Chapter 10 (Patreon)

Chapter 10

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As smart people say, if two people are fighting, the third one gets popcorn and enjoys the spectacle. I don't think I'm the smartest, but I'm still not so blithely stupid as to try to get my head into a freshly overturned vat of sewage. An attack on the Emperor's blood would be enough of an excuse to turn the whole Capital upside down a few times and then do it again just to be sure. And if my incognito identity is compromised in the process, it's not even certain I'll be able to leave the city.

So I sat under the table, watching the carnage unfold and nodding respectfully in response to the unknown assassins. They clearly knew their way around a square attack, so much so even I was uncomfortable looking into the mess. Maybe I could have hit just as hard. I would have been guaranteed to hit harder, but still, but still...

The blades of fallen leaves played the first fiddle, and that fiddle completely cleared the area of anyone who didn't have a really powerful defense against the deadly rain. Each petal, even individually, was an armor-piercing attack, but together they somehow summed up, merging into a portable enclosed field, something remotely reminiscent of my own bastion. And it was really painful.

I could repel such a powerful pitch, but I certainly wouldn't, trying to evade the attack. Even though the leaf vortex was a very flexible thing, closing the entire space in one fell swoop, they were too close to the physical world to catch up to me at the depths of the Shadow Realm. With that, a field of unknown nature had to help, cutting off, or at least impermissibly complicating, all spatial manipulation in the immediate area. Even a step through such interference would do some damage to me, even if I healed it faster than my blood would spill - it's the advantage of the Shadow Form.

Except that, for me, it's a move to evade attacks through the deeper layers of an aggressive realm that is considered, if not a normal action, then an acceptable combat tactic. For bodyguards of the august blood, eternal blood, this move would be something analogous to "your ward won't get killed if you kill him first". And dragging the entire entourage somewhere out of reality wouldn't work quickly, even if you took away the risk of tearing their bodies apart by spatial interference.

Instead of trying to flee, the bodyguards used a blind defense tactic, waiting for the moment when the heat of the attack subsides and the most important civilians can be led away from here. It would not be possible to block off the space for long or to quickly kill them all by walking over their corpses. Even though no one obviously expected this attack, for which someone will definitely have to answer with his head. But the bodyguards of the members of the Imperial Family are a priori prepared for battle. In general, they all reasonably believed since the very first blow had not killed their target, they had a good chance of getting out of the mess alive.

To be fair, I support their opinion. The first attack was powerful, cool, and really impressive, but it was very pointless. Personally, if I wanted to kill someone in that crowd, I would have preferred a point-by-point, maximum concentrated attack rather than a wide fan of weak single attacks, even if mutually reinforcing. Instantly stood in the way of yellow leaves and dark red barrier, clearly powered by an artifact, as quickly began to be supplemented by personal shields of mage guards, becoming an impregnable fortress. If the leaves had struck from one direction, they could have squeezed through the defense simply due to the amount, mass, and reserve of invested power, but the spells either did not have time to reconfigure or simply did not wish to do so. Logic and common sense dictated that the attack failed unless it was originally intended solely to intimidate.

It's a shame no one bothered to tell the killers of this fact.

I was saved by my intuition which worked well even when clairvoyance was disabled in some unknown way, pricking me in the back of the head not even with needles but with a bloody knight's spear. The Aegis sheltered me with a reflexive rush rather than intentional use. And a second later, it was clear why I was right to listen to my instincts.

Those gathered beneath the barrier, a perfect sphere fifty meters in diameter, were clearly about to strike back at such an unusual magical structure when the dry, shriveled leaves crumbled into dust. All together and at once, and that was before they tried to attack. And then, I witnessed the high science of the Dark Magical Middle Ages. This dust turned out to be highly toxic, magically charged, and attention - flammable. A volumetric explosion mixing magical and physical components is no joke at all. Considering the number of dead leaves used in the attack (at least within sight, the park went bald at once), their mass, and the volume of the resulting dust cloud, it blew so bad that if I had been in the epicenter, and even under the Aegis, it would have been bad. If not from the attack itself, then from the kickback of the Aegis for sure.

The cafe, the table, the bodies of the occasional victims, and the upper layers of earth were swept away like an angry wolf blowing on a straw house. The blast wave crushed my temporarily invulnerable body into the ground, and I thanked my ingenuity for covering not only me but also the dessert I hadn't eaten enough with Aegis. There would be no way to order a second one, even if I agreed to pay extra. I doubt the same chefs survived. Also, there is a suspicion that the number of whole windows in the entire Eternal has decreased dramatically.

Meanwhile, the survivors of the blast, whose barrier had collapsed but held most of the damage and whose personal enchantments deflected the rest, had a whole new set of problems. The explosion had simply vaporized - the magic was at work here for sure - the upper layers of the earth, exposing what was hidden beneath the ground. Needless to say, the bodyguards and the guards themselves did not like what they saw.

The black, slimy, poisonous spiked roots covered the area in a living and constantly moving carpet, a dirty, disgusting, and fucking dangerous carpet. I was, to put it mildly, perplexed, bordering on incomprehensible. I'd never encountered a Druid in combat before, except for a couple of dead men in the Stone, but I knew their arsenal and tactics pretty well. There was the advice of Hestia, who had fought all kinds of battles and wandered through other people's dreams, where I could gain if not skills, then pure knowledge and life experience.

Well, this was unlike anything I knew of in the arsenal of fans of Greenpeace and environmental protection. It wasn't even the power and scale of the enchantments that turned a huge chunk of the park into a death trap. A high level and rank of sorcerer would easily add power, volume, and sophistication, so it's all right here. It's just for me, and all my sources of information, Druids, Florists, Growth Masters, and Forest Masters are Life, purest and most distilled, unstoppable and ubiquitous, invincible in their evolutionary perfection.

It cannot be said that there was no life here, for it was present... but what a life it was! This living, life-taking, and ceaselessly dying madness was the embodiment of a very different side of this facet of magical art. Life was entwined with its eternal rival and closest sister, Death. It was nothing like the cold and detached power that necromancers like Cassie Let's Be Friends called for and conquered.

The reverse side of life, of living nature as such: death, which gives birth to new life. Which will have to die only to give birth again to that which will die a little later. The incessant decay of fallen forest giants covered with moss and fungus, the sprouting of beautiful flowers on the bones and bodies of forest animals, and the dance of predator and prey, which always has a natural outcome. Death fed Life, made it stronger, and life, in return, gave to death with that blazing and impassioned passion that is available only to the living who long to live and procreate.

The two opposing forces fed their antipodes, extracting mass for growth and energy for the attack in a continuous stream. The sensor was simply drowning in the power released by this madness, and the power, once released into the world, was immediately used to create new units to replace those that had fallen. Even through all the interference to my fucking eye, I could see the majestic and beautiful forest as if I were alive, aware of what lay behind its façade. No one likes this side. No one wants to notice it, but it doesn't go anywhere. Nature is cruel, as her laws are cruel. For her, death will only be part of the endless cycle of life - the withering away of the unnecessary, the death of the weak, the oblivion of the unfit, to be replaced by another, better life, which will be obliged to give way to those who will be better than herself.

Whoever had summoned this something here, whoever had raised it secretly from the seers and sensors, exactly beneath the walk of its victims, but it was strong, capable, and quite definitely nuttier than ever. But he didn't miss a beat. It was not for nothing that I said that all this had not grown in one day - all the plants in the area were obviously treated in advance because I'm afraid to imagine what costs to the reserve would be required to implement such a fucked up thing in one decisive stroke. And that's what's so powerful about natural magic-the ability to invest not so much power but to let one's spells feed on the universe by themselves, to be filled with power without the creator's direct involvement.

As opposed to the attackers (or attacker), the Imperials had no time to prepare and were not at all prepared for such a brazen surprise attack, which came down on their heads in a hail of bricks. But they had an advantage in the number of spells used and the small area to defend.

It didn't help very much.

The poisonous roots attacked like one organism, preventing them from gathering into a new formation, but they were still just roots. The charms are dangerous but fairly straightforward. The first seconds after the detonation allowed for a bloody harvest, but as soon as the victims recovered, things didn't go so smoothly.

There were only three individuals whose magic allowed them not only to fight back and stay alive but also to cover others and attack quite adequately. The one who stood out the most was a slightly hunched old man in a dark purple robe and an elaborately tailored suit underneath. The old man was on fire in an unspectacular way, pouring flames all over the place. He wield one of the simplest and easiest branches of magic to master, yet still so damn powerful that he could withstand almost any type of opponent.

Normally, flame attacks are even too strong, making the notion of friendly fire a whole new color for flamethrowers. Now that was disproved before my eyes, as the forty-fourth level Fire Sculptor wasn't just hit with flames, but literally making flame flow around allies, attacking strictly the targets they were supposed to be attacking. Control comparable, if not surpassing my own, and this for the energy of that realm that just happens to be famous for precisely uncontrollable power that does not discriminate between enemies or allies! Streams of fire, streams of white-hot flame, could easily burn a man just by flying near him, but the sizzling heat refused to touch anything but the spawn of an unknown druid or druids.

The second bastion of resistance turned out to be a huge knight in armor that looked completely impossible to wear. And I'm sure before the attack, no one in the crowd wore such outstanding "clothes". Had he jumped to the rescue with a teleporter? Or took the protection out of a spatial pocket? The answer is not as important as his actions. Where the other guardians could barely manage to defend themselves, and even then, gradually decreasing in number, this guy made full-fledged attacks.

The Juggernaut of the forty-fourth was also a Defender, literally taking away any attacks that were meant for someone else. Something reminiscent of my Theft, but working at the expense of an artifact and personal, non-planar skills. Not only did the armor make him look like an escaped space marine from the 40k, but it also managed to accumulate the damage he was taking. When they piled up enough, he returned the damage, leaving only dust, slivers, and clouds of harmless poison from the deadly flora in a certain radius. The mass of that dust, by the way, was insufficient for another massive explosion, and the small explosions that did happen came back, so they were quickly discontinued. Or, more likely, they waited for more dust to accumulate.

The third guard, who literally hugged her ward, hiding him under an individual protective dome, was the Summoned One. Or rather, Chained, unknown to my eyes class. Subconsciously I expected to see in this victim of other people's desires and goals typical slave girls, what they make Slavemancers and other bad people. You know, empty and stupid appearance, weak expression, or vice versa - lust and obedience, and it was just spilling out of all the crevices. All I saw was the tenacious and attentive gaze of a mage ready for battle, focused and dangerous in the same way that a mountain slump would be dangerous.

I wasn't kidding about the landslide. Dressed in an elegant green dress, Chained was a Geomancer, the strongest I'd ever met. Her will bound the root-ripped earth together, turning it into a monolith, breaking, crushing, and dusting the angry and dying plants. What's more, somehow, it literally petrified them, turning them into another level of protection since these worm-like golems didn't lose their mobility, but they changed sides dramatically. I was a little too scared to see what was going on in my head.

For a few seconds, it really seemed that the problem was solved. A trio of defenders methodically cut the creature of life and death to shreds without meeting any really serious resistance. And the still-not-dead entourage, combined with the guards running to the rescue, who were close enough to come to the rescue even with the teleporters not working, did their part.

Alas, the goal of the whole construct was to buy time, not to kill everyone, because seconds later, a second wave of magic began, with the same unnatural direction, combining such unconnected forces. Something new began to grow directly from the still-moving but now rapidly decaying roots. The construct recycled itself into extremely useful fertilizer, allowing a new weapon to grow on its remains.

Mosses and fungi spewed tons of poison into the air just as they died and let the first stalks rise on their remains. The stalks became bushes and then trees, trees initially decrepit, dying, terribly warped, and covered with the sores that devoured them. The trees grew with leaves that had already shriveled and dried up, that had fallen and turned into an active defense, knocking down (trying to knock down) any oncoming spells.

And they attacking.

They attacked with instantly rotting flowers that shot poisonous needles. They hit with projectiles of cones, disgusting fruits, and fetuses that shot streams of woody debris out of hollows, acting like autonomous spells that looked for gaps in the barriers. And, of course, decomposing into fertilizer the corpses of those who had already died. And what grew on the bodies of high-level suites was far more dangerous than "simple" constructs.

But that was not the purpose of the attack, no. The most terrible danger, the true purpose of this feast of natural selection, was the gradually entering force of a closed field that methodically stratified amulet and artifact defenses. Such shields are powerful, can be created instantly, and require little maintenance, but unlike personal magic, they cannot be adjusted on the fly. And if a particular closed field is used against a perfectly known attack, there's not much chance.

It was the first time I'd ever seen someone who had the blood of one of the most powerful dynasties in the world. He looked ordinary, even though he was richly dressed and thoroughly aristocratic. Losius was a better-looking bastard, a smug bastard. This Heir of Eternity of level thirty-three was more like a gray mouse from the aristocratic world. There was nothing about him that could be considered unusual.

The fallen barrier was spotted, and everyone knew exactly who was going to be hit next. The Summoned immediately forgot about the attack and almost instantly covered them both in a thick cocoon of earth. And the cocoon wasn't earth for long, becoming stone, almost black from its density and the magic put into it. That thing was much stronger than gun steel, I'll tell you! But, as anyone will tell you, "almost" is never enough. At least a hundred needles, flying at about bullet speed, and a couple dozen "rotten arrows," along the lines of all the "flaming arrows," managed to take off in their deadly flight.

It was then I realized that the local emperors are called Eternal for a reason. It was either a class skill or a consequence of the gift of the perk, but for one brief moment, the moment was no longer short. The will of a guy who didn't even look at the attack - and the blows were coming from all directions - simply stopped them.

It reminded me of a reversed Moment of Eternity, only much more skillful and expansive. My perk gave me the ability to stretch out a second, temporarily increasing my speed and becoming so damn fast. And it wasn't just the increased stats. It was something else, something I saw before me now, albeit in a different form. The Flow of Time had changed.

The needles, based on the chaff and rot of the spell, darted forward the already familiar leaves and just froze. Without any perturbation in the energy plane, they froze! I mean, sensors in such a mess were not a very reliable source of information, but I still did not notice anything at all! A moment passed, summoned sheltered his master inside a stone egg, hardness incredible, and already harmless attacks only left on that Koschey Egg a pair of instantly tightened cracks.

