The Gamer Chapter 1231 – The Fate of Another Kingdom 17 – Night and Veil [Nia POV] (Patreon)

Even the Ironborn craved meaning.

In every golden instrument and carefully bound book contained within the grey walls of the borderline brutalist structure, that truth was betrayed. Attention to detail was paid, with great care, wherever an Ironborn dwelled. Their immortal bodies removed the need to sleep or eat, yet they still created art. The sapient need for  an aesthetic dwelling was constant.

‘Why then make a grey world?’ Nia wondered, strolling through the chambers of some middle-ranking Ironborn. She couldn’t understand these former people. What did they get out of perpetuating the colourless dullness they had grown up with? They created their own chambers of sparkling displays. Even they were only desperate pockets in this world, full of beauty, devoid of movement. There was not a single dog to be pet around, no birds to sing, no tortoises to snap at greenery.

Nia walked through one of the nearby doors. Before she stepped through the frame, she convinced the world that she might as well emerge somewhere else. There was some annoyed grumbling in the air, like a disgruntled old woman vocalizing through a swarm of bees. Reality was starting to get upset with her hijinks.

‘Best not conjure the Blue Queen,’ the Maiden of Null told herself, while strolling down one of the rune covered bridges of rock and metal that connected the cavern pillars. Her teacher had done well, leaving only a faint trickle flowing through the runes.

The cave shook, the screams of Nathalia and Eliana bouncing through the gargantuan space. Those two had the lung volume to be heard down here. Combat with Jevaine was nearing its end. That unparalleled magical aura that Nia saw through her third eye, the visor formed of liquid nothing, it was waning.

Confirming the defeat was not her task. She had places to be. A while ago, she had sensed a particularly intense flare of magic in this underground space, one that overcame all other powers around for a brief flash. Since then, there was a steady and sustainable exchange of magical efforts. There was a clear stalemate and Nia wished to investigate.

She walked from edge to edge of the enchanted strands of rock and metal. Reality was more forgiving of her following a path that magic could otherwise take. Each time, before her feet hit the pillar that the paths were anchored to, she calmly emerged somewhere else.

After some minutes of leisurely strolling, she found herself by a dense web of metal wires that resembled a spider cocoon. It was layered in enchantments, separated from the massive structure that filled the entire cave. Spatial magic, and a connection to the tunnel system that curved through the fortress above like an impossibly interconnected ant hill. There was something beyond that. Another mystery to this project of nearly a millennia. Nia did not have the time to decipher it, she had somewhere to be.

The spatial magic that separated the inside from the outside, the pariah simply ignored. One moment to the next, she found herself in the pitch black she had seen through gaps in the cocoon previously. Her human eyes could not even see the ground to her feet. The second sight revealed the vying influences in this darkness.

One was Arkeidos, his shape greatly damaged, the other was Nightingale, hiding among the dripstones on the ceiling. One attempted to channel the black into something dangerous, the other succeeded in enveloping her opponent in a suppressing layer of illusion and trickery. This stalemate could have gone on forever, from what Nia saw. Damaged as he was, this simulacrum did not appear to be able to muster the necessary magical force to even temporarily overcome the seal on his senses.

Nia walked by the Emperor, just outside the veil of the night that had been woven out of the ambient darkness. She looked up to Nightingale and waved. The harpy tilted her head. That was about as much as Nia could make out of her emotional response. A goddess’ body was entirely made of mana. Without her human vision, all that the pariah saw of Nightingale was a prismatic, three-dimensional shape, tinted purple.

Nia jumped on the spot. Soundlessly, she landed. She jumped again. Nightingale’s head was now tilted almost ninety degrees. Croaking, cawing, laughing, the Nevr’est slapped Nia’s ponytail. After landing again, she turned to the not quite present fragment of the nirvana and patted it on its fluffy carapace. It meowed, like a raven imitating a puma imitating a house cat.

Nia jumped again. This time, she appeared just underneath Nightingale. Surprised, the harpy reacted just in time and grabbed the pariah’s arm with one of her clawed feet. “Hello,” Nia calmly greeted.

