Deathseed: Chapters 9-10 (Patreon)

Alright, for better or for worse, release season is over! I'm as glad about this as anyone, believe me. Back to Deathseed chapters, including some fun things in these two. ^-^ 

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Chapter 9

Even with detailed local instructions, it would take them several days to reach the School of Emerald Indulgence. Just in case, Theo had inquired within the city - named Ruby Ericho - about whether Navim or Krikree had been seen. Since all signs pointed to the two remaining at their destination, that meant they had a long trip ahead of them.

This was honestly what he'd wanted. Traveling through a simple landscape in the comfortable sleigh, he could finally dedicate his time entirely to soulcrafting without a shred of guilt. He'd been putting in so much brute force work over the past year, now he could engage in the most meaningful designing. With Senka under control, and Fiyu and Nauda similarly focused, there was nothing to distract him from the pleasure of the work.

If bandits or demons interrupted them, Theo was going to murder someone.

He walked into his soulhome slowly, enjoying the feel of the grass on his toes. It might be yellowed and old, but it was his. There was nothing he particularly needed to do in the outer portions of his soul, but he always started there when he entered, just in case something new jumped out at him. His shielding wall and everything else appeared normal, so he walked through his vestibule and into the main chamber.

Since Authority, he freely controlled gravity within his soulhome, so he floated up the central column. It all felt right. When he exerted himself, his singularity put out an enormous amount of cantae that was contained only by all the effort he'd put into crafting his spherical flow. With the slightest exertion of his will, he could shift the spherical patterns through any room toward any technique.

The problems started when he ascended to his fourth floor, still empty. Originally he'd planned to build another sphere on top of a first, a second set of three floors that would gain all the same advantages. At one point he'd hoped one singularity would cover the entire column, but now he was operating on the assumption that he'd develop a second singularity for his next set of floors.

Except that he couldn't. The Five Transcendent Monuments, which should have been such a great boost to his soulcrafting, got in the way on every path.

As Theo walked through the temporary rooms, he considered the problem yet again. What made his design stand out was the three-dimensional cantae flow that leveraged his exceptional mental control. The hitch was that the most space-extensive Monuments directly interfered with those designs.

Building an Ethereal Floor seemed the most impossible, because by its very nature it was separated from all the rest of his cantae flow. He'd spent a month considering vent designs to try to put it on his fifth floor and make the sphere flow through it, but it would always decrease efficiency. Technically there was nothing stopping from him devoting his fourth floor to an Ethereal transformation and then building a second sphere from the fifth to seventh floors, but that would mean having unstable cantae flow when he tried to ascend past Dominion.

Based on what he'd seen, that could be lethal to his soulcrafting. Senka had personally recommended ignoring it for now and building his Ethereal Floor on the seventh or higher tiers, but he hadn't let the idea go just yet.

As Theo looked over his temporary plinths, he was again reminded just how many of them had strong physical components. The unnatural lostflesh from the House of the Lost, the fleshnexus from Senka's cache, and more. Based on his most powerful sublime materials available, he should be focusing his next efforts on a Corporeal Floor.

But haphazardly building based on what he had available was what he'd done with his first soulhome. Theo couldn't let make serious compromises if he wanted to reach Vistgil.

Cantae could easily move through a Corporeal Floor, as Fiyu's design proved. The problem was that the strongest benefits of this blueprint meant binding his entire soulhome tightly to his body. That worked for Fiyu, who wanted to make her abilities a physical part of herself. It was a counterproductive design for Theo, since all of his skills so far were based on abstract principles of gravity that he cast at a distance.

Technically he didn't need to stick with his design. His first three floors were more potent and efficient than most soulcrafters, so he could have dedicated three to becoming a physical powerhouse and been a hybrid fighter. But Nauda was already taking that path and he was certain there had to be a better solution that he hadn't found yet.

The other Monuments posed different sorts of problems. Basements had the decency to be locked in a single position and the Field of Abrogation was still a mystery.

If he couldn't solve his design problem, an alternative would be to throw himself entirely into building his basement. But it was usually nearly impossible at Authority, and even his use of the lightegg would only improve a slow process. To gain an appreciable amount of strength against other competent Authorities, he needed to work on his his new floor.

His only real progress with alternate designs had been on his Immortality Conduit, where he thought he might actually have a chance at integrating it without ruining his design. In theory, using some of the immortality materials from Noven, he might be able to make a circular conduit around his second sphere. He hadn't gone further than shaping some silver rings before deciding he needed more saturated materials.

