Looming Shadow: Journey to Chaos book 2

by Brian Wilkerson

  As far as Eric could tell, it was exactly what it said on the tin: compressing mana between one's hands until it became highly concentrated. There was nothing technically complicated about it. All that one required was a great personal supply of mana and the will to control it. However, a warning followed its description.

  “Chaos is a duality and reality is opposing forces. The greater power stored in a bolt, the greater the strain it exerts on the body. Therefore, only those blessed with monstrosity by the Great Mother, such as myself, should use this technique. A human will surely and grievously injure themselves.”

  Challenge accepted.

  At an isolated corner of the plateau, Eric drew his staff and then focused mana at its tip. He brought out enough to create a bolt bigger than his head and compressed it all into a pin. He repeated the process and, by the third layer, he felt like he was pushing water into a vat. The mana wanted to leave. It wanted to escape his grasp, but he compressed it tighter and tighter. After an eighth compression, he held a shimmering seed of brilliant and angry energy. Grey Dengel's lecture came back to him. I am a god. Then the seed exploded.

  It left a crater in the ground and made his ears ring. His staff was dusty, but neither the crystal nor the wood was cracked or damaged in any way.

  “Wow,” Eric whispered.

  “If that was your hand, it would be goop,” Basilard said.

  The veteran mage stood next to him with a disapproving look on his face. When Eric came to him for advice on the spell he’d found, he said it was impractical. When Eric insisted, he laid a number of ground rules: use the Soiléir crystal, point it at the ground away from you, and go no further than eight compressions. This was the result.

  “No healer alive could fix it. If that was a staff of lesser quality, it would have shattered and sent a feedback pulse that would cause spiritual trauma.”

  He pointed to the Soiléir.

  “This is a storehouse for great quantities of power in tiny spaces and this light is a proxy for your soul so the pulse can't reach the real deal. Do you understand now why this technique is not in your book or mine?”

  “Who cares?” Tiza shouted. “Do it again!”

  “If I recall correctly,” Haburt said, “there was a sect two thousand years ago that committed mana-powered suicide in the belief that it would reunite them with Lady Chaos. Could this be the technique they used?”

  “Yes,” Grey Dengel said. “I learned this technique from them.”

  “Daylra, I could be very powerful offensively with this. I'd like to continue practicing.”

  Basilard looked off into the distance. “I won't forbid it, but I want you to think about what would happen if you injured yourself and who would be affected by it.”

  He left the area without looking back. The rest of the group followed suit until Eric was alone with Zettai. She hadn't moved from her seat.

  “After everything I've seen you do, I have no doubt that you can handle this. I want to be there when you do so I can learn it myself.”

  “You want to be my student?”

  “Yes! I've been practicing!”

  She put her hands together and closed her eyes and, after thirty seconds or so, a tiny blue speck appeared between her palms. Extending her arms, she pushed the speck forward with her will, but only succeeded in pushing it past her fingers. Even this effort made her break out in a sweat.

  “Don't push yourself. If you're going to be my student, I don't want you to hurt yourself.”

  I did not like seeing my students injured either.

  You hated teaching in the Dragon's Lair.

  Incorrect. I had a favorite pupil and she was an Otherworlder like yourself.

  Eric threw himself into his physical training with a passion: punches, kicks, patterns with the staff. Basilard often lectured on the importance of physical conditioning for a mercenary and he had been slacking off for mysticism. This failed to clear his head, so he instructed Zettai in the movements, but that only made it worse.

  He drew, compressed, and fired mana until he was exhausted. He examined them closely and discovered that no two mana bolts looked exactly the same nor felt the same way. Some were spheres, but others were more oval or ellipse. One time, he even got a square. As he pulled more and more mana from his soul, he noticed some were warmer or colder. Some were rough and jagged, and some transparent and breezy enough to fall through his fingers. Nor were they all a solid generic blue, but there were subtle variations. A bolt might be darker at its core and blue-white along the edges like a cross-section of a planet. Different shades of blue could be interlaced across the bolt and solid at either end. Gasping and sweating, he dropped to his knees and lay back.