T.N. Koschey - A character of Russian folklore. According to fairy tales, he hid his death at the end of a needle. He hid the needle in an egg. He hid the egg in the duck. He hid the duck in the hare. He hid the hare in the chest. And the chest hid on a huge oak tree far, far away.

Koschey Egg  - An idiom denoting a vulnerable point.

Whatever was used to interfere with teleportation, it worked selectively - only on those who were tried to be banned from jumping. How did I understand this truth? Well, there are my high-caliber analytical talents, sharp mind, sharpened intuition, phenomenal observation, and even my admirable modesty... In all seriousness, one of the assassins proved my version with a practical method, falling out of some blink right in the middle of the remnants of the imperial formation. I had a feeling this teleport was also made by an artifact, but I dare not vouch for it.

The figure of the eighth-level Gardener possessed such a cool disguise that she even ignored my heroic Gaze. It makes sense since there was a full-fledged Chained in the delegation, which would have been enough to accidentally dab a glance at a suspicious individual to make the ambush fail before it even began. Let the class and level of the killer be hidden, but outwardly you could confuse him with a gardener only if one very much to drink, smoke, and use pills on the top.

His clothes were the equivalent of a camouflage suit: moss hanging down on all sides, dead leaves, and dried twigs that had become anthropomorphic. If it hadn't been for the sphere and the Steady Gaze, I might have missed the barely discernible figure in the changing landscape. If it weren't for the nagging pain of the sense of danger, I would have simply mistaken this figure for one of the dozens of lookalikes that looked exactly the same but were really made up of moss, leaves, and wood.

Summoned, hiding in a shell of almost absolute protection, she could not catch the real enemy, and the others simply did not have time to react. Every move this man made was absolutely correct, taking away random attacks and glances. The clairvoyance blocking, I suppose, didn't apply to the attacker either, as well as the countering of teleportation. The movements were light, fast, and slightly, slightly excessive - an obvious sign that someone had been drugged with potions before the fight. And how barely this excessiveness slips through indicates a habit of such amplification. There is also the option of not too strong potions, but I sincerely doubt that such a thing is done by limiting oneself to half measures. And there's no way a pure caster can have that kind of speed without amplification. And the fact that it was this figure who created the attacking construct, I have no doubts.

Each step left behind a seed crumbling on the ground, immediately sprouting into sharp tentacles with some kind of coniferous coating. The conifers were a good shot, adding to the chaos of the surrounding reality. The two Brethers of the entourage, covered by the barrier keeper, were simply swept away without delay. And they were approaching the thirtieth level!

With a wave of his hand, a handful of seeds turned into bullets that ripped into the barrier and sucked the magic into themselves, destabilizing the enchantments and rapidly increasing in size. Reaching the size of an average cone, they immediately exploded, finally shattering the weakened barrier. A sharp approach, a sweep of a long, crooked, and sharp as a dagger or a tree root, and the brether who tried to strike from the blink were cut open like a fish. And the assassin struck before he had time to move.

The second man managed to block the stingy sweep of the strange weapon while simultaneously burning the roots that had almost reached him with his one-time amulet, but he, too, made a mistake. He clearly expected the blow to be strong, as terrifying as the previous one. Instead, the assassin barely touches his blade with his own, causing the brether to reflexively raise his weapon upward. The dagger in his other hand tries to deflect the attack and buy time, but the killer manages to lightly scratch his victim with its wooden claws. Poison and instant death of the second melee fighter.

Equally carelessly bypassing the falling body, the strange druid tossed forward a particularly wicked seed that passed through the hastily placed barrier and immediately began to sprout in the body of the convulsing in agony mage. He couldn't shout because the seed was too quick to get to his throat, and he had no time, either, because the killer had been spotted and burned along with the corpses of his victims. The old Sculptor burned off a third of the reserve, no less, but even space itself was burned in that place, not to mention matter or magical shields.

I, who was watching the scene, caught the strangeness, but I realized it even slower than the old man did. After all, it wasn't me the trick was aimed at, but my gut didn't warn me. The mossy twins were not only distractions but also beacons for the teleport-replacement. Bodyguards do something similar, and the same cheaters, with their shuffling of cards in a deck without shuffling, have the same roots in their skills. But how quickly and cleanly worked, even with clairvoyance!

The killer could sense in advance, for his foresight was not dimmed, but he waited until the last moment. The moment when the old man had to open up, to loosen his concentration on defense, if he wanted to strike truly powerfully. The grandfather figured it out very quickly, unnaturally quickly, covering himself with a fiery flower. And every petal of that flower, closing in an incredibly beautiful motion, was combustion incarnate. This protection might not have lasted long. A couple of seconds, but in those seconds, not even a god would have pushed through that protection. A sort of equivalent of my Aegis, but far less reliable and not instantaneous.

It was the moments that ruined him. It might have seemed to some that the thin wooden spike, almost black, simply pierced the flower, but I knew it did not. The thing was very powerful, albeit disposable and close to legendary, and still would not have been able to penetrate such defenses. Flower didn't close instantly, no matter how perfect control the Sculptor possessed. Perfect timing, a golden shot in every sense: the needle slipped beneath the defense at a moment when the rest of the defense had weakened beyond repair.

Also, such all-burning flames tore down the old man's defenses of the enormous knight that he could have tried to take the wound for himself and transferred it to something else. At that moment, the mighty mage was especially vulnerable. It was that moment that decided his fate. The flower burst into a particularly bright blaze, scattering scalding sparks, and the mage fell to the ground, turning into a puddle of slime and mold as he fell.

Life devours life.

Barely a second and a half had passed since this person had entered the battlefield, but the damage had come out as if it were no more significant than the entire previous rampage. And neither side was going to stop.

The stone spikes, exploding like nail bombs, sent by the summoned were dangerous, but that was about all. Unable to observe the battle properly, the Chained One focused entirely on protecting her ward, not even trying to reveal herself. Clever, for it was for his life that they had come here, but at the same time, such a move gave too much freedom to the attacker.

Lacking the support of the all-consuming flames, the Defender was no longer able to cope with the druid's nimble, leaping between his ever-renewing doppelgangers. And every move he made left more and more seeds, and not all of them sprouted with needlepoint, dangerous only to the leftovers of retinue. Gradually, the vegetation was twisted into some strange construction of the fruit of an extramarital Ivy and barbed wire bond. Withered and dying, like all of the killer's creations, the bushes slowly and unobtrusively weaved into another closed field, weakening, restraining, interrupting techniques, and the Defender flinched.

A little more than twenty seconds. Though even to me, it seemed like minutes, if not hours. The powerful blow simply tore the man inside his armor. He didn't have time to recoup the damage he was taking too quickly, and the tricky magical stuff temporarily knocked out his armor's defenses. Also a homebrew, no doubt about it. The general nature of the first volumetric explosion was clear, but physical damage played a major role there. Here it was almost pure magic. Or rather, its absence - a combination of dust, rotten leaves, and moss simply siphoned off all the magic from the air, eating it up like a drunkard drinks a shot... Or like a dozen bottles of the highest-grade negator, and the shockwave from the relatively weak explosion finished the job, killing the knight.

And there were only two of them left.

The retinue was almost smothered, and those who weren't were rapidly retreating out of the circle of death. Running guards, though considered among the guards elite, but the level reached a maximum of twenty with a rare splash of twenty-fifth. There was no way they could interfere with that, even if there were more of them, and they came in squads at once.

There was one last hurdle to the goal.

I couldn't see how an assassin could push through a Summoned shell. Even I would have a lot of problems with it. You can't do much with direct magical attacks, and you can't just throw it away. This magic... It was like she was clinging to the ground, clinging to reality itself. Even if I were to sink her deeper into Shadow, she would be drawn back to the real world. And druids, even the weird ones, suck at the cumulative magic that breaks through all shields. That's where you'd have to ask the late old man.

Give a time to a killer, and he, like any druid, will create something slow, gradual, but guaranteed deadly. It's exactly the same game of creating specialized closed fields! But it'll take too much effort and too many precious seconds because teleportation protection isn't eternal, and they're probably already trying to break through it. I can feel it with my ass, my gut shrinking from the roar of energy somewhere above, beneath the clouds. The strange shroud of destabilization is being torn and shredded with all its might, and with each passing second, more and more participants joined in the torment.

If the druid hoped to accomplish his mission, he urgently needed a way to open the shell and get to the personalities inside, or all that was left was to flee and make it fast. The assassin did not disappoint, so much so that I almost choked on another cherry in despite of the Aegis. Note: Eating sweets under the Aegis is a good way to combat planar influence. In the emptiness this skill creates in you, any feelings become fuel to throw into the furnace instead of yourself. Usually, I just crush the growing impulses with my will, especially since the basic Aegis hasn't been pushing me too hard for a long time, but even that little bit helps.

So why did I almost choke?

The Druid, without a second's hesitation or even a glance in the direction of the fallen Defender, stopped just outside the shell, surrounded himself with a whirlwind of foliage, and turned all the earth underfoot and in the immediate radius into solid roots, moss, mold, and rot, temporarily depriving the geomancer of the ability to attack from below. She suspected something, by the way, and began... to strengthen her defenses. She had learned her lesson from the Sculptor's death and so she would not reveal herself except to make her attacks more frequent. Though they could devastate a medium-sized fortress, they were far too crude to bring down such an opponent.

The attacker got down on one knee and put something on the ground, or rather, on the mulch that replaced it. I couldn't make out anything in detail because of the interference and the flickering leaves, but I didn't have to guess. A flash of energy, no weaker than the tactical charms, and roots as thick as a man's torso instantly surged from the ground around the motionless figure. And they didn't just embrace the druid; no, the force of nature spread out, sprouting the same roots deeper and deeper, covering an area even larger than the original circle of roots.

And the trunk of a giant tree, so thick that you could fit a small cafeteria in the trunk, like the one where I had recently rested. It was at least eight meters in diameter, and the height kept growing and growing. And not just grew, but also attacked - a lot of titanic roots, the largest of which were as thick as a car or the sense of humor of an average 4chaner, rushed vicious tentacles to the even more solidified stone egg. I can bet my daggers that the summoner and her client inside swore and wished, with glee, that they could turn back the clock. They'd rather try to break through a barrier of dying plants surrounding the shell than get a beating like that.

A vast, giant oak, five stories tall, and the crown of a medium-sized courtyard next to that five-story building rose from the sprout in seconds. It had just been born, but the druid's power had warped it. The trunk and branches were covered in cracks and hollows, the leaves had the same autumnal hue, and the acorns were black from the power that had filled them. And it was movable, too - I choked to death because it reminded me of a slightly smaller version of the legend we'd killed in the wilderness.

Even the name was similar, except that while we were confronted by the Ancient Tree of the fifty-sixth level, this thing was signed The Dying Tree and had no level, most likely a temporary construct that had gained a semblance of self-consciousness. It could sprout fully, the clairvoyance whispered, managing for a moment to break the blockade, becoming a still but permanent guardian, a mighty protector, and a living fortress. The assassin imbued it with power as benign as it was pernicious, effectively creating a full-fledged legendary beast from the sprout, but the price was high. Like everything this power touched, the newborn monster was doomed to die, only to be born again as something else.

The fruit that is already sprouting comes down from its branches, but the main power of the dying body is aimed at preventing the men trapped in the shell from retreating. They very wrongly did not flee, thinking they could easily hold out, not wanting to show their backs and hoping to exhaust the enemy so they could be taken alive. Or not dead enough to prevent necromancers and seers from interrogating the remains.

Chained One was showing class, making me delighted to send another berry into my mouth, but she was still not alone, and she needed to cover her ward. And her reserve was not bottomless. Drawing energy from the realm wouldn't work forever unless you wanted to die a particularly bad death. I could have tried, but I was a statistical error among those who had tried and died.

But she fought back! The roots turned to stone and the stone to dust, the dust becoming thin and deadly blades, needles, and arrows that struck the tree pole by the hundreds. By enhancing the spawn's attacking abilities, the creator of the quasi-intelligent construct weakened its innate armor. It was still delightfully strong, but the blows sliced through the decrepit bark and rotten wood, making it ooze black sap. Stone battering rams came from all sides, and the dust clouds collided with the chorus of foliage, mutually destroying each other.

The druid drew power from the bodies of his creations, gradually killing all but the giant oak that was receiving all of the power. But he, on the other hand, was in no hurry to run out of power. The clouds of stone shrapnel grew less and less heavy, the clouds of dust became less and less heavy, and the clumps and spears flew slower and slower. Attempts to drown, if not the construct, then their shelter in quicksand was ceaselessly interrupted, not letting go, not allowing to move away, to dive deep into the earth's depths, where no efforts to reach the mighty geomancer would be impossible.

In response, the rain of sharp leaves rained down, leaving barely visible notches in the stone, but there were too many notches. In response, acorns were sprayed with acrid sap and flammable mixtures, or rather, acorns that were not used to grow new sprouts and decompose them for energy. Streams of debris flowed from the crevices, and the hollow trees beat full-fledged analogs of battle magic, not giving a second's respite, crushing, crushing, crushing any attempts to get off the hook. The Tree also moved, dragging itself with its roots closer to the sphere that was trying to roll away, clutching at it and threatening to literally get on top of it. After that, the rest of the couple would be dead.

The enemy almost made it in time.

But, as with the Sculptor, "almost" never counts as an argument. My ears perked up with a heartbreaking screech, and the space next to the beating just tore up and stapled together with rusty staples. It felt like my meat had been torn and stapled in the same way - a wild, twisting headache and unbearable chorus chanting, merging into an indistinguishable and maddening recitative.

A divine miracle.

God, whose name I will find out and adequately repay for this unconventional attitude toward random passersby, was limited to a single Miracle, performed through the prayer of an entire plethora of high-level clerics at once. But a single intervention was enough because people were standing here for a reason, too. God created a puncture that was relatively stable and accurate enough to connect the place of prayer and the battlefield, and people were able to bridge the channel, even if it was not stable at all.