Which just brought him back to his immediate problems and his mismatched materials.

"Senka, come look at this." Theo surfaced from his soulcrafting and poked her with his shoe. She sat up from the floor of the sleigh and yawned. By now this was familiar: she borrowed Nauda's telescope technique and slipped into his soulhome.

"What are we talking about this time?" Senka yawned again in spirit form and looked around. Meanwhile Theo took off his spiritual shoes before returning to his soulhome.

"What about a Corporeal Column?" he asked. "Say I dedicate the southwestern column above my armament chamber to physical enhancement. My cantae could flow through it and gain strength without being entirely dominated by physical characteristics."

"There are three big reasons people don't build columns. First, they wouldn't get the full benefits until three floors later. Second, it's not very much space versus a full floor. Third, that's sporping stupid. You really think you can balance another sphere of cantae when it's flowing through a purely physical column all the time?"

"Admittedly that's rough, but what am I supposed to do, build it in my central column? I need that for my singularity."

"Actually, I figure that would be a better place for a Corporeal Column." Senka floated into his central chamber and looked up through the roof. "You could isolate it from the rest of your floor so you can stick with gravity-based materials and everything would just revolve around it. That wouldn't strengthen your singularity, but it'd be the most space-efficient method of including a Corporeal Floor."

"What about putting my Corporeal Floor in my basement?" Theo asked.

"Once you've actually developed it, you mean? It's workable, especially if you want to be a physical fighter, but you'd be betting everything on a single synergy between two Monuments."

"What if we build a massive Corporeal Balcony? It could be like an enhanced vestibule, moderating all my abilities through the body casting them."

"Now you're repeating yourself." Senka paused and twisted her lips. "Alright, the vestibule bit isn't a bad idea, but putting Corporeal rooms outside is a bad idea. You're already nearly maximizing the soul space you can use for soulcrafting. Any further and you'll start running into serious trade-offs with soulhome stability. This is just like I told you before: if you want to do a Monument right, it needs to be part of your core construction."

"Isn't trying something over and over again expecting different results the definition of genius?" Theo smiled in self-deprecation and threw up his hands. "I guess I'm just hoping if we talk about this enough, I'll see it from a different angle."

"A column or another unusual layout isn't necessarily a bad idea. Creating one single, unified Corporeal Floor is a strong model but it's not the only option. Some people even have distributed Corporeal Chambers all throughout their soulhomes, but they're usually physical warriors aiming for maximum synergy."

Theo stood back and considered it. Was he going about this from the wrong angle, all head and no heart? That felt wrong. Even though his mood wasn't as bleak as he'd been when his soulhome first blackened, it still fit him. Gravity aside, it was technical and analytical, just like him.

He began pacing around his outer eight rooms, considering his options. Every time he reached a corner he turned sharply, just like his cantae did. There was always going to be so much intermixing at those points... unless that was the point? He slapped a fist into one palm as a new idea came to him and pivoted to face Senka in the center.

"Brand new idea: what if I have four Corporeal Columns? One in each corner of my next three floors, that would mean twelve total rooms, even more soulhome space than a standard floor."

She cocked her head to the side. "Going all in on the Corporeal Monument? I guess it's viable, probably with a different physical theme to each column. But I thought you didn't want to invest that heavily in physical traits. Seems like it's going backwards."

"The key part would be the intervening columns." Overcome by his idea, Theo began moving his plinths, floating the physical sublime materials into the corners. "In between all these, I'd place the strongest gravitational materials I can find. The result would be a fusion of physical and gravitational energy: not quite as optimized as either, but perfectly suited to me."

"Sporp, that's... alright, I see three problems with that immediately. No, four... maybe five. For a start, putting Corporeal Columns in the corners is wrong, that's where your cantae needs to curve. You want them in the middle chambers and gravity in the corners."

"Fine, fine, that's a minor design change."

"The bigger issue is that you're going to need better doors." Senka pointed down through the central column to his lower cube. "Down there, you have cantae flowing in every direction and rely on your stupid discipline to keep it under control. But if you're mixing two different fundamental concepts, you need to build doorways that modulate the cantae."

"You better not be about to tell me that's impossible."

"Oh, not at all." Senka grinned back at him. "I'm saying I want to help."