“Salutations?” the goddess of the night greeted with some confusion in her voice. Nia was confused as to what there was to be confused about, but elected to instead brush over one of Nightingale’s wings. She had wondered how those magical feathers would feel for days now. The answer was: soft, fluffy, and pleasantly cool. Peculiarly, they parted almost like a liquid around her fingers. Finding a quill seemed impossible. “Have you come to assist?” the still confounded goddess asked.

“Yes.” Nia removed her hand from the wing, to continue probing later. Suddenly, she focused everything on the situation at hand. “I will prepare a large attack. Lift your spell when I raise my weapon. Reapply afterwards.”

“Understood,” Nightingale responded, her voice now firm. Her claw relaxed and Nia dropped back to the ground.

Coordination was the key to effective warfare. Had Nia not agreed on a signal with the goddess, the attack would have torn the spell asunder in a way that would have made it difficult to reconstruct. Drawing on torn pieces of paper was still possible. Most people would have described it as unnecessarily bothersome. That was roughly what happened to the magical effects in the area if they weren’t cleared out beforehand.

Nia was back on the floor. The very molten and deformed floor. She could guess what had happened there. ‘My teacher always said Sol had no tactical sense whatsoever,’ the pariah thought. ‘That must have been sarcasm.’

Clearing her thoughts of such things, she stretched one arm out to the side. Soundlessly, her anti-magic tore a hole into the ambient mana, a place where a weapon of nothingness could dwell. Although pitch black like the environment, the kind of void it represented was wholly different from the absence of light around them. It was more distant, otherworldly.

Its presence caused Arkeidos to move his head about. Nia had suppressed her aura so far, now she let her alien presence seep into the world around her. The magic around was eliminated when it came in contact with her presence. Patches of inexplicable white appeared around her. They tore away the rules of reality. The lack of light was no issue when looking through them, everything behind them was broken down to black outlines. Through one that appeared particularly close, Nia could see the Nevr’est. Its many, many eyes moved around, bulbous spheres with no definitive iris. The catlike non-creature wound its three tongues around the weapon, as it manifested fully from the other side.

The sword laid weightless in her hand. The grip, cross guard, and long blade all made it appear like a weapon proper for two hands. Effortlessly, Nia moved it in front of her and indeed did secure the sleek handle with left and right. Nothing changed visibly, yet Arkeidos grew more agitated. “I have felt this sting before,” the lich bellowed, raising his one intact arm.

Nia raised the weapon above her head. Immediately, Arkeidos’ half-molten head turned towards the pariah. The unclaimed darkness was his to command and he forced it into the shape of sharp projectiles, unleashed by a swipe of his arm.

Nia inhaled, sucking mana into the silver lines that were crawling all through her skin in the process. A word was carved out of the world. “[Annihilation]”

A wave of anti-magic was realized in a space that did not accept it willingly. The total black was inverted into total white. Enchantments that assured the utter darkness turned into spewing out of a flash of prismatic light, exploding all around the travelling slice of white. Like exploding breakers at a high voltage station, they fizzled out immediately. The flashes were extinguished as quickly as the negative energy tore through what Arkeidos had hastily constructed to throw at her.

It sliced through the revenant Emperor’s chest. Metallic distorted noises echoed through his entirety, as the intense magic of his body swallowed the anti-magic like a base swallowed an acid. Inhuman spasms twisted his limbs, the Schattengarn exterior partly dissolved into strings. What had molten and where the slice cut vertically down his form, the material seemed to transform into some kind of fur. Like a mutated demon or mould-covered corpse, he appeared.

Nia skipped back, while Arkeidos’ will re-exerted itself over his simulacrum. He attempted to chase after her with unsteady steps. It would have been easy to exploit, yet there was no need to risk herself in an assault. Nightingale’s magic soon reconsolidated around Arkeidos.

The Emperor did not stop moving, violently swung for any opportunity to hit her. Nia stopped and then walked away calmly. All she had to do here was finish off an already weakened opponent.

Arkeidos stopped, after less than a minute of futilely thrashing around, and instead went to run at top speed in no definitive direction. He was making himself a harder target. It was the proper course of action. Standing still, Nia watched, calculating what to do next. Landing another one of her previous hits would be near impossible like this.