The channel barely functioned, but it did its job - two dozen high-level (no one below thirty-five) guardsmen came to the ruling bloodline's aid. I was expecting another Chained One or even a Hero from the locals, but apparently, they were too strong and "heavy" for such a wimpy portal... Or just didn't have time to squeeze through. However, the channel was again pulsing with power, gradually readying itself for the second batch of fighters if the first was insufficient.

And they might not be enough. The Tree, and the druid dwelling in its depths, fight back fiercely and methodically. The attacks tear at the crown, almost emptying it, knocking out huge wounds on the tree pole, severing and incinerating the plant flesh. The roots strike with impossible precision, and the spells always weaken the defenses exactly where they are needed. Here sprouts moss, getting to the bones and brains of the Swordsman and Sorcerer, who have fallen forward a bit. Followed by several needles piercing the neck of the fidgety Blade Master, and the allies don't have time to heal the wounds that are bending before their eyes, forced to retreat under a gust of stale leaves oozing toxins. In the next instant, roots striking from three sides ripped apart a group of as many as four mages, collectively preparing something massive

It didn't last long: the work of a battle-seer is easily discernible to the seasoned eye of battle-trained Guardsmen. Many of them could count themselves as such, and the fact that the strange field interfered with their clairvoyance or similar skills did not prevent them from stirring reality even more. Yes, they will not see anything as before, but the enemy, who is now killing them at the expense of this superiority, will also be blind. And the fight will be on an equal footing.

And it goes, even if not as smoothly as the guardsmen would have liked. Either the druid could see even through such powerful interference, or he hadn't relied too heavily on his visions before, but he didn't fall at the same moment. Yes, he no longer managed to kill with the same ease, yes, now the wounded had time to cover and let them heal naturally or with the help of potions, amulets, and a couple of healers. Only two died of poison before they could escape, but the damage the tree had sustained suggested cautious optimism. Meanwhile, the shell with the Chained and the prince was already recovering, gradually rolling over behind the backs of the forces that covered it.

The druid could have crushed them even now - only twenty seconds had passed, and almost half of the two dozen had been knocked out, though the weakest, though there was no one above the fortieth level among the reinforcements. The battle was frozen in a shaky equilibrium, and it could have been broken in any direction. But space roared again, and new detachments came onto the battlefield.

Two, by the way, were torn apart by the portal itself, but about three dozen more successfully engaged in combat. There were no really strong ones among them; apparently, the portal really couldn't carry too powerful warriors and wizards. But not for long, for the structure of the channel is rapidly stabilizing, and the assassin has already wasted too much power to prevent it.

Another strike from two stars of mages at once poured a torrent of black fire over the frenzied flora, making the wood burn and begin to crumble in black ash. Darkness and Flame mingled, even if only for an infinitely short time. They immediately began to mutually destroy each other and couldn't help but start. Two different planar forces would never get along together. But the very result of their conflict was the kind of creepiness that combined the destructive concepts of both planes.

The oak was still moving, still trying to reach the shell, but in vain. The next attack by the coordinated mages, supported by Summoned, who managed to temporarily slow the Tree's progress with hardened sand, simply chopped the trunk off at the root. The druid allowed no delay at all, immediately beginning to rebuild the construct, transforming the crown into a new root system, but there was no chance. A desperate attack with all free energy at once was simply called for, as was an attempt to escape, but the expectations were only half fulfilled. An attack followed, but no escape.

The crumbling trunk and swirling foliage screamed its danger. Not wanting another super explosion, the Imperials hit the cloud with everything they had, including the skills that destabilize other people's magic. But they didn't have to, I said as one who felt the falsity of the danger. The cloud wasn't even going to explode or do anything at all. It was just a distraction.

The same lone figure, wrapped in camouflage - though I did not believe to the last that there was only one killer - slipped between the distracted fighters, cutting off half of the skull of one of them. You should be wearing a fucking helmet, not walking around with your head uncovered!

They noticed the druid and tried to stop him, but he tossed up a dozen glowing crystals that unfolded as a heavy barrier each, slicing the hapless healer in half and severing the shell from the helpers. They couldn't even go underground because all the barrier - crystals somehow blinked at once and merged into one, encasing them in a dome.

This is not a legend, but something simpler, even if it almost reaches it, and therefore it will not last long. In fact, being alone with a geomancer of this level, and in such a small space, is a very rash thing to do. Another crystal, this time not sensed at all on the sensory plane and not perceived in any other way than by ordinary sight, lightly bumped against the sphere that rocked backward in a moment.

Perhaps Summoned was able to sense her death or was simply expecting something of the sort if it had not encountered such an attack before. The sensation of absolute emptiness, where there was and could be nothing at all, and about half of the shell simply disintegrated, leaving not even a hint of a way to destroy it, hit my perception. It's not just to throw in еру realm. It's much cooler than that!

Both targets appeared in plain sight, the same indifferent lad and a staggering, fatigued Chained One. And then, before the druid could even drop a single poison needle, the barrier collapsed, and the full power of the Imperials gathered there came crashing down on the assassin.

I had never seen such a direct attack with clairvoyance before. No, I could do something similar, even better, but I was hitting through Dream, not with pure and refined clairvoyance in its conceptual manifestation. It wasn't even an attack, by and large, but rather a desperate cry, the last will of a man ready to die.

My consciousness was touched by an inexpressibly sharp bitterness, a sense of loss, of being deprived of everything I had and valued. It was as if the ground had been knocked out from under my feet at once, leaving me dangling in the air, trying desperately to cling to something but finding nothing. And, of course, hatred. Not the rage of a berserker, not the hysterical anger of a bloodthirsty thug, but a cold, measured, and calm hatred for the one who robbed you of everything you loved. No loss of head, no deprivation of control, not in the slightest. Only an endless ocean of motivation, a willingness to go to the end and not finish the story until the end is in sight.

These feelings stalked everyone around him, even me, making me lose my concentration for just a brief moment. The assassin twisted like a snake, struck dozens of sprouts growing out of his clothes, slipped between the near-crossed blows on his neck, and came face-to-face with the Imperial Prince.

And the latter, without even changing his expression, calmly waved his hand, enclosing his unsuccessful executioner in a gray sphere of immobility. This was to stop the river of Time, to freeze the murderer, but he, sensing something, managed to wrap himself in a cocoon of the purest energy, having the same nature as he gave to his creations. The vortex of leaves was small but very dense and literally glowing with a rotten green color. The whirlwind allowed him to wrest a little free space from the immutable Law, nicknamed Time, formerly eternal and Eternally abiding.

The killer froze inside a sphere two meters in radius, which itself froze inside a sphere of stasis, and stared silently at the equally indifferent contemplation of the guy who was watching him. I could sense his hatred, his thirst to do something, his reluctance to die without completing his not even revenge, but the truth. If I were him, I'd probably have tried to dive deep into the plan and set off fireworks at my funeral. He could have done it, too, he could have... but fear was added to the hatred. The druid was not afraid of death; he had already died, already buried himself and mourned in the same nameless and empty grave where lies the one he had strangely deprived, lost forever. But he was afraid of such a death. He was afraid to give all of himself, to the end, without the rest.

And the prince, as if he could see this thin sprout of fear, smiled for the first time, miserably and joylessly, with a certain amount of smugness. It was as if he hadn't expected anything else. Stasis was pressing harder and harder to break free, and the portal was opening for the third time to bring truly mighty defenders with it. The druid had no choice but to kill himself, but that would hardly help. And what would keep him from a fate worse than death would become exactly that fate itself.

The game is over, the winner is revealed. The loser was destined to perish, and the prince of imperial blood, who had survived the attempt, would be groping his Summoned One in two hours' time. The clairvoyance had not returned, but I knew for certain that the prince, despite his natural indifference, had shown some excitement. A wild night in the hot arms of a beautiful, passionate, skilled, and determined woman would surely help.

As loyal as I could become.

I throw the rest of the dessert into the mouth transformed by Shadow Form and then do another stupid thing. I don't even know which one. The effort of will and my body were ripped open by a dozen blades - not too deep, but painful and unpleasant. It was predictably difficult to get into the Shadow since the spatial interference was eliminated for only one channel. But the wounds instantly heal, and the body changes its appearance, becoming flexible, clawed, and multi-armed, as adapted as possible to the realities of this side of the universe.

I dive deep, dangerously deep, twisting my exorbitantly long body like a snake, turning it into an enormous pneumatic cannon whose projectile will be myself. Occasional Shadows, attracted by the glow of powerful magic, easily discernible even from quite considerable depths, darted away as soon as they saw me. The weak assholes have long been afraid of me, and even the stronger ones don't risk getting to know me or asking about my "neighborhood". The main thing is not to attract the attention of really strong Shadows, who can not only eat me in one bite but just accidentally breathe into my nostril.

The body tenses, changes structure, weaves into something new, and then, in an instant, throws me up with tremendous acceleration, pushing me into reality so fast that even I can hardly keep track of the moment, let alone those who catch such a surprise unanticipated.

I managed to take on an almost human form, though it would be more correct to call it anthropomorphic. I hadn't brought a mask, so my face was just a few pieces of snow-white skin, shadow eyes, and a mouth that made it impossible to distinguish any of my features. They wouldn't let me into the temple with a face like that, but they couldn't make a sketch of me, and that was my biggest concern.

I conceal myself with un-existence, hiding as I have never hidden from anyone, literally erasing myself from the picture of the world, hiding my fate behind thousands of other people's fates, blurring and erasing it, leaving it to the only person I can trust it to - myself. For a second, it seems to me that I really do not exist and never was, but a second passes, and I am thrown into the real world.

They were surprised when I appeared out of nowhere in midair like a breakdancer filmed during a jump. I fell out somehow sideways and a little bit upside down. It was good that my vestibular apparatus was used to this kind of abuse during my time in the world, though I would have complained to the labor inspectorate if I had been him.

My gaze met with genuine surprise in the eyes of the man stepping through the portal. Level fifty-one, the Hero of the Unstoppable Storm shining in my Gaze like that very storm. One move from him would turn a clear day into a cataclysm of national proportions. One impulse of his will could wipe an army off the face of the Earth. To confront him is Folly, to enrage him is Doom, and to stand against him is Madness. A very interesting opponent, truly fearsome and, unlike Ferer Rocher, who has managed to master his abilities and the Heroic title, becoming even more dangerous as a result. It would be an ordeal for me to fight such a man, especially against the backdrop of the Guardians, who were still standing, and the tired but still capable Chained.

It would be.

He must have been surprised, but he didn't have time to be frightened. I hid so completely that I even began to doubt my own existence. I didn't stir his gut, even at the very last moment. Especially against the backdrop of the madness in the infosphere, dulling the intuition, especially since I hadn't even intended to fight him.

A sharp exhalation, and the essence drawn in my mouth, just before the transformation, directly from the vessel touches not even the Hero, but just the edge of the portal, away from him. The impact is not directed at him at all and therefore, not taken into account. Or rather taken into account, but even all his combat experience could not make him perceive my existence. If he'd had even one more heartbeat, he would have dropped the obsession, remembered it forever, and learned his lesson.

With an indescribable chugging sound, the portal arch collapsed, turning his body, his artifact armor, his legendary staff, and even his soul into meat, bloody pulp, and irrecoverable splinters. The only thought in my surprisingly empty head was the somewhat derisive, And it was much harder with Roche.

The people around me didn't react immediately to my appearance either, perhaps mistaking me for one of their reinforcements. For that, they paid the price, surprisingly enough. Kostik is like that. He does not forgive if he is not recognized! The almost human form also gave me back my clothes and pockets, which found a powerful negator, without which I have not left the house since long ago. Well, from the place where I spent the night. The negator was really useful, and it came in handy far more often than even the first aid kit.

T. N. I don't know about the Western Internet. But according to ours - Anonymous - does not forget, does not forgive, and delivers.

The vial shatters on the surface of the eternal sphere, causing it to shake and release the nearly exhausted druid from captivity, and I already twist the neck surprised mage staring at the place where the portal was a second ago. Mage is legitimately crunching vertebrae, and the surrounding people begin to realize that things go wrong, and in the picture of their universe got something that should not be there. And here began the funniest and most amusing thing, even for me alone.

I only filled my unnaturally flared lungs with air, creating shadowy spells right inside me, preparing to exhale them along with my anger, and the druid had already regained his composure, unlike his target. Black dust surged, never having had time to become a defense as the crooked wooden dagger pierced through Chained's heart. My absent heart clenched at this level of transformation as well, but what did I actually expect? That I would be able to kill all the assholes without staining the hands with the blood of the Summoned?

A strange knife remains in the chest of a slave who failed to protect her master, and in the hands of the killer appears a thin and not even seemingly combat-ready dagger in the shape of a bat's wing. Somewhere beneath the cloak, a few amulets flare up, extinguishing another attempt to disturb Time. Had the prince tried to use the same stasis, he might have succeeded, but it struck not the reality around the druid but him. And the amulets withstood the blow, even at a considerable cost.

As soon as the dagger pierced the victim's heart, I realized that someone here really hated the guy because he had spent a mythical artifact on him, and it seemed to be disposable. It was an artifact, not an amulet, despite its disposability. It happens, it turns out. Now there was nothing left of the Emperor of the Ages relative - no soul, no body, no informational trace, not even memory. Even my resilience was barely enough to retain in my memories the appearance and class of the guy I first saw today. Most of those who knew him wouldn't even remember what he looked like, and any available portraits would show a void where his image had been, as would crystals with illusions or other similar artifacts.

A blow that erased from reality once and for all.

I wouldn't survive such a thing, but then again, I wouldn't let myself be hit with it, I hope. And it can only kill if it pierces someone's heart. By the way, I had a brief insight that the artifact couldn't work on something that didn't have a heart. Should I walk around in a transformed form more often? It wouldn't help, though - the heart, in this case, symbolizes a full-fledged soul, not an organ for pumping blood.