For over an hour they hashed out the design. Senka introduced some new problems but also some brilliant ideas for the doorways. Apparently there were some soulhome designs that hung sublime silk between every room, hanging cloths that slowed down the cantae flow but also modified it to fuse different elements. Since he wanted more complex multi-directional flow, he needed another solution, so Senka proposed elaborate door frames. They didn't have a single one of the sublime materials they needed, but that didn't mean they couldn't theorize about it.

Eventually Senka began to babble, so she slipped away and went back to sleep. Theo returned to his soulcrafting, using secondary materials to build up an elaborate housing for the lostflesh. It was such a powerful material, and highly fused to his soulhome, he absolutely needed to make sure it could fit into his design.

Yet as he worked, Theo's enthusiasm drained out of him. Senka's earliest objection had been right: trying to dedicate a large percentage of his soulhome to Corporeal Chambers, only to spend even more space balancing it, was a mistake. Plus, he didn't want a two-dimensional whirlwind in his floors, he wanted another three-dimensional sphere that would be perfectly centered around his second singularity. The idea of four different columns might have been a great design for another soulcrafter, but it was wrong for him.

Another dead end. One of so many.

Theo sourly set himself to carving so he wouldn't begin to sulk. His strongest material was the mountainheart, which was too powerful to use at Authority. In his spare time he'd been carving out a lesser piece of it that was still plenty strong for his tier. The mountainheart, gravitational carvings, new plinths, bricks... whenever he hit a wall, he went back to brute work so that he didn't slow his progress. For months he'd had enough to do, but now he was getting closer to a real wall.

What he needed was a truly transformative idea: just like he could integrate another sublime material into his force of gravity, he needed to integrate the power of a Corporeal Floor into his overall blueprint. The problem was that it was easy to say something like that and hard to come up with an actually strong design.

He went to go look at his sublime materials again for inspiration. It would be so easy to create a merely good chamber: the elemental gemstones from Senka's cache were immensely powerful, so he could create an elemental technique easily so long as he could manage to survive integrating them. In a matter of days, he could soulcraft a big fireball into his torsion bolts, or add wind cantae to his singularity, or make it rain for no good reason.

There would be nothing wrong with doing that. It would just always haunt him that he could have come up with something better.

What frustrated him most was the fleshnexus, because it should have been perfect. It was about as powerful as it was possible for an Authority-tier sublime material to be and excellently suited for a Corporeal Floor. When he reached out to touch the cube, it extended rigid strands of muscle to his fingers and began to attune to him. He'd experimented and seen how it also wrapped tendrils around sublime materials placed near it.

The fleshnexus, as far as Senka had explained, had been created to integrate different materials. It wouldn't have worked for some blueprints, but it could easily have pulled an entire Corporeal Floor together. Integrated with it, the mountainheart and other powerful materials could massively strengthen his body. Most likely it would even interface with a gravitational material and help him fuse the two.

For a while he even considered just giving up all these assets. Let his allies make better use of them and just start over with new sublime materials. But Fiyu already had her Corporeal Floor, and Nauda's natural soulhome would hate the rigid fleshnexus, and above all he didn't want to admit defeat...

Especially because one benefit of a Corporeal Floor was binding the soul firmly into the body. He might need that in order to ascend, so there had to be-

When the idea hit Theo, he stopped working. He sat down on the floor of his soulhome and just stared for a while.

There had always been a conflict between his physical body and the gravity of his soulhome. It just wasn't contained within his soulhome, so he hadn't been thinking about it. The truth was that he was still a physical body, reaching into his soulhome and then "casting" gravity as a force separate from himself.

Merging the two concepts had never been the right idea: what he needed was to convert one to the other. Not fusing gravitational cantae into his body, but linking his body to his own singularity and thus doing the opposite. All these materials, and whatever form of Corporeal Monument he eventually formed, needed to be subservient to his gravitational theme.

How exactly he was going to do that, Theo had no idea. But unlike all the other brilliant ideas he'd invented and then thrown aside over the past months, he thought this one could work.

It was like a perverse fusion of everything he'd discussed with Senka. Instead of alternating doorframes to combine two different concepts, he needed a more elegant design. Yes... his second singularity could still be in the central column, it just needed modulation. He could build doors around the center instead of around the edges: strengthen the gravitational cantae as it emerged, fuse it with the physical sublime materials, then use their strength solely to enhance the gravity.

The second sphere of his soulhome would represent him. Not his ordinary physical body, with chambers for each organ, but the abstract concept of himself. If he did everything right, his Corporeal Monument wouldn't make his soulhome more physical, it would make him more abstract by fusing his flesh into all the gravity he'd been soulcrafting.

