36. A Battle of Minds

Chapter 036
A Battle of Minds

Eventually, the month-long recuperation period came to an end. Zorian spent the last few hours of that restart with Kirielle, attending Cirin’s own celebration of the summer festival. Kirielle was very happy with him, because apparently she was never allowed to wander around or stay up so late during the previous festivals. He didn’t really reciprocate her excitement, to he honest – Cirin’s summer festival was the same as it was every year: incredibly dull. He found himself almost wishing for Ibasan invaders to make an appearance, just to liven the place up a bit.

Okay, no. No, he didn’t. The whole thing was still very boring – that’s what he meant.

Regardless, with the beginning of the new restart (initiated by the familiar feeling of Kirielle jumping on top of him to wake him up), he was ready to once again tackle the problem of contacting the aranea and getting them to teach him mind magic. It didn’t work all too well last time, but he had a whole month to consider what went wrong and how to fix it and he was willing to give it another go. Though not immediately, of course – teleporting to the nearest aranean web right from the start would be stupid. He had no intention of getting anywhere near one until he had already tested some tactics and equipped himself accordingly. Consequently, he started the restart in the same way he had started most of the previous ones: by going to Knyazov Dveri.

He did two things before anything else after entering the town. First, he descended into the local dungeon to pick up all the mana crystals he knew the location of… though he didn’t sell a single one in the Delver Village, or even the town above, so hopefully there would be no uproar and spying attempts on him this time around. Secondly, he saved both Alanic and Lukav from the assassins – even though he had no intention of pursuing lessons from Alanic in this restart. One of his reasons was purely emotional – both men had helped him a lot, and it felt wrong to let them die when he was already there, capable of preventing their deaths, even if it was meaningless in the long term – but the other reason was that saving them gave him some relatively non-threatening combat practice. He knew he could defeat the undead boars trying to ambush Lukav and the attack party assaulting Alanic’s temple without dying, but they were still life-and-death battles that he had to take seriously.

One of these days, when he finally got some mind magic expertise from the aranea, he was going to capture the two mages involved in the assault on Alanic’s temple and trawl through their memories to see if they knew anything important. Maybe some of the gunmen too…

But he was getting ahead of himself. No counting his chickens before they hatch – better worry about actually learning said mind magic before thinking about what he would do once he had it.

The first and most obvious problem he had to tackle was what to do if things went wrong again. No matter what precautions he decided to take, there was always a possibility he would bite off more than he could chew or end up caught off-guard. Technically, he had his suicide rings for that, but there was one thing that struck him about his altercation with the Sword Divers – how slow he had been about activating them. He should have blown himself up the moment it became obvious that the situation had become hopeless, instead of waiting for the last possible moment like he had. He could think up a lot of excuses for himself, but at the end it all came down to one simple fact: he didn’t want to die. He had a powerful survival instinct, and it was not easy for him to consciously kill himself… even if he knew, on an intellectual level, that it wouldn’t be permanent. Thus, he had waited until he was absolutely sure he wasn’t getting out of that situation alive and intact, and it had almost cost him everything.

All things considered, Zorian didn’t want to become jaded, accustomed to dying and suicide – that seemed a bad attitude to have, especially once he left the time loop. That left two main ways he could see to deal with the problem. One was to set up a bunch of contingencies into his suicide rings, allowing them to activate automatically in certain cases. Another was to have more options to choose from when faced with disaster – something other than ‘fight to the death or kill yourself’. A retreat option.

Contingencies sounded like a good idea, and Zorian even had some experience making them thanks to his studying of warding – a discipline that made heavy use of contingencies to determine when it should activate particular defenses. Unfortunately, most warding schemes used relatively easy-to-define triggers such as ‘a human touches the object’ or ‘a living being not keyed into the wards enters the area’… defining a trigger for a contingency that would kill him should his mind be tampered with but wouldn’t activate the moment he engaged in telepathic communication of any sort or hit his head or became dizzy or a million other things which were beyond him at the moment. Even if he could make such a thing, he would still have to exhaustively test it to make sure it was reliable… by working with a friendly aranea. Which, uh, kind of made it useless for his current needs.