That thought didn't stop me from completing the spell, ignoring the few counter-spells that spilled over the Aegis. The exhalation that releases a cloud of shadows, among which I can detect a few fully alive Shadows, covers the entire surrounding area, making the space even more turbulent, corroding everything in the cloud and gradually preparing to eat a hole in reality. The peaceful population is long gone, and these guys are no comrades to me.

I walked, emerging next to the druid, and found him staring silently at the spot where the last man he killed had stood, not even trying to move. My appearance caused a flash of irrational terror to the dangerous creature, but the man made no attempt to run away, to defend himself, or even to look into the eyes of the moron who had supposedly saved him. What kind of ungrateful bastard is that?

The druid is still closed off from my third eye, but I still pick up some echoes. And those echoes are enough to know how bad it is. I even found the rest of my tact and transformed my throat back into human flesh. The voice came out too hissy and nasty, but at least it was without the extra content.

"Are you going to die in here?" The creaking of unlubricated door hinges can convey sarcasm.

"There's no getting away from here." An indifferent and somewhat mechanical voice, as if distorted, yes, exactly distorted by the amulet so as not to leave any clues to the seers, the voice. "Not in my condition. I don't know what power you belong to, but I can't be charged for my debts. And there's no one else to pay it but me."

A second's reflection gives no answers, only increasing the number of questions. On the one hand, this asshole had just committed the most shitty terrorist attack in the spirit of earthly terrorists. Still, there were really a lot of civilians around. On the other hand... The suicide bomber was fully exposed. And his feelings, the pain that he literally hammered into the heads and hearts of those around him was such that I sincerely doubt that I would be able to hurt him more in return. Unless, since this used contraceptive is so afraid of losing his soul, I could devour him with a Shadow Grip or tear his very essence to shreds with essentialism. I could also throw in the Dream, but the Weaver is there, and I don't need that kind of glare. Except such sentences already seem to me somewhat excessive and harmful to myself. Should I feed him to the Shadows? I'm sure they'll eat it and ask for more.

"Okay, hold your breath and squeeze your ass," I reply, feeling the guardsmen left unattended gradually pulling apart my charms, even if they lose half my remaining cast in the process. "We'll talk somewhere else."

Then I activate my Grip, grabbing the druid who reflexively tried to poke me with a knife pulled from the corpse of a Summoned, taking the knife from him, fully assuming the Shadow Form, and dragging us to the deepest bottom I could, hoping that it would be enough to throw the searchers off the trail. And I can't physically doubt that they will because just trying to hope for it is so stupid that it makes my gyrations straighten up.

The body turns into a manta or stingray, wrapping itself around the desperately resisting body of the druid and dragging us deeper and deeper. To the latter's credit, realizing he wasn't going to be killed in the most nightmarish way, he seemed to calm down and freeze, barely sinking into some kind of meditation and phoning into my brain with such primal terror that I almost didn't let go of my burden. The latter would have been fatal - at such depths, you don't even need aggressive Shadows, just being on this layer of the universe is enough.

And also, here's the surprise, I remember where else I've observed a similar uncontrollable terror of my powers. And, as my captive, or rescued, is now literally wrapped around me, I manage to discern something. And his incredibly sweet for Me-The Shadow soul, brimming with pure life and starlight, which makes me hard to resist the urge to devour this miracle, which has not happened to me in a long time. And its long ears, as well as its somewhat inhuman physique. And, most importantly, in this situation, a couple of quite distinctive bulges of a size three, but no more, stating with categorical precision that the ears and soul were not his, but hers.

Kostik wanted an elf girl?

Kostik got it!

When is life going to teach me something?

* * *

If you have a lot of quiet and free time, you can spend it not only on spitting at the ceiling but also on something useful. I am far from the concept of workaholism. But I can't do anything around the clock. This warehouse is empty and will be empty for about two years. I inherited it from a misguided purebred halfling merchant, and it's not listed as one of his possessions, thanks to a chain of coincidences.

The merchant doesn't come to Eternal very often, and even then, mostly through representatives because, in his youth, he managed to sleep with his beloved wife, quite a young mother-in-law, and the native sister of the local criminal baron, one of the toughest Night Fathers. And this is not in Tavimark but in Eternal. That man can tell the hell out of other lords, the poorer ones. And the short merchant didn't even possess the talents of seduction, nor did he have the skills. He was just "lucky" to catch the ladies' eyes after taking a whole set of cocktails of varying degrees of strength. Actually, it was only because Father preferred to deal with the situation first that he hadn't killed the fuckin' salesman in the first place. Even he understood that it wasn't the boy's fault. Not that he was all-forgiving, but he preferred not to move a very hurt wound on his heart. If a hobbit came within the capital, he would kill him, but he had no intention of chasing after the tramp himself.

In general, we are not talking about Popydryn Shygdystybsky and not about his dangerous love life, which made him unwelcome in the Eternal, but about a chain of accidents. The chain of coincidences wore the rank of one of the not-very-big officials of the Imperial Chancery, whose uncle owned all sorts of warehouses. He did not know the exact reasons for Popydryn's dislike of the capital, but he felt that this unsociable halfling certainly would not come to Eternal in person, and the distant relative from whom he inherited, he did not know too well, so the warehouse was quietly pocketed. They even paid taxes on it instead of the real owner using the premises.

Small things, against the background of really big machinations, but that official was also far from the real power. He was a frog, only slightly larger than the average tadpole. These are the ones who, if anything happens, become scapegoats in all situations where someone's sins need to be shown off urgently. An official was executed for embezzlement, his brother owed money to creditors and mysteriously disappeared forever, and the warehouse, which belongs to nobody, is lost.

That's the kind of place your humble me decided to use as a backup base in case I had to retreat there. At once, a bucketful of shards of the mirror that died during a family quarrel in one of the rich houses of the shopping quarter, mastery of the use of Dream, and a great deal of free time. Now, in all corners, on the floor, and the ceiling of this warehouse stick out the processed shards, which I turned into redirectors of any attempt to see. And in the center is another mirror, this time in one piece, which served as the main hub and relieved the shards so if anything happened, they would not too quickly turn into black as pitch pieces of glass, as they did when the Shoreless Eye struck.

It was here that I dragged both myself and my burden when I realized that bringing this sort of thing to my rented accommodation was a direct ticket to the Darwin Prize recipient club. I pulled myself out of the Shadow and, with some fiddling, regained my human form. I tossed the unbearably delicious elfess away from me and began to breathe deeply and frequently, gradually turning off my gaze and removing the inhuman pallor from my face. I would have eaten her a little more, even though I was aware of the possible problems and consequences for my already shattered soul.

It's not a bad exercise for willpower.

I fumbled for a crude shard of the mirror with my hand and focused it on one of my companions. The one that got caught first. She is the best at not raising suspicions. I wish I could find Hans, but I'm too tired, and Taria can bring me a set of potions to cure my withdrawal as well. Though if she saw my "trophy," I wouldn't be getting any jokes for a long time.

The trophy was silent, though he had long since put his psyche in relative order... Or maybe it was just the shock. The elvess (or should I say elfa?) has a surprisingly strong will, not unlike that sucker, though, with her levels and classes, it would be strange to see the opposite. I roll my eyes at her, discerning only the cloak, grayed and drank to the ground, now crumbling to gray dust on the floor. The Hero's Gaze, however, is enough to give me the information I need.

Dark Druid and Starseer of level forty-seven. Both classes are epic but much closer to legendary than one might think. And I sense the Druid class is very close to being either changed or upgraded to legendary. More likely a change rather than an upgrade since her level is too low to cover all class ranks. Unless she's been pumping it alone... Or is it the same as a certain Konstantin Yurievich degenerate pumping it on her own.

"Look, I don't want to impose, but what the fuck are you up to?" My throat's dry, but I lost my flask somewhere very deep in The Shadow, and I'm not too keen on diving back for it.

For a moment, I thought she was brazenly ignoring me. And then the bitch... No, she didn't answer. She just removed her defense against clairvoyance. Not because she appreciated my talent in that branch, though just the warehouse protection she could feel, but because she passed out. And a few seconds later, her heart stopped beating.

"Damn..."

I stagger to my feet and assess the damage to her body. Magical exhaustion is bad, and so is some of the damage to the subtle bodies, but it's not fatal. A couple of weeks of bed rest and a bunch of unpalatable potions at most. I diagnosed it as an alchemist if anything, and healers could have done it faster. The alchemy, in fact, was the main trouble.

I remember Taria almost died after the Stone because her insides were threatening to start decomposing. Well, that wasn't going to happen here - it was almost over. The liver is just gone, there's just some bloody mass, and the kidneys and intestines go there, too. There are so many toxins in the blood that there's almost no blood itself. The heart looks like it's been eaten by woodworms - some of the muscles are dumbly absent and all puckered up. If it were not for the nature of her power, which allows her to make a life out of death and to feed herself with it, she would have died in the middle of the battle quite shamefully.

I give out a long line I'd once heard from Cassie, You're My Friend, which is an amazingly accurate portrayal of how I feel about this situation, and I begin to slowly pull her injuries onto myself. I don't forget to turn parts of myself into shadow flesh to regenerate faster.

The first thing I do is start her heart, feeling my own heart stop. That organ, that part of the body that will bear the damage, has to be left intact by the transformation. Otherwise, the theft will fail wildly. So now I only have human skin, so I can't radiate into space, and my heart so it can regenerate normally. I could also transform it. After all, I had already taken the trauma, but then the blow to my brain would be stronger.

The elf began to breathe again, hoarse and wet, and her nose bled. Her lungs began to fail later than her heart, but they did. While she was still coughing up her alveoli, I repaired her liver and one kidney. Then I had to repair one of her lungs, too, because they were almost completely coughing up through her mouth.

Now it's just the two of us coughing. And both of us have black blood. She's from toxins, and I'm from my class nature, dammit. I need a normal healer on my team, not this stuff. Because being treated my way is an ode to masochism, and I'm already losing my marbles without this stuff. I don't need new bugs.

I'm cleansing her blood with the last steals, dragging the toxins onto myself piece by piece, which makes me want to vomit again, but now I don't have anything to vomit with. Taria will be here for at least a couple of hours because I told her not to hurry, and the most important thing is that no one sees her at all. I've instructed my whole crew so many times on the importance of not giving any clues to the Seers that they can remember the basic ways of counteraction even if I woke them up in the middle of the night. Well, except for Ygra, but she observes these rules instinctively even without a declaration.

The patient passed out completely, but now it was more like a tired and nervous sleep in the background of complete mental exhaustion. At least she won't die, though I might kill her myself. Or I could charm her with a Ring, but she's too high for that, even a little - who knows what kind of mental defense perks she's got there?

Instead of foolish reflection, I plunge into a trance and, activating clairvoyance to the fullest extent available to me in my current state, I plunge into the Dream and through it, into the memory of this killer of kings and emperors. Regardless of how much I suffer, she will certainly not be able to lie or defend herself under these conditions. At least, not in a way that I wouldn't notice. She can't - still an epic-grade seer, clearly able to do something, and able to do that "something" well.

Elves and love, in general, are a very interesting collision. They are natural egoists but, at the same time, equally natural altruists. It's just that their self, which is ego, extends almost entirely to every elf they know and don't know too much. Even the different states of this race rarely fought, and if they did, it was proxy wars by mercenary forces, carefully trying not to spill star blood. But, nevertheless, sincere love is not so much unknown to them but very difficult to achieve.

To find one's own heart in the soul of another is the greatest rarity and the rarest gift, valued only slightly less than the life of a newborn child. Such couples are always protected, even if without much obsession. There is a kind of white envy that someone has managed to find someone he loves just as much as he loves himself and who receives similar feelings in return.

Most marital unions are made by elves not out of love but out of friendship, mutual respect, common interests, or even simply out of calculation. This is not condemned, the more so the fidelity of such spouses to each other will do honor to the "loving" hearts of other races. It is just their nature that they do not succeed in love. They're too... Elves.

The situation when one loves and the other does not is much more common, but it is not often an unhappy love. Whoever, but the star children know how to appreciate other person's feelings and respect the dedication and self-sacrifice that sincere love requires. Even if only one loves, the other will most often try to respond, even if only with the same friendship, respect, and loyalty, not love.

Exceptions are not too rare, but not frequent - in such cases, to push away unwanted love, love that will not bring happiness to any of the couples, prefer the most gentle and non-traumatic way. In the most extreme case, the one suffering from unrequited love can turn to someone from the masters of the mind, and his (or her) feelings will quietly and imperceptibly fade away. It is painful and dangerous, especially for elves with their piety for the personality of their fellows, but they dare to do it. Some, on the contrary, agree to awaken artificial feelings in themselves to turn them into real ones with long and hard work - this is the pinnacle of the same mentalism or slavemancing, not the creation of dumb whores.

More often than not, an older partner repulses the courtship of an overly young one. Especially, since it is precisely youth that can give reason to fall in love too early, confusing love and admiration. Youthful maximalism in the Elven way, yes. The situation with my ward was somewhat different - she was the one who fell in love with a much younger, younger Bard, not the other way around. Women love with their ears, the old saying goes. I don't know how much of that applies to elves, but her chosen one's singing was no small part of what attracted her.

Tialrianrelia of the House of the Misty Tree, a branch of the Blossom Blue, a blossom of the Eternal Beat, was not ancient but certainly not young even among the elven people. The 140 yo boy who had managed to capture her heart was an unequal and unnecessary marriage for her. Of course, she hadn't fallen in love in a day or at first sight. There were many, many months and years of distracted conversations and mutual exchanges of courtesies, moonlit walks, and friendly lovemaking, to which elves, oddly enough, are quite calm. People have an impression of them as asexual prudes, but elves themselves are quite a liberated race. Without excesses and all sorts of perversions, their long life allows them to try all sorts of things, including carnal pleasures.

When Tialrianrelia realized one spring morning that she wished to see her chosen one beside her and herself beside him, the first thing she did was to check her mind for extraneous influences of a subtle kind. A classic reaction, but although such dirty tricks are considered among the star born a very bad tone, there were all kinds of cases, and all elves from the moment of growing up are taught with piety and caution to treat their thoughts and feelings.