Immediately more problems arose - the fun kind. Most mundanely, the fleshnexus only wanted to extend connections at right angles. That made it suited to his geometrical blueprint, but he didn't think he could force the material into a sphere without damaging it. Somehow he needed to take advantage of its strength without bending it unnaturally.

Dedicating three entire floors to physically-oriented sublime materials was also clearly insane, not remotely sensible for his blueprint. Perhaps he could use the same concept of converting other elements into gravity and build an entire sphere out of conversions.

Gravitational fire was an idiotic concept, but he could try it as a proof of concept.

Oh, but mashing together different concepts around his singularity would lead to terrible gravitational imbalance and make cantae flow into a headache.

He didn't have a complete solution yet, there had to be something else...

Theo was so pleased with his breakthrough that he had to be reminded to eat and drink. When they finally reached their destination, a day later, he was more annoyed than anything, at first. Still, when he emerged into the real world, he thought better of the reaction. The reason he was doing all this soulcrafting was for the sake of helping his allies, after all.

Okay, and maybe partially for the fun of it.

The School of Emerald Indulgence didn't look any different from the outside, still a warren of tunnels within a plateau. As the sleigh flew closer, he did note that he saw fewer Arbaians: only a handful moving through the visible tunnels, plus the guard seemed to have been reduced. They wore ominous spiked war forms, but their bodies couldn't hide their nervousness.

One of the guards approached cautiously. "Please state your intentions," it said with a very feminine voice for an Arbaian.

"We've come to pay our respects and assist the School of Emerald Indulgence," Theo said. "If you don't trust us, one of your number named Navim will speak for us."

"Please wait outside while I confi-"

"Hey, wait a minute!" The second guard lurched forward and cut off his partner. "These are the foreign soulcrafters who saved Navim's life! This was before you joined the school, but I'd recognize that strange combination anywhere."

Once they had been recognized, the remaining guards relaxed somewhat. Theo realized that they were below their pay grade here: the School had been notable for having a single Authority as a leader and his group had just flown up with two.

Sooner than Theo had expected, Navim appeared in the doorway. He had a long burn mark along one of his outer limbs, and one of his crafting arms had been reshaped into a spike, but it was definitely him. His sapphire gemstones seemed to sparkle in recognition as he approached.

"Friends." Navim breathed the word into their minds in relief. "I had hoped to see you again, but I never expected you to come find me here."

"We could use your help," Theo said, "but we're also here to help you. I heard about Uvvah Ulim... let us know if there's anything we can do. I don't mean that as a social nicety."

"It's good you don't, because if you want my help, I will definitely require yours. The situation has bec-" Navim was cut off by a scrabbling sound and several stones tumbling down the side of the school.

"Ivo-sister!"

Theo had a brief glimpse of insectoid claws rushing toward him and then he and Krikree were tumbling end over end through the sand.

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Chapter 10

Theo found himself flat on his back with a Slescan gripping his torso with all four arms. Krikree felt stronger than before, simply by measure of how tightly she was gripping his ribs.

"Ivo-sister back!"

"I'm glad to see you too, Krikree." He got an arm free and rubbed her head around the base of her antennae. Only two rubs in, Krikree jerked back to arms' length.

"Ivo-sister find Krikree!"

"That's right, we heard you moved here with Navim."

"Then... Ivo-sister back?" Her antennae vibrated wildly and he realized how important the question was to her. Theo sat up and, after extracting himself from her grip a little, answered seriously.

"That's right, we're back. We're about to go into another dangerous battle, but you might be ready to help with this one."

"Krikree soulcraft!" She seemed eager to show him her soulhome, but by that point all eyes were on them, so Theo decided she had gone on for long enough. Navim had lost his master and the school its leader, after all. Even with no faces among the Mundhin, the somberness of the school was palpable.

"Well, it seems we have passed far beyond any reasonable doubt regarding your identities." The feminine-sounding guard chuckled and returned to the doorway. "Welcome to the School of Emerald Indulgence, or what's left of it. Please come inside and find somewhere you won't cause a disruption."

Their group entered the school, which was exactly as he had remembered it in terms of physical characteristics and completely different in atmosphere. Before, he'd seen Mundhin conversing and studying in every tunnel and cavern, even during the emergency with Navim. Now their numbers were reduced by at least a quarter and those who remained appeared more subdued. Their activities were dedicated to packing or preparation instead of new research.