So he cheated. Instead of creating a nuanced, sophisticated contingency, he made the metaphorical equivalent of a sledgehammer. Specifically, he made a contingency that would kill him the moment he lost consciousness or suffered a sufficiently strong headache… but only if he turned it on. It would normally stay dormant, to cut down on unwanted activations, but he could activate it on a moment’s notice if he found himself in a dangerous situation. He wasn’t terribly happy with that solution, but it would do for now. He just had to remember to turn it off once the danger had passed, lest he explode the next time he went to sleep. That would be so very embarrassing…

That being done, he turned his attention to the retreat option. He had considered everything from talking to Lukav about transforming into a rock worm or some other tunneling creature, alteration spells that would allow him to create his own paths and sanctuaries underground, phasing magic, haste spells, and more. But ultimately, his mind kept going back to teleportation. It was the ultimate form of mobility magic, and everything else was just a poor substitute. If he could somehow bypass Dungeon interference to teleport away, he could simply avoid ambushes like the ones the Sword Divers had used against him instead of resorting to suicide in order to evade capture.

Fortunately, during the month-long recuperation, Zorian had come up with an idea of how he could side-step his current limitation as far as teleportation was concerned. Which was why, before descending into the dungeon, he turned one of the large stones he found on the outskirts of Knyazov Dveri into a recall anchor.

The recall spell was outright made specifically for quick retreats, and the link forged between the caster and the anchor ensured they could teleport out even from areas warded against teleportation. Well, so long as the wards were basic ones, since those protections simply disrupted the targeting part of the teleport rather than inhibiting dimensional warping as such. Consequently, Zorian had a feeling the spell would work to yank him back to the anchor, even through the Dungeon interference.

He was right… sort of. He had found that past a certain depth, the strain on the link became too much and it snapped. Before that happened, however, the spell worked flawlessly, allowing Zorian to quickly teleport away to the surface. The depth past which it ceased to work was too shallow for his liking, but he was confident he could strengthen the link. Over the next couple of days, he worked to combine several marking spells and his knowledge of spell formula in order to create a stronger anchor for the recall spell – one that would allow it to power through any amount of rock and Dungeon interference. He was largely successful in this, though the anchor object had to be pretty large to contain the final spell formula he designed. No matter, there was no need to make the anchor particularly portable for what he had in mind.

Satisfied that both of his projects bore fruit, Zorian spent the rest of the week creating various portable traps and magic items… including a more combat-worthy version of his wooden golem. Golems, having no minds, were almost entirely immune to aranean mind magic, and Zorian intended to bring one with him under the explanation that it was his helper and luggage carrier. Partially true, since the golem he’d made wasn’t exactly the mobile wardstone and murder statue that professional war golems were… but in the end it was still a painfully obvious bodyguard construct and Zorian fully expected the aranea to recognize it as such. Having such a guardian trailing behind him was bound to make even the most opportunistic aranea think twice about going after him.

Or at least he hoped so. He also hoped they wouldn’t feel too threatened by the construct, since they might simply refuse to talk to him at all if it made them too nervous around him…

Well, no matter. He would risk it. Gathering all of his equipment, he teleported himself and his golem to the one aranean colony that had been friendly to him the last time around. It was time to pay the Illustrious Gem Collectors a visit.

– break –

The last time Zorian had visited the aranean web that called itself Illustrious Gem Collectors, he found a colony that specialized in harvesting various precious stones that were abundant in their local underworld and traded them to the nearby human village in exchange for various human-produced goods. They were miners, essentially. They informed him straight away that they had agreed not to trade with any humans except the ones at the village, but gave him the locations of five other webs that might be more willing to help him. Since his main goal had been to locate as many aranean webs as possible and sound them out, Zorian had accepted this explanation at face value and moved on. However, after thinking about it for a while, he realized he had been kind of stupid. Just because they couldn’t trade with him didn’t mean they couldn’t receive gifts. He should have given them one – aside from the fact they may have been even more helpful if he had done so, there was also a chance they immediately alerted the webs they sent him to about his coming. In which case he definitely wanted them to put in a good word for him, which would be far more likely if he were handing out gifts to every group he visited.