The love was sincere, and an experienced and mighty warrior, who had quite a serious reputation among her kin as well as among humans, had enough experience and skill to keep a young man whose position and origins were far removed from her own. Yes, all elves are, in a way, considered aristocrats, but there is a difference in position.

In truth, Tialrianrelia was not very romantic and refined, even if only in comparison to the a priori graceful and lofty elves. A fighter, a specialist in military operations and liquidation, she was far better at fighting than she was at seducing. For one boy, however, her skills were more than enough. After just a couple of years, she planned to confess her feelings to him, testing him in different situations and finding exactly how she fell in love with him.

And then her love died.

The Second Prince of Eternity was a quiet guy, secretive and absolutely ruthless to those who got in his way. Where the first heir was being prepared as, in fact, the heir, the second was predicted to be head of the secret office since the past head was about to retire. He was really going to retire, voluntarily and without being shoved in the back - man had spent fifty years in that position, and before, he had spent another hundred years as a deputy to another carrier of Eternal Blood. He was really tired of carrying it all around, and he'd reached the pinnacle of his career; that was as far as he could go.

The practice of the Eye is run by a relative of the Emperor of the Ages is fairly standard, but it has never resulted in power rivalries or mutinies. Blood is not water, and, in the case of this dynasty, these words mean more than a clever proverb. The Blood of Ages not only gives access to hereditary titles and classes, but it also prevents, physically prevents, enmity with each other.

And then there was the second son, who had a very useful personality and character that was perfect for the position he was being prepared for. So they prepared him by quietly allowing him access to secrets and easily handing him funds for his projects, many of which were really good, despite the sycophants' flattery. He didn't care about flattery, but the very fact that he was allowed to be involved in operations marked "everybody involved is dead" was pleasing to him.

The Eternal Forest, not to be confused with the Empire of the Ages because the spelling and pronunciation are different, even if the names of states are synonymous to some extent - is not at enmity with the Empire of the Ages. Well, not too much enmity, certainly not at the level of mutual love and respect between the Sorz and the Dawn Forest. But the absence of enmity doesn't mean it didn't exist before, and it won't appear again. Tialrianrelia could tell from personal recollection-she had often worked in the territory of a powerful and troubled neighbor.

It is very common for Bards to search for inspiration, which can really raise their level and give them new titles. This class, let's face it, is quite unusual and difficult to level up, despite being "only" a rare grade. And so the lover of my unwilling rescued went to seek his inspiration in the company of repeatedly tested squad of mercenaries from humans and beastmen. And the commander, by the way, was a dwarven Machine Gunner who had long had some trade connections in the Eternal Forest, both with elves and with his distant kin.

Bards often know intuitively where to go to see something special. Whether that special something is a funny situation, a beautiful landscape, an unusual natural phenomenon, or simply an encounter with a funny person... the options are endless. But there are also situations when together with inspiration comes danger. For such situations, every eared Jaskier carries with him a detachment of Geralts so as not to get stuck to death. That, by the way, is why the Bards of the mortal races somewhat despise them. And, to tell you the truth, it's very rare for elves to become great bards. Between glory and life, any elf always chooses only life.

No one knows what the Second Heir was doing in that remote village, long abandoned because of a raid by some monsters, in the company of a well-coordinated detachment and his personal Chained. Likewise, no one knows why feelings led the long-eared Bard there to his death. It just happens sometimes, despite all the precautions and attempts to avoid such a fate.

The mercenaries and the elf simply disappeared mysteriously, but the Seer could not help but feel the death of part of her own heart. It took her several months to find the place of death and to see what had happened, to know the course of events. She never understood what the prince was doing in the old and deliberately collapsed adit, but she saw the battle and the death of her love, a part of herself, from beginning to end.

She saw the old and gray-haired dwarf choking with blood, covering his employer to the last, and trying to equip the machine-gun disk with his hand crushed by the grindstone. Saw the prince's indifferent gaze, calculating in his undoubtedly intelligent brain the ratios from the problems due to the story of the elf's death surfacing and the other problems associated with the survival of an unwanted witness. She also saw the moment of decision, the calm nod, and the elusive swing of the stone blade that cut off the long-eared head.

With these visions, she came to those whose will guided the Eternal Forest. She came to ask for justice and vengeance like the one who had more than once brought victory and vengeance to them. And they heard her, but they would not listen. They could, could send one of the Chained ones into a suicidal - and there would be no other attempt to kill such a protected target - attack. Catching a sight-protected prince on another "walk" would hardly work, and an assassination attempt in the capital would be an automatic scandal and loss of face. It would be pointless to send larger groups because even if they accomplish their goal without dying in the process, they won't be able to get out.

All elves are equal, but some are more equal.

All of their lives are priceless, but some are still cheaper.

Beyond all doubt, the elven rulers were no less sickened by such a decision than Tialrianrelia herself. To admit that the life of one of the Chained Ones was more valuable than the life of their blood, that it was easier to forget and gloss over the story of an ordinary bard's death than to set up a conflict with the Empire of the Ages... it wounded their souls and minds. However, they would not have led their forest to greatness and would not have lived to see their years if they had not learned to tame their pride and lust for revenge.

It is almost impossible to hide from elven revenge for a loner or someone who has no real power. But those who have power and patronage can be relatively safe for their lives. At the slightest opportunity, he will be avenged, stabbed in the back, but this is only an opportunity. The owners of elven slaves and slave girls glorified assassins who execute eared targets, military men, and soldiers who have fought with them live on. Elves know how to take revenge, and their vindictiveness has long been a proverbial name, but you can't take revenge on the whole world.

A mere bard, and one belonging to the supporters of a rather reviled political-social program, was not worth the life of a prepared and trained Chained, nor a war with the Empire of Ages that would avenge its blood. Funny, but the dead eared one was the kind of guy who was against using Sumoned too often and resolving conflicts with their lives. Not out of kindness or liberality but because he believed that by relying on the power of Summoned, Star folk risked losing the ability to solve problems themselves. An unpopular opinion, but not without its supporters and the scientific basis to prove this theory right. The scientific basis proving it wrong, by the way, was also there.

All in all, this minstrel was not worth the price, even if they once again had to make a hard and unpleasant choice. And the venerable liquidator, accustomed to accepting and understanding such choices, should have understood even now. But they were unaware of her true feelings, considering her patronage of the young bard as mere patronage. And she, strangely enough, had bitten back, unwilling to forget. Alas, she was a schemer only compared to the average man, not to the ancient long-eared one, who'd catch every misunderstanding on the fly and gut it. They understood the background of her request almost immediately and realized their mistake.

But the words were spoken - she was denied the opportunity to even mourn her love.

And then a second mistake was made. The Seer, looking for her heart, dived really deep into the class, developing it incredibly in an impossibly short time for an elf. Nothing outstanding, but enough to be stronger than she is considered, even if only a little. And she had no desire to report titles taken or to go to work where her amplification would be noticed by others.

She shut herself away in her manor to grieve for the empty tomb in which nothing but the lute she had once given had been put, mourning for the eternity that had become her eternity. An eternity that would now always be half as long, and she did not care if that eternity was infinite. She mourned silently and coldly, as she was used to doing everything in her life. She mourned and found peace, forgetting her grief under the flow of a measured life.

All wounds heal, especially if you help them.

Her increased talent was enough to catch the thinnest edge, to grasp at the very edge the effect perfectly matched to her. Nothing harmful, just an opportunity to forget the pain, to let it go where those who are not with us go - into oblivion. The fact that her beloved's life had been placed below that of one of the summoned literally pounded her, but she could understand it, even if she refused to accept it with all her essence.

The fact that even what was left of her heart had been trying to be taken from her made her go into the cold rage with which elves go into battle, with which they kill and die. Somewhere on the edge of her mind flashed a panicked thought-understanding that this hatred was now directed at her brothers and sisters.

The elf who gave the order to put such a subtle and sneaky spell on his employee, with whom he had worked many times and more than once congratulated her on the successful completion of her tasks, was without any embellishment or exaggeration bad. How easily elves betrayed outsiders, how hard it was for them to betray a colleague, even from another country. And if they had to betray one of their own companions... It really hurt him.

The moment the gate to his estate sprouted moss and then was knocked out by a flood of woody decay, the moment she entered the meditation garden in a circle of dead leaves, stepping over the unconscious but living bodies of his family members in her path, he was neither surprised nor tried to talk her out of it.

He saw the way she came at him, saw and understood. The fight began without more words, in complete silence-she always attacked silently, without thinking or talking. It was doubly painful and frightening to know who she saw him as to attack him like that. He could have been considered stronger since he'd only lost to her once out of five in sparring. A consequence of inconvenient classes for her, not his own skill, but still.

Except he was only ready to protect his life, and she came to kill. And he died, died in terror of nothingness, like any other elf, for whom there is nothing more terrible than death, the cessation of existence. Died, too, the Keeper of Memory, who had performed his effects on her through a sample of the blood taken in the archives. Died his disciples, helping their master.

She died, too.

She died with the first man she killed, for by this murder, she betrayed all that she had lived for. Killing a kinsman, a comrade-in-arms, killing him with her own hands and looking him in the eye, there is no worse crime in elven society. For her, now there was no place in the picture of the world of former friends and allies, for them she became something like a rabid beast, a creature that took someone else's body and memory. And there is no pity or understanding for creatures, even though her demise would have been preferably organized by someone else's hands. Not out of remembrance of her former sister but simply unwilling to risk a fight with a dangerous opponent.

She felt like a creature herself, in the Alurean sense of the word, and so she wished she could just lie down and stop being. She had nothing left to keep her in this world, and a piece of her heart, sent into oblivion, tugged frantically at her where there was no pain or unbearable loneliness. Only her instinctive fear of death held her back, her aversion to death, and the same hatred that was unquenchable and inseparable from herself.

From the vault, to which she had very high access, which is not surprising given her rank and regalia, she took many expensive and useful items. Including the mythical artifact Wing of Nonexistence, a dagger that could kill even a god if you wounded it through the heart. Not just kill him, but send him to the same place her love went - into Nothingness itself. This dagger literally erased and took away any image and even memory, not allowing anyone to keep or pass this memory to someone else. In all the world only she could remember the real name of her lover's killer. Maybe someone will hold the appearance in her mind without letting that image be ripped out, maybe someone will retain memories of other traits of the dagger-killer, but his name will be remembered only by her. And she was not destined to live long, anyway.

She had been preparing for nearly a year, slowly transforming the soil in the park to suit her needs, even taking a job as a gardener so as not to arouse suspicion. Especially since she really was a good gardener, like almost any elf. It was a skill that came easily and without difficulty to her tribe. She worked by concealing, with a set of artifacts, visions of her activities. It was possible, even likely, that her former kin would alert the prince to her. If only to ward off the consequences of her failed assassination attempt, and one would hardly believe in her success. Even she forced herself to believe.

Partly because she managed to replace the taken artifacts with rather skillful forgeries, which is not sure that they will notice - such things are not taken in hands very often. And to assume that she did not immediately go to kill those who gave the order for the mental adjustment, but waited with the thought for almost six months, would not come to their minds immediately. It would have come instantly had it not been for a star-born woman like them, who was one of them even yesterday.

On a fateful day, she drank a knowingly lethal dose of potions, donned all the available artifacts, and, waiting for the target to enter the trap zone, activated the stolen treasures. Canopy of the Pedestrian, a mythical artifact, though not too strong, could turn quite a significant piece of territory into one where it would be possible to move only on foot and on horseback for a day. Any spatial techniques were highly likely to kill the user. Particularly powerful strikes can still temporarily squeeze the Canopy, but she will have some time. She can't help but have it.

Even that was not enough, though she was impossibly close to breaking the heart of the vile man, the short-eared creature who had no place under the eyes of the Stars. But the blood of the Ages is strong, too strong, and she, as the loser, had a fate awaiting her, whatever her captors choose. It was even a good thing that the potions would kill her sooner before her soul was given to one of the other planes if not given to the fiends.

The resentment and even greater self-disdain came from that smirk on the target's lips. When she tried to force herself to let not only magic but her own flesh, mind, and soul into the Life Cycle, only to strike one last blow. It offended her more to know that if she had had her way, it would have been a fatal blow even if it hadn't been delivered by a Wing of the Void. But it was as if he laughed at her and her cowardice, and she could not bring herself to cross the last line.

She did not ask herself how she had managed to free herself, did not ask about what was behind her back, killing her enemies. She put her whole self into one last dash, one single attack. In passing, as she killed the Chained One, she struck her blow, driving the dagger that was happily chuckling in her mind into the heart of her next victim.

The nature of this weapon is such that, once used, it will disappear from the hands of an assassin, appearing anywhere in the world. Maybe right in the hand of a dying warrior, eager to plunge the blade into his enemy, or maybe on top of an impregnable mountain peak, where the blade lies for centuries to come. She didn't care anymore. She had completed her mission - the last target no longer existed. And now she, too, had no reason to exist.

The cold and abomination of the deadly enchantments from the School of Shadow was clearly premeditated, for a mere mage could not do that on sight, not even a whole circle, let alone use it in combat. Her unwilling helper spoke to her, even though his voice testified to the effects of the ritual that had been performed on him so that he could use those enchantments.

The instincts demanded a lie, a promise of reward from the Eternal Forest for her salvation, because maybe he had a way to get her out, or at least let her live a little longer... Or at least just to die rather than fall into the jaws of the spawn of the Land of Eternal Twilight. But she simply told the truth - even her survival instinct, the legendary lust for being that made the star born what they were, could not overcome that feeling.

And when, from beneath the body of the ritually distorted humanoid, devoid of even a hint of humanity, she saw the true essence of the creature that was hiding inside, when the creature grabbed her, grasping her very soul and pulling her down into the darkness with it... Her resistance was more of a reflex, and she could no longer resist. And she didn't want to, couldn't want to.

The bitter end of her eternity seemed surprisingly fair to her.

The moments of agony stretched for an unknown length of time, after which came pain and oblivion. Perhaps it was a hallucination born of a digested essence, but it seemed to her that she was no longer in the Shadow but in the real world and that a lonely ray of light was shining in her face. Somewhere in the distance, someone's voice sounded, but she heard only the sound of a lute and the quiet tune of a song she had just composed. A song that called her to where her heart was.