Navim escorted them to a cavern off the main pathways, uncharacteristically silent the entire way. Even Krikree, who seemed eager to tell him everything, remained silent. She restricted herself to emitting pheromones at him, half of which he struggled to interpret. Clearly she considered Navim a friend and the school an allied hive, but she emitted identity pheromones for the locals that puzzled him.

When they arrived at their destination, Navim gestured toward a large stone plateau that served as a table. "We have chairs and other supplies for outsiders," he said, "but I fear they have been put away. If you will assist me, step into these rooms..."

"Oh, this looks like Tatian wood," Nauda remarked as she lifted a chair. "Are you doing more business through the gate?"

"Yes and no. That would be another subject to discuss, when we have time. But we had taken more steps to be accommodating to foreign guests, including appropriate furniture and comestibles."

While they dealt with the chairs, Krikree dragged Theo into a different room. One wall was filled with cabinets and he immediately searched for sublime materials, finding only trivial amounts of cantae from a few of them. Krikree began opening several, revealing a mixture of plates and rocks.

"Food!" Krikree declared, pointing at some of the brown rocks. One of her four limbs opened a second cabinet while another pointed toward the gray stone inside. "Not food."

Her labels were actually useful for once. Theo sniffed one of the brown rocks and gently put it between his teeth. To his surprise, it was much softer than it looked and tasted like an earthier potato. He had no idea what it was, but it seemed palatable.

"Foreigner food." Krikree crouched down beside the cabinets proudly. "Krikree help mine."

"Glad you get to use those skills again." Theo opened one of the cantae-emitting cabinets and looked over the softly glowing gemstones within. "What are these?"

"Thinkrock food!"

Her words were usually underwritten with pheromones, and this time Theo had context for the strange scents from earlier. He glanced at Krikree curiously and tried emitting [Thinkrock.]

[Thinkrock,] Krikree agreed, and pointed toward Navim in case there was any doubt.

Apparently scouts could create neologisms, as he knew Krikree had never seen Arbaians before leaving her world. As much as he wanted to ask her about that, or why she considered the crystals to be Arbaian food, they had higher priorities. Theo gathered some plates and the edible rocks to bring to the table, with Krikree's help.

Everyone else had been busy as well, so soon they were seated around the table. Navim didn't require a chair, as the stone was at the right height for a Mundin in settled position, and Senka's head was barely above the tabletop, but otherwise it worked well. Nauda picked at the rocks curiously, Fiyu was silent as usual, and Navim seemed reluctant to speak.

"I'm sorry to hear about Uvvah Ulim," Theo said. He was repeating himself, but they needed to start somewhere. "I know our condolences don't mean much, since we didn't know him well. We could never have saved Myufuru without his help, though, and the information he shared with me meant a great deal."

"I believe he was pleased to speak with you as well." Navim's voice didn't sound sorrowful, yet his gem sphere hung lower than normal. "He left behind a great deal from a lifetime of soulcrafting and travels. One book was actually marked as for you."

"Really? About what?"

"It is currently sealed, but I believe it likely to be an academic curiosity. Do not expect any great secrets, only know that he thought of you."

Truthfully, Theo hadn't thought about Uvvah Ulim often since they'd parted. The difference between them, and the idea that the old Arbaian had spared him a thought in his final days, depressed him more than the actual death had. When he remained silent, Nauda spared a brief glance and then spoke up.

"What are you planning to do, Navim? Clearly it was important for you to be here, if you were willing to call in favors to come back."

"It was a long journey, but a worthwhile one." Navim roused himself slightly and gestured toward Krikree. "My travails were made easier by my companion, who proved a valuable guard."

"Krikree scout!" She skittered away from Theo to climb onto one of the Mundhin's outer limbs. "Navim-thinkrock good."

"But do not think that I evaded your question. I had always believed that the School of Emerald Indulgence would survive the death of our master, but the reality appears to be more complex. Those who were not here solely to study under him are so valuable that other factions hope to poach them, and they are willing to offer scholarly incentives. Many intend to depart once they finish paying their respects."

[Prince dead. Sad.] Krikree emitted. Theo was unclear on whether anyone else picked up on her pheromones or if she even intended to communicate.

"Others, including myself, are committed to our school and our work, and that is where the difficulties begin. The school institutions are entirely capable of surviving on their own, but without an Authority-tier soulcrafter, our existence this far from Arbaian civilization is... less practical than I had hoped. I do not mean solely demon attacks, you understand, but also simple practical matters such as transporting guests and materials. This has led to our presumed dissolution."

