Chapter 267 – Persistence

Mirian stood over the corpse of Scebur. He’d bound a silver mask to his face, and when the RID had taken it off, some of the flesh had come with it. The mask was nonmagical, but mimicked the pattern of jewels embedded in the Skull of the Second Prophet. Why the obsession with the Second, though? Nothing she’d found in the histories of the Prophets had given her any clues. The historical Scebur remained as much a mystery as this present one.

There were some features she could see, at least. He’d had blue eyes, blond hair, and there was a notable scar on his forearm. As far as she could tell, she had never interacted with the man whose corpse lay before her. She opened up her spellbook to one of the pages full of tri-bound glyphs and runes in her spellbook and began examining what was left. Strange. Fragments of soul energy lingered by the corpse. Parts of his soul must have spalled off from bindings severing the pieces before the temporal anchor activated. If they were using curses that aggressively, no wonder they triggered the temporal anchor early. That would mean that in addition to having curses binding him into unconsciousness, he’d have soul damage that would make his recovery even slower. Plenty of cycles to find him, then. After all, Jherica was never able to shed the curse on their own.

Mirian was eager to be done with the matter. She mentally noted several more distinguishing features, then said, “Good work, Liuan.”

The other woman gave a stoic nod. “One less thing to worry about.”

Their meeting lasted an hour longer as Liuan discussed ways she was attempting to settle and delay the Akanan attack. Mirian listened, but part of her mind kept drifting. She’d gotten several new ideas on how to try to influence the leyline repulsors. She also had some ideas on how to create an elevator beneath a goods warehouse in Palendurio that would reach down to a second passage connecting the Gate, but needed to test out more ideas on how to move those goods up from the Mahatan Gate. Only the gates in the Jiandzhi and Torrviol had working elevator mechanisms. If she couldn’t get that to work, there was always the possibility of shipping the materials through Alkazaria instead, overseas to Falijmali, then south to Mayat Shadr. And, she had been making progress on analyzing the dissolution of Divir’s entropic field as it descended, mixed in with her attempts to reach it.

When she said her goodbye to Liuan, it was a relief. She could stop pretending to care about the nuances of politics in Akana Praediar, and instead, focus on something interesting.

Zhuan stayed in Vadriach to study the social dynamics. Zhuan insisted she stay longer, but Mirian stayed only another two days. Again, she had trouble focusing on the lessons the other Prophet was trying to teach her.

Soon enough, Mirian made her way back across the Rift Sea.

***

Plan 6 – Interception at low altitude (4th iteration)

Notes: The entropic field seems to only fully dissipate on Divir’s impact. At high altitude, the entropic field is still too wide and strong to be penetrated. At mid-altitude, the field is smaller, but seems to be ‘compressed,’ strengthening it.

The entropic field cannot be the field moderating the repulsion of Divir, or at the very least, cannot be the only arcane (or anti-arcane) force at work. The equations simply do not work. A third field type is at play here, one I haven’t been able to measure. Otherwise, we would expect Divir to fall only at a) greater leyline instability than I have measured by at least 312 major units [see notes on Endresen’s arcane field scale] or b) only after a larger breach in the entropic field [see notes on Labyrinth antimagic studies].

Regardless, the leyline instability is eroding the entropic field, which intensifies as the field is put directly into contact by a leyline breaches in the 4th, 8th, and 7th regions around Mayat Shadr [see map with measurement data].

Thus, despite the difficulties of my last attempt, this is still the plan most likely to succeed.

Mirian sequestered her soulbound spellbook, then checked her pocket watch. She had synchronized it to the leyline eruption in the 3rd region around Mayat Shadr, then positioned herself on the southern axis. The watch was currently ticking down.

She had prepared four mythril-sheathed wands. One was for levitation, but that would just be getting her to the starting position. The second was for the shaped cone shield. The third was for black shield, which would be absolutely necessary for surviving the attempt long enough to reach the Divir Gate. The biggest challenge would be regulating how much energy the shield would be absorbing. She’d met her father to practice several times, but he couldn’t put out anything close to as much power as the flames and force that would be engulfing Divir. The fourth was a wand designed for pure directed force. Unlike her first attempt at this plan, she would be starting at height and heading down at an angle.

She’d prepared two leather bracers made of reinforced drake hide, enchanted, and then wrapped with orichalcum wire that would keep the wands in contact with her skin while acting as another layer of protection. She strapped them on. The desert sun had heated the wands slightly, so they felt just a bit too warm, and they bit uncomfortably into her forearms. She tightened the straps.

Next, she had procured goggles. They were a rare enough sight, but merchants traveling across the desert who were too poor to hire arcanists to manage sandstorms sometimes used them. With Endresen’s help, she’d found a way to darken the glass. Then, she put on her armor. It was based on the antique designs of bygone years, not the modern armor worn by infantry. It had a quilted layer that was enchanted for insulation, with thin steel plates. Again, she’d used orichalcum wire and what little mythril she could manufacture to reinforce the design. Most of the reinforcement was in the helmet, breastplate, and arm armor. If her legs were shredded, so be it. She only needed to survive a few seconds without them. It might very well speed her up.

She finished tightening the buckles, then checked her pocket watch again.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Time to get in position. She began to levitate up. By now, the research camp that had been in the ruins was destroyed and any survivors had long since departed. She’d stopped bringing people with her; it only complicated things, and didn’t have much of a benefit. Zhuan might scold her, but she’d gone back to eating drake meat that she roasted in the air, with just a little bit of salt drawn by spells from the nearby rocks.

Mirian looked up. The auroras danced across the sky. The air rumbled with the rolling thunder of distant leyline eruptions. To the west, the Casnevar Range still smoldered, having had the tops of several peaks lopped off by a leyline. As she ascended, she could see the magical eruptions dotting the land like an arcanist’s light show.

Wisdom is in daily action, she thought, and checked the flows of her soul. She needed to remember each lesson. Everything is connected. Each piece of me, each decision, has its origins in our long history, in my childhood, in the cycles of life and nonlife. Even the way distant mountains look has entered my mind as a thought and changed the slightest thing. She closed her eyes, rising higher. I have remembered the turbulence of moonfall. My skin has felt the fires of Divir as it burned. Each memory is painful because pain is a great teacher. I will not flinch, but I will remember. Memory guides action.

As she opened her eyes, she saw the moon begin to move in the sky.