  “Zettai!”

  Zettai looked up from the meditation pose Eric taught her earlier. “Y-yes?”

  “I want you to tell me what you see.”

  Zettai thought for a moment.

  “If you flatter me, I'll smack you upside the head.”

  “I see mana bolts and....one cycle of the flow of power. Mana comes from the soul and leaves through the soul and exits through the gates and out into the veins and back to the Sea of Chaos and then returns to the soul. Mana bolts are, in this sense, no different from mortal life because they are different states of the same energy.”

  “You're a quick learner,” Eric said with a smile. “I wish you had as much mana as I do. Then we could move past theory and into practice.”

  Zettai pawed the ground bashfully. “We could go to Mount Heios. Then I’d have plenty of mana.”

  “No. That’s too dangerous. A Fog cloud that big is guaranteed to have powerful monsters inside. It’s best to stay away from it.”

  At last, he lost the battle with exhaustion and fell backwards. He looked at empty sky above his head. In Ceiha, there were no large buildings nor airships; nothing that could reach the stars, let alone the clouds. Only the occasional dragon passing overhead broke the endless sky. Kallen would probably fly here just to prove she can and I can't stop thinking about it!

  Grey Dengel was not the real Dengel. It was an illusion born from spiritual residue and Eric's imagination. It was little more than his imaginary friend and at the same time was not created by his imagination. Because of this, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't decide for himself if Grey Dengel was speaking naked factual details or if he wanted Dengel to think of him as his “favorite pupil.”

  Were you telling the truth? Who was it?

  If you want to learn, then study.

  Supporting himself by his staff, Eric began the slow journey back to Haburt's yurt. Zettai jumped up to help him and, suddenly, Eric felt like an old man. Better yet, an ancient sage with a beautiful and adoring female pupil. He shook his head. I must be truly tired if I’m thinking thoughts like that. When they arrived at the yurt, Zettai sat at his feet to listen to him.

  “Today, I received the first fragment of good fortune since I was coerced into joining this patchwork guild,” Eric read aloud. “Being as I am the Captain of the Mage Team, I am required to meet each and every lower life-form that the so-called 'Mother Dragon' picks off the street. However, this one was particularly interesting as she was a human who claimed to be from another world. She appeared to be of mature age and yet possessed little knowledge of even the most basic elements of this world: too ignorant even for amnesia. Because of my own curiosity, I decided to train her myself.”

  Eric chuckled. Confident, rude, curious: This is the Dengel I know.

  “The Otherworlder possesses remarkable natural stamina; greater than humans of equal level. She is also capable of drawing power from the Great Mother in greater speeds. I shall keep an eye on this human. Perhaps she will prove useful in advancing my own knowledge. While I have temporarily paused in my pursuit of Chaotic Enlightenment and the Chaotic Starlight in order to haul this fledgling guild out of the refuse, I have not ceased my attempts to study magecraft itself.”

  There it is again...The Chaotic Starligh
t...Judging by the tone, this is when he was a full-grown adult. He must have really wanted it if he's still trying...

  “After observing my Otherworlder for some years now, I am prepared to put forward a hypothesis: While the spirit of an Otherworlder is weaker than those native to this world, once they adjust to the raised mana levels, they gain the advantage of deeper reserves. A non-elf must retain a certain degree of mana at all times, for non-elves lack our Seed of Chaos and can exhaust themselves. When this limit is breached, the non-elf will experience shock, coma, and finally, death.”

  That must be what happened to Nolien in the Yacian Caverns...No wonder Tiza used that soft voice of hers...Soft, sweet, comforting, and so unlike her normal rough and abrasive attitude. He'd like to hear it more of – If Tiza heard that, she'd gut me like a fish and then eat my liver.