[Hive weak. Scavengers come.]

"Aside from paying my respects, that is why I am here. Before the school is abandoned, many scholars are visiting to acquire scholarship or indeed the scholars. As you might imagine, many feign a connection in order to acquire some part of Uvvah Ulim's legacy, sublime or otherwise."

[Bad!]

"If the institutions our master established are to survive, they must be reinforced now. If we had an Authority, which seems unlikely, the school would maintain its identity. Failing that, its resources must be divided judiciously. Above all, I am concerned about what might arise to fill the gap the school leaves behind."

When Navim finished speaking, everyone was silent, including Krikree. Theo passed from somberness to analysis of the situation, and Nauda looked only compassionate, so Fiyu was actually the first one to speak.

"Could we help?" she asked. "We cannot serve as an elder relative, clearly, but we do have two Authorities among us. If there are any tasks that would require our strength, we will do our best to help."

"And I'm heartened by your support." Navim shifted from side to side and Krikree leapt away as he adopted a new position. "Perhaps we can speak of such things in time, but I do not believe that you are here solely to assist me. Is there some way that the remnants of the School of Emerald Indulgence can help you?"

"There's a problem on Tatian," Theo said. "I won't lie, we were hoping that you or your master might be able to back us up, but that doesn't mean we won't help while we're here."

"Perhaps an agreement could be reached. We do have resources, and even military might, but you must understand that any involvement will necessarily include our local politics. All of you appear to be weary from your journey... I suggest you rest here tonight and we can make plans tomorrow."

The plan was unobjectionable by design and no one seemed enthusiastic about their rocks, so the group began to disband. Theo started to help put things away, but Krikree tugged on his arm and pulled him toward one of the tunnels.

"Ivo-sister! Scout rocks!"

She sounded insistent, so Theo glanced back and gestured toward Nauda. He'd have to trust her to navigate the rest.

~ ~ ~

Since Theo was dealing with Krikree, Nauda took point with Navim. She still wasn't confident when it came to comforting Arbaians, but she helped him with clearing the room and made sure to pat his outer limbs. Even if touch didn't mean the same thing to him, he more than anyone would appreciate the intention behind it.

That evening the others settled into a bedroom chamber for foreigners - Tatian crafters had definitely built the furnishings at some point. Nauda lingered outside the door with Navim. He began to speak about the school and went silent before his sentence truly began.

"Sometimes it can be hard to talk about the most important things." Nauda leaned against his rocky shell and hoped it seemed companionable. "You don't need to if you're still thinking about it."

"That is... a more charitable interpretation." Navim emitted a low rumble and settled down, which gave her a place to sit on one of his limbs. "I feel mentally paralyzed on that subject. Everything seemed so stable, and now... perhaps I might want to speak about it, yet I have no words. I did not come here in order to discuss it."

"And yet you want to talk?"

"Yes, perhaps that is true. All conversations here are fraught with political weight."

"If you want to discuss some random academic subject, I should probably go get Theo or Fiyu."

Navim chuckled and shifted his central sphere toward her. "No, I would rather you sate my curiosity. If you're still awake, why don't you tell me about this problem on Tatian?"

So Nauda did. She tried to stick to sober tactics and analysis, and almost immediately drifted into her complex emotions about seeing Nlukoko enslaved. Of course Navim would never object, and she thought he even felt some kinship with her melancholy. Since he didn't object, Nauda ended up fully explaining the difficulty they faced.

When she finished, Navim was silent. Unlike most people, who might hum or mutter or shift their weight, Navim was deathly still while thinking. She had almost worked herself into thinking that he was offended when he spoke.

"You face a considerable army," he said, "and you will need whatever advantages you can acquire. And yet, I find myself thinking about the battleground itself."

"Nlukoko? I don't see how it's relevant, since they'll all be fighting in the sky."

"Ah, but I mean the landscape in a more abstract sense. For example, the distance between the Deuxan gate and the enemy's home city is quite relevant. From that you can estimate how quickly your foes could summon reinforcements."

"Right, I understand that." Nauda realized a second later that his observation was more complex than it seemed. "If they have to use messengers, then the time to reinforcements is a round trip, but if they have a method of communicating between worlds... or if they have a weirkey, it won't take much time at all."

"Do you think it likely that your foes have such resources?"