Hell, he even had a perfect gift for them. Although he cashed in on a lot of the crystallized mana he found in Knyazov Dveri’s local underworld, he left a fair amount for his own tinkering and for situations like this. He was pretty sure the Illustrious Gem Collectors would have no problems accepting a gift of crystallized mana, since they traded similar items to the village all the time and it would not be in the least bit suspicious of them to have a couple of mana crystals in their possession.

Zorian entered the tunnels that held the Gem Collectors’ colony and contacted the nearest sentry in the manner shown to him by the web’s matriarch during his last visit. If the web found it in any way unusual that a human knew how to properly greet them and ask for audience, they never mentioned it. Instead he was soon presented with the web’s matriarch, She Who Eats Fire and Sees Gold, and her escort of 10 other aranea. Huh, two more guards than the last time… apparently having his golem trail after him did have an effect. Still, while the matriarch was noticeably more nervous around him this time, she did not act outraged at his addition and she gave him essentially the same speech she had the last time around. They were honored by the visit, but they had prior commitments and agreements and couldn’t deal with him so here’s a bunch of other webs he could pester for help instead. Only this time they gave him eight names instead of five. Aside from the Rose Labyrinth Dwellers, Yellow Cavern Guardians, Filigree Sages, River Navigators and Luminous Advocates that he’d already known about, she also gave him the location of the Talisman Bearers, Ghost Serpent Acolytes and Silent Doorway Adepts. Strange. Why the extra information this time around?

[Is there something special about those last three webs?] he asked.

[Ah, so you have heard of them then?] the matriarch said, making her own conclusions about his question. [Yes, they are a bit… shady in their dealings with others, human and aranea alike. I wouldn’t normally send a young mage like you to webs like theirs, but you seem like someone who can take care of himself.]

She gave his golem a significant look.

[He’s just my luggage carrier,] Zorian said.

[Of course he is,] the matriarch said, a touch of amusement embedded in her telepathic message. [I’m sure those glyphs on its surface are purely aesthetic too. Leaving that aside, is there anything else we could do for you?]

[You have done more than I could have possibly hoped for, honored matriarch,] Zorian answered honestly.

He beckoned the golem to come closer and pulled out a box from the backpack it was carrying, pointedly ignoring the wave of tension that rippled throughout the assembled aranea at the action. He then opened the box, revealing several pieces of crystalized mana and placed it in front of the matriarch.

[Please,] he said. [Take this as a small token of my appreciation for your help.]

The matriarch stared at the box without a word for several seconds before becoming agitated. No, wait, she was just trying to mimic shaking her head with her entire body.

[I cannot accept this,] she protested.

Zorian frowned. [Surely the village leadership isn’t so insistent about your trade agreement as to keep you from accepting gifts?]

[It is not that! Your gift – it is simply too generous,] the matriarch said. [It’s too much.]

[I respectfully disagree,] said Zorian firmly. [You were amicable and honest with me, and you told me where to go even if you could not help me yourself. You’ve most likely saved me months of searching by telling me where I can find more webs. I feel this is the least I can do for wasting your time with this meeting.]

The matriarch remained silent after that. After a while, Zorian figured she was not going to say anything and that this was effectively the end of their meeting.

[In any case, I suppose it’s time for me to leave,] Zorian said. [Until we meet a-]

[Wait,] the matriarch said, interrupting his farewell. [One of the webs I told you about. The Luminous Advocates.]

[Yes?] asked Zorian curiously.

[They are a web dedicated to honing our psychic abilities as much as possible, even by aranean standards. Among other things, that means they are intensely interested in studying rare cases, such as aranea with unique talents… or human psychics. They will want to work with you every bit as much as you want to work with them. Always keep that in mind, because they’re liable to pretend otherwise when you deal with them.]

