Chapter 260 – Something of a Plan

Over the next month, the Prophets discussed the finer details of the plans they needed to try, as well as the research that needed to be done. In addition to that, Zhuan and Mirian took turns instructing them on use of the violet focuses and soul-communication. They still hadn’t solved the non-linearity problem of the dream, but it seemed useful to be able to start communicating directly instead of needing to wait days or weeks for zephyr falcon messages to arrive. Privately, Mirian hoped that the focus’s assistance in interpreting intention helped move people like Liuan and Ibrahim closer to her way of thinking.

There were still going to be problems, but Ibrahim was no longer trying to kill Gabriel, and they were no longer debating which nation should have hegemony. Xecatl and Liuan still didn’t trust each other, and Liuan was reluctant to even talk to Zhuan, but it seemed the Prophets were finally learning to work together.

Mirian wasn’t perfectly happy with the agreements, but she wasn’t unhappy either.

Liuan insisted the relics of the former Prophets were key and wanted to keep searching for them as she continued to hunt for Scebur. Mirian had studied the holy texts and what they said about each of the relics, and was skeptical that all of the former Prophets had figured out how to use relicarium or had done much in the Labyrinth. The Flesh of the Nameless God had probably just been a special focus; the one currently in the Grand Sanctum was normal stone. The Mask of the Fifth Prophet was probably just an excuse for how the Fifth Prophet had shifted his form because announcing it was soul-bindings would have had them branded as a necromancer. The Staff of the Third Prophet in the vault was a fake, but there was no reason to think the original was much more than a well-crafted staff.

Mirian already knew where the real treasures were. There was a bounty of mythril and a titan catalyst even more potent than Apophagorga’s sitting on Divir, waiting for her. In return for granting Liuan freedom to maneuver as she pleased, though, Liuan agreed to work on iterating on preventing the Akanan invasion altogether.

Jherica, now that they’d decided it made perfect sense for there to be a way to control the Labyrinth on the Luamin moon, had made it their mission to find a way to get there. They would work on that while continuing to assist Xecatl with instructing their nagual in standard glyph theory, as well as arrange for a research group to be transported to Mayat Shadr and back. To Mirian’s surprise, Ibrahim volunteered to be the one to escort the group. Emperor Xecatl would continue the spirit construct research and continue her search for the Tlaxhuacan Gate.

In turn, Mirian agreed to be the one who looked for any way to control the Labyrinth in the Labyrinth. That was easy enough. She was planning on examining more entrances anyways.

Zhuan had volunteered to work on mobilizing artisans and workers for production—whether it was Jherica’s moon project or Mirian’s leyline regulator—as long as she could do so in her own way. When Mirian wasn’t delving into the Labyrinth, she would also visit Zhighua and assist with research on the Viaterrian ruins, attempting to take their derelict technology and find ways to learn from it. Torrviol Academy and Benansuo’s Royal University, through Mirian and Zhuan, would head those projects. They’d pass promising projects over to Akana Praediar’s universities, where Jherica could incorporate them into their own project.

Gabriel, in turn, would try to unite southern Persama and make sure much needed resources for research continued to flow across the Rift Sea. “As long as I get to do it my own way,” he’d said, while smiling at Zhuan.

In the private conversations, Xecatl agreed with Mirian’s decision to withhold information about relicarium from Liuan specifically. She also was continuing to monitor the archipelago for incursions. Claimed agents of Scebur had continued to try to make their way to Tlaxhuaco.

“Perhaps there’s a relic there,” Xecatl mused. “We’re searching the whole island anyways, we might as well look for it. But I don’t think that’s the true goal here. I just can’t tell what it is.”

Zhuan, meanwhile, hadn’t needed Mirian to tell her that she should keep quiet about the nature of Sun Shuen’s soulbound scepter. She also hadn’t needed Mirian to tell her that Mirian’s excuse about storing her true spellbook in a dimensional storage space was a lie. She’d already gotten Song Jei to confirm as much previously, and was too smart to not immediately make the connection between the book and the scepter. Her caution was more over Gabriel than Liuan, but she pointed out that Liuan probably already knew the existence of soul-binding, hence her passion for finding the relics.

“She’s made no indication she does. And why, then, announce her search? That’s basically inviting the rest of us to look at them more closely.”

“My guess is that she suspects enough people know about the relics that she’s trying to get a better read on who knows what and who has what. It also may be that she has spies in place, so by provoking someone—say you—into searching for the relics, she seeks to find them by watching others search. It’s also a way to assess what information is being hidden from her. I believe your tactic of pretending you have no interest in them is best.”

“I have my own way of doing things,” Mirian said.

“Yes. And, between you and me, I would appreciate if you did not attempt to seize the relics of Zhighua. Before this all started, I believed that, in principle, archmages should not be allowed to exist because of how they influence the power structures of society. Now that I am an archmage, I find that I am not immune to self-justification and hypocrisy, yet I still am suspicious of just how much power can be centralized in a single person. I discovered a Viaterrian saying you should know. I found it engraved in that ship we found. It roughly translates as, ‘When we traveled across the great void and beheld it, it beheld us too. No gift is not also a curse. No symbiote is not also a parasite. No saint is free from sin. Remember, we are all Viaterria.’”

At first, Mirian had thought the quote was a bit trite. There were similar sentiments in the sacred texts, after all. The more she thought about it, though, the more she became interested.

The gift was magic, wasn’t it? We couldn’t have survived on Enteria without it. Yet, it’s also become our doom. What gifts did the Viaterrians use before they found magic? And what curse accompanied them?

She considered the Ominian. Long had she beheld Them. Only rarely did she feel when They beheld her. Has that changed my soul? She felt like she was in control of at least that.

Some days, she felt closer to the Ominian than to people. Do you, too, look at us, scurrying around, and wonder why we can’t understand how to fix what’s gone wrong? Wonder why we fight over such petty things?

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

A few days later, the Council of Prophets ended its session, and they all got to work.

***

With the extended cycle, there was plenty of time to start setting their plans into motion. Liuan and Jherica would be returning to a number of crises in Akana. Ibrahim was in no rush to begin anything. Zhuan wanted to visit Tlaxhuaco, and Gabriel suddenly became extremely interested in visiting too.

Mirian went with the two of them to Tlaxhuaco, more to provide Xecatl’s ships an escort to deal with the hostile leviathans than anything. She acted as a screening force, levitating high above the ship, using detect life to spot them from a distance, then used powerful necromancy and lightning to pummel them until they either chased her—so she could lure them away from the ships—or retreat. She spent some time aiding the search for the Gate on the island, but the natural abundance of volcanic stone made it difficult to use divination to pinpoint any particularly promising area.