"We should try to find out, but probably not. They're more powerful locally than between worlds. Even House Blacksilver doesn't use inter-world communication methods lightly, so I doubt one Deuxan family has very many. That still leaves us with an army to deal with."

"Are you so confident they have no weirkeys?" Navim asked. "I must point out that this Ariano is from Noven, so they may have at least one."

"No, there's a small Noveni gate in Nlukoko. That's... huh." Nauda hadn't thought about it in some time because it was always locked away, but it provided interesting potential opportunities. "That's another argument in favor of the idea that Ariano doesn't have a weirkey."

"Then, if pressed, he may attempt to flee through the gate."

"Since he's already fled once before, that's possible. We're outnumbered, but I think only Esaire and his family have a commitment to the position, given whatever they're doing with Nlukoko. If we can push our advantage hard enough, their allies might flee and the scales would tip in our favor."

"Allow me to investigate a matter." Navim sat up, moving more purposefully than he had since they arrived. "I hope that we can help one another. Sleep well and we will converse in the morning."

Since he seemed so focused, Nauda said her farewells and went back into the room. She didn't feel tired, since she hadn't fought anyone or physically trained, yet when she pulled herself under the sheets she slept like the dead. Waking up amid soft Tatian bedding confused her for a while before she reoriented herself and sat up.

Fiyu slept angelically in her own bed and Nauda looked away from her before she stared. There were multiple other beds in the room, but Theo's was crowded: Senka flopped over the headboard like a discarded sock and Krikree had curled up on his chest. Why did the scowling misanthrope always attract the hangers-on?

Nauda padded out on bare feet and found an empty place to train with her staff. Even though the primary obstacle to her ascension was perfecting her soulhome, she didn't want to let her training lapse. She had three different towers and an unusually high number of techniques for her tier, so it took significant concentration to make them all work together.

After an hour, she was joined by several Arbaian guards. They offered to spar and Nauda was reminded that she wasn't at the bottom of the food chain. She didn't fight too aggressively and looked forward to getting to know the guards better, but before she could begin a real conversation, Navim arrived.

"Nauda, please be so kind as to come with me. We have matters to discuss."

"Sure." Nauda smiled at the guards and then followed Navim. He took a different turn than before and began ascending toward the top of the school.

"Whatever else happens," he said, "I consider us allies. I will craft armaments for you if possible, and if I am unable as an Archcrafter, I can at least create them for your allies."

"You don't owe us, Navim, so we'd be grateful for anything."

"However, I hope that we can find mutually beneficial agreements. The School of Emerald Indulgence does have a number of significant needs, and I believe you might be well-rewarded for your assistance."

"That's not my main goal, but you know it would make Theo happy."

"Heh, as I am confident this will." Navim finally led her to a larger room. It was a wide cavern with an entire wall open to the Arbaian desert, guarded by a thin line of wards. At the moment it was filled with a wide variety of boxes, a few open to reveal sublime materials and other supplies. "These are resources that the School intends to sell in order to resolve all debts and close our operations."

Nauda had bent down to examine them and now sharply glanced up at Navim. "Are you in a lot of debt? We don't really do business that way on Tatian, so I don't know much about it."

"Our assets are estimated to be a significant net positive, it is simply that any institution will carry debts as a necessity of operation. The problem is that some, in their zeal to liquidate the School, intend to sell off assets that are necessary for its continued existence. You can see how this would be a fatal blow before any reorganization can even be discussed."

"And you want us to help with that? Consider it done. I'm barely spending my Blacksilver salary and I converted most of it to craftgems, so I should be able to buy out a lot of the supplies and give them back to you."

"I see." Navim shifted his limbs in what might have been amusement, though she was just guessing from his tone. "I was not, in fact, asking for your charity. I was going to suggest that if you bought certain items, those of us loyal to the school would compensate you with pieces of the master's sublime legacy that would be particularly useful to your soulcrafting."

"You don't have to do that." As she stood up, Nauda considered the army waiting for her and winced. "But I don't think I can really afford to refuse. This will all make sense, business-wise?"

"It should. We can discuss the matter once..."

As Navim trailed off, Nauda realized that something was wrong. She'd grown accustomed to the sound of Arbaian limbs moving over the stone throughout the tunnels and hadn't realized that they'd changed. She wasn't hearing the same stone-on-stone thumping, this was something else.

Abruptly a demon crawled up from the outside and began clawing at the ward barrier.