  “My Otherworlder has a greater limit because her body is born coping with less. It may be compared to cracks in the ground of a desert lake: The water fills the cracks before the lake itself. In addition, she can pull more mana faster as her soul is used to working harder. Apparently, there is no mana, or extremely little, coming through the Ten Elemental Mana Gates of her home world and so the greatest source of nourishment for the soul is itself.”

  A smile crawled across Eric face. Dengel was praising Otherworlders and, in doing so, praising him! Then, the smile inverted. No matter how good at magecraft or how renowned for his research, praise from someone like him is worthless.

  Do you truly hold me in so little esteem?

  Eric smiled at the Grey Dengel. You're different. You're pure scholarly pride instead of the real Dengel's appalling bigotry.

  “Out of curiosity – rather morbid, I might add – I have shown my student Mana Compression and all the wonders its practitioner can achieve.” After skimming the five pages of said wonders, Eric continued, “I even told her of the Chaotic Starlight and my personal quest. She was suitably awed and impressed by her master's power and vision.”

  I bet she was...Why isn't she named? He directed his question at the Grey Dengel.

  Her name was unpronounceable and otherwise unfitting, so I gave her a new one, but she disliked it. It was the one thing on which we disagreed.

  What was it?

  Grey Dengel smiled in such a way he convinced Eric that, at one time, he could have been The Trickster's Choice. Conjuring a skull, he held it up as to talk with. Alas, poor Asuna. I knew her well.

  You mean....that skull!

  Did you truly believe there was a spell that could animate an inanimate object and program it to speak only in flattery?

  In disbelief, Eric continued reading and every word confirmed what he feared. Dengel's documents moved from referring to the Otherworlder as “my Otherworlder” to “my student” to “Asuna.” There were sections that digressed from academics or self-praise and talked exclusively about her. One whole chapter was about her wedding and he was father of the bride!

  Eric pushed himself away and left the tent in a huff.

  Night had fallen and the courtyard was shrouded in darkness. The only light was the campfire at the center and it only reached a few yards in diameter. This didn't bother Eric. Night or day made no difference to him; he could see clearly in either. He walked unerringly to the tower.

  Zettai followed him, but stopped when she realized where he was headed. She couldn’t follow her teacher in there. It was too dangerous for her.

  “Just because you were soft on one girl doesn't mean you weren't an asshole!”

  Grey Dengel followed him in a manner not unlike Tasio. By the same token, it means I wasn't completely evil.

  Eric stomped toward the tower and, in an honest rage, declared, “Dengel was evil. He likely abused her and she rationalized it into something Nemu and Merlinish.”

  Grey Dengel shook his head. “Ask your Daylra if you don't believe me.”

  As Eric bypassed the traps once again, the wheels in his head began to turn. Out of all the souls imprisoned in their bones in this castle, there was only one bedroom inside the tower. He saw it for himself; it was not a slave's room, but for someone held in high regard. Out of all the people mentioned in Dengel's notes, only one was referred to with anything resembling affection. A third fact completed the puzzle; Dengel was un-killable and Asuna was not. Could all these defenses be here to protect her instead of him? As soon as he crossed the threshold into Dengel's lair, he picked up the skull and immediately returned to it.

  “What are you doing, my master?”

  “I'm not your master. My name is Eric Watley.” He didn't stop. “Your master has been dead for over a thousand years.”

  “Don't joke of such things, my master. You are immortal and no one else could ever reach this room. It is irrational for me to believe otherwise.”

  “I'm going to break the spell holding you here so you can cross over.”

  As he stepped on the threshold, the skull spoke up again. “Did it occur to you, Eric Watley, that there is no spell to break?”

  “So all that 'master' talk was an act? Are you a submissive or a troll?”

  The skull bit him.

  “Ow! Either way, you're not staying here. You could help people that are alive and deserving of your help.”

  All the way back to the entrance, the skull protested. Like First Skeleton and Second Skeleton, her voice was ethereal and so there was no way to silence her. Eric had to endure the one hundred and one reasons why Dengel was a benevolent sage whether he liked it or not. By the time he crossed the tower's threshold, he was tempted to shatter the thing against the wall. Instead, he restrained himself and joined the rest of his party at the campfire.