And her own no longer has any reason to beat.

Despite the fact that the elf's psyche was in such disarray that she could not adequately defend herself against my digging into her memory, the very stay in her mind was more exhausting than working in the uranium mines. Still, forty-seventh level and very old, experienced consciousness, which, even being almost extinct, continues reflexively to keep itself in the chains of self-control. It didn't push me out, because she wasn't capable of such a conscious effort now, but the very attempts to read her memory were quite demanding on the reserve.

I had a full reserve. I only landed one serious blow in combat, and after that, I was in shadow form, which restores my reserve of magic almost faster than it goes away. And when you think about it, there was no fight at all. Kostik came in, killed the illustrious Hero, and then put up a damper and quietly took off on the sly, covering himself with an artifact that was still working. Canopy of Pedestrian!

My psyche was far more damaged, and it was because of the elf, though she didn't even try to attack. But I wasn't joking about my desire to eat her - so ancient, powerful, and pure (not in terms of morality or kindness, but in the level of distillation) was not even candy for (un)my instincts, but a dose of cocaine to a junkie. Forcing myself to refuse dinner was excruciatingly painful as if I were pulling my own veins out of myself.

Nevertheless, after I came to my senses and checked her memories, I felt relatively fine. I mean, I wouldn't want to go into battle with any Hero, but I didn't need any special treatment, either. A couple of relaxing tonics to reduce mental fatigue and take away headaches, and a regular long nap. After a day or two, I'll be back to normal, though I wouldn't repeat such swims for another week, just to be sure. To be honest, I could wait and crawl home on my own without Taria's help.

In turn, the victim of love and her superiors felt disproportionately worse. She was physically healthy, and the damage to her subtle body was far from fatal, but her moral pain, alas, was not on the list of things that could be cured by stealing a shadow. And I won't try to take away her torment through a Dream. No, I can, even without considering the patient's weakened state, and relatively quickly, in a day or two, even with active resistance. But, after what I've seen, I'm afraid to even think in that direction-she didn't fucking spare her friends for this mistake.

To fully comprehend the depths of the asshole, you have to understand the elven mentality, but once you do, you have to wonder. She didn't just overstep her bounds. She flew the fuck up in a jet pack! In general, everyone has their own bugs, and let her deal with them on her own, and I'm done with the fact that I saved her life.

To be honest, I wanted to kill the prince rather than save him because of his Companion. The crumbs of information I received during the brief disclosure were enough to make me realize how much he considered her to be his. And then I had a very unanticipated stall when I imagined myself in the place of the fallen geomancer for a second and almost boiled over with anger. I'd already seen slavery, sacrifice, and a whole lot of the abominations that humans and nonhumans do at all hours of the day and night. But to see it applied to someone so similar to me was beyond me.

If it were up to me, even if this druid hadn't been able to complete her revenge, I would have completed it for her and with as much imagination as she had. At the very least, I would have fed some of the Shadows. Maybe even the ones I'd already made contracts with because I'd still be beating them up and scaring them. The carrot and the stick, but the carrot should be used to beat those things, too.

"You saved my life." My thoughts are interrupted by a statement of fact.

The elf's voice is so calm and indifferent that you might mistake her for a machine or an undead creature. Even its natural softness and melodiousness only further emphasize the inhuman nature of this lady. Such a voice could be spoken by a river, or the wind, or the mountains, or anything, but not by a human being. It is not the usual readiness to fight, not the meditative calm, but the complete control over one's mind and will, which has been achieved over the centuries, but if one achieves it... I suppose a good deal of the mental influences she's in this state won't just repel but won't notice them at all.

"What, really?" Sarcasm always helps make an acquaintance. I can tell you that. "And I didn't even notice!"

She sits down slowly but very smoothly, not breaking the movement into many small steps but merging them all into one cycle as if it were a battle chord. It looks somewhat unnatural and creepy, though I don't feel much danger from it. Her light attempts to sense the surroundings and me with clairvoyance stop the moment she doesn't find me. I have habitually wrapped myself in un-existence. I looked for her like a complete void or, rather, an empty place. Her eyes can see, but that's all.

"Are you having fun, human?" The question is dry, cold, and indifferent enough that it doesn't even require an answer. "Believe me, your grimaces are hardly enough to throw me off-balance. Unless, of course, you need them yourself."

Not in the forehead, but in the eye, Kostya. I'm really not trying to feel her out, I don't need to yet, but I'm calming my nerves. The more I look at her, the less I understand those who order elven concubines. I can't deny that she's beautiful, even though I couldn't see her face behind her camouflage suit, but I can't deny the way she carries herself. Even the girl Kickass saved seemed dangerous, but this lady is instinctively repulsive - she's too different. Not as a creature or a monster but as someone whose values and personality are on a completely different plane.

Like the other elves in her, it feels impossibly dense, all-encompassing Life, but there are enough differences, too. Her classes make the perception of this lady too painful, not like a bloodsucker or even a Hestia, but still, I was uncomfortable interacting with her. So was she, I'm sure, even if she couldn't sense my energy and imprint. Except that she has disproportionately more experience with people you don't want to see than the image-board hiki like me.

That was the moment Taria chose to fly gracefully into the warehouse through a window somewhere under the roof of the building. The illusion of invisibility was draining from her, and she was sinking to the ground, barely touching the wall with her fingertips. Mass control is a great thing. I can tell you that. Instead of a greeting, the cheeky dancer took the bull by the horns:

"You know, after the grandmother of all the explosions I'd heard before, and then there was a wild commotion and everyone running around like they were going to be hung by the balls, I was worried. And when you contacted me, I had no doubts about my conclusions. Tell me the truth, did you, as always, accidentally kill the Emperor?"

I was choking and coughing, and the girl's face was getting more elongated by the second as if she had mastered metamorphosis and was trying to turn into a horse and run the project Palace 2 show right now. Apparently, she really does know me better than I expected.

"Just some prince!" I muttered, trying to catch my breath. "And I didn't kill him!"

Taria's gaze shifted to the elf woman, still sitting motionless. It was impossible to see her face beneath her clothes and mask, but she looked impressive enough. She looked at the only witness to our conversation, nodded to her thoughts, and summed up with a chuckle, barely able to contain it:

"Still, you really are attracted to all sorts of... stuff, anyway." She handed me a small pouch of just-in-case potions and a bottle of clean water, either for washing or for drinking.

I'd just had time to rinse my face and pour some of the gentlest tonics into myself before the elfess was in motion again. The complete stillness was replaced by a smooth stride so fast and natural that I couldn't help but frown again. It wasn't her skill, which such a gait would indicate, but her unnaturalness.

When she stopped next to us, the star creature slowly and deliberately openly removed her hooded mask, revealing her face to the world. If I'm not mistaken, elves always look young. Except that big-eared one from Sorz looked twenty at the most, and this one looked thirty-three at the most. Part of it was fatigue, bruises under her eyes, and dried bloody tracks near her nostrils and eyes, but still, her age played a big part. Very old and dangerous indeed.

Dark green eyes, in which all emotions and feelings simply sink without showing themselves, marble-white skin without a single flaw, delicate facial features and slightly bright against this background, lips full and sensual, but seemingly incapable of smiling. The hair was dark, and with the pale face, it seemed to absorb the light altogether. And the same absolute serenity of a dead man. She shut herself off from the clairvoyance, too, and I, though I could squeeze her in, was in no hurry to do so, allowing her to talk first.

"Rare is the beauty in your face." She makes an unexpected compliment to Taria that throws both me and her out of whack, a phrase I never expected from someone like that.

"Thanks... I guess." The dancer replies. "You're fine, too."

"Very rare." It's like she's not even paying attention. "Unnaturally rare. From nature one is given very rarely, and it obviously requires regular maintenance, care, and nurturing. Your clothes and gait suggest you are far from massage parlors and beauty-creating chambers. But appearance... such looks are easier to create than to maintain on your own."

"You know, bich, I don't like where you're going." Taria doesn't understand much right now, but she's alert in advance, and I just keep quiet, preparing to strike if necessary.

The elfess, meanwhile, opens her clairvoyance to the full, trying to see something of interest to her. The defense on me is insurmountable for her, and on Taria, it's just too complicated, but she's not a novice. She stares at Taria for a few minutes. The girl's ready to go into battle herself, regretting only the absence of Valerium.

"Good defense." In the end, she voices, not even reacting to the threat to her eternal life that literally permeated the air and turned to me already. "But not perfect. Her looks and also, perhaps, her loyalty. I cannot see your destinies, they are hidden from me and from those who are stronger, but you are both bound, bound tightly and inextricably. As if she were chained to you by invisible chains, Summoned without Chains."

I just wondered, really wondered, without any double meaning. Did she lose her mind at all, saying that to my face? Or does she think that since I saved her, I won't just kill her? If she does, that's a huge minus to her intelligence because now she's inexpressibly close to death.

"Just out of politeness. How did you know?" And I did manage to say it almost kindly and without the slightest threat, which caused her to react in a way that disappeared too quickly for me to read without turning her mind inside out.

"I didn't." A calm reply and an equally unreadable look. "It was a blow to the void whose purpose was your reaction. But, if you're interested, I can recognize the workings of a high-class slavemancer and transformer. Your shroud hid this thing behind someone else's destiny, but I have met those who have swapped destinies with other people's shadows. Hiding the connections of two separate people is more difficult and foolish since you must have introduced yourself as associates, no?"

"That's right, that's exactly what we introduced ourselves as," I answer, not intending to lose the stare.

"Few people know about it, for this knowledge died long ago, disappeared for lack of use." Without changing her posture or facial expression, she continues. "But such connections between people are very individual. Even if they occur between a slave and an enslaver. You can read them the way I did if you sit them side by side and look very carefully if you know what you are looking for and where you are looking. The Connection of the Hero and his Companions... This technique, a description of the very special echo of such a bond, was no longer taught three centuries before I was born. Carrying Chains cannot choose Companions, and cannot link destinies into one. I was not sure, for I had never had even a shadow of a chance to see such a thing with my own eyes. There were at least three dozen versions besides the true one, but I relied on my premonitions."

Well...

At the very least, the whole idea of rescuing this vigilante had already paid off since such vulnerability had been exposed. And yet I was already accustomed to considering myself practically unreachable. The elfess is inferior to me, if not by her class rank and its narrow imprimatur, then by the grade of that class and the practice of the skill. However, she was able to cut me open almost instantly and even shared her hunch. It's already good because knowing where she was looking, I can block that path, too.

Taria is silent.

I am silent.

And she continues.

"The decisive argument I took was that I hadn't even heard of people to whom the power of two such contradictory plans as the Mirror and the Twilight Realm had been conquered at once." For the first time since the conversation began, she points to the shards of mirror protection sticking out of the walls of the warehouse. "I would even suggest that your Companion's submissiveness is due to stolen Dreams and warped Reflection, but I cannot say with certainty. That I find no trace of it is not at all surprising: few things can be better concealed than the effects of a Dream on another's mind and will."

Sincerity for sincerity?

Well, as long as we're playing these games, why not.

"Alas, it was the effect of an artifact. A mythical trinket, at times also very useful." Still smiling kindly, I explain. "You know how our fellows are doing with them, don't you?"

"Absolutely." A short, almost elusive nod and another unreadable reaction. "The Hall of the Chosen gives you a lot. And the choice of a Slavemancing artifact, in the days when the likes of you walked the earth without the Chains, was on the list of the most frequent gifts of the All-Seeing."

All-seeing? Is that what she said about the System and its administrators? But it all pales in comparison to the way she gracefully called me a sperm toxicosis woodpecker, dreaming only of a harem of titty girls. Not that she was that wrong, especially at the time of my fallout on Alurei, but I was somewhat offended. Still, I'm not an idiot enough to grab my ring instead of some cool pick or staff.

Perhaps she, if she can use her knowledge wisely and get it to the right place, can even save her life because they will forgive her a lot for reporting such a cool and awesome me. Not her kin, of course, and not the Empire of Ages, but in the same Thousand Arms she will, if she is very lucky, successfully immigrate. She is also mentally very tired and unable to fight or repel mental submission, which is why I don't even need to kill her because I need such an asset myself.

"Look, I feel like a fool right now, but I'll ask anyway." My retort interrupts Tarya, who has almost rushed into action, so intimidated is she by this lady. "You're almost directly provoking me into trying out this enslaving artifact on you right now. Do you have some sort of crazy title for deflecting any attempt at subjugation back into a subjugator? I've never even heard of it, but knowing the System, I wouldn't be surprised."

If that's true, I respect her immensely, taking such risks and playing so well that if I were some typical harem-gatherer, she'd have every chance of succeeding. I can imagine my face if my mythical submission hit me! Honestly, I'm not even that mad. That's how cool that plan is. She'd make a great troll, the kind of troll that lets the victims browbeat themselves into realizing their own idiocy. Although, given her age, it would be good for me to learn how to troll from her.

We look at each other for a few moments, and then she, instead of answering, reveals her defense. Though it was more likely that the lack of strength to maintain it played a role here. And no, there was no plan, no trick, no matter how I looked for it. I've seen it all before, all her pain and grief, so it's not immediately clear what exactly this means until she starts talking. Her words make me cringe so fully, so comprehensively, that if she had decided to stab me at that moment, Kostya would have died in an instant, not even able to defend himself.

"I am too afraid of death, Summoned." For the first time, I hear any feelings in her words, or, to be more specific, mortal fatigue and doom. "I no longer have the strength to live. I will not despise myself for my weakness, but I will not be able to cut my life short myself, and how my enemies will cut it short scare me too much. Whatever I become, after... processing, it won't be me anymore. Artifacts of this focus almost always work instantly, with rare exceptions. This death is almost always pleasant, especially if you don't resist. As I said before, I know very well the method of work of the masters of slavery."

Honestly, I had never experienced such a stupor in my life. To see such doom, to hear such speeches even from an ordinary person is quite shocking, and from such an ancient and dangerous person even more so...