Nauda flinched, then instinctively thrust out her staff and used a binding to knock it away. Her action barely mattered: the first demon was followed by several more. All at the first crawling stage, but they could begin sacrificing themselves at any moment and make the odds much worse.

"Another demon attack." Navim moved rapidly to the edge and peered through the hazy wards. "They have been increasing of late, as if to emphasize our helplessness."

"That does look bad." Nauda went to the edge and, while she knocked away more demons, tried to count how many were crawling up the side. At least three dozen. "Do you have a defense plan?"

"For such swarms? Naturally. For that? No."

He extended one limb outward and Nauda swallowed as she saw it: there was a titan striding through the sands toward the School. The rocky humanoid had house-sized sledgehammers for hands and looked like it could break the tunnels with a single blow. Last time Nauda had seen one of those on Arbai, it had taken the late Uvvah Ulim to defeat it.

Then again, their situation had changed a lot since then. As if to emphasize that, Fiyu appeared beside her from a bubble of stealth.

"There is only one third stage," Fiyu said, "but the defenses here are failing."

"Go." Nauda smiled at her and tapped her staff on the ground. "I'll hold off the lesser demons and leave the titan up to you."

~ ~ ~

Fiyu leapt away from the School of Emerald Indulgence and soared through the arid sky. She had not located Friend Theo but she would trust Friend Nauda to handle the defenses. So long as the titan did not reach its destination, she believed that the Arbaians would survive the attack.

This would be the first third stage demon she fought on her own, after having encountered them at the battle in the Dustwind Plateaus. Elder relatives had always told her that it was unwise for Rulers to attempt to fight such demons and that it should be left to Authorities. That could mean retreating for some time until more powerful relatives could arrive.

Now she was the elder relative. Fiyu swallowed and flew faster.

When the titan saw her, it immediately swung with an over-sized limb. Rather than take a risk, Fiyu cloaked herself in a sphere of stealth and altered her course. The titan swung wildly, showing no awareness of her position. Just in case it was faking, Fiyu flew cautiously to the side and then unleashed a light storm against one of its legs.

She was mildly surprised to see her bolts shatter the rocky limb. The titan fell onto its side, only then realizing her position and flailing toward her. No longer so imposing.

Because she could feel the battle at the School was under control, Fiyu decided to experiment. She first summoned tendrils of darkness to wrap around the titan's arm, trying to pin it to the ground. Regrettably, the demon snapped through them. Just as she had feared, her darkness technique lagged behind the others, and especially behind her relative's power. That was the weakness that her current soulcrafting was meant to resolve.

Though she could have tested her Corporeal Floor by allowing the demon to strike her, Fiyu decided that was unwise. Her defenses had already received a dangerous enough test in Noven. Instead, she remained hidden and pressed her senses into the rocky body.

Demons possessed unnatural flesh and organs, incomprehensible compared to beings from any of the Nine Worlds. Yet they weren't as featureless as Betrayer Senka's solid body or the Arbaians. She realized that there were lines of tension within the titan. Perhaps not joints or key organs as in a normal being, but simply by existing in a physical form, stresses were placed on the demon's body.

Fiyu waited for the titan to rise and then flew up to its chest. She extended cantae from one hand and swept it through the demon's torso, just where she felt the line of stress. Its attempts to resist her cantae barely even registered and she sliced through it as deeply as the length of her blade allowed.

As its physical unity was compromised, the titan began to sag. Fiyu quickly dismantled the demon so that it could harm no one. It would have been faster if she could extend her hand blade, and she even considered adding that capacity to her blueprint. The goal of her fourth floor, after all, was to develop her relative's foundation into something her own. Perhaps... but she had only six rooms around her new heart chamber, so she should not choose ideas idly.

With the titan removed, Fiyu flew back toward the School of Emerald Indulgence. The demons were piercing past defenders one moment, then abruptly neutralized: Theo had entered the battle. He dropped all the demons into the air with a single field, which could have ended the battle on its own. If that was not enough, Associate Krikree bounced out, spearing the floating demons one after another.

On the top floor, Friend Nauda had resolved her own fight. Even Ally Navim appeared to have crushed one demon, though now he stared at the remainder of the battle. When Fiyu passed through the wards and landed beside him, he inclined his gemstones toward her.

"I see that, even though I intellectually understood your ascensions, I underestimated you."

"Do not worry, Navim." Fiyu walked closer and patted one of his arms. "We are here to help."