  “Do you mind that I brought a guest for dinner?” He placed the skull next to him. “Everyone, this is Asuna, Dengel's love slave.”

  “How dare you slander my master! He never touched me except when I asked him to!”

  “Like I said; Asuna, this is everyone.”

  “Fascinating!” Haburt exclaimed. “She speaks coherently and without pause despite possessing nothing but her dried-out skull!”

  “I am the master’s student and thus I retain full use of my vocal capabilities. Slaves don't need to talk; they only need to listen and obey.”

  Now that she wasn't flattering her master, she took on the air of a haughty lady. Eric imagined her as a human, wearing the dress Tiza did now, and ordering Dengel's slaves to perform tasks for her. Dengel’s student? No, she sounded more like Dengel’s daughter.

  “Put her back,” Basilard said coldly.

  “Daylra?”

  “Put her back right now,” Basilard repeated.

  “She does no one any good lying in there.”

  “Eric, she's waiting for her mentor. The bond between a student and her teacher is a precious thing. It is familial without the blood and it is how knowledge is passed down through the ages.”

  “Dengel is dead.”

  “He is undead. Casting him out of your body did not send him to the Abyss; a spirit of his potency can resist its pull. He might come back here, someday, and if he finds out that you kidnapped his precious student, then you will be the one going to the Abyss.”

  “Listen to your elder and better, boy,” Asuna said. “He knows what he's talking about. I hypothesize that he's experienced such a thing himself.”

  “Daylra?” three voices asked.

  There was a long pause and at last Basilard said, “It was eight years ago. I was tracking someone suspected of crimes against humanity in the Latrot/Mithra war. My team consisted of my original three students. They were young adults in their prime and I had trained them since they were your age. We found the man in question and engaged him.”

  He gripped BloodDrinker's hilt so tightly his knuckles turned white and the blade gleamed with his blood lust.

  “He killed all three of them and poached their corpses for his forbidden research. He tried to strike me down too...”

  He removed the glove on his right hand a
nd revealed a long, red scar stretching down the entire length of his palm. It glowed with the same blood red as BloodDrinker.

  “But I caught his sword and channeled all my rage and sorrow into powering the Bladi Clan's Impeachment and Succession spells. For that moment, I was stronger than him and I took the sword from him. I used it to interdict his birthright and sentence him to the most painful death in my power.”

  He put the glove back on.

  “Now, please, put the skull back where you found it.”

  At first, Eric was too stunned to move. Then he felt Basilard's bloodlust focus on him and he ran as quickly as he could back to the tower.

  Zettai followed him again, wondering if Eric would do the same thing for her. She shook her head. They weren’t close enough. When his mission was completed, he would leave the country without her. The thought depressed her immensely.

  “Eric!”

  He stopped and turned.

  “Yes, Zettai?”

  “…Ahh…Can I…um… can we…I mean, I’m a good student, right?”

  “Absolutely. You caught on faster than I did and you have the passion for it.”

  “Then you’ll continue teaching me, right?”

  “Sure, as long as I’m here.”

  Zettai’s face darkened and her lip quivered. “You’re leaving me behind?”

  “Please don’t cry. There’s nothing I can do about it. Smuggling you out would be illegal.”

  “Rescuing me was illegal too!”

  Eric winced. “This is different. They’re much more thorough when it comes to ships leaving the country. Despite my darkness power, there’s a good chance they’ll find you. Abyss, they might be looking for magical tricks because we’re mages. I wouldn’t be able to hide you.”

  “What about the bag?”

  Eric held it up. “This thing? I used it when I was crazy. I have no idea how it works and Grey Dengel can’t teach me.”

  It is you who cannot learn it. How is it that you grasp the Omnipresent Mana principle and foible with the Zero-Finite principle?

  “I’m sorry, but like Haburt said the other day, the only way you’re getting off this island is on the back of a dragon or a trickster.”