[I… see,] Zorian responded. [That is a very useful thing to know about. I thank you for your advice, wise matriarch.]

[Oh, there is no need to flatter me,] She said. [I’m just helping a good, generous soul get forward in life. Besides, the Luminous Advocates are snotty and arrogant, always looking down on us as ‘mere miners’ and thinking their mastery of the mind arts makes them so much better than everyone else… in my opinion, they deserve to be taken down a bit. But never mind that, I’ve just realized I’ve been a terrible host. If you would be willing to follow me deeper into the tunnels, I would love to give you a brief tour of our humble home. We can talk some more while we walk.]

Zorian agreed, but quietly turned on the suicide contingencies before following after her.

Just in case.

– break –

Despite Zorian’s concerns, the brief tour of the place offered by the matriarch turned out to be just that. There was no sudden ambush or sinister reveals, just a stroll through the tunnels with some running commentary. Zorian could tell he was only being shown the less interesting, outer parts of the settlement… but the tour was really more of an excuse to have a conversation and exchange some information, so he didn’t mention it.

The matriarch gave him a little more information about the other webs. The Rose Labyrinth Dwellers were somewhat unique in the sense that they never visited the surface. Most aranea webs lived underground but were heavily dependent on the surface for their survival. Not so for the Rose Labyrinth Dwellers – they were only active underground, and were rather mysterious even to other aranea. The matriarch didn’t know how they would feel about teaching him, but she seemed sure they wouldn’t attack. The Yellow Cavern Guardians had apparently found one of the rare underground fungal forests and made it their home – they were fiercely protective of their home, knowing just how tempting a target it was for just about anyone, but the matriarch felt they were worth the visit. The Filigree Sages specialized in ‘webcraft’, which was basically the aranea equivalent of spell formulas – instead of carving glyphs onto items, they anchored their spells into web constructs for some reason. Zorian didn’t understand why they would do that, since web constructs were bound to be far more fragile than glyphs carved into stone and metals, but it seemed to be a thing among the aranea. It was probably a convenience thing – aranean limbs weren’t exactly made for carving and chiseling things, so they probably had to use alteration magic any time they wanted to do such things. Easier to just spin some webs. The River Navigators made their homes on the banks of an underground river, and had mastered the skill of making boats and using them to travel down its length and back. This allowed them to range a lot further than most aranea could manage, and thus gather more resources. They were very active in trading with humans, but mostly for material possessions rather than psychic instruction. Finally, there were the Luminous Advocates. Their territory had little in the way of natural resources, so they mostly traded their mind magic expertise to other aranean webs instead of dealing with humans much, but that was due to lack of means rather than wants. The matriarch insisted that the Luminous Advocates were clearly jealous of the Illustrious Gem Collectors’ wealth, and otherwise made some snide comments about their character and even sexual potency. She did admit, albeit grudgingly, that they were his best bet if approached correctly.

Zorian was somewhat surprised how relatively advanced the aranea in the local region were with regards to their crafting abilities. The Cyorian web mostly traded with the surface for all their crafting needs and didn’t produce anything except silk and processed monster parts. It reminded him of Novelty and her desire to learn ‘human construction magic’… and thinking of Novelty promptly made him feel guilty and angry, so he dropped that trail of thought soon enough.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Of the last three webs, the matriarch knew little beyond generalities. The Talisman Bearers were apparently heavily magic-focused, most of them carrying large metal discs full of spell formulas strapped to their bodies. The Ghost Serpent Acolytes had abandoned the aranean Great Web belief in order to worship some kind of native spirit they found. The Silent Doorway Adepts had either some kind of stealth magic or great teleportation skills, or maybe both, because they had a reputation for getting into inaccessible places and disappearing from them just as easily. All three had a bit of a shady reputation. The Talisman Bearers were known to be very greedy for magic they could use, especially magic items, which could be either very good or very bad for Zorian. The Ghost Serpent Acolytes slavishly followed the guidance of their guardian spirit, and the Ghost Serpent was known to be a little… erratic at times. The Silent Doorway Adepts were thieves, or at least had a reputation for such.