"You... you want to escape the pain... by killing your identity in slavery?" The pauses between words are very long, as I sincerely try to speak without swearing.

"I agree!" Taria, no less shocked but recovered from the shock before I did, intervenes. "Just let me play with her for a little while. I've heard so much about long-eared whores, and I've never tried it."

She ignored my companion's words, did not take her eyes off me, and then managed to answer, putting everything that had accumulated inside her since the death of her lover into a single phrase.

"I just want to stop being in pain."

The fact that the request you asked of the universe falls literally into your hands would make anyone cringe, not just Kostik. A powerful elf sorceress with vast experience and a cool shape, herself, voluntarily offered herself to sexual and not only slavery. If it's not a piano in the bushes, it's only because it's a goddamn organ in those very bushes and a church organ the size of an entire multi-story building.

T. N. Piano in the bushes is an idiom for a plot device when everything just happens to work out the way the hero needs.

Anyway, I think everyone will understand that such offers are not to be turned down, especially considering how dangerous she is while she's free. Even if she had any titles to protect her mind, they don't work now - she has no will to resist at all. Using a temporary level upgrade to even out the slight difference in that very level, then acquiring a new one. Voluntary, and therefore not immoral, as surprising as that sounds in relation to the enslaving artifact.

It's not my fault that I lost my composure from such news and opportunities.

The Shadow Form actually requires no preparation time. Like the Aegis, this technique goes into full boost instantly, requiring no time to accelerate. The problem is that the brain strain from Aegis increases with the damage you receive. The more you get fucked up, the more you turn into a living portal to the depths of Shadow. Shape, on the other hand, crushes depending on the speed and depth of the transformation. No one prevents you from completely transforming into a chupacabra scary in one microsecond, but you can't turn back, no matter how you spin it. Even now, a full transformation takes me no less than three or four seconds because faster is dangerous. It's only later when you're fully transformed you can manipulate the shadow flesh as fast as you like, but first, you have to transform.

Whatever.

I've just proven in practice that it's all bullshit, and you can turn your whole body into the purest Shadow in no time at all. Here I was, still smiling the disbelieving smile of a virgin who'd gotten a lifetime subscription to a premium brothel, and here I was, already a Shadow. The shape came out not too big, completely replicating the size of me-human, but as dense as possible. In this state, even without the Aegis, I could tank high-class magic.

"'It pains, you say?" My voice rustled against my will.

I'm used to giving The Shadow power over my words, soaking them in shadow power, and speaking through, my words become terrifying. The rustling, the laughter, hungry cries, the furious screeching, the hateful hissing, and the promise of all the torments of the world are what the people around me hear in my words. This voice has been shown to frighten even incapable of fear, warped creatures. I even have a suitable title!

Yeah, yeah.

But now my words weren't angry, hateful, or even promising torment, no. The hissing rustle was gentle, almost affectionate. In another situation, such a sound would have caused me cognitive dissonance, but now I somehow didn't pay attention to such a thing. For the first time since the fight with Roche, I was in the highest, highest possible form of rage, which made even me feel a little scared, let alone those around me.

The step was performed so quickly that even I failed to catch the moment when I was beside the elfess, whose face turned pale with horror and whose reflexes threw her body into a hopeless fight. She could not conjure in her current state, and what she could, was not considered serious magic even by the standards of ordinary people.

I knocked the dagger out with my hand, the one that looked like a root, at the cost of a small scratch on my forearm. I ignored the poison that could incinerate a man in seconds. It was devoured by The Shadow before I realized I'd been poisoned. One more step, the usual one, and the star maiden's thin, graceful body was pinned firmly against the wall of the warehouse, and my hand, my fingers turned into straight, thin daggers, dug into her flesh, piercing the shoulder joint and inflicting unimaginable pain.

The simultaneous activation of the Grip stops at the very edge of starting to chew the elfess. She holds back a cry of pain and despair, not even so much because of her endurance as her throat has been seized by a cramp. Her lips let out only a quiet sigh, and I had already lifted her on those daggers, cutting even deeper into her muscles, bringing even more pain. Her lips were bleeding from her damaged lungs, and I, in that same wrong Shadow voice, continued:

"I don't need another toy, unlike such a dainty soul." I smiled with a toothy maw open on my completely black face, which seemed even blacker, even against the absolute blackness.

"No." Not a denial but a request. It's just she doesn't have the strength to ask. It's all taken away by the sheer terror of the very doom that had earlier forced her to retreat even from her revenge.

"So give me one reason why I would spare your eternity?" Another tug lifts her higher so her feet no longer touch the ground, and droplets of fresh blood fall to the floor of the abandoned warehouse. "You have one minute."

"I can p... pay for my life." Her habit of fighting and wriggling her way out of a hopeless situation, though she has to swallow the blood filling her mouth just to speak. "Arti... facts and gold."

"Lies." I press even harder, causing agony on her face that she can't even hold still anymore. "Everything of value is already on you, and I'll take it from the corpse."

"For me... ...will be avenged..." Horror and hopelessness make her stoop to a very primitive lie, which we both know is a lie.

"Liar." I interrupt her, twisting my claws in the wound again, causing a full-blown shriek and a stream of blood so sweet it coughs up into my face that it immediately soaks into the shadow flesh.

"Please..." Tears begin to flow down her face, either from pain or despair.

"No." Only the same tenderness in my words, but no compassion to be found there. "Time is running out."

"I beg... mer... cy..." There was no trace of the proud, though broken woman, only the dying Eternity, trying to postpone the end.

"No." The answer doesn't change, and another twist of the claws causes a sob full of pain.

"I don't... want... die... so..." There was only pleading in my eyes, and my face was probably already indistinguishable from the tears and the approaching oblivion.

"I don't care." I back away from the wall, holding her completely on my weight, turning the claws in her lungs into spiked hooks, causing another burst of agony to keep her from falling into oblivion. "More reasons?"

The flash of pain that interrupted the unconsciousness gave her the strength to try desperately to do something. She couldn't attack, for any attempt I'd prevented, and all she had was another rush of blood in my face, which cleared the airways and allowed her to shout her last words in my face:

"I want to live!"

She fell to the ground, healthy as she was, and I nearly screamed from the unbearable pain in my chest - my blows were more painful than ordinary wounds. Much more painful. I stood still for a few seconds, worried that I might kill myself, which would be the stupidest way to end my life. But the pain passed, and the wounds healed, allowing me to return to my human form and look at the curled-up elf.

Her whole body is not even shaking, but a painful cramp, almost a seizure. Her breath is constricted by her sobs, and her clairvoyance, for the first time ever, does not feel even an attempt at self-control on her part. This is no longer a broken personality, but a complete collapse and destruction. But with each passing second, all her will, all that makes her - her, Tialrianrelia of the House of the Misty Tree, a branch of Blossom Blue, a blossom of the Eternal Beat, is gradually restored back. Because now, having been where no one comes back from, having seen the gullet of nothingness and turned from it, she wanted to live again.

I bent down and lifted her by the collar of the strange armor. It's a kind of full body, somewhat tight, but it hides the figure and has metal inserts of something enchanted, which probably provides good protection. The elf-woman hanging on her outstretched arm gradually regained consciousness, beginning to breathe normally and even attempting to apply some kind of calming technique.

"Why?" There's the same tiredness in her voice, but now there's no deathly longing or willingness to die.

Her bitterness had not gone away, her pain had not faded, and her hatred had not diminished, just as the emptiness in the place where her heart had once been would never recede. A heart, the best and most precious half of which had been murdered for some unnecessary mystery, and the rest of which she had ripped out and desecrated herself, left all alone in the face of inevitability.

"Because you can't do that." There is no less weariness in my words, but at the same time, an infinite stubbornness that makes me me. "You can't give up. You can't die before death comes. We breathe while we are alive, fight while we can, and gnaw at the throat of the world and death itself. Because nothing is ever finished as long as you are still alive. Live. Look for a reason to live and die, but don't you dare, never, you hear me, you big-eared bitch, don't you dare accept death before your time."

I let her go, and she barely manages to keep her balance and not fall gracefully on her ass so she doesn't fall to the ground like a sack of flour. I nod at the bag Taria dragged over and start picking pockets of mirror shards that haven't yet been used in the main perimeter. Without even looking back at her, I explain:

"There's food and supplies in the bag and potions in the sachet." I couldn't stand it, so I kneaded the shoulder that had taken her wounds, for it had been a very unpleasant experience. "They're not signed, but you're a seer. You'll figure it out. The protection in the warehouse is pretty strong, but I'm not sure how long it'll last if they're really serious about searching. You definitely have a couple of days. Lie down and go wherever you want. If you sell information about me, be prepared for me to ask for it. I don't ask for gratitude and neither are you capable of it. Goodbye."

With these words, I clutched Taria to me and walked with her out of the warehouse. It's dangerous to use the shadow because techniques based on it can also track, so we'll go on foot, using the standard stealth abilities and my friend's favorite illusions.

It's time to get some rest.

The streets of Eternal were agitated, though that was a bit of an understatement on my part. The number of guards was such that I assumed they'd put on the streets everyone, even the retired ones. Suspicious personalities and searching charms of all sorts were sniffing around. Several times I had to change the pieces of mirror clutched in my hands, covering myself from the very imprecise but very powerful search impulses. They weren't even directed at me, but they could catch a glimpse of me. My image would be imprinted with other junk knowledge, but it would still be imprinted there, creating an extra inconvenience and an unnecessary hitch for the future.

"Listen." Taria, huddled against me in the dark alley as the pissed-off patrol whizzed by, was thoughtful not to call me by my name. "Won't that bitch sell us out?"

"There's a high probability she'll try," I answer, glancing at the obese captain of the guard, who, according to the suspicious stains and the slight fleur of shit, had been picked right out of the latrine without even wiping. "But from the moment I got into this mess at all, even if just by being around, our disguise was a failure. I was the only surviving bystander there, so even if I hadn't tried to kill that bastard in person, they'd still be looking for me. And I would have tried. I know myself."

It was impossible to walk on the rooftops, because the rooftops were occupied by Eyes patrols, and the ones that weren't were perfectly visible from the many points that were already occupied. But the alleys, along with the Silence in the Hall and Taria's very specific illusions, allowed them to evade all sights quite successfully. Still, she was right to choose the second class, very right. The clairvoyance and sphere served as navigators, allowing them to avoid those whom our disguises would not deceive or even simply to avoid the need for disguises.

"But she knows that you... well, you know." The dancer's objection is well-founded.

"Who's she going to tell?" I sourly parry her argument, realizing that she's actually right. "She needs to get away and lay low first. I'm more afraid of getting caught and interrogated. By the time she finds someone to sell information about me, I'll probably be dead anyway. And anyway, given the elves' love of long-range plans, we'll have a few years at least. If not dozens of years."

"That doesn't sound very convincing," Taria answers honestly, hiding us from a couple of passersby hurrying home.

"I know," I confess. "And that's why I'll be sure to follow her. I have her image. So she can hide, but not for long. And, if she does decide she's the smartest, she'll die."

At some moment, my gut screamed about the problems especially strongly, so I, despite my silent clairvoyance, grabbed a whole handful of shards at once, reinforcing my defenses. It helped because the divine celestials manifested their powers, showing me the difference between our levels and experiences. It was an absolute, divinely expressed desire to know.

Such a search was not necessary to look for circumstantial clues or to know some basic information about me, no. All that was enough was the sheer amount of divine power, the skill in using it, and, in fact, the intention. If I had held a single shard, assault teams would have teleported to us by now. The Canopy effect was already gone, so the quick delivery system within Eternal was functioning again. Three of the shards went black at once, and my nose bled again, but I still diverted the stranger's eyes away from me.

"What was that?" Even Taria, despite her low sensitivity to subtle energies, felt all this madness. "An unpleasant shiver. It was like..."

"Like the sounds of a church service in the distance." Finishing in her place, swapping shards for new ones. "A divine miracle. If not of the highest order, then somewhere around that. Even ordinary people could distinguish it easily."

It was getting harder and harder to go on as the streets were becoming more and more turbulent. There were crowds of curious people who were slightly euphoric after touching the divine energies, guards, bandits, and lurkers of all kinds. I had stirred up a hornet's nest! Now I'd better not get caught by the angry wasps, if not the hornets.

"And she's a seer, isn't she?" Once again, Tarya begins as we pause in the small, empty barn, left empty and locked up so that one amorous couple can have some privacy here. "She might try to hide."

"She might." I adjust my stolen clothes. "And I can try not to let her do that."

I had to destroy the carefully alchemized set and throw it into The Shadow (very carefully, making a very tiny rift) because I was seen wearing it. Of course, I could cover myself and my clothes with unexistence even in my sleep, but with such efficiency of searching impulses of cognition, it was better not to risk it.

"So she killed the victim, huh?" His friend moved on to more interesting topics, albeit avoiding direct names and terms. "And you were just standing nearby."

"No, there's also a mage who got his neck snapped and hit with mass magic, and a dozen of them got hit, too." I thought for a moment and added. "And a Hero, not one of the summoned, half a hundred level one."

The girl stumbled at that last statement, and I had to catch her to keep her from making a fuss. And why is she surprised? I've already killed a Hero! Even the title was not given, only added to the level. No, something there flashed in the tray of the System, but not for hero-destruction, but for the creative use of non-existence. I'll have to check after I rest.

"Was it a hard battle?" She asked with incomprehensible admiration.

"There was no battle." Immediately I give a detailed explanation. "He was just entering the portal, and I hid from his premonitions and destroyed the portal while he was in it. Mincemeat, in short."

Taria stops and bites down on her sleeve, holding back the laughter that's bursting out and barely audible whimpering. I cough into my fist, too, and sit down next to her because this is really funny. The pompous battles today went to the elfess, and Kostik just gave some slaps and ran away.

"If I wasn't already, I'd fall in love with you right now." Breathed the bandit. "Hee hee hee! Holy tits Armatnia just tore the Hero apart with a portal, that's all. Whew! Come on. Let's go, or I won't make it home and collapse right here."

