent of others resumed walking.

Silence stretched.

And then the big angel asked, “Read any good books lately?”

Erick huffed a tiny chuckle; there and then gone.

The atmosphere lightened.

And Erick said, “I haven’t read much recently; not for enjoyment, anyway. I have a friend who reads everything she can get her hands on, though, and she told me about a series called ‘Whispers in the Pantry’ that she wanted me to read. It’s apparently a well-regarded comedy of errors, about a young man meeting women and turning them into his enemies through his own ineptitude…”

The conversation continued, with Avandrasolaro talking of books, and then Erick mentioning movies. It was an exchange of culture practically 200,000 years distant from each other, and yet people were mostly people. Eventually the group reached the surface and Avandrasolaro stared at the brilliant blue sky, his questions falling silent as he took in the sight of the moons in the east, rising above the horizon like three drops of color upon the endless blue; a drop of white, a silver drop, and a bit of pink.

“That would be Celes of the Angels, the Silver Star of Koyabez, and Hell of the Demons,” Erick explained. “We can talk about that later if you want, but for now—” Erick opened a [Gate] to the Wake Up House, to the reception room, where nurses and doctors were dressed as professional as they could dress and Director Magnin stood ready to receive his new patients. “This [Gate] takes us to the Wake Up House, far away from here. Getting back here will be easy because I have a Gate Network up and running…”

Erick stepped through as he explained, carrying all the sleeping kings and queens of the Bisection with him in a softly floating train. Avandrasolaro followed. And the others followed him.

Events proceeded rapidly and sometimes painfully slow as people got situated and woken up and tempers flared or emotions turned dark and depressive. Avandrasolaro calmed all that he could and then the panic started but was quickly quashed by others. Lorizal got to talking with Avandrasolaro about the Forever War. Solomon spoke with Avandrasolaro about this and that. Erick introduced the man to his daughters, all 6 of them, and also to his friends, and then Avandrasolaro started getting some really concerning questions about the nature of the world.

So Erick took the angel and Solomon on a small tour of the world, to show him how the Gate Network functioned and some places of interest; the human kingdoms of Greensoil, the incani kingdoms of the Wasteland, the mixed demi nations of the Songli Highlands, and the orcols of Treehome and a bunch of other places. Avandrasolaro had kept himself in reserve, but now he started to actually ask about what would happen next. Erick asked about what he could actually do, which was still a mystery, and Avandrasolaro let go of some of his trepidation. He spoke of his powers a little bit, warming up in a certain kind of way, finally beginning to believe that this truly was happening.

And then Erick introduced the angel to House Benevolence, and Candlepoint.

The entire trip was a whole big thing for Avandrasolaro, but for Erick and Solomon, it was running through everything they knew about the world, and simply repeating it in a way that Avandrasolaro could understand.

They cut the world tour short, though, because Avandrasolaro’s people were starting to get truly pushy with their demands, and more than one of them wanted a [Reincarnation] into something else. Erick was happy to oblige, trying to make the new people as comfortable as possible.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

But there were limits to his generosity. No elves. No dwarves; at least not yet, and no, he didn’t have any real good reason for that. No; he couldn’t do alvani at all, for many reasons, all of those reasons being the same as why he couldn’t do elementassi; the Death of All Halves was still in effect in certain ways. An old dragonkin body? Like with wings? Erick tried that, and he succeeded. The resulting person was extremely happy, and yet still reserved. They kinda reminded Erick of Rats, that old guard of his who quit long ago. He was living down with Messalina’s entourage last Erick heard, but that was years ago; the guy did his damnedest to avoid Erick at all times, too, so Erick never really pursued that reconnection.

Eh.

Some people wanted to be orcols after they saw orcols for the first time. Erick explained about Aloethag and all that, but everyone who wanted to be an orcol already knew what they were signing up for; these people were not dumb, after all. Erick granted them their wishes.

And that’s what started a whole round of everyone else suddenly wanting different bodies; more beautiful, more perfect, more whatever-they-wanted. Erick had seen this before and he had given the same sort of response to that demand for beauty time and time again. He simply told people that one more change was all they would get, until they proved themselves as beneficial to the entire world, at which point he would be happy to renew their [Reincarnation]s.

Avandrasolaro confronted Erick about that later. “You can really give everyone eternal life?”

They were in the side rooms of the Wake Up House, where Erick was going over the [Reincarnation] applications of many different people, many of them not of his most recently-revived group. Mostly, he let people choose whatever they wanted, because sometimes people needed to make mistakes before they learned what they actually wanted, and that was fine. He still tried to help people avoid mistakes, though, like someone wanting to be a red-skinned orcol; those simply did not exist in a natural state. Sure, there were red-skinned orcols from Ar’Cosmos, specifically those from House Carnage, but those were red because of an influx of Carnage Dragon essence; they weren’t naturally red. Erick was hesitant of adding something like that to the basic gene pool. In that particular case, Aleothag would likely have something to say about all that, and so would Treehome. Raging orcols were often red-tinted with Carnage, so no real orcol would appreciate seeing another orcol ‘Raging’ all the time; that was one point of cultural contention between Treehome and Ar’Cosmos these days. Such a [Reincarnation] would cause Treehome to send letters.

It had happened before.

“I can certainly bridge the gap between immortal and mortal, but not for all always,” Erick said, “But this particular magic is getting around to others. Solomon can do it, as can another, as can my boyfriend Quilatalap. I and Solomon might be the only people who are doing this in an organized, ‘for most people’ sort of way.”

Avandrasolaro stared at him. “… So you really are Xoat. As those people say.”

Erick laughed. “I don’t know. Probably not. That’s just what a few people are calling me.”

Avandrasolaro was rather sure Erick was lying to himself.

The angel asked, “Are you lying to yourself?”

Erick smiled. “Maybe! Let me know if you should come across a particularly noteworthy link between me and Xoat that I haven’t already derided. I’m sure the Xoatists have a whole list of reasons why I am Xoat, right alongside the publicly-stated reasons I have given for why I am not.”

Erick wasn’t speaking in hyperbole there; the Xoatists really did have that sort of writing. Erick had seen it a few times and felt his answers were rather strong in all cases, but the Xoatists believed… And Erick had mostly gotten over that.

Avandrasolaro huffed a small laugh, his weapon-wings lifting up and out a fraction, in what Erick was rapidly coming to learn meant something like a ‘smile’. His mannerisms as an angel were almost the same as other angels Erick had met, but they were also more. Other angels were just summoned creatures, but Avandrasolaro was a real person. He seemed to be adjusting well to both his body, and his current circumstances, though he had a habit of only wearing a very short kilt, which Solomon probably appreciated more than Erick; Erick had a boyfriend—

“I believe I have decided where I wish to base my operations,” Avandrasolaro said.

“Oh? Already?” Erick was a little surprised at that. It had only been several days since Avandrasolaro’s resurrection. “Sure. Where?”

“On the island east of Dungeon Island. It is rather untamed, as far as I have heard.”

“Done and done,” Erick said, “I can get a part of the Network out there as early as tomorrow. Would you like help building?”

Avandrasolaro was puzzled for a moment. “You really are letting us go.”

Erick smiled at that. “I’m pretty sure some of your people want civilization, and I have no problem with raising other people to power, so yes. You can ‘go’ wherever you want, as long as you do what you normally do and bring peace and prosperity to all. In order to do that, it will require your people interfacing with all the other people of this world. Which means my Gate Network.” Erick added, “Though it’s kinda Kiri’s now, or at least it will be soon enough. You can make your own Network too, if you want. I think all of my daughters and my brother are on the Worldly Path too, right now.”