Zorian decided to put all three of them firmly at the bottom of his list of aranean webs to visit.

For his part, Zorian told a little bit about himself to the matriarch – how he was studying magic in Cyoria, and how he had met the aranea there. How they had helped him make sense of his abilities and learn how to control them. How they are all dead now, wiped out in totality.

[So Cyoria changes hands once again, does it?] the matriarch asked rhetorically. [I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. Do you happen to know which web took over?]

[None at the moment,] Zorian said. [It wasn’t a rival web that destroyed them. It was… something else. Most likely some monster rising from the deeper section of the dungeon. Cyoria has had a bit of a problem with that recently.]

[I have heard something about that from the night runners,] the matriarch said. [But I didn’t know it was that bad. Still, expect a new web to move in soon enough. Cyoria is a tempting prize. Not for us, mind you, the Illustrious Gem Collectors are happy enough with their lot, but plenty of ambitious webs would jump at the chance to claim the place for themselves.]

[Night runners?] asked Zorian.

[A name for aranea that go between different webs to bring news and conduct trade. Don’t go looking for them. Night runners generally don’t like humans. Their whole existence revolves around crossing over vast stretches of human-controlled land. Many die to mages and guns in the process. They wouldn’t appreciate some random human tracking them down, regardless of the reason. The whole point of being a night runner is evading humans, after all, and especially mages.]

[Got it. Don’t bother the night runners unless I want a fight,] said Zorian.

[Have you ever gotten in an actual fight with an aranea?] the matriarch asked curiously.

[Um. Sort of,] said Zorian. [It didn’t end all that well for me. While we are on that topic, have you ever heard of the Sword Divers web?]

[Can’t say that I have. Where are they from?]

[They live under Korsa,] Zorian answered.

[Oh, no wonder, then! Korsa is really far from us. I’m afraid that aranean webs have very little contact with webs outside of our immediate vicinity. Other than the news we get from the night runners and the occasional aranean explorer, we know little of what happens in distant webs. It may be strange to hear this, but we actually have a better picture of what humans are doing at any given point than our own kind. What did you want to know about the Sword Divers anyway?]

[They arranged for a meeting with me and then tried to ambush me when I got there,] Zorian said.

[Ah,] the matriarch said quietly. [I am sorry to hear that. Treacherous webs like that bring a bad name to our kind.]

[So you can’t tell me why they did that?] Zorian asked.

[It could be any number of things,] the matriarch said, adding a mental equivalent of a shrug. [Aranea are not nearly as homogenous as humans in term of culture-] Zorian silently boggled at the notion of humans being culturally homogenous. [-since the relative isolation of each web quickly causes webs to develop their own… peculiarities. Perhaps you insulted them somehow. Perhaps it was how they test anyone wanting to meet with their leaders. Perhaps they were simply greedy and decided you would be an easy target. I’d personally assume the latter, but who could possibly tell?]

Soon after that, the conversation died down and he parted ways with the Illustrious Gem Collectors. The matriarch told him to drop by for another chat when he was done scouting out the other webs to tell her how it went, which Zorian interpreted as ‘come back again soon with some more expensive gifts’, but agreed to anyway. He meant it too – this visit had turned out to be far more productive than he had been hoping, and who knew what else he might learn from the matriarch if he could get her talking again. Stopping by before the restart ended shouldn’t be too much of a hassle.

The next day he set off towards the Rose Labyrinth Dwellers to begin his task in earnest.

– break –

Despite having detailed instructions about where they live, it took Zorian an entire day of searching before he encountered any of their sentries. And an entire day of wandering the lightless tunnels, constantly doubling back after taking wrong turns and fighting the denizens of the Dungeon. That black, fire-breathing beetle whose carapace shrugged off both kinetic force and fire really gave him a scare, but thankfully it was rather slow and freezing it solid finally allowed him to kill it.

The Rose Labyrinth Dwellers really lived up to the ‘Labyrinth’ part of their name.