By the time we got under the roof of the rented house, half of my shards were used up, and we'd been struck twice more by a divine Miracle of the same type and rank. I entered the place already wet with sweat and tired, like a longshoreman on the morning of the first of January. The hangover was successfully replaced by a pounding headache.

I was woken by hunger deep into the evening. In that time, I'd slept, sipped a few potions for intuition overload, slept again, and met the messenger from the adventurers' guild, who checked to see if we were there and issued vague orders not to go anywhere "for now". My head was no longer in danger of bursting, but it ached, so I had to put a bottle of wine to it. I was sorry I couldn't get physically intoxicated, but I wanted to get drunk.

The protection on the house stopped redirecting other people's desire to see and waking me up with the ringing of mirror shards only a couple of hours ago, although the intensity has dropped only in comparison to what it was before. The wonders and all sorts of legendary and above artifacts alone revealed so many that I lost count, and that's an indicator. There were about a dozen really dangerous ones, like the ones that caught us on the way to the shelter, and the rest didn't bother me too much - yes, still a Miracle, but too weak and covering only certain quarters or tuned to certain individuals.

The only time I was ready to sound the alarm was when a full-fledged Avatar was summoned, or rather embodied. Not a couple of Heralds, whose appearance to the people I had also caught, but the real God himself. After his shout, reminiscent of thousands of tinkling bells falling to the ground, shining in the sky, and rustling in the waves of the sea, I had to raise not the alarm but my ass and go and change a quarter of the blackened pieces of mirror from the entire perimeter. Over fifty pieces in one fell swoop! And if it weren't for the full-fledged mirrors as center nodes, it would have ruined almost everything.

I went to bed and realized I didn't want to sleep anymore. The comrades, tired and having had time to discuss everything three hundred times, went to their rooms, and the servants did not come to us very often. We were playing the part of the unsociable persons who did not like to be disturbed. Now, by the way, that might be one reason to suspect us.

Hestia sits next to me. She doesn't need much sleep. She silently handed me the headache potion, diluted in the sweet compote, accepting a grateful nod in return. There is a knock on the door again, either by guards or by representatives of the guild - at least if not with another search. It's not too difficult to conceal anything suspicious with a light veil of Dream, but it keeps me awake.

"I'll get it." Hestia bails out a sick man, though my conscience tries to wiggle something about straining a woman in my place.

The door opens, and I hear the visitor's easily discernible voice. A very, you know, familiar voice, one that would give even the Spawn of the Mist a head start in terms of indifference and serenity.

"Greetings." A slight pause. "I have a visit with one of the residents of this house. He and I are acquainted."

"Fuck that!" A cry from my soul, filled with righteous indignation, bursts out. "What the hell else do you want from me?"

"Now I understand why you were so hated and feared." Not the best way to start a conversation, especially after ten minutes of intense silence and staring games. "Until this day, I had, at times, considered rumors of the danger of the Summoned to be exaggerated, for I knew their strengths and weaknesses well. But now, I am forced to admit that the old manuscripts were not only spared from exaggeration and hyperbole but also left a fair share of understatement of the true state of affairs."

We're sitting at a table in the living room, her on one side and me on the other, and my team is spread out, but they're all ready to attack at any moment. Our guest is not trustworthy, not at all, even though she disguised her elven features with some kind of makeup, without a drop of magic in it. She probably doesn't trust us, either.

"Thank you." I'm not even trying to sound good-natured. "I'm flattered. You make it sound like a compliment, but what's next?

"That wasn't a compliment." She shakes her head and then shoots me a cold and angry look. "I should hate you, but I can't do that. You are an abomination that has no place in this world. Doubly an abomination, for you were born of the Unshackled Summoned. You are already more creature than endowed, much more... But you are still human."

"We're still us until we admit otherwise." I nod affirmatively, taking a serious look, and not just a look.

"You told me to live." She continues, with great difficulty holding back her rage. "Extremely convincingly. So I had to agree. I was ready to stop being. You wouldn't let me. I was ready to become your plaything, to let you entangle my mind and do with me whatever your imagination could conjure up. You refused. You took even that opportunity away from me, leaving me forever alone with the pain. Alone with loneliness, bereft of heart and home. I should kill you. I should at least try."

All her defenses are removed. She literally reveals her soul to me, and not even someone much stronger than her would be able to lie in such a state. Not to me, at least, to lie. I can't help but feel this desperate desire, angry and doomed.

"Before you is one of the best liquidators of the Eternal Forest." The sudden change in the topic of conversation is somewhat disconcerting. "My level may not inspire in comparison to some others, but I have retreated only eight times in all the centuries of my existence, unable to cut off another's eternity. I know the mysteries of the blackest side of life, despite the dangers of working with such energies. My blood has given me the ability to look directly to the Stars, asking them and receiving an answer. And all this I am ready to put into your hands."

Somewhere behind, there is a whistle of admiring disbelief from Hans, and I just incline my head slightly to the side, not understanding the meaning of this performance: even though she cannot lie, I do not understand where her thought leads.

"You already suggested it," I note. "You didn't like the answer."

"I offered you a toy." Without even changing her face, she parries. "As your Companion said, a long-eared whore to spend a pleasant evening with and brag about in front of other exotic lovers, one of whom I mistook you for. Now I offer you myself, with all my strength, experience, will, and hatred. But only on one condition."

"Believe me, your skills, your strength, and your will wouldn't have gone anywhere once you were subdued." I allow myself a restrained sneer. "But I'm so interested. I'll listen to your price."

The silence stretches on, and I understand she is afraid as if she is taking a step into nowhere, a leap into the abyss, but along with the fear in her soul shines steel determination.

"You're going to die." Because of her words, Taria almost squeezes the trigger of the Valerium, and Hans almost throws daggers. So much confidence in those words. "I know about your purpose. I know what you want to do. You wouldn't have survived if you hadn't known about the Chains. You would not have come here, to the lair of your enemies, if you had not tried to fight a battle where there was no possibility of victory in the first place. But... you're not Chained. And I have already witnessed where and in what position you have seen the theory of low odds."

A heavy and hoarse sigh, as if those words would take something of impossibly great value from her as if it were the highest bid she'd ever had to pay. A price she'd already taken.

"If." Her tongue licks her parched lips. "If you can. I don't know. I have no idea how. But if you can. You won't just free the summoned from their Chains. Summoned, one of whom took half my heart. Summoned, to save the life of one of whom the memory of that heart was ripped from me! You will not just set them free. You will send into oblivion the very possibility of calling them into my home! That the spirit, the word, and the echo of these creatures in the faces of strangers may not be under the eternal Stars! Hall of Recognition, Hall of Choice... Promise me that you will destroy it, that you will burn it to the ground, that no one will ever appear there again. I don't need oaths on altars or contractual agreements. Just a word. Promise me... and I will follow you to the end."

After saying this, as if she had opened a pustule with an old boil, she was silent, looking into my eyes expectantly. Still not covering her existence, which makes her worse than naked in the eyes of a clairvoyant. It's a look I can hardly stand.

"Why?" It's a stupid question, but I can't not ask it.

"Because this world is cruel enough as it is." In her eyes, completely dry, glisten the remnants of tears forever wept. "We are all cruel. Starborn, endowed, deities and monsters - all of us. I just want to believe that we can handle our evil. The Chained one took love away from me. For the sake of not sacrificing our own Chained, the hierarchs took away my right to be one of my people. For the sake of revenge on the Chained and her Controller, I took away my brothers and sisters eternity. For the sake of this vengeance, I took away the eternities of my own. And even the right to oblivion was taken from me by another Summoned one. My verse, my melody... He believed the world could be changed. He believed that all it took for virtue to triumph was for those accustomed to stay out of the way. Youthful maximalism, misunderstanding of the nature of the world, but I want to believe he was right..."

She remains silent for almost a minute, and I already thought she wouldn't say another word, but yet she continues, completely calmer and even more collected than when we met.

"Alurei is all too accustomed to solving its problems by summoning those who will solve them instead of us. I wish to believe that we can manage on our own." She is tearing those words out of her mouth, tearing it out of her very last strength, and I am only now noticing how tired she is. "Your word?"

"You're right that I'll probably die trying..." I smile at this thought with unexpected warmth. "But if I get one chance to break this whole flawed system to the fucking mother, I'll gladly do it. Word."

"So now my Eternity belongs to you." Tialrianrelia, of the House of the Misty Tree, branch of the Blossom Blue, blossom of the Eternal Beat, said in a casual and unpretentious way as she rose from the table. "I would like to get some sleep. Trying to get to your hideout without leading your pursuers has exhausted me to the bottom."

Silently, I get up from the table and catch the unconscious elf in my arms. Total exhaustion. I mean absolutely exhausted. You can't fake that. She was hanging on by sheer stubbornness and willpower. I dragged her back to her room and threw her on the bed. I had to sleep on the living room floor again, next to the fireplace. Falling on the mattress had woken her briefly, and she opened her eyes.

"How did you even find me?" I'm asking because it's really interesting and might help in the future.

"You had my blood on your hands, my wounds, and this is a guiding thread, which is hard to think of better." Her answer is honest, calm, and without a single note of gloating or superiority.

Yeah.

I should have thought of that option! But too much moral fatigue and too eager to get back to my own walls. And I had never left alive after such "contact" battles before that day. It's a good thing I wasn't caught in something else. And I wasn't caught because if I had been, I would have been killed by the evil Imperials.

"Look," I just remembered a moment. "Now that we're a team, knowing your elven vindictiveness, which is legendary, how should I ever address you? Hey, are you laughing?"

She did laugh, a dry, melodious, but joyless laugh that would have been more appropriate for a major villain than for a tired, long-eared beauty.

"I gave you my Eternity, human," The elfess expresses sadly. "You can do with me now whatever you wish, as you wish.

"Well, well." I nod with an all-knowing look. "What if tomorrow I sent you to a brothel to earn money to finance my activities while also pleasuring me? Or if I order you to open your own throat? Or do I urgently need to kill you in a dark ritual?"

I expected all kinds of responses. I expected even more indignation, anger, and disgust. I had, after all, poked around in her memory enough to know the character of my new companion far better than she could imagine.

"I would suggest a few dozen less conspicuous and dangerous ways of making money. A personal slave of my kind arouses much suspicion and envy. I can share a bed with you at any moment, though now I think you would prefer a peaceful sleep. I can't promise you sincere passion, but my skills are enough to hide any negative emotions from your sight, so that the pleasure will be as comprehensive as my skills, appearance, and the flexibility of my body will suffice. Speaking of suicide, Instead of slitting my throat I prefer to stab a dagger through my heart or straight into my brain. I am also willing to ascend the altar voluntarily, but that voluntariness will be limited by natural impulses and the characteristic instincts of my people. You can hardly rip out and transplant my class, but I am willing to serve as a voluntary sacrifice to the Supreme Spawn of Twilight, though I would prefer to ask you to refrain from selling my essence to Hells, for such an Eternity for me would be more terrible than nothingness. Did I answer your question?"

Attention! Attention! The Kostik-Brain line is lost, call back in a few hours, but in the meantime, we'll turn on the Teletubbies for you. Have a nice day, and fuck off! She is absolutely sincere in her words and intentions, though I'm almost blowing smoke in my attempts to recognize the lie. And, as a result of all this effort, I have to admit that she told the absolute truth.

"Are you seriously willing to take such orders?" The question sounded more like an indignant squeak from a hamster berserker. "What about your lauded pride?"

"Pride is something we are taught to sacrifice for a purpose, to save a life, for our people. I no longer have a home, no kin, not even a life. I'm almost ashamed of my words now, and this is after all these years on the image boards. "All that's left is purpose. And for that purpose... I've got nothing left, Summoned One."

"Tin." I introduce myself since it's the first time I've had to. "Grzegorz in public. We came here under other people's names. No longer a nameless Summoned One."

"Nice to meet you, Tin." Something resembling emotion flashed in her voice.

"Still, I don't understand how you agreed to something like this." I shook my head in disbelief. "I might as well cheat you, take advantage of you, and kill you."

"Would you do that?" Now I see a smile, as stingy as a Jewish banker, but a smile. "Would you cheat, take advantage of my knowledge and body, and then get rid of me? I saw you, too, while I was opening myself to your knowledge. At the very edge, just a shadow of a shadow, but I saw you. I want to believe that the creature who refuses to stop being human against all the rules of creation... that the one who didn't let me perish, even at the risk of everything he himself had... I just want to believe that you do not deceive. Believe as my song knew how to believe, as I believed in him."

I am silent.

She is silent.

I got the slight and deliberately mistaken feeling that I had just been counted and teased.

Nah, that's crazy.

"Welcome to the team."

* * *

Author's Note:

Thirty-six pages were just so damn hard. Especially the proofreading. It's supposed to be three chapters at once, but there are interludes ahead, and I had to close that too-long event all at once.

The dice, as you might guess, were a lot, but there were also some really interesting ones. There were as many as eight crits:

100 with bonuses for trying to kill a Hero who could have been a serious opponent. He threw 6 minus 55 on Attention, so he died quickly and stupidly.

100 to escape through the Shadow, but there were bonuses too, and very big ones.

100 and 76 on the amount of assassin equipment and its quality. Two mythics, three legendaries, a bunch of epics.

100 and 24 on the success of divine miracles - embodied Avatar. A little more, and it would have been bad for Kostiq's disguise.

100 pure on the reflection of the first Miracle, when MC was caught off guard and only intuition bailed out.

100 with bonuses for breaking the Canopy of Pedestrian, bonuses at the expense of good clerics.

100 with bonuses on clairvoyance of Kostik, and even twice, and there were 90 and 97.

Now the ones:

1 on the morale of the elf after the battle. No minuses or pluses, pure 1. Kept on bare anger.

1 with a huge minus on the attempt to send a contracted Senior Shadow, almost Legend, after MC. The bloodhound sensed the **tenderness** of MC when he was "talking" to the elf, thought and, issuing the equivalent of a shadowy "fuck you", ripped the contract strings off herself, spat on the reward, and quickly sailed away. One of the most intelligent shadow creatures in the text.

There's more, but there's not much room in the notes.