Nia prepared herself. The little tears in reality appeared all around her again while she channelled her anti-magic into the weapon whose non-existence was dedicated to this task. Arkeidos turned his head in her direction. That was the extent of his reaction. He did not give her an easy opportunity to strike by attempting to attack her.

Tirelessly sprinting, senses subdued, waiting for an attack whose true nature he could never comprehend, Nia did not envy the Emperor’s current position. He had brought it upon himself. Creating a world of misery, killing practically all of the animals on it, and taking what her beloved and his harem desired hostage, those were sins unforgivable.

Patiently, she kept waiting. Then, there was a flash of magic in the air around, exploding outwards from Arkeidos. Earth mana flared outwards, interfering with what was currently in control of the body. ‘A magical rebound,’ Nia recognized it and immediately knew what exactly was happening. ‘Seven bodies, seven soultypes, as his bodies are defeated, the separated soultypes converge back with the original.’

Unexpected as it came, Nia did not unleash her attack quickly enough to capitalize on it. Putting full trust that someone else among her comrades would be able to exploit their given opportunity, all she had to do was wait. After only a few seconds, a different kind of obfuscation hit Arkeidos. Seven swiftly following explosions, less than a quick breath apart, burst from his form.

Ever informed about the capacities of her darling, Nia recognized the description of the sin elemental’s Unleash put into practice. Raising her weapon over her head, she prepared for the inevitable hindrance to Arkeidos to follow. A flash of green air mana followed swiftly after the seventh explosion and with it came the opportunity.

Arkeidos slowed and Nia brought her blade down. “[Annihilation]” The word etched itself into the air once again, as the silver lines all over Nia’s skin forked out. Her form turned partly translucent. The other side tore at her, gently nudging her to come over, if she enjoyed the presence of nothing so much.

The Emperor conjured shadows as quickly as he regained control over his body, this time into nothing but a dense mass. The blob of mana enriched black halted the white, vertical slice. In due time, it would be dissolved, but the attack would be consequently weakened.

‘A swift cascade of stunning effects will be most effective,’ Nia analysed. That was all she needed to take the gamble. Her own attack was still suspended against the Emperor’s shield as she ran forwards. A third one of these attacks in such quick succession would have pulled her over. The sword itself was all she could rely on.

Arkeidos must have felt her approaching weirdness. He pulled his hand away and the shield of darkness dissolved. More of the Schattengarn armour dissolved as the second slice of anti-magic ravaged the surface. Weaker, the attack scattered, furthering that pelt of cut-off strands.

Nia had decisions to make and she had to make them fast. Now aware of early warning signs, she recognized when a third disruption was about to emerge. She took the straightforward right and dodged underneath the thin claws, freezing mid motion. Leaping, she cut horizontally with her sword. The light in Arkeidos’ helmet was extinguished with the magical connection severed. She landed on his shoulders and tore it off, before it could reconnect. Now without sense, the simulacrum could barely even thrash around, before Nia rammed her weapon into the chest cavity.

Where the first attack had sliced through, the crystals on the inside had already turned into quartz. The rest sent bolts of energy shaped like wires into the blade, as the anti-magic caused a local vacuum that demanded to be filled. Thrashing turned into seizures and then paralysis. Incapable of movement, this body of Arkeidos was sapped of its magic until finally collapsing as nothing but metal.

Nia pushed herself off at the last moment and landed, unharmed, while the Schattengarn clacked onto the recently molten stone floor. She dismissed the weapon and took a few deep breaths. Nightingale landed next to her. “Admirably executed,” the harpy said.

Turning to the harpy, the pariah stared and thought. Thought hard about what exactly she should do next. Then she decided to open her arms wide and hug Nightingale. The goddess flinched. A common reaction, especially for those of purely magical origin. Nia wordlessly rubbed her head against Nightingale’s soft hair, while using the goddess’ presence to anchor herself back to this world. Pure bliss was achieved when the soft wings of the harpy closed around Nia.

“Follow me,” the pariah said